Category: English

October 6, 2024

Droit 43 État civil biologique et état civil déclaratif : Conséquences juridiques

Juillet-Septembre 2024 FR-EN

État civil biologique et état civil déclaratif :
Conséquences juridiques

Un État ne peut forcer une personne à renoncer à son opinion sur le sexe d’autrui, c’est-à-dire ne peut traduire son revirement de politique et admission de changements de sexe à l’état civil en criminalisant l’opposition à cette politique. L’État qui pratique cette criminalisation ne reconnaît pas la liberté d’opinion : or les États signataires de la Convention européenne des droits de l’homme s’engagent à reconnaître et respecter cette liberté.

Ce que prétend une telle persécution, c’est forcer les citoyens à renoncer à leur opinion sur le sexe comme donné biologique. Parce que l’État a procédé à un revirement de politique et accepte maintenant de changer l’état civil des personnes (même mineures au sens de la législation) en fonction de leurs déclarations, il prétend que, tout comme l’état civil « biologique » n’était pas une décision contestable, ce nouvel état civil « déclaratif » doit tout aussi légitimement être garanti contre les remises en cause. Or, puisque ce nouvel état civil est à présent le résultat d’une opinion, il n’est justement plus garanti comme acte d’autorité publique mais est ouvert à la libre critique des opinions divergentes en vertu de la liberté d’opinion. Nul n’est contraint de tirer les mêmes conséquences que l’État d’un état civil déclaratif.

Dès lors que l’État renonce à ce que l’état civil d’une personne soit déterminé par son sexe biologique constaté à la naissance, la déclaration d’état civil à la naissance n’a plus la moindre justification. L’État a de fait renoncé à établir un état civil des personnes en fonction du sexe sans déclaration à ce sujet des intéressés. Or, puisque cette caractéristique est à présent laissée par l’État à la libre appréciation des individus, il est évident aussi que la mention du sexe à l’état civil n’est pas une propriété personnelle reconnue et garantie par l’État mais une simple opinion, soumise en tant que telle à la critique des opinions divergentes.

Dans le cas du professeur Enoch Burke en Irlande, celui-ci a été incarcéré pour avoir contesté son exclusion de l’école où il enseignait, en continuant de s’y présenter physiquement. Ce moyen de protestation n’était sans doute pas le plus indiqué mais la question n’en est pas moins posée de la légalité de l’exclusion d’Enoch Burke compte tenu des principes rappelés ci-dessus. S’il s’agit d’une école publique, l’État doit bien sûr respecter ses propres principes, à savoir que le nouvel état civil déclaratif ne peut lier personne de manière contraignante. Dans le cas de contestation par un professeur sur le sexe déclaré par l’élève, c’est bien plutôt à l’élève de changer de classe ou d’établissement. Si c’est une école privée, il n’est pas non plus possible à un contrat passé entre l’établissement et le professeur de faire renoncer ce dernier à un droit fondamental, à savoir, ici, celui d’avoir une opinion sur ce qu’est le sexe d’une personne.

Embrassades en politique

Les amendements de l’opposition sont rarement retenus, et cela n’arrive que s’ils sont techniques. On voit donc, avec les images d’embrassades émues entre la présidente réélue de la Commission européenne Von der Leyen et la députée européenne LFI M. Aubry si fière de son travail d’amendements non votés au Parlement européen, qu’être « productif » en amendements, comme l’intéressée, a surtout pour résultat de faire de députés de l’opposition des collègues et amis des gens dont ils dénoncent la politique. L’effusion que montrent ces images d’embrassades et de sourires radieux est très au-delà du simple « respect républicain » invoqué par l’intéressée pour se justifier après la diffusion desdites images ; c’est un épanchement qui montre une connivence, une joie d’être ensemble ; quiconque voit ces images sans être au courant de qui sont les personnes en question pensera que ce sont de bonnes amies. C’est une faute monumentale. Ces politiciens de carrière se respectent plus les uns les autres qu’ils ne respectent leurs électeurs. Ces embrassades délirantes de joie glacent le sang de l’électeur qui croit envoyer des programmes, des idées dans les institutions représentatives.

Du vote au Parlement de ministres démissionnaires

Sur le vote des ministres démissionnaires à l’Assemblée nationale pour l’élection du président de cette chambre, en juillet, c’est le Conseil constitutionnel qui est responsable de l’usine à gaz et de l’arbitraire. Le Conseil constitutionnel a été saisi en 1986 de la question et s’est déclaré incompétent pour ne pas imposer au Parlement son interprétation de la Constitution, au nom de l’indépendance des assemblées parlementaires. Or le Conseil constitutionnel est l’interprète ultime de la Constitution et si son interprétation s’impose à l’exécutif elle s’impose aussi au législatif, de même que quand le Parlement vote des mesures inconstitutionnelles le Conseil les censure. L’indépendance des assemblées est vis-à-vis de l’exécutif et des tribunaux (immunités parlementaires) et non vis-à-vis du contrôle constitutionnel.

En 1986, le Conseil avait seulement à dire si le vote de ministres démissionnaires est permis ou non à l’Assemblée. En refusant de répondre, il a potentiellement créé une crise politique majeure à chaque renouvellement. C’est ce qui s’appelle ne pas savoir pourquoi l’on est payé, même s’ils appellent cela, quant à eux, « l’indépendance des assemblées ». Comme si les assemblées étaient indépendantes de la Constitution ! En bref, c’était une décision grotesque de ces clowns qu’on appelle « les sages ».

Un journaliste de chaîne privée n’est pas un fonctionnaire ayant un devoir de neutralité. Comme tout salarié, il a un devoir de loyauté envers son employeur privé, sous peine de licenciement. Quand un employeur est un sioniste enragé, ses employés auront sur ces questions la même position que leur employeur dans leur travail. Il appartient donc aux gens d’arrêter de consommer du média sioniste, non aux salariés d’être « neutres » comme des fonctionnaires alors qu’un contrat de droit privé prévoit au contraire une loyauté envers les positions du patron sioniste. Cependant, les conventions passées par les médias privés avec l’État prévoient des obligations de pluralisme qui alignent le travail journalistique sur une neutralité du même type que celle de la fonction publique : il faut donc dénoncer des manquements à ces conventions, et cela seul, car il n’existe en dehors de ces textes contractuels de droit public entre un média et l’État aucun principe qui ferait des journalistes salariés des fonctionnaires.

Cérémonie officielle insultante et prétendue laïcité

La cérémonie d’ouverture des Jeux olympiques de 2024 à Paris comportait une parodie insultante de la Cène.

Plan : (i) Le principe de laïcité ; (ii) Des excuses ; (iii) Mais aussi du déni.

(i)
Le principe de laïcité

Ce n’est pas une question de liberté d’expression : c’est la question d’un État supposé laïc qui insulte une religion, car cette cérémonie est une cérémonie officielle. La liberté n’est pas pour l’État : ce n’est pas pour que l’État soit libre que les gens se sont battus. Même en supposant que si ce spectacle avait eu un caractère privé la justice française n’aurait pu la condamner pour de la haine envers un groupe de personnes à raison de la religion, l’État est sorti de sa neutralité laïque en détournant par une cérémonie officielle le sens d’un fait religieux. C’est un manquement à un principe fondamental et si notre régime ne permet pas de faire condamner ce manquement en justice, c’est que l’État français ne connaît pas le principe de laïcité et trompe les Français.

Les médias français nous assurent que l’extrême droite veut gâcher la fête. Or nul besoin d’être d’extrême droite pour voir que l’État français a manqué à son devoir fondamental de laïcité et neutralité dans une cérémonie officielle, en détournant l’imagerie religieuse des confessions chrétiennes. Un avocat dit vouloir saisir la justice : il sera intéressant de suivre la procédure pour savoir par quel moyen l’État pourrait être condamné pour une violation manifeste d’un principe fondamental dont il nous rebat par ailleurs les oreilles. Ne pas insulter une religion serait un bon commencement pour un État laïc… L’État français s’est essuyé le derrière avec sa Constitution.

Même s’il existait un droit au blasphème (ce que l’on entend maintes fois répété par des ignorants et qui est juridiquement faux, comme nous l’avons montré à l’aide des textes : voyez nos Cours de science du droit I-II), il ne s’applique pas à l’État qui a une obligation de neutralité et de respect de la laïcité, obligation enfreinte quand dans une cérémonie officielle l’État détourne l’imagerie religieuse de telle ou telle confession.

« Il y a une liberté de l’artiste. » Dans un État laïc, une cérémonie officielle ne doit pas insulter une religion. Quand ce principe fondamental n’est pas respecté, ou bien l’État est condamné pour le manquement, par une juridiction compétente, ou bien cet État est un régime arbitraire puisque, alors qu’il prétend garantir la laïcité, en réalité il attaque une religion sans conséquence judiciaire. L’État arbitraire qui se cache derrière la liberté de l’artiste pour insulter une religion, c’est abject.

(ii)
Des excuses

« Les excuses du Comité olympique ».

L’État français doit lui aussi présenter des excuses puisqu’il est coresponsable de cette cérémonie officielle. Par ailleurs, il doit être sanctionné pour le manquement à ses obligations de neutralité et de respect de la laïcité.

(iii)
Mais aussi du déni

La chaîne publique France 2 a parlé de « mise en Cène légendaire ». Le déni, dans le cas présent, est une bien piètre défense. La référence a été immédiatement perçue par toutes les personnes non dépourvues de culture et l’on ne saurait prétendre que, parce qu’il existe une partie de la population qui n’a pas la moindre idée de ce qu’est la Cène ou qui est Léonard de Vinci, le détournement et l’insulte ne sont pas caractérisés. Le tollé vient d’apprendre aux organisateurs de cette cérémonie officielle, au cas où leur déni serait de bonne foi car ils appartiendraient à la catégorie des gens les moins cultivés de la population, qu’ils viennent de commettre une faute par ignorance et négligence. Ils se rappelaient vaguement un tableau mais croyaient aussi que c’était une publicité pour une marque de chips : il n’en reste pas moins que l’État a manqué à ses devoirs et obligations et que si la justice administrative de ce pays est une justice elle doit le condamner à la suite des saisines dont nous entendons dire qu’elles se préparent.

« Laïcité », c’est le nom que donnent les islamophobes à leur islamophobie depuis que la loi condamne l’islamophobie.

Thiaroye

Tirailleurs « morts pour la France » à Thiaroye en 1944. (France 24)

C’est du négationnisme. On n’est pas « mort pour la France » quand on est mort victime de la France. Ces six tirailleurs, mais aussi les autres victimes du camp de Thiaroye, ont été exterminés par la France. Cette reconnaissance du statut de mort pour la France est une façon de ne pas présenter d’excuses officielles. Nous les avons massacrés, donc ils sont morts pour nous ! La France s’enfonce dans l’indignité.

Ces six tirailleurs (pourquoi seulement six alors qu’on en dénombre des dizaines ?) ne peuvent pas être dits morts pour la France puisqu’ils ont été massacrés par la France. Si la France considère aujourd’hui que c’était une faute, il faut qu’elle présente des excuses officielles. Ce négationnisme est une bassesse. La France veut faire croire que des gens qu’elle a massacrés sont morts pour elle ! Qu’ils sont morts à son service quand elle les criblait de balles parce qu’ils demandaient leur dû financier à la fin de la guerre, après la guerre dans laquelle ils avaient servi ! Le fait qu’elle les ait massacrés signifie qu’elle ne les reconnaissait plus comme étant à son service, au service de la France. Mort pour la France voulant dire « compensation » (à savoir, selon le code des pensions militaires : sépulture perpétuelle dans un cimetière militaire aux frais de l’État, inscription sur un monument aux morts communal, gratuité des droits de mutation par décès, pension de veuve de guerre le cas échéant, reconnaissance des enfants comme pupilles de la Nation), ici la compensation doit être double ou triple parce que ces tirailleurs ne sont pas morts en servant la France, tués par l’ennemi au front, mais massacrés traîtreusement dans leur camp par les autorités qu’ils servaient.

Si ces tirailleurs sont morts pour la France, alors c’est que ceux qui ont donné l’ordre de les tuer ne représentaient pas la France, et la reconnaissance de la mort pour la France des uns implique nécessairement une condamnation, même posthume, par exemple la dégradation nationale, pour les autres, leurs assassins.

Digital Services Act (DSA) européen
et loi de 1881 sur la liberté de la presse

Les principes du DSA (Digital Services Act) européen sont contraires à ceux de la loi française de 1881. En effet, ce règlement rétablit une censure administrative. La loi de 1881 n’existe donc plus, en raison du principe de primauté du droit européen, dans sa dimension la plus fondamentale qui était censée nous distinguer des anciens régimes, monarchie et Second Empire. Mais le pouvoir français entend faire comme si rien n’avait changé, après avoir activement soutenu le DSA qui balaie un principe majeur d’une des lois fondatrices du régime républicain en France.

Political Asylum

Big Shock For Sheikh Hasina From UK; This Is London’s ‘Reply’ To Ex-Bangladesh PM’s Asylum Appeal [namely, refusal]. (Times of India)

A state cannot refuse to grant asylum unless the application is unwarranted. In the present case the application is clearly justified, especially seeing the storming of the deposed PM’s house by a crowd of angry people. UK authorities seem to believe the right to asylum leaves them with a discretionary power to cherry-pick people, regardless of the people’s objective situation in their country. This is not how it works: There can be no right to asylum without a state duty to accommodate asylum seekers. If the refusal here is UK’s last answer, it means British authorities deny the existence of a right to asylum in international relationships.

Designed Asymmetries of Hate Speech Laws

As long as one supports hate speech laws, that is, criminalization of speech based on content, their proffering the f-word (f for fascist) will elicit a mere shrug of the shoulders. Such laws have an obvious chilling effect on criticism of Israel and Zionism. This is where their effect is maximal. To be sure there are no such laws in the US and yet criticizing Zionism comes at a risk there too, by other mechanisms. However, this is an international question: In the US the Zionist lobby must fund its repressive campaigns against criticism, whereas in Europe, where there are hate speech and other such laws, Zionists only have to give the police a call. By supporting and promoting hate speech laws, the delusional Left gives Zionism a wonderful repression tool. All critics in Europe must defend themselves from possible criminal suits. At least in the US it costs the Zionist lobby some dollars to gag people; in Europe it gags people and earns money in the bargain through civil damages.

If you think the hate speech laws that you promote chill Islamophobia as much as criticism of Israel, think again.

UK Riots

That people be charged for “anti-Muslim rhetoric” is nothing to be surprised of, as UK has had hate speech laws for decades and these laws aim at defending groups based on race, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, but also religion, from so-called group libel. If Britons disagree with this, this is not against law enforcement, namely the government, police, and courts, that they should complain, but against the legislation itself: namely, they should call for its repeal.

However, that a court allege, besides, “anti-establishment rhetoric” is strange and worrying, as one doesn’t see how such rhetoric could lie in the purview of hate speech laws. Three possibilities: 1) UK law against speech is much more comprehensive than its neighbors’ similar laws and includes anti-establishment rhetoric in the prosecutable hate speech category. This is unlikely. 2) The media report is not accurate, and the court did not mention anti-establishment rhetoric, which is not a legal category as far as hate speech is concerned. 3) This court is blatantly incompetent.

(ii)

Hate speech laws have been in British legislation for centuries. “Free speech” British-wise since Blackstone means one’s speech won’t be subjected to prior censorship but the author of illicit speech will be prosecuted. This is what was supposed to be a progress. Therefore, what might be new, if anything is new here, is that internet content is censored by the administration, not that people are punished by courts for their speech.

Trump’s plan: Deport anyone [any foreign resident, that is, as American citizens cannot be deported legally] who “wants to eliminate Israel.”

This trashy rhetoric is already policy in France, where foreigners are subject to deportation for speech that is allowed by national law. That is, foreigners do not have the same speech rights as nationals although freedom of speech is a fundamental human right according to the European Convention on human rights ratified by France.

Of “Values” and the Law

“Islam must adapt to Swedish values or leave.” (Swedish Deputy Prime Minister Ebba Busch)

Such speech is discriminatory according to the European Convention on Human Rights ratified by Sweden. Legal migrants do not come uninvited by the host countries, and they cannot be told to comply with a different set of rules than the natives as far as fundamental rights are concerned. Their only obligation is to comply with the law, because all are equal before the law. To imply they would have to comply with more than that, namely, to adapt to values while they already abide by the law, is discriminatory. And if adapting to values means that migrants should abide by the law, it goes without saying and this speech is offensive.

A statesperson cannot ask for more than abiding by the law because their mandate is either legislative (lawmaking) or executive (execution and enforcement of the law). Besides, one fails to see how a law-abiding individual can be found at fault re a state that is based on the rule of law. The spirit of the law, as some would call it (the letter and the spirit), is either the law itself, and in this case one either abides by it or not, or it is something alien to the law and therefore outside a statesman’s mandate.

On Collective Punishment in the USA:
Kinship Punishment Against the Right To Bear Arms

Charging the mass shooter Colt Gray’s father, Colin Gray, for “involuntary manslaughter” because he gifted his son a gun, is legal insanity. If gifting a gun to a minor is legal, the father did nothing illegal. If it is not legal, the father committed this crime, not manslaughter. Gifting a gun to a minor is obviously legal in the state of Georgia because Colin Gray is not charged with gifting his minor kid a gun but for involuntary manslaughter after the kid shot people; one of the most absurd and unprincipled charges one has ever heard of.

Prosecution says Colin Gray had been warned about threats made by his son. What about that? Many more threats occur than shootings. Obviously, the father didn’t take the threats more seriously than the authorities themselves, which did not charge the kid for threats, therefore didn’t think it was a serious matter. At most the father is civilly liable for neglect, just like the authorities (except that the law conveniently gives the latter qualified immunity), not criminally guilty of manslaughter. It is a fundamental principle of civilized countries that collective punishment does not obtain. If a father is guilty of his son’s shooting, then the gun dealer is guilty too, and so on. One probable cause for arresting the father would have been that investigators had hints that he knew his son would shoot people with the gun, for example if he had gifted the gun on the proviso that his son shot people, but we hear nothing about this; it is only known that the father bought the gun despite “warnings” by authorities, but what warnings were these since the authorities did not act according to serious threats and failed to charge the kid for making these threats?

Threats are crimes. Courts’ decisions limit these laws’ purview to “true threats” (Watts v. United States, Scotus, 1969), that is, when authorities don’t prosecute threats, they admit they can’t stand a trial for true threats. Absent a trial for threats against Colt Gray, the authorities can make no claim to have warned his father. The alleged warning is a mere figment of I don’t know whose imagination. In a free country with a Second Amendment protecting the right to bear arms, one simply does not have to heed to a police warning against buying guns to one’s kid when/if the law allows one to do it. Even as the warning was followed by a shooting, the father committed no crime, at least not the crime of “involuntary manslaughter” for the demise of these people. Absolutely not. He cannot be found guilty of this without miscarriage of justice.

I am told the police warned the father about threats of which they did not keep evidence. That settles the matter. There is no record of threats, no record of the father having heard of or remembering them, no record of anything and certainly not of criminal manslaughter by the father. The father can only be guilty of a crime if he intentionally assisted in committing the actual crime. The alleged criminal being the son, even a reckless disregard of the consequences of buying a gun, if proven, can only be civilly liable recklessness, not a criminal liable offence, because it took an intentional shooter to slay people and the mens rea (intention) of this crime lies with the son alone. Therefore, one’s pointing to allowing an “unstable” minor to get a gun has nothing to do with a crime (everything that is not forbidden is allowed) and only, at most, with a civil tort. As a public prosecutor cannot charge with civil torts and only with crimes, the “involuntary manslaughter” charge is criminal and hence gravely misguided.

A man can’t be charged with a crime if he has not committed or participated in it, and both commission and participation require an element of mens rea (intention) that is obviously absent here: No one claims the father bought his son a gun so that the kid shoot people. Therefore, criminal guilt of the father must be discarded. There only remains the possibility for victims to raise the issue of tort liability for reckless behavior but that is an altogether different issue that has nothing to do with criminal charges. Such a prosecution is in blatant disregard of principles, the latest attempt by opponents to the Second Amendment to stifle the right to bear arms.

To make parents guilty of their kids’ crimes is called collective punishment and doesn’t obtain. In such cases, parents can only be held liable for civil torts. The intervention of a prosecutor for criminal charges where no mens rea is claimed, as such criminal charges already lie with the kid, is out of place and abhorrent to well-established principles. The father cannot be criminally charged for “involuntary manslaughter,” this is out of the question in a civilization of the rule of law. Relatives should ask for damages in a civil trial. A prosecutor does not protect single victims as much as the society as a whole, and a criminal court pronounces penalties, not damages. When these penalties are financial, they don’t accrue to the victims but to the state. Many trials have both civil and criminal sides but as far as Colin Gray is concerned, prosecution and a prosecutor are out of place.

While some forms of extremely reckless behavior may be treated as crimes, such as throwing stones randomly and one stone hits a person on the head, in the present case the existence of a mens rea on the kid’s part locates the crime on the kid’s person, and it is not possible to charge the father with “involuntary manslaughter” for making a gift with the same intentions as all other people who are making such gifts every day without dire consequences. Acts with dire consequences but no harmful intent are at most torts, not crimes, when the consequences are the direct result of an existing crime committed by someone else.

Colin Gray would have been complicit in the murders according to the district attorney (DA) if the latter said that the father bought his son Colt a gun so that Colt shoot people; this is being complicit. However, the DA is not saying this. The DA says the father bought his son a gun knowing he was unstable, and the DA alleges police warnings about threats made by his son. If the police had a record for threats, they should have charged the kid with threats, because threats are a crime. Absent charges for threats, the father was not compelled to heed a warning because ultimately one’s right is what the law says, not what police officer x tells you. Absent actual criminal proceedings against Colt for threats, the warning was as much as nonexistent: As the authorities didn’t draw consequences from threats, namely prosecution, why would the father have? Therefore, he bought his son a gun and the two went hunting together. The DA wants to reinstate long-vanished kinship punishment, forbidden by international law.

(ii)

Some are trying hard to disarm the people. No well-established principle will detain them, they’d rather steamroll principles before the bemused eyes of a law-blind population. Here they’re claiming that it is criminal for this father to have ignored a police warning about his kid, a warning not to buy a gun, while the law says Colin Gray had a right to buy the gun. Do you understand? It is criminal to ignore the police when they instruct you to give up your protected rights!

If you think there are more shootings in the US than in Mexico or Brazil where gun laws are stringent, think again. Wikipedia: “Mexico has restrictive laws regarding gun possession”; “In Brazil it is generally illegal to carry a gun outside a residence”. Those who oppose your rights only focus on shootings on this side of the border. When you lose your rights, you will be living secluded in your homes while heavily armed gangs and cartels roam the streets.

The father’s criminal trial for involuntary manslaughter is a political trial by the opponents of the right to bear arms. A few words on the Second Amendment, then. The Second Amendment prevents anyone from claiming that a standing army has made militias irrelevant. The Founding Fathers would not admit it, because they knew that a standing army is an instrument of tyranny; and not only that but also that a standing army would be an instrument of tyranny even under their own Constitution absent an all-inclusive right to bear arms.

What we’re seeing is kinship punishment in its blatantest, most disgusting form. “International law posits that no person may be punished for acts that he or she did not commit. It ensures that the collective punishment of a group of persons for a crime committed by an individual is forbidden…This is one of the fundamental guarantees established by the Geneva Conventions and their protocols. This guarantee is applicable not only to protected persons but to all individuals, no matter what their status, or to what category of persons they belong…” (Wkpd: Collective Punishment) The principle of individual responsibility opposes the notion that a father is criminally liable for the crimes of his son, even a minor. However, there probably are some statutes in Georgia allowing for tort action against parents for some form or other of neglect, and allowing victims to ask civil damages, but we don’t hear about this here and now. We only hear of the eager violation of the principle of individual responsibility by unhinged authorities in what is a political trial to curb the right to bear arms.

There is the possibility to ask civil damages to parents for the trouble made by their minor kids, but to criminally charge two people for the same crime, the shooter and his father, is something different called collective punishment, forbidden by the international law of civilized nations. They’re not saying the father is an accomplice; instead, they’re claiming that he’s guilty of involuntary manslaughter while his kid is guilty of voluntary murder, as if the father ever crossed the victims’ way. Some people will stop at nothing to curb the right to bear arms.

The Inconsistency of Statutory Rape Legislation

Current legislation in France says a sexual relationship between a 14-year-old boy and a thirty, forty something woman is statutory rape, but the legislation back in the days when such a relationship allegedly occurred between the current President of France and his wife, I don’t know.

I have an issue with the legislation. According to French law, statutory rape is limited to cases where one is a minor (say 14) and the other an adult, or the age difference between the two is more than 5 years. So, if both are minors and about the same age, everything is fine: These kids can have group sex parties together. But if one of them, with the sexual experience she has legally acquired by having sex parties since she has been 13, has sex with a 19-year-old virgin boy because she wants to teach him sex, the 19-year-old is a rapist. Go figure.

As designed, the law deprives itself of reasonable ground. One simply cannot assume that kids are victims of older people without further inquiry, because the law allows for practices among kids that may grant them the experience, knowledgeability, and confidence to act as sexual predators or seducers. At the same time, the law demands that authorities make illegitimate assumptions and punish accordingly the older person without further inquiry. As it is obvious, given the circumstances created or allowed by the law itself, that every case in strict justice requires an investigation of the conduct of the kid, who may be more sexually knowledgeable than the person five years older than him or her, we cannot talk of “statutory” rape.

April 12, 2024

Law 40 Wawkeism

Sep 2023-Mar 2024

Wawkeism

“China Blasts German Foreign Minister Over ‘Dictator Xi’ Jibe” (Hindustan Times, Sep 2023)

Why are woke politicians such bellicose hawks? I am coining the word wawk for them. But no matter how wawk is a hen, it can only peck small chicken.

Taliban’s Heinous Surveillance Cams

“Taliban Plan Mass Surveillance Network in Afghanistan Using U.S. “Security Map,” China’s Huawei” (Crux, Sep 2023)

Cameras are law enforcement tools. Taliban, like other governments, will enforce legislation with the help of cameras. When human rights organizations express concerns about a mere tool with which laws will be enforced but these organizations in fact consider that the laws themselves do not abide by human rights and are the problem, it is idle talk as far as their speech focuses on a universal tool rather than specific and allegedly problematic laws. These organizations show themselves as mere anti-Taliban pecking hens. Tomorrow, if they can find nothing else, they will express concern that the Taliban have a police force. When you express concern that the government of a country uses the same police measures as other countries, you are pecking like a hen.

The right to advocate and incite unlawful conduct

“Influencer ‘Meatball’ appears to be arrested while livestreaming looting rampage in Philadelphia” (New York Post, Sep 2023)

Streaming is not looting. The influencer has First Amendment rights. The First Amendment allows advocacy of unlawful conduct and the influencer’s arrest was unjustified.

She has a First Amendment right to incite riot or looting or any other unlawful act one can think of, provided it is not inciting (1) an imminent act (2) likely to occur: Brandenburg v. Ohio. As she was livestreaming on her blog, she was not even addressing the crowds around her, which is the only way in which her speech could have resulted in imminent unlawful action likely to occur. There is no incitement relationship between the looting and her gloating over it.

But even if she had livestreamed herself addressing the looters, “Well done, guys!,” this is not incitement either because congratulations cannot be incitement, as the former follow the act while the latter precedes it. Furthermore, even if she had said “Well done! There is another store next door,” the looting started before her speech, and if this speech (“go to another store after this one”) could be incitement in this context, then congratulations would be incitement as well, as a warmup, but congratulations cannot be incitement by definition. As one has a right to advocate wrongful conduct, one obviously has a right to cheer over wrongful conduct, even if this could be said to warm up wrongdoers.

To be sure, congratulations may also occur during, rather than after, the act, but during the act is still not before the act, and one needs precedence to talk about incitement. If there were incitement in the present case, it would be incitement to keep looting and not to start looting, but if it could be said that such a thing exists as incitement to continue doing something that people had already started doing, then there is obviously no possibility that cheering could be protected by the First Amendment as it is in a free country where advocacy of unlawful acts is protected.

Even if addressing looters in one store with such words as “Loot the next store too” has some formal characteristics of incitement, it is not incitement, here, because for speech to be incitement it must incite, again, an imminent act likely to occur, and if the imminent act was likely to occur already before the speech, the speech is not inciting, it is only cheering, rejoicing, reveling, gloating… Looting has material interests attached to it, people loot for goods and merchandises; this motive is self-sufficient without the need to add cheering as a likely cause of continuation. As an individual caught in the middle of a rampage, and liking it, some of the influencer’s words had a few characteristics of incitement but her speech lacked other characteristics and they are all needed together to characterize unlawful speech.

The arrest follows a typical pattern of police frustration, where, most of the wrongdoers escaping arrest, police turn against a person for her speech. This is not acceptable under a Constitution with First Amendment. Besides, the arrest psychologically relies on an outdated notion that people on the street have a legally enforceable duty to make citizen’s arrests (called hue and cry): when, in the past, such a duty existed, a person running with the crowd after, say, a thief on the street while cheering for the theft at the same time was obviously unlikely.

To sum up, “keep going,” in whatever form, is not incitement. The looters were not triggered by the person’s speech. Gloating over wrongful acts is protected speech, as a form of advocacy.

While Western governments and media were stressing that some Russians tried to emigrate to escape the draft, and this was described as a blow to the Russian regime, they asked European populations to welcome and accommodate millions of Ukrainian refugees who were fleeing not only the war zone in their country but also their country itself. In other words, while these governments and media asked European people to fund the Ukrainian army, they also asked them to welcome Ukrainian men escaping military service for the country we were supposed to root for. Ukrainian refugees had a duty to take refuge in their own country in order to enlist in the Ukrainian army; their coming to Europe has been opportunistic, to the best of a rational agent’s understanding.

On the “hypocrisy of the international community” regarding the treatment of civil casualties in Ukraine and Palestine. The parallel between Ukraine and Palestine would be more adequate if Western nations held Ukraine accountable for Russian civilians’ deaths, which they are not doing, whether it be because there are no Russian civilian casualties (but there are: see below) or for the same reason they keep largely silent on Palestinian casualties, namely because they support Ukraine’s goals as they support Israel’s ones. They only see civilian casualties when the “bad guys” are responsible.

Nota Bene. 1) Since the beginning of the war, there have been Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory. 2) There is a significant Russian minority in Ukraine. If you refuse to call them ethnic Russians, you will count them as Ukrainian casualties rather than Ukraine’s victims; how convenient.

Aerial invasion and mass bombardments have become the number one modus operandi of technological war, and this type of warfare is highly indiscriminate and lethal to civilians and civilian infrastructures, especially when faced with guerrilla warfare. This, among other things, is the reason why Western nations are reluctant (to say the least) to condemn the bombardments on Gaza, because they know they would do the same, namely indiscriminate mass bombardments, in the same situation, regardless of international law. The existence of Palestinian enclaves (the relics of Palestinian territories) surrounded by Israeli territories allows this to happen, and the so-called “human shields” in these enclaves are all the present and living Palestinian Arabs.

“[British] Police ‘treading a very fine line’ | Pro-Palestine protesters provided with leaflets on antisemitism” (GBNews, Nov 2023)

These leaflets are police provocation. Police target law-abiding citizens, namely pro-Palestine demonstrators, telling them through leaflets: “We are confident that you may be criminals.” Of course, this serves to dissuade people from joining the movement, as individuals who decide to join know they would be under police surveillance as suspected criminals. These leaflets are blatant discrimination.

“Algerian footballer Youcef Atal convicted by French court over Gaza post” (Islam Channel, Jan 2024)

The fact it took less than three months for a French court to pronounce a condemnation (for a post dated Oct 12) is unusually swift for a so-called speech crime. So much so that a political spin may be suspected in the procedure, in relation with the current atrocities taking place in Palestine. Besides, if Youcef Atal has no criminal record, his sentence is unusually harsh, even taking into account the suspended part of prison time. (He probably doesn’t have a record; I only say “if” to avoid making believe I know his file personally.) The sentence is unusually harsh and the trial unusually swift, which hints at political pressure to speed it up and at a political sentence. This was a political trial, not a fair trial.

Of Salutes and Flags

“Hundreds Perform Nazi Salute in Italy. (…) Banning the Nazi salute opens the Pandora’s box.” (FirstPost, Jan 2024)

The Pandora’s box has been open for decades in France and I confirm politics is a joke here.

Contrary to wearing uniforms and displaying paraphernalia, the salute per se is not an offense in the French books (as such it is forbidden in stadiums only) but the courts condemn it nevertheless as incitement to racial hatred. Thus, where the law actually forbids, say, the display of Nazi flags, the guilty may have to pay a 1,500€ fine, but where the law says nothing but courts nevertheless filled in the gap, then one may incur one year in prison and a 45,000€ fine. The legislator said nothing on the salute but the salute is punished as racial hatred, whose penalties are substantially heavier than for Nazi uniforms and objects that are statutorily punished by a much smaller fine, even though the obvious display of objects, if the salute is racial hatred, is racial hatred by the same token. So much so for consistency.

Finally, neither the law nor the courts limit the scope of the law to the Nazi and Italian Fascist parties; their phrasing targets organizations condemned by the Nuremberg and other trials in 1945 and other organizations condemned for crimes against humanity. Which means displaying the Israeli flag should be punished by French courts when the International Court of Justice (ICJ) rules that Israel has committed or is committing a genocide.

Defamation and the Fair Trial Principle

(For those reading French, see Droit 39 “Diffamation et Droits de la défence.”)

a) Speech during a trial
b) Speech after a trial

a) In Trump’s defamation case, what has been condemned is basically Trump’s defense in his sexual offence trial. When you defend yourself in a trial, what in other circumstances might be called defamation is protected speech, because otherwise no one could defend themselves in a trial and no one could have a fair trial. Trump’s defense was protected from defamation suits in the context of his trial. The federal prosecutor talks about Trump’s tweets, interviews, after this or that audience, at this or that time, but she fails to tell us how the points she stresses are outside the protection that Trump’s speech, like any other accused person’s speech, was afforded for his defense. Think about it, now when one is brought to court and wants to dismiss their accuser’s allegations, that is, when one defends themselves, if they lose the trial, they will also lose a defamation trial because they dare defend themselves?

In this particular trial, protected speech was not limited to the precinct of the court, because both parties were public figures and the trial was in the mass media as much as in the court. Therefore, it is obvious that Trump had a right to express himself on the trial in the media, that is, he had a right to carry elements of his defense to the public via the media, which were dealing with the trial. Consequently, his speech was protected as defense speech in a trial, and at the very least, if it could not be protected because in some similar cases this had been previously ruled out, Trump may have been in good faith about his rights, about the extremely important rights of speech protection in a fair trial. This condemnation conveys the suggestion that the court treats protection of speech quite lightly, even to the point of ignoring it. What citizens will remember of this trial is that by defending oneself in a trial one may incur another trial for defamation.

Defending oneself in a trial, if it is libel, is protected libel. Trump lost a libel case after he was sued for commenting his own trial on the internet and in interviews. His comments were merely to tell what his defense is in the case, namely that his accuser is a liar. These people mean he was the only person on earth compelled to keep silent about his own trial? There can be no fair trial at all if your defense is liable to be treated as libel because a judicial trial is basically, for starters and some dubious characters here involved, reciprocal aspersions.

b) Besides, you can’t defame someone whose reputation is not at risk. Since the court said a party to a trial did not lie, this party is reputed to not be a liar, and when the accused keeps calling her a liar this cannot taint her reputation. The whole libel suit is flawed on principle. An American citizen has the right to keep claiming he is innocent (and his accuser is a liar) after he was found guilty by a court of law. You can’t sue for libel a man who claims his innocence. He claims his innocence but the accuser has been vindicated by the court, the court’s judgment therefore precludes that the person the court found guilty, when he keeps claiming his innocence, commits libel, because there can be no damage to the vindicated accuser’s reputation in such a claim.

Conclusion

When I say “I am innocent,” I am saying (unless I believe my accuser is making a mistake, a precision I would then be well-advised to articulate) that my accuser is lying. Someone wanted to object to me that, had Trump said he is innocent, he would not be sued for libel (quote: “He’s not being sued for claiming he’s innocent”), but, as this person claims, as Trump said his accuser is a liar he is being sued. I call everyone’s attention to the fact that had Trump said he is innocent, these very words (“I am innocent”) would accuse his accuser of lying, which my detractor says is deservedly sued for libel. His viewpoint is therefore inconsistent and unfamiliar with libel law.

Annex

“The Adult Survivors Act (ASA) is New York State legislation enacted in May 2022 which amends state law to allow alleged victims of sexual offenses for which the statute of limitations has lapsed to file civil suits for a one-year period, from November 24, 2022, to November 24, 2023.” (Wikipedia)

There are statutes of limitations for a reason, the bill is tailor-made and unconstitutional. The laws of the state have statutes of limitations but the lawmaker of the day, although acknowledging the relevance and goodness of said statutes, suddenly finds it expedient to cancel them for a short, limited period. Expediency considerations do not belong to the legislative power, lawmakers must make good laws and repeal bad laws. If statutes of limitations are good, they must leave them alone, if they are bad, they must repeal them. This temporary cancellation of statutes was an unconstitutional infringement on the judicial power, to which the laws of the state say that statutes of limitations are good legislation they must abide by. This legislative self-contradiction is constitutional insanity, that is, unconstitutional remissness.

Corporate Speech and the First Amendment

There is no such thing as corporate speech, as speech is protected as a political right, that is, speech protection is the result of a connection to the electoral process and ballot. The right to vote is the condition for protected speech. The Supreme Court of the United States must reverse Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and allow the legislator to regulate and limit so-called corporate speech.

Commercial speech is not fully protected (in contrast to hate speech for instance). The U.S. constitution does not want advertising to flood the “marketplace of ideas,” so the notion that websites have a constitutionally protected freedom to censor content for the sake of advertisers is fanciful. The lawyer we heard in Moody v. Netchoice talks of “users and advertisers,” but he really thinks “advertisers” only because advertisers are the platforms’ source of income, not users. Besides, users and advertisers shouldn’t be thrown in the same bag as far as the First Amendment is concerned, because commercial speech is protected from state regulation only partially, while the user is an agent on the marketplace of ideas and has the right to vote, that is, the right to determine the states and nation’s policies.

When you’re watching a political debate to make a choice on who you’re going to vote for, you’re in a speech environment. When the broadcast is cut for commercials, you’re leaving this environment. Next thing you know, they’ll tell you a football game is “speech.” The Founding Fathers did not fight tyranny for this.

Furthermore, private censorship by platforms is infliction of emotional distress, a tort. When a platform user makes a speech that the U.S. constitution protects and he is censored by the platform because of his speech, the platform is a platform for speech but acts as a private club, or a church, or a private property. However, the platform attracts users to expose them to commercial speech, advertisers being their source of income. The platform has a minimal duty to the user in the circumstance, which is that, as long as they abide by the law, users must be free on the platform. Anything else is ruthless exploitation by platforms exposing gagged masses to advertising and mind manipulation.

Thus, the reasoning is along two lines. 1) Private censorship by platforms might be liable to tort actions. 1a) It could be for invasive moderation, invasion of others’ rights. It would be absurd to claim a platform owner can shield a manic staff who harasses targeted users, like an ex-girlfriend, through flagging their posts manically. Not admitting that a platform can be sued for moderation is like saying they can staff their moderation offices with maniacs and that would be just as good. Absurd. 1b) Then, a notice on posts could well be libel, depending on the notice, but even a removal could have the same effect on one’s reputation. Even though platforms cannot be liable for users’ content (Section 230), they are liable for moderation. Moderation is speech and not all speech is protected; moderation can be unprotected speech where libel laws obtain. Section 230(2) provides “Good Samaritan protection” for bona fide moderation, it isn’t a blanket protection.

2) A law curbing platforms’ speech regardless of the First Amendment could pass the strict scrutiny test because of the so-called preferred position doctrine that applies in case of conflicts of rights. As currently the First Amendment cannot ensure for free, voting citizens the free flow of information and ideas against encroachments by platforms, a statute is needed. That statute will be upheld against the private companies’ claim that it violates their, the companies’ First Amendment right. Indeed, corporate speech has not as strong a status as citizens’ speech, all this ultimately deriving from the common law, where property is not a source of absolute discretionary power. Corporate speech is twofold: commercial and political. Admitting that corporations’ political speech is equally protected under current precedents (since Citizens United), that’s not the case of their commercial speech. This enables one to say that, according to the existing positive legislation, corporations have fewer First Amendment rights than individuals.

The envisioned statute can specify the kind of companies concerned, same as there exist statutes regarding “common carriers.” Some time ago, Justice Clarence Thomas floated the idea that internet platforms are common carriers. If this is what they are, the platforms will realize that a statute can impose duties on companies, on private property. Malls are a good example in the discussion. See Logan Valley Plaza (1968): “Logan dealt with the right to use private property as equivalent of public space”; “A business in a privately owned shopping center cannot prevent labor picketing in its surroundings.”

– Wouldn’t narrowing the scope of 230 potentially incentivize U.S. companies to register abroad? Of course internet companies have to comply with each country’s local laws and ICCPR but that concerns, to my knowledge, widely what should and must be censored – not what cannot be censored, as long as the terms are enforced without prejudice. (G. Muller)

These American companies operate in foreign countries where they are under obligation to censor content (see for instance the European DSA–Digital Services Act). Why would they register abroad if tomorrow these companies come under an obligation not to censor content in the U.S.? Registering abroad, they would face the same compulsions as if registering in the U.S., namely: to censor abroad, not to censor in the U.S.

Firepower and the Second Amendment

Whether a legislator wants to ban machine guns or bump stocks (see Garland v. Cargill about the constitutionality of a Trump-era ban on bump stocks, currently examined by the U.S. Supreme Court), this is a vicious wish because enactment is unconstitutional. The Second Amendment means that the state cannot tamper with the gun function of guns. If you can ban bump stocks, nothing can stop you from banning anything except toy guns shooting soft rubber bullets while claiming the U.S. constitution has a Second Amendment. “Militias” that are “necessary to the security of a free State” need more than toy guns, they need the deadliest weapons on the market.

A militia being necessary to the security of a free State, it needs the deadliest weapons. We all know you don’t need a machine gun to go hunting, but this amendment wasn’t written for hunting. It was written for the security of a free State. We also know that whether a “well regulated militia” is something of the irretrievable past or not, it is not what the Court is asked to consider, because this is only the premise of the amendment, and it is the amendment’s prescription that is the standing and binding rule, namely that the state don’t infringe on the people’s right to bear arms for the security of a free State.

In other words, whether well regulated militias have been existing or not these last decades, it still obtains that the people’s right to bear arms is necessary for the security of a free State according to the constitution. You can’t deny it without hollowing out the amendment. The constitution is not concerned about what rifle or what firepower a hunter needs to shoot a deer, so that lawmakers could put a limit on the firepower legally available to citizens. The firepower constitutionally available to U.S. citizens is the firepower necessary to the security and existence of a free State, that is to say, the deadliest weapons available. All restrictions on this account are unconstitutional.

The Second Amendment forbids the state to consider that its standing army has made “well regulated militias” unnecessary to the security of a free State. But the right to bear arms is a people’s individual right, not a militia’s collective right. The authors of the amendment made this obvious and they made it so lest, through devious statutes, militias became annexes to the standing army and/or the states’ administrations (which is actually the case with the existing militia statutes and militias). The people’s right to bear arms entails the unrestricted freedom to achieve maximum firepower, because the security of a free State entails the ongoing validity of the constitution itself, that is, there can be no higher duty for a U.S. citizen than the security of a free State, and therefore, as this highest duty requires arms, lawmakers cannot impose limits on the firepower available to citizens.

Removing Names from the Ballot

Trump has not been convicted for insurrection. Statutorily removing his name from the ballot for insurrection (January 6 events) amounted, therefore, to removing his name because “somebody” is saying Trump is an insurrectionist. This “somebody” could be my grandma or your grandpa or the current President of the United States, it doesn’t matter, this somebody is nobody. Coloradan authorities lacked a legal basis for their action. The only possible legal basis would have to be an actual conviction for insurrection, and not only an indictment because from indictment to conviction the indictee is presumed innocent (Coffin v. U.S., 1895). You cannot remove a person from the ballot for sedition when this person is presumed innocent of sedition. That the Colorado supreme court thought otherwise is baffling. Coloradan authorities misused their authority.

“Colorado should be able to bar oath-breaking insurrections from our ballot,” a Coloradan official declared after Trump v. Anderson. Well, you can do that, Colorado state, only you don’t have the power to say who is an insurrectionist and who is not, it has to be a court of law, with an actual conviction, which is the small detail missing in your operation. You are a government, not a court, and although you would like to convict Trump for insurrection, you don’t have this power and you removed from the ballot a person as innocent of insurrection as your own officials until proven guilty by a court. Colorado state intended to gather in its hands the powers both of an executive and the judiciary, and these people don’t even seem to realize how spiteful this is to fundamental principles.

Detractors of SCOTUS’s Trump v. Anderson (2024) are now considering a federal bill, which is the obvious option given the angle in the court’s decision. In my humble opinion, however, this was not so much a state versus union issue as an executive power versus judicial power, a checks and balances issue. To remove an “insurrectionist” from the ballot is not allowed to a government absent a judicial sentence about said person. As a commentator already put it, the bill smelled a lot like a bill of attainder, and by floating the idea this commentator made it clear that in his opinion the issue was not whether states (as opposed to the federal state) could take such a step but whether the authorities of a state and/or federal authorities could pass a bill targeting people who have not been convicted by a court and at most are indicted and still presumed innocent. And the answer to the latter question is an obvious no.

If the ballot removal act is a bill, it is a bill of attainder, forbidden by the attainder clause of the U.S. constitution. If it is an executive act, it lacks legal ground, which could only be an actual conviction for insurrection or a bill. An executive act depriving a citizen of his rights (the right to participate in an election) without legal ground is misuse of power. It seems these people have been taking the partisan Jan 6 house committee for some kind of court of law because they’re always talking of insurrection as if guilt has been proven by a court. However, a claim of insurrection is at this stage a mere fancy and cannot serve as legal ground, the Jan 6 committee notwithstanding.

The issue is people’s right to be candidates for elections when there is no charge of insurrection against them and all other conditions are met for their being candidates (age, nationality, and so on). This right is constitutionally protected. Neither a state nor a federal act can deprive an American citizen of this right on a mere fancy of insurrection. And for a claim of insurrection to serve as legal ground, guilt must be proven by a court of law, by a final conviction in a court. Indictment is to no avail in this regard because indictment is an executive act, and a legal ground could only be a judicial act by an independent court after a fair trial.

What, then, would such a federal statute aiming at removing Trump from the ballot be? Absent a conviction by a court of law, it would be a bill of attainder, forbidden by the attainder clause of the constitution. The bill would be both a judicial, individual judgment (“Trump is an insurrectionist”) and a legislative act (“Therefore he must be booted from the ballot”). Bills of attainder are unconstitutional because of the fundamental principle of separation of powers. To rule that “Trump shall be booted from the ballot” you need a prior judicial, individual judgment stating that “Trump is an insurrectionist.” This judgment is missing. To remove Trump from the ballot, a law could be passed without being attainder if it were so worded: “Any person indicted (not convicted yet) for insurrectionary acts shall not be accepted as candidate.” However, how could this be congruent with the presumption of innocence? The government could indict any person and these people would be deprived of their right to be candidates for elections without judgments by independent courts. That would be unconstitutional too, a misuse of power.

Porn being legal in the U.S., a platform needs to moderate its content to bar porn. No one can object to such moderation, but then, using the argument, the platforms become willing witch hunters for the administration. The solution is to make porn illegal. Filmed pornography being based on meretricious contracts, its very making is illegal to begin with (see Law 22 “Pacta turpia cannot be speech”).

Platforms need to moderate content because porn is legal in the U.S., with the valid argument: “We need to moderate content because we’ve got to bar porn from flooding our platforms since it is not police job but ours.” Therefore, ban porn again. Porn is no more speech than a football game (and much more damaging). Stop the nonsense, the only reason they – mafia lawyers – say porn is speech is because in the U.S. speech is protected. How can filmed pornography be legal in states where prostitution is illegal (all states except Nevada), when the making of filmed pornography requires the same meretricious contracts as prostitution? Filmed pornography is filmed prostitution, and if there is such a thing as crime prevention the making of filmed pornography should be prevented in said states. You’ve got to be consistent.

Some ethical remarks on police interrogation techniques

1) The right for a police officer to be deceptive during an interrogation

Ask yourself why it is not okay for a juvenile service officer to be deceptive, but it is for a police officer (these are interrogation regulations in the states, where the presence of a juvenile service officer is mandatory when juveniles are interrogated by police). There can be no good reason, for in the former case a moral commandment prevails while in the latter expediency does, but if it is a question where a moral commandment applies, expediency is not a legitimate concern. Criminals use deception to conceal their crimes. As the outcome of Alyssa Bustamante’s trial shows, the police officer’s occasional deception during the interrogation was not even decisive, since the whole interview was dismissed as evidence and yet Bustamante was convicted.

2) Sitting close to the suspect

In normal social interactions, especially in the U.S., one would not sit so close to a stranger as the detective to the suspect here (no need to specify the case) without an intention to intimidate or even assault the stranger. Why should a detective be allowed to intimidate a suspect? Truth requires dialectical skills and the state should not tolerate other, bullying, humiliating techniques. According to proxemics, imposing a spatial distance shorter than the socially accepted distance between two interacting strangers is indeed a form of humiliation and degradation.

3) Telling the suspect to look at you in the eyes

Telling someone to look at you in the eyes, as the detective does with the suspect (no need to specify), is outrageous in normal social interactions. It is a request that, between strangers, could easily start a so-called “trivial altercation” resulting in homicide (such trivial altercations between strangers are a cause of 37% of all homicides). In other words, for a detective to talk like this is a misuse of power.

Between two strangers, the reaction of a normally constituted man to an injunction to “look at me in the eyes when I’m talking to you” is some kind of “f*** you.” As this is not an option for a suspect interrogated by a police officer, the suspect is degraded. To be sure, between strangers, there is no such thing as asking their ID to someone and other such things either; however, police are entitled by law to make such requests, whereas to our knowledge there is no legal ground formally allowing a detective to carry out an interrogation by asking the suspect to look at him in the eyes. An interrogation can be carried out without the suspect being forced to look at people in the eyes if it is not his habit.