From: Chris Russo (extropy@russo.org)
Date: Thu Feb 01 2001 - 20:38:55 MST
At 18:16 -0500 2/1/01, Michael Lorrey wrote:
[ Michael's troubled childhood snipped ] :)
Okay, so the cameras are more impersonal than cops in a small town.
They still give law enforcement an advantage that I'm not sure they
shouldn't have.
> > >But there's something wrong with all those
>> >pictures. A society that needs that sort of observation of its members in
>> >order to enforce its rules must have some structural flaws.
>>
>> Uh... Yes? Are you saying that our society lacks structural flaws?
>> A society that needs *any* observation of its members in order to
>> enforce its rules must have some structural flaws - it's just a
>> matter of minimizing the impact of those flaws upon the law-abiding
>> members of our society.
>
>I don't think it structural, its more a systemic failing, partly induced
>by insufficient acclimatization of immigrants, partly induced by
>communalist tendencies and ideologies denigrating the individual.
No real argument here.
> > Personally, I'm not satisfied with the safety level in our society.
>> In the last ten years or so, I've had my car stolen, my car broken
>> into and valuable items stolen, a friend who was mugged and slashed
>> in broad daylight downtown, etc. Those issues are fresh in my mind
>> and impact my life quite often - affecting where I go and what I do.
>
>Last time I was victimized by crime was when I was assaulted in
>Burlington Vermont by some acid-head picking a fight. The time before
>that was when my truck was broken into in San Francisco. City events.
My car was stolen from a nice little neighborhood in Sunnyvale,
California. I found it rather ironic when Sunnyvale was named the
"Safest City in the Country".
> > To contrast that, I've never had law enforcement agents take my
>> property or make me feel like I might lose my life. I can't think of
>> any friends or friends of friends who've had serious encounters with
>> law enforcement that they didn't bring upon themselves. I'm not
>> always enamored with policemen. Sometimes they can be a bit haughty,
>> but give me an asshole cop writing me a ticket versus someone
>> stealing my car from IN FRONT OF MY HOUSE any day.
>
>Tell me: how many of the crimes you cite have actually been investigated
>and/or solved?
They found my car about a week later down in San Jose, stripped.
Does that count? There happened to be cops nearby when my friend got
mugged, and they caught 3 of the 5 guys involved.
> I'll bet none of them. The break-in in SF that happened
>to me was never solved, not that they actually put much effort into it,
>(the guy who assaulted me got busted because he was so high that he
>flagged down the cop for me ;-)). I'll bet if you had used a gun to
>restrain the guy who stole your car, you'd have been arrested for
>brandishing and assault with a deadly weapon.
I felt so extremely violated by having my car stolen. I didn't have
much savings yet, I didn't have theft insurance (playing the odds...
lost), I couldn't get to work without my car, I was going to have to
go into debt to replace it with something crappy. I'm probably lucky
that I didn't have an opportunity to point a gun at the guy who stole
my car, especially since I was living in California.
Regards,
Chris Russo
--
"If anyone can show me, and prove to me, that I am wrong in thought
or deed, I will gladly change. I seek the truth, which never yet
hurt anybody. It is only persistence in self-delusion and ignorance
which does harm."
-- Marcus Aurelius, MEDITATIONS, VI, 21
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