Lessons

Lest you forget

Yes, it’s AI-enabled. Still a thug, not an artist.

Here are two photos. Both photos involve mentally-ill felons with violent criminal histories on trains.

Mentally-ill felon with history of violent attacks being restrained on a train.

Mentally-ill felon with history of violent attacks butchering an innocent on a train.

Of the two incidents represented by the photos above, guess which one got the Legacy Media’s jimmies all rustled? If you guessed the one where the innocent girl got slaughtered like a lamb in an abattoir, you would be incorrect.

Of the two incidents represented by the photos above, guess which one got the politicians all in an uproar? If you guessed the one where the innocent girl was savagely sacrificed to the gods of madness, you would be incorrect.

In the top incident, a mentally-ill felon on a train with a history of violent criminal acts was restrained by a member of the public and died in the process; in the bottom incident, a mentally-ill felon on a train with a history of violent criminal acts decided — with no provocation or reason — to hammer a knife into the throat of a 23-year-old girl multiple times.

Only one of these incidents resulted in millions of pixels and hundreds of gallons of ink’s worth of headlines, editorials, op-eds, riots, demonstrations, civil unrest, declamations, pulpit-pounding; and millions of dollars worth of funds raised.

There are several lessons here — all important, and none good.

The first: Get self-defence insurance¹. Something where you pay them a fee every month, and if you wind up with a criminal case against you, you don’t go broke defending yourself².

Once you’ve got your insurance/membership, ask them which attorney they’d use in your area, if you should need one — then go visit that worthy. Yes, now. Get to know them ahead of time, talk to them about the legal atmosphere around self-defence in your area, and get their thoughts about your training, EDC load-out, training, planned courses of action, and — most importantly — your training³.

Have a plan, and discuss it with your loved ones, about what to do in the aftermath if you wind up having to Ol’ Yeller a violent trustee of modern pharmacology. Odds are that — despite your Y-chromosome-influenced daydreams — you aren’t going to be considered a hero. At a minimum your face is going to wind up in local Legacy Media — if not National Legacy Media — and social media, which may lead to basement-dwelling mouth-breathers to decide that digital vigilante justice upon you and yours is justified. Doxxing, at the least, and swatting is not out of the range of possibilities. Sending the wife and sprogs out of town for a while might be wise.

Learn and practice situational awareness — starting by keeping your bloody smartphone put away in public. Learn to automatically establish a baseline for mood, activity, dress, and conduct in your area of operations, and learn to spot and note deviations from same. Learn and practice avoidance. If an obviously mentally-ill person enters your AO … leave. You cannot get hurt by a lunatic if you’re three train cars away; and you cannot be jammed up by the po-po if you were two streets away in a coffeeshop when the fight went down.

If someone makes you nervous for any reason at all — if they make the hair on the back of your neck stand up — and you can’t leave the area, at least move as far away from them as you can. And never, ever — for the love of little kitten toes — turn your back on them.

Always, always, always practice the “+1” theory. If yon Random Maniac doesn’t have a weapon you can see, assume he has one hidden. If he has one you can see, assume he’s got another that you don’t see⁴.

If the gods blink, and — despite all your efforts — you find yourself the victim of an unprovoked attack by your local paranoid-schizophrenic Who Was Just Turning His Life Around … do something. Don’t just stand there, popping your mouth like a goldfish, defend yourself. Yes, it’s going to suck. Yes, the aftermath is going to suck worse. No, you may not be successful.

But don’t bleed to death on the dirty floor of public transportation like a sacrificed lamb, while your attacker saunters off. Walk through Valhalla’s doors with your head held high and his blood on your knuckles at the very least.

Thus endeth the lesson.

Ian

1. I’m not going to recommend one, but a quick google search using “self defense insurance” will get you links. Do your due diligence and research.

2. Successfully defending myself against a misdemeanor charge cost me $40,000. I don’t want to think about what the cost would have been for a felony. Pay the $30 or $50 a month.

3. You think I’m kidding, but there are “self-defense” trainers out there the mere mention of their names causes defence attorneys to start drinking heavily. If your defence attorney thinks your prize instructor is an indefensible moron with a problematic training methodology, you need to know that now.

4. Young LawDog was saved by his chicken plate when he relaxed after taking a club away from an urban outdoorsman. The feel of the serrations on a steak knife vibrating along the edge of a trauma plate is a sensory memory I’ll take to my grave.