[IMAGE] THE PIT - All The News The Pit Can Fit Bringing YOU The TRUTH Since 2014 -------------------------------------- July 14, 2024 "Read It Before It Gets Censored!" by Thom S. O'Ryan [IMAGE] THE STATEMENT OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS Greetings, boys and girls and whatever the hip youngsters are turning themselves into in the cyborging houses of New Jersey Sector. Time again for another installment of that favorite column of the administration, "Read It Before It Gets Censored!" as I rip another viral meme into the collective consciousness and try to wake it up. As you can see from the title of today's piece, assuming you're not just skimming The Pit for the pictures, I want to talk a little about the Statement of Fundamental Rights that's part of the Combine's Constitution. You've probably had to memorize in school, it's like the old United States Constitution's Bill of Rights, but nnnnnot quite. First off, it's not a series of amendments, it's an integral part of the new Constitution, although it has been amended since its first writing. I'll be covering the current form, if you're curious about the development...well, you should have paid attention in history class instead of thinking about what the person in the desk in front of you would look like naked. Anyway, here's the preamble to the Statement of Fundamental Rights. Try to stay awake, it was written by bureaucrats. --begin-- The rights enumerated in this document apply to all citizens of the North American Combine and its protectorates. They may also be construed to apply to non-citizens except where specifically contraindicated by law. No law contravening these rights for non-citizens shall be enacted for a term of more than four years, although it may be renewed after that period. It is to be understood that in the case when two or more rights are in conflict, it will be the responsibility of the government to establish laws that determine the outcome of such conflicts. It is also to be understood that the omission of a right from this document does not mean that citizens of the Combine lack this right. However, it does mean that this right may be suspended or abridged by the enactment of legislation by the Combine, State or Sector governments. --end-- Okay, if you're the sort of suspicious person who normally reads The Pit, this part should immediately set off warning bells. These rights are only guaranteed for CITIZENS. Sure, a non-citizen probably has these rights too, but he'd better not count on it. Now, I know most of you have forgotten the ways you can become a citizen, and I'm not going to make you read the relevant part of the Constitution. It's insanely boring. So here's a quick and dirty explanation. Just don't try to use it in court. If you were born in the Combine, or any of the nations that joined up to form the Combine, and both of your parents were citizens of the Combine or blahblahblah...then you're automatically a citizen. Congratulations, but you're not home free yet, see below. If you were born in the Combine (et al) and only one of your parents was a citizen, then your parents have to choose which citizenship to give you: Combine or whatever other country one of the 'rents is from. It's a simple bit of rubberstamp paperwork, more a convenience thing than anything else. It only gets messy in a divorce. Let's say dad was a citizen and mom wasn't. If they decided to make you a citizen, then dad automatically gets custody, no matter what other circumstances apply. If they decided not to make you a citizen, then mom gets you automatically. (If your parents are both citizens, then who gets you mainly depends on where you live...in America and Canada, fathers haven't been considered real parents for a generation or two, so mom gets ya.) If they don't choose before you're 18, you get to pick. Oh, and if both parents are citizens and you're born outside the Combine, they have to fill out the same paperwork to make you a citizen. Now, if neither parent is a citizen and you're born in the Combine, it's not so easy. Thanks to the run of Asians during China's conquest phase, there's been something of an anti-immigration backlash. So babies born here to non-citizens aren't automatically citizens. Although they generally have an easier time applying for naturalization. Finally, if you were born outside the Combine, you have to naturalize to get citizenship benefits. I'm not going to go into the details here, but basically you need to prove you can speak English (which really honks off the Quebeckers), that you have some basic citizenship knowledge, etc. Unless you have a vital skill of some sort (like being able to fly), it usually takes a few years to jump through all the hoops. Now, remember how I said that if you were a citizen you still weren't home free? Well, you can LOSE citizenship. Used to be that if you were convicted of a first degree felony, you lost the right to vote. Now you lose citizenship entirely. Harsh, yes? On the other hand, it's not all bad, so never let it be said I had nothing but vituperation for the NAC government. First, now you can apply for citizenship like anyone else (and they don't kick you out of the country unless you're from somewhere else to begin with). It's harder to get through all the hoops with that black mark on your record, but it's a lot easier than getting a pardon from the governor, which used to be the only way to get back your franchise. That's the technical term for the right to vote, not ownership in a McD's, kids. Second, at least it's HONEST. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, every couple of months some jackass would push through a bill that was blatantly unConstitutional or at least really scummy, the purpose being to find new ways to further punish convicted felons, especially those nailed for drug or sex offenses. The Supreme Court would twist around like they were sitting on tacks, but find some way to allow these legal abominations to stand. You could get tossed in jail in 1990 for 2 years and get out to find you'd just been handed three extra lifetime punishments because someone decided he could get re-elected if he was Tough On Crime. At least now the government makes no bones about it...get convicted, lose your rights. They may be making the rules to suit themselves, but at least they're picking rules they're willing to play by. So they're honest slimebags. Speaking of slimebags, while corporations are considered legal entities, they are FORTUNATELY not considered citizens. Yet. But you can bet no one's going to be stupid enough to pass laws denying them rights. And it's only a matter of time before someone clever decides that the Combine government, as an abstract body, is also a legal entity. Fun for all. Finally, before I go into the actual Rights, try to stretch your memory to recall that line in the preamble about passing laws to deny rights to non-citizens. There's been a few to come and go, but two "rights exception" laws get passed almost unanimously every four years. Khadamites have NO rights. And sex offenders have damn few. So, if you've been buggering the neighborhood kids and get caught, take heart! At least you're not from Khadam. --begin-- I. Equality Everyone is guaranteed equal treatment under the law, regardless of gender, race, sexuality, or beliefs. Those with powers and abilities beyond normal human capacity may only be treated differently to the extent that their powers and abilities require it. --end-- The first sentence is very nice. Combines a couple centuries of amendments into one simple statement, catching a couple things that never made it into the old Constitution, like the ERA and gay rights. Mind you, while you can't be discriminated against for HAVING beliefs, you CAN be slapped down for EXPRESSING those beliefs, but I'll get into that later. The second bit is the paranormal clause. It lets the government pass laws restricting paras without denying them citizenship. Personally, given that we've seen paranormals create hurricanes, snap airports like taffy and rain flaming death from the heavens JUST IN THE PAST YEAR, I'd be REAL careful passing laws restricting paranormals if I was the government. Then again, if I was the government, you'd all be peeling grapes for me. The main function of the paranormal clause, though, is that it lets the Combine lock up paranormal criminals in superjails while awaiting trial. Convicted felons may not have the right to reasonable restraint, but merely INDICTED ones do. Unless they're paranormals. --begin-- II. Security Everyone has the right to protect themselves from harm, and to take what reasonable measures are required to provide this protection. Everyone has the right to be reasonably secure from danger to life and limb. --end-- Here's the one that makes everyone feel warm and fuzzy and forget that their freedoms are being leeched away. You have the right to be SAFE. No one ever tried to put THAT one in the old Constitution. Even as weaselly as "reasonably secure" is, it still makes a promise that no government can really back up. But most people would rather be safe than free, so it goes down really well with the voters. The real kicker, though, is that this replaces the old right to bear arms, and may be even more vague and confusing than the 2nd Amendment was. What's a "reasonable measure?" To look at the laws on the books, the average citizen has the right to learn martial arts, but not to carry a weapon unless he's regularly in a hostile environment. Personally, I think any country that won't let me carry a gun is a hostile environment, but the judge never buys that one. Sometimes I think I should move to Manhattan and buy a suit of power armor. I think I could prove it was a reasonable measure. --begin-- III. Privacy Everyone has the right to be free of excessive intrusions to privacy. These include, but are not limited to: physical intrusion, electronic intrusion, psychological intrusion and telepathic intrusion. This right includes both intrusion by private concerns and public concerns. Agents of public concerns may not breach this right without probable cause or warrant. Agents of private concerns will be liable for prosecution upon proof of violating this right. --end-- This is sort of a modern restatement of the old stuff about quartering soldiers. However, the fact that the Combine actually obeys this one is about the only reason The Pit is still around. They can't just poke around in The Pit's servers and find stuff to censor before it goes out. They have to let it come out, then get a warrant to blank it out. They're getting faster, though...hope you saved a copy of this file, since it's probably already been zapped by the time you get this far. --begin-- IV. Self-Determination Everyone has the right to act in a manner that suits their beliefs, except where such actions infringe on the rights of another. --end-- This is a fuzzy one, and kind of overlaps with the Right to Expression later on. It's a way of giving religious freedom without actually specifically SAYING they're going to let people worship in whatever freaky cult they belong to. It also means that the human sacrifice rituals are right out, unless the victim is from Khadam. It's not as protective as you might think, though. Just about any action affects others, and it doesn't take too much legal fandangoing to establish that a particular action infringes on the rights of another person. Basically, don't bother anyone and you can do what you like. Make waves, and get stomped. Especially if a judge agrees that your actions are infringing on the Combine's right to Security.... --begin-- V. Due Process No person shall be held to answer for a felony crime without an indictment by grand jury, except in cases arising in the Armed Forces when in actual service in time of war or public danger. Everyone has the right to a trial by jury, as well as the right to waive trial by jury. No person shall be tried a second time for the same crime when acquitted in the initial trial, nor shall any person be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself or herself. Everyone subjected to jury trial as a defendant has the right to determine whether the outcome of that trial shall be examined by a court of appeal. No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property, physical or intellectual, without due process of law, nor shall private property of any description be taken for public use without just compensation. --end-- You may have noticed that up until this point, all the Rights statements started with "everyone." This is the lone exception, and it's mainly because they cribbed it pretty closely from the old Bill of Rights. Someone decided that it would be a really dumb idea to mess with case law, as that part of things seemed to work reasonably well. There's a few tweaks here and there, and of course it gets bent as much as the old Amendments did, but this one's generally okay. It also means that they can't just grab these columns and hide them from the public eye, since they're intellectual property. Censor 'em, yeah...but not take 'em away from The Pit or from any of you quick enough to download this to your own system. --begin-- VI. Fair Trial Everyone has the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the sector and district wherein the crime was alleged to have been committed. Everyone has the right to know the nature of the crime for which they are on trial. Everyone has the right to know who is testifying in their trial, to be able to compel witnesses to appear in court to testify, and to have the assistance of counsel for their defense. Everyone has the right to decide whether their trial shall be open to the public or closed to all but witnesses, jury and officers of the court. --end-- Again, pretty close to the old Bill of Rights, but with an interesting bit tacked on at the end. The 1990s was a time of media circus trials, and not everyone liked being the center of a media firestorm. So now the defendant gets to say whether he wants to let the press in. In the past 20 years, it's been decided that a judge can still close the court against the defendant's desires if it's causing disruptions or hazards, but he can't open it up to the press if the defendant wants it closed. Fine by me. I've got better things to do with my time than wade through coverage of the Trial of the Century of the Week. --begin-- VII. Fair Punishment Everyone has the right to reasonable bail when indicted of a crime. Everyone convicted of a crime has the right to reasonable fines and punishments, as determined by the nature of the crime and the nature of the individual. --end-- "Cruel and unusual punishments," one of the more poetic phrases of the old Bill of Rights, is gone, you may note. Why? Because some of the paranormals out there won't be stopped by anything BUT cruel and unusual punishment. Court cases over the old Northwoods Correctional Facility were still being wrangled over even after the supervillains all went poof, and this put an end to 'em. You might ask why it's necessary, since convicted felons aren't citizens anymore, and can be imprisoned however you feel like. Well, that's only for first degree felonies, and second degree murder still carries hard time. Not to mention, some guys you just DON'T let out on bail, since they can leave the PLANET before their trial date. Of course, they were pretty smart not to do anything too cruel or unusual to Derek Radner when he got caught a few years ago. Because something tells me that the Chancellor of Khadam is the type to hold a grudge. --begin-- VIII: Expression Everyone has the right to express their beliefs. The expression of beliefs may not be limited except in cases where it impinges on the rights of others. --end-- Freedom of speech, watered down almost to the point where it exists only as a whim. They only added this one a few years ago, and it's really not much of an improvement over the Self-Determination right, for the same reasons. Knock out that last sentence, and maybe I'll believe the Combine is run by non-jackbooted non-thugs. Assuming that that belief doesn't violate the rights of the Combine to the reasonable defensive measure of jackboots. In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is labeled a dangerous lunatic. Thom S. O'Ryan, blinking.