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I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

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Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#231

Post by coldtea »

tptacek wrote: post #222
coldtea wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find this response, and the suggestions, exemplifying why Kazakhstan justice (as expressed in the story, I don't know how it's in general) is superior to American justice. It's the ability to take the law and regulations lightly, when they're not that serious, and be humane about it. I mean writing: "YOU CHOSE to violate it", with added emphasis, as if having a visa expiring on the same day you leave a place (and l…

What you see as humanity, I see as corruption. The system where you have onerous laws that aren't enforced against normal people because they pay nominal sums to avoid enforcement is also the system where you have to pay nominal sums to get anything done, and where the price to avoid enforcement for "undesirable" people climbs to infinity. This isn't theoretical: it describes plenty of corrupt governments that nobody…

>and where the price to avoid enforcement for "undesirable" people climbs to infinity.

How's that latter part any different from any western country? There too, it's mostly the undesirables and those low down that get the full force of the enforcement. Those advanced countries just remove the part where less rich people can have a go at bending the rules, even if a little.

As for the equality of basic enforcement, that's illusory under the inequality of means and motivations. To quote Anatole France, "In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread".

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#232

Post by dragonwriter »

coldtea wrote: post #161
jules wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All this does is provide random and selective justice for those who can pay the bribe. What about the visum expiring the day before you leave? Two days? The law has to draw a line somewhere. It is the obligation of the person to stay clear of that line. If the visum duration is too short, just make all visa valid for 16 days rather than 15 days, and then enforce that line equally for everybody. Once corruption has ta…

> All this does is provide random and selective justice for those who can pay the bribe. The ability to pay your way out of it, usually comes together with the ability to talk your way out of it, and with the ability of police and such to bend some things on their discretion if they seem BS. [addition] To quote John McAffee's guide on the matter: " In order to make the most of your travels, you need to first understa…

> You might still call this lower level “corruption”, but that’s not a helpful word if you want to acquire the most effective attitude for dancing with it. I prefer “negotiable”."

The people I know who have lived significant periods of their life in these systems would describe them as "corrupt", not "negotiable".

Though "negotiable" does correspond to the way I've usually heard wealthy Americans who've encountered these systems describe them.

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#233

Post by PeCaN »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #124
PeCaN wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going by forum posts McAfee made—it's questionable whether or not he was trolling (he was for sure at one point wrt bath salts) but it's also somewhat likely he's into stimulants and sex.

> it's also somewhat likely he's into stimulants and sex Like every single other human being on this planet. It's a feature of our brains. I still don't understand what's the reason to treat McAfee as extremely unreliable. Could someone state the reasons explicitly ?

> Like every single other human being on this planet. It's a feature of our brains.

In my experience, most of us don't move down to Belize to manufacture research chemicals and fuck underage women then get implicated in a murder all while being investigated for tax evasion.

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#234

Post by tripzilch »

turar wrote: post #96
grizzles wrote: post #62

This dude just grassed on all the people who bent the rules to be nice to him. With pictures. For a moment of blog fame. Very uncool.

The guy sounds like an asshole. His bemused depictions of friendly border guards reek of self-superiority and total lack of empathy.

The "situations" in the first part of the story, I felt like he was just acting strategically and smart (impressive even, I'm not quite that forward-thinking). Because he did't know yet if these people are helpful or just trying to screw him out of as much $100's as possible and then let him hang.

But after the rest of the story, those guys helping him, drinking with him, showing him a good time (probably because life can be boring there and hanging out with a foreigner was an enervating experience for them too?) and greasing a few wheels for him (the "lenient judge" and possibly some other things he doesn't know about), I felt a bit different.

He was carrying $160 all the time, while Irlan paid for everything (probably not very much in dollars, but still). Some guy needed a spot for $6.5 to carry him to the end of the month, that says something about how far $160 goes in that country. At the end when Irlan said "it's gonna be boring without you", he knew he was free and could have wired himself another $200 later with relative ease (or maybe not? I'm not sure). I think at the very least he could have given Irlan some money/tip for all the effort, lunch, coffee, drinks? I mean, now that you know you're no longer in a complex negotiation / bribing situation with this person (so the cards are more open), he did go the extra mile, spent his own money even (while in the end, the author spent .. $0 ??? or did I miss something, he did say he got the $100 back). Say $50, that he'd otherwise spend on a single night out in SF, would mean a LOT more to this guy, so why not just do it? He'd earned it yes?

Could be some kind of cultural differences though. The author seems to know the culture of the area really well, so maybe it's something obvious. Maybe Irlan would be insulted getting such a large sum for just being hospitable. OTOH maybe Irlan hoped all this extra effort would earn him the $100 deal he couldn't fulfil earlier. Or maybe during all the "bonding" the author had been hinting he was a stranded student with zero money left and therefore they felt pity on him, so he didn't dare to break that character and suddenly producing $50 cash to give away (but Irlan knew he still carried that $100 at least).

Or maybe, the author's bottom-line thinking about this was, I did my best to stick to the (admittedly, draconian) rules, bad shit (aka adventure) still happened, so I really oughtn't face any consequences at all (except the part where he got free lunch, drinks and a tour).

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#235

Post by tripzilch »

witty_username wrote: post #212
TeMPOraL wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes highlighting the problem can cause a bigger problem than the original was. Do you think that this post will make a dent in corruption issues in Kazakhstan? That it will fix anything? The only thing it may cause is repercussions for the good people in this story. Which will leave the system even worse . There is this concept of responsibility when publishing the story. I have a feeling that it's often forgot…

But the "good" people tried to take bribes. So, they aren't perfectly good.

No. Bribes are part of a culture, and carry consequences into behaviour of society. It's weird (even alien) if you're not familiar. To me as well. But the US situation with tips, service staff and their separate minimum wages is just as weird and alien to me. Doesn't mean the people living that culture are not good. I understand that tips are basically mandatory in the US or I'll be screwing people out of their needed income (I got great use from the tipping % calculator app that happened to be in the burner phone I bought for the trip). The way it's often solicited is distasteful (to my Dutch cultural norms), flat-out passive-agressive messages on the receipts, occasionally pushy servers (just a few though) trying get rapport, while I'm just there to eat. But I understand these people aren't being bad either, they're just being people manoeuvring in the cultural environment they are part of.

I can disagree with this, or think up improvement, fixes. But at the end, I'm still a tourist, a guest in this country. I'm there to experience the culture, not to tell them they're doin' it wrong. That would be activism, not tourism.

Addition: experiencing other cultures has taught me things as well. Having to barter in Turkey, I probably got screwed but did learn a few lessons that are applicable at home (particular from watching other tourists handle it) (though sometimes they were dicks). All that tipping in the US, coupled with the fact that listed prices are never what you pay (because they're pre-tax) (this is not the case in the EU, it feels very weird not being able to calculate the final sum before checkout--a little exercise I often do in NL to keep my mental math sharp) I took home a bit more fluid idea of prices, and this makes for a lower barrier to tip in NL as well (but I still feel 20% is just crazy :p).

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#236

Post by tripzilch »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #28
mc32 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of that stems from his reported behavior in Belize. I think it was reported he was high on something on the occasions of some of his reportedly bizarre behavior. From my recollection.

Yeah that's my recollection as well. I presume the parent has something to back up the claim though as it's not a term you throw around lightly.

Most probably they did throw in fact it around lightly, but (carelessly) didn't intend to. I'm always very careful to not throw around medical (particularly psychiatric) diagnoses because I'm not trained for that. Instead I prefer to describe the symptoms I perceive and phrase it as my personal perception (aka, own it). At very most I might say "that guy might have some autistic tendencies ..." and almost always qualify it with "... but that spectrum is so vague, forget the label and just assess him on his particular quirks like the individual he is".

Anyway, not to distract this discussion into a further tangent, I think the best way is to charitably read it as "paranoid schizophrenic episode" (which is kind of fair, yes?) and the "mind AWOL" remark as hyperbole, without reading too much behind it. It was a setup to the post's main point anyway, the anecdotal part.

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#237

Post by oh_sigh »

Unbeliever69 wrote: post #216
turar wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The guy sounds like an asshole. His bemused depictions of friendly border guards reek of self-superiority and total lack of empathy.

Try spending even a night in a U.S. jail, or worse yet, any considerable amount of time in a US jail while awaiting trail, and ONLY THEN can you appreciate how easy he got off. Before reading the article, my gut told me that he was going to get it much harder in Russia. I was surprised to find out how humanely he was treated compared to the way we treat suspects/inmates in the U.S.

He was in Kazakhstan....

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#238

Post by oneloop »

jules wrote: post #156
coldtea wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find this response, and the suggestions, exemplifying why Kazakhstan justice (as expressed in the story, I don't know how it's in general) is superior to American justice. It's the ability to take the law and regulations lightly, when they're not that serious, and be humane about it. I mean writing: "YOU CHOSE to violate it", with added emphasis, as if having a visa expiring on the same day you leave a place (and l…

All this does is provide random and selective justice for those who can pay the bribe. What about the visum expiring the day before you leave? Two days? The law has to draw a line somewhere. It is the obligation of the person to stay clear of that line. If the visum duration is too short, just make all visa valid for 16 days rather than 15 days, and then enforce that line equally for everybody. Once corruption has ta…

You have a few typos there. The singular is "visa" and the plural is "visas". Don't be discouraged, your English is already quite good. You'll get there.

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#239

Post by swhipple »

wtetzner wrote: post #221
swhipple wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have the story around, but if I recall correctly, the minor procedural errors were forgetting to read Miranda rights. In the US, conviction can be based on possession without that form of evidence. Let's say for the sake of the argument that social status was an important factor here. If going by-the-book is overly harsh, then the book needs to be amended. Bending the rules is not really praiseworthy, though…

The problem is that it's basically impossible to come up with a book of rules that are reasonable to enforce in all circumstances. The world is too complicated for that, which is why it's necessary to look at each case individually.

Right, I don't mean to imply that there can never be any nuance or discretion within the system.

But in the author's case the rules were bent for him (officers rewriting his confession, having 'the' lenient judge; "It seems like she might actually let him off," said the prosecutor) and seems that he was either a) given special treatment, possibly influenced by US citizenship or education; or b) that the prosecution being baffled by the results is common. The author suggests that because of the officer camaraderie and that he received what he believes a reasonable punishment, it's an example of a better (more humane) system.

Cultures with different values will have differing punishments for transgressions, but an ideal justice system should aim to reduce bias and codify procedure, so that no one is left scratching their head at the end of the day.

Re: I got arrested in Kazakhstan and represented myself in court

#240

Post by scooke »

It helped that he speaks Russian. It helps even more that he clearly had an idea of what was going to happen and so could roll with it. I know a few North Americans who did not speak English and did now get even close to similar treatment; they were viewed as walking ATMs. It also didn't help the North Americans that they freaked out and tried to fight it out of their own sense of what is fair and right.
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