self defense

A day at the range – why you need it.

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

This past Saturday I was out at KR Training helping with Defensive Pistol Skills 1 and a relatively new course called Personal Tactics Skills.

DPS1 went about as expected, tho I could see Karl continues to make small evolutionary tweaks to the approach and curriculum. I like that he’s never static with material. Sure, the core concepts and focus remain the same, but the approach to teaching them is always refined in an attempt to find the best way to convey and ensure students pick up on the concepts.

Personal Tactics Skills was different. This was my first time helping with that course, and only the second time the course has been taught. The material comes from numerous sources and really isn’t new, just the format of presenting it all. There is no live-fire in this class. It’s all about discussion, role playing, demonstration. It’s no-stress, no real physical exertion, but it’s a LOT of mental work.

And that’s so important.

We all love throwing lead downrange. It’s fun. But is throwing lead going to keep you out of trouble? Well, if you get to the point of having to throw lead, you’re already in deep trouble. What would be better is if you could have avoided the situation in the first place, if you could have kept things from getting to the point of having to throw lead.

That’s what PTS is all about.

Karl wrote a good article titled “Scenario Based Training – Why You Need It“. Read it. Yeah, you might think that because we’re instructors that there’s bias because we’re trying to drum up business for ourselves. Here’s the reality. Do you think Michael Phelps won all those Olympic gold medals by only getting his feet wet in the kiddie pool? No, he had to get into the pool and swim and work in the context he chose to excel in. If you want to be a champion fighter, MMA, boxing, whatever… you have to get in the ring and spar. So if you want to be good at winning a gunfight well… you don’t really want to get into a gunfight because that’d be hard to train. 🙂 But you can simulate it, you can replicate it. You can put yourself into those situations. They allow you to figure out what you need to do, how you can react. It’s so much better to figure these things out now and not when the flag flies. Especially consider that now, you will probably fail, you will probably make mistakes. Better to make them now when it costs you nothing but a learning experience, than when it could cost you something much more expensive.

I mentioned to students in class a good DVD that complements what was taught. It’s called “Practical Unarmed Combat” from SouthNarc of ShivWorks. I have a review of the DVD here.

A good day at the range.

Remember your sunblock, folks.

Got to start breaking in my S&W 640. I like it. While I bought it primarily for the extra weight to help with recoil management, the grip ended up helping a lot more because those small “boot grips” on my 442 leave the top corner of the backstrap exposed and it bites into the web of my hand, whereas the 640’s factory grip covers it just enough to keep it from biting. I do want to try out the boot grips on the 640 for comparison. Next range trip I guess.

Oh, and again… dumping 20-round mags of .308 out of an AR-10 has a high giggle factor. 🙂

Situational awareness

/ hsoi

An excellent piece on situational awareness.

The money quote:

Carrying a firearm for protection is a great step – you have the best tool available for the job of defending yourself. However, if you miss the early warning signs and have to be accessing that tool after the attack has started, you’re way behind the power curve.

Elitist politicians aren’t our friends

/ hsoi / 10 Comments

Texas HB 1463 – Relating to the application of certain concealed handgun license laws to statewide elected officials and certain current and former members of the legislature.

An attempt to exempt elected officials servants. Here’s what Rep. Tim Kleinschmidt, R-Lexington, author of the bill said:

“This is not intended to be any type of elitist bill,” Rep. Tim Kleinschmidt, R-Lexington, said Monday.

“We spend a disproportionate amount of our time with the public in these particular locations. And therefore it’s a safety factor,” said Kleinschmidt, the measure’s sponsor.

[…]

Under the state concealed-weapons law, citizens who take a course and pass a background check may carry concealed handguns in public but not in bars, schools, sporting events, hospitals, amusement parks and churches.

Kleinschmidt said those restrictions make it dangerous for politicians. He cited the shooting three months ago in Arizona in which a federal judge was killed and Giffords was severely wounded.

“There are so many places I’m scheduled to go where we don’t know the circumstances, but you’ve got to be there,” he said. “In some instances, you really don’t know what type of neighborhood, what type of risks you may be exposed to.”

We mere plebeians spend a lot of time with the public in these particular locations.

Those same restrictions make it dangerous for us lesser people too.

There are so many places that I have to go where I don’t know the circumstances, but I’ve got to be there. And in some of those instances, I don’t really know what type of neighborhood, what types of risks I may be exposed to.

So what makes you more important than me, Rep. Kleinschmidt? other than your perception of yourself and your importance, of course.

Predictable Violence

/ hsoi

Rory Miller writes a short piece about “predictable violence”.

So what are the stupid life choices? Almost all social violence happens in four kinds of places:

  • Where people get their minds altered. Drugs, alcohol, or even ecstatic drumming, things that break down the social conditioning against violence increase the likelihood of violence. Who’d a thunk it?
  • Where young men gather in groups. An audience plus insecurities about status are a recipe for Monkey Dance violence.
  • Where territories are in dispute. War or the edge between rival gang territory, doesn’t matter. Violence is more common and even the types of violence are similar: raids and drive-bys; spray ‘n’ pray and collateral damage.
  • Where you don’t know the rules. Groups have rules and those rules will be enforced. In certain groups, they will be enforced with a look or a word. In others if you refuse to acknowledge your error, the correction may be violent.

Give the whole piece a read. It’s a fairly good analysis. I wouldn’t say it’s as cut and dry as he presents tho. For example:

Third analysis: What kind of target do I look like? Big guys who look tough are Monkey Danced on more than little guys. Win or lose with the big guy, you score points on ‘heart’. Win with the little guy and you just beat a child– no rep in that. Worse if the little guy beats you. People who are uncomfortable in their own skin (reads as weak) and labile (literally translates as ‘lippy’ but a psychology term for showing emotion) are bully targets.

There’s logic to this, certainly. But consider this story of 2 teenagers attacking a 75-year old woman as a gang initiation. And one of my favorite quotes from Greg Hamilton:

Most people are grass-eaters with their heads down on the ground. The jackals and lions know this and think of them as that. Hold your head up and walk like you are the biggest, baddest lion that walks. The jackals and lions will notice and leave you alone because they don’t want to get hurt. Don’t challenge them because they might feel they have to respond to it. All you want is their respect, not their dignity.

This isn’t to say one guy is right and the other is wrong, but more that it’s not always so cut and dry. Things can be complex and well… as much as we want to be able to predict violence, as much as we might be able to lend support to particular situations or contexts, in the end we have to admit we can’t predict it all, that sometimes shit happens. Best we can do is strive to be prepared.

Kel-Tec PMR-30?

/ hsoi / 10 Comments

My buddy Charles over at TacticalGunReview.com was telling me he’s supposed to get a Kel-Tec PMR-30 for testing. Hasn’t arrived yet, but since then I’ve read two articles on the gun. One at GunBlast, and the other just came through from The Box O’Truth (Ed Zone #123).

That prompted me to write.

It sounds like this gun is actually pretty positive. That it’s light but workable, good factory trigger. It uses .22 Magnum rounds (30 of them!), and TBOT did some penetration testing.

It got me wondering.

Could this be an effective pistol for self-defense?

I don’t think it would be as optimal as more traditional pistols, like those chambered in 9mm Parabellum, .40 S&W, or .45 ACP. But when some gun is better than no gun, could this gun be good for people that are recoil sensitive? The hard factor there, that I can’t judge until I can hold one in my hands, is that often if someone is going to be recoil sensitive they may also not be able to handle a long and/or heavy trigger or a large grip. It sounds like the trigger here isn’t heavy, but is it long? And just how big is that grip to be able to hold 30 rounds of .22 Magnum?

I’m not saying I’m advocating anything… at least at this point.  But there’s enough about this gun that make me wonder if it could fill a niche beyond plinking and small varmint control.

Kel-Tec…. if you’re reading this, I can give you my FFL’s address. 🙂

Palm38 Tri-Plex ammo

/ hsoi

I like snub revolvers. One challenge is finding the right/best ammo to carry in a snub. I have documented my snub trials, if you want to read them. So when I read over at The Firearm Blog about the Palm38 Tri-Plex Multi-Projectile .38 Special Cartridge, I was intrigued.

I read the specifications PDF. It looks… interesting. I’d like to see how it actually fares in something other than gel, and it’d also be nice to see it performing 1. in a lot more tests, 2. out of its intended firearm. From what I can tell, this ammo would NOT be good for use in the general sense (looks like it’s not very useful past 10-15 feet). But you see, this ammo is made by the people behind The Palm Pistol. So within that intended niche, the ammo appears to have promise. The Palm Pistol is designed for people who may have dexterity issues or arthritis and the like. In cases like those, the less recoil the better. But of course, if you reduce the kick going backward you also reduce the kick going forward. Furthermore, the Palm Pistol is single-shot, so anything you can do to make your one shot do as much work as possible, that’d be good. The Palm Pistol isn’t meant for distance, and aiming is either by point shooting or at best a laser, so distance isn’t too much of a factor. Within those parameters, this ammo could be a good thing.

It’ll be interesting to follow their developments.

Observations about observation

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

Jay’s back online. He’s been on duty as a Deputy for about 6 weeks now, and has some observations about observation.

I’ve observed some unobservant behavior recently myself.

Was at a bookstore a couple of nights ago and there was some hipster guy walking around with his nose glued to his mobile phone. The entire time I was in the store and saw the guy, he was always glued to the phone (15 minutes? maybe more). He was holding the phone up such that it forced his eyes on a more horizontal plane than on a diagonal downwards to the ground, but yet he walked around constantly with the phone in front of him and his eyes more focused on the phone than anything else. He was able to notice things better than someone whose focal plane was aimed downward, but yet I could still see his walking wasn’t steady nor decisive. He might have noticed that giant bookshelf in front of him, but barely. I was tempted to walk up to him and constantly get in his way to see just how badly his “condition white” was, but I was out with the family and figured the guy would have caused a scene… since he’s engaging in his behavior, he doesn’t find that behavior to be wrong, so my pointing it out to him would only put him on the defensive and then I become the asshole. I didn’t need the grief. Besides, sooner or later he’ll fall into a fountain and hopefully learn a lesson on his own.

I was in the drive-thru at a bank. The woman in the lane next to me finished and she pulled forward into the open parking lot. I saw her park her large SUV, get out — leaving her driver’s door wide open (and car running) — and go around the back of the vehicle to the rear passenger-side door. She opened it and proceeded to do something for a few minutes, my guess is there was a child back there in a car seat that needed tending to. So now, her car is running, her driver’s door is open, and she’s on the complete other side of the car. She can’t clearly see anything on the driver’s side of the car, her attention is focused on the child that’s strapped into the car seat… and here I see some strange man walking through the parking lot. There’s no way she can see this man, and he’s walking in a direction that puts me into condition orange: he’s going towards her open driver’s door. I’m formulating a plan of action, then I see the man continue past the car. A minute later the woman closes the rear door, walks back around the car, into the driver’s seat, and off she goes.

I just kept thinking how someone could jump into that car and drive off… who cares about the car, it’s about the child in the back seat.

No, I’m not perfect myself. We are all guilty of slipping in and out of condition white. We just have to do our best to be vigilant and spend as much time ‘condition yellow’ as we can.

The dream of one-shot stop

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

I don’t want to say it’s a myth, because it can happen. So instead, I’ll call it a dream because sometimes dreams do come true.

The “one shot stop”.

A few days ago something happened that caused me to think about this topic again. Oldest shot a 255# boar. A big, tough S.O.B.. It was a perfect shot through the vitals, 165 grains of .308 Win Barnes TSX dead-on through the heart. About 2500 fps, about 2300 ft-lbs of energy. Massive damage, and right through the pump station. Yet, the hog still ran a good 25 yards.

So why is it that people believe one shot from a .45 ACP is going to drop someone in their tracks? I’m not saying it’s not possible, but it’s not something you should count on. Remember, all pistol rounds suck. Caliber only matters inasmuch as it affects your ability to get good penetration and shot placement. As long as your round can get down where it needs to be, and you can put it there on-demand, that’s what matters. But don’t think that one shot is all it’s going to take. If you’re in a self-defense situation, your goal is to stop the attack. Techniques where you shoot once, or “double-tap” and assess, they can lull you into a routine that may set you up for trouble. That hog was shot through the heart yet he still “kept fighting” long enough to potentially do some damage if we weren’t 60+ yards away from him.

One-shot stops can happen, but instead of wishing for your dream to come true, it’s better to keep working to make the reality happen. Keep fighting until the fight is over… because your opponent probably will do the same.

That bullying video

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

There’s a video that’s been going around lately where some small skinny kid is picking on some larger kid. The small kid gets in some punches to the big kid, and eventually the big kid has enough, grabs the small kid and slams the bully to the ground. Backstory is that the big kid has been bullied for quite some time.

Here’s a story telling what’s happened since then.

My personal feeling was the bully got what he asked for. I also bet the victim won’t be picked on any more now that people (everyone around the world, in fact) know he’s willing and able to stand up for himself.

What bothers me more is some typical reactions:

 

“We don’t believe that violence is ever the answer,” Mr. [John Dalgleish, head of research at Kids Helpline and Boys Town] says. “We believe there are other ways that children can manage this.”

[…]

 

[An older girl] physically stops a friend of the younger boy from going after the older boy, telling him to “back off”.

“The longer term way is about developing better relationships between kids in the school, that will then empower young people to not be passive bystanders when these acts occur but to stand up and say ‘this is wrong’,” Mr Dalgleish says.

[…]

St Marys Police duty officer Inspector Jason Green said posting the video had the effect of glorifying violence in schools.

 

 

 

 

Violence is never the answer. I used to believe this myself. The trouble with this belief is it takes our value system and imposes it upon someone else, someone who does believe violence is the answer or violence is the first resort. When someone is punching you, what are you supposed to do? Politely request them to stop punching you? It doesn’t work out very well. Walk away? They’ll follow you and keep punching you. Hope and pray for someone else to step in? If someone finally does step in, what happens when that person is no longer around to protect you? I do believe one needs to try to resolve situations in the best manner possible (e.g. maximize enjoyment of beer & tv), that we should work for non-violent dispute resolution, that we take steps to avoid such a situation in the first place. But when you are dealing with a predator that won’t back off, sometimes bearing teeth in return is the only response they will understand.

To deny violence’s place, to deny realities of violence, is a cover-up and a lie. When we don’t talk honestly and realistically about things, we do a disservice to all involved, including greater society. Jack Donovan wrote a great essay titled “Violence is Golden”. Give it a read.