ASBOs for America

July 21, 4:18 PMDallas Libertarian ExaminerGarry Reed

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These black-hooded London teens were protesting the lack of financial
help for youth clubs. Calling them disruptive "Hoodies," The UK
frequently responds by issuing ASBOs, causing many teens to purposely
misbehave because getting an ASBO is seen as a badge of honour.
Effective, eh? (AP Photo)

With the Republic of Ponzi (formerly America) so hell bent on following the Brits down the steeply spiraling dirt path into the abyss of National Health Scam (Obama's disingenuously captioned “public insurance plan” is not a destination but just another step toward total government takeover) it might be beneficial to consider what other appallingly ignorant ideas can be adopted for use in the U.S.A. as well. 

The Brits have invented what they call the ASBO. Pronounced "æzbo" according to Wikipedia, the Anti-Social Behaviour Order is a civil citation issued in the UK and Ireland to people exhibiting anti-social behaviour (their spelling).

 ASBOs "must be tailor-made for the individual" and can be issued for immensely disagreeable deportment of the type that would "cause harassment, alarm or distress" such as noisiness, loitering, littering, fare dodging and spitting. 

Anti-Social Behaviour as defined by an ASBO: "conduct which caused or was likely to cause harm, harassment, alarm or distress, to one or more persons not of the same household as him or herself and where an ASBO is seen as necessary to protect relevant persons from further anti-social acts by the Defendant"

They can also be issued, as a Welsh granny discovered, for growing tomato plants in the wrong place in her public housing unit. 

Ms Linda Ware, according to Ananova, was handed a bright green slip of paper that read, "You have been visited concerning your anti-social behaviour." 

True to bureaucracies everywhere, the bureauboobery that oversees her council flat "operates a green, amber and red warning system which ultimately leads to an anti-social behaviour order." 

Breach of an ASBO is a criminal offence that can result in fines, prohibitions, and up to five years in prison. 

Just think how handy this system would be for training those pesky independent-minded rowdies in America how to become more respectful of their ruling classes. The ASBO could be renamed the American System of Bureaucratic Officiousness and could be issued like Homeland Security Threat Advisories in green, blue, yellow, orange and red levels. 

It might work like this. 

ASBO Green Warning: Dear Mr. Wormly Meeks. It has been reported to us that your lawn is brown. It appears that you have not been watering your lawn as your civic duty requires. Please begin watering immediately. 

ASBO Blue Warning: Mr. Meeks. It has come to our attention that you are watering your lawn on the wrong days. You are permitted to water your lawn only on the first, third, and sixth days following your regularly scheduled trash pickup day preceding your weekly recycling collection day immediately following the most recent reading of your water meter. Please comply with these simple community standards. 

ASBO Yellow Warning: Mr. Meeks. You are watering during the wrong time of day. You may water your lawn only between the hours of 6pm and 7pm on the first day as instructed in the ASBO Blue Warning, between 6:30pm and 7:15pm on the next day specified in the same ASBO, and between 6:45am and 7:10am on the last day per the same ASBO. Your failure to fulfill your social obligations to your neighborhood is creating a condition of harassment, alarm or distress amongst your fellow citizens. 

ASBO Orange Warning: Meeks. You are over-watering your lawn, under-watering your shrubs and bushes, flooding your lawn, completely missing your cannas, and the Tuscarora Crepe Myrtle near your driveway is dying which is allowing the blooms to wither and fall and blow into your neighbor's Azalea beds. This is extreme anti-social behaviour and must be corrected immediately. 

ASBO Red Warning: Attention Alleged Hostile and Disruptive Perpetrator Meeks. The ASBO Tribunal has issued a warrant for your appearance for legal proceedings and adjudication in re your egregious insensitive and unkind acts of improper watering. If you do not appear voluntarily an ASBO SWAT team will be dispatched to your home to take you bodily into custody. If you resist, your crepe myrtle branches may be broken and your cannas may be trampled. That would be unfortunate but they are the police and they can get away with it. You have been legally advised.

The ASBO also solves the problem of what to do with the nearly 50% or so of the population that can't be put on councils and committees and commissions and boards and bureaus and offices and agencies but who still live on the public dole. They need something to do. So make them snoops and sneaks and snitches and stooges to spy on everyone else so an ASBO can be issued.

In the end the ASBO is a system of citizen-on-citizen grudge-baiting, fully enforced by the legal system, which keeps people so focused on interpersonal pettiness that they'll never notice what the ruling classes are doing to them. Sort of the libertarian's ultimate nightmare.

Wonder what else the Brits can teach us.

Poster of "Dallas Swat" reality TV show that ran on A&E network, 2006 - 2008. Were they delivering an ASBO Red Warning for improper lawn watering? Almost as pathetic, the Dallas Swat actually invaded a poker game at the VFW hall in the middle of a fund-raiser in 2007. Now that's antisocial behavior!

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