Ben Taylor @VoxDei@qoto.org

@eivind @histodons The clothing persuaded the women or the washing? Or both? All plausible!

@garius Yeah, but I still miss Aerie. ;-)

(I may be the only one, I think everyone else thought she was annoying...)

@drandrewv2 I briefly read that as "I will try to do butter" for some reason. That sounds more fun.

@freemo Um… I mean I’ll read it, but work and kids to sort out in the morning, so I doubt I’ll have time to pick up the discussion then. All honesty this probably already went on longer than I wanted, I am genuinely interested in your point and I may reply later on, but I’ll be up front and say I may not. Completely understand if you don’t want to spend time explaining to me in those circumstances. 🙂

@freemo OK, sorry, I guess I’m just used to people (including me) just explaining their point to me, asked or not. That’s the internet for you! I’m interested, if you would like to explain your point to me then yes please, but I’m going to bed now so I’ll be leaving the discussion here anyway. But thank you. 🙂

@freemo As I say, apologies - I thought I understood your point. I’m still not sure I do, I’m sorry - taking the UK as an example again (my knowledge elsewhere is very limited, though entirely possible I’m also wrong about the UK), handguns are banned outside gun clubs, rifles, shotguns or certain air rifles (and cannons, slightly strangely) require either a firearms or shotgun certificate to own I believe, but once you’ve got that open and concealed carry are both legal (though you’ll get treated like a live rattlesnake if you carry a shotgun around the supermarket, I imagine). Knives that are classed as “offensive weapons” are banned in public places. If anything the knife has stricter treatment?

@freemo OK, then I think I’m misunderstanding what you were saying. The cartoon you posted seemed to be saying that gun violence was the only kind for which we blamed the weapon, for all other kinds we blamed the person behind it. I had read your words as giving the same message.

I was disagreeing with that and saying that while “blame” per se lies with the human in every case (obviously, it cannot be the “fault” of an inanimate object that something happened), we can and do address both the human causes and the weapon causes in all cases to try and reduce a given type of violence.

But like I say, I think I misunderstood your point, so my apologies.

@freemo But that was my point? Nobody's saying (well, I'm not) that gun violence is the only type that can be addressed through the legal system and all the others are just down to the perpetrator. For gun violence, knife violence, whatever, if there's a weapon involved you need both the weapon and the wielder. To address it you can/should always address both sides of that fact, surely?

And we do. I've never seen anyone say that you should address gun violence solely through gun laws, and I've never seen anyone say that you should treat knife violence solely as a problem with violent people.

@freemo We don't though? We (UK) also have laws about possession of knives that are primarily weapons (eg locking blades or "zombie" knives, and possession of offensive weapons

https://www.leics.police.uk/police-forces/leicestershire-police/areas/leicestershire-force-content/c/campaigns/2019/knife-crime/i-carry-a-knife-what-do-i-need-to-know/#:~:text=You%20can%20carry%20a%20knife,illegal%20to%20carry%20in%20public.

@MelsGarden I loved the trilogy, plus I thought the cultural difference between a Chinese and a western author came out a number of times. It was fairly frequent that he'll say something like "This happened and the population just did this" that made me think "Really? Just like that?"

The man himself is problematic, mind. He's an apologist for what's going on in Xinjiang.

@drandrewv2 I read quite a good article the other day (https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/02/truth-about-ultra-processed-foods-upfs?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other) arguing that it isn't that simple and there isn't a good definition of "ultra processed food" anyway.

I wouldn't worry. If the whole thing doesn't turn out to be a result of too much salt and a small number of additives that turn out to be carcinogenic (ie. Foods that don't have those, like golden syrup, are fine) I'll be very surprised.