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The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

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Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#111

Post by rebuilder »

krageon wrote: post #30
SuperGent wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When asked about the Freedom fine, [Patel] responded, "I decided to take it as a cost of doing business." This is the problem, why should you not take dubiously legal or moral action, if there isn't a significant deterrent?

Because you shouldn't be an asshole. People aren't animals unless they have some sword of Damocles hanging over them keeping them in line, it is a conscious choice to do the wrong thing.

Social pressure doesn't seem to work in societies as big as we now have. There's not much meaningful feedback from victims to wealthy criminals, because these hardly ever even meet. Financial incentives override social responsibility in such a situation, and I don't see how to address wrongdoings except by changing the incentives.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#112

Post by krageon »

magduf wrote: post #37
krageon wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you shouldn't be an asshole. People aren't animals unless they have some sword of Damocles hanging over them keeping them in line, it is a conscious choice to do the wrong thing.

You can't expect this of people. When you do expect this, as you seem to, you end up setting up a society where sociopaths like that guy are able to rise to the top and profit handsomely because the people who made the rules just can't seem to conceive of someone who doesn't mind being an asshole as long as it gets him ahead.

This is about the US. I don't live there, I do think that and while it is super bad everywhere on earth I think we can agree the US is pulling the cart in terms of terrible. Frankly you I think the argument that "this is just how it'll be" is not one that is terribly convincing on it's own.

Yes, it'll go wrong. It'll also go right. I don't think we need to structure our society like a prison just because it has the capacity to be worse than we like it to be.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#113

Post by Retra »

daveFNbuck wrote: post #89
Retra wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not the only one talking about him, and that very much contradicts 'not achieving anything'. In any case, your individual perspective being contrary to my claim isn't anything meaningful here, because there isn't an impactful person on this planet who hasn't had their accomplishments trivialized by somebody.

I'm not trivializing his accomplishments. You're the one who's implying he hasn't accomplished anything beyond being an example people bring up in HN comments. Would that be worth ruining your life? I'm asking for your perspective.

WTF are you reading? I said that the fact that Snowden can be used as an example is evidence of him accomplishing something. Explicitely to argue against the position that he hasn't accomplished anything. I am in no way arguing that he didn't accomplish anything more.

>Would that be worth ruining your life? I'm asking for your perspective.

Would what be worth ruining my life for? Obviously one doesn't make such personal sacrifices solely for personal gain, so if I'm going to ruin my life, it will be because I feel that it could very well lead to the betterment of many other lives. There's no 'perspective' there to glean. The fact that you would personally not value my sacrifice doesn't really impact that, because frankly, I don't give a shit what you think. You're just some rando with an opinion.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#114

Post by Gibbon1 »

magduf wrote: post #42
Gibbon1 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Two points: of course you can put a price on being away from your family. It's called a job In all due respect this is an opinion born of a sheltered life.

No, it sounds like your opinion is born of a sheltered life. You're probably thinking something along the lines of a job being enriching, fulfilling, etc. Sorry, but that's a minority of workers; for most people, a job is just daily drudgery they do to pay the rent, nothing more. It really is just a transaction where you trade your time for money.

I think you're making the mistake of assuming that everyone else has your work ethic.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#115

Post by secabeen »

towelr34dy wrote: post #102
tzs wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 3% who were sentenced above the guideline amount were not chosen at random. They were people who had specific factors in their cases that allowed for an above guideline sentence. These are factors such as causing a death, causing significant physical injury, causing extreme psychological harm to your victims beyond that one would expect from the crime, abducting people, causing property damage beyond what is take…

Ah tzs again. Let me quote you: "lot of reporting said he faced 30 years... Actually, he was looking at maybe 6 or 7 years if things went as favorably as possible for prosecutors." So let me ask again, last time you didn't answer: Is the chance of a 35 year sentence for Aaron 0%? No? Then do the intellectually honest thing and admit you are wrong. Your correcting somebody by saying wrong things. And then doubling dow…

>Low probability is not 0%. Whatever the probability was, it was real that they could have given him 30 years. Unlikely? Yeah. But I'll bet you wouldn't play Russian roulette at those odds; whatever they may be.

But that's the question. The probability is not 0%. It may be %0.01, or %0.001. Can either of us find any existing cases where a defendant with Aaron's background received a 33-level sentence increase? I would propose that that has never happened in cases with similar circumstances to Aaron's. If you can find one, I'd be interested in the citation.

In the absence of any examples, my argument is that the chance of a 35 year sentence is not functionally different from 0%, and Aaron (and any other defendant in this situation) should have made decisions based on the 99% of sentences they were actually likely to receive.

One last note: you mentioned playing Russian Roulette at those odds. Russian Roulette normally has a 16% chance of death. I wouldn't play RR at 16% odds. Would I play it a 0.001% odds? Probably, presuming the benefits of playing RR were of significant value to me.

Aaron's chance of a 35 year sentence was not 16%. It was also not 0.0%. It's somewhere in-between, and unless you have evidence that shows otherwise, I'd personally guess it was below 0.01%, and his choice of suicide remains a tragic one. YMMV.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#116

Post by daveFNbuck »

Retra wrote: post #113
daveFNbuck wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not trivializing his accomplishments. You're the one who's implying he hasn't accomplished anything beyond being an example people bring up in HN comments. Would that be worth ruining your life? I'm asking for your perspective.

WTF are you reading? I said that the fact that Snowden can be used as an example is evidence of him accomplishing something. Explicitely to argue against the position that he hasn't accomplished anything. I am in no way arguing that he didn't accomplish anything more . >Would that be worth ruining your life? I'm asking for your perspective. Would what be worth ruining my life for? Obviously one doesn't make such pers…

> I said that the fact that Snowden can be used as an example is evidence of him accomplishing something.

How is it evidence of anything more than his fame? It's very counter-intuitive that being brought up as an example of an unaccomplished person is evidence of accomplishment. I don't see how that works.

If you want to argue in favor of Snowden having accomplished something important, point out his accomplishments. Your argument is bad and makes it seem like he has none.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#117

Post by towelr34dy »

secabeen wrote: post #115
towelr34dy wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah tzs again. Let me quote you: "lot of reporting said he faced 30 years... Actually, he was looking at maybe 6 or 7 years if things went as favorably as possible for prosecutors." So let me ask again, last time you didn't answer: Is the chance of a 35 year sentence for Aaron 0%? No? Then do the intellectually honest thing and admit you are wrong. Your correcting somebody by saying wrong things. And then doubling dow…

>Low probability is not 0%. Whatever the probability was, it was real that they could have given him 30 years. Unlikely? Yeah. But I'll bet you wouldn't play Russian roulette at those odds; whatever they may be. But that's the question. The probability is not 0%. It may be %0.01, or %0.001. Can either of us find any existing cases where a defendant with Aaron's background received a 33-level sentence increase? I woul…

Read the other apologists. They quote a 3% deviation from sentencing guidelines.

Sentencing guidelines for Aaron were 6-7 years. A single wire charge on max penalty could be 20. All you need is one judge who saw WarGames to want to make an example out of the kid.

I don't know what the probability is. You don't either. Likely no one did. But that probably has weight.

It's disturbing: the callous indifference to that weight by those who question the exact kilos from an arm chair expert point of view.

This whole thing has parallels to other situations:

A Powerful Group is responsible for a system that perpetrated an injustice.

Members of the powerful group are confronted with the injustice. Members have the following reactions:

Denial (high dissonance)

Disgust

Apologists

Apologists do the same thing: They minimize, deny, question and speculate.

What apologists of all kinds don't realize is that even if they are right, they are wrong.

The callous indifference shown, instead of the guttural understanding of something wrong being needed to be made right... is what is so hard to understand. Even if your argument that the official numbers are overblown by x%.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#118

Post by magduf »

Gibbon1 wrote: post #114
magduf wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it sounds like your opinion is born of a sheltered life. You're probably thinking something along the lines of a job being enriching, fulfilling, etc. Sorry, but that's a minority of workers; for most people, a job is just daily drudgery they do to pay the rent, nothing more. It really is just a transaction where you trade your time for money.

I think you're making the mistake of assuming that everyone else has your work ethic.

Sounds like you're making the exact same mistake.

In reality, where I live, different people have different work ethics. Some people get fulfillment from work, some people have really interesting jobs, while lots of others only work to put food on the table. You really think a hotel maid gets some fulfillment from her job?

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#119

Post by iheartpotatoes »

Dirlewanger wrote: post #87
iheartpotatoes wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean like when Obama got legislation passed to protect them? https://www.whistleblowers.org/news/obama-signs-whistleblowe...

Didn't help Snowden much.

He was never charged, hence could not be pardoned. However, it is duly noted that I'm trying to reconcile being objective about Obama's own nuanced position, while also supporting whistleblowers like Snowden, Manning and Winner.

Re: The Personal Toll of Whistle-Blowing

#120

Post by tzs »

towelr34dy wrote: post #117
secabeen wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Low probability is not 0%. Whatever the probability was, it was real that they could have given him 30 years. Unlikely? Yeah. But I'll bet you wouldn't play Russian roulette at those odds; whatever they may be. But that's the question. The probability is not 0%. It may be %0.01, or %0.001. Can either of us find any existing cases where a defendant with Aaron's background received a 33-level sentence increase? I woul…

Read the other apologists. They quote a 3% deviation from sentencing guidelines. Sentencing guidelines for Aaron were 6-7 years. A single wire charge on max penalty could be 20. All you need is one judge who saw WarGames to want to make an example out of the kid. I don't know what the probability is. You don't either. Likely no one did. But that probably has weight. It's disturbing: the callous indifference to that w…

> Read the other apologists. They quote a 3% deviation from sentencing guidelines

In any given year, around 4% of women in the US will get pregnant. Suppose Alice is a sexually active woman in the US who uses the pill religiously, and who requires her sex partners to wear condoms.

Do you think that because 4% of women will get pregnant this year, and Alice is a women, Alice has a 4% chance of getting pregnant?

That's the kind of reasoning you are using with the 3% figure for upward deviations in sentencing. You are assuming that because 3% of sentences are above guidelines, everyone who is sentenced is equally at risk for an above guideline sentence.

> Sentencing guidelines for Aaron were 6-7 years. A single wire charge on max penalty could be 20. All you need is one judge who saw WarGames to want to make an example out of the kid.

A judge cannot just arbitrarily exceed the guidelines like that. There are specific factors and considerations that a judge must cite to justify an upward deviation, and they are not applicable in Swartz's case. A judge who just arbitrarily decided to apply his own criteria to come up with 20 years would have that quickly overturned on appeal as an abuse of discretion.

You want to know what happens to someone in Swartz's situation if he gets a judge that wants to throw the book at him? He gets 7 years. That's the result of a hard line judge accepting an exaggerated damages claim and not applying any of the factors that would allow lowering the sentence. That's why his lawyers, the prosecutors, and outside lawyers all said he would probably actually get at most a few months--the 7 year number is the "judge who saw WarGames to want to make an example out of the kid" number.

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