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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 31, 2025

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If everyone is aware that firing a gun on the subway is illegal and will result in serious prison time, and therefore anyone carrying a gun is extremely unlikely to use it in that circumstance, then I’m not sure what would actually be causing the deterrent effect.

A jury decides self-defense cases. If you can convince even one person out of eight that you credibly feared for your life or the life of another, you are not guilty.

Leave aside that the average bum is not even in a clear enough state of mind to seriously consider who might have a gun

Even a very addled person can understand "Lots of people around here have guns and there's no way to tell who. I had better not cause trouble (like swinging a makeshift halberd at people) or I might get shot."

Observably, this is what we see. The homeless objectively behave differently in places with guns versus places without.

Republican-run areas tend to give their police and prosecutors far greater leeway to punish vagrancy

Houston's government is entirely run by Democrats and vagrancy is not punished. The police force is smaller and less active than most comparable cities. Houston's police force is 5,300 (pop. 2.3 million) versus 11,000 in Chicago (pop. 2.6 million).