Thursday Humor At The Blog

 

Wheelgun Wednesday -- From The Gatdaily Website - The S&W Model 13 The FBI's Last Revolver

  https://gatdaily.com/

 https://gatdaily.com/articles/the-sw-model-13-the-fbis-last-revolver/

Sunday With Blackthorn - "The Best , Worst Option"

 The Best, Worst Option
By John Johnston

Every person is a problem solver, and each individual has a framework of how they approach this problem solving. While it’s true that not everyone is aware of their framework, everyone does generally have one. Where this creates issues inside of the world of personal protection is when the framework isn’t built acknowledging the reality that we can make mistakes and things can go very wrong.

Perhaps even worse than ignoring that reality, that negative outcomes are possible, is
when people confuse a negative outcome for a positive one. Here’s the bad news: there’s an elephant in the room that more people should be talking about.

Defending yourself with a gun isn’t a good outcome. In fact, defending yourself with a
gun is a very negative outcome. To be clear, people should defend themselves when
forced to. But what we need to fully comprehend is using a gun to protect ourselves is
only a good outcome compared to the worse option of being killed or seriously injured
during a violent encounter.

OUTCOMES
Every single action we take will result in an outcome. While it’s true that we live in a world with a lot of shades of gray, for our purposes it’s useful to think of potential outcomes as either positive or negative. Some outcomes are easily identifiable as negative. For instance, there wouldn’t be much disagreement if you were to ask people whether being killed or injured was a negative outcome. Likewise, if you ask someone to identify whether it’s a positive or negative outcome to be sentenced to 30 years in prison following a shooting, I’d have serious questions for anyone who said that was anything other than negative.

Where things become interesting is when you start to factor in the potential outcomes.
After all, there are rarely any certainties in life. We often make decisions uncertain of
what the outcome will be. By their very nature, self-defense incidents are chaotic and
uncertain events. The potential for negative outcomes inside of these situations is high,
and being killed or injured isn’t the only way that they can go wrong for the self-defender.

CALLING CAPTAIN OBVIOUS
Yes, saying “using a gun is only a good thing when compared to the worse option of being killed or seriously injured,” may seem like a completely obvious and pointless
observation to make. But when we begin to think in terms of potential outcomes, we see
that no matter how justified you may be in the moment, there are a lot of seriously bad
things that can only happen after a gun is introduced into a situation. Whether those
seriously bad things are better than the alternatives of being killed or injured is a question
you need to ask yourself. Some outcomes may, in fact, be just as bad as death or grievous injury. The other thing to keep in mind is that we’re currently speaking in certainties,
and real life rarely works that way.

Self-defense situations and their aftermath are very often full of ambiguity. You might be killed or injured if you don’t act. You might run afoul of an overzealous prosecutor looking to catapult themselves into the national spotlight. You might be the only one capable of saving your own life in the moment. You might be just fine. There’s no way of knowing ahead of time. These are all risks inherent in any encounter, and it’s also
important to acknowledge that we can never make an encounter entirely risk-free.

RISK
Everyone conducts, at least on the subconscious level, personal risk assessments.
The decision to own or carry a firearm for personal protection is rooted in acknowledging that there is at least some level of risk that you might be targeted for criminal violence. You’re worried about being targeted for criminal violence, that sounds like a decidedly unpleasant scenario, so you decide to mitigate the risk of being targeted for criminal violence by having a firearm.

There’s an issue with this framework though: a firearm doesn’t mitigate the risk of being targeted for criminal violence. A firearm, plus the skill and will to use it, simply lowers the chances that you’ll be seriously injured or killed after you’ve been targeted for criminal violence.

A SPECIFIC, NICHE TOOL
Defensively, firearms are an incredibly specific and niche tool. Think of them as
the parachute of self-defense items. If you find yourself falling out of a plane, nothing
other than a parachute will do, and if you ever need a gun, chances are high that you’ll
really need it. The flip side of that is that if you don’t need a gun but use one anyway,
you’ve significantly increased your likelihood to be able to cross “sentenced to prison” off your bucket list. So, if guns are the defensive equivalent to a one-trick pony, why does
the community spend so much time focusing on them?

The aftermath of even the most clear-cut self-defense shootings are stressful, costly events. And what happens if it’s not a clear-cut shooting? If there’s any level of ambiguity inside of a shooting, the possibility exists to have the entire nation armchair quarter-backing every decision you made during the worst moment of your life.

With these thoughts in mind, it becomes clear that due to the potential for negative
outcome that exists inside of every encounter, most of our efforts at personal
protection should be dedicated to avoiding trouble. But sometimes, despite our best efforts, trouble finds us. This is what your CCW is for.

I’D RATHER NOT
When you build your self-defense problem-solving framework around the foundation that using the gun is just the better of two very bad options, while also acknowledging that there’s the potential for Very Bad to happen in any violent encounter, it becomes amazingly simple to focus on ways to avoid situations that have even a remote chance of going sideways. Just play the tape forward and examine the potential outcomes.

We’ve all found ourselves in moments where the potential for things to go wrong were present. Revisit some of these and reexamine your priorities. Brushing off the rude stranger or ignoring the amazingly bad motorist becomes child’s play when you consider that given the right set of circumstances either of those events might spiral out of control.

You need to ask yourself “Do I really want to willingly put myself in a situation where if
things get out of hand, I might be forced to use my firearm?”

 I can’t answer for you, but I’d rather not.

When Confronted, Go Low First!

 Don't let your ego get in the way when a situation develops. Take David James Advice and GO LOW!

 

Today We Have Another Message From David James About Being Prepared And Alert

When Is It Not Wheelgun Wednesday? -- When It's Lever Gun Instead Day!!

 

 I'm a Lever Gun guy from way back. And since finding a decent Wheelgun article or video that's worth putting up is not that easy, I think a Lever Gun Article or video makes a more than suitable replacement.  So sit back, get an adult beverage or a cup of your favorite coffee, and settle in for a brief but informative read on how to 'Run a A Lever Action The Right Way' for all you guys who've never had the pleasure of shooting an iconic American rifle that has withstood the test of time. Over 150 years to be just about right.

 

 https://www.fieldandstream.com/guns/how-to-run-lever-gun/

Sunday With Blackthorn - Pat MacNamara On Situational Awareness

Pat MacNamara with another Podcast. This time on Situational Awareness for regular people, not the kind of "Tacticool" material you read about in the Gun Rags.

David James On Unarmed Knife Defense Bullshit

 I've seen and practiced a lot of "Unarmed Knife Defense" techniques over the course of my MA/SD practice. And I am going to say it straight out, I have never seen one that I considered what so many people these days refer too as "A High Percentage" technique. Some were simply better or worse than others.

 But not a single one impressed me as something to stake your life on.

 Having said that,  let David James give you a little insight into some issues with the current state of finding yourself unarmed against an assailant.