biggest piercing website on the net (bmezine.com) forced out of america
...ok this is bull shit, the website www.bmezine.com is having to be transferred out of the country so that tit does not get shut down, and the owners of the website (shannon and rachel) are facing life sentences in jail if they return to the U.S. (5-10 years for each picture on the site), read on for more information...
taken from Shannon Larratt's journal
2005/06/28 09:19 As you may know, the Bush administration recently changed the laws regarding certain types of online "adult" publishing and made sites like IAM illegal. We managed to get an injunction until September 9th, but if the site isn't immediately transferred back to full Canadian ownership and hosting (while it is Canadian owned and run, the servers were in the US and there was US management), Rachel faces life in prison for her involvement in BME and IAM.
"Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. They know its power. Thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers, founded in injustice and wrong, are sure to tremble, if men are allowed to reason... There can be on right of speech where any man...[is] compelled to suppress his honest sentiments.
Equally clear is the right to hear. To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the hearer as well as those of the speaker."
- Frederick Douglass
Among many others, the following restrictions were forced by the Republicans in the new legislation:
* I would have to get copies of everyone on IAM's ID, and share this with the US Department of Justice. Same goes for everyone who submits to BME, or is in a photo submitted to BME.
* No underage (under 18) members.
* Most foreign (non-US) members would be banned from joining IAM or submitting photos to BME.
The new laws effectively would have forced BME and IAM to immediately go offline, or face 5-10 years in prison for every single photo on both sites.
Clearly I am not OK with that, and am not willing to comply with such laws (So don't worry - other than the downtime, nothing is changing from a user's point of view and none of the above rules will be enforced on IAM). Thus IAM will be offline from Wednesday to Thursday as we move our servers and corporate presence back to Canada where free speech and expression is respected.
If you voted for Bush, this is your fault. May insects feast upon your loins.
If your eyes got scarred from those pictures, click here for an erotic hamster dance to hypnotize them back to normal (note to DoJ: that's hosted in the free country of Russia). But seriously, if you voted for Bush, and I know many who enjoy IAM and BME did, I hope you understand that you put Rachel and I at serious risk, cost BME a whack of money, and put many, many others here at risk as well.
So goodbye USA. If you're going to make BME illegal, I'll spend my hosting dollars in a free country.
What happened to "land of the free"? (330)
Update: Since a number of people don't know what this is about, here's the EFF press release on it, and you can find more via googling for 2257 adult (and in google news. This is why FARK no longer posts BOOBIES links (for now) and why sites like gaping maw have been forced offline.
taken from Shannon Larratt's journal
2005/06/28 09:19 As you may know, the Bush administration recently changed the laws regarding certain types of online "adult" publishing and made sites like IAM illegal. We managed to get an injunction until September 9th, but if the site isn't immediately transferred back to full Canadian ownership and hosting (while it is Canadian owned and run, the servers were in the US and there was US management), Rachel faces life in prison for her involvement in BME and IAM.
"Liberty is meaningless where the right to utter one’s thoughts and opinions has ceased to exist. That, of all rights, is the dread of tyrants. It is the right which they first of all strike down. They know its power. Thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers, founded in injustice and wrong, are sure to tremble, if men are allowed to reason... There can be on right of speech where any man...[is] compelled to suppress his honest sentiments.
Equally clear is the right to hear. To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the hearer as well as those of the speaker."
- Frederick Douglass
Among many others, the following restrictions were forced by the Republicans in the new legislation:
* I would have to get copies of everyone on IAM's ID, and share this with the US Department of Justice. Same goes for everyone who submits to BME, or is in a photo submitted to BME.
* No underage (under 18) members.
* Most foreign (non-US) members would be banned from joining IAM or submitting photos to BME.
The new laws effectively would have forced BME and IAM to immediately go offline, or face 5-10 years in prison for every single photo on both sites.
Clearly I am not OK with that, and am not willing to comply with such laws (So don't worry - other than the downtime, nothing is changing from a user's point of view and none of the above rules will be enforced on IAM). Thus IAM will be offline from Wednesday to Thursday as we move our servers and corporate presence back to Canada where free speech and expression is respected.
If you voted for Bush, this is your fault. May insects feast upon your loins.
If your eyes got scarred from those pictures, click here for an erotic hamster dance to hypnotize them back to normal (note to DoJ: that's hosted in the free country of Russia). But seriously, if you voted for Bush, and I know many who enjoy IAM and BME did, I hope you understand that you put Rachel and I at serious risk, cost BME a whack of money, and put many, many others here at risk as well.
So goodbye USA. If you're going to make BME illegal, I'll spend my hosting dollars in a free country.
What happened to "land of the free"? (330)
Update: Since a number of people don't know what this is about, here's the EFF press release on it, and you can find more via googling for 2257 adult (and in google news. This is why FARK no longer posts BOOBIES links (for now) and why sites like gaping maw have been forced offline.