Chuck Taylor On Handgun Stopping Power

As an anecdotal read this is worth a look. Forget for a moment that Chuck, like most old guys, lumps all modern ammunition into the same category, full metal jacket or hollow-point, believes ballistic gelatin to be worthy of nothing but a good choice for dessert if enhanced with the proper flavoring, and as a very good shot forgets that bullet placement is NOT the single most important aspect of self defense since most folks under duress will not hit the broadside of a barn. From inside.

Of late we have seen a rash of "new revelations" on the old subject of bullet performance, specifically the issue of stopping power and whether or not hollow point bullets are all they're cracked up to be. These "revelations", based upon results obtained in irrelevant target mediums like gelatin, clay, wet Los Angeles telephone books, limited personal experience or, worse, pure assumption based on nothing at all, are beginning to inundate the pages of the gun press and completely muddle an already abstract and sensitive issue.

Perhaps none of this makes much difference to many readers, but it does indeed matter to a significant percentage of people -- those who either carry a gun for a living or train those who do. In other words, some of us read the trade journals for reasons other than simply to be entertained.

I've said many times that life and death are serious business -- too serious to be left to amateurs. A harsh statement? Perhaps. But to me the problem is that these days it seems like everybody wants us to believe that they have all the answers. And maybe they do, but, at times, I can't help but wonder...