Poll: Arming the UK Police

[Danny Ocean]

Cum Catapultae Proscriptae Erunt Tum Soli Proscripti Catapultas Habebunt

"When catapults are outlawed, only outlaws will have catapults."

That's why.

Writing something in Latin doesn't make it any more correct.

Ehm...no, it doesn't. The fact that it's TRUE is what makes it correct.

Except it's evidently not true. Guns are by-and-large banned here among the civilian population, but the police still have them, so the phrase:

"Only outlaws will have catapults."

Is simply factually wrong. The outlaws and the police have them, and the police have more.

You may then say, "Well if the police can have them they're not outlawed!"

To which I may respond, "Well then why the hell do you think your comment has any relevancy?"

Although I'm glad you agree that simply rephrasing something in Latin is the height of intellectual condescension.

 

[Westerschwelle]

Obviously Cops should carry guns all the time! People will always be able to get weapons illegal so why should the police be armed worse than potential hostiles?

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

You guys seriously don't have long distance tazer guns in the UK? It took what, 20 minutes to even get riot shields in play? No tear gas? I saw no bean bag shotguns.

Those are all perfectly acceptable non-lethal weapons that ALL officers should have access to. This would have ended with 2 officers rather than over 30 if you had ANY of this devices. Devices most US CITIZENS can purchase without a license.

this by far

there are other weapons that are WAY more useful in that situation, tasers/beanbag shotguns/riot shields(on hand)



if that was america, WITHOUT THE USE OF A LIVE GUN, he woulda been down in maybe a minute, if that, hell a civilian probably would have had him down quicker than that.

the whole point of the police is to be able to protect the civilians, and if they aren't equipped for it then they are no better than a babysitter

 

[Arizona Kyle]

I sleep well knowing these men are on the streets protecting us from danger every day.

and i fear this

 

[Westerschwelle]

Well I see the American standard of gunning down anyone looking at you funny is really nicely excepted.

Anyway police officers in my country are all trained and armed, but for them only to unholster a weapon can be a career ending decision unless they have several colleges confirming the necessity, and anyone pulling an american style gun-down will land in jail before the body get's cold.
So they aren't just armed and let loose like the wild west nutters, they are armed for necessity only and very closely monitored not to step out of line.

Same here

 

[Danny Ocean]

the whole point of the police is to be able to protect the civilians, and if they aren't equipped for it then they are no better than a babysitter

Oh? Was a civilian hurt in that video? If not, then how can your point still stand?

We should really exclude Americans from this poll. It's seriously skewing the results.

 

[Westerschwelle]

If the police have guns, so too should the citizens, to protect themselves from the police.

Yeah, because the police are power hungry maniacs that hate you and are out to get you. That makes a ton of sense.

Remember those guys that wrote the constitution of the United States of America? Those guys a lot smarter than anyone in this forum, including you and I? Yeah, see, they just got done fighting against, among other things, the police and saw fit to include the right to bear arms into the founding rights of their country.

P.S: go tell those people being beaten by police in the gutter that they have nothing to fear. I mean, they obviously don't need to protect themselves from that. And those guys in Libya? Fighting for their democratic rights against a military that wants them dead? Yeah, I'm pretty sure they need to protect themselves too.

But we all live in Democratic countrys where there are regulations and laws in place to prevent such things. Although if you are an US-American then I could see why you would think you're living in some kind of fascist dictatorship.

 

[Vanguard_Ex]

I sleep well knowing these men are on the streets protecting us from danger every day.

Holy shit dude, THOSE are YOUR street cops? No fucking wonder we have so much little fuckers in this country...

I think our regular patrol police should be armed with (mostly) non-lethal weaponry: tasers, rubber bullets, stun grenades etc.

 

[DSK-]

Jean Charles De Menezes? Ian Tomlinson?

We don't want America's situation, readily armed police and readily armed civilians. We understand that American's like guns and feel they need them (in case North Korea invades). Even the really shitty areas of the UK are relatively gun free and I wouldn't trust the regular police to carry guns. Leave that to the Army, TA, airport security and firearms officers.

My sentiments exactly. If guns were suddenly made legal I know there would be a hell of a lot of crime and killings, mostly because in my area there isn't a great deal for youths to do.

 

[Chris^^]

I don't actually feel secure in this country at the moment thanks to the police being less heavily armed than the majority of criminals here. Where I am in Manchester isn't far from Moss Side, an area the police simply avoid because they don't have the adequate force to enforce the law there, it's ridiculous. I'm not necessarily advocating all police to be armed with lethal weaponry, but every officer should at least have the ability to incapacitate a dangerous individual, as it is you get the truly insane situations as demonstrated in the video where an inordinate ammount of officers are taken away from ordinary duties to deal with ONE dangerous person as none of them have the power to simply render the them harmless.

 

[Shydrow]

this by far

there are other weapons that are WAY more useful in that situation, tasers/beanbag shotguns/riot shields(on hand)



if that was america, WITHOUT THE USE OF A LIVE GUN, he woulda been down in maybe a minute, if that, hell a civilian probably would have had him down quicker than that.

the whole point of the police is to be able to protect the civilians, and if they aren't equipped for it then they are no better than a babysitter[/quote]

We also have guns everywhere and are easy to get while in england not so much. I'm glade you took at least 2 seconds out of your busy life to not bother looking up UK gun laws cause you would have understood NOT TO MANY PEOPLE HAVE A GUN. and on top of that even in the states you cant shoot people cause they are a threat if you can get away or maybe you don't even understand the laws of your own country.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

the whole point of the police is to be able to protect the civilians, and if they aren't equipped for it then they are no better than a babysitter

Oh? Was a civilian hurt in that video? If not, then how can your point still stand?

We should really exclude Americans from this poll. It's seriously skewing the results.

the man was more annoyed at the police at the moment, had a civilian been more near or been in the mind of the bad guy, he could've easily gone after the civilian just fine, seeing as they had to keep a solid 8-10 ft distance from him as they couldn't do jack shit until the riot shields got there.

they did a good job with only having a spray and baton as their "weapon" of choice, but honestly police should be armed a bit better than that, all the things i put in my post, which you didn't quote, were all non lethal methods of containing threats, which is what i support.

honestly a civilian running out with a butchers knife would've been more threatening than the police in that situation.

 

[TheXRatedDodo]

Wee, Orwelle was right.

 

[Mandalore_15]

Currently, most EU, Asia-Pacific, Eastern and American countries have firearms issued to officers as part of their standard equipment and I think that above video makes it pretty bloody obvious why that's the case. So what are your thoughts, Escapist, on arming the police of the UK with firearms as standard issue and why?

It's never going to happen, particularly with the Jean Charles de Menezes incident. What's more, the standard of police officers we have in the UK is incredibly poor. I couldn't trust a regular policeman in this country to handle a gun responsibly, could you?

 

[Duskwaith]

The Police service of northern ireland are all armed as standard issue and even get to keep their guns off duty due to the high security threat.

Im happy they are armed and they should be. Calling out the armed response unit is aload of balls when its a split second decision to be made.

Look at Raoul Moat he shot a cop and he could do nothing to protect himself

 

[Danny Ocean]

the man was more annoyed at the police at the moment, had a civilian been more near or been in the mind of the bad guy, he could've easily gone after the civilian just fine, seeing as they had to keep a solid 8-10 ft distance from him as they couldn't do jack shit until the riot shields got there.

Couldn't do jack shit? He didn't move from the same square 20-or-so meters. No need to employ more force than necessary. In that situation- a civilian life in danger0 armed police would have been dispatched straight away afaik.

they did a good job with only having a spray and baton as their "weapon" of choice but honestly police should be armed a bit better than that,

Those "Weapons" are more than enough most of the time. Have you ever been hit with one of those? They cane and will incapacitate most people with one or two hard hits to the knee or leg.

I know it's hard to imagine where you are, but you've got to remember that hardly anyone here has a gun, including the criminals, and most violent weaponry like that machete is in the hands of gangs, which are countered with more heavily armed police.

 

[icame]

I picked option one. That man was running at them swinging his machete, he needed to be stopped, and the cops had no means to do it. THAT is bullshit.

 

[jurwell]

Are you effen kidding me?
Does anyone remember Iain Tomlinson? No? Mkay....
ARV's are trained very well from what I've seen - I've never heard of them killing innocents. This is fine.

Give every EDL-member bobby boulders with a beer belly and a hatred of hippies a gun and we are up shit creek.

Also more guns in the UK means ... more guns in the UK. Look at our murder statistics, look at amuricuh's. The poliss lose things, sell things after hours and have stuff nicked from them: crack, smack, cars; let's not make it crack, smack, cars, and guns, eh?

Exactly. Fuck guns. I'd fancy my chances against a pikey with a knife over a pikey with a gun any day. Cuz legalising guns would turn people getting into fights into shootings and rather than having guys come out of their house to shoo away kids playing in their garden and stuff, you'd get kids being shot.

See last week in America:http://www.wjla.com/articles/2011/05/charles-joseph-armiger-shoots-skateboarder-60876.html

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

this by far

there are other weapons that are WAY more useful in that situation, tasers/beanbag shotguns/riot shields(on hand)



if that was america, WITHOUT THE USE OF A LIVE GUN, he woulda been down in maybe a minute, if that, hell a civilian probably would have had him down quicker than that.

the whole point of the police is to be able to protect the civilians, and if they aren't equipped for it then they are no better than a babysitter

We also have guns everywhere and are easy to get while in england not so much. I'm glade you took at least 2 seconds out of your busy life to not bother looking up UK gun laws cause you would have understood NOT TO MANY PEOPLE HAVE A GUN. and on top of that even in the states you cant shoot people cause they are a threat if you can get away or maybe you don't even understand the laws of your own country.[/quote]

maybe you could at least take 2 seconds to quote correctly?

if you would actually pay attention to my post, i was supporting NON LETHAL types of firearms, tazers, beanbag shotguns, or at least handy riot shields for protection.

uh lolwut? in texas you can shoot someone for being on your own property (i don't live in texas nor have i been there but that is what is stated last time i checked) , hell a few months back some guys were robbing a walgreens(local pharmacy store) with shotguns ready and loaded, and a civilian was able to take them down in the process with no repercussions on the situation.

if you feel threatened, then you have the option to protect yourself in the situation. I don't have the time nor the care to look up articles to prove this but it happens all the time when people protect themselves from assailants and nothing happens with repercussions, at most they go to court to prove the evidence which it nearly always does.

unless i am completely off base on what you were talking about for "understanding the own laws of my country", then explain to me what you meant by that.

 

[Kaarnage]

As a British citizen and Uniformed Public Services student, I am delighted to see the majority vote to be in favour of option A.