Although I have never met him in person, I have long appreciated the work of Claude Werner, and not just because we are both professors (Werner being known as The Tactical Professor).

Owing to his “heady” approach to gun education and training (e.g., his “Mind Map” captured below), Werner addresses the mental game of personal protection more than many, hence the subtitle of his blog: “more than weapons manipulation.” I like that.

Werner’s work on negative outcomes — especially what he calls “serious mistakes” — is extremely important for anyone who lives with or around guns to consider. These include:

• Shooting yourself
• Shooting someone you shouldn’t have, either intentionally or unintentionally
• Getting needlessly arrested
• Getting shot by police officers responding to a call for help
• Leaving guns where unauthorized persons can access them, resulting in tragedies
• Frightening innocent people around you
• Endangering innocent people needlessly

Although Werner argues that “Avoiding Negative Outcomes is a goal of all training,” I find people in the gun culture are sometimes reluctant to discuss these sorts of problems too openly for fear that anti-gunners will take advantage of them to push for further restrictions on gun ownership and use.

But ignoring these negative outcomes and serious mistakes or sweeping them under the rug is more harmful in the long run. Werner maintains that to educate and train gun owners to avoid negative outcomes requires standards. This has been a recent topic on The Tactical Professor blog. For those who have more time to listen than to read, Werner recently discussed standards on Ballistic Radio, Episode 207, from May 7th, 2017.

In addition to standards, Werner also discusses the difference between education (can be done through a variety of media) and training (must be hands on); explains why he uses the term “personal protection” rather than “self-defense” (b/c you may be protecting persons other than yourself); and suggests that a distinct Gun Culture 3.0 already exists.

Of course I find this last suggestion most threatening since I’m all in on the concept of Gun Culture 2.0. Werner argues that Gun Culture 3.0 are people who have or acquire guns for personal protection, but aren’t that interested in guns themselves. In that sense, they are really more a subset of  self-defense or even prepper culture than they are of gun culture. For now I still consider these folks a subset of Gun Culture 2.0. Even in Gun Culture 1.0, you had people who just used their guns for particular purposes and those who were known as “gun cranks” because they were so into every aspect of guns themselves. Today’s situation with GC2.0 may be no different. I hope so, at least until my book is complete.