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Comment by konschubert | Hacker News Reader

How about we start with not making stuff illegal that we don't want to enforce?

Necessary but not sufficient.

Weed is a category B drug in the UK: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannabis_in_the_United_Kingdom

This means "with penalties for unlicenced dealing, unlicenced production and unlicenced trafficking of up to 14 years in prison, an unlimited fine, or both. The maximum penalty for possession of cannabis is five years in prison and an unlimited fine."

The police absolutely try to enforce this: "In the survey-year ending March 2014, possession of cannabis offences accounted for 67% of all police recorded drug offences in the UK."

Despite this, "In 2017, 7.2% of 16 to 59-year-olds reported using cannabis in the last year, making it the most commonly used illegal drug in the United Kingdom."

If this law, all by itself, was perfectly enforced, the UK would bankrupt itself just on the extra spending in the prison system.

> If this law, all by itself, was perfectly enforced, the UK would bankrupt itself just on the extra spending in the prison system.

That conclusion ignores the interdependence of those effects. If people knew that it's going to be perfectly enforced, then almost nobody would do it anymore.

(Not that I'm a proponent of this particular law; just pointing out a flaw in your argument. Somebody wrong on the internet -- gotta reply!)

So that shouldn't be a law then, the argument goes.

I think it shouldn't be a law partly for that reason, but it's definitely an example of needing to go further than just repealing the laws nobody can be bothered to enforce.

But society wants selective enforcement.

Speeding laws are good when the stop that guy from endangering my kids. Or when they generate revenue from tourists.

Those same laws are awful when they inconvenience me.

I think one of our greatest failures as a species is that we have yet to architect a society in which these sorts of double standards of personal belief have sufficient consequences to prevent people from engaging in them with the fervor and frequency that they do.

I think one of our greatest failures as a species is the hubris of _thinking_ that we can "architect a society"

The organization of society is not outside our control. We've been architecting society for 1000s of years based on what has worked and what hasn't in years past. We aren't just along for the ride although that is a convenient excuse to do nothing and make no effort.

I wasn't necessarily suggesting to "do nothing and make no effort" - That's a strawman and false dichotomy. Sure, we can generally try to do more of what works and less of what doesn't. But usually the type of people who want to "architect society" end up being the worst type of "rules for thee but not for me" tyrants.

I think the Founding Fathers of the U.S. 'architected society' reasonably well in the 1770-1800 period?

Tip-of-the-hat to our founders, for sure! But I'd say they were architecting a government, not a society. That's a very important distinction, and without it you can end up with some really destructive Statist/Authoritarian stuff.

Regarding those first 25 years or so: Jefferson's attempt to ban slavery in 1784 failed by 1 vote. Then there was the Whiskey Rebellion in 1791 and then the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798. So, nothing's perfect I guess...

I highly doubt they ignored considerations of how their envisioned government would affect future society and vice versa.

Maybe I'm just being contrarian to your comment, but I've always thought the US and other countries are silly for not automating basic traffic enforcement.

Red light cameras should effectively catch 95%+ of people who blow through them. Speeding cameras (that are actually on, looking at you NYC) that are super visible are a known deterrent to speeding in Europe. Even parking - in some modern garages they have sensors to tell you when spots are full/empty. Why can't they use similar tech for parking tickets, street cleaning, etc?

I feel like I wouldn't be upset about rule enforcement if I knew everyone was more or less following them. What makes me ignore rules is when I see people taking advantage of them over and over without repercussions. Then, introducing human elements where the cop gets to decide who to ticket adds a bunch of bias that we haven't been able to correct. It's one of the countless examples of humans over-complicating things to the point of dysfunction.

A lot of places in the US have tried out automated speed traps and red light cameras. Some still use them AFAIK.

But what's common is that infractions are so widespread that there's a massive backlash and the programs get cancelled. There was an automatic speed trap on the interstate just south of Pittsburgh a few months ago, set up along side some temporary construction with reduced speed limits. A few weeks later there was a headline that it had generated so many tens of thousands of tickets that they were considering it an error and throwing out the tickets.

Not to mention they also cause accidents. People who see a red-light camera flash often hit the brakes, causing people behind them to rear-end them. There were a number of red-light cameras removed in the U.S. once it became clear they were snarling traffic on a weekly basis because of that.

We absolutely could do that. I don't know how US driving license work, but in the UK a speeding ticket gets you 3 penalty points on your license, where 12 points in 3 years gets you disqualified from driving: https://www.gov.uk/speeding-penalties

On this basis, the only people who would be allowed to drive a month after perfect enforcement starts, would be people who don't drive (plus the Queen because monarchy).

(Outside the hypothetical, the imperfection of the UK's speed cameras is such that the only ticket I've received was for an event that happened six months after I sold the car).

Generally, our licenses use similar points systems, but the actual implementation varies at the state level. 1-2 big speeding tickets (reckless driving, which can also be criminal) could be enough for a temporary suspension, but usually you'd need several in a row.

I've always though the points per unit time measurement system is dumb. Maybe points per 10k miles or something instead. Bill who gets into a wreck and drives like a bat out of hell the 3 times of the year he manages to break out of his schizophrenia disorder enough to drive could get only 9 points, or 3 points on every occasion he drives. Whereas the responsible driver who drives non-stop racking up 100,000 miles in a year and accidently driving through just 4 bad speed-trap towns by accident could end up with 12 points despite being far safer.

IMO the points system is as much about punishing people who depend on driving a lot as much as it is about punishing unsafe drivers.

The people do not support lawmakers who pass laws they do not want. Making traffic enforcement automatic would only be supported by the most strict law-abiding drivers, which is probably a minority. Your elected officials will not create laws that would cause you to vote them out of office. So, we don't have those laws, because we don't want them.

> I feel like I wouldn't be upset about rule enforcement if I knew everyone was more or less following them. What makes me ignore rules is when I see people taking advantage of them over and over without repercussions.

Yep, this is absolutely what happens. Very hard to get people to self-sacrifice and cooperate if there isn't enough momentum.

One of my favorite things to do on 55mph PA highways near Philly is to go the speed limit. All other drivers on that road are going 75-85mph. They treat you like a terrible person for going the speed limit. But eventually one person slows down behind you, then another, and after about 45 minutes, there's a line of cars going the speed limit, while people zooming by wonder if they should slow down.

As someone who used to drive heavy equipment that topped out around 60mph on flat ground I agree with the other drivers. You are a terrible person. If you used your rear view mirrors you would see that there's a constant cluster fuck of people cutting each other off trying to get out from behind you. This creates a bunch of unnecessary danger. And for what? So you can get some cheap virtue points from internet authoritarians with a justice boner? To say it boggles the mind that you think your behavior is defensible let along brag worthy is an understatement. I hope you cross paths with someone predisposed to violent road rage so that two dangerous people may be removed from the road without any innocent people being harmed.

Drive the same speed as the other traffic or take the bus. It's safer for everyone that way.

I heartily disagree with this take and your swearing doesn't help your point at all. Drive the speed limit, it's the law.

For basic traffic enforcement, you're right. However, poor implementation in the US has led to withdrawal of systems in some cities. I'll have to dig up details, but I recall a red-light system that was implemented as a revenue-share with the company contracted to build/maintain the system. That company set the timing of the camera such that it had many false-positives (it was basically triggering on yellow instead of red, IIRC). System was eventually shut down, but people are now rightfully wary of similar systems.

But, my comment wasn't meant to imply traffic is the only place this happens, it was just an easy example. We see the same with (building) code enforcement at all levels from HOA to city/town/county. We see excess policing/enforcement (to the point of infringing on individual rights) in certain neighborhoods and with certain ethnic groups (stop and frisk in NYC, for example).

Red light cameras are added along with shortening the yellow lights. More ticket revenue harvested, and more rear-ending from stopping more quickly when the light turned yellow.

It's the same reason we veered away from using the metric system at the gas pump: changing things went along with outright gouging. Too many venal actors in the American system.

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