This is interesting:

i feel very sorry for the de menezes family. their son has been killed, and whether you want to call it murder or manslaughter, nobody is being held responsible. if the boot had been on the other foot and de menezes had killed a cop, then justice would have been done very quickly and without all this dodging, posturing and lack of commitment.

those involved should stop hiding, reveal who actually authorised his killing, by direct order or by proxy by way of rank, and send them down for manslaughter at the very least. unfortunately in this case reputations and 'national security' are worth mor than the life of an innocent man with a head full of lead.

i think this is one of the uk's darkest moments in recent history, and instead of setting the situation straight, the powers that be are just deepening totalitarian implications of the stockwell shooting with lies and evasiveness. a deeply disgusting situation and not a moment to be proud to be british.

I agree wholeheartedly.

I keep hearing more and more about the erosion of civil liberties in Britain.

Here's one item: 'Censorship update' ~ 1 November 2009
It tells of the sacking, of a Professor Nutt, by the home secretary, which is, apparently, 'Further evidence that Britain is now a police state ..'
http://indyeagleeye.livejournal.com/

Not everyone agrees with the sentiment in this case, but it's out there, none-the-less.

'Alan Johnson was right to sack Prof. Nutt:
http://conorfryan.blogspot.com/2009/11/alan-johnson-was-right-to-sack-prof.html

Here's another:

'Four out of five of us believe freedoms are being eroded in Britain' ~ Thursday, 29 October 2009
'Britain is a country rightly known around the world as a cradle of liberty and freedom. But most people now feel that our freedoms are being eroded.'
'Regardless of what we want or try to do about it, we continue to be the victims of ever more intrusive policies, with the Government pushing more and more into the details of our lives.'
http://indyeagleeye.livejournal.com/16809.html

Then there was the case of the Policewomen, who unwittingly broke the law, by babysitting for each other, so that both could go to work.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8277378.stm
Discussed here:
http://www.wineintro.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=386071

Jennie Bristow thinks that we should 'say no to supernanny;
Jennie Bristow: Stand up to Supernanny
29 October 2009
"Before I had children, I was bothered that politicians today have an unhealthy interest in lecturing people about how they conduct their personal lives ..... Then I got pregnant – and I realised that, until that point, I’d had it relatively free and easy."
http://indyeagleeye.livejournal.com/15884.html

The government is now trying to control Home Education. Home Educators teach their own children largely because they are disillusioned with the government-run education system, which produces many bullies, many desperately unhappy children, and many who cannot read & write. Some schools & some teachers are brilliant. Some are not. Parents and children have little choice in which school they attend. Now the government is clamping down on the alternative.

Jennie Bristow;s article 'Hands off Home Education!' deals with this subject:
'the recent UK government proposals to clamp down on home schooling represent a major blow to the principle of parental autonomy'
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/7017/

Children are expected to be put into institutions from within a few days of birth and stay there ~ the expected school-leaving age now being 19.

Knives are potentially dangerous. So are fireworks. So is alcohol.
For this reason, youngsters cannot purchase them.
Now, though, adults can't, either.
In many shops, if you look under 25, you have to provide ID, before purchasing a whole host of things, including chocolate liqueurs, toddlers' safety scissors, matches, cutlery, etc.
Not only that, but if you are a middle-aged mum, shopping for a bottle of wine for Auntie, for her birthday, you will not be allowed to buy it, if you have someone with you who appears to be under 21. This could be your 18-year-old daughter or your grandchild in the pram.
Say you are 25 and want to buy a can of beer ~ and you have ID on you, but the shopkeeper thinks that you have friends with you who do not have ID ~ then you cannot buy the beer.
This is shopkeepers playing the part of law enforcersers because they fear the consequences if they son't. But isn't this taking things too far?

Do you want to strip naked, to prove that you are not carrying a lethal weapon, next time you catch a plane?
You don't have to ~ the camera will do that it for you, as you go through check-in.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2009/10/13/x-ray-checks-115875-21743172/

We are constantly supervised by CCTV:
'There are 4.2million closed circuit TV cameras here, one per every 14 people.'
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...ple--China.html

You can't smack your child ~ even if you cause him no harm & are only trying to teach & protect him:


Some of this is for our benefit, but sometimes I think that things go way too far.

I don't believe that we should not have totalitarian state. In the past it has failed multiple times. In China and Russia it caused the deaths of over 40 million people. Nobody benefited in the end and countless people lost their families to the brutal dictators. I think that arresting parents for disciplining their children is going way too far. If something happened to the child because of lack of discipline the parents would also be persecuted.

want to rephrase that?

Um America should not have a totalitarian government.

too late, it already does. you had bush in power for what - eight years, after cheating the election, and the usa has been behaving like a military dictatorship since vietnam. on top of that large sections of the country are trying to expand america's scope as a theocracy.

the question for american citizens is not 'how do we stop our country becoming a totalitarian state', but 'how can we reverse the tide of totalitarianism'.

I do still think the US and UK have it far better than many other countries out there, but I also agree that we have a lot of improvement we can achieve. We should aim to have the best governments we can.

I suppose the discussion always comes down to the rights of individuals vs what is best for the community as a whole. For example cameras. I know the UK is swarming with cameras. Do they make it easier to catch criminals and keep some areas more safe? In the US there are hardly any cameras, and often crimes go unpunished because nobody knows who did them.

With everyone having cell phones that are also cameras and camcorders, I bet we see a lot more criminal documentation going forward. Plus, people see things and then tweet about them in real time. And don't forget the power of flashmobs for peaceful assembly, all via cell phone texting.