Police Weapons Prove Vexing for a British Town

I wonder if many will go the black market route to get a handgun for self-defense? They seem to have a real distaste for firearms but fear of your life is a good motivator to overcome that feeling.

Illegal ownership of a semi-automatic pistol would be a category A firearms offence (7 years imprisonment), owning it for the purpose of self defence would up the sentence to 10 years. Whereas, a GBH charge (from causing an attacker serious injuries) would probably only get you 4 years, so which method of self defence would you use?

As for a distaste for firearms, only a tiny proportion of Britons (around 4%) have owned firearms, unlike the 40% of Americans. Therefore, the majority of the British public associate firearm ownership with militants or vigilantees, not with "normal" tolerant folk.

I would say that on the face of it, having an unarmed police force is a noble or at least respectable tradition. It shows trust by the governent in the governed and it keeps a government agency from being too powerful. Without guns the police officers have no choice but to be public servants for they do not have the means to control the populace.
However, given current circumstances in Britain, it makes no sense at all. The government has already proved that it does not trust the poeple enough to let them have guns. If the government does not allow citizens to rule themselves in any area(crime control in this case) it must instead rule subjects(or risk anarchy). It stands to reason that without armed civilians or an armed police force the unchecked criminal world will expand in size and power until it takes over. Because the people of Britain are not able to defend themselves against criminals, they must submit to the rule of a more constrictive, more powerful government.
Even more serious is the fact that the British are only beginning to recognize and respond to the crime problem. By the time the whole nation sees the problem and begins to combat it through armed police officers and other means the criminal underworld will be so firmly entrenched that it will take years to bring it down. History has shown that whenever a government is given too much power it is unwilling to surrender this illegitimate strength. The same is true of the criminal world. Now that the law-abiding citizens and unarmed police force have allowed the crime lords a taste of power they will be forced to take it back by violence. This battle will be fought by a heavily armed increasingly large and powerful police force because Britain has no other means to combat criminals.
Because of the power and size of the criminal underworld by this time, the battle will be a long and vicious one. The police force will be permitted ever-growing authority and impunity from criticism in this fight. We know this because in America we have seen the constitution slowly eroded as LEA's are given more and more power in their war on drugs. In Britain, the crime problem will be genuine(unlike the drug problem) and the people will have no written constitiution or bill of rights to slow the progression toward a police state.
...And they will have no right to keep and bear arms to fall back on.
By the time crime is brought back to todays levels in Britain the people will have grown accustomed to police rule and will have no power to end it.

Let us hope for Britain's sake that I am wrong. Let us hope that they will somehow see their danger and prevent these things from happening. Let us hope also that the people of our great republic will forever hold dear its right to keep and bear arms and so save itself from ever having to face this danger.

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