THIS SITE & ITS LOGO

Why This Website?

• This website was created in response to the frustration that I had with much of what I had been reading in gun magazines and some of what I saw being taught as defensive firearms training.
• It presents some general points as well as some of the controversial topics in the defensive use of firearms. The Naked Emperor page was originally devoted mostly to differences in interpretation that I may have with other instructors or writers. Over time, it has become more of a catch-all for all the short articles I am inspired to write from time to time.
• The Street vs. Games page was a late addition that deals with a number of general issues that I have with a lot of what passes for self-defense training in many of the "shooting schools."
• I hope that this site facilitates your own evaluation of the issues. Unlike a book, a website is easy to modify and to update. This site should be viewed as a work in progress. Visitors are invited to check back periodically. The chart a few paragraphs down the page shows the dates of the latest updates to the various site pages. Any update will be listed as an update to this page as well as for any other page that has been updated.
• Obviously my opinion will be discernible and I purport to furnish nothing more than my opinion on these pages. You can decide how well founded my beliefs and opinions are.
• This website has grown as intended. During this time I have both developed and discontinued my own school and published a book - now in its second edition - on this subject. I now view the website as part of a triad that I offer to people who are seriously interested in the use of firearms for self-defense:

Why No More Live Training?

• Over a period of two decades, I traveled to all four corners of the nation and numerous points in between, spending tens of thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours in classrooms and ranges for my own training. For an overlapping pair of decades, I taught others to defend themselves with firearms, about half of that time through my own school.
• Increasingly, as the years went by, I received more and more e-mails of the sort, "I'd love to come to Arizona to train with you but I can't afford the trip. Can you recommend an instructor to me here in East Podunk." Finally, in 2011, I decided that I could no longer justify the cost of liability insurance and all the costs associated with maintaining my NRA-LEAD instructor certifications - including continuing education - on the off chance that someone would actually make the trip, across town or across the country, to avail himself of the training I had been offering.

• I maintain an e-mail list which I use primarily to distribute annotated links to news items of interest to gun owners, along with some forwarded material on tactics and defense of our rights, and occasional comments of my own. One list member has described the mailings as a Reader's Digest for gun owners.
• These mailings normally go out on a daily basis, except for those rare days when I am away from home.
• If you would like to be added to the list, e-mail me your request.
  • I need a first and last name. I cannot keep my address book organized without this information and will not add you to the list if you do not furnish it.
  • Make sure that a phrase such as "Subscribe to Mailing List" appears in the subject line. The list mailing is a manual process and I receive all my e-mail at this address. I'm not very good at guessing - if you leave the subject line of your e-mail blank, it will be deleted as suspected spam.
  • If you prefer to receive the mailings in Plain Text format, please mention that. I like to use the bold and italic fonts, along with bullets and indentations, afforded by HTML formatting.
  • I will only mail to people who make their own requests - please do not ask me to add friends or relatives to the list.

Why This Logo?

• As to the picture, it is a Smith & Wesson New Departure Safety revolver, .38 S&W, Fourth Model. While I firmly believe that shotguns and rifles have legitimate defensive roles, I also believe that handguns are Americans' primary defensive firearms.
• I intentionally selected an obsolete firearm for the logo to symbolize my belief that the operator is more crucial than the equipment. In fact, I rank my priorities as follows:
  1. Mental Awareness: Know the current status of your surroundings and its occupants. You should actually be able to avoid most unpleasant encounters.
  2. Mental Preparedness: You must decide in advance what circumstances will trigger your use of deadly force; you cannot wait until you are threatened to make the decision that you will respond with such force. Once you recognize that you have become a target you must become proactive.
  3. Tactics: In the simplest terms, this is using common sense to take any "unfair" advantage which will help you under the circumstances. While most instructors emphasize use of cover, most attacks come at close range, where side-stepping, coupled with deflection of the attack, are the crucial tactics that can give you the time to access your firearm.
  4. Skill: For the shooter this includes being able to place shots where you need them in a reasonable time frame, one-handed, with either hand, if need be. This is but the lowest-common-denominator example.
  5. Choice of Equipment: Last on the list is the actual choice of the gun and its ammunition. It's on the list, but the other issues are more crucial.
• In historical point of fact, this particular obsolete firearm was selected because it was obviously designed as a defensive firearm, not a sporting one. Additionally, it is a direct ancestor of the S&W Centennial series, a personal favorite.
• As to the "~spwenger," this site spent its first four and a half years as a "free" site on EarthLink, where "~spwenger" was part of its URL. This site is now hosted by Web Alaska.
• This website deals with the defensive use of firearms, not their sporting use or their misuse in any form. My fervent desire is that these opinions may help good people prevail against those who would do them harm.

Privacy

• I make no effort to identify or track visitors to this site, by cookies or any other means.
• I have been asked to add the Google search feature to the site but will not do so out of respect for your privacy. You may search individual pages with the "Find" function in your browser - usually Ctrl + F. Alternatively, most search engines will restrict their search to a designated site, if directed to do so. For example, if you wanted a search of this site for "carbine," you could type in "carbine site:www.spw-duf.info" at your favorite search site.
• While I do not knowingly share return addresses from e-mail generated from this site, such as to make comments or ask questions, I cannot preclude monitoring by ISP's and government agencies. Similarly, I cannot resist seizure of my computer by lawful subpoena or warrant.
• If correspondence from you would reveal indictable, illegal activity on your part, I suggest that you reconsider such correspondence. I have no desire to abet such activity nor to become embroiled in your prosecution.

Questions? Comments? Stephen P. Wenger P.O.Box 4227 Show Low AZ 85902-4227 U.S.A.

DEFENSIVE USE OF FIREARMS: Revised and Updated Your purchase via this website helps keep the site available Click image for further details