News Australia to ban laser pointers

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2008/04/22/australia_to_ban_laser_pointers/1

New South Wales has become the latest part of Australia to ban high-powered laser pointers, with punishments of up to fourteen years in prison for transgressors.

 

Laser pointers are still abaout? I honestly havn't seen one for a couple of years now!

Anyway, losing the right to carry them seems fair came if people are misusing them so blatently. Although how can you possibly get the angle to shine a laser pen into a plane? surely the nose would stop it reaching the windscreen?

 

do people really think that this is going to have an effect on the people who are using them for already illegal means? It is the same as banning any 'weapon', those who are already law abiding people will get rid of them or license them if they still need them. Those who are pointing them at divers/planes and the likes are hardly going to be the sort of people who will see this new law and think 'eek, must hand them in now they are illegal' and incedents such as described will continue to happen.

We have seen it over here with things like the pistol ban and the violent crime reduction bill.

What is needed is existing laws to be implemented fully and punishments given that fit the crime rather than the watered down slap on the wrists we see now.

 

Lawmakers go for the tools, rather than the people who use the tools. Just like banning knives, guns, whatnot, crime is unaffected.

Besides, I highly doubt these lasers are a real public safety issue in the first place. Probably trying to score points by being 'tough on youth', 'tough on hooliganism and vandalism', etc. Election coming up, they need to play more theater for the masses of sheep.

 

But unlike guns, lasers have a constructive positive use in every day life. From construction to astronomy, some people need them. But as usual, one bad egg spoils 375,000 dozen, and the Labor government is right on top of things with a bandaid solution.

 

Australia loves the bandwagon..... really, if i want to down a airplane with a laser then you are a criminal and you wont care about the 14 years in jail, hell i can down a airplane with a gun if i want, i could buy a RPG unit from the soviets and shoot stuff like in GTA and then Australia would go out and ban GTA.... and contrary to guns, lasers are useful.

edit: several people start attacking people with table forks..... LETS BAN FORKS!!!!!!!

 

I'm sorry? Guns are perfectly legitimate useful tools for the ordinary citizen as well.

http://www.a-human-right.com/

 

That site is hilarious

 

Weapon != Tool

 

It is about reducing the availability of means to the 'casual' ****, rather than the hard-core criminal who, who let's be honest, has got business crime to be getting on with rather than trying to blind some bus drivers or ambulance chopper pilots for kicks.

The same applies to guns. Gun bans do not disarm hard-core criminals, but they do disarm the occasional disaffected nutter student who wants to go postal on his peers, the drunk neighbour who wants to have it out with you over some petty dispute, or the inadequate wife beater who can't quite accept his ex leaving him.

The added bonus is that if your do catch a hard-core criminal carrying a gun, you can arrest him outright rather than wait to see how he is going to exercise his right to bear arms.

There is no point clamouring for more effective application of the law and stricter punishment, if you give the police no laws to work within in the first place.

 

Arresting and charging the criminals is not the problem, they can and do get caught. The problem is that the punishments given are not a deterrant. For example, getting caught with a pistol here in the UK warrents a minimum of a 5 year sentance, we hear stories of people getting away with 1 or 2 years and a slap on the wrist. Flat out banning of anything is never going to be the way forward as it only hurts those who are law abiding,

I get your point about the casual man in the street obtaining something in the heat of passion, so to say. This is what our pistol ban and violent crime reduction (VCR) bill was designed to stop. Gun crime has continued to rise and will do so until the existing laws we have (and have had for a loooong time) are enforced properly in the courts.

Sorry for the rants but as an airgun shooter and knife collector, this is a subject very close to me.

 

Wasn't NSW the same place that can ticket you just for having a car that looks like it broke the law previously. "That car looks fast. Lock him up boys." That or the thing that if any of your tires loose traction they can bust you on that, I understand that they don't get the snow that I am used to but its not uncommon for the drive wheels to do their own thing no matter how careful you are in a good snowstorm.

The last time I saw a laser pointer used or the last several times was when the teacher pointed something out on the board while staying out of the way so we could copy it down. He has one of those ridiculously bright green ones that probably could bring down a plane.

 

Apparently you can get sniper like lasers, and they are very precise. However you do need them for some work places. They won't take the high powered lasers away from Astronomers or Road workers just like they didn't with guns and the police. I would rather see a ban on these lasers then have 110 passengers or 416 passengers die as a result of so called "fun", take in mind that these people aren't doing it whilst the planes are thousands of feet in the air but meters from landing, that's hoq they can aim in the slits.

 

The idiots doing this still will, one of them will be locked up in the next year but 100 people will try this now that its been mentioned. Criminals already bought there illegal guns and now its hard for the guy whos about to get robbed to get one, more guns not less.

 

i had to chuckle when i visit that site.

just curious tho, does the author ever kill a man before?

 

laser pointers are annoying when in the hands of someone who is not using them properly. Ever been to a concert? Little red dots flying around is nothing but childish. Who cares if they get banned? If you use them at school or work, get a permit. It couldn't be that hard and it would only take a bit of your time. If you are energetic enough to bitch about not being able to carry it with you, you are energetic enough to go get a permit. Laws are in place to help everyone (even though some are a bit extreme). Look at this laser

 

I like how the article makes it sound like people are running around using class 4 lasers as laser pointers. Class 4 being the kind of laser can burn skin, may permanently blind you on an indirect hit, and set things on fire.

 

Scientific research has shown that making guns less available to the general public also makes them less available to the criminal (where do you think most illegal guns start out?), and reduces gun crime. Fact, sorry.

That's just what would make me feel safer. People like yourself carrying a gun.

 

This ban is pretty dumb

 

im afraid you wrong there, that study just proves that the influx of new weapons to the criminals slows when the price of weapons rises.

the claim that it is "fact" as you say that making firearms less available = reduction in gun crime is also wrong. year on year since the handgun ban, firearms offences have risen.

anywhos, if they catch anyone trying to blind a helicopter pilot then they should treat it as attempted murder imo