Japan also has warm toilet seats that can shoot a jet of water up your ass. Coincidence? I THINK NOT!!!

Japan has a very different culture and has many issues of its own. It has one of the highest suicide rates in the world (7th worldwide), and is not far behind the US in overall crime and other statistics.

It has a different culture, you're right. People don't kill each other based on skin color and hand weapons to mentally unstable people here.

Japan also has very little ethnic diversity to begin with.

japan has crazy cannibals doe,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BosZxa1bYcE

Oh yeah Japan is a bastion of tolerance and racial equality. Ask the Ainu, or Koreans, or any other race how they're treated in Japan. Go look at portrayals of black people in Japanese shows and cartoons (anime):

http://images.wikia.com/dragonball/images/archive/d/d7/20130112081920!AssistantBlack.gif

http://cdn.bulbagarden.net/upload/thumb/1/13/124Jynx_OS_anime.png/150px-124Jynx_OS_anime.png

http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/scale_small/0/6539/361450-mr_popo_01.jpg

Has Japan ever put Americans in concentration camps?

*cough* pearl harbor *cough*

There weren't many Americans living in Japan during WW2, as they weren't too keen on foreigners at the time. But their treatment of the Chinese, Koreans, and basically the whole of the Pacific region during that time period dwarfs anything the Americans did during WW2 (excluding the A-Bomb, but that is a different discussion).

But I think that WW2 arguments are a little off of what you were talking about earlier bo.

Sometimes you amaze me at what you seem to be ignorant about:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/32/JapanesePowCamps-WWII-front.jpg

Bo, are you aware of the Rape of Nanking?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanking_Massacre

Hey bo!
Switzerland has extremely high gun ownership rates and very few homicides (12% of that of Japan!)

Coincidence, right?

Oh and BTW most countries during WWII had civilian interment camps. I'm almost certain the conditions were worse for the people that were in the Japanese internment camps.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Japanese-run_internment_camps_during_World_War_II

Before you say that these were only for POW:
" Some of these camps were for prisoners of war (POW) only. Some also held a mixture of POWs and civilian internees, while others held solely civilian internees."

gun ownership is misleading; it's gun training as part of mandatory service.

At least in American politics, few people who are pro-gun-ownership-laws are pro-government-forces-you-to-do-things-laws.

@KC: For the record, Switzerland also has a lot of conscription and people are taught how to use guns responsibly and safely. (i.e not doing things like giving an Uzi to a nine year old)

KC, Switzerland is also a nation of non-religious hunters that refuse to participate in wars. Hence, they are quite intelligent and spend their money furthering scientific study and preserving their gorgeous nation instead of bombing the wrong country. Coincidence, right?

I am all for training for guns. Perhaps not conscripted soldiers, but perhaps as a pre-requisite for certain types of guns? Absolutely.

My main issue with any barriers-of-entry into gun ownership is that the government could use them to keep most/all from buying guns. Like a mental health check:

"Oh you have had a violent thought at one time? - NO GUN"

"Oh you enjoy metal music? Violent! - NO GUN"

and further BS

Shouldn't you be out soaking in Japanesy culture right now rather then wasting your time on here?

Bo, all I am saying that your assertion that low gun ownership=low homicide is BS. Extrapolate whatever else you want.

I'm not wasting my time. Getting Chaqa and the nutters riled up is quite fun.

Besides, I'm on a train.

Chaqa, I agree. That is definitely a problem. Perhaps tax incentives for local gun stores to require that? Then it would be a private policy, rather than a state mandated one.

@bo 日本語は話しますか。

The restrictions that the government put on would probably be very small. Even if they were big though, what would be really bad about that?

People not having guns seems more like an incentive than a drawback of such policies.

@bo: 日本語は分かりますか。

@tv: I don't think bo speaks Spanish. Why do you ask?

@vashta: asking do you speak spanish would be スペイン語は話しますか。

Japan has their nuts killing people in sprees with swords and knives which does slow the death rate. However they also had a cult that tried to release sarin gas in a subway. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aum_Shinrikyo

Meanwhile the Swiss during WW II were in it for themselves. They allowed Germany and Italy to send trains through them. They had labor camps for those that escaped into Switzerland even before the war. Their banks took money from all sides and it was only in 2000 that they were forced to return money from those that died in German death camps.