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Protester shot in chest by live police round during Hong Kong protests

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628 points nodea2345 | 2 comments | 01 Oct 19 11:19 UTC | HN request time: 0.065s | source
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nvahalik ◴[01 Oct 19 13:30 UTC] No.21125093[source]▶
> Imagine if the US suddenly had a dictator

This is why we have the second amendment. And the constitution as the thing to which office-holders swear allegiance to rather than to "the party" or "the president".

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Fezzik ◴[01 Oct 19 15:03 UTC] No.21126073[source]▶
I always find this sentiment a little silly - if the US President went in to full dictator mode and had the support of the military, do you really think a militia of armed citizens would be anything but gnats against the windshield of the United States Armed Forces? And if s/he did not have the support of the Armed Forces, it would not be a very effective dictatorship and you would not even need guns for a rebellion. I truly do not get it.
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1. csomar ◴[01 Oct 19 15:11 UTC] No.21126182[source]▶
> if the US President went in to full dictator mode and had the support of the military, do you really think a militia of armed citizens would be anything but gnats against the windshield of the United States Armed Forces?

You don't really need militias. If a majority of the people oppose the dictator and the military man are from these families then your coup is going to fail. That's why dictatorships with strong oppositions try to lure a portion of their population against another portion or hire an army from another country.

In a nutshell, the current US army is not going to attack their fellow citizens anytime soon for the eyes of a dictator.

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2. dragonwriter ◴[01 Oct 19 16:14 UTC] No.21127127[source]▶
> You don't really need militias. If a majority of the people oppose the dictator and the military man are from these families then your coup is going to fail.

That's the real (failed) purpose of the second amendment, to prevent the use of a professional armed force for internal and/or external security, with it's invariable separate subculture, so that the views of the masses of the people and those of the armed forces would not be distinct.