On Mon, 16 Apr 2001, Declan McCullagh wrote:
This badly misrepresents, or misunderstands, what "coercion" is when most of the rest of us talk about it.
I haven't misrepresented anything. You've never defined it. I just assumed you were speaking english. Clearly my mistake, I keep forgetting you're like Tim; always re-defining what a word or term means and then not telling anyone. Then when they use it in some way that you don't like it's 'their' failure. Coerce - from L. coercere, 'to restrain', in modern usage it means something along the lines of 'to compel or dominate by force or threat'.
Hint: It has to do with the initiation of force, often through the application of government power, not with your mother saying "you'd better look nice for dinner tonight with Great-Aunt Suzie."
'force' has no requirement to be physical, any more than 'violence' does. What you're doing is using a very restricted definition to mean 'physical force' or 'physical consequence'. Unfortunately this isn't a broad enough definition to be useful. To claim that psychological coercion is of no consequence, as your statement implies means that it is you and folks who use your definition who are missing the bigger picture/problem. The crypto-anarchy claim that if we'd only get rid of government coercion all will be good is the real view that doesn't get it. ____________________________________________________________________ The ultimate authority...resides in the people alone. James Madison The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------