…is being driven by women:
Most women would not have thought to carry a gun even five years ago, said Andrea Durhal. When she became a National Rifle Association certified instructor eight years ago, her classes were mostly men. Recently, women have started to fill her classes.
It took a few years for women to get over a fear of guns and take responsibility for their protection, she said.
“We’re being victimized; we’re being raped. The crimes are getting higher and the police departments are less and less,” she said. “People are realizing now that they need to be their own security.”
There’s a very interesting graphic there. The highest percentages of women getting permits is Wayne County (Detroit) and Barry County (Grand Rapids). I would have thought that Genessee (Flint) and Oakland (Pontiac) Counties would be equally high, but they’re slightly less. I wonder why?
I heard some horror stories yesterday from someone who lives in a rough neighborhood. Her daughter is being harassed by a group of girls who have been following her and threatening her. They have come around to the house and broken windows. While stopped at a railway crossing they attacked the mother’s car and did a few thousand dollars of damage. The police have been completely ineffective at dealing with the situation, failing to even provide the correct forms for legal proceedings, etc.
How would concealed weapons help this situation? Do you shoot teenagers who throw rocks at your house or kick your car?
In the case of the car you get out and brandish the weapon. Unless they’re terminally stupid, that should solve the problem.
In the case of rock throwing, you don’t need concealed. You come out on the porch with a twelve gauge loaded with rock salt, and rack it. If they don’t disperse immediately, the first shot is in the air. Again, if they’re terminally stupid, they’re remember the next one for a long time.
You need not wonder why Flint isn’t as high as other areas. Everyone in Flint knows that if they’re attacked by a weird psycho they can just fling a Twinkie across the street to distract the fat slob, or threaten to take his Oscar.
Rand, unfortunately we don’t have either option in this country. Thanks Johnny Howard.
Never ‘brandish’ a firearm. Thats usually a felony – and grounds for revocation of your CCW.
If you pull it out of it’s holster, you must be prepared to use it. If you’re not then leave it alone.
As far as kids damaging your car, it’s a 3000 lb weapon: Use it.
In the case of the pack of girl bullies, the solution Rand offered won’t work because they’re based on American male culture. It’s unlikely these girls would respond to a firearm (have they ever even seen one?) the way a typical group of male would. In any case, in Trent’s country that isn’t an option, so we have to abandon it. Here’s my take on the situation:
Trent doesn’t say what the girl did to provoke the ire of the other girls, but I doubt it matters — girl gangs are irrational, not driven by real events like boy gangs are (you crossed into their territory, say; which a boy gang all you have to do is stay out of their territory and they’ll leave you alone). If one day a gang of vicious girls decides they don’t like you, you’re toast. Until for no reason they lose interest and turn on someone else, but as with any irrational force you can’t count on that happening until your life has been made a complete misery.
Here’s my solution: psychological warfare. Mother and daughter are going to have to put aside their desire to be seen as nice and civilized by everyone (which is usually the main problem in getting women to defend themselves from anything), and go completely insane on these females. I’m guessing none of the girls are very smart, and they’re probably filled with all sorts of irrational fears and superstitions. (Smart, rational girls don’t join gangs.) I’d say a campaign of headless dolls drenched in fake blood and stuck with pins with each bully’s name embroidered on them left in locker rooms and on doorsteps, maybe some dead chickens (try to find some unplucked birds that haven’t had their heads cut off yet) left near the girls’ hangout, air let out of tires (if the girls have bicycles or cars — don’t damage the tires, if found out charges could be filed) with warning signs spelled out in chicken bones… If anyone can afford a cheap voice recorder they should record some scary sounds on it (screams, ghost noises; they can get them off the internet) and leave it somewhere where it can be heard by one or more of the girls without them realizing where it comes from — can voice recorders be set to go off at a certain time?). If the daughter has any guy friends maybe she could get them to help; guys won’t fight women, but they love playing pranks on them. Maybe the daughter should start practicing an eerie, rage-filled stare. I stared down a girl who tried to bully me at school once. She never bothered me again. But the main trick is to be really crazy and unpredictable.
If the girls still bother her after that, then pull out the final weapon: start a rumor. This weapon is deadly because it can backfire, so it should only be used as a last resort. It’s the nuke of teenage girl fights. Anyway, if this all seems very tiresome compared to just waving a gun, please remember the female mind is basically anti-reason and you have to fight fire with fire.
I didn’t say to not be prepared to use it. If one is being attacked, one has the right to self defense. I was just pointing out that the most common means of self defense (and unreported) with a weapon occurs when it is shown.
Trent,
The proper response to those girls would to have hosed them down with Pepper Spray.
Rand,
Never point a firearm at someone unless you are willing to apply deadly force and deadly force is justified.
Mike: I’d say rather than pepper spray, something that made them smell bad or turned their skin a different color, or ideally both, with hard-to-remove aspects. That being said, that solution isn’t very practical unless 1) there is a hose present and ready to be grabbed attached to a tank of pepper spray or whatever, and 2) the girls are in a position where they can be so hosed, like out in the open. Cars don’t usually come equipped with hoses, likewise hoses aren’t inside of homes (where the mother and daughter probably were when the girls started breaking windows).
I would have walked up to them damaging my property, asked them once to surrender(citizen arrest), failing that, I would have produced a can of Fox Labs and proceeded to individually spray each of them in the face. After the first one or two, it would be a moot issue as the others would be running in terror.
Who cares about stinky spray? They are going to experience pain on a level they never imagined. That is deterrent enough!
Spray them, call 911 and tell 911 you are being assulted and your property is being damaged.
Never point a firearm at someone unless you are willing to apply deadly force and deadly force is justified.
I don’t know why people continue to read things I didn’t write. “Brandish” != “point at.”
Rand,
The term Brandish has a specific legal meaning.
bran·dish (brndsh)
tr.v. bran·dished, bran·dish·ing, bran·dish·es
1. To wave or flourish (a weapon, for example) menacingly.
2. To display ostentatiously. See Synonyms at flourish.
n.
A menacing or defiant wave or flourish.
You DO NOT want to Brandish a weapon unless you are prepared to issue leathal force.
I think Definition 1 is what we are discussing.
I think what you mean to say is to ‘Dispaly’ a weapon like a Holstered Pistol or a slow slung Rifle.
Brandish is specifically defined in some state legal codes. Where it isn’t, Wanton or Reckless Endangerment pretty much covers the same ground.
Even if all you do is display a weapon, expect the aggreieved party to call 911 and report you for pointing it at them.
ALWAYS BE THE FIRST PARTY TO CALL 911! IT MAKES A HUGE DIFFERENCE.
low slung rifle
Mike, you keep acting like these are men dealing with other men. Women are not going to walk up to anyone damaging their property and ask them to leave, then calmly produce a can of something and calmly begin spraying the other, who would have just been standing there. It’s. Just. Not. Going. To. Happen. Or at the very least, it’s highly unlikely. Because women are simply not trained to defend themselves, not if they have been raised all their lives to be “nice” women. In our civilization it’s either/or when it comes to women — either you are nice, in which case you are expected to go to someone else for help in a case where you are being attacked, or you are not nice. It’s a really big step for a nice woman to buy a gun or take a tae kwan do class or just refuse to put up with someone’s shit anymore, and our civilization still doesn’t like it when nice women do that — they get labeled as a possible “not nice” and there are social consequences to that. This is despite years of feminist changes to society, but all those changes did was remove men from the equation without helping women feel they had a right to defend themselves from physical attack (instead women are supposed to depend upon government agencies that supposedly have been “enlightened” by feminism; as we can see from Trent’s story, this often results in the women getting no help at all).
Anyway, saying what the women should have done is beside the point. It wasn’t done, it’s too late now.
Vandalism and violence happen before you can stop it. Punishment comes after the fact and often is not enough to dissuade. If they break your windows, photograph them and call 911. Then send Andrea after them!
Laws are irrational. Mike is right about the trouble you can get in showing a gun. I was once arrested for the tone of my voice (I have no need to shout) when speaking to a hoodlum that had stolen property from my mothers home. It’s not right, but it happens.
I would ask, “Do you want to get shot?” (in that tone) then reveal the gun.
To answer Trent’s question. You only shoot if lives are threatened. Vandalism doesn’t qualify. You may have to accept injustice, because we live in an unjust irrational world. Then see if Andrea will contract for services.
“I was once arrested for the tone of my voice (I have no need to shout) when speaking to a hoodlum that had stolen property from my mothers home. It’s not right, but it happens.”
^^See the point I made about calling 911 first?
Uusually the 1st person to call 911 gets treated as the victim.
Folks in the US need to exercise their rights of jury nullification more frequently, but alas that option is strongly discouraged by our judges. Juries should consider both the guilt of the accused as well as the worthiness of the law when sitting for a case.
Check your state laws. In Nevada, for example, your vehicle is considered an extension of your home – so staying in your car is vastly preferable to exiting it, if you are going to display a firearm. Exiting can be construed as escalation, especially if you only then pull a weapon.
Michigan has a castle doctrine law that applies to your car as well as your home.
I’m not entirely sure where the law lands on the difference between “brandishing” and, say, just drawing your pistol because you believe you may need it ASAP. Yes, drawing is often enough to get all but the densest criminal to back off, but sadly there’s a massive gray area there. The wrong police or prosecutor may take your drawing as escalation; the right one might see that your drawing forced the threat to back away.
Whoa, be careful about this “brandishing” stuff.
Here in Massachusetts, there have been cases of conviction for “brandishing” even when a weapon wasn’t brandished in the sense that the word is understood by most of us. Merely threatening to use a weapon which is never actually seen can, in the peculiar world of the court, be called “brandishing”. Weird, but that’s how it is.
Again in Massachusetts, there is no room for escalation. Either the situation justifies the use of defensive force, up to and including lethal force, or it doesn’t justify the use of any force at all, real or threatened. In other words, if the situation is so serious that you are justified in threatening your assailant by waving a gun at him, it is also serious enough that you are justified in shooting him. Conversely, if shooting isn’t justified, then neither is threatening to shoot.
Now obviously just because you have a gun out and are prepared to shoot your assailant, this does not mean that you have to go ahead and do it. If the situation changes, you may no longer be justified in exerting force, deadly or otherwise. Imagine that you draw a gun when attacked, but your attacker sees the gun and immediately turns to run off. Can you shoot him? No, because once he turns and begins his retreat he is no longer the threat to your safety that he was a second earlier. In such a case, the firearm successfully performed its function; it caused the assailant to cease and desist without even being fired. However, the fact that a deadly threat existed immediately prior is key. A deadly threat never existed if, say, you had caught the assailant vandalizing your mailbox, but not actually presenting a physical threat to you. In that case, you can’t shoot him, and you can’t threaten to shoot him, either.
Sorry to be tedious about this, but it’s important. Innocent people can be jailed if they get this wrong. To wave a gun around for defensive use, there must be an imminent threat of deadly or at least serious physical harm. Exactly how “imminent” is defined varies from state to state and from situation to situation.
Another important but not obvious factor is that if the state laws are written in such a way that they seem to allow the use of deadly weapons for the protection of “life or property”, don’t believe it; that’s obsolete boilerplate. Protection of “life or safety” is probably OK, but property isn’t. Texas seems to be a notable exception, but don’t quote me on that.
How would concealed weapons help this situation? Do you shoot teenagers who throw rocks at your house or kick your car?
==
If you believe your life is in danger (and that may or may not be true, depending on the exact circumstances. . .eg are you IN the car?), then yes, you open fire. In a situation like that you probably wouldn’t need more than one shot, since one shot will cause all of them to disperse pretty fast.
Note that in many jurisdictions being assaulted by multiple attackers at once creates an automatic presumption of “fear of grievous bodily injury”. In other words, the bar to legally using deadly force is quite a bit lower if you’re being threatened by more than one individual at once.
In practice the bar is probably lower yet if you’re female and being threatened. And note that the key is THREATENED, you don’t actually have to wait until they start physically attacking or raping you until you respond with force.
Now what do you do if a group of teenagers is vandalizing your PROPERTY (house or car) without any credible threat to your person?
That’s much trickier. You can’t legally point a gun at them, nor “brandish” one (legally speaking that means draw one and display it), though depending on the totality of the circumstances, doing so illegally may well be a good response. (Depends on who they are and the quality or lack thereof of local law enforcement). You can show someone you HAVE a gun without “brandishing” it, and that response might be enough to dissuade them.
One potential response is to videotape them in action, and call the cops. Another is to fence your yard and put a large (or several large) dogs in the yard.
The safest thing is to leave it in the holster unless you are committed to shooting someone or something. I can put my hand on top of it and have it out and shooting in a second and a half, possibly less. If it does not leave the holster, it cannot meet the legal definition of brandishing or reckless endangerment or anything else.
“Note that in many jurisdictions being assaulted by multiple attackers at once creates an automatic presumption of “fear of grievous bodily injury”. In other words, the bar to legally using deadly force is quite a bit lower if you’re being threatened by more than one individual at once.”
AKA a Mob Scene
There used to be talk radio host in Los Angeles named Michael Jackson. This was at least 20 years ago and he was a lefty. I used to listen to him because he was a good interviewer but he eventually got really ideological and soon after Rush Limbaugh came along and blew him away.
Anyway, he once had a show on carrying concealed weapons in Los Angeles. Of course, it was (and is) illegal but he had the then police chief, Bernard Parks, on his show and it was expected to be a lefty lecturefest. However, surprising everyone, all the callers were women ! They had a single theme, “I will not be a victim !” He would lecture the caller about how dangerous it was, blah, blah, blah. Then the next caller would be another woman and they were all in favor of concealed carry !
It was hilarious.
Video them and post it wide and far. Get a million hits on youtube, pass out dvds to everyone in town. Show them for the creatures they are. And then with the evidence, go after everything their parents own.
I just wanted to point out Barry County is Hastings, and Kent County is Grand Rapids. I’m not surprised Barry county would be high, a lot of people commute to Grand Rapids, Lansing, Battle Creek or Kalamazoo.
It’s crazy situations like this that cause a lot of people to favor open carry laws. There is a guy up at my work that has the entire backside of the camper of his truck turned into a open carry billboard.
For anyone who still cares.. yes, the mother and daughter were in the car, stopped at a railway crossing with the boom gates down. The gang of girls approached the car, so they locked the doors. The girls then started yelling obscenities and kicking the car. Eventually they left. The mother got out of her car and approached all the cars piled up behind them, got names of anyone who was a witness. She took all this to the police who said they couldn’t do much, and failed to contact any of the witnesses.
Oh, and pepper spray is illegal here too. Fun eh?
All this talk about nonlethal alternatives is silly – the most effective deterrent is a well-handled assault rifle.
Is carrying hairspray illegal over there? It is a lot nastier than pepper spray.
The best advice on this board comes from Andrea Harris. I laughed reading it cuz it’s funny. No doubt, the guys think it’s funny and a waste of time, too. However, it’s dead on when dealing with women. You want to spray these girls with something nasty and long smelling (no matter how many showers) and hard to remove? Get one of those monster water guns, prep it, and keep it on hand. Have one for the house and one for the car. Make sure that cayenne pepper is a component of whatever you put in it. Power to the bitch factor!
Back in college, during Initiation Week the seniors used to carry Super-Soakers filled with a mixture of water and the cheapest parfume/cologne they could find. We newbies would get a dose whenever out of “uniform” (a djinn-like costume, my year), not running fast enough from classes to classes, and so on.
Smelled like heck, went away with one or two showers.
Try a baseball bat or cricket thingy or a large stick.
Andrea’s idea of revenge vandalism is also appealing as long as you are tricky enough not to let it get tied back to you.
But really, if you are going to stand up for your self when the law won’t, there are always consequences and if you are not prepared to take responsibility by getting your a** kicked or spend some time in jail if things go wrong, you shouldn’t do anything.
“All this talk about nonlethal alternatives is silly – the most effective deterrent is a well-handled assault rifle.”
Don’t be stupid, vandalism is not a reason for lethal force unless it is so criminal it endangers the life of yourself or your family!
Rand – Brandishing a gun at people who are not offering you violence is a felony in Michigan, and will get you all kinds of prosecuted in most localities. Terrible, terrible advice, and I’m surprised at a smart guy like you for saying something so ill-considered.
God made men and women. Samuel Colt made them equal.
“…if you are not prepared to take responsibility by getting your a** kicked or spend some time in jail if things go wrong, you shouldn’t do anything.”
Right, but then what? “Just ignore them” does not work in situations like this. The attacks and vandalism have already happened. Guns and other weapons we take for granted in this country are not available to these women. No one is doing anything substantial to help them beyond making sympathetic noises. What do you suggest they do, go into hiding? With what money? I assume by “living in a rough neighborhood” Trent means they can’t afford to move someplace nicer like a gated community with cops who care.
No, my solution is still the best: all-out psychological warfare — voodoo dolls, weird noises at night — the works. Of course care must be taken so nothing illegal can be proved. Maybe the daughter should rent out and watch The Craft for some pointers. It’s one of the best primers for studying girl bullies and how to deal with them that I’ve seen, despite the supernatural stuff.
My sister has Multiple Sclerosis, and cannot flee if attacked. Several years ago, she pulled into a (handicapped) parking space at a crowded Kroger’s, apparently flustering the driver behind her. He pulled his car up behind hers, blocking her in place. (Again, limiting her ability to flee.) Then he came to the driver’s side window and began pounding on it with both fists, screaming obscenities at her.
She reached into her car’s console and pulled out her gun, pointed it at the window and yelled at the top of her lungs, “just how f**king serious do you want to make this?”
The road-rager gave his actions some careful consideration, and decided to drive off.
Point the gang out to a couple of high school football players and offer them $20/gang girl beaten and stomped into the ground. Tell the guys to wear masks, don’t touch the payoff with your own fingers. Not associated with you, noooooo. Repeat as necessary.
“What do you suggest they do, go into hiding?”
Na, I am just saying take responsibility for what happens after acts of revenge and that if a person can’t handle the blow back they might be better off getting bullied.
Treat them the same as any other feral bitches, shoot, shovel, and shut up.
Yeah, they’re going to keep being meek (as required by law) and pursue legal action against the ring leader. The fun thing is, she has legal aid.. I’m paying for her defense! What a country.
Anyway, didn’t mean to hijack the thread.
Trent, the best advice so far was given by Andrea, forget about waving guns around in this situation(though carrying one incase you ever REALLY need it would be prudent).
My advice for whoever you were writing about: Get some really hard to wash off red spray paint. The kind that sticks for a week even with repeated showers and scrubbing. Next time they come around to harass/vandalise, spray them with the spray paint, and call the police after. If nothing else it will be really easy for the police to identify them!
PS: A camera could come in handy too. For documenting damage, and for to ID perps. Video would be even better.
Curtis: high school guys aren’t going to beat up high school girls. Not here, not in Australia. For one thing, girls don’t have the inhibitions guys do, and the guys don’t want to have their eyes clawed out. For another thing — teenage guys beating up on girls they might want to date? Are you serious? (And by “date” I mean have sex with. Girls who form gangs tend to be morally loose in other areas.)
Trent: well I hope that works out for them. Are they able to get a restraining order? I’m not familiar with the law in Australia.
PS: this isn’t actually that much of a threadjack. It does point out that the problem is possibly not the growing restrictions on guns, but the increasing influence of the idea that citizens are not supposed to defend themselves but instead to rely on the government, and how this idea poisons society in many ways. It makes the law-abiding citizen less able to take individual initiative on anything; and it makes criminals more violent because they know that the forces of the law are a lot more restricted in what they can do and in how quickly they can act than the victim and/or the victim’s family members can. Women taking it upon themselves to buy guns instead of falling back on the fashionable cant of “guns are nasty!” is a step in the right direction, but we’ve got a long way to go.
The modern vernacular is “hooking-up.”
I consult Urbandictionary.com…
The word you’re looking for is “rooting.”
Oh, sure, I forgot we were all Aussies now.
Spray those girls with anything, even water, and you could go to jail. As satisfying as it might be, it’s not worth it. The same thing goes for verbal threats, and the voodoo dolls could probably be construed as “terroristic threats” in some places. “Looking closely” and “ray” and “Mikael Hallin” have the right idea. Make a video and upload it to YouTube. Make it high definition and be sure their faces are clearly visible. Send the URL to your local TV station’s investigative reporter and tell them that the police wouldn’t help. Also send the URL to the Drudge Report, because they are covering stories like that.