On 3-5-2010 20:40, Warp wrote:
> Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
>>   I fear that you are projecting your notions of how "racist people" behave
>> and what they think on me, for the sole reason that I dared to mention
>> ethnicity as something which could be used for illegal immigration
>> statistics. As ironic as that may sound, I call that prejudice.
> 
>   Btw, do you know what I find both interesting and sad?

Yes and do you know what I find interesting and sad?

That there is such a large gap between what you intend and what you 
write. We have been through this several times and I really think that 
you are sincere and that you are not a racist yourself. Somehow that 
does not stop you from writing the most stupid things without realizing 
what that means to others. Why don't you trust other people's judgement 
if they say that a remark is a racist one? You might not really mean it 
that way, you might not see all the consequences, you might just repeat 
a convincing argument you heard in the pub, but some people here live in 
societies where racism is part of everyday life. They have seen what 
kind of arguments have led to what behaviour. Based on that they know 
that e.g. racial profiling is bad, really bad. That has nothing to do 
with being "devoted anti-racism activist" just experience and common 
sense. The alternative is of course to decide that you know more than 
anybody else and that you can insult every other loser here that 
disagrees with you as much as you like.

>   But that's the modern western culture today. Either you are a devoted
> anti-racism activist, or a white-power supremacist. There is no middle
> ground. Especially there is no "I don't care" option.

Jim, Darren, me and whoever entered this discussion are all something in 
between. IMO you are the one who is forcing everybody into some box or 
another. The main message is that there are things you can better not 
say on internet fora because people will read them wrong. That has not 
so much to do with political correctness but with not insulting people 
needlessly.

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On 3-5-2010 21:35, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Mon, 03 May 2010 00:49:20 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> 
>>> The law goes further, though, by making it possible for people to sue
>>> law enforcement for *not* enforcing the law - so if someone thinks
>>> their neighbor is an illegal and calls the police, and the police do
>>> nothing about it, then the neighbor can sue the state for failing to
>>> take action (so I understand).
>>>
>>> Jim
>> Yeah. One person put it like this: "Damned if you do, damned if you
>> don't, so you are just damned 'period'."
> 
> Yep.  And a cop of Hispanic descent in Tucson has actually filed a 
> lawsuit over this now.

I think I would too if every time I met a colleague I had to present my 
birth certificate and every time I arrested someone he could escape 
while my back up tried to establish if I was legally in the state. I 
guess it would distract from my work.

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On 5/3/2010 12:35 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Mon, 03 May 2010 00:49:20 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>
>>> The law goes further, though, by making it possible for people to sue
>>> law enforcement for *not* enforcing the law - so if someone thinks
>>> their neighbor is an illegal and calls the police, and the police do
>>> nothing about it, then the neighbor can sue the state for failing to
>>> take action (so I understand).
>>>
>>> Jim
>> Yeah. One person put it like this: "Damned if you do, damned if you
>> don't, so you are just damned 'period'."
>
> Yep.  And a cop of Hispanic descent in Tucson has actually filed a
> lawsuit over this now.
>
> Jim
Well, as the same person explained it, when he said he was **not** going 
to enforce the law, was, "Before this, if we found someone we felt was 
likely to be illegal, we handed them over to the border patrol (I assume 
this means the Mexican one), now they want me to put them in jail, waste 
tax payers money figuring out if we need to do something *then* turn 
them over to the same people. And, if I don't, I can be sued?"

-- 
void main () {
   If Schrödingers_cat is alive or version > 98 {
     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

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On Mon, 03 May 2010 15:34:18 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:

> Well, as the same person explained it, when he said he was **not** going
> to enforce the law, was, "Before this, if we found someone we felt was
> likely to be illegal, we handed them over to the border patrol (I assume
> this means the Mexican one), now they want me to put them in jail, waste
> tax payers money figuring out if we need to do something *then* turn
> them over to the same people. And, if I don't, I can be sued?"

Handing over to border patrol would be the US Border Patrol, not the 
Mexican border patrol.  That's part of US Immigrations & Customs.

At least that's my understanding.  But he raises a good point; the 
analysis of the case I've read, though, talks about specific 
constitutional violations (more than just the 4th, as I recall).

Jim

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On Tue, 04 May 2010 00:30:10 +0200, andrel wrote:

> I think I would too if every time I met a colleague I had to present my
> birth certificate and every time I arrested someone he could escape
> while my back up tried to establish if I was legally in the state. I
> guess it would distract from my work.

Yeah, that could be a bit of a problem. :-)

Jim

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> On Mon, 03 May 2010 22:54:20 +0200, andrel wrote:

> > I guess Warp's problem is that not only the police is 'punished' but the
> > society as a whole even more.

> That provides the police with incentive to follow the rules.

  But at what cost? They know that the person is a criminal who has harmed
or will harm other people (or both), yet they let him go because of a
technicality. It's the policeman who should be punished for breaking the
law, not innocent bystanders who may be harmed by the criminal who was
let go on purpose...

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Every feature you mentioned is part of "race". It's all based on genetics.

  Gender and age is part of "race"?

> Was this intentional, or did you also want to include, say, style of 
> clothing, amount of taxes paid last year, which God you happen to worship, etc?

  Didn't I say it clearly enough? To me it's all the same. It doesn't matter
*what* is used.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> So are you changing your view?

  *sigh*

>  Otherwise I don't understand the 
> statement you made earlier about "if 90% of illegal immigrants are of 
> Mexican descent, then you should check them more frequently" (not an 
> exact quote, but you did make a statement to that effect).

  As opposed to "race must not be used for profiling because that's baaad!"

  People are oversensitive whenever "race" comes into question. All I said
is that if "race" *could* be used to catch criminals more efficiently, it
would make sense to use it. (Which is different from claiming that race
*can* be used for that purpose.) However, even making such a suggestion
seems to be a huge no no.

  How many times do I have to explain this? I'm tired of explaining it,
so I won't do it anymore. If you don't want to understand, then don't.
Think whatever you wish.

> >   If hair color can be used for some statistic, then so be it. If race
> >   can
> > be used for some statistic, then fine. I don't care. To me it's all the
> > same. I don't make any special distinction.

> Similarly, you couldn't say "people with black hair should be stopped to 
> see if they're illegal immigrants" because the fact that they have black 
> hair has no bearing on whether or not they're illegal immigrants or not.

  If it raises the apprehension rates of illegal immigrants, then technically
speaking it would make sense. (Of course a different question is whether it
really does, and another different question is how people will feel about
that.)

> That's because making a decision about someone's guilt or innocence based 
> solely on the colour of their skin is a racist decision.  Period, end of 
> story.  What about that don't you understand?

  What I don't understand is why you keep saying that even though I have
made absolutely no claim in relation to that. I have never talked about
"deciding someone's guilt or innocence". That's all your invention.

  But it really doesn't surprise me. When people see "race" and "statistics"
and "criminals" in the same paragraph, they immediately see "racism, racism,
racism, racism" and nothing else, and they start forming all kinds of
preconceptions of what was *really* being said.

  I am becoming really tired of these "you have said", "you claimed",
"you argued" lies.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> That there is such a large gap between what you intend and what you 
> write. We have been through this several times and I really think that 
> you are sincere and that you are not a racist yourself. Somehow that 
> does not stop you from writing the most stupid things without realizing 
> what that means to others. Why don't you trust other people's judgement 
> if they say that a remark is a racist one?

  So when people have preconceptions and strong prejudice against anybody
who even dares to mention things like "race" and "statistics" and "crime"
in the same sentence, *regardless of what he is really saying*, and then
they start making up all kind of lies about what I have claimed and accusing
me of whatever, and they keep going on and on with these lies even after
I clearly and repeatedly explain what I'm saying, and they keep pulling
things I write out of context, *I* am the one to blame for being stupid?

  Well, maybe I am stupid for assuming that people can have a rational
conversation even if the subject happens to contain the term "race".

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> >   As I said, the police checks random drivers here, and I don't see it
> >   as a
> > bad thing. Hence it's not *always* a bad thing.

> And over here that's not the way law enforcement generally works.  You 
> seem to trust your government; over here, we tend not to.

  I honestly fail to see how random sobriety testing is a trust issue.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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