Wretchard over at Belmont Club is
far more polite about this than I'm going to be. As a follow-up to Tuesday's post about gun control in Britain comes this
column by Dr. Ian Stephen published in The Scotsman which "advises" homeowners on what to do if faced by an intruder. It is difficult to express just how jaw-droppingly pathetic the state of affairs in Britain is if this is the homeowner's only recourse. But I'm gonna try anyway.
From a police perspective, the advice to potential victims of burglaries is unequivocal and clear-cut and you should never "have a go", so to speak, but for the victims of crime this is a very difficult thing to put into practice, especially when your natural instincts are to defend yourself, your family and your own property - the very pillars of your life that are being violated and potentially destroyed by criminals. (emphasis mine -RR)
Gee, do you think that this coule be a natural instinct for a reason? Like maybe it's a behavior that makes it more likely that you'll survive to procreate? Of course, anything as base as a natural instict is obviously bad in a socialist utopia. We must all suppress our insticts to the benevolent will of The Government. It will protect us and provide for all our needs. Except, of course, that it
CAN'T.
As a law-abiding individual confronted by an intruder in your home you face a catch-22. If you attack the burglar, or react in an "over the top" manner, as was recently illustrated in the case of Tony Martin who shot intruders in his Norfolk farmhouse, you will inevitably end up on the receiving end of a prison sentence that will far outstrip that imposed on the intruder in your own home. This situation has resulted in a lack of belief in the law among the public or rather a belief that the law isn’t exactly on your side when your home is broken into.
That's not a belief, that's a certainty. What we have here is legally mandated submission to someone who is committing a crime, potentially violent, against you and your property. It boggles the mind that there are people who actually believe this is the right way to go, not just in Britain but in the US as well.
To this end it is perhaps important not to dwell on the situation involving Mr Martin because, regardless of the appeal procedure he successfully went through to secure his freedom, in many ways the law still points to his particular attack on the intruders who entered his home as a pre-meditated assault. He had previously been the victim of a number of burglaries within his home and as a result of this he was effectively prepared for further intrusion and reacted as such when his farmhouse was broken into again.
I'm glad that he's not in prison but he shouldn't have been tried in the first place. His home had been burgled repeatedly, proving beyond any doubt that the police were acting as precisely zero deterrent to the criminals. So he decides to do something about it himself, perhaps remembering what it was like to be a Brit back in the days when the law actually protected people's rights. And when the practically inevitable happens and his home is invaded again, he takes action for which he is accused of and tried for the crime of "premeditated assault." Bullshit! Premeditated assault is when you initiate violence against someone else after having planned on doing so beforehand. What he did was self-defense, pure and simple. He
reacted to the initiation of a crime against him. He didn't start it, but he did finish it.
Now we come to the actions that Dr. Stephen says homeowners should take when someone breaks into their home while they are there:
When individuals are confronted by intruders there are some actions they should follow. Direct contact should be avoided whenever possible. If unavoidable, the victim should adopt a state of active passivity. In most cases the best form of defence is always avoidance. If this isn’t possible, act passively, be careful what you say or do and give up valuables without a struggle. This allows the victim to take charge of the situation, without the intruder’s awareness, through subtle and non-confrontational means. People can cooperate but initiate nothing. By doing nothing there is no chance of inadvertently initiating violence by saying something such as "Please don’t hurt me".
This sounds awfully familiar. Where have I heard this before? Oh yeah!
Right here. I love how he tries to make this "advice" more palatable to those Brits with spines by saying that this behavior "allows the victim to take charge of the situation...." One would have to be Reed Richards (or Plastic Man or Elasti-Girl) to stretch far enough for that one without hurting oneself.
Sometimes the perpetrator of a burglary is even more terrified than the victim and in many cases when things go wrong it is the perpetrator of the crime who panics. Although they sometimes go equipped with weapons, in most cases they probably don’t intend to use them but in the heat of the moment, and the fear of either getting caught or attacked themselves, they use them. They don’t expect the person they are trying to hold up to retaliate or react. Mostly the knife is there simply for intimidation rather than intent to use it and they finish up killing somebody by accident rather than design. (emphasis mine -RR)
It doesn't matter. I can't possibly know for sure whether he's terrified or stone-cold. I have to assume the worst-case scenario. If I assume the best-case and I'm wrong, well that's it for me. The sentence in bold is the real kicker. Of course they don't expect it, because they know the
LAW prohibits it! And I don't care whether or not he intends to use the knife. The fact that he brought it with him tells me that he has considered the possibility that he'd end up using it but brought it anyway.
This, of course, does not excuse their actions,...
Perhaps the only thing the good Doctor gets right in the whole article...
...but it is certainly worth taking on-board when you consider confronting an intruder. While saying this, in my own experience counselling victims of crime in recent years, there has also recently been a marked increase in the use or the threatened use of dangerous weapons in burglaries and common assaults. This, in itself, is a deeply worrying trend and, although not entirely excusing over-retaliation from homeowners, creates an understandable degree of sympathy for members of the public who lash out at intruders in their home. In truth it is an incredibly difficult situation to assess. (emphasis mine -RR)
Gee, the beginning of that marked increase wouldn't happen to coincide with another event, oh such as the prohibition of private handgun ownership? Not to mention the policy of punishing homeowners who defend their homes, regardless of the tool used, which is the whole reason this article even exists. And it's not that difficult at all. Some people actively handle a threat when it confronts them and naturally other people are going to sympathise with them. This guy is trying to spin the favorable attitude toward people who actively defend themselves as a bad thing so it's all the more easy to stamp that attitude out.
Dr. Stephen then starts playing psychologist and talks about how being the victim of a home invasion can lead to psychological problems, post-traumatic stress disorder, and so on. He finishes up with:
The trauma can be dealt with in a number of ways with professional help, counselling to develop effective coping strategies and taking time off from stressful professional activities. People who fail to seek help often develop further psychological problems. Men especially are not good at accepting support, but some simple counselling immediately after an attack can substantially reduce the risk of long-term psychological problems.
You know what would be just as effective? How about letting homeowners take the responsibility for their own safety, since the government certainly isn't protecting them. Uh-uh. Instead we get, "Oh it's okay. You can always undergo therapy to handle the psychological problems." Of course, in a country that has socialized medicine, it's just another "service" the government provides "for free." And that assumes you survive your ordeal, unlike John Monckton who didn't even get the chance to put this "advice" into practice before he was murdered.
I'm simply disgusted. There's a name for the state someone is in when they are completely subordinate to the will of another who can then take whatever he wants and do whatever he wants. It is the state that Dr. Stephen is saying that people faced with criminal intruders in their homes should voluntarily enter.
That state is slavery.
Update: Someone on Fark
posted the link to this article. The category tag he used, "asinine," is totally appropriate. The commenters appear to be in broad agreement with it as well.
