A Good Use of Religious Freedom Laws

When you heard the phrase “religious freedom laws” your mind probably jumps to thoughts of business owners discriminating against patrons based on their sexual orientation. That has been the primary motivation of the politicians who passed these laws and the angle being covered by the press. But these laws can also be used for good. Let’s take the state’s war against the homeless as an example. One woman has cited a religious freedom law in response to the state trying to stop her from feeding the homeless:

Joan Cheever of San Antonio has been serving meals to the city’s homeless for 10 years. But last week, police officers handed her a ticket with a potential fine of $2,000. Despite having a food permit for the food truck she cooks out of, which she calls the Chow Train, she was cited for transporting and serving it from a different vehicle.

But that hasn’t stopped her from continuing to hand out three-course meals to the homeless. On Friday, she went back to Maverick Park with 50 supporters to hand out food, and this time she wasn’t ticketed. Cheever has argued that she has a right to feed the homeless under Texas’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act because she considers it exercising her religious beliefs.

Christianity teaches compassion for the poor and afflicted so it’s not extent to claim feeding the homeless is a protected act under religious freedom laws. Now the question becomes whether the state will find and act that goes against its interest a lawful act of religious freedom.

Metal and Antistatism

Anarchism and metal are like fish and water. Metal has a long history of counterculture and antistatism. In fact in many areas of the world metal is illegal but bands exist anyways (proving once again that laws can’t control behavior). Vice recently did an interview with members of Al-Namrood. Al-Namrood, for those who are unfamiliar with Middle Eastern metal, is a Saudi Arabian black metal band. They’re worth nothing not only for their music but also for the fact that they stand the real chance of being executed for playing their music:

Black metal bands have never been keen on religion. However, in parts of the world where religion can actually be oppressive, bands inspired by Bathory and Mayhem and Burzum are few and far between.

That’s presumably because it’s a lot easier to be in an anti-Christian metal band in the US, than in an anti-Islamic metal band in Saudi Arabia. In America, your obstacles extend to overhearing your mom tell a friend you’re just “going through a phase.” In Saudi Arabia, you face social ostracism and the possibility of imprisonment or death.

With that in mind, you’ve got to give it to Saudi Arabia’s only black metal band, Al-Namrood, whose lyrics include all sorts of things that could get them executed. I got in touch with guitarist and bassist Mephisto for a chat.

It’s an interesting interview. Al-Namrood is one of those bands that I look up to for its willingness to give a giant middle finger to the state. It also gives me hope because even the oppressive Saudi government can’t find the members of Al-Namrood. If an oppressive regime such as Saudi Arabia can’t find a single band that sells physical merchandise then there’s hope for all of us agorists.

Using Copyright Laws to Push Independent Mechanics Out of the Market

You have two options when your out of warranty vehicle needs repairs. Option one is to spend a small fortune taking your vehicle to the certified dealer and having their mechanics fix it. The other option is to spend far less money and either repair it yourself or take it to an independent mechanic. Because automobile manufacturers make tons of money off repairing the vehicles they sell they have a direct interest in locking out independent mechanics (both professional and hobbyists).

It’s difficult to lock people out of purely mechanical devices. Any part on a car can be fabricated with enough machining tools and many people rely on this fact to restore old vehicles. But computer technology is offering automobile manufacturers an option to legally lock out independent mechanics through copyright law:

Allowing them to continue to fix their cars has become “legally problematic,” according to a written statement from the Auto Alliance, the main lobbying arm of automakers.

The dispute arises from a section of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that no one thought could apply to vehicles when it was signed into law in 1998. But now, in an era where cars are rolling computing platforms, the U.S. Copyright Office is examining whether provisions of the law that protect intellectual property should prohibit people from modifying and tuning their cars.

[…]

In comments submitted so far, automakers have expressed concern that allowing outsiders to access electronic control units that run critical vehicle functions like steering, throttle inputs and braking “leads to an imbalance by which the negative consequences far outweigh any suggested benefits,” according to the Alliance of Global Automakers. In the worst cases, the organizations said an exemption for enthusiasts “leads to disastrous consequences.”

If automobile manufacturers are allowed to charge people who modify a vehicle’s electronics it opens the door for locking independent mechanics out of the automobile repair business. All it would take is including some rudimentary electronics on every major component of a vehicle (which often exist already) and require it to receive the proper digital signature from the on-board computer to operate. Then, in order for the vehicle to start, the manufacturer can set a requirement that each part must transmit the proper digital signature to the on-board computer. If any part or the on-board computer fails to provide the proper digital signature the car can simply refuse to start (for security purposes, of course).

By holding the private keys to create the correct digital signatures an automobile manufacturer could tightly control who can and cannot create parts for their vehicles. It could also control who it is willing to supply parts to. Right now investing so much money into implementing such a scheme is pointless because there’s no recourse for manufacturers to take against those who modify the electronics. That would change quickly if they could charge anybody who modifies the electronics of a vehicle under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Then they could get the state to go after anybody who modifies a vehicle’s electronics for them. Anybody who modifies the electronics on a vehicle would then face serious cage time and fines at little cost to the manufacturer.

Officer Safety

Police officers like to justify their trigger happy nature but uttering the magical words “officer safety”. When an officer beats and unarmed man to death? Officer safety! When 10 officers unload 1,000 rounds into a truck that wasn’t even being driven by a suspect? Officer safety! What happens when officer safety puts officers at risk though? That’s what happened when a group of Miami police officers when all officer safety on a couple unarmed individuals:

As the car was wedged helplessly between a light pole and a tree, nearly a minute passed before officers opened up – firing approximately 50 bullets at the car and the two unarmed men inside the vehicle.

The two men inside the car survived that initial volley of gunfire, according to witnesses, who said they could see the men moving inside the Volvo. Everything went quiet for nearly two minutes before the officers opened up a second time – unleashing an unrelenting torrent of bullets that lasted almost 25 seconds. By the time it was over, the two men inside the car were dead.

CBS4 News has learned a total of 23 officers fired a total of at least 377 rounds.

Nothing unusual about this story, right? But wait, there’s more:

Montesano and Valdes were killed by the dozens of rounds that tore through their bodies.

But Montesano and Valdes weren’t the only ones struck – two Miami Dade police officers were hit as well – caught in the crossfire. One officer was shot in the arm and the second was hit in the arm and grazed in the head. If the bullet had struck just a half an inch to the side the officer would have been killed.

The officers were going officer safety so hard on the unarmed suspects that they ended up hitting two of their own in the crossfire. Considering this was the unloading of 377 rounds into two unarmed suspects really defensible under the magical words “officer safety”?

Don’t Stay at Motel 6

As a general principle I avoid doing business with snitches. What this means is that I don’t do business with individuals or organizations that I know voluntarily hand over customer information to law enforcement personnel (I understand they can’t do much about it when a warrant is issued though). This isn’t a big deal since most businesses aren’t handing over customer lists to local law enforcers. Motel 6, on the other hand, has decided to do exactly that:

WARWICK, R.I. — City police have arrested four people staying at the Motel 6 on Jefferson Boulevard as a result of the hotel chain’s agreement to provide police with a daily guest list, Mayor Scott Avedisian said Tuesday.

The names of Motel 6 guests, which police then check for outstanding warrants, is one of five steps Motel 6 corporate managers agreed to take in response to a string of high-profile incidents and concerns the establishment was becoming a haven for passing criminals.

The other measures listed in an agreement Motel 6 executives signed Tuesday include raising the minimum age to rent a room from 18 years old to 21, hiring a police detail every night, sharing their national “do not rent list” with police and conducting regular training, including on how to spot human trafficking.

I don’t understand this strategy. To alleviate concerns that Motel 6 is a haven for passing criminals the company is going to get more deeply involved with the biggest gang of criminals wherever it operates. That doesn’t make sense. But it looks like a good deal for the gangs. In addition to receiving customer lists the local agencies are looking to make some extra cash on the side since Motel 6 will be hiring officers for “protection”.

Mind you, I’ve never really planned to stay at a Motel 6 before but I will make sure to avoid the chain wherever I travel. The last thing I’m going to do is hand over cash to a company that has gotten into bed with the most dangerous local gangs.

The Eschaton Has Been Immanentized

Michelle Bachmann has good news for us all. The Eschaton has been immanentized! That’s right, Jesus is coming back:

Former Congresswoman Michele Bachmann (R-MN) predicted in a recent interview that President Barack Obama’s handling of the Middle East was a sign of the End Times and that Jesus Christ would soon return to Earth.

[…]

But even though Bachmann lamented that Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran was “pro the goals of Islamic jihad,” she said that the coming End Times were a reason to celebrate.

“These are not fearful times, these are the most exciting days in history,” she insisted. “Talk about what you see in the newspaper. We can talk about God’s time clock and the fact that Jesus Christ’s return is imminent. Is there anything more important to talk about?”

Jesus is coming back and Obama is responsible. Thanks, Obama! As A Geek With Guns exclusive I’ve also obtained a photograph of behind the scenes of the Iranian nuclear negotiations:

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Murdered Over a Broken Taillight

The murder of Walter Scott is receiving a lot of much needed media coverage. Thanks to the fact the murdered, Officer Michael Slager, was filmed this case didn’t get swept underneath the rug like so many others. It should serve as a reminder that people should always film any police encounter they’re involved in or are witnessing. But there’s one fact about this case that’s not receiving enough media attention, the event that lead to Scott’s murder:

The confrontation occurred around 9:30 a.m. ET on Saturday after Slager pulled over Scott’s car because of a broken taillight.

A man is dead because our rulers have deemed it acceptable to send armed thugs after people with broken equipment. Broken taillights are a simple matter to solve without pulling people over. Each vehicle has a unique license plate number that identifies it. If an officer sees a car with a broken taillight they could just look up who the vehicle is registered to, something they routinely do when they pull somebody over, and send them a letter informing them that their taillight is broken. Instead officers are allowed to turn on their loud sirens and flashy attention whore lights, force drivers to pull over to the side of the road, and waddle their heavily armed and often aggressive asses over to the driver to terrify them for a bit before issuing them a citation.

Walter Scott would almost certainly still be alive today if broken taillights weren’t grounds for officers to initiate force against motorists. In addition to being a remind of police brutality this story is also a reminder than any police encounter, regardless of how minor the offense that preceded the encounter was, can escalate to deadly force.

You Can’t Stop the Signal

Two days ago a giant bust of Edward Snowden was found perched atop the Prison Ship Martyrs’ Monument in Fort Greene Park. The sculpture was of the best sort, illicit. It didn’t take long for the authorities to coverup and then remove Snowden from the park, which sent a more prominent message than anything else they could have done. But the signal can’t be stopped. Yesterday a different group of artists created a hologram of Snowden at the site of the previous sculpture:

NEW YORK — Hours after police removed an illicit bust of Edward Snowden from its perch in a Brooklyn park on Monday, artists replaced it with a hologram.

The group of artists — who collectively call themselves “The Illuminator” and are not related to the trio behind the original sculpture — used laptops and projection equipment to cast an image of Snowden in a haze of smoke at the spot where the sculpture once stood.

They say the action was a message of defiance aimed at the authorities who “censored” the piece, according to a tumblr post.

I believe if anybody is deserving of a monument it’s Snowden. He belongs to that rare breed of people willing to risk it all to bring our rulers’ dirty laundry to light. Someday I hope a monument of him and Chelsea Manning are erected in dedication to the idea that breaking the law is sometimes the most heroic thing one can do.

Defrauding Advertisers

Since I have a lot of libertarian friends it’s no surprise that I see a lot of articles posted on a websites called the Libertarian Republic on my news feed. Personally I have avoided linking to the site with one exception. This is because the site has the atrocious practice of creating top 10 (or whatever arbitrary number they choose) lists where each item is on a separate page. That means you have to click 10 fucking buttons to get through the entire list. I always knew this tactic was to artificially raise the number of page clicks to game advertisers but I never though I’d see one of the administrators of the site so brazenly admit to it. The site recently posted a bullshit top 10 list of reasons why Rand Paul should be elected president (when the site says libertarian it means statist libertarian, which is why I don’t read it). On the site’s Facebook page somebody asked why these top 10 lists always require 10 goddamn clicks to get through and one of the admins chimed in:

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So the site is planning on charging readers to see top 10 lists on a single page. I don’t fault the admins of the site for wanting money and see nothing wrong with charging for a service. However the admin’s followup lead me to ask another question:

defrauding-advertisers-2

Aren’t the Libertarian Republic’s advertisers customers? Isn’t artificially raising the number of page clicks by requiring readers to click 10 times to read a single article defrauding those customers? When you think about it the Libertarian Republic is selling its customers a lot of clicks without providing as many potential readers. Since a site admin claims they care so deeply about customers wouldn’t you think the site would not try to artificially increase the number of clicks by shamefully cutting up top 10 lists into 10 separate pages?

If I were an advertiser on that site I would be a bit miffed that clicks were being inflated through this practice. I might even consider it an act of fraud if sale units of ads were purchased on a per click basis.

Again, I don’t fault the site administrators for trying to make a buck. I do find their claim of being interested in customers a bit dubious when they split top 10 lists up like this specifically to sell more ads though. And if they treat their advertiser customers like this then what incentive do I have to buy a subscription (not that I would since I’m not interested in paying for another statist rag)?

That Should Teach Those Kids a Lesson

Kids make stupid mistakes. In the old days before an all pervasive police state parents usually handled correcting their children’s bad behavior. Today the police try to involve themselves in all matters including children acting stupidly. A group of children from Chicago recorded themselves having sex and uploaded it to Twitter. Police found out and decided to intervene. How did they handle the situation? By kidnapping them and charging them for manufacturing child pornography, of course:

Four Chicago-area teenagers faces felony child-pornography charges after uploading a video of themselves having sex to Twitter. The three boys and one girl, ages 14-16, are being held in juvenile custody until a court hearing later this month.

Both the sex and the posting of the video were consensual—this is not a rape or “revenge porn” scenario. But under Illinois law (as in many other states), minors who post sexually-oriented images of themselves online or even share them privately with one another can be charged as child pornographers.

That should teach those kids a lesson. A felony record will ensure they are never able to get a job and that will likely push them towards a life of crime to survive. Since they would be living a life of crime they would likely have continuous run-ins with the police as they check in and out of jail like some traveling salespeople do hotels. This will ensure that the state has a unending source of forced labor and us tax victims will be forced to pay for their housing, clothing, food, and medical care.

OK, now it’s time to be serious for a moment. Making kids felons is not an appropriate way of handling these types of situations. Felonies haunt people for life and labeling somebody a felon before they even have a chance to get a job is fucked up. This is especially true when you consider kids make really stupid decisions because they lack the life experience necessary not to. But bullshit like this will continue to happen so long as police are allowed to involve themselves in situations that really should be handled by parents.