Of course one of the things is there are many different levels of
hoplophobia... theres that "bottom end" where you have the women **
who will wig out over the mere discussion of guns.
Then theres the middle somewhere- there are the ones that just deal
with it because its part of who you are and they accept it the same way
they accept any of your other faults. This can go bad, however, you
can end up with a harpy that is on your ass all the time about getting
rid of the guns- as though its some kind of a problem that needs to
be corrected.
If you sniff that out at all, save yourself the
years of misery up front and say "The door is that way. ". I realize that
some people think that they should sacrifice who they are or what they do
to be with someone else, but IMO that is the road to ruin, usually. What
is the point of being in love with someone if they will not accept you for
who you are? (and anything that comes with that, wether its a dog, cat, a
motorcycle, guns, whatever... ) People need to analyze their relationship
as a whole and ask themselves if its really worth it. It is very easy to
get jaded by emotion while losing sight of the fact that someone is actually
using you. And once they get you to capitulate to one demand, then
they will start walking all over you. (I realize this is a rash
generalization, but all the men I know personally that are excessively
pussy whipped are usually miserable souls. It's one thing for the partner
to ask for help/advice/etc but when they start dominating your existence
then that only results in misery. )
This issue is thorny and every situation is a little bit different. For every
woman that isn't completely mortified, there is usually hope. The goal
can be to get her (on her own terms) to a place where shes at least
"comfortable" around guns. It doesn't even matter if she doesn't have the
same level of interest that you do. If you can get her to a comfort
zone, that is a win by any means. How you accomplish that, well, you
often have to be creative and very patient, and gentle.
*In the interest of being gender neutral about this- I'm damned sure that
on more than one occasion there has probably been a single woman who
is a gunperson that has had the opposite problem. Probably doesn't
happen as often, but there are a lot of male hoplophobes out there,
too. IMO these might even be WORSE to deal with than the women!
-Mike