Acceptance, or Doing Nothing

I was out with the parental units the other day. There's a new Italian restaurant in town, and the food is good. So I decided to take them out.

On the way we got stopped at the Wellawatte checkpoint. Since I was the one not driving, I gave my driver's licence.

Yes, my driver's licence. It is what I show at checkpoints.

Of course the copette who was there - rather cute too I might add - asked me for my ID. I said ,That is a valid ID.

At which point she insisted on seeing my National Identity Card. I kept on telling her the same thing.

That is a valid ID. Issued by the government.

The law does not state that you have to show your ID. It merely states that you have to establish your identity. In fact, there is no law that states that all people should have National Identity Cards.

So, if a government-issued document with your picture on it - and lets face it, all ID cards have old and unrecognisable pictures - is not good enough to establish your identity? Then what is?

Things were getting heated, when my parents started yelling at me to just show your damned ID card!

So I did. Not because of anything, but I was taking my parents out for dinner, and I really didn't need the bad blood this creates in my family. On the way, my parents were haranguing me about my actions. Why do I borrow trouble? Why don't I just show my ID? Why not just follow the status quo and move on?

Simple. I don't like the status quo.

I don't like giving powers they don't have to people.

I don;t like my freedoms being taken away from me.

Since I was a kid I have seen what happens to people who get power, especially the little people. To quite the (often misquoted) Baron Acton ,All power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The problem is, we have been taught from a young age to bow to power, to not upset the apple-cart, to unquestioningly accept what is said. And this is being used against us. The rights we have are being taken away from us not de jure but de facto. Not by law, but by the simple fact of it. Things that are not against the law are being punished because people believe that it is against the law.

Let's take a few examples. A long time back, the cops used to raid guest houses and take the couple they found there away. They would be harassed, mocked, and finally released after a bribe was paid. One couple among the many taken in like this, on a raid that was done under the Prevention of Terrorism Act decided to fight it. They were both adults, and were not doing anything illegal. They had just come there to have a good time. When they were arrested, they went to court and fought. And won. This gave the cops the message that they cannot harass the couples who were in a guest room if they prove that they are not part of the terrorists. So if you ever have to go for a dirty weekend (or day, or night, or afternoon, or one-hour quickie) they are the people you should thank for making it possible.

Another example. A good friend of mine was having a post-prandial at Green Cabin in the outside area. You know the place. It has a roof on it, some tables, but not much else. Some guy comes up to him and says that it is illegal to smoke in public areas. So my friend, who is a visitor to dotelkay, puts away his cigarette. He tells me this later, and I explain to him that the law says that you can't smoke in enclosed public spaces. The place he was smoking in was not enclosed, and he could have told the guy to fuck off and die. But he's a nice guy who doesn't know the laws.

Buy us unquestioningly accepting the supposed laws they have, we are not just destroying our rights, but those of the people around us. And these rights were fought for by our forefathers. If we are willing to fight tooth, nail, and claw for the dining set that our great-uncle left us in his will. why are we not fighting for these?

So that is why I go out of my way to make life difficult for the cops and anyone else in power who wants to exert that power on me. I want to know what rights we have and what we don't have. I want to know the strength of the law that we have on the side of the people.

But there are many people who are willing to fight the creeping removal of our rights. One example is a guy who got arrested for not showing his ID in the US. Go, read the story, I'll wait.

But the issue in that story is not what happened. It is what happened after the event. He decided to fight it. He decided to fight for what was undeniably his right. And he would have won it too. Admittedly it may have been a long battle, but he would have won. The problem was his family. His family put pressure on him to not fight the case. To accept a lower charge and plead guilty. His family wanted him to plead guilty because they didn't like the inconvenience.

It is easy for my family to do the same thing. To say give up. Give in. Let them do their thing as long as you're not inconvenienced. But that is not the point is it?

The point is that we should always fight for our rights. If we don't, they get used to eroding them and the courts get used to fining us and punishing us for something that isn't wrong in the first place.

Let me leave you with another quote, this one attributed to Edmund Burke.

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.