Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

[robertsona]

Okay, this is my first CT thread, so if it sucks, sorry. Also if it's a copy, I'm really sorry too.
When Franklin Roosevelt was President, he set up Japanese Internment Camps. This was because, in the wake of the Pearl Harbor attacks, America was basically afraid that anyone could be an attacker for the Japanese, and an attack from the inside would be devastating. So they took all the Japanese and put them in camps to "prevent" this.
When 9/11 happened, some people suggested that they do the same with Arabs. The idea was promptly shot down by Civil Rights groups, but this is just an example.
My question is: Do you think, during a certain point, should security supercede the civil rights of an individual or groups of people, in order to protect America (or any other country for that matter). You can find examples of this all over American History such as my example and things like wiretapping.
In my opinion, security should almost never come before civil rights, as it is, simply put, "breaking the laws" that this country was founded on. It is outright wrong and should almost never be done.
However, I think, in a complete state of crisis where all of America is put at serious risk, we may need to engage in activities such as this.
What are your thoughts?

[x After Dawn x]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

No, simply because that would be considered racial profiling.

[robertsona]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

No, simply because that would be considered racial profiling.

I completely agree with this, and we should never do anything like that again, but that isn't the only example I am talking about. What about wiretapping or using hidden cameras on a suspicious person or something?

[funmonkey54]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

No, because if they did this to all the white people every time some hick blew something up, the majority of America would be in these camps.

[Tps222]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

Never never never never never.

FDR was a loon for doing it back then.

Civil rights are the most important thing man has ever created in the history of man.

[devonin]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

If the government wants to hold a national referendum and ask the population of the united states if it would be willing to consent to such measures for a fixed duration, and they voted in the majority to support it, perhaps.

Of course by the time such a thing happened, the crisis would almost certainly have passed one way or another, so I guess no, the government should simply never have the ability to trump civil rights because it decides it ought to.

[Afrobean]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

Never never never never never.

FDR was a loon for doing it back then.

Civil rights are the most important thing man has ever created in the history of man.

Most people don't seem to think so.

How many Libertarian politicians on the national level are able to successfully win elections? Hell, how many Libertarians can even win on smaller elections like on a state or even local level?

If the government wants to hold a national referendum and ask the population of the united states if it would be willing to consent to such measures for a fixed duration, and they voted in the majority to support it, perhaps.

Of course by the time such a thing happened, the crisis would almost certainly have passed one way or another, so I guess no, the government should simply never have the ability to trump civil rights because it decides it ought to.

I'm sure that you know that democracy doesn't really exist on a national level, not like that.

The will of the people wouldn't factor on an issue like this at all. It would be Congress or Mr. Bush (or McCain or even Obama) alone bringing this down, and the only thing that could stop them would be more bureaucratic **** (i.e. Supreme-Court-sup or UNITARY EXECUTIVE LOL) or lobbyists (tell me that's not ****ed up).

Oh and "the government should simply never have the ability to trump civil rights because it decides it ought to." That's pretty funny. The government can do basically whatever it wants. What are you gonna do to stop them? All you could do is hope- just hope- that another branch of the government is able to step in and stop them. Good plan!

[rzr]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

With enough justification, yes. Not just because they want to. Not just because they can. If there's an adequate, clean, logical reason, and voted in favor of by Congress, yes, it's fine.

[Vendetta21]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

National security does supercede civil rights in some cases, but the way that we supercede Civil Rights now is non-invasive. I think on a broader level it is an issue of privacy that we face these days rather than an issue of the attrition of our rights.

The fact is that the amount of your personal data on the internet is enormous and it is quite easy as just another citizen to aggregate data on you if I were to choose to do so. The government aggregates data on you but in a trickier way. Since any sort of demographic profiling and loss of rights is to try and get the few among the many, and since it is about stopping the flow of information because it cannot be controlled, this issue will become increasingly moot over time. The reason being that it is quite easy to gather information about the flow of information, and it is also quite easy to control the flow of information.

We won't ever see internment camps again in the United States, but I will venture that our intelligence and counter-intelligence efforts will largely involve government databases aggregating data via the most prevalent forms of communication.

We do not have the power to stop threats to national security 100%, but we do know that in order for something to be preventable it must have some sort of signal that it is a threat, and the only signals that we can accurately do anything about are through our lines of communication and through organizational spies (which you probably will never encounter in your life.) Everything else is a false measure to create the "sense" of being safe, like security at airports. Intelligence leads us to believe that the biggest plausible terrorists attack that could happen would happen via the seaports, but our seaports are not very secure at all. And that is because we don't believe they need to be that secure because of the information we are able to obtain about them. Surely they could have more stringent security standards, but this would be at huge cost and the belief is that the return would be very little, even though the chance exists. So we don't. But we do in airports because it creates the mentality of security because many of us use airports, and if we didn't do this we'd feel like the government wasn't doing a good job of making us feel safe. That's a loss of liberty for a sense of security which could be either real or just percieved, but I don't think it's necessarily a bad one. It has negatives, but it also has positives. Can you find both, and which way do you tend to lean in your belief?

More importantly and back on point, national security has to do with communication more than anything. Collecting data on certain types of communication, aggregating it, having the computer sort and archive it, and having intelligence officials interpret it.

Is this invasive? Not particularly if you aren't doing treasonous things. Some of us have probably had data about us aggregated by government spider-bots in one form or another, and we don't know the difference. The real question is do you trust the government in knowing this information about you?

Some people don't trust the government on principle. Some people don't trust the government because it represents a majority of the people, and they think a majority of the people are stupid. Some people don't trust the government because they believe the power vested in it causes it to be inherently corrupt. I don't believe in any of these things a priori.

The question moreover is this: do you believe the government should be aggregating data in the same way that google aggregates data, as well as other more secretive methods about private citizens? You can be sure that at this point everything posted on 4chan.org is collected by the government. Does that make you feel uncomfortable? Do you feel your civil rights are being invaded? Does this make you feel more secure?

And on another note that is indirectly related, Do you believe complete privacy can survive in a world where I can figure out where you live, what your neighborhood looks like, how many cars park on your street, and what high school you go to just by having you talk with me over IRC or by you posting on my website?

[devonin]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

All you could do is hope- just hope- that another branch of the government is able to step in and stop them. Good plan!

Pretty sure that if things got bad enough, all those constitutionally protected militias could probably count on a good chunk of the military helping them out with that.

[Afrobean]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

Pretty sure that if things got bad enough, all those constitutionally protected militias could probably count on a good chunk of the military helping them out with that.

Nah. Those military idiots are probably more likely to favor fascism I'd think. Can't count on them to save our freedom.

But then again, I guess we can't really count on anything. All we can do is just hope that it never gets too bad.

[Vendetta21]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

Nah. Those military idiots are probably more likely to favor fascism I'd think. Can't count on them to save our freedom.

But then again, I guess we can't really count on anything. All we can do is just hope that it never gets too bad.

Apparently someone hasn't met Americans. I don't know if you've noticed, but we're all crazy as ****.

[Afrobean]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

Apparently someone hasn't met Americans. I don't know if you've noticed, but we're all crazy as ****.

Yeah, crazy in the sense that they like seeing government having more power rather than less.

[dore]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

In a time of global crisis, I think it is fair to sacrifice for our country's survival. If the necessary sacrifice is the suspension of some of my civil rights, then I have no problem with that (assuming the government guarantees my rights will be preserved after the crisis).

The OP uses WWII as an example but I think WWI is just as relevant, when everybody was forced to ration their supplies and waste as little as possible. That doesn't seem like the malignant removal of rights that I think the OP is referring to but it was an unprecedented amount of government control over the average person's life, and it shows how such tactics could be pragmatic.

I think if a worldwide conflict broke out (WWIII, if you will) then I would be alright with the government taking away some rights for the good of the nation and her allies.

On the other hand, I completely disagree with our rights being sabotaged due to terrorist activities. While I understand that safety is a priority, I think that with any open society things like that are going to happen. You're not going to be able to stop every loony who wants to shoot up a school or bomb an airport or whatever. Until our every action is controlled by the government, these small-scale attacks will be ever-present. The thing is, they are ultimately small-scale compared to a real war and for the sake of democracy must not change our outlook on personal freedoms. They are tragic occurrences but are not worth weakening our liberty.

[Vendetta21]

Re: Should National Security Supercede Civil Rights?

Yeah, crazy in the sense that they like seeing government having more power rather than less.

Broad oversimplification based on the parties that run the country rather than the people who its citizenry is made up of.