Re:"Machine-guns for Algernon"
on
Muscle Mice
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· Score: 1
Hah! Algernon's Curse. That is a really good name for it. I don't know which is worse - the more literal versions, where someone physically suffers for their enhancement, or the old cyberpunk-y style metaphysical ones where people become less "human". In either case, it sounds like the twin brother of Caveman Science Fiction.
Okay. There are few "good guys" in this mess. Let's just call them the significantly more elected group than their Western-backed rivals. It'll do. I do still maintain that the West should not have responded as it did. That was disgraceful from countries that talk of democracy.
Absolutely accurate. And to my mind, if the West had reacted with less of a reflex strike at Hamas (freezing assets, cancelling aid, etc) and instead said: "okay, we have no choice but to treat them as representatives of the people", then a great deal of good could have been achieved. Instead, the West did everything it could to topple the democratically elected group in the naive belief that they could put a grossly corrupt body back in power, resulting in yet more bloodshed, resentment and suffering.
Organized religion is indeed one of the most effective tools of mass control. And you are right that were it to suddenly vanish, other means could be substituted. What enables it to be a tool of mass control is primarily the same set of reasons as would enable other tools. Poverty. Lack of Education. And to some extent, a threatening outside force which is something that is always useful to quash dissent. Palestine greatly suffers from the first two and the Israeli government amply provides the last.
Education. Opportunities for women. Open trade. If the UK and the USA spent a portion of the money they have spent on military action against certain countries on providing these things instead. then the West would have countries that were instead friendly and grateful, useful trading partners and we would have enriched ourselves by ploughing our resources not into funding the military-industrial complex, but teachers, engineers and medical professionals. We would see real economic benefits in our own countries to such policies. Mercenaries from the US and UK earn fortunes in Iraq. For every couple of mercenaries you could get at least three teachers. And making teaching a "gold rush" industry would pay our society a far greater dividend than investing in people who will return home merely with a lot of money and more practice and beating the shit out of / killing people.
Of course, the unquestioned belief is that it's far harder to get a country to support a couple of billion dollars of foreign aid than it is to persuade them to accept a hundred billion dollars of military action. I would love to challenge that as I think more of people than this.
Well I don't flatter myself that I got modded informative for any reason other than the usual "sounds confident" which usually supercedes all other reasons on Slashdot whether the poster is right or wrong. But I can reassure you that I've never read the Da Vinci code and I avoid any film with Tom Hanks in it like the Black Death.
You know, you're actually right and I'll concede that I can't offer substantive proof of what I said. So I wont try to contest your opinions. They're actually more valid in some ways as they're based on your personal experiences. For what it's worth, some of my impressions are formed by an article in The Independent some years ago, but I don't have a copy or references, I'm afraid. So it may be that I spoke out of turn and you are correct. But I'll stay wary of closed, members only religious organizations that have government Ministers in their ranks, if you don't mind - that's just good practice.
It is fair of you to challenge me on this. And I will keep an open mind on them here on. Just not so open that I'll watch a film with Tom Hanks in it, that is.;)
It doesn't matter what I think. The standard is: " could a reasonable purpose conclude it was a serious request.", to which the answer is, of course, yes.
No, the law in question requires that the inciter intend someone to act on their statements. I've addressed this in response to your same comment further down. Even she herself has stated in her column that she doesn't think he was serious or think that anyone is going to act on his statement.
I guess I can vaguely see where you're coming from. It was a genuine question, btw. Note that the irony intended by the MP has nothing to do with her religion or race as you think, but is because she had been on the radio arguing how it was wrong for politicians to criticise the practice of stoning people. Can't condemn it, can't advocate it. Can't win, really can you?;):)
Wrong (You are correct, but about the wrong crime.) You are confusing the trial of the person who actually does the stoning with the trial of the person whose negligent behavior resulted in the other person doing the stoning.
No I'm not. You said that the incitement crime was similar to the crime of murder because intent didn't matter. I pointed out that this is wrong in both cases by referencing the actual laws.
The test is if a reasonable person could know that the consequences of his actions might likely result in another person carrying out the request.
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown herself said in her column in the Independent today, that she doesn't expect anyone to act on his comments. Nonetheless, depsite herself in print stating that she didn't think anyone would take his comment as a serious request, she nonetheless reported him to police for Incitement (technically 'Encouraging or Assisting Crime') because "she found it very offensive". Furthermore this is actually a bit of a red herring you've created because as I quoted earlier, intent is an intrinsic part of the law that he is being accused of: specifically "the inciter must intend others to engage in the behaviour constituting the offence". Unless you can show that he actually intended for someone to act on his twitter posts, (and I think he would be utterly horrified and shocked if someone if someone did, as we all would be), then he is not guilty of this crime.
I think you're well-intentioned and I concede you tricked me into clicking on your homepage,;), but I don't think you have taken the time to actually read the law in question or familiarise yourself with the context.
Rhetorical, as previously stated, means for dramatic effect. And your last sentence:
A request that someone stone someone to death is not a rhetorical question.
is flawed logic as it presupposes that this is an actual and serious request that someone stone her to death which is exactly what people are disagreeing with you is the case. Saying Y is true because X is true, isn't an argument against people saying that X isn't true. If you're trying to argue that his statement was a serious request for someone to stone her to death, you need to make a case for that.
I don't know for certain that it was her, but she's reported in the Guardian yesterday (link) as saying that she was going to report him to the police. It's a bit rich, since in her column in the Independent she actually states that she 'doesn't for a moment' think she's actually going to be stoned.
It's actually worth listening to the radio broadcast. There's a chinese lady on earlier in the show (just a member of the public) who puts across an incredibly well-spoken and moderate argument. The American human rights activist who argues with her is also extremely articulate and despite that they are disagreeing, they both make their points very well and convincingly. And then near the end, Yasmin comes on and makes a pretty bad idiot of herself in comparison. I'm actually sympathetic to some of what she was trying to say: that there's considerable hypocrisy on the parts of some British politicians in criticising Chinas Human Rights behaviour. But unfortunately she broadens her ire to encompass every politician, actually goes on to argue not merely that there is hypocrisy on the part of some politicians in criticising China, but that no British politician should play any role in trying to oppose human rights abuses around the world, including and explicitly they shouldn't speak out against stoning in Iran. You'd think it were hyperbole but she keeps arguing the point even when the otherwise impeccably polite and sincere human rights specialist is starting to incredulously tell her how wrong she is. By the time you get to her column in the Independent today, she's broaden her offensive to "masculinists" and other monsters. It really is a terrible performance by someone who I remember reading with a lot of interest and respect years ago.
As is increasingly the case with the Independent, a discussion in the comments section there got deleted when it started to go against her position. First, posts that were critical (not necessarily offensive) started to get deleted and then when I checked back later, the entire section had been removed. The couple of pages that I read of it before it went weren't filled with abuse. Certainly strong criticism, but not trolls and flamebait.
wtf? You seriously think there was ever any remote likelihood that anybody would actually try and stone her to death?
As a result of his tweet, seriously unlikely. But be aware of the facts, Yasmin has received death threats due to her speaking out against fundementalist Islam. She's shown a lot of bravery at points in her life. (Even if in this particular instance, she's shown (imo) a lot of poor judgement.
There is no need to determine intent. The explicit request is the indication of intent. If I murder someone, the jury need not know or care why I did it. It is entirely immaterial. A request that someone be stoned is exactly that, and why it was made is completely immaterial
Very incorrect. Murder is the intentional killing of someone. Intent is part of the crime. It is made murder, as opposed to say manslaughter or accidental death, by the intent. In the case of incitement to murder, it has to be assessed on the expectation that the comment is actually serious. To quote from the now superceded Incitement law in the UK: "The inciter must intend the others to engage in the behaviour constituting the offence, including any consequences which may result, and must know or believe (or possibly suspect) that those others will have the relevant mens rea". Intent is very relevant to determinining that an "incitement" is actually seriously made.
And the context in 144 bytes of a tweet would be?... That's right, zero.
Okay, first off, are you in the UK and are you familiar with the people involved? I'd not heard of this guy before now, but I've been reading Yasmin's columns for years. She writes for the Independent quite frequently which I read. You keep making comments about there being no context for a 144 character tweet. Well if you are familiar with her writing, or him, or listened to the show (available in the UK here) then actually you do have some context for it. And if you don't read or listen to any of those things, then I find it harsh for you to seize upon one quote that was passed along directly to you without every having read her work, known him or listened to the show that his comment was in reply to, to start talking about how he should be arrested because you say without context he might be serious, when the context is there if you want it.
You keep saying that there is no context for a 144 character tweet. Well there were over a thousand such tweets before his twitter feed was deleted so you might as well take a single word in my post and say there's no context for it by the same principle.
Rhetorical means that something is said merely for dramatic effect. I think without other supporting evidence, such as finding he'd set aside a pile of money marked "reward for person who kills her", you can't presume that it was an actual request.
Oh if only. And then those that abuse it further. There's a better bit of coverage here. For Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to report a comment like this as a genuine incitement to murder, is dishonest. He was also responding to her comments saying that politicians had no right to criticise anyone for human rights abuses, including her saying that they shouldn't criticise stonings in Iran. So it seems she feels that one shouldn't criticise actual stonings taking place, but that suggesting unseriously that someone should be stoned, is an arrestable offence. So in her mind, it's wrong to even speak out against actual brutal murders, but merely talking about them gets you arrested, loss of job, etc.
Not only did he lose a fortune, he spent a long time kept in fear for his life. If you've even spent a night wondering if people you've pissed off are going to come round and break into your home, imagine spending two years being told a group are trying to kill you.
Incidentally, TFA makes a little fun about Opus Dei, featured in the Da Vinci Code being one of the supposed villains that are after him. Okay, that's a bit of a red flag, but Opus Dei do actually exist and are a sort of sub-cult within Catholicism. They've got their claws into various influential people and actually score moderately well on the Sinister Scale. Lower than Wahabism, bobbing along under Scientology, but certainly high above your run of the mill nutters.
And when one party doesn't sign a contract, you need a default state: it means they do have the legal ability to copy and re-distribute the work, or they don't. Without copyright law, it's the former which brings us exactly back to the need for copyright law.
Slashdot Mirror
Hah! Algernon's Curse. That is a really good name for it. I don't know which is worse - the more literal versions, where someone physically suffers for their enhancement, or the old cyberpunk-y style metaphysical ones where people become less "human". In either case, it sounds like the twin brother of Caveman Science Fiction.
Germans. Nice people. Get a bit over-excited sometimes.
Where are you talking about?
Okay. There are few "good guys" in this mess. Let's just call them the significantly more elected group than their Western-backed rivals. It'll do. I do still maintain that the West should not have responded as it did. That was disgraceful from countries that talk of democracy.
Absolutely accurate. And to my mind, if the West had reacted with less of a reflex strike at Hamas (freezing assets, cancelling aid, etc) and instead said: "okay, we have no choice but to treat them as representatives of the people", then a great deal of good could have been achieved. Instead, the West did everything it could to topple the democratically elected group in the naive belief that they could put a grossly corrupt body back in power, resulting in yet more bloodshed, resentment and suffering.
Organized religion is indeed one of the most effective tools of mass control. And you are right that were it to suddenly vanish, other means could be substituted. What enables it to be a tool of mass control is primarily the same set of reasons as would enable other tools. Poverty. Lack of Education. And to some extent, a threatening outside force which is something that is always useful to quash dissent. Palestine greatly suffers from the first two and the Israeli government amply provides the last.
Education. Opportunities for women. Open trade. If the UK and the USA spent a portion of the money they have spent on military action against certain countries on providing these things instead. then the West would have countries that were instead friendly and grateful, useful trading partners and we would have enriched ourselves by ploughing our resources not into funding the military-industrial complex, but teachers, engineers and medical professionals. We would see real economic benefits in our own countries to such policies. Mercenaries from the US and UK earn fortunes in Iraq. For every couple of mercenaries you could get at least three teachers. And making teaching a "gold rush" industry would pay our society a far greater dividend than investing in people who will return home merely with a lot of money and more practice and beating the shit out of / killing people.
Of course, the unquestioned belief is that it's far harder to get a country to support a couple of billion dollars of foreign aid than it is to persuade them to accept a hundred billion dollars of military action. I would love to challenge that as I think more of people than this.
Well I don't flatter myself that I got modded informative for any reason other than the usual "sounds confident" which usually supercedes all other reasons on Slashdot whether the poster is right or wrong. But I can reassure you that I've never read the Da Vinci code and I avoid any film with Tom Hanks in it like the Black Death.
;)
You know, you're actually right and I'll concede that I can't offer substantive proof of what I said. So I wont try to contest your opinions. They're actually more valid in some ways as they're based on your personal experiences. For what it's worth, some of my impressions are formed by an article in The Independent some years ago, but I don't have a copy or references, I'm afraid. So it may be that I spoke out of turn and you are correct. But I'll stay wary of closed, members only religious organizations that have government Ministers in their ranks, if you don't mind - that's just good practice.
It is fair of you to challenge me on this. And I will keep an open mind on them here on. Just not so open that I'll watch a film with Tom Hanks in it, that is.
H.
It doesn't matter what I think. The standard is: " could a reasonable purpose conclude it was a serious request.", to which the answer is, of course, yes.
No, the law in question requires that the inciter intend someone to act on their statements. I've addressed this in response to your same comment further down. Even she herself has stated in her column that she doesn't think he was serious or think that anyone is going to act on his statement.
I guess I can vaguely see where you're coming from. It was a genuine question, btw. Note that the irony intended by the MP has nothing to do with her religion or race as you think, but is because she had been on the radio arguing how it was wrong for politicians to criticise the practice of stoning people. Can't condemn it, can't advocate it. Can't win, really can you? ;) :)
Wrong (You are correct, but about the wrong crime.) You are confusing the trial of the person who actually does the stoning with the trial of the person whose negligent behavior resulted in the other person doing the stoning.
No I'm not. You said that the incitement crime was similar to the crime of murder because intent didn't matter. I pointed out that this is wrong in both cases by referencing the actual laws.
The test is if a reasonable person could know that the consequences of his actions might likely result in another person carrying out the request.
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown herself said in her column in the Independent today, that she doesn't expect anyone to act on his comments. Nonetheless, depsite herself in print stating that she didn't think anyone would take his comment as a serious request, she nonetheless reported him to police for Incitement (technically 'Encouraging or Assisting Crime') because "she found it very offensive". Furthermore this is actually a bit of a red herring you've created because as I quoted earlier, intent is an intrinsic part of the law that he is being accused of: specifically "the inciter must intend others to engage in the behaviour constituting the offence". Unless you can show that he actually intended for someone to act on his twitter posts, (and I think he would be utterly horrified and shocked if someone if someone did, as we all would be), then he is not guilty of this crime.
;), but I don't think you have taken the time to actually read the law in question or familiarise yourself with the context.
I think you're well-intentioned and I concede you tricked me into clicking on your homepage,
A request that someone stone someone to death is not a rhetorical question.
is flawed logic as it presupposes that this is an actual and serious request that someone stone her to death which is exactly what people are disagreeing with you is the case. Saying Y is true because X is true, isn't an argument against people saying that X isn't true. If you're trying to argue that his statement was a serious request for someone to stone her to death, you need to make a case for that.
I don't know for certain that it was her, but she's reported in the Guardian yesterday (link) as saying that she was going to report him to the police. It's a bit rich, since in her column in the Independent she actually states that she 'doesn't for a moment' think she's actually going to be stoned.
It's actually worth listening to the radio broadcast. There's a chinese lady on earlier in the show (just a member of the public) who puts across an incredibly well-spoken and moderate argument. The American human rights activist who argues with her is also extremely articulate and despite that they are disagreeing, they both make their points very well and convincingly. And then near the end, Yasmin comes on and makes a pretty bad idiot of herself in comparison. I'm actually sympathetic to some of what she was trying to say: that there's considerable hypocrisy on the parts of some British politicians in criticising Chinas Human Rights behaviour. But unfortunately she broadens her ire to encompass every politician, actually goes on to argue not merely that there is hypocrisy on the part of some politicians in criticising China, but that no British politician should play any role in trying to oppose human rights abuses around the world, including and explicitly they shouldn't speak out against stoning in Iran. You'd think it were hyperbole but she keeps arguing the point even when the otherwise impeccably polite and sincere human rights specialist is starting to incredulously tell her how wrong she is. By the time you get to her column in the Independent today, she's broaden her offensive to "masculinists" and other monsters. It really is a terrible performance by someone who I remember reading with a lot of interest and respect years ago.
As is increasingly the case with the Independent, a discussion in the comments section there got deleted when it started to go against her position. First, posts that were critical (not necessarily offensive) started to get deleted and then when I checked back later, the entire section had been removed. The couple of pages that I read of it before it went weren't filled with abuse. Certainly strong criticism, but not trolls and flamebait.
Disappointing.
People are morons, the correct way to make the joke is using sarcasm; "Hope no nutjob stones this person to death, that'd be terrible".
What? No - that's terrible, That actually sounds like you really do want her to be stoned.
wtf? You seriously think there was ever any remote likelihood that anybody would actually try and stone her to death?
As a result of his tweet, seriously unlikely. But be aware of the facts, Yasmin has received death threats due to her speaking out against fundementalist Islam. She's shown a lot of bravery at points in her life. (Even if in this particular instance, she's shown (imo) a lot of poor judgement.
Why do you find saying she should be stoned to death funny?
There is no need to determine intent. The explicit request is the indication of intent. If I murder someone, the jury need not know or care why I did it. It is entirely immaterial. A request that someone be stoned is exactly that, and why it was made is completely immaterial
Very incorrect. Murder is the intentional killing of someone. Intent is part of the crime. It is made murder, as opposed to say manslaughter or accidental death, by the intent. In the case of incitement to murder, it has to be assessed on the expectation that the comment is actually serious. To quote from the now superceded Incitement law in the UK: "The inciter must intend the others to engage in the behaviour constituting the offence, including any consequences which may result, and must know or believe (or possibly suspect) that those others will have the relevant mens rea". Intent is very relevant to determinining that an "incitement" is actually seriously made.
And the context in 144 bytes of a tweet would be? ... That's right, zero.
Okay, first off, are you in the UK and are you familiar with the people involved? I'd not heard of this guy before now, but I've been reading Yasmin's columns for years. She writes for the Independent quite frequently which I read. You keep making comments about there being no context for a 144 character tweet. Well if you are familiar with her writing, or him, or listened to the show (available in the UK here) then actually you do have some context for it. And if you don't read or listen to any of those things, then I find it harsh for you to seize upon one quote that was passed along directly to you without every having read her work, known him or listened to the show that his comment was in reply to, to start talking about how he should be arrested because you say without context he might be serious, when the context is there if you want it.
You keep saying that there is no context for a 144 character tweet. Well there were over a thousand such tweets before his twitter feed was deleted so you might as well take a single word in my post and say there's no context for it by the same principle.
Rhetorical means that something is said merely for dramatic effect. I think without other supporting evidence, such as finding he'd set aside a pile of money marked "reward for person who kills her", you can't presume that it was an actual request.
Oh if only. And then those that abuse it further. There's a better bit of coverage here. For Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to report a comment like this as a genuine incitement to murder, is dishonest. He was also responding to her comments saying that politicians had no right to criticise anyone for human rights abuses, including her saying that they shouldn't criticise stonings in Iran. So it seems she feels that one shouldn't criticise actual stonings taking place, but that suggesting unseriously that someone should be stoned, is an arrestable offence. So in her mind, it's wrong to even speak out against actual brutal murders, but merely talking about them gets you arrested, loss of job, etc.
The worst part of my night, I never got to enjoy the cheese. hehe.
Eating a lot of cheese can make it hard to sleep so... actually, that's probably not such an issue on your wedding night.
Yeah, if you're ever in England, you're going to have to try some really good, British cheddars.
True. Thank you.
Or anyone remotely in the public eye who might find themselves pilloried in the press for what the rest of society does blamelessly.
Not only did he lose a fortune, he spent a long time kept in fear for his life. If you've even spent a night wondering if people you've pissed off are going to come round and break into your home, imagine spending two years being told a group are trying to kill you.
Incidentally, TFA makes a little fun about Opus Dei, featured in the Da Vinci Code being one of the supposed villains that are after him. Okay, that's a bit of a red flag, but Opus Dei do actually exist and are a sort of sub-cult within Catholicism. They've got their claws into various influential people and actually score moderately well on the Sinister Scale. Lower than Wahabism, bobbing along under Scientology, but certainly high above your run of the mill nutters.
And when one party doesn't sign a contract, you need a default state: it means they do have the legal ability to copy and re-distribute the work, or they don't. Without copyright law, it's the former which brings us exactly back to the need for copyright law.
(Besides, spray-on-cheese is not primarily for eating.)
Then what on Earth is it for? Self-defense?