04-22-2007, 01:19 AM
Exactly the point made in the article about gun control and crime in Japan -- the cultural and social mores of that society "allow" gun control to work to a degree that, for all practical purposes, is impossible here in the United States.
Almost everyone accepts the paradigm that the police should be respected. Because the police are so esteemed, the Japanese people co-operate with their police more than Americans do. Co-operation with the police also extends to obeying the laws which almost everyone believes in. The Japanese people, and even the large majority of Japanese criminals, voluntarily obey the gun controls.
As a general matter, gun control does not take a great deal of police time to enforce because the Japanese voluntarily comply. The Japanese have acceded that gun control protects them effectively. There was and is little need for individual self-defense guns.
In short, while many persons may admire Japan's near prohibition of gun ownership, it is not necessarily true that other nations, such as the United States, could easily replicate the (pg.41) Japanese model. Japan's gun laws grow out of a culture premised on voluntary submission to authority, a cultural norm that is not necessarily replicated in Western democracies.
It seems we will need to find our own solution to this problem, though what that solution might be is beyond me.
:oops:
Narukami
Almost everyone accepts the paradigm that the police should be respected. Because the police are so esteemed, the Japanese people co-operate with their police more than Americans do. Co-operation with the police also extends to obeying the laws which almost everyone believes in. The Japanese people, and even the large majority of Japanese criminals, voluntarily obey the gun controls.
As a general matter, gun control does not take a great deal of police time to enforce because the Japanese voluntarily comply. The Japanese have acceded that gun control protects them effectively. There was and is little need for individual self-defense guns.
In short, while many persons may admire Japan's near prohibition of gun ownership, it is not necessarily true that other nations, such as the United States, could easily replicate the (pg.41) Japanese model. Japan's gun laws grow out of a culture premised on voluntary submission to authority, a cultural norm that is not necessarily replicated in Western democracies.
It seems we will need to find our own solution to this problem, though what that solution might be is beyond me.
:oops: Narukami
David Reinke
Burbank CA
Burbank CA
