I finished Real World Survival by Walt Rauch a while back and just got down to putting my notes into my notes notebook. This was a great book and I highlighted stuff from just about every other page. The book was written in the late 90’s and is a little dated when it comes to equipment, but the rest of the book was great.
It starts out with a chapter on your state of mind and then talks about “otherhuman” in chapter 2. This book is worth buying just to hear Walt’s discussion on what criminals think of normal people. He calls these criminals “otherhuman” and I call them dirt bags or just evil. Either way, he puts it so you can understand the state of the criminal mind when it comes to your self defense. Everyone that thinks about self defense should read this chapter.
The rest of the book was good. Sections on awareness, what weapons will be used against you, what weapon you should choose, types of defensive handguns, and how to master it. All of these chapters were worth reading.
Walt does an entire chapter about whether or not to customize your gun for self defense. He talks about Massad Ayoob’s opinion of not customizing your gun and about his opinion that it’s okay. He breaks it down to two things; if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. If there is no reason to customize something don’t give an attorney something to look at. And it’s okay to customize things that will help you be better within reason. Two great quotes that made me think; “The jury may feel that some punishment is merited, grieving widow with six kids needs some money from someone, if this happens you flat-out lose – and there’s not a damned thing you can do about it!” and “…it is much more important to consider how you’re going to pay for your defense, rather than concern yourself with what the prosecutor will say about your ivory grips.” He really has a unique way of putting things.
He goes on to talk about the aftermath of a shooting, practice and training, and traveling. He even answered the question everyone asks. What do you carry? He wrote an entire chapter carries. He talks about what he carried in the past and what he was carrying when he wrote the book. Some things weren’t a surprise, like a chief’s special, and others, like his custom 1911, were a little surprising.
This was a good book to read and you can still get it a lot of places. If you aren’t sure about self defense or know someone that doesn’t want to think about it, maybe you can get them to read Chapter 2, “Knowing the Enemy,” where he explains “otherhuman.” I’m serious when I say this book is worth buying just to read the second chapter. It’s one of those things I wish I could have written.
Stay Safe,
Ben
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