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Comment by rngname22 | Hacker News Reader

It's not considered alarming to publicly state you believe those guilty of murder should face capital punishment - that is - to be executed by the state. Certainly not a view held by all but it's within the Overton window to state you hold the view.

I believe it should be normalized that we speak about the most egregious, permanent, impossible to reckon with environmental pollution in the same way - that is - it ought to be a crime to pollute in the most serious ways and that crime out to be punished with state executions.

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Thinking of it this way just as an exercise also leads you directly into how constructed the entire idea of crime even is.

All these articles in mainstream papers the last few years fomenting a panic about rising crime, calling it crime waves, etc. They are not talking about this. Because they don't mean this. We don't, for the most part, consider these to be crimes. Sometimes we may use that word, but you don't see the same flood of op-eds and public official press conferences calling for retributive justice.

Similar shit elsewhere. Shoplifting is a crime but hundreds of millions in wage fraud is just bad accounting, etc etc.

I agree. If somebody from Iraq did this to a US river, it would a catastrophic act of bioterrorism, an act of war warranting death by drone without trial.

Maybe calling it corporate bioterrorism (though a bit hyperbolic) could shift the overton window into somewhere closer to reality.

This is a somewhat one-sided perspective. The end polluter is often the US government itself. Do we hold the government officials to that same standard? How about the citizens that elected them?

I think the only real answer we can have is, yes. Unless something really fundamental changes, where egregious forms of pollution of forever chemicals is seen the same way things like incest, rape, or murder, then nothing will change.

The problem is the GOP has spend the last 40 years trying to kill the EPA (Which, ironically, was created by Nixon).

When Congress continually undermines and rolls back the agencies rules, who actually is to blame? The regulator? Congress? The voters?

Should we lock up fireman who use pfas and all of our local governments that instruct and allow them to do so? Should we equivocate putting out apartment fires with murder?

The point I'm trying to make is that this scenario isn't as black and white as one might think. It's easy to be an absolutist about it when it's not your child burning to death.

If it is a horrific crime to produce the pollution in the first place, the US government could not buy that product on the open market. I don't care who WANTS to buy bad shit, it is on you as a company to not make that bad shit.

For some reason, even though plenty of people are ready and willing to buy and sell murder, we still don't allow it.

Both can be bad and disallowed.

Sure, I just think the majority of the blame is misplaced.

The US government knew it was bad, bought it, and then knowingly created the vast majority of contamination.

They then Sue manufacturers like 3M, while continuing to buy and use it and cause more contamination.

It is like buying a knife, stabbing a bunch of people, then suing the manufacturer while still running around stabbing people. It screams of misdirection.

Yes government should be held to the same standard. They should live in fear of the law, as many citizens do.

The difference is intent. Killing someone unintentionally attracts much less ire than premeditated killing. If you can demonstrate you took reasonable care (eg. someone jumping in front of you while on the highway) you won't even be punished.

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