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 Now online (1)Roger Wilco ...and 292 guests Last 5 registered Oplandisks nothingstar N_loop yipe foxtrotromeo Browse members... |
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Suppose the following scenario: You have just escaped record-breaking heat as you walk into your air-conditioned home. It occurs to you that if you hadn't left work early, you probably wouldn't have walked home at such an unbearable temperature. The cool air relaxes you intensely. You go to your bedroom and let gravity pull you to your bed. You fall asleep. An indefinite time period passes. You wake up to the sound of footsteps. You are expecting a spouse, or common-law partner, to come home, but looking at your alarm clock, you see that he/she should not be home for another three hours. You start to hear a shuffling of drawers and a breaking of fragile glass. You then hear unrecognizable voices; you conclude that you are being burglarized. Your conclusion is proved correct as one of them turns around the corner and sees you. He has a gun. You quickly close your eyes and hope he does not see that you are awake. You keep your eyes closed as you hear him check your face to see that you are indeed sleeping. You then hear him go through all of your things; you hear him take and break various things. You recognize the sound of an old chess set that you and your spouse acquired on a vacation to Switzerland smashing on the floor. You then hear him stop to listen to the other man yell at him. The other man feels it is time to leave. You peak your eyes open and you see that he is right beside you; his gun is in perfect reaching distance. You think that he probably would not expect you to be awake, which means you could probably take his gun, detain him, and perform a citizen's arrest. As you are thinking about this, you see that he has destroyed a very valuable sculpture that you acquired on your vacation to German three years ago. You decide that you must grab his gun; if not to fulfil a civic duty, to satisfy your personal urge to exact revenge. |
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You grab his gun. He quickly turns and tries to grab it back from you. He is incredibly strong and forceful. You feel one hand of his grabbing for the gun, and the other at your neck trying to strangle you. He yells to the other man, "Fuck! He's awake; he's got my gun!" As he yells, you push yourself away from him to the other side of the bed and fire the weapon. You shoot him in the chest, he falls to the floor. The other man walks into the room. He raises his weapon to shoot, but so did you; you shoot him in the chest. He dies. The other man struggles for something in his boot. You see that there is something strapped on his leg. You shoot him in the leg to stop him. He screams in pain. He is detained. You then get off the bed and walk toward him. You put the gun against his head. He is shaking. He utters with great effort, "Please...don't..." You say, "This is the life you chose." You shoot him dead. Are you guilty of murder? |
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Yes |
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uhh.... could you repeat the question? |
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Looks like someone just read Camus' "The Stranger." |
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Legally, at least in canada, Yes. |
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You might be able to get away with it in Florida. Who ever thought that armed intruders into your home would garner such sympathy? |
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yes |
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shoot him in the legs so he doesnt die but cant get away. laws about defending your property are very hazy over here, i dont know if you could get away with it here - e.g. you are allowed to kill an intruder with a baseball bat if it is a spur-of-the-moment reaction. not if you have kept it close to your bed especially for that purpose. wierd. |
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If you're talking in legal terms, perhaps, but you could easily get it reduced to manslaughter if there were no other witnesses and you had a half decent lawyer. Morally? I'd say it's fine. |
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In Spain we cut intruders to pieces with our knifes... |
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See, you're even admitting it yourself. :P Did you see my response in that thread BTW? |
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Sure... I was just jokin'... *hides huge machete in the back* |
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I'm not suggesting that anyone deserves to die for commiting burglary, but at the same time I wouldn't blame someone who was being threatened or intimidated in their own home for reacting with extreme measures. Burglars must understand the risks attached. |
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they deserve to get shot for not leaving when they realised there was a guy in the place, and furthermore for yelling at eachother in the same room as a supposedly sleeping man they are currently robbing, whom they have just provided with a firearm |
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this actually happened to me 6 years ago. i was celebrated as a hero and the mayor gave me the key to the city. what a skam though, this key, it's way to big to fit in any lock i've found thus far. |
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You see that there is something strapped on his leg. You shoot him in the leg to stop him. He screams in pain. He is detained. The ideal move is to further check his person as he is already detained. The shot to the chest plus the shot to the leg would certainly be enough to keep him down. Going any further as indicated by the story makes you a murderer as the character in the story seems to have control of mental faculties and is operating with reason and not "In the heat of passion" (which might have explained the murder that occured last in the story) Once the man was detained going any further violates moral standards in my most humble opinion. :) |
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Great book. It changed my life when I was young. =| |
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smegma |
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shooting someone in the head isn't a very nice thing to do, whether they're breaking into your house or not. personally, i would've pretended to be asleep until they left. that way i wouldn't really need to risk anyone getting shot at all. anything a couple of guys can steal from your house isn't worth dying for, imo. but then again i'm not a very big fan of sculpture... |
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I thought this would actually be a moral mystery. You are not guilty of shooting the first guy, nor shooting the second guy the first time. However the moment you shot the second guy one more time, you were guilty of murder, which is unjustifiable both morally and legally. |
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yes.we comes. |
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You then get off the bed and walk toward him. You put the gun against his head. He is shaking. He utters with great effort, "Please...don't..." You say, "This is the life you chose." You shoot him dead. That's just cold. It's the straw that breaks the camel's back... no longer a threat, you don't do that. Before that, you're gravy. I would have pretended to be asleep, too. Waking up isn't worth the potential clusterfuck... how much can two dudes make off with, anyway? |
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your wallet? which has loads of cash as well as all your ID and cards? |
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cash life cash life cash life plastic cards life cash life |
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This is one of those arguments, like people who think it's wrong to "mercy kill" an injured animal that has no hope of survival, that I just don't get. I really don't see why it's such a grey issue. They shouldn't be in your house, they chose to enter illegally, you had no choice in the matter, why should you take the hit, so to speak? By take the hit I mean you're likely to suffer from either of the two most likely outcomes of the scenario: 1. You ask them to leave. They shoot you. 2. You do nothing, they make off with a load of your stuff. I don't really care that being killed is disproportianate to housebreaking. To use the playground argument, "they started it". |
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i wish it wasnt that way, but if you lose your money, or proof of your identity, you are SCREWED. |
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do you keep ALL your identity papers in your wallet? even your passport? do you keep ALL you money in your wallet? in either case it isn't as bad.. at least not in norway. you sleep through, ba-bam: insurance. lock credit cards. done. |
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you have a choice. you can choose to shoot them or you can choose to pretend to sleep through. that's a moral choice, and in a moral choice you should act as is morally right to you, but then you should also prepare to take ther consequences; in this situation you should be prepared to be honest and admit what you did, you should takee responsibility for your actions and prepare to be judged as a killer. |
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The reason I wouldn't admit to being the killer is due to the way our (well, in the UK at least) society seems to have this rather irrational/unfair idea that burglars should have rights, during the commiting of a crime. Admitting you killed them opens you up to the possibility of having to go prison for it (again, making you take the hit for them choosing to break in)and as I don't feel it is an immoral (to me) act that I had commited, I'd do everything in my power to conceal the fact (including dumping the bodies/lying about them attacking me, etc.). We should also remember that if there's a perception that you forfeit your rights the moment you break into someone's house, it would deter all but the most desperate of burglars. Yes, you'd still get junkies looking for a hit, or people who really needed the money, but there'd be less "casual" crime of breaking into a house just to steal a DVD player/new console/etc. for themselves/family. The normal arguments about the death penalty (what if they're later found to be innocent, etc.) no longer apply if it's you catching them red handed; there's no doubt about what they're doing/chance that you have the wrong man. I also think killing the criminals would help vindicate the sense of violation/fear you would otherwise suffer for months/years after the robbery, if you were just a victim. Normally you'd be worried about them breaking in again 6 months later to steal the new stuff you bought with the insurance money from the first robbery. I think people who write it off as just "some stuff" being stolen are overlooking/ignorant of the far more severe (than mere materialistic loss) feelings that arise from burglarly. Feeling insecure/threatened at home is a hell no one should suffer. |
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i agree wholeheartedly with opchecks and panda bear. ceri, you're kind of missing the point. everything is just "gravy", as it was said, up until the house-owner decides to put the gun to the guy's head, as he lies on the ground incapacitated, posing no immediate threat, and kills him. that's murder and as such it's totally wrong. it's well within reason to do everything else mr. blokey bloke decided to do, shooting them both (and killing the other guy -- although if it was his intention to kill him, there's a bit of leeway for debate concerning morality).. it's the ending that's in question, and it's wrong and horrible and morally reprehensible without a doubt. |
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i think people should be allowed to defend their property, but how? would you see a distinction between someone shooting a burglar at home with a handgun, and a farmer shooting a group of people rambling through his field with a rifle? both are examples of someone defending their property. of course they are different, but where would you put the line, relating to how you can defend your property? |
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I think my problem stems from the fact that if you let them live, you've got it hanging over you forever; what if he comes back to avenge his mate you killed? What if he manages to convince a jury that you got hold of gun and neither of them posed a threat and you then shot his mate in cold blood before crippling him? Offing him gives the whole affair a degree of closure/finality. |
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Well, the Americans make the sensible distinction in most states by if the person is in your house, it's breaking an entering; shoot away. If you're just crossing their land, it's tresspassing and you can't shoot them with impunity. There certainly should be a line drawn, I'm not debating that. It would be wrong, for example, for you to incapacitate them, before tying them up in your basement and torturing them for days before killing them. I don't think killing them outright is wrong though. People may argue that incapacitated the criminal posed no further threat. I disagree, he may still have another concealed weapon on him and attack. Getting close enough to him to pat him down is also dangerous; he may snatch the gun back and use it on you. Shooting someone in the leg doesn't make them suddenly "completely harmless", it just reduces the threat they pose. |
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that's a very cold and heartless way of regarding human life. just as one could say "what if you let him live and he comes back to avenge his friend's murder?", one can say just as certainly "what if you let him live, and having experienced this ordeal, having seen his friend shot dead and himself crippled, he stays away from you forever, and perhaps even changes his ways?" i'm not saying that that IS certainly what would happen.. but it has just as much chance of happening as what you supposed. |
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but you cant tell what the burglar will do in future life when he is tip-toeing round the bungalow of a terrified granny who thinks they might try to kill her. whether the burglar dies, is injured or gets away is entirely down to what is going through the homeowner's mind. you have no control over that, no matter what the law says. |
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what are you saying? i can't tell whether you're agreeing (towards the end) or disagreeing (at the beginning, especially with the fact that the beginning's marked by 'but').. also, you replied to a post in which i said: just as one could say "what if you let him live and he comes back to avenge his friend's murder?", one can say just as certainly "what if you let him live, and having experienced this ordeal, having seen his friend shot dead and himself crippled, he stays away from you forever, and perhaps even changes his ways?" and you go on to presume that the burglar will definitely, without a doubt, break into the house of a terrified granny who thinks the burglar might kill her. make some sense, please. |
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what the fuck? ok, sorry, but I lost quite a bit of respect for you just now, 'cause that's the stupidest most uninformed assrambling drool I've ever read! first of all: of course burglars have rights! sure, they're forfeiting a few of them, but not their fucking humanity or life! also, that you wouldn't take responsibility for shooting them makes me a bit sick... so much in fact that I threw up in mouth a bit. and then appealing to fright tactics to deter people from entering your home.. well, didn't you read that other thread? would scaring someone from doing something make them a better person?! I don't even think it'd reduce your ass' right wing fear of other people! the "normal" arguments about death penalties doesn't have anything to do with anyone being possibly innocent! It's because the eye for an eye and revenge stuff is totally untolerable in todays society as well as the fact that taking a life NEVER is reasonably justifiable in any way. and your last paragraph is so low that I'm not even going to comment. |
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oh come on now, he's obviously got a lot going on upstairs.. and as I don't feel it is an immoral (to me) act that I had commited, I'd do everything in my power to conceal the fact (including dumping the bodies/lying about them attacking me, etc.). he's a moderator on an internet messageboard, you know. |
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you were saying what a burglar might do in later life if he is not killed by a homeowner while in domeones house - wither come back to intrude again, or change his ways. but the terrified homeowner can't tell that - they would not stop to think "if i let this guy go, he might turn out a nice person in a few years" because there are much more immediate issues, most probably also coupled with fear. drunken mastah: first of all: of course burglars have rights! sure, they're forfeiting a few of them, but not their fucking humanity or life! yes, of course they have rights! but from a homeowner's point of view, who may be fearing for his life, killing the intruder is spur-of-the-moment self-defence. in the homeowner's mind the burglar could be a murderer. does a murderer, when he is just about to kill someone, have the right to life at that point? which life is more important? (im probably meaninglessly waffling again) |
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Yes, of course he's not going to go through the morality of it then - although calling the killing of somebody as they lie on the ground, posing no threat, something done "in the heat of the moment" is complete nonsense. it cannot be. but i'm not saying you said that - just making the point. however what's being debated here is whether or not it is moral to kill somebody in such a situation, and so this is where the ideas and thought are mulled over. people then take their conclusions (from debate.. ie, i'm not saying it'd be wise to live by anything from the internet) and live by them. really poorly written post, 0/10, forgive me, i'm sick with a cold. |
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good point |
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first off that last bit is less spur of the moment than anything. second, the best way to keep your life safe in that situation would be to pretend you're sleeping. |
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Maybe he was a burglar... |
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Maybe he entered somebody's house... |
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thats assuming they dont see you standing in the corridor or something, and that you hear them and decide to stay in bed. what would you do if you met face-to-face? |
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Someone's backyard after securing the house... |
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yeah................................. |
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I've had enough searchin for images. I'm gettin' sick. And those posted here are the less disturbing. Go figure... |
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what would Lacan say about that? |
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