Every Jamaican male, with very few exceptions, wants to own a licensed firearm. This desire becomes even more compounded when he passes age 30.

There are so many things to consider when you take the decision to own a licensed firearm. It is likely the third most important decision you will make in your lifetime; the first and second being, who you have children with and who you marry.

The decision to own a licensed firearm is one that can cost you your life, or save your life. There are so many variables, I don’t know where to start. First, and most important, can you adequately secure the weapon? This is important. In some years, stolen guns number more than guns recovered by the police. You don’t want to be in a situation where you help to put another gun into another killer’s hands.

This is more than just the obvious issue of having a vault at your house. It involves the consideration as to whether you can secure it when you’re actually carrying it. Let me explain. If you are a lady or a small man, it is important that your gun is concealable to the point where people can’t tell you are carrying it. The reason it is so important in these cases is that you are more likely to be a target of an attack if you appear physically vulnerable.

One could say that it doesn’t take a big guy to pull a trigger. That is true. However, if you are small in stature they will simply grab you and take it off of you. It doesn’t mean that all small men are weak. Nor does it mean that all women are weak. I know this. My eldest son, Nicholas, is an International Sport Karate Association (ISKA) world champion. He achieved that when he was 150 pounds. If he hits you, you are going down.

I trained another fighter, Sheckeema Cunningham, who was also an ISKA world champion. She was barely 100 pounds. She could break any jaw she hit. That being said, you don’t want to be attacked because ‘any card can play’. Therefore, if you are small in body, then carry a gun small enough to be concealed on your person.

Second, do you have the temperament to not kill when provoked? I’m not just talking about the taxi man who will drive you to the brink of hell every day. I am talking about not killing when you find your intimate partner in bed with someone else, or speaking of their lovemaking on
WhatsApp. This will drive you to extreme anger.

If you don’t have a gun, then you have to get more up-close and personal to do harm. A gun allows for a more disconnected attack, one that will cost you your future. Are you ready to use lethal force?

Pointing a lethal barrelled weapon at someone and pulling a trigger must come with an intent to kill, or at least a consideration that it could occur. If you’re not ready to defend your life at the cost of taking someone else’s, then leave gun ownership alone.

Third, do you realise that you can be considered a criminal if that gun is lost because of your negligence? Good people have been destroyed because they made a mistake that resulted in a gun being stolen or lost. You may not get jail time, but you will be a criminal with a criminal record.

Are you prepared to take the risk that you may spend 25 years in prison because someone told a lie on you? This is real. If your woman or her man, or your neighbour, your employer, your employee, your ‘waste man’ family member, or a malicious driver in a road rage dispute tells a lie that you pointed a gun at them, you can go to prison for decades.

Are you ready to go through a process that involves people you don’t know coming to your home and asking you sensitive questions, calling your adult children, your spouse, or your co-workers, and asking them about you?

Can a special branch inquiry wake up a part of your life that you had previously given up? This is a very real consideration.

Okay, you have thought of everything and you still decide that you want a gun. I understand. When I was in my 20s, if you had asked me if I was willing to amputate a finger in order to get a licensed firearm, I would have told you to “forward with an axe and a painkiller”.

So, very importantly, what type of gun is reliable?

This will usually depend on how well you keep it clean and maintained. This consideration of care of the weapon is far more relevant if you don’t carry a Glock pistol. I’m not biased, it’s just that a Glock needs much less care than any other gun I have had experience with. This is not to say that it does not need cleaning and maintenance to perform to its maximum capability.

Additionally, when it comes to reliability, brand names matter. Stick with guns that are proven, like Sig Sauer, Smith & Wesson, Beretta, HK, Ruger, CZ, and of course, the aforementioned Glock.

Reliability also has a lot to do with the age of the weapon. An old gun is a collector’s item, not a reliable weapon with which to go into battle. The Firearm Licensing Authority (FLA) will replace your weapon every 10 years without too much trouble.

Can you protect your children from this gun?

This is where the Glock starts to lose points. I have known of too many children killed by licensed Glock pistols simply because they are too easy to fire and good people are not perfect. You can make a mistake. You can fall asleep.

There are too many variables for you to carry a gun that a five-year-old can fire and carries no safety. So this gun is not for the family man with young children.

A suitable gun for a uniformed police officer, or security officer is not necessarily the best gun for plain-clothes carry. The Glock is unsuitable here again.

If you are going to carry a weapon that is not in an external holster that has retention capability, then you need a gun with a safety latch. By retention I mean a lever of some sort that must be activated in order to remove the gun from the holster.

Anybody can be disarmed. Most people carry a gun with a round already in the chamber. The safety mechanism buys you the half-second to prevent the attacker from shooting you with your own gun.

Which gun won’t jam?

Well, as I said before, cleaning and maintenance play a great part in determining that. Glocks jam less frequently in my experience but truth be told, revolvers are probably the most efficient in this regard. The issue is they are hard to conceal because of how they are constructed. The round capacity is rarely more than six and getting new ones locally is not that simple.

There is so much more we could discuss on the subject, but word limits are real. I will close on this note.

Are you ready to invest in training? If you are not, then leave gun ownership alone. If you are, then you have great trainers and great facilities in Jamaica. Pound for pound, you can get the best tuition in Jamaica from experts that you couldn’t afford in other countries.

Does gun appearance matter? It does not matter how shiny or pretty it is; you can’t marry it. What matters is how suitable it is for your special situation and your personal circumstances.

Are you required to carry it on you all the time?

No. This is why a vault is mandatory. They say it’s better to have it and not need it, than to need it and not have it. That doesn’t necessarily follow. There are places that are unsuitable for you to carry a firearm. A party is, of course, one. Public transportation is another, A beach is also one because you can’t carry the gun into the water. It’s also inadvisable to bring the gun to a family dispute.

What is the best calibre?

The best is a .38 because it does not over-penetrate; or .45 because of its stopping power. However, the FLA won’t give you a .45 and the .38s, as I said before, have capacity issues, so you’re stuck with 9 mms.

Think on all of these things before you buy a gun. I know a few people who regret ever having owned one. I would migrate if I were barred from carrying one.

Gun ownership is an important decision. It is necessary if you plan to protect yourself.

A legally-armed society is a safer society, but not everybody is ready or suitable to be a firearm owner. The most important consideration is to know if you are ready.

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