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Comment by ty6853 | Hacker News Reader

I live next to the us-mexico border, in a place with basically no police services. There are (true) signs everywhere warning of cartels roaming, often with automatic weapons diverted from the Mexican military. Maybe they won't ever bother me, but better to have and not need, than the other way around.

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I mean, if the cartel with their automatic weapons come at you, do you really think your stash is going to protect you?

Also, lack of police services is probably commensurate with the low levels of taxation that so many Americans desperately want and vote for.

I'll be super real. The numbers from 2021 say the average American household owns 5 guns. This isn't because the average American really has a gun, but because of the people with 100 guns skewing the numbers. Those people are real, exist, and will give the cartel, and the local police, and a swat team a run for their money, if invaded. The real average American doesn't have an armory that can protect them from the cartel, but if you're the cartel, you now have to spend additional time and money doing research on if hitting some random house in San Antonio, Tx is going to result in a shootout that's going to get a bunch of your cartel members killed.

Can you point to any actual real-world cases where something like this has happened? It sounds like a movie concept; we're letting real-world policy be determined by a fantasy people have about a lone gun enthusiast killing a bunch of drug cartel members?

Nope! I agree it's something out of a movie, but real world people do actually have such arsenals. I'm not embedded enough in gun culture to have any personal stories/know of any news reports, but not everything makes the news. I'm not making a comment on policy, just that such individuals exist.

Warsaw ghetto uprising bought some people a few extra days (and a couple women their lives spared), which is better than nothing.

I really hope your example remains a straw man argument, and not something that Americans are going to have to face up to in the next few years.

Well they are outnumbered. So if one of their guys get killed one of 10 times they fuck with the locals, that is enough to persuade them not to do it. Of course they could eliminate me, but can they do it without one of theirs getting hurt? Probably, but not probably enough to make it worth their time.

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