In lieu of my prep hour, I had lab duty today. I always like to sit in the back of the room so I can monitor students computers, make sure there not looking at inappropriate material. About halfway through the class period I noticed that a few students were looking at some gun related youtube videos. These were mainly military/tactical videos, but they were watching some hunting ones as well. Felling the need to dress the part of self-proclaimed gun-nut, they were stereotypically dressed in the appropriate attire (camo hat, carhartt jackets, and worn jeans). Everything would have been right as rain, except for the fact that at least 90% of what they were saying was pure dribble. After a while of hearing them have there go at each other, I felt the need to step in and set the record straight. Anyway, here are some examples of the arguments these students were making with one another.

Argument: The 30-06 is WAY more powerful than a .308
Logic: The military has used the 30-06 longer than the .308 because the .308 drops like a rock.
Interjection: I actually made them look this claim up using ballistic charts; 3in at 500yds is not a significant difference.

Argument: You NEED a .50 cal to shoot long range
Logic: The military uses the .50 cal as a long range sniper round because it’s the only round that has enough power to kill at that range. Plus, the round doesn’t drop that much.
Interjection: While there is some degree of truth to the bigger the round/the farther it can shoot theory, a 50BMG is not really needed. There are many cartridges that will shoot out to 1000yds that are much less cost prohibitive to shoot. It can even be done, gasp!, with a .308. Bullet drop is not much of an issue, so long as you have enough windage adjustment in your scope to compensate. This led to a lengthy argument on why the 7mm and .338 were potentially just as good, if not better than the .30 cal for long range shooting.

Argument: The Marines are now using 6.8 SPC
Logic: They wanted something with more knockdown power
Interjection: it is unlikely that an entire branch of the military will move away from a standard NATO round. It boils down to two things, cost and logistics.

Back in my day we had to bring gun magazines to school to get this wonderful information

Back in my day they were shooting 1000 yd matches with the 45-70 !!

Try to teach those kids to separate internet BS from fact .You can find both on the computer.

Inform them again (physics 101) that superior velocity [within reason] will affect negatively gravitational pull.

Did you explain to them that it doesn't matter what caliber you shoot if you can't shoot? I have a friend who just bought him a 338 lapua, just because of the gun he thought he could hit anything. Last he showed me he was up to six inch groups at one hundred yards.
All the speed and lack of drop will never make up for a guy that can shoot good.