Carrying a weapon for self-defence: is it acceptible?

[Cryozombie]

but the aim should still be to escape (assuming avoidance has failed).

I totaly agree wity that... BUT there are certain circumstances where you absoultley cant, or maybe, shouldnt flee... I wouldnt flee from a home invasion and leave a child in the house with the invaders, for example.

As far as use of deadly force goes, the real fact is, unless your name is Ms Cleo, you just never know. Is the guy gonna be content to throw the TV at you and run? Or are him and his buddy gonna knock you down with the TV and put the boots to you till you are dead or dying? Same with the drunk in the pub... is he gonna swing a few times and be done, or decide to break a bottle and cut you with it?

Fights of any kind on the street are NOT the fights we got into on the playground or in the schoolyard. Teacher isn't gonna come break it up and send us to the principles office. I would ALWAYS assume that if someone is starting a fight with me, and it escalates all the way to violence, that their intention isnt to punch me and be done with it. Ive watched enough video footage of "street fights" and seen enough bar fights to know that dude often will put the boots to you when you are down just to make a point.

Does it obligate you to shoot someone? Of course not. Someone commented earlier in this thread that the responsible thing in carrying a weapon is know how to use it. I say thats only partially true... its probably more important, if you carry a weapon to know responsibly WHEN to use it.

 

[Rich Parsons]

So trying to kill them is the always the only way. If your first defence, say a punch, only stuns them enough for you to escape, you should follow up until they are dead anyway? Cool, Mr Morally enlightened.

Dude Buy a CLUE will you. What you think and what is moral and what is legal are all different depending upon your back ground for morality, and location for legality.

So while you have an opinion so do others, and you might get better results with people without the sarcasm or the attitude.

Just a note from a long time poster.

Peace

 

[elder999]

We then come across a moral/practical limitation with certain weapons, particularly firearms; these are by their nature lethal force in most contexts. They cannot be used in a scalable fashion unless, perhaps you pistol-whip someone which I wouldn't recommend. If you face the situation that Elder and I discussed earlier where you come downstairs to find two kids with your TV, if you are pointing a gun at them you cannot use the gun with non-lethal force - you could perhaps aim to miss just to give them a scare... but if they attacked you with the TV, even though it is hardly them using lethal force... BANG! -guns are a one-size-fits-all approach and so limited within a scalable response.
PS. NRA, guess I missed that course then....

Uhh...I'll say it again: birdshot. Your ignorance in this regard is showing....my shotgun (primary home defense weapon) is loaded so that the first thing out of it will be birdshot, which is likely to be less-than-lethal, even with the 45 minute response time of the ambulance corps.
In fact, my shotgun is loaded for a scalable response, just as you put it.

 

[elder999]

Oh, and Mr. kickcatcher? I really admire your adept intellectual dishonesty in misinterpreting statements, substituting your conclusions for statments, and ignoring questions that are only looking for clarification. Well done.....

 

[Cruentus]

Paul, if in your scenario you have a safe room, why are you going downstairs into the danger?

Lots of possible reasons.

#1. Just because you heard a noise, that doesn't mean that it is an intruder. I personally have had my cats knock down glass before, breaking it in the middle of the night. Cops don't want to come to your house unless you are sure that it is an an intruder, and not your cats. It is common to investigate if one is not sure, but assumes that it isn't someone breaking in.

#2. Depending on your circumstance, you may not want to let the intruder come to you, and you may want to create a barrier between you and them. This could mostly be the case if you have more vulnerable household members, like kids, that you don't want to get caught in a shootout.

That said, ordinarily it is better to stay in the safe room, especially if your SURE that there is an intruder, call the police, warn the intruder if they are coming near the safe room that you have a firearm and will shoot if the door opens.

Regardless, this is all sort of incidental to my previous point.

Paul

 

[elder999]

Your smart, professional burglars case their jobs carefully and hit empty homes. The ones who hit when you are there have to be considered dangerous. Either they know you and your loved ones are at home and are prepared to deal with you forcibly, or they are so incredibly stupid or spaced out that they are dangerous to themselves and others.

You cannot, of course, use deadly force merely because the intruder is in your house, but , if he attacks you after forcing his way into your home, he is bought and paid for. The best thing, of course, is to keep him from getting in at all.

I’ve repelled burglary twice in my life; both times, the sound of my racking the slide on my pump action shotgunm and saying “GET OUT OF MY HOUSE,” was enough for the burglar to run for it. If he didn’t, well, yes, I’d have shot him.

You’d have to be truly crazy and dangerous to not run at the sound of that…..

The locksmith will tell you it’s all about locks. The alarm salesman will tell you it’s all about alarms. The guy at the puppy mill may tell you that all you need is a watchdog, and the clerk at the gunshop may tell you that the gun is the be-all and end-all.

Don’t fall for it. I hate to sound like a yuppie here, but you need a holistic approach. You need it all. We live waaaay out in the woods, though, so the alarm isn't going to do much besides wake me up-average response time for the sheriff is about 45 minutes. We've got really good locks and motion-sensor activated lighting.

Dogs are great. They sense things you can’t sense, they smell things you can’t smell, and they intimidate people you may not be able to intimidate. A burglar climbing in a window was taken at gunpoint by a woman. He snarled at her, “You ain’t got the balls to shoot me.” Wrong sentiment. She blew him away. You know if she’d had a slavering Rottweiler at her side, I really don’t think that dude would have looked at the dog and said, “You ain’t got the balls to bite me.”

You Brits are (imho) royally screwed,……

 

[KenpoTex]

But going back to morals, I still cannot buy that a person should be morally obliged to apply lethal force in circrmstances where they are facing (credible) threat of deadly force - though I'm not saying that they shouldn't - but the aim should still be to escape (assuming avoidance has failed).

In general, when faced with a situation in public places, I'd agree that escape is the desired option (although I don't feel that you should be required to retreat if you are innocent of any wrongdoing...go Florida!). However, there are a variety of reasons why you might not be able to SAFELY escape. 1) The attacker(s) might be between you and your point of escape. 2) You might be physically incapable of escaping safely. 3) You might not be able to escape due to a responsibilty to protect a family member or friend who is unable to safely escape. If you cannot safely (without putting yourself further at risk or failing to eliminate the threat) escape, then your best option at this point becomes meeting the threat with whatever level of force is necessary to eliminate the threat, up to and including deadly force.

When it comes to defense within the home I have a different policy. I'm one of those "unenlightened" people who still believe that a man's home is his "castle" so to speak. NOBODY is going to run me out of my home, especially if there are also family members in the home. In other words, while I would try to escape if confronted with a threat in a public place, I am not going to retreat in my own home...period.
There have been a number of studies which show that most criminals go out of their way to avoid breaking into an occupied house. Why? because they are admittedly more afraid of the consequenses of running into an armed homeowner than they are of the "slap on the wrist" they will recieve if they're somehow caught by the police. (I'm not going to take the time to find the info. right now but it's easy enough to access if anyone cares enough to look).
Why is this relevant? Since criminals generally try to "case" the premises to ensure that no one is home, it seems logical to conclude that if they break in while you are there, they know you're there. If they decide to break in despite the fact that you are home, one can reasonably assume that they are fully willing to use force to carry out their goal whether it's burglary, rape, etc. (Elder mentioned a lot of this). This being the case, I think that it's logical to treat any home invasion as a viable threat to your safety. I'm not going to assume that the person is only there to steal my TV or computer. I feel that in the case of a home invasion it is perfectly acceptable to immediately respond with the maximum amount of force available until the threat has been eliminated. If I felt that I had time to warn them or give them a chance to surrender so be it, if this could not be done safely however, I'm wouldn't put myself at any further risk by hesitating.

 

[WingChun Lawyer]

WCL, is there not an issue that the force being threatened must be proportional to the crime? Like if you dropped a chocolate bar wrapper on the pavement (where it is illegal) and someone pointed a knife at you and told you to await the police, even if you believed that they were going to stab you (despite their words) it would (/should) be illegal to attempt a disarm?

To take it full circle, is pointing a gun at an unarmed burglar proportional? Clearly some people think it is.

In Brazil, the amount of force used should be proportional to the threat, and should not exceed what is necessary to eliminate the threat.

In the example you pointed, yes, it would be legal to attempt a disarm, because a threat in Brazil is a crime - dirtying the streets is not a crime here. That disarming attempt would constitute legitimate defense against a crime.

Pointint a gun at an unarmed burglar, in Brazil, is OK. Actually shooting is probably not OK, unless you have good reason to believe he was going to draw a weapon of some kind.

Incidentally, in Brazil self defense means you don´t have to retreat, even if you have the option to do that. Sure, the judge will consider that possibility if you are faced with excessive violence charges, but you are under no obligation to run away, even if you are not at home.

 

[Phil Elmore]

Your ignorance in this regard is showing

Precisely. With few exceptions, those who speak out most strongly against weapons simply don't understand them. Their ignorance of the objects of their contempt and fear hamstrings these critics in their attempts to argue their ill-conceived opinions.

 

[WingChun Lawyer]

Precisely. With few exceptions, those who speak out most strongly against weapons simply don't understand them. Their ignorance of the objects of their contempt and fear hamstrings these critics in their attempts to argue their ill-conceived opinions.

So, Phil. Would you sell guns to the iraqis right now? I mean, I am sure they need all the protection they can get against those darned terrorists and criminals, and they probably need the democracy as well. I am quite sure many of them could be converted to martialism, since they do have families they would like to protect.

So, would you open a weapons shop in Baghdad?

 

[kickcatcher]

Uhh...I'll say it again: birdshot. Your ignorance in this regard is showing....my shotgun (primary home defense weapon) is loaded so that the first thing out of it will be birdshot, which is likely to be less-than-lethal, even with the 45 minute response time of the ambulance corps.

I heard you the first time. If you think shooting someone at close range with birdshot is not deadly force, you need to stop kidding yourself. Phil says he understands guns, he will no doubt back me up on this. lol.

 

[elder999]

I heard you the first time. If you think shooting someone at close range with birdshot is not deadly force, you need to stop kidding yourself. Phil says he understands guns, he will no doubt back me up on this. lol.

It certainly could be, but it's less than lethal enough to legally demonstrate an intention not to kill, especially in the home-which is all the justification, legal, moral and otherwise, that I need to use deadly force, and the law backs me up on this.

 

[Cruentus]

It certainly could be, but it's less than lethal enough to legally demonstrate an intention not to kill, especially in the home-which is all the justification, legal, moral and otherwise, that I need to use deadly force, and the law backs me up on this.

I'm not so sure about that; that is, bird shot being considered less then lethal by law. However, I agree that if your in your home, you are generally in the right to point a gun at an intruder.

 

[elder999]

I'm not so sure about that; that is, bird shot being considered less then lethal by law. However, I agree that if your in your home, you are generally in the right to point a gun at an intruder.

I said legally demonstrate an intention; the same could be said of a baseball bat, and they could as easily wind up dead.....

 

[Cruentus]

I said legally demonstrate an intention; the same could be said of a baseball bat, and they could as easily wind up dead.....

Even so, I am still not so sure about that. The law looks at lethal force alegorically like a line in the sand; once crossed it is hard to legally argue that intent wasn't present. A baseball bat to the head, for example, is still considered lethal force. There is no way that an arguement along the lines of, "I didn't want to kill him" would hold water. I understand what you are saying, and certianly hitting someone with bird shot and not killing them would be better (depending on the situation) then killing them with buck shot. However, I am not sure that your choice of bird shot will legally matter because a gun is brought into the fray, and a gun is a tool of lethal force.

Paul

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Coming in from the side here, I have to say that to an extent all the arguments hold some merit here. There are cultural and other differences at play though. Someone from the Metro Chicago/NY/Detroit areas would have a different opinion than someone in rural America, or in a nation with low violent crime rates.

If you carry a weapon, regardless of what it is, knife, pepper spray, firearm, you had better know how to use it, when to use it, and why you use it. You also better know when to stop using it, otherwise you can become the badguy when the boys in blue arrive.

Good discussion, but, lets leave the little digs aside eh? Thanks.

 

[elder999]

Even so, I am still not so sure about that. The law looks at lethal force alegorically like a line in the sand; once crossed it is hard to legally argue that intent wasn't present. A baseball bat to the head, for example, is still considered lethal force. There is no way that an arguement along the lines of, "I didn't want to kill him" would hold water. I understand what you are saying, and certianly hitting someone with bird shot and not killing them would be better (depending on the situation) then killing them with buck shot. However, I am not sure that your choice of bird shot will legally matter because a gun is brought into the fray, and a gun is a tool of lethal force.

Paul

A gun is a tool of lethal force-even with rubber bullets and other "less than lethal" rounds like the old rock salt thing, we're agreed on that-those things kill people all the time. I'll look around a bit, I'm certain that not only has the arument been used in New Mexico, but that it was nearly unecessary, as the shooting took place in the shooter's home....and he didn't kill him, of course...

 

[Chris Thompson]

I have to agree with those who say there is no moral duty to try to escape from a person who has assaulted you or entered your home. In doing so, they have violated your most basic rights as a human being, and you are fully justified in standing your ground and responding aggressively to the violation.
Having said that, I wouldn't use lethal force against a burglar unless they forced me to, because I wouldn't want to have that on my conscience. In my city, there was case where a homeowner shot and killed three unarmed men who had come to his house to pick a fight with him after an argument in a bar. He was arrested and tried, but the jury refused to convict him. The general feeling was that if they hadn't gone to his home and threatened him they would not have gotten shot. People also felt that the guy was a loose cannon and no one much wanted him around after that, so he had to move away.

-Chris Thompson

 

[WingChun Lawyer]

Chris Thompson: THREE men against one guy, threatening him in his house? No wonder he was not convicted for using a gun.

 

[Chris Thompson]

>Chris Thompson: THREE men against one guy, threatening him in his house? No wonder he was not convicted for using a gun.>

The situation was a little more complex than my brief summation. They came to his house, but I don't think they got in. If I remember correctly they were in his yard shouting threats and he came out with his gun. Exactly what happened after that was unclear. Some said that one of the guys was shot while taking a leak on his wall, but this wasn't publicly confirmed. The jury felt that whatever it was, it wasn't murder. The locals felt that he was a little too trigger-happy for their comfort. Basically he was acquitted and then run out of town.

-Chris Thompson