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Comment by sasasassy

5 years ago

American citizens should be shot in the same circumstances any other citizens should be shot, like when all other reasonable countermeasures fail and they are posing a credible treat to other people's lives.

11 comments

sasasassy

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ashtonkem  5 years ago

Lethal force is occasionally necessary, and I agree it should be applied in as minimal as a way possible.

That’s pretty orthogonal to whether or not the political leader of the US should publicly say that looters should be shot.

dfxm12  5 years ago

like when all other reasonable countermeasures fail and they are posing a credible treat to other people's lives.

...neither of which is an outcome in this situation, and looting is not a credible treat to people's lives.

  • packetlost  5 years ago

    But arson is.

    • ashtonkem  5 years ago

      There are two different questions here, which are only tangentially related.

      First, are there circumstances in which a citizen could apply lethal force to protect life and limb? Obviously yes; shooting someone trying to light your house on fire is certainly something that is both plausible and plausibly legal.

      Second, is it appropriate for the political leader of a nation to imply that people committing a crime will be shot for it on the street? Not "we will deploy the national guard to provide safety and security to the citizens" but "looters will be shot". I think the answer here is obviously no, that is not appropriate.

      4 replies →

onemoresoop  5 years ago

There are better options than killing people. Even shooting legs is better than shooting to kill. I will never advocate violence on your own citizens because that creates a never ending cycle of violence and vendettas. It’s as stupid and fruitless as populist politics

  • AnIdiotOnTheNet  5 years ago

    > Even shooting legs is better than shooting to kill.

    No it isn't. Legs are hard to hit compared to center-mass, and the only reason you should be shooting at somebody is if you need to because they are an imminent threat; therefore you should be aiming for a part of the body that you have a higher probability of hitting and that, having been hit, has a higher probability of effectively stopping the threat.