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Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

bostonmagazine.com

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Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#51

Post by 1stop »

MIT clearly did something wrong here... The Secret Service seemed to get involved by accident, due to the fact MIT do a lot of "Super secret stuff, that China want". MIT should have immediately moved to limit how seriously this was taken, when they understood who was perpetrating it (and why). Kind of like if a kid accidentally (because he didn't know it was one) spray pants the side of nuclear missile silo, we would treat them differently to someone trying to sabotage a nuclear missile silo (I hope!)

The article hinted at the fact MIT ran an "Open network" which ran counter to the charge of "unauthorised access". MIT should have commented on that in their report.

MIT worked with the prosecution to help build there case, that's fine, but talk about "neutrality" as that clearly isn't.

Anyone arguing that MIT didn't do anything wrong, I would say, just isn't rational.

But we still haven't gotten causation (Are they to blame for Aaron's death?).

There is always some people who say that suicide is only the victims fault, no one else. But do you apply that to people being tortured? Or people with no hope to live out their life as they thought they would. Was it the jews fault for committing suicide rather than face the camps?

Now applying that extreme analogy to the US legal system, and in particular, the plea bargain system... isn't it the same dynamic? They want to make the proposed outcome so bad that you take an easy way out. In the process they destroyed parts of your life (in Aaron's case it was his friendships, girlfriend, family, wealth).

Thus, aiding this system (the prosecutor) (as MIT did) certainly deserves some of the blame, no?

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#52

Post by marincounty »

It's just a sad story. I do know one thing, don't tell your significant other, or anyone else Anything-- "Instead, he grilled her until he had what he needed: Norton mentioned that Aaron had coauthored the Guerilla Open Access Manifesto "

I am on the end of a civil suit. It's nothing big, but I have never felt so helpless. I can't imagine what Aaron was feeling.

I don't know if MIT was complicit, but a few things suprised me--50k charge to public libraries.

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#53

Post by icelancer »

benologist wrote: post #42
marincounty wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can guarantee by your quip; you have never dealt with our legal system.

If it wasn't the legal system it would have been literally any other reason, big or small, that Aaron felt was terminally wrong with his life.

This is incredibly insulting. How could you possibly know this?

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#54

Post by mpyne »

freejack wrote: post #48

What makes me absolutely, terribly sick is the extent to which the USG waves its hands to dismiss the seriousness of the extent and reach of the NSA's domestic data gathering activities and at the same time deciding that Swartz's data gathering was worth going to the mat over.

The USG also claims it's wrong for people to shoot each other all while maintaining an army of hundreds of thousands of people empowered to do exactly that, and worse, in the right situations.

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#55

Post by mpyne »

git-pull wrote: post #16
afatc wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they certainly did not help to prevent the ridiculous prosecution being made

I am curious, what was wrong with the criminal charges against Swartz? Can someone clarify how the prosecutor handled things wrong?

The charges themselves are based on law that is rather too harsh in many people's opinion, given the scope and effect of the "crime" itself.

E.g. there's no reason that this should have been a felony, but the option of pleading to something that was a misdemeanor wasn't even available to Aaron here because of the way the law is constructed.

However given the law and the way the legal system works the prosecutor was certainly treating this just like any other CFAA case.

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#56

Post by mentalhealth »

cjbprime wrote: post #14
bradleydwyer wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm genuinely curious, is that a widely accepted position on suicide and mental stability? I can think of a number of situations where suicide might be preferable to continued existence.

I think it may be widely accepted, but I also think it's nonsense. As you allude to, someone with a terminal and painful disease could have an entirely rational desire to commit suicide based on a sensible projection of the future as containing a persistent unacceptable level of suffering. I think we should only invoke "mental instability" when someone's projection of their future level of suffering is clearly mistak…

I think it's theoretically possible for someone to arrive at the decision to end their own life via careful evaluation, but it's quite unlikely (and at this point, the only real acknowledgement of it in the psychiatric field is in the case of terminally ill patients, when the calculus is pretty clear).

Regardless, the vast majority of suicides are the result of a combination of depression and loss of inhibition, both of which are psychiatric symptoms that can be brought on or exacerbated by severe stress. The assumption can and should be that this is the case, not that an individual who was self-admittedly under huge amounts of personal stress performed a rational evaluation of their own future prospects in life and determined that it wasn't worth living.

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#57

Post by mentalhealth »

crag wrote: post #43
mentalhealth wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I learned quite a long time ago that realistic discussion of mental health as it actually affects real people generally results in a lot of negative votes here on HN. But please, continue to dismiss my argument by attacking me and not the statement I made. More par for the course hereabouts.

"...it actually affects real people generally results in a lot of negative votes here on HN." Then don't comment if you're so afraid of your rep. I mean, what's the point of this site? To me, it's to exchange various thoughts/ideas related to tech and otherwise. Creating a new account to comment cause your afraid of being down-voted is cowardly. And insulting, frankly.

It's not about the rep score, it's about people looking through my post history, determining where I work, and trolling me via my employer (this happened). Let's get back on topic, shall we?

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#58

Post by rscale »

Smerity wrote: post #23

I'm still more disturbed by the laws in play. Aaron was facing a cumulative maximum penalty of 35 years in prison. The roommates of one of the Boston bombers was only facing 25 years in prison[1] if found guilty of helping Dzhokhar Tsarnaev dispose of a laptop, fireworks, and a backpack in the aftermath of the bombings. I understand it's not a straight comparison, but no matter how I try to re-arrange those numbers i…

I also find the sentence Aaron faced to be excessive.

For additional context, David Headley received a 35 year sentence for his active participation in the Mumbai bombings which killed 160 people.[1] The median sentence for murder and non-negligent manslaughter in the US (effective 2000) is 24 years, 3 months.[2]

I can't help but find Aaron's prospective punishment to be far more abhorrent than his crimes. It continues to sadden me that MIT used their influence in such a hurtful manner.

[1]: http://www.propublica.org/article/david-headley-homegrown-te...

[2]: http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/ascii/Fssc00.txt

Re: Losing Aaron: Bob Swartz on MIT's role in his son's death

#60

Post by inspectahdeck »

suprgeek wrote: post #35

MIT Played a key role in Aaron's Death: http://gothamist.com/2013/01/15/aaron_swartzs_lawyer_mit_ref... They refused to sign-off on any deal that did not involve Jail time. This was THE one point that weighed more on his mind than any else per the recorded statements of his partner. MIT's pig-headedness in this aspect really destroyed any respect I had for that institution. JSTOR made a much more reasoned statement h…

"MIT was never involved in any plea negotiation, and was never asked by either the prosecution or the defense to approve or disapprove any plea agreement"

http://swartz-report.mit.edu/docs/report-to-the-president.pd...

II.B.3, last sentence. Read the whole section for a summary of that event.

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