riding and weapons

[keithr@nocdc.bc.ca (Ann Hatfield)]

I'm absolutley astonished at how many women wrote to say they carry
handguns not to mention mace, knives, pepper spray, etc. I assume all of
them were from the U.S. because in Canada it is VERY difficult to get
permission to carry a handgun of any kind and now one has to go through a
training program, a background check and certification to be able to carry
a rifle.

The weapon carrying literally scares me.  I live in what most Americans
would classify as wilderness.  We have a momma bear and her cubs on the
place every single summer and autumn.  In winter we have cougar tracks on
the driveway.  Coyotes call many nights when I'm out feeding the night
horse feed and checking on foals.  I lived 6 years in Jasper National
Park-as wild as you can get-lots of bears and cats.  Wolves called at the
literal edge of town.  Tourists wandered about everywhere and few ever got
hurt by animals. You aren't allowed to carry guns, in any National Park,
unless you are a Park Warden.  I rode on the edge of the Park where the
Wilmore Wilderness borders it with a friend who is a hunter as well as an
avid rider/explorer of the farthest reachest into which he can get,  and he
seldom caries a gun.  When he does it is a rifle so a large animal can be
stopped at a distance.  Yes, I understand some pistols pack quite a punch
and can stop a bear but I don't think they are the 'game' gun of choice-ask
ranchers and hunters what they carry. Pistols are designed to kill humans.

 When we were in an area that we heard had a problem bear we rode
carefully-out!  I was the third woman in B.C. to be hired as a forest fire
lookout.  I had drunks come up to my look out, which was fairly accessible
to the public, on  a couple of occassions.  "Whassh a pretty girl like you
doing all alone up here?"  "I'm not all alone, I had 92 visitors today.
Are you fellows going to sign the guest book, too?  Feel free to enjoy the
view and the trail down is that way and the cliffs are right ahead of you."
 Most drunks I've dealt with in Canada weren't dangerous,  just drunk. 

Does the States really have that much more human trouble than Canada that
ordinary people must really pack all this firepower?  Makes me nervous
about coming down for rides.

Am I totally naive, or protected here in my Canadian world;  is there so
much violence around you everyday that you must go armed?  I wonder if
Canadians, South Africans, Aussies, Europeans carry the arsenal the
Americans feel comfortable with/reassured by.  I ride with no weapon-ever.
I ride alone in very rough country. I camp with women friends every year
and not one of us carries anything more deadly than a cel phone and a
hatchet to make kindling and it only goes with us if we think we may have
to clear trail.  Even then it's likely to be left in camp and a folding saw
carried.

I work with poor, stressed, difficult people.  No staff on the three floors
carries a gun.  We have panic buttons that connect to the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police office in town.  Only time they have been called is when the
alarum installers were putting in the buttons.  "Oops, sorry officer.  No,
he's o.k., he's installing it!"

Truly scares the tar out of me to think that you ordinary folk feel
obligated to carry all this stuff.

Ann