#providing legal information

[echodrops]

I know I've posted about nothing but my job lately, but I am really struggling right now...

I honestly think one of the greatest failures of our modern education system is that teachers are expected to exhibit patience and forgiveness beyond anything that would be expected in other career fields.

Genuinely, I think the world would be a lot more functional (and better educated) currently if teachers were just allowed to be a little more real with students and tell them that, yeah, actually, it's not acceptable to continue making the same mistake after being corrected on it twelve times.

Of course, I fully understand instructors cannot expect students to master concepts they're never been taught.

But if a concept or rule has been clearly communicated to the student multiple times, it is honestly just not reasonable to expect a high grade while still continuing to make all the same mistakes. If a student refuses to learn the material, they just shouldn't pass. If I give a student a step-by-step video walk-through for how to handle basic formatting and they still fuck it up because they didn't bother to even watch the video, they should lose points. Like is that rocket science???

Imagine being a cashier, being taught the proper procedure for closing out a register multiple times, and then still fucking it up every single time you have to close.

Would you be employed as a cashier for very long? No!

Man, I don't even know. I know I'm just ranting at this point because I'm disappointed, but... Really, I do think that teachers should just be allowed to be a little more real. Sometimes calling people out for not putting in the minimum effort is fair.

If a student makes the same basic mistake after I've corrected them 20 times, it should be socially acceptable for me to tell them to stop wasting my time--and wasting their own time--in a class they don't intend to learn anything from.

I'm so tired...

[halo-eater]

PLEASE BE CAREFUL ABOUT THIS APP IF YOU ARE TRANS AND US-BASED. your ~trans inclusion statement~ means nothing if you're ready and willing to collaborate with pigs and feed them our personal information when you know full well that existing as a trans person is rapidly becoming illegalized in the United States.

[savage-rhi]

Magggennnttaaaa!

[tayloralison]

I deal with pretty high profile clients and it's always the ones that make a lot who are obnoxious and entitled lmaoo

[earthwyrms]

happy nonbinery day!! 🥳 im a multigender xenogender genderless genderqueer type of beast & its so fun. lets all frolic together

& btw legal gender should be abolished if you want to achieve gender liberation. there's no legitimate/non-oppressive reason to force people to have gender markers on record. & gender markers are never going to be "inclusive" of people with complex and/or shifting genders, nor many genderless people. so that's something you can think about today wrt activism.

[areyoudoingthis]

so apparently I'm being asked to "choose a gender" for the property paperwork for my house because "non binary isn't an option" and I'm developing an eye twitch. do these people know they make laws for a reason

[cereusblue]

Gonna stream some Palworld

Gonna throw some balls that nintendo says is illegal alongside my hubby. I'll be the only one streaming out of the two of us today, so stop by and watch two idiots run around throwing balls.

Come hang out with us~

[wirelessmemoryadministratorbrad]

[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!

[luxvinova]

Dear mutuals and followers, sorry for the politics in your dashboard but in some homes today we cannot afford to "ignore the problems".

The country where I come from, Venezuela, has had an election for president that has resulted in fraud. Mr. Nicolás Maduro has proclaimed himself President although the votes have said the opposite. This regime has devastated the lives of its citizens, resorting to violence against those who opposed it. It has brought ruin to a nation once celebrated as a pioneer of Latin American independence, yet many choose to overlook its plight. Venezuela, a country that once extended support to immigrants and provided aid to others, is now dismissed as insignificant by many.

If you are an advocate who values the dignity and needs of individuals, we urge you to raise your voice alongside us. Don't ignore us because we are Latinos, this is also a war. It is a conflict against an individual who has controlled his armed forces, law enforcement, narcotics syndicates, and citizens, rendering any attempts at reform futile despite our vocal protests. I have family members who are unable to depart through legal means, and if they choose to leave unlawfully, they face harsh judgment from people of the outside.

If you are interested, here are more information you may read:

Twitter Thread Summary // What is happening in Venezuela // Torture Center: The Helicoide

(ASK) How can I help Venezuelans?

[sayruq]

In the early afternoon of 29 November last year, several Palestinian boys descended on to their street in the occupied West Bank, where they often played together.Minutes later, two of them lay dead from gunshots fired by Israeli soldiers - Basil, 15, and eight-year-old Adam. As part of an investigation into the conduct of Israel's security forces in the West Bank, which has been under military occupation for more than half a century, the BBC has pieced together what happened on the day the two boys were killed. Mobile phone and CCTV footage, information about the movements of Israel's military, witness testimony and detailed investigation of the scene, including taking measurements, combine to reveal evidence suggesting serious human rights violations. The evidence we found has prompted Ben Saul, UN special rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism, to say the death of Adam appears to be a "war crime".Another legal expert, Dr Lawrence Hill-Cawthorne, described the use of lethal force as “indiscriminate”. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the circumstances of the deaths were “under review” but said “live fire is used only in order to remove immediate threats or for arrest purposes, following arrest protocols after exhausting other options”.

Video footage from 29 November shows Basil standing next to a hardware store, its shutters firmly locked down. When Israel's military arrives, shops close quickly in Jenin, a city in the West Bank - Palestinian territory which, unlike Gaza, is not run by Hamas. Witnesses said gunfire had been ringing out from a nearby operation by Israel's army in the Jenin refugee camp. Adam, a football fanatic and massive Lionel Messi fan, stood with his older brother Baha, 14. There were about nine boys on the street in total, all captured on CCTV cameras that provided a nearly 360-degree view of what happened next.

A few hundred metres away, a convoy of at least six armoured Israeli military vehicles turned a corner and began heading towards the boys, who clearly became uneasy. Several of the boys started to move away. At this precise moment, mobile phone footage shows the front door of an armoured vehicle opened. The soldier inside had a direct view of the boys. Basil had darted into the middle of the road, while Adam was 12m further from the soldiers, running away. Then at least 11 gunshots rang out.

Medical reports obtained by the BBC show that two shots hit Basil in the chest. Another bullet struck eight-year-old Adam in the back of the head as he ran away; his older brother Baha desperately tried to drag him to cover, leaving a trail of blood as he screamed for an ambulance.

[avaantares]

Fanfiction Authors: HEADS UP

(Non-authors, please RB to signal boost to your author friends!)

An astute reader informed me this morning that one of my fics (Children of the Future Age) had been pirated and was being sold as a novel on Amazon:

(And they weren't even creative with their cover design. If you're going to pirate something that I spent a full year of my life writing, at least give me a pretty screenshot to brag about later. Seriously.)

I promptly filed a DMCA complaint to have it removed, but I checked out the company that put it up -- Plush Books -- and it looks like A LOT of their books are pirated fic. They are by no means the only ones doing this, either -- the fact that """publishers""" can download stories from AO3 in ebook format and then reupload them to Amazon in just a few clicks makes fic piracy a common problem. There are a whole host of reasons why letting this continue is bad -- including actual legal risk to fanfiction archives -- but basically:

IF YOU ARE A FANFIC AUTHOR WITH LONG AND/OR POPULAR WORKS, PLEASE CHECK AMAZON TO SEE IF YOUR STORIES HAVE BEEN PIRATED.

You can search for your fics by title, or by text from the description (which is often just copied wholesale from AO3 as well). If you find that someone has stolen your work and is selling it as their own, you can lodge a DMCA complaint (Amazon.com/USA site; other countries have different systems). If you haven't done this before, it's easy! Here's a tutorial:

HOW TO FILE A COPYRIGHT COMPLAINT FOR STOLEN WORK ON AMAZON.COM:

First, go to this form. You'll need to be signed into your Amazon account.

Select the radio buttons/dropdown options (shown below) to indicate that you are the legal Rights Owner, you have a copyright concern, and it is about a pirated product.

Enter the name of your story in the Name of Brand field.

In the Link to the Copyrighted Work box, enter a link to the story on AO3 or whatever site your work is posted on.

In the Additional Information box, explain that you are the author of the work and it is being sold without your permission. That's all you really need. If you want, you can include additional information that might be helpful in establishing the validity of your claim, but you don't have to go into great detail. You can simply write something like this:

I am the author of this work, which is being sold by [publisher] without my permission. I originally published this story in [date/year] on [name of site], and have provided a link to the original above. On request, I can provide documentation proving that I am the owner of the account that originally posted this story.

In the ASIN/ISBN-10 field, copy and paste the ID number from the pirated copy's URL. You'll find this ten-digit number in the Amazon URL after the word "product," as in the screenshot below. (If the URL extends beyond this number, you can ignore everything from the question mark on.) Once this number has been added, Amazon will pull the product information automatically and add it to the complaint form, so you can check the listing title and make sure it's correct.

Finally, add your contact information to the relevant fields, check the "I have read and accept the statements" box, and then click Submit. You should receive an email confirmation that Amazon has received the form.

Please share this information with your writer friends, keep an eye out for/report pirated works, and help us keep fanfiction free and legally protected!

NOTE: All of the above also applies to Amazon products featuring stolen artwork, etc., so fan artists should check too!

[communistkenobi]

"Sex" is commonly used to refer to a person's status as a man or woman based on biological factors. Although sex reflects a person's biology, as opposed to gender, which is generally considered to be socially constructed, the biological aspect of the body that determines a person's sex has not been legally or medically resolved. Traditionally, a person's legal sex is established by the sex that the birth attendant places on the birth certificate. Thus, for infants born with unambiguous external genitalia, the external genitalia typically control the sex determination. If the genitalia appear ambiguous, sex is assigned, in part, based on sex-role stereotypes. The presence of an "adequate" penis in an XY infant leads to the label male, while the absence of an "adequate" penis leads to the label female. A genetic (XY) male with an "inadequate" penis (one that physicians believe will be incapable of penetrating a female's vagina when the child reaches adulthood) is "turned into" a female even if it means destroying his reproductive capacity. A genetic (XX) female who may be capable of reproducing, however, is generally assigned the female sex to preserve her reproductive capability, regardless of the appearance of her external genitalia. If her phallus is considered to be too large to meet the guidelines for a typical clitoris, it is surgically reduced, even if it means that her capacity for satisfactory sex may be reduced or destroyed. In other words, men are defined based on their ability to penetrate females, and females are defined based on theis ability to procreate. Sex, therefore, can be viewed as a social construct rather than a biological fact.

— The Road Less Traveled: The Problem with Binary Sex Categories by Julie A Greenberg in Transgender Rights (2006)

interesting to note that 1) the introduction of chromosomal information doesn’t actually provide more “biologically accurate” precision in sex assignment, only a more complex set of administrative and medical instructions on the procedures of assignment, 2) the only concern in sex assignment is maintaining the distinction that “females make babies” and “males penetrate females to induce pregnancy.”

This is why the idea that “sex is biological” or that we can just drill down to find the sex atom of the human body, be that chromosomes or gametes or whatever else, is premised on the notion that sex assignment is simply a record of a self-evident reality, not the construction of the category of sex as the mythological foundation of cis-heterosexual reproduction

[ctbraininjurysupportservice-blog]

Is CCC's secret electronic randomization system for federally funded programs legal?

Is this secret referral system violating the rights of the disabled?

How long has CCC's this secret system been in place?

How many Approved Agency Providers have possibly been affected by this secret system?

Who may be benefiting from CCC's secret referral system?

ABI Resources will let keep you informed as we discover more information.

Investigating the Legality and Impact of CCC's Secret Electronic Randomization System on Federally Funded Programs

Subtitle: Exploring the potential implications for Approved Agency Providers and the rights of disabled individuals

Introduction:

Recently, questions have emerged regarding the legality of CCC's secret electronic randomization system utilized in federally funded programs. This system, which has been operating clandestinely for an unspecified duration, could potentially impact numerous Approved Agency Providers and raise concerns about the rights of disabled individuals involved in these programs.

The legality of the Secret Electronic Randomization System

A comprehensive analysis of the legality of CCC's secret electronic randomization system is necessary, taking into account federal and state regulations, as well as any potential breaches of constitutional rights.

Duration of the Secret System's Implementation

Further investigation is required to determine the exact length of time that the secret electronic randomization system has been in place and the extent of its impact on federally funded programs.

Potential Effects on Approved Agency Providers

The number of Approved Agency Providers possibly affected by this clandestine system is currently unknown, necessitating a thorough examination to assess the system's impact on the delivery and quality of services provided.

Implications for the Rights of Disabled Individuals

It is crucial to evaluate whether the secret referral system might be infringing upon the rights of disabled persons, particularly in terms of equal access to services and protection against discrimination.

Conclusion:

As we continue to uncover more information about CCC's secret electronic randomization system, ABI Resources remains committed to providing unbiased, professional, and comprehensive updates on the issue. Stay tuned for further developments as we work to unravel the implications of this system on federally funded programs, Approved Agency Providers, and the rights of disabled individuals.

ABI Resources has taken steps to address these concerns by reaching out to the federal government for assistance. Specifically, the organization has requested an investigation into management practices and has requested more detailed information about the programs, including the total number of program-approved agency providers, the entity responsible for managing and updating the approved provider directory list, information about public access to this list and Care Management referral practices of federal program agency providers. ABI Resources' requests for information have been made in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA).

ABI Resources remains committed to steadfast advocacy for the rights of individuals with disabilities. We are dedicated to staying informed and up-to-date on the latest developments, and we pledge to keep you informed as we receive new information.

This article sheds light on the concerns surrounding the lack of transparency and accountability in Connecticut's federally funded programs.

Connecticut, brain-injured individuals, transparency, accountability, Approved Provider Directory, care management referral processes, Medicaid agency providers, lack of access, concerns, confusion, investigation, advocacy, Freedom of Information Act. Trending

#trendingnow #ctnewss #Democrats #Republicans #FOIA #BreakingNews #news #Connecticut

ABI Resources contacted,

Erin Kane Head of Quality and Performance Improvement for CCC Connecticut Community Care. and Julia Evans Starr, President, of CCC Connecticut Community Care. And they are not providing clarity.