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Comment by giarc | Hacker News Reader

Imagine you are a tradesperson and get hired for some job. You go to the house, complete the work, only to later find out the owner of the house (who was there the whole time) was legally required to self-isolate due to risk of having COVID. How would you feel? What if the tradesperson lived with elderly parents or had kids or someone they were in touch with that was high risk?

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7 months in prison is an insane punishment for "you could possibly have COVID and your contractor could possibly not be able to get a vaccine or wear a mask or etc and he could also have immunocompromised family members". Note that Western Australia has a 7 day average of 1 covid case and not a single death since May 2020 (9 total COVID deaths) [0].

The maximum term for drunk driving in Perth is 18 months[1] and that's for a repeat offense with a BAC in excess of 0.15. Is our contractor scenario really ~5 times more dangerous than multiple driving-while-absolutely-hammered offenses?

[0]: https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=covid+c...

[1]: https://www.gotocourt.com.au/drink-driving/wa/dui-penalties/

The number of possible deaths is _far_ higher. The chance is almost certainly lower. I would not be at all surprised if on the balance it's way worse than 5 times more dangerous, in terms of expected lives lost (in statistical terms).

The point is we're now at the point of jailing people based on conjecture and projection and statistics instead of them committing an actual crime.

What is the statistical likelihood that any person of a specific religious group will commit an act of terrorism? Should we find that number and then jail a random swath of their population?

It is an actual crime. This person risked many people's lives for their own convenience. He did actual actions, not possible future activity.

If I fire a gun into a building blindly, the chance I kill anyone is low. Should that be legal?

I think we're all arguing for sentencing in proportion to risk; we differ in our relative risk assessments. You mention that you think being near someone (presumably while masked?) is at least 5x more dangerous than drunk driving (per your comment upthread) while I (and presumably the parent) disagree.

I don't know about that. Ggp seems to be arguing that any crime based on risk (and not outcome) should not be a crime, though their possibly forthcoming reply may clarify.

If we agree it should be a crime and just disagree on severity, that seems fair enough and (at least to me) not worth any further discussion than I already engaged in on it.

Yeah, I can't speak for him. We definitely outlaw things that are simply very risky (e.g., drunk driving) whether or not anyone is actually injured. I don't have a problem with prohibiting unnecessary social gatherings, but this feels like it should be a $200 USD fine--certainly not 5 times the max drunk driving sentence.

7 months is not five times 18 months, did you misread this as 7 years?

What if they found out before, not later? The story doesn't say he failed to inform. In fact, it was someone whom he informed who informed on him.

People don't get to make the rules.

He's being accused of endangerment by the GP comment, which assumes he lied and omitted his status. That's speculation and has nothing to do with the law he supposedly broke.

I said people don't get to make the rules referring to your comment about what if the homeowner informed the tradesperson first. Well that's the thing, you can't break the rules just because everyone is in agreement that it's ok. There were many documented parties that occurred during the pandemic and just because everyone was aware they were breaking rules, doesn't make it legal.

By the story, we don't have enough information to determine that, and it wouldn't make it moral if so, but even questioning this is taboo.

I guess stating facts is beyond the pale.

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