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Bad news. One of the things that burglars most like to steal is GUNS. After all, they are much easier to carry off than a flat-screen TV, and if you steal more than you need, they are ridiculously easy to sell off on the streets for serious cash. If you want to promote your place as a target for housebreakers, just put an NRA bumper sticker on a car in the driveway. People will notice.
Always try to get away first. I wouldn't do that if I had a child upstairs in the bedroom, though.
Do you think thieves would prefer a child to a TV? In their very, very small numbers, armed intruders do not come to anyone's home with a mind to kill anyone. They come with a mind to steal stuff that they can quickly trade for cash on the street. They want to get in and get out in a hurry -- no muss, no fuss, no bother. This is why they try to arrive when no one is home. They carry guns for purposes of self-defense. And the thing that prompts them to do that is the potential for some scared-out-of-his-skin nutcase with a gun happening onto the scene and going all Rambo.
Do you think thieves would prefer a child to a TV? In their very, very small numbers, armed intruders do not come to anyone's home with a mind to kill anyone. They come with a mind to steal stuff that they can quickly trade for cash on the street. They want to get in and get out in a hurry -- no muss, no fuss, no bother. This is why they try to arrive when no one is home. They carry guns for purposes of self-defense. And the thing that prompts them to do that is the potential for some scared-out-of-his-skin nutcase with a gun happening onto the scene and going all Rambo.
Assuming that this analysis is correct, then that puts them in a rather stupid position.
If a person starts attacking them, their best response is to retreat and get the heck out of there......to steal another day.
In Texas, killing someone during a robbery is capital murder and that gets one the death penalty.
Aside from the love of life, it means if caught and convicted, they are never getting out of jail again to steal. At least in retreating, if caught, they can probably be out again to steal again.
There are so many guns in the US already. The genie is out of the bottle so to speak. I personally know dozens of people with large collections of guns. They are everywhere.
If you enacted laws today that required every potential gun buyer to be personally finger printed by the FBI and psycho analysed by Dr. Phil it would be a simple case of closing the barn door after all the horses are gone.
At this point, no matter what you do, you will not keep guns out of the hands of the psychopath. The American people will not let the government take their guns away and there are far to many guns in circulation to try and control them.
So what can you do?
As crazy at it may sound to some the only thing I can think of is to encourage more people to become armed and WELL TRAINED. The more law abiding, trained marksmen and women we have on the streets, the less likely some psychopath will get far when they go off the deep end.
Yes, when people come to your home bent on killing someone who lives there. If however someone with a gun bursts in wanting to steal your TV set, run out the back door, go over to the neighbors, and call 911.
Luckily, in my state I have no obligation to run and hide when a felon breaks into my home, nor do I need to try to figure out *why* he's breaking in.. I know that some people think that should be the law, but it isn't one I would support - the ability to defend yourself in your own home by whatever means necessary is a fundamental one worth protecting. If you want to run, hide & beg for your life, you still have the right to do so. No one will ever take that right from you.
Assuming that this analysis is correct, then that puts them in a rather stupid position. If a person starts attacking them, their best response is to retreat and get the heck out of there......to steal another day.
Which most likely would if given an opportunity. They didn't come over to have a chat with anyone after all. They would have much preferred that no one was home. But the habits of scared-out-of-their-skin nutcases with guns typically don't allow such a thing. If some panicky macho-wannabe forces a him-or-me situation, guess who's going to go down first.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TamaraSavannah
In Texas, killing someone during a robbery is capital murder and that gets one the death penalty.
Texas is a little like Iran in some ways. And many other states have laws requiring that a victim seek first to retreat, making it some form of murder to simply kill an intruder as your first line of defense. It should of course be the last.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TamaraSavannah
Aside from the love of life, it means if caught and convicted, they are never getting out of jail again to steal. At least in retreating, if caught, they can probably be out again to steal again.
People steal because they need to. The imagined love of stealing doesn't really enter into it. And pulling a trigger on either side typically happens as a foggy split-second reaction, not as the end result of some careful process of rational consideration.
The more law abiding, trained marksmen and women we have on the streets, the less likely some psychopath will get far when they go off the deep end.
Horrific as the headlines are, psychopaths are not behind the bulk of the death and mayhem that results from guns. It's otherwise sane law-abiders who kill their own daughter after mistaking her for an intruder. Or who impulsively blow themselves away in a moment of personal doubt and weakness. Or who settle an argument with a spouse or neighbor in quite the wrong way. We may have a longer row to hoe in terms of violence between urban drug gangs and the like, but there is significant lower-hanging fruit that we could agree to go after, the plucking of which would bring significant benefits to society in the event that we did.
Horrific as the headlines are, psychopaths are not behind the bulk of the death and mayhem that results from guns. It's otherwise sane law-abiders who kill their own daughter after mistaking her for an intruder. Or who impulsively blow themselves away in a moment of personal doubt and weakness. Or who settle an argument with a spouse or neighbor in quite the wrong way. We may have a longer row to hoe in terms of violence between urban drug gangs and the like, but there is significant lower-hanging fruit that we could agree to go after, the plucking of which would bring significant benefits to society in the event that we did.
And yet, those gun owners who have a CCW permit commit less crimes (and are better shots in a stressful situation) than your "average" cop. Maybe we already have decent "regulation" and some don't want to admit it because of their irrational fear of guns?
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