Prepared to defend yourself?

[The_Seeker]

I voted no; I do own a .22 rifle and a shotgun (for hunting) but I store them at my parent's house. I've been considering getting a pistol to keep at my apartment but I still haven't made up my mind about that. Too many angles to think about.

[amightyfortress]

When it comes to food storage--there's a big difference between someone politely knocking on your door and asking if you have anything to spare to eat and maybe even offering something in trade--either a good or perhaps a service--and someone with a shotgun, etc. busting down your door and willing to gun you down to take food from you and your family.

As for me telling people not to expect me to feed and take care of them... they've received their warning. I've done them a favor. They can now go stock up and prepare knowing they can't count on me. If they are too lazy to stock up or are unwilling to stop spending money on stupid stuff, that's not my problem. I've given them the answer to their dilema: "Stock up now while times are good so you can take care of yourself".

Just as a sidenote, if I knew someone was completely into preparedness and for some reason all their provisions were destroyed (fire, flood, etc.) I'd help them out a bit. It's the knowledgeable freeloaders I have an issue with. Knowledgeable freeloaders are those selfish people out there who are able to prepare, choose not to, spend their money on goodies/restaurants/gadgets/fun, and then plan to show up on other's doorsteps in an emergency.

I just got off the phone with my mom. She just dropped about $1,000 today on more provisions. This is after spending every day the last couple of weeks stockpiling. It's not that she can't afford to stockpile, it's that she was too uninterested in doing it...until I set her straight and told her she'd better do it and not be counting on other people (myself included) to feed her.

My viewpoint can be summed up kinda like Noah and the flood. He prepared, he warned, he prepared some more, warned some more... none of the people would change their ways. The flood came. You'll notice the unprepared/unrepented were not on the ark. Could Noah have opened the door to the ark and let a bunch of them in and risked his family dying? Sure. But he didn't.

Edited October 19, 2008 by amightyfortress
typo

[amightyfortress]

I'm only prepared to kill those who are trying to kill me. The beans or any other reason are irrelevent.

My first choice would be the intruder never shows up. My second choice is the sound of me readying my 12-gauge makes them decide to turn and leave. If that doesn't work, it's only then that I would take things to a final conclusion. It's something I hope I never have to do, but I will do if I have to.

[amightyfortress]

Are people that are starving, and who wish to feed their own 10 year old daughter, scum?

Perhaps we should rethink some of the concepts in this thread?

If they are willing to attack, kill, steal--yes--I would put that in the scum category.

[amightyfortress]

It is very interesting to see the completely different viewpoints. Each side feels strongly about this subject. There really is no wishy-washy at all. I hope this thread does continue... because it gives people things to think about.

[jimuk]

Of course if somebody is out to kill you or your loved ones you are going to protect, even kill, if indeed its a kill or be killed situation there is only one way to go.

But when we are talking about "The scum" as a couple here has judged, the people up the road, how do you know they are out to get you, to kill you or yours, couple of you have implied that you would actually be looking for a good reason to take these people out. maybe you think that Jesus would be behind you with this kind of reasoning.

I have heard some good christian thoughts from some of you guys, i have also heard some less than Christian words from others.

What i havent heard from any Christian is how they would handle a bad situation should it arise, we already know how the "look i have a gun" guys "think" they would act, and treat others that would be hungry along with their children.

I think there will be a lot of surprise when Jesus orders that the food storage that some guys would kill for, is to be distributed among the "scum" up the road.

I could be wrong, but i really do think that this is what will happen, and at that point it could well be your last chance to show who you would choose to follow, and if you are reveling in the thought of killing anybody, then i would have to say that you have already decided what or who's side you would choose should that time come to pass.

I do think though that if you come from a family that has always had guns around then it would/does sound strange that some do not hold them in such high regard.

I do not like them, i am sorry, it changes a person, gives them ultimate power over others, and there is only one person that should have ultimate power and we as Christians all should know who that one person is.

I may well be wrong with all that but it is the way that the pro guys posts have come across, and i am reading it all wrong, it just seems that you like the thought of having to hurt people, or dont care if you do.

This is just my thoughts guys, please be Christian about it lol.

I do hope that i am wrong though, i truly do.

[jimuk]

So UK you don't think that the guy who wants to take your can of beans doesn't want to take your 10 year old daughter too. So when that moment arrives you going to say "Peace be unto you" or are you going to take the scum off the face of the earth.

My vote, remove the scum.

Ben Raines

Hi Ben, come on man, dont talk like that, dont feel bad about people that way, reading lots of your posts, i know you are probably feeling a little uptight in this thread because some of us are against keeping guns, but if we all agreed on everything then we would all be walking around like robots.

peace to you. (not piece) lol

[breezygirl]

I may well be wrong with all that but it is the way that the pro guys posts have come across, and i am reading it all wrong, it just seems that you like the thought of having to hurt people, or dont care if you do.

This is just my thoughts guys, please be Christian about it lol.

I do hope that i am wrong though, i truly do.

I am pro gun. I grew up with a family who all served military. I also grew up in a military town. My family were ranchers, or veterens or military or hunters who all owned and used weapons. I own weapons as does my husband. I DO NOT like the idea of having to use my handgun against another person. I would only do it as a last defense.

In April of this year a man came at us in a local park. He was hostile and aggressive and threatening. At one point he picked up a softball sized rock and threatened to bash my skull in with it...all the time this was occurring I was on my cell phone with the police. My husband drew his weapon. He did not point it at the man ... but he did have it drawn in case he needed to stop this nutjob.We did everything in our power to not have this conlict and we did convince him to shove off after he saw the handgun. I believe that he would have tried to kill me if he hadnt seen that weapon. He DID NOT WANT TO SHOOT but he would have if he needed to . Neither one of us wanted to shoot this guy....neither one of us was uncaring about the possibilty that we might have to kill. Please believe me when I say that most people with guns dont enjoy the thought of having to use them on another human

[Elgama]

So UK you don't think that the guy who wants to take your can of beans doesn't want to take your 10 year old daughter too. So when that moment arrives you going to say "Peace be unto you" or are you going to take the scum off the face of the earth.

My vote, remove the scum.

Ben Raines

no we are just not brought up to live in fear constantly and assume that the person who lives next door to us is going to harm us when they do as a nation we tend to fight it very hard... I am finding it very sad that we are going that way and that old people are now afraid to talk to my children in case they are seen to be predators - fewer people offer to help out with bags etc although I am pleased a lot of people are still helpful I couldn't survive on a bus without the chivalry of other people taking my daughters hand or carrying my son on or sometimes helping with the buggy and I loved the times in restaurants other people have sat with my kids or helped me eat a meal - when I was a child in a big city this was the norm. now it is the exception even in rural areas.

-Charley

[wy0mn]

Today is Sunday, althought I'm opinionated 24/7, today I will be nice to my christian friends and not be myself.

[dalepres]

I do not like them, i am sorry, it changes a person, gives them ultimate power over others

Actually, a gun is not the ultimate power giver, it's the ultimate equalizer. If a bad guy has a gun and you have a gun, there is no ultimate power. If only the bad guy has the gun then, yes, he has ultimate power over you.

[dalepres]

no we are just not brought up to live in fear constantly and assume that the person who lives next door to us is going to harm us when they do as a nation we tend to fight it very hard... I am finding it very sad that we are going that way and that old people are now afraid to talk to my children in case they are seen to be predators - fewer people offer to help out with bags etc although I am pleased a lot of people are still helpful I couldn't survive on a bus without the chivalry of other people taking my daughters hand or carrying my son on or sometimes helping with the buggy and I loved the times in restaurants other people have sat with my kids or helped me eat a meal - when I was a child in a big city this was the norm. now it is the exception even in rural areas.

-Charley

I agree with you whole-heartedly, Charley. The days when children could play anywhere in their neighborhood are gone. The age of naivety is past.

Please keep in mind that those days that you are remembering were when, both in the US and in the UK, the population was generally armed. As soon as laws changed to protect the criminal, release them from jails, disarm the populace so that criminals know you are defenseless, then the roving gangs have started to rule the cities. They have no fear of their neighbors or victims. Guns helped to ensure the equality of the masses - whether they be citizens or subjects - and led to a polite society. An unarmed society is a fearful society ruled by the ruthless, meanest, biggest, and strongest.

What you never see in the news are the hundreds of thousands of times every year that a gun saves a life or prevents a rape or prevents a robbery. You only see the much lesser number of occasions where a criminal uses a gun for violence that he would have committed by another means had he not had a gun anyway.

Relating all of this to preparedness and to the original post, keep in mind that in the hour of need it is too late to prepare. I hope I never have to go on a diet of wheat, rice, and beans. I hope I never have to use a gun for self-defense - against man or beast. But I am prepared. By having prepared to defend my family, I can always make the choice you are suggesting to not defend my family or to defend my family. If you are unprepared then when that true moment of decision comes, you have no choice to make. You are defenseless.

I assume your presence on this forum means you are interested in and are preparing for something (the title of the forum doesn't imply simply food storage). I suggest, if you have the means and can legally do so wherever it is that you live, that you prepare to defend your family so that you can actually make a choice one way or the other when the time comes that you really have to decide.

[Elgama]

I agree with you whole-heartedly, Charley. The days when children could play anywhere in their neighborhood are gone. The age of naivety is past.

Please keep in mind that those days that you are remembering were when, both in the US and in the UK, the population was generally armed.

our gun laws aren't that much different to how they were 15 years ago, do you know in the UK the number of children murdered, molested and abducted has actually remained constant since the 1970s to now and most of those incidents are committed by those who should be protecting the child - family members

I think its a Herman Melville quote that says by teaching our children to fear strangers and not speak to them we innoculate them aginst 3% of crime and allow 97% of crime against children to continue

We are prepared and do live on a diet that incudes beans, wheat and rice - I was also an archaeologist so can make bread ovens, build basic shelter etc

My husband is very well trained in firearms and I can also shoot, both of us also have a martial arts background.

Charley

[dalepres]

I don't live in the UK so I can only go by what I here on these Internets. Of course we all know how reliable that is, huh? So, this story is not accurate?

or this one?

[dalepres]

And the UK has yet to have a single school shooting.

Ok, perhaps my geography knowledge is lacking. Isn't Scotland part of the UK? I know when I drove from London to Edzell Scotland, I did not go through any checkpoints or customs checks.

Again, I only know what I read. Is this wrong? From http://www.davekopel.org/2a/Foreign/The-Gold-Standard-of-Gun-Control.htm:

In 1998, after a known pedophile used a handgun to murder kindergarten children in Dunblane, Scotland, the Parliament banned non-government possession of handguns. As a result the Gun Control Network (a prohibition advocacy group) enthused that “present British controls over firearms are regarded as ‘the gold standard’ in many countries.” According to GCN spokesperson Mrs. Gill Marshall-Andrews, “the fact that we have a gold standard is something to be proud of….”[14]

A July 2001 study from King’s College London’s Centre for Defence Studies found that handgun-related crime increased by nearly 40% in the two years following implementation of the handgun ban.[15] The study also found that there had been “no direct link” between lawful possession of guns by licensed citizens and misuse of guns by criminals.[16] According to the King’s College report, although the 1998 handgun ban resulted in over 160,000 licensed handguns being withdrawn from personal possession, “the UK appears not to have succeeded in creating the gun free society for which many have wished. Gun related violence continues to rise and the streets of Britain…seem no more safe.”[17]

This website lists two shootings at UK schools, another attack with a machete, a stabbing, and a flamethrower attack.

List of school-related attacks - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Clearly teen on teen violence, at school and away from school, is a big problem even in the UK:

gang stabbing UK - Google Search

While the first link above and the videos I posted previously indicate that gun violence in the UK is actually up 40% since the handgun ban, that last link shows that even without guns, criminals are criminals. Sociopaths simply change weapons. UK has had to, of all crazy things, ban machetes, ban Samurai swords (as if the type of sword makes a sword more or less a weapon), ban pocket knives, and soon you'll be tearing your meat apart in your kitchen with your hands and teeth like a caveman because they will have to ban kitchen knives. Eventually, they will have to ban tools altogether and you can live like cavemen because any and nearly every tool made since cavemen can be and has been used as a weapon. Outlawing every offensive weapon only ensures that only the outlaws have weapons. Oh, and the government. They, of course, are more worth defending than either you or me.

Edited October 19, 2008 by dalepres
Fixed the spelling of Samurai

[john doe]

I think a lot of the difference in opinion on guns is cultural. Americans, especially those who live in the west, are more into self-protection, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is due to the sparse population in some areas. Brits, in my opinion, tend to believe that help will arrive before an attacker will fatally wound them, or that they can escape to safety fairly quickly. Western Americans, especially those in rural areas, don't usually have that luxury, and know that they will probably have to rely on themselves to survive a potentially deadly situation, at least for the short term.

[dalepres]

Let me just add that my posts are not intended to be UK bashing or anti-UK at all. I think that most Americans have a great affection for the UK. We have a common language, a common history, and our roots are in the UK. You have been our ally and we have been yours in two world wars.

Many Americans, myself included, are very concerned about gun control in the UK, though, because what happens in the UK eventually happens here. Just as the Magna Carta preceded our own Constitution, many of the great things in our nation have roots in the UK. Our futures are inseparable. So we are justifiably concerned about gun control in the UK and what it means to the United States in the future.

We are not against you; we're for you. We in America want all good things for the United Kingdom.

[Elgama]

I don't live in the UK so I can only go by what I here on these Internets. Of course we all know how reliable that is, huh? So, this story is not accurate?

or this one?

It is very much propaganda most of my friends own guns and go shooting you do have to however have a reason to own the gun and land to shoot on. I did recognise the video but no its not accurate handguns were banned but shotguns and rifles can still be owned.

Both school attacks on mainland UK were by people going into schools not pupils and were what precipitated the tightening of the laws, Northern Ireland I believe the police there are still armed and is a completely different situation than the rest of us.

I stated in previous posts that gang vioence and gun crime had increased - I did not deny that but both are very much restricted to urban areas.... And I do not remember the school shootings being plastered all over the BBC which given their ability to cover such disasters is very unusual - the country would have been in shock, and probably laws would have been tightened

But I still refuse to live my life fearing what might happen it is so against the way I was brought up as soon as you allow that - food storage yeah sure and that is one reason I may consider owning a gun here, we have plenty rabbits, deer and pheasants in the back garden.

-Charley

[Elgama]

I think a lot of the difference in opinion on guns is cultural. Americans, especially those who live in the west, are more into self-protection, for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is due to the sparse population in some areas. Brits, in my opinion, tend to believe that help will arrive before an attacker will fatally wound them, or that they can escape to safety fairly quickly. Western Americans, especially those in rural areas, don't usually have that luxury, and know that they will probably have to rely on themselves to survive a potentially deadly situation, at least for the short term.

you maybe right John although I don't think our us Brits lack fight either - having said that my very much Wild West in-laws did not see their guns as their best means of home or personal defence and my husband has grown up with that.,

-Charley

[dalepres]

It is very much propaganda most of my friends own guns and go shooting you do have to however have a reason to own the gun and land to shoot on. I did recognise the video but no its not accurate handguns were banned but shotguns and rifles can still be owned.

And there were no rifle or shotguns destroyed? And no owners lost the ability to have them? What is a valid reason to own a gun in the UK? Self-defense, as I interpreted the second video, does not appear to be one of them? Can you own a gun for the purpose of self defense?

[jimuk]

And there were no rifle or shotguns destroyed? And no owners lost the ability to have them? What is a valid reason to own a gun in the UK? Self-defense, as I interpreted the second video, does not appear to be one of them? Can you own a gun for the purpose of self defense?

I am really not to sure dale, i think it can only be kept for Sporting/Hunting. No license would be issued for self defense.

[Elgama]

I am really not to sure dale, i think it can only be kept for Sporting/Hunting. No license would be issued for self defense.

that is correct or certain police and military

[Elgama]

And there were no rifle or shotguns destroyed? And no owners lost the ability to have them? What is a valid reason to own a gun in the UK? Self-defense, as I interpreted the second video, does not appear to be one of them? Can you own a gun for the purpose of self defense?

no self-defense is not a valid reason but it doesn't take much to be able to hunting or join a gun club - and the guns have to be kept in a locked cabinet only those with licences can know where the keys are kept. And only those shotguns that were illegally owned were destroyed which I assume is the same as an illegal gun in the US given it is a story every so often.

-Charley

[NeuroTypical]

This continues to be a pretty good thread - thanks to everyone for trying to keep it civil.

[Elgama]

This continues to be a pretty good thread - thanks to everyone for trying to keep it civil.

Thats a relief I was worried you would feel it had been hijacked - just heard a story from my neighbour about a blind old lady of 91 who saw off 2 burglars with a lamp and a walking stick who say's you can't fight back lol

-Charley