4 ms·

Right. Like most laws, it will end up being used against ordinary citizens who obey the law 99.9% of the time, to squeeze them for the 0.1% of the time they br

Right. Like most laws, it will end up being used against ordinary citizens who obey the law 99.9% of the time, to squeeze them for the 0.1% of the time they broke the law either by mistake, or in the same ways that MOST people are breaking the law but nobody cares because law enforcement hasn't singled them out for special treatment.

majewsky 8y ago
> it will end up being used to fulfil interrogation/arrest/etc. quotas FTFY
vinceguidry 8y ago
This isn't a good argument. The weird thing you realize when you start exploring the law enforcement space is that the vast majority of people that break the law are just, pardon me for not mincing words, just monumentally stupid. They don't take basic precautions. Police wind up dealing with the same people over and over and over and over again. You'd think they'd wise up and learn how to not get caught, but the mindset that leads to criminality is pretty far away from the mindset that leads to careful action. It's only the very rare person that actually breaks the law with intent, and also with the care and forethought to avoid even the most basic law enforcement scrutiny. Organized crime represents the barest fraction of actual crimes committed. So as a result, dragnet-style police tactics are often extremely effective at accomplishing their aims. Which is, of course, why they're employed. This is, sadly, a pure human-rights issue. Sad because the human rights angle is just not very convincing to people who are invested in the status quo. Which is why we still see these types of tactics, even today.
- syshum 8y ago
  >>>The weird thing you realize when you start exploring the law enforcement space is that the vast majority of people that break the law are just, pardon me for not mincing words, just monumentally stupid. They don't take basic precautions I think you mean most people that get caught breaking the law are monumentally stupid There are plenty of people that break the law everyday and never get caught, unsolved crimes rates are HUGE >>>Police wind up dealing with the same people over and over and over and over again. You'd think they'd wise up and learn how to not get caught, but the mindset that leads to criminality is pretty far away from the mindset that leads to careful action. Recidivism is a complex issue and is not simply down to "you'd think they would wise up", it is mix bag of untreated Mental illness, lack of education, lack of support structures, lack of opportunity, and then even further reduction in opportunity due to a criminal record, and finally once you are "on the radar" of the system the police become aware of you and will target you for greater scrutiny >>>So as a result, dragnet-style police tactics are often extremely effective at accomplishing their aims. I would agree here, but only because their aim is to have a nice press release to "show their effectiveness" and justify their budgets, dragnet policing is pure security theater. it is a show for the taxpayers nothing more
  - vinceguidry 8y ago
    > There are plenty of people that break the law everyday and never get caught, unsolved crimes rates are HUGE Sure but this is a resource problem. If we devoted the resources, we could solve the crimes. Those resources would arguably be "better" deployed 'simply' rather than, say, by investing in officer sensitivity. The tactics of policing work, that's the argument I'm trying to make. No, society deserves more sensitive policing, even though it costs more and demands more from people, because it's the right thing to do. It's a pure moral argument, and it loses something when you try to paint it as a tactics issue. > Recidivism is a complex issue It's really not. The whole thing can be boiled down to a very simple statement of fact. Society fails people. The reasons why it fails people can be largely determined to be resource problems, not failures in the mentality of the people trying to help. The 'bad egg' explanation of law enforcement failure should be taken way more seriously than it is. Most cops really do want the best for the people they have to work with on a daily basis. But they just don't have the resources to put all these people into the precise social programs that they need. Every decent social worker is immensely overworked and underpaid. There's a massive number of people who want to get into social work but there's just not that many jobs available, because from a governmental budgetary perspective, money spent on social work is money thrown away. Sure, when you get academics into a room and do studies, yes, money spent on social programs more than pays for itself. But that 'paying for itself' is diffuse, the repayment doesn't just flow back into state coffers. So you have to justify every expenditure. It's a really hard problem, and laying blame at the feet of law enforcement systemic failure misses the point profoundly.
    - Retric 8y ago
      Life is not a crime drama we really don’t know how to solve most individual crime even with essentially unlimited resources. Ex: Somone was robbed at knife point in a city. With no direct physical contact with victom and no image of who did it and you don’t have any way to track this down. People mostly get caught becase they can’t retire of of one thing so they keep rolling the dice and eventually something changes.
      - tluyben2 8y ago
- maxerickson 8y ago
  Why do you say "even today"? Socially, the US is almost hilariously authoritarian, we aren't at any sort of interesting benchmark when it comes to respect for personal freedom. (The US Constitution is well written enough that our system has less and less blatant hypocrisy when it comes to personal freedoms, but that's different than broader society actually respecting personal freedom)

majewsky 8y ago

> it will end up being used to fulfil interrogation/arrest/etc. quotas FTFY

vinceguidry 8y ago

This isn't a good argument. The weird thing you realize when you start exploring the law enforcement space is that the vast majority of people that break the law are just, pardon me for not mincing words, just monumentally stupid. They don't take basic precautions. Police wind up dealing with the same people over and over and over and over again. You'd think they'd wise up and learn how to not get caught, but the mindset that leads to criminality is pretty far away from the mindset that leads to careful action. It's only the very rare person that actually breaks the law with intent, and also with the care and forethought to avoid even the most basic law enforcement scrutiny. Organized crime represents the barest fraction of actual crimes committed. So as a result, dragnet-style police tactics are often extremely effective at accomplishing their aims. Which is, of course, why they're employed. This is, sadly, a pure human-rights issue. Sad because the human rights angle is just not very convincing to people who are invested in the status quo. Which is why we still see these types of tactics, even today.

syshum 8y ago
>>>The weird thing you realize when you start exploring the law enforcement space is that the vast majority of people that break the law are just, pardon me for not mincing words, just monumentally stupid. They don't take basic precautions I think you mean most people that get caught breaking the law are monumentally stupid There are plenty of people that break the law everyday and never get caught, unsolved crimes rates are HUGE >>>Police wind up dealing with the same people over and over and over and over again. You'd think they'd wise up and learn how to not get caught, but the mindset that leads to criminality is pretty far away from the mindset that leads to careful action. Recidivism is a complex issue and is not simply down to "you'd think they would wise up", it is mix bag of untreated Mental illness, lack of education, lack of support structures, lack of opportunity, and then even further reduction in opportunity due to a criminal record, and finally once you are "on the radar" of the system the police become aware of you and will target you for greater scrutiny >>>So as a result, dragnet-style police tactics are often extremely effective at accomplishing their aims. I would agree here, but only because their aim is to have a nice press release to "show their effectiveness" and justify their budgets, dragnet policing is pure security theater. it is a show for the taxpayers nothing more
- vinceguidry 8y ago
  > There are plenty of people that break the law everyday and never get caught, unsolved crimes rates are HUGE Sure but this is a resource problem. If we devoted the resources, we could solve the crimes. Those resources would arguably be "better" deployed 'simply' rather than, say, by investing in officer sensitivity. The tactics of policing work, that's the argument I'm trying to make. No, society deserves more sensitive policing, even though it costs more and demands more from people, because it's the right thing to do. It's a pure moral argument, and it loses something when you try to paint it as a tactics issue. > Recidivism is a complex issue It's really not. The whole thing can be boiled down to a very simple statement of fact. Society fails people. The reasons why it fails people can be largely determined to be resource problems, not failures in the mentality of the people trying to help. The 'bad egg' explanation of law enforcement failure should be taken way more seriously than it is. Most cops really do want the best for the people they have to work with on a daily basis. But they just don't have the resources to put all these people into the precise social programs that they need. Every decent social worker is immensely overworked and underpaid. There's a massive number of people who want to get into social work but there's just not that many jobs available, because from a governmental budgetary perspective, money spent on social work is money thrown away. Sure, when you get academics into a room and do studies, yes, money spent on social programs more than pays for itself. But that 'paying for itself' is diffuse, the repayment doesn't just flow back into state coffers. So you have to justify every expenditure. It's a really hard problem, and laying blame at the feet of law enforcement systemic failure misses the point profoundly.
  - Retric 8y ago
    Life is not a crime drama we really don’t know how to solve most individual crime even with essentially unlimited resources. Ex: Somone was robbed at knife point in a city. With no direct physical contact with victom and no image of who did it and you don’t have any way to track this down. People mostly get caught becase they can’t retire of of one thing so they keep rolling the dice and eventually something changes.
    - tluyben2 8y ago
maxerickson 8y ago
Why do you say "even today"? Socially, the US is almost hilariously authoritarian, we aren't at any sort of interesting benchmark when it comes to respect for personal freedom. (The US Constitution is well written enough that our system has less and less blatant hypocrisy when it comes to personal freedoms, but that's different than broader society actually respecting personal freedom)