Friday, February 02, 2007
American Ignorance
I'd like to comment on a couple absolutely absurd situations I learned of this week:
1. The first story is in the city of Boston where men placed bright led signs portraying a simple cartoon character flipping observers off. This was to advertise an upcoming movie release. While maybe not completely inoffensive, city officials arrested and are planning to place criminal charges upon the two men who placed the signs around town (who where simply doing their jobs).
They are being charged because some brilliant citizens saw the signs and thought they were bombs. The flashy signs with some wires sticking out apparently resemble explosives. I'd sure hate to see these individuals walk the Vegas Strip...Anyway, instead of the police actually investigating and asking questions, they basically shut parts of the city down, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. So basically, ignorant and paranoid citizens of Boston are putting two marketers in prison for up to 5 years because they put up flashy signs.
Oh, and the same signs were put up in several other American cities where no incidents occurred...
2. Now consider the case where a substitute teacher went to crayola.com on a schoolroom PC and a pornographic popup appeared, plaguing the minds of observing students. Unfortunate? Yes. Criminal? No. Regardless of what I think, the substitute teacher now faces up to 40 years pending her sentencing hearing.
You see, the prosecution argued that this proves the SUBSTITUTE teacher visited pornographic sites and caused the incident. Hopefully, anyone reading this blog knows that the judge and jury (that convicted her) are absolutely insane to begin with. Everyone who has surfed the internet, especially on someone else's computer, has no control over the popups that appear.
Not convinced she's innocent yet? Well, a security specialist who investigated reported that the popup was generated from advertising malware installed by a hair styling website. But was he allowed to testify fully? No. Why not? The story doesn't specify, but the quoted specialist doesn't seem too pleased.
Now that we've seen the stories, we can take one of two lessons from it.
Lesson 1: People who put up flashy signs should be thrown in prison if people think those signs resemble a bomb (even if it's a green rectangular alien made out of LEDs). It also doesn't matter if the same sign prompted no response in several other cities.
Plus, if you're substitute teaching a class and try to show them a legit website and a bad popup appears, while minors are observing, you should be tossed in the can. The fact that the IT dept. admits it didn't keep the filters up to date doesn't make a different.
Or
Lesson 2: The internet allows us to see how incredibly ignorant many of the inhabitants of our country, even in elevated positions (judges, attorneys, police chiefs, etc...) really are.
I for one, go for number 2. What do you think?
1. The first story is in the city of Boston where men placed bright led signs portraying a simple cartoon character flipping observers off. This was to advertise an upcoming movie release. While maybe not completely inoffensive, city officials arrested and are planning to place criminal charges upon the two men who placed the signs around town (who where simply doing their jobs).
They are being charged because some brilliant citizens saw the signs and thought they were bombs. The flashy signs with some wires sticking out apparently resemble explosives. I'd sure hate to see these individuals walk the Vegas Strip...Anyway, instead of the police actually investigating and asking questions, they basically shut parts of the city down, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. So basically, ignorant and paranoid citizens of Boston are putting two marketers in prison for up to 5 years because they put up flashy signs.
Oh, and the same signs were put up in several other American cities where no incidents occurred...
2. Now consider the case where a substitute teacher went to crayola.com on a schoolroom PC and a pornographic popup appeared, plaguing the minds of observing students. Unfortunate? Yes. Criminal? No. Regardless of what I think, the substitute teacher now faces up to 40 years pending her sentencing hearing.
You see, the prosecution argued that this proves the SUBSTITUTE teacher visited pornographic sites and caused the incident. Hopefully, anyone reading this blog knows that the judge and jury (that convicted her) are absolutely insane to begin with. Everyone who has surfed the internet, especially on someone else's computer, has no control over the popups that appear.
Not convinced she's innocent yet? Well, a security specialist who investigated reported that the popup was generated from advertising malware installed by a hair styling website. But was he allowed to testify fully? No. Why not? The story doesn't specify, but the quoted specialist doesn't seem too pleased.
Now that we've seen the stories, we can take one of two lessons from it.
Lesson 1: People who put up flashy signs should be thrown in prison if people think those signs resemble a bomb (even if it's a green rectangular alien made out of LEDs). It also doesn't matter if the same sign prompted no response in several other cities.
Plus, if you're substitute teaching a class and try to show them a legit website and a bad popup appears, while minors are observing, you should be tossed in the can. The fact that the IT dept. admits it didn't keep the filters up to date doesn't make a different.
Or
Lesson 2: The internet allows us to see how incredibly ignorant many of the inhabitants of our country, even in elevated positions (judges, attorneys, police chiefs, etc...) really are.
I for one, go for number 2. What do you think?
Labels: Americans, ignorance, news, paranoid, teacher
