Today I’m going to venture from the cyber world into what geeks call “meatspace,” the actual physical world.
I’ll start with a quick answer to the question in my title—almost certainly no. There are exceptions, but they are relatively few. But there are alternative ways to defend yourself if it comes to that.
As the Trump regime takes power, Nazis and their allies are becoming emboldened and enabled in their quest to “take back” America. This means that we in the resistance are potential targets of physical attacks, especially those of us who are POC, women, non-Christians, and/or LBGT persons. Even older white men like myself could draw unwanted attention from dangerous persons if we become visible in our communities by speaking out and organizing.
The physical danger can range from isolated assaults on one’s person to vandalism of your home to groups of people attacking your home. As most of you know, many of these attacks have already taken place, and there will be more. You will need to decide what risks you face in your community, and how to deal with them.
I have heard and read statements by people, some right here at DKos, saying they were considering buying a firearm for personal and/or home protection. I am a gun owner myself, but I think that this is almost always a bad idea. There’s a lot more to having a gun than just getting one from a gun shop and keeping it handy, and there’s a significant risk of injury or death from owning one.
There are several questions you need to ask yourself before buying a gun. The first of these is whether you are prepared to become proficient in its use. For most people, this would mean hours of practice at a shooting range or, if you live in an area where it would be appropriate, shooting at targets on your property. In the movies and on TV, we often see examples of someone with no firearms experience picking up a pistol and drilling a zombie through the head at 100 feet. But life isn’t like the movies, and nothing like that could ever happen. If you have not grown up around guns or ever fired one, you will need a lot of practice before you can hit a target at any distance. And that doesn’t prepare you for dealing with a moving target that doesn’t want to get shot. It takes longer than you probably think to get to the point where you can actually hit what you’re aiming at.
And a hugely important part of gun ownership involves safety. That’s why I think that, if you are going to get a gun and you are not experienced with firearms, you should receive professional instruction in not only its use, but in gun safety. I can’t cover all aspects of safety here, and any safety advice I may mention is no substitute from learning it the right way.
So another question to ask yourself is if you’re prepared to do what it takes to own a gun safely. This means, if you live with other people, keeping the gun secured where no one will casually pick it up. If you have kids or persons whose mental health might put them at risk, it means keeping the weapon unloaded and locked up at all times. Of course, this makes it useless for self-defense, so those in these situations need to think about alternative methods of self-defense. We’ll get to that in a bit.
I also feel the need to note that if you have a mental health issue like depression or bipolar disorder (among others), you should under no circumstances even consider having a gun in the house, even if you think you’re doing OK right now.
You also need to decide if you are willing to put in the time it takes to keep a gun maintained. You can’t just keep it laying around for months or years and expect it to do what you need it to do should the situation arise. Even if it hasn’t been fired, a firearm needs to be periodically taken apart and cleaned. And this must be done every time you do fire it, which means you’ll be doing it a lot while you’re learning to use it. This is a somewhat time-consuming process, and many people are unwilling to add “cleaning the gun” to their list of household chores. It’s one thing that pisses me off on those rare occasions I’ve had to shoot a coyote on my property.
But even if you are willing to go to the time, effort, and expense of owning and taking care of a gun, if you’re getting it for self-defense, you have to ask yourself—could you shoot and kill someone? Don’t even think about buying a firearm just to scare someone with. While it’s true that most people will back off when someone produces a gun, it is still the kind of threat you need to be prepared to back up with action. If you’ve never seen someone get shot or seen a gunshot injury, you can have no idea how horrible it is. My wife was shot in the shoulder by an abusive husband when she was young, and the after-effects of that injury will be with her the rest of her life. And getting shot is a terrible, painful way to die. Could you inflict that sort of thing on another human being? If you have any doubts, a self-defense firearm is not for you.
And even if you think you can deal with all that, chances are a firearm is still not appropriate for you. If you live in an urban or suburban environment, probably the best way to deal with a potential attack on your home is to call 911. There are risks involved in doing that if you are a POC with a white mob on your front lawn, but often just announcing that you’re calling the cops should be enough to send the fascists running—they’re not usually very brave people. And there are alternative methods of defending yourself in your home. Again, we’ll talk about that shortly.
If you live in a rural area where it might take the sheriff a half hour or more to get to you, and if you able to deal with the questions I mentioned above, then a firearm may be appropriate. It’s one of the reasons I own a shotgun (and thank goodness I’ve never had to point it at anything more threatening than a coyote.) But I’m thinking that includes a very small number of people reading this. For the vast majority, the next logical question is what exactly can you do to protect yourself?
One alternative is to get an air pistol. They’re not quite as dangerous as a regular gun, are easier to maintain and use, and a realistic “replica gun” can look very much like the real thing. But a good one that shoots 410 feet per second or better can injure an attacker and greatly discourage them. I own a Colt Defender replica air pistol I use to shoot rats. From a few feet away it looks very much like an actual Defender, and it will kill even a large rodent. One advantage to this type of weapon is that persons who cannot legally own a firearm can, in most jurisdictions, own an air gun.
Keep in mind that air guns are not toys, and can be quite dangerous. Many of the objections to owning a traditional gun will apply here.
Another alternative is pepper spray. This is easily and cheaply obtained (where legal), or you can even make your own. Pepper spray will stop almost anyone for at least 30 seconds, and is not nearly as dangerous or lethal as a gun. It does, obviously, have to be kept where children can’t get at it.
Tasers are legal in many areas, and will work at stopping an attacker even when pepper spray won’t. You can even get these at Amazon.
Please be aware of the laws where you live if you’re thinking about pepper spray or a taser. They are legal in many areas, but they are illegal in many areas, too.
An alarm system for your home can also be a deterrent to attack, and is not really all that much more expensive than buying a gun, ammunition, cleaning supplies, and paying for instruction in its use and safety. A good loud alarm has an excellent chance of scaring off the bad guys.
The need for all this stuff probably won’t arise for most of us. But it very well could for some of us. The main purpose of this diary was to address those who are frightened enough to have considered buying a firearm to protect themselves. It’s almost always a bad idea, and there are other ways to defend yourself if the need arises.
It’s important to remember that one of the best ways we can defend ourselves is to stay connected to each other and take care of each other. If you can establish contact with people living nearby that you can call in times of trouble, you might not need any of the things I’ve talked about here.
I have deliberately not included here any suggestions on which firearms a person might buy, nor will I answer any questions about that in comments. I believe that anyone who should buy a gun already knows the answer to those questions, or is willing to ask an instructor, and I don’t want the comments section to devolve into the kind of dick-waving contest that gun owners often get into when discussing firearms.