Can You?

“Can you?”

“Can you what?”

“Can you kill someone?”

If you are advocate of the Second Amendment and you carry, you probably think that you can. And you say, “I am good at the range; punch holes in paper; make the metal targets sing.”

OK, do you think that you can shoot somebody?  If you are serious about self-defense, and preparedness in general, you better be able to do so. 

If Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, Ret., is correct, and I think that he is, most people will fail when put to the test.  I did once.  Thank goodness, because a 16-year-old boy got to live another day, and he should not have. 

Grossman (psychologist, author and law enforcement/military training expert) posits that most humans have a built-in aversion to killing another human. Grossman’s insight is not predicated upon whether a person is Sheep or SheepDog.  I am unquestionably a SheepDog, and I failed a survival test.

Perceiving a threat and surviving an actual threat is two different things.

Kendrick Castillo is a SheepDog.  Unarmed, he did not hesitate to charge the shooter at the recent Colorado school shooting.  Because he is a SheepDog, he acted.  But, acting does not guarantee success nor survival. Kendrick did not survive his mission.

I survived because the perpetrator’s semi-automatic pistol was an exact look-alike BB gun. You could not know it was a BB gun until you held it in your hand and examined it. I perceived a deadly threat and failed to act appropriately to that perception.

Grossman’s position is supported by the dismal performance of American WWII soldiers.  Most enemy casualties were as a result of bombs and crew-served weapons.  Most individual American soldiers either never fired their firearms in combat or they shot over the heads of the enemy.

The problem was recognized by the U.S. Military and rectified during the Vietnam conflict using desensitization techniques.  Incidentally, the same desensitization to killing apply with the use of violent video games by youth.

Couple the inhibition with time consuming OODA factors (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) and you have a recipe for personal failure and disaster.  However, I assert that the inhibition can be overcome with the employment of muscle memory when properly embedded with shoot/don’t shoot training.

Shoot/don’t shoot training is really threat assessment coupling muscle memory to the correct decision to shoot. Upon a predicate act being perceived as a threat, muscle memory ignores the aversion and shortens the OODA response time creating a strong survival protocol.

Perception, as in “What would a normal man perceive?” is a strong, historic, legal standard.  It remains a benchmark in most of the country, but it is under attack from the left.  Currently, there is legislation in the works to change the standard in CA for law enforcement officers to a standard of “actual threat” for a defense in the application of lethal force. Such nonsense is social decay. Individuals must remain in a “perceived threat” mindset when determining the appropriate use of lethal force, if they wish to survive a hostile contact.

My original law enforcement firearms training in the early 1970’s, punching holes in paper targets, did not prepare me to overcome the inhibition and respond appropriately when confronted with a sudden, perceived threat.  Subsequent law enforcement shoot/don’t shoot training changed my behavior. Today, the 16-year-old would not survive the incident. 

To be most effective, shoot/don’t shoot firearm training must mimic actual life scenarios and be as realistic as possible.  My shoot/don’t shoot training was computer driven interactive video wherein you had to respond to changing scenarios depicted by real actors.  Your laser firearm had the feel and report of an actual firearm.

Overcoming the aversion in a sudden individual self-defense response is crucial.  Preparing for planned combat is a different kettle of fish, and Grossman’s “aversion” is still in play.