Complacency

[Jason Axtell]

Damien Morton said:

> Its the absolutism of it that is creepy. Right now, crime and 
> punishment
> (especially victimless crimes such as speeding) is a probabilistic

Speeding is most definitely not a victimless crime (unless, perhaps, you are
on an otherwise empty road at the time).

> The problem is that the cameras qualitatively and 
> quantitatively change
> the meaning of those laws. In framing, laws are absolutist, but the
> reality is that they can only be partially enforced. The scope of the
> law and the penalty will generally have been drafted with the present
> limited enforcement mechanism in mind. Laws change much more 
> slowly than
> technology, and youre going to be hard pressed to argue against a law
> that absolutely enforces a law currently only 
> probablistically enforced.

Agreed. Do you believe the laws would not change when/if absolute
enforcement came about?

> I like the probablistic way they are enforced. Ive been 
> caught speeding
> by cops who could see that I was maneuvering to avoid another 
> car - they
> let it slide. In a surveilance society, Id have to explain it to a
> judge. When caught on camera, I get a letter weeks later, and 
> can barely
> remember the situation. I have no chance of defending myself.

Good point. This really isn't about probabilistic vs. absolute enforcement,
though - it's about human vs. automatic enforcement.

> I actually dont like cars very much, so if I could create a suite of
> technologies that would record every possible infraction of 
> every law on
> the books, then possibly I could make life so unfomfortable for
> car-using people, that they would catch busses and trains instead.

I think I would prefer a simpler means of deterring driving - perhaps an
unreasonably large gas tax at the pump?

> Even without a surveilance society, I can picture a mobile 
> very personal
> annoy-bot that follows you round recording every infraction 
> of every law
> - jaywalking, bad driving, whatever. With a surveilance society, every
> camera is one head of the harasment programme.

I saw that on an episode of Outer Limits once. It looked, um, annoying.

> Has anyone ever heard of a kind of strike called a 
> 'work-to-rules'. The
> idea is that striking workers dont walk off the job, but rather follow
> every rule covering their workplace _to_the_letter_. The result is a
> completely obedient, law-abiding, and instant paralasys of any
> organisation this is done to.

Simply a beautiful example of the fact that people intuitively know when not
to follow a stupid rule. Napster is another. Nonetheless, point well-taken.

Here's a thought, though. If rules are just meant to be broken, if human
interpretation is needed in order to prevent inappropriate enforcement, then
perhaps the problem is just that the rule was written badly. Take speeding.
You cite as a 'good' thing the fact that a cop can and will sometimes
overlook your speeding if it is appropriate to do so. So, say you, laws
should not be absolutely enforced. I say laws shouldn't be absolutely
written. 

Take California's basic speed law. It doesn't define a certain number of
miles per hour; it simply says you should drive at a safe speed. What speed
is safe? Depends on you, the weather conditions, the traffic conditions, and
on the judgment of any police officer who happens to be watching. This, I
contend, is a well-written law. The number on your speedometer is
irrelevant. All that matters is whether it was a safe speed at the time. The
cop who lets slide your speeding violation because you were trying to avoid
an accident is already following this law, at least in spirit.

The problem with absolute rules is that there is always a context in which
they don't make sense. We've gotten used to just not following the rules and
hoping that either we don't get caught or when we do, the officer/judge/jury
has a sympathetic ear. I say we just stop writing these kinds of rules.
Require people to use their brains in order to follow the laws. Require
police officers to use theirs in order to enforce them.  My experience shows
that this is true most of the time anyway. So why not recodify things to
make this explicit?

Jason Axtell
axtell@alum.calberkeley.org