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[–] JesTheRed 0 points 10 points (+10|-0) ago  (edited ago)

Nobody really cares about the gun permits (they call it a FOID) in Illinois. Nowhere in the state is very far from a state border, across which ammo and firearms can easily be purchased without the card. I knew plenty of people with safes full of guns who just drove to Missouri to load up on bullets or spend a day at the range. Illinois sits in the middle of prime hunting and ranching territories too, so in college towns across the state it's ridiculously common to see college kids from Kentucky or Tennessee shooting skeet in their f'ing backyards. Most of them don't even bother getting IL licenses, without which they can't even apply for a FOID. Your chances of getting prosecuted as an everyday joe for not having a FOID is about the same as getting paid in the IL lottery, so at the end of the day it's just another tax on the stupid and a way to trump up charges against undesirables.

The crime problems in Illinois aren't really the result of stupid gun laws, it's just a silly coincidence that they have such idiotic laws and the murder rate. The problem is, and always has been, the massive criminal population needed to sustain one of the single largest addict population in the history of the world. The drug trade in Chicago is so lucrative that it runs murder rates similar to those found in Mexican cartel cities, and for precisely the same reason. Without a radical new policy toward poverty and addiction in Chicago, the whole state of Illinois is swirling in the bowl.

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[–] Kurplow 1 point 1 point (+2|-1) ago 

Addiction is symptom of poverty among other things. People who want to be present in their lives don't abuse drugs or alcohol. Conversely, if you give an addict a reason to want to be present in their lives, they often find the will to walk away from their addiction.

http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/a-war-well-lost

The above is a great discussion between Sam Harris, a public intellectual I enjoy and Johann Hari, a journalist and writer who spent a long time looking at addiction and drug enforcement policies worldwide.

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[–] mastersw999 ago 

I agree with that to an extent but you don't just "walk away" from an addiction. But you are right though that there is some correlation between poverty and crime/addiction. But correlation don't equal causation but it might be a big part of the issue.

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[–] china_troll 4 points -4 points (+0|-4) ago 

You guys are shitting on poor people without any problem. This is fucking class-ism. Just because a person is poor, he cannot be a good person? This is far worse than racism.

As someone from extreme poverty*, no, you guys are fucking retardedly wrong.

  • by poverty, I mean real poverty, nothing any American has ever experienced or has the mental capacity to comprehend.