Bye bye, Britain

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Britain has bigger problems than the rights of British citizens?

Your prime minister seems to agree with that....

Her her

I suppose Britain tends towards conservatism and the approval of the community, rather than building on grand principles. Conviction is done by the community, and once you're convicted, few outsiders care about your theoretical well being in order to uphold some high principle.

This is the kind of thing that makes us sound despotic - there is a principle at work here - and it's a very important one. Namely, that those who break the law should not have a voice in the making of the law.

Indeed, and as such I don't see any point in having a "wall of nonsense"-discussion where neither of us really engage with the arguments of the other, which is why I said I didn't have much interest in discussing it further.

I do realize it may have come off as more cross than I intended it to be.

It is not the "right of the individual"(the prisoner) I care about. I care about the larger community. Why on earth should a pinko-commie like myself care about the rights of an individual? Lenin focused on class and state, nothing else!

The Norwegian model appears to largely work for Norway at the moment - but it is predicated on a small population and relatively high homogeneity. The population of Norway is roughly 70% of the population of London, spread over a much wider area. That means smaller communities where you're more likely to know people, and hence the pressure of offenders to reform within their commies much higher. Added to that, homogeneity means that the reaction of felons will be similar across the country AND you have stronger communities which apply pressure on the individual to reform.

A few Norwegian expats I have met have highlighted the pressure to conform as a reason for leaving the country - which tells you how strong it is. You get similar responses from Swedish and French expats too.

Now - after hundreds of years of immigration, especially over the last 150 years,the UK is both densely populated and heterogeneous. Communal pressure to conform to national laws is relatively weak, and in some instances whole communities willfully uncooperative with the national government - up to the point of waging sustained terror campaigns in order to force central government to accede to their demands.

In our society, the rule of Law is NOT vested in the community as it is in Norway, it is vested in the national government which has to manage competing demands from antagonistic factions. This being so, the government cannot allow those who break the law to vote. Consider - when a few hundred or a thousand prisoners are incarcerated in a city ward, their votes could determine who is elected to the local Council. The prisoners are there to be punished by they could potentially disenfranchise the law abiding citizens who live in the ward.

This may not have a practically adverse affect on those people, but that does not make the situation less repugnant to our democracy.