Concealed carry and the anti-gun wife

[Mazeman]

You can also let her read the old sheep/wolf/sheepdog analogy. Described here by Prof. Mike Adams.

Sounds like even though she tries to be a tough CEO, she's a sheep at heart.

 

[FLORIDA KEVIN]

dont build a wall when you need a bridge

I believe that your approach will further alienate your wife from your position on guns and concealed carry ! You should try presenting her with information that is factual and if possible unbiased !( I know thats not easy ) ! But if you treat her as a reasonable and competent adult and present facts to reduce her fears ,and ACT like a reasonable rational adult !She will come around, and become your ally instead of adversary ! good luck : Kevin

 

[Mazeman]

One more thought about this, and I speak from experience.

You say you're a 31 yo MD. Which means you probably recently finished training, or are about to. Which means you may *finally* be getting some more free time, the likes of which you may not have experienced since high school. Free time to read about current events, develop interests, develop stronger opinions...

Most of my strong beliefs and enjoyable hobbies really took shape after training, because I finally had the time to learn and enjoy things outside of medicine. Your wife may have married the "concept" of a doctor, but outside of medicine many training docs are still diamonds in the rough as far as being human beings. This may be a challenging time. A time when you will blossom a lot more rapidly as a complete INDIVIDUAL, as opposed to an adornment for your wife. Both of you need to understand this.

 

[orionengnr]

1) stop with the CCW thing until your wife is more comfortable. Unless you have a specific threat in mind (i.e. you are in the jewelry trade or have received death threats) this would be a reasonable course of action. Yeah, I know it's your right but the chances of you needing a gun while in public over the next few months (while you work the PR angles with the wife) are about 0.0000001%

Utterly ludicrous position. First, check your math. That is one in ten trillion. If that were a true statement, no-one in the history of the universe ever needed, or ever will need, a gun.

If you buy the "guns used 2.5 million times per year to prevent crime, most often without firing a shot", then the true average is more like one in ten. By my reckoning, anyone who doesn't carry is mentally ill.

As a physician and CEO it sounds as though you are, if not wealthy, at least pretty well off. The best part about being well off is that it tends to isolate you from the seedier parts of society. It also enables you to delegate many menial tasks to someone else - toilet clogged, call a plumber. Car runs rough, call a mechanic. Or just buy another. You can have groceries delivered or meals cooked for you. You never have to get your "hands dirty". All this is great but it tends to color one's perception about self-reliance, which is the reason many self-reliant people elect to carry.

For your wife guns are repugnant. They have no place in her clean and predictable world of breakfast meetings with bottled water served by eager assistants. After the evening workout at the health club, she's accustomed to driving her late model Lexus into your three car garage then relieving your baby's nanny. The thought of stopping off at the range for a half hour to hone her skills just doesn't compute. That's cowboy stuff.

It can be very difficult to understand that there is another world beyond yours. It's much more common, but you never see it or have to think about it. That's the world from which violent predators emerge. They would not understand your world any more than you could understand theirs. When their world intersects with yours, you may need to get your "hands dirty". Quick.

Sir, you have hit the proverbial nail squarely on the head. Great post.

 

[starshooter231]

I totally understand

My wife is an anti. She does not see the need for guns. She thinks the police and military should have them, but not us. She thinks it is fine to own a long gun IF you are a hunter thats it. She does NOT like that I have my CPL and carry a gun. "If you want to carry a gun be a cop". She knows (because I told her) that I carry EVERY where we go (that is legal) but doesn't understand why. She doesn't really seem to think about it. She just bought me some clothes and asked if I liked them? I told her yes because the length of the fleece and vest are long enough to hide my sidearm when OWB. She doesn't know it but I have taught her to buy the "right" clothes.

She HATES firearms,but I LOVE HER.

 

[Ed Ames]

Utterly ludicrous position. First, check your math. That is one in ten trillion. If that were a true statement, no-one in the history of the universe ever needed, or ever will need, a gun.

If you buy the "guns used 2.5 million times per year to prevent crime, most often without firing a shot", then the true average is more like one in ten.

Your numbers aren't so hot either. US Population is about 300 million. If you have 2.5 million uses per year that gives you one use in about 120 people. Then you take the time factor. I said, "Next Few Months." Call it 1/4th of a year. We're at one chance in four hundred eighty. 1:480.

Now we get to crime distribution. Most crime is committed by AND against people in the lower socioeconomic strata. Most crimes are committed in areas of resource deprivation aka poverty. That isn't a small factor... people in poverty experience 10 times the crime that wealthier people experience. So now we are at 1:4800. Quite a distance from your 1:10.

...then we get into controllable risks. If you know you are going to be more vulnerable for the next three months and it really freaks you out, deal with it.

Maybe the number is 0.0002% maybe it's 0.00001%. Yes, the risks are higher than my 0.0000001% figure by two or three zeros. No, that's not as big an error as your 10% figure. In any case it is vanishingly small. Note that you may need adjust your lifestyle to attain these levels of safety but that plays into the pro-carry argument the OP is trying to make to his wife. "Oh, we can't go there too many people have been killed doing that."

 

[Superlite27]

Remember: When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.

 

[30 cal slob]

i continue to believe that the best antidote for an anti-gun wife ...

is another pro-gun woman, particularly a firearms safety instructor.

best not to argue with the wife. as was wisely pointed out here by one of the mods, there is a husband-wife dynamic that gets in the way when one spouse tries to indoctrinate the other. so don't try.

have someone else do it. women will listen to each other.

offer to take your wife to a firearms safety/personal protection class taught by a qualified FEMALE instructor. bribe the wife to go if you have to.

give it some time, it will sink in.

 

[RubenZ]

women will listen to each other.

Aint that the truth. In regards to xmas decorations I suggested to my wife we put ribbon around our huge pillars. She thought it would look dumb UNTIL her mother said it would look cute

 

[Conqueror]

Curare - have you shown her the CDC report on gun legislation? I'm a medical student, and many of my peers are vehemently anti-gun. However, most educated folks in this country are at least aware of the CDC and accept it as a fairly authoritative, fairly unbiased resource (particularly folks in healthcare). When I demonstrate to my anti-gun friends that even the CDC was unable to conclude that gun restrictions curb violence, I at least get them to listen a little more intently to my side. Your wife, being educated, may be a little more receptive to the CDC data than to facts you get from any website with the word "gun" in the URL.

 

[Tokugawa]

Arguing statistics, eh? Well, ya know what they say about 'em.

The very un-pc truth is that most shootings occur in the inner city, and most of the shooters and shootee's are minority gangbangers.

Most of them are young males 14-25 AKA "children" ,and most of them have "guns in the home" and most of them are far more likely to kill an "acquaintance or family member."

The Brady bunch have twisted this to make it seem like all across middle class America, people are shooting one another. BS- There is a reason the latest official stat's on killings in NYC showed white males involved as killers or victims at a staggering 7% rate. Yes, seven percent.

 

[MiddleAgedKen]

When I met my wife, I had only a Remington 510 and was only mildly interested in/curious about guns. Parenthood and current events have changed my outlook--I am much more conservative than I was ten years ago and am a Second Amendment absolutist (and more into shooting as a hobby).

She doesn't like guns, to say the least. When I had the one .22 it wasn't a huge deal to her, but as we discuss getting more it becomes an issue. I am resolved to be patient, because in some ways I'm not the same person I was when we met. It wouldn't be fair, I think, to play Pharaoh ("so let it be written--let it be done") at this stage.

It would be changing the deal unilaterally, just as it wouldn't be fair for one's previously indifferent spouse to suddenly start drinking the Brady Kool-Aid and say, "It's the guns or me." That has not happened in my case, nor do I believe it ever will--it's just a hypothetical counter-example. Actually, from our conversations regarding issues and events, my honey is getting to be almost as conservative as I am these days--she just doesn't know it yet .

Anyway--she's the best, she puts up with a lot, so I don't push hard.

 

[Grizzly Adams]

I've read all of your journal posts and it appears that all of your conversations have been about you and your wife, statistics, and what is going to happen or which one of you is going to get killed. Try to bring the protection of your 2 y/o into the disscussion. Point out all of the abductions, rapes, and killings of children thats running rampart in this country. Also point out that in your finanical situation you are prime targets for burglaries. One thing you need to avoid is ultimatums.

 

[antsi]

I feel that I now have complete control of the academic aspect of the debate. I also told her that I am documenting the dates when she verbally abuses me--calling me "mentally ill," for going about armed.

This does not sound healthy to me.

If you are CCWing daily, then aren't already you getting what you want? Why do you keep stirring this pot? Have you thought about just leaving it alone for a while?

This sounds more like some kind of mind game or power struggle than an actual gun issue.

 

[divemedic]

Here is how I have won similar discussion and arguments:

1 I do not carry a gun because I think I am going to be in a gun fight. If I knew I was going to be in a gun fight, I would endeavor not to be there, because the best way to win a gun fight is to survive, and the best way to do that is not to get in gun fights. I carry a gun because I don't know what will happen, and I choose to be prepared.

2 Your odds of being killed in an assault are 1 in 211. Your odds of being killed in a car accident are 1 in 228, yet you are considered foolish if you decline to wear a seatbelt. Your odds of being killed in a fire are 1 in 1471, yet most of us have fire extinguishers.

Dying isn't the only hazard. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Justice, your lifetime odds of being a victim of violent crime are 1 out of 2. Maybe they will be nice and they won't kill you. Maybe they will be nice and only leave you maimed, incapable of going to work and confined to a hospital bed.

In the United States, police average an 8 minute response to a call for a violent crime, so calling the police will frequently result in them arriving AFTER the crime is over.

You can either rely on the mercy of a criminal willing to kill you over the $23 in your wallet, rely on a police officer that will be here in 6 to 8 minutes, or you can rely on yourself and carry a gun.

 

[Curare]

Here is how I have won similar discussion and arguments:

1 I do not carry a gun because I think I am going to be in a gun fight. If I knew I was going to be in a gun fight, I would endeavor not to be there, because the best way to win a gun fight is to survive, and the best way to do that is not to get in gun fights. I carry a gun because I don't know what will happen, and I choose to be prepared.

2 Your odds of being killed in an assault are 1 in 211. Your odds of being killed in a car accident are 1 in 228, yet you are considered foolish if you decline to wear a seatbelt. Your odds of being killed in a fire are 1 in 1471, yet most of us have fire extinguishers.

Dying isn't the only hazard. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Justice, your lifetime odds of being a victim of violent crime are 1 out of 2. Maybe they will be nice and they won't kill you. Maybe they will be nice and only leave you maimed, incapable of going to work and confined to a hospital bed.

In the United States, police average an 8 minute response to a call for a violent crime, so calling the police will frequently result in them arriving AFTER the crime is over.

You can either rely on the mercy of a criminal willing to kill you over the $23 in your wallet, rely on a police officer that will be here in 6 to 8 minutes, or you can rely on yourself and carry a gun.

That's gold.

Thanks for the advice everyone. Things are going well here. It has been quiet since the bathroom debate. Over time I believe that my wife will accept concealed carry--just as she accepted my love of firearms when I first met her.

 

[Nightwing]

Dude!!!! If you have any breakthroughs.... tell me! MY wife is the EXACT SAME WAY! Getting my concealed carry in like 1 month. Taking a class within the next 2 weeks or so and then just applying.
My wife fights me on EVERY ISSUE like this... so hard not to walk away when she starts acting like this.
Let me know.

 

[Black Adder LXX]

My wife was very anti and is coming around. Somebody earlier said:

A few incidents of "close-to-home" violence got my whole family more interested in firearms.

Some incidents have done the same for my family. Since I brought the first handgun home, I have done a lot of research on this and other boards. I've also learned a lot on Pax's corneredcat.com. Since then I have made sure to point out every instance of violent crime in our area (I don't often watch the news, but usually hear about stuff in my neighborhood on this board). As my wife has come to see how dangerous South Florida is, it has been a lot better. I've actually gotten my wife to go shooting with me, and I think she may be coming around on getting her own CCW... The trick is patience, and strategic conversations on the facts of how dangerous the world is...

 

[markmc753]

Here is how I have won similar discussion and arguments:

1 I do not carry a gun because I think I am going to be in a gun fight. If I knew I was going to be in a gun fight, I would endeavor not to be there, because the best way to win a gun fight is to survive, and the best way to do that is not to get in gun fights. I carry a gun because I don't know what will happen, and I choose to be prepared.

2 Your odds of being killed in an assault are 1 in 211. Your odds of being killed in a car accident are 1 in 228, yet you are considered foolish if you decline to wear a seatbelt. Your odds of being killed in a fire are 1 in 1471, yet most of us have fire extinguishers.

Dying isn't the only hazard. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Justice, your lifetime odds of being a victim of violent crime are 1 out of 2. Maybe they will be nice and they won't kill you. Maybe they will be nice and only leave you maimed, incapable of going to work and confined to a hospital bed.

In the United States, police average an 8 minute response to a call for a violent crime, so calling the police will frequently result in them arriving AFTER the crime is over.

You can either rely on the mercy of a criminal willing to kill you over the $23 in your wallet, rely on a police officer that will be here in 6 to 8 minutes, or you can rely on yourself and carry a gun.

Could you please site your source for these stats??
Thanks much!

 

[mgregg85]

I hate when people say that I am paranoid or that I live in fear because I choose to carry a pistol. I don't live in fear, I live in confidence. I'm confident that at least now in the very small chance that I might get attacked, I could defend myself. I know that it is rather unlikely to happen but your also unlikely to get into a car accident, yet people still wear seatbelts.

 

[yahkohb]

it's about her feelings, not the guns

As Chris Rock eloquently puts it, women are not handicapped by sense or logic in an argument.

More seriously, your actions are challenging her feelings on the issue, and this has clearly triggered a "fight or flight" response. right now she's fighting, and she's fighting over her feelings, not over your concealed carry permit. trying to overwhelm her with statistics and "win" the argument isn't going to do anything but piss her off and push her into "flight" mode. statistics and data alone are not enough to change someone's feelings.

I was in a similar situation. my wife didn't grow up around guns, had never been around guns, had never shot a gun. when we met, her opinion was along the lines of "the only reason you own a gun is to commit a crime". not surprisingly she didn't like the fact that I got a CHL. by the time we got married a couple years later, she was pretty much completely accepting. if it was up to her I think she'd still rather not have any guns in the house, even though she will occasionally get spooked and ask me if I'm carrying. what allowed her to change was seeing me, over time, own guns, use and carry them responsibly, without ever pressuring her or being in her face about it. there were many times when she didn't know I was carrying until she saw me put my pistol in the safe. I never made a big deal about it and tried not to respond with anything more than "it's just a gun", as if it were no more routine than tossing my keys, chapstick, and cell phone into my pocket.

what it ultimately boils down to for many folks who are uncomfortable with concealed carry is a misguided notion that carrying a gun will make you act differently. and what dispels this is her seeing you, over time, carry a gun and NOT acting differently. don't hide it, but definitely don't flaunt it, because that will only reinforce her beliefs. it's your example that is going to win her acceptance, not your words. so stop talking and start packing

 

[Maxinquaye]

HAH! My Ex was very anti gun when I met her. Also very much her own woman, successful exec, etc.

When we got married, she knew I had a gun safe and I knew she had two Tivos; everything was on the table.

The marriage didn't last more then 20 months (oil and water; we're still friends), but when we split up I left a .357 in the nightstand at her request.

Hopefully yours will come around like mine did.

 

[Markbo]

I am not about to give you or anyone marriage advice. Suffice it to say that your wife sounds a lot like my ex wife. My love of firearms, my passion for RTKBA and CCW were not what caused her to be my ex.

It was that I changed as a human being and she did not like it. I became a Christian, an activist and a better human being. I was tired of being in a purchasing co-op. I have less money, fewer material possessions and work a lot less hours. I also have so much more happiness today that I often wonder what was wrong with ME then.

She has become very, very happy. Each time we talk I take great pains to ask her "How are YOU? - How are you DOING?". She always responds by telling me what new and wonderful 'thing' she has obtained. A boat, a lake house, a Cadillac, ad nauseum. She is educated, owner of her own business and very opinionated.

Anyway, my current love was not an anti. She is a non. But she is absolutely vehement in her belief that NO ONE needs a 50 caliber sniper rifle or explosives or more than 10 round magazines and that the government has every right to legislate them just like they do cars. She is what liberals hope to make. She too thought it odd that I would carry a gun. She was very uncomfortable with it. I took her to the range, I told her about the statistics and most of all, I made my guns part of what I do around the house. It is not at all uncommon to have a gun parts on the kitchen counter... a 1911 taken apart on the coffee table. Not for cleaning though!! or a gun just laying on my desk. She rather likes the loaded shotgun in the bedroom.

All of this has eventually desensitized her to the point that she does not care. Now it is simply a non issue. I don't care what shoes she wears or earrings she matches and she doesn't care about my pistols. I like it that way and keep it that way.

I am not intimating this mirrors your story at all. I am just telling you my experience in hopes you can make it work for you. A marriage is worth fighting for too if you love and respect your partner, warts and all.

 

[Curare]

Dude!!!! If you have any breakthroughs.... tell me! MY wife is the EXACT SAME WAY! Getting my concealed carry in like 1 month. Taking a class within the next 2 weeks or so and then just applying.
My wife fights me on EVERY ISSUE like this... so hard not to walk away when she starts acting like this.
Let me know.

I'm probably the last person to give you marriage advice. This turned out to be like fights we have had regarding important issues over the years. We fought, we made up, and then we moved on. In some ways this has made us stronger, and each intereaction she is becomming more tolerant of concealed carry.

We went to a party downtown. I carried. She said, are you going to have anything to drink--I said "no," I don't want to break any laws. She replied that I was an "idiot," which is great progress.

At dinner yesterday I made the biggest step in the overall philosophical stance of our marriage. I told my wife that she sounded a lot like a Libertarian--and she agreed. Years ago I told her that she would become more and more conservative as we paid more taxes and moved further away from college. That's amazing progress.

 

[yongxingfreesty]

very nice, let her know who in charge and show her your backhand if ya have to......