--- Dana wrote:
Smearing one's political opponents is a tried and tested part of the business. I agree that it is irrational to move from "Blake is a paedophile" to "Resistance to the Federation is a bad thing" but
it
is a move that people quite frequently. When Roger Casement was on trial for Treason, the Cabinet released his diaries which contained detailed
accounts
of his homosexual activities. Quite what this had
to
do with Casement's support for Irish independence
is
unknown, but it did help to ensure his conviction
and
ensure that pleas for mercy were more than usually muted.
But in that specific case, I think the psychological issue was "Is Casement a Good Person or a Bad Person?" with the usual belief being that homosexual activities were conclusive proof that Casement was a Bad Person.
Isn't the issue in both cases that smearing Casement and Blake was supposed to discredit their respective causes. The sub-text in each event being "Look at the sort of nasty people who oppose British/ Federation rule. You don't want to be associated with people like that". The same thing happens in politics whenever a politician is found to be having an affair. Their political opponents claim that it is a 'character issue' but I think the object is to somehow make the electorate think that socialists/liberals/conservatives (delete as appropriate) are bad people who cheat on their wives. Because people identify causes with the people who espouse them, discrediting the people indirectly discredits the cause.
I think the important line is where Varon tells
Blake
that the children have all been tested by lie detector. The Federation judicial process,
apparently,
does not need the presence of witnesses as all statements have been verified before they are
entered
into court.
Why not enter the verification into the record at the same time as the fabrication? Cake.
Ogilvy's Law. The name was coined by a prominent jurist who remembered from 1984 how Winston Smith created the record of Comrade Ogilvy, reflecting that after he had finished Ogilvy existed as an historical character on the same evidence as Julius Caesar or Charlemagne. The jurist insisted that before the data was entered into the justice machine the data be assessed independently otherwise the Federation could download anything they wanted into it (forensic reports, statements, you name it). Hence that funny little ritual where the prosecution and defence exchange futuristic globe thingies which symbolises that this has been done.
This reform was incorporated into the Federation legal system to huge acclaim. Acclaim which was soured somewhat when someone remebered that Orwell's work had been placed on a blacklist and promptly arrested the Jurist for possession of an illegal copy of "Keep the Aspidistra Flying".
The Federation seems to have an attachment to a rather baroque form of legalism, suggesting that they still have to take some regard for public opinion in the early series. I suspect that the Gordian knot was cut when the Empire was rebuilt in Seasons 3 & 4.
Stephen.
Stephen.
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