More criminalization of photography underway: Las Vegas is the latest place to implement the hysteria-inducing anti-terror campaign, “See Something Say Something.” Eight area billboards will ask for the public’s help in identifying suspicious activity.
What does that look like, according to the Las Vegas Sun?
It could be a car parked in a suspicious spot, a person taking unusual photos of a building’s infrastructure or even snippets of an overheard conversation that raise concern.
And on the other side of the country, the Washington Post is reporting that authorities have now implemented random bag searches in Washington, DC-area Metro stations. As someone who regularly uses this dilapidated system, I can tell you if the people doing the searching are anywhere near as incompetent as those who run and operate it, “terrorists” don’t have anything to worry about.
There are many wonderful things to do in LA … the Getty Center, Venice canals, Griffith Park, Kogi BBQ truck … but if you’re visiting, why not spend $150 to shadow paparazzo Rick Mendoza, best known for suing Britney Spears for running over his foot.
The “Rolling With the Paparazzi” tour will let you “chase celebrities all day,” or for three hours, and experience the “thrill of the hunt,” or show up when a Kardashian sister texts to let you know she’s leaving her gym.
• During the period of 1935-1944, the Farm Security Administration undertook a photo project to document American life. The book Killedcompiles 157 rejected photos by FSA director Roy Stryker, photos that didn’t meet his exacting standards. The above video, “Punctured,” put together by William E. Jones, is a sampling of some of the castoffs that were marked by a hole punch.
• Mick Rock — “the man who shot the seventies,” i.e., Andy Warhol, David Bowie, Queen, and just about everyone else — talks about his new book. See Rolling Stone’s slideshow here. [Bloomberg News]
• Forty years later, John Filo remembers the Kent State riots and the circumstances behind his Pulitzer Prize-winning photo, one of the most iconic images of the era. [Neon Tommy]
• Photoshop wiz Danil Polevoy drops modern-day pop culture icons into old photos, creating incongruous images like half Storm Trooper/half vintage military officer. [Design You Trust, via Boing Boing]
• Sit down at your own risk: a photo gallery of the 50 Scariest Santas. [UGO]
How does a situation where a campus police officer reprimands a high school kid for smoking escalate into a felony charge and a possible seven-year jail sentence for another?
That’s a good question, and the focus of an LA Weekly story this week will really make you question justice and the American way and all these lofty ideals that supposedly make our country great. It all started when Erin Robles, an LAUSD campus police officer, approached a Verdugo Hills High School student for smoking at a bus stop a few blocks from school. The situation quickly turned ugly, with Robles getting aggressive and a group of taunting students quickly egging them all on. Robles, clearly out of her depth, drew her baton, roughed the student up, and knocked his head so hard into a school bus that the window fell out.
But the only person who is paying for the incident is Jeremy Marks, 18, who taped the altercation with his cell phone and allegedly, according to Robles, yelled out “Kick her ass!” But by most accounts, and even other cell phone videos, Marks didn’t do anything other than observe, and in fact, was one of the less vocal and aggressive students there.
That doesn’t seem to matter to LA District Attorney Steve Cooley who’s out for blood in a major way. Marks has been in jail for seven months already and Cooley wants him to accept a plea deal that will give him a mere 33 months in jail in exchange for pleading guilty to obstructing an officer, resisting arrest, criminal threats and attempted lynching. Yes, you read that right — lynching.
I guess there aren’t enough real cases to prosecute in LA County that the authorities have the time and money to go after a high school kid for pissing off a campus officer. Really, can Cooley sleep at night knowing this is the “justice” he calls his life’s work? And Robles for her part is some sort of incompetent, vindictive officer that wants payback for being embarrassed by a bunch of kids. Because that’s what this amounts to; everyone seems to be placing their own ego above the scale of the violation that in reality may have been ugly, but was nowhere near criminal.
Meanwhile Marks’ life will be ruined and if he isn’t a criminal now (which he isn’t), he almost certainly will be when he emerges from jail in 33 months or seven years, whatever the outcome may be.
boywithgrenade.org 