The Handgun's Perspective

"

Hi, I’m a handgun, Victoria Police’s best friend. A sweet, old .38-calibre Smith and Wesson revolver is what I am, baby. Despite evidence that suggests that my presence not only endangers the lives of suspects (Shepparton, Brooklyn) and the general public, but also police officers (Tony Clarke this week) unnecessarily, there’s been very little talk about getting rid of me. I’ll tell you why.

You see, taking me out of the police officer’s superhero utility belt would constitute a symbolic affront to the authority of the police institution. This is good for me since, despite handguns doing little for actual self-defence (police officers are more likely to be injured when attacked with bodily force than by guns, thus making guns often an over-reaction to a situation), people associate guns with police inexplicably and it has become a cultural artefact in many Western nations.
Police themselves even consider guns to be an important aspect in how they exert their power. In fact, the general public are so ignorant to the actual roles the police perform that the idea of a police force without guns – like in the UK – is silly. Remember that woman at the start of Bowling for Columbine that said the only reason people call the police is because they have guns? People like her help me out a great deal. You can’t tell them policing isn’t as dangerous a job as construction work.

You would think that after 4 incidents (Wayne Joannou, Mohamed Chaouk, Lee Wally Kennedy and Tony Clarke) in Victoria this year with police involving guns (this most recent one involving a police officer being shot dead for no good reason), more people would be up in arms – no pun intended – about the overuse of guns. But no, it looks as though I’ll be safe. Public discourse has been focussed more on stopping solo patrols and making the belt more secure rather than on safer measures such as tasers, nets and the like.

Guns are just too sexy to throw away. There has to be some semblance of masculinity in this increasingly feminized society. Police guns are the last bastion of that cause. The public perception is that guns defend more people than they hurt. And that’s fine by me.

I’m very glad that I have such a symbolic stranglehold on the population. From where I’m sitting, in the dignified and respected leather belt of the Victoria Police, there doesn’t seem to be any stopping me and my impact. That is, of course, until they replace me with the apparently ‘much safer’ semi-automatic weapon.

Oh, boy. What a day that will be.

"

'Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, my baby shot me down.'


Link1
Link2