American crime vs English crime: not what you thought

Al_Havemann

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

Absolutely correct!.

While living in London several years ago on assignment, I was roundly bounced about by three young thugs in a subway early one morning - real wise asses with colored Mohawk haircuts wanting money. I took it for a few minutes then elbowed one on the forehead and kicked another in the Balls, the third took off as the conductor showed up and called the cops.

The cop didn't say a word to the kids but questioned me aggressively about my need to defend myself, even saying that perhaps I should have forked over a few quid to avoid the confrontation and indicated that I was probably the cause of the fracas. Only my American citizenship prevented my being charged with aggressive behavior and fined.

The cop let the kids go without a word.

There are no victim rights in England, and no right to defend yourself. This is the ultimate result of liberal court judges having their way. If you successfully defend yourself in the US against attack, your usually safe from prosecution. In England, a successful defense means you need to split quickly, you are now a criminal.

Al
 

Mednanu

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Morality, or Mutually Assured Destruction - those are the only two factors that tend to restrain people from committing otherwise nefarious and heinous acts.

- If one is morally responsible and accountable, no gun or defense is needed against them, as they will police themselves.
- If one is morally devoid, only the thought of self destruction ( due to one's built in survival instinct ) restrains their actions - without the possibility/probability of harm coming to them, their actions will go unchecked and will no doubt lead to a destructive end for others.
- If one is morally devoid AND has no regard for themselves or their own destruction........shoot em now, before it gets out of hand.
 

brightnorm

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

Al,

What a horror story, like something out of Kafka! Black is white and white is black; it's even worse than I imagined.

Brightnorm
 

brightnorm

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[ QUOTE ]
Mednanu said:
Morality, or Mutually Assured Destruction - those are the only two factors that tend to restrain people from committing otherwise nefarious and heinous acts...

[/ QUOTE ]

That's a very good succinct way of putting it.

BN
 

nisshin

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What is the thinking on Japan, which has twice the population of the U.K., but half the gun-related murder rate?
 

sideshowandy

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i live and work in London - aside from general criminal pass times (robbing banks, old ladies etc) there are specific areas where gun crime is a major issue.

these tend to be centred on black (or should i be politically correct and call then afro-carib? actually, i'll be accurate and simply call them Jamaican gangs) and sri lankan drugs gangs where extreme violence is shown within each group. it is quite common for there to be murders - occasionally innocent passers-by do get caught up in this but on the whole they are normally just killing each other. which is a good thing.

pathetically, whenever there is a murder/funeral the families are shown in the media defending their recently departed loved one - he was such a nice boy, wouldn't hurt a fly /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif

incidentally, the sri lankans also use swords /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon15.gif just down the road from my local supermarket one guy earlier this year met his maker thanks to a samurai sword during a gang fight on the high street!

and we do have specific police units to tackle this problem but i suspect that the bad guys can get hold of guns more easily than the police themselves /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon23.gif
 

Ross

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An interesting read Norm, I am both a UK citizen and a police officer. I do not discuss most of my views at work for fear of seeming 'right wing' but I agree wholeheartedly with the right of citizens to defend themselves. Anyone breaking into my home would receive a sound kicking.
 

turbodog

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[ QUOTE ]
Ross said:
An interesting read Norm, I am both a UK citizen and a police officer. I do not discuss most of my views at work for fear of seeming 'right wing' but I agree wholeheartedly with the right of citizens to defend themselves. Anyone breaking into my home would receive a sound kicking.

[/ QUOTE ]

Not to give you a hard time, but maybe you have unwittingly hit the nail on the head here. Most US officers would have said that the burglar would have received a sound killing.
 

Al_Havemann

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

It wasn't really horrible, just something that needed to be delt with quickly before it got out of hand. I was really pissed about being rebuked for defending myself - I steamed over it all day.

Don't get me wrong, I like Brits, I've worked with them a lot, gone pub crawling with them many times and their normally as friendly and mild mannered a people as you'd care to meet (although they have this strange sense of humor at times), but they have this thing about disarming everything in sight over there that's stupid, I swear they'd pull the teeth from every dog if they could. They have a long history of this and with every step it gets worse.

I've spent a lot of time in England, and to this day I don't simply don't understand why they insist on surrendering most of their freedoms voluntarily. Although, Brits do have a habit of sticking with a method, no matter how wrong or self defeating it has been shown to be, out of shear stubbornness or something. It's just a blind spot they have, I guess <shrug>.

Too often these days I see similar happenings with US court judges as well. Something we all need to watch carefully because these liberal judges will take away every freedom they can if given enough leeway. These judges place themselves above the law they swore to defend and administer. Recently, here in NY a judge had a wanted criminal escorted out the side door of her court room to avoid arrest - and not her first infraction either - in complete defiance of every legal precept, just because she didn't want an arrest to occur in her courtroom, a courtroom which is public property. They will take every opportunity to re-write the constitution as they see fit, given the opportunity.

I've often been of the opinion that this would be a Very Polite nation, if gun competence were required and everyone carried a .45 in plain sight.

"A defenseless people are a conquered people" (Attila the Hun on the Eurasian steppes)

Al
 

ErickThakrar

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

Heinlein once said "An armed society is a polite society."

He couldn't have been more right.

Like it was pointed out above, more and more a similar attitude is rearing it's ugly head here in the US. People going to jail for selfdefense. Happens all the time. Even in the US.
 

PeterW

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

A few isolated incidents of nutters going on shooting sprees with children is what got us the worlds strictest gun laws..... even though >>>90% of gun crime is/was with UNlicensed guns. The previously mentioned drug turf wars are a major factor as well as guns as percieved status symbols. We also have a problem with unprovoked knife attacks too. I think that main problem is the 'breakdown of the family' and a general lack of respect for anyone/thing in the youth of today. It would be nice is no-one carried any weapons as no-one would have need to use them. Carrying a weapon assumes that you will need to use it which creates fear which potentially futhers the problem.

Sometimes I think we may be losing some of the 'Great' in Great Britian.

Cheers

PEterW
 

cheesehead

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

This thread is ridiculous, you are much less likely to get killed in London. I'd much rather get held up at knife point, than gunpoint.
 

PlayboyJoeShmoe

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

I don't know about England.

But over here, it used to be "Give me your wallet or I'll shoot you"

Now by and large it's POW! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/xyxgun.gif and then they take what they want.

I'd rather not be shot OR stabbed!!!

Over here some of us have SOME chance of shooting back. I KNOW Brits don't have that luxury!!!
 

KC2IXE

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

[ QUOTE ]
cheesehead said:
This thread is ridiculous, you are much less likely to get killed in London. ...snip...

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you really SURE about that? London had 190 reported murders from April 2001 - April 2002. NYC had 218 last year. London's population is 7.2 Million, NYCs is 8.0

Sounds about even

Of course you ARE 6x more likely to be mugged in London
 

cheesehead

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

Where did you get your numbers? Certainly that would open up my eyes. Right now, I'm skeptical. In Chicago, we'd typically have 20-30 murders a month with a pop of about 3 million, and you could read that off any paper. Even in the original Brightnorm referenced article they very carefully NEVER mention actual numbers and they begin by saying that the murder and rapes are higher here in the states.
 

Phil_B

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

And the US has 11000 gunshot deaths every year,we have about 30.The US population is only 5 times ours.
Hell,the US wins again... /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon6.gif
 

cheesehead

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

Where did you get your numbers? Certainly that would open up my eyes. Right now, I'm skeptical (well, actually dumbfounded with the arguments made in this thread). In Chicago, we'd typically have 20-30 murders a month with a pop of about 3 million, and you could read that off any paper. Even in the original Brightnorm referenced article they very carefully NEVER mention actual numbers and they begin by saying that the murder and rapes are higher here in the states.

BBC as a source
 

tkl

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

Keep it in perspective, majority of shootings are low lifes, gang bangers and drug dealers/addicts. Good riddance.
 

brightnorm

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Re: American crime vs English crime: not what you

[ QUOTE ]
cheesehead said:
This thread is ridiculous, you are much less likely to get killed in London. I'd much rather get held up at knife point, than gunpoint.

[/ QUOTE ]

The issue was not murder, but violent crime in general:

"...Gun crime is just part of an increasingly lawless environment. From 1991 to 1995, crimes against the person in England's inner cities increased 91 percent. And in the four years from 1997 to 2001, the rate of violent crime more than doubled. Your chances of being mugged in London are now six times greater than in New York. England's rates of assault, robbery, and burglary are far higher than America's, and 53 percent of English burglaries occur while occupants are at home, compared with 13 percent in the U.S., where burglars admit to fearing armed homeowners more than the police. In a United Nations study of crime in 18 developed nations published in July, England and Wales led the Western world's crime league, with nearly 55 crimes per 100 people..."

Brightnorm
 
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