4 ms·
Good to see someone standing up to this sort of thing. Internet vigilantism is creepy, disturbing and usually disproportionate to the severity of the crime bei
by philk 16y ago
Good to see someone standing up to this sort of thing. Internet vigilantism is creepy, disturbing and usually disproportionate to the severity of the crime being punished.
They also seem to go after soft targets. I can't remember seeing one of these go after (for instance) a violent criminal rather than some ordinary schlub who's done something rather fucked up.
- steveklabnik 16y ago/b/ has gotten a dude to admit that he had sexual feelings for children and then send them a picture of his penis. I don't remember the rest of the details at the moment, but he did end up being convicted. If I remembered his name, I'd grab the source right now, but I'm not about to go searching for this while at work. Anyone recall his name?
- philk 16y agoI'm pretty sure entrapping[1] some sad weirdo on the Internet is pretty much the definition of a soft target. By hard targets, I mean someone who is actually scary in real life. Harassing the guy who's extorting protection money from local businesses, or people associated with organized crime rather than a middle aged woman who put a cat in a bin. [1] It's possible they did get a dangerous pedophile off the streets but I can't help but be cynical when even the police led operations in these situations are sometimes downright shady: (http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2009/12/sexual-predators-200912?printable=true http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2009/12/sexual-pr...)
- steveklabnik 16y agoOh totally, I agree. I have such a love/hate relationship with Chris Hanson's work, it's not even funny. Just something slightly more than cats, that's all.