No, I agree. Many are extremely lax on firearm safety. I have been around them all my life, and have invested a great deal of time in training and practice and it's just one of those things I am always aware of when I handle any type of weapon. It took me a lot of practice to ingrain those procedures into my brain so that it has become second nature. When I see or hear of people talking about how they've "never even shot their gun, but if x ever comes around, he's going to be sorry". Every part of my being wants to just reach out, grab them, and force them to get some training. People think because they go hunting once or twice or go to "a" training class once every four years that they are set. That's how accidents happen.
Exactly. That's what makes me nervous about the laws here in particular... I'm not a gun law nut or an anti gun zealot by any means, I just think that if you're going to use firearms - even "just in case" - then you should know how to do so *safely*, for the benefit of yourself and others. After all, that "gun for protection" does you little good if you barely know how to fire it... and as I'm sure you know well, Doug, the most likely thing to happen in that situation is for the attacker to disarm you and use your own gun on you. (That kind of thing is another reason why I've decided not to carry my own gun - disarming me would be pretty easy, which is why my number one requirement for carrying anything for defense is "can I fit the *whole thing* in my hand, and if someone wrestles me for it, they can't break my grip unless they first break my fingers/wrist?".)
I absolutely believe in guns for protection/deterrents; about 10 years ago, a friend of my mother's was having trouble with a boyfriend she'd recently broken up with, and things had escalated to restraining order territory, after which her father bought her a gun. Said friend was the last person you'd think of as a gun owner, and swore up and down she didn't want one and would never use one. Her father persisted, taking her to lessons, teaching gun safety and taking her to the range. He wouldn't lay off until she could hit center mass with every shot. She thought he was being ridiculous. (Frankly, at the time, so did I... this friend was as feminine as they come, but also 6'2" and, so we all thought, could probably take this guy in a fight!)
One night not long after she'd shut the gun in a drawer, the guy broke into her house. She picked up the phone to call 911... he'd cut the phone line. She ran upstairs to get her cell phone - he knew where she kept it, and got there ahead of her... and then brandished a knife. (What kind of knife, I asked her later. "Are you kidding me? I don't know, it was a big a** knife and it was pointed at my face, I wasn't in the mood to ask what brand he was planning on killing me with!" Fair point.) She went for the gun, pointed it at him, and fired, hitting him in the stomach. He kept coming toward her. "You're supposed to fall down!" she screamed at him, and fired again. It took four shots to get him down on the ground, but he was still conscious and blocking the stairs, so she squeezed herself through the second story window. Broke her sternum in the fall, but otherwise okay. In the aftermath, she found out that he was high on all manner of drugs (thus why it took so many shots to bring him down), and in his car, all bagged up together, he had rope, barbed wire, duct tape, and a sledgehammer.
So yeah, guns can save lives (as well as having sustained us from a food perspective for lo these many years)... but in both cases, like any tool, they're only useful if you know how to use them properly.
After hearing this friend's story, I asked her, out of sheer curiosity (curse of a writer) if she thought she could have held him off long enough to get out the window if her dad had stopped at buying the gun... in other words, assuming everything was the same except for not having training, would it have gone roughly the same way?
"Not a chance," she answered. "I was terrified, my hands were shaking, it was one in the morning... and then when he kept coming at me after I shot him the first time, my mind went blank... I kept screaming at him, "You're supposed to *fall down*!" but then my training kicked in and I shot till he dropped and I had enough time to get away. Without training, he probably would have gotten the gun away from me after that first shot."
Incredibly, the guy did survive... only because he was "too high to die," according to the paramedics - but he later got shived in prison, so... all's well that ends well, or something.
Craziest thing is, as far as *she* knew, he'd never taken drugs before. Obviously *that* wasn't true!
Back to vaping my usual coffee/chocolate mix for the morning.
Thing is, there's an easy fix none of them seem to have realized; a friend of mine who's retired USAF (spinal injury took her out) carries hers on the inside of her shin. Actually *easier* to reach there when you're sitting down, and much less chance of accidental discharge.
