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Old November 14, 2017, 02:17 PM   #1
DaleA
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The REAL meaning of "AR"

I’ve always been tolerantly amused when the ‘new guy’ gets a little hazing.

You know, like when the apprentice plumber gets sent out for a pipe stretcher or when the apprentice electrician gets sent out for a circuit stretcher, you know, to lengthen short circuits. Or when anybody in the building trades gets sent out for a box of prefabricated holes or the new guy on a ship gets sent around to all the departments looking for a can of 'relative bearing grease'…

Well now I suspect it’s happened to me, and right here.

I always chuckled at folk that thought AR stood for ‘assault rifle’ and waited for someone to correct them that AR stands for 'Armalite Rifle'. Now I find out that I may have been taken in by the hoax for all these years!

Check out this very official looking and sounding video on Youtube. It’s “Stephen Willeford: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know”. It’s about Stephen Willeford the NRA member in Sutherland Springs Texas that shot the church shooter and along with John Langendorff ran him to ground.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGOBIMDxxBY

Check it out, the video has both audio and text on the screen and at the 1:25 minute mark, when the text prints “an AR assault rifle” the narrator CLEARLY STATES:

“when he heard what was going he armed himself with an ARKANSAS ASSAULT RIFLE, and engaged the suspect.”

For all the folk that have kept me in the dark all these years, well, I am deeply wounded. Sniff, sniff.
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Old November 14, 2017, 02:46 PM   #2
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Might be referring to a lever gun carbine--which many (myself included) consider the "grand-daddy" of modern uhhh, whatever you want to call ems.
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Old November 14, 2017, 06:52 PM   #3
Evan Thomas
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Somewhere in a garage outside Hot Springs, buried under some old rags and a couple of left-handed monkey wrenches, are the fourteen unsuccessful prototypes...
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Old November 14, 2017, 07:10 PM   #4
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Just to be sure. You're being sarcastic, right?
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Old November 14, 2017, 07:16 PM   #5
Bill DeShivs
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Computers just can't figure every speech nuance.
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Old November 14, 2017, 07:23 PM   #6
OzeanJaeger
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For duck hunters Arkansas is a verb.

They make a distinctive sound when in operation. Not the bang, bang, bang of other rifles, but SoooooooooWeeeeeeee.
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Old November 14, 2017, 08:22 PM   #7
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Computer generated voices My dad, son and I share the same name, except for SR, Jr and the 3rd, which is normally written III. My son used to get computer generated messages to confirm DR's appointments etc. where they called his name, but instead of the 3rd, they literally said I-I-I after his name.
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Old November 14, 2017, 11:16 PM   #8
James K
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Just goes to show the total ignorance of the newscasters who get on the talk shows pretending to be firearms experts. Except for some actual experts, police are not much better. A police chief on TV once called a semi-auto shotgun a "machine shotgun"; some people really believed there was such a thing,* and lawmakers wanted to ban them.

Jim

*Yes, there have been fully auto shotguns, but a Remington 870 is not one.

JK
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Old November 14, 2017, 11:52 PM   #9
TXAZ
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I have my Grandpa’s Browning Automatic 5 shotgun, circa Bonnie and Clyde.
It still requires 1 trigger pull per shell fired. Automatic in the shotgun vernacular means auto loading.

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Old November 15, 2017, 12:55 AM   #10
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Quote:
Just to be sure. You're being sarcastic, right?
Oh, for sure.

After the hatchet job the NY Times did on Stephen Willeford (detailed in another thread in the 'General' section) I watched the YouTube video of Willeford describing in his own words what happened. Then I saw the Stephen Willeford: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know and decided to watch that too.

I don't know if it is really a computer reading the text or a person running their voice through some kind of synthesizer but the voice took the printed 'AR' and read it as 'Arkansas'. Reminded me of the movie 'Anchorman' where the news producer admonishes the crew again and again that Ron, the anchorman at the TV studio will literally read anything and everything written on the cue cards.

P.S. The thread I mentioned about Stephen Willeford is here:
https://thefiringline.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=590985

Last edited by DaleA; November 15, 2017 at 12:58 AM. Reason: added a link to the Stephen Willeford thread
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Old November 15, 2017, 06:56 AM   #11
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When I first signed up here and I looked at the classifieds, if I saw "AR," I naturally thought the AR was for Arkansas.

To misquote Shooter, "Welcome to Arkansas. Patron State of Shootin' Stuff."
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Old November 15, 2017, 07:41 AM   #12
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Quote:
To misquote Shooter, "Welcome to Arkansas. Patron State of Shootin' Stuff."
How DARE you! that moniker is exclusive rights to Tennessee--the UNQUESTIONED patron state of shooting stuff!
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Old November 15, 2017, 08:16 AM   #13
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Quote:
Originally Posted by DaleA
I always chuckled at folk that thought AR stood for ‘assault rifle’ and waited for someone to correct them that AR stands for 'Armalite Rifle'.
All joking aside, it doesn't actually stand for "Armalite Rifle", it simply stands for the first two letters in "Armalite". There were many weapons made by Armalite with the "AR-" prefix that weren't rifles, including pistols, shotguns, and even an aircraft-mounted gun.
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Old November 15, 2017, 02:29 PM   #14
hdwhit
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AR = Arkansas.

Of course, just like the postal abbreviation. How could I have ever believed otherwise? Oh great natural state, former land of opportunity, forgive my lack of faith and welcome me back as a contrite exile seeking merely the solace of being set to rest in his adopted soil.
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Old November 15, 2017, 05:38 PM   #15
DaleA
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Thank you Theohazard. I stand corrected.

I actually do think there's some of what people might call 'nitpicking' that goes on here but there is some stuff that we should just get 'right' and this, IMhO, is one of those things. Part of being 'gun literate' is getting the terms right. Thank you for correction.
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Old November 15, 2017, 09:05 PM   #16
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Quote:
Originally Posted by stagpanther
How DARE you! that moniker is exclusive rights to Tennessee--the UNQUESTIONED patron state of shooting stuff!
Ha! Well, I tole you I was misquotin' it....
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Old November 16, 2017, 02:19 AM   #17
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Quote:
Ha! Well, I tole you I was misquotin' it....
Did you know that Levon Helm of the Band played the ballistics expert in that classic scene? "Still got the shovel out back"
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Old November 16, 2017, 07:16 AM   #18
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I do know that. Shooter is one of my all-time favorite movies and I love that character!
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Old November 16, 2017, 08:23 AM   #19
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I always thought it was a pirate gun.

Arrrrrr Matey.....
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Old November 16, 2017, 08:46 AM   #20
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Argue Relentlessly
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Old November 24, 2017, 12:54 PM   #21
wild cat mccane
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Is it a Kleenex or a tissue?

Are people uneducated or without knowledge of the purpose if they call it one or the other?

Gun owners making fun of people for saying mag/clip or AR/Assault Rifle -- you're nit picking the schematics. It really doesn't matter. It doesn't show people don't know what they are talking about when it comes to a weapon.
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Old November 24, 2017, 01:25 PM   #22
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Quote:
Originally Posted by wild cat mccane
Gun owners making fun of people for saying mag/clip or AR/Assault Rifle -- you're nit picking the schematics. It really doesn't matter.
It usually doesn't matter, but sometimes it does. If you're a Marine and you ask your buddy for a clip for your M4, he's going to think you're referring to 10 rounds of ammo on a stripper clip, since that's how the ammo is issued. If you go into a gun shop and ask for a clip for an SKS, the guy behind the counter will probably think you need a stripper clip for a traditional SKS when you actually need a magazine for your modified version. And if my buddy says he just bought an assault rifle, I'll probably assume he really means a semi-auto rifle, but part of me will think that maybe he splurged and bought a real full-auto assault rifle.

Here's the thing: a clip is a different thing than a magazine and the term "assault rifle" has a specific technical meaning. I'm not going to make fun of someone for misusing and mixing up those terms; I'll probably know what they mean to say most of the time. But not always.
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Old November 24, 2017, 03:11 PM   #23
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Kleenex is a copyrighted name brand. I recall one of my high school teachers saying Kleenex employees were told to use "Kleenex band tissue." Jim Henson was very adamant that "Muppet" referred to his creations and his company and took legal action against anyone who tried to use it as a generic term.
My idea of an "assault rifle" is an M1888 in 45-70-I carried one up San Juan Hill in 1898.
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