The Unabomber

Today’s “The Unabomber Was Right” Note…

/ Jack Marshall / 19 Comments

I don’t find any of these funny.

I ended up in the emergency room of my local hospital thanks to a massive leg hematoma that has produced the most disgusting symptom you could imaging in your worst nightmares. (Think the first feature of Tarantino’s “Grindhouse,” “Planet Terror.”). I was quickly checked out and sent home (diagnosis: painful, ugly, incredibly swollen, blistered and bruised, but healing slowly but surely), but checking out was like a nit from an old Woody Allen movie—you know, back when he was funny.

I had to get a text, then click on the link, then jump through a half-dozen other hoops, read serial messages sent to me, sign three documents with m with my finger, all also I could be pestered by more texts, a survey, another disclaimer and more when I got home. I also witnessed two elderly patients (I’m afraid they were both younger than me) get upset and profess complete helplessness regarding the process because they didn’t know how to use their smart phones.

This is not “progress.” It is not caring service. It is neither reasonable nor necessary.

Post Script: I have no idea how much I will get posted today. I have a Zoom legal ethics seminar to teach, I had almost no sleep last night because my leg was hurting so much, and sitting at my desk isn’t a good idea (but still necessary) because I’m supposed to keep this misshapen red, yellow and purple-mottled thing elevated. I’m sorry: there is a lot I need and want to write about. We will see how it goes.

An Unethical Cascade…Thanks, Metropolis!

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

The photo above carries the caption: “Metropolis parking utilizing AI to create drive in drive out parking without the need for a ticket and validation. This lot is at 236 S. Los Angeles in Little Tokyo in Downtown Los Angeles.” Here’s my caption: “Metropolis parking can bite me.”

And did, come to think of it.

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Morning Ethics Warm-Up, 4/20/2021: The Unabomber Really Was Right, You Know….

/ Jack Marshall / 28 Comments

Crazy, but right. I first wrote about that inconvenient fact here. This year has driven the horror home more than ever. His point was that we were allowing technology to control our lives, constrict our liberties, and poison our values and culture, while giving aspiring dictators tools to dominate us. Here are some of my recent experiences:

  • A friend, a season ticket holder, gave me tickets to a Washington Nationals game, except that D.C., being in the grip of a Wuhan hysteric, won’t allow the Nats to give out printed tickets. Thus, in order to “access” my tickets, I had to log in to the MLB website as a first step, then download an app to my smart phone, which would then allow my phone to accept the virtual tickets. But MLB wouldn’t accept my password, and wouldn’t allow me to change it either. I called the Nats, but nobody was there—everyone was working from their computers. Finally I was called back by a nice guy who tried to walk me through the system. He gave me a password, but my phone wouldn’t connect with the app. Then he started to explain an alternate method which involved registering with eBay. I thanked him, but told him to give the tickets back to my friend. I had spent over an hour just trying to get the things that once could be faxed to me in five minutes, or sent by mail. To hell with it.
  • Then, last night, my sister took me to a game. The Nats make you order food or drink from your smart phone. You have to order food or drink, because you are only allowed to take off your damn mask—outside, with nobody within ten feet of you—if you are eating or drinking, so everyone is holding a water bottle under their chin the whole game. You download an app, and you get a menu on the phone, see? Then you order, and a text comes to tell you where to pick up the stuff. You can’t pay using money, because the Nats want to keep us “safe.” I found out that there were a couple of places around the park where you could buy food the old, bad, low-tech complicated way: “Give me a dog and a beer—thanks—here’s money…bye!” Most Nats staff, however, had no idea where those places were.
  • Speaking of systemic racism, not to mention classism and ageism: What are the likely consequences of making all aspects of life dependent on owning a smart phone?
  • My wife had been waiting for the promised email from the Virginia Health Department with a link to the way to schedule a second Wuhan vaccine. It never came. After spending over a hour in a phone queue, she was told that a computer had garbled her email address. Oh.

1. Thanks Maxine! Thanks , journalists! Thanks, Democrats! Thanks, Black Lives Matter! How can a nation maintain a justice system and preserve due process and the rights of the accused when this happens? From USA Today:

A group of people vandalized the former Northern California home of an expert witness who testified for the defense in the murder trial of Derek Chauvin, police said, throwing a pig’s head on the front porch and blood splatter on the house.

The incident occurred in Santa Rosa, California, where retired police officer Barry Brodd once lived and worked. Brodd testified last week in Chauvin’s trial, saying the former Minneapolis police officer was “justified” in his use of force against George Floyd, who died in police custody last May.

The Santa Rosa Police Department said Brodd no longer lives at the residence nor in California, but “it appears the suspects in this vandalism were targeting Mr. Brodd for his testimony.”

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The Unabomber, The Red Light, And Me [UPDATED!]

/ Jack Marshall / 41 Comments

I ran a red light last night, and I’m feeling bad about it. Ted Kaczynski made me do it.

It was after midnight, and I was returning home after seeing the pre-Broadway production of the musical “Mean Girls,” based on the cult Lindsay Lohan comedy. I was late, my phone was dead, I knew my wife would be worried, and I was stopped at an intersection where I could see for many football fields in all directions. There were no cars to be seen anywhere.

Ted, , aka “The Unabomber” or “Snookums” to his friends, cited my exact situation as an example of how we have become slaves to our technology. Why do we waste moments of our limited lifespan because of a red light, when there is no reason to be stopped other than because the signal says to. Admittedly, this had bothered me before I read Ted’s complaint. Stop lights should start blinking by midnight, allowing a motorist to proceed with caution, as with a stop sign.  If one isn’t blinking, we should be allowed to treat it as if it is.

Last night, I ran the light. With my luck, there was a camera at the intersection, and I’ll get a ticket in the mail. But..

…whether I do or not doesn’t change the ethical or unethical character of my conduct. That’s just moral luck.

…it was still against the law to run the light, even it I was treating it as a blinking light, because it wasn’t

…breaking the law is unethical, even when the law is stupid, and

…there was no legitimate emergency that could justify my running the light as a utilitarian act.

So I feel guilty. Not guilty enough to turn myself in, but still guilty, since I am guilty.

But Ted wasn’t wrong.

Update: Let me add this; I was thinking in the shower.

On several occasions in the past, I have found myself stopped by a malfunctioning light that appeared to be determined to stay red forever. Is it ethical to go through the light then? The alternative is theoretically being stuck for the rest of my life. So we run such lights, on the theory the frozen stop light is not meeting the intent of the law or the authorities who placed it there, and to remain servile to the light under such circumstances is unreasonable. Yet running it is still breaking the law, and isn’t stopping for a light in the dead of night with no cars to be seen also not consistent with the intent of the law and the light? What’s the distinction?

The Unabomber Had A Point. [UPDATED]

/ Jack Marshall / 37 Comments

FX has a new limited series about the hunt for the Unabomber, Theodore John Kaczynski. I didn’t pay much attention to the story when it was going on; I just thought it was one more Harvard-grad-turns-serial-killer episode, and that was that. I certainly didn’t pay attention to his “manifesto.” The series, however, enlightened me.  As I understand it, Ted believed that technology was destroying society, making us all slaves to it, and taking the joy out of life. I have yet to see how blowing people up addressed this problem, but then he shouldn’t have to be right about everything. The evidence has been mounting since 1995, when he killed his final victim,that  the Unabomber  wasn’t quite as crazy as we thought.

I could bury you in links, but will not.  We are slaves, for example, to passwords. I teach lawyers that their devices containing client confidences should, to be properly protective of them under ethics standards, have passwords of at least 18 random letters, characters and numbers, with the password for every such device being different, and all of them changed every month. Or you can go the John Podesta route, use “password.” and get hacked, and eventually disciplined by your bar association, once they decide to get serious.

[CORRECTION: In the original post, I relayed a link to a site where you can check your password to see if it’s been compromised. I had been forwarded the link by another tech-interested lawyer. But as I was just alerted by a commenter (Than you, Brian!) It’s apotential trap and an unethical site, making you reveal your password to check it. I apologize for posting it. See how dangerous and tricky this stuff is? See? SEE?.I fell for the trap of depending on technology to protect us from technology! Ted warned us about that, too.]

Then there is this feature in The Atlantic. An excerpt: Continue reading →