UFC Executive Vice President Lawrence Epstein posted an editorial piece in the Las Vegas Review-Journal in support of the Stop Online Piracy Act. It’s the kind of thing Vice Presidents Of Things do to share their side of the story (their side: “shut up, give us more money”), but usually they avoid making themselves sound like a taskforce of old man Sarahs Palin and skip the parts where they equate promoting MMA fights to “[fighting] real-world criminal activity”. Sometimes they type in Comic Sans MS, for extra lulz.

Replace “consumer” with “soul” and “websites” with “Satanists” and this thing could be a religious tract.

One of the worst things about this hidden problem is the American consumer is being snookered. These criminal sites look legitimate. Deceptive and sophisticated, rogue websites carry legitimate-looking logos and seals of approval. It’s often almost impossible to know what is real and what is fake … often until it is too late.

Well, it looks like the snookered have become the snookerers. Snookees? That can’t be right.

One thing you’d know if you were actually a part of today’s Internet climate and not shaking your fist at it from down the road is that major corporations who come out in support of anti-Internet freedom legislation often get snookerized in the swiftest, most Internet ways possible. Example: In retaliation to Epstein’s column (we’re assuming), the “Underground Nazi H4ck3rGr0up” sprang into action, snookering UFC.com by hacking it and replacing its content with an anime drawing of Adolf Hitler. Cage Potato captured what the site looked like for most of yesterday, and as of Monday morning UFC.com still sorta looks like you’ve accidentally typed UFC.corm.

Lesson learned, I guess: If you want to continue your life peacefully, never f**k with a guy who calls himself “JoshTheGod”.

Thou shalt not steal. As Tim Tebow would tell us all, that’s one of the first laws written by man. As an Internet writer and avid Tweeter, I’m one of the first people you’ll hear pissing and moaning about thievery because I’ve had jokes, terrible photoshops and even With Leather posts stolen many times. But I’ve always chalked it up to the nature of the game because we’re all hustlers out here trying to make that cheddar, or something like that. My point is that I always credit my sources because I respect creative property and integrity. I just wish others shared that belief.

That’s how we’ve come to this whole SOPA mess. Despite what people are erroneously Tweeting as fast as they can type, it’s not about people who post sh*t on their Facebook, Twitter or Tumblr pages. Well, not entirely. It’s about the sites like the defunct ChannelSurfing.net and others that illegally stream sports games, TV shows and movies. It’s about the torrent sites that allow people to steal music and movies. It’s about sh*t that’s illegal and wrong. The Internet certainly needs laws and crap most certainly needs to be flushed.

But that doesn’t mean that us innocent folk aren’t going to get caught in the wake. I’m against SOPA because I don’t like the idea of giving networks and corporations the power to crush us just because they feel like it. All power needs limitations and I need to know there’s a difference between some dick in Europe giving away free movies and me posting a clip of Blake Griffin dunking. I also don’t like ignorant politicians who are blatantly lining their pockets trying to cram a bill down our throats because they doesn’t understand this wild, crazy Internet and they believe that we’re all young punk thieves, when we’re actually the last frontier of creativity.

SOPA and PIPA were created by wealthy people with hair trigger mentalities. Both bills have foundations that are understandable, but they are still allowing people with money to have control over the voices of us that have little to no means of defending ourselves. Basically, they could take away my right to criticize people. It’s not a certainty, but I’ll be damned if I’ll even allow someone to open the door to the idea of taking away my God-given right of calling someone a douchebag because that douchebag doesn’t like it.

That said, here are some pictures of Kelly Brook supporting New Look lingerie, because that’s what my Internet was meant to give us. I assume she did this both in opposition to SOPA and clothing.

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