#civilliberties — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #civilliberties, aggregated by home.social.
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America After 9/11: 25 Years of Fear, War, Surveillance and Permanent Emergency
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America After 9/11: 25 Years of Fear, War, Surveillance and Permanent Emergency
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America After 9/11: 25 Years of Fear, War, Surveillance and Permanent Emergency
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America After 9/11: 25 Years of Fear, War, Surveillance and Permanent Emergency
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Twenty-Five Years of “Temporary”: How the Patriot Act Became Permanent
By Cliff Potts, CSO, and Editor-in-Chief of WPS News
Baybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 11, 2026
Twenty-five years ago today, the United States experienced the deadliest foreign attack on its soil in modern history. The September 11, 2001 attacks killed nearly 3,000 people and shocked the nation into a state of collective fear and urgency. In Washington, that fear translated into speed. Within weeks, Congress passed the USA PATRIOT Act, a sweeping expansion of federal surveillance and law-enforcement authority described at the time as temporary, emergency legislation.
A quarter-century later, most of those powers remain in force.
This article examines where the Patriot Act came from, how it moved so quickly, and how every administration since 2001—across both parties—has contributed to its endurance.
A Law That Predated the Crisis
Despite its association with September 11, the Patriot Act was not created from scratch after the attacks. Its core provisions had been debated in Washington for at least five to ten years prior.
Throughout the 1990s, federal agencies repeatedly sought expanded authority to conduct wiretaps across multiple devices, share intelligence between law enforcement and intelligence agencies, monitor financial transactions more closely, and standardize identity and address records for people living outside traditional housing structures. These proposals regularly stalled in Congress due to civil-liberty concerns and the absence of political urgency.
September 11 provided that urgency. Proposals that had previously failed were rapidly consolidated into a single bill, introduced on October 23, 2001, and passed three days later. Many lawmakers later acknowledged that they had not read the full text before voting.
The Bush Administration: Emergency Powers Become Law
Under President George W. Bush, the Patriot Act was framed as a wartime necessity. The administration argued that extraordinary threats required extraordinary tools and assured the public that the measures were temporary.
The law expanded federal authority to conduct surveillance under Section 215, allowed delayed-notification searches, broadened access to business and banking records, and lowered barriers between intelligence and law enforcement databases. Sunset clauses were included, reinforcing the claim that these powers would expire once the emergency passed.
For many Americans, the impact was indirect but real. Financial institutions tightened compliance rules. Address databases were standardized. People living in mobile-home parks, rural communities, and other nontraditional housing arrangements saw their records altered without notice. Missed bank statements, disrupted accounts, and bureaucratic errors became common side effects of a system designed to prioritize traceability over continuity.
No comprehensive mechanism was created to address or remedy these disruptions.
The Obama Administration: Normalization and Limited Reform
When Barack Obama took office in 2009, the surveillance framework was already embedded in federal practice. Rather than dismantle it, his administration treated it as a baseline reality.
Key Patriot Act provisions were reauthorized, and surveillance programs were defended in court as lawful and necessary. The Justice Department argued that the authorities had become integral to national security operations.
Meaningful change came only after the 2013 disclosures by Edward Snowden. In response, Congress passed the USA Freedom Act in 2015, which ended some forms of bulk data collection and added modest transparency requirements. Certain data storage responsibilities were shifted from the government to private companies.
These changes narrowed the scope of specific programs but left the broader surveillance architecture intact. Emergency authority had become routine governance.
The First Trump Administration: Rhetoric Without Rollback
Donald Trump entered office in 2017 denouncing the “deep state” while inheriting its tools. During his first term, surveillance authorities were renewed with minimal reform. Foreign intelligence programs that incidentally collected Americans’ data continued to expand.
Public criticism of intelligence agencies increased, but structural oversight did not. The result was continuity rather than change. The surveillance state remained intact, accompanied by louder political rhetoric.
The Biden Administration: Quiet Continuity
From 2021 to 2024, the Biden administration maintained existing authorities with little public debate. Surveillance programs were renewed, and civil-liberties language returned to official statements, but no major structural reforms were pursued.
By this point, the Patriot Act and its successor authorities were no longer discussed as emergency measures. They were treated as permanent components of federal infrastructure.
Trump’s Return and the Risk of Repurposing
With Donald Trump’s return to the presidency in 2025, the long-term implications of the Patriot Act have become clearer. The law was written with the assumption that institutional norms and good-faith restraint would guide its use.
Those assumptions are increasingly fragile. Authorities created for counterterrorism can be repurposed for immigration enforcement, protest monitoring, political surveillance, or media pressure. The risk lies not in new powers, but in the continued availability of old ones.
The Permanence of “Temporary”
From the outset, Americans were told the Patriot Act was temporary. That it would expire once the emergency ended. Instead, sunset clauses were repeatedly extended, reauthorizations became routine, and each administration passed expanded authority to the next.
Twenty-five years later, the emergency persists not because the original threat remains unchanged, but because emergency power is easier to retain than to relinquish.
A Quarter-Century Reckoning
September 11, 2026 marks twenty-five years since the attacks that reshaped the United States. It also marks twenty-five years of a legal framework that quietly altered daily life, often without notice, consent, or effective recourse.
The Patriot Act did not endure by accident. It survived because fear moved faster than democratic deliberation—and because no administration, Republican or Democratic, chose to fully unwind what crisis had built.
The question now is no longer how it began, but whether Americans are willing to confront the reality that “temporary” has lasted a generation.
For more social commentary, please see Occupy 2.5 at https://Occupy25.com
This essay will be archived as part of the ongoing WPS News Monthly Brief Series available through Amazon.
References
American Civil Liberties Union. (2021). Surveillance under the USA PATRIOT Act.
https://www.aclu.org/issues/national-security/privacy-and-surveillance/surveillance-under-patriot-actGreenwald, G. (2014). No place to hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. surveillance state. Metropolitan Books.
USA FREEDOM Act of 2015, Pub. L. No. 114–23, 129 Stat. 268.
USA PATRIOT Act of 2001, Pub. L. No. 107–56, 115 Stat. 272.
#911Anniversary #CivilLiberties #ConstitutionalRights #Democracy #emergencyPowers #opinion #PatriotAct #Politics #security #Surveillance #USNationalSecurity -
"The Home Office and police were criticised in the aftermath of the weekend for failing to take a hard line on the #FarRight. #Environment campaigners and #CiviLliberties groups have complained that there appears to be a “two-tier” approach, with peaceful climate protesters prosecuted more aggressively than far-right agitators."
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Gloria Steinem’s Final Essay before her death this week - "When you’re lucky enough to have lived a long life, as I have done, your role is to remind us how far we have come." https://periscope.corsfix.com/?https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newyorker.com%2Fculture%2Flife-and-letters%2Fgloria-steinems-final-essay= #civilliberties #women #girls #law #civilrights #justice #equality #publichealth #choice #privacy #freedom #voting #democracy
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this.weekinsecurity:
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Vigilantism comes for Flock
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"More Americans than ever are destroying Flock license plate cameras amid rising backlash against the company. Is the tide turning on intrusive U.S. mass surveillance, and where does the privacy fight go next?"https://this.weekinsecurity.com/vigilantism-comes-for-flock/
4.9.2026
#BigBrother #CivilLiberties #Flock #Freiheitsrechte #Kennzeichenscanner #LicensePlateCamera #LicensePlateTracking #Massenüberwachung #MassSurveillance #Privacy #Surveillance #Überwachung
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Texas: Faith, Freedom, and Mind Your Damn Business
By Cliff Potts, CSO
Editor-in-Chief, WPS NewsBaybay City, Leyte, Philippines — September 4, 2026, 9:15 p.m. PHT
Texas talks about faith constantly and practices freedom inconsistently. Religion is waved like a banner while personal liberty is quietly narrowed, regulated, or punished when it doesn’t line up with political fashion. This contradiction has become so normal that many Texans barely notice it anymore.
Faith is not the problem. Power is.
Faith Is Personal, Not Administrative
Texas is home to churches, synagogues, mosques, temples, meeting houses, and people who believe quietly or not at all. That pluralism is not a flaw. It is a fact. Faith has always been part of Texas life, but it has never belonged to the state.
When government begins enforcing one version of belief, it stops protecting faith and starts weaponizing it. That does not strengthen religion. It cheapens it. Faith that requires government backing is not faith—it is insecurity dressed up as authority.
People believe deeply without being coerced. The state does not need to supervise that.
Freedom Means Leaving People Alone
Texas politicians love to invoke freedom while inserting themselves into private decisions about bodies, families, education, and belief. That is not freedom. It is control wrapped in familiar language.
True freedom is not loud. It is boring. It is the quiet confidence that your neighbor’s life choices are none of your business unless they cause real harm. A free society tolerates disagreement without demanding conformity.
If a belief system is strong, it does not need the force of law to survive.
Religion in Schools Without Indoctrination
Teaching about religion is not the same thing as preaching it. Students benefit from understanding the beliefs that shape history, culture, and global affairs. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Shinto, Indigenous traditions, and secular ethics all belong in a serious education.
Teaching one belief as truth while excluding others is not education. It is indoctrination. Texas should be confident enough to teach broadly without fear.
Knowledge does not weaken faith. It strengthens discernment.
The Myth of Moral Decline
Texas politics often leans on claims of moral collapse to justify intrusion into private life. These claims rarely hold up under scrutiny. Crime trends, family structures, and social behavior are influenced far more by economics, education, and stability than by religious enforcement.
Blaming social problems on belief differences avoids addressing harder causes like poverty, healthcare access, housing, and education. Moral panic is easier than policy work.
A serious state solves problems instead of sermonizing about them.
Faith Communities Do Real Work
Faith-based organizations are often the first to respond when communities struggle. They feed people, shelter families, provide counseling, and show up quietly without demanding credit. That work matters. It deserves respect and support.
What it does not require is political dominance. Faith communities are strongest when they act voluntarily, not when they are fused to state power.
Service speaks louder than slogans.
Freedom of Conscience Cuts Both Ways
Freedom of religion includes the freedom not to believe. It includes the freedom to change beliefs. It includes the freedom to practice quietly without public approval. Protecting conscience means accepting outcomes you may personally dislike.
That is the price of liberty. It is also its strength.
Texas cannot claim to honor freedom while punishing people for living differently.
When Government Picks Winners
History offers no shortage of warnings about governments that decide which beliefs are acceptable. Even when intentions begin as sincere, outcomes tend toward exclusion, resentment, and abuse. Texas is not immune to that pattern.
Keeping church and state separate does not weaken either. It protects both from corruption.
Personal Faith, Public Restraint
Leaders are allowed their faith. They are allowed to be guided by conscience. What they are not allowed to do is impose that conscience as law when it infringes on the rights of others.
Restraint is not betrayal. It is maturity.
What a Confident Texas Would Do
A confident Texas would protect freedom of worship for everyone and freedom from coercion for everyone else. It would teach religion academically, not devotionally. It would trust families and individuals to handle belief without supervision.
Most of all, it would stop confusing moral authority with legal power.
Why This Matters Going Forward
Faith will continue to shape Texas culture. That is not in question. The question is whether it will be used to inspire service and compassion—or to justify intrusion and control.
Freedom survives only when people mind their own damn business.
Texas is strong enough to do that.
This essay will be archived as part of the ongoing WPS News Monthly Brief Series available through Amazon.
References (APA)
#churchAndState #CivilLiberties #educationPolicy #personalFreedom #religiousFreedom #TexasPolitics #TexasReligion #WPSNews
Pew Research Center. (2025). Religious diversity and belief in the United States.
First Amendment Center. (2025). Religion, government, and constitutional boundaries.
National Council of State Legislatures. (2025). Religious freedom and public policy analysis.
Gallup. (2025). Public attitudes toward religion and government.
American Academy of Religion. (2025). Teaching religion in public education. -
"While standing in a private parking lot in Sussex, Wisconsin, on May 4, 2025, Napoleon Jones witnessed a traffic stop made by an out-of-county police officer. "It just didn't sit right with me," Jones told TMJ4 News, a local NBC News affiliate. "So I did what I legally could do, and I walked over and recorded it."
Jones, a United States Navy veteran, was well within his rights to record the police stop. But even though he recorded from a safe distance without interfering, that didn't stop the Waukesha County Sheriff's deputy, Brandon Shayhorn, from later unlawfully stopping and arresting Jones.
After Shayhorn completed the traffic stop, Jones returned to his vehicle. But before Jones could exit the parking lot, Shayhorn turned on his lights and initiated a second stop, claiming Jones' temporary license plate, displayed in the rearview window, was unreadable, reports TMJ4 News. Shayhorn demanded to see Jones' driver's license, but Jones refused, arguing that he'd been unlawfully pulled over on private property. Video clips of the encounter show the deputy opening Jones' door and pulling him from his vehicle."
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Ontario's cash bail law is unconstitutional – and Ford knows it. BUT "they deliberately undermine confidence in #courts, plow under the Charter and #civilliberties, and use real human suffering to manufacture a political grievance." https://www.canadianlawyermag.com/news/opinion/ontarios-cash-bail-law-is-unconstitutional-and-ford-knows-it/394586
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Flock is in Lafayette. Who else is watching you?
Everyone’s heard of Flock cameras. But they’re not the only ones watching Lafayette.https://thecurrentla.com/2026/flock-is-in-lafayette-who-else-is-watching-you/
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What #Flock’s defenders are missing
As cities reconsider the tech, it’s worth asking how design choices have shaped trade-off between solving crimes and protecting civil liberties
New policies don’t address broader concerns from #civilliberties and #privacy groups that Flock is turning crime-stopping tool into #masssurveillance. Criticisms led to a growing backlash that already has some cities canceling contracts and some states trying to ban #ALPR
https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/08/17/1142200/what-flocks-defenders-are-missing/
https://archive.ph/q3iXJ -
Since 2001, the Australian government has passed more than 100 pieces of "national security" legislation that limits our speech, our liberties, our rights and our movements, in ways most people don’t understand until it applies to them.
#australia #ausgov #authoritarianism #civilliberties #activism #surveillance
https://www.deepcutnews.com/p/dave-hughess-common-sense-is-just -
“The fact that Trump is now taking inspiration from Britain’s repression of the movement for Palestinian freedom exposes just how dangerous this ban is and should be a wake-up call to anyone who cares about #FreeSpeech and #CivilLiberties.”
#UKPol #USPol #PalestineAction
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/aug/26/us-issues-sanctions-uk-based-palestine-action
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Flock’s license-plate network was used by Wisconsin police to track a man’s trips to Michigan and justify a car search. 🚨
As some cities drop Flock, others are replacing it with Axon ALPR systems that can blend into existing street infrastructure. 📷#TechNews #Flock #Axon #ALPR #Surveillance #Privacy #DigitalRights #CivilLiberties #Security #Technology #PoliceTech #DataPrivacy #SmartCities
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A US activist faces felony charges after using GrapheneOS’s duress code to erase his phone during a border search. 🔐
The DOJ alleges the deletion violated a law barring destruction of property to prevent seizure. ⚖️#TechNews #GrapheneOS #Privacy #DigitalRights #Encryption #OpenSource #Security #FOSS #UserControl #Technology #Mobile #CivilLiberties #Cybersecurity
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Which topic at "The Forever War and the First Amendment" are you most curious about? Share in comments👇
📍The Lee C. Bollinger Forum, Columbia University
📅 September 9–10
RSVP: knightcolumbia.org/events/the-f...
#FirstAmendment #PressFreedom #WarOnTerror #CivilLiberties #Journalism
The Forever War and the First ... -
"This designation lacks any real legal weight because U.S. law has no formal domestic terrorist organization category. Creating one risks infringing on First Amendment protected speech. #DomesticTerrorism itself is not a chargeable offense."
https://www.govexec.com/defense/2026/07/trump-directive-reshaped-governments-counterterrorism-approach/414869/
#NSPM7 #USpol #USpolitics #stateRepression #civilLiberties #freedomOfSpeech #Trump #Rubio #justice #fascization -
🚨 A 23-year-old Florida woman spent 13 days in jail and seven months under threat of life in prison for a triple-fatal hit-and-run she had nothing to do with.
On Oct 4, 2025, a speeding Dodge Durango caused a chain-reaction pileup on I-4 near DeBary, killing motorcyclist Joaquin Deno and Flagler County Deputy Administrator Jorge Salinas and his wife Nancy. Witnesses said the SUV was black, and a Flock license-plate reader had caught Lindsey Isaacs' black 2025 Durango about 3 miles west of the crash minutes before it happened. FHP seized her car that night and arrested her in April on eight felony counts, including three counts of vehicular homicide.
The case fell apart quickly: her SUV had zero damage, a 911 caller had reported the fleeing SUV was maroon (with the first three digits of its plate), and maroon paint transfer was found on one of the struck cars. Charges were dropped May 22, and Alisa Montalvo, 47, was arrested instead. Her maroon Durango had its driver-side doors replaced and airbags removed or stuffed back in to hide the crash.
The camera did what it was asked; the investigators just stopped looking once it handed them a suspect. Isaacs has since filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against FHP.
Read more:
https://www.wesh.com/article/woman-wrongfully-arrested-in-deadly-i-4-crash-speaks-out-after-charges-dropped/71393304
https://reason.com/2026/08/13/flock-cameras-and-license-plate-readers-are-everywhere-can-we-trust-cops-with-them/
https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2026/05/24/wrong-woman-jailed-in-deadly-i-4-hit-and-run-after-witnesses-misidentified-suv-color-records-show/ -
#CivilLiberties groups Monday asked #SCOTUS to hear their challenge of a #Texas #law requiring that all #PublicSchools’ classrooms display the #TenCommandments, potentially setting up a landmark clash over the #SeparationOfChurchAndState.
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"A Sacramento immigration law firm claims #ICE agents arrived at its office without a warrant, threatened to break in, and targeted the firm based on a list of addresses allegedly linked to undocumented immigrants":
https://www.kcra.com/article/sacramento-immigration-law-firm-ice-agents/73441433
#brutality #thuggery #recklessness #HumanRights #CivilLiberties #politics -
Flock cameras, and automated license plate readers (ALPRs) are _inherently_ unlawful, _unavoidably_ contrary to the U.S. Constitution.
Yet another expert's view: youtube.com/shorts/DUQGu...
#USpol #law #CivilLiberties #CivilRights #FourthAmendment #4thAmendment
Ohio professor specialized in ... -
Flock cameras, and automated license plate readers (ALPRs) are _inherently_ unlawful, _unavoidably_ contrary to the U.S. Constitution.
Yet another expert's view: https://youtube.com/shorts/DUQGu4l4a2g
#USpol #law #CivilLiberties #CivilRights #FourthAmendment #4thAmendment
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“France's Constitutional Council on Friday, August 14, struck down the ban on social media for children under 15, a flagship policy of President Emmanuel Macron's second term, calling the measure "a disproportionate restriction" on freedom of expression.
The Council ruled that Article 1 of a law adopted in July, intended to protect minors from the risks associated with the use of social media, "constitutes a restriction that is not appropriate, necessary or proportionate" to the freedom of expression and communication of under-15s.
While recognizing the "constitutional requirement to protect the best interests of the child," the judges said that such a broad ban "could apply to online communication services for which the risks to the health and safety of minors (...) have not been established."”
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Despite 'New' Updates, Flock's Creepy #Cameras Remain Major #CivilLiberties Threat
In response to Flock’s announcement of operational changes, the #ACLU breaks down why many fall short.
#alpr #flock #surveillance #privacy -
Hollow Mockery: Douglass, Jefferson, and 250 Years of a Promise Unkept
Mike Cone
“Your 4th of July is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license . . . your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery.”
— Frederick Douglass (1852)These words still resonate today.
In the wake of our celebration of the 250th birthday of our independence, let us not forget the ugly truths in the birth and history of this nation. To wash over these truths, as our current administration is wont to do, is tantamount to erasing that part of our past which we should strive to learn from, and to better ourselves as a people, to truly become that nation where the words penned by Thomas Jefferson are not just hollow mockery, but true:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These are the unalienable rights bestowed upon us. These rights are not to be infringed upon for any reason, whether it be race, color, ethnicity, religious beliefs or social status. For this to be true, we as a people need to understand and accept that indeed “ALL” men are created equal. In this regard, we have failed as a nation time and time again. There are numerous examples of our nation suppressing the civil liberties of the many throughout our history: chattel slavery, the Tulsa Race Massacre, forced dispossession of ancestral Native American lands, Selma, Alabama, Jim Crow laws, the Alien and Sedition Acts, Japanese internment, Kent State, the Patriot Act, just to name a few. Hell, even Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War.
My point in all this is we need to do better. It is morally important that we learn from our past and not ignore or erase it just because at times it can be ugly and messy. We need to continue to move forward, toward morality and virtue, because virtue will always prevail.
Our current president is unwilling in this regard.
President Trump is the converse of morality and virtue and continually seems to move us backward with his version of revisionist history, distorting, altering and even falsifying historical evidence to fit his agenda. He is forever suppressing or attempting to suppress the civil liberties of those who oppose him. He has actively supported and empowered local governments to ban and remove books from public institutions. He has removed or altered exhibits, plaques and monuments from our National Parks, exhibits he terms “inappropriately disparaging to Americans past or living.” These exhibits include the nation’s first executive mansion, which detailed the nine people enslaved by George Washington; the Bunker Hill Monument, to eliminate language he deemed contrary to founding principles; and locations highlighting Japanese American internment and Native American conflicts. He has sent federal troops into our cities in direct defiance of the Posse Comitatus Act. He has allowed his defense secretary, who some call a Christian White Nationalist, to deny high-ranking promotions to senior Army and Navy officers, the majority being women and minorities, and to intervene in a Navy one-star admiral promotion list, removing nine highly vetted officers. The final list of 22 nominees contained zero women and only two non-white officers. Finally, his immigration policies appear to be an obvious attempt to rid the country of Black and Brown people. This is just a small sample of Trump’s penchant for authoritarianism and what this author feels is a deep hatred and disdain for anyone other than his own race. Donald Trump is the ideological antithesis to the phrase “all men are created equal.”
With that said, I was having a conversation with my good friend Nick Allison, an Army combat veteran and fellow Chaos Section contributor, the other day and mentioned my feelings of anger and visceral disgust for our current administration, so much so that I could not find a reason to celebrate our 250 years of independence, particularly as a veteran. I’ll end with Nick’s response:
“You know what? I think we can always find a reason to celebrate, regardless of the current occupant in the Oval Office, because there are always things and ideas and people worth celebrating. This is still a great country with great people and a wonderfully unique experiment in constitutional representative freedom. It gets messy and sometimes runs off the rails, but that’s kind of the whole point of the experiment: we’re a nation of people governing ourselves, which means it’s on us to correct course when things go sideways. Most of human history has been kings, monarchs and strongmen who never had to answer to anybody. Making it 250 years as a self-correcting experiment, messy and beautiful and stupid and wonderful all at once, is reason enough to celebrate. Don’t let one egotistical, narcissistic old man who will be out of office in a couple years, dead within ten, take that away from you.”
Mike Cone is a Marine Corps infantry veteran who served as a mortarman and forward observer in Weapons Company, 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines. “Hollow Mockery” is his first piece for The Chaos Section. He lives on Long Island with his wife Cynthia.
#250thAnniversary #AmericanHistory #authoritarianism #civilLiberties #FourthOfJuly #FrederickDouglass #IndependenceDay #JapaneseInternment #NativeAmericanHistory #PosseComitatusAct #racialEquality #revisionistHistory #trump #Veterans -
Dawn of our Country's Semiquincentennial at the Lewistown Courthouse. #Semiquincentennial #anniversary #usaanniversary #usacelebration #celebration #history #historical #celebrate #patriotic #jingo #jingoism #civilwar #civilwarmonument #monument #concrete #courthouse #civilliberties #civilrights #scotusiscorrupt #potusiscorrupt #flotusiscorrupt #corruption #corruptioningovernment #governmentcorruption #EndCitizensUnited
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#BradLander on his illegal arrest by #ICEThugs and his trial, after standing up for #immigrantsrights
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Sddv9Wg4d5o
#law #USLaw #HumanRights #CivilLiberties #AbolishICE #AbolishDHS #NY #NYC #NewYorkCity #NewYork
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I just migrated to @defcon.social from @infosec.exchange!
My principles are very straightforward:
1. Transparency is of utmost importance. This doesn't mean you have to make your entire life an open book. It just means being honest and authentic.
2. Mass surveillance is a violation of our civil liberties. In relation to the first point, "nothing to hide" doesn't mean "everything to see."
3. In relation to point two, I am completely against government and corporate overreach. That doesn't mean I am anti-civilization or anti-government. I am very much pro-security but I am also a supporter of limited government and civil rights.
4. Nuance matters. Reference my first three points made.
My opinions are subject to change granted I am presented with evidence to logically form a new conclusion.
I am empathetic but I have also seen and experienced a lot of manipulation. I am not quick to give anything I see or read on the internet validity. The data is the only thing that matters in this world; talk is cheap, show me the code. :pixel_skull:
#civilliberties
#civilrights
#NoBIGTech
#endmasssurveillance
#opensource
#foss
#showmethecode -
Battle of The Beanfield
There are certain moments in modern British history that seem to sit just beyond the edge of official memory. Events that everybody vaguely remembers, yet somehow never quite make it into the comfortable national story we tell ourselves.
The Battle of Orgreave is one. The miners’ strike is another. The poll tax riots. Hillsborough. Brixton. They linger in photographs, old television footage and the memories of those who were there, carrying the uncomfortable reminder that Britain is not always as civilised, measured and orderly as it likes to imagine itself to be.
The Battle of the Beanfield belongs firmly in that category.
Forty years on, it remains one of the most controversial policing operations in modern British history. More than 1,300 police officers confronted a convoy of around 600 New Age Travellers attempting to reach Stonehenge on 1 June 1985. By the end of the day, dozens of people had been injured, hundreds had been arrested and an entire way of life had effectively been marked for destruction.
What happened in that Hampshire beanfield has never been the subject of a full public inquiry. Yet for many people who witnessed the decline of Britain’s traditional industries during the Thatcher years, the images remain painfully familiar.
I grew up in Yorkshire through the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. I watched pit villages hollow out. I watched steelworks close. I watched communities that had existed for generations suddenly find themselves described as obstacles to progress. There was a language that emerged during those years. Certain groups became “the problem”. Miners. Trade unionists. Travellers. Alternative communities. Anyone who stood outside the increasingly rigid idea of what Britain was supposed to become.
That is one reason the Battle of the Beanfield still matters.
To understand the confrontation itself, we first need to understand the strange, colourful and often misunderstood world that produced it.
The Stonehenge Free Festival began in 1974. It emerged from the wider countercultural movements of the late 1960s and early 1970s, combining music, environmentalism, spiritual exploration, political activism and communal living. Over the following decade it grew steadily, becoming one of the largest free gatherings in Britain. By the early 1980s thousands of people travelled to Stonehenge each summer to celebrate the solstice. The festival attracted an eclectic mix of punks, bikers, druids, musicians, environmental campaigners, anarchists, hippies and families living on the road.
The people who became known as the Peace Convoy were not a single organisation. They were a loose collection of travellers, festival-goers and alternative communities who spent much of the year moving between free festivals, protest camps and temporary settlements. Some were escaping unemployment. Some rejected consumer culture. Others simply wanted a different way of living. Many travelled in converted buses, coaches, ambulances and vans that doubled as homes.
To their supporters they represented freedom, creativity and resistance to conformity.
To their critics they represented disorder.
By 1984 tensions were reaching breaking point. The Stonehenge festival had become enormous. Estimates suggested attendance reached around 100,000 people. Concerns were raised about damage to the archaeological landscape, litter, unauthorised trading and open drug use. English Heritage, which had recently taken over management of the site, came under increasing pressure to act. Local authorities and police forces were equally determined that the gathering should not continue in its existing form. A High Court injunction was obtained to prevent the 1985 festival from taking place. The state had drawn a line.
On the morning of 1 June 1985, the Peace Convoy left Savernake Forest and began moving towards Stonehenge. Around 140 vehicles carried approximately 600 people. Many were families. Children were travelling alongside adults who had spent years living on the road. They knew there would be police opposition. Few appear to have anticipated what was waiting for them.
Police had prepared extensively.
The miners’ strike had ended only months earlier. During that bitter industrial conflict police forces had developed new methods of coordination, rapid deployment and large-scale public order operations. Senior officers later openly acknowledged that lessons learned during the strike had informed preparations for dealing with the travellers.
A four-mile exclusion zone had been established around Stonehenge. Roadblocks were prepared. Officers from multiple forces were assembled. Some estimates place police numbers at around 1,300. Others suggest even higher figures by the end of the operation.
The convoy encountered its first major roadblock near Shipton Bellinger, several miles from Stonehenge. According to police accounts, some traveller vehicles attempted to push through the blockade and rammed police vehicles. Travellers and independent witnesses tell a very different story. They describe a convoy seeking negotiation before finding itself trapped and surrounded.
Whatever happened during those first moments, the situation rapidly escalated.As vehicles attempted to leave the road and move into adjacent fields, police began smashing windows and making arrests. The convoy became scattered across farmland. Families were separated. Children became lost in the confusion. What followed would become one of the most infamous confrontations in modern British policing.
Television footage remains difficult to watch even now.
Officers in riot gear strike vehicle windows with truncheons. People are dragged from buses and vans. Terrified children can be seen inside shattered vehicles. Journalists and witnesses described police hitting men and women indiscriminately. Several accounts alleged pregnant women and individuals carrying babies were assaulted during the operation. Numerous vehicles that functioned as homes were systematically damaged.
The Earl of Cardigan, whose family owned Savernake Forest and who had followed the convoy on a motorcycle, later provided testimony that proved deeply damaging to official police narratives. He described officers rushing vehicles with drawn truncheons, shouting at occupants and creating scenes of intimidation and violence that contradicted many early police claims.
Journalists present that day reported similar concerns.
ITN footage captured scenes that shocked many viewers. Photographer Alan Lodge later described the event as an ambush rather than a battle. Others argued the very name “Battle of the Beanfield” created a misleading impression of two evenly matched sides. One side possessed riot shields, command structures, communications systems and overwhelming numerical superiority. The other consisted largely of civilians living in vehicles.
By the end of the operation, 537 people had been arrested. It remains one of the largest mass arrests of civilians in modern British history. Most of the charges eventually collapsed or were dismissed.
That fact alone raises uncomfortable questions.
If hundreds of supposedly dangerous lawbreakers had been lawfully apprehended while carrying out serious criminal acts, one might expect hundreds of successful prosecutions to follow. Instead, much of the legal case simply evaporated.
Years later, travellers successfully pursued civil actions against Wiltshire Police. Damages were awarded for wrongful arrest, false imprisonment and property damage. One police sergeant was convicted of actual bodily harm arising from the events of that day.
Yet despite these outcomes, there has never been a full public inquiry.
Perhaps that is because the Battle of the Beanfield was about more than Stonehenge.
Looking back now, it feels impossible to separate it from the wider atmosphere of Britain in the mid-1980s. This was a country being transformed at extraordinary speed. Traditional industries were disappearing. Unemployment was soaring in many regions. Entire communities were fighting for survival. Alternative lifestyles increasingly found themselves portrayed as threats to public order rather than expressions of individual freedom.
For many people in mining and industrial areas, there is a recognisable pattern.
First comes the language.
A group is described as troublesome, outdated or undesirable.
Then comes the media narrative.
Then comes the justification.
Then comes the force.
That does not mean every traveller was a saint, any more than every miner was. Human beings are messy. Large gatherings bring problems. Some attendees at the Stonehenge festivals undoubtedly caused damage. Some individuals within the traveller movement undoubtedly committed crimes. A serious historical assessment has to acknowledge that reality. The archaeological concerns surrounding Stonehenge were genuine. Local residents had legitimate complaints. Authorities were entitled to seek solutions.
But none of that explains the scale of what happened on 1 June 1985.
The images of smashed homes, frightened children and riot police advancing across fields continue to disturb because they seem wildly disproportionate. They suggest a state determined not merely to enforce an injunction but to send a message.
And the message was received.
The traveller movement never fully recovered.
Legislation introduced during the following years increasingly restricted nomadic lifestyles and unauthorised gatherings. The Public Order Act 1986 and later the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 created new powers that made life significantly harder for travellers, free festivals and eventually the emerging rave culture.
In many ways the Beanfield became a blueprint. The same language used against travellers would later be applied to ravers, squatters, protesters and environmental activists. Alternative communities were increasingly framed not as citizens exercising freedoms but as public order problems requiring management.
Yet the legacy of the Beanfield refuses to disappear.
Songs were written about it. The Levellers turned it into a folk-punk anthem that introduced a new generation to the story. Hawkwind referenced it. Writers, filmmakers and activists kept returning to it. Every summer solstice the memory resurfaces among those who remember what happened.
Perhaps that is because the Battle of the Beanfield sits at the crossroads of so many larger questions.
Who gets to occupy public space?
Who decides what constitutes a legitimate way of living?
How much power should the state possess when dealing with communities that reject mainstream norms?
And perhaps most importantly of all, what happens when governments begin to see certain groups not as citizens but as enemies?
Forty years later those questions feel remarkably current.
The travellers who set out for Stonehenge in 1985 were not trying to overthrow the government. They were trying to reach a festival. They were trying to celebrate a solstice. They were trying, in their own eccentric and imperfect way, to live differently.
Many paid a heavy price for that.
For those of us who grew up watching pits close, furnaces go cold and communities written off as inconvenient relics of the past, the Beanfield feels like part of the same story. Different people. Different landscape. Different politics perhaps. But the same underlying lesson.
When power decides a group no longer belongs, it rarely begins with dialogue.
It begins with exclusion.
Then comes the roadblock.
Further Reading
Andy Worthington, The Battle of the Beanfield
Christopher Chippindale, Stoned Henge: Events and Issues at the Summer Solstice, 1985
Emma Hallett, BBC News, Summer Solstice: How the Stonehenge Battles Faded
Tony Thompson, The Observer, Twenty Years After, Mystery Still Clouds Battle of the Beanfield
English Heritage, Stonehenge 1977–85: A Dig in Time and a Confrontation
Copyright © Mysterious Times 2026. All rights reserved. This article may not be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form without prior written permission from Mysterious Times, except in the case of brief quotations used for review, criticism or scholarly reference.
#1980sBritain #1985Events #AlternativeBritain #AlternativeCommunities #AlternativeLifestyles #BattleOfTheBeanfield #BritishCounterculture #BritishFolklore #BritishHistory #BritishProtestCulture #BritishSociety #BritishSubcultures #CivilLiberties #CivilRights #ContemporaryHistory #CounterculturalHistory #Counterculture #CountercultureHistory #culturalHeritage #CulturalResistance #Druidry #EnglishCountryside #EnglishHeritage #FestivalCulture #ForgottenHistory #FreeFestivals #FreeSpiritBritain #FreedomOfMovement #Hampshire #HiddenHistory #HistoricalAnalysis #HistoricalConflict #HistoricalControversies #HistoricalMysteries #HistoryFeatures #LongReadHistory #LostBritain #MargaretThatcher #MiningCommunities #ModernBritishMythology #ModernFolklore #ModernLegends #MysteriousTimes #NewAgeMovement #NewAgeTravellers #Paganism #PeaceConvoy #PeopleSHistory #PoliceHistory #PoliticalHistory #ProtestHistory #ProtestMovements #PublicOrder #RoadProtestHistory #RuralEngland #SocialChange #SocialCommentary #socialHistory #SocialJustice #SolsticeCelebrations #SolsticeTraditions #StatePower #Stonehenge #StonehengeFreeFestival #StonehengeHistory #SummerSolstice #ThatcherEra #Thatcherism #TravellerMovement #TravellerRights #TravellingCommunities #UKHistory #UndergroundBritain #UnofficialBritain #Wiltshire #WorkingClassHistory #YorkshireHistory -
Massive Attack / Tom Waits - Boots on the Ground - https://youtu.be/L-57FrioeuE?si=lBApXbai35cdzo0x #MassiveAttack #TomWaits #BootsOnTheGround #ProtestSongs #CivilLiberties #ACLU #ChurchStateSeparation #ChristianNationalism #fascism #music #ProtestMusic
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Why #GiorgiaMeloni's '#AntiProtest' law has divided #Italy
Italy’s new security law, pushed through by PM Giorgia Meloni’s #RightWing government, is stoking nationwide outrage. From harsher protest penalties and a ban on cannabis light to legal cover for police, critics warn it criminalises dissent and threatens #CivilLiberties. Protests, international concerns and Senate drama have all followed
FP Explainers
June 5, 2025"A new security decree introduced by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing coalition government has divided Italy.
"Approved by the Senate with 109 votes in favour, 69 against, and one abstention, the legislation has sparked a backlash from opposition lawmakers, human rights bodies and legal groups, who argue that it undermines fundamental freedoms and disproportionately punishes marginalised communities.
"The decree expands legal authority for law enforcement, imposes stricter penalties on demonstrators, and introduces a variety of criminal provisions touching on #protests, public order, #cannabis regulation, and social #housing.
"While the government insists the law is a necessary measure to safeguard security, critics see it as a repressive attempt to #CriminaliseDissent and curb civil liberties in one of Europe’s major democracies."
Archived version:
https://archive.ph/n6clN#WorldPol #ItalyPol #CriminalizingProtest #SilencingDissent #Authoritarianism #Fascism #HistoryRepeats? #AntiProtestLaws
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NSW Government to Reintroduce Antiprotest Move-On Power, After Police Approve Nazi Rally
"Our government is using the decision by police to authorise a neo-Nazi protest to reintroduce unconstitutional laws empowering police to issue move on directions at places of worship."
>>
https://www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/nsw-government-to-reintroduce-antiprotest-move-on-power-after-police-approve-nazi-rally/"You don't solve the Nazi problem with laws that erode our civil liberties. You don't get us closer to social cohesion by arresting people."
>>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-11-16/nsw-protest-laws-eroding-right-to-protest-say-legal-experts/106006324
#law #NSW #constitution #CivilLiberties #FarRight #WhiteAustralia #Ethnonationalism -
The Kavanaugh Stop’s Legacy: 50 Days, 170+ Detained Citizens, Zero Answers
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How Civilian Phone Civil Liberties are Violated
https://archive.org/details/DanielRigmaiden-AaronSwartzDay2017
#AaronSwartz #cut #suicide #AaronSwartzDay
#Feds #AdministrativeSubpoena #IMEI #NIC #BaseTransciever #CellSiteSimulator #Masquerade
DRT Inc. , Key/w --> #ThirdParty #CivilLiberties
#LEAP - Local Number Portability Enhanced Analytical Platform
#ISP #Cellular #PenLink #E911 #ACABhttps://archive.org/
subject:“Cell Phone Surveillance”
#Brax #Phone #iodeOS #HighWare -
"Changes implemented in 2023 by Conservative then-home secretary Suella Braverman allowed police to impose restrictions on protests deemed to cause “more than minor” disruption.
The wording of the law since 1986 had allowed officers to act only if disruption was determined to be “serious.”
Human rights organisation Liberty said the lowering of the threshold gave police “almost unlimited” power to restrict protests, and subsequently brought a legal challenge against the legislation.
Last month, the court of appeal upheld a high court ruling, which found Ms Braverman did not have the power to force through the change which redefined “serious disruption” as “more than minor” in the law concerning when police could impose limits on protests.
Despite initially backing the tougher definition, the government has now dropped its case against Liberty, meaning the law reverts to its previous wording, and protests once again need to cause "serious disruption” to warrant police enforcement."
https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/exclusive/anti-protest-laws-greta-thunberg-uk/
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The War on #Masks Has Taken on a New Meaning
This time, the masks have nothing to do with #COVID19.
By Henry Grabar
Feb 05, 20254:57 PM"Last month, state legislators in New York introduced a bill that would create a new crime: 'masked harassment.'
"That, the law explains, is when you wear a mask 'for the primary purpose of menacing or threatening violence against another person' or 'placing another person or group of persons in reasonable fear for their physical safety.'
"If that seems like a bit of a niche offense—threatening violence is already a crime, after all—it’s because the language has been watered down to attract political support. It’s a sign of New York Democrats’ cautious new approach over masks in public life, and a retreat from last spring, when anti-Israel protests, on top of a widespread urban crime panic, pushed leaders from New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass to consider mask bans.
"In its original form, the New York bill would have banned masks at public assemblies entirely. But the outcry from #DisabilityRights advocates, #CriminalJustice reformers, #HealthCareWorkers, and #CivilLiberties groups was swift, and so New York wound up with this bill on 'masked harassment' instead.
"Elsewhere, the pandemic-era leniency on masking in public is over. #NorthCarolina Republicans overrode a gubernatorial veto last summer to once again #BanPublicFaceCoverings, except to stop the spread of contagious diseases. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost dusted off an old law to threaten #StudentProtesters with #felonies. Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick has asked the state’s Senate to consider a bill to #unmask #protesters this year.
"For Republicans, it’s a chance to kill two birds with one stone. They can strike back against the perceived overreach of pandemic-era #HealthDirectives and make it easier to arrest #demonstrators at the same time.
"In #Ohio and North Carolina, the original statutes were written in the 1950s to stop demonstrations by the #KuKluxKlan, but had been ignored or suspended during the #pandemic and the #GeorgeFloydProtests. Many lawmakers have cited the recent demonstrations in defense of #Gaza as a reason to crack down again. Defending the proposed mask ban in New York, Anti-Defamation League [#ADL] president Jonathan Greenblatt said the demonstrators were using '#KKK tactics' to intimidate Jewish New Yorkers.
"That instinct was bolstered by the sense among many city residents and elected leaders that widespread masking was a factor behind the pandemic-era crime spike. That led to #Philadelphia banning #SkiMasks in parks, on trains, and in public buildings. A more recent, high-profile example came in December with the Midtown Manhattan killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO #BrianThompson by a #MaskedAssassin, which prompted New York Mayor Eric Adams to call for cab drivers and business owners to ask customers to remove their masks. The new New York bill has won over the liberal Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who endorsed the 'tailored' approach. As the police say: #NoFaceNoCase.
"For what it’s worth, there are too many confounding variables and too little data to be sure if mask-wearing is associated with crime, said Ernesto Lopez at the Council for Criminal Justice, which collects crime reporting statistics from various cities. 'From a theoretical statement it makes sense that could occur, but it has not been demonstrated that’s the case,' he told me.
"But if all that weighed in favor of more mask bans, there was also widespread resistance. Disability advocates mobilized to defend the right to mask; North Carolina had to write a medical exemption into their bill at the insistence of a GOP House member. #PoliceReformers observed that #MaskBans have often been used for pretextual #policing and racial profiling against #BlackAmericans. (#AtlantaGeorgia tabled a mask ban for that reason.)
"What looms largest, as the second Trump administration begins, is the role of protest. As Semafor’s Dave Weigel has noted, masks have become a badge of left-wing protest culture. That’s in part an extension of politicized COVID-era concerns about health and civility, but at this point it is mostly a tactic to preserve anonymity in an era of #FacialRecognition, streaming video, and #doxing. Last year, the anonymous #ProIsrael website the #CanaryMission posted photographs of hundreds of students and faculty at campus protests and posted their names and photos online, labeling some as supporters of terrorism.
"'The concern takes on new urgency as Donald Trump pledges to revoke the visas of pro-Palestine protesters, and the Trump-Musk GOP embraces the naming and shaming of otherwise private citizens. A conservative group called the American Accountability Foundation has begun circulating lists of federal workers, many of them Black, who should be
'targets' for their alleged involvement in #DEI initiatives at work."Clearly, the masked protest does not always sit well with an older generation, many of whom cut their teeth in the protests of the pre-internet age. As Georgetown professor Michael Kazin told the New York Times last year: 'I do think if you are going to demonstrate, and it’s something you feel deeply about, you should be willing to stand up and be counted.'"
Source:
https://slate.com/business/2025/02/mask-bans-new-york-los-angeles-crime-protests-criminalize-face-coverings.html?utm_source=firefox-newtab-en-us
#Fascism #AuthoritarianRule #BigBrother #BigBrotherIsWatchingYou #SurveillanceState #SilencingDissent -
Children of 1960s watch in #pain as story of our lifetime is #erased. The first week of #Trump47 was marked by all-out push to declare victory in #culture war that started in 1960s to reverse that decade’s victories — from #Selma to #Stonewall to #EarthDay. I talked with my fellow #boomers about the very real pain of watching the end of the world as we know it, and what comes next. #Maga #civilliberties #justice #freedom #constitution #politics #racism #WhiteNationalism https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/trump-presidency-1960s-civil-rights-20250126.html?int_promo=newsletter
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#WHATtheFUCKisWRONGwithTHESEPEOPLE part 2
#ShitMyFatherinLawSays (born in #NYC) : '...I don't recognise this place anymore'
Widely hated #NewYorkCity Mayor #EricAdams expresses strong support for #PublicFaceMaskBanNY #WTF
#NewYork antiPalestinian/ #Antiprotest Governor #KathyHochul banging on about a #PublicFaceMaskBanNY
#COVIDIsNOTOver
#ProtestIsNOTACrimeIn response #civilliberties law firm #NYCLU said:
'The Governor's concerns about #masks disguising criminal activity won't be quelled by banning anonymous #peacefulprotest ...A #maskban would be easily violated by bad actors and, if someone engages in unlawful actions, the judgment should be made based on the criminal behaviour, not their attire'You have now entered ...
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@jeffjarvis #ClarenceThomas has gotten the attention of late due to questionable ethics. But it’s high time #SamuelAlito received the scrutiny he deserves. Alito’s #dissent in the #mifepristone case has served up yet another example of his #intemperate, #partisan #rhetoric. #Alito and #Thomas would have allowed the #indefensible #ruling by a panel of the #CourtofAppeals for the #5th #Circuit to stand. #NoJustice NoPeace #SCOTUS #humanrights #civilliberties #healthcare #privacy #judicialtravesty
