From: Eric Murray <ericm@lne.com>
Date: Mon, 29 Jul 1996 04:34:38 +0800
To: m5@vail.tivoli.com (Mike McNally)
Subject: Re: Feinstein wants controls on Internet, Books
In-Reply-To: <31FBA2D3.C32@vail.tivoli.com>
Message-ID: <199607281835.LAA01418@slack.lne.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Mike McNally writes:
> 
> Either that, or Ms. Feinstein assumes (depressingly, perhaps correctly) 
> that her constituency is itself so collectively idiotic that they'll 
> accept such activity as good work done for their benefit.

Of course.  She'll have "done something" about the "terrorisim problem".
Never mind that it's completely ineffective and restrictive of
civil liberties.  Most Americans don't particularly care about
civil liberties as long as their day-to-day life runs smoothly.
Especially if it's other people's civil liberties that are
restricted.

The media hypes the terrorisim threat because it helps sell air
time and newspapers.  Fear sells.  How many of you were glued to the tube
for the dismal "coverage" of the Olympic Park bombing?  I was, and I
usually hate TV.  Fear is a powerful attention-getter, almost at good
as sex.  Since we're not allowed to have sex in the media, guess what
we get?

The articicially-generated climate of fear creates a reaction among
the populace.  Witness the countless studies that show that people's
fear of being a crime victim has increased markedly in the last 10 or
15 years while actual crime statistics have for the most part gone down.
The politicians have picked up on this reaction with a vengance, being
"tough on crime" is a sure way to get (re)elected.

 
> So infuriating, in fact, that I'll vent a bit more.  How effective does
> Ms. Feinstein imagine a ban on bomb-building information might be?  Those
> who've already learned can't be expected to forget, so there'll be a 
> period of time during which today's crop of crazed bombers work the
> urges out of their systems.

[..]

DiFi and crowd isn't thinking of how their information crackdown would
actually work.  They probably don't really care if it'll be effective or
not.  The point is to "do something" right now about the "terrible
problem".  That something just has to sound like it'll be effective; no
one will find out if it works or not for 10 or 15 years, which is an
eternity for politicians (and most constituents).


-- 
Eric Murray  ericm@lne.com  ericm@motorcycle.com  http://www.lne.com/ericm
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