Clarification
If you are defending yourself, you are not a vigilante.
Remember, I do this to entertain me, not you.
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August 11th, 2011 at 9:24 am
What’s wrong with being a vigilante?
August 11th, 2011 at 9:37 am
In the UK I believe you are. I’m no expert but I believe defending yourself with a non-improvised weapon (ruled in court as anything you carry with you with the plan to use it as a weapon…the case that got a lot of press was a man who beat up a mugger with a milk bottle) is a crime.
So here, defending your life is protected. There is isn’t, so defending your life IS a crime, and therefore the defenders ARE vigilantes.
August 11th, 2011 at 10:03 am
I’m pretty sure D’beard is correct. There is no right of self defense in the English law system. The use of force is solely the right of the Crown.
Where a damn prince when you need them?
August 11th, 2011 at 10:03 am
Yeah, the Brit’s law enforcement is more worried about vigilantes (like that is some kind of bad thing) than it is about its feral gangs of rioters.
August 11th, 2011 at 10:22 am
Vigilantes go after the yobs.
Self-defense is when the yobs come after them.
August 11th, 2011 at 10:40 am
Those who are whining about “vigilantes” are the enablers of the riots.
August 11th, 2011 at 10:46 am
Gerry, that’s Marquis D’beard to you! LOL! Love the contraction! 🙂
August 11th, 2011 at 11:12 am
OK, I’ve argued this question extensively. Here’s the deal:
In the UK, under the law you are permitted to use “reasonable force” to defend yourself or others.
Here’s the rub: Other people after the fact determine what was “reasonable” at the time of the incident.
Possession of anything “with the intent to threaten to cause injury or fear” is verboten – so if you pick up a baseball bat and stand outside your property as a deterrent to rioters, your intent is to “threaten to cause injury or fear” and you’re therefore guilty of being in possession of an “offensive weapon.”
Apparently you’re supposed to wait until you, personally are under physical attack before you can pick up anything with which to defend yourself, and then you are restricted in how you use that item to some “reasonable” level to be determined at some future time when the jurors can reflect calmly on the situation.
Further, as has been explained to the British public, the law does not require the intention to kill for a prosecution for murder to succeed. All that is required is an intention to cause serious bodily harm. That intention can be fleeting and momentary. But if it is there in any form at all for just a second – that is, if the blow struck was deliberate rather than accidental – you can be guilty of murder and spend the rest of your life in prison.
As a result, the Crown Prosecution Service can (and has) prosecuted people for merely possessing anything they consider to be an “offensive weapon” whether or not said “weapon” was ever displayed. They have prosecuted people, like the man who beat a burglar with a milk bottle, for “unreasonable” use of force. One man was acquitted not too long back of murdering a home invader with his shotgun when his defense was that the gun “accidentally discharged” as he was pointing it at the huge, steroid-enraged bodybuilder climbing through his second-floor window and verbally threatening to kill the homeowner. Since there was no intent, fleeting or momentary, he wasn’t guilty of murder, apparently, even though he had to unlock the gun cabinet, retrieve his shotgun, unlock the ammo cabinet, retrieve his ammo, load the gun, aim the gun, and put his finger on the trigger. All of that was “reasonable,” but pulling the trigger intentionally would have been an act not of self-defense, but of murder.
The result of these laws is that the act of defending yourself is legally risky. Even if you’re acquitted, it may cost you a fortune in legal fees, and you very well might go to jail. If you actively defend your property, the chances are very high that you will be prosecuted for – at a minimum – possession of an “offensive weapon” and “causing fear,” and you will most probably lose in court.
All of this has what has been referred to as a “chilling effect” on the willingness of the British populace to actively defend themselves. You’ll note in the stories coming out of the UK that the people doing the “vigilantism” are almost exclusively immigrants – mostly Turks and Sikhs. They haven’t had their self-reliance beaten out of them yet.
August 11th, 2011 at 11:43 am
Which is why one leaves a Shovel stuck in the Flower Bed in Britain nowadays, and a Ball Peen Hammer in a open Tool Box near one’s Bedroom at Night, or so a Brit told me recently.
August 11th, 2011 at 11:46 am
By definition, vigilantes are members of committees of vigilance, and as such, operate in a group.
Ergo, there is no vigilante (singular).
August 11th, 2011 at 11:52 am
With other words, the solution to riot defense is a neighborhood street softball tournament.
August 11th, 2011 at 2:56 pm
“… the act of a private citizen in striking down a criminal, who, by raising himself above the law, has placed himself beyond the reach of legal punishment or control, has been accounted by whole nations, and by some of the best and wisest men, not a crime, but an act of exalted virtue” –John Stuart Mill,
August 11th, 2011 at 3:08 pm
When one is forced to rely on oneself due to the unwillingness of the police to act to protect society, one does not involve the tossers after the fact.
As the government claims they police by consent, one merely should decline to consent to the policing, or does that only apply to criminals. If so, one might as well become a criminal but one working for society rather than against it.
August 11th, 2011 at 8:14 pm
Markie Marxist sez: “But ‘vigilante’ is our commie code word for people who defend themselves! I don’t want to argue semantics, but that is in fact how my commie compadres in the MSM actually use the word, isn’t it? Some Americans on the political right may tend to get confused by the word ‘vigilante’ because we haven’t made self-defense illegal in the US like we were able to do in the UK. However, once we’ve criminalized self-defense in the US, it will all be much clearer. Especially from the inside of a jail cell, after successfully fending off an attack by our Marxist/warrior/hero/criminals, which will be a big no no after we’ve changed the law to reflect our Marxist sensibilities. Americans will have to develop a newfound sense of respect for our criminal allies, or they’ll be sent to the gulag.”