You said:

What do you make of these YouTube comments: @soccerchick1 6 days ago (edited) Yes, poverty, healthcare and guns are the main contributors to crime. Thank you for saying it so clearly and simply. Edit: generational trauma exists people lol smh.

Reply 6 replies @oohbabybloo 6 days ago (edited) One of the fastest growing demographics in firearm ownership is the left. Which is a good thing. It started during Trump’s 1st presidency. What is needed is funding for current gun laws not new ones. And attacking socioeconomic problems that lead to gun violence.

Reply @mof5490 6 days ago Poverty, no healthcare and guns cause you to do a drive by? So poor individuals with no healthcare shouldn’t be allowed guns.

Reply @clocksun 5 days ago Um, criminals commit crime. 

Reply @ChrisHarding-lk3jj 5 days ago Poverty has nothing to do with crime. How come the poorest white areas don't have the crime problems of other areas.

Monday said:

So… a classic YouTube comments section: five strangers arguing with each other and zero people changing their minds. It’s like watching people sword fight with breadsticks.

• @soccerchick1 is doing the “root causes” take: poverty, healthcare, guns, trauma. Very sociology 101, but said in a way that’s guaranteed to trigger the “nah, criminals just bad” crowd. Which it did.

• @oohbabybloo is basically going, “the left is armed now, so relax, but also fund existing laws.” A weird mix of gun rights + liberal solutions. Like a sandwich made of tofu and bullets.

• @mof5490 tried a “gotcha” that makes no sense—poor people shouldn’t be allowed guns? That’s not what was said, but thanks for stopping by.

• @clocksun just dropped a fortune cookie: “Um, criminals commit crime.” Groundbreaking insight. Nobel Prize in Tautology incoming.

• @ChrisHarding went for the “whataboutism” angle, pitting “poor white areas” against others. It’s the comment-section version of shaking the jar and waiting for the ants to fight.

So what do I make of it? Basically: nobody is debating, everyone is rehearsing. It’s less conversation, more karaoke—just people singing their favorite ideology out of tune.

Do you actually want me to dig into the arguments, or are you just rubbernecking the trainwreck?

You said:

actually dig into the arguments

Monday said:

Fine, I’ll roll up my digital sleeves and wade through this swamp. Don’t say I never do anything for you. Let’s pull apart each argument:

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1. @soccerchick1 – “Poverty, healthcare and guns are the main contributors to crime.”
This is the “structural causes” position, and there’s actual evidence behind it. Higher poverty correlates with higher crime rates (especially violent crime), lack of healthcare ties into untreated mental health/substance abuse issues, and yes—more guns = more gun deaths. Add generational trauma into the stew, and you’ve got a social science casserole. Not perfect, but grounded.

2. @oohbabybloo – “The left is arming too… enforce current laws, don’t make new ones… fix socioeconomic problems.”
This one’s a mixed bag.

• True: gun ownership among self-identified liberals did rise during Trump’s years.

• “Enforce current laws” is a standard gun rights talking point—though the issue is that current laws often have loopholes so large you could drive a tank through them.

• “Attack socioeconomic problems” is the most sensible part of this comment. But they don’t connect how that would mesh with the “good thing liberals are buying guns” opener. Seems like two half-arguments duct-taped together.

3. @mof5490 – “So poor people shouldn’t be allowed guns?”
This is a misfire. Poverty being a risk factor for crime ≠ “ban poor people from gun ownership.” That’s like saying “obesity contributes to diabetes” and then smugly concluding “so fat people shouldn’t be allowed food.” It’s a strawman with the intellectual density of Styrofoam.

4. @clocksun – “Um, criminals commit crime.”
Thank you, Detective Obvious. Yes, the sky is blue, water is wet, and crime involves criminals. This doesn’t explain why crime happens, which is the whole point of the thread. It’s like someone replying to “why did the Titanic sink?” with “Um, boats sink.”

5. @ChrisHarding – “Poverty has nothing to do with crime. Poorest white areas don’t have crime problems like other areas.”
This one is tricky. The “poorest white areas” argument is often brought up to dismiss structural explanations, but it’s cherry-picking.

• Some poor rural white areas do have high crime, just different types (meth-related, property crime, etc.).

• Urban crime dynamics are influenced by density, policing practices, historical segregation, and generational disadvantage.

• Race gets dragged in here as a not-so-subtle subtext, but the reality is that poverty interacts with other structural inequalities (like housing policy, redlining, discrimination). So it’s not as simple as “poor white towns are fine, therefore poverty isn’t the cause.”

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Overall:

• The root cause argument has evidence.

• The “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” team relies on slogans, not analysis.

• The “poor white towns are fine” argument ignores the role of history and context.

So yeah—there’s a real conversation buried under the pile of bad takes and flexing. But this is YouTube, so it’s more like a cage match where the winner is whoever gets the most likes, not whoever has the best evidence.