Sometimes stupid loses

"tony cooper" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 8 Apr 2011 15:57:05 -0400, "Neil Harrington"
wrote:

tony cooper wrote:
On Fri, 8 Apr 2011 02:49:02 -0400, "Neil Harrington"
wrote:


"tony cooper" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 7 Apr 2011 12:34:03 -0400, "Neil Harrington"
wrote:


Unfortunately the far more numerous occasions when guns prevent
crimes do not generally appear "in today's paper." Mostly they do
only when the intended victim has to shoot someone to protect
himself, and this is a very
small minority of cases.

Ahhhh...the "media conspiracy theory": the only reason we don't
hear about armed and brave citizens successfully thwarting thugs is
because the newspapers won't print stories that their liberal
editors and publishers don't want to see in print.

Try to pay attention to what I said instead of making up straw men.
It's that an intended crime prevented by the would-be victim showing
a gun is most often simply a non-event; it's not reported in the
news because the crime didn't occur.

Well, which is it? The Kleck/Gertz study claims 2.5 million DGU
incidents, but now you're saying most of these were "non-events".

Non-events as far as news media are concerned.

Suppose you're repairing your roof and lose your footing. Wow, you're
sliding down the roof! You can't get any traction on the shingles! You go
off the edge and grab the gutter! Good heavens! Will the gutter hold?!
It's
starting to come loose! What will happen? Will you be injured or maybe
even
break your neck?! Horrors! But no, the gutter holds! Your feet find the
stepladder and you have solid support. Carefully you climb down the
ladder.
Now you're safe. Boy, that was close. Your heart is still going fast.

Now you're so excited about this experience that you call your local
newspaper and tell them all about it. They shrug. What are they going to
print, TONY COOPER ALMOST FELL OFF HIS ROOF?

You really think that is a comparable situation?

Of course. What would have been a newsworthy story otherwise, turned out to
be non-newsworthy because nothing bad actually happened. You really cannot
see that in principle it's essentially the same as, say, a woman who is
cornered by a would-be rapist, but pulls a gun causing him to run off? I
would not expect to see that event in any newspaper. But if she hadn't had
the gun and was brutally raped, that would make the newspapers.

Maybe I've been
wrong giving you more credit for sense than I do Bill Graham.

The anecdote would be more comparable if I had a gun with me on the
roof and fell off scrambling to get it because I saw someone trying to
steal a wheelbarrow from my yard, but they ran off upon seeing me.

Huh?


No crime would have been committed, but the headline would be MAN
FALLS FROM ROOF SCARING OFF BURGLAR. Of course, "American Rifleman"
would write "MAN'S LIFE SAVED BECAUSE HE WAS ARMED".

You seem to have gone completely around the bend, Tony.


A painful anecdote, by the way. Two years ago I *did* fall of my
roof. Just as I stepped on the first rung of the ladder to come down,
the ladder broke and I fell.

Well, I'm sorry to hear that.

On Sat, 9 Apr 2011 16:19:54 -0400, "Neil Harrington"
wrote:

Now you're so excited about this experience that you call your local
newspaper and tell them all about it. They shrug. What are they going to
print, TONY COOPER ALMOST FELL OFF HIS ROOF?

You really think that is a comparable situation?

Of course.

Was I not clear that this is an extremely silly attempt of comparison?

What would have been a newsworthy story otherwise, turned out to
be non-newsworthy because nothing bad actually happened. You really cannot
see that in principle it's essentially the same as, say, a woman who is
cornered by a would-be rapist, but pulls a gun causing him to run off? I
would not expect to see that event in any newspaper.

I would certainly expect to see that in the newspaper if the woman
reported it. Whether she chased him off with a gun or hit him with
her purse, an attempted rape is newsworthy. The gun wouldn't make it
newsworthy, the attempt would. Sadly, I do see such stories in the
local newspaper, but I don't remember one where a gun in the hands of
the victim was involved.

Unfortunately, we know that many rapes and rape attempts are not
reported. Many women do not want their name in the paper associated
with the act, are afraid that they will be accused of doing something
provocative that prompted the rape or the attempt, or afraid that they
it would be considered to be a consensual act that got out of hand.

I believe my local newspaper will withhold the name of rape and
attempted rape victims. I know they do with a minor.

--
Tony Cooper - Orlando, Florida