Anybody else pack a heater? (Non-burgerlanders, we know this is not normal or good, but we are surrounded by frothing at the mouth chuds with guns). Right now I carry a pepper spray and a legal knife, never needed to use it, but I’m thinking of carrying. What are your thoughts on this from the trans perspective?
Yeah. I don’t anymore because I live somewhere where trans people are relatively safe, but I used to.
A lot of holsters marketed to women will assume you have wide hips and they can fit kinda awkward if you don’t. Also regular 4 o’clock iwb carry feels weird to me - I’ve had the most luck carrying aiwb (1-2 o’clock) with a subcompact with jeans and a proper belt. That’s hard to do if you have a tummy or sit down a lot though.
As for what to carry, those teeny tiny 9mms aren’t that bad to shoot and fit much better with women’s clothing. It’s not just the size - anything bigger than a subcompact will weigh down pretty heavy unless you have a good belt, which limits outfits. .380 is also good, but bullets are way more expensive and not that much easier to shoot. The Ruger LCP is a trap though - it’s too small and awful to shoot and you won’t wanna practice with it ever. But also you need to practice.
I only have full to extended frame right now, but they can fit in my purse. Not I’m not a fan of small guns with average calibers, but a .380 might do the trick for a subcompact for me so long as I get a grip extender mag. I’ve thought of revolvers for concealed on my person too though.
Off-body carry is not great, purse snatching becoming gun snatching makes a bad problem worse. There are purses designed for concealed carry through; with fast-access dedicated firearm pockets/sections and (hopefully) reinforced or somehow body-attachable straps.
Fair, but I’m not taking my maxpedition gun purse out to any place but the range. My coach will due until I can find something cute that also carries.
This article is pretty old, but the info is good. A lot of the links from it are dead but it looks like these folks have not-strictly-utilitarian looking carry purses (lotsa leather though, so not vegan friendly).
Ugh now I kind of want to be a purse person instead of a pockets person because there are a lot of cute purses