Who said posses were a thing of the past?
The mainstream media is constantly reporting on the negative aspects of the Internet– that it is filled with pedophiles after you children, that it is lurking with identity theives after your social security number, and that it will fry your hard drive with a million Trojan horses. But luckily the Internet is also the perfect way to reach out and find people who share your passions and interests. When you plug into your clan of people, it’s amazing the lengths they’ll go to to help you.
It didn’t help that he was the dumbest car thief in Canada, but the arrest of Jamie Jacobsen is proof that most folks out there are law abiding people who want a decent world for all of us to live in. Within 72 hours, a rare tricked out sports car was stolen, spotted, and recovered, and the thief arrested, all thanks to bloggers and forum friends. The police can only do so much. They’re shackled by procedure and don’t have a high degree of expertise for spotting a specific kind of car, or even enough time to do it. A detective is just one person, and they can only do so much. So when the car’s owner, Shaun Ironside, turned to the Canadian sports car community, he suddenly found a posse of friends at his side in the hunt. Within a day of posting a plea for help, a friendly Netizen snapped a photo of the thief in the car. A day after that, his Facebook profile and Google maps to his house were plastered all over the Internet.
Like the case of evil mom Lori Drew who tortured Megan Meier to death using MySpace, this proves that the Internet is a powerful tool to expose the bad guys in our society and help bring them to justice. Luckily this kind of overwhelming reaction generally only occurs when there’s a compelling case– like death or grand theft auto. There are detractors who complain that this is a violation of privacy or even vigilante justice. My response is that it may be vigilante, but it’s justice.
So I say saddle up. Let’s round up some outlaws. Our camera phones and blogs can be the virtual eyes and ears that protect our real lives.
on Apr 5th, 2008 at 1:31 am
Well a man, come on
Six o’clock news
Says somebody been shot
Somebody’s been abused
Somebody blew up a building
Somebody stole their car
Somebody got away
Somebody didn’t get too far, yeah
They didn’t get too far
Grandpappy told my pappy
Back in my day, son
A man had to answer
For the wicked thing he done
Take all the rope in Texas
Find a tall oak tree
Round up all of them bad boys
And hang ‘em high in the street
For all the people to see
And justice is the one thing
You should always find
You gotta saddle up your boys
You gotta draw a hard line
When the gun smoke settles
We’ll sing a victory tune
And we’ll all meet back
At the local saloon
We’ll raises up our glasses
Against evil forces
Singing, “Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses!”