To intervene or not?

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ZeSpectre

My thanks to you for setting me straight. And my profound apologies (not to mention my respect and thanks) to Titan.

The only problem with mediated communication such as this is that it's sometimes difficult to catch the subtleties that would be readily apparent in face to face conversations. My mistake. On re-reading Titan's post, it's very clear what he meant. Again, my apologies.

Respectfully,

DarkSoldier
 
I call it the mud box today.

Never been a mud storm before. Dust storm mixed with rain, thunder that shakes the whole building. Guess there is a first time for everything. The whole sky has an orange/ brownish/ yellowish tinge to it. I'd send a picture but the picutures don't do it justice. It is like walking inside of a giant urine colored fish bowl. So nothing to do today but harass the gutless on the internet.

So let me reinterate... People can always come up with a reason about why they did not do a thing... Coming up with a reason as to why they did something is always a bit harder. But, I would take the help of strangers (even poorly executed and possibly damaging) for me and my family any time over the logical inactions of best friends whenever lives were on the line.
 
Hey, don't look at me, I took on a BEAR for ya <grin>.
Hrmmm, come to think on it what I actually did was take on some politicians for ya. Much scarier :neener:

Weather here isn't much better to tell the truth. Can't wait to see some pictures though, sounds pretty weird.
 
The Jews/ Christians/ gays/ gypsies/ whoever being marched off to die
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Sorry, don't buy your philosophy. These people needed to pick up a rifle and not hope others would do so for them. Case in point, Jews in 1939 vs Jews in 1948.

Everything about life is a choice; where I live, who my friends are, is the coffee too hot to sip, did I sip it whilst driving anyway? I choose to defend myself, I spent time and money to get educated in this art / discipline, they choose to graze in the sun with the other sheeple not even slightly interested if there are Wolves in the area or if Bo Peep and her Sheepdog are in the vicinity.
Gunshots ring out, people panic and scatter, whether I am alone or with my family makes not a whit of difference, for choices have already been made for me. If I choose to remain and defend those that didn't care enough about themselves to learn to be more vigilant why should I care? On top of that, I run the real risk that these same people that I try to save may later be sitting as my peers in a court of law casually and comfortably deciphering my every move, my every syllable that I utter in court, a safe court protected by others that learned the discipline of defense. They will chew me up and spit me out, they will slice my every word and action in their comfortable chairs in a serene warm room taking days or weeks to think through the situation where I had mere seconds to contemplate.
What if one of the sheeple were injured in the resulting chaos and decided to sue the only living gunfighter, me? Even if I win, who will compensate my lost time and expenses? Maybe I get fired because I was too often absent from work due to attending my own defense? Maybe I took it to heart so deeply that those that I defended with my life now turned on me, so sick that I developed chronic health problems and could no longer work and support a family, a year later my spouse and I seperate and three years later divorced.
When they say that cops have one of the highest rates of divorce and suicide amongst all public workers, now you know why.
Some of the above scenerio happened to me and I was lucky that I had enough strength to fight for an early retirement (a very meagre one) when I was facing a different type of separation (w/o retirement).
I was gung ho, and the Captain that was taking minutes at my internal hearing whispered to me that she now understood why so many of the good cops no longer exist. My whispered answer to her as I walked into my new life as a civilian was because they are smart enough to do the minimum to get past the shift.
I too served in the military, and even that has changed, but those of you that have served in neither had better understand the risks you face before you go off John Wayning around the mall. You had better be so proficient with your weapon that you can run, roll, dive and then shoot straight. Standing leisurely at the range comfortably shooting your weapon at a paper target is not training for such an event.
Run a mile first, skip rope thirty times, do five pull ups, twenty push ups, forty sit ups and then immediately shoot at your target, because in a real situation your Breathing, BP and Pulse are going to be way off chart when TSHTF in some mall or school where sheeple are running in panic and blocking your view and you only have a split second tomake it count w/o injuring anyone else.
Gunmen and Terrorists don't scare me, I have faced them. The ones I faced that made an everlasting impression were the sheeple that afterwards took 9 months to decide if I could have reacted differently. By differently they meant, not do anything at all I suppose. I lasted another year or so in uniform but the chronic health problems began to interfere, and had I not retired, I doubt my ticker would still be atickin'.
Does anyone really feel that an off duty cop wil automatically come to their rescue? You better pray it is a cop that either has no idea what he could face later on or one that is so naive as to believe it is enough that he was acting with the right intentions.
Would I personally, even today take action against terrorists or gunmen? If I thought I had a clear shot and people were dying? John Wayne having been my surrogate father, probably! That doesn't make me smart, it just means that old dogs can't be taught new lessons.
 
You sound bitter and jaded George. Can't say I blame you much because it sounds like you have had a rough time. There are many such people in the world that will scream for help and try to sue when things go poorly, or even when things go well. I have not walked in your shoes so I am in no way capable of judging how you live your life or the decisions you make about how to live it.

If you are the way the you are because you know in your heart that you did the right thing and the very best you could than you have my well earned respect and admiration. My words may be meaningless, but I want you to know that there are people out ther in the world that still feel this way, even if there are many who do not.

I have no false illusions about my skills, they are what they are and any given day the bad guys might be better. I hope those days are few and far between but really have no control over those days either. I just do the best I can.

I gave several examples, in some of those examples the people fought back and in some they did not. Certainly some did not know what was going to happen until it was too late to fight back. But if you can pick and choose who you want to help stay in the gene pool than you are helping create a society of sorts. Maybe you think it is a better one where these different kinds of weaker people die. But we will never know how many Einsteins died in the camps or if the Christian Algerians would have changed the face of the region for the better. We will never know because they are dead and that is a pretty final thing.

I do know that death is bad and there really is nothing great about it. But I also believe that there are worse things than death. There are worse things than losing your wealth and even your love. Other than my life I have lost all these things and found them again in life. I did not lose things or get them again by playing it safe. Do the minimum in your life on your shift and safe and sound you will likely be, but true to yourself and your heart you likely will not.
 
While not involving an active shooter, I did "get involved" in a domestic dispute once. Maybe I saved a life, maybe not.

Anyway, I came home from my apartment only to encounter a young woman sitting on the steps. She asked if she could use my phone to call her mom for a ride. Since cell phone airtime is "free", I loaned her my phone and she called her mom. She told me she was fighitng with her boyfriend. They lived on the ground floor, I was three stories up, never seen either of them previously.

Anyway, later on that night I hear screaming and cursing coming from their apartment. No smashing or beating, but a lot of yelling. So I call the apartment office to report it, as they sometimes have cops living in the place that pull security duty for lower rent. Then I hear the magic words,"Somebody please help me".

Maybe if I hadn't met her that very day I wouldn't have done anyhting other than call 911 (which I did anyway), but for some reason I decided not to stand around and listen to some woman get beaten to death.

So I put my 642 in my strong side pocket and my surefire in my weak hand. I walked out to where I could see into their apartment. They were out on the ground floor "porch" so I could just stand on the sidewalk and see what was going on.

They kept yelling until they noticed me standing off to the side. They ignored me for the most part until the woman kept asking to use the phone and he kept denying her. He wanted her to leave but she could go anywhere without calling someone to get her.

Eventually I offered to let her use my phone just to get her away from him. He looked at me and started approaching. I immediately had a 100% increase in heart rate becasue while ths guy was my size, who kows what he was hopped up on. But I told him to stop at about 10 feet and he did.

The woman came out to use my cell phone and he stayed inside, out of sight. I got nervous that he might be going for a gun so I made sure I stayed around a corner where he couldn't see me from the windows or door. I figured that if he was going to come out shooting he would go for the woman first.

Anyway, the woman called the police and her mom. The guy stayed inside. Eventually the cops came and I went back to my apartment to leave the revolver. Even though I had a permit I didn't need that kind of problem beofre the cops could sort everything out.

The cops interviewed me, but once the woman told them I wasn't the boyfriend, they lost interest. I did hear the woman say that I had pepper spray. Guess she mistook the surefire and didn't consider that I had something more potent :)

Anyway, not much of a story in the end, but I think it illustrates that good folk can make a difference and you don't have to always stay in the background. Not sure what I would have done had the guy started beating her. I doubt I would have shot him unless he had a serious weapon like a club or knife. Not sure if just flashing him with the surefire and presenting the gun would have been enough either. Hell, he could have gone to the closet and invited his buddy the shotgun (my internal escape plan at that point was to jump into the ponds just in front of the apartments and play fish for a while).

But it was simply resolved by getting the woman away from him and me keeping my distance from him.
 
The cops interviewed me, but once the woman told them I wasn't the boyfriend, they lost interest. I did hear the woman say that I had pepper spray. Guess she mistook the surefire and didn't consider that I had something more potent
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Or maybe she was a lot quicker on the uptake than at first she appeared... even if her taste in men was... poor.

These type resolutions happen a lot more often than the bad results that get the press and have negative effects on people's lives. Unless you want to believe the anti lies. Unfortunately the good guys almost never get press.
 
I may have some residues of bitterness in me Titan, but the words I write are not out of bitterness, they are reality. I am grateful to God for allowing me this glimpse into a world few see, it was an adventure when I was younger, I finally opened my eyes in my late thirties and realized the world wasn't all black or white, it was mainly grey. If you are a Black Soul or a White Knight, you make up 20% of the population, the other 80% are in the grey area. They are kind when it is no burden to them, they only steal when they can get away with it. I learned that it is the grey class that rule our world, they are our teachers, our judges and lawyers, our MD's and our fellow soldiers and officers. They also make up the ranks of the 20%, some belong to the dark side, others to the light. This is why both type gravitate toward politics, they are either of noble souls or they are the opposite and see an opportunity. But if my math is correct, and you accept what I am writing, if 10% of the black souls and 80% of the grey souls make up 90% of the population, then the 10% White Knights better watch their butts. This isn't being jaded, this is reality. I spent many years in the Sandbox (sticky claylike mud when soaked), more years as a Civilian in blue uniform. Jaded? Perhaps, but for good reason, do I need to do the Fox News Hannity Report on America for you?
Yes, there are Heroic Doctors and Nurses, True-to-their-cause Politicians, Police Officers that joined due to a calling and not for the pay check and ego trip and soldiers that truly believe and are willing to die and not just those that joined for the benefits and were surprised to actually be called up. These true heros, mostly anonymous people, do walk amongst us, but they are the rare 10% and usually not the ones that sit in the jury pews.

I did hear the woman say that I had pepper spray.
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That's the way the trouble usually starts, some innocently stated sentence and all of a sudden you may become the focus. Imagine if she decided there and then she really loved her BF, or was truly afraid of him and decided to back him up if he lied and said you assaulted him? These things do happen and it sometimes takes an attorney and a lot of money to sort it out. Jaded? I've seen it. Do you not think a good lawyer couldn't make the jury think there was some type of relationship between you and the lady? After all, in your own words she was sitting outside your door previously and you lent her your phone previously and a good lawyer could all of a sudden make you part of the problem and not the good samaritan you were being. Jaded? I've seen the reality in the streets and the reality in the courts, which is why most career criminals are more afraid of the armed citizen then they are of the armed officer or of the legal system. This was my original point that I was trying to make.
 
I can not disagree Gerorge.

What we are talking about is more than mere tactics even if it comes down to it in the end. What we are talking about is entire life outlook. I believe that are more good guys than you imagine, or maybe I have just been lucky enough to find more of them and make them a part of my life. If it comes down to the grays than the world is most certainly doomed, as there will be no chance when put on the watch they will nap and the wolves will come in through the gates.
 
Other situations are not always clear. Intervening in what turned out to be two miscreants' mutual combat situation can get you in a heap of trouble. You don't always know all the facts. If you don't wish to physically intervene, at least get on your cell phone, call the police and try to be the best possible witness.
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Off Duty I will protect me and mine. I have no duty or obligation to act when I'm not "on the clock". If you aren't threatening me or mine, I'm not defending people that should've taken steps to ensure their own safety.

Problems start when guns come in to play, but they can help to eliminate the greatest problem of all, deadly force used against you.

BikerRN
 
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I try to stay out of the tactics approach, too many variables to consider from my armchair.
In the big picture, just remember, 20 Privates, 10 Corporals and 5 Sergeants do not out weigh the command of one brand new-in-country 2nd LT. So your argument of more may not wash in the real world where one very vicious Politician or Judge or Attorney General or Chief of Police or Five Star or Mayor may set all the good you do / done off balance.
The balance is that I am sorry to see and hear of people suffering, but usually they suffer out of fear, they prefer to suffer than to die fighting.
America has rescued so many, so often, we think it is our duty. Why?
Anyway, I know that you would die for your comrades as they would die for you, right now that is. It will be different when you get back to the world. The world you live in now is more clear cut, very simplistic in nature. That is the hook that makes certain people sign up for a second and third stint, the simplicity of life out there in that situation. Only someone who has lived it can understand. There is a reason the Military has a cut off age to enlist, and it hs little to do with physical prowess, and more to do with not needing a bunch of self thinkers in the ranks. I was there, I thought I saw thepicture and anyways, I didn't care, I was having too much fun to care about politics, I was too busy staying alive and having fun.
Stay safe and never stop checking the tree tops (roof tops in your case).
 
I'll stand by what I said despite its misinterpretation. I wonder if Titan6 or his comrades would welcome well-intentioned, but unknown and randomly assembled civilians dropping in from time to time to lend a quick hand during a few minutes of action, then returning to the comfort of their homes to resume their lives.

A concealed weapons permit grants only the ability to legally carry a concealed firearm, often only a handgun, and not always even the same handgun that the permit holder is carrying. The permit conveys no virtue to its holder and does not guarantee that the holder has anything but the most basic knowledge of the law or skill beyond rudimentary marksmanship and firearms safety.

Pure altruism is a wonderful thing but altruism without knowledge and skill can increase rather than reduce harm to other people. I haven't at all implied that people not help other people in trouble, and that's clearly not what I meant.

My point is that if you don't know what you're doing don't do it, because otherwise you risk increasing rather than decreasing damage.

To expand on the example I gave, if my wife and I are at a mall in which there is an active shooter nearby we would both be grateful if you would not try to help us from a distance. Both of us have the skills and training to do what I suggested is necessary to save our own lives and each others' in such situations, and we have worked out a high degree of coordinated actions to improve our chances. We are well aware--probably much better aware than most of the well meaning people who have contributed to this thread so far--that we are not guaranteed success. Nor is either of us tacticool mall ninjas or hotshots. We are competent, know each other's skill level and moves, and we trust each other. But we know those risks and neither of us want you getting in our way and increasing them.

That's not the same as saying that we wouldn't welcome your help if you absolutely can help and do. If you stop someone from stabbing my wife while she is on the ground--a la Kitty Genovese--of course we both will be eternally grateful. But we really don't want the long range intervention of people who might not even be able to defend their own lives against an attacker at bad breath distance. Don't practice brain surgery on us because you saw the movie, read the book, or took a first aid course. We'll handle it or we won't. Neither of us will have the slightest regard for your good intentions in such a situation. Our only interest will be in your results. The first rule here is to do no harm.

For my own comfort level there's far too much posturing in threads like this and there's real danger in preprogramming untrained and unskilled people to react in ways that can be counterproductive in essentially chaotic situations.

You can't always know for sure if you come upon a scene in which one person is pointing a gun at another whether you are looking at a bad guy in the process of murder or a good guy trying desparately to defend his life. If you've been programmed by one of these threads to believe that you're doing good by intervening, you can make the wrong decision and the consequences would be dreadful forever after. Uniformed cops have killed their off duty brothers in such situations, and they have recognition signals and training that CWP holders don't.

Of course you must act if your own life or your family's is under imminent threat, but that's not what anyone is talking about here. The subject here is intervention. You will be judged by your effect, not your intentions.

I'll conclude by repeating Ralph Mroz' rhetorical question:

What of the innocent people who are in danger if we do not intervene? Well, the obvious question to ask is: Why aren't they armed and prepared to protect themselves and their families? Isn't protection of one's family from harm the primary obligation of everyone, and not something to be outsourced to others?
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Robert Hairless,

Let me start out by saying that you and your wife sound like just the kind of folks I’d like to have close by if I ever found myself in another bad situation. You raised several important points. As I understood this thread, it was about intervening in the absence of police being on scene to take action on behalf of the helpless. I don’t think any of us would advocate interfering with an ongoing police response or military operation. As you wisely pointed out, waiving guns around in close proximity to police officers is not a good idea even if you are the good guy.

I must also agree with you that we all need to take a serious reality check as to what our real abilities are, as opposed to what we like to think they are. Probably we should do this frequently since the skill sets (especially partner drills) we are talking about evaporate quickly into little more than horse crap and wishful thinking if we don’t train hard and often. What we could do last year may not be what we are capable of this year.

As to posturing, I haven’t noticed much of that but then I’m not looking for it. I take what the people who post here say at face value. I don’t know them so it would be disrespectful of me, in the absence of any facts, to assume that they are less than they appear to be. I would hope for the same consideration in return. When you say you and your wife are capable of dealing with situations and keeping each other alive, and would rather not have help from lesser trained people, some might call that posturing. I call it common sense from the point of view of a person trained to the level your post leads me to believe you have reached.

As to preprogramming untrained and unskilled people “to react in ways that can be counterproductive in essentially chaotic situations”, I'm not certain how we can keep untrained and unschooled persons from reading what we discuss unless we create some sort of "experts' section of THR (to which I am certainly not qualified to be a member!) and then who decides which of us is fit to take part? Bad idea all around.

Unschooled and untrained doesn't mean necessarily unbalanced and unthinking. I don’t believe reading my opinions on THR will cause someone to become a reckless avenger out to be the latest hometown hero. I don’t hold myself out as a teacher, or a role model, or encourage others to follow my example. At least that is certainly not my intent. My impression of the other posts I’ve read is that this is not their intent either. I realize that untrained and unschooled people will read what we write and it’s important to stress that no one should get themselves into something they are not prepared to deal with if they can help it. As a well known firearms instructor (I'm thinking it's Clint Smith) likes to say, every bullet you fire has a lawyer attached to it. But I think we need to remember that you and I were once unschooled, untrained and without the skills we have now developed.

My goal in responding to this thread is to hear what others have to say about this important issue and try to learn from them (whether they agree with me or not) and judge my own ideas against the backdrop of their experience. I’ve learned a lot from thinking about the points you raised in your posts and from those of several others, and even though I suspect you and I will never agree on the fundamental question of whether one should intervene, if I ever again find myself in that dark place, I think I’d like to see you and your wife coming to help me and my wife deal with whatever we find there.

Respectfully,

DarkSoldier
 
Good points, DarkSoldier, and well said.

I was reluctant to offer myself and my wife as an example because it's hard to say such things without appearing to posture, and I tried to phrase it carefully so as to avoid giving that impression. It seems I failed on both counts, which is not good because it dilutes what I was trying to communicate.

We're not warriors, never will be, never think of ourselves as such, and if you saw us once you would know it would be a laughable pretense. But we do train with good instructors, we do it as a couple, and we coordinate with each other as we practice.

That's not my point though. It was an example to make the point, again, that the first rule is and ought to be to do no harm. I tried to make some distinctions. I distinguish between an unmistakable situation in which intervention can undoubtedly save an innocent person from death or great bodily harm and situations that are not so clear and not so certain to an onlooker.

The classic example is one in which a well intentioned CWP holder comes upon a big man straddling a smaller while he shouts "Help! He's killing me!" The CWP holder would be at least embarrassed to discover that he has interfered with a takedown of a murderer or other violent criminal by an off duty or undercover cop.

In the case of my wife and me you can't possibly know from across the mall corridor that we're engaged in one or another thing we've rehearsed many times. If you see someone pointing a gun at us shouting "I'll kill you!" and you have the skill to stop him, please be my guest and accept my gratitude. But if all you've done is target practice on the range and you're not too good anyway, please stay out of it. We'll bet on ourselves and take our chances without the possibility of additional complications we might not be able to handle.

There's the basic point: know for sure what's happenening, know what you're doing, and be sure you are capable of doing it before you get involved in situations that are essentially chaotic. I do find threads like this one chilling because they stimulate professions of virtue and stimulate zeal without taking into account the need for skills that can effect the virtue and zeal without doing more harm than good.

I hope I've explained myself better. More I know not how to do.
 
I'll stand by what I said despite its misinterpretation.
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I was not neccessarily addressing your post, despite my first post coming right after yours.

I wonder if Titan6 or his comrades would welcome well-intentioned, but unknown and randomly assembled civilians dropping in from time to time to lend a quick hand during a few minutes of action, then returning to the comfort of their homes to resume their lives.
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If you mean combat than no, although this is vastly different than law enforcement operations or even responding to a random act of violence as you are likely aware.

Pure altruism is a wonderful thing but altruism without knowledge and skill can increase rather than reduce harm to other people. I haven't at all implied that people not help other people in trouble, and that's clearly not what I meant.
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Yes I understand that is what you meant, but not what some others meant. And there certainly is a danger, we have the same problem which is why we try to clearly define the situation before we involve ourselves in unplanned actions and still there are fratricides even among highly trained professionals. So even with knowledge and skill there are no guarantees. All we can do is the best we can. But doing nothing... especially when someone does have the knowledge and skills I find unappealing if the situation can be well defined.

Even so... I think this is truth:

Unschooled and untrained doesn't mean necessarily unbalanced and unthinking. I don’t believe reading my opinions on THR will cause someone to become a reckless avenger out to be the latest hometown hero. I don’t hold myself out as a teacher, or a role model, or encourage others to follow my example. At least that is certainly not my intent. My impression of the other posts I’ve read is that this is not their intent either. I realize that untrained and unschooled people will read what we write and it’s important to stress that no one should get themselves into something they are not prepared to deal with if they can help it. As a well known firearms instructor (I'm thinking it's Clint Smith) likes to say, every bullet you fire has a lawyer attached to it. But I think we need to remember that you and I were once unschooled, untrained and without the skills we have now developed.
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And

As to posturing, I haven’t noticed much of that but then I’m not looking for it. I take what the people who post here say at face value. I don’t know them so it would be disrespectful of me, in the absence of any facts, to assume that they are less than they appear to be. I would hope for the same consideration in return. When you say you and your wife are capable of dealing with situations and keeping each other alive, and would rather not have help from lesser trained people, some might call that posturing.
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I do not know Hairless, but find his posts remarkably consistent and he certainly is no fool. I do know ZeSpectre and his charming bride and he did indeed dispatch a 300lb bear for me that raided my pantry last fall. He has been fighting the good fight in Virginia for far longer than I have known him. I have seen him shoot and know his skills and am familar with his training so I won't ask him to practice brain surgery on me but I know I could count on him and I of course have his back if ever asks it of me.

But here in the digital world it is all posturing in any case. Posturing and planning and considering what you will do when the time comes. And now that the storms have lifted I have to go back to the real world.
 
Titan6:

I was not neccessarily addressing your post, despite my first post coming right after yours.
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Then you might find it mildly amusing to know that I reread your post a few times in an attempt to decide whether it was or wasn't. The last toss of the mental coin was "maybe," which is a difficult feat with only a two sided coin, so I'm not surprised that I was wrong.
 
When one takes the responsibility of carrying a firearm, it is in one's own best interest to do so with sound judgement.

The same good judgement that I would use when determining to use the gun to save my own life would be used when deciding whether to intervene to save the life of another. It all depends on circumstance.

While I see no reason to come up with hypothetical scenarios (it's kind of mall-ninja when we do that, isn't it?), suffice it to say there would be times when I would draw my gun to come to the aid of another, and there are times when I wouldn't for fear of my own life. After all, having a clean conscience is great, but you don't have any conscience when you're dead. ;)
 
Robert Hairless

Good points. I think I understand and appreciate where you are coming from. I agree that the first consideration in any situation is to not make things worse than they would be if you hadn't gotten involved. Good training and good judgment, and I wouldn't mind a little good luck thrown in (although I so rarely have it, I don't depend on it).

Titan6,

Good points as well. Watch your six and thanks again for what you do everyday.

Respectfully,

DarkSoldier
 
DarkSoldier:

Robert Hairless

Good points. I think I understand and appreciate where you are coming from. I agree that the first consideration in any situation is to not make things worse than they would be if you hadn't gotten involved. Good training and good judgment, and I wouldn't mind a little good luck thrown in (although I so rarely have it, I don't depend on it).
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I'm relieved that I was clearer this time around. The subject is fraught with possibilities for misunderstandings and it also is emotionally charged, so it's far too easy to stumble.

Luck is what you wish for when it isn't there. :) That's another part of the problem.
 
To tackle just one subset of the discussion so far, it seems to me like the question of my capability to use the weapon reliably in any given situation ought to be answered before I carry it there. For me personally, that means that I don't currently carry a handgun at all in public, because my skills aren't far enough along yet. I'm getting better, but I will need to be as quick, reliable, situationally aware and confident as I have always been with a shotgun before I start shopping for a concealment holster.

At the same time, the ability to make a deadly-force decision, in real time, is not one that most of us are born with. I'll be taking a simulation class soon, and will add the results from that (positive or negative) to my evaluation of my basic gun-handling skills to see whether the next step is the completion of my CCW application or the pursuit of more training.

As a hunter, my basic ethic has always been that I never pull the trigger on anything that I (1) don't intend to eat and (2) am not confident that I can kill with the first shot. There may be subsequent shots, but I need to be confident that I can kill and not simply wound the animal, lest it escape and suffer instead of dying instantly. That carries over into the self-defense, family-defense and society-defense discussion approximately as follows: I don't want to get into a situation in which I have to decide whether to pull the trigger on anybody unless I am confident that (1) deadly force is clearly justified and (2) I can stop the attacker with the first shot. Again, there may be subsequent shots, but I need to know that I can fire a stopping shot before I pull the trigger. I'm getting training on both aspects of that, but don't consider myself up to answering the whole question, as asked, just yet.
 
OldCowHand,

From reading your post it looks like you are addressing most of the concerns raised so far in reference to willingness to help versus real world ability. You are certainly on the right track. BTW, as you probably know, you are close to Thunder Ranch. If you want training, that's the Holy Grail for civilians.

Respectfully,

DarkSoldier
 
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