Every man can handle .357 Mag. If he can't he needs proper training. Perceived recoil is just that. You can be trained to handle it whether in a handgun or long gun.
Worst recoiling handgun I ever owned was a PPK in .380. Seriously. Learned to shoot it very well.
Well that's the most ridiculous statement I ever heard.
Yes, the .357 can be mastered if you put enough time into it, and you have no problems with arthritis. But even if you can, should you?
Yeah, I know, the exalted Federal Bureau of Intimidation says you need more than a foot of penetration, but I don't know of any meth head or crack punk that has a heart, liver or lungs 12 inches deep. And is a .357 the end all defense handgun for urban/suburban use with such over penetration? With houses with sheet rock walls and family members a few rooms away? Or frame houses with vinyl siding and tyvek and sheet rock down range?
All macho bull hockey aside, having a gun that it takes a real man to handle is kind of dumb. What if your'e not there but your wife or teenage kid is home and an intruder makes an entrance? What if you're even temporally incapacitated with a hand injury or medical condition that makes the short barrel .357 too much to handle left handed?
I can very easily see the viability of a nice little .32 or even a .380 or .38 special with mild wadcutters. Heck, the preferred gun of choice of the O.S.S. guys being dropped into occupied France in WW2 was the Colt pocket model in .32acp. They reported that it had very good killing power. Our friend Al, a 6' 1" full contact karate guy was dropped in his tracks at the Silver Spring metro parking garage by a inner city punk crack head using a .25acp Raven. One round right in his chest at arms length when his fancy karate move failed. The human chest wall is just not that hard to penetrate. Any handgun will do it, even a little .22 like Hinckly used to shoot at President Reagan. The gun guru's love to preach their BS, but watch the youtube videos of the Reagan shooting and see everyone hit with a single round go .22 long rifle laying on the gourd and not getting up. Hell, a letter opener or screw driver shoved hard will penetrate the human body. A humble .32 or .380 is moe than enough to ruin some criminals day.
Few people can deal with full bore loads in a concealable size .357 on a regular basis. Yeah, I know some people claim to carry a .44 Automag as their concealed carry weapon while wearing a speedo, and can hit a flying aspirin tablet. But the internet is full of a lot of outright BS floating around. For the run of the mill human being, not a die hard gun nut shooing 200 rounds a week, or an outright masochist, a short barrel .357 is about the last gun they want for self defense. The outright explosion of the concealed carry class of .380's and compact 9mm's say a lot about what flies and what dies in the market place. Ease of carry, ease of shooing, make up what the shooting public wants and buys.
A PPK being worse in recoil than a compact revolver of equal size and weight? Bullhocky. Having owned and shot both a PPK .380 and the J frame S&W .357 with a 3 inch barrel, I can attest first hand there's absolutely no comparison. While the PPK was a little snappy, the S&W revolver was punishing for anyone not on a mission to prove something. The only .357 I found comfortable to shoot for more than a box of ammo was my model 66 with a 4 inch barrel, and that was hardly a concealed carry gun for hot weather.
But like they say, Opinions are like something else everyone has.
