From: anon.526@pax.tpa.com.au
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns
Subject: The real gamble of self-defense with a gun
Date: 12 Jan 1993 11:31:19 +1030
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Reply-To: anon.526@pax.tpa.com.au
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An argument has erupted with a one Richard Kelly on the question
of the risks involved in using a gun for self-defense against
a criminal.  No one has yet mentioned the greatest risk of
all in such circumstances:

Your opponent is not actually a criminal.  If you use a gun
against him, you will be the criminal.

Although nearly every self-defense use of a gun reported in the Armed
Citizen involves mutual strangers, in reality, even for most
*justifiable* homicides, the parties involved are not strangers.  If
you use your gun for self-defense, it will probably be against someone
you know.  Whether or not your actions are warranted will be an issue.
But if you actually are facing a criminal, you may not have time to
think about it.  And if you're not and you jump to conclusions, life
will really stink for you.  If you reach the point of fatally shooting
your acquaintance, you will go to prison.  You will live with the guilt
of extinguishing an innocent life.  And, ironically, the NRA will cite
you as yet another reason for everyone else to own a gun.

People have bandied about a great many statistics about "successful"
versus "unsuccessful" self-defense.  None of these statistics include
the numerous cases where a man with a gun thought he was acting in
self-defense, but wasn't.

I don't have any statistics either, because it seems that the vast
majority of defendants in homicide cases claim self-defense, and
separating out the sincerely wrong from the liars would be difficult.
But in many of these cases it seems to me that this claim is sincere,
because most homicides have no planning whatsoever and arise from
verbal arguments.  There are even many cases with celebrity status.
For example:

Christian Brando shot and killed his sister's ex-boyfriend Dag Drollet
in the erroneous belief that Drollet was about to harm him or his
family.

Brando is not the only example.

No doubt most of you here will poo-poo this unhappy fate as an
extremely remote possibility.  That might be acceptable as far as your
personal business is concerned.  (Of course, if it turns out that you
can't handle this responsibility, it will become everyone's business.)
But if you're trying to persuade Mr. Kelly or me or anyone else that
shooting the wrong man is a remote possibility in general, you ought to
back it up with some actual facts.

Speaking for myself, I declare that:

I will always give another human being nearly limitless benefit of the
doubt before pointing a gun at him or her.  If it means I or
someone in my family might die needlessly, so be it.  At least I
won't kill needlessly.


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