It must be frustrating for some guys that their personal sexbots occasionally exercise autonomy and annoying tendency to wander outside the range of their remote control. Here’s an example of a fellow trying to regain control of a wandering toy by sending repeated commands, to no avail.
Oh, yeah, setting traps for the drone is a brilliant, tech-savvy move.
Oh, this wasn’t a flaky machine? It was a human being? Jebus, people, don’t be like that guy. What the fuck is wrong with people who are that controlling?
It could be worse. The guy could have the backing of the Justice Department in his power plays, like this Scott Nickerson sleazebag.
There’s nothing wrong with Scott Nickerson that extreme violence wouldn’t solve.
Re: Marcus Ranum (#1):
I don’t know what to think about that but did wonder why DEA agents’ shitty behaviour of this magnitude isn’t at least being treated as a security risk.
Nickerson’s victim could easily have decided at some point to forward whatever classified stuff he gave her to the drug cartels, or whatever other information she might have gotten from him. Not exactly risk-free, but if someone hounds you and yours for years and years that might just motivate someone to go to extremes, hoping to finally shake that bastard off. And I seriously doubt this guy is ‘only’ harrassing that woman and her loved ones. The article also makes it sounds like there are a lot more DEA agents who behave pretty much like that. They must be making enemies left and right.
At some point some operations might start going seriously wrong and the DEA might find itself realising, ‘Oh, this happened because Agent such-and-such kept fucking up people’s lives and when we did nothing about it, it bit us in our lethargic asses.’ (Which, presumably, would be followed by a storm of memos and presentations about professional conduct and no change whatsover.)
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I also enjoyed how the first linked article was followed by several ads (‘paid content’ immune to blocking) about seducing women, making them ‘obsessed’ with you and about weight loss. Becaus any article about domestic abuse of women benefits from thinly disgused pick-up artistry and you’re-fat ads. Why do people think targeted and ‘content-related’ ads are a good idea again? And why haven’t they figured out yet to never ever post their ads alongside articles that plumb the darker recesses of humanity?
The military and foreign policy apparatus has been bitten in their lethargic asses repeatedly and they can’t even be bothered to circulate meaningless memos.
Because they didn’t decide: “Let’s post our ads alongside articles that plumb the darker recesses of humanity.”
They decided: “Let’s put our faith in a targeting algorithm. It’s science-y and computer-y and the marketers whose jobs depend on selling the idea that the advertising industry needs to exist assure me it can’t go wrong.”
komarov@#2:
At a certain point, when someone is being threatening and won’t back down, won’t stop, and keeps amping it up, and won’t negotiate, then they’ve left no option except to either endure or take the fight to them. I’m comfortable making the latter choice only in the first case. “Baginnnnnssssss We hates it foreverrrrrrrr!” Oh, yeah? *BAM*
The guy’s a PR risk, a security risk, and a threat to someone else. The person he is threatening has a right to a peaceful life without harassment and threat. If he’s incapable of getting that and seems to be intent on continuing and amping up, you’ve got the option of getting them out of your life completely by running away, or getting them out of your life by getting them locked up. If you can’t do either of those, then I guess they belong where the river runs deep.
In the pines, in the pines, where the sun never shines…
Re: Jessie Harban (#3):
But surely the military, which kills people, has a completely different mindset than the DEA …
Oh, right, war on drugs, never mind. I guess it’s all the same bureaucracy anyway. I don’t suppose the DEA happens to be staffed in part by former soldiers? Maybe one part of the armed forces retires to the cops, another to the DEA, and so forth. Spread the poison!
Technology fallible? Impossible! I could probably run a computer simulation proving it works flawlessly.
Re: Marcus Ranum (#4):
You’re right, unfortunately. That’s why I was uncertain – I can allow myself some ambivalence by not being in that situation, lucky me.
multitool@#5:
Dolly’s done some good dark stuff. Where “the river runs deep and the water is cold as ice” is from a pretty badass tune by J.J. Cale. It belongs on everyone’s creepy revenge music playlist, along with Fred Eaglesmith’s “Dawson Creek”