[ExI] Transparent Society problem

[spike at rainier66.com]

-----Original Message-----
From: extropy-chat <extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org> On Behalf Of
Stuart LaForge
Subject: Re: [ExI] Transparent Society problem

BillK wrote:


>> In the UK there exists the Public Order Act 1986 which aims to ensure 
> that individual rights to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly 
> are balanced against the rights of others to go about their daily 
> lives without being harassed, alarmed or distressed...


Since BillK wrote this a few days ago, it has been rattling around in my
brain like a golf ball in a 55 gallon drum.

In the USA, the rights of the people are spelled out in the constitution;
there is no need to balance those against anything.  Legally those rights
win in the long run.

I have heard the argument that people have the right to not be harassed,
which is used against people who go onto college campuses with posters of
aborted fetuses and crap like that, but from what I understand, that kind of
thing is first amendment protected speech.  If it is a public university and
the poster child gets assaulted (a common consequence) then the one doing
the assaulting is guilty, the poster child is innocent.

I notice the anti-abortion crowd will often get sturdy-looking children who
are just under 18 to carry the posters.  Most college students are 18 or
older.  So if some outraged collegian takes a swing at some 300 pound
gorilla (who is 17) the video evidence shown in court is a woman assaulting
a child.  Things tend to go badly with those kind of charges.

Conclusion: Americans do not have the right to not be offended.  I can't
find that one anywhere in the Bill of Rights.

>>... A case has arisen recently where an offensive private party was 
> recorded and the video posted online...

Ja, more weirdness occurs as we enter the age of super-accountability.
Since the advent of technology which enables easy large-scale video and
audio recording, any offhanded comment by any Hollyweird bit actor becomes a
news story.  Simultaneously, any comment or act seen or comment heard by
several people, but not recorded, never happened.  With super-accountability
comes super-forgiveness for anything for which hard evidence is absent.  The
plethora of external storage of data has caused collective amnesia.  If one
is well known to have been a total asshole in the past but without digital
documentation, his reputation is mostly erased with all the good people's
digitally undocumented past.

Fun example: local high school principal, young, energetic, up and coming,
fast riser, highly regarded, considered the likely next superintendent.  The
day after the 2016 election, the students staged a walkout, assembled on the
field.  He went out there with a bullhorn and demonstrated solidarity with
them by shouting over the bullhorn FUCK DONALD TRUMP to massive cheers.
Someone recorded it on her cell phone, posted it to FaceBook within minutes,
showed up on mainstream news within the hour, his career was a smoldering
ruin by the end of the day.  For the next month, if one entered into Google
the name of our town, that video was the first five hits.  Of course no one
would hire him.  His LinkIn page is silent.  We don't know where he went.

Object lesson: this is the age of super-accountability.

spike