Dangerous technologies mandate regulation, at the least when preventable dangers exist.
What's your problem with DUI laws? Are you one of those people who thinks that he can drive better after 'one for the road'? (OK, one drink might improve the driving of someone anxious by removing the excessive defensiveness.... but that is one drink). Do you still believe in the myth that you are safer being 'thrown clear (into something hard or jagged, like pavement or trees, or into icy water) than being protected by an automobile body from such things for a few seconds before things stabilize? If you are concerned about fire, then you are more likely to burn to death or die of smoke inhalation if you are paralyzed or knocked unconscious because you are thrown around in a car.
Liability insurance is typically mandated by auto lenders as a condition of a loan. Blame the banks and entities such as GMAC for that. Insurance premiums are good incentives to not take undue risks like speeding, running red lights, and dangerous overtaking.
No-knock raids are necessary against armed offenders... drug traffickers almost always have guns. Sure, marijuana probably isn't as bad as its detractors have claimed... but opiates, cocaine, and meth really are dangerous. DNA databases are just the thing to link offenders to murders and rapes -- and clear the innocent. DNA is about as reliable as fingerprints.
Sex offender databases? Sex offenders are a large chunk of murderers... and by definition rapists are sex offenders.
I concede that COPS is dreadful television, as is most reality television. If you don't like it, then don't watch it! America's Most Wanted? Once a fugitive named on the show is caught there are no replays of the segment.
What's your problem with DUI laws? Are you one of those people who thinks that he can drive better after 'one for the road'? (OK, one drink might improve the driving of someone anxious by removing the excessive defensiveness.... but that is one drink). Do you still believe in the myth that you are safer being 'thrown clear (into something hard or jagged, like pavement or trees, or into icy water) than being protected by an automobile body from such things for a few seconds before things stabilize? If you are concerned about fire, then you are more likely to burn to death or die of smoke inhalation if you are paralyzed or knocked unconscious because you are thrown around in a car.
Liability insurance is typically mandated by auto lenders as a condition of a loan. Blame the banks and entities such as GMAC for that. Insurance premiums are good incentives to not take undue risks like speeding, running red lights, and dangerous overtaking.
No-knock raids are necessary against armed offenders... drug traffickers almost always have guns. Sure, marijuana probably isn't as bad as its detractors have claimed... but opiates, cocaine, and meth really are dangerous. DNA databases are just the thing to link offenders to murders and rapes -- and clear the innocent. DNA is about as reliable as fingerprints.
Sex offender databases? Sex offenders are a large chunk of murderers... and by definition rapists are sex offenders.
I concede that COPS is dreadful television, as is most reality television. If you don't like it, then don't watch it! America's Most Wanted? Once a fugitive named on the show is caught there are no replays of the segment.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.