You can be arrested for carrying pepper spray/CS and charged under section 5 of the firearms act 1968 including any other gas canister or self defence method regardless of whatever excuse you give to the police. If the spray was used on a rapist or attacker and he suffered eye injuries, you could be arrested for serious assault or if he had asthma and it was induced, manslaughter.
There is no way around it, only other "legal" (read: legislators has not gotten round to banning them yet) alternatives and because the use of them haven't been challenged in court yet, until they are I wouldn't carry it around. The only legal self defence product that can be accessed is a rape alarm, like a whistle :roll:
That is truly appalling.
Although I was surprised at the time - and pepper spray was a new invention when I was a young women, I guess the problem is that any old toe-rag can get their hands on it and so use it simply for violence.
As far as whistles, on my self defence course I was told not to call for help as most people become afraid and ignore but better to call 'Fire!' which is more likely to get people out to see what is happening.
I know under UK Law you can use sufficient force necessary for self defence, up to killing the person if that is needed.
I would always advise girls to go on self defence courses. I think it is really important to be a ble to protect yourself. Possibly even more so for boys. That being said, my daughter refused to go.
And yet, addressing the bolded sentence first, you are denied the use of any effective tools in defending yourself. It is a reasonably good bet that if the attacker intends to do you serious harm, he will likely have a knife or cudgel, but you can't even carry
pepperspray. :roll:
So you can kill him if you have to, but you can't use anything but your bare hands. :doh
Addressing the self-defense courses.... this is a good thing, everyone should take these.... but understand that their utility is limited.
Professional MMA fighters have gotten themselves killed going up against armed thugs, even
though they train intensively as a full-time profession.
A serious-amateur martial artist (trains 4 hours a week for 4 years, say) might handle ONE typical unarmed thug
readily enough, (if the MA he trains in is practical), but add weapons or multiple attackers and his chances drop like a rock down a well.
A short-course in self-defense... well if you are attacked by one unarmed thug who underestimates you and isn't
all that tough, and doesn't have serious fighting skills on his own.... you
might manage to escape... maybe.
Another problem is that the
quality and
practicality of these courses vary a great deal. I've spent some time teaching short-course self-defense (SCSD) to small groups, and evaluating other SCSD programs for
merit... and there is more horse-manure than gold nuggets out there. Some of these SCSD progs are worse
than useless; most are mediocre at best; a relative few are gold-star quality.
If you have no prior experience in dealing with real-world violence, your ability to judge the quality of the training
you are receiving is going to be somewhat limited.
A good course should spend a great deal of time on the subjects of security proceedures (locks, alarms, habits),
awareness and avoidance (indicators of criminal behaviors or intent, observation and avoidance of same),
how crime develops and the stages it passes through, tactical considerations, and dealing with the aftermath.
In the physical, a roughly equal amount of time should be spent on how to not get hit, striking vital points
(mostly with your hands or knees, kicks should be low), and how to escape from various holds and chokes.
Weapons disarms are a tricky subject. I've tried teaching disarms to people with no martial-arts background
before and it usually doesn't work out that well. They get the general idea, or to be more precise they learn
the rote-technique... but it takes more than that to pull it off in real life in most cases. Most people who
are not at least serious-amateur MAists seem to lack the attributes (speed, precision, complex-movement-coordination) to manage disarms very well in realistic scenarios.
Well, anyway, that's my two bits, and I teach this stuff...
If that's how you all want it, it's not my country so it isn't my place to say, but rather to just wish you good luck with it.
If you can't even carry pepperspray it sounds like you need all the luck you can get.