In Light of the Recent Shootings....

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Convenience stores are a high target for robberies especially at night. Yet how often do we see comments that the poster carries a small size, small caliber handgun when going to convenience store late at night because it is easy to slip in the pocket of the shorts/pants?
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But see this misses a fundamental fact: that is that the person in your example probably has and probably will enter convenience stores thousands upon thousands of times and never once happen to be there when somebody does something violent. And further if somebody does do something violent when our friend here is in the store, reaching for a firearm is not necessarily part of the right course of action for him to take. Then yet further, having that small easily carried handgun is quite likely to be perfectly adequate if he needs to draw and defend himself and/or cover his retreat from the scene.

The subsets of instances where that guy is going to walk into a convenience store and while he's there someone's going to do something violent, and that something violent is going to require our friend to draw a weapon, and the situation is for some reason going to require that the weapon only is effective if it's a large powerful one, is a very very very small subset. Most likely having any gun whatsoever is way more preparation than he will ever need.

Honestly, soft body armor would quite literally be more of a reasonable addition to anyone's defensive carry gear then a bigger more powerful handgun. And yet every time we discuss whether or not any of us who aren't cops would wear body armor for a trip to the convenience store, or in other bit of our day-to-day life, the idea pretty much gets labeled absurd.
 
Sam1911 said:
Honestly, soft body armor would quite literally be more of a reasonable addition to anyone's defensive carry gear then a bigger more powerful handgun. And yet every time we discuss whether or not any of us who aren't cops would wear body armor for a trip to the convenience store, or in other bit of our day-to-day life, the idea pretty much gets labeled absurd.
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I completely agree. It's comical, really, how much stock folks will put into winning a "gunfight" if it comes to that, worrying about getting the first hit, more hits on target, moving so you don't get shot, all this other stuff...but mention carrying a tourniquet on your person or wearing some kind of armour and whoa look out you're a paranoid psycho freak
 
Varminterror said:
I won't be mild about it, because this kind of mindset is dangerous - The responsible reaction by a civilian is NOT the same as that by an LEO.
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Not exactly the same, but many responsible citizens have responsibility for others that extends to a duty to protect - a man in his own home and on his own property - a pastor in his own church - a business owner with respect to his employees and his place of business - any individual that others are implicitly or explicitly relying on for safety and security.

One occasion where I brought a firearm into play was when a pedestrian crossing my farm field became threatened by a bull I owned. I think I acted reasonably in defending the third party.

Another occasion where I brought a rifle into play was when some teenage miscreants threatened to throw a third party who was in my care off of a cliff. I was the caretaker of the property where the event occurred. The third party was powerless to resist or protect themselves. Once the rifle came into play, they ran like rats.

The police may or may not have had a duty to protect in those circumstances, but I was there (they were not), I had a rifle, and I felt I had a duty to act.
 
What do investment companies tell us right after boasting huge returns on last year’s investments? “Past performance is not indicative of future outcome.”

It’s similar with crime stats, more so with terrorism. When you’re the one being robbed, statistics no longer matter. “I’m not getting shot, it’s statistically not possible!”

As for caliber, what happened to shot placement?
 
But see this misses a fundamental fact: that is that the person in your example probably has and probably will enter convenience stores thousands upon thousands of times and never once happen to be there when somebody does something violent.

Which actually places the person MORE at risk due to complacency.

How many people scan the vehicles in parking lot, look for people outside the building, look into the building BEFORE opening the door?

For example is that person standing outside the store really just taking a smoke break or is he acting as a lookout?

Or how is the clerk acting? Does he/she act like they are ringing up a normal transaction or are they standing frozen facing someone on the other side of counter?

The subsets of instances where that guy is going to walk into a convenience store and while he's there someone's going to do something violent, and that something violent is going to require our friend to draw a weapon, and the situation is for some reason going to require that the weapon only is effective if it's a large powerful one, is a very very very small subset.

Again you are making a powerful argument for not carrying a small caliber handgun. If I have to make the choice to draw and shoot in a situation that has turned violent I want a powerful gun and cartridge that will end things here and now. It is of no small comfort to my family if my attacker dies 30 minutes later than I did.

When I was a clerk at a shop-n-rob I carried a cocked and locked Detonics 45 under my smock against company policy. If it was only money that wanted they were welcome to it. But if they forced me to kneel or to go to the back stock room I figured I was a dead man in which case I was going to draw and shoot the robber. If I was lucky enough to get a shot off I wanted it to be a powerful proven man stopper.

Honestly, soft body armor would quite literally be more of a reasonable addition to anyone's defensive carry gear then a bigger more powerful handgun.

You will be dismayed to find out how many leo’s don’t bother to wear their body armor. Concealable soft body armor isn’t all that comfortable.

I do think it is a good idea for employees at stop-n-robs, liquor store and other occupations that involve large amount of money or valuables such as gold and jewelry. But employers at stop-n-robs and liquor stores find it cheaper to hire minimum wage employees and buying personal body armor is not affordable for a low-paid person trying to support a family.
 
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Here is something I'm getting more serious about carrying.
http://darkangelmedical.com/blog/how-to-roll-your-own-kit/?mc_cid=926abd8e44&mc_eid=a1d5137709
From the link;
"Remember, it’s your kit and you can keep adding more and more stuff to it but in a stressful situation we fall to our lowest level of training and when we do that, more ‘stuff’ can become confusing instead of us going right for the piece of equipment we need. Confusion leads to hesitation. Hesitation leads to exsanguination. Exsanguination leads to expiration. Expiration leads to frustration and possible litigation. Keep it simple.


The last point we’ll make is of the utmost importance and that is to get the training you need to effectively employ your equipment. It does you no good to carry a kit if you can’t use it. Know WHAT to carry, HOW to use it, WHY you’re using it and WHEN to use it because you’re way more likely to use the med kit than you ever will your firearm. Fact.


Med kits and training may not seem as cool as that sweet new blaster you bought, but the last time I checked, watching myself or my buddy bleed out ain’t too cool either."
 
sootch00 has really good videos on youtube under Sensible Prepper. Some of them are about first aid and how to store/carry first aid supplies and what to put in it.

However this subject is off topic of the O.P's original question which is how many are changing their carry habits. It seems most of THR members are not.
 
BSA1 said:
sootch00 has really good videos on youtube under Sensible Prepper. Some of them are about first aid and how to store/carry first aid supplies and what to put in it.

However this subject is off topic of the O.P's original question which is how many are changing their carry habits. It seems most of THR members are not.
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Fair enough, but he asked if we were going to change any of our carry habits, and that's about all I'm going to change. Wasn't trying to derail the thread or anything.
 
Fiv3r said:
I generally pack a gun in the car that is more powerful than my carry gun like a rifle or shotgun "just in case" I get into a scrape or get stranded some place I really would rather not be. Maybe I need to look into a beater AK or barebones AR or handy scatter gun. These don't take up any real room in the trunk and I think I would have access to them rather than another sidearm.
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How do you secure it from being stolen out of the trunk?
 
Double Naught Spy said:
If you are going to change your carry habits because of recent shootings, then you are probably changing your carry habits for all of the wrong reasons. You are exceptionally unlikely to be involved in a public mass shooting if you are not a drug dealer or gang member. However, all the same and constant threats remain of being robbed, raped, assaulted, or murdered by any number of people, particularly drug addicts (robbed or assaulted) or family (assaulted or murdered). Chances are, the person that harms you will be somebody that you know and not some unknown stranger who walks into Wal-mart or church and starts shooting.

There are very real threats to consider and all very real reasons to carry a significant gun, but absolutely very low on the list is being involved in some sort of public mass shooting.
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Depends a lot on where you live. In an urban environment there are many attacks by people with whom the victim has no prior relationship.
 
Cooldill said:
Just what were those Vegas concert goers supposed to do?

Return fire from 400 yards away at a dark hotel window, at night, with their carry guns??

Do you REALLY think something you can conceal in your pants is going to be effective there??

Sorry folks, sometimes it's best to just take cover and run like hell, not play hero with your LCP or J frame.
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For Vegas you are right.
For the church in Texas, no, even ONE armed congregant could have made a signficant difference.
 
old lady new shooter said:
Depends a lot on where you live. In an urban environment there are many attacks by people with whom the victim has no prior relationship.
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Where you are does not seem to matter.

And every domestic violence event has the attacker and one or more of the victims knowing each other. Student-based school shootings, the victims know the shooter in some form. Workplace shootings, same thing.

Familial mass murders are more common than stranger-based mass murders.

Of course there are attacks where there is no relationship. I would never argue that there wasn't. I would argue that we tend to overlook the very ugly aspect that we don't want to believe that somebody we know, or somebody close to us would ever harm us, but the reality is that it happens all too often and many such events are not very newsworthy. It happens in the country. It happens in the city. It happens in urban areas and "peaceful" little sleepy bedroom communities and when such events are brought to light, you hear the oft-repeated claim, "I can't believe it happened here."
 
danez71 said:
Sam, Here's some info I think you would like. Lots of valuable, hard data by the FBI with quite a bit of detail. Titled: A Study of Active Shooter Incidents in the United States Between 2000 and 2013

The link still works below and is in pdf. I suggest you download it - Who knows how long it will be there.

Its not 100% related to this thread but it has info that is relevant to your post and its just darn good data for these (generally speaking) types of threads. The new format of THR changed my post just a bit.


Said by me/danez71 in 2015 on THR,
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John Lott has an article on that study at http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/11/12/good-guys-with-guns-saving-lives.html.
 
Sam1911 said:
No I assure you I am not. You posted some things about the very real threat of terrorism. I posted some things that said this is not a very serious, even remotely likely, concern to any of us as individuals. You pretty much posted something that said you feel I'm hung up about the numbers and that you don't find statistics to be worthwhile indicators of risk.
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You can speak for yourself, but you can't speak for "any of us as individuals". You live in a more rural area than those of us who live in urban areas. And some of us are members of ethnic or religious groups singled out for targeting by certain other groups.
 
Double Naught Spy said:
Where you are does not seem to matter.

And every domestic violence event has the attacker and one or more of the victims knowing each other. Student-based school shootings, the victims know the shooter in some form. Workplace shootings, same thing.

Familial mass murders are more common than stranger-based mass murders.

Of course there are attacks where there is no relationship. I would never argue that there wasn't. I would argue that we tend to overlook the very ugly aspect that we don't want to believe that somebody we know, or somebody close to us would ever harm us, but the reality is that it happens all too often and many such events are not very newsworthy. It happens in the country. It happens in the city. It happens in urban areas and "peaceful" little sleepy bedroom communities and when such events are brought to light, you hear the oft-repeated claim, "I can't believe it happened here."
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I'm coming from the opposite end of the experience continuum. I live in an urban area and the crime reports for my neighborhood show much higher incidence of plain old assault than domestic violence. There will typically be six assaults per month within a mile of my house but maybe two instances per year of domestic violence.
 
You can speak for yourself, but you can't speak for "any of us as individuals". You live in a more rural area than those of us who live in urban areas. And some of us are members of ethnic or religious groups singled out for targeting by certain other groups.
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Eh, perhaps that's a poor choice of words. I can't speak for YOU or any individual, and what you are concerned about. That's just poor writing on my part.

A look at sheer numbers indicates that these are not present, numerically non-zero, risks to any individual member of society.

And certainly it's possible that you are of a religious group which is so heavily targeted by some other religious group for violence that you see a statistically significant elevated risk, but that would have to be a very special case. Neither being a Christian, or Jew, or Hindu, etc., -- nor being an urbanite -- means you are literally at great or significant risk.

Essentially, it's a matter of quantity zero, times some multiplier, still equals zero. We simply don't have enough cases of these sorts of attacks to statistically make any individual response to them logical.
 
Logical, rational fears are such to any average observer. Irrational, illogical constructs typically are such to any average observer - assuming the observer sufficiently weighs given evidence.

My 4yr old son has off and on for about a year and a half fought nightmares about coyotes coming out of his closet and eating him. Despite understanding coyotes can't get into our house, and knowing he is safe in his bed, he sleeps better having a small nerf gun under his pillow. It's not impossible for a coyote to get into our home and attack him, but in any realm of plausibility or likelihood of probability, it's not going to happen, and even if it DID happen, his planned solution, a non-lethal toy, would not save him. It is my contention, based on all presented evidence I've seen, the belief an extra firearm or ammunition in your vehicle is no more rational or logical as a means of protection than my son's nerf blaster...

1620588_10151959522070678_218324520_n.jpg
 
Double Naught Spy said:
Where you are does not seem to matter.

And every domestic violence event has the attacker and one or more of the victims knowing each other. Student-based school shootings, the victims know the shooter in some form. Workplace shootings, same thing.

Familial mass murders are more common than stranger-based mass murders.

Of course there are attacks where there is no relationship. I would never argue that there wasn't. I would argue that we tend to overlook the very ugly aspect that we don't want to believe that somebody we know, or somebody close to us would ever harm us, but the reality is that it happens all too often and many such events are not very newsworthy. It happens in the country. It happens in the city. It happens in urban areas and "peaceful" little sleepy bedroom communities and when such events are brought to light, you hear the oft-repeated claim, "I can't believe it happened here."
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If some guy who happens to have been in one of your classes is the shooter I don't think it makes much difference to anything that you recognize said guy as 'hey I think he was in my bio lab last year"
 
Sam1911 said:
Eh, perhaps that's a poor choice of words. I can't speak for YOU or any individual, and what you are concerned about. That's just poor writing on my part.

A look at sheer numbers indicates that these are not present, numerically non-zero, risks to any individual member of society.

And certainly it's possible that you are of a religious group which is so heavily targeted by some other religious group for violence that you see a statistically significant elevated risk, but that would have to be a very special case. Neither being a Christian, or Jew, or Hindu, etc., -- nor being an urbanite -- means you are literally at great or significant risk.

Essentially, it's a matter of quantity zero, times some multiplier, still equals zero. We simply don't have enough cases of these sorts of attacks to statistically make any individual response to them logical.
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Take the door off your house then, it's statistically unlikely that an intruder will come in.
 
old lady new shooter said:
Take the door off your house then, it's statistically unlikely that an intruder will come in.
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This statement isn't accurate, and doesn't represent the magnitude of "almost zero" which terrorist attacks, spree killings, active shooter situations represent - especially those in which a stashed firearm in a vehicle would have been an apt solution.

A quick google search confirms somewhere around 3.7 million home invasion robberies per year. There are about 125.8 million households in the US, so right at 3% of homes are affected annually.

However, even if a guy exaggerated and claimed 10,000 Americans were killed in active shooter/terrorist attacks in the last two decades (which is a GROSS exaggeration, somewhere on the order of 2-3x the actual number), out of 325 million, you're talking about 0.0003% per year.

So you're literally 10,000 times more likely to have a home invasion than be a victim of such an attack...
 
Take the door off your house then, it's statistically unlikely that an intruder will come in.
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And this is a perfect example of why it's hard to have serious, thoughtful conversations about emotionally gripping matters.

You fear terrorist attacks and so can't differentiate relative levels of real risk.
 
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