An aluminum bat to the head would greatly increase the chance that the person will be killed rather than just knocked out. I certainly disapprove of the looters and rioters, but I don't think they deserve to die.
Basically, don't hit someone on the head with any baseball bat unless you're willing to kill them.
But yes, I agree that whether the person is hit with a wooden or aluminum bat there is a chance of them dying.
Why not?
If looter was caught and is on trial - then few years in prison would be enough. But being killed while looting when police is overwhelmed - that's only fair.
The whole damned thing is disturbing.
Unfortunately looting mob during mass riots puts store owners into totally different situation. They basically have only two options: run vs fight.
I'm not sure if I personally would choose to fight in that situation, but if business owner chooses fight option, I would support him even if he kills looters during that fight. In part because that would make my neighborhood safer.
Considering the example: If you were a shop owner in your shop vs a mob, I'd suggest that if you had to fight tere's a good probability that you were fighting for your life anyway. You would most likely be trying to permanently disable any threat. Perhaps a blow to the knee? I don't know how anyone would react.
The thing you need to consider is this: in the UK you aren't encouraged to buy equipment designed to hurt people (for example there's legislation on knives (length) and for guns you need licenses which are very hard to get). Also the law tends to be unfavaourable if you simply kill an intruder. You really have to be using due force. Now consider you're home alone and a mob arrives at your door/flat. What do you do to protect yourself? What equipment (that you can easily justify was used in self defence or with appropriate force) should you use that might just persuade them that it's not worth the effort?
Perhaps getting the aluminium one to put them off?
What I find more disturbing than anything else here is the prospect of a violent individual too stupid to properly analyze such a situation.
You also are assuming that all of these confrontations are done face-to-face, and that both parties have plenty of time to think about what they're doing first. It's already pretty clear few of these looters are analyzing anything.
The only thing you get with aluminum is a greater velocity.
force = 1/2 mv^2
momentum ~= mv