Ya because it's Soooooooooo hard to train to flip off a safety.
Buy the one you want and shoot the heck out of it until you're proficient.
No.......you're completely right. It isn't hard at all to train someone to 'flip off a safety'.
But more importantly and what is likely the most important task of all when being taught and while teaching responsible firearms ownership/possesion, is safe gun handling.......while worn and while not.
If the above is done properly and the 'student' truly embraces all aspects of said training, a thumb safety is of no use, in fact, it can be detrimental to getting your firearm into action ASAP, albeit, by a second or less. Even though rare and unlikely to ever occur to 99.9% of us, who doesn't believe, and rightfully so, that in such dire circumstances, that every second doesn't count....?
If a person takes on the responsibility of gun ownership, he/she should then become as 'proficient' in that use as possible, as you say. I completely agree and there should be little argument, otherwise. Practice makes one as perfect.....
as possible, because practice does not make perfect.....ever. There is nothing that a gold medal winner has ever done where they don't think that they could have done it just a bit better or faster and as far as practice goes.......what people practice more?
Even the most practiced, proficient and confident members/gun owners on HW will go through the 'panic' stage when confronted with any situation that could lead to drawing their weapon in self defense. And really.........what training/practice can really and truly elicit those kind of surreal, dramatic, heart stopping emotions from a person hoping to learn even through the most current training on just exactly how to effectively deal with just such a generally fast moving and very potentially lethal situation? It's a bit like expecting someone not to scream, yell, jump, cringe, jump away or have their heart beat jump 50x's normal rate when you scare them. Can you moderate that.....perhaps, but not enough to not already have affected your response time........no way.
Training helps immensely and I promote seeking out such training, but unless one has been there, done that (and even then each such encounter is different)....we can't possibly know exactly how we will react. But we do know that placing one more 'factor' into this unexpected, horrific, terrifying, completely foreign and dire situation, might very likely delay the immediate response that our minds now tell us that we need to make......and right now. And when that one additional 'factor' is a 'mechanism', one that takes both a mental and physical moment and effort or two to employ, is that not an unnecessary impediment to being able to immediately satisfy what your mind is screaming at you to do?
Do I think that everyone is able to learn to disengage a safety....yep, I would certainly hope so anyway. Do I think that in most cases, when all is said and done, that there was time to disengage a safety? Yep.....likely so. Do I think that gun owners should learn to use firearms both with and without safeties.....yep, no different than teaching a young driver to drive an auto and manual vehicle (if you can find a manual anymore). Who knows if/when the only gun available to you might contain a safety or not.....it's a prudent move to learn both.
As with every driver on the interstate, every gun owner is his/her own person. We all react differently to the same situations, sometimes much differently. But one thing is irrefutable and is always true no matter who we're talking about or what the situation. Our brains always engage before every single move that we make, whether as a positive or negative result. Every step we take, every time we pass another vehicle, everytime we change the channel, look left, look right.........no matter what, we are guided by what our brains tell us to do. It is our brains that keep us safe and most times it does that well. It is therefore our brains that are our safeties and no better safety exists.
You can have 10 safeties on every firearm, but their only use would then be to slow down what your brain has already told you to do.....by 10x's. If your immediate situation has convinced you (your brain) that you need to react as quickly and decisively as possible, the decision your brain made already went through every possible alternative, scenario and possible result known to you. That same thinning out of options and choosing the most prudent (safe) approach is something we do countless times each day....without ever questioning ourselves. When to start breaking prior to that stop light, entering heavy traffic considerations, etc., ......all those things happen automatically.
If and when a life threatening situation occurs, our brains don't immediately bail on us and abandon us. It kicks into high gear, does it's best to deal with what is likely the most stressful and adrenaline producing situation you have ever encountered, filters through what you've been taught and accepted as the best approach, your muscles then engage to satisfy your brains goals and the cards are then dealt. It is the natural progression of how we have survived that long, what our training and practicing has hopefully afforded us and we are carrying out our best plan to be able to survive that immediate situation. If our weapon is drawn because we have definitively decided that the situation calls for the use of deadly force, it is then necessary to put our response in play ASAP. There is no fidgiting around, no I hope that he/she doesn't shoot/stab me/choke me/beat me first......your internal safety, your best and most faithful safety, your brain, has determined that this is the most prudent way to go. A mechanical safety, in that scenario, serves no useful purpose. It does, however, delay, no matter how long or short, your efforts to reduce or completely stop any aggression made towards you.
No matter how practiced one is with a gun that employs a safety, he/she will still need to disengage that safety in their attempt to achieve their goal of stopping the aggression and being made safe. Given the most heightened adrenalin rush that one can possibly experience, no matter how practiced and confident, that external, mechanized safety can't help but be more of an imposition and time consuming (if done exactly right while keeping the same grip as an added challenge for most) than a firearm without. At no point do you have to fire your weapon given your particular circumstances, with or without a safety attached. Your brain makes that final decision as well. But what is certainly true is that sometime during that encounter and after you have drawn your weapon, if it employs a safety, you will have to disengage that safety in order to fire your weapon. That involves both movement and a sound that your adversary may be either able to see or hear.....or both. To expect that you will disengage your safety the millisecond before you decide to fire is neither sane nor a recipe for a longer life. Outside of alerting said adversary of your next move, disengaging your safety cannot but help even slightly, at best, neccessarily move your intended POI as your thumb is no less important in a proper grip than your trigger finger. None of these factors and the time and movement/noise spent to better position yourself for the shot with a gun that employs a safety needs to be considered on firearms without safeties. The moment your brain says go, it's out the tube. No movement, no noise, no slight grip adjustment to disengage the safety.....nothing more than the bare minimum of effort (mental and physical) needed to exact the result you deserve in such a situation. No different if you decided to carry a firearm with a safety full time with the safety disengaged. Your firearm then resembles a non-safety firearm except that you also have a metal mechanism protruding from your firearm that serves no purpose whatsoever other than to get in your way.....no matter how slightly. A smooth firearm, less safety, cannot help but make for an easier draw. Yep, it is somewhat of a non-issue for some, but gun manufacturers don't advertise that they produce their firearms with more rough edges and unnecessary external parts than their competitors in an attempt to sell more guns, at least, from what I've seen. Actually, quite the opposite seems to be true.
As far as the very real issues of storage, kids, people in general and having access to a firearm with or without a safety......that is the responsibility of the gun owner....period. How, when, where gun owners deal with this issue is their total responsibility and unfortunately, young kids and others do pay for gun owners irresponsible actions. But given that we are all left to our own best practices in that regard, the horrors of making bad, irresponsible and regrettable decisions justifiably affects many, but as we know, we are all painted with the same brush when such incidents occur.
If the ownership/use/storage of a firearm is not easy and conveinent for you, don't own one. If you can't figure out a way to secure your weapon safely while at the same time schooling your kids on the important aspects of gun safety that all children and adults alike should be aware of.......you've got choices to make. And no.....getting rid of your kids isn't one of them.......
.
Lots of differently designed firearms out there to choose from.......
I'm glad that some companies do offer the handguns with and without safeties. It is important that the gun owner feel both confident and proficient with their firearms, especially those intended to be their self defense weapon of choice.
Be safe and become proficient no matter the firearm you choose......
.
