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When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

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Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#21

Post by someguydave »

insickness wrote: post #15

This discussion is synonymous with whether countries should even have borders. If borders aren't policed, they may as well not even exist. It would be great if all people were kind and caring, if there were no corruption, war, terrorism, religious fanaticism, crime or discrepancies in standards of living. But we've seen over and over that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The problematic migrant situati…

Indeed. I would be fine with "open borders" as long as every subsidy and welfare program is eliminated. It is unfair for people to have free stuff from the local government just because they happen to have been born there.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#22

Post by zajd »

someguydave wrote: post #21
insickness wrote: post #15

This discussion is synonymous with whether countries should even have borders. If borders aren't policed, they may as well not even exist. It would be great if all people were kind and caring, if there were no corruption, war, terrorism, religious fanaticism, crime or discrepancies in standards of living. But we've seen over and over that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The problematic migrant situati…

Indeed. I would be fine with "open borders" as long as every subsidy and welfare program is eliminated. It is unfair for people to have free stuff from the local government just because they happen to have been born there.

Would you be ok if every local government was required to provide welfare programs and subsidies to their population? Seems "fair".

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#23

Post by sheepz »

insickness wrote: post #15

This discussion is synonymous with whether countries should even have borders. If borders aren't policed, they may as well not even exist. It would be great if all people were kind and caring, if there were no corruption, war, terrorism, religious fanaticism, crime or discrepancies in standards of living. But we've seen over and over that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The problematic migrant situati…

One of the few sane posts here that is considering the realities of "the borderless world".

There are reasons why countries all over the world have immigration policies. Each country is interested in immigration that serves its interests, and the leaders are well aware of the negative consequences of unrestricted immigration.

The experiments with this like the Schengen Area might not survive the consequences in the coming future.

Most people here seem to blinded by some liberal pipe-dream.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#24

Post by jrockway »

CalRobert wrote: post #7
jstanley wrote: post #2

A large majority of people view me as a crackpot when I say passports should be abolished, and free men ought to be able to travel the planet freely. It never occurred to me that the world was like this as recently as 100 years ago!

I suspect it has a lot to do with the rise of relatively cheap global travel and strong disparity in the median wealth of different nations. 100+ years ago could you travel from a poor country to a wealthy country with relative ease and expect to raise your own standard of living? Either the journey was expensive and arduous, or the situation in places you could travel to was not likely to be a massive improvement on…

States in the US have different laws (consider income tax rates), and travel inside the US is super cheap, but we don't see people migrating like crazy to avoid taxes or get free stuff from the government.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#25

Post by zajd »

icebraining wrote: post #20
insickness wrote: post #15

This discussion is synonymous with whether countries should even have borders. If borders aren't policed, they may as well not even exist. It would be great if all people were kind and caring, if there were no corruption, war, terrorism, religious fanaticism, crime or discrepancies in standards of living. But we've seen over and over that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The problematic migrant situati…

The problematic migrant situation in Europe is a good example of that. Is it? Are illegal immigrants more likely to cause problems that both natives and legal immigrants? From what I can tell, at least the attacks that make the news have all been perpetrated by people born and raised in Europe. EDIT: http://www.dw.com/en/report-refugees-have-not-increased-crim...

Well you have to understand that when white Europeans complain about "immigrants" what they really mean is "brown people". It's 2016 baby, thinly veiled racism is the name of the game.

edit. I'm sure with these downvotes someone will come answer your question... lol

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#26

Post by wtbob »

I'm reminded of this famous piece by A.J.P. Taylor:

'Until August 1914 a sensible, law-abiding Englishman could pass through life and hardly notice the existence of the state, beyond the post office and the policeman. He could live where he liked and as he liked. He had no official number or identity card. He could travel abroad or leave his country for ever without a passport or any sort of official permission. He could exchange his money for any other currency without restriction or limit. He could buy goods from any country in the world on the same terms as he bought goods at home. For that matter, a foreigner could spend his life in this country without permit and without informing the police.'

It's hard to believe how much we've given up.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#27

Post by wtbob »

jrockway wrote: post #24
CalRobert wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect it has a lot to do with the rise of relatively cheap global travel and strong disparity in the median wealth of different nations. 100+ years ago could you travel from a poor country to a wealthy country with relative ease and expect to raise your own standard of living? Either the journey was expensive and arduous, or the situation in places you could travel to was not likely to be a massive improvement on…

States in the US have different laws (consider income tax rates), and travel inside the US is super cheap, but we don't see people migrating like crazy to avoid taxes or get free stuff from the government.

> we don't see people migrating like crazy

Yes we do! How many people do you know who were born in the state you now live in?

I don't think one person in my office was born in this state.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#28

Post by oconnor663 »

sheepz wrote: post #23
insickness wrote: post #15

This discussion is synonymous with whether countries should even have borders. If borders aren't policed, they may as well not even exist. It would be great if all people were kind and caring, if there were no corruption, war, terrorism, religious fanaticism, crime or discrepancies in standards of living. But we've seen over and over that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. The problematic migrant situati…

One of the few sane posts here that is considering the realities of "the borderless world". There are reasons why countries all over the world have immigration policies. Each country is interested in immigration that serves its interests, and the leaders are well aware of the negative consequences of unrestricted immigration. The experiments with this like the Schengen Area might not survive the consequences in the c…

> Each country is interested in immigration that serves its interests

A lot of immigration policies only serve the interest of a particular group or a particular industry. I don't know how to make an objective count on either side though.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#29

Post by J-dawg »

The UK has obviously seen a lot of debate about immigration recently, around the Brexit referendum. I've often felt like non-EU immigration was the elephant in the room during all this.

'Leave' voters have often been portrayed as racist bigots by liberal 'Remain' voters. (I'm one of the latter, and I've been guilty of this myself at times).

But if we extend the same logic to the whole world, isn't the EU basically a racist organisation? Why should a French, German or Romanian arbitrarily have special rights to enter my country, while an Indian, Mexican or Nigerian is subjected to ever harsher visa rules?

I don't know the answer, but I don't think it's possible to make the liberal case for EU freedom of movement without being something of a hypocrite. And I say this as a (confused) Remain voter.

EDIT: Before anyone says, I know there is more to the EU debate than just immigration, and that not all Remainers are liberal/lefty, just as Leavers are not all right wing. But there's no denying that immigration was the main issue on many (most?) voters minds.

Re: When world leaders thought you shouldn't need passports or visas

#30

Post by Havoc »

open-source-ux wrote: post #8
Havoc wrote: post #3

I'm fine with the controls part, but can't we at least get rid of the paper documents? People just lose them anyway. Surely a combination of say retina + finger + voice etc would provide more security than could ever be needed...

" Surely a combination of say retina + finger + voice etc would provide more security than could ever be needed... " How would this data be held and who would see it or have access to it? The privacy implications would be enormous. Ironically, many European countries already issue biometric passports that require you to provide your fingerprints before the passport is issued. But maybe it doesn't really matter - you…

>How would this data be held and who would see it or have access to it?

Same way as its currently held - by the various governments with (limited) agreements in place to to check each other's databases. Its not that big a leap to have a unified system in place I think. Or at least starting with the 1st world countries.

Not a fan of big government, but this is an area where I think streamlining things would help.

>European countries already issue biometric passports that require you to provide your fingerprints

Yeah got one of those. The fingerprints aren't actively used at borders though - just facial recognition.

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