It’s a well established fact that, despite our special relationship with our friends in Great Britain, the folks across the pond do not enjoy the same fundamental freedoms as their breakaway former subjects in the colonies. One of the more stark differences is seen is in their lack of a fundamental right to keep and bear arms. The rules in the UK are restrictive to the point where you’re probably more likely to find a unicorn than a shotgun on any given block. But as the NRA found in a recent article, the Queen’s government takes the issue of not being able to defend yourself even more seriously than you might have imagined. If you happen to be attacked by one of the bad guys (and they have them over there, too) you’d best be sure not to do anything to injure your attacker in return.

The latest dispatch from the United Kingdom’s ongoing campaign to eliminate all forms of armed self-defense seems too incredible to be true. Unfortunately, after tracking down the origin of a publicly distributed statement regarding self-defense products on the country’s “Ask the Police” website, we can confirm that British subjects continue to live at the mercy of their potential attackers.  Even to the point of baffling absurdity.

The statement appears in the Frequently Asked Questions section of www.askthe.police.uk – a site that is operated by the Police National Legal Database.   Information provided by the PNLD and its site are used by local police constabularies to help inform the public.

The question at issue asks, “Are there any legal self defence products that I can buy?” Succinctly epitomizing the sad state of natural rights in Great Britain, the first sentence states, “The only fully legal self defence product at the moment is a rape alarm.”

A rape alarm (by which I assume they mean a whistle or some other device intended to alert the authorities and the public) isn’t a bad idea. That’s particularly true in a place like the UK where you can’t carry a .38 to get your point across to the rapist in a more convincing fashion. But it’s not just guns that are banned from use if you are under attack. No, the restrictions go much, much further.

“You must not get a product which is made or adapted to cause a person injury. Possession of such a product in public (and in private in specific circumstances) is against the law.” So even in the sanctity of one’s home, the statement seems to suggest that care for violent offenders outweighs the rights of potential victims to be safe and secure against attack.

Mace and pepper spray are out of the question because they could cause injury to the mugger or rapist. But how about one of those inert dye sprays which would at least allow the cops to pick the bad guy out of a lineup later on? Nope. The cops’ web site specifically states that spraying such a marker intentionally toward the face could cause injury as well, so don’t do it. In fact, anything you may do which results in injury to your attacker will apparently see both of you in court side by side.

The Brits clearly seem to have a zero tolerance policy, though how they deal with their throngs of soccer hooligans is a bit of a mystery. Presumably they are all just beating the snot out of people with their fists, and since it doesn’t involve a foreign object that might get a pass. But the moral of this story should be clear by this point. When you fail to secure (or simply relinquish) enough of your fundamental rights to Big Brother, things start with giving them an inch and they inevitably take a mile. The Brits have enacted one ban after another, with the most onerous ones coming in 1968, 1988 and 1997. They periodically make sweeps through the territory, search people’s property and confiscate what they find. And after a sufficient number of years being told what to do, the Brits simply turned them over.

Apparently, having run out of guns to confiscate, they’ve now moved on to making sure that you don’t have any personal protection devices of any sort. One assumes that in due time they will outlaw printed reading material lest someone get a paper cut. But the point is, if you want to elect officials who are prone to banning guns and trying to defang the Second Amendment, take a look across the Atlantic. Your future is already on display there.