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Death in Singapore

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Re: Death in Singapore

#71

Post by JumpCrisscross »

homosaur wrote: post #68
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shane Todd worked for the IME, a globally regarded research organisation based in a country that scored higher in the 2012 Corruption Perceptions Index than the U.S. (87, #5 versus 73, #19) [1]. If he worked for the defence industry then so would an Oracle engineer deployed at Northrup Grumman or a SpaceX engineer in competing with Lockheed Martin. [1] http://cpi.transparency.org/cpi2012/results/

What does corruption have anything to do with this? I would think it's largely irrelevant. And also, you're right, those people do work in the defense industry.

Working in any industry in Pakistan or Nigeria (both #139 on the Corruptions Perceptions Index) is probably going to be more life-threatening than working for the Danish, Finnish, or Kiwi (tied for #1) defence establishments.

Re: Death in Singapore

#72

Post by eshvk »

homosaur wrote: post #59
contingencies wrote: post #30

Fellow hackers: stay away from anything connected to the defence industry. Security might be fun, it might pay well, but the ethics are terrible, things get used for bad purposes, and you can easily lose your freedom or worse.

Amen, my friend. Money: not fuckin' worth it.

Counter perspective: I used to work in robotics and really the majority of the jobs are in defense or defense related. There are a handful (less now that willow garage is closing down) of robotics companies that do civilian work. Sometimes it is not just about the money.

Re: Death in Singapore

#73

Post by wilfra »

PeterisP wrote: post #58
wilfra wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While these aren't good, they don't refute the commonly held belief that Singapore is essentially free from corruption. Human rights is another issue and on this they do very badly. They are among the worst places in the World to get arrested for basically anything and they have harsh laws that restrict all sorts of personal freedoms. But that's not corruption.

Well, the article in no way actually implies corruption. If the men in power decided that Shane's death needed to be covered up, and the men in uniforms followed orders - then that is exactly how a non-corrupt police state works; you have strict order but that order doesn't neccessarily favor the people. A corrupt state would have the relevant police officer be bribed individually and/or extracting favors from the re…

If the men in power decided the death needs to be covered up, that is exactly evidence of corruption - it's just high-level corruption and not low-level.

Mexico is an example of a country with a lot of low-level corruption (you can bribe the police to get out of anything). The United States is an example of a country with very little low-level corruption, but with (arguably) lots of high-level corruption.

Singapore is a country with almost non-existant low level corruption in my experience (i lived there for a time and have visited many times), and their system is specifically designed to eliminate high-level corruption: they pay public servants high salaries and punish any corruption with very long prison sentences.

Re: Death in Singapore

#74

Post by vellum »

jacques_chester wrote: post #52
venus wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You are essentially subject to all manner of ridiculous punishment for what would be considered minor or non-offenses in most free countries Like vandalism and petty theft. And just look at how successful those "free countries" have been in addressing those categories of crime! What you call "ridiculous" is simply what you have been conditioned to think, no more. Elsewhere in the world it might be called "effective…

> And just look at how successful those "free countries" have been in addressing those categories of crime! The crime rate in Western countries, including the US, has been falling steadily since the 90s. Given the differences in cultures and legal frameworks ... nobody is really certain why.

One theory that's been gaining some attention is less lead = less crime.

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/01/lead-crime-li...

Re: Death in Singapore

#75

Post by rdl »

contingencies wrote: post #30

Fellow hackers: stay away from anything connected to the defence industry. Security might be fun, it might pay well, but the ethics are terrible, things get used for bad purposes, and you can easily lose your freedom or worse.

I'm quite comfortable in defense. There are good reasons to avoid doing direct operations contracting for the USG (bureaucracy, inefficiency, etc.), but if you can just sell products, it's fine.

The USG doesn't tend to assassinate its contractors.

Re: Death in Singapore

#76

Post by homosaur »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #71
homosaur wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does corruption have anything to do with this? I would think it's largely irrelevant. And also, you're right, those people do work in the defense industry.

Working in any industry in Pakistan or Nigeria (both #139 on the Corruptions Perceptions Index) is probably going to be more life-threatening than working for the Danish, Finnish, or Kiwi (tied for #1) defence establishments.

It may be relatable at extremes like you mentioned, but I'd have to see more evidence of a direction relationship between corruption and safety. Of course countries with little to no government will be more corrupt on some NGO's index.

Re: Death in Singapore

#77

Post by miked »

VexXtreme wrote: post #39

Sounds like a classic case of corporate murder. In the cozy world of web startups, we engineers have an incredible amount of freedom and control over our lives and what we do... but megacorps and companies connected to the defense/war industry are known for treating their engineers as fungible resources that can easily be disposed of once they get the job done. Sounds like something out of a hi-tech Tom Clancy spy no…

>> Sounds like a classic case of corporate murder.

No, it sounds like a case of Chinese government murder, something they have plenty of experience with. They must have known that there was a good chance that he would talk to the US government. The more interesting aspect is that the IME, a agency of the Singaporean government, would appear to be in on at least the suppression of the story.

Re: Death in Singapore

#78

Post by homosaur »

eshvk wrote: post #72
homosaur wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amen, my friend. Money: not fuckin' worth it.

Counter perspective: I used to work in robotics and really the majority of the jobs are in defense or defense related. There are a handful (less now that willow garage is closing down) of robotics companies that do civilian work. Sometimes it is not just about the money.

I don't work in the field I have a degree in. You have to judge these things against your own morals and ethics and decide whether working in your field is actually even a good thing.

Re: Death in Singapore

#79

Post by zero_intp »

VexXtreme wrote: post #39

Sounds like a classic case of corporate murder. In the cozy world of web startups, we engineers have an incredible amount of freedom and control over our lives and what we do... but megacorps and companies connected to the defense/war industry are known for treating their engineers as fungible resources that can easily be disposed of once they get the job done. Sounds like something out of a hi-tech Tom Clancy spy no…

William Gibson writes this plot repeatedly

Re: Death in Singapore

#80

Post by natrius »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #71
homosaur wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does corruption have anything to do with this? I would think it's largely irrelevant. And also, you're right, those people do work in the defense industry.

Working in any industry in Pakistan or Nigeria (both #139 on the Corruptions Perceptions Index) is probably going to be more life-threatening than working for the Danish, Finnish, or Kiwi (tied for #1) defence establishments.

From the little I know, corruption in Nigeria is usually about bribery, not murder.
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