Well if this actually is an empire maybe we should work harder on that towards a more democratic society?

Wouldn't past wars be an incentive to seek more peace? I don't think North Korea gets out much and they are very military oriented. Not sure the last confrontation they've had in recent decades.

Please watch this, everyone:

Horrible state of things. Particularly that screaming teenager thinking he knows anything about anything.

Andrew: "They [the NRA] say that high capacity rifles are the final line of defense against a tyrannical government."

Uvalde lady: "We are already facing a tyrannical government when we have things like this happening."

Bipartisan gun control legislation passed by the Senate

Writer Paul Auster on the violence endemic to American culture

“American society was built by religious fanatics who promoted armed struggle, conflict, war, violence, annihilation, and what we today would call genocide,” says Auster. He notes how the Declaration of Independence that the Continental Congress approved on July 4, 1776, announced the separation of 13 North American British colonies from Great Britain. The second paragraph states that all men are created equal, and they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. Namely: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Auster describes this bedrock credo on which the American republic was founded “as a hypocritical lie”. He has a point. Slavery, after all, was still legal at the time the words were written. “Violence, from the very beginning, was embedded in the whole American project,” says Auster. “The United States is an invented country, based on the premise of capitalism, where there is conflict, competition, and winners and losers.”

He then spends significant time and ink deconstructing the wording of the Second Amendment of the US Constitution. Passed in 1789, along with nine other amendments known as the Bill of Rights, it reads: “A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”

Auster says: “The Second Amendment is so confusingly worded that no one can really make sense of it. It seems to suggest that Americans have the right to set up militias. But it has nothing to do with individual ownership rights [of guns].”

Today, many Americans continue to interpret those words in different ways.

“Right now, there are tens of millions of diehard Second Amendment advocates who feel that owning guns is essential to the American way of life,” says Auster. “In fact, it serves no other purpose than to kill people. A gun is an instrument of destruction.”

https://www.smh.com.au/culture/books/america-built-by-religious-fanatics-who-promoted-armed-struggle-paul-auster-20230306-p5cpqm.html

Are you an Auster fan too?

I don't believe authors such as Paul Auster do a very good job of accounting for the level of violence present in the United States today by linking it to colonial era religious fanatics, slavery, and genocide. Those causes all had long-term and catastrophic consequences, so I am not discounting them. More recent developments also need to be considered.

One is the manufacture and sale of guns which has resulted in a glut of guns suitable for purposes ranging from squirrel hunting to near-warfare. Estimates vary, but there seem to be around 300 million guns in the US.

Two is the rhetoric surrounding guns. The NRA has not always been an organization promoting a rabid firearm fetish. The change to its present presentation occurred in the mid 1970s, when the NRA expanded its membership, quite purposively recruiting conservative voters.

The Second Amendment was for a long time a rather dull topic. Gun control and the 2nd Amendment, became a cause célèbre after 1977 when anti-gun-control NRA members took over the NRA at their annual convention in Cincinnati.

There have been periodic surges of violence in various countries, including the US. The late 1980s to mid 1990s saw such a surge in the US, then the rates declined -- and then in the past few years went back up. A quick and dirty summary would be rates peaked in 1972, 1992, and 2018 (give or take a year).

There are factors apparently accounting for some of the waxing and waning of violence. Various suggestions have been made. Here's a chart that reflects a possible contemporary influence:

Auster believes peace will not come to the US unless an honest conversation is had about the country’s violent and racist past. Right now, that doesn’t seem very likely though.

I am definitely in favor of Americans understanding the history of their country. I am not sure, though how this 'honest conversation' will change behavior.

That story is the first I'd heard of him, it appeared in my newsfeed.

In fairness that is a brief excerpt from an entire book, not yet published but highly relevant, I feel. I'm continually baffled by the American attitudes towards ownership of guns as a fundamental right. Why not poisons, explosives, torture instruments? I just don't see the rationale, other than it being a vicious circle - because so many others have guns, I need one also. I'm sure that's also why there are so many police shootings - they never know whether the guy they just pulled over in a traffic stop has a gun, so it's shoot first, ask questions later. In any case, I don't see any solution on the horizon, we all know that it's only a matter of time - and not much of it - until the next mass shooting death in America comes over the airwaves, and I don't see anything changing it.

Damned if I know why people believe in their guns more than they believe in Jesus.

But note, it's been 40+ years that the the NRA and conservatives have been grinding away on guns. And every mass shooting provides fresh justification for gun ownership to those already so inclined.

There is a devious activity going on; we just had an example of it in Northern Minnesota. This week the Itaska County Commissioners voted in favor of a non-binding resolution opposing any form of gun control. The resolution was sponsored by some conservatives, including the sheriff if I remember. This sort of resolution seems similar to attacks on libraries by conservatives. The primary object is less to get rid of a particular book like "Heather Has Two Mommies" but rather to find, collect, and animate their 'base'. As a side benefit they probably will get some of the books they don't like pulled.

The identification of gun ownership with appeals to Jesus is itself a particularly revolting aspect of American conservatism. Really signals a very deep and dangerous confusion as far as I can tell. It's diabolical.

Damned if I know why people believe in their guns more than they believe in Jesus.

Wait until someone invades Australia. Boomerangs won’t accomplish much. A defenceless populace is a servile one.

Didn't the Brits already invade Australia around 1788? Used it as a penal colony? Boomerangs didn't stop them, either.

On the other hand, China probably won't invade Australia with troops equipped with small arms. Against a shark what can a herring do? Sing out a Te Deum when when you see that ICBM and the party will be "come as you are".

They probably won’t invade with the US continuing to shoulder their defense burden. But should the US step aside, an unarmed populace will have to welcome their new overlords or hide in the outback.

That's the ticket! Appeal to fear and division. Just your kind of schtick.

The fear is not China invading Australia, but Taiwan, which then turns into a global nuclear confrontation. Gun ownership won't have any bearing on that either. It'll be fought by remote control.

American society was built by religious fanatics who promoted armed struggle, conflict, war, violence, annihilation, and what we today would call genocide

they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights. Namely: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Whether we like it or not, every society or country has been built with the use of violence and wars. The thought of the past was: "kill before you get killed" and it seems that in some states of America they maintain this thought so deeply.
You put USA as an example but all the American continent is violent itself. Just check our Honduras, El Salvador or Nicaragüa. They have never lived in a sense of "peace" or "calm" since they got the independence from the Spanish Kingdom.

It isn’t me who is denying you your fundamental right to defend yourself.

The fear is not China invading Australia, but Taiwan, which then turns into a global nuclear confrontation. Gun ownership won't have any bearing on that either. It'll be fought by remote control. — Wayfarer

Interesting concept -- Taiwan invading Australia, but why not? Will it be in the interests of the US to protect Oz from Taiwan with nukes? Don't know. Would you prefer PRC or Taiwan to be your invader and benevolent overlords?

If you are really very strongly against being invaded, then you might want to keep a gun handy to off yourself before the new management does it for you. .

Whether we like it or not, every society or country has been built with the use of violence and wars. — javi2541997

This is basically true. Just off hand, I can't think of any group that gave up their land willingly without a fight. There hasn't been any unoccupied territory on earth for the last 20,000 years, at least, so anybody who wanted to move their operations had to take land and resources away from somebody else. The taking of occupied land is generally a little more violent than a garden club plant swap. Somebody, maybe many somebodies, are going to end up dead, and the conquerors are not going to apologize.

When it comes to territorial acquisitions and mergers, humans just aren't very nice.

D’oh! Not Taiwan invading Australia! China invading Taiwan! :brow: That’s been a headline hypothetical in the local media the last two days, and it’s frighteningly plausible, with Australia being caught up in it as a US ally.

When it comes to territorial acquisitions and mergers, humans just aren't very nice. — BC

The actions and violence have become more sutil. Instead of deploying soldiers or bombing with planes, the "international" enterprises and organizations land in your territory and force you to live accordingly to them. We do not die but it is another type of violenece.
A good example could be how the African continent is now disputed between superpowers. None lands with violence but it is clear that the territory is been exploited by China, Russia, EU, etc...

he identification of gun ownership with appeals to Jesus is itself a particularly revolting aspect of American conservatism. Really signals a very deep and dangerous confusion as far as I can tell. It's diabolical. — Wayfarer

I hear you. I doubt that much of this is held in place by a deep reading of politics or scripture. It seems more emotional, a form of tribalism which has become embedded in cultural identity in some parts of the US. I wonder if it even properly counts as Christianity? It seems somehow too shallow and propagandistic.

there’s the possibility of Australia invading Taiwan. Then we might stand a chance of developing some sort of production capacity…

:lol: But the thought of going up against X million Taiwanese ninjas soldiers ought to give anyone pause (even the PRC).

A lot of what goes under the banner of Christianity in today's America is deeply aberrant.



although I have to believe that it's not all it is.

X million Taiwanese ninjas — Wayfarer

Ninja is a ancient warrior who comes from Japanese culture... it never existed in Chinese/Taiwanese history and army.

Sorry about that. Figure of speech connoting deadly warrior.

It is ok! we all are here to learn something new everyday. :sparkle:

It isn’t me who is denying you your fundamental right to defend yourself. — NOS4A2

No, it’s the govament. Speaking of which, they just forced Americans to be prisoners in their own homes for over a year, wear masks etc, and all the 393 million guns in the nation did nothing to stop it. Australia’s Covid response was similar in strictness. What needs to happen before the guns come out? Death camps?

D’oh! Not Taiwan invading Australia! China invading Taiwan! — Wayfarer

OK, I've tortured you long enough.

Tensions between the US and China with respect to Taiwan have been daily fare on the news here for some time. "Will they or won't they" invade? "Can they or can't they" defend themselves? The nuclear angle figures into it, but the nuclear angle with respect to Russia is more common.

Will we insert ourselves between China and Taiwan? Will China resort to nukes if we do? If we don't, how long can Taiwan hold out? And most importantly, what about Taiwan's chip factories? (That would be computer chips, not potato chips. Fortunately, the US is self-sufficient in the area of potato and corn chips.) High end computer chips are neither designed nor made in China -- most of that is done in Japan and Taiwan.