Photographing farms soon to be illegal in Florida?

[vsa]

Cracking Down on Croparazzi: Florida Bill Would Criminalize Farm Photography - NYTimes.com
Your thoughts on this?


Rather silly if you ask me. And a lol at the "croparazzi". :D

[dlambert]

That's about seven shades of nuts. I'd love to know the back story on this one (why in the world would anyone think we need that legislation in the first place?).

[BuddhaPi]

Apparently the state is concerned that the PITA folks wil go around and snap images of livestock being treated unfailry...Thye'd be better served to look a the division of family services and perhaps prevent some of the child abuse / deaths that are rampant in this state..Just this last week we had 3 kids die at the hand of their guardians, after they were reported to DCF which apparently did nothing to prevent these tragedies...ok i'm done and pissed!

[dlambert]

Well.... are there livestock being treated poorly? (seems like that might be a more appropriate place to start).

In any event, I think there are already laws against tresspassing, so if people are sneaking around farms taking pictures, there's already other recourse. Otherwise, I think people might want to give some thought to what's going on with their food that would make the farmers so paranoid about people taking pictures. I *eat* that stuff!

Oh, and I hear what you're saying about the kids. What they really need to do is to go out and buy themselves some lobbyists....

[Ambrosia76]

I completely agree my stepdaughter went to school for weeks with 2 black eyes and a broken nose thanks to her mother and no one did anything. But I bet if she had been beating her dog they would have had her locked up. I don't think one abuse is worse than the other but both should be handled.

We had a case here where a guy molested 3 kids,he got 18 months in jail and will probably only serve half of that,at the same time another guy got convicted of 3 counts of animal abuse and neglect and he got 10 yrs.

[Jim Bryant]

Lawmakers should worry about more important subjects, illegal aliens, high gas prices, outsourcing jobs overseas. Or, that rather, enforce the ones they already have.

[dvtldav]

In my opinion, I am not sure most lawmakers have enough common sense to know what they should be doing.

Dave

[SusanH1970]

Originally Posted by Jim Bryant

Lawmakers should worry about more important subjects, illegal aliens, high gas prices, outsourcing jobs overseas. Or, that rather, enforce the ones they already have.

Originally Posted by dvtldav

In my opinion, I am not sure most lawmakers have enough common sense to know what they should be doing.

Dave

Amen and amen.

[vsa]

I believe couple months back there was plan in Malawi to ban farting in public places.
Doesn't have anything to do with photography but goes to show that peeps in charge aren't always all that rational.

[theosus]

Reading the article it sounds like they are at least changing the law so it's legal to photograph a farm from the road (air, space, etc), just not on farm property.

Sounds like they are just trying to end investigative journalism and the PETA morons spying on farmers. Florida has disparagement legislation as well - if you say something that negatively impacts Florida agriculture you can be fined or jailed (the same type of thing the cattle people did unsuccessfully to Oprah after she said she wouldn't eat beef).

While I can see one side - giving farmers the right to say "no you can't take pictures here", at the same time, how long before cameras get treated like concealed weapons - no longer allowed on any property...