Gun Crime UK

[Sim G]

I had to attend my force's training college a few weeks ago, where they undertake Probationary Officer training. In a few months, they'll be answering the calls. 19 year old, slips of girls, earning barely more than minimum wage...

[Chuck]

Bet that's doing your nut in Sim. Stay safe.

And here's another wee story that for some reason is getting publicity - good guy with a gun steps in!


Husband 'shoots his estranged wife and her new boyfriend dead in the parking lot of an Oklahoma Walmart before turning the gun on himself when confronted with an armed bystander'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... lmart.html

Just waiting for some twerp to comment on the source!

[breacher]

I had to attend my force's training college a few weeks ago, where they undertake Probationary Officer training. In a few months, they'll be answering the calls. 19 year old, slips of girls, earning barely more than minimum wage...

I dont know what its like now ( I have been out over 10 years ) but I doubt it has git better !

[ordnance]

We're told that several of our esteemed Members of Parliament do have authority to carry a firearm for self defence. Their lives are worth more than ours you see.

And plenty here, including some who served time for terrorist offences terrorists.

[Pippin89]

You have missed the point. No body died in your friends incident. Granted given other circumstances he could have done but the chances are remote. Add guns to the equation and the chances get exponentially larger! In the simple equation of life vs death guns do not help...

The chances are remote?
Well, OK then. Please explain why you believe it's right to allow some thug the opportunity to find out how remote the chances are of killing / causing life changing damage to their victim without said victim having the right to decline that opportunity with a viable means of defence.

I think I may have recounted elsewhere how my slip of a thing ex-wife shot an intruder in her home one evening (Ohio). He didn't die but he certainly stopped being a threat.

A friend of hers was not so lucky. A few years earlier one of her friends was abducted (along with her child) taken for a harrowing ride before being tortured and then killed. The child was dumped at a gas station. It was this incident that encouraged her and her friends to take up concealed carry permits. It laid the foundation for her later experience and her not getting / raped / assaulted / murdered whatever the creep had a mind to do.

I had a work colleague who was mugged at knifepoint in Oxford (some years ago now).
His wallet was taken which contained about £60 in notes and all his credit cards. There were some bits and bobs with his name and address in there too - usual wallet junk.
Bit of a shame as he had recently been made redundant so any loss was a big loss to a temp worker.
The credit cards were used almost immediately.
The trickle down consequences of having his identity appropriated and worrying about his house being broken into plagued him for some months. He felt that having meekly handed over his wallet marked him out for a sequel in his own home. Not an unreasonable feeling perhaps.

I suppose you'd consider that a win. At least nobody died this time.

However, I view it as a win for the criminal. He made a tidy haul for a few minutes enterprise. It proved he had a viable means of making money. And there were no consequences. I expect he did it again and again and again - along with whatever spin-off criminality he boosted his earnings with.
Who is to say whether he escalated to actual violence if someone later had the temerity to refuse his demands?

It left my friend with, I suppose, what might be called PTSD for quite some time. And a number of financial headaches. And a lot of bother cancelling cards and bills he accrued in his name.
Nobody was caught. Also a terrible sense of being something less than a man took hold of him. Being helpless and unable to prevent being at the mercy of some parasite. Churning over the 'what if I had ...?'
Knowing the bloke was still out there somewhere in the same city (Oxford) worried hm too. What if he met him again? It became quite debilitating.

You obviously don't value a human life as highly as I do! Your "slip of a thing ex wife" was either lucky or skilled enough that she got off the first shot and that it was enough to stop any return fire. And the guy she shot was lucky to keep his life!

And I'm sorry but PTSD is a terrible thing to go through! But it is not as bad as death..... We have therapy and other solutions for PTSD. There is no cure for death.

If you want to make guns available for people to protect themselves, and in doing so increase the chances that the person they are protecting themselves from also have guns, then you are down to a 50/50 chance that you are better or more lucky than the criminal when it comes to the act. If both sides have a gun then the chances of someone dying exponentially increases. The only question is who it will be.....

So how about changing the tune.... What about less lethal methods of stopping a criminal? Taser, pepper spray, rubber bullets etc? They could be enough to disable a criminal for long enough to get safely away, and even long enough for police to turn up, without leaving a body behind.... Seems like a more acceptable resolution to me!

[Sim G]

You obviously don't value a human life as highly as I do! Your "slip of a thing ex wife" was either lucky or skilled enough that she got off the first shot and that it was enough to stop any return fire. And the guy she shot was lucky to keep his life!

And I'm sorry but PTSD is a terrible thing to go through! But it is not as bad as death..... We have therapy and other solutions for PTSD. There is no cure for death.

If you want to make guns available for people to protect themselves, and in doing so increase the chances that the person they are protecting themselves from also have guns, then you are down to a 50/50 chance that you are better or more lucky than the criminal when it comes to the act. If both sides have a gun then the chances of someone dying exponentially increases. The only question is who it will be.....

So how about changing the tune.... What about less lethal methods of stopping a criminal? Taser, pepper spray, rubber bullets etc? They could be enough to disable a criminal for long enough to get safely away, and even long enough for police to turn up, without leaving a body behind.... Seems like a more acceptable resolution to me!

Firstly and unequivocally, it is exactly why we support a position of being able to use arms defensively because we do value life! Attempting to gain some kind of moral superiority that anyone doesn't, just confirms that you have understood next to nothing of what has been written in this latest thread.

Likewise, very early on it was stated that this whole argument was not about "guns". Even though a pistol is by far the best defensive tool available, the concept of "arms for defence" is a myriad that includes, but not restricted to "less than lethal". It's the choice to "arm" oneself that is the crux, not the individual tool of choice.

[Mattnall]

- good guy with a gun steps in!

I think the reason this is getting more time in the news is the fact that someone had access to a firearm (legally?) and killed two innocent people, the killer most likely wouldn't have gone on to kill again as shown by his suicide as soon as confronted. The 'good guy' only stopped him getting away, didn't prevent the tragedy so is only a footnote to the story.

[Christel]

100% in favour of the right to bear arms.

Frankly I could not care a hoot about the criminal who is pointing a gun at me, doesn't deserve to see the end of the day.

[Pippin89]

100% in favour of the right to bear arms.

Frankly I could not care a hoot about the criminal who is pointing a gun at me, doesn't deserve to see the end of the day.

Christel... do you not think that if a criminal is pointing a gun at you, you have more chance of being shot if you pull out your own gun??

[Pippin89]

You obviously don't value a human life as highly as I do! Your "slip of a thing ex wife" was either lucky or skilled enough that she got off the first shot and that it was enough to stop any return fire. And the guy she shot was lucky to keep his life!

And I'm sorry but PTSD is a terrible thing to go through! But it is not as bad as death..... We have therapy and other solutions for PTSD. There is no cure for death.

If you want to make guns available for people to protect themselves, and in doing so increase the chances that the person they are protecting themselves from also have guns, then you are down to a 50/50 chance that you are better or more lucky than the criminal when it comes to the act. If both sides have a gun then the chances of someone dying exponentially increases. The only question is who it will be.....

So how about changing the tune.... What about less lethal methods of stopping a criminal? Taser, pepper spray, rubber bullets etc? They could be enough to disable a criminal for long enough to get safely away, and even long enough for police to turn up, without leaving a body behind.... Seems like a more acceptable resolution to me!

Firstly and unequivocally, it is exactly why we support a position of being able to use arms defensively because we do value life! Attempting to gain some kind of moral superiority that anyone doesn't, just confirms that you have understood next to nothing of what has been written in this latest thread.

Likewise, very early on it was stated that this whole argument was not about "guns". Even though a pistol is by far the best defensive tool available, the concept of "arms for defence" is a myriad that includes, but not restricted to "less than lethal". It's the choice to "arm" oneself that is the crux, not the individual tool of choice.

I understand it perfectly... But you made it quite clear that a dead body was a better outcome to you than PTSD was... as long as the body is on the right side of the confrontation! My point is that NO dead bodies is the best outcome no matter what side they come from, and that this outcome is far more likely if neither side has a gun and still more likely if only one side does!