Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
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Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#2[deleted]
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#3What is so interesting to me is that it passed with 81% support. Seems to be a class example of the "think of the children" argument run amok in that it's impossible to enforce and vague enough to mean that every convicted sex offender is breaking it every day.
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#4What is so interesting to me is that it passed with 81% support. Seems to be a class example of the "think of the children" argument run amok in that it's impossible to enforce and vague enough to mean that every convicted sex offender is breaking it every day.
The brunt of the proposed law was about "harsher punishments for human trafficking" and that is how it was described on the ballot (from the official voter's guide: "HUMAN TRAFFICKING. PENALTIES. INITIATIVE STATUTE."); the part about sex offenders having to register their usernames on all of the online services that they use was tacked on the end, related by way of pointing out that the "sex crime" classification that then requires sex offender registration "includ[es] some crimes involving human trafficking".
Many voters, thereby, probably did not even realize that this other aspect was a consequence; those that did may have not cared enough to think about it (as it doesn't affect them personally), and those that cared may have decided "on the balance, in this flawed democratic system where I have to vote on this as a single unit, I think the result is better despite this consequence" (I often wish I could vote "I agree with these specific diff hunks" as opposed to "I agree with this changeset" ;P).
(I say this not to defend the law, but as a way to try to explain why 81% of the people in my state apparently voted for it; when I saw the number I was thereby depressed, but not really surprised: human trafficking "sounds bad". Also, the official "CON" argument blurb was "I provide erotic services, and this (might) incorrectly label my son", which probably turned off a lot of conservative voters in addition to being an argument many would call "far fetched", even if it totally ends up happening.)
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#5What is so interesting to me is that it passed with 81% support. Seems to be a class example of the "think of the children" argument run amok in that it's impossible to enforce and vague enough to mean that every convicted sex offender is breaking it every day.
The brunt of the proposed law was about "harsher punishments for human trafficking" and that is how it was described on the ballot (from the official voter's guide: "HUMAN TRAFFICKING. PENALTIES. INITIATIVE STATUTE."); the part about sex offenders having to register their usernames on all of the online services that they use was tacked on the end, related by way of pointing out that the "sex crime" classification tha…
Another aspect is that there was exactly $0 in campaign funding to oppose the proposition, whereas there was $3.7MM in favor of it.
Campaign contributions are public record, and nobody wants to be seen to be supporting sex offenders. Instant social suicide.
Ref: http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/California_Proposition...
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#6What is so interesting to me is that it passed with 81% support. Seems to be a class example of the "think of the children" argument run amok in that it's impossible to enforce and vague enough to mean that every convicted sex offender is breaking it every day.
The brunt of the proposed law was about "harsher punishments for human trafficking" and that is how it was described on the ballot (from the official voter's guide: "HUMAN TRAFFICKING. PENALTIES. INITIATIVE STATUTE."); the part about sex offenders having to register their usernames on all of the online services that they use was tacked on the end, related by way of pointing out that the "sex crime" classification tha…
> those that cared may have decided "on the balance, in this flawed democratic system where I have to vote on this as a single unit, I think the result is better despite this consequence"
They would be wrong. Anyone who has enough resources to get a proposition on the ballot has enough resources to get the legislature to pay attention to them. And something like prop 35 would pass in the legislature for the same reason it passed at the ballot box. But the legislature can make amendments.
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
The brunt of the proposed law was about "harsher punishments for human trafficking" and that is how it was described on the ballot (from the official voter's guide: "HUMAN TRAFFICKING. PENALTIES. INITIATIVE STATUTE."); the part about sex offenders having to register their usernames on all of the online services that they use was tacked on the end, related by way of pointing out that the "sex crime" classification tha…
Another aspect is that there was exactly $0 in campaign funding to oppose the proposition, whereas there was $3.7MM in favor of it. Campaign contributions are public record, and nobody wants to be seen to be supporting sex offenders. Instant social suicide. Ref: http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/California_Proposition...
Interestingly, with the vast majority of that (especially so once you factor out some portion of the contributions that had been made to multiple simultaneous campaigns, which ballotpedia can't separate), came from a single person: Chris Kelly (former Chief Privacy Officer of Facebook).
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
The brunt of the proposed law was about "harsher punishments for human trafficking" and that is how it was described on the ballot (from the official voter's guide: "HUMAN TRAFFICKING. PENALTIES. INITIATIVE STATUTE."); the part about sex offenders having to register their usernames on all of the online services that they use was tacked on the end, related by way of pointing out that the "sex crime" classification tha…
> those that cared may have decided "on the balance, in this flawed democratic system where I have to vote on this as a single unit, I think the result is better despite this consequence" They would be wrong. Anyone who has enough resources to get a proposition on the ballot has enough resources to get the legislature to pay attention to them. And something like prop 35 would pass in the legislature for the same reas…
The argument being that someone (not the voter in this example) may have specifically wanted that sex offender registration part, but didn't feel that that one single part would be juicy enough, and so instead managed to get it tacked on to a much larger campaign.
For whatever reason it was included, however, as an individual voter, if you are for "increased punishment for human trafficking" but against that smaller part about sex offender username registration, you don't really have anything you can do other than decide "on the balance".
(To be clear, I went into this in more detail, as I think you were interpreting me to say that the sex offender registration part was the way to push through the human trafficking change: I was attempting to imply the reverse, although I think the argument stands even if the parts are just considered related to many people, as you still must decide what to do if you agree with the first half but disagree with the second half.)
As a specific example where I had to do this, I was for the changes being proposed to the California nexus tax formula that were on this same ballot, but was not certain if I agreed with having a large percentage of that new corporate income tax be earmarked specifically for clean energy (locking it away from education, infrastucture, or any number of other number of things it could be used for). However, as that part had a limited time horizon (five years), and as I felt the other change made sense, "on the balance" I decided to vote for that proposition.
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
> those that cared may have decided "on the balance, in this flawed democratic system where I have to vote on this as a single unit, I think the result is better despite this consequence" They would be wrong. Anyone who has enough resources to get a proposition on the ballot has enough resources to get the legislature to pay attention to them. And something like prop 35 would pass in the legislature for the same reas…
The argument being that someone (not the voter in this example) may have specifically wanted that sex offender registration part, but didn't feel that that one single part would be juicy enough, and so instead managed to get it tacked on to a much larger campaign. For whatever reason it was included, however, as an individual voter, if you are for "increased punishment for human trafficking" but against that smaller…
If you disagree with any part of the proposition, or if you feel it is poorly constructed, then you should vote against it. It's easier, ultimately, to reject a poorly written law and try again with a new law than it is to accept a poorly written law and later try to repeal it.
Too many people fall into the trap of believing "we must do something; this is something; therefore we must do this."
Re: Judge blocks California’s new ban on anonymity for sex offenders
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
> those that cared may have decided "on the balance, in this flawed democratic system where I have to vote on this as a single unit, I think the result is better despite this consequence" They would be wrong. Anyone who has enough resources to get a proposition on the ballot has enough resources to get the legislature to pay attention to them. And something like prop 35 would pass in the legislature for the same reas…
The argument being that someone (not the voter in this example) may have specifically wanted that sex offender registration part, but didn't feel that that one single part would be juicy enough, and so instead managed to get it tacked on to a much larger campaign. For whatever reason it was included, however, as an individual voter, if you are for "increased punishment for human trafficking" but against that smaller…
In your tax example, that reasoning would make sense, since the legislature would be unlikely to pass those on its own. My point was that, even if "prop 35 gets enacted" is better than "nothing like prop 35 gets enacted", that doesn't necessarily mean you should vote for prop 35, since if it failed, its backers would be likely to take it to the legislature, which would be likely to pass it with amendments that may address your concerns.
In retrospect, though, the chances of all that happening conditional on prop 35 failing might not be enough to justify my original comment, even though each step is individually likely, since it requires 3 things to go right (and people often overestimate the probabilities of highly conjunctive events).