Micah Harris (31) – Oxnard, California
Since he was a boy, Micah Harris has had just one wish—to surround himself with the same guns he’s seen in Hollywood movies. He would dream about them at night, first and foremost among them, “Bruce Willis’s Beretta from Die Hard. It’s a legend.” However, surrounding oneself with firearms is no simple thing in California, and not well looked upon either. When he decided to buy his first rifle, a Remington 700, the bureaucratic hoops he had to jump through were so many and so complex that he decided to set up a YouTube channel, posting updates on his progress and sharing what he learned along the way. The channel garnered moderate success. Today, Micah knows all the rules and advises others on how to buy the firearms they want. He manages a gun shop that he founded with a friend, and he’s also a member of the NRA.
Losing some friends in a mass shooting only strengthened his convictions about the importance of knowing how to defend oneself. “Shootings are a tragic way to use a tool that was never conceived for that purpose. If I could speak to the victims, I’d tell them I offer them all of my help and understanding, and that I’d be happy to teach them how to use guns, so that they could defend themselves in the future.”
Choosing a favorite gun is kind of like choosing a favorite child. If I really had to, I’d say an Mk 12 Mod 1
Torrell Jasper, a.k.a. Black Rambo (35) – Schiever, Louisiana
(in the background, Allen Craff, Tyrone Gathen, James J. Herbert)
Every day, nearly six hundred thousand people wait for Torrell Jasper to make his appearance on Instagram and show off one of his guns. To find him, just type in “Black Rambo,” a nickname he’s extremely proud of, and make sure you don’t end up on his son’s account by mistake (at 13, he’s already trying to make a name for himself on social media). Torrell, now 35, learned to shoot from his father as a child. A former Marine, he spent a few years in war zones, “where pulling the trigger and hitting the target was a question of life or death.” Now, back in civilian life and working as an A/C systems installer, Torrell, a.k.a. Black Rambo, mostly just has fun with his guns. People have fun watching him, too. About a hundred different manufacturers of firearms and related paraphernalia have, over the years, asked him to use and promote their products, and he loves being the center of attention at least as much as he loves owning a flamethrower. “There are no weapons I would ban ordinary citizens from owning, but if I had to name one, well, a bazooka isn’t really something you need,” he admits. That said, he has no fear that an item in his arsenal might be dangerous for his young children or for any of his many followers. “It’s not guns that hurt people, it’s the people holding the guns.”
I couldn’t say which weapon is my favorite. I can’t choose just one. I love them all. That’s why I buy so many.
The first gun I ever bought was an AK-47.
As we pine for ploughshares, we might recall that it was on this date in 2021 that U.S. District Judge Roger T. Benitez of the Southern District of California ruled that sections of the 1989 California state ban on assault weapons– military-style rifles like the AR-15, so prominently featured in the photos above– was unconstitutional. In his opinion, Benitez opined, “like the Swiss Army knife, the popular AR-15 rifle is a perfect combination of home defense weapon and homeland defense equipment.” Later that month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit blocked his ruling.
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