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fickman wrote:I'm glad that my CHL course had two instructors who would disagree on the answer to this scenario. I learned a lot by watching their disagreement.

They gave a similar situation, only I think the gunman was pointing at the cashier in a fast food restaurant and you were just around the corner with your family.

Instructor 1 felt a moral obligation to intervene and try to stop the threat. He was a former LEO and said that IF the BG shot and killed anybody in that store and he had failed to act, he would've never forgiven himself.

Instructor 2 felt no such moral obligation. (He's a retired Marine, so similar training and demonstration of bravery.) He said he'd be taking advantage of the distracted BG (focusing on the clerks) to sneak his family out the back door. He'd walk backwards with his gun drawn in case the BG's attention turned toward them. He felt that if the other people wanted somebody to defend them, they should have gotten their own CHL. He got his for himself, his family, and his loved ones.

The interesting thing is, neither of them were wrong. It's a personal choice. Few of us have the training of a Marine or a LEO. How we respond will be somewhat unpredictable, but working through these scenarios is still a worthwhile exercise. If you make your moral decisions now and train accordingly, hopefully in the moment you can react with muscle memory instead of waging this internal war in your head.