From: Coyote (coyyote@hotmail.com)
Date: Tue Apr 11 2000 - 23:24:54 MDT
The corporate organisation known as the American Bar Association
notwithstanding
> RE: Re[2]: POL: Reaction to Microsoft RulingOn Tuesday, April 11, 2000
1:56
> AM Jonathan Reeves JonathanR@iclshelpdesks.com wrote:
> Billy Brown wrote:
> >> If a company want to oppress me, the worst thing it can do is refuse to
> sell
> >> me something I want. If a government wants to oppress me, the worst
thing
> it
> >> can do is send men with guns to my house to murder me. That's a big
> >> difference.
> >
> >In the USA perhaps, what about the oil company that torched a load of
> villages
> >in Africa that were protesting against some development (cant remember
the
> >exact details),
>
> I believe that was Chevron in Nigeria. WBAI did an expose on it.
>
> >or the slash and burn farming cartels in south america ?
>
> I'm unfamiliar with that example, though Pacific Fruit had a long history
of
> paramilitary operations in Latin America.
>
> >Both
> >examples of companies 'oppressing' people by sending men with guns to
> >murder the opposition.
>
> This does happen, to be sure, but the cases where it does happen are
> peripheral and unlikely to happen in a developed nation especially if the
> citizenry is well armed.
>
> >Government/Business - only difference is the amount of power they can
> wield.
>
> True, though I would say that to the degree a business uses force, it is
no
> longer acting as a business on a free market, but is becoming the
equivalent
> of a government -- whether it be small time like a local mob or big time
> like bankrolling a coup or a revolution.
>
> But I think what Billy Brown was getting at was something like this.
> Yesterday, I visited a friend of mine in Brooklyn. We went out to eat and
> checked several restaurants before settling on a Thai place over on Park
> Slope. We even went into two before settling on that one. At no time did
> anyone chase us down the street or threaten our very lives. You just
don't
> have that kind of exit power with governments. (Yeah, sure, one can move
to
> Canada if one doesn't like the US, but it's just not the same.)
>
> Also, government is defined basically by its ability to use force,
> specifically in a given area. A government that does not use force is
like
> a tiger without teeth and claws. (This is ignoring, for the moment, when
> and how a government should use force -- or whether there should be
> governments at all.) When Chevron helped to attack villagers in Nigeria,
it
> was acting as a government would. It was able to do this because, for the
> most part, the Nigerian government is too busy trying to consolidate its
> power (parts of the country want to secede) and it's extremely corrupt.
(If
> Chervon had tried the same tactics in, say, Japan or Iran, in
contradiction
> to the governments there, what do you think would've happened? If Chevron
> didn't get the help of another government, chances are it would lose and
> lose face.)
>
> Daniel Ust
> http://mars.superlink.net/neptune/
>
>
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