Hacker News Reader

HNHacker News

Top New Best Ask Show Jobs

Comment by electrograv | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

electrograv·

> Criminals are in fact normal people.

Could you elaborate more on this claim?

In an ideal world, criminal behavior is supposed to be defined as abnormal and unwanted behavior.

* Is my definition of “criminal” for an ideal world way off target?

* Or, are you mostly critiquing how non-ideal our current world is, and the injustice of many laws currently on the books?

* Something else?

View on HN

Read Alex Kozinski and Misha Tseytlin's classic essay "You're (Probably) a Federal Criminal" – http://alex.kozinski.com/articles/Youre_Probably_a_Federal_C... - in the US, there are so many federal crimes, so expansively defined, that almost every adult has probably committed at least one, and the only thing keeping them from prison is that they aren't on some prosecutor's hitlist. And I don't think this is an exclusively American problem either, it is a problem in many other countries too.

It serves the side effect|purpose of making people actionable literally from birth. That is, if some day you become an inconvenient someone for people in power, it's just a matter of finding something you did in the past that can ruin your life Cardinal Richelieu style.

The majority of Americans have smoked pot, are a majority now criminals?

Most people are not cops either. Most cultures (aside from some sometimes vocal subcultures) do appear to consider their abuses unwanted anomalous behaviour.

Most people are breaking some law, it just depends how vigorously we want to enforce the law against you.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com