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I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

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Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#131

Post by droithomme »

I see some are saying that holding someone handcuffed in a cell for 5 hours is not an arrest but is only a brief detention, aka Terry Stop. This is unequivocally false. The situation described was an arrest.

Here is some information about what an arrest is.

http://www.hendonpub.com/resources/article_archive/results/d...

> What, then, is a correct definition of arrest, for purposes of federal Constitutional law? An arrest is a seizure of a person in which the subject is 1) required to go elsewhere with police, or 2) deprived of his freedom of movement for more than a brief period of time, or 3) subjected to more force than is reasonably part of an investigative detention.

> So, if an officer has said or done things that would cause a reasonable person to believe that he was not free to leave or to decline the contact with the police and either the subject is required to leave and go elsewhere with police or a detention persists for more than a short while, or more force is used than is reasonable to simply restrain someone, then that person has been arrested.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#132

Post by saraid216 »

jkot wrote: post #116
thanksgiving wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As someone said, accused parents in such cases have less rights than Breivik. Hang on a minute. Here in the US, my tax dollars support your children. WIC and Food Stamps and school lunch programs which come from my tax dollars ensure your infants and children do not starve in case something happens to you or your income. As a parent, you get to claim tax deductions which means more money out of my pocket to cover f…

??? I dont follow. Parents have right for due process, right to raise their own children and so on. Children also have some rights, those might colide wiuth rights of parents in some cases. Problem is that in Norway parents have ZERO rights. Norway have not signed relevant EU treaties for Child Protection. Once children is taken by social servies, there is were little chance for return. SS than bullies parents, force…

> Parents have right for due process,

I can agree with that.

> right to raise their own children and so on.

Says who? Why, precisely? Where is this right enumerated and what is its basis?

> Imagine Alabama would start abducting children of people who just moved in, because their parenting is not religous enough.

But the issue with this is religious discrimination and a lack of separation between church and state. The wrongness of this has nothing to do with parental rights.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#133

Post by jacquesm »

thanksgiving wrote: post #101
jkot wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Norway has way too many similar cases, for such small country of only 5 million people. Barnevernet also puts artificial obstructions for adoption by biological relatives, such as grandparents. As someone said, accused parents in such cases have less rights than Breivik.

> As someone said, accused parents in such cases have less rights than Breivik. Hang on a minute. Here in the US, my tax dollars support your children. WIC and Food Stamps and school lunch programs which come from my tax dollars ensure your infants and children do not starve in case something happens to you or your income. As a parent, you get to claim tax deductions which means more money out of my pocket to cover f…

> As I see it, your children are not your property. The children belong to the community at large.

There has been no country stupid enough to ever make such an outrageous claim, no matter how communist they were.

For starters: Children are not property at all, not their parents, nor society at large. They belong to themselves, they're independent and they are people just like adults, not cattle or objects. Second, parents are the primary agents responsible for their children and if at all possible parents should be the ones to raise their kids. Only in extremely rare cases should children be removed from their parents care, the main reasons are that this is the natural order of things, that parents tend to have their childrens best insterests at heart and that parents are by and far the best placed to relate to their children.

Last but not least: the number of violations per capita of the physical integrity of children placed in 'care' vastly exceeds that of those children living with their parents.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#134

Post by DanBC »

bambax wrote: post #111
zaroth wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Other notable facts: recent travel to middle east, flash cards included words like "terrorist", "explosion", "bomb", "to kidnap", etc., didn't follow basic screening process guaranteeing an elevated inspection (left large electronics in bag), had the cards in his pocket and handed directly to the TSA agent. As soon as someone arrived who had the necessary pay-grade to release this guy, he was released. Sorry for miss…

> I do expect TSA to flag me if I literally hand the agent a stack of cards with "bomb" and "terrorist" written on them Really? What else should you have not written on cards when trying to learn a foreign language? Insults? Names of body parts? Names of crimes?

Don't joke about drugs when crossing a national border or you're probably going to get a digital rectal exam.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#135

Post by jacquesm »

zaroth wrote: post #70
yourad_io wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any source for these notable facts? > It never occurred to Nick to put the cards away before going through security screening? Oblivious beyond belief. Obnoxious beyond belief. You're saying "he should know better and hide the perfectly legal thing that he was doing". In the same line of thought, if you're learning Arabic online without going through Tor, you're asking for it. Right? EDIT: Found the source[1]. The fu…

Well, at least I think it's relevant to understand the full context of what happened. Remember, TSA's job is to spot outliers, oddities, and flag them for review. I have zero love for TSA, but I think they did their job here. There were 80 cards total. At least 10 were bizarre words that would get you arrested if you handed to a bank teller. Guilty of not censoring? No you missed my point entirely. I am suggesting th…

We're well into thoughtcrime territory here, and projected thoughtcrime at that in this case.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#136

Post by javert »

ceejayoz wrote: post #123
javert wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Marx's works were not appropriated, they were taken seriously, and to their full conclusion.

If you think Stalinist Russia/Maoist China were Marx's views "to their full conclusion", you should read past the title page.

Marx is bad in theory and bad in practice.

There can be nothing redeeiming about a philosophy that does not treat individuals as ends in themselves.

Such a philosophy will always lead to people and their lives/property being sacrified for "the common good," which means: for everybody and nobody.

Sure, there are different permutations of Marxism. Stalin and Mao may not have done it the way Marx would advocate, but it's still a permutation of Marxism. We see a different permutation of it in Britain and gaining ground in the US. We also saw it on Pol Pot's killing fields. I am not talking about Marxism as a specific political position; I am talking about Marxism as an underlying philosophy.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#138

Post by 616c »

Different anecdote.

I majored in Arabic. I have a chip on my shoulder. I live in the Arab world, and have stickers from many countries in the Arab world, and Iran, AND China (lived there teaching with a family for a year).

Beyond being asked what I do for work in my country residence. I have never been harassed. I expected the opposite and joke about it often. I carry novels in Arabic, and used to carry learning materials for Persian/Farsi.

I have not been stopped once. Whether or not you helped, thanks to this guy for making this effort.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#139

Post by nemo »

zaroth wrote: post #60
hownottowrite wrote: post #45

Summary of Agreement (not judgement): 1. Plaintiff received $25K (directed to ACLU legal and subject to tax) 2. Philadelphia PD must communicate the following for a period of months: "Investigative detentions may be made only on reasonable suspicion of criminal conduct and any arrest must be based on probable cause. A referral by TSA agents is not grounds for arrest unless an officer makes a judgment ofprobable cause…

Other notable facts: recent travel to middle east, flash cards included words like "terrorist", "explosion", "bomb", "to kidnap", etc., didn't follow basic screening process guaranteeing an elevated inspection (left large electronics in bag), had the cards in his pocket and handed directly to the TSA agent. As soon as someone arrived who had the necessary pay-grade to release this guy, he was released. Sorry for miss…

You are blaming the victim for having his rights violated. Thinking, "of course he shouldn't have had a flash card with the word 'bomb' on it, if you do that you'll have your rights violated" is blaming the wrong party, while accepting an unjust status quo.

Re: I Was Arrested for Learning a Foreign Language. Today, I Have Some Closure

#140

Post by DanBC »

saraid216 wrote: post #130
kghose wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Finally, some one with additional details I was waiting to hear. If they hauled everyone learning Arabic off the false positive rate should be sky high. I wonder, just wonder, if this person was an "activist". You know, someone who tries to go positive on sufficient features of the detector to pass the threshold.

...why were you waiting to hear these details? Court documents are open to the public.

The details were not part of the reporting and it seems like many HN readers were not aware of the details until the links to the court document were posted.

What happened to him is clearly not acceptable, but the story is not "Learning Arabic got me arrested" but "handing a list of words including 'bomb' and 'terrorist' to a security screener got me arrested".

I'm not sure the Arabic is relevant - I suspect the NSA screener could not read the Arabic and could only read the English portion of the flashcards, and that he would have had similar results if the cards were in English and French.

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