Off-topic: Something for home defense?

[TexasSP]

I can also come up with stories of people who saved lives. It's an imperfect world, however I want to at least give myself the chance versus sitting there thinking "only if I had a gun".

Just because something is rare doesn't mean I won't protect myself against it. I also think people should spend less time worrying about how others choose to live when it affects them in no way what so ever.

For the record, bear attacks are very rare. However, my group of friends and family who fish in Alaska still carry protection against bear attacks.

If someone breaks into my house tying them up won't be an issue because I have no intention of tying up corpses.

As far as kids, everyone I knew growing up and my whole family had guns. There was never a single incident of anyone I knew getting into them because our parents had properly educated us. I was a naturally curious and mischievous kid and still never got into anyone's guns. Some of you act like your kids go around sticking their fingers into light sockets and dancing on the hot stove top. I touched the stove because I was taught it was hot, I didn't play with knives because I knew they would cut you, I didn't ride my bike into the street because I knew a car could hit and kill me. In fact, if you look at numbers many more people are killed accidentally this way than by guns in the house.

If you don't think you can properly educate and exercise your authority over your children then by all means don't have guns in your house. However, don't try to exercise your will on those of us who do.

Well said TexasSP; also, it is better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it ;-) As a kid as was dropped off and left at a hunter's safety class to learn more about guns than my parents had taught me because kids tend to listen to people with cool uniforms and badges better.

[PBO]

Originally Posted by TexasSP

If you don't think you can properly educate and exercise your authority over your children then by all means don't have guns in your house. However, don't try to exercise your will on those of us who do.

Are you kidding? this a public forum where we discuss 'issues'. What's wrong an opinion that's different to yours?

Originally Posted by PBO

Are you kidding? this a public forum where we discuss 'issues'. What's wrong an opinion that's different to yours?

I don't think he meant it as an insult PBO, it's just that in this country we have been fighting people that think they can enforce there opinions over us simply because we disagree, and they use the "for the children" line over and over again when the solution to that problem is simply education. Of course nobody in this country wants to hear the simple answer because it means one of them doesn't have an excuse to get paid now. IMO I don't care if someone is for or against guns like you,it's totally fine with me as long as you respect mine as well,which you have done and I respect that.

[2genewb]

Originally Posted by i should never have posted this, but it's too late now

i've had a gun in my mouth and one in between my testicles while being robbed. i can honestly say that if i were the best shot in the world, locked, loaded and with the safety off i would have only been a statistic and a cause for remorse for family members. the third guy holding and standing back would have made sure of that if the other two failed.

i've muscled 5 intruders out of my home single handedly. 2 of them were packing. i didn't need a firearm for that and having one would have put me at a disadvantage because i would have felt the need to access it.

i've had a pistol pulled on me in a busy city street and knocked the guy clear out of his boots.

my son is well trained at 7 yrs old and can pick off a jittery squirrel with a BB gun at over 10 yards with pretty good accuracy. i too was raised with locked and loaded pistols in the house and therefore am very strict about what is what and how to act. there's no question about my place over my children... just about their curiosity and the fact that one incident with a firearm is final, plain and simple.

i was trained with a 22 long rifle at age six and have an entire family full of military and ex military from green beret to red beret to recon to WWII to vietnam to iraq/afghanistan vets. weapons safety and tactics is almost a weekly event. there's only one person in my family who's ever fired a weapon whom cannot score expert on at least a couple weapons. it's not me...

i am an advocate for gun safety and home protection. however, there's a way to go about it and a way not to. having a firearm readily available and accessible for use in a home with children is absolutely not the way to go about it no matter how well you think you've trained your children. there's no way around the fact that having a firearm in the home readily accessible and ready for action only increases the chances that a firearm will be used in the home... and possibly by children... who no matter what you do are curious.

there's also no way you can deny that if you have a kitchen, you have sharp knifes the children have unfettered access to. the argument about a sharp knife is useless if you've ever actually prepared a home cooked meal for your children.

now, i see no reason not to have a firearm ready in the home as a secondary or third tier form of home defense. i do, however see absolutely nothing logical or intelligent about having it readily accessible and fire-able at a moments notice with the exception that it's put away correctly. if it's locked in a proper safe, you're simply not getting to it in a timely manner. no other way around it. this introduces the necessity for a primary means of protection. thinking a bat is sufficient is laughable as far as i'm concerned, but the right knife could certainly bridge that gap between "there's a perp downstairs" and "there's a perp in the room".

as far as i'm concerned, given the nature of the beast and the curiosity of a child at any age what-so-ever, anyone who thinks they can train the curiosity out of their children to the point any child isn't eventually going to handle their readily accessible firearm when they're not aware is completely delusional. my grand daddy grew up in a home with access and lived through it... but he certainly has stories of when he played. same thing with my pop and my uncle. same with mom. same with my brother and i. we all knew not to fire them, but something could have happened at any time. heck... it took my brother 22 years before he decided to do what he did. nobody, and i mean absolutely nobody would have even entertained the thought that what he did was even remotely possible at that point... but it happened... and now he's gone because of it.

so... yeah... brian... i completely understand your stance and actually agree that honest citizens should be armed or the criminals have the upper hand. but i think in a home with children of any age (8 - 80) should have not only the children trained and knowledgeable, but have tiers to it's defense strategy. it should start with either a good alarm system or slightly lethal and readily accessible in the event lethal is the purpose and move up to a fire safe that's nearly un-crackable that harbors anything you choose short of nuclear war heads. just don't go picking up something you need a push rod and black powder for.

i know what you do is your choice and this is simply my opinion, but by all means... think sincerely of the children first... and your right and/or possible need to bare arms second.

[TexasSP]

Originally Posted by PBO

Are you kidding? this a public forum where we discuss 'issues'. What's wrong an opinion that's different to yours?

You missed my point. Bigsteel basically addressed it so I will leave it at that. Too many people running around trying to legislate what others do. This goes for both sides of the spectrum.

Originally Posted by 2genewb

i've had a gun in my mouth and one in between my testicles while being robbed. i can honestly say that if i were the best shot in the world, locked, loaded and with the safety off i would have only been a statistic and a cause for remorse for family members. the third guy holding and standing back would have made sure of that if the other two failed.

i've muscled 5 intruders out of my home single handedly. 2 of them were packing. i didn't need a firearm for that and having one would have put me at a disadvantage because i would have felt the need to access it.

i've had a pistol pulled on me in a busy city street and knocked the guy clear out of his boots.

my son is well trained at 7 yrs old and can pick off a jittery squirrel with a BB gun at over 10 yards with pretty good accuracy. i too was raised with locked and loaded pistols in the house and therefore am very strict about what is what and how to act. there's no question about my place over my children... just about their curiosity and the fact that one incident with a firearm is final, plain and simple.

i was trained with a 22 long rifle at age six and have an entire family full of military and ex military from green beret to red beret to recon to WWII to vietnam to iraq/afghanistan vets. weapons safety and tactics is almost a weekly event. there's only one person in my family who's ever fired a weapon whom cannot score expert on at least a couple weapons. it's not me...

i am an advocate for gun safety and home protection. however, there's a way to go about it and a way not to. having a firearm readily available and accessible for use in a home with children is absolutely not the way to go about it no matter how well you think you've trained your children. there's no way around the fact that having a firearm in the home readily accessible and ready for action only increases the chances that a firearm will be used in the home... and possibly by children... who no matter what you do are curious.

there's also no way you can deny that if you have a kitchen, you have sharp knifes the children have unfettered access to. the argument about a sharp knife is useless if you've ever actually prepared a home cooked meal for your children.

now, i see no reason not to have a firearm ready in the home as a secondary or third tier form of home defense. i do, however see absolutely nothing logical or intelligent about having it readily accessible and fire-able at a moments notice with the exception that it's put away correctly. if it's locked in a proper safe, you're simply not getting to it in a timely manner. no other way around it. this introduces the necessity for a primary means of protection. thinking a bat is sufficient is laughable as far as i'm concerned, but the right knife could certainly bridge that gap between "there's a perp downstairs" and "there's a perp in the room".

as far as i'm concerned, given the nature of the beast and the curiosity of a child at any age what-so-ever, anyone who thinks they can train the curiosity out of their children to the point any child isn't eventually going to handle their readily accessible firearm when they're not aware is completely delusional. my grand daddy grew up in a home with access and lived through it... but he certainly has stories of when he played. same thing with my pop and my uncle. same with mom. same with my brother and i. we all knew not to fire them, but something could have happened at any time. heck... it took my brother 22 years before he decided to do what he did. nobody, and i mean absolutely nobody would have even entertained the thought that what he did was even remotely possible at that point... but it happened... and now he's gone because of it.

so... yeah... brian... i completely understand your stance and actually agree that honest citizens should be armed or the criminals have the upper hand. but i think in a home with children of any age (8 - 80) should have not only the children trained and knowledgeable, but have tiers to it's defense strategy. it should start with either a good alarm system or slightly lethal and readily accessible in the event lethal is the purpose and move up to a fire safe that's nearly un-crackable that harbors anything you choose short of nuclear war heads. just don't go picking up something you need a push rod and black powder for.

i know what you do is your choice and this is simply my opinion, but by all means... think sincerely of the children first... and your right and/or possible need to bare arms second.

Sorry, but I call BS on your post. You can pretend to be Billy Bad Ass all you want but seriously, I don't believe one word of it.

You can be pissed all you want, but anyone over the age of 2 should realize making claims like you have over the internet is stupid. Especially when you haven't been here long enough to lend any kind of real credibility to yourself.

As far as home alarms go, they are only good for alerting the home owner. Any law enforcement officer will tell you home alarms are always lowest priority. My alarm was on when my house got robbed several months back, the sheriff's department was on site 45 minutes later.

[2genewb]

i'm not pissed at all. call bs all you want. i'm a grown man with witnesses to all of those accounts, not some 14 yr old finally let loose behind a keyboard. either way, your response is exactly what i expected of you since it's the same as mine would be. i can respect that.

you are absolutely correct about the home security. notice i didn't mention silent alarm. as far as i'm concerned, there's 2 main reasons for home security. one is the loud alarming sound they're capable of. the second is that they're capable of alerting the authorities faster than a sleeping homeowner in the event of a fire when a couple minutes can be critical. in this instance they can startle and possibly scare away some would be robbers while buying billy bad ass who thinks a gun solves everything the needed time to lock and load.

there's no difference between billy bad ass that thinks a gun solves his troubles and billy bad ass who thinks he can do without it. in this case, i'm not buying it either.

[PBO]

Originally Posted by TexasSP

You missed my point. Bigsteel basically addressed it so I will leave it at .

Ah OK, I'm not sure I could have got it...I don't follow every issue in the US. Thanks for the heads up Bigsteel

Firstly I respect everyone's opinion be it pro or against guns. Bellow is just my opinion and how I think on the subject.

I love guns but would never have one loaded under my pillow or carry on me as protection. In fact if someone broke into my house to rob me or mugg me in the street with a gun, first thing I would say is "Take what ever you want man. Here is my wallet too". I think that pulling a gun on someone who has a gun already in their hands would not play out well. Thats why I don't think of guns as much of a defense. It still only gives you a 50-50 chance that you will come out on top. I rather let them have what they want and hopefully they will leave. At least that is the way I hope it would play out.

As far as kids safety I can't imagine having a gun that isn't locked up in my house with kids around. Thats just me but if anyone else feels comfortable with it then go for it. Your house, your gun and your kid. Who am I to tell you how to look after either one of them?

Something to lighten the mood
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIpLd0WQKCY&feature=related[/YOUTUBE]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIpLd...eature=related