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I see no suggestion of equivalency in either post, unless you think such examples represent the lower-bound of how out of line the law must be before you can re

by jlgreco 13y ago

I see no suggestion of equivalency in either post, unless you think such examples represent the lower-bound of how out of line the law must be before you can reject it. Surely you don't think that... These examples establish that there is a limit to blindly pinning morality and the law. These examples to not make statements about where that limit is, nor do these examples serve to equate any of the governments' actions.

thrownaway2424 13y ago
Both of the posts indirectly imply that complying with this specific pen register order would have been evil on the hitler/mlkjr scale, because they are both made in the context of this article. It would be pointless to say "One must not comply with evil laws, but this law isn't evil, so cool, nevermind what I was saying about evil." A comment that implies this specific court order was evil, or even moderately wrong, needs to be accompanied by supporting rhetoric about _why_ it was wrong, some indictment of our system of due process. Without such supporting arguments the comments are just disposable invocations of Godwin.
- jlgreco 13y ago
  > "Both of the posts indirectly imply that complying with this specific pen register order would have been evil on the hitler/mlkjr scale" That is an implication you invented. The person who quoted MLK has in fact already very explicitly and painfully clearly stated that he thinks no such thing[1]. If you continue to think that he was implying that, then you are the one that's got an issue. This "mock offense at historical allusions" shit has no place on HN. It is transparent as hell and does nothing but gum up the discussion. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6486091 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6486091
  - thrownaway2424 13y ago
    Yeah, but he didn't clarify what he actually meant by invoking the MLK quote. As I said, it was a disposable invocation of a historical quote. I've read every comment in this thread and I don't see anybody making even a semi-cogent argument about how due process was violated in this case. Remember, the US Constitution does not guarantee your privacy. It guarantees that you won't be deprived of it without due process of law. That process appears to have been followed here, by the government at least. People like the Lavabit founder who refuse to comply with the results of due process are as guilty of undermining our system of laws as any corrupt law enforcement agency.
    - jlgreco 13y ago
      He could not have possibly given you a more exact and clear response to your request for clarification. I was previously giving you the benefit of the doubt and leaving myself open to the possibility that you simply had not seen it (since it is technically in response to himself) but if you really did read his response, then continued to misrepresent his comment that way, then you are doing nothing but shitposting.
alanctgardner2 13y ago
> I see no suggestion of equivalency Well, there were zero mentions of Nazis before we started. Then you brought Nazis into the picture. I can imagine, based on how you've brought up a completely unrelated topic, you must be drawing some sort of comparison. Otherwise why mention them? Even if you're not saying they're identical, they aren't even on the same order of magnitude. Compare this to Soviet surveillance, or some other oppressive regime if you must. Don't bring the murder of millions of innocent people into the discussion just to prove a point. It trivializes a horrible event.
- jlgreco 13y ago
  > Then you brought Nazis into the picture. I think you need to spend less time writing accusational posts and more time reading the posts that other people have written here. Seriously; take a deep breath, relax, and read.
- jack-r-abbit 13y ago
  (side note: it was VexXtreme, not jlgreco, that first mentioned Nazis)
- Sambdala 13y ago
  Soviet surveillance directly and/or indirectly involved the murder of millions of innocent people though.
- halfninety 13y ago
  I would argue that actively avoiding to mention a horrible event will cause it to be forgotten and wouldn't help prevent a similar event from happening again.

by jlgreco 13y ago

thrownaway2424 13y ago

Both of the posts indirectly imply that complying with this specific pen register order would have been evil on the hitler/mlkjr scale, because they are both made in the context of this article. It would be pointless to say "One must not comply with evil laws, but this law isn't evil, so cool, nevermind what I was saying about evil." A comment that implies this specific court order was evil, or even moderately wrong, needs to be accompanied by supporting rhetoric about _why_ it was wrong, some indictment of our system of due process. Without such supporting arguments the comments are just disposable invocations of Godwin.

jlgreco 13y ago
> "Both of the posts indirectly imply that complying with this specific pen register order would have been evil on the hitler/mlkjr scale" That is an implication you invented. The person who quoted MLK has in fact already very explicitly and painfully clearly stated that he thinks no such thing[1]. If you continue to think that he was implying that, then you are the one that's got an issue. This "mock offense at historical allusions" shit has no place on HN. It is transparent as hell and does nothing but gum up the discussion. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6486091 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6486091
- thrownaway2424 13y ago
  Yeah, but he didn't clarify what he actually meant by invoking the MLK quote. As I said, it was a disposable invocation of a historical quote. I've read every comment in this thread and I don't see anybody making even a semi-cogent argument about how due process was violated in this case. Remember, the US Constitution does not guarantee your privacy. It guarantees that you won't be deprived of it without due process of law. That process appears to have been followed here, by the government at least. People like the Lavabit founder who refuse to comply with the results of due process are as guilty of undermining our system of laws as any corrupt law enforcement agency.
  - jlgreco 13y ago
    He could not have possibly given you a more exact and clear response to your request for clarification. I was previously giving you the benefit of the doubt and leaving myself open to the possibility that you simply had not seen it (since it is technically in response to himself) but if you really did read his response, then continued to misrepresent his comment that way, then you are doing nothing but shitposting.

alanctgardner2 13y ago

> I see no suggestion of equivalency Well, there were zero mentions of Nazis before we started. Then you brought Nazis into the picture. I can imagine, based on how you've brought up a completely unrelated topic, you must be drawing some sort of comparison. Otherwise why mention them? Even if you're not saying they're identical, they aren't even on the same order of magnitude. Compare this to Soviet surveillance, or some other oppressive regime if you must. Don't bring the murder of millions of innocent people into the discussion just to prove a point. It trivializes a horrible event.

jlgreco 13y ago
> Then you brought Nazis into the picture. I think you need to spend less time writing accusational posts and more time reading the posts that other people have written here. Seriously; take a deep breath, relax, and read.
jack-r-abbit 13y ago
(side note: it was VexXtreme, not jlgreco, that first mentioned Nazis)
Sambdala 13y ago
Soviet surveillance directly and/or indirectly involved the murder of millions of innocent people though.
halfninety 13y ago
I would argue that actively avoiding to mention a horrible event will cause it to be forgotten and wouldn't help prevent a similar event from happening again.