On Fri, 30 Mar 2001, Bill Stoddard wrote:
> You are not a very empathetic person are you ? :-)
>
> > But my understanding
> > is that you have better odds if you just give them the car/wallet, and
> > that is why the police recommend that
>
> Dammit here we go again with "the average person is better off...."
> statistical bullshit. Using this logic, the military and police are better
> off being unarmed. Statements like this completely ignore the training of the
> individual.
...
Bill, I thought I was acknowledging that. I said your skills might be
average, or they might be Dirty Harry supercop-level, but you have to
decide that for yourself, and it's a tough call. And then another tough
call is whether the perp is a garden-variety car thief with a gun, or a
crazy thug who'd kill you as soon as look at you. And whether that in
turn means you have to not threaten him the slightest, or shoot him as
fast as humanly possible. That's why I meant it empathetically when I
said it's a terrible situation no matter what you decide to do.
-Matt Jensen
NewsBlip.com
Seattle
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Apr 27 2001 - 23:15:16 PDT