Keeping a round chambered

[Gun]

So by your 'Locked & Loaded' argument, that means you don't know anything about English, right?

Incorrect. You failed to understand his argument.

[afdcomposer]

Glad someone posted this. The Tueller Drill really teaches you that you need to develop and practice alternate plans to defend yourself if you are unable to deploy your weapon in time.

Every time I've seen this drill run, the defender just stands in his original position and tries to get his handgun into play before the attacker reaches him. No one thinks "outside the box" by sidestepping, back peddling, placing an obstacle in between themselves and the attacker, kicking/striking, or even running away to gain the needed distance and/or time. If you are solely relying on deploying your handgun as your only plan for self-defense, you are going to come up short.

"Never bring a gun to a knife fight."

As for me and my house, we will be +1 in the chamber.

Things I carry (not at the same time), each of which is carried +1, are as follows:

Sig: 239, 226, 229, 938, 1911

Other: FNP (that's 14+1 of .45 ACP, which arguably should be enough), Kel-tec P-32 (for when shit is about to get real)

NB: None of these semi-automatic weapons of war has the shoulder thing that goes up.

[KCJones]

Incorrect. You failed to understand his argument.

I understood his statement perfectly, and that's exactly the point: Despite the minor error he made, his point was very clear. He was pointing out, as "proof" that cops "don't know anything about guns" that it's "loaded & locked" not "locked and loaded", and further that "no safety" and "loaded & locked" are mutually exclusive by definition.

I also understood his argument perfectly. The problem is his argument is internally-contradictory: He equated a fairly minor semantical error that likely impeded nobody's understanding of the original statement to "not knowing anything about guns" {my emphasis}... In doing so, he made a minor error himself, which also really didn't impede anyone's understanding of the point, but which -by his own logic- would imply him "not knowing anything" about English.

The fallacy of a minor error being equivalent to knowing nothing about a topic is the issue.

e.g. A couple days ago I made a careless typo, referring to an extractor pin as an ejector pin. Right word in my head, wrong word on screen. Does this mean I know nothing about guns? If I happen to casually reference my AR-style semi-automatic rifle erroneously as an "AR-15" does that mean I know nothing about guns? If I go to the Konica photocopier to "xerox" a document, do I know nothing about making copies? If I point to a box of "puffs" and say "can you hand me a kleenex?" am a moron about blowing my nose?

Bottom line, the semantics-police are annoying enough without it being turned into "you know NOTHING about this..."

[mpan72]

I understood his statement perfectly, and that's exactly the point: Despite the minor error he made, his point was very clear. He was pointing out, as "proof" that cops "don't know anything about guns" that it's "loaded & locked" not "locked and loaded", and further that "no safety" and "loaded & locked" are mutually exclusive by definition.

I also understood his argument perfectly. The problem is his argument is internally-contradictory: He equated a fairly minor semantical error that likely impeded nobody's understanding of the original statement to "not knowing anything about guns" {my emphasis}... In doing so, he made a minor error himself, which also really didn't impede anyone's understanding of the point, but which -by his own logic- would imply him "not knowing anything" about English.

The fallacy of a minor error being equivalent to knowing nothing about a topic is the issue.

e.g. A couple days ago I made a careless typo, referring to an extractor pin as an ejector pin. Right word in my head, wrong word on screen. Does this mean I know nothing about guns? If I happen to casually reference my AR-style semi-automatic rifle erroneously as an "AR-15" does that mean I know nothing about guns? If I go to the Konica photocopier to "xerox" a document, do I know nothing about making copies? If I point to a box of "puffs" and say "can you hand me a kleenex?" am a moron about blowing my nose?

Bottom line, the semantics-police are annoying enough without it being turned into "you know NOTHING about this..."

The answer to all your questions is yes.

[KCJones]

The answer to all your questions is yes.

Apparently so!

[Starfighter]

Come back in two more years and we might be talking about carrying a pointed stick vs a rape whistle.

That's funny

[Starfighter]

I'd give them the Zoolander Stare.

Works every time.

There's only ONE look.

[Gun]

I understood his statement perfectly, ...

If you had, you would not have made that post.

Two points he made perfectly clear which led to the assertion cops know nothing about guns.

First, guns cannot be locked, then loaded. This is impossible.

Second, guns cannot be locked, AND (MOST IMPORTANTLY) have no safety (on). This is impossible.

So your statement he quoted, he argued that the cops know nothing about guns, succinctly.

Using your recent thread is not an argument, even if in the thread title, you called it an extractor pin.

http://forum.pafoa.org/showthread.php?t=317205

[Gun]

There's only ONE look.

That look might be patented, or at least patent pending.

[Starfighter]

This thread is interesting. I do not always carry with a round chambered. I read all the posts before commenting. Here's my thinking, and it's just MY THINKING, not an attempt to persuade anyone.

1 - Situational Awareness. If I know I may be at elevated risk, like coming from a show in the city late at night, or say closing up a cash business where no one is around etc. I may or may not chamber a round, but I will definitely be aware of corners and alleys where someone can hide. I am counting on my perception of my surroundings to help me, you may need to ward off an attacker here, this is a more likely place for a criminal to try to gain an advantage. This is a compromise, I know, because of course no one knows the moment when they will be victimized. But let's say 300 days out of the year I go to work and back, visit friends, etc., all of which time I may have my firearm. And only 65 days of the year do I venture to places where crime happens semi-regularly. My thinking is, of those 300 days, God forbid a kid gets hold of my weapon? I don't consider myself 100% immune to mistakes. The chances of a tragedy happening are perhaps more possible than me getting assaulted, so the chamber remains empty. If a small child is somewhere that I don't expect that child to be, like sleeping over for a night at a friend's house but they don't have children, I don't want to make it a foregone conclusion that the weapon is armed to kill. Yes, I have a daughter. I'm thinking of her too. It's not a guarantee. It's similar to the argument, gun safe, no gun safe? Do you lock it up and keep the ammo separate? How does that help during a break-in?

2 - I don't always carry my sidearm holstered. I carry a holster with me, in case a situation arises where I choose the option of wearing it. But sometimes I just carry it with me - in a carry on, so to speak. If I can't get to it in a split second, I can't personally make an argument to keep a round chambered. In situations like this, FYI, when I park my vehicle, I move my pack or case out of sight or cover it with a garment, so it's less likely someone will do a smash and grab for what's on the seat. And of course I always always always lock the vehicle.

3 - John S. Law. S stands for SIDEARM. Everyone knows cops carry guns. No one knows that I am carrying. If I were a cop, there's no question, personally I would "lock and load". (SORRY, it just SOUNDS BETTER). I mean, c'mon. If you're crazy enough to attack someone who YOU KNOW is authorized to use deadly force, well, that's just one for the Darwin Awards. And from the officer's standpoint, I would imagine the thinking to be, "anyone coming at me with malice has got to know I will do everything in my power to defend myself or whomever it is I'm protecting." So the more readier, the bettier. But some cops don't. Now I'm going back many years, but once or twice I noticed a Glock in an officer's holster and the trigger was pulled "all the way back". And I thought, Hmmmmm, that's odd, it doesn't seem like there's any ROOM to PULL the trigger on that gun! (Long before I knew anything about them, of course.) So even some officers, at least years ago, erred on the side of caution.

4 - The "we call it rough housing" and "put some distance between you and your assailant" posts. I am not trained in combat. I certainly think about my own gun pointed at me. How s__ttily ironic that would be. Do you ever hope that just to draw might be enough? A deterrent? I don't want to shoot anybody, and I certainly don't want to kill. If I draw the weapon, or gesture like I'm going to draw, possibly, a stand-off moment? This is not an easy target, let's move on. And let's say the assailant doesn't have a gun, but mine falls into his hands. I have no option if it's loaded. I don't feel I can overpower an attacker in the time it takes him to squeeze the trigger. If I feel uneasy about the environment, I may chamber a round, and then this thinking goes out the window. Hopefully a heightened state of readiness will make the chances of being disarmed unlikely.

I do not think about shooting my foot off, or "will the safety fail?" None of that. I do holster the gun like I'm disarming a bomb, when it's live. That is good advice, and a good metaphor. Not carrying in "condition 1" is not about the risk of me hurting myself. It's all about who else can pick up this gun and do unintentional, or intentional damage. I don't even shoot my .45 ACP with 8 round mags anymore, cause I find that's when all the jams happen. And I only load 14 rounds in the Glock 19 for the same reason, even though it has never jammed. I truly don't foresee a firefight. I don't think it's a plausible defensive carry scenario, although of course anything's possible.