I own a gun!

[GeeMack]

Got back from the range last night and was using a new kit to clean my .22. As much fun as shooting is, I almost enjoy the post-trip cleaning even more.

I go with the credo: Don't take any more guns to the range than you're willing to clean. But if Drudgewire wants to come over and help clean the guns, that could change things significantly.

 

[tyr_13]

I go with the credo: Don't take any more guns to the range than you're willing to clean. But if Drudgewire wants to come over and help clean the guns, that could change things significantly.

For some odd reason, my 10/22 doesn't cycle right after I clean it. It always takes about forty rounds through it to start cycling cleanly. This is why I love my lever action.

 

[Drudgewire]

For some odd reason, my 10/22 doesn't cycle right after I clean it. It always takes about forty rounds through it to start cycling cleanly. This is why I love my lever action.

22s are just weird that way. The first two times I took my Walther out there were misfires and cycling issues galore.

Last night... with THE EXACT SAME BOXES OF AMMO... about 300 rounds without a single problem. Even warned my buddy before we went there would be some issues (his first time shooting it) and when we were done he asked if I had been kidding.

 

[Ranb]

I hate cleaning my guns so much that I usually leave the semi-autos home and just shoot the bolt action and single shots. I do a proper job on the cleaning, but it is a chore I would rather do without.

Ranb

 

[RenaissanceBiker]

Late for the party. I am bewildered by the number of arguements that go, "It would be stupid to do that where I live so no one should do that anywhere." I understand that it may be different where you are. When I began raising my children, I decided to teach them about the use of guns in a responsible way. I figured that they would encounter them one day and it would be best if they already knew what to do or how to act. Two of my kids enjoy shooting. One does not. I'm ok with that. They all know about gun safety.

This is me training a future menace to society.

This is why I feel safe leaving my wife home alone.

 

[Cainkane1]

I dont know.
in my country at 18 you get an assault rifle and amunition that you keep at home.
so almost every swiss family owns a swiss assoult rifle.
It is extremly seldome those weapons are used in crimes or murder.

gun ownership is just one part of the story, how people think and act is more important i think.

but i dont see a reason why people should be alowed to have a gun. we have profesionals that are trained to use weapons and also to solve situations without useing weapons, we call them police.

Well I'm glad you people are able to have and maintain a firearm in your homes. If you are ever invaded it must be comforting to know that you have a servicable weapon handy. Its my guess that crimes involving home invasions in your nation are few and far between. I feel that gun ownership is essential to home security. I have a pump shotgun by my bed and I carry a glock .40 cal in my car. I have a license for the gun in my car.

 

[Euromutt]

Well, I'm mainly wondering why this surprisingly high percentage of burglaries in occupied homes isn't reflected in newspaper reports. Despite the fact that occupied-home burglary would seem likely to be a better headline-grabber than empty-home burglary.

I recall one very serious and nasty case of what you guys would call a "home invasion" happening in the south of England, which was widely reported in the press. But that's it.

I should point out that "hot burglary"and "home invasion" aren't synonymous. "Home invasion" involves an intent--or at least a very strong willingness--on the part of the intruder to inflict a violent crime on the occupant(s), whereas a "hot" burglar is just after whatever swag he can grab without necessarily confronting the occupants. But as I remarked earlier, it's hard to tell them apart while they're in progress; only after the burglar leaves without confronting the occupants can you be certain that it was a "hot burglary" and not a "home invasion."

And in the UK, frankly, a burglar doesn't particularly need to be worried about being confronted by a homeowner; even the few that have a firearm available would be reluctant to use it, given the penchant of the crown to prosecute anyone who has the temerity to fight back against a criminal. (While few such people are convicted of the charges brought, the prospect of facing trial, with all the attendant stress and expense, is a powerful deterrent.)

 

[Rolfe]

The "home invasion" thing was exactly what you described. Very nasty indeed. Thankfully, also very rare indeed. The victims were also extraordinarily rich, so the potential gains were very high.

Still, just one burglary.

What I'm pointing out is that most occupied-home burglaries aren't about "confronting" the owner, or sneaking past and maybe not confronting him. They're about a couple of con-artists deliberately distracting some little old lady so that her home can be ransacked. She knows there is someone there, but she doesn't realise till later that the "someone" wasn't legit.

One of the common tricks is to show up with fake credentials purporting to come from a water company, and say that the water in the house needs to be turned off at the mains. Often, the old lady isn't even entirely sure where the mains stopcock is, and even if she knows, she can't physically shift it. The resulting performance, maybe involving pulling a washing machine out into the middle of the kitchen, is usually sufficient to allow the other partner(s) free rein in the rest of the house for quite long enough.

There are constant public information films and announcements telling people who live alone not to let anyone like that in under any circumstances. But of course a lot of old ladies don't really take that in. (On the other hand, some do. Last year a perfectly innocent girl came to my door with a sample bottle and a questionnaire about water quality, and asked me to fill the bottle from my kitchen tap. She didn't attempt to put a foot over my doorstep, and she was clearly legit. When my mother heard the purpose of the call, she almost had a fit, being convinced that anything that similar to what she had been warned about had to be the scam itself.)

You think these scamsters call on any door that doesn't have a little old lady living alone behind it? Not likely. You think they do anything but run off to try the next victim if one doesn't fall for it? The whole thing has nothing at all to do with guns. But that's almost certainly the scenario that is responsible for the bulk of your "hot burglary" statistics.

Rolfe.

ETA: The recommended course of action, if a single home-owner has a probably-legitimate caller, is to politely ask the caller to wait, close the door on them, and telephone a neighbour to come round. A legitimate caller will wait till the neighbour arrives.

There are other scams. My mother tells me that when she lived alone someone called at her door claiming to be a policeman. She did what she'd been told to do, and asked him to pass his ID through the letter box. Nothing happened. She looked through the letter box herself, to see an eye looking back. Then the letterbox rattled and there was silence. My mother continued to follow the script and telephoned the local police station, to be told that no policeman had gone to her house.

She doesn't want a gun, her neighbours don't want guns, and the con artists don't want guns. These occurrences, the things that make up the statistics, are about trickery of the vulnerable, not about force.

 

[Drudgewire]

These occurrences, the things that make up the statistics, are about trickery of the vulnerable, not about force.

Except for the ones that aren't.

 

[Rolfe]

And how many would that be? Remember, this part of the discussion is about the alleged 40% of burglaries in Britain that some statistic says are carried out while the house is occupied, and which was thus used to imply that in Britain the knowledge that home owners are unlikely to be armed makes burglars more prepared to attack occupied houses.

I was merely pointing out that the bare statistics may have a completely different explanation.

Rolfe.

 

[Drudgewire]

I was merely pointing out that the bare statistics may have a completely different explanation.

I understand that. It's a leap, however, to assume that's what makes up the "bulk" of situations where an intruder is in someone's home.

I do agree with you that IN those situations, the best course of action is to never let someone get past the front door in the first place by non-violent means. MY point is that there are times where "let me see your ID" is not going to keep a criminal out.

 

[Rolfe]

Maybe not. But these situations are vanshingly rare to find in news reports in Britain. To imply that they're actually very common (and that that is because householders are unlikely to be armed) is simply unsustainable.

Actually, "let me see your ID" is pretty useless these days, if it ever meant much. Who would have trouble faking something plausible? But there are other ways. With the cop call, the "let me see your ID" is just the first bit. If ID is forthcoming then you still don't open the door, you call the station and ask if that particular cop has come to see you.

Maybe criminals breaking down the door while someone is home is common in the USA, but not round here.

Rolfe.

 

[Drudgewire]

Maybe not. But these situations are vanshingly rare to find in news reports in Britain. To imply that they're actually very common (and that that is because householders are unlikely to be armed) is simply unsustainable.

Rolfe.

I should've read more carefully. Didn't realize we were talking specifically about Britain.

My bad.

 

[Rolfe]

Ah, I thought I detected some cross purposes. I was querying Euromutt's assertion here.

The US has lot fewer "hot" burglaries, that is, residential burglaries that occur while the occupants are home. In the US, it's about 15% of residential burglaries, in the UK and the Netherlands, it's over 40%. [....]

Either way, the evidence indicates that the availability of firearms to private citizens prevents more crimes than it facilitates.

He cited his source.

Kleck, Gary. 1991. Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America Hawthorne, NY.

The American figure was from Dept. of Justice statistics; I believe the British one came from British Crime Survey statistics, but I may be mistaken.

There was actually another survey done in 1982 (cited in Residential Burglary: A Comparison of the United States, Canada, England and Wales by Pat Mayhew) that found that 59% of residential burglaries were "hot."

Frustratingly, the Home Office Statistical Bulletin Crime in England and Wales 2007-2008 does not list the percentage of domestic burglaries that are "hot."

If you're wondering why a burglar would hit a house when the occupants are likely to be home, reasons include that any burglar alarms will be turned off, and if the occupants are home, their wallets, purses, handbags etc. will be too.

I still found this statistic highly improbable, especially because a burglar ransacking an occupied house is exactly the sort of thing that makes front page news, and yet such headlines are very rare. Then I figured out what was probably the real explanation for the statistics. The cops probably have a special name for the scam, but it would go down in the statistics as a burglary of an occupied house.

So no, 40% of our burglaries are not what Euromutt meant by "hot burglaries", and there is no evidence at all to be found from these statistics that "the availability of firearms to private citizens prevents more crimes than it facilitates."

Rolfe.

 

[BenBurch]

Which is why the UK is making such a big deal about "knife crime" now.

I thought you were being sarcastic until I looked it up!

 

[tyr_13]

I thought you were being sarcastic until I looked it up!

Knife proof vests are in short supply. Most officers simply don't want to wear chain mail on the job. Frankly, I'd consider it a bonus.

It's hard to explain to some people, but most bullet-proof vests are not blade proof. A knife point, or other blade point, has much more force that is sustained on a small point.

 

[Kestrel]

Maybe criminals breaking down the door while someone is home is common in the USA, but not round here.

Burglary of an occupied home is rare in the USA. Residential burglaries typically happen during the day when everyone in the neighborhood is at work or school.

If you watched the ads for home alarm systems you would get a different impression. They typically show a young wife with a couple of cute kids at home and a guy wearing a hood attempting to pry open a window.

 

[Euromutt]

Maybe not. But these situations are vanishingly rare to find in news reports in Britain. To imply that they're actually very common (and that that is because householders are unlikely to be armed) is simply unsustainable.

A possible counter to that is that common occurrences are not newsworthy. England & Wales combined have one of the highest residential burglary rates of countries surveyed in the ICVS, and if the percentage of "hot" (but non-"home invasion") burglaries were that high, they ought to be fairly common. Just like the papers don't report every car crash, they might not bother with "hot" burglaries unless someone was seriously hurt.

So no, 40% of our burglaries are not what Euromutt meant by "hot burglaries", [...]

Can you present any evidence to that effect, other than the newspapers' disinterest? I'm not saying you're necessarily incorrect, but then how do you explain that in the Home Office Statistical Bulletin Crime in England and Wales 2007-2008, we find the following:

• Households with no home security measures were around ten times more likely to have been victims of burglary than households where there were simple security measures such as deadlocks on doors or window locks (25.0% compared with 2.3%) (Table 4.01).
• Households that had been a victim of burglary were less likely to have any home security measures (67%) than those households that had not been a victim of burglary (97%) (Table 4.02).

With entry under false pretenses, like the cases you describe, it wouldn't make a difference if there were deadbolts, window locks, alarm systems, etc. because the burglars (and you are correct "burglary" under English law does not necessarily require breaking in) gain access by conning the occupant into letting them in, thus bypassing any security measures.

[...] and there is no evidence at all to be found from these statistics that "the availability of firearms to private citizens prevents more crimes than it facilitates."

I should clarify here: my statement about the comparative percentages of "hot" burglaries was in response to Dictator Cheney's question about whether the US had fewer burglaries than countries with lower gun ownership levels. It was not intended to be part of my response to Oliver's query which I addressed subsequently.

The fact is that there are plenty of countries which have highly restrictive gun laws, and also have lower rates of residential burglary than the US; Germany and the Netherlands are two of them. So it's not as if a high rate of gun ownership prevents burglary overall. But that's readily explicable by the fact that if there's nobody home, it's impossible for a household member to use a firearm to scare off or incapacitate an intruder. In that regard, therefore, it's notable that, as criminologist David Kopel has described:

It is axiomatic in the United States that burglars avoid occupied homes. As an introductory criminology textbook explains, “Burglars do not want contact with occupants; they depend on stealth for success.” Only thirteen percent of U.S. residential burglaries are attempted against occupied homes.
[...]
The introductory American criminology textbook states, “Opportunities for burglary occur only when a dwelling is unguarded.”
[...]
American burglars tend to “work” at hours when persons are unlikely to
be in the home. Consistent with the desire to avoid a personal confrontation,
burglars prefer houses, such as those on corners, where the risks of being observed by a neighbor are reduced. Two hours are spent on the average suburban burglary; most of that time is spent “casing the joint” to ensure that no one is home.

These points help explain why many Americans do treat the terms "hot burglary" and "home invasion" as if they were synonymous: given that is the norm for American burglars to hit houses where nobody's home, when they do strike an occupied dwelling, it's taken as read that at least part of the intent is to harm the occupants.

Now, do bear in mind that I'm not claiming that these "hot" burglaries in Britain are "home invasions"; I'm sure that in the bulk of cases, all the burglar is after is material goods, and he's counting partly on stealth to avoid detection, and if that fails, on the reluctance of the occupants to do anything except sit tight in the bedroom, dial 999, and wait for the police. Another point that comes up in the HOSB is that:

Households consisting of a single adult and child(ren) (6.4%) were more likely to have been a victim of burglary compared with all other household types.

A single adult with child(ren) is most likely to be a female, and therefore less likely to seek confrontation even if she's aware of the intruder's presence.

 

[Kestrel]

Another point that comes up in the HOSB is that:A single adult with child(ren) is most likely to be a female, and therefore less likely to seek confrontation even if she's aware of the intruder's presence.

I don't think that assumption is valid.

A single adult is often the family breadwinner and leaves the house for work while the children are at school. A stay at home housewife is more likely than a single mom to be at home while the kids are in school. Seem to me that single parents are more likely to be burgled because their houses are more likely to be unoccupied.

 

[Phrost]

@ the OP

Reason for owning a gun is not the issue, right to own a gun is. The U.S. holds that the citizenry should never be disarmed. Freemen are responsible for their own defense.

Thank you. I just spent several minutes reading this entire thread and this was not sufficiently addressed until your post.

The reason the right to bear arms is second in our bill of rights is because the founding fathers knew that having an armed populace was the only real deterrent to tyranny.

Frankly, it's asinine to be having this discussion 200+ years later, especially since it's already been addressed:

“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms… disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes… Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants…” — Thomas Jefferson in “Commonplace Book,” 1774-1776

And it's disappointing to see that firearms ownership is yet another issue for which "Skeptics" selectively turn off their critical thinking and start appealing to emotion; in this case, fear. Your fear should never trump my rights. Yet many of you, like Rolfe, live in societies where fear does overrule rights. For example, the right to free speech. Throwing people in jail for expressing a belief, regardless of how abhorrent, is shameful. But I guess some people just prefer to live under the watchful eye of the nanny state, than to face the risks associated with living in a truly free society. These include people abusing those rights. But punishing everyone for the crimes of individuals is never just, regardless of how emotionally worked up and fearful you allow yourself to become.

If you prefer to live with the delusion that your government will always be there to protect your safety, and will always have your best interests in mind, I don't think you have any business calling yourself a Skeptic. Because there's no difference between you, and someone who believes in an invisible man in the sky; you're just swapping your faith in a god for faith in a Government.

Ownership of firearms is a hedge against tyranny, and a means of protecting your individual sovereignty. A free man has no obligation to put himself at the mercy of those who break the social contract, those who would threaten or harm him, his loved ones or deprive him of his rightful property.

And that's why this right should be even more staunchly defended than those of speech, assembly, the press, religion (or lack thereof). It is the one right, that guarantees those others.