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from the can't-they-find-a-new-excuse-to-steal-my-rights dept.
You have too many rights, so it's time for a little rebalancing:
Internet anonymity should be banned and everyone required to carry the equivalent of a license plate when driving around online. That's according to Erik Barnett, the US Department of Homeland Security's attaché to the European Union.
Writing in French policy magazine FIC Observatoire, Barnett somewhat predictably relies on the existence of child abuse images to explain why everyone in the world should be easily monitored. He tells a story about how a Romanian man offered to share sexually explicit images of his daughter with an American man over email. The unnamed email provider uncovered this exchange and forwarded the IP address of the Romanian to the European authorities and a few days later the man was arrested. Job well done.
Before we have an opportunity to celebrate, however, Barnett jumps straight to terrorism. "How much of the potential jihadists' data should intelligence agencies or law enforcement be able to examine to protect citizenry from terrorist attack?", he poses. The answer, of course, is everything. Then the pitch: "As the use of technology by human beings grows and we look at ethical and philosophical questions surrounding ownership of data and privacy interests, we must start to ask how much of the user's data is fair game for law enforcement to protect children from sexual abuse?"
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday February 01 2016, @08:40AM
If you hadn't already proved yourself an idiot, "vagina" is a pretty cool word. I wonder - can you name the rest of the female genitalia? Or, is "cunt" and "pussy" the only words you know? Are you at all familiar with female anatomy, or is it all just some deep, dark, forbidden sphere of knowledge? You're really not much of a geek, or nerd, if "cunt" is the best word you can think of to describe women. FFS, you're an embarrasment.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Monday February 01 2016, @09:55AM
Please note that I'm not trying to validate MikeeUSA or whatever name that moron is using these days. For the record, you're a jerk.
That said, some folks don't feel that "vagina" is inclusive enough [huffingtonpost.com].
I find it interesting (and rather disturbing) that a vocal few seem to want to control what words we use and in what context. I disagree with that idea. At the same time, I also believe that if one finds speech offensive, one should respond with appropriate vitriol. Freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences.
I'm going to go off on a bit of a tangent here, but it's something I've been thinking about.
In keeping with my above comments, feel free to tell me I'm wrong, but, please, pretty please with sugar on top, for the love of all that's good in this world, tell me why you think so.
There are some people who, upon meeting and getting to know me, would identify me as a "cis-gendered MAAB" or something similar.
I am *not* a cis-gendered MAAB. I am a human with a Y chromosome. That is how I define myself.
I don't wish to restrict anyone from identifying as anything they feel is correct. However, I do not identify as a cis-male or a cis-gendered MAAB. I don't attempt to identify others in ways they don't wish to be identified. As such, I would prefer that others don't try to identify me in a way other than I wish.
I realize that it may seem as if I'm aligning for or against one or more groups to which some or all of you feel aligned. That's not my intention. Rather, it's to define *my identity* for myself.
Moreover, I strongly believe that each individual should be judged on their actions and quality of their character, not based upon how they define themselves or, more importantly, now others define them.
You might ask, "if someone takes issue with how I define myself, why shouldn't I do the same?" In my view, that's because I prefer that each of us be given the freedom to define ourselves.
As such, even if you dislike how I define myself, I don't mind how you choose to define yourself. Ever. Please give me the same respect.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by kurenai.tsubasa on Monday February 01 2016, @04:27PM
Re: link. Hoo boy. Going way off topic here. As usual, I never really cared about what people whose identities are defined by which body parts they were born with are up to. They're pretty much talking apes in my mind if they cannot imagine any kind of separation between biology and identity.
Let me clarify. You've made an observation about your biology. I don't think you're the type to go around claiming that your Y chromosome is responsible for everything bad that's ever happened to you and that anybody who does not have a Y chromosome is an inferior, inauthentic being. People who do that are the reason that I have always been uncomfortable with The Vagina Monologues. It just strikes me that somebody who finds any truth there is just doing something horribly wrong.
I'm surprised to now learn that even The Vagina Monologues is under attack. As I understand it, there are trans productions of the work, even though that strikes me as being akin to a Jewish or homosexual person putting on a production glorifying Mein Kampf. (Godwined! boo ya!) Note: Mount Holyoke College is a women's college in Massachusetts. I can see how women who were assigned the male gender at birth would be problematic for them. According to the article, they began admitting women who had been assigned the male gender at birth in 2014.
In general, everything that's “women only” will suffer these problems. It's no different from things that used to be “men's only” with the exception that we laugh at MRAs while many people are afraid to question TERF/Michigan feminism for fear of being seen as a misogynist.
However, I would like to make the observation that things like The Vagina Monologues and the defunct Michigan Womyn's Music Festival are frankly downright toxic in effect (think macroaggressions), at least the way that Michigan feminists brandish them like weapons. People I should be allies with, namely “lesbians”—I count this as a different category from women who happen to be homosexual or bisexual due to recent events (“lesbians” would include women who are ashamed of and in the closet about being heterosexual [lol, yeah, I know, Bizarro world and all that])—, have decided that people like me are a valid target for retaliation thus creating needless conflict.
I mean, hey, they view me as a rapist and an invader. For some reason, the fact that I have the hormones I do in my body, have the body parts I do, and am even lucky enough to get gendered as female by strangers, combined with the fact that I have excellent computer skills and can fix my own appliances unless something goes catastrophically wrong, utterly infuriates them. That's fine with me, even though I truly don't get it since I have no interest in attempting to date any of them, and I really don't care what festivals or plays they want to exclude me from (nothing of value was lost). If they want to continue publicly celebrating their bigotry, that makes it all the easier for me to make my case.
Instead the hatred goes underground.
As for MikeeUSA, let's just ignore her outside of making sure she's at -1. (I also deeply suspect for about the past year that MikeeUSA is a “lesbian” who for whatever reason thinks that posting that crap will be as effective towards her goals here as it was with Debian Women. I haven't checked Geek Feminism Wiki [again the I don't give a shit thing], but I'm betting this site is even more maligned than the green one is. It's probably just a bunch of /b tards though. I seriously doubt there is an actual MikeeUSA who honestly believes the things that persona posts. If there is… that person is a truly sad individual.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 01 2016, @04:07PM
You forgot the "twat" and the "hoo-hah". I think those are located somewhere around the labia.