To feel scared in my own home?

[Colabottle10]

Last November we were burgled. During the daytime, I came home minutes after they'd fled.

We live in a rural village, it's a drive through as in not a dead end, and is a through route to the local town.

Took me a while to feel better about being in the house and slept with a shotgun under the bed for a long time.

The culprit hasn't been caught.

Friday just gone I noticed a car driving back and forth through the village very slowly with two men inside eyeing up all the houses. I saw it again tonight parked up at one end of the village. DH went for a drive to see if he could see it and found it just outside the village at the other end and stopped and asked if they were lost (man and woman this time). They said they were trying to get phone signal. I called 101 and logged it.

I feel scared again. I want to move.

Chilled - but surely you must see that if America banned all guns, and made it harder to own, operate or licence them. Then it would be harder, not impossible, to get hold of a gun to commit murders with. If someone is determined to commit a crime by golly they will as our gun statistics show we still have deaths via guns.

But it stops people who may be mentally incapable of making a rational choices from grabbing a gun 'cause it's there' and shooting up a school full of innocent children.

Or are you planning on arming all school age children too because, guns!!!

most of those crimes actually happen in areas where guns are already banned.
Guns are not banned in the USA. Ergo sentence nonsensical.

I hear that if you repeat a lie often enough people will believe it

So it would appear - e.g. The gun lobby, USA

"If you want to believe what you hear in the media, that we're all potential mass murdering psychos who would not hesitate to shoot you if you looked at us wrong, then that's your mistake"

@chilled - not the media. Facts! Did the media fabricated the figures above. Do they pay people to act as grieved relatives to fake dead people to convince the rest of the world. Now who's lying.

Nope, people around you aren't perfectly safe if you're walking around with a loaded firearm and you're prepared, as you've stated, to take the law into your own hands.

Wasn't there a woman recently who was shot in the back by her toddler as she drove along? She had campaigned for laxer gun laws. She clearly wasn't carrying responsibly - the little boy could just as easily have shot himself as her.

@too - let's not forget the unimaginable psychological damage that child will have to live with as he ages because he shot (and possibly killed) his mother.

It's a circle with a lot more loopholes that your safety.

He doesn't need to take your gun off you, chilledwarmth - he can legally be carrying a gun himself.

If he meant to harm you, he can discharge that gun into you from a distance - and long before you'd even managed to open your handbag and get your own gun.

Who on earth would suggest arming all school age children? That's just ridiculous. I don't agree with what you're saying FreeSpirit. If some mentally insane person wants to kill, then there's not much we can do to stop it because they will find something to use as a weapon. And people who are having a mental episode can be very resourceful and use all sorts of improvising to turn any number of freely available objects into weapons. All I think that would happen if we duplicated your laws over here is that it would be open season on law abiding people. No more deterrence, no more capability for the ordinary man or woman to have a fighting chance against a physically superior attacker. I want lives to be saved just as much as you but I strongly disagree that a gun ban would make that happen. I do agree with some levels of control, but nothing near the level that you have in the UK. I had to do a training course to be allowed to carry in public, and I think everyone should have to do one of those to prove they are competent to own and carry a gun. Because as others have said, it's a serious responsibility, you should have to prove that you are capable of handling that responsibility.

The notion of aiming children was sarcasm, which you obviously missed.

Yes mentally ill people can be very resourceful. So your argument is there gonna do it anyway, so let's not make it harder for them to hurt others too.

I'll try that. Next time I walk down the street and see someone about to jump off a bridge, I'll push them. And then when questioned by the police, I shall say 'we Mr Police man he was going to do it anyway, so I gave him a hand'

I doubt that would get me very far at all. Again sarcasm in case anyone missed it. I would defiantly not do this, I'm just using this very horrible example to illustrate the point chilled is making.

Just because someone is going to do something anyway, doesn't mean you need to hand them the gun. Given more time to think clearly most people wouldn't bother to obtain a gun. Hence the term crimes of passion.

Myself and my eldest dd came back from an old friend's 50th a couple of years back. We live in a small village and there are no street lights. My dd said she had a feeling she was being watched and said the hairs were standing up on the back of her neck. I said she had had far too much to drink and to go up to bed. Instead she went outside for a smoke and came in saying there was someone in the bushes. Just then our security light went on and we hid in the dining room. There was the sound of stones falling and the light then went out. She went to the porch and screamed. Someone had laid out a dead rabbit carefully across and porch. It was still warm.

We went outside and someone had actually taken my gs1's new tractor and wagon - the stones were placed in the back as he had been playing with it. We called the police and they actually brought dogs to make sure they had gone. They found his tractor thrown out in the middle of the local coast road which could have caused a bad accident.

They never got who did it, but none of our other neighbours had any problems and one had left his works van open by mistake that night. Clearly we were being sent a warning and they had the right house as they took my gs's toy. We have never cleared up the mystery but yes, it is incredibly unsettling.

If some mentally insane person wants to kill, then there's not much we can do to stop it because they will find something to use as a weapon.

This is the crux of the US gun argument "guns don't kill, people kill" - but it's a lot easier to kill people with a semi-automatic weapon, than with any other weapon that might come to hand. You can kill people a lot of people from a distance, very quickly, with a gun.
I actually feel sad for people in the US, knowing that in some states any person on the street could potentially be carrying a gun. It's an alien concept to me.

Hey UnderTheGreenwoodTree, you're talking about very very very unlikely scenarios here. People, even thieves and crooks aren't likely to just shoot you from a distance. Don't get me wrong it's possible but pretty "far out there". It's not a real risk that I ever consider.

Maud I have not, and would never, "take the law into my own hands", I would only ever act within the law. We didn't sit around doing nothing on that course, we were educated about exactly what kind of situation we could use a gun in, and what situations we weren't. The law where I live is very harsh on people who abuse their license. Surely even the UK doesn't consider self defence "taking the law into your own hands"? Or maybe you do.

I'll bet the OP is really happy that she posted her original message about how scared she is feeling.

She must be feeling really reassured about her safety after reading all this; that's probably why she hasn't come back.

The average burglar in this country is some mindless cowardly kid, drunk or drugged, looking for something easy to sell for quick money. They don't usually come armed, unless they have a knife. I'm sure they wouldn't hang around if presented with a furious homeowner wielding a shotgun. They're not likely to wait and see if it's loaded. It would certainly make me feel safer anyway. Our gun cabinet is in the next bedroom and is full of guns. Dh would be able to sneak in and grab one and at least put the wind up a burglar, loaded or not. In fact even if he did load it and shoot a burglar, the law would probably be on his side anyway if he was using reasonable force to protect his family. It's a very rural part of the country round here. Lots of farming, shooting, countryside pursuits etc. A shotgun is a fairly common possession round here and probably would be quite close to hand for some people.

I got the sarcasm, I just didn't understand what point you were trying to make with it. Arming all schoolchildren is a ridiculous idea, I don't think I've ever heard anyone seriously suggest it. So what's the point in bringing it up? We are all opposed to that idea. Where's the joke, or the sarcasm?

In fairness greenwood, I understand why it must feel an alien concept to people who live in a society where they are more or less completely banned. It would feel completely alien to me to be in a society where I wasn't allowed to protect myself by carrying. But if I'd grown up in such a culture, I would probably see it as the norm.

. And people who are having a mental episode can be very resourceful and use all sorts of improvising to turn any number of freely available objects into weapons.They don't need to in the USA, there are guns to hand. Legally.
I think that would happen if we duplicated your laws over here is that it would be open season on law abiding people.
How strange, it hasn't happened here and it's a good few hundred years since we stopped toting.

Hey UnderTheGreenwoodTree, you're talking about very very very unlikely scenarios here. People, even thieves and crooks aren't likely to just shoot you from a distance.

Why carry a gun then? Do you think if a man grabbed you, you'd be able to get it out of your handbag??

It was brought up in response to your comment about having a gun makes you better able to protect yourself. The meaning was who, is protecting those school children?

It was sarcasm as I have already said no joke, because I for one don't think this is a laughing matter. I am, honestly flabbergasted at the whole notion behind the pro gun campaign when evidence and facts suggests it is a terrible idea.

I for one, am thankful l that when I drop my DC off at school I don't have to think that a crazed gun toting lunatic could enter into the school and kill him. And I feel absolutely dreadful for the parents living in the USA where that threat is a real one. Especially those parents who are stuck, can not leave or homeschool. Everyday to have to kiss your kids goodbye wondering if they'll come home. It shouldn't be like that when your government has the power to make the change and the knowledge that the change proposed would be beneficial.

Donald Trump (or the NRA, I dunno) advocated arming school teachers. Because that's just what a school needs, isn't it? Guns on the premises

US gun laws are so determined to defend the right to own a gun, they would arm school teachers, to protect schools from other gun owners. Because gun fight at the OK Corral is just what every school needs.

Simples stats from the BBC on guns in the UK and USA - I know which guns laws I favour

Katz - nailed it in that one image! Look at those figures. Wow!

I have quite a few 'mental episodes' due to longstanding MH condition. If I'd had access to a weapon, I'd have shot myself many a time.
However, I don't. As I'm not a member of the A Team, I can't improvise weapons in a metal shop either.

Toddler gun stats too - scarey reading

Jim Jefferies on gun control. This pretty much sums it up for me.
reverbpress.com/politics/jim-jefferies-gun-control-laws/