Site Claims to Reveal 'Tattle-tales' 565
Dekortage writes "Have you ever ratted somebody out? If it was a legal case, you might end up on Who's A Rat, an online database of police informants and undercover agents, identified through various publicly-available documents such as court briefings. The data-mined information is now available online at a price. As reported in the New York Times, 'The site says it has identified 4,300 informers and 400 undercover agents, many of them from documents obtained from court files available on the Internet.' Understandably, U.S. judges and law enforcement agents are upset, although defense lawyers seem to like the idea. Where do you draw the line between legal transparency and secrecy?"
Haven't we seen this before? (Score:4, Insightful)
There was a bit of a kerfuffle over that if I recall.
Wow (Score:2, Insightful)
I wonder about legal liability for releasing this information if it leads to the death of the undercover agents...
Where do you draw the line? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Undercover Agents? (Score:4, Insightful)
That being said, they need to put the creators/curators on the list - aren't they rats themselves now?
Re:Undercover Agents? (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder if soon we'll see a prohibition on this sort of data mining...making it a crime, or at least a regulated activity, to collate publically available data into a more usable form. I don't see how such a law could be enforced, however, since data-mining technology is already available to practically everyone. Perhaps we'll see restrictions on data-mining technology we currently see on encryption algorithms.
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:2, Insightful)
Who is this going to help? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:5, Insightful)
This smacks of the same kind of "we're your lords and masters who dare not be questioned" as this topic [slashdot.org] does, as does this one [slashdot.org].
IANAL, so now would be a pre-emptively good time for me to ask someone to detail what exactly "entrapment" is and how undercover infiltrators relate to it.
What goes around comes around (Score:5, Insightful)
Public information... (Score:4, Insightful)
MOD PARENT UP (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:5, Insightful)
Aide to (Republican) Senator Bob Dole
Foreign policy advisor to (Republican) President-elect Ronald Reagan.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for East Asia and Pacific Affairs in the (Republican) Reagan administration.
Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy in the (Republican) Reagan administration.
Roving ambassador in the (Republican) first Bush administration.
Foreign policy advisor to (Republican) George W. Bush in the 2000 campaign.
Deputy Secretary of State in the (Republican) second Bush administration.
He clearly has deep roots in the Democratic Party.
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:2, Insightful)
At the moment, police and other authorities spend much of their time doing 'good' things(that is, things I happen to agree with). I don't see this as any reason to label all their future activity as good. They might start doing things I disagree with, that they are 'authorities' is no reason to assume that my position is wrong.
reminds me of "stop snitching" (Score:5, Insightful)
but of course, you will hear the regular cacophony of folks here on slashdot who can only think of subjects like this in a vacuum, outside of real world effects, and support "who's a rat", just because it's vaguely antigovernment
as if the government is the source of all of our problems in the world. as if the police are only the brutal shock troops of tyranny
gee, i dunno, maye sometimes law enforcement is there to fight simple straightforward crime and protect us and we should help them do that?
i know, wacky reactionary ultraconservative fascist and authoritarian of me to say that, huh?
pffft
Re:Not no new news (Score:2, Insightful)
If the site puts law enforcement officers in danger, it should not be protected by free speech. It should be taken down.
I'm getting the feeling that many Slashdotters really, really hate law enforcement.
Re:Not fair game. (Score:5, Insightful)
Bullshit [november.org]. Informants are often criminals themselves and are paid for their information. Undercover policework walks a very thin line to keep from crossing over into entrapment. Not to mention, almost all of the "wrongdoing" that this network of lies is trying to stop is victimless drug crime.
Re:Not fair game. (Score:2, Insightful)
At the moment, it doesn't appear to be illegal. If there is no good way to change that, tough noogies for law enforcement.
They deserve to be outed (Score:2, Insightful)
They use lies, deceit and misdirection as the tools of their trade, to put normal people in jails and prisons where they are systematically abused and indoctrinated into actual hard criminal activities, to the detriment of all society. Your average person who gets charged with the average crime that an undercover agent helps to bring about also has no chance of getting a job afterwards as well, because he's got a criminal record now. Which means he's now stuck with either a low paying job for the rest of his life, or a life of crime in order to pay the rent.
Re:Undercover Agents? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yea, we need to stop all the data mining going on to research the cure for cancer. In addition, we need to stop the data mining looking for intellegent life in space. Heck, we need to stop the data mining involved in global warming research. Dude, here's your sign.
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Easy : commodity (Score:3, Insightful)
Riddle me this, is it right or wrong to have the identifying information available in court orders etc? If it's right, this guy has done nothing wrong. And if it's wrong, it shouldn't have been available in the first place (AND you support oppressive, secretive gov'ts, but that's an argument for another day). Either way, it's not this guy's fault. Unless it's also Google's and pretty much every other entity on Earth capable of compiling a list of things.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
"Victimless crime" is usually meant to exclude the person committing the crime.
Even if you don't buy that, "drugs" isn't a crime. "Drug Possession" is a crime, and IS victimless. Now, people who use the drugs may have made themselves victims. That is something else, though.
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:3, Insightful)
How nice to be able to tidy up your own yard just like that by simply declaring your trash as someone else's problem.
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:3, Insightful)
Sex offenders are convicted felons.
People bing falsely accused is a valid problem.
Re:Who is this going to help? (Score:3, Insightful)
Who care's about physically punishing these guys? If it was me, I'd just use the list to black ball any one that happens to be it. I'd just say that these individuals make poor employees due to not meeting my standards. (My standards would be being loyal to me.) The HR departments at major companies could "punish" these guys alot more than "criminals" ever could. Who cares about going after you? All I care about is not employing you. Go make your living under someone else.
Re:This sort of thing should be illegal (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, when parents don't feed their children because they need drug money, its a victimless crime, no one other than the parent is hurt!
When people cant think properly because they've taken too many drugs, or can't afford what they a mentally or physically dependant on, and rob/kill others for drug money, its a victimless crime. The people robbed/killed certainly weren't hurt.
People dealing drugs to others, even when the others haven't been shown how dangerous the drugs are, is a victimless crime. The people who recieved the drugs certainly weren't hurt!
Honestly, I could care less about the people who know the risks, and still use the drugs to the point of harming themselves. It's those that use them and harm others in the process, that bother me.
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:3, Insightful)
Do Islamic terrorists deserve to die for their mistaken belief that carrying out Jyhad is the correct thing to do? Do US soldiers deserve to die in Iraq for their mistaken belief that they are fighting for a good cause? Anytime you join up with some organization that may put your life on the line, you'd better do some deep thinking about your cause. I feel that most joiners don't --- they are brainwashed or swayed by demagogues. If you decide to play Russian Roulette, you deserve to die.
Whether or not people higher up in the drug trade are responsible for murders and other crimes, drugs do kill people directly (from overdose and other health artifacts).
Illegal drugs kill a miniscule fraction of the people killed by all drugs (including alcohol, nicotine, aspirin, etc.) If all drugs were legal, and manufactured under FDA restrictions, even fewer people would die. No one can legitimately justify the war on drugs by dragging out the drug casualties. Remember Prohibition? That worked out so well they repealed it.
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
> its a victimless crime, no one other than the parent is hurt!
This is a parent being neglectful. There are separate laws for that.
> When people cant think properly because they've taken too many drugs
Yes, that is "victimless" in the sense that the only person they're hurting is themselves.
"Hurting yourself isn't a sin -- it's just stupid." Robert A. Heinlein
> or can't afford what they a mentally or physically dependant on, and
> rob/kill others for drug money, its a victimless crime.
You are aware this is an argument for legalization, not for illegalization, don't you?
> People dealing drugs to others, even when the others haven't been shown
> how dangerous the drugs are, is a victimless crime.
So you would support mandatory pamphlets be handed out with the drugs beforehand to make sure the buyer is aware of the risks? Sounds good to me.
And, for the record, I've taken less drugs than Bill Clinton even publicly admits to.
secrecy through obscurity? (Score:2, Insightful)
If the information is available from court files online, then it has already passed the legal transparency barrier.
Obviously, the problem here is that the names of those informants and undercover agents have already made it to the public sections of the court files, instead of being censored appropriately - especially nowadays that everything is searchable.
The website seems to be suspended. However, the screenshot from the nytimes article shows that the site also encourage users to submit information. Users can submit profiles of others, and I wonder who verifies the information? It seems like an easy task to falsely submit someone's name, and seriously harm their reputation.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, when parents don't feed their children because they need drug money, its a victimless crime, no one other than the parent is hurt!
No, it's child abuse, just the same as if they spent the children's money on a trip to Vegas. That doesn't mean that staying in a luxury hotel or selling someone an airline ticket is or should be a crime.
When people cant think properly because they've taken too many drugs
No, it's criminal negligence, just the same as if they put on a blindfold and got into their car. That doesn't mean that owning opaque pieces of cloth should be a crime.
People dealing drugs to others, even when the others haven't been shown how dangerous the drugs are, is a victimless crime. The people who recieved the drugs certainly weren't hurt!
If you choose to consent to something, you aren't a victim of it. Now, there might be a small minority that were addicted by someone else, in which case they are victims, but most people who use drugs choose to do so.
(And so on for the other examples)
Honestly, I could care less about the people who know the risks, and still use the drugs to the point of harming themselves. It's those that use them and harm others in the process, that bother me.
The vast majority of drug users don't harm others. For the minority that do, harming others is already a crime, so punish them for that.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude, that's not drug use, that's abuse.
When people cant think properly because they've taken too many drugs, or can't afford what they a mentally or physically dependant on, and rob/kill others for drug money, its a victimless crime.
Again, that's not drug use, that's robbery.
People dealing drugs to others, even when the others haven't been shown how dangerous the drugs are, is a victimless crime. The people who recieved the drugs certainly weren't hurt!
It's a consensual transaction.
Listen, I smoke pot every day. I have a job. I pay my bills. I did well in college. I have a nice home. I'm friendly with the neighbors. I'm good with kids. I love my family. Who is the victim here? If you believe I should go to jail for this, you're a far more dangerous man than I will ever be.
Well, that is the point... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
Of course that's not a victimless crime. The crime here is child abuse and neglect, which is not victimless.
It's a little difficult to accurately gauge the efficacy and dangers of a drug when, as schedule 1 drugs, it's very, very difficult to research them. That said, making a drug illegal will not solve the issue you've raised here. As our experience with alcohol and tobacco has shown, if you want to publicize the dangers of a drug, the best way is to legalize it and use the taxes raised by it to educate the public about the dangers of it.
Hypothetically, if I were mentally dependent on World of Warcraft, stayed up for 48 hours straight playing it, found out I didn't have enough money to maintain the subscription because I lost my job, so concluded that I should rob a liquor store to satisfy my dependency, would that mean we should ban World of Warcraft? Of course not. Now, I understand the concept of chemical dependence, but there's a big leap between "Wow, I need this substance in my body" and "Wow, I think I should go kill someone for it." When people make that leap, prosecute them for that. Until then, they haven't done anything wrong.
At this point, I will point out that I'm not necessarily a fan of legalizing all drugs for OTC purposes. I do think opiates should be prescription-only (too difficult for a person to reliably self-dose), and drugs that are addictive that lead to severe bodily harm after constant use are definitely a concern (meth, LSD, PCP, etc.). Then again, tobacco would fall under that category, and alcohol can, too, if it's abused enough - that's the problem with drawing the line in the sand there. I do think that marijuana should probably be legal; I don't think it's a particularly healthy drug, but it isn't any worse than anything else we have legalized.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that's what most folks arguing this tend to miss. Sure, people can be cold sober and still commit crime - usually as the result of mental retardation, ignorance, stupidity, or an over-sized ego. OTOH, when an otherwise normal brain is soaked in a narcotic, burns through it, and suddenly that brain cries out for more? All bets are off.
Thanks to the dumbasses who want to out the "rats" so bad, good luck finding out (much less prosecuting) anyone who commits a crime against you or your property in the future. Folks aren't going to be so eager to be a witness on your behalf if the odds are good that the perpetrator looked like some sort of psycho or gangster type, and potential witnesses stood a solid chance of facing bad mojo for the simple act of telling the truth in a court of law.
Feel safer now?
Re:Who is a rat??? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Haven't we seen this before? (Score:2, Insightful)
Of course killing someone is evil. I wouldn't be comfortable with someone using this list for intimidation. My ethics aren't what is important though. The ethics of the operator, and the legality of his actions are.
My point was more that 'authorities' aren't automatically 'good guys', and that in a society of tens of millions of people, good things and bad things often come together, and are a matter of point of view.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
By the time you find out about a family member working as an undercover anything, you'll likely be dodging bullets. It's not as if you go to the annual family reunion and Uncle Steve says "What am I doing these days? Why, I'm an undercover cop."
Re:Public information... (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, this is pretty typical of privacy issues that have arisen in recent years. There has always been shit-tons of information about you that was public information, but it was scattered through paper files in dozens or hundreds of offices, and collecting any of it, much less all of it, was such an expensive and time-consuming task that the very difficulty involved provided a great deal of protection.
It's still a pain to collect information on people, but what has changed is that once you do go to that trouble, you can resell the information easily via the net, and now it is suddenly very, very profitable to do so. Entrepreneurs are doing the hard work to gather the info and making it very easy to obtain for a relatively modest fee.
The question we really need to be asking is if the things that have traditionally been public information ought to remain public now that the information is much easier to obtain than when it was originally decided to make it public. Bear in mind that the reason so much information is public is so the public can keep an eye on the activities of the government and to make it difficult for misdeeds by government officials harder to hide. Can we still accomplish this goal without making everyone's home address and bus schedule available to any random stalker or psycho with a credit card and a public library terminal?
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:3, Insightful)
I do too. That wasn't the comparison I was making. Try instead: Jihadist who dies for his beliefs vs. DEA agent who dies for his beliefs. If you put your life on the line in the belief that a better good will be the result, without empirical evidence to support that belief, then you are a fool, and deserve what's coming to you.
Finally, your claim that fewer people would die under an all-drugs-legal regime is probably incorrect. More people would die from the long-term impacts of extended drug use, and from greater drug use due to legality.
Do you have any support for that? Many, if not most, who die from illegal drugs, die because (a) the drug was more concentrated than they thought, or (b) the drug was contaminated with more harmful substances. Read up on it here [briancbennett.com]. Much of that could be corrected through legalization and regulation.
To claim that you can't legitimately justify the war on drugs due to fears about the consequences of those drugs to society is just ridiculous.
You're twisting my words again. Remember, you brought up the point about people involved in drug enforcement
How many people died in Hurricane Katrina? ~1500? Let's outlaw living on the coast.
How many people die each year in the U.S. because of taking aspirin? 10,000 [ucheepines.org]? Let's outlaw Aspirin.
How many people die in automobile accidents in the U.S. each year? 43,000 [dot.gov]? Let's outlaw automobiles.
How many people die of cigarettes in the U.S. each year? 400,000? [cdc.gov] Folks, we have a winner!!!
Once again, anyone who resorts to body count as a justification for the war on drugs is liar and a fraud.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
If this information is already publicly available in court records anyone who wanted to get back at their snitch probably could. All this does is consolidate it.
If you have an issue with this its the fact that these names of undercover agents are publicly available as it is.
While I have little to no sympathy for snitches, under cover agents should be protected by the legal entities that employ them. I see no reason why the names of under cover agents need to be public record in court cases.
Re:Well, that is the point... (Score:3, Insightful)
By contrast, the odds of being struck by lightening are about 1 in 240,000. Think about that... a child is approximately three times more likely to get struck by lightening as to be sexually abused by a stranger.
So, tell me again how it is you're not being unreasonably paranoid?
Re:Undercover Agents? (Score:3, Insightful)
Publicly publishing already publicly available even if not widely known true information about matters of public concern is about as protected an act as there is under the first amendment.
Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, but a FAKE list like this might be brilliant:
1. Identify 2nd/3rd highest ranking members in gangs
2. Post their names as rats on a website claiming to out undercover agents
3. Gang leader has them killed
4. Go to step 1 a few times
5. Post leader's name as supposed agent
6. Any remaining members kill leader
The resulting gang, much reduced in leadership and too paranoid to work effectively as a team, would be much easier to round up and the taxpayers would have a much smaller prison / court system tab.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course their identity needs to be public record. They're individuals testifying in a court case. What are you going to do, have a cop take the stand as "Mr. Anonymous"? Cops already are known to lie on the stand occasionally, but can you imagine if they were allowed to testify and never have their name revealed? There would be no accountability whatsoever! They could say anything they wanted, and even if proven false later, nobody could come after them because nobody knows who they are!
Secrecy and fair trials generally don't mix. This does cause some problems and may be inconvenient, but it is, as they say, the price we pay for freedom.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:5, Insightful)
Why shouldn't we try to actually prevent crime every now and then? How about, if you take the drug out of the equation? Parents don't need drug money, so they can feed the children. Child neglect prevented. Or someone didn't become physically dependant on some drug, and doesn't rob/kill anyone to get the money.
And before you go all "future-crime" paranoid, please be aware that there are such things as victimless crimes which are real crimes, because it will lead to someone being hurt. Drunk driving is such a crime. How would you feel if some jerk drank two whole kegs of beer and hit the road, and the police couldn't arrest him because he hasn't hurt anybody yet? Do you really think we need to wait until the guy kills a whole family with his reckless driving before we stop him? Until he hit someone, there's no victim, yet I do believe it is a crime.
Or how about someone walks into a bar with a pocket full of date rape drugs? Possession is not a crime, there are no victims, so nobody can arrest him. Let's wait until the guy rapes a couple of women before we can start an investigation after which we're not even sure we'll find anybody guilty because the woman can't even testify.
Walking into a bar with date rape drugs in your pocket is a victimless crime and should remain a crime, because it is very likely somebody will get hurt eventually. Driving drunk is a victimless crime and should remain a crime because it is also very likely that somebody will get hurt.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:4, Insightful)
OK, how do you propose to do that? Is criminalizing use of certain drugs doing a good job of that? Not as far as I can tell.
In any case, when people say "victimless crime" they mean something victimless by nature, not by chance. Reckless driving may be victimless if you're lucky. Getting stoned in your own living room is victimless period. So drop the straw man.
"Or how about someone walks into a bar with a pocket full of date rape drugs?"
One drug is involved in more date rapes than any other by a very very long way. It doesn't fit in pockets well, but bars serve it.
We have, in Alcohol, a fine example of a drug that has been both criminalized and legally regulated. Every negative effect on users or society was much worse under Prohibition. Regulation is simply a better way to mitigate problems related to drugs; it works, and prohibition doesn't. Not creating a market that supports violent criminal gangs, and not locking up huge numbers of non-violent otherwise innocent people are just nice side effects.
Re:They deserve to be drugged. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
I would like you to venture about the local "bad area" of your town at 2am, and tell me how drug use doesn't hurt you afterward, especially when your in the ER with a stab wound because some junkie really wanted your wallet. Tell that to their families and friends who they screwed over since discovering that they really don't want to be human beings anymore. Drugs (some of them, okay) are bad, they have bad social effects, and serve to keep the poor and uneducated poor and uneducated.
Yes, we shouldn't treat having a couple of grams of marijuana like a crime worse than rape or murder. Heck, I would even say legalize marijuana, but this statement will not be applicable to things such as methamphetamines or heroin. These effect the rest of society, and thus I have no problem with society banning them.
The absolute freedom ideology annoys me. Its idealistic, not based in reality. My rights end where yours begin, this is the price I pay for reaping the benefits of society. Drugs consistently cause people to hurt other people, and society as a whole (non productivity, crime, entrenched poverty), so how could you justify them. Hopefully, though doubtfully, you support extensive social programs to care for those people who have been fried from drugs, and to support the recovery of those who "freely" decided to imprison themselves.
On a more philosophical level, why would you want to support anything that serves to dehumanize other people? Why drugs? What single good thing could be said about heroin or tweak? If someone chooses them, they obviously are not rational to begin with.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:3, Insightful)
They didn't? They didn't decide to take that first dose? Or the nth one? Well in that case we have a different problem. Someone is out there on the loose forcing needles into people vein's without their consent. I think the police should stop them immediately.
The idea that everything is a rational choice is vital to a free society where people have free will.
That's immaterial. Their decision to use a drug may cause a chain of events leading to me getting stabbed, but there are an infinite number of decisions that person could have made that would result in me getting stabbed.
Perhaps, but I think a free(er) society is worth striving for.
Right there is the fundamental different between you and I and it sums up this whole thing I think. You think drugs cause these problems. I think the users cause these problems. You think problem is the drugs themselves. I think the problem is the concious choice certain people make to use them. Your solution is to remove drugs from society. My solution is to remove from society the people who make bad choices that result in harm to another person.
Well on a more philosphical level, I find it FAR more dehumanizing to support a nanny-government that dictates what free people can and cannot put into their body. That's what its all about really.
Re:They deserve to be outed (Score:2, Insightful)
When people cant think properly because they've taken too many drugs
No, it's criminal negligence, just the same as if they put on a blindfold and got into their car. That doesn't mean that owning opaque pieces of cloth should be a crime.
You're missing the entire point. An opaque piece of cloth has many uses. What would you use the drugs for it not to intoxicate yourself, thereby endangering both yourself and others?
The Law cannot tell you what to think, however, it is supposed to prevent you from harming yourself or anyone else. Possession of illegal drugs is illegal because there isn't any real use for them. What are you going to do, make a paste to add pigments to in order to make a painting of your house? Realistically, hard drugs have no value other than for getting high. By contrast, opaque strips of fibrous material can be used in many places, as lifesaving tourniquets, or as clothing, or as rope to secure a tree so it doesn't smash your neighbor's car during an intense windstorm.
You can argue the medicinal uses of hard drugs all you want, however, those aren't illegal. They're prescribed, manufactured, and administered in controlled environments. Who knows what stringent FDA-approved tests your corner drug-lord went through to ensure that your coke doesn't have anything else in it that could kill you (other than the cocaine).
Furthermore, the psychological ramifications of using an artificial substance to stimulate/depress your brain in order to create/depress emotions are all absolutely detrimental to your health. The addictive nature of neurological medicines make them all the more dangerous. Think of the smoker who needs to take a 5 minute break every hour to placate a massive nicotine addiction! He's lost his freedom of choice: if he does not acquire his nicotine fix, he will experience an acute psychological breakdown after enough time has passed. That's why it's so difficult for people to quit smoking by going cold-turkey. Those that do need to be tied to their bed and isolated until the psychological effects have abated to the point that they can begin to show signs of recovery.
You're arguing the freedom to use substances which take away your freedom. Perhaps you should get off the drugs long enough for your frontal lobe to develop - you know, the part of your head which deals in high-level cognitive areas like foresight and long-range planning.
Re:Where do you draw the line? (Score:3, Insightful)
I made no claim as to the 'badness' of either one. I am only trying to point out that just because one person thinks that they are convinced they right in what they are doing, it does not give them the right -- or make them right -- to use any means necessary. Again, this is irrespective of the nature of these means; one person being VERY "wrong" does not make a more minor "wrong" right.