Genna Watson - "Society would be safer if we had security cameras in public places to catch potential criminals."

While this idea might seem initially acceptable because we have video cameras in the majority of public places already, one word in this statement makes it unacceptable - "potential". I am wholly in favor of cameras in public places to catch thieves or committers of other illegal actions. However, once you enter the realm of proscibing crimes to people before they have actually been commited, law has lost its concreteness and crossed over into speculation. Just because someone glances at Mein Kampf in a bookstore does not mean that they will spontaneously begin killing Jews, just as a person who has a friend committing tax fraud will not immediately do so themselves. In addition, accusing people of potential crime paves the way for making certain types of inaction illegal. In 1984, like during the French Revolution, people are imprisoned or killed for not being enthusiastic enough about their governments, despite the fact that they never actually performed any anarchistic actions. In this way, people are no longer naturally innocent, but actually born with intrinsic guilt. While actual versus potential crime may seem like a fine line, please don't be fooled. Once that gap is bridged, there is no going back.