Armed men beat up four traffic enforcers

**squala** · August 21st, 2006 04:51 PM

I personally believe vigilantism can only be a crime if those cops do their job properly. The problem here is that cops are oftentimes involved in the crimes themselves. Those who are supposed to uphold the law are actually the ones breaking it. Solons pass bills and oftentimes they're the first ones to disobey them. Oh well...

Back to those enforcers, what those vigilantes did, for me, was with a cause. They want to eliminate people who improve their wallents rather than the traffic situation itself. Cities like Makati is starting to make a business out of coding, disobeying 10-3 windows and not complying with the no-coding scheme last summer. The people above are simply not doing their jobs. Many motorists have already complained but no proper action is taken. So I'm not wondering why people like those who beat up the 4 enforcers surfaced.

**niky** · August 21st, 2006 07:24 PM

The belief that force can solve the ills of the world is the start down a dangerous path wherein the supposed ends justifies the means. The real question is, whether those means will realistically result in that end.

This is increasingly becoming a problem in this country, where we accept a President, who, by all available evidence, cheated her way into office, because "the ends justify the means." But what end has come of that? A President held hostage by Congress for money. Hostage to the armed forces for power. And who needs to resort to extraordinary means and measures to keep her power secure. Note: her power, not her country.

This kind of thinking is also what spurred on the Iraqi war, which, instead of the stabilizing influence it was hoped Saddam's removal would give, has turned Iraq into a hotbed of terrorist activity and Al-Quaeda's rallying point in the region. This is in direct contrast to the Afghanistan war, which was a direct attack against the actual 9-11 agitators, and which weakened Al-Quaeda immensely.

The ends do not always justify the means, especially when those means create their own problems, which may or may not be worse than those that we are attempting to solve.

And like I said: like anyone else, those enforcers must be presumed innocent until proven guilty of any crime. Unlike those robbers (I won't deign them with the label vigilantes unless it is proven that those particular enforcers were ALL corrupt), who committed their crime for all to see.

**empy** · August 22nd, 2006 12:25 AM

Originally Posted by squala

I personally believe vigilantism can only be a crime if those cops do their job properly. The problem here is that cops are oftentimes involved in the crimes themselves. Those who are supposed to uphold the law are actually the ones breaking it. Solons pass bills and oftentimes they're the first ones to disobey them. Oh well...

Back to those enforcers, what those vigilantes did, for me, was with a cause. They want to eliminate people who improve their wallents rather than the traffic situation itself. Cities like Makati is starting to make a business out of coding, disobeying 10-3 windows and not complying with the no-coding scheme last summer. The people above are simply not doing their jobs. Many motorists have already complained but no proper action is taken. So I'm not wondering why people like those who beat up the 4 enforcers surfaced.

the problem with vigilantism is that the 'criminals' are usually assumed to be guilty based on appearances instead of evidence or facts. it can be a slippery slope and very scary if you're the wrongfully accused.

for reference see historical situations like the Salem witch trials or the Inquisition