Training and Concealed Carry Permits (PLEASE read 1st post before answering poll)

[NevadaDep]

Like I said before, I believe all of you are right. We shouldn’t have to get CCW permits to pack. I will agree that mandatory training opens the people up to further restrictions. Still, knowing this I find it hard to back down from my original statement, even though I believe most of you to be correct.

 

[Striker]

I continue to follow this thread with great interest and the same question continues to come to my simple mind.

Must an armed citizen be proficient with his weapon? I think that most if not all agree that the answer is yes.

Forget for a moment the discussion of public safety that I originally raised. Rather how about the premise that an armed citizen that cannot effectively utilize his weapon to protect himself, is not protected at all, so whats the point in being armed in the first place?

So the rub is how does one establish and maintain profiency?

I reiterate that I don't know what the answer is, but as we have seen in this discussion it bears consideration.

 

[GEM]

The conflict is between the 'right' perspective - a reasonable one and the 'efficacy' perspective which makes sense outside of the strict application of the 'right' perspective.

One has to get little training in religion to exercise your freedom to worship. One has to get little training in rhetoric to excercise your freedom of expression.

However, both do have some restrictions. One cannot practice Aztec human sacrifice or polygamy based on one's freedom of religion. You can't start your own radio station without permit. Some forms of speech and publication - about sexuality for instance have been controlled in the past. Periodically, speech about religion is subject to debate.

Is gun carrying similar?

 

[pax]

Striker ~

I believe, if the armed citizen is establishing & maintaining proficiency for himself, because it is to his own benefit, (rather than because he is coerced by laws), then the citizen himself is the best person to say how much training is enough training, and what level of proficiency is enough to meet his personal needs.

For me personally, I believe that one 18-hour course per year, plus regular practice, would be enough to maintain my own shooting proficiency at my current level. If I wanted to improve, I would have to do more than that.

pax

 

[BullfrogKen]

Striker,

As pax touched on, there are two separate considerations this question addresses. One is personal - being effective with the tool. The other is to the public - safety and good judgement.

The requirement for training should not be debated over our desire for those who decide to walk about society armed must be proficient for their own good. Opinions on what constitutes proficiency varies greatly, and the public really has no business deciding the matter on those grounds.

The issue of safety to the public, which is what most mandated training courses are designed to cover, could be. I'm not so sure it is something that must be addressed by a mandated class. States with no certification requirements, such as mine, rarely see instances when a CCW holder does something improper or unsafe that endangers the public. And, in those rare instances when it does occur, the State has means by which to address those occurances.


NevadaDep, that is an honest answer. I challenge you to consider why you feel this way without evidence to support your feelings. Reasonable and enlightened men make informed decisions from evidence, not off our feelings.


Just like pax, I believe training is invaluable. But I am firmly against making it mandatory, on both practical and moral grounds.

 

[NevadaDep]

BullfrogKen

Training is just that, training. All that material can't be covered in one day and still be honestly called training. Advanced training means a level above and beyond basic, above and beyond intermediate. If you want to instead suggest a basic one day training class, I challenge you to prove how that one day class differs in any way from the state-mandated class pax said isn't under consideration.

1. You are right. Basic Familiarization would have been more appropriate.
2. Although I could be wrong, I have yet to hear of a state class that teaches weapon retention or runs folks through a practical weapons course.
3.I know that the class I took in Clark County was a complete joke. Didn’t really even qualify as training.



I do not wish to argue this anymore. You have already proven that required training is un necessary restriction and I believe you. On a side note. I think you underestimate the value of even a days worth of practical shooting and lecture.

 

[NevadaDep]

BullfrogKen

NevadaDep, that is an honest answer. I challenge you to consider why you feel this way without evidence to support your feelings. Reasonable and enlightened men make informed decisions from evidence, not off our feelings.

Common sense would tell me that if you intended to carry a firearm on you regularly, you should seek training. RKBA is our right, but it is not like freedom of speech or religion. These firearms have the ability to kill indiscriminately, bullets to do not have a conscious or a recall button. We as Americans living in a free state have the right to bare arms. We do not have a right to jeopardize isn’t bystanders because of lack luster training or lack there of.

If you want to exercise you 2nd amendment rights (and you should). You should seek to be the most competent person on the face of the planet with your firearms

 

[BullfrogKen]

NevadaDep Said: 2. Although I could be wrong, I have yet to hear of a state class that teaches weapon retention or runs folks through a practical weapons course.

And why would a state class need to cover this? Again, what is the goal of those state classes? To give the public some small level of assurance that a CCW applicant knows the law, displays good judgement, and won't do something completely stupid with his gun? Or to go beyond that and impart proficiency?

NevadaDep Said: 3.I know that the class I took in Clark County was a complete joke. Didn’t really even qualify as training.

Which is why pax doesn't have those included in this discussion as training. There are many practical factors that makes that class what it is, and we've discussed that.

NevadaDep said: I think you underestimate the value of even a days worth of practical shooting and lecture.

No, I don't. But I am realistic about what one only day can do for a novice. I certainly don't think it can accomplish any more beyond what those minimum state classes do, and in practice I don't think it will patently be any different.


I understand your desire for folks to be better trained. I understand your approach and why you come at the problem from that angle. I just disagree. Your initial suggestion is fit for folks who must be proficient, such as an officer with a duty. The redefined suggestion is similar to what already exists in mandatory training states. Pax has put before us the question of whether professional training, beyond something like the state class you took, should be a requirement for the permit.

 

[Lonestar.45]

No, it should not be required.

Being able to excercise our rights guaranteed to us under the Bill of Rights should not be contingent upon completing some compulsory government mandated training.

What's next, a class on free speech in order to excercise that right?

It's already bad enough we have to jump through hoops just to get a permit to excercise our right. Let's not add to the hoops we have to jump through. We ought to be taking away the ones that are in place now.

 

[NevadaDep]

Let me try and come at it from this angle.
Americans wanting to exercise the constitutional right to bare arms should at the very least be afforded quality training at a reasonable expense.
The whole point of my argument is, required ccw courses do not provide quality training. Not everybody can afford to attend Thunder Ranch or other prestigious schools. Yet, there are many folks out there in desperate need (who want) affordable, realistic firearms training.
Why not standardize a basic well rounded firearms school built around the working mans dollar and schedule. Maybe this school shouldn’t be mandatory but, at least we have afforded the less fortunate the option.

I believe the ccw course I took in Vegas cost about 140.00. We fired 8 rounds! That’s it. Fortunately I had plenty military/ Law enforcement training to fall back on. I held a small arms instructor NEC when I was active duty and I still had to take this stupid class.


Give me a student with a reliable firearm and 50.00. I bet when I am done with him he will at the very least, have a basic understanding of defensive/ practical pistol tactics, combat marksmanship, fire arms safety and an incredible thirst for more knowledge.

Am I a great instructor? No. Do I know it all? No. But I can do a hell of allot better then Clark county did and at half the cost.

 

[BullfrogKen]

NevadaDep said:Americans wanting to exercise the constitutional right to bare arms should at the very least be afforded quality training at a reasonable expense.

Well, that is a whole different mess. Americans deserve homes, food . . . all manner of things. But should they have a right to it? To suggest we have some claim to a good or service then puts the provider in the postition of servitude.

Good training can be had at an afforable price. The marketplace serves these needs today. A whole host of Interant trainers serve such customers. They will come to your range, provided you have a sufficient number of students, and teach their cirriculum over a weekend.

The quality of the instructor and material presented generally determines the amount of money one pays on a class like that. Some local community colleges offer basic classes. Training, good training, has a price attached. But that's true about anything in life.

 

[NevadaDep]

True but, that type of training at that cost seems hard to come across in southern Cali and Las Vegas.

I don’t want to speak for everybody but, it seems like there is a growing amount of individuals/schools that seem pretty good at charging ludicrous amounts of money for watered down training.

Why does quality training have to cost so much money? I once saw an ad for Suarez international that wanted to charge people 500.00 dollars to shoot at each other with air soft pistols. I can do that out in the desert with my friends for free.

Nothing against Mr. Suarez, I happen to respect him very much.

 

[pax]

Am I a great instructor? No. Do I know it all? No. But I can do a hell of allot better then Clark county did and at half the cost.

You just eloquently and beautifully illustrated the argument against mandatory training that I made in post #14 of this thread. Mandated training always sinks to some level of overpriced inefficiency, sometimes worse than others but nearly always far below the level a free market would create. The Clark County training you took is about like most mandatory classes end up being: a whole lot of talking, a tiny bit of shooting, a huge bore for the folks who know the basics but nowhere near enough for the folks who don't.

Absolutely agree with you that poor folks should have access to quality training. The question becomes, how can they get it?

Best-kept secret in the training industry: People can obtain quality training for nearly free, if they're willing to do a little work in exchange for the privilege. Most of the big-name, traveling instructors really need people to organize classes in each local area. If you contact one of these guys and ask about organizing such a class in your area, and you're willing to do the legwork, guess what? You will get to train "for free," as the incentive to be the class organizer. Of course that does not cover the cost of ammunition or motel bills or food, but, well, you have to eat anyway and if you're organizing it you'll organize it close to home so no hotel bill or other travel expenses. Ammunition remains a problem, sometimes a substantial one (believe me I know this), but if you know six months in advance that you will need 300 rounds on a given weekend, even the slimmest budget would usually allow you to squirrel away that much ammunition over the intervening months.

So it's already possible to obtain high quality training at a low cost, if you're willing to put some effort into it.

But here's the irony: most of those high-quality, traveling instructors don't actually provide the proper rubber-stamp for state-required training! They give more complete classes, for the most part, but rarely meet the specific, state-mandated requirements written by bureaucrats. The really sad part is, state-required classes often cost a set amount of money, and all of the paperwork that goes with them costs another set amount of money. Even if you find a willing instructor who will waive his own fees, there are going to be some set paperwork fees which cannot and will not be waived.

What all that amounts to is that someone who is resourceful and energetic but broke can still get good training tailored to their specific needs for "free" (plus effort), making it possible for even the poor to afford good training. But mandatory training will almost always cost what it costs, and will rarely if ever provide what the student actually needs at the level the student needs it, making it impossible for the poor to obtain training.

pax

 

[Charles S]

Very interesting thread.

I personally believe that the right to carry arms for self defense is an absoluter right.

I also do not believe in any government restrictions.

I also believe as a reasonable person one has a responsibility to train to be as proficient as possible in self defense.

I also believe that people have a right to ignorance (mandated training is largely ineffective) and if they choose that path so be it.

'm going to have to agree with Trebor. Responsible people train. But there are too many civil rights issues with mandatory training.

That pretty much sums up my position.

"Professional training" does not equal proficiency in my book. It just means you sat through the training. Because training for licensing purposes is usually "least common denominator" training, I really don't see much benefit in such a requirement. A person who wants to learn will do it, whether reading a book and practicing the skills on the range by himself, taking classes, or some combination of both. A person who doesn't want to learn won't, regardless of the "training."

I would be willing to bet you have had no training. People who choose to train are generally highly motivated. They have made the effort to select the course they need, they have paid the money for the course and they usually learn a lot.

One cannot learn from a book or practice by them self what one can learn from taking a class.

You are correct in your last assessment that a person who does not want to learn will not under any circumstances.

I have had training beyond the what is required by the state of Texas.

 

[YK]

hso
I challenge anyone to find any numbers indicating that Weapons Carry Permit holders represent a statistically significant safety threat to themselves or others. You can look at the CDC numbers for firearms injuries for states that do and don't require training and the numbers indicating higher accident rates for no training states just aren't there. If the numbers don't indicate trained/untrained permit holders have any difference in accidental shooting rates then the problem is perception/prejudice and not real. If there's no threat to public health I don't see the need for any controls being applied. Since there's no public health or safety driver I certainly see no need for regulation. It can't get any simpler than that and we need to quit hanging onto these prejudices when they aren't supported by facts.

I cannot answer your challenge, but I'd like to point out that events of interest here [like firearm incident-related deaths or innocent bystander deaths] are rare events. I am sure you know how difficult it is to detect a difference between the two groups with low-rate events. I guess I am trying to say that absence of evidence isn't the same as evidence of absence.

Just trying to help NevadaDep to defend a position that's difficult to defend

 

[BullfrogKen]

NevadaDep said: True but, that type of training at that cost seems hard to come across in southern Cali and Las Vegas.

Earlier today you said my estimates for professional training fees were bogus. Yes, professional training "resort" fees are comparatively high. They also have things like lots of land, buildings, and overhead costs to cover if they wish to remain a going concern. The interant trainers have costs to cover, too. I maintain those fees I quoted for quality training are accurate, and your comments tacitly confirm it.

NevadaDep said: I don’t want to speak for everybody but, it seems like there is a growing amount of individuals/schools that seem pretty good at charging ludicrous amounts of money for watered down training.

What professional training intruction have you been through that caused you to come to this conclusion? All the professional training classes I've taken were well worth the fee charged.

NevadaDep said: Why does quality training have to cost so much money? I once saw an ad for Suarez international that wanted to charge people 500.00 dollars to shoot at each other with air soft pistols. I can do that out in the desert with my friends for free.

Because that's what the market will bear. Good instructors, with good material, don't fall out of the sky. Professionals in any field have gained skills and experience to enable them to become competent in their fields. I encourage you to find out what it takes to become a professional instructor, with the insurances, the risks, the encumbrances, and the liabilities that are attached when one holds himself out as competent and qualified to instruct others. Its much more than you taking someone's $50 and going out to a range someplace to impart your knowledge.

You may respect Mr. Suarez, but you insult him when you think you are qualified to do the same. Quality Force on Force training consists of much more than a few friends going out to the desert to play a glorified game of tag. That simple statement suggests to me you lack an awareness of the subtleties involved in organizing and conducting quality FoF training.


Don't take this the wrong way. I know you're a new member, even though you've lurked here for a long time. But to suggest you are able to do what it is that Mr. Suarez, or any other accomplished professional trainer for that matter, does in his classes diminishes who his is, and his role as a professional.

 

[NevadaDep]

BullfrogKen

Earlier today you said my estimates for professional training fees were bogus. Yes, professional training "resort" fees are comparatively high. They also have things like lots of land, buildings, and overhead costs to cover if they wish to remain a going concern. The interant trainers have costs to cover, too. I maintain those fees I quoted for quality training are accurate, and your comments tacitly confirm it.

Yes that is correct, what i was trying to say is that it is possible to offer quality training without charging people an arm and a leg.

What professional training intruction have you been through that caused you to come to this conclusion? All the professional training classes I've taken were well worth the fee charged.

Schools like Thunder Ranch, Suarez and Gunsite to name a few, do have very very good training but, there are also a hand full of self proclaimed experts that do nothing but rip people off with lackluster/ dangerous training.

You may respect Mr. Suarez, but you insult him when you think you are qualified to do the same. Quality Force on Force training consists of much more than a few friends going out to the desert to play a glorified game of tag. That simple statement suggests to me you lack an awareness of the subtleties involved in organizing and conducting quality FoF training.

First off, I never claimed to offer anywhere near the quality training Mr Suarez offers. I have been to FoF training many times. I have also been deployed to Iraq twice and know what it is like to have rounds impacting around you, I just don’t brag about it or capitalize on it. I don’t know why some of you people put these men on pedestals. Take their training with a grain of salt. Suarez is a very nice professional man but, he is not the truth the light and the way.

I don’t need to pay 500.00 so some man can tell me not to hug walls because bullets can traverse walls (I already learned this). If you want to pay ridiculous amounts of money to learn common sense principles, then be my guest. To each his own.

 

[NevadaDep]

Before I get flamed for my last post, I would like to say that I think Mr Suarez is a great guy. I would take one of his knife fighting classes in a heartbeat. I think Mr suarez offers first rate training and has done allot for self defense. I love his books and I would never lie and pawn myself off as offering superior training to Mr Suarez’s. He is a true professional. I would take one of his pistol classes but, I would still go in with a subjective mind questioning the validity of everything. This is nothing against Mr Suarez but, the day you believe everything you hear, you are in serious trouble.

 

[BullfrogKen]

NevadaDep said: I don’t need to pay 500.00 so some man can tell me not to hug walls because bullets can traverse walls (I already learned this). If you want to pay ridiculous amounts of money to learn common sense principles, then be my guest. To each his own.

And you took his class and this is what was taught? Or, you didn't take the class, and you ignorantly choose to denigrate it? I can ask Mr. Suarez for his FoF class syllabus, and I'm sure I'll find more on it than this. And I'm left wondering who it is you have taken good, professional training from. Recall that pax asked us not to consider military training or police training valid for this discussion. Have you in fact anything good to say about any professional trainers? I haven't seen much beyond criticisms and blanket defamation.

NevadaDep said: I don’t know why some of you people put these men on pedestals. Take their training with a grain of salt. Suarez is a very nice professional man but, he is not the truth the light and the way.

I don't agree with Mr. Suarez on plenty of issues. I definitely wouldn't lump the entirety of the professional trainers together as "these men", and go further to suggest all "us people" put them on pedestals. We respect them for their experience as professionals. They have a vast amount of experience teaching and instructing students across an entire spectrum of abilities, and that exposes them to problems we may only rarely, or possibly never see in our own microcosm of experiences. Disagree with them in their solutions to solving tactical problems, or shooting stance, or the gun they choose all you want. Hell, I am in a position to meet the most of the prominent men in the training community on an annual basis. And I actually DO critique their performances, in my shoothouse in particular, and our Team critiques their performances in general.

One thing I DO NOT do though is belittle what they do. I will consider their approaches, and I'll experiment with the methods they support in their cirriculums, because there is no right answer. I'll debate the efficacy of a technique from time to time, but its usually to ask about the reasons they used to arrive at advocating something I am unaware of, or have seen other solutions to the problem I thought worked better.

Accomplished professionals have trained thousands of students, from the most diverse backgrounds and skill levels, on a wide spectrum of weapons platforms. That earns my respect, and I will value what they say even if I disagree with it. That is not idol worship, that's giving them the respect a professional deserves.


I'm not sure where you're going to end up with this debate. You've gone from wanting the taxpayer to fund for your training, to lamenting over how no good training exists at cheap prices (imagine that), to now belittling the training professionals you originally proposed we all must spend time with to get our permits.

Frankly I'm left wondering just how much you've thought this through.

 

[NevadaDep]

And ......around and round we go....

 

[NevadaDep]

BullfrogKen, we have obviously gotten off on the wrong foot here. I don’t know where all these emotions are coming from; let alone why you are defending them so vehemently.

No I do not have a course syllabus, I was being sarcastic.

It was not my intention to defame anybody but, if you think they are all kind and gentle souls incapable of inflating their prices or possibly even teaching less then stellar tactics then I am at a loss of words for you.

Yes the debate didn’t get a little derailed, my apologies.

If we were having this discussion politely and in person, I doubt you would have that great of a problem with my thoughts on these matters. I think the majority of the problem here is you or I misunderstanding what we are trying to say or, taking a post incorrectly out of context.

I don’t trust big business. Suarez, Thunder Ranch and others, as awesome, great and awe inspiring as they may be, are businesses in the end. It has been my experience that businesses are out to make as much profit as possible with little expense to them.

Take it with a grain of salt.

 

[Jeff White]

And ......around and round we go....

I think we've gone round and around enough...I'm getting dizzy....

Jeff