I listened to a radio program yesterday where callers were discussing their feelings about hate crimes, and whether it makes sense for offenders to get double or triple the punishment when an act is said to be rooted in discrimination against a protected group.

I didn’t agree wholeheartedly with what the callers or the panel was saying. And as the conversation evolved, I realized what was bothering me about the idea – that the legislation allows the government to make a value judgement on our behalf. While typically the justice system punishes actions, with hate crimes they are attempting to determine whether a crime was bias motivated and mete out extra punishment based on that determination. And it’s the government that gets to determine which groups deserve this protection, potentially to the detriment of other groups.

I understand the reasoning for such laws to be that by punishing more severely for bigotry, the government is saying that the action is not OK in our society. There is some perceived greater societal harm that comes from such acts that makes it worth taking extra steps to deter and punish. To be honest, I’m not sure how I feel about that.

A lot of the callers were making the First Amendment/slippery slope argument, saying that if we allow regulation based on thought where does that end? But the path my thoughts took extended to something bigger, to the role that the government plays in our lives and society at large.

In our representative form of government, we basically authorize others to make decisions on our behalf. Letting the government decide what’s important to us gives them a lot of power, and it makes the justice system vulnerable to political influence, with laws alterable by the whims of the current office holders.

Is this the way the system was designed to work? What if we don’t agree with the value judgement they have made? How do we come to a consensus on areas where society does not agree? What do we do as the values of a society change?

As with many other things, I take issue with giving this power to the government. I’d prefer they treat people equally, including criminals, just as I’d prefer they didn’t determine that particular people or relationships have more value than others. That owning a home or having a child is worth incenting. That certain substances are OK to use and some are not. That it’s OK to redistribute income between groups. That some subjects are important for kids to learn and not others. I guess it’s just the libertarian in me questioning (as always) how we got to this point of authorizing that power.

While thinking about this over my lunch break I came across an interesting piece called Social Welfare, State Intervention, and Value Judgments. It argues that the state cannot govern without making arbitrary value judgements, and thus discriminating against some for the benefit of others. It also purports that this becomes more acceptable when the state is attempting to economize on the value judgement. “Any activity, process, or institution will create gainers and losers and ultimately requires extra-economic criteria for its evaluation.”

With that in mind, some governmental decisions make much more sense than if economics were not considered. But is this really how legislators govern? If so, then what of the hate crime legislation? Is there an economic motivation for dis-incentiveizing bigotry?

I also ran across a book called, Government: servant or master? that attempts to answer some of the questions I’ve got swirling around in my head. From the back cover, “The authors do not shrink from debunking the exaggerated prestige of democratic government which instead of being a guarantor of private rights regularly violates them on the debased pleas of “public interest”.”

Too much to deal with in one blog posts, but definitely a topic I intend to explore further.

I wrote this piece back in late November and forgot to post it.  I still agree with what I’ve written, so decided there’s no reason not to just publish it now.
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I learned a new term yesterday- security theater.  A phrase coined by Bruce Schneier, security technologist and author, it’s something that only serves to make people feel more secure without doing anything to actually improve security, much like the TSA security measures for screening of airliner passengers.

While I understand that some form of security is necessary to protect travelers, the methods currently being employed are beyond acceptable in my eyes.  I cannot envision permitting our young son to go through either the full body imaging scanner or the more aggressive pat downs that have recently been put in place.  I’m thankful we’re not set to fly somewhere already, as it would be a hard to face the loss of the money spent on tickets, but I think at this point foregoing the flight is something I’d do.

It’s beyond imaginable to me that people would even begin to think the aggressive behaviour that constitutes the advanced pat down is OK when in any other context it would be a crime. Modesty aside, the safety of the scanners is unproven in my mind, considered by many scientists to be potentially dangerous.  Yet, I hear coworkers defending the practices, and passing it off as no big deal! It can only be fear talking, the traditional technique used to elicit such a response.

When writing this post, I tried to examine many sides of this issue and look at my personal fears on the topic. What I found was that it’s more like indignation than fear in my case.

One one hand, you have the issue of being forced to  submit to the full body scanners, a multifaceted problem. Even if you ignore the part about some stranger viewing pictures of your naked body, there’s still the problem with the radiation from the scanners.  Of course the TSA says they’re safe, but that’s with limited testing and when they’re operating within normal limits.  But what if they’re not operated correctly (as happens even in the medical world where people are very well trained and paid, and that’s not the case with TSA workers) and are giving off more radiation than they should? And what effect does it having on growing kids brains? And since this is in addition to the radiation received in flight, what effect does the cumulative exposure have on health? Does it make one more likely to get cancer? Just so many unknowns!

On the other hand, you have the fear of humiliation, coupled with outrage and indignation about personal bodily integrity.  I firmly believe that the government should not have the right to control what we do with our bodies, that it  should be left up to the individual (and parent).  In the western world, we value our right not to have our bodies touched without our consent.  In this case, there is no other option. Sure, you can choose to go through the scanners, but even after doing that you may be forced to go through the pat down process.  While I may decide that this trade off makes sense for me, I just cannot put my son through that.  Just how does one explain to a child that a random low-level security guard is on the list of people that should be allowed to touch their genitals? You can’t; it’s just not justifiable.

Have you seen the video of the young boy being strip searched? What about the one where the disabled passenger’s urine bag is broken? While it’s good for people to see these things happening, for all to be aware of just what’s going on, it also adds to the growing level of fear of what will happen if we do implement the procedures. And I don’t even want to think about what happens when they encourage the use of this technology for all forms of public transportation!

I think we’d be hearing less public outrage, if we knew the new measures were effective. But that’s the point of security theater– effectiveness is not the goal.

According to Schneier, our current response to terrorism, “relies on the idea that we can somehow make ourselves safer by protecting against what the terrorists happened to do last time.”  And this is so true!  Terrorist will always evolve to incorporate the most recent changes into their plans. If you do look at 9/11, the example brought up by so many in defense of the TSA practices, you’d realize that the same attack would not be allowed to happen today, irregardless of the right of security personnel to touch your “junk”. Cockpit doors have been reinforced and passengers are now willing to fight to make sure planes aren’t being used as weapons.

Scnheier also argues that there’s no need to subject citizens to increasingly invasive search methods when, “the best defenses against terrorism are largely invisible: investigation, intelligence, and emergency response.”  I really agree with Scneier, and also loved his piece in the New York Times debate on the topic of body scanners making us safer. It’s one of the only sensible things I’ve read on the topic over the last few days.

So what’s the cost of all this security theater? Millions of taxpayer dollars, loss of bodily autonomy, increased public fear. People are willingly submitting to be harassed in order to visit their family members or go on vacation.  Some would argue that it’s just the price you have to pay if you want to travel via air. I’ve decided that price is too steep for my family to accept. For the unforeseeable future, we’ll be avoiding flying.

New York Mayor Bloomberg’s attempt to get federal permission to block food stamp recipients from using them to buy soda was all over the news today.

Many people have complained that it’s “Big Brother” government telling you what you can can’t eat, and the start of a slippery slope towards them legislating what is and isn’t allowed. However, I don’t find this to be a credible argument.

Mayor Bloomberg is not attempting to block the sales of pop all together, just say that you can’t buy it on the government’s dime.  When you accept the government’s assistance, you do so knowing there are rules attached. After all, the government is the one providing the food stamps and just like with any of their other programs, they determine the guidelines and can administer the program as they see fit.

In fact, the government already limits other items from being purchased with food stamps, such as alcohol, household products, vitamins, cigarettes and other non-food things.  And there’s certainly precedent for limiting specific food choices as well. If you look at state sponsored WIC programs (a program that provides food and supplies for women, infants and children under five), there are stringent regulations surrounding what can be purchased.  Many states only allow recipients to buy certain types of items, insisting on 100% fruit juice instead of “orange drink” for example.

Food stamps are not, as one correspondent on NPR alleged, an income supplement.  It does exactly what it says on the tin!  It’s  officially called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and it’s a program meant to help people buy nutritious food.  No matter what Pepsi or Coke says, soda is not a food, whether nutritious or not (and not surprisingly, the answer is a firm no).

I also don’t think it’s fair to say disallowing soda will be a huge inconvenience and ruin shopping efficiency.  It’s no more inconvenient than disallowing toilet paper, shampoo or any other non-food item you might also buy in a grocery store.  The food stamp program does not provide a high enough amount for it to cover all of a household’s grocery expenses anyway, and it’s not intended to. Splitting the ticket is common. Families will have to use at least some money coming from other sources in order to buy many of their grocery items. Adding soda to that list does not seem to be that much of a stretch. And why can’t stores police soda in the same way they do other disallowed items?

I think it only makes sense to revisit government programs from time to time and see what can be done to make them better.  With a record number of people on food stamps due to the poor economy, pursuing any benefit or efficiency that can be gained seems like a good idea.