Shocking: Iowa and Florida Move to Outlaw Unauthorized Photos of Farming Operations

Yes that head line is correct, read all about it here.

In theory your kid could take a picture while driving with her parents, along the highway, say in Florida, a picture of say a field with maybe in a building in the distance and post it on Facebook, that could according to these new proposed laws be illegal!  The penalty?  If approved you could get up to 30 years in prison, so proposes the new law in Florida.

Just another reason NEVER to VISIT FLORIDA EVER AGAIN.

Of course if the farmers weren't doing something you didn't want to see you wouldn't need draconian fascist laws like these proposed by radical right wing politicians.  Probably God spoke to them in the night and told them to do it - what do you think?   Even George Orwell couldn't have imagined this....

Of course the people who they really want to stop are documentary film makers and news shows that are trying to expose their abusive or poisonous practices. The kid taking a picture would probaby be over looked as long as the kid didn't use it in a way that was intentionally pointing out the abuses of a particular farm.  My point is simply that the laws as proposed are so broad the interpretation and the enforcement of them could vast and sweeping.

This makes my blood boil, what have we become as a society, as a culture that these kinds of bills are even being proposed?  I mean the fact, the reality is that the web is filled with these images already, not to mention the dozens of movies made about the abuses of corporate agriculture.

Ok I'm going to step away from the computer, breath and when I get back hope this was all just some sick joke.

After sending a note to the folks at Grist they wrote back and alerted me to this post and very upsetting video from last week: