I am going to refrain from joining the ranks of amateur psychologists trying to identify the “root cause” of the English riots. People of any age or economic status who riot are, it is fair to say, assholes, like lesser social miscreants such as vandals, computer virus inventors, Leroy Fick and Pastor Terry Jones. If I were convinced that these riots were in response to necessary government cutbacks in social programs, I would have something arguably useful to say, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.
There is no question, however, that in allowing the riots to go on so long and harm so many citizens, businesses and homes, the British government has failed one of its most basic duties. Great Britain has been the anti-gun zealot’s Nirvana for a long time: not only can’t citizens own guns for their personal protection, neither can the police. That can work, if the culture is reliably non-violent, and if social and community institutions do a good job making sure that the culture of non-violence is strong, self-reenforced, and deep.
Well, it isn’t, is it?
I am pretty sure that everyone in the country, including the police and the various levels of government, knew it too. They didn’t, or couldn’t, strengthen that aspect of the culture, and they were unprepared to protect law-abiding citizens when the failure of the culture made violence a reality. The government took their citzens’ most effective means of self-protection away, and now they are desperately buying…baseball bats.
Baseball bats! I think its fair to say that when your nation’s law-abiding citizens are reduced to buying baseball bats so that when the unruly hordes come to slaughter them, at least they can take a few marauders with them to that Big Pub in the Sky by bashing in their skulls, there has been a teensy miscalculation somewhere.
This is why I roll my eyes when someone’s argument for changing American policy and attitudes—be it free speech, capital punishment, health care, the welfare state, or not being bored stiff by soccer—boils down to “we’re the only ones who do it this way!” Well, good for us. That doesn’t prove anything, nor is the United States to be assumed wrong just because it is alone, or in the minority, in its cultural norms. There is great value in our nation’s traditional insistence on self-reliance, which also includes the tools to be self-reliant.
If the government is going to insist that its citizens can’t be armed, it has a sacred, undeniable obligation to be ready and able to protect the citizenry when arms are needed. Great Britain has failed that obligation, miserably and inexcusably. Three days into the riots, which are spreading to other cities, and the police were saying that they might be forced to use water-cannons and rubber bullets? How nice. How quaint. How incompetent.
The famous quote likely to come out of this calamity is one rioter’s boast that the thugs are “showing the police, and showing the rich, that we can do whatever we want.” Yes, they are. And the government is to blame. I’d like to invite that eloquent young lady to come to my neighborhood and see if she and her pals will have similar success. I know of three neighbors, at least, who are within a stone’s throw of my home who wouldn’t be reaching for a baseball bat, I can guarantee her that.
Now, as political leaders like Ron Paul and Barney Frank appeal to the Anglophiles in the United States to gut our national defense to temporarily postpone cuts in our runaway social programs that are unavoidable anyway, we should look at what Great Britain’s non-violent ideal and the failure of its government to meet its core obligations has wrought. Sure, go ahead, Barney–cave to the no-nukes, no war and isolationist advocates, because the world is such a peaceful place. If you do, however, you better be able to promise me and my family that the disarmed government will still be able to protect us if and when the worst happens.
Never mind. I wouldn’t believe you anyway.
Where’s that baseball bat?
Ethics Alarms 
I didn’t understand the point about your last paragraph. Britain has nukes, has gone to war several times in the past decade and is a very cosmopolitan place (i.e. not isolationist, Eurosceptics notwithstanding). You are comparing military toughness to toughness in domestic policing.
While the riots are shameful, I can understand the desire of the police not to use force if they can help it. While rioters may be assholes, their behaviour probably does not warrant their death.
1. That’s an overly literal comparison. The broader point is the government’s promise to protect while reducing the tools to protect.
2. Their behavior warrants the threat of death, and I have no problem with announcing that looters will be shot, and then shooting them. None at all. The threat of firearms is useless if it isn’t backed up be a willingness to follow through. You must be British.
Or a looter.
Not British, but Canadian. We have a somewhat similar approach (look at what happens when someone loses a hockey game). Never looted anything outside of Dungeons and Dragons.
The British tried your strategy once in Boston. It was a bit of a PR backfire.
I’m from Boston. The British were firing in self-defense; that’s why they were acquitted. The fact that something may be bad PR doesn’t make it wrong—wait: you’re Barack Obama, aren’t you?
I mentioned shooting looters, not rioters, But the British in Boston didn’t have the benefit of tear gas,
If a mob of hockey fans attack my business and home, I’m warning, and then I’m shooting, as I have a legal right to do here. In England, I have to sit by and watch them destroy everything I own while the authorities debate the use of water cannons. Great system.
There was a riot in Vancouver recently that involved a mob of hockey fans attacking businesses. While there was considerable property damage, no-one died. Property can be replaced but lives cannot so I cannot but think that this was a good result.
I strongly believe in our Second Amendment Right. It is placed so high on our Bill of Rights simply because it is placed there to protect our First Amendment Right.
The ownership of guns is deeply in-grained in our society. It was and still is a means of self-reliance. Guns were used to defend and feed our families. We have periods in our history defined by specific guns. The Winchester Repeating Rifle is considered the weapon that won the west. Guns are to America what the Samurai Sword is to Japan.
England should have brought out the rubber bullets and water cannons once it was shown the riots were not stopping. This is not a question of being nice or genteel or fair. This is a question of stopping the unlawful action and preventing any further damage. Riots are like wildfire. Unless aggressively controlled, the wildfire will run rampant and keep on destroying.
And I do not believe all riots are wrong or unethical. This one I believe is unethical and should be stopped at all costs. Human life if absolutely necessary can be one of those costs.
You’ll have to give me an example of an ethical riot. Riots are by nature chaotic and lead to mob violence. Protests and demonstrations are ethical. I have never heard of an unethical riot.
The irony here is that our tradition of private possession of arms comes down to us from British traditions going all the way back to Celtic times. It was one of those “rights of Englishmen” that we took up arms to maintain. Over the last few decades, the British themselves have turned away from that and many other traditions of their culture that made them a great people. What’s happening now in Britain is a stark reminder of how quickly a great nation can fall into ruin when
… when it neglects and negates its own heritage.
Remember, Great Britain is embracing the police state. The role of the police state is not to protect its citizens, it is to control them. Look at the case of Munir Hussain. He and his family were tied up and held by knife-wielding thugs who threatened to kill them. He escaped, and he and his brother beat one of the three thugs with a cricket bat. He and his brother were both sentenced to ~3 years in prison each. Their assailant, Walid Salem, with 50 other convictions, was given a non-custodial sentence. The other two were never found. They claimed that Salem was left with brain damage and was too injured to be tried. He WAS tried for credit card fraud that he committed a few weeks after the robbing Mr. Hussain, however.
Why was Hussain given such a severe sentence while his attackers were given so little? Why is it that career criminals can rack up 50 convictions while committing armed robberies and still be on the streets? Why could they not find Salem’s accomplices when they had him in custody? They don’t really care about criminals attacking law-abiding citizens, but they do care when law-abiding citizens don’t think they have to rely on the state for everything.
Look at the punishment they are threatening the current protesters with: riot and loot and we won’t let you live in council houses anymore.
Well said,they could give a rats ass about citizens!