MUGGING and CC

Add a wrinkle to this scenario

Lots of heated discussions about what we'd all do. So take this wrinkle. The below is my nightmare, why i carry, and i still don't have a good response.

So now you're walking with your wife, after seeing a show maybe, and these 4 guys pop up out of dark stoops in front, behind, your situational awareness couldn't spot them beforehand. The guns are pointed at both your wife and you. What do you do?

Is there any difference in your reaction? how can you save her when you're busy saving yourself? How good are you? does she carry too? Are the BG serious or just punks or can you tell? Do you give them your wallet?

Truth - when they get the drop on you, no matter how, your options are reduced to bad and worse. Compliance is bad, for all the reasons already stated. But dying, and getting your wife shot or killed, is worse. Somebody in that scenario is getting shot if you draw.
 
Once the wife is brought into the realm... It is fight to the death! If we were both to escape with our lives and I had done nothing to protect her, she is gonna make my life a miserable hell! "YOU HAD YOUR GUN AND DID NOTHING???"
First move is to put the wife down... SHE HATES THAT PART The reaction of the BG's is likely astonishment when one victim jumps the other...
Then I commence to fight to the death with any and all weapons available to me...
Brent
 
Truth - when they get the drop on you, no matter how, your options are reduced to bad and worse. Compliance is bad, for all the reasons already stated. But dying, and getting your wife shot or killed, is worse. Somebody in that scenario is getting shot if you draw.
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You're right about that for sure. It all comes down your goal. My goal is to minimize losses. Unless I have a VERY strong feeling that I'm getting shot no matter what, I comply. It's already bad. You're behind the curve and, when guns are pointed at you, you're NOT getting back ahead of that curve. Your last sentence is the key. If you draw, somebody gets shot. Most likely multiple "somebodies" and most likely both you and your wife. I personally don't care if the BGs live or die, I want to maximize my odds of living, preferably without injury. The most probable action leading to a safe outcome is compliance.
 
I just realized!!!
I make a real sorry example as the "proper victim":D Kinda like when some dog postures up on one certain "catch dog" bulldog I own... She is the greatest dopey looking bulldog with not a mean bone in her body but if a dog postures (no matter their size) she is gonna commence to whoopin butt and taking names!
Brent
 
BTW, compliance has bounds as Pax once listed. For example, going with them, on your knees with the back of your head to them - may not be the way to go.

However, the point is survival or is the point 'ego'?

If your wife gets mad at you because you didn't kick butt but you are both unhurt (if robbed of cash), then next time - let her duke it out and you scamper off for help. :D
 
BTW, compliance has bounds as Pax once listed. For example, going with them, on your knees with the back of your head to them - may not be the way to go.

However, the point is survival or is the point 'ego'?
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Exactly, there comes a point where there's nothing left to gamble. "Turn around and get on your knees." is definitely at or beyond that point.
 
I tell you what, it pretty scary to deal w. something like that b/c you never know how it will turn out. I just hope that non of us would have to deal with that
 
Another worthy point about Mrs.hogdogs... She isn't some mousy little thing. Likely in a mugging she is going to commence, in one breath, to cuss out the deviant subjects and order me to kill them!:eek: More than once I have had to pull her off of guys! There have been other times she has been mad because I didn't take her side in situations (back was sore for a month after those weeks in bowsers house)... It didn't do my case anygood when I tell her the reason was because she was out of line and/or off base in the situation...
She has "MEAN MOMMA" genes!
Brent
 
One of the things that seriously complicates any discussion like this is the fact that after an attack, particularly one in which the victim cooperated, the victim often has a significant ego investment in believing that there was nothing else he could do other than cooperate. By necessity, most crime survivors who cooperate with their attackers are very adamant about that, but this belief may not always be congruent with physical reality. That's not to say crime victims lie about their encounters, but the human ego strongly protects itself. For many people, the only way they can live with the memory of the crime and their cooperation with it, is to cling tenaciously to their own powerlessness. To support or enable that belief is often (not always) to support a lie. But it's the kind and compassionate thing to do anyway.

On the flip side, and equally difficult from a discussion standpoint, nobody in the world is capable of a ruthlessly accurate assessment of their own capabilities and alertness status. Some come closer than others, but they're rarely the people who believe themselves to be fully self-aware (see http://www.apa.org/journals/features/psp7761121.pdf for a discussion of how & why that might be true). Whenever someone opines, "Nobody would ever catch me off-guard," it's a 100% certainty that the person who is talking is nowhere near as alert as they think they are.

This isn't rhetoric, either. It's simply the truth. As a human animal, you are blind and inattentive a lot of the time, and you simply do not recognize that fact because -- well, because you're blind a lot of the time. It's simply the way you're wired.

A lot of us in the firearms world are passingly familiar with the phrases "tunnel vision" and "auditory exclusion." We tend to think of these phenomena as if they are solely the product of adrenal stress. That's not true. (See http://www.forcescience.org/fsinews/2006/12/tunnel-vision-and-tunnel-hearing-time-to-update/ for a great discussion of that.) Tunnel vision is a variant of a phenomena sometimes called "inattentional blindness", "sustained inattentional blindness", or "change blindness." These are all separate but closely-related ways to describe some specific failures in how the human brain perceives and stores information. Generally speaking, the most intensely we focus upon a task, or the more difficult the task becomes, the less we observe about the world around us.

Incidentally, it's why magicians are able to work their magic. A skilled sleight of hand performer takes advantage of these known weaknesses in human perception -- in fact, he often walks right through them. Repeatedly.

Sometimes this blindness can be quite striking, and even humorous. A few years back, some researchers won an Ig Nobel Prize for their study, "Gorillas in Our Midst: sustained inattentional blindness for dynamic events." The authors ingeniously demonstrated that when we pay attention to something, it's all too easy to overlook other events happening right in front of us -- even a woman in a gorilla suit. Standing right in the middle of a screen at which the subject is directly focused upon. And remaining there for five full seconds while the subject continues to focus on the screen. And beating her upper chest before walking off the screen. Utterly invisible to roughly half the very attentive and focused observers ...

(Oh, yeah, I know. Everyone reading this would be in the other half... ;) )

The people in that study weren't unusual in any way. They were normal. Just as the posters in this thread are all normal. Guys, you can be taken by surprise. If you are determined to be tactical and safe, you owe it to yourself to have a plan to cope with situations where you ARE taken off guard, where you ARE suprised by an unanticipated event, where you AREN'T ahead of the game and magically in control of all circumstances. Because quite frankly, failing to be prepared to cope with this reality is living in a fantasy world.

pax
 
Cool post PAX. i don't know the scientific stuff, but i do know that the more often those Muggers do it the better they get at it. They practice too ya know, it's a two way steet.
 
My dad always told me this, When dealing with an armed robber who has you at gun point, if you decide to draw, you have to;

1)Find gun with your hand
2)Unclasp button/move clothing
3)Draw weapon
4)Aim (even quick target aquisition counts)
5)Pull Trigger


The BG has to
1) Pull Trigger.

How fast are you?



As for situational awareness goes, i give a stern look to anyone even looking in my direction, and if they are within ten or fifteen feet of me i VERY Loudly ask "Can I help you?" I get alot of looks like "what a psycho" and "man that guy is a dick" But i've never been mugged... I've never even been solicited for spare change! And my girlfriend loves it because she says she never worries about being bothered when we're together. (which has it's withdrawls, as she loves to shop and i HATE IT!!! But i ALWAYS go with her)


It comes down to this, if i don't know you, and you're walking toward me, Especially if you're between my 3:00 and 9:00 I'm going to address you, and ask your business. (I.E. Hey, do you need something?) and if i get anything other than, "nope just walking home" Then i move to my aggressive stance (which is, turn and face you with my hands free of pockets) and hold my ground until the person has either walked by or changed direction. I may sound like a bully but I just want to make it home every night and unlike them, I KNOW that i have no intention to hurt anyone. My Kickboxing teacher always said that when someone starts talking crap or acting tough, you should leave. But if you can't, and you're sure that a fight is iminent, Lose your mind and scream like a psycho! Go over the top and yell like a rabid Grizzly... Become the aggressor, but not in a provoking mannor. I've done this at countless parties when i was in highschool, and the drunk bad ass never knows what to think or do... They are in awe. They turn around and walk out, yes i may look like a moron. BUT I"M SAFE! I don't care what that stranger thinks about me. Because i'll probably never see them again, and i'll be unharmed.
 
In addition

I'm not saying i'm doing it the correct way, and i'm Definately not saying to Scream at your armed assailant, that's just what i did when confronted with an old fashioned fist exchange. As for being aware, i constantly catch myself distracted and unprepared when i'm out. Especially when i'm shopping because you can't possibly be aware of everything, and most of the time you're within 2 feet of someone else.

Just thought i'd put that out there before i got flogged for being too head strong (which i'm definately not lol) I was just trying to illustrate that if you puff up and ruffle your feathers more than the other person before the exchange of blows, you may not have to be there for it.
 
And if all else fails, i whip out my trumpet and Lull them into a slumber... While they sleep i take their cell phones out and make long distance calls to rogue 3rd world nations.
 
peetzakilla said:
Your own definition proves my point. The mere presence of a gun is not "violence". It most certainly is IMPLIED violence which is why you must act in a manner that keeps it implied.
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Alright, I was in a pretty bad mood yesterday, and have since calmed down. Based on your reply, it is my opinion that you have a narrow and simplistic view of the term violence. Yes, the presence of a gun is not violence, I agree. But when the gun is being directly used to threaten death or serious injury to you, it is not the mere presence of the gun, and it is violence, whether the gun is utilized as threatened or not. Same scenario with any weapon, not just a gun. Please reread my definition of violence, then cross-reference that with the definition of mugging. Even without a weapon, the use of force is used to make you surrender your possessions, and that is violence. Really read the definition. It even defines harsh language as violence. A nonviolent mugging would require the criminal to politely ask you to surrender your possessions without forcing or threatening you. Sounds like the Salvation Army collectors to me :D. I mean really read the definition of violence, then look at the definition of mugging, think about them both, and then tell me that nonviolent muggings are possible. The definitions I cited are in post #27, which I tell you so that you and others can easily find them. I don't mean to dwell on this, but come on, I'm right and I know it. Moving on...
peetzakilla said:
The best gunfight is one that didn't happen. Let's not go down the "He started the gunfight by pulling on me..." road. A gunfight doesn't start until someone pulls the trigger
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A mugging at gunpoint constitutes a threat on your life. A mugging at gunpoint is justification for stopping the threat using potentially deadly force. Don't blame the victim.

Not saying this particular mugging should have been resisted (I mean, they're alive, right?), just saying that other hypothetical muggings start to get murky really fast.
 
:) Glenn,

I thought you'd like that. It's amazing how the human brain works -- and how easily we're led astray by our own perceptions.

Check out this magic trick, for example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voAn...tomori.com/2007/skepticism/mind-under-matter/

It's a great video about a color changing card trick. Don't read the comments before viewing the video, of course!

(Discussed in more detail here: http://forgetomori.com/2007/skepticism/mind-under-matter/)

As fascinating as this stuff is, and as amusing as it can be, it really has huge implications for anyone interested in self-defense -- both in terms of personal awareness (are you as observant as you think you are?) and in terms of how we present our actions and beliefs to the authorities after a shooting event (did you really see everything you thought you saw?).

Anyway, all this is one reason I've kind of slowed down on posting in this type of thread. There are lots of people who're aware of what they're up against when it comes to observing the world around 'em (and bless 'em for it!). But sometimes it seems as if these knowledgeable voices are too often shouted down by people who like the Oracles of old, see all, know all, and tell a great deal more than that!

pax
 
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