Okay, I have been reading through various arguments from both sides and looking up incidents. Here is my take. Both handgun defense and spray defense have proponents and detractors. Both sides selectively use information to bolster their positions. Both sides seem to conveniently ignore information that doesn't suit their argument.
It is difficult to tell from the various eye witness/victim accounts just how often bears were actually attacking or just bluff charging and the humans reacted to the encounter as an attack. In some cases, it appears that the aggression was more on the part of the humans because they felt threatened. Not passing judgement here, but simply pointing out that bears were too close and that did not respond to shouting and posturing by the humans were then hazed by the humans in an attempt to fend off the bears who instead returned aggression.
Pistol proponents (such as the guy from Ammoland) like to talk about all the times bear spray 'failed,' citing accounts like the two hunters in Wyoming where the guide was killed and his partner didn't know how to work a Glock. Of course the guy using the bear spray was potentially already terminal, the surviving buddy not having reported seeing his guide ever deploy the spray. Of course, it is important to keep in mind that bear spray is a short distance weapon and often after the attack has commenced. People are going to get hurt at that point. People also seem to get hurt by bears when they attempt to use firearms at that point as well. The difference here is that a pistol can actually kill the bear to stop the attack and pepper spray has to dissuade the bear.
Pistols can dissuade or kill bears at longer distances, a big benefit for handguns. However, shooting and not killing a bear has apparently triggered bears to then charge and physically engage the humans. I did not find any instances of it, but I do not doubt that very close use of spray in an attempt to haze bears may have had a similar result. It is hard to get good information from the various accounts online. They often exclude the less exciting aspects of the events and so we miss how things truly unfolded.
Bear spray proponents point out that people engaging with firearms are more apt to be injured or killed by bears than when using bear spray. Firearm proponents argue that a higher percentage of attacks are actually stopped successfully with firearms than bear spray. Both arguments appear to be correct based on the data presented. Again, based on the information available, I would have to question just how often attacks were actually attacks and how often the attacks were actually triggered by humans. I am not suggesting that the humans did not feel threatened, but am suggesting that some attacks were undoubtedly brought on by how the humans performed.
When I talk about the bias in reporting success and failures, I am going to use this article as one example as I still have it pulled up. I found examples from both sides that seemed to read the same way.
https://www.ammoland.com/2017/09/bear-spray-failure-bow-hunter-mauled/#axzz5azjz89Gb
Here, bear spray was said to fail because the bear charged through a cloud and still attacked, resulting in injury. Bear spray did manage to drive the bear off however. So was it a success or failure? Bear spray stopped the attack, but did not prevent the attack.
https://www.wideopenspaces.com/harr...ack-finally-stopped-with-a-glock-10mm-pistol/
By contrast, Weingarten considers this to be a success story for guns because the hunter was not killed despite the bear being shot multiple times to prevent "attack." The gun did stop the attack after the hunter was seriously wounded. So is this a success or failure of the gun?
My point here is that both sides want to claim their option is best. Both sides will present information in a favorable manner to make it sound like they are correct. The contrast between Weingarten stories is interesting. Bear spray is bad because it did not prevent an attack even though it eventually stopped the attack, but in the gun story, the gun is good because it did stop an attack despite failing to prevent it. Hmmmm.