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DC seems to have more murders than the netherlands each year despite being 25 times smaller. I guess what one considers safe is very subjective.

anigbrowl 1y ago
Ah, but you're not free in the Netherlands because you don't have a second amendment. /s
- runsWphotons 1y ago
  DC has incredibly strict gun laws. I doubt many of the weapons used in crimes are legal. I don't think you will be truly any less free having national guard soldiers walking around. Actually seems better than the usual dystopian tech solutions people come up with. Maybe they will try it for thirty days and people will like it.
  - anigbrowl 1y ago
    DC isn't an island. It's super easy for people in the region to get hold of guns, it's just that they'll be in a lot of trouble if they get caught actually doing crime in DC with a gun. The question of whether guns used in crime are legal or not seems moot to me, they are equally deadly if misused.
    - gottorf 1y ago
      > it's just that they'll be in a lot of trouble if they get caught actually doing crime in DC with a gun Actually, the whole issue is that this is not true! Statistically speaking, the average crime in DC, whether involving a gun or not, goes uncaught, unresolved, and ultimately unpunished.
    - runsWphotons 1y ago
      How is this different from the netherlands?
      - jacquesm 1y ago
        It's so different that for as long as I've lived here I have seen a gun maybe a handful of times, the vast majority of those were guns holstered on the hips of police on patrol (and not even a single time in their hands) and a gun that a private owner was maintaining who uses it exclusively to shoot at a range. Other than that, no guns here, at all.
        runsWphotons 1y ago
        No, I think the answer is that is only different in that Americans in DC are more criminal. Both places have strict gun laws with licensing requirements. In both places you can get illegal guns, and these are the ones used in crime if a gun is used, otherwise it will be an illegal knife. However in the Netherlands the laws are followed and/or policed better. Maybe now in DC the laws will be enforced better too, and maybe Americans just need a little more show of police force to behave. I predict that few people lose any liberty and that this experiment reduces certain crimes (like street murder, assaults, random robberies/muggings) a lot.
        rkomorn 1y ago
        > maybe Americans just need a little more show of police force to behave I say this as someone who's split his life between the US (on both coasts) and Europe: the US's police forces are far more visible, and employ far more force, than in Europe. "More" isn't going to change anything.
        runsWphotons 1y ago
        Is it really? It is not hard to go the hague and see gendarmerie. I see police all over Europe when I go. If they apply less force, it may be because the population is less criminal, or perhaps they get better people into their forces. I think Europeans have way more regulations that are enforced. The claim that "more" won't change anything is empirical. Let's come back in a few months and see if DC is safer or not--I will admit if I was wrong. Again, I think this is an interesting solution because it is actually less invasive than all the tech solutions to just have guys on the street who watch and maybe come up and talk to you and then forget about it. If you are just going about your day peacefully, are you going to lose anything here? We seem to have gotten a surveillance state with cameras and sensors (and censors) everywhere that somehow doesn't police easily solvable/preventable crime. If I thought there was some big civil liberties tradeoff I might think differently, but it seems like we lost those while still having to buy our deodorant from behind locked cabinets and occasionally getting shot by some guy with ten priors. The complaints and protests that this goes against civil liberties has just started to ring hollow because there are few visible serious efforts to protest the real abuses of civil liberties which mostly come from tech and the surveillance economy. Somehow the energy is directed against guys in uniform standing around making sure the street doesn't get turned into a drag race.
UncleMeat 1y ago
Ah yes the famous police state of the netherlands. "We have higher crime rates than nordic countries so therefore we must have more and more and more militarized police" is not exactly my idea of reasoned thinking.
- runsWphotons 1y ago
  Why should I live in a more dangerous society than the Netherlands (which isn't "nordic")? Or Australia? I fit in those places fine. Why can't we have that at home? Why is this level of crime acceptable just because it is lower than 1980? What liberty do I give up by having some guardsmen standing around?
  - cthalupa 1y ago
    His point is that the crime rate being lower in these places does not happen due to them having militarized police, so assuming that militarized police in general, much less literally using the military for policing will drop the crime rate doesn't track.
    - runsWphotons 1y ago
      You can see my comment below for some facts about the Netherlands. They do, literally, have a militarized police (the gendarmerie) which has civilian duties while operating under the defense ministry (and having military duties as well). They operate at airports, do border control, protect state assets (especially in capitol), do crowd control at major events, contain riots etc. You will see them if you go and even try to look. Their normal police is very similar to America's in number and capability. They may be trained better, which seems like an argument for better training. I have the opposite hypothesis: I think more police, even from the NG, will help. I think if our society is more criminal, for whatever reasons, it should be policed more. I do not see any good arguments for how having a few hundred NG deployed will strip me of any important liberty, and I think it is much better than tech solutions in that regard. We now have a test case, and we can come back and see.

anigbrowl 1y ago

Ah, but you're not free in the Netherlands because you don't have a second amendment. /s

runsWphotons 1y ago
DC has incredibly strict gun laws. I doubt many of the weapons used in crimes are legal. I don't think you will be truly any less free having national guard soldiers walking around. Actually seems better than the usual dystopian tech solutions people come up with. Maybe they will try it for thirty days and people will like it.
- anigbrowl 1y ago
  DC isn't an island. It's super easy for people in the region to get hold of guns, it's just that they'll be in a lot of trouble if they get caught actually doing crime in DC with a gun. The question of whether guns used in crime are legal or not seems moot to me, they are equally deadly if misused.
  - gottorf 1y ago
    > it's just that they'll be in a lot of trouble if they get caught actually doing crime in DC with a gun Actually, the whole issue is that this is not true! Statistically speaking, the average crime in DC, whether involving a gun or not, goes uncaught, unresolved, and ultimately unpunished.
  - runsWphotons 1y ago
    How is this different from the netherlands?
    - jacquesm 1y ago
      It's so different that for as long as I've lived here I have seen a gun maybe a handful of times, the vast majority of those were guns holstered on the hips of police on patrol (and not even a single time in their hands) and a gun that a private owner was maintaining who uses it exclusively to shoot at a range. Other than that, no guns here, at all.
      - runsWphotons 1y ago
        No, I think the answer is that is only different in that Americans in DC are more criminal. Both places have strict gun laws with licensing requirements. In both places you can get illegal guns, and these are the ones used in crime if a gun is used, otherwise it will be an illegal knife. However in the Netherlands the laws are followed and/or policed better. Maybe now in DC the laws will be enforced better too, and maybe Americans just need a little more show of police force to behave. I predict that few people lose any liberty and that this experiment reduces certain crimes (like street murder, assaults, random robberies/muggings) a lot.
        rkomorn 1y ago
        > maybe Americans just need a little more show of police force to behave I say this as someone who's split his life between the US (on both coasts) and Europe: the US's police forces are far more visible, and employ far more force, than in Europe. "More" isn't going to change anything.
        runsWphotons 1y ago
        Is it really? It is not hard to go the hague and see gendarmerie. I see police all over Europe when I go. If they apply less force, it may be because the population is less criminal, or perhaps they get better people into their forces. I think Europeans have way more regulations that are enforced. The claim that "more" won't change anything is empirical. Let's come back in a few months and see if DC is safer or not--I will admit if I was wrong. Again, I think this is an interesting solution because it is actually less invasive than all the tech solutions to just have guys on the street who watch and maybe come up and talk to you and then forget about it. If you are just going about your day peacefully, are you going to lose anything here? We seem to have gotten a surveillance state with cameras and sensors (and censors) everywhere that somehow doesn't police easily solvable/preventable crime. If I thought there was some big civil liberties tradeoff I might think differently, but it seems like we lost those while still having to buy our deodorant from behind locked cabinets and occasionally getting shot by some guy with ten priors. The complaints and protests that this goes against civil liberties has just started to ring hollow because there are few visible serious efforts to protest the real abuses of civil liberties which mostly come from tech and the surveillance economy. Somehow the energy is directed against guys in uniform standing around making sure the street doesn't get turned into a drag race.

UncleMeat 1y ago

Ah yes the famous police state of the netherlands. "We have higher crime rates than nordic countries so therefore we must have more and more and more militarized police" is not exactly my idea of reasoned thinking.

runsWphotons 1y ago
Why should I live in a more dangerous society than the Netherlands (which isn't "nordic")? Or Australia? I fit in those places fine. Why can't we have that at home? Why is this level of crime acceptable just because it is lower than 1980? What liberty do I give up by having some guardsmen standing around?
- cthalupa 1y ago
  His point is that the crime rate being lower in these places does not happen due to them having militarized police, so assuming that militarized police in general, much less literally using the military for policing will drop the crime rate doesn't track.
  - runsWphotons 1y ago
    You can see my comment below for some facts about the Netherlands. They do, literally, have a militarized police (the gendarmerie) which has civilian duties while operating under the defense ministry (and having military duties as well). They operate at airports, do border control, protect state assets (especially in capitol), do crowd control at major events, contain riots etc. You will see them if you go and even try to look. Their normal police is very similar to America's in number and capability. They may be trained better, which seems like an argument for better training. I have the opposite hypothesis: I think more police, even from the NG, will help. I think if our society is more criminal, for whatever reasons, it should be policed more. I do not see any good arguments for how having a few hundred NG deployed will strip me of any important liberty, and I think it is much better than tech solutions in that regard. We now have a test case, and we can come back and see.