Tag: police state

Patrick Henry Argues Against Imaginary Dangers

On June 9, 1788, Patrick Henry delivered a speech at the Virginia Ratifying Convention arguing that many of the alleged crises of the time used to justify the proposed constitution were “imaginary.”

This was actually the fourth long speech Henry delivered during the convention and it builds on arguments he previously made on June 7 when he observed “it is the fortune of a free people not to be intimidated by imaginary dangers” and urged the addition of a bill of rights to the proposed Constitution. 

At the time, the United States of America was hardly a decade old. It was still struggling to pay significant debts owed to France from the War of Independence. There were also disputes with Spain over control of the Mississippi River to the west. Many Federalists believed that a new government was needed to pay off the debts to France and also effectively handle the dispute with Spain.

However, Henry pushed back against the underlying sense of urgency, while reiterating the need for a Bill of Rights.

“When I review the magnitude of the subject under consideration, and of dangers which appear to me in this new plan of government…unless there be great and awful dangers, the change is dangerous, and the experiment ought not to be made. In estimating the magnitude of these dangers, we are obliged to take a most serious view of them — to see them, to handle them, and to be familiar with them. It is not sufficient to feign mere imaginary dangers; there must be a dreadful reality.

“…I am persuaded that four fifths of the people of Virginia must have amendments to the new plan, to reconcile them to a change of their government. It is a slippery foundation for the people to rest their political salvation on my or their assertions. No government can flourish unless it be founded on the affection of the people. Unless gentlemen can be sure that this new system is founded on that ground, they ought to stop their career.”

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Brits could lose passports for using drugs

Recreational drug users in the UK could soon be stripped of their passports or driving licenses under a series of new laws proposed by the Home Office on Monday.

In the document titled ‘SWIFT, CERTAIN, TOUGH New consequences for drug possession,’ the Home Office proposes introducing three tiers of punishments for possession of illegal drugs such as cocaine and cannabis. 

The penalties vary from being forced to pay for a drug awareness course to being issued with a hefty fine, and could even result in the loss of an offender’s passport and driving license.

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‘Mind-Reading’ Cap Keeps Men from Watching Porn in China Where the Content Is Illegal

Although porn is beyond normalized in the U.S.—whether for good or bad—it is, apparently, utterly illegal in China. To help aid in combating the spread of porn in the country, a team of scientists at Beijing Jiaotong University has developed a “mind-reading” cap that can read men’s minds and sound an alarm when they’re watching illicit content. Particularly “porn appraisers”—a.k.a. jian huang shi—whose job it is to rid the Chinese internet of the material.

The South China Morning Post reports that the device could “speed up the work” of these porn appraisers (which the outlet refers to literally as “censors”) by alerting them—with an alarm—as to when they’re seeing pornographic material. These appraisers—much like Facebook content reviewers, it seems—scan thousands upon thousands of images and videos every day on the look out for porn. The problem is sometimes they miss images: this cap is supposed to solve that problem.

According to the scientists, who published their research the Journal of Electronic Measurement and Instrumentation, the cap is able to pick up on a spike in brainwaves triggered by a wearer seeing explicit content. The researchers tested the cap on 15 male university students between the ages of 20 and 25 as they watched images flit one after another on a computer screen; sounding an “alarm” any time one of the wearer’s saw (somewhat) pornographic images amidst normal, acceptable ones.

“The prototype device proved that human-machine collaboration was feasible ‘for bad information detection,’” Xu Jianjun, director of the electrical engineering experiment center at Beijing Jiaotong University told the Post. As the news outlet notes, human eyes and brains still outperform machines—which utilize machine-learning algorithms—when detecting porn; at least some of the time, particularly when the images contain complex backgrounds.

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AMAZON ADMITS GIVING RING CAMERA FOOTAGE TO POLICE WITHOUT A WARRANT OR CONSENT

RING, AMAZON’S PERENNIALLY controversial and police-friendly surveillance subsidiary, has long defended its cozy relationship with law enforcement by pointing out that cops can only get access to a camera owner’s recordings with their express permission or a court order. But in response to recent questions from Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., the company stated that it has provided police with user footage 11 times this year alone without either.

Last month, Markey wrote to Amazon asking it to both clarify Ring’s ever-expanding relationship with American police, who’ve increasingly come to rely on the company’s growing residential surveillance dragnet, and to commit to a raft of policy reforms. In a July 1 response from Brian Huseman, Amazon vice president of public policy, the company declined to permanently agree to any of them, including “Never accept financial contributions from policing agencies,” “Never allow immigration enforcement agencies to request Ring recordings,” and “Never participate in police sting operations.”

Although Ring publicizes its policy of handing over camera footage only if the owner agrees — or if judge signs a search warrant — the company says it also reserves the right to supply police with footage in “emergencies,” defined broadly as “cases involving imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to any person.” Markey had also asked Amazon to clarify what exactly constitutes such an “emergency situation,” and how many times audiovisual surveillance data has been provided under such circumstances. Amazon declined to elaborate on how it defines these emergencies beyond “imminent danger of death or serious physical injury,” stating only that “Ring makes a good-faith determination whether the request meets the well-known standard.” Huseman noted that it has complied with 11 emergency requests this year alone but did not provide details as to what the cases or Ring’s “good-faith determination” entailed.

Ring spokesperson Mai Nguyen also declined to reveal the substance of these emergency requests or the company’s approval process.

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