Switzerland is always brought up by gun-rights proponents, but is a very bad comparison to America. All qualified Swiss men must serve compulsory military service in Switzerland, and after their term of service they are allowed to own, but normally not use, a gun and are given a limited, highly regulated, quantity of ammunition. There is also hunting, which accounts for the ownership of rifles. The population of Switzerland is under 8 million people, which is less than New York City. This is not a country that can be accurately compared to the United States, because it is very different in a number of ways. And yes, I do think that the police should carry guns in America.
To everyone saying Europeans arnt allowed firearms, we are in the UK you can hold rifles and/or shotguns. We arnt allowed to own handguns because of the blatant miss use of them, after the dumblane shooting pistols were banned and gun crime plummeted a stupid amount!
1) were just going to have to agree to disagree that its in any way likely for a typical police officer to be fired at then. of course theyre paid to deal with the threats, but there just arent that many violent individuals willing to fire on a cop. all but those totally caught in wild passion or those so deeply criminal death or life in prison is not a deterrent. these people will fire on cops unarmed or not however, and arming the entire police force for these very special scenarios is unwarranted. the point isnt no cop can carry, the point is only a select few in dangerous areas would, and for domestic disputes or other scenarios specially armed backup would always be there. 2) im not sure what you mean tbh. unless you see the point im trying to make is "some ghettos are so bad they are at best infrequently visited", youre misunderstanding me. which if you dont believe.....idk. visit one. talk to people. theyre out there. again, i think these cops should likely be armed, unless a valid plan was in place to allow them not to be. these instances would be the exception not the norm.
Yeah I'm on my phone but ill try finding it for you later, I wasn't alive at the time but my mum was trying to get rid of some shotguns and couldn't for months after the shooting, after dunblane the uk turned its opinions vastly on firearms.
I hope you are joking... Kid shot for wii remote. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/georgia-teen-holding-wii-remote-shot-cops-front-door-family-lawyer-article-1.1619842 Kid shot for toy gun http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/calif-deputy-shot-kid-fake-gun-firearms-trainer-article-1.1500144 Sunday school teacher shot in a church parking lot http://reason.com/blog/2012/05/14/why-did-a-culpepper-cop-kill-a-retired-s Cops shoot and kill a man watering his lawn, then lie saying he had a gun. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/07/06/1221732/-Unarmed-Man-Shot-And-Killed-By-Police-While-Watering-Plants Pigs shot and killed a HERO http://www.thewrap.com/tosh-0-producer-mistakenly-shot-killed-los-angeles-sheriff-deputy I don't feel like posting more so take a look and open your eyes. https://www.facebook.com/CopBlock?ref=br_tf I seriously hope your post was sarcasm.
1 - Because officer safety doesn't matter at all right? How many people would be willing to sign on as a cop, knowing they had no way of defending themselves against someone armed? I've actually talked to quite a few officers in my day, and have actually made quite a few positive relationships with them...and they will all say the same exact thing: that their number 1 priority is to come home safe. 2 - Well, ghetto is your word, not mine. But yes, that's how you are coming off. How else should I have taken it? By 'anti-cop' you must mean criminal, because in the context of this conversation, someone who is anti-cop but does not break the law doesn't really apply. Cops don't go after anti-police, law abiding citizens. Extrapolate further, because I'm interested in hearing your theory...
There are isolated incidents for everything in a country like the United States which has the most guns per capita of any large nation, and hundreds of millions of people, but there's no evidence that wrongful police shootings are widespread. I read somewhere that during their career, about 95% of cops never fire their weapon. I will try to find the statistic, if I can.
hes right actually. its an extreme minority of cops (way under 1%) that will ever shoot somebody. i simply feel its unnecessary for them to carry in most cases and causes a lot of animosity which to me seems to be building up and is potentially waaaaaay worse for the country than a few hundred dead cops or citizens a year. also idk, i feel like if youre supposed to be the dedicated peace keepers of society you should ideally never be able to escalate or initiate violence. which is not how many cops operate. and if they cant follow that basic principle idk that i want them having weapons.if they can not follow the code we uphold them to and act inappropriately, you have no recourse. if you are being truly unjustly assaulted, you cant even protect yourself. let alone fire shots. you fire on them you are dead plain and simple. there is no reason the police need to be untouchable, and there is no reason the average one should be armed. 1) officer safety is very important. however, that virtually never requires lethal force for the average cop. perhaps thats good less cops would sign on. those that really want to uphold the law will still join. 2) i dont have a clue what youre talking about. all im saying is there are some ghettos cops dont go to. even getting ambulances and stuff can take a long time...are you disputing this or something else?
1 - It doesn't usually require lethal force, no. But that's not a point against needing armed officers, it's actually a point for it. The threat of power has power, and many situations that may become ugly don't, due to the threat of lethal force. After all, gun's don't need to be fired to get the point across. 2 - Of course I'm disputing this. Let's just take what you say as truth...so we have a portion of the population, the 'ghettos' that don't really get policed. Then we have another portion, the rich areas, that don't really get actively policed either. I think thats something most people really can agree with. So that leaves us with...who, exactly? Middle class suburbia? Except that's not really true either, because the average response time for cops in suburbian areas is about half an hour. So who are the police policing?
New York City has a very large police force, with nearly 35,000 officers. In 2011, there was a total of 92 incidents of firearms discharged by cops. This figure includes accidental firings. Sixty two officers were involved in 36 incidents of adversarial violence, with 19 subjects injured and nine killed. In a city of over eight million people, I think that it's expected that there will be crime, and that there will be occasions when the police have to use a gun. Sixty two cops, out of a force of almost 35,000, is not a very large statistic. And, whether you realize it or not, most of these shooting incidents were entirly justified. http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/downloads/pdf/analysis_and_planning/nypd_annual_firearms_discharge_report_2011.pdf
1) the fact theyre the police is enough for practically all scenarios. if that ever isnt enough nonlethal force is plenty in all but the worst cases, and those can usually be planned for. 2) arbitrary and petty crime breakers for the most part. an extremely small part of crime is violent. nearly all routine incidents could be handled with nonlethal. bottom line is the police should work for the people. they should not be unreasonably empowered over the common man. if anything by swearing that oath you should be held to higher principles of nonviolence (but always matched escalation as needed) at all costs. the average patrol unit does not have a real need to carry a gun, and if a few die because of it that should be a known risk. they are supposed to be servants.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_the_United_Kingdom Did you guys know that the majority of pistols in Manchester/London all came from the one shop in America?
@[member="Snoop Toad"] would you be an unarmed cop in America? Just imagine showing up somewhere, anywhere, not knowing what yer gunna find in a country with over 3 hundred million firearms and maybe even more. Nevermind that only a small minority of the armed are wicked, but just the volume of armed folks is worrisome. Don't you think?
i wouldnt be an armed cop in america for a variety of reasons either so im not really the best to ask. however, i would totally be an unarmed cop in every town ive lived in. and this is WI where most homes have one or several guns. if the population isnt prone to violence there isnt a need.
Isolated? These are all different departments. I guess you didn't really even look at the links, if you have you would have seen the last one, with literally hundreds of links where police shot,beat, harassed, unarmed people. An FBI link showing they are investigating these dirty pigs. Even they finally see how trigger happy cops are. They finally stepped in so the police could not review themselves and constantly keep getting away with shooting people. http://www.fbi.gov/albuquerque/press-releases/2014/fbi-opens-investigation-into-albuquerque-police-department-shooting
The FBI only came in because somebody is claiming that the shooting was a violation of civil rights. Look at my NYC statistics, in 2011 far less than one percent of NYC cops even fired their weapon in the line of duty.
Obviously the majority of citizens aren't going to shoot at police or even fire a weapon at all. Its the extreme small percentage of individuals. Are you going to tell a cop that he has to walk his beat in gang ridden L.A. carrying nothing but a tazer and pepper spray?