>>>Here, let's put the question out there to everyone. Who here has had their home broken into by armed criminals when they were home? Who hasn't?
>>>
>>>Tamar
>>
>>And son't forget to ask..
>>
>>Who is sure it's never going to happen to them?
>
>That's the wrong question. The question is who thinks the chances it will happen to them are higher than the chances that someone will be seriously injured (or, if you prefer, killed) accidentally or by suicide from a gun in their home. Surely, the basic question here is one of risk management.
>
>Tamar
I agree that for most of us the chances of needed armed home defence is very small. I would say that the chances of accidental death or suicide in my home is even smaller. But I certainly agree the question is risk, but I would contend it is an issue of risk allotment. The risk/reward ratio for criminals should be such that certain crimes - home invasion, car-jacking, armed robbery - just don't pay off. Any attempt to use physical intimidation or threat of harm to commit a crime should carry with it the risk of immediate death. It really would cut down on the allure. The criminal justice system does not offer a credible threat.
Charles Hankey
Though a good deal is too strange to be believed, nothing is too strange to have happened.
- Thomas Hardy
Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. They don't mean to do harm-- but the harm does not interest them. Or they do not see it, or they justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.
-- T. S. Eliot
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for lunch.
Liberty is a well-armed sheep contesting the vote.
- Ben Franklin
Pardon him, Theodotus. He is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature.
