5 ms·

Even if it is, which I doubt, that is like the least important thing that I listed.

by pfisch 7y ago

crispinb 7y ago
Probably true, but let's face it, there are few good actors in this story. The Venezuelan government is not remotely interested in the actual welfare of its citizens. The US foreign policy establishment is concerned as always only with Empire (the aid story is a lie: https://theintercept.com/2019/02/20/regime-change-we-can-believe-in-the-u-s-agenda-in-venezuela-haiti-and-egypt/ https://theintercept.com/2019/02/20/regime-change-we-can-bel...). The nation itself is riven. Picking a 'side' here could not possibly be done in good faith. And thinking that armed citizens would improve matters is beyond absurd.
- rjf72 7y ago
  I completely agree with you, with one exception. It's easy to see the absurdity of an armed population against a government with a military at its back. Of course the United States was founded by this very contradiction in intuition, but a more modern event is probably a better example. We destroyed Iraq without difficulty, yet never managed to control it. The full force of the US military backed by literally billions of dollars a day, and the best training money can buy, was unable to stabilize control against disparate groups of poorly trained, poorly funded, insurgents armed with little more than 50s eras rifles and some rudimentary homemade explosives. Think about how remarkable it is that these disparate individuals managed to force our military to huddle into small isolated 'green zones'. The point here is that there's a difference between destroying a location and controlling it. Of course an armed population is not going to stop aerial bombardment and mass destruction, but at the same time it's practically impossible to control a territory when there is a hostile armed population. And there are also morale issues. The government doesn't own the military. Even the military doesn't own the military. The military is made up of real people who, though trained to act as a group, are still independent actors. And when there is real resistance between a population and a government, you can't rely on the military to behave as you might like. Once again - Iraq and the general failure of the Iraq military to enforce western interests is a perfect example here. Ultimately there is a reason that governments who expect there may be major resistance to future actions tend to work to ban gun ownership. Mao took control of the government by arming a population, and then went to every effort to disarm that very population before engaging in actions leading to the deaths of tens of millions. Shortly after the Bolsheviks overthrew czarist Russia through force of arms - they began working to seize arms from the people. Stalin was already well entrenched in the nation and his actions, once taking absolute control, would come to cost the lives of tens of millions. And perhaps the most well publicized example - Hitler seized all arms from Jews in 1938. The holocaust started 3 years later. Venezuela banned gun ownership/sales in 2012. This was likely done at the behest of then vice president Maduro. Chavez was terminally ill and would die several months later. It was supposedly done to combat Venezuela's rising murder rate. This [1] is that murder rate. It didn't stop the criminals from having guns, but it did stop the citizenry. Despotism and gun control are invariably tightly linked. So, at the minimum, I think we would be in a different place today if Venezuela did have an armed citizenry. While it's impossible to predict exactly what effect this would have culminated in, I do not find it absurd to suggest it would have been better than the present. [1] - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/1998_to_2013_Venezuela_Murder_Rate.png/400px-1998_to_2013_Venezuela_Murder_Rate.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/19...
  - crispinb 7y ago
    > Despotism and gun control are invariably tightly linked "Linked" is a tabloid weasel word in this context. It may or may not be true that most despots favour gun control. I'm not familiar with the evidence in that case. But the reverse is not remotely true. Tight gun control has been hard fought for by citizenries of many democracies, and as with other rational policies (eg. real health care systems), once won, populations are loathe to allow corporate lobbies to remove it. Armed citizenries have a measurably lesser chance of usefully opposing a government (and its military) than do unarmed ones (again, see Chenoweth and others). The post-revolutionary consequences of armed rebellions are invariably unending tales of multigenerational trauma and reciprocal violence.
    - rjf72 7y ago
      What is the point of discussion? I'd say it's presumably to convey our ideas and ideally influence one another. I mean we all think we're right about the things that we believe - or we wouldn't believe them. So why don't other people think the same way? Well they must just not be privy to the logic, evidence, and other information that you possess! And so of course the key tools in this are rationale, logic, and evidence. And so let's imagine I'm coming from a different perspective from yourself. Do you think your post is going to help me see your world view in any more clear a fashion? For instance, I've never heard of Chenoweth. I'd assumed it was some significant revolutionary event I was not familiar with. Search results turn up an actress I've also never heard of. With some degree of effort, I surmise you are talking about some person who wrote some book. Why not share what you find to be the most compelling incident from the book? Major modern events every child is familiar with, from Vietnam to Iraq, demonstrate the power of an armed population. I'm sure your author must have covered this, so why not summarize their logic in practice, offer examples you found particularly compelling and representative, and ultimately perhaps persuade me to their merit?
  - pfisch 7y ago
    Wasn’t the Iraqi resistance funded by outside groups like Iran?
- rStar 7y ago
  I pick the side of the Venezuelan people over the US empire. I, as a US citizen, am horrified to watch an oil war play out in real time. Similar to how the US uses siege warfare(a war crime) in Yemen, we are using sanctions against Venezuela to install our dictator of choice. The people of Venezuela decided their leader in free and fair elections. We need to leave them be.

Even if it is, which I doubt, that is like the least important thing that I listed.

by pfisch 7y ago

Even if it is, which I doubt, that is like the least important thing that I listed.

Probably true, but let's face it, there are few good actors in this story. The Venezuelan government is not remotely interested in the actual welfare of its citizens. The US foreign policy establishment is concerned as always only with Empire (the aid story is a lie: https://theintercept.com/2019/02/20/regime-change-we-can-believe-in-the-u-s-agenda-in-venezuela-haiti-and-egypt/ https://theintercept.com/2019/02/20/regime-change-we-can-bel...). The nation itself is riven. Picking a 'side' here could not possibly be done in good faith. And thinking that armed citizens would improve matters is beyond absurd.

rjf72 7y ago
I completely agree with you, with one exception. It's easy to see the absurdity of an armed population against a government with a military at its back. Of course the United States was founded by this very contradiction in intuition, but a more modern event is probably a better example. We destroyed Iraq without difficulty, yet never managed to control it. The full force of the US military backed by literally billions of dollars a day, and the best training money can buy, was unable to stabilize control against disparate groups of poorly trained, poorly funded, insurgents armed with little more than 50s eras rifles and some rudimentary homemade explosives. Think about how remarkable it is that these disparate individuals managed to force our military to huddle into small isolated 'green zones'. The point here is that there's a difference between destroying a location and controlling it. Of course an armed population is not going to stop aerial bombardment and mass destruction, but at the same time it's practically impossible to control a territory when there is a hostile armed population. And there are also morale issues. The government doesn't own the military. Even the military doesn't own the military. The military is made up of real people who, though trained to act as a group, are still independent actors. And when there is real resistance between a population and a government, you can't rely on the military to behave as you might like. Once again - Iraq and the general failure of the Iraq military to enforce western interests is a perfect example here. Ultimately there is a reason that governments who expect there may be major resistance to future actions tend to work to ban gun ownership. Mao took control of the government by arming a population, and then went to every effort to disarm that very population before engaging in actions leading to the deaths of tens of millions. Shortly after the Bolsheviks overthrew czarist Russia through force of arms - they began working to seize arms from the people. Stalin was already well entrenched in the nation and his actions, once taking absolute control, would come to cost the lives of tens of millions. And perhaps the most well publicized example - Hitler seized all arms from Jews in 1938. The holocaust started 3 years later. Venezuela banned gun ownership/sales in 2012. This was likely done at the behest of then vice president Maduro. Chavez was terminally ill and would die several months later. It was supposedly done to combat Venezuela's rising murder rate. This [1] is that murder rate. It didn't stop the criminals from having guns, but it did stop the citizenry. Despotism and gun control are invariably tightly linked. So, at the minimum, I think we would be in a different place today if Venezuela did have an armed citizenry. While it's impossible to predict exactly what effect this would have culminated in, I do not find it absurd to suggest it would have been better than the present. [1] - https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/1998_to_2013_Venezuela_Murder_Rate.png/400px-1998_to_2013_Venezuela_Murder_Rate.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/79/19...
- crispinb 7y ago
  > Despotism and gun control are invariably tightly linked "Linked" is a tabloid weasel word in this context. It may or may not be true that most despots favour gun control. I'm not familiar with the evidence in that case. But the reverse is not remotely true. Tight gun control has been hard fought for by citizenries of many democracies, and as with other rational policies (eg. real health care systems), once won, populations are loathe to allow corporate lobbies to remove it. Armed citizenries have a measurably lesser chance of usefully opposing a government (and its military) than do unarmed ones (again, see Chenoweth and others). The post-revolutionary consequences of armed rebellions are invariably unending tales of multigenerational trauma and reciprocal violence.
  - rjf72 7y ago
    What is the point of discussion? I'd say it's presumably to convey our ideas and ideally influence one another. I mean we all think we're right about the things that we believe - or we wouldn't believe them. So why don't other people think the same way? Well they must just not be privy to the logic, evidence, and other information that you possess! And so of course the key tools in this are rationale, logic, and evidence. And so let's imagine I'm coming from a different perspective from yourself. Do you think your post is going to help me see your world view in any more clear a fashion? For instance, I've never heard of Chenoweth. I'd assumed it was some significant revolutionary event I was not familiar with. Search results turn up an actress I've also never heard of. With some degree of effort, I surmise you are talking about some person who wrote some book. Why not share what you find to be the most compelling incident from the book? Major modern events every child is familiar with, from Vietnam to Iraq, demonstrate the power of an armed population. I'm sure your author must have covered this, so why not summarize their logic in practice, offer examples you found particularly compelling and representative, and ultimately perhaps persuade me to their merit?
- pfisch 7y ago
  Wasn’t the Iraqi resistance funded by outside groups like Iran?
rStar 7y ago
I pick the side of the Venezuelan people over the US empire. I, as a US citizen, am horrified to watch an oil war play out in real time. Similar to how the US uses siege warfare(a war crime) in Yemen, we are using sanctions against Venezuela to install our dictator of choice. The people of Venezuela decided their leader in free and fair elections. We need to leave them be.