Anti-monitoring law (Was Re: MARTI)

[mwaters@mail.wesleyan.edu (Martin J. Waters)]

>Sven Weil wrote:
>    Unless you're some kind of Mo-Ron who goes off and brags to his
>friends about the conversations he heard last night - or on his way to
>work, who is going to know that you are listening to cell phones?
>
>        It's such a ridiculous (and unenforceable) law.

        I'm not a supporter of the law (I used to be firmly against,
although these days I'm not so sure). But I disagree that it is without its
use or effect. Your statement suggests what it does--discourage people who
illegally monitor cell phone conversations from disclosing them in a very
public way, i.e., publishing or broadcasting them, or even bragging very
widely that they're doing it. And just making the monitoring equipment
illegal and hard to get cuts way down on the number of people monitoring.
There are many laws higher on the unenforceable scale than this one. Those
who are sure they oppose the law should urge that it be repealed, not just
dismiss it as ridiculous.

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