#fax your senators

[pilloclock]

US PRO PALESTINE PLEASE WATCH

Fax your senators ! They cannot ignore us 🇵🇸

Ceasefire now

[bunnie-the-idiot]

the kids online safety act passed the u.s. senate.

long story short (for anyone who hadn't heard of this before) the kids online safety act, aka kosa, is a bill that will censor online content and resources for lgbtq+ matters, reproductive healthcare, activism (INCLUDING PALESTINE AND LIKELY OTHER CRISES GOING ON LIKE IN CONGO OR SUDAN), mental health, etc. everywhere--its effects likely won't be contained to just america.

today, july 30th, 2024, the senate passed it 91-3. it has officially moved to the house of representatives.

is this a pretty massive setback? yes. do you have every right to be scared, sad, angry, or whatever else about this happening? absolutely. but should you give up hope completely? NO!

even though kosa passed the senate, the house is on break/august recess at the moment. we have around an entire month to get emails, calls, and faxes in to house reps, maybe more depending on when they decide to vote on it.

should it pass the house and get signed into law, we still have a whole 18 months before it actually goes into effect. this is plenty of time for digital rights orgs (e.g. fight for the future, the electronic frontier foundation) and other groups that oppose it to file a lawsuit against it. even if, worst-case scenario, it flies through the house immediately after the recess ends, we can still fight this up to march 2026.

so, yes, remember what's at stake here, but also remember that it's not over yet. we lost a battle, not the war.

below are some resources to learn more about kosa and how to contact your reps (first link) + a page that lets you directly contact progressive house reps, sign an open letter opposing the bill, and view others' testimonies against it (second link):

FIGHT. FIGHT. FIGHT.

[gwydionmisha]

11/30/23: KOSA is an anti-LGBTQIA+ censorship bill. It is essential you call THIS week. Tell them you are specifically against KOSA and especially against hotlining the bill.

Call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to the Senator of your choice.

Here is one that will send your reps a fax: https://resist.bot/

[pineappleciders]

in the strike for palestine, please talk about it. please do not stay silent. even if you have zero followers, zero interaction, talk about palestine. reblog, like, comment, boost anything you can calling for ceasefire. do not buy anything that isn't a necessity.

you can email or fax your representatives and senators for free calling for ceasefire. keep doing your daily clicks, donate if you can, and do not keep quiet

IMPORTANT RESOURCES

how you can help palestine

daily click to donate

resources on palestine-israel history

what to boycott

what to boycott pt. 2

more resources

call for ceasefire

sudanese-led causes to donate to

esims for gaza

(US) email your representatives

(US) call your representatives

ceasefire action toolkit

NOTE: focus boycotting/pressuring products and companies stated by the BDS

[elhopper1sm]

Stop KOSA. KOSA just got passed through the House and More organizations even Twitter and Snapchat. Social media companies it aims to delete are coming out in support of it. This content creator has been covering KOSA for a long time. If you remember when AO3 was down how everyone freaked out. KOSA could take AO3 off the Internet. Could remove queer content online. The ACLU opposes it. It's unconstitutional call your Senators. Call your Representatives. Call everyone you can in power and tell them to oppose this bill. Sign petitions follow the link in that creators bio. Go to bad Internet Bills dot com and get call script or fax script for it. Contact the ACLU about suing states that support KOSA. We can still fight. End KOSA protect online safety!

[laurenfoxmakesthings]

Folks, what the Senate voted on was the cloture for KOSA. It's like a prelude, their way of deciding TO vote on it soon. Those many Democrat votes don't even represent whether they would vote for KOSA itself.

It still sucks, but I'm not letting anyone believe it fully passed yet and declare 'DoOm! Time to get the VPNs'. You can still fight this. Call, email, fax (that would really annoy the hell out of them) your senators and representatives.

There. Is. A. Chance.

Keep. Making. Noise!

[mollyjimbly]

🚨🚨The Senate vote on KOSA is either taking place today or tomorow.🚨🚨

We need all the noises possible to make it clear that this bill should either be fixed or stopped.

There's still the House next if it passes, do not give up. ❤️

Use this to call your reps :

What you need to write/say is right here.

You can also send faxes using this if you wish

We were able to push against KOSA for so long and its all thanks to our combined efforts. Let's keep it up ! ❤️❤️❤️

[pintadorartist]

The Senate Must Block Trump’s Cabinet Nominees

Here is an image of the President-Elect, Donald Trump's cabinet picks for his administration:

These picks are not only bad since most of these picks lack experience in these fields, but some actually have written parts of the Project 2025 guidebook, like Russel T. Vought for example.

And although the Republicans took the Senate, they still need Democrat cooperation to confirm these nominations.

Another factor to consider is that not all of the Republicans are on board with these nominations, an example being Matt Gaetz, who ended up withdrawing his bid for Attorney General after facing backlash from fellow Repubs amid allegations of sexual misconduct

So, I ask that you all Call, Email, and Fax your senators to tell them to reject these nominations.

For more info on the appointees, https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/4985802-trump-cabinet-nominees-second-term/

Here's where you'll find your Senator:

You can also call (202) 224-3121, where a switchboard operator will connect you directly with the Senate office you request.

If you're nervous about talking with someone call after your senator's office is closed or test RESIST at 50409 to turn your text into an email or fax

Fax tool here:

Scripts;

If your Senator is a Democrat, use this script for calls, email, and fax:

"Hello [Senator name], my name is [Your name], and I urge you to reject Trump's cabinet picks. Instead of competent experts, Trump has picked his most loyal allies as Cabinet members to enforce his authoritarian agenda and disrupt the most essential services for everyday Americans. He's appointed self-serving people like anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services and former Fox News host and white nationalist Pete Hegseth as secretary of defense.

The Senate must reject these Cabinet nominees to protect working Americans from the dysfunction our federal agencies will face under the direction of these appointees. We're worth fighting for, and we deserve better. I urge you and the Senate to reject RFK Jr., Hegseth, and any other extremist Trump nominees who will seek to enact Trump's radical Project 2025 agenda."

If your Senator is a Republican, use this script instead:

"Hello [Senator name], my name is [Your name], and I urge you to reject Trump's cabinet picks. Instead of competent experts with experience, Trump has picked unqualified Cabinet members who will disrupt the most essential services for everyday Americans. He's appointed people who lack qualifications, like anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services and former Fox News host and white nationalist Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense.

The Senate must reject these Cabinet nominees to protect working Americans from the dysfunction our federal agencies will face under the direction of these appointees. We're worth fighting for, and we deserve better. I urge you and the Senate to reject RFK Jr., Hegseth, and any other unqualified Trump nominees who lack the expertise and qualifications for these roles"

Here are also some petitions to sign as well:

[taikeero-lecoredier]

RECENT UPDATES ON THE BAD INTERNET CALIFORNIA BILLS:

Sadly, both AB1949 and SB976 passed and are now on their way to the governors desk.

We need him to veto them so they dont become Law.

If you havent Heard of the danger of those bills for the Internet , this post explain it thoroughly :

- Post doing a deep explanation on those bills here

I CANNOT emphasize enough how these would have a global effect on the Internet given that most websites and apps originates from California and not all of them could afford either following those bills or moving states.

Now, as the bills are on their way to the governor, we need Californian citizens to voice their oppositions to those bills to the Governor Gavin Newsome HERE

(Non California peeps, we are urging you to share this as well!!! )

Please keep in mind that calling with phone is much,much more efficient.

You can also send faxes with Faxzero

Here are scripts you can use as arguments : (text/alt version below the read more )

Than you for reading. Even if youre not from California, please spread the word anyway ! Make posts,tweets,etc

REBLOGS ENCOURAGED

TEXT VERSION :

AB 1949

Hello, my name is (INSERT NAME HERE) and I'm one of the Senator's constituents from (INSERT CITY HERE). I'm calling to urge the Senator to vote NO on AB 1949, the amendment to the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2020. While this bill's intent is to prevent the sharing and sale of minor's information under the age of 18, the method it would intend to do so by is written far too broadly for it to be safely and reasonably implemented.

While this bill retains a safer standard of the business requiring actual knowledge of a consumer being under the age of 18 to be held liable for the sharing or sale of personal information, its wording is still too broad to exclude a default usage of age verification by online businesses in order to protect themselves from liability. Taking measures such as age verification, age assurance, or other data collection and analysis to determine the age of users. Even though measures like this have been proven to be vulnerable to data breaches no matter how secure they proclaim to be. Such as this year's largest discovered breach of AU10TIX, which supplies age verification to companies like TikTok, X, Uber, LinkedIn, Paypal, and many others.

As it stands, this bill is far too broad in its wording and enforcement of its age-specific measures to be considered a safe piece of legislation. Which is why I urge the Senator to vote in opposition to this measure.

Vote NO on AB 1949.

---------------------------

SB 976

Hello, my name is (INSERT NAME HERE) and I'm one of the Assembly member's constituents from (INSERT CITY HERE). I'm calling to urge the Assembly member to vote NO on SB 976, the Protecting Our Kids from Social Media Addiction Act. Although this bill has intent to protect the mental and emotional health of California's youth, the method this bill would intend to use could be counterproductive to that goal, or even endanger them further.

One of this bill's primary measures includes requiring verifiable parental consent to allow websites to display “addictive” feeds to minor users. However, the ways “verify” the identity and age of a responsible parent are often invasive and dangerous. Especially since these methods have proven repeatedly to be vulnerable to data breaches that can leak sensitive information to bad actors. Such as this year's largest discovered breach of AU10TIX, which supplies age verification to companies like TikTok, X, Uber, LinkedIn, Paypal, and many others. To determine if this is necessary at all would also require collecting even more data on minors and non-minors alike to determine who would even require these measures to be set in place. Especially when it would have control over someone's access to a website or application based on the time of day, as this bill would require in order to “reasonably determine” the user is not a minor.

The vagueness of this bill's text at all is dangerous as well. The broad-spectrum definition it gives of “addictive internet-based service or application” could cause an unintended censorship effect where minors and adults alike could be blocked from accessing information purely because some part of a website or application uses a “feed” which could arguably fit the bill's definition of “addictive”

With all of this in mind, I urge the Assembly member to vote in opposition of this measure to protect the privacy and safety of California's minors and adults alike.

Vote NO on SB 976.

[audristarzz]

KOSA SENATE VOTE ON 7/30/24

hello everyone!! I am back with an update for KOSA. @super-firepaw119 made a recent post about this update so most of my information will be based on her recent post and thank you also for speaking on this update :)

On 7/25/24, KOSA was put on the senate’s procedural vote, meaning that they put an end to debating and will be going forward into voting.

As of today 7/27/24 KOSA has NOT passed the Senate. There still is opposition between senators and representatives, which is good. So until Tuesday (7/30/24) which is the Senate vote, im urging and begging you to call/ email and fax your reps and senators. Senate or House yet I recommend moving onto House now, (not trying to be a debbie downer!!)

the House has yet to vote , I don’t believe there is a date set for House vote yet but let’s try to stall and push it back for as long as we can and keep calling / emailing and faxing. With election year and what’s been going on in the presidential race I want to assume it might take a bit for it to get signed to the President and depending on what state your in it will take 18 months to go into effect. Kosa is also very unconstitutional so I recommend you to remind that to your senators and representatives as well as it being a danger to LGBTQ youth and will be a danger hazard when it comes to the government ID upload. And in August the senate will go into break , this is not over and I urge you to once again, call/ email and fax and spread the word around. Do not panic I know it’s scary right now but if we voice our opposition we can stop this bill. Thank you again to @super-firepaw119 again for the information and update. If I got any information wrong or accidentally spread misinformation please politely let me know and I will change this post asap

[hamadisthings]

BAD CALIFORNIAN INTERNET BILLS

While it is good that KOSA is now dead in the House (for now) I would like to ask for people's attention on AB1949 and SB976, which could push for Age verification by showing your ID.

There was a third bill named AB3080 that had similar goals, but luckily it received revisions so it is no longer a threat or require ID verification to access websites. So it would be possible to get AB1949 and SB976 to be revised so they aren't dangerous anymore.

You can read the text for AB1949 right here

AB1949 doesn't explicitly ask for ID verification anymore, as it used to, due to a revision, but there is a provision stating if they deem a website "willfully disregards" the age of the user they will be deemed to have actual knowledge of the user's age.

This broad part could be left to abuse, which is why it needs to be revised before passing, in order to confirm ID verification is not required. FIND YOUR REPS HERE!

For AB1949, you can find your Senate representative with the link above as I said, and check to see if they're a member of the CA Senate Appropriations Committee. Then call them to tell them you oppose this bill. Try to add reasons you think this bill would negatively affect California financially because that's what this committee focuses on.

As for SB976, which you can read here

Its goal is to "keep kids off social medias and addictive feeds" But the concerning part is that "it would make it unlawful for the operator of an addictive internet-based service or application, as defined, to provide an addictive feed to a user, unless the operator does not have actual knowledge that the user is a minor; commencing January 1, 2027, has reasonably determined that the user is not a minor; or has obtained verifiable parental consent to provide an addictive feed to the user who is a minor."

How are you supposed to know that you have "verifiable parental consent" without ID and age verification of both parents and child?Even then, holding the ID of a minor feels pretty illegal given how sensitive how an info this is, in case of a data breach (which will happen) this would endanger kids even more, and no one in general want to give their ID to access a website or an app.

The bill would also make it unlawful for a website or app to send notifications to a minor according to a certain timeframe.

For SB976, find your Assembly representative using the link below and check to see if they're a member of the CA Assembly Appropriations Committee. Then call them to tell them you oppose this bill. https://apro.assembly.ca.gov/members

You can tell them how this is terrible for privacy, and the safety of children, and that it would be terrible for the economy of California, as they seem to focus on it. You can try sending faxes for either bills, but calling IS MUCH MORE efficient. https://faxzero.com/

Here is the time schedule, bills must be taken care before the end of August so it is a matter of time crunch:

You may use the following scripts for the respective bills, you can try to trim it if you deem it too long!

Might be worth a shot to contact Gavin Newsom (Californian governor) here to voice your concerns for these bills

[musicofthenightphantomoftheopera]

KOSA SENATE VOTE UPDATE

The official senate vote is set to take place July 30th and then the senate goes on august break. If we can fight this bill and make sure it doesn't pass again, we'll have around a month before we have to fight it again!

So CALL AND EMAIL YOUR SENATORS!

This link below has a call and email masterpost with contact info for a few senators and 2 scripts (1 for democrat and 1 for republican) that works for calls, emails, and even fax! (yeah you can still fax your congress ppl. do with that info what you will) call and email and fax every day you can!

also, for my peeps that are still Minors, you can do all this too! you don't have to be an adult to contact your reps & senators! They don't even ask for your age! you especially need to be helping since this bill is trying to use you as a scapegoat and directly targets you. Don't let them unleash textbook fascism upon the internet in your name!

Spread the word! at the time I'm making this post (July 28th, 2024) we got a little under a day and a half to make as much noise as we can! SPREAD THIS LIKE WILDFIRE PPL

[gwydionmisha]

Remember how we spent all last year and the early part of this one fighting this sort of thing where they slip anti-trans stuff into must pass funding bills?

Here we are again. Please, call your critters in both house and senate. Democrats actually had our backs through these fights in the last few years, but it's not guaranteed given the scapegoating in the press, so call Democratic critters to help stiffen their spines.

If you can't safely contact them in person, here are some other options:

Call the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to the representative of your choice. Here is one that will send your reps a fax: https://resist.bot/ To get your Critters' numbers to call direct: https://www.congress.gov/members/find-your-member

[an-elegant-void]

KOSA has been introduced in the House.

It will be discussed in a hearing next Wednesday (April 17th) along with other related bills. There's a calling day planned for the day before (April 16th) to show just how much resistance there is to this bill, but you don't have to participate in that to tell your reps it's garbage.

It hasn't been passed in the Senate yet, so contact your Senators too!

Here are two email and call tools (be aware that the Bad Internet Bills tool will take you through a number of relevant representatives, most of which won't be your local reps. Stop KOSA will give you the option to call after you send an email):

Your representatives might also be available to fax via FaxZero, which is completely free - just make sure you click the confirmation links in your email to actually send your faxes. It accepts regular .txt files for the fax, along with common file types like .docx and .pdf. You can copy an email script or the call scripts from this post for the body of your fax:

[pineappleciders]

hey, have you heard of the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA)? it's a law that's been introduced to the US senate a few times now, and it's coming back. here's the most recent version of the bill.

wel, what would KOSA do? it's goal is to "protect children online", as the name would suggest, by having online content algorithms changed in the US. it'd also make it illegal for social medias and "addictive" internet feed to notify you at night or during school hours. the billmakers like to depict it as saving teenagers from body images, substance abuse , addiction and the likes, but it's not.

what KOSA aims to do is to shield children and teenagers from progressiveness. this law will create censorship for every single marginalized community, including POC, LGBTQ+, and women. this law is pure censorship and only aims to create less transgender folks in this "free" america.

i urge you to fight back. censorship laws are already being passed everywhere in america, and there is a very real chance this can be passed as well. if you value freedom on the internet, and especially if you're LGBTQ+, please take a moment to visit these links.

stopKOSA.com lets you sign a petition easily and directly call your lawmaker's office.

omarsbigsister's linktree has a script on what to say, as well as many resources on KOSA. (go check out @omarsbigsister on tiktok, she has good input on KOSA and is cool!!)

faxzero.com lets you fax your representatives FOR FREE 5 times per day.

while you are here, don't forget your daily click!

[dragonoftheunderground]

PSA 12/18/2024 21:55 UTC - KOSA Update

The following is forwarded from a moderator on the Stop Internet Censorship discord server (join):

<quote>

Hi everyone

Recently the CR came out and KOSA isn't in it. Advocates are pushing very hard to include it, and are saying they won't vote unless it's added. Check out the #general-kosa for all the screenshots. Very dangerous territory.

We must send calls into congress immediately. We MUST have our voices heard. There its a very strong chance congress gets an extention and stays longer than this Friday, putting the risk to pass KOSA even higher

You know the drill. Call leadership, especially Senate and House. Call your own reps. Call anyone and everyone.

Btw: "Continuing resolution" aka end of year spending bill

</quote>

Tag everyone you can and make sure to call, email, fax, add resources so people can join in, etc. My tagging is after the break.

@singular-ghost-sound @holisticdetective42 @the-mango-ninja @tumbler-polls @nonbinary-polls