Ronn Blankenship wrote:
{snip}
>> More bluntly, if owning a gun is a civic right, then being safe with guns
>> is a civic responsibility and should be embraced as such, including
>> measures to uphold civic accountability.
> Then what method do you recommend that the safety-conscious, law-abiding
> homeowner have ready to defend his home and the lives of his family members
> from an intruder armed with a potentially lethal weapon (gun, knife,
> crowbar, etc.)?
First make an effort to reduce the likelihood of an intruder.
Second, make careful use of alarms so that an intruder is unlikely to
'appear without warning'. For me it doesn't go beyond that because my
interpretation of the likelihood of being attacked and the risks of
guns (etc.) is such that I feel I would not be 'defending my family'
by having a gun.
> Simply asking the intruder to wait until the police have
> time to get there is probably not going to work . . .
You never know, if you ask nicely it just might! (particularly if
the police are clearly on their way.) It can be astounding how well
people respond to politeness....
Fundamentally the best defense is to not be attacked - the more that
the situation does not escalate to greater and greater violence the
more it resembles that 'best of all defenses'. If the intruder is not
'cold-bloodedly intending to harm you' there is a very good
possibility that if you can appear 'not-dangerous' to the intruder
you will not be harmed. But if you have a gun in your hand then no
matter how little you know about shooting - and even if the gun is
unloaded - you appear to be a danger to the intruder.
Furthermore, with various weapons there is also the risk of
accidentally injury (kids shooting themselves, running with knives,
finding out too late that the intruder was actually your grandson,
etc). So possessing and using a weapon needs to be balanced against
the certainty of being perceived as dangerous and the other risks of
'bad things happening that wouldn't have happened if the weapon
wasn't there'.
For me the calculation generally comes down on the 'no weapons' side
of things, for others it may come down on the 'weapons' side. But the
calculation is the same - the risk of a problem occurring, the
likeliness of various outcomes of the problem, the potential
usefulness of various weapons and other approaches - and the
potential problems facilitated by the presence of those weapons or
other approaches.
Once all the factors are considered you make the best decision that
you see as supported with the facts and remember that no matter what
the consequences are you, or someone, will have to live with them.
(Which hypothetical 'tragic outcome' can you most/least live with?
Which of those outcomes is most/least likely to happen? Have you done
every 'non weapon' thing you can do to reduce the 'tragic outcomes'?,
etc.)
cheers,
christopher
--
Christopher Gwyn
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
