Britain’s Criminal Utopia

This caught my attention and I'd like to know what those in The UK think of it. Anyone is welcome to comment of course.


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I'm writing a rewiew of Lesson 1, Ep 3 right now (on Notepad, no spell chk, sorry), about lack of rituals, moral guidelines and modern barbarism. How enlightening when you put that old interview into a modern environment.
Anyway, the guns has nothing to do with a right to a selfdefence. You could bring battlestars in, that would solve nothing. Just bring things (not to call it a game) on the other level.
I live in the country where people own automatic weapons and explosives and still the houses are being robed and children abducted. It is a society that has to change and not by bringing more rules and more regulations and certanly not more guns. My opinion is that ignorance (in all parts involved) is the real problem and not only in GB.

It's all too easy to twist a major piece of news into whatever you want it to mean. The riots had nothing to do with the right to self-defense or in fact with a lot of criminality. A lot of the damage done, and crimes (such as looting) committed were opportunist - people following the crowd and seizing the chance to grab some "free goods" or indulge in a bit of casual violence.

The reason for the riots starting are many and a lot of it has to do with social conditions. People are angry that massive cuts are being made to social and welfare resources in the wake of the worldwide recession. Since our Government (albeit a coalition) is being led by the Conservatives (equivalent to the US Republicans but with even more of a historical bias towards the rich), it seems that the poorer members of society are being penalised while stories are continually emerging of those in the banking industry (who caused the whole problem in the first place) enjoying luxury dinners and celebrating bonuses by buying themselves sports cars. It makes it all the more unpalatable considering that several of these banks were bailed out by the taxpayer and are mostly owned by the Government (on paper, anyway). So effectively speaking, we paid for their mistakes and are now having our support systems removed even further as a result. Bit of a kick in the teeth really considering we had no choice in the matter!

All this and more produced tensions in communities with a higher proportion of welfare recipients and it took one instance of police heavyhandedness to spark things off and turn those frustrations into anger and defiance. Remember the LA riots after the Rodney King incident? Similar sort of situation and America has guns! This completely destroys the article author's point IMHO.

There are an ever-increasing amount of gun crimes being committed here in the UK and the presence of guns doesn't make anyone feel safer, it just produces more violent criminality and more death. Besides, you can regulate gun ownership but it only takes one psycho or egotistical idiot to wield that weapon in a dangerous manner and you have a problem. Look at some of the videos of the police response to previous demonstrations (even the "legal", peaceful ones) and you get a fair idea of what can happen when power and guns mix. Poor old Ian Tomlinson was killed for simply being at the wrong place at the wrong time by a policeman who cared more about a show of strength than the welfare of the people who he was supposed to protect.

Anyway, I could keep going but I think I've made a fair point so far!

In America everybody should carry a gun on them at all times. Are you going to break into a house when you know that the owner might shoot you as soon as he sees you? Unlikely... I know of some American towns where they have a law stating that they need to have a gun on them at all times (but that it isn't enforced), and there is a very simple reason for this. Criminals will carry and use guns regardless of what the laws are. So by banning guns you are just penalising the innocent law-abiding citizens.

But in Britain the case is different. Guns aren't as easily accessible as they are in American and so we can have a lot more control over them. If guns were rampant throughout the streets and every criminal had one then yes I would absolutely legalise carrying a gun. But as far as I'm aware guns in Britain are few and far between (correct me if I'm wrong).

There is no overwhelming need for everyone in Britain to have a gun and Mark is absolutely correct. It would likely only make things worse. There are almost certainly a lot of other and more effective ways of reducing crime than just giving everyone a weapon.