swords in the news

Kill or incapacitate? I think that when your family or your self-preservation is threatened your reactions are more instinctive than thought out. I would swing at him with the sword until he was down. Once he is down or running, I would stop swinging.

It would be better if I killed the intruder. Otherwise, there might be some difficult questions during the trial, especially about me shouting "Blood and souls for Arioch!" while slashing at the guy.

Shellhead wrote:

It would be better if I killed the intruder. Otherwise, there might be some difficult questions during the trial, especially about me shouting "Blood and souls for Arioch!" while slashing at the guy.

Yeah, that was me too, but I was screaming "Vae Victus!!" the entire time. When I was done, I sucked out all his blood from across the room. Damndest trick, not sure if I can do it again.

This thread is saddening. I know you all don't really mean it, but how can you show sympathy with that sword-wielding guy? That guy's clearly a psycho, how can you first cut someone's hand off and then, after that, slash at his torso? The cutting off the hand might pass as a kneejerk reaction, but delivering the deadly blow, the guy must have really felt he was in a computer game or something, requiring him to "finish the opponent".

I'm suspicious of any person in possession of a weapon, be it a pistol or a sword or anything. Maybe I've seen Taxi Driver too often. Sure, the USA are a little rougher than Good Old Germany, but nobody really needs a lethal weapon for self defense, a household offers enough blunt instruments to knock an intruder unconscious, Space Hulk 3rd edition should really do the trick. If I were living in the USA and worrying about my possessions or family, I would "arm" myself with a baseball bat or maybe a taser, but not a sword or firearm.

I also couldn't live on with having killed a human. I'd rather lose possessions worth a couple of thousand dollars.

Schweig! wrote:

This thread is saddening. I know you all don't really mean it, but how can you show sympathy with that sword-wielding guy? That guy's clearly a psycho, how can you first cut someone's hand off and then, after that, slash at his torso? The cutting off the hand might pass as a kneejerk reaction, but delivering the deadly blow, the guy must have really felt he was in a computer game or something, requiring him to "finish the opponent".

I'm suspicious of any person in possession of a weapon, be it a pistol or a sword or anything. Maybe I've seen Taxi Driver too often. Sure, the USA are a little rougher than Good Old Germany, but nobody really needs a lethal weapon for self defense, a household offers enough blunt instruments to knock an intruder unconscious, Space Hulk 3rd edition should really do the trick. If I were living in the USA and worrying about my possessions or family, I would "arm" myself with a baseball bat or maybe a taser, but not a sword or firearm.

I also couldn't live on with having killed a human. I'd rather lose possessions worth a couple of thousand dollars.

I got burglarized by an ex-girlfriend with a meth addiction. (I broke up with her when I realized her problem and her unwillingness to solve it.) Anyway, if I had been home when she and her friends showed up to cart off a couple of thousand dollars worth of my possessions (at least half of which was my CD collection), I would have happily slashed away with my sword. As things worked out, they stole that sword, too.

It took me several weeks to deal with everything, because they stole my checkbook and an old driver's license that I should have thrown out, used that to run up a couple of credit card accounts in my name, and also got a cell phone in my name. You bet I would I cut them if I had a chance. I also had to move, just so they wouldn't hit my place again, which is common practice.

How do I know it was her? I did some detective work and tracked her down to the place she was staying at after we broke up. It was 3 AM on a Saturday morning, and the house was full of drugged out losers, at least two dozen of them. The homeowner was sitting on the front porch, gasping for breath after getting punched in the stomach by one of the "guests." I went back to my car to get a tire iron, then stomped around the place looking for my stuff. I found a boom box and a dozen CDs that were almost definitely mine, given that most of the people present didn't look like indie rock fans. Later, a friend of the homeowner sold me back my CCG collections and half my CDs for $200, which I knew would be a bargain if my renters insurance came through.

After nearly a week of anonymous tip calls from pay phones in that area, the police raided the house at dawn. They recovered my VCR, a stack of comics, some Penthouses, my phone and my caller ID. The caller ID showed a lot of phone calls to my place on the afternoon of the burglary. It turned out that the homeowner and several other people there that morning were all squatters, and everybody except for my girlfriend got arrested for outstanding warrants. Nobody was held responsible for the burglary, because none of them owned the house and they all accused each other.

Mad Dog wrote:

Black Barney wrote:

I think they should allow swords in hockey.

Ice-skates do have blades on them. The hockey guys just need figure-skating lessons so they can roundhouse their opponents throats on the ice.

How quickly people forget. The amount of damage a skate can do is horrific. Here's a video of Clint Malarchuk actually *getting* his throat cut--and, yea, it was actually a kill shot.






Richard Zednik had it happen a couple of years ago, as did Adam Burish in last year's playoffs. I don't think either was as close to fatal as the Malarchuk episode, but they were pretty brutal nonetheless.


Edit: Rough story Shelly; hardcore tweakers are a truly special breed of scumbag.

Edit2: Simon, I no longer own any firearms, though I've had a few in my life. However, if someone was in my house after kicking in the door and my shotgun was handy, I would have absolutely no qualms against putting a wall of bird- or buckshot into him. I might be able to take someone out with a blunt object, but I'm quite certain that my wife is not unless she had the element of surprise *and* the dipshit in question wasn't high. Chances are extremely high that someone committing a kick-in-the-door home invasion is either doing so because they're high, to support a drug habit, or with intent to cause serious bodily harm. Getting dead is the price you have to be willing to pay if kicking in someone's door is on your daily to-do list.

Schweig! wrote:

This thread is saddening. I know you all don't really mean it, but how can you show sympathy with that sword-wielding guy? That guy's clearly a psycho, how can you first cut someone's hand off and then, after that, slash at his torso? The cutting off the hand might pass as a kneejerk reaction, but delivering the deadly blow, the guy must have really felt he was in a computer game or something, requiring him to "finish the opponent".

I'm suspicious of any person in possession of a weapon, be it a pistol or a sword or anything. Maybe I've seen Taxi Driver too often. Sure, the USA are a little rougher than Good Old Germany, but nobody really needs a lethal weapon for self defense, a household offers enough blunt instruments to knock an intruder unconscious, Space Hulk 3rd edition should really do the trick. If I were living in the USA and worrying about my possessions or family, I would "arm" myself with a baseball bat or maybe a taser, but not a sword or firearm.

I also couldn't live on with having killed a human. I'd rather lose possessions worth a couple of thousand dollars.

A friend was talking about this exact thing just this weekend. It is a very different culture in the US to Europe. In the UK, the individual killing an intruder with a sword would almost certainly be put in jail for life. However, it is considered laudable to kill someone entering your home without permission in the US.

When I spent a summer in Texas, before going we where told a story of a British student who needing to relieve himself urinated in a garden in Texas. The homeowner shot him in the back of the head as he urinated presumably unaware of the homeowner's presence. The homeowner was not even tried.

Shellhead wrote:

I didn't mean to belittle burglary and I certainly understand your anger. But killing because of it? No way.

Citadel wrote:

Schweig! wrote:

This thread is saddening. I know you all don't really mean it, but how can you show sympathy with that sword-wielding guy? That guy's clearly a psycho, how can you first cut someone's hand off and then, after that, slash at his torso? The cutting off the hand might pass as a kneejerk reaction, but delivering the deadly blow, the guy must have really felt he was in a computer game or something, requiring him to "finish the opponent".

I'm suspicious of any person in possession of a weapon, be it a pistol or a sword or anything. Maybe I've seen Taxi Driver too often. Sure, the USA are a little rougher than Good Old Germany, but nobody really needs a lethal weapon for self defense, a household offers enough blunt instruments to knock an intruder unconscious, Space Hulk 3rd edition should really do the trick. If I were living in the USA and worrying about my possessions or family, I would "arm" myself with a baseball bat or maybe a taser, but not a sword or firearm.

I also couldn't live on with having killed a human. I'd rather lose possessions worth a couple of thousand dollars.

A friend was talking about this exact thing just this weekend. It is a very different culture in the US to Europe. In the UK, the individual killing an intruder with a sword would almost certainly be put in jail for life. However, it is considered laudable to kill someone entering your home without permission in the US.

When I spent a summer in Texas, before going we where told a story of a British student who needing to relieve himself urinated in a garden in Texas. The homeowner shot him in the back of the head as he urinated presumably unaware of the homeowner's presence. The homeowner was not even tried.

It's a joke in Texas. Ever heard of the Texas Defense (against a charge of manslaughter)? "He needed killing."

Schweig! wrote:

Shellhead wrote:

I didn't mean to belittle burglary and I certainly understand your anger. But killing because of it? No way.

I don't think that I would have killed them, but I would have definitely come out swinging with the sword.

Schweig! wrote:

This thread is saddening. I know you all don't really mean it, but how can you show sympathy with that sword-wielding guy? That guy's clearly a psycho, how can you first cut someone's hand off and then, after that, slash at his torso? The cutting off the hand might pass as a kneejerk reaction, but delivering the deadly blow, the guy must have really felt he was in a computer game or something, requiring him to "finish the opponent".

Who says he slashed more than once? It's possible one swipe of the sword cut his chest and nearly severed his hand.

metalface13 wrote:

Schweig! wrote:

This thread is saddening. I know you all don't really mean it, but how can you show sympathy with that sword-wielding guy? That guy's clearly a psycho, how can you first cut someone's hand off and then, after that, slash at his torso? The cutting off the hand might pass as a kneejerk reaction, but delivering the deadly blow, the guy must have really felt he was in a computer game or something, requiring him to "finish the opponent".

Who says he slashed more than once? It's possible one swipe of the sword cut his chest and nearly severed his hand.

Pure speculation, but my money is one the student having had a bit of Iaido training and came out with 2 cuts in one movement, once on the downstroke at the wrist and back up again across the chest.

I use to live with 4 Hopkins students about 5 blocks from where this happened today. Our house was broken into 3 times. Most of the houses are 100 year old houses without central AC so during the summer it is very easy to break into these houses. During the 3rd break in one of my housemates walked into the kitchen as the punk was breaking in. My housemate grabbed a dirty kitchen knife sitting on the counter and yelled "hey what are you doing". The punk looked at my dirty kitchen wielding housemate and said "oh, sorry I didn't know you lived here or something stupid like that." and then he ran off. I emailed this article to my housemates this morning and one of my other housemates emailed back and said "I really wanted to kill that bastard that robbed us". I've gotta wonder if it was the same robber?

In Australia, if a guy breaks into your house, belts the shit out of you, takes your stuff then trips over the stairs on the way out he gets to sue you.

Mr Skeletor wrote:

In Australia, if a guy breaks into your house, belts the shit out of you, takes your stuff then trips over the stairs on the way out he gets to sue you.

Same here in Canada.