Concealed Carry Scenario A: Valleyfair beatdown

This article has been in the top-5 for over a week in my local paper (please click on the link, which generates traffic to the Strib site and supports our local newspaper):

Dad who shielded daughter in attack at Valleyfair recovering, wife says (link: http://www.startribune.com/local/south/25472764.html)

Basically, a family was at an amusement park when a man approached them and assaulted their 12-year old daughter. The father protected his daugter, and the man called seven friends on his cell phone, whereupon the group ambushed the family in the parking lot and beat the man into the hospital.

I am not commenting on and do not want to hear comments about ethnicity, gangsta rap and the kids these days histrionics of the Strib's token conservative reporter. Stuff like this happens, even in the good old no-gun United Kingdom and Japan. I am just curious about how people who carry firearms (legal in MN with a permit) would see this situation. The gun is for self-defense, but would you really consider that to be only yourself?

Yes, I know there are laws, but there's also morality and where does it fit in? I'm curious about how they and people in general define the boundary of self-defense and protection.

If you are in that parking lot and that group attacks you, do you pull your gun? You have a very legtimate reason to believe your life is in jeopardy, but it's 8-1. Maybe your gun will make them back off. However, unless you are a trained professional it's more likely that you will be disarmed, and even if you aren't you'd better be prepared to shoot somebody and probably multiple somebodies.

There's also the consideration that if any of those accused of being in the attacker group were even the smallest of small time criminals they may be carrying a gun as well.  Now you are in a shootout in a crowded area, and I don't even need to describe all of the ways that can go wrong (but here's one, and another link with more detail).

So...if you are there, and you have a gun, and someone is in danger of being killed, do you draw your firearm? If it's you? If it's your son, and your granddaughter is the one who was assaulted? What about a son-in-law, or an uncle, or a friend from high school you don't see all that often?

Where is the line for you? When are you prepared to pull that weapon, and when are you not, and if you wouldn't draw it in this situation, what the heck are you carrying it for?

Note: I am not anti-concealed carry - I just think that the conversation is loaded with hyperbole, with the pro-lobby simplifying the context under which guns would be useful to one-on-one situations: Osama Bin Laden planting a bomb, or two young toughs looking for meth money. The anti-lobby claims led to scenarios of wild Mr. Pink-style shootouts on city streets (e.g at 1:02 of this clip) over parking spaces and tickets to "The Dark Knight". That has not happened in Minnesota.

This is more a what-if question for those who carry or would like to carry a gun for protection - what is your boundary for self-protection? You? Your blood relatives? Your legal relatives? Close friends? Whoever's in your group?

If you're not going to pull a gun, will you stand there and watch someone be killed? If you are prepared to pull a gun, you need to be prepapred to shoot to kill, but how would you deal with the aftermath? If you do wind up exchanging gunfire in that crowded parking lot, and someone innocent is hit...how do you reconcile that?

For those against concealed carry: what would you feel if it was you, or someone in your tribe? Sure people will call the police, and the police will come and arrests will be made, but your father/husband/brother/friend will still be dead or crippled. Would you be opposed to a gun owner intervening to prevent that?