yup, that’s indeed what I do generally, in the end. I always start with an MX lookup and DNS TXT lookup just to see if the email infra looks safe enough, and compatible with my msg. I often find the answer is trivially /no/, because usually the MX server is simply *outlook*. But these email firewalls create a bit of opacity so I wanted some clarity on that.

Worth noting that MS has been caught snooping on msgs that traverse their network when the msg is about Microsoft (even when MS Corp is not themselves the sender or recipient).

Thanks for the insight.

The context is this: I want to send an email to a senator who has no PGP key, and I do not want Microsoft to see it. The msg would go to the email firewall for sure, but from there AFAIK I have no way of knowing what the email firewall does with it. So as you say, the DNS record only indicates that the recipient’s response /can/ go from MS’s server, not that it necessarily will. And indeed there are other “include:” elements on that spf line. But in the end, I suppose I must conclude that the email firewall very likely hands the msg to MS, because if they had taken care to ensure they can send msgs via MS, they likely receive traffic that way too. And so I should not use email to reach the senator.

Is it that internal belief system I keep talking about?

You’re talking about it, yet the doublespeak remains irrelevant.

I have no idea what the UDHR is.

Not surprised. Universal declaration of human rights.

Do you feel opreased by a book?

Of course I would feel oppressed when blocked from access to a book, amid your attempt to arguing the contrary by reducing it to an object /being/ a thought. Being blocked from access to books is similar to being blocked from information generally (i.e. the Internet, which is where books now exist).

Neither is your browser.

Okay, but you’re still missing the relationship between objects and the practice of one’s cognitive liberty facilitated those objects. It’s the oppression of cognitive liberty that is the problem. The objects involved are just working for your doublespeak to conflate and trivialize the oppression of a demographic of people.

If its a choice it should be easy.

If a choice is inherently easy, in your view, then you are misusing the term. Of course the reality is some choices are easier and some are not.

Thats great, but not what I was talking about. I’m talking about internal belief systems.

The UDHR is not.

Your browser is not an internal belief system.

This is like saying a book is not an “internal belief system”. Yet the bible and koran are books.

Your high-heels is not “an internal belief system”. Nor is a hajab. Does this mean you can’t cite oppression when forced to dress a certain way?

And again, browsers are irrelevant without the transparency of knowing the oppressor’s blocking criteria. They are more likely suppressing people on the basis of their IP address, not browser. But we can only guess because they do not express which demographics they are oppressing.

You don’t choose faith, its found to be you. You find your faith and community.

Nonsense. Religion is a choice in my part of the world. There may be regions where it is imposed, but that’s irrelevent to the demonstration of your foolish stance that it’s okay to oppress demographics of those who made a choice.

We are also free to change our religion, or even join another religion in parallel, where I am.

Is a browser so important to you that you can’t live without it?

This is becoming increasingly so, as governments impose using a browser to obtain public service. (and yes, I am in a country that is a signatory of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which means public service is a right).

Nonetheless, a “living without it” test does not exist in this context. The UDHR does not have such criteria for our right to autonomy. Rightfully so. Women in France got their right to abortion under the right to autonomy. Imagine if they had to prove being unable to live without that right in order to have it. That criteria can fuck right off because we have higher standards than mere survival.

Is a browser part of your internal definition of you?

This is double speak. My choice of browser is a reflection of my ethical values. Some browsers are more closely aligned with my philosophical view than others.

None of those are choices for faith, or other protected classes.

Nonsense. The UDHR does not separate religion from freedom of thought. It’s written in the same article. Would do you some good to read it.

I can’t choose a woman, you can choose a browser. Its really that simple.

No, it’s not. This is as good as telling someone oppressed for their religion: “you chose your religion – you don’t have to be muslim if you don’t like being oppressed – become christian”. Of course, this requires you to neglect freedom of autonomy, freedom of thought and conscious, freedom to practice one’s values and live by a philosophy. Choice is irrelevent when the choice is a rightfully protected choice.

And you can control one situation, where I can’t control the fact I’m a woman.

Nonsense. I cannot control others acceptance of my demographic any more than you can. You telling me to change demographics is as good as me telling you to do gender therapy or change your gender representation (dress differently). You’re an asshole for telling people to change their demographic if they don’t like being marginalized. Hard to believe you’re actually trans while supporting the oppression of forced lifestyles and conformity.

THATS the difference. Did you choose this. You chose tor, I did not choose to be a woman.

Nonsense. You did not choose to be a woman, but you chose your gender representation. You should be able to choose your gender representation. There is a human right to autonomy, privacy, and religion. We have a right to choose our demographics in cases involving choice.

As a trams woman, let me know when you get accosted in a bathroom for using tor.

As a tor user who does not travel by tram, let me know when an information service blocks you from web access for your gender identity.

For users are not a demographic, and you are not oppressed for it.

Oh, so if you are told: “the other bathroom is available to you”, are you not oppressed because you have an option in the end? The whole “my oppressed group is more oppressed than your demographic, therefore your demographic doesn’t matter” – this attitude can fuck right off. You’re an asshole for sure.

With the lack of transparency, we can’t even conclude for certain that it’s the Tor community who is being marginalized. It could be a blind DoS based on user-agent string (which is becoming popular). As far as Tor blockades go, I have never heard of tor versions being a blocking factor. Usually tor-hostility manifests as an IP-based decision logic.

I’m not the one being an asshole here buddy

Of course you are. You’re the one supporting oppression. Collective punishment and collateral damage is a dick move. Stop being a dick. You cannot support collective punishment and marginalization of a demographic of people without being an asshole. It’s impossible.

That could be a plausible reason for opacity if it were true, but I don’t think it’s true because blocking Tor (for example) is trivially discovered and the non-transparency only frustrates legit users. The opacity of an anti-tor policy has no effect on adversaries. Yet a vast majority of tor-hostile sites are sloppy about informing legit users.

Infosec that relies on secrecy is already out on a limb in despiration. And in this situation, the collateral damage to friendlies based on arbitrary factors creates a heightened need to inform the legit users. An AI scraper bot is not going to be coded to know where to look for such announcements because that’s actually more effort for the attacker than manual trial and error. Note as well we are talking about relatively unsophisticated adversaries considering they were too lazy to code the user-agent header to dynamically blend better in the first place. (They will fix that in the future).

Nonetheless, your point cannot be disregarded because those who take the crude approach of blocking on the basis of UA string are likely not thinking all this through. Perhaps some have consciously made the decision to not inform the legit users, but considering the widespread pattern of not informing users, it’s sloppy disregard for the most part.

Its your free speech to say that, and its mine to point out you have no foundation to actually complain.

Of course. You can make whatever baseless points you want to attempt. But you only make an ass of yourself if you cannot support your claims with facts. So far you’ve failed to show competency in the case at hand.

No, I’m not “mad”. I’m not a user of that system. I have invested no time in it – no content. I was simply visiting one of their communities to verify whether it existed before posting from another node. They put on an embarrassing display and I spotlighted it. I am in a country that gives me a right to criticize and I am happy to exercise that right.

You have every right to give your candy to whom you please, for whatever reason, with the exception of protected classes.

Of course. But rights are not at issue. They are irrelevent, and have been since you brought them up.

Tor is not a protected class, like race, gender, sexuality…

And we are not talking about law or rights, so again, another red herring.

Seriously, your comparing a war crime to someone telling you to fuck off with your connection.

I thought you were deliberately exaggerating when you brought uip war crime the first time. You need help if you think collective punishment inherently involves war crimes.

A business/person can choose not to engage with you for any reason other than legally protected classes.

Of course. I already agreed on this. Means nothing though in terms of the thesis of the thread.

If you don’t have a right to content, how is it collective punishment,

How is this a sensible question? A does not imply B. Punishment is independent of rights. If a kid dressed up as spiderman smashes my pumpkins, and I then refuse to give candy to all kids dressed as spiderman thereafter, it’s collective punishment regardless of whether the kids had a “right” to the candy in the first place.

Thats my entire argument.

And it wholly fails.

How is you not being able to access information in your preffered format, that you probably still have means to access, an ethnic group…

Read your own source: “which could be an ethnic or political group,” It’s an example to help you understand, not a definition.

This is a fallacy of division. It encompasses a proof of work tool. Yet it fails to use it properly to get better accuracy. It doesn’t matter how many tools are in that toolkit. They are not being used sensibly.

Marketing works wonders on people. My devices are doing a lot of work when Anubis presents, to produce what you claim is not a proof-of-work, that is for some reason a barrier to entry. “Firewall” vaguely refers to perimeter security – not even web-specific. If you think my browser is just waiting around for for an open slot, this does not explain the time lapse consistency. Please explain why “Calculating…Difficulty: 6,…Speed: …kH/s” is presented, if this is not a proof-of-work. Looks like kilohashes to me.

Why do you feel like you have a right to content?

This is a strawman. You did not hear that claim from me.

Its not collective punishment. All you have to do is do a normal http request directly.

Moving someone outside of the collectively punished group does not make the collective punishment non-existent.

I bet if you turn off tor, itll work.

You can only guess and test because it’s a non-transparent design.

The website as self defense has blocked for traffic. A business can decide their customers too.

Of course. Rightfully so. No one contests their power over their own assets.

Ffs, it could just be the website down.

Sure. Of course a transparent design would be useful.

It’s not sympathy that I ask for. It is actually that people recognize that this form of enshitification is that of incompetence. Incompetence is the thesis (thus warranted). When a CAPTCHA or proof of work tool resorts to sloppy reputation-based logic, it defeats its own purpose of obtaining a more accurate result.

As far as “coming across like an ass”, that’s exactly what I see when someone says “conform like everyone else”. “Use the clearnet, and use a mainstream browser”. That is very much being a dick. Or if you are referring to my response to the accusation that I was “shocked”, that is on its own a false statement designed to imply ignorance.

So you do something that makes you look like an attacker

Choosing to run Ungoogled Chromium is an act of self-defense. It’s also a personal choice for several reasons that are apparently beyond your comprehension. I will not apologize for that. Fuck anyone who advocates for conformity and playing the boot-licking pushover.

and then get mad when your seen as an attacker.

Collective punishment at the expense of human rights is not justified. But to understand that, you first must appreciate the human right to autonomy and privacy.

Your own post calla the developer incompetent. How can you judge that?

If you cannot understand the purpose of proof of work, I am not going to write an essay here so you can understand what that means, or how it differs the crude technique of discriminating on appearance and reputation factors.

Because you did everything an attacker would, and then blamed everyone else.

“because you wore a red shirt as you entered the shop just like yesterday’s shoplifter, you should expect to get kicked out – and stop blaming others. Wear a different colored shirt!”