A 77-year-old Republican man is staging a solo protest against Flock cameras

https://www.cltampa.com/news/a-77-year-old-republican-man-is-staging-a-solo-protest-against-st-petes-flock-cameras/

112•UmYeahNo•1h ago

Comments

dyauspitr•56m ago

If I made an app that showed their locations and gamified knocking them out (subtly), would that get me in legal trouble?

vkou•53m ago

In a country where not attending a protest gets you 30 years in prison, and attending a protest where you set off a firework gets you 70, and where a government thug can pin you down and execute you on the sidewalk, and get recognized for his heroism and bravery... you tell me.

trollbridge•50m ago

In what country did those things happen?

ethin•49m ago

In the United States

vkou•49m ago

The United States, the first two in Texas and the latter in Minnesota.

In that bit, an unarmed man was murdered, the killers scatter like roaches, the federal police is covering for them, while actively preventing the state from giving the guilty a fair trial and a swift sentencing and imprisonment.

(What they did is a state crime with a maximum penalty of life imprisonment, and also a federal crime that carries the death penalty.)

parineum•44m ago

> ... while actively preventing the state from giving the guilty a fair trial

Interesting.

vkou•41m ago

Anyone with eyes can see that those killers are guilty. You don't need to split hairs on that, you can look at the video yourself.

As anyone else, though, they constitutionally deserve a fair trial where the onus is on the state to prove that guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, before they can be sentenced. My assessment of their guilt has little bearing on the state's ability to do that.

Proving that guilt would be trivial if the federal government weren't actively complicit, by preventing such a trial from taking place. There's no need to cover for it, it's behavior is unconscionable and treasonous.

throwaway173738•49m ago

Hey if anything we should keep protesting. You should read about what the British did to Indians protesting for independence. Protest in spite of consequences is a singular act of bravery. The cops want people to give in.

nielsbot•47m ago

I hope a (civil rights) lawyer will reply. I’m curious too.

Dig1t•44m ago

Make it a web app and host it in a different country? Probably also depends on the mechanics of the game though as well..

cwillu•44m ago

A different country... without an extradition treaty.

mc32•26m ago

Oh like Snowden then… he or she just has to be okay living under those conditions…

anematode•44m ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incitement#United_States

If done obliquely enough... e.g., just making a tracker and having the ability for people to report broken cameras, you're probably fine in theory. In practice, this is a litigious society, so you'd want to build this anonymously.

Zak•27m ago

The article already links to a website that shows their locations: https://deflock.org/

It does not gamify or otherwise encourage damaging them, which would be legally risky.

indy•19m ago

No need to damage the cameras, just place some balloons in front of them.

codeddesign•43m ago

Why “republican” man? Editorials like this piss me off. Just say “Man from Florida”. Why bring party politics into an article that isn’t about party lines?

Avicebron•39m ago

Ikr, "Florida man" already has a distinguished pedigree

forsalebypwner•36m ago

Right, and also, a 77-year-old man in Florida means that adding "Republican" is just redundant.

odyssey7•35m ago

The developments of political parties’ positions are themselves newsworthy, as well as the ways in which writers attempt to frame them. You’re right to notice it.

Rebelgecko•34m ago

Florida Man is an overloaded term

LeoPanthera•30m ago

Republicans are not on the side of liberty and privacy. So emphasizing that he's a republican makes the case even more strongly.

You can argue that this shouldn't be about politics, but how many years of living under an authoritarian government do you need?

Everything is about politics now.

ryandrake•43m ago

Being against mass-surveillance should be a bipartisan struggle. Given our political polarization, each side is highly distrustful about what "the other side" will do with mass amounts of data about their side. This should be a cause that unites everyone.

tedggh•27m ago

We do have some bipartisan initiatives, it’s just that they are not news worthy. Take for example the initial push for banning TikTok. It had unprecedented bipartisan support.

SwellJoe•9m ago

All the evil shit (war, funding genocide, mass surveillance, privacy invasions or curtailing free speech in the name of protecting children) nearly always has bipartisan support.

jmspring•19m ago

Having binged on a bunch of modern British detective fiction in the last year or so - Rhys Dylan as an example. The reliance on cameras in society, yes it is fiction, but there is also truth is an interesting thing in terms of what a society accepts.

PaulHoule•8m ago

I've seen Trump 2024 voters go to No Kings in 2026 because they fear being the victim of federal overreach as in ICE.

drnick1•37m ago

A sledgehammer would be a better solution.

cogman10•33m ago

These cameras aren't just invasive, they are expensive. Cities are paying a pretty penny to access a few web cams.

Last I looked it up, $2500 per year per camera in the surveillance area.

dagurp•12m ago

They are also installed improperly https://www.wate.com/news/tennessee/flock-cameras-tennessee-...

hamandcheese•10m ago

That doesn't sound expensive to me. Not compared to, say, a $1.7M public toilet[0].

To be clear, I do not support Flock cameras.

[0]: https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/san-francisco/san-fran...

Aboutplants•28m ago

Curious if hoisting an Ipad on the end of his pool skimmer that just showed a video of random cars and their license plates, causing the camera to register a bunch of false positives?

biztos•20m ago

That's a fun idea! I wonder if it'd work if you just used something like an e-Ink screen and had it generate random license plates?

I suppose "blocking the view of surveillance cameras" is probably illegal though.

jagged-chisel•5m ago

Waiting for the “obstruction of justice” suit. Probably won’t stick, but it’ll be a tremendous pain in the ass of the protester.

jubilee33•26m ago

Why does it matter his political party? Many otherwise good people have fallen for a con of some sort at least once at some point it their life. The man has some time and uses it in a non destructive manner to do what he thinks will help his community rather than just posting nonsense online, that in itself is commendable . I find the article trying to forment division by naming him a Republican...who cares, human privacy and the imbalance of power is something every American and even non Americans should care about.

aliasxneo•22m ago

I'd wager it has something to do with this: https://www.cltampa.com/news/creative-loafing-tampa-bay-has-....

carimura•21m ago

nice. i just asked chatgpt for the lean and it said progressive so there ya go.

carimura•22m ago

ya. classic tactic to label someone so there's pattern matching for readers. happens everywhere unfortunately.

JMKH42•13m ago

Because the modern GOP is itself a con. Its great that he is protesting flock cameras but he should also be protesting his own party, which is engaged in unprecedented corruption, murders american civilians, attacks democracy, and seeks to disenfranchise our daughters and wives.

I cannot stand it that disingenous and ignorant people pretend this isn't the case, you can all go to hell.

WhyComboNadir•20m ago

Equally informative title: A 77-year-old lactose-intolerant man is staging a solo protest against St. Pete’s Flock cameras

nozzlegear•20m ago

He's a 77-year-old patriot o7

nozzlegear•7m ago

Flock enjoyers didn't like this one

Barbing•19m ago

Thanks for acting out my daydream, Carl.

carimura•19m ago

i've said this before on Hn but I called the sheriff to discuss these in our neighborhood and asked if they could search for our whereabouts and he said "only if there's an active crime for your plate", so I said "what if the governor imposes a 'bird flu curfew'?" and after some kerfuffling said in theory yes they could then use it to track offendors.

grg0•5m ago

The other issue is that the company obviously has access to the streams nationwide, and they likely don't have the same oversight that a local police might have to document when/how they are used, if they have any oversight at all.

linsomniac•13m ago

Last month I said to my wife that we should start paying homeless people to hold their signs while standing in front of the radar speed cameras the city has been putting up around our town.

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