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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   25806 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of August 4, 2025

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general disarmament

I feel though that the kind of people who will not attempt to get illegal guns because they're more trouble than they're worth are the kind of people that are peaceful enough that they could be trusted with them anyway.

In europe it's quite common even for terrorists and other hard criminals to use knifes simply bc guns are just too hard to get for them. And that's despite hunting licences being available!

At least in the case of terrorists specifically, they are demonstrably vulnerable to copycat contagions, and stabbings are the current contagion in Europe. So that particular point I would observe is a little bit faulty.

I don't think that follows. Terrorists clearly choose to copy based on a combination of lethality and availability, as seen by the proliferation of car-based attacks since the Nice truck attack. Easier gun availability would mean more initial gun-based attacks, and a higher transmission likelihood for following copycats.

I have a hard time believing that if there was demand bringing guns into european countries would be that difficult, considering how big the external frontiers of the EU are and how open the internal ones are, and considering how drugs make it there, illegal refugees make it there, etc...

I think that for the most part, there is little demand because local hard criminals are still civilized enough to understand deadly shootouts are not worth the hassle because they bring down a lot more heat on them. North American street gangs are not civilized; they believe shootouts are cool. As for terrorists, if you distinguish mental health cases (random nutjob just starts stabbin') from organized terrorist cells, I think the latter are usually packing (and packing military equipment).

You don't even need the if here. You can already get guns provided you're sufficiently functional, patient and have the right connections. AFAIK the easiest way is generally getting your hands on old soviet stock from eastern Europe.

But these conditionals matter, because the average terrorist and hard criminal does not have these properties. People still get caught before they can do anything because they fell for obvious honeypots on silk-road equivalents. This is also why the large-scale entry of organized crimes into Europe is so dangerous; Not only do at least some of the members have these properties and so can organize guns for the rest of the members, while there at it they can also buy more stock that they can sell further locally, making it much easier to get a gun.

I think the latter are usually packing (and packing military equipment).

by that definition nearly no terrorist attacks in Europe were done by terrorists

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