German Killers Sue Wikipedia To Remove Their Names 859
Jason Levine writes "Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber killed a German actor in 1990. Now that they are out of prison, German law states that they can't be referred to by name in relation to the killings. Therefore, they have sued to get Wikipedia to remove their names from the Wikipedia article about the killings. The German edition of Wikipedia has already complied, but the English edition is citing US freedom of speech and a lack of presence in Germany as reasons why they don't need to remove the name. In a bit of irony, their lawyer e-mailed the NY Times: 'In the spirit of this discussion, I trust that you will not mention my clients' names in your article.'"
Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
Are we not allowed to state simple facts now?
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't care what their names are. What are they doing out of prison?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:2, Insightful)
No I think the idea here is that if you have done the time in jail then you should have the right to a normal life. This is the premise of our entire justice system. I can completely understand that. Ask yourself if you were introduced to a person and you found out that they were murderers would you think of them the same way? Probably not and that is the problem and why the German law exists.
You are right that those are the facts, but must facts always haunt you?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:4, Insightful)
They KILLED someone.
I think I would like to know the a potential employee is a murderer, that isn't something you want to come to light later on when said person goes on an office rampage.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:4, Insightful)
Honestly, no, I wouldn't think of them the same way as I would someone else.
Because they actually killed someone.
Re:Freedom of Speech (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Freedom of Speech (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh REALLY?
Explain the PATRIOT act to me?
While the American constitution undeniably is what you say it is, the past 20 years has not been kind to America!
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Freedom of Speech (Score:2, Insightful)
Wouldn't it be much more effective if the internet was not under the control of any one country? If instead it was a network of computers spread throughout the entire world....oh wait. Nevermind.
A fresh start (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm sure a lot of people are going to come out against the position of Germany's culture on this, citing freedom of speech. Freedom of speech, in the United States at least, is not given to citizens so that they can harm other people's reputations or hold them accountable for their actions. It is there so that actions by the government can be openly criticized and constructive dialog be established between (and amongst) citizens and the government, without fear of reprisal. It is there for the betterment of everyone. If there is no benefit to society, no protection is granted.
These people have served their sentences. They have been punished according to the law of their land, and then released. In this country, a person's criminal record haunts them for life -- denying them jobs, restricting their freedoms, and in some cases leading to a greatly diminished quality of life such that they are forced into criminal enterprise in order to meet basic needs. But in Germany, these laws are crafted so that people can have a chance at a normal life again--A chance at redemption. It is recognized that people make mistakes, but these mistakes shouldn't haunt them for the rest of their lives. The government has stepped in to ensure that any adult citizen that has their freedom also has the same chances as the next.
As far as the internet -- do we really want it to be a tool that enables a person's past mistakes to haunt them forever? That any personal information, once released into it, somehow becomes public property? Those naked photos your boyfriend took of you when you thought you'd be with him forever -- are those public property once he breaks up with you and posts them online? How about the records of your divorce, or the reasons why you were fired? What about that one night when your best friend tried to walk out of the bar drunk, and you stole the car keys and the two of you got into a big fight and the police were called? You want the whole world to know about these things? Or--was it just a mistake and once amends have been made then that's the end of it?
Just because the information is out there doesn't mean it should be. Information doesn't have rights -- people do.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:2, Insightful)
How about the interest of the public who might like a little warning about what they're dealing with?
Re:A fresh start (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes. If you murder two people, then I have the right to know about it. That you served your time and have set out in the world to start over is your right once released. But people have the right to know the guy down the street is a convicted murderer.
What happens if somebody is released for sexual predation of children? Should their names be stricken from any record of the crime? Does the young mother living next door to this released predator have no right to know of a potential danger?
I am all for giving ex-cons a fair deal. I really do understand how badly they are treated by society and would never treat them as such myself. But I do have the right to know about these crimes. If you are talking about stealing beer at age 19, then fine, whatever. I really don't care. But murder? Come on.
Re:A fresh start (Score:2, Insightful)
I'll bet there are a lot of dictators who agree totally
Re:Respect the law (Score:3, Insightful)
So if a law against something exists, anywhere on the planet, everyone should follow it? I'm pretty sure you don't want the world to adhere to Saudi Arabian, Singaporean, or North Korean laws. And I'm pretty sure they wouldn't want to adhere to Western laws.
Re:Respect the law (Score:1, Insightful)
No.
I elected my government to support and protect MY interests, not other countries' citizens' interests.
Re:A fresh start (Score:2, Insightful)
"Information doesn't have rights -- people do."
That, is a very good point. I'm sure it falls on deaf ears here, but a good point regardless of what the anti-social "nerd patrol" here thinks.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
You are right that those are the facts, but must facts always haunt you?
Gee, I don't know because that's the fucking reality of the situation? The guy they murdered doesn't spring back to life after they've paid their "debt". They've got some nerve complaining about how rotten their lives are after taking someone else's. Perhaps they would have been happier with a lethal injection?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:1, Insightful)
Yet it's pretty much in the same ballpark as the laws against discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation...
Say you're looking to hire someone and one applicant served a sentence for murder. He might cause trouble, or might not. You can look at statistics about recidivists to find the odds.
Suppose one applicant is of race X. He might cause trouble, or might not. You can look at crime statistics by race to find the odds.
Same thing.
Re:A fresh start (Score:4, Insightful)
What about the rights of Walter Sedlmayr, who the duo tortured, mutilated, and killed because he was gay? He apparently doesn't matter anymore, you know, because they murdered him.
Everyone makes mistakes, right? Hogwash.
So these men should have a chance at a normal life again? What about Sedlmayr's normal life?
Re:A fresh start (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure a lot of people are going to come out against the position of Germany's culture on this, citing freedom of speech. Freedom of speech, in the United States at least, is not given to citizens so that they can harm other people's reputations or hold them accountable for their actions. It is there so that actions by the government can be openly criticized and constructive dialog be established between (and amongst) citizens and the government, without fear of reprisal. It is there for the betterment of everyone. If there is no benefit to society, no protection is granted.
Actually, no that is not the fundamental premise of the US concept of freedom of speech. It is that the prior restraint of speech is so onerous that it is not allowed; so that open debate can be had around issues.
These people have served their sentences. They have been punished according to the law of their land, and then released. In this country, a person's criminal record haunts them for life -- denying them jobs, restricting their freedoms, and in some cases leading to a greatly diminished quality of life such that they are forced into criminal enterprise in order to meet basic needs. But in Germany, these laws are crafted so that people can have a chance at a normal life again--A chance at redemption. It is recognized that people make mistakes, but these mistakes shouldn't haunt them for the rest of their lives. The government has stepped in to ensure that any adult citizen that has their freedom also has the same chances as the next.
As far as the internet -- do we really want it to be a tool that enables a person's past mistakes to haunt them forever? That any personal information, once released into it, somehow becomes public property? Those naked photos your boyfriend took of you when you thought you'd be with him forever -- are those public property once he breaks up with you and posts them online? How about the records of your divorce, or the reasons why you were fired? What about that one night when your best friend tried to walk out of the bar drunk, and you stole the car keys and the two of you got into a big fight and the police were called? You want the whole world to know about these things? Or--was it just a mistake and once amends have been made then that's the end of it?
Just because the information is out there doesn't mean it should be. Information doesn't have rights -- people do.
Yes, and in the US we have the right of free speech. The solution is not to suppress speech but to change the concept of how past infractions are viewed. While the later is a difficult task; repressing speech in the name of protecting people's rights is far worse.
Of course, as information becomes easier to access people also need to modify behaviors in light of changing technology; which they have been doing since the beginning of time. That is the real solution, IMHO.
Re: A fresh start (Score:5, Insightful)
Forgive and forget? Seems pretty short-sighted. I'm not sure I'd call murder a "mistake". An act like this *should* haunt the perpetrators for the rest of their lives.
Except for the guy they killed. Where's his freedom and chance?
Lastly, what about the victim's family and friends? How about their chances for normal lives without the murder of their loved-one haunting them. Some things cannot be forgiven and some things should definitely not be forgotten.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't care what their names are. What are they doing out of prison?
They did the crime, they served their time. What's so hard to understand about that?
"WERE killers" or "HAVE killed", not "ARE killers" (Score:2, Insightful)
Your post is a good example of why that German law was passed in the first place.
Wait, what? (Score:1, Insightful)
So basically in Germany, if I really really dislike someone, I can say "hmmm for a mere 20 years of my life I can take X amount of years of theirs, after giving them a gruesome and painful death". Seems like stupid logic to people who have a lot to live for, but for people that don't... I'm sure these two are giving each other high fives and declaring themselves the winner.
And this isn't the difference between "murder" and "accidental killing" here, they murdered this guy, and it was a hate crime. The victim was a gay actor. They then mutilated his body.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
No I think the idea here is that if you have done the time in jail then you should have the right to a normal life.
That's a seriously wrong understanding of a "normal life". After they come out of jail, the government has an obligation to treat these people no differently than anybody else. Everybody else (employers, private citizens), however, are under no obligation to forgive and forget.
There is something seriously wrong with you if you think that it is the government's job to revise historical facts for the purpose of tricking me into associating with people I would otherwise not want anything to do with.
This is the premise of our entire justice system.
If rewriting historical facts is a recognized function of the German justice system, then Germany is already careening out of control towards fascism again.
Ask yourself if you were introduced to a person and you found out that they were murderers would you think of them the same way?
Of course not. They are murderers. They have to live with the consequences of their past actions, just like everybody else.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
If they did their time they'd be buried in a state-owned plot with a small placard to mark the spot and this whole discussion would be nonexistent.
Re:A fresh start (Score:3, Insightful)
These people have served their sentences. They have been punished according to the law of their land, and then released. In this country, a person's criminal record haunts them for life -- denying them jobs, restricting their freedoms, and in some cases leading to a greatly diminished quality of life such that they are forced into criminal enterprise in order to meet basic needs. But in Germany, these laws are crafted so that people can have a chance at a normal life again--A chance at redemption.
And when they kill again, say at a job, the employer can just shrug off responsibility because the law says you're not supposed to know they kill people.
How about pedophiles being hired at schools?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:A fresh start (Score:5, Insightful)
Laws are only a reflection of the will of the society. The German society seems to be okay with forgetting such things. A large part of the slashdot community (a significant part of it living in the US) seems not to be okay with this. Different places, different minds. After you've said this, it just comes down to know how such laws are handled between countries. It kind of reminds me the "Yahoo nazi items" [wikipedia.org] controversy, in which the U.S. site of Yahoo was accused to sell nazi items to French people (selling such items is prohibited in this country). Yahoo was ultimately required to prevent the sale of such items to French people. In the story case, I suspect a ruling would not be as clear cut - as there is no financial motive involved for wikipedia.
Re:"WERE killers" or "HAVE killed", not "ARE kille (Score:4, Insightful)
You know, I admit I am biased. I don't like murderers like Wolfgang Werlé and Manfred Lauber, because their victims have no recourse, ever again. And while I do believe that some of them can change and not be a threat to other people again, that doesn't mean that the past didn't happen. Forgiveness yes, whitewash the past, fuck no!
Murderers should very well learn to live with the consequences of their actions, because their actions have consequences that can never be rectified.
Re:NOT Ironic!! (Score:3, Insightful)
Or maybe you and GPP just aren't smart enough to see the irony.
The American lawyer dealing with this is named Godwin. Surely you get the irony in that, if nothing else.
"Ironic" was a stupid song, but the stupidity of the reaction to it is far greater. Every use of the word "ironic" is now a red flag for every would-be pedant who isn't nearly as smart as he thinks he is.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:1, Insightful)
I think a society does have to treat people released out of prison the same as anyone else - otherwise they should have given them a longer sentence. However, that does not mean that therefore their past has to be whitewashed. Enforcement of that is a blatant violation of freedom of speech, one of our most important treasures.
Re:Small incorrectness in the NYT article (Score:3, Insightful)
While I recognize the goal of precedent -- to provide consistency in legal decisions -- I have to envy the Germans on this one. The major side-effect of precedent in American law is that it creates such a huge body of law, often piling ambiguity on top of ambiguity, that the general public cannot understand the law. At the very least, I wish that case law that added to (or invalidated) existing statutory law forced the law back to the legislature for clarification and correction.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
Your name, address, social security number, bank account balance, credit card transactions, passwords, medical history, and so on are simple facts. Should those who have access to that information be allowed to state those simple facts? In public, on the internet, where anyone and everyone can see it?
This is an issue about freedom of speech versus the right to privacy. The murder is a simple fact, but it's something that happened almost 20 years ago. They have done their time, and are being released back into the world, where they need to try and put together a life again. Now, the question is, should anyone (such as potential employers) be able to Google their names and get a Wikipedia article naming them as murderers as the first hit?
This is a tough question. On the one hand, it is a plain and simple fact, that has been widely publicized, so it's fairly hard to put the cat back in the bag. On the other hand, someone who's been in prison for years, and is getting out and trying to re-integrate with society, doesn't need the added burden of everyone who interacts with them treating them with fear and suspicion because of something that happened long ago. Some judicial systems (such as that in the US), focus most on punishment and the deterrent value that supposedly has; others focus on rehabilitation and turning someone back into a productive member of society.
Now, I do favor protecting freedom of speech in this case; you can't suppress the information entirely, so any attempt to is just going to be more harmful than helpful. But I just wanted to point out that just because something is a simple fact, does not mean that it's OK to publish it on the public Internet.
right of disassociation (Score:3, Insightful)
The _murderer's_ rights aren't violated by people knowing what they did. They should have been executed anyways. But irrelevant of that, non-aggressive people also have the right of freedom of association. I for one choose not to associate with people I consider dangerous.
In a free society, criminals would owe restitution to their victims, and victims would be also entitled to request retribution against the criminal. Then people at large could make their own associative or dis-associative decisions regarding the criminal.
One thing is clear, however. It doesn't violate anyone's rights for other people to know information about them that they've made publicly available through their actions.
Note that I'm not saying I have, per se, the right to know information about other people. That would imply positive obligations on the part of other people. However, no-one has the right to stop the various people at Wikipedia from recording and maintaining an account of history. That is their private property right.
Re:"WERE killers" or "HAVE killed", not "ARE kille (Score:5, Insightful)
A young man is walking through a small village one day and decides to stop by a bar and have a beer. He walks into a bar, and sees a grizzled old man, crying into his beer. Curious, the young man sits down and says, "Hey old timer, why the long face?"
The old man looks at him and points out the window, "See that dock out there? I built that dock with my own two hands, plank by plank, nail by nail, but do they call me McGregor the dockbuilder? No, no."
The old man continued, "And see that ship out there? I've been fishing these waters for my village for 35 years! But do they call me McGregor the fisherman? No, no."
The old man continued, "And see all the crops in the farms out there? I planted and have been farming those crops for my village for nearly 45 years! But do they call me McGregor the farmer? No, no."
The old man starts to cry again, "But you fuck one goat..."
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
The idea, the concept behind crime&punishment, is that you paid your dues after you are released from prison. Especially in the case of murder these people are examined to determine if they're still a threat for humanity. If they are, they don't go free.
If you don't want to give these people a chance to reintegrate into society, why bother releasing them at all?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, I do make the same argument for anyone. If they're released, then they are deemed no longer harmful. If they were considered harmful, they would not be released. Yes, there are of course problems with this. Laws are the work of humans, humans err and thus other humans get harmed. But what's the alternative?
To you the same question that I asked above, if you don't want to give a person the chance to reintegrate and redeem, why bother releasing them?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:1, Insightful)
Let's define some things here bub:
A soldier defending himself from someone who is trying to kill him is not a murderer.
A soldier defending a third party from someone who is trying to kill them is not a murderer.
When one of our soldiers, or a group of soldiers goes out and purposefully kills a bunch of innocents, they are murderers... And they stand an increased chance of being prosecuted for it, relative to any other country.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you think that is wrong, move to Germany and change the laws, but don't advocate just ignoring the laws.
Can we apply that same rule to this case, which would keep the killers name in the wikipedia article?
Re:A fresh start (Score:3, Insightful)
No, you're just blatantly making shit up. There's a lengthy history of freedom of speech in the US being upheld in cases where it is neither about the government nor for "the betterment of everyone". "5, Insightful"? Are the mods on crack again today?
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
Sorry, but I have no duty to treat a murderer the same way I would treat an innocent person, even if they've served their sentence. The German parliament made a poor decision to pass a law protecting a murderer from the disgust of the public.
You got that backwards. Precisely due to the lack of that duty, their names need to be withheld so that they can start a new life outside of prison. The alternative would be to keep most offenders in prison forever, but that's not what's currently being done over here.
Re:A fresh start (Score:2, Insightful)
What about the rights of Walter Sedlmayr, who the duo tortured, mutilated, and killed because he was gay? He apparently doesn't matter anymore, you know, because they murdered him.
Speaking as someone who is gay, he certainly does matter. Every life matters. But that's not what's at issue, and this is just an emotional appeal. And probably flamebait too.
Everyone makes mistakes, right? Hogwash.
Okay, you're perfect. It's the rest of us that are mortal.
So these men should have a chance at a normal life again? What about Sedlmayr's normal life?
Yes, they should. As to Sedlmayr's "normal life" -- it's been over for some time. I prefer to focus on the living, and what can be done for them. Once my time has come, I would hope my family and friends would not dwell on it to the point that they forget to live as well.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
That said, I do agree that one purpose of the prison system should be reform. However, hiding what someone has done in the past doesn't necessarily help the people they are around or to reform them. In fact, hiding somones criminal past can make it easier for them to comit crimes again. Say, a convicted imbezzler working with large amounts of cash? The question between balancing the protection of the public vs. the convict continuing their life is an interesting balancing act. I think Germany has gone a bit too far towards the convict in this law.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
This deficiency is being adressed, though. See, for example, "hate crime" laws.
I don't follow you here. How do hate crime laws contradict the notion that "truth is an absolute defense" in the US?
Hate crime laws apply when someone has committed a serious crime. They set enhanced minimum penalties when the crime was committed out of hatred against one of the enumerated minorities. The reason for that is that juries have traditionally been softer on criminals who hurt minorities.
So, how do hate crime laws at all relate to the German law? How is truth being suppressed by hate crime laws?
Amen! (Score:5, Insightful)
Enough with the goddamn excuse culture. You want respect, you earn respect. You want a second chance, then PROVE you deserve it first.
These guys killed someone and now they want the world to pretend it has never happened. Does NOT happen.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:2, Insightful)
Your name, address, social security number, bank account balance, credit card transactions, passwords, medical history, and so on are simple facts. Should those who have access to that information be allowed to state those simple facts? In public, on the internet, where anyone and everyone can see it?
They are private facts. The people who hold that information have always been, and will always be, contractually and legally obliged to keep those facts private.
This is an issue about freedom of speech versus the right to privacy. The murder is a simple fact, but it's something that happened almost 20 years ago.
The identity of the murderers isn't just a fact, it's a public fact, part of the public record, established in a public trial.
But I just wanted to point out that just because something is a simple fact, does not mean that it's OK to publish it on the public Internet.
The question is not whether this fact may or may not be published; it has been published and is part of the public record. The question is whether government has the right to retroactively rewrite public databases, public records, and public facts.
The only possible answer is a resounding "no". Fascist states, dictatorships, and communist states rewrite history; democracies do not.
This is a tough question.
No, it really isn't.
Re:A fresh start (Score:4, Insightful)
"Freedom of speech, in the United States at least, is not given to citizens so that they can harm other people's reputations or hold them accountable for their actions. It is there so that actions by the government can be openly criticized and constructive dialog be established between (and amongst) citizens and the government, without fear of reprisal. It is there for the betterment of everyone. If there is no benefit to society, no protection is granted."
This is perhaps the biggest pile of bullshit I've read on Slashdot in quite some time. This is not remotely how the U.S. constitution reads. This is complete fabricated nonsense.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd prefer not to know, so I could treat them the way I'd treat anyone. The way I see it, that way they have the possibility to redeem themselves. If they are hated and persecuted everywhere they go, what good are they to themselves or to anyone else?
Shoe on the other foot ! Hypocrits (Score:5, Insightful)
This is fascinating -- when the United States [frequently] seeks to have its laws apply beyond its borders [extraterritoriality], everyone particularly the EU objects reflexively: "How dare they? We're a separate society."
Now some in the EU think its laws should apply to the US. And not just about this, also other issues. Why should anyone in the US, and particularly elements of the [deservedly] much-abused US government give a rats @$$ for such blatant hypocrisy? Surely no-one denies the US is a distinct society!
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
If they did their time they'd be buried in a state-owned plot with a small placard to mark the spot and this whole discussion would be nonexistent.
Funny how some people, for all their preaching, have have a blind spot on the most essential human right of all.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
Nice attempt to troll but that bit is getting old, try to give it a little freshness by perhaps giving examples (no matter how marginal and irrelevant) of how US states are more independent from the federal government than EU member states are from the EU.
/Mikael
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:5, Insightful)
The EU countries, unlike some other countries, are civilized ones and here we don't execute our citizens.
Misconception of prison (Score:2, Insightful)
People need to think deeper than just the inherited customs and traditions they were born into. Otherwise, we do not have much hope of progressing as a species. (No, I don't have a positive outlook on our future... and NO, we have not progressed in tens of thousands of years-- take a modern baby and raise them in a "primitive" time and they'd come out no different; no less violent, no less potentially intelligent.)
Prison is a matter of necessity in SOME cases-- its purpose is to prevent the anti-social members of society from breaking the rules of society. Even primitive pack animals will expel (or kill) a member who is too damaging to the group structure.
Prison as a punishment is NOT necessary. Unfortunately, social science has not gotten far enough to undo popular cultural BELIEFS... yet. Christian based religions are culturally biased against their own teachings. So one can't expect much change anytime soon.
Wiping history of the names of criminals is quite foolish for academic and government needs; however, it does make sense to do so for the general populace. People are unfair, judgmental, and quite quite irrational so for a "cured" criminal or "payed up" criminal the knowledge continues to plague them for probably the rest of their lives. A good argument can be made for keeping the general public unaware and having some compassion for the criminal (something americans do not understand; I've likely lost most of them already.)
Sure, one could say that a pervert needs to be known... but if they are treated as the mental cases that they are; they will NOT get out of the system until they are actually treated - not some meaningless time period in a cage! Its SICK how we use terms like corrections and reformed in a culture that doesn't believe in it. We make it economic-- you PAY your debt to society with time and/or money; like it was a trade. It is not.
Errors always happen; its human run. If you want to start harming former criminals simply for the sake of potential future crimes you are entering a line of reasoning that easily can be extended into lots of unpleasant areas (and already is.) The reason we have free speech that is near absolute is because splitting hairs always ends up being abused. Therefore, the right to be reformed (ignoring that the public doesn't believe in reform - "can't teach an old dog new tricks") comes into conflict with the right to free speech. Something for some judges to weigh in on time to time...
I have no direct experience with the system, I know people who have: Childish behavior labeled as adult; mental cases labeled as criminal; untreated pedophiles let free or not even convicted...to repeat it! (as an illness, its much easier to be diagnosed than it is to be convicted. false positives are also not as harmful...)
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
This was not self defense, home defense, nor an accident. Neither were they cops or soldiers.
Allow me to edit my prev statement:
Because they actually killed someone in cold blood, apparently because he was gay.
Pull out all the self defense strawmen you want. But you're badly wrong.
Re: A fresh start (Score:1, Insightful)
I don't see you as having put forward much of an argument, more just an ejaculation of personal feelings. For sake of better analysis, let's look at girlintraining's position:
P1. An ideal punishment should be both retributory and reformatory.
P2. The retributory aspect of a punishment is fulfilled when a prisoner's sentence expires (otherwise, why not make it a longer sentence?)
P3. The reformatory aspect of a punishment is furthered by providing a prisoner with anonymity upon his or her release (the fact that the wikipedia article for the person you killed will probably come up as the first result for your name when Google is searched was adduced.)
C. An ideal punishment should provide a prisoner with anonymity upon his or her release.
I assume you don't want to deny premise 1 (isn't it better if we can punish and reform somebody?) I also take it that, given the frequency with which Google is used, premise 3 is fairly uncontroversial (it will be easier for somebody to reintegrate with society if they are granted this anonymity.) Thus, I take it you're rejecting premise 2, by essentially proposing either that some crimes are unforgivable, or that the current system fails to punish convicts sufficiently. In response to the latter, I would propose that you're probably underestimating just how bad it is to spend 25 years in a federal pound-your-ass prison. That being said, this position is probably defensible, although you owe me an explanation for why it's better to induce more harm on this person in such a way as to preclude them from becoming a contributing member of society.
The latter point (that some crimes are unforgivable,) is probably a defensible position (albeit one I disagree with,) but I think to hold it consistently you would probably have to advocate capitol punishment, or at least permanent imprisonment (one might prefer the latter simply because capitol punishment is a little too final, and precludes an innocent prisoner from being released when evidence later surfaces.) At any rate, it hardly seems to make sense to release these people from prison and yet consider them to be nonetheless in need of more punishing. Bear in mind I'm not saying that you don't hold this position, but I think, if you really don't think that criminals after serving a crime deserve a second chance, you should be aware of what your position entails.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
People like you tarnish the global reputation of the country we share, and policies like the ones you advocate erode our human dignity. We already punish crimes too severely. We lock up more than one out of every hundred people. That's savage. There aren't anywhere near that number of dangerous people: no culture is that twisted.
Our attitude toward crime is one of punishment, punishment, and more punishment.
What you'd get out of our losing the keys isn't a rational sense of safety, but rather the visceral satisfaction of seeing people punished, of the great balance sheet in the sky being corrected. If people like you had your way, we'd feed criminals to lions in Giants Stadium, then impale their bodies on the flagpoles outside the United Nations. You'd have us openly embrace exploiting of criminals for economic gain and sadistic pleasure, and thereby turn us into monsters. We're not so far away now, after all: we think of repeated rape as a normal part of a prison sentence, after all, and joke about it.
Well, I refuse to be part of that.
We don't need harsher sentences. Two-decade sentences are just as effective as longer ones. Either way, a large chunk of an offender's life is wasted, and that waste is enough disincentive. While there are people that have compulsions, and that need to be separated from society, you need a different arrangement. But there are vanishingly few of these people, and prison isn't the right place for them: these irredeemable people need psychiatric help. Even among murders, the vast majority don't belong to this category.
As for your crime wave: there was a massive crime wave 1920-1939. What your 1970s crime wave and that one had in common is that both happened when economic conditions really went sour for a lot of people. The 1920s saw wealth increase, yes, but wealth disparity between the rich and poor also skyrocketed. Then the 1930s happened. In the 1970s, we had stagflation, and then for the past thirty years, we've pursued policies that have greatly increased the gap between rich and poor. Is it any wonder crime is on the rise?
You know, it's really fucking sad when a man has so little hope, so few prospects, and so little education that he thinks it's a good idea to turn to mugging, robbery, and gangs as a way of life, of providing for himself, and of giving us life meaning. Happy people who have a chance of raising a family and growing old don't do those things. Desperate people do. And while individuals might fail society, it's even more true that society has failed these individuals.
And all that doesn't even take into account the people locked up for the so-called "crime" is enjoying certain recreational drugs. See, when you take a perfectly ordinary person and stick him in prison, you do two things. First, you expose him to the dregs of society. More seriously, you make him a pariah who, when released, goes on to enter crime culture because he's been excluded from respectable society. When you put harmless people in jail, you create harmful crime.
But not for you. On the planet you live on, all criminals are irredeemably wicked, and all crime is the result of personal flaws. You'd have us suppose against [wikipedia.org] all reason [wikipedia.org] that anyone who commits a crime is a worthless sub-human who deserves to be locked up forever.
What if you were reduced to such desperate straits that you felt crime was your only option? What if you snapped one day and acted on one of the illegal scenarios we all briefly entertain? Would you judge yourself to be a sub-human, beyond retribution and worthy of the harshest treatment? Or would you judge yourself to have made a mistake, one that you might rectify later? No? Well, everyone is just like you.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
Since when is it your job to tell Germany how to apply its laws?
Since when is it Germany's job to tell Wikipedia how to censor its content?
Re:Flamebait? (Score:3, Insightful)
No, blatantly misrepresenting the concept of freedom of speech in the US, arguing for censorship of the information in the US on the basis of German laws, and making an extremely dishonest comparison between the release of private information like pictures of yourself naked and public information like that you fucking murdered someone is flamebait. The only thing sad here is that you think you actually have a proper argument.
Re:"WERE killers" or "HAVE killed", not "ARE kille (Score:2, Insightful)
That story/joke sums it up quite well: When you do things right, no one remembers... do things wrong, no one forgets.
Most people are not enlightened enough to make the distinction between "did a bad thing" and "is a bad person", and give em a chance to get on with their lives. Sturgeon's Law applies to the human race, also.
Moron tries to sue information off the Internet. (Score:2, Insightful)
I think we know how this one's going to turn out for our convicted murderers, [redacted] and [redacted].
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
Rude would be if I called you ein verdammter Idiot, it could be seen as either justice or cruelty but never rudeness I think. Personally, I think there are people that are beyond redemption and should be given life without the possibility for release, but I'm against the death penalty on the principle that courts are fallible. We know there has been cases where people convicted to death later have turned out to be innocent, of course nothing can really give them back the 20 years in jail either but then you can at least do something to correct your mistakes.
Re:A fresh start (Score:3, Insightful)
It's you who doesn't seem to understand that rights are highly subjective.
Re:Amen! (Score:5, Insightful)
Enough with the goddamn excuse culture. You want respect, you earn respect. You want a second chance, then PROVE you deserve it first.
Yeah, but how are they supposed to do that?
If you're going to make them walk around with a scarlet letter 'M' on their chests for the rest of their lives, just what opportunities will they ever have to redeem themselves?
If the purpose of prison is to reform criminals and give them the opportunity to return to society as productive citizens -- as seems to be the prevailing theory in Germany -- then it is the responsibility of the public to put that theory to the test. You can't send people to prison telling them, "you must reform," then let them out and tell them, "you have not reformed, sorry." One of the fundamental principles of justice in any democratic country is that the accused is allowed to speak up in his own defense, but what you're describing is a sentence from which there is no appeal.
Re:"WERE killers" or "HAVE killed", not "ARE kille (Score:2, Insightful)
Their victims ARE dead, not were dead or have been dead.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"WERE killers" or "HAVE killed", not "ARE kille (Score:2, Insightful)
Drastic penalties have drastic side effects (Score:3, Insightful)
If you happen to commit one murder, and the penalty is the same as for 100 murders, you would be correct in finding it logically desirable to kill every potential witness and their family for good measure, instead of stopping at one victim.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:4, Insightful)
Since when is it Germany's job to tell the US how to apply the First Amendment?
Since when does a german lawyer and his german clients represent the nation of Germany. The lawyer would be ignoring his duties in protecting his clients if he didn't petition US wikipedia and news agencies to not discuss his clients. He's not going to win this fight because of the first amendment but he has to try.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
In theory right, but in this case you have to weigh the interests. These people committed a crime, did their time and now they are free again. They should be given a chance to reintegrate into society. At least in Germany the idea behind prison is to "better" the person, not just revenge and punishment. And this can be severely hindered if the first thing you find when you look for his name is that he's shot someone. Wikipedia has a tendency to come up as the first hit for any given keyword you might be looking for.
Most Americans have been socialized in a culture of punishment, not rehabilitation. It is difficult to try to get us to avoid the knee-jerk reaction of "BUT HE NEEDS TO BE PUNISHED!" It's precisely why we imprison so much of our society.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:4, Insightful)
Or someone close to you that was killed by someone who was placed in an untenable situation. If you let someone out of prison and then make sure that they can't feed themselves or have anything resembling a life you shouldn't be surprised when they return to the only option left open to them, crime.
Re:Get your lawyers ready /. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:right of disassociation (Score:4, Insightful)
The _murderer's_ rights aren't violated by people knowing what they did. They should have been executed anyways. But irrelevant of that, non-aggressive people also have the right of freedom of association. I for one choose not to associate with people I consider dangerous.
Most countries in the world do not hold to the barbaric idea of execution. We are supposed to be more moral than animals.
In a free society, criminals would owe restitution to their victims, and victims would be also entitled to request retribution against the criminal. Then people at large could make their own associative or dis-associative decisions regarding the criminal.
They paid their restitution, the victims likely requested their desired restitution, and you can associate or not with people in general, but people need not actively tell you that they committed a crime, or necessarily any other sort of information. In a free society, we have the right to disclose personal details at our own discretion... some details will be worn on our face... the color of our skin, our gender, etc... but in general, we should have our privacy to tell only the details that we wish to.
You're still free to choose not to associate with ex-criminals... but how many of them do you really know? I suppose more people than you would expect have had criminal run-ins... especially if you live in the USA.
One thing is clear, however. It doesn't violate anyone's rights for other people to know information about them that they've made publicly available through their actions.
Note that I'm not saying I have, per se, the right to know information about other people. That would imply positive obligations on the part of other people. However, no-one has the right to stop the various people at Wikipedia from recording and maintaining an account of history.
People have a right to privacy. The USA has "false light" laws as well as defamation laws. Sometimes, even if information is true, if it is presented with actual malice, it is wrong, and the individual is entitled to damages.
That is their private property right.
You seem to misunderstand what prompts rights. A government grants the rights of their citizens to their citizens. There is not some omnipotent higher-power that brings his hand down to personally interfere with human legal machinations.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:2, Insightful)
If they have paid their dues, and they are fully rehabilitated, then why does it matter if they are mentioned by name? After all, they're just normal citizens again.
Clearly there is a disconnect between the theory of rehabilitation and what the public considers to be sufficient stigma for past offenders
Re:right of disassociation (Score:4, Insightful)
In a free society, criminals would owe restitution to their victims, and victims would be also entitled to request retribution against the criminal. Then people at large could make their own associative or dis-associative decisions regarding the criminal.
In a completely free society, nobody is stopped from doing anything, which includes murdering others. A completely free society has no laws, and the strong rule.
In a society where people value life, liberty, and property, we restrict what others can do in order to protect those rights which we, as a society, have determined are most important. Thus, in order to protect my right to life, we have enacted laws against murder. In order to protect my right to property, we have enacted laws against theft. By violating the victim's right to life, those criminals gave up their right to freedom for nineteen years. According to German law, they have apparently given up no other right, and owe nobody else any other restitution. Their debt has been paid, and they now have all the rights given any other citizen. That's fine by me.
I still side with Wikipedia here because, among other reasons, German laws should not apply outside Germany. However, I object to your statement that in free society retribution is expected. Every law removes of some liberties in order to protect rights which said society values and thus, by definition, makes a society less free. A completely free society would not be one I'd like to live in, so these restrictions can make for a better society, but not a freer one.
Note that I'm not saying I have, per se, the right to know information about other people. That would imply positive obligations on the part of other people. However, no-one has the right to stop the various people at Wikipedia from recording and maintaining an account of history. That is their private property right.
Yes, I agree completely with you there. Seems like if they wanted to protect the identity of the murderers once they got out of jail, a better law would have been to never reveal this information in the first place, except to people who have some reason to be directly involved (family of the victims and the criminals, lawyers, etc). Once the information is out, it's out.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
The question is whether the subjects have to right to request said information to be removed from public records
They clearly have that right in Germany. The question is what that says about German democracy.
To most people in functioning democracies, it is absolutely unthinkable for a democratic government to alter the contents of historical archives or libraries, for any reason whatsoever. If Germans (or you) think this is OK, there is something wrong with you and the rest of the world cannot trust you or your democracy.
And no matter what you or other Germans think about it, rest assured that the US will not permit having Germany's views prevail in this matter in international law.
(As for your other comments, you don't even know what a "public record" is, so don't talk about people being "uninformed".)
Re:Freedom of Speech (Score:4, Insightful)
Just look at what's censored from American TV! Spike TV, "the network for men", can't even broadcast "God damn it" or "asshole", as if their UFC audience would be offended!
Any claim that Americans are the worldwide guardians of free speech is an epic fail.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a cultural difference. In America you value freedom of speech above many other rights, including privacy. In Germany, it is the other way around - Germans value privacy greatly, but do not necessarily think everyone should always be allowed to speak their mind. For example, you can go to jail for denying the holocaust happened... but on the other hand Privacy International acknowledges german privacy safeguards while naming the united states an endemic surveillance society. (source [privacyinternational.org]. It seems even Germany is slipping on PI's scales these days...)
They are private facts. The people who hold that information have always been, and will always be, contractually and legally obliged to keep those facts private.
The identity of the murderers isn't just a fact, it's a public fact, part of the public record, established in a public trial.
The main facts remain the same, only the names will be expunged from public access. I would say this is because, once freed, criminals regain a lot of their rights to privacy.
The question is whether government has the right to retroactively rewrite public databases, public records, and public facts. The only possible answer is a resounding "no". Fascist states, dictatorships, and communist states rewrite history; democracies do not.
Oh, you can't just denounce everyone who doesn't share to the your particular viewpoint of an ideal democracy as fascist! Different cultures have different needs. Both viewpoints are trying to achieve an ideal but falling short as realistic governments are bound to.
Anyway, it's not altering history, it's expunging names from the public record to protect people. It's not like they're writing someone else's name into the history books.
This is a tough question.
No, it really isn't
It's just that your particular value system only permits one possible answer, but not everyone shares that system precisely. Disagree if you must, but at the very least you have to agree that in Germany, the german people should be allowed to make their laws as they see fit. Now, American law disagrees with German law. How then do you approach such an international thing as wikipedia? You don't think this is a tough question? The obvious answers all leave a lot to be desired.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:3, Insightful)
Sorry, but I have no duty to treat a murderer the same way I would treat an innocent person, even if they've served their sentence. The German parliament made a poor decision to pass a law protecting a murderer from the disgust of the public.
-jcr
No, they did not made a poor decision. This is just your opinion. The opinion that a convicted person can never reenter society as an equal. Which is not the opinion of Germany.
Re:Bubby? Is that you? (Score:4, Insightful)
Their sentence was handed out by a German judge and did not include being haunted for the rest of their lives. They are convicted murderers, but they also are human beings. If you think that last fact means nothing for you, then you are saying you have no respect for human beings.
It is easy to respect the rights of someone you agree with. You show your civility in how you respect the rights of those you disagree with.
Re: A fresh start (Score:4, Insightful)
So you are saying people can't change? They could be radically different people after 20years.
"An act like this *should* haunt the perpetrators for the rest of their lives."
That is called REVENGE. Something that is not at all useful. I'd like to hope that we could evolve past this base need.
You seem to think that making this guys life harder will some how bring back the dead dude. It won't. You seem to think that this man being tortured will ease their hearts and make them happy. It won't. And if it did it fucking shouldn't, those thoughts are pretty horrible and something again we should move past.
Re:Amen! (Score:2, Insightful)
Yeah, but how are they supposed to do that?
By working harder than anyone else to have the kind of lives they want. Guess what? Actions have consequences. One of the consequences of murdering another human being is that other human beings will be extremely unlikely to trust you in the future. Don't like it? Tough shit; Werle and Lauber need to stop their whining and accept their fate, which is solely their responsibility.
It's not my problem if these guys are stuck doing manual labor for the rest of their lives. They've already proven once they're willing to kill. The authorities apparently think there's a low likelihood they'll do it again, but there's a lot of truth in the old joke* that it's a lot easier to kill someone the second time. So yeah, they have to eat shit, as it were, while trying to rebuild their lives. Maybe they should have thought of that before killing their business partner just because he was gay.
*The joke involves a war vet meeting his daughter's boyfriend for the first time and his attempt to convince the lad to keep his hands to himself.
Re:Case in point (Score:3, Insightful)
LOL...how can you ever know that?
I'd rather trust the opinion of the judge (and possibly the jury) who gave them 19 years, and not life sentence, over that of a crazy mob with pitchforks.
Unfortunately, the mob is still there, which is why laws like this one have some purpose.