British Civil Liberties Film Released 282
An anonymous reader sends us to a BBC article about a British film likely to attract the attention of civil liberties supporters. The film, Taking Liberties , is a documentary about eroding civil liberties in present-day Britain. It will be showing in cinemas in major cities across the UK starting next weekend. From the article: "Director Chris Atkins wants Taking Liberties to shake the British public out of their apathy over what he sees as the dangerous erosion of traditional rights and freedoms. 'This film uses shock tactics. We needed to be unashamedly populist... Once you give up traditional liberties such as free speech and the right to protest you are not going to easily get them back,' says Atkins."
I'll take back some of my liberties... (Score:3, Interesting)
Film as political persuasion (Score:3, Interesting)
It's interesting to me that video has become the newest, best tool to portray a point of view on an issue. Now if we could get these videos on the airwaves on a regular basis, I think the public good would be served. I realize that oil companies, tobacco companies, and other groups with an agenda might tend to drown out the discourse wi
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This is a small film, so why is it being released in summer blockbuster season? Maybe it will get an audience--after all, the BBC is advertising it. But it's also possible that this film will be in the cinemas for two weeks and then be pulled for "lack of interest," since so many Brits will be watching Pirates of the Caribbean 3 or the latest Harry Potter film.
And who distributes this to DVD? When it does reach DVD, the DVDs might all be region
Or: Is it a tipping point subject? (Score:2)
Both have tipping points... (Score:2)
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Thanks so much for another moronic viewpoint regarding copyright laws on slashdot.
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Pray tell, what liberty is there to download films illegally? Or are we operating under Slash-Law where it's your inalienable right to enjoy everything for free?
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We needed to be unashamedly populist... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:We needed to be unashamedly populist... (Score:5, Insightful)
Which is why political change usually comes in the form of War. Most people don't do anything about anything unless they see it as a problem that is costing them more than it would to address the problem. When it comes to regaining eroding freedoms, the cost of getting arrested at a real protest is too high for comfortable middle class folks. Only when things get bad enough that there is no "comfortable middle class" will the masses be likely to deal with the problem of bad government. By that time the only solution is civil war. When a government takes away your freedoms they don't willingly give them back.
Re:We needed to be unashamedly populist... (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like in the Great Woman Wars, when the suffragettes fought their way, rifles in hand, to the ballot box, the Race Wars waged in the '50s under the careful, analytical and ruthless direction of Martin Luther King, and the Gay/Lesbian Guerrillas of the '70s(who still, of course, meet the Christian Right Crusaders in occasional skirmishes).
Or perhaps there are other ways to change unjust systems in democracies? I'm painfully aware that democracy doesn't work as well as we'd like, but saying that a war is the "usual" way these changes happen seems either overly prematurely defeatist("We can't stop this from devolving into a war"), apathetic("I'm not going to do anything about this until it devolves into a war") or like a survivalist fantasy("Can't wait 'till the war!").
Re:We needed to be unashamedly populist... (Score:5, Interesting)
So no, it may not be War, like the American Revolution, but it would still be war, like those pushing the issue have reason to fear for their safety. Still far too much commitment. What Rights are you willing to get beaten with a police baton to protect?
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What I find somewhat amusing about contemporary political dialogue from some quarters is that they are quick to make noises like "Chimpy McHitlerBush", and follow that up with some talk about universal health care.
The Patriot Act and Department of Homeland Security, etc. etc. have had a net negative impact on individual freedom from interference. Deciding whether or not the tradeoff is worthwhile or suicidal is an exercise for
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High taxes may be related to socialism, but that's not the only reason for high taxes. And I had never heard how low wages were related to socialism.
Guest-worker programs aren't directly related to
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Having married a lovely German lady, I sort of took it for granted that everyone knew that the micro-management of the economy by the government was stifling the economy and driving people out.
To drop an example, my father-in-law is slated to retire in a year or two. He is by law precluded from, say, opening a bicycle shop or something.
Lovely place to hang out, but I find myself in disagreement with a lot of
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The other problem is the order. Hitler rounded up the communists first long before he had even looked at the Jews.
After he dealt with the communists he moved on to the Gypsies. The Jews were actually the last victims of the holocaust, although they do probably make up the greatest number.
Where did your version of the poem come from?
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Although other versions mentioned are from the New England Holocaust Memorial -> communists, jews, trad
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However, it does appear that there is no "correct" version, as Niemoller himself was wont to change the order to suit the audience.
Gah! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Gah! (Score:5, Insightful)
So, we should just accept all the propaganda that's being shoved our way via Fox News, talk radio (ClearChannel, Salem, TRN)? You don't think that Tom Paine or Ben Franklin wrote "political propaganda"?
I'm not saying there should be any support for dishonesty, but the best political messages have a little drama. You have to get people's attention before you give them the message, yes?
When the mainstream media as used by corporate power is putting their resources toward putting people to sleep and hypnotizing them to be good consumers and borrowers, then maybe it's time to WAKE THEM UP. I mean sure, life will go on the day after we are all slaves to corporate power. We'll eat, sleep, fuck, except our souls will have become superfluous. We'll still be able to watch American Idol after work, and we didn't really need to read all that depressing anti-Bush, anti-Growth, anti-Profit nonsense. Did we?
I'm not going to fault someone who cares about freedom because they used the tools of propaganda to slap these sleepy-assed sheep awake. That's why, in spite of his shortcomings, I think Michael Moore is a patriot, and is doing something very necessary. Of course, the people on the Right will tell you that you shouldn't listen to him because HE'S FAT, but his documentaries are a lot more carefully researched and intellectually honest than anything you'll see come from Rupert Murdoch's sausage-grinder. Sure, it's propaganda, but thank God.
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Also, you yourself will never be effective at influencing people, because you're so fucking confrontational and arrogant that
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I think Michael Moore is a patriot, and is doing something very necessary.
He made millions with his films. He's just pushing his own political agenda, in a screechy, one-sided way. If he's a patriot, then so is Rush Limbaugh.
Of course, the people on the Right will tell you that you shouldn't listen to him because HE'S FAT
Now you're acting just like you accuse "the Right" of. I'm sure there are plenty of fat jokes at his expense, but there's more criticism than that. After reading Truth about Bowling for Columbine [hardylaw.net] some years back, I lost all desire to see any of Moore's films.
but his documentaries are a lot more carefully researched and intellectually honest than anything you'll see come from Rupert Murdoch's sausage-grinder. Sure, it's propaganda, but thank God
No thanks. I don't like spin from either the right or the left. I'll take a Frontline document
most ppl are stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
oh, and before you ask, many of them regard themselves as 'intellectual' (a.k.a. they don't read yellow press etc.).
kinda seems like only IT ppl and civil rights activists are concerned now. and i absolutely cannot see anything that would change that.
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When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
The Film Would Be Even Longer If Made In The US (Score:2, Insightful)
Talk about disappearing civil liberties, but this country might have well reverted to monarchy rule. It would
Re:The Film Would Be Even Longer If Made In The US (Score:4, Insightful)
We are headed there too, but they're one step ahead of us.
Re:The Film Would Be Even Longer If Made In The US (Score:5, Informative)
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I think policemen need cameras in their hats/helmets. Now someone could actually watch the watchers - just so long as the people watching the camera footage aren't corrupt themselves.
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rj
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Could you please provide an example of the Bush administration's limiting free speech in a way that it was not limited before the administration, monitoring anything that wasn't monitored before Bush was elected, using hiring practices that were not in use before the election, illegally imprisoning people without charge, declaring war illegally, or forcing anyone into debt?
I'm not trolling. I'm not accusing you of lying. I really don't know of any good examples of the limitations of free speech which you accuse the Bush administration of. If they really do exist, I wish to know about them (well, no, I don't, but I need to know).
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It's also worth pointing out that if the intent of the protesters is to actively disrupt the target, and I think that's a fair assessment of many anti-Bush protests, the zones really are promoting Free Speech, which targets of the protest have as well. Free Speech is not an unlimited right to disrupt the speech of others.
Free Speech zones are a sort of dangerous precedent, but unfettered protesting is a problem too. If protesters believ
Cracking down on freedom of speech (Score:2)
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What needs to happen is that somebody reputable, well-known, and with the actu
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While you're distracted by the mostly fanciful descriptions of the evil of Bush, Britain is being plated with surveillance cameras, Venezuela is sliding into dictatorship (just got the most popular TV
Re:The Film Would Be Even Longer If Made In The US (Score:4, Informative)
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The issue of forcing us into debt is couched in the fact of cutting taxes whi
This film will be enormously interesting... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:This film will be enormously interesting... (Score:5, Interesting)
And yes, we all understand that there are more cameras, modifications of laws to account for acts of terror, etc., but people simply can't see the application of technology or updates of laws for what it is: for the most part, a genuine, honest attempt by persons within free governments in free societies to protect that system that are no more sinister than the police or the state adopting any other new technology that makes its charge from society easier, or an update to any other law, which we ostensibly value in societies that are based on rule of law.
Are there people with ulterior motives and are people in power looking to stay in power? Sure. Absolutely. But the CCTV systems in the UK aren't a part of some larger plot to create a secret police state and keep "the people" down. I find it humorous that the people who live in what are essentially the freest, richest nations that afford them, in general and on balance, the widest variety of personal freedoms coupled with the rule of law required to maintain order and stability in society for all, seem to think they're living in rapidly degenerating 1984-style police states.
We are certainly not perfect. But to paraphrase Churchill, the general systems of what we loosely call "democracy" are a hell of a lot better than any other systems we've seen tried over the centuries. We have the freest flow of information ever, the ability to communicate and share ideas across the globe to nearly anyone instantly, and the ability to produce alarmist films like this without retribution (save by others who disagree with you, which it is also their right to do).
Sure, be vigilant. Be watchful. But this idea that society-at-large is nothing but consumerist sheep who have been brainwashed into complacency by corporations and government, and only the truly enlightened who see the "truth" that we're in a rapid decline to totalitarianism - and I don't care if it's the US, the UK, or EU in general - are going to save us all is just garbage, and these people really need to get some perspective on things, and perhaps a healthy grip on reality at the same time.
Re:This film will be enormously interesting... (Score:5, Insightful)
Personally, I don't trust the current government very far, but if I did, the same principle applies.
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Nice try (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:This film will be enormously interesting... (Score:4, Interesting)
I see someone has already pointed out your strawman argument, but think about this for a moment. If someone were to prevent distribution of the film, Britain still has enough of a free press (and enough freedom of speech) to kick up a major fuss. On the other hand, if it's distributed, so what? A few people who already agreed with it get their views confirmed, people like the AC and the public dismiss the message and use the film's existence to reassure themselves that we have free speech, and the Government is unaffected. You're looking for the wrong kind of censorship in the wrong place.
Re:This film will be enormously interesting... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's how the modern police state works, you see. Freedom of speech is still allowed, dissent is still recorded, and people thus think they aren't really living in a police state.
However, start organizing against the state and see just how quickly you can get shut down. Your activist groups will be infiltrated, investigations into your personal life will begin, and at the slightest hint of significant success at changing the status quo you will be arrested and charged with a bogus crime to end your career as a political radical. Web sites will describe your fate and complacent onlookers will marvel that in their free society -- which is clearly free because people can read these stories -- some people can still go crazy about such fringe political topics.
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1.Do CCTV camera's effect People's reactions?
While they do generally stop thugs and chav's do they stop me acting like I normally do? The answers no, the only time I'm even aware of the things is when I'm walking through a rough area and I'm glad to see them. For the rest its like the security camera's in a shop, while people know they exist their not aware of them.
2. Camera's are watching everyone all the time!
Obviously false I'
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I'm waiting to see the promos (Score:3, Funny)
Can we.. (Score:2)
how many different "associations" do we have in the US that
"Viva Nepal!" (sorry, couldn't help that)
saw it (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm pretty sure I already saw this movie when it was called V for Vendetta. Or was it Children of Men?
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Note well: if you want to stop fascism in Britain, don't bomb Liverpool!
We need more cameras (Score:3, Insightful)
So in this one South London neighborhood that I occasionally frequent, there was an armed robbery at 4 in the afternoon on the main street last Saturday. It's a quiet neighborhood, very well-balanced, well-off, so it makes sense to come there and rob people.
There was a similar robbery the previous week.
The week before that, it was on a weekday evening, I guess they had a busy schedule that week. It's the same guys each time. They live in this totally different neighborhood a way to the south, though.
And there is absolutely nothing anyone can do about it. Nothing at all. What are you going to do? Call Batman? The UK police are very nice guys (compared to any other police force I've met) but they really can't do much in this situation.
The trouble is, this particular chunk of street doesn't have any cameras. The south half of the street near the station does, and the north half near what's called a 'roundabout' does, but there's this bit in the middle that doesn't. So all you have to do is rob people there, since nobody around here is fool enough to intervene and get jailed or killed, and there's no chance of a conviction (or even police attention) without video evidence. If you have video evidence, and there is a history of crime, and someone gets hurt, then in the end, you can get a custodial sentence passed. It's an uphill struggle, though, because there's a hell of a lot of civil liberties in the way.
If nobody gets hurt, there's nothing you can do even with cameras. Every weekend, kids come up the road from the other, nastier neighborhood to the south, and as they go they kick over stuff and pull flowers out because, well, that's the local culture. It's not a life-threatening problem -- it just means you kind of have to remember to get stuff indoors by a certain time on Fridays. And don't grow rosebushes in the front yard.
But all is not lost. Armed robbery generally *does* mean someone eventually getting hurt, and next year there will be cameras for that bit of street, yay! And none of this is really *Real Violent Crime* such as you might find in south chicago; it's just that there's no reason *not* to mug people or kick stuff over so it just becomes the normal expectation that those things will happen.
The thing about 'omg they are taking our libertiez!' is, Civil Liberties in this sense aren't as important as for example the liberty to *not* be mugged or the liberty to *not* have your stuff smashed or the most important liberty of all, the liberty to *not* have the nature of your life dictated by the whims of thugs. The liberty of not being recorded on camera is actually pretty trivial by comparison.
So install some more freakin cameras. Create new powers to stop 'public nuisance', use electronic tags, maybe suspend habeas corpus or something. Take away more civil liberties. Here, have some of mine. I'll expect them back when I leave the UK.
Re:We need more cameras (Score:4, Insightful)
Do you recall if it was like that there before cameras were installed in the surrounding area?
-Peter
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-uso.
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Re:We need more cameras (Score:4, Insightful)
The actual problem is the competence of the police, or lack thereof. They've become over-reliant on the law bullying the populace. Since the beginning of the year littering has become an arrestable offence and if Tony "Uncle Joe Stalin" Blair has his way before he leaves we'll have the "Suss laws" returning: police can arrest and question you on suspicion of doing something.... no evidence, you just have to look a bit shifty, in the police's opnion.
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The UK police are completely focussed on automatic revenue-generating activites like giving out speeding tickets. They don't want to actually do real police work and deal with the crime that affects peoples lives on a day to day basis.
You never see a policeman on the beat any more. The few that you still see are all in cars avoiding any contact with the public.
Re:We need more cameras (Score:5, Insightful)
And there's the truth of the matter. Everyone in the UK knows their rights but too many have no sense of responsibility and they are fully aware of the fact that some smart arse lawyer who doesn't give a shit about truth because that's not what he's paid for will get them off on some minor procedural technicality. And the worst part is that it's a small section of the Police that bought this situation about. Remember the West Midlands Serious Crime Squad that caused as much crime as they stopped? The Birmingham 6 & Guildford 4 convictions, the Special Patrol Group etc. Normally, when things get out of control there's a swing back towards the other side five years down the line only in this case, the swing has continued to the point where your average thug has the same immunity to consequences that the above had in the 70's and 80's.
CCTV should not be a necessity. Unfortunately, in this "have your cake and eat it" society it is a sticking plaster over the gaping wound of idiot thuggery that seems trendy at the moment. If you can work out how to make being an evil little tosser uncool then you may have a chance of improving things but sadly it seems to be evil little tossers that run this country seem happy to put up more cameras.
Minor offence? (Score:2)
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I recommend you read Wasting Police Time by David Copperfield ISBN:0-9552854-1-0
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Big Brother is watching you, but he most certainly isn't watching the fucking criminals.
Now, just for a minute, try and do something that British people are generally terrible at, and try and look at the big picture. Why is there so much armed crime round your way? Clue: the answer is not "because there aren't any CCTV cameras".
The real, underlying problem with life in Brita
nice fearmongering, try responsiblity instead. (Score:5, Insightful)
Ahh. there is your problem. People in that nieghborhood don't give a shit. How did nieghborhoods ever have low crime rates before CCTV? Because they stood by their nieghbors and acted in their own best interest by actually doing something about it themselves. By hiding behind closed doors pretending not to see, they are getting the shitty neighborhood they deserve. Act like a victim, get treated like a victim. I have more than once come out of my apartment into the street and made my presence known, when there is a disturbance on my street.(I live in New York City) Guess what happens when I walk out and look them in the eye? Well usually it's some arguement that is starting to turn physical, but when suddenly there is a witness threats go back to being just words. The one actual mugging that I encountered the guy just ran away.
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Next thing you know, the populace is asking Big Brother to please keep an eye on everything, because they're too helpless themselves. Oh wait, you've already asked for that.
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Also, if I was living in a south London estate (I don't thankfully, I live down in rural Sussex), I'd rather like to own a gun. The government play this little game where they make 'guns' seem like an evil, evil thing which only south London gangster
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So in this one South London neighborhood that I occasionally frequent, there was an armed robbery at 4 in the afternoon on the main street last Saturday. It's a quiet neighborhood, very well-balanced, well-off, so it makes sense to come there and rob people.
There was a similar robbery the previous week.
The trouble is, this particular chunk of street doesn't have any cameras
It looks like yo
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The UK doesn't have the right to bear arms, and may be reluctant to create one--I mean, look how we Americans use ours!
The UK also outlawed defending one's home with force outright--the exact opposite of the proposition you want. Their reversing that could be as har
Repect for the law (Score:2)
Nevertheless, when the most sacred and cherished documents in history are trashed by a government of men (British or American) over a period of years, apathy sets in the longer it goes on wit
Bad timing (Score:5, Insightful)
Intresting quote on the site (Score:3, Interesting)
They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty nor security.
It is intresting because the words in bold are not usually included. Watch the excellent british series "yes minister" ("the right/need to know" I believe) for why these words are so fucking important.
In that episode it is the word "significant" wich is added to a sentence to make it into weasel language.
Yes, if this quote above is correct, then Benjamin Franklin was a weasel.
After all, just what do you classify as essential or for that matter tempory. The right to travel outside your own country is hardly essential for the majority of us, and if a sacrifice would grant you a million years of security by the age of the universe that would still be temporary.
They are weasel words, words that can be used to, well weasel out of commiting yourselve to anything firm. Franklin by including these words could always claim that he never meant for something to be considered an essential liberty or that security measure in his eyes was not temporary.
The world changes. Take travelling, pasports have been known for a long time and used to be documents that merely asked of friendly powers to let this person pass unharmed. The dutch pasport at least still has text that asks friendly powers to allow the owner of the pasport to free passage and any aid or assitance necesarry. Officious language from an age when the vast majority of people never travelled from their place of birth.
Nowadays you can easily find a job were you pass several borders each and every day. Taking a long weekend on the other side of europe is common as hell and airports handle millions of people everyday.
Obviously then a passport today is much different then it once was. More and more info linking the intended owner to the document is included. Loss of an essential liberty? Providing temporary security OR the price for a liberty that gives us some security. Discuss, but know that Benjamin Franklin's famous quote does NOT take a firm stand against any amount of biometrics to be included on your pasport, not even if it was to be injected in your body. "Essential" and "temporary".
Liberty is a noble goal. Just go ahead, disable the traffic lights on a busy intersection, see how well people cope with liberty. The simple fact is that for instance speed cameras do have a positive effect, areas known to be heavily controlled show a drastic reduction not only in the speeding itself but also in accidents. The essential freedom of being able to speed sacrificed for the temporary security of not being killed by some idiot who thinks he is Michael Schumacher?
Play an MMORPG for a while, say WoW and see what a world looks like when the police and the state are essentially absent. It ain't pretty. Yes it is freedom, but at what price?
We should always be wary of what is being done in the name of security, but next time someone quotes Benjamin Franklin and leaves out the two weasel words take note of it. These words were included by a smart man for a good reason, why did they choose to leave them out?
no one will see it anyway.... (Score:2)
Nonsense (Score:2, Insightful)
We've never had them in the first place, Mr Atkins. In order for there to be inalienable rights like freedom of speech, there must be constitutional limitations on the power of the state, legislature and judiciary, all three of which needing to be subject to the rule of law.
WE DON'T HAVE SUCH A DOCUMENT. WE DON'T LIVE IN SUCH A STATE.
We never have.
Therefore your film abo
Re:Nonsense (Score:4, Insightful)
We've never had them in the first place, Mr Atkins. In order for there to be inalienable rights like freedom of speech, there must be constitutional limitations on the power of the state, legislature and judiciary, all three of which needing to be subject to the rule of law.
WTF are you talking about? The UK is a constitutional monarchy. Our constitution is not a written document, but rather spread across several laws. There are indeed limits on state power and recognition of natural rights, going back all the way to the original Bill of Rights and the Magna Carta. Since we joined the EU last century, we have further restrictions on state power.
WE DON'T HAVE SUCH A DOCUMENT. WE DON'T LIVE IN SUCH A STATE.
50% right, 50% wrong. We do live in such a state, it's just that there's no one singular document that we can point to and say "that's it". It's way more complex than that, mostly because the UK is comprised of a mixture of constituent countries that are a thousand years old.
I'm getting really fed up with people spouting off these misinformed "factoids" that they heard somewhere, like "Oh, Brits aren't citizens, they are subjects". Nonsense. Don't repeat somebody else's opinion you heard on Slashdot as fact. Not only are you wrong, you are actually spreading ignorance.
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scarier in the U.S. (Score:5, Interesting)
My thoughts (Score:2)
Written Constitution (Score:2)
sadly, not going to happen ... (Score:2, Insightful)
the possibility of such an event ?
Re:sadly, not going to happen ... (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem, however, is that many kinds of individual accidents can't all be prevented, and thousands of people will still die from them. We can come to terms more easily as humans with someone dying from an accident, like falling off a ladder while cleaning your gutters, no matter how meaningless or even preventable. It's a part of life.
What we don't deal well with is knowing that there is a group of people who - for whatever reason - deliberately plan to kill as many innocent Americans as possible, at the same time causing billions upon billions of dollars of damage to the US economy. The whole idea is to terrorize and paralyze people in the hopes of getting some of your own demands met.
The other issue is that incidents of mass casualty - plane crashes, natural disasters, Virginia Tech, mine collapses, etc. - generally hit humans harder and make the national news. Whether accidents or not, 10 or 50 or 300 people dying at once is an "event" and resonates with people, no matter how unlikely it is in comparison with the things that are (sometimes preventably) killing people every day.
Still another issue is that things like obesity, smoking, etc., that someone is bound to bring up when talking about the "fat and lazy Americans" don't kill a person right away. A big plane crash or bus fire does. In an instant. It's not just "terrorism"; it's mass casualty. The additional problem people have with "terrorism" is that it's another person or group of people plotting harm or death for others. And in the case of non-domestic terrorism, people not even from within our own borders. That's why so many see it as a military, foreign policy, and critical national security issue, not a simple civil or criminal law enforcement issue that we shouldn't take any specific or particular action to stop.
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So, to counter this, we deliberately invade as many tangentially related countries as possible, spending hundreds of billions of dollars, sacrificing thousands of our soldiers' lives and "accidentally" killing tens or hundreds of thousands of innocent foreigners.
We don't intend to kill innocents or civilians (isolated - yes, isolated - incidents where some individual person MAY "intend" to kill a civilian in war aside). It is not condoned nor supported by policy or our population. The US spen
Re:Right to bear arms? (Score:4, Insightful)
Furthermore, not one British citizen on 10,000 would want anyone to have such a right. the other 9,999 are 100% behind the full enforcement of 7 years jail for anyone posessing a weapon, legally or otherwise. The American right to bear arms is seen as the reason why American deaths from gunshot wounds run at around 100 times the rate here, adjusted for population size. In short, almost everyone in the UK sees weapons as the problem, and none see them as the solution.
A few criminals have guns, and probably a similar number of country dwellers have them, and perhaps a few who shoot competitively as a sport, but carrying guns is not something many in the UK would consider. Those with a sound legal reason for carrying a gun have very little support here.
Our police dont normally carry guns, but have still managed to shoot more innocent people than guilty ones. Each time a policeman is shot by a criminal, there is a clamour to arm the police, but I do not recall any incident where this would ahve prevented the policemen being shot. AFAIR 75% of American polise shot are shot with their own gun, or by a colleague.
How about a right to bare breasts? Now that really would be popular!
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No more than you have the right to free speech, etc. etc. [wikipedia.org]
Your last vestige of the right bear arms was taken away, and in short order you see your other rights sliding slowly away. And there's no correlation.... Slashdot really needs to implement smilies, 'cause I really need to use
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There isn't that correlation in the US. In fact, gun groups like the NRA are usually at odds with civil liberty groups like the ACLU. So if anything there's a reverse correlation in the US. Can you back up your thesis in any way? Because it seems to me that the erosion of rights in Britain has more to do with the so-called "War on Terror" than gun issues.
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How about a right to bare breasts? Now that really would be popular!
Legal protection for topless women already exists in Ontario, Canada. I'm not aware of any efforts made in other provinces in Canada, but the Ontario supreme court ruled back in 1996 that it was fine for women to be topless in public.
http://www.fcn.ca/Gwen.html [www.fcn.ca]
Few women do so, but I've seen women sunbathing topless in the park south of my house in the summer(grassy area, near Lake Ontario). It's not really made a huge deal of, at least that I've seen. The women have no shirt on, and neither do the
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We in England have never had the right to bear arms,
Not true, in fact archery practice was mandatory for quite some time, and in some border towns killing Welsh people was regarded as a public service. If by "never" you mean "in the last 100 years" and by "arms" you mean "guns", I think you'll find that the restrictions were very different pre-WW2, definitely pre-WW1.
How about a right to bare breasts? Now that really would be popular!
Hrm. Maybe. Depends on the breasts.
Re:Right to bear arms? (Score:4, Informative)
You're pretty much correct. The first British gun licensing laws were enacted in 1870, but they were essentially a revenue generation tool. You had to pay ten shillings for the right to carry guns around in public places, but could keep as many at home as you wanted without one, and the licenses were handed out at post offices to anyone who could pay for them. The first actual control legislation was in 1903, when certain classes of pistol could only be sold to people who produced a valid game or gun license, although once again such licenses were extremely easy to obtain, and any other sort of gun could be bought without them. True gun control didn't happen until 1920, and was largely a reaction to the 1917 Russian Revolution, where private gun ownership played a significant role in overthrowing the Czar, and the British government feared that the millions of recently demobbed (and therefore extremely cheap) weapons from WWI would be used to start a massive armed revolt.
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I suggest you check your own history, paying particular attention to the 1689 Bill Of Rights, which (among various other things) gives the right to have armaments for personal defence.