Britain is becoming a nation afraid of its young people

Actually I was referring to an incident that happened over here. Tony Martin, a farmer from Norfolk and general all round nutjob, was burgled by two young men. He caught them and they ran away. Fair enough. However, as they were running, and clearly no longer a danger to him or to his property, he took out his shotgun and fired twice. One was shot in the back and killed, the other was seriously injured. This was not self defence, this was an execution - for a crime that does not carry the death penalty!

 

Cops have done it zillions of time and dont forget very recent a cop shot guy after he was laying flat on the ground and obeying all the orders being given to him . so whats your point? are we going to stop flying airplanes becouse 5 days ago a jumbo 747 crash somewhere?

 

what about the fellow in london the two old bill shot for having a table leg and there shot him in the back forgot what happened them two does anyone know i think they got done as it happens but cant really remember

 

As I remember, they got away with it. As did the police who shot Jean Charles de Menezes at Stockwell tube. There's a very poor record of convicting police who have shot innocents. It is a good thing, I think, that bobbies on the beat are not routinely armed, and that guns are quite strictly controlled in this country....

 

If you want to infer that from my post, then please, be my guest. Personally, I was just explaining a situation, I wasn't aware that I was making a point....

 

I wouldn't shoot anyone, nor would I condone the shooting of anyone. I'm not a pacifist, but neither do I feel killing pettry criminals to be the moral high ground here. Theft is a less serious transgression than shooting someone, especially if you cannot be sure whether you would kill them or not. You might say that property is not a natural state of being, but life and health are. Not all wrongs have rights and not all criminals can be brought to justice. If it happens that the criminal gets away because of my apparent justice-bringing cowardice, then so be it. I appreciate this may seem a radical difference in opinion, but as Lithium mentioned earlier, attitudes to life are very different here....

 

Moved to main UK Forum as it's more of a serious debate than random....

 

I agree here with you and so does most people armed or not is just comon sense.

 

Dirk trying to restrain him well only do 2 thing = get hurt or kill. dont be such a materialistic pig.

 

tell you for nothing some ones in my house there are getting a proper hiding then calling the police and getting compensation as well

 

show me the money

 

yes materialastic sounds a better then having all my gear nicked hahahaha

 

are you the same dirk pitt as in the book imagine what he would have done ahahahaha

 

No, not at all. As far as i'm aware the crime rate in London is far higher than New York, so it wouldn't suprise me at all if the overall reported crime rate is higher in the UK.

I think you'd have to be both insane and blind to UK gun culture to think that everyone owning guns would be a preventative measure though.

 

clives good but lets admit it robet ludlam is the bollox some with the boune films crap

 

Of course, London's hardly the most crime-ridden place in the UK. I'm sure that New York isn't the most crime-ridden place in the US either.

 

UK crime rates in terms of violent crime, proportional to population size, are considerably lower than the US. I'm not sure about property crime.


Restraint is fine within the law here, but shooting someone isn't. Having said that, Tony Martin only got 4 years in prison for what was essentially murder, so I think the law does take into account the circumstances involved, without actually conding the act....

 

It would be interesting to see the study itself, as the article has been quite selective in its quoting from it. It has downplayed the high murder rates in the US. So it may be conceivable that UK has a higher overall violent crime rate, which could include actions as minor as punching someone, whereas the US will have a much higher murder rate. Also, it would not, I expect, count lethal or serious violence in defence of property - which is not a crime in the US, but is a crime in the UK. Here's an interesting article:

A child is killed by gunfire every 3 hours in America. That's certainly not a rate the UK could compete with, even accounting for population size.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usguns/Story/0,,1736424,00.html

Also, compare the murder rates here:

http://www.murderuk.com/misc/stats.htm

Under 1000 people were murdered in the UK in 2002 (not including Harold Shipman who killed hundreds over many years), and in the US over 16,000 were murdered in the same year. The US has just under 5 times the population of the UK. So accounting for that difference, the UK murder rate would be under 5000, still considerably less than the US.

 

No worries!

 

Drowning is the second leading cause of
accidental injury-related death among
children ages 1 to 14 and the leading
cause of accidental injury-related death
among children ages 1 to 4.

1. http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:8HXsGZA_SNEJ:www.usa.safekids.org/content_documents/Drowning_facts.pdf+drowning+of+kids+rate+in+the+us&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=3​