On the street or elsewhere, footing might be uncertain. Tripping and falling are real possibilities, especially if under pressure - or attack. I proved that to a few folks not long ago by falling on my derriere in a parking lot doing some defensive drills.
Problem is, in the process of falling, your reflexes are apt to cause your hands to clench. If your finger is on a trigger when this happens, guess what might happen next?
Reflex is something we don't have control over. We can say, "Oh, I wouldn't do
that" when it comes to shooting someone we didn't intend to shoot. But anyone who keeps a finger on the trigger when they do not intend to immediately fire a shot is asking for trouble.
Different instructors train different methods. For example, the
PoliceOne article below that I pulled a quote from mentions the "C position" for the trigger finger. I haven't heard of that being taught for years now. Might be someone out there is still doing it, I don't know, I don't get around that much. But different people are or were teaching all kinds of things. Not to drop names, but merely as an illustration, see
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2011/01/robert-farago/gabe-suarez-is-insane/ .
I will simply put it this way. NO instructor I have ever trained with has ever told me to keep a finger on the trigger when I didn't intend to fire Very Soon Now. Ever. Any of them. In fact, some of them have been very adamant in insisting that fingers NOT loiter on triggers, or inside trigger guards even.
Louis Awerbuck threatened to boot my dearly beloved hardheaded wife out of a carbine class in 2007 if she didn't keep her finger out of the trigger guard of the too-heavy target style AR she insisted on using the first day of class - he could tell she was straining to keep the gun up and using that finger to help support it, but it was still Against The Rules. She made it through the day without getting tossed, and next day she was back with the pencil-barreled lightweight carbine I had tried to get her to use to begin with, and she successfully completed the class with it.
What we talk about here is not target shooting or informal practice on the flat range. What we encourage is training, with a good instructor, who can and will teach those things that are important to know about fighting with a gun. And we encourage that because those differences are critical to know, and the time to learn them IS NOT when trouble comes calling. This is not some chestbeating ooohh-lookit-us-we're-gunfighters schtick. There ARE differences, and IMPORTANT differences, between simple target shooting, informal flat-range practice, and fighting for your life with a gun in your hand.
Trigger discipline is among the most important of those differences.
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http://www.policeone.com/police-pro...ntal-discharge-during-close-quarters-contact/
May 04, 2007
Preventing accidental discharge during close quarters contact
While most training programs will tell you to keep your finger off the trigger until you’re ready to fire, under stress fingers often subconsciously wrap around the trigger anyway. At that point, if you are startled, bumped, or jostled your trigger finger can then inadvertently discharge the weapon.
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2010/08/robert-farago/the-secret-life-of-trigger-discipline/
The Secret Life of Trigger Discipline
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