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L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

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Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#41

Post by macspoofing »

CJefferson wrote: post #28
darkcha0s wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes let us just start collective punishment, because we have such a justice boner. Jesus christ, sometimes HN has some wild opinions. Just to be absolutely clear -- it's not reasonable, and what you're suggesting is literally how North Korea handles crime. "Oh but you know here it's different" -- you're setting a precedent which, if allowed, would mean your family members could face jail time for crimes YOU commit.

No-one is talking about putting people in jail, but also (in my opinion), someone shouldn't get to inherit millions of dollars just because their grandfather committed some terrible crime -- inheritance should not be a right, when the original money was acquired illegally.

>No-one is talking about putting people in jail, but also (in my opinion)

Every law, no matter how small and well-meaning, has implicit threat of prison behind it. You can't be so naïve as to believe that this enforcement action won't result in prison for some, destroyed lives for others, and because laws and enforcement are man-made, there's also a guarantee that your dragnet will punish some innocents, and let some guilty go (maybe because they can afford great lawyers and/or bribes). And of course, because this would be a very controversial measure, it would be highly politicized.

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#42

Post by NeutronStar »

LittlePeter wrote: post #34
gattilorenz wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, DDT is like "IBM". It might mean "International Business Machines", but many people wouldn't immediately recognize it unless the acronym is used (while the opposite is true: if you know what the acronym stands for, you usually know the acronym as well). And I'm sure Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane wouldn't add much for most people that read a newspaper :)

Even from the context, it was not clear to me what DDT was. I suspected it was some chemical. I would have appreciated a sentence or two explaining why it is bad and what it does. What IBM is would typically be clear from the context: "IBM reported record loss in 2nd quarter of 2020".

What DDT is would typically be clear from the context: "L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground".

What do you think we dump?

> Even from the context, it was not clear to me what DDT was. I suspected it was some chemical. I would have appreciated a sentence or two explaining why it is bad and what it does.

TFA is explaining quite well. Do your homework instead of going straight to the comment?

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#43

Post by ChrisLomont »

charlesu wrote: post #20
sokoloff wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn’t, but suppose my grandfather legally (or even semi-legally) disposed of some DDT and left my father some money. My father later me some money. What’s the legal process to claw some of that money back to pay for the cleanup? Do you or the state have standing to sue me for something I never did, knew nothing about, and can’t reasonably answer to any specifics about?

This is a great argument for an absurdly high estate tax. You can’t inherit ill-gotten gains if you don’t inherit anything at all!

So punishment for everyone because someone, somewhere may have done something that decades later was made illegal?

What kind of bizarre sadism is that?

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#44

Post by dathinab »

sokoloff wrote: post #22
meed2000 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suing you to the extent of having to pay back whatever your father passed on to you, at least what's left of it would be reasonable, don't you think?

No, I do not. If my grandfather left my father $X, my father left me $Y, at the very most the maximum would have to be the lesser of $X and $Y, decremented by the full cost of answering the lawsuit. This is problematic from a variety of practical angles, though, not just mathematical ones. It seems like something the forensic accounting lobby would salivate over. Should I be forced to defend a lawsuit because my grea…

Yes.

The only think which could in anyway get close to legality would be to:

- Legally hold a case against whoever did it and win it. (Can even legally have a case against a dead person?) This requires thinks to have been illegal when done.

- Requiring that (likely dead) person to pay a fine based on existing law.

- Arguing that whoever accepted an inheritance did inherit the fine, too.

But as far as I know every point of this list has many legally questionable aspects.

But what you MUST NOT do under any circumstances in a state of law is to not base judgement on law but arbitrary "I feel like this should be done" arguments. This is also why it's of upmost importance to fast adapt laws make them general instead of specific and not put any loop holes in them. Because then you can judge people to some degree even if they do something bad even if that specific think wasn't explicitly forbidden. (E.g. based on a generic law which makes any form of causing environmental damage in a context where it's reasonable to assume it the person should have been aware illegal. Sure you need some threshold, too. Else driving your care is illegal.)

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#45

Post by sokoloff »

antonvs wrote: post #39
darkcha0s wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes let us just start collective punishment, because we have such a justice boner. Jesus christ, sometimes HN has some wild opinions. Just to be absolutely clear -- it's not reasonable, and what you're suggesting is literally how North Korea handles crime. "Oh but you know here it's different" -- you're setting a precedent which, if allowed, would mean your family members could face jail time for crimes YOU commit.

If your inheritance was the result of a bank robbery, do you still think it should be untouchable? You're being very emotional about what seems like a pretty clear case of recovering ill-gotten gains.

Ideally proceeds from a bank robbery would be removed from the estate. From a purely practical standpoint, once the estate is settled, it should stay settled and no one should be forced to answer for the actions of another adult.

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#46

Post by macspoofing »

dusted wrote: post #2

It's amazing how little some people have cared, this was not that they didn't know, they certainly knew, otherwise, it'd not have resorted to hiding the stuff by dumping it into the sea.. It'd not be unreasonable to hunt down those responsible, and make them pay for cleaning it up. Sure, they're probably dead by now, but they probably left a lot of money. I don't think it's even relevant that "it was not illegal at t…

The problem with your approach, besides the immorality of arbitrary post-hoc rationalization for punishment, is that it is not pragmatic. What's done is done, and you need people to get behind making it better. If you come out and push a policy that in part entails rooting and punishing those responsible (or even descendent of those responsible), you'll have people come out against it just for that reason and the environment will suffer. I would be one of those people, because I would never give that power to the kinds of people who would argue for the arbitrary execution of collective punishments on people today. If given the choice to fix environment/punish wrongdoers or do nothing, I would go with 'do nothing'. It's why 'The Green New Deal' is so terrible because instead of focusing on pragmatic solutions we can all get behind, it suffers from scope creep of socialist and progressive policies that have little to nothing to do with climate change and environment - and therefore I'd rather have none of it.

To circle back on collective punishment - there's a reason why the North, after winning the civil war, has largely chose not to collectively punish the South - in much the same way that other regions which suffered through terrible civil wars where terrible crimes were committed, frequently choose to replace punishment of many of those responsible with something like reconciliation committees, where symbolic gestures are accepted in lieu of prison or capital punishment.

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#47

Post by amcoastal »

refurb wrote: post #33
1propionyl wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See? This is why we don't need environmental regulations. The market will regulate itself if externalities are properly priced in! (Just pay no mind to how those externalities might be systematically priced and how penalties might be retroactively enforced. If you do you're a freedom-hating socialist!)

That's a silly comment considering it was the gov't who has done a shit-ton of ocean dumping in the past (not this case, but others). Who will regulate the government?

The people. People like me, and I would hope you, would demand the government pass laws to not do these things.

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#48

Post by onion2k »

darkcha0s wrote: post #25
meed2000 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suing you to the extent of having to pay back whatever your father passed on to you, at least what's left of it would be reasonable, don't you think?

Yes let us just start collective punishment, because we have such a justice boner. Jesus christ, sometimes HN has some wild opinions. Just to be absolutely clear -- it's not reasonable, and what you're suggesting is literally how North Korea handles crime. "Oh but you know here it's different" -- you're setting a precedent which, if allowed, would mean your family members could face jail time for crimes YOU commit.

Yes let us just start collective punishment, because we have such a justice boner. Jesus christ, sometimes HN has some wild opinions.

FYI this does happen for companies. It's not that wild. Businesses like Lloyds of London and Greene King are paying slavery reparations today despite the fact that no one in the company had anything directly to do with that part of the business. I guess if you had stock that had been passed down through generations you would indirectly lose out on some money if the share price fell as a result.

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#49

Post by throwaway0a5e »

charlesu wrote: post #20
sokoloff wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn’t, but suppose my grandfather legally (or even semi-legally) disposed of some DDT and left my father some money. My father later me some money. What’s the legal process to claw some of that money back to pay for the cleanup? Do you or the state have standing to sue me for something I never did, knew nothing about, and can’t reasonably answer to any specifics about?

This is a great argument for an absurdly high estate tax. You can’t inherit ill-gotten gains if you don’t inherit anything at all!

So we should tax the crap out of everyone's estates on the premise that they probably wronged society and that society will need to pay to un-screw up whatever they did?!? Whatever happened to giving people the benefit of the doubt? Whatever happens to presumption of innocence?

Firstly anyone with a brain is gonna conveniently go broke before they die if you try and pull something like that.

Second I'm struggling to find words for just how fundamentally wrong, unethical and dystopian the assumptions that underlie your comment are. I and a hell of a lot of people don't want to live in a society where assuming malice is the default like that.

Re: L.A.'s coast was once a DDT dumping ground, but no one could see it until now

#50

Post by FDSGSG »

ChrisLomont wrote: post #43
charlesu wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a great argument for an absurdly high estate tax. You can’t inherit ill-gotten gains if you don’t inherit anything at all!

So punishment for everyone because someone, somewhere may have done something that decades later was made illegal? What kind of bizarre sadism is that?

Who does estate tax punish?
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