I think we agree. The way we get there (less vigilantism) is for reasonable people to expect that the authorities will handle crime. When people believe the authorities will do nothing, they become much more sympathetic to people taking the law into their hands (and much more tolerant of what should be viewed as overreactions).
I think you are missing what happened with the Goetz shootings. I don't think very many people ever thought it was appropriate for Goetz to shoot a bunch of kids because they were asking for money. You agree, but that's kind of a straw man.
At the peak of the 80s-90s crime wave more people were willing to believe that the youths were not just begging for money. Just as the mafia don says, "nice place, it'd be a shame if anything happened to it" isn't wishing you good fortune, many people believed the kids ask for money was the first step in a violent mugging.
People supported Goetz (or thought he was an attempted murderer) based on their belief of what they thought would happen if Goetz had declined to hand over money. In many peoples' view, this was the request for money was just the first step in a mugging, a mugging that was backed up with sharpened screw-drivers. If that supposition is correct, self-defense was on the table. If that belief was incorrect, then you are just shooting kids.
Now I believe Goetz had been a mugging victim several times, and therefore subjectively believed he was about to be a victim again. For self-defense, however, his beliefs must be objectively reasonable. The kids hadn't brandished any weapons or made any verbal threats. But there behavior of surrounding him went beyond mere begging, and was objectively coercive. But then, Goetz continued shooting after any possible threat had passed, and his statements at the time indicate he was acting out of vengeance for being a victim rather than self-defnse ("You don't look so bad, here's another").
And whether a belief is objectively reasonable may change over time. Increased crime shifts the bell curve of the public's response to the right. There will be more people willing to use violence to confront criminal behavior, and the public will be more accepting of it. On the right tail of the curve, that means vigilante murder will occur, and it will be tolerated more. But it also means that what is objectively reasonable changes as well.
I have no sympathy for Goetz. I have some for Penny. There is evidence that he was threatening people, and he didn't act alone (which indicates at least SOME people felt it was reasonable). That being said: while what both did is understandable that doesn't make it morally right. Perhaps Penny was right to restrain Neely, but he clearly overdid it and killed a man. That requires, on basic principle, that society respond. I can quibble over what the proper sentence is, but I do not believe that Penny is innocent of all crimes. I can't. Even if it was an accident (and I do not think Penny intended to kill him; I do reserve the right to change my mind if more evidence comes forward) Penny went too far. End of story. Same with Goetz. Sure: shoo off the hecklers. They didn't deserve to die.
The first priority for police and law enforcement is to protect the lives of its citizens. If society cannot provide for physical protection then anarchy will be the inevitable result.
We have the right to self-defense, and furthermore to defend others. This right of self-defense can be triggered by heuristics and, in the case of a Marine, training. Heuristics require 1/25th the time and energy of cognition. In other words, we act on instinct and training to defend outselves, and then we jjibber jabber about what the politics of that event should be. The inherent right of self-defense implies that the individual gets to decide when they feel threatened.
I can tell you this with absolute certainty: if a man entered the subway car with us right now, yelling about how he did not care for his life anymore and was ready to die, or go to jail, because he is frustrated by the world (elements of this event that you see fit to elide), and that Marine had put him in the hold in front of us when he got aggressive, you can be damn sure I would be helping the Marine. Then I would damn the state and the activists, testify in his defense, and call him a hero.
This post seems to breezily hand-wave away any argument that isn't yours.
"It is something of a cliche among gun rights advocates to claim that private gun ownership deters crime. Supposedly, criminals know that the armed populace will shoot them if they engage in criminal mayhem, and it prevents crime. Or at the very least, it prevents the specific crimes being interdicted by the self defense. This position is obviously silly, which is probably a big reason why you don’t see, say, Republican presidential candidates espouse it (even as they appoint judges who toe the NRA line). We have a gun homicide rate that far exceeds other developed countries; obviously the number of homicides deterred by citizens exercising self defense rights is far exceeded by the number of additional homicides generated by widespread gun ownership."
I don't see how either of these 'obvious' points is obvious. As to the first, I'd say the United States has a much more permissive culture in many ways than other developed countries; it is not impossible that this, all other things being equal, would lead to a higher base level of crime. It strikes me as anything BUT obvious that a well-armed populace does keep the level of crime below that base rate.
I'd say the same about the second point; I think it might be impossible to directly measure deterrent effect. Things that didn't happen didn't happen and can't be measured. I'm likely wrong about this in a literal sense, and it's certainly not my area, but the decision to just put up a strawman and then set it on fire makes me skeptical of your good faith in this respect.
"As I said, there’s no serious argument that people asking for 5 dollars are threatening deadly force against your life."
I don't see how this follows; I accept that Goetz took action at least, too far down the causal chain. But I'm not at all convinced that asking for five dollars isn't a prelude to a violent mugging, especially when there are three potential aggressors.
As to the specific case of Neely, I don't think he needed to die. But I do think that any citizen, in that situation, would have the right to physically restrain such a person, not necessarily in (or only in) self-defense, but in defense of others as well. Of all the people on that train, it strikes me as plausible that the least threatened by Neely would have been the young, fit, ex-Marine. The same likely cannot be said about the other passengers. The specific use of a chokehold, definitely a bad choice; it's well known how dangerous such holds are, but the risks aren't an issue for, say, soldiers on deployment. Funnily enough, this situation strikes me as very reminiscent of the set up for the Nic Cage movie Con Air, for example.
Also, see this tweet from Wilfred Reilly, re-tweeted by Wes Yang:
"It's fascinating and hilarious to see that the 'speech is genocide' people have identified ONE phrase that clearly is just harmless word-play: "I will hurt/kill all of you!!! I ain't afraid to go back to prison!!!""
"the victim must be about to attack the other passengers, at the very least."
So, again, we're talking about where in the causal chain we 'activate' the right to self-defense or defense of others. I don't at all think that Penny intervened too early; he intervened incorrectly perhaps, but not too early. He didn't use a firearm or a knife, for example.
"I am very skeptical that in fact a bare threat to stab someone, with no knife anywhere to be found, is sufficient authorization under the law to shoot someone dead."
This is certainly incorrect. Just plainly, baldly incorrect. If someone threatens to stab me, in the context of a fight outside a store and a bag of stolen goods, I am going to believe that person. See 3 California Criminal Defense Practice § 73.11, Penal Code § 197; People v. Ceballos (1974) 12 Cal. 3d 470, 477–478, 116 Cal. Rptr. 233, 526 P.2d 241 (although terms of Penal Code § 197 appear to permit killing to prevent any felony, defense is available only when crime is violent). Granted, this is California law, but CA is where I live.
I ordinarily at least can understand your points, but the shoddy reasoning, strawmanning, and just plain lack of diligence displayed in this post has me reconsidering my decision to even be a free subscriber.
I think we agree. The way we get there (less vigilantism) is for reasonable people to expect that the authorities will handle crime. When people believe the authorities will do nothing, they become much more sympathetic to people taking the law into their hands (and much more tolerant of what should be viewed as overreactions).
Dilan,
I think you are missing what happened with the Goetz shootings. I don't think very many people ever thought it was appropriate for Goetz to shoot a bunch of kids because they were asking for money. You agree, but that's kind of a straw man.
At the peak of the 80s-90s crime wave more people were willing to believe that the youths were not just begging for money. Just as the mafia don says, "nice place, it'd be a shame if anything happened to it" isn't wishing you good fortune, many people believed the kids ask for money was the first step in a violent mugging.
People supported Goetz (or thought he was an attempted murderer) based on their belief of what they thought would happen if Goetz had declined to hand over money. In many peoples' view, this was the request for money was just the first step in a mugging, a mugging that was backed up with sharpened screw-drivers. If that supposition is correct, self-defense was on the table. If that belief was incorrect, then you are just shooting kids.
Now I believe Goetz had been a mugging victim several times, and therefore subjectively believed he was about to be a victim again. For self-defense, however, his beliefs must be objectively reasonable. The kids hadn't brandished any weapons or made any verbal threats. But there behavior of surrounding him went beyond mere begging, and was objectively coercive. But then, Goetz continued shooting after any possible threat had passed, and his statements at the time indicate he was acting out of vengeance for being a victim rather than self-defnse ("You don't look so bad, here's another").
And whether a belief is objectively reasonable may change over time. Increased crime shifts the bell curve of the public's response to the right. There will be more people willing to use violence to confront criminal behavior, and the public will be more accepting of it. On the right tail of the curve, that means vigilante murder will occur, and it will be tolerated more. But it also means that what is objectively reasonable changes as well.
(None of which, obviously, is a good thing).
I have no sympathy for Goetz. I have some for Penny. There is evidence that he was threatening people, and he didn't act alone (which indicates at least SOME people felt it was reasonable). That being said: while what both did is understandable that doesn't make it morally right. Perhaps Penny was right to restrain Neely, but he clearly overdid it and killed a man. That requires, on basic principle, that society respond. I can quibble over what the proper sentence is, but I do not believe that Penny is innocent of all crimes. I can't. Even if it was an accident (and I do not think Penny intended to kill him; I do reserve the right to change my mind if more evidence comes forward) Penny went too far. End of story. Same with Goetz. Sure: shoo off the hecklers. They didn't deserve to die.
The first priority for police and law enforcement is to protect the lives of its citizens. If society cannot provide for physical protection then anarchy will be the inevitable result.
We have the right to self-defense, and furthermore to defend others. This right of self-defense can be triggered by heuristics and, in the case of a Marine, training. Heuristics require 1/25th the time and energy of cognition. In other words, we act on instinct and training to defend outselves, and then we jjibber jabber about what the politics of that event should be. The inherent right of self-defense implies that the individual gets to decide when they feel threatened.
I can tell you this with absolute certainty: if a man entered the subway car with us right now, yelling about how he did not care for his life anymore and was ready to die, or go to jail, because he is frustrated by the world (elements of this event that you see fit to elide), and that Marine had put him in the hold in front of us when he got aggressive, you can be damn sure I would be helping the Marine. Then I would damn the state and the activists, testify in his defense, and call him a hero.
This post seems to breezily hand-wave away any argument that isn't yours.
"It is something of a cliche among gun rights advocates to claim that private gun ownership deters crime. Supposedly, criminals know that the armed populace will shoot them if they engage in criminal mayhem, and it prevents crime. Or at the very least, it prevents the specific crimes being interdicted by the self defense. This position is obviously silly, which is probably a big reason why you don’t see, say, Republican presidential candidates espouse it (even as they appoint judges who toe the NRA line). We have a gun homicide rate that far exceeds other developed countries; obviously the number of homicides deterred by citizens exercising self defense rights is far exceeded by the number of additional homicides generated by widespread gun ownership."
I don't see how either of these 'obvious' points is obvious. As to the first, I'd say the United States has a much more permissive culture in many ways than other developed countries; it is not impossible that this, all other things being equal, would lead to a higher base level of crime. It strikes me as anything BUT obvious that a well-armed populace does keep the level of crime below that base rate.
I'd say the same about the second point; I think it might be impossible to directly measure deterrent effect. Things that didn't happen didn't happen and can't be measured. I'm likely wrong about this in a literal sense, and it's certainly not my area, but the decision to just put up a strawman and then set it on fire makes me skeptical of your good faith in this respect.
"As I said, there’s no serious argument that people asking for 5 dollars are threatening deadly force against your life."
I don't see how this follows; I accept that Goetz took action at least, too far down the causal chain. But I'm not at all convinced that asking for five dollars isn't a prelude to a violent mugging, especially when there are three potential aggressors.
As to the specific case of Neely, I don't think he needed to die. But I do think that any citizen, in that situation, would have the right to physically restrain such a person, not necessarily in (or only in) self-defense, but in defense of others as well. Of all the people on that train, it strikes me as plausible that the least threatened by Neely would have been the young, fit, ex-Marine. The same likely cannot be said about the other passengers. The specific use of a chokehold, definitely a bad choice; it's well known how dangerous such holds are, but the risks aren't an issue for, say, soldiers on deployment. Funnily enough, this situation strikes me as very reminiscent of the set up for the Nic Cage movie Con Air, for example.
Also, see this tweet from Wilfred Reilly, re-tweeted by Wes Yang:
"It's fascinating and hilarious to see that the 'speech is genocide' people have identified ONE phrase that clearly is just harmless word-play: "I will hurt/kill all of you!!! I ain't afraid to go back to prison!!!""
"the victim must be about to attack the other passengers, at the very least."
So, again, we're talking about where in the causal chain we 'activate' the right to self-defense or defense of others. I don't at all think that Penny intervened too early; he intervened incorrectly perhaps, but not too early. He didn't use a firearm or a knife, for example.
"I am very skeptical that in fact a bare threat to stab someone, with no knife anywhere to be found, is sufficient authorization under the law to shoot someone dead."
This is certainly incorrect. Just plainly, baldly incorrect. If someone threatens to stab me, in the context of a fight outside a store and a bag of stolen goods, I am going to believe that person. See 3 California Criminal Defense Practice § 73.11, Penal Code § 197; People v. Ceballos (1974) 12 Cal. 3d 470, 477–478, 116 Cal. Rptr. 233, 526 P.2d 241 (although terms of Penal Code § 197 appear to permit killing to prevent any felony, defense is available only when crime is violent). Granted, this is California law, but CA is where I live.
I ordinarily at least can understand your points, but the shoddy reasoning, strawmanning, and just plain lack of diligence displayed in this post has me reconsidering my decision to even be a free subscriber.