:doh: It is putting words into my mouth. Show me where I said that I don't believe in the right of self defence please.

Your comment was that I do not believe in the right to self defence. How can you know that from what I wrote? How does this:
equal this:

It's quite a leap of logic and certainly doesn't make any sense.

My comment makes no reference to the right to self defence and relates only to the responsibility of the person pulling the trigger. Can you deny that the person holding a gun and pulling the trigger is responsible for their actions? Unless someone is actually forcing you to fire by pushing your finger onto the trigger, how can that be? Who else made the choice to hold the weapon? Who else made the choice to pull the trigger?

If you take an extreme view, then you are extremist. I make no apology if you are insulted by that, however the fact remains you've repeatedly stated extreme views on a number of points. Most of which are actually irrelevant to my position.

If you think cheering on someone who takes a life for theft of property is a good thing, then you cannot be described as anything but an extremist.

:haha:

I don't like any cats, but chairs are a good thing.

But those are very definitive.
Have you met all cats ? there might be a nice one out there.
There are certainly some bad chairs around, they are not good.:03:

:hmmm:

I've met no good cats and all the chairs I've sat on have been good enough.:sunny:

Have you met a lot of ocelots?
Beware the hazards of badly woven wicker.

One or two. They were not nice.
I avoid wicker chairs where possible. I don't like the marks it leaves on my skin when I stand up. :know:

It is rather simple Tarjak. Perhaps if I type slowly you will get it...

Self defense is an action taken by a person to protect himself or herself from an attacker. Now - if you believe that a person is responsible for the outcome of choosing to pull a gun and squeeze the trigger and killing another person - as you put it - in a way that "no justification can change" (your words) - you are stating that there is absolutely no justification for killing for any reason - including self defense. While I believe that killing in self defense should generally be the "last option" - your claim that there is no justification that eases the responsibility of the act - removes the "last option". Ergo, while you can claim to believe in "self defense" - you position ends up gutting the entire premise - that you have the right to save your own life at the expense of those who would take it from you via criminal attack. You in essence make "self defense" equal to "murder" - and I highly doubt that you would claim that you or anyone else has the right to murder another person. Maybe this will help:

"He took my pencil so I shot him" + no justification = Murder
"He looked at me funny so I shot him" + no justification = Murder
"He was stealing my truck so I shot him" + no justification = Murder
"He was raping my wife/daughter so I shot him" + no justification = Murder
"He was raping me so I shot him" + no justification = Murder
"He was killing my wife/daughter so I shot him" + no justification = Murder
"He was killing me so I shot him" + no justification = Murder

No matter what you combine it with..... + no justification = Murder

Or would you claim you have the right to defend yourself as long as you do so in a way that does not take another life - ever? If that is the case, then you have the right to fight against your attacker until they kill you, but don't fight too hard or else + no justification = Murder.

Neither position is compatible with believing in the right to self defense. Simply put - self defense is in essence the position that the defender has more rights than the attacker - because the attacker abrogates his/her rights by the very action and intent of violating the rights of the defender.

You boxed yourself into a corner when you said "no justification". If you can't see the flaw in holding to that statement while attempting to say you believe in self defense, then you really should just continue as you have in the last few posts and keep on trying to learn from the "tribesman's school of ass-hattery" instead of actually trying to debate.

So saying that there is "no justication" for pulling a trigger is seen by many as an extreme view. So what did you just make yourself there?

I am not in the least bit insulted - just was pointing out the irony of it all. However, my views are "extreme" by what definition? Yours or General Society? Given that society here in the US where I live finds my views on this subject generally acceptable, your claim of "extremist" is simply false.

I don't recall every "cheering on" anyone. I did post a thank you to Mr. Gerlach on behalf of the future victims that now will not have to undergo that ordeal from the deceased. That is hardly "cheering on". In fact, I pointed out some grave concerns over how the law in Washington State was written.....

But then, you would have to understand how to debate a subject to understand how I could look at both sides and see problems on each....

Looks like we're getting personal.

I honestly don't understand why you accept people have different opinions but you cannot accept that not everyone thinks like you.

Hmph. We give medals to people who kill other people. The more they kill, the more prestigious the medal.

I'll wade back into this argument; I don't hold the life of a car thief in high regard, and I don't apologize for that. If he wants my respect and he wants me to value his life, don't steal my car. Simple. Human being, pft, that's overrated.

Message received loud and clear.

As I said earlier. Everyone has a right to have a different opinion. They also have the right to be in error. :arrgh!:

Personal attacks aside, you have yet again missed my point. My first point is that I'm not trying to have a debate with anyone. I'm attempting to make clear a comment which you have seized upon as a debate because you don't agree with it and you have repeatedly attempted to put words in my mouth that I have not said.

My second point is that responsibility for your actions can lie nowhere else but with you. Otherwise you are using the child's defence of "he made me do it."

Who decided take out his gun?

Who decided where to aim the gun?

Who decided to pull the trigger?

Who's responsible for that dead body being dead?

Not one word I've written has anything to do with self defence. Every word I've written is about the choices made by someone. Why those choices were made is a very separate issue. The fact remains that no-one forced Mr. Gerlach to any of his decisions and he is therefore responsible for the outcomes.

Cheering = encouraging
Thanking someone does nothing to discourage and could be considered encouraging.

Clearly we work with different logic patterns.

Understood.

I think that they're rewarded more for bravery, rather than how many people they kill :hmmm: i
I mean, Keith Payne got the Victoria Cross for saving lives in Vietnam.

I disagree, as I value all human life, and would only consider killing in self-defense. And personally, I'd leave the 'This guy wasn't a human being' stuff to murderers, rapists, terrorists, and dictators. But I think we can agree to disagree, and respect each other's opinions, at the very least. After all, we've all lived different lives, so of course we're going to disagree a lot.

But I do agree with you that putting him on trial was unnecessary. The morality of his actions is debatable, but the legality isn't. It would've been better if the thief was arrested rather than shot, but I can hardly condemn Mr. Gherlach for defending his property. Hopefully we'll see a rapid drop of car thefts in the area.

The school of ass-hattery?
You need a simple lesson from the school.:yep:
You are failing to understand English.
You are changing the articles to make what was written into something else.
You are mixing actions to blend them into other things.
You are taking specifics then generalising them, you are then taking the generalisations and oversimplifying them, your oversimplified generalisations bear no resemblance to the specifics you started with.
In other words, the basis of your position has been made completely rubbish by yourself.

There is your problem.

Self defence is self defence.
Self defence may or may not involve killing someone.
Killing someone may or may not be self defence.
Property is not the self.
Objecting to someone killing another over a car is not a rejection of self defence.
Claiming that it is is bollox of an extremist nature.:know:

@tarjak
one or two ocelots is not all ocelots, it is certainly not all cats, there may be a nice one out there somewhere.
See, not all chairs are nice:03:
So is it 4 legs bad, or is it 4 legs good?
Maybe its 4 legs not so bad or not so good depending on the specifics.

Both and neither depending on your point of view.

And thanks for being logical. I didn't think I was being overly obtuse.

What are your school fees? Most of the lessons appear to be free.

No, you were very clear.
What you encountered there with Haplo is fairly common, someone takes a rather extreme(depending on perspective) view.
Someone objects to that view.
To justify the extreme view in light of the opposing view the person takes the opposing view and changes it into an extreme view.

Killing in war is no less senseless than killing in the street. Medals though are usually for merit though getting notches on your belt can add to the objective of winning a war and there may be perceived merit in that.

But we have very different rules for war as opposed to behaviour in your average suburban street.

I don't hold the thief in high regard either. But his life is not valued lower than a vehicle by your own legal system. If it was, you would have different penalties than those in place now. Would a court that put criminals to death for car theft be preferable?

Being human may be overrated but it's all we've got.