MetaFilter posts tagged with Rights

Act of Terror: arrested for filming police officers - video

nickyskye — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:21:01 -0800

When police carried out a routine stop-and-search of her boyfriend on the London Underground, Gemma Atkinson filmed the incident. She was detained, handcuffed and threatened with arrest. She launched a legal battle, which ended with the police settling the case in 2010. With the money from the settlement she funded the production of this animated film, which she says shows how her story and highlights police misuse of counterterrorism powers to restrict photography. Article in French. On Facebook under the title Fat Rat Films.

IRS Claims Authority to Read Your E-Mail Without A Warrant

Sleeper — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 13:11:55 -0800

The ACLU reports that the IRS claims in an internal document that it has the authority to access citizens' online communications without a warrant. The IRS claimed in a 2009 document that "the Fourth Amendment does not protect communications held in electronic storage, such as email messages stored on a server, because internet users do not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in such communications." It still retains that position even after the 2010 case of US v Warshak which determined that citizens have a reasonable expectation of privacy in such communications. The IRS to this day declares in bland language that no warrant is required for e-mails held by an ISP for more than 180 days. (One relevant document). A CNET article gives additional context. The ACLU is currently awaiting a response to its FOIA requests to other agencies like the FBI and Justice Department for information on their policies, procedures, and practices in reading citizens' private communications. The related case of Jewel v NSA, in which the EFF is suing the NSA on behalf of AT&T users for the NSA's dragnet surveillance of Americans' electronic communication, is ongoing (after nearly being completely dismissed on the grounds that nobody has standing to challenge the practice because it's secret).

"Evidence in the case includes undisputed documents provided by former AT&T telecommunications technician Mark Klein showing AT&T has routed copies of Internet traffic [including ~1.7 billion e-mails etc. daily] to a secret room in San Francisco controlled by the NSA. It also includes declarations from three NSA whistleblowers along with a mountain of other evidence."

The government's use of electronic surveillance is increasing dramatically each year.

"I thought I was the only gay person in the world for a long time."

zarq — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 16:19:04 -0800

The county where no one's gay. The 2010 Census of Franklin County Mississippi shows no same sex couples. (pdf). CNN videographer Brandon Ancil and human rights columnist John D. Sutter tried to determine if the census was wrong, and see if they could find gay men and women willing to speak about "what keeps them hidden." Video

Her Name was Lucy Meadows

Charlemagne In Sweatpants — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 21:30:43 -0800

Popular transgender Lancashire teacher Lucy Meadows was found dead last Tuesday. Blame has quickly fallen on an inflammatory Daily Mail article by Richard Littlejohn, which has lead to a petition to sack the writer. Is this fair? Jane Fae at the New Statesman says it doesn't matter, while the New Scostsman calls it 'monstering'. The f word blog and the Guardian have longer articles on the case and the issues surrounding it.

"I am a prime example of American unacceptablility."

MeghanC — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 06:14:23 -0800

Civil Rights is a slam poem performed at last year's Brave New Voices festival. There's a transcript here, though it's worth noting that the page gets the poem's title wrong.

Written and performed by Shanita Jackson and Dakota Oder, it becomes even more impressive when you realize that both women are still teenagers...and from the looks of it, Jackson was only fourteen at the time.

Abnormal Desire

divabat — Sat, 02 Mar 2013 02:53:53 -0800

In Malaysia's continuing efforts to persecute and combat the "deviant wave" of homosexuality, after banning a LGBT rights event claiming a threat to "public order" and training parents and educators to spot "LGBT behaviors" in school children for possible entry into a gay rehabilitation centre, they are now producing and presenting Asmara Songsang, a musical where LGBT people live lives fuelled by sex, drugs, and rock and roll...only to be struck by lightning and go straight or die. The musical is being staged in the Istana Budaya (Palace of Culture), one of the major performing arts venues in the country. It is fully sponsored by the Government and will be toured in colleges and universities across the country.

You've Come a Long Way, Baby...?

Miko — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 17:34:25 -0800

Makers: Women Who Make America is a sweeping 3-hour documentary of the movement for women's equality in the last half of the twentieth century. Airing this month on US public television, it's accompanied by an online archive of videos of interviews with individual women in leadership across a variety of fields. Leaders and activists, celebrities and pioneers, and everyday women retell the story of their awakening, organizing, and world-changing efforts.

"Roe has been her life, but it's no longer much of a living."

zarq — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 16:05:26 -0800

"Better known as the “Jane Roe” in the landmark Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade, Norma McCorvey has led a conflicted life. Forty years ago, she was at the center of the court decision that famously legalized abortion. Today, she is a zealous anti-abortion advocate." Why did McCorvey turn against the cause she once championed? Tracing the life of an Accidental Activist. Via

Abortion in America

Artw — Thu, 24 Jan 2013 07:22:32 -0800

The Geography of Abortion Access - Forty years ago Tuesday, the Supreme Court ushered in legal abortion for American women when it decided in Roe v. Wade. Today, states—particularly in the South and Midwest—are eroding that right by legislating hundreds of provisions intended to impede access with burdensome obstacles. To understand more fully the complex state of access to abortion services in America, The Daily Beast identified and confirmed the location of the country’s remaining 724 clinics and calculated the distance from every part of the country to its closest clinic. (more)

The Jim Crow violence machine

LonnieK — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 13:38:44 -0800

In on attempted murder . . . According to evidence cited by Diane McWhorter in today's NYT: Bull Connor, eased out but still active, organized a police assassination plot against Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth. The conspiracy failed, but it was known to the Birmingham News beforehand. (The News was & is owned by the Newhouse family -- Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, etc). According to McWhorter, the paper also funded and collaborated in police spying on civil rights activists. McWhorter won a Pulitzer for Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama, the Climactic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution. Her point in today's piece is to recall how wide and deep the Jim Crow violence machine operated. Good And Evil In Birmingham

Persistence prays

infini — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 02:41:42 -0800

Chagos Islanders Lose the European Court Battle but the Struggle Continues Former residents of the Chagos Islands have lost their latest legal bid for the right to return following a European ruling. What next for the islanders? James Wan recaps the decades long struggle and the implications of the latest ruling on the fate of the former residents of Diego Garcia. Previously in 2002, 2003 2006 and some archives.

TIRED OF BRAND X?

The Whelk — Fri, 04 Jan 2013 13:20:37 -0800

An insert house provides labels and covers for products in TV and film production to avoid legal problems and Earl Hays Press is the big granddaddy of them all so why not enter an alternate off-brand universe of Butt Beer, Captain Sugarr, and Sports Page today?

Undue Burden

zarq — Thu, 03 Jan 2013 10:31:43 -0800

Jennie Linn McCormack "isn’t the only woman in recent years to be prosecuted for ending her own pregnancy. But her case could change the trajectory of abortion law in the United States": The Rise of DIY Abortions. Single page version of the New Republic article (triggers print queue) Background A week after her at-home abortion, Jennie Linn McCormack was arrested. "McCormack ran afoul of a 1972 Idaho law that makes it a felony for a woman to perform her own abortion" (in a manner not sanctioned by the state.) "Not only does the law pre-date Roe v. Wade, it pre-dates RU-486." Her case was dismissed. The court ruled there was no way to enforce a law which forbids women from inducing their own pregnancies. McCormack then appealed the decision, claiming the law itself was unconstitutional. This past September, the US Court of Appeals Ninth District agreed. The decision is here (pdf). An interesting read. From the New Republic article, above: "Written by Democratic appointee Judge Harry Pregerson, the ruling describes in detail the difficulty poor women experience in obtaining an abortion in Idaho. These restrictions, he argued, essentially outlawed the procedure for them, potentially violating the “undue burden” test sometimes invoked by the Supreme Court. He maintained that, since it was so hard for McCormack to obtain a legal abortion, it was unjust to charge her for having an illegal one."
McCormack's lawyer then filed a motion "that, if successful, would halt prosecutions of all women and doctors in Idaho for illegal abortion, and overturn the pain-capable law." The case has been heard. A decision is pending. Editorial from one of the experts called by McCormack's lawyer in New York Times Opinionator: Can Neuroscience Challenge Roe V. Wade?

15 years of Aboriginal title in Canadian courts

salishsea — Tue, 11 Dec 2012 08:02:57 -0800

It has been 15 years since the Supreme Court of Canada released their decision in Delgamuukw v. British Columbia. The decision was perhaps the most important Aboriginal rights decision in Canadian history, radically framing the notion of Aboriginal title and creating several legacies in common law. The case was first brought by the Gitxsan and Wet'suwet'en Nations of northern British Columbia in order to establish their ownership and jurisdiction of their traditional lands. Having not made a treaty with the British Crown at any stage, there was a good chance that title to their entire territories - not simply the reserves the federal government had given them - was intact. They launched a a court case that featured huge amounts of oral testimony, drawing from the Gitxsan history called Adwaak. In 1991, the BC Supreme Court in a shocking decision, ruled all of the oral evidence to be inadmissible and dismissed the case(WARNING: large .pdf). The Gitxsan and Wetsuwet'en successfully appealed all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada and on December 11, 1997, the Court released its verdict, making legal gains for First Nations in the area of rights, the admissibility of oral history and the duty of governments to consult. While the Court did not rule as to whether the Gitxsan and Wet'suwet'en had existing title to their traditional lands, it did say that Aboriginal title is an existing reality in Canadian law, and that it can be proven to exist. The Court ruled that Aboriginal title was not extinguished by the Crown simply claiming soverierngty over the land mass of British Columbia and it set out a test that First Nations could use to prove their title. The court ruled on the admissibility of oral evidence, requiring courts to give significant consideration to the weight of oral evidence. Courts began taking taking oral history seriously. Since Delgamuukw, the requirement of governments to deeply consult with First Nations before engaging on activities within traditional territories has been strengthened. The duty to consult in particular had significant affects in the ability of First Nations to affect activity in their territory. Several court cases subsequent to Delgamuukw further advanced and defined the nature of this right. The most progressive of these were brought by the Haida Nation in 2004, and the Taku River Tlingit. This aspect of the decision has important implications on resource development in British Columbia and may have significant effects on the ability of Enbridge to build a pipeline through northern British Columbia. Delgamuukw also had a significant impact on the treaty process in British Columbia, creating several alternative avenues for First Nation to advance their interests at the negotiations table and requiring the federal and provincial governments to more actively pursue reconciliation of Aboriginal rights and title through negotiations. The subsequent decisions in Haida and Taku also had led the British Columbia government to change its stance towards reconciliation with First Nations and enter into an ambitious, if imperfect, new relationship which has had important ongoing results in negotiations, land issues and social services.

No rights are absolute and there is no hierarchy of rights.

saucysault — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 06:53:47 -0800

A woman wanting a mans-style hair-cut was denied one by a Toronto barber because his religion forbids him from touching a woman he is not related to. The Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario is expected to hear the issue if mediation fails, as a competing rights issue where there is a conflict between two individuals exercising their rights. The OBA (warning, cheesy music autoplay) defends some Barbershops as a men's-only space tradition dating back to Ancient Greece, while others point to womens-only spaces like spas that are allowed to continue to operate while discriminating against men.

Just taking a video.

ignignokt — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 23:06:16 -0800

Surveillance Camera Man (SL Vimeo) is a man who acts like a surveillance camera. However, he is not ceiling-mounted like most surveillance cameras. He takes video of people in public and private places. Most people have a problem with him, creating conflict. One person actually likes him.

"I would not choose to be any one else, or any place else."

zarq — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 09:05:04 -0800

"Look, goddamn it, I’m homosexual, and most of my friends are Jewish homosexuals, and some of my best friends are black homosexuals, and I am sick and tired of reading and hearing such goddamn demeaning, degrading bullshit about me and my friends." - Merle Miller.
In 1970, two years after Stonewall, Joseph Epstein wrote a cover story for Harper’s Magazine, Homo/hetero: The struggle for sexual identity, that came to chilling conclusions: "I would wish homosexuality off the face of this earth." His incendiary language prompted author/journalist/writer Merle Miller to come out of the closet in the New York Times Magazine, with an angry and poignant plea for dignity, understanding and respect: "What It Means to Be a Homosexual." 40 years later, that essay helped inspire the launch of the "It Gets Better" campaign. Via Miller's piece generated a record-setting 2,000 letters and later was described as "the most widely read and discussed essay of the decade." He expanded it into a short book, On Being Different: What It Means to Be a Homosexual, which was republished on September 25. Charles Kaiser: When the New York Times Came Out of the Closet (Adapted from the book's Afterword.) Dan Savage: The Magazine Article That Changed Everything for Gay People. (Adapted from the book's Foreword.) Tim Teeman, of Gay City News: Epstein, now 75, is a contributing editor at the conservative Weekly Standard and a columnist for the Wall Street Journal. He was “unavailable for comment” when I tried to speak to him, so I sent three questions by email. Did he stand by his original piece, or regret it or any aspect of it in hindsight? Had his views changed or evolved over the years? And would he write about the subject again, now that Penguin is republishing Miller’s landmark essay? No answer.

How does that make you feel?

mahershalal — Sun, 07 Oct 2012 04:10:46 -0800

Civil Rights CAPTCHA is unique in its approach at separating humans from bots, namely by using human emotion. This enables a simpler and more effective way of keeping sites spam free as well as taking a stand for human rights.

Electronic surveillance skyrockets in the US

Sleeper — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 21:02:11 -0800

The Justice Department, after a legal battle with the ACLU to avoid having to admit it, recently released documents showing that the federal government’s use of warrantless “pen register” and “tap and trace” surveillance has multiplied over the past decade. But the Justice Department is small potatoes. Every day, the NSA intercepts and stores 1.7 billion emails, phone calls, texts, and other electronic communications. (Previously on Metafilter: Mobile Phone Surveillance by the numbers, Former NSA officials sue NSA over NSA misconduct, Washington Post's project on government surveillance, Map of organizations authorized to use drones in the US) Surveillance is ubiquitous. Do we really need more data, or do we need better data & analysis? The Washington Post’s project on electronic surveillance raised some important points:

* Many security and intelligence agencies do the same work [as each other], creating redundancy and waste. For example, 51 federal organizations and military commands, operating in 15 U.S. cities, track the flow of money to and from terrorist networks. * Analysts who make sense of documents and conversations obtained by foreign and domestic spying share their judgment by publishing 50,000 intelligence reports each year - a volume so large that many are routinely ignored. ….improvements have been overtaken by volume at the ODNI, as the increased flow of intelligence data overwhelms the system's ability to analyze and use it. Every day, collection systems at the National Security Agency intercept and store 1.7 billion e-mails, phone calls and other types of communications. The NSA sorts a fraction of those into 70 separate databases. The same problem bedevils every other intelligence agency, none of which have enough analysts and translators for all this work.

To deal with the information glut, the government is turning to artificial intelligence for help. AI surveillance has also gone from cyberspace to meatspace: Known projects for sorting through the high volume of video surveillance include the military-developed Mind’s Eye (still in the works) and the privately-developed Trapwire, (already in use here). Sooner or later it will be standard for security cameras to be able to identify individuals and recognize their actions at least as well as the Xbox Kinect can. Updates on the legal status of domestic surveillance: 1.The House of Representatives last month re-approved the FISA bill, and the bill is now ready to pass in the Senate as well. 2. In August a federal appeals court ruled that the federal government may spy on Americans’ communications without warrants and without fear of being sued in the case of Al-Haramain Islamic V. Obama. This case is all over unless the Supreme Court agrees to hear it. 3. The Electronic Frontier Foundation's case Jewel v. NSA challenges the NSA's enormous domestic spying operation. It looked like a lost cause, but it's now up for a hearing on December 14, 2012. 4. The Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that law enforcement officers can’t sneak a GPS tracking device onto an individual’s vehicle unless they get a warrant first. 5. (From Salon):

the Obama administration is aggressively seeking to block any efforts to have federal courts rule on the constitutionality of this new FISA law. Immediately after its 2008 passage, the ACLU, on behalf of journalists, activists, and writers, sued to invalidate the law on the ground that it violates the Fourth Amendment rights of Americans by subjecting them to warrantless eavesdropping. As they always do in such cases, the Bush and Obama DOJs demanded dismissal of the suit on the ground of “standing”: namely, they asserted the definitively Kafkaesque claim that because the list of Americans who have their conversations intercepted is kept secret, the plaintiffs cannot prove they were eavesdropped on under the law, and thus lack “standing” to challenge it.

The widespread use of electronic surveillance couldn’t occur without the assistance of the telecommunications companies. The Electronic Frontier Foundation reports:

The undisputed documents show that AT&T installed a fiberoptic splitter at its facility at 611 Folsom Street in San Francisco that makes copies of all emails web browsing and other Internet traffic to and from AT&T customers and provides those copies to the NSA. This copying includes both domestic and international Internet activities of AT&T customers. As one expert observed “this isn’t a wiretap, it’s a country-tap.”

The ACLU lists several ways that telecommunications companies stumble over themselves to meet the government’s requests for private information: Copying of existing messages to a separate account, The Voicemail PIN Reset, Voicemail “cloning," etc. Related: Spy drone usage increases domestically and globally. Last year saw the first-ever drone-assisted arrest of a US citizen, as well as the first-ever drone-assisted killing of a US citizen by the US government. Lastly, coming soon to a city near you: Gorgon Stare , a drone-mounted city-spanning surveillance system planned to be deployed in Afghanistan that could eventually be deployed in the US. (Man, who named that thing?) It's designed to be combined with visual recognition technology like Mind's Eye. With this, they won’t need to put a GPS tracker on anyone’s car.

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

The Whelk — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 09:08:07 -0800

What do you do when you own the IP to a beloved 28-year old family classic widely regarded as one of the finest Christmas movies ever? Why you make a sequel of course. (via)

Our country has never solved anything with less democracy

cashman — Mon, 23 Jul 2012 19:38:29 -0800

With the U.S. Presidential election about 3 months away, and voter ID laws headed to court this Wednesday in Pennsylvania and in other states like Texas and Minnesota, Propublica tells you Everything You’ve Ever Wanted to Know About Voter ID Laws. A solution to a nonproblem. [Previously] The Challenge of Obtaining Voter Identification PA State Secretary Announces New Voter ID Card to act as safety net National Survey Shows Support for Voter ID Laws Strongest Among Those with Negative Attitudes Toward African Americans Justice Department Investigates Pennsylvania Voter ID Law State by State Voter ID Laws [Ballotpedia]

Dance before the police come

Len — Mon, 09 Jul 2012 11:48:43 -0800

"Shut Up and Dance’s 1991 hardcore LP ‘Dance Before the Police Come’ was released at a time when the UK authorities were struggling to contain the massive explosion of raves. Thousands of people each weekend were playing a cat and mouse game with the police to party in fields and warehouses, and if the state was often outwitted by meeting points in motorway service stations and convoys of cars, it tried to keep the lid on the phenomenon by staging high profile raids."
Dance before the police come: a social history, covering UK (and US) raves, queer activism, morality police (both figurative and literal) and racial discrimination. Found via Dan Hancox's excellent article on the disaster that was this past weekend's Bloc Festival in London (during which people danced before the police came, and after they left, via the medium of turning shipping containers into huge drums). Also: the title track from Shut Up And Dance's 1991 album: Dance Before The Police Come.

"The justice system is invisible, unable to deter or heal."

zarq — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 13:51:36 -0800

In July 2007, NPR published a two part series (direct links: 1, 2) about a four year old uninvestigated rape case at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation. Sparked in part by a 2006 report (pdf) from Amnesty International that included a startling statistic: "One in three Native American women will be raped in her lifetime," NPR's investigation led to the reopening of the case and Congressional hearings. In February 2011, Harper's published an update of sorts: Tiny Little Laws: A Plague of Sexual Violence in Indian Country (Via)

A difficult decision.

sio42 — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 09:49:30 -0800

"Boxes where parents can leave an unwanted baby , common in medieval Europe, have been making a comeback over the last 10 years. Supporters say a heated box, monitored by nurses, is better for babies than abandonment on the street - but the UN says it violates the rights of the child." There are more arguments than just that it may "violate the rights of the child." From the article: "The critics say that baby boxes may be used by unscrupulous fathers or even controllers of prostitutes to put pressure on mothers to dispose of an unwanted baby." In the US, there are Safe Haven laws where the mother drops the infant off in person but does not have to give any information. From the Safe Haven site: ""Baby Safe Haven" laws or infant abandonment laws were created to remove the potential for prosecution so long as children were given unharmed and given to proper authorities. Since the first law was adopted in Texas in 1999, each state across the US has enacted a Safe Haven law. While each state's law is different, they all ensure the safety of newborn infants and the protection of parents who decide to properly relinquish their child."

The "Unstoppable Gay Jew"

zarq — Thu, 07 Jun 2012 18:30:03 -0800

In 1971, "decades before any state had seriously considered legalizing gay marriage, long before anyone had thought of creating—never mind repealing—a policy called “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” before Reagan, before AIDS, before the American Psychiatric Association determined that homosexuality was not a mental illness, and before half the people currently living in America were even born, a man named John Singer stepped into the King County marriage license office in Seattle." Meet Faygele ben Miriam, the radical activist who pioneered the fight for same-sex marriage in Washington State, 41 years ago. Via.