Posted on 07/31/2002 9:27:10 PM PDT by kattracks
Note: The following is the second of a two-part series
Did you know that a person's chances of being mugged in London are six times higher than in New York City?
Did you know that assault, robbery and burglary rates are far higher in England than in the United States?
Did you know that in England self-defense of person or property is regarded as an anti-social act, and that a victim who injures or kills an assailant is likely to be treated with more severity than the assailant?
Joyce Lee Malcolm blames the rocketing rates of violent and armed crimes in England on "government policies that have gone badly wrong." Her careful research in "Guns and Violence: The English Experience," just released by Harvard University Press, leads to this conclusion: "Government created a hapless, passive citizenry, then took upon itself the impossible task of protecting it. Its failure could not be more flagrant."
Malcolm begins her study of English crime rates, weapons ownership and attitudes toward self-defense in the Middle Ages. She continues the story through the Tudor-Stuart centuries, the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. She finds that five centuries of growing civility, low crime rates and declining firearm homicide rates ended in the 20th century.
Malcolm shows that an unprotected public at the mercy of criminals is the result of (1) the 1967 revision of criminal law, which altered the common-law standard for self-defense and began the process of criminalizing self-defense, and (2) increasing restrictions on handguns and other firearms, culminating in the 1997 ban of handgun ownership (and most other firearms).
In England, the penalty for possessing a handgun is 10 years in prison. The result is the one predicted by the National Rifle Association: "when guns are outlawed, only outlaws have guns." During the two years following the 1997 handgun ban, the use of handguns in crime rose by 40 percent. During seven months of 2001, armed robberies in London rose by 53 percent.
These shocking crime rates are understatements, because "the English police still grossly underreport crimes. ... The 1998 British Crime Survey found four times as many crimes occurred as police records indicated."
A disarmed public now faces outlaws armed with machine-guns. People in London residential neighborhoods have been machine-gunned to death. Gunmen have even burst into court and freed defendants.
The British government forbids citizens to carry any article that might be used for self-defense. Even knitting needles and walking sticks have been judged to be "offensive weapons." In 1994, an English homeowner used a toy gun to detain two burglars who had broken into his home. The police arrested the homeowner for using an imitation gun to threaten and intimidate.
A British Petroleum executive was wounded in an assault on his life in a London Underground train carriage. In desperation, he fought off his attackers by using an ornamental sword blade in his walking stick. He was tried and convicted of carrying an offensive weapon.
A youth fearful of being attacked by a gang was arrested for carrying a cycle chain. After police disarmed him, he was set upon and hospitalized as a result of a brutal beating. The prosecutor nevertheless insisted on prosecuting the victim for "carrying a weapon."
Seventy percent of rural villages in Britain entirely lack police presence. But self-defense must be "reasonable," as determined after the fact by a prosecutor. What is reasonable to a victim being attacked or confronted with home intruders at night can be quite different from how a prosecutor sees it. A woman who uses a weapon to fight off an unarmed rapist could be convicted of using unreasonable force.
In 1999, Tony Martin, a farmer, turned his shotgun on two professional thieves when they broke into his home at night to rob him a seventh time. Martin received a life sentence for killing one criminal, 10 years for wounding the second and 12 months for having an illegal shotgun. The wounded burglar has already been released from prison.
American prosecutors now follow British ones in restricting self-defense to reasonable force as defined by prosecutors. Be forewarned that Americans can no longer use deadly force against home intruders unless the intruder is also armed and the homeowner can establish that he could not hide from the intruder and had reason to believe his life was in danger.
The assault on England's version of the Second Amendment was conducted by unsavory characters in the British Home Office. Long before guns were banned, the Home Office secretly instructed the police not to issue licenses for weapons intended to protect home and property.
In the British welfare state, crimes against property are not taken seriously. Malcolm reports that criminals face minimal chances of arrest and punishment, but a person who uses force to defend himself or his property is in serious trouble with the law. A recent British law textbook says that the right to self-defense is so mitigated "as to cast doubt on whether it still forms part of the law."
An Englishman's home is no longer his castle. Thanks to gun-control zealots, England has become the land of choice for criminals.
Contact Paul Craig Roberts | Read his biography
©2002 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
People are going to have to decide if they want to live as free men or if they would rather live like slaves. The right to keep and bear arms has little to do with hunting, it has a whole lot to do with the basic relationship of the individual to the state. I wish more people realized that fact.
I think one ploy they have been using is to report multiple occurances of the same crime as one crime. That is ten break-ins in one apartment block = one crime.
BTW, what ever happened to those tough Tommies who chased Rommel out of Africa?
Because the elite live in gated communities with armed guards, and because crime is effective at keeping the 'little people' in their place.
Holy cow! What did he have left to steal?
I guess one way to ignore your own problems is to concentrate on other peoples.
Cheeers Tony
Cheers Tony
I intend to go to a FR convention sometime next year.
LOL I dont know if it will be friendly or I will be having a punch up with at least a few freepers who have annoyed me.
Ah well it would be good to see you and harpseal we could drag up a few sand bags and swing the oil lamp.
Cheers Tony
-Empty-Barrel Gun Policies-A legacy of nonsense from Clinton, Blair, and the Left--
-A Problem With Guns (Long... but SOOOO good)--
Shooting More Holes in Gun Control
HCI Aussie Style (read it and weep-or laugh)
The Great Australian Gun Law CON!
| Canadian Gun Control Has Little Impact on Crime (Home Gun Confiscation/Resisters) | ||||||
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Israel is Arming Its Civilians - Why Aren't We?
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| Through the Looking Glass and Back Again - From Anti-gunner to Firearms Instructor in Four Months | ||||||
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