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4. 1984 Redux

Nov-25-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: “On coins, on stamps, on the covers of books, on banners, on posters, and on the wrappings of a cigarette Packet — everywhere. Always the eyes watching you and the voice enveloping you. Asleep or awake, working or eating, indoors or out of doors, in the bath or in bed — no escape.” Orwell, 1984. In Orwell’s dystopia, telescreens monitored your every move. These days, License plate scanners are one of a number off ways that happens. The ACLU article started a fine discussion on Reddit; we append two comments. And a look at those who wear masks and fight back, from Wired.

* License Plate Scanners Logging Our Every Move ACLU

The Washington Post reported on Sunday that the District of Columbia is engaging in widespread tracking of citizen’s movements using automated license plate readers (ALPRs). According to the Post, the D.C. police:

Are running more than one ALPR per square mile;
Are planning on sharply increasing the density of these devices until they form a “comprehensive dragnet;”
Retain the time/date/location/tag number even of innocent people for whom nothing is found to be wrong;
Store that data in a database for three years.

It has now become clear that this technology, if we do not limit its use, will represent a significant step toward the creation of a surveillance society in the United States. The Post article cites a number of examples in which the technology has proven useful to police. Of course, if the police track all of us all the time, there is no doubt that will help to solve some crimes — just as it would no doubt help solve some crimes if they could read everybody’s e-mail and install cameras in everybody’s homes. But in a free society, we don’t let the police watch over us just because we might do something wrong. That is not the balance struck by our Constitution and is not the balance we should strike in our policymaking.

* Two Reddit comments on the ACLU Post Above

Hillwiki

GPS cellphones
GPS car navigation
[1] Wireless smart meters that record your home power usage by the minute. You could lose in court because it was proven your alibi of ‘being home watching TV’ was not possible because no TV or lights were on, and your 500W garage door opener didn’t turn on until 1:13am
Traffic cameras
Worst of all: your internet usage and emails
Credit card/debit purchases
Reward points/miles
About 50 other things

Or maybe I’m just paranoid.

RoughWaterAhead

i did a blind move from florida to california. lived on the streets, finally got a new apartment, still to this day haven’t gotten another car or drivers license. no change of address forms or anything like that, called my bank to let them know and that was it. no facebook, no myspace; i wasn’t trying to hide, but i wasn’t really trying to be found.

a year later, a random college that i had done surveys with tracked me down instantly when they wanted to do another survey. they figured out my landlords phone number and convinced my landlord to call me, took almost no effort at all on their part.

my point is, between the publicly available information about us, and the information we post on the internet, hell, even satellites these days, unless you’re so serious about privacy that you’re faking your death, it’s probably best to assume you have no privacy at all from this point forward.

* Anonymous 101: Introduction to the Lulz Wired

Also this year, Anons released documents on, or d0xed, several police organizations and one prominent police vendor in retaliation for heavy-handed law enforcement reaction to occupations associated with the Occupy Wall Street movement. They’ve fought with child pornographers, hacked Sony repeatedly, and even tried to release compromising pictures to blackmail Bay Area Rapid Transit spokesman Linton Johnson into resigning. (Johnson claimed to have authored and then defended BART’s controversial decision to shut off mobile phone service in BART stations to pre-empt an anti-police brutality protest.)

They’ve created law enforcement excitement that’s verged on panic, given net and media pundits hyperbolic logorrhea about “cyber terrorism” and “cyber freedom”, and happily skipped between damn funny, deeply disturbing, and self-aggrandizing, depending on the mood of the hive mind at the moment.

But what is Anonymous? In this in-depth series “Anonymous: Beyond the Mask,” we’re going to do our best to answer that

3. The Spirit of OWS

Oct-21-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: One of the most powerful aspects of the OWS movement is that it is about people rather than power. In this section we look at the voices of the people who are out there, rallying for change. We look at Starhawk, at longtime Tikkunista Avi, at Counterpunch. And if you’re not sure where in the world is the closest demo to you, you can answer that question here.

* What drives Occupy Wall Street?StarhawkThe Washington Post

I’ve been to four different Occupy sites in the last two weeks, … all share a common heart, a revulsion against an economy and a politics that increasingly say, “You don’t count, except as something to exploit. Your voice is drowned out by money, your labor is expendable, your needs must be sacrificed to the gods of profit.”

At its essence, the message of the Occupations is simply this:

“Here in the face of power we will sit and create a new society, in which you do count. Your voice carries weight, your contributions have value, whoever you may be. We care for one another, and we say that love and care are the true foundations for the society we want to live in. We’ll stand with the poor and sleep with the homeless if that’s what it takes to get justice. We’ll build a new world.”

The Occupy movement is not overtly religious, like the Tea Party. The 99 percent includes people of all religious faiths, and people who have none. But I believe its core message and ethic is profoundly spiritual, even prophetic.

* “i’ve been to many protests, here in TO and overseas…”Avi Zer-Aviv

I’ve been to many protests, here in TO and overseas, and i have to say, this one felt the most grounded, mature, spiritual, and interpersonal ever!

i was struck as we spent time getting to know our neighbours through interpersonal conversation about the reasons we were there as part of the demo, and how organic and free-flowing the entire process was, down to thousands of people voting on the march route. this is democracy.

protest movements have often still used patriarchal systems and top-down models to spread their message. this one is different. chaos because no clear messaging, but the process is what is exciting, a whole new way of being in activist politics.

* This Might Be The Big One Counterpunch

Really, I haven’t felt this much positive energy since around 2005 at some big anti-war rally in London in old England. And it’s not just kids, either, although the faces you tend to see at the front are younger. Steel workers, teachers’ unions–there’s a good spread. At the park, a multi-faceted community bloomed into instant viability. I checked out a copy of Hamlet from the new library, which on Day One was fifty books on a blanket. Tents flowered. Assemblies general and specific went about their tasks as if they had lived in the park since the last time tents looked this beautiful west of the Don three hundred years ago. Saturday was a good day.

… People of Toronto: send your youth to the encampment. There will be some danger, but it is primarily in getting there across a city given over to automobile traffic. Visit yourself. Bring food, blankets, ideas. Don’t miss this. It feels like the big one.

5. Recent Anonymous Actions

Jun-10-2011 | Comments (0)

Bird’s Eye: Anonymous and Wikileaks aren’t exactly the same group: the former is Anonymous, the latter merely anonymous. But they overlap their interests and targets. We look at the five big Wikileaks stories of this year (largely ignored by the MSM), at an Al Jazeera interview with Anonymous, focussing on their role in fomenting the Arab uprisings, and at a recent Anonymous manifesto in response to NATO’s targeting them.

* Five WikiLeaks Hits of 2011 That Are Turning the World on Its Head AlterNet

Number Four: World leaders are practically lighting a fire under the Arctic. As Secretary of State Hilary Clinton met with the Arctic Council last month to discuss oil exploration, WikiLeaks, with impeccable timing, published a new trove of cables highlighting a race to carve up the Arctic for resource exploitation. Nations battling to poison the arctic with oil drilling include Canada, the US, Russia, Norway, Denmark, and perhaps even China, which all have competing claims to the Arctic.The leaks illustrate a frightening reality, where world leaders are greedily awaiting the opportunity to exploit the oil and natural gas that lie beneath the melting Arctic ice, even arming themselves for possible resource wars.

…Clearly, banking on the melting of the polar ice caps has taken priority over halting or even reversing the catastrophic effects of climate change. The Arctic contains as much as one quarter of the world’s gas and oil reserves, once hidden under huge masses of ice and inaccessible through frozen seas. However, ice is melting faster than predicted, presenting profitable business opportunities which are leading the Arctic countries to lose sight of longer-term climate issues.

* Anonymous and the Arab Uprisings Al Jazeera

Anonymous’s rapid rise from the depths of geekdom to becoming a catalyst and nerve centre for real-life revolutionaries is one that has taken even some of its own members by surprise. The loosely-knit hive brings anonymous techies, hackers and, increasingly, activists together under a single appellation, united in their non-violent but often illegal collective action.
With high-profile campaigns, centred on “distributed denial of service” (DDoS) attacks that knock target websites offline, it has been transformed from a fringe group of law-breaking pranksters that emerged in 2006 into an international movement that draws new recruits by their thousands. In an interview with a group of Anons conducted on their home turf, Internet Relay Chat (IRC), they tell Al Jazeera that they are fighting, above all, for the free flow of information. “You can’t make a decision on something if you don’t know anything about it,” one Anon says.
…While mainstream media was slow to tune in to the revolutionary drumbeat that has been rising in the Arab world, Anonymous was present from the beginning. Tunisian Anons collaborated with their international counterparts on Operation Tunisia, which was launched on January 2 – well before most Western media outlets had clicked onto the fact that there was a revolution underway.

* Anonymous Message to NATO (via reddit.com)

Anonymous is not simply “a group of super hackers”. Anonymous is the embodiment of freedom on the web. We exist as a result of the Internet, and humanity itself. This frightens you. It only seems natural that it would. Governments, corporations, and militaries know how to control individuals. It frustrates you that you do not control us. We have moved to a world where our freedom is in our own hands. We owe you nothing for it. We stand for freedom for every person around the world. You stand in our way.

We hope you come to see that your attempts to censor and control our existence are futile. But if this is not the case, if you continue to object to our freedoms — we shall not relent.

We do not fear your tyranny. You cannot win a battle against an entity you do not understand. You can take down our networks, arrest every single one of us that you can backtrace, read every bit of data ever shared from computer to computer for the rest of this age, and you will still lose.

So come at me bro. You can retaliate against us in any manner you choose. Lock down the web. Throw us in prison. Take it all away from us. Anonymous will live on.

Cross-posted on rabble.ca, Canada’s voice from the left.

1. Actions

Jan-28-2011 | Comments (2)

* Stop the Meter on Internet Use. Canadian Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are about to impose usage-based billing on you. This means we’re looking at a future where ISPs will charge per byte, the way they do with smart phones. If we allow this to happen Canadians will have no choice but to pay MUCH more for less Internet.

Protest, most of all, because this will reduce internet access as a voice for people without power.

* Protest “Corrective Rape” ‘Corrective rape’ is based on the outrageous and utterly false notion that a lesbian woman can be raped to ‘make her straight’, but this heinous act is not even classified as a hate crime in South Africa….This is ultimately a battle with poverty, patriarchy, and homophobia. Ending the tide of rape will require bold leadership and concerted action to spearhead transformative change in South Africa and across the continent. If enough of us join this global call for action, we could push Zuma to speak out, drive much-needed government action, and begin a national conversation that could fundamentally shift public attitudes toward rape and homophobia in South Africa. Sign on now and spread the word.

1. Actions

Dec-24-2010 | Comments (0)

* Support the CBC :: Sign the Petition!

On November 23rd, Stephen Harper’s secret plan for the CBC was revealed when the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage mused publicly about killing our public broadcaster! You can hear the audio for yourself here. On Dec 6th, the matter of the government’s plan for the CBC was raised in Parliament. The Heritage Minister was asked to disavow his Parliamentary Secretary’s idea of cutting all funding to the CBC. Twice Minister Moore was asked to dismiss the notion that the government should kill public broadcasting. And, twice he refused to do so. You can see the exchange in the House of Commons here…. We recognize the threat posed by Harper could be the most serious peril CBC has ever faced. Now is the time for all of us who love and depend on the CBC to stand up and be counted.

* Stop Torturing Bradley Manning Glenn Greenwald reports that U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning is being tortured. Manning is accused of leaking unflattering information about the Afghanistan war to WikiLeaks, but hasn’t been convicted of — or even tried for — any crime. The Guardian reports that the United Nations is investigating a complaint on behalf of Bradley Manning that he is being mistreated while held since May in US Marine Corps custody pending trial. Sign a petition to either end the torture and put him on trial or set him free.

* Contribute to the EFF When our freedoms in the networked world come under attack, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is the first line of defense. EFF broke new ground when it was founded in 1990 — well before the Internet was on most people’s radar — and continues to confront cutting-edge issues defending free speech, privacy, innovation, and consumer rights today. From the beginning, EFF has championed the public interest in every critical battle affecting digital rights.

Blending the expertise of lawyers, policy analysts, activists, and technologists, EFF achieves significant victories on behalf of consumers and the general public. EFF fights for freedom primarily in the courts, bringing and defending lawsuits even when that means taking on the US government or large corporations.

1. Actions

Nov-12-2010 | Comments (0)

* Two at Beit Zatoun: The Gay International Thursday, November 18, 2010 7:00 PM Queer activists around the world have been organizing in opposition to homophobia, gender- and sexuality-based violence both locally and across borders. This panel features activists who work on queer issues in India, Canada and the Caribbean at both local and transnational levels. It will highlight the tensions that activists face when their work puts them in contact with local governments, legal systems, international relations, and even popular culture.

* DIY Punk Matinee: Saturday, November 20, 2010, 5:00 PM – 9:00 PM Featuring:WOMB RAIDER (Feminist hardcore from Montreal), INDICTABLE MISCHIEF (Anti-police anthems from Peterborough), LOATHSOME (Vegan powerviolence from Toronto) No Apathy! Toronto is a project that seeks to empower youth and create social change through the ideas and culture of DIY-Punk. We understand Punk as a way of living, not just as an aesthetic. To us, Punk is about actively engaging in the betterment of our communities and ourselves through activism, art, and education. To us, Punk is about creating our own culture in opposition to an oppressive society. To us, Punk is important.

* IJV Petition against The Canadian Parliamentary Coalition to Combat Antisemitism (CPCCA) [which] is conducting eight hearings starting November 2 to December 14. “Witnesses” have been selected from some 150 submissions to further the CPCCA’s political agenda. Many of those critical of the CPCCA agenda to equate criticism of Israel or Zionism as anti-Semitism made submissions ….they have all been excluded from the hearings. The CPCCA’s goal is to criminalize criticism of Israel and Zionism, not to hold impartial hearings. Therefore, we oppose the CPCCA as an ideologically biased organization with an agenda that will harm free speech and human rights activity in Canada…. It is a danger to both Canadian liberties and to the genuine and necessary fight against anti-Semitism.

1. Actions

Nov-05-2010 | Comments (0)

* Fight Bill C-49 which would punish refugees fleeing for the lives to Canada. As a Jewish open letter says, Some of us are immigrants ourselves, while others are the children and grandchildren of people who came to this country fleeing persecution. We know either firsthand or through the lessons passed down to us, that Canada has longstanding tradition of refusing entry to immigrants deemed undesirable by the State. Today, Jewish immigration is no longer seen as a threat to the Canadian state, but it was not so long ago that Canada’s attitude towards Jewish immigrants was ‘none is too many’. Perhaps the best known result of this policy was the 1939 decision by the Canadian government to turn down a request for landing of the refugee ship, St Louis. Its nine hundred Jewish refugees were sent back to their deaths in Europe. The recent detention of nearly 500 Tamil refugees in British Columbia shows that Canada is proudly continuing its legacy of racist discrimination against people fleeing persecution and genocide. Sign their petition here, or get further information from the Canadian Council for Refugees

* Opening today, Amy Gottleib’s show FBI Family, at Ellington’s 805 St Clair W. Combining 1950s family photos with her mother’s FBI files, Gottlieb’s series FBI Family, speaks to historic and contemporary issues around state surveillance. While the family photos seem ordinary and representative of domestic photography of the period, the layering injects a counter-narrative of classification, suspicion and control.

1 Actions

Oct-22-2010 | Comments (0)

* Live in the GTA? On Monday, go and vote.

* Norman Finkelstein to tour Canada Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) is delighted to announce it is hosting a five-city speaking tour by American scholar Norman Finkelstein… His academic research has concentrated on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and its representation in political discourse. He has devoted much of his adult life to the achievement of a just peace between Israel and Palestine.

* Montreal Tuesday, Oct. 26

* Ottawa Wednesday, Oct. 27

* Toronto Thursday, Oct. 28

* Edmonton Friday, Oct. 29

* Vancouver Saturday, Oct. 30

1 Actions

Oct-15-2010 | Comments (0)

* Rick Salutin has been fired from the Grope and Fail. Mr Salutin, a consistently intelligent and challenging voice from the left, was released because“focus groups in Toronto and Vancouver showed that “readers wanted the paper to have a ‘friendlier’ look. Friendlier apparently meant more white space, shorter stories, grabbier graphics and a lot more colour.” Murray Dobbin says, “Each time I saw that column in the Globe – a hard-line neo-liberal paper in most ways – it allowed me to believe progressive voices were still part of the mainstream debate – a place at the table that we might be able to expand. The sheer breadth of his commentary is amazing – economics, politics, culture, cities, philosophy, the nation. And in all of it he was an original thinker – not “derivative of anyone” as some else said today. He challenged, provoked us into thinking beyond conventional progressive ideas and ways of seeing. He was tough but never shrill and rarely really angry – just dead on the money. When you read Rick Salutin you feel like you still live in Canada.” You can read the last column as he wrote it (The Globe cut his farewell off!) here, and you can write to The Globe’s Editor in Chief John Stackhouse here.

* Evangel Hall needs volunteers. Evangel Hall runs an Out of the Cold program Tuesday and Wednesday nights and needs people to cook and serve breakfast on Wednesday and Thursday mornings. This is early-morning work, since the guests have to leave by 7:00 a.m.

If you think you might be interested, please phone Elizabeth Block at (416) 979-2398.

* I shall not hate: A Gaza doctor’s journey by Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish. Dr. Abuelaish is a medical doctor who was born and raised in the Jabalia refugee camp in Gaza. During the most recent incursion by Israel into Gaza, three of his daughters and a niece were killed by a shell fired by an Israeli tank into Dr. Abuelaish’s house. Despite this horrific personal tragedy, Dr. Abuelaish continues to be a passionate and eloquent proponent of peace between Palestinians and Israelis, giving full meaning to his resolve that he “shall not hate.” Sunday Oct 17th at 1:30. Ryerson

* Vote by Choice Ranked Choice Voting is a way of picking our elected officials that is superior to the current “One X” system. Register today to cast a ballot for a parallel vote (ranked choice voting method) in the forthcoming Monday, October 25, 2010, municipal election in Ontario

1 Actions (some non-Canadian ones for a change)

Oct-08-2010 | Comments (0)

* Just Peace has a website on which Americans can voice their concern over the military aid given to Israel. “U.S. military aid to Israel is a barrier to peace. This aid sustains Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land and buys weapons used against Palestinian civilians. Has U.S. military aid to Israel over the past six decades advanced the prospects for peace? Quite the opposite: tens of billions of our tax dollars in military aid has not and will not bring peace because the conflict requires a political solution—not arming one side. America’s reputation and precious resources should be utilized to promote a positive outcome for both Israelis and Palestinians.”

* Pro-Science Rally in London this Sunday Londoners! This Saturday, 2,000+ scientists and lovers of science will rally in Westminster to tell the nation that “Science is Vital” and to protest cuts to science programmes in the new budget. Bring placards, lab coats, and scientific instruments.

* Rally to Restore Sanity / March to Keep Fear Alive The 10/30/10 Jon Stewart/ Stephen Colbert rallies are spawning… there are now local support rallies all across the US. Check for your state.

1. Actions

Oct-01-2010 | Comments (0)

* The YIMBY Festival October 16th, the Gladstone Hotel with the help of Ryerson University is presenting the 4th Annual YIMBY Festival. The YIMBY (Yes, In My Backyard) Festival provides a social space for your community group to gather and exchange ideas and strategies, as well as to celebrate the achievements of your organizations in an atmosphere focused on listening, learning and engaging.

* Toronto Palestinian Film Festival starts Oct 2nd. Full details and program online

* George Galloway, banned as a “security risk” by the Harper Gov’t for donating wheelchairs to Gaza, finally gets to arrive on Oct 2nd and speak on Oct 3rd in Toronto. Rabble.ca will be live-steaming the speech; all details here

1. Actions

Sep-24-2010 | Comments (0)

* Electric Train Festival Sorauren Park, Toronto, Sunday, September 26th, 1–6 pm. Join us for an afternoon in the park to send a message to Premier McGuinty that Toronto wants an electric rail link to the airport now, not dirty diesel.

* Toronto Palestinian Film Festival starts Oct 2nd. Full details and program online

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