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> What about gun ownership (oh thats the nerve), its easy to assume things will be better when guns are banned, but what is the actual game theory in the balanc

> What about gun ownership (oh thats the nerve), its easy to assume things will be better when guns are banned, but what is the actual game theory in the balance of power between a people and their government when the people are stripped of their ability to defend themselves from an oppressive government? While this has surface appeal, this theory of "gun ownership as bulwark against oppression" falls apart when you examine both how the US still manages to exert power over its populace and how democracies where guns are much harder to get continue to function just fine.

gosub100 3y ago
> the US still manages to exert power over its populace exert power != oppression
sandworm101 3y ago
>> the US still manages to exert power over its populace Self-oppression. For all the fearmongering, the US population is clearly able to install random people into high office and rewrite the rules as they see fit. Both Obama and Trump are clear evidence that you don't need to be from established political families to gain power. Literally any idiot can be elected should the people want them. Many are.
- mrangle 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - sandworm101 3y ago
    Obama's father was Kenyan, his mother from Hawaii, his maternal grandfather a US army Sergeant. That's about as far away from American political power as one can get and still be qualified to run for office. It's proof that any plebian from the peripheries of America can rise to be president. Conversely, Trump stands for the fact that anyone with the right combination of anger and money can usurp and then bend the political system to their will. There are many doors to power in the US, which is the whole point. Oppressive countries are not organized that way.
    - mrangle 3y ago
      So Obama is "proof of democracy" (and I assume "not angry") and Trump wasn't elected but "usurped" power (from the every-man Neocons who haven't since stopped causing chaos and trying to jail him?) because he was "rich and angry". Tell me if I missed anything in this anti-democratic storybook narrative.
- guyomes 3y ago
  Another indicator is the rate of citizen un prisons. The laws on gun ownership doesn't prevent the US government to have high rate of citizens incarcerated [1]. On the other hand, US is a state of law, and in theory, US incarceration does not come from oppression but from justice and written laws [2]. Now even though gun ownership might be one way to garanty that US remains a state of law, it is not obvious that it is the only way. If US was not a state of law, I would not be comfortable that GAFAM companies gets their own armies, as in the funny dystopian novel Jenifer Government [3]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Government

gosub100 3y ago

> the US still manages to exert power over its populace exert power != oppression

sandworm101 3y ago

>> the US still manages to exert power over its populace Self-oppression. For all the fearmongering, the US population is clearly able to install random people into high office and rewrite the rules as they see fit. Both Obama and Trump are clear evidence that you don't need to be from established political families to gain power. Literally any idiot can be elected should the people want them. Many are.

mrangle 3y ago
[flagged]
- sandworm101 3y ago
  Obama's father was Kenyan, his mother from Hawaii, his maternal grandfather a US army Sergeant. That's about as far away from American political power as one can get and still be qualified to run for office. It's proof that any plebian from the peripheries of America can rise to be president. Conversely, Trump stands for the fact that anyone with the right combination of anger and money can usurp and then bend the political system to their will. There are many doors to power in the US, which is the whole point. Oppressive countries are not organized that way.
  - mrangle 3y ago
    So Obama is "proof of democracy" (and I assume "not angry") and Trump wasn't elected but "usurped" power (from the every-man Neocons who haven't since stopped causing chaos and trying to jail him?) because he was "rich and angry". Tell me if I missed anything in this anti-democratic storybook narrative.
guyomes 3y ago
Another indicator is the rate of citizen un prisons. The laws on gun ownership doesn't prevent the US government to have high rate of citizens incarcerated [1]. On the other hand, US is a state of law, and in theory, US incarceration does not come from oppression but from justice and written laws [2]. Now even though gun ownership might be one way to garanty that US remains a state of law, it is not obvious that it is the only way. If US was not a state of law, I would not be comfortable that GAFAM companies gets their own armies, as in the funny dystopian novel Jenifer Government [3]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rechtsstaat [3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Government https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Government