Depends largely on your surroundings. If you're going into an area where everyone else is armed (like say, people in cars are armed with airbags, talking on cell phones, and pushing a few thousand pounds of metal around) then yeah, you should most likely have SOME sort of protection, although a kevlar vest would be a better analogy for the gun thing. Funny how Police wear them all the time, even when they don't plan to get shot, huh?

Joe