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OK, you have valid points, but in reality, how many muggers are going to stand 21 feet away from you and shout at you to give them your wallet? They're gonna need to be close so they can do it more quietly - - -after all if you shout loud enough to be heard 21 feet away, someone else (cop) might hear you and take you out. Most muggings happen very close - in trapping range - not far away. Guns are pretty much useless in trapping range if you don't have it out already before the attack starts. Even then, the guy can take the gun from you. Knives are faster to deploy, harder to take away (contrary to popular belief, if you're close to the gun, guns are much easier to trap and take away than knives are - - -you don't have to worry about cutting your hand off on the gun. If I were gonna rob and kill you, I'd get close to you and stab you - and if you're like most of the population, you'd never see it coming. If you want proof of that, play a little game the next time you're walking down the street. See how close you can get behind someone before they notice you're there. When I've done this, I've gotten not only directly behind people, but I actually have to move directly alongside them before they have any clue someone's back there. Were I a mugger, they'd be taken out LONG before they had any idea I was near them. Most people are like that. Carrying a gun doesn't do you any good if your awareness is so crappy that you have to actually be hit before you know a fight is coming.
My central point in this thread is that so many people carry guns and think they'll be safe, but they not only don't learn to use a gun properly, they also fail to learn how to see (and avoid) bad situations before they're unavoidable.
You have to remember that American society wants everything quick, cheap, and easy. We don't want to work for anything. That's why car stereos have remotes, we have drive-thru funerals (no lie), and almost every product advertisement has quick, easy, free, or instant in big letters on it. As such, people want the quick solution to personal safety (I'm a-gonna get me a gun) even if it won't work without putting a lot of effort into training to use that gun to defend yourself. They'd rather go with the illusion of safety than put the effort into actually being safe.
BTW, and to turn this into a total rant, that's the central problem with American society as I see it. People are satisfied with crap as long as it projects the illusion of quality to everyone else. That's why you see idiots driving around with $500 of crap stuck on their car that they think makes it look like a $50,000 race car. That's why stereos have thousands of blinky lights and all sorts of exotic-looking materials, yet still sound like crap. As long as people keep building the illusion of quality (or in this case protection) around them without actually getting any quality/protection, they'll continue to be in constant danger of major disappointment.
/rant
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