(no subject)

[fpb]

I spent most of the nineties in a quiet working-class district in East London, called Leyton. Today I heard that a car repair shop a few block from my old address, and which I knew very well by sight, had been turning out illegal weapons including somes - like guns disguised as pencils and cigarette lighters - that would look well in a movie. I always did wonder how that shop managed to stay afloat.

Comments

[fpb.livejournal.com]

This is not the first time. But both this guy and the last who was discovered were tiny workshops making stuff by hand, on orders, and charging the earth for them. This sort of thing is certainly not going to arm every thug in London - few of them would have the contacts, and most could not afford the prices. In point of fact, gun ownership among London's thugs is low, and most of them use knives. My friend mentalguy found the very expression "knife crime" bewildering; it was not an expression used by the US media, or a concept they embraced. But it is the daily bread of British newspapers.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

In America, we take for granted that a thug attempting a confrontational crime will be armed with at least a knife. The term for an unarmed thug attempting such a crime in America is generally "wounded" or "dead," since his intended victim often turns out to be armed.

[mentalguy.livejournal.com]

I think that might be overstating the reality of the situation. We have plenty of "unarmed robbery" convictions here, and the vast majority of Americans don't walk around armed (legally or otherwise).