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Comment by DeusExMachina | Hacker News Reader

What I don't get, instead, are the people who, like you, find a no fly-list acceptable.

If you punch a person on the street, you get charged. Same if you punch a flight attendant on a plane.

You might even go to jail in both cases. But what you don't get in the first case is to be put on a blacklist that prevents you from using some services. If you punch a person in a supermarket, you are not banned from supermarkets.

What you advocate for reminds of proscription lists in ancient Rome or the social credit system of the CCP.

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> If you punch a person in a supermarket, you are not banned from supermarkets.

Uh, I dunno. We definitely banned disruptive people from our supermarket. And we’d happily let other supermarkets nearby know that Mr. X was an asshole that should be treated with extreme caution (and vice versa).

I don’t see why the government needs to get involved with this though. Airlines are perfectly capable of making and sharing such a list themselves.

But you can't ban them from all supermarkets in the country forever. That's what the no-fly list does.

If the supermarkets share such a list: why not?

There is a reason not all sentences are life sentences. Sometimes people do things wrong and if they are willing to change their ways we as a society should forgive them if it's safely possible. Just because someone does something wrong once doesn't mean they are that person forever.

Essential business. So now that person needs to rely on other people for groceries?

Actions have consequences, you say?

I can't explain it but every time I hear that phrase I get a very visceral feeling of injustice. The phrase represents extrajudicial punishment by a mob or powerful entity, and the negation of fairness, proportionality, and due process, often expressed by a person who does not care because they are certain that they themselves will not fall victim to abuses of such systems.

Why would it ban them forever? That’s something you can choose to do, or not.

> If you punch a person in a supermarket, you are not banned from supermarkets.

If you punch a person in a supermarket, authorities can be summoned to take you away. If you do that on a plane, that can't be done. Planes are safe because things are heavily regulated and expected to go according to an extremely strict plan. Any aberration increases the risk of a catastrophic event.

Your comparison does not work. You can be taken away from a supermarket in that instance. You can legally come back to the same supermarket in the future. And even if the owner decides you are not welcome in his store, you can go to any other store.

Banning a person from ever flying again is not the same thing at all.

I’m not taking a position here, but you didn’t counter their argument. They also explicitly stated that it’s not the same thing, but that it’s reasonable it gets treated differently because of the security ramifications. You didn’t engage with that line of thinking, you just reiterated that the context is different, which you both already seem to agree on.

Yes, they basically repeated the same argument to which I responded.

"You can legally come back to the same supermarket in the future." Incorrect, you can be trespassed and thus legally prevented from coming back to the same supermarket in the future.

Ok, let's use drunk driving as an example.

If you drive drunk and are caught, you can lose your license, which technically, means you can never drive yourself again.

> which technically, means you can never drive yourself again.

I haven't audited all 50 states, but at least in all the states I've lived in, there is no way to permanently lose your license from any number of DUIs. The license suspensions (and jail time) go up for each DUI someone gets, but they're always able to get their license back at some point.

Here in NL, a driver's license can be forfeited by judicial order. Usually in such cases, the driver has to re-take the driving test and can regain their driver's license that way, but it takes time and is quite costly around here.

Which is why it might make sense to get the government involved, instead of having a purely private-sector no-fly-list sharing among airlines, which would effectively ground someone without supervision or recourse.

(Though I can imagine some libertarians reply "well, just take your own plane..." :-)

Yes, absolutely agree. Having such list is as important to flight safety as all the other FAA regulations.

You should be banned from that particular supermarket. But that's up to the owner.

AFAIK the pilots decides who are eligible to get on a flight or not. So I guess they can say that they don’t want to have people with a prior history on their plane. The pilots are responsible for the flights safety.

Most professional sports teams in the US ban fans that fight in the stadiums. In regards to banning people in supermarkets - yes, the store is entirely within its right to ban the customer: https://axislc.com/public/can-a-business-ban-a-customer/

Clearly the system has not been abused too much if you are not even aware this is how it already works.

An airline is a business - why would a business want to transport a passenger who has a history of criminal misconduct onboard their aircraft? The airlines have a duty to protect their employees, and a duty of care towards other passengers. They also have a rightful interest in running their services on-time and without disruption.

In the US, airlines are common carriers - which involves certain obligations like published pricing and non-discrimination - but that still allows them the right to refuse carriage on reasonable grounds. You can argue what "reasonable grounds" means, but "criminal history of violent or disruptive behavior onboard an aircraft" seems like it's probably going to suffice.

You can be banned from driving though if you risk endangering others.

Very instructive comparison... and considering the current laws on DUI (driving under the influence of alcohol, a clear endangerment to others imo) is instructive.

In my area:

* First offense (failed sobriety test): 6 month ban

* Second offense: 12 month ban

Convictions are different: they draw bans of 1, 5, and 10 years. You need 4 convictions for a lifetime ban.

Most counts reset after N years.

Now compare this to the suggestions for an airline no-fly list. The permissiveness with which alcohol + driving is treated in the US boggles the mind, but I think it's clear from this a similar proposal for airlines would be very lenient.

I'm not sure I am in favour of a no-fly list, however, flying (unlike other examples in this thread; walking across the street, going to a supermarket etc) is not a basic human need. You (and many others do) do not need to ever fly in your life to live a happy and fulfilled life, without any pressure (you could never visit a supermarket but that's actually much harder; most people will never fly in their lives automatically anyway). For most people it is a minor inconvenience if they could never fly again and a minority will have to find another job. A list like it would have little or no impact on anything basically for by far most people on earth. So the question is, is having the list so beneficial for enough people (who are in these planes where repeat offenders kick up a stink) to go through the trouble of creating one?

Well, if we're doing strict utilitarianism, I don't like you much after this comment, maybe I can find five friends to vote you off airplanes?

That would probably give us more pleasure than you derive utility from your privilege to fly, depriving other people is always satisfying.

Oh your computer? Not a basic need either. Hand it over comrade, there are more socially useful purposes than posting on Hacker News!

For each person who punched a flight attendant I bet there are 5 on the list who didn’t come even close to that. The list itself can be used as a threat.

Around here (NL), notorious shoplifters are banned from certain shopping centres. The shopkeepers keep a list with photo's and share it among them. This is established practice (though I'm not sure how widespread) and isn't even considered a GDPR violation as long as the list isn't made public, since protecting yourself from fraud is a legitimate business interest.

Yes, in an ideal world this wouldn't be needed because you could trust the police to handle such cases adequately, but they don't. Hence, where justice fails, you see alternative systems prop up (also see #metoo, cancel culture).

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