Some food for thought...

[BlackShanglan]

No you don't. You want a gnu.

http://www.uakron.edu/ogc/images/gnu.jpg

Be still mine heart.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

So what if that hungry 17 yr old is going to rape and kill you or your wife, kids, dog, cat, etc. when he's done rifling your wallet? How do you know?

You hear a noise in the middle of the night and go to investigate. You flip on the the sitting room light to find a skinny teenager robbing you blind. A teenager that may well be armed himself and the fact that you just caught and startled him may be enough for him to risk shooting you so that he can escape.

You can argue that his life is as valuable as yours. And you can risk dying by his hand to prove it. As for me, my life and the lives of my loved ones is more valuable than anyones. Threaten them and you risk losing yours. I am simply not willing to risk my life to find out out if this punk is desperate enough to shoot me.

If he values his own life he shouldn't be breaking into someones home. For ANY reason.

There are children raised in poverty that do make it out and it's not rare. I dare say it's not even difficult. The hardest part of it is that they have to WANT to. They have to want to improve their lives enough to stay in school and actually learn something. That is the way out of the ghetto. Not breaking into my home and stealing what I worked hard to obtain. I don't care how you slice it, when anyone breaks into my home with intentions less than legal he deserves what he gets.

Dran, Dran, Dran, ambiguous moral situations like that is why I installed an electrified floor, the various pitfalls, and the knockout gas turrets. If they make it past, they learn I'm poorer than they are and have a sick sense of humour.

 

[mismused]

Doctors:
(A) The number of physicians in the U.S. is 700,000.

(B) Accidental deaths caused by physicians per year are 120,000.

(C) Accidental deaths per physician is 0.171.

Statistics courtesy of U.S. Dept. of Health Human Services.



Guns:

(A) The number of gun owners in the U.S. is 80,000,000. Yes, that is 80 million.

(B) The number of accidental gun deaths per year, all age groups, is 1,500.

(C) The number of accidental deaths per gun owner is 0.0000188.



Conclusion:

Statistically, doctors are approximately 9,000 times more dangerous than gun owners.



What To Do:

(A) Remember: "Guns don't kill people, doctors do."

(B) Worry: Not everyone has a gun, but almost everyone has at least one doctor.

(C) Please alert your friends to this alarming threat. We must ban doctors before this gets completely out of hand.

(Out of concern for the public at large, the statistics on lawyers are withheld for fear the shock would cause people to panic and seek medical attention.)

========================================

Fantastic, Dran. Made me grin (wryly).

 

[Liar]

I have to say I agree with you wholeheartedly, RG.

The problem is that no one seems to want want to see the truth of the matter. Getting rid of guns will not get rid of crime. Getting rid of the criminals is another story.

No, I agree with that. I'm just against the whole "Guns are harmless" chorus. Because they're not. They are tools for violence. I don't dig on violence. It messes with my groove.

But the liberals would rather stand up and fight for the rights of those criminals than their victims.

It's just not right.

Did I ever say that? I just don't think the opposite, undeniable right to shoot them dead ("Them" by the way? As if they weren't people too.) at the suspicion of a crime/threat is right either.

Law abiding, responsible people should educate themselves to better judge situations like that, so that the use of unnessecary force in minimised. Sadly, the "my house, my gun, my rules" mentality very seldom coexist with that.

#L

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

Sorry. Two names: Thomas Hamilton, Horrett Campbell. Same motive, same target, same opportunity. Hamilton: 16 dead. Campbell: 0 dead.

Hamilton: firearms
Campbell: machete

Yes, people kill people, but they do it a great deal more efficiently with guns. That's why we give them to our soldiers, as opposed to sending them into battle with straightened paper clips.

But what if Campbell had been a Triad? Then he might have known the secret skills of the machete.

 

[BlackShanglan]

Personally, it's not the accidental deaths that really concern me.

 

[cloudy]

Sorry. Two names: Thomas Hamilton, Horrett Campbell. Same motive, same target, same opportunity. Hamilton: 16 dead. Campbell: 0 dead.

Hamilton: firearms
Campbell: machete

Yes, people kill people, but they do it a great deal more efficiently with guns. That's why we give them to our soldiers, as opposed to sending them into battle with straightened paper clips.

People, people, people....

Humans are violent. If it weren't guns, it would be something else. As I've always said, the propensity for violence lives in us, not in the tools we use to perpetuate it.

 

[angelicminx]

Take a gun, your choice of what type, brand, model, etc., load it and lay it on a table. Now how long will it be before that gun kills someone of it's own volition?

I do love the way you think darlin'!

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

People, people, people....

Humans are violent. If it weren't guns, it would be something else. As I've always said, the propensity for violence lives in us, not in the tools we use to perpetuate it.

Paraphrased from a Dilbert cartoon:

DOGBERT: I wish nobody in the world was violent.
DILBERT: What a nice wish.
DOGBERT: (thought bubble) Cause if no one else was violent, I could take over the entire planet with a fork.

 

[Op_Cit]

Sorry. Two names: Thomas Hamilton, Horrett Campbell. Same motive, same target, same opportunity. Hamilton: 16 dead. Campbell: 0 dead.

Hamilton: firearms
Campbell: machete

Sounds like another case of one poorly trained in the use of the machete. Dammit! When will people learn to get proper training before using a weapon!

(OK, somebody quick put the name of one of the pilots that hit WTC. Don't want this tennis volley to end.)

 

[Guest]

Dran, Dran, Dran, ambiguous moral situations like that is why I installed an electrified floor, the various pitfalls, and the knockout gas turrets. If they make it past, they learn I'm poorer than they are and have a sick sense of humour.

Good thinkin'.

Unfortunatly, I'm also a forgetful old bastard and I'd no doubt forget all my booby traps and spring them on myself.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

Good thinkin'.

Unfortunatly, I'm also a forgetful old bastard and I'd no doubt forget all my booby traps and spring them on myself.

Sigh, how will you ever hope to be an Evil Genius with sloppy trap management like that? I bet you even forget to monologue.

 

[yui]

But what if Campbell had been a Triad? Then he might have known the secret skills of the machete.

I was just about to say this, Luc.

 

[Liar]

There are children raised in poverty that do make it out and it's not rare. I dare say it's not even difficult. The hardest part of it is that they have to WANT to. They have to want to improve their lives enough to stay in school and actually learn something. That is the way out of the ghetto. Not breaking into my home and stealing what I worked hard to obtain. I don't care how you slice it, when anyone breaks into my home with intentions less than legal he deserves what he gets.

You make it look like a choice, and an easy one. If it was an easy one in certain areas of society to stay away from crime and work one's way out of poverty, then there would not be any crime. People don't break into houses for the fuck of it. They do it out of desperation.

I can think of alot of situations that might force someone to trespass. None would have to do with this person being evil and worthy of a bullet in the face. To me, it's a scary place some must live in, to demonize their surroundings like that.

But I guess I won't reach through with my world wiew anymore than you reach through with yours to mine. So if it's all the same to you, I think I'ne made mine as clear as I can, and that we can agree to disagree. I just hope I get to stay a happy, healthy middle class man the rest of my life, so that I don't get into a siuation that would makes those worlds collide.

pax,
#L

 

[Guest]

Sigh, how will you ever hope to be an Evil Genius with sloppy trap management like that? I bet you even forget to monologue.

I never monologue. You will never hear me ramble on about my great plan on the assuption that you are about to die and will never be able to foil my plans. Even if you ask, "Before you kill, me will you at least tell me what this is all about?" I'll just say "Nope." And shoot you.

As for the traps, even the most clever trap can be spotted and therefore circumvented. And if the good spy sees it and gets away, I have a more serious problem. No, I say let him get deep into my lair, then I'll kill him and dispose of his body in the incinerator. That way I know he won't go telling everyone my secrets.

 

[angelicminx]

You're assuming I'm anti-gun.

And really, this debate has its success stories on either side. In Japan it's very illegal to have a gun. Basically only Yakuza will risk it. Their gun murder rate is in the single-double digits and their murder by sword/knife rate is actually higher than it.

All sides of an issue, that was the joke behind your joke, what makes it funny.

Though it's probably too late for the thread. It looks like an AK-47 accidentally went off. Or the rapper ninjas swept through again.

Dran, Dran, Dran, ambiguous moral situations like that is why I installed an electrified floor, the various pitfalls, and the knockout gas turrets. If they make it past, they learn I'm poorer than they are and have a sick sense of humour.

ROFLMFAO!

 

[TheEarl]

Whoever said that it's illegal to confront an intruder in England has got it wrong (think it was Op-Cit). You are allowed to hit the burglar with the blunt instument of your choice if he comes at you, you are allowed to sneak up on him and belt him across the head with a cricket bat and you are allowed to hide behind the bedoom door and clock him when he walks in. What you are not allowed to do is run after a fleeing intruder and hit them, or to keep hitting them after they're downed. These were the rules laid down by the government earlier this year and are one of the few things coming from Labour that I agree with. They sound like fair rules to my mind (assuming they're adhered to by the powers that be of course).

I am firmly against gun-freedom. The people who say that criminals will 'be able to get guns anyway' sound like they're talking about a different species. All it takes to turn a normal person into a criminal is a crime. If that crime is murder, then it's a lot harder to commit without a gun. Okay, so you can stab someone with a kitchen knife, but even that's not easy. It's close range and physical and difficult to do if you're the smaller person. Guns are impersonal weapons (in that you don't have to actually touch someone to kill them). If a normal person has a thermo-nuclear bad day, then their crime of passion is going to be a lot more accessible with a gun to hand.

To take a high profile case, Eminem beat his wife's lover over the head with the butt of his gun when he discovered him kissing her and quite cheerfully admits that in the heat of the moment, he would have shot him without a second's pause had he had ammunition on him. When he calmed down, he was very glad that the gun wasn't loaded. But in the moment, had he had the means, he would've killed him. And that would've been one more gun-death.

You have to wonder how many people die because their partner did have the means to hand.

The Earl

 

[Liar]

I never monologue. You will never hear me ramble on about my great plan on the assuption that you are about to die and will never be able to foil my plans. Even if you ask, "Before you kill, me will you at least tell me what this is all about?" I'll just say "Nope." And shoot you.

Telling The Evil Plan is mandatory. Didn't you get the memo?

 

[Colleen Thomas]

No, no, no Colly. I didn't say, nor was I implying that if you are in fear of your life then you can't take reasonable precautions up to and including shooting them dead.

The point I was attempting to make was that reasonable force is a poor excuse when the defender (homeowner) is a 6' 6" left tackle and the intruder is a 'hunger' driven 17 year old.

I was actually (obscurely) making my attack on a society that will put property over life and will bolster its own fundamental short comings which engender an underclass who are 'worthless'.

It just seems to me we are no further along than being hung for sheep stealing.

The sentence of death for house-breaking just seems a little harsh and yes they do have a right to life which they do not abdicate merely by being somewhere they shouldn't be.

The real point though gauche, is how am I to know? I don't feel you abdicate your right to live for breaking into someone's home, but thieves don't wear signs. Hungry 17 year old junkie isn't flashing over his head, anymore than psycopthic serial rapist is. By your reasoning or liars, it's incumbant upon me, the vitim of the original crime to make sure I am in the right when I shoot. Basically, passing responsibility for his breaking the law onto me in determining me response.

I don't know that he's the new Ted Bundy and I am to be the first in his line of victims, but I have to assume thats the case. If I assume he isn't and he is, then I will likely become a statistic. If I'm not prepared to rick my life on his being a "good" criminal rather than a "bad" one, I don't believe that places me on the wrong side either legally or in a moral sense.

When you break into someone's home, you have already made the decision you are going to break the law. You have also considered the consequences of that action, up to and including facing the homeowner. It you are still there, then you have to have come to a decision on how you plan to act if you are confronted. Considering the fact I already know you are a criminal and that you have no reguard fo the rule of law, it seems prudent to assume you also know the consequences of your act and there is no indication you intend to obey the laws dealing with my person anymore than you did in dealing with my property.

I think there is a world of difference in favoring capital punishment for sneak thieves and feeling the need to protect yourself. The bottomline is there is nothing in my house worth dying over. But there is something worth killing over. In my own estimation at least, my life is worth killing someone over. The argument, that said intruder wasn't after my life, but after my stereo, is fine if it comes to a court trial where he is charged with attempted murder. But in the dark of my living room, I'm not prepared to discuss the niceties with him. I am prepared to defend myself, my body much more than my property.

While an intruder has not forfieted his right to life, he has forfited his right to the benefit of the doubt. Without that benefit, I will assume the worst and act accordingly. There are folks who aren't prepared to go that far. You see a lot of them on court TV, victims who begged for their lives or tried to talk a criminal out of killing or raping them. I already know where I stand, I am going to let Mr. Remington do my talking.

It may be very selfish, but it's simply the way I am. I'm not willing to risk my life on the chance the intruder isn't there with evil intent. My lifekinda sucks, but it is still my life, and it's the only one I have. In a game of highstakes poker, I'mnot willing to risk it for all the tea in China. Why should I be prepared to risk it on an obvious criminal not having evil intent against my person?

 

[cloudy]

Whoever said that it's illegal to confront an intruder in England has got it wrong (think it was Op-Cit). You are allowed to hit the burglar with the blunt instument of your choice if he comes at you, you are allowed to sneak up on him and belt him across the head with a cricket bat and you are allowed to hide behind the bedoom door and clock him when he walks in. What you are not allowed to do is run after a fleeing intruder and hit them, or to keep hitting them after they're downed. These were the rules laid down by the government earlier this year and are one of the few things coming from Labour that I agree with. They sound like fair rules to my mind (assuming they're adhered to by the powers that be of course).

I am firmly against gun-freedom. The people who say that criminals will 'be able to get guns anyway' sound like they're talking about a different species. All it takes to turn a normal person into a criminal is a crime. If that crime is murder, then it's a lot harder to commit without a gun. Okay, so you can stab someone with a kitchen knife, but even that's not easy. It's close range and physical and difficult to do if you're the smaller person. Guns are impersonal weapons (in that you don't have to actually touch someone to kill them). If a normal person has a thermo-nuclear bad day, then their crime of passion is going to be a lot more accessible with a gun to hand.

To take a high profile case, Eminem beat his wife's lover over the head with the butt of his gun when he discovered him kissing her and quite cheerfully admits that in the heat of the moment, he would have shot him without a second's pause had he had ammunition on him. When he calmed down, he was very glad that the gun wasn't loaded. But in the moment, had he had the means, he would've killed him. And that would've been one more gun-death.

You have to wonder how many people die because their partner did have the means to hand.

The Earl

Earl,

What you and so many overseas don't seem to realize is how firmly guns are entrenched in our culture here in the states. Colly made a reference to it earlier.

Those households that own guns most likely own more than one. Here, in my house right now, there are two shotguns, three rifles, and three handguns. I'm am very well-trained in their use and care, and have never shot anyone, either by accident or on purpose. Would I? Certainly, if I felt that I or a member of my family was in danger.

If only half the households in this country are like mine, how many guns do you suppose that puts in the hands of the general populace here? I wouldn't even hazard a guess. I would say it's billions of guns.

So, say tomorrow they're outlawed. No ownership whatsoever. And the law-abiding citizens dutifully turn theirs in. But, the ones that aresn't so law-abiding don't. Because there are so many out there, that still lives millions of guns in the hands of the people that are not law-abiding citizens.

Outlawing guns is not an answer here. It just isn't. It's way too simplistic, and it just plain won't work.

 

[cloudy]

The real point though gauche, is how am I to know? I don't feel you abdicate your right to live for breaking into someone's home, but thieves don't wear signs. Hungry 17 year old junkie isn't flashing over his head, anymore than psycopthic serial rapist is. By your reasoning or liars, it's incumbant upon me, the vitim of the original crime to make sure I am in the right when I shoot. Basically, passing responsibility for his breaking the law onto me in determining me response.

I don't know that he's the new Ted Bundy and I am to be the first in his line of victims, but I have to assume thats the case. If I assume he isn't and he is, then I will likely become a statistic. If I'm not prepared to rick my life on his being a "good" criminal rather than a "bad" one, I don't believe that places me on the wrong side either legally or in a moral sense.

When you break into someone's home, you have already made the decision you are going to break the law. You have also considered the consequences of that action, up to and including facing the homeowner. It you are still there, then you have to have come to a decision on how you plan to act if you are confronted. Considering the fact I already know you are a criminal and that you have no reguard fo the rule of law, it seems prudent to assume you also know the consequences of your act and there is no indication you intend to obey the laws dealing with my person anymore than you did in dealing with my property.

I think there is a world of difference in favoring capital punishment for sneak thieves and feeling the need to protect yourself. The bottomline is there is nothing in my house worth dying over. But there is something worth killing over. In my own estimation at least, my life is worth killing someone over. The argument, that said intruder wasn't after my life, but after my stereo, is fine if it comes to a court trial where he is charged with attempted murder. But in the dark of my living room, I'm not prepared to discuss the niceties with him. I am prepared to defend myself, my body much more than my property.

While an intruder has not forfieted his right to life, he has forfited his right to the benefit of the doubt. Without that benefit, I will assume the worst and act accordingly. There are folks who aren't prepared to go that far. You see a lot of them on court TV, victims who begged for their lives or tried to talk a criminal out of killing or raping them. I already know where I stand, I am going to let Mr. Remington do my talking.

It may be very selfish, but it's simply the way I am. I'm not willing to risk my life on the chance the intruder isn't there with evil intent. My lifekinda sucks, but it is still my life, and it's the only one I have. In a game of highstakes poker, I'mnot willing to risk it for all the tea in China. Why should I be prepared to risk it on an obvious criminal not having evil intent against my person?

Amen, Colly.

It's Smith & Wesson that talks for me in a situation like that, but they're both good to have on your side.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Whoever said that it's illegal to confront an intruder in England has got it wrong (think it was Op-Cit). You are allowed to hit the burglar with the blunt instument of your choice if he comes at you, you are allowed to sneak up on him and belt him across the head with a cricket bat and you are allowed to hide behind the bedoom door and clock him when he walks in. What you are not allowed to do is run after a fleeing intruder and hit them, or to keep hitting them after they're downed. These were the rules laid down by the government earlier this year and are one of the few things coming from Labour that I agree with. They sound like fair rules to my mind (assuming they're adhered to by the powers that be of course).

I am firmly against gun-freedom. The people who say that criminals will 'be able to get guns anyway' sound like they're talking about a different species. All it takes to turn a normal person into a criminal is a crime. If that crime is murder, then it's a lot harder to commit without a gun. Okay, so you can stab someone with a kitchen knife, but even that's not easy. It's close range and physical and difficult to do if you're the smaller person. Guns are impersonal weapons (in that you don't have to actually touch someone to kill them). If a normal person has a thermo-nuclear bad day, then their crime of passion is going to be a lot more accessible with a gun to hand.

To take a high profile case, Eminem beat his wife's lover over the head with the butt of his gun when he discovered him kissing her and quite cheerfully admits that in the heat of the moment, he would have shot him without a second's pause had he had ammunition on him. When he calmed down, he was very glad that the gun wasn't loaded. But in the moment, had he had the means, he would've killed him. And that would've been one more gun-death.

You have to wonder how many people die because their partner did have the means to hand.

The Earl

The physical converse is true as well Earl. If gun are illegal and an intruder breaks into my home with a knife, then what? Defending myself becomes an extention of my physical prowess vs. his. It's not a battle I am likely to win very often. On the other hand, I'm a crack shot with jut about any kind of fire arm you care to name. He can be 6 foot 6, 340 with a black belt in use of ancient weapons and he is still going to be at the disadvantage.

Without a gun, my safety relies on fleeing or hiding. With one, it relies only on my skill in its use. When the stakes are my life, I have more faith in my skill with a firearm than I do in my 40 yard dash.

 

[TheEarl]

Telling The Evil Plan is mandatory. Didn't you get the memo?

http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html



The Earl

 

[Guest]

You make it look like a choice, and an easy one. If it was an easy one in certain areas of society to stay away from crime and work one's way out of poverty, then there would not be any crime. People don't break into houses for the fuck of it. They do it out of desperation.

I can think of alot of situations that might force someone to trespass. None would have to do with this person being evil and worthy of a bullet in the face. To me, it's a scary place some must live in, to demonize their surroundings like that.

But I guess I won't reach through with my world wiew anymore than you reach through with yours to mine. So if it's all the same to you, I think I'ne made mine as clear as I can, and that we can agree to disagree. I just hope I get to stay a happy, healthy middle class man the rest of my life, so that I don't get into a siuation that would makes those worlds collide.

pax,
#L

But it IS always a choice. I have been in poverty more than once. And I'm talking about going days without food. Hell right now I'm a month behind on my rent and don't have a way to pay it because a job I was supposed to have fell through and now I'm unemployed. But I'm not looking to rob a bank or start stealing from the neighbors to get by.

EVERYONE has that same choice. There are a dozen food banks in this town where people can go and get food if they are hungry. No charge. There are shelters for people who are homeless. And even a welfare system to provide in not all that exteme of circumstances. It's not the best way to live, but it's not intended to be the Ritz. It is INTENDED to keep you alive UNTIL you get back on your feet. You have to decide to get up, though.

To say that crime is a necessity for these people is just plain bullshit.

They may not be able to chose what family and socio-economic circumstances they are born into but they DO have a choice of how they deal with it.

If poverty was a valid justifaication for crime there would be one HELL of a lot more than there is.

And what a truly sad society it would be that allowed it to happen.

 

[Op_Cit]

Those households that own guns most likely own more than one. Here, in my house right now, there are two shotguns, three rifles, and three handguns.

Let's see... 1, 2....6, 7, Shit! Cloudy's got me beat by one; now I'll have to go out and buy another if I want to maintain my gun nut status. Does all the reloading equipment count for anything?

Despite the quantity of guns I own, not one is kept at hand for intruders. I don't carry one around in my truck, or on my person. It's all the aikido in my past: Be prepared to survive without harming your attacker.

Still, I find the right to self defense a natural one and unalienable. I will become a felon when the gun laws inevitably shift to make me one.

(Now, why does she need or want two shotguns....?)