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Posts Tagged ‘hysteria’

Throwback Thursday vs. Baragon

Posted in History, Miscellaneous, Philosophy, tagged , , , , , , , , on November 30, 2023| Leave a Comment »

All of us are time travelers, and though the process is both slow and unidirectional, it inevitably brings us into a world very different from the one where we started.   –  “Welcome to the Future”

Computers and the internet have made the creation and dissemination of graphics so easy that any ass can accomplish it; naturally, that means there are a lot of wholly asinine graphics on the internet.
–  “Painfully Clueless”

Most drugs aren’t “unsafe for human consumption” when properly-prepared doses are used responsibly; prohibition, however, has been repeatedly proven to be unsafe to humans in any form.  –  “Unsafe for Human Consumption”

Both Team MAGA and Team {unpronounceable string of umpteen capital letters} are much too busy dreaming of inflicting their own flavor of totalitarian dystopia on everyone else to bother even attempting to learn from those who went before.  –  “Peculiar Ignorance“

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In the News (#1392)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 25, 2023| Leave a Comment »

He got so excited that I was bisexual, like, maybe he needed to change his underwear.  –  “Alison”

Without Let or Hindrance

Some still believe these sociopaths are motivated by “child protection”:

…an…anonymous caller, whom L.B. believes to be a former acquaintance with a grudge, has [repeatedly called] New York’s state child welfare hotline….[to] make outlandish, often already-disproven claims about her…[in order] to…trigger a government intrusion into her domestic life…Over the past three years, the agency either has [raid]ed her home or [molest]ed and [interrogat]ed her son at school more than two dozen times.  [Bureaucrats] have sought a warrant for only three of these searches, most recently in August.  All of those requests have been rejected by judges…[yet] it keeps happening, and it’s nearly always the same routine…[busybodies with cop henchmen] demand entry into her apartment, ringing her doorbell and, embarrassingly, sometimes those of her neighbors as well, at all hours of the day and night.  They [leer at] her child’s unclothed stomach and thighs, and sometimes take pictures.  And they interrogate him without her consent, covering topics like whether she has sex around him…L.B. [has now] filed a federal lawsuit against the commissioner of ACS and the city of New York…[because] her Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures has been repeatedly violated by the agency’s warrantless incursions…

If Men Were Angels

“Youth pastor”, “youth leader”, “youth minister”, “youth director”…can’t y’all settle on one term for preachy molesters?

Luis Mendoza…was arraigned…on multiple counts of…grooming and [molest]ing…a minor…[he was reported by the victim’s] parents…

Paint By Numbers (#1070)

Dumb “anti-trafficking” events are now mostly ads for sports:

[Several professional golfers collaborated with]…Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody for a celebrity golf tournament with a focus on [promoting “]sex-trafficking[” propaganda.  Funds raised from the Teeing Off to Stop Human Trafficking golf tournament…will [be given to cops to conduct pogroms against sex workers while spewing talking points and nonsense statistics]…

Monsters (#1300)

Never forget that this started with censorship of internet porn:

Russia’s justice ministry has filed a motion with the country’s Supreme Court to ban the activities of what it calls the “international LGBT public movement” as extremist…[due to] inciting “social and religious strife”…The extremist label has been used in the past by Russian authorities against rights organisations and opposition groups…The top court will examine the motion on 30 November.  The ban would make it impossible for LGBT organisations to operate and put activists and employees at risk of criminal prosecution…

Stupor Bowl (#1311)

It’s no longer unusual to see this type of article on “sex trafficking”myths:

Every year…a…public relations blitz repeats the long-discredited myth that major sporting events such as the…[Super Bowl] are a magnet for sex trafficking.  There’s not a shred of evidence to support it…so why does it keep coming back?…federal and local law enforcement agencies use this “trafficking hysteria” as an excuse to mount lucrative vice stings…renaming prostitution as human trafficking, pretending to rescue “sex trafficking victims” and saddling people with prostitution arrests…We are asking the media to ask critical questions.  Do not simply repeat whatever the police might claim.  Do not be complicit in this annual ritual.  Instead, speak to the sex workers who are being rounded up, harassed and criminalized to provide extravagant headlines for the police.

The End of the Beginning (#1373)

What kind of moral imbeciles condemned him to the registry in the first place?

In 2012, when Adam Nesteikis was 25 years old, his friend [a younger neighbor who had been molesting him, encouraged] him to pull down his pants in front of a young girl…Adam is intellectually disabled, which means he didn’t realize he had done something wrong.  He also didn’t understand what it meant when, after a trial, he was placed on the sex offense registry.  He just knew that for some reason, he lost the job he loved wiping tables.  He could no longer participate in the Special Olympics.  And he couldn’t scuba dive—his very favorite activity—because the club practiced in a high school pool and he was no longer allowed to be near young people.  Thankfully, this injustice has finally been remedied: This year, he received a full pardon from…Gov. J.B. Pritzker [of Illinois].  His record will also be expunged…

Served Cold (#1382)

The schadenfreude of watching Tim Ballard’s reputation go down in flames is so very sweet:

A female [“]operator[” for]…OUR…spent time with [Tim Ballard] on a private island, where he claimed to directly communicate with God, before shadowing him as he trawled massage parlors and strip clubs across the British Virgin Islands, despite there being no intelligence to suggest that…any trafficking was going on at all…In planning and execution, the [organization’s] work was amateurish and dangerous…it became clear to her that the OUR hierarchy was fully aware of what Ballard was doing…and…other top members of the organization…were themselves participants in the couples ruse…[her] story…depicts an organization focused on allowing its celebrity founder, who had become completely detached from reality, to live the lavish lifestyle of a wealthy sex tourist and sexually manipulate and abuse volunteers under the guise of saving children….

Looks like the cops are getting involved as well:

A woman…[has reported fallen rescue industry con man] Tim Ballard [for] sexually assault[ing] her, the first known instance of a…[criminal] accusation…after similar [attacks on women have led to] two civil lawsuits…

 

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!

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In the News (#1391)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 22, 2023| Leave a Comment »

When have the people who ban books ever been the good guys?
–  Keri Lambert

Stalkers in Blue

This creepy shit appears to be a cop’s twisted idea of “flirting”:

[Florida cop] Dylan Fruh [resigned before he could be fired for stalking]…a 17-year-old girl whom he traffic-stopped [on a flimsy pretext and demanded]…her phone number…[he then] followed her and parked 3 spaces over…and…[started repeatedly] texting and calling her…When this was reported…[he claimed to his] superiors…that he had followed her to make her more comfortable with cops…While investigating this, the Marion County Sheriff’s Office searched his phone and found yet another c[reepy stalking of] yet another [underage] girl…No photo [of Fruh] can be found on the Marion County Sheriff’s Office page or elsewhere…

Why do so many cops seem to believe that stalking and harassing women will “build trust“?

Thought Control (#1356)

Surely you didn’t think this crusade would stop with libraries and the internet?

Murfreesboro [Tennessee] passed an ordinance in June banning “indecent behavior”…[and] specifically [referencing] Section 21-72 of the city code…[which defin]es homosexuality [as “sexual conduct”]…An ACLU-backed challenge…has already been launched, but that hasn’t stopped [politicians] from [us]ing the measure [for its intended purpose, banning LGBT-themed]…books…from the public library…[including] the books Flamer, Let’s Talk About It, Queerfully and Wonderfully Made, and This Book Is Gay.  The board also implemented a new library card system that categorizes books into certain age groups…[so] children and teenagers will only be able to check out books that correspond to their age group; they will need permission from a parent or guardian to check out “adult” books…[including] many classic high school books, such as To Kill a Mockingbird…

Dangerous Speech (#1373)

The main phase of this evil self-parody is finally over:

After a dozen years of legal tussles, seven years in the crosshairs of ambitious prosecutors, and five-and-a-half years fighting a federal case that saw his business forcibly shuttered, his assets s[tolen], and his longtime partner [harrassed into] suicide, alt-weekly newspaper impresario Michael Lacey was found guilty Thursday on just one of the 86 criminal charges levied against him…But the government’s fanatical pursuit of Lacey and his four other Backpage co-defendants is far from over…[the] award-winning investigative journalist…was found guilty of international concealment money laundering, which could land him in prison for up to 20 years, and not guilty of international promotional money laundering.  But after a week of contentious deliberations, the jury could not come to agreement on the other 84 charges, prompting U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa to declare a second mistrial…That means Lacey could face a third federal trial…for the crime of running a classified ads site…executives Scott Spear and John Brunst were found guilty of…over 20 counts apiece…[and] could very easily spend the rest of their lives in prison…Andrew Padilla and Joy Vaught, [who were charged specifically to goad them into testifying for the prosecution,] were found not guilty on their 51 prostitution counts…

Unsafe for Human Consumption (#1375)

Opportunists taking advantage of cop gullibility by selling them ordinary gear at inflated prices just by slapping the word “fentanyl” on it would be hilarious if it were their own money these idiots were throwing away, but of course it isn’t; it’s money they steal from others, either indirectly (by taxation) or directly (by pointing at it and belching “drugs”).  And now that they’ve extended their panic to dogs, there are even more opportunities to wreck lives by accusing victims of the made-up crime of “exposing” others to fentanyl.

Counterfeit Comfort (#1383) 

It’s good to see someone with a functional moral compass addressing this topic:

Meaghan Ybos…is president of Women Against Registry, an organization dedicated to ending sex offender registration…when her rapist was finally caught, nine years after the attack…she…learned that the Memphis Police Department had neglected to test the majority of the rape kits it collected, including hers.  Since then, she’s been pushing back against the myth of the rape kit “backlog”…[which she describes as “]political theater…It’s…politicians and law enforcement…using victims like me as a currency…A lot of times the retort to people arguing against the registry is, “You should tell that to so-and-so who was raped when she was 16 by a stranger.” OK: Well, I was. That was my case. I actually have a rare type of stranger rape that doesn’t even happen to that many people, and I’m still against this…Is it good for a society to be able to punish people after they’ve served their punishment? Is it good for our society to accept the government keeping lists of people for whom constitutional rights can be suspended?…the registry is counterproductive as any supposed crime reduction goal[“]…

The Puritan Recrudescence (#1389)

The latest entry in the currently-fashionable “monkey see, monkey do” parade:

Indiana [politician] Mike Bohacek…has filed a bill that he [doesn’t admit is to monitor adults] online…[it] would require age verification for websites [politicians summarily deem] pornographic…[and invent a new crime for] a website operator [to fail to guess what politicians might declare]…pornographic material without [spying on users]…

To Molest and Rape (#1389)

Cops should not be allowed anywhere near legal minors:

A [typical and representative Colorado cop named]…Dylan Miller…was arrested…[for] kidnapping [and] sex[ually] assault[ing]…a 15-year-old girl…in July at the North Lake Park in Loveland [Colorado]…Miller…[target]ed the girl [by using the pretext that she was] in [the] park after-hours…[he demanded she] walk with him to a secluded area of the park…[and] sexually assaulted her…

 

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!

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Links #698

Posted in Current Events, Links, Miscellaneous, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on November 19, 2023| Leave a Comment »

It’s absolutely unconscionable.  –  Russ Oliver

From the dark recesses of Maggie’s brain: one of my childhood favorite Heckle & Jeckle cartoons, which I still remembered pretty well despite not having seen it in nearly 50 years.  The links above it were provided by Mike Siegel, He’s Just Adam, Mike Masnick, Franklin Harris, Jesse Walker, Radley Balko, and IncarcerNation, in that order.

From the Archives

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!

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In the News (#1388)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 12, 2023| 2 Comments »

Technology doesn’t make better people.  –  Vera, from Aqkol, Kazakhstan

Creepy Coppers

Police departments attract predatory garbage even to positions that don’t involve directly inflicting violence on citizens:  “[Typical and representative Tennessee cop employee] John Herring was arrested and charged…[with] possession of child pornography…”

Pyrrhic Victory (#1291)

All too often, evil arrives cloaked in the mantle of expediency:

…Smart Aqkol [is] a pilot study in digitized urban infrastructure for Kazakhstan…[using] Chinese surveillance [technology to establish a]…Chinese-style public surveillance system…The government…[sells the system with the usual rhetoric about] public safety…But the hardware came through…China’s…Silk Road initiative…and…uses surveillance cameras made by Chinese firms Dahua and Hikvision, which in China have been used — and touted, even — for their ability to track “suspicious” people and groups.  Both companies are sanctioned by the U.S. due to their involvement in surveilling and aiding in the repression of ethnic Uyghurs in Xinjiang…Kazakhstan…is home to a large Uyghur diaspora of more than 300,000 people, many of whom have deep ties to Xinjiang…Hikvision announced in December 2022 that its software is used by Chinese police to set up “alarms” that are triggered when cameras detect “unlawful gatherings” in public…its cameras can detect ethnic minorities based on their unique facial features…

I Spy (#1340)

It’s good to see sane people speaking up about this:

…the European Union…have bent themselves towards breaking up “monopolistic” (i.e., huge and non-European) services on the Internet, in the name of benefitting…user choice…this effort is at least equally motivated by a desire to delay adoption of end-to-end secure messaging solutions that lack…means to passively “backdoor” them…the latest draft of Section 45 of the EU’s eIDAS proposal contains phenomenally dangerous propositions that will clearly undermine the security and privacy of millions, even billions (because Europeans also speak with non-Europeans) of people.  They are a replay of the widely derided ChatControl proposal…and they too deserve to be roundly and loudly rejected by the privacy-loving European public …“Browsers” are not somehow conspiring to exclude European innovation.  It’s simply safer and clearer and more transparent to have just one agreed, well-oiled, open, global, standard website trust mechanism, especially where it’s proposed to be regionally usurped by something that is so clearly undermining trust and enabling surveillance…

Choke Point (#1354) 

It always starts with a politically-unpopular group like sex workers or gun owners, but never stops there:

The [pretexts] vary, but the scene that plays out is almost always the same.  Bank customers get a letter…saying their institution is closing all of their checking and savings accounts.  Their debit and credit cards are shuttered, too.  The explanation, if there is one, usually lacks any useful detail.  Or…instead, they discover that their accounts no longer work while they’re at the grocery store, rental car counter or A.T.M.  When they call their bank, frantic, representatives show concern at first…then comes the telltale pause and shift in tone.  “Per your account agreement, we can close your account for any reason at any time,” the script often goes…This isn’t your standard boot for people who have bounced too many checks.  Instead, a vast security apparatus has kicked into gear, starting with [bureaucrats] in Washington and [imposed on] bank security managers…The [pretext used] is to crack down on fraud, terrorism, [and invented political “crimes” such as sex work and “]money laundering[“…]

The Widening Gyre (#1368)

Apparently, as “sex trafficking” hysteria has shrink in popularity, imaginary “sex traffickers” have been forced to give up their ambitious schemes to abduct women and children from big-box stores such as Target and Ikea, and instead to stalk them at gas stations.  And while they could once afford to lure them with roses, honey, or $100 bills, or to mark cars with various objects such as zip ties or litter, they’ve now been reduced to rather pathetically begging for help.  I’m a bit disappointed that Sara didn’t describe her fantasy stalker’s vehicle as a windowless white van, though.

Unsafe for Human Consumption (#1370)

The way local media parrots copaganda in the face of clear evidence of its foolishness is utterly pathetic:

A…Sonoma County [California cop had a panic attack]…after a c[opsuck]er reported finding what [he imagined was] fentanyl.  The [suggestion was strong enough for the weak-minded cop to have psychosomatic symptoms, feeling]…lightheaded and dizzy, and experienc[ing] rapid tunnel vision, [none of which are] symptoms of…fentanyl…a[nother cop]…quickly administered naloxone, which [calmed the crybaby cop due to the placebo effect]…

A Moral Cancer (#1379)

Anyone whose brain isn’t rotted by prohibitionism could’ve predicted this:

The Biden administration’s flavored cigarettes and cigars ban, currently under final review by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), will soon make it illegal to buy or sell menthol and flavored tobacco products in the United States…its [claimed] intention [is] to prevent people, especially [imaginary] children, from becoming addicted to cigarettes…[but] a similar ban in Brazil gives us a window into the probable outcome of [this new theater in the Drug War]…In 2012…Brazil became one of the first countries in the world to fully ban flavored cigarettes…But…demand for…flavored cigarettes…only increased.  Illegal actors quickly entered the market, leading the Brazilian government to conduct dangerous raids…[which have often resulted] in bystanders being killed in the crossfire.  The Brazilian government has lost billions of dollars in enforcement and tax revenues…[and] Brazil now has one of the largest cigarette markets in the world, [because]…of…prohibition…the illegal cigarette market now represents about half of the entire cigarette market…

 

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!

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Teenage Throwback Thursday

Posted in Miscellaneous, Perception, Philosophy, The Dark Side, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on November 2, 2023| Leave a Comment »

The lurid, sensationalized tragedy porn narratives that make up the body of “sex trafficking” mythology are nothing more than Gothic horror tales that opportunists pretend are real.  –  “Unreal Horrors”

Every…sex-work[er]…has had clients fall for her; it’s a natural outgrowth of a situation in which a lonely man spends a lot of time in the company of a beautiful, alluring woman who only shows him her best side.  –  “Out of Bounds”

You are going to die.  Soon.  And there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.  –  “Thanatopsis”

Sex and death are but two sides of the same coin:  the former is the door through which we enter the world, and the latter the door through which we leave it.  –  “Eros and Thanatos”

That experience of being a stranger in one’s own community, of being treated like a living oracle, like a weird visitor back from the underworld with divine wisdom to share…that, I think, is the experience which defines the old.
–  “Let There Be Dark”

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Newsworthy

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, Perception, Tyranny, tagged , , , on October 16, 2023| 2 Comments »

At the beginning of the pandemic, the news was so dominated by it that there really weren’t many items for my news columns (other than the undermining and/or outright violations of civil liberties politicians used the pandemic to justify).  So a couple of weeks in, I wrote:

…it’s become difficult to fill my news columns due to the pandemic; nobody’s talking about anything else (even though there are definitely other things to talk about), so there just aren’t enough stories to feature (because I have even less interest in writing a column about stupid epidemic memes than you have in reading one).  So for the time being, I’m rationing news items to seven per news column (instead of the usual nine to thirteen) until I start noticing the number of fresh items has increased again…

Three and a half years later, I’m still at seven per column, and have no intention of expanding that even though I probably could pretty easily average about nine.  The reason is very similar to the one for no longer writing full essays on the occasions I used to observe with polemics: too much repetition runs the risk of this blog degenerating into irrelevance.  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.  Nor do I need to amplify the voices of others writing on this topic any longer; they seem quite capable of attracting attention themselves, and there are plenty of good articles by sex workers and about sex worker issues all over the internet every week.  So I’m content for the time being to keep things as they are, maintaining a comfortable pace until such time as I decide to make another in the long series of adjustments I’ve made to keep things going for the past thirteen years.

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Throwback Thursday Meets the Wolf Man

Posted in Miscellaneous, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , on October 12, 2023| Leave a Comment »

The [“sex trafficking”] panic can’t last much longer, but I shudder to think which new imaginary menace the statists will dream up next to replace it.  –  “All-Purpose Excuse”

This being 21st-century America, what used to be called “stupid kids being stupid” is now called “terrorism”.
–  “Send in the Clowns”

One can believe in souls or gods without the silly notion that stiffs need to be cherished like treasured keepsakes for the next 5 billion years.  –  “Taking Out the Trash”

[Many] men…labor under the delusion…that most women are able to climax dependably if only their partner does everything “right”, as though a woman’s body were a video game which spits out the prize called “orgasm” once the player reaches a high enough total of points.  –  “Why Fake?“

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In the News (#1380)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on October 11, 2023| Leave a Comment »

The implication is that [edible] manufacturers want to trick kids into getting high, although it’s not clear why that would be a sensible business strategy.  –  Jacob Sullum

Bottleneck

Worldwide, over 90% of whores prefer to work illegally than submit to “registration”:

The Dutch Cabinet’s plan to register sex workers…will…worsen their situation, the Dutch Data Protection Authority (AP) warned…The Cabinet’s proposal would allow municipalities to [demand]…sex workers…register their personal data, and to require businesses operating in the space to force their workers to do the same.  The Cabinet [justified] the [scheme by barfing out that all-purpose excuse for violating women’s rights, “]human trafficking[“, but in reality]…sex workers would wind up plying their trade underground “for fear of registration and loss of privacy.”  As a result, they would fall out of view of authorities…

Law of the Instrument (#974)

In a moral panic, ordinary business arrangements get spun into “exploitation” and “crime”:

[Mike Jeffries,] the ex-CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch and his British partner [Matthew Smith]…used a middleman to find young men for…events, [and now eight] of [them] allege…they were exploited or abused…the couple’s middleman denied any wrongdoing and said men went into these events “with their eyes wide open”.  Abercrombie & Fitch…[bloviated pearl-clutching nonsense against Jeffries to protect its] brand…Two former US prosecutors…have called for an investigation to determine whether charges for sex trafficking could be brought…

The Clueless Leading the Hysterical (#1185)

Why do so many morons refuse to grasp that nobody is going to give expensive cannabis edibles to their spawn for free?

It’s October, which means it is time for alarmist cops and credulous reporters to start [attempt]ing [to panic] parents about the purported menace of cannabis edibles in trick-or-treat bags.  KSNT…in Topeka, Kansas, got a jump on that annual rite last month, when it amplified a “community advisory” from the…[local cop shop] about “THC-infused gummies and snacks marketed to children ahead of the holidays”…

Without Let or Hindrance (#1303)

These abuses are finally getting the attention they’ve needed for a generation:

It’s hard to overstate how little mainstream news attention has been paid to…problems with the [“child welfare”] system, which…is more akin to law enforcement than social services, given its ability to surveil parents and hand down the ultimate punishment — terminating the legal bonds between parent and child.  Families ensnared in the system lack many basic due process rights in navigating a punitive bureaucracy, and they typically don’t receive a lawyer until the state seeks temporary or permanent custody of their child in court.  Regardless, children…aren’t actually made safer; the rates of maltreatment for children in foster care are abysmal, and research has repeatedly found that children who enter the system fare worse on multiple measures than children left in their homes…

Unsafe for Human Consumption (#1304)

If you didn’t foresee where this was going, you haven’t been paying attention:

A woman has been [condemn]ed to life in [a cage] after [a gang of whiny-baby cops had panic attacks while rooting through]…Jessica Thomas[‘ possessions without her permission after using]…a…traffic stop [as a pretext]…Douglas County sheriff Dan Coverley [spouted a lot of pseudoscientific nonsense about an “]increase in pressure from transporting the drugs from low elevation to high elevation[” somehow magically changing the physical and chemical properties]…of…fentanyl [so it would behave as cops imagine it does rather than as it actually does in the real world]…

Checklist (#1363)

Airlines:  do you really want to keep accepting liability for employees racially profiling passengers due to the government propaganda you force-feed them?

American Airlines has apologized to a Black musician who…was [harassed using the asinine pretext] that he was trafficking his own children, [based solely on their being] biracial…David Ryan Harris…and two of his children, Truman, 12, and Hendrix, 7, were flying…from Atlanta to Los Angeles on Sept. 15…[when an air hostess started peppering] his children [with nosy] questions…After the plane landed, Mr. Harris…and his children were [confronted] at the top of the jet bridge by an American Airlines employee and [a pack of] four [scowling cops]…They…were eventually allowed to continue on to the baggage claim area, but were not given an apology….[until] he p[ublicized the harassment on] Instagram…

Permanent Record (#1379)

I can’t feel sorry for someone whose job is ruining lives for violating arbitrary diktats when they get in trouble due to a similar diktat:

The Minneapolis Police Department is looking into a [female cop] who moonlights as an OnlyFans model.  [Local news] is not identifying the [cop, though they would never extend the same courtesy to any other sex worker]…

 

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!

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In the News (#1379)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on October 7, 2023| Leave a Comment »

[Amazon’s] assurance[s]…should…be greeted with a lot of skepticism.  –  John Davisson

Stalkers in Blue

Sleeping with a cop is one of the most dangerous things a woman can do:

In 2014, Bryan Bailey, the sheriff of Rankin County, Miss., [told]…the local district attorney’s office…he needed grand jury subpoenas…to force the phone company to turn over records of calls and text messages for what he [pretended was] a “confidential internal investigation…[of a] school district employee.”  But…[in actuality he abused] the power of a grand jury at least eight times over a year to spy on his married girlfriend and the school employee with whom she was also “unfaithful”…the district attorney at the time, Michael Guest…decided he could not pursue the case further because of conflicts of interest…[but] told two local judges…and passed his investigation on to the state attorney general…no one questioned the sheriff or conducted a full investigation…For seven years, every [politician] who learned of the allegations kept them secret from the public, leaving citizens of Rankin County in the dark, even as they twice voted to re-elect Sheriff Bailey.  He is on the verge of another re-election…facing no opponent in November…

Eavesdropping (#1183)

Amazon also eagerly hands data from internet-connected devices to cops:

Amazon announced new [machine learning] capabilities for its Alexa products last week, based on a model it’s calling AlexaLLM (LLM refers to the “large language model”).  The technology will make Alexa “more personalized to your family” and allow it to remember relevant context throughout conversations…But along with those new capabilities…Amazon would use some user voice interactions with Alexa to train its [ML] model…by agreeing to use a more “customized” version of Alexa, users would be volunteering their voice data and conversations for Amazon’s LLM training purposes.  It’s not clear how much voice data is actually necessary to train Amazon’s models and to what degree it might be used for other purposes [such as handing it to cops without even requiring a warrant]…

Thought Control (#1226)

Idaho newspaper approvingly reports sheriff appointing himself chief library censor:

Kootenai County Sheriff Bob Norris…[barged into several] libraries…[with intent to intimidate librarians, bringing] along a video camera…he [decided to steal two books, named]…Deal With It!…and…Identical…[he then issued a babble-filled statement including words and phrases including “]sexually explicit[“…”]inappropriate[“, “harmful to minors”, and “protect children”, bloviated about an unconstitutional censorship bill wisely]…vetoed by Gov. Brad Little…[which] would have allowed a parent or legal guardian to sue a school or library for [a bounty of] $2,500…[then bizarrely pontificated on child psychology (even though he is not a child psychologist), and sexual health (though he is neither a therapist nor healthcare professional), threatened librarians with]…criminal [charges]…equate[d books]…to providing children with alcohol or drugs…[equated both adolescents and] the elderly…[with small] children[, and declared he would not return the books he stole]…

Cops and Robbers (#1287)

Who could have guessed that making a hobby of accusing strangers of felonies could be dangerous?

A [Michigan] man who [made a hobby of accusing people of being]…child [molesters for social media clout] was shot to death…[after accusing two teenagers] at a restaurant…Robert Wayne Lee…confronted [the] two [boys]…and punched [the 18-year-old, who]…pulled a knife…while the [17-year-old]…pulled a gun, shooting Lee several times.  The two…fled [but were]…arrested [the next day]…Lee…[was radicalized by] online videos by a group called Dads Against Predators…[who in turn] modeled their videos on…Chris Hanson’s “To Catch a Predator” segments on NBC’s Dateline news show [which were cancelled after Hanson and company caused the suicide of a Texas politician they tried to humiliate on TV despite his refusal to walk into their trap].  Lee…recorded online conversations and his in-person confrontations with the [people he accused]…In some videos, he can be seen [vandalizing his target’s]…tires to prevent them from driving off…he’[s]…mistakenly identified at least one person as a suspect, who was later cleared…

Permanent Record (#1354)

If prohibitionists really want to “rescue” sex workers, why do they keep shutting us out of other jobs?

A Missouri school district suspended a high school English teacher…after someone outed her as an OnlyFans creator…The teacher does not know who notified the school district about her account, “but she suspects it was after she and her husband appeared in a recent video alongside two other OnlyFans performers in St. Louis who have a substantial following”…she [only] made about $42,000 last year at her teaching job, and…she and her husband earned an additional $8,000 to $10,000 per month performing on OnlyFans…

To Molest and Rape (#1373)

There is nothing “shocking” about a cop abusing a minor or anyone else:

…a [California cop named]…Matthew Dessert…is facing serious charges of sexual and physical abuse of a minor…for around five years…[starting when she was 9 and continuing until] 14…[when she told] a school counselor…[about] the abuse…

A Moral Cancer (#1374)

Anyone whose brain isn’t rotted by prohibitionism could’ve predicted this:

Legal restrictions on the flavors of nicotine vaping products are associated with increased cigarette purchases, according to a new paper that analyzes retail sales data from 44 states.  For each fewer 0.7-milliliter nicotine pod sold in jurisdictions with such policies, the analysis found, consumers bought 15 more cigarettes.  “That tradeoff,” the authors note, “equates to over a pack…per pod for the size of current leading products” such as the Vuse Alto, which uses 1.8-milliliter pods…this…underlines the folly of trying to protect public health by deterring the use of electronic nicotine delivery systems…which are far less hazardous than combustible cigarettes…

 

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!

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