Re: Socio-Economic Cults (Re: Cypherpunk Cults)
It really isn't that hard to figure out that shooting a guy breaking through your bedroom window at 3 AM with a crowbar and a TEC-9 is a Good Thing, (at least if you value your continued existence, and that of your family) while shooting someone giving you the finger on the way in to work is a Bad Thing. In the second case, there is no threat to your life involved, so there is no reason to kill anyone. In the first case,
Jonathan Wienke: there
is. Is this brain surgery?
Maybe not, but how about the suggestion earlier to shoot people who are painting graffiti on your property? What happens if someone gets shot in that situation, or in some other gray area? How would you propose to handle claims that a shooting was unjustified. Mob justice? Get enough people in the streets to storm the house of the shooter? Keep in mind that the majority of people may have views about the proper use of force which differ from yours and mine. Consider the roundup of Japanese Americans during WWII. Yes, a government action, but one with popular support. A Japanese man holes up in his house and shoots at those who try to take him away. A Caucasian man outside shoots back, fearing that the Japanese is a spy, whose information will lead to Japanese victory in the war. Both men are shooting, both fear for their lives. And in each case, the fear could arguably be justified, based on the information available to each man at the time. How does your simple rule solve this case? "John ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
On Thu, 28 Aug 1997, John Smith wrote:
A Japanese man holes up in his house and shoots at those who try to take him away. A Caucasian man outside shoots back, fearing that the Japanese is a spy, whose information will lead to Japanese victory in the war. Both men are shooting, both fear for their lives. And in each case, the fear could arguably be justified, based on the information available to each man at the time.
How does your simple rule solve this case?
"John
Let me get this straight: a couple of federal (were they in this case?) LEA's come to your door and say, "Come with us, you and your family are going to prison because of the color of your skin." You say, "I am a citizen of of the United States, and my rights are enumerated in the Constitution. You do not have the authority to incarcerate me without due process of law. Now please get off my property." The LEA's reply, "Hey, we're just doing our jobs. Don't give us a hard time, you stupid Nip." You pick up the shotgun you keep in the closet by the front door and say, "If I have commited a crime, then arrest me. Otherwise, get off of my property." The LEA's reply, "You just made a big mistake, bud." Twenty minutes later they return with a fifty agents with automatic rifles and orders to shoot to kill the "spy". Of course, if he just "went along quietly", he would have spent a few years rotting in an "internment camp" while his business failed or he lost his job to someone fortunate enough to have immigrated from Italy or Germany instead of Japan. That's better than endangering the lives or yourself and your family, right? You might feel that the example that you responded to was a bit too simplistically polemic, but I think for many people, especially those in this forum, your hypothetical situation is not at all an ethical dilemma. -stonedog
At 9:19 pm -0400 on 8/28/97, Tim May wrote:
Like the Jews in Europe, the Japs were just too fucking timid and well-mannered.
Actually, they were subjected to hundreds of years in which weapons were only permitted to be handled by a special warrior caste. Sound familiar? Which reminds me... Peter Cassidy's just starting a book called "Fortress America", which talks about where all the LEA money goes. You know, for useful stuff, like armored personnel carriers, and ARs, and body armor, and flammable teargas, and stun grenades, and black nomex balaclavas, and kevlar gloves. Oh, well, so much for those 100,000 cops Billary promised us. Maybe it's just as well? I mean what if we had 100,000 new cops all wanting *their* black nomex balacalvas and kevlar gloves too... A spook's gotta sell his toys somewhere, I suppose. It's a living, I guess. I just wish they'd find a more useful line of work. Like lawyering, or something... Cheers, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com), Philodox e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' The e$ Home Page: http://www.shipwright.com/
Maybe not, but how about the suggestion earlier to shoot people who are painting graffiti on your property? What happens if someone gets shot in that situation, or in some other gray area?
This is an ideal value-added extension to all those surveillence TV cameras springing up, especially on private property. With a bit of technology the cameras and guns could automatically identify graffiti activity and alert a security person or the resident. Tranc-type guns would be mounted on the camera platforms. The artists would often be found facedown on the pavement when the police arrive. --Steve
At 12:45 PM -0700 8/28/97, stonedog@ns1.net-gate.com wrote:
Let me get this straight: a couple of federal (were they in this case?) LEA's come to your door and say, "Come with us, you and your family are going to prison because of the color of your skin." You say, "I am a citizen of of the United States, and my rights are enumerated in the Constitution. You do not have the authority to incarcerate me without due process of law. Now please get off my property." The LEA's reply, "Hey, we're just doing our jobs. Don't give us a hard time, you stupid Nip." You pick up the shotgun you keep in the closet by the front door and say, "If I have commited a crime, then arrest me. Otherwise, get off of my property." The LEA's reply, "You just made a big mistake, bud." Twenty minutes later they return with a fifty agents with automatic rifles and orders to shoot to kill the "spy".
Of course, if he just "went along quietly", he would have spent a few years rotting in an "internment camp" while his business failed or he lost his job to someone fortunate enough to have immigrated from Italy or Germany instead of Japan. That's better than endangering the lives or yourself and your family, right?
You might feel that the example that you responded to was a bit too simplistically polemic, but I think for many people, especially those in this forum, your hypothetical situation is not at all an ethical dilemma.
Whatever you do, don't interpret what some are saying on this issue at "the view of Cypherpunks. In my view, the arrest, detention, and internment in concentration camps of persons of putative or confirmed Japanese ancestry was a slam dunk violation of their constutional rights (specifically, I presume, of their 4th and 14th ("equal protection") rights. That a "foreign entanglement," which Washington warned of, was happening between mostly Caucasian soldiers and mostly-Mongoloid soldiers over trade routes and colonies was no constitutional justification for these arrests and detetentions. And once released from these concentration camps, redress in the courts was not possible. (Token redress was made decades later.) The Japanese should have formed underground cells to track down and execute those who stole their property and their freedoms. We think killing SS arrest battallions is what the Jews should have done, so why not the same for the battallions assigned to ship these persons to America's concentration camps? It's still not too late. Strong crypto will make this very possible to coordinate and carry out. The Jews are always clamoring for Nazi criminals to be tracked down, kidnapped, and tried, a la Eichmann, so why not the co-conspirators in this case? Of course, like the Jews, few Japanese were armed at the time. And even fewer after the war (hint: any rifles or handguns they owned at the start were _not_ returned to them in 1945.) Other ethnic groups are less easily placed into concentration camps. Let the fascists try putting Koreans into concentration camps, and some of those AR-15s they used so well on the rampaging blacks and Hispanics will kill some cops and soldiers. Like the Jews in Europe, the Japs were just too fucking timid and well-mannered. --Tim May There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws. Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!" ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1398269 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 03:45 PM 8/28/97 -0400, stonedog@ns1.net-gate.com wrote:
You might feel that the example that you responded to was a bit too simplistically polemic, but I think for many people, especially those in this forum, your hypothetical situation is not at all an ethical dilemma.
Or as I said to people waiting in line to see "Schindler's List" as I was leaving the theater, "When you watch this film remember that this is what happens when the government has all the assault rifles and the people don't." DCF -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGP for Personal Privacy 5.0 Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBNAY6t4VO4r4sgSPhAQGSdQP/aPhLU9X4t5I1al+5+rQ6VGJFr/x56ZCr 53c/ABCkCCHSR9OoBcOoSkWYHIO7MI80SEZDUAGtcpRPo53mgK8mVOKik6RQy3kO HadYqp0FkMq5wl7CDqvm2Pw79MZlKLplwwFZodq/NgT5BFbALx5fB6a+Dr9/GoQv 0uvENnhqb4E= =dN0J -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
participants (6)
-
frissell@panix.com -
John Smith -
Robert Hettinga -
Steve Schear -
stonedog@ns1.net-gate.com -
Tim May