Californian Senate votes to make knowingly transmitting AIDS no longer a felony - AKA why Americans fucking hate Cali

http://www.latimes.com/politics/ess...osing-others-to-hiv-1496281754-htmlstory.html

The state Senate on Wednesday voted to no longer make it a felony for someone infected with HIV to knowingly expose others to the disease by having unprotected sex without telling his or her partner about the infection.

The crime would be downgraded to a misdemeanor, and the bill would also apply to people who donate blood or semen without telling the blood or semen bank that they have acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, or AIDS, or have tested positive for human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, the precursor to AIDS.

The measure, which next goes to the Assembly for consideration, was introduced by Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who said it is unfair to make HIV/AIDS the only communicable disease given such harsh treatment by prosecutors.

“These laws are irrational and discriminatory,” Wiener told the Senate, adding that the current felony status is “creating an incentive not to be tested, because if you don’t know your status you can’t be guilty of a felony.”

The measure was widely opposed by Republican lawmakers including Sen. Joel Anderson of San Diego. "If you intentionally transmit something that is fundamentally life-threatening to the victim, you should be charged and go to jail," he said.

 

[AnOminous]

I think they really need to distinguish between just being a shitty person and sleeping around despite having HIV and actually deliberately transmitting it with the intent of harming someone. Laws like this made more sense when it was essentially a guaranteed death sentence. This strikes me as a lot more like drunk driving, where you're knowingly risking harm, than deliberately causing harm.

Arguably, the solution to the inequity would be upgrading knowingly transmitting other diseases to a felony as well, though, rather than downgrading this one. Frankly, though, California already has absurdly harsh criminal sentencing for a supposedly liberal state. It's like this fucked up state has taken the worst aspects of liberalism and mixed them with the worst aspects of conservatism.

Also, you get bullshit like this in any state with uncontested single party rule, like the supermajority of Democrats in both houses in California. With no effective opposition, they're going to do batshit stuff constantly, because there's no one there to tell them they can't.

 

[Absolutego]

I think they really need to distinguish between just being a shitty person and sleeping around despite having HIV and actually deliberately transmitting it with the intent of harming someone. Laws like this made more sense when it was essentially a guaranteed death sentence. This strikes me as a lot more like drunk driving, where you're knowingly risking harm, than deliberately causing harm.

Arguably, the solution to the inequity would be upgrading knowingly transmitting other diseases to a felony as well, though, rather than downgrading this one. Frankly, though, California already has absurdly harsh criminal sentencing for a supposedly liberal state. It's like this fucked up state has taken the worst aspects of liberalism and mixed them with the worst aspects of conservatism.

Also, you get bullshit like this in any state with uncontested single party rule, like the supermajority of Democrats in both houses in California. With no effective opposition, they're going to do batshit stuff constantly, because there's no one there to tell them they can't.

This is why I balk when people in my new home talk about how we need to be more like California. It's easily the most dysfunctional state I've ever lived in. It's like an entire state governed by speds.

 

[Dysnomia]

The part about sperm banks really bothers me. It's ok to knowingly donate an AIDS baby to be?

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

http://www.latimes.com/politics/ess...osing-others-to-hiv-1496281754-htmlstory.html

Welp, I'm never going to California.

 

[AnOminous]

This is why I balk when people in my new home talk about how we need to be more like California. It's easily the most dysfunctional state I've ever lived in. It's like an entire state governed by speds.

There is an extreme excess of government by referendum there, which is in fact government by speds. They also instituted term limits for legislators there, which sounds great in principle, especially when you look at stuff like the U.S. Congress where people shit up the place for 30-40 years no matter how incompetent or corrupt.

But then you end up with amateur legislators who have no idea what they're doing, so they just introduce whatever lobbyists hand them, written by lawyers for special interests, because they don't know any better. By the time they've been in the legislature long enough to have a clue what they're doing, they're gone. And of course, lobbyists don't have term limits.

 

[teh forist speret]

At this point I think California would be doing the US a favor if they seceded.

 

[Overcast]

Well, we're openly protecting illegal immigrants and being apologetic about Islamic extremists, doesn't surprise me we're trying to pull this shit as well.

Seriously, what was going on through this guy's mind when proposing this?

 

[AnOminous]

Well, we're openly protecting illegal immigrants and being apologetic about Islamic extremists, doesn't surprise me we're trying to pull this shit as well.

Seriously, what was going on through this guy's mind when proposing this?

Some mix of prions and AIDS.

 

[ADN_VIII]

Well, we're openly protecting illegal immigrants and being apologetic about Islamic extremists, doesn't surprise me we're trying to pull this shit as well.

Seriously, what was going on through this guy's mind when proposing this?

The guy who proposed the bill said it's because current legislation hurts minorities, women of color specifically, disproportionately. Reality, naturally, disagrees.

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

The guy who proposed the bill said it's because current legislation hurts minorities, women of color specifically, disproportionately. Reality, naturally, disagrees.

What, it hurts minorities because they can't drag whitey down with them after fucking without contraceptives?

Oh, I feel so sorry.

 

[ADN_VIII]

What, it hurts minorities because they can't drag whitey down with them after fucking without contraceptives?

Oh, I feel so sorry.

This state is 72% white. Guys got his legislation backwards since minorities are at much greater risk of some crazy white person intentionally spreading HIV, not the other way round as his statements imply. The

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

This state is 72% white. Guys got his legislation backwards since minorities are at much greater risk of some crazy white person intentionally spreading HIV, not the other way round as his statements imply. The

No matter how you slice it, this is a dumb idea. His other argument was that making it a felony dissuades infected people from getting a diagnoses, but it would still be a misdemeanor so it's still illegal anyway & makes no difference, except the punishment for it is less severe and thus incentives pozzers to become more emboldened since the cost for their activities just went down significantly. On the other side of that same coin, anyone deliberately avoiding a diagnoses is doing so with the intent of freely infecting other people without repercussion, so why would they suddenly change their minds if it changed from a felony to a misdemeanor?

Then there's sperm bank donations and blood transfusions, which is the equivalent to discarding life preservers on a boat in the hopes it'll stop sinking.

 

[Gym Leader Elesa]

Also, you get bullshit like this in any state with uncontested single party rule, like the supermajority of Democrats in both houses in California. With no effective opposition, they're going to do batshit stuff constantly, because there's no one there to tell them they can't.

This is a really good point, actually. For the flip side (and my own side of the aisle) one can look at Mississippi, a beautiful state which I love dearly but which highlights the dangers of one-party rule on the other side.

That said, California really at this point may as well be its own country. I'm not even mad at them. But if you want to do this kind of gay shit, just leave. Would Trump really stop them?

Still, bitching "lol loony liberals" isn't constructive. It's clear the whole justice system of California needs restructuring so that it can treat risks like this more severely, but decrease penalties in other areas and try to strike a better balance between what is and is not actually considered harmful. I think figuring out something better to do with its prisoners than "jail forever" would be a good start. A lot of people on this forum balk at the idea of any criminal rehabilitation, but not every felony is equal to child molestation. My own state has this problem.

 

[Absolutego]

This is a really good point, actually. For the flip side (and my own side of the aisle) one can look at Mississippi, a beautiful state which I love dearly but which highlights the dangers of one-party rule on the other side.

That said, California really at this point may as well be its own country. I'm not even mad at them. But if you want to do this kind of gay shit, just leave. Would Trump really stop them?

Still, bitching "lol loony liberals" isn't constructive. It's clear the whole justice system of California needs restructuring so that it can treat risks like this more severely, but decrease penalties in other areas and try to strike a better balance between what is and is not actually considered harmful. I think figuring out something better to do with its prisoners than "jail forever" would be a good start. A lot of people on this forum balk at the idea of any criminal rehabilitation, but not every felony is equal to child molestation. My own state has this problem.

Yes, Trump would stop them because California has the lion's share of useful harbors on the Pacific coast. Oregon is just a cliff sliding into the ocean for the most part and all of the ports in Washington that are worthwhile in any way require you to navigate through the entirety of the Puget Sound before you can access anything. San Diego and Long Beach are so critical to the American trade and military infrastructure that the US government would invade the moment their grandpa-in-chief Jerry Brown even made the slightest noise about seriously leaving the Union.

I don't know, a lot of California looks from the inside like a house of cards waiting for the breaking point. Their education system is a complete joke (you want to see the end game of letting teacher's unions run amok? Look at California, which is ranked around 40th in student performance but 20th in the amount they spend on education per student), the new universal healthcare system Sacramento is making a priority is guaranteed to drive the state further into debt, and, rather disturbingly, the Calexit petition is actually gaining ground last I checked. There have been doomsday predictions for the area forever but I'm genuinely concerned what another economic crash or earthquake would do to the state.

 

[Mariposa Electrique]

That's just gross. So, what happens when an HIV positive person rapes a minor? Are they only on the hook for the rape?

 

[AN/ALR56]

Yes, Trump would stop them because California has the lion's share of useful harbors on the Pacific coast. Oregon is just a cliff sliding into the ocean for the most part and all of the ports in Washington that are worthwhile in any way require you to navigate through the entirety of the Puget Sound before you can access anything. San Diego and Long Beach are so critical to the American trade and military infrastructure that the US government would invade the moment their grandpa-in-chief Jerry Brown even made the slightest noise about seriously leaving the Union.

I don't know, a lot of California looks from the inside like a house of cards waiting for the breaking point. Their education system is a complete joke (you want to see the end game of letting teacher's unions run amok? Look at California, which is ranked around 40th in student performance but 20th in the amount they spend on education per student), the new universal healthcare system Sacramento is making a priority is guaranteed to drive the state further into debt, and, rather disturbingly, the Calexit petition is actually gaining ground last I checked. There have been doomsday predictions for the area forever but I'm genuinely concerned what another economic crash or earthquake would do to the state.

allow it to leave but make a clause stating they lease in perpetuity all the useful harbours
problem solved

 

[AnOminous]

Yes, Trump would stop them because California has the lion's share of useful harbors on the Pacific coast.

Why do so many people not understand that the most important thing about the location of cities through all of human civilization is just access to water?

 

[Absolutego]

Why do so many people not understand that the most important thing about the location of cities through all of human civilization is just access to water?

Exactly! I mean it's driven literally all of Russia's foreign policy since...the 18th century? Even that may be too recent.

 

[ADN_VIII]

That's just gross. So, what happens when an HIV positive person rapes a minor? Are they only on the hook for the rape?

If I understand correctly, and it's possible I don't, the misdemeanor gets bumped to felony in that scenario. But the simplest fact of the matter is that neither charge is likely to stick with the way the justice system works in this state. I mean, that Turner guy got six months and only served three for sexual assault. I've never heard of these charges sticking since its almost impossible to prove someone knows something.

 

[TowinKarz]

1. Find something that "disproportionately" affects minorities
2. Find out if there are laws against it.
3. Decriminalize said laws in the name of tolerance
4. Go home to your gated community where none of the consequences will ever reach you and tell everyone in the HOA what a great blow you struck for the world today.

Seriously, how the FUCK does this help ANYONE other than the virtue signalers?!

And it's not even really "California" that's the problem, just the hard blue areas in the cities that force everyone else to be "progressive" or GTFO. If they do somehow succeede in their petty little succession, I can't wait until the red areas of their new country say "HEy, great idea! Leaving behind a government that forces you to live in a way you'd rather not, see ya!"