A few remarks about last week's self defense discussion:
1) Educate yourself in applicable laws. What you think is legal might not be and vice versa.
2) Become fluent in the use of your self defense article, even if that is a body part (fist, foot, etc...). Get professional training. (closely related to below point).
3) Get over your resistance to use violence. You may want to try hunting or varminting: As opposed to shooting at a target or punching/kicking a bag, you may not find killing (or otherwise harming) a living thing as easy as you thought. This may be one reason why bystanders in dog attack scenarios don't do much - they haven't gotten over their reluctance to use violence.
4) Think through all possible scenarios beforehand.
5) Be the first to call police. The default assumption of police is the first one to call police is the victim.
6) Think through how you are going to present yourself in the aftermath. How you present yourself to authorities is critical. Avoid an aggressive posture, and do not apologize.
7) Learn to recognize bad advice. Many people giving "advice" in this space are either dogs-first agitators, incompetent, appeal to perfection and so forth.
