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In the hands of the Chinese government being on such a list could get you sent to a reeducation camp. The US isn't there yet, but "yet" does too much work here.

In the hands of the Chinese government being on such a list could get you sent to a reeducation camp. The US isn't there yet, but "yet" does too much work here. If you ever wonder why pro-gun folk are so adamantly against gun registration, remember the yet. If 1A won't hold, 2A through 10A likely won't either.

shadowgovt 7y ago
Because I'm sure in the context of a revolution, the American gun owners would be super hard to identify. How closely does the NRA guard its donor list, or Guns & Ammo its subscription roster?
- satokema_work 7y ago
  You might find the extreme gun fanatics this way, but for every one of those there are dozens that just have a regular weapon in the closet for emergencies and don't advertise it whatsoever. (At least in some jurisdictions, may vary based on your location)
  - shadowgovt 7y ago
    In an actual revolution scenario, they're pretty easy to find too. They'd be the people with guns. I don't think I've actually ever really understood this aspect of American paranoia.
    - A4ET8a8uTh0 7y ago
      It is not paranoia when a US presidential candidate states he wants full blown confiscation. If anything, it is mistrust.
      - fzeroracer 7y ago
        I'm curious as to why gun advocates trust the candidate who says they want to confiscate guns less than the president engaging in authoritarian and corrupt behavior. The whole point of the right to bear arms is that they're meant to be used against the government when they overstep their bounds. But what happens when the people who bear said arms agrees with how the government is breaking the law?
    - 34679 7y ago
      See Venezuala. First came registration, then confiscation, then conflict. The government would round up as many guns as possible before war broke out in the streets.
      - shadowgovt 7y ago
        It's an interesting hypothesis that more guns in the hands of civilians would have resulted in less bloody conflict (as opposed to military escalation in light of armed resistance), but I don't know how one proves it. What's the control group?
        RonanTheGrey 7y ago
        I don't think the claim has ever been that it would result in less bloody conflict. On the contrary, likely more bloody. I think the claim is simply that it can potentially change the outcome. And before anyone disagrees, how many soldiers died in Iraq & Afghanistan at the hands of insurgencies?
        shadowgovt 7y ago
        Plenty, until the US pivoted to drone-launched missiles.
        homonculus1 7y ago
        Have fun launching missiles at American cities and insurgents embedded in civilian targets. Even shooting missiles at the desert kill enough innocent bystanders to radicalize the enemy, now imagine doing that in Miami and Houston.
        shadowgovt 7y ago
        I have imagined it, and it's horrifying. But not guaranteed to radicalize people outside the immediate effected area against the ones pulling the trigger. Philadelphia bombed a city block to flush out an entrenched armed group in the '80s, and life went on (for everyone who didn't have their home burned down). Don't underestimate the American capacity to believe something was done because it was necessary. It's the only country to have ever deployed nuclear weapons. Twice.
- madengr 7y ago
  Hell, they sell those lists. Though just because you are on those lists, does not make you the typical “gun nut”; FWIW I fall in that gun nut category. The “I lost them in a boating accident” won’t work when they zip tie you to a chair and start cutting off body parts.
  - shadowgovt 7y ago
    I don't consider them "gun nuts." People support the NRA or read Guns & Ammo for their own reasons; it's a free country. So free that someone who has a mind to shoot a dozen strangers can do so with relative ease, but a free country.
- homonculus1 7y ago
  Granularity matters. Anyone can find my phone number in the book, but when the government tracks and analyzes exactly who I'm calling it becomes an invasion of privacy and an existential threat to free society.
- 4ntonius8lock 7y ago
  What prey, would you do with the list of 5.5 million gun owners? Basically, 4% of US adults.
  - bsanr2 7y ago
    Take their guns. Though I gather that might still be difficult, since so many Americans profess their intention to lay down their lives to protect their gun(ownership right)s. I'm sure you can understand why most observers are puzzled by this, since guns are ostensibly purchased as tools used to prevent one's own death.
    - 4ntonius8lock 7y ago
      There's less than a million police in the US. More than half of them are desk/bureaucracy bound. It's probably more like 3/4 of them, not to mention many of them will favor the gun owners, but let's be generous to the opposing argument and suppose all active street duty cops were in on it. So you are saying each police officer is going to arrest and remove weapons from 10 people scattered across millions of square miles. They will also need to ostensibly put those 5.5 million 'bad Americans' somewhere. We don't even have jails for that many people. You'd need literally a few million guards just to keep them. And that's just NRA members. There's many more gun owners than there are NRA members. Have you been in the US? Do you understand how insanely unrealistic this is? Lists are great when the people you want to hurt are small in number and weak in force. Neither applies here. A tyrant dictator could send the army, but again, way outnumbered. Not to mention how big the USA is, how rugged the terrain can be, and how well acquainted the locals are. Even just rounding people up is super hard when people WANT to cooperate (look at our response to natural disasters) The tyrant dictator can take over with tanks, no doubt. But then they would face a long, protracted guerrilla war with all freedom loving Americans. If Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, the founding of the USA, etc have taught us anything, is that you can conquer, but holding a territory is a whole other ball game. And holding is where it's at.
      - bsanr2 7y ago
        I imagine we'd do it like Australia did, where the cop/population and population/land ratios are presumably even worse.
account73466 7y ago
>> In the hands of the Chinese government being on such a list could get you sent to a reeducation camp It is against HN's policy to bring your political sarcasm. Stop doing it here, go on Reddit or Twitter instead. p.s. I am not Chinese
- costcopizza 7y ago
  Stop...what?
- TurkishPoptart 7y ago
  Stop what? Stop telling the truth?
  - account73466 7y ago
    It is a speculation about possible future outcomes, not "the truth".
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
jascii 7y ago
And what, may I ask, are your pea shooters going to do against the firepower of a corrupt nation state? I find it interesting to observe that most 2A defenders are totally willing to support bills funding their potential adversaries and limiting your ability to organize. I would argue that in the modern world strong encryption and other safeguards against surveillance much more worthy of of 2A protection than firearms..
- madengr 7y ago
  Totally agree on the encryption, but why not both? They don’t need a quantum computer to get your 1024 bit key; a pipe wrench will work fine. I need a gun in the latter case. Guns do work. You may end up dead, but you’ll take some with you.
  - jascii 7y ago
    Well, I hope -- by among other things, a careful use of encryption -- to avoid facing the pipe wrench :D Dying for a course can be a choice, but I would like it to bring some meaningful benefit to society. Just taking some lackeys with you doesn't seem all that useful to me.
- Spooky23 7y ago
  The pen is mightier than the sword. Guns themselves are pretty useless except as ways to make a few people rich. The "revolution" against the powerful nation state are the tools of propaganda and discord. Enemies can manipulate our political system and the powerful forces of self-interest and partisanship fog the battlefield. The aura of power associated with guns is literal bread and circus that keeps people angry and ignorant. There's a fantasy that some sort of popular revolt is a viable thing. It's not, and that's been demonstrated time and time again. This sort of thing is a big part of the limits of US power today... there's nobody to blow up. We're equipped to fight the ultimate WW2, but that arsenal cannot be directly focused on a nuclear power. The United States has the most powerful and capable military that has ever existed, but like any tool, it isn't so effective in solving problems outside of it's scope.
dang 7y ago
"Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents." We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21648271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21648271 and marked it off-topic.

shadowgovt 7y ago

Because I'm sure in the context of a revolution, the American gun owners would be super hard to identify. How closely does the NRA guard its donor list, or Guns & Ammo its subscription roster?

satokema_work 7y ago
You might find the extreme gun fanatics this way, but for every one of those there are dozens that just have a regular weapon in the closet for emergencies and don't advertise it whatsoever. (At least in some jurisdictions, may vary based on your location)
- shadowgovt 7y ago
  In an actual revolution scenario, they're pretty easy to find too. They'd be the people with guns. I don't think I've actually ever really understood this aspect of American paranoia.
  - A4ET8a8uTh0 7y ago
    It is not paranoia when a US presidential candidate states he wants full blown confiscation. If anything, it is mistrust.
    - fzeroracer 7y ago
      I'm curious as to why gun advocates trust the candidate who says they want to confiscate guns less than the president engaging in authoritarian and corrupt behavior. The whole point of the right to bear arms is that they're meant to be used against the government when they overstep their bounds. But what happens when the people who bear said arms agrees with how the government is breaking the law?
  - 34679 7y ago
    See Venezuala. First came registration, then confiscation, then conflict. The government would round up as many guns as possible before war broke out in the streets.
    - shadowgovt 7y ago
      It's an interesting hypothesis that more guns in the hands of civilians would have resulted in less bloody conflict (as opposed to military escalation in light of armed resistance), but I don't know how one proves it. What's the control group?
      - RonanTheGrey 7y ago
        I don't think the claim has ever been that it would result in less bloody conflict. On the contrary, likely more bloody. I think the claim is simply that it can potentially change the outcome. And before anyone disagrees, how many soldiers died in Iraq & Afghanistan at the hands of insurgencies?
        shadowgovt 7y ago
        Plenty, until the US pivoted to drone-launched missiles.
        homonculus1 7y ago
        Have fun launching missiles at American cities and insurgents embedded in civilian targets. Even shooting missiles at the desert kill enough innocent bystanders to radicalize the enemy, now imagine doing that in Miami and Houston.
        shadowgovt 7y ago
        I have imagined it, and it's horrifying. But not guaranteed to radicalize people outside the immediate effected area against the ones pulling the trigger. Philadelphia bombed a city block to flush out an entrenched armed group in the '80s, and life went on (for everyone who didn't have their home burned down). Don't underestimate the American capacity to believe something was done because it was necessary. It's the only country to have ever deployed nuclear weapons. Twice.
madengr 7y ago
Hell, they sell those lists. Though just because you are on those lists, does not make you the typical “gun nut”; FWIW I fall in that gun nut category. The “I lost them in a boating accident” won’t work when they zip tie you to a chair and start cutting off body parts.
- shadowgovt 7y ago
  I don't consider them "gun nuts." People support the NRA or read Guns & Ammo for their own reasons; it's a free country. So free that someone who has a mind to shoot a dozen strangers can do so with relative ease, but a free country.
homonculus1 7y ago
Granularity matters. Anyone can find my phone number in the book, but when the government tracks and analyzes exactly who I'm calling it becomes an invasion of privacy and an existential threat to free society.
4ntonius8lock 7y ago
What prey, would you do with the list of 5.5 million gun owners? Basically, 4% of US adults.
- bsanr2 7y ago
  Take their guns. Though I gather that might still be difficult, since so many Americans profess their intention to lay down their lives to protect their gun(ownership right)s. I'm sure you can understand why most observers are puzzled by this, since guns are ostensibly purchased as tools used to prevent one's own death.
  - 4ntonius8lock 7y ago
    There's less than a million police in the US. More than half of them are desk/bureaucracy bound. It's probably more like 3/4 of them, not to mention many of them will favor the gun owners, but let's be generous to the opposing argument and suppose all active street duty cops were in on it. So you are saying each police officer is going to arrest and remove weapons from 10 people scattered across millions of square miles. They will also need to ostensibly put those 5.5 million 'bad Americans' somewhere. We don't even have jails for that many people. You'd need literally a few million guards just to keep them. And that's just NRA members. There's many more gun owners than there are NRA members. Have you been in the US? Do you understand how insanely unrealistic this is? Lists are great when the people you want to hurt are small in number and weak in force. Neither applies here. A tyrant dictator could send the army, but again, way outnumbered. Not to mention how big the USA is, how rugged the terrain can be, and how well acquainted the locals are. Even just rounding people up is super hard when people WANT to cooperate (look at our response to natural disasters) The tyrant dictator can take over with tanks, no doubt. But then they would face a long, protracted guerrilla war with all freedom loving Americans. If Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, the founding of the USA, etc have taught us anything, is that you can conquer, but holding a territory is a whole other ball game. And holding is where it's at.
    - bsanr2 7y ago
      I imagine we'd do it like Australia did, where the cop/population and population/land ratios are presumably even worse.

account73466 7y ago

>> In the hands of the Chinese government being on such a list could get you sent to a reeducation camp It is against HN's policy to bring your political sarcasm. Stop doing it here, go on Reddit or Twitter instead. p.s. I am not Chinese

costcopizza 7y ago
Stop...what?
TurkishPoptart 7y ago
Stop what? Stop telling the truth?
- account73466 7y ago
  It is a speculation about possible future outcomes, not "the truth".
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

jascii 7y ago

And what, may I ask, are your pea shooters going to do against the firepower of a corrupt nation state? I find it interesting to observe that most 2A defenders are totally willing to support bills funding their potential adversaries and limiting your ability to organize. I would argue that in the modern world strong encryption and other safeguards against surveillance much more worthy of of 2A protection than firearms..

madengr 7y ago
Totally agree on the encryption, but why not both? They don’t need a quantum computer to get your 1024 bit key; a pipe wrench will work fine. I need a gun in the latter case. Guns do work. You may end up dead, but you’ll take some with you.
- jascii 7y ago
  Well, I hope -- by among other things, a careful use of encryption -- to avoid facing the pipe wrench :D Dying for a course can be a choice, but I would like it to bring some meaningful benefit to society. Just taking some lackeys with you doesn't seem all that useful to me.
Spooky23 7y ago
The pen is mightier than the sword. Guns themselves are pretty useless except as ways to make a few people rich. The "revolution" against the powerful nation state are the tools of propaganda and discord. Enemies can manipulate our political system and the powerful forces of self-interest and partisanship fog the battlefield. The aura of power associated with guns is literal bread and circus that keeps people angry and ignorant. There's a fantasy that some sort of popular revolt is a viable thing. It's not, and that's been demonstrated time and time again. This sort of thing is a big part of the limits of US power today... there's nobody to blow up. We're equipped to fight the ultimate WW2, but that arsenal cannot be directly focused on a nuclear power. The United States has the most powerful and capable military that has ever existed, but like any tool, it isn't so effective in solving problems outside of it's scope.

dang 7y ago

"Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents." We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21648271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21648271 and marked it off-topic.