From: "Alex Hamilton", [EMAIL PROTECTED]
May I wade in rather late into this argument and say that I am not in
the least concerned about any kind of statistics, nor do I care whether
more guns will increase or decrease crime.
Naturally, I would prefer to live in a society where violence does not
exist and where the concept of self-defence is completely obsolete, but
in the event that I am attacked, shot at or killed, it would not be a
"comfort" to know that mine was a very rare case!
The purpose of self-defence is to survive and not become a statistic
and, at a risk of appearing obtuse, I am concerned that our government,
both Labour and Tory, think otherwise. Anyone who thinks that
controlling the law abiding can have any effect on crime should be
entrusted only with menial tasks under close supervision!!
I do not buy the argument that guns had been designed to kill people and
so their ownership is sometimes tolerated but cannot be justified! And
the fact that cars had been designed for transport is an irrelevant
parallel.
Military use of guns is for national self-defence and that is nothing
else but personal self-defence on a large and organized scale.
As I said at the start, I would much prefer to live in a world where
self-defence is unnecessary, but if that is not possible, then I would
like to have the option to select the most effective tool to defend
myself. I am not interested in giving the criminal a fair chance at my
risk and criminals should not be offered the protection of the Law -
their only option is not to do it!!!!
However, sporting shooting and target shooting are SPORTS and it is a
political and social disgrace that they are constantly linked with crime
and people who follow these sports are subject to continuous speculation
as to what they might or might not do with their "weapons". Even to
this day the NRA still uses the term "Weapons Check", which I can only
attribute to "military thinking" amongst its staff - most undesirable
and short sighted. I am not concerned about political correctness, just
pointing out that there is no military connection with target shooting.
Alex.
--
I found it mildly interesting that the term "target practice" in
the Firearms Act 1968 was replaced with "target shooting" by
the 1997 Act.
Steve.
Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org
List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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