Zompist Bboard Again

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:23 pm

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 6:56 pm The US is a violent country by European standards and a peaceful one by New World standards. Why apply the standards of the side of the Atlantic we aren't on?

I'm always amused by that sort of argument. Does gunpowder react differently in America?

Apparently Finland has a comparable household gun ownership rate.

Open carry is probably more of a factor (to say nothing of concealed carry) as is the relative lack of registration.
It's not like there are no problems with guns in Europe either. Parts of my family are what you Americans would call white trash, I suppose, and there were plenty of guns lying around: hunting guns and service weapons from the war. Accidents definitely happened, also one or two deaths I'm convinced were not accidental.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:23 pm While we're comparing culture, I don't agree gangs are inevitable. I don't think we have something that compares to a North American gang. (Also biker gangs: I remember reading a Québecois thriller and thinking, man, what's so scary about bikers?) I mean, there's organized crime, yeah, but it doesn't quite reach that level. Cultural differences are difficult to figure out, but it's hard to exclude different attitudes about guns as a factor.

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 6:31 pm

bradrn wrote: ↑Thu Oct 28, 2021 12:14 am I’ve come to the conclusion that, short of remaking the whole of society, very little can be done about gangs. Until we do remake society, the best that can be done is to prevent them from getting ahold of tools which they can use to do harm.

What? Isn't the state supposed to be the one legitimate gang? Monopoly on legitimate force and all that? If they can't even do that, what's the point of having a state?

It's said that a young woman could travel alone with a purse filled with gold across the entire length of the Mongol Empire and not have problems. If we can't do that, can we get Genghis Khan on the Ouija board and run him for president?

I should perhaps have emphasised the fact that guns are designed ‘in a way which other weapons aren’t’. There is a reason that mass murderers use guns and not swords: you can hurt more people, more harmfully, more quickly with a gun than with a sword.

If the Columbine shooters' bombs had worked, would school bombings have the cultural place school shootings do today? (Bombings were a live option in American culture then, but were primarily associated with political violence.)

If you, a decent and law-abiding person who actually lives in the neighborhood, get a noise ordinance passed, and then it's noon on a Sunday and your kid's having a birthday party, what's to stop the pettiest person on the block from calling the cops on you?

Absolutely nothing! It should be the responsibility of the cops to see this for what it is and take appropriate and proportional action. But I fail to see how this is relevant.

What's the point of putting laws on the books if they aren't going to be enforced?

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 6:56 pm

Travis B. wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 6:45 pm Likewise, with gun ownership, the US today shows what happens when you have widespread gun ownership, and shows why gun control is needed by providing an example of what happens without it.

The US is a violent country by European standards and a peaceful one by New World standards. Why apply the standards of the side of the Atlantic we aren't on?

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:23 pm While we're comparing culture, I don't agree gangs are inevitable. I don't think we have something that compares to a North American gang. (Also biker gangs: I remember reading a Québecois thriller and thinking, man, what's so scary about bikers?) I mean, there's organized crime, yeah, but it doesn't quite reach that level. Cultural differences are difficult to figure out, but it's hard to exclude different attitudes about guns as a factor.

bradrn wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:57 pm

It's said that a young woman could travel alone with a purse filled with gold across the entire length of the Mongol Empire and not have problems. If we can't do that, can we get Genghis Khan on the Ouija board and run him for president?

I dunno, I’d say a young woman should be able to do that across the entire length of Australia, too. (At least, the dangers I immediately think of relate to the climate rather than the people.) I’d expect the same in Europe, too. It’s the US which is an outlier here.

bradrn wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:57 pm Could you elaborate here? I assumed gangs were pretty much the same the world over.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:23 pm

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 6:56 pm The US is a violent country by European standards and a peaceful one by New World standards. Why apply the standards of the side of the Atlantic we aren't on?

I'm always amused by that sort of argument. Does gunpowder react differently in America?

bradrn wrote: ↑Sat Oct 30, 2021 7:57 pm I dunno, I’d say a young woman should be able to do that across the entire length of Australia, too. (At least, the dangers I immediately think of relate to the climate rather than the people.) I’d expect the same in Europe, too. It’s the US which is an outlier here.

Sadly, it is quite possible. This discussion applies to all sorts of murder-weapons, not just guns. But also: doesn’t the US place restrictions on making and using bombs? If so, I’d directly link the absence of bombs in modern-day violence to enforcement of ’bomb control’.

Well, this is why the law-enforcement system needs to work well in order to have a functioning society. If it doesn’t work well, the priority should be to get it working again.

I’d say the relevant distinction here is between ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ countries. By developed-country standards, the US is right at the bottom.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 5:18 amI don't think that claim is even true of the US. I'm pretty sure people can drive cross-country from East Coast to West Coast.

Overall gangs in the US feel way scarier. I don't know, the Aryan Brotherhood feels like an actual threat. We have white supremacists here and there's a threat of a sort; but they're either nerds or clowns, and generally both.

Raphael wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 6:27 am I can't believe I'm saying this, but Nort might have a point there. I recently saw some people post on Twitter that a lot of things about the USA - not just the high violent crime levels, also the big role religion plays in society - make more sense if you see them mainly as a Western Hemisphere country, rather than a Western country.

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 9:12 pm

Well, this is why the law-enforcement system needs to work well in order to have a functioning society. If it doesn’t work well, the priority should be to get it working again.

Do we want it to work well? Anyone else in this thread smoke weed?

Winning the War on Drugs is well within the reach of a competent state, and would be popular in the US if it were considered a live option. But, like, we don't want that. (Concerned Parents whipped up on Bill O'Reilly do, and they vote, but maybe they shouldn't.)

I’d say the relevant distinction here is between ‘developed’ and ‘developing’ countries. By developed-country standards, the US is right at the bottom.

Did I never complain about my parents' tap water here? It wasn't potable. Sometimes it was brown. I wouldn't call the US developed.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 5:18 amI don't think that claim is even true of the US. I'm pretty sure people can drive cross-country from East Coast to West Coast.

As long as you stay out of the cities and travel by car, the worst you'll run into is towns whose only revenue stream is loading the roads with cameras, making yellow lights last a millisecond, and lowering the speed limits on the thoroughfares to 20. But the feds should ban that. They use strings-attached highway funding for grotesque overreaches of power already, so whatever.

zompist wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 10:38 pm

Raphael wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 6:27 am I can't believe I'm saying this, but Nort might have a point there. I recently saw some people post on Twitter that a lot of things about the USA - not just the high violent crime levels, also the big role religion plays in society - make more sense if you see them mainly as a Western Hemisphere country, rather than a Western country.

Um dude. I don't want to be rude or anything, but did you ever look at 20th century German history?

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Tue Oct 26, 2021 10:38 pm The police don't enforce noise violations either. What are you supposed to do about loud music at night? Talk civilly to the new neighbors? That you don't like it is part of the point - they're trying to mark their territory.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 5:18 amWell, first off, Wikipedia states, from a FBI source, that there are 33,000 gangs active in the US. That sounds enormous, even accounting for population.
Second, I don't think we have anything comparable to the Crips, which if Wikipedia is to be trusted, have a color code, a dress code and a gang dance.

Linguoboy wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 10:58 am

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 5:18 amWell, first off, Wikipedia states, from a FBI source, that there are 33,000 gangs active in the US. That sounds enormous, even accounting for population.
Second, I don't think we have anything comparable to the Crips, which if Wikipedia is to be trusted, have a color code, a dress code and a gang dance.

I hear they also have a code of silence and violating it means death. Oh, wait, sorry, I was thinking of the Sicilian Mafia. Does anyone remember where they originated?

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 9:12 pm Do we want it to work well? Anyone else in this thread smoke weed?

Winning the War on Drugs is well within the reach of a competent state, and would be popular in the US if it were considered a live option. But, like, we don't want that. (Concerned Parents whipped up on Bill O'Reilly do, and they vote, but maybe they shouldn't.)

Overall gangs in the US feel way scarier. I don't know, the Aryan Brotherhood feels like an actual threat. We have white supremacists here and there's a threat of a sort; but they're either nerds or clowns, and generally both.

What? The Aryan Brotherhood is a curiosity of prison life. They don't matter. The Crips and Bloods might, but I think the worst violence is disorganized.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 11:38 amGood point. I was probably a bit too enthusiastic in my claims. It does seem like gangs and organized crime are altogether less active in Europe. At least the corners of Europe I'm familiar with.

(I'd love to find good figure to support that claim, but I can't locate anything. An article suggests between 300-400 gangs in France. This is so different from the American figure that I think they're not measuring the same thing. The Police Judiciaire apparently claims that there is no mafia in France. They were probably misquoted, because we definitely have mafias. We're not Sicily but a lot of old-school politicians were mobbed up.)

Raphael wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 2:16 pmPedantic linguistic side note: while the words "gang" and "gangster" are clearly etymologically related, to me, they evoke quite different mental images: the word "gang" evokes a mental image of teenagers, while the word "gangster" evokes a mental image of an adult.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 4:36 pmI would have expected a very different meaning

Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Sun Oct 31, 2021 11:08 pm This is two different questions. Do we want our law enforcement to work well? Yes, of course we do, otherwise the institution of laws is pointless. Do we want every law presently on the books to be on the books? Certainly not, whether we've engaged in recreational drug use or not. Conflating the two is unhelpful, and rather silly.

James C. Scott wrote:To see how tacit coordination and lawbreaking can mimic the effects of collective action without its inconveniences and
dangers, we might consider the enforcement of speed limits. Let's imagine that the speed limit for cars is 55 miles per hour. Chances are that the traffic police will not be much inclined to prosecute drivers going 56, 57, 58 ... even 60 mph, even though it is technically a violation. This "ceded space of disobedience" is, as it were, seized and becomes occupied territory, and soon much of the traffic is moving along at roughly 60 mph. What about 61, 62, 63 mph? Drivers going just a mile or two above the de facto limit are, they reason, fairly safe.
Soon the speeds from, say, 60 to 65mph bid fair to become conquered territory as well. All of the drivers, then, going about 65 mph come absolutely to depend for their relative immunity from prosecution on being surrounded by a veritable capsule of cars traveling at roughly the same speed. There is
something like a contagion effect that arises from observation and tacit coordination taking place here, although there is no "Central Committee of Drivers" meeting and plotting massive acts of civil disobedience. At some point, of course, the traffic police do intervene to issue fines and make arrests, and the pattern of their intervention sets terms of calculation that drivers must now consider when deciding how fast to drive. The pressure at the upper end of the tolerated speed, however, is always being tested by drivers in a hurry, and if, for whatever reason, enforcement lapses, the tolerated speed will expand to fill it. As with any analogy, this one must not be pushed too far. Exceeding the speed limit is largely a matter of convenience, not a matter of rights and grievances, and the dangers to speeders from the police are comparatively trivial. (If, on the contrary, we had a 55-mph speed limit and, say, only three traffic police for the whole nation, who summarily executed five or six speeders and strung them up along the interstate highways, the dynamic I have described would screech to a halt!)

Having had decades to "win" it, the United States has had an entirely pathetic result (and we perhaps ought to remember that Prohibition did not go very well, either; it just resulted in enormous and ultimately pointless social harm). I don't see why even you would make such an excessively fanciful assertion.

Is this the norm, or a weird outlier? From what the news and Google suggest, there are areas with water problems, but there are areas without (beyond environmental contamination by widespread contaminants which are nigh unescapable anywhere). I can provide a counter-anecdote of having never seen anything of the kind you describe in more than three decades of having lived in the United States, and it's equally valid.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 11:38 am We have a serious problem here with crack addicts. One part of the problem is that crack addicts are dangerous people and that bothering weed users feels like you're doing something and is way cheaper.

Nortaneous wrote: ↑Mon Nov 01, 2021 6:00 pm The existence of crack seems like a civilizational failure that could've been avoided if we'd just normalized coca tea. But who knows, maybe people would do that with caffeine if it had a wider efficacy window.