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Self-Defense Newsletter for June 2005 Inside this issue: Defend U. Bookstore Now Online
Samuel Johnson Defend U. Bookstore Now Online We get lots of requests for the Fight Like a Girl shirts at classes, seminars and workshops as well as requests for Defend University tees. Now you can check out and order apparel, mugs and clocks at the online Defend U. Bookstore. There is also a new line of patriotic line of t-shirts and mugs. Check the bookstore for new items.
New U.S. Crime Statistics Available
The FBI's new 2004 Uniform Crime Report is now available showing data from 12,700 law enforcement agencies. The report has an interactive feature allowing you to access spread sheets for the crime rates for cities with at least 100,000 residents. Click here for a PDF of the 2004 Uniform Crime Report. (The file size 4.2 MB because of all the spread sheets, so expect some download time.
UK Road Rage Survey Shows 10 Percent 'Rage'
”But the primary concept you should keep in mind is that, while you want [protection] people who are professional in demeanor as well as qualified, their primary mindset must be that they are willing and able to do whatever is necessary to neutralize the level of aggression they encounter. This, hopefully, means nothing more than confronting a hostile instigator and convincing him to go away, but, if placed in a life-threatening situation, they cannot hesitate. They must be prepared to take another’s life.”
Michael H. Corcoran, Ph.D.
Employee Theft Six Times Higher than Typical Shoplifting Incident The Security Research Project University of Florida at Gainesville found that a typical shoplifting incident costs a retailer $158.86, while an average employee theft is more than six times as high, at $1,004.35. Highway Help Program Distributes "Call Police" Signs for Stranded Motorists The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police is behind a program distributing "Call Police" signs for stranded motorists. The program allows you to stay in your car and lets other motorists act on their desire to help without stopping or putting themselves at risk. Go to the Web site at http://www.highwayhelp.org for more information and for a list of regional organizations that also distribute the sign. Canadian Says Australia Proves Gun Control is Not Crime Control "There's one area where Northern and rural riding have not been well served by the Federal Liberal government and that's because our big city cousins are convinced that gun control is crime control...that our world is a safe place because fine, decent law-abiding citizens are registering their firearms. "Ed Chenel, a police officer in Australia, reports that down under it's been 12 months since Australians were forced by their new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be be destroyed by their own government - a program costing Australian taxpayers more than 500 million dollars. "The first year results are now in. Australia-wide homicides are up. Australia-wide assaults are up. Australia-wide ARMED robberies are up 44%. In the state of Victoria alone homicides WITH FIREARMS are now up 300%. Obviously criminals don't turn in or register their guns. While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robberies with firearms this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months since the criminals can be increasingly confidant that their victims are unarmed. There's only been an alarming increase in break-ins and assaults on the elderly. "You know gun control isn't crime control - I venture to say most MPs know our measures have made us less safe - but we've got to convince the condo-dwellers in the concrete jungles of the big cities who make up the majority of Canadians read that 'voters' that gun control increased crime and threatens their lives." Canadian Radio Commentator Rick Smith
It was bound to happen.
The authors of an editorial in the latest issue of the British Medical Journal are calling for knife reform:
"Reducing knife crime: We need to ban the sale of long, pointed kitchen knives."
The doctors, from West Middlesex University Hospital in London, noted that the rate of violent crime in Britain rose nearly 18% from 2003 to 2004. They said that in the first two weeks of 2005 there were 31 stabbings, 15 of which were fatal. The researchers cited a January headline in the Daily Express: "Britain is in the grip of knives terror, third of murder victims are now stabbed to death".
I used to think those who cried, "what's next, banning knives or sticks?" were just being alarmist. To echo Rick Smith above, how about trying some crime control instead of knife control?
Even in some of the country's toughest prisons where, presumably, great efforts are made to deny inmates any access to weapons, those crafty bad guys continue to fashion shanks and other weapons out of almost anything. Face it, being a step above the apes on the evolutionary ladder, humans are going to fashion tools. And sub-humans will continue to fashion tools that give them a deadly advantage over the gentle folk in our villages.
Want to fight crime in your neighborhood or city? Fight back. Crime rates tend to drop in areas where it's publicized that citizens have either fought back or are receiving training in being able to fight back. A Florida jurisdiction noted a 20% drop in rapes immediately following a well-covered news event in which women were being given training in the use of the defensive handgun. Carjackings in one western city dropped dramatically after a husband and wife both shot back at the bad guys.
And make sure that misguided and dangerous people like the doctors noted above as well as your local, state and federal politicians aren't infringing on your right and your ability to defend yourself.
Go here if you want to access the newsletter archives.
Train like your life depends on it. Someday it
might.
Brad Parker
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