Archive for category Liberty

I find myself simultaneously amused and saddened slightly by the language in this article in the Independent. The piece reveals to us that some security guards now have the power to “request a name and address for a string of offences including criminal damage, begging and anti-social behaviour” around Victoria Station as part of a trial into increasing the power of security guards.

“Request”? The security guards have always had the power to request this, just as I have the power to request the name and address of the person sitting next to me on the Clapham Omnibus. As long as they don’t engage an anti-social behaviour, they’d equally have the power to tell me to go forth and multiply.

So it’s not that the security guards have gained any power to request anything. We, the public, have just lost the power to tell them to (politely) get lost without expecting “consequences”.

I wonder if the exact wording of that article was supplied by the department of spin press officer at the Home Office?

Apart from the sex-by-deception case that’s in court again this week, there’s another sex-related case doing the rounds of the internet at the moment. I find this one very interesting for the liberal dilemma that it raises, being the case of the man “banned” by the court from having sex (The Telegraph) because his IQ is “too low”.

Firstly, let’s refer to the exact court report to clear up a few bits that have been misreported elsewhere. Most notably, he appears to be bisexual, not gay, but towards the homosexual end of the spectrum. Secondly, it’s not specifically his IQ that’s discussed beyond the opening paragraphs but more his inability to understand the consequences (Health risks and pregnancy) of his actions. The judge himself notes that 0.5% of the population have an IQ that’s 50 or below (In this case, his IQ is 48) which equates to quarter of a million adults. I hope we’re not about to try to stop quarter of a million people having sex, even if it was possible to do so.

And finally, the order is merely to leave existing restrictions in place for six months while sex education is organised.

Although it’s not in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, I regard reproduction as a fairly basic human right. If we consider it otherwise, we’re crossing a dangerous line into eugenics such as the forced sterilization carried out in Australia and other countries. You can probably already tell from my choice of language that I don’t approve of such things. Control over ones own body is important and certainly an issue that the Trans community struggles with against those who think they know best.

The council are in a tight spot. If he was not being looked after full time by them, they would not have a duty of care towards him and it would not, from what I can see, be an issue. At least that means we don’t have to stop those other 249,999 people from also having sex. There is a separate problem that he’s unable to appreciate who it is and isn’t appropriate to approach for such things – it seems he’s not able to understand that children are off limits for example – but as he’s being closely supervised at the moment that doesn’t seem to be an immediate concern.

But they do have a duty of care and the court does conclude, rightly or wrongly, that he’s incapable of giving informed consent as he does not understand the risks or take appropriate precautions. (He was unable to demonstrate how to put a condom on a a fake penis) If he can’t give informed consent and the council permitted him to have sex while under their care, they’re possibly allowing an illegal act to take place.

They’re faced with the choice between violating what can be regarded as pretty basic rights or possibly allowing him to come to harm while in their care.

I think the judge came up with the right solution with the temporary restriction, merely because it may render a morally difficult question moot in teh longer term if the sex education is deemed successful. The psychological staff did not want to attempt this as they felt it unlikely to work and might just confuse and upset him. But a permanent ban could be seen as draconian and he’s expressed an interest in being allowed to have sexual relations again.

As I sit here, from my nice safe desk in an anonymous building somewhere in Essex, I can see the internet. Not just Twitter, not Facebook, not any of a million other websites but the “routes” that tell service providers how to reach each other.

There’s a hole in those routes right now, where Egypt used to be. I can see one small bit, Noor Group, is still online but that’s it.

This isn’t good and neither is the violence but it’s not what I wanted to write about. I want to write about Vodafone.

There’s been criticism levelled at Vodafone for bowing to Egyptian government pressure in turning off the mobile phone network. I don’t believe they had any choice, not because of government political pressure but because otherwise they’d be asking their engineers to put their lives on the line.

Almost all networks are terribly, terribly vulnerable to anyone with enough internal knowledge. If you know physically where certain bits of equipment are (HLRs, if you’re into mobile phones) you can shut them down and bring the whole network down. There’s probably only a few locations – maybe only two, perhaps as many as a dozen or so – where these devices are held.

It only takes one engineer to tell the authorities where those locations are.

What then? Are you asking engineers to barricade themselves inside data centres until either the generators run out of fuel or the authorities break in? People have been beaten and shot there, so you’re asking the engineers to potentially martyr themselves just to buy a few days or even hours of mobile network coverage.

And if the engineers and managers and everyone else all refuse to say?

I have kids. Someone holds a gun to their head and I’m going to sing like a canary and I would tell them where those locations are and shut them down myself if necessary.

Sorry, but that’s the way it is. I expect no more of my colleagues in Egypt than I expect of myself.

I’m an engineer, not a martyr.