Its important to be reminded regularly that there are perfectly legal ways for people with lots of money to endlessly bully people that annoy them. These people/companies have lawyers on retainer that they're already paying so its essentially free for them to file bogus suits and motions to cause havoc in your life. What are you going to do? Sue them back? Thats the world they live in, and its a world that as a small time person or corporation you can not win in (long term).
Look at Gawker and Peter Thiel--no matter how you feel personally about what they did, what they published about him was absolutely legal. As a background task his lawyers destroyed that company by keeping them tied up in court cases and funding any one with an axe to grind against them until they were gone.
My mom was an attorney. A really sound piece of advice she gave me was, "Never get into a legal battle with a lawyer. You can't win." What she was saying was that an attorney can essentially sue you for free. (Ok not totally free but you get the point). They can tie you up in legal battles and force you to just waste money on something that is seemingly trivial. The same advice goes for someone who can spend large sums of money and not worry about the consequences.
There is this great scene in the movie "From The Hip" where the CEO of a bank assaulted another individual. The scene is his lawyer saying he thinks they can win the case. The CEO responds essentially with "You can't win. I hit him. Just make the case last 3 days so he has to spend more money." That pretty much sums up being rich and the power those people wield.
I agree with you up to a point.
However there are real limits to what the rich and powerful can do before the peasants revolt. The current American Elites have completely forgotten the concept of "noblesse oblige" and I believe we are currently seeing the start of a peasant rebellion.
It starts with rejection of the mainstream media, academics, and other "experts".
In the case of Peter Thiel, he is extremely hated among emerging factions of the radical left and dissident right.
I opened up the article mildly curious about which internet personality was about to make the outlandish claim to the biggest victim crown for internet clicks.
I'm heartbroken it was Steven Danziger, they guy that took on big oil, gave them a black eye, and went to (house) jail for it.
Even though his case is one I've followed for years, it even escaped my own memory.
Also, someone mentioned Snowden and Arrange. for comparison. Although they can be thought as same, remember these two, unlike Danziger, took on the govt, the intelligence apparatus, and its guns. They should have known full well that when you play high stakes poker you are risking a ton.
Danziger OTOH, was taking on a private corporation. His case is big, but no too different in scope than say Erin Brokovich's case against PG&E & Hinkley(2), or Jan Schlittchmanns case vs WR Grace and Beatrice Foods(1). The plaintiff counsels won in both cases, without consequences to their life or careers.
Arrange and Snowden were morally righteous however they probably knew the size of the sacrifice they were about to make and made the decision to proceed anyway. I doubt Danziger had any idea that what he was getting into would cost him his career.
It should be noted that a significant difference between Steven Danziger and Erin Brokovich is that he took on a US energy corporation which was acting against non-US citizens.
The US state apparatus clearly considers that US corporate economic interests far outweigh any rights non-US citizens have, especially outside the USA, and doubly especially in South America, and are thus more than willing to provide any kind of assistance that helps those economic interests - up to and including military aid in the past (for example, the infamous banana republics).
Taking on a US corporation harming people outside the USA (especially if you have the gall of winning!) is seen as a slight on the USA itself, and is punished as much as possible. It's important to the US state department that people are taught not to take such a task on lightly. I'm surprised there weren't bigger repercussions for the foreign judges who tried the case as well.
Also remember another person who took on a large, well-connected corporation, Karen Silkwood [0], and ultimately lost her life under suspicious circumstances.
Erin Brokovich's case against PG&E & Hinkley(2), or Jan Schlittchmanns case vs WR Grace and Beatrice Foods
Are these exceptions? I wonder how many individuals (without money) have taken on mega corporations only to have their lives destroyed by the mega corps (legally)?
I am just speculating here, but my guess is that everyone knows about cases like Brokovich vs PG&E because the little guy won and because of the size of the settlement (and the movie helps too). For every case that small guys win, there must be many many more cases that they lose, even though they are on the right?
It's worth noting that there is another side to the story. As Wikipedia notes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Donziger), significant evidence of Donziger's fraud ended up being captured by a friendly documentary crew that had been following him around.
The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague found that the evidence placed before the Court was "the most thorough documentary, video, and testimonial proof of fraud ever put before an arbitral tribunal", and that [Donziger] did engage in blackmail and bribery of Ecuadorian judges.
The situation is complex, and I certainly don't have any insight into the true rights and wrongs of the case. And there's certainly evidence that points towards Donziger's innocence too. But Esquire's take is, I think, entirely unbalanced, and discounts out of hand the idea that any of the many, many court cases Donziger has lost (in multiple legal systems and in front of multiple judges) may have been at all correct.
They're misdemeanor charges, though. I don't believe he was criminally charged in the US for the (alleged) fraud/bribery, only for contempt because he refused to produce documents as ordered by the court. Regardless of the evidence for or against his alleged past actions it's excessive to confine him to house arrest for 18 months when the maximum sentence for the charges, if proven, is just six months.
> significant evidence of Donziger's fraud ended up being captured by a friendly documentary crew that had been following him around.
I don't think thats a correct reading of the judgement at all. The "most thorough documentary" is the court referring to itself in the amount of data (i.e. documents) that it accumulates to show that it's improbable for the Ecuadorian judge to have written the initial decision (against chevron).
> many court cases Donziger has lost
Tthose court cases generally explicitly say they're not deciding if Chrevron broke any laws. They're generally pretty explicit in that they don't think Donziger won "correctly". i.e. with the PCA the PCA isn't saying that Chrevron didn't litter, they're saying we think the decision by initial judge was done improperly (i.e. it was ghost written).
[1]: https://pcacases.com/web/sendAttach/2453
> (4) The ‘Ghostwriting’ of the Lago Agrio Judgment: The facts established on the
factual, expert and forensic evidence speak for themselves, as set out at length in
Parts IV, V and VI above.
8.54 As there explained, the details as to how exactly all or material parts of the Lago Agrio
Judgment came to be written, corruptly by certain of the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs’
representatives for Judge Zambrano, remain incomplete. The missing factual and
forensic evidence is likely available only in Ecuador, if it still exists at all. Yet the
circumstantial and other evidence adduced in this arbitration is overwhelming. Short
of a signed confession by the miscreants, as rightly submitted by the Claimants at the
end of the Track II Hearing, the evidence establishing ‘ghostwriting’ in this arbitration
“must be the most thorough documentary, video, and testimonial proof of fraud ever
put before an arbitral tribunal.”31
The article specifically pointed out that the fraud charges are based on a single accusation of a former Ecuadoran judge whom Chevron moved him & his family to the United States, paid his income taxes, and had their lawyers coach him for 53 days.
He since recanted his false testimony.
Even if there is actually some kind of wrongdoing on Donziger's side, the blatant multi-million dollar effort to discredit him and blatantly ignore the law on Chevron's part so taints any such evidence that it should be considered worthless.
The "both-sidesing" it as you are doing, you very nicely demonstrate how it's so easy to fall into the trap of being "fair" but actually siding with the wrongdoer.
"Significant evidence of Donziger's Fraud" seems to only be backed up by the following line from the article you cite:
> showed an environmental scientist present at a legal strategy meeting of plaintiffs' lawyers; the same scientist was later appointed by the Ecuadorian court as an ostensibly impartial expert to write a report on technical issue
So the evidence shows that one scientific expert wasn't fully independent.
Contrast this with the clear evidence of conflicts of interests from the US judges, the bribing of the oil company's star witness and their eventual recantation of some of their testimony.
It sure looks like there's far more evidence of fraud from Chevron than whatever the documentary crew caught.
Yes, there’s definitely a lot more to the story than what is described in the article, or indeed most of the articles that are based primarily on interviews with Donziger. It’s hard to find a single element of the case that hasn’t been the subject of fierce controversy. The arbitration decision you referenced [1] also relied heavily on disputed evidence, but they tended to give it credence anyway. I don’t think it’s very controversial that Judge Lewis Kaplan has been remarkably hostile toward Donziger, just depends on whether you believe Donziger deserves the harsh treatment. I think it would help if the case got a proper review from a cooler headed judge, but with the current trajectory of the US judicial system that seems to be impossible.
Donziger did some bad things. That's mostly indisputable, although it's questionable how much control an American lawyer had over a team of Ecuadorians operating in Ecuador. But the sanctions carried out against him were an atrocious breach of ordinary legal procedures.
Just because someone's moral character isn't perfect doesn't mean their legal rights disappear. John Adams would be horrified.
When I look at how figures like Donziger, Assange and Snowden are treated I cant help but think our society is a lot more like Russia than we think we are - differing mostly by a matter of degree, rather than principle.
Furthermore, this is a geopolitical risk. If the west doesnt uphold the principles we purport to represent then our support dwindles and allies who were on the fence will fall against us.
When I look at how figures like Donziger, Assange and Snowden are treated I cant help but think our society is a lot more like Russia than we think we are - differing mostly by a matter of degree, rather than principle.
Stalinism was economic totalitarianism with a goal and an exit strategy. Authoritarianism was supposed to be a phase; the system would moderate itself over time. The degree to which that would have actually happened, we don't know. External forces destroyed the Soviet Union, so all we can do is speculate, but I suspect that if it had been left alone, it'd have fixed a lot of its problems and be a decent place to live by now.
The corporate system we have now is also economic totalitarianism. Financial interests decide where you can live, what jobs you can do, and what kind of reputation you have in the community. The issue here is that it's economic totalitarianism with no exit strategy. Neoliberalism insists that things have never been better (despite substantial evidence to the contrary) and there's no reason to exit from economic totalitarianism when we should, instead, "own nothing, have no privacy, and be happy".
This story is scary and heartbreaking. The guy represented poor people in a foreign country against brutal corporation and now his life and career are ruined
While what happened seems wrong based on the article, it's clearly not the "most vicious corporate counterattack in US history." No Pinkertons, no machine guns, no families.
At the end of the day (or house arrest) this is all still legal maneuvering. It may be vicious within that context but there are much bigger and sometimes nastier contexts out there.
Until I read Hobbes in my late 20s I couldn't see further. Give
Leviathan a go. I suggest an easy way in is to listen to these
lectures on Political Philosophy by prof. Steven B. Smith [2].
Now, Hobbes and Rousseau are flawed thinkers, but the gist of "social
contract" theory still constitutes the foundation of the modern
nations state, whether republic, parliamentary or monarchy.
The failure, as an earlier commenter pointed out to be a "geopolitical
risk" is when we don't uphold our own principles. the Rule of Law that
we in the "west" are so (rightfully) proud of must therefore be as
brutal against the rich and powerful as against the poor.
Without that example to assuage the middle classes everything
gravitates to two poles, those with everything to lose and those with
nothing to lose. Hobbes rightly feared those with nothing to lose
much more (being an aristocrat's teacher at a time of civil war) and
seeing all the fancy lawyers and money in the world won't do you any
good against a hungry peasant with a rifle and nothing left to
protect, so the state must treat the rich and poor as equals.
State violence keeps the peace. If you think of your own life (for most people I think), there's some incident in the past where you or somebody you love was hurt, and if it weren't for state violence, you'd have felt the obligation to hurt the perpetrator back. That's not good for the victim of crime, because not only are they suffering from the crime, but now they feel obligated to do take a dangerous, difficult action that they're unaccustomed to, or to feel ashamed for not having done it. It's not good for society, because the friends and loved ones of the perpetrator of the crime may have a different view of it, and now for you, you're the perpetrator of unpunished harm to their loved one. That's how family feuds start.
That's in the basic case that almost everyone will experience at multiple points in their lives. Instead, the state intervenes and does just enough violence to keep the peace on both sides.
The other reason state violence keeps civilization together is credit. To extend credit, you have to have state violence or a mafia. There has to be something to do if someone just decides not to pay you back. You can build up trust with a particular borrower by starting with small amounts (or collectively do this by sharing information with other lenders, but that's a bit of a mafia), but that doesn't prevent people from living up to that trust for the little loans, until the big loan comes, then absconding. Or simply doing it with introductory loans across many different (non-colluding) lenders.
In all these situations, fortune favors larger families. Your family determines whether people will be afraid of hurting you, whether you'll get justice if they do, whether there are people who have resources that trust you enough to lend them to you... if you don't have a family, you're fucked.
My problem is state violence on behalf of the powerful towards the weak, which comes with state control by the wealthy. Otherwise, thank Christ for state violence. I know I would have killed at least two people (unless one of them killed me) if it didn't exist.
The underpinnings of modern civilization is the state, and the base definition of the state is that which has the monopoly on violence.
The alternative is anarchy, and from anarchy a winner through any violence necessary will emerge and become the monopoly on violence becoming the state. You cannot have rule of law without coercion, and you cannot have coercion without some threat of violence.
Not sure if mob justice is devoid of suffering. The problem is that the justice system is only open to those with money. There is some basic help, right for an attorney if indicted, but that isn't enough overall to really get justice.
This kind of stuff happens more often than people want to admit. For example, I have discovered that I have no constitutional right to a trial or due process. A multi year long Federal investigation was done based on a false accusation. My career and everything was taken. I have never been charged with anything and it is implied that there is no crime to even charge me with. I have taken all of this to Twitter recently (link in my profile). The past few weeks I have been asking the state and federal to arrest me, even though I didnt do anything, just so I would have a right to an attorney to be honored and begin the process of defending myself. But they havent even replied now for months.
Good luck out there when you run up against real power structures. You do not have the rights you think you do.
The Government can and will kill you without even charging you or proving anything to a jury.
This isnt even political as both left and right wing controlled states, CO and TN have gone along with it.
We simply do not have any rights in the U.S. Truth seems to be based simply on how many political connections and how much money you have.
Based on a skim of your Twitter, it looks like you were accused of committing a lewd act with a minor. You believe that this was an unfounded accusation. The police seem to agree because they have decided not to charge you with a crime, but the stigma has hurt you personally and professionally. You want to be charged with a crime so you can prove yourself innocent in court. It also appears that many, many people you know have urged you to seek mental health care, which you perceive as attempts to gaslight you.
I won't discuss the mental health component further because I don't see why you would trust an anonymous HN comment on this topic if you are skeptical of the motivations your friends and family.
Due process and right to a trial don't apply to your situation, since those are rights for people who have been charged with a crime. There is no constitutional right to be charged with a crime on request.
I understand your desire to prove your innocence in court, but even if you were able to do that, it is highly unlikely (read: near zero chance) that it would reverse the damage to your career and personal life. Based on the lack of potential benefit, time spent on trying to be charged with a crime is likely to be time wasted. I suggest that you move on and try to rebuild your life in other ways.
While the atrocities committed by Texaco and the Ecuador government in Ecuador are heinous, Steven is a class action lawyer that was trying to line his own and his backer's pockets. I agree that Chevron and US judges appear to have crossed the line and hope that is prosecuted. But you should really research the whole story before you honor the lawyer's actions in any way. And the whole suit was frivolous anyway as the Ecuador government had already absolved Texaco/Chevron of all liability. Their own documentary was very damning even before the outtakes where revealed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvrZRvgwBS8. This guy is getting way too much mileage out of this 20+ year lawsuit and should stop representing himself as the victim.
https://law.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/boutrous....
'"Indeed, Maria Aguinda, the lead plaintiff in the Chevron litigation, admitted that when the plaintiffs’ lawyers originally instructed her to sign the litigation papers, she thought she was signing up for free medicine: in
her own words, the lawyer told her, “In four months, I will bring medications
so you will be healed. But first, sign this paper here.”'
[+] [-] a2tech|3 years ago|reply
Look at Gawker and Peter Thiel--no matter how you feel personally about what they did, what they published about him was absolutely legal. As a background task his lawyers destroyed that company by keeping them tied up in court cases and funding any one with an axe to grind against them until they were gone.
[+] [-] kemiller2002|3 years ago|reply
There is this great scene in the movie "From The Hip" where the CEO of a bank assaulted another individual. The scene is his lawyer saying he thinks they can win the case. The CEO responds essentially with "You can't win. I hit him. Just make the case last 3 days so he has to spend more money." That pretty much sums up being rich and the power those people wield.
[+] [-] hackernewds|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stuckinhell|3 years ago|reply
It starts with rejection of the mainstream media, academics, and other "experts".
In the case of Peter Thiel, he is extremely hated among emerging factions of the radical left and dissident right.
[+] [-] eterevsky|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] seventytwo|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|3 years ago|reply
I'm glad I don't work in legal, it sounds so drawn out and boring.
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] IG_Semmelweiss|3 years ago|reply
I'm heartbroken it was Steven Danziger, they guy that took on big oil, gave them a black eye, and went to (house) jail for it.
Even though his case is one I've followed for years, it even escaped my own memory.
Also, someone mentioned Snowden and Arrange. for comparison. Although they can be thought as same, remember these two, unlike Danziger, took on the govt, the intelligence apparatus, and its guns. They should have known full well that when you play high stakes poker you are risking a ton.
Danziger OTOH, was taking on a private corporation. His case is big, but no too different in scope than say Erin Brokovich's case against PG&E & Hinkley(2), or Jan Schlittchmanns case vs WR Grace and Beatrice Foods(1). The plaintiff counsels won in both cases, without consequences to their life or careers.
Arrange and Snowden were morally righteous however they probably knew the size of the sacrifice they were about to make and made the decision to proceed anyway. I doubt Danziger had any idea that what he was getting into would cost him his career.
(1) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anderson_v._Cryovac,_Inc.
(2) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinkley_groundwater_contamin...
[+] [-] simiones|3 years ago|reply
The US state apparatus clearly considers that US corporate economic interests far outweigh any rights non-US citizens have, especially outside the USA, and doubly especially in South America, and are thus more than willing to provide any kind of assistance that helps those economic interests - up to and including military aid in the past (for example, the infamous banana republics).
Taking on a US corporation harming people outside the USA (especially if you have the gall of winning!) is seen as a slight on the USA itself, and is punished as much as possible. It's important to the US state department that people are taught not to take such a task on lightly. I'm surprised there weren't bigger repercussions for the foreign judges who tried the case as well.
[+] [-] doodlebugging|3 years ago|reply
[0] (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Silkwood)
[+] [-] akudha|3 years ago|reply
Are these exceptions? I wonder how many individuals (without money) have taken on mega corporations only to have their lives destroyed by the mega corps (legally)?
I am just speculating here, but my guess is that everyone knows about cases like Brokovich vs PG&E because the little guy won and because of the size of the settlement (and the movie helps too). For every case that small guys win, there must be many many more cases that they lose, even though they are on the right?
[+] [-] tintedfireglass|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Lazare|3 years ago|reply
The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague found that the evidence placed before the Court was "the most thorough documentary, video, and testimonial proof of fraud ever put before an arbitral tribunal", and that [Donziger] did engage in blackmail and bribery of Ecuadorian judges.
The situation is complex, and I certainly don't have any insight into the true rights and wrongs of the case. And there's certainly evidence that points towards Donziger's innocence too. But Esquire's take is, I think, entirely unbalanced, and discounts out of hand the idea that any of the many, many court cases Donziger has lost (in multiple legal systems and in front of multiple judges) may have been at all correct.
[+] [-] elliekelly|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lesuorac|3 years ago|reply
I don't think thats a correct reading of the judgement at all. The "most thorough documentary" is the court referring to itself in the amount of data (i.e. documents) that it accumulates to show that it's improbable for the Ecuadorian judge to have written the initial decision (against chevron).
> many court cases Donziger has lost
Tthose court cases generally explicitly say they're not deciding if Chrevron broke any laws. They're generally pretty explicit in that they don't think Donziger won "correctly". i.e. with the PCA the PCA isn't saying that Chrevron didn't litter, they're saying we think the decision by initial judge was done improperly (i.e. it was ghost written).
[1]: https://pcacases.com/web/sendAttach/2453 > (4) The ‘Ghostwriting’ of the Lago Agrio Judgment: The facts established on the factual, expert and forensic evidence speak for themselves, as set out at length in Parts IV, V and VI above. 8.54 As there explained, the details as to how exactly all or material parts of the Lago Agrio Judgment came to be written, corruptly by certain of the Lago Agrio Plaintiffs’ representatives for Judge Zambrano, remain incomplete. The missing factual and forensic evidence is likely available only in Ecuador, if it still exists at all. Yet the circumstantial and other evidence adduced in this arbitration is overwhelming. Short of a signed confession by the miscreants, as rightly submitted by the Claimants at the end of the Track II Hearing, the evidence establishing ‘ghostwriting’ in this arbitration “must be the most thorough documentary, video, and testimonial proof of fraud ever put before an arbitral tribunal.”31
[+] [-] toss1|3 years ago|reply
He since recanted his false testimony.
Even if there is actually some kind of wrongdoing on Donziger's side, the blatant multi-million dollar effort to discredit him and blatantly ignore the law on Chevron's part so taints any such evidence that it should be considered worthless.
The "both-sidesing" it as you are doing, you very nicely demonstrate how it's so easy to fall into the trap of being "fair" but actually siding with the wrongdoer.
[+] [-] shkkmo|3 years ago|reply
> showed an environmental scientist present at a legal strategy meeting of plaintiffs' lawyers; the same scientist was later appointed by the Ecuadorian court as an ostensibly impartial expert to write a report on technical issue
So the evidence shows that one scientific expert wasn't fully independent.
Contrast this with the clear evidence of conflicts of interests from the US judges, the bribing of the oil company's star witness and their eventual recantation of some of their testimony.
It sure looks like there's far more evidence of fraud from Chevron than whatever the documentary crew caught.
[+] [-] resfirestar|3 years ago|reply
[1] https://www.chevron.com/-/media/chevron/stories/documents/in..., especially part IV where the use of Guerra’s testimony is explained on page 139 of the PDF.
[+] [-] scythe|3 years ago|reply
Just because someone's moral character isn't perfect doesn't mean their legal rights disappear. John Adams would be horrified.
[+] [-] fjfaase|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ratg13|3 years ago|reply
The judge responsible should be disbarred.
[+] [-] exabrial|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pydry|3 years ago|reply
Furthermore, this is a geopolitical risk. If the west doesnt uphold the principles we purport to represent then our support dwindles and allies who were on the fence will fall against us.
[+] [-] avidphantasm|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] psi75|3 years ago|reply
Stalinism was economic totalitarianism with a goal and an exit strategy. Authoritarianism was supposed to be a phase; the system would moderate itself over time. The degree to which that would have actually happened, we don't know. External forces destroyed the Soviet Union, so all we can do is speculate, but I suspect that if it had been left alone, it'd have fixed a lot of its problems and be a decent place to live by now.
The corporate system we have now is also economic totalitarianism. Financial interests decide where you can live, what jobs you can do, and what kind of reputation you have in the community. The issue here is that it's economic totalitarianism with no exit strategy. Neoliberalism insists that things have never been better (despite substantial evidence to the contrary) and there's no reason to exit from economic totalitarianism when we should, instead, "own nothing, have no privacy, and be happy".
[+] [-] JTbane|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pain2022|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fencepost|3 years ago|reply
At the end of the day (or house arrest) this is all still legal maneuvering. It may be vicious within that context but there are much bigger and sometimes nastier contexts out there.
[+] [-] dctoedt|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hulitu|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nisegami|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nonrandomstring|3 years ago|reply
Now, Hobbes and Rousseau are flawed thinkers, but the gist of "social contract" theory still constitutes the foundation of the modern nations state, whether republic, parliamentary or monarchy.
The failure, as an earlier commenter pointed out to be a "geopolitical risk" is when we don't uphold our own principles. the Rule of Law that we in the "west" are so (rightfully) proud of must therefore be as brutal against the rich and powerful as against the poor.
Without that example to assuage the middle classes everything gravitates to two poles, those with everything to lose and those with nothing to lose. Hobbes rightly feared those with nothing to lose much more (being an aristocrat's teacher at a time of civil war) and seeing all the fancy lawyers and money in the world won't do you any good against a hungry peasant with a rifle and nothing left to protect, so the state must treat the rich and poor as equals.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_(book)
[2] https://oyc.yale.edu/political-science/plsc-114/lecture-1
[+] [-] baxtr|3 years ago|reply
Having armed militias / mafia organizations that operate state-like, working for those with the biggest wallets is not ideal either.
[+] [-] pessimizer|3 years ago|reply
That's in the basic case that almost everyone will experience at multiple points in their lives. Instead, the state intervenes and does just enough violence to keep the peace on both sides.
The other reason state violence keeps civilization together is credit. To extend credit, you have to have state violence or a mafia. There has to be something to do if someone just decides not to pay you back. You can build up trust with a particular borrower by starting with small amounts (or collectively do this by sharing information with other lenders, but that's a bit of a mafia), but that doesn't prevent people from living up to that trust for the little loans, until the big loan comes, then absconding. Or simply doing it with introductory loans across many different (non-colluding) lenders.
In all these situations, fortune favors larger families. Your family determines whether people will be afraid of hurting you, whether you'll get justice if they do, whether there are people who have resources that trust you enough to lend them to you... if you don't have a family, you're fucked.
My problem is state violence on behalf of the powerful towards the weak, which comes with state control by the wealthy. Otherwise, thank Christ for state violence. I know I would have killed at least two people (unless one of them killed me) if it didn't exist.
[+] [-] SigmundA|3 years ago|reply
The alternative is anarchy, and from anarchy a winner through any violence necessary will emerge and become the monopoly on violence becoming the state. You cannot have rule of law without coercion, and you cannot have coercion without some threat of violence.
[+] [-] raxxorraxor|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pydry|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] b112|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] otikik|3 years ago|reply
Is there anything the general public can do to help? Like, write to a congressman or something?
[+] [-] ftyhbhyjnjk|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] revscat|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lupire|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] notlukesky|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Threeve303|3 years ago|reply
Good luck out there when you run up against real power structures. You do not have the rights you think you do.
The Government can and will kill you without even charging you or proving anything to a jury.
This isnt even political as both left and right wing controlled states, CO and TN have gone along with it.
We simply do not have any rights in the U.S. Truth seems to be based simply on how many political connections and how much money you have.
[+] [-] Calavar|3 years ago|reply
I won't discuss the mental health component further because I don't see why you would trust an anonymous HN comment on this topic if you are skeptical of the motivations your friends and family.
Due process and right to a trial don't apply to your situation, since those are rights for people who have been charged with a crime. There is no constitutional right to be charged with a crime on request.
I understand your desire to prove your innocence in court, but even if you were able to do that, it is highly unlikely (read: near zero chance) that it would reverse the damage to your career and personal life. Based on the lack of potential benefit, time spent on trying to be charged with a crime is likely to be time wasted. I suggest that you move on and try to rebuild your life in other ways.
[+] [-] rehash3|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drazle|3 years ago|reply