Sorry Guys, I did a post n run, had to get to work. In my case, I've gone out with a couple guys and they were surprised at a woman carrying and asked if they could see mine.
My mindset, however, is I never SHOW OFF a gun, I have few friends who are shooters and that I trust that if it came up I'd let them take a look for an opinion or if they were to tell me they are considering purchasing one similar to one I have. If it's the later case I'll usually invite down to the range to let them really get the feel for it.
Now, on a normal basis I have always had it drilled into my head to NEVER hand someone a loaded weapon. I don't even do this at the range like it was mentioned here of people doing.
I usually drop (clip/cylinder), clear (slide or again cylinder), check and recheck and then yes hand it over facing down by the muzzle...
I saw a friend's boyfriend a shoot himself in the hand once as his way "showing" me his gun was not loaded.
I told him he needed to be more careful handling his gun, he told me to calm down dropped the clip and pointed it at his hand pulling the trigger.
It was surreal as he said, "see Cyn, it's not loaded.." and then BANG. It was in a small cabin so the sound was deafening and my ears were ringing... took a couple seconds to hear him cursing in pain.
I'm just glad he didn't point it at his head, it could have been worse. and BTW, he was 2 years out from the army and had a master marksman (or something like that)patch he had earned... =o/
^^^ Wow, thanks for sharing, eye opening experience at how easy it is for something like this to happen.