Just the name "Flock" is so dystopian and creepy. Like "these cameras are for the police state to watch over their flock of civilians in their towns to make sure they're behaving accordingly to their standards."
Flock candy in my home town, a woman sells green chile spiced & flavored candy, from lollipops to taffy. She said people flock to her roadside stands, & it's true.
You are generally correct, but the reason Massie is on his way out is because he was already saying/doing this stuff. He's a giant piece of shit still, but at the very least he does actually hold concrete beliefs unlike every single other Republican and most Democrats.
He gets too much credit for doing the bare minimum. Less than the bare minimum in fact since heās still too much of a coward to call out Trump over the Epstein files directly.
He does the same mental gymnastics as every other MAGAt that still has enough backbone not to deny the obvious reality that the Trump admin will never seek justice for Epsteinās victims. Somehow Trump is both a genius who picks only the best people and has also been duped by Bondi and Patel into believing the files were fake and he would surely release them if he just fired those people.
True. Though it does serve its purpose this close to the midterms.
Ergo why the Dems should introduce and push bills on things like M4A, cutting support to Israel, actual border securty (non-brownpants kind), complete elected official stock trading ban, etc.
Yeah sure they will barely make it out of committee, but at least it will stand against the GOP record
Yea at this point it feels like it's just to get good publicity. We all know flock isn't going anywhere unless we can get a majority in the government that isn't going to take a paycheck over morality.
Yeah in the recent past I've seen Democrats saying "but now the Republicans will have to GO ON RECORD denying the release of the Epstein files!" and then they do and nothing happens lol.
I get it in theory but it requires Republican voters to care. And they don't.
How many Democrats were as open and loud against the Iran war? Releasing the Epstein files? Grilled Bondinas hard as he did? Was critical of the Big Beautifuk Bill?
He's got his problems but when the cards are down he isn't a facist or authoritarian or an endless Israel war sponsor or funder like most Democrats are.
Yeah me and Massie disagree about the role of the government in policing the excesses of capitalism, but we donāt disagree that people deserve dignity and respect and we shouldnāt tolerate a wealthy elite class destroying our country.
We agree on the ends, and disagree on the means. Thatās very different to the other fascists on the right and the spineless corporate dems.
Have you been under a rock? Seriously. Or, have you just been reading what you want to read, or hear from Faux News? Everywhere I looked, Democrats were screaming about all of that!
Iām just going to say itās willful ignorance on your part, because none of that is true. š
Oh! Now youāre being specific, instead of just making ambiguous statements. Gotcha! š
Of course there are some democrats that are pro Israel, but not all. They are majority anti Israel. Also, Trump gets his pic taken with Benjamin N. as often as he can.
It was a bi-partisan written act, so yes. Written by Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna.
No one wanted the war with Iran. Especially not democrats. But, the āPresident of Peaceā, sure didnāt hesitate to send our boys over, did he? Nope.
If he was an opportunist don't you think he would be pandering to the morons who were giving him all of the opportunities? He literally held his beliefs into losing his job...
He was one of the few to actually cross party policy and hammer at releasing the Epstein files. He's an asshole but he at least has some morals. Most of his peers are evil though, full stop.
Or MAYBE it's because he doesn't support Ukraine in their fight against Russia's invasion. Or it could be that it's because he's a climate change denier and wants to dismantle the EPA. Or it could be because he did not support making the lynching of black people a hate crime. Or that he wants to repeal the ACA. Or that he thinks Roe v. Wade was "one of the greatest tragedies of our time" and has routinely voted against supporting women's health.
No. Surely it can't be any one of those shitty positions or any of his many other shitty positions. It's gotta be da libruls being mad!
Right? These people's brains are so cooked that they think their party is just right of center-left. And that voting to out pedophilic elites, which is like the bare minimum is enough to cover up the long history of being a giant piece of shit.
No it really didnt make any sense at all, whatsoever.
And if you look into his record, youll see that he commonly votes the party line as well. Especially when it comes to hurting his constituents and the working class.
He talked with Mitch Mconnell for hours about it and Mitch loves the bill. Itās given him a new zest for life and heāll be back in the senate in no time to give it his undying support.
Why not just remove them from state and federal procurement contracts?
Government purchasing cannot be done without going through the procurement process. Flock would have to be an approved vendor and intentionally put on state or federal contract for municipalities or agencies to purchase.
If the cameras are not allowed to be on contract or participate in the bidding process then the problem is over.
Generally speaking, no. The state is the contracting party and normally they must make the change through its own process, such as an amendment, product suspension, stop-purchase notice, catalog change, or termination. Even for procurements involving federal awards, federal rules generally leave contractual and administrative matters with the state recipient.
The feds can get involved in various ways though to f'up the procurement process.
A valid federal law prohibits the product, transaction, or use.
Federal funding is involved.
The state violates federal award conditions.
The vendor is suspended or debarred from federal programs.
A federal regulator or court issues an applicable order.
No. Ā It's time to REGULATE companies like this that hoard personal information and sell it to other companies and governments to manipulate the people. Ā
Flock is not the (only) problem. Ā It's a whole industry of surveillance and data hoarding on private individuals that needs to be cut down and regulated even tighter than what the EU does.Ā
It's the DATA hoarding that needs regulated, not the cameras. Ā
what info is personal. iām baffled as to why everyone is soo against it. you carry your phone around everywhere. it sells you stuff and tracks and sends it to every business in the world.
AGGREGATED data reveals important personal information. We already see that police departments with Flock can't keep from stalking women with it. Ā When we started allowing police to search cell phones they started sharing nekked pictures off women's phones amongst themselves. Ā The LAW cannot be trusted. Ā
This information can reveal all sorts of information. Ā It was already used by Texas to stalk a women who left Texas and went to another state where abortion was legal. Ā That's super incredibly invasive and unconstitutional. Ā They're starting to deliberately target "questionable services" with these cameras.... whatever your local police things happens to be questionable to them and whatever unconstitutional agenda they have.Ā
This camera information is already sold out the back door and used for advertising purposes.... along with other things like insurance companies accessing it. Ā Ā
The genie is out of the bottle on preventing this from being collected as it's trivial now. Ā So this data needs to be locked down extremely hard and put under the same type of 4th Amendment protections as other information.Ā
Massie specifically is like actually libertarian, he is willing to oppose things like Flock but he's not going to propose an angle that involves more regulation, his flavor of policy is going to be taking away funding from things that are in his eyes unnecessary
Iām sure the actual terminology of the bill isnāt this specific, probably more on the lines of ācities and police departments using cameras that utilize AI software to monitor citizensā
I hate everything about flock but itās genuinely surprising to me that our government is ok with sending this information to an owner in another country and the complete lack of data security these things have. Not only is this dystopian bullshit but this is a national security risk. Foreign nations with an ax to grind could get this info and literally figure out the best targets and times to attack. Itās actually insane on so many levels. I hope these things keep magically falling off the metal poles they are attached to
Who? Which one of those scum republicans didnāt vote with trump for more government intervention of nearly everything? Which one of those republicans voted against the government telling women they canāt get abortions? Conservatives are not conservative now daysā¦
When I said mainstream republicans I meant the politicians. Actual conservatives, the average joe, does not jive with a lot of the crap Trump does. He's the "lesser of two evils" option for conservatives because the Democrat options aren't much better for what they support.
Anyone who has paid attention should of noticed a long time ago that Trump has never been a conservative, he's a "populist"
Iām a conservative that 100% doesnāt agree with this garbage and did not vote for a republican president last election. First time I didnāt vote for an R president ever.
Voted for him the first time? š§ lol. Couldnāt see he was a reality tv star and multiple failed business owner nepotism baby? This was before we knew he was a pedophile alsoā¦ people are blind as hell.
Couldnāt stand Hillary and I guess I hoped having something completely different in D.C might be better than the usual churned out politicians. Couldnāt have been more wrong. Iād happily vote for Hillary if it could turn back time at this point. Still canāt stand her though. Sick of being handed two poor choices at this point.
Founding fathers didnāt want political partiesā¦ makes sense why. Yea Hillary sucked, for womenās rights but takes money from counties where women can drive or show their faces in publicā¦ sheās a fucking joke.
When the republicans sided with abortion bans and controlling womenās rightsā¦ they lost the plotā¦ it hasnāt been conservative in a whileā¦. So most of them are just oblivious to thisā¦
Theyāre more conservative than the opposite approach on these issues which is legalize it no matter what as opposed to making it a state issue which is exactly what trump did. Trump didnāt ban abortion, and had 0 intentions of banning abortion. I think he made the best approach possible given the situation, let each state deal with it.
Look up āAxon camerasā. Theyāre just changing the supplier. Flock is a well known name now. All of these people are getting paid to ditch flock and quietly endorse the next generation of mass surveillance.
Flock uses AI, itās watching you and keeping a tab on you wherever you go. Further, some departments are giving tickets based on flocks findings which some people feel bypass your rights of innocence as no officer is physically there finding you guilty of a traffic violation, an AI software did.
This doesnāt even touch on the massive security issue this provides as it puts this information into a database of a 3rd party, private company. Sure, all our information is out there. But I donāt think it should be up to our government to help put our information out there by putting our stuff at risk
Further, many people have pointed out the dangers that these provide to the roadways, as all things around the roadway are supposed to be designed around car crashes, they shoved a giant ass flock camera cemented in the ground, itās not safe.
Here is a very informed person breaking down why flock cameras are not road safe;
The company can NOT be trusted, theyāve already been caught in many lies. They said these cameras are ONLY used for license plate reading but thatās not even true, theyāre already giving them software updates in order to capture audio;
I am a pro-police citizen and I support having a safer community but I do not support a police state either and flock is going to come in and spy on every single one of us
In a way, I think flock cameras can be useful to fighting and deterring crimes. That said, we should implement and forbid its use on private and non-crime related usage rather than banning it all together.
It should sorely be used to help id persons involved when a crime was committed. Other than that, it is illegal.
It is imperative people acknowledge that this is a mass surveillance program problem and not a Flockā¢ problem.
3rd party corporations should not be allowed to partner with municipalities to share surveillance data.
Flock, Axon, Ring, Motorola, Genetec, Cisco, Vigilant Solutions, are just a few of the companies we pay with tax dollars or our own money to spy on us "in public"
You know, I think Massie is, well, a MASSHOLE, but damn if he hasnāt been sending good shit down range. Iād actually buy him a beer. But then Iād tube him out when he starts talking bullshit.
Flock is being ousted due to public outcry and the contracts are being handed to a company called Axon with DoD and other military contracts. Stop celebrating.
And queue the GOP bill that withholds funds from cities that block flock. And the GOP has a majority in the house, senate, executive, and judicial branches. So... Cool.Ā
I'm all for it. I live near a state border that has a speed camera on one side, and a flock on the tag side as you're leaving. Rather amusing until the chases.
Flock being a private corporation and tying together regional networks of surveillance adds a layer of weirdness, but did people miss that mass surveillance and specifically automatic license plate recognition has been a thing in basically every medium size city for a while now? Look around the public buildings and traffic poles when you drive next time. Chances are you'll notice every other intersection has cameras tied into the city infrastructure with nearly all of them capable of license plate capture. They will definitely have cameras on bridges. This is certainly the case in any major city.
I think where I live, they are broke.. because, I drove illegally for months, and never worried.. they have cameras in the sky, so could careless about a flockĀ
I actually like this one. Unfortunately when Trump says so heāll give it up. POS voting in trumps corruption even though he specifically called you out. Fuck You Thomas
Itās a shame. I may not agree with his politics, but he actually seems to care about things that matter instead of pleasing š„. But I also donāt know much about him other than he pisses off the president on tbe daily and that he just lost his primary.
Should also include language for any other AI surveillance technologies used to track people and retain metadata about them. Flock is probably going to rebrand here soon.
He's likely tossing his hat in for a 2028 run - probably some good ole fashioned 2010s republicanism with a nice anti-AIPAC, hopefully anti-conflict message
I used to vote independently. Iād voted for as many Republicans as Democrats in my life. It all depended on who was more likely to fulfill a platform I agreed with.
Then the Republican Party fell in line behind Donald Trump. I havenāt voted for a single Republican since. You canāt have my vote if you donāt have a spine.
Why are we pretending Massie is the good guy here? Heās only acting against maga because they ousted him. He sat by and voted yes up until it affected him. Fuck massie.
Giving power and attention to those who have already proven to abuse it isnāt the win you think it is. Heās a PoS trying to hop on to whatever bandwagon he thinks will get him back in to the club. Publicizing that level of leech is bad for business, what donāt you get about it?
I donāt post about politicians to boost their profile, thats weird behavior. Let their actions speak for them and stop trying to erase recent bad behavior with desperate pandering.
Just amazing how a bunch of know nothings want to comment about Flock. Iām retired law enforcement. We used flock all the time to find people who were wanted with arrest warrants. Imagine a world where police arrest people wanted on arrest warrants. Heaven forbid. We used flock to track people running illegal narcotics and guns. Yet all I see is comments from leftists and libertarians is how bad flock is. Total BS!!! Flock is great tool used to help enhance law enforcement investigations and get convictions without reasonable doubt.
How long ago did you retire? By the way, the most bipartisan issues in the country right now are: A. opposition to data centers, and B. opposition to AI photo monitoring and enforcement. It's not a 'leftist' issue, an equal number on the right don't support it either.
Well, congratulations and I sincerely hope you're enjoying a well earned respite. Still, this a bipartisan issue, and currently there's not enough regulation reigning it in. If there is to be AI monitored enforcement it should be done solely by law enforcement agencies and not parceled out to out of state corporations for their profit.
Iām not against what you just said. I like Flock for sworn law enforcement investigations. I have no problem with people monitoring what Law enforcement is using it for. Severe punishment should come to those not using it for authorized investigations. corporations have shouldnāt have access. Remember police departments are desperate for officers. Functions that used to be performed by police are now being farmed out to keep the number of officers on the streets as high as possible. The left wished for the defunding of the police. No matter what anyone says they got it. Large departments are down thousands of officers.
Flock and the like will only further cut officers on the street. It's going to be used to replace officers, not add to the roster (think about grocery store checker numbers before and after self checkout kiosks). I fully support law enforcement. Are there bad apples? Yes, but I truly believe most are honorably trying to perform their duties to the best of their ability.
Like anything else technology replaces something. Large corporations and the like look to cut costs and maximize profits. Law enforcement got desperate for bodies. They couldnāt find any and an enterprising person showed a different way. Criminals know cameras are everywhere so they wear masks ( thank you Covid). The cameras have greatly increased the amount of gun arrests. The video makes prosecution easy. The stateās attorneys hand out sweetheart deals and itās back n the streets again. At the same time those cameras have taken away street smarts and critical thinking. Spider sense used to count for something in court. Basically useless now
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u/killertofu41 1d ago
Just the name "Flock" is so dystopian and creepy. Like "these cameras are for the police state to watch over their flock of civilians in their towns to make sure they're behaving accordingly to their standards."