The apparent path of the sun reached its southernmost point at 9:20 UTC today, the exact moment this posted; that makes this the shortest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere and the longest day of the year in the Southern. This is a time for remembrance, renewal and rebirth; I wish for all my readers the blessings of the season, and pray that all of you get all you hope for in the new year. Blessed Be!
Archive for December, 2024
Yule 2024
Posted in Holidays, tagged holidays, paganism on December 21, 2024| Leave a Comment »
In the News (#1499)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged Apple, Australia, Bluesky, censorship, cops, Cops and Robbers, drugs, fascism, Google, homosexuality, If Men Were Angels, internet, libraries, Monsters, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, politicians, porn, pregnancy, Property of the State, rape, surveillance, teachers, The Mob Rules, The Puritan Recrudescence, The Truth About..., Thought Control, Without Let or Hindrance, You Were Warned on December 20, 2024| 1 Comment »
The hospitals are at fault. The clinicians are at fault. Our policies are at fault. – Dr. Davida Schiff
The Truth About “The Truth About…”
At first, I believed her, until it became clear that Nifong was showboating:
Crystal Mangum, the former exotic dancer who accused three Duke men’s lacrosse players of rape in 2006…now [admit]s she lied…“I testified falsely against them by saying that they raped me when they didn’t…And I betrayed the trust of a lot of other people who believed in me,” Mangum said on the web show “Let’s Talk with Kat“…The interview took place at the North Carolina [prison]…where Mangum is serving time for [the] 2013 [knife] murder…[of] her boyfriend…she said she hopes the three men will forgive her…[Mike Nifong,] the district attorney [who turned] the case [into a circus,] was convicted of criminal contempt and disbarred…
Preacher can’t or won’t behave like a moral person; what a shock:
A [typical and representative Oklahoma] pastor…[named] James McMillan was arrested in late November…[becaus]e he unzipped his pants and began touching himself in front of a…[teen girl] while [driv]ing down a Cleveland County highway. McMillan was arrested again [on December 9] for [show]ing [porn]…to a minor…he…has been [repor]ted [for] sexual abuse…in multiple [social] services and [criminal] cases dating back to 2003 [but nothing has ever been done]…
Cops don’t like it when non-cops ape their entrapment schemes:
Police are …[hu]nting teenage gangs [which are] terrorizing gay men in “pedo hunts” in the Sydney area…Nearly a dozen organized attacks have been connected to the…gangs, likely a fraction of the actual number…the victims were gay men who arranged to meet in public parks with someone they met on a dating app like Grindr. Instead of a consensual hook-up, they were confronted by multiple teenagers, who then taunted, beat, and robbed the victims, sometimes using [guns Australian politicians like to pretend don’t exist in Australia]…Several of the victims were forced [by threats] to c[laim they were] pedophiles while being filmed, [so the attackers could post the]…videos…online, in…[places such as] an Instagram account called “pedohunting_syd”…At least five boys, ages 14 to 17, have been charged in connection with the assaults and robberies, as well as…possessing unauthorized firearms. Police are describing the gang as a terror group…
I was destined to be threatened with state violence regardless of career path:
After years of culture war battles in school and public libraries, the campaign by [pro-censorship] “parent rights” groups has succeeded in casting a nationwide chill over the market for children’s books…During the 2023-24 school year, there were more than 10,000 book bans in public schools — a 200% rise over the previous year. The books overwhelmingly included LGBTQ+ themes and characters of color, according to PEN America. Many of the same books are banned over and over across the country, through coordinated efforts by [pro-censorship] groups…Teachers and librarians, facing threats and fearful of losing their jobs or even going to jail…are hesitating to put [any] books that include LGBTQ+ characters or discussions of racism on their shelves…sales of such books are down significantly…and authors have seen school visits canceled, leaving them without a crucial income stream…[wannabe thought controllers vomit out the word “]pornography[” at sane, moral people, and opine that “authors and publishers]…should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who [stock any book we point at] should be classed as registered sex offenders”…
Politicians really do believe they can control people’s thoughts via threats:
Karen Cahall…who teaches third grade [in Ohio], was recently suspended for three days without pay and threatened with termination…for [hav]ing four books in her classroom library [of about 100 books] that contained LGBTQ characters…Ana On The Edge, The Fabulous Zed Watson!, Hazel Bly and the Deep Blue Sea, and Too Bright to See…[were on a list used by busybodies to harass teachers] and…on October 30, 2024, a [wannabe thought-controller took it up on herself to compare every title in Cahall’s library against that list, then]…sent an email complaining to…every [school board] member…Superintendent Tracey Miller, who [has neither spine nor principles, claimed]…Cahall’s inclusion of these books in her classroom library violated school district policy…[against books about] “topic[s] on which opposing points of view [exist]”…Cahall has filed a…lawsuit against Miller and…School District…[because] their actions were [blatantly] unconstitutional…
How long will society accept its medical system being used as a tool of state violence?
Across the country, hospitals are dispensing medications to patients in labor, only to report them to child welfare authorities when they or their newborns test positive for those very same substances on subsequent drug tests…The[se]…are…medications routinely prescribed to millions…every year…includ[ing] morphine or fentanyl for epidurals or other pain relief, anxiety medications, and two different blood pressure meds prescribed for C-sections. In a time of increasing surveillance and criminalization of pregnant women since the end of Roe v. Wade, the hospital reports have prompted calls to the police, child welfare investigations and even the [abduction] of children from their parents…
Politicians will use any trick to gain control of the internet:
[Pro-censorship politician] Mike Lee has introduced a bill to…forc[e unconstitutional] age verification on app stores and mobile devices, with [the] goal of chilling sex-related speech. Lee [misuses the word] “accountability” [to weirdly represent]…”big corporations”…[as public] “moral[ity agencies” despite the fact that]…big corporations like Google and Apple already ban apps featuring sexual content…[for] everybody…[so] this legislation is about…age-gating…social media…and making tech companies even more afraid of allowing anyone to access adult content…[by inventing] a private right of action for parents and guardians [to file nuisance lawsuits] against app stores…If minors download a web browser and visit porn websites, their parents can sue. If minors download X or Bluesky or Reddit and happen upon some sort of sexualized image, their parents can sue. If minors download a chat app and peers direct message them GIFs featuring cartoons committing violence, or inappropriate selfies, or any message at all, their parents can sue. All a parent has to [do is belch out the word “]harm[“]…or “lewd”…
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
The Last Throwback Thursday
Posted in History, Miscellaneous, Perception, Philosophy, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged activism, agency denial, blogging, evidence, holidays, Lack of Evidence, paganism, politicians, Thought Experiment on December 19, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Prostitution is to my knowledge the only “crime” which is entirely defined by its motive. – “Lack of Evidence”
Adult women are ADULTS. It isn’t the job of strangers, nor that of “rescue” organizations or the government, to police their private lives. – “Thought Experiment”
To anyone who knows anything at all about the origin and development of Christmas, the insistence by American Christians that the holiday belongs to them and them alone is bizarre indeed; it’s rather like someone buying a used car, giving it a new paint job, and then declaring that he was the inventor of the internal combustion engine. – “Christmas Eve 2012”
In a very real sense, Christmas is literally as old as civilization, and we owe the majority of what makes us more than just high-falutin’ monkeys to [an] ancient event that we now only remember in myths of a time when life was easy.
– “Yule 2013”
There are still far too many…who want sex workers silent, invisible, and preferably caged, enslaved, or dead. – “Before It Gets Better“
Diary #755
Posted in Diary, tagged Grace, holidays, Presents on December 18, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Once again, I was a bit nervous about my toy drive this year, and once again my readers came through! Even better, I discovered that the Toys for Tots organizers had put a donation box in the gift shop at the chemotherapy clinic, so I didn’t even need to drive across town to the Tractor Supply; I just brought the toys with me to the clinic and dropped them off while Grace was getting her therapy. And that was really good, because these first two weeks were full of extra steps (like having to get up two hours before dawn on Monday to get Grace to surgery to install a “power port” in her chest wall so the chemo won’t require as much needle-sticking). Anyhow, the drive is now over for this year; thanks to all who donated, and if you missed it this year make sure you set a calendar reminder for November 28, 2025!
December 17th, 2024
Posted in Perception, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged activism, holidays, The Red Umbrella, violence vs. sex workers on December 17, 2024| Leave a Comment »
In the News (#1498)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged Arizona, California, censorship, Colorado, cops, drugs, evidence, harm reduction, If Men Were Angels, lawheads, libraries, Nebraska, New Jersey, No Escape, Ohio, politicians, prisons, rape, Rhode Island, Texas, The Crumbling Dam, The Scarlet Letter, Thought Control, Unchristian Nation, United Kingdom, Utah, Winding Down on December 16, 2024| 2 Comments »
This cat is not going back into the bag. – Heather Fazio
This was directly caused by people teaching children unquestioning obedience to “authority”:
A [fundamentalist Mormon] religious leader who claimed more than 20 spiritual “wives ” including 10 underage girls faces decades in prison…for [repeatedly rap]ing girls as young as 9…Samuel Bateman, whose small group was an offshoot of the sect once led by Warren Jeffs, has pleaded guilty to a yearslong scheme to transport girls across state lines for his sex crimes, and later to kidnap some of them from protective custody. His plea agreement called for 20 to 50 years in prison, though each conviction carries a possible life sentence…Bateman traveled extensively between Arizona, Utah, Colorado and Nebraska and regularly [rap]ed underage girls…
The feds will try to destroy this just as they did in Philadelphia:
Providence is now home to the country’s first state-sanctioned facility for people to use illegal drugs under medical supervision…Last year, more than 400 people in Rhode Island died of an overdose…Staff will provide clients with access to clean supplies, like needles, and equipment to test drugs so people know exactly what they’re taking. People using the site will also be able to connect with recovery services, and basic needs like food and clean clothes…The nation’s first government-sponsored supervised consumption sites opened in New York City in 2021…Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott announced his intent to open supervised consumption sites locally. Burlington, Vermont, approved a pilot program…and expects to open a facility within a year. City officials in Somerville, Massachusetts, are working towards opening similar sites there, too. [But] Rhode Island remains the only state to have approved and written regulations for supervised-consumption sites…and…a federal prosecutor in New York [has] threatened to shutter the city’s two safe injection sites…
Politicians are terrified of losing ways to destroy peaceful citizens’ lives:
Houston-area businesses and advocacy groups are rebuking Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s call for an outright ban on all consumable THC products…The Texas Cannabis Collective [wrote]…”So you’re telling us, out of all the issues facing Texas, banning all THC products is of the highest priority for the Texas Senate?”…
Every once in a while, a politician develops a particle of human decency:
…A “prostitute’s caution”, unlike other police cautions, does not require a person to admit to an offence or agree to accept it. Police can issue them to any…[woman they point at while belching “prostitute”. Most] cautions…are filtered out from someone’s record after six years and do not need to be disclosed to employers, but a prostitute’s caution will show up on a sex worker’s enhanced DBS check until they are 100 years old. [A few politicians] have demanded that police forces are immediately stopped from issuing the[m]…In November, a London assembly motion was put forward asking mayor Sadiq Khan to stop the Metropolitan police issuing…them…
It’s sad that the First Amendment has been so weakened it needs a state law to give it teeth:
Librarians and schools weary from escalating efforts to ban books have new protections under…[New Jersey] law…The “Freedom to Read Act” limits book bans in public schools and libraries and shields librarians from lawsuits and criminal charges filed by [wannabe thought-controllers]…The law also bars school and library boards from removing books because of the “origin, background, or views” of the material or those contributing to its creation, and allows only people with a “vested interest” to challenge a book in a school library…[pro-censorship] activists have fought the measure, [vomit]ing…[the buzzword “]obscene[” at]…librarians…
Government at every level crusades against Christian charity:
For close to a year now, [a colorfully-named] Bryan, Ohio, church and its pastor Chris Avell have been locked in a fierce legal battle with the city government and the local fire chief over a makeshift shelter it’s operated on the first floor of its rented church building. Dad’s Place has argued that letting people rest and worship in its building 24 hours a day, seven days a week, is an integral, First Amendment–protected part of its ministry. [But politicians] have [pointed at] the church [while belching bureaucratic buzzwords such as “]illegal[“]…residential use[“]…and…[“]fire code[” at it]…a local trial court [has] sided with Bryan Fire Chief Douglas Pool in a civil suit he’s brought against the church…[and ordered it] to [evict] the homeless [in 19o F weather while labeling]…Avell…a…criminal…Bryan Mayor Carrie Schlade…[belched] “the law” [at reporters]…
Government uses a shell game to avoid making actual reforms:
The federal Bureau of Prisons is permanently closing its “rape club” women’s prison in California and…deactivate minimum-security prison camps in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Colorado, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Florida. S[crews] and [victims] are being moved to…[continue the abuse elsewhere; indeed, the bureau] said it is…committed to finding positions for every [rapist and abuser in its employ]…The…shutdown…is the clearest sign yet that the agency…is…unwilling to rehabilitate its most problematic institutions…
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
Links #754
Posted in Current Events, History, Links, Miscellaneous, Music, Obituary, Tyranny, tagged Antarctica, California, cops, holidays, I can't breathe, Indiana, language, Mexico, Never Call the Cops, New York, racism, teachers, video on December 15, 2024| Leave a Comment »
I can’t breathe. – Herman Whitfield III
Given the season, I decided this was the best choice as a sendoff for beloved children’s singer Ella Jenkins. The links above the video were provided by Phoenix Calida, Yasmin Nair, Alex Vitale, T. Greg Doucette, Michael Peters, and Jesse Walker, in that order.
- R.I.P. Ella Jenkins.
- At the Mountains of Madness.
- “School safety agent”. Seriously.
- Was this “protecting” or “serving”?
- What part of “never” is so hard to understand?
- I wish reporters would learn what “ancient” means.
From the Archives
- Hundreds of hours & thousands of dollars wasted on political showboating.
- That they’re willing to admit this is a sign of how bad things have become.
- Indonesian fanatics have been trying to impose this evil scheme for years.
- Biden tries to take the “sex trafficking” narrative back from the Trumpists.
- Texas sez doctors should just do abortions & hope they aren’t prosecuted.
- Sleeping with a cop is one of the most dangerous things a woman can do.
- Far too many believe all society can be neatly divided into sheep & goats.
- One needn’t know why a rabid dog bites to recognize that it’s dangerous.
- Until there are criminal penalties for this, cops have no incentive to stop.
- Gang committing widespread mayhem is described as merely “troubled”.
- New Zealand cops apparently lack sufficient reasons to brutalize people.
- The key to breaking these evil laws is recognizing them as punishment.
- PREA is nonsense while screws have absolute power over their victims.
- Cops, muffins, Bob McGrath, Kirstie Alley, Angelo Badalamenti & more.
- To an exceptionally-healthy person, rare illnesses are deeply annoying.
- Will South Africa become the 3rd country to achieve decriminalization?
- Politicians no longer care whether their new diktats are Constitutional.
- Cops are sexual predators who specifically target traumatized women.
- Even the use of the distancing “former” is the same as for rapist cops.
- The adventures of a fanatical, unhinged lawyer and his pet fantasist.
- Canada often rewards its rapist cops with years-long paid vacations.
- Why are people shocked when men paid to behave violently, do so?
- Note that cases of actual coercion don’t look much like the myths.
- The Dutch establish more financial surveillance over sex workers.
- We aren’t living in a simulation; at least, not the kind you mean.
- Cops hiding evidence are described as murderer’s “co-workers”.
- Cops, cartoons, Keith Richards, Norman Lear, and much more.
- Some still believe these sociopaths desire to “protect children”.
- A district court judge has to do SCOTUS’ job because it won’t.
- A dangerous new front in the Drug War claims its first victim.
- Arizona screws think they can cure mental illness by torture.
- Why end-to-end encryption is only the beginning of security.
- Some cops don’t limit themselves to one type of creepiness.
- Using federal law s against terrible state “prostitution” laws.
- He wasn’t a “former” warden when he raped three women.
- It’s rare that a rapist cop is stopped after only one victim.
- Psychopathic rapist-murderer cop gets slap on the wrist.
- Cops should not be allowed anywhere near legal minors.
- “Lockdowns…mak[e] poor people an awful lot poorer“.
- Bigotry is not a legal justification for sexual assault.
- Cops, snakes, Mars, Anne Rice, and much more.
- The very last day of my toy drive for 2023.
- A better toy drive than I initially expected.
- Your “leaders” refer to this as “correction”.
- A tag just for cops caught with child porn.
- Jesse James Meets Throwback Thursday.
- Scary “sex trafficking” candy wrappers.
- Setting an example for his underlings.
- Cops of all types love their child porn.
- The last day of my 2022 toy drive.
- This subtitle is no exaggeration.
- My shower is almost complete.
- I’m sure you feel safer now.
- Rapist cops of the week.
- Pleasant Valley Sunday.
I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one. Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful. But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer. So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets. Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements. Thanks so much!
Twitter Wonderland
Posted in History, Miscellaneous, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged Alabama, animals, artificial stupidity, Australia, blogging, Bluesky, censorship, consensual crime, crypto-moralism, drugs, ethics, genitalia, holidays, imaginative fiction, internet, language, left-right myth, New Mexico, politicians, psychology, robots, social purity, Thailand, Twitter, Washington (state), yin and yang on December 14, 2024| Leave a Comment »
The best time to ditch the idiotic 18th-century "left-right" model was in the early 19th century.2nd-best time would've been in the early 20th century.3rd-best time would've been in the postwar 20th century.4th-best time would've been before the recent election.So I don't have much hope.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-16T18:44:34.315Z
You forgot the most important one: it's the place where Bugs Bunny always made the wrong turn.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-17T04:32:49.912Z
"Leaders".
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-18T08:12:33.571Z
20 million people who don't typically cook need to stop thinking there's no skill involved, and they can do it as well as someone who's been practicing every day for decades.The same could be said of those who aren't sex professionals, but that's a topic for another day.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-19T18:24:24.928Z
How long before a gang of politicians somewhere decides that, because "AI" and "safer", any collision between a robot car and one driven by a human MUST be the human's fault? reason.com/2024/11/20/t…
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-20T19:28:24.430Z
If that buyer sees this, I've got a deal for him: for only $2 million (and no extra fees) I'll give him a certificate of authenticity that gives him the authority to put a croissant on any bookshelf and call it "Maggie".
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-21T18:21:28.096Z
The absolute best thing about reading web pages after saving them to archive.is is seeing this across the still images that replace auto play videos:
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-24T05:16:40.978Z
Please also remember that Puritans didn't go away; they multiplied. The Puritan ethic is alive and well in dozens of modern movements (including feminism, Marxism, nutritionism, prohibitionism, evangelicalism, and Law & Order-ism) and infused throughout the entire body of US law at all levels.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-24T18:05:19.293Z
Americans who are moral imbeciles 34%have "kick me" printed on their faces 42%have the approximate wisdom of a gibbon 45%can see what's in front of them 49% are extremely stupid 55%
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-27T05:48:48.331Z
Protip: Any pundit whose rhetoric reads like Mad Libs with slots marked "wing", "buzzword", and "target group" can be safely ignored.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-27T19:03:54.481Z
So nice to mute people who "joke" about calling the cops on others for their opinions.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-28T17:17:47.899Z
Tell them to go play in the damned yard, because adults are talking inside.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-29T18:14:18.849Z
Anyone familiar with the history of empires knows that this is not "unorthodox" by any stretch of the imagination. To the contrary, it is bog-standard.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-11-30T18:33:11.880Z
This looks like something from the Fiend Folio.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-02T05:57:29.848Z
I guess some people haven't recognized yet that I view partisanism as a disturbing form of mental incapacity and moral degeneracy that I mute on sight.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-05T04:03:06.741Z
That US law and policy are solidly rooted in Puritanism is clearly visible in the fact that while it is considered "criminal" to make a person feel good for pay, it is perfectly legal to deny a person medicine or treatment he needs to feel good.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-05T18:29:49.892Z
Your regular reminder that there is no such thing as "artificial intelligence" except in marketing materials of tech companies. This does not use any kind of judgment; it is merely an algorithm which looks for certain "flags" defined by its programmers, like training a chicken to peck red things.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-06T18:33:28.520Z
Every friggin' one except Cleveland, Buffalo, and Honolulu.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-08T04:07:45.860Z
Timeline cleanse. Your eyes may also get washed a bit.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-11T02:37:59.541Z
Well, be fair; it would CERTAINLY damage her brand as "World's Worst Break Dancer" if there were actually *competent* dancers in a musical bearing her name.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-11T18:11:16.971Z
Loki would be amused.
— Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2024-12-13T19:14:16.167Z
Friday, December 13th, 2024
Posted in Perception, Tyranny, tagged activism, Friday the Thirteenth, holidays on December 13, 2024| Leave a Comment »
Regular readers know that every Friday the Thirteenth, I ask those who aren’t sex workers to stand up for us. If you’re one of them, you already know the sorts of things I’m going to say; if you aren’t, you can simply go back and read the essay for the August 2021 occurence, which contained quotes and links for every occurrence of this particular day and date combination. And if you value all the work I’ve done fighting for sex workers over the past 14 years, a concrete sign of that (via continuing subscription or one-time donation) would not only be deeply appreciated, but also provide vital resources for the continuance of that work.
In the News (#1497)
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged A Moral Cancer, abortion, agency denial, artificial stupidity, California, censorship, consensual crime, cops, Delaware, end demand, Feudalism Redux, Florida, Idaho, If Men Were Angels, internet, law, Mad Libs, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, politicians, porn, prohibitionist myths, scams, social purity, Texas, TikTok, Washington (state), Welcome to the Future, Worse Than I Thought, Wyoming, You Were Warned on December 12, 2024| Leave a Comment »
We can’t eradicate the human sex drive. – Elizabeth N. Brown
North Carolina has made it a felony crime to patronize a sex worker…a crime that comes with a presumptive minimum sentence of four months in prison, up to two years…in recent years, we’ve seen a disturbing trend of states starting to classify attempts to pay for sexual activity as a felony…mirror[ing] the misguided and detrimental path [of]…the war on drugs. Three states now make it a felony crime to pay for sex or attempt to pay for sex…In 2021, Texas became the first…then…last May, Oklahoma [followed]…Morality in Media…is a major driver of these laws and, more generally, the idea that we can “end demand” for prostitution…sold…by [conflating female agency with]…sex trafficking…
“Pastor” + teacher = “youth pastor”:
A [Texas] pastor and teacher in Grapevine is under arrest for possession of child pornography…Arturo Alarcon…[plant]ed hidden cameras in a church-owned mobile home used to host visiting families. [After these were discovered by visiting missionaries staying there], detectives found an image of child pornography on Alarcon’s cell phone…one of the cameras was designed to look like a clock. Another…was like a bug zapper…Alarcon [has, unsurprisingly, long been buddy-buddy with] Grapevine Police…
Of course they had to be forced to end this ugly, evil scam:
The Pasco County [Florida] Sheriff’s Office is permanently scuttling a [“]predictive policing[” sc]am that was the subject of…a pending civil rights lawsuit…[due to its unceasing,] unconstitutional harassment of families. In a settlement agreement ending that…lawsuit, the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office [was forced to admit] that it…[had intentionally violated] the plaintiffs’ First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights…In addition to ending the…[scheme] and agreeing not to create a similar one, the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office will pay [a mere] $105,000 to the four plaintiffs…
Prohibitionists always claim surprise when the predicted effects of one of their bans appear:
If you want to create a black market in a perfectly legal product, just make regulations and taxes so onerous that many people prefer to buy from illegal vendors…that’s certainly the case with cigarettes… “New York has the highest inbound smuggling activity, with an estimated 54.3 percent of cigarettes consumed in the state deriving from smuggled sources in 2022,” note [Adam] Hoffer and [Jacob] Macumber-Rosin [in the latest edition of the Mackinac Center’s regularly compiled research on the topic]. “New York is followed by California (46.7 percent), New Mexico (41.2 percent), Massachusetts (39.7 percent), and Washington (36.8 percent)”…because their tax rates drive people to purchase their smokes from illicit dealers, high-tax states suffered a revenue hit in 2022 of more than $5 billion. Since 2007, they’ve lost out on more than $79 billion….[and] with flavored tobacco banned in places like California and Massachusetts, those products are available in those states only on the black market…New Hampshire taxes cigarettes at the rate of $1.78 per pack, which is relatively low. As a result, find the Mackinac Center and the Tax Foundation, 31.43 percent of cigarette sales are for smuggling elsewhere. That puts it in third place after Wyoming, where 49.2 percent of cigarette sales are smuggled out of state, and Delaware, where 34.4 percent of sales are resold in higher-tax jurisdictions…
If you need a law like this to control your teen offspring, you’ve already lost them:
[The Ninth Circuit] has ruled that Idaho can [attempt to] enforce its abortion travel ban, which [criminalizes adults who assist] minors [who] travel…out of state for abortions without parental consent. The decision…reversed a 2023 decision that had blocked the law on First Amendment grounds. The law [is intended to allow a parent or guardian to force a minor to carry an unwanted or even dangerous pregnancy to term by terrorizing anyone who might help a girl to exercise her right to bodily autonomy. Its]…sweeping language…could [even] apply to a grandmother driving a pregnant minor to the post office to pick up a package containing abortion medication, for example…
Increasingly-unhinged federal courts uphold a blatantly-unconstitutional law:
A panel of three federal…judges ruled unanimously…to uphold a law that could [unconstitution]ally ban TikTok in the United States…[unless its] Chinese owner, ByteDance…sell[s] it to a…[politically-connected] American owner by Jan. 19, 2025…the…decision sets the table for TikTok to take its case to the Supreme Court…During his campaign, [dancing orange-utang] Donald Trump…[claimed] he would “save TikTok”…though opinions among his [gang of unhinged cronies]…are mixed on whether…to [include this particular]…unconstitutional [action among]…the…flawed and dangerous precedent[s they already support to]…give…the government far too much power [over] Americans’ speech online…
Following Hunter Biden’s pardon by his father…Ana Navarro-Cardenas, a commentator who appears on The View and CNN…cited a pardon granted by President Woodrow Wilson of his brother-in-law Hunter deButts…and…an Esquire article called “A President Shouldn’t Pardon His Son? Hello, Anybody Remember Neil Bush?” was based on the premise that George H.W. Bush pardoned his son Neil; it has since been retracted “due to an error.” The day before its publication, Occupy Democrats’ executive editor Grant Stern tweeted a similar claim that Jimmy Carter pardoned his brother Billy…As far as I can tell, n[one of these] actually occurred. Where was all this coming from? Well, I don’t know what Stern or Esquire’s source was. But I know Navarro-Cardenas’, because she had a follow-up message for critics: “Take it up with Chat GPT”…
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Boring but necessary legal stuff