If the cops can handle the local crack and meth dealers, how come there are crack and meth dealers? A real-life Batman would simply dispense with the bureaucracy and procedures and standards of proof that cops have to abide by, and beat the living crap out of meth dealers until they stopped dealing meth.
There’s a reason it’s called, the **never ending **battle for truth, justice and the American way.
You seem to be promoting the idea that cops have the ability to stop EVERY crack and meth dealer, and if they can’t, they can’t handle it. If you have a meth dealer dealing from or has lab in your apartment building and call the cops, I would be surprised if they don’t turn up. That’s handling…but it’s unrealistic to believe that the police with a limited amount of resources will be able to handle ALL crack and meth dealers.
Even in the fantasy world of comics, Batman and his ilk can’t prevent ALL aliens, mutants, rouges and guys with all manner of fetishs from being created, freed or entering our universe. Hell even the Punisher or Hitman that did kill their enemies always found there was always another one to kill…they couldn’t kill the desire for things that criminals provide.
When they do try, they end up creating fascist societies and the overlords of the world.
Beating the crap out of meth dealers won’t stop the demand of people to get stoned, all you will do is make it even more profitable to take the risk to make meth. Hell make it legal, tax it, provide treatment for those who want to get off it and you’ll stop the dealers of meth; far better than bashing a low level dealer in the face ever would.
We’ve had the death penalty for centuries, yet we still have murder; wouldn’t the thought of having a rope aroung one’s neck, especially in the days of quick justice, been enough to stop murder? It didn’t; because people have the fundamental belief that they won’t get caught, just don’t care or are willing to take the risk.
In the Watchman series, The Rorschach figured out the crime, who the villian was and STILL lacked the power to bring him to justice; even the god-like Dr. Midnight was rendered helpless to do anything and in fact had to “protect” the villian…it was too big.
The question is what’s more dangerous to society, a meth lab or an Enron? A columbian drug lord or a company polluting the water table of communities all over the country? And what type of person will spend a fortune, to punch meth dealers in the face, while allowing guys that loot pension funds, get rich and leave it’s workers in the lurch?
Which does more good: a neighbourhood watch, that video tapes the cars of men who engage prostitutes and publish them in the local newspaper or report them to the police or a masked man that bashes in the faces of pimps?
Which one would reduce the demand for prostitutes in your neighbourhood?
holmes, you seem to think that I am arguing in favour of real-life Batmen. I am not. Originally, I opposed them because of the “perfect information” problem, and the points you raise are all valid arguments against them as well.
I was merely pointing out that if there is a crack and meth problem, then that problem isn’t being handled, and the appeal of a real-life Batman would be that he could dispense with all the hassle and start crushing skulls. I think we’ve all wanted to, at some point. I believe such a person would create more problems than he would solve, though.
Cheap bow tie, seedy jacket and horn rim glasses - it’s the Amazing Auditman! 
I think you guys raised soem good points like holmes who said that Batman should go after Enron like criminals. Priceguy also said that Batman may beat up on innocent people and that’s a good point too. But I think a Batman like person would improve soicety because he would focus on important stuff and beat up the people who deserved it. Inner cities would be a hell of a lot safer if a Batman were around and helping out. I mean inner cities can’t get any worse like Newark because the cops there mostly do nothing so I don’t think a Batman would hurt.
Personally, I have already been considering adding an element of this to my story.
The heroin will take randomly selected night a week, and patrol the nearest town at night . When she comes across an actual mugging taking place, she stops it. Her hope is that the fact that she will be successful, and no one knows what pattern she will be using. Hopefully, this will lead to less crime. True, this always allows for the possibility of an ambush later in the story, but she will have superpowers, later in the tale, and that will help her out of the situation.
Anarky, it that you?
The problem is **Scott Plaid ** most criminals know their victim. Sure random muggings do occur, but it far more likely your heroine will come upon criminals attacking other criminals and not some innocent bystander. Then find herself surrounded by enemies who now have a common goal…putting the beat down on HER.
Well, yes, but in her roof-top patrol, she can simply skip past the gang warfare, and chose to only interupt the crimes she thinks she has a chance of winning.
Not talking gang warfare. You have 3 guys chasing one down an alley, he’s cornered they use whatever weapon you believe your herione can handle. She drops in, starts fighting and finds a blade in her back, or trash can to the side of the head, because the “victim” was really a rat, who now has a way to save his own skin or a girlfriend who really “loves” her man and won’t let anyone hurt him.
Not trying to be a pain, but I think that the days of saving innocent victims from muggers simply isn’t as black and white or as easy as it was in the old days.
Ahhh, now I see what you meant. Well then, I will insert a scene just like this into my story, but seeing as how it is just fiction, she will still have a high success factor, and as I plan it, copy cats will emerge, but she will take down the more messed up ones.
Fair enough. There’s a scene similar to this in Batman: Year One, where Bruce in his “vet” disguise, tried to put the beat down on a pimp and finds himself surrounded and set upon, by the pimp’s ladies. I think he ended up with a stab wound in the thigh from one of the girls, which slows him down enough to allow the local cops to shoot and capture him.
Risky business, this crime fighting gig.
Somebody clear this up for me: does a bounty hunter’s authority to capture, subdue and use deception without writ or warrant extend to ANY criminal on the run or engaged in criminal activity, or just the ones the bail bondsmen identifies to catch?
This doesn’t much seem like Great Debate material. It seems like we’re all saying vigilantism is ethically fine as long as they don’t use lethal force. And nobody seems willing to tackle the question whether a vigilante whose precise identity is masked or otherwise kept private and unaccountable is ethically correct or not.
I say no, not in the real world.
I would say that theoretically, an unmasked vigilante is ethically clearer than a masked one, but not by much, and at far more of a danger to himself. Hardly makes any difference, either way. It is still immoral.
It still doesn’t quite answer whether “sanction from a bail bondsmen” is target-specific sanction (you’re authorized tio chase Billy Joe Jenkins and bring in) or any old person suspected in criminal activity (and if you run into any of the Jenkins gang, you can haul them in, too.).
I don’t see why it would follow that being a vigilante would necessarily make one more of a danger to himself. Surely that just depends on a person’s training, resources and skill?
Also, immoral != unethical.
A priest (or psychiatrist) who defies the sanctimony of the confession (or patient/client privilege) to turn over a confessed child molester to police could be acting within a perfectly correct moral framework while behaving completely unethically according to the dictates of their chosen profession.
Y’all seem to be assuming that masked vigilantes have to be the “judge, jury, executioner” type. When I was a kid, it seemed like Batman, Spider-Man, etc., were more like concerned citizens, working outside the law enforcement system, but apprehending people for the system, a sort of unofficial adjunct to law enforcement.
Someone like this, acting as private citizen, might rationally hide his identity. I don’t think this is a moral problem.
Wow. I really don’t think so. Any increase in the perception that your neighbors, not just the professional police, will fight crime has got to be a deterrent.
And I think sanction from a bail bondsman does require that there actually be a bounty to pursue, so no, bounty hunters are just like any private citizen when fighting crime in general.
I think a Batman would be more responsible than most cops because of the very reason he doesn’t kill.
Just take the London shootings as an example. The information thing is still a problem like Priceguy noted but I would rather have my ass kicked than killed.
The way you’ve put this, it wouldn’t make me feel safe at all.