The state is not your friend, so do what you have to do and if you drive off some thugs, do not call the police after it is all over as nothing good will come of that. — Perry de Havilland, Samizdata – Defend yourself and be a vigilante
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Taking the Law into Your Own Hands
I was fascinated to read England riots: When is it right to turn vigilante? at the BBC website. Excerpts:
Stories are emerging of Londoners forming vigilante groups to protect their homes and businesses, but police have warned this is making matters worse.
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…little by little a picture is emerging of Londoners beginning to fight back against the wave of violence – in some cases by taking the law into their own hands.
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But when is it right to take the law into your own hands?
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But are those who take the law into their own hands to protect shops and homes more of a hindrance than a help?
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He urged people not to take the law into their own hands.
I keep remembering Sir Robert Peel’s Nine Principles of Modern Policing, the seventh of which is:
Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
But now, we are told, taking those duties seriously is “taking the law into our own hands.”
Uh, that’s where it’s supposed to be. Principle No. 1 is
The basic mission for which the police exist is to prevent crime and disorder.
You’ll note, they’re not too good at that.
But “vigilantes” are.
I don’t advocate chasing looters and arsonists down and beating ’em to a pulp – that’s not the duty of citizens. Detaining them, however, for retrieval by authorities is. That’s why there is such a thing as the power of citizen’s arrest. This power traces back to “Anglo Saxon law in medieval England.” I guess they’ve “Progressed” themselves right out of it.
Perry de Havilland at Samizdata has more on the subject. Tomorrow’s Quote of the Day comes from that piece.
We’ll see how many people get prosecuted for protecting their own property after the riots finally settle down. After all, according to UK law:
The term ‘offensive weapon’ is defined as: “any article made or adapted for use to causing injury to the person, or intended by the person having it with him for such use”.
True,
The courts have been reluctant to find many weapons as falling within the first limb of the definition and reliance should usually be placed upon the second. On that basis, it must be shown that the defendant intended to use the article for causing injury
However, standing outside your property with a half-dozen friends or family members, all armed with baseball or cricket bats, axe handles or steel pipe in anticipation of rioters pretty much meets the definition of threatening or causing fear. That’s the idea – make ’em sheer off somewhere else out of fear of seeing their own blood.
As I said in “(I)t’s most important that all potential victims be as dangerous as they can”,
Britain today represents a perfect example of the pacifist culture in control, because that culture doesn’t really distinguish between violent and predatory and violent but protective – it sees only violent. Their worldview is divided between violent and non-violent, or passive. There is an exception, a logical disconnect if you will, that allows for legitimate violence – but only if that violence is committed by sanctioned officials of the State. And even there, there is ambivalence. If violence is committed by an individual there is another dichotomy: If the violence is committed by a predator, it is the fault of society in not meeting that predator’s needs. The predator is the creation of the society, and is not responsible for the violence. He merely needs to be “cured” of his ailment. If violence is committed by a defender, it is a failure of the defender to adhere to the tenets of the pacifist society. It is the defender who is at fault because he has lived by the rules and has chosen to break them, and who must therefore be punished for his transgression.
Thus defending your own property is “vigilantism,” not a duty “incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.”
Quote of the Day – British Riots Edition
Phil B., expat Brit and current resident of Middle Earth emails a link to Counting Cats in Zanzibar from which comes the QotD:
One thing that is quite interesting though is that this demonstrates how weak the authorities’ grasp on power really is. Numerous commentators throughout history have noted that even the cruelest dictator rules by consent; if the people do form a mass against him, he cannot prevail. A lot of people are saying, “why are the police letting this happen?” and while we’re all I’m sure going to play armchair quarterback with this for many happy internet-arguing weeks to come, there does seem to be that lesson here that mass resistance- or rather, a kind of mass ignoring of the hypothetical “social contract”- leaves government/governance reeling, especially in a nominally liberal polity. It makes you realise just how compliant we are; ten million smokers or whatever the number is, all dutifully trooping outside to have a ciggie. The authorities rule by the presumption and acceptance of power, and when people just ignore them they lose control very quickly.
This scares the snot out of those presumptively in power, and you know what to expect of frightened animals.
Billy Beck has been preaching civil disobedience as the tool to wrest back our liberty – not, as Counting Cats says, “run(ing) outside and set(ting) fire to World Of Carpets and steal(ing) mobile phones”, but simple refusal to comply – stop paying taxes. Stop feeding the Beast. Unfortunately, for this to be effective it must also be widespread. Pillaging and burning has the advantage of being (mostly) anonymous and, if you’re so inclined, fun. Refusing to pay your taxes? They have your number – literally.
So expect to see looting and arson, but principled civil disobedience? Not so much.
Snark or Prophecy?
A sign in the window of a Manchester Subway restaurant:
It reads: “Due to the imminent collapse of society we regret to announce we are closing at 6pm tonight.”
Found here.
I do still love the British “stiff upper lip.”
Too Little, Too Late?
Well, THIS is interesting, from Amazon.com.uk:
I guess a bunch of people over in Ol’ Blighty have figured out that they are responsible for their own protection first, regardless of what their government tells them.
Either that, or American baseball has developed a tremendous following.
Odd about the lack of glove and ball purchases though…
Quote of the Day – English Riot Edition
The British state lectures, hectors and micro-manages the law-abiding. When it comes to defending them, it is, all too often, AWOL. — Andrew Stuttaford
Brilliant!
First this:
<img 
Now this:
That’s no moon, that’s our national debt! And our economic Titanic continues to sink.
A Third Day of Rioting in London
Trevor Reeves said his business which has been in his family for five generations has been “completely trashed”
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Shops were looted and buildings set alight as police clashed with youths. The trouble also spread to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Bristol.
- Several fires broke out in Croydon, including one at a large sofa factory which spread to neighbouring buildings and tram lines
- In Hackney 200 riot officers with dogs and mounted police were located around Mare Street where police cars were damaged
- Looters raided a Debenhams store and a row of shops in Lavender Hill in Clapham, as well as shops in Stratford High Street
- A Sony warehouse in Solar Way, Enfield, a shopping centre in Woolwich New Road, a timber yard in Plashet Grove, East Ham and a building on Lavender Hill were all on fire
- More than 100 people looted a Tesco store in Bethnal Green, the Met said, and two officers were injured
- Cars were set on fire in Lewisham
- A bus and shop were set alight in Peckham
- Buses were diverted as the violence spread to Bromley High Street
- There were reports of looting of phone shops in Woolwich High Street, in south London, and a torched police car
- Shops and restaurants were damaged in Ealing, west London, and there was a fire in Haven Green park opposite Ealing Broadway Tube
- Football matches at Charlton and West Ham which were due to be played on Tuesday have been postponed at the request of the police
- At Clapham Junction looters stole masks from a fancy dress store to hide their identity
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One resident in Croydon, who gave his name as Adam, said he saw two cars which had been set on fire.
He said: “One older woman was dragged out and they set the car on fire. Then another car around the corner was on fire, then we counted about 12 to 15 shops that had been looted.
“The looting started about three hours ago. I just came back into my apartment and the looting was still going on – not a single policeman.”
That’s not all that unusual in incidents like this. There just aren’t enough police. So what you get is:
What you won’t see is this:
Those are Koreans protecting a shop during the Los Angeles riots in 1992, when the police were nowhere to be found. You won’t see pictures of people defending their property against looters in London – that would get them arrested.
I expect the number of Brits fleeing Airstrip One for greener pastures will now increase above the 200,000 or so that have been leaving annually.
UPDATE:
Police lose control of streets shop owners form local “protection units”
News Desk 9am Sunday
Shop owners along Wood Green, Turnpike Lane and Green Lanes, the majority of which are of Kurdish or Turkish owned have formed local protection units following riots in Tottenham which have spilled over to Wood Green.
“We do not have any trust in the local police, our shops are next on the target list by the thugs who have ransacked Tottenham, we will protect our property”, said a leading member of the Green Lanes “unit”.
Shop owners have been seen by London Daily News reporters carrying crow bars, and other objects in case of attacks.
But, thankfully, no pictures which would be used as evidence against them.
The Tools and Mechanisms of Oppression
Ayn Rand wrote in her frighteningly prophetic 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged many warnings, among which was this:
There is no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is to crack down on criminals. When there aren’t enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking the law. Create a nation of lawbreakers and then you can cash in on the guilt. Now that’s the system!
The Geek with a .45 wrote, back 2004 and unfortunately no longer available at his site, this warning:
We, who studied the shape and form of the machines of freedom and oppression, have looked around us, and are utterly dumbfounded by what we see.
We see first that the machinery of freedom and Liberty is badly broken. Parts that are supposed to govern and limit each other no longer do so with any reliability.
We examine the creaking and groaning structure, and note that critical timbers have been moved from one place to another, that some parts are entirely missing, and others are no longer recognizable under the wadded layers of spit and duct tape. Other, entirely new subsystems, foreign to the original design, have been added on, bolted at awkward angles.
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We know the tools and mechanisms of oppression when we see them. We’ve studied them in depth, and their existence on our shores, in our times, offends us deeply. We can see the stirrings of malevolence, and we take stock of the damage they’ve caused over so much time.
Others pass by without a second look, with no alarm or hue and cry, as if they are blind, as if they don’t understand what they see before their very eyes. We want to shake them, to grasp their heads and turn their faces, shouting, “LOOK! Do you see what this thing is? Do you see how it might be put to use? Do you know what can happen if this thing becomes fully assembled and activated?”
Assembly and activation proceeds apace.
Three recent books come to mind, Three Felonies A Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent by Harvey Silverglate, Go Directly to Jail: The Criminalization of Almost Everything by Gene Healy, and The Tyranny of Good Intentions: How Prosecutors and Law Enforcement Are Trampling the Constitution in the Name of Justice by Paul Craig Roberts. There are others.
Just a few days ago, the Wall Street Journal reported that
For decades, the task of counting the total number of federal criminal laws has bedeviled lawyers, academics and government officials.
“You will have died and resurrected three times,” and still be trying to figure out the answer, said Ronald Gainer, a retired Justice Department official.
They’ve given up even trying to count them.
As I said in Malice vs. Stupidity
At some point it becomes immaterial whether the laws were due to incompetence or maliciousness. That point is when their implementation is indistinguishable from maliciousness. I submit that we’ve passed that point, and the only thing preventing even more massive public blowback is our general ignorance and our well-established general respect for the Rule of Law. As I’ve said, the .gov has done a good job of practicing such persecution on a retail level, rather than wholesale, but it’s getting to the point where the abuse is going wholesale and the stories are getting out to the mass audience.
And I’ve said elsewhere I think a lot of people are getting fed up with ever-increasing government intrusion into our lives. Government interferes lightly on a wholesale basis, but it does its really offensive intrusions strictly retail. So long as the majority gets its bread and circuses, it will remain content.
Until it happens to you. Then you get pissed right quick, and wonder why nobody hears your side of the story.
I’ve reported here at TSM on just a tiny fraction of these prosecutions; George Norris and his orchid import business, the persecution of Albert Kwan and the prosecution of Joseph Pelleteri are just some examples. Other bloggers have as well. Sebastian noted how an 11 year-old escaped the mailed fist of the law in Massachussetts with a mere suspension from school when he could have been prosecuted under felony law, for example. There are many, many, many more such examples. If you have your own, please feel free to leave them in the comments. Links would be appreciated.
But today’s post is inspired by a YouTube video I watched over at Jaded Haven. I’d not heard of the case, but I was not surprised. Go watch.
Still, you don’t have to be surprised to have an RCOB event.
A recent Rassmussen poll indicates:
(J)ust 17% of Likely U.S. Voters think the federal government today has the consent of the governed. Sixty-nine percent (69%) believe the government does not have that consent. Fourteen percent (14%) are undecided.
Is there any wonder why?
Tottenham Rampage
In 1909 the Tottenham Outrage occurred. A pair of anarchists armed with then-new semi-automatic pistols attempted to rob a local business payroll, and went on a shooting spree in their attempt to escape. Normal citizens joined in the pursuit, going so far as to provide privately-owned weapons to the normally unarmed police in pursuit. Their escape was foiled.
One hundred and two years later, same place, a different kind of outrage:
The riot that tore through parts of north London’s deprived Tottenham neighborhood has cast a pall over Britain’s capital, echoing an earlier era of racial unrest, while spreading malaise through a city preparing to host the Olympic Games.
Eight officers were hospitalized after a peaceful protest against the shooting death of a young man degenerated into a Saturday night rampage, with rioters torching a double-decker bus, destroying patrol cars and trashing a shopping mall.
Looters descended on the area around midnight, setting buildings alight, and piling stolen goods into cars and shopping carts. Sirens could be heard across the capital as authorities rushed reinforcements to the scene.
More information and pictures here.