Criminalizing the normals; my activities

Using my brother's computers. Unlike my parents' computer, it's a PC, not a Mac, so I can use ''cntrl'' keys instead of ''open-apple'' without causing myself problems. ;)

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There's a perspective in Criminology called ''Conflict Theory.'' Part of it says that criminality is as much a function of what the laws are this year as it is the willful violation of them: If you make something illegal that a segment of the population routinely engages in, then you've created an instant class of criminals. For example, if abortion is illegal in some states, but not others, then people getting abortions are criminal, or not, depending on which side of the state line they're on.

Generally, there's two options for dealing with problematic behaviors: The powers-that-be can either make it illegal; or they can legalize it [thus providing an outlet], but channel and regulate it.

One example is prostitution: States where it's legal requried the prostitutes to have regular medical checkups, etc. -- so there's [hopefully] less disease transmission.

Another example is skateboarding: Making it illegal to skateboard in town squares and shopping mall parking lots is pretty futile. But building a skate park down the road, where the kids can skate instead, is (IMO) a fairly balanced solution.

The point of all this is that at both the Brisbane and Sea-Tac airports, people were parking along the shoulder of the road leading to the airports, waiting with their cell phones for their incoming people to call them for a pick-up. This was problematic to the authorities -- maybe it was a traffic hazard? -- so they two governments responded in different ways.

In Brisbane, it's just illegal. There's signs up along the highway to the airport, saying you'll get a fine if you park there waiting for your call from your incoming pasenger.

At Sea-Tac, there's a ''Designated Cell Phone Waiting Area'' reasonably close to the pick-up zone. It's sufficiently well-signed that I found it without any difficulty (despite it being at night), and there was a very efficient security guy directing traffic between the ''main'' waiting area and the temporary ''overflow'' area.

I like the Sea-Tac solution better.

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I thought of the above as I was slogging through the traffic to pick up my brother and his family. Traffic leading up to the ''Arrivals'' section was heavy, so it took me a while to slog through. Except for them phoning me a few times to confirm that, yes, I was coming (traffic was at a standstill at times, so it indeed took me a while), it went without a hitch.

The Lady and I chatted w/ my brother and his wife, and shared with them some (by now, cold) tater-tots. Then the two ladies put the two youngsters to bed, while I stayed up somewhat late talking about handtools with my brother. :)


--GG