baby guns – women, weapons and design
Female body guards for the Royals and the Prime Minister in Britain may carry Baby Glocks:
Often seen as a ‘girl’ gun in the hands of female detectives in TV programmes like CSI Miami and Criminal Minds, the Baby Glock is smaller, lighter and easier to use for those with smaller hands.
But critics have warned that police chiefs are putting political correctness before security as officers from Scotland Yard’s elite protection squad could be hampered by the smaller weapon if they come under attack.
Police want to recruit more women. Women (supposedly) feel more comfortable with smaller guns. It seems a simple enough formula: Offer smaller guns to female officers, and see if women swarm to police academy.
But when I read the article above, I immediately aimed my sights on the name of the pistol: “Baby Glock.”
If Glock designed this gun for female hands, why not call it a “Lady Glock” (as I have seen with several other small pistols)? I did a little sleuthing to find out, and to be fair, the gun was not necessarily designed for women. Nowhere does the Glock website call the “Baby Glock” a “women’s gun.” However, it certainly gets marketed that way. And if Glock participates in product placement ala CSI Miami, then the company benefits from the “girl gun” label.
Or on the flip side: Why do crime shows present the Baby Glock as a “girl gun?”
The term “baby” feels, well, infantalizing. Insulting. Women are not “baby” versions of men. And let’s get real. It does not refer to actual, you know, babies.
All of this reminds me of when my husband wanted to get me interested in pistol shooting. I challenged him to find me a pink gun, thinking that no such pistol could possibly exist. Really, though, I felt secretly drawn to the mix of the girlish with the deadly. It felt very Bond Girl—garter-style holsters, poisonous lipsticks, spy cameras. I would never admit it to him (at the time, anyway), but I wanted that gun. I wanted a little design with my deadly force.
Besides practical issues such as the size of their hands, do women have a different aesthetic relationship with weapons? If so, why? What does it signify?
I have actually handled a variety of small weapons that were adonized pink and purple. Some were small and some were full sized. As a student of history I would note that much as most small weapons were designed or modified from larger weapons for concealment purposes or ease of handling, their adaptation was basically androgenous. As far as aesthetic relationship- I would say no more or less than men. A little gold or personal engraving on ones weapon (or coloring)just makes that much more yours. “This is my weapon. There are many like it, but this one is mine.” U.S. Marines.