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What Privacy? UK DNA Database Could Grow Fast
An unnamed and unsampled reader writes: "According to the BBC The UK home secretary is expanding the police DNA database to include innocent people. And, of course, these can be taken without your consent if the police have 'reasonable' grounds. The police state (RIP bill, etc.) emerging in the UK is looking less and less 'reasonable' every day." The article cites Home Secretary Jack Straw as making a comparison that may strike him as more attractive than it does me, namely likening DNA testing to widespread video surveillance. According to Straw, the "introduction of closed circuit television in streets and shopping centres had been seen at the time as an attack on civil liberties but [is] now welcomed by the public." Anyone from that side of the water feel that way?
I am soooooo glad I got out of there and came to the US when I could. Video cameras on most street corners, the ability to MAKE you give up your pgp keys, and now, to crown it all (after the huge Mad Cow Disease gaff and the "British Constitution" forced by losing in the Euro Court of Human Rights one time too many) MANDATORY DNA submission. And this is under the labour party? WTF?
All that is needed to extract DNA is one cell - a speck of blood, a swab of saliva or a miniscule fragment of skin that clings to a strand of hair.
DNA samples can be taken without consent from people who are arrested if there are "reasonable grounds for believing they are involved in a recordable offence (ie one for which they could serve a custodial sentence)".
Few refuse because to do so may encourage police suspicions about their guilt.
At present authorisation for the forcible removal of a sample - usually using a mouth swab - has to be given by a superintendent.
But Mr Straw is proposing reducing this to an officer of inspector rank.
My goodness. I do not want the police oin control of databanks like this! Nobody should have them.. DNA charts should be maintained by the families that possess them, and perhaps by doctors.
Obviously, more people have to refuse when officers demand a DNA search! Make it a political stand, not an admission of guilt- because DNA not only links you like a fingerprint would to a crime scene, it also provides information on your medical history and that of your family.
I do not know the UK law system very well, but does the system have a fifth amendment type protection against self incrimination? Then again, the right not to self-incriminate does not prevent law enforcement from encroaching upon DNA privacies in this country as well...
Goat sex free since 2001
With unique genes being even rarer than dentists in the UK, it won't take log to round them all up.
That said, I find it pretty creepy that any body would have the legal (if not moral) right to compile databases of DNA information "just in case." So much for the presumption of innocence!
Lead developer, http://wisptools.net
But I just wanted to add my 2 cents (pence?). When that purse snatcher takes your wife's purse, or the kidnapper your daughter, and a wee bit of evidence is found that could lead to the perp's arrest *IF*ONLY* there were a national database of such information, I'm certain your tune might change. Or would you rather picture the maniacal leer of a child molester getting away with crime after crime because we want our privacy? To hell with that. I'll gladly give a DNA sample if asked, if it means getting criminals off the streets. 'Gigs
There really isn't any problem with video surveilance in a mall or another public area where there are lots of people. If there are already crowds around you, then you have no expectation of privacy, and you already know you're being observed directly by the crowd around you. The problem only comes into play when this technology crosses the thin line and starts monitoring private encounters. Two people slip into a back ally and start kissing, or maybe two people standing in a bathroom start discussing politics or their dislike of a particular security guard's wife. That's when freedom starts to plummet, and surveillance starts to permeate our private lives.
DNA databases are an entirely different issue. A DNA database can be used to match repeat offenders of crimes, provided strict rules are in place to prevent the usage of this database for anything other than crime solving. (Yes, even convicted criminals have rights, that's necessary for the entire concept of rehabilitation to work.) But DNA databases of innocent civilians? This is unacceptable. The only acceptable use of DNA by government would be in solving crimes, but when government begins an investigation with a presumption of guilt, then a lot of innocent people are sent to prison. Is it justice to send a person to prison for murder because one of their hairs fell onto the murderer earlier that day and was carried to the crime scene?
We have no need to catalogue and number the general population using the body's serial number. This is no different from branding a person with a serial number on the arm and setting up a device that can track everyone wherever they go by their serial number. It serves no greater good, only abuse.
I recall a while back the UK police made the very logical argument, that "We'll only keep the DNA of convicted criminals on file, if your DNA is sampled and you're found to be innocent, the sample will be destroyed and your database entry erased." (paraphrased, of course)
Judging by what is happening here, it looks as if the officials have used the above argument as a way to get their metaphorical foot in the door on DNA databasing, so that they can eventually build up a comprehensive database of the populous.
IMO, this stinks. I don't want to seem alarmist, but there are very real, very genuine privacy issues that are being dealt with here, and I'm willing to bet that the majority of the public in the UK doesn't know anything about it, and I think that's a shame.
As for the CC Surveylence, I have absolutely no issues with such systems being implemented in public places. These have been shown to decrease vandalism and violent crime drastically, as well as increasing the feeling of safety among members of the community. Good stuff.
Unfortunately or not, the list of dead certainties is long. If there is one thing that can be learnt from Western history, it is that, as a civilization, we will use any technology that we can use. That is what defines us. Economists now talk about "disruptive inventions" as a new thing. But they are as old as print and gunpowder, and if we know ourselves we know that we cannot have enough disruption ( as long as it increases our ability to do things).
That does not mean that technology is deterministic. we do shape it to fit our preconceptions; we do try to fit it within old legal and political structures ( cf. Napster) . But we ( as a civilization) just do not say, 'No Thanks'.
given this copious history, my feeling is that too many privacy mourners are barking at the wrong tree. We now have the technology to track individuals in their everyday life and access that knowledge with growing efficiency. Whether it is good or bad is rather irrelevent. Does this technology increase power? Can we do, thanks to it, what we couldn't do yesterday, or do it with less expenses? Does it create wealth? It seems that the answear is a triple yes. Extrapolating from the past, I believe it is a sure bet that this technology will be widely adopted across the developed world in two decades.
Culture matters! In the UK and France, the government will hold the keys. Scandinavians will put the new databases under public control while the Americans will pretend that as long as its Visa rather than Uncle Sam that knows all about you than it is ok. But we will all use it, ( to all those who think the US is different, btw, New York City is already widely covered by video surveillance)
So what should we do ,Give up? I think we need to recognize that while privacy as we know it is as good as dead, power isn't. We will lose our privacy. But it is up to us whether we will also lose the power over our life that privacy affords us and because of which we value it. Rather than bitch about privacy itself, we should concerns ourselves with the way the new technologies alter the balance of power in society and concentrate on new mechanisms that compensate for it.
-- look, cheese ahoy!
All Things Considered had an interesting discussion of DNA banks and peoples rights. They discussed both the voluntary data bank in Iceland, as well as the purchased databanks, of entire islands that were bought by independant American research companies. They also discused similar actions very similar to a DNA collection, such as Cancer and tumor collection that were collected from patients during surgery, and sent on for analysis and research without the patients consent; their point being think how much we have advanced through not giving people a choice, or even informing them. While I do not neccessarilly agree with this view, it is an interesting one to think about and hear debated. Genetic mapping differs slightly from previous collections in that these samples could theoretically tell you almost everything physical about a person; where as previous databanks like this had been mutated or foreign cells. Anyway, an interesting thing to think about; you can get both transcripts and audio from the site. and if you didn't know about "Science Friday" on NPR you should check it out, it's a great program!
-OctaneZ
(expected rating: -1, Troll) That being said, this is absolutely not a troll. People fear the government far too much. Technically, it exists for you, or in spite of you. If you want to have the benefits of its protections, then you have to submit to the lack of freedoms in some areas. Otherwise, you get martial law, or anarchy. Anarchy is extremely lame, because it denies every advancement we've made in 6000 years. If you can't trust your government, overthrow it. Otherwise, be happy at the protections you get. -k.
The problem with DNA analysis is that (as someone else pointed out) it doesn't narrow down to an individual. Let's take the other person's numbers and say that 1 in 10,000 people has a particular DNA signature. In a city of 1,000,000 people, that means that 100 people have this DNA signature.
Now, the prosecution may say something like this: "There's only a 1 in 10,000 chance that your DNA print matches the DNA print found at the scene! Certainly that's beyond a reasonable doubt!"
But the defense can counter as follows, "What particular DNA print my client has is not in question. He shares that pattern with 99 other people here in Smog City. So there's only a 1 in 100 chance that you're accusing the right person! How's that for reasonable doubt?!"
John Allen Paulos does a nice treatment of just this kind of fallacy/paradox in "Once Upon A Number," his most recent book, as well as perhaps a couple of his other books (I'm guessing "A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper").
Slashdoter: It's things like this that make me thankful for the right to own firearms.
At least with a DNA database we'll be aiming our non-existent guns at the right person, rather than just going on random killing sprees that you seem to prefer over there.
--
Andrew Oakley - www.aoakley.com
Fancy a laugh?
Under the Data Protection Act in England&Wales (and Scotland IIRC), you have the right to a copy of any data held about you by a company.
This include security firms.
This includes CCTV cameras.
If you walk past a security camera, you can legally demand a copy of the tape every time you walk past.
--
Andrew Oakley - www.aoakley.com
Britain recently made it legal for insurance companies to discriminate on the basis of the results of a genetic test for Parkinson's Disease. Presumably, permission to do so with other genetic diseases will soon follow. Couple this with a government-run DNA database, and you really have to wonder what the hell is going on. I know I posted that earlier message about how credit rating agencies aren't pure evil, but when the government gets in on it, and it's your DNA, it's time to be afraid.
How big a leap is it from this to "monitoring" people who have a genetic predisposition to violent or compulsive behaviours? Perhaps we'll see mandatory DNA sampling of those who get caught in the net of "geek profiling".
I'd like to make a few observations that may be offensive to people who hold certain political views. This is not a troll, but instead is a straightforward (blunt) statement of my opinions.
1. When you take a people's freedoms by force, there is some hope that they will rise up and reclaim them. When you convince them to give their freedom up willingly, those freedoms will never be restored.
2. Britain is (or soon will be) no longer a free country. Time to take it back or leave. Mayflower II, anyone?
3. This is why the Fourth Amendment is a good thing, along with the Second Amendment to guarantee that the people always have a last resort against a tyrannical government.
4. My genome is mine. The only people who have any sort of claim on it are my family members. If you want to record, patent, or copy my DNA without my permission, go fuck off and die.
It's now standard procedure to append "Do you mind if I search your vehicle?" to routine traffic stop dialogue.
:P
If the police have reasonable cause to do so, they don't need your permission.... yet refusing to allow a search on principle leads to a confrontational situation that may or may not end in a citizen's favor.
Twice now I have been through this conversation:
"Do you mind if I search your vehicle?"
"No, I see no need to search my vehicle."
"Do you have something to hide?"
"No, but you have no cause to search my vehicle."
"If you have nothing to hide, why do you mind if I search your vehicle?"
"Because there is no reason for you to be searching my vehicle."
"You seem nervous. Are you nervous?"
*repeat ad nauseum (for 20 or 30 minutes)*
Of course the cop knows better than the citizen that they have no right to search the vehicle without cause. But still this conversational tactic persists.
A swab in the mouth is arguably less intrusive in the short term than a cop digging McDonald's cartons from under the seat, yet in the long term... the possibility for abuse is terrifying, far more than the possibilities that exist in relation to your car.
"Do you mind if I swab your mouth for the database?" will only escalate the already contentious relationship between the citizenry and the police. And here, we have a situation where it's not only, "Do you have something to hide?" but, "Will you have something to hide in the future?" From the start, such a confrontation will not only set up the citizen as a potential perp at the moment, but a potential long-term criminal....
It has taken a great deal of strength not to look at that gun, get out of my car and say, "Fine. Whatever the fuck you wanna do. I have nothing to hide." People who (a) don't know better, or (b) have less contempt for law enforcement officers are probably at some disadvantage. And it's those people -- people with far less ability to protect themselves from abuse -- that will end up in this database.
But those people are all criminals anyway, right?
I am too drunk to sum it up in any less cheesy way. But you get the point.
And no, I'm not driving tonight.
If you deny that a DNA bank could have real good criminological uses, you're fooling yourself.
And if you deny that a government would misuse such a bank, you're also deluded.
The solution seems obvious. A private company who keeps the data, and only gives it out for legitimate purposes.
If I knew the streets were monitored, I'd feel safer walking in San Francisco. If only a few streets were being taped, I might go out of my way to walk on a taped one.
I don't see the problem. If you don't want people to see you, don't go out in public. That's how it's always been.
I heard that street crime has practically disappeared in heavily monitored areas in the UK, but I may misremember that.
It comes down to the bigger guns
No it doesn't, this is a seemingly logical argument that really doesn't hold up at all when you think about it.
The british had "bigger guns" than the revolutionary army but we still won. The US had bigger guns than the vietnamese but we still lost, and so on.
The simple fact is that its pretty impossible to control a population through military force alone. you can DEFEAT them in a military sense, but then you have to live with them on a day-to-day basis and if they don't want to let you do that, you're in for a long life of painful terrorism -- never knowing if the barber is going to slash your throat or cut your hair. Being an occupying force isn't easy, and doesn't hinge on superior firepower...
---------------------------------------------
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
Every bad story about Australia, UK and China there's always some guy who goes (haha you don't have guns, you can't bloodily kill your entire government when they make a bad policy unlike us)
Not to mention guns haven't been made illegal in Australia, just many automatics and the more deadly guns have been made so. I'm not sure about policy in other countries.
So tell me, how many times did you rally up your troops about carnivore or when net porn was temporarily banned in America. Friggin None (I hope).
Ahh message was probably just flame bait anyway.
It's turtles all the way down.
Does your coworker ever pick his nose? Does he ever secretly read books written by Rush Limbaugh and assert that he is a Democrat to gain peer acceptance? Does he ever laugh at racist jokes?
Does your coworker ever dislike the government's policy about something? Has he ever felt morally obligated to disobey that policy because it was so heinous? There is a thing called Civil Disobedience - in America we regard it as a duty to disobey unjust laws. True, Civil Disobedience is supposed to be a public act, but the practical side of Civil Disobedience is that it can gain momentum by offering the anonymity of the group - anonymity which can be taken away when we let this kind of technology be used by those who govern.
And if we've learned anything with /., it's that if a technology can be used to do something, it will be. If a DNA database exists, it will be used by people who want to pick out political dissidents. It will be used whether you want them to or not, whether that use is "legal" or not, it will be used because it CAN be used. Our governments have the power to access this technology, to use it for nefarious purposes, and therefore they will. Maybe they'll get caught, but they'll do it.
Did you believe those websites when they said your credit card information would be securely stored where no cracker could ever possibly get to it? Do you believe them now? Now ask yourself - do you believe the DNA database will be uncrackable? Do you believe no one can be smart enough, or bribe enough people, or have the right friends, to get access to this knowledge?
And once access is gained, does your coworker KNOW everything that can be done with it? I don't. Neither do you. Neither does he. But I didn't know the flags set on your TCP packets could be used to tell what OS sent the packet, either, and therefore used to figure out how to crack the machine - now I do. All information given away gives away power. And this is an egregious amount of information - this is YOU, down to your toenails.
Don't let them just take it.
--
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
The act still requires the individuals permission to keep his DNA on file unless the individual is guilty of a crime. They anticipate that the DNA database will grow because people will want to be on the database, I for one do not want to be on the database.
They still do not have the right to do anything that is contrary to the Human Rights act. That includes taking DNA without permission or a warrant and keeping it without a conviction.
I have not read the BBCs article but I have read the act. I also have a copy of RIP and that does not give them the super powers that you read about here either.
I love stacking my barbecues in the shed at the end of summer - you can't beat a bit of grill on grill action.
Citizens do harm to one another. That is a fact of life, unfortunate but something we have to live with. Government should do no harm. It is better to let 100 criminals go free than to wrongly convict one inocent. "To declare that in the administration of criminal law, the end justifies the means...would bring terrible retribution." (Justice Brandeis)
Our dentists are first rate
This confuses me. Do you yanks really think perfect teeth are more important than being thin? I'd rather have one tooth out of place and weigh 210 pounds than have perfect teeth and weigh 400 pounds. And if you knew anything about the UK you'd know that we haven't joined the Euro yet. Anyway why would I want a gun when I can defend myself fine with my fists and feet, although I wouldn't expect a yank to know anything about exercise more strenuous than a walk from the car park to McDonalds.
It was not.
;) But I wasn't pulled over for that violation. I was pulled over for things the cop hoped I was doing. Were they actually wishing that crime was happening on their watch? And where's the line between vigilance and assumption of guilt? Hey, this is on topic, isn't it... :)
And not because of some triumph of principle, but because after a while it just wasn't entertaining for them anymore, and there were other things to occupy their time.
I keep reading the sentence that I just wrote, and each time I get a little more frustrated. In both cases, I was pulled over for trivial things, like failing to use a turn signal at 1AM on a deserted street. Technically, I guess, I broke the law. But you know... why should I ever be in a position in which I am forced to defend myself like that? We all know I was pulled over not because of an exceedingly minor traffic violation, but because the cop harbored hopes that something more significant would arise. Yes, his job is to enforce even exceedingly minor traffic violations. But if I were a 50 year old woman driving a brand new Cadillac... who here thinks that violation would have been enforced? (You caught me! I'm a twenty-something male in a not-so-new vehicle...)
If I had been stopped and simply reminded to use my signal -- or even ticketed for it -- and left to go on my way, I wouldn't be writing an enormous diatribe on Slashdot right now.
The "Why are you nervous?" question both cracks me up and infuriates me. Yes, when I'm driving down the street doing nothing horrendously wrong, transporting nothing illegal, minding my own business, and a person with a gun (and the power to do, ultimately, pretty much anything they want) forces me to stop and begins questioning me with the clear presumption that I must be a criminal, using rhetorical techniques and body language and other actions expressly designed to intimidate, I'm probably not going to be reacting to things "normally." Especially when I'm trying really hard to exercise my rights in the face of someone who ought to understand them better than me, and yet is pretending not to in hopes of an entertaining bust. And of course, all the while I have to work equally hard not to be the irritating smartass I want to be, to prevent the situation from escalating. Best of all, this all plays nicely into their game: sufficient "nervousness" or "hostility" can probably be construed as probable cause, if they want it to be. And then I'm going to have to open my mouth for that swab if eight cops have to hold me down to do it.
Get rid of the fun-size fascist Jack Straw, who seems to have read 1984 when he was little, and thought "Hey, that's a pretty good idea"...
Actaully don't do that - it'd just be creating a martyr...
The british tabloids are great at discrediting politicians - surely Jackie boy must have some odd little habits like old J.E. Hoover did....
Choice of masters is not freedom.
Hmmmm. That's a thought. Identification w/o information. Doesn't help the tracking problem, though.
--
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
I am sure that you know a good deal about the laws and freedoms in Britain. However I find your comments about the lack of freedoms in America ignorant.
For example:
"America has in there bill of rights stuff about free speach but if you say what you think then you get your yourself taken to court."
The actual fact is that it is much harder to bring a libel case in the US than it is in Britain. In the US public figures cannot bring libel cases unless you can prove intent to do harm by publishing facts that you knew were incorrect, which is extremely difficult. The libel standards in Britain are much lower, making it much harder to publish freely.
The fact is that the US rights to freedom of the press and freedom of speech are MUCH stronger than they are in Britain, and have been for over 200 years.
1. ths subject was convicted of a serious crime (rape, manslaughter, blackmail, ...)
2. there is the expection that the convict will be recidivous.
The simple collection of a DNA sample to compare against a given piece of evidence is allowed (with certain checks) but the sample and collected information has to be destroyed afterwards.
...with another country, and that country has a copy of the national database. I wonder if they could use it to construct a virus to destroy a significant percentage of the UK population ?
British cuisine? Give me a break. In England you will find French, Italian, German, Chinease, Thai, etc. restaurants.
Travel to these other countries, and you will find NO English restaurants! British cuisine is the WORST in the world.
Fish paste sandwhiches! Pah!
I have to disagree. Private companies have an excellent record of honoring privacy, when that is central to their success. Better than any government.
One example is banks, whose secrecy is famous and hated by governments everywhere. Auditing and accounting are other fields where loose lips will kill your business.
Certainly child molesters and serial killers commit deplorable acts against individuals, but they don't frighten me in the least as compared to a controlling and all powerful government who commits equally deplorable acts against entire nations!
--It's Pimptastic!--
WTF,
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
Imagine you could hack into a DNA database (or better yet just bribe someone with access), and find the hundred or so people that matched your DNA imprint in your city.
Now it's a simple matter to figure out how to make one of them be around the area you plan a crime, and plant 10% of the loot somewhere in the vicims home. The police come looking based on the database, they find some evidence - case closed!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
My memory is a little shaky here, but I suspect this is in reaction to a recent court case where a man was found to be guilty of a particulary gruesome rape - but had to be let go. The DNA evidence they had taken from the scene was matched against DNA of his taken during an earlier investigation into another crime - one he had been found innocent of. That's how they caught him. But under current UK law after an investigation is concluded all DNA evidence collected has to be destroyed (not sure about the DNA evidence of the accused but I think that has to go to).
So the police shouldn't had had the earlier DNA on file - it should had been destroyed years ago. The only evidence that could had convicted him was inadmissable in court and he was found to be innocent.
Oh, as regards CCTV camera's they are everywhere here! Mark Thomas said recently that we have the highest camera/person ratio in the world! (I'm told by an American friend of mine that schemes like this would never fly in the states.) And lots of studies have concluded that they do nothing to reduce crime - and in many case crime goes up. It's seen as an alternative to putting real officers on the beat and CCTV footage can't be used as proof of identification in court.
In Bridgewater, Devon there was a spate of robberies in the town centre timed to conincide perfectly with the shift change at the CCTV centre. Most CCTV footage is very low resolution - incredibly blurry. I believe they typically multiplex about seven feeds onto one tape. Unless the police eating doughnuts in front of the TV screens notices something happening and flicks it to a higher quality output they can be next to useless.
Oh this is amusing. Under the Data Protection Act 2000 any organisation, company or government body has to provide you with any information they have about you. It cost a tenner. And as Mark Thomas pointed out recently it include .. dah dah dah dah daaah... CCTV cameras!
That's right - you too can act like a loon in front of CCTV cameras, then write to your local council with a tenner inclosed and they have to send you a copy of the tape!
Been taped by the police at a local football match/protect/err...riot recently? They get a copy off the police to prove you were there..
Hours of fun...
In the US the courts are constantly full of people being taken to court for their opinions
This is just some figment of your imagination. The fact is that people publish uncomplementary opinions regarding companies ALL THE TIME without any such actions. Hell, if your theory were true people would be getting sued for publishing bad movie reviews. It just isn't so.
Look at the recent Firestone case - this company was dragged through the media and whipped on by the press beyond all imagination. Show me ONE instance where Firestone sued any of it's critics.
Our press have a history of freely saying what they like
Perhaps, however government censorship of the press is a lot easier in England than in the US. There is NO guarantee of freedom of the press at the level of the US in Britain.
If you don't believe my assertions regarding British libel law vs. free speech in the US, look at the case where Dr. Godfrey sued several people outside the US for libel and won, where in the US his case was thrown out for infringing on free speech. Here is some background from an article in the NYT:
Fri, 5 Jun 1998 16:44:46 -0400 (EDT)
Dr. L. Godfrey is suing Cornell university and a former Cornell grad student for libel in London complaining about messages posted by the student
(M. Dolenga) on the usenet group soc.culture.canada 3 years ago. Dr. Godfrey has previously settled a case in which he sued a British physicist and won a libel suit against an Australian ISP. He also has two other Internet defamation cases he is pursuing. The general issue here is that UK libel law often prohibits speech which in the US is protected by the
first amendment. If the usenet articles were written in the US and transmitted to the UK, which laws apply? "English Court May Test U.S. Ideals on Online Speech" -- *The New York Times* (5 Jun 1998, electronic edition)
One of the most famous cases showing the problems with British libel law was the Living Marxism suit, which prompted Noam Chomsky to come out and write "reform of libel law is crucial for British democracy" in a letter to the London Times dated March 16, 2000.
Here we have cases which CLEARLY illustrate what I am talking about - what is protected speech in the US can and DOES get you sued in other countries, including Britain.
I have about had it with people outside the US critcising the state of our freedoms when in FACT they are better than the home country of the person doing the criticising, and a little research can easily turn up factualy evidence to illustrate the truth.
>Private US citizens with modest military training, would be absolutely no match against the US military.
Tell that to the Russian soldiers in Chechnya.
OK, in an all-out war of destruction, a neighborhood full of rifles isn't going to stop the military. They could obviously bomb the place into dust. But you are making the critical mistake of believing THAT IS HOW A REVOLUTIONARY WAR WOULD BE FOUGHT. It isn't.
The military needs to SUBDUE the population. Not destroy it. And an occupying, invading, pacifying force is terribly susceptible to the kind of warfare that armed citizens can produce. When every door and window might hide a rifleman, it makes the job of rounding up the malcontents a lot harder.
Going back to Chechnya, the Russian Army found this kind of warfare SO terrible that they DID resort to bombing the city. They shelled the hell out of Grozny. They bombed it with aircraft. They destroyed MOST of the city, and killed tens of thousands of innocent civilians, who were not actively resisting. And to this day, Russian soldiers in Grozny take their life in their hands. Snipers and carbombs still abound. Armed resistance against a "superior" military force can be effective.
The first time the Russians invaded Grozny, they occupied the city for a time, then were SOUNDLY whipped by the rebel forces. The Russians retreated. A couple of years later, they started the war we see today. (At least we used to see it, before it stopped being news.) Are the Russians in control of the city now? Technically, yes -- but only technically. But at what cost to them? And the Chechens show no signs of letting up. Those guys have some serious spirit.
A revolution isn't an easy thing. You don't do it overnight. But even against the standing army of a nation, the citizens CAN prevail. It has happened in our recent history.
First of all everyone interested in this thread should check out the book Database Nation, which discusses DNA testing at some length among other things. Second, where this is going is DNA samples will routinely be taken from all newborns in the hospital at birth. So the DNA database will include everyone, not just criminal subjects. Be very afraid.
It is interesting that your "evidence" is so completely irrational.
That is a silly claim. I present facts regarding cases where it is clearly illustrated that free speech is NOT as well protected in Britain, and you try to dismiss this as irrational. Well, I think that this dismissal is in itself irrational as you have not presented any countering argument to my evidence that the legal protection of free speech in the US is greater than in Britain.
As far as speaking what you think, there is in any society a social norm as to what is considered polite, and what is considered impolite. Clearly your voicing of your prejudices against America might be considered impolite to your American hosts. Surely Americans get much criticism for voicing their views when visiting other countries. Perhaps you percieve this as lack of freedom of speech. Other people might feel that you are merely being rude and obnoxious.
In regards to your run-in with the immigration service, well, I too have had problems with petty bureacrats - in many countries. It is universal.
As far as eToy goes, that was simply a trademark dispute. As such it has NOTHING to do with censorship.
Calm down.
The chances are that you'll soon get to bash the U.S.A. again -- most probably under an MPAA or a patent article.
Maybe. But just because a few people with poor judgement in positions of authority (government, industry standard setting bodies, major corporations) make a bad decision or two, I won't take it as carte blanche to fire off banal, inaccurate, semi-racist blanket comments at Americans or any one else.
Thankfully, most Slashdotters have a brain and can distinguish between the few and the many, and don't sully themselves by making xenophobic statements. Freedom of speech is a great thing - but so is using your head.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
Not entirely fair. British cuisine is superb: it's just impossible to serve economically in a restaurant without buggering it up completely - so much of it depends on coming straight from the oven to the table that you can't make the pre-preparation economies that restaurants have to make in order to serve food that the mass market can afford.
-- AndrewD
A Maze of Twisty Little Laws, All Different.
Well the broad history of Britain has largely been about moving the power from the monarchy to the elected parliament. We still don't have an entirely elected legislature.
It's a small island. In England, at least, the govenment never seems that far away. There isn't really the idea that the national government is some alien thing.
That isn't to say that I agree with the legislation. There seems to be a tradition on /. to believe that bills get passed without amendment. Some of the worst provisions of the RIP Bill were removed. I confidently predict that this Bill will be heavily amended.
No I'm not Chuck Norris, and a far more likely scenario would be that a scumbag comes up behind, sticks a knife against your kidney and reaches for your wallet. How does a gun prevent that? A quick twist of his wrist and the perp drops his knife, looks shit-scared and runs away. Even Chuck Norris wouldn't take on a heavily armed group in real life, his most likely action would be to punch one and run for it.
Not as exciting as blowing them away with an Uzi, but then you won't get arrested either.
Finally why do good teeth matter more than good physical condition? You've still failed to answer that.
Warning: if your parents brought you to one of those police fingerprint days when you are a kid, your fingerprints are *already* on record. The whole point (or so it seems), is that if you're abducted as a kiddie, etc., that they can find you more easily because they have your fingerprints on record.
You might want to look into one of those plastic keyboard covers if you are considering keeping your fingertip skin sliced off...
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?