Snapshot of your freedoms


I guess you’d better throw away those photos of the White House and the Washington Monument and maybe Mount Rushmore just to be safe.

Here’s an experience of a Knoxville photographer taking photos at the John J. Duncan building downtown::

When I got to to the building, I stood across the street with my wide angle (to fit the huge structure in the frame) and put the camera to my face. And after a few clicks of the shutter, I hear this man yelling at me, “Ma’am! Ma’am! You can’t photos here!!!” It was the security guard, and he was running down the stairs towards me. I immediately put my camera down by my side and ran across the street to the guard. I asked him what the problem was, and he suddenly went into a tirade about post 9/11 laws prohibiting the photography and videography of any federal properties. He went off about terrorism and national security and then threatened me with two years in the penitentiary for possessing images of federal property. I had to delete my photographs or else I would get two years in jail.

Read the whole blog post here.

I don’t think they managed to come up with that even in the Patriot Act.

It’s outrageous.