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There's something I find loathesome about this "Send a message" sentencing. What the judge has done is send a clear message, that he won't sentence you on the m

There's something I find loathesome about this "Send a message" sentencing. What the judge has done is send a clear message, that he won't sentence you on the merits of the case but will sentence you to serve his own agenda. The only message this sends is that justice has failed. It's always completely transparent who exactly gets made an example of, and who gets off with a slap on the wrist. We'll spend months hunting down every rioter in the London riots throwing the book at them and putting up massive billboards in city centres trying to identify them, but when a prominent tory steal millions from the tax payer in dodgy PPE contracts? Well let's just write that off shall we. Because as we know, stealing some shoes from JD sports is much worse than stealing millions in the middle of a pandemic.

dp-hackernews 5y ago
"Remember, that not he who gives ill language or a blow insults, but the principle which represents these things as insulting. When, therefore, anyone provokes you, be assured that it is your own opinion which provokes you." ~ Epictetus, Enchiridion
- dekken_ 5y ago
  Words can only hurt you if you let them
timcavel 5y ago
Terry_Roll 5y ago
One thing I have learnt is that anything bad reported in the so called british press that other countries do, goes on here in the uk as well. Churchill summed it up best, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, which means people will be made examples of as and when needed.
- FpUser 5y ago
  >"Churchill summed it up best, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" Looking at the cases it seems like "the needs of few" at the top outweigh the needs of many. So cut the BS Mr. Churchill
  - forum_ghost 5y ago
    The needs of the many moneybags, outweighs the needs of the few moneybags. Seems correct on the money-adjusted metric
- trelane 5y ago
  I think the usual analogy in places where you "have" to hurt some people for some noble Higher Purpose is about omelets and breaking eggs.
  - bruhvinston 5y ago
- travisgriggs 5y ago
  > Churchill summed it up best, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few I’m disillusioned, discovering that it wasn’t Spock (Nemoy) uttering this as his dying words. Did someone eventually tell Churchill that sometimes “the needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many?” Or do I have to wait many years in the future to hear that sentiment?
  - lkrubner 5y ago
    It’s a restatement of Bentham’s dictum from 1776: the law should do the greatest good for the greatest many. Churchill obviously knew of Bentham, but I think Churchill often put things more elegantly than some of the famous philosophers.
standardUser 5y ago
The entire concept of "setting an example" seems like a bit of fascism that has snuck its way into liberal democracy.
- RobertoG 5y ago
  Is that liberal democracy thing some time in the past when this kind of things didn't happen? what period would be that?
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    > Is that liberal democracy thing some time in the past No, it's an ideal that some countries claim to aspire to, and some seem to be moving away from. (Those lists of countries are not as disjoint as they might seem).
    - thirdwhrldPzz 5y ago
      Some people claim to aspire to. It’s always people. Biden is a person. Putin is a person. Hiding behind language like country or state is part of the propaganda and mind virus such people rely on, insuring agency defers to concept. They’re self serving people, not concepts.
- john_moscow 5y ago
  Such things are indicative of the general zeitgeist in the society. If most people were hard workers, knowing how to count money and expected accountability, you would see more sentencing for embezzlement and nobody would care about some random dude's shitposting. Sadly this isn't the case in the West anymore. Most people come from a rather meaningless and mind-numbing job, turn on the TV and expect to be entertained. And seeing your neighbor from a different political camp punched in the face is the oldest form of entertainment the humanity came up with. Look at many social justice programs now: "group X has been suffering historically, so let's now make group Y suffer in some other way to make it fair" as opposed to "let people from X and Y build shit together for the sake of prosperity". This way will inevitably bring poverty, people will eventually wake up and start asking the right questions about the dropping quality of life and affordability of assets, but it can take decades more of arguing on who's shitpost was more offensive.
travisgriggs 5y ago
There’s something I find holistically loathesome that a) other people read twitter at all, leading to b) it actually matters and has to fall under legal jurisdiction. If people moved on and quit reading twitter, this just wouldn’t matter.
- MattRix 5y ago
  Twitter is quite different from most of other social networks out there. It’s much more immediate, which has a lot of benefits but also a lot of drawbacks. You might not like it yourself, but surely you can see the appeal?
  - travisgriggs 5y ago
    Nope. 12 years ago, College Humor pretty much pegged it for me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTN9We8unmU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTN9We8unmU I still think it applies.
    - MattRix 5y ago
      Oh come on, that video doesn’t capture it at all. First of all the people who follow you actually choose to follow you, AND they choose when to read twitter, which already changes the dynamic completely from the video. On top of that, that video (and your view of Twitter) is based on what Twitter was like 12 years ago. These days it’s used by world leaders to make important declarations. It’s used by war correspondents. There are two-way discussions and twitter threads by experts in every field. Twitter has substance and importance now.
- hackernewsblows 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
erdos4d 5y ago
Nail on head. This is the best take on these cases I've yet seen and it expresses my own feelings perfectly.
tshaddox 5y ago
I don't really understand your argument. It's one thing to disagree with the law itself, but in what way was this case not judged on its own merits, and what agenda was the judge serving? I hardly think "I'm sentencing you in accordance with the law so that people will see that if they break the law they will be sentenced in accordance with the law" counts as some person agenda. I see no indication that the judge said or believed that the person did not violate the law or did not deserve the sentence according to the law, but was being sentenced merely to serve as an example to other people.
- SamBam 5y ago
  Except that the judge said specifically that he was sentencing him as a deterrence to show other people. > "The deterrence is really to show people that despite the steps you took to try and recall matters, as soon as you press the blue button that’s it. It’s important for other people to realise how quickly things can get out of control. You are a good example of that, not having many followers." Jesus, 18 months supervision and 150 hours unpaid labor, for a tweet by an unknown Twitter user, who named no names, and who deleted his drunken tweet after 20 minutes. Did the judge have minimum sentencing requirements? If not, this was absolutely discretionary and absolutely out of proportion to the "crime," and is only "justified" by the judge using him as an example.
  - tshaddox 5y ago
    > Except that the judge said specifically that he was sentencing him as a deterrence to show other people. Right, that's precisely the statement from the judge that I was paraphrasing as "I'm sentencing you in accordance with the law so that people will see that if they break the law they will be sentenced in accordance with the law." The judge is not saying "you didn't do this" or "you don't deserve this." The judge is saying "you deserve this sentence according to the law, and this will show people that if they break the law they will also receive the sentence they deserve according to the law." Argue as much as you want about the law itself, or even about the judge's specific decisions within whatever sentencing leeway he legally had, but it's just plain ludicrous to say the judge isn't sentencing based on the merits of the case or is serving a personal agenda. There's nothing even remotely hinting that this is the case.

dp-hackernews 5y ago

"Remember, that not he who gives ill language or a blow insults, but the principle which represents these things as insulting. When, therefore, anyone provokes you, be assured that it is your own opinion which provokes you." ~ Epictetus, Enchiridion

dekken_ 5y ago
Words can only hurt you if you let them

timcavel 5y ago

Terry_Roll 5y ago

One thing I have learnt is that anything bad reported in the so called british press that other countries do, goes on here in the uk as well. Churchill summed it up best, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, which means people will be made examples of as and when needed.

FpUser 5y ago
>"Churchill summed it up best, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" Looking at the cases it seems like "the needs of few" at the top outweigh the needs of many. So cut the BS Mr. Churchill
- forum_ghost 5y ago
  The needs of the many moneybags, outweighs the needs of the few moneybags. Seems correct on the money-adjusted metric
trelane 5y ago
I think the usual analogy in places where you "have" to hurt some people for some noble Higher Purpose is about omelets and breaking eggs.
- bruhvinston 5y ago
travisgriggs 5y ago
> Churchill summed it up best, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few I’m disillusioned, discovering that it wasn’t Spock (Nemoy) uttering this as his dying words. Did someone eventually tell Churchill that sometimes “the needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many?” Or do I have to wait many years in the future to hear that sentiment?
- lkrubner 5y ago
  It’s a restatement of Bentham’s dictum from 1776: the law should do the greatest good for the greatest many. Churchill obviously knew of Bentham, but I think Churchill often put things more elegantly than some of the famous philosophers.

standardUser 5y ago

The entire concept of "setting an example" seems like a bit of fascism that has snuck its way into liberal democracy.

RobertoG 5y ago
Is that liberal democracy thing some time in the past when this kind of things didn't happen? what period would be that?
- dane-pgp 5y ago
  > Is that liberal democracy thing some time in the past No, it's an ideal that some countries claim to aspire to, and some seem to be moving away from. (Those lists of countries are not as disjoint as they might seem).
  - thirdwhrldPzz 5y ago
    Some people claim to aspire to. It’s always people. Biden is a person. Putin is a person. Hiding behind language like country or state is part of the propaganda and mind virus such people rely on, insuring agency defers to concept. They’re self serving people, not concepts.
john_moscow 5y ago
Such things are indicative of the general zeitgeist in the society. If most people were hard workers, knowing how to count money and expected accountability, you would see more sentencing for embezzlement and nobody would care about some random dude's shitposting. Sadly this isn't the case in the West anymore. Most people come from a rather meaningless and mind-numbing job, turn on the TV and expect to be entertained. And seeing your neighbor from a different political camp punched in the face is the oldest form of entertainment the humanity came up with. Look at many social justice programs now: "group X has been suffering historically, so let's now make group Y suffer in some other way to make it fair" as opposed to "let people from X and Y build shit together for the sake of prosperity". This way will inevitably bring poverty, people will eventually wake up and start asking the right questions about the dropping quality of life and affordability of assets, but it can take decades more of arguing on who's shitpost was more offensive.

travisgriggs 5y ago

There’s something I find holistically loathesome that a) other people read twitter at all, leading to b) it actually matters and has to fall under legal jurisdiction. If people moved on and quit reading twitter, this just wouldn’t matter.

MattRix 5y ago
Twitter is quite different from most of other social networks out there. It’s much more immediate, which has a lot of benefits but also a lot of drawbacks. You might not like it yourself, but surely you can see the appeal?
- travisgriggs 5y ago
  Nope. 12 years ago, College Humor pretty much pegged it for me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTN9We8unmU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTN9We8unmU I still think it applies.
  - MattRix 5y ago
    Oh come on, that video doesn’t capture it at all. First of all the people who follow you actually choose to follow you, AND they choose when to read twitter, which already changes the dynamic completely from the video. On top of that, that video (and your view of Twitter) is based on what Twitter was like 12 years ago. These days it’s used by world leaders to make important declarations. It’s used by war correspondents. There are two-way discussions and twitter threads by experts in every field. Twitter has substance and importance now.
hackernewsblows 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

erdos4d 5y ago

Nail on head. This is the best take on these cases I've yet seen and it expresses my own feelings perfectly.

tshaddox 5y ago

I don't really understand your argument. It's one thing to disagree with the law itself, but in what way was this case not judged on its own merits, and what agenda was the judge serving? I hardly think "I'm sentencing you in accordance with the law so that people will see that if they break the law they will be sentenced in accordance with the law" counts as some person agenda. I see no indication that the judge said or believed that the person did not violate the law or did not deserve the sentence according to the law, but was being sentenced merely to serve as an example to other people.

SamBam 5y ago
Except that the judge said specifically that he was sentencing him as a deterrence to show other people. > "The deterrence is really to show people that despite the steps you took to try and recall matters, as soon as you press the blue button that’s it. It’s important for other people to realise how quickly things can get out of control. You are a good example of that, not having many followers." Jesus, 18 months supervision and 150 hours unpaid labor, for a tweet by an unknown Twitter user, who named no names, and who deleted his drunken tweet after 20 minutes. Did the judge have minimum sentencing requirements? If not, this was absolutely discretionary and absolutely out of proportion to the "crime," and is only "justified" by the judge using him as an example.
- tshaddox 5y ago
  > Except that the judge said specifically that he was sentencing him as a deterrence to show other people. Right, that's precisely the statement from the judge that I was paraphrasing as "I'm sentencing you in accordance with the law so that people will see that if they break the law they will be sentenced in accordance with the law." The judge is not saying "you didn't do this" or "you don't deserve this." The judge is saying "you deserve this sentence according to the law, and this will show people that if they break the law they will also receive the sentence they deserve according to the law." Argue as much as you want about the law itself, or even about the judge's specific decisions within whatever sentencing leeway he legally had, but it's just plain ludicrous to say the judge isn't sentencing based on the merits of the case or is serving a personal agenda. There's nothing even remotely hinting that this is the case.