Gun Safety Instructor: Attitude Is Everything When Deciding To Carry A Concealed Weapon

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The National Rifle Association trains their gun safety instructors to focus on knowledge, skills and attitude when they teach people how to carry and use their weapons.

Francois Ross, of Glendale, also teaches those elements to his students as a certified NRA instructor when he teaches his classes on personal protection in the home and pistol shooting at the . But in his Carrying Concealed Weapons class, he'll stress the importance of attitude a little more.

On Nov. 1, people wanting to carry a concealed weapon can apply for a permit with the Wisconsin Department of Justice. He'll start teaching his conceal carry weapons class in December.

For Ross, a person's attitude is important when deciding to carry a concealed weapon. The decision to carry should be rooted in humility, an acknowledgement of the good and evil that exists in the world, of being confident in your ability to discern what is a real threat and what is not, and understanding (and accepting) the responsibility of carrying a weapon.

"I stress the idea of, 'Can you really take a human life?' and that's something you can’t decide here and now in my class," Ross said. "So I give them an visualization technique that they can use at home."

Ross knows the power of this thinking. Five years ago while he was living in Las Vegas and wanted to conceal carry, he took a carrying concealed weapons class and came into it with the attitude that he already knew how to handle a gun since he had grown up hunting most of his life.

"But when you learned to hunt from your dad, that made it easy for you to pull the trigger and you were taught when the deer comes into your site to pull that trigger, that you had a right to do it," Ross said. "But say someone comes into your home with a long criminal history and you shoot and kill that person. Then your kid just came out...what do you say to your kid?"

When the instructor walked Ross through this scenario, he had never thought of it that way.

"It's not a black and white process. And when I thought about it, it took me off my feet and I unloaded every gun that I had in my house because I didn’t know if I could take a life," Ross said.

For Ross, carrying a gun may be a right, but just because you can carry a gun doesn't mean you have the right attitude about it.

"I say there is no shame in getting robbed and complying with a bad guy, even though you are carrying a gun," Ross said.

Ross points to the Jesus Gonzalez case as an example of having the wrong attitude in carrying a weapon. Gonzalez, of Milwaukee, was found guilty of first-degree reckless homicide and first-degree reckless injury on Thursday for shooting and killing one man, and injuring a second man after the three of them fought over a parking spot. Both victims were unarmed. According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Gonzalez had no firearms training, was a gun advocate and had repeatedly open carried loaded weapons into retail establishments.

"He's going to cook," Ross said. "...(F) irst of all he had a gun, you don't elevate a situation. You turn around and walk away. Now if someone punches you in the head while you are walking away, that's a different story. He could have gone in his house and called the cops and let them handle it."

Often when Ross teaches his other classes, people will often decide not to carry a gun.

"On more than one occasion, when I talk to people after taking my class they'll say, 'I went home and thought about, and I decided it’s not right for me.' Which is fine," Ross said. "I respect that."

To learn more about the classes Ross teaches, please call him at (414) 510-3840.