The whole left-right, red-blue, all-or-nothing nonsense rots the brains of those who embrace it. If you actually look at the percentages, so-called “red states” don’t actually have many more “red” voters than “blue states” do. The idea of monolithic “red” or “blue” states is a fiction promoted by nitwits with childlike views of the world who long for easy, clear “white hat-black hat” narratives that simply don’t apply to mass politics. I grew up in a so-called “red state”, lived for a while in an even “redder” one, and for ten years now have lived in a “blue state”. And the balance of political commentary I heard from neighbors, casual conversation in public, etc hasn’t changed much over my lifetime. What has changed is the amount of power given to dangerous, psychopathic crackpots, and the erosion of citizens’ protections from said crackpots. This has been a bipartisan project all along; even the Constitutional crisis which started 24 years ago last month and finally came to a boil in January, was a contest between the GOP and Dems to see who could erode more civil liberties and scream “FOR THE CHIIIIIIIIIILDREN!!!” the loudest. In the end, the GOP turned out to be the party that broke and completely succumbed to populist-flavored fascism, but that’s because it has long cultivated a more rigid belief-system which broke when the winds of change blew hard enough. The Dems cultivated a more flexible catechism which did not snap in those winds, but instead has become so warped and weakened it isn’t good for anything. Trumpism is the immediate danger, and needs our focus. But don’t fall for lies that Democrats are noble saviors, else ending trumpery will be no more than leaping from one boiling pot to another.
Posted in History, Philosophy, Tyranny | Tagged ethics, fascism, left-right myth, Louisiana, Oklahoma, politicians, Washington (state) | Leave a Comment »
Paradoxically, the anti-sex mob are those most obsessed by sex; they see it even where normal people do not. – “Obsession and Bedevilment”
Modern people are deeply in denial about how common sex work has been throughout human history. – “The Invention of Incels”
Though cops are still conducting their entrapment schemes and pretending they’re something more than an excuse for moral degenerates to rape and rob women and ruin men’s lives, the public has largely lost interest in the “sex trafficking” hysteria which drove them, and they’re limping along on a mixture of inertia, sadism, and the federal government’s profligate spending until such time as the sociopaths in office can think of a way to interject more mindless carceral violence into their war on the internet. – “Newsworthy”
It’s one of the ironclad rules of media journalism that all “100 best” lists are bad. – “By Non-fans, For Non-fans“
Posted in Favorites, History, Miscellaneous, Perception, The Dark Side, Tyranny | Tagged blogging, censorship, consensual crime, cops, hysteria, Imagine the Sky, McNeill's Law, politicians, pragmatism, prohibitionist myths, psychology, rape, Reviews | Leave a Comment »
[“]AI[“]…is beginning to resemble one of the great speculative manias of market history. – Karim Moussalem
A North Carolina…[politician nam]ed Cecil Brockman…was arrested on [October 8th for child molestation and]…statutory rape…[before his court appearance the next day,] Brockman suffered [a panic attack and]…was taken to a local hospital…his…party is calling for Brockman to resign…[so] the[y can]…pick a replacement..[but] if Brockman doesn’t resign, the[y will probably]…impeach…[him]…
Yet another example of McNeill’s Law:
A [politician] leading a campaign to ban pornography in Michigan appears to have had an account on a pornographic hook-up website that promised users they could “find sex” and “get laid tonight”…Josh Schriver…has called porn a “scourge” and compared it to heroin…but…an account linked to his personal AOL email address appeared in a data breach from Fling.com…[where his] profile indicat[es] sexual interests including “fetish” and “groupsex”…
Prohibitionists never tire of treating adults like children:
In 2015, Oregon [politicians impos]ed a law that prohibited the sale of vaping products “packaged in a manner that is attractive to minors”…The resulting regulations offer a “non-exclusive list” of packaging features that the OHA deemed “likely to appeal to minors,” including images of “food or beverages…such as candy, desserts, soda, [and] food or beverages with sweet flavors including fruit or alcohol.” Also forbidden: “terms or descriptive words for flavors that are likely to appeal to minors such as tart, tangy, sweet, cool, fire, ice, lit, spiked, poppin’, juicy, candy, desserts, soda, [and] sweet flavors including fruit, or alcohol flavors.” The premise of these rules is that such flavors [never] appeal to…adult smokers looking for a less hazardous form of nicotine consumption…[but] adults who switch from smoking to vaping overwhelmingly prefer the flavors that the OHA views as juvenile…The…regulations require vape shops to actively conceal information that their customers want…[by censoring] labels…[which] means customers must ask employees for information that ordinarily would be on the label…a state appeals court [has] rul[ed] that the law…is “unconstitutional on its face”…
Zuckerberg’s sleaziness has no bottom:
Strike 3 Holdings, a company that…makes [adult videos it describes as] “high quality,” “feminist,” and “ethical”…is suing [Facebook]…for…infringing its copyright-protected content [by] using it to train [machine learning systems]…since 2018…[Facebook’s] motive was partly to obtain otherwise difficult-to-scrape visual angles, parts of the human body, and extended, uninterrupted scenes—rare in mainstream movies and TV—to help it create what Mark Zuckerberg [absurdly] calls [artificial] “superintelligence”…[Facebook] used the BitTorrent protocol to download and distribute [2,396 of Strike 3’s copyright-protected porn videos], which is illegal…[and] made [the] videos accessible to minors…since BitTorrent does not have age verification…
The only way to stop these maniacs is to hit them where it hurts most:
A former Wyoming library director who was fired amid an [attempt to censor] books with sexual content and LGBTQ+ themes…will be paid $700,000 after settling a lawsuit. Terri Lesley was fired…[by] Campbell County in 2023, two years into the [censorship crusade]…P[oliticians collud]ed with the [wannabe censors] and violated Lesley’s First Amendment rights…[but the] board…[l]ied…claim[ing she was fired for incompetence]…Lesley’s attorney, Iris Halpern…and her firm, Rathod Mohamedbhai in Denver, have supported fired library employees elsewhere in recent years. Under the settlement agreement, Lesley is dropping her lawsuit, though a separate lawsuit she has filed against [the] three [wannabe censors]…will continue…
Sleeping with a cop is one of the most dangerous things a woman can do:
A [typical and representative Tennessee cop] has been indicted…on federal charges [for violently attack]ing his estranged girlfriend…Alan James Greenman…was initially arrested Aug. 21…[the day after he barged into] her apartment complex at 6:25 a.m. [while wearing his magical clown costume]…he…accused her of cheating on him and demanded to see her cellphone. She told [him] to leave and [he responded by destroying her]…television…and…cellphone…he…[then threw] her…onto the bed…[and] punched her in the head multiple times…she tried to leave [but] Greenman [threatened] her…[with his] gun…[saying] “I’m going to fucking kill you”…he [then went on a rampage, destroying] her belongings…[until she managed to escape with] her [toddler] son…[the Clarksville cop shop] has sensors on their duty holsters that activate their p[igmobile’s] in-car camera when the weapon is drawn…the camera…captured…her [escape] and [his subsequent confession]…to…an unknown male…when [cops later] searched the [victim’s] apartment, they found Greenman hiding under clothing in [her] bedroom closet with his personally owned pistol[, apparently planning to ambush and murder her when she returned]…
The Bank of England [is]…warning of an intensifying risk of a “sudden correction” in global financial markets driven by the spending frenzy on [machine learning]…it’s the…clearest warning yet that we could be on the precipice of an [economic] disaster…the…[“]AI[“] bubble…[is] 17 times the size of the dotcom-era bubble and four times bigger than the 2008 financial crisis…only a measly five percent of [machine learning] pilot programs…succeed…with the vast majority falling flat. Yet [the mania]…now accounts for roughly 40 percent of the United States’ gross domestic product…[so when] the…spending boom falls apart, it could take down the entire economy with it…
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!
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny | Tagged A Moral Cancer, Above the Law, artificial stupidity, Buried Truth, censorship, consensual crime, cops, crypto-moralism, domestic violence, drugs, ethics, Facebook, internet, libraries, Mad Libs, McNeill's Law, Michigan, North Carolina, Oregon, politicians, porn, rape, scams, Shame Shame, Tennessee, The Cop Myth, Thought Control, Wyoming | Leave a Comment »
Every October, before the rains start mid-month, I put the atrium shutters back in place. But since I don’t have the energy I had even a few years ago, nowadays I tend to do that sort of chore on days when I feel I have the energy. That’s how I mucked out the henhouse a couple of weeks ago, and the system seems to be working. So when I had the urge to install the shutters a week ago today, I went ahead and did it. In the past, I’ve always installed the north-side shutters by myself, but waited until I had help for the much-larger south-side shutter. Well, this time I moved the ladder and all the shutters from the garage into place and installed the north-side ones as usual. But though I was winded from that, I decided for some unfathomable reason to attempt the south side alone. I leaned the ladder against the wall, put one end of the shutter on the ramp railing, lifted the other side to the top of the ladder, then climbed up a few steps and lifted the shutter onto the studs. To my surprise and pleasure, it went right into place on my very first try, and all I had to do was tighten down the wingnuts to secure it. Then I put the ladder away, et voilà; done until I take them down again somewhere between Easter and May Day. It may seem a small thing, but with Grace gone there are a lot of things she used to do for me or with me, that I now have to do for myself. So please allow me to celebrate these little victories which represent my settling into the way things must be now.
Posted in Diary | Tagged psychology, Sunset | Leave a Comment »
There’s usually some kind of boogeyman…that justifies the building of a very extreme…policing apparatus. – Matthew Guariglia
It’s not unusual these days for a news item to fall into more than one category, so I have to figure out which is best; in such cases I typically link recent examples of the other applicable categories, or at least include them among the tags. But sometimes the article does such a good job of analyzing the connections between the various categories, I feel it’s better to simply call my readers’ attention to the article and urge y’all to read it in its entirety. This Reason article from a week ago today is a good example:
…On issues such as library books, abortion, gender, and even food, the culture war is now feeding the police state. This phenomenon started in the states, and none have pursued it with more intensity than Florida and Texas, where governors and legislatures have competed to show that they’re fighting the hardest against what they call “woke”…[but] now…using criminal law, mass surveillance, [snitch] lines, and the threat of police violence to wage the culture war…is [becoming]…a danger to every American who wants to live, work, and travel without being monitored and menaced by the state…
…the…Trump…[regime]’s campaign against universities on such issues as anti-Israel protests, transgender athletes, and critical race theory were all preceded by Florida, wh[ich]…PEN America…[has] dubbed…the “blueprint state” for the White House’s run of education-related executive orders…The sheer number of bills churned out over the past few years by Florida and Texas is notable, especially in light of how petty the targets can be—drag queens, librarians, whoever might be using a certain bathroom stall…Also notable [is] those laws’ dismal track record in court. Federal judges, even those appointed by Trump…have repeatedly struck down culture-war bills…represent[ing] a boundless paternalism…indistinguishable from the…identitarian politics that [proponents of such laws claim to oppose, such as bans on]…cultivated meat…[one] Texas [politician ludicrously defended as]…”plain cowboy logic“…in the bizarre, zero-sum logic of politicians like DeSantis and [Nebraska Governor Jim] Pillen, the freedom to eat bacon harvested from a pig that was alive and sensate before it was slaughtered is contingent on consumers never being given a choice to try an alternative…
…What makes the creation of new criminal statutes especially worrisome is law enforcement’s sweeping power to search and investigate targets…[via] vast, nationwide databases of personal information…facial recognition, cellphone surveillance, license plate tracking, sophisticated social media monitoring, and more…the huge surveillance architecture and data-sharing networks being created now won’t go back in the box when the current…[regime] is over, nor will they consider whether their targets used to have the right kind of politics…
There’s much, much more, bridging tags including Eavesdropping, Guinea Pigs, I Spy, The Last Shall Be First, Panopticon, Pyrrhic Victory, Thou Shalt Not, Thought Control, Universal Criminality, The Vultures Descend, Welcome to the Future, and many others. So go read it!
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, Perception, Tyranny | Tagged abortion, cell phones, censorship, consensual crime, Eavesdropping, fascism, Florida, I Spy, left-right myth, libraries, nanny state, Panopticon, politicians, propaganda, Pyrrhic Victory, racism, surveillance, teachers, Texas, The Last Shall Be First, Thou Shalt Not, Thought Control, transgender, universal criminality, Universally Criminal updates, Welcome to the Future | Leave a Comment »
Y’all gonna have to kill me, I will kill myself. – Jarrell Johnson
I came to know and love jazz and swing not only via my grandparents, but also via Captain Kangaroo, which used to feature what amounted to music videos with puppets. Alas, none of those bits from the show seem to be available online or anywhere else, but I did find this charming little slideshow backing one of the songs the Captain used to play. The links above it were provided by Jesse Walker, Mike Siegel, Amy Alkon, Scott Greenfield, and IncarcerNation (x3), in that order.
- R.I.P. Diane Keaton.
- Portrait of a psychopath.
- Lovecraftian entity of the week.
- Prosecutors don’t want justice, but victory.
- Was this “protecting” or “serving”? Hard to tell.
- No, your reason for calling them is not an exception.
- Crime: petty theft. Penalty: summary execution of bystander.
From the Archives
- Modern people are in deep denial about the ubiquity of historical sex work.
- Nobody is going to give expensive cannabis edibles to your spawn for free.
- Cops’ typical Halloween nonsense, now with fentanyl instead of marijuana.
- Thinking with the wrong head creates its own problems sans political help.
- How long will airlines accept liability for government-brand racial profiling?
- Sexworkers ask the Canadian Supreme Court to uphold its own judgment.
- If you didn’t see where this was going, you haven’t been paying attention.
- So much for SF’s pious BS about not sending cops to assault sex workers.
- Nobody is safe until this odious practice is recognized as unconstitutional.
- As practical limits on surveillance vanish, legal limits are more important.
- Over 90% of all whores work illegally rather than submit to “registration”.
- Cops believe “a woman wanted to be raped by a random cop” is credible.
- Ordinary business arrangements get spun into “exploitation” and “crime”.
- The government is working to ensure these men die in their filthy cages.
- Looking-glass politicians say adding window to bathroom “adds privacy”.
- Cop deals with disagreement exactly as paid to; all claim to be shocked.
- Cops, Sergio Aragonés, Loretta Lynn, Angela Lansbury, and much more.
- I find it sweet that so many people are so enchanted by our pig, Cicero.
- Another individual protection the Establishment is working to eliminate.
- When it comes to surveillance, fascism beats communism hands down.
- Authoritarians are working toward worldwide criminalization of speech.
- Something advertised as spyware is spyware, and people are shocked?
- Another ex-whore thinks it’s her job to cheat her sisters out of money.
- Profiteers will continue to harass businesses thus while FOSTA stands.
- Politicians believe “election” grants them license to practice medicine.
- Surely you didn’t think this would stop with libraries and the internet?
- Many overseas pharmacies don’t care about politicians’ permission.
- Funny how many cops who are willing to pay prefer underage girls.
- These abuses are finally getting the attention they’ve long needed.
- Your regular reminder that my writing depends upon your support.
- It is not the job of libraries to enforce parental censorship choices.
- A reminder that I depend on your support to keep this blog going.
- Every Friday the 13th, I ask non-sexworkers to stand up for us.
- As I’ve said many times, the urge to censor is a mental illness.
- The people the government empowers to police your sexuality.
- About a twelfth of the time his long string of crimes deserves.
- I can’t feel sorry for cops hoist with their own twisted petard.
- Some rapist cops are indiscriminate in their choice of victim.
- Cops, Russell Batiste, Jr, gay furry hackers, and much more.
- Conditioning kids to accept constant, intrusive surveillance.
- Privacy as we once knew it will soon be a thing of the past.
- Cops, dark ages, Nazca lines, John Amos, and much more.
- In case you’ve ever wondered where the good cops are.
- We might be about to see the end of the open internet.
- Because this kind of prohibition will surely be different!
- Politicians keep openly trying to destroy the internet.
- PayPal is becoming a major threat to civil liberties.
- I’ve been wanting one of these for quite a while.
- Consider the massive waste on display here.
- All cops will have these within a few years.
- Throwback Thursday Meets the Wolf Man.
- Connecting my new bathroom plumbing.
- Sometimes I really miss the Beatles.
- Your “leaders” call this “correction”.
- Victor Throwback Thursday.
- Rapist cop of the week.
- Water for the piggies.
Posted in Current Events, Links, Miscellaneous, Music, Obituary, Tyranny | Tagged acting, animals, cops, Florida, imaginative fiction, Michigan, Missouri, Never Call the Cops, nostalgia, politicians, racism, Tennessee, Texas, video | Leave a Comment »
This is exactly how our system is supposed to work. – Mini Timmaraju
“Serious domestic incident” seems to mean he raped his ex:
A Monroe [Louisiana cop named]…Chad Austin Prather…was [arrested and charged]…for…rape [but also rewarded with a paid vacation]…
The Face of Trafficking (#1533)
It says a great deal that when something resembling the myths really happens, a church is behind it:
An FBI raid revealed 57 victims of forced labor living in cramped quarters at a lavish Florida mansion [owned by] the leaders of a church…David Taylor…and Michelle Brannon…[ran] a forced labor and money laundering scheme through…Kingdom of God Global Church…Taylor, who calls himself “Apostle,” and Brannon, his “executive director,” established call centers across the country, staffed by followers working long hours with no pay, tasked with collecting donations…and [also] to work…as…Taylor’s personal servants who fulfilled [his] demands around the clock…The call centers earned $50 million…over the last 10 years…If victims disobeyed…or failed to reach his monetary goals, Taylor and Brannon punished the victims with public humiliation…psychological abuse, forced repentance, sleep deprivation, physical assaults, and threats of divine judgment in the form of sickness, accidents, and eternal damnation…At the mansion…[were] seven Mercedes Benz sedans and two Bentley sedans…as well as $500,000 in gold bars in Brannon’s bedroom…Taylor claimed to have had “multiple face-to-face encounters with God” and said he was “Jesus’ best friend”…He often demanded sexually explicit videos and photos from women within the organization, and investigators…found thousands of such videos…
Oh look, sensible people were correct as usual:
Discord has confirmed one of its third-party [age gate] providers [was hacked and]…the…government-issued IDs…[used to submit to] age verification laws [stolen]…Experts have warned collecting sensitive personal information, [including] government-issued IDs, is a “disaster waiting to happen” and sites adopting age verification would be a prime target for hackers…
Much of the culture war is driven by ignoramuses refusing to understand how things work:
The [FDA] has approved a[nother] generic version of the abortion pill mifepristone, expanding its supply at a time when [minions of] the Trump [regime want]…to sharply restrict [legal] access to [it]…The approval…means…three American companies can now produce [the drug]…The FDA. approved the original pill 25 years ago and in 2019 approved the first generic version…nearly two-thirds of abortions in the country are carried out with medication…[which] is a major reason…the number of abortions in [states that want the procedure banned] has not decreased…By law, the Secretary of Health and Human Services must approve an application if it demonstrates that the generic drug is identical to the brand-name drug…
Even after a century of “Drug War” failure, prohibitionists refuse to get it into their thick skulls that banning a thing does not make it magically vanish; people simply get what they need on the black market. Even if the US wholly “banned” mifepristone, it is still made in other countries and could easily be smuggled in.
Anybody still using Facebook products deserves everything they get:
[Facebook] will soon use what people [foolishly] tell its…chatbot to…target them with even more personalized ads…[Facebook] already targets users with ads based on what they post and click on, as well as who they’re connected to…but in conversations with [the] chatbot, users could directly tell the company…what [ads] they…[might] have [less resistance to, leading]…to…potentially harmful content recommendations…[Facebook calls this] “improv[ing] people’s experience”…
A program is not a “she”, and running a program is not “acting”:
[A corporation hopes] Hollywood [will accept a program called “]Tilly Norwood[” as an actress even though it is just a computer program]. The [program runs an animated] brunette [image which]…has so far made only brief public appearances…on social media…”Tilly Norwood is not an actual human performer. It’s a…[computer-driven] construct,” said…SAG-AFTRA president Sean Astin in…a formal statement condemning the [tech companies’ attempt to convince]…people [that the program is “intelligent”]…and…[c]an…replace a human being…under the terms of SAG-AFTRA’s contract with Hollywood producers, studios may not use synthetic performers without…bargaining over terms…[but that doesn’t stop]…Particle6, the London-based production studio behind the [cartoon, from ridiculous claims about]…talent agencies [“]signing[” the character and] calling [it] “the next Scarlett Johansson or Natalie Portman”…
“Worship leader”. How many variations on these titles are there?
A [Texas] worship leader is facing charges of promoting child pornography…Jon Paul Sheptock [was apparently turned in by one of his victims]…and…was [convenient]ly [arres]ted at…a…prison…where he was providing ministry services to [people locked in the state’s filthy cages]…
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!
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny | Tagged abortion, advertising, artificial stupidity, consensual crime, cops, domestic violence, drugs, Facebook, Florida, Hollywood, If Men Were Angels, internet, Louisiana, porn, rape, scams, Shame Shame, slavery, surveillance, Texas, The Face of Trafficking, The Puritan Recrudescence, The Vultures Descend, To Molest and Rape, Welcome to the Future, You Were Warned | Leave a Comment »
Can y’all please stop using the phrase “conspiracy theory” to mean any kind of bizarre fantasy, even ones that are literally impossible, whether it involves a conspiracy or not? Even a conspiracy hypothesis would need to be scientifically credible; anything that isn’t is a bizarre cultic belief. And using “false conspiracy theory” to mean such a cultic belief is even worse; it’s like calling transubstantiation a “false conspiracy theory” because the bread is still provably bread. To discuss myths, ie the beliefs of a given cult, as though they were scientific assertions is absurd. See the screenshot below? You might as well call the Golden Fleece or Ark of the Covenant “conspiracy theories”, because every irrational belief-system has magical or esoteric devices somewhere in its mythology. Stop pretending QAnon isn’t a religion; it has a prophet, unprovable mysteries that must be taken on faith, etc. And its adherents can no more be talked out of their beliefs than fundamentalists can be talked out of their belief in the Rapture or Techists out of their belief in the “Singularity”. 
Posted in Current Events, Philosophy, Words | Tagged fantasy, language, psychology, STEM, The Implosion Begins | 1 Comment »
October is more than just my native month; it is my native country, and the time in which I have always been most at peace and (paradoxically for a time associated with haunts, dying vegetation and the dying year) felt most alive. – “The October Country”
An authoritarian government enacted by election is much worse than one produced by a coup, because while the latter can have little credible pretense of legitimacy, the former can represent itself as fully legitimate and claim the “right” to do whatever awfulness it wants because “the majority wills it”. –
“The Veneer of Legitimacy”
It is not the job of libraries to enforce parental censorship choices; that is the job of parents. – “Garden of the Muses“
Posted in Miscellaneous, Philosophy, Tyranny | Tagged blogging, censorship, ethics, left-right myth, libraries, politicians, psychology | Leave a Comment »
Amazon [is] serving as a midwife for…law enforcement technologies. – Jay Stanley
The Punitive Mindset (Chamber of Horrors)
The Illinois Department of [Torturing Caged Humans] will now permanently scan most physical mail sent to [its victims] and…upload…[it] to [the overpriced, substandard] tablet [prisoners are forced to buy if they want to read anything or have any contact with the outside world]…the [only exception is]…legal mail…the [screws’] union…has encouraged the move [to help obscure the well-known fact that drugs in prisons are smuggled in by screws]…the department [even absurdly vomited the word “]emergency[” to justify the move]…But a bipartisan legislative committee [refused] to [buy] the [claim]…at least 14 other states [deny their victims] physical mail…[even though] the rate of random positive drug tests [dramatically increase after such schemes are implemented, as do overdose rates]. In Ohio, lawyers [have reported that screws] are opening confidential mail…
In mass surveillance, fascism beats communism hands down:
ICE…has bought access to a surveillance tool that is updated every day with billions of pieces of location data from hundreds of millions of mobile phones…this…gives ICE…an “all-in-one” tool for searching both masses of location data and information taken from social media…without a warrant or court order…ICE spent more than $5 million on…Tangles…and [its tracking add-on] Webloc [which were developed] by an Israeli company called Cobwebs…[which merged with another fascist conglomerate called] Penlink in July 2023…
Welcome to the “safe” future you keep voting for:
…Amazon’s [Orwellian-named “]law enforcement and school safety team[“], led by a…Washington [cop], is aggressively courting new customers…[for] its own surveillance offerings and an expanding array of [surveillance] tools that run on its [servers], among them…car tracking from…Flock…[ML systems]…with billions of records on U.S. citizens from Lucidus…now owned by Flock…app…[connected fascist fusion] centers…Gun detection software from ZeroEyes…[LLMs] that can…write police reports…[algorithms] from Veritone [which] can identify and track individuals in surveillance footage or video posted to social media…[and] Verus…which constantly monitors and transcribes [im]prison[ed human beings’ phone] calls…
Politicians will never stop until privacy is completely abolished:
The UK government…is…[once again trying] to [force] Apple to create a backdoor into its cloud storage service, this time targeting only British users’ data…In February, Apple withdrew its most secure cloud storage service, iCloud Advanced Data Protection, from the UK [in response to the previous spying attempt]…Caroline Wilson Palow…of…Privacy International…[points out that] the new [attempt is]…“just as big a threat to worldwide security and privacy” as the old one…“If Apple breaks end-to-end encryption for the UK, it breaks it for everyone. The resulting vulnerability can be exploited by [governments], [cop]s and other bad actors the world over”…
It took seven years for people to start fighting wannabe censors:
Educated We Stand, a national nonpartisan organization dedicated to defending public education…has quickly become a counterweight to Moms for Liberty and other groups pushing [pro-censorship] “parental rights” agendas in education. The group reported a 78% win rate in endorsed school board races nationwide last year, including major victories in Florida, Wisconsin, and Michigan…The organization…raised more than $375,000 in grassroots donations in its first six months and says its mission is to fight book bans, elevate the voices of teachers and parents, and champion equity-focused, evidence-based policies…
Privacy as we once knew it will soon be a thing of the past:
The U.K. may be about to…require every adult…to have a digital ID in order to work in the country, with these IDs becoming mandatory by 2029…when somebody presents a plastic driver’s license, that interaction is between the two parties, and the government is none the wiser…But digital…IDs…are…built so…the system notifies the government every time [they are] used…giving the government the ability to track [physical movements and internet] history…a digital ID system, once created, would prove catnip to politicians…[who would demand its] use…for taxes, travel, health records…government benefits…social media accounts…[and] age-gated websites…[and would] link…[it] to facial recognition…database[s]…a lot of bad ideas regarding technology…in Europe, and especially the U.K., seem to wind their way over to the U.S. eventually…And as of June, 13 states had launched digital driver’s license systems and an additional 21 have passed legislation that would enable or study such a system…
The open internet is becoming a thing of the past:
Bluesky will begin [forcing adult Ohio] users…[who don’t have VPNs] to [submit to intrusive surveillance via]…Kids Web Services’ (KWS)…This is the same [concess]ion [to censors] that Bluesky is already using in South Dakota and Wyoming to comply with similar laws…
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!
Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny | Tagged Apple, Bluesky, censorship, drugs, fascism, Florida, I Spy, illegal aliens, Illinois, internet, Michigan, Ohio, Panopticon, politicians, prisons, Pyrrhic Victory, surveillance, The Punitive Mindset, Thought Control, United Kingdom, Walled Garden, Welcome to the Future, Wisconsin, You Were Warned | Leave a Comment »
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Boring but necessary legal stuff