[Buddha-l] Re: Buddhist social deconstruction

[Dan Lusthaus]

> > inflicting dangerous predators on a defenseless populace is an act of
> > compassion is perverse.
>
> I totally agree. This is why people need to stop voting for Republicans.
> Or isn't that what you meant by "inflicting dangerous predators on a
> defenseless populace"?

Have no fear. Sizeable portions of Republican administrations get indicted,
and a good percentage of those get incarcerated. It's a well-established
tradition going back to the Nixon administration. Perhaps you'd like to
arrest all the people that vote for those fools in the first place (or just
revoke their right to vote)?

> > If you've never had a conversation [...].
>
> This sounds like something that Gareth Keenan (from the BBC comedy The
> Office [http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/theoffice/]) would say.

Anyone who has had the sort of conversation I mentioned wouldn't find much
humor in it.

> Were you ever in the
> Territorial Army, Dan?

Like countless others, I managed -- with great effort -- to avoid military
service.

> If one does not "conflate" "the necessity of prisons" with the "issue of
> false imprisonment" then how does one pretend to know that the bad guys
> are in prison and the good guys are not? Isn't that the point?

You do the best you can -- appeals, judicial constraints, etc. Beyond a
"reasonable doubt" does not mean metaphysical certainty. The alternative -- 
holding no one to account since one cannot be sure with metaphysical
certainty -- would produce the kind of anarchy that would lead people to
overcompensate with undisciplined vigilantism.

> The real question is - who is Dan arguing with? Who has said any of the
> things that Dan is arguing against?

Gad Horowitz quoting Eugene Debs.

> My own personal view is that society has both the right and the
> responsibility to punish people who "do wrong" and to protect "the rest
> of us". I know of no evidence that the American system of justice does
> anything of this sort.

It could certainly do a better job.

Dan Lusthaus