Category: self-defense

  • Violent Crime Statistics

    Before we get started, we need to cover some common misunderstandings over terminology. The word “assault” for instance is often used in everyday language to mean a violent attack, such as the title of the movie “Assault on Precinct 13.” The word “violent” has similar connotations, such as a news program saying “a violent incident…

  • Best Magazine Article I’ve Ever Read

    The magazine is RECOIL presents CONCEALMENT from CMGWEST recoilweb.com | Issue 31. The article is “Safe in the City” by Dave Merrill. I don’t know Dave, but the advice he gives is absolutely sound! Read it and absorb it! There is another good article by Jared Wihongi called “Close-Quarters Firearms Integration Tactics.” For law enforcement,…

  • Police Marksmanship: Violence Skill vs. Firearm Skill

    In a previous post, I discussed the difference between firearm and violence skill. I want to expand on this topic here. The driver is the article “Hitting (or missing) the mark: An examination of police shooting accuracy in officer-involved shooting incidents,” for which the citation is at the bottom. This document costs money to download,…

  • William English: 2021 National Firearm Survey, Updated Analysis

    One of my biggest regrets in my book was stumbling across English’s research way too late. I was only able to mention it briefly. In fact it is worse than that, because I hadn’t heard of it, I had assumed that some of the Defensive Gun Use (DGU) statistics I referenced came from Kleck’s research…

  • Capacity and Reloading Speed versus Simplicity

    My book and blog posts are for ordinary civilians who may not have any firearm experience or self-defense experience. As such, I prioritize things like safety over speed (see a previous post). In this post, I will prioritize simplicity over things like capacity and reloading speed. As such, I will recommend certain types of revolvers…

  • Talking to Law Enforcement

    [note: this post contains some foul language that is relevant for describing a criminal escalation] The public and its relations with law enforcement (LE) have strained over the last several years. This characterization is mild, as law enforcement officers (LEOs) have been deliberately targeted and killed. A lot of the difficulties with the public stem…

  • Comfort and Light Recoil

    A helpful way to improve your self-defense preparation is to focus on your likely threat. In my book, I tried hard to eliminate misperceptions and rely on vetted statistics so that the attributes of the threat would be identifiable. Knowing these attributes allows us to prepare appropriately. For the self-defense industry, the threat a civilian…

  • Small, Medium, and Large Caliber Handguns

    A study titled “The Association of Firearm Caliber With Likelihood of Death From Gunshot Injury in Criminal Assaults” was released in mid-2018. I’ll cite the article at the end and link to it. Unfortunately, the study is often presented as a rebuttal to the slogan “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” This rebuttal is…

  • Fast-Access Safes

    I discuss safes a lot in my book. One type of safe homeowners use is a fast-access safe for firearms. These safes can be in several different configurations. Some open with a manual key, some have biometric (e.g., fingerprint) capability, some have keypads, and some have RFID. These safes allow faster access to a firearm…

  • Speed vs. Safety

    When I grew up, I did a lot of hunting. Firearm safety was paramount. My first two single-action revolvers had the transfer bar safety mechanism, allowing you to load six rounds safely. No matter; I loaded five rounds anyway. There was never a round underneath the hammer. When rifle hunting, it was rare that there…