Originally Posted by DVPGSR
Here is my gripe with the ACLU. They put the concerns of the individual of the concerns for the collective masses. This country was founded and is governed by the masses. Those with the most votes win elected office. Laws with the most votes get enacted. Now it seems, and especially with the War on Terror, that the ACLU is hand stringing our law enforcement personell. People are not subject to searches or are allowed to be profiled because it may upset their civilliberties. But what happens when the person that you cannot search and cannot profile blows themselves up on a subway in Manhattan. Dozens would be dead, hundreds injured, and termoil would ensue...but hey, the suicide bomber's civil liberties were not offended before he blew up.
There are times that the good of the whole takes precedent of the good of the individual, and when it comes to securing this country I would much rather take my shoes off at an airport or have my bag checked when entering a subway then be on that plane or subway that blows up.
That's incorrect; this country has it's basis in the individual. Democracy as we know it comes from Enlightenment thinking, which emphasized the individual over the state: government exists through consent of the governed, and the sole purpose of government is to protect the rights of the individual. The Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, all refer to how all men (ie each person) are endowed with inalienable rights. The ideas behind voting, free speech is that an individual can participate in government. The value of individual is the basis for our democracy.
It's a fine line we walk: our country would be much safer and crime free if it were a dictatorship like Singapore or Kuwait or UAE. Sure, you'd have no rights (including right to free speech, right to bear arms, etc.), but you can bet there would be next to no crime and terrorist would have a much more difficult time staging attacks. And our government, while not a dictatorship, has, since the days of the Revolutionary War, grown much larger and more powerful and encompassing than our forefathers ever imagined. And it only keeps getting bigger. And the ACLU is one of the groups that keeps it from growing the wrong way. Sure, sometimes they go a little overboard, but without them, the government would, whether on purpose or on accident, start having its way with the people.