Sunday, October 30, 2022

Who will leave Twitter?

I wrote articles — "Quit Twitter?" and "We May Not Have Twitter Tomorrow" — on Medium.

Umair Haque, writing on Medium, October 29, 2022:

"Racial slurs are hate, and “free speech” is about government interference, not your so-called right to hate someone. ...much of the rest of the world bans hate speech precisely because it has consequences. It manifests in violence. Hate is the intent to hurt someone, to do harm them, and in that sense, it is a form of violence itself, because it begs and calls for the real thing."

Elon Musk tweet, November 9, 2022:

Please note that Twitter will do lots of dumb things in coming months.

This has been happening:



An account comments: Well, that didn’t take long at all lol (This is not Lebron James). In reply to a fake LeBron James account: I am officially requesting a trade. Thank you #LakersNation for all the support through the years. 100 Onto bigger and better things!
An account comments: Big day for the politicians of my youth. In reply to a fake George Bush account: I miss killing Iraqis. To which replied a fake Tony Blair account: Same tbh.
An account comments: Two great new verified accounts! In reply to: a fake Ben Shapiro account: Matt Walsh won't stop calling me and talking about genitalia. And a fake President Biden account: im over here stroking my dick i got lotion on my dick rn
Zack Budryk with a blue-check says: Hi, I'm Twitter's head of advertising. I've been talking to a lot of big brands who are concerned about the potential for verified accounts to pose as them and tweet 'Inflate me daddy' and I'm going to say, once again, we are WORKING ON IT
An account comments: I take it all back. this new verification scheme is flawless. They're responding to a tweet from a fake Elon Musk account: Starting today we'll begin offering Twitter Gold: a free subscription that gets you yearly family vacations and nightly dinners with me. If your name is Grimes. Please come back. I love you.


man on a typewriter

Saturday, October 29, 2022

Wednesday, October 26, 2022

In ChristoQfascist conspiracy theory, Satan makes people transgender

"QAnon adherents believe that Donald Trump is trying to save the world from a cabal of satanic pedophiles. The conspiracy theory’s narrative includes centuries-old antisemitic tropes, like the belief that the cabal is harvesting blood from abused children, and it names specific people, including Democratic politicians and Hollywood celebrities, as participants in a global plot. Experts call these extreme, baseless claims 'an incitement to violence'.
* * *
'QAnon is popular on the sovereign citizen child custody groups, in part because its believers claim that the government and child protective agencies are abusing the children they take from their parents’ custody,' wrote the Daily Beast reporter Will Sommer, who has published in-depth investigations of several kidnapping cases with links to QAnon."
— "QAnon: a timeline of violence linked to the conspiracy theory," Lois Beckett, The Guardian, October 16, 2020.

doorbell

"Ex-Gay Christian Author Calls Trans People Satanic Enemies of God." Esther Spurrill-Jones. April 7, 2023.


READ more on Julie Green: "Doug Mastriano’s campaign “prophet”: Political executions are coming, Biden “is no longer alive,” Pelosi drinks “children’s blood”" Eric Hananoki, Media Matters, Aug 17, 2022.

Day 2 of the conference:

Mastriano was scheduled to speak but was too busy to come due to his political campaign schedule.


The Federalist published an article: "‘Hail Satan! Hail Thyself’: What The Gender Cult And Satanism Have In Common" (Georgi Boorman. August 7, 2023). The final lines are that "it should come as no surprise that rebellion against God’s design for humanity is satanically inspired. That is, after all, his mission." On the way there, readers wind through ridiculous academic-sounding prose like: "While Baphomet has a complicated history of iterations and interpretation, it’s not unreasonable to imagine that gender-confused young people might welcome this binary-breaking symbol of 'balance and harmony' and see a satanic sect as a spiritual home for them." This is not serious.

Headline for ‘Hail Satan! Hail Thyself’: What The Gender Cult And Satanism Have In Common. The cover art is a femme-looking person with a big Afro.

Online course on fascism and racism

There's a free online course on "Against Oppression: Black Antifascism(s)"

lightning

Is 2°C warming inevitable?

The Washington Post editorial, Oct. 29, 2022:

"At the 2015 Paris climate conference, nations agreed to limit global warming to under 2 degrees Celsius relative to preindustrial levels — and preferably to under 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit). According to a new report the United Nations released on Thursday, the more ambitious 1.5 degree target is now all but out of reach.

This year’s U.N. Environment Program’s Emissions Gap Report found that there was “no credible pathway” to remain under 1.5 degrees Celsius — and that countries are falling “pitifully short” in making good on their national commitments. Under the current policy framework, global temperatures are projected to rise 2.8 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. If nations scale up according to their agreed-upon climate pledges, the projected temperature increase will be between 2.4 and 2.6 degrees Celsius — which would threaten billions of people.

This prognosis comes on the heels of another U.N. analysis released Wednesday, which considered countries’ voluntary emissions commitments. It found modest increases in emissions reductions and adaptation goals over the past year, but not enough to put the world on a better trajectory. Though countries agreed to establish more rigorous emissions plans after last year’s climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, just 24 nations have actually done so. The additional Glasgow pledges would reduce emissions by less than 1 percent by 2030.

And their conclusion? "...the U.N. system represents the world’s best hope at averting catastrophe." So basically, we are in trouble.

"His [Robinson's] next novel is likely to be set in the Arctic, where scientists are debating controversial ideas for manipulating the climate in a bid to stop the region's self-fulfilling feedback loop of ice melt and warming waters. The techniques, which could be implemented in polar regions and elsewhere, range from injecting aerosols into the atmosphere to underwater curtains that shield glaciers from warm water, or seeding massive algae blooms that can sink carbon to the seafloor.

Some of these suggestions have alarmed certain groups of scientists who see hubris and the potential for distraction where Robinson sees noble desperation. 'I see immense resistance to geoengineering that is ignorant and reflexive and comes out of a moral calculus of, like, 1990,” he says. The moral hazard associated with continuing to burn fossil fuels because of the existence of an escape clause is 'not relevant', he adds. 'We know we have to decarbonise. We know we’re not. It’s desperate.'"

Writer Kim Stanley Robinson: ‘If the world fails, business fails’ The cult sci-fi author on Mars, Musk — and how speculative fiction can offer real-life solutions to the climate crisis. Kenza Bryan. November 17, 2023.

"The United Nations reported Wednesday that global warming will rise to between 2.1 and 2.9 degrees Celsius based on the world’s current climate pledges – way beyond the 1.5 degrees nations are trying to stay below."
"World still way off track on goal to keep global warming below dangerous threshold, UN says." By Ella Nilsen and Radina Gigova, CNN, October 26, 2022

Another perspective from Karl Burkart (Oct. 25, 2022):

"...the gnawing sense that solving climate change is just too difficult, and that exceeding the 1.5°C limit in global temperature rise at this point is a foregone conclusion.

Now let’s ask ourselves, who would benefit from this narrative? Why of course, the fossil fuel industry and the institutional investors...

* * *

Back in the mid-2000s, the industry devised a five-phased strategy to delay regulatory action on climate change. ...the final phase is to promote the idea that it’s just too expensive and/or too late to do anything about it.

This final phase has always worried me the most. There’s nothing like a sense of doom and perpetual anxiety to make people check out..."

The ocean is really good at absorbing carbon.

Update: The 1.5-degree climate goal may be ‘deader than a doornail,’ and scientists are bitterly divided over it Laura Paddison, CNN, January 18, 2024

1.5 is possible if you're "clutching at straws," says the Washington Post editorial board (January 18, 2024). But look at reality:

"Last week, the European climate monitor Copernicus reported that the globe’s average temperature hit 14.98 degrees Celsius last year, 1.48 degrees above that of the second half of the 19th century. Two U.S. agencies, NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, followed suit, putting warming since then at 1.4 and 1.35 degrees, respectively. The synthesis by the World Meteorological Organization landed on 1.45 degrees above the preindustrial average, with an uncertainty band of plus or minus 0.12 degrees."

So what does that mean? It means we have to "put more tools on the table."

"If the fracturing of our once stable climate doesn’t terrify you, then you don’t fully understand it. The reality is that, as far as we know, and in the natural course of events, our world has never — in its entire history — heated up as rapidly as it is doing now. Nor have greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere ever seen such a precipitous hike.
* * *
The truth is that people can take being scared if they know there is still hope and that they can do something to make things better, or at least stop things getting worse."

Opinion: I’m a climate scientist. Am I obliged to scare you? Opinion by Bill McGuire, CNN, March 7, 2024

trees

Saturday, October 22, 2022

To-read: Books I've seen mentioned on Twitter

An eclectic list.

tree

Recent tweets about climate (Oct 2022)


Book bloggers

Monday, October 17, 2022

Latest round of antisemitism and transphobia

See also: "The Biggest Conspiracy Theories Are All-Consuming". It's a 7-minute read on Medium.

None So Arch-Vile (@deportablediz) tweets October 16, 2022: Like even if certain groups of people make you uncomfortable due to past trauma or whatever, that's not the same. I wonder if JKR has considered for even a second that one of the contributing factors to gender dysphoria in trans women is the attribution of violent threat to physical features they have no control over. This position directly contradicts her broader "gender-critical" stance that gender dysphoric people, particularly children, should be taught to be comfortable with their bodies without transitioning. And how does this not affirm toxic masculinity? Where the capacity for violence is used to intimidate others, where the vulnerable are taught to redirect their anxieties outwards and harm others? Also this is gonna come across like an epic Reddit logic takedown, but JKR is married to a man and women are unquestionably more likely to be harmed by their spouses than by a stranger in a public bathroom. The point is, the threat of male violence comes from experience. Abstracting and weaponizing women's pain to shit on minority groups you hate, like transgender people or refugees, is a fucking rotten thing to do. It does nothing to address the problem of male violence.




"Experts said the climate is the product of a stew of forces including a digital culture that spreads misinformation and hate and right-wing political forces focused on protecting White Christians’ status. Some said current antisemitism is also aggravated by more people downplaying it as merely an interreligious issue instead of a dangerous form of racism; in the past majorities from Germany to America made clear they saw Jews as a distinct and inferior race."
— "Overt U.S. antisemitism returns with Trump, Kanye West: ‘Something is different’." Michelle Boorstein and Isaac Arnsdorf. Washington Post. October 27, 2022.

Zoé (@ztsamudzi), October 14, 2022 tweet: Listening to Maddow and Chris Hayes talk about the Jan 6 committee and how disgrace is a form of accountability and how fascism/authoritarianism should be fought with democracy makes me realize how many people both don't fully understand WWII and also believe Fukuyama was right
Jared Yates Sexton, Oct 16, 2022 tweet: I don’t know, man. Weird how all these guys with authoritarian tendencies are all being openly anti-Semitic and following the same trends and cycles of past authoritarian movements.<br><br>It’s almost like, and hear me out, this stuff is totally predictable.

Update

May 15, 2023 on Twitter: Elon Musk continues to spread antisemitic tropes. (He is, of course, also transphobic.)

Elad Nehorai, May 15, 2023: Since buying Twitter, Musk has reinstated neo-Nazis, antisemites like David Icke, & countless white nationalists. All while suspending journalists & anti-fascists. Now he goes after George Soros (again). This time with the trope of a rich Jew trying to destroy civilization.
Elad Nehorai again, May 15, 2023: This is not the first time Musk has spread antisemitic tropes. As someone enmeshed in the far right ecosystem, it’s basically impossible for him to avoid using them. And he clearly relishes in spreading them.
Jared Yates Sexton tweet, May 15, 2023: The idea that Jewish puppet masters are clandestinely attacking civilization is a reiteration of Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a forgery favored by Right Wing authoritarians for how it legitimizes violence and antidemocratic actions. That’s what Musk is peddling.
Ben Collins tweet, May 15, 2023 tweet: This is another level.
Thomas Lecaque, May 15, 2023 tweet: This is boilerplate anti Semitism. I mean really your basic, overt, 'Jews are the enemy' shit, from one of the world's wealthiest men and the bridge troll who owns this platform.

In May 2023, Rep. Lauren Boebert, expresses her sense that complaints about "antisemitism" are really about Republicans (who are also, as we know, the party of transphobia).

Lauren Boebert tweet, May 25, 2023: When they say stuff like this, they mean they want to go after conservatives. Their tactics are straight out of the USSR's playbook. She's quote-tweeting Disclose.tv which says NOW - Biden says U.S. government agencies will take over 100 'bold and unprecedented' actions to 'fight hate' and antisemitism.

The White House press secretary had to respond with the obvious: "Congresswoman Boebert is mistaken; antisemitism is not ‘conservative’ ― it is evil."

December 2023

From Judd Legum in Popular Information: On December 2, 2023, "the Executive Committee of the Texas Republican Party considered the following resolution: 'BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Republican Party of Texas have no association whatsoever with any individual or organization that is known to espouse anti-Semitism, pro-Nazi sympathies, or Holocaust denial.'

The committee voted it down, with one member telling the Texas Tribune that the word "anti-Semitism" was a "slippery slope." Another Republican, Texas Senator Bob Hall (not on the committee), told the Texas Tribune

"that the Texas Republicans should have the flexibility to meet with Nazis and anti-Semites. 'I've had meetings with transgenders, gays and lesbians,' Hall said. “Does that make me a transgender, gay or a lesbian?' Asked if he was comparing LGBTQ people to white supremacists, Hall said they are all people 'who are political hot potatoes.'"

Legum also reminds us that the Texas Republican Party in January 2021 adopted the QAnon slogan "We are the Storm" and in June 2022 adopted a platform "adopted a platform that described homosexuality as 'an abnormal lifestyle choice.'"

Saturday, October 15, 2022

What the phone cord meant

In the transition to mobile, we have less phone cord. And in losing the phone cord, we lose the manifestation of what it feels like to make multiple phone calls, over and over and over, taking the windiest route possible for the simplest request. The phone is now "in the air." It makes it seem as though our frustration is that much more imaginary.

coiled phone cord

Image by Brett Hondow from Pixabay

See also, the poem: "Power Down!". It's a 4-minute read on Medium.

Friday, October 14, 2022

Seditious conspiracy, shmeditious deliracy

What does it matter if he's guilty?

Huffington Post screenshot. Opinion: The Jan. 6 Hearings Make Trump Look Guilty. But, Does It Matter? Despite damning evidence against the former president of the United States, it's most likely that nothing will happen to him because nothing ever does. The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol Thursday voted to subpoena former President Donald Trump. Michael Arceneaux, Guest Writer Oct 14, 2022

Michael Arceneaux wrote in this article:

"However, while half of the respondents said they think Trump should be charged with a crime, six in 10 respondents said they don’t think Trump will face any charges.

Because nothing ever happens to him."

Here's yet another argument for Trump being held criminally responsible for January 6: Salon Video

Shmeditious deliracy.

Steve Bannon has acknowledged that the January 6 rioters felt they were cosplaying more powerful versions of their real selves.

To read more — especially about what is not working in U.S. democracy — please see "The United States is an 'Anocracy'". It's a 4-minute read on Medium. Medium lets you read a certain number of stories for free every month. You may also consider a paid membership on the platform.


In November 2023, CNN reported of Liz Cheney's forthcoming memoir (HuffPost) that Kevin McCarthy was concerned that Trump wasn't eating after January 6 didn't go his way:

“Mar-a-Lago? What the hell, Kevin?” Cheney asked, according to CNN, which obtained an advance copy.

“They’re really worried,” McCarthy said. “Trump’s not eating, so they asked me to come see him.”

“What? You went to Mar-a-Lago because Trump’s not eating?” Cheney replied.

“Yeah, he’s really depressed,” McCarthy said, according to the book excerpt.

In reaction to which, Sean Casten tweeted:

November 28, 2023: A few weeks ago our 14 year old dog stopped eating. At no point did our vet say to us 'you should grovel before him and tell him you think he's the President'.

If the tipping point of fascism has already been reached

The gears have been moving for a long time. The scene is set. It is likely that fascism is already here:

To which, this response:



See also:

See also:

"'Good speech' cannot balance 'bad speech' when the bad speech is fascist, because fascists use violence or the threat of violence to silence their targets." — Jude Ellison S. Doyle, KiwiFarms Went Down. Now Everything is KiwiFarms., Medium, September 7, 2023

See also:

An article in the Federalist called "We Need to Stop Calling Ourselves Conservatives":

"Re the explicitly pro-fascism article that's going around, white conservatism in the U.S. was never "conservative." There's nothing intrinsically "limited" abt using the state as an explicit instrument of white power, as white conservatives have historically done."(tweet)



oil rig on fire

Wednesday, October 12, 2022

Submissions — Fall 2022

Book

Anthology

Magazine

Contests

In case you missed it

Have you seen inside the book 'To Climates Unknown'?

The alternate history novel To Climates Unknown by Arturo Serrano was released on November 25, the 400th anniversary of the mythical First ...