HelixDab2 @ HelixDab2 @lemm.ee

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2,373

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2 yr. ago

Never had one. If you get tested prior to each new partner, and require the same from them, it's remarkably easy to avoid, as long as you don't participate in hook-up culture.

We know that cops can break encryption on your phone

Depends on the phone. Cops have not managed to break the latest iPhone encryption yet, and I believe that some of the more recent Android is also currently unbroken. Regardless - if you don't use a smartphone for doing questionable shit, there's nothing to break. This is why burner handsets exist.

get everything from your social media account

Not if you don't have one. And even if you do--a smart assassin isn't going to post anything that's remotely close to linking your real life to committing a murder.

track your payment methods for your ebike get away

Not if you steal it. Which is reportedly what happened. An even easier trick is to buy a used bicycle with cash off at your destination; you've already spent $1000 on a pistol with a threaded barrel, and about $2000 on the printer to print a silencer (because you sure as fuck aren't buying a Dead Air Sandman and getting on an ATF list, right?, the printed silencer won't last long, but it doesn't have to), so what's another $500 for a used bike, and $200 for a good lock and chain so that it doesn't get ripped off while you're whacking a CEO?

Pro-tip: .45ACP is always subsonic, although a silencer will never make a gunshot silent by any stretch of the imagination. Best case scenario for anything other than .22LR is that it's going to be quiet enough that you won't destroy your hearing if you pop off a shot in a small room.

to the CVS you bought your prepaid card with cash at

...Which is 500 miles from where you live.

they can use gait identification to ID you

Easy to fool just by putting a rock in a shoe. Also an exceptionally questionable (e.g. psuedoscience) method of identification, much like bite analysis.

use thermal vision drones to find you in some field.

First, they have to know who and where you are in order to even be searching for you in that field. Second, thermal is not nearly as useful as you'd think. A piece of carboard, a mylar blanket, even a sheet of glass will entirely block it. It's not even going to be able to see through moderately heavy brush or tree cover.

I'll buck the trend here.

Yes, I want him prosecuted. I want every single piece of evidence the cops have put out in public, and I want the public to see exactly how they traced him and caught him. I want people to see just how insidious the surveillance state is, and I want them to understand what kind of lengths they'll need to go to in order to avoid getting caught the next time.

Hey, I'm against condoms. They suck, and don't feel very good for anyone. That's why I got sterilized, and when I was dating I got tested regularly and insisted on the same from my partner(s).

To build on this - casings and bullets are more likely to be useful because the marks left on them by the lands/grooves (for the bullet) or the chamber, extractor, and bolt face (for the casing) are likely to be consistent with the criminal's firearm. However, this assumes that the criminal is caught first, and the gun they used was both recovered, and can be linked to them. (either circumstantially or by forensic evidence).

I suspect that, if you replaced the barrel and extractor immediately after committing a murder, it would be very difficult to link the firearm to the murder, particularly if it was an exceptionally common firearm. Although you'd want to buy the parts with cash, so that the purchase couldn't be linked to you...

Should have had them directed by Quentin Tarantino.

It's been years since I had glög; I should make that again since it's starting to get chilly.

Unfortunately, part of living in the US is that most people aren't exposed to other languages to any significant degree. If you are a native American English speaker, and grow up in a large city, you might hear enough Spanish to learn it, but that's about it. I learned Spanish in school, but there was no opportunity to practice until I moved to a large city close to the Mexican border.

I watch one season of some show in a language I don’t understand

I wish my brain worked that way; I'd be watching Finnish television and movies all day, every day.

I watch a fair number of shows in Swedish or Norwegian, and I've never picked up anything from what they're saying. I always have to have subtitles.

The reason I did it was to see if I could endure it. It was a matter of facing something that scared me because I knew that it was going to hurt, and still passing through. I'm not a stranger to pain--I've had well over 100 piercings, and currently have about 25 or so remaining--but a suspension is on another scale.

I guess you could say that it was a ritual for me, similar to many coming-of-age rituals that are done in tribal societies, such as some of the tattooing in the Maori culture, or the scarification done by certain tribes in Africa.

Some people say they experience transcendence; that the pain puts them in a euphoric state. For me, the swinging motion just made me motion sick.

If each person that steps in to the position fails to change the way they do business, and each one ends up getting murdered, then pretty soon you either end up with no one willing to take the position --OR-- the next CEO changes the way they do business so that they aren't painting a target on their chest.

Given what United Healthcare has been doing, the lawsuits against them, their denial of services using shady means, I can't say that a targeted attack is all that surprising. I'm mostly surprised that this hasn't been done more often against CEOs and people on the board of directors of corporations.

I should have been a little more precise; 1923 was, IIRC, when he'd consolidated power. It wasn't an instant process as soon as the tsar and his family had been murdered, and the government overthrown.

That's a dumb take, given that the two largest communist countries so far were both founded before the CIA ever existed. Lenin started the authoritarianism of the USSR by 1923 (not terribly long after WWI, although the Bolshevik coup took a while to consolidate power), and the revolution in China that put Mao Zedong in power in 1945, shortly after the end of Japanese occupation. But, as with the Russian revolution, the Chinese revolution had been going on for some time prior to WWII.

Meanwhile, the CIA didn't even exist until 1946. The predecessor to the CIA, the OSS (Office for Strategic Services) was founded in 1942, specifically as part of the wartime effort.

Moreover, the US fought in two wars to prevent communists from taking over, since the communist governments were unfriendly to US interests, notably Kim Il-Sun in North Korea (took power in '48), and Ho Chi Min in Vietnam (took over part of Vietnam in '45). Additionally, Fidel Castro overthrew the Cuban gov't led by Fulgencio Batista; Batista had the support of the US, and was friendly to US interests in the region, while Castro was decidedly not. The US attempted multiple time to overthrow Castro, and failed each time.

So the idea that the CIA is appointing the heads of communist countries is simply not supported by facts.

The gun charge was a sham. Yes, lying on form 4473 (firearm transaction record) is a federal crime. It's also one that has historically never been prosecuted on it's own; it's always used as part of another prosecution, such as bank robbery, conspiracy to distribute controlled substances, and so on. You can count the number of times where that's been prosecuted on it's own on the fingers of one hand, in part because it really doesn't come to light unless you're caught committing another crime while also possessing a firearm that you can't legally have. The justice dept. was originally going to drop that charge altogether, until pressure was applied from the political right. (Also, maybe don't write a memoir where you admit to crimes, unless you're past the statute of limitation on those crimes.)

The tax charges were pretty legit though. Depending on sentencing guidelines--which are quite complicated--the odds are pretty good that he would have ended up with large fines and penalties, in addition to having to pay the back taxes with interest that he owed.

are showing a more subdued response

...That's because, if you're smart, you keep your responses off public channels. Didn't anyone learn anything from January 6? Don't fucking plan in public.

They can't find your house, but somehow they know your phone number...? I don't know about you, but I've never had to use a person's email address or phone number when I was mailing them a letter or package, just their physical address or post office box.

I want to be clear: I don't think that the people leading the GOP are dumb. I think many of them are very, very smart. Ted Cruz, for instance; yeah, I think that he's an awful person, but he graduated from one of the most prestigious law schools in the country--Yale, I think--and that's not mean feat. People in the GOP have cognitive biases, as do people in the Democratic party, and as do I. Many of these cognitive biases are completely invisible to the person that has them; they weight information that confirms their beliefs more heavily than information that would disconfirm, when it's a belief that is central to their identity. And again, that's not just the GOP; that's everyone.

Point is, I don't think that simply saying they're dumb is accurate. Yeah, the GOP voters might be dumb, but shit, so are a lot of Democratic voters. And I'm dumb in some ways too.

Sometimes it breaks the relationship

My parents and I had a very strained relationship for a long time. It took them a long time to accept that I had not only left their religion, but had converted to Satanism (the atheistic version). Interestingly, Trump in '16 broke a certain amount of their social conservatism, and may have turned them off to Republican governance entirely, because they saw--for the first time--just how awful the political party they believed in had become. They're old--both in their 80s--but they're finally starting to ask some of the fundamental questions about following authority for themselves.

recognize where the boundaries are to forgive yourself and others

That's the tough one, isn't it? I know that when I was a believer, I said and did some pretty awful shit to other people, shit they absolutely didn't deserve, because my entire worldview was warped. Sure, it wasn't my fault I was raised that way, and sure, it's hard to really question the foundation of your upbringing, but at the same time, I caused real harms even though I didn't intend to. You can't change the past; the best you can do it apologize where you can, and try to do better in the future.

treat them how you wish you were treated.

I try. And still, even 30 years later, in the heat of them moment, it's hard to be empathetic. It takes a degree of mindfulness that's hard. I continue to work on it.

Oh, absolutely. Electrocution is very low on my list of ways to kill myself. Nitrogen asphyxiation is definitely number one, hemlock tea is number two (both water hemlock and poison hemlock are fairly common in the US). Electrocution is probably slightly above hanging, but just below standing in front of an express train.

Never.

My parents at the time were religious conservatives, and authority was expected to be followed. He did say that members of their religious organization had served as Nazis, because they had been drafted by their government, and that it was morally correct for them to have served their country, just as it was morally correct for American members of their church to also serve their country, and for both of these people to try their level best to kill each other at the behest of their respective countries. "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's."

It wasn't until I had a nervous breakdown in my very early 20s--due in large part to the extreme cognitive dissonance caused by membership in that religious organization--that I started to seriously question authority.