Shooting in defense of a third party: "A neighbor heard the commotion and responded to the scene with a gun in hand. One of the criminals allegedly fired at the good samaritan neighbor, who then returned fire, killing one of the aggressors. The three others have been arrested and are charged with murder. Forgetting all the legalese for a minute, is this not what we as a society want from our fellow citizens? Such are the actions of heroes in movies. ... But life is not like the movies. In real life, we must now deal with the law."


Handguns for self-defense: "Handguns are very popular for self-defense in the United States. There are a variety of reasons for this, many of which have to do with convenience. While we all recognize that a 12-gauge shotgun is probably better at stopping an assailant, how easy is it to tote one around all day?In 2009 alone, more than 4.5 million handguns were manufactured and imported into the US. While many of these firearms were sold to collectors and shooters for various sports, I would argue that many, if not most, were sold to people for defensive use.There is a problem with handguns that many people don’t know about: they stink on ice for actually stopping an attacker."