Tag: UK

Cherry-Picking

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Or just plain lying.

First, read SayUncle’s Quote of the Day.

Then, read Joe Huffman’s Quote of the Day.

Then, read the article Joe’s QotD comes from.

The specific bit I’d like to point out from an article ostensibly about the accidental death of an eight-year-old is this:

Data collected by the Centre For Disease Control And Prevention shows that on an average day, three American children die in gun accidents or suicides.

(Emphasis mine.)

Are they intimating here that young Christopher Bizilj intentionally shot himself?

I went to the CDC’s WISQARS site to check on their statistics.  Let’s stipulate that “children” are 17 years old or younger.  Accidental deaths by firearm for children up through 17 years of age for the year 2007 (latest data available):  112.  Suicide by firearm for children up through 17 years of age for the same year:  325.  Combined, 437.

Four hundred thirty-seven divided by three hundred sixty-five is (carry the one):  not quite 1.2 per day.

Not three (3).  Not two (2).  One point two.

And to get THAT number, they have to combine accidents AND SUICIDES, where suicides represent THREE QUARTERS of the total.

I have to ask again:  The real numbers are bad enough – why must they inflate them?

(Edited to add)  More of the same here:

Meanwhile, the shootings continue – more than 30,000 deaths a year, most of them individual killings that are barely reported,

That’s because more than half of them are suicides, by definition “individual killings” that don’t merit much reporting seeing that the US is firmly in the middle-of-the-road for suicide rates, and at the lower-end for high GDP nations.

A Land Fit for Criminals

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One of the books in my queue is David Fraser’s A Land Fit for Criminals:  An Insider’s View of Crime, Punishment and Justice in the UK. The synopsis states:

In this meticulously researched study of the British criminal justice system, author David Fraser, a long-serving Senior Probation Officer, offers a clear-sighted and persuasive analysis of how and why the country faces the spiraling crime figures it does today. Fraser addresses government policy since World War II, showing how the belief that ‘prisons do not work’ became a central plank of criminal justice policy and charts the disastrous consequences that this had for the British public. He examines in detail how the workings of government, Civil Service, judiciary, police and Probation Service have all become perverted by a philosophy that seeks to uphold the ‘rights’ of the criminal rather than those of their victims. Finally, he argues that only by sending the country’s large numbers of persistent criminals to prison for increasingly long periods will we be able to head off the social, political and civic catastrophe that looms in Britain today. Accessible and lucidly written, “A Land Fit for Criminals” will appeal to both those involved in the criminal justice system and to general readers concerned about the issues affecting Britain today.

The book was published in 2006. Four years later, nothing much seems to have changed.  In a recent headline from The London Evening Standard entitled Clarke tackles record jail numbers, we get this update on the British “justice” system:

Murderers could serve less time in prison under Government plans that would see shorter sentences, fewer criminals in jail and more offenders handed fines or community sentences.

Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke outlined plans which would give judges more discretion over how long killers should spend behind bars.

A “simpler, more sensible” approach that “leaves the judge to do justice in the individual case” will be put in place.

Other plans include letting foreign nationals escape jail as long as they leave the UK forever, wiping the slate clean for young offenders when they reach 18 so they are not hindered by a criminal record, and halving sentences for those who plead guilty early.

As I’ve noted previously, it appears that a “life” sentence for murder in the UK is actually about 15 years.

Nope. Not much has changed at all.

What Vapid Editorial Comments Tell Us About the UK

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I ran across an editorial piece in the UK Telegraph today, What Teresa Lewis’s last meal of fried chicken and apple pie tells us about America. It’s really not worth reading, IMO.

But the comments are.

The author of the piece, Lucy Jones, makes her abhorrence for the death penalty apparent in the column, but in the comments, she goes one step farther:

I think it’s morally, absolutely, categorically wrong to take another person’s life. The details of the crime aren’t going to make a difference.

So, Lucy, if someone makes an attempt on your life, you should just lie back and think of England?

Quote of the Day – Education Edition

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From Theodore Dalrymple’s speech at the Harvard Club, November 2001:

One of the things that has happened in Britain, as I said, is that people are radically disconnected from their past – from the past of the country in which they live. To such an extent, as I’ve suggested to you, that the vast majority of people don’t even know when the Second World War was. Out of hundreds of sixteen to twenty year-old patients whom I’ve seen, very few – in fact, I think about three – have known with any degree of accuracy when the Second World War took place, and they’re not even capable of deducing from the fact that there was a Second World War that there was a First World War.

And in the circumstances, I regard it as a triumph when they tell me that the Second World War took place in the eighteenth Century, because that means that they know that there was another century. And quite often if I ask them anything about history, not just of their own country, but of the entire world, what they say is, “I don’t know because I wasn’t born then.” As if one could not be expected to know anything other than by personal acquaintance. And our educators, I think, have a lot to answer for because they have suggested that education should be of relevance to the children’s lives as they are lived, and of course the whole point of education is to make the world beyond that relevant, and of course interesting and important to them, otherwise they are utterly enclosed in the indescribably miserable world in which they find themselves.

Bad Gun Handling

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I’ve been watching the BBC TV SciFi program Torchwood. Breda got me hooked with her video clip of one character, Gwen, getting trained with firearms (in Blighty!)

But in one episode I just watched, Gwen’s training seems, well, deficient:

As far as I could tell in that episode, Gwen hadn’t fired a shot, yet the slide on her pistol is locked back, and she seems completely unaware of it.

Oopsie!

(This is the kind of thing that irks my wife when I notice it.)

UPDATE: And in a related post, Mrs. Borepatch comments on why it takes an American to actually pull a trigger. EXCELLENT piece.

Do it again, only HARDER!

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In the comments to yesterday’s post, “…only the strictest control of firearms will protect the public”, reader Richard wrote:

There are over 1/2 a million shotgun shooters here in the UK. Politically we are not going to be as easily oppressed as the 47,000 pistol shooters were. I live in hope that we will ride this out without any new legal idiocy despite the vileness of the left trading on peoples grief and loss.

Half a million! Sounds impressive, doesn’t it?

Let’s check that number. According to Home Office statistics as reported by the Guardian, here are the numbers since 1995:

So, as of 2008/09 574,000 people have shotgun certificates, and 138,728 people have firearm certificates. What’s the difference between the two? As I understand it, a shotgun certificate will allow you to possess smoothbore long-guns capable of firing not more than two shells before reloading. A firearm certificate will allow you to possess both rifled and smoothbore long-guns capable of holding more than two rounds.

British subjects are forbidden from possessing centerfire and rimfire handguns, semi-automatic and pump-action centerfire rifles, and anything fully-automatic. Short-barreled rifles and shotguns are similarly verboten. However, suppressors (silencers) are readily available over there with little hassle. Go figure.

The data above is for England and Wales, excluding Scotland and Northern Ireland. The current population of England and Wales is estimated at about 54.5 million. Given this, approximately one person in a hundred holds a shotgun certificate there. Approximately one person in five hundred holds the more stringent firearm certificate. And there must be significant overlap between the two groups. I am reminded here of St. George Tucker’s 1803 commentary in his American Blackstone law text concerning our Second Amendment:

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep,(sic) and bear arms, shall not be infringed. Amendments to C. U. S. Art. 4.

This may be considered as the true palladium of liberty …. The right of self defence is the first law of nature: in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine this right within the narrowest limits possible. Wherever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any colour or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction. In England, the people have been disarmed, generally, under the specious pretext of preserving the game: a never failing lure to bring over the landed aristocracy to support any measure, under that mask, though calculated for very different purposes. True it is, their bill of rights seems at first view to counteract this policy: but the right of bearing arms is confined to protestants, and the words suitable to their condition and degree, have been interpreted to authorise the prohibition of keeping a gun or other engine for the destruction of game, to any farmer, or inferior tradesman, or other person not qualified to kill game. So that not one man in five hundred can keep a gun in his house without being subject to a penalty.

Just barely over one percent of the population of England and Wales owns firearms. They’ve got just a bit farther to go to get to that one in five hundred number for all firearms. “Without being subject to a penalty,” that is.

Sorry, Richard, but 98% of the population can steamroller just over one percent like they aren’t even there. And it doesn’t take 98%. It takes less than 51%. A lot less, depending on voter turnout.

What happens when only one percent of the population possesses something? The majority of the rest of the population has no firsthand knowledge of it. All they know of it they learn from where? The media, generally. Or they don’t learn anything at all.

What do people fear? The unknown.

Here’s an admittedly biased sample of comments from that Guardian piece:

I am so angry by what has happened today in Cumbria that I think that it is time that we had a radical change in our approach to gun ownership in this country. I think this has to start with a referendum on whether the public should be allowed to own firearms at all. I know that this will rile the gun lobby in this country and those who believe that they have a right to bag the odd rabbit, grouse or even clay pigeon, but is one single life worth appeasing the minority who get a kick out of their double barrels? I’d rather see hunting with hounds come back than have guns available. I’ve heard it said earlier on the radio that these murders could have been done with any weapon, but surely not as fast and as lethally as this. You can’t wander around a county strangling and stabbing innocent people as quickly as this guy did with 2 guns!

Let’s get a majority opinion, once and for all, on whether such deadly devices should be so widely available. I don’t believe that most sensible people would believe that anyone other than the Police and armed forces should have access to them. It’s not ‘totalitarian’ to say that it should be the decision of the majority of people in the country whether individuals should be allowed to own leathal(sic) weapons. – “Sefidahjan”

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I don’t know why someone who isn’t a hunter needs a gun at home. – “Summertimephantasy “

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The gun lobby always say that the problem isn’t with them, the law abiding good folk who have licenses. They say the problem is illegal, inner city gun ownership. Sorry, but I’m just as afraid of a person who has a license as someone who doesn’t. For those of us who see no point in firearms, a gun is a gun! – “Sefidahjan” again.

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Living in the British countryside where gun ownership is quite common.
Its too easy for licensed gun holders to obtain weapons and ammunition, when they flip. There are probably hundreds of mentally unstable gun owner who could potentially turn their guns on their families, others or themselves.
The police seem to have little interest in addressing the potential problems.

A public list of licenced gun owners would be useful so mental problems and other character issues could be notified to the authorities to alert them of potential problems and misuse. – “Sleaseball”

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How do you find out if there’s a gun-nut in your community? Are license addresses available? I think I want to know. – “Danceswithcats”

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You put your finger on the problem, though, which is that the ‘vetting’ obviously isn’t working. At the moment renewals occur every five years and they seem to be fairly standard criminal record checks. What’s needed is an annual psychological assessment of the individuals (at their own expense). – “DonutHingeParty”

I said in my earlier piece that I expected there to be legislation presented very shortly to ban shotguns and .22 rifles, but on further consideration I don’t believe that will be the case. They’ve already done that with full-autos, semi-autos, pump-actions, and all handguns. It’s time for a change in tactics, and “DonutHingeParty” has the answer: Make getting and keeping a firearm or shotgun certificate even more difficult, expensive, tedious and insulting than it already is.

Look at what the UK’s current death-by-a-thousand-cuts strategy has accomplished so far. Here’s a graph of homicide in England and Wales from 1898 through the 2007/2008 recording period. Bear in mind that the way they keep statistics over there has changed more than once during this period, and there is no data for 1939 as they were a bit busy at that time.

And another for “Violence against the person,” as it is kept by the police statisticians:

This data comes from Police Recorded Crime data available from the UK Home Office in Excel spreadsheet form. Obviously something changed between 1997 and 1999/2000 in their record keeping, but Britain has been declared the most violent country in Europe. As you cans see from the graphs above, the Brits have never been much into killing each other, but banning firearms hasn’t lowered their homicide rates, nor has it lowered their other violent crime rates.

In short, it hasn’t made them safer, even though that’s what they’ve been promised each and every time the laws have been ratcheted tighter. And the public hasn’t learned any better, either, because in the majority they still support ever more restrictive gun laws.

After all, the philosophy cannot be wrong! Do it again, only HARDER!