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This page contains all of the posts and discussion on MemeStreams referencing the following web page: Privacy Rights Are at Issue in New Policy on Searches - New York Times. You can find discussions on MemeStreams as you surf the web, even if you aren't a MemeStreams member, using the Threads Bookmarklet.

Privacy Rights Are at Issue in New Policy on Searches - New York Times
by Decius at 6:45 pm EDT, Jul 22, 2005

Police officials... have also said that anyone found to be carrying illegal drugs or weapons will be subject to arrest, a provision that lawyers have found troubling.

One has to be sympathetic to the idea of performing some searches. However, one of the basic ideas behind the notion that random searches at airports are legal is the idea that they are specifically limited to AT and do not target other crimes. There is a bit of a legal grey area here about whether they have the right to prosecute for other crimes if they discover them in the course of one of these searches. That grey area needs to be resolved now. The NYPD have clearly expressed their opinion on the matter.

If we establish a policy that says we can do random searches where ever because of terrorism and we will prosecute any crime we discover in the process of performing these searches then essentially we're saying that we can perform random searches where ever. If the police think you're up to no good they can stop and search you and just put you down on their quota of "daily anti-terror searches." The connection with terrorism eventually becomes irrelevant other then as a loophole that popped the whole thing wide open.

This is really going to push the 4th amendment. If its ok to do it at airports, can we do it at the subway? If its ok to do it at the subway can we do it on the street? If its ok to do it on the street, then when is it not ok to do it? Is it ok to search random houses for bomb labs. You might discover some that way...

This is the slippery slope that concerns people with the rise of searches at airports, schools, and border crossings. We're slipping down that slope. The subway is so pervasive in NYC that this will have a significant effect on the culture of the city. If you live there you ride the subway. If you ride the subway you may be searched. So, if you live there you may be searched. NYC suddenly seems more prickley then Singapore.

The government there should have presented this as a temporary measure. They should have performed the searches with teams that are firewalled from the regular police and have no authority to prosecute anything except terrorism. Declaring it an "indefinite" fixture of the city, and doing it with regular police, was a mistake.

You want to have a free and open society, but that society requires cooperation. Mutual respect. When people begin to seriously abuse the society you have to respond. Its really hard to figure out how to do that without sacrificing openness, but this announcement doesn't reflect a genuine effort to try. This is the image of terrorism changing our way of life.

Look for the spin to be that anyone who raises questions about the way this is being handled is either opposed to the searches in totality or is simply helping the enemy.

RE: Privacy Rights Are at Issue in New Policy on Searches - New York Times
by janelane at 10:17 am EDT, Jul 25, 2005

Civil libertarians began expressing their concerns even as the policy was announced yesterday. "We all have an interest in protecting our safety and security as we ride the trains," said Donna Lieberman, the executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union. "However, searches without suspicion of wrongdoing are fundamentally at odds with our constitutional guarantee of privacy, and placing unfettered discretion in the hands of the police invites racial, religious and ethnic profiling."

I think it is more important that ever to get data on how American muslims feel about Islamic terrorists. If their sentiment is anything like the Londoners in a previously memed article, then I say bring on the racial profiling. You can't condone terrorism and then hide behind the ACLU's skirts.

-janelane, s/w/f

RE: Privacy Rights Are at Issue in New Policy on Searches - New York Times
by Decius at 11:35 am EDT, Jul 25, 2005

janelane wrote:
I say bring on the racial profiling.

I'm not sure that will do you much good. People from Chechnya are white. People from North Africa are black. People from Central Asia can be hard to separate from hispanic people at a glance. Furthermore, your typical bomber dresses in plain clothes, and several Americans have joined the other side. The assumption that you can focus on people who look central asian may not be a good one.

RE: Privacy Rights Are at Issue in New Policy on Searches - New York Times
by janelane at 12:09 pm EDT, Jul 25, 2005

Decius wrote:
janelane wrote:
I say bring on the racial profiling.
I'm not sure that will do you much good. People from Chechnya are white. People from North Africa are black. People from Central Asia can be hard to separate from hispanic people at a glance. Furthermore, your typical bomber dresses in plain clothes, and several Americans have joined the other side. The assumption that you can focus on people who look central asian may not be a good one.

I concede the point, Decius. Damn the melting pot!

Alas, it would only work for people who insist on the whole Muslim "look" with the bandana, beard, and long hair (which would also include hippies, yuppies, and homeless people). Of course, if it ever came out that racial profiling as such was intentional, I'm sure the Muslim radicals would just assume that the 72 virgins awaiting them in the afterlife could do with less man-hair anyway.

-janelane, 3/4 Irish + 3/16 Scotch + 1/16 Native American

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