American Suppressor Association’s (ASA) president and executive director Knox Williams sat down with Breitbart News to discuss the launch of a video series titled, “The Sound of Safety.”
The video series addresses basics, beginning with the ear and environmental protections achieved by shooting with suppressors.
The first video leans into hearing protection by asking, “Ever wondered what the difference is shooting with a suppressor and without one?”
Audio in video No. 2 allows viewer to hear how a suppressor removes the sharp, ear-splitting aspect of a gunshot but does not remove the sound of the shot altogether.
Breitbart News spoke exclusively with ASA president and executive director Knox Williams about “The Sound of Safety” and the current push to secure suppressor deregulation via the Hearing Protection Act, which has now been introduced in both the House and the Senate.
We discussed fighting misconceptions about suppressors and Williams said, “A suppressor does not silence a gun, rather, it takes away that dangerously loud sound from a gunshot, making it safer. That does not mean that it completely eliminates the risk to hearing posed by a gunshot, even suppressed gunshots can be very loud. The biggest disservice that Hollywood and anti-gun folks do is push this narrative that you can put a suppressor on a firearm and eliminate the sound of a gunshot. But anyone who shoots with a suppressor knows that is simply not true.”
He added, “At the end of the day, a suppressor really is one of the best tools to protect hearing and make the shooting experience safer.”
Williams then spoke about the environmental benefits of suppressors, noting that the devices serve to “reduce noise pollution.”
File/Twenty-two-year-old Englishman Ronald Chapman, credited with inventing the suppressor for revolvers, guns and machineguns, pictured with an early gun and suppressor in England. The suppressor seen here is fitted to a 19th century percussion revolver. Photograph – May 13, 1932 (Imagno/Getty)
He noted, “If you live near a shooting range or some place where there is a lot of hunting going on, you generally want people to be shooting with suppressors. It does not mean you won’t hear gunshots, but it is going to be a lot less disruptive.”
We discussed the Hearing Protection Act, which ASA supports, and other proposed pieces of legislation that would reduce or eliminate the cumbersome process for acquiring a suppressor.
Williams said, “We view suppressor deregulation as commonsense. And we would urge any legislator that may be on the fence about it to ask themselves whether their vehicle should have a muffler on it or not. Because at the end of the day, the muffler that reduces the noise of that vehicle’s internal combustion engine is doing the same thing a suppressor does, it’s just that one is attached to a car and one is attached to a firearm.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a member of Gun Owners of America, a Pulsar Night Vision pro-staffer, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly: awrhawkins@breitbart.com.