UK Concentration camps for Mussies?

[JimC]

Brian Peacock wrote:

The issue is a knotty one for sure, but at risk of invoking the slippery slope argument, even if we use internment to ring fence the hard-core idiots as soon as some idiot from outside the ring does something reprehensible the lazy politician with an eye on their majority will have a ready excuse to expand the ring. The legal and social pitfalls are not worth the hassle of making it easier for election-focused politicians to appear tough and uncompromising while doing very little but telling the police to "Round 'em up boys". The lessons of our own recent history should teach us that we need proper, robust frameworks for dealing with those intent on causing harm in the name of their pet cause rather than casting a wide net and hoping we catch all the right fish.

It would need to be a narrow net, in the sense of a particular set of circumstances involving a real chance of harm to the population where court convictions are unlikely...

[Hermit]

Yeah, but it's still internment without trial. If there's evidence arrest the buggers, or failing that we have a mechanism for house arrest and electronic tagging.

Is the house arrest still without trial?

And a real problem would be if authorities had compelling evidence that X is part of a real terrorist threat, but for whatever reason (often technical), it would not stand up in court. Lose innocent lives, or remain paralysed by legal niceties?

Our protections are not legal niceties. Habeas corpus is the core of our protection from arbitrary arrest, and there is no way to control such arbitrariness "under special circumstances". If evidence is not sufficient to lead to a charge it is by definition not compelling. You'd understand if you were one of the 731 (out of 780) prisoners at Guantanamo Bay prison who were eventually released without ever being charged with anything. Your claim to be a moderate is total bullshit.

[cronus]

I don't claim to be a moderate in the pursuit of saving lives. If there are three thousand potential terrorists then lock them up. These are all potential mass murderers. And this is a sovereign nation again now. We can make laws to do what we want here....exactly like America.

[JimC]

Yeah, but it's still internment without trial. If there's evidence arrest the buggers, or failing that we have a mechanism for house arrest and electronic tagging.

Is the house arrest still without trial?

And a real problem would be if authorities had compelling evidence that X is part of a real terrorist threat, but for whatever reason (often technical), it would not stand up in court. Lose innocent lives, or remain paralysed by legal niceties?

Our protections are not legal niceties. Habeas corpus is the core of our protection from arbitrary arrest, and there is no way to control such arbitrariness "under special circumstances". If evidence is not sufficient to lead to a charge it is by definition not compelling. You'd understand if you were one of the 731 (out of 780) prisoners at Guantanamo Bay prison who were eventually released without ever being charged with anything. Your claim to be a moderate is total bullshit.

As is often the case, you miss my point. Most of the time, the legal niceties of our society are important and useful, and should not be abandoned lightly.

However, it is possible that certain circumstances would require a choice between a very real potential of many innocent lives being lost or making an exception to those normally valuable legal niceties. Without invoking a slippery slope argument, I think it reasonable that competent authorities can make that choice, as long as there was judicial oversight, if only in retrospect. Guantanamo Bay is not a good counter argument - it was not done by competent authorities, it was done by Americans...

[pErvinalia]

I don't claim to be a moderate in the pursuit of saving lives. If there are three thousand potential terrorists then lock them up. These are all potential mass murderers. And this is a sovereign nation again now. We can make laws to do what we want here....exactly like America.

You're a potential mass murderer, what with all the dark fantasies you engage in..

[Hermit]

Yeah, but it's still internment without trial. If there's evidence arrest the buggers, or failing that we have a mechanism for house arrest and electronic tagging.

Is the house arrest still without trial?

And a real problem would be if authorities had compelling evidence that X is part of a real terrorist threat, but for whatever reason (often technical), it would not stand up in court. Lose innocent lives, or remain paralysed by legal niceties?

Our protections are not legal niceties. Habeas corpus is the core of our protection from arbitrary arrest, and there is no way to control such arbitrariness "under special circumstances". If evidence is not sufficient to lead to a charge it is by definition not compelling. You'd understand if you were one of the 731 (out of 780) prisoners at Guantanamo Bay prison who were eventually released without ever being charged with anything. Your claim to be a moderate is total bullshit.

As is often the case, you miss my point. Most of the time, the legal niceties of our society are important and useful, and should not be abandoned lightly.

However, it is possible that certain circumstances would require a choice between a very real potential of many innocent lives being lost or making an exception to those normally valuable legal niceties. Without invoking a slippery slope argument, I think it reasonable that competent authorities can make that choice, as long as there was judicial oversight, if only in retrospect. Guantanamo Bay is not a good counter argument - it was not done by competent authorities, it was done by Americans...

I get where you're coming from, and far from missing your point, I simply flatly disagree that ignoring "legal niceties" can be controlled. Retrospectively? You must be joking. It's literally trying to catch a train that has already left the station when those who do the retrospective control can finish up imprisoned without charge.

And Guantanamo Bay is an excellent example of what happens when we allow "likely suspects" to be imprisoned without charge. Or can you think of a better one in the real world?

[NineBerry]

There are 7 billion potential terrorists on this planet. Lock them all up.

[cronus]

There are 7 billion potential terrorists on this planet. Lock them all up.

Stuck at the bottom of a gravity well, where they all belong.

[Svartalf]

There are 7 billion potential terrorists on this planet. Lock them all up.

I already live under self imposed house arrest, little more is necessary

[cronus]

There are 7 billion potential terrorists on this planet. Lock them all up.

I already live under self imposed house arrest, little more is necessary

Tag and chip and dna swab everyone at birth. No one moves unless I say.

[Tyrannical]

Just "declare" war on radical Islamists. Then you can call them POW's.

[cronus]

Just "declare" war on radical Islamists. Then you can call them POW's.

How's that obvious solution going stateside, then?

[Svartalf]

it's got problem because to do that would require a suspension of the First Amendment... to start with, I don't know how many other statutes and constitutional laws such a measure would break

[Cormac]

Yeah, but it's still internment without trial. If there's evidence arrest the buggers, or failing that we have a mechanism for house arrest and electronic tagging.

Is the house arrest still without trial?

And a real problem would be if authorities had compelling evidence that X is part of a real terrorist threat, but for whatever reason (often technical), it would not stand up in court. Lose innocent lives, or remain paralysed by legal niceties?

The problem with this is that once such powers are used for one case, they will be used for other cases.

The reason we, in Common Law jurisdictions, don't generally have this, is because before we invented habeus corpus and the right to presumed innocence, and the rights to be charged and tried before our peers, governments were brutal, cruel, and abused this kind of power.

This is not something any country should do lightly.


And I wonder what one has to do to become a "person of interest"?


Regarding "slippery slope" fallacy accusations - this is not a question of MIGHT happen. It is a fact of experience. The reason we prohibit such powers is because of the entire history of law up to the innovations I mention above.

[pErvinalia]

But it will be different this time.