The Tennessee Senate has passed a bill targeting “chemtrails.”

SB 2691/HB 2063, sponsored by Rep. Monty Fritts, R-Kingston, and Sen. Steve Southerland, R-Morristown, passed in the Senate on Monday. The bill has yet to advance in the House.

The bill claims it is “documented the federal government or other entities acting on the federal government’s behalf or at the federal government’s request may conduct geoengineering experiments by intentionally dispersing chemicals into the atmosphere, and those activities may occur within the State of Tennessee,” according to the bill.

The legislation would ban the practice in Tennessee.

“The intentional injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of chemicals, chemical compounds, substances, or apparatus within the borders of this state into the atmosphere with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight is prohibited,” the bill reads.

The bill is scheduled to go to the House Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee on Wednesday.

  • Hobbes_Dent@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    “The intentional injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of chemicals, chemical compounds, substances, or apparatus within the borders of this state into the atmosphere with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight is prohibited,” the bill reads.

    Gonna look dumb later when they need cloud seeding for a drop of rain.

    Or when somebody applies the law to CO2 or methane and finds an express purpose.

    Or if we come up with a remotely feasible sunlight solution for warming. But I think that’s their point isn’t it.

    • Cort@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      This is how I see it backfiring.

      Federal gov: we hereby formally request that the motorists of the great state of Tennessee drive their motor vehicles in order to release CO2 and other chemicals into the atmosphere for the express purpose of changing the temperature in Tennessee.

      Oops, all motor vehicles are now banned in Tennessee.

      Edit: also banned are parasols and air conditioners as they’re both an apparatus with the express purpose of affecting temperature

      • Shdwdrgn@mander.xyz
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        8 months ago

        I’m wondering if this could actually be applied to things like crop-dusting, as it does temporarily affect the intensity of sunlight. The same might be true of any airplanes flying over the state – oops that airliner obscured the sun for a moment and their flight path was intentional. It would be hilarious if all airlines suspended flights “just in case”.

          • Shdwdrgn@mander.xyz
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            8 months ago

            Yeah but “intent” doesn’t seem like it is clearly defined? It’s like all these damn anti-abortion laws – nobody “intends” to have a miscarriage and yet the lawmakers made sure that women can still be prosecuted for it. Funny how they didn’t leave any loopholes to prosecute the men who were just as guilty. Shitty laws like this always make sure to leave some wiggle room so they can go after anyone who they randomly decide needs prosecuted, but hopefully this whole things slaps them in the face like the book bans.

              • Shdwdrgn@mander.xyz
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                8 months ago

                I always prefer backfires, just to rub in their stupidity. 😄

                The city where I work is currently ‘renovating’ the intersection near my parking lot. The direction I drive in is taking three lanes and converting them to four lanes – two left-turn lanes for practically non-existent traffic, the ‘new’ lane will be for the busses, and a single straight-through lane for a high amount of traffic which is already backing up because construction has dropped us to a single lane. Also, half of the straight-through traffic needs to immediately cut off the busses after the intersection because the remaining lane feeds directly into a pair of left-turn lanes for the next light a few hundred feet away.

                Now the traffic leaving the area where I work, they are also switching one of the lanes to a dedicated bus lane. This means ALL of the exiting traffic gets funneled into a single lane, half of that traffic immediately cuts off the buses right after the light to make their exit to the freeway, the other half is split between a left turn lane that is always backed up blocking the remaining straight-through lane (why didn’t they make THIS side into a double turn lane???). Again because of the construction they have closed off the lane that will soon become a bus lane so the traffic is now backed up through two lights and half way to the third light (and no, the construction isn’t impeding the traffic, they just have the lane blocked off).

                Of course all of us on reddit who discussed the proposed changes immediately pointed all the problems with this plan… and gee we were all correct except it’s already worse than imagined. But the city is being “progressive”… As I said, I love it when these idiot’s plans backfire.

                • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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                  8 months ago

                  Wow, that’s terrible, and it makes my complaining seem way more petty.

                  My kids go to school at a business park where there are some large trucks ending and leaving for deliveries. They’re also building a bunch of apartments and whatnot in the area, so they’re redesigning the intersection and street. They tore up a nice strip of trees in the middle of the street to make room for another lane.

                  Here’s a rough map:

                  • H - highway
                  • A - apartments
                  • C - city
                  • B - business park
                  • ∅ - nothing of interest yet (alternate to backside of B)

                  There’s a stoplight at the H/C intersection, and they’re putting another in at the other intersection, as well as a dedicated turn from B to H and from H to B. Most people want to go between H and A/B. Going toward or from ∅ is very rare, and I think I’ve only seen large trucks to that way (if the turns are too tight in the business park).

                  Since almost nobody goes to ∅, I think a roundabout would make a ton more sense. The traffic from H to B would never need to stop and the traffic from B to H would rarely need to stop, so traffic would flow really nicely. It would also work really well for traffic from B to A, which is going to get more busy as people move in (it’s new construction). The light at H/C is frequent enough that it should keep up with the traffic from the roundabout.

                  But no, we get a left lane (B to H) that’s going to always be backed up enough to block people from going from B to A. And it’s probably way more expensive.

                  I guess one nice part is that kids walk from B to A, but since there’s almost no traffic going to ∅, we could just put a crosswalk there (almost nobody is going to ∅ anyway, so people probably won’t need to stop). The road that crosses ∅ is really wide, so there could totally be a protected island there as well.

                  But the real solution is to not have so many cars. There’s no bus service in this area despite a commuter train station being a mile or two away. I really don’t understand why you wouldn’t have at least a shuttle from the commuter rail to this business park…

        • GlendatheGayWitch@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          The law says “express purpose”, the purpose of the flight isn’t to block the sun. The purpose of the flight is to carry people to a destination and a by-product of that purpose creates a shadow.

          I thought the same thing at first about the airplanes releasing CO2 into the air, but that release isn’t the express purpose of flying a plane.

      • Rivalarrival@lemmy.today
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        8 months ago

        There’s also the reverse: the bill doesn’t actually ban chemtrails. It bans dispersing chemicals for purposes of altering the weather. If they are dispersed for purposes of controlling people’s minds, they slip right past this bill.

    • stevedidwhat_infosec@infosec.pub
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      8 months ago

      Exactly. This bill is a Trojan horse to solidify the effects of global warming so that the rich and elite can leave the planet and the rest of us behind to burn and rot.

      • Leg@lemmy.world
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        8 months ago

        This is so explicitly evil that it sounds too ridiculous to be true. But I’m far too familiar with capitalists and the republican party to say it’s definitely not true.

        • stevedidwhat_infosec@infosec.pub
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          8 months ago

          That was just a best guess, I’m not saying thats fact or anything but

          Kinda seems to be the gig? Rich people don’t like other not rich people. Their lives are too different. If they can automate most of their shit and rope in enough socially inept super geniuses to follow their path, what’s to stop them from succeeding with their friends and maybe some heavily devoted slaves to boot?

          They always come up with these wild ass stories about democrats and their master plans for the world but I really really think the fucks are projecting.

          • Leg@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            Nah, you’re absolutely barking up the right tree. We have some real supervillains out there. Can’t trust em, but we can eat em.

  • stevedidwhat_infosec@infosec.pub
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    8 months ago

    So if anyone wants to use “chemicals” to try and do anything corrective for the environment, this bill will also stop them.

    Classic 2 faced republican bill.

  • davel [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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    8 months ago

    If the Tennessee Senate’s goal was to waste 45 seconds of my life, mission accomplished.

      • delirious_owl@discuss.online
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        8 months ago

        What else is actually being done now thats banned by this? Or is this just preemptive banning of technocrats stupid geoengineering ideas to fight climate change?

    • FartsWithAnAccent@fedia.io
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      8 months ago

      I’m not sure because “chemtrails” don’t fucking exist: It’s an insane conspiracy theory spouted by idiots who don’t understand what contrails are or why they form.

      • You999@sh.itjust.works
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        8 months ago

        Just because they don’t exist doesn’t mean they won’t look in the sky and see a condensation trail Coming from a jet liner and start throwing fines at people.

        • FartsWithAnAccent@fedia.io
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          8 months ago

          I’m not saying fucked up experimentation has never happened, it 100% has in multiple countries including the US & UK, but I am saying that “chemtrails” do not exist and are a misunderstanding of contrails.

          • smooth_tea@lemmy.world
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            8 months ago

            It all depends on how you define the word chemtrails. It’s easy to jump to the most ridiculous version of the theory and reject it, but that is somewhat akin to a straw man. In light of what I just showed you, it’s also incredibly contradictory.

            No offense, but if you oversimplify the situation to “it’s just contrails that linger and people not understanding this” I think you’re not doing yourself any justice. Not everyone who questions these things is a fool who can’t reason or apply logic.

            • FartsWithAnAccent@fedia.io
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              8 months ago

              If you’re describing anything other than a made up conspiracy theory, you should use a term other than chemtrails, which applies (as far as I have always heard) specifically to the conspiracy theory. Otherwise, as soon as any most people hear you use the term you come off as another crazy, ignorant conspiracy theorist.

  • Etterra@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    In today’s class; how to pass a law that does nothing, affects no one, and makes idiots re-elect you.

  • EndOfLine@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    The intentional injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of chemicals, chemical compounds, substances, or apparatus within the borders of this state into the atmosphere with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight is prohibited,

    So just bring a camera to film it and say the express purpose is to make art, educational videos, documentaries, study dispersal patterns, etc.

    It’s totally cool to affect the environment accidentally or as a biproduct of another activity.

  • Thordros [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.net
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    8 months ago

    Clickbait headline.

    Chemtrails aren’t mentioned anywhere in the bill. They’re banning solar geoengineering tests in the state. Which is at least something that some companies are studying, even though the tech doesn’t exist yet.

  • ganksy@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    So it does just what it’s designed to - nothing. Welp, guess you got your tin-foil-hat constituents covered. Time well spent.

  • culpritus [any]@hexbear.net
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    8 months ago

    I guess this bans crop-dusting of any kind unless there is some altitude stipulation involved. Kinda funny if that pans out to be true because I’m sure these Tennessee Republicans are not too keen on organic farming practices.

    • Liz@midwest.social
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      8 months ago

      “The intentional injection, release, or dispersion, by any means, of chemicals, chemical compounds, substances, or apparatus within the borders of this state into the atmosphere with the express purpose of affecting temperature, weather, or the intensity of the sunlight is prohibited” the bill reads.

      It’s right there in the the description.

      • culpritus [any]@hexbear.net
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        8 months ago

        AH, so pesticide chemtrails are A OK for these folks! As long as is doesn’t have the express purpose of affecting the temperature, weather, or intensity of sunlight, you can spray all kinds of fun chemtrails!

  • TehWorld@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    100 years ago they banned mustachioed men from holding groundhogs above waist height for longer than 6 minutes per hour….

    • idiomaddict@feddit.de
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      8 months ago

      Yeah, but it got John the groundhog hoister to shave his awful mustache, so you know, time well spent

  • delirious_owl@discuss.online
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    8 months ago

    I mean I support this bill. The solution to the climate catastrophe is a carbon tax and eventual carbon burning ban.

    We need to shutdown these stupid ideas of geoentineering cooked up by the oil industry.

    • blakeus12 [they/them, he/him]@hexbear.net
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      8 months ago

      the solution is the overthrow of the global capitalist system, the transition of energy to solar, nuclear, wind, hydroelectric, etc. then banning cars, transitioning to 100% electric infrastructure

    • reddithalation@sopuli.xyz
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      8 months ago

      they aren’t good ideas but we dont seem to be doing much about our emissions, so research into potential methods to delay the problem doesn’t seem terrible. (as long as its not exploited to continue doing nothing)

  • TheJims@lemmy.world
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    8 months ago

    Just convince Tennessee Republicans that airplanes aren’t real. Should be easy considering they’re completely capable of ignoring reality in favor of conspiracies. Problem solved. You’re welcome.