D.C. a little safer (I hope).

[Pangloss62]

Shod foot.

That whole exchange was fucked. I don't get the "joke" about "shot" vs. "shod."

I guess what I was saying is that many times a gun is less effective than just kicking the fucker in the nads with your DMs.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by Pangloss62

I guess what I was saying is that many times a gun is less effective than just kicking the fucker in the nads with your DMs.

Who wants to get that close? And I know one or two nasty counters to a crotch kick.

But if you're not reliably much more effective with your sidearm than with your shoes, definately you shouldn't carry.

Or your car.

[DanaC]

I heard a statistic that suggests that the person most likely to end up shot is the one who brought the gun to the fight .

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by DanaC

I heard a statistic that suggests that the person most likely to end up shot is the one who brought the gun to the fight .

Anti-gun people love statistics. Most of them are either wrong or badly put together.

For example such a number would be easy to phony up if you counted police officers in weapons retention incidents...who obviously did "bring the gun to the fight". (It's sad, but police officers can be the absolute worst at firearms skill and safety. Many of them practice concientiously and observe all the safety rules...and some do not, perhaps because they consider themselves above laws and rules--witness the DEA undercover in the link I posted earlier.)

The famous "more likely to shoot someone in your own household" was created by counting suicides as "someone in your own household".

Gun Facts is a fantastic source of information. For example, appropos of what you "heard somewhere", on page 46 we read:

Originally Posted by Gun Facts

Myth: You are more likely to be injured or killed using a gun for self-defense

Fact: You are far more likely to survive a violent assault if you defend yourself with a gun. In episodes where a robbery victim was injured, the injury/defense rates were:
Resisting with a gun 6%
Did nothing at all 25%
Resisted with a knife 40%
Non-violent resistance 45%

These numbers are from the UK Home Office, of all places...perhaps they were pushing an anti-knife law at the time. :-)

[DanaC]

Anti knife laws? NO! No we wont let you take our knives!

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by DanaC

Anti knife laws? NO! No we wont let you take our knives!

Already happened, no? After some of the thugs switched to knives because they were cheaper and they could be sure the law-abiding wouldn't be better armed?

http://www.cellar.org/showpost.php?p...9&postcount=33 was the poster in Swansea.

Followed by proposals to make kitchen knives with sharp points illegal, because they have "no legitimate use". And let's not have any of you out there get caught with battlleaxes, broadswords, maces or morningstars, since there's apparently such a rising tide of assaults with medivial weaponry.

Once the Nanny State gets started, it's hard to get them to stop...all for such a good cause, don't cha know...

[Griff]

Being 1/4 Scot, Lil' Pete is pretty dissappointed in her "cousins". She just started saber lessons btw (she was strictly foil her first couple years), I can't believe how unconcerned she is with the bruises etc...

[DanaC]

*grins* yes I know they've clamped down. I was just being facetious:P Forgive me, it's a flaw.

since there's apparently such a rising tide of assaults with medivial weaponry.

Once the Nanny State gets started, it's hard to get them to stop...all for such a good cause, don't cha know...

Two points:
1) Yes we are a bunch of tights-wearing, sherrif-whooping, arrow-firing, monarch-crowning medieavalists at heart :P Are you surprised?

2) Damn that nanny state, and it's unreasonable ban on broadswords and axe-wielding. 'Cause y'know maces don't kill people, people kill people......with maces.

We have had a couple of memorable samurai sword/decorative battle-axe/broad sword type killins around these parts in recent years.

[wolf]

You've also jailed homeowners for defending themselves against violent repeat offenders ... and give the offenders a walk on the crimes they were committing at the time for giving evidence against the homeowner. There is something majorly fucked in your system of justice.

[DanaC]

You've also jailed homeowners for defending themselves against violent repeat offenders ..

Yes, i think i know the case you are referring to. A farmer was jailed for shooting a teenaged burglar in the back as he ran away. I do not believe that anyone has the right to kill a child ( he was 15) in order to defend their stuff. To defend their life? yes. To defend their cd player? nope.

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by DanaC

I do not believe that anyone has the right to kill a child ( he was 15) in order to defend their stuff.

Fred Barras was 16, but his accomplice was Brendon Fearon, a 29-yo violent career criminal, who was apparently *not* running away, and then sued for damages. I don't think it reasonable that a farmer, in a remote farmhouse, burgled many times in the past, confronting two criminals late at night in the dark in his own home should be required to get proof of age of all present before acting to defend himself.

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

At his trial, Martin claimed that on the night of August 20, 1999, he was awakened by sounds in his home. He took his shotgun and came downstairs, he claimed, to be confronted by a torch being shone in his face. A 29 year old man, Brendon Fearon, and an accomplice of 16, Fred Barras, were stealing from the house. Martin fired three shots in the dark and in doing so killed the youth, and injured the older man.

Fearson died in the comission of a felony...and the UK held the victim of the felony responsible, rather than the "adult" man who led him into that peril.

[DanaC]

That may have been what he 'claimed' happened. But during the trial it became apparent that the shooting occured as the burglars were leaving his property. He fired as they were running down the stairs. Shooting someone in the back as they run away is not defence.

[footfootfoot]

Originally Posted by DanaC

*grins* yes I know they've clamped down. I was just being facetious:P Forgive me, it's a flaw.

I was just being facetious, it's the law.

(tagline?)

[MaggieL]

Originally Posted by DanaC

That may have been what he 'claimed' happened. But during the trial it became apparent that the shooting occured as the burglars were leaving his property. He fired as they were running down the stairs. Shooting someone in the back as they run away is not defence.

Well, it's truly noble that England is being kept safe for burglars.

Strikes me it grows out of that "wealth of the nation" philosophy..."You have no right to be safe in your home with your property, it's part the 'wealth of the nation' and your claim on it is so weak that these poor unfortunate criminals have a right to walk off with anything they can make it out the door with, and your only recourse being to call the constables who tried to disarm you and have been ignoring your complaints."

Our laws are different, and I prefer it that way.

[footfootfoot]

Ahhh, I'm on the fence re: shooting felons in the back. I suppose he did not do his due diligence, i.e. walk up to them and ask their ages before properly shooting them in the front. He's a frigging farmer. he doesn't have a backhoe on his tractor? Doesn't he keep pigs?

He should go to jail for being sloppy and unimaginative. He wanted to get caught.