Slashdot Mirror
Man Robs Convenience Stores With Klingon "Batleth"
mnovotny writes "Colorado Springs police are looking for a man who hit two 7-Eleven convenience stores, armed with a Klingon 'Batleth' sword inspired by the Star Trek science fiction series.
They did appear more human in the original series."
He should be stripped of his land and titles.
Box cutters and pocket knives were legal at the time. Too bad the other 100 plus passengers on those planes were not carrying box cutters or pocket knives. The world would be a very different place today.
9/11 happened because 4 guys with box-cutters could commandeer an airplane.
9/11 happened because:
a) US government secret services and law enforcement agencies failed to do their job.
b) because the entire plane of passengers just sat there and allowed it to happen.
c) because they were able to just waltz in into the cockpit.
d) because Arnold, Bruce, Sly and Steven were busy elsewhere.
The terrorists could have just as well held a large clock and claim that they have a bomb.
Forget the clock - they could have held a bag and claim there is a bomb inside.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Yes ... but notice that the one plane where people knew what they were going to do crashed into the middle of PA?
It doesn't matter anymore. Anyone trying to hijack a plane is going to run into the "problem" that people will remember the 9/11 modus operandi now and will most likely actively rebel.
Darn good thing too, at least there is a chance of them NOT being sheep in ALL situations.
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
Pretty easy to armchair quarterback in total safety what you think you would have done in the same situation, but the truth is you would never know until you were in that situation. I don't think the plane was full of extraordinarily "unaverage" people - they were average joes. Odds are you would have sat right there with them scared out of your wits as well. The funny thing is, if as many people who claimed they would be a hero in situations such as this actually did step up and be a hero, stuff like that would not happen as much as it does in reality.
P.S. It would be fairly trivial to kill someone with what you call a "kid's knife". A box cutter is a razor blade with a handle. Would you like to be slashed with a razor?
"But this one goes to 11!"
e) nobody before had ever hijacked a plane with the suicidal intent to crash it, and the standard response to hijackings had been to land wherever the hijackers said to land.
Once the passengers on Flight 93 heard about what happened on the other planes, they changed their response.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
I agree 9/11 wouldn't have likely happened if people were allowed to regularly carry weapons on planes.
However, you have to balance that with the inevitable 2-3 crashes per year because of drunk or otherwise hotheaded passengers who just didn't think about pulling triggers etc.
9/11 happened because of intelligence failures, plain and simple. It won't happen again, not because of better intelligence, but because the hijacker-passenger contract was ripped up. People know now that they may not survive if they don't fight back. Previously people knew that if they just went along eventually they were likely to be released unharmed in some random foreign land.
Now people will fight back hard and fast when something happens. That alone is the safest thing we have in our favor preventing another 9/11 attack.
People in cars cause accidents....accidents in cars cause people
P.S. It would be fairly trivial to kill someone with what you call a "kid's knife". A box cutter is a razor blade with a handle. Would you like to be slashed with a razor?
As opposed to being smashed into a skyscraper? Yes.
But hindsight is 20/20, and they didn't know it just a typical "take the plane to cuba" deal until it was too late.
It comes down to the information available to the respective passengers. The standard approach is to assume that the hijackers want money or the release of prisoners and probably won't kill the passengers. With that in mind you just sit in your seat, shut up, and hope that when the SWAT team kills the hijackers you don't get injured. When the passengers realized those people were going to turn them into a missile (because of phone calls informing them of their impending deaths) they weren't going to have any of that shit. The passengers of the other planes would have clawed the eyes out of their attackers if they had any idea what was going to happen. People will readily die for a higher purpose (see soldiers, religious crazies, people that try to rescue children/pets/the elderly from fires), they just have to see the purpose of dying.
Uh the world was a different place then.
If you think the reason why the 9/11 hijackers were successful is because the 100 plus passengers were not armed you are badly mistaken.
On average 20-30 people armed with stuff readily available on a plane should be able to take down 4 average guys with box cutters. Box cutters don't even penetrate inflight magazines well. You can kill people with pens. Heck if people started throwing their shoes and coins at the hijackers it would hurt them badly.
Why they didn't try was the passengers didn't realize what the hijackers were _really_ up to.
Back then the "general understanding" was the passengers and crew cooperate with hijackers, the plane lands somewhere and the hijackers either a) eventually get something they can accept and nobody gets hurt, b) or the Special Forces storms the plane and some people die.
In fact it seems that after passengers in one of the 9/11 planes found out what happened to the other planes, they stopped the hijackers from achieving their objectives. Sure that plane still crashed (just not at the target), but perhaps if they knew earlier things would have been different.
I'd actually argue that if you can really prevent "teeth and claws" getting on board, it's harder for 4 wolves to overpower 100 sheep in a fight to the death. Whereas if you allowed everyone to carry deadly weapons, it just makes things worse. Most "sheep" won't bring swords on board. And a skilled person with a sword can defeat very many unarmed people (a decent sharp sword has pretty good "stopping" power). In contrast a skilled unarmed martial artist will find it harder to fight off many unarmed people at once (some poor bastard may have to be the shield, but too bad).
It has nothing to do with bravery or "averageness". Prior to 9/11 the best thing a hostage could do was stay calm and obedient -it ensured not only your own safety, but the safety of others. Hostage-taking was nothing new and almost always resolved safely on the ground. Going cowboy was an act of foolish endangerment.
The reason the passengers on the flight over PA fought back was because they heard what happened with the other planes and realized the previous rules didn't apply this time. I have little doubt the people on the early flights would've tried the same thing if they had known.
If he manages to survive then I'll tell the 911 dispatcher to send an ambulance along with the cops.
You're more compassionate than I. The fucker would probably sue you and win.
Ok, so I'm bad at sarcasm. I'm mocking the "logic" of the proposed "assault weapons" ban on the following points:
(Regarding pistol grips) Apparently, changing the angle at which your hands hold the gun makes it "more deadly and able to spray fire from the hip". Tilting my hand twenty degrees more vertical just means my hand is at a different angle, no more. It's like arguing that changing the steering wheel and gearshift on your bone-stock Honda Civic (or holding your hands at 3 and 9 instead of 2 and 10) makes it a racecar that corners better.
(Regarding the "high powered" claim) Apparently, using smaller, less powerful rounds makes a gun "high powered" and "more deadly" than a gun that fires a bigger, more powerful, standard hunting round. Or, the same bullet fired from a "normal"-looking rifle is less deadly than one fired from a scarier-looking AK-47--even though it's the same bullet moving at the same speed. To use a car analogy again, putting a smaller engine with less horsepower and less torque makes the car more powerful and have better acceleration.
(Regarding the "no legitimate use" claim) Apparently, the thousands and thousands of AR-15s, SKSs, M1As, and 10/22s that law-abiding Americans use for hunting, target-shooting competitions, and defense of the home have no legitimate uses like hunting, target-shooting, and defense of the home.
(Regarding the "collapsible stock" claim) Apparently, changing a stock's length by a few inches makes it bad, evil, and easy to conceal. Yet a fixed stock equal in length to the fully collapsed one would still be legal, as would removing the stock entirely (provided the minimum overall length of 26 inches is maintained).
Also ignored is the fact that the previous ban had no effect on criminal violence whatsoever. I'd suggest that a much better approach to crimefighting is to keep violent offenders in prison doing hard time, and help keep people from turning to violence in the first place. Make decisions based on facts rather than "ZOMG it's scary looking!!1!" emotions.
Remember, the government will tell you to rely on it to protect you and defend you from criminals--but then it will turn right around and claim it had no obligation to do so.
The meek may inherit the earth, but the strong shall take the stars.
Whereas if you allowed everyone to carry deadly weapons, it just makes things worse.
Given the number of cases where passengers panic over someone they think is acting funny or who have Arabic script on tee shirts, I'd really hate to see some of those passengers armed.
"Really officer, I saw him praying, and everyone knows those terrorists always pray before blowing themselves up. So of course I shot him."