Slashdot Mirror
England Starts Fingerprinting Drinkers
dptalia writes "In an effort to reduce alcohol related violence, England is rolling out mandatory fingerprinting of all pub patrons. If a pub owner refuses to comply with the new system, and fails to show 'considerable' reductions in alcohol-related crimes, they will lose their license. Supposedly the town that piloted this program had a 48% reduction in alcohol-related crime." From the article: "Offenders can be banned from one pub or all of them for a specified time - usually a period of months - by a committee of landlords and police called Pub Watch. Their offenses are recorded against their names in the fingerprint system. Bradburn noted the system had a 'psychological effect' on offenders."
In the united states we also have a system of reducing the effects of alcohol related violence. We call it prison.
First post......or last call???
Can't stop the Beta? Time to evacuate to ##altslashdot at webchat.freenode.net - Slashcott in effect.
how many drunk pub patrons upon being asked for their fingerprints will pull down their pants and shout "Fingerprint this?"
Thank god for inalienable rights!
Seems lots of people across the pond love to quote 1984 and make references to Big Brother about nearly every single political story about the United States.
Pot. Kettle. #000000
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Law! The cure to society's failures! That's what laws are for.
Laws built civilization, at reduced price.
Got a problem with something, just get together with some of your friends and write a law against it.
No need to address systemic issues. No need to worry about whether it's harmful to individuals. Human rights? But what about civilization? Laws are above you and me they're for the greater good.
Can I get a law. Cheers to that ol' chap Hammurabi. What greater gift to pass on to future generations than a bunch of laws? Better than trying to raise 'em up with values.
I, for one, welcome our fingerprinting overlords. Burp.
I am wondering how this will affect non-citizens of England, will U.S. or foreign visitors need to be fingerprinted as well and if so, that means that our fingerprints are in a foreign system, I am wondering how this info will be used, since the U.S. has demanded that the UK and all EU countries give the U.S. passenger data, will this info be used as a counter tactic to stop this practice.
In all seriousness, I wonder how many alcoholics and repeat drunk driving offenders will look for ways to skirt the system? If employed nationwide, a cottage industry of fingerprint concealment/modification techniques could pop up that eventually could negatively impact other areas of crime prevention.
Also, how are they going to prevent people from drinking themselves into a stupor at a friend's home then getting in the car? In the end, this could be a pretty significant blow for the bars and restaurants, kind of like the smoking ban in some U.S. cities.
Crack - Free with every butt and set of boobs
So for the English out there, who does this law really apply to? I've been to London a few times and enjoy a good pub lunch, without drinking - am I still going to be printed in that case? Is it all electronic scans (the article made it sound as if it were)?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
+5, Insightful? What the hell is this? "Seems a lot of Americans like to make unsubstantiated claims about people in other countries."
(Well, parent poster and the President, anyway.)
God forbid that we hold people accountable for their actions while intoxicated. We simply cannot be so rough and judgemental as to do that! Why they're just a good person who did something stupid while drunk!
Yes, just keep giving people excuses to be dumb. This is perhaps the single greatest reason why the Libertarian Party won't gain traction in America besides welfare-related issues. The LP stands for freedom with accountability. Most libertarians I know are sympathetic to the idea that you can punish someone 100% to the letter of the law while engaging in vice. Most conservatives and liberals aren't, and this is the problem on both sides of the pond.
There is no good reason to let people off the hook in these cases, except perhaps in the most extreme cases like someone got caught drunk driving because they got a call that their kid was bleeding all over the place.
In Edmonton, they have a little something called "Barwatch" that calls for (Voluntary per establishment) scanning of photo ID cards. I've submitted this a couple of times but it hasn't gotten to the front page just yet... http://www.hackcanada.com/canadian/freedom/barwatc h/barwatch.html
Not to stray too far off-topic, but the issue is a lot closer to home than you might have thought.
Bradburn noted the system had a 'psychological effect' on offenders.
No doubt it has psychologican effects on everyone. You know, that creepy feeling you get when you're being watched.
Push Button, Receive Bacon
Less street violence, and if adopted here I can start selling fingerprints to the local alcoholics.
This law has a major loophole. People without hands can visit any pub they like! I'm certain that we'll soon see an increase in alcohol-related violence by people with artificial hands, hooks, stumps, and the like.
Please, please, won't someone think of the children?!?! We need to implement alternative ID methods. Perhaps something like RFID chips implanted in artificial hands. We should also consider banning artificial limbs, hooks, and the like so these people cannot drink excessively and threaten our children. If we save the life of only one child, it will be worth it.
-- Fugacity: Confusing chemists since 1908
I had to read this a couple times for it to settle..
I figured someone had to be pulling our leg? I can't believe this seems like it's actually for real?
Do they have the power to do this in the U.K.?
What about in other countries. Canada, USA? Seems a little too 1984 to me.. Imagine having to have your fingerprints taken just to enter a pub!! WTF
Give them the illusion of choice and they will blindly follow for they choose not to make one.
I know that just about anywhere that required me to give my fingerprint for purchasing their product and/or participating in their business would have a psychological effect on me. I'd just be looking for alternative locations to do business.
Development notes at http://devscribbles.blogspot.com
This is actually part of a fantastically clever campaign to come up with laws that finally push the British Public to the point where they demand major roll-backs of the power of their government! Trouble is, every time we think we have something that they just won't put up with, they do!
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Never fear, when you grow up, you can tell your children about all your fond experiences drinking with your Big Brother.
Ninjas use italics.
Sorry. No. Go to news.google.com and look for reference to this. It ain't there.
The Register a great example of info-tainment. But not a solid news source. Editors aughta know better.
PS: If I am wrong about this, please post a link of something. To a real source.
Has all proper British subjects drink on a daily basis...this is really just you standard British ploy......within 6 months every easy going regular Bit will have been printed....and then you just go round up all the nut jobs that don't drink....brilliant !
Maybe not funny. Definitely not insightful. But I can't say the guy is trolling. Sheesh.
Great. This will go with the 50 billion cameras they have watching everyone. No doubt soon to be joined by the ever popular house-to-house public opinion polls (answer "yes" or "no", I suggest "yes" unless you want your head nailed to the wardrobe).
So this item is appearing in what other news outlets?
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2033473, 00.html
As much as I agree with your "need to get verification" stance, it didn't take me more than 30 seconds to find this. And I believe the Times should be considered a reliable news source.
It's not even mentioned on BBC news either and for something of this magnitude to be not mentioned on the BBC is a huge huge deal. I think this story is horseshit.
I'm curious - in the US, what privacy do we have in public? I know there's unreasonable search and seizure - but considering that fingerprints are something you leave behind on everything you touch anyways (unless you wear gloves or use a sanding machine - ouch!) so are they not public? Is taking a picture of someone's finger prints any different than taking a picture of their face w/ a security camera?
The real problem with any system that tracks behavior, especially vice-like behavior, is that it is only a matter of time before powerful interests secure access to that data. Fingerprint drinkers today, in the hands of insurance companies tomorrow. Fingerprint pub-crawlers today, in the hands of employment agencies tomorrow. Fingerprint drunks today, in the hands of law-enforcement and government interests tomorrow.
Abuse slowly unfolds, it does not spring into existance overnight. Almost everything that is seriously broken in America started off as an innocent (often temporary) stopgap measure to correct some issue of the day but then slowly grew, was hijacked by various interests and warped into an aberration.
I am personally against any tracking of human beings at all and I could give a god damned about the whinning of law enforcement. The simple fact is that once such data is available to law enforcement, it is also available to criminals and interests that are not working for my benefit and since I am a law abiding citizen, there is absolutely no upside for me - only increased scrutiny and loss of privacy. Only the stupidest of criminals will expose themselves through these channels anyway. The smart criminals belong to syndicates that fscking include law enforcement (and therefore have access to this *data* for nefarious purposes).
Reject tracking, profiling and surveillance in all it's guises. Demand court issued warrants for private data. Retain your rights and your personal security.
It is your personal duty to fight for what is right on a daily basis. Ignoring injustice is identical to approving
here ya go. 15 seconds of googling.
Marxism is the opiate of dumbasses
This has to be the stupuidest thing I've ever read for any number of reasons. Civil lib issues galore. Technology problems - pubs spending money on this? implementation probs? whotf instals let alone maintains the sytems? who looks after the dbs? access (secure?) to the dbs? a committee of landlords acting in the public interest vs vested interest? and on and on and .....
Imagine the local boozer with systems and knowledge enough to implement something like this and then, and this is the real gem, actually implememting this?!!!!!!!!!
The author was drinking when he wrote this. He should be fingerprinted. And then put in prison.
It mentions "alchohol-related crimes", but it seems to me that the only time you ever actually know that any particular crime was genuinely alchohol related is if you already know who the person that did it was, and it's only then that you realize that they are under the influence of alchohol. What do you need fingerprints taken beforehand for when every single time you'd be able to pin a crime on alchohol consumption you have the guilty party in custody anyways?
About the only good this might do is produce a sort of "scare tactic" effect, that might initially incline people to behave better, but I don't see this making a significant difference in the long run.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
And therein is the problem. YEOVIL. YEOVIL IS NOT ENGLAND. The article at the top of the Slashdot page implies it's all over England which is quite clearly is NOT.
I read your rant, looked around, and couldn't find the peanuts. Make sure to let everyone else know that they're four behind...
damaged by dogma
Right you are. Thank you.
Why not brand them? Or put a tattoo on their foreheads?
"Anyone that has ever gotten an idea based on any of my work and done something better with it-good for you."--J.Carmack
You seemed so sure. What happened?
For a second I'm going to ignore that the government is collecting fingerprints on everyone. Why is this law so bad? All it does is:
* Allow for criminals who've willingly consumed alcohol to be caught quicker in certain circumstances.
* Force bars to stop serving alcohol to people who habitually break the law when drunk
* Allow for witnesses necessary in solving a crime to be found easier.
These are all bad things why?
I know, I know. Then we move onto the fact that the government is collecting finger prints. But then again, I do wonder at why people having your finger prints on record is such a bad thing? It's not as if they have your pin number to your bank account. I know the American constitution has a clause against the government having it in this particular instance, but instead of treating it as a religious text, why not think about whether or not the police and businesses having your finger prints on record is such a bad thing? If you're worried about privacy concerns (employer gets a P.I. to see if you entered a strip club, using the fingerprints they have of you) surely there are easier ways for them to keep tabs on you? All we need is a law to stop businesses from using the fingerprints in all but very specific instances.
The only time I can think of this being bad is when the police catch you in an illegal brothel. But how about instead of breaking the law, you work to have the law overturned first?
Having been denied entry to london pubs, 48% of alcoholic criminals are now committing crimes sober.
Has anybody taken time to read the other (more reputable) sources that have been cited? Two key points:
1. This is OPTIONAL. People do not have to provide prints if they don't want to.
2. It is only in one town in England.
"Well, sir... I notice that you were in a bar on nine occasions last month, including two visits on one night... we recommend no more than one beer per day for your health and infer that you had two drinks on that night. Your premiums are going up."
Or...
"Well, sir... we noticed that you entered a pub in the mission district last month, which we consider to be a dangerous naeighborhood... if we find that you've been drinking there again, we're going to have to raise your rates or drop your policy."
Or how about...
"Well sir, we have evidence that you may have been drinking on the night when somebody smashed your rear fender and as a result, we refuse to pay for the damage on the suspicion that you were drunk when the incident happened."
And...
"Well, kid... I'm sorry, but we have to let you go. We've been informed that you had a drink at lunch last week and if we continue to employ you our insurance premiums will go up."
I think it would be fun to have a beer party and watch all the beer kegs float down the Thames River. Then they'd send in all those Imperial Troops. One if by land, two if by sea, and if you don't see anything at all, I'm geting fingerprinted at the pub.
Or better still one which actually has some facts. This is one small town, it's voluntary for both patrons and for drinking establishments (five clubs are using it so far). Many clubs already require you to have a membership card, what's the difference? The worry is that it may end up with you having to sign up just to go for a drink, but then you can vote with your feet and drink somewhere else....
Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes.
How many beans make five, anyhow ?
OK, I knew that the uk was sailing further and further toward police state territory, but fingerprinting people *who aren't even breaking the freaking LAW*? WHAT THE FUCK?!?! Does *anyone* actually think this is a good idea? The only possible way this makes sense is as a way of building a universal fingerprint database by stealth, which is just plain scary.
How did "civilized" society come to this?
Are you really trying to say ubiquitous fingerprinting is a Libertarian position!!!!!!????? Libertarianism at it's best is about preserving freedom, ubiquitous fingerprinting is as anti-freedom pro government intrusion into private affairs as you can get. This is more like Keystone Cops meets 1984 than anything worthy.
Tired of all the isms, don't exploit people as an employer, or a government, mmmmK?
It seams like there's a kind of competition going on between our two countries to strip their citizens of basic rights. For a long time I'd read Slashdot stories about England and think to myself how weird it was, then of course I compared notes.
We seem to do everything under the guise/honest or not, of protection. Protection from terrorism. Protection from child abuse. Protection from violence. But we don't seem to be making so much headway. How much of our freedom or dignity will we concede before we stop calling ourselves free nations? Is it our destiny to become everything we hate?
Quack, quack.
Thinking about how easy these scanners are to fool, someone should create a fingerprint patch and supply a copy to everyone in town. It'll look like one guy goes drinking way too much. It'd be even better if the finger print was of some semi-important or visible offical who's in favor of this legislation. I'm thinking about how the Mythbusters people lifted a fingerprint from a can and used that to create a fake fingerprint to fool a scanner.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
Canadians, Mexicans who are staying in border areas, and visitors from many European countries that have reciprocal visa agreements with the U.S. are exempt.
Just so you don't think I'm passing U.S. propaganda, here's a quote from a ChinaDaily article:It's also not a full fingerprinting, it's just the index finger and it's an electronic scan. Basically it does an "instant check" against the FBI database. But basically, if you're from a major European country and here on a tourist visa, there's no fingerprinting. (Which makes the whole process pretty fucking stupid -- I mean, so now the terrorists need to get false Dutch papers instead of false Egyptian ones; great use of a few million dollars. Why do we do this at all? But I digress.)
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Oops. I meant to link to the article.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
This is a pilot scheme. CCTV was a pilot scheme. Speed cameras were a pilot scheme. Electronic tags were a pilot scheme.
Pilot schemes, no matter whether successful or not, are what happens right before it's rolled out in every town with alcohol-related violence in England as an election-pleasing anti-anti-social-behaviour "measure".
And the "Optional" is "you do not have to come into the pub", in practice. The landlords will be pressured, and are being pressured, into making it mandatory for everyone who enters; your only recourse is to not go to the pub.
Named quotes or not, this story is high enough on the giggle scale for me to want a stronger source than The Register. I'd say the same if it was the Daily Express or Daily Mail carrying it.
I've looked, and I can't find one. I have to say I'm suspicious of it going out at 17:45 on Friday too - corroboration or denial can't be quick under those circumstances.
How, exactly, would this work anyway? Are they proposing even longer queues to get into pubs, and mandatory security personnel at the doors of all licensed premesis? How would they determine if you've crept in (say, via the beer garden, many of which couldn't easily have access controlled without fundamental modification) without fingerprinting? If you went in to the garden, would you need to be rechecked every time you went back in? Maybe they'd need to fingerprint all customers as part of the sale, and reject if it didn't match one of their live entries - I can see that being popular with staff...
This seems to have enough problems to make it either unworkable or ineffective (and possibly both), and would be the dream of every right-wing media commentator for attacking 'Blair's Nanny State' (not a viewpoint I subscribe to) even more than they do already.
So - until I personally see a fingerprinting station in a pub, or hear about it from a news source with a better reputation for reliability than The Register, I'm not buying this one.
Greg
(Inside a nuclear plant)
Aaaarrrggh! Run! The canary has mutated!
Answer: there is no law that requires you to be finger printed if you want a pint. There is no government roll out of fingerprint checking before you can have a pint.
:-)
:-)
Slashdot is enjoying a nice hyped up headline, egged on by The Reg singing it up. Major towns and cities? one rural backwater population 40,000. We've had bigger towns voting for monkeys as their town mayor (Hull, go have a read). Have a sip of that nice warm beer and calm down
Reading TFA, one town has trialed a system. Little Britain jokes aside, we have more than half a dozen towns here
So we do have a law, the "Crime and Disorder Act (1998)" which requires town councils to reduce drunken disorder. One district council (in Yeovil, a nice little country place in rural Somerset, population 40,000) has decided the way to do this is to have fingerprint recognition, it's putting the pressure on pubs to install this system. It's using money from a government fund "Safer, Stronger Communities" through the Department for Communities and Local Government's Local Area Agreements. The government funder have already noted that its a local decision, not theirs, on how local town councils spend the money.
This "rollout" the article speaks of consists of ten pubs in a neighbouring small town considering it. Trust me, we have more than eleven pubs in the UK...
A couple of police forces elsewhere have "shown an interest" which suggests to me somebody's phoned up to ask how its doing. The district council representative (who you'd expect to be positive and not say "well we really wasted our taxpayers money on that one") has said the Home Office is considering trials in more towns (what does this mean? 5 pubs in each place?) - but the Home Office later in the article denies it decides how the budget is spent.
Bouncers do ask for ID for people they think are underage (under 18) in some pubs. But only those folks. I was amused when in the USA to be with a silver haired retired friend who was asked for his ID as well. I think he was quite amused and pleased that they were checking him in case he was under 21....
The data protection act should in theory stop abuses like that, data collected is not allowed to be used for any reason other than for what it is collected. And you have to be upfront about what the data will be used for.
we should be required to show id everytime we buy alcohol. get caught drunk driving or any other drinking related offence your ID gets stamped NO ALCOHOL and your barred from even entering a bar. sure some would get around it (we've all seen enough drunks driving there bikes or lawn mowers to the bar to realize they'll do about anything) but even if we only cut off half the problem drunks we'll save a lot of lifes. And it need not be any more intrusive then when you were in your twentys and had to show ID anyway.
Here's the story from when Yeovil first started the scheme in May, with other places showing an interest if it succeeded. It's been claimed it has, so it's no surprise it may go national under *this* ID-card loving, camera installin' , secret-shipper-of-US-terror-suspects, privacy invadin' government.
Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
yes, this would cause a bit of a fuss, if it were true. The first I have heard about this is on Slashdot. The landlord of my local has not heard about it. Publicans have a lot of freedom over who they let in or don't let in to their public house. If a publican wants to install fingerprint scanners to control access then they would have the freedom to do that. Customers have the freedom not to go to that pub if they don't like it. Publicans also have the freedom to install bouncers who won't let in people they don't like the look of. Local authorities (not national government) who make licensing decisions have the freedom to be influenced in their decision about issuing/renewing a licence by looking at how the publican maintains an atmosphere of responsible drinking. I think this will fail for practical reasons (you will need a bouncer to stand by the machine - if you have a bouncer just let them make the decision, if you don't have a bouncer then people can walk past the machine). People who are registered drinkers can still arrive drunk, and it is illegal to serve alcohol to drunks. There is no way that this will be installed in country pubs.
It's been a while, but IIRC in Pennsylvania it's not that you can't buy beer in less than a case, it's just that you have to go to a different store. They have "Beer Stores," which sell beer by the case and only by the case, but then they also have "Six-pack Shops" which sell smaller quantities (and any bar can legally sell you up to two six-packs; bowling alleys that have bars were a favored place to get late-night booze IIRC). I think they have different hours for each. And then there are liquor stores which are actually run by the state, and where you can get your distilled alcohols, and I think wine just comes from the grocery store? (I was never clear on wine there.)
Anyway, just nitpicking. It does have some of the most bizarre liquor laws of anywhere I've ever been to. I can only pity the poor coddled European who might wind up in Pennsylvania, desiring a case of wine on a Sunday, or something similarly impossible.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Imagine having to have your fingerprints taken just to enter a pub!! WTF
... we've moved past that here.
It is a little fascist, I give you that. Here in the U.S., we'd never allow anything so intrusive. Fingerprinting is for foreigners and criminals! We prefer more subtle monitoring. Out of sight, out of mind, right?
Here, we'll just mandate that the bars have to check ID by scanning your RFID-enabled, government issued card through a terminal. Your photo pops up on the terminal screen (built by Diebold -- don't ask what's inside!), and they see that you're 21. It's for the children, naturally. Don't want them drinking. Of course, also on file from when you applied for your ID card is your retinal patterns, fingerprints, shoe size, etc. So if they find some suspect fingerprints, it'll be a simple matter to check them against the files for everybody that's been in that pub. Superior to the Brits really, since you don't have to deal with low-grade print scanners at every bar, getting gunked up and unreliable.
From a "citizens" perspective, it's no different than today. Lots of places scan your ID when you buy booze, so most people would never notice. By putting all the changes in the backend, it's far less intrusive. Doesn't make sense to remind people of what's going on -- why not keep things looking the way they "always have?"
Actually taking fingerprints is so 20th century. Honestly
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
I actually live just down the road from Yeovil. (or YeoVile). An aquiantance actually runs the main firm of bouncers in the town. He says that the fingerprint scanners started off in one of the clubs in town more or less as the owner is a gadget freak and just got a MS keyboard with fingerprint scanner. The club owner used it to get some free publicity in the local press. The regional press and tv picked it up and finally the story was on the main bbc news a few months ago. Governement has seen it and thought "Hang on a minute..."
Actually having your right index finger print taken in the clubs closed, non-government affilitated system is optional even in the bar that started it. YeoVile is a small town and the bouncers know all the main troublemakers personally by now. If someone comes in from out of town looking for trouble of course no system is going to stop them.
So all of this started out as a cheap publicity stunt by the owner of a small club in a small town and has got people the British government involved and now people all round the world are commenting on it... the guy must be laughing his head off.
another Roadkill on the Information Superhighway
I live in Coventry now and I really hope that this idea does come through, they did mention that the council is considering it here. We have quite a few police about on a night out - which is good - but there is a limit to what they can reasonably do.
As I understand it this system checks your fingerprint against a "banned" list, so if your on the list you don't get in, but if your not on the list you can go in - and they have no idea who you are. If they don't already have your fingerprint on file (for previous drunk and disorderly behaviour) they don't know you from Adam. I really don't see what problem people have from the point of view of privacy, or anything else... I'd certainly be more inclined to go out at night with this system in place
*''I can't believe it's not a hyperlink.''
I don't see how this story, true or not, fits into the YRO section of /. The only "online" thing about it is the discussion, which seems to have a low signal/noise ratio.
Maybe YRO should signify Your Rights Outside?
I would like to say refering to your last line there. Yes, it's a little rediculous to card someone who is obviously above drinking age. However, I know here in georgia, it dosn't matter how old you are, if you don't have your ID with you, you are not permited to drink. period. I am a bartender myself, and it's hard to tell sometimes who is of age, and who isn't. When there is any sort of doubt in my mind, I will card everyone with that party. When any objections arrise, I just tell them that in the state of georgia, age asside, no ID no drink. Now, if someone is obviously of age, and they don't have there ID, I go ahead and serve them.
They want their sheep-think police state back...
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
As I understand it this system checks your fingerprint against a "banned" list,
Is that so? My understanding is that even human "experts" cannot always agree on whether or not two fingerprints taken in optimal circumstances match, and that it is commonplace for police computers to produce several possible matches when presented with a fingerprint taken from the scene of a crime - the idea being that once the computer's narrowed it down, an expert can then identify the correct match.
Now, replace the computing power and software sophistication available to the police with that available to your local pub landlord. Replace the optimal circumstances with a beer-soaked bar staffed by untrained students who just want to get on with serving the next customer. Replace the fingerprint experts with a couple of knuckle-dragging bouncers.
Once that thing's got enough fingerprints on there for there to be a reasonably sized database to search against, it's going to make the pub a lot quieter.
It was Hartlepool. They voted for H'Angus the monkey (Or at least the guy who wore the H'Angus suit as a mascot for the local football team) to become mayor on a campaign of providing a banana to every school child.
If I could make a suggestion that would solve your problem: Leave Coventry.
Seriously, the place is dire.
Cheers for the info!
this would make more sense as to why ID cards get asked for, you can't prove who you are, no alcohol/entry to venue serving alcohol. I can see the sense in asking for everybody's id's so nobody gets picked on and as a means of diffusing tensions in a situation. I hada chuckle when it happened to me in Los Angeles when I was there aged 35, much as I'd love to look 21 I don't think anybody would have knocked 15 years off my age... I suppose I was just pointing out that in places other than the UK drinking of alcohol seems to be tied into individuals proving their identity. I'd be interested to hear of how it works in other places as well. I've travelled round a few countries and UK and USA seem to be the most keen on checking ID/age. Mind you I've heard that Danish folk are/were (?) pretty fed up with Swedish teenagers on crazy nights out - in Sweden you have to be older before you can drink than in Denmark so loads of people come over and make fools / a nuisance of themselves (21 vs 18 years old maybe?) so I guess they must check IDs and age in Sweden as well...
Imagine that you walk into a bar. You ask the barman for a drink. He produces a biometric scanner to scan your fingertips. The scanner then searches for your fingerprint in a database of customers. Then a robotic arm in a big vending machine produces the glass you used when you last drank at that pub! And since it's only been used, it only gets rinsed, rather than washed with detergent! Think of all the detergent you could save!
See, wasn't it worth that teeny-weeny bit of privacy you gave up?
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
they should just implement a loyalty card like the supermarkets, save up get one free pint in 10, or save for 20 years and get a free liver harvested from a chinese worker sentanced to death for not making western consumer goods fast enough. People dont mind giving up their privacy for a tiny bribe. (except me it seems)
really, if all they are doing is registering you at a certain bar at a certain time, its no more an invasion of privacy as being caught on the cctv, having you car registed by ANPR (automatic number plate recognition) on the way in (data kept for 2 years) or using your card in or near the place. why all the panic?.
The thing is though, if it is going to stop the violent people from getting in, who is going to run the scheme? I mean it would only be 2 weeks before all the bouncers in the country are barred. Also can we bring in random breath testing for bouncers please, theres nothing quite as worrying as a pissed (drunk) bouncer wandering around.
We've had bigger towns voting for monkeys as their town mayor (Hull, go have a read)
I think you'll find it was Hartlepool not Hull.
It is your personal duty to fight for what is right on a daily basis. Ignoring injustice is identical to approving
In the same town of this piloted program, there was a 48% reduction in alcohol-related PATRONAGE, because people were so pissed off about being fingerprinted like a criminal just to buy goods / merchandice.
l
Therefore, your 48% reduction in alchohol related crime.
Dang, while don't you heavily tax the internet instead, may'be you'll see a 48% reduction in internet addiction. Oh, wait, the Germans just did. http://slashdot.org/articles/06/10/22/053201.shtm
I guess our President's obnoxious and overbearing dumbassedness has gotten so contagious that it's leapt the pond. Sorry guys.
I still don't like the fingerprinting bit - it seems like it's begging for someone to abuse it.
Well, we're already fingerprinting kids in schools so that they can borrow library books, the excuse being that it's too much to expect them to bring their library card with them. Now, this information isn't shared with anyone, but you can bet your life that if the police thought it would be useful, it would be handed over. So it's not that surprising to see a willingness to find a similarly innocuous excuse to systematically fingerprint adults too.
Are we talking male or female patrons here ?
Both, have you no idea of how vulgar us Brits are?
Otherwise known as "Track Every Vehicle in Europe with the thin excuse of taxation".
Since the last time I looked at this, the UK Department for Transport documentation on the matter has become far more structured and comprehensive.
I've yet to find the mention that cropped up in the original, that the system had to be compatible with the proposed European system, but the number of documents has expanded considerably and I'm still looking. As has their estimate of costs, which has risen by an order of magnitude. And we all know how underpriced goverment IT project figures tend to be.
The justification that the DfT has always put forward for the scheme is the reduction of congestion in key areas. This does not stand up to examination.
The DfT themselves prices the "OBU" on board unit with GPS and cellular comms at between £100 and £525. In contrast, a simple active RFID in the front number plate would cost around £10. I suspect the road side infrastructure to read either solution is going to work out roughly equivalent in cost.
It's just not credible that the end goal of the scheme is congestion reduction. Congestion reduction only requires you to track vehicles entering the congested stretches of road. It does not require you to be able to track a vehicle parked in the middle of a field. When you can achieve your aims with an order of magnitude less in terms of capital cost, the only possible conclusions are that this is either pork-barrel spending on a massive scale, or that the government wants to track your vehicle wherever it goes, anywhere in Europe. I'll leave it up to the reader to decide WHY.
Secondly, in the eyes of most people in civilized democracies, US politics has mostly been dominated by rabid right-wing capitalists, dictated by powerful companies, since at least the 1960s...
Hahaha. Off topic I know, but ALL of my friends from Europe love to jab me about crap like this all the time. However, ALL love visiting me here in the US, and wish they could stay longer. And, a few have moved here and work full time...so it can't be that bad.....geeeez. I love visiting Europe, but I've always found the local politics rather drab and, well, the overall atmosphere kinda depressing. Yes, I'm being pretty general about these comments...but that is the way it goes.
Come to think of it, most of Italy was upbeat and laid back...renting a house there next summer...
"As I understand it this system checks your fingerprint against a "banned" list,"
Is that so? My understanding is that even human "experts" cannot always agree on whether or not two fingerprints taken in optimal circumstances match, and that it is commonplace for police computers to produce several possible matches when presented with a fingerprint taken from the scene of a crime - the idea being that once the computer's narrowed it down, an expert can then identify the correct match.
From previous news about the Yeovil scheme, I can tell you that they associate a fingerprint with a photo taken at the same time. Where possible matches on the fingerprint come up, they'll simply compare your face with the photo(s).
Once that thing's got enough fingerprints on there for there to be a reasonably sized database to search against, it's going to make the pub a lot quieter.
If it was a national scheme, then it would hit a problem. But the blacklists are town-based or city based. And wouldn't ever hold all the fingerprints for that town or city, just the sub-set of people that do actually go drinking in city centre pubs. Also note that it only needs to hold for the long term the fingerprints of those who cause trouble. The fingerprints of non-trouble making people can be purged after a short time. So all in all, it'll never be such a large database that it becomes problematic.
What are the limits ? While I find some of such regulations reasonable, I didn't ever hear of one which didn't contain at least some disturbing elements.
So, if I have a pub, with about 10 fights (or else) in a year, and I disgustedly refuse to take people's fingerprints just because they want a beer, and there will be 15 fights in the next year, they will take away my license ? What will they consider reasonable reduction ? What change in numbers will they consider unreasonable growth ?
Who can guarantee that the data containing the drinking habits of people won't land in the hands of insurance companies who will raise their fees because people drink from time to time ? Yes, they probably say now that they won't misuse the data. But what about tomorrow, when a new regulation will allow, or require them to give out the data ?
We will probably be just better off by buying the booze ourselves and party at home with our friends. Or better, buy that long-dreamed of mini beer brewery in the basement.
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
Does a drunk falling in the street make a sound if no one is there to Breathalyzer him?
I am not trying to use a slippery slope fallacy here, but isn't it obvious that everything starts small?
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
how many drunk pub patrons.....
Are we talking male or female patrons here ?
---
Google for "female binge drinking" and you'll see almost only british hits.
a little OT, but did anyone read this in the article:
A fight between two youngsters escalated into a brawl involving 435 12-16 year olds
unbelievable...
That only substantiates the trial in Yeovil; it in no way substantiates the claim that it's going to be rolled-out nationwide. I'd say the OP's objection stands.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Clearly, the only equitable solution is to amputate everyone's hands and make everyone wear RFID-implanted artificial hands.
It seems any excuse is good enough to enact as much as possible from George Orwell's novel, from Doublespeak to monitoring (with CCTV cameras now being equipped with speakers - expect mikes to come next).
The process is always the same:
a - decide which bit of individual liberty you're going to take away;
b - use the latest threat (communism, child molesters, terrorism, furry animals) and 'market' the crap out of it via a very willing and increasingly uncritical media (it sells);
c - implement;
d - abuse;
e - repeat;
I don't know if anyone's noticed that 'temporary' measures in this context are another lie - ever seen any rolled back?
At the moment, the UK is also busy enabling a new type of speed cameras (as far as I know). They're called 'traffic masters' and originally those cameras were set up to monitor traffic flow by tracking where vehicles went (by license plate recognition - it's been around for long). They're the mid-dark blue cameras on high poles you see.
I've been told code is now being developed to track point-to-point speed of vehicles, thus making it an implied speed camera, but without the compulsory bright yellow marking. I wonder how long it's going to take for someone to claim "savings from which we can pay xx hospitals" - which they never do judging by the state of the health system- and "combine" the functions as if it's a new idea. Another privacy aspect: we know where you go and how fast you got there.
Meanwhile, complete fortunes are wasted on Government IT. The reason it's in such a state is quite simply because awarding contracts to (campaign) friends (i.e. rigging the process) is not exactly the right way to guarantee quality and value for money, especially not if you 'avoid' analyzing the long duration contract for tactics that avoid penalties for malperformance. Coincidence? Only the first time.
But hey - that's why both Government need those external threats (and manufacture them if they don't exist): it stops the voter from looking too close at what's going on.
Be scared! Hide! Don't ask embarrassing questions! We'll make you a terrorist/child molester/commie if you don't comply!
Sick or what?
Suggesting that wez folks that lives in the Sounth (East I'm sure you was referrin to) USA is in cahoots with the KKKlan.. well hell thats just as silly as a one legged dog swimmin across the river at high tide on a Sunday. I live in Tallahassee and I reckon I'll take offense for my kin folk... your horse sense is scarce as hen's teeth boy. The KKKlan done moved its HQ out to the Khristian Kountry Klub and they aint let me in on account of some fancy "no shirt no shoes" rule... hell I ain't got neither! Just remember boy , Sun don't shine on the same dog's tail all the time. (FYI open office has "cahoots" AND "reckon" in its spell check database!)
Sure, but equally, there's no law requiring any landlord to serve you if he doesn't want to. If the landlord wants to appease the magistrates by enforcing fingerprinting, then he can refuse any customers who don't cooperate; even non-drinking customers. That makes this scheme rather toxic: it's made to look like a free decision by the licencees, but it's driven by local government pressure which in turn is wound up by pressure from central government.
Wow! That's amasing. Let there will be next step - do total fingerprinting. Why limit it just to pubs? How about all drivers? The car is very, very dangerous thing. How about all who buy a knife in the store? Knife can be used for murder ....
As an American living in Europe, I don't think that the problem is "drunks". By American standards, almost everyone in Europe is an alcoholic, yet no other country has the the same kind of savage violence that the UK sees. Scandinavian countries have hard-core binge drinkers, and both Germany and Ireland have a higher per-capita beer consumption.
Clearly the problem is cultural. It seems to me that a reasonable approach might be to try to change the culture to be a bit more like places where you don't have to be scared of looking people in the eye lest it start a fight, or where the police don't show up in riot vans every weekend to control the carnage.
But, like almost everyone, the Brits love their culture, and are loathe to change even the ugly bits. So, instead they get cameras and fingerprint readers. It might work, but I'm still going be very, very careful in pubs there...
I've often wondered if Americans were somehow genetically unable to judge a persons age by their face, in the UK if the bartender is unsure as to how old someone is they will ask for ID but if they are sure the person is over 18 they will never ask for ID. I have never been asked for ID in a UK pub or off licence.
In the US however, despite being 28 years old I was constantly asked to prove I was over 21 and I can't claim this is down to my youthful good looks. What is even more ridiculous is that sometimes the bar tenders wouldn't even accept my passport as proof of my age. I began to think that the US was breeding a strain of genetically subnormal, anal retentive trolls to tend their bars for them.
There was a case in the last 10 years or so in the US, and I can't find the reference right now (its 8:30am ;), but someone set a precedent, based on taking it to the Supreme Court, arguing that fingerprints are considered property, and cannot be taken without the consent of the holder.
Can someone who is a bit more awake, seek this case out for me and post a link?
All those schemes you've quoted are schemes which were once trialed as pilot schemes. You haven't mentioned the, no doubt, millions of pilot schemes which were never taken any further. This idea is obviously never going to get any further than the half a dozen pubs in the small town it's currently, optionally, being used.
For a start the majority of pubs don't have bouncers or door staff and it's obviously impractical in the extreme to be fingerprinted every time you go to the bar to get a drink, secondly there are thousands and thousands of pubs in the UK all within a 10 second walking distance if people thought they were going to be fingerprinted and fail the test at one pub they would simply go to another pub which wasn't implementing the scheme.
There are areas in most towns and cities which attract the majority of drink related violence, you can normally identify them by the huge number of horrible chain pubs with loud music, bouncers and very few seats all right next to each other, these pubs have one goal and one goal only and that is to sell as much booze as they can for as much as possible, they already have bouncers to deal with the violence so why would they want to place any further barriers to selling more people more booze ? Luckily most towns also have areas where pubs aren't run along such lines and these do not generally attract any violence at all except once in a blue moon so why would these pubs wish to inflict fingerprint checks for their regulars every time they buy a pint ?
I was watching the movie "V for Vendetta" again last night - as a graphic novel that was written in 1982 it's eerily predictive. For a movie made two years ago, it's practically a documentary.
I'm a Brit who has been living in the USA for the past 13 years and it's hard to say which is more like the movie. Britain with more spycams per person than anywhere else on earth - and soon you can't even have a beer without being fingerprinted! Or perhaps it is the USA in which the faceless secret police can monitor what books you check out from the library, bug your phone without judicial oversight and swoop down on you, merely accuse you of being a terrorist (no proof required) and on that pretext lock you up, torture you, ship you off to god-knows what hell-hole - and all without any right of trial or appeal?
Hmmm - hard call. Between the two countries - it's difficult to say which comes closest to the nightmare that V opposes in the movie. As he says: If you want to know whose fault this is - just look in the mirror.
Our own fear of statistically insignificant terrorist violence (or avian flu or WMD or drunk drivers or...you name it) induces progressively higher tolerance for the State to ratchet down the human rights of the entire population. There will come a point when we realise that this has been a terrible mistake - but will we do that before or after the point where we can no longer reverse it's effects?
Better get that bulk order for Guy Fawkes masks in before the rush. Amazon have them for $5.99.
www.sjbaker.org
The U.S> has the largest prison population (over 2 million) and the highest rate of prisoners per capita at 715 per 100,000. source: NationMaster
harmonious design
Weren't they the people who elected Peter Mandelson? The man who narrowly avoided being responsible for a recent European-wide bra shortage?
Hold on - the linked article says that this scheme is proven to work because in the Yeoville area alcohol related violence had dropped 48% over the trial period. It then went on to say that over that eight month period there were only TWO major incidents. So if there had been (say) four major incidents over the preceeding eight months - which reduced to two during the trial - that would have been a 50% reduction.
(Note that one of those two major incidents wasn't even anything to do with pubs - some kids were at an under-18's disco and obtained alcohol "somewhere else" - it shouldn't even have been counted).
I have two observations:
Firstly: I would submit that whether there were two or four major incidents over a period of eight months is not a statistically valid sample. Especially because the preceeding 8 months would have included Xmas and New Year - both notable occasions for serious drunkenness. No competent statistician or conductor of scientific tests would sign up to these conclusions from such a ridiculously small sample - so we should either conclude that they are invalid - or that they were actually counting something else...which leads me to:
Secondly: For a number like '48%' to have come about, we cannot be measuring a reduction from four to two major crimes - that would be a 50% reduction. This MUST have been taken over a vastly larger sample of incidents. We must conclude then that they are not talking about 'major' incidents such as the two described (a sexual attack in the toilets and a fight between two kids that erupted into a major street brawl). So what this fingerprinting exercise is all about is reducing MINOR incidents.
So let's call this what it is. It's not about cutting down on serious offences - it's about reducing MINOR offences by banning people from pubs who happen to have lost their tempers or done any of the usual things that drunk people tend to do.
Is that worth the loss of privacy that this entails?
www.sjbaker.org
Apologies to the good citizens of Hull, you are indeed right :-)
f'sure but equally true that not everything small gets big, I had plans for world domination aged 7 and here I am with a small vegetable garden in a wee house in the country.... :-)
I was responding to the headline "OMG town of 40,000 does this therefore the whole planet will follow suit!".. my point was that in the UK more people have voted for monkeys to be their town mayor (Hartlepool not Hull as well corrected, and it was a bloke in a monkey suit, the local football team mascot) than have voted for finger print recognition before you can have a pint. So I think we've got a while yet before it takes over the world.
World of technology is littered with pilot projects that just don't scale up. I'd say we don't have to worry till the system's been well tested. Other posters have suggested it's a pretty small scale hack.
http://www.thisiswiltshire.co.uk/display.var.88442 1.0.fingerprint_plan_to_stop_pub_yobs.php
:-)
It's hardly Sheffield or Coventry, admittedly.
We have all kinds of tough new drunk driving enforcement over here, too. Though thankfully short of fingerprinting people going into clubs. The net effect is people who are problem drinkers drink anyway and responsible people, many of whom don't like the police gettin' up in their business, stay home. Instead we'll have private parties, where our guests can stay the night. Just like I'm guessing a lot of people will skip their pint at the pub because being fingerprinted seems sort of creepy.
You might think that's a responsible solution and you'd be right. The downside is for people trying to run a business. The more enforcement, the more responsible people stay home. It's getting to the point we don't go out on weekends at all. Who wants to run the road block gauntlet just to go out to eat and dancing for a couple hours?
More enforcement is always easy from a political point of view. It's a feel good thing to do that doesn't really work, but since when do results matter in political solutions? I'm not sure there are any easy answers. But I can say for sure, the tougher you get on enforcement, the more your business and entertainment district is going to suffer.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
The problem is that even when one person comes up with a dumb idea (for whatever reason) like that, which happens to be offensive towards civil rights there are always some authoritarian/totalitarian dickwads who think "hey, that's a great! idea.
If the idea takes off, it'll be a couple heartbeats before it becomes mandatory & is tied into the national "if we arrest you for any reason, your fingerprint & DNA are belong to us" database. Even stuff like speed cameras & CCTV had to start out on a small trial basis to find out if it was worth doing.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Is this the UK's version of prohibition?
Well, they aren't prohibiting anything, but if enough people cannot get a drink, or are sufficiently bothered to do so, circumvention will arise somehow, illegally or otherwise.
Tagging drinkers is almost nice (aside from standard privacy concerns), it can track those in a mind altered state, after the fact, if a crime was committed. Barring them elsewhere, however, may be overstepping the bounds. Or at least, it is taking two steps at a time.
I'd guess this will fail soon. It sounds overambitous and intrusional, it'll take one public incident to have the public rally against it.
Then again, if tracking works, will narcotics be legal as long as your tracked?
Have you read my journal today?
"...Bradburn noted the system had a 'psychological effect' on offenders."
I'll say....
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
How about, instead of treating everyone like a potential criminal, you just treat the criminals like criminals?
For instance, there is already a law against violent acts, in England and the US. If someone gets drunk and does something violent, they could easily be punished under existing laws (and note you just punish them, not everybody. Imagine that).
And I don't know about England, but in the US, it is quite possible to keep someone out of clubs. It is a little thing called probation, and if you break it, they throw you back in jail. And believe me, they take probation violations very seriously, or at least I know the US does.
This is like one of those things where they make a law to be really tough on child murderers, only it is already against the law to murder a child!?!?! (What the hell, were we being easy on them before?).
So in other words, this law serves one of two purposes:
1) Someone wanted to make themselves look good, so they spend time trying to get stupid laws passed...and sometimes succeed.
2) This is yet another law designed to make sure that everyone is a potential criminal, passing so many laws that at any given time, everyone is going to be breaking some law or another. So when they get ready to round everybody up, you have a legal excuse to, because after all, they are criminals.
Transporter_ii
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
"The US on the other has one thing going for it: constitutional protections, and associated with that, pretty good transparency. Whenever there's a new law project that might touch constitutional protections, there's usually some people that will notice, and there's quite a bit more public debate about it."
u st_try_voting_here.html
Some do notice, but apparently not enough. Just two examples of the effectiveness of "The US on the other has one thing going for it: constitutional protections, and associated with that, pretty good transparency. Whenever there's a new law project that might touch constitutional protections, there's usually some people that will notice, and there's quite a bit more public debate about it."
Just Try Voting Here: 11 of America's worst places to cast a ballot (or try)
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2006/09/j
Lie by Lie: Chronicle of a War Foretold: August 1990 to March 2003
http://www.motherjones.com/bush_war_timeline/
I won't even yet go into how rotted roofs in Houston (unrepaired because a certain governer would not release or mark funds for repairs of run down police stations) led to destruction of crime scene evidence that led to uncounted illegal or erroneous convictions of people, this under the watch of then gov geo bush. Or, how with zeal and zest he signed off on the executions orders for people because he has complete faith and trust in the judicial system.
Funny Slash image word: "canons"
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
The description of the article at the top of this story is COMPLETELY BOGUS. There is NOTHING in the register article that says mandatory fingerprinting is being rolled out.
m
A few local councils are experimenting with a scheme for city-center pubs and clubs. A home office department has offered to put a bit of funding their way.
Yeovil city council have been using their licensing committee to pressurise local landlords into joining up with their scheme, an almost certain misuse of their powers that will be stopped sharply by the first landlord to have his license refused and take the council to court. In the bill referred to, "Section 17 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 requires local authorities to consider crime and disorder reduction in the exercise of all their duties, activities and decision-making."[*] This in no way mandates the use of any particular measures or obliges landlords to operate any particular systems in pursuit of this goal, and any landlord who could demonstrate before a judge that he had taken measures that were equivalent, reasonable and proportional, could make a strong case that the council would be misdirecting itself if it refused him a license. Even the government's own guidelines [**] don't suggest anything more than vague considerations such as "A consideration of impact on existing provisions, local population etc.", "Regulation of public order", "Links to drugs and alcohol Reduction Strategy group". It's a long reach from that to coercing publicans to participate in an experimental scheme.
Of course you're a kook with a chip on his shoulder, so you didn't actually RTFA before flinging uninformed accusations of substandard journalism. Facts, who needs em? If Slashdot says the Reg says something, then that's what the Reg damn well says, right?
[*] - http://www.copelandbc.gov.uk/main.asp?page=3227
[**] - http://www.crimereduction.gov.uk/legislation30.ht
No, they were right the first time with Hull. They just meant the MP instead of Mayor.
I began to think that the US was breeding a strain of genetically subnormal, anal retentive trolls to tend their bars for them.
There certainly is a breed of genetically subnormal, anal retentive trolls, but bartenders are not as a whole, members of it. Unfortunatly, the people who decide if they may remain in business or not ARE members.
Essentially they are victims of a series of 'get tough' initiatives such that serving a single under aged person, even if thet person went to great lengths to look old enough can cost them their livlihood and freedom. The one and only thing that can save them is to check the person's ID.
It's not that unusual in some towns for the police to find the oldest looking 20 year olds in town and get them to try getting alcohol. It should probably be dismissed as entrapment, but when the cry of 'think of the children!' goes up, that goes out the window.
If one single slip-up could shut down the business you've spent years building and leave you looking for work, you'd card a few too many people too.
... It has been found that a 100% reduction of crime occurs when all people in the sample group were killed.
I hope my "read between the lines" point doesn't need to be explained...
(ok I'll explain it: If you make people AFRAID to even go to the pub, then of course you'll see a reductionin alcohol-related crimes and accidents. DUH)
Just FYI for the non-brits, being "pissed" over there is drunk, not "pissed" as in angry in the states.
That may clarify what is a bit confusing as the slang differs.
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
Exchanging liberty for extended government control is never a good trade. Never. Ever.
That is, unless you want to be controlled, ruled, herded, marked, investigated, and dominated. In that case, you are on the right track.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
It seems to me that the concept of "privacy" was embodied in the concept of "liberty," for without privacy, liberty is reduced. Also, as noted in the fourth amendment, a person is as inviolable as their house, which means the government has no right to request anything from me without a warrant, which includes fingerprints.
As the ninth amendment states, the enumeration of rights in the constitution does not imply these are the only rights held by the people. Rather, the implication is, the US government and states are only allowed those rights specifically listed in the constitution. All other rights belong to the people.
The U.S. Constitution does not specifically mention privacy, but that is merely because the comings and goings of person at the time were private by nature, subject only to observation by other people. The principles outlined in the founding documents of the United States clearly imply that a person is sovereign within themselves, and the government is supposed to be limited in power.
But then again, what do I know? I'm clearly idealistic, and believe the only way for a democracy to properly work is when every single person embodies the full power of the state.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Between ASBOs, cameras on every corner, and now this fingerprinting thing, I have to wonder:
What is it about the British public that requires they be treated as a classroom of unruly children?
--
Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
It's not torture until our 'Great Decider' the President *says* it's torture. And prison rape doesnt't count either.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
had to reply to remove my unintentional redundant mod. this new ajax moderation system sucks. Finger slipped and you got a redundant instead of an insightful. Hopefully someone else will take care of modding you up.
the town that piloted this program had a 48% reduction in alcohol-related crime
Sooooo.... what kept people from just going over to the next town to drink?
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
That's because "cahoots" and "reckon" are actual words.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
British.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
Not yet, but in 1984 it was. (Well, actually they were both part of Oceania and Britain was called 'Airstrip One'.)
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
Go watch GATACA
Youch! I hope that was a typo -- that's a big brawl!
So if the bar posts a sign that they share the information then it can be used anywhere?
Some data protection that is.
Well this is a little stupid. Instead of just going out for a good time now.
I have to get drunk before going to the bar.
Apply the belt sander to my thumb / fingers and go down to the local so i can get in with anyone else who also applied the belt sander to their hands.
Though i do guess that "sorry mr bouncer i left my ID in the car" excuse wont work any more for that problem.
I bet the bars cash in to finger out who their regulars are as well when using this system.
F***ing marketing
Looks to me like the system is 99% working, 1% fatally flawed. But I'm also a little older than you, probably. Looking at all the violence in the world: the idea that humans have evolved past needing laws is, well, absurd.
damaged by dogma
And I'm wondering... isn't the extreme extrapolation of this, oh, say, requiring all stores to fingerprint shoppers, to cut down on the number of shoplifters??
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
All the schools just installed kiddy fingerprinting ... without telling parents ... because they don't have to tell them anyway.
... people were frightened enough to keep mum ... pubs were the next move. Wonder what's on the whole list of next moves?
.... it'll be a while longer
Once that clearly worked
Of course here in the US we still have half a constitution left
"You must try to forget all you have learned. You must begin to dream." -- Sherwood Anderson
Maybe you should READ The Times before offering that opinion - here is today's edition.
Bradburn noted the system had a 'psychological effect' on offenders."
Oddly, when a government official or bureacracy attempts to threaten or intimidate me, I also experience psychological effects. This idiot is basically proud of the fact that this initiative managed to intimidate a bunch of drunks into submission. Good going.
3. It is only 5 out of 51 pubs and clubs in the town.
It's a shame things are this way, in the UK it is theoretically possible for pubs to be fined or to lose their licences for serving people who are under age but I have yet to witness this ever happening despite there being dozens of bars in my area alone which are obviously catering mainly to 16 year olds, it's perfectly acceptable for someone to have been drinking in a pub for a couple of years and then arrive one night with all their friends to celebrate there 18th birthdays which may at the most lead to the landlord to raise his eyebrow and mutter "kids nowadays eh !". This does possibly contribute to the supposed problem of drunken teenage yobs but to be honest I think it's far better for them to do their drinking in pubs where older drinkers will certainly point out to them what is and what is not an acceptable way to behave whilst drunk in pubs ( e.g. if you or friends break the keys on the jukebox one more time my friends and I will smash your fingers ) than the widely used alternative of drinking in parks and wrecking childrens playgrounds.
I think the bottom line is most people in the UK regulary visit pubs and bars and most of them started doing so well before the legal drinking age so the moans from the anally retentive groups who don't know how to enjoy themselves and don't see why anyone else should are largely ignored unless the police have a free evening to wander around some pubs and kick some people out.
What if I have a sarcophagus, live in Sealand, and always succeed in making car analogies?
Then you're evil, due to the effects of the sarcophagus.
At one time in the U.S. underage drinking, while frowned upon, was primarily viewed as youthful indescretion and was mostly punishable by watching a cop pour your beer on the ground. Some parents would provide beer for parties on the grounds that it's better to keep it at home.
Now, being caught underage with alcohol means arrest and parents can also face legal trouble for buying their own kids beer for consumption at home!
For a country that likes to talk about freedom so much, the U.S. sure is fond of prohibition.
Way to go Airstrip One!
"So passed, to all appearance, from the minds of man the strange dream and fantasy called freedom."
It's great reading and so marvelously 'spot on' it's still in print after over 80 years.
Oi you American fuck wit, go back to high school and find out what England is actually part of!
Bloody hate it when I'm referred to as English when the United Kingdom is made up of several countries, I'll name then since you seem so thick to call the entire island England. We have Wales, England, Scotland & Northern Ireland.
Actually, I question the methodology they use for the polls in the first place. The vast majority of those I've seen cited in the media are government-funded, and carried out by the kind of organisation one hires when one already knows the result required.
Having seen the full list of questions they asked in a couple of cases, it usually goes something like this:
What they fail to mention is that:
You show me a study that presents both the questions at the top of this post and the verifiable facts afterwards in a balanced way and then tells me the majority of the population wants ID cards, and I'll believe my failure to encounter a single person who speaks favourably of them is just a matter of moving in different circles. Until then, it's just lying with statistics, and you can conduct as many polls as you like but still you have no meaningful information about how the population as a whole would feel on the issue if it had a balanced knowledge of the potential advantages and potential risks.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
It's strange, but the comments I see in a quick read are mostly about whether this is a good way to prevent crime, rather than about the character of effectively being asked for your "papers" wherever you go. Since the sensors are government-mandated, isn't it fairly likely that (as with cameras) they'll soon be linked to a federal database such that dissidents, er, criminals can be identified at these handy checkpoints?
Englishmen, how far will you let this surveillance trend go? Is there any restriction your government could theoretically place on you that would cause you to say, "I won't let you treat me like this?" It seems you've already submitted to a lot of other things, and are now being told you can't even go out for a beer without being treated like a criminal. Are you comfortable with all possible forms of monitoring and control, or can you name one that will be too much?
Revive the Constitution.
Lots of Islamic places do indeed chop off hands and heads.
Other places spank you. This is probably the best: if the criminal goes to prison and thus loses his job/wife/home, he'll have nothing left to lose when he gets out of prison. Somebody with nothing left to lose is dangerous.
Looks like another win for big brother. The UK is already fameous for having millions of cameras watching the moves of everyone. "Deny the use of roads to criminals" is a popular political system for justifying big brother's continual observation and monitoring. Now, if you want to drink you need to provide a fingerprint. How soon before that turns to a national ID smart card with DNA verification?
This wouldn't be so bad if big brother could be trusted -- but we already know that he lies, cheats and steals to forward his agenda. Look at the UK and US in their blatent lies about "weapons of mass destruction" as an excuse for a war on Iraq.
The word trust and politician should never be used in the same sentence.
Slowly, increment by increment, both the USA and UK are turning into police states. The agenda has been set, the plans made, all they need to do is erode every speck of privacy a unit at a time.
Is everyone sleeping? Is nobody worried or seeing the big picture?
Nope. No conspiracy here. Move along and get on with your business, citizen.
"Please fill out this form in triplicate to show you have paid your tea tax. cheerio!"
When you pry them from my cold dead... Uhh. oh. Nevermind.
It's true no man is an island, but if you take a bunch of dead guys and tie 'em together, they make a good raft.
Over here in blighty we've a number of other terms for this state of inebriation. A few of them are below
drunk
mullered
wasted
trashed
beanoed
trolleyed
badgered
rat-arsed
ratted
tight
lashed
When out drinking on can be:
on the piss
out on the lash
on the badger
on the raz
having a couple of sherberts
and many many more...
Note that I've been all over the country and some of the slang is very localised. If anyone can contribute some more to the education of the site in expressing their state of disrepair...
Banned from the pubs get out of that door, banned from the pubs or i'll call the law.
Banned, banned, banned, cos they don't like punks, banned, banned, banned, they treat us like drunks.
Banned from the pubs go on I said go, banned from the pubs can we have a drink ? No !
Banned from the pubs just get out of here, banned from the pubs no you can't have a beer.
Banned from the pubs go on yer way, banned from the pubs no punks they say.
Banned from the pubs you lot get out, banned from the pubs no punks they shout.
'Banned From The Pubs' by Peter & The Test Tube Babies
... but I did nothing, for I was not a pub-going beer-drinker.
See how it works? First of all techniques like camera surveillance, fingerprinting, and biometric ID cards are essential to protect us from mad terrorists who want to kill us all (because they hate our freedom). Then they turn out to be pretty useful against those dreadful paedophiles... and kiddy porn dealers... and (kiddy) porn viewers... and rapists. Then, after a while, the scope is extended to violent drunks, muggers, groups of suspicious-looking people standing around for no obvious reason, people who send emails or make Slashdot posts mentioning Tony Blair and Iraq... Until finally, one day we wake up to find that children are fingerprinted and/or iris scanned every time they enter their school (which they are compelled to do, by law, every day); and perhaps adults get the same treatment every time they visit a supermarket checkout, take their car into or out of a parking lot, or go a restaurant or the movies... and satellites track every movement of their cars... and so on.
Once you make the initial concession, the rest of it seems so logical and inevitable. Why wouldn't you feel safer knowing the state is keeping track of you every minute of every day and night? You don't have anything to hide, do you? Do you? Do you?
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
Since you need a passport or similar ID to enter many drinking establishments in the US, I have a hard time understanding why Americans are getting worked up over this.
Jaffa, kill the shol'va!
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
"I was amused when in the USA to be with a silver haired retired friend who was asked for his ID as well. I think he was quite amused and pleased that they were checking him in case he was under 21...."
Its more likely they suspected him as possibly being someone with an outstanding tab or bounced check/card charge.
Wabi-Sabi
Matthew
Like the signs on the CCTV? "...for the purposes of public safety and crime prevention."
You could drive a bus through that, comrade.
Let me just say, at this point, that I love the Politblairo and am a loyal citizen of the Union of Soviet Socialist Kingdoms.
How on earth is this flamebait? If I had points I'd mod you up, hopefully someone else will do it though.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Well apparently they need to do something over there. A few months ago they outlawed the ownership of swords in Scotland do to drinking problems. They called it a "booze and blades" problem. I have friends over there and they say alot of their drinks have stronger alcohol content than ours do. And they have a lower drinking age too. I'm not sure how what there real problem is, but they better find out soon before the situation gets any worse.
and they have no idea who you are. If they don't already have your fingerprint on file (for previous drunk and disorderly behaviour) they don't know you from Adam.
, 00.html ).
Yes they do - "Clubbers and drinkers will be asked to register by providing proof of ID and personal information including name, address, date of birth and a photograph." ( http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2033473
Like you, when I read theregister article I assumed it would just check against a fingerprint list, but it seems a lot more worrying. Yes, they will know all sorts about you.
They claim that they're not spying on us, but if that's so, why do they need these extra details?
one rural backwater population 40,000. We've had bigger towns voting for monkeys as their town mayor (Hull, go have a read). Have a sip of that nice warm beer and calm down :-)
I know it's a local Government decision, but the point is still that this scheme may very well extend to many other places. I agree with you that the headline is misleading in that it's only "started" in this one place, but just saying, there is still reason to be concerned.
[apologies for stupid subject - Slashdot won't let me post with the Subject put there automatically, nor will it allow a blank one...]
Over 50% of the prison population in the US is non-violent drug-related offenses. To be clear, I don't really consider those people to be real criminals.
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