Wow!
Via Geek With A 45, comes this BBC article (yes, the BB fucking C) which states Britain needs more guns:
Old stereotypes die hard and the vision of Britain as a peaceable kingdom, America as “the wild west culture on the other side of the Atlantic” is out of date. It is true that in contrast to Britain’s tight gun restrictions, half of American households have firearms, and 33 states now permit law-abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons.
But despite, or because, of this, violent crime in America has been plummeting for 10 consecutive years, even as British violence has been rising. By 1995 English rates of violent crime were already far higher than America’s for every major violent crime except murder and rape.
As the Geek says: Holy shit!
January 7th, 2004 at 11:22 pm
Nice to finally have a link to the article itself. Which was written by an American and published a year ago…
Brits themselves may be waking up to this, according to the recent result of a “which of these laws do you want to see in Parliament” program, albeit some have noted the other choices were not terribly interesting and are near-certain to come up anyway.
And then there is 2002’s “decline” in break-ins responded to, which strangely correlated with a directive in some areas to not respond to burglar alarms not accompanied by a 999 call, preferably with specific mention of possible firearm involvement.
Or 2003’s request that police be enabled to go armed at all times, rather than having to apply for permission. My goodness, the police no longer feel safe without guns? But of course, a civilian without even cursory instruction in, or capability at, unarmed combat – say, a 24 year old woman – is perfectly safe while trained officers fear for their lives.
Meanwhile the nannies here in the US are bending their nano-gram minds to banning all firearms – even toys – despite the growing number of states who are finding their residents (hey, dummy, VOTERS!) want to be allowed to effectively protect themselves (and families, homes, businesses…) and are starting to accomodate them.