continued

I believe that torture is horrible and should be avoided. If we make it legal then it will be employed casually even where there is no justification for it. If it is kept illegal and those who torture are brought to trial the accused torturers will come before a jury. If the jury feels that the torture was justified they will not convict.

Is Mise wrote: “Then how did the murderer in the Lintz café get a gun; especially in a country where to possess anything for the purpose of self defence is a crime?”

Dear Is Mise,

To the best of my knowledge owning a gun or anything else for self defence is not a crime in Australia. A person can get a license to carry a gun. However, as long as guns are available they can be misused. Neither John Howard nor I want guns banned entirely.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia:

A common misconception is that firearms are illegal in Australia and that no individual may possess them. While it's true that Australia has restrictive firearms laws, rifles and shotguns (including semi-automatic), as well as handguns are all legal within a narrow set of criteria.

As of 2007 about 5.2% of Australian adults (765,000 people)[1] own and use firearms for purposes such as hunting, controlling feral animals, collecting, security work, and target shooting.

continued

I believe that torture is horrible and should be avoided. If we make it legal then it will be employed casually even where there is no justification for it. If it is kept illegal and those who torture are brought to trial the accused torturers will come before a jury. If the jury feels that the torture was justified they will not convict.

Is Mise wrote: “Then how did the murderer in the Lintz café get a gun; especially in a country where to possess anything for the purpose of self defence is a crime?”

Dear Is Mise,

To the best of my knowledge owning a gun or anything else for self defence is not a crime in Australia. A person can get a license to carry a gun. However, as long as guns are available they can be misused. Neither John Howard nor I want guns banned entirely.

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia:

"A common misconception is that firearms are illegal in Australia and that no individual may possess them. While it's true that Australia has restrictive firearms laws, rifles and shotguns (including semi-automatic), as well as handguns are all legal within a narrow set of criteria.

As of 2007 about 5.2% of Australian adults (765,000 people) own and use firearms for purposes such as hunting, controlling feral animals, collecting, security work, and target shooting."

If one shows a legitimate need for a gun one can get it.

david f.

"To the best of my knowledge owning a gun or anything else for self defence is not a crime in Australia. A person can get a license to carry a gun. However, as long as guns are available they can be misused. Neither John Howard nor I want guns banned entirely"

Your knowledge is faulty for to possess ANYTHING for the purpose of self defence is a crime in this country, especially a firearm.
Licenced firearm owners are forbidden to keep a firearm and ammunition ready for use for defence.
If such a person is in fear of their life and takes out an AVO against a person that has threatened them then the police will take any firearms from the subject of the AVO and all firearms from the person that was the subject of the threats, so that he cannot use a firearm for protection.

Licences to possess, use and carry a pistol became a thing of the past over twenty years ago.

A grazier's wife, alone on a large and remote property commits a crime if she keeps a shotgun in the kitchen and a couple of shells in her apron pocket, even if it is only in anticipation of a fox going after her chooks.
The lawful course of action is to wait until the fox is sighted, unlock the gun cabinet and take out the required firearm, re-lock the cabinet, unlock the ammunition box, grab some rounds, re-lock the box, run out to stop the fox....faint chance as by this time reynard has made a kill and is high tailing it into the scrub.
The Greens, if they got their way, would make firearms use even harder for her and other people on the land.

David F,
Yes the purpose of torture is to control the subject, not to gain information.
The torture scene in the video game "Grand Theft Auto Five" is satirical but that series of games is known for it's intelligent but biting critique of post-post modern America.
In the aftermath of the brutal, interactive interrogation the torturer is ordered to kill the subject but instead lets him go after explaining that once a person has been tortured his old life is finished.
That aspect is overlooked in most discussions of torture, once a suspect has been taken into custody, detained for a period, tortured and forced to sign a confession he can never go back to his former life. He's effectively in limbo, a pariah because nobody in his former circle of friends and family will ever trust him or see him in the same way again.
Being a complete social outcast is really a fate worse than death for a lot of people and that's got to be one of the purposes of the CIA techniques, to set an example to other would be terrorists of what their lives are going to be like if they're captured and denied a martyr's death.

IS MISE...

Unfortunately, most of what you say is correct, and I say unfortunately, because that is exactly what the prevailing situation would be ! It would seem the judiciary, and our politicians, would prefer that the community at large, were to be completely divested of anything, that may be used as a weapon of self-defence ? The Greens and other like minded groups would prefer that all licenced F/A's were seized from those (licenced) members of the public, and destroyed.

If that were ever to happen, the only people who would possess F/A's, is the Military, the Police, and of course your criminal groups. My only question being, how on earth would your ordinary member of the public, who may reside alone, manage if they were to be violently attacked ? Seek immediate police assistance ? And if the police are inundated with other jobs, what then ?

In this increasing climate of violence, surely there's some 'fail safe' mechanism that could be conceived, that all vested parties can adopt, and live with ? Rather then allowing the poor ol' public being left to flounder, at the mercy of armed and dangerous individuals ?

O sung,
Back in the days when gun ownership was common we also had mental hospitals, it was easier to get a gun but it was also easier to get disturbed people locked up indefinitely for their own and society's protection.