> Seeing him on HN actually makes me feel a bit queasy.
I'm with you. I hate this style of straw man argument, for example:
"We see the same sort of overreaction to paedophilia. Just because one man in your town likes to watch schoolgirls playing netball"
Well obviously if paedophilia was limited to men like watching schoolgirls play netball, and not to people employed in positions of trust to deal with other people's children abusing them horrifically, then yes, that would be an over-reaction.
This kind of cartoon argument also makes it hard to have a real debate on the issue. For example we can legitimately discuss the "pants bomber" case - does the fact that one man caught attempting something increase the chances of it being done in the future, or are we like generals always fighting the last war?
As to the dog argument I am rather astonished at the hysteria surrounding this pronouncement, given the very high rates of micro-chipping in the UK. And there are a whole number of reasons why dogs should be microchipped for their own welfare.
Worse than that. The pants bomber failed! And while we're at it, so did the shoe bomber!
In short the system we already had - no extraordinary measures except a populace who was aware of the danger and willing to act, was sufficient. And furthermore to the extent that we are safe from similar incidents in the future it is because we have a populace who is aware of the danger and is willing to act.
Actually, speaking personally, I'm mostly upset at the pants bomber for ruining a good joke. I used to reliably get a good laugh by saying how much worse it would be if the shoe bomber hid the explosives in his underwear. Now that joke doesn't work as well. :-(
Pedophilia is extremely rare. Getting every teacher to have lengthly criminal record checks done, having CCTV in schools, it's all theatre. But it's damaging. Anyone would think there were monsters lurking outside schools trying to get in to abduct children.
It just doesn't happen. Apart from to the 0.000001% unlucky people it does happen to. Which is the whole point.
As for dogs, it should be up to the owner if they want their dog chipped or not.
s/0.000001%/0.003%/ – it is ~3000 times more common than you think.
(number estimated from 879,000 substantiated child abuse cases in 2000, of which 10% where sexual in nature. Granted most of those are in a home environment not a school. If you want to just think about non-family member abductions (about as rare as things get), then you get down to something like one in 250,000 per child each year.)
Granted most of those are in a home environment not a school
I understood this to be the whole point: that the danger from the general public is vanishingly small. If you're saying that one in 250k is the stranger abduction rate and that the pedophilia is one tenth that, the PC thinks it's 4 times more common than you do.
ETA: What's worse, expending any effort on the 1-in-a-million issues, at best, distracts from actually imporving ones quality of life.
Wow, I don't know why I am still posting so I can get more downmods, but I really don't get all the hate.
The fact that child abuse by educators is rare is no reason not to do something relatively simple (like a criminal check) to reduce its incidence. Lots of things are rare - liver cancer; plane crashes due to mechanical failure; Rackspace losing a whole data center, twice; I don't get the whole "pshaw, it's rare, no worries" attitude. I thought many of us here spend a lot of time eliminating rare events.
There are many professions which require background checks; for example accountants. What's the big deal?
Speaking, at least, for myself, it's not hate so much as that I think you're mistaken. Your position appears not to have been fully thought out, based on your explanation or lack thereof.
The fact that child abuse by educators is rare is no reason
At the risk of seeming like I'm quibbling over semantics, of course it's a reason. It just may not be a reason you find adequate.
not to do something relatively simple (like a criminal check) to reduce its incidence.
Herein lie two fallacies.
The first is that criminal checks are simple. An earlier commentor points out some potential complexities. Saying they're relatively simple begs the question of simplicity. They're most certainly not simple relative to doing nothing beforehand.
The second, in my mind far more significant, fallacy is that doing "something" will reduce the incidence of the rare event. If the event is rare enough, we may not be able to reach any rational conclusions for lack of statistically significant sample size, let alone controlling for confounding factors.
Lots of things are rare - liver cancer; plane crashes due to mechanical failure; Rackspace losing a whole data center, twice; I don't get the whole "pshaw, it's rare, no worries" attitude.
I think you misinterpret as "no worries" the actual attitude of "I have better things to worry about."
Far more importantly, I my efforts (not just worries) are far better focused on something more frequent or at least on something where those efforts will clearly make a difference.
Since all the criminal checks and assumption that it's likely most people may be pedophiles, the number of male teachers has dropped to almost 0. I don't think that's coincidence, and I don't think it's a healthy trend.
On the radio the other day, a paediatric surgeon in the UK was lamenting the hassle involved in background checks. Ok, he operates on children, he gets a background check, so far so good. As one of only a few hundred dedicated paediatric surgeons, his skills are in demand, he is called as a consultant to another hospital. They don't accept any checks except their own so they do another. Which takes another month during which he is unable to help. Repeat for every hospital or every NHS zone, every year, for every applicable surgeon.
But who cares that treatment for children is being hindered by repetetive bureacracy, at least it's protecting children, right? Oh, wait...
In other words, having checks in place is a good thing, but only as far as it is proportionally useful to the costs of doing it. Not just doing anything and everything to anyone and everyone because it might help maybe.
I don't get the whole "pshaw, it's rare, no worries" attitude. I thought many of us here spend a lot of time eliminating rare events.
How much do you spend on rare event insurance? You read HN so it's a fair bet you earn living from computing, so you'll have particular insurance against losing or damaging your hands, yes?
But who cares that treatment for children is being hindered by repetetive bureacracy, at least it's protecting children, right? Oh, wait...
Well, that's just a stupid implementation. You evidently should only be cleared once for any NHS facility and anyway, screening a paediatrician is not that useful because (a) they don't typically have uncontrolled access to children and (b) if you are a paedophile, putting yourself through med school just to have access to children is really beyond unlikely.
I think the fact that there is a media hysteria is blinding people to the actual issue - that's just like saying "PETA is nuts, let's all have battery-farmed chicken". Many people correctly assume that paedophilia is rare (it is). Also, not many people have unsupervised access to children (in fact only childcare workers, educators and priests typically do). So people put two and two together and say "a childcarer who is a paedophile is a very rare event". But that assumes that the chance of being a paedophile and the chance of having access to children are statistically independent events. They are not - as this well publicised case shows:
Moreover, the "leverage" of the event is quite high. This is the same problem with plane crashes; they are rare, but when they happen, 300 people die.
You would be amazed how many professions in the UK require background checks. Did you know you need a background check to work at the Meteorological Office?
And many, many people on HN are working the US on immigrant visas. Frankly if you have been able to get a job without a background check or a drug test or a work permit, you're pretty lucky.
How much do you spend on rare event insurance? You read HN so it's a fair bet you earn living from computing, so you'll have particular insurance against losing or damaging your hands, yes?
Well losing my hands is just a sub-class of {unable to work for any reason} so no, I don't have specific insurance against that (though for example, more than one famous violinist or pianist does - because their lifetime earning loss is much greater). But when I was pregnant I got screened for cystic fibrosis. That's pretty damn rare. You'd be amazed if you thought about it, how many rare events you insure against. For example, the chance of your house burning down is actually very small. Yet most homeowners have fire insurance.
That would be part of the problem - most child abuse of all forms takes place within families, but we pretend that we need to intensely scrutinize every unrelated adult in order to protect children from "predators". The odds don't work that way.
Getting every teacher to have lengthly criminal record checks done
Do you actually have children? People who do generally would prefer they are not in the care of criminals (and we are not just talking about sex crimes - I woudn't particularly want a drug dealer or a murderer teaching kids either). It can be theater, but that doesn't mean it is without value to public welfare.
As to the microchipping, I don't understand how this is different than requiring a rabies vaccination or a dog licence. It's not a GPS tracker, for god's sake.
The incidence of crime here is so low that criminal checks, CCTV on schools etc is just stupid.
If you live in a city, then sure, maybe you want more security.
How many people with criminal records that actually put our kids at risk, apply to be teachers? It's likely a negligable %. When they go for an interview, they'd likely be refused if there was a real risk.
It's like taking off your shoes at the airport. It doesn't stop anyone who wants to blow up a plane, and it just pisses travelers off and makes them fly less.
I'm with you. I hate this style of straw man argument, for example:
"We see the same sort of overreaction to paedophilia. Just because one man in your town likes to watch schoolgirls playing netball"
Well obviously if paedophilia was limited to men like watching schoolgirls play netball, and not to people employed in positions of trust to deal with other people's children abusing them horrifically, then yes, that would be an over-reaction.
This kind of cartoon argument also makes it hard to have a real debate on the issue. For example we can legitimately discuss the "pants bomber" case - does the fact that one man caught attempting something increase the chances of it being done in the future, or are we like generals always fighting the last war?
As to the dog argument I am rather astonished at the hysteria surrounding this pronouncement, given the very high rates of micro-chipping in the UK. And there are a whole number of reasons why dogs should be microchipped for their own welfare.