Fedaykin wrote: There is another issue as well which came to me as I was pondering it yesterday evening, this is a country where the Death Penalty is not legal, what do you think the cultural and judicial considerations would be if we extended the right to the general public to perform extrajudicial capital punishment when that sentence is not even legal under our court system.
To avoid any long discussions I am:
a) Against the death penalty
b) Because I find it repugnant
c) It should never be returned to and if you want a reason Google David Bentley
The use of force, up to and including lethal, should the circumstances dictate, is already legislated for and in fact enshrined, in Common Law. There would be no "extending the right to perform extrajudicial capital punishment". The only thing denied is actually the tools to be able to exercise the right of defending oneself, one's property or another, particularly in a public place.
Criminals are predators. If you're young, strong and in company, generally you are safe. If you have or show weakness, you are vulnerable. As with animals, "if you look like food you will be eaten". It's no good relying on passers-by to assist, they sure just as vulnerable and scared. The police, unfortunately, are unlikely to make it to your rescue in time. The numbers font add up there. But I will tell you what the police are really, really good at, especially in the UK, and that is evidence gathering. Few murders go unsolved, but justice will be served.
Well, that's if you believe justice is 17 years on average, served in a prison that will allow you 12 hours a day out of your cell, access to healthcare at a moments notice, education free of charge, up to PhD. Gymnasiums that would cost a fortune to join the equivalent on the outside and then, towards the end of that 17 years, an open prison that will allow you out on licence every day, for five days a week, so you can get your own job or education, then let you out on the sixth day to visit family.... Yep, justice the British way. Any wonder violent, predatory criminals don't fear "justice".
So you mention Derek Bently.... Yes, I too was anti death penalty but after 24 years in the criminal justice system. But for every Derek Bently or Ruth Ellis you cite, I know 100 others that make an outstanding case for the reintroduction of the death penalty. The fact is, there are some people, who's course of conduct or life style choice, who just simply need shooting in the chest or dancing at the bottom of a rope....
So what really sets you against the concept? The fear that ordinary people will then become murderous psychopaths or that gunfights in shopping centre carparks over spaces? There is absolutely nothing evidentially, anecdotal or other wise that shows this as a potential. Quite frankly, in localities where such measures have been introduced, huge drops in crime is reported and society actually becomes more pleasant, some saying more polite. There are still far more good people around than bad. Opportunity to utilise a defensive tool does not change that. What it does change is criminal behaviour. Crime, as the evidence dictates, is that of a nature where the perpetrator reduces drastically his chances of coming into contact with a member of the public. Theft from unattended park cars and burglary of commercial businesses feature highly.
The routine arming of the police is not that far away, relatively. Discussions on Sky news the day after the Paris attack brought the subject again to the fore. We still hear the 2006 Federation survey being pulled out to state that "rank and file" coppers don't even want it. Well I sat round the table with eight rank and file of both genders, and a wide variety of ages and service, send to a person, we have a different opinion to that survey.
We have one of the home countries of the UK who are fully armed off and on duty. Throw into the mix of other officials such as prison or UKBF or NCA and even retired personnel and other civilians armed, in public, whilst going about their lawful lives. Where's the massacres over the last chicken in Sainsburys there? Somewhat ironic considering the amount of misery that guns and violence have brought Northern Ireland over the last four decades, that the people of the Province and the authorities there have a much more pragmatic attitude towards firearms.
Perhaps you're fortunate enough to live in a nice place and never have to venture to the wrong side of the tracks in your daily live. But some us don't and some of us have to go to the worst places and deal with the worst people that society has to offer. Some of us have had to fight for our lives, literally. And when injured and covered in someone else's blood, having had dig as deep as anyone has ever had to, in order to summon the strength and fortitude to continue, certainly does focus your mind on the whole issue. Try CPR on a young man where you can feel the broken bones in his chest where he was effectively kicked to death for nothing more than his up to date mobile phone. Try telling the husband that purely by chance it was his wife that was dragged into the van after being approached and chased through the car park after the last train.
Where you, the pessimist, see wrongful conviction and lawless ness, I see strength. I see the countless victims of violence and violent or intrusive crime. Where you wish to abdicate your responsibility to your own safety, I wish to strength in a collectiveness that refuses to bow to the criminals. The government will tell you reported crime is down. Everything else will tell you that is because society no longer tells the police because the state have failed to protect their public from harm, despite there being those of us who would offer ourselves to save you and yours....
