Strange:
You are welcome to troll any of my threads in this forum. You will, almost guaranteed, take the thread in a new, unexpected, and awesome direction.
But the Poster of this thread was asking a serious question and likely is not familiar with your antics. It's bad form to deliberately give someone (who doesn't already know better) bad advice in order to make a thread more interesting... Especially if they are likely to listen to it.
Here's my two cents for the OP and/or rebuttal to SF's post:
First: any weapon is better than no weapon. I would much prefer to have a .32 Long revolver over no gun at all if someone were breaking into my home. However, it is far, far from ideal and if you have other options in a more mainstream chambering such as .38 Special, 9mm, etc. I would seriously consider using one of those instead..
Secon: Pay attention people. The weapon the OP mentions is a .32 Long, which is an old revolver round. Not the .32 ACP people seem to think it is.
The .32 Long is considered an obsolete round so there isn't very much information available regarding ballistics. However, it is similar to (but still less powerful than) the diminutive .32 ACP. One shop stop stats's for .32 ACP are as follows: 62% for Silvertip ammunition and 50% for ball ammo (probably all you can find for .32 Long, if you can get ammo at all).
The .38 Special with quality ammunition shot out of a four inch barrel sits at 83% for one shot stops.
This is actually a big difference, especially considering that the .32 Long has lower muzzle velocity and energy than the .32 ACP. I did an internet search and was not able to locate anything except round nose ball or low-velocity target loads. So if you choose to use this weapon it is reasonable to expect a round fired into the torso of an attacker to stop him a little less than 50% of the time. There are, of course, a thousand variables that I am not considering. Remember that a lethal shot may not 'stop' someone from completing their attack...you can get stabbed with an icepick and have plenty of time to wreak havoc while slowly bleeding to death.
Basically: A .38 Special with a four inch barrel, loaded with premium ammunition will stop 7 out of 8 attackers with one shot. The .32 long loaded with ball ammo (all you can probably find) will stop less than 4 of the 8....
Oh, and with regards to the .40 being about the same: With the best ammunition, the .40 S&W currently holds a 96% one shot stop likelihood... Basically only 4 bad guys out of 100 who get shot in the torso with a .40 S&W Cor-Bon Nosler 135gr round continue their attack...That's a big different from 50 out of 100 or more.
I have to point out that these stats are not the 'ultimate' in gun information and they can be interpreted in different ways. But, along with ballistics tests in Gelatin (and other media) they provide the most statistically and scientifically sound way to evaluate the effectiveness of a particular cartridge....
Shot placement is very important, as SF points out. However, even the most highly trained of people fail to put rounds on target in stressful situations.
While police are not what I would typically consider to be 'highly trained' they receive a considerable deal more firearms training than the average citizen and yet they tend to hit their target (at all, not just in the torso, head, etc.) about 20 percent of the time. It is absurd for Strange Famous to imply that you or your wife 'just shoot the bad guy in the head' rather than worry about the effectiveness of your round. You will probably be struggling just to hit an attacker at all, let alone be able to reliably hit him in the head, at night, while he is shooting at you.
I am including a couple Youtube videos below. It is the only watermelon video I could find with a .32 long, along with comparison videos for .38 special and .40 S&W. It is easy to see why the .32 Long is now mostly a thing for history buffs.