4 ms·

> police defaults to avoid violence, and defaults to not even carry guns. I think this might be more of a difference between the legality of guns in the US and

by tomxor 9y ago

> police defaults to avoid violence, and defaults to not even carry guns. I think this might be more of a difference between the legality of guns in the US and UK. Guns are so rare in the UK because they are illegal to own for almost everyone. I can imagine that makes a big difference for a police officer's expectation of the likely potential danger of public adversaries... yes there are still knives and acid and whatnot but those are close quarter and improvised weapons that don't emerge so suddenly from a distance, I think those make you far less "jumpy" for lack of a better description. PS. Please don't start an "anti guns" thread under here because we all know that never goes anywhere on the internet. I'm simply pointing out that the prevalence of guns will have a big impact on personal risk felt by law enforcers and that is a relevant difference between these two countries.

literallycancer 9y ago
I live in a country where guns are legal to own and the police still doesn't shoot random people for no reason. It's not that hard, just don't give the job to thugs.
- tomxor 9y ago
  Is gun ownership as common as in the US?
  - vidarh 9y ago
    Norway has one of the highest gun ownership rates, and until some years back the territorial army had people keep their AG3 service weapons at home. Yet it's only been for time limited periods that police has been routinely armed, and they certainly also doesn't act like the US. I don't like guns, but I also don't think guns alone are sufficient to explain the high firearms related crime rate in the US. Some of the differences: 1. a different gun culture. Most weapons in Norway are actually for hunting, and no that does not mean semi-automatics etc.. A few are for firing on a range, but there's no culture for seeing a firearm as intended for self defense, and the laws specifically makes it hard (you need to store the weapon locked down and inoperable, and generally you'd e.g. store gun and ammo separately; if you have time to arm yourself, police will question whether or not you had the ability to get away and call for help instead - if the threat is not immediate enough you risk a murder charge). 2. A culture for not meeting suspects with force unless they're armed, and generally focus on de-escalation, and for taking weapons use extremely seriously. E.g. officers need to account for every time they take their weapon out and every bullet fired. 3. A legal system that is generally lenient but where there is a clear path of escalation in response based on how dangerous a crime is. E.g. a robbery carries a sentence up to 5 years if unarmed, of which you'd generally serve less than half (and most people won't get the maximum sentence) - as an example, a robber that participated in a stealing one of the instances of Scream and Madonna by Munch got 2 years and 6 months a decade and a bit back. Arm yourself, and you risk an additional 7 years. Kill or seriously injure someone during a robbery, and you might get 21. As an example, one of the largest armed robberies in recent Norwegian history, that ended up with one dead poice officer, (the "Nokas" robbery) ended up with one of them getting 18 years, and several others getting 16. That's a pretty substantial extra risk on top of the risks involved in a shootout with police. Combine that with #2, and criminals have a very strong incentive in general for not being armed - by not arming themselves they don't risk being shot at by police, and they cut the worst case punishment from 21 to at most 5 years in a robbery, for example. Compare to the US, where a robber has little reason to want to take the risk that police won't shoot even if they're unarmed, given how often we hear of police firing even at innocent civilians. Couple that with high sentences and the incremental cost in using firearms to prevent police from catching or killing them is low.
    - oreo81 9y ago
      Wait, an armed robber killed a police officer and only got 18 years?
      - literallycancer 9y ago
        The maximum sentence in Norway is 21, AFAIK. It can be renewed if the person is deemed a threat after that time (terrorists and such).
      - _Tev 9y ago
        THAT is your take away from that post? Or is this just trolling illustration of U.S.police mindset?
    - tomxor 9y ago
      Thanks that's a really interesting perspective, for me that really highlighted a refined 'equation' of: legality_of_guns * gun_culture * gun_ownership_legal_details * gun_crime_sentence_details * police_gun_use_rules * police_descelation_emphasis Specifically the differences between culture and usage laws between US and Norway that you describe.
kps 9y ago
> I think this might be more of a difference between the legality of guns in the US and UK. I don't think so; UK gun restrictions are relatively recent (~20 years). I would attribute it to the Peelian Principles¹, which post-date US disconnection from Britain. ¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles
- tomxor 9y ago
  Interesting, I didn't know about the peelian principles, and no doubt a substantial amount of differences can be attributed to it... however I still suspect gun ownership differences play a significant role, 20 years law or not, guns are and have been prevalent in the US like they have never been in the UK.
- alimw 9y ago
  > UK gun restrictions are relatively recent (~20 years). This statement is misleading. Yes there were gun laws made twenty years ago, as there were ten years before that, twenty years before that, thirty years before that ... right back to 1594. Source Wikipedia.
vidarh 9y ago
That would affect incidents where the police is not yet sure whether they're meeting someone armed, but the de-escalation is generally adhered to when firearms teams are brought in too - which are generally situations where they know they're dealing with an armed suspect.

by tomxor 9y ago

literallycancer 9y ago

I live in a country where guns are legal to own and the police still doesn't shoot random people for no reason. It's not that hard, just don't give the job to thugs.

tomxor 9y ago
Is gun ownership as common as in the US?
- vidarh 9y ago
  Norway has one of the highest gun ownership rates, and until some years back the territorial army had people keep their AG3 service weapons at home. Yet it's only been for time limited periods that police has been routinely armed, and they certainly also doesn't act like the US. I don't like guns, but I also don't think guns alone are sufficient to explain the high firearms related crime rate in the US. Some of the differences: 1. a different gun culture. Most weapons in Norway are actually for hunting, and no that does not mean semi-automatics etc.. A few are for firing on a range, but there's no culture for seeing a firearm as intended for self defense, and the laws specifically makes it hard (you need to store the weapon locked down and inoperable, and generally you'd e.g. store gun and ammo separately; if you have time to arm yourself, police will question whether or not you had the ability to get away and call for help instead - if the threat is not immediate enough you risk a murder charge). 2. A culture for not meeting suspects with force unless they're armed, and generally focus on de-escalation, and for taking weapons use extremely seriously. E.g. officers need to account for every time they take their weapon out and every bullet fired. 3. A legal system that is generally lenient but where there is a clear path of escalation in response based on how dangerous a crime is. E.g. a robbery carries a sentence up to 5 years if unarmed, of which you'd generally serve less than half (and most people won't get the maximum sentence) - as an example, a robber that participated in a stealing one of the instances of Scream and Madonna by Munch got 2 years and 6 months a decade and a bit back. Arm yourself, and you risk an additional 7 years. Kill or seriously injure someone during a robbery, and you might get 21. As an example, one of the largest armed robberies in recent Norwegian history, that ended up with one dead poice officer, (the "Nokas" robbery) ended up with one of them getting 18 years, and several others getting 16. That's a pretty substantial extra risk on top of the risks involved in a shootout with police. Combine that with #2, and criminals have a very strong incentive in general for not being armed - by not arming themselves they don't risk being shot at by police, and they cut the worst case punishment from 21 to at most 5 years in a robbery, for example. Compare to the US, where a robber has little reason to want to take the risk that police won't shoot even if they're unarmed, given how often we hear of police firing even at innocent civilians. Couple that with high sentences and the incremental cost in using firearms to prevent police from catching or killing them is low.
  - oreo81 9y ago
    Wait, an armed robber killed a police officer and only got 18 years?
    - literallycancer 9y ago
      The maximum sentence in Norway is 21, AFAIK. It can be renewed if the person is deemed a threat after that time (terrorists and such).
    - _Tev 9y ago
      THAT is your take away from that post? Or is this just trolling illustration of U.S.police mindset?
  - tomxor 9y ago
    Thanks that's a really interesting perspective, for me that really highlighted a refined 'equation' of: legality_of_guns * gun_culture * gun_ownership_legal_details * gun_crime_sentence_details * police_gun_use_rules * police_descelation_emphasis Specifically the differences between culture and usage laws between US and Norway that you describe.

kps 9y ago

> I think this might be more of a difference between the legality of guns in the US and UK. I don't think so; UK gun restrictions are relatively recent (~20 years). I would attribute it to the Peelian Principles¹, which post-date US disconnection from Britain. ¹ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peelian_principles

tomxor 9y ago
Interesting, I didn't know about the peelian principles, and no doubt a substantial amount of differences can be attributed to it... however I still suspect gun ownership differences play a significant role, 20 years law or not, guns are and have been prevalent in the US like they have never been in the UK.
alimw 9y ago
> UK gun restrictions are relatively recent (~20 years). This statement is misleading. Yes there were gun laws made twenty years ago, as there were ten years before that, twenty years before that, thirty years before that ... right back to 1594. Source Wikipedia.

vidarh 9y ago

That would affect incidents where the police is not yet sure whether they're meeting someone armed, but the de-escalation is generally adhered to when firearms teams are brought in too - which are generally situations where they know they're dealing with an armed suspect.