VG readers, it is hard to believe that any self-respecting person, much less someone who identifies as male, would actually publish a confessional like this: Firing an AR-15 is horrifying, menacing, and very very loud.

It feels like a bazooka — and sounds like a cannon.

Gersh Kuntzman, an award winning journalist at NY Daily Mail, is curious, and with all the talk about the big bad weapons of war in the news, he thought he should go try them out for himself.

But that is not the first reason he cited for trying out the AR-15 – what he said was this:

One day after 49 people were killed in the Orlando shooting, I traveled to Philadelphia to better understand the firepower of military-style assault weapons and, hopefully, explain their appeal to gun lovers.

So that’s what drives him to the range – seeing how it would feel to be a murderer?

Even in semi-automatic mode, it is very simple to squeeze off two dozen rounds before you even know what has happened. In fully automatic mode, it doesn’t take any imagination to see dozens of bodies falling in front of your barrel.

All it takes is the will to do it.

Forty nine people can be gone in 60 seconds.

Hey, that’s why I go the range, don’t you?

But what old Gersh finds out is that it is the gun itself – not the person behind it – that terrifies him:

I’ve shot pistols before, but never something like an AR-15. Squeeze lightly on the trigger and the resulting explosion of firepower is humbling and deafening (even with ear protection).

The recoil bruised my shoulder. The brass shell casings disoriented me as they flew past my face. The smell of sulfur and destruction made me sick. The explosions — loud like a bomb — gave me a temporary case of PTSD. For at least an hour after firing the gun just a few times, I was anxious and irritable.

Ahhh, deep breath. Warning, readers, some profanity does follow.

Gersh, I have to speak to you directly. You are a complete moron. I have to question what “pistols” you’ve shot before. They were water pistols weren’t they?! Can’t have been more than a .22 for you to have such a big surprise upon shooting some real ammunition.

And yeah, no shit, firing a gun is LITERALLY an explosion! What kind of cartoon Elmer Fudd expectation did you think was going to happen? A little flag popping out the end of the barrel that said “Bang!”?

Oh my, a bruise on your shoulder? Poor baby. Put some ice on it and suck it up buttercup. Yeah, you gotta watch out for white hot brass flying at your face and down your shirt. That’ll leave a mark. At least you (probably) weren’t wearing a bra where it could lodge nicely until it cooled off. I call Male Privilege!

Here's a 15 year old girl shooting an AR-15. No shoulder boo-boos like @GershKuntzman https://t.co/7kyPWLqdtQ

— High Quality Person (@thatbillokeefe) June 14, 2016

But I think my favorite part of your reaction was how the smell of sulfur made you sick. Don’t you know that’s the smell of FREEDOM, man?!

Nah, you wouldn’t – you couldn’t – appreciate that. You wouldn’t have even made it through the first day of boot camp – particularly because the thought of putting your country before yourself has never even occurred to you. You probably thought, “What kind of sorry suckers go in the military? Losers without futures, that’s who!” And you and your Park Slope buddies had a good laugh at the Food Coop.

Gersh’s Wikipedia page was updated to reflect his recent foray to the gun range, which notably was outside of his home state of New York:

On June 14, 2016, Kuntzman wrote an article about firing an AR-15 in which he repeatedly lied, misrepresented the capabilities of the weapon, and proved himself to be quite a pansy. The evil gun was loud and scared him. The men of America request that Kuntzman’s man card be immediately revoked and all privileges associated with it disallowed.

All this provides us responsible and respectable gun owners a good guffaw, but I have to warn you – you went too far. Everybody who’s reading this right now knows what’s coming next.

Sorry about your PTSD. I'll organize your parade. @GershKuntzman

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) June 14, 2016

How dare you even think, much less put into print, that you experienced “temporary PTSD”? You are simply despicable. You sit around in your cushy enclave comforted by your New York values and you have the nerve to say you’ve experienced PTSD because you fired a rifle? How distorted is your world view that you think you could possibly ever know what our combat veterans have gone through in order to protect your pathetic ass?

The only thing you ought to be saying after a trip to the gun range is Thank You. Thank you to our military service-members for the sacrifices they made for YOU, and to your lucky stars that you have the freedom to walk your little tree-lined neighborhood with your fluffy white dog and report on hotdog eating contests at Coney Island (and even star in your own silent movie about Coney Island hot dogs). Now that’s a life everyone should lead, right? “Those people out in fly-over country just don’t know what they’re missing,” I’ll bet is what you say in your cozy newspaper office.

So I’ll laugh at your pansy-boy reaction to firing a gun, but I say you are a sick fuck for wanting to shoot it the day after you hear about a massacre. I despise people like you who sit in your easy, warm and fuzzy lives, who think they have any right to be part of this conversation. You don’t own a gun, and never would, so what gives you the idea your opinion would be of any value? What gives you the gall to think I should be the one to part with my private property, that I should be the one to turn over my personal safety to someone else – someone with a gun?

You just proved you are certainly not someone who should ever be trusted with a firearm. But guess what Gersh? I’m not gonna tell you to carry one. So just to be fair, that means you shut your mouth about telling me what I “need” and what I don’t need. I’m a far better judge of that than someone like you will ever be. I’m also 100% per cent sure that if you were stuck in a bathroom in a nightclub at 2:00 in the morning hiding from a crazed man with an AR-15, you would be the first one crying for someone with a gun to come help you. You’re welcome.