I just wanted to tell you all something: I love guns. Yes, real guns. In fact, I own a .22 rifle that my dad gave me. I keep it in my home along with a box of ammunition.
The first gun I ever shot was my mother’s boyfriend’s .22 rifle. It was a bolt action made of wood and metal. Perfect weight for me, too. The rifle was beautiful and old, and I felt like I could hit anything with it. I love knowing I only have one bullet in my gun – one chance to hit my target. Semi-autos aren’t for me because the stakes don’t feel high enough. The far end of that spectrum is buckshot in a shotgun: there’s no point in target shooting with buckshot.
I don’t really like shooting shotguns. I tried some sort of assault rifle once, too, but I didn’t like that either. Smaller gauge rifles and, to a lesser extent, revolvers and other small handguns are what I prefer.
If you’ve never tried target practice, it’s quite fun. If you have a chance to try it, I’d encourage you to do so. Be sure to be safe – take a safety course (many ranges offer brief gun safety lessons when you use their range). Knowledge is power in this situation: the more you know, the less likely you are to do something stupid or hurt yourself. Know the cardinal rules of shooting practice – keep the safety on when targets are being set up or you’re not shooting, don’t point your gun at anyone (or any pets or things you don’t want to shoot), be responsible. Wear safety gear, too!
If you’re wondering why I bothered to post it, it’s because I think there are way too many people out there that think gun owners and gun enthusiasts are all crazy (and Bible-toting – the only reason I’d have a Bible and gun is that I ran out of other targets). There are too many people that are irrationally afraid of guns. Are you afraid of knives? Swords? Bow and arrow? Sling shots? So why are you afraid of guns?
I was raised viewing guns as tools. More dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing around them than, say, a hammer, but still a tool. You don’t have to hunt or want to kill people or even want to protect yourself to enjoy guns. Do you actually have a reason for believing that guns are evil?
amandatheatheist 
Could my timing on this be any worse? Alabama, Toronto and Aurora, CO. I still love guns, but I hate the choices people sometimes make with them.
From my experience, people who grew-up in cities tend to view guns as weapons, whereas people who grew up in rural areas tend to view them as tools (which makes sense, considering how they are used in each of the two locales). Of course, I have no idea what your background is.
I would say that’s true in some places. I grew up in a suburb of Minneapolis, although “suburb” has different meanings in different areas, and I’m not sure it really conveys what Bloomington, MN is like. In my experience, people who grow up in the middle/northern United States view guns as tools if they are from a gun-owning family while those that don’t grow up in a gun-owning family see them as scary weapons. It’s less a rural/urban dichotomy here, although I’ve definitely seen that elsewhere. On the one hand, I kind of wish guns had never been invented. On the other hand, I enjoy target practice with guns. There’s also the question of whether it’s better that people kill each other with guns or in other ways, but I don’t really want to go into that. Especially not right now.