5 ms·

As unfeeling as his statement might sound, he's entirely correct. I told a family member today that the saddest thing about this whole Boston incident isn't th

by acabal 14y ago

As unfeeling as his statement might sound, he's entirely correct. I told a family member today that the saddest thing about this whole Boston incident isn't the (still very sad and senseless) loss of life and limb, but that it's undoubtedly going to be used as an excuse to further degrade civil rights nationwide in the coming years, to continue to justify state-sponsored human suffering like Guantanamo, and to further enforce money-wasting, civil-rights-violating theater like the TSA... all while real threats to life like car accidents and disease get left behind.

magic5227 14y ago
except we havent seen this, so let's focus on the loss and talk about this when we see a disproportionate response
- magic5227 14y ago
  if anything, people seemed to critique that they called off letting people outside too early. its never good enough it seems
- acabal 14y ago
  I don't know, haven't we? An entire city shut down, militarized police systematically searching wide swaths of civilian homes, all to look for a guy who caused fewer deaths than a botched bank robbery, a highway pileup, or a hospital MRSA outbreak? Focusing on the loss is fine and appropriate but it's precisely when we focus elsewhere that we lose sight of how utterly over-the-top some of our societal reactions are and will continue to be. I've been in Colombia when some government buildings were destroyed by FARC bombs. People died, each one was a tragedy, but cities weren't shut down and society didn't let itself be overcome with fear. That's not to say they accepted that violence as OK; but the response was (and continues to be, as the FARC are still sometimes active here) very different.
bane 14y ago
going to be used as an excuse to further degrade civil rights nationwide in the coming years I don't necessarily disagree, but I look forward to RMS's anti-terrorism proposal.
- tedks 14y ago
  You can read his political notes and get a pretty good grasp. But to use a metaphor, it's possible to find a bug without knowing what the patch is.
  - bane 14y ago
    if I'm not mistaken RMSs concepts about security are to have essentially none.
    - tedks 13y ago
      You are mistaken. RMS believes that users should control their computing experience. As such, he thinks that university administrators shouldn't restrict access to powerful features, such as the ability to install software, on communal machines. This is very different from civil safety, or defending against terrorism. RMS takes the (in my mind very reasonable) view that terrorism is not costly if it doesn't provoke an auto-immune response, and that civil liberties are more important than obliterating terrorism.
- tlrobinson 14y ago
  Is terrorism actually a problem in the US though?
platz 14y ago
You're wrong. The saddest thing is the loss of life and limb.
- anon808 14y ago
  The whole point of those rights is to avoid massive loss of life and limb in the long run. I think there's a reason the us has been relatively stable over a long period of time, and it has everything to do with civil rights that serve as another check to the power of the government. As the balance is tipped in the favor of government power over civil power, the chances for large scale loss of life and limb (civil wars, internal power grabs etc.) increases. History provides good examples of ever powerful governments, spectacularly collapsing, and crushing way more people than are killed from individuals abusing 'lax' civil rights.
  - platz 14y ago
    I'm not very convinced by by your slippery slope argument with regard to the US, at least in domestic affairs. (foreign is another matter) It's probably not a good idea to mix the emotional with the analytical, but when it happens, the emotional wins; we're human beings. I hate to get moral/philosophical, but utilitarian motives, in the eyes of societal norms, usually is the loosing position. The canonical example of this is the man waiting by the railroad switch who must decide whether to divert a train to certain doom or let the train run over an individual. According to society the man must always divert the train.
    - zanny 14y ago
      Your example is situational, and also doesn't come close to his argument. The super-parent argument is that the loss of life in the immediate is shallow compared to the inevitable loss of life from the loss of liberty and rise of tyrrany in the name of security. If people are on the train, condemning many to die for one is never the right decision. If the train is unmanned (assumed if there is no conductor to manage it) you are trying to minimize loss of life, so of course you divert the train and just lose some resources in the crash. That example just doesn't make sense.

by acabal 14y ago

magic5227 14y ago

except we havent seen this, so let's focus on the loss and talk about this when we see a disproportionate response

magic5227 14y ago
if anything, people seemed to critique that they called off letting people outside too early. its never good enough it seems
acabal 14y ago
I don't know, haven't we? An entire city shut down, militarized police systematically searching wide swaths of civilian homes, all to look for a guy who caused fewer deaths than a botched bank robbery, a highway pileup, or a hospital MRSA outbreak? Focusing on the loss is fine and appropriate but it's precisely when we focus elsewhere that we lose sight of how utterly over-the-top some of our societal reactions are and will continue to be. I've been in Colombia when some government buildings were destroyed by FARC bombs. People died, each one was a tragedy, but cities weren't shut down and society didn't let itself be overcome with fear. That's not to say they accepted that violence as OK; but the response was (and continues to be, as the FARC are still sometimes active here) very different.

bane 14y ago

going to be used as an excuse to further degrade civil rights nationwide in the coming years I don't necessarily disagree, but I look forward to RMS's anti-terrorism proposal.

tedks 14y ago
You can read his political notes and get a pretty good grasp. But to use a metaphor, it's possible to find a bug without knowing what the patch is.
- bane 14y ago
  if I'm not mistaken RMSs concepts about security are to have essentially none.
  - tedks 13y ago
    You are mistaken. RMS believes that users should control their computing experience. As such, he thinks that university administrators shouldn't restrict access to powerful features, such as the ability to install software, on communal machines. This is very different from civil safety, or defending against terrorism. RMS takes the (in my mind very reasonable) view that terrorism is not costly if it doesn't provoke an auto-immune response, and that civil liberties are more important than obliterating terrorism.
tlrobinson 14y ago
Is terrorism actually a problem in the US though?

platz 14y ago

You're wrong. The saddest thing is the loss of life and limb.

anon808 14y ago
The whole point of those rights is to avoid massive loss of life and limb in the long run. I think there's a reason the us has been relatively stable over a long period of time, and it has everything to do with civil rights that serve as another check to the power of the government. As the balance is tipped in the favor of government power over civil power, the chances for large scale loss of life and limb (civil wars, internal power grabs etc.) increases. History provides good examples of ever powerful governments, spectacularly collapsing, and crushing way more people than are killed from individuals abusing 'lax' civil rights.
- platz 14y ago
  I'm not very convinced by by your slippery slope argument with regard to the US, at least in domestic affairs. (foreign is another matter) It's probably not a good idea to mix the emotional with the analytical, but when it happens, the emotional wins; we're human beings. I hate to get moral/philosophical, but utilitarian motives, in the eyes of societal norms, usually is the loosing position. The canonical example of this is the man waiting by the railroad switch who must decide whether to divert a train to certain doom or let the train run over an individual. According to society the man must always divert the train.
  - zanny 14y ago
    Your example is situational, and also doesn't come close to his argument. The super-parent argument is that the loss of life in the immediate is shallow compared to the inevitable loss of life from the loss of liberty and rise of tyrrany in the name of security. If people are on the train, condemning many to die for one is never the right decision. If the train is unmanned (assumed if there is no conductor to manage it) you are trying to minimize loss of life, so of course you divert the train and just lose some resources in the crash. That example just doesn't make sense.