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Tinfoil Hat House
An anonymous reader writes "A family in Sacromento has covered the side of their house with aluminum to keep the radiowaves from their neighbors at bay. The city has given them one week to remove the life saving shielding or face charges."
Is that near Sacramento? Or is it in Colifornia?
That's just what they want you to think.
How can they be brought up on Misdemeanor charges for this?
It's stupid. It's ugly. But why in the fuck is it illegal?
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Bet that works great to keep the heat out of the house too...
Maybe they could use that as a reason to keep it?
I'll Find You Peer, If It's The Last Thing I Do!!!!
"The inside of the house is also covered with foil and the beds are covered with a foil-like material as well,"
So, these are the guys that buy those "space blankets"...
and now back to the fallout shelter...
Why don't they just cover their bodies instead?
Why not just ask the neighbors to turn their radio down?
The best part of this article is that was posted by an anonymous reader. That's irony. (and, if it's not, I'm sure the grammar police will enforce).
... they might have a point.
In a band? Use WheresTheGig for free.
easy fix, just line the inside of the house with foil.
love the antibot text field btw. same i cant read the fucker.
It's Sacramento, not Socromento, samzenpus, you oaf. Yes, it's a spelling flame, but it's the third one in three days. I guess the "editors" don't do much "editing".
Advice: on VPS providers
www.kxtv.com/storyfull1.asp?id=11032
Looking for something to do? http://www.grinion.com
Though it seems to be a classic: http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2004-12/903959/tinf oil.jpg
(from San Diego)
just because your house is covered in tin foil doesn't mean they're not out to get you.
"Is this just useless, or is it expensive as well?"
All they have to do is install it under the siding of the house, and it is legit, code-worthy, and kinda cool.
IANAL but I bet this treatment violates neighbourhood 'quality' standards.
One thing to remember, pot-houses do this to minimise the heat signature.
"The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men." ~Plato (427-347 BC)
If I'd have known I was causing them problems, I would've stopped trying to microwave their paint off their house as a practical joke.
Stop learning! Only you can prevent esoterrorism.
I'm sure there will be plenty of Tinfoil Hat Jokes and other posts, but after reading the article I'd say they need lithium, not aluminum. That is to say, the "radio waves" deal is typical in schizophrenic patients. Other common variations are people using radio waves to listen to what their thinking, people using high-tech devices to spy on their homes. The end result is a bunch of variations on the sheet metal siding. Those people that aren't familiar with metal and radiation commonly use cardboard boxes to cover all openings and windows.
A misdemeanor charge isn't what's needed, a visit from a social worker probably is. There's a difference between being unique and unusual, and having mental issues.
only here could a story about tinfoil freaks turn into a serious discussion about how effective it is and how they can legally keep it up.
Why not just re-do the house in aluminum siding? Then they can keep their crazy ideas and have a decent looking house.
Put in some Low-E glass windows with a metal reflective layer and a metal roof and they should be good to go - until someone tunnels under their house, of course.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
But they don't have the right to put up whatever they want. Especially if they have neighbors. You see, if the town becomes ugly, then the value of their property diminishes. It's kinda like me going over to some kids house and spilling kool-aid on his super rare comic book.
If, however, there is no radiation hazard, then nobody is affected and it's no more of an eyesore than all of the other satellite dishes out there.
Now, there are known places where radio leakage from assorted sources has caused problems. There was a metal stadium in the Middle East - forget exactly where - where, whilst it was under construction, power tools would turn themselves on and huge arcs could be seen. Turned out that the stadium acted as a gigantic radio dish and was not only receiving signals from powerful radio sources, but was focussing them too.
There have also been known cancer spikes in areas with (a) high humidity and (b) badly-maintained, sparking power lines. It is not yet proven that there is a causal relationship, but nobody has convincingly ruled it out, either.
This particular case, though, smacks heavily of a family being traumatized by George Bush's "War on Terror" (Sept. 11th, in and of itself, was really a fairly negligable event - ten times that number die each year in car accidents in the US, and more than a thousand times that number are currently in prison in the US for violent crimes).
Personally, I think the city should come to an agreement with the family. The family takes down the aluminum, agrees that the problem probably isn't real, but agrees to work with the city to sue the Federal Government for psychological damage to cover the expenses incurred and the treatment needed to deal with the PTSD the family has suffered with, because of GWB's attitudes.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Well, you gotta admit, "Tinfoil Hat House" has a little more zing than your title. Yours is a little too factual, too journalistic. And all the words are spelled correctly.
Should we be poking fun at the serious issues being raised by these simple folk. They sincerely believe what they are saying about the intentional bombardment of their home with radiation. Instead of ridicule, some kind hearted geeks should be going out there with various forms of detector equipment and identifying the source. Where's Egon Spengler when you need him?
Who knows the Door Keeper and Key Master might be heading that way already to do the dirty deed and finally let the traveler loose into the world of men!
"GET / HTTP/1.0" 200 51230 "-" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; Setec Astronomy)"
Then again, I don't understand the reasoning of the average crank.
I've hit Karma 50 and gotten a Score:5, Troll... I win!
I've never seen my house from that angle before...
there's nothing liberal about trying to keep some looney bin neighbor from bringing down the local real estate values.
or, if there is, then i'm all for it anyway.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
Too bad the NSA's engineering manuals are classified. They specialize in that type of construction. Nothing gets out. Nothing gets in. It still looks like a normal building, although the windows look somewhat unusual.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The seem really certain that the neighbours are out to get them, though if they've proved it I've no idea why they don't get the police involved.
But seriously, with that jumble of jagged strips forming a bunch of slot radiators, it's possible that certain resonate frequencies in their house have actually been significantly amplified above background levels.
D'Souza family. Obviously culturally acclimated as their house is not garishly painted behind the metal sheets (I saw some detailed photos on a live TeeVee newscast) is nutzo. The whol efriggin family.
OR
OR
OR
There is a single, LONE NUT, in their neighborhood who coupled the magnetron from his microwave oven to an antenna and is actually tossing photons at the D'Souzas.
Seriously guys, which is more believable? It's California after all. Personally, you couldn't pay me enough to live in any city in that state.
As someone who has a family member with Lupus, I call absolute bullshit on this.
Lupus causes haven't really been figured out. Furthermore, there's absolutely ZERO medical evidence that EMF/EMI causes or even aggravates Lupus. Trust me, I looked and looked after her doctor told her to "avoid cell phones and wireless devices whenever possible". I even emailed two mailing lists- one for researchers, one for patients- and came up with nothing. Nobody had ever heard of this. Furthermore, if their theory wer correct, we'd be seeing an explosion of Lupus cases (we haven't).
The D'Souzas said they will comply with the order and remove the sheet metal, but they also plan to gather evidence to show city officials what they believe is a problem with radiation.
That will be pretty tough, given there's next to no evidence EMF/EMI causes anything in people, and a lot of studies showing it has no discernible effects.
The inside of the house is also covered with foil and the beds are covered with a foil-like material as well,"
Sounds to me like they'd be a lot better served spending their money on a psychologist, not tin foil. Self-diagnosis ("radio waves are making us depressed, and giving us Lupus!") is a textbook sign of a hypochondriac.
Please help metamoderate.
In that context, a strong reaction to a house covered with metal foil is most predictable. The only suprise is that the neighbors took the time to call the code enforcement people, instead of rounding up a lynch mob!
If your situation is any better, don't feel too smug. Housing costs are going up everywhere, and the same obsesssion with property values is spreading like a disease.
If you own a house an somebody does this in your neighborhood, I'd think you'd have an opinion about it. Life in the suburbs kinda sucks, but at the same time it makes sense. Your house is your property and it's affected by surrounding properties. "Hi, prospective home buyer, let me show you the garden..Oh don't mind the neighbor with the billboard in his front yard advertising his church. Oh and across the street is my neighbor Phil. he decided to pave his entire front yard so he could park his two RVs and his boat all year. Gotta love this place!"
that kinda crap doesn't wash. Life is supposed to look normal, well trimmed, green and conforming. If for some reason what they believed was true, if they can't stand their rights being trampled on, they can put sheet metal on the inside of the house, between the brick and insulation.
Most of the time this kind of transgression starts with several written and in person warnings, notices and then you're slapped with the misdemeanor or fine.
...::----::...
I am in no way affiliated with this sig.
+2 Informative? Spilling cool-aide on some kids rare comic book has nothing to do with this situation. This would be more like taking your crappy comics and putting them next to his nice ones. Sure, it may not look nice, but the ACTUAL value and quality of his comics are not affected in any way. As soon as you take your nasty comics away his look nicer again. In order for your analogy to be correct, these foil people would have had to put the sheet metal on their neighbors house instead of their own. Frankly, I find the whole "they're making my house worth less" argument to be ineffective unless you are actively trying to sell your house. Thanks for playing.
-cp-
Alaska -- America's most tax-friendly state
There's an interesting, if not well defined, link between trauma and psychosis. Delusions and paranoia seem to have a strong link to widely shared public "concerns". I recently talked with a psychiatrist about paraniod schizophrenics and mentioned that there seemed to be a recurring theme of religious delusion and persecution. He, in return, said that in the 50's, paranoid schizophrenics, frequently complained of persecution by communists. The bogey man of the day seems to morph readily into paranoid delusions.
On a less humane note, it's scary these people are procreating, but just to help things along this site should validate their paranoia.
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
but yes, yes I did read that URL as something do to wiht crak and chanels
Isn't it interesting how you come to recognize posters based solely on their sigs???
Looks like /.ers are making the news!
"A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes." -Mahatma Gandhi
A neighbour of my parents did this as he slowly slipped further into insanity. When I lived at home, he was a normal guy with a job. I never met him, but he never did anything that would indicate there was anything wrong. However a couple years later it started. He became a reculse, lost his job, began screaming at imaginary things at all hours of the night. He worse an AFDB, coated all his windows in aluminium foil and so on.
The neighbours wanted to have him comitted for his own good, but you can't do that just because someone is acting crazy, so it kept worsening. Finally he did something threatening and they were able to get him to a mental instution. There he was treated and drugs were able to return his grasp on reality... Unfortunately like many, he elected to stop taking them. This time, his slip to madness was forever, as he decided to kill himself.
Now while I suppose it is theoriticly possible these peopel are being bombarded by radiation, I somewhat doubt it. Microwave radiation isn't known to cause ill health effects at low levels, and if it was at any kind of serious levels you'd know, it would interfere with all kinds of things. Now higher energy radiation such as gamma could, but aluminium won't do shit for that, I'll take a reasonable plate of lead at least.
Also all kinds of radiation are rather easy to detect. If you are concerned you can get or rent the necessary equipment and check. Someone who was in thier right mind and genuinely worried would likely do just such a thing. I mean what if it's something like radon? That's really dangerous as it can release alpha radiation inside you, which is a serious health problem.
I agree with the parent, this is likely a case of eairly schizophrenia and needs to be dealt with. With proper treatment, most schizophrenics can lead a normal life. Without it, they usually totally lose their grip on reality and often hurt themselves.
------
In case you're wondering, this Web page is about my next-door neighbors. Since my neighbors have been driving me crazy and no amount of civilized reasoning and/or negotiations have worked - I have decided to dedicate a small corner of cyber-space to them.
My family and friends are constantly asking me to tell them the "latest" thing my neighbor has done so this page will save me from repeating myself. Besides, I thought it would be fun. Everything you read here is entirely true, that's what makes it so funny. Enjoy!
Background:
My neighbors moved into the house next to ours in October 1997. It's a brand new neighborhood with new houses. Everyone's house looks beautiful but that's about to change. The new neighbors seem like normal people until shortly after they move in (more later).
First, let me say that my redneck neighbor is not destitute or under-privileged. The guy owns a business, drives VERY nice new cars, he just doesn't care about his house. In order to protect the ignorant, we'll call him John Doe # 8 or JD8 for short.
October 1997 - They are here!
Well, it should have been a sign of things to come but my neighbors move into their brand new house. Inventory: 1 artificial Christmas tree, clothes, stereo system, TV, no furniture). The Christmas tree is nicely decorated (remember, it's October). We can tell what the tree looks like because the windows have no miniblinds so at night, you can see right into the house as you drive up. They have also decided to wrap some strands of Christmas lights around their front porch railing. I guess there's no electric outlet nearby because they never turn these lights on.
October 1997 - 1st Home beautification project
It's dark outside, I'm standing in front of my house and my neighbor does the following: He gets in his car, drives it up to the house on the other side of my house (this house is still being built). He backs his car up to the construction site and opens the trunk. He calmly proceeds to load up the trunk with bricks and 2x4s. Pretty clever, huh?
The following night, at around 9:00pm he decides it's time to build a mailbox post. It's very nice. He used the stolen 2x4s from the previous night. It looks like it's made out of 2x4s except he didn't steal any that were long enough so he nails a couple of them together to get the correct height - I mean, it has to look just right! The mailbox post is not very sturdy so he braces it with an additional 2x4 (at an angle). Click here to see the mailbox (no bracing 2x4 though).
He uses the bricks as edging for his flower beds. They look nice. Especially with the newly planted bamboo trees and the ten gallon fish tank (no fish, just water).
November 1997 - The fence!
I wake up to my wife telling me, "Hey, it looks like JD8 is working on a fence". Well I don't think much of it until she tells me that he's trying to build a fence around the entire house (front and back) and that the fence is going to be chain-link. We have some "covenant rules" that prohibit you from putting up a silver chain-link fence. Also, you cannot have any fence go past the back of your house. By now, I am freaking out. I can see the property value falling faster than his mailbox post.
Anyway, I get to work and at 9:01AM I call our builder. I explain the situation to him and he agrees to pay JD8 a visit before the concrete around the metal posts dries. Sure enough, I get home after work and the posts around the front of the house are laying on the street. Not exactly what I expected but at least they're out of the ground. Tra
rights? hahaha haha ha ha a a . . ...
the only way property values should have bering and a persons rights is when DIRECT damage is being done. for instances:
1)you are burning your house and you catch your neighbors house of fire! or less extreme, the odor/smoke is drifting onto their property.
2)you have weeds, your weeds are spreading to your neighbors property.
3)anything else not along these lines, go F'ING LUCK!!!!
In other news, people from California are crazy.
[sig]www.masterslate.org[/sig]
There are many reasons that they can be forced to take it down. As it is shiny and metal, it could reflect into the eyes of pilots &c (long shot, but it is used). The residents of my city are forced to only use certain colour roofs, as we live in a primarily bushy area and it helps blend into the environment or something. The shields could also count as a 'structure' and have their removal ordered by the local government. Not to mention the fact that there is a "right to not be offended by an eyesore", if it causes a change in lifestyle or even minor discomfort, then it is required to be taken down.
In conclusion, I win.
Anonymous Coward
This is SLASHDOT, for God's sake, and no one has pointed out the obvious:
They just need to call up Scotty and get him to give them some transparent alumminum. That should stop the neighbors from complaining.
Sheesh. News for nerds? How can you call yourself nerds if you miss such an obvious, pathetic pun?
Tinfoil on the inside of your house. After all, you don't want them to know you're on to them.
You know who I mean
R(k)
Or link to a non-slashdotted copy.
http://totfc.net/misc/rednecks/
Not sure why I care (perhaps because I've seen the damage a redneck can do), but here's an archive with the pictures... It's pretty funny.
http://web.archive.org/web/20021015131654/http://Of course, I just waited for station identification and found out which AM station I was getting. It turned out that the 50KW AM station nearby away had one of their three towers collapse in the 1989 California earthquake. Until they replaced it, their output pattern was distorted. I was in a really strong lobe.
Adding a small bypass cap across the phone line helped the problem. But it took more filtering to completely cure it. I had to have the telco guys add some filtering on their side of the demark. And, years later, when I got DSL, that had to come out. Huge hassle. Three telco visits with test gear to get DSL working properly.
Family Takes Down Metal That Covered Home. html
POSTED: 11:12 am PDT May 23, 2005
UPDATED: 1:26 pm PDT May 23, 2005
http://www.thekcrachannel.com/news/4520485/detail
.
NATOMAS, Calif. -- A house that neighbors called an eyesore is starting to blend in after a Sacramento family spent the weekend removing the metal covering their house.
The D'Souza family started taking it down this weekend. They claim neighbors are bombarding their home with harmful microwave radiation and it's making them sick.
The D'Souza's lined the inside and outside of their home with metal and aluminum to block the rays, but the Sacramento city building inspector ordered them to take it down by Monday.
The city says that all the metal is dangerous and that there is no evidence of radiation.
I thought it would be cool to see if you could see the aluminum panels from space using Google Maps. However, the entire area around the D'Souza's neighbors' house is greyed out in both the satellite maps and the roadmaps. Weird.
I'm sorry. They might be as crazy as SCO but private property is private property.
If the neighbors or the city really has something to gain with their house looking good they should either offer to pay for more attractive tin foil or offer to buy their house from them. Forcing a private property owner to decorate their home a certain way at gunpoint is not part of a free society.
Shhh... now the police are going to start monitoring the temperature of the water in sewers. Don't give away the best tricks.
Come one, come all, see this site and admire the stylish and attractive choices.
Seriously, this guy worked for a real good friend of mine for a while, and he is real serious about this stuff.
Yow...
Got Wisdom?
Frankly, I feel bad for both parties; one is clearly insane, the other is driven to despair by his neighbor's insanity.
"OH SHIT, THERE'S A HORSE IN THE HOSPITAL!"
All of that metal might attract a tornado that thought it was a trailer park.
On the other hand, try being the one _propagating_ the radio waves. Flight path restrictions exempted, amateur radio operators have a federal license to a 100 foot tower and 1000 watts output. Happy homeowners' meeting announcing that.
Google offers some pictures, small but neat. Excellent story :-)
Reading this signature is senseless so don't do it.
Yes, it's a community code. It means the community got together and a majority decided that they wanted to live in an area with certain rules. Nobody is forced to live in the community and that same community can act to modify those codes whenever they please.
This has nothing to do with race, national pride, or an unchecked autocracy. Therefore, the fascism label simply doesn't apply. I suggest you learn the meaning of a word before you start throwing it around.
Cali meaning Heat
Forni as in Fornication
nia as in Narnia (A magical land)
The Magical land of Hot Sex?
And you wonder why this stuff goes on there.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
America has many problems, most of which have been frequently pointed out on slashdot, where tinfoil hats are de'rigueur. I think this story points to the conflict between individual rights (a basic measure of freedom), and the mis-application of "democracy" to force the desires of the majority on everyone else.
Most people live in white houses, obviously that's the preferred color. Perhaps it should be illegal for me to live in an offensive green one. Catholics outnumber all other religions, why SHOULDN'T they be able pass a law requireing the rest of us to attend mass, after all it's DEMOCRACY. The Religious right doesn't think we should do stem-cell research -- guess we'd better cut federal funding from one of the most promising fields since antibiotics.
Unless he's endangering his family or neighbors, they should leave this family alone. Protecting propterty values by heavy-handed regulation should NOT the mandate of the government in a free society.
Must get lonely out there in the middle of Montana or North Dakota or wherever you are, hours away from any other civilisation. You should get into town more--despite being "fascist" the good citizens of those towns really are nice people.
Seriously though I'm guessing you have a bit of a warped sense of humour or you are a masterfull troll. Besides the fact that there ARE health and safety concerns associsted with prostitution and scrap vehicles, a typical community code is quite reasonable. If all people were reasonable and considerate there would be no need for such codes.
Alas, a small but significant minority of people are complete jackasses. Given the chance these people will paint their houses hot pink with purple, orange and yellow trim and park a rusty old truck with two flat tires on the front lawn under the shade of their 12-foot C-Band dish (the one that pipes hard-core porn into their living room which they view with the volume on so high everyone on the block can count the orgasms).
These codes might not be about health and safety, but they are about the right of law abiding citizens to live in realtive peace. Unfortunately, there are other types of jackasses who are the opposite--these are the ones that insist on hearing their favourite pins drop after 9PM, mow their lawns in a checkerboard pattern and wish everyone would do the same, and hold up city business with requests for more traffic-calming measures, more noise bylaws and more regulation of every little thing that slightly annoys them.
If you find you are living in a redneck hellhole, or nazi-Stepford-suburbia there is a way to stop the madness. It is called "civic duty". Get involved in politics--especially at the local level. Attend the odd community planning meeting, endorse non-wacky candidates for office and vote for them...or at least vote for cryin' out loud. The latter form of jackass knows this already, and that is why California is so whacked that a government led by Conan the Barbarian is actually a vast improvement over the previous rock-bottom situation with Davis.