I’m with you. I expect folks I know to call ahead of time and say they are coming. Somebody comes to the door I don’t know, I don’t open it. There is no requirement that you open the door for every Fuller Brush salesman or Seventh Day Adventist whatever they are called. I know about the bible and I know about Jesus and I don’t care to discuss either with some stranger. It’s like your sex life. Unless we are really, really good friends and you are sincerely seeking advice about a problem in your life, in which case I would suggest an experienced, licensed professional. I am far from an expert in sex — I don’t want to know about your sex problems. I am far from an expert in that field. Want to talk about guns? Okay, I know a little about guns, although I will readily admit, my brother is much more of an expert than I, so I refer anything more difficult than “Is a .357 hard to shoot?” to him. As a well-known actor said in one of his films, “A man has got to know his limitation.” And as we used to say in the Marine Corps, “Don’t work outside your M.O.S.” I don’t know why the young lady in question opened the door. I don’t care if it is Joe Biden offering me the ambassadorship to France where they have great wines, I am not opening the door. Speaking of great wines, my daughter gifted me a B.V Clone 4 from 2015 for my recent 86th birthday. Oh My! With a filet mignon tonight, it was great.
Hello @John1422! Welcome to the community! Glad you are here.
Rule #1, NEVER open your door unless you know exactly who’s on the other side. You can buy a Ring doorbell or even a Wyze video doorbell for $60. I can see who’s at the door by viewing the video stream in my phone. An additional plus is having the video uploaded to the cloud if you need to call law enforcement.
Hello and welcome @Martin99
Thank you. Nice to be a part of the conversation.
Welcome to the family brother @Martin99 and we are glad to have you with us.
I have heard elected officials claim that “bad guys don’t ring the doorbell” following the tragic shooting of a teen by an 84 year old man. As a retired LEO, I can tell you confidently that is not true. Most burglars, especially day time burglars will ring the doorbell to see if anyone is home before breaking in. Home invaders would rather you let them in than force their way.
It is better to challenge people from behind a locked door than to open to see who’s there. Ignoring the doorbell may tell a would be burglar you are not at home and invite a break in and confrontation.
With the USCCA and all of these stories, I have one big gripe. The simple act of discounting physical barriers. A difficult to break storm door is worth its weight in gold. You put the same lock that is on your main home door on it. It auto locks behind you. Always has to be opened to let someone in. Mine is made of hurricane glass. A simple kick or even a couple of standard ghetto pistol rounds are not going to go through it. Check Youtube about Fire Departments training to get though Hurricane glass. Gives you time to close the main door, call 911 and take defensive action.
The main door has the basic of being hardened with 3 inch screws and long lock plates with a door latch designed to take a pounding. It gives you more time to back up to your defensive weapons and any safer locations if you choose.
Outside of the expensive storm door that I have, nothing else is expensive for hardening and making entry more difficult. Get a storm rated glass door with a metal frame (couple of hundred dollars). Put a throw bolt on it and use it every time that you come in your house. Well worth your life should you choose to talk to someone at the door.
There are fake cops out there. Make them identify themselves. Call 911 or dispatcher and verify that these are cops at your door. Check a warrant before you allow them entry.
If someone is in trouble, you can visibly check and call 911. Don’t go outside. These kind of traps are used all the time to get into people’s homes at night.
For women with a bad ex, this kind of thing is absolutely invaluable.
Get the training to deal with a gun being wrestled from you. One thing that a trainer taught me was to drop the magazine pull the trigger if I felt that I was losing the weapon. Limited ability to do me harm.
Have a knife. I cut a car thief’s leg open. If I had not been nice and put a tourniquet on him. He would be a dead car thief.
Hello and welcome @Michael_D5
Welcome to the family brother @Michael_D5 and I agree with your post 100 percent.
You can’t put a price on you and your loved ones personal safety.
Sounds about right. How do we change that ? I dont even “try” with men anymore - they all know they can shoot since they have been to the range and can shoot bulls-eyes all day - "Good to Go ??? Not realizing there is a LOT MORE to “Actually Defending” with a gun than they think or imagine. And Real Gun Fights Dont Happen that way. Like - how fast and sure is your Draw?? What do you do if you put 2 in chest with no effect ? What is “Retention Shooting”, What is “Cover”, on and on.
I suspect this might be because these things cost a not-insignifcant amount of money, won’t always be there even if you install them in your home (you move, you’re at a different door, you’re at friend or family’s home, etc), etc.
A training, education, ‘software’ solution probably costs nothing and is able to be implemented on a much wider scale.
But yeah there are all kinds of physical security things that are great. For my part we have door jam armour kits I installed, high security realistically bump-proof and pick-proof cannot-be-duplicated dead bolts, auto locking PIN activated door knob for the most used door to the attached garage (plus the previously mentioned dead bolt), peep holes on every door including basement, backdoor, and garage, replaced the back door that had a bunch of glass with one that doesn’t (I can’t believe how many houses are built where a punch or rock through the glass of the door lets you reach in and unlock the door lol like what)
But again those things cost money and they are not as much training and education based
Like, for safety, I drive an IIHS Top Safety Pick rated vehicle that weighs 6,000 lbs. But that’s money. So I imagine a USCCA training/education/safety related article on that would talk about what to do with your vehicle, not what vehicle you should buy
Nathan,
No one says everything needs to be done. Trust me. A good hard to break storm door with just a throw bolt for when you are home and replacing screws with facings for your lock jambs runs right around a $300 dollars. But at night or facing a stranger at the door, they are a necessity. I know that reinforcing your front and back door is an essential thing to do. Get a storm door later. Make it harder to kick it in {the most common method of gaining entry to your home)and gives you warning if you are home. Putting a piece of 1x2 or drill a hole in the side and put a double headed nail in windows to keep them from being forced and not hard to remove. An inexpensive $10.00 device to keep your door from being opened to your bedroom at night in case a burglar is in the house.
The point being that your most basic security measures should be physical reinforced by alarms/lights subject to power blackouts.
I would disagree with those being a necessity. Just don’t open the door and there is no need for a separate storm door.
And a lot of people won’t have the option of a storm door, perhaps due to cost, perhaps because they are renting or in an apartment and can’t.
But if you can, sure
- Fight until your last breath, Do Not Stop
Fight dirty. No such thing as a fair fight anymore. Grab parts of the body people arent fond of being grabbed. Eye gouging allowed. An Human ear can be ripped off very easily if need be. Aint no referee in that sort of fight.