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Comment by fleitz | Hacker News Reader

Yes, definitely, we should not stand by while companies host their content in countries known to use torture to extract information, hold prisoners with out trial, hold prisoners with out charge, allow their leaders to execute citizens summarily, execute minors and the mentally retarded, incarcerate people at a rate higher than any other country on earth merely in order to serve as slave labour for the state and state sponsored corporations.

Even worse is many of the citizens of this 'republic' have been brainwashed by a compulsory education system that they actually live in a democratic republic.

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If you think you can legitimately compare the living conditions, political environment, and human suffering in North Korea that with the USA, you might have also brainwashed yourself (it happens when you take everything you have for granted).

In NK you'd be lucky to get 1 meal a day. Over here poor people are morbidly fat.

And at the end of the day, you're not a prisoner, if you hate it here so much, you can leave this country any day you want to. But can't say the same for people in NK.

How is it that you think I was talking about a country other than NK? Is there a country other than NK with such a piss poor human rights record?

Generally when someone murders one person we regard them as a horrid individual we don't say their not that bad because they only killed 1 instead of 10 like that Ted Bundy guy.

I didn't say I was living in a police state, the country I live in hasn't executed anyone in 40 years, and we certainly didn't think it was a big deal to destroy our nuclear weapons arsenal, stop stockpiling nuclear weapons, or ban landmines. I simply said we should stop hosting websites in countries with numerous years of history of horrid human rights abuse. Imagine living in a country where as recently at 1960 that certain classes of people were forbidden from eating lunch with other classes of people.

I find your definition of police state interesting, would you say that NK would stop being a police state with different emigration policies?

Stop being obtuse.

And what country are you from?

Edit: Oh I get it, if you you don't say what country you can pretend they are perfect. Brilliant.

> the country I live in hasn't executed anyone in 40 years, and we certainly didn't think it was a big deal to destroy our nuclear weapons arsenal, stop stockpiling nuclear weapons, or ban landmines.

From all countries with nuclear weapon 40 years without death penalty match only UK.

Ok, then he can go to jail for a tweet.

Except the UK is nowhere near destroying their arsenal; in fact, they are trying to figure out how to replace their current missile boats. The country described by that line does not actually exist.

You're right! The United States is JUST LIKE NORTH KOREA! It's uncanny. Like that one time Obama starved the entire population of the country and proved his international bona fides by meeting with Dennis Rodman.

"Is there a country other than NK with such a piss poor human rights record?"

Sure. Germany and Russia to name just two. Several European countries in degree if not in sheer magnitude.

Fantastic - And I mean no sarcasm. Your previous comment was brilliantly written, allowing the user to draw his own conclusion. Except for that part 'incarcerate people at a rate higher than any other country' which gives it away...

> If you think you can legitimately compare the living conditions, political environment, and human suffering in North Korea that with the USA, you might have also brainwashed yourself

The parent comment wasn't comparing NK to the USA.

It was comparing the USA to every other developed country, where the USA ranks very poorly.

Don't deny them their straw man.

"It was comparing the USA to every other developed country, where the USA ranks very poorly."

http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM

It does?

Doesn't Europe have at least one violent ethnic conflict going on at any given time? Usually several?

Here's today's:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/at-least-22-peopl...

> It does?

Bottom of the list for everything that matters.

http://www.oecd.org/statistics/

"Bottom of the list for everything that matters."

Except for "first choice to which to immigrate", oddly.

http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SM.POP.NETM

It's called "voting with your feet".

..and by capita it's barely 20% of Australia's net immigration growth.

U.S. immigration is severely restricted. The waiting list can be up to 20 years long.

If the U.S. had the same immigration policies as, say, Canada or Australia, you could add an order of magnitude to those numbers. Easily.

If the best example of current US performance relative to other developed countries you can think of is "killed fewer people than other protagonists in last century's World Wars" (which is essentially what your cited stats show) you may as well not bother.

n.b. I'm sure Rummel would grudgingly admit that the US is far worse than any other developed country for committing acts of "democide" this century. In fact it's probably the only metric in which a sane person could argue the US might have performed worse than North Korea in recent years.

Yeah, I rank governments that murder millions of their own people pretty low on the scale of "human rights". Sorry.

Edit: Most of those people weren't "killed in World War II". They were murdered. By their own governments.

> Yeah, I rank governments that murder millions of their own people pretty low on the scale of "human rights". Sorry.

You seem only interested in comparing the US to undeveloped and developing countries, which is not a useful comparison.

Why not compare the US to developed countries?

You responded to a comment that the US ranked poorly in relation to 'every other developed country' with an outdated casualty count implying the US government might have been less deadly to human life than Germany, Japan and the UK before 1945 (and also less deadly than a few non-developed countries since then). I'm pretty sure the same set of statistics points towards the US government causing more deaths than other developed countries since 1945, which is why I thought it probably didn't help your case. Sorry.

Yes, I take the long view when it comes to goverments.

I fully expect the current Eurozone crisis to devolve into bloodshed before it's over, by the way.

Trail of tears...

It is almost like the difference between 1984 and a Brave New World.

Ok, maybe not, but you can compare the two. The US is not getting better.

I wouldn't be so fast as to dismiss obesity. Especially when the culture is saturated with body images that are so far from the folks who are that size, and are so far from being able to easily lose that weight.

Besides for executing minors/mentally handicapped, the US does all those things. Torture (waterboarding), hold prisoners without trial/charge (Guantanamo Bay), allow their leaders to execute citizens summarily (drone strikes), incarcerate people at a high rate for benefit of state sponsored corporations (drug war - privatized jails). I'm not arguing politics - I don't think HN is the place for it, but you should evaluate your perspective and how it might be changing how you view the world.

The US also executes people that were minors when they did their crime and mentally handicapped people.

Texas has executed people with IQs as low as 61. Google for Marvin Wilson.

I'm honestly confused, are you talking about the United States of America or North Korea. With the exception of the execution of minors, it describes the USA fairly accurately.

He was probably wrong on that and meant

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_juvenile_offenders_exec...

Correcting myself: "The youngest person to be executed in the 20th century was George Stinney, electrocuted in South Carolina at the age of fourteen on June 16, 1944. [...] The last execution of a juvenile may have been convicted murderer Leonard Shockley, who died in the Maryland gas chamber on April 10, 1959, at the age of 17."

If you are so upset about those issues in the United States how about you sign up to adopt some of the citizens who vote for them? We'd be happy to ship a few off.

Assuming this is not in fact a reference to NK at all what is the execution of minors and the mentally retarded that you refer to?

i lol'ed

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