We are fast approaching an era when humanity will be subjugated by a technological tyranny managed by an untouchable organization of elites, bureaucrats and paid public minders hired to monitor our behaviors, emotions and thoughts. In an environment like this, law and justice will be meaningless, as the tools of a technocracy can used to enforce the policies and whims of whoever monitors us, whether it be corporate employees, criminals, or abusive state actors.

Recent developments and roll-outs of advanced facial recognition technology are a hint of the coming ubiquitousness in using biometric, face-scanning, emotion-reading, all-seeing technology to govern every detail of daily life. Consider the following developments:

French authorities arrested several people over the weekend on suspicion of planning a terrorist attack, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said. "Seven individuals, from 29 to 37 years old, have been arrested, they are French, Moroccan and Algerian nationals," he said at a press conference, as cited by French media. "France has never faced such a [terrorist] threat before," Cazeneuve said.

The individuals were detained in the city of Strasbourg in eastern France on the border with Germany, and in the port city of Marseilles in the south of the country, according to the minister. The arrests came during anti-terrorist raids carried out by officers from the General Directorate for Internal Security (DGSI) and the elite RAID (Research, Assistance, Intervention, Deterrence) unit. Of the seven men arrested, six were unknown to French intelligence, the minister said.

"We foiled a terrorist attack," Cazeneuve said. According to the data provided by Cazeneuve, at least 418 people have been arrested in France since the start of 2016. In November alone, special services arrested 43 individuals. "All these [arrests helped to] avoid attacks and tragedies," concluded Cazeneuve.

A weeklong occupation of the restrooms in the University of Massachusetts Amherst administration building began Monday, with protesters demanding a speedy rollout of gender-neutral bathrooms across campus.

Gender Liberation UMass is occupying most of the bathroom stalls in Whitmore, home of the offices of the chancellor and other key administrators, in what they're calling a "S--t-in."

Protesters are demanding that the university quickly increase the number of gender-neutral bathrooms in campus buildings.

Gender-neutral bathrooms at UMass are currently limited to single-stall ones designed for use by those who are handicapped. Not every campus building has those bathrooms, which means that a safe bathroom is not always easily accessible. Plus, when someone without a disability must use those handicapped bathrooms, it takes those bathrooms away from those with disabilities, said Justin Kilian, one of the organizers.

"We're coming together to make a statement about the fact that there are so few bathrooms available to trans students," Kilian said.

A Brooklyn, New York resident has been charged by federal authorities for supporting terrorism, after making online postings supporting ISIS in plotting to commit an attack in Times Square similar to that in Nice, France.

The man has been identified as Mohammed Rafik Naji, 37, a legal US resident originally from Yemen, according to NBC News investigative reporter Tom Winter.

Naji made several online posts in support of Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), Winter said, citing the federal complaint.

Naji was arrested Monday morning and charged in a federal court in Brooklyn, according to the FBI.

Oregon taxpayers bear a cost estimated at more than $1 billion annually due to illegal immigration.

Some disagreement exists about the size of the unauthorized immigrant population in the Beaver State. The Pew Hispanic Center published an estimate in November 2014 indicating Oregon's illegal immigrant population was 120,000 in 2012.

The Federation for American Immigration Reform previously put forth a higher figure, estimating Oregon in 2010 was the home of 170,000 illegal aliens and 64,000 U.S.-born children of illegal aliens.

I'm hearing lots of after-the-fact explanations for why Trump won the election. The most common interpretation of events is that many citizens had a view of the country that pundits, pollsters, and the Clinton campaign missed. But somehow Trump accurately identified the mood of the people - especially in the Great Lakes region - and crafted a message to fit their emotions.

That explanation of events fits the observed data. Trump's priorities do seem to match what polls tell us people are thinking and feeling. Or at least enough people feel that way to give Trump the Electoral College win. In this view of the world, Trump is a populist who has good instincts about what people want to hear.

But as I have been teaching you for the past year, people can be living in different movies while physically inhabiting the same spacetime. In your movie, Trump might be a populist as the experts are saying. But in my movie, Trump is a Master Persuader. And the script for my movie fits the observed facts just as well as yours. Maybe better.

The Master Persuader filter says Trump didn't identify and match the preferences of the people so much as cause them to think the way they are thinking. My filter on the election says that Trump's skill for persuasion could have given him the victory with DIFFERENT policies than the ones he championed - such as Bernie Sanders policies. And Trump would look like a populist in that case too.

In an exclusive interview with RT, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, shared his ideas on the difficult situations of Christians in the Middle East, the US presidential election, and European multiculturalism.

RT: Your Holiness, first of all, let me congratulate you on your upcoming birthday. Thank you for taking the time to discuss these important - even global ­ - issues with us. Let us talk about Christian affairs outside of Russia - specifically, about the Middle East and Northern Africa. As everyone knows, the dramatic events associated with the armed conflicts raging in the Middle East, especially in Syria, pose a threat not only to government leaders, individuals, secular regimes, etc., but to the Christian faith itself. Several months ago, you had a historic meeting with Pope Francis, during which you called upon the international community to stop the extermination and expulsion of Christians from these regions. Do you believe that enough is being done to stop this? Have you noticed any improvement since the time you made that statement? Or do you believe the situation has deteriorated?

Patriarch Kirill: I have on many occasions been forced to raise my voice - on behalf of the Russian Orthodox Church - in defense of those whom I would call the persecuted Christians of the Middle East. Of all the minorities in the region, it is Christians who have been suffering the most. The statistics show an appalling dynamic: there used to be 1.5 million Christians in Iraq - now there is less than 150,000. There used to be half-a-million Christians in Syria, and now they have vanished without a trace, whether they were killed or fled the country. But the Middle East is the birthplace of Christianity, and of Christian culture. Which is why killing Christians or driving them out of the region isn't just a crime against religion and against human rights and freedoms: it is a civilizational disaster. Because once Christian communities vanish from those countries, life there will change in every respect. Prior to the current crisis, the governments in those countries, including secular governments, had to reckon with the presence of Christians and devise their policies in a way that would ensure some kind of sectarian balance. Now there's no need to maintain a balance. And who knows what may happen to the remaining Christian population in those countries.

An alleged accomplice of Jaber Albakr, the Syrian suspect who planned a terrorist attack a Berlin airport, is now at large and cleared of all charges, reportedly in return for tip-offs leading to local terrorist sponsors. The 33-year-old man, identified by Spiegel as Khalil A., has been released from police custody on Monday, the magazine reported citing his lawyer Peter Hollstein.

In October, the 33-year-old was arrested on suspicion of aiding Jaber Albakr, the Syrian suspect who eyed an airport in Berlin as a potential target for bombing. Albakr himself managed to evade the police manhunt earlier in the month, but was later detained by fellow Syrian migrants and handed over to security forces.

Several days after his capture, Albakr was found dead in his prison cell in Leipzig. The Saxony Justice Ministry insisted the prisoner had strangled himself by tying his shirt to the bars of his cell, despite allegedly being checked on every 15 minutes and given pants without a belt.

In the meantime, investigators alleged Khalil A. was aware of Albakr's plans as he allowed the terrorism suspect to stay at his flat in Chemnitz, a town in eastern Germany. "Highly-sensitive explosives" were found during the police search at Khalil A.'s Chemnitz flat, thus making him an alleged terrorism accomplice. Khalil A. served his detention in Leipzig, too, but a round-the-clock officer was assigned to him to prevent suicide attempts.

Hollstein, Khalil's lawyer, told Spiegel that there was "no complicity from the very outset," claiming that evidence of his contribution to Albakr's plans was too slim. But the Spiegel report said Khalil A. gave tip-offs leading to terrorist financing network in North Rhine-Westphalia which could have funded Albakr plans, thus marking a sort of a plea bargain.

The Supreme Military Council of the Army of Conquest which controls East Aleppo has published the following fatwa -

Those people who attempted to escape without paying were shot.

In fact, no family is able to collect the necessary sum to free their children and old people after such a long period of occupation, during which food was sold to them by the jihadists at exorbitant prices.

The Supreme Military Council of the Army of Conquest is under the command of the Supreme Judge of the Tribunal of the Charia, the Saudi cheikh Abdullah al-Muhaysini. This person has declared his allegiance to al-Qaïda. In an interview broadcast on 28 October, he declared that the combatants present in Syria are foreigners supported by a few Syrian collaborators, and he reproached the Syrians for refusing to participate in the jihad.

Vice-president-elect Mike Pence got more than he bargained for at the Broadway musical Hamilton, as the cast delivered a statement citing their concerns that the new administration would not protect the rights of all Americans.

As the cast took their bow at the end of the performance on Friday, actor Brandon Victor Dixon delivered a statement to Pence. "I see you walking out but I hope you will hear us for just a few more moments," he said, before thanking him for coming. "We have a message for you sir and I hope that you will hear us out.

"We sir, we are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children, our parents, or defend us and uphold our inalienable rights, sir," Dixon said.