But in the overall scheme of things, it's not very plausible to think that you will ever need a defensive handgun to begin with. Face it, the vast majority of us will NEVER have to draw, much less fire, our handgun in self defense. With this reality in mind, should we then conclude that anything more than a few casual rounds fired at the target range every couple of months is unnecessary based on the "plausibility principle"?
Of course not.
Like it or not, the entire idea of defensive training as a whole is NOT based on "plausibility" to begin with, at least not for the average gun-carrying citizen. As normal civilians, we are essentially preparing for an emergency situation that will likely (and hopefully) never occur. If we were to approach the idea of defensive handgun training based on plausibility alone, most of us probably wouldn't need much more than a run of the mill gun safety course. As Rob said, training resources are limited. So why spend thousands of dollars on training courses, guns, gear, and ammunition with the likelihood of ever needing it being so low? Plausibility? Probability? Nope. I think it's important to have some understanding of that before we try to use "plausibility" as a cornerstone by which we either accept or dismiss any particular tactic or skill.
The reason we spend all of the money and all of the time on training and practice is because, no matter how remote the possibility and no matter how low the plausibility may be, the COSTS associated with failing are so very high! It only takes one failure to cost you your life or the lives of loved ones, and for most of us here, that potential cost is simply too high to ignore and leave to pure chance. The same thing can be said for developing fighting skills with our "weak" hand. No, it's not likely you will have to rely on that hand to see you through the fight, but the price of not being able to could be ultimate and final. THAT is reality, whether plausible or not.
But I digress, my intention here is not to argue or even contradict. IMHO, I believe Rob is accurate in suggesting something around 5 - 10% of our training time be devoted to weak hand manipulations. Regardless of how plausible it is we will need it, I seriously doubt that most people possess the physical and mental ability to develop much more pistol handling dexterity in their support hand than what can be realized with that level of training without devoting HUGE amounts of time to support hand training (and at the expense of strong hand manipulations development and maintenance). Remember that support hand training isn't only a physical task, but it is largely a mental one as well. The human mind and body have a very strong tendency to naturally want to do things a certain way. It's not realistic to think you are going to change that built-in "programming" by running a few IDPA matches weak-hand only. Spending much more time on support hand training could quickly get to a point of diminishing returns.
Heck, we now have some instructors out there that no longer refer to the support hand as the "weak hand", but rather, they call it the "Other Strong Hand" in an attempt to make the shooter not relate his/her "off" hand with the word "weak" (as if it really matters). Never mind the fact that 99.9% of us have two hands, one of which is stronger and more dexterous than the other, and always will be. I think some of these folks are trying to over-complicate things when we get to this point, or perhaps they are simply trying to incorporate something "unique" into their training classes as a way to set them apart from everyone else.
This has been a very interesting and informative conversation, everyone. I can't thank you all enough for sharing your opinions and expertise with the rest of us.
Chris S.
NRA Certified Pistol, PPITH, & PPOTH Instructor
NRA Certified RSO
Missouri CCW Instructor
