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BS: Civil Obedience
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Subject: BS: Civil Obedience From: Mrrzy Date: 01 Apr 08 - 09:22 AM So, US truckers apparently are going to protest the high price of diesel fuel by - wait for it - driving the under speed limit! What's next - French students flock to classes in protest? When did NOT breaking the law become a statement of disapproval of one's government? And this isn't even April Fool... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Bobert Date: 01 Apr 08 - 09:25 AM Yeah, that's a head scratcher... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: GUEST,PMB Date: 01 Apr 08 - 09:33 AM They scared off Tony Blair a few years ago by doing this in the UK. They occupied roads by driving very slowly, creating massive tailbacks. They also picketed oil depots preventing supplies from leaving, and creating panic among car users. Blair exhibited all his legendary courage and capitulated immediately. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: wysiwyg Date: 01 Apr 08 - 09:55 AM When you drive fast, you drive with less fuel efficiency. "We're slowing down so we can use the gas more slowly." The protest as described would be aimed at the shippers who contract the trucks, slowing down their commerce, inviting them to pressure the gov via lobbying, etc.. (If they drive AT the speed limit instead of using their usual hammer-down approach, they will deliver rmore slowly but have the legal speed on their side to dispute short-pays for missing deadlines.) Also (as PMB indicates) they will slow down and piss off all of the other traffic on the roads, because they'll slow 'em down in areas even a little congested. Again, the legal speed will be their defense-- "[shrug] Whaddaya gonna do?" Etc. I think it's actually very creative. Truckers' equivalent to a nonviolent sit-down, or a factory-line "safety" slowdown. ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Becca72 Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:03 AM Won't work very well here in Maine as far as pissing off the other drivers. The majority of truck traffic is on the highway (I-95) and we have a law that prohibits them from the lefthand lane anyway. So they can drive 40mph in the right and center lanes and everyone else will just pass them. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: wysiwyg Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:06 AM Get back to me on that after the slowdown affects your area. It will not quite work as you describe as passing motorists start to compete for passing time and space. ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: John MacKenzie Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:16 AM Operation Escargot It worked in France, and will work in any country given time. Even the sanguine residents of Maine may find their State's Finest are helpless in the face of a mass occupation of all lanes of the highway by trucks going slow. I mean, what are they going to do to the truckers, stop them? Giok |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Becca72 Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:21 AM Susan, this is Maine...we already have the advantage of only having 1 million people living in the entire state. It will be less effective here than, say, NYC, Hartford, Boston...where traffic is more of a problem. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Wolfgang Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:34 AM Every couple of years, civil servants in Germany do a similar thing. Since they are not allowed to strike for better payment they work strictly to rule. Instead of using, for instance, good sense. After a few days of working strictly to rule, the government grants a pay rise to avoid complete breakdown of all administration. Wolfgang |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: GUEST,Guest Date: 01 Apr 08 - 10:37 AM And don't take it personally, but it doesn't really need to "work" in Maine, if it cripples commerce, traffic, etc in major urban areas--especially the big, urban port areas. I not that Congressional hearings with major oil executives being called on the carpet are now scheduled to take place today. From AP: "As gas nears $4, Congress calls Big Oil on the carpet Senior executives of the five largest U.S. oil companies were to appear before a congressional committee today where they were likely to find frustrated lawmakers in no mood for small talk. By H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press Last update: April 1, 2008 - 7:21 AM "These companies are defending billions of federal subsidies ... while reaping over a hundred billion dollars in profits in just the last year alone," complained Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., in previewing the hearing. The lawmakers were scheduled to hear from top executives of Exxon Mobil Corp., Shell Oil Co., BP America Inc., Chevron Corp. and ConocoPhillips, which together earned about $123 billion last year because of soaring oil and gasoline prices. Markey, chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, said he wants to know why, with such profits, the oil industry is steadfastly fighting to keep $18 billion in tax breaks, stretched over 10 years. He said the executives would be asked to explain how they can get energy prices down in the short run and "in the long run what are they going to do to shift the focus to a renewable energy agenda." "We have to move beyond this oil economy," Markey said Tuesday on CBS' "The Early Show." "We have to move to a renewable energy economy. ... We can never get out of this trap as long as the oil companies want to hold us hostage to this old agenda." The House last year and again on Feb. 27 approved legislation that would have ended the tax breaks for the oil giants, while using the revenue to support wind, solar and other renewable fuels and incentives for energy conservation. The measure has not passed the Senate." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Amos Date: 01 Apr 08 - 11:40 AM Wolfgang: Your post is fascinating in what it says about the fine art of rule-making. There must be a set of meta rules which when broken produce rules which are counter-productive when applied. Humans have been practicing this rule-making business for thousands of years -- since the first parents! -- and it is really interesting to see how unsuccessful they are (as in your example) at creating viable rulesets. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: jeffp Date: 01 Apr 08 - 11:45 AM One of the problems is that rules, once created, almost never die. Instead, more rules are created which overrule, conflict, ignore, etc., the previous rules. Eventually, rule gridlock ensues. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: katlaughing Date: 01 Apr 08 - 12:14 PM I hope they do slow down out here on the interstate. They drive way too fast and switch lanes like maniacs. If there are ever enough of them to clog it, all the better because a lot of the idiots in cars drive too fast and carelessly, too. Going the speed limit would be a welcome change around here. As to the price of gas? Americans have not paid their share ever until recently. I don't think the oil and gas companies should be reaping in huge profits at our expense, but we really have been spoiled with low gas prices versus what percentage of the world's oil we use. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Richard Bridge Date: 01 Apr 08 - 12:18 PM It is settled law in England that a worker can be dismissed for working to rule... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Amos Date: 01 Apr 08 - 12:33 PM LOL, RIchard!! If it wasn't 1 April, I'd believe it!! A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Liz the Squeak Date: 01 Apr 08 - 12:35 PM I have to keep telling my fellow workers that working to rule is a two edged sword. They may be able to decline what they feel is an unsafe working practice, but they are also contracted to work a certain number of hours per week - and that if that rule were enforced there would be some frantic working to make up hours. The comment from a colleague 'I'm not paid to answer that telephone' was greeted with frosty stares and a good talking to. LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Jack the Sailor Date: 01 Apr 08 - 12:54 PM I'm on the highways quite a bit. I think that most truckers do drive the speed limit. But then a lot of them have famous logos on their trucks and an 800 number and a "sign saying how is my driving." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Wolfgang Date: 01 Apr 08 - 01:00 PM Digression Yes, Amos, there is a gray area between following all the rules always strictly and having no rules at all. I'm a great friend of rules that leave room for some interpretation. This place here, for instance, has (mostly) fuzzy rules and I like that. No rules at all or strict rules down to each conceivable detail would make this place become a Shambles. I remember a student once who had certified in sum nearly a year of practical work. She needed 26 weeks but the boundary conditions were that if there are two different practice times the longest may not be longer than 18 weeks and with three different times the shortest may not be shorter than 9 weeks. Since she had studied abroad before coming here she couldn't know about the restriction and whichever way she added two or three times of practical work, two weeks were missing and that would have meant her losing one whole year. I was the person to interpret the rules but in her case there was no wiggle room. The rules technically forced me to decide in a nonsense way. I then told her: "I'm going now to add up your acceptable weeks of practical work and it could happen that I make a numerical error in my addition. Please don't talk about such an embarrassing error if you spot it". Things like this happened perhaps about once every two years and not more often for, in general, I'm a friend of following rules. Wolfgang |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: SINSULL Date: 01 Apr 08 - 01:04 PM In the early 60s as Kennedy Airport traffic became heavier and heavier, the neighborhoods around the airport complained constsntly about the noise levels - planes landing every 30 seconds, emptying fuel lines and creating a really dangerous situation over residential neighborhoods. Complaints fell on deaf ears until housewives started calling the airline reservation numbers to complain effectively tying up the lines. Then everyone drove in and around the airport at 5-10 miles an hour. Kennedy was for all intents and purposes shut down. People missed flights; planes flew empty and all of sudden everyone started paying attention. Very effective form of civil obedience. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Amos Date: 01 Apr 08 - 01:25 PM Great story, Mary! Wolfgang, I applaud your exercise of ethical judgement, and the diplomatic solution you found to implement it. A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Peace Date: 01 Apr 08 - 04:06 PM Vehicles get their worst fuel economy when they're parked. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Liz the Squeak Date: 01 Apr 08 - 04:23 PM Sins - we have that in place already - it's called Terminal 5 Heathrow. LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Peace Date: 01 Apr 08 - 04:30 PM You're standing in the wrong lane. The other lane moves faster. Always. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Art Thieme Date: 01 Apr 08 - 07:06 PM U.S. economy is trying the same tactic. Art |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: wysiwyg Date: 01 Apr 08 - 07:12 PM Becca, our rural area is even more sparsely populated than Maine. I think you will see that this DOES have an effect, even in Maine. ~S~ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Bert Date: 01 Apr 08 - 07:16 PM Nice solution Wolfgang. That wouyd be funny if it weren't so true Art!!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Art Thieme Date: 01 Apr 08 - 07:36 PM Bert, That's why I left off the smiley face. Art |
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Subject: RE: BS: Civil Obedience From: Rapparee Date: 01 Apr 08 - 09:07 PM It'll work here in Idaho, too. Shades of the 1970s.... |
