On 2-5-2010 0:03, Darren New wrote:
> Florian Pesth wrote:
>> Actually in germany, you don't get automatic citizenship,

Sort of the same here in the Netherlands.
You can also get it, I think, if you live here 5 years or so legally.

> So you have people born in Germany who aren't citizens of *any* country?

These things can happen, but in most cases citizenship is hereditary, so 
you normally get the nationality of your parents.
Citizen rules vary wildly between countries, so it is not impossible to 
have none.

You can also loose your citizenship and become stateless in that way.

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 17:49:19 +0100, Stephen wrote:

> O! say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free
> and the home of the brave?
> 
> No offence folks

None taken, the law in and of itself is the offensive bit.

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 13:13:57 -0400, Warp wrote:

> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
>> No, but the notion that you can pick someone up because they *look*
>> like an illegal immigrant (which BTW violates the 4th amendment right
>> to protection against unreasonable search/seizure) *is* patently
>> racist.
> 
>   Why does it have to be racism?

Because it relies on racial profiling, and not on what has been done.

>   Imagine that a woman is raped, and the police is immediately called,
> and they suspect that the rapist is still in the vicinity. The police
> ought to start questioning suspects they find. Male suspects.

Different circumstances.

>   One could argue that only having males as suspects is discrimination,
> that suspects should be equally male and female. But that someone would
> be a complete idiot. It's 99.999% probable that the rapist was a male,
> rather than a woman who raped a woman and was nevertheless mistaken for
> a man (that has probably never happened in the history of mankind).
> Hence it makes sense for the police to only suspect males and leave
> females off the hook. If the police was stupid enough to start detaining
> females for suspicion of raping a woman, they would be wasting valuable
> resources which would be better used in searching for the actual rapist.
> After all, law enforcement has only very limited resources to solve
> crimes.
> 
>   Likewise with illegal immigration: The vast majority of illegal
>   immigrants
> don't look like locals. 

Except that in Arizona, the vast majority of immigrants (legal and not) 
are of hispanic descent.  Let's see how many Canadian immigrants get 
stopped there because "they don't look like they belong".

> Hence it only makes sense to prioritize the
> scarce resources law enforcement has and concentrate on people who don't
> look like locals. This is not racism. This is practicality. Questioning
> people equally is only going to waste resources, which wastes taxpayers'
> money, and causes less crimes to be stopped.

No, this law *is* a waste of taxpayer money, in fact, several police 
departments in Arizona have said that this takes resources away from 
*real* crime.

Jim

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On 1-5-2010 23:47, Stephen wrote:
> On 01/05/2010 10:18 PM, andrel wrote:

> Good guess and said better than I could but I just don't want anyone to 
> live in a Nazi state.
> 

Does that 'but' imply that I do?

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 14:43:32 -0400, Warp wrote:

>   Stopping crime sometimes means that innocent people are questioned.

There's a difference between questioning someone and detaining them 
because they didn't happen to take their birth certificate with them to 
prove that they were born here.

Those who are willing to trade liberty for security deserve neither.

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 17:10:09 -0400, Warp wrote:

>   How can you compare asking someone's ID to putting someone in prison?
> Aren't you exaggerating a bit here?

NO!  That's the point - if you LOOK like an illegal immigrant, you have 
to provide on the spot PROOF that you're not, and if you can't, YOU GO TO 
JAIL.  That's what the law is all about.

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 14:58:23 -0400, Warp wrote:

>   Why is it so only with immigration? If the suspect of a crime is a
>   white
> male, is it racism to question only white males? Wouldn't it be less
> racist to question also black females? You know, for equality.

Wrong.  If a suspect in a *specific* crime is a white male, then 
naturally you look at people who match the suspect's description.

But this law makes "Being brown and unable to prove you're here legally 
when asked" a crime.

Big difference.

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 14:50:06 -0400, Warp wrote:

>   If find your argument that "the police should not be looking for the
> illegal immigrant because doing so might offend someone" even more
> disturbing.

In the US, we're supposed to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.  
You're starting with a presumption of guilt, which goes against the 
ideals under which this law is created.

That's why the law is a problem:  It starts with a presumption of guilt 
based on skin colour, and requires that the "suspect" prove their 
innocence of being an illegal immigrant.

Based. On. Skin. Colour.

Nothing else.  If you *look* like an illegal, you are presumed guilty 
until you prove otherwise.  This could be a daily occurrence IF YOU 
HAPPEN TO HAVE THE WRONG COLOUR SKIN.

Hell, it could happen HOURLY.

Wouldn't that piss YOU off if YOU were constantly having to prove that 
you were in your country legally?

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 23:31:13 +0200, andrel wrote:

> On 1-5-2010 18:36, Jim Henderson wrote:
>> On Sat, 01 May 2010 11:48:15 -0400, John VanSickle wrote:
>> 
>>> You can take your kids with you or you can leave them behind.  Sure,
>>> it is not their fault that you broke the law, but if that didn't stop
>>> you from breaking the law, why should it stop us from enforcing it?
>> 
>> I don't think that this is what Darren was saying, but rather that the
>> Arizona law opens the potential for someone who *is* a legal citizen
>> but isn't carrying their papers on them to be deported.  But the idea
>> behind deporting someone to their country of origin is not valid when
>> their country of origin *is* in fact the US.
> 
> Isn't there a problem that if somebody does not have papers you won't
> know where to send him/her?

We have that situation already here in the US.  Typically people whose 
country of origin can't be determined are detained indefinitely.

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 11:10:11 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> I don't think that this is what Darren was saying, but rather that the
>> Arizona law opens the potential for someone who *is* a legal citizen
>> but isn't carrying their papers on them to be deported.
> 
> No. I'm saying that some people want to pass a law to deport someone who
> *is* a legal citizen and who *is* carrying their passport to be deported
> because they were born of illegal immigrants.

OIC, that is also a problem sure.

Jim

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On Sat, 01 May 2010 16:45:04 -0400, Warp wrote:

>   My point is that if someone commits a serious crime, it could be quite
> practical if it was possible to throw him out of the country to stop him
> from wasting taxpayers' money. In other words, the plain idea of
> deporting big criminals can have some sensible logic in it.

Except that the person's country of origin is frequently unlikely to 
accept them back if they've committed a crime.  That happens quite 
frequently, actually, when illegal immigrants commit crimes - their 
actual home country refuses to take them back.

Jim

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On 01/05/2010 11:33 PM, Jim Henderson wrote:
> On Sat, 01 May 2010 17:49:19 +0100, Stephen wrote:
>
>> O! say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O'er the land of the free
>> and the home of the brave?
>>
>> No offence folks
>
> None taken, the law in and of itself is the offensive bit.
>

True


-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

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On 01/05/2010 11:35 PM, andrel wrote:
> On 1-5-2010 23:47, Stephen wrote:
>> On 01/05/2010 10:18 PM, andrel wrote:
>
>> Good guess and said better than I could but I just don't want anyone
>> to live in a Nazi state.
>>
>
> Does that 'but' imply that I do?

No, I think that your country has good credentials.

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> On Sat, 01 May 2010 16:45:04 -0400, Warp wrote:

> >   My point is that if someone commits a serious crime, it could be quite
> > practical if it was possible to throw him out of the country to stop him
> > from wasting taxpayers' money. In other words, the plain idea of
> > deporting big criminals can have some sensible logic in it.

> Except that the person's country of origin is frequently unlikely to 
> accept them back if they've committed a crime.  That happens quite 
> frequently, actually, when illegal immigrants commit crimes - their 
> actual home country refuses to take them back.

  If he is an illegal immigrant, why should the country he illegally
entered take responsibility? It's his own country's problem.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> > Isn't there a problem that if somebody does not have papers you won't
> > know where to send him/her?

> We have that situation already here in the US.  Typically people whose 
> country of origin can't be determined are detained indefinitely.

  Guess what's the most common tactic of people who want to get inside
the European Union and not get deported? Make it as hard as possible to
determine where they come from.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> >> The goal is to have nobody innocent hassled by the government here.
> > 
> >   Does that apply to all crimes, or only illegal immigration? Why?

> All crimes. Note that it's not "hassle" if you actually have reason to 
> suspect someone of a crime. If you find a dead woman, you question the 
> husband and boss and etc.  You don't go walking up and down the streets 
> stopping everyone and questioning them.

  I suppose it depends on your definition of "hassle". If illegal immigration
is a big problem at some place, I think it should be understandable if the
police regularly asks people for their ID.

> >   How can you compare asking someone's ID to putting someone in prison?

> Because that's what happens when you don't have ID. Note that it's not just 
> "ID" but "proof of citizenship."

  I thought ID is exactly that.

  Carrying some form of ID at all times is not mandatory here, but there
are many countries where it is (at least technically, by the letter of the
law). Spain is one example, AFAIK.

>  Hell, I'd be surprised if 75% of the 
> people in Congress here had actual proof of citizenship where they could get 
> to it within 24 hours.

  If ID is not proof of citizenship, then what is?

> >   If I started complaining how the stores asking me for my ID is
> > discrimination, I would be a complete idiot.

> Great. Do you want the stores to ask you for ID when you're *not* buying 
> something from them?  When you're just walking down the road, do you want 
> every store you pass to ask for your ID?

  Is it necessary for a store to ask my ID if I'm not buying anything, if
the goal is to avoid stolen credit card abuse?

>  Or to show them you have enough 
> money to buy what they have in their store?

  I thought they pretty much do that on the checkout counter. It's not like
they let you leave with the goods if you don't have the money.

> >   Is this comparison far-fetched? Much less far-fetched than comparing
> > asking for someone's ID with putting someone in prison.

> Lots of people here don't have ID. There's no reason to carry ID if you're 
> just out walking around.

  Well, sometimes one has to adapt to the conditions.

  Of course if illegal immigration is not seen as such a big problem, then
perhaps the police should stop even trying?

> This country has IDs for specific purposes: A 
> driver's license to drive, a social security number to track social security 
> tax payments, a passport to pass ports.

  But not to prove that you have the right to stay in the country?

> >> Because what you're doing is hassling all people of central american 
> >> descent, regardless of whether they've done anything wrong. That's by 
> >> definition racism. You're treating people differently based on their race, 
> >> not their behavior.
> > 
> >   And the police investigating males in rape cases is sexism, by the same
> > logic. 

> Only if they investigated *all* males, instead of just the ones who might 
> have been in the area, etc.   "Hi, a woman was raped three blocks from here. 
> Please come with us until you can prove you didn't do it."

  It's only sexism if they check *all* males, not just *some* males (but no
females)? Sorry, the argument doesn't hold.

  If they check only males but not females, it's *technically speaking*
sexism because they are "discriminating" against males. Of course there's
a completely justifiable *reason* for that.

> >   So what? Are you saying that nobody should be investigated because they
> > might be legal immigrants? Or what is it that you are trying to say? I don't
> > get it.

> I'm saying nobody should be investigated because of their facial features. 
> They should be investigated if there's some reason to believe they committed 
> a crime.

  Well, I suppose that if you don't feel illegal immigration to be such a
problem, then you could let political correctness get in the way of efficient
law enforcement.

> We don't let the cops randomly pull over drivers just to make sure they paid 
> their insurance and license taxes, either. You actually have to do something 
> wrong first.

  You don't? Here the police regularly stops drivers. Well, not to check
their licenses, but to check their alcohol level. No suspicion is needed.

  Maybe it's different there.

> >   Let's go again with the rape inverstigation: Should the police stop
> > investigating people because most of them did not commit the crime? After
> > all, you can't distinguish one male from another in this respect. 

> But you can. Do you think it's reasonable if someone got raped in a 
> neighborhood for the police to go door to door and demand every male in the 
> house provide a DNA sample?

  Wait, I say that you can't distinguish one male from another, and you
respond that you can, but then you don't explain *how*. Exactly how do you
make the distinction?

  Demanding DNA tests of thousands of people is not exactly the most efficient
use of resources because it's time-consuming and expensive.

  It would be interesting to know how people feel about such a suggestion.
Would they be ready for something that may feel as an "invasion of privacy"
to some people in order to catch rapists, or are they willing to compromise
conviction rates with their own sense of privacy? What is an "acceptable"
conviction rate for rape?

> >   I don't think the solution to the problem of corrupt police officers is
> > to make the laws more lenient. Why would it?

> No, the solution is to have laws that regulate the behavior of those police 
> and punish them when they're corrupt.

  Ok. And what does this have to do with using the law enforcement resources
more efficiently to catch illegal immigrants?

> >   Is the assumption that a black person is more likely to steal a car than
> > a white person based on pure prejudice, or statistics?

> It's not even a matter of "stealing cars."  You're a black person in a nice 
> neighborhood, so you must be up to no good, so we're going to stop you, make 
> you late for where you're going, and possibly arrest you if you give us any 
> crap or ask us why we're stopping you.

  I'm not saying that's a right thing to do, but I would still be interested
in knowing whether that behavior is based more on prejudice or on statistics.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp wrote:
>   If he is an illegal immigrant, why should the country he illegally
> entered take responsibility? It's his own country's problem.

I think it's more a matter of "what are you going to do?"  If the country 
won't take him back, it's not like you can leave him in a cardboard box on 
the front step.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> On Sat, 01 May 2010 17:10:09 -0400, Warp wrote:

> >   How can you compare asking someone's ID to putting someone in prison?
> > Aren't you exaggerating a bit here?

> NO!  That's the point - if you LOOK like an illegal immigrant, you have 
> to provide on the spot PROOF that you're not, and if you can't, YOU GO TO 
> JAIL.  That's what the law is all about.

  Well, there are basically two options:

1) Demand that all people always carry a form of identification.
2) Stop trying to catch illegal immigrants.

  Which one do you prefer? I assume you understand the consequences of
choice #2.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> >> There is another way that even takes less time and is not illegal 
> >> because of various international laws: don't question people unless you 
> >> have a serious reason to believe that they are illegal (or you are 
> >> questioning them anyway because of a non-related suspicion or check).
> > 
> >   And then watch illegal immigration raise. Right.

> Wrong.

  The police should stop looking for illegal immigrants, and that will not
cause illegal immigration to raise? Can you give some kind of explanation
how that works?

  Maybe you should awaken to the real world. If a country gets a fame of
being very lenient on enforcing its immigration laws, the word *will* spread
and people *will* try to get to that country because, once they are inside,
it's unlikely they will ever get caught and deported.

  And if enforcing the laws is indeed lenient, they will be successful, and
the amount of illegal immigrants will inevitably raise.

> >   It's better to allow illegal immigration than to possibly offend someone.

> It it not about offence, it is about human rights and/or the local law.

  It still sounds to me like "the police should stop checking primarily
Mexican-looking people because it's racism and it offends them".

> >   If find your argument that "the police should not be looking for the
> > illegal immigrant because doing so might offend someone" even more
> > disturbing.

> They have all the right to do so, just not based on looks alone.

  Basically, this is pragmatism vs. political correctness.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp wrote:
>   I suppose it depends on your definition of "hassle". If illegal immigration
> is a big problem at some place, I think it should be understandable if the
> police regularly asks people for their ID.

If it was "ask for ID", then yes, it wouldn't be *too* much of a problem. 
Instead, it's "ask for proof of citizenship, and arrest you if you don't 
have it, until someone can come up with it."

>>>   How can you compare asking someone's ID to putting someone in prison?
> 
>> Because that's what happens when you don't have ID. Note that it's not just 
>> "ID" but "proof of citizenship."
> 
>   I thought ID is exactly that.

Generally not.  Proof of citizenship here is generally birth certificates, 
passports, or (for some, like who immigrated before computers) someone 
personally vouching for you.

>   Carrying some form of ID at all times is not mandatory here, but there
> are many countries where it is (at least technically, by the letter of the
> law). Spain is one example, AFAIK.

Yes, but the ID here doesn't say whether you're a citizen.  I have all kinds 
of papers that identify who I am without saying whether I'm a citizen.

>>  Hell, I'd be surprised if 75% of the 
>> people in Congress here had actual proof of citizenship where they could get 
>> to it within 24 hours.
> 
>   If ID is not proof of citizenship, then what is?

Proof of citizenship. I.e., only certain kinds of ID. In particular, 
passports.  I can't think of anything else offhand that combines proof of 
citizenship and identification in one document.  A birth certificate doesn't 
identify you, and the other forms of identity documents are all mostly 
available to non-citizens.

There's also "Green Cards" (which are pink, for some reason) which is a card 
that combines ID and proof that you're *not* a citizen but that you *are* 
allowed to be here.

But since you can be a citizen without any identifying papers at all, then 
no, there's no ID that every citizen has.

>   Is it necessary for a store to ask my ID if I'm not buying anything, if
> the goal is to avoid stolen credit card abuse?

Sure. Because you look like someone who commits a lot of fraud. :-)

>>  Or to show them you have enough 
>> money to buy what they have in their store?
> 
>   I thought they pretty much do that on the checkout counter. It's not like
> they let you leave with the goods if you don't have the money.

As you walk past?

> 
>>>   Is this comparison far-fetched? Much less far-fetched than comparing
>>> asking for someone's ID with putting someone in prison.
> 
>> Lots of people here don't have ID. There's no reason to carry ID if you're 
>> just out walking around.
> 
>   Well, sometimes one has to adapt to the conditions.

Sure. And if people normally had proof of citizenship easily available, the 
same way they have identification, it would be less of a hassle. But they don't.

>> This country has IDs for specific purposes: A 
>> driver's license to drive, a social security number to track social security 
>> tax payments, a passport to pass ports.
> 
>   But not to prove that you have the right to stay in the country?

Correct. Well, the passports of *foreigners* show you have a right to stay 
in the country if you have the right visa. The US passport shows you have a 
right to come into (and presumedly stay) in the country.  But people don't 
normally carry their passports around with them.

Plus, citizens have the right to stay in the country even if they've never 
had a passport.

>>>> Because what you're doing is hassling all people of central american 
>>>> descent, regardless of whether they've done anything wrong. That's by 
>>>> definition racism. You're treating people differently based on their race, 
>>>> not their behavior.
>>>   And the police investigating males in rape cases is sexism, by the same
>>> logic. 
> 
>> Only if they investigated *all* males, instead of just the ones who might 
>> have been in the area, etc.   "Hi, a woman was raped three blocks from here. 
>> Please come with us until you can prove you didn't do it."
> 
>   It's only sexism if they check *all* males, not just *some* males (but no
> females)? Sorry, the argument doesn't hold.

Yes. It's sexism if they investigate all males, including those they already 
know couldn't have been involved, or who they think have no reason to be 
involved. If they investigate only those who might have committed the crime, 
then they are good. If that means they only investigate males because 
they've already ruled out females, that's fine.

>   If they check only males but not females, it's *technically speaking*
> sexism because they are "discriminating" against males. Of course there's
> a completely justifiable *reason* for that.

Exactly. In counterpoint, there's no justifiable *reason* for stopping 
random brown-skinned people and asking if they're breaking the law.

>> I'm saying nobody should be investigated because of their facial features. 
>> They should be investigated if there's some reason to believe they committed 
>> a crime.
> 
>   Well, I suppose that if you don't feel illegal immigration to be such a
> problem, then you could let political correctness get in the way of efficient
> law enforcement.

Do you understand the difference between "looking Mexican" and "having a 
reason to believe that particular person committed a crime"?

>> We don't let the cops randomly pull over drivers just to make sure they paid 
>> their insurance and license taxes, either. You actually have to do something 
>> wrong first.
> 
>   You don't? Here the police regularly stops drivers. Well, not to check
> their licenses, but to check their alcohol level. No suspicion is needed.

Yes, and when they do, they're required not to stop just the people who look 
mexican.

There are sobriety checkpoints here, but the rules are that you either have 
to check everyone going through, or you have to check every Nth driver. You 
can't just pick out people you don't like.

>>>   Let's go again with the rape inverstigation: Should the police stop
>>> investigating people because most of them did not commit the crime? After
>>> all, you can't distinguish one male from another in this respect. 
> 
>> But you can. Do you think it's reasonable if someone got raped in a 
>> neighborhood for the police to go door to door and demand every male in the 
>> house provide a DNA sample?
> 
>   Wait, I say that you can't distinguish one male from another, and you
> respond that you can, but then you don't explain *how*. Exactly how do you
> make the distinction?

If the woman was raped 15 minutes ago, no male that's more than 15 minutes 
travel time from the scene is a suspect. You don't go checking every male in 
Arizona to see if he's the rapist.

>   Demanding DNA tests of thousands of people is not exactly the most efficient
> use of resources because it's time-consuming and expensive.

It's also illegal. We have this rule that says the police actually have to 
have a reason to suspect you committed a crime before they're allowed to 
arrest you or search you.  They don't get to say "Someone had their watch 
stolen, so we're going to go through every house in the neighborhood to see 
if we can find it."

Maybe your country doesn't have such a rule, but ours does.

>   It would be interesting to know how people feel about such a suggestion.

It's already decided, repeatedly, that people don't want a DNA database.

> Would they be ready for something that may feel as an "invasion of privacy"
> to some people in order to catch rapists, or are they willing to compromise
> conviction rates with their own sense of privacy? What is an "acceptable"
> conviction rate for rape?

No. You see, there's no benefit to the individual citizens to cooperate if 
the police don't suspect them.

Plus, DNA profiling doesn't work that way anyway.

>>>   I don't think the solution to the problem of corrupt police officers is
>>> to make the laws more lenient. Why would it?
> 
>> No, the solution is to have laws that regulate the behavior of those police 
>> and punish them when they're corrupt.
> 
>   Ok. And what does this have to do with using the law enforcement resources
> more efficiently to catch illegal immigrants?

Because this law is written in such a way as to encourage corruption under 
the guise of more efficiently catching illegal immigrants.

>   I'm not saying that's a right thing to do, but I would still be interested
> in knowing whether that behavior is based more on prejudice or on statistics.

Prejudice.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

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Warp wrote:
> 1) Demand that all people always carry a form of identification.

Identification isn't proof of being allowed to be in the country. I do 
always carry identification. That doesn't prove I'm allowed to be here.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

Warp wrote:
>   It still sounds to me like "the police should stop checking primarily
> Mexican-looking people because it's racism and it offends them".

If the primary illegal immigrants look Mexican, then the majority of people 
doing something that raises suspicion that they're illegal immigrants will 
be primarily Mexican.

Not being prejudiced about it doesn't make it more lenient.

Analogy: If Mexicans are the primary drunk drivers, pulling over mexicans at 
random is not going to reduce drunk driving as much as pulling over people 
who are driving erratically. Even if the majority of the people you stop 
wind up being Mexican, there's no reason to pull over Mexican drivers 
driving safely to see if they're drunk.


-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> In the US, we're supposed to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.  
> You're starting with a presumption of guilt, which goes against the 
> ideals under which this law is created.

  So if you go to a grocery store and use your credit card to buy something
and they want to check your ID to make sure you are the real owner of the
card, are they presuming you guilty until you prove you are not? Or is this
simply a security measure which, on the grand scale, benefits you as well
as everybody else?

  If you enter the country and at the airport they check your baggage using
an X-ray machine, are they presuming you guilty? Or is this just a security
measure?

  If a police officer asks for your ID to check that you have the right to
live in the country, is he presuming you guilty, or is it just a security
measure?

  You make it sound like in that last case the situation is different, for
some reason.

> Based. On. Skin. Colour.

  Why are people so damn obsessed with skin color? Criminal profiling does
not have anything to do with racism. Skin color is just one feature which
can be used for profiling.

  If most illegal immigrants happen to look similar, it only makes sense
to concentrate resources on people who look like that. It's the same as
the vast majority of rapists being male, hence it it makes sense to
concentrate resources on investigating males and skipping females. Nobody
is crying sexism because of that.

  I really think people are way too hypersensitive with any kind of
profiling based precisely on skin color. Any other type of profiling is
ok, but heaven forbid if you start using skin color as a distinctive
feature. The second you do that, all human rights are flushed down the
toilet. Sheesh.

> Nothing else.  If you *look* like an illegal, you are presumed guilty 
> until you prove otherwise.  This could be a daily occurrence IF YOU 
> HAPPEN TO HAVE THE WRONG COLOUR SKIN.

> Hell, it could happen HOURLY.

> Wouldn't that piss YOU off if YOU were constantly having to prove that 
> you were in your country legally?

  If it significantly increased my own security, I wouldn't. (Of course
I'm not saying that's the case here. I'm just saying that there are more
sides to this than an extremist political correctness.)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> What you are proposing
> - is not effective

  What do you suggest which would be more effective?

> - will violate rights of legal citizens

  Wait, exactly what am I proposing here that would "violate rights of
legal citizens"?

  Don't confuse what *I* am proposing with whatever laws they are proposing
in those states in the US. I don't know what exactly they are proposing there,
nor am I explicitly advocating those laws.

  I am simply arguing that extreme one-sided political correctness *can* be
too naive to be practical. Sometimes innocent people have to endure some
scrutiny (and even profiling) if criminals are to be caught.

> - will harm trust in the police and the juridical system

  Well, I suppose it could. It's basically a lose-lose situation. You can't
win. Either you get many criminals go free which would otherwise be caught
of more efficient measures were taken, or you anger people.

> - will increase racial tension

  I really think people are way too sensitive about what they perceive as
"racism". Well, I suppose there's no helping that.

> For these and a number of other reasons legislators all over the world 
> have decided it is not a good idea and made it illegal.

  Make what illegal, exactly? You seem to use the word "it" to refer to
something I have proposed. What exactly?

> Although it 
> seems a good idea at first sight, if you think a little longer you will 
> understand why it will destabilize the society more than it solves 
> illegal immigration.

  As I said, it's a lose-lose situation.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Stephen <mca### [at] aoldotcom> wrote:
> Good guess and said better than I could but I just don't want anyone to 
> live in a Nazi state.

  I think this is a genuine instance of Godwin's law.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Warp wrote:
> >   Let me rephrase: If 90% of illegal immigrants are Mexicans, then 90% of
> > illegal immigrants will look like Mexicans. Hence it only makes sense to
> > devote 90% of the law enforcement resources to check Mexicans.

> But if 90% of the local population *also* looks mexican, then there's no 
> reason to favor checking mexicans over non-mexicans, is there?

  Wait, what? If 90% of the local population looks mexican, all the more
reason for 90% of checking to be done on mexican-looking people. A completely
random blind-testing would get you that.

  If less than 90% of the checked people would not look like mexican,
wouldn't *that* be discrimination? It would not be impartially random
anymore, but it would be a conscious choice of checking other people
more.

> The problem with this sort of profiling is that you have to look at the 
> ratio of legal to illegal immigrants, not just the ratio of illegal immigrants.

  Exactly what are you proposing here? I don't quite get it.

  If 90% of the population of a place is of mexican origin, wouldn't it only
make sense that 90% of the resources are devoted to checking mexicans?

> If 10% of 10,000 mexicans are illegal immigrants, and 90% of 200 africans 
> are illegal immigrants, it makes much more sense to ask random africans if 
> they're citizens than random mexicans.

  Well, I suppose it does.

  But I thought you were *against* such "profiling"?

> >   Why is it so only with immigration? If the suspect of a crime is a white
> > male, is it racism to question only white males? Wouldn't it be less racist
> > to question also black females? You know, for equality.

> No, because there's already suspicion of a crime, a reason to believe that 
> the person accused might have done it. Note that you don't get to question 
> *all* white males when a crime is committed. You have to have *some* reason, 
> known as "probable cause", to believe the person you're questioning was 
> involved.

  So the police must not question anybody unless they have "probable cause"?

  Wouldn't that be a bit hindering on criminal investigation?

> What *this* law does is it makes immigration a *special* status, saying you 
> do *not* have to have any reason to believe the person was committing any 
> sort of crime before you ask him to prove he isn't.

  If a store clerk asks for your ID in order to corroborate that you are
indeed the owner of the credit card, is he suspecting you of a crime and
thus making an illegal demand? Would you argue that the store clerk must
have a valid reason to suspect you of not being the legal owner of the
credit card before he can demand you to show your ID?

> >   So what do you suggest? 

> I suggest that before you question anyone, you be required to do enough 
> police work to at least have a reason to question them.

  And what would that reason be, exactly?

> >> Or to put it another way, jump back 180 years. Pass a law in the northern 
> >> part of the USA saying everyone had to prove they aren't an escaped slave. 
> >> Do you think there's any way that wouldn't be considered a racist law today? 
> >> Do you think there's any chance you wouldn't wind up locking up a whole lot 
> >> more innocent black people than innocent white people?
> > 
> >   You are comparing immigration laws with slavery laws. Same thing?

> No, I'm comparing racism to racism.

  Sorry, I still don't see slavery comparable to checking people's ID based
on typical illegal immigrant profiling. You might argue both are, technically
speaking, "racism", but I still see a huge difference in magnitude.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> On Sat, 01 May 2010 13:13:57 -0400, Warp wrote:

> > Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> >> No, but the notion that you can pick someone up because they *look*
> >> like an illegal immigrant (which BTW violates the 4th amendment right
> >> to protection against unreasonable search/seizure) *is* patently
> >> racist.
> > 
> >   Why does it have to be racism?

> Because it relies on racial profiling, and not on what has been done.

  So all other types of criminal profiling are ok, but not profiling based
on how someone looks like?

  I really think this is political correctness getting in the way of
criminal investigation.

> >   Imagine that a woman is raped, and the police is immediately called,
> > and they suspect that the rapist is still in the vicinity. The police
> > ought to start questioning suspects they find. Male suspects.

> Different circumstances.

  Right. Profiling based on gender is ok. Profiling based on skin color
is not.

> >   Likewise with illegal immigration: The vast majority of illegal
> >   immigrants
> > don't look like locals. 

> Except that in Arizona, the vast majority of immigrants (legal and not) 
> are of hispanic descent.

  You are the fourth. Do we get a fifth?

>  Let's see how many Canadian immigrants get 
> stopped there because "they don't look like they belong".

  Is it typical for illegal Canadian immigrants to move to Arizona?

> > Hence it only makes sense to prioritize the
> > scarce resources law enforcement has and concentrate on people who don't
> > look like locals. This is not racism. This is practicality. Questioning
> > people equally is only going to waste resources, which wastes taxpayers'
> > money, and causes less crimes to be stopped.

> No, this law *is* a waste of taxpayer money, in fact, several police 
> departments in Arizona have said that this takes resources away from 
> *real* crime.

  Well, I suppose if illegal immigration is not seen as such a bad crime,
you could argue that it can be overlooked.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Warp wrote:
> >   If he is an illegal immigrant, why should the country he illegally
> > entered take responsibility? It's his own country's problem.

> I think it's more a matter of "what are you going to do?"  If the country 
> won't take him back, it's not like you can leave him in a cardboard box on 
> the front step.

  You send him to his own country's airport and let them decide what to do
with him. Give him the phone number of Amnesty International.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

On 2-5-2010 8:24, Warp wrote:
> andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
>>>> There is another way that even takes less time and is not illegal 
>>>> because of various international laws: don't question people unless you 
>>>> have a serious reason to believe that they are illegal (or you are 
>>>> questioning them anyway because of a non-related suspicion or check).
>>>   And then watch illegal immigration raise. Right.
> 
>> Wrong.
> 
>   The police should stop looking for illegal immigrants, and that will not
> cause illegal immigration to raise? Can you give some kind of explanation
> how that works?

Your logic fails. What you propose is not being done ATM and for good 
reasons. Stopping doing something that is not done will not give rise to 
a raise.

>  Maybe you should awaken to the real world. 

It might have escaped you, but IMHO you are the one who is not in 
contact with the real world. Or at least fails to see all the 
consequences of what he is proposing. No problem as long as you don't go 
into politics.

>>>   It's better to allow illegal immigration than to possibly offend someone.
> 
>> It it not about offence, it is about human rights and/or the local law.
> 
>   It still sounds to me like "the police should stop checking primarily
> Mexican-looking people because it's racism and it offends them".

if it does, read again.

>>>   If find your argument that "the police should not be looking for the
>>> illegal immigrant because doing so might offend someone" even more
>>> disturbing.
> 
>> They have all the right to do so, just not based on looks alone.
> 
>   Basically, this is pragmatism vs. political correctness.

It is obvious (in the traditional sense as used in mathematics)

Post a reply to this message

On 2-5-2010 8:35, Warp wrote:
> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:

>> Based. On. Skin. Colour.
> 
>   Why are people so damn obsessed with skin color? Criminal profiling does
> not have anything to do with racism. Skin color is just one feature which
> can be used for profiling.

Look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pars_pro_toto
You were the one who asked us to stop nitpicking words and finally try 
to understand what you meant in stead. And yes, that made me ROFL.

Post a reply to this message

On 02/05/2010 7:46 AM, Warp wrote:
> Stephen<mca### [at] aoldotcom>  wrote:
>> Good guess and said better than I could but I just don't want anyone to
>> live in a Nazi state.
>
>    I think this is a genuine instance of Godwin's law.
>

OK, I’m of that generation. Let’s say fascist or right wing totalitarian 
state which is what the right minded Americans are trying to avoid.

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

Post a reply to this message

andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> On 2-5-2010 8:35, Warp wrote:
> > Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:

> >> Based. On. Skin. Colour.
> > 
> >   Why are people so damn obsessed with skin color? Criminal profiling does
> > not have anything to do with racism. Skin color is just one feature which
> > can be used for profiling.

> Look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pars_pro_toto
> You were the one who asked us to stop nitpicking words and finally try 
> to understand what you meant in stead. And yes, that made me ROFL.

  Then by all means explain what he really meant with "Based. On. Skin.
Colour." if not "picking possible suspects of illegal immigration based
on skin color is racism". Because that's what I understood.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

Stephen <mca### [at] aoldotcom> wrote:
> On 02/05/2010 7:46 AM, Warp wrote:
> > Stephen<mca### [at] aoldotcom>  wrote:
> >> Good guess and said better than I could but I just don't want anyone to
> >> live in a Nazi state.
> >
> >    I think this is a genuine instance of Godwin's law.
> >

> OK, I???m of that generation. Let???s say fascist or right wing totalitarian 
> state which is what the right minded Americans are trying to avoid.

  It still feels like an exaggeration. Enforcing immigration laws is not
the same thing as being a totalitarian state.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

Post a reply to this message

On 02/05/2010 10:13 AM, Warp wrote:
> Stephen<mca### [at] aoldotcom>  wrote:
>> On 02/05/2010 7:46 AM, Warp wrote:
>>> Stephen<mca### [at] aoldotcom>   wrote:
>>>> Good guess and said better than I could but I just don't want anyone to
>>>> live in a Nazi state.
>>>
>>>     I think this is a genuine instance of Godwin's law.
>>>
>
>> OK, I???m of that generation. Let???s say fascist or right wing totalitarian
>> state which is what the right minded Americans are trying to avoid.
>
>    It still feels like an exaggeration. Enforcing immigration laws is not
> the same thing as being a totalitarian state.
>

It is not the enforcing but the method of enforcement. That is what 
whole argument is about.

-- 

Best Regards,
	Stephen

Post a reply to this message

On 2-5-2010 9:07, Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> Warp wrote:
>>>   If he is an illegal immigrant, why should the country he illegally
>>> entered take responsibility? It's his own country's problem.
> 
>> I think it's more a matter of "what are you going to do?"  If the country 
>> won't take him back, it's not like you can leave him in a cardboard box on 
>> the front step.
> 
>   You send him to his own country's airport and let them decide what to do
> with him. Give him the phone number of Amnesty International.
> 
Just never, ever go into politics, please.

Post a reply to this message

On 2-5-2010 8:12, Warp wrote:
> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
>> On Sat, 01 May 2010 17:10:09 -0400, Warp wrote:
> 
>>>   How can you compare asking someone's ID to putting someone in prison?
>>> Aren't you exaggerating a bit here?
> 
>> NO!  That's the point - if you LOOK like an illegal immigrant, you have 
>> to provide on the spot PROOF that you're not, and if you can't, YOU GO TO 
>> JAIL.  That's what the law is all about.
> 
>   Well, there are basically two options:
> 
> 1) Demand that all people always carry a form of identification.
> 2) Stop trying to catch illegal immigrants.
> 
>   Which one do you prefer? I assume you understand the consequences of
> choice #2.

You are consistently missing the point and repeating your own false 
assumptions.
It is *NOT* about stopping trying to catch illegal immigrants. It is 
about the methods allowed to do so.

Post a reply to this message

On 2-5-2010 11:12, Warp wrote:
> andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
>> On 2-5-2010 8:35, Warp wrote:
>>> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> 
>>>> Based. On. Skin. Colour.
>>>   Why are people so damn obsessed with skin color? Criminal profiling does
>>> not have anything to do with racism. Skin color is just one feature which
>>> can be used for profiling.
> 
>> Look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pars_pro_toto
>> You were the one who asked us to stop nitpicking words and finally try 
>> to understand what you meant in stead. And yes, that made me ROFL.
> 
>   Then by all means explain what he really meant with "Based. On. Skin.
> Colour." if not "picking possible suspects of illegal immigration based
> on skin color is racism". Because that's what I understood.

Have you read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pars_pro_toto?

Ok, "Skin" and "color" are generally used to point to any phenotype that 
makes it more likely that someone is member of one group of people than 
another. Could range from pigmentation to e.g. shape of nose. E.g. Obama 
is "Black" even though his skin is just as brown as many a Mediterranean 
guy that has an outdoor job. One of the reasons Obama is black is 
because of his nose.
Even you can see the difference between e.g. a typical Dutchman and a 
typical Finnish guy, it is common use to refer to that difference as a 
difference is skin or colour even though I might be more pale than you. 
If such differences are used to treat people different that is generally 
referred to as racism, even though we belong to the same race (if such a 
thing exists).

So having cleared that, will you now stop attacking people that use 
these terms in this way and START LISTENING TO WHAT THEY MEAN.

Post a reply to this message

Darren New wrote:
> John VanSickle wrote:
>> The same principle applies here to the immigration law.  If you don't 
>> want your children to suffer the indirect consequences of your 
>> lawbreaking, then don't break the law.
> 
> You miss my point.

And you are missing mine.

> Where would you deport them to?

I would not *deport* the citizen children of illegally immigrated 
parents.  I would deport the parents, and allow them the option of 
taking their children with them.

> You're missing the point. The nutcases want...

Since by your admission we are no longer on the topic of what the law 
actually says, but what some "nutcases" want, I am leaving this part of 
the debate.

Regards,
John

Post a reply to this message

John VanSickle wrote:
> Since by your admission we are no longer on the topic of what the law 
> actually says, but what some "nutcases" want,

Well, yes. I've been saying that for three days.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

Warp wrote:
 >   You make it sound like in that last case the situation is different, for
 > some reason.

OK. I'm going to go through the falacies one last time and bow out, because 
you seem not to be listening.

<http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_35kDzNt-gTQ/RpmeXjcag9I/AAAAAAAAACE/Bpo04QrGBvc/s320/dead+horse.gif>

It's different in the following ways:

1) If you do not have ID at the store, you simply walk away. If you do not 
have ID for the police, you go to jail until you can find someone to bring 
to the police station your ID.

2) Buying something at the store is a reasonable action that would require 
you to produce ID to complete the purchase.  Walking down the street is not 
an action that one would reasonably have to expect to prove your citizenship 
to perform.  This is closer to saying "before you get a job, you need to 
prove you'll pay taxes." A law we already have.

3) We don't have any form of universal ID in this country that lists whether 
you're allowed to be in the country.

 >   If most illegal immigrants happen to look similar,

I already told you that too is a fallacy.

If you have 100,000 mexicans, 12% of which are illegal immigrants, and 
10,000 africans, 99% of which are illegal immigrants, you have more illegal 
immigrants who look mexican than african, but you'd do much better arresting 
the africans.

 > concentrate resources on investigating males and skipping females.

But you're wasting resources by investigating males for whom you have no 
reason to believe they're rapists.

 >   I really think people are way too hypersensitive with any kind of
 > profiling based precisely on skin color. Any other type of profiling is
 > ok,

No, really, it's not.

 >   If it significantly increased my own security, I wouldn't.

We have sayings about that too.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

Stephen wrote:
> It is not the enforcing but the method of enforcement. That is what 
> whole argument is about.

Hey, I know. We could get all the legal americans of central american decent 
to wear something sewn to their clothing to show they're legal, so the 
police would know not to bother them. ;-)

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

Warp wrote:
> andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
>> What you are proposing
>> - is not effective
> 
>   What do you suggest which would be more effective?
> 
>> - will violate rights of legal citizens
> 
>   Wait, exactly what am I proposing here that would "violate rights of
> legal citizens"?

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probable_cause

>   Don't confuse what *I* am proposing with whatever laws they are proposing
> in those states in the US. I don't know what exactly they are proposing there,
> nor am I explicitly advocating those laws.

They're proposing to disregard the probable cause requirements for arresting 
someone.

>   Well, I suppose it could. It's basically a lose-lose situation. You can't
> win. Either you get many criminals go free which would otherwise be caught
> of more efficient measures were taken, or you anger people.

Nobody is against catching the criminals. We already have laws for catching 
illegal immigrants that aren't being enforced.

>> - will increase racial tension
> 
>   I really think people are way too sensitive about what they perceive as
> "racism". Well, I suppose there's no helping that.
> 
>> For these and a number of other reasons legislators all over the world 
>> have decided it is not a good idea and made it illegal.
> 
>   Make what illegal, exactly?

Randomly stopping people and asking them to prove their innocence.

>   As I said, it's a lose-lose situation.

Only if you take it to extremes.

Consider driving. Do you want police randomly pulling you over because you 
have long hair, or you're driving a red car? After all, a majority of 
traffic tickets go to people in red cars.

No. You want the cop to wait until he sees you do something wrong before he 
stops you, yes?  You don't want him stopping you just because you drive a 
particular color car, or you're wearing a particular kind of clothing, right?

Note that your ancestry hasn't anything to do with whether you're in the 
country legally. It's exactly as relevant to whether you're an illegal 
immigrant as what color car you drive is to whether you're breaking the 
speed limit.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> Warp wrote:
>>>   Let me rephrase: If 90% of illegal immigrants are Mexicans, then 90% of
>>> illegal immigrants will look like Mexicans. Hence it only makes sense to
>>> devote 90% of the law enforcement resources to check Mexicans.
> 
>> But if 90% of the local population *also* looks mexican, then there's no 
>> reason to favor checking mexicans over non-mexicans, is there?
> 
>   Wait, what? If 90% of the local population looks mexican, all the more
> reason for 90% of checking to be done on mexican-looking people. A completely
> random blind-testing would get you that.

Right. At which point you're not favoring the checking of mexicans. There's 
no reason at all to use profiling to decide who to check, right?

Hence, the whole "most illegal immigrants look mexican, so let's check the 
mexicans" is a flawed argument.

>> The problem with this sort of profiling is that you have to look at the 
>> ratio of legal to illegal immigrants, not just the ratio of illegal immigrants.
> 
>   Exactly what are you proposing here? I don't quite get it.

I'm not proposing anything. I'm simply pointing out that the argument that 
says "Most illegal immigrants look mexican, so let's focus our checking on 
mexican-lookign people" is flawed.

>   If 90% of the population of a place is of mexican origin, wouldn't it only
> make sense that 90% of the resources are devoted to checking mexicans?

Yes. But that's not what you suggested. You suggested checking in the ratios 
of illegal immigrants of different backgrounds, not legal immigrants or 
total residents of different backgounds.

If someone said "The town is 70% brown and 30% white, so that's the ratio 
we'll check in" then nobody would complain. But you're saying the "the 
illegals are 70% brown and 30% white, so let's check in that ratio", which 
is a different statement.

>> If 10% of 10,000 mexicans are illegal immigrants, and 90% of 200 africans 
>> are illegal immigrants, it makes much more sense to ask random africans if 
>> they're citizens than random mexicans.
> 
>   Well, I suppose it does.
> 
>   But I thought you were *against* such "profiling"?

I'm simply showing the flaw in your logic.  You're suggested profiling 
*fails* to improve the efficiency, unless you use more information to tune it.

>   So the police must not question anybody unless they have "probable cause"?

Yes.  Well, sort of. It's complex. They're not allowed to arrest you without 
probable cause.  I.e., they can ask, but you're not required to answer or go 
with them or let them into your house unless they have probable cause and/or 
it's an emergency (e.g., they hear someone screaming for help inside).

>   Wouldn't that be a bit hindering on criminal investigation?

Not especially. "Probable cause" is a fairly low bar. It's about the same 
difficulty as having a policeman stop you while you're driving.

>   If a store clerk asks for your ID in order to corroborate that you are
> indeed the owner of the credit card, is he suspecting you of a crime and
> thus making an illegal demand? 

No. For one thing, if you don't have ID, he's not allowed to detain you. He 
may chose not to complete the transaction, but he's not arresting you. 
There's a difference there.

Nobody would complain if they said "before you can get a job, you have to 
show proof of legal residence."  (Which they already do, actually, but 
apparently don't actually enforce consistently.)

> Would you argue that the store clerk must
> have a valid reason to suspect you of not being the legal owner of the
> credit card before he can demand you to show your ID?

No. For one thing, it's not my credit card. It's the bank's credit card. The 
bank requires the clerk to look at my ID before the bank authorizes the 
holder to use it.

>>>   So what do you suggest? 
> 
>> I suggest that before you question anyone, you be required to do enough 
>> police work to at least have a reason to question them.
> 
>   And what would that reason be, exactly?

I don't know. The employer not paying taxes on you, for example. Or you 
riding across the border in the back of a truck that doesn't stop at the 
immigration gates. Having no USA address last year when trying to get 
something that requires you to list where you lived in the previous years. 
Or you try to get a job, the boss asks for proof that you're allowed to be 
in the country, and you can't provide that proof, and the employer tells the 
police.

>> No, I'm comparing racism to racism.
> 
>   Sorry, I still don't see slavery

I wasn't talking about slavery. I was talking about freemen.  That's where 
you're missing it. You're thinking this law is targeting illegal immigrants. 
It isn't. It's already easy to catch illegal immigrants. You just have to 
enforce the laws we already have.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

Post a reply to this message

andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> On 2-5-2010 9:07, Warp wrote:
> > Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> >> Warp wrote:
> >>>   If he is an illegal immigrant, why should the country he illegally
> >>> entered take responsibility? It's his own country's problem.
> > 
> >> I think it's more a matter of "what are you going to do?"  If the country 
> >> won't take him back, it's not like you can leave him in a cardboard box on 
> >> the front step.
> > 
> >   You send him to his own country's airport and let them decide what to do
> > with him. Give him the phone number of Amnesty International.
> > 
> Just never, ever go into politics, please.

  I'm sorry, but I don't understand.

  A person enters country X illegally, without permission. Hence country X
deports him back to his own country Y. Country Y forbids its own citizen
from entering its borders (which in my books is a clear violation of
international basic human rights). This is somehow the responsibility of
country X, and now *they* have to take him back and feed him?

  Exactly how does this make any sense? Why does country X have to pay for
this illegal emigrant, just because it chose that country X? Why does country
X become responsible for him so that they have to spend their tax money on
feeding him? If this illegal emigrant had chosen another country Z instead,
it would now by the responsibility of Z to feed him? How exactly does that
make any sense? What has X or Z made to deserve this burden? Shouldn't the
emigrant's own home country Y be responsible for the burden? It's *their*
citizen.

  What happens if instead of one emigrant it's one million emigrants, all
of who illegally enter country X? Is country X still responsible for their
well-being if their country of origin forbids them from coming back? Why
is country X suddenly responsible for one million non-citizens who entered
their borders illegally?

  Do you know what sounds more like? An invasion. Why should country X have
to accept that?

  I'm sorry, but if your politics consist of ideas like "the country who
the illegal immigrant succeeded in entering becomes responsible for feeding
him", then I honestly wouldn't want that kind of politics. Please never,
ever go into politics, thank you very much.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp wrote:
>   So all other types of criminal profiling are ok, but not profiling based
> on how someone looks like?

No. It's not legal to profile anyone before a crime has been committed.

>   I really think this is political correctness getting in the way of
> criminal investigation.

Nobody minds being asked to show proof of citizenship if a crime has been 
committed, or even if a crime *might* have been committed. This law isn't 
that. This law is stopping people just in case maybe a crime has been committed.

>   Right. Profiling based on gender is ok. Profiling based on skin color
> is not.

No. This is rounding up samples from all the men in case someone got raped 
that the police don't know about.

>   Well, I suppose if illegal immigration is not seen as such a bad crime,
> you could argue that it can be overlooked.

No, it's that the law requires the police to look for criminals without any 
indication of where to start, or any indication that there was even a crime 
committed.

You don't go around questioning all the men in an area, trying to determine 
if they're hiding the fact they raped someone, *before* someone reports 
being raped.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

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andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> It is *NOT* about stopping trying to catch illegal immigrants. It is 
> about the methods allowed to do so.

  Stopping the police from utilizing their resources effectively sounds to
me a lot like stopping even trying to catch illegal immigrants in practice.
Sure, a few of them will still be caught, just a lot less. It's effectively
the same thing as giving up.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> On 2-5-2010 11:12, Warp wrote:
> > andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> >> On 2-5-2010 8:35, Warp wrote:
> >>> Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> > 
> >>>> Based. On. Skin. Colour.
> >>>   Why are people so damn obsessed with skin color? Criminal profiling does
> >>> not have anything to do with racism. Skin color is just one feature which
> >>> can be used for profiling.
> > 
> >> Look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pars_pro_toto
> >> You were the one who asked us to stop nitpicking words and finally try 
> >> to understand what you meant in stead. And yes, that made me ROFL.
> > 
> >   Then by all means explain what he really meant with "Based. On. Skin.
> > Colour." if not "picking possible suspects of illegal immigration based
> > on skin color is racism". Because that's what I understood.

> Have you read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pars_pro_toto?

> Ok, "Skin" and "color" are generally used to point to any phenotype that 
> makes it more likely that someone is member of one group of people than 
> another. Could range from pigmentation to e.g. shape of nose. E.g. Obama 
> is "Black" even though his skin is just as brown as many a Mediterranean 
> guy that has an outdoor job. One of the reasons Obama is black is 
> because of his nose.
> Even you can see the difference between e.g. a typical Dutchman and a 
> typical Finnish guy, it is common use to refer to that difference as a 
> difference is skin or colour even though I might be more pale than you. 
> If such differences are used to treat people different that is generally 
> referred to as racism, even though we belong to the same race (if such a 
> thing exists).

> So having cleared that, will you now stop attacking people that use 
> these terms in this way and START LISTENING TO WHAT THEY MEAN.

  Maybe I'm being dense here, but I still don't get it.

  He said, effectively, that trying to stop illegal immigration by doing
racial profiling is wrong. Did I understand this incorrectly? If yes, then
exactly what did he say?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp wrote:
>   Maybe I'm being dense here, but I still don't get it.

Most illegal immigrants are also Christian. So what we *really* should do is 
be stopping lots of people, asking if they're Christian, and if they are, 
ask them to prove they're allowed to be in the country, and lock them up 
until until they can.

Does this make sense to you? If not, why not? If so, should we be targeting 
people coming out of churches, or people who look Mexican?

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
   open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Warp wrote:
> > andrel <byt### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> >> What you are proposing
> >> - is not effective
> > 
> >   What do you suggest which would be more effective?
> > 
> >> - will violate rights of legal citizens
> > 
> >   Wait, exactly what am I proposing here that would "violate rights of
> > legal citizens"?

> http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Probable_cause

  That didn't answer the question I asked. I didn't ask "how/why would it
violate the rights of legal citizens?"

  He talked about what *I* am proposing. I'm not proposing anything.
Seemingly what he (and you) meant is what the new Arizona state law is
proposing.

  I haven't read the letter of that law proposal (I would have to read it
carefully before forming an opinion; it wouldn't be the first time that
hypersensitive people exaggerate new law proposals), but if what has been
written here is the truth, then I'm not advocating that kind of law.

  What I *am* opposing is the idea that countries should enforce their
laws more leniently to avoid offending people. (Sure, sometimes enforcing
them more strictly regardless of how hypersensitive people might get
offended may cause unrest and riots, but then it's basically a lose-lose
situation. Everybody loses, nobody wins. Tough luck. Humans are bastards,
and sucks being human.)

> >   Well, I suppose it could. It's basically a lose-lose situation. You can't
> > win. Either you get many criminals go free which would otherwise be caught
> > of more efficient measures were taken, or you anger people.

> Nobody is against catching the criminals.

  Of course they aren't against that. But at the same time they oppose
stricter measures which could rise the conviction rates of the criminals,
if doing so would offend some people. In other words, they want to eat the
cake and keep it too.

> >> For these and a number of other reasons legislators all over the world 
> >> have decided it is not a good idea and made it illegal.
> > 
> >   Make what illegal, exactly?

> Randomly stopping people and asking them to prove their innocence.

  Apparently Britain is not one of those countries? Or have they already
lifted their random security checks at metro stations and other places?

> Consider driving. Do you want police randomly pulling you over because you 
> have long hair, or you're driving a red car? After all, a majority of 
> traffic tickets go to people in red cars.

  I wouldn't be surprised if the police was more likely to stop SUV's than
eg. trucks for random sobriety tests, purely because of statistical reasons.
(No, I don't know if they do, but I wouldn't be surprised if the did.)

  If truck drivers are statistically significantly less likely to drive
while drunk, that kind of selectiveness makes sense. Don't tell me it
doesn't.

> No. You want the cop to wait until he sees you do something wrong before he 
> stops you, yes?

  Cops don't need probable cause to stop cars for a sobriety test, and
personally I really don't mind.

>  You don't want him stopping you just because you drive a 
> particular color car, or you're wearing a particular kind of clothing, right?

  If SUV drivers were statistically more likely to drive while drunk,
I really wouldn't mind if the police concentrated their efforts more on
SUVs than on trucks.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> Warp wrote:
> >   Maybe I'm being dense here, but I still don't get it.

> Most illegal immigrants are also Christian. So what we *really* should do is 
> be stopping lots of people, asking if they're Christian, and if they are, 
> ask them to prove they're allowed to be in the country, and lock them up 
> until until they can.

> Does this make sense to you? If not, why not? If so, should we be targeting 
> people coming out of churches, or people who look Mexican?

  Please take into account the *context* in which I wrote that sentence
you quoted. I did *not* write "perhaps I'm being dense here, but I just
can't understand what's wrong with randomly checking people based on skin
color". I wrote that as a response to the accusation that I'm deliberately
misinterpreting something someone wrote.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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