Yanks and Guns

youngdan wrote:

I am saying it is outlandish that it is happening, that it is allowed to happen, that people accept it and that people are forced to accept it as they can not defend themselves.

There is a saying that an armed society is a polite society.

If the thug knew that the victim was armed and his life was over if he bullied to you think he would try the bully tactics.

All I hear is talk of money being spent to help them. That is just fancy talk for a kid giving up his lunch money. It has not worked.

It is a question of crime and punishment. except the punishment is not great enough to counter the crime.

Your point about every punch-up turning into a shoot- out is not what happens in real life, up to now anyway.

However some segments of society have become so dumb that not even this can hold.

I await the next killing

It hasn't happened until now because (a) guns are for the most part illegal in Ireland and (b) nobody's stupid enough to shoot a thug who has a whole estate of other thugs to back him up. This is why arming victims would do diddly squat.

youngdan wrote:

I am saying it is outlandish that it is happening, that it is allowed to happen, that people accept it and that people are forced to accept it as they can not defend themselves.

There is a saying that an armed society is a polite society.

If the thug knew that the victim was armed and his life was over if he bullied to you think he would try the bully tactics.

All I hear is talk of money being spent to help them. That is just fancy talk for a kid giving up his lunch money. It has not worked.

It is a question of crime and punishment. except the punishment is not great enough to counter the crime.

Your point about every punch-up turning into a shoot- out is not what happens in real life, up to now anyway.

However some segments of society have become so dumb that not even this can hold.

I await the next killing

The moon landings are faked, and society will be more polite if it is armed to the teeth. Are you allowed to leave your compound in the woods at will, or do you have to ask permission?

toxic avenger wrote:

youngdan wrote:

I am saying it is outlandish that it is happening, that it is allowed to happen, that people accept it and that people are forced to accept it as they can not defend themselves.

There is a saying that an armed society is a polite society.

If the thug knew that the victim was armed and his life was over if he bullied to you think he would try the bully tactics.

All I hear is talk of money being spent to help them. That is just fancy talk for a kid giving up his lunch money. It has not worked.

It is a question of crime and punishment. except the punishment is not great enough to counter the crime.

Your point about every punch-up turning into a shoot- out is not what happens in real life, up to now anyway.

However some segments of society have become so dumb that not even this can hold.

I await the next killing

The moon landings are faked, and society will be more polite if it is armed to the teeth. Are you allowed to leave your compound in the woods at will, or do you have to ask permission?

(Apologies Youngdan, but TA's got a point there.)

What point does he have. Society is armed to the teeth up in Vermont and it is more polite.



So let's give some time for the likes of TA to come up with a solution then. Too late for Kane though

And of course some solutions which have been suggested aren't adequate and need to be rethought. Too late for Ryan Clark, Emily Hilscher, Liviu Librescu, Minal Panchal, G V Loganathan, Jarrett Lane, Brian Bluhm, etc. etc. etc.

youngdan wrote:

What point does he have. Society is armed to the teeth up in Vermont and it is more polite.



So let's give some time for the likes of TA to come up with a solution then. Too late for Kane though

Five years, summary offence, when caught with a firearm illegally. Life, meaning life, for anyone who shoots another dead, or can be proved to have attempted it. Life, meaning life, for anybody who possesses a firearm in the commission of a crime. Anyone proposing to use legally held firearms for legitimate purposes to notify the Gardai at least 48 hours in advance, any found in possession outside that to be dealt with as any criminal. And all Americans in the country to be barred altogether from holding arms at any time, lest they blow the neighbour away for being too loud putting the bins out.

Well give that a go and hopefully it will work.

I would agree with this for say 3 years to see if a future problem can be nipped in the bud. Afer say a year I would disarm the gardai special units as well. Would you agree to this.

youngdan wrote:

Well give that a go and hopefully it will work.

I would agree with this for say 3 years to see if a future problem can be nipped in the bud. Afer say a year I would disarm the gardai special units as well. Would you agree to this.

Gun crime will never be nipped in the bud, but it can be severely contained. So special response units should maintain the discretion to use firearms when they deem it necessary, armed sieges or whatever. Ordinary Gardai must never be firearmed. The British ordinary constabulary object themselves to their own firearming, knowing full well it would only ensure the firearming of nearly the entire serious criminal class. Bearing arms is not a human right, pace your American Constitution, but is an extraordinary privilege to be strictly controlled. I don't think the majority of the Irish people want it any other way.

self defence is a human right and if you are facing a gun there is little use having a sword. Would you believe that having a sword was not a human right.

You admit and realise that the criminals will always have guns.


I would still be willing to give it a try for 3 years to see but I do not think it would work.

Some approach is necessary though as the situation to me me seems to be getting worse.

Here is a fun place with lots of guns. It is one of those places where a few hand guns would be unlikely to improve your safety. Now 6 heavily armed retainers may sound about right but I think that would be optimism.

http://video.google.co.uk/videosearch?hl=en&q=Mogadishu+video&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=X&oi=video_result_group&resnum=4&ct=title#

Once any sort of order breaks down it is very hard to restore.

It won't play Squire. Is it from Tallaght or Vermont

youngdan wrote:

Yes he was. I assume no one here knows the poor man. Now assuming is of course assuming but in this case I am assuming that he was a target of bullying by these thugs many times and he eventually chased. I am further assuming that it never entered his mind that he would face a knife not to mind a 9mm. If he had he would have cowered one more time. I did see a bit of the news and the report said that the police would look into the possibility that the egg throwing was to lure Kane out.

I do not know the backgrounds of some of the posters here and it seems that they never enjoyed a kick to a tender spot.

Speaking as a one time bully and a one time target of a bully, I can attest that a bully only respects force. End of story and the greater the better.

It is not just a gun culture, it is a savagery culture. How many lads have been kicked to death in the recent past

Let's say we were back in the days where swords were the weapon. A law depriving a man a sword would be an outrage. It would probably be called a Penal Law.

Well put Dan.I agree .
"It is not just a gun culture,it is a savagery culture"
Have you seen the latest graduates from the Urban Degeneration Scheme.A PPP brought to you courtesy of....?
http://www.herald.ie/national-news/a-lawless-ghetto-no-this-is-the-real-face-of-irelands-gangland-1542620.html

YoungDan

No Mogadishu, not that dissimilar from Tallagh.

http://current.com/items/76377322/mogadishu_madness.htm

It is attitude, culture etc that create the problem areas not the weapons but once you throw weapons into a bad situation you risk all hell being unleased.


In days of old when men carried swords it was brutal. Might was right. Few criminals were caught and the country was run by thugs who got their positions by clubbing someone else. In those days it would have been very easy to sort out a few local gangs and co lateral damage was not a worry. Indeed the worse you were the better as adverse publicity was highly desirable. It give you real Street Cred.

Only in Hollywood movies can an individual make an effective stand against gangs of thugs.

How is the crime scene back there. In the 4 days since I last posted there was a 20 year old knifed to death in Galway, a woman killed in Dublim and some dick had a sawed off shotgun shoved up his whole. Where did that gun come from. It should be illegal

powderfinger wrote:

youngdan wrote:

Yes he was. I assume no one here knows the poor man. Now assuming is of course assuming but in this case I am assuming that he was a target of bullying by these thugs many times and he eventually chased. I am further assuming that it never entered his mind that he would face a knife not to mind a 9mm. If he had he would have cowered one more time. I did see a bit of the news and the report said that the police would look into the possibility that the egg throwing was to lure Kane out.

I do not know the backgrounds of some of the posters here and it seems that they never enjoyed a kick to a tender spot.

Speaking as a one time bully and a one time target of a bully, I can attest that a bully only respects force. End of story and the greater the better.

It is not just a gun culture, it is a savagery culture. How many lads have been kicked to death in the recent past

Let's say we were back in the days where swords were the weapon. A law depriving a man a sword would be an outrage. It would probably be called a Penal Law.

Well put Dan.I agree .
"It is not just a gun culture,it is a savagery culture"
Have you seen the latest graduates from the Urban Degeneration Scheme.A PPP brought to you courtesy of....?

I don't know if these men were product of Ballinacurra or moved in last week. From their age they are part of the generation that grew up in the 1980s and 90s. In Limerick and in most of Ireland that was the time when there was heavy unemployment and emigration and getting a job was all about who you knew and where you were from. There were areas like Ballinaccura that had no particular law and order problems - neither did they have any local police stations, in some cases for populations up to 10,000.

Government had the bright idea of saving spending on social housing by giving tenants a grant to buy a private house "releasing" the council house for someone else. Private housing was cheap and subsidised by mortgage relief and first time buyers grants. Nearly everyone in work left their Council house and in Limerick whole terraces of council housing were left vacant. Some estates were populated only by single mothers who suddenly found it easy to get a council house and there were no men at work left in these communities. The Tidy Towns residents groups fell apart and the estates that had been maintained by residents with pride began to look like Beirut, with the vacant houses eventually being vandalised and burnt out and uncollected litter and dumping from inside and outside. Ask someone in Limerick City and County Councils how many houses they have demolished in those years at a time of housing shortage and how many they plan to demolish now. The Guardai were office bound and motorised and completely stopped patrolling the streets. There were no play parks and no sports facilities for young people and these very large parts of Limerick are very physically separated and invisible from the rest of the City.

I'm sure there were a few right bastards around there the same as anywhere, but without the water to swim in of a wider layer of young men who follow them or at least don't oppose them, they could never have done much damage. Most of those "followers" given half a chance would have lived completely different lives. Bullies in the estates make the lives of the 95% of decent people miserable and progressively anyone who could get out got out. The chances of getting effective Garda action was and is zero, for criminal offences (for some reason described as "anti-social behaviour" in the media). Add drugs and drug money to that in the last ten years

Local people have told the authorities what needs to be done over and over again. There are a few people in the Councils who have done their best but they were viewed as odd by their colleagues. Indifference, snobbery and disfunctional management, have done the job.

I think a big physical regeneration scheme is a mistake because it gives the illusion, no matter what is said about education and facilities, that the physical side is a problem. These estates need repair, public transport and services and facilities added and the children need homework clubs with proper tuition and sports facilities and youth workers. The community groups need to be listened to. Ballymun, that relied on architecture, is having the predictable experience that the same people are doing the same things as they were in their old flats and houses. The first play area was built in an out of sight piece of ground in which it was vandalised out in a few weeks. Highly paid middle class people with no basic cop on and only superficial commitment to the area are in charge.

The existing authorities really have failed. I think the tenants of these areas should be allowed to form local councils with their own maintenance and estate management budgets and given back up by the police, and should have control themselves over regeneration.




A Tale of Two Cities: http://www.cathalmccarthy.ie/Election2007/twocities.html

I don't get it... was it the Council who burned out that house? I doubt it. I understand that we need to invest more into our struggling communities, but to blame the activities of scumbags of the local authorities is pointless.

evercloserunion wrote:

I don't get it... was it the Council who burned out that house? I doubt it. I understand that we need to invest more into our struggling communities, but to blame the activities of scumbags of the local authorities is pointless.

There are 250 houses derelict and burnt out in Limerick at the moment, according to the link. They have demolished hundreds. How can that possibly be a consequence just of the actions of a few "bad boys" - who are a tiny few of the people living in those areas?

Bad policy left a mass of houses empty for years in an unpoliced area. The houses did not get a makeover by "Grand Designs". It is a picture of public neglect and policy mistakes uncorrected for year after year.

Do you think if local authority management had to live within these areas this situation would have been allowed?

The truth is each compounds the other. Disruptive influences within housing developments, partly due to bad planning but also down to other factors, compounds bad planning which leads to greater disruptive influence and thereafter a retreat by the authorities from the area creating an even greater problem which they eventually have to go back into and sort at a much higher cost in the future. The difference is that the scumbags aren't being paid high salaries by the taxpayer whereas the local authority is. Therefore, it is the local authority who we should expect to take the initial high ground.

cactus flower wrote:

evercloserunion wrote:

I don't get it... was it the Council who burned out that house? I doubt it. I understand that we need to invest more into our struggling communities, but to blame the activities of scumbags of the local authorities is pointless.

There are 250 houses derelict and burnt out in Limerick at the moment, according to the link. They have demolished hundreds. How can that possibly be a consequence just of the actions of a few "bad boys" - who are a tiny few of the people living in those areas?

Bad policy left a mass of houses empty for years in an unpoliced area. The houses did not get a makeover by "Grand Designs". It is a picture of public neglect and policy mistakes uncorrected for year after year.

Do you think if local authority management had to live within these areas this situation would have been allowed?

So we can't blame it on the scumbags? Tell me. Do you believe the council burnt out those houses?

3 murders in 3 days. Same as the US per capita. The soft approach is not working too well

youngdan wrote:

3 murders in 3 days. Same as the US per capita. The soft approach is not working too well

Statistics doesn't quite work like that YD. But while on the subject - the US has 1 in every 100 adults in jail , we have less than 1in  1200. 1 in every 36 adults is in the penal system in the US between probation, parole etc. Basically the US is one gigantic penal colony. Guns haven't done much for it, have they?

evercloserunion wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

evercloserunion wrote:

I don't get it... was it the Council who burned out that house? I doubt it. I understand that we need to invest more into our struggling communities, but to blame the activities of scumbags of the local authorities is pointless.

There are 250 houses derelict and burnt out in Limerick at the moment, according to the link. They have demolished hundreds. How can that possibly be a consequence just of the actions of a few "bad boys" - who are a tiny few of the people living in those areas?

Bad policy left a mass of houses empty for years in an unpoliced area. The houses did not get a makeover by "Grand Designs". It is a picture of public neglect and policy mistakes uncorrected for year after year.

Do you think if local authority management had to live within these areas this situation would have been allowed?

So we can't blame it on the scumbags? Tell me. Do you believe the council burnt out those houses?

evercloserunion, whole rows of houses were left vacant and unsecured for years on end. Yes, so far as I am concerned, Government and the local authorities were entirely responsible for those houses being burnt down through their gross and negligent mismanagement.

There is a strong element of personal responsibility as well. This should not be overlooked because it is only from the authorities and the community working in tandem that anything like this is ever solved. Where are the leaders in these communities and more to the point what is the State doing to support and affirm them.

If you had been thrown into a housing estate 20 years ago, miles away from your original community- no public transport, no community centre, nothing but a big, horrible label of living in a council estate- what prospects would you have? Very few. I'm sure a few of us are old enough to remember that addresses mattered on CVs. They mattered big time.

Now imagine bringing your children up in a place enveloped by this depressive atmosphere. Imagine having the dilemma of protecting versus socialising your children. Imagine the horror of gang warfare in your area. This is real. It's happening down the road from us, be it Limerick, Tallaght, Derry or Wateford; it's everywhere and it's an epidemic. There are so many families, innocent familes, who, by pure bad luck, ended up in these areas and now not only have to suffer the label of living in Moyross et al but also have to live literally in fear of their lives.

It is amazing that in our so-called 'Global Village' that so many live in complete ignorance of what is happening on their own doorstep.

What is really depressing is that the people who do know this is happening are choosing to ignore it and are starting a new pattern every time an exclusively social housing estate is built.

johnfás wrote:

There is a strong element of personal responsibility as well. This should not be overlooked because it is only from the authorities and the community working in tandem that anything like this is ever solved. Where are the leaders in these communities and more to the point what is the State doing to support and affirm them.

There are leaders who have done a huge amount with tiny resources, but you are talking about populations of the size of a small town with no facilities, no police on the street and rows of houses lying empty.