It really depends just how bad things get. If we see a short lived recession without inflation then the best thing to do is leave your money in some type of savings and buy stocks when they are low.
If inflation continues to be a problem then gold or metals would be a better place to be. I still really like gold but over the last week it has been tracking the dow and that scared me away. I will probrably regret it and may buy back. Gold could go to the moon if the economy really slows down and inflation continues to be a problem. However, the dollar just doesn't want to break resistance against the Euro at 1.5. The ECB refused to cut rates in Europe and if they hold their ground and the fed keeps slashing rates then the dollar could really start to spiral downhill and gold may be one of only a few safe havens.
Bottom line is everything is risky because the credit problems can run so deep in an economy and with the dollar being at all time lows it magnifies this problem. When the financial institutions, currency and monetary policy all have major issues it can collapse empires.
The good news is the stocks have stabalized for now but more bad news is going to come because there is still $240 Billion in risky debt that nobody is willing to touch. This means a lot more big write downs are on the way.