Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

Nobody deserves to die (unless you believe in the death penalty I guess?). However, threatening to kill people, and exhibiting signs of extreme instability and violence, makes someone a danger that needs to be neutralized.

If that person pulls a gun on the police during that process, they are not likely to end up in a good spot.

Especially with a five year old in the vicinity.




I agree that the outcome could have been predicted, and I would not have acted in the same way she did.

But let's have some empathy: she was in her home, and some folks came to her home and attempted to remove her, with threats of violence. She didn't believe they had legal authority to do that.

What would you do in that situation, with those beliefs?


I live in the US. Let's say there's a law I disagree with. If I break that law, and police officers take action to enforce it, I'm still capable of cooperating with the officers and working through the system, using my rights as a citizen to achieve as fair an outcome as possible.

Now let's say I disagree that police officers have the right to enforce the law, and that, in fact, the entire legal system doesn't apply to me, and it infringes on my fundamental rights as a human being. I don't need to work through the system, because the system doesn't apply to me! Well, that sucks -- I still live in the United States, where the power of the law is ultimately backed by a large citizenship that does believe that the laws apply to them, and also by an incredible military force and globally connected political powers.

Clearly, saying "the law doesn't apply to me," while I'm living in the US, is about as useful as saying "the rules of physics don't apply to me." In the interest of self-preservation, while pursuing my ideologies, I might abscond to some country that does not have political ties to the US, and obtain citizenship there. Heck, I might just find my own island in the middle of nowhere and live out the rest of my days in the peace of my own personal government. Great! Everyone's happy!

However, essentially declaring war on an institution far more powerful than yourself, while the institution has both the self-interest and ability to enforce its laws isn't so much "exercising your personal ideologies" as it is "a symptom of an insane person with no sense of self preservation"

There are refugees all around the world that are fleeing from the ideologies of their own governments. That's within their rights as human beings. However, it's a symptom of insanity, not personal ideology, to believe that the laws of the country literally don't apply to you while you're there. This is why we don't often see these refugees driving around the streets of their home country, disobeying (relatively) minor laws in an extremely attention-getting way, trying to pick fights, and then threatening to shoot cops. I'm sure there are examples of this, but I'll just say the same thing in those cases -- that's not political ideology, it's insanity. And when insane people wave guns around, they get shot.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: