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Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, February 22 2013 @ 02:53 PM EST |
More like: It WILL be used against you in any shape or form
required.
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Authored by: IANALitj on Friday, February 22 2013 @ 03:45 PM EST |
There was a joke about a hundred years ago, "Do right and fear no man;
don't write and fear no woman."
This was in the era of breach of promise of marriage suits, an era that is now
well past in many places. (There were less common actions that are even less
remembered; for example, seduction was a father's action for damages against a
man who led his daughter astray.)
In New York, the legislature put a stop to these concerns with three related
pieces of legislation. Section 8-a of the New York Civil Rights Law is
"Causes of Action for Alienation of Affections, Criminal Conversation,
Seduction and Breach of Contract to Marry Abolished":
Causes of action for alienation of affections, criminal conversation,
seduction and breach of contract to marry abolished. The rights of action to
recover sums of money as damages for alienation of affections, criminal
conversation, seduction, or breach of contract to marry are abolished. No act
done within this state shall operate to give rise, either within or without this
state, to any such right of action. No contract to marry made or entered into
in this state shall operate to give rise, either within or without this state,
to any cause or right of action for its breach.
The legislature went farther: it closed the courts of New York to actions on
these grounds based on acts in other states. And it went farther yet, and made
it a minor felony to bring such an action in New York or threaten to do so.
Since conviction of a felony results in automatic disbarment, this is a severe
incentive for lawyers not to misbehave.
This is an example of what is meant when an argument is made along the lines of
"if the legislature had intended the construction you propose, it would
have made its intention clearer."
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Authored by: symbolset on Saturday, February 23 2013 @ 06:19 AM EST |
Considering that (as seen in Newspicks) it is now the executive policy of the United States Presidential
Administration that "Americans should have easy access to the results of
research they help support" and that not just the papers but the data too should
be available to all for free, it seems they were making an example of a guy for
advocating a social change that was needed.
They are on the wrong side of
history on this one. They will rationalize and defend their actions because
they really don't understand what they've done, why we perceive it a dire evil
and a threat to progress and the nation. They thought this was what they were
supposed to do, and that is supposed to make it OK. The mental shift to accept
that they exercised power stridently in such harmful ways would involve
internalizing guilt for working hard to cause harm not just to a single person,
but to the larger community and ultimately a crime against all mankind. Humans
just aren't engineered to make that sort of turn quickly. Some never
can.
These people still think they're fighting the good fight for Justice and
the American Way - wielding the courts and prisons and hundreds of thousands of
armed peace officers as weapons against the darkness of anarchy. That makes them
incredibly dangerous. Since they cannot emotionally accept that they have done
wrong they need to be retired from service for the good of the community as much
as the human preditors they are supposed to be looking for need to be locked
away. [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, February 23 2013 @ 11:06 AM EST |
-- Alma [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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