Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2(pesnta.1.2) 9/5/84; site scc.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxj!mhuxn!houxm!ihnp4!zehntel!hplabs!pesnta!scc!steiny From: steiny@scc.UUCP (Don Steiny) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Re: Bastille... actually about gun control Message-ID: <267@scc.UUCP> Date: Tue, 4-Dec-84 11:50:23 EST Article-I.D.: scc.267 Posted: Tue Dec 4 11:50:23 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 6-Dec-84 05:52:04 EST References: <128@decwrl.UUCP> Organization: Personetics, Inc. - Santa Cruz, Calif. Lines: 117 *** Time to post this again!! . . . The premise that handguns do not deter crime is not valid. The "Wall Street Journal", Aug. 17, 1983, page 1, has an article titlted "Can We Deny Citizens Both Guns and Protection?" by Don B. Kates. Jr. The article discusses a court ruling that the police were not required to protect citizens against criminals. They pointed out that in District of Columbia, where the incident took place (three women were robbed, terrorized, and repeatedly raped and police did not respond to any of the calls), gun control is in effect. They say that in the five years before gun control went into effect the murder rate had dropped almost 36%, in the five subsequent years it rose 16%. . . . "The only homicide rate that fell was justifiable killing of felons by citizens which dropped to virtually nothing." "Anti-gun lobbyists claim that such justifiable homicides are rare, but this turns out to be based on 20-year-old artificially truncated statictics from just two cities. Nationwide, 1981 FBI statistics show that citizens justifiably kill 30% more criminals than do police. Even this statistic substantially underrepresents the phenomena: it counts only robbers and burglers killed, excluding personal self-defense - for example a woman who kills a boyfriend to keep him from beating her to death. The whole range of 1981 California statistics show citizens justifibly kill twice as many felons as do police; in Chicago and Cleveland it is three times as many. . . . "Even justifiable homicide statictics are only a crude index to the value of civilian handguns. We don't, after all, measure the value of police guns by the number of criminals they kill. The number, wounded, captured, or driven off is far more important. . . . " ... the number of defensive handgun uses by civilians each year far exceed criminal misuses." . . . "Faced with a dramatic increase in rape, Florida police in Orlando instituted a highly-publicized program in 1966 in which 3,000 women received handgun defense training. Rape statics were down [which presumablbly means there were less rapes] 90% in 1967, while aggrivated assults dropped 25% and burglary fell 24%. Although rape began to increase again when the one-year program ended, even five years later it was still 13% below the 1966 figure. In the same period, rape in the surrounding areas increased 308%. When a defensive firearms program for Detroit grocers received wide publicity from the police chief's denunciations and the shooting of seven robbers, grocery robberies dropped 90%. Comparative programs for retail merchents Highland Park, Mich., and for pahrmacists in New Orleans are credited with similiarly dramatic robbery decreases. . . . "A burglar has a numerically greater chance of being confronted by an armed householder then he has of being arrested and of actually serving time. ... " ... recall the Atlanta suburb that reacted to the Morton-Grove Ill. handgun ban by requiring every sane, responsible, head of household to keep a firearm. Compared to the preceding year, burglary rose slightly in Morton-Grove, but fell 73% in the Atlanta suburb. ------ Wall Street Journal - Can We Deny Citizens Both Guns and Protection? Don B. Kates, Jr. August 17, 1983 One person that decides to shoot it out with police in society the way it is right now wouldn't have much luck. On the other hand, the Nazis had disarmed everyone and made it illegal to possess weapons, which made it hard on the resistance at the time. If, by referendum and other means, the bill of rights is so eroded in 10 years that some religious group could try to force others to share their beliefs, the fact that there are large groups of armed people in this country that disagree with them might moderate their actions. What else could? The United States is a wonderful place to live right now, but how long can this "utopia" last? In many countries in this world the knock on the door means it is all over. Historically governments have not been benevolent things, or if they are benevolent for a time they do not remain that way. Bullys are less likely to run roughshod over someone that might kill them. Deterents are psychological. Rape did not go down in Orlando because women were pasting large numbers of rapists left and right, it went down because a rapist's chances of getting pasted increased dramatically. Likewise, our right to arm ourselves is a deterant against a police state, not because we would go around shooting police but because we COULD. "An armed society is a polite one." Robert A. Heinlein -- scc!steiny Don Steiny - Personetics @ (408) 425-0382 109 Torrey Pine Terr. Santa Cruz, Calif. 95060 ihnp4!pesnta -\ fortune!idsvax -> scc!steiny ucbvax!twg -/