Übergeek 바둑이: Yeah you're right. forget the guns. Burning down entire stores and damaging other property and beating the crap out of innocent bystanders is so much better. Heck, one guy in the UK ran over three pepole in his car killing all three of them! That's just ONE car and ONE hit. No gun can do that.

I'll bet those three dead guy would have like to have had a gun to protect themselves.

Artful Dodger:

> I'll bet those three dead guy would have like to have had a gun to protect themselves.

Dont' get me wrong. I entirely agree that people have a right to protect themselves. The point I was trying to make is that gun manufacturers and sellers make a huge profit. Nobody even talks about how violence drives their profits. All i was pointing too was that guns would not be a problem if they didn't get manufactured in the first place. Of course it is naive to think weapons manufacture will ever end. We will kill each other with guns as long as human beings are animals, or worse than animals.

To make another point, this is something I wrote in a game I am playing with Welsh Rugby Fan. It had to do with my comment that curfews and shooting on sight were used by the Nazis.

"Oh, I entirely agree. Specially when the rioting accomplishes nothing. There is such a thing as valid political protest and riots that lead to political change for the better. These rioters of today are just hooligans bent on theft and destruction. They have no ideological or political objectives. These riots are just like the movie Harry Brown. "In Ireland the people had a cause, but these animals do it just for fun." A few years later we see exactly the same kind of destructive behaviour. Just for fun. Rebels without a cause or ideology.

As for me, I think shooting accomplishes little. I think forced labour teaches people a lot. Once captured, they should be made to work digging in construction sites until they pay for the damage they have done. At this point I can say "Stalin tried that one!"

There is one thing I am not liberal about and that is crime punishment. I believe in gulags and chain gangs digging roadside trenches. I believe in the death penalty and I think it is underused. I also think prisoners should pay their own keep, instead of having taxpayers house them and feed them. Hence the forced labour comment. I think shooting the rioters accomplishes little, but capturing them and having them work to rebuild the burned buildings and compensate the victims sounds good to me. This is the one thing in which my left wing morals leave me. I think it is a good thing I have no political power!

Übergeek 바둑이: You have my vote

Übergeek 바둑이: The violent actions of the have-not's against the have's, go back to Cain and Abel, rioting in the UK started long before Margret Thatcher, It's a moral fault, not a political fault

Vikings: We can't blame *cough* "Cain and Abel" for what is happening today. It's neither a moral or political fault.. but both.

Some of the areas are being hard hit by cuts, yet we see politicians, police, bankers, corporations all sc**wing us over. Years of bad policies that have favoured those with money.. and thanks to Maggie, house prices gone through the roof despite the recession due to gazumping being practised and allowed to be practised under her government.

Plus other policies that prevented the Local councils investing money they did gain from the sell off of council property back into more housing... leading to a political good year in terms of 'it looks good' but bad long term levels of social housing.

Vikings:

> The violent actions of the have-not's against the have's, go back to Cain and Abel, rioting in the UK started long before Margret Thatcher, It's a moral fault, not a political fault

As always, it is not as simple as it looks. After WWII the UK had to rebuild its economy. As the economy recovered many people were left behind while the middle class did better than ever. When Margaret Tatcher cfame into power the world was in the grip of the Cold War. Western countries replied to the centrally-planned economy of the Soviet Union with supply-side economics (Reaganomics, trickle down economics or whatever it might be called). Supply side economics was very good at maximizing the profits of big corporations, but it slowly eroded purchasing power from the lower segments of society. Then the early 1990s saw the worst recession since the Great Depression and unemployment increased not only in the UK but in the entire western world.

As the new technologies emerged over the last 20 years a new wave of consumer goods hit the markets and the low-income working classes have struggled to keep up with the perceived need to buy those products. We also have had changes in how children are exposed to violence and sex. The Internet, Video games and movies have desensitized youth to violence.

The end of the Cold War also left an ideological void. In the past the working classes were guided by communist principles such as better working conditions, income equality, worker's rights, etc. Marxism (whether we like it or not) gave the working class an ideological compass. The fall of the Soviet Union meant that communism was discredited as an ideology. The working class lost a viable and valid channel for social discontent. Consumerism was sold as a cure for social and income inequality. As long as the working class has enough money for Walmart and Macdonalds then the working class has "nothing: to complain about.

The riots then are fuelled by several factors:

- A culture of desensitization to violence and sexual objectification
- Income inequality (a perception of social disadvantage) and social inequality (a perception of racism)
- A lack of an outlet for social discontent
- A lack of ideological compass in the working class
- Consumerism and the inability of the poor to fully partake in it
- Unemployment among youths and immigrants

I am sure there are other factors too. Regardless of the factors involved, wanton anarchy is never justified. Protests are supposed to be constructive processes that lead to positive social change. These riots lead to nothing but a radicalization in thinking that justifies oppressive measures (think guns, water cannons, mass arrests, etc.) These riots are destructive at every level. Nothing good can come out of this.

Übergeek 바둑이:
You are right that nothing good can come out of it, but you also prove my point, it is all about morrals. These people have all the time in the world to be destructive and blame others just like your examples, but if you study rich or well off people today, you would find out that getting there is very obtainable, and coming up with a plan to do so is easy, the only hard part is the fact that they would have to SPEND THEIR TIME WORKING ON IT JUST LIKE THE WELL OFF PEOPLE DO.
If a person choosed to get a simple blue collar job, they have no one else but themselves to blame for their plight in life, and before you pull the "what about the dissadvantaged" card, I am not talking about them, You don't see one dissavantaged person in those protest, just people who think they should be "GIVEN" more.

Vikings: That depends on what they want to achieve. Being the CEO of a big multinational can be beyond reach of what most call "The American Dream".

"If a person choosed to get a simple blue collar job, they have no one else but themselves to blame for their plight in life"

Simple blue collar... our houses are dependant on blue collar skills. I know guys who can't do school, but they can do a mean wall.

(V): Thanks, you proved my point, I am talking about thinking like a rich person by figuring out how to make money, and you are talking about thinking like a poor person does by describing how a labor job is so noble that someone should give them more, and by making excuses like I cant do school, I'm not talking about the mentally challenged

Vikings: Nope. Some people do find though money is not the only richness (Jesus for example) ... like the guys who are just happy doing a job that brings them great satisfaction as it what they want to do.

"and by making excuses like I cant do school, I'm not talking about the mentally challenged"

.. Only mentally challenged can't do school!!?? I find that somewhat lacking in depth.

"Either brick layers or dry wallers (which ever you are talking about) can easily make $100,000 a year, I know examples of both that do"

Yes I know people who do as well.. but you said.... "person choosed to get a simple blue collar job"... These jobs might not be "noble" but they are essential to our modern world.

(V): you prove my point again, people choose their plight in life, and these are the the people that are whining about the rich, their choice

Vikings: ... Plight... is being happy a plight??

I think you've missed much of my meaning.

(V): choosing your career is and therefore your financial situation is

Vikings: what?

Übergeek 바둑이: I don't agree that violence is the driving force behind their profits. Most people who own guns don't ever use them except at the firing range. Violence may be a social factor but so what? People get stabbed all the time too. But certainly violence isn't the driving force behind the sale of knives.

Here's a fact often overlooked. Just remember: dead is dead

"According to Statistics, Facts and Quotes there were 30,694 gun-related deaths in the US in 2005 vs Fatal Car Accident, Crash Statistics: Stats Auto, Traffic, Car, Collision, Traffic showing 43,443 vehicular fatalties that same year. So guns overall are about 71% as deadly as vehicles in the US."

We value our freedoms in the US. I've lots of friends with guns and they've never shot anyone. It's a constitutional right to own a gun. It should stay that way.

Übergeek 바둑이: We've had protests here over different issues, including people getting killed by police for menacing, but nothing like the reaction in the UK. I suspect that something other than one mans death (whether justified or not) is at work.. some kind of tension has obviously been brewing for some time. btw are you sure about that 30% gun ownership in the US? I didn't see Artful dispute that, so I suppose it could be true. I was always more afraid of my wifes impressive stash of kitchen knives than I ever was over some armed bandits breaking in.. maybe they knew about her knives. I don't know.

Iamon lyme:

> some kind of tension has obviously been brewing for some time.

Divisions of social class, income inequality, unemployment among youth and harship in the immigrant community are a legacy tht goes back to the Margaret Tatcher years, and even earlier. This is a problem that has been in the making for decades. People in the the riot areas of the UK (as in most other places in the world) feel that they can effect no political change through the electoral system. Since communism died the wroking class has no ideological compass. instead of protesting for legitimate reasons, they are rioting and looting to get what the middle class has. This is a side effect of anticommunism. Anticommunism took the ideology out of social protest, and left in its wake an ideological void. Now people don't protest about issues that matter and there is no real avenue for social discontent.


> btw are you sure about that 30% gun ownership in the US?

In answer to your question:

"In 1995, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms estimated that the number of firearms available in the US was 223 million. About 25% of the adults in the United States personally own a gun, the vast majority of them men. About half of the adult U.S. population lived in households with guns. Less than half of gun owners say that the primary reason they own a gun is for self-protection against crime, reflecting a popularity of hunting and sport-shooting among gun owners."

That was 1995. After 9-11 gun possession increased since many people bought firearms to protect themselves from terrorism.

300 million people. 223 million firearms. It is a staggering statistic.

Übergeek 바둑이: "..rioting and looting to get what the middle class has.. is a side effect of anticommunism."

Are you sure about that? I was under the impression communism is fueled by resentment over what the middle and upper classes have. Without the coveting of what others have there is no motivation to 'divide the spoils'. Communism can only work when a small group of people are able to convince a majority that they are entitled to what someone else has worked for.

I'm not surprised by the 30% gun ownership figure, but it does sound a little misleading. I would expect a higher percentage in rural communities where a police response would not be as quick. That makes sense. But still I have to wonder how they arrived at what implies a nearly one out three gun ownership figure. It seems like an unusually high number. btw, one of the reasons we have a constituional right to own a weapon is to make sure that if our government ever does become totalitarian (the founding fathers were looking ahead) the average citizen would be able to protect himself against government sanctioned muggers.