Are you trying to prove my point for me? They already have the power to arrest people arbitrarily or wrongfully, just not the right. We trust that they won't overstep that boundary, but we cannot be sure. Hence, since your proposal makes that easier for little benefit to society, there is no point in enforcing such a solution.Samuel wrote:They can already abuse power and get the same results- aren't you aware that the FBI infiltrated many "subversive" organizations? Not just the KKK, but antiwar movements and the like. All this will do is make their job easier- it doesn't give them the power to start arbitrarily arresting people.Irrelevant. I'm talking about the potential for abuse, not what we already do to enforce our laws.
Knowledge is power. You are giving them the ability to acquire arbitrarily detailed knowledge/information about their populace, thus giving them power over their populace that they cannot be trusted with.What power? I haven't given the government any more power than they already have except with ID chips.Irrelevant. They are still held accountable when they misuse that power, which is the concern I was citing. History suggests that if you let a government have too much power over you, the government tends to misuse it. Does the phrase "secret police" ring any bells? Or the phrase "who guards the guards?"
Secret Police are for political crimes which I haven't suggested.
Who guars the guards refers to the abuse of power. Great, what power?
It is. What do you think I am talking about?No, the thread was about morality of the death penalty.Besides, as this thread has shown, the government only has the right to kill in limited circumstances.
Why? The founders of America didn't think so. Are you going to ignore the point about government corruption and abuse of power? This is power, and it can be used to abuse the populace. Why should the populace not be guaranteed a right to privacy?Because that presumes that individuals have a right to privacy. They don't.And why, exactly, does the government have that right?
Strawman. I never said that I disagree with your plan merely because of personal desires, but for the potential danger to society your plan presents. I said this to refute the notion that all people are like the morons in "reality" tv.FDR. Great- however, we don't base laws on your personal desires, but the groups. And as a group people get acclimated to being watched very easily, even when it is an actual human being. A camera is even easier. Or do you notice everytime you enter a 7/11?Being free from fear? You know who else used that rational for breaking privacy laws, right? (not to mention a whole slew of other offenses) I'm not like those people morons on "reality" tv. I'm much more paranoid.
As for the 7/11 argument, that is a private property owned by a corporation. They have a pattern for being targeted by crime, so there is utility for them to keep a watch over their premises. You are arguing that the government should keep watch over a much larger area of land (100% of public property! Even people's lawns!) actively, even though the government actually has power (unlike the corporation that owns 7/11) and deny that this creates too much potential for abuse for it to be a good thing for society.
No strawman, you said that the government has the right to watch my front lawn 24/7 arbitrarily. All our hypothetical gay couple has to do is come home and look intimate for the camera while walking to the door. And as for the point about how anti-sodomy laws were enforced back in the day, yes. That's my point entirely. If we cannot trust the government to not go through periods of oppression, we cannot trust them with the power to watch us at will. This is why the police must get warrants, after all.I wanted to put cameras in homes... where? Strawman. As it is, how do you think the government arrested people for sodomy back in the day?Say I am planning on doing something that breaks taboo, but otherwise is neither against the law nor unethical. Say for sake of argument that I am gay (though I am not) and am going to come home with my husband. Remembering that the concern is with the potential for abuse and government corruption, they now know that I am gay and can use that information to oppress me. They would not be able to do that without that information. This may not be a reality right now, but it is a possibility that you would introduce.
What is your point? I don't agree with the British government's decision for the reasons I have outlined. I'm still in America for a reason, you know. We may have lots of stupidity in our government, but hey, at least we haven't taken the first steps towards all out nanny state yet!Which is why the English have managed to partially adopt it, right?That your plan would be ungodly expensive when the money could be far better spent. Priorities, in other words. Yours suck.
Uh... yes? Haven't there been threads about this recently pointing out how people don't respond to deterrents the way we expect them to? That they will still do illegal stuff because they think "maybe I will get away with it!" Therefor, there is more utility in reducing the usual sociological causes of crime than there is in making sure there are more convictions.So if a person knows they will be caught, they commit crimes anyway? Right... criminals are that stupid you know.Your solution merely means more convictions.
Concession accepted.
Now I don't even know what you are talking about. Are you suggesting that for every crime on the books there will only be one case and that is it under your system? I'm thinking "bullshit".Yeah it will happen- once for each case, not again and again.After all, even with universal surveillance of public places, crime will still happen too. We both know there are people stupid/desperate enough to try it.
Then how are you going to use them to catch crimes in action? I thought that was the whole point of this proposal?Well, aside from making programs to search through the files, you could just look them up when crimes occur.Not only do you have to install and maintenance your cameras and other surveillance equipment, you also have to pay people to watch it for crimes.
Your propensity for being completely irrelevant to the point is striking. I guess you must like the taste of Red Herring. That it isn't illegal to be a part of those parties has fuck-all to do with whether or not we should trust governments with the power to violate privacy, especially with those parties to set historical precedent.Being a member of the Nazi party or communists isn't illegal in the US.At the expense of the populations privacy and security from totalitarian movements in your government. Why must we assume that the government wants the best for all its citizens at all times?
They do. That is not in dispute. That the government cannot be trusted with this kind of power is.As for assuming the best, I'm not. I just believe the police have a vested interest in reducing the crime rate.
Oh great. A torture debate. That is where i wanted to take this... NOT. *sigh* Again, why is this justified behavior? How is this supposed to make me trust the government any more than I already do? How does this make my position wrong?Than they get you with an informant and you get tortured.Or, what if you are a protester against a corrupt, totalitarian government?
Never said the current government and its policies were competent either. In fact, that only makes me think worse of this proposal from a practical standpoint. Other, less stringent solutions to this problem exist, starting with changing the sociological conditions where you live, something which should be done anyway.... the crime rate where I live is significantly greater than 0%. We had over 100 murders here last year.I'm not talking about risks coming from competent governments here, because they should have little need for such stringent measures in the first place.
You said so yourself. It makes it easier for the government to get information they need to abuse their power. The example situation of a gay couple is illustrative of my point. The example of the political activist is another one. My logic holds. All you have done is show that there is a potential problem, and have admitted that this proposal would make it worse in case of a totalitarian situation or corrupt government.Why make that worse?Show how this makes things possible that can't occur normally. It just makes survillence easier.I'm talking about the risks of abuse this plan introduces.
Actually, no. I don't. The last few seasons made me lose my faith in it. You still have a wasteful system that achieves little while potentially being dangerous to society.You watch that show too much?Frankly, this proposal reminds one of the "bear patrol" from the Simpsons. Stew on that for a second.
I'll concede that it is the way the government uses the information that is what I am worried about. However, what I am concerned about is that the government cannot be trusted to use it responsible in the first place, and that historical precedent suggests that it would be better to simply not give them this power at all. If a totalitarian government must put its totalitarian procedures in place whole cloth, they are more visible. But when they are simply using tactics that were established when the government was still legit, no one can call them on it. Besides, this is surveillance that the authorities don't need a warrant to use, which means that they don't need to go to the effort of justifying themselves first. That is a bad legal precedent to set, IMO.Akkleptos wrote:I see your point. But, in my opinion, if you live in a corrupt and totalitarian government, you're in for quite a nasty ride anyway, Orwellian surveillance or not. In the 1984 examples, the problem is that the government considers it a crime to even think against the official doctrine and the regime. You don't need a 24/7, 100% coverage of public areas for it to become a nightmare, as demonstrated by Cambodia's pretty low-tech Khmer Rouge regime, or Castro's Cuba, North Korea, the USSR... Meaning that the surveillance is not the problem, but how the regime will use it. I'm with Samuel on this one.