And you're completely missing the point. What I was trying to come to was the idea that, if a law and/or its punishment is unjust enough, would you agree with the NZ government getting involved? I wasn't trying to put littering on the same platform as the holocaust, only that both of them could be used in my example.

But you dodge questions better than George Bush, so forget the whole thing.

No, let's forget it because it's irrelevant to the issue being discussed. Not to mention improbable.

EDITED for pointless flaming of Adolf (he's not gay enough)

Yeah you're right, the idea of a country protecting its citizens from foreign laws is COMPLETELY different from the idea of a country protecting its citizens from foreign laws. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

Oob, you're really stretching this too far. I see no relevance to the comparison you've made considering one is far more serious while the other is trivial, and almost imaginative. You're clutching at straws now.

Yeah, those were all just imaginary jews that got killed. The real ones are in my fridge.

The theme is: a country protecting its citizens from the 'unjust' (in their view) laws of another country. I am producing examples of unjust laws to show why a country may want to intervene in the laws of another country, as is happening here.

If you don't understand the relevance this time, I will assume you are either a) deliberately being ignorant to annoy me, or b) actually a complete retard.

I was referring to the littering example you used.

Use my 'jews being killed for being jews' example, since that one actually happened (though not to australian citizens I presume). An obviously unjust law I'm sure we can both agree.

I'm amused at how you use such an extreme example, which naturally i would agree with you. The eradication of a ethnic/racial/minority group would be universally condemnable. Of course, there are limitations if you take this as a point of reference.

I find extreme examples such as this to be a good way to draw common ground, from which I can explain my point.

So what I'm saying is, you can see why a country might consider its own values above that of another country, if it thinks the other country is being unjust. In the case of jews being killed for being jews, it would be right for us to consider our own values first because genocide is morally abhorrent. In this story, the australians clearly think that the execution of a man for drug smuggling is also morally abhorrent, though not to the same degree of course.

At some point, there is a level where you say 'enough is enough', the Australians have drawn that at executions for drug smuggling, whereas you or I may draw the line somewhere else. But to say that a country should never impose its values on another countrys treatment of one of its citizens is clearly wrong, the extreme example I gave shows that. The only question is at what point should it do so?

And I'm not trying to say genocide is anywhere near a single execution, obviously.

Oob, the mass killing of a group would involve the international community putting their values above the country committing the crime. Universal values that is. A tad different. I agree, there should be limitations. This is being one of them.

However, Australians are thinking of themselves, and themselves alone. If they really found executions to be abhorrent then they would protest the way they do every single execution that has occurred. Or is there a difference in human life? Most Australians in fact didn't care too much about this young man until the time of his execution drew near. He has been in prison for a lot longer than the 3 weeks the media has covered his case. The inconsistency gives them no credibility.

This reminds me of the Corby case where Australians were threatening to boycott Indonesian products, and even asking for their tsunami donations to be returned. It was totally uncalled for, and an example of the arrogance of Australians. These Asian countries have specific laws for a reason, and they don't hide them. Whether we like them or not, is irrelevant. If people are going to violate them, then they should pay the consequences.

Being against genocide isn't quite a 'universal value', it's clearly not a value of those comitting the genocides, of which many have happened with many involved. At best it's a popular value, and so is the distaste for death sentences.

People can only build up strong emotions and act against only so many of the wrongs in the world. For instance, I'm sure you give a disproportionate amount of time voicing your concerns over the Palestinian-Israeli conflict than you do over concerns you may have about, say, various wars in Africa. However, that doesn't necessarily mean you don't find those wars abhorrent.

Of course, if you do give equal time in protesting against every single unjust war in the world, I stand corrected.

The media of course has an influence over what people get angry over. Both this execution and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict have received a lot of press time, so unsurprisingly there are, for both issues, a lot of people with strong objections.

However, I don't see how the fickleness of the Australian public makes their point any less valid, and I don't think it's fair to complain that they are only "thinking of themselves" when one of their citizens is about to be killed. I'm sure you'd be none too happy if I said that to you concerning your captured friend.

I do sympathise with Australians for their efforts to prevent the execution. But the fact remains, this citizen was a criminal who was going to contribute to the death/destruction of the lives of many. Singapore reacted in an effort to deal with its drug problem. It was thinking of its own citizens by protecting them from being exposed to more drugs. Foriegners especially from the west expect special treatment and think they're immune to the laws of other countries. This serves as a reminder they're not.

When it comes down to it, its one countries laws vs another. This individual commited a crime in another country and (when in rome...) he has to face the consequences. Personally I think the courts played their part and it came to a very good conclusion, let it serve as a warning to everyone else that you cant go breaking laws overseas and expect your home country to bail you out.

For a time, the burning of witches was popular in the west. Perhaps in a more civilized time, we may look back at executions of drug smugglers in the same light as we look at the burning of witches.

I agree completely, but if you're going to execute the citizens of another country, don't act too shocked when that country retaliates in some way, after all, they're also thinking of their own citizens. Although I may not agree with them in this case, I don't think Australia is being unreasonable in trying to safeguard the human rights of its citizens, even its criminal citizens.

I wonder, has there ever been a pair of countries that have made an agreement for any criminals caught in either of their borders to be deported for punishment in the other country? Seems like that could help in situations like this. Of course, then we have the problem where western countries would need to be willing to send back foreigners for execution in their own country, but thanks to tribalism this shouldn't cause the same fuss as the issue at hand.

Anyway, the only point I wanted to make is that a country may feel a need to impose its own values on another culture when one of its own citizens is involved, and may or may not be right to do so, depending on the issue.

So would you complain about the laws if one of your friends was executed in China for beloning to a religious group that followed a different koran from that allowed by the government? (It is a real life possibility given their political association laws)

Depending on the crime, it is not uncommon for people to have their visa/etc... revoked and sent back to their homeland. There was a issue a year odd back with some truant for life women who lived in Australia since she was 2yrs old (now an adult) being deported to NZ because they were sick of her criminal activity. Suffice to say we didn't want her as many NZers felt that she developed her problems in Australia.

While not an ongoing, nor two-way agreement, France managed to free its operatives who had committed crimes in NZ for blowing up the Rainbow Warrior. But really we were pressured into that one and now god knows what those stink'n frenchies are doing now (serve their time out in a french jail my, yeah right!).

We really should have gotten some sweet concession out of it, like a 'spy on us again and you have to give us a battleship' agreement or something.

That said, I'm no fan of Greenpeace (and neither is their founder, for much the same reasons as me), so I've never really felt much either way about the issue.

Eh?

Preach the wrong way in China and die:

http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/04/11/china10447.htm

We interrupt this flame war to bring you

http://www.putfile.com/putfile-goodbye-to-singapore.php

Putfile taking a stand.

It'd be interesting to see a large scale internet boycott of countries which abuse human rights.

Although I guess that would only leave New Zealand and Rand McNally.