46 Gun Quotes

In the vast landscape of literature, film, and public discourse, gun quotes have often captured the complexities and emotions surrounding firearms. Whether evoking thoughts on freedom, protection, or the consequences of violence, these powerful statements provide a window into a diverse array of perspectives. In this blog post, we have meticulously curated a collection of the top 46 gun quotes that span various contexts and eras. Each quote offers a unique lens through which to examine the multifaceted role that guns have played in society. Join us as we delve into these thought-provoking words and explore the nuanced viewpoints that continue to shape the conversation around firearms.

1. “A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well-digested plan is requisite; and their safety and interest require that they should promote such manufactories as tend to render them independent of others for essential, particularly military, supplies.” - George Washington

2. “If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun. Not at the head, where a fatal wound might result. But at some other body part, such as a leg.” - Dalai Lama XIV

3. “Foolish liberals who are trying to read the Second Amendment out of the Constitution by claiming it's not an individual right or that it's too much of a public safety hazard, don't see the danger in the big picture. They're courting disaster by encouraging others to use the same means to eliminate portions of the Constitution they don't like.” - Alan Dershowitz

4. “If frogs had side pockets, they'd carry hand guns.” - Dan Rather

5. “The fascination of shooting as a sport depends almost wholly on whether you are at the right or wrong end of the gun.” - P.G. Wodehouse

6. “Literary detection and firearms don't really go hand in hand; pen mighter than the sword and so forth. ” - Jasper Fforde

7. “Speaking personally, you can have my gun, but you'll take my book when you pry my cold, dead fingers off of the binding.” - Stephen King

8. “It's very dramatic when two people come together to work something out. It's easy to take a gun and annihilate your opposition, but what is really exciting to me is to see people with differing views come together and finally respect each other.” - Fred Rogers

9. “I've heard it said that God made all men, but Samuel Colt made all men equal.We'd see what Mr. Colt could do for a woman.” - Cherie Priest

10. “I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginia, I'll even 'hari-kari' if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun!” - Alan Alda

11. “The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles.” - Jeff Cooper

12. “I took my .38 out and looked to see that there were bullets in all the proper places. I knew there would be, but it did no harm to be careful. And I'd seen Clint Eastwood do it once in the movies.” - Robert B. Parker

13. “Elephant, beyond the fact that their size and conformation are aesthetically more suited to the treading of this earth than our angular informity, have an average intelligence comparable to our own. Of course they are less agile and physically less adaptable than ourselves -- nature having developed their bodies in one direction and their brains in another, while human beings, on the other hand, drew from Mr. Darwin's lottery of evolution both the winning ticket and the stub to match it. This, I suppose, is why we are so wonderful and can make movies and electric razors and wireless sets -- and guns with which to shoot the elephant, the hare, clay pigeons, and each other.” - Beryl Markham

14. “Criminal: You can suck my dick, motherfucker!Detective Bridges: You suck mine! [shoves barrel of pistol in the Criminal's mouth] An' you get used to it, cause you get to Rykers you're gonna find a lot of dick on the goddamn menu! Now grunt twice for yes! You through bitchin'?” - Garth Ennis

15. “Guns, she was reminded then, were not for girls. They were for boys. They were invented by boys. They were invented by boys who had never gotten over their disappointment that accompanying their own orgasm there wasn't a big boom sound.” - Lorrie Moore

16. “violence is an evil thing, but when the guns are all in the hands of the men without respect for human rights, then men are really in trouble.” - Louis L'Amour

17. “Christmas ought to be brought up to date,” Maria said. “It ought to have gangsters, and aeroplanes and a lot of automatic pistols.” - John Masefield

18. “How many times must I tell all of you! Sky, ground, or target. Damn it, you don't point a gun at another person unless you are prepared to kill that person." He scowled at Ona. "A careless accident could cost one of you a husband. I've told you from the beginning. The Oregon men won't accept a crippled wife. They insist on brides who are healthy and whole.” - Maggie Osborne

19. “I hate and fear violence myself, have always avoided barroom brawls, and tho' I'm a bit of a gun-nut, and a member of the NRA, I never shoot at anything but beer cans and mule deer. (In season.) And seldom hit either, except by accident.” - Edward Abbey

20. “When guns are outlawed, only the Government will have guns. The Government - and a few outlaws. If that happens, you can count me among the outlaws.” - Edward Abbey

21. “And upon his return, Gherkins, who had always considered his uncle as a very top-hatted sort of person, actually saw him take from his handkerchief-drawer an undeniable automatic pistol.It was at this point that Lord Peter was apotheosed from the state of Quite Decent Uncle to that of Glorified Uncle” - Dorothy L. Sayers

22. “The shots left a hard ringing sound within the closeness of the brick walls. Terry held the pistol at arm's length on a level with his eyes--the Russian Tokarev resembling an old-model Colt .45, big and heavy--and made the sign of the cross with it over the dead. He said, "Rest in peace, motherfuckers," turned, and walked out of the beer lady's house to wait at the side of the road.” - Elmore Leonard

23. “One day I was telling him that I thought that cars had replaced guns as phallic symbols for American men, and I thought it was interesting that he had one that was so small and fast. The next day he gave me the Datsun and went out and bought a Lincoln.” - Christopher Moore

24. “When I came here as a child, he would always remove the bullets as soon as he walked in the door. I guess he considered me old enough now not to shoot myself by accident, and not depressed enough to shoot myself on purpose.” - Stephenie Meyer

25. “One of the arguments that authoritarian governments use to ward off the call for greater political freedom is to argue that American-style democracy is no guarantee of good policy.... Over the years, I’ve grown used to these arguments, and my response has rarely wavered: Sure, we might make dumb choices sometimes, but we will defend, to the end, the right to make choices at all, because we believe that our collective conscience, freely expressed, will eventually lead us in the right direction. When it comes to guns, it is getting harder to muster that argument abroad. Every new shooting, every new failure of will and citizenship, slashes another hole in our credibility as a way of life.” - Evan Osnos

26. “What about guns with sensors in the handles that could detect if you were angry, and if you were, they wouldn't fire, even if you were a police officer?What about skyscrapers made with moving parts, so they could rearrange themselves when they had to, and even open holes in their middles for planes to fly through?” - Jonathan Safran Foer

27. “I'm tired of the whole anti gun thing. Saying that Guns cause Murders is like saying Steering Wheels cause car wrecks” - Stanley Victor Paskavich

28. “Science gets more fun when I get a bigger gun!” - Kari Byron

29. “Not that I've noticed." She looked down at my gun. "What a nice Glock. My sister carries a Glock, and she just loves it. I was thinking about trading in my .45, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. My dead husband gave it to me for our first anniversary. Rest his soul.” - Janet Evanovich

30. “It seems to me that television is exactly like a gun. Your enjoyment of it is determined by which end of it you're on.” - Alfred Hitchcock

31. “I keep hearing this fucking thing that guns don't kill people, but people kill people. If that's the case, why do we give people guns when they go to war? Why not just send the people?” - Ozzy Osbourne

32. “Just inside the doorway he puts down the bags, motions her to stand by them a minute. He saunters out ahead, carefully casual. Peers up one way, down the other. Nothing. The street's dead to the world.Then suddenly, from nowhere, ping! Something flicks off the wall just behind him, flops at his feet like a dead bug. He doesn't bend down to look closer, he can tell what kind of a bug it is all right. He's seen that kind of bug before, plenty of times. No flash, no report, to show which direction it came from. Silencer, of course. He hasn't moved. Fsssh! and a bee or wasp in a hurry strokes by his cheek, tingles, draws a drop of slow blood. Another pokk! from the wall, another bug rolling over. The insect-world seems very streamlined, very self-destructive, tonight. ("Jane Brown's Body")” - Cornell Woolrich

33. “A second red-orange spearhead leaps straight at O'Shaughnessy. The whole world seems to stand still. Then the gun behind it crashes, and there's a cataclysm of pain all over him, and a shock goes through him as if he ran head-on into a stone wall.A voice from the car says blurredly, while the ground rushes up to meet him, 'Finish him up, you guys! I'm getting so I don't trust their looks no more, no matter how stiff they act!' ("Jane Brown's Body")” - Cornell Woolrich

34. “Several months ago there was a somewhat, in some people's eyes, relatively normal Cal--or by and large normal--the best he was able to be as half Auphe. Occasionally he did lose his shit, attacked and ate deer while on road trips through the woods, created massive holes in between dimensions to shove through malevolently murderous pucks, and once in a while ripped out an Auphe's throat with his teeth. He also opened a gate or two to save his friends, blew up an antihealer from the inside out to save the world, cleaned his guns while watching porn, and generally was a smart-ass to everyone.Normal.” - Rob Thurman

35. “I hate guns," replied the Doctor. "Which isn't to say that a bit of fantasy violence can't be therapeutic.” - Jacqueline Rayner

36. “Fucking GUNS are fucking AWESOME and when you SHOOT them at SHIT, they fucking KILL it!” - Etienne Guerin DeForest

37. “Most gun control arguments miss the point. If all control boils fundamentally to force, how can one resist aggression without equal force? How can a truly “free” state exist if the individual citizen is enslaved to the forceful will of individual or organized aggressors? It cannot.” - Tiffany Madison

38. “We do not need guns and bombs to bring peace, we need love and compassion.” - Mother Teresa

39. “I should not yield to it, he told himself once again as he walked along carrying the briefcase. Compulsion-obsession-phobia. But he could not free himself. It in my grip, I in its, he thought.” - Philip K. Dick

40. “Oh, it doesn't work at all. That's the problem! It's an endless, halting parade of inspections, bribes, and nonsense—but if you're aboard a Texas vessel, you'll find less inconvenience along the way." "It's because of their guns!" declared Mr. Henderson, once more escaping his reverie, bobbing out of it as if to gasp for air. "Concise, my love." Mrs. Henderson gave him a smile. "And correct. Texans are heavily armed and often impatient. They don't need to be transporting arms and gunpowder to create a great nuisance for anyone who stops them, so they tend to be stopped…less often.” - Cherie Priest

41. “I snapped the crossbow into the top of the mount, took a canvas bundle from the cart, and unrolled it. Crossbow bolts, tipped with the Galahad warheads.“This is my baby.” I petted the stock.“You have a strange relationship with your weapons,” Roman said.“You have no idea,” Raphael told him.“This from a man with a living staff and a man who once drove four hours both ways for a sword he then put on his wall,” I murmured.“It was an Angus Trim,” Raphael said.“It’s a sharpened strip of metal.”“You have an Angus Trim sword?” Kate’s eyes lit up.“Bought it at an estate auction,” Raphael said. “If we get out of this alive, you are invited to come to my house and play with it.”It was good that Curran wasn’t here and I was secure in our relationship, because that totally could be taken the wrong way.” - Ilona Andrews

42. “George grinned. 'A pity you're perfectly dreadful at shooting.'Aubrey shrugged. 'I've had all the lessons. I'm adequate.''Adequate? I suppose it depends on what you mean. If you mean that you haven't actually shot yourself by accident, then by all means describe yourself as adequate.'George laced his fingers together and placed them on his chest. ''I'll come, then I might be able to spare you some embarrassment.''I'm honoured.” - Michael Pryor

43. “The tank, the submarine, the torpedo, the machine-gun, even the rifle and the hand grenade are still in use.” - George Orwell

44. “Randy is a member in good standing of American society again, having cheerfully endured the process of being ritually goosed by the Government. He feels a strong impulse to drive straight to the nearest gun store and spend about ten thousand dollars. Not that he wants to hurt anyone; it's just that any kind of government authority gives him the creeps now.” - Neal Stephenson

45. “We'd be the safest country in the world if the world knew we didn't have a gun. Men are not killed because they get mad at each other. They're killed because one has a gun.” - Jeannette Rankin

46. “His fear-inflamed mind sent the control-signal to his finger-joint to fold back. The trigger sliced back. The blast seemed to lift the booth clear off the floor, drop it down again. A pin-wheel of vacancy appeared in the glass, flinging off shards and slivers.” - Cornell Woolrich