If you only follow the law you have nothing to worry about

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Conservatives say "If you only follow the law you have nothing to worry about."

They're right!

http://nation.wikia.com/wiki/Library_of ... ngress.jpg

lol, that is hilarious...and entirely ridiculous since its so unbearably false.

Sounds like something a power-hungry emperor would say to his people.

More like... if you follow the law, the law makers and law-enforcers have nothing to worry about.

I dont understand the joke

Its a picture of the library of congress and something saying you have to apply for a pass to get in?

I don't think most of the people saying that on this board are particularly conservative.

I also don't get the joke. The link is to a wikia page for a fictional nation. It doesn't seem to have any connection to the statement "if you only follow the law you have nothing to worry about".

I realize that it's possible to break the law without even realizing it, such as teens who have found themselves arrested for child pornography after sexting.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/tee ... story.html

Is it that and similar cases you are talking about? A fair point, but what is the link all about?

Many books = much complexity. How can one follow the law when it's so complex?

I know; it's hard for lawyers to follow the law! What chance does a common person have

Oooh, ooh, let me guess! I guess... is it a reference to the number of laws one must follow to actually follow the law?

Ya Got it! It's a form of sarcasm. How is it possible to always follow the law when the law is so complex and there are so many of them. The Library of Congress is the tip of the iceberg. We have to worry about state laws and local laws as well and county laws too.

There is a huge amount of complexity but much of this complexity is aimed at businesses, not individuals. Untangling corporate tax law or copyright law really does take a law degree. But on an individual scale I think google will do. Want to know if it's legal in your state to shoot an intruder in your house? Google the law when you buy the gun. I posted upthread about teens getting arrested on child pornography charges for sexting photos of each other, but teens don't have the common sense to research iffy things. (I think the law should be modified to be more like statotory rape laws which accept that same-age teens have sex with each other and so put in an allowed age difference window). For the ordinary person, ordinary research will suffice.

If you never drive, you don't need to learn traffic laws.
If you never own a gun, you don't need to learn gun laws.
If you don't have kids, you don't need to learn child safety laws (I researched when mine was born)
If you don't own a business you don't need to learn corporate tax law (and if you do own one, it's easier to just hire an accountant who knows enough to do your ntaxes)

etc
etc
there are zillions of laws in the U.S. but you only need to know the ones relevent to your life

a. Criminal law is just one area of law. The individual would also need to be aware of contract law, intellectual property (patent) law, tax law, real estate law, employment law, litigation law (if litigating or litigated) and most importantly constitutional law .... and many other areas of law that may affect the individual.

b. Also, law is not so simple as knowing some statute(s), you have know the case law regarding the statute(s) , how to file /what paperwork file, what to say / who to send the information, and how to present yourself to people in the legal system. Any tiny mistake may cost you much time, money, and may disadvantage your arguments.

For example, my brother who is not lawyer was sued for a purchase he made on a military base, he did not know that the federal court has jurisdiction on military bases, and since he did not raise this objection in the state court, the state court made a decision - which was against him.

All of your advice assumes that what I'm reading is accurate, is from a reputable source and I'm interpreting and understanding it properly. In addition, one can't research unknown, unknowns or out of context problems. It also assumes that it is possible for me to delineate what is a reputable source from what is not reputable.

This is just an off the wall example of an unknown, unknown.

Asking for a salary for a potential job. For example, I said I would take x amount of dollars which take told me to put in a cover letter. My wife said that I didn't do it right and should have stated a salary range (x-y) x being lowest, y being highest. She said that I should've looked up the correct way. I told her "you're assuming that I knew and understood that there was a correct way, so how could I look up a correct way if I didn't conceive that a correct way existed?" We ended up in a major argument. I could not look up the correct way because I didn't conceive there was a correct way to ask for a salary.

Finally, it assumes that there is an entity called common sense and based upon empirical evidence out there "common sense is not so common" so I have to question its' validity and reliability.

So what conservatives and others demand is difficult and highly improbable to do and I ask does a law abiding citizen truthfully exist. I say no?

LoveNotHate has excellent points as well.