Category: Control Freaks

Handing Over The Reins

Control Freaks, Corporate Fuckery, Science!

Read this story and see if you don’t get a slow burn, or even an RCOB:

An Australian small business owner says she lost about $50,000 after Instagram suspended her accounts over what she describes as an innocent photo of three dogs.

Rochelle Marinato, managing director at Pilates World Australia, recently received an email from Instagram’s parent company Meta stating her accounts had been suspended because the image breached community guidelines relating to ‘child sexual exploitation, abuse and nudity’.

The photo had been mistakenly flagged by an AI moderator which confused the image of the dogs with those of children.

She appealed the decision and sent 22 emails to Meta, but received no assistance from the global tech giant, which owns Instagram, Facebook, Threads, Messenger and WhatsApp.

Ms Marinato claimed her story was just one of many and that the problem was widespread.

She also said it was impossible to talk to a human at Meta to explain her situation.

‘I couldn’t get a human to look at it. Clearly any human that looks at this photo is going to know it’s completely innocent,’ she said. 

‘You can’t contact a human at Meta. There’s no phone number, there’s no email, there’s nothing and you’re literally left in the dark.’ 

To paraphrase Insty:  And Skynet smirks.

Appropriate Age

Control Freaks, Nannies

As Colorado continues to turn blue — from Californian expats, and not from the cold — we have situations like this one:

On Friday, Colorado House Democrats approved a measure, HB25-1133, which would raise the minimum age for purchasing rifle and shotgun ammunition to 21 years and require that ammunition be stored behind the counter at retailers that sell it.

The battle against young adults’ Second Amendment rights is extensive, with many states and even the federal government debating and enacting laws that restrict the right of 18-, 19- and 20-year-olds to keep and bear arms. For every other constitutionally protected right, Americans are nearly universally regarded as adults at 18 and afforded protection under the Constitution.

It’s really quite simple.  If 18-year-olds are old enough to be drafted, sign a contract, get married (or get abortions) without parental consent, and vote:  then they are entitled to full Second Amendment rights as the adults they are.

Oh by the way:  as adults, they should be allowed to consume booze as well.  Adult privilege, in terms of the law, is kinda like virginity.  You either have it or you don’t.

And it’s long past time that we acknowledge that fact, under the law.

That said, if people think that 18-year-olds can do this, but not that, depending on the opinions and prejudices of politicians and moralists, then we should just go ahead and overturn the 26th Amendment and restore the age of majority (and the voting age) to 21 and have done with it.  (Oh, and make the 18-20 age group ineligible for the draft and ban them from driving, while we’re there.  Let’s at least be consistent.)

No?

Then the current age of majority should preclude any and all restrictions under the Equal Protection clause, no matter how popular or how we choose to address the topic of “immaturity”.

Fucking busybodies can all go to hell.