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roachboy · 01-04-2005, 08:43 AM

but how do you define a potential "terrorist"?
seriously--can "potential" ever be other than arbitrary?
conspiracy devolves straight away onto questions of intent...the situations in which intent can be proven are quite small, as the problems attending proof are extreme.

every day, i have the potential to eat red meat.
every day, i implicitly make a decision that either includes or excludes red meat.
i am a vegetarian. but i am also a potential omnivore.
at the level of intent, am i am omnivore or am i a vegetarian?
if being an omnivore was to become illegal, could i be arrested for the potential act of eating omniverously?
how would you establish guilt?

what if this is the motivation behind the denial of due process--that the charges are absurd, the question of proof impossible--futher there is no theater of operations, no way to be caught in flagrante delecto--so "potential terrorist" is and remains a wholly arbitrary category--and the entire process incoherent, except as theater, as providing the illusion of action, of direction....

say you were a young arab male who accumulates radical literature as something of a hobby. given the above, is there anything--anything at all--that would prevent your arrest and unlimited detention? why is this acceptable?
i assume that the question of ruining someones life for the greater good does not concern supporters of the bush administration becuase they approach the problem already sure that the life being ruined would not be their own as a simple function of race maybe or of the kind of political literature you keep around your house maybe....so it is easy--easier than you could imagine--to support this kind of legal balck hole because at stake is always already someone else's.

01-04-2005, 08:43 AM	#111 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	but how do you define a potential "terrorist"? seriously--can "potential" ever be other than arbitrary? conspiracy devolves straight away onto questions of intent...the situations in which intent can be proven are quite small, as the problems attending proof are extreme. every day, i have the potential to eat red meat. every day, i implicitly make a decision that either includes or excludes red meat. i am a vegetarian. but i am also a potential omnivore. at the level of intent, am i am omnivore or am i a vegetarian? if being an omnivore was to become illegal, could i be arrested for the potential act of eating omniverously? how would you establish guilt? what if this is the motivation behind the denial of due process--that the charges are absurd, the question of proof impossible--futher there is no theater of operations, no way to be caught in flagrante delecto--so "potential terrorist" is and remains a wholly arbitrary category--and the entire process incoherent, except as theater, as providing the illusion of action, of direction.... say you were a young arab male who accumulates radical literature as something of a hobby. given the above, is there anything--anything at all--that would prevent your arrest and unlimited detention? why is this acceptable? i assume that the question of ruining someones life for the greater good does not concern supporters of the bush administration becuase they approach the problem already sure that the life being ruined would not be their own as a simple function of race maybe or of the kind of political literature you keep around your house maybe....so it is easy--easier than you could imagine--to support this kind of legal balck hole because at stake is always already someone else's. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 01-04-2005 at 08:46 AM..