LWN: Comments on "Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door"

America is a continent, not a country

jkingweb — Tue, 20 Aug 2024 23:45:37 +0000

Just by the way, Bretagne is feminine. La Grande-Bretagne est au nord de la plus petite Bretagne.

America is a continent, not a country

Wol — Tue, 20 Aug 2024 14:50:16 +0000

I did say it was complicated ... :-) and more myth than fact :-)

But I've always understood Grand- and Petit- Bretagne to be a matching pair, as in "the land of the Br(e/i)tons" before the Romans, so Petit-Bretagne to me is all of Brittany. I didn't know that was divided into "Upper" and "Lower".

Cheers,
Wol

America is a continent, not a country

jkingweb — Tue, 20 Aug 2024 12:32:26 +0000

> In Canada, we rarely use the term America to refer to the US, or American to refer to a US citizen. We usually call the US the US, and a person from the US simply a US citizen, from the US, or from the States.

You and I must live in different Canadas, then. While I agree "America" is practically never used outside an ironic context, I also rarely if ever hear fellow Canadians use a name for our southern neighbours other than "American" (or « américain » in French).

America is a continent, not a country

laarmen — Mon, 19 Aug 2024 07:53:50 +0000

Since we're wading into linguistic pedantry, that'd be Grande-Bretagne (Great Britain) vs Bretagne (Brittany). Brittany is culturally divided into Lower and Upper Brittany, so as a Breton I would probably wonder if you're talking about Lower Brittany if you say "Petite Bretagne".

America is a continent, not a country

Wol — Fri, 16 Aug 2024 22:57:49 +0000

But people are quite happy to say "English" when they mean "American" ...

(Those are nouns, not adjectives, by the way ...)

Cheers,
Wol

America is a continent, not a country

Wol — Fri, 16 Aug 2024 22:55:58 +0000

Bear in mind also, that Briton and Breton are (historically) the same word.

Nowadays the distinction is that Britons come from Grand Bretagne, while Bretons come from Petit Bretagne.

Nationality is complicated ... and usually rooted in myth, not fact, to boot ...

Cheers,
Wol

America is a continent, not a country

NAR — Thu, 15 Aug 2024 08:49:30 +0000

I don't understand the "cultural appropriation" thing, but in natural languages it's common that a word has multiple meanings and it's also common that words are not precise. For example in my native language "pesti" usually refers to something or somebody from or related to Budapest even though technically Pest is only one part of the city. The word "American" has also two meanings and one of its meaning might be considered imprecise. However, I don't think it's confusing it because almost always relates to the USA. If not, "American continent" or something like that is used. Trying to invent a Newspeak work for a supposed confusion just creates more confusion.

America is a continent, not a country

neilbrown — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 22:30:59 +0000

We don't say "Briton", we say "British", which is an adjective just like "American" is.

America is a continent, not a country

Cyberax — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 20:33:10 +0000

To add to the irony, "American" is probably the easiest and most correct demonym outside the USA. Something like "usian" will require other people to know English enough to understand what the "US" stands for.

"American" also doesn't clash with any other country's name (official or not). It would have been a different story if a significant number of people identified themselves as "North American" or "South American", but I don't think it's a thing?

America is a continent, not a country

daroc — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 19:54:07 +0000

Well, at the risk of being unnecessarily nitpicky: technically, the United States of Mexico's official name is "Estados Unidos Mexicanos", as given by the current constitution, and therefore the words "United States" aren't in its name. While the country, like the USA, has no official language, the government does conduct business almost exclusively in Spanish.

America is a continent, not a country

Cyberax — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 19:42:43 +0000

> There are widely-recognized demonyms to refer to a US citizen other than the misnomer and misappropriation of American.

There are two countries with the words "United States" in the official name: the USA, and... Mexico. There's only one country with the word "America" in the official name.

America is a continent, not a country

excors — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 15:25:13 +0000

I suspect that if you use "USAsian" (either written or spoken) without sufficient context, many people will think you're talking about people of Asian ancestry in the US, so it will not be very effective at communicating your intent.

America is a continent, not a country

paulj — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 14:58:47 +0000

I use USAsian. USian seems incomplete to me (United States of ... what? - ian?). USAsian also flows better when spoken.

America is a continent, not a country

anselm — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 13:12:10 +0000

There are widely-recognized demonyms to refer to a US citizen other than the misnomer and misappropriation of American. Just maybe not in English.

The architect Frank Lloyd Wright was in favour of the term “Usonian”, which however does not seem to have caught on.

The only language which appears to have picked it up is Esperanto, where the United States is called usono, and its inhabitants are usonanoj.

America is a continent, not a country

Delicieuxz — Wed, 14 Aug 2024 12:52:20 +0000

There are widely-recognized demonyms to refer to a US citizen other than the misnomer and misappropriation of American. Just maybe not in English.

In Spanish (which is the dominant language of America), there's "estadounidenses", which translates to United-Statesian. The shorter form for which would be USian.

In French, there's états-unien, which again translates to United-Statesian.

In Italian, there's statunitense, which is again United-Statesian.

In German, there's US-Amerikaner, which translates to US-American - as opposed to Canadian-American, Peruvian-American, Bolivian-American, etc.

In Canada, we rarely use the term America to refer to the US, or American to refer to a US citizen. We usually call the US the US, and a person from the US simply a US citizen, from the US, or from the States. Personally, I use the term USian all the time now.

I've seen it said on occasion "but Mexico's full name is the United States of Mexico, so wouldn't there be confusion there?" And that's not correct, as the full name of Mexico is actually The United Mexican States.

There's a document I saw on the Library of Congress' website which says that the trend of referring to US citizens as Americans wasn't popularized until the 20th century, and happened as a result of the US becoming an empire. So, it's an imperialist slang.

The continent America, with north and south sub-continents (like Eurasia has Europe and Asia sub-continents) was named America centuries before the US existed, and the US from its beginning was named merely "of" the continent America. In fact, in 1783, right before the US became a country, the states were being referred to as the united states of north America. Then the name was shortened to the US of A, but the America in the name always referred to the continent.

So, I don't feel comfortable calling the US by a name that misappropriates what belongs to 35 different countries, or its people's nationality by a term that applies to all the people of America. It's a misnomer and misappropriation, and is basically identity theft for the sake of aggrandizing and reinforcing the imperialist mindset in an impererialist state.

And I cringe a bit when people claim the term for the collective landmass of north and south America is "the Americas", as "the Americas" is plural, referring to multiple landmasses at once. The fact that "Americas" is plural testifies that, as a singular landmass, its name is America.

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

pizza — Fri, 17 Apr 2020 11:56:59 +0000

> So there's much benefit and little risk by making encryption available to the general population while there is little benefit and high risk by making guns generally available.

I disagree; these restrictions aren't actually intended to benefit the _public_, but instead to benefit the _government_. And there is absolutely much risk involved (to the government) when it can't effectively spy on its own populace and pro-actively "redirect" agitators into less disruptive activities.

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

niner — Fri, 17 Apr 2020 10:37:07 +0000

The difference is that it's kinda hard to have fatal accidents related to encryption and that encryption in the hands of mentally unstable people can be a nuisance at most. On the other side, contrary to encryption, guns are of no use to the general population.

So there's much benefit and little risk by making encryption available to the general population while there is little benefit and high risk by making guns generally available.

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

nix — Thu, 09 Apr 2020 00:15:13 +0000

The only cures for inequality that have heretofore been known are warfare and plague, but that doesn't mean that warfare and plague are *good* things, or that it is not desirable to find other ways to reduce the power of the mighty. Of *course* it's worth trying to restrict the rich from having the loudest voice, just as it is desirable to restrict the rich and powerful from having absolute power of life and death over everyone.

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

gdt — Fri, 27 Mar 2020 12:33:07 +0000

The international meetings related to this proposal may well be remembered more for their role in the initial spread of COVID-19 into the highest level of governments.

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

Wol — Tue, 24 Mar 2020 08:47:18 +0000

"Never argue with a man who buys ink by the barrel"

Cheers,
Wol

Courts as corruptions of government

giraffedata — Mon, 23 Mar 2020 15:04:19 +0000

In other words, the court was interpreting the US Constitution, one of the sources of law in the US.

As I said before, people may reasonably disagree that this was a correct interpretation of that law and was instead new law, but the point is that if so, that's a failure of the system, not an application of it. Common law doesn't allow judges to make new law from whole cloth. At no point in the detailed written decision in Roe v Wade does the court say, "We think abortion is fine, so we nullify any law that says otherwise."

The U.S. Congress does not have the power to modify the U.S. Constitution all by itself, but it could certainly initiate an amendment and if 3/4 of the states agreed that abortion is not fine, the Supreme Court would be overruled and would start upholding criminal convictions for having abortions.

One way to have a system where the courts have less power is not to have a constitution - the legislative branch's power is unlimited. Another is to have a constitution that can be amended by a quick majority vote of the people, which many US states have. But that's not a common law vs civil law issue.

Courts as corruptions of government

pizza — Mon, 23 Mar 2020 14:48:49 +0000

> Really? How do you explain the existence of Roe vs Wade? The legality of abortion in the US is based on a ruling by the Supreme Court. Why can't Congress simply pass a new law making it legal/illegal?

The US Supreme Court didn't write new law with RvW; instead they ruled that the law being challeneged ran afoul of the rights laid down in the US Constitution, and was consequently unenforceable.

(Meanwhile, Congress and various States never stopped attempting to pass new laws that sidestep RvW. One's now up in front of the USSC)

Courts as corruptions of government

kleptog — Mon, 23 Mar 2020 14:07:55 +0000

> In both common law and civil law countries, courts only interpret law.

Really? How do you explain the existence of Roe vs Wade? The legality of abortion in the US is based on a ruling by the Supreme Court. Why can't Congress simply pass a new law making it legal/illegal? Or the Mabo decision in Australia, where the court basically invented a new legal framework from whole cloth. Such things are impossible in a civil law system: the legislature creates law, not the courts. If the courts make a decision that the legislature doesn't agree with, it simply passes a law to override it.

Although, to prevent the wasting of time, the courts often ask the government what to do about corner cases not considered and use that to guide the ruling. In the next revision of the law these corner cases are written in and the ruling becomes redundant.

Courts as corruptions of government

amacater — Sun, 22 Mar 2020 17:22:30 +0000

Actually, it's a bit later in the UK - Chancery courts more or less disappear as an independent entity from 1873-1882 and the last vestiges disappear mostly in 1925 with the reform of the laws of land law, inheritance and trusts. Judge made law is still important in England and Wales in lower courts and in Scotland under a different legal system: the Supreme Court actions about Brexit were binding on all three jurisdictions because separate actions were brought in England and in Scotland.

/me used to be a trainee barrister and retains an interest in legal history and international law.

Courts as corruptions of government

mathstuf — Sun, 22 Mar 2020 01:18:13 +0000

> I don't like Dickens and don't know the story, but doesn't he have a lawsuit Jarndyce vs Jarndyce? This is based on a REAL case that lasted about 100 years and, like Jarndyce, only terminated when the entire disputed fortune disappeared in legal fees.

I was curious, so I looked it up. The real case lasted 117 years, but Bleak House (the book that has the Jarndyce case) was published only 55 years into it. Not even half way!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jarndyce_and_Jarndyce#Real-...

Courts as corruptions of government

Wol — Sun, 22 Mar 2020 01:02:41 +0000

> To the extent that cases are not exactly the same, common law judges have the same power and use it constantly. A judge finds that the instant case is different in some tiny but legally meaningful detail from a prior case, so deserves a different result. The only thing the common law judge can't do is say, "I disagree with my superior court's (or, sometimes, fellow judge's) reasoning in a prior identical case, so I'll rule differently on this one."

Bear in mind that "common law" is an umbrella term for assorted courts. We have the criminal courts which interpret the law as laid down by Parliament, including punishments imposed by the state.

Then we have the civil courts, which interpret the parliamentary laws controlling society.

And one of the reasons we precedence is so important is because it WASN'T until about 150 years ago. Because we had (still do to some extent) the Court of Equity, whose purpose was to define what was fair in citizens dealings with each other. Any squabble taken to law that is not defined in law is taken to a Court of Equity. And you only have to read Dickens for a perfect example of a squabble gone seriously wrong. I don't like Dickens and don't know the story, but doesn't he have a lawsuit Jarndyce vs Jarndyce? This is based on a REAL case that lasted about 100 years and, like Jarndyce, only terminated when the entire disputed fortune disappeared in legal fees.

I think it was this case that basically did in the courts of equity and led to the importance of precedence.

Cheers,
Wol

Courts as corruptions of government

giraffedata — Sat, 21 Mar 2020 21:23:57 +0000

This "first judge past the post" idea

If you're thinking of a system in which the first judge to interpret some aspect of a law sets binding precedent for every future application of that law, I don't know if that exists. I know it doesn't in the United States. In the US, a judge's decision is binding at most on the same court (which may have many judges), and often not even that. It's always binding on inferior courts, though.

[Civil law judges are] free to add a different or more nuanced opinion (cases are never exactly the same)

To the extent that cases are not exactly the same, common law judges have the same power and use it constantly. A judge finds that the instant case is different in some tiny but legally meaningful detail from a prior case, so deserves a different result. The only thing the common law judge can't do is say, "I disagree with my superior court's (or, sometimes, fellow judge's) reasoning in a prior identical case, so I'll rule differently on this one."

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

smitty_one_each — Sat, 21 Mar 2020 21:19:32 +0000

Furthermore, when we set up our our totally illegal unbiased news smuggling ring, @marcH, we'll doubtless use some out-of-band means to move one-time pads[1] and just thumb our noses at the authorities.

As with other external laws to manage behavior, this is doomed to affect mostly the law-abiding.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-time_pad

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

marcH — Sat, 21 Mar 2020 19:24:23 +0000

> the US will issue an arrest warrant for their founders.

Sure.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/24/21150918/european-comm...
> Signal becomes European Commission’s messaging app of choice in security clampdown. It’s the recommended app for public instant messaging

I heard Angela Merkel wasn't super happy when Snowden told her the NSA was spying on her.

Courts as corruptions of government

marcH — Sat, 21 Mar 2020 19:21:04 +0000

> So in Common Law a single judge can shift the meaning of the law for the whole judicial system. In Civil Law a single judge can make a dubious decision but this doesn't bind the next judge.

Thank you. To answer another comment "bind" => not just a "matter of degree".

By the way Civil Law judges don't ignore precedence either. However they're not bound by it and free to add a different or more nuanced opinion (cases are never exactly the same) to the whole precedence corpus.

This "first judge past the post" idea is as ridiculous as the "winner-take-all" electoral college in most US states or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REDMAP gerrymandering. Loss of basic logic and common sense.

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

marcH — Sat, 21 Mar 2020 19:07:45 +0000

Trying to restrict the rich from having the loudest voice is laudable but totally futile, it can never work. The only counter-measure is "freedom of information" = *who* is paying for this or that propaganda. That is of course under attack too but it's a much simpler and actually winnable fight.

Courts as corruptions of government

Jandar — Sat, 21 Mar 2020 00:37:15 +0000

In Common Law a judge creates via precedence long-lasting law whereas in Civil Law no judge is bound by a decision made by another random judge but only by the law written by the legislature. So in Common Law a single judge can shift the meaning of the law for the whole judicial system. In Civil Law a single judge can make a dubious decision but this doesn't bind the next judge.

Courts as corruptions of government

giraffedata — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 21:23:49 +0000

Interpreting the law is what I meant by courts "filling in the missing words," which can be called writing law.

In both common law and civil law countries, courts only interpret law. You may be cynical and claim that a certain judge, out of corruption or incompetence has written new law instead of interpreting existing law, but that's a separate issue. That's not the system. A judge in a common law country does not say "I think everybody should provide a back door for law enforcement, so I'm going to fine you for not doing it." He says, "I think Congress has required a back door for law enforcement in this case, so I'm going to fine you for not doing it."

The difference between the role of courts in civil and common law jurisdictions is mostly a matter of degree. To me, the biggest difference between the two is that civil courts don't pay anywhere near as much attention to using the same interpretation in every case (stare decisis), which means they have a much freer hand than a common law judge in writing law. If you don't like powerful judges, a common law country is what you want.

Courts as corruptions of government

mpr22 — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 20:45:27 +0000

>In countries with Civil Law courts only interpret the laws given.

To me, that sounds like the legislature decides what the law says, and the judiciary decides what the law means, and thus from the practical perspective of a person interacting with the courts, the judiciary is involved in the legislative process, because "what the law means" is what determines whether a tort or crime will be found to have occurred.

Courts as corruptions of government

Jandar — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 19:04:59 +0000

> the only thing any court does is "write law".

Only in countries with Common Law. In countries with Civil Law courts only interpret the laws given.

In my opinion Common Law is incompatible with Separation of powers because the judiciary takes part in the legislature.

America is a continent, not a country

sbdep — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 18:03:12 +0000

> As an aside, I find it rather sad that a Canada-based project uses the word "American" to mean "USA citizen". America is obviously a continent (which includes
> Canada, by the way), not a country.

As a Canadian, I can assure you that we universally refer to people from the USA as Americans, and never use "America" to refer to the continent.
Referring to the continent might be "North America", "South America", "Central America" (which is of course a fairly ambiguous term).

However the insistence of Europeans that the term "American" should refer to all people from "North America" or perhaps both "North and South America" is humourous :)

America is a continent, not a country

Wol — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 13:05:36 +0000

Not helped by the fact that "Briton", in modern British usage, means someone who was here before the Anglo-Saxons arrived ... :-)

Cheers,
Wol

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

Wol — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 13:03:08 +0000

> It's funny that you post this on an article about how America is being uncapitalist by restricting corporations in the name of the public good.

Isn't the article about America restricting corporations FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE STATE (and the *un*benefit of the public good)?

All hail the minister of the Department For Truth ...

Cheers,
Wol

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

Wol — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 13:00:36 +0000

> You're demanding something you're not offering.

I'm not. It helps if you read what I wrote. I most definitely do not expect Americans to disadvantage themselves in my favour - I object to them expecting me to disadvantage myself.

If you offer me a "win win", I'll take it. If I want something from you, I'll try and offer a "win win". America just ASSUMES we'll be happy with a "win lose", when we're the ones losing. NO WAY!!!

Cheers,
Wol

Bringing encryption restrictions in through the back door

roc — Fri, 20 Mar 2020 11:36:06 +0000

This kind of hyperbole does no-one any good. There are lots of examples where the US courts have restrained elites.