Video: the policeman’s friend

Ed Brayton has published a long list of police departments abusing people’s First Amendment rights and illegally interfering with people trying to videotape their conduct. But now, in a refreshing change of pace, there is news of at least one police department that finally “gets” video technology.

After years of seeing officers’ misconduct captured on video, police departments across the nation are trying to use the medium to their advantage, releasing footage of their own to rebut allegations and to build trust within communities. One department even posted video of an officer punching a woman to show why he was fired.

Weeks before the Occupy demonstration in April, Minneapolis police created their own YouTube channel to give officers a venue to tell their own stories.

Ed has been saying this all along: video is the policeman’s best friend. Police departments have significant power to do harm in society, and consequently deserve closer scrutiny. Video records of their actions will vindicate proper conduct and expose improper conduct. That’s a win-win all around.

“Liberty Institute” unclear on what “establishment” means

The Liberty Institute, a self-described “nonprofit legal group dedicated to defending and restoring religious liberty across America,” is asking a Texas district court to dismiss a lawsuit against the Wood County Commissioners Court for opening their public meetings with prayer, and for displaying the motto “In God We Trust.”

“Higher courts have already determined that legislative prayers and our nation’s national motto are constitutional,” said Jeff Mateer, General Counsel of Liberty Institute. “Our nation has a longstanding tradition of opening governmental meetings with prayer as well as publicly acknowledging the role of God in our governmental institutions. Such traditions and acknowledgments do not violate the First Amendment.”

In other words, we have a long-established history of putting religion in government, and therefore we have not violated the First Amendment prohibition against establishing religion in government. And in related news, there’s no racism in America because we have a long history of preferential treatment for whites.

via MarketWatch.

Second-degree terrorism

Over at Pharyngula, PZ has a nice wrap-up of the debate between Bruce Schneier and Sam Harris on the topic of whether or not we ought to implement a 2-tiered screening system that subjects “Muslims or anyone who looks Muslim” to extra scrutiny at airports. Bruce points out some very good reasons why this is a bad idea, but there’s one somewhat tangential argument that he doesn’t mention. The biggest problem with screening for Muslims at the airport is that some of our biggest terrorists aren’t at the airport. They’re in the media, in Congress, and in the White House.

Of course, I’m not talking about first-degree terrorism, i.e. blowing things up and killing people directly. I’m talking about second-degree terrorism: keeping people in a constant state of fear in order to manipulate them. We’ve had going on 12 years of being told that we need to voluntarily surrender our liberties and constitutional rights because—gasp—there’s bad guys out there. And yes, there are, but there always have been. Our problem isn’t the terrorism that attacks us with bombs and guns, our problem is the terrorism that attacks us with legislation and unwarranted spying and other clandestine, illegal activities hidden behind the autocratic dictum of “state secrets.”

Bruce summed it up well:

But perhaps most importantly, we should refuse to be terrorized. Terrorism isn’t really a crime against people or property; it’s a crime against our minds. If we are terrorized, then the terrorists win even if their plots fail. If we refuse to be terrorized, then the terrorists lose even if their plots succeed.

Unless and until we stand up and refuse to be terrorized, unless and until we stop cowering and bleating like sheep every time a politician or media personality cries “security!”, these abuses of our liberty will continue to get worse. “Maximum security” is a prison, not a Utopia.

Improving the pledge

Maybe you’ve seen this, or even participated in it: the occasion is a public meeting of the local PTA, school board, town council, or what have you, and someone gets up and leads everyone in reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. Everyone, that is, except the local atheist/agnostic, who stands there quietly but visibly NOT reciting the pledge, in silent protest over the addition of the words “under God.” He or she might also object to the whole idea of a loyalty oath on general principles, but let me skip over that for the moment, because I want to zero in on the words “under God,” and suggest a way we can make a huge improvement.

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Who’s attacking marriage?

You hear a lot from the religious right about how marriage is under attack and how Christians need to band together to defend marriage. And yet, nobody is really attacking people’s right to get married—except people like Jayman.

I don’t view marriage as a civil right (i.e., it is not like the right to life, the right to free speech, and the like).

Pardon me whilst I attach my own Defense of Marriage Amendment to that particular argument.

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Defending bad definitions

I got a lot of good comments on yesterday’s post about the definition of marriage, but not everybody was happy with my description. In particular, Jayman777 wants to take me to task.

It makes sense, therefore, to define marriage in terms of what the relationship between those individuals is and/or should be.

Which is it? What marriage is or what marriage should be?

I think he’s missing an important point here. There are many definitions of marriage, some good and some bad, and some of those definitions describe what marriage is, and some describe what marriage ought to be. By what definition of “marriage” has Newt Gingrich had 3 wives? By the definition of what marriage is, or the definition of what marriage should be? By what definition of marriage did King Solomon have 300 wives (and 600 concubines)? Is marriage a union of one man and up to 900 women? Should it be? Well, we could talk, but the point is, if you have a definition of what marriage is, that does not preclude you from having a different definition of what marriage should be.

That’s why it’s silly to talk about anyone “changing THE definition of marriage.” There is no one, single, exclusive definition that covers all the cases. Even in purely heterosexual relationships there’s frequently (if not inevitably) a gap between what it is and what people think/want/expect it to be.

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Not all definitions of marriage are equal

The other day I was listening to yet another Christian conservative parrot the tired mantra about how liberals are trying to change the definition of marriage. My first thought was that if marriage equality changes your definition of marriage, you’ve been using a bad definition of marriage. And that got me thinking about the various definitions of marriage, and how they compare with one another.

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Better late than never

So President Obama has finally come out in favor of equal civil rights for gays. About damn time, and kudos to him for having the courage to do so ahead of the election instead of waiting until it was “safe” to take a stand. He should have done so years ago, but still, credit where credit is due. This takes a fair amount of courage. He’s taking a genuine risk here by making gay marriage a campaign issue, because the right is looking for something they can use to build up a backlash, and this could be their best bet.

My advice to the Obama campaign: focus on the theme that it’s wrong to discriminate against people just because they fall in love differently than you do. The right is going to harp on the idea that he’s “changing the definition of marriage” and promoting immorality. He needs to undercut that and challenge the assumption that there’s only one “correct” way to fall in love, and that the government ought to deny equal rights to those who are different. Marriage, as an institution, belongs to everyone, and not just to those who fit the majority’s self-serving definition of what constitutes “normal.”

Gay Marriage in the 10th century Church?

I have to confess, I’m a bit skeptical of this story about St. Serge and St. Bacchus. But it is interesting.

While the pairing of saints, particularly in the early church, was not unusual, the association of these two men was regarded as particularly close. Severus of Antioch in the sixth century explained that “we should not separate in speech [Serge and Bacchus] who were joined in life.” More bluntly, in the definitive 10th century Greek account of their lives, St. Serge is openly described as the “sweet companion and lover” of St. Bacchus.

In other words, it confirms what the earlier icon implies, that they were a homosexual couple who enjoyed a celebrated gay marriage. Their orientation and relationship was openly accepted by early Christian writers. Furthermore, in an image that to some modern Christian eyes might border on blasphemy, the icon has Christ himself as their pronubus, their best man overseeing their gay marriage.

I have no doubt that gay relationships go back to long before there was a Judeo-Christian faith, but I have a hard time believing that the medieval Christian Church openly accepted and celebrated such relationships, let alone elevating the couple to sainthood with Jesus as their best man. I’d expect any gay love between them to be strictly in the closet.

Kiss the Fourth Amendment good-bye

Wow, I thought the vote was supposed to be today, but it looks like CISPA has already been rushed through the House.

The measure, which some are calling the Son of SOPA, allows internet service providers to share information with the government, including the Department of Homeland Security and the National Security Agency, about cybersecurity threats it detects on the internet. An ISP is not required to shield any personally identifying data of its customers when it believes it has detected threats, which include attack signatures, malicious code, phishing sites or botnets. In short, the measure seeks to undo privacy laws that generally forbid ISPs from disclosing customer communications with anybody else unless with a court order.

Orwell was off by a few years, but he had the right general idea. Big Brother is going to be watching you. Purely in your own best interests of course.

Right.