Why do you assume a gun would be randomly taken out in a tense confrontation?
I can spin this idea as well by saying "What if a few rogue protestors were really pissed off, kicked in your front door and began to beat you with a baseball bat, wouldn't that be a great time to have some leverage to protect your life?"
Or what if you were walking your child to school and just one angry protestor twice your size followed you, became increasingly more agitated and decided to smash your head into the curb.
It's all relative to how you phrase it.
[EDIT] And apparently "hbags" found this comment really insulting for some reason and thinks I'm nuts for demonstrating an alternative way to phrase a situation... and I'm the unstable one...ok.