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Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

japantimes.co.jp

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Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#91

Post by azernik »

mafribe wrote: post #81
azernik wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Emergency powers were indeed reduced. But more importantly, the post-war constitution was not allowed to be amended in ways that would contradict its "liberal democratic basic order" (banning a rerun of the Enabling Act).

Emergency Acts (Notstandsgesetze) were passed in 1968. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Emergency_Acts

Which are much more limited than Weimar emergency powers. Only specific freedoms can be limited (certain types of privacy, movement, and career), limited legislative powers devolve onto a proportionally-assembled subset of the full legislature rather than to the executive, and the federation can only take control of state forces in emergencies that cross state borders.

Plus a specific exception that says a state of emergency can't be called against labor disputes.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#92

Post by noego »

stcredzero wrote: post #68
noego wrote: post #53

> During detention, both were subject to extensive questioning by prosecutors without an attorney present. Videotapes of Ghosn’s questioning — a new feature added in the Criminal Procedure Reform law in 2016 in direct response to documented abuses — were made available to his attorneys who were present at the detention center, but lawyers were not permitted in the room where questioning took place. > The system must…

"We're all doing it, so you better do it too" isn't a particularly compelling argument. That's not the argument. The real argument is from principle. The principle of inherent human rights.

Having a lawyer present while being questioned as an "inherent human right"? Why is that? Why not your parents, spouse, children and best friend as well? I don't recall seeing this anywhere in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. By what reasoning have you decided that having a lawyer present is an "inherent human right"?

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#93

Post by gerbilly »

on_and_off wrote: post #41
ConcernedCoder wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My unpopular opinion: Questioning someone longer than they want to provide answers, when that same person is unable to leave the interview is a form of torture -- change my mind.

Not going to actually. The Merriam-Webster definition above is weak. One discussion around torture with my philosophy professor (thankfully the french engineering cursus has one or two interesting classes) really stuck to my mind. We were discussing a text where a french general that had practiced torture in Algerie. He said something that amounts to "I have asked my soldiers to electrocute me so I could see how it f…

> This kind of repeated pain is what is impossible to resist to for very long

I think it's the implied 'ill will' of the interrogator also has an effect.

Knowing that someone means you harm and might even be willing to escalate that harm, is very stressful.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#94

Post by LifeLiverTransp »

lostlogin wrote: post #61
mises wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At some point, foreign nations are different and we just have to deal with it. We got habeas corpus and other processes from the Magna Carta back in the eleventh century B.C., and the resultant English Common Law shaped the justice systems of America and other nations. It is not fair of us to expect all justice systems to align with ours. For an extreme example of this issue, look at the Middle East. They have simply…

> For an extreme example of this issue, look at the Middle East. They have simply never taken to democracy. This isn’t helped by foreign interference in every election they have. Even the borders, arbitrary lines drawn up by colonial powers, contribute to the problem as the forced groupings don’t suit anyone except for some colonial empire a long time ago. If the meddling stopped for a decent duration democracy might…

If thats the case, why can other nations stand up so easily even after colonialization and western occupation? Why are japan, china, south-korea and taiwan successes? Why did australia succeed? Why is Chile succeeding? If keeping western powers at bay is all it takes- why is north korea and cuba not a singapor? Why is singapor thriving?

This whole narrative gets more implaussible by the day, the more you look at it. And by defending it, and not trying to look for the real issues, those who push it - further the only counter-quack-narrative, which is basically racism.

It sounds like the rambling of a homeless men by now, inventing invisible foes to justify all bad and random events happening to him.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#95

Post by pwim »

zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC wrote: post #55
Thaxll wrote: post #40

Japan is a really weird country, on one hand it's the safest country, on the other it has old laws / weird mentality about some modern concepts for society, ex: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_child_abduction_...

> Japan is a really weird country, on one hand it's the safest country How do you know it is safe if you can easily be wrongly convicted, but no statistic about the country shows that?

With Japan's incarceration rate of 41 per 100,000 people, one of the lowest in the world, your chance of being falsely convicted is exceedingly low (as only a very small percentage of the population is convicted of crimes, wrongly or otherwise).

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#96

Post by stcredzero »

noego wrote: post #92
stcredzero wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We're all doing it, so you better do it too" isn't a particularly compelling argument. That's not the argument. The real argument is from principle. The principle of inherent human rights.

Having a lawyer present while being questioned as an "inherent human right"? Why is that? Why not your parents, spouse, children and best friend as well? I don't recall seeing this anywhere in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. By what reasoning have you decided that having a lawyer present is an "inherent human right"?

It's a part of due process. One underlying principle or right would be along the lines of Presumption of innocence. There are all sorts of non-obvious shenanigans which the authorities can pull, otherwise, which given the authorities the unchecked power to pressure or harass individuals. Obviously, that is against individual human rights.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#97

Post by ansible »

Causality1 wrote: post #71
_cs2017_ wrote: post #54

Edit: I just realized that the nearly 100% conviction rate is only for those who go to trial. A third of the people who are detained are released without trial. So ignore this post: my main assumption (that arrest is similar to conviction) was incorrect. --- Maybe one way to think of the Japanese justice system is that the trial happens before the defendant is arrested. After all, the conviction rate is nearly 100%,…

Like much of Japanese society, appearances and propriety are very important. Sometimes that means releasing criminals who might not be found guilty. Sometimes it means homicides get declared suicides.

Years and years ago I traveled to Japan.

It seemed like a very safe place. I had heard about crime in Japan, and the year before had (allegedly) less than 100 murders for the entire country, which puts the murder rate far, far below the rest of the world.

And these days when I read about how criminal justice works there... well, I'm glad I'm not as naive as I used to be.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#98

Post by mises »

stcredzero wrote: post #88
mises wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Inherent human rights are universal. No, they are not. This reflects a bias to believing that your own ideas and values are best. The only value that is universal is power. > the... countries with the highest scores are Israel... I'm not sure what this is meant to argue. It is merely a listing of the countries in a certain area with the highest levels of democracy. > they are over a dozen generations behind the wes…

The only value that is universal is power. Most of history is dominated by such "might makes right" thinking, and much of human history is dark. It's universal inherent human rights which are the outlier, and which have contributed to the outlier of prosperity and individual human well being we have in the US today. I'm not sure what this is meant to argue. It is merely a listing of the countries in a certain area wi…

> Most of history is dominated by such "might makes right" thinking, and much of human history is dark. It's universal inherent human rights which are the outlier, and which have contributed to the outlier of prosperity and individual human well being we have in the US today.

I did not advocate for this, I simply said it was a reality. It is sad but true. I would ask: why is your set of "universal human rights" true? Who defines it? I would argue that the UN has attempted to define a number of bogus rights that are not intrinsic (indeed, America has in the past protested against some of these; see the holier-than-though stance the UN takes on home-schooling).

> I'm not arguing. Merely informing.

I asked because I wasn't sure what you were arguing by stating which nations were most democratic in that area. Could you clarify?

> everyone should be able to express their opinion

I think most agree on the principle, but courts claim they may restrict time, place and manner. Who draws the line, and where?

> Individual human rights are intrinsically good. This tends to result in Democracy

Yes. Liberty is a good thing. The problem is that not every one's culture has the same degree of liberty. Many languages do not even have the same word for liberty that America does; I believe it is Egypt that has it as a word meaning something granted from above rather than an intrinsic thing given by God.

My point is simply that democracy may never exist everywhere. Quite frankly, it is not perfect. Had America maintained some of her more republican policies (less centralization; state-appointed senators; etc.), we may have had reduced political polarization. Democracy is very difficult at scale.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#99

Post by mises »

rayiner wrote: post #84
lostlogin wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For an extreme example of this issue, look at the Middle East. They have simply never taken to democracy. This isn’t helped by foreign interference in every election they have. Even the borders, arbitrary lines drawn up by colonial powers, contribute to the problem as the forced groupings don’t suit anyone except for some colonial empire a long time ago. If the meddling stopped for a decent duration democracy might…

Maybe, maybe not. Counter example. Bangladesh (where I’m from) was created in 1972 with a constitution embodying various western style principles, including secularism. The country was organized along pretty sensible geographic/linguistic/religious borders, and there has been no western meddling with its elections. Regardless, over the decades the people have voted to make Islam the official religion and generally cu…

I certainly didn't blame the west. I personally think it has done more good than harm in the long term. My only point was that not all cultures take to democracy in the same way.

Re: Examining Carlos Ghosn and Japan's System of 'Hostage Justice'

#100

Post by mises »

LifeLiverTransp wrote: post #94
lostlogin wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For an extreme example of this issue, look at the Middle East. They have simply never taken to democracy. This isn’t helped by foreign interference in every election they have. Even the borders, arbitrary lines drawn up by colonial powers, contribute to the problem as the forced groupings don’t suit anyone except for some colonial empire a long time ago. If the meddling stopped for a decent duration democracy might…

If thats the case, why can other nations stand up so easily even after colonialization and western occupation? Why are japan, china, south-korea and taiwan successes? Why did australia succeed? Why is Chile succeeding? If keeping western powers at bay is all it takes- why is north korea and cuba not a singapor? Why is singapor thriving? This whole narrative gets more implaussible by the day, the more you look at it.…

Japan and South Korea succeeded due to substantial American occupation and influence. Taiwan is a similar situation. From the perspective of liberty, China is an abject failure. Australia succeeded because it was a transplant of Englishmen.

What narrative? What quack? What racism? Please clarify.

I didn't say all cultures were unsuited to self-determination. Many are. All I said was that some are not, and that we may do better if we recognize this and learn from it.

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