Uechi-Ryu.com

would we really be able to do that..or would we freeze?

These forums have effectively convinced me that unless you're really dedicated to the level of training it takes to use a gun (or anything else) in a crisis scenario, there's no point in carrying one.

But the murder rate has fallen precipitously since the federal ban on assault weapons expired in 2004, and this was also a period in which millions of Americans began to carry their guns in public.
As Jeffrey Goldberg points out in The Atlantic, it may no longer be rational to hope that we can solve the problem of gun violence by restricting access to guns—because guns are everywhere, and the only people who will be deterred by stricter laws are precisely those law-abiding citizens who should be able to possess guns for their own protection and who now constitute one of the primary deterrents to violent crime.

It is impossible to tell how many murders or assaults have not occurred because the victim was known to be armed. Nor can we be certain that such knowledge will necessarily deter the kind of man who contemplates attacking his ex-wife or girlfriend. It is clearly a deterrent to other kinds of violence, however. Surveys among prison populations uniformly find felons stating that, whenever possible, they avoid victims who are thought to be armed, and that they know of planned crimes that were abandoned when it was discovered that the prospective victim was armed.

Indeed, in these surveys prison denizens expressed support for handgun prohibition on precisely the same grounds which lead many honest citizens to oppose it, that it would make life safer and easier for the criminal by disarming his victims without affecting his own ability to attack them. Typical of prisoner comments, according to criminologist Ernest van den Haig of New York University, was: "Ban guns; I'd love it. I'm an armed robber.”

Another illustration of the deterrent effect of civilian handgun ownership is the contrast between the Albuquerque police strike of 1974 and the Liverpool, England police strike of sixty years ago.

The unprecedented increase in criminal activity in Liverpool while the strike lasted has been used as a classic example of the need for police services. But when Albuquerque police went out on strike, storekeepers openly armed themselves and citizens patrolled their neighborhoods with pistols and shotguns. Not only did major crime not rise - it dropped to lows that Albuquerque had not seen in years.

In striking contrast to the anti-self-defense studies are measures that their sponsors and publicists take when their own safety is at stake. While the New York Times unceasingly advises ordinary citizens that no one needs a handgun for self-defense its publisher, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger has a permit to carry a concealed handgun at all times.

So, reportedly, have Congressman and former New York Mayor John Lindsay (author of innumerable bills to disarm everyone else) and the husband of Dr. Joyce Brothers, the renowned pop-psychologist, whose public position is that no one needs a handgun for self-defense and that men who have them may be suspected of sexual dysfunction.

One of the anti-self-defense tracts was issued by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, an organization that lobbies ceaselessly for handgun prohibition. Yet virtually every one of the big-city mayors responsible for this position carries a handgun himself and or has armed body guards.

Sigmund Freud: "A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity."

Now it will undoubtedly be suggested that public office holders and publishers (but faded ex-mayors and Dr. Joyce Brothers?) have reason to keep handguns for self-defense.

But this would seem irrelevant if handguns are useless for self-defense as the tracts say.

In any case, it is quite untrue that big-city mayors and newspaper publishers are exposed to greater dangers than many classes of ordinary citizens.

For instance, hundreds of thousands of women are threatened by male acquaintances each year; thousands of these women are killed, and tens of thousands severely injured.

In contrast, the last big-city mayor murdered in the United States was Anton Cermak of Chicago, who got in the way of a bullet intended for F.D.R. in 1934.

Our information as to the murder of newspaper publishers is not so precise, but the last one that comes to mind is Elijah Lovejoy in 1857.

If anybody in our society does not need handguns for self-defense it is the mayors, the Sulzbergers, the Lindsey and Brotherses, the Nelson, David, Winthrop, and John Rockefeller, and all the other millionaires, socialites. and celebrities who hare New York City to carry concealed guns while ordinary citizens can't even get permits to own them.

If these people - whose lives are spent in mansions, high-security office buildings, and chauffeured limousines - believe that handguns are useless, let them give theirs up first. But, somehow, not only does a handgun prohibition not affect them first, it never gets around to them at all

Professor Kates has for a year and a half had students clipping out, from thirty daily newspapers available in university and public libraries in St. Louis, reports of both successful and unsuccessful use of firearms in repelling criminal attacks.

Some 296 incidents were analyzed, which allowed an interesting comparison between the success rate of armed civilians against criminals and that of the police and uniformed security guards.

With success defined as the criminal being driven off, captured, or killed, armed civilians were successful in 84 percent of the cases, while police and security officers were successful in 73.3 percent.

As to the danger of such resistance, 11.3 percent of the civilian defenders, and 15.1 per cent of the officers, were wounded, while 6.5 percent of the civilians and 6 percent of the officers were killed. (The differential between the success of civilian defenders and the somewhat lesser success of police may be due to the fact that victims are likely to encounter criminals at closer range than are police.

Alternatively or cumulatively, it is also true that the average police officer has little interest in developing firearm skills, and the encouragement, training, and opportunity to do so afforded by most police departments are meager at best17 whereas shop-keepers and residents in high-crime areas often have great incentive to perfect their firearm skills.)