11 Jun
Just a quick question
I’m still rattling around inside my mind (and yes, it is a very scary place) about several posts.
So, in the mean time I have a question or questions to the antis again.
What level of violence is acceptable when fighting back against a criminal intent on harming me or mine?
Seriously, the antis don’t want us using firearms but seem to be okay with T.A.S.E.R.s or Pepper Sprays.
That is violence.
The antis seem to be okay with unarmed combat techniques (Karate, Aikido, etc).
That is violence.
The antis seem to be okay with punching attackers with your keys between your fingers or a rat tail comb.
That is violence.
So, Mr./Ms. Anti – where do you draw the line?
What tools are okay and what tools aren’t okay? Is there an approved list I can check out online, is it something passed down generation to generation like Aunt Martha’s Apple Pie recipe?
And the flip side to this also gets me to wondering.
Where are you efforts at convincing criminals to be non-violent?
I didn’t see any foot of the Protest Easy Guns groups at the meeting of the Mexican Drug Cartels. I haven’t seen anyone lying down at the annual Thug, Mugger and Murderer’s Convention (going on all year in Chicago).
So, talk to me folks. Tell me what level of violence, what tool I can or can not use to employ that level of violence.
Please (really I mean it Anti-Rights Advocates, Please) Join the Discussion.
Posted by Weer'd Beard on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
Again, your questions assume what the Antis say is honest. We BOTH know that that is NOT the case.
They are only fine with violence distributed by the state. Period, full-stop. They just know they can’t build their Utopia in one night, so first they take away the guns, then the knives, then OC and Stun devices (FYI OC spray can only be owned or carried here with a gun permit, and stun devices are illegal) then other defensive tools….then personal defense entirely, so using Karate as anything but a sport will be a crime. (Did you notice there are no stories of British Subjects charging the gunman attempting to stop him? We had similar stories from the disarmed people in Virginia Tech. They were all slaughtered just the same, but the Americans resisted. There’s a reason for that. If somebody had stopped this guy, they might be in jail for it!).
So they’re “OK” with these forms of civilian violence FOR NOW!
Posted by Bob S. on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
Weer’d,
I assume that antis are for the sake of debate and understanding. I really try to live Covey’s “Seek to Understand then Be Understood”.
I’ve noticed that lack of fighting back (even the cops charged with Public Safety failed to try to stop the crime. It is part of a post I’m struggling with on mindset — and I think you are right about their eventual goal.
But for the mean time, if firearms aren’t acceptable for self defense — What is?
What level of violence – if the antis will even admit that OC or Stun Guns are violent– do they recommend and approve of when confronted with crime?
Posted by Sarah on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
The antis operate on the false notion that the state and its members – the police, for example, and the justice system – will take care of us all if they only have the opportunity. It’s why they encourage us to have our cell phones out when we cross dark parking lots, ready to call 911 so that an officer who’s only five minutes away when every second counts. It’s why they tell us that it’s better, in fact, to stay home at night instead of living our everyday lives as free citizens have every right to do.
It’s why they tell women like me to not resist when somebody attacks us because we need to be “morally superior” to a rapist…as if that’s somehow better than just ventilating the air thief in the process of stopping him from doing whatever he wants to innocent members of society.
They even tell us to make ourselves vomit on rapists, or tell them that we’re HIV positive, so that they’ll (hopefully) leave us alone.
Honestly? They’re against any violent response to violence. They don’t even like it when a LEO, in danger of being hurt or killed, uses deadly force to protect himself and innocent bystanders.
Posted by Thomas on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
Many rapists are HIV positive. Not much of a deterrent. Guns and knives are deterrents. Stun Guns are of limited effectiveness. I’ve been hit by one (friend got one so we wanted to see what it was like and I lost the coin toss on who got to be the LITERALLY in this case “test DUMMY”). Made my arm feel weird for a while after but didn’t disable me much nor long. From what I understand from some military I’ve known over the years, they’re pretty handy interrogation tools (not that they would ever have been used that way) but if somebody was a THREAT and not tied to a chair or somesuch, they were going to eat lead, not stun gun.
As to taking of a life vs just stopping the threat, wounding somebody without killing them will get you sued. If you shoot somebody to the ground properly, they don’t have very good odds of survival.
If people don’t want to risk getting killed committing violent crime, they need to take up a different career. Don’t do the crime if you an’t do the time and/or aren’t bullet, knife, brick, or whatever else is handy to hit you with–proofed.
I think a .338 Lapua or .50BMG is legitimate self defense if a person has announced intent to physically attack you. There’s been more farm murders by my friend’s parent’s farm in Natal. If a group of angry youth armed with pangas are forming by your gate 1000 yards from your house, what is their intent most likely going to be? If you answered “rape your women and children in front of you and then kill you all” you probably answered properly. Friend who has bailed for NZ for good this time will openly admit to picking them off before they got inside the wire more than once in his 45 years living there. Oddly, he and his family are one of the families that haven’t been farm murdered yet. Criminals don’t like targets that shoot back, especially ones that start with highly accurate rifle fire from long range.
If the economic downturn turns into a full blown depression and I see aggressive people 75 yards away rather than knocking on my front door, I’ll think of the as the safe. And defensive shooting is legal in my book. They can interview the undertaker as to what he presumes the motives were of the angry mob cutting my fence. Better to be tried by 12 than carried by 6.
I realize “long-range” self defense wouldn’t easily be viable in the city but what about the Korean Grocers in the LA King Riots on the roofs of their stores with rifles. If somebody is setting fire to the store you’re standing on the roof of to protect with a rifle, you are being threatened if they try to burn the building out from under you, are you not? Therefore we’re back to benefit of the doubt always going to the defender and hopefully the offender doesn’t live to argue.
Thomas says it’s perfectly acceptable to use battlefield nukes in cases of widespread urban violence.
Posted by Linoge on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
Unfortunately, the basic assumption of honesty, upon which effectively all of society operates, has been violated so many times by the anti-rights nuts that relying on it is fool’s errand, at best. Not trying to say that you are a fool, Bob, mind you – I know you mean well by giving the anti’s a break – but historical precedent is a bitch.
Offhand, given how anti-rights nuts periodically go off on the “give them what they want”, and “do not fight back and they will not hurt you” rants, I would venture to say that they firmly believe that any violence, whatsoever, is a bad thing. Sure, that includes the criminals perpetrating the original violence, but those people are just acting out their natural tendencies, and it is all society’s fault, so they are forgiven.
We, however… we are fighting back of our own free will, and encouraging others to do the same, and that is simply not acceptable.
In short, they are either unwilling or unable to determine or accept the difference between predatory violence and protective violence, and conflate those two concepts constantly, even though they are markedly different. In some cases, it is simply an issue of not knowing better – being brought up that “violence is bad”. But in a lot of cases, that conflation is malicious and intentional, and should be regarded as such.
Posted by ASM826 on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
You have already chosen violence as an acceptable response when you prepare/plan/train to use it. So, a martial art, pepper spray, a baseball bat, a knife, or a gun are all just steps on a continuum.
That being said, training of any sort, armed or unarmed, and having a clear mindset to defend yourself and those around you, is the only moral choice. It is even the choice we have made as a society, hence armed police and soldiers protecting the society from various levels of threats.
Posted by Dixie on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
I subscribe to what the Soviets called “the Axe theory.”
If you and I are squared off against one another, table in front of each of us with objects ranging from a pillow to an axe, which will you grab first? We could be each other with pillows until they burst, then throw custard pies at each other, but this would be prone to two big problems. 1) One of us is going to tire first… and it might be me. 2) What if I finish you off and a friend of yours walks in? I’d be exhausted, and he’d be rested and ready.
In any conflict, it is safer for me to go to my biggest tool for three reasons. 1) I can remove you as a threat more quickly. 2) I might intimidate you into leaving me alone. 3) I can be ready for any follow-up threat.
Posted by Thomas on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
The Russians have an adage: If you shoot at a man with a gun, he’ll pull his own gun and shoot at you. If you throw an axe at him, he’ll duck. THEN You shoot him. Makes for a safer transaction on your part.
Posted by Thomas on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
Needs a visual…
http://www.terma-nator.com/images/motivation/Spetsnaz.jpg
Posted by Weer'd Beard on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
“If you shoot at a man with a gun, he’ll pull his own gun and shoot at you.”
Well that’s because the Ruskis us shit guns like 9×18 and 5.45×39. Of course he’ll pull his own gun and shoot you, and it’ll hurt REALLY BAD and you’ll shoot him again. Continue until both men die of old age.
Here in America we use .45s or at LEAST the lowly 9x19mm!
Posted by Thomas on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
You missed the point. Make them duck and cover and then sap the coonts!
Posted by Accept no substitute. « A Dixie Carpetbagger on 11.06.10 at 9:45 AM
[...] ties in with something Bob S. wrote: What level of violence is acceptable when fighting back against a criminal intent on harming me or [...]