or take shooting advice from religious leaders. I’m pleased that the Dalai Lama is not entirely anti-self-defense, but this suggestion suggests that he hasn’t really thought hard about the subject. Clayton Cramer quotes an old Seattle Times piece (which is no longer available for free on the Web, it appears):
One girl wanted to know how to react to a shooter who takes aim at a classmate.
The Dalai Lama said acts of violence should be remembered, and then forgiveness should be extended to the perpetrators.
But if someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, he said, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun. Not at the head, where a fatal wound might result. But at some other body part, such as a leg.
Unless I’m woefully mistaken, “shoot at the leg” is lousy advice, except perhaps to skilled and experienced combat marksmen.
First, when you use a gun in self-defense, you’ll almost certainly be petrified, full of adrenaline, and shooting in combat for the first time in your life. Even if you’re quite well-trained, I doubt that you’ll be a very good marksman. That’s why you should shoot at the torso, where you’ll be more likely to hit.
Second, your goal should indeed not be to kill for its own sake, nor to wound for its own sake. It should be to stop the attacker from shooting (at you or at the person you’re trying to defend). Even if you hit him, you’re more likely to stop him if you hit him in the torso — better yet, if you hit him several times in the torso — than if you hit him in the leg.
Of course, one can imagine some moral systems under which the attacker’s welfare isn’t valued enough to bar all violent self-defense, but is valued enough to mandate such a carefully calibrated response. But given the virtual impossibility of actually achieving such careful calibration, it seems to me that such moral systems make little sense.
On the other hand, the Dalai Lama was quite correct that you usually shouldn’t shoot at the man’s head — but again the right reason is simply that the head is a small target compared to the torso.
Comments are closed.