One of your palms grips the handle. The other presses up against the butt. Steady your arms. Line up the sights. Click goes the hammer under your thumb. A clammy forefinger starts to pull back on the trigger. You suck in a deep breath and...Ka-WHAM! Everything from your belly button to your scalp shudders with the recoil. Organs jostle. Eyelids involuntarily blink. Your brain sloshes around in your skull, convinced an F-16 just broke the sound barrier inches from your face. A dragon's breath of muzzle flash momentarily blinds you through your goggles. Endorphins flood every capillary in your being. Your nostrils fill with the smell of cordite. You gasp, finally letting the air escape your lungs. Then laughter bubbles up through your throat - giddy, uncontrollable laughter. Your arms slacken. The laughter subsides, replaced by a plummeting jaw, an overwhelming sense of wonder at the sheer power and violence of it all. If you've ever shot a .454 Magnum, you know exactly what I'm talking about.
Now let me come right off the bat and say that I'm a strong advocate of gun control. In fact, I'm the NRA's worst nightmare. I don't merely advocate heavy gun regulation; I'm for outright prohibition. I think all handguns and assault weapons should be outlawed, reserved exclusively for the military and police. As for rifles and shotguns, I think they should only be allowed for purposes of hunting and self-protection from wild animals in rural areas. Any argument along the lines of "Guns don't kill, people do," is bogus as far as I'm concerned. People couldn't kill other people with guns if they didn't have guns to begin with. And the 2nd Amendment is an anachronistic relic of a bygone agrarian society that feared Native Americans and invasion from larger countries - it simply doesn't apply to 21st century America.
So what was I doing with a .454 Magnum in my hands? The story goes like this. Last week I was in LA for business (I write screenplays for Hollywood to pay the rent), and I was sitting around on a patio with some buddies enjoying a tranquil Saturday afternoon. As we made plans for dinner one of my friends, Noah, looked at his watch and said, "I'll meet you guys at the restaurant. I gotta head to the firing range first." We all looked at him perplexed. Noah is a gentle soul - mellow, thoughtful, kind - the last person you'd expect to see packing heat. "The firing range...?" I asked. He explained that a group of his pals had formed what they call the "Super Adventure Club" and every few weeks they get together for some sort of "adventure." Mostly these excursions are nothing more than harmless camping trips or hikes. But this week they had decided to visit the Los Angeles Gun Club and shoot bullets at flimsy pieces of paper. Before I could check myself I blurted out, "Can I come?!" And that was that. Next thing I knew I was in a packed car full Super Adventurers careening down the 101 toward downtown Los Angeles.
I can't say why I was so eager to join in. The only gun I had ever shot in my life prior to that day was a measly .22 rifle in the Boy Scouts when I was twelve. And a .22 is only one small step above an air gun, so it's not like it gave me a life-long thirst for major firepower. But eager I was, despite my strong political beliefs to the contrary of such behavior. Maybe it was pure curiosity. Or perhaps I did harbor some deep, shameful lust for weaponry - not from the Boy Scouts, but from video games. Truth be told, I'm a video game freak. I refuse to buy a PS3 or Xbox for my home for fear that it might ruin my life. I think I would cease to accomplish anything productive, would quickly dispense with all human contact, and would very well end up with a nasty case of arthritis in my over-used digits from constant gameplay. At home I mostly stick to online Scrabble, or chess or Risk - games I find far less addictive than the spectacular games created for consoles these days. But, whenever I get the chance I head over to my friend Kyri's house to play his PS3. And there I gorge for hours and hours on a smorgasbord of Grand Theft Auto 3, Fight Night 4 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. I kill, I maim, I delight in the blood-thirst of my inner cave-man. I'm not proud of it, but I keep going back for more. Why the attraction to high-jacking an old lady's car, or boxing a man senseless, or tossing hand grenades in suburban Virginia? I mean, I'm a pacifist after all. I'm against the war in Iraq, I abhor real-life violence, and as I stated above, I couldn't be more opposed to the use of handguns. Maybe going to the gun range was a way to confront my hypocrisy head-on.
The Super Adventure Club (of which I was now an honorary guest member) consists entirely of writers, all of whom suffer from varying degrees of dorkdom, myself certainly not excluded. Besides Noah and me were the following motley crew: Mike - a tall, gangly, bespectacled man in a plaid flannel shirt - had organized the outing. Ostensibly he was doing "research" for a pilot he had been hired to write about a "spunky female CIA agent." His hope was that the firing range offered AK-47s. Rick was a quiet, soft-spoken fellow with a perpetual grin, the sort of guy whose neighbors you could picture saying, "He kept to himself, but he seemed so nice. I never would have thought in a million years he ran a dog-fighting cartel out of his basement." Mark was a friendly chap who worked for a British video game company (and wrote animated movies on the side), both of which gave him high marks in my book. And David, perhaps the hippest among this decidedly un-hip dirty half-dozen, originally hailed from South Brooklyn and was the only one among us to have shot a variety of guns before.
As he explained in the car, David was keen to price some shotguns at the firing range. He wanted to buy one to keep in his home for self-defense. This raised the hairs on my neck, mostly because David and his wife have a small child in the house. "Are you really that worried about somebody breaking in?" I asked him. He got dead serious. "I'm very, very worried," he replied. "You'd be an idiot not to be." Mark suggested that maybe he should buy a taser gun instead. "But that only lasts for a few minutes," said David. "And who know how long it will take the cops to get there. I would have to keep tasering the guy. I'd be torturing him." Mark scoffed. "So it's better to just kill him instead?" he asked. "No, to deter him," replied David. "The sound of that shotgun clicking would scare anybody off. But yeah, if it doesn't, I'd kill the guy. Anything to protect my kid." Now the notion of a loaded shotgun being in the same house as a small child makes my stomach turn. But however much we tried to convince David that his logic was faulty, he'd have none of it. Reason and statistics can't sway a mind like this. Here they are, however, in the hopes that they may sway yours:
A spreadsheet from the National Center for Health Statistics (which I obtained from the NRA website of all places) shows that over the last 25 years, deaths caused by guns accounted for approximately one-fourth to one-third of all non-natural deaths in the U.S., depending on the year (on average about 30,000 per annum). The only cause of death which outnumbered fire-arm related deaths was motor vehicle fatalities. Death by gun outnumbered falls, poisoning, suffocation, fire and medical accidents. And in every single year, of those deaths caused by firearms, more than half were the result of accidents or suicides rather than homicides. All of this to say that guns cause a lot of death in our country, and if you have one in your home, it's statistically more likely to be used for suicide or cause an accident than protect you from intruders. Don't believe me? Take a look at the spreadsheet for yourself here.
The Los Angeles Gun Club is located in semi-industrial wasteland in downtown LA It's surrounded by drab warehouses, empty lots and even emptier streets. The last thing I was expecting when we stepped inside was a lively, festive atmosphere. But that's exactly what it was. Scores of people filled the joint - most of them young, some on dates, some in big clumps of friends. It felt much more like a bowling alley than a firing range. There were folding tables where you could sit an enjoy a soda or juice (alcohol was not permitted) and a lounge area where you could watch movies (they were playing Goonies - I shit you not). We Super Adventurers were told there was a 45 minute wait before we could shoot. So we put our names on a list and walked over to the interior windows which overlooked the range itself. With our faces pressed up against the glass we were reminded this was not a bowling alley after all. A dozen or so folks were lined up in adjacent booths firing away at paper targets, just like in the movies. But unlike the movies these were not FBI agents or hardened cops. They were regular Joes and Janes, just like you and me, and most of them looked like they had no idea what they were doing.
While waiting for our turn, we gawked at the display case full of guns available to us. We decided to go for a tasting menu which we would share among us: one .44 Magnum, one .454 Magnum, one Beretta, one .38 Special, one shotgun, two bolt-action rifles and a partridge in a pear tree. Next we chose our paper targets. There was a large assortment ranging from traditional bull's eyes to James Bond types to buxom female zombies. I decided on a simple human silhouette within which all the vital human organs were outlined. If I managed to hit the thing at all, I wanted to know whether I hit a spleen or a kidney. Finally we had to fill out the necessary forms. You might think that for an arsenal like ours, we'd be signing stacks of documents, submit ourselves to blood tests and be required to go through hours of psychological evaluation. Unh-uh. All we had to do was show a photo I.D., give our thumbprint and sign a single flimsy piece of paper swearing we weren't drug addicts or insane. Of course, if we were drug addicts or insane, or both, I doubt any of us would have admitted it. But that's okay, because with a simple signature the gun club was willing to take our word for it. The clerk placed our guns and ammo on the counter then gave us a brief - and I mean very brief - explanation on how to load and fire our weapons. It all took less than five minutes. I'd say about 45 seconds per gun. "Any questions?" the clerk asked at the end of his little spiel. We all shook our heads, pretending we had absorbed everything he had said. And voila! We were ready to pump some lead - at least according to California state law.
Donning our goggles and ear guards we filed into the firing range with our guns. The sound inside was ten times louder than through the glass in the lobby. Even with ear protection I jumped a little every time a shot went off. We split into pairs, each pair taking a couple guns and a booth. Then we clipped up our targets and ran them down the electronic clotheslines about thirty feet away from the platform. Noah and I had chosen the .44 Magnum and the shotgun. We decided to start with less firepower and work our way up, so with shaking hands I loaded the Magnum's revolving chamber with bullets. Everything had felt pretty dreamlike and unreal up until this point - even comical. But now it felt extremely real, and there wasn't a single funny thing about it. I was placing live ammo into a weapon that had the potential to kill with the twitch of the finger. As I raised the gun and aimed through the sights I found it incredibly difficult to steady my hands. The muzzle seemed to be wavering all over the place, aimed anywhere but the target. I took a breath, tried to relax, and aimed once more. The sights seemed somewhat aligned. My hands - if not exactly steady - had at least stopped shuddering. I glanced back to Noah for reassurance. He nodded solemnly. I re-fixed my eyes on the sights, on the target, counted down to myself - three...two...one...
It was over before I knew it - the jolt, the flash, the smoke. I noticed the paper target was swinging slightly. My first shot had hit! A smile spread across my face. I looked back at Noah, who was smiling too. Adrenalin overwhelmed me. It was like I had just downed five cups of espresso. I discharged the rest of the chamber and then retrieved my target. I inspected it closely while Noah took his turn. Three shots to the right lung, one to the ribcage and one to - according to the target - the medulla oblongata. I took a strange sense of guilty pride from this. As I watched the other Super Adventurers firing their respective weapons, I found myself impatient to try out all the other guns. Over the next hour I got my wish. Each gun seemed to have its own personality. The Beretta was smooth and (relatively) quiet. The shotgun was big and sloppy. The .38 Special was neat and functional. The bolt-action rifles were like Mack Trucks slamming into your shoulder. And the .454 Magnum, which I described at the top of this article, was pure power and violence.
We just couldn't get enough. When we ran out of ammo, we'd run back to the counter in the lobby to get more. Noah and I missed the dinner we had planned with friends. Our cell phones went off and we ignored them. All of us were under some sort of perverse spell. All we wanted to do was fire our weapons over and over, and then fire them some more. When reason finally kicked in and we realized we might have spent hundreds of dollars by this point, we reluctantly called it quits. But when they rung us up at the counter I was astonished - our bill only added up to about 30 bucks each. For the price of a movie and large popcorn we had shot guns deliriously for an hour and half.
On the drive back we were all punchy with excitement. "Did you feel the kick of that bolt-action?!" "Man, that .454 packs a wallop!" "We definitely have to go back!" Apparently we're not the only people to have had an experience like this. Later I looked online and, believe it or not, the Los Angeles Gun Club has 52 reviews on yelp.com. Here are some excerpts (any mistakes in grammar, spelling or logic are not my own):
"Sweet place to let off some steam."
"If you feel like you really want to shoot someone or like angry, just come here and do this, you'll come out feeling better!!! Release all your anger here!!!""I came here with a date once and it was fun!...Checking out the scene and the guns being fired by women! Women and guns seem to go hand in hand--very sexy indeed!"
"Fun place. I probably wouldn't be too comfortable working at a place like this though...'Hi, welcome to the gun club, are you emotionally or psychologically unstable? You suuuuure? Okay, I guess I trust you. Here's your pistol!'"
"Me like gun. Gun shoot go bang. Gun shoot go bang, however, is fucking expensive. Get the .44-- the most kick for your money, no pun intended."
And my personal favorite, which invokes The Beatles in a terrifying way:
"'When I hold you in my arms (Ooooooooohhh, oh yeah!) And when I feel my finger on your trigger I know nobody can do me no harm Because happiness is a warm gun, momma' With exactly these, among other, thoughts I walked into this powder-perfumed steel brothel of violent happiness (or happy violence). Either way is valid."
Scary, huh? To think that all these authors wielded loaded weapons at some point? To be fair, there are less enthusiastic and more coherent reviews for the gun club. But most of them tend to be on the frighteningly positive and nearly illegible side of the tracks. You can see the rest of them here.
Later that night Noah and I met up for drinks with some friends, including those we had ditched for dinner. Now I'm guessing 100% of these folks would characterize themselves as "liberal." They all voted for Obama. They all are against the war in Iraq. And though I haven't asked them, I would imagine most would be in favor of strong gun regulation. When I whipped out my target from the range, however (which by now had been nearly shot to tatters), they were all incredibly enthusiastic. "That's so freakin cool!" was the general timber of their responses. It turns out that some of them had actually been to the gun range before. And others were dying to go. Clearly I was not the only one suffering from a bad case of the hypocrisy blues.
With a little time to reflect, I must say that despite the visceral pleasure I enjoyed at the gun range, the experience only strengthened my anti-gun beliefs. The damn things are just way too deadly and powerful... and way too fun. The closest thing I can describe it to is smoking crack, of which I have first-hand knowledge (don't worry - I've been sober for nine years). I only smoked crack once, late one night with a one-legged stranger in Spanish Harlem who was generous enough to share his pipe with me. But that night seared itself on my brain. The high is overwhelming and instantaneous. You feel more alive than you've ever felt. And firing guns is exactly same. But like crack, the high is short-lived, and the only way to fight the crash is to fire back up. Crack is outlawed for a reason. And while the analogy isn't perfect, I'd say guns should be too. With crack you can only kill yourself. With a gun you can kill everyone around you.
Since returning New York, I looked up local gun clubs online. There are a lot of them within the city limits. But I didn't realize how easy it had all been in LA compared to here. New York City has extremely rigid gun laws (which I now take pride in) and you can't just show up to a firing range, sign a piece of paper and get handed a gun. It's slightly less rigid outside the city limits, but not by much. I looked up the gun laws in neighboring New Jersey and Connecticut and found them rigid too. If I wanted to repeat my experience in LA closer to home, I'd have to head to Pennsylvania, which has some of the more lax gun laws in the country, even more lax than California.
As you've probably guessed by now, gun laws are enacted more at the state and city level than the federal level. There are federal laws to be sure, but they have been passed infrequently and do little to curb the ownership of handguns. The most significant piece of federal legislation ever passed was the 1968 Gun Control Act (catalyzed by the assassinations of JFK, RFK and MLK). The bill expanded licensing requirements, restricted handgun sales over state lines, and prevented convicted felons, the mentally incompetent and drug users from selling arms (duh!). It also outlawed the mail order sales of rifles and shotguns. (Just think - you used to be able to order a rifle the same way you now order a book on Amazon). There have been several federal laws passed since, but the only major one enacted since the Gun Control Act was the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban (aka The Brady Bill) which outlawed civilian ownership of assault weapons and instituted federal background checks for those purchasing guns. These laws are not radical. They're pure common sense. The only shocking thing about them is how recently they were enacted. And big loopholes remain, such as the infamous "gun show loophole" which allows unlicensed gun sellers at flea markets and swap meets to sell guns without using the same background checks required of licensed sellers.
I can't say that my jaunt with the Super Adventure Club rid me of my hypocrisy. I'm still going to play ultra-violent video games at Kyri's house. And I can't promise that I'll never go to a firing range again. But what it did certainly do was place my formerly abstract beliefs into a very real, physical context. Having fired more than a few types of guns I can rightfully say that they're no joke. They're not something to be romanticized or celebrated. Whatever pleasure there is to be had from them is vastly overshadowed by their brute, vulgar banality - a few pounds of steel with the potential to destroy a human life in the blink of an eye. No adventure - super or otherwise - is worth that. I would gladly give up the opportunity to fire a gun ever again if Congress or the state legislatures had the balls to outlaw them. I would even give up video games.
Those types of weapons accounted for a vanishingly small percentage of crime before and after the ban.
The laws in the ban were used to prosecute or investigate only a handful of cases, and were instrumnental in obtaining exactly zero convictions.
1)Mike has not “been hired to write a pilot about a spunky CIA agent” as Beau states.
2)David and his wife do not “have a small child in the house” as Beau claims. They are child-less. More generally, Beau mis-interperted his insistence on buying a gun without the context of male-bonding s**t-talk it was expressed in. Dave has absolutely no plans to buy a gun.
3)'Rick's name is actually 'Rich.'
4)Beau states that our bill fwas just 'thirty bucks each.' This is not true-- the total was about $330 for the six of us but since we paid in pairs for the rental and ammo, Beau didn't bother to check this fact.
5) )The name of our club is not 'Super Adventure Club' as Beau reports, but 'Super Fun Adventure Club.'
David, Mark, Mike
Super Fun Adventure Club
My deepest apologies for any errors in the blog-post, and thank you for pointing them out. I can honestly say that I had no intention to write about the firing range when I joined you all. It was an afterthought once I had returned to New York. This was my first posting on Huffpo, so I'm new to this whole blogging thing, but I should have been more fastidious and double-checked everything with you before I posted instead of relying purely on my faulty memory. None of the errors were deliberate, I can assure you. I only set out to relate my personal experience in a hopefully humorous way with a little bit of substance thrown in (more gonzo than investigative), but that is no defense. This is indeed a very public forum, after all, and I should have repaid your generosity with more accurate fact-checking. I hope you all will accept my apologies.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAqA2sJM-qg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TC2xTCb_GU
Once the trepidation due to novelty wears off, you may find that shooting is more Zen than Rambo. The best shooting advice I have ever heard is "slow is smooth, and smooth is fast," and that applies to anything from hunting to IPSC/IDPA competition.
You may find the following thoughts on gun ownership interesting, even if you ultimately disagree: http://journals.democraticunderground.com/benEzra/29
Finally, I would like to point out that is a bit simpler to rent a gun from a range for target shooting on the premises than it is to actually purchase one, in California or anywhere else. California has arguably the harshest state-level gun laws in the nation (definitely stricter than those of the state of New York); the only state I can think of that *might* exceed California for harshness against gun ownership would be New Jersey. Massachusetts, Maryland, and possibly Illinois would round out the top 5, I think. Your neighbor Vermont, on the other hand, is one of the most gun-owner-friendly states in the nation, with laws less restrictive than Pennsylvania's.
Thank you for a very thoughtful, interesting, and civil article.
Quote: "In Hospital Deaths from Medical Errors at 195,000 per Year USA"
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/11856.php
I am aware that the right to bear arms is an important part of US history and way of life, but ultimately, shouldn't the value of human life count more?
The problem is you, along with nearly all other gun control advocates, are too hung up on the actions of gun toting criminals while ignoring the far more positive actions of lawful gun owenrs:
Check out these stories. They may not make headline across the nation like mass shootings, but they are no less significant:
http://www.thearmedcitizen.com/
Something I've found when I've talked to gun advocates, (and this is only from my own interactions) is that very few have spent time in a system without guns, such as the UK or France, and it's hard to judge the feeling of day to day life in these countries. One thing I can say about Western Europe, is that unlike the US, where a decent chunk of the population are calling for more restrictive gun control - there are no such groups in Europe advocating for the relaxation of gun laws.
As someone who spent a lot of time in Europe, I can say that you did not live in a system without guns. Firearms are not banned in Europe and I have been shooting and hunting in a great many European countries.
" In 96, following the dreadful events of the Dunblane massacre, the UK government enforced a strict ban on all handguns, and we have been fortunate not to suffer a similar event since."
You didn't have many such events before Dunblane. There is no proof that the laws passed after Dunblane have accomplished anything.
To those who can't get past the phrase "2nd Amendment rights" I offer the words of Justice Scalia in the Supreme Court ruling on District of Columbia v. Heller:
"Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose."
The Heller decision makes it absolutely clear that the right to own a gun exists side by side with the right to regulate the purchase, possession and carrying of guns.
blaming the 2nd for gun deaths is the same as blaming the 1st for child porn...
discuss....
Written by another liberal that you my find interesting.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4/21/496931/-Why-Liberals-Should-Love-The-Second-Amendment
1934 National Firearms Act
1968 Gun Control Act
1986 Firearm Owner Portection Act ( which actually contained several notable restrictions on firearms, despite what the name sounds like)
1992 Brady Act
1994 Assault Weapon Ban
Each of these made obtaining and possession of a firearm increasingly more restrictive.
First of all, the law didn't ban "assault weapons". It only banned the manufacture of 19 specific firearms as well as the manufacture of new ones with certain cosmetic features such as a flash suppressor or bayonet lug. Most features covered by the law had no functional effect on the gun itself. The 1994 law also banned the manufacture of new ammunition magazines that could hold more than 10 rounds.
The key thing is that it only banned the manufacture of certain new guns and magazines holding more than 10 rounds. All weapons and ammo magazines covered by the law made before 1994 were still legal.
Also, over 660 rifles and shotguns that violated the law were specifically exempted. That stands as proof of the law's uselessness. If so called "assault weapons" as defined by law were so bad, why did it only ban 19 guns while allowing 660 of them?
Most importantly of all, Mr. Williams neglected to mention the law expired in 2004 and has not been revived since. It is no longer in effect.
Considerably more AR-15 type rifles, civilian AK's, and whatnot were sold after the Feinstein law passed in 1994 than in the previous three decades combined, and it was sometime during that era that the AR-15 platform became the most popular civilian centerfire rifle in the United States. I bought my own civilian AK (2002 model SAR-1) in 2003; at that time, normal-capacity magazines were $9.99/ea and reduced-capacity 20-rounders were $5.99/ea.
Regarding the OP, half of U.S. gun owners are Dems and indies, and the Brady Campaign is run by Republicans. The "most Dems oppose gun ownership" meme is a false one.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/19/AR2009071902154.html
Also, you really should learn the facts on firearms and self defense. Gun save many lives:
http://www.thearmedcitizen.com/
Your friend who owns a shotgun had the right idea. A firearm is the best defense against home invasions. If a home invasion occured in your house, what's your defense?
You will never see Paul Helmke or Denis Henigan respond to comments in one of their blogs. Mr. Willimon has directly responded several times already. I like and respect that.
You will almost never hear or read or see others who share Mr. Willlimon's view on the 2A express their desire for civilian disarmament, even though many are inclined to believe that is what anti gun folks truly want. Mr. Willimon clearly advocates for civilian disarmament. I respect that.
Mr. Willimon, the culture battle over firearms is over. Gun control is dead. The movement has been reworked into a "gun safety" idea and although its overall goal remains the same (repeal of the 2A and prohibition on private ownership) it largely remains just as ineffective as its predecessor. The Supreme Court has weighed in, more importantly the court of public opinion has weighed in. Congress has weighed in (almost passed nationwide ccw for God sake). The White House has weighed in (publically told AG Holder to stand down when he mentioned an AWB). Private firearm ownership is a right. It is no different than free speech, freedom of religion, keeping soldiers out of civilian homes, fair and speedy trials, and powers not enumerated.
38 state legislatures. Can you even imagine? Might as well debate repealing freedom of religion. Just not going to happen. Not in our lifetime, nor our children's lifetime.
If there's one thing Clinton, W., and Obama have all done successfully, albeit inderectly, it's sell firearms. The first AWB, Y2K, 9/11, Patriot Act, election of BO, have sold millions and millions of firearms. The gun culture has been galvanized, even defiant, in the face of increasing restrictions, whether real or perceived.
Prohibition is not going to happen, and should not be a part of any serious discussion on the issue.
The gun owners I know are not the occasional, "social" shooters you describe. We have formal training (shooting a handgun well is not as easy as it looks on TV -- police officers hit their intended target about 1/3 of the time). We enjoy shooting, and doing it well. We keep our firearms secured -- any gun not in my personal possession is locked in the safe. I usually carry (legally) a concealed handgun. Like a fire extinguisher, it is for extreme circumstances only and I never expect to use it. It's not a "macho" thing and I'm not a "wannabe" cop; nobody around me knows it's there and under only very limited circumstances would I be justified in using deadly force. The people you need to worry about don't follow these (or any other) rules. I'm more observant than most people, and that's not a bad thing. You can often see trouble coming in time to avoid it, but you also see a lot of good things happening around you when you're not oblivious to your surroundings.