wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Why the US military usually punishes misconduct but police often close ranks
wildmusings's comments
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Why the US military usually punishes misconduct but police often close ranks
It's worth noting that while every unjustified shooting is one too many, the vast vast majority of shootings by police are unambiguously justified. The US has a lot of violent criminals, many of who are bold enough to even try to kill police officers.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Reddit started banning accounts that voted for content “against their policies”
Free speech is not so daft a concept. Where some restrictions are necessary, the principle of “viewpoint neutrality” still works to prevent censorship. This is the approach that First Amendment jurisprudence takes. So, where the government allows pro-abortion expression, it must also allow anti-abortion expression. But it can still set volume limits and control crowd movements and so forth, as long as it does not discriminate on the basis of viewpoint. And this applies even where its more general obligation to allow all expression does not hold.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: The history that James Baldwin wanted America to see
"Given" native histories? Are you asserting that the historical evidence about these societies is fabricated?
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: FBI used Etsy, LinkedIn to make arrest in torching of Philadelphia police cars
The peacefulness of a protest has nothing to do with the political message. Not every concept is about your political bottom line. Friend and foe alike can engage in peaceful and violent protests.
A "violent protest" is a clear concept that means something. You can very easily imagine a peaceful protester with the most awful things written on their sign. And you can imagine the most violent rioters being inspired by the greatest message.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: FBI used Etsy, LinkedIn to make arrest in torching of Philadelphia police cars
I see we have abandoned the facade of neutrality. The right to protest is the same regardless of your cause, as is the duty to remain peaceable.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: FBI used Etsy, LinkedIn to make arrest in torching of Philadelphia police cars
Yes, it’s telling that even mentioning the full context will upset people. Hence your downvotes. People really want to believe that the Philly PD was firebombing black neighborhoods for fun.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: ZFS Removes References to Slavery
Each individual concession seems small but the end result is that one must live life in fear of saying the littlest wrong thing, lest the angry mob come down on you. We're at the point where we can't even talk about any of these issues, only obey the barked orders of angry activists.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone
Because these people have claimed territory and held themselves out as challenging the sovereignty of the United States. So the implication is pretty clear, that the guns are there as a show of that sovereignty. Are they serious about using them? Who knows.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone
This is going to come to either an immediate or tragic end when someone inside this zone needs the police to come save them. Either the police will tear down the fences and fight whoever they must to rescue this person, or the mayor will order them to stand down and an American is left to fend for himself so that a politician's agenda can be advanced.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: If it ain't broke: Share your oldest working gadgets
I have a Unicomp but I'm disappointed that the resistance varies a lot from key to key. Maybe I got a bad unit?
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Is Sudo Almost Useless?
Just to say more directly say what someone else said: this is ahistorical. What you're talking about, Windows UAC, is a relatively recent innovation in the Windows world, first introduced with Windows Vista. Obsession (maybe well-placed) with limiting usage of root for security reasons was a concept in Linux system administration well before that.
Also, the normal UAC setup for a consumer device does not require a password, just pressing a button.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Lenovo to Certify ThinkPad and ThinkStation Workstation Portfolio for Linux
You have a pay a premium for that next-day, on-site warranty. But it's worth it.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Anonymous hackers re-emerge amid US unrest
I agree, but one friendly nit-pick: capitalized "Anonymous" is the hacktivist thing, and lower-case "anonymous" is the ordinary adjective. People acting as Anonymous are also anonymous, but not everyone acting anonymously is Anonymous.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: Supreme Court says state may enforce some restrictions on religious gatherings [pdf]
It is really going to be a farce when the same jurisdictions that so zealously enforced the lockdown against churches, the same governors that threatened and said vitriolic things about small anti-lockdown protests, now refuse to enforce those same rules against the people organizing and involved in these mass protests.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: The nightmare that colleges face this fall
You're talking about this US military policy like it wasn't just another panicked reaction at the height of the crisis.
The vast vast vast majority of young people with coronavirus don't have any of those long-term side-effects. Most of them don't get more than the sniffles, if any symptoms at all.
If you've looked at the anecdotes about how readily the virus spreads, you'll realize that avoiding people until a vaccine is ready is ridiculous. The public health plan, all along, has been for most people to get the virus, but at a slower rate ("flatten the curve"). Being this deathly scared of the virus for that long just isn't a feasible plan.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: The nightmare that colleges face this fall
The chance of a college kid dying from coronavirus is exceedingly small. If they aren't sick in some special way (severe diabetes, HIV), then why are we even worried? Isn't this just an easy way to let the virus pass through a huge chunk of the population while they are away from their older, more vulnerable family members?
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: A touch of absurdity can help to wrap your mind around reality
Humor is powerful, which is why people want to control what you are allowed to laugh at.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: UK government advisor caught out by Wayback machine
A funeral, attended by many people, is rather different than a drive and walk through nature with the people you live with. Anyhow, the hypocrisy angle makes sense. Two strikes for everyone involved: one for coming up with the stupid rules and two for then breaking them themselves/covering it up.
wildmusings | 5 years ago | on: UK government advisor caught out by Wayback machine
Driving around was one of the ways I kept my sanity through all this. I'm sorry your government came up with such stupid rules.
You can look at the reports. They don't usually leave local news, if they even make it there, because there is nothing remarkable about them. People have done aggregations of the data. I'm not saying it's going to convince you if you're already convinced otherwise.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2015/10/24/o...
"But only a small number of the shootings — roughly 5 percent — occurred under the kind of circumstances that raise doubt and draw public outcry, according to an analysis by The Washington Post. The vast majority of individuals shot and killed by police officers were, like Snyder, armed with guns and killed after attacking police officers or civilians or making other direct threats."