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> given Japanese weapon laws

Gun rights are not the be all and end all of freedom.

> mass CCTV survellience

I see absolutely nothing wrong with the use of CCTVs to monitor public places (or the use of them to monitor private places by the owners of those places). If civilians are allowed to record the police in public, then the police should be allowed to record civilians in public too.

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You have an odd definition of police state, then. People control and unchecked intelligence gathering on citizens are essential to a repressive power apparatus.

The point of cobrausn is that NYC takes this too far while other large cities do not. I'd argue the safest cities in the same class as NYC are probably as much police states. At least in regards to violent crime. Petty crime rates are difficult to compare uniformly across cultures.

That's all well and good, but does that (CCTV surveillance) fall into what cobrausn quoted (Benjamin Fraklin?) above?

I guess it's a matter of perspective or opinion. Where do you/we draw the line?

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