What to do, What to do???
- Thread starter mrmel
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Well, not exactly true. The US does have a national "instant check" system to buy any handgun, rifle, or shotgun. And may of the individual States have their own "waiting period" laws.
But most gun crimes are committed by criminals, often repeat offenders. So they don't pay attention to laws anyway - because they cannot legally own/possess any guns.
Where personal ownership of guns is high, gun related crimes are low - and all crimes are lower. Where personal ownership of guns is low or almost completely banned, the crime rates are very high. New York City and Washington DC are glaring examples of HIGH gun crime rates and almost total bans on private ownership of guns.
Repeated interviews with criminals show that if they want to get a gun, they are not worried about breaking any "law". But their biggest worry is not being caught by the police, it is facing an Armed Citizen that they are trying to victimize. Where they know there are no guns, they have few worries. And the statistics show this time after time.
The latest "mangling" of statistics for political purposes involves KIDS and shootings. The numbers they quote sound horrific when they tell us about all the KIDS shot and killed. But they never tell anybody what is included in those statistics. Their definition of "kid" is anyone up to and including 19 years old! Almost all of those shootings are by 16 to 19 year olds. Most all of those are "gang" or "drug" related crimes. But they also include all the suicides, and those "kids" shot by the police and citizens while those "kids" are committing crimes! All lumped into that "kids shot/killed by guns" statistics.
And now Knives are starting to get the same attention/concern over here.
It all reminds me of a bad problem that had developed in Japan about 2 decades ago. The local kid ... gangs ... had started carrying around baseball/softball bats as weapons. It would always look like they were just heading over to the local field to play a game, but that was just their way of having a large weapon on hand and in plain sight. But they had mostly shifted to carrying the Aluminum bats - because they were stronger and less likely to break. Well, the usual knee-jerk politicians and "concerned citizens" jumped in and Japan BANNED the private carry of aluminum bats by anyone who was not a coach/trainer. They could still use them, but only the coach/trainer could transport them to and from the baseball/softball field. And, get this, they were DEMONIZED by being called ... ASSAULT BATS!!!!!!! And it was declared that their private use was only for criminal purposes!
So much for logic. Demonize the "object" instead of the person using it for criminal purposes. That way you don't have to ... judge ... the individual.
Just my humble rambling thoughts to share. Take them as such.
Mikey - yee ol' grumpy blacksmith out in the Hinterlands
p.s. About a decade ago, a small city in Ohio passed a local ordinance REQUIRING that every household keep and maintain a gun in their residence or place of business. Right after it passed, there were the usual wringing of hands and wailing about a predicted huge increase in shooting, deaths, and accidents. But the news media and all the "special interest groups" quickly buried all stories about what really happened. There was a dramatic decrease in ALL crime in that small city. The "criminals" went elsewhere - were it was safer for them to practice their chosen trade. And the city officials have generally not "enforced" that ordinance, so those who did not get/keep a gun in their home for whatever reasons have not been charged. And that stopped all those "hate guns" groups from filing lawsuits about the ordinance.
An Armed person is a Citizen
An Un-Armed person is a Subject (or slave or victim)
Why should the goverment be suprised at the level of knife / gun crime ? we have "allowed people from the four corners of the world to live together in very close proximity often as neibours yet they cannot live together in there own countries of origin or indeed in the rest of the world 
working in one of the racialy most diverse parts of london (Croydon) there are gangs of tamils, somalis , eastern europeans (with sub gangs ) iraqis, iranian, turks , chinese , and various africans all within a 10 mile radius 
working in one of the racialy most diverse parts of london (Croydon) there are gangs of tamils, somalis , eastern europeans (with sub gangs ) iraqis, iranian, turks , chinese , and various africans all within a 10 mile radius Why should the goverment be suprised at the level of knife / gun crime ? we have "allowed people from the four corners of the world to live together in very close proximity often as neibours yet they cannot live together in there own countries of origin or indeed in the rest of the world
Are you seriously suggesting that we should segregate different races?
I think what we should have is more intergration, rather than separating races out and aadding to the feeling that they are all different.
So, do you think it is all the foreigners that are causing knife crime?
I don't think its all racial,but i do feel that a poll should be done to see exactly,what nationalities are commiting these crimes.
Bernie
Bernie
I would beg to differ. I served this country as a member of the armed forces for 13years, the men and women that I served with are something to be very proud of indeed and I would say that if there was one thing great about Britian within your life it would be the armed forces.
They endure poor pay, shabby living conditions that most prisons wouldn't be allowed to have and risk to life and limb. They are treated poorly by the civilian populace whilst they are in the forces and when they leave have virtually no support structure from either the military or civilian authorities and believe me when I say you do need it. I have met a lot of service personnel who have had a nightmare adjusting to the back stabbing, bitching, irresponsible, codeless and honourless ways of civvy street.
Bushcraft4life said:
That is your choice, but when good people get up and run then all they leave behind is a bigger problem for the fewer remaining decent folk to clear up (It's almost like Newton's laws of motion "every action has an opposite and equal reaction", except the reaction is not equal it's logarythmic). This is where people have choices and the choices that they make have effects on others.
The lack of taking responsibility for something and then acting on it are the reasons that we are in the situation we are in. We live in a blame society where we try and blame everyone else for mistakes made. Effectively people lie, they lie on their CV's, they lie to each other and worst of all they lie to themselves, nothing built on a lie can sustain itself indefinitely, eventually it will fail and break down. This is what society is doing now.
Right I am going to get out of this now before I go off on a right one.
Mike, are you aware of other small town gun law ordinance, in places like Kennesaw Cobb County, Georgia, or Greenleaf, Idaho, and the more recent Morton Grove, Ill,
Their gun laws, were also introduced to which makes it mandatory to keep a gun in the house hold. Sadly "Interested parties" have manipulated the statistics to the point where they are just useless, just barely a hairs-breadth from out and out lies.
In surveys carried out including the ones by Kleck (1988) and Schmidt (1987), the domestic burglaries claimed by the local officials were vastly inflated, Usinf the proper date collected and verified by an including the FBI and local police forces, the real figures of domestic burglaries have changed little since the introduction of the laws. They the home-invasion crimes have tracked the population growth/decrease.
In Kennesaw, the total reported burglaries published by the Mayor before the introduction of the law were 45% higher than the real figures, and after the law was changed, the figures he published were more closely matching the number of real crimes reported to the police, showing a newsworthy drop of some 20 burglaries per year.
When in fact the true figures show a slight increase as domestic home were invaded to steal newly purchased handguns (Federal Bureau of Investigation's Uniform Crime statistics reports)
In 1997 study in the New England Journal of Medicine that found that a gun kept at home is 22 times more likely to be used to kill a friend or family member than to stop an intruder.
In a survey carried out by American Journal of Preventive Medicine in San Diego (admittedly by a tiny tiny sample of people who live only in San Diego 525 respondent) it was found that only 27.7% of people who kept a gun at home, actually kept it loaded, 64.4% kept the gun loaded but locked away. Of all the people who owned a gun, only 4.65% had any formal firearms training. According to the survey, people were more willing to have a gun loaded and ready to fire in their cars than they were in their homes
A criminal knows that when he attempts to enter a household, the chances are:
The owners are either not in, or is in and asleep
The owners do not have a gun
The owners if they have a gun will not have it loaded or if it is loaded, it is locked away.
The owners does have not got a clue how to use the gun, or even if they know which way to point the weapon they are not sufficiently trained
If the owner is not trained, there is a very good chance that the criminal will quickly gain control over that weapon and use it against the owner and or their family, and gain a valuable weapon and ammunition.
If the owner is untrained in a firearm use, then the chances are that they will be unable to shoot and hit the criminal before they are either disarmed or killed.
Criminals generally have more experience in handguns than the person they are robbing. They will understand the situation and they will be awake and fully prepared. Even with a gun in your hand the unarmed or knife wielding criminal holds all the cards. Yes even a knife Im sure you have heard of ten pace rule, the rule states that in the time it takes for a fully awake and trained person to draw a hand gun, cock it, aim it, a man with a knife would have closed the distance and killed the gun owner. Now if you have a person who is familiar with using a knife, even in an unfamiliar living room he could close the distance and disarm you, long before you could snap off two rounds.
A hand gun in the home will not keep you safe, it will just make you feel safer than you are.
A shameless plug for another post
Anyone agreeing with Leon's thoughts on the treatment of our military may want to help out a little, details here...
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32250
A shameless plug for another post
Anyone agreeing with Leon's thoughts on the treatment of our military may want to help out a little, details here...
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32250
Actually mate, I hadn't seen that one, but thanks for posting the link. My comments are only my opinions and they are based on my personal experience.
They are also not posted to target anyone in particular, so Jamie if your reading this I am not picking on you as I know that this is a belief held by many people i,e; "Get the hell outta here as soon as possible".
I agree 100% with what Leons saying about our armed forces,after leaving they are not looked after at all,when thev'e lived in a family environment,for all those years to adapt to civvie street is extremely hard with all the lies and deciet,thats why many poor souls end up alcoholics and homeless as there's no help for them.
Bernie
Bernie
You may well beg to differ, but your begging to differ on something totally different to what i was implying.
I am well aware that the Armed forces in this country is something to be proud of, my Grandfather was in the SAS and serving in the Army has a long history in my family, i was in the cadets for 4 years myself with a view to joining the REME and i still may do so!!
However, as i said, that was not what i was implying, i was not referring to things that i am proud of or should be proud of or things that are indeed great in Britain, i was referring to the state this country has been in in my lifetime.
I am proud of my country, but i am not proud of what it is becoming!!
And just for your info, any person serving or who has indeed served will always have my utmost respect and loyalty and will never ever be treated poorly by myself or any members of my family, we all agree the state of the support structure is in a shambles and that criminals, get treated better than people who have laid down their lives for this country.
I am not running away, i am leaving because if i am honest i believe i can provide a better life for myself somewhere else.
I agree with everything you say, but as is obvious, the majority of people in this country either don't want change or don't give a damn, and are quite happy to walk around like everything is fine and then even the people that do want change have no power to do so.
I am 18, and i have grown up in South East London, honestly, can you blame me for wanting to leave?
Lots of people leave family enviroments and don't become alcoholics or homeless, not just soldiers. So it really is the "civvie's" fault because we lie and deciet each other.
I can't really understand why people believe we should give extra money in the form of charity to armed forces, they get paid for thier job, what I think really are great are the lifeboats, mountain rescue teams, people volunteering, and risking thier lifes in dangerous conditions.
Plenty of folk do dangerous jobs, but only the armed forces seem to make people think they should give them more money.
I would be very interested to find if anyone has the percentage of crime commited by ex military guys compaired to non military.
I wonder sometimes if maybe the army attracts a higher proportion of pyschopaths than average. Not that I'm suggesting you all are.
The pay is pretty poor actually, however there can be no argument that Mountain Rescue, voluntary organizations etc. also deserve our support.
This excerpt from a recent article in 'The Times' may open a few eyes, a Colonel from 3 Para talks about going to see some of his chaps in hospital in the UK...
"The task of motivating his troops became difficult for him after he visited wounded men in Selly Oak hospital, Birmingham, while home on leave. “I was shocked to my core by what I saw,” he said. “I’d expected to see a military ward with military staff and patients, but instead they were mixed with all sorts of civilian patients, young paras next to 80-year-old geriatric women.”
One para sergeant major had been shot through the arm leaving it shattered in 14 places. When Tootal asked how he was, he replied: “Pretty ****, sir.”
“He motioned to a civilian patient next to him who couldn’t control his bowels, he was urinating and defecating, no one was clearing it up,” said Tootal. “It got so bad my warrant officer would get out of bed and clean it up with his hands.” A para with a damaged back had been waiting days for a CT scan, and nobody had told him that the machine was broken. Another soldier whose lower leg had been amputated was left, unattended, in agony.
Tootal was horrified. “It was those stories that I had to carry back to theatre with me, knowing I was about to lead people back into combat. It filled me with foreboding every time we flew on a helicopter, thinking if one of my guys gets hit they’re going to go back to that.”
I'm sure that there are a few 'bad eggs' however I doubt that a predilection for psychopathic behavior would be a useful trait in a soldier.
I think you will find that the army screens out the pyschopaths who apply to join. they end up as Traffic wardens and burger king managers.
"What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof"
The armed forces themselves don't ask for charity from people, it is normally people who have served and experienced and seen the conditions that servicemen and women endure who are now civilians that start charities.
The reason you can't understand it is because you have never been there.
I like the fact that you mention mountain rescue teams, the RAF have a few, the army have a few and many serving servicemen and women have been involved over the years.
I have personally raised money for charities (RNLI being one) whilst I was in the forces, whether you like them or not the armed forces do a lot for charity.
Within the forces everyone that I served with used to pay into SSAFA who help those who need it, we never pushed it down peoples throat.
fishy1 said:
When you think that members of the armed forces get paid less than a teacher when they have to be able to teach and instruct, less than a nurse when they have to be able to work as medics, less than a policeman when they have to carry out policing actions and then you add to that the fact that you will probably be doing these jobs either whilst under fire or under threat of fire I think they deserve a bit more in their wage packet. There are dangerous jobs (trawlermen for one) where people are at great risk and they deserve respect for those jobs, but it is slightly different going out knowing that someone is lineing up a rifle sight on you or that your whole world could change today because you could lose your life or limbs to a roadside bomb.
Would you step outside your workplace knowing that someone is pointing a rifle at you intending to blow your head off? It takes guts to do it, to do it day in and day out has a very real effect on a person that will change the rest of your life.
fishy1 said:
Is this to say that you think that most ex military turn to crime, most ex military that I know off don't, infact you'll find that there are a lot of ex military personnel that work either in law enforcement, the fire service, as paramedics, the prison service and jobs which are classed as services to the public.
fishy1 said:
Very very unlikely, a psycopath is unpredictable and the last person that you want in the world next to you is someone that you won't be able to depend upon when the mire hits the fan. Preferably you would want someone that will remain calm, be able to think quickly on their feet, can shoot and is fit enough to maintain that as long as is neccesary. The military selection process is designed to pick out people who could be psychotic or psycopathic and then get rid of them, that's inclusive of military training.
Bushcraft4life this I will direct at you, make sure to read the bottom part of it.
leon-1 said:
Sorry Leon, did not mean to go off on one........
I didn't see that post until after i posted my comment in response, i assumed yours was directed at me just a bit.
I didn't see that post until after i posted my comment in response, i assumed yours was directed at me just a bit.
No problems mate, the reason I posted it was reading through the original post it looked like it was directed at you and that was not what I meant to do.
The main point that I was really trying to get across was that "Great Britain" was actually built on the blood and efforts of servicemen and women in many ways, that spirit that was abiding in those people then still abides in those serving today.
And it was a good point well made, even if my post did not seem to agree with you
EDIT* think i need to go to bed, i am posting things even i don't understand, hopefully you will get what i meant in the above sentence Leon
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