Why isn't a gun considered an elegant weapon?

[Michael Henrikson]

Actually isn't the definition of elegance that it is unusually effective and simple? So guns are pretty much the definition of elegance. Although it's probably that when you look at a "master" of any type of sword while their using it and see something very pretty and disciplined, you can look at a novice of the same style and see an uncoordinated drooling howler monkey with a stick, and look at a "master" marksman versus a novice marksman and see less of an immediate visual difference. That and people are stupid and opinionated.(By the way: I take no sides.)

 

[TheRundownRabbit]

I have no idea where you get your "facts", as for me, my position comes from being friends with 1 retired Marine, 2 active-duty Marines, 1 active-duty Navy SEAL, and being in a family full of people who lead a military career, most involved them being in the line of fire.

I got them by being in the US Army where I personally was given 3 weeks (which is less than one month) of training with the M16A2. There was additional training later, which is after my initial entry training (which I noted). Navy Seals represent training received long after initial entry and even in the Marines (or Army Infantry) you are only given 3 - 4 weeks of Basic Rifle Marksmanship training during which you only fire a few hundred live rounds. Yes, you continue using your rifle longer than that in training, but the aim of such things is not teaching you how to shoot and is instead largely relegated to maneuver training.

I was also in a JROTC program run by active duty Marines and if my Staff Sergeant heard you say this, boy oh boy, he'd make you go through PT so hard, you'd be shittin in your pants.

He can bluster all he wants as it does not detract from what I am saying. More to the point, thanks to a long series of rules and regulations, even if he wanted to try to do such a thing as work me to the point that I lose bowel control, he is forbidden by law from doing so. Part of the joy of working with minors and having the federal government acting as the parent organization.

The point is simply this: while it takes work to employ a firearm effectively, the amount of work is incredibly minor when compared to using a sword, a spear, or any of a dozen other weapons. The use of a firearm is not a lifelong mastery sort of skill but rather the sort of thing anyone can be taught inside of a few weeks of training.

And, for the record, the vast majority of one's initial entry training into the military has little to do with learning martial skills. One will spend more time doing various physical training, standing in formation, learning basic first aid and survival skills and learning proper drill and ceremony than they will mastering the use of any particular weapon. Even under the new program in the army (where basic training was extended beyond the original 9 weeks), the new "Warrior Task Training" that is included in basic training is largely relegated response to various combat situations rather than weapons mastery of any sort.

Well than, with that much maybe I am wrong

 

[IndianaJonny]

If we're talking about 'elegance' by a mutually agreeable measure then one good indicator of elegance, style and 'taste' in weapons might be how they have fared at auction. After some very lazy browsing I came up with Napoleon Bonaparte's sabre [//www.the-most-expensive.info/weapons/most-expensive-sword.html] (valued at $1.6 million, sold for $6.4 million) and this Swiss rifle made for a Shiekh [//most-expensive.net/rifles] (valued at $825,000).

Admittedly, this may seem a skew way of doing things but it might be the closest to a mutually consensual method. There are some weapons, such as the JFK assassination rifle, that while priceless because of their historical significance cannot truly be considered intrinsically 'elegant'.

 

[A Shadows Age]

I'm sorry but if you consider any weapon elegant, then your either full of shit and/or a idiot. They may be beautiful, but any weapon in the right hands is most definitely not elegant. Efficient, asymmetrical, quick and brutal but not elegant... Unless you consider rending a persons life from whatever is left of their body elegant, in which case I would suggest a dull piece of rebar properly inserted, gravity and several days of free time to watch the show.

A little harsh don't you think? Plus that little example you put at the end seems, sadistic. Yes, weapons are meant to take the life of another there's no denying that but you seem to be under the impression that anyone who has ever held a weapon will use it exclusively for murder... That is not the case and I would hate to live in a world where it is.

Harsh ? I suppose it might be a little harsh to imply that someone who would prefer to use a melee weapon over a gun to kill is a psychopath, maybe. Maybe dying slowly is more humane, I suppose it depends on who you are killing why you are using a "stick" and their preference for how they wish to die. Sadistic yes, I was implying that romanticizing about implements of death should take into consideration their effectiveness, I mean by that to say how quickly a living thing dies once the weapon is used. Murder ? No I was trying to illustrate the "effectiveness" (see 2nd sentence back) a melee weapon often had back when they were the primary weapons used to kill, as compared with my own experience of using firearms. I may not be the one who should explain this to you but as far as the "world" goes it's a big place, and while you may consider homicide of any sort murder, the people who are going to use these implements probably see it more as... Pragmatism.

Sorry if I disturbed you with that rather nasty bit at the end (of my previous post), I simply thought it was more effective at getting to the point than something with less contrast, i.e. pain and how long it lasts until the inflicted dies. And yes I realize that where you use the weapon is very important, just that a gun is quicker if used on those same places such as the head and the brain inside of it.

Edit: which is why I don't think a word with such connotations as elegant should be applied to weapons, I do see the beauty in them. Just not the elegance in their effects which is effected by the beauty inherit in their design, which would hold elegance if not for their purpose to which such tools are applied.

So I consider any weapon elegant only in it's proficiency of brutality...

 

[FenrinJRaten]

I think it more to do with levels of exaggeration.

Swords in terms of levels of exaggeration, have the advantage of guns on this because with swords (as shown in games, anime, cartoons, movies and comics) people can make some weird and exaggerative dance-like style to it and make it 'awesome' or 'elegant'. This is especially the case with Asian cultures where martial arts such as Wuxia, Kung-fu and Shaolin has proven such. Even westerns sword arts like Fencing and Rapier duels have a dance-like and exaggerative feel to it if Revolutionary Girl Utena doesn't show that already. Slow movements, fast movements, slashes, and stabs, the sword has it easy to make elegant because of how easy it is to exaggerate sword movements. Heck even larger swords like that of Cloud Strife's Tsurugi and Buster Sword and Ichigo's sword have the advantage of exaggeration to make it look elegant if the need arises, even though there is no need to. Really it just has to do with the design of the sword.

Whereas guns, it's rather hard exaggerate, due to its design, purpose and portrayal. Design-wise, it is easy for small guns like pistols, revolvers and etcetera to be elegant, but it is hard to exaggerate that elegance because the elegance relies on it being still, if cowboy movies stand-offs haven't shown that. But exaggeration of gun movement can be achieved if effort is given like Hellsing (anime and manga) and the Matrix (slow-motion) have shown. But when guns get bigger it gets harder because of the weight and size of it. BFGs have this worst since characters using BFGs have to stay still to use it properly and would look rather silly if exaggerative movement were to be applied.

Also the purpose of is that anyone can use it while sword is for those who want to put the time and effort into using it. Almost everyone knows how a gun operates and as such there's no elegant finesse to using it, unless one puts in the effort. Guns require little effort to be elegant since they are machines and machines are often hard to be elegant.

It doesn't really help that it is guns are mainly portrayed as just weapons and machinery. Even the futuristic ones have little elegance because everything is instaneous whereas, swords there is delay of sorts. Guns are instant distant kills while swords are also instant but there's a sense of delay in that one can actually see how they died and are somewhat more immersive.

So really I think it has more to do with exaggerating the weapon in the grandest way possible because really weapons are weapons.

 

[Voodoomancer]

Because of pro-lightsaber bias...

Guns were, in fact, considered the most elegant of weapons until the Jedi Order Publicity Department's highly successful anti-gun campaign.