• Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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    4 hours ago

    I agree with that the abusive cops and ice is insane in the US, and it should be stopped. I also believe that the US is a corrupt nation in nearly every place of the government and surrounding instances.

    But a question surround this, what if the US wasn’t corrupt and the judges would actually follow the law (juries wouldn’t be able to exist for most cases) and hypothetical if the US had privacy laws for everything besides businesses wouldn’t this be the same punishable offence that would protect citizens?

    In GDPR countries (among others) nobody is allowed to do something like this with face recognition because the law works for everybody. (Some people are trying to destroy this in some countries, though).

    At the same time, if the government is allowed to use facial recognition and other anti-privacy measures to identify people where there is no ground to, then why shouldn’t the people be able to do that?

    Edit: I am not from the US and my look on life and trias political situations is different than what the fuck is happening in the US

    • MangoCats@feddit.it
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      3 hours ago

      In GDPR countries (among others) nobody is allowed to do something like this with face recognition because the law works for everybody.

      IDK the specifics of GDPR (and GDPR is relatively new, so it will continue to evolve for some time…)

      In my view: the police are public servants, salaries and pensions paid by taxes. They have voluntarily chosen to serve as public servants. Whole hosts of studies show that police who are actively involved with the communities they police, seeing, being seen, being known by the neighborhoods they work in, those police are more effective at preventing crime, defusing domestic disputes, etc. than faceless thugs with batons and guns who only show up when they are going to use their arrest powers to shut down whatever is going on.

      If I were to write “my version” of the GDPR that I think the US should enact, there would be clear exceptions for public servants, including police and politicians. Now, you can get into the whole issue of “undercover cops” which is clearly analogous to “secret police” which may be a necessary evil for some circumstances, but that’s not what is going on with OP’s website. OP is providing a tool to compare photos to a public database of photographs of public servants - not undercover cops. By the way: performance is spec’ed at 1 to 3 seconds per photo comparison, so 9000 photos might take 9000-27000 seconds to compare, that’s 2.5 to 7.5 hours to run one photo search.

      • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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        3 hours ago

        Considering people all across the world tend to generalise I don’t think it’s a good idea to share all the personal details of a cop. I would rather prefer we just having transparency in the general administration (annual reports) and their salary.

        I also dislike that the law should have exceptions. The more exceptions a law has the complexer it gets and the more some people can abuse it.

        Fining a complaint about a police office can also be done on their badge number, and that should be enough. If a police is just bad at their job, but a good person (so they fuck up some other way), then they shouldn’t be at risk of being attacked/stalked or whatever by the people they arrested, which is what a public database of the people doing their job allows for. People should be held accountable for their actions and everybody should be held accountable in the same manner.

        Just because a photo is made in public doesn’t mean it is a public photo, or at least it shouldn’t mean that. Again, to protect civilians.

        • MangoCats@feddit.it
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          55 minutes ago

          I don’t think it’s a good idea to share all the personal details of a cop.

          I think there’s a balance to be struck. Should the cop’s home address be shared? No. Should their face, badge number and service record be public? Absolutely. I also agree that all public servant’s salaries (including employees of publicly traded companies) should be public.

          The more exceptions a law has the complexer it gets and the more some people can abuse it.

          Agreed, but something as complex as “the police” isn’t going to have one solution fitting all circumstances. Whatever the solution is, it should be simple enough to explain, clearly and accurately, to an average 12 year old.

          what a public database of the people doing their job allows for.

          Any database, public or private, can be endlessly abused. This is the crux of the GDPR.

          People should be held accountable for their actions and everybody should be held accountable in the same manner.

          Yes, but that has always been less than perfect in practice. Transparency is always the answer. Increased transparency with increased accountability for inequity is the right direction to be moving, not all at once, but gradual continuous progress in the good direction is what we should be seeking. Unfortunately, people lately are standing up and cheering for what they call a “good direction” that is composed of more lies, corruption and ultimately more secrecy about what’s really happening.

          Just because a photo is made in public doesn’t mean it is a public photo, or at least it shouldn’t mean that. Again, to protect civilians.

          That’s going to be the tricky part about a future where 200MP 60fps video cameras cost less than $100, and digital storage costs less than $100 per TB.

          I feel that outlawing or otherwise restricting the use of cameras in general will go poorly. It has been hobby-level practical for the past decade to drive around with license plate reading software, building your own database of who you pass where and when, and getting faces to go with that tracking data isn’t hard either - setup a “neighborhood watch” of a dozen or more commuters and you’ll have extensive tracking data on thousands of your neighbors, for maybe a couple thousand dollars in gear. Meta camera glasses may be socially offensive, but similar things are inevitable in the future - at least in the future where we continue to have smartphones and affordable internet connectivity.

          Even if it’s outlawed, that data will be collected. What laws can do is restrict public facing uses of it. Young people today need to grow up knowing that, laws or no laws, they will be recorded their whole lives.

          • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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            21 minutes ago

            Making picture in public of others is alreasy not allowed under GDPR, but only if somebody complains you will get into issues most of the time.

            We need to stop the bullshit excuses people like you are using to allow for the recording or eveeything it really needs to stop. You are already no allowed to have a camera watching the public streeth

    • Bloomcole@lemmy.world
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      3 hours ago

      The plebs and the regime never have the same rights, in any country
      FR is definitely used in GDPR countries.
      For police it’s so- called ‘tightly regulated’.
      For private use forbidden but ‘there are exeptions’

      • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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        3 hours ago

        Based on trias politcal yes you do.

        If your country is corrupt then yes the people with money have power. Not every country is corrupt enough for people to really buy into it.

        • Bloomcole@lemmy.world
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          2 hours ago

          “Based on trias politcal yes you do.” what are you trying to say?
          And I said nothing about corruption or ‘people with money’
          Again, what are you trying to say?

          • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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            2 hours ago

            Sorry, but I assume everybody here at least has a basic level of understanding on the political system most democratic countries are at least somewhat based on.

            Trias Political is the sense that you have the government, the police and the judges. Everybody needs to follow the law, the government makes that law, the judges judge who gets punished and how long and the police enact that punishment. (Very broadly explained).

            If the system works like intended or at least close to, then everybody has the same rights and need to follow the same low. You are were talking about “the regime” what regime are you talking about? Generally people mean the 1%er’s or at least the actual rich. Corruption is what allows the inequality between people, but removing the corruption can also cause issues. Just look at the situation in Brazil.

            Facial recognition is not something any company can just use in a GDPR country in the way they do in China or in this example. Again, we have rights.

            My original comment was more an “if” question about what IF the US actually functioned like a democracy instead of a consuming focussed, angelo-saxton country.

    • MangoCats@feddit.it
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      3 hours ago

      the judges would actually follow the law (juries wouldn’t be able to exist for most cases)

      A core tenet of the law is the right to trial by a jury of your peers.

      Jury trials have a very similar flaw to democracy.

      Think of an average person you know, how stupid are they? Now, realize that half the people out there are stupider than that.

      An average randomly selected jury is going to be composed of 50% below average intelligence people.

      • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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        3 hours ago

        Of the US law yes, but that’s not the case everywhere.

        I personally don’t think juries should do more than give extra input to the judge. The judge should follow the law exactly and tif they don’t, the average person should be able to file a complaint about them not doing their job and they should be investigated.

        (I also work in a field (accountancy) where you can file complaints to be for very cheap if I don’t do my job correctly)

    • jwmgregory@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      The answer is that I don’t think it matters because the US or any other society will never reach some utopic standard of privacy. So long as we live in a world where facial recognition is possible - it is better to regulate it strongly than attempt to prohibit it.

      In a modern globalized world the old privacy is dead, no matter how you look at it. Going forward something new will need to be built out of the ashes, be it a new privacy or something better/worse.

      • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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        3 hours ago

        Well yeah it is better to regulate it but that should include that you aren’t allowed to use the data from it to track people etc. We already have protrait right in the GDPR so it is already hard to use.

        • jwmgregory@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          Kindly, I believe your blind faith in your societal institutions to be at best naive and at worst a danger to liberty. I mean this as a genuine warning meant to be heeded, not a personal criticism directed at you. I’m an American. This exact blind institutional faith I see you and many other Europeans frequently espouse online was a core part of what caused the civil collapse of my own society. It will happen in yours too if you guys aren’t careful. The prevalence of this way of thinking amongst Europeans I meet online is a dangerous omen. You guys remind me a lot of us back in the 90s. Please. Take it not from an ignorant American, but from a global citizen who has already been down the rough and tumble line.

          I think I’ll just quote you from another comment you made in this exact same thread, because you encapsulated it better than I ever could:

          “…If your country is corrupt then yes the people with money have power. Not every country is corrupt enough for people to really buy into it.”

          This is a fiction. It is a noble lie you are told by people with power. Think semantically. What is corruption? What is “money,” “power,” etc? In your mind, in countries that you believe to be “one of the good ones,” one where by your description the nation “isn’t corrupt enough for people to really buy into it”… who controls the nation and how? Realistically, you aren’t going to be able to provide an answer to that question that is free from discussing existing corruption, because your idea of supposed societies that cross some arbitrary threshold of being “pure vs corrupt”… doesn’t exist in reality. There exists not one corruption-free government, now or ever, in the history of mankind.

          This sounds fantastical from your POV but I do mean it as a genuine warning to be heeded. First it starts with gradual scrapes and nicks at the block of reason… stuff exactly like this that everyone engages in on some level, to some degree - it is a transmogrification of the social conscious… soon yet the fascists carve their own damnable Michelangelo from the marble, instead.

          • Vinstaal0@feddit.nl
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            2 hours ago

            The system in the US is different than what we have in NL, nontheless is it good to be vigilant yes I agree, but I have also seen plenty of laws, rules and regulations here in NL and the EU. I also know that some people in the EU are trying to destroy things like encryption because it is abused by crimnals.

            There are also plenty of examples of why our tax system is broken at times and people can abuse it. I have seen it enough first hand and at a further distance.

            But we still have an open selection for the government and loads of different people from different parties to vote onto which makes it a lot harder fo somebody to do something similar in the US and buy votes etc.

            Part of my work is signaling corruptions, well mainly fraud and financing of terrorism etc, but still. The transparance in The Netherlands really helps with preventing it.

            But yes I am vigilent, we are lucky that our government failed with Geert Wilders

  • NOT_RICK@lemmy.world
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    23 hours ago

    I get the impression that the cops are about to hate facial recognition all of the sudden, for no particular reason

    • ByteOnBikes@discuss.online
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      18 hours ago

      Cameras. They fucking hate body cameras. When it clears them of wrongdoing, they have the video ready. When they ‘accidentally’ shoot a guy nine times in the back of the head, video seems to be missing.

      • catloaf@lemm.ee
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        12 hours ago

        I heard a bit on NPR over the weekend talking about copaganda. Turns out body cams are beneficial to cops, because they can take that footage and selectively edit and release it to push a certain narrative.

        If you’ve ever seen a clip on social media, it often starts a few seconds before the cop hits someone, rarely showing the full sequence of events that led up to that point.

        And if they can’t edit the footage to make them look good? “Oops, we didn’t retrieve that footage in time so it was overwritten.”

      • pyre@lemmy.world
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        easily solvable problem: losing the footage is indication of guilt. you shoot someone, you better have it ready. it malfunctioned, better have a partner who has theirs ready. if no one has footage to clear you, it’s used as evidence of guilt.

        of course pussy ass lawmakers will never do that.

        • knatschus@discuss.tchncs.de
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          15 hours ago

          I believe having lack of evidence being the evidence for a crime is problematic, but it sure is evidence enough that they aren’t fit for their job and they should immediately lose it. Everyone Including the supervisor who failed to run the team properly.

          • pyre@lemmy.world
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            9 hours ago

            first of all it’s not lack of evidence, it is evidence itself. if the camera is not working that’s tampering with evidence and is a good indication of guilt.

            second of all if you can have laws like felony murder you can sure as shit have this. if you commit a felony (like a robbery), don’t hurt anyone, and a cop murders a random person in response because they’re trigger happy pigs, you can be held responsible for the murder as if you committed it yourself.

            my suggestion is far more reasonable compared to that: if you kill someone you better have evidence that it wasn’t foul play because guess what that’s what everyone needs to do. we don’t just allow people to kill and go free, cops shouldn’t be exempt.

          • MisterFrog@lemmy.world
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            10 hours ago

            Should be at least streamed to a server not controlled by the police, including things like charge levels so they can’t claim “oh whoops, it ran out of charge!”. A specific organisation within the judiciary, perhaps?

            This way they’re gonna need to get far more creative in concealing video.

            And if you’re found to do something that is concealing evidence, well that’s a crime by itself

    • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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      20 hours ago

      There’s a reason ICE conceal their faces.

      They know what they’re doing is wrong and don’t want to be held accountable if their fascist rule collapses.

      • ScoffingLizard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        13 hours ago

        So just use one too and blend in. Put on a stupid Trump or racist hat, and if you are not white, put on gloves. Then surround them.

      • Ulrich@feddit.org
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        16 hours ago

        They know what they’re doing is wrong

        Is that why the protestors wear them too?

        • masterofn001@lemmy.ca
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          11 hours ago

          Please post the entirety of your online history.

          Surely there’s no reason to hide.

          Whether what you’ve done is entirely legal (or not) authoritariaism doesn’t care.

          What is done in a free society is punished by small men with anger control issues.

          What you may find reasonable to say in a free society, could, under a government opposed to free expression, land you in el Segundo - without your wallet.

          The gestapo hide their faces because they know what they do is wrong, and to hide from justice.

          People who protest or simply appreciate privacy do so because they understand the potential for retribution and being disappeared.

          • Ulrich@feddit.org
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            11 hours ago

            Please post the entirety of your online history. Surely there’s no reason to hide.

            …we’re talking about hiding though

            Whether what you’ve done is entirely legal (or not) authoritariaism doesn’t care.

            That goes both ways. That was my entire point.

            • Tiger666@lemmy.ca
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              5 hours ago

              Who is in power again? The protesters are not making anyone disappear. Goodbye, troll.

              • Ulrich@feddit.org
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                2 hours ago

                You think individuals can’t be targeted because they’re “in power”? Why do you think they’re wearing them?

        • EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com
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          16 hours ago

          Protestors or vandals and rioters?

          The former: to prevent government persecution and unfair retaliation. The latter: yes.

          • Ulrich@feddit.org
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            16 hours ago

            Protestors or vandals and rioters?

            Yes.

            The former: to prevent government persecution and unfair retaliation.

            Why would they face persecution if they did nothing wrong!?

            • EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com
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              16 hours ago

              The government has always had it out for protestors, to the extent that they’ll try and use agents provocateur to escalate the situation. They don’t want people to protest, they just want people to life back and take it. C’mon, you seriously asking this?

              • Ulrich@feddit.org
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                16 hours ago

                The point I’m trying to make is that everyone is wearing a mask for the same reason: to prevent retribution for their beliefs and according actions.

                • Tiger666@lemmy.ca
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                  5 hours ago

                  Your point is moot.

                  For the people by the people or did you forget?

                • EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com
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                  15 hours ago

                  There’s a difference between wearing a mask because you are engaging in wrongdoing and wearing a mask to prevent unjust retaliation. Even if the actual motive is the same, the implications are very different

                • Pup Biru@aussie.zone
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                  12 hours ago

                  the government should always identify itself to the people

                  the people should, by default, not be identified by the government

                  the power imbalance is important: the government is a large and powerful entity which is meant to serve the people without prejudice. people are individually small, and only gain their power from being a large group. the government is given power by the people in order for it to perform tasks beneficial to all, and must be accountable to the people

                • WizardofFrobozz@lemmy.ca
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                  15 hours ago

                  Some beliefs require retribution. Some causes are righteous. Fuck off with your false equivalencies. Rioters aren’t employed by the people- law enforcement is.

    • Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works
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      22 hours ago

      Upvoted and agreed, not least because I just learned that “all of the sudden,” while at present a nonstandard variant of “all of a sudden,” has valid history.

      And of course it doesn’t matter in this casual context!

      But in formal writing, in this era, using “a” will avoid distracting the reader from your main point.

      • samus12345@sh.itjust.works
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        22 hours ago

        “All of the sudden” is only valid because it’s so commonly (incorrectly) used. Much as it annoys me, that’s just how language works.

        • Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works
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          21 hours ago

          “of the sudden” (1570) actually predates “of a sudden” (Shakespeare) according to my OED as squinted at through the nifty magnifying glass. But it’s been considered obsolete for a long time despite having all of a sudden experienced a resurgence.

          (Note, I modernized the spellings of “sudden” rather than try to switch focus back and forth)

            • Mouselemming@sh.itjust.works
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              16 hours ago

              Nothing wrong with “suddenly.” I probably should have used it in my previous comment. It’s just that sometimes you want to say “all of a sudden.” Especially at storytime. The extra time helps build the suspense. “Suddenly” is more sudden in that it just jumps in there. With “all of a sudden,” the subject isn’t ready but the listeners are.

          • samus12345@sh.itjust.works
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            20 hours ago

            People aren’t saying it because they’re language scholars, it’s because they misheard the proper modern usage. So it goes for many language shifts.

      • Bloomcole@lemmy.world
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        21 hours ago

        Non-Anglo here.
        Totally not distracted bcs my brain autocorrected it to “all of a sudden” without even noticing.
        A bit like “It deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are”
        Also never seen/heard the “the” variant. (Well consciously that is).

  • StarlightDust@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    18 hours ago

    Putting it out there for someone to do this for cops in the UK. I can’t run infrastructure but the cops terrorise out local community and constantly refuse to identify themselves/turn off their badge cam.

  • BigMacHole@sopuli.xyz
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    22 hours ago

    This is ILLEGAL when Working Class people Do It!

    -Chuck Schumer at Some Point probably!

      • LibertyLizard@slrpnk.net
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        21 hours ago

        No, it’s happening everywhere. But I’ve also seen some significant resistance happening in other cities like NYC, Newark, Portland, Chicago, Seattle, SF, etc.

    • Ulrich@feddit.org
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      16 hours ago

      It’s just you. There were mass protests across the country just a couple of weeks ago.

      Unless you meant the senseless destruction of property.

      • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
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        15 hours ago

        Mass protests where people did nothing in particular. That is, in fact, not resistance. People in LA are actually making it harder for ICE to terrorize them.

        • Ulrich@feddit.org
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          13 hours ago

          Mass protests where people did nothing particular.

          A mass protest, in and of itself, is not “nothing”.

          People in LA are actually making it harder for ICE to terrorize them.

          I would argue the opposite. You haven’t noticed the National Guard and Marines being deployed there?

          • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
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            13 hours ago

            A mass protest, in and of itself, is not “nothing”.

            It is. What happened on June 14th was technically a mass protest, but it has none of the aspects that make a mass protest effective. In essence, that wasn’t a protest; it was a parade. They can, in theory, be used as a launching point for something more effective, but on their own? Yeah, nothing.

            You haven’t noticed the National Guard and Marines being deployed there?

            Okay and? They were deployed because ICE wasn’t able to do their jobs, and even now they’re suffering widespread harassment and obstruction. Not getting backlash because you did nothing isn’t the flex you think it is.

            • Ulrich@feddit.org
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              13 hours ago

              it has none of the aspects that make a mass protest effective

              Oh please, do go on, what makes a protest effective? Nonsensical general destruction of your neighbors’ property?

              Okay and?

              Okay and…that’s bad?

              Not getting backlash because you did nothing isn’t the flex you think it is.

              Getting the marines and national guard deployed on you isn’t the flex you think it is.

              • NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io
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                12 hours ago

                Nonsensical general destruction of your neighbors’ property?

                No, real obstruction of fascist activity. And, you know, turning out on a weekday. Mass protests work because, aside from the implicit threat of violence, they grind economic activity to a halt. That is simply not what happens when you parade for two hours on a Saturday.

                • Ulrich@feddit.org
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                  11 hours ago

                  No, real obstruction of fascist activity.

                  You’re using a bunch of general language. Why don’t you want to say what makes a protest effective?

                  Mass protests work because, aside from the implicit threat of violence, they grind economic activity to a halt.

                  Good luck not getting fired.