UK Home Secretary Bans US Martial Arts Expert 440
Posted
by
samzenpus
from the chuck-norris-does-not-approve dept.
from the chuck-norris-does-not-approve dept.
Big Hairy Ian writes "An American expert in violent self-defense has been excluded from entering the UK by the Home Office. From the article: 'Tim Larkin tried to board a plane from his home in Las Vegas on Tuesday, but was given a UK Border Agency letter saying "his presence here was not conducive to the public good." Mr Larkin, who was due to host seminars, told the BBC the move was a "gross over-reaction." The Home Office said he was subject to an exclusion order. A spokeswoman said: "The home secretary will seek to exclude an individual if she considers that his or her presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good." Mr Larkin — who trained as a US Navy Seal — runs a company teaching combat to military and law enforcement clients in the United States.'"
Turn about is fair play. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not the first time someone has been prevented from entering a country. While the US refuses people all the time, we're supposed to get indignant that this person is refused entry to GB?
I'm sure the mental train wreck in some peoples' minds regarding this is epic.
However, this is not news.
--
BMO
Re:In the UK self defense = racism, extremism (Score:2, Insightful)
"making shit up" is not very smart.
Since thats exactly what you did...
Re:Turn about is fair play. (Score:5, Insightful)
The only interesting part of this will be how much money he makes when he starts advertising with, "My kung-fu is so lethal they wont even let me into certain countries."
The nationalistic, "We just dont like violent people" line is, of course, nonsense. The UK is known for being very liberal about letting hateful, violent Imams and such into the country.
Re:Different kind of anti-social (Score:5, Insightful)
The UK just so happens to have codified what common practices it considers to be anti-social and to have laws in place to give police and the courts specific powers to deal with them.
Re:In the UK self defense = racism, extremism (Score:5, Insightful)
Ultimately, however, this is not the point. This man will teach a civilian how to cause serious injuries to a person, but we let these same people point 2 tonnes of motorised steel around our roads on a daily basis, operate plant machinery which can destroy whole buildings, run our healthcare infrastructure. Learning how to do something dangerous doesn't mean they will employ that knowledge improperly. These people are still culpable for their actions.
Ultimately all the government is done is prevent the spread of knowledge.
Re:Turn about is fair play. (Score:5, Insightful)
We had a 17 year old kid banned for life from the US for sending a drunken e-mail to Obama. We've had people turned away from the US for making jokes that weren't to the taste of TSA agents.
As reasons go, this guy teaching people specifically to kill using hand to hand combat isn't any worse an excuse than those of people being turned away from the US.
People get turned away all the time, even when I went to Canada once I was threatened with being turned away seemingly for no reason other than the customers officers in question were just complete cocks - I'd done absolutely nothing wrong, no criminal history, not there for work, just there for nothing more than a holiday and they felt like interrogating someone for 3 hours. They eventually just let me through but the fact is customs officers seem to be able to just weild this power randomly and at will whenever they want and for seemingly no valid reason at all.
This needs to be seen in context, the UK's border agency is under attack right now, it's being used as a political pawn in the run up to the olympics in a battle over whether the government's management of it is competent enough to support the influx we'll see at the Olympics. Had this happened at any other time I doubt very much it would have even made the news. People get this sort of treatment all the time in all countries, it really isn't newsworthy full stop - not even the reason they used.
Re:Inciting violence (Score:4, Insightful)
Reasonable force must be proportionate. The position (to kill in self-defence) that this man was advocating was untenable and can be classified as incitement. There is no reason why the UK should let him in, esp. when the US routinely turns away British citizen for infractions such as sending the president an email while drunk.
Re:Turn about is fair play. (Score:4, Insightful)
So basically... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:In the UK self defense = racism, extremism (Score:5, Insightful)
Only an American would call the current UK Government "left-wing".
The last time the UK had an actual left-wing Government was sometime back in the '70s. Like most of the Anglosphere, it's been moving further and further to the right for decades.
Re:Different kind of anti-social (Score:1, Insightful)
This is the same Norway where Beer factory workers went on strike because the company wouldn't let them drink on the line and drivers could only take two beers on the road for all day? My mistake, it must be the other Norway.
Re:Turn about is fair play. (Score:5, Insightful)
"Self defence" covers a wide spectrum, from running away shrieking like a little girl, through to crippling your attacker using potentially lethal techniques. Larkin is at the throat-punch-for-great-justice end of the spectrum. That doesn't sit well with a Nanny State which (despite occasional noises to the contrary) de facto wants victims to blubber for help rather than take responsibility for their own safety.
As to preaching this message in riot hit areas, those very riots demonstrated how inadequate the Nanny Will Protect You plan is when it kicks off big style, and it comes down to decent householders and business owners versus a pack of ferals. In case you're unclear on it, Larkin wasn't planning to teach the ferals, who simply pick up a knife or brick anyway.
Re:The Home Office message to Brits: (Score:3, Insightful)
Amen. This is why cases of intentional homicide per capita are four times higher in the UK than the US.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate [wikipedia.org]
Oh no, wait a second. It's the US where more people are intentionally murdered. Guess all that self-defence didn't really pay off...
Re:Different kind of anti-social (Score:5, Insightful)
the UK has explicitly abandonded the principle that everyone is equal before the law.
Everyone is equal before the law. After the law, everyone not wealthy and connected is fucked..
Here in the USA we have the biggest and most offensive example of not everyone being equal before the law — Disenfranchisement of Felons. If the state declares you to be a criminal, you lose your right to vote. Therefore, all the state has to do to prevent you from voting is pass a law criminalizing your behavior. It will probably take longer to get your voting rights back than it will to repeal the fucking law. The same is true of every other right we hold dear; it can be trivially denied you and it is most likely to be denied you if you oppose the corrupt status quo.
Re:Different kind of anti-social (Score:4, Insightful)
red lights are there for a reason
And sirens and lights are on emergency vehicles for a reason: to make everyone stop at green traffic lights so the the vehicle can pass quickly through the intersection and reach the emergency. Moving out of the way of the emergency vehicle is the primary responsibility and the law should be updated so that driving through a red light to prevent forcing an emergency vehicle to wait (when the traffic has stopped) is not just legal, but required.
Re:Turn about is fair play. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:UK (Score:2, Insightful)
But in actual fact they were wrong with the most likely reason he was on the no-fly list being that he has a relatively common islamic name shared with a bunch of other dudes who spell it different ways. It's a bit like Jon Smith being banned from flying 'cos a bloke called John Smyth may or may not be a terrorist.
Re:Different kind of anti-social (Score:2, Insightful)
It is highly unlikely that anyone actually needs to proceed past a red light to let an emergency vehicle through.
Emergency responders are well trained, have well established procedures for dealing with hazards, including exemptions so they can do things like taking paths through junctions that are not normally legal, and have vehicles equipped with high profile warnings to alert other road users that they may be doing this.
The average driver has none of those advantages, and is almost certainly better off moving as far to the side of the road as they can and letting the emergency driver do the rest. There is no need to try to be a hero; they drive the vehicles with the pretty blue lights, and if you want to do that, you should go and undertake the same training and qualifications as they do first.
No doubt there are isolated exceptions, but the thing about these policies is that they are based on a vast amount of real world experience that gets updated every day. Given the kind of person who chooses to work for the emergency services in the first place, if they are saying don't run the light, they probably know that on balance running the light does more harm than good.
Re:Different kind of anti-social (Score:3, Insightful)
At BAC 0.02%, your driving is not impaired in any meaningful way. Being mildly tired from a long day at work would have more of an impact. It's nice to see that the prohibitionist ladies that ruined the USA's liquor industry and emboldened organized crime in the 1920s are right at home in Norway.
Post hoc.