>Finally - if you /really/ want to have a gun to “protect your family/self” use a shotgun. There’s less harm to people who aren’t directly in the line of fire,

>Finally - if you /really/ want to have a gun to “protect your family/self” use a shotgun. There’s less harm to people who aren’t directly in the line of fire, the effective distance is vastly shorter so less risk to people in other rooms, and you don’t have to be as good at aiming. This! And I think there's another aspect of shotguns that makes them far better suited for self-defense: the sound of just pumping a shotgun is LOUD. It's absolutely a "warning shot" in and of itself. If you're looking for a self-defense gun, get a pump-action shotgun. If that sound alone isn't enough to make any intruders scatter like cockroaches, only then do I feel like deadly force would ever really warranted, because no bumbling hapless robber just out to steal your TV is going to stick around after hearing it.