Magazines and clips...

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So are you arguing language doesn't evolve?
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Hey, more like the language devolves or just plain degenerates.

I just keep thinking of other faulty usages that bother me worse than clip vs magazine.
Like the Internet Expert shoving his properly defined magazine into his "double stack 1911". I'd rather put a real Colt clip in my real 1911, thank you. Like my Uncle did on Corregidor.


Apologies to the OP. You have been filled in on the technical jargon, sometimes even correctly. But not always, I keep thinking of those Garand (+Pedersen, Steyr, Mannlicher, etc.) clips that actually do "feed the chamber." En-bloc clips, distinguishing them from stripper clips and half-moon clips.

Oh, what do you call those long brass things that hold cartridges for a Hotchkiss machine gun?
 
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so you are willing to insult someone over the fact that im not going to go around correcting everyone, being the vocabulary police?

and if this is such an issue, it doesn't sound like it is "evolving", or at least not in the direction you want it to.

Now don't you feel gay about doing your part to make sure everyone talks the way you want them to?
 
what I don't understand is why some people, after learning the proper terminology, refuse to use it. Perhaps they're bitter over how arrogant some people were in correcting them, but I still think that applying what one has learned is generally more constructive in life.
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That gets me too. It's not just our hobby either. People that are resistant to learning mystify me. I've been called upon to answer questions for people from other departments at work, only to have then throw up their hands when they believe they've heard what the needed to know.

If I wasn't done talking, you're likely going to miss something if you stop listening.

(It sounds arrogant, but I give me the benefit of the doubt.)
 
...communication is conveying understanding, and it is rude to interrupt in person, or to correct, in a post, such a commonly understood difference as clip or magazine...it shows arrogance, rudeness, and quite often the one who does it doesn't even have the courtesy to answer the poster's question...just to slap their face over terminology...that's anal...
...a much better way to handle it (High Road or just plain decent, if you will) would be when I refer to extra clips for my .45, and you know full well what I mean...and so does everyone else...rather than being a jerk, why not reply something like: "I only carry one spare magazine for my pistol."....by doing that...you've given me a polite reminder, cleared up any misconception on the part of any "new shooter"(common excuse used by those who jump us) and have been a gentleman, not disrupting the communication but adding something useful to it...instead of sounding like an ex-wife...
 
I know the difference between a magazine and clip and train new shooters in the difference. Once they are told I really don't care if they call a magazine a clip. Even though it's wrong the term clip has become a generic term for magazine. It's kind of like saying you are going to xerox something instead of saying you're going to copy it. I make sure that I use the right term but if someone else wants to say clip I don't care. I just figure they don't know guns.
 
Magazines are those paper thingys you read in the dentist's office,

While you are waiting and waiting and waiting.............

Clips are those electronic thingys you bring up on YouTube, on the 'Net.

That being said, we always called 'em clips, growing up in the 50's,

This in reference to a detachable steel thingy you filled with cartridges........

But then again, I'm not a member of The Firearm Intellectual Property Trust.


isher
 
The Chinese say that the first step toward wisdom is calling things by their right names.

Sure, a lot of times folks get casual about terminology. Sometimes it results in confusion or misunderstanding, and sometimes it doesn't. There may also be times where casual terminology is just fine, and times when it's not such a good idea. But it's always nice to know and understand correct terminology so that at least you can exercise some reasonably judgment about when to use it.
 
Aran said:
So are you arguing language doesn't evolve?
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Language in the general public at large may evolve though random acts of ignorance, marketing, media, laziness, and street slang, but technical jargon that makes distinctions between objects that are still different today should not be deliberately "evolved" using the above as an excuse. Even with jargon I can understand how a word like "round" could have evolved naturally over time to mean something different as certain technologies completely superseded others, but for instance "bullet" and "cartridge" are definitely still relevant today. While it doesn't matter whether one says that they're out of bullets or out of cartridges because the same thing is implied, bullets being a part of cartridges, it does not make sense to say that you pulled apart a bullet and poured out the powder, or that the surgeon removed the cartridge from a wound. The public might say such things, but shouldn't enthusiasts know better? What's next, computer programmers using "bit" and "byte" interchangeably?

highorder said:
That gets me too. It's not just our hobby either. People that are resistant to learning mystify me. I've been called upon to answer questions for people from other departments at work, only to have then throw up their hands when they believe they've heard what the needed to know.
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Yeah, I get this all the time when I tell people--briefly and simply or I wouldn't try at all--how to figure out something for themselves. Why take my word for it? Here is why I believe such and such, and you can verify it for yourselves. But they often don't want to, sometimes poking fun at their own lack of knowledge as a roundabout way of making fun of me as being some kind of freak (or in some cases, maybe a jerk). People are particularly afraid of learning math, even the most basic arithmetic. I think this says a lot about the state of education in general.

sheepdog said:
...communication is conveying understanding, and it is rude to interrupt in person, or to correct, in a post, such a commonly understood difference as clip or magazine...it shows arrogance, rudeness, and quite often the one who does it doesn't even have the courtesy to answer the poster's question...just to slap their face over terminology...that's anal...
...a much better way to handle it (High Road or just plain decent, if you will) would be when I refer to extra clips for my .45, and you know full well what I mean...and so does everyone else...rather than being a jerk, why not reply something like: "I only carry one spare magazine for my pistol."....by doing that...you've given me a polite reminder, cleared up any misconception on the part of any "new shooter"(common excuse used by those who jump us) and have been a gentleman, not disrupting the communication but adding something useful to it...instead of sounding like an ex-wife...
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Not a bad suggestion at all, but I still think it's strange to keep using the wrong word just because somebody was rude about it. If somebody corrected me in a rude manner I'd throw their attitude back in their face, but I'd still try to be correct from then on. Maybe I'm strange this way, but I hate to do things wrong when I know better.
 
My last words on the subject...

...we disagree in whether or not it's wrong to use a commonly used name like clips, rounds, bullets...when for over 50 years they've been used that way, and the meaning is clear to many who have but a rudimentary knowledge of the business of guns...authors, movie writers, advertisers, even manufacturers have used these words...and I think it's anal to be jumping into threads to correct folks about them...that is much more offensive to a new person here than that "improper" terms were used...and, by the way, I'm using anal with the modern, commonly used meaning #2 in Webster's New World...wouldn't want to confuse any new shooters....
 
A 'Magazine' used to be a storage place.


Powder Magazines, etc.


Literary 'Magazines', took the term playfully, being a place then where topical or literary information was stored or placed, in effect.


The detachable Box Magazine, the invention of James Paris Lee, held Cartridges for Rifles...soon, also, holding Cartridges for Pistols.


Some Rifles and Pistols had/have Magazines which are not detachable, and, these are charged ( 'Loaded' ) with Cartridges using one's fingers, or, using Stripper Clips.


Of course, many people mistakenly refer to 'Cartridges' as 'Bullets', not distinguishing between the Projectile, and, the Metallic Cartridge Case and it's ancillary components in which the Bullet is held prior to being fired.

Right nomenclature is not only a courtesy and respect to others, but, to one's self, and, the subject.
 
My father is nearly 70, holy crap, he and his family grew up around hunting and guns, most were in the military, WW2, Korea, Vietnam. He never heard any one of them or their friends ever call it a magazine until I said it last year some time.

Personally, I don't give a crap. In fact, if I know someone is going to get annoyed if I were to say clip instead of magazine, I will never ever utter the word magazine in his presence. There are much more important things in life to worry about than one of the stupidest of arguments, clip/magazine. No one is hurt, no one is going to get hurt, there will be no villages plundered with the women and children being taken as slaves. The sun will still sun, the birds still chirp, there are guns to be loaded and games to be watched. If you get annoyed or angry about the terminology, take a blood pressure pill because I know you are on one, and sit in your lazy boy and watch the Andy Griffith show.

Clip.
 
It's not the knowledge and use of correct terminology, as part of what E.E. Smith, PhD called "Precisionist English" it is the smug correctness of Internet Jargonists that annoys me. I tend to overreact by correcting the correctors on less obvious stuff. "Bore diameter" is my current pet peeve.

By the way, it helps your case to use the shift key in a conventional manner, and maybe even the occasional paragraph break.
 
What really gets up my nose is the clip expert who proceeds to load his ammunition feeding device with "bullets." Or slugs the "bore" of his rifle to determine bullet diameter.
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Yep, if they are going to be anal, they should be consistent. :D

I know better, and I still call mags clips sometimes. Grew up not knowing any better. I don't get bent out of shape about it.....either way.

I call loaded rounds bullets sometimes as well, even though they really aren't. Guilty of calling it a slugging a "bore" too, even though I really know better.

Oh well. :)
 
I don't see "smugness" as a factor in trying to correct someone who is ignorant of correct terminology. True, incorrect usage of "clip" for "magazine" is not the end of the world. However, when we are willing to accept a world where anyone can call anything what he or she chooses then we must be willing to be comfortable with the chaos that miscommunication engenders. If a surgeon calls for a forceps and is instead given a retractor by his assistant then that is a problem. In my profession if I ask for a C-Stand and instead my assistant shows up with a tripod, I may miss my shot and not be hired by my client again. As someone earlier mentioned, words have meaning. It behooves us all to learn the correct terminology in whatever profession of hobby we participate. To be stubborn to do so is silly and trite.
 
By the way, it helps your case to use the shift key in a conventional manner, and maybe even the occasional paragraph break.
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Now that is one of my pet peeves. It drives me nuts.
 
yep. now its slang to call it a clip. if youre fine with that, you might as well call your handgun a "gat" and call the wheels on your vehicle "rimz" or call the tires on your wheels "shoes" or call the shoes you wear on your feet "kicks"
 
"Bore diameter" is my current pet peeve.
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Uh oh.....I don't know about that one; please let me know so I don't mess that one up, Jim!

At least I've never said, "boar diameter"........:D
 
In Ohio, the difference between "magazine" and clip" can be the difference between being arrested for illegal transportation of a firearm or not being arrested.

Ohio law considers a gun "loaded", if there is a magazine for that gun present anywhere in the vehicle with rounds loaded in the magazine. It doesn't matter how physically separated the gun and magazine are. Ohio law also says that loaded "clips" do not make a firearm "loaded".
 
If someone calls a magazine a "clip" in my presence, I won't correct them, but I will assume that they got their gun knowledge from Hollywood and don't know much about firearms, the same as if they called a handgun a "gat".
 
All I can say is in certain company it's better to use the term detachable box magazine, cartridges and caliber rather than clip, bullet and bore.

In certain company it's better to use the term rifle or pistol rather than gun. As one poster pointed out, nomenclature can make a difference. If you are firing an M1A next to a guy firing a Garand and ask for another 'clip' you are bound to have the one smart alec hand you a Garand clip rather than a magazine.

As for language not evolving, I give you the mortar. It once referred an artillery piece designed to fire at a very high angle. Now it refers to a rocket propelled device.
 
The act of correction is not, itself, smug. It's how you do it that makes it rude.
Teachers sole purpose in occupation is correction, they are not rude, themselves for helping you learn from mistakes.

When a foreigner comes to you and says with a heavy accent in broken English, "I have bathroom"
Do you ignore him, and look at him as stupid for trying? Or do you point out the nearest restroom, and along the way offer a correction, "Oh, ok.... 'where is the bathroom' you mean". And send them on their way. They usually thank-you and make the effort to use the correct words for next time.

Bullets are not cartridges or rounds. But *sometimes* you know what they want or mean.
Slight polite correction.
Clips are not magazines. But *sometimes* you know what they want or mean.
Slight polite correction.

Using correct terminology is not only for experts in their fields, it is part of the English language. Its a matter of education. We should ALL aspire to speak as intelligently as we can. And, you should always try to help others, in a polite, non-offending way.

Moral:
yes, its a magazine
yes, cut them some slack
yes, make an honest effort to correct them in a way they will learn and change.
 
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