Quote :

""[these] are countries without dangerous minorities (who are becoming the majority) ruining everything with thug life and gang violence. take the ethnicity percentages of these countries and compare to the USA. then look at crime statistics for those countries and the USA, and see what percent of ethnicity commits the violent crimes."

There's something to this. The whole "dangerous minorities" bit is stupid, of course, but places like Norway and Iceland always get trotted out as places where everything is great and they do stuff differently from America.

These are homogeneous countries. They're all ethnically and culturally the same, and they're financially very similar. There isn't much of an "out-group" to be angry at. America is not homogeneous. We've got just about every kind of minority you can have, and vast income disparity between rich and poor. Everybody's got someone they can blame for their ills and get angry at.

It doesn't matter which thing everybody is, but as long as everybody is the same thing, crime goes way down. I go to any given village in Benin, there's next to no crime. Everybody's the same ethnic group and they're all poor as shit, so stealing doesn't exactly get you much. You go to Norway, everyone is Nordic and upper-middle-class. If you stole stuff to get rich everybody would know who the thief was. He'd be the only guy in town with remarkably more stuff than his neighbors.

But then you go to the US, and you put a bunch of rich white people next to middle class Koreans next to poor black people, and everybody starts shooting everybody. Or you go to China. Yeah, they're all Chinese, but some of them live in the dark ages and some of them are richer than God. There's not a lot of crime but there are a lot of executed Chinamen.

I, for one, am in favor of having heterogeneous societies, because the benefits (in terms of creativity, productivity, and overall development) seem to outweigh the drawbacks (when different groups are near each other they shoot at each other sometimes). Norwegian cops might not have to carry guns when all they're policing are a bunch of Norwegians. But Norway didn't invent the airplane, land on the moon, create the internet, win two world wars, or invent rock & roll, either.

8/22/2014 6:40:01 AM

someone with GOP in their name favors income equality and i assume progressive taxes and strong social services

[Edited on August 22, 2014 at 8:52 AM. Reason : .]

8/22/2014 8:51:36 AM

Huh? I don't favor "income equality." I just said it probably reduces crime. So would the eradication of the human race. Doesn't mean I favor it.

8/22/2014 9:57:41 AM

my bad, i read your last paragraph as "i favor homogeneous societies" for some reason

8/22/2014 10:02:49 AM

So you saw "I support homogeneous societies," and your first thought was, "He favors income equality!" instead of "He's a goddamn racist"??

Huh.

8/22/2014 10:05:42 AM

a homogenous society would require income equality, i was surprised (incorrectly) that a GOP supporter liked that. i don't remember including anything about race in that post, i think your internet connection may be wonky.

8/22/2014 10:08:48 AM

Quote :

"They're all ethnically and culturally the same, and they're financially very similar. There isn't much of an "out-group" to be angry at. America is not homogeneous. We've got just about every kind of minority you can have, and vast income disparity between rich and poor. Everybody's got someone they can blame for their ills and get angry at. "

There's always an out group, I think the difference is that America, in its naïveté, did a piss poor job of integrating blacks into society. At the end of the 19th century when they did begin to integrate, people freaked out and then really set things back further. It wasn't until the 70s and 80s that we decided to take legal equality seriously. This legacy, more than lack of homogeneity, is what causes the disparities. I believe had the idea of unity been embraced from the beginning we'd be in a different place now. Modern day culture is very accepting of diverse races, as someone who until recently worked on a college campus, younger generations are better at race than we are, and America is probably ahead of our peers culturally in this regard.

But being more homogeneous in the sense of equal access to jobs, wealth, and justice certainly would go a long way...

And in your Benin example, I wonder if the chance of street justice and being chopped to death doesn't factor into crime...

8/22/2014 10:56:49 AM

^^"Homogenous society" strongly implies race, more so than income equality.

^I disagree. Yes, we did a bad job integrating blacks and everybody else, but we did, eventually. The Nordic countries are only just beginning to have other people to integrate into their societies. We'll see how well their brilliant systems hold up when a million or two poor Turks start wanting free shit.

And in Benin, the street justice isn't as much a fear as the ostracism. In west Africa, being shunned from society is probably worse than death for most people.

8/22/2014 11:40:41 AM

Quote :

" It doesn't matter which thing everybody is, but as long as everybody is the same thing, crime goes way down. I go to any given village in Benin, there's next to no crime. Everybody's the same ethnic group and they're all poor as shit, so stealing doesn't exactly get you much. You go to Norway, everyone is Nordic and upper-middle-class. If you stole stuff to get rich everybody would know..."

This isn't true. Go to south America, and petty crime happens all the time. The poor steal from the poor, regardless of their perceived “sameness." I know you want this to be a valid argument, but your examples can easily be countered with other examples.

People don't generally steal from the rich, because the laws tend to protect those with power from those without. The inverse is usually not true.

Quote :

"Yes, we did a bad job integrating blacks and everybody else, but we did, eventually."

Whaaaaaaaaaattttt? Based on what metric? Income? Not likely. Crime and punishment? Please. Yeah, they're not considered property anymore, but they're still systemically disadvantaged. You can't analyze the numbers and argue otherwise. The only thing one can do to refute that is to bring up isolated anecdotes.


Also, side note: where you been, dog? The current crop of conservative intellectuals on this board leaves a bit to be desired.

8/22/2014 12:58:25 PM

Lets not pretend everyone is the same in norway. Much of it is homo but oslo is a bit of a melting pot just like many american cities. The city is only 70% ethnic norweigian and they have tons of pakistaniss somali and poles who are all treated equally in society. Using the wxtreme racism in this country as an excuse for the poor social structure is pretty much a cop out.

8/22/2014 1:29:04 PM

Quote :

"Also, side note: where you been, dog? The current crop of conservative intellectuals on this board leaves a bit to be desired."

Yeah you're a real intellectual heavyweight "dog."

Lol (alias).

8/22/2014 2:31:44 PM

Lol (professor)

[Edited on August 22, 2014 at 2:39 PM. Reason : shit, wrong user name]

8/22/2014 2:39:04 PM

No you really can use either at this point; no need to keep thinking that's a clever comment you have there.

Just don't use them in the same thread (that's rather silly).

8/22/2014 3:03:09 PM

Let's make this interesting, Willy:


Let's get a jury of three users (preferably with 1 or 2 moderators)

We'll both present our cases as to whether or not I'm also dtownral. If the majority agrees with you, I'll terminate my account ("both" of them). If the majority agrees with me, you'll terminate your account.


Whaddaya say, homie? High stakes up in this bitch.

[Edited on August 22, 2014 at 5:16 PM. Reason : ]

8/22/2014 5:13:09 PM

That's one of the stupidest things I've ever seen here.

Congratulations.

[Edited on August 22, 2014 at 5:25 PM. Reason : -]

8/22/2014 5:21:12 PM

I just said I would delete "both" of them.

Whatever, you clearly don't want to do it.

8/22/2014 5:25:09 PM

In case you haven't noticed the mods don't do anything except lock the occasional thread; which is exactly what they're supposed to do.

dtownral won't abide by the ruling of any court; your alias is psychotic.

[Edited on August 22, 2014 at 5:28 PM. Reason : -]

8/22/2014 5:26:24 PM

So is that a no?

What's the matter, sweetheart? I thought you had more heart than this.

8/22/2014 5:33:55 PM

Why should I make juvenile bargains with you? Your "jury" has already seen the violent protest thread and drawn their own conclusions.

The damage is done and I'm satisfied that less people here take you and dtownral seriously. What is the difference between that and you "leaving?"

You (or dtownral) wouldn't leave anyway, so again, what do I have to gain? You're grandstanding for literally no one.

8/22/2014 5:46:55 PM

Is this true tww?

Do none of you take me seriously anymore?

8/22/2014 5:53:40 PM

Is this true tww?

Do none of you take me seriously anymore?

8/22/2014 6:47:11 PM

Did we ever take him seriously?

8/22/2014 9:01:08 PM

How could we?

He occupies a plane of existence we couldn't possibly hope to comprehend; he benevolently thought that two usernames could better communicate his complex thoughts.

It's our fault for falling short, dog.

8/22/2014 9:08:50 PM

You guys bicker too damn much.

8/23/2014 4:43:39 PM

A plane of existence? Lol, okay thegoldenrul.

[Edited on August 24, 2014 at 2:06 PM. Reason : .]

8/24/2014 2:06:01 PM

Quote :

" Go to south America, and petty crime happens all the time. The poor steal from the poor, regardless of their perceived “sameness.""

South America also has a bewildering confusion of racial and economic divides. Most of the region has a prominent middle class and a small but powerful upper class. Benin has people that fit into either of those categories but not enough to really talk about having a "class" as such.

And my point wasn't that poor doesn't rob poor. Of course it does. Rich people can afford guns and security guards. But my experience has been that a certain degree of uniformity lowers crime across the board.

I will admit that I was wrong to say "stealing doesn't exactly get you much," because that's not really relevant. In West Africa, at least, the ubiquitous poverty has led to a very strong anti-theft culture. Whoever you're robbing probably has next to nothing, so you might well be killing them. Which is why when Cotonou had a couple of carjackings the last week, the carjackers got caught in the act and lynched by the mob.

Quote :

"Whaaaaaaaaaattttt? Based on what metric?"

Well, I suppose that's a good question. I guess I was looking at it from my point of view. I could live in Benin for a hundred years and never really be "integrated" because I'm a foot taller than everybody else and a different color. Every day I leave my house, somebody yells "White person!" at me in some language or another.

Now, in the US, a black person can go just about anywhere without arousing much comment. The only exceptions that leap to mind are certain country clubs, and apparently the White House. If you got a new job and your boss turned out to be black, you wouldn't think much of it.

So that's more what I mean by integration -- not equality, but a more or less seamless blending into society. Outside of a few holdouts, we're past the point of thinking blacks "belong" in certain parts of town, certain businesses, certain parts of the bus.

Quote :

"Also, side note: where you been, dog?"

I lived in a village in Africa from June 2012 up until last week. Internet wasn't really a thing. Now I live in a city in Africa and my office has wifi.

Quote :

" Much of it is homo but oslo is a bit of a melting pot just like many american cities. The city is only 70% ethnic norweigian and they have tons of pakistaniss somali and poles who are all treated equally in society."

If you say so. Everything I've read about immigration into the Nordic countries has emphasized the strain it has been putting on their social programs and criminal justice systems, though they're polite about it because they're Norwegian. And let us not forget that the one Norwegian murderer anybody can name shot all those kids because he didn't like immigrants.

8/25/2014 7:48:25 AM

Quote :

"^I disagree. Yes, we did a bad job integrating blacks and everybody else, but we did, eventually. The Nordic countries are only just beginning to have other people to integrate into their societies. We'll see how well their brilliant systems hold up when a million or two poor Turks start wanting free shit. And in Benin, the street justice isn't as much a fear as the ostracism. In west Africa, being shunned from society is probably worse than death for most people. "

What did you disagree with? And Nordics integrating an immigrant population is an entirely different ball game than America integrating a former slave population.

The poverty of freed slaves and the ensuing development of the "black community" was entirely, 100% imposed by the US government and society. They never had any real opportunity to accumulate wealth, or the cultural trappings that go along with this. And even the ones that could gain wealth never gained the respect this wealth typically buys.

Immigrant populations have different dynamics, that don't necessarily apply. India, for example, is the most AIDS ridden country in the world, with massive poverty and huge swaths of poorly educated religious extremists, but this doesn't characterize Indian immigrants in America.

8/25/2014 1:11:07 PM

Quote :

"What did you disagree with?"

That there's always an outgroup -- at least, one prominent enough to count for much.

Freed slaves and immigrants aren't identical, no. But both of them present hurdles to smooth and quick integration. Immigrants to Norway are liable to be poorer, and they're usually easy to spot -- a Pakistani in Oslo stands out just as easily as a black guy in Connecticut, and being able to recognize the difference is just as important as the difference existing.

The immigrants present some hurdles that weren't there for freed slaves, like having a different language and religion in a place that's pretty overwhelmingly Lutheran (at least culturally) and Norwegian-speaking.

But honestly, this end of the debate is immaterial. My claims are simple and don't really care whether a country had slaves or Pakistanis or whatever. They are:

1) Homogeneous societies tend to have fewer strains on them, one consequence of which is that they have less crime
2) As the Nordic countries become less homogeneous, I expect them to become less utopian as they are forced to pay more attention to law and punishment, and less attention to social programs.

Note that #2 does not mean that I think Norway is going to have its own Ferguson somewhere down the line. Just that the unblemished reputation that certain countries have of being pure happy places that the US should (or even could) imitate will be less realistic.

8/26/2014 4:46:42 AM

Oh man. I miss the days of page long quote rebuttals.

8/26/2014 7:26:31 AM

I think we've been showing remarkable restraint.

8/26/2014 9:20:21 AM

http://wdtn.com/2014/08/26/attys-for-both-sides-of-walmart-shooting-to-hold-news-conferences/

I can't remember which thread this was in, but there is a video of the guy shot with the air rifle. It's not being released to the public. The family is saying it shows the guy not being a threat, with other shoppers being at ease around him.

8/26/2014 11:52:50 PM

Quote :

"That there's always an outgroup -- at least, one prominent enough to count for much. "

http://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/30/world/japan-s-invisible-minority-better-off-than-in-past-but-stilloutcasts.html

Just learned about Japan. I'd wager most countries have similar stories where there's an historically oppressed group, not necessarily for racial reasons.

South Koreans treat North Koreans this way too -- they are scorned rather than embraced, even though they're all the same race. They have affirmative action for North Koreans.

9/8/2014 11:26:05 AM

The boy in cleveland would still be alive if police didn't have guns.

Without guns, police actually have to solve problems. Gone are the days where they can just run into situations and shoot their way out.

Less police would be attacked as well because criminals would know htey are less of a threat to their own life. Crime might go up, property loss might go up, but homicide would go way down.

11/23/2014 10:21:41 PM

Crime likely wouldn't go up-- there's no correlation with crime and policing, and even with increasing poverty of the recession, crime didn't go up on average.

There's doesn't seem to be much research on why crime is dropping, the Pb hypothesis is interesting, but there's no follow-up on how we can understand chemicals in our environment to keep crime on the decrease.

Property crimes tend to be more responsive to economic conditions, but murders don't necessarily follow this trend.

There's nothing rational about any dimension of how we view crime nowadays. We're a country of fearful, paranoid, reactive people.

11/23/2014 10:50:11 PM

It would kind of defeat the purpose of calling the cops for help if only the criminals had guns.

11/28/2014 11:55:47 PM

Called cops would bring guns. They would only use them for specific calls though.

11/29/2014 12:21:44 AM

that's the stupidest shit i've ever heard.

11/29/2014 7:51:48 AM

oh excuse me sir can you please stop threatening that innocent civilian with your gun?, oh you might shoot them?, pardon me while i go back to the station to check out a firearm so this can be settled equally, brb

12/1/2014 12:12:21 AM

^beat me to it

[Edited on December 1, 2014 at 1:52 PM. Reason : .]

12/1/2014 1:52:19 PM

LoL there'd be so many dead cops.

12/1/2014 2:09:48 PM

"Lol"

12/1/2014 2:15:24 PM

Quote :

"Called cops would bring guns. They would only use them for specific calls though."

I hope that's a troll post.

Cop gets a call for a domestic dispute, goes out with a taser. White trash husband ends up going nuts, turns into a hostage situation. But it was a domestic dispute. No problems there, right?

I wonder how many calls cops get for a certain situation that turns 180 degrees on them once they arrive.

12/1/2014 4:45:26 PM

You guys are imagining a world where cops don't have guns but people still react to cops as if they have guns and are being aggressive with them to abuse power. Thats just not the case. Stop acting like there aren't places where this actually works.

^Why would you want a cop with a gun during a hostage situation. Makes no sense.

12/2/2014 1:15:24 AM

This proposal could possibly have a negative effect on employment levels at many police departments. Some police departments are responsible for policing areas with higher crime rates than other areas. How would the OP incentivize people to seek employment as police in high crime areas without the ability to carry a gun?

12/2/2014 6:38:56 AM

Police standby while dispatchers watch camera footage and dispatch police when necessary.

[Edited on December 3, 2014 at 12:59 PM. Reason : this works well in singapore]

12/3/2014 12:59:34 PM

so does caning.

12/3/2014 1:49:25 PM

Warning: death.


This is why cops not carrying guns is stupid.

[Edited on January 7, 2015 at 4:46 PM. Reason : a]

1/7/2015 4:45:37 PM

warning: nobody ITT gives a shit about cops

#preferjihadis

1/7/2015 5:45:30 PM

Its sad that this op movement going down the drain was the first thing i thought about when i heard the news

1/7/2015 6:59:53 PM

^^^[/thread]

1/7/2015 8:38:16 PM