Number one reason: Because THEY don’t want you to.
Reason #?? should be that 5.56mm/.223cal ammo is extremely common, unlike many other calibers, and in a SHTF situation, can come in handy.
cause it’s redneck cool...
Kewl! I can just drive on down to Dick’s Sporting Goods and buy....
Oh...
Wait......
Nevermind.
(I actually built my AR)
Actually, the M-16 was derived from the AR-15.
Reporter Deterrent.
That is a reason that would throw fear in the hearts of any Jack-booted thugs in the employ of a dictatorship. Knowing that in confrontations, some fully automatic weapons would be picked up by those in revolt and knowing that a goodly portion of them may have been combat trained would also cause the police and military to pause.
#11 Feral hogs.
#12 Bacon
11. Because the people who don't want me to have one, don't want me to live.
The AR-15 predates the M-16 version with select fire. It’s a great general purpose design with lots of commodity support.
#1, per my wife, “because THEY don’t want you to.”
AK-47 | AR15 / M16 / M4 | Mosin-Nagant |
It works even though you seldom clean it. | It works as long as you buy the $9/ounce special non-detergent synthetic teflon infused oil. | It was last cleaned before entering Berlin in 1945. |
You can hit the broad side of a barn from inside. | You can hit the broad side of a barn from 600 meters. | You can hit the farm from the adjacent county. |
Cheap magazines are readily available. | Cheap magazines melt. | What is magazine? |
Your safety is a broad lever audible 300 meters away. | You can silently flip off the safety with your finger on the trigger. | What is safety? |
AK-47 | AR15 / M16 / M4 | Mosin-Nagant |
Your rifle came with a cheap nylon sling. | Your rifle now has a 9-point stealth tactical suspension system. | Your rifle came with two dog collars and a leash. |
Your rifle's finish is varnish and paint. | Your rifle's finish is teflon and polymers. | Your rifle's finish is low-grade shellac, cosmoline, and Soviet toenail polish. |
Your bayonet makes a pretty good wire cutter. | Your bayonet makes a pretty good steak knife. | Your bayonet is as long as your leg. |
You can mount your bayonet and intimidate your foe. | You can mount your bayonet and make your foe laugh. | You can bayonet your foe on the other side of the river without leaving your hole. |
Recoil is manageable. | What is recoil? | Recoil is often used to relocate a shoulder dislocated by the previous round. |
Your sight adjustment goes to an uncalibrated "10", but you have never bothered changing it. | Your sight adjustment is calibrated in fractions of minute of angle. | Your sight adjustment goes to 1200 arshins, and you've actually tried it. |
AK-47 | AR15 / M16 / M4 | Mosin-Nagant |
Your rifle is used by two-bit nations' illiterate conscripts to fight elite forces worldwide. | Your rifle is used by elite forces to fight two-bit nations' illiterate conscripts worldwide. | Your rifle has fought against itself and it won every time. |
You paid $350. | You paid $900. | You paid $59.95. |
If your rifle breaks, you can repair it with a hammer. | If your rifle breaks, you can take your rifle to a certified AR15/M16/M4 gunsmith, if it is still under warranty. | If your rifle breaks, it is cheapest and easiest to just buy a new one. |
You buy cheap Yugoslav ammunition by the case. | You carefully reload precision crafted rounds one at a time. | You dig your ammunition out of a Ukrainian farm field and it works just fine. |
You can change between 7.62 mm and 5.54 mm, most easily by buying a second rifle. | You can change cartridge sizes by pushing a couple of pins and installing a new upper receiver. | You know that no real man would suggest that there is anything other than 7.62x54R. |
Favorite movie: Red Dawn | Favorite movie: Black Hawk Down | Favorite movie: Enemy at the Gates |
AK-47 | AR15 / M16 / M4 | Mosin-Nagant |
You could accessorize your rifle with a new muzzle brake or a modified stock. However, Ivan Chesnokov will tell you that you should not. | Your rifle's accessories are more expensive than your already expensive rifle. | Your rifle's accessory is a small tin can with a funny lid. But it's buried under an apartment building somewhere in Budapest. |
You would really like to have an autographed photo of Mikhail Kalashnikov. | You would really like to have an autographed photo of Eugene Stoner. | You're uncertain if there were cameras when Sergei Mosin was alive. |
Late at night you sometimes have to fight the urge to hold your rifle over your head and shout "Wolverines!" | Late at night you sometimes have to fight the urge to clear your house, slicing the pie a room at a time. | Late at night you sometimes have to fight the urge to dig a fighting trench in the yard to sleep in. |
Service life: 71 years. | Service life: 55 years. | Service life: 127 years, so far. |
Lol, another FR firearms thread, alternately hilarious and horrifying! :)
Never liked it. Still don’t.
To each his own. I would rather have an M-14.
.
I like my Rugers, and they don’t look like something a d!ckless MR would cherish.
Because I’m a Natural Born American Citizen with God Given Inalienable Rights.
No need to list any other reason.
I LOVE my AR-15s! They never do anything that I don’t want them to do.