People saying "Are you making a bomb?" when seeing someone working on electronics outside of a professional setting or "Are you making drugs?" when someone talks about doing amateur or recreational chemistry, are both methods of exerting social taboos ...
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People saying "Are you making a bomb?" when seeing someone working on electronics outside of a professional setting or "Are you making drugs?" when someone talks about doing amateur or recreational chemistry, are both methods of exerting social taboos against individuals outside the sanctioned hierarchy accessing and democratizing bodies of knowledge critical to industrial society.
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This intersects with racial prejudice to produce situations like the Ahmed Mohamed clock incident.
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@noracodes i have been thinking about this a lot since i got kind of right to repair pilled this week. i think not having power over our devices is hierarchically enforcing and that the denial of agency over them is of a piece with this
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@nora Yeah, I absolutely agree with this. Even *asking* about repair/DIY aspects of a product is seen as gauche or threatening in some quarters of society
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@noracodes Haven't some people been flagged aboard planes for working in a computer terminal window (looks like hacking, thereby trying to hack the plane?), or even for doing mathematics? And even professionals…
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@noracodes ahaha I distinctly remember that as an arab kid going to school in the us who was into electronics and programming
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@lunabee yeahhhh i'm sorry this country is such a fucking hellhole
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@MonniauxD Yep!
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@noracodes So this seems like the nefarious influence of works of fiction and how criminal technology is depicted in them, which people confuse with reality.
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@MonniauxD At least in part, yeah.
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@noracodes Though to be perfectly fair, "recreational chemistry" is the *perfect* euphemism for drugs.
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Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️replied to !!__NORA__!! last edited by
@noracodes I just keep thinking of what happened to Star.
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Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️replied to Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️ last edited by
@noracodes Let me revise that: what the government *did* to Star.
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!!__NORA__!!replied to Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️ last edited by
@xgranade Wait, I don't know about this. What happened?
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Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️replied to !!__NORA__!! last edited by
@noracodes Basically, she had a custom made name badge with exposed solder connections, was arrested at gunpoint in Boston Logan, and was given *probation* after a year long legal battle.
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!!__NORA__!!replied to Xandra Granade 🏳️⚧️ last edited by
@xgranade what the fuck!!!
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Precognitive Butt Shakerreplied to David Monniaux last edited by
I have personally been flagged for doing mathematics in public (not on a plane, but questioned by police as to what I was doing. Not sure how else one responds to hostile police being suspicious of algebra.)
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!!__NORA__!!replied to Precognitive Butt Shaker last edited by
@aroacemagicalnerd @MonniauxD Disturbing, but not surprising. I'm sorry to hear that.