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A regulation that seems sensible to one cultural group might seem like ridiculous overreach to another cultural group. The US is one of the most polycultural co
by wyager 10y ago
A regulation that seems sensible to one cultural group might seem like ridiculous overreach to another cultural group. The US is one of the most polycultural countries in the world, so any regulation is bound to piss a lot of people off. It's better to be judicious with regulation in such situations.
Gun control is a great example that seems to confuse a lot of non-Americans. To your average San Franciscan, who has never used a gun and has no particular reason to use one, restrictions on e.g. magazine size probably seem quite reasonable. But go to an agrarian Texan rancher, and the situation is entirely different. Good luck thinning out a stampeding herd of wild hogs with a ten round fixed magazine. Similar situation with pot; the average SF resident is probably fairly familiar with it, whereas the rancher probably isn't. In either case, ignorance breeds irrational fear, which is a bad (but unfortunately likely) foundation for laws.
So yes, many regulations are not sensible, and it's harder to get away with in the US because the US isn't a monoculture. Even those regulations that are sensible (by whatever metric you like) are likely to anger some non-negligible group.
- sharemywin 10y ago“Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.” ― James Bovard, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty I think lately far to many people already have the answer before there is any discussion I think democracy only functions when people are open minded and willing to put themselves in others shoes.
- nerdponx 10y agoI'm ignorant on ranching. Are wild hog stampedes a non-trivial threat to ranchers?
- wyager 10y agoThe stampedes aren't, but hogs are a horrible invasive pest that causes many billions of dollars of destruction per year. They've tried trapping, poisoning, everything. The only thing that has any effect on the population is some serious firepower. The problem is so bad that you can hire people to fly around at night in helicopters with sniper rifles and thermal vision to shoot hogs. I've helped a few friends with hog control, and you'll often startle 10-20 at a time and then they'll go into hiding and you're done for the day. You need to put a lot of bullets downrange fast to have any effect.