Depends, if you have a security camera on your own yard it is legal, but if it films the sidewalk it is illegal.

Bitching about things like unlawful camera use is exactly how things like the GDPR get enforced. A lot of people don't even know that it isn't allowed.

Heck the police will still use your camera if it is filming the road. They cannot use it as evidence, but it can help them in their investigation.
FIlming cars is fine, but it is hard to fil the cars without filiming the people walking or cycling. There is also a balance that needs to be struck between privacy and being able to find/monitor actual criminals.
This article from the authority of personal data goes into the Police and their camara use

It's still a very new area, will continue to be debated and evolve over time. What we think is "ideal" today will not be what people think is "ideal" in 20 years.

Yeah, that's how it should work. We have personal experience of a bogus complaint being filed by a big player with a regulatory agency, the agency coming around and interviewing / intimidating us, and subsequently sending us paperwork finding that the complaint was "substantiated" - something we consulted with a couple of lawyers about and they said "this would never, ever stand up in any kind of hearing or trial or other official process, but... to get it reversed will effectively cost you a couple of thousand dollars out of pocket and a lot of time and hassle - better to ignore it." Of course the real issue is that the big player was guilty of everything in the complaint and more, this is just them "getting in front of the problem" before we complained about them - which we actually had no intention of doing...

The restaurant example comes from a friend who was running a restaurant when he decided to run for political office. His incumbent opponent was directing health inspections of his restaurant at about 10x the normal frequency of inspections... Again, you can fight it, but even if you have the resources to win, what do you get for your troubles?

Meanwhile, the bad actors in the above scenarios repeat their bad actions over and over for marginal advantages. Maybe someday they'll be taken down for it, but usually not.

Yeah... As someone who has been on a jury, I have to disagree completely. Putting people's lives into the hands of one (most likely old, straight, white dude in the case of the US) single person is an awful idea. The concept of a trial by a jury of your peers is far from perfect, but it works relatively well.

For an example a single judge being responsible for ruining the lives of thousands of children as a result of outright quid pro quo, look into "cash for kids" scandal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal

It sounds like you are talking about a lawsuit instead of a complaint, or at least I see the two different. Complaints don´t have anything to do with the actual court and lawsuits do.

The restaurant example comes from a friend who was running a restaurant when he decided to run for political office. His incumbent opponent was directing health inspections of his restaurant at about 10x the normal frequency of inspections

That is just corruption shining through, something like that (samples) should only be done in set intervals f.e. Man, the US really sucks. And people keep going to massive companies and especially in the US that is destroying jobs and possible the entire country. A lot of the money from massive companies doesn't end up inside the US government's treasury.

What I'm talking about is abuse of those complaint systems which is only rectifiable via lawsuit. The abuse lies in the low cost (50€?) of filing a complaint, the corruptability / apathy-indifference of the complaint handling agency, and the relatively high cost of seeking justice vs un-just complaints. In theory, complaint processing at the agencies should filter out frivolous, harassing and otherwise improper complaints - but that's very frequently not how things run, not all the time.

just corruption shining through, something like that (samples) should only be done in set intervals f.e. Man, the US really sucks.

Yep. I'm thinking more and more what "made us great" in the past was the relative youth of our institutions. The longer these things run the further from ideal they tend to become. I would be very much in favor of institutional reform to attempt to continually improve these situations, but of course "institutional reform" is often a cover for fast-track corruption enabling.

A lot of the money from massive companies doesn’t end up inside the US government’s treasury.

Dystopian future stories about global corporate rule making governments irrelevant have been around for a long long time - the US is continuing to develop in that direction, but we do have at least a little further to go before we completely get there (even with recent accelerations in some areas.)

I agree with that the abusive cops and ice is insane in the US, and it should be stopped. I also believe that the US is a corrupt nation in nearly every place of the government and surrounding instances.

But a question surround this, what if the US wasn't corrupt and the judges would actually follow the law (juries wouldn't be able to exist for most cases) and hypothetical if the US had privacy laws for everything besides businesses wouldn't this be the same punishable offence that would protect citizens?

In GDPR countries (among others) nobody is allowed to do something like this with face recognition because the law works for everybody. (Some people are trying to destroy this in some countries, though).

At the same time, if the government is allowed to use facial recognition and other anti-privacy measures to identify people where there is no ground to, then why shouldn't the people be able to do that?

Edit: I am not from the US and my look on life and trias political situations is different than what the fuck is happening in the US

Yep. I’m thinking more and more what “made us great” in the past was the relative youth of our institutions. The longer these things run the further from ideal they tend to become. I would be very much in favor of institutional reform to attempt to continually improve these situations, but of course “institutional reform” is often a cover for fast-track corruption enabling.

I am not sure if this is even correct, The Netherlands as it currently is, is pretty young, but people have been living in Europe for ages. We are one of the countries with the lowest corrupt, we do pay a lot of corrupt nations/people though, but that is a different story.

Dystopian future stories about global corporate rule making governments irrelevant have been around for a long long time - the US is continuing to develop in that direction, but we do have at least a little further to go before we completely get there (even with recent accelerations in some areas.)
It is hard for people in the US to make a choice other than support these companies, mom and pop stores are an alternative. In Europe, I am seeing a trend that we are more focusing on EU based alternatives or even better national based alternatives. (or open source, even better imo)

people have been living in Europe for ages. We are one of the countries with the lowest corrupt, we do pay a lot of corrupt nations/people though, but that is a different story.

Netherlands specifically did a pretty significant reboot after WWII, and again in 1983? even if the base Constitution was established in 1814 / 1848. The US has been screwing around with a women's rights amendment to our Constitution for over 100 years and we still can't get that done - which I attribute to all kinds of entrenched interests blocking change for the better for most people because the special interests might be a little inconvenienced.

It is hard for people in the US to make a choice other than support these companies, mom and pop stores are an alternative. In Europe, I am seeing a trend that we are more focusing on EU based alternatives or even better national based alternatives. (or open source, even better imo)

My grandparents' generation (born in the 1910s, formative young adult years during the Great Depression) pushed a strong "never spend a cent you don't have to" ethos on my parents, and my parents pushed that hard on me. That ethos is pervasive throughout rural America, and when a Wal Mart Supercenter opens they undercut Mom and Pop stores by just enough margin to push that "can't pass up a better deal" ethos in the local population. Mom and Pop stores usually go unprofitable and close within a year or two of a WalMart opening anywhere within 100km. The customers could afford to still patronize Mom and Pop and ignore WalMart, but that "save a penny whenever you can" ethos wins out. Of course once Mom and Pop are out of business, WalMart goes on to raise prices higher than Mom and Pop used to charge - big data analysis tells 'em just how much they can charge for each of their tens to hundreds of thousands of items to achieve their customer acquisition / retention goals. Meanwhile, Mom and Pop still had stick-on paper price tags on their merchandise when they went out of business.

. The US has been screwing around with a women’s rights amendment to our Constitution for over 100 years and we still can’t get that done
To be fair to the US the 50 states basically act like they are different countries instead of different states.

never spend a cent you don’t have to
This is a pretty common ethos in The Netherlands among other countries, but there is a rising trend in purchasing power and people (with or without a rise in purchasing power) are making more informed decisions and realise that often the mom and pop store option is cheaper in the long run. Heck we had a store (the Jumbo) which used to not have discounts, but saw less people buying from them that they changed it so now they are offering discounts again.

I see it a lot in the retro gaming community. In NL, a country the is 240 times smaller than the US, we have a lot more options to buy our games from. Heck I can find American limited releases easier in The Netherlands than in the US.