Knife attack kills 27 people, wounds 109

[JimC]

I gather that it is not just an islamic thing, but resentment against the resettlement of large numbers of Han Chinese in the region, somewhat like they have done in Tibet...

Except that Yunnan, unlike the Tarim Basin, has been Han since the Han dynasty, before the birth of Christ, let alone Mohammed.

More likely it is because the area has largely missed out on China's economic gains, and it's possible that islamic kids are feeling the pinch a bit more because they 're from larger families, since the muslims, being a "minority", were exempted from the one child rule.

However, I suspect that the terrorists had come from the islamic region to the west, and were after showing they can strike out of their Uighur heartland...

We'll have to wait and see for more information...

West of Yunnan is Burma. If the terrorists were Uighurs, that's considerably further away. They may be showing where they can strike, but I doubt it's going to achieve their goals.

OK, North-west then!

But islamic separatism, based on the Uighur ethnic group seems to be the main internal terrorist threat in China. A determined group would want to spread their activities across the state...

But as I said, we will need to wait and see...

[rainbow]

The only thing gun bans do is disarm the very people who might need them to save their lives.

You don't allow people to walk around with handgrenades, or napalm flame throwers.
...so you're disarming people too.

[Hermit]

That criminals might get guns if law-abiding citizens carry them is not a rational argument for disarming innocent citizens.

Nice tacking manoeuvre there, Seth. So, now it's not the result that matters - it's the principle that counts. Fuck. Ideological fundamentalism really does blind.

[Beatsong]

A few people were shot by police as well. If more people had guns, more of the murderers would have been shot, and a lot fewer of the innocent victims.

Because you'd have some magical way of making more of the bystanders have guns, without letting any of the attackers have them?

Do let us know what that is then...

It appears the attackers didn't need guns and did just fine with knives precisely because nobody in that crowd of people had any weapons, much less a gun.

That depends on what you mean by "just fine". This story has fed into the idiotic "guns are no worse than knives" meme because of the fairly high death toll of 28. But, while reports are not yet clear or consistent, it seems there was at least 10 attackers (I read that 4 were shot, 1 apprehended, and the police were looking for "at least 5 more"). That means, as I said, that their death rate was lower than 3 victims each.

Of course it's a terrible tragedy, but there's no fucking question that they would have killed a lot more people with guns. You only have to look at the numbers of people that DO get killed by nutters with guns - eg Utoya, Columbine or all the other such incidents in America. So presenting this story as some kind of evidence that there's no significant difference between guns and knives is just moronic. The death toll - which is actually extremely low for a terrorist attack carried out by at least 10 people - says exactly the opposite.

Yours is the utopian prohibitionist's fallacy that thinks that defensive firearms are only used against attackers with firearms and that they have no utility in preventing or ending attacks by criminals armed with other types of deadly weapons...like knives.

Except that I never said any such thing, so stop making up bullshit and ascribing it to me.

All I said - that is, the bit that you've completely ignored - was that there was no way for a government policy to make it possible for the bystanders to have guns to defend themselves, AND avoid letting the attackers get them too. Which is the meaningless and impossible scenario that Warren seemed to be advocating. So any speculation about what would have happened under more liberal gun laws has to allow for BOTH sets of people having guns.

I'm not sure there's a lot of point in such speculation. There are too many hypothetical variables involved.

[Beatsong]

That criminals might get guns if law-abiding citizens carry them is not a rational argument for disarming innocent citizens. That's why it's utopian prohibitionist nonsense to even suggest such a thing. People get killed with all sorts of weapons other than guns and every single one of them has a right to be armed in order to protect themselves and others against deadly attacks, whether the attackers are using hand grenades, knives, guns, rocks, clubs or anything else.

No they don't. Under Chinese law - which is what's relevant to this story - they don't have any such right.

[MrJonno]

That criminals might get guns if law-abiding citizens carry them

Luckily law abiding and carrying guns is a contradiction in terms, might as well ask why law abiding citizen's aren't allowed to rape people (lets face it they used to be allowed to)

[FBM]

I blame moo goo gai pan.

[Seth]

The only thing gun bans do is disarm the very people who might need them to save their lives.

You don't allow people to walk around with handgrenades, or napalm flame throwers.
...so you're disarming people too.

Actually, if you want a hand grenade or a flamethrower, all you have to do is file a Form 4 (or a Form 1 if you want to manufacture one yourself) and pay the $200 for the tax stamp.

Didn't know that, did you?

[Seth]

That criminals might get guns if law-abiding citizens carry them is not a rational argument for disarming innocent citizens. That's why it's utopian prohibitionist nonsense to even suggest such a thing. People get killed with all sorts of weapons other than guns and every single one of them has a right to be armed in order to protect themselves and others against deadly attacks, whether the attackers are using hand grenades, knives, guns, rocks, clubs or anything else.

No they don't. Under Chinese law - which is what's relevant to this story - they don't have any such right.

And therein lies the root of the problem...

They have the right, but their masters deny them the exercise of it.

[MrJonno]

Seth's is probably thinking he could have killed far more innocent people with a gun than 10 Chinese with some knives. It's really sloppy psychopathy and makes psychopaths look incompetent

[SnowLeopard]

That criminals might get guns if law-abiding citizens carry them is not a rational argument for disarming innocent citizens. That's why it's utopian prohibitionist nonsense to even suggest such a thing. People get killed with all sorts of weapons other than guns and every single one of them has a right to be armed in order to protect themselves and others against deadly attacks, whether the attackers are using hand grenades, knives, guns, rocks, clubs or anything else.

No they don't. Under Chinese law - which is what's relevant to this story - they don't have any such right.

And therein lies the root of the problem...

They have the right, but their masters deny them the exercise of it.

No. They don't have the right, because it's not a right.

Your masters deny you the right to buy a kinder egg. So...



Just look at that delicious chocolatey freedom.

[Svartalf]

Kinder eggs ought to be forbidden from being manufactured... there's not one Ferrero product worthy of reaching the consumer, it's all crappy pseudo chocolate and far too heavily laden with sugar and palm oil

[Seth]

Seth's is probably thinking he could have killed far more innocent people with a gun than 10 Chinese with some knives. It's really sloppy psychopathy and makes psychopaths look incompetent

You're projecting again. Go take your meds and pull the blanket back over your head you coward.

[Seth]

That criminals might get guns if law-abiding citizens carry them is not a rational argument for disarming innocent citizens. That's why it's utopian prohibitionist nonsense to even suggest such a thing. People get killed with all sorts of weapons other than guns and every single one of them has a right to be armed in order to protect themselves and others against deadly attacks, whether the attackers are using hand grenades, knives, guns, rocks, clubs or anything else.

No they don't. Under Chinese law - which is what's relevant to this story - they don't have any such right.

And therein lies the root of the problem...

They have the right, but their masters deny them the exercise of it.

No. They don't have the right, because it's not a right.

Ya think not? I betcha that if you go and try to harm one of them they will exercise that right to the best of their ability. That's what makes it a right, not some blather from some despotic fuckwits in Beijing.

[JimC]

Seth wrote:

Ya think not? I betcha that if you go and try to harm one of them they will exercise that right to the best of their ability. That's what makes it a right, not some blather from some despotic fuckwits in Beijing.

Defending oneself may certainly be a natural response, but that does not equate to a natural right; responses are behaviours one can observe and analyse in any living thing, rights are abstract concepts that humans may assign to others in some form of social compact. This does not reduce their importance; there should be a minimal set of basic human rights that should be assigned to all in any civilised society. But, we build them, we don't discover them...