Civil Liberties Minute

Upcoming talks

• [ No upcoming talks. ]

I will have a trip to Europe in the second week of October and I am looking for invitations for additional talks in the same trip. If you would like to invite me to speak in that trip, please write to me at rms-invitation@gnu.org with "october" as the subject.

It is more likely I can actually go if you have funds to cover the additional cost, and a speaker's fee would be nice.

Urgent action items

• US citizens: call on federal and state officials to shut down the Everglades torture immigration prison.

• US citizens: call on Congress to make Israel end the Gaza famine now, by stopping US military aid to Israel.

• US citizens: phone your senators and call on them to reject the misnamed "CLARITY Act" and any other bill that would deregulate cryptocurrency businesses.

  If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121

• US citizens: phone your congresscritter and call on per to oppose the so-called "Modern Worker Empowerment Act", which would "empower" delivery companies workers to be blocked from unionizing.

  If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121

• US citizens: call on Grassroots Dissent! Tell the Supreme Court Racial Profiling is Unconstitutional.

  Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for why that issue matters.)

  First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

  I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without javascript!"

  They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

  To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

  Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

  First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

  This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

  If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121

• US citizens: tell your congresscritter to support the Equal Tax Act, which would block the use of certain tax breaks by the very rich. (The name of the bill can give the wrong idea, but the actual substance is good.)

  Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for why that issue matters.)

  First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

  I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without javascript!"

  They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

  To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

  Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

  First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

  This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

  If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121

• US citizens: call on the forest Service to defend the roadless rule that protects some forests from logging and mining. What's at stake is not just their ecosystems, but the potentially devastating masses of carbon that they keep out of the atmosphere.

  Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for why that issue matters.)

  First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

  I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without JavaScript!"

  They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

  To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

  Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

  First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

  This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

• US citizens: Tell the Supreme Court Racial Profiling is Unconstitutional.

  Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for why that issue matters.)

  First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

  I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without JavaScript!"

  They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

  To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

  Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

  First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

  This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

• US citizens: phone your congresscritter and urge per to stand against the efforts of the repressors to attack freedom of speech.

  If you phone, please spread the word! Main Switchboard: +1-202-224-3121

• US citizens: tell your congresscritter to support the Equal Tax Act, which would block the use of certain tax breaks by the very rich. (The name of the bill can give the wrong idea, but the actual substance is good.)

  Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for why that issue matters.)

  First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

  I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without JavaScript!"

  They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

  To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

  Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

  First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

  This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious)

• US citizens: call on DoorDash to stop lobbying to abolish gig-workers union rights.

  I urge people to reject all the food delivery companies, for several reasons.

  Here's how to make the actionnetwork.org letter campaign linked above work without running the site's nonfree JavaScript code. (See https://gnu.org/philosophy/javascript-trap.html for why that issue matters.)

  First, make sure you have deactivated JavaScript in your browser or are using the LibreJS plug-in.

  I have done the next step for you: I added `?nowrapper=true' to the end of the campaign URL before posting it above. That should bring you to a page that starts with, "Letter campaigns will not work without JavaScript!"

  They indeed won't work without some manual help, but the following simple method seems adequate for many of them, including this one.

  To start, fill in the personal information answers in the box on the right side of the page. That's how you say who's sending the letter.

  Then click the "START WRITING" button. That will take you to a page that can't function without nonfree JavaScript code. (To ensure it doesn't function perversely by running that nonfree code, you can enable LibreJS or disable JavaScript by visiting that page.) You can finish sending without that code By editing its URL in the browser's address bar, as follows:

  First, go to the end and insert `&nowrapper=true'. Then tell the browser to visit that URL. This should give you a version of the page that works without JavaScript. Edit the subject and body of your letter. Finally, click on the "SEND LETTER" button, and you're done.

  This method seems to work for letter campaigns that send the letters to a fixed list of recipients, the same recipients for every sender. Editing and revisiting the URL is the only additional step needed to bypass the nonfree JavaScript code. I'm sure you'll agree it is a small effort for the result of supporting the campaign without opening your computer to unjust (and potentially malicious) software.

• I'm looking for a cartoonist who would like to draw cartoons for me once in a while. If you're interested, please write to rms, which refers to me, at the location gnu period org.

• Boycott Chevron, in the name of Steven Donziger.

Recording of Guantanamero

There Ought to Be a Law

• * Abandoned coalmines and oil and gas wells are now one of the biggest sources of the powerful greenhouse gas methane, new data shows, and little effort is being made to clean them up.*

  I expect that the fossil fuel companies to divest themselves from old mines and wells in ways that will avoid liability for them — just as they sometimes disconnect themselves from responsibility for supporting former workers.

  So I suggest making it a felony to implement a restructuring of business or assets in a way that is likely to result predictably in strand assets that carry financial responsibilities with no one capable of shouldering the responsibilities.

• A pitifully weak attempt to solve a real problem: asking for a federal law that would permit victims of domestic abuse and stalking to demand that data brokers delete information about them.

  Data, once collected, will be abused. The way to prevent that abuse is to facilitate refusing to hand it over in the first place.

  Here is my proposal for protecting the specific people known to be in particular danger, and everyone else who could be harmed if individuals, businesses or governments use their personal data against them without a search warrant: require services to be available anonymously.

• The regulation of toxic chemicals in the US is hamstrung by laws that enable companies to keep their use and their presence in any place secret.

  The selfish interest of those who keep trade secrets is rational but antisocial. In many cases the only harm it does is to hold back the general advance of technology. But sometimes it does really nasty things. For digital hardware and software, it often gives companies a way to subjugate their users. Regarding use of toxic chemicals, it endangers public health.

  Why would legislators pass laws to "protect" companies instead of protecting the people they harm? I suspect it is partly because these companies are influential and the legislators seek their support, and partly because the legislators ask them for campaign funds.

  But it is also partly the result of the mindset of "trickle down", which assumes that the only way to get more funds for the state is to let increase the size of the economy by letting companies have what they want. Unfortunately, what they want is often to be allowed to harm the public.

  Most Democrats in Congress got corrupted this way in the 80s and 90s. (The exceptions are the progressive Democrats.) Now in the UK Starmer is guiding Labour into that sort of corruption.

  Clearly our laws should say that any public need to know about the presence of toxic substances in a business facility overrides the desire to keep them secret.

• *China-owned British Steel said to have requested £600m of taxpayer support.*

  Whether the owners are Chinese is a question that there is no need to ask, because the state should never give money to a business "to support it." Instead it should offer to lend money to the company for suitable repayment, or else buy equity at a fair price.

  These two ways of supporting a company avoid giving the owners an opporunity to rip off the state -- which the company's owners are likely to try to do, if they can, regardless of which country they are from.

  With a policy like this, it wouldn't matter which country the company's owners are from.

Quotes

Here are some quotations that I particularly like.

Most recent Political Notes and News Items

You can now read the political notes on Mastodon.

Peter Prinsley's story
27 September 2025

Peter Prinsley is a British MP, a doctor, and a Jew. He tried to visit Israel as part of a parliamentary delegation, and was not admitted.

Paragon Solutions spyware
27 September 2025

*Citizen Lab says it found, [in journalists' snoop-phones,] "digital fingerprints" of military-grade spyware [from Paragon Solutions] that Italy has admitted using against activists*

US border patrol collected DNA
27 September 2025

The US border thugs sometimes collect DNA samples of US citizens without legal grounds to do so.

These DNA sequences go into a permanent database.

Antoinette Lattouf's unlawful termination
27 September 2025

*ABC ordered to pay Antoinette Lattouf another $150,000 for unlawful termination over Gaza Instagram post.* This is the operation of a system intended to preserve freedom of the press. Under ordinary circumstances, a media outlet would hesitate to fire someone for invalid reasons knowing that it would probably face such a penalty.

But a company faced with enormous threats wielded by fascist officials who demand that certain views be suppressed will treat such penalties as the normal cost of sucking up.

Populist right and the image of Dubai
27 September 2025

*Dubai presents the hard-right vision of utopia: a place stripped of workers’ protections or the right to protest, a place of pure environmental dereliction, a place where everyone drives everywhere, a place where the queer and the gender-fluid are told from birth that they simply do not exist, a place where citizenship is defined along narrow ethnic lines and everyone else is there on sufferance, where the super-rich and well-connected can simply do and consume as they please. A place where the poor are simply cleared out of sight.

*But of course, the poor do exist in Dubai. They live in often squalid camps on the baking peripheries of the city, working long hours for low wages with no protections, indentured if not always by law then by circumstance. Migrant workers form almost 90% of the UAE population, most from south Asia or the Philippines. And unlike the small and gilded class of native Emiratis who enjoy free healthcare and a generous welfare state, they must toil unquestioningly in a system engineered to embed their subservience.*

Improperly issued subpoena
27 September 2025

The persecutor's agents are using an improperly issued subpoena to try to identify the person who published the identity of agents of the secret police, who were marauding near Los Angeles.

Future in which Israel is economically isolated
26 September 2025

Netanyahu is planning for a future in which Israel is economically isolated.

I think that is lunacy — that it will push Israeli business into opposition and that he will lose power. But we can't be certain.

Ratio of right-wing to left-wing domestic attacks
26 September 2025

A US government investigation determined that domestic right-wing extremists had committed, since 1990, over 200 violent attacks and killed over 520 people, since 1990. In the same period, left-wing extremists had committed 42 attacks and killed 78 people.

This disagreed with the persecutor's official propaganda line, so the Department of "Justice" deleted it. But it is available on the Internet Archive so you can see the facts that the bully wishes to suppress.

Unofficial political violence seems to be decreasing this year. Maybe the unofficial right-wing thugs have decided that the official masked right-wing thugs are doing enough persecution.

UK "trade deal"
26 September 2025

The UK just agreed to a "trade deal" in which computing megacorporations made a "commitment" to invest large sums in the UK, including the construction of hypothetical future small nuclear reactors a decade or two from now.

In effect, the deal gives the UK a promise to implement lots of malicious technology (bullshit generators and computer chips whose instruction sets are secret) along with the risks and wastes of a new type of nuclear reactor (instead of renewable generators).

It is possible that these "commitments" to impose problems will not be carried out.

When a big company makes a "commitment" for future investment, it can break that commitment later after receiving the benefit it already received "in exchange". Corporations have no consciences and are happy to swindle states and their workers if they can't be punished. This is why I proposed that the 50 states should form a union so as to replace their negotiations over tax breaks for "investors" with collective bargaining.

It is not clear to me what benefit the companies are getting in exchange for this "commitment". If it is nothing other than the profit they might later get from these investments, why call it a "deal"?

I suspect that the benefit they got is a change in policies, this year — that the UK government dropped some important objections to some of what the companies plan to do there. If so, they have already received their side of the deal, and if they later invest less than they "promised", it will be impossible to take back what they were given.

European Commission calls for freezing of free trade with Israel
26 September 2025

*European Commission calls for freezing of free trade with Israel over Gaza.*

It seems there is no guarantee that a majority of EU countries will vote in favor of this.

Lab tests confirm Navalny was poisoned
26 September 2025

*Widow of Alexei Navalny says lab tests confirm he was poisoned in prison.*

The Israeli army is attacking Gaza City
26 September 2025

The Israeli army is attacking Gaza City, apparently trying to force out the million civilians living there.

The army says that HAMAS is using apartment buildings for "surveillance", and has bombed some of those buildings to destroy them. Based on this logic, the army might bomb every tall building in Gaza City with the large bombs that the US is providing.

(satire) Nonthreatening Eunuch Driver
26 September 2025

(satire) *New Uber Feature Allows Women To Request Nonthreatening Eunuch Driver.*

(satire) To make this work, Uber contracted to Google the development of an app to recognize automatically whether a driver is a eunuch. Reports say that it got confused when first used by women drivers, because it had not encountered any in its training.

(serious) Why not to do business with Uber.

People arrested in UK for projecting Epstein and bully images
26 September 2025

The UK has arrested people for projecting large images of the bully and Epstein. This is outrageous censorship.

MSNBC strict standard to staff critical of Charles Kirk
26 September 2025

MSNBC is applying a ridiculously strict standard to staff that post criticizing Charles Kirk for his politics.

I have a suspicion that MSNBC is not applying the same strictness to statements that support the bully. But I don't watch MSNBC (I don't have a cable hookup since they use DRM and track people), so I don't really know.

Does anyone know first hand if this is true?

Therapy sessions given to bullshit generators
26 September 2025

Psychotherapists are invited to give recordings of therapy sessions to a bullshit generator service to summarize them. They must agree to give the company a "non-exclusive, transferable, assignable, perpetual, royalty-free, worldwide license" to patients’ anonymized therapy sessions.

With so much data to work with, I expect that these recordings will often be deanonymized.

Deportation thugs find people by subpoenas for data
26 September 2025

The deportation thugs often find people by subpoenas for data from dis-services that the targets are dependent on. This included graduate students with visas, who were accused of the non-crime of speaking up for Palestinians' lives and rights.

In the early years of the century I learned about the listening and tracking capabilities of portable phones, and concluded people should refuse to carry these surveillance devices. So that's what I have done.

Convincing evidence Israel has committed genocide
26 September 2025

The UN Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel has published convincing evidence to show that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, and its leaders did that intentionally.

This article goes through the case, describing the kinds of evidence and how they relate to the genocide treaty.

Bully filed frivolous lawsuit against New York Times
26 September 2025

The bully has filed a frivolous lawsuit against the New York Times demanding 16 billion dollars damages for publishing things he did not like.

I say "frivolous" because lawyers say he has no valid grounds and can't win in a fair trial. The point, however, is to ensure it can't be fair.

Do you go to a clinic which urges you to sign up for Mychart?
26 September 2025

Do you go to a clinic which urges you to sign up for Mychart? If so, it is already mistreating you by making you run nonfree software. But the developer, Epic, wants to do worse: lead users to sign away their right to sue if Epic misuses or leaks their personal medical data.

The old terms and conditions were already unacceptable in my view, and so was running nonfree software, so I never did sign up. But if you did in the past, this should be the point at which you won't stand for any more.

The four factors of the apocalypse:
   global heating, global hating,
   global eating, global mating.

Copy this button (courtesy of R.Siddharth) to express your rejection of Facebook.

E-books

Non-oppressive Commercial E-books

Don't use Facebook

Facebook's face recognition demonstrates a threat to everyone's privacy. I therefore ask people not to put photos of me on Facebook; you can do likewise.

Of course, Facebook is bad for many other reasons as well.

Boycott Harry Potter Books, Movies, etc.

Internet Music EULAS

Business Supremacy Treaties

Countries to Stay Away From

No national identity cards

I'd like to make a list of countries that do not require a national identity card, and have no plans to adopt one. If you live in or have confirmed knowledge of such a country, please send email to rms at gnu.org.

Here's my list of countries with no national ID cards and no plans for one: Australia, Canada, New Zealand, UK. Australia's previous government tried to institute national ID cards, but the Labor government dropped the plan.

India has mostly finished imposing a national biometric ID number in a grand act of oppression.

Switzerland has national ID cards which are optional, but they or some other government ID card are needed for some purposes.

Iceland doesn't have ID cards as such, but they have ID numbers that citizens are forced to use frequently. For example, the national ID number is often required to rent a video or use a gym.

Denmark issues non-photo ID cards with a "person number", and many services use this card to identify people.

Norway will impose a national biometric ID card.

Ireland - national ID card by stealth.

ACLU: the five dangers of national ID cards.

Wikipedia has a list of identity card policies by country.

Borders

Stay away from certain countries because of their bad immigration policies.

Flight connections

Avoid flight connections in these airports because of their treatment of passengers.

The Lifelong Activist

People often ask how I manage to continue devoting myself to progressive activism (such as the free software movement) for years without burning out. The best way I can answer is by recommending a book, The Lifelong Activist by Hillary Rettig.

I disagree with the book on one theoretical point in the last part of the book: we shouldn't think of political activism as being marketing and sales, because those terms refer to business, and politics is something much more important than mere business. However, this doesn't diminish the value of the book's practical advice about borrowing techniques from marketing and sales.

Disclosure: I am friends with the author.

Bob Chassell

Solidarity Economy and Free Software

Personal Declaration of Richard Stallman and Euclides Mance on Solidarity Economy and Free Software.

Falkvinge articles

I have reposted some of Rick Falkvinge's articles. As posted on his site, you can't see them in a browser without running some nonfree Javascript code which is apparently non-free. These versions show the same text, without the obstacle.