>> ^PostalBlowfish:

>> ^BicycleRepairMan:
How about stupid fucking youtube tv-hosts wannabes who doesnt understand how the legal system works, or that even criminal rapist teens also have families, should we name and shame them too?
First, I think the hosts of this video have the naming/shaming you're suggesting handled multiple times in this video. Second, people on the internet aren't helping things?! HOLY SHIT LIGHT THE BAT SIGNAL!
I just don't get the hate in here. People are saying "I totally empathize with the victim" and then "I hate the hosts" but usually not "I hate the perpetrators" and that's just bizarre that there's more hate for people fucking around on the internet than for real life rapists.
The victim obviously was aware of the consequences (she's in a rather unfair position btw) and she named the rapists anyway. She obviously accepts that the law will punish her, which I think is rather heroic. She was raped, and she has been threatened with a penalty for talking about it, and that didn't stop her. I hope she is actually rewarded in the long run.


I did share some of my feelings towars the perpetrators, actually, and they werent positive either. As for people on the internet not helping, fair point, but there are ways of doing opinion pieces/news stories without making a bad situation worse.

My point is that one should be careful about this vigilante-business on the internet. Like it or not, there are human beings behind names and news-stories, We werent there when the crime happened, we werent there when the trial was held, we didnt even read the case files or make any effort. Because thats the courts and the legal systems job. It is also their job to find someone guilty or not and deal out punishments. Not our job.

I agree that in this case it looks like that system failed miserably, by even attempting to silence and punish the victim. That sucks, but instead of going vigilante on people, it might be a good idea to speak up against this system, appeal the descision or whatever it takes. Change the law. Thats all fine. Vigilante justice is not. That just means a bunch of uninformed trolls are responsible for dealing out sentences made using the armchair approach. We shouldt go back to that.

Rapists and murderers may be monsters to us, but society is, or atleast is supposed to be, better. To rise above revenge, bloodlust and tribal warfare, thats what civilization means.

@renatojj

Church has high interested in religious candidates being elected. Most of the debates going on in politics are based on religious philosophy. Few off the top of my head are abortion, creationism, and women's rights. They've been going against the grain of the Constitution trying to get creationism which is a arguably religion based subject taught in schools. Which in turn possibly gets them more followers, which in turn gets them more tithing and more people in their "group" giving them more power. In fact I would argue they are specifically trying to erode the line between church and state with these arguments, injecting religion based reasons into many of the arguments.

Big media networks push for things like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_Act_of_1996 where the reason for the bill is not actually what ends up happening. It was supposed to deregulate and open up the market for competition and instead it allowed them to reconsolidate by buying up competitors. And they largely don't fight with censorship on curse words because generally it drives off their audience, and those networks that don't have to censor curse words charge for the privilege of hearing them and seeing some nudity to boot. And they also support SOPA-like bills which are essential a blanket tool to censor the web....they also support monitoring and traffic shaping on the networks they control...which is another potential avenue for censorship.

You'll have to be more specific on what you're getting at......all these groups are eroding divisions we built through regulation and have been doing so steadily since the 80s at every opportunity across industries.

I've already shown that given the chance, they buy up competition to remain a monopoly. Look at ISPs, look at all the oil companies we USED to have. Look at the media conglomerates that own the majority of your radio stations ( I think there's two major radio networks, but they have like a million different stations under the same banners so it LOOKS like choice). How the record labels and movie industries are all tied together and often even tied into the same parent company that owns your ISP. Cell phone industry, ATT trying to buy T Mobile which would have brought it down to 3 major providers and they did it in the name of "better service" but still haven't announced plans to build out their infrastructure since the deal went through...why? Because it wasn't about better service, it was about buying up a competitor that offered plans at prices people preferred.

When people are unhappy with their ISPs they've tried to form local government run coop non-profit ISPs, and they get sued by the huge companies who refuse to service their area. It's happened multiple times. With regulation, they would have to provide internet to those places in a timely manner instead of preventing people from doing their own thing.

Did GoDaddy pay dearly for supporting SOPA? I heard they lost 30k subscribers at some point, but did they really? You'll have to show me on that. GoDaddy did lots of terrible things before it, yet they were still a huge provider and still are. They cybersquat on domain names people search for and allow you to buy them at "auction" from them when you try to look up if it's taken or not..they snatch it up to sell to you. They also give away people's domain names with no repercussions and a myriad of other things. Sounds like it needs a regulatory body with some teeth on it to make them act right or shut them down.

Unions are actually a really good way to fight monopolies and under the table deals, but they've been systematically villified. And unions aren't monopolies if they aren't mandatory, and most places are not fully unionized anymore. Often times they will have sections with union employees to do government work and non-union to do non-government work. Non-union guys make half the rate of union guys usually, and have less protections in place to keep themselves from getting shafted. But I don't really see how a union is a monopoly when there are lots of unions and lots of individuals in a union who make decisions for themselves and not as a collective like a company would. IE a company has a "head" that directs it and unions are a collective of individuals. Companies are people after all, unions are not (they are made up of people).

There are laws governing behavior usually based roughly on societal standards. Like pot being illegal is kind of against most of the societies beliefs, yet it remains illegal is an example of where it doesn't quite track. But overall we have laws that say you can't write a check that you know won't cash. Drunk driving, trespassing, vandalism, theft.....yelling fire in a crowded building.......setting off the fire alarm for fun.....etc. Giving people the finger isn't against the law....well probably not in most places so that might fall under social pressure. But we see that social pressure fails miserably at stopping bad behavior, so we have laws to enforce behavior...like not stealing and not murdering. This is society and people holding other people to standards, without the law to judge and convict them by the only thing you have left is personal interpretation and meeting out punishment by each individual or vigilante justice.

If you don't regulate business there is nothing stopping them, because nothing about our market is free. You can't have a free market without perfect information. You can't know every possible thing going on, so you will never have perfect information even if it was possible. So you will have swindlers and knock offs, pyramid schemes, etc. And without laws and regulations on these things, you will never be able to punish the company for what they did in a court of law.

Even if they were 100% above the board honest, they'd still be sourcing their materials from overseas and getting inferior materials to what you are paying for. It happens to the military all the time right now. They buy a bunch of nuts and bolts and some of them are chinese knockoffs that fail well after the installation is done and the machine is in operation. They can't catch them because china is basically lawless when it comes to producing goods for knock off purposes. It could just as easily be a US source doing it if we de-regulated everything and made no way for people to sue them into oblivion...because the damage would be done as soon as you buy a knock off and it fries the rest of your stuff.

The definition of "free market" right now means they want to be able to buy stuff cheap as shit from overseas and charge you US built prices for it. And when it comes to financial industry "free market" means they want to have speculation upon speculation to where the financial industry has 10-100x more money leveraged than what actually exists. It's a house of cards if they can just inflate it without any kind of acceptable risks being enforced.

Kindly go fuck yourself overcast. I never called for vigilante justice so don't try to put words in my mouth.

I called Zimmerman was he is, a murder and a scumbag. I never called for his lynching.

Zimmerman is very clearly guilty of murder.

But of course, legal moralists like you and edgeman are gonna defend this whole "The United States is a nation of Laws" bullshit. "We have to let the system runs its course."

That shit is same reason why Goldman Sachs, etc. stole all our tax dollars and will never be brought to trial for it.

"Well if it's not illegal or there's no evidence to prosecute them then.. what are we supposed to do about?"

Stop pretending like "innocent until proven guilty" means anything.

It's just empty rhetoric you've been indoctrinated with so you'll comply with this fucked up judicial system.

Think about it Overcast and @Edgeman2112. What kind of society puts INNOCENT people on trial?

It's all a game and scumbags like Zimmerman's retired judge father know how to play to win. i.e. get away with murder



>> ^xxovercastxx:


innocent until proven guilty in a court of law is not "defending" anyone; it's the foundation of our legal system.
If it was up to people like you he'd have been strung up in a tree in the public square 3 weeks ago.

@Porksandwich:

According to Zimmerman, he was carrying his weapon in plain sight. So if he's telling the truth, I assume Martin would've seen it. Now, this is still all just speculation, but whatever the events leading up to the confrontation, if I felt I absolutely needed to hit someone who I knew had a gun, I would absolutely make sure that person was unconscious before the end of my assault. All this shit about how Martin had a responsibility to back off once he'd subdued Zimmerman is crazy. As if you would hit someone who had a gun and then back off and tell them to calm down.

Anyway, I could speculate forever, but what I don't have to speculate on is this: I support an American's right to carry a gun, even in public. There's a reason though, that most (practically all) neighborhood watch groups have policies about patrolling unarmed and in groups. The reason is to avoid vigilante justice, and even just unfortunate confrontations or misunderstandings that end in tragedy. The recommendation in ninety-nine percent of watch groups is that even if you have a license to carry a gun, you do not carry it on patrol and you always patrol in groups to avoid situations that escalate to unnecessary ends.

All that said though, the law is still open to interpretation. Even if Martin loses a murder trial, he could still appeal a conviction in a higher court and bring the whole thing back to square one. Unfortunately, this tragedy is just a another messed up event in a sometimes shitty world that people sometimes have to learn to live with.

The thing is, the First Amendment only protects from Government intervention. So, vigilante justice is a-ok according to 1st amendment

I couldn't agree with you more shuac. I still feel weird about it though, because whenever I ponder the Westboro Baptist Cult, two words always float softly through my mind... "vigilante justice".

How is it that people cannot defend themselves right now? We can still purchase a wide variety of weapons, including firearms. Do you need an RPG to protect your apartment?

I'm trying real hard to understand your moral vs. immoral approach to crimes. You seem to be claiming that it is immoral for the government (representatives of the collective public) to throw a person in prison for breaking the law. Tell me if I'm wrong, because I don't know how else to interpret that weird "stabbing you with a knife to quit smoking" example.

Incentivize people using fear and violence? What does that even mean? Fear is a good thing. Fear of consequences. Whether there is a government around or not, there will be consequences for actions. Either from a neutral party (like police and the courts) or from vigilantes (the family and friends of the victim). From my point of view, there's more violence in your proposed world.

Your entire argument is beginning to sound like "I can't smoke what I want where I want so let's burn this whole mutherfuker down!" and "I can't buy a guy without a three day waiting period so let's burn this whole mutherfuker down!"

You have no clue what would even happen if you got your way, and you act like we are crazy for defending a system that at least functions a little bit. We're not crazy, we have a pretty good idea how fucked up the world gets when there is no functioning government. It's like those African countries where they don't have any roads but they've all got AK-47's. Where entire villages get wiped out by roving mercenary gangs. Where hundred or thousands of women get raped and nobody does a damn thing about it. I don't want to live there, and I don't think you do either. It's fucking hell on earth, and you think everybody is suddenly going to start being nice to each other? Because there is no government to "incentivize violence"?

I'm trying real hard not to start throwing insults, so please tell me why you think I am wrong. Aside from allowing you to buy more weed and guns, how would a lack of government be better?


>> ^blankfist:

>> ^MaxWilder:
I think we're stuck on the word "prevent". Nothing can prevent crime, only discourage it and punish people who are caught committing crimes.
So the real question is: would your system do a better job discouraging people from harming one another? And when someone inevitably does, what happens when they are caught?
Currently, we have courts and police to discourage crime and attempt to punish those who commit crimes.
I see no alternative, other than vigilante justice, which in my humble opinion would suck balls. Please explain how it would be better!

Yes, "prevent" was the word dystopianfuturetoday scrawled above as some sort of ham-fisted challenge as if there's any proof the current system prevented anything. No law (no matter the number or the severity of the draconian punishment) will prevent a crime. If it did, then today we'd have no murder, no rape, theft, etc.
Would a voluntary society discourage crime? Maybe. Who knows. If you mean discouraging the more egregious crimes like murder and rape and theft, I feel confident it would help to allow people the right to self defense by allowing them to arm themselves if they chose to do so. I can guarantee a voluntary society would not have that horrible '3 strikes' rule we have here in California where receiving the third felony nets you a mandatory life sentence. Has it been successful in preventing or discouraging crime? I don't know, but people are still committing felonies.
The real difference is in having a moral vs. immoral approach to crimes. For instance, if you wanted to stop smoking I could come to your house and threaten you with a butcher knife. If I find you smoking then I stab you. Would that prevent you from smoking? Would that discourage you from smoking? And would that be moral even if I did in fact effectively stopped you from smoking?
Voluntary societies would morally deal with drug addicts, jaywalkers, etc. As long as people are not hurting others, then they won't be harmed. That's the motto. We don't want to incentivize people using fear and violence. We want to do it voluntarily.

>> ^MaxWilder:

I think we're stuck on the word "prevent". Nothing can prevent crime, only discourage it and punish people who are caught committing crimes.
So the real question is: would your system do a better job discouraging people from harming one another? And when someone inevitably does, what happens when they are caught?
Currently, we have courts and police to discourage crime and attempt to punish those who commit crimes.
I see no alternative, other than vigilante justice, which in my humble opinion would suck balls. Please explain how it would be better!


Yes, "prevent" was the word @dystopianfuturetoday scrawled above as some sort of ham-fisted challenge as if there's any proof the current system prevented anything. No law (no matter the number or the severity of the draconian punishment) will prevent a crime. If it did, then today we'd have no murder, no rape, theft, etc.

Would a voluntary society discourage crime? Maybe. Who knows. If you mean discouraging the more egregious crimes like murder and rape and theft, I feel confident it would help to allow people the right to self defense by allowing them to arm themselves if they chose to do so. I can guarantee a voluntary society would not have that horrible '3 strikes' rule we have here in California where receiving the third felony nets you a mandatory life sentence. Has it been successful in preventing or discouraging crime? I don't know, but people are still committing felonies.

The real difference is in having a moral vs. immoral approach to crimes. For instance, if you wanted to stop smoking I could come to your house and threaten you with a butcher knife. If I find you smoking then I stab you. Would that prevent you from smoking? Would that discourage you from smoking? And would that be moral even if I did in fact effectively stopped you from smoking?

Voluntary societies would morally deal with drug addicts, jaywalkers, etc. As long as people are not hurting others, then they won't be harmed. That's the motto. We don't want to incentivize people using fear and violence. We want to do it voluntarily.

They know damned well that nothing short of an asteroid can stop all human crime. They are playing the "I'm going to take everything as literally as possible so I am not forced to concede anything" game.


>> ^MaxWilder:

I think we're stuck on the word "prevent". Nothing can prevent crime, only discourage it and punish people who are caught committing crimes.
So the real question is: would your system do a better job discouraging people from harming one another? And when someone inevitably does, what happens when they are caught?
Currently, we have courts and police to discourage crime and attempt to punish those who commit crimes.
I see no alternative, other than vigilante justice, which in my humble opinion would suck balls. Please explain how it would be better!

I think we're stuck on the word "prevent". Nothing can prevent crime, only discourage it and punish people who are caught committing crimes.

So the real question is: would your system do a better job discouraging people from harming one another? And when someone inevitably does, what happens when they are caught?

Currently, we have courts and police to discourage crime and attempt to punish those who commit crimes.

I see no alternative, other than vigilante justice, which in my humble opinion would suck balls. Please explain how it would be better!

The system may be flawed, but it will not work at all if people can simply "opt-out" and stay within the borders. Hence the "work with it or leave it" policy. If you want to help change the current system so that it will grow in the direction you prefer, then by all means do so. However, if you are advocating a complete dissolution of the system in favor of anarchy, then I will be the first to stand against you.

You, and others who make similar arguments, keep saying that the power needs to be taken from the police and put in the hands of the people. Are you high? The police *are* the people! I mean, let's break it down for a second. If there was suddenly no police, everyone would be forced by definition to be performing vigilante justice whenever they saw fit. Well, that just causes chaos, because anybody could at any time attack anyone else and claim self defense. A system like that cannot stand, and thus it would be necessary to task neutral parties with judging claims (the courts) and taking evidence and suspects into custody (the police). How the hell else could it be done? You think if there was suddenly no government that everyone would play nice? That's nuts!

If there are flaws with the government, then work to fix them. If there are corrupt police officers, then work to have them brought to justice. Starting over from nothing is completely absurd and would be of no help to anybody, except perhaps those who have the means to form their own police forces (gangs) and start their own little feudal societies based on their own whims.

>> ^ipfreely:

Mel Guzman could have purchased it from a pawn shop, flea market or by any other legitimate means, for all we know. Yet some of you here and on youtube are passing judgement on this person. And I "love" how the speaker makes a snarky remark about having an unemployment form.
How many of you have not had to fill out an unemployment form?
Maybe this person couldn't afford the latest machine because he's, I don't know... unemployed? Maybe he didn't know how to reformat the drives on this machine? Since all the anecdotal information tells us is that Mel got the computer recently and just turned it on.
And before you people jump on my ass... lets read upon the law of Possession of Stolen Goods.
If the individual didn't know the goods were stolen, then the goods are returned to the owner and the individual is not prosecuted. Innocent possession is not a crime.. If Mel was the original thief, why would he still have the computer? Wouldn't a thief sell it quickly as possible to make money... Not hold on to it for 2 years then use it himself?
So it's okay to virtually lynch Mel Guzman... Vigilante Justice in a form of a Hacker Hipster is acceptable in Videosift world?
Videosift is liberal minded, yet there are 98 of you who just assume Mel Guzman stole this computer. You fuckers don't believe in due process before passing judgment?
And yes, it is true it's not the court of law. Yet this video has been viewed by over half of million people... What if one of these people were someone who wanted to hire Mel Guzman. Now because of some smug smart-ass douche bag, Mel Guzman will continued to be unemployed.
You know what would be true justice... If the authorities finds mp3's downloaded from Limewire and RIAA sue the speaker, because we all know Mel does not have the password to install any applications on this machine.
You bunch of phony liberal fuckers. I consider myself a center-right, yet even I know this is wrong.
Merry Fucking Christmas and Happy New Years Assholes.

>> ^ipfreely:

Mel Guzman could have purchased it from a pawn shop, flea market or by any other legitimate means, for all we know. Yet some of you here and on youtube are passing judgement on this person. And I "love" how the speaker makes a snarky remark about having an unemployment form.
How many of you have not had to fill out an unemployment form?
Maybe this person couldn't afford the latest machine because he's, I don't know... unemployed? Maybe he didn't know how to reformat the drives on this machine? Since all the anecdotal information tells us is that Mel got the computer recently and just turned it on.
And before you people jump on my ass... lets read upon the law of Possession of Stolen Goods.
If the individual didn't know the goods were stolen, then the goods are returned to the owner and the individual is not prosecuted. Innocent possession is not a crime.. If Mel was the original thief, why would he still have the computer? Wouldn't a thief sell it quickly as possible to make money... Not hold on to it for 2 years then use it himself?
So it's okay to virtually lynch Mel Guzman... Vigilante Justice in a form of a Hacker Hipster is acceptable in Videosift world?
Videosift is liberal minded, yet there are 98 of you who just assume Mel Guzman stole this computer. You fuckers don't believe in due process before passing judgment?
And yes, it is true it's not the court of law. Yet this video has been viewed by over half of million people... What if one of these people were someone who wanted to hire Mel Guzman. Now because of some smug smart-ass douche bag, Mel Guzman will continued to be unemployed.
You know what would be true justice... If the authorities finds mp3's downloaded from Limewire and RIAA sue the speaker, because we all know Mel does not have the password to install any applications on this machine.
You bunch of phony liberal fuckers. I consider myself a center-right, yet even I know this is wrong.
Merry Fucking Christmas and Happy New Years Assholes.


I'm not sure anyone would hire someone who can't spell their own name.

But basically you're right unless Mel had already been proven to be the thief. And I imagine that would be hard to do once he denied it.

As has already been said this is the sort of conference where anything goes - but I'm surprised the organisers did not seek to anonymise much of the material.

Nope. I upvoted another of your unsifted videos elsewhere. That'll have to do for both our craics.


>> ^lampishthing:

Ah go on, it'll be good craic. The button's right there! You know you want to...>> ^bareboards2:
Sorry, can't upvote vigilante justice. Even if it is faked.
I'll find another one of yours to vote for....

Ah go on, it'll be good craic. The button's right there! You know you want to...>> ^bareboards2:

Sorry, can't upvote vigilante justice. Even if it is faked.
I'll find another one of yours to vote for....