Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests • Hacker News Board

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#111

Post by ekianjo » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:46 PM UTC

rplnt wrote: post #77

powvans wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your estimate of "a couple of rednecks" is off by orders of magnitude. There are millions of AR-15's in private hands in the United States. Those are just a fraction of the 300 million privately owned guns in the US. This country is armed to the teeth.

Still wouldn't do anything to a malicious government controlling the army. And for overthrowing government you don't need to be armed - see dozens of examples all over the world - the army is made of citizens as well after all. So, no, it doesn't make any sense in the current age to say you own guns to protect yourself from the government.

> Still wouldn't do anything to a malicious government controlling the army.

Except that an army cannot fight on 10 fronts at the same time. When you have a whole country turning against you, you can't be there at every single place every second with a regular army. On the contrary a regular army would be beaten up in no time.

You also have to take in account that it's much more likely there would be rogue generals turnings against the power in place so general + armed people is a good catalyst.

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#112

Post by pyronik19 » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:46 PM UTC

rplnt wrote: post #77

powvans wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your estimate of "a couple of rednecks" is off by orders of magnitude. There are millions of AR-15's in private hands in the United States. Those are just a fraction of the 300 million privately owned guns in the US. This country is armed to the teeth.

Still wouldn't do anything to a malicious government controlling the army. And for overthrowing government you don't need to be armed - see dozens of examples all over the world - the army is made of citizens as well after all. So, no, it doesn't make any sense in the current age to say you own guns to protect yourself from the government.

You're also assuming that the army wouldn't fracture under an armed populace uprising.

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#113

Post by lostlogin » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

pnako wrote: post #45

swarnie_ wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Non-American here, i never really understood your second amendment or how you cling to it in the modern age. What are a couple of rednecks with assault rifles (which arguably they shouldn't be able to purchase anyway) going to do against semi-autonomy kill droids being flown from a bunker in the desert?

Same things rednecks from Vietnam, Afghanistan or Yemen would be doing. The second amendment is not exclusive to America. The flag of Mozambique even has an AK-47 on it, for pretty much the same reason. "Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" said Mao.

Those places are not examples I’d like to follow. I’m struggling to think of a first world country with a law that’s similar, is there one?

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#114

Post by gleenn » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

zacharytelschow wrote: post #104

kristiandupont wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If HK'ers had a similar right to carry guns, do you honestly believe that they would be any better off right now?

Do you think it's coincidental tyrants are more powerful when their populace is unarmed?

Citation needed

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#115

Post by tyingq » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

vnchr wrote: post #89

dx87 wrote: post #6

Not to defend what the police have been doing overall during this protest, but in this specific incident you can see the protestors beating a police officer on the ground, and the protestor who got shot was swinging a metal pipe at the police officer that shot him.

The police are allowed to shoot someone in the leg. Lethal force is not the only option with a firearm.

Curious if there's any place where this is common. I assumed everyone trains center mass. Also, there's a femoral artery in your leg... you'll be just as dead if that gets hit.

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#116

Post by hanniabu » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

swebs wrote: post #59

swarnie_ wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No offence intended, just a stereotypical image i go to when thinking about the US's gun culture and all the problems it brings.

I think the problems are unrelated to gun ownership. If you were to plot the percent of gun ownership vs the crime rate among various states or even countries, you wouldn't find much of a correlation.

> I think the problems are unrelated to gun ownership

Exactly, if the same logic for guns were used on other things then you'd have people up in arms saying nobody should be able to drive cars because of how many people kill others with them.

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#117

Post by Thriptic » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

swarnie_ wrote: post #36

ericmay wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same thing that people in Afghanistan did? It's also not cool to characterize people who have assault rifles or support the 2nd amendment as rednecks. I'm certainly not one. It's actually kind of offensive to even use that term anyway if you ask me.

No offence intended, just a stereotypical image i go to when thinking about the US's gun culture and all the problems it brings.

It's definitely the case that an armed populace acts as a check against tyranny. You can argue that this is not enough of a benefit to warrant private gun ownership given the societal costs and low probability of a tyrannical government in the US, but this benefit definitely exists.

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#118

Post by throwaway_law » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:47 PM UTC

barsonme wrote: post #76

chrift wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused - are you saying that Afghanistan triumphed?

Did we win Afghanistan? Did we win Vietnam?

>Did we win Afghanistan?

The Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan and the illegitimate communist government was ousted right?

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#119

Post by dorfsmay » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:48 PM UTC

kristiandupont wrote: post #25

nvahalik wrote: post #18

> Imagine if the US suddenly had a dictator This is why we have the second amendment. And the constitution as the thing to which office-holders swear allegiance to rather than to "the party" or "the president".

If HK'ers had a similar right to carry guns, do you honestly believe that they would be any better off right now?

No. Chinese army would have walked in and do away with armed protesters.

Re: Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

#120

Post by hokumguru » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:48 PM UTC

empath75 wrote: post #74

mc32 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s uncertain what the eventual outcome would be, but one thing is for sure, it would increase the threshold before the tanks rolled in.

If they were armed this would have been over a long time ago. China would have gone in with tanks and the army, or even air strikes. Once you take up arms against the government that’s not a protest, that’s a civil war.

The world would react quite brutally I imagine to another massacre from China - especially one on this potential scale.