• PrinceWith999Enemies@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    No offense here either, but you seem to have fallen for the NRA-driven narrative that knife attacks are more common in Europe as if that balances out the enormous rate of gun crimes (including this one) in the US. Statistically, both the US and Europe have approximately the same rate of knife attacks - with some countries in Eastern Europe being a bit higher.

    But let’s reason that through a bit more, just to be scientists. If an officer is willing to fire a gun at the literal drop of a hat, and that was somehow a deterrent to knife crimes, then we might hypothesize that the fact that in European countries officers use de-escalation first and engagement with pepper spray or tasers second would in fact see far higher rates of knife crimes. They don’t.

    So logically speaking, I don’t think either the statistics nor the models support your hypothesis.

    • lath@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      My “hypothesis” is simply that you’re downplaying the dangers of an attack with a melee weapon. They can be and often are deadly, regardless of how often they happen.

      • PrinceWith999Enemies@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        So should a cop respond with lethal force against a child because they have a garden tool, or has the rest of the planet been making a terrible mistake that only the Americans, with their off the charts levels of violence and incarceration, have figured out?

        Do you think a militarized police force has a negative effect on violent crime and the rest of the world outside of places like Haiti and Somalia need to catch up with us?