The Column, No. 21:

The High Capacity Magazine Myth

Many kids these days believe that high capacity magazines are the way to go. I would know about this, I’m sixteen years old. Then again, I’m not exactly your normal kid when it comes to guns.

However, I don’t understand this obsession with huge magazines. They want at least 30 rounds, and beg for more. Ruger’s oddity of a magazine type, the rotary, (I’ve never understood it) has a 30 round curved magazine replacement that sells like hot cakes at local stores. I hear kids obsessing about how good the "Tommy gun" (in and of itself a pain to a gun nut’s ears, it’s a Thompson, and state the model year!) must have been because of its drum magazine.

I learned how to shoot with the Boy Scouts. There, you have two choices: single shot or no shot. I can shoot a Marlin 925 with fairly good accuracy (within the 6 ring) on a NRA A-4 target (all BSA ranges are 50 feet), firing one shot every 2 to 3 seconds. That’s fast. If I was standing, I could do it about one shot every 3 to 5 seconds. If you ask me, that’s shooting plenty fast enough.

Anyway, why do you need a high capacity magazine? What good does it do? Do you like having the extra weight under your barrel? The inability to do prone or sitting positions in a comfortable manner?

I will never understand the obsession with huge magazines. Five shots is a good amount, ten shots is a lot. But thirty or more? That’s just stupid. You’re not in a life or death military operation; you don’t need that giant magazine on your 10/22. Then again, I guess I’m just not "with it."