Live data from Hacker News

Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

bloomberg.com

361–370 of 412 posts

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol the fact that random people have guns has nothing to do with US dominance, and it’s not random people with guns that will protect the US in an exceedingly unlikely armed conflict on US soil, it’s the army - which has no shortage of funding. Unless you’re saying that random armed people are going to defend against a coup from our own army - doubtful. Hypothetical “defense” at what cost? Mass shootings every week i…

I agree that random people with guns has nothing to do with US dominance globally, but you're wrong that the US army would win versus the armed civilians in the country. There are only 1 million US army soldiers and over 81 million armed civilians in the US capable of fighting a sustained guerilla war. You only need to look at history to know that's a bad scenario for any armed forces trying to take and hold control…

It really depends on how vicious whatever commanding force controls the army would want to be.

If they're willing to rule over a country of bones, the asymmetric warfare resources the United States has available are sufficient to put down any rebellion. How much fight do you think 81 million armed civilians would keep in them if cities just started vaporizing?

A hypothetical American government with open rebellion wouldn't need to take and hold territory... It could decide specific chunks of the country are worth saving and nuke vast quantities of the rest.

I'd say that scenario is impossible, but this is America we're talking about... If there's one thing the history of American warfare teaches, It's that you can't apply the rest of the history of war to the way America fights wars. This is the country that gave us, in modern times, ending a rebellion by putting civilian cities to the flame until the civilians became too tired and hungry to support the war.

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#362
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is that gun violence has several different categories, and gun control only helps some of them (such as accidental, or emotional, spur of the moment shootings), but doesn't prevent any premeditated ones. It will not stop people like the one at 4th july, nor those school shootings. Unless the gun control laws completely outlaw civilians owning guns - which i dont think will fly. The root cause of gun violence…

Strongly disagree. Access to powerful firearms vastly increases how damaging shootings are. Compare the single death in a decade for Japan to the hundreds, if not thousands of deaths per year from gun violence in the US[0] [1]. Keeping guns out of circulation reduces gun deaths. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-r...

Japan's death rate seems higher than the US by quite a bit (14 vs 10 per 1000). I believe this is because they have far greater violent death than the US, but don't call most killings 'murder'. E.g. a person that owes money is found hanged in a Japanese park, it's suicide even when it's obvious they cannot have hanged themselves.

Culture plays a large role in statistics. It's hard to interpret from outside. But surely the choice of weapon is less meaningful than the outcomes.

The term 'gun violence' is designed to cherry-pick numbers out of a whole landscape of social problems and argue toward a point.

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#363
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is that gun violence has several different categories, and gun control only helps some of them (such as accidental, or emotional, spur of the moment shootings), but doesn't prevent any premeditated ones. It will not stop people like the one at 4th july, nor those school shootings. Unless the gun control laws completely outlaw civilians owning guns - which i dont think will fly. The root cause of gun violence…

I am sorry, but it will stop if guns are banned for ordinary people. How many school shootings happen in China or India? I am taking china and india because they are populous and don't have gun distributed freely like in US. The fact is quantity matters in such cases. Having 1 incidence vs 10 or 20 is a huge difference.

There are occasions it happened in India. In fact, it happened in my city, I think I read of one happening 8-10 years ago. Could be more recent, I don't really remember, but it was a big deal back then that's for sure. Some bully kid shot some kid with his father's pistol. But it isn't as widespread a problem as in America. I personally had more things to worry about, like casual racism and bullying.

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the school shootings, at least, there is always some unhinged person behind it. Deeper mental health checks before purchasing a gun (like as is required in Germany) could be very useful. Also, rules in place that your gun is stored securely in a safe, and spot checks to verify such (again, in Germany) can help with guns making their way into other people’s hands either by being given or by being taken. A friend of…

That is a slippery slope to every state having restrictive NY-like gun laws. I don't care about legal or cultural precedent in germany or the EU. This isn't germany. The US plays a far more important role in global affairs, and as such must take more dramatic measures to prevent it from falling into the hands of some regime, those measures include the right to bear arms as well as freedom of speech and freedom of rel…

[flagged]

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a slippery slope to every state having restrictive NY-like gun laws. I don't care about legal or cultural precedent in germany or the EU. This isn't germany. The US plays a far more important role in global affairs, and as such must take more dramatic measures to prevent it from falling into the hands of some regime, those measures include the right to bear arms as well as freedom of speech and freedom of rel…

Serious question (I also highly value personal freedom): Isn’t the freedom to walk down the street or go to school without fear of a deranged shooter or accidental firearm discharge an important freedom too?

sounds like socialism to me

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that random people with guns has nothing to do with US dominance globally, but you're wrong that the US army would win versus the armed civilians in the country. There are only 1 million US army soldiers and over 81 million armed civilians in the US capable of fighting a sustained guerilla war. You only need to look at history to know that's a bad scenario for any armed forces trying to take and hold control…

It really depends on how vicious whatever commanding force controls the army would want to be. If they're willing to rule over a country of bones, the asymmetric warfare resources the United States has available are sufficient to put down any rebellion. How much fight do you think 81 million armed civilians would keep in them if cities just started vaporizing? A hypothetical American government with open rebellion wo…

I think you will see a right wing government using weapons of mass destruction on cities like NYC in our lifetime

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a slippery slope to every state having restrictive NY-like gun laws. I don't care about legal or cultural precedent in germany or the EU. This isn't germany. The US plays a far more important role in global affairs, and as such must take more dramatic measures to prevent it from falling into the hands of some regime, those measures include the right to bear arms as well as freedom of speech and freedom of rel…

Lmao "the right to bear arms" domestically is going to what, stop a land invasion by Russia or something to the tune of that? Somehow, I don't think so. Instead it's just allowing you and yours to kill each other. As a Kiwi living in the UK: gun control works, it really does. Also, falling into a regime? Your current political atmosphere is that a regime of extremely conservative people who are pretty much the major…

exactly this, the right wing are truly dangerous, we will see how it plays out

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#368
post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The equivalent would be the PM of Germany denying the Holocaust and paying respects annually at the graves of Nazi elites.

Yep. > graves of Nazi elites The Allies were smart with that one, most of the big ones were cremated and their ashes were spread, that way there are no shrines.

As another user said:

> Yasukuni Shrine isn't only for WW2 criminals, but also for who died on previous wars. As a Japanese, I don't think it's bad to go to the shrine unless denying historical fact or praising criminals. It's uncomfortable that foreign countries blames about that. Maybe WW2 criminals shouldn't be buried at the shrine. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasukuni_Shrine

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#369
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My take is that gun violence has several different categories, and gun control only helps some of them (such as accidental, or emotional, spur of the moment shootings), but doesn't prevent any premeditated ones. It will not stop people like the one at 4th july, nor those school shootings. Unless the gun control laws completely outlaw civilians owning guns - which i dont think will fly. The root cause of gun violence…

I am sorry, but it will stop if guns are banned for ordinary people. How many school shootings happen in China or India? I am taking china and india because they are populous and don't have gun distributed freely like in US. The fact is quantity matters in such cases. Having 1 incidence vs 10 or 20 is a huge difference.

Considering the cultures of these countries are vastly different, not even just on the topic of gun control, I'm not sure you can make a good-faith comparison.

Re: Former Japan PM Shinzo Abe Unconscious After Shooting; Man in Custody

#370
post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone did the math, scaling up chemical attacks is really hard because the stuff dissipates so quickly, even if you have something like sarin.

Any link? Would be curious to read. That is, of course, good to hear.

There's this military historian perspective [1] on why chemical weapons aren't used by regular militaries becase they aren't actually that effective (compared to spending the same effort on making normal explosives). It is slightly different topic to terrorist attacks but I think it touched on that as well.

Be warned, the blog is a complete rabbit hole of "oh god why am I reading analysis of logistics of Lord of the Ring armies at 3 AM".

[1]: https://acoup.blog/2020/03/20/collections-why-dont-we-use-ch...

Post reply on HN