Fun With Glocks, or Not

I tend to have very good adherence to the rules of safe gun handling. Being human, I will readily admit I’m not perfect, and that can include weapon handling. Being a psychologist and talking to many, many people, I will readily attest to the incredible consequences people face for making simple, human mistakes. We all do stupid things sometimes. I can’t emphasize enough... lapses in judgment and behavior can and do happen to all of us.

I have to think a lapse in judgment, an error or anomaly in behavior no matter how hard our training drills a given movement into our muscle memory, can happen to anyone. In this guy’s case, he didn’t NEED to draw his gun, but he did, in a lapse of judgment. He didn’t draw the way he usually did, in a lapse of muscle memory or trained behavior. He didn’t treat the gun as loaded, point it in a safe direction, or keep his finger off the trigger. The thing is, those failures are only separate when we dissect the event afterward. It’s a bit like dissecting your draw or trigger pull: many steps form one fluid motion. One mistake. It’s a good reminder to be mindful at all times of what we’re doing and how easily it could go wrong.
 
A light trigger pull does NOT mean a striker fired gun like Glock.

A S&W 3rd generation in single action is more dangerous than a glock.

It has an extremely short reset and light trigger.

Bluntly glocks have trigger travel distance to allow a psychological detection of motion.

Double actions revolvers have trigger motion and weight.

Prejudice against glocks or any striker fired gun is misplaced.

If glocks didn't exist S&W would likely be making striker fired guns today anyway and we would be cursing them except for the "MASS" trigger ones of course that hopefully would replicate the model 10's trigger... :(
 
Glad to see this topic today. It's been a couple weeks since we had a Glock hate thread.

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What posters #5 and #25 said!

Rule 3 violation and most likely a Rule 2, also.

Keep your finger off the "bang switch".

There is nothing wrong with the Glock pistol platform. Problems with negligent discharges result from shortcomings between the operator's ears.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is lack of proper training. Sadly, many police department succumb to this.

JPJ
 
He says in the video "I am a stinking idiot"
Who am I to argue with a video star?

I do own a Glock 17. It is in my nightstand I like it, but, for carry I prefer pistols with a thumb safety
Steve W
 
What posters #5 and #25 said!

Rule 3 violation and most likely a Rule 2, also.

Keep your finger off the "bang switch".

There is nothing wrong with the Glock pistol platform. That causes it to discharge without pulling the trigger. Problems with negligent discharges result from shortcomings between the operator's ears.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is lack of proper training. Sadly, many police department succumb to this.

JPJ

There, fixed it.:-)
 
So he's walking through his house, and decides to do that while handling his gun. Which is a bad idea--if you're handling a gun, that should be the only thing you're doing.

The reason he decided to handle his gun, is because he basically wants to play with it. That's what you're doing when you draw your gun for no reason, without doing a "I am about to train/practice with my gun" check. Especially when you do it outside of train-and-practice time.

Aside from the fact that there was no reason to draw a loaded pistol. If you're removing your loaded pistol from your holster, you should either be (a) doing some necessary gun-chore that you cannot avoid doing no matter how hard you try, or (b) shooting a fool.

And your takeaway from this lesson--which is actually a good lesson, this is dumb stuff lots of people do--is "Glocks are bad".

The guy in question doesn't even blame the gun. He doesn't quite reach my conclusion that the first problem was creating the opportunity to do these things, but he does identify that complacency was an issue on his part.

For that reason, I don't even consider this guy an idiot, defined as someone who's outside the normal range of stupid. Because lots of people make exactly the same poor decisions he did.

In my humble opinion, Glocks "go off too easily." You may not agree. I think pistols need safeties. Whether you use the safety is up to you.

If the gun is designed to use a manual safety, and you choose not to use it, you are in fact being horribly unsafe.

Handling a loaded 1911 with the safety off? Unsafe.

Holstering a DA/SA with the hammer cocked? Unsafe.

SCORPION520AZ said:
In the early 80s when the powers that were forced me to sample my first Glock pistol I honestly didn't feel it was safe compared to my Government Model. That of course as I came to learn through training was false.

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My opinion, for what it's worth, is lack of proper training. Sadly, many police department succumb to this.

I think it' sort of the opposite, Joe. But training is still the answer.

If you're carrying a gun every day, eventually you stop being afraid of the damn thing. Which is good. After a while, you start being comfortable handling it.

Give it enough time, and comfort--familiarity--breeds a certain lack of respect.

Hence, I think that more training in the conventional way we think about it, isn't going to solve the problem. Instead, the solution is periodic "check-ups" to fight complacency.
 
When I owned and carried Glocks I didn't worry about "accidental discharge", or reliability. They were dead solid reliable. I went back to revolvers only for a number of reasons; but I wouldn't mind at all having a G19 again if my ruined hands could still rack the slide and I had more feeling in my trigger fingers.

With diminished sensitivity and strength in my mitts, a DAO revolver is just a better bet. But I liked the G19 and 22, especially the handy 19, and didn't worry about shooting myself with either.
 
Striker Control Device

It works. Makes holstering, un-holstering much safer in the event of a foreign object, drawstring etc. finding its way into the holster and inside the trigger guard.

Millions of rounds fired through Glocks equipped with the device without a single failure.

Can even prevent accidents when knuckleheads put their fingers on the trigger and apply pressure (while their thumb engages the "gadget").

(I have no connection to the device except as a satisfied, paying customer.)

With all due respect, Blues7, I don't see how this device would have made a difference in this situation.

I can see it possibly being of some use in the more common scenario of Glock NGs, when they are forced into a holster and trap some loose clothing, belt or other object in front of the trigger as the pistol is pushed into the holster.
 
The ONLY time I've been concerned about a Glock was when I first started carrying my Glock 19 in a garbage Bianchi IWB. It was so flimsy that I was afraid it'd get into the trigger guard.

I threw that piece of junk away and replaced it with a Don Hume 715M and never looked back.

I eventually replaced the Hume with a home made tuckable IWB.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
 
With all due respect, Blues7, I don't see how this device would have made a difference in this situation.

I can see it possibly being of some use in the more common scenario of Glock NGs, when they are forced into a holster and trap some loose clothing, belt or other object in front of the trigger as the pistol is pushed into the holster.

No problem, my friend. I've been carrying Glocks, (G17, 19 and 26), since 1988 and have never had a ND on or off the job.

When I learned about the "Gadget" I realized that it fit a niche for issues such as you bring up in your post.

The other advantage is that "if" one is going to un-holster a loaded firearm in their home or under similar circumstances, the device will allow one to avoid a ND by simply keeping their thumb on the slide cover plate if and when they put their finger on the trigger, either intentionally or otherwise.

It was more of a PSA than an attempt to address the specific user admitted error reported in the thread.

My apologies for any confusion it may have caused.
 
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In my humble opinion, Glocks "go off too easily." You may not agree. I think pistols need safeties. Whether you use the safety is up to you. ... ...
How many safeties? How too easily? As easily as a cocked 1911? A cocked 1911 that can go off so very easily can have three cascading safeties, and someone who is having a careless moment can disengage all three of them in rapid succession and still have a careless discharge. Back to the Glock: Long, heavy trigger pull compared to the 1911. How long and heavy? Long and heavy enough that the trigger suffices as a manual safety as long as the person is not having a careless moment.

One day in the future, super-duper smart guns will automatically disengage the safety only when the owner has the thought that he is ready to fire.
Then the rule will be: "Don't even think about touching the trigger until you are ready to fire."
 
My opinion, for what it's worth, is lack of proper training. Sadly, many police department succumb to this.

Will not deny that LEO training budgets should be improved. But the Negligent Discharge by the "finger less man", is not secondary to lack of training, but to negligence,plain and simple. If you take a loaded firearm and point it at something ( your hand ), and pull the trigger what do you expect will happen. Ignorance can be treated, stupidity is permanent, no safety device for any tool is effective if you circumvent it, and then try to blame the object. Be Safe,
 
Let's see; The OP comes on and opens a "discussion", then walks away. Then follows 38 posts "discussing" the problem. Think you guys fell for it and have been had.......


BTW, there is no such thing as an accidental discharge....with a firearm that is........
 
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