Every time I’ve fired a Glock, it feels like I’m using the handgun equivalent of Croc slippers. Blockish, ugly, without character. Comfortable and reliable but they remind me of Walmart for some reason. I’d rather internalize the knife of a home invader while attempting to clear the jam from a 1911 or Beretta 92 than defend my castle with those featureless door stops.
As such, I would derive great pleasure from watching those Austrian abominations erased from our great state. California is in the process of making my dream come true.
Assembly Bill 1127 passed several roadblocks in the state’s legislature last month and will soon face a final vote in the Senate. Starting in 2026, the bill would ban any new sales or transfers of semi-automatic handguns that can be modified to fire fully automatic.
Glock pistols and its imitations lend themselves to these modifications and the vulnerability applies to most models. “Glock switches”, which can be manufactured at home using 3D printers, are used to illegally convert the firing mode of some Glocks to fully automatic. The process takes about a minute.
Setting aside my contempt for Glocks, this is the sort of legislation that targets criminal activity in name only. The predominant effect that this law will have is to prevent law-abiding citizens from purchasing their preferred firearm. While gun data is generally limited, what we do have indicates that most gun crime is committed with illegally possessed guns – some estimates have it at around 80%.
The reasoning is fairly straightforward: in order to convert a Glock into fully automatic, one must break the law. Those who break the law to possess a very illegal fully automatic weapon to later use in crime are unlikely to care if California passes a law that bans certain handguns.
It’s hard to believe that this ban is going to stop violent gangs from getting their hands on Glocks.
They are more than willing to buy a Glock on the black market or take a quick trip out of state. Straw purchases are also common – criminals who would fail a background check get their more sparsely convicted buddy to purchase their gun. Since straw purchases are common ways that criminals acquire guns, this bill would indeed put an end to this in-state source. The effectiveness of cutting off a common source of some undesirable product is only good if there are no other easy alternatives to switch to. In this case, gangs and criminals have plenty of other options, not only in acquiring Glocks, but acquiring other fully-automatic weapons.
Criminals get their hands on firearms irrespective of how strict the gun laws are in their state. In states like California and New York with strict gun laws, researchers at John Hopkins found that 60% of inmates convicted of gun crime acquired their weapon illegally while in states with lax gun laws, that number was 40%. Criminals simply turn to the well-supplied black market.
The only people that this inconveniences are normal law-abiding citizens. Polls consistently show that a majority of Americans are in favor of stricter gun control laws but this doesn’t entail that any gun control laws are justified – they also have to be sensible and they have to achieve their desired effect. In this case, to make guns that are capable of killing a relatively high number of people less available to criminals.
The debate is too often oversimplified as gun control vs gun rights, as if it’s the case that either all gun control is good or all bad. Some gun control is good and we have to be able to make distinctions between good and bad policy. Universal background checks, modest waiting periods, restricting gun ownership for those with some mental illnesses, and those with a history of violent crime are examples of good gun control that most people support. What makes these good is that they reduce gun violence while reasonably respecting our right to bear arms.
Lawmakers may feel antsy about the increased use of glock switched handguns in crime. As a state, there isn’t a clear solution to the problem that California can implement. They can’t limit the manufacture of switches because they can be made at home by anyone with a 3D printer. There are millions of Glocks already in circulation and there isn’t much that can be done about Glocks from other states making their way into California’s cities. In the face of a seemingly intractable problem, they should resist the impulse to implement symbolic legislation that only hurts non-criminals and doesn’t solve the issue.
Rafael Perez is a columnist for the Southern California News Group. You can reach him at rafaelperezocregister@gmail.com.