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

#121

Post by davinic » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:48 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.

There are several studies on this that conclude otherwise. For example[1]:

"Firearm prevalence is significantly related to total violent crime (B = .600, p [1]: http://www.cjcj.org/uploads/cjcj/documents/jpj_firearm_owner...

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

#122

Post by cjslep » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 PM UTC

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #41

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?

> 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? The point is to increase the cost of violence against the population. The Swiss bunker / guerrilla strategy. Also, there is no reason to suspect asymmetric vectors like autonomous drone armies would accrue solely to state…

> The Swiss bunker / guerrilla strategy.

As an American living in Switzerland, this is not a fair comparison. The Swiss strategy involves mandatory service (with the backing of the government), short and long term preparations against an outside invading force (with the backing of the government), highly regulated gun ownership (with the backing of the government). It's always wielded with the backing of the government against an outside force.

In stark contrast, the U.S. mindset around gun ownership has always been about wielding the weapons against the government itself. Instead, what this effectively means is that this will be an easily hijacked ideal if, in our politically charged era, portions of the government are viewed as "illegitimate" and one part of the government backs a coup with gun-toting civilians against "the government" (the part not liked).

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

#123

Post by sokoloff » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 PM UTC

ixtli wrote: post #99

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?

From experience, people who are able to live their lives casually collecting weapons here are also able to live pretty disconnected from the reality of these types of situations. We're long, long past a world where a rag tag band of ideologically enfranchised citizens could oppose the police. The fantasy of standing up to The Gubment comes from two things: 1) a rambo fantasy. a serious overestimate of your own skills…

3) a supposition that "if it ever came to that" a meaningful subset of the military and the police would join (and lead) the revolution.

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

#124

Post by kube-system » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 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.

Any use of a firearm is potentially lethal and should be treated as such. The precision necessary for the scenario you are proposing is not physiologically possible during an active conflict.

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

#125

Post by ptero » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 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.

Different police units are trained for different rules. Somewhere it is a verbal warning, warning shot, shot in the leg, shot to kill. Sometimes it is just a verbal warning and a shot to kill. Not defending the police in this specific case (I do not know the details), but blaming an officer for following the sequence he has been trained for is misplacing the blame. My 2c.

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

#126

Post by ajross » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 PM UTC

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 there were guns in those protest groups, the military would have long since rolled in and simply seized the territory in a routine urban invasion.

No, you can't fight the People's Liberation Army with your tricked out semi automatic .223, no matter how many drum magazines and bump stocks you attach to it.

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

#127

Post by moate » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 PM UTC

ericmay wrote: post #28

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?

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.

Hello. I grew up surrounded by guns and on food stamps. My parents like cheap beer, low brow humor, my father mostly worked manual labor jobs, and they generally vote "anti-government". Some people call it white trash, others call it rednecks. The term is offensive if you want to be offended. That's fine if you're offended, you have the right to be. As someone who grew up around that life, I call them "hillbillies, Hill-People, The banjo-music-folk, or fucking hicks" depending on my mood.

Now, that said: your read is one read on OP's comments, that people who own semi-auto, clip fed tactical rifles and support the second amendment are all rednecks. Another, very reasonable read is that rednecks exist, and some of them support 2A and own murder guns. It's the whole Square/Rectangle thing.

As for Afghanistan: Comparing the war/politics there with a potential modern US civil war is comparing apples to rocket ships: There might be some similarities if you try (people fighting each other for political reasons) but the actual events, techniques, and implications of the wars would be universes different.

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

#128

Post by woutr_be » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 PM UTC

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.

I've been fairly critical of protestors before, but in this instance, you can see the police going in for a fight, already heavily outnumbered. I'm not sure what they expected to happen, but the officer drew his gun almost instantly and shot a high school kid at point blank range.

There's been other instances today where police was just looking to fight protestors, and as soon as they realized protestors weren't having any of it, they drew their guns and shot in the air. There's a difference between an officers' life being in danger, and the officer stupidly putting his life in danger.

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

#129

Post by geggam » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:49 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #105

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?

kill family members of the people in power?

Imagine a person in power with nothing left to lose. Doesnt seem like a person who would make rational choices.

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

#130

Post by ajross » Tue, Oct 01, 2019, 2:50 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #38

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?

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.

Why wouldn't it decrease the threshold? Armed insurrection is a trivial justification for military force. Non-violent protest is not, which is why they've held back.