A Rochester police captain takes the usual tired questions about "more gun laws," and expresses his own theories about what's causing the problem: a removal of social consequences that starts with irresponsible child-rearing and continues with "bail reform"--basically treating grownups as children and being being bad parents to them. He talks mostly about enforcing the gun laws that already are on the books, but I hear a different message: what concerns us is not the guns but the actions of people with guns. He points out that he can't think of a case of gun violence committed by a registered owner that wasn't justified. The problem is that the gun violence committed by unregistered owners isn't justified, and isn't effectively punished or deterred. The problem isn't that we're not punishing illegal gun ownership, it's that we aren't distinguishing between crime and self-defense, and are if anything obsessing on gun ownership instead of on whether a crime is occurring along with the gun ownership. On top of that, we keep excusing the crime, on the basis of some kind of half-baked political theory about roots causes of robbery and murder, and distracting ourselves with the problem of the weaponry--no matter how clear the evidence is of how weapons are used differently by criminals and non-criminals. It's as if we thought social nirvana were achieved by making people weaker and weaker until they lack tools to do any more harm.
The police captain's message throughout is that we can't solve problems if we keep lying to ourselves and each other about what's happening right in front of us.
The video link doesn't say, but the captain is Frank Umbrino. He was involved in early decisions not to release information about the death of Daniel Prude, video of whose arrest sparked riots when it finally came out months later. He's still standing after the decapitation of the police department leadership and the indictment of Mayor Lovely Warren on campaign fraud charges. Was Umbirno wrong? He accurately predicted the effects of the video, and it's easy to understand his decision, but it was futile. You can't keep a lid on in-custody deaths, and shouldn't, no matter how clearly you see the consequences in a tinderbox like the present one.
5 comments:
Govs kept lid on ufo reverse engineering for decades until 2020.
Big orgs are risk averse. Takes them extra long to assess risks of disclisure.
Gun controllers believe as an article of faith that guns make people act worse, and that if we moved to a world where people just didn't have guns around so much, violent crime would eventually go down. Whatever crime happens on the way to that is regarded as an unfortunate side-effect. Other facts and data don't much matter, as they just have this feeling, y'know? This is why you keep hearing about people not "needing" this gun or that one, or so many, or even any at all. And why we hear about "America's love affair with guns." They find something wrong in it.
They live in safe, usually very white areas and come from non-gun cultures: non-military, non-hunting, non-law-enforcement, not even target shooting (though there are some there). They perceive those other people as Not Our Tribe, and all humans have some tendency to see other tribes as dangerous. Eww.
Come to think of it, taking liberals target shooting, not even mentioning self-defense or hunting or laws, might be the only road home. A friend bought cheap BB guns for the family Thanksgiving celebration weekend one year and even the liberals enjoyed it, despite their initial worries.
Is it true that they live in safe areas? I got the impression that a lot lived in large cities, where there are often large not-very-safe places. Blaming the gun is much less challenging approach than blaming the criminal--there's an easy "solution" with no need for hard questions.
Within the city you can sometimes find shooting ranges, but not much other place to fire a gun--which feeds the "nobody needs one" notion.
And, of course, in cities it seems the default approach to a problem is to pass a new law about it.
Is it true that they live in safe areas? I got the impression that a lot lived in large cities, where there are often large not-very-safe places.
Ironically (or perhaps not), in those not so safe areas, the residents tend NOT to be pro-gun control. But they also tend to fully believe in voting for nothing but Democrats, and gun-control comes with that package. Which is why there is room for folks like Kim Klacik. She reminds them that they have a choice, and that choice is important. I think that's the future of urban Republican candidates. Local candidates who say "you have a choice, and we won't tie your hands so only the criminals are armed". But it's in the hands of those residents to free themselves from the "Blue No Matter Who" mindset.
Is the data for any sizable sample tabulated and published somewhere that shows (1) number of all violent crimes (for the period whether year, month -- whatever) then (2) the number of those involving firearms, then (3) the number of those crimes with persons identified by arrest records -- some will be "drive by" etc and no way to tell more, so we need to account for them separately, for this purpose we needn't wait for convictions (4) the number of persons arrested for crimes involving guns who had at least the state's "ownership" permission -- registration or higher, if they have "carry" or use certificates as security guards that's all part of "permission" and finally (5) the number of persons arrested for gun-related crimes who had state DENIAL status -- parolees, ex-convicts, under restraining orders, underage ... not those who lacked a permit but those who could not have gotten permits if they had ever applied. (6) other persons, with guns, no restrictions or permit.
I would expect the percentages of such a table might show something like ;
--(1)----(2)----(3)-----(4)-----(5)------(6)
100%--25%---20%----2%---15%----3%
How wrong do you suppose I might be?
Post a Comment