California bans force. Mostly?

California is addressing the possibility of forced RFID implantation:

California’s senate passed a bill last week that would protect people from having RFID tags forcibly implanted beneath their skin. All that’s left is for Governor Schwarzenegger to sign it, and then the state will become the third to pass such legislation (after Wisconsin and North Dakota).

The motivations for the bill were to prevent people from being forcibly tracked and to protect them from identity theft should someone electronically sniff data stored on the tag.

Kip already debunked the flaw in this plan:

It’s quite simple really: Only the government (or an armed thug) can “force” anyone to do anything. No employer can ever “force” an employee to accept any rule, policy or prerequisite.

I have nothing to add to that, but in light of what I wrote last week, there is another component. First, a word from the bill’s sponsor, Senator Joe Simitian:

“At the very least, we should be able to agree that the forced implanting of under-the-skin technology into human beings is just plain wrong,” he says.

I’ve read through the bill (pdf), and it clearly addresses what to do in the event a minor (or dependent adult) suffers a forced RFID chip implantation, but I can only find this for the possibility that it’s the parent forcing the child rather than an outside party:

This section shall not in any way modify existing statutory or case law regarding the rights of parents or guardians, the rights of children or minors, or the rights of dependent adults.

I’m not an attorney, so it’s possible, probable even, that I’m missing something in my analysis. But I doubt it. I have a strong suspicion that no one in the California legislature is much interested in the ethical issues posed by parents implanting an RFID chip into their children. Obviously it’s better to address a nearly impossible scenario with a new law, while leaving the entirely plausible scenario unprotected in order to guarantee parental “rights”.