We’d originally planned to use pipe for the uprights on the north side of the deck, but a few days of research led us to the inescapable conclusion that it simply wasn’t feasible; only one place with two hours’ drive had it at all, and the cost was dramatically more than the alternative: framing the north side wall structure completely now, and using it to support the roof header on that side. While steel was definitely the way to go for the roof, y’all may remember that it took six weeks to find it all, and then two months more for everything to finally arrive. So as you can imagine, I wasn’t willing to go through anything resembling that again. For a couple of hundred bucks I got what we needed, and on the day my previous report posted, we were doing this. I went ahead and finished the porch because it would’ve been silly not to, and what you can’t see is that in addition to the external steel braces, each of those tall posts has a steel rod at its core, pounded into holes drilled in the ends of the posts. The diagonal brace is temporary; it’s just there to steady the structure until the inner wall is framed and the posts cross-braced to that structure. By the time you read this, that will be done; look for pictures next week! 
Archive for March, 2022
Annex 59
Posted in Diary, tagged Sunset on March 11, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Blake’s 6
Posted in Miscellaneous, tagged domestic violence, ethics, imaginative fiction, psychology, Reviews on March 10, 2022| 3 Comments »
This is the conclusion of my series on the classic BBC sci-fi series Blake’s 7, which ran from 1978-81. The first part appeared the last week of January, and four other installments on the series’ characters and writing followed in successive weeks.
Blake’s 7 was controversial from the very first episode, which featured an unusually-realistic depiction of how totalitarian states deal with dissent; self-appointed Moral Climate Monitor Mary Whitehouse practically had a cow over it. And the creators didn’t stop there; for four seasons the show’s creators took risks and violated expectations in a way few broadcast TV shows ever dared. Major characters were depicted in harsh daylight or even killed off, and that included the titular character at the end of season 2; the last episode of season 3, originally planned to be the last, left the remaining crew stranded on a remote planet when their beloved ship, the Liberator, was destroyed. And when a BBC executive decided to order one more season, the creators seem to have viewed the surprise renewal as permission to color even further outside of the lines, depicting the heroes’ flaws much more clearly and ending the final episode with a bloodbath. But two episodes earlier than that, “Orbit” had already thrown caution to the winds to produce one of the most realistic and adult episodes of series television ever aired by broadcast. It was written by Robert Holmes, who is my all-time favorite Doctor Who writer thanks to his gift for characterization. The basic plot was borrowed from “The Cold Equations“, one of the greatest sci-fi short stories of all time; Holmes, however, does not merely adapt the already-powerful tale, but instead uses it as a vehicle for portraying not one but two abusive relationships.
The story concerns a renegade scientist named Egrorian, who proposes a deal in which he will give his new super-weapon to Avon and Company in exchange for their supercomputer Orac. The eccentric, narcissistic, treacherous Egrorian has a very elderly assistant named Pinder; the way Egrorian psychologically dominates and physically abuses him is already uncomfortable before we discover the truth: Pinder is only 28, and was prematurely aged due to radiation in an experiment where he was used as a gunea pig. He was a child prodigy who has been in hiding with Egrorian for ten years, and the homoerotic overtones of their interaction, combined with the abuse and Pinder’s being a teenager at the beginning of their relationship, paint a very dark and nasty picture indeed; I suspect the only way it got past the censors was simply that they were too puritanical to grasp what was going on. But even that pales in comparison with what happens later: Egrorian has sabotaged the shuttle on which Avon and Vila will return to their ship by hiding a microscopic quantity of super-dense neutronium on board, making the ship too heavy to achieve orbit with the available fuel. And when they run out of other things to dump, Avon goes looking for Vila,
whose body mass is just over the critical amount they must shed. Now, Avon does figure out the problem and jettisons the neutronium instead; however, that does not change the fact that until he does, he is stalking around the ship with a gun, fully intending to murder his crewmate, who only escapes a grisly fate by hiding. It would be difficult to count the number of unofficial rules of 20th-century broadcast TV drama this story broke; even in a series which had regularly broken rules for four seasons, it was nothing short of shocking.
Those under 40, whose televisual landcape has always included antiheroes, flawed or even criminal protagonists, and morally and factually ambiguous situations, can scarcely grasp how absolutely new, amazing, and even scandalous Blake’s 7 was, and its last season, in which the full humanity of the characters (with all that entails) was laid bare, was like nothing ever before seen on television. And in its willingness to blow up audience expectations and transgress sharply-drawn boundaries of its time, like nothing since either.
In the News (#1218)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged abortion, activism, California, censorship, cops, crypto-moralism, domestic violence, fantasy, Georgia, hysteria, internet, law, lawyers, left-right myth, New Hampshire, porn, rape, scams, Sisters In Arms, surveillance, Texas, The Cop Myth, The Widening Gyre, Their Own Petard, Thou Shalt Not, Ukraine, violence vs. sex workers, Working From Home, You Were Warned on March 9, 2022| Leave a Comment »
America[ns]…associate sin or indulgence with desserts. – Oona Hanson
I’m repurposing this disused tag to highlight sex worker activism of this type:
Sex workers around the world, and many of the platforms they use, have spent the last week rallying support for their colleagues stranded on the ground in Ukraine…[sex workers] have developed a strong track record in recent years of mobilising for victims of disasters and ensuring they see the money that has been raised for them…even the platforms Ukrainian sex workers depend on to make a living have made serious efforts to make their support known. OnlyFans made a donation of 500 Ethereum, equivalent to about $US1.5 million, to UkraineDAO on Saturday, one of a legion of crypto organisations raising millions of dollars…for Ukraine…payment app…Paxum…is currently working…to connect workers with transport at Ukraine’s border with Romania, where they would then be offered free accommodation…On Twitter, sex workers can regularly be seen urging their clients and fans to donate to individual causes that are as narrowly targeted as a life-saving surgery, or as broad as a global campaign to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for victims of bushfires, as was seen in Australia in 2020…
Long-time readers may recall that I called this a hoax as soon as the story broke:
Sherri Papini, the California [woman] who disappeared for weeks in 2016 and claimed she’d been kidnapped at gunpoint, made up the story and had been staying with an ex-boyfriend…Papini…was arrested for…lying to investigators in 2020 when presented with evidence the kidnapping was faked and of defrauding California out of more than $30,000 in victim assistance money…Papini…[re]appear[ed]…on…Interstate 5 in rural Yolo County, with a chain around her waist and a “brand” on her shoulder she [pretended] was inflicted by her captors…[but] were [in reality] self-inflicted [with a wood-burning tool. Papini, who had a history of posting on white nationalist sites, pretended]…two [armed] Hispanic women…kept her captive…[but] in 2020, DNA found on Papini’s clothes…led investigators to her ex-boyfriend…[who] told [them] that Papini asked him for help and needed to get away, that he agreed to drive to pick her up in Redding, and that she stayed at his home in Costa Mesa in the Los Angeles area the whole time…eventually she asked to be driven back to Northern California…
As long as sex work is marginalized, sex workers will be targets for creeps:
A 20-year-old man…hid…in the attic of a [New Hampshire] woman he [followed] online through…OnlyFans…Mauricio Damian-Guerrero…[ha]s [been] charged with…burglary…for…br[eaking] into [her] home multiple times and t[aking] video of the woman’s private areas while she slept…he admitted [to cops that] he [also planned] to tape [a tracking device] to…he[r]…car…he…appeared to have been in the attic for a period of time, as [the woman] found food, a cup with urine in it, and a pair of headphones [in her attic. He tricked her into giving him]…her address b[y claiming] he wanted to buy her a TV and fireplace…he [also]…admitted…that before breaking into the [house], which is…he[r mother’s] home, he had broken into her Dover, New Hampshire, apartment multiple times…
A [cabal] of [ambulance-chasers] currently appealing a dismissed lawsuit against Reddit…[have] renew[ed] their claim that Section 230 protections should not shield the social media platform…from allegations of “profiting off of child pornography” over user-generated content…through an…increasingly…[popular but still legally] novel doctrine of “constructive knowledge,” as opposed to actual knowledge…
Marissa Sanchez [and the other plaintiffs]…in an ongoing lawsuit…against the [Houston, Texas] Constables’ Office…and [several of its boss cops]…They [agreed to participate in an elaborate scam]…in which [cops fantasy role-played as]…partygoers…[and] prostitutes…[in an attempt to ruin the lives of] sex workers [and their partners and friends]…Instead of capturing [imaginary “]traffickers[“]…they were subjected to [the same] sexual harassment…molestation…and sexual ridicule…that [they were happy to inflict on other women who never did them any harm]…
Crypto-moralism rots people’s brains:
Girl Scouts, and the women who lead their troops and volunteer with them during cookie season, say that the…tradition of face-to-face sales is increasingly accompanied by…angry tirades from adults who want to lecture them about [those adult’s beliefs about] healthy eating…or rant about the group’s rumored (and false) link to Planned Parenthood…”I feel like in the last 10 years, and maybe especially since the pandemic, that people are getting even more aggressive”…[said] Oona Hanson, a Scouting parent in Los Angeles…she’s seen [oafs] make comments about weight gain, tell girls they can’t trust themselves to have Thin Mints in the house, or even yell at girls for “poisoning” people…Other [cretins]…have…harassed [girls] for…the use of palm oil in the cookies. Widely used in commercial baked goods, the oil [has become] controversial [among people who think of themselves as environmentalists] because its production can lead to deforestation and disrupt the habitat of endangered species…a…[rumor started in] 2004…[by] the leader of an anti-abortion group in Waco, Texas…has stuck…among…anti-abortion [fanatics, who act out by] harassing [girls too young to even know]…what an abortion is…
41% of cops admit to beating their wives; some don’t stop with mere beating:
[Typical and representative Georgia cop] Michael Perrault was found guilty on all counts…in…the Feb. 2020 [murder] of [his wife] Amanda Perrault…he…[was] sentenced to life in prison without parole…Perrault was initially arrested on Jan. 28, 2020 [for] battery on his wife…[and] was released on…bond…Days later…Michael claimed she killed herself in front of him…[but] there…[was] a long history of domestic abuse…[and Sheriff Howard] Sills testified it was obvious [to him] from the jump that Perrault had killed his wife and tried to stage it based on details at the scene. A neighbor who gave Amanda refuge in their home also testified saying she told them, “If anything happened, she didn’t kill herself”…
Diary #610
Posted in Diary, Music, tagged imaginative fiction, Presents on March 8, 2022| Leave a Comment »
One of the things that makes going into Seattle worthwhile is knowing that I might have a gift or gifts waiting for me. My landlord and I have a very good relationship; he shows his appreciation for my being an exemplary tenant by helping me out in little ways, such as keeping an eye out for packages that arrive while I’m gone. He then texts me to let me know something has arrived and asking what would be a good time to put it inside my apartment. Of course I don’t usually know what has come in, so there’s a nice surprise on my coffee table when I arrive. This time, I’m sending a big “Thank you!” to a reader who has enjoyed my Doctor Who and Blake’s 7 reviews who was delighted to discover I’m also a horror fan, and therefore sent me this double CD from my Amazon wishlist (there are still several other horror-movie-related items there, and a set of DVDs of a delightful animated series I loved as a child, but only recently discovered was available). Plus some more music and other goodies, so there are lots of choices if you’d like to get me something nice, and most of them are quite reasonable.
Leaving the 20th Century
Posted in Current Events, History, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged agency denial, Australia, Belgium, consensual crime, drugs, Europe, hysteria, Leaving the 20th Century, New Zealand, Prohibition (alcohol), prohibitionist myths, propaganda, Rooted in Racism, Safe Position, social purity, Swedish model on March 7, 2022| 2 Comments »
One of the titles by which the 20th Century will no doubt be known to future historians is “the Prohibition Era”. The concept of Prohibition first started to take root in the diseased brains of control freaks in the late 19th century; it was an outgrowth of the broader “Progressive” philosophy which held that ordinary people cannot be trusted with our own lives, and must therefore be ruled by “experts” who decide for everyone how the human race should be “improved”, and enforce their diktats with violent thug armies whose actions cannot easily be reconciled with the concept of civil rights. The first prohibitionist laws date to the late 19th century, but it was in the 20th that the concept not only reached full flower, but also successfully penetrated the minds of the general public so thoroughly that most took it for granted that for governments to tell people what they could consume, what they could own, and even what thoughts they could have while agreeing to consensual sex, was not only normal, but desirable. Full alcohol prohibition lasted barely over a decade, but it left in its wake a patchwork of local prohibitions which have only very gradually eroded (and in some ways worsened again toward the end of the century). And the failure of this one form of prohibition to thrive probably has a great deal to do with the fact that virtually no other country was willing to follow the American example; in most other cases, prohibitions which started in the US (such as drugs and prostitution) spread like a plague over the rest of the world.
But as the 20th century recedes into the past and the number of adults who can’t even remember it grows with every passing year, what Josephine Butler called “the fatuous belief that you can oblige human beings to be moral by force” has gradually become less popular. The once-global “War on Drugs” is beginning to wind down, and the full or partial criminalization of sex work is increasingly recognized as an abomination by those with healthy minds and respect for human rights. New South Wales decriminalized “prostitution” in 1995, followed by New Zealand in 2003; many other countries at least loosened their laws on the subject around that same time. Unfortunately, the prohibitionists recognized the trend before it could snowball, and began a propaganda campaign to convince the world that adult women are universally too weak-minded and spineless to be allowed to run our own sexual affairs, and that phenomena which had previously always been recognized as the pragmatic sexual decisions of individual women were in reality the result of the machinations of a vast cabal of “sex traffickers” abducting hundreds of thousands of “children” into literal slavery. But moral panics have a very limited lifespan, and this one is already long past its heyday of the early ’10s. It is now in the process of imploding in a rather spectacular fashion, and opposition to the continued criminalization of sex work has become a safe position even for US politicians. The temporarily-delayed process of decriminalization got rolling again over the past few years; Australia’s Northern Territory decriminalized near the end of 2019, and Victoria state followed suit just a few weeks ago. And now the first country outside of Oceania is set to join them:
The official green light has been given to Federal Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne’s proposal to reform Belgium’s sexual criminal law…[by] remov[ing] sex work from the penal code…The Federal Parliament still has to approve the proposal but that is not expected to be more than a formality. “This is a crucial leap forward. We are finally giving sex workers what they are entitled to: recognition and protection. Something they have been asking for decades,” Van Quickenborne said…Under current regulation, sex work is allowed, but third parties involved with sex workers are committing a crime. The law [cl]aims to target pimps but in practice impacts other people…from book-keepers and web designers to drivers, landlords and even banks…
The importance of this move is difficult to overstate; the “sex trafficking” myth has provided a convenient cloak for Europen racism, and European chauvinism made decriminalization easy to ignore as long as it was strictly a “Down Under” practice (the same chauvinism has given the toxic “Swedish model” undeserved credibility). But if Belgium follows through, Europe can no longer dismiss recognition of the sexual rights of adult women as a provincial abberation, and it’s entirely possible others may follow its example.
Links #609
Posted in Current Events, Links, Miscellaneous, Music, Obituary, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged animals, comics, cops, Florida, hotels, Illinois, politicians, prisons, psychology, Rome, teachers, United Kingdom, video on March 6, 2022| 1 Comment »
I didn’t know anything about building careers. Somehow I still have a career. – Sally Kellerman
If you don’t know the name, enjoy this video of the first percussion-driven #1 hit in Billboard history. The links above it were provided by Jason Kuznicki; Yasmin Nair; Clarissa; Mike Siegel & Jesse Walker; and Cop Crisis (x2), in that order.
- Politics is cruelty.
- Be like these birds.
- Sic transit gloria mundi.
- R.I.P. Sally Kellerman and Sandy Nelson.
- Cops keep demonstrating exactly what they are. Believe them.
- It’s amazing how often people die mysteriously when cops are nearby.
From the Archives
- They usually try to pretend “public health” rhetoric isn’t crypto-moralism.
- Threats of life-destroying consequences often cause people to surrender.
- Deranged prohibitionist vows to violate court order so he can kill people.
- “If it were as easy to get a sex slave as a pizza, all cops should be fired.”
- US anti-whore jihad is so out of control it’s attacking foreign websites.
- Wild fantasies about normal events seem most common in the South.
- Hey nurses, how does it feel to be infantilized by misogynistic racists?
- “The terms of carnal encounters should not be up to the government.”
- Sex workers need to bury all prohibitionists of every kind in lawsuits.
- Another entry in the “sex trafficking” scare story invasion of Twitter.
- While India allows deranged prohibitionists to dictate health policy…
- Too bad the settlement won’t come out of their personal assets.
- What cops & politicians really mean by “going after the pimps”.
- Just in case you think being a “legal” sex worker protects you.
- Too bad nobody listened when I wanted this banned in 2012.
- Anti-sex laws are deeply rooted in racism all over the world.
- A modern descendant of the walled districts of feudal times.
- Cops, whales, confusion, Southern Gothic and much more.
- Another toiletful of assorted sociopathy from Deliverfund.
- Please take a moment sometime to tell me how it went.
- Virginia excels in inventing truly awful anti-whore laws.
- No doubt the children were contaminated by sex rays!
- Your “leaders” know what’s best, so shut up and obey.
- Cops lie, constantly. They are almost never not lying.
- A catalogue of my essays for Sex Worker Rights Day.
- “Sponsored content” means an ad, not journalism.
- Cops, stupidity, Florida, kittens, and much more.
- Police departments hide pictures of rapist cops.
- All vice squads are breeding grounds for rape.
- Cops think everyone is as stupid as they are.
- Sex workers need your help more than ever.
- Endangered beetles and the Fermi Paradox.
- Words mean things, and so do spellings.
- Cops, crows, straights, and much more.
- How stupid do these pigs think we are?
- The premiere of The War on Whores.
- Another case of white van hysteria.
- They’re not even trying any more.
- A very interesting development.
- A visit to Orlando, Florida.
- Rapist cops of the week.
- Chick days!
In the News (#1217)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged Alabama, California, China, cops, Counterfeit Comfort, Creepy Coppers, Georgia, hotels, hysteria, internet, Louisiana, porn, propaganda, rape, sex offender registry, Signs, surveillance, teachers, The Cop Myth, To Molest and Rape, video, Watershed on March 5, 2022| Leave a Comment »
As shocking as this may be to the fine folks at Marriott: people have sex in hotels. – Jennifer Worrel
…After an alleged sexting incident in 2012 snowballed into a felony conviction in his southern state, [Jason] was forced to register as a sex offender and barred from using a computer or smartphone. Over time, the conditions of his probation were reduced to a patchwork of technology-related restrictions: He was allowed to use email, but…not…text[ing]. He could use the internet, but…not…social media account, and all of his time online was [surveill]ed by a probation officer…Jason has become a leader in nonprofit advocacy around criminal legal system reform…Last summer he petitioned the court to have his probation end early…But right now Jason is sitting in prison and will be there until July 2023…[because the probation officer and a prosecutor decided] watching a community prayer livestream…was…accessing social media…
When a timid hack like Oliver feels safe supporting sex worker rights, we’re definitely past the watershed:
Persecution of sex workers invariably affects other women as well:
Several years ago…I booked an overnight at a…convenient…mid-priced hotel…I informed the young woman working at the desk that I had a reservation….[but] she [kept] ask[ing]…annoying…question[s]…It felt like I was being assessed and scrutinized…In hindsight, I wish I would have just left right then and found another hotel. I had already presented my driver’s license…I had loyalty status showing numerous prior stays at related properties which presumably she could confirm in her system; I had a drivers license with my photo confirming who I was. The reservation was made via a corporate travel department. Why was I getting the third-degree? “Ma’am, we need to make sure women staying in our hotel are doing so for legitimate reasons”…As it turned out, Marriott International had launched an initiative to combat…sex trafficking…By 2019, the company proudly announced an achievement milestone of [indoctrinating] 500,000 hotel workers [in propaganda about]…signs of human trafficking…I suggest that Marriott could make more of a contribution to their mission of “combatting modern day slavery” and “caring about human rights” if they re-assessed their business presence in China or their treatment of Uyghurs instead of scrutinizing adult American women checking into rural hotels…
The writer is a supporter of sex workers, and the article is well worth reading in its entirety.
Even rapist cops sometimes get their comeuppance when the victim is a kid:
Former St. Tammany Parish Sheriff Jack Strain was sentenced to…four life sentences without parole [for] aggravated rape…and…aggravated incest…of…five victims, some of them relatives, [who] testified at trial…of looking up to Strain as an older brother or father figure and having their trust betrayed when he molested or raped them in tents, campers, and in his bedroom. The sexual abuse continued into adulthood in many cases…
The article is pretty vague, but it seems to belong in this tag:
A [typical and representative Georgia cop] is facing a wave of new charges after having already separately been indicted by a federal Grand Jury…for child pornography…Peter Bilardello is facing five charges for the sexual exploitation of children…in [addition to the previous charges]…for the…possession and distribution of child pornography…Bilardello…worked in a sex-offender [gang, and]…was receiving training in sex crimes investigations while…committing online sex crimes against children…
Sleeping with a cop is one of the most dangerous things a woman can do:
…On Aug. 3, 2018, [typical and representative California cop Brad] Wheat took his CHP-issued service weapon and hollow-point ammunition to [murder] (by his own later admission) Philip “Trae” Debeaubien, the boyfriend of Wheat’s estranged wife, Mary…Wheat’s colleagues convinced him to surrender his…weapons and they reported it to superiors. Instead of treating this matter with the seriousness it deserved, or showing concern for the dangers that Debeaubien and Mary Wheat faced, CHP…essentially did nothing…it didn’t even inform the…planned [victims]…sent [Wheat] on vacation for two weeks, let him return to work, and returned his firearm and ammunition…Two weeks later, Wheat…shot Debeaubien in the shoulder…shot to death his ex-wife, and then killed himself. Now CHP says it has no responsibility for this tragic event and that its decisions did not endanger the plaintiff’s life…
Notice how often rapist cops’ victims are underage?
An Alabama A&M spokesperson…[thought the most important detail about] the…arrest…for sexual abuse and enticing a child o[f campus copper] Ismael Roldan…was [that he wasn’t wearing his magical clown costume while committing the assault]…
Blake’s 5
Posted in Tyranny, tagged imaginative fiction, Reviews, United Kingdom on March 4, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Continuing my thoughts on the classic BBC sci-fi series Blake’s 7, which ran from 1978-81. The first part appeared the last week of January, and three installments on the series’ characters followed in successive weeks.
It’s always interesting to me to think about a creator’s influences; what sci-fi or fantasy books, shows and movies did they find interesting, and how did that affect their own creations? After the first season of Blake’s 7, the influence of its creator, Terry Nation, seemed to wane while that of script editor Chris Boucher waxed. Boucher was clearly influenced by Dune, not so much for its specific desert-world setting (though that definitely appears in other Boucher stories such as his Doctor Who serial “The Robots of Death”) as for its portrayal of future colonial societies which have grown away from Earth as they developed, some to the point of even forgetting about their origins (as Leela’s people did in Boucher’s Doctor Who serial “The Face of Evil”). In the “Blake” universe, there hasn’t quite been enough time for that; by the stated times in several episodes (especially the Robert Holmes-penned “Killer”), the main action seems to take place in the 29th century. However, in other episodes we meet societies such as that from which crew member Cally came, which seem to have gone though or fallen into a dark age, but were at a much higher level of technology in the past; Boucher’s own “City at the Edge of the World” (a title which I’m sure deeply annoyed Harlan Ellison) entirely revolved around this concept, and the idea infuses a number of other episodes to a greater or lesser degree. Even the third-season background of Servalan trying to rebuild the splintered Terran Federation after the invasion from Andromeda (which Nation apparently originally conceived of as a war with the Daleks) has its roots in both actual history (“Make The Empire Great Again!” is not a new idea) and the Dune universe, and the entire series’ theme of independent colonies forcibly subdued by a central government with pretenses to some kind of legitimacy in turn influenced later shows like Firefly. 
Boucher also definitely seems to have been influenced by Star Trek, and I don’t just mean in titles such as the aforementioned “City at the Edge of the World”; the plot of “Death-Watch”, for example, bears a striking resemblance to that of the Star Trek episode “A Taste of Armageddon”, though both the particulars and the resolution were very different. That’s not a complaint, BTB; one of the great things about sci-fi IMHO is the way that creators are directly influenced by each other, and openly admit it. For example, J, Michael Straczynski (whom I believe to have himself been influenced by Blake’s 7) borrowed his Babylon 5 psionic system from the writer Alfred Bester, and acknowledged that by naming a villain (played by an actor borrowed from Star Trek) after him.
Look for more about the series’ writing next week.
Sex Worker Rights Day 2022
Posted in History, Perception, Tyranny, tagged activism, holidays on March 3, 2022| Leave a Comment »
As I wrote last year on this day, the time has come for me to stop writing new essays for this and the other days in which I have in the past published polemics, “lest I grow irrelevant due to repetition. Besides, I’ve already written plenty“… Last year, I observed each of those occasions with links to all the previous examples, so that the interested reader can more easily explore them. Though some of them may contain details to events which are no longer current, I think you’ll still find most of them worth your while if you’ve never read them, or even if you have.
In the News (#1216)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged A Broker in Pillage, asset seizure, Canada, censorship, child "protective" services, Choke Point, cops, drugs, Enablers, Kentucky, law, Law of the Instrument, New Jersey, Peeping Toms, prisons, rape, teachers, Tennessee, Texas, The Last Shall Be First, To Molest and Rape, transgender on March 2, 2022| 12 Comments »
Without economic freedom you cannot have political freedom.
– John H. Cochrane
This article on how Lawrence v Texas and other cases relate to sex work isn’t flawless by any stretch; while the author makes some good points (especially regarding the common claim that Lawrence specifically excluded sex work), he also makes some shaky assertions and endorses some rather odious academic interpretations, which is perhaps unsurprising given his academic background. Worth reading, but only cum grano salis.
It’s rare to see these schemes called what they are: extortion:
Two years ago, prosecutors offered a [Kentucky] man a deal: give up $380,000 in cash through asset forfeiture, and criminal charges just filed against his family would be dropped. The case has now been resolved, with no criminal convictions for anyone involved — but police and prosecutors still kept the bulk of the cash. Patrick Card was arrested in 2019 [on]…marijuana…charge[s]…As prosecutors began negotiating [a plea bargain]…they [decided to also] indict…his mother, father and wife…[then] offered Card a plea deal that would reduce his charges and dismiss those against his family if he forfeited the cash…He turned down the deal…[and eventually] the commonwealth’s attorney agreed to dismiss the charges and return a portion of the s[tolen] money. “This supposed ‘offer’ was nothing more than an attempt by the Commonwealth and its agents to leverage the threat of indictment and prosecution for financial gain,” said attorney Daniel K. Robertson…the prosecutor agreed to…return Card’s [elderly]…parents’…bank account…but [kept]…$305,050 and three dozen guns [stolen from Card]…
They try to make these cases sound like the rapist was doing his victim a favor:
A Le[cherous]…deputy sheriff…[is the target of] a federal lawsuit…filed [by]…Sabrina Adkins…Ben Fields [coerced] her [into submitting to rape]…six times late at night last year in a district judge’s chambers where he [raped] her [both] oral[ly] and [vaginally]…Adkins…was coerced and compelled to comply with Fields’ [demand]s given his “position and power and because she could not afford to pay for the ankle monitor and did not want to return to…jail.” Fields…has not been charged criminally…
By invoking emergency powers and freezing the assets of…protesters, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau makes clear that civil liberties protections mean little when the government can deny you access to your money. That financial weapon has been used…in democracies against controversial (to some) businesses and organizations…”It’s a Western version of China’s social credit system that does not altogether prohibit political dissent but makes it so costly that it becomes impractical to the ordinary citizen,” David Sacks, former PayPal COO, writes…Sacks warned that we should expect a wave of firms denying services to those who don’t share their ideology…this isn’t the first example of governments conscripting private companies against targets that otherwise enjoy legal protection. Credit card companies have been pressured into denying services to suspected sex workers, and the U.S. federal government’s Operation Choke Point cut off gun dealers, payday lenders, and sex-oriented businesses from banking without the muss or fuss of proving any illegality…
The Last Shall Be First (#1132)
Texas has officially lost its collective mind:
Texas…Attorney General Ken Paxton has declared all medical treatment of transgender minors to be child abuse and says that his office could prosecute parents of transgender children, as well as “mandatory reporters” who fail to report medical treatment of transgender children to the state. In tandem…Gov[ernor and former AG] Greg Abbott has [ordered] state [“child protection” bureaucrats] to begin investigating any families that may be giving their trans kids puberty-blocking drugs or hormones, or allowing them to undergo surgical treatments…Paxton’s policy…is a rejection of transgender medical care entirely, as further evidenced by [his] concession that some types of genital surgery are “medically necessary” when they correct genetic disorders or cancer…Abbott…[also] threatens criminal penalties for anybody [with a functional moral compass] who [refuses] to [snitch on trans kids, their parents, and their doctors]…
Picture what you’d think of as “sex trafficking”, then compare it to this:
A school spirit club mom has been accused of having sex with nine pupils from a Tennessee school. Melissa Blair allegedly had sexual encounters between spring 2020 and late 2021 with teenagers as young as 14…Blair is charged with solicitation of a minor, 18 counts of statutory rape…[and] four counts of human trafficking by patronizing prostitution…District attorney Steve Crump said cops want to “make the fullest amount of [political coin] possible…[out of] this, it truly is about…a headline, it’s…about trying to [posture] as much as possible, [so] our [subjects think we’re actually ‘fighting crime’]”…
Hey, female cops; how’s that collaboration with the police state working out?
[Police] chief [Thomas J. Herbst], of…Manville [New Jersey was rewarded with a paid vacation]…after a [female] employee [reported] in a civil lawsuit that he repeatedly sexually assaulted her at work and raped her at her home in a “prolonged pattern and practice of abhorrent sexual harassment” that continued for 13 years…Herbst…masturbat[ed] in front of the woman at the [cop shop]…and [molested] her…on a regular basis while he was a lieutenant…He later raped [her] approximately 10 times in the police archive room and began to regularly rape her at her home and in a hotel parking lot during her lunch hour…she was a single mother when the…assaults began and she feared losing her job…if she reported the [attacks]…She came forward now partly because she is retirement age…
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Boring but necessary legal stuff