POLL: Gun Ownership

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I don't own a gun. The only member of my family who owns a gun is my uncle who is a farmer, he uses it to hunt game, slaughter pigs, kill vermin and as home protection.

In New Zealand we have a 'don't start nothing, won't be nothing' policy. Make guns difficult to obtain and few people will have guns, fewer people with guns results in fewer gun related crimes.

 

For your consideration.

Sincere and respectfull regards,
HOM

If the state fails us, we must defend ourselves
By Simon Heffer
(Filed: 24/02/2002)


LAST Monday 82-year-old Violetta Vella was found dead in a pool of blood in her flat in Finsbury Park, north London.

She had been attacked in her own home, in broad daylight, and repeatedly stabbed in the neck. A gang of youths was seen fleeing from the scene. The estate on which she lived, Six Acres, is infested with drug addicts who rob and steal to finance their habit.

Two days after Mrs Vella was murdered, St Albans Crown Court heard how a wealthy man's wife was killed and their teenage son and his girlfriend maimed after being shot outside their home in suburban Hertfordshire. The object of the robbery was a pair of Rolex watches.

On that same day a drug addict, Andrew Aston, was given 26 life sentences for murdering two octogenarian war veterans in their homes and attacking 24 other pensioners. Aston's father announced, with commendable propriety, that he thought his son ought to be hanged.

It was also revealed that, 10 days ago, the head of a computer firm, his wife and baby son were ambushed in their home in Twickenham by a gang of eight raiders with an axe, knives and a baseball bat. We have become inured to the daily stories of carjackings, and resigned to the news that street crime in London rose by 39 per cent last year.

We all know things have become steadily worse since the 1960s. We might, however, be just about to reach that point where enough is, at last, enough.

To say there is an "epidemic" of violent crime is to push understatement to its limits. As this week's incidents show, it strikes across classes. At the root of it is the drugs problem.

The crime wave is being compounded by the complacency of politicians, by the bullying of the police into attitudes of craven political correctness, and by a creaking criminal justice system. Now we have reached a situation in which few can feel safe even in their homes, and this could be the breaking point.

Most of us had an implicit assumption that there was a contract between law-abiding people and the state. In return for our restraint, the state would use the various means at its disposal to control crime. It would police our society properly. It would severely punish those who attacked us.

It must, though, be clear to all that the state has broken that contract. When it comes to crime, we are no longer dealing with good, honest criminals. We are dealing with degenerates who view crime not only as a way of life but also as a recreation.

They have no regard for the property or even the lives of others. All of them are wicked. Many have their wickedness exacerbated by mind-altering chemicals. Above all, they engage in murderous, anarchic behaviour because they are confident the police will not catch them or, if they do, that they are highly unlikely to be condignly punished for their horrible crimes.

Since the contract has been broken, what should the public do about it? Ideally, we should persuade our rulers to enforce policies that deter people from committing such crimes: but they won't.

Mr Aston's repulsive son will not be hanged. Nor will the murderers of Mrs Vella. Nor will the drug dealers who are at the root of so much of this evil. Nor will the police be given the resources to put more men in uniform on the streets.

Nor, even if they were, would they be encouraged to take the sort of pre-emptive, aggressive action required against the perpetrators of so much inner-city crime, because many such criminals happen to be from those sections of society dealt with by the Macpherson Report.

The Government absolutely lacks the political will to deal with the violation of one of the most fundamental liberties of the people it governs: their right to feel safe in their own homes.

Given this scandalous situation, it is time for the Government to confer a new right on the people: the right to bear arms. Gun control in this country is in any case a joke. There is far more gun crime now than there was before the idiotic law passed by the Major government to ban handguns after the Dunblane massacre.

The police obsessively regulate shotguns and rifles held by sportsmen who have no intention of killing anyone with them, while failing utterly to control illegal weapons. In America, the two states with the highest level of gun ownership - New Hampshire and Vermont - have the lowest levels of crime.

One of the most murderous places in the United States, Washington DC, has the most rigorous gun control in the Union. For a householder to shoot a burglar in most states in the US is regarded not so much as permissible as part of his civic responsibilities.

There is, as a result, very little burglary in America. In this country, when a man shoots a burglar who is part of a gang with more than 100 previous convictions between them, it is he who goes to jail - for life, until Tony Martin's sentence was reduced on appeal.

Many of these appalling crimes are committed by junkies, which might lead some to argue that they would be insufficiently rational to respond to greater deterrence. They may well not respond when they are on drugs, but that is their problem.

In any case, this is not about the criminal, but about protecting the victims. The point is not to have a retributive free-for-all, but rather to bring a real threat of deterrence. The principle of protection could be extended.

While it might be unacceptable for motorists to carry a gun - even though many criminals routinely do - certainly a driver stopped by a carjacker or, indeed, a pedestrian attacked by a mugger, should be able to spray mace in his face, or use a stun gun on him without fear of prosecution for having used an illegal weapon.

The present weighting in these crimes of the rights of the criminal over those of the victim ignores the new realities: it cannot, in a just society, be allowed to continue.

Ideally, the Government would give the police the resources and moral backing, and the courts the draconian powers, to stem these depravities. As it shows no signs of doing so, it must allow people to defend themselves.

If that means criminals getting killed or horribly injured, so be it. As the saying goes, they have a choice: their victims don't.


Simon Heffer is a Daily Mail columnist

 

@ HOM,

With due respect, Heffer is not exactly known for being objective. Reading his article, his dislike for the incumbent UK administration is pretty obvious, and it's less about whether UK citizens should be subject to less stringent gun controls than inciting a moral panic and attacking the government.

I'd also like to see his statistical proof of his assertions, with the implied correlation being that more guns = less property crime. Vermont and New Hampshire are highly homogenous areas (mostly white and Christian) and much lower population density than DC. Heffer's implied correlation ignores a lot of other factors that contribute to his assertion - and which ultimately detracts from the power of his message, since it isn't as simple as giving people guns. Firearms just increase the likelihood of someone dying.

He is right about the fact that these crimes should be a cause for concern - they are. However, I don't think he's so concerned with working towards a solution as he is with discrediting and attacking New Labour.

A few Wiki articles for reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Heffer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enoch_Powell (Heffer's intellectual hero)

 

That article is so biased and makes such vague generalisations. The gun crime in somewhere like New Hampshire is probably due to many factors other than just it's level of gun control (how do you measure gun control anyway?). New Hampshire is pretty small so its results might be skewed by any factor. Actually, I think NonSequitur already said that.

 

NonSequitur/Harbourboy,

Fair concern and criticizm.

Vermont is a "shall issue" state with the least restrictive gun laws - ownership/class III (full auto)/CCW state in the union.

If, as many assert, a prevalence of gun ownership, as a pecentage of the populace = an increase in violent gun related crime... what are we to conclude about Vermont and in fact many other states or metropolitan city jurisdictions which have passed concealed carry laws to find that their violent crime rates are measureably reduced after passagae of such laws? Or say... similarly populated jurisdictions with similar gun restrictions, yet with disparagingly different crime statistics?

What are we to infer then...?

I suppose I have a question... what factor then is valid... and are folks on either side of the equation really concerned about working solutions to deter or reduce violent crime... or is one side fixated with their right to own bazookas... and the other fixated by an unhealthy level of trust in a government run police state with a complete monopoly on the use of deadly force... even for self preservation?

Guns and gun ownership is an easy scapegoat... it's an easy sell for a politician or media talking head to frame a bias statistically disgenuine argument around... it makes a good sound bite... it makes a good picture... it's simplistic... it sells to the masses... ooow looky... evil black rifles.

My concern... is that the real world answers to effectively reducing violent crime that require a deeper analysis and in some instances may result in less PC but effective prescriptions for legislative and judicial efforts will be overlooked and never truly acted upon.

Government has an overwhelming tendency to enforce laws that are easy to enforce, rather than ones that should be enforced. A corollary is that it also tends to go after generally law abiding people, as enforcement against them is easier. Most legislation flows from this principle, too.

All organizations drift into that, but government has the ultimate coercive power that you can not walk away from.

That is why the concept of limited government was so crucial, and why we are paying the price everyday for having lost sight of it.

I used to believe the great philosophers who said, in various ways, that man was born free or was free in his natural state.

I no longer believe that to be the case. I think man's natural state was various levels of enslavement or subjugation to others.

Periodically, a small cadre of people push the envelope, through war or thought, and create a situation of freedom. In order to presevere it for themselves, they must gift it to the rest of the people and their posterity.

Initially, this gift is welcomed by all but eventually deteriorates as the majority of people find the price of freedom is more than they are willing to pay.

And, I am not necessarily using the price of freedom in the sense of self defense or the military. I am also using it in the sense of normal living through the natural ups and downs of life.

That siad... regarding the current state of American law and government; it is my observation that somewhere along the line, we forgot that personal freedom, i.e. liberty, is directly proportionate to personal responsibility. That the failure of personal responsibility is not license for government intervention unless a crime (malum in se) is committed."

BTW - thank you both for your intelligent debate - it is quite refreshing to "discuss" rather than argue this topic.

Sincere regards,
HOM

 

I guess I can't talk for the whole world, I can only talk from my own experience. Where I live, hardly anyone has a gun, and hardly anyone ever gets shot. I can't say for certain that one is the result of the other. All I can say is that it is a situation which I find to be preferable to one where everyone had guns.

 

I can't believe the rhetoric here. When were we ever dealing with "good, honest criminals"? The article seemed to me at least to be somewhat biased. However, it does seem to me that having some level of protection would aid in preventing serious harm to your person. I can't believe that in the UK you can't even carry mace. You don't even need a permit to carry it in the US - if you're 18 or over, you can buy it.

The only problem is that it's never so easy. Where I live, lots of people own guns, and hardly anyone ever gets shot. Most gun crimes occur in inner city areas, and since I don't live in an inner city, we see very little gun crime.

 

I agree with that. Just speaking from my own experience, to which I would add the following. I come from an enormous family (must have at least 100 people at the cousin level or closer) and only one of them has ever owned guns. That person is also the only one in the family to ever die from a gunshot wound. He lived in New York.

Once again, I'm not trying to make dubious generalisations, I'm just trying to show the factors that have impacted my anti-gun point of view.

 

I don't have a clear answer either HB. The one piece of information I have seen seems to lend itself to a poverty angle. I don't have the statistics in front of me, but the general point of the article said that you were more likely to shoot someone or get shot yourself if you're poor. It also said that crime rates among the poor are higher than among the middle or upper classes. Of course, then we're left with a chicken or the egg type problem.

My personal view is it is more about society than the person. The vast majority of those replying that they own guns, do so for reasons of protection, recreation, or hunting. None of these people are part of the problem, because none of these people own guns with the deliberate intention of shooting someone. Even those who own them for defensive reasons, aren't intending to shoot someone - they are just taking the attitude that if someone breaks into my house, and it's him or me I'd prefer if it were him. But I don't think any of these people actually WANT someone to break into their house so they can shoot them.

The problem comes with thugs, hooligans, and other nefarious people like drug dealers and pimps. These people own guns for the express purpose of using them on other people, either directly or in a threatening way. Since these types of people are far more common in densely populated areas like inner cities than they are in suburbia or rural areas, that's where we see the gun crime.

 

As a serviceman, Army, I have learned how, when, and why to use a firearm, next, I really have no faith in most situations when it comes to the 'police', heh, I have had more ignorant cops threaten me with/without a firearm than I have violent intent from normal people!!!

I am a good-natured, non-violent person under most conditions, but let someone come *uninvited* into my home and attempt to take what I personally worked hard to get the money for, or physically (knife, firearm, dumb-chucks, whatever....) threaten me/family/friends/puppy for *any* reason in my home, and I will show them the way out one way or the other, preferably in the non-violent way....

 

So what if the Desert Eagle is a big gun? I'll just get a wider and deeper pocket made in my trench coat, simple as that. And I have taken note of your suggestions, Kitrax, but I'm not exactly fond of Beretta, especially considering that mine is broken, and I have no idea what EXACTLY is broken.

 

Oh, come on. If we're talking about a Desert Eagle, we got it give it props here. We should never just call it a "big gun". The proper terminology is a "Desert Eagle is a big mother f'ing gun".

Obviously, if your Beretta doesn't work, then you're not going to like it. However, it's a fine firearm. It's still used as a standard issue police weapon in many places across the U.S.

 

Geez, how the heck did i miss this?!?!?
i personally own lots and lots o' guns. 3 .22 pistols(rugers),3 .38revolvers(s+w , colt , taurus) ,4 .357 revolvers(s+w , taurus , rossi , ruger) ,3 .40 s+w pistols(glocks),2 .41 magnums(taurus , s+w) , 2 .44 magnums(ruger s+w) , .44 special(rossi) , 4 .45 acps(glock springfield),3 10 mm pistols(glocks) 4 9mms(glock , beretta , taurus) , 3 .45 long colt(rugers) ,2 .22 magnum derringer , .450 bond super defender derringer , 5 mossberg 12 ga shotguns(models 500 , 590 & 635(bolt action slug gun)) , 1 30-30 lever action, 1 30-06 bolt action , 1 45-70 lever action , 1 .357 lever action , 1 .45 lc lever action , 4 .22 semi autos , 2 .270 bolt actions , 1 7mm bolt action , 2 ak-47 style , 3 ar-15 style , and my all time favorite my benelli M3 12 ga shotgun.

On the self defense point , cops are not there to prevent crimes , their job is to clean up afterwards. ask one, they will tell you that the chances of them being on the scene when you need them is a million to one.
I have a military and police background and thought that had taught me how to shoot. boy was i wrong ! First time i went to compete in a firearm event i was waxed by these "civilians"!! guys(and gals)who had never served in the military or as an officer of the law. These guys shoot 4-6 times a week (avg about 300 rnds / practice). they taught me more about shooting in a month than 8 years in service and as an officer did.
go to a IDPA or another shooting federation event if you have a a chance. you will see no more than a couple police officers competing in the whole shoot. These guys average 89-98% accuracy rates. and these are action events (example.. sitting in the driver seat of a car opening the door,crouching behind the door,unholstering your firearm,aiming at and hitting 5 targets at 3,5,7&10 yds. running around the car to shield from a second group at 11 & 13 yds(3 targets) you are using 16 - 24 rds of ammo and the better shooters are doing this in less than 12 seconds.(some well under)).
i would rather have one of these guys back me up than 85% of the officers i know(most of whom never fire their weapons except at the twice yearly qualifications course).
I now manage a group of convienance stores(3) and we have to deal with the worst types and kinds of people on a daily basis. all of my clerks have the option of being armed and we also offer training in the proper use of firearms(free of course). in all my years helping to train people to shoot & to have the correct mindset to use it if needed, i personally know of more than a dozen women and men who are alive and healthy today because they had the will to stand up to their attackers and the determination to use their firearm to kill if needed.
I have personally had to pull a firearm on 5 occasions at work and once at home (came home to find 4 individuals had broken a window in the basement, proceeded up the stairs and broke down the door into the house and were attempting to pillage the safe in the bedroom closet. idiots walked right by the 6'x4'x4' gunsafe in the den on the way to the bedroom and for some reason didn't think the residents would be armed . as i pulled in the driveway i say the lights go on in the bedroom and as all the cars were gone i knew no one was at home. dialled 911 and informed them of an breaking and entering and an attempted burglary and gave them the address. i than entered the house through the front door and made my way towards the noises emanating from the master bedroom(yes i was checking the rooms i was passing along the way) i had carried a model 21 glock .45 fully loaded with 14 rds of magsafe +p ammo.i entered the bedroom to find the four idiots(er.. individuals) clustered around the safe bolted to the floor in the closet trying to pry it loose with a couple of crowbars. i firmly instructed them to lay flat on the floor and try not to make any sudden moves and i would try not to pull the trigger even though there was nothing i would have wanted to do more at that moment. hell i even recognised one of them as being at a neighbors cookout the week before! it took the cops almost 20 minutes before they finally got there. i yelled to them as they entered the house as to our location ans disposition. after they took the very happy to see them crooks away i was informed that these guys were suspected in a recent string of home breakins. it turned out that a couple of them went around doing lawn maintenance and scooping ut homes that looked open or if they saw the residents leaving.
I am personally glad that i was the one that had come home at that time and not the better half. she carries a glock model 23 .40 loaded with magsafe 72gr glock loads. she would not have called the cops until after she had shot all of these individuals in as short amount of time as possible. this comes from growing up dirt poor and having to fight for everything she has ever gotten in life. she never resorted to crime and has no use for those who do. at 5'1 and 105 lbs soaking wet , she would have been able to execute all four of them and never had to bat an eye at wondering if the DA was going to file charges. As long as their are people determined to steal what you have or to harm you, there is and will remain the need for firearms.

TO DARKWOLF: a 5 second burst of pepperspray on your pizza is the best way to keep your pals from eating it all while you're in the restroom.
to those that propose the use of tasers , these are single shot implements, you have to remove the charge unit from the front of the taser and place a new unit in place to shoot a second target.
yes i am part of the gun culture and am proud of it. i have raised 7 children around guns in the past 20 years and have never had a problem because they all started shooting by the age of 7. even though i work 60-70 hrs a week i still shoot 2-3 thousand rds /month. not as much as i would like but i make do(still irks me that the better half outshoots my with .40's and 9's! oh well just need to train more

[ March 06, 2006, 01:55: Message edited by: martaug ]

 

@Martaug:
Any reasonable human being would have waited for the police to arrive (20 minutes? WTF? Are they riding on snails?) instead of going in the house.

That's just inviting to be shot by the burglars.

 

actually, 20 minutes is pretty quick around here for an incident that isn't a high priority felony like a bank robbery or a child kidnapping. they only sent one car and the only reason there were 2 officers is because it was an fto (field training officer) and a b.l.e.t. newbie. as i had stated, i do have prior experience in law enforcement, so i felt confident in my own abilities to handle the situation.
@ tal - thanks for the message. i forgot to break it up

 

The myth that "better response time = better clearance rate" is a sad but enduring one. It only really matters when that response time can effectively allow them to apprehend a person committing an offence (rare except in more serious crimes against a person, or if they're right outside when it happens) or when material evidence has to be gathered extremely quickly (eg: fingerprints).

The one time I had to call police for assistance, it took them about 4 minutes to get there. It was fairly late on a Sunday night, though.

@ martaug - Having worked in and been robbed at a convenience store, I know at least a few people would have been grateful for the firearms training.

Personally, I think it's better that people have the knowledge but realise that it's only ever a measure of last resort. Thankfully, my life has been such that I've never needed to consider such action. In the case of four-on-one, I understand the threat of its use, but would have tried to avoid it unless I felt there was no other choice. Once you pull out a firearm, you've escalated the situation such that it can only end with submission or violence.

 

the city/county i live in has almost(or maybe more than now ?) a million residents. our police force only numbers a little over 1200 officers. thats about 240 officers / shift, or 1 officer / 4000 people!
if you get any major sports events going on it is even worse. we waited for almost an hour for a police officer to show up for a 3 car wreck without PI's one time. oops,sorry PI stands for personal injury.
in fact you can't get an officer to come out for a car break-in! you just report it to a computer over the phone. got a good handprint on the window? too bad, we can't come out and lift the print. oh well you have insurance right? yeah your rates will go up but we are just to busy to actually try to put somebody in jail! hell, it doesn't do any good as they are normally released before you get the paperwork done.
sorry about the rant but all the pc bull that the police have to deal with now is just f'n crazy!

 

Martaug, that's really, really sad.

I don't know how much policemen Berlin has for its about 3 million inhabitants. But I bet the ratio is much better.

I had to call the police once on a saturday evening because of a noise disturbance. They arrived after 10 minutes. And it was only a minor matter.

 

Owning and being trained in the use of a firearm is as prudent a thing as owning homeowners insurance... in that, you do not plan to ever have your house burn to the ground.

In the exception of rare conditions of proximity and chance being met... a Police Officer's capacity to deter violent crime is directly proportionate to the veracity of the law and the severity of it's punishments... other than that, they are generally very good at taping off crime scenes, collecting evidense, IDing bodies, staffing "tip lines", enforcing "ordinances" malum prohibitum, informing the next of kin, and drawing chalk outlines.

If you are cursed enough to live in a large metropolitan jurisdiction... they may have budget enough for some solid yet basic detective and forensic work.

 

Um, no. My house insurance can't kill anybody (unless you suffer a very nasty paper cut).