30 August 2007

Street justice




This is what happened to a drug dealer in Northern Ireland. He was tarred, feathered, tied to a lamppost and had a sign hung round his neck, reading 'I'm a drug dealing scumbag'. Police have described it as 'brutal and barbaric' and have condemned the action.
So let's think about this.
The residents in the area that this person was operating had reported him to the Police on numerous occasions, but no action was taken, even though it is claimed that he was selling drugs to children. Fed up of no action, the residents took it upon themselves to deal with it.
The man was publicly humiliated, but he wasn't killed or maimed, just embarrassed and inconvenienced. Hopefully, he'll get the message and behave himself in future.
But what if they'd got the wrong man? Again, no physical harm was caused, but it could have ruined his life. Mud sticks. Or in this case, tar.
Every day we hear about drug dealers, gangs of feral youths, shootings, stabbings and attacks on random people, and the great British public have had enough. It's clear that the Police don't have the resources to cope, the law is an ass in that it protects the perpetrators' rights more than those of the victims and defenders of the law. People are reluctant to step in and say "No, that's wrong" and defend themselves and others, for fear of being criminalised themselves, and it has to stop. If the authorities can't or won't deal with it, then they can hardly blame civilians for rising up and taking direct action.
It's long overdue that the politicians should stop 'discussing' the problems and actually do something about it. Strengthen the law in favour of the victim, and reduce the rights of criminals. As previously stated in this blog - if you put yourself outside of the law, you should not expect to be protected by it. Live by the sword, die by the sword (metaphorically speaking, of course).

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