I won't be adding much to the conversation but I really feel I need to say this. If Sony doesn't release this film I am not buying a Sony product ever again.
An Offer to Sony from 2600
131–140 of 200 posts
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#132The CIA report threatens our legitimacy as a world power. no it does not...almost everyone in the world understand that under certain conditions, torture to get potentially life-saving information is just the way of things. let me put it this way...if your immediate family was going to be blown up in two hours, wouldn't you say go ahead and torture that guy who you KNOW has information on how to diffuse the bomb?
You're missing the entire problem with this premise.
Somebody torturing a man that has his family held hostage is entirely different than state sponsored torture. I think that should be obvious.
People understand the fact that on the battlefield, sometimes torture happens, even when it shouldn't. When a soldier tortures somebody they just captured to keep their fellow soldiers alive, we don't agree with it, but there's a different mentality surrounding it. When the government TELLS that soldier to torture somebody, then it's a different matter entirely. This same idea is at work with your example above.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#133The CIA report threatens our legitimacy as a world power. no it does not...almost everyone in the world understand that under certain conditions, torture to get potentially life-saving information is just the way of things. let me put it this way...if your immediate family was going to be blown up in two hours, wouldn't you say go ahead and torture that guy who you KNOW has information on how to diffuse the bomb?
You're missing the entire problem with this premise.
Somebody torturing a man that has his family held hostage is entirely different than state sponsored torture. I think that should be obvious.
People understand the fact that on the battlefield, sometimes torture happens, even when it shouldn't. When a soldier tortures somebody they just captured to keep their fellow soldiers alive, we don't agree with it, but there's a different mentality surrounding it. When the government TELLS that soldier to torture somebody, then it's a different matter entirely. This same idea is at work with your example above.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#134Earlier quoted context omitted.
i'm sorry, but this simply flies in face of logic. it is absolutely morally wrong, but it certainly can be effective and has been used throughout history. usually, things that don't work don't last anywhere near that long. there are all sorts of reasons to oppose it, which of course I do, but saying it cannot be effective just isn't one of them.
What?!?! When John McCain was tortured and was asked to give up the names of his squad mates, he gave the names of the front line of the green bay packers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_life_and_military_career_... Clearly torture is an effective way of getting useless information, you have no way to tell if the info is correct or not, and the prisoner has no incentive to give you the correct information. People…
There is only one justification, and it does happen to be the ticking time bomb scenario, only when you've exhausted all other (effective) investigation methods. But that's so rare that if it ever did happen in human history, the bomb would have probably detonated anyway. So it's practically useless and counterproductive.
The bottom line is if you have to resort to torture, too many systems have failed, and you have to seriously question the values you're trying to preserve.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#135Earlier quoted context omitted.
I understand the sentiment behind your comment but applying this doctrine does more good than harm. The right to not be offended, quite simply, does not exist and should not exist in free democracies. Everything should be open for debate, discussion, parody, etc.. Not producing a movie because someone might feel insulted by it and then throw a temper tantrum is censorship by proxy in its purest form. The tyranny of s…
> The right to not be offended, quite simply, does not exist and should not exist in free democracies Genuine question: Why is that?
Not being able to offend/hurt feelings/be disrespectful would be contrary to any semblance of free speech.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure I would. It's scary me that you're sure that you would.
you would allow your parents and children to be blown up rather than make a horrid criminal be very uncomfortable for a few minutes???? and i'm the nutty one?
Would you allow your parents or children to be misidentified and wrongly tortured out of the false view that torture is the most effective interrogation/investigation approach?
Note also that the CIA had to really claim some kind of permanent unknown ticking time bomb of unknown nature, but after they used that justification, held a suspect they ignored for 40 days before torturing them.
A false sense of urgency at an unknown threat is not a rational justification for torture (I'd argue that if we were rational we'd never justify it), but once you permit torture, it opens the door to all kinds of terrible, immoral, and ineffective tactics.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#137The last time people got this crazy about a hack, Kevin Mitnick was thrown in solitary confinement for months because they thought he could "whistle nuclear launch codes into prison telephones". 2600 made the documentary about it, Freedom Downtime, and I strongly recommend watching it if you never have. So what if North Korea did it (of course I'm skeptical of this, anyone with a computer can conduct the same activit…
> e-graffiti artists That's brilliant. (I assume this refers to defacement s/kiddies)
I don't think script kiddies could do this size of a hack, especially considering the amount of data involved and stay under the radar this long. If this is what a script kiddie is capable of... then what is a real hacker capable of?
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
you would allow your parents and children to be blown up rather than make a horrid criminal be very uncomfortable for a few minutes???? and i'm the nutty one?
The world doesn't work like the television show 24.
i don't watch tv so i don't know what you are talking about.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
> e-graffiti artists That's brilliant. (I assume this refers to defacement s/kiddies)
I don't think script kiddies could do this size of a hack, especially considering the amount of data involved and stay under the radar this long. If this is what a script kiddie is capable of... then what is a real hacker capable of?
That isnt what I or parent was saying.
Re: An Offer to Sony from 2600
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sony owns several digital release platforms. If they want this movie out, they could make it happen tomorrow. This is just PR speak. They might cave and release anyway, but Lynton's statement is deliberately weak and duplicitous, once again attempting to deflect all blame from themselves rather than admit to any mistake on their part.
I'm not sure they are in complete control, although it's a great image of master manipulation to imagine they are. I'm waiting until I really understand the whole story to start assigning any blame. I'm more interested at this point in figuring out what this means for the future. Do we live in a world now where state-actors will target specific companies and basically try to rip them to shreds and extort them? Now I'…
The state has targeted lots of private conpanies for decades, offering the advice to American companies as a competitive advantage.
This is different from states trying to explicitly destroy another company, but the bottom line is the same: you need to include state actors in your list of potentially hostile attackers, same as any black hat.