Correct use of terms.

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Dixie, why would Webster be more authoritative on guns than educated gun nuts who know more about guns all the way around? Besides, dictionaries pay a lot of attention to current usage and don't seem to worry about proper usage.

Stripper clips and Garand clips seem to fit the usual meaning of "clip." A metal or plastic device that clamps things together.

Giant_Binder_Clip.jpg

Box magazines do not.
 
so what is Marlins reasoning behind their Magazine Clips? yea gun manufactures arnt th ones who decide whats what. but i think id trust them over someone who merely collects guns.

and gun nuts that like to think they know everything, do just that. they like to THINK they know everything.
 
Marlin wants to sell "magazine clips." So they'll call it whatever is most suited to that purpose. Some people won't know what a magazine is, so they cover all bases with "magazine clips." Why do you want to call them clips, anyway?
 
read my first post thouroughly and youll see i dont call them clips. but theres nothin wrong with callin them clips. its a container used for holding cartridges. plain and simple. its in the dictionary as clips and magazines. magazines are also referred to as a room to hold munitions. theres more than one word for damn near everything. why should you nitpick and take offence when someone calls a magazine a clip? that seems more like a physocoligcal problem with always havin to be right or superior to someone.
 
Dirty Harry

A famous movie personality once said,

"Well.... you're out of bullets! When you're out of bullets you're SOL."

Wouldn't have had the same effect if he'd said "cartridges".

On another matter, is a steel case still called "brass"?
 
well i wasnt talkin about you specifically. i meant the people that jump down others throat when they say clip. if it bothers you, that seems like a personal problem, seein how they both mean the same thing in relation to what your talkin about

and who decides if its OK or not to call a mag a clip?
 
I think Their Moderatornesses ought to clip this string.
 
Wayne, Webster is wrong on that point. It happens.
Click to expand...

...much of the spelling's wrong for starters ;)

In all seriousness though, dictionaries record the way words are being used. As language and usage change, dictionaries need to be updated to reflect that. IOW if, say, people start referring to "magazines" as "clips" then that will be reflected in dictionaries.

FWIW "clips" were originally called "chargers", and Colt himself referred to his products as "pistols", and so they continued to be called through the 19th century, as various models such as the Navy Pistol, Improved Pocket Pistol, New Model Army Pistol, Root's Patent Pocket Pistol etc were released.
 
A clip is not a magazine, a mag is not a clip,
And neither is a grip a stock, and "stock" does not mean grip.
I do not mean to nitpick, but improvement could be seen,
If we could ever bring ourselves to say exactly what we mean.

-Author Unknown (to me anyway)
 
1 : a handgun whose chamber is integral with the barrel; broadly : HANDGUN
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What are people disagreeing with there? A revolver's chamber is not integral with the barrel--it's part of the cylinder. But people do refer to all handguns as "pistols," in a general way, or "broadly." So what's wrong?
 
Revolving Pistol

I've actually seen a photo of a "Colt Revolving Pistol" box, and met such a box in person.

There's also this news item from 153 years ago:
http://www.researchpress.co.uk/firearms/history/revolver.htm

Colt was happy with "pistol" so I'm not going to lose sleep over it.

Yes, good manners dictates that we don't deliberately offend the sensibilities of our fellow gunners by calling revolvers pistols or calling rifles guns or calling catridges bullets.

If I can find that box photo, I'll post it.
 
Yes, good manners dictates that we don't deliberately offend the sensibilities of our fellow gunners by calling revolvers pistols or calling rifles guns or calling catridges bullets.
Click to expand...


Arrrg!! No! Don't offend ME with this baseless nonsense about revolvers not being proper pistols or rifles not being guns, or handguns being sidearms and not weapons! Arrrg!! :cuss: :cuss: :banghead: :fire: :banghead: :mad:
 
I wouldn't count on Webster's as being authoritative on anything, despite the fact that it is "customary" to cite it as such.

At one point I simultaneously owned brand-new copies of the Unabridged Webster's and the Random House Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language.

Comparing the two over a couple of years induced me to sell the Webster's at a garage sale for fifty cents.

Boy, did I gloat over that fifty cents, gleefully rubbing my hands together, twirling my moustache tips, throwing my cape back over my shoulder, and thinking about P. T. Barnum's quote regarding suckers.

I have since wisecracked that the way to tell a good dictionary was to look up dirty words. The "Unabridged" Webster's had elided them.

I still have the Random House. I keep it on the end of the bookshelf so it doesn't make the shelf sag so much.

I'd use it more often, except I always have to go find my truss first.

I shall now repair to another thread so I can read about gonnes.
 
Dictionaries, encyclopedias, websites, etc., are all written by people, and people are all imperfect! This is why I am not gonna sweat over correct terms unless I am writing a paper of my own or teaching a shooter. Other than that, I'll call these things what I will. Maybe the term "gun" is a blanket term or just a slang term, kinda like we call automobiles "cars" (which is technically incorrect). There are other items in the world, non-gun related, that are also termed incorrectly and you could spend the whole day (maybe 2 days or more) pointing them all out. Why worry about it? Unless you like stomping your feet and pulling your hair out!
 
It's been almost 60 years since I saw the movie "Sgt York", but I seem to recall Gary Cooper saying, "This here rifle gun shoots low and to the right".:)

Jim
 
Dictionaries, encyclopedias, websites, etc., are all written by people, and people are all imperfect!
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This is absolutely true. However, commercial publishers of reference materials don't just make stuff up. They do make a reasonable effort to research their definitions and support them with historical evidence, if for no other reason than that they know the world is full of people who are going to nitpick everything they publish.

This argument goes nowhere because both sides are right and both are wrong. The point is that there is technical terminology and then there is everyday usage. They aren't the same thing and never have been. The first one is more precise than the second. Does it matter if you refer to a magazine as a clip? Yes and no. Mostly no. It depends on who you're talking to and what your purpose is. If I were King of the World, I'd do it this way:

fixed magazine = magazine
stripper clip = clip
removable box magazine = clip magazine

Any takers?
 
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