Glen wrote:

Everyone should be prepared for eventualities, some of them remote.
If you decide that you will exercise your right of self defense you
should at least have some idea of how you will respond if attacked.
Such thinking is the jump start you may need if and when the time ever
comes, it is not indicative of foolishness, and will not of itself
bring on conflict.
Gunners posting was meant to be humorous, and also there were some
important truths about conflict. Mainly that we should be better
prepared than any adversary when the time of conflict comes, I don't
think that is bad advice.


Ok. OK! I've been beat up enough. I KNEW I was wasting my time.

I didn't see the humor in what Gunner posted. It sounded an awful
lot like other things I've heard from people who were absolutely sincere
and serious. Maybe I was just in the wrong mood.

The part about being prepared to protect oneself is sorta
interesting, though. There's a not-quite-explicit undertone in all of
the responses to my post which seems to assume that I've never been in
danger, never dealt with violence, and that I live some sort of charmed
life which affords me the luxury of pretending that self-defense isn't
necessary or important. People who have faced danger, and who have
found a way to deal with it, sometimes appear to believe that thier's is
the only way, and that anyone who chooses differently must necessarily
do so out of ignorance.

If someone is REALLY concerned about being "prepared for
eventualities, some of them remote", then doesn't he or she sorta NEED
the capacity to keep an open mind, and to recognize, habitually and
automatically, that things aren't always what they seem, and aren't
always as simple as they seem?

If a gun is a good and important way to protect oneself, then why is
it that several of the pro-gun members of this group are also
accomplished martial artists? Doesn't that mean that there are times
when a gun isn't the best defense? Doesn't it mean that there are
sometimes alternatives about the best kind of protection? If so, then
why the almost universal assumption that alternatives aren't available
to ME, or that I've never had any reason even to consider the questions?

I'd LOVE to live a charmed life, untouched by hazzards and hardship;
but it's never happened. I grew up in NorthWest Detroit, in places
where, even 40 years ago, the cops never traveled alone. I paid part of
my way through college by working the midnight to 8 AM shift, alone, at
an all night gas station. I attended Wayne State University, right in
the center of center city Detroit, where crime and violence were more
common than I'd really care to remember. I worked for years in little
machine shops in places that had fenced parking lots with barbed wire,
and where it was considered foolish to enter or leave the building alone.

And I survived all that without keeping my guard up at all times,
and without slinking around, trying to be invisible, and hoping trouble
would never find me. I used to have drinks with friends after work, in
places where the only things white were me and the cue ball. (That's
not in any way a racist statement, or an attempt to imply that black is
scary or dangerous; but Detroit in the 1970's was a tense and nervous
place. Race relations, even at the personal level, were NEVER simple or
trouble free.) I bought snacks at lunchtime at a little place where I
literally had to step over the junkies passed out on the sidewalk. For
a while, I lived where I could walk to work, when I didn't have money
for a car. The walk was about a mile, down one street that was run by
an Italian gang of thugs, and another that was home to a Polish gang.
I'm neither Italian nor Polish, and I didn't belong on either street;
but I got where I was going anyway - every single day.

Now, I'll admit that I've never been in the military, never
knowingly killed anyone, and never done things like police work that
involved volunary acceptance of danger; but that doesn't mean I've never
lived in the real world. And, I've survived the real world - or as much
of it as I've been able to experience - on my own terms, without a gun,
and without ever feeling the need to walk around with my head down, or
my guard up, except in very rare situations that are pretty easy to
anticipate and avoid.

And, I don't consider myself to be exceptional. LOTS of people live
like I do. Many have faced much greater danger, and had more serious
problems, without ever developing the need to arm themselves, or to view
the world as an inherently threatening place.

There are a couple of signature lines, used commonly by several
group members, which say, in effect, that someone who doesn't own guns
must necessarily be afraid of them; and must therefore be less than a
man, and some kind of sub-human coward. I resent that idea personally,
of course; but I also wonder if the people who believe such things
aren't confessing their OWN lack of knowledge and experience. A friend
of mine, when I was much younger, did three tours of duty in the Navy
during the Viet Nam war - not on an aircraft carrier off the coast
somewhere; but in a plastic patrol boat on the Mekong river. He came
home with a whole box full of medals, including two purple hearts, and
with an absolutely unshakable dislike for firearms of any kind.

Now, you can believe what you like about me. That doesn't matter
much one way or another. But if you really think that someone who
doesn't like guns is either ignorant or a coward, then how do you
explain my friend, who was defintely neither of those things? Could it
be that your OWN experience is too limited to include such people.

It's one thing to keep your eyes and ears open, and to understand
that the world CAN be dangerous, at times. But it's quite another thing
to allow your whole life to be colored by the fear that danger lurks
around every corner, and that failure to be fully, constantly, overtly
prepared for it is proof of stupidity. Being alert and aware of your
surroundings doesn't just mean that you recognize danger in places where
other people can't. It should also mean that you recognize comfort, and
safety, and friendly faces, when you happen to encounter those.

If your view of the world is small enough, you probably CAN prepare
yourself to deal with it. And if you view your little world as
inherently hostile, then I guess that preparation just naturally
includes weapons. But the world - the real world - is a very big place;
and, if you're willing to face it without fear, it offers an endless
variety of things that you CAN'T anticipate, and CAN'T prepare for.
That's half the fun of being alive! Danger - at least the kind of
danger that a gun might protect you from - is not the world's dominant
feature. Open your eyes a little wider, broaden your horizons just a
bit, do some real, serious, open-minded versions of those 360
lookarounds, and you might find people and places that don't want to
harm you, and that you don't need to protect yourself from, and that
will welcome you into a whole new set of experiences that will actually
allow you to check your paranoia at the door.

Of course, they might also REQUIRE you to check your paranoia before
they let you in. And that can be a problem, if you're not brave enough
to face the world unarmed.

KG
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