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Aussie Police Consider Using Automated Spy Drones
beaverdownunder writes "Police in the Australian state of Victoria have confirmed that they are investigating employing unmanned drones in the war against crime, following the lead of law enforcement agencies in the United States, set to begin using drones as of tomorrow. This revelation has alarmed Australian civil libertarians, who fear that in a country with no constitutionally-protected civil rights, people could be surveilled for political reasons."
Australian civil libertarians know that in a country with no constitutionally-protected civil rights, people will be surveilled for political reasons.
Fixed that for you.
Currently hooked on AMP
in a country with no constitutionally-protected civil rights
Well, we have them here in the USA, but they make near to no difference whatsoever. We've built a government so big, with so much momentum and attracting so many power-hungry ppls, that it ignores civil rights when they are "inconvenient". Or it passes so many laws in so many ill-defined ways that everyone is guilty of violating them. Then if they don't like something or some group, it's just down to finding *which* laws they are breaking - because everyone is breaking some.
Civil rights only count to the extent that the citizenry defends them, and here, people generally do not. Whether they are written in a several hundred year old document, that doesn't matter. Ppl similarly do not defend against intrusive practices of big corporations. It's the same root cause: keep the people happy with bread and ci... err, Hollywood movies and Facebook, and they won't care about their rights.
>>I wonder how easy it will be to shoot those out of the sky, shotgun? or rifle?
They'll use boomerangs. Everyone in Australia is trained to use these from the age of two.
Disclaimer: My cultural intelligence is mostly the result of action cartoons from the 1980s.
A better link about the US story (*)
.. but on the whole it would make things easier by not having to reply to my own posts like this.
Drones with an eye on the public cleared to fly
(*) Why the fuck can't I edit my own posts? If you can track my karma, then you should be able to let me edit what I wrote. Sure it could be misused by trolls
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
"the war against crime?" That's like calling life "the war against death."
They'll use boomerangs.
Stainless steel boomerangs - with razor sharp edges thrown by feral kids
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
Why the fuck can't I edit my own posts?
The motivations might be:
(1) To accurately preserve "history". To prevent you from hiding a statement you later regret.
(2) To encourage people to get their post right the first time since their errors will be preserved.
(3) It can destroy the context of followup posts. The followup may be referring to something deleted or corrected. This would encourage more data usage as followups are incentivized to includes quotes in case of future edits.
From a *legal* point of view how is this different than helicopters with observers and video cameras?
I get the creepiness angle, you are far more likely to be "seen" when an expensive helicopter/crew is replaced with some number of drones. I just don't get the *new* legal issue. The police have been using that birds eye view for quite some time.
Why won't you people wake up and realize that there is a GLOBAL movement towards totalitarianism?
Why do you keep turning the other way?
Australia, Britain, USA and many other countries are following the exact Standard Operating Procedure for taking a Free society and transforming it into a Totalitarian state.
Stop looking the other way. Start caring.
Liberty.
I do wonder if having a world war rage across your home turf makes you culturally more sensitive towards what can go wrong in your own back yard.
Good point. The powers that be in the USA like to inculcate their population with a sense of trust in domestic institutions. And they don't like skepticism of the same. These principles are found in ideas of "institutional intelligence". That is: The group is smarter than the individual. This may be true for cases where members of the group independently arrive at a consensus. But it overlooks the susceptibility of the group to influence by self-appointed leaders. Some with their own self interest placed before that of the public. Europe has had recent history with such leaders and is in a better position to recognize them should they arise again.*
The study of social psychology is more common in Europe than in the USA. One reason for that might be Europe's past experience with problems relating to group behavior. But its also due to the fear that American power brokers have with too close an inspection of their methods. One of the primary methods of dealing with dissent is to turn it into a "them vs us" fight. If you don't buy into the group philosophy without question, you must be an outsider. And by definition, a troublemaker. So, you are out of the group and the group, by definition, has no internal problems.
*Its interesting to note the corollary to Godwin's law: That a reference to Hitler automatically ends a discussion. In part, because often that's a sign that the discussion has descended to the level of being ridiculous. But also because Americans (in particular) aren't comfortable with the idea that they are being manipulated by their own leaders for other than the good of the group. And with this remark, I end the thread.
Have gnu, will travel.