Alpine wrote:
Just got back from a 3 week trip to Greece and Italy, it was interesting having to go that long without carrying.
. . .
In my research for and during the trip I found and was told that it is better to avoid dealing with Greek and Italian police unless you get physically harmed and that even if you get robbed and need a report for insurance unless it's very expensive don't bother. I witnessed firsthand how cowed the citizens of these 2 countries were and how they just meekly accept strong-arm crime and abuse from the authorities as common-place.
Having lived in Italy for 8 months when I was a junior in college, I can attest to that. The police there are almost as corrupt as the police in Mexico. The Italian federal police, the Carabinieri, had a reputation for using excessive physical force when taking suspects into custody. Even fully cooperative suspects were known to take a club to the face or a knee to the ribs. I just learned to avoid them whenever possible. I think that's pretty sound advice when in any foreign country.
We are definitely fortunate to still have most of our natural right to self-defense intact.