Big Brother is here

Palantir were three crystal balls used in Lord in the Rings to directly communicate between Gondor, Orthnac(where Saruman set up shop), and I don't remember the location of the third one. Anyway Sauron got a hold of the third one. He used it to communicate with Saruman which started him on his path to corruption and the Steward of Gondar was slowly driven insane. Even after Sauron was defeated, the Palantir were all considered lost causes. The one Sauron had was destroyed because it was in Mordor. The one at Orthnac was locked away there never to be touched by anyone. The one at Gondor was permanently stuck with an image of the Steward burning to death.

So when a real life company/product is called 'Palantir', I'm going to find it really, REALLY sus.

Ngl I *really* want whatever it is you folks are smoking lol. Sounds fun.

Also I love how apparently a bunch of you have just fallen for (and upvoted lol) a *VERY clearly* made-up joke meme without even questioning it. (Imgflip is a credible source so no need to check. 🤣🤣)

The photo doesn't even match the story ffs. (It's called a reverse image search, folks. Try it sometime lol. Might take you at least 1 minute though so clear your diary.)

And there's no way the BBC would write in that sensationalist style, even if you excuse the bad spelling and American-sounding language.

Plus, that tweet *doesn't exist*. Have a look for it and I'll buy you a beer if you find it.

And yet... you won't believe climate scientists or scientists who develop vaccines, for love nor money. No matter how much evidence they present you with. 🤔 What gives? Should scientists start making fake memes with typos about climate change and Covid and then you'll all fall for it in 5 seconds? 🤣

In any case, the UK already has CCTV on practically every street corner so you won't get very far if you wanna sneak around committing crimes. The only upgrade with this is we get to watch all the suspects in the bathroom and see if they washed their hands after taking a shit. 👀🤣

Police can't install CCTV inside houses. They can occasionally install covert spy cams inside houses in very specific cases to track eg drugs or other serious criminal gangs/cases, and you absolutely need a *warrant* and some kind of strict legal authorization for that. They can't just go around putting big box cameras up in people's living rooms. 🤣

They can also strip-search people inside eg a police station, if they have *authorization*. But not in the street whenever they feel like it, no matter how sexy you think you are, and they don't need last year's riot gear from Northern Ireland to do it! 🤣🤣🤣

Just in general to no one in particular, I guess. 🙃 Not necessarily you personally. Well, to people who've upvoted this fake meme lol. And people in general who believe the claims made in it, which are demonstrably false.

(Or if someone would like to prove me wrong, I'm all ears. But I'm pretty confident this tweet doesn't exist. Go through the @BBCNews Twitter account and see for yourselves if you can find it. See if you (plural) can find an article on the BBC website (or the same news story reported anywhere else, for that matter).

Normally, they link to the actual article in the tweet btw. Where is that?

It has no date, for starters. Already sus. All tweets have dates. Conveniently missing here... There are literally websites where you can generate fake tweets lol.

Anyway, as a side note, I'm gonna revise one line I said above. I wrote: "you won't get very far if you wanna sneak around committing crimes". I'm actually gonna disagree with myself lol because I realized this doesn't make sense.

Yes, the UK has more CCTV than loads of countries. Surveillance nation lol. (Not actually 100% sure this is true btw, but I've heard the UK has more CCTV cameras per person than any other country after China. So invest in CCTV company stocks if you wanna get rich lol.)

But obviously crimes still happen all the time and you can't catch everyone, especially from some super grainy video footage. So yes, CCTV doesn't prevent all crimes.

Funny paradox is that in the UK they don't even have ID cards like in the EU. Loads of British people don't even have a passport and it's not a legal requirement to carry ID with you anywhere. (If the police do stop you for whatever reason, you get a few days or something to provide actual ID and/or address details or whatever, but you don't need to walk around with it.)

Brits would probably never agree to mandatory ID cards over their dead body so good luck trying to introduce those. That smacks of a police state. So instant election s*icide for any party that tries to introduce that kind of thing.

But surveillance cameras on every street corner? That's fine lol. In any case, it's moot now because all our phones already track stuff about us everywhere we go and listen in to our conversations. (They're always listening even when you think they aren't. Just say "Okay, Google" or whatever.") They track everywhere you go. Mark Zuckerberg probably knows more about you than you know about yourself lol.

Got an actual real source for that little PhotoShopped meme there, bud?

CCTV *in*side people's houses? 🤣🤣🤣 Strip search citizens? What, in the street? "Alright, let's see wotcha got in yer undies then." 🤣

Lols will continue until you provide evidence. At which point I shall humbly retract my skepticism.

Also, what's with the riot gear? That's a lot of equipment just to install a camera or take off someone's shirt. 🤣

There's zero mention of this on the BBC (or anywhere). I wonder why... 👀🤣

PS It's Online Safety Act (in caps), and the BBC would've put a comma after it.

Need to get better fake news, my friend. Thanks for the lols, though. 🤣🤡 🌍

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/police-psni-northern-ireland-police-officers-united-kingdom-b2593777.html

This image is from 2024 and relates to riots in Belfast, ya daftie.

Oh, and terms like "law enforcement" are a dead giveaway this was made up by a US troll lol (who apparently thinks UK police dress up like that all the time 🤣).

TL;DR: This "meme" is entirely fabricated/doctored (complete with shitty spelling and weird-sounding language lol) and NONE of this is true.

Or CMV lol and beers are on me.

You're talking about a US context though. (I can't comment on the Maxine Waters thing.)

UK doesn't have some centralized database of all citizens' details that I'm aware of... 👀 I mean, everyone has a birth certificate, I guess. (At least, they're supposed to.)

Otherwise, they technically don't exist lol. Over 80% of people have a passport. (Some people don't like to travel much lol.)

No one has an ID card because they simply don't exist and Brits don't believe in that kind of thing and have repeatedly rejected any attempts to introduce them, so good luck trying to introduce them (equals political S-word, along with defunding the NHS, which is sacred lol).

You can leave the house with nothing on you and it's none of anyone's business where you go. Unlike in some countries where you have to carry ID all the time in case the police stop you and ask for it. Brits historically have thoroughly rejected that kind of thing, and still do. (CCTV on every street is fine though lol.)

There are tax records. Health records. Electoral roll records. Immigration records. Driver's license records. Criminal records. And other things.

But no national centralized database of all UK citizens that I'm aware of. (Unless it's secret. 👀)

Also, at risk of repeating myself (but for the benefit of some US people online here), "libs" aren't a thing in the UK and that term is essentially meaningless to most British people and they probably wouldn't even understand what you meant by it unless you explained it. Or even most of the world outside the US. It's really a US thing.

The only "libs" you get in the UK are the Lib Dems (aka Liberal Democrats), who are a sort of centrist party that win national elections once in a blue supermoon; although they do tend to do pretty well in local council elections. And, historically, if you go back far enough, they (or their predecessors) actually did tend to win majorities in Parliament, actually.

Anyway, the meme posted above is 100% fake news made up by someone for a laugh/to push some agenda, and it actually blows my mind so many people seem to have just taken it at face value. If it's really this easy to deceive people online, maybe I should get in on it lol. But God forbid you listen to scientists. 🤭