Calling all civil libertarians...

[Link]

I wish to discuss a couple of ideas with you...

I was looking at future employment prospects the other day and it occoured to me that I could well end up paying £1000 pounds in tax a month. Now I have no problem paying tax, however, I do take issue if it is spent badly. Now, as I see it, two major drains on resources are the prision system and social security. Alow me to present examples:

A man comes to my house, breaks in and steals everything I own. The police catch him and put him in jail. Now, not only does he not have to repay the value of what he stole, but I am paying for his upkeep, with his nice comfy cell, three hot meals a day and so on. Obviously I am somewhat distressed at this.

Another example. A man decides that he does not like work. So, he leaves his job and goes to the social security office, who hand him a nice chunk of the tax I pay, previded he goes to the odd job interview. He dosen't have to get the job of course. So he spend the rest of his life going to one interview a week, whilst I pay for him to exist. Again, feeling a bit miffed here.

So, what is the solution? Well, for the prison systems, I feel the following is in order: Prisoners get 1 blanket, 1 cell, and whatever food they need to live in the form of gruel, 3 times a day. Then, they are given the option to work. They do not have to work, but they may, and if they do, they get paid "Prison money". They may use this "Prison money" to buy beds, better food, TV's, computers, internet access and so on. The point being that whilst they remain captive, they can learn the value of working. A prisoner who works an 8 hour day, 5 days a week, may expect to live in a similar style to a normal person in civvy street, with the above mentions amenities. The obvious benefit is that whilst I am still paying, I am actually paying to have the streets swept, graffiti cleaned off, bins emptyed. You get the idea.

Now for the social security folks. The same goes as the prisoners, they get the money, but instead of pretending to try to get jobs, they are given jobs to do. Then they can either do the job they are given, or they can starve, or more likley, steal and end up in system A (In prision, with the option to work). They will be paid minimum wage to encourage them to go and find jobs of thier own.
*Note - People who are disabled beyond the point of being able to work will have noraml social security benefits as that is what the system is there for. but they have to prove it, by an examination by a doctor every 6 months.

Great, I hear you say, so why are you telling us? Go and tell Mr Blair about your fantabulouse idea. Well, I would, but everyone I have mentioned this to has said "Great idea, I tottaly agree. But the civil libertarions will have a fit" so, I wish to ask the civil libertarions, what is wrong with the above ideas? We know you think that we should be giving these people a life of luxury for free, but why do you think that? Why do they deserve more than what I suggest, which everyone I have spoken to says is fair and just?

*I do not want a flame war, I want rational, civilized debate. Start flaming me and I will request the thread is closed and the rest will not get their say, which no one will thank you for.

 

[Murray_H]

Have you had a stay in prison? It's not as comfy as the daily mail makes out....

 

[The Dark Elf]

Prisoners are looked after far too well these days, criminals are treated better than the victims. The government wont even change the law regarding intruders in your home. If they are harmed in any way while stealing from you or attacking your family, you get sentanced or sued for it and they end up walking free on a technicality.

Prison cells should be nothing more than a hole in the floor for crapping in and some straw in a corner for sleeping on. One meal a day, and make it a meal THEY have to grow, cook and provide themselves, no outside help, no tax payers money. If they want better conditions they should earn it themselves, if they dont then they can get used to the bed of straw can't they.

As for murders, rapists, child molestors, don't kill em, thats an easy way out. Just throw em in a big deep hole together and leave them there, why should they be treated well after what they've done.

*waits for someone to pipe up about innocent people being arrested*

 

[burner69]

I regard myself as extremely liberal - and think that plan sounds about right. Go get um!

 

[Hapless]

*waits for someone to pipe up about innocent people being arrested*

I've got an idea who that might be.......

 

[Link]

Have you had a stay in prison? It's not as comfy as the daily mail makes out....

Ok, fair point, but it is far nicer than is needed. they do have access to TV and radios, selection of food all curteousy of the tax payer.

The point remains, why should we pay for more than the bear minimum that is required to keep them alive?

Note - As much free education in the form of evening classes as they like. Forgot to mention that.

 

[burner69]

Prisoners are looked after far too well these days, criminals are treated better than the victims. The government wont even change the law regarding intruders in your home. If they are harmed in any way while stealing from you or attacking your family, you get sentanced or sued for it and they end up walking free on a technicality.

Prison cells should be nothing more than a hole in the floor for crapping in and some straw in a corner for sleeping on. One meal a day, and make it a meal THEY have to grow, cook and provide themselves, no outside help, no tax payers money. If they want better conditions they should earn it themselves, if they dont then they can get used to the bed of straw can't they.

As for murders, rapists, child molestors, don't kill em, thats an easy way out. Just throw em in a big deep hole together and leave them there, why should they be treated well after what they've done.

*waits for someone to pipe up about innocent people being arrested*

You've been reading the daily mail too much DE
The law states that we can use reasonable force against burglars. So if one came into my house I could fend him off with a curtain rail or threaten him with a baseball bat - if he attacked me I could use said bat. The main reason this issue was brought into focus is Tony Martin - was he reasonable? Shooting dead a burglar. No. So he was imprisoned, and rightly so. Now, threatening to shoot them, or, if they remained, beating them back with a rifle butt, is regarded as reasonable. You don't hear about the thousands of people who do this to shoo away burglars because it's not newsworthy, it only makes headlines when the criminal makes a claim (very rare) and when they do it usually falls through.

As for throwing certain people in a hole... how does that help them or us?
First off, let's say a man came into my house, shot my family and ran off. 3 months later I see him in the street and beat him to death and get charged with murder. Hole in the ground? Nope. Prison... certainly the better option.
Rapists need good punishment.
Now, child molestors is a funny old one. First of all, legally, if I'm going out with a 15 y/o girl and I'm 16 I'm a paedophile. The law sucks in that respect.
Secondly, and this is as controversial as it gets, are paedophiles simply different in that they deviate from normal means of sexual arousal? Homosexuals don't conform to the norm, and have been given much stick about it for years. But if a 8 y/o girl loves a 31y/o man who finds her sexually attractive - through no conscious decision of his own - if he had intercourse with her is throwing him in a hole going to help anyone? No.
Now I'm in no way condoning paedophilia, merely trying to understand it - can it be 'cured' through treatment? Is it a genetic problem that can be prevented in future generations? Throwing them in holes will not help us understand that.

And by the way, I'm sure if it get's out that someone raped a child while they're in prison they'll get the shit beaten out of them on a regular basis - it hardly cancels out the crime committed - but neither does lobbing them down a dark hole.

 

[Link]

I wouldn't advise you pick up a bat, or for that any other weapon. The point, as you say, is that "reasonable force" is authorised, but it is unclear as to what that is. One jury may let you off for beating him with it, another might convict you just for picking it up. And yes, people have been sued/convicted simply for threatening intruders with weapons. Regardless of all of that, its your house, if you have CCTV set up to prove the guy is breaking in, you should be able to shoot them in the head and not worry about any hassle legally. The way I see it is an intruder may be coming to kill you, so you should be entitled to treat him as such and kill him first.

As for your example with killing the man who murders your family, you should not be convicted at all. Again, people who commit crimes are chosing to live outside the civilisation the rest of us subscribe to, so why should the legal system designed to protect it look after them?

I don't think (But may well be wrong) that a 16 year old has ever been proceccuted for sleeping with a 15 year old. I was with my girlfriend from about 13 till about 16 and a half and when I turned 16 she was still 15. It was public knowledge that we were together and having sex (In fact one teacher busted us when we did it in the woods behind the school) and no one even considered informing the police...

Rapists and peadophiles do have an illness that can be cured, through castration. Proper procedure, I'm not sugesting chopping blocks here, but it eliminates thier ability to rape anyone else.

Your final point, it would be nice to think that, and would be true, but because of it, rapists and peadophiles are kept seperate from other criminals.

 

[RakuraiTenjin]

The problem is socialism, pure and simple. Welfare is too easily abused. Wealth redistribution is a highly unfair practice. It's not Bob's job, who has worked hard his entire life, to pay for Bill's welfare, who sits around all day doing drugs.

Everyone I've ever known on welfare has not deserved to be on it.

 

[gcomeau]

*waits for someone to pipe up about innocent people being arrested*

Well... it is a problem you know.

Personally I think there should be two different categories of punishment severity. One for those found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, and one for those found guilty beyond any rational doubt.

For example, got caught on video, left ironclad DNA evidence, 157 eye-witnesses saw you do it, etc...

 

[Gray Fox]

The problem is socialism, pure and simple. Welfare is too easily abused. Wealth redistribution is a highly unfair practice. It's not Bob's job, who has worked hard his entire life, to pay for Bill's welfare, who sits around all day doing drugs.

Everyone I've ever known on welfare has not deserved to be on it.

Yup it's unfare, but generally counties that don't have it are more ****ed than countries that don't, so though it is unfare to be humane to people we do it, to help ourselfes in the end. You can say the same thing for smokes and beer, or drugs. I mean why should it be illegal, if someone wants to **** up their own life let them, why wast valuable resources of the police wehn they can go catch real criminals. Why is schooling provided, I mean it's the parents own responsibilty to provide education, or the don't to pay for a school. Why spend so much money on aids research, I mean if peoplw **** unprotected it's their own choice, let them bare teh consenquencis. In fact why pay taxes at all.

 

[RakuraiTenjin]

Yup it's unfare, but generally counties that don't have it are more ****ed than countries that don't, so though it is unfare to be humane to people we do it, to help ourselfes in the end. You can say the same thing for smokes and beer, or drugs. I mean why should it be illegal, if someone wants to **** up their own life let them, why wast valuable resources of the police wehn they can go catch real criminals. Why is schooling provided, I mean it's the parents own responsibilty to provide education, or the don't to pay for a school. Why spend so much money on aids research, I mean if peoplw **** unprotected it's their own choice, let them bare teh consenquencis. In fact why pay taxes at all.

Where do you draw the line between government responsibility and personal responsibility?

I say at safety. Keeping people safe is the government's number one priority. I support government projects like roads and education, but that's about it. Also- there should be no income tax, but rather a national retail sales tax. If we take it in baby steps though- a flat income tax comes first. The more successful you are in today's world, the more the government penalizes you? That's a crock to me. A flat tax so people have an equal amount taken from them.

 

[Gray Fox]

Yeah but, tell me if you had to chose a honest system, but the result of that would be that in the long term you would be porer and worse life.
Or an dishonest sytstem that will have the result in the lonmgterm that you will get richer. Yes welfare is dishonest in your example, but there are a lot others where it is good. Besides like I said countries that have it have larger standerd of living then countries that don't. I mean would you also abolish minimum wages, cause lets be honest kapitalism works best without it, and it's the peoples own responsibility to get a good job or to organise, lest be hones minimum wages are unfair to, natural selection dude.

 

[RakuraiTenjin]

Yeah but, tell me if you had to chose a honest system, but the result of that would be that in the long term you would be porer and worse life.
Or an dishonest sytstem that will have the result in the lonmgterm that you will get richer. Yes welfare is dishonest in your example, but there are a lot others where it is good. Besides like I said countries that have it have larger standerd of living then countries that don't. I mean would you also abolish minimum wages, cause lets be honest kapitalism works best without it, and it's the peoples own responsibility to get a good job or to organise, lest be hones minimum wages are unfair to, natural selection dude.

I don't see how I'd have a poorer life. If my family had the amount of taxes they've paid into that went straight to welfare (this is calculating the percantages, seperating military, school, roads, and such) my parents could retire without a single financial worry, and I wouldn't have to be stressed over a scholarship.

Every successful person I've met has never been on welfare. Every person I've ever met ON welfare has not deserved to be on it.

 

[Gray Fox]

Yeah but without welfare wouldn't the crime rates soar, and that would end op costing even more money, and if you don't like welfare do you agree with the tread starters plan or do you have your own.

 

[Edcrab]

The idea of welfare payments boggles my mind. I have never wanted to be on benefits. Getting my first job was stupidly hard, because 90% of employers want experience, or chronological maturity, or even the ability to drive around (I didn't own a car then and I don't now). Rather than benefit payments, use the money to distribute jobs. Back then I'd have happily worked doing nearly anything, from retail to administration to basic technical duties. Instead I had to cope with rejection after rejection, and the worst part was I had fairly good qualifications. I must admit, however, that I can understand why some people shun minimum-wage dead end positions. Not so much for the salaries, but purely because most of them are so soul-destroyingly dull, and you keep wondering whether to try for the best you're capable of or give in and apply for something you're almost guaranteed to get. With a government-funded drive (something more direct then the pathetic system currently in place, it just confuses those who want to be employed and lets those that don't run amok, leeching off tax payers) that issue would be a thing of the past.

I used to fantasise about the so-called "facility" positions, whereby you are allocated living quarters and food and decent payment in return for living on/near the site of your job. Oil-rigs and other industrial works. Or perhaps sprawling, secret research bases. Great pay, but always the danger that you have to protect yourself from invading dimension-hopping aliens.

 

[kirovman]

Yeah but without welfare wouldn't the crime rates soar, and that would end op costing even more money, and if you don't like welfare do you agree with the tread starters plan or do you have your own.

Let's reach a compromise... you get food vouchers. You can't use them to buy luxuries, like Cigarettes, Alcohol, Sky TV, etc.

Yeah, if you're living off the state you have the right to food, shelter, education, but you don't have the right to indulge in luxuries, unless you can afford it with money you have earned.

 

[Edcrab]

Hmm, using benefit payments to stifle crime... people always end up paying for the criminal element somehow, eh? Maybe a moron cull really would help matters.

As for the issue of citizens defending their property from burglary, I've put it in more detail on some other thread somewhere... but my view can be summarised in that if someone breaks the law and enters someone elses home it's perfectly acceptable for the home owner to take the law into their own hands in an attempt to fix it. The law may not be quite as fecked up as some believe, but nevertheless, I can say in all honesty that if someone ends up killing an intruder they should be left without charge.

The burglar has the luxury of free will and, of course, premeditation... the man who encounters a large individual roaming his house doesn't, and if he panics and ends up smashing the bastard's head in with a poker then so be it.

 

[kirovman]

If the government said tomorrow "You are well within your rights to kill an intruder within your own home" I'm sure the burglary rate would drop.

However then you get into the issue of what if it was a neighbour who was checking on your house, they thought it was on fire but noone was awake, but you killed him... well not exactly like that, but there are some explainable cases, albeit rare.
And also burglars would be more likely to arm themselves when robbing someone, knowing they could be legally killed, they'd come armed to the teeth.

I don't know, but I'm going to protect my home with CCTV, and prison pods, and electrifiy everything. Can't be too safe. Although they'd probably legally get you for electrifying things, even with big warning signs, "Beware of High Voltage"

 

[RakuraiTenjin]

Let's reach a compromise... you get food vouchers. You can't use them to buy luxuries, like Cigarettes, Alcohol, Sky TV, etc.

Yeah, if you're living off the state you have the right to food, shelter, education, but you don't have the right to indulge in luxuries, unless you can afford it with money you have earned.

We have those. Food stamps.

They are abused.

My sister is on welfare, she's done some hgorrible things in her life, I don't consider her part of the family anymore or related to me. She pays people with them :/. Like I've said- I've never seen anybody on welfare that hasn't abused it or any form of welfare that isn't overwhelmingly abused.

Yeah but without welfare wouldn't the crime rates soar, and that would end op costing even more money, and if you don't like welfare do you agree with the tread starters plan or do you have your own.

I don't agree with the prisoners being able to work their way up to an almost normal lifestyle but just in prison. Working should yield them some benefits, but it must be remembered that prison is there to punish them for their crimes, not let them live leisurely.

On the welfare- you can't FORCE anybody to hire and pay another person- that would violate their rights.

But- if a system of voluntary companies was set up that agreed to it, and had open jobs, - it's better than the current system, and as everything must go in baby steps, it is a step in the right direction

 

[Edcrab]

Yes, that last part is basically what I'd have pictured for a government-sponsored system Rakurai- got a free position? Go to the Job Placement Scheme, and guarantee that the best guy for the job will be picked out and sent your way- good for Mr. Doesn't want to be on benefits, good for the employer that utilised the JPS's services. Don't think anyone would support a forced employment drive anyway

 

[Link]

But- if a system of voluntary companies was set up that agreed to it, and had open jobs, - it's better than the current system, and as everything must go in baby steps, it is a step in the right direction

I like the sound of companys with open jobs, although its unlikley to happen.

Note, I wasn't suggesting forcing companys to take on people, as you say, thats not fair. I am suggesting that they do jobs for the government, that the government already has to pay for, cleaning graffiti, sweeping the roads and so on.