Category Archives: GUNS

UPDATED: Self-Defense Honored In Egypt (Reader Horrified By Hoppe)

Feminism, GUNS, Individual Rights, Law, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Middle East

Not a word has the non-libertarian mainstream media said about the spontaneous order that has sprung from the disorder in Egypt. I’m referring to what Hans-Hermann Hoppe calls “the private production of defense”:

“Private-property owners, cooperation based on the division of labor, and market competition can and should provide defense from aggression.” (http://mises.org/journals/scholar/hoppe.pdf)

No sooner had the chaos erupted in Egypt than individuals acted to protect their families and private property.

Volunteers formed neighborhood watch groups to patrol the streets. They also set up checkpoints to stop criminals and mischief-makers from gaining access to private property.

Having endured the disparaging comments of an American policeman while he was fingerprinting me when I applied for my firearm license—I was amazed by the response of the Egyptian military to an armed, proactive citizenry:

“‘The military encourages neighborhood youth to defend their property and their honor,” the army said in a statement.

Honor is central to the macho Arab culture. “It is better to die with honor than live with humiliation,” goes an Arab saying. It is considered cowardly to fail to protect one’s kin and possessions. These, naturally, are timeless truths and values that transcend culture and religions. But men in the US have been neutered (often by their left-liberal women). Some liberal men would sooner see their homes robbed and their women imperiled than abandon pacifism. The most the typical Western man will do to defend hearth and home is to dial 911… and wait… and wait… . (And when tragedy strikes, they become eloquent spokespersons for everything but self-defense.)

There is almost nothing more immoral and unnatural than a liberal male.

As night follows day, the progressive policies enacted by such people lead to a regressive society.

UPDATED (Feb. 2): To the “contemplationist” who is horrified by Hoppe: I’m a minarchist as was Nozick, but I’m also a big Hoppe fan. Hoppe’s writings don’t horrify me; they delight.

UPDATED: Poignant Crime-&-Punishment Comments From Dr. Petit

Crime, Criminal Injustice, GUNS, Individual Rights, Justice, Law, Private Property

“Closure is a term invented by imbeciles” was one. I offered a precis of this particularly heinous case of home invasion (“all burglars are home invaders”) in the post, “You’re The First Line Of Defense For Your Family.” Even better were the biblical, ten-commandments comments of Dr. Petit’s father-in-law, which are not yet online (please send them along if you find them).

UPDATE: “Jennifer Hawke-Petit’s father, Reverend Richard Hawke, told reporters, ‘There are just some people who do not deserve to live in God’s world,’ in reaction to the death penalty sentencing.” Via Inside Edition.

It would be a great blessing if one of the Petit relatives or friends took up self-defense and Second-Amendment activism. Someone very close to me in South Africa watched two men enter his home on a Sunday afternoon, when the family was beside the pool, relaxing. He saw his wife flee, as in slow-motion. He rushed to the safe, where the gun had been kept. Then aimed at the invaders and yelled, “Get the hell out of my home.” They fled like the cowards they were. From then on, this man has carried his piece on his ankle. (The family also needed therapy.)

The sadistic letter the Connecticut killer and rapist Joshua Komisarjevsky wrote from prison makes clear that this is just what he and his accomplice, Steven Hayes (placed on death row today), needed.

UPDATED: Poignant Crime-&-Punishment Comments From Dr. Petit

Crime, Criminal Injustice, GUNS, Individual Rights, Justice, Law, Private Property

“Closure is a term invented by imbeciles” was one. I offered a precis of this particularly heinous case of home invasion (“all burglars are home invaders”) in the post, “You’re The First Line Of Defense For Your Family.” Even better were the biblical, ten-commandments comments of Dr. Petit’s father-in-law, which are not yet online (please send them along if you find them).

UPDATE: “Jennifer Hawke-Petit’s father, Reverend Richard Hawke, told reporters, ‘There are just some people who do not deserve to live in God’s world,’ in reaction to the death penalty sentencing.” Via Inside Edition.

It would be a great blessing if one of the Petit relatives or friends took up self-defense and Second-Amendment activism. Someone very close to me in South Africa watched two men enter his home on a Sunday afternoon, when the family was beside the pool, relaxing. He saw his wife flee, as in slow-motion. He rushed to the safe, where the gun had been kept. Then aimed at the invaders and yelled, “Get the hell out of my home.” They fled like the cowards they were. From then on, this man has carried his piece on his ankle. (The family also needed therapy.)

The sadistic letter the Connecticut killer and rapist Joshua Komisarjevsky wrote from prison makes clear that this is just what he and his accomplice, Steven Hayes (placed on death row today), needed.

“You’re The First Line Of Defense For Your Family”

Crime, Family, GUNS, Individual Rights, Law, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, Private Property

I’m a hard-core propertarian. This is, in part, because I believe in the sanctity of life—not only in a man’s right to keep his earnings, but his right—even obligation—to defend his life and the lives entrusted to him with all his might. A right that cannot be defended is no right at all. This is why I’d go as far as to say that all burglaries ought to be considered potential home invasions from both the standpoint of the home owner and the law.

Confronted with a criminal breaking and entering, there’s precious little a homeowner can do to divine the intentions of the invader. It should be assumed that anyone violating another man’s inner sanctum, will be willing to violate the occupant.

A home owner ought to be permitted to deploy deadly force in defense of his home and family. In general, albeit with a growing number of exceptions, the Castle Doctrine proceeds from this premise.

Still, you’ll often find reporters calling a deadly home invasion a “robbery gone wrong.” As though the criminals who invaded the home were some modern-day Jean Valjeans. Or that unless the visitors announce their intentions to harm the homeowners, it must be presumed that they intend only to take a loaf of bread—like Victor Hugo’s protagonist in Les Misérables—sate their hunger, and then leave.

In this context, I was stumped when the always-interesting Lawrence Auster bristled because a news reporter used the more severe term for the crime of breaking and entering:

… burglary is when a person illegally enters private property and steals things. A home invasion is when people illegally enter a home in order to terrorize, harm, or kill the residents… If we start calling all burglaries “home invasions,” we lose the distinction between them.

All burglars are home invaders.

The less said about the 2007 invasion of the home of Dr. William Petit of New Haven, Connecticut, the better. I blogged about it at the time. Steven Hayes and Joshua Komisarjevsky took great delight in raping mother Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her 11-year-old daughter Michaela Petit, after which they strangled the mom and set the home afire before fleeing. The two daughters died of smoke inhalation.

What killer and rapist Komisarjevsky wrote in a 40-page letter to some author is revealing:

“‘All were compliant,’ he wrote. “This time I took a risk, pulled the trigger, and the chamber was loaded. … The Petit family passed through their fears and into terror. … It was captivating, validating that this pain in me was real. … I was looking right at my personal demon, reflected back in their eyes. … Hayley is a fighter; she tried time and time again to free herself. … Mr. Petit is a coward; he ran away when he thought his life was threatened, and ran away to leave his wife and children to madmen…”

AND:

“I’m ultimately responsible for my own actions. … Had Mr. Petit fought back in the very beginning, I would have been forced to retreat. … You’re the first line of defense for your family not law enforcement.'”

[SNIP]

The fact is that these criminals entered the Petit home through an unlocked door. The least a man can do is lock the house before he retires, and if he refuses to arm himself, let him arm an alarm system.

I don’t mean to be “insensitive,” but skirting this indelicate matter simply will not do. Life is too precious.