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Stallman: Thousands Dead, Millions Deprived of Liberties
The worst damage from many nerve injuries is secondary -- it happens in the hours after the initial trauma, as the body's reaction to the damage kills more nerve cells. Researchers are beginning to discover ways to prevent this secondary damage and reduce the eventual harm.
If we are not careful, the deadly attacks on New York and Washington will lead to far worse secondary damage, if the U.S. Congress adopts "preventive measures" that take away the freedom that America stands for.
I'm not talking about searches at airports here. Searches of people or baggage for weapons, as long as they check only for weapons and keep no records about you if you have no weapons, are just an inconvenience; they do not endanger civil liberties. What I am worried about is massive surveillance of all aspects of life: of our phone calls, of our email, and of our physical movements.
These measures are likely to be recommended regardless of whether they would be effective for their stated purpose. An executive of a company developing face recognition software is said to be telling reporters that widespread deployment of face-recognizing computerized cameras would have prevented the attacks. The September 15 New York Times cites a congressman who is advocating this "solution." Given that the human face recognition performed by the check-in agents did not keep the hijackers out, there is no reason to think that computer face recognition would help. But that won't stop the agencies that have always wanted to do more surveillance from pushing this plan now, and many other plans like it. To stop them will require public opposition.
Even more ominously, a proposal to require government back doors in encryption software has already appeared.
Meanwhile, Congress hurried to pass a resolution giving Bush unlimited power to use military force in retaliation for the attacks. Retaliation may be justified, if the perpetrators can be identified and carefully targeted, but Congress has a duty to scrutinize specific measures as they are proposed. Handing the president carte blanche in a moment of anger is exactly the mistake that led the United States into the Vietnam War.
Please let your elected representatives, and your unelected president, know that you don't want your civil liberties to become the terrorists' next victim. Don't wait -- the bills are already being written.
Copyright 2001 Richard StallmanVerbatim copying and distribution of this entire article are permitted in any medium provided the copyright notice and this notice are preserved.
Does it bother anyone besides me that Congress is using the terrorist attacks as a blank check to take away civil liberties? As we all know, a bill has been proposed that would require back doors in all encryption products, which is NOT okay in my book. I'm all in favor of heightened security carried out in an intelligent manner, and I'm willing to give up some liberties for security, but the way this whole thing has been blamed on the internet is completely ridiculous.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?
Sometime last week, I suggested voluntary biometrics as must one small measure to help facilitate idendification of the average joe. The thought is that as we are routed to more automated inspections, enforcement officers are freed up to perform more thorough human inspections. I've seen facial recognition and other technologies suggested as well.
Perhaps what's needed is NOT legislation as the article suggests. For as with toll bridges, once set, they are very difficult to repeal.
Instead, why not voluntary programs? For example, my enrollment in the above program would automatically expire in a year's time, unless I opt out right away. No harm is done either way, as I choose to go the long route.
Granted, we are temporarily suspending some of our civil liberties, in return for safety, but in a way where we control the duration and participation in the program.
healyourchurchwebsite.com - WWJB?
British citizens have "chosen" to give up their freedom for nothing.
That's only one example. In France, there is a law that forbids people to use any kind of encryption. Net result ? Algerian terrorists, the ETA, the FLNC still plant bombs in the country. French people too have given up their freedom for nothing.
I'm all for giving up things that make it possible to catch terrorists, but freedom is not one of them. Watching people is not the solution.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
I said very clearly that we don't always do the right things. The principle is the important thing, the law, as it was intended, is just. The problem is how individuals carry out the law, as in the situations you describe. We're not perfect, nobody is, and terrible things happen here, but we try, we have good intentions, and we're the best thing going if you look around the world.
~ now you know
RMS, and Roblimo before him, correctly argue that we must not let our freedom of speech (and freedom to control our personal property!) be compromised by mandatory crypto backdoors. Putting aside the fact that such a decree would be totally unenforceable, and that users would surely revolt (I know I would), and that it would surely be found unconstitutional as prior restraint on speech, nonetheless this is a terrible idea that we need to fight.
(Note that all discussion of this in connection with this incident is 100% theoretical anyway. If the bad guys used crypto, we don't know it yet - only grandstanding politicians have suggested anything of the kind.)
But I must say that I feel very differently about face recognition - particularly in airports. Such a system could have caught some of the hijackers - several of whom who were WANTED BY THE FBI and FLEW UNDER THEIR OWN NAMES! - before they killed 5000 people. Extending it to public spaces such as Times Square is more questionable to me, but particularly in airports where the possible harm is now much greater than we ever imagined, I think this is a technology that would be welcome.
Remember that you already give up a lot of rights while you fly. It's too bad, and I don't enjoy having to check potentially hazardous luggage (e.g. knives) any more than the next guy, but flying is materially different from all other forms of transit. You can't crash an Amtrak train into much more than another train, or a station. You can't do that much with a bus. But you can kill thousands with a plane, and as such we need to exercise extreme caution there.
sulli
RTFJ.
Privacy can be important, especially for someone acting justly who has enemies, but in public there is no privacy. You are already out in the open, anyone who wants can snap a picture of you. Everyone sees you picking that monster weggie, everyone see you wipe that hanger off your nose, everyone sees you checking out that hot chick's ass while you're walking with your wife...
The day someone puts a camera in my house(or in too close a proximity), forces dna sampling, forces me to turn over personal information, etc., then I'll be pissed.
Personally, I'm not sure what I think about gun registration laws, and other such things that exist already, but complaining about face recognition is like complaining about putting up a website with pictures of you and people coming to download them, YOU PUT IT THERE, just like being out in public.
note: I'm still open to any arguments about why it's bad, but right now I just don't see it as a threat in any way at all.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Please, tell me where it has? Last time I checked, most informed (not speculative) news analysis in mainstream papers (not Wired News) has discussed $6/hr rent-a-cop airport security, unpreparedness of the Pentagon, the years of flight training taken by the bad guys, and Osama bin Laden's ability to finance all of this and create terrorist cells around the world. Where's this clamor against the net that I haven't seen on the 10+ websites I read daily on the subject?
sulli
RTFJ.
To save our civil liberties and more, we should come to a full stop. Do not invade Afghanistan and others. Immediately pull out of Iraq, without even bothering to tell Sadaam.
Over the next few years, unilaterally pull out of the rest of the middle east and eastern europe. Tell Israel we won't even try to stop them from doing whatever they think is necessary to survive. Say so long to NATO. Start weaning Japan and Taiwan. Do whatever it takes to become independent of imported oil. Tell the disappointed war-mongers in the US that they're being good Christians.
Let the Palestinians crow over their "victory" - at least until they realize we aren't going to be there to stop the Israelis any more. Let the terrorists claim they they've won and are great heroes. Let Sadaam strut and probably brag that he was behind the WTC attack. Let the international media record it all.
Then, about 3 years from now, after all the bragging and celebrating is over, and we know who our enemies are, strike with no warning, with deliberate and massive force.
Or would you rather salve your ego, toss aside your civil liberties, and go into an impossible war on terrorists that has potential to quickly escalate into WW III?
Given that the human face recognition performed by the check-in agents did not keep the hijackers out, there is no reason to think that computer face recognition would help.
This is the only real argument that Stallman puts forth save, "I don't want big brother is watching me!!!"
Does anyone else see this as ridiculous. The whole purpose of putting computerized facial recognition in place is because humans aren't perfect. Neither are computers for that matter, but humans are much more flawed. What are you going to do, make all of the Security Guards memorize faces of all suspected terrorists? I wouldn't trust myself to pick out one, why should I trust a $6 rent-a-cop?
You could use this to identify "possible" suspects, and then rather than just gang probe them, place an armed air marshall on board, like they have in Israel. The air marshall can supervise the flight, and has one leg up on the competition, should anything happen, because he/she is prepared.
Don't get me wrong. I don't want everyone tracking all of my personal travel, but if you're travelling, that information is already in a database, the airline you're flying with, who I'm sure has no beef sharing this information with the goverment. What possible civil liberty encroachment is there?
Seriously folks. You guys need to calm down.
Captain_Frisk
Yes, I'm a pilot.
How many times do you have to point out that Franklin never said the quotation contstantly mangled here (the one about security and liberty)? Ludwig Thoma. Ludwig Thoma. Ludwig Thoma.
And so I don't get shot down for being off-topic, not a single one of the suggested and/or planned "security measures" would have made the slightest difference last Tuesday. I can make a weapon with a plastic spoon and an emory board or with a shoelace and the in-flight magsazine. The only way to have truly safe flights is to strap all passengers down like in slave ships, not that we're that far removed already. Lose your rights and gain NO security.
The false sense of security people are getting from all these knee-jerk actions is actually more dangerous than being scared and therefore attentive. People in the US are too busy waving their flags right now to remember the hundreds of thousands who fought and died for the rights they're now ready to simply give up. THAT is shitting on the memory of far more people.
woof.
perspective: 5,000 dead is the monthly toll on US highways.
I have seen a report that, in response to the events of last Tuesday (including the passengers who resisted and downed the fourth plane on its way to DC), Brazil has legalized gun-toting by airline passengers.
.44 special Bulldog model. It was developed for the US Air Martial program. Fires a big, slow bullet to avoid puncturing the hull or the windows. Kicks like a mule, but a bruised hand is better than a crash. Reasonably easy to conceal.
The flight-attendant speech is being revised to add instructions on how to plug a hijacker with minimum risk of puncturing the pressure hull, crew, and other passengers.
(This may be a bow to the inevitable. I understand that well over 60% of the Brazillian population already carries concealed pistols, often in violation of their existing gun laws.)
FYI: If this is ever legalized where you fly, I recommend the Charter Arms
(Try Glaser Safety Slugs, too - in this or anything else. Think of pistol-round sized shotgun shells that spread out in the first thing they touch, rather than a jacketed bullet that penetrates and damages whatever is behind the target. That's also what "Black Talon" slugs were REALLY about.)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way