Britons named world's biggest emitters

[Sundae]

We are well trained in double-think here. Like all the mobile phone users want universal coverage, but no-one wants a phone mast within 10 miles of their home, workplace, child's school, playground etc etc.

So we want anyone vaguely suspect on a database, so they can be locked up indefinitely, but the idea that Mrs Smith down the road should have her cheek swabbed is ludicrous.

[Aliantha]

NIMBY!

[DanaC]

*grins*

Oh please, I have to deal with a lot of NIMBYism in my work. Frustrates the living hell out of me. It always amazes me how quickly people can whip up a protest group steering committee if it involves the slightest change to the look of their street, but damn, can ya get these people out of their houses when something big is going off?

[Aliantha]

Many industries have the same problem with nimbyism, some rightly so. It's a big problem in a lot of ways though. someone's always going to be unhappy. The trick is to start paying people to accept having things in their back yard. Then you get swamped by people being pissed of because they weren't offered.

Doesn't really matter what you do, you can't win.

[Sundae]

At least you have a fair amount of space over there. We're such a crowded little island that everything is in someone's back yard.

[Aliantha]

lol...believe me Sundae, it can be 500 km's away and someone will still claim it's in their personal space.

[DanaC]

My great-great...not sure how many greats-grandfather on dad's side was a country parson, who went out to India with the British East India Company. Did very well for himself and his offspring became Indigo plantation owners. In fact Dad's family were the last of the great Indigo families in India. Grandfather, as the second son, would not have inherited the family estate anyway, so he went into governance. He was Chief Auditor of Indian railways, with (I kid ye not) his own train, or rather a train for his own use.

He used to tell fabulous stories, like when some bandits (or rebels, I could never be sure) tried to derail his train. I don't remember at what point he ended up stood on a rock firing his army revolver, but it was a good story:P Oh and the time his servant was bitten by a poisonous snake, whilst they were out hunting crocodile.


Brits may have come across the Fast Show, with Paul Whitehouse. The old man telling stories, really reminds me of Grandfather, right down to the green leather chair he's sitting on.

[Cicero]

~snip~"If there's a criminal we're interested in, not necessarily in a position to arrest him, but if you're trying to track this criminal, learn his lifestyle, his movements, his vehicle number will be put into the system, and any time he comes into the city, his movements will be tracked," said Roger Clayton, chief inspector of Gloucester.~snip~

Here in the United States the people are saying that you at least need probable cause. I guess that is the difference between Americans and Britons. Not that I'm sitting here calculating differences, but I believe in peoples right to privacy.

If I were there I think I would get confused between the actual trash and the actual receptacle and might throw the wrong thing in the wrong place...but I am a rude American.

It's suprising what we can get used to. Being investigated without cause has never made me feel safer.

Yea....I do think catching people for loitering and then releaseing them is a great idea and a great way to spend the public's money and your time.....I'm not sure why we should put up with people doing nothing in the wrong place here in America. We should adopt this all across the United States...just like Colorado where people were caught loitering in public parks.

[DanaC]

~"If there's a criminal we're interested in, not necessarily in a position to arrest him, but if you're trying to track this criminal, learn his lifestyle, his movements, his vehicle number will be put into the system, and any time he comes into the city, his movements will be tracked,"

This sounds to me like probable cause. Just not enough evidence to actually issue an arrest warrant. You can be breathalised, or have your bag searched, if the police feel they have reasonable cause for suspicion. That doesn't mean they have enough evidence to convict. If the police were only ever able to search/question/breathalise or investigate people when they already have enough evidence for an arrest then they would be unlikely to ever gain that evidence.

He's not said that anybody they don't like the look of will be tracked; he's suggesting that if they have reasonable grounds for suspicion they will continue to monitor and investigate that individual. I would have thought that constituted much of police work.

[Cicero]

Yes...you are right Dana. That statement is too ambiguous to tell. Now isn't it?

It's alright if you are all under a self-imposed investigation in Britain and you don't mind. Hey, if that's what you guys really want-do it. The people have spoken.

Oooh...I've got that Kafka feeling...I hate that feeling.

I will not accept this in the country I live in if I get the choice. People have a right to privacy. I am an adult that doesn't need to be told how to throw my trash away or how to wipe my own ass.

Tell me when they finally report the OmegaVision goggles and how it's ok to peer into your home and watch you scratch your ass on the way to your fridge for milk. (the scenarios could get worse from there) When will you say enough is enough? When is when? How far is too far?

I don't think you need to be filmed all the time Dana. As fun as that sounds..... Is it ok to be taken in for suspicion of loitering if it keeps the real loiterers off the streets?

[Aliantha]

Gee...take out the smilies from Ciceros' posts and there you have rkz.

I don't know how Dana and other Brits feel about what you've put in your last couple of posts Cicero, but from the outside looking in (and also being from a country with very similar laws) I'd say you've got no idea. That's the problem with some people from the US. You're so wrapped up in your own ideals about things that you can't see that there are other ways of doing things which might be just as good... or heaven forbid. Even better!

[Cicero]

I know Ali....

Some people have this version of heaven that happens to be my version of hell and vice versa. American or not.

But I would still like the answer from Dana....on when will enough be enough because I give a flip about her opinion.

[DanaC]

I don't think you need to be filmed all the time Dana. As fun as that sounds..... Is it ok to be taken in for suspicion of loitering if it keeps the real loiterers off the streets?

I don't think people get taken in here for loitering. Unless it's loitering with intent

[DanaC]

But I would still like the answer from Dana....on when will enough be enough because I give a flip about her opinion.

I dunno. When will it enough be enough in America? In another thread we see that your president and whitehouse can act outside of the law, on such things as phone tapping without a warrant. Yet Americans consistently point to our law enforcement and cameras and tell me that this is an invasion of our privacy.

If the people are requesting, nay demanding, more cctv, who are the police and politicians to deny them that? If the police have enough evidence to suspect a criminal, but not enough to issue an arrest warrant, should they just throw up their hands and say "oh well, let him go, don't bother watching him or attempting to gather evidence about his activities"?

Honestly Cicero, I think you guys have a strange view of freedom. There's a real double standard in what you allow in your own country and what you perceive as amiss in mine.

[ZenGum]

This may be the line Cicero is looking for:
CCTV cameras only film public places. (Checks "L" is correctly used in that phrase )

On the street, if there were a police officer, they could stand and keep an eye on you. I have no problem with that. Inside your home, the police need a good reason (or your permission) to enter.
I am fine with CCTV in public places. I am opposed to it if it is used inside peoples' homes, especially against their will.
This gives Dana her protection from street hoodlums, and Cicero her privacy - inside her own home. You can't expect privacy on the public street, can you?

Cicero, your arse-scratching is indeed your own business, but throwing out your garbage is, I believe, public business. Once it leaves your home, you expect the city to deal with it. What if Mr Burns decided to start putting nuclear waste in the domestic garbage?
Mind you, that can go pretty extreme. In Japan, you must (a) sort your garbage into appropriate categories and (b) put it out in transparent plastic bags, so that people can see if their neighbours are doing the right thing. Not shocked yet? When this was first introduced, you had (by law) to write your name and address on all the garbage you threw out! Even in Japan this was going too far, and they fell back to the clear bags bit, figuring that shame and neighbourly disapproval would do the trick. Mostly it does.