It's okay, I guess: the firearm registration thing applies to essentially every kind of private ownership that the commons might have some interest in. Pinpointing it out of all possibilities betrays a very American perspective where the ability to bear arms is considered a fundamental right.
Edit: as another commenter astutely pointed out above, this rule, when sufficiently contorted, can essentially be applied to invalidate every law. It amounts to a radical mistrust of government. I wonder what the author's perspective is on property rights and their enforcement.
This applies to almost every law, and illegitimate governments don't suddenly give up when there are no legitimate means (laws) that lead to their ends, they just use violence. This is deeply ignorant.
> illegitimate governments don't suddenly give up when there are no legitimate means (laws) that lead to their ends, they just use violence
Only if they can get away with it. That is not always the case. And that's a key point of the test: it could be rephrased as "will this make it easier for an illegitimate government to achieve its ends using violence?"
The ultimate law in this case is discrimination. If it can get away with targeting anyone - an individual or a demographic - for imprisonment or murder, the game is already lost.
The point is to attempt to connect all sorts of laws the author doesn't like to Nazism and the holocaust. It's a common 2A-absolutist trope but it's so ahistorical, dumb and offensive nobody else takes it seriously. That's really all there is to it.
There are a lot of people who live in places that are essentially lawless, but that experience isn't freedom like extreme libertarians might believe. It's total fear that at any moment 20 people in shitty Jeeps can drive up and threaten to cut off your hands unless you kill your parents and join their gang. This is what we refer to as the state of nature. At some point, people get pretty tired of it, so they form their own gangs to fight back. Time goes on, decisions have to be made about how to run things, you make a couple of rules, and before you know it you've got yourself a government.
But what I find more dangerous is this ersatz common sense tone in the essay. It lends the argument a certain weight, like "boy, balancing of rights sure is tricky. Can we __really__ trust governments? I mean, Nazis." Please no one fall for this. The rule of law is a bedrock principle of human civilization, not a bullet train to totalitarian town.
> The rule of law is a bedrock principle of human civilization
The article is not advocating abandoning the rule of law. It is advocating judging laws based on a particular criterion. The fact that many existing laws do not meet that criterion does not mean no laws do, nor does it mean the only alternative is to abandon laws altogether.
For example, consider the law against murder. Does it meet the criterion? Of course. Having a law against murder does not make it easier for the government to persecute the innocent.
The essay is full of slippery slopes. It advocates against "government monopoly of medical care", arguing that if the government knows everyone who's getting care it can discover you. This applies to essentially every government service: social security, taxation, driver's licenses, regulations on utilities, etc. etc. etc. It's not a dissimilar stretch to say that because murder investigations have led police to develop sophisticated forensics departments that the author would be against murder laws as well. After all, if the government can discover you were at a crime scene, couldn't it also know who was in your attic?
It's just a blatantly terrible test, wrapped up in faux wisdom and scare tactics. Balancing of rights is far more complicated than this and deserves better treatment. In fact, _most_ issues are complicated and don't readily yield to this kind of simple test. Frustrating though it is, it's a reality we have to deal with if we want to be at all fair and truly address complex issues.
Disagreeing would mean making actual counter arguments. Some posters have been doing that, but not the one I responded "you are seriously missing the point" to.
> Government monopoly on medical care. This is a bit surprising -- isn't it? If it is illegal for you to pay someone for anonymous health care then how can your "Jews in the attic" receive health care?
This is absurd. The government also has a monopoly on law enforcement, so if "Jews in the Attic" are victim of a crime how can they seek justice? From this premise, to suggest the government should not enforce laws is a non sequitor.
> The government also has a monopoly on law enforcement, so if "Jews in the Attic" are victim of a crime how can they seek justice?
They can't. So by the proposed test, a government monopoly on law enforcement is a bad thing and should be opposed.
If you ask "how can it be possible not to have a government monopoly on law enforcement?", note that historically that has been more often the norm than the system we have now. See, for example, David Friedman's The Machinery Of Freedom for a number of historical case studies.
> From this premise, to suggest the government should not enforce laws is a non sequitor.
No, it's a reason, as above, to not have the government have a monopoly on law enforcement.
>See, for example, David Friedman's The Machinery Of Freedom for a number of historical case studies.
Is it possible to give a reasonable summary of the thesis of this book?
>No, it's a reason, as above, to not have the government have a monopoly on law enforcement.
What is the definition of 'government' here? Also, whatever that definition is, it doesn't need a monopoly on law enforcement, but only some of the authority over it.
> Is it possible to give a reasonable summary of the thesis of this book?
I'm not sure, but I'll try: the main thesis is that many, if not most, if not all, of the functions we currently associate with conventional governments do not actually need to be provided by conventional governments; they can also be provided by private entities in a free market. Most of the book is trying to imagine and develop in detail how key functions, such as police, fire, and courts, might be provided in a system where conventional governments either did not exist or did not provide those functions.
> What is the definition of 'government' here? Also, whatever that definition is, it doesn't need a monopoly on law enforcement, but only some of the authority over it.
Different sources will use different definitions, which might lead to different answers to this. :-)
A good starting point might be Friedman's definition: a government is an entity which everyone agrees is allowed to do things that, if any other entity did them, would be considered crimes. A common example is taxation: the government is allowed to take money from you whether you agree to give it or not, which would be theft if any other entity did it.
A government under this definition might not need to have a monopoly on law enforcement, but it would need to have a monopoly on any actions required for law enforcement that would be crimes if another entity did them. (One common point of debate among different strains of libertarians is whether the set of such actions required for law enforcement is non-empty.)
This is an asinine concept much in the same way that people being opposed to electric vehicles is an asinine concept.
If the government didn't have a monopoly on law enforcement, what you'd end up with are rival gangs each enforcing the law in their own biased way, propogating the amount of injustice we're already dealing with, and decentralizing it, making it harder to fight.
When you have a centralized source of law enforcement, you have a "single point of failure" that you can apply pressure to if it becomes corrupt, much in the same way that electric vehicles centralize the source of emissions making it easier to sequester.
Decentralization is not a panacea.
EDIT: That's not even considering the fact that without the government providing law enforcement, among other things, that many would be guaranteed to go without those things. Right now that may be the case for many with the current system, but at least that is fixable by, again, applying pressure to the single source to adequately provide those things. In a system where the free market is supposed to take care of this, many poor folks would go without. That used to be the case with fire fighters, but we soon learned that it was a bad idea for nobody to show up to fight the fires of the poor folk, because those fires would spread. Same goes for crime, disease, etc.
> This is an asinine concept much in the same way that people being opposed to electric vehicles is an asinine concept.
If this is your definition of "asinine concept", I think you need to re-examine your criteria. Not everyone who disagrees with your pet beliefs is asinine.
> If the government didn't have a monopoly on law enforcement, what you'd end up with are rival gangs each enforcing the law in their own biased way, propogating the amount of injustice we're already dealing with, and decentralizing it, making it harder to fight.
This claim is historically false. I referred elsewhere in this thread to David Friedman's Machinery Of Freedom, which gives a number of historical counterexamples.
> When you have a centralized source of law enforcement, you have a "single point of failure" that you can apply pressure to if it becomes corrupt
But you also have a single point of failure that special interests can apply pressure to to make it corrupt. Which, historically, is far more likely to happen than what you describe, because the special interests are concentrated while the people as a whole are dispersed and can't easily coordinate.
> Decentralization is not a panacea.
Nobody has claimed that it is. The fact that decentralization is not a perfect solution to all of society's problems is irrelevant to the point that decentralization, all things considered, is better (because it has less damaging failure modes).
Also, has anybody actually proposed making it "illegal for you to pay someone for anonymous health care"? The government funding some type of minimum health care doesn't mean they are actually providing the health care.
The only part I have a strong logical objection to is "Furthermore I told them that if it fails this test no further discussion is really needed, the law must be opposed in the most vigorous manner possible."
Asking a single question is a poor way to get absolute perspective on topics. Especially those as complicated as presented. Instead it leads you to be overly dismissive and combative of alternative viewpoints.
“Will this law make it difficult or impossible to protect innocent life from a government intent on their imprisonment or death?”
This makes no sense to me. A tyrannical government can change the law. If there’s a law that will make it easier for them to commit atrocities, they can make it happen. Enacting that law now, or refusing to do so, won’t make a bit of difference. Laws should be evaluated on their merits as things stand now, not based on their effects on a hypothetical where current laws don’t even matter.
Those in power often do not reach the critical mass needed to completely change or flout the laws at their whim. But they are able to selectively enforce existing laws or otherwise use them to target people they don't like. This has been the case throughout history, even under monarchies and during the rise of fascism. Existing laws matter.
Ok, but if the government is shipping entire populations to genocide camps, surely we’ve passed the point where they’d be constrained by old laws about IDs.
The article is not talking only about tyrannical governments, or laws passed by such governments. The test the article is proposing is meant to apply to any law passed by any government. The example of Jews in the Attic is just an illustration; it's used because one of the article's points is that failing to apply the test early on, when your government is not tyrannical but is just asking for a little bit more power to "fix" some problem, is how you ultimately get to a government that is tyrannical enough to either just ignore laws or pass them by fiat to suit itself.
Then perhaps the article should choose a more illustrative example.
My point is that I disagree with the basic premise. Laws which help tyrannies oppress and murder people are not necessarily the same laws that turn good governments into tyrannies. I see no reason the two should be connected.
> Laws which help tyrannies oppress and murder people are not necessarily the same laws that turn good governments into tyrannies.
Can you give any counterexamples? Also, bear in mind that the criterion in the article is not "does the law help tyrannies oppress and murder people?" but "does the law make it difficult or impossible to protect the innocent against the government?"
The test as quoted makes no sense. It’s always going to be difficult or impossible to protect the innocent against a government run amok. There is no scenario where a bunch of maniacs have taken over and you’re trying so save some innocent people and it’s easy to do.
Thus I have interpreted it as “does the law make it more difficult to protect the innocent against the government if the government has gone crazy?” That seems like the more charitable interpretation, as it actually makes a little bit of sense until you bite into it.
That's an awfully crude test, that derives its power from its appeal to emotion.
Which is not to say it's prima facie wrong, but to point out that its correctness should be separated from its emotional impact, which is very tough for most humans to do.
This is a powerful argument for limited government and decentralization, requiring a simple premise that I think most people can agree with: That the protection and concealing of Jews and other groups under Nazi Germany was a just and desirable act.
Especially with the rhetoric today about creeping fascism, we should recognize that all authorities have the potential to become corrupt and oppressive. We should ensure proper checks against that and consider the potential consequences before implementing centralized services. Efficiency and cost effectiveness should not be the only consideration.
For instance, you might think that there are no potential downsides to a centralized welfare system. However what happens if those benefits are provided only to people of specific ideologies or races? What if it becomes contingent on giving up your biometric data or subject to drug testing as we have already seen in many areas of the US? Maybe we should consider the potential consequences of centralizing essential support structures and social safety nets.
Absolutely agreed, and I think decentralization is a part of that. Instead of a single point of failure, spreading power between multiple groups reduces the potential damage and the incentive to corrupt a system.
Consider a treaty organization organized against a hypothetical enemy. If the adversary succeeds in corrupting and neutralizing one of the member states, that is significantly less damaging than if it were a centralized command that was corrupted.
It increases the cost dramatically to neutralize the treaty organization, and the threat to the system is easily and publicly recognized. As opposed to the slow and eventually catastrophic corruption of a centralized command.
I think what you’re after is robustness, which decentralization can achieve, but it’s not the only way. For example, a strong central government built around a large representative legislative body can still be robust, depending on how it’s set up.
American society is quite interesting in that there is a belief that rights are absolute and any negative effects just have to be accepted as an unfortunate side effect of those rights.
Firearms are the topic where this seems to apply the hardest.
The USA is the only country in the world that allows any citizen (except those declared unfit, i.e. felons) to own a firearm with the express intention of using it to kill people. Even if you don't intend to go out and shoot somebody, buying a handgun or a shotgun for home defence is buying one with the intention of killing people.
So of course, with this uninfringed right, you have people killing their spouse, children accidentally killing their family members, people seeking help after a car crash getting shot [1], increased rates of suicide, etc. etc. That's not to mention otherwise lawful firearms owners shooting up schools, churches, and theaters.
These are all negative side-effects of unrestricted firearms ownership.
Of course, there are benefits. Theoretically the people can stop a tyrannical government. People can stop home invaders, muggers, rapists, abusive ex-partners, etc.
I can understand the argument that people have a right to own arm themselves to stop the above from happening. But on balance, is there more or less pain and suffering from this right to bear arms?
The same applies to freedom of speech. The concept of (almost) complete unrestricted freedom of speech is very American. Most countries have laws against hate speech or laws against incitement to violence with a much lower threshold than the USA. Germany bans Nazis, and they have a very good reason to, given their history.
There seems to be this common thread of argument in regards to "constitutional rights" that if they aren't absolute, the USA will turn into Nazi Germany. It's a false dichotomy.
> So of course, with this uninfringed right, you have people killing their spouse, children accidentally killing their family members, people seeking help after a car crash getting shot [1], increased rates of suicide, etc. etc. That's not to mention otherwise lawful firearms owners shooting up schools, churches, and theaters.
You're leaving out some key factors.
First, firearm violence in the US (like violence in general) is highly locality dependent. It's not a coincidence that the incident you linked to of a woman getting shot while seeking help after a car accident happened in Detroit. Most of the US has
a rate of violence (firearm and otherwise) than is at or below the norm in European countries like Switzerland. The statistics you see don't show this because they average over the entire country instead of separating out the particular areas where almost all of the violence actually happens.
Second, the localities in the US that have high rates of violence, including firearm violence, are all inner cities that have been run for decades by liberal governments that have imposed strict controls on firearm ownership. The rest of the US, which, as above, looks like Switzerland as far as violence is concerned, has much more reasonable policies on firearm ownership. So at least in the US, the data does not support the common claim that gun control reduces firearm violence; it supports the opposite claim.
Third, the mass shootings that make the news are most often not perpetrated using firearms that were legally owned by the shooters. Either they were legally owned by someone else and the shooter got access to them (illegally), or they were illegally obtained by the shooter in the first place.
You don't even attempt to cite any stats that would show that non-urban America is as safe as Europe. And it's a stretch to believe because Europe doesn't have semi-regular gun massacres, which aren't actually happening in inner cities.
Guns are widely available in high crime areas because it's trivial to travel to a jurisdiction where buying them is legal.
We also have very little liability for what happens with a gun you own or sale when it's not in your possession. If this weren't the case, you'd see much fewer firearms getting into the hands of criminals.
> semi-regular gun massacres, which aren't actually happening in inner cities.
You're right, "inner cities" was too narrow. "Urban areas" would be better. The point is that the localities are isolated; they aren't evenly spread across the US, they're concentrated in certain places, and those places all have a common factor that I described.
> We also have very little liability for what happens with a gun you own or sale when it's not in your possession
For "own", yes, you're right; greater accountability for gun owners who let others use their guns would be a good idea.
For "sale", not so much; selling something means transferring ownership, which means once you've sold it, you aren't responsible any more because you aren't the owner. The new owner is the one who should be held responsible.
"Even if you don't intend to go out and shoot somebody, buying a handgun or a shotgun for home defence is buying one with the intention of killing people."
Not necessarily. Even assuming there's an intention to fire the gun in the first place (it might be meant as a deterrent), there also might be the intention to only wound the assailant. Not all gunshots are fatal, after all. Of course, even a shot to the leg can be fatal, but the intent is still not to kill.
> Government mandated ID cards and the authority to demand them at any time.
> Searches without probable cause.
> Elimination or severe restriction of anonymous financial transactions.
You know that a jew-hunting government can simply pass these laws? In fact, ID cards were introduced in Germany in 1938.
> If it is illegal for you to pay someone for anonymous health care then how can your "Jews in the attic" receive health care?
Illegaly.
> The registration information can be used to confiscate the firearms used to protect innocent life -- as it was under the 1938 Weapons Control Act in Nazi Germany.
Not having a registered weapon does not stop a jew-hunting government from searching your house for weapons.
I've seen arguments like this before. It boils down to "the second amendment gives me the right to own/buy/manufacture any weapon I need to defend myself against tyranny."
The problem is to maintain the private citizen/armed forces of a cou try balance of power is ludicrous. What exactly do you need to buy to defend yourself against a troop of Navy Seals? OK, training and gear. For a start: Teflon coated bullets, high velocity rounds, grenades, land mines, high explosives.
OK next step. What do you need to defend yourself from an armored tank division?
The 82nd airborne?
A harrier jet?
Sorry, but once the military reached a certain point, it's impossible. And trying makes you sound like a madman.
> It boils down to "the second amendment gives me the right to own/buy/manufacture any weapon I need to defend myself against tyranny."
At the time the amendment was passed, privately owned warships, comparable in power to those available to governments, were common. In fact the use of such warships as privateers was a key component of the United States' strategy in both the War of Independence and the War of 1812.
The current situation, where governments have a level of force available to them that is much, much greater than that available to any private entity, is a large change from the situation throughout most of human history. That might indeed make it a good idea to talk about a further amendment to balance the right to keep and bear arms with the realities of current weaponry; but unless and until that happens, the second amendment says what it says and you can't just ignore that because you don't like the implications.
> but unless and until that happens, the second amendment says what it says and you can't just ignore that because you don't like the implications.
People are not ignoring it.
And a lot of people think that the SC has the duty and responsibility to [re]interpret the Constitution every time they consult it. Therefore there might not be a need for a new Amendment.
Of course, cleaning up the mess would be great with a new Constitution. But the time is not right for that, reason is not hip enough nowadays.
There are 300M guns in the USA spread across 3.8M m^2.
1M soldiers (O(current armed forces)), armed with all the equipment they have (unless they decide to nuke the whole country) could not take down a rebel force spread across most of the US (concentrated away from the coasts, of course ;-).
Of course an average civilian wont be able to match the training and resources of a soldier. The idea is to raise the cost of engaging the civilian populace. No government wants to rule over piles of ruble and streets full of corpses.
Occupation is already expensive and essentially temporary. Look at the situation in Afghanistan, the US invades and occupies the country. As they begin to withdraw, territory is taken back by the Taliban and warlords, they simply bide their time and wait for an opportunity to return.
An armed populace changes the math around occupation and engaging in violence. Of course this also leads to other oppressive mechanisms like propaganda and manufacturing concent, but at least people aren't dying. Its a step in the right direction.
High yield explosives, shovels and demolitions training.
The actual force that is impossible to repel with typical means is naval and air force. (though you can still attack the logistics of those operations)
So, the Gestapo knocks on your door looking for Jews. You have three legally owned guns. Explain how this protects you? Because I'm pretty sure that if you use them, you're in for a fate worse than death.
62 comments
[ 1.6 ms ] story [ 103 ms ] threadEdit: as another commenter astutely pointed out above, this rule, when sufficiently contorted, can essentially be applied to invalidate every law. It amounts to a radical mistrust of government. I wonder what the author's perspective is on property rights and their enforcement.
Yep. What does that tell you?
> illegitimate governments don't suddenly give up when there are no legitimate means (laws) that lead to their ends, they just use violence
Only if they can get away with it. That is not always the case. And that's a key point of the test: it could be rephrased as "will this make it easier for an illegitimate government to achieve its ends using violence?"
It tells you exactly what the commenter is saying. This is a really silly 'test'.
I think you and the other commenter are seriously missing the point.
But what I find more dangerous is this ersatz common sense tone in the essay. It lends the argument a certain weight, like "boy, balancing of rights sure is tricky. Can we __really__ trust governments? I mean, Nazis." Please no one fall for this. The rule of law is a bedrock principle of human civilization, not a bullet train to totalitarian town.
The article is not advocating abandoning the rule of law. It is advocating judging laws based on a particular criterion. The fact that many existing laws do not meet that criterion does not mean no laws do, nor does it mean the only alternative is to abandon laws altogether.
For example, consider the law against murder. Does it meet the criterion? Of course. Having a law against murder does not make it easier for the government to persecute the innocent.
Not at all. What if the Jew in the attic had to kill an errant Nazi out of self-defense?
Killing in self-defense is not murder.
It's just a blatantly terrible test, wrapped up in faux wisdom and scare tactics. Balancing of rights is far more complicated than this and deserves better treatment. In fact, _most_ issues are complicated and don't readily yield to this kind of simple test. Frustrating though it is, it's a reality we have to deal with if we want to be at all fair and truly address complex issues.
It sounds more like they are disagreeing with the point, which is not at all the same as missing it.
This is absurd. The government also has a monopoly on law enforcement, so if "Jews in the Attic" are victim of a crime how can they seek justice? From this premise, to suggest the government should not enforce laws is a non sequitor.
This actually happens to undocumented immigrants: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/652/ice-capades/act-two-2
They can't. So by the proposed test, a government monopoly on law enforcement is a bad thing and should be opposed.
If you ask "how can it be possible not to have a government monopoly on law enforcement?", note that historically that has been more often the norm than the system we have now. See, for example, David Friedman's The Machinery Of Freedom for a number of historical case studies.
> From this premise, to suggest the government should not enforce laws is a non sequitor.
No, it's a reason, as above, to not have the government have a monopoly on law enforcement.
Is it possible to give a reasonable summary of the thesis of this book?
>No, it's a reason, as above, to not have the government have a monopoly on law enforcement.
What is the definition of 'government' here? Also, whatever that definition is, it doesn't need a monopoly on law enforcement, but only some of the authority over it.
I'm not sure, but I'll try: the main thesis is that many, if not most, if not all, of the functions we currently associate with conventional governments do not actually need to be provided by conventional governments; they can also be provided by private entities in a free market. Most of the book is trying to imagine and develop in detail how key functions, such as police, fire, and courts, might be provided in a system where conventional governments either did not exist or did not provide those functions.
> What is the definition of 'government' here? Also, whatever that definition is, it doesn't need a monopoly on law enforcement, but only some of the authority over it.
Different sources will use different definitions, which might lead to different answers to this. :-)
A good starting point might be Friedman's definition: a government is an entity which everyone agrees is allowed to do things that, if any other entity did them, would be considered crimes. A common example is taxation: the government is allowed to take money from you whether you agree to give it or not, which would be theft if any other entity did it.
A government under this definition might not need to have a monopoly on law enforcement, but it would need to have a monopoly on any actions required for law enforcement that would be crimes if another entity did them. (One common point of debate among different strains of libertarians is whether the set of such actions required for law enforcement is non-empty.)
If the government didn't have a monopoly on law enforcement, what you'd end up with are rival gangs each enforcing the law in their own biased way, propogating the amount of injustice we're already dealing with, and decentralizing it, making it harder to fight.
When you have a centralized source of law enforcement, you have a "single point of failure" that you can apply pressure to if it becomes corrupt, much in the same way that electric vehicles centralize the source of emissions making it easier to sequester.
Decentralization is not a panacea.
EDIT: That's not even considering the fact that without the government providing law enforcement, among other things, that many would be guaranteed to go without those things. Right now that may be the case for many with the current system, but at least that is fixable by, again, applying pressure to the single source to adequately provide those things. In a system where the free market is supposed to take care of this, many poor folks would go without. That used to be the case with fire fighters, but we soon learned that it was a bad idea for nobody to show up to fight the fires of the poor folk, because those fires would spread. Same goes for crime, disease, etc.
If this is your definition of "asinine concept", I think you need to re-examine your criteria. Not everyone who disagrees with your pet beliefs is asinine.
> If the government didn't have a monopoly on law enforcement, what you'd end up with are rival gangs each enforcing the law in their own biased way, propogating the amount of injustice we're already dealing with, and decentralizing it, making it harder to fight.
This claim is historically false. I referred elsewhere in this thread to David Friedman's Machinery Of Freedom, which gives a number of historical counterexamples.
> When you have a centralized source of law enforcement, you have a "single point of failure" that you can apply pressure to if it becomes corrupt
But you also have a single point of failure that special interests can apply pressure to to make it corrupt. Which, historically, is far more likely to happen than what you describe, because the special interests are concentrated while the people as a whole are dispersed and can't easily coordinate.
> Decentralization is not a panacea.
Nobody has claimed that it is. The fact that decentralization is not a perfect solution to all of society's problems is irrelevant to the point that decentralization, all things considered, is better (because it has less damaging failure modes).
> From this premise, to suggest the government should not enforce laws is a non sequitor.
That is correct, but I don't think it means what you think it means.
If the government has been allowed to discriminate and target a demographic, you’ve already lost.
Asking a single question is a poor way to get absolute perspective on topics. Especially those as complicated as presented. Instead it leads you to be overly dismissive and combative of alternative viewpoints.
This makes no sense to me. A tyrannical government can change the law. If there’s a law that will make it easier for them to commit atrocities, they can make it happen. Enacting that law now, or refusing to do so, won’t make a bit of difference. Laws should be evaluated on their merits as things stand now, not based on their effects on a hypothetical where current laws don’t even matter.
The article is not talking only about tyrannical governments, or laws passed by such governments. The test the article is proposing is meant to apply to any law passed by any government. The example of Jews in the Attic is just an illustration; it's used because one of the article's points is that failing to apply the test early on, when your government is not tyrannical but is just asking for a little bit more power to "fix" some problem, is how you ultimately get to a government that is tyrannical enough to either just ignore laws or pass them by fiat to suit itself.
My point is that I disagree with the basic premise. Laws which help tyrannies oppress and murder people are not necessarily the same laws that turn good governments into tyrannies. I see no reason the two should be connected.
Can you give any counterexamples? Also, bear in mind that the criterion in the article is not "does the law help tyrannies oppress and murder people?" but "does the law make it difficult or impossible to protect the innocent against the government?"
Thus I have interpreted it as “does the law make it more difficult to protect the innocent against the government if the government has gone crazy?” That seems like the more charitable interpretation, as it actually makes a little bit of sense until you bite into it.
Which is not to say it's prima facie wrong, but to point out that its correctness should be separated from its emotional impact, which is very tough for most humans to do.
Especially with the rhetoric today about creeping fascism, we should recognize that all authorities have the potential to become corrupt and oppressive. We should ensure proper checks against that and consider the potential consequences before implementing centralized services. Efficiency and cost effectiveness should not be the only consideration.
For instance, you might think that there are no potential downsides to a centralized welfare system. However what happens if those benefits are provided only to people of specific ideologies or races? What if it becomes contingent on giving up your biometric data or subject to drug testing as we have already seen in many areas of the US? Maybe we should consider the potential consequences of centralizing essential support structures and social safety nets.
If maniacs take power, we’re deeply screwed. Our efforts should go toward making sure that doesn’t happen.
Consider a treaty organization organized against a hypothetical enemy. If the adversary succeeds in corrupting and neutralizing one of the member states, that is significantly less damaging than if it were a centralized command that was corrupted.
It increases the cost dramatically to neutralize the treaty organization, and the threat to the system is easily and publicly recognized. As opposed to the slow and eventually catastrophic corruption of a centralized command.
Firearms are the topic where this seems to apply the hardest. The USA is the only country in the world that allows any citizen (except those declared unfit, i.e. felons) to own a firearm with the express intention of using it to kill people. Even if you don't intend to go out and shoot somebody, buying a handgun or a shotgun for home defence is buying one with the intention of killing people.
So of course, with this uninfringed right, you have people killing their spouse, children accidentally killing their family members, people seeking help after a car crash getting shot [1], increased rates of suicide, etc. etc. That's not to mention otherwise lawful firearms owners shooting up schools, churches, and theaters.
These are all negative side-effects of unrestricted firearms ownership.
Of course, there are benefits. Theoretically the people can stop a tyrannical government. People can stop home invaders, muggers, rapists, abusive ex-partners, etc.
I can understand the argument that people have a right to own arm themselves to stop the above from happening. But on balance, is there more or less pain and suffering from this right to bear arms?
The same applies to freedom of speech. The concept of (almost) complete unrestricted freedom of speech is very American. Most countries have laws against hate speech or laws against incitement to violence with a much lower threshold than the USA. Germany bans Nazis, and they have a very good reason to, given their history.
There seems to be this common thread of argument in regards to "constitutional rights" that if they aren't absolute, the USA will turn into Nazi Germany. It's a false dichotomy.
[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/renisha-mcbride-detroit-woman-s...
You're leaving out some key factors.
First, firearm violence in the US (like violence in general) is highly locality dependent. It's not a coincidence that the incident you linked to of a woman getting shot while seeking help after a car accident happened in Detroit. Most of the US has a rate of violence (firearm and otherwise) than is at or below the norm in European countries like Switzerland. The statistics you see don't show this because they average over the entire country instead of separating out the particular areas where almost all of the violence actually happens.
Second, the localities in the US that have high rates of violence, including firearm violence, are all inner cities that have been run for decades by liberal governments that have imposed strict controls on firearm ownership. The rest of the US, which, as above, looks like Switzerland as far as violence is concerned, has much more reasonable policies on firearm ownership. So at least in the US, the data does not support the common claim that gun control reduces firearm violence; it supports the opposite claim.
Third, the mass shootings that make the news are most often not perpetrated using firearms that were legally owned by the shooters. Either they were legally owned by someone else and the shooter got access to them (illegally), or they were illegally obtained by the shooter in the first place.
Guns are widely available in high crime areas because it's trivial to travel to a jurisdiction where buying them is legal.
We also have very little liability for what happens with a gun you own or sale when it's not in your possession. If this weren't the case, you'd see much fewer firearms getting into the hands of criminals.
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/jun...
> semi-regular gun massacres, which aren't actually happening in inner cities.
You're right, "inner cities" was too narrow. "Urban areas" would be better. The point is that the localities are isolated; they aren't evenly spread across the US, they're concentrated in certain places, and those places all have a common factor that I described.
For "own", yes, you're right; greater accountability for gun owners who let others use their guns would be a good idea.
For "sale", not so much; selling something means transferring ownership, which means once you've sold it, you aren't responsible any more because you aren't the owner. The new owner is the one who should be held responsible.
Neither did the post I responded to.
See here for some stats on US gun violence in 2018 (the site also has data for past years):
http://www.gunviolencearchive.org/charts-and-maps
Not necessarily. Even assuming there's an intention to fire the gun in the first place (it might be meant as a deterrent), there also might be the intention to only wound the assailant. Not all gunshots are fatal, after all. Of course, even a shot to the leg can be fatal, but the intent is still not to kill.
Any shot is a potentially lethal shot, and the only reason that a gun is a deterrent is that you have the potential to kill the assailant.
> Searches without probable cause.
> Elimination or severe restriction of anonymous financial transactions.
You know that a jew-hunting government can simply pass these laws? In fact, ID cards were introduced in Germany in 1938.
> If it is illegal for you to pay someone for anonymous health care then how can your "Jews in the attic" receive health care?
Illegaly.
> The registration information can be used to confiscate the firearms used to protect innocent life -- as it was under the 1938 Weapons Control Act in Nazi Germany.
Not having a registered weapon does not stop a jew-hunting government from searching your house for weapons.
The problem is to maintain the private citizen/armed forces of a cou try balance of power is ludicrous. What exactly do you need to buy to defend yourself against a troop of Navy Seals? OK, training and gear. For a start: Teflon coated bullets, high velocity rounds, grenades, land mines, high explosives.
OK next step. What do you need to defend yourself from an armored tank division?
The 82nd airborne?
A harrier jet?
Sorry, but once the military reached a certain point, it's impossible. And trying makes you sound like a madman.
At the time the amendment was passed, privately owned warships, comparable in power to those available to governments, were common. In fact the use of such warships as privateers was a key component of the United States' strategy in both the War of Independence and the War of 1812.
The current situation, where governments have a level of force available to them that is much, much greater than that available to any private entity, is a large change from the situation throughout most of human history. That might indeed make it a good idea to talk about a further amendment to balance the right to keep and bear arms with the realities of current weaponry; but unless and until that happens, the second amendment says what it says and you can't just ignore that because you don't like the implications.
People are not ignoring it.
And a lot of people think that the SC has the duty and responsibility to [re]interpret the Constitution every time they consult it. Therefore there might not be a need for a new Amendment.
Of course, cleaning up the mess would be great with a new Constitution. But the time is not right for that, reason is not hip enough nowadays.
1M soldiers (O(current armed forces)), armed with all the equipment they have (unless they decide to nuke the whole country) could not take down a rebel force spread across most of the US (concentrated away from the coasts, of course ;-).
It's not just theoretical.
If occupation, there’s more to it than guns.
If battle: the military has tanks, which are highly resistant to small arms.
Occupation is already expensive and essentially temporary. Look at the situation in Afghanistan, the US invades and occupies the country. As they begin to withdraw, territory is taken back by the Taliban and warlords, they simply bide their time and wait for an opportunity to return.
An armed populace changes the math around occupation and engaging in violence. Of course this also leads to other oppressive mechanisms like propaganda and manufacturing concent, but at least people aren't dying. Its a step in the right direction.
The actual force that is impossible to repel with typical means is naval and air force. (though you can still attack the logistics of those operations)