I used to carry my gun in Condition Two: magazine inserted, empty chamber. Then I stepped into a shooting simulator…and got my [bleep] handed to me.
It was an interactive shoot/no shoot simulation designed to teach people how to engage in real-life scenarios. Everything happened in the blink of an eye. It was so fast my muscles were playing catchup with my brain and even though I knew something was about to go down, I couldn’t react to it effectively. The simulated shooter killed my simulated pastor before I even got my gun up.
That night I realized how unprepared I was to meet a realistic threat. It changed my mind set and consequently I now carry in Condition One – “locked and loaded” with a round in the chamber; the safety mechanisms are my training and proper equipment. This is not the case for everyone, and that’s okay. But it begs the following question:
Why do you want to carry a gun?
It’s a simple question many gun owners never contemplate. Is the motivation security or personal protection? Is the weapon a piece of backup equipment, a tool you can use to get home safely should calamity hit while on the road? Or in Alaska, is it a means to ward off a bear attack?
These are all good reasons to carry a firearm. And depending on the intended purpose, it’s fully appropriate to keep the weapon stowed in a safe condition and location, such as within a locked case in your vehicle, or in a purse or bag with the magazine removed.
My reason for carrying a gun is to protect myself and others from bodily harm. I wear one practically everywhere I go and it’s ready to deploy in a fraction of second. I’ve got a large family and I’m unwilling to subcontract their safety out to those not invested in it. That includes the police, by the way, which we’ve discussed in another post.
But does having a gun or wearing it every day mean you’re safe from an attack? Do hours at the range matter that much if you’ll never manage to get a shot off?
That largely depends on how you carry it, and most people aren’t carrying in a way that will allow them to use it in a defensive manner.
Not For Everyone
Now let me pause right here and say that everyday carry (EDC) is not for everyone. Some people don’t want to carry a pistol, and others probably shouldn’t. That’s fine, I respect that. I wish every American was taught guns and firearm safety in grade school, along with fire safety and first aid preparation. In one sense guns are no different than defibrillators and fire extinguishers; they’re tools that when operated properly can save lives. They teach this in China, and someday the reason for that may become dangerously evident. But that’s not to say all Americans should be gun carriers or even gun owners. Some people have no business doing either – people who still wear masks, or those who can’t define the word ‘woman,’ for example. But even those lacking a certain degree of sanity – like a few Supreme Court justices and some current military leaders – still have a right to carry a gun.
Fine. Praise God and pass the ammo.
If you own a gun for emergency purposes and don’t carry it on your person, keep it in a safe location. But if you plan on wearing it every day, there are a few things you need to consider, like what condition it’s in.
Conditions of Carry
Now, right out the gate we’re going to have some discrepancy about the numerical conditions of firearms. The reason being that guns are highly diverse. Some have manual safeties, some don’t. Some have hammers that can be dropped when a round is in the chamber and others don’t. These and other design factors can complicate the carry conditions. On some scales there can be as many as five, but for the purpose of this discussion I’m going to keep it as simple and universal as possible for the vast majority of firearms. *[Click here to jump to a brief discussion of revolvers.]
Condition Three – No magazine inserted, no round in the chamber. Or, no bullets in the gun.
This is as safe as it gets. The gun is merely a heavy piece of metal with a few springs. There is no cartridge to fire.
Condition Two – Magazine inserted, no round in the chamber.
The gun in this condition will need to be cocked to chamber a round and fire. Pulling the trigger will not fire a round.
Condition One – Magazine inserted, round in the chamber.
Pulling the trigger will fire a round.
[Again, fight me on this all you want. It’s a distinction without a difference regarding this discussion.]
Prepare for the Worst
For most of my adult life I never bothered with guns. Sure, I’d shot at ranges with my dad a few times in the 80’s, but I never owned one until 2009. My first gun was a .44 caliber, five-shot revolver, and the only reason I bought it was to protect my young family from bears while hiking in Alaska. I still have it, and still carry it, but only for that reason. I’ve been fortunate to avoid ever having to take it out of the holster on a hike. It’s big, heavy, and annoying to shoot. It rattles the bones upon firing, but it serves its purpose nicely as a backup to the wild noises of Alaskan kids and bottles of bear spray.
More recently though, I began carrying a concealed semi-automatic pistol.
The riots of 2020 coupled with the reality of living in the most dangerous state in the union led me to understand how quickly my family could be harmed. I know many people who simply write off those concerns with additional prayers. “God will protect us,” they say.
Sure, but to them I ask, “Did you wear your seatbelt the last time you drove?” God can always protect us, so why bother taking safety precautions? The answer is that He gives us wisdom in using certain devices, like gas dryers, vehicles, and bottles of bleach. Any one of those can be deadly when disrespected. A gun is no different.
Let’s go back to that original question: Why do you want to carry a gun?
If the answer is personal protection and you don’t carry in Condition One, I suggest you do a little experiment:
The next time you’re at the range, line up in your fighting stance in Condition Two: magazine inserted, no round in the chamber.
Then have a buddy get ready to run behind you, twenty feet away. Make sure he or she is far enough behind to not get near you. Have them yell, “Threat!” and run in your direction, while you attempt to get your gun out, cocked, and fire a round off before he passes your position. I doubt you’ll be able to do it.
Now try the same thing but with your gun in Condition One. I also doubt you’ll be able to do it, at least not at first, but eventually you might.
The reason for this drill is to demonstrate exactly how fast a perpetrator can cover a distance, and how hard it is to get your weapon out and ready to fire in that time constraint. And that is in perfect range conditions, not under duress and without having to consider your target and what’s beyond it.
But attacks happen in the blink of an eye.
Given that reality, consider that you may not even be able to use your other hand to pull back the slide. In a wrestling, fighting, or attempted rape situation, you may be lucky to even get a single hand on your gun. Unless we prepare to use them, guns are just expensive paperweights. And bad guys can take our paperweights and bludgeon us over the head with them faster than we can say ouch.
I know it’s uncomfortable to think about such scenarios. But if you’ve settled on carrying a weapon, be it a knife, a bottle of mace, or a gun, you need to think now about how you’ll deploy it should the time come. That means practice and repetition. It needs to be ingrained into muscle memory.
If you’re going with a pistol, practice speed draws at the range. At home, dry fire as often as you can. Draw you weapon with a perfect presentation and get used to the trigger.
But a round in the chamber is dangerous!
Not everyone who uses a gun is a gun person. There are plenty of cops and longtime hunters who shoot themselves because they’re not adequately trained in the safe use of their tools. I have a teenager who routinely uses a truck, a boat, a phone, and a gun. Of all these tools, the one I worry most about him using is the truck, because it possesses the most potential for deadly incidents, and next the phone, because there are so many potential areas of harm it can cause.
But we don’t fear the tools, we familiarize ourselves with them.
It takes a person months of driver training to learn how not to kill people with a motor vehicle. We sit behind the wheel and rarely consider the deadly potential of our feet and hands while there. We’re comfortable because we were trained and follow safety precautions. If our foot slips to the accelerator at a stoplight we could kill a family of seven in the intersection, just like that. Yet for some reason we don’t apply this same logic to the use of firearms. Our trigger finger, like our accelerator foot, is entirely under our control.
A handgun will only go off if something presses the trigger. They’re stubborn that way. You can throw it, drop it, or roll over it with a tire but something must strike that bullet’s primer for the gun to go bang. We can control that, just like we control how and when we use gasoline, how we stand when using the chainsaw, and where we put our fingers when slicing a tomato.
This is probably a good place to insert the four rules of gun safety. If you want to prevent a negligent discharge, memorize the rules:
#1: Every gun is a loaded gun:
Just assume it’s loaded and always clear the weapon yourself. Never trust someone who tells you it’s empty. Also, never hand someone a gun that’s not cleared with the slide locked open.
#2: Only point at what you intend to destroy:
Even if you think it’s unloaded (see rule #1), keep that barrel pointed in a safe direction. That way if you’re wrong (it happens), nobody dies.
#3: Finger off the trigger:
Keep your trigger finger high on the barrel until your sights are on target. When holstering, check to make sure nothing enters the trigger well, like those little dangly zippers or cords on the side of your jacket.
#4: Know your target and what’s behind it:
A 9mm ball round can penetrate your target, the wall behind him, the neighbor’s wall next door, and their interior living room wall. Adjust accordingly.
The next time your friends are handling guns, watch and see if you can count the number of rules they break. And if they do, you may want to bolt. If you don’t have these memorized, it’s worth the time to do so, and teach them to your kids. You can start by bossing your kids about trigger discipline when they play with Nerf guns. It’s never too young to develop good muscle memory, and once they memorize the rules, reward them.
Finding the right equipment
Let’s say your trigger discipline is on point. You’ll need to ensure your holster will protect the trigger well so nothing can press it. A gun carried loose in a purse or backpack can easily go off if it’s not. There are a number of holsters designed to secure that trigger and prevent accidental discharge, even if you trip while hiking or fall onto your gun.
A Kydex holster will keep your gun snapped in place. Some have buttons that lock them in (which I don’t suggest for speed issues, but may be appropriate for some). They make them ergonomic and comfortable for both male and female body types, open carry or concealed, outside the waistband or inside near the appendix. It’s just a matter of shopping around to find the best fit to keep you and everyone around you safe. After that, it’s on you to control your own bodily impulses. You do it all the time.
Ready to Fight
When I first decided to start carrying a gun, I didn’t have this mindset. To be honest, I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I had a means to protect my family (I thought) and felt comfortable in that. It wasn’t until I began training with it that I learned how much I didn’t know. And even then, it took several days on the range and thousands of rounds to get comfortable enough to carry every day with a round in the chamber. If you’re new to carrying a gun, it will likely take some time to build that confidence. Take it slow, get good equipment, follow the safety rules, and practice your draw and re-holstering technique. As mentioned earlier, an attack can come faster than you realize, and even big beefy cops have been laid flat by speedy perpetrators when caught off guard. Practice situational awareness, know your weapon, and prepare to use it in those critical tenths of a second that matter most. We need courageous people ready to protect the innocent. If that’s your goal, consider upping your preparedness level, and perhaps ask yourself if you want to learn how to fight with a gun, or if you’re satisfied making tight groups of holes in paper targets.
*Revolvers are different beast. Here is a great article detailing the differences between revolvers and how the conditions of carry might vary depending on the model. https://www.pewpewtactical.com/best-beginner-revolvers/
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