>without someone saying something? I have the impression from the
media that
>people who feel they have been wronged either head to their lawyer
or resort
>to terrorism first before talking reasonably to their accusers. And
if K was
>known to be a professional person (even if retired), the people may
have felt
>intimidated because of that, and not able to approach him.
My background in organizational behavior tells me that most
disagreements
and quarrels result from failure to communicate. I would agree 100%
that K should talk reasonably to his accusers- had they come to him
first instead of reporting him to a government agency. As it stands,
however, I do not see why K should exercise any restraint in
retaliating
(within the limits of civil and criminal law). His accusers
effectively
invaded his life without warning and, as it turns out, without just
cause.
As I mentioned in a previous posting, revenge for its own sake is
useless,
but legal action would have the legitimate, beneficial effects of:
(1) Discouraging the accusers from repeating their behavior
(2) Discouraging others from imitating it (as the French say,
"pour encourager les autres")
(3) Recovering monetary compensation for his inconvenience
Regarding the latter, if K's accusers were truly sorry about what
they did, they would have offered to compensate him for his
trouble and expense. (Since they reported him anonymously,
an anonymous package of money in his mailbox, with an apology,
might have been a good idea.) Since they have not apologized for
their conduct, and have not tried to make amends, we must conclude
that they are not sorry. (Or they're sorry that K might find out
who they are.) Therefore, I feel that anything K does to them, within
the limits of the law, is appropriate- assuming he is able to find
them.
Your posting also mentioned the importance of people being
able to report child abuse, etc. without fear of retaliation.
The Wall Street Journal has run convincing editorials that
claim that dishonest child protection workers, detectives, and so
on have fabricated child abuse cases against innocent people.
While I agree that child abusers deserve punishment, those who
falsely and maliciously invent such accusations also merit
retaliation (criminal, for perjury, and civil, by their victims).
The false accusers not only harm the victims of their accusations,
but they undermine confidence in the child protection system, so
people may be less likely to believe true accusations. Therefore, the
ability of people to report other people anonymously and without
fear of (legal) retaliation is not necessarily a good idea.
A good compromise would be to limit anonymous reports so they,
alone, have no legal weight whatsoever. They are already inadmissible
as evidence in courts, and should be inadmissible in administrative
proceedings (e.g. motor vehicles). However, an anonymous call to
the police that results in the police themselves seeing a violation,
or
dangerous driving, is effective because they do not need the caller's
testimony to prosecute the behavior. As I understand, in the U.S.,
if I tell the police that a car with a given plate number is being
driven recklessly, or is running stop lights, they will not write the
driver a ticket on the basis of what I tell them. They may, however,
watch for the car and, if they observe a violation themselves, ticket
the driver.
Which brings up another point- if K's driving was as bad as
his neighbors said, he should have accumulated enough traffic
violations to get him off the road. In most U.S. states, too many
violations results in a license suspension or revocation. I assume
it is the same in Canada. Since K apparently did not have enough
violations (if any) to result in such action, this again shows that
his neighbors should have minded their own business.
-Bill
