Economisto has a point.
Human rights in theory is what a bunch of legislators in a room thought the definition should be.
Human rights in practice is what a bunch of judges in European Court of Human Rights decide.

For Europe only, and having delivered less than 10000 judgements in its history, only a very minor part of Europe at that. Also, their decisions are evolutionary, largely mirroring the sensibilities of the populace which is what I (and I think Corbets) meant in the first place.

Alright alright alright - the US bill of rights spoke of certain "unalienable rights" - but definitely only for white people, not the black slaves or the native "savages"... and in the ancient greek "democracy" only full citizens had those rights, no slaves or women... so yes - some ideas were there before, but the UN declaration was the first time that the human rights included absolutely everyone, no matter of skin color, religion, gender...

How about the French declaraion of human rights? That, in its early form, abolished slavery and proclaimed equal rights regardless of race or religion (but it didn't mention women one way or the other). Napoleon then trampled on that and reintroduced slavery and specifically ruled that women were not covered, but that doesn't mean the original document didn't leave room to be interpreted differently.

Right. Reminds me of that great Victorian campaigner for human rights Lord Shaftsbury, whose sterling efforts to champion children's rights were commemorated in the naming of Shaftsbury Avenue in Piccadilly. Actually he had absolutely no objection against the practice of child labour in pits and factories. Simply that he felt they had a fundamental human right to have their working hours limited to 10 hours a day max. What a hero.

And while the Bill of Rights didn't guarantee freedoms regardless or religion as indicated by Trev, it did guarantee the freedom to practice which ever religion you chose, which comes very close to the same thing.

Okay, expressed this way: I think I agree.

So, the points I think we agree on:

1) there should be strict guidelines as to how one is put on the register in the first place, to ensure only those who are a danger are put on it; and

2) there should be some sort of review process for removal from the list, but it needs to be strict as well - so those who are still a danger are kept on the list.

Is this true for you, and anyone else?

But prisoners and the mentally handicapped don't get the vote. So not everyone. Face it: it's all relative - people who were liberal 100 years ago would be conservative today, people who are liberal today will be conservative in 100 years. Things that are OK in the West aren't necessarily OK in other countries and vice versa.

There are no absolute rights. There are my ideal of what human rights should be, there's your ideal too. But until everyone has the same idea of what human rights are or should be, a group of old men in suits can declare what it likes - it doesn't make it any more true.

I've done some research on boke

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/bokeh.shtml

Ah yes. 'Boke' is also a term popular on b3ta.com, meaning to throw up little bit in your mouth when presented with something particularly foul or horriffic.
However, what was actually meant was 'bike' (hence the axle grease quip...), 'i' and 'o' being next to each other on the board.

This problem with the Qwerty board was first highlighted in 1024 when Hamfyst the Great told his captains 'to stroke the french until they can stand no more', thus leading to the common misconception that the English army was a bit, y'know, that way inclined. A similar misconception was started in England at the same time as a lot of the French soldiers seemed to like it.

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The effects that a paedophile can be pretty devastating on victims.

Suppose there were people who have an incurable desire to take life. Once committed of a murder, everyone knows that the released person gets up every day trying to control the urge to murder. Everyone knows that the chance that they will rescind is high.
After years, the value of a register, that served to warn the general public, of where the murderer lived and his crime, is questioned. the murderers are now advised that they can apply to be removed from the register after they have served their time. Many will do this, (but it won't help with employment or housing, because they still have a record). What it will do is allow that murder to walk freely among the uninformed public. They know where to go and where to find easy victims

Paedophilia may not seem like a big deal to those who know guys ( it is more often who are the perpetrators) who 'just got a bit too touchy feely', or you know 'there was this young girl but she was really mature looking'. However, to the child violated it can mean a lifetime of mental torture and social stigma. Some children commit suicide, some turn to drugs or alcohol, many end up on the streets as prostitutes. But hey, you know the guy has done his time and should be free with no register.

Do I have sympathy- No!. I have sympathy for the victims.

and there is the UDHR. Universally adopted. This gives everybody the same idea of what Human Rights are. It's the guide. These rights are absolute. To violate them is a crime. These were not thrown together by old men in suits. They are carefully drafted and proposed. The wording is simple, unambiguous. The meanings are clear and precise. The declaration is the most translated document in the world.

Even though not formally legally binding, the Declaration has been adopted in or influenced most national constitutions since 1948. It also serves as the foundation for a growing number of international treaties and national laws and international, regional, national and sub-national institutions protecting and promoting human rights.

It is not a matter of "my ideal" and "your ideal", the document serves to remove that level of interprative ambiguity.

Hi Hoppy,

Nice to see you back.

Nobody is trivilaisng child molestation.

But just some facts.

Firstly, I'd like to draw your attention to the article I linked previously.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Lesley_Molseed

The guy who was accused and wrongly imprisoned sounds a bit freakish and definitely had problems, but he was also innocent. The girls who accused him did it "for a laugh" and made up the incidents they held against him. Probably they didn't know what they were doing, but these things happen and just because they're children it doesn't mean they can't do evil. Not only did this guy go to prison and the stress of that doubtlessly contributed to his premature death, but he was beaten up viciously four times by other prison inmates. Because the topic of child abuse is so abhorrent, there is always a knee jerk reaction from the public calling for lynching and this guy got no sympathy from anybody and glaring mistakes were ignored. On the contrary, the police bullied him into admission and supressed evidence that might support his innocence.

There are a lot of peopl like that. Lonely men who don't have many friends and who maybe have some sort of mental problem and act strangely or puruse strange hobbies as this guy did (he wrote down car registrations in his notebook). But just because a man has mental problems and writes down car registrations that doesn't make him a sex offender.

Secondly, not everybody on the sexual offenders regsiter is a child molester. Any type of sexual offence can get you on there and some types of sexual offence are less clearly defined than others. So if a one night stand went wrong or there is an argument in a partnership and the woman accuses the man of rape and there are no witnesses then its her word against his. How many people are wrongly sentenced? Can we ever know?

I don't like the idea of a state where people, wherther innocent or not, can be lynched by the 21st Century equivalent of a witch-hunt just because the Daily Mail or Fox News or RTL or whoever decide to publish a hate story on them and publish their name and address because of something they did a long time ago and which they did their full prison term for and are now a reformed and improved person.

Very emmotive, but you concentrate on a very, very small minority of criminals. The murderer you describe is the unhinged sort, the psychopath.

Most crimes aren't commited by this sort of criminal, most murders are domestic, crimes of passion, between people who know each other. The perpetrators aren't the monsters you describe, waiting to kill again.

Maybe concentrating on the monsters makes us think less about the day to day horrors.

Of course the famous dystopian PR spin Jockey Cameron will say anything to pander to that sort of middle Englander sentiment. Still, it seems like a rather harsh philosophy to remove 'all rights' from an offender of any crime, surely the point of prison and eventual release is to rehabilitate the offender and develop them into a social contributor, to label them 'murderer' and 'rapist' for the rest of their lives seems pointless and inflexible to the notion rehabilitation.
In a fair system a man who has truly reformed should be supported by the state, not demonised to his dieing day, your statement panders to the school of thought which dictates that all convicts should be shot on site, in my opinion this is short sighted and a superficial statement showing a dearth of detailed thought.

oh look!! A glass house!

No it isn't. Was it adopted in Cambodia or Guantanamo or Darfur or South Africa or...or....

Except for bad people. And dictators. Much like pre-1948 in fact.


What do you call a law that's followed only by people who were going to follow it anyway? What do you call enforcement that only exists against the weak from the strong?

By imperalistic old men in suits. But done with care with few to zero spelling mistakes.

You will think as we do, you will share our morals and worldview. And to make sure of this we will write it down.

Not as simple as these words though, eh?

I have reviewed and considered your reply. Thank you for your time taken to create it. I have spent time considering and carefully wording my reply




Arse.

Generally, the public can't be trusted.

A mate of mine from my school days became notorious for a date rape charge which was later dismissed. The press caught hold of the story, found out who he was and went to town. Due to the slumbering legal process, it didn't go to trial for over a year. His life was made hell. His families life was made hell. The woman - through spite - made the story up and ruined a young man's life.

Consider the families of people on the register; it must be awful. They are not guilty yet ostracised in their communities by the ignorant who take great glee in causing trouble.

Those who gather the rope and horses ought perhaps realise the power of redemption. To deny it's possibility is to deny what it means to be human. Good can come from bad.

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