Ziselberger
Yoko's Asterisk 🏳️⚧This is legit scary. Marsha Blackburn is openly admitting that her bill KOSA will be used to drive trans people off the internet.
But Democrats are lining up to support it, and LGBTQIA+ orgs have dropped their opposition. WTF WTF WTF
PS: If you're going to call or write your reps, I would focus heavily on the enforcement mechanism of this bill. It would allow the attorney general of *every single state* to sue over any content they have reason to believe harms kids. This is an open invitation to censorship.
PPS: I wrote a very detailed analysis of the bill here:
https://buttondown.email/charliejane/archive/the-internet-is-about-to-get-a-lot-worse/
Kay Ohtie 🔜 FWA@charliejane This seems like a bill that's incredibly easy to make GOP lawmakers uneasy about by nudging with "what if the AG thinks _your_ content is inappropriate to kids?" Spin it into censorship against them; it's broad enough that it SEEMS like that's an easy stroke when writing or calling even reps in a GOP-owned state.
Riley S. Faelan@KayOhtie Tell them that a California AG might one day, out of the blue, start thinking that a website promoting gun ownership might cause the mental health problem of wanting guns too eagerly among children.
@riley @charliejane One hopes. It seems like the best case to make in an R-controlled state to lawmakers for right now, fuck
David Conrad@charliejane In addition to the other red states you list, I would be concerned about how Kris Kobach, Kansas AG, would use the bill. He's almost as bad as Paxton in my opinion.
HowToPhil (Phillip R)@charliejane This could kill ALL adult content online. Even the people who don't care about others, if they like reading smut, they better speak up too
Joshua A.C. Newman@charliejane Thank you. I was having a hard time figuring out what to address.
Tormod Halvorsen"any content they have reason to believe harm kids" 😧
Not exactly a narrow, legal definition.
Probably no guidelines set about what scientific evidence need to be considered for their "reason" to be valid either.
Straight up fascist cruelty.
geographile@charliejane Tammy Baldwin co-sponsored it!? Omgwtf
@geographile Sounds like somebody needs to get a phone call
Wiredfire 
@charliejane holy shitsnacks 😦
Time to get some no-knowledge VPNs up in everyone’s house. This is awful
LisPi@wiredfire @charliejane VPNs won't do (many deliberately cooperate with Five Eyes authorities anyway), this is a "the #clearnet has completely failed" scenario.
@lispi314 @charliejane picking the right VPN isn’t always obvious, but there are very very good options with absolute true anonymity if your risk profile calls for it.
The clearnet hasn’t failed. Government has.
@lispi314 @charliejane but to what you might be alluding to though, the more this nonsense goes on the more knowledge of how to share & act online with safety and outside of the purview of government hassle will become commonplace. Which is bad news for authorities who already fail to grasp that the true threat actors are always far far beyond their reach online.
Ursidinoj/The Bjornsdottirs
LunarSpaceDani@wiredfire @charliejane Mullvad is a good option, account creation is done without any personal information, doesn’t log whatsoever, is audited and even got raided by the police and they didn’t hand over information because of their policy for no logs
But for real this sucks, this is just censorship at its purest form allowing anyone to sue you just because they don’t like you
@TheRealDanini @charliejane Mullvad is absolutely my VPN of choice. I like that you can even pay with physical cash (if you don’t mind risking losing the cash in the mail 😅).
But yeah censorship is pretty much always bad 😞
Farawayeyes4@charliejane I'm terrified that we're going to lose fandom and health education and queer anything because "protect the kids!" when that is NOT what this will do. Sounds like the AO3 will die if this passes. I hate this timeline.
Nonya Bidniss 🥥🌴@charliejane I recently saw a commercial pushing this bill. A dire FUD-filled minute featuring bereft mothers. And I knew that everyone seeing this commercial, who didn't know anything about it, would immediately fall for it. 😱 Dems will get in line for it if they haven't heard any info about it. Huge disinformation push.
olena@Nonya_Bidniss @charliejane non-american here: you guys have commercials for bills? WTF?
@olena @charliejane Yep. Dark money groups, PACs, political parties will put out commercials trying to get citizens to put pressure on their Congress members.
Virginia Holloway@olena @Nonya_Bidniss @charliejane we have commercials for everything. Legislation, politicians, prescription drugs. I think the only thing you can't have to commercials for are guns, cigarets and hard alcohol.
Sean@charliejane @gwynnion I emailed my rep about the bill. This being a blue area I normally get a response like “we’re already doing the thing but thanks for the email!” but this time it’s been absolute crickets.
Queue 
@charliejane God I hate how this is consistent for the United States.
Just remember that politicians aren't your friend, they just want to be reelected.
⚡️ axeshun ⚡️ 
@queue @charliejane fyi:
the alt-text says the man is labeled "corporations speech", but it's actually "corporate media".
the alt-text says the man is labeled "corporations speech", but it's actually "corporate media".
Philosophical Fish@charliejane Then they came for the trans people, and I spoke out because I know how the rest of the fucking poem goes.
mochaandmuses 😈@charliejane not only that, Bill S.1409 is badly written with so much vagueness that I doubt it would stand up in court. Some of the wording can easily tread on 1st amendment grounds and get shut down. Luckily though, it's in committee and @GovTrack is only giving it a 31% chance of even surviving there. Hopefully the bill will die right there like it did last legislative session.
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/118/s1409
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/118/s1409
rin ft ?!system@itwasntme223 @GovTrack @charliejane the problem with relying on it being unconstitutional via being too fucking vague (which it pretty plainly is from what we understand) is the current supreme court
considering it died last legislative season in committee, hopefully it will again this time as well, but it only takes one time where it doesn't to basically kill the open internet inside the US
@rin @GovTrack @charliejane Oh, I agree the Supreme Court is the issue too but that's kind of a long term issue to get to. If the bill becomes law, it's gotta first move through the Federal Court system which is suing, injunction, appeal, trial about the law, appeal (for whoever loses), appellate court, ruling, then appeal to the Supreme Court and they may not even take it up.
The biggest thing people can do (and I have already done) is reach out to their representative/senator. I've already loudly made it clear to them that I don't support this.
The biggest thing people can do (and I have already done) is reach out to their representative/senator. I've already loudly made it clear to them that I don't support this.
Social Justice Warrior🦍@charliejane Is it fair to compare this to the war on drugs? In that case one should study that period to see what one can learn from it.
To be more precize, there is a narrative: protect children from drugs/ protect children from harmful content.
a goal: suppressing the blacks/ suppressing the trans people.
a strategy: massive police brutality/ prosecution.
@vegafjord @charliejane Drug trade is one of the #FourHorsemenOfTheInfocalypse. The similarity is not a coincidence.
@charliejane Fuck the state! 🏳️⚧️🏳️⚧️🏳️⚧️
Zorro Notorious MEB 😡@charliejane Blackburn wrote it? YIKES! She's a hard-core bigot of numerous stripes.
@charliejane they want to make 2024 election about stuff like this cuz they got nothing as long as they support the big lie no one will take them seriously so they take cheap shots at marginalized communities
Blake C. Stacey@charliejane The claim about specific LBGTQ organizations dropping their opposition traces back to a "news" story that was very clearly written by a lobbyist (https://nitter.net/evan_greer/status/1695253691152957916#m). Maybe it's true, or not-untrue; we need direct word from GLAAD and company themselves.
I mean, I do not trust the people who support #KOSA to tell the truth about what they had for breakfast, let alone present comments from anonymous "sources" correctly. Perhaps a noncommittal "we are reviewing the changes and have no further statement at this time" is being spun really hard. Perhaps it's more alarming than that. I don't see how to tell the difference from here.
Mads (old account)@charliejane It's shit like this that makes up so much of my growing interest in cybersecurity. I'm losing a lot of hope for so-called liberal "allies" to stick with us when it matters most, so I want to be in a good spot to keep myself and others safe if (or when, gods forbid) this garbage passes.
I wish I had something more helpful or optimistic to add. Just massive hugs to all y'all.
Woozle Hypertwin@charliejane I am ready to move to an asteroid somewhere, preferably in an obscure orbit that's hard to reach from Earth, so it's not worth their while to do anything about it.
@charliejane why would any democrat support anything this nut 🥜 proposes
Caroline Bell 
@charliejane This just sounds like another "Don't Say Gay" bill???
gavinisdie 
@charliejane wait, so the KOSA will consider Trans people EXISTING on the internet inherently sexual? What the fuck
Olives@gavinisdie @charliejane That's not the only argument they might use. They might call transitions a form of self-harm.
James Endicott@gavinisdie @charliejane
KOSA allows state attorneys general to define "harmful to children" however they want, so long as they can produce some scientific evidence to back it up. It doesn't have to be the majority or consensus opinion of experts in the field, a handful of discredited whackjobs is probably enough.
There are a number of Republicans who have explicitly said that "trans ideology" is inherently harmful to children. Trans people don't even have to exist online to be a target of their ire and thus censorship, the mere possibility that someone could be trans is enough.
KOSA allows state attorneys general to define "harmful to children" however they want, so long as they can produce some scientific evidence to back it up. It doesn't have to be the majority or consensus opinion of experts in the field, a handful of discredited whackjobs is probably enough.
There are a number of Republicans who have explicitly said that "trans ideology" is inherently harmful to children. Trans people don't even have to exist online to be a target of their ire and thus censorship, the mere possibility that someone could be trans is enough.
furina 💧⚖️@charliejane what the hell… she thinks she can get rid of trans people like that - you can't just do that but yet again "think of the children!”
@charliejane The Democrats in Congress as so disappointing. No Republican has done anything in good faith in the last 30 years and yet the Dems are all “these people seem nice” at every turn.
Kay 
@charliejane #ThinkOfTheChildren is never about listening to children and young people say what they need to be safe, like an end to bullying, affirming that they're good people, and ensuring they have knowledge, support and appropriate health care to grow to match their innate sense of themselves whatever that means.
Kids who want to dance should be supported to be dancers should be included even if they use wheelchairs. Trans and nonbinary kids need support not silencing.
Ivey Janette McClelland@charliejane They aired an ad on Fox this weekend during sports telecasts.
Because CBS,ABC, ESPN and NBC all turned them down.