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Author Topic: Self Defense (NOT a gun thread)
Foxer
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posted 04 August 2003 02:35 PM      Profile for Foxer     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I have been reading about the increase in violent crimes. Fortunately, some violent crimes are on the way down, and when you blend in ALL violent crimes, on the whole they are reducing.

However, some types are going up. And worse, there are credible reports that suggest that reporting for violent crime may be going down. In other words, someone beats someone up a bit and the police don't get called.

A girl here in the lower mainland was recently attacked and killed. People nearby admitted later that they heard the screams! But they did nothing.

The police have already won precident in court that they cannot be held responsible for the fact that they can't be everywhere to protect everyone, even people they know may be at risk. Fair enough, they're neither gods not jedi. But that leaves a problem.

The laws in Canada allow you to defend yourself against attack. But, for the most part, they don't allow you to TRAIN for that, or to carry anything to use to defend yourself. It's like many of our passive-agressive laws, Prostitution for example isn't a crime, but Solicitation is.

Right now many people skirt the laws on technicalities. It's illegal to carry pepper spray to use on another human, but it's fine for dogs. So they carry it for people, but say it's for dogs. One girl put it to me "I carry it for dogs and out-of-control pigs I may date". But All that does is mean there are people armed with a defensive tool that they have NO training to use.

Do you think that Canada should have a policy of licensing people to carry devices in order to defend themselves against attack? Forget guns right now - I'm talking about non-leathal or less-leathal devices such as pepper spray or tazers. I Get very upset when I think about my sister, who is about 20 years younger than me. She sometimes has to be in places I'd rather she wasn't, and as she gets a little older that's just going to be the case more often. But unless she takes the dog with her, she is utterly defenseless against someone who is bigger and stronger with the will to do her harm.

I believe that the gov't policy is wrong - we should have training, properly certified training, covering the use of non-lethal devices, and most importantly how to avoid having to use them.

When we train for bear defense, the first most valuable training is how to avoid having a violent confrontation with a bear. Then we look at how to deal with it if an attack is unavoidable or sudden. Why not do the same thing here? Teach people how to avoid confontation, how to recognize and evade a hostile or potentially hostile situation, and then train them how to deal with it using effective tools if it is unavoidable?

Studies show women (and men) who are not afraid get attacked less often. And, those who are attacked may be able to save themselves if they are trained and equipped.

Why are we leaving our citizens exposed? Especially the most vunerable.


From: Vancouver BC | Registered: Jul 2003  |  IP: Logged
'lance
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posted 04 August 2003 04:03 PM      Profile for 'lance     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
However, some types are going up. And worse, there are credible reports that suggest that reporting for violent crime may be going down.

Can you provide a source for either claim? And what types of violent crimes, particularly, are on the increase?

You do raise an important point about reporting rates, though. Criminologists are generally agreed that it's very difficult, if not impossible, to say much about the actual rates of crime at any one time, because when you look at police or court statistics, it's very difficult to know just exactly how they're influenced by reporting rates.

However, there's some support for the idea of "surrogate" offences. That is, if you want to know something about the level of violent crimes, you pick the one violent offence that is almost always reported, i.e. homicide. (I know that some murders, such as those of the women in the Downtown East Side of Vancouver, are not immediately recognized as such, at least by the police. But such occurrences are fairly rare). If you want to know about property crimes, the one property crime that is almost always reported is auto theft, because almost all cars are insured.

Anyway, criminologists like Neil Boyd of SFU are convinced that the murder rate is a good stand-in for the general level of violent crime. The murder rate has been on a steady decline in Canada since 1977, though with occasional brief upticks.

So if you claim that some kinds of violent crime are on the increase, I'd be interested to know what kinds, and how you know this.

I strongly suspect that so-called "zero-tolerance" policies for bullying and assault in schools, for example, are responsible for the perception that young people are more violent than ever before. Many incidents are now reported and investigated which would have been ignored or shrugged off in earlier generations. These reporting practices alone might account for an apparent increase, though I doubt that young people are really more violent than they used to be.


From: that enchanted place on the top of the Forest | Registered: Jul 2001  |  IP: Logged
Foxer
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posted 04 August 2003 04:47 PM      Profile for Foxer     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Lance - all good points, and yes murder is down.

Violence involving 12 -17 year olds is on the rise, and robberies not involving a firearm (strange catagory) is on the increase. But as you say, is the 'kid' thing a better reporting issue or an actual increase?

I'll try to dig up the online stats in a bit for you. But regardless, one has to wonder if that girl i mentioned killed in daylight by an attacker without a firearm needs to be dead. If she had training and a tazer or pepper spray or something similar, might she be alive right now?

Why do we not have an effective method and policy to allow people to defend themselves in the event of an attack? So many of these deaths and assaults may be defended against or at least deterred.


From: Vancouver BC | Registered: Jul 2003  |  IP: Logged
'lance
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posted 04 August 2003 04:54 PM      Profile for 'lance     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Well, there are plenty of self-defence classes one can take -- including Wendo, which is derived from various martial arts and was developed specfically for use by women.

But most experts on self-defence, at least the ones I've read, advise that it's generally a bad idea to carry a weapon (even a "non-lethal" one), if only because it's relatively easy for a sufficiently determined attacker to get hold of it. And then you're worse off than before.

As for the larger question, public policy and all, I'd rather see the effort devoted to making the streets safer. In other words, make it a public matter instead of individualizing it. With the proviso that street attacks are a minority of the whole. Most women who are sexually assaulted, I believe, are assaulted somewhere other than the streets and by someone they already know. So training them to deal with random attacks by strangers goes only so far.


From: that enchanted place on the top of the Forest | Registered: Jul 2001  |  IP: Logged
Foxer
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posted 04 August 2003 05:04 PM      Profile for Foxer     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
But most experts on self-defence, at least the ones I've read, advise that it's generally a bad idea to carry a weapon (even a "non-lethal" one), if only because it's relatively easy for a sufficiently determined attacker to get hold of it. And then you're worse off than before.


Most of the comments i've seen along those lines assume no or limited training for the 'carrier', and I agree. That's what we have now with people carrying 'dog spray'. However, if this were actually true for those with training, the police would not carry either firearms or pepper spray. Used correctly it can be very effective.

The best defense is still avoidance. No training or system is an absolute guarantee, it's a last chance.

quote:
As for the larger question, public policy and all, I'd rather see the effort devoted to making the streets safer. In other words, make it a public matter instead of individualizing it.

I dont know if the two are exclusive. I agree with you, it's every bit as wrong that no one helped that girl when they heard her scream as it is that she was unable to defend herself. But that doesn't mean that both can't co-exist. Heck, that's what the 'screamer' personal defense alarms were supposed to do, scare the intruder and call for help. But it tends to do neither these days.

quote:
So training them to deal with random attacks by strangers goes only so far.


True - but it does go farther than what we have today. If it helped reduce the pictons, or the assaults like the one which killed that girl - why wouldn't we?

From: Vancouver BC | Registered: Jul 2003  |  IP: Logged
Tommy_Paine
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posted 04 August 2003 09:28 PM      Profile for Tommy_Paine     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
When I was a child I started carrying a pocket knife around. My brother advised that if I carried one around, I'd likely find an excuse to use it; and it was best left at home.

Sage advice, I think, and I've followed it ever since.

I did put a long screw driver in the van when my ex and I were still together. She was doing a lot of driving out of town at night, and I thought it was prudent. I told her that used under hand, it could be a formidable weapon.

It's still in the van, perhaps I should remove it.

[ 04 August 2003: Message edited by: Tommy_Paine ]


From: The Alley, Behind Montgomery's Tavern | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
mighty brutus
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posted 07 August 2003 06:50 PM      Profile for mighty brutus     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I vote for keeping the screwdriver in the car. You could actually have a screw that needs tightening someday. Or, if your starter was giving you trouble, you could conceivably bypass the solenoid with it to get going again (something that actually happened to me)

May I suggest keeping a "Maglite" type aluminum flashlight handy (the type with three "D" cells). One can investigate a situation, and if things turn ugly (heaven forbid) they can be used defensively. Furthermore, one can more easily justify carrying a flashlight, as opposed to a baseball bat.


From: Beautiful Burnaby, British Columbia | Registered: Oct 2002  |  IP: Logged
Foxer
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posted 07 August 2003 07:02 PM      Profile for Foxer     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Ok - slightly missing the point i think...

It's easy to Actually arm yourself. But that in and of itself will not likely make you safer. What i'm talking about is people being allowed specifically to trian for, and THEN arm for, defensive circumstances effectively.

without proper training, it's too easy to put yourself at GREATER risk, or to commit a crime. But because of our laws, we don't allow people to actually be trained to use defensive tools, even though we know that people are going to carry anyway, and that's WORSE than teaching them.

I've carried firearms for defense in the woods. I don't do it everytime I go in the woods, i've learned to asses risk and decide if there's a reasonable concern or not. I've never shot it in self defense, and don't expect I will. We do allow tools for use against animals for some reason, so I've read and trained with bear spray, firearms, and so on. I know how to avoid most situations, and recognize a false charge from a real threat.

As a result, I will likely never have to kill an animal in self defense. But it's likely that if I have to, I will be able to. I know what my gun can and cannot do, and have no illusions of invincibility. And aside from the odd ghost story around the fire, i'm never afraid in the woods, or paranoid, or any of the other things they say happens when people are allowed to carry for defense. I'm probably more aware of what's going on around me, and even tho i'm equipped to deal with a threat, because most of my training is how to avoid it i'll probably be MORE likely not to be in a situation where i'll have to.

Why is it that people can take these reasonable steps against preditors in the woods, but not preditors in the city?

Especially given the choices of less-lethal tools available today.

[ 07 August 2003: Message edited by: Foxer ]


From: Vancouver BC | Registered: Jul 2003  |  IP: Logged

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