Yes, US companies have a lot of IP conflicts with China and we do tend to hear about them through media. But that paints a skewed picture of what’s actually happening.
If you were to research it more carefully, you would find out that the vast majority of these claims (>90%) are not pursued by US companies. As a deliberate, strategic decision. They don’t want to.
Ask yourself why.
Don’t believe me? Google is your friend.
You would be correct if that is how the copyright and trademark system actually worked.
But they don’t. They favour the big guy, not the little guy. Crazy, I know. Wait until you find out how modern taxation systems work.
This is insane - Pokemon cannot trademark having mounts in games. Screw Niantic, the Pokemon company and especially Nintendo which basically controls the first two. Screw them
Do not support these companies.
Sincerely, A life long Pokemon fan
Is this true?
Oh yeah. There are tens of thousands of gun ranges throughout Europe. Hell, you can do crazy things at ranges owned by companies that provide shooting and combat training, like firing from a helicopter or learning to use an APC machine gun. These sorta services are available to any adult citizen that wants to use them (and can pay).
A very common type of visitor to USA gun ranges are tourists from other developed countries. I wouldn’t expect this if these were equally accessible in other countries.
I mean, specific regulations and accessability will vary from one country to another, and I assume the same applies to US states. But in general - yes, shooting ranges are available at most any major town and city. Hunting is of course a different set of regulations but yeah absolutely you can hunt, assuming ofcourse you follow basic hunting laws.
I think the main difference comes down to culture. While gun ranges are readily available throughout Europe, I’m guessing the demand for them is significantly lower compared to the US, as is the demand for gun owning and using overall. And I believe the reason why is at the crux of the issue.
My guess is that a lot of tourists use gun ranges in the US because its “part of the experience”, not because they don’t have gun ranges back home. From a European perspective, and looking at google maps, seems like most Europeans have a gun range less than an hour drive away.
Edit: just to stress the point about how widely different things are compared to some US states. In Europe, you can shoot an AR-15 at a gun range (with proper training first) but you can’t buy one, keep it in your car and go grocery shopping with it. I mean, I’m sure people and the police in the US won’t be happy about you wandering around with an AR-15 but the fact that you can even do it is striking from a European perspective. And the fact that this activity is protected under the guise of “democracy” and “self-defence” makes it that much worse. Sure, the AR-15 might be an exxagerated examples (but only slightly) but the same applies for hand guns - it would be seen nearly the same way.
Seems to me like the only logical reason to own a gun in the US (unless, say, you use it professionally) is to defend against all the other people who own guns and might decide to use them for all sorts of reasons, including highly irrational ones. So we’re back to the highly insidious cycle I mentioned before. There is only one way to stop the cycle and I don’t see a logical reason why tougher gun laws haven’t been enacted.
I think answer you’re begging for here is “crime” or “violence against other humans”
Truthfully, I was thinking more along the lines of “identity”, “entertainment” and “machoism”. And while these often unfortunately do interesect with “crime” and “violence”, I wouldn’t think they were the primary reasons because I don’t think that would be reflective of most people’s actual attitudes and behaviours (regardless of nationality). I did not mean to imply that the dominant reason is “crime”, lean on the stereotype of gun violence in the US or paint every gun owner as a psychopath. I can see how that might have been construed based on the way I wrote it. But I don’t actually believe in any that.
My main point was that the actual reasons for both owning and using guns are not related to the reasoning of the 2nd amendment eventhough it is the law that makes all of this possible. And how could they be related - that reasoning is centuries old and simply nomlonger valid due to the way power is exercised in the 21st century.
The discussion of whether the reasons have more to do with crime or entertainment is an interesting one that I didn’t really actually mean to touch on in my first comment because its kind of a side point to the main point I was making (though still obviously important). As you point out, and this seems to be corraborated by Pewpew, most Americans use their guns for the stated reasons of “go shooting” or “go hunting”. Interestingly, you can hunt or go to a shooting range in most other developed countries and the fact they don’t have an extensive right to bear arms enshrined in their constitution doesn’t seem to be limiting that entertainment value. Nor has it impacted the ability of people in those countries to fight against tyranny. What it has done, however, is significantly limit gun violence, to the point where there are several hundred times more gun-related deaths in the US compared to Western European countries. Not even gonna mention countries with even tougher gun laws like Japan - the difference is staggering - in the thousands of times, at least according to the University of Washington.
Culture and ideology are the primary words here, I think. As the epistemological crisis deepens, I fear ideological violence will continue to rise, and guns will be a very combustible ingredient in that dynamic.
Again, did not mean to paint all gun owners as looney criminals. But the relationship to the culture of power is most definayely there and we should very much be afriad of those who use the notions of self-defence and democracy as a guise to enact their power fantasies, or even worse - as a tool of ideology and politics.
It’s really weird to see people in the US from both the left and the right protect the 2nd amendment and see it as some sort of mechanism to protect against authoritarianism. In fact, weird is putting it lightly - it’s actually kinda insane.
I’ll spare you the whole debate format because I don’t think there is any real arguing with the science and statistics behind the mass spread and use of guns in the US. I also don’t think there is any stopping the gun culture in the current paradigm because the dogma behind it has been parrotted and regurgated so much that it’s basically part of the nation’s psyche.
Guns only matter as much as the ideas of the people carrying them. Most guns in the US are not used for self-defence or to protect against government overreach, are they? When it comes down to it those are not the real reasonS why most people buy and use guns, are they? They sure make it easy though, not just to buy and use but also to rationalize and justify violence and killings.
Fighting fire with fire creates an inferno. You’re not going to put out the fire with more fire. You’re just gonna make it worse and feel self-righteous while doing it, creating an insidious cycle of violence.
It’s the 21st century. The name of the game is cognitive warfare and liberty-loving people are losing badly. Guns won’t change that.
Brought to you by a president who f****d a pornstar and paid her off by falsifying business records.
Clown world for a clown species.