Philippines Drug War Female assassin

August 20, 2017, 02:13 PM

WaterburyBob

I somewhat like the concept of getting rid of scumbags, but it is a system that could be abused terribly and used to just get rid of innocent people you simply don't like or are dangerous to your ambitions, politically or career-wise.
But, I suppose that kind of thing happens all the time anyways (Vince Foster, etc. ...).

August 20, 2017, 02:15 PM

nhtagmember

don't disagree with you but its a great contrast to our penchant for excusing bad behavior with a book full of excuses

August 20, 2017, 04:20 PM

rtquig

Last night while watching TV I saw a tourist commercial for the Philippines. I don't think so.

August 20, 2017, 05:30 PM

RNshooter

What could possibly go wrong?
Have a debt to settle? Kill the guy and hang a "drug dealer" sign around his neck.

What a mess.

Bruce

"The designer of the gun had clearly not been instructed to beat about the bush. 'Make it evil,' he'd been told. 'Make it totally clear that this gun has a right end and a wrong end. Make it totally clear to anyone standing at the wrong end that things are going badly for them. If that means sticking all sort of spikes and prongs and blackened bits all over it then so be it. This is not a gun for hanging over the fireplace or sticking in the umbrella stand, it is a gun for going out and making people miserable with." -Douglas Adams

“It is just as difficult and dangerous to try to free a people that wants to remain servile as it is to try to enslave a people that wants to remain free."
-Niccolo Machiavelli

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all. -Mencken

August 20, 2017, 05:50 PM

Fenris

quote:
Originally posted by 46and2:
Duterte is a murderous tyrant who is known to use "drugs" as an excuse to kill opponents, including for petty crimes for which there has not even been a trial. He's a psychopath

Fuck that guy.

I understand your impulse, but perhaps we in the West don't fully appreciate how bad things had gotten over there. Dutarte's approval rating is at 75-80%. It is hard to believe that he could maintain that level of support if the killing really were as random and arbitrary as critics claim, or if he were bumping off the political opposition. Why bother killing your opposition when, for example, the 296-member legislative lower chamber only has 7 member in the opposition. The opposition is irrelevant.

According to statistics, the police launched 40,982 anti-drug operations from July 1 last year to January 7 this year. The police arrested 44,070 and killed 2,206 drug personalities during this period. Those killed were supposedly "resisting". Were they really "resisting"? I don't know. But a 5% kill to arrest ratio is high, it certainly does not indicate that the police are setting out to kill wantonly rather than make arrests. Given the pictures of Philipine prisons, going down in a blaze of glory may be more rational than getting arrested.

The families of the killed often say that the dearly departed were not resisting, were not armed, and were just turning their lives around.

August 20, 2017, 06:31 PM

Rey HRH

quote:
Originally posted by Fenris:
quote:
Originally posted by 46and2:
Duterte is a murderous tyrant who is known to use "drugs" as an excuse to kill opponents, including for petty crimes for which there has not even been a trial. He's a psychopath

Fuck that guy.

I understand your impulse, but perhaps we in the West don't fully appreciate how bad things had gotten over there. [B] Dutarte's approval rating is at 75-80%. It is hard to believe that he could maintain that level of support if the killing really were as random and arbitrary as critics claim, or if he were bumping off the political opposition.[B] Why bother killing your opposition when, for example, the 296-member legislative lower chamber only has 7 member in the opposition. The opposition is irrelevant.

According to statistics, the police launched 40,982 anti-drug operations from July 1 last year to January 7 this year. The police arrested 44,070 and killed 2,206 drug personalities during this period. Those killed were supposedly "resisting". Were they really "resisting"? I don't know. But a 5% kill to arrest ratio is high, it certainly does not indicate that the police are setting out to kill wantonly rather than make arrests. Given the pictures of Philipine prisons, going down in a blaze of glory may be more rational than getting arrested.

The families of the killed often say that the dearly departed were not resisting, were not armed, and were just turning their lives around.

Do you know that the dictator Marcos still has a sizable following such that the rest of his family is in various positions of power?
There's no underestimating the stupidity of people.

I'm not pro-drug or pro-drug dealers but absolute power corrupts absolutely.

"It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life – daily and hourly. Our answer must consist not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual." Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, 1946.

August 20, 2017, 07:18 PM

Fenris

quote:
Originally posted by Rey HRH:
...but absolute power corrupts absolutely.

^^^ Absolutely.

But I'm not sure that his actions thus far are that out of line given the circumstances. Granted, the usual suspects are up in arms. But not all games can be won by playing to the rules of Cricket.

If a majority of suspects were dieing before making it to prison, I would be more skeptical. But given the massive crackdown, the number of deaths don't seem excessive.

Regarding vigilantism, in some situations it can serve a purpose. It wasn't that long ago in the Western US, that Wanted Dead or Alive posters helped establish law and order.

An interesting question I have not seen answered is but for Dutarte, how many more innocents could we have expected to die from their huge crime and drug problem.

August 20, 2017, 07:55 PM

46and2

There's a Grand Canyon sized divide between a regular arrest, a trial with due process, and a subsequent execution where the law allows - and this motherfucker... There is no place, zero, for such horseshit in an even remotely civilized world. I don't care if hookers are making crack sandwiches for babies and tourists alike on street corners, you can't go killing folks who are merely accused and skip twelve steps and not be a murderous nutbag

I'm surprised it even needs explaining.

You either believe in due process and the presumption of innocence and the decided lack of such murderous asshattery, or you don't. And there's nothing in the world about such "assassins" that reeks of sane. I don't give a fuck what country it is. Fuck that guy.

August 20, 2017, 08:19 PM

jhe888

quote:
Originally posted by Fenris:
quote:
Originally posted by 46and2:
Duterte is a murderous tyrant who is known to use "drugs" as an excuse to kill opponents, including for petty crimes for which there has not even been a trial. He's a psychopath

Fuck that guy.

I understand your impulse, but perhaps we in the West don't fully appreciate how bad things had gotten over there. Dutarte's approval rating is at 75-80%. It is hard to believe that he could maintain that level of support if the killing really were as random and arbitrary as critics claim, or if he were bumping off the political opposition. Why bother killing your opposition when, for example, the 296-member legislative lower chamber only has 7 member in the opposition. The opposition is irrelevant.

According to statistics, the police launched 40,982 anti-drug operations from July 1 last year to January 7 this year. The police arrested 44,070 and killed 2,206 drug personalities during this period. Those killed were supposedly "resisting". Were they really "resisting"? I don't know. But a 5% kill to arrest ratio is high, it certainly does not indicate that the police are setting out to kill wantonly rather than make arrests. Given the pictures of Philipine prisons, going down in a blaze of glory may be more rational than getting arrested.

The families of the killed often say that the dearly departed were not resisting, were not armed, and were just turning their lives around.

There is no justification for Duterte's methods.