#Historical legal systems

[afterthefeast]

i love seeing people (the times, to be precise) refer to the post office scandal as the biggest ever miscarriage of justice in the uk when internment in northern ireland went on for years with no apology or reparations - and when the uk govt is right now putting in place a complete amnesty for all crimes committed by security forces during the troubles

[moodr1ng]

the amazigh new year is now an official holiday in morocco!

[talesofedo]

You often began to draw cute Izo, but it’s scary from what kind of torture (in Ryoma Den) he happened to endure. Would he be able to recover? Or his legs...

Yes, Izo would have likely been able to recover if he hadn't confessed and been sentenced to death.

Torture was a routine part of the Edo period legal system, and it was meant to elicit a confession, not leave the person disabled.

Torture was supposed to be supervised by a doctor, and stopped before it got to a point where the person was at risk of permanent damage or death. They would be allowed some recovery time before torture started again.

It's of course possible there could have been permanent damage if the people doing the torturing were careless, but that was not the intent, nor would it have been a desired outcome.

The reason there is such a focus on getting a confession is because a confession was required to pronounce a sentence, even if there were eye witnesses or other irrefutable proof of the crime.

It was exceedingly rare for someone to be found guilty without a confession - I know of one case (but my knowledge of individual cases is limited, so there could be more). That particular case involved a thief named Kichigoro, who was a repeat offender. He was tortured a total of 27 times over the course of approximately 2 years, including at one point having his legs pressed under 7 stones for 6 hours.

On an additional note, Tosa domain may not have used the ishidaki (pressing stones) torture that was shown in Ryomaden. There are records of a different device called shimeki (搾木) that was unique to Tosa. Instead of piling stones on the person's legs, a large wooden apparatus was used, which pressed down from above. Here, both the part on which the person kneels and the part that pushes down from above would have been triangular blocks, so the injury was to both the shins and thighs.

[nationallawreview]

The Economic Benefits of AI in Civil Defense Litigation

The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into various industries has revolutionized the way we approach complex problems, and the field of civil defense litigation is no exception. As lawyers and legal professionals navigate the complex and often cumbersome landscape of civil defense, AI can offer a transformative assistance that not only enhances efficiency but also significantly reduces…

[gallusrostromegalus]

Move To A Darker Place

This is a story of Man Vs. Machine.

---

Last March, my father attempted to file his Taxes.

My beloved father is a Boomer. Unlike most Boomers, my father is rather handy with technology because he was one of the people that had a not-insignificant hand in Developing a hell of a lot of it. He was studying Computer Science at Cal Poly before the computer science degree existed. I have many fond childhood memories of skipping through the aisles of various electronic and computer part warehouses while Dad described something that either terrified the staff or made them worship him as a God.  He taught himself how to use his smartphone.  Internationally.

So when he saw the option to file digitally with the IRS through the “ID.me” program, he leapt at the chance to celebrate the Federal Government finally entering the Digital Age.

It was all going swimmingly for about six hours, until he was ready to file and the system told him that it needed to verify his identity. 

“Very Well.” said my father, a man unafraid of talking to himself and getting something out of the conversation. “It wouldn’t do for me to get someone else’s return.”

The System told him that it needed him to take a “Digital Image ID”.

a.k.a: A Selfie.

“A-ha!” Dad beams. Dad is very good at taking selfies. He immediately pulled out his phone, snapped one, and tried to upload it.

Please log into your Id.me Account and use the provided app to submit your Digital Image ID. The System clarified.

“Oh. You should have said so.”  Dad pouted, but used his phone to log onto the ID.me account, do the six security verification steps and double-checked that the filing looked the same as it did on the desktop, gave the IRS like nine permissions on his phone, and held up the camera to take his Federal Privacy Invasion Selfie.

Please align your face to the indicated grid. Said The System, pulling up a futuristic green-web-of-polygons approximation.

“Ooh, very Star Trek. Gene Roddenberry would HATE this!” Dad said cheerfully, aligning his face to the grid.  My father is a bit… cavalier, when it comes to matters of personal information and federal government, because he’s been on FBI watchlists since the late 60’s when he was protesting The Vietnam War and Ronald Regan before he’d broken containment. Alas.

Anyway, there is very little information the federal government does not have on him already, but he’s as good at stalking the FBI as they are at stalking him, and had worked out a solution:  He has something approaching a friendship with the local Federal Agent (Some guy named “Larry”. Allegedly), and got Larry hooked on Alternative Histories and Dad’s collection of carefully-researched “there is very likely buried treasure here” stories, and Larry is loath to bother his favorite Historical Fanfiction author too much.

But I digress.

After thinking for a minute, The System came back with an Error Message. Please remove glasses or other facial obstructions.

And here is where the real trouble began.

See, my father wears glasses that do substantially warp the appearance of his face, because he is so nearsighted that he is legally blind without them. His natural focal point is about 4 inches in front of his nose.  While Dad can still take a selfie because he (approximately) knows where his phone is if it’s in his hand, he cannot see the alignment grid.

He should ask someone to take it for him! I hear the audience say. Yes, that would be the sane and reasonable thing to do, but Dad was attempting to do taxes at his residence in Fort Collins, while his immediate family was respectively in Denver, Texas and Canada.  He tried calling our neighbors, who turned out to be in Uganda.

He looked down at the dog, Arwen, and her little criminal paws that can open doorknobs, but not operate cell phones.

She looked back at him, and farted.

“Well, I’ll give it a try, but if it gives me too much trouble, I’ll call Larry, and Larry can call the IRS about it.” Dad told her. 

She continued to watch him. Arwen is an Australian Kelpie (a type of cattle-herding dog), going on 14 years old, deaf as a post and suffering from canine dementia now, but she still retains her natural instinct to Micromanage. She was also trained as a therapy dog, and even if she can’t hear my dad, still recognizes the body language of a man setting himself up for catastrophe.

So, squinting in the late afternoon light next to the back door, Dad attempted to line his face up with a grid he could only sort-of see, and took A Federal Selfie.

The System thought about it for a few moments.

Image Capture Failed: Insufficient Contrast. The System replied. Please move to a darker place.

“...Huh.” Dad frowned. “Alright.”

He moved to the middle of his office, away from the back door, lit only by the house lighting and indirect sunlight, and tried again.

Image Capture Failed. Please move to a darker place.

“What?” Dad asked the universe in general.

“Whuff.” Arwen warned him against sunk costs.

Dad ignored her and went into the bathroom, the natural habitat of the selfie. Surely, only being lit by a light fixture that hadn’t been changed since Dad was attempting to warn everyone about Regan would be suitably insufficient lighting for The System.  It took some negotiating, because that bathroom is “Standing Room Only” not “Standing And Holding Your Arms Out In Front Of You Room”.  He ended up taking the selfie in the shower stall.

As The System mulled over the latest attempt, Arwen shuffled over and kicked open the door to watch.

Image Capture Failed. Please Move to a Darker Place.

“Do you mean Spiritually?” Dad demanded.

“Whuff.” Arwen cautioned him again.

Determined to succeed, or at least get a different error message that may give him more information, Dad entered The Downstairs Guest Room.  It is the darkest room in the house, as it is in the basement, and only has one legally-mandated-fire-escape window, which has blinds.  Dad drew those blinds, turned off the lights and tried AGAIN.

Image Capture Failed. Please Move To A Darker Place.

“DO YOU WANT ME TO PHOTOGRAPH MYSELF INSIDE OF A CAVE??” Dad howled. 

“WHUFF!” Arwen reprimanded him from under the pull-out bed in the room. It’s where she attempts to herd everyone when it’s thundering outside, so the space is called her ‘Safety Cave’.

Dad frowned at the large blurry shape that was The Safety Cave.

“Why not?” he asked, the prelude to many a Terrible Plan.  With no small amount of spiteful and manic glee, Dad got down onto the floor, and army-crawled under the bed with Arwen to try One Last Time. Now in near-total darkness, he rolled on his side to be able to stretch his arms out, Arwen slobber-panting in his ear, and waited for the vague green blob of the Facial grid to appear.

This time, when he tapped the button, the flash cctivated.

“GOD DAMN IT!” Dad shouted, dropping the phone and rubbing his eyes and cursing to alleviate the pain of accidentally flash-banging himself. Arwen shuffled away from him under the bed, huffing sarcastically at him.

Image Capture Failed. Please move to a darker place.

“MOTHERFU- hang on.” Dad squinted.  The System sounded strange. Distant and slightly muffled.

Dad squinted really hard, and saw the movement of Arwen crawling out from under the bed along the phone’s last known trajectory.

“ARWEN!” Dad shouted, awkwardly reverse-army crawling out from under the bed, using it to get to his feet and searching for his glasses, which had fallen out of his pocket under the bed, so by the time he was sighted again, Arwen had had ample time to remove The Offending Device.

He found her out in the middle of the back yard, the satisfied look of a Job Well Done on her face. She did not have the phone. 

“Arwen.” Dad glared. It’s a very good glare. Dad was a teacher for many years and used it to keep his class in order with sheer telepathically induced embarrassment, and his father once glared a peach tree into fecundity.  

Arwen regarded him with the casual interest a hurricane might regard a sailboat tumbling out of its wake. She is a force of nature unto herself and not about to be intimidated by a half-blind house ape.  She also has cataracts and might not be able to make out the glare.

“I GIVE UP!” Dad shouted, throwing his hands in the air and returning to the office to write to the IRS that their selfie software sucks ass. Pleased that she had gotten her desired result, Arwen followed him in.

To Dad’s immense surprise, the computer cheerfully informed him that his Federally Secure Selfie had been accepted, and that they had received and were now processing his return!

“What the FUCK?” Dad glared. “Oh well. If I’ve screwed it up, Larry can call me.”

---

I bring this up because recently, Dad received an interesting piece of mail.

It was a letter from the IRS, addressed to him, a nerve-wracking thing to recessive at the best of times.  Instead of a complaint about Dad’s Selfie Skills, it was a letter congratulating him on using the new ID.me System.  It thanked him for his help and expressed hopes he would use it again next year, and included the selfie that The System had finally decided to accept.

“You know, my dad used to complain about automation.” Dad sighed, staring at the image. “Incidentals my boy!  My secretary saves the state of California millions of dollars a year catching small errors before they become massive ones! He’d say. Fought the human resources board about her pay every year.  I used to think he was overestimating how bad machines were and underestimating human error, but you know? He was right.”

He handed me the image.

My father was, technically, in the image.  A significant amount of the bottom right corner is taken up by the top of his forehead and silver hair.  Most of the image, the part with the facial-recognition markers on it, was composed of Arwen’s Alarmed and Disgusted Doggy face.

“Oh no!” I cackled. “Crap, does this mean you have to call the IRS and tell them you’re not a dog?”

“Probably.” Dad sighed. “I know who I’m gonna bother first though.” he said, taking out his phone (Dad did find his phone a few hours after Arwen absconded with it when mom called and the early spinach started ringing). 

“Hey Larry!” Dad announced to the local federal agent. “You’re never gonna believe this. My dog filed my taxes!”

Larry considered this for a moment. “Is this the dog that stole my sandwich? Out of my locked  car?” he asked suspiciously.

“The very same.” Dad grinned.

“Hm. Clever Girl.” Federal Agent Larry sighed. “I figured it was only a matter of time before she got into tax fraud.”

---

I'm a disabled artist making my living writing these stories. If you enjoy my stories, please consider supporting me on Ko-fi or Pre-ordering my Family Lore Book on Patreon. Thank you!

[lawtoppers]

Major Legal Reforms: Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) and Two Other Acts to Replace IPC, CrPC, and Evidence Act Starting Tomorrow; महत्वपूर्ण कायदे सुधारणा: भारतीय न्याय संहिता (BNS) आणि दोन नवीन कायदे उद्यापासून IPC, CrPC, आणि पुरावे कायदा बदलणार

India is set for a historic legal transformation as the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) and two other new acts replace the IPC, CrPC, and Evidence Act starting tomorrow. Discover the key changes and their implications on LawToppers.in.

Major Legal Reforms: Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) and Two Other Acts to Replace IPC, CrPC, and Evidence Act Starting Tomorrow Date: June 30, 2024 In a historic move, the Indian legal framework is set for a monumental transformation starting tomorrow, July 1, 2024. The Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) will officially replace the Indian Penal Code (IPC), marking a significant shift in the country’s…

[hope-for-the-planet]

Under what legal experts called a “historic” settlement, announced on Thursday, Hawaii officials will release a roadmap “to fully decarbonize the state’s transportation systems, taking all actions necessary to achieve zero emissions no later than 2045 for ground transportation, sea and inter-island air transportation”, Andrea Rodgers, one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs in the case, said at a press conference with the governor.

[lifehacksthatwork]

Just a bunch of Useful websites - Updated for 2023

Removed/checked all links to make sure everything is working (03/03/23). Hope they help!

Sejda - Free online PDF editor.

Supercook - Have ingredients but no idea what to make? Put them in here and it'll give you recipe ideas.

Still Tasty - Trying the above but unsure about whether that sauce in the fridge is still edible? Check here first.

Archive.ph - Paywall bypass. Like 12ft below but appears to work far better and across more sites in my testing. I'd recommend trying this one first as I had more success with it.

12ft – Hate paywalls? Try this site out.

Where Is This - Want to know where a picture was taken, this site can help.

TOS/DR - Terms of service, didn't read. Gives you a summary of terms of service plus gives each site a privacy rating.

OneLook - Reverse dictionary for when you know the description of the word but can't for the life of you remember the actual word.

My Abandonware - Brilliant site for free, legal games. Has games from 1978 up to present day across pc and console. You'll be surprised by some of the games on there, some absolute gems.

Project Gutenberg – Always ends up on these type of lists and for very good reason. All works that are copyright free in one place.

Ninite – New PC? Install all of your programs in one go with no bloat or unnecessary crap.

PatchMyPC - Alternative to ninite with over 300 app options to keep upto date. Free for home users.

Unchecky – Tired of software trying to install additional unwanted programs? This will stop it completely by unchecking the necessary boxes when you install.

Sci-Hub – Research papers galore! Check here before shelling out money. And if it’s not here, try the next link in our list.

LibGen – Lots of free PDFs relate primarily to the sciences.

Zotero – A free and easy to use program to collect, organize, cite and share research.

Car Complaints – Buying a used car? Check out what other owners of the same model have to say about it first.

CamelCamelCamel – Check the historical prices of items on Amazon and set alerts for when prices drop.

Have I Been Pawned – Still the king when it comes to checking if your online accounts have been released in a data breach. Also able to sign up for email alerts if you’ve ever a victim of a breach.

I Have No TV - A collection of documentaries for you to while away the time. Completely free.

Radio Garden – Think Google Earth but wherever you zoom, you get the radio station of that place.

Just The Recipe – Paste in the url and get just the recipe as a result. No life story or adverts.

Tineye – An Amazing reverse image search tool.

My 90s TV – Simulates 90’s TV using YouTube videos. Also has My80sTV, My70sTV, My60sTV and for the younger ones out there, My00sTV. Lose yourself in nostalgia.

Foto Forensics – Free image analysis tools.

Old Games Download – A repository of games from the 90’s and early 2000’s. Get your fix of nostalgia here.

Online OCR – Convert pictures of text into actual text and output it in the format you need.

Remove Background – An amazingly quick and accurate way to remove backgrounds from your pictures.

Twoseven – Allows you to sync videos from providers such as Netflix, Youtube, Disney+ etc and watch them with your friends. Ad free and also has the ability to do real time video and text chat.

Terms of Service, Didn’t Read – Get a quick summary of Terms of service plus a privacy rating.

Coolors – Struggling to get a good combination of colors? This site will generate color palettes for you.

This To That – Need to glue two things together? This’ll help.

Photopea – A free online alternative to Adobe Photoshop. Does everything in your browser.

BitWarden – Free open source password manager.

Just Beam It - Peer to peer file transfer. Drop the file in on one end, click create link and send to whoever. Leave your pc on that page while they download. Because of how it works there are no file limits. It's genuinely amazing. Best file transfer system I have ever used.

Atlas Obscura – Travelling to a new place? Find out the hidden treasures you should go to with Atlas Obscura.

ID Ransomware – Ever get ransomware on your computer? Use this to see if the virus infecting your pc has been cracked yet or not. Potentially saving you money. You can also sign up for email notifications if your particular problem hasn’t been cracked yet.

Way Back Machine – The Internet Archive is a non-profit library of millions of free books, movies, software, music, websites and loads more.

Rome2Rio – Directions from anywhere to anywhere by bus, train, plane, car and ferry.

Splitter – Seperate different audio tracks audio. Allowing you to split out music from the words for example.

myNoise – Gives you beautiful noises to match your mood. Increase your productivity, calm down and need help sleeping? All here for you.

DeepL – Best language translation tool on the web.

Forvo – Alternatively, if you need to hear a local speaking a word, this is the site for you.

For even more useful sites, there is an expanded list that can be found here.

[bogusfilth]

hitting the local bookstores in 'rents city for Christmas gifts and like. Trendy bookstore with queer friendly stickers on the door, but they have Anton Jäger's UBI book, Stefan Eich's Money book (which I'm going to have to finally read Colin Drumm's review on, now that I'm considering getting it for them), a book called "Adorno's critique of Political Economy," and the I cannot stress this enough brand fucking new Hegel's World Revolutions. Older used bookstore that just has Albert and Hahnel lying around. Cute lil' bookstore and cafe that actually has a basement where you can find both volumes of Braudel's The Identity of France. anyway they've been reading a lot more political and historical lit (My dad is reading Zinn's People's History right now) so I'm trying to find them something that's not too trumpetingly Marxist or deep in The Idiom but is a on the radical end and maybe imperialism oriented. unfortunately a lot of the clearer-eyed policy facing stuff that they like still seems insufficient on this kind of issue of inequality between countries as a structural issue rather than just inequality within western nations as a structural issue. thinking probably some Mike Davis. would also love something sympathetically and immanently, rather than externally or dismissively, critical of the limits of civic liberalism and democracy (again w/r/t the limits of capital's relatively determining power and global inequality politically). though at this point I am clearly just working through my own politics.

[leisureflame]

WORLD BUILDING CHECKLIST

If you are writing a book/story that takes place in another world, I have provided for you the complete world building checklist to ensure that you know your world inside out.

Economy A. Currency B. Poverty rate/line

Government A. Crime & Legal System B. Foreign Relations C. Politics D. War

The Land A. Physical & Historical Features B. Climate C. Geography D. Natural Resources E. Population

Society & Culture A. Arts, Entertainment, & Recreation B. Architecture C. Calendar D. Daily Life. E. Diet F. Ethics & Values G. fashion & Dress H. History I. Dining Customs J. Education K. Language L. Gestures M. Manners N. Meeting & Greeting O. Religion & Philosophy P. Social organization

Magic A. Magicians B. Magic and science C. Magic & Technology D. Rules of Magic

Technology C. Technology D. Medicine D. Transportation & Communication you're welcome <3

Fell free to reblog and fill it out if you want. I am curious to see the worlds in my fellow writers heads.

Follow me @leisureflame for more posts like this!

[luulapants]

Real talk, expanding the Supreme Court is a bandaid solution, which may be necessary but may also lead to serious future consequences for our judicial branch at large. Here are some steps that would actually work to repair the harm done to SCOTUS:

At least one of the liberal judges must begin writing dissents not based on the content of specific cases but based on the illegitimacy of the court. The dissent must state that this court is corrupt, financially and politically, and that none of its judgments should stand as valid case law. This opens the door for #5.

Impeach Justice Thomas for financial crimes. There is abundant evidence of these.

Impeach Justice Roberts for financial crimes. There is abundant evidence of these.

Open investigations into ALL Supreme Court judges (not just the conservative ones - the liberal judges signed that abominable "we are in charge of our own ethics" decision, too) to seek evidence of financial or political misconduct. Proceed accordingly.

Open a Greylord-style Special Commission to determine the chronological extent of the current systemic corruption of SCOTUS. We do not need direct evidence of quid pro quo bribery in specific cases to justify overturning them. The presence of financial misconduct related to even one case means the absence of a bribe in another could have contributed to its findings. Overturn every single case tried under systemic corruption.

This would create a massive, tangled knot of case law, precedent, and judgments, all of which would need to be walked back, possibly decades. It would be a nightmare. It would be necessary. The Cook County courts tackled the same beast during Greylord. There is historical precedent, and the alternative is to continue building our legal system on corrupt case law.

[mikurulucky]

Dude! I was intending to look up info on knighthood and squires in medieval France because a lot of sources are rather general or have medieval England in mind and wondered if the process was similar pr different in other parts of Western Europe.

But what I got was one INSANE true story of a judicial duel to settle the guilt of a knight accused of a rather horrific thing. Warning for mentions of rape as this story involves a court case about just that.

And there was apparently a movie based on these events. Like, the whole thing was wild from start to finish. It was quite a famous event at the time when the duel happened.

[ayeforscotland]

What is Dataflow?

This post is inspired by another post about the Crowd Strike IT disaster and a bunch of people being interested in what I mean by Dataflow. Dataflow is my absolute jam and I'm happy to answer as many questions as you like on it. I even put referential pictures in like I'm writing an article, what fun!

I'll probably split this into multiple parts because it'll be a huge post otherwise but here we go!

A Brief History

Our world is dependent on the flow of data. It exists in almost every aspect of our lives and has done so arguably for hundreds if not thousands of years.

At the end of the day, the flow of data is the flow of knowledge and information. Normally most of us refer to data in the context of computing technology (our phones, PCs, tablets etc) but, if we want to get historical about it, the invention of writing and the invention of the Printing Press were great leaps forward in how we increased the flow of information.

Modern Day IT exists for one reason - To support the flow of data.

Whether it's buying something at a shop, sitting staring at an excel sheet at work, or watching Netflix - All of the technology you interact with is to support the flow of data.

Understanding and managing the flow of data is as important to getting us to where we are right now as when we first learned to control and manage water to provide irrigation for early farming and settlement.

Engineering Rigor

When the majority of us turn on the tap to have a drink or take a shower, we expect water to come out. We trust that the water is clean, and we trust that our homes can receive a steady supply of water.

Most of us trust our central heating (insert boiler joke here) and the plugs/sockets in our homes to provide gas and electricity. The reason we trust all of these flows is because there's been rigorous engineering standards built up over decades and centuries.

For example, Scottish Water will understand every component part that makes up their water pipelines. Those pipes, valves, fitting etc will comply with a national, or in some cases international, standard. These companies have diagrams that clearly map all of this out, mostly because they have to legally but also because it also vital for disaster recovery and other compliance issues.

Modern IT

And this is where modern day IT has problems. I'm not saying that modern day tech is a pile of shit. We all have great phones, our PCs can play good games, but it's one thing to craft well-designed products and another thing entirely to think about they all work together.

Because that is what's happened over the past few decades of IT. Organisations have piled on the latest plug-and-play technology (Software or Hardware) and they've built up complex legacy systems that no one really knows how they all work together. They've lost track of how data flows across their organisation which makes the work of cybersecurity, disaster recovery, compliance and general business transformation teams a nightmare.

Some of these systems are entirely dependent on other systems to operate. But that dependency isn't documented. The vast majority of digital transformation projects fail because they get halfway through and realise they hadn't factored in a system that they thought was nothing but was vital to the organisation running.

And this isn't just for-profit organisations, this is the health services, this is national infrastructure, it's everyone.

There's not yet a single standard that says "This is how organisations should control, manage and govern their flows of data."

Why is that relevant to the companies that were affected by Crowd Strike? Would it have stopped it?

Maybe, maybe not. But considering the global impact, it doesn't look like many organisations were prepared for the possibility of a huge chunk of their IT infrastructure going down.

Understanding dataflows help with the preparation for events like this, so organisations can move to mitigate them, and also the recovery side when they do happen. Organisations need to understand which systems are a priority to get back operational and which can be left.

The problem I'm seeing from a lot of organisations at the moment is that they don't know which systems to recover first, and are losing money and reputation while they fight to get things back online. A lot of them are just winging it.

Conclusion of Part 1

Next time I can totally go into diagramming if any of you are interested in that.

How can any organisation actually map their dataflow and what things need to be considered to do so. It'll come across like common sense, but that's why an actual standard is so desperately needed!

[jewish-sideblog]

Clearly, y'all don't care about Jews, and the fact that Hamas is violently antisemitic doesn't seem matter to any of you. So let me go with a new approach, of equal truth and value. Hamas is violently anti-Palestinian.

This past week, Hamas attacked evacuation routes and prevented Gazan citizens from fleeing an active warzone. [1]

They did that because they routinely use Gazan civilians as human shields. Hamas intentionally builds military targets close to schools, hospitals, and mosques, putting soft targets in the way of both incoming and outgoing fire. Hamas encourages Gazan civilians and children to stand on the roofs of buildings they know the IDF is targeting. [2]

Hamas has refused to allow elections in Gaza since 2006. Not just Palestinian National Authority elections, mind you. No open elections for any office have been held in seventeen years. Palestinian rights to free elections and self-determination have been denied by Hamas. [3] (And good luck to anyone who tries to blame that on Israel, because elections were held by the PNA in the West Bank in 2012, 2017, 2021 and 2022. It's Hamas's intention alone to purge democracy.)

Hamas's track record on human rights is appalling. Palestinian prisoners in Gaza face unfair trials and death sentences after being tortured by police. Palestinian women are prevented from accessing the legal systems to escape domestic abuse situations. Political dissidents in Hamas, even ones who merely support the other half of the Palestinian government, have been summarily executed. [4] [5]

Peaceful organizers in Palestine protested Hamas's massive tax hikes in 2019. Hamas security forces responded by assaulting demonstrators, tracking them down, raiding their homes, and detaining them. And, as previously mentioned, prisoners in Gaza are not treated well by Hamas. [6]

Edit Nov.5, 10:30 PM: I forgot to add arguably the most important thing-- Hamas manipulates the humanitarian aid they receive away from helping Gazans and toward killing Jews. 5% of Hamas's budget actually gets used for humanitarian aid, while 55% goes to military use. Construction equipment intended to rebuild Gaza's crumbling infrastructure is used to build a complex series of underground tunnels. Those tunnels in turn are used to smuggle Iranian military equipment into the country. They were also used for human trafficking in the October 7th attacks. [7]

If you actually want Palestinians to be free, you can't just replace Israel with Hamas. But it's not like they're the only option for supporting Palestinian liberation. While Fatah doesn't have an immaculate historical track record, it now operates as a leftist, democratic socialist, secular Palestinian government that fights for a two-state solution. Similarly, Arab-Israeli political parties like the Hadash-Ta'al coalition support leftist, anti-Zionist, and two-state solutions from within the Israeli parliament.

You can and should support Palestinian liberation movements that abuse neither Jewish nor Arab human rights and dignities. Plenty of them exist out there. But if y'all continue to throw your weight behind an antisemitic and anti-democratic terrorist regime, Palestinians and Jews will both take note of exactly where you stand.

[lipid]

MEXICO DECRIMINALIZED ABORTION AT A FEDERAL LEVEL TODAY!!!!

The Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) has decriminalized abortion at the federal level throughout the country. This unanimous decision of the highest court obliges federal public health institutions, such as the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS), Institute of Security and Social Services for State Workers (ISSSTE) and Pemex, to offer the service on a free basis. In addition, it indicates the resolution of the Court, in no case may medical personnel be criminalized. This decision is one more step towards the freedom to terminate the pregnancy, after the historical precedent of 2021.

This Tuesday, thanks to an injunction from the feminist organization Gire, the First Chamber of the Court ruled: "The legal system that penalizes abortion in the Federal Penal Code is unconstitutional, since it violates the human rights of women and people with ability to gestate”. This represents several advances, on the one hand, it is not only that abortion cannot be criminalized, but also that federal health institutions must provide the service.

[its-not-a-pen]

i love the hilarious eunuch ranking system by @welcometothejianghu so i decided to make one based on (mostly) REAL historical chinese enunchs!

in chronological order:

Warring States Period long story short, the PM is sleeping with the Empress Dowager, and he wants to extracate himself before her son (future Emperor Qin Shi Huang) gets old enough to find out. the PM finds her a suitable replacement, and the replacement is attached to a guy named Lao Ai. They pluck his beard and pass him off as a eunuch so he can sneak into the palace. Bing bang boom everyone's happy. This goes terribly wrong later, since Lao Ai tries to replace the emperor with his own kids and stages a failed coup. rest in pieces buddy...

it's very likely that Lao Ai was a ficticious character invented by Sima Qian, who will be appearing on this list later.

Qin Dynasty

Zhao Gao helped the first emperor of China conquer an empire, and administer it efficiently with his legal knowledge, but he also made the second emperor into a puppet, and weakened the empire for his own political gain. Max points of complexity, but you'd get more loyalty out of a coffee club punch card.

Before launching his soft coup, he decided to test the waters by bring in a deer and gaslighted the emperor by calling it a horse. the officials who were loyal to him called it a horse, and he executed the rest.

Han Dynasty Jiru, male favourite of Emperor Gaozu (Liu Bang), the peasant scoundrel who became the founder of the Han Dynasty. look, if the emperor has a harem of hundreds of women and you manage to catch his attention, you max out in style points. simple as. for most of chinese history it was fairly common for high-ranking men, especially eunuchs, to wear make up like powder and rouge, but i decided to give Jiru some women's huadia as well, cause he's a baddie.

Jiru gets a bad rap for alledgely distracting the emperor from his duties, but lets be real, history is written by civil officials who have no shortage of professional jealousy and gender/sexuality related prejudice towards eunuchs, since they were the personal attendants of royalty and could exert a lot of influence. plus Liu Bang was already pissing in the hats of confucian scholars, most of the poor work ethic is on HIM. Jiru should get credit for making him marginally less of a troglodite.

all in all he didn't try any court intrigue so extra points for loyalty and complexity. free my man >:( he's just a Han dynasty Monica Lewinsky who got slutshamed by jealous coworkers >:(

Han Dynasty

meet the father of east asian history, sima qian. half the people on this list can owe their placement here thanks to his extremely though history books "records of the grand historian"

history at this time was mostly "creative writing" and sima qian attempted to give the practise more academic intergrety, he went out and personally interviewed people, tried to get primary sources, and got rid of most of the more fanstastical aspects. however, he was not without his biases and some texts can be seen as allegorical/veiled insults towards the Han Dynasty, especially towards Emperor Wu. unlike most of the people on this list, sima qian was from the gentry and castated later in life as a punishment for treason. he was implicated after trying to defend a friend, and could not pay the fine to commute his sentence. the gentlemen at the time were expected to die by suicide rather than live with such ignimony, but sima qian chose to live so he could finish writing the history book his father started. the "giant conspiracy" joke explained: the chinese word for penis is a homophone for "conspiracy".