Hm, so if she had said “fuck Bush” would they examine a rape threat?
Let’s listen to Ben: “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. Bitches”
Regardless of the legal rights & obligations of 14y/o in the U.S. legal system (which I don’t know) pulling a teen out of class without arranging the matter solely with her parents should have raised some outrage and make these guys back off. Arac’s comments on freedoms and torture are right. GM, if the girl is not sane because of public “threats”, what are the fellows who cause the death of 100 Iraquis/day?
My only point is that the link had nothing to do with the subject and was a cheap ploy to make your argument seem logical. I understood why you put it there, to try and convince people you had some sort of rational, factual backing to your point. You just chose to show it with a massive, massive logical gap. Because their are child soldiers, children who are not child soldiers can feasibly kill the president and should, therefore, have their rights horrifically violated in the name of his safety.
Two non-sequiters in one logical path! Woo!
Like I said, a vaguely related, cheap ploy to make your argument seem remotely based in reality.
Really, there is a vast difference between child soldiers and a girl who posts a comment that could barely be called threatening with a straight face on myspace.
I’m not saying children don’t have the capacity to kill, they do. What I’m saying is that your example was invalid because it had nothing to do with the subject, and that the fact that children are able to kill does not mean any threat by a child should be taken seriously. I have taken enough Muay Thai I’m probably legally classifiable as a deadly weapon; I know a way to kill someone with only eight pounds of pressure, and I am quite capable of beating a man to death. I am capable of killing.
So, if I’m on a project with a kid who’s a slacker, and I tell him “Man, I’m going to kill you iuf you don’t get your half done,” is it worth investigating? I use a common phrase, not literally meant, to show my frustration with his slacking, but it mentions kill, and I could pull it off, so should I be intellectually raped against my constitutional rights to “investigate the threat” for the kid’s safety?
No, but it is a pretty good indication that they are not in a child army. Making public comments about killing people can show insanity, but there is, again, the fact that colloquealism frequently includes the use of phrases like “Eat shit and die.” Not to mention the fact that if you make a public comment about killing someone, it could generally be considered insane, were you clearly serious and whatnot, however, statements about killing political figures have long, long, been signs of protest, the most powerful you can give; I am a generally decent person, and this leader is such a poor leader, I actually wish death upon him.
So, really, the context of saying you’ll kill someone matters a lot more than the words.
Let’s look at some things about these links:
The first two do not contrain direct, public death threats to anyone.
None of the death threats are political statements, they are all to people they know personally.
They have fragile relations to this incidence, and are, just like the first, a pathetic attempt to show some sort of factual backing for a point which has none, and you’re hoping we don’t notice how unrelated they are.
Rig: I was thinking of using that Ben Franklin quote, but I couldn’t remember it exactly. It was the “bitches” part I was forgetting. I always forget that part! =P
Ok, let’s try analyizing the flow here to try clearing things a bit.
I’m going to hope everyone here already agrees with me on these three points, or we’re in for some trouble:
The job of the Secret Service is to protect the President of the United States.
Protection means finding and eliminating threats to the President’s life before they can harm him.
A threat is something that could potentially harm the president.
Now, ignoring threats like pretzels or something for a bit, one main source of threats to the President’s life come from people - humans like you (I hope) and me. Now, there are around 6 billion people on the planet, and probably less than a thousand Secret Service agents presently. This ratio makes finding people who are threatening to the president’s life a little more difficult, since they can’t directly inspect every single person on the planet. However, anyone who’s ever used Google knows something about find something you’re looking for: you have to narrow down your search. In the case of the Secret Service, a very clear and obvious paramater to use in your search would be to look for people who are threatening to kill the President. Who would be more likely a person to kill the President than someone threatening to kill him? There shouldn’t be any arguing over this point.
So now we come to the case of the girl. She made a threat against the President’s life, so naturally the Secret Service is going to take note of her. It’s what happens after this point that seems to be where there are many reservations, so let’s anaylize it in depth. The Secret Service identified a threat to the President’s life - their assigned job. Now, they had three options here: Eliminate it, Ignore it, or Investigate further.
Option 1:
The “German SS” option that you are all suggesting the Secret Service took would have been to straight up eliminate the threat based on the evidence they had. They could have swooped down, and thrown the girl into jail… or worse. Whatever you dream up probably wouldn’t be as bad as what the German SS would have done. Clearly this didn’t happen.
Option 2:
The next option would be to ignore the threat. This would have been a terrible choice, but I won’t bother explaining why, since you should be able to figure it our yourself. If you can’t figure out why, I don’t want to waste time arguing with you.
Option 3:
The remaining option was to investigate the girl - which they did. Interviewing the girl was the right decision in this case. Their execution in doing so was poor - I’m not arguing about that. They could have done a much better job in getting ahold of the girl and interviewing her, but to say that they shouldn’t have done so at all is absurd.
Unlike how you violated Ben’s quote, the girl here never had her rights violated. To the best of my understanding, she hasn’t been punished in any way for this incident. The Secret Service merely needed to verify whether a threat to the president’s life was valid or not, and in the end it was clearly not a valid threat, and the whole thing was dropped on their end. She never had her right to free speach taken away, she was never told to do anything at all. What’s the big problem then?
Oh yeah, fucking the president and the guys who kill 100/iraqi’s a day? Yeah, those neither of those have much to do with anything that’s been brought up here at all, so good thing you brought them up so we can talk about them. But yeah, if there was a terrorist who was making threats about fucking the President, then I’d hope the Secret Service would investigate into the matter a little further. It’d make the news interesting.
Edit:
Some questions to ask:
What if when they looked into the matter further they had actually found something more of interest? What if instead of finding a 14 year old girl, they found a 40 year old with a gun and severe mental issues? What if when they interviewed the girl, they found someone similar to the kids at Columbine? This clearly wasn’t the case here, but it’s the reason why they bothered with something everyone here takes for granted - sure it’s very clear that a 14 year old girl was behind this whole thing now, since the news tells us as much, but how was the Secret Service supposed to have that same information before the fact without looking into the matter further? How can the Secret Service effectively do their jobs, if all it takes to hide from them is a rather simple mask?
Clearly, if they were able to pull her out of class for an “interview,” then they already knew her name and the school she attended. Then they could have just called her teacher and found out that she’s a normal kid, from a normal family, and poses no threat whatsoever, and then gotten back to investigating other threats that are more likely to be real than a 14-year-old’s myspace page. By the time they actually pulled her out of class, all these things should already have been evident. Then what the fuck was the point of intimidating her (without letting her parents attend, mind you), other than “because they could”? The way they conducted the “interview” isn’t just some inconsequential procedural question. It shows, in a small way, that the government believes that it has the right to intimidate its own citizens even when they’re obviously harmless. The general reaction to the Columbine shooting was very similar - every time a kid draws a violent picture in his notebook, school administrators hysterically threaten him with their “zero tolerance” policies - and I doubt that it has really improved the safety of public schools.
One of my first posts here in RPGC had a graphic critic to Bush and Blair (anyone remember Bomberbush?) and I asked whether I should worry or not about posting such stuff around. I think someone said there was no point in worrying. I would like a opinion revision now.
Yes, there should. I’d argue that any intelligent would-be assassin wouldn’t, you know, give the target a written warning of intent. While some people who threaten will try, doubtless, the most dangerous assassins are those who don’t state their intent to do so.
The problem here is that this should never have been taken seriously as a threat. Look in the article at the description of it. It is a common figure of speech being used by a teenage girl to vent her frustrations, fairly obviously, at that. The idea that it is a threat is laughable, at best.
Because there was no real threat whatsoever and ignoring it would not have wasted time, money and violated a girl’s constitutional rights. It was obvious this was not a threat.
No. It is not. In doing so, they are attacking a protestor based on what is clearly not a threat using psychological warfare. Additionally, I’d argue the secret service shouldn’t exist at all, since I’m an anarchist, so I object to there being a president to protect. So, no, it is not absurd to thing that psychological warfare from the government to prevent protest and social unrest is wrong, I don’t think. Maybe you think I’m overreacting, but a step on the road to fascism is a step we just took and I don’t want to have taken.
I’d be careful using sarcasm like this, it doesn’t carry well over the internet. Oh, and the quote isn’t violated at all. The meaning is intact.
A man holding a gun to your head when you vote telling you he’s fond of Republicans/Democrats isn’t taking your right to choose away, either, right? Her rights, not necessarily free speech, were directly violated, in ways mentioned earlier in the threat I won’t retrace, and her free speech was not directly violated, but men who can have you killed pulling ouy out of class and terrifying you because they read what you say does not make one amiable to future protest.
Funny you talk about missing the point, since Rig’s comment was a good deal more on topic than your links. What he was saying was, the girl was using a figure of speech, if someone used a differed figure of speech (fuck not as “have sexual intercourse with” but a generally bad thing), would it be investigated as though a literal remark. The idea, as you hopefully understand, is ridiculous. That was the point he was making; this is nearly the same thing. I figurative statement of political protest being taken as a literal, valid thread when it was clear it was not.
Someone making a colloqueal statement about disliking Bush is no more likely to be an off-base muderer than anyone else. By the logic of “Oh, this person made this casual remark as a system of protest, later learned it was illegal and removed it,” and therefore could be a heinous, insane murderer, and thus should be investigated, virtually everyone should be investigated, because they could be a killer. Yes, she could have been, but so could anyone else and the “Evidence” she was investigated upon was as hollow as a bird’s bones.
EDIT: In the time I was typing this, SK expressed a lot of my opinion on the matter very eloquently and I’d like to state my general agreement with him.
And I agree completely - if what the girl is saying is true, then the agents definately went over the top with their interview of her. But to blame the entire government for the actions of a couple agents is a huge stretch, and you of all people should realise that, SK. The government was responsible for sending those agents there, true, but there’s nothing showing that they were told to intimidate the girl, or that their actions were the result of anything but their own decisions.
At this point, it’s not clear what exactly happened to the girl - it’s really just a case of her word against no-ones at this point, since as far as I’m aware, the government hasn’t issued a response. However, I do think the Secret Service should take a closer look into what went wrong in this case. I think it much more likely that they sent agents in who were used to dealing with hardened criminals than 14 year old girls, and the situation escalated higher than it needed to. An administrative mistake, to be sure, but hardly a government-wide conspiracy to turn the US into Nazi Germany.
Why, yes, come to think of it, you do resembe and Ostrich! I’m glad you mentioned your avoidance of dealing with problems.
Maybe I’m paranoid and over-reacting, but over-reacting makes sure something doesn’t happen. Sticking your head in the sand and explaining how maybe the government that is voting in torture as an acceptable means of questioning isn’t going down the short to fascism, in the Extreme Right-Wing Totalitarian definition (just to prevent any insinuation that I misuse the term), so let’s just hope for the best, right?
Wow, all I can say is that I hope you’re happy with being a pompous dick, Arac. And if you’re not, I wish you the best of luck in dealing with people better in the future. I don’t really appreciate being baselessly insulted, especially when I haven’t provoked anyone.
There have been several independent counts of this happening, and that in itself lends credit to the girl’s claims. Also, this particlar government is already known for doing morally dubious things such as spying on its own populace, spying on peace groups opposed to its policies and condoning torture. It is not a far stretch to believe that it is capable of yet another way to abuse it authority. There are still people jailed without charge from when police across the country rounded up potential troublemakes, with no warrants form right after 9/11.
At best, this is a gross abuse of authority on part of the SS. At worse, its a government condoned systematic abuse of several minor’s rights. My guess is that reality sits somewhere in between.
As for yoru 3 points about the SS, the SS isn’t supposed to do the eliminating unless the president is directly under attack. There is such a thing as due process.
But the government also allows them to make such decisions. If you give someone a lot of power, he might decide to abuse it, or he might not. But if he does, you’re partly to blame for having allowed him to be unaccountable, even if you hadn’t told him to do it.
I thought the insult had quite a lote of base, personally. You do seem to be saying “it’s not so bad, let’s hope for the best” and otherwise putting your head in the sand to the larger problem. I’m sorry if it came off like a random, cruel thing to say, but I believe it to be true.
You honestly do seem to be avoiding dealing with the disintegration of rights in America by pretending it’s not that bad.
If saying what I think in an addmitedly aggressive manner makes me a pompous dick, then so be it. That’s fine by me. I deal with people with most people just fine.
Again, I apologize for the insult, but I will not admit to it being baseless. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings or anything, really, but I honestly do believe what I said and will not take it back.
Arac, I would just like to honestly say that I never hear “I wish someone would kill So and So” or something of the like as a way of expressing displeasure. Seriously. I never hear it. Maybe I just hang around classy people.
Even the Secret Service still has an internal affairs board, so you can’t call them entirely unaccountable, but you are correct in saying that the Secret Service does have a lot of power, and in this case it did abuse that power.
Whether the Secret Service should have as much power as it does or not is a whole different nasty argument of its own, and I’d rather keep on this topic, so I’ll avoid it, with your graces hopefully.
However, it’s entirely possible to train the secret service agents so that an incident of abuse like this doesn’t happen again. The big problem seems to be with how the agents treated the girl, so it seems to me that the correct cure for this problem would be to train the agents how to properly deal with non-criminal, low-level threat suspects, such as 14 year old girls. There wouldn’t be any discussion about any of this if the agents had interviewed the girl, but done it in a polite, less intimidating fashion.
Edit: Arac, you keep saying she had her rights violated, but what rights were violated? Her right to being treated politely by the government? Sure, that’s a nice thing to have, but it’s not in the constitution. If it was, the DMV would have been shut down for violating constitutional rights a long time ago. Nothing was ever really done to her, except for the tactless interview. Her free speach caused her to to be interviewed, but it was never taken away or was she punished because of it.
You probably have heard that you wished someone were dead, “I could just kill you,” “Eat shit and die,” or any one of hundreds of phrases with identical meaning used frequently in English. Plus, I wish someone would kill X is a fairly common form of political displeasure-expressing, if you ask me.
GM: To quote sinistral: “(where were her parents, where was the consent? Where were the lawyers?)”
Oh, and her Free Speech was violated, if you ask me. She was intimated because of her opinion and forced to remove it as a result of the law; the law that caused the investigation is a violation of her free speech.
If you would argue that the Interview was a violation of her Freedom of Speech, I would have to counter that her comment falls under the known <A href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_of_speech#Restrictions_on_free_speech” target="_blank"> restrictions on free speech</a>, and that threatening to kill the president allows the Secret Service to verify if that threat is valid. Ergo, an interview to verify.
I still never hear “I wish someone would kill blah blah blah” as expressing depleasure. I’ve heard a general insult around “drop dead,” but the latter is a passive action. The former requires some sort of action. I still don’t think either are appropriate ways of expressing displeasure though; I guess that’s an ingrained value on my part. I’ve certainly never heard my angry liberal friends wish death on Bush or his posse.
As for her free speech, once again, writing “Kill Bush” can quite easily be construed under the whole clear and present danger exception.
GM may have been a bit extreme in presenting child soldiers as means of showing that children are capable of killing and doing horrendous things, but there are still other examples. If you look at unconventional war, you’ll see that kids, not used as soldiers are often used since they can get into places easier and don’t apppear as much of a danger. If you don’t want to look at war or overseas, just look at all the school shootings. It shows that kids in America do have the means to get weapons and use them to kill. Hell, when they ask, teachers, friends, parents, etc. the people rarely say that the person was violent or considered to be capable of such an act. Which goes to show that there is some validity in going straight to the girl (however, he parents should have been present during the questioning).
While I can see the paralels with the current United States of America with other not-so-favourable governments in the past, I really think a lot of you are overreacting.
The media loves to exagerate things, and children/kids/preteens/teenagers/whatever love to exagerate things even more. Hell, everyone exagerates things to a degree, usually to their own liking. This girl probably stretched the truth a little when giving the media her story, and then the media probably deformed it even more. What’s left is bull shit, which is mostly why I don’t read stuff from the media anyways.
Yes, there is a good chance that the secret service were out of line, because with great power comes great abuse. But that in no way eliminates the idea that this girl is innocent. Perhaps she didn’t do anything wrong but my point is that she probably wasn’t as mistreated as claimed.