Pete Buttigieg Chides Gun Owners Who Have ‘Sense of Manhood’ Wrapped Up in Guns

Mayor Pete Buttigieg criticized some gun owners on Friday, suggesting it was sad that their “sense of manhood” depended on owning a gun.

In an interview with TMZ Live on Friday, Buttigieg was asked about the Twitter feud between former Congressman Beto O’Rourke and Texas Republican Representative Briscoe Cain.

After O’Rourke told gun owners that “Hell, yes, we’re gonna take your AR-15″ during the Democrat debate on Thursday, Cain dared Beto O’Rourke on Twitter to come and take his AR-15.

Buttigieg agreed with O’Rourke that Cain’s comment on Twitter was a “death threat,” and the South Bend mayor admonished Cain for failing to have a more intelligent conversation about gun issues.

“[I]f it gets to where your sense of manhood is wrapped up in owning a gun, I think that’s where our culture is on the wrong track,” Buttigieg said, referring to the controversy.

Buttigieg said that a gun was effectively “a tool” and should be treated as such.

“We’ve got to think about the relationship we have with our weapons,” he said. “Look, to me, a gun is a tool. It can be used as a tool for hunting. You can use it as a tool for sporting. You can even use it as a tool for self-defense.”

O’Rourke’s campaign reported Cain’s tweet to the FBI and Twitter as a death threat on Thursday, as O’Rourke spent most of Friday taunting the Texas lawmaker for his tweet.

“It really drives home the point, better than I could have made,” O’Rourke said on CNN on Friday. “Rep. Briscoe Cain is making the case that no one should have an AR-15 that they can hold over someone else in the country and say, look, if we disagree on something, let me introduce you to my AR-15.”