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Comment by victor9000 | Hacker News Reader

It was just a little baby GTA

My state recently passed a law (similar to Texas') which allows people to defend with lethal force certain property (beyond just their vehicle, which was already allowed).

Tennessee-wide, it goes into effect July 1st – and is long-overdue. I live in a working-class neighborhood and we do whatever we can to keep the trouble elsewhere (i.e. not here). Wish guns didn't exist, but until they don't stay safe thugz.

What's your hypothesis on why Texas has a much higher auto theft rate than Tennessee, given that they long had the policy you seem to believe is a remedy?

Eh, texas gets all that borderly goodness the liberal north dishes out so freely, but avoids for itself ?

I'm just wondering why this Wild West stuff seems to be neither effective, since Texas has auto theft rates well above national averages, nor necessary, considering that Florida lacks the statute and has auto theft rates well below national averages.

It doesn't work but it does let people fantasize about being allowed to shoot someone to death legally.

Well there are working alternatives to that:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_El_Salvador

Yes, I suppose we could in fact do corrupt bargains with criminal groups and then throw a bunch of people in jail without worrying too much about whether they're guilty or not. Bukele isn't the first person in the world to think of that. Mussolini had a similar approach.

I have actually killed, before. Given similar circumstances: would, again. I am a free man, walking among you; they let me carry a gun, still.

Self defense ought'a be allowable, and is a deterrent (even if only "statistically" ... which it is). Recent enhancing legal protections represent the shifting tides as our economy wavers into "survival" mode – ¿perhaps a Depression 3.0? – certainly it's bleak here in the workingclasshood.

Do you have any questions for your reality shaping, this morning?

I can't say someone gleeful and proud of having killed is exactly changing my mind.

Any parent would have been proud of what I've accomplished.

Do you actually have any questions, or just angry?

No, I don't have any questions, nor did I ever claim to. Fishing for questions was your idea.

I have a question for you: were somebody about to abduct your [hypothetical?] child/wife, would you consider use of lethal force to prevent such aforementioned tragedy (whether by yourself, or by a third-party [e.g: police])?

Florida is surrounded by ocean and you can’t drive stolen cars to Cuba.

Texas is bordered by Mexico and you can drive stolen cars to Mexico.

Also if we’re talking gundefend shouldn’t we be comparing carjacking stats?

After adjusting for socioeconomic factors auto theft in the US is pretty much a straight gradient based on "how quickly can it be in mexico"

Arizona, New Mexico and Socal have pretty high auto theft rates as well.

So do Washington, DC and Colorado but those don't really seem to fit your theory.

This would be my answer, having grown up in Texas just hours from the border.

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Now that I live 1,000+ miles-more, inland, I definitely keep more of these opinions to myself – but decades of Texceptionalism (indoctrination, the Tejas way) definitely affects one's opinion on proximity to Mexico.

Well, for one Texas has a port and a border with Mexico. Car theft is almost exclusively for export to other countries, particularly South America and Africa.

You can see how seriously stopping that crime is being taken by the anecdote I'm replying to, can't you?

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