andrewducker | Interesting Links for 26-10-2022

ooh, is 1899 in *German* :-)

Very international, and deliberately so: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1899_(TV_series)#Development

Dark was German, and very popular from my understanding.

Yes it was. I was excited at first ... but I REALLY HATE time travel stories, so I never watched it.

5. Australian Women Sue Qatar Over Forced Airport Vaginal Exams

I wonder why this isn't called 'rape' both from ethical and legal POVs.

Depends on the legal definition of 'rape' either in Australia or Qatar. In common law counries it usually requires penetration with a penis. With anything else, it's usually called something aggravated sexual assault.

Yep, but no mention of this either unless I missed it. It seems that because the perpetrators' intent wasn't 'sexual' it doesn't qualify as sexual assault, which is very disturbing imo. Even assault, period. I don't know if it's how things were phrased by the victims or the journalist and why. I mean the quote says "unlawful physical contact". I find the way this is reported weird and this adds to the horror of the event itself.

And I'm glad to know now that I looked it up that this is legally called 'rape' in my country.

Edited 2022-10-26 13:58 (UTC)

Many a time in a crowded cocktail reception have I longed for a prehensile tail, so that I could manage glass, plate, and actually eating, all at once. This can partially be solved by clip-on glass-holders, of course, but a useful tail would just be so much more efficient and elegant.

Edited 2022-10-26 12:33 (UTC)

A prehensile tail would be amazing.

Article 5

Has some similarity with the case of Child Q reported in March of this year.

https://chscp.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Child-Q-PUBLISHED-14-March-22.pdf

I suspect it's probably not an assault of any sort. It's an unlawful and unreasonably intrusive evidence gathering. I think the the Qatari's line is would be that some officials made a mistake about who should be investigated for a crime and took the wrong action too quickly with too little thought or checking or use of other evidence gathering methods. However they had not intended to assault anyone. They had attempted to obtain evidence in a grossly inappropriate way.

Had the women in question been reasonably suspected of smuggling drugs then the sort of search they were subjected to might well be warranted - literally and figuratively.

I think in those circumstances the evidential hurdle of official failure required to turn an failure to operate evidence gather processes in a reasonable and appropriate way in to an assault is high. You would have to establish something like the officials had deliberately and knowingly misused their official position or powers solely in order to coerce these women in to physical contact which was intended either to hurt or threaten them or intended to provide sexual gratification to the officers.

But it's been a long time since I studied criminal law and how misuse of official powers leading to personal injury is treated might have changed.

But damn me if that is not a messed up state of affairs and it must have been miserable and terrifying for the women involved.

This strikes me as one of those areas where there are acts where, if anyone else did them they'd be "X", but we need the police to do them in certain situations, so they're not legally that thing in that situation. But that doesn't stop them being that thing in other senses.

If I were to force people into a room and insist that they let me inspect their genitals then I'd be assaulting someone*. We can argue that the police are allowed to assault people, if they have probable cause, and therefore can't be charged with it unless there wasn't probably cause (or whatever other reasons they are allowed to assault people for). But that doesn't change, to me, what they did.

*I'm totally open to the idea that what they did wouldn't be an assault no matter who did it, but would instead be some other thing. The details are vague enough for me to be unsure what exactly happened.

"We can argue that the police are allowed to assault people, if they have probable cause, and therefore can't be charged with it unless there wasn't probably cause (or whatever other reasons they are allowed to assault people for). But that doesn't change, to me, what they did."

I think I disagree with part of this. Specifically that they can't be charged with [assault or some other serious offence] unless there was not probable cause. The intention behind criminal actions matters in determining what sort of crime if any has been committed. Classically picking up the wrong coat in a pub by mistake is very different from deliberately picking up a coat you know doesn't belong to you.

I think there are three options
1) the police have sufficient reason to gather evidence / violate people's bodily autonomy and are therefore permitted to do so (they may even be in error but not grossly in error)
2) the police do not have sufficent reason to use their powers of coercion or have grossly overstepped the reasonable use of those powers and have committed an administrative offence (and a civil tort or delict)
3) the police have misused their powers, knowing they were misusing them, in order to help them commit an assault or similar serious offence.

That's what I mean by the evidential hurdle being high in this situation. It seems straightforward to establish that dragging (presumably white?) tourists in transit off a plane to look for evidence that they had just given birth to a South Asian baby and starting with an examination of their genitalia was unreasonable. It's harder to establish that the head of that operation was thinking "this is a great opportunity to go and molest some female passengers" and used his authority as a tool to do that. The difference between a very arrogant and serious error of judgement and a deliberate intent to harm.

Unless you could get hold of something like similar Whatsapp messages to those found during the Sarah Everard investigations or the Smallman / Henry case I think you are going to struggle.

Which is not to say that I am certain that this just a case of heavy handed and stupid law enforcement. It could be a deliberate assault but not based on the facts as presented.

2. And there I am a trans woman with Jewish ancestry.

They really do get me every which way, don't they?

Boat show looks great!

2. If trans affirmation really were a conspiracy to reduce the Christian birth rate, what a baroque and inefficient way of going about it. Allow me to doubt that many trans men, if denied the opportunity to transition, go on to become mothers.

3. As they both take place in Qatar, does 3 have anything to do with 5? Thought not.

5. Typical police behavior: treat everyone in sight as a guilty suspect, even if only one, if any, of them could possibly be the person they're looking for.

Edited 2022-10-26 15:21 (UTC)

2. I did not know that there was any connection between trangender and transhumanist.

Mostly an invented one by people saying "Look! These people are modifying their bodies! Next thing you know the Earth will be a hellscape resembling HR Giger!"

Which isn't to say that there aren't transhumanists looking forward to the glorious nanotech age where we can change gender at the drop of a hat. But the vast majority of transgender people will never have heard of transhumanism.

Interesting Links for 26-10-2022

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