Text 14957, 239 rader
Skriven 2008-05-08 21:56:14 av Roy Witt (1:397/22)
  Kommentar till text 14894 av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
Ärende: Martial arts
====================
07 May 08 19:23, Robert Bashe wrote to Roy Witt:

 RB>>>>> You ask whether I think you might shoot someone with your legal
 RB>>>>> guns and the answer is "it depends on the situation". The
 RB>>>>> possibility certainly exists.

 RW>>>> Yes, it certainly does, however 'that' isn't the problem.

 RB>>> No? Seems to me you brush this aside a little too quickly.

 RW>> Seems to me, you have no grounds to judge, since you're not
 RW>> interested in the statistics and reports that show you're wrong. A
 RW>> situation where I'm confronted with an armed robbery or burgler
 RW>> certainly warrants that I protect myself and family. Heated
 RW>> arguements on the streets or roads in the USA can lead to
 RW>> confrontations, but the licensed firearm carrier is not going to be
 RW>> the first to draw a weapon.

 RB> Why should _anyone_ draw a weapon?

Well, there are those who not obey any laws and they would rob you, murder
you for your purse, if they felt inclined. A weapon drawn in self-defense
wards off many of those kinds of people, who will go off and find someone
like you who does not have the means of self protection.

 RB> Unless, of course, everyone has access to one or even carries a gun.

That's the best part of it. Everyone with legal access to them is able to
carrry it concealed. Any of the above mentioned people are most often
looking for those who aren't armed.

 RB> And your trust of people with "legal" firearms is touching, but not
 RB> convincing.

That's ok, I don't need to convince you. You may live in your world
without.

 RB> As I say, none of us are machines. I'm absolutely convinced you - and
 RB> I - could be incited to murder under the appropriate conditions.

In my case, it would be called self-defense. I do not brandish my
concealed carry for the fun of it, nor to threaten anyone who pisses me
off. I've been doing that for over 40 years and haven't had to kill
anyone yet.

 RB>  And if you - or I - had a gun in our hand, that would happen rather
 RB> sooner than later.

See above, the part about 40 years of CC and nobody has died yet.

 RB> It's so easy to pull a trigger.

I guess if you felt not responsible for your actions, that would be true.
Cooler heads always prevail.

 RW>> In California and Texas, such confrontations can lead to charges of
 RW>> "Road Rage" with the mere brandishing of a fist.

 RB> You might be interested to know that such things as "road rage"
 RB> simply don't exist in Germany.

LOL! Yeah, that not so free society where you can be sued for calling
someone a derogitory name.

 RB> Nor do people carry guns to "protect" themselves.

BS...

 RB> Nor are people shot by hoodlems trying to rob them.

More BS...

 RB> Nor do violent "gangs" exist to shoot up the cities.

Soon.

 RB> The worst problems we have are drugs, same as in the States. But
 RB> violence is generally with fists or at worst with a knife.

LOL! Note in the stats below where Germany is compared to where the US is
listed. While you're doing so, keep in mind that the US has 'right to
carry' - 'will issue' carry permit laws and German doesn't. Also note at
the bottom the source of these stats...Your favorite world body. Of
course, these were reported in a 1998 and subsequently, a 2000 report that
may be outdated now, but they do show a trend that has continued in stats
reported as recently as 2004.

 Intentional Deaths: United States vs.Continental Europe Rates

In order of highest combined rate; nations having higher rates than the
United States are indicated by asterisk (suicide rate) or + sign (murder
rate).

Nation              Suicide         Murder     Combined rates

Russia              41.2*           30.6+        71.8
Estonia             40.1*           22.2+        62.3
Latvia              40.7*           18.2+        58.9
Lithuania           45.6*           11.7+        57.3
Belarus             27.9*           10.4         38.3
Hungary             32.9*            3.5         36.4
Ukraine             22.5*           11.3+        33.8
Slovenia            28.4*            2.4         30.4
Finland             27.2*            2.9         30.1
Denmark             22.3*            4.9         27.2
Croatia             22.8*            3.3         26.1
Austria             22.2*            1.0         23.2
Bulgaria            17.3*            5.1          2.4
France              20.8*            1.1         21.9
Switzerland         21.4*            1.1Ø        24.1
Belgium             18.7*            1.7         20.4
United States       11.6             7.8         19.4
Poland              14.2*            2.8         17.0
Germany             15.8*            1.1         16.9
Romania             12.3*            4.1         16.4
Sweden              15.3*            1.0         16.3
Norway              12.3*            0.8         13.1
Holland              9.8             1.2         11.0
Italy                8.2             1.7          9.9
Portugal             8.2             1.7          9.9
Spain                8.1             0.9          9.0
Greece               3.3             1.3          4.6

Notes: Data based in general on U.N. DEMOGRAPHIC YEARBOOK (1998) as
reported in David C. Stolinsky, America: The Most Violent Nation? 5 MED.
SENTINEL 199-201 (2000).

 RB> I suspect you in rural Texas also have no problems with such things,
 RB> but from what the media report, things in larger cities are pretty
 RB> hairy.

I'm not exactly in rural Texas, it's a small city with a population of
about 53,000. We've had our small share of murders and such here too.
Reading the local police reports, I see that most of those who get
caught, are from San Antonio.

 RB> I can remember my sister coming home one day (Cincinnati) and
 RB> telling how some crazy had shot three people at an office not far
 RB> from where she worked. That was in 2003.

Diane Feinstein, now a US Senator, but then a San Francisco Council-person
watched a mad man shot the mayor and several others on the City Hall
steps. And there was a ban on firearms in that city.

 RB>>> That particularly applies in this case, since I - in contrast to
 RB>>> most of the others writing here - definitely _do_ have a knowledge
 RB>>> of both the States and Europe,

 RW>> I find that hard to believe. Your 'States' has changed many fold
 RW>> over the 40 years since you've been gone.

 RB> Roy, the last time I was in the States was 2003. Have things changed
 RB> so radically since then, except of course the absolute paranoia
 RB> toward foreigners?

There are currently 40 states that allow some sort of CC, while in 03,
there may have been 30 or 32. Those with 'will issue' conceal carry permit
laws have shown a decline in gun violence. Before 03, I recall hearing and
reading about foreigners (Germans) being robbed and killed on the Florida
highways. Again, they were killed by people who do not obey any laws, so
obviously, those who have firearms legally, and/or are licensed to carry,
do not commit these crimes. Criminals do.

 RB>>> and not merely a superficial knowledge based on a vacation or brief
 RB>>> stay. I don't write on the basis of heresay, nor on the basis of
 RB>>> something I read in the Internet, but on the basis of personal
 RB>>> experience.

 RW>> Which was 40 years ago. A lot of water has gone over the damn since
 RW>> 1968...

 RB> On the one hand true. In the 50s and 60s, people weren't obsessed
 RB> with "security" and didn't buy firearms to "protect" themselves, but
 RB> to hunt.

In the late 40s, early 50s, I took my .22 rifle to school and left it in
the cloak closet all day. Some of the boys I ran with did the same. Nobody
worried about it being there because there was no reason to. After school
I and my buddies would go hunting or just plinking in the stone quarry.

 RB> When I went to school in the 50s, there were bullies - sure - but
 RB> they beat you up with fists, and left "four eyes" like me (glasses)
 RB> alone.

And those of us who didn't wear glasses and carried .22 rifles to school,
didn't shoot anybody. (well once, a guy shot himself in the calf and got
lead poisening)

 RB> Even among them there was a certain code of honor. We read
 RB> about things like zip guns in the papers, but never saw one.

We had heard of them too and one or two of us made them, just to
experiment with. They were more of a fad than anything else.

 RB>  And we all had pocket knives, but it wouldn't have occurred to us to
 RB> stab anyone with them.

Same with the .22 rifles.

 RB> We threw them to try to hit tops on the schoolground.

We waited until we got to the stone quarry. Picture in your mind a group
of young boys marching down a city sidewalk with shouldered arms. Ahhh,
the joys of freedom.

 RB> Times have meanwhile changed, and not for the better.

I recall not so long ago carrying a holstered revolver in the city,
walking to a liquor store and entering, not even realizing I had it on me.
No one said a word. Of course this was in the suburbs of San Diego. San
Diego had a law that if you carried a firearm, it had to be unloaded and
carried by hand. Of course, that was enforced more around center city
where the courts and police departments were.

 RB> On the other hand, as I say, my experience runs right up to 2003.
 RB> Don't assume I have no knowledge of the States just because I haven't
 RB> actually lived there for many years.

Actually, I'll stand by what I said. You may have visited, but you have no
idea what the States are really like. You cannot determine that over a few
weeks visiting.

 RB> In fact, I suspect my knowledge of the States is a good deal better
 RB> than yours of Europe...

I never claimed that I did. And this isn't about how much I know about
Europe, it's about how much you don't know about America.

 RB>  tell me, how many years did you live here?

How many years have you lived in the States since you moved to Germany?

Zero...
                R\%/itt



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