Connecticut (et al)

[MrJonno]

Sure, and laying blame is interesting. Taking measures to prevent the tool from being used again is a more useful goal. Sitting back and saying "well, it's happened, so we may as well just let it happen" because if we're such jerks we'll do such things, then it's our own fault anyway, is rather pointless and silly.

I've given methods on how to reduce the chances of it happening and fluffy constitutions and guns don't seem to have worked very well. The battle begins in schools and the press

[Coito ergo sum]

Sure, and laying blame is interesting. Taking measures to prevent the tool from being used again is a more useful goal. Sitting back and saying "well, it's happened, so we may as well just let it happen" because if we're such jerks we'll do such things, then it's our own fault anyway, is rather pointless and silly.

I've given methods on how to reduce the chances of it happening and fluffy constitutions and guns don't seem to have worked very well. The battle begins in schools and the press

However, those methods seem designed to increase the likelihood of it happening. Even if you start with what you would think is a benevolent State, once you provide that State with an immunity from criticism and examination and once you vest in that State the power to squelch views it labels as hateful, then the people who run that State have acquired a method for retaining power. That's what your methods will be used for -- preserving the power of individuals who would otherwise have been replaced by virtue of the speech and press that would have been allowed.

If your goal is to keep the horrible people from being able to use the tool of the government to engage in their nefarious acts, then the last thing you want to do is make that tool more powerful. That's like saying, "guns are too powerful and can kill a lot of people --- so, we're going to remedy that by making them all fully automatic with high capacity magazines, laser sightings, and hollow point, poisoned ammo." By arming the government with the power to censor, as a prior restraint, the content of speech under the rubric of hate speech or evil political ideologies, you are increasing the power of that tool you claim is used by people to do evil acts.

[MrJonno]

You will disciplined in school for being racist. homophobic, you will be sacked if you do it in work.
If you act on on those prejudices you can be jailed.

This can only happen because via government we allow it to happen (and require it in some cases).
You can say a lot of crap in the press but start handing out leaflets saying this is a gay/jew/muslim free zone with a picture of a hanging man on it and you will be jailed.

The limits need to be carefully watched but they do exist, they is how you fight bigotry along with more positive promotion of minority groups.

Curious where in the US constitution is a human being defined, heard christian nuts saying if you dont believe in god you have rejected humanity. Think its absurd ?,that how Jews got defined as non people.

[Coito ergo sum]

You will disciplined in school for being racist. homophobic, you will be sacked if you do it in work.

Not for being racist or homophobic -- but, treating people badly. B

If you act on on those prejudices you can be jailed.

Act in what way? If you act by marching down the street "singin' songs, and carryin' signs" then you won't be jailed. If you act on those prejudices and punch someone in the face, you will.

This can only happen because via government we allow it to happen (and require it in some cases).
You can say a lot of crap in the press but start handing out leaflets saying this is a gay/jew/muslim free zone with a picture of a hanging man on it and you will be jailed.

Not in the US you won't.

The limits need to be carefully watched but they do exist, they is how you fight bigotry along with more positive promotion of minority groups.

Bigotry is not illegal, not in the US.

Curious where in the US constitution is a human being defined, heard christian nuts saying if you dont believe in god you have rejected humanity. Think its absurd ?,that how Jews got defined as non people.

It isn't defined in the US constitution, or the British constitution

According to you, defining any group as non-people is just up to the majority vote or their representatives. If they define Jews, or Gingers, as nonpeople, it is what it is, right? We just know who to blame. Us.

[MrJonno]

It isn't defined in the US constitution, or the British constitution

According to you, defining any group as non-people is just up to the majority vote or their representatives. If they define Jews, or Gingers, as nonpeople, it is what it is, right? We just know who to blame. Us.

No according to me if it gets to that stage your problem isnt the government, I find it amazing that libertarians say government isn't the solution to problems but by that logic its not the cause either . Problems begin at the bottom and rise up until they reach government

[Coito ergo sum]

It isn't defined in the US constitution, or the British constitution

According to you, defining any group as non-people is just up to the majority vote or their representatives. If they define Jews, or Gingers, as nonpeople, it is what it is, right? We just know who to blame. Us.

No according to me if it gets to that stage your problem isnt the government, I find it amazing that libertarians say government isn't the solution to problems but by that logic its not the cause either . Problems begin at the bottom and rise up until they reach government

One, I'm not a Libertarian.

Two, just because government is not the solution does NOT necessarily mean that government can't be the cause of problems. In my view, government can be a solution to some problems, and can cause others.

Three, whether "your problem isn't the government" is not the issue. The problem is that the people in the government use that tool of the government to engage in bad acts. The solution is to weaken the tool, so that the people can't use it as powerfully or forcefully, and/or to distribute power over a broad area so no one person or small group of people can amass those government tools to too much of a degree.

You seem to think that the people change or are different, and that in a good, kind social democracy the people are the good and kind ones, whereas in a nasty fascist place the people have become bad. That's complete nonsense, of course. The people are basically the same. People are led. The Germans became what they became in the 1930s because they were led there, by people making use of the tool of government which they used to control speech/press and everything else. The German people in 1935 and 1941 were not worse than the people of Britain in 2012. They were the same.

[Blind groper]

Winston Churchill described democracy as the worst possible form of government, except for all the rest. I agree with him. We are democracies, and we should be very thankful.

Republics, like the USA, are also democracies. Just one form of democracy. A republic is a form of democracy whose head of state is not a monarch. This is normally used to exclude the UK, Australia, NZ etc as being non republics.

I dispute this. The Queen of England is titular head of state. The key word is "titular". She holds the title but has no power. Thus, I consider her not to be the head of state in reality. A head of state has power, and she does not. By this logic, we are all republics, which are democracies.

[MrJonno]

The German people in 1935 and 1941 were not worse than the people of Britain in 2012. They were the same.

Germany had an extreme nationalist and racist culture long before Hitler came to power. Most other western nations while sharing some of those characteristics were slowly moving away from this. Interesting to see how the European powers treated their empire subjects. The British tended to bribe/divide and conquer their subjects, the French tried to destroy the local culture by making everyone French (with full rights), the Germans were busy slaughtering everyone in sight this in the 19th century nothing to do with Hitler . Obviously the US has a few race issues themselves but again were moving in the right direction.

The German culture produced Nazism, Nazism did not corrupt German culture (just to make it perfectly clear I'm not refering to modern Germans).

If you want to take from the 1930's the lesson than the people have to watch nasty governments as they tend to murder everyone, I prefer the lesson that we need to watch each other as problems begin with yourself and your neighbours

[MrJonno]

I dispute this. The Queen of England is titular head of state. The key word is "titular". She holds the title but has no power. Thus, I consider her not to be the head of state in reality. A head of state has power, and she does not. By this logic, we are all republics, which are democracies.

The Queen is a living flag who you can't burn, (behead occassionaly) by having a head of statement that most people at least tolerate we can then unite behind despising our government without fearing being disloyal to the country

[Coito ergo sum]

If you want to take from the 1930's the lesson than the people have to watch nasty governments as they tend to murder everyone, I prefer the lesson that we need to watch each other as problems begin with yourself and your neighbours

The latter does not preclude, nor should it preclude, the former.

[Jason]

The German people in 1935 and 1941 were not worse than the people of Britain in 2012. They were the same.

Germany had an extreme nationalist and racist culture long before Hitler came to power. Most other western nations while sharing some of those characteristics were slowly moving away from this.

Very very very slowly. I vaguely recall some of my history classes covering how the 'world' was more than a little approving of the early actions Germany took against the Jewish population.

[Gallstones]

[Blind groper]

Gallstones.
What is the point of this video?
We have discussed pretty much everything that guy said already. I did not pick up a single point that really means anything in relation to the gun control discussion that we have not already covered.

[MrJonno]

There is not one shred of evidence that non-murder violent crime is any different in any country anywhere in the world as no one counts in the same way.

There is overhwelming evidence ie bodies that the US murder rate is far far than any industrial country

[Blind groper]

I am quite happy to accept that violent crimes rates are different in different countries, and the suggestion that England/Wales have a violent crime rate per capita three times that of the USA is probably not accurate, but also probably not too far off the beam either.

Where the video goes, not just wrong, but into glaring misrepresentation and total dishonesty, is the suggestion that the difference in murder rate is due to different amounts of large metropolitan area. The narrator says that the USA has six times the large metropolitan areas. What he fails to note is that it also has approximately six times the population of England and Wales. So on a per capita basis, the percentage in large metropolitan areas is close enough to the same.

Yet England/Wales has, on the same per capita basis, a quarter of the murder rate. The only real difference is guns, and especially hand guns, plus a pathological gun culture.