UK Madness Regarding Gun Control

[Tombstone]

Originally Posted by Warsai

Yes, maybe it should.

(goes off to start a new thread)

Warsai, maybe you can come back here and post the new thread link for us. I'd like to follow it!

[Tombstone]

Excellent analogy!

Originally Posted by oldfred

My 'concern for the welfare of the Brits' was a direct response to 'UK madness regarding gun control'.

I'm sure the vast majority of Brits don't see the Americans as scoundrels, but we do occasionally approach things from a different point of view.
I liken it to a family who defend each other from outsiders, but aren't affraid
to have the occasional squabble between thmselves.

Fred

[xlt66]

Originally Posted by oldfred

The sad thing is why on earth did we allow these neighbourhoods to go bad in the first place....but maybe that should be another thread.

Fred

Indeed. I can't even fathom the responses on that thread!

[oldfred]

Originally Posted by Tombstone

Hi oldfred,

Thanks for your reply. Why the concern for the Brits? Well, I for one have a common heritage, I have several British friends, and Britain's politics can have a ripple effect over here in the U.S.

Throw out the gun issue for a minute. The items I have been reading about and have been talking to my British friends about can be summed up by the following excerpts:

"In England "[m]erely threatening to defend oneself can also prove illegal, as an elderly lady discovered. She succeeded in frightening off a gang of thugs by firing a blank from a toy gun, only to be arrested for the crime of putting someone in fear with an imitation firearm" (p. 184).

Not even if one's life is in danger can one legally use a weapon. In another case, two men assaulted Eric Butler in a subway, smashing his head and choking him. "In desperation he unsheathed a sword blade in his walking stick and slashed at one of them. . . . The assailants were charged with unlawful wounding but Butler was also tried, and convicted of carrying an offensive weapon" (p. 185)."

The right to self-defense using anything more than your fists looks to be outlawed.

I guess you won't ever feel the outrage until you are in a position of needing to protect yourself. Lord help you if you try to get that playing field level and use a like-type weapon.

Thankfully the cases you quote don't happen as frequently as you may have been led to believe over here....though a single case is one too many in my opinion.

Right or wrong, the law over here sees the use of immitation firearms almost as serious than if it had been a real one.

Again, right or wrong, Eric Butler was already committing a criminal offence when he left his home carrying a sword-stick.

Sometimes I find it difficult to defend certain of our laws....but I strongly believe that while these certain laws are in place it is our duty to obey them.

Fred

[Bill Sikes]

Gosh, this *is* late. Nice drop of cider and time to relax... this"forum" thing is
a whole lot more clunky than the simplicity and availability of Usenet news,
isn't it? Anyway:-

Reasonable force is the phrase. Tony Martin, for instance, would have been
OK had he not killed his man whilst he was running away. He was tried by
a jury, who decided his guilt after examining evidence from both sides.
The man who stabbed an intruder doesn't seem to be in any danger of
being convicted of anything as far as I can see.

[Bill Sikes]

This from "oldfred":
> Sometimes I find it difficult to defend certain of our laws....but I strongly
> believe that while these certain laws are in place it is our duty to obey them.

Yup. Where the structure seemd to me to fail is the lenient treatment of
convicted criminals. The punishment no longer seems to fit the crime.

[Tombstone]

Understood and well said.

Originally Posted by oldfred

Thankfully the cases you quote don't happen as frequently as you may have been led to believe over here....though a single case is one too many in my opinion.

Right or wrong, the law over here sees the use of immitation firearms almost as serious than if it had been a real one.

Again, right or wrong, Eric Butler was already committing a criminal offence when he left his home carrying a sword-stick.

Sometimes I find it difficult to defend certain of our laws....but I strongly believe that while these certain laws are in place it is our duty to obey them.

Fred

[Tombstone]

Originally Posted by Bill Sikes

Gosh, this *is* late. Nice drop of cider and time to relax... this"forum" thing is
a whole lot more clunky than the simplicity and availability of Usenet news,
isn't it?

It's 9 p.m. here right now. Just got in and am starting to settle back. I think I'll have something cold and hearty.

I'm a forum junkie now. Usenet has devolved from what it used to be, unfortunately. Making a post there puts your online life at risk.

I appreciate your and oldfred's input and comments here. It gives a great perspective on what is going on and its a firsthand view - which is very important.

Anyway:-

Reasonable force is the phrase. Tony Martin, for instance, would have been
OK had he not killed his man whilst he was running away. He was tried by
a jury, who decided his guilt after examining evidence from both sides.
The man who stabbed an intruder doesn't seem to be in any danger of
being convicted of anything as far as I can see.

[CVX]

Hey Everyone,

As you know, I post a lot of stories. I like to watch the discussions develop around them. The gun control topic interests me. I have to agree with Tombstone regarding the right to self defense. As I research the Press and stories relating to crime, I'm finding interesting anecdotal evidence to support the contention that certain Western societies are turning the act of self defense into a crime. It's very interesting. I have some catching up to do on my readings here, but bear with me. I am going to post just a few of many articles I've found. The next few posts are from an editor of a newspaper in Winnipeg. He condenses some new current events that I found interesting.

Originally Posted by Tombstone

There is so much I can write about this. I'm really quite curious about what the opinion is from our longtime true friends in the UK.

The British government has completely stripped away any defense capability from her citizens.

In addition, their legislation makes everyone a criminal. Next will be a ban on screwdrivers, sharpened pencils, scissors, clippers, and safety pins.

Take a minute to read this article:

http://www.mises.org/misesreview_detail.asp?control=215

Take note of paragraph 3 and 4. Amazing. The police acknowledge that American burglars overwhelmingly prefer empty houses while in England, Canada, and Australia they enter houses at will, not caring if anyone is home.

[CVX]

Fri, August 20, 2004

Recoil from evil

By JOHN GLEESON -- Winnipeg Sun


Forget the waste, the futility, the alleged fraud committed in the name of Canada's firearms registry -- Americans found an even better reason to shoot down the idea in our times. They saw the evil that men were doing with it.

Modern U.S. opposition to gun registration dates back to the Second World War (not the Wild West, as too many Canadians cartoonishly think) and began as a healthy recoil from Nazi abuses.

As Virginia-based author and constitutional lawyer Stephen P. Halbrook has documented in his groundbreaking studies of Nazi gun laws, America was months away from entering the war when the U.S. attorney general urged Congress to create a program to register all the firearms in the nation. It was 1941 -- more than a half-century before Canada would embark on the same folly.

Read more:
http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/Column...20/592781.html