Tag: police state

Utah Bans Polygraph Tests for Those Reporting Sexual Assault

For years, Utah allowed government officials to do something other states banned: ask a person who reports a sexual assault to take a polygraph test.

That will change soon. Earlier this month, state lawmakers passed a bill that prohibits police and other government officials from requesting polygraph tests for alleged sex assault victims. Gov. Spencer Cox signed it into law on Thursday, and it goes into effect in May. 

Experts say these tests are known to be especially unreliable with victims of sexual abuse. That’s because victims may have stress and anxiety recounting their assault that the polygraph may interpret as deception. Other states don’t allow them to be used with assault victims for this reason.

It took two years and three legislative sessions for Utah state Rep. Angela Romero, the House minority leader, to get the bill across the finish line. When she first sponsored it in 2024, she cited reporting from The Salt Lake Tribune and ProPublica as she told her fellow legislators the damaging effects polygraph tests can have on people who are reporting sexual abuse. 

In the case covered by the news outlets, state licensors asked a man to take a polygraph test after he reported that his therapist, Scott Owen, had touched him inappropriately. The test results indicated he was being deceptive, and that led the patient to drop his complaint. Owen was allowed to continue to practice for two more years, until others came forward with similar allegations. Owen is now in prison after admitting he sexually abused patients.

Romero said in a recent interview that she was determined to bring the bill back for that former patient.

“For me, it was really specifically for that one individual who was not believed,” Romero said, “and then their perpetrator went on to harm other people.”

Cox signed the legislation during a small ceremony at his office, telling Romero that she “has been such a champion, and made a difference and saved lives.” The governor also nodded to The Tribune and ProPublica’s reporting driving change.

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Friendly Fire: British Army to Punish Soldiers Writing Satirical Songs as Morale Plunges

British Army soldiers have been reprimanded for lampooning the low morale among troops amid warnings from the top brass that they would likely be wiped out if a major war broke out.

A British Army Major was “summoned for a telling off” after it was revealed that he created a satirical song reflecting on the official position of senior officers that, should a big war come, they in the “first echelon” would have to be quickly replaced with new recruits if the country had a hope of winning the conflict.

The song, which quickly spread among the personal mobile devices of serving soldiers, expressed in its chorus and final verse:

…we keep on getting told that wars are won by the second and third echelon, but fuck that because we’re in the first one.

But don’t worry about it… because we’re all dying in the first wave.

Don’t think about the tactics or question the plan, there’s no kit but the [NATO Allied Rapid Reaction Corps] all over it so bring back the glory days and earn the parade of our coffins…

The line speaks both to a recent remarkable speech by General Sir Patrick Sanders about the inevitability of the “first echelon” of the British Army being expected to suffer badly should a major war come, and the institutional memory of when exactly the same fate befell soldiers in the First and Second World Wars.

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City that never sleeps to get 11 pm lights out order under Dem NY state lawmaker proposal

A proposed bill from a New York state lawmaker could dramatically change the nighttime atmosphere of New York City, potentially leaving landmarks like the Empire State Building and nearly half of the city dark after 11 pm.

Manhattan assemblywoman Deborah Glick has sponsored the “Dark Skies Protection Act,” which would require many businesses and residential buildings in New York City to turn off non-essential lighting between 11 pm and 5 am. The proposal aims to reduce energy consumption, cut down on light pollution, and protect migratory birds.

According to the legislation, its goal is to “preserve and enhance the state’s dark sky while promoting safety for people, birds and other wildlife, conserving energy and reducing our carbon footprint, and preserving the aesthetic qualities of the night sky.”

“Our ancestors were able to experience a night sky full of stars, but now 80% of Americans can no longer see the Milky Way and experience its profound beauty,” the bill states. “Exposure to excess artificial light can disrupt the body’s natural circadian rhythms – causing changes to brain wave patterns, hormone production, cell regulation, and other biologic activities.”

If passed, the measure would take effect in 2028. The bill includes exemptions for lighting “used for travel and public safety would be exempt.” However, the proposal has drawn criticism from those who argue that reduced lighting could lead to increased crime, including theft and gang-related activity.

“I guess Glick wants to push one last ridiculous idea before she retires,” said NYS Conservative Party chairman Gerard Kassar, according to The New York Post.

Despite the concerns, Glick appears to be prioritizing environmental concerns. The bill notes that 70 percent of bird species migrate annually, with 80 percent migrating at night using the night sky for navigation. Bright city lights, the bill argues, can disorient birds and lead to fatal collisions.

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The Age Verification Con

Politicians on both sides of the Atlantic are competing to look tough on Silicon Valley. They hold hearings, write bills, and pose for photographs with parents who say their kids’ lives were ruined by social media algorithms they somehow couldn’t pull them away from.

The cause is protecting children from social media, and it supposedly polls so well that it has achieved something almost unheard of in modern politics: genuine bipartisan consensus. Republicans and Democrats in Washington. Labour and Conservatives in Westminster. The Australian parliament voted the whole thing through with barely a whisper of dissent.

There is just one problem with the narrative. The tech giants these politicians claim to be fighting are spending record sums to help them do it. And the tool they have all converged on, age verification, is not really about checking whether someone is 15 or 16. It is the architecture for a verified internet, one where anonymous access is replaced by identity checkpoints, and where using a social media account, downloading an app, or browsing a website requires you to show your papers first.

The campaign is presented as protecting children. The infrastructure being built will apply to everyone.

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SCOTUS Rejects Citizen Journalist’s Case Against Officials Who Arrested Her for Asking Police Questions

Priscilla Villarreal built a following in the way modern news often grows now. Not through printing presses or broadcast towers, but through a Facebook page that drew more than 200,000 people into its orbit.

In Laredo, Texas, under the name La Gordiloca, she reported quickly, conversationally, sometimes uncomfortably close to the raw edge of events.

In 2017, she texted a police officer to confirm the identities of two victims, one from a suicide, one from a car accident. She received answers. She published them.

Months later, she was arrested.

The law used against her had been sitting unused for 23 years. It makes it a felony to solicit nonpublic information from a government official “with intent to obtain a benefit.”

In Villarreal’s case, authorities argued that the benefit was popularity, more followers, more attention, more reach.

In other words, doing well at the job became the job’s alleged crime.

A state judge dismissed the charges, finding the statute too vague to stand. That might have sounded like a resolution, the system correcting itself in the end.

Instead, it became the beginning of a second act.

Villarreal filed a civil rights lawsuit against the officials involved in her arrest. The response was immediate and familiar within legal circles: “Qualified immunity.”

The doctrine protects government officials from liability unless there is already a court decision declaring nearly identical conduct unconstitutional.

No case had ever addressed the idea of arresting a journalist for asking a question over text.

A three-judge panel initially sided with Villarreal, stating, “If the First Amendment means anything, it surely means that a citizen journalist has the right to ask a public official a question, without fear of being imprisoned. Yet that is exactly what happened here: Priscilla Villarreal was put in jail for asking a police officer a question. If that is not an obvious violation of the Constitution, it’s hard to imagine what would be.”

The clarity of that statement did not last.

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New Israeli policy targeting Christian schools in Jerusalem could threaten their future existence

The Israeli government instituted a policy prohibiting Christian Palestinian teachers who live in the West Bank from working in any of the 15 Christian schools in Jerusalem in a move that threatens to weaken the two-millennia presence of Christians in the Holy City.

School principals in Jerusalem recently received letters from the Israeli Ministry of Education stipulating that beginning in September they are required to only hire teachers who reside in the city and hold Israeli-issued qualifications.

The March 10 directive comes in the wake of a bill approved last July by the Education Committee of the Knesset (the Israeli parliament) aimed at prohibiting Palestinian teachers who earned their degrees at institutions in the West Bank from teaching in Israel or the occupied East Jerusalem.

Therefore, work permits for Christian Palestinian teachers living in the West Bank will no longer be granted despite their possessing a green card that allows individual Palestinians to work and travel within Israeli-controlled areas.

According to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), this restriction will affect almost 230 Christian teachers at 15 schools in Jerusalem, relegating them to the financial hardship of unemployment.

A representative of the General Secretariat of Christian Schools (GSCS) in the Holy Land told ACN that the new policy threatens the future of Christian education in the Holy City.

Additionally, he said, “If this decision is truly implemented, our Christian schools will find themselves in a very difficult position, which will jeopardize their sustainability and cause them to lose their Christian mission.”

The GSCS representative, who spoke on condition of anonymity, explained, “There are not enough Christian teachers in Jerusalem to take over. In the long term, these restrictions risk permanently affecting the Christian character of our institutions and weakening the Christian faith and presence in the city.”

With most of these Christian schools having been founded in the late 19th century, they have educated hundreds of thousands of students, both Christian and Muslim, throughout the decades.

According to ACN, they were established “to promote Christian education and to preserve the Faith and the Christian presence in Jerusalem,” and “have played an essential role at national and interreligious levels.”

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Finland’s Supreme Court Convicts Parliamentarian for 2004 Church Pamphlet “Insulting” Gay People

Finland’s Supreme Court has found parliamentarian Päivi Räsänen guilty of “hate speech” for “insulting” gay people by expressing her beliefs on marriage and sexual ethics in a church pamphlet from 2004. ADF International, which is supporting Räsänen, has more.

In a narrow 3-2 decision, the Finnish Supreme Court has found parliamentarian Päivi Räsänen guilty of “hate speech” on one charge relating to the expression of her beliefs on marriage and sexual ethics in a 20 year-old church pamphlet. Räsänen has been criminally convicted for publishing the 2004 pamphlet for her church, alongside Lutheran Bishop Juhana Pohjola. The conviction is for “making and keeping available to the public a text that insults a group”. The Supreme Court unanimously acquitted Räsänen for her 2019 Bible verse tweet.  

Räsänen was previously unanimously acquitted on all charges by two lower courts. 

The long serving parliamentarian and former Minister of the Interior has been convicted for “hate speech” under a section of the Finnish criminal code titled “war crimes and crimes against humanity”. The medical doctor and grandmother of 12 was tried in early 2022 and again in 2023 for expressing her beliefs in a 2019 tweet, which included a Bible verse, in addition to a 2019 radio debate and 2004 church booklet.  

After the prosecutor appealed for a third time, the Supreme Court, which heard the case in October 2025, has now ruled on two of the three original charges: concerning the tweet and the church booklet. The Supreme Court was not asked to rule on the radio debate as the prosecution did not appeal it, so Räsänen’s acquittal for the debate stands. 

“I am shocked and profoundly disappointed that the court has failed to recognise my basic human right to freedom of expression. I stand by the teachings of my Christian faith, and will continue to defend my and every person’s right to share their convictions in the public square,” stated Päivi Räsänen after receiving the judgment.

“I am taking legal advice on a possible appeal to the European Court of Human Rights. This is not about my free speech alone, but that of every person in Finland. A positive ruling would help to prevent other innocent people from experiencing the same ordeal for simply sharing their beliefs,” added Räsänen.  

The Court found Räsänen and the Bishop guilty for having “made available to the public and kept available to the public opinions that insult homosexuals as a group on the basis of their sexual orientation”. It held that: “It must be taken into account that the text forming the basis for the conviction did not contain incitement to violence or comparable threat-like fomenting of hatred. The conduct is therefore not particularly serious in terms of the nature of the offence.”

The pamphlet was authored by Räsänen in 2004. The Court convicted her on the basis that: “After a preliminary investigation into the matter was launched in 2019, Räsänen continued to share the article on her own internet and social media pages in 2019 and 2020.”

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Apple Forces UK iPhone Age Checks in iOS 26.4

With iOS 26.4, Apple has turned every iPhone in the UK into an identity checkpoint. The update, released March 24, requires all UK users to confirm they’re 18 or older before accessing certain features and services on their Apple Account.

UK communications regulator Ofcom called it “a real win for children and families.”

The infrastructure being built is more of a problem than that framing suggests.

Apple has, without warning, placed a gatekeeper on the devices of 35 million UK users who paid good money for full-featured smartphones and now find themselves holding something closer to a supervised children’s tablet.

It’s a corporate ultimatum: hand over sensitive personal data or lose functionality you already paid for.

The verification prompt appears immediately after the update installs.

Apple checks whether your account already has a credit card linked or whether the account has existed long enough to establish you as an adult.

For many existing users, the process is essentially automatic. For everyone else, the options narrow quickly: link a credit card, scan a government-issued photo ID, or accept that your account defaults to teen restrictions, with Apple’s Web Content Filter and Communication Safety features switched on across all browsers and messaging apps and FaceTime, monitoring communications.

Web Content Filter blocks websites Apple classifies as explicit, operating across Safari and third-party browsers alike.

Communication Safety scans incoming and outgoing images and videos for nudity. Both activate silently for anyone who hasn’t cleared the adult threshold. Skip verification, or lack a credit card and a government ID, and Apple decides what you’re allowed to see.

Users without a credit card or government ID have no other path. Reports from UK users confirm it. Scan the card, upload the ID, or live with restricted access. The system doesn’t offer alternatives.

Ofcom praised the rollout in a statement, saying it had coordinated extensively with Apple and others on age assurance under the Online Safety Act: “Apple’s decision that the UK will be one of the first countries in the world to receive new child safety protections on devices is a real win for children and families…We’ve worked closely with Apple and other services to ensure they can be applied in a variety of contexts in order to ensure users are protected. This will build on the strong foundations of the Online Safety Act, from widespread age checks that keep young people away from harmful content, to blocking high-risk sites and stepping up action against child sexual abuse material.”

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Canada’s House of Commons passes ‘anti-Christian’ bill that would criminalize quoting Bible

The majority of Canadian MPs have voted to pass a Liberal bill that will allow the criminalization of religious expression and belief when quoting parts of the Bible, including about homosexuality and gender.

Early Wednesday evening, MPs from the Liberal Party and the Bloc Québécois, in a 186–137 vote, passed Bill C-9, known as the “Combatting Hate Act.” Conservatives, NDP, and Green Party MPs voted against the bill in a rare form of unity among the usually opposing parties.

The bill now heads to Canada’s rubber-stamp Senate for review.

A last-minute effort by the Conservatives to change the wording of the bill failed to pass.

Earlier this week, Liberal MPs forced the bill through the report stage, after earlier, as reported by LifeSiteNews, shutting down all debate on the bill in the committee stage.

In comments sent to LifeSiteNews, Campaign Life Coalition (CLC) blasted the passage of Bill C-9 and called upon “Christians and pro-life advocates to prepare for increasing hostility.”

“With the passage of Bill C-9 in the House, Christians and pro-life advocates will almost certainly face an entirely new level of hostility, as the door swings open to actual persecution under a cloak of supposed legality,” said CLC’s Campaigns Manager David Cooke, who is also a Christian pastor.

Cooke said the Bill C-9 was framed as a law going after “hate,” but, in reality, it is a bill that religious leaders from various faith communities “say could lead to hate-related charges against believers – empowers ideologically-driven police officers and judges to target, for the first time, the very word of God on matters of life, family, and faith.”

“We must prepare for the battle ahead,” said Cooke, adding Canadians must “commit” to the “One who has won the ultimate victory over every foe, demonstrated by His resurrection on that first Easter morning.”

CLC Director of Political Operations Jack Fonseca noted that Bill C-9 must be stopped in its tracks in the Senate, but admitted it will be a hard battle, as most of the senators were appointed by former Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

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WOKE AND STUPID: Maryland Democrats Push Bill That Would Require Tampons in Every Public Men’s Restroom

Democrats in Maryland have figured out a new way to waste everyone’s time and money. They want to require the placement of free tampons in all public men’s rooms.

This is another virtue signal from Democrats who just can’t stop falling all over themselves to appeal to the trans community. Who else would need a tampon in a men’s room?

This is just more proof that the Democrats learned absolutely nothing from the 2024 election. The voting public made their position on this kind of thing very clear. The Democrats just don’t care.

FOX News reports:

Maryland Dems mocked for prioritizing tampons in men’s bathrooms amid state deficit: ‘Nonsense’

Maryland Del. Kathy Szeliga, R-Baltimore County, is calling out Maryland Democrats for backing a bill that would stock tampons in men’s bathrooms in state-owned buildings — an idea she says is emblematic of Annapolis’ misplaced priorities.

Szeliga said that after she was made aware of HB 941, she took to the House floor to question which public buildings would be impacted. In particular, she wanted to know if the state’s professional sports facilities, such as where the Ravens and Orioles play, would be impacted. During her remarks, the GOP Maryland lawmaker also questioned language in the bill ordering “appropriately sized tampons” be placed in all public restrooms in all public buildings.

“What are appropriately sized tampons?” Szeliga asked, earning laughter from parts of the House. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. What do you consider appropriate?”

In response, Del. Ken Kerr, D-Fredrick County, said that the language “just means that tampons are offered, there’s no specific size.” Szeliga shot back, arguing that if that is the case, it should say so, and not talk about sizing.

Meanwhile, Szeliga then pivoted to inquire with Democrats about which public buildings would be impacted, with emphasis on the football stadium where the NFL franchise Baltimore Ravens play and the baseball stadium, Camden Yards, where the Baltimore Orioles play. According to Szeliga, both are owned by the Maryland Stadium Authority.

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