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Comment by mywittyname | Hacker News Reader

> Most people would be absolutely astounded how bold you can get with a safety vest and/or a clipboard, and how passive most people are to an obvious suspicious situation.

I don't think they'd be surprised at all.

What the hell am I supposed to do if I see someone stealing a bike or whatever? Stop them? Hell no, if they have tools then it's a good bet they have weapons. Call the cops? They don't care; recently they don't even pretend to care.

Pretty much all you can do is say, "knock it off" and maybe they stop (they won't).

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You have to hope a stubborn, but surprisingly fit, 60+ year old man is nearby to assert himself into the situation and tell the thief to bugger off.

Don't do this and don't let anyone else do this. Intervening in a crime in progress is likely to lead to immediate execution. Even police squads get shot at, and they are armed to the teeth and well trained.

That mentality is precisely what lets criminals gain the power to commit crime with impunity.

In any shithole society in which that's become the attitude, the solution is citizens becoming at least as brutal themselves.

That approach is going to get people killed.

If you're not ready, able and willing to whip out a pistol and instantly put two bullets right between the eyes of each one of those criminals, you're probably better off pulling out your phone and covertly dialing 911... After you have gotten as far away from those people as possible.

> the solution is citizens becoming at least as brutal themselves

Becoming a brutal, violent person capable of ending another human being's life is a long process. It's not a switch that people just flip. Especially civilized people from developed countries where it is likely they will go their entire lives without experiencing violence.

Even if they do manage it, they'll have to pay the price. There are professional soldiers out there who are traumatized by the lives they have taken. Normal citizens will have it that much worse... And that's if they don't screw it up and end up going to prison for excessive use of force which can easily turn self-defense into cold-blooded murder.

> In any shithole society

I'm brazilian. I live in exactly that kind of shithole society. You should see the hilariously violent liveleak videos this country produces. Way too many of them are the result of people trying to fight their way out of a robbery, or intervening in a crime in progress. I remember this particularly cartoonish video where a child is running away from something, pistol in hand, and some guy randomly decides to trip him up. He gets up, shoots the guy dead and resumes his escape as though absolutely nothing had just happened.

This is a country where the population is prone to brutally lynching criminals, by the way. Ironically, the drug traffickers are the most effective at it. They routinely dispense brutal violence against the lesser criminals who hurt their drug trade by scaring off potential customers. It's gotten to the point they have formed parallel governments, complete with laws, tribunals and taxes.

I get it. The sheer audacity of criminals is offensive and the impunity is truly soul crushing. This sense of impunity permeates the life of every brazilian. It feels like there's no justice. I'm just saying that if you aim to fight this impunity, you need a far more sophisticated approach than telling random bystanders to be "fit" and "stubborn". That sort of thing will accomplish nothing but the eventual deaths of well meaning people.

Yes I assumed you were Brazilian, which is where most of the "off duty cop" shooting videos come from - sounds like a Mad Max state. But in other countries, people don't get executed for standing up to crooks.

Of course, if you ever get a Bukele in power all the leftists will be out in force crying about the poor criminal's human rights etc - always a good reminder that these situations are intentionally inflicted from above.

> But in other countries, people don't get executed for standing up to crooks.

That belief will get people killed. A simple web search yields numerous results. For instance:

https://www.foxnews.com/us/home-depot-worker-fatally-shot-ca...

> if you ever get a Bukele in power all the leftists will be out in force crying about the poor criminal's human rights etc

Current president of Brazil literally makes excuses for them. "I'm so tired of watching people die just because they robbed a phone", he says. "It was just to buy some beer", as though crime was an actual legitimate profession. That is the absolute state of this country. Mad Max would be an improvement over this shithole. In the Mad Max universe it's literally kill or be killed but you don't have leftists worshipping the criminals and shitting all over the "fascist" police defending them.

Police is powerless to stop it. If they try, they are tried and imprisoned by the same government that hired them to do it. It is already common knowledge that military police is one of the worst career choices you can make. The country is losing police officers at a rate of thousands per year. Not enough people are signing up for this shit. Meanwhile, drug gangs dominate over a quarter of our territory. The current speculation is that they finance judges and politicians. In other words, it is not only possible but probable that this is a literal narcostate.

At some point, it becomes war. The criminals are sufficiently organized that they should be treated as enemy combatants and gunned down on sight. Trump ordering US ships to nuke drug boats out of existence is the correct course of action. The only problem is the "civilized" people who cry about it instead of thanking him for his service and thanking god they have people willing to commit extreme violence against others in order to protect them from the evils of this world. That is a luxury I would love to have myself. Instead I live in a extremely leftist country where drug traffickers spray paint threats on people's homes, giving them 24 hours to leave on pain of death.

Sadly the power of drug gangs in Latin America and Brazil can be traced as much to the war on drugs itself as the lack of war on drugs.

I do believe your assertion is correct that literal war would probably be better than the status quo, but regulating powerful drugs as basically "sell to adults and it needs to meet some sort of purity standard" would bring the drug trafficking portion of gangs into looking more like Petrobas than Comando Vermelho.

As a doctor I can't support full legalization of drugs. Nobody who's seen up close what opioid addiction does to a person ever could. It's not even a question of allowing people to ruin their own lives. The drugs themselves absolutely cause crime all on their own. Many violent robberies are perpetrated by people whose reward systems are so warped by drugs they'd sell their own mother for their next dose. I had one such person as one of my neighbors for decades.

I'll admit I'm unable to fully calculate the total devastation between the three of

(1) Absolute war against drug traffickers

(2) Full legalization

(3) status quo

I'd rank (3) as the absolute worst. I don't see (1) nor (2) as avoiding crime and infliction upon innocents, though, rather choosing which lesser poison to pick.

I claim (1) is the only possible response. We're already at war, and innocents are already dying.

I claim that the drug gangs have launched a stealthy secession. They have gotten sufficiently organized that they have laws, tribunals, taxes and territory. Is gang territory really brazilian territory? I don't think so. In such areas police is executed on sight, like enemy combatants. The brazilian government is not really there guaranteeing any of your so called rights. So are you really a brazilian citizen if you live in gang territory? Don't think so. These drug gangs have formed a government so barbarous they kill you if you don't pay your taxes.

When São Paulo tried to secede last century, war was declared and they were massacred. So why are these gangs tolerated? It's just a completely stupid status quo. This government needs to recognize the gravity of the situation and react accordingly. Instead the government and the gangs are merging into one.

I'm intrigued by your take, and it is quite convincing.

What are the effects you predict would happen if drugs were legalized, therefore eliminating most of the profits of drug traffickers, and simultaneously declaring war on the groups controlling seceded territory?

What's your calculus on the over under of fighting a war against drug-funded vs non-funded drug traffickers? I'm willing to take at face that they are de facto seceded and have already started a war, but I don't see how it can exclude (2) since even if you defeated them there would still be yet the same underlying incentives and the seceding drug traffickers could emerge again.

Legalization depends on the drug. We could certainly afford to be more lax than we are now. We could legalize and control the use of many drugs. Certainly not all. Drugs like fentanyl cannot be allowed to circulate freely. Even if we completely ignore the safety of the individual, the safety of society as a whole is threatened by such drugs.

Legalization will wipe out the drug gang operations due to simple economics. I don't think criminals can compete with actual pharmaceutical laboratories operating in the clear. Drugs would be cheaper and higher quality. In fact I seriously doubt drug gangs would support legalization of drugs. It would destroy their ridiculously high profitability. Their prices would be squeezed. They'd have to compete on quality and price. They wouldn't be able to eliminate the competition, impose cartels and control prices. Drug companies get rich due to patents which are government-granted monopolies, once they expire it's a literal race to the bottom, you actually need regulation in order to protect consumers. Some drugs actually disappear from the market because they are too cheap to be profitable.

Drug gangs are the career path of the favela denizens. Drug operations have lots of "employees" and they pay ridiculously well. Wiping them out via economic or military means will also wipe out all of those "jobs". It will do nothing to solve the underlying problem of a poor and disenfranchised people forgotten by society. They're likely to turn to other forms of crime if society doesn't integrate them, and it probably won't.

The hope is that whatever criminal activity they turn to will not be as profitable as the drug trade. Robbery isn't that big a problem in the grand scheme of things, drug gangs moving billions and billions of dollars absolutely is. All wars come down to money. Make enough money and you can have better equipment than police, militaries. You can raise armies, just like the middle ages. You can hire actual professional soldiers to train your men. Crime that's too profitable is literally a matter of war. Common criminals are a thorn on our side but in the grand scheme of things they are mere nuisances. Well-funded criminals are an existential threat for civilized society.

War on these groups would require enormous political capital. Television networks would probably have to spend years manufacturing consent for it. The fact is left has infiltrated the entire country and they practically worship these "victims of society". Literally days ago we were forced to listen to our president say that drug traffickers are victims of their consumers. I have no idea what it takes to reverse this sort of brainwashing but whatever it is we'll need lots of it.

If by some miracle the military is deployed against the drug gangs, the gangs will be routed. It's happened before and will happen again. Drug gangs do not have the training, the discipline, the sheer organization required to stand up to actual armed forces. Even our pathetic military has managed to prevail against them. It's the politicians who get in the way. There's no point in "pacifying" an area and then retreating from it, thereby allowing the enemy to occupy it again.

Find a way out then man.

Believe me, there are a large number of countries where, if someone was shot for standing up to a crime, it would be national news for months. Not in the Americas, obviously, but they exist.

The drug war is the stupidest thing humans have ever done. It literally fuels the criminals, and even entire criminal states like north Korea. State illegalisaion (mostly the US) of drugs is to put guns right into the hands of gangs and create competing states. Drugs should both be 100% legal - so they cost the same as sugar, gutting the money that empowers the gangs - and simultaneously drug users should be pushed to the edges of society with wide open discrimination.

How did we come to this as a society.

Anarcho-tyranny. In places like Brazil or California, thief is armed at will with ease, person defending themselves instead have to pass licensing and background check which is difficult for poor people or those convicted of BS crimes like possessing a pot plant 20 years ago when they lived in Texas.

Thief only faces lukewarm prospects at prosecution, and moves around from address to address, and stranger-on-stranger homicide conviction rate in places like Chicago well below 50%. Honest citizen has mortgage, child in school ,and a day job, very easy for police to fuck with them if they dare fight back, which makes criminals even more violent and bold as they rely on many of them overwhelming the tiny minority that will fight back.

Yeah I know, but how did we collectively decided to be in this situation? Aliens didn't impose this bs on us, we voted and accepted it somehow.

Lack of violence.

All of civilization exists due to the threat of violence. There's no need to negotiate peacefully when you can just take what you want. It's the violence that makes it happen. Negotiate, because if you don't there's no telling who's gonna be left standing.

If people are breaking locks and stealing property in plain sight right in front of other people, it's because they think society has become so soft they won't do anything about it.

And frankly, the average person won't. They'll probably just stand there shocked at the event unfolding before them. Or they'll try to "stand up" to the criminal, only to end up insulting his masculinity or something, thereby getting themselves killed for the insult. Yes, criminals kill people who disrespect them.

If you're gonna do this, you have to be prepared to use lethal force against another human being. The vast majority of people are not. They're better off calling the cops, whose entire purpose is to be that person.

> If you're gonna do this, you have to be prepared to use lethal force against another human being.

Many people, me included, would gladly do that, if they were allowed to. The problem is that when dust settle, the criminal will remain a criminal with one more record in his file, but the whole legal system will steamroll me if I don't precisely calculate force in split second and apply 3N more than absolute necessary minimum.

Here in Canada there were cases when people defended themselves and ended up in legal kafkaesque hell, imposed by country. Even after acquitted of all charges, they would spend lifetime savings, lose jobs and actually have to rebuilt their lives from almost zero.

We voted for all of this and I don't understand how it happened. Aliens dispersed something so we all became that stupid?

> Many people, me included, would gladly do that, if they were allowed to.

Doubt. Many people certainly think they would. In a real situation, they'd hesitate.

I don't even mean that in a disrespectful way. Taking lives traumatizes professional soldiers. It has enormous psychological costs. If you do it, you will live with it until the end of your days.

I'm not speaking out against guns and self-defense either. Better to be traumatized than dead. Weapons are a requirement for basic human dignity. Just pointing out the fact that it's not that simple.

> Here in Canada there were cases when people defended themselves and ended up in legal kafkaesque hell, imposed by country.

My country is the same. The absurdities produced by the "justice" system are maddening.

I remember one case where a person had his house burglarized dozens of times. The "justice" system didn't do shit about it. He got so fed up he booby trapped his own home and killed the criminal when he tried to victimize him again. Suddenly police, prosecutors and judges found the will to act and vigorously condemned him for cold blooded murder. It's the kind of thing that makes me wish a meteor would strike this country and reset it back to the stone age.

As for why it happens... I've thought about it for way too long and I don't have a definitive answer for you. I think it's because people want to prevent the abyss from gazing into them as they combat the darkness. My conclusion is that we should have some very dark people of our own, pointed right at the abyss, perpetually staring it down into submission.

I fought in the Syrian Civil War (with the YPG) and the effects on the ISIS enemy has not bothered me a single day of my life. This is over a decade ago and I've never lost a single second of sleep over it. In fact I often dream about going back and fucking them over even more, as it was one of the happiest moments of my life, even though like 10%+ of the people I was with ended up dead.

The tracer rounds flying at the enemy at night, absolutely exquisite, brings a joy like the 4th of July.

Civilization depends on people like you in order to continue existing. It's definitely not a universal trait.

Your characterization of Brazil leads me to believe that "people like me" would be better off just living in the favela and joining a gang, as at least then you could have some chance to defend yourself and the government would not be able to enforce their anarcho-tyranny. Which sucks, but leaves me wondering if they're even acting irrationally.

I suspect, somewhere in brazil, there is a group of people that have adopted the practices of the drug traffickers of soft secession, but actually do it for a righteous cause, and are getting away with it, as long as they are not too noisy about it. They have learned the tactics work, and rather than trying a seemingly futile effort to steer the government in their favor they ultimately likely came to the same conclusions as the drug traffickers as to how to gain control of their community and perhaps even their own lives.

Sad part is... You probably would be better off joining a gang. We'd all probably be better off. They just keep winning. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tempted to just give up and become a criminal myself instead of insisting on this upstanding-citizen-in-corrupt-shithole life. My father didn't raise me to be a criminal and sometimes I curse that fact.

Rio de Janeiro is in a state akin to civil war literally right now. Apparently the drug gangs have discovered drones. They're using drones to drop grenades on top of each other and on top of police. Nearly a hundred dead as of right now.

Check out this war zone:

https://www.cnnbrasil.com.br/nacional/sudeste/rj/operacao-no...

I don't even know what to say anymore. I'm just... Tired.

I have nothing useful to add, but just wanted to say that I appreciated your insight through all your comments in this thread. Best of luck to you!

Sure, don't get yourself hurt, but also don't live in irrational fear. Intervening in a crime in progress has never led to my execution, so it seems that likely is the wrong assessment of chance.

I have stopped bike thieves, car break-ins, and harassment in multiple cities in North America. I have stopped a racist situation escalating into an attack on a subway in Rotterdam, and stopped a pickpocket in Barcelona. I have shooed away people clearly up to no good in Central and South America. Certainly there was the possibility of violence, but the worst of it in reality was criminals cussing at me as they retreated.

If you don't feel comfortable with direct confrontation, something as simple as yelling "I already called the cops" has worked, or you know, actually calling the cops is an option.

I'm well aware that there are parts of the world where intervening will get you into trouble (and have been in situations where I have held back), but I also believe pretty strongly that doing the right thing is a virtuous feedback loop, and the risks do not outweigh the benefits.

I don't want to live in a world where good people won't do the right thing out of fear. So I choose not to live in that world by being a good person that does the right thing.

> I'm well aware that there are parts of the world where intervening will get you into trouble (and have been in situations where I have held back)

You clearly have more street smarts than the average person. The average person doesn't know when to hold back. They will say and do dumb things, and they will be killed.

There are examples right there in your comment.

> the worst of it in reality was criminals cussing at me as they retreated

You allowed them to leave even though they were insulting you, thereby avoiding violence.

Plenty of people out there who would do the opposite of what you did: they'd go out of their way to insult and humiliate the criminals as they were leaving. "Teach them a lesson", as they say. This can easily escalate the situation into lethal force.

If you insult a man in front of his peers, tell him he's a pussy right in front of his friends, you almost leave him no choice but to come back and escalate just to prove you wrong. It seems obvious but there's plenty of people out there who have died over disrespect.

> something as simple as yelling "I already called the cops"

You were smart enough to back up your threat before confronting the criminals.

Plenty of people out there who threaten the criminal with the 911 call itself. "Stop or I'll call the cops". Not only is it a direct challenge to the criminal, it also provides them with the solution to their problem: kill the guy and he won't call the cops.

It all seems obvious when we're academically discussing this stuff here but in a rapidly escalating, potentially violent situation where emotions and adrenaline are running high, people will do and say all kinds of stupid shit. And they are going to die for it.

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