Tobeat1:
If your home address is on your drivers license than you've already lost, even before the party.
You must NEVER have anything with your name connected to your home address. NEVER!
All my paperwork goes through a PO Box that, if they backtrace to where I put down where I "live" will turn out to be a mailbox on a post in front of a vacant field in the middle of nowhere.
So let them have my ID and house keys, they'll never find where I live.
And the "mass execution" is EXCEDDINGLY rare. How many non-gang war, non-bank surrounded by the cops, situations have you heard of everyone being executed. I can only think of 2 in the last few years, and those were both robberies where someone tried to play hero. I'm sure there's more, but that fact is that for the 40,000 or so people murdered every year with guns, how many of those are "mass executions"? Less than a dozen or two.
You were many times more likely to be killed driving to the party, or murdered by your wife after you got home because she thought you were staring at the neighbors wifes ass, than you are to be executed by a criminal.
Believe it or not, most criminals aren't out to rape and kill everyone they see. They're criminals because they're too lazy to work. Killing everyone is more work and draws more heat then they want. They just want your ****, and once they have it, they'll leave.
LASur5r+P:
I've seen circumstances leading up to, and the aftermath of, gunfights, but never the "during" (thank God). I've always made it a point of removing myself from the area when I see the "up to" phase starting. Once I missed the "during" only by a few seconds. But then again I don't carry a gun 99.99% of the time so I'm not tempted to John Woo.
To me, a gun is a "mission specific" tool. If I don't already have a plan for using it before I head out the door, I'm not taking it with. Too much temptation with all the idiots out there that nature didn't cull first.
Also, what you described doesn't fit my "minds eye" picture of a gated community.
The gated communities I've seen being built in my area had 10' high walls, private security patrols, many hundreds of $250,000+ homes, all waaayyyyy out in the middle of nowhere, many dozens of miles away from the nearest ghetto, all surrounded by similar such communities.
What you described sounds like an apartment complex, only with houses. And in the middle of "ghetto-land" to start with. 4' walls aren't walls, those are tall skinny benches.
Not to sound mean, since I'm just going on the limited info you posted, but perhaps your neighbors were wearing "rose colored glasses", thinking that somehow they were invulnerable to the scummy predations that they live in the middle of, simply by dint that they live in a "gated" community and only see people like them around them most of the time?
BTW, I was a happy, bloated tick on thanksgiving.
Steve M:
Thanks for the invite. I think you're also saying that you don't believe the gun is the cure for cancer too? More people need to think first, definitly.
Mahakorin:
To each his own. Carry whatever makes you feel safe. That's all anyone can do in life.
The very few times that I've had a party, I knew my guests were carrying, and they knew the same of me. Anyone coming uninvited would have met with a very "warm" reception.
And if I was at someone elses party, I'd mind my own damn business, regardless of what happening to the others, that's their look out. I know that's selfish, but "I" will only get to live once, and I want that to be as long as possible, as healthy as possible. That does NOT include catching bullets for the neighbors wife or brat.
Since I have no family to worry about that's easy for me to say. If it was my family, it might be different, I don't know.
Besides, for all I know, the neighbors brought it on themselves. Maybe hubby was holding drugs for the "BG"s and decided to skim a little of the top. You may THINK you know your neighbors, but that's what a lot of people who found out their neighbor was a cannibal serial killer, drug kingpin, or career bank robber thought too.
In reality, you (and I) don't know jack **** about anyone besides ourselves. Not even about your spouse or children.
My personal defense philoshopy (SP?) is prevention. Too much to go into detail here, but if you don't set yourself up in situations where you need a gun, then you don't need a gun.
The simplist things greatly reduce your risk, like staying out of scummy areas, doing your business during the daylight hours, traveling with others, etc. Common sense lifestyle changes that cost nothing.
Nothing major that'd get a write up in a "I Was There" magazine article, but hey, who want's to write about the great tactics they used in the gunfight they "won", if you have to write it from your wheelchair.
In my opinion, having to use a gun is like having to use a fire extinguisher, because if you have to use it, you've already f***ed up by not preventing the situation that requires it.
Prevention beats cure anytime.
End Rant.