WTF is wrong with you Americans?

[Michael]

You asked, but you already had the answer.

No, once you made the question clear, I gave my opinion about it in order to have a discussion about something tangible.

Universal background checks required for all gun transactions ought to be validated by stats on crimes committed with illegally obtained weapons. I don't know the answer to this question.

Oh, so iow you think that anyone should just be allowed to purchase a weapon?

I don't think criminals should be allowed to purchase or own guns. Any violent criminals, regardless of status.

Or, who would you choose to have background checked? Hmm, you can find out whatever you want to find out usually. But, I'd bet that most crimes are not committed with legally owned weapons. They call such incidents "accidents."

I don't know much about background checks and the effect they have on preventing gun crime. They're relatively new. The federal government has no trouble getting around them in order to get guns in the hands of its favored criminals. That issue aside, I'd like to hear more about background checks, their effectiveness, what changes could be made, etc.

[Michael]

nor will you acknowledge that you have already lost all your rights

Nope, can't say that at all. Funny that you can, but forget it.

Yeah, yeah, I know exactly what you're thinking, but you do not reciprocate that insight.

There are written rights that have been codified in the past that are updated by newer laws. There is a lag time in how this is enforced and understood in practice, as well as common law that is slower to change. Our legal rights are always in a state of transition influenced by: 1) changes in written law; 2) adjustment to the changes by the enforcement process; 3) common law. Glad that you believe in and can exercise some rights. Use it or lose it.

[Steve James]

I don't think criminals should be allowed to purchase or own guns. Any violent criminals, regardless of status.

Hold it. Do you mean anyone who has been convicted of a crime, a "violent crime" or of a crime using a gun? Would robbery count? Anyway, as you know, "criminals" don't obtain their weapons legally. And, fwiw, felons convicted of violent crimes are already prohibited from owning firearms in many states. None of these mass shooters had criminal records.

That issue aside, I'd like to hear more about background checks, their effectiveness, what changes could be made, etc.

There's no reason not to have background checks. How else would you find out whether someone was a criminal or had a psychiatric history or belonged to a terrorist organization (:)) or was a Freemason? (Have you ever considered the connection between the Masonic Founders, the 2nd amendment and government conspiracies). Anyway, if it's a gov't conspiracy issue, there isn't any useful regulation that can't be considered part of the plot. However, cataloging and registering don't stop people from shooting, one way or the other. As we've said, a cultural change is needed.

[Steve James]

Glad that you believe in and can exercise some rights.

Lol. And, at least I have more rights than you do .

[bailewen]

Omar,

That sounds like an interesting book and I've heard people mention it before. Thanks for the tout. Of course I haven't read any part of it, but my first reaction to the idea that violent crime is in decline because people are growing out of it is strong skepticism. Human nature doesn't change, but behavior can be adapted, influenced, modified, etc. through education, e.g. realizing higher truth than previously understood, or through coercion, whether overt, e.g. Orwellian, or covert, e.g. Pavlovian or Dewey type training.

I don't think quantity of violence in society changes, but it can be channeled into different avenues and concentrated in certain areas. It's a little bit like money: the total amount can be constant, but it moves around, takes different forms, and gets concentrated in the hands of the powerful.

While I applaud your skepticism, there is no data to support your position: zero.

You are describing the "hydrolic theory" of violence. It turns out though, that over the past few hundred years, violence has plummeted, not just gone down...I mean it's dropped so far that you need to use a logorithmic scale with the charts or else all you see if a giant mountain for medieval times and then a flat that looks like no violence for the rest of human history. It's dropped like that for murder, deaths from war, rape...you name it. In pretty much every category of violence that we can measure, the human race has been making massive reductions pretty much ever since we invented books. Even in your lifetime there are things we can look at. Who here on the board beats their children? It was so common place 100 years ago it wasn't even controversial. Same thing for rape. Nevermind backwards Islamic theocracies, rape wasn't even considered a serious crime in most western democracies 100 years ago. Even including WWI and WWII the 20th century was not the most violent century when measured in deaths from war per 100,000 people. Heck, WWII, when adjusted to be measured in per capita terms was only the 9th most deadly war in human history. Number 1 is the An Lushan rebellion (China) in the 9th century.

Can we consider ourselves a less violent society as a whole, or believe we actually commit less gun violence, when those conclusions (assuming this is the case in your book, that it omits gun violence committed by USA Americans in the Iraq) are based on excluding the statistics of the gun violence committed by American soldiers and mercenaries simply because their victims were not of the same status or nationality as the perpetrator?

You know what they say about "assumptions". No. It does not exclude those deaths. The United States is lagging considerably behind Europe in terms of reduction of violence in society but is, nevertheless, still on a downward path. The book includes every violent conflict on the entire planet. Genocides in Africa and that, honestly, most non-violent war in American history, Afghanistan. Consider this:

estimated death toll for Afghanistan civilians: 15,000-20,000
estimated death toll for Vietnamese civilians: roughly 2,000,000

Like I said, orders of magnitude. Something like a 10 fold reduction. Similar figures for US casaulties. Vietnam was something like 10-20 thousand. Afghanistan is more like 2 thousand. Again, tenfold reduction in violence...even in a war.

[gzregorz]

My point about China and the reason I bought it up earlier was because among the billions that live there, there are no shooting sprees.

It seemed like a personal attack but it wasn't. I have pointed this out to other Americans living abroad, that they are safer from gun violence. Out of the richest countries in the world the US has highest odds of its citizens getting killed by gun violence.

The whole reason it came up was because Michael said he would not want to live in a country that didn't give its citizens access to basic technology on another thread. I won't bring this anymore, out of respect for Michael this is in response to Omar's post that I was being unfair which wasn't my intention.

[gzregorz]

By the way Omar, I would say Americans and other foreigners have faced much worse than just deportation.

But the fact is if you guys raise your kids in China you don't have to worry about shooting sprees or your kids being the victims of gun violence on the level we do here.

[Michael]

I would like to live in a country where kittens are always cuddled, but I don't.
I would like to live in a country where there is no violence, but I don't.
I would like to live in a country where I can access basic technology, but I don't.
¿Ustedes comprenden Inglés? ¿Si o no? Por seguro, si.

But the fact is if you guys raise your kids in China you don't have to worry about shooting sprees or your kids being the victims of gun violence on the level we do here.

I think the amount of physical violence in China is much greater than the USA, even without the rare shooting spree. Here there are stabbing sprees, and according to the Chinese govt there are around 300 riots per day. Per day!

They don't quantify the size of each riot, but I think the threshold is when the local police have to call the paramilitary police, like the ones who gunned down 20 people in Dongzhou, Guangdong on Dec. 6, 2005. If you want to read about that, I can send you in email a document I compiled. If we go into details here, RSF might get blocked. There's also basic info on wiki.

[Michael]

I don't think criminals should be allowed to purchase or own guns. Any violent criminals, regardless of status.

Hold it. Do you mean anyone who has been convicted of a crime, a "violent crime" or of a crime using a gun?

I was implying that people sanctioned by the government, but who are in fact criminals, should be excluded from gun ownership. I'm talking about war.

[Michael]

It turns out though, that over the past few hundred years, violence has plummeted, ... In pretty much every category of violence that we can measure.

Physical violence is a subset of all violence. You have listed categories of physical violence that are readily measurable, but there are other kinds of physical violence. For example, during the Industrial Revolution it was necessary from the point of view of the powerful, such as factory owners to make it simple, they needed workers but the people were living in an agrarian lifestyle. Did the factory owners simply offer them jobs that would be mutually beneficial to both parties? No, those in power used violence to force/coerce people off the land and into the horrible, disgusting, disease-ridden, crowded cities, where they would be forced, at the threat of starvation, to work 16 hour days, their wives or children substituting for them any time they were physically unable to drag themselves into the factory. We've all read Dickens.

Economic violence was used against these people by free trade that brought crops from other countries, without protective tariffs to prevent devaluing of local goods, brought them into the local markets in order to drive down normal prices of the crops until it put the farmers out of business and forced them into the factory towns. Do you acknowledge economic violence? Does your book measure this kind of economic violence?

There is a conflict between those who hold power and those who are ruled, it is a violent conflict that takes many forms, many physical forms and many non-physical. The most obvious physical form is the brutal, overt Orwellian type of Nineteen Eighty-four, but this also includes covert surveillance, which is violence against the individual's right to privacy, without which there can be no individuals as we have come to understand the concept in the USA. The next kind of violence against the individual by the state is coercion described by Huxley in Brave New World, which he explained in his famous Berkeley lecture of 1958 as a pharmaceutical and genetic engineering model of a scientific dictatorship that could be used to cause slaves to love their servitude when, by all normal measures, they should abhor it.

In other words, violence can come in the form of coercion so technologically advanced that it is not physically obvious and difficult to measure objectively, but it is still violence by the powerful minority against the individual for the purpose of total control of society. Along the path toward a scientific dictatorship described in detail by Huxley, society would be expected to become less and less physically violent because the individual capacity for violence of the masses would be effectively eliminated by the superior and more technologically advanced violence of the state.

What I have written does not invalidate the conclusions you've taken from your book because I have said that violence is only eliminated by reaching a higher level of understanding, which I do think has occurred in the time period you've mentioned since the Middle Ages, rightly stating this coincides with the availability of books, implying I think, whether you intended to say or not, that literacy does reduce violence. I think it does, but there are some people who pursue knowledge solely in order to increase their capacity for violence in order to remain in the ruling minority.

The book includes every violent conflict on the entire planet. Genocides in Africa and that, honestly, most non-violent war in American history, Afghanistan. Consider this:
estimated death toll for Afghanistan civilians: 15,000-20,000
estimated death toll for Vietnamese civilians: roughly 2,000,000

The connection between these two wars and their different casualty rates must be framed in the context of the purpose of the war and the intentions of those who conducted it. If they had the exact same plans and goals for both, such as goals for casualty rates of civilians, but were somehow morally inhibited from killing as many civilians in Afghanistan, that would support the theory. Does the book offer something about this?

[Steve James]

I was implying that people sanctioned by the government, but who are in fact criminals, should be excluded from gun ownership. I'm talking about war.

Implying doesn't mean much. When you say "people sanctioned by the government," are you accepting the authority of the government to decide? When you say "who are in fact criminals," I can only scratch my head. My question specifically asked "which criminals?" And, if you're "talking about war," that brings us back to the same question, "Why prepare for war ... everywhere in our own country?" Who is expected to be fighting whom? And, again, what about people who suffer psychotic episodes? or paranoid schizophrenics? or the mentally disabled? In general, anyone who hasn't committed a crime, but might not be considered responsible enough to own a weapon?

I would like to live in a country where kittens are always cuddled, but I don't.

Lol, well, that is the closest you've gotten to a syllogism. But, fwiw, it's not that you "don't" live in a country where kittens are cuddled. It's that you "choose" to live in a country where something you truly claim to believe in (liberty/freedom) is not practiced. In fact, you have to be a criminal just to get to the "free" internet. As I said, I feel free here; but, you say that I'm wrong.

Um, ok, a drug addict might tell you "Never do dope." Yet, he might still overdose. That's not hypocrisy; it's addiction. Otoh, if he puts down people because they do dope, and says that he'd never do it, that's being hypocritical. In this case, someone who owns a weapon because he thinks he needs it can advocate that guns are necessary for freedom (if freedom is important). We hear it in the phrase that "the Second Amendment is what allows all the others." Well, those important freedoms are not available everywhere. The presence of gun laws and the possession of weapons does not define where those freedoms are. So, I start from the premise that, for the majority of Americans, their freedom is not defined or described by their gun ownership. Yeah, if you're unarmed in a war, you're a target; and, if you're unarmed in the forest, you're bait. But, I don't consider our society (as I personally experience it here) as either a war zone or a jungle. This discussion did not start because of "crime" in the streets. It started because of a very specific incident, and the question is what can and should we do now.

[bailewen]

gregorz,

Ah..I see I misunderstood your point. I thought you were saying Michael was being hypocritical but, as I understand you know, you were just pointing out the irony.

And sure, I suppose there's technically worse than deporation but you get my point. As an American in China, I have far more freedom from CCP whims than a Chinese citizen does.

[bailewen]

It turns out though, that over the past few hundred years, violence has plummeted, ... In pretty much every category of violence that we can measure.

Physical violence is a subset of all violence. You have listed categories of physical violence that are readily measurable, but there are other kinds of physical violence. . .

....which are, in many cases, also readily measurable.

Economic violence ... Do you acknowledge economic violence? Does your book measure this kind of economic violence?

Yes. Sure I aknowledge it. Do you aknowledge that economic "violence" is not as violent as actual violence. You argument is a sign of how far we have come. In the past, the standard method of economic competition was to simply kill every single farmer and take their land. I consider that to be far more vilent than the use of sneaky tarif measures and various other legal means to force people off their farms. Back before the industrial revolution, if they needed workers they would simply burn down the farms and take the men as slaves. Again, industrial revolution stuff, while more violent than today, was again, more peaceful than what preceded it. You're proving my point for me.

The connection between these two wars and their different casualty rates must be framed in the context of the purpose of the war and the intentions of those who conducted it. If they had the exact same plans and goals for both, such as goals for casualty rates of civilians, but were somehow morally inhibited from killing as many civilians in Afghanistan, that would support the theory. Does the book offer something about this?

Once again, you made the point yourself. I highlighted your point. "somehow morally inhibited". That is really a new development in the history of humankind. You know why the word "genocide" was invented for WWII? Most people think it is because of what the Natzi's attempted but actually it was invented because it was the first time in human history that society was civilized enough to be repelled enough to need a special word for this thing which was, historically, quite common, even standard practice in many places. We became moral enough to find our old practices so abominable we needed a new word to describe our revulsion. The practice was nothing new.

[gzregorz]

I think the amount of physical violence in China is much greater than the USA, even without the rare shooting spree. Here there are stabbing sprees, and according to the Chinese govt there are around 300 riots per day. Per day!

They don't quantify the size of each riot, but I think the threshold is when the local police have to call the paramilitary police, like the ones who gunned down 20 people in Dongzhou, Guangdong on Dec. 6, 2005. If you want to read about that, I can send you in email a document I compiled. If we go into details here, RSF might get blocked. There's also basic info on wiki.

Yes, I'm well aware of what goes on in China.

Now, just imagine if there were more guns than people there. What would the body count be then? That's how I see it.

Like you I'd like to live in a county with no violence but obviously that's not going to happen but there are ways to reduce that violence and I believe Australia has proven that.

[Michael]

Yes. Sure I aknowledge it. Do you aknowledge that economic "violence" is not as violent as actual violence.

No, I don't see this the same way that you do. I do not think that economic violence is preferable to physical violence. It's better to deal with a problem when it's obvious than when it's obscure. To be a slave in physical bondage is obvious to all, including the slave. To be a wage slave, debt slave, indentured servant, sharecropper or serf is not always better. See "Burn!" (1969) starring Marlon Brando about the transition of a Caribbean island in bondage slavery to Portugal that was transitioned via revolution to debt slavery under the UK.

In addition to physical safety, what about quality of life? How has that changed since the Middle Ages? I'd rather have a meaningful life for a shorter period of greater freedom and risking physical safety than to be removed from such danger and challenge at the cost of my life being dull and perfunctory, lived according to endless rules that can eliminate violence only in proportion to their elimination of freedom. See "A Clockwork Orange" (1971) film by Kubrick or novel of the same name by Anthony Burgess.

The connection between these two wars and their different casualty rates must be framed in the context of the purpose of the war and the intentions of those who conducted it. If they had the exact same plans and goals for both, such as goals for casualty rates of civilians, but were somehow morally inhibited from killing as many civilians in Afghanistan, that would support the theory. Does the book offer something about this?

Once again, you made the point yourself. I highlighted your point. "somehow morally inhibited".

Did you notice this was a conditional sentence starting with "If"?
I can't conclude from civilian casualty rates alone in a comparison of two wars what the difference in the numbers means regarding the morality of those conducting the war. Maybe there is a trend more obvious to you from reading your book, but I don't think it's conclusive in this simple comparison of Vietnam to Afghanistan.

I'm interested in your book, but at the moment my attitude is that society is too complex for me to agree with all of your conclusions about the meaning of lower unnatural death rates, war casualty rates, etc. But like I said, I do think there's a strong correlation with increased literacy to a reduction in violence among some people, unfortunately not those with power to avoid war.

That is really a new development in the history of humankind. You know why the word "genocide" was invented for WWII? Most people think it is because of what the Natzi's attempted but actually it was invented because it was the first time in human history that society was civilized enough to be repelled enough to need a special word for this thing which was, historically, quite common, even standard practice in many places. We became moral enough to find our old practices so abominable we needed a new word to describe our revulsion. The practice was nothing new.

Good point. I didn't know about the etymology of that word. Too bad only Germans and Japanese were prosecuted for genocide and other Nuremberg crimes, otherwise the word would have had a greater meaning. As it stands, it's really just part of the politically correct jargon those in power use to condemn their enemies.