On Sat, 17 May 2008, Ian Kelly wrote: > While I agree with you that double jeopardy is a serious issue, what > would then prevent a person from breaking a rule, initiating a > specious criminal case alleging that the action broke some other rule, > then go on to assert that any further prosecution presented an illegal > violation of eir R101 rights?
Naw, you're right. After thinking about things over the weekend, I realized my annoyance at double-jeopardy is a symptom, the disease (what's leading me to step back from the game right now) is: 1. Compulsion of judges via threat of prosecution. It's only very recently that judges could be punished above and beyond a OVERRULE and loss of judge's salary, e.g. criminally. I think that's a perversion of the justice system which has been used politically and has severely degraded the practice and important Agoran Custom (one of the key aspects that makes the game interesting and respectful) of "letting each judge have eir turn, even if it isn't 100% what you would agree with." And do we need it? Even in CFJ 1346, blatant corruption, we didn't need to punish the judge. Why do we need to now? Does it really improve the game? Unfortunately, I think this is the current Zeitgeist rather than just a rule which needs tinkering with so there's not much to do other than either accept it or step away from it. 2. Compare 1932, again to the (unconspired) CFJ 1346. All well and good for a player and judge to attempt it, and appeals took care of it. But at the time, someone (Steve?) commented "if the Appeals court had been corrupt too, I would have quit the game as we wouldn't be playing nomic." In this case, the appeals court held up their end (no I don't want to hear your opinion again) only to be tied up in criminal proceedings, and the new judge wholly ignored the appeals court. A system of law is only as good as the persons defending it choose to treat it. Still, an interesting experiment: provide the ability to punish and sue, and people will use it with a vengeance. -Goethe
