LESLIE, Mich. - Gay rights usually are seen as part of the liberal agenda, with gun rights of interest to conservatives. So gays with guns cut across the grain of America's political landscape.

That's just fine with Albert Lowe, who is starting a Michigan chapter of the Pink Pistols, a gay gun-rights group with 37 chapters in the United States and at least 5,000 members.

"I'm politically incorrect, totally," the Leslie resident told the Detroit Free Press for a Monday story.

If the group takes hold in Michigan as it has in places such as California and Tennessee, the state could have a new set of hobby target shooters and a broader, stronger gun-rights lobby.

That is the aim of Lowe, who is in the early stages of building membership, and of some traditional gun-rights groups, which are eager to gain support.

"The more the merrier, in that battle," said Chuck Perricone, executive director of the Michigan Coalition for Responsible Gun Owners. "As long as they're supportive of the underlying issue, which is self-defense, we welcome their support."

Lowe said his primary reason for starting a Michigan chapter was to provide a forum to "go out and have fun target shooting" in an atmosphere that is friendly to gays, lesbians and others who may not feel comfortable in traditional gun groups.

But Lowe, who said he has a permit to carry concealed weapons, said he also supports loosening Michigan's gun laws.

"There are a lot of people in the lifestyle who are interested in firearms," said Lowe, 47. "And there are some of the more conservative gun groups around who are not friendly toward the gay lifestyle. I've run across a few people who didn't like me because of my viewpoints and such."

A few years ago, while living in Chicago, Lowe met Doug Krick, who started the first Pink Pistols group in Boston and started a Web site.

"The next thing I know, I'm having people calling me from across the country saying, 'I want to play. Can I set up a chapter?' It wasn't my intention. But I'm not complaining," said Krick, 32.

From there, the Pink Pistols morphed from a collection of gun enthusiasts to a more political group that educates, lobbies and speaks out in favor of gun rights in the gay community.

The Pink Pistols' Web site is peppered with adages boosting self-defense, such as "Armed gays don't get bashed" and "Pick on someone your own caliber."

Indeed, Krick said he believes "when the queer community can defend themselves, they're no longer going to be perceived as an easy target."

That is a dangerously misled assumption, said Jeffrey Montgomery, executive director the Triangle Foundation, a Detroit-based gay rights group.

"Like many minority communities who are routinely targeted and highly at risk of being victims of violence, ours would be a community I would hope that would lead the discussion and debate in favor of gun control," Montgomery said. "I firmly believe the presence of guns in confrontations does not diffuse those in any way, and does not make anyone safer."

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Pink Pistols, http://www.pinkpistols.org

Triangle Foundation, http://www.tri.org