'Bullet proof hoodie' condemned by gun (control) groups (Retitled because across the atlantic a 'gun group' is against firearms ownership.)

Body armor reduces the chance of injury if you are shot, but apparently in Britain that constitutes encouraging violence:

But gun control groups said today that the company was practising “exploitation at its most grotesque”. They predicted a rise in gang violence, saying children would buy the hoodie as a status symbol.

Raymond Stevenson, a spokesman for Don’t Trigger, an international anti-gun campaign based in Brixton, London, said: “It’s not helping kids to provide them with bullet-proof armoury. These companies are just encouraging the escalation of the urban warfare.

I have no idea just how effective or bullet resistant this thing actually is, but one would think those who wring their hands and bemoan the violence would be all for passive measures that make people safer and do not harm anyone else.

Criminals with body armor is certainly a possibility, but since the criminals are the only ones with guns in Britain I don't see how that would be much of a problem - nobody has the guns to shoot them anyway.