Vigilantism & Justice

localgrizzly said:
Ted,

If you had added the word "just" to your comment about "well functioning government," I would say that there is, indeed, no place for vigilantism.

Unfortunately, there are many "well functioning" governments in today's world that are the polar opposite of just. North Korea, China, Cuba, most of the Muslim countires, etc.

In countries such as these, vigilante action, especially against government and religious officials, is indeed justified.
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I intentionally left out "just" because that is a concept open to perception. Good governments don't always act just, but they do stick to constitutional laws. But you do have a point when you mention governments who use political instruments to supress their people.
 
Once a goverment and its law enforcement is no longer upholding their own laws due to corruption, then vigilantism is pretty much guaranteed to surface. But that is not the real solution. Revolution and overthrow of the corrupt government is ultimately the only true answer. Rule of Law must have set rules and vigilantes are not good at opperating within the Law. Romanticized figures such as Batman are unrealistic models. They're make believe. If someone can put forward a real world case that demonstrates that vigilanteism is a good thing, then I may alter my opinion.

On the other hand, it behooves responsible citizens to be proactive in the enforcement of laws. Standing idly by while crimes are committed in plain sight is just as irresponsible. If you can be a deterrent in small ways, you should.
 
godofthunder9010 said:
On the other hand, it behooves responsible citizens to be proactive in the enforcement of laws. Standing idly by while crimes are committed in plain sight is just as irresponsible. If you can be a deterrent in small ways, you should.
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I agree. but "respnsible citizenship" and "vigilantism" are open to interpretation.

The most well known example that I can recall at the moment is "the Texas deer hunter incident."

A deer hunter and his son were returning home, when the hunter saw a criminal kill a Texas state trooper on the side of the highway. The hunter stopped his truck, loaded his rifle, and killed the fleeing miscreant.

Most Americans, myself included, veiwed this man as a good citizen that did the right thing even though it placed him in personal danger.

However, many liberals decried him as a "vigilante murderer" and demanded that he be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

Most liberals will go so far as to label legitimate self defense as vigilantism. This explains, to a large extent, their bitter opposition to laws that allow honest, responsible citizens the right to carry concealed handguns.
 
Most liberals will go so far as to label legitimate self defense as vigilantism. This explains, to a large extent, their bitter opposition to laws that allow honest, responsible citizens the right to carry concealed handguns
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Unfortunatly LG, even in Holland I read often enough articles how some punk blew a few people to shreds. The trouble lays in the fact that you can't determine who is a honest and responcible citizen. People flip sometimes and a handgun in the vincinity is a tricky thing at that time. This includes people with no rap sheet, good job, nice car and living in the suburbs.
The second problem is the self defence. We have something called self defense excess. Somebody starts yelling at you, you whip out your gun blow his brains out and claim self defense. The action doesn't match the "crime"...
 
Ted said:
The second problem is the self defence. We have something called self defense excess. Somebody starts yelling at you, you whip out your gun blow his brains out and claim self defense. The action doesn't match the "crime"...
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In all American jurisdictions that I am aware of, the use of lethal force in self defense is justified only when there is a real and immediate threat of death or great bodily harm to the individual, or another innocent person.

In the 38 states that have enacted laws enabling citizens to acquire concealed weapon permits, violent crime has DECREASED in all but one.

Actually, critical analysis of thousands of studies conducted by both sides of this debate over the years, indicate strongly that the presence, or absence, of a handgun has no effect whatsoever on the violent crime rate.

Many factors seem to influence the rate of violent crime, but the presence, or absence, of handguns is not one of them.
 
mmarsh said:
5.56



Your info on NYC gangs is also out of date. About 15 years ago, the gangs you refer to (which I knew well) had a unfortunate encounter with a guy named Guiliani and as a result crime has been in steady decline ever since. The mafia also had a similar encounter, they too never recovered. NYC is the safest of the largest cities. Gary Indiana, Nashville Tenn, even Ann Arbor Mich have higher crime rates.
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Don't buy into the whole Comstat myth or reductions in crime rates at the hand of Rudy, Bill and Bernie. Alot of that was Quality of life issues that focused more on drinking on the stoops, moving along the homeless and hookers, street corner drug dealers and such. The MOS's of NYPD were given directives to concentrate on it and Comstat is famous for being the LE version of Book Cooking.

As far as percentages and large cities, first you have to understand how Suits spinn the figures and change the classification of crimes to show a drop. An armed robbery becomes a theft or burgalry thereby drooping your Violent crime rate.
Percentages are based on crime per capita so if NYC reports 200 murders in a year and Nashville reports 50 with the divergance in population yes Nashvilles will be higher. It's a paper game.
As far as safer NYC is still in the top 2 most dangerous places to be a Cop.
 
Modern man's 'Rule of Law'

Modern man's 'Rule of Law' exists because our forefathers realized that vigilantism doesn't work side-by-side with a duly elected police force. Where laws are enforced by trial and punishment, vigilantism is in complete violation of the very laws we agreed to live by. Without those laws, anarchy is not far behind.

In order for hangman's justice to be valid, every vestige of our modern law community would have had to completely disappear.

What you seem to advocating when you say there is a place for vigilantism, is a return to the days of anarchy before the establishment of the laws we live by today. I'm quite sure you don't really equate today's society as being anarchy.

If you advocate a group of concerned citizens that work in conjunction with legal law enforcement authorities and who are willing to live within the framework of existing law, then someone who patrols our borders and makes citizens arrests of illegal aliens and turns them over to regular police forces are a welcome addition. We can not afford to hire enough manpower to completely patrol our borders and in this terrorist, age we can not afford to allow unfettered infiltration of our borders.

SOOO - VIGILANTISM - NO...... VOLUNTEER PATROLS - YES.
 
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