Americans:
"The 2nd Amendment is to protect us from a tyrannical government". π
Also Americans:
"The United States has the largest known prison population in the world. It has 5% of the worldβs population while having 20% of the worldβs incarcerated persons. China, with more than four times more inhabitants, has fewer persons in prison." π₯΄
#justsaying
Yup. Prison labor subsidizes a lot of big industries that people don't bat an eyelash at.
The problem grows quietly.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_labor_in_the_United_States
I'm not one to defend government, nor our prison system. But damn, there are a lot of robberies and home break-ins around here. Have been my whole life. I was sharing stories about my dad's shop as a kid and why he carried every day, and now why I do. My uncle made the news for a gang hit in what I considered a "safe" neighborhood a year or so ago I just saw the local news video again. He had a chunk missing in is porch pillar from a stray shot. His neighbor had a bunch of holes in his car. We could argue the wrong people are put in prison, but if you ask me, someone breaks into my home I'm emptying every magazine I can reach into them. So they should end up in prison, or find themselves dead. People talk about "white flight" but you ask me i don't care what color you are, if you grew up in where you could leave keys in your ignition and your front door unlocked, then you're home is catching stray bullets, you get the fuck out.
Yeah, my point is that my door is unlocked and we have essentially no crime. Violent crime makes the national news, here, and usually doesn't involve firearms.
The black neighborhoods here are safer than many white neighborhoods over there because the overall culture is more peaceful. Black men are much much safer in Germany than in the US and we have literal Nazis here. Furthermore, the black neighborhoods over there also used to be more peaceful.
A lot of the American need for personal protection is due to the higher overall level of violence, which the gigantic prison landscape doesn't really change. It's a chicken-egg problem.
When you get out of the cities and the burbs, it's peaceful despite a higher percentage of household firearms and concealed carry. I'm no whateverist, but in my lifetime it seems to creep out from the cities and seemingly poor areas.
There are decaying rural areas with drug problems. They are also dangerous.
Do you think that if you had a public healthcare that worked good enough, there would be less crime?
I think that having for example a finger cut off and the healthcare system doesn't fix it if you don't have money, then you have a barbaric canibalistic society, caring about money more than normal and thus being more violent. Do you see such a connection?
I don't know, but the hit TV series "Breaking Bad" is about someone becoming a drug lord to finance his chemotherapie treatments because he's too poor to pay the doctor, and that premise didn't strike Americans as particularly odd. π
Yeah. They think this barbarosity is normal. It is not...
I don't exactly think you are wrong in saying that despite your judgement. Many of us grew up with a belief that the world has a natural state of depravity, capacity for harm, and chaos. We must do all we can to protect ourselves and communities at all cost. That's the way the world has always been. There was no such thing as healthcare, let alone one that EVERYONE deserves access to off the backs of hard working people. That's it, we're not a homogeneous culture, we don't all have the same goals and some want to protect those goals or dreams, and others want to watch them burn.
Again not necessarily my views, I think this position accurately reflects myself and my peers.
"it's a republic... if you can keep it"
What do you mean there was not such a thing as healthcare? And why do you say that not everyone deserves access and why do you assume that it will happen on the backs of hard working people? π€·
Hard working people are the people who currently often aren't getting health care, in the US. Unemployed people get Medicaid and older people all get Medicare.
You split my statement up, it was meant as a whole.
> why do you assume that it will happen on the backs of hard working people?
Because we already do. The federal government pays for up to $220/month for individual health insurance. If you make between like 22k and 50k you get a subsidy included in your premium payment. Which is called a median "silver" plan. In most places it's better coverage and support than provided by large corporations as "benefits", completely free, no hoops, sign up online. State regulated health insurance the only legal option I have as a business owner. If I or my business makes over a certain amount I pay extra OVER the cost of the plan. Meaning I have to pay more for the same insurance coverage because I made more than the threshold for median income. But if my total anual income (including the business) makes less than about 48k/yr I can get money back on my insurance premium. If I make $22,500/year or less, _and_ choose a silver insurance package, my insurance is completely paid for. If I choose better coverage I pay the difference.
This isn't even medicare or medicaid, which is arguably worse in terms of providers, paperwork, and support.
I have a family member, who refuses to work. He over 30 now, and never works. He lives off disability, believes the world owes him housing, food, water, and his regular ER visit and refill on medial marijuana script. Whos funding his ability to live like this? Whos paying for his ability to remain unemployed, get high, and play video games all day?
Does he deserve to get turned down for a legitimate issue, absolutely not, and you don't get to paint me as evil for suggesting that not _everyone_ that appears in the hospital deserves to get FREE attention.
What I think Im trying to say is, if you take $500/month out of my paycheck in insurance premium, or in my tax bill it's the same thing, except I personally believe, it's likely the state will make a mess of it, because it already has.
While I don't have the stats, I believe Thomas Sowell would describe what we have now as price fixing. Look how well that usually goes.
To be clear this is assuming you are advocating for state run/socialize healthcare. If you aren't and can bring my prices down, I'm all ears, bug I'm biased to believe you'd be speaking utopian.
To be even more clear, the federal government already regulates the price of healthcare with the "open marketplace". They fix the price and coverage.
The system you have is unfixable and worse than you described it. It is made for profit and exploitation. You cannot fix that, so there is no solution with such a base, you have to change that. So i am not talking about a system with such a base (see my others comments on the thread too). Forget about USA and its monstrosity even though it is all you know. Take another country as an example. There are other ways out there and you have one of the worst or the worst.
Oh, but thanks for the extensive answer.
Yeah, the US has some good hospitals, but the insurance system is terrible. Both public and private insurance are totally bonkers over there.
Even if you pay cash, the prices are often weirdly inflated.
I think a fundamental problem comes from the assumptiom that "the government should take care of it"
You have The State, which organizes a city according to their own framework, optimizing for things they care about while the things they aren't measuring are invisible to them. The State creates grid cities to make it easy for "outsiders" to navigate and intervene, which by design, creates opportunities for bad actors to navigate and extract resources they need.
"Wow, this place is overrun by CRimiNalz!! π± What do we need to do? We need to put more restrictions on the city to stop them! But where does it happen? We need to figure that out as well! We need monitors where we see the BAD behavior and stop it before it gets to our neighborhoods! Wow, can't you see?! We have so much work to do, and we need more funding!"
You have The State operating its own framework, imposing rules upon a city that they aren't a part of, and when they observe behavior that goes against their ideals, they impose their framework harder. They're able to do so through leveraging the authority and power they have.
What happens then, to those at these margins? Society itself then assumes that the mentally ill, sick, and violent are the responsibility of The State, failing to recognize them as neighbors. The State also assumes this responsibility, to the point where individuals taking matters into their own hands are punished:
- you have people trying to feed the poor getting fined
- self defense being criminalized
- doctors prohibited from giving advice that contradicts authorative medical knowledge
This doesn't negate the purpose of a healthcare system, or any other centralizing system, but rather points to the fallacy that order is best managed from some top-down outside perspective that fails to recognize the specific lived experiences of the individuals navigating said systems day to day.
Even the doorbells watch you walk by on the sidewalk, in America. That's actually illegal here, for data privacy reasons.
You have no experience of a public healthcare system. Do you? π
It is funny because you are trying to imagine something that is the established rule. The state takes care of some basic stuff for the citizens since it collects taxes. That is what this is all about. Having the ability as a citizen to go to a hospital or being able to receive education for fucking free is basic stuff. It is the normal...
Its a hyperbolic argument, which derives from an archtype we see as a result of systemic failures. Again, i'm not negating the systems of healthcare or centralization itself. I'm not reimagining anything, I'm stating observations verbosely "to the room" to lay out my stance. My argument is not "we need better healthcare systems", if "better healthcare systems" means more organizers at the top placing more rules and more beauracratic systems to enforce said rules.
We need more individuals at the low level navigating the intricacies of the situation. We also need the organizers at the top to be receptive of these local needs. If it was the norm we wouldn't be seeing such disparities of violence and homelessness that already exist.
In practice, the American health system is larger, more beauracratic and more expensive than any of ours.
I think it's also fair to say we're a significantly less established country, span over a very large landmass. It's quite expensive to do a lot over here in comparison, regardless of how much red tape is involved, which is a lot. I still don't think these are fair arguments though. I can't imagine how cheap it would be to live where yall are at where a majority of your infrastructure has already been built for centuries. Like where is the expense?
Germany was a wasteland after two world wars, and Eastern Europe was Soviet.
Our infrastructure is newer, not older.
I don't know if this is the best video i could pick, but it is from a guy that used to be a marine in USA army. And he is saying something
Youtube blocks me, so i'll take your word for it.
Sorry for the youtube link then. What about rumble?
Just keep in mind that the state cannot cover everything or give often the best personalised solutions, thus the private sector and initiative can fill some or many gaps. I guess the rules you are talking about, are the rules that the state in USA tries to apply in the healthcare system in USA for reasons i have no idea about. I have heard something like that before. I don't know what it is all about, but it is specifically related to USA.
In general you go to a public healthcare facility,hospital or else, and you receive a satisfying treatment according to established medical practises. You want something more or something different and you have the money to support it? You go to the private sector. That's it...
Chickens been raised from incubators don't make chicks. So... it was the chicken that made the egg. Not the egg made the chicken π
But you are on fire indeed. I enjoy your latest posts very much π
So much of this comes down to how much violence are ordinary people willing to commit today. I feel like my great grand fathers would either be convinced or willing to engage in war over things that may seem slight today. If anyone were to use them in the way they are intended most of the population would recoil in horror.
Most of the population here is afaid of seeing a gun, let alone using one for reasons beyond immediate defense.
Is the arguement we should have overthrown the government more often or is it that we should put down our arms and let the state go even further?
Does armed revolution make our gun ownership more resonable?
Hmmm.
I don't know if there is any correlation between armed revolution and privately-owned guns in peacetime. This is an axiom that gets thrown out because Franklin said so, but most violent revolution seems to be happening in countries with low gun ownership rates.
Guns, after all, are very expensive, and munition even more so. And places awash with guns tend to have highly-militarized police forces, who can just shoot back.
Nepal has only 1.7 firearms per 100 residents, for instance.
The simplest way to overthrow a government is for a whole lot of angry young men to grab clubs, rush out into the street, and overrun police lines. Look at how shook the Capital Storm guys made the US federal government, and they were mostly unarmed and took selfies of themselves. Or how Trudeau was scared of the truckers.
We just ignore reeducation camps now ?
Apples and Oranges. China kills its dissidents rather than imprisoning them. To the extent they DO imprison people, China lies in its official records. They may not even have the population we THINK they do. Not to excuse the USAβs flaws, but this is a bit like comparing a burnt hamburger to a literal shit sandwich. I donβt want to eat either, but I know which one Iβd choose if I had no other options.
Also, with what happened with Iryna and Charlieβ¦ I think we are going to start seeing more of those guns soon. Even if we donβt, the US government hasnβt gone as far as jailing people for memes on the scale the British has for a reason: guns. Just because we donβt use them enough doesnβt mean they donβt have an impact.
Europeans β¦ π
Because China kills them after a 2 day trial.
USA keeps them alive for 20 years for appeal after appeal after appeal.
You are going to be a full fledged commie one day.
Congrats
πππ
China is a prison
This is why I eventually abandoned American-style libertarianism. It sounds so great in theory, but in practice everything is very different.
At some point, I just gave up and realized that the theory must be wrong because it can't predict actual outcomes.
Civilized, cultured people need less government proportionately.
Uncivilized, barbaric people, need more government.
So anarchy or libertarianism only works when the people and society as a whole have become sufficiently developed, civilized, cultured. That's the conclusion I've come to
True. America could drastically cut those numbers if the state similarly threatened starved the children of criminals and dissenters through a centralized financial system tied to an arbitrary social credit system.
Are you positing that it doesn't? There's a reason why so many American political dissenters use crypto, after all. And why they've now trying to grab the on/off ramps.
From my understanding. America doesnt tend to apply the sins of the father to the children intentionally, or systematically, at a national level. The children of criminals are still allowed to attend higher education instead of being cut out of almost everything, including public transport. They dont get cut out of the financial systems either. Its not been so completely centralized yet, as evidenced by off ramps even existing.
I can agree with the idea there are many different groups attempting to create such a system in their own self-interest.
china would never waste money on prisons, thats why they have deth penalty for everything. π
China leads the world in executions. Thousands of them per year, but the population is over 1.4 billion. Without exact numbers, we can't calculate their pro-capita execution rate, but it's definitely the highest for a large country that isn't engaged in a large-scale war.
USA and China have roughly equal numbers of prisoners, but the China has 4x the number of people.
The probability of being arrested, in the USA, is 4x higher. Even if you add in 5k executions (a wild overestimate), it remains 4x.
2) However, the United States incarceration rate per capita is still outrageous, for such an advanced, wealthy country.
anytime someone groups all of america into one thing to make a point, i look up their country and compare it's size to a state. a *single state.
for example, germany is the size of wyoming. to me this means, you should keep your nice things by staying small and possible for people to agree on how to make things nice.
so, i bet i can find a state where the stats are different..
im not going to tho, my only point is.. america is big and not really the federal gov that has as much effect on crime rates and such as each state and the people in the state do..
at least, that's what it feels like.
Okay. Compare America to the EU, then. EU has 450 million residents and the USA has 347 mil.
Germany has 82 milllion residents and is highly industrialized and densely populated. Wyoming has half a million and is nearly empty. You would need something more like California or Texas.
EU has 111/100k in prison. USA has 580/100k.
Germany 70/100k
California 319/100k
Texas 450/100k
japan has half the incarceration rate as germany, silly germans, prob cause they ..
see, this is what stats sound like π
but yes, there is def a high incarceration rate in the US and it does suck. but it's not cause of guns, it's for many reasons beyond our control and taking away guns will only make things less safe and worse.
there is also lots to dig in to these stats, do they include jails? or just prisons? people in jail are short term or awaiting trial etc.. and slowdowns in courts cause these numbers to go up. drug related crimes are way high, almost half of it. big pharma dont want you using drugs they dont sell, etc.
big problems and lots of it.. much of it not related to guns. guns are a tool, and as you said, there are plenty of other ways to be violent. many reasons to need a gun, such as, protecting your self from wild animals, or hunting. as america is full of wilderness and farms. it would be impossible and makes no sense to take away guns, and then only criminals would have them.
I suspect it's mostly because American prison sentences tend to be draconian, so each person stays in longer. And because you incarcerate people for things they'd get a fine, therapy, or probation for, elsewhere.
Japan is full of Japanese people. They have a low incarceration rate, everywhere they emigrate to.
That one is really easy to explain.
The Second Amendment is doing exactly what it was meant to do, its acting as a barrier against full government control. Since they can't just take away our guns, the government has to find workarounds, mass incarceration, police militarization, surveillance, etc. In a way, it proves the Amendment is still doing its job, even if itβs not always in the way we expect.
Honest question how does Germany treat someone with schizophrenia or a similar issue. I donβt have the stats at the ready but my feeling would be that in the US we shutdown and replaced the mental institutions with the hope that people could be freely in the population with meds, but people with serious mental issues often donβt take their meds. And there isnβt a place for them we just let them ride in the population until they do something criminal and then go to jail. So I havenβt done a comparison but could it be that the 5% of the population is in Prison in part because in other countries some of that population is in mental institutions and they arenβt being counted as being in βPrisonβ but that is where they are, medicated, and not producing crimes? Otherwise I believe the US system has a lot of drug related crime. The crime of taking the drug, selling the drug, and the violence that occurs as gangs fight for positions in an illicit market. So Iβd be curious how Germany approaches drugs (hard and soft). Those are the two areas that I think the biggest problem are for the US prison system.
