People are admonished never to go on margin. Going on margin to the extent of having to worry about being sold out of one's investments at the wrong time certainly is taking on wild risk. Buying a high dividend-paying investment that does not keep up with inflation is just as much a loss as any speculation. A dollar is a dollar, whether in dividends or in the value of the investment. A dollar borrowed is a dollar borrowed.
Reality is what counts.
Forget the names. Being located in the Detroit area, we get many new clients who own stocks in the automotive companies. Sometimes there are tax reasons for holding onto these stocks, but even when there aren't, it is difficult to get people to leave what they know. One can point out that the automotive industry is a very mature industry with little to no growth prospects, but if people have lived with it for many years, they feel comfortable with it. Sometimes familiarity is mixed in with inertia and they are hard to distinguish.