#that IS a legitimate response and a legitimate action

[demigodofhoolemere]

Me through most of Boom: Wow, this is a really solid dramatic episode.

Me when Moffat needlessly sprinkles in anti-faith sentiments without specifying that it’s blind faith in bad things that the Doctor doesn’t like, which makes it come off like the Doctor is just against religion generally:

[communistkenobi]

I don’t really want to wade into discourse too much today because I know everyone is extremely miserable online rn but I think if you want to give people genuine advice on what to do politically, “join a union/get involved in your current union/organise your workplace” or “join ACORN/a tenant union/etc” is much more actionable advice than like “build community.”

the problem with “community” is that it doesn’t have the same formal infrastructure / resources / political connections / organising capacity that allows your hard work to have reach far beyond your immediate circle (which is what a union has), and also because like, “community” is an extremely vague and abstract concept that can mean anything from a local restaurant run by your neighbour to a church to your dnd friend group. Reaching out and helping your neighbours is a good thing, lots of people are having a really tough time and helping people around you pay rent or take care of their family or etc is a good thing and you should feel good doing that, but in response to the complete institutional and political failure of electoral liberalism I think the next best option is to turn towards already existing national infrastructure that can mobilise people without requiring you to individually maintain dedicated personal relationships with everyone around you. In my experience + the experience of many long-time activists that I know, relying on interpersonal connections to organise and get things done leads to highly sectarian, disorganised, toxic, and unpleasant organising conditions. The cold impersonal bureaucracy of union membership is legitimately a good solution to this problem.

there are many little positions of power available in these organisation that become open to you for as low a cost as showing up to zoom meetings. I have personally been elected to positions in various unions/orgs literally because I was someone who showed up to meetings! Nobody goes to committee meetings! You get annual budgets! You get to pass votes, organise events, spend money on organising materials! You get to buy food for people! Organising is so much easier in these spaces.

And of course, you are going to face the same ideological resistance, apathy, ignorance, incompetence, and bigotry that you would at your local queer meet-up or community neighbourhood council, and I have no illusions about the institutional limits of unions (which can also be reactionary, bigoted, highly disorganised, incompetent, toxic, and so on), but if you want to avoid completely exhausting yourself and resenting everyone around you, you don’t need to build “community” from the ground up, there are already structures out there where you can do good work. For all the resistance there is to unions and union activity, you will face that same level of resistance with local organising but have none of the power, resources, or institutional legitimacy already secured by unions

[dostoyevsky-official]

The existence of an immigration-enforcement agency isn’t inherently the problem. Most people accept that states have a right to control their borders and that there’s a legitimate role for authorities charged with enforcing immigration policy, especially when it comes to those who have committed serious crimes. ICE also investigates trafficking, smuggling and other transnational offenses that clearly require federal oversight. The core issue is less the agency’s mandate than its methods. Well-documented abuses — denials of due process, inhumane conditions and politically motivated enforcement — have undermined public trust and raised serious ethical concerns. The worry is not whether immigration law should be enforced but how, and at what human cost. The holding facilities ICE uses are part of this system: They house people awaiting deportation, court appearances or further investigation. What’s in dispute isn’t the need for such spaces; it’s the treatment of detainees within those spaces. Many facilities have drawn criticism for degrading or dangerous conditions. Still, as a beneficiary of a trust that rents a property to ICE, your leverage is minuscule. You can’t unilaterally break the lease. Even if you could, ICE would simply relocate its facility. And while moral complicity is a serious concern, receiving income from a legal tenant, however problematic, isn’t generally considered an ethical transgression on its own. We’re all entangled in systems we don’t control. As citizens, we’re already implicated in the actions of government agencies that act in our name and that we help fund. If those actions are shameful, they cast a shadow on all of us. But that shared entanglement also opens the door to shared responsibility — and response. [...] Here’s one constructive path: If this money feels tainted, redirect it. Use it to support organizations that advocate for the rights you believe ICE has violated — groups like the A.C.L.U., the American Immigration Council or local legal-aid nonprofits that provide support for detainees. Back candidates pushing for humane immigration reform.

jaw-dropping new york times column reassuring readers that receiving blood money from the gestapo is ok

[outoftheirdifferences]

🎁 There's a nicely wrapped up present for Connie. It appears to be a self-help book about mental health. But in addition to the book is a pair of very fluffy, pastel-colored socks perfect for cold nights.

🎁 Also a present for Vanellope! It's two action figures from a cartoon the child watches. But also a pair of thick, mint-green colored gloves for when she wants to play outside.

Send in 🎁 + an item to give my muse a Christmas present!

Was Black Star hinting at something here? Though Connie made sure to still grin appreciatively, she puzzled a moment as she turned the book over in her hands. Actually, she couldn't deny the topic was an interesting one - psychology was always fascinating, if not something she'd chosen to study personally - but she liked to think that her own mental health was pretty good.

Then again. Maybe the point was that she could use some of the tips within to help Steven if he needed it. He was doing a lot better now, of course, but still... the idea was a thoughtful one. The girl nodded to herself, her smile becoming more genuine.

And the warm socks? Those looked like just what she needed. She ran a hand through the fluffy material.

"These are perfect, Black Star. Thanks."

--

"Oh yeah! Just look at these!"

There was absolutely no hiding the way Vanellope's eyes lit up as she ripped the paper off her own gifts. Naturally, she didn't stop at the paper: Vanellope wasn't a girl who believed in keeping action figures mint in their boxes, and soon their cartons joined the rest of the wrapping debris littering the floor.

"This guy's even my favourite-- how did you know?"

Not a question that needed answering: obviously, Black Star had talked to her mom Garnet or something. Still, the attention to detail that had gone into the gift impressed her; standing the two figures proudly on the kitchen countertop, Vanellope felt in the package for the third and final item--

She wasn't usually a child to be excited about receiving clothes for Christmas unless they were some pretty darn great clothes. But these... they were just her colour, AND would be perfect for playing out in the snow (and maybe or maybe not hurling snowballs at unsuspecting visitors... if someone was doing that, she wouldn't admit to it being her). Pulling them on right now, despite the fact that she didn't need them indoors, Vanellope flexed her fingers experimentally.

Comfy, warm, and still allowing her a good range of motion? Perfect. She grinned at Black Star, a truly genuine expression.

"Aw, these're... these're all great, I love 'em."

[abyssconqueror]

listened to the do not disturb call again and it really hits me in the chest how sensitive sylus really is beneath all the bravado he has to display as the leader of onychinus

the way he responds when mc jokes abt it being a misdial after he asked if she called to celebrate finishing her workout… the way he just says “oh, i’ll hang up then” which on its own could be his way of messing with her but at least in eng he sounds legitimately a bit deflated abt it… and then “jokes” about how she didn’t check the weather before leaving but managed to turn on do not disturb and he tried to call her all afternoon (and mentions that she’s the only person who ever really calls him). and then it ends with him driving to pick her up and saying he’s not good at nursing sick patients, which to me is a callback to exclusive care when mc was being fussy and told him he sucked and he asked her to teach him

even in smaller ways like if you send the angy emoji and one of his responses is like “the reason you’re angry… it’s not because of me is it?”

it truly makes my chest ache how soft and considerate sylus is, and i’d say genuinely scared too, that he’ll do something to mess it up and end up back in a situation like that in the n109 zone, where she was disgusted by him. even if he knows the circumstances aren’t the same anymore, he also consistently points out that things can always change in the future

it’s just clear in his actions how much he cares abt and treasures his relationship w mc, and how the concept of her pulling away or being upset with him genuinely unnerves him

she was so right to tell him that he wears his heart on his sleeve at the lantern festival bc he really truly does

[stephobrien]

Is your pro-Palestine activism hurting innocent people? Here's how to avoid that.

Note: If you prefer plain text, you can read the plain text version here.

Over the last few days, I’ve had conversations with several Jewish people who told me how hurt and scared they are right now.

To my great regret, some of that pain came from a poorly-thought-out post of mine, which – while not ill-intentioned – WAS hurtful.

And a lot of it came from cruelty they’d experienced at the hands of people who claim to be advocating for Palestine, but are using the very real plight of innocent Palestinians to harm equally innocent Jewish people.

Y’all, we need to do better. (Yes, “we” definitely includes me; this is in no small part a “learn from my fail” post, and also a “making amends” post. Some of these are mistakes I’ve made in the past.)

So if you’re an advocate for Palestine who wants to make sure that your defense of one group of vulnerable people doesn’t harm another, here are some important things to do or keep in mind:

Ask yourself if you’re applying a standard to one group that you aren’t applying to another.

Would you want all white Americans or Canadians to be expelled from America or Canada?

Do you want all Jewish people to be expelled from Israel, as opposed to finding a way to live alongside Palestinian Arabs in peace?

If the answer to those two questions is different, ask yourself WHY.

Do you want to be held responsible for the actions of your nation’s army or government? No? Then don’t hold innocent Jewish people, or Israelis in general (whether Jewish or otherwise), responsible for the actions of the Israeli army and government.

On that subject, be wary of condemning all Israeli people for the actions of the IDF. Large-scale tactical decisions are made by the top brass. Service is compulsory, and very few can reasonably get out of service.

Blaming all Israelis for the military’s actions is like blaming all Vietnam vets for the horrors in Vietnam. They’re not calling the shots. They aren’t Nazis running concentration camps. They are carrying out military operations that SHOULD be criticized.

And do not compare them or ANY JEWISH PERSON to Nazis in general. It is Jewish cultural trauma and not outsiders’ to use against them.

Don’t infuse legitimate criticism with antisemitism.

By all means, spread the word about the crimes committed by the Israeli army and government, and the complicity of their allies. Criticize the people responsible for committing and enabling atrocities.

But if you imply that they’re committing those crimes because they’re Jewish, or because Jewish people have special privileges, then you’re straying into antisemitic territory.

Criticize the crime, not the group. If you believe that collective punishment is wrong, don’t do it yourself.

And do your best to use words that apply directly to the situation, rather than the historical terms for situations with similar features. For example, use “segregation,” “oppression,” or “subjugation,” not “Holocaust” or “Jim Crow.” These other historical events are not the cultural property of Jews OR Palestinians, but also have their own nuances and struggles and historical contexts.

Also, blaming other world events on Jewish people or making Jewish people associated with them (for instance, some people falsely blame Jewish people for the African slave trade) is a key feature of how antisemitism functions.

Please, by all means, be specific and detailed in your critiques. But keep them focused on the current political actors – not other peoples’ or nations’ political or cultural histories and traumas.

Be prepared to accept criticism.

You probably already know that society is infused with a wide array of bigotries, and that people growing up in that environment tend to absorb those beliefs without even realizing it. Antisemitism is no exception.

What that means is, there’s a very real chance that you will screw up, and get called out on it, as I so recently did.

If that happens, please be willing to learn and adapt. If you can educate yourself about the suffering and needs of Palestinians, you can do the same for Jewish people.

Understand that the people you hurt aren’t obligated to baby you. Give them room to be angry.

After I made a post that inadvertently hurt people, some were nice about it, and others weren’t. Some outright insulted my morals and intelligence.

And I had to accept that I’d earned that from them.

I’d hurt them, and they weren’t obligated to be more careful with my feelings than I had been with theirs.

They weren’t obligated to forgive me, trust me, or stop being mad at me right away.

I’ll admit, there were moments when I got defensive. I shouldn’t have. And I encourage you to try not to, if you screw up and hurt people.

I know that’s hard, but it’s important. Getting defensive only tells people you care more about doubling down on your mistake than you do about healing the hurt it caused.

Instead, acknowledge that they have a right to be angry, apologize for the way you hurt them, and try to make amends, while understanding that they don’t owe you trust or forgiveness.

Be aware that some antisemites are using legitimate complaints to “Trojan horse” antisemitism into leftist spaces.

This is a really easy stumbling block to trip over, because most people probably don’t look at every post a creator makes before sharing the one they’re looking at right now.

I recently shared a video that called out some of the Likud and IDF’s atrocities and hypocrisy, and that also noted that many Jewish people are wonderful members of their communities.

I was later informed that, while that video in particular seemed reasonable, the creator behind it is frequently antisemitic.

I deleted the post, and blocked the creator. I encourage you to do the same if it’s brought to your attention that you’ve been ‘Trojan horse’d.

EDIT: Important note about antisemitism in leftist spaces:

While it's true that some blatant antisemites are using seemingly reasonable posts to get their foot in the door of leftist spaces, it's also true that a lot of antisemitism already exists inside those spaces.

This antisemitism is often dressed up in progressive-sounding language, but nonetheless singles Jewish people and places out in ways that aren't applied equally to other groups, or that label Jewish people in ways that portray them as acceptable targets.

If you want to see some specific examples, so you can have a better idea of what to keep an eye out for, I suggest reading this excellent reblog of this post.

Fact-check your doubts about antisemitism.

Depending on which parts of the internet you look at, you’ve probably seen people accused of antisemitism because they complained about the Likud and/or IDF’s actions. So you might be primed to be wary, or feel unsure of how to tell what counts as real antisemitism.

But that doesn’t mean antisemitism isn’t a very real, widespread, and harmful problem. And it doesn’t mean many or even most Jewish people are lying to you or being overly sensitive.

So if someone says something is antisemitic, and you aren’t sure, I encourage you to:

A. Look up the action or thing in question, including its history. Is there an antisemitic history or connotation you aren’t aware of? For best results, include “antisemitic” in your search query, in quotes.

B. Understand that some things, while not inherently antisemitic, have been used by antisemites often enough that Jewish people are understandably wary of them. Schrodinger’s antisemitism, if you will.

C. Ask Jewish people WHO HAVE OFFERED TO HELP EDUCATE YOU. Emphasis on WHO HAVE OFFERED. Random Jewish people aren’t obligated to give you their time and emotional energy, or to educate you – especially on subjects that are scary or painful for them.

@edenfenixblogs has kindly offered her inbox to those who are genuinely trying to learn and do better, and I’ve found her to be very kind, patient, reasonable, and fair-minded.

Understand that this is URGENTLY NEEDED.

In one of my conversations with a Jewish person who’d called me out, they said this was the most productive conversation they’d had with a person with a Palestinian flag in their profile.

THIS IS NOT OKAY.

I didn’t do anything special. All I did was listen, apologize for my mistakes, and learn.

Yes, it feels good to be acknowledged. But I feel like I’ve been praised for peeing IN the toilet, instead of beside it.

Apologizing, learning, and making amends after you hurt people shouldn’t be “the most reasonable thing I’ve heard from a person with a Palestinian flag pfp.”

It should be BASIC DECENCY.

And the fact that it’s apparently so uncommon should tell you how much unnecessary stress and fear Jewish people have been living with because of people who consider themselves defenders of human rights.

By all means, be angry at the Likud, the IDF, and the politicians, reporters, and specific media outlets who choose to enable and cover up for them.

But direct that anger toward the people who deserve it and are in a position to do something about it, not random people who simply happen to be Jewish, or who don’t want millions of people to be turned into refugees when less violent methods of achieving freedom and rights for Palestinians are available.

Stop peeing beside the toilet, people.

[catboybiologist]

Many billionaires in tech bros warn about the dangerous of AI. It's pretty obviously not because of any legitimate concern that AI will take over. But why do they keep saying stuff like this then? Why do we keep on having this still fear of some kind of singularity style event that leads to machine takeover?

The possibility of a self-sufficient AI taking over in our lifetimes is... Basically nothing, if I'm being honest. I'm not an expert by any means, I've used ai powered tools in my biology research, and I'm somewhat familiar with both the limits and possibility of what current models have to offer.

I'm starting to think that the reason why billionaires in particular try to prop this fear up is because it distracts from the actual danger of ai: the fact that billionaires and tech mega corporations have access to data, processing power, and proprietary algorithms to manipulate information on mass and control the flow of human behavior. To an extent, AI models are a black box. But the companies making them still have control over what inputs they receive for training and analysis, what kind of outputs they generate, and what they have access to. They're still code. Just some of the logic is built on statistics from large datasets instead of being manually coded.

The more billionaires make AI fear seem like a science fiction concept related to conciousness, the more they can absolve themselves in the eyes of public from this. The sheer scale of the large model statistics they're using, as well as the scope of surveillance that led to this point, are plain to see, and I think that the companies responsible are trying to play a big distraction game.

Hell, we can see this in the very use of the term artificial intelligence. Obviously, what we call artificial intelligence is nothing like science fiction style AI. Terms like large statistics, large models, and hell, even just machine learning are far less hyperbolic about what these models are actually doing.

I don't know if your average Middle class tech bro is actively perpetuating this same thing consciously, but I think the reason why it's such an attractive idea for them is because it subtly inflates their ego. By treating AI as a mystical act of the creation, as trending towards sapience or consciousness, if modern AI is just the infant form of something grand, they get to feel more important about their role in the course of society. Admitting the actual use and the actual power of current artificial intelligence means admitting to themselves that they have been a tool of mega corporations and billionaires, and that they are not actually a major player in human evolution. None of us are, but it's tech bro arrogance that insists they must be.

Do most tech bros think this way? Not really. Most are just complict neolibs that don't think too hard about the consequences of their actions. But for the subset that do actually think this way, this arrogance is pretty core to their thinking.

Obviously this isn't really something I can prove, this is just my suspicion from interacting with a fair number of techbros and people outside of CS alike.

[qqueenofhades]

been seeing some responses to the many many lawsuits and other actions taken against trumpet and munkfruit that fall along the lines of "this isn't enough, it's already too late, you can't fight fascism with the law, we're all gonna die." i understand the fear, truly, but i'm curious as to your thoughts on it, as to me it seems like this sort of behavior/posting doesn't do much beyond embolden the narrative that everyone actually likes these bastards and they're too powerful to be stopped.

Welp. This is the kind of question that requires me to write a long and complex sociopolitical/critical/historical/Discourse-esque analysis that will take a while and which I am trying to do only selectively, but I'm at home on Saturday morning, I don't have anything else to do right now, and it does present me an opportunity to address some things I've been thinking about. So. We'll give it a shot.

The first thing that has struck me is that in a few short weeks, we're getting a sharp empirical disproving of two common online-leftist fallacies: one, the old "both parties are exactly the same" chestnut, and two, "the only resistance that matters is Violent Glorious Revolution" (which somehow and conveniently never happens). We had months and months of "Biden is just as bad as Trump!!!" being spread as gospel truth in online-leftist circles, and then when Harris took over, it switched just as seamlessly into "Harris is just as bad as [or even worse than] Trump!" Now, as I have said before, there were plenty of legitimate criticisms to make of Biden, particularly the Gaza policy (upon which Harris notably differed). But it's quite telling that the keyboard warriors who spent all of last year howling for The Righteous Punishment of Biden-Harris (regardless that the obvious ancillary consequence was letting Trump come to power) have either disappeared completely when it comes to dealing with the results of that rhetoric, or have switched to "everything is doomed so I guess we shouldn't bother anyway." Like. Trump is now proposing to fully ethnically cleanse Gaza and either blithely hand it over to Israel or build Jared Kushner Beachfront Resort Disneyworld, and what do we hear in protest? For the most part, crickets. These are not serious people. Their opposition is not morally consistent, and it only depends on how they can make themselves look good. I thought that Trump was somehow supposed to be magically better than Biden particularly on the Gaza issue, and that was why it was worth letting him get elected? Or something? Something!?!

I'm curious as to whether those people still legitimately think that Harris would have spent her first few weeks in office dismantling USAID, signing weekly anti-trans executive orders, unleashing ICE across the country and terrorizing immigrant communities, putting the Project 2025 guy in charge of the Office of Management and Budget, letting Elon Musk run rampant with Treasury data, nominating the likes of RFK Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard to Cabinet posts, trying to freeze all federal funding, stripping DEI initiatives, dismantle the Department of Education -- etc. etc. The thing is, as ghoulish as it is, none of this is a surprise, because it is literally what Trump and his people spent the entire presidential campaign loudly, openly, and repeatedly promising to do. However awful they were and are, they were not remotely secret about their intentions. That information was out in the open every time they opened their mouths. But too many people didn't pay attention, rationalized it away, decided that "he won't actually do that" (despite the fact that he launched a literal violent coup attempt on the Capitol the last time he was in office), or just made up their minds that Trump Will Reduce Grocery Prices and refused to listen to any information that countered that view. What do we get now? Trump laughing off the grocery-prices issue and insisting that it's "not a priority" and Musk managing to claim that the real problem is government spending, not corporate greed. Again, this was completely predictable, because y'all got willingly suckered. It was not hard to see it coming.

That said: if the Glorious Online Leftist Revolution is still coming, and by some lights we might now legitimately need it, where the fuck is it? Are they still out there banging the drum against Trump and his "let's ethnically cleanse Gaza" policy and anything else that they insisted, they swore up and down, was functionally equivalent or possibly even marginally better than Biden-Harris getting another term? No. They're either dead silent, offering weak excuses, or completely giving into "we're doomed there's no point fighting back through weak shitlib institutions that are obviously terrible and will fail" blubbering that makes no fucking sense. One, because they move the goalposts so constantly that there's not even any attempt to reckon with the last effects of their damaging bullshit, and two? As I said, where's the fucking Revolution magically coming to save us and install a perfect leftist utopia (which is never how revolutions have ever worked) and sweep away Government Tyranny? Is that only for when a Democrat is in office and you can have confidence that the government is not going to come after you in the middle of the night for talking about it? Now that there's an actual fascist in power, it's somehow too hard to resist at all, even in small, institutional, and everyday ways that are often far more effective at practically confounding the bad stuff instead of empty and useless online echo chambers, so guess we should all just give up??!

Fuck. That.

This is also why we have to talk about the catastrophic lack of information literacy and critical thinking skills in young leftist spaces. A good example is the recent migration of TikTok users to the Chinese app RedNote. It was sweet for a little while as there was cultural exchange and friendship and memes. But then, predictably, it dove hard into "ah, once again The Evil US Government Has Lied To Us and there are no problems at all in China!" I have seen posts float by on my dash that unironically claim this is the case and China is truly great and Americans should want to move there and clearly all that business about authoritarian control and mass repression was just a ruse by, again, The Evil US Government. If you are so utterly devoid of basic information literacy and research abilities that your standard of proof for "is the Chinese government repressively authoritarian and totalitarian" is "a random Chinese person on an app in a country where the Internet is viciously controlled and voicing the slightest criticism can make you disappear told me that it isn't," then for Christ's fucking sake, you need help. For one, it wasn't just the US government saying this. It was, y'know, Chinese dissidents, the entire nation of Taiwan, historians, academics, researchers, the Uyghur Muslims of Xinjiang, etc etc. If your only standard for believing or supporting anything is "the opposite of what the US government thinks," then you are perfect targets for authoritarianism. Hey, a person living under an authoritarian regime who will punish them if they speak out against it told me everything was fine! Clearly there's nothing to worry about and we should want it here in America!

Come on. Come on.

This is also the case because uneducated young leftists like to unironically label themselves "communists" or "Marxist-Leninists" as if it's cool and hip and has never been involved in anything problematic in all of history, so anything that calls itself that must be supported. Shoutout to the idiot in my notes recently who reblogged a several-year-old post just to shout at me about how historical communists NEVER worked with or collaborated with fascists, because something something The Communists Were The Pure Shining Good Guys! (Uh, nobody tell them about the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.) Clearly, the Chinese Communist Party is good and beneficial, end of story, no more criticism or caution needed! Obviously, yes, official American policy toward China has often been driven by basic Sinophobia, and the determination that nobody can change American hegemony or unipolarity or its ability to call the shots how it pleases. But if that is the literally only criteria you're using, then yeah. If you're so unaware that "the Chinese people are ordinary human beings" and "the Chinese government is repressive and authoritarian" are statements that can and in fact do coexist, then apparently you've missed the situation you're in right now, where "the American people are ordinary human beings" and "the American government is repressive and authoritarian" is also the case. Because online leftism is essentially devoid of a consistent moral principle and will just blithely switch up to support Bad Things as long as they're being done by governments with the correct ideological label, here we are.

Anyway. This is getting long, but the main takeaway is that the "all resistance against Trump is doomed and I guess we just gotta die :(" line is now, somehow, often coming from the same people who were constantly yelling that the only hope was a Glorious Revolution against Biden-Harris, and it is somehow even stupider. So you'll trumpet about Gloriously Overthrowing The Government all the day long as long as a Democrat is in office, but the instant a Republican gets in there instead and starts acting like an actual fascist, welp, time to just shut up and accept our doom and not even bother to struggle? Please tell me how any of that makes sense. Especially when actively confounding the Trump/Musk Axis of Evil is already working. There is also the fact that the establishment-media types are supporting this narrative for reasons of their own; witness the fact that the entire US corporate media is owned by oligarchs who hastened to bend the knee and pledge fealty to Trump 2.0. They obviously also have a reason for inculcating hopelessness in you, and that the only recourse is to shut up, accept it, and let them continue to rob you blind. Because American democracy will never matter as much as money, power, and control for the Billionaire Bros.

The point is: this is a bad-faith narrative on all sides. Whether it's coming from the online leftists in their latest head-spinningly hypocritical volte-face, the oligarch-owned corporate media that wants to feed you constant Bad News to keep you clicking and worried and distracted and unable to resist, the Trumpist power that wants people to quit making this pesky stink about all their authoritarian fascist adventures, or anyone else. There is nobody who has your best interests at heart if they are telling you that everything is doomed and the only thing to do is lie down and take it. There is no logical reason you should listen to them. Go forth and keep resisting, in whatever way presents itself. Those cumulative small actions are far more effective than any Splendid Revolution that never, ever materializes, while the people who preach it just sit back and whine about how things are so bad now so clearly they couldn't. Shut up.

It is always important. It always matters. It will make a difference.

Courage, etc.

[potofsoup]

i love your fourth of july comics every year but this years feels extremely optimistic about biden’s abilities in the face of him letting roe get overturned and funding a gen*cide at worst or letting it happen at best by taking the bare minimum of regulatory action… i mean can he really be trusted at all anymore to do the right thing or act in line with the people’s demands? and how do we know the people behind project 2025 won’t just rig the election again to get in under false pretenses?

Hihi! Thank you for reading and enjoying my July 4th comics every year! I am in a non-US airport en route to a month-long trip in a place with sketchy internet, so sorry in advance for sloppiness in my response (and potentially going radio silent).

But:

I don't think he "let" Roe get overturned, since that was the Supreme Court's overwhelming conservative majority, which really started with Mitch McConnell refusing to approve Obama's appointee and forcing it into a 2016 election issue. The fact that Trump got to appoint 3 Supreme Court Justices is what got us here.

Re: Biden and the Israel/Hamas war ... on the one hand, there's definitely more that he could have done, but on the other hand, they are a whole other country over there. It's Hamas that initiated the Oct 7 attacks and took the hostages. It's Netanyahu and his right-wing government who decided to retaliate to such extreme extent. Biden can talk about how he would really like Netanyahu to stop fighting and step down, but at the end of the day that's not his call, any more than he can stop the Sudan fighting that is near-genocidal either.

So, to come to your question #1: "Can he really be trusted at all anymore to do the right thing or act in line with the people’s demands"?

For me, it's a resounding YES. Guyz, he has passed so much good domestic policies. My spouse works in green energy and the passing of the Inflation Reduction Act halved his anxiety and gave him legitimate hope. The tumblr post I linked to in my comic has links to many of the other great things that Biden has done. Tbh I voted for him in 2020 because "a moldy onion is still better than Trump", and I've been pleasantly surprised. Like how he tried to cancel student loans, the Supreme Court overturned it, and then he came back 6 months later with a different way to do it that didn't lead to a court challenge.

Is he perfect? Hell no. There's tons of stuff that I wish he did more about, or he went further on, but also he's just one guy heading one branch of government who is heading into an election year. (Just like FDR promising not joining WWII, while behind the scenes doing all the Lend-Lease Act stuff). And "the people" have lots of demands, many of them conflicting.

I'd also like to push at the unspoken part of your question... "Can he really be trusted to do the right thing..." compared to whom? Because right now the answer is "compared to Trump." And compared to Trump... I don't even trust Trump to respect the results of a legitimate election. Heck, he might just take his favorite state secrets, sell them to the highest bidder (or just show them off to someone for funzies), and then claim Presidential immunity. A decent Democrat who got stuff done vs someone who probably wants to pardon himself and all his friends and do Project 2025 stuff is not even on the same level. (Do I wish that there was a viable Democratic alternative to Biden? Sure! But who?) Heck, at this point -- imagine if it's Kamala Harris vs. Trump. Who would you vote for?

As for your question #2: "How do we know the people behind project 2025 won’t just rig the election again to get in under false pretenses?"

We don't. But also what can we do besides showing up to vote?

Actually, I need bullet points for this:

The 2022 midterm elections brought in fewer-than-expected election-deniers into crucial electoral offices at the state level, which means that hopefully most state electoral boards will continue to have integrity

Yes, voting is harder but at least we can still vote. So it's about getting out there and getting your vote counted. For some states, it involves waiting in 8 hour lines. For some states, it involves bringing 2 forms of ID. Document. Track. Make sure it's dropped off in a real ballot box and not a fake one. Don't believe messaging that the voting is happening on a different day or location, etc.

A 50.1% majority is easily challenged. A 55% majority, less so. Which means getting people out to vote.

The more people know about and think about the reality of a second Trump term (versus being disappointed by a Biden term), the more they will be motivated to vote against Trump.

Finally, let's be real here: I'm braced for a 2nd Trump term. That said:

I'm still going to go and vote for Biden, because the only way to prevent a 2nd Trump term is to vote.

A Trump term where either the House or Senate is controlled by the Democrats will be *very* different from a clean Republican sweep.

Even with a clean Republican sweep on the federal level, States have so much more power now, and voting the state level stuff will help shore up Democratic goals for the future. States get to draw voting districts however they want. States get to decide on abortion policies. If you live in a deep Red state, there still might be things to vote for that make it easier to live in now, and turn it purple a few elections down the line.

So at the end of the day, it's "Vote AND". Vote and keep living your best life. Vote and tell others about Project 2025. Vote and have hope. Even if Trump wins, at least you'll have voted against him. Vote and stay to build up a progressive wave for the next election.

[sayruq]

The Joe Biden administration will work with Congress on possible sanctions against the International Criminal Court after its prosecutor announced it was seeking arrest warrants for senior Israeli and Hamas officials, US secretary of state Antony Blinken said on Tuesday. Congressional Republicans have signalled they plan to introduce legislation that will impose costs on the court for its decision and are expected to force a vote on a measure that could lay bare the divisions with the Democrats over the Israel-Hamas war. Jim Risch, the top Republican on the Senate foreign relations committee, asked Blinken at a hearing whether he would support legislation to counter “the ICC sticking its nose in the business of countries that have an independent, legitimate democratic judicial system”. Risch said he and other members were working on legislation to address the court’s actions, which he described as “wrong-headed”. Blinken’s openness to bipartisan co-operation over the ICC is a sign of the level of anger in Washington over its request for arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and defence minister Yoav Gallant. Blinken told the committee that while the “devil’s in the details”, the Biden administration would consider Republican proposals and “take it from there”. Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. “We want to work with you on a bipartisan basis to find an appropriate response,” Blinken said.The administration of Donald Trump in 2020 sanctioned top ICC officials in response to their efforts to investigate alleged US war crimes in Afghanistan. The sanctions were lifted by the Biden administration in 2021, although at the time it said it was opposed to the court’s actions relating to Afghanistan and the Palestinian territories.

[mythtakens]

question. do some people know that you are meant to be able to recognize that when characters are having a knee jerk emotional response, it does not automatically define who they are? I’m actually not even trying to be condescending rn I’m asking genuinely out of concern. it feels like some people legitimately do not know. that you are generally not supposed to watch a character in a vulnerable place respond with pettiness or anger or defensiveness etc towards another character and immediately conclude that they are either totally justified and innocent and correct or completely selfish and irredeemable and abhorrent. like do you know that you are not supposed to completely divorce words and actions from context and history when you are watching something? please know

[mossadspypigeon]

I saw someone talk about how they broke out of the “antizionist” echo chamber so here’s my story about it!

Cracks started when the college encampments did. Even that deep in I still felt very uncomfortable with, yk, hoards of Ivy League students (and professors!!) chasing Jews out of schools. Even that deep in my brain still recognized Heh, What The Fuck (surprise, propaganda does not deprive a person of moral integrity or responsibility!). I ended up logging off tumblr and the other online spaces I was in. One could call it a detox. Touching grass. Best decision of my life. When I came back, I found @/rootsmetals on Instagram. She is amazing. For people you don’t know her: she talks about Jewish history and current events and boy does she bring receipts. After her, I started looking at a ton of other Jewish influencers (that feels like a weird title but idk what else to call it), and MAN I am so happy I did. Moral clarity and consistency is amazing. Now I’m going into anthropology, and I really want to study in Israel- beautiful place and people, and god DAMN is Jewish history impressive.

Trying to use the arguments/methods that worked on me- I also hope I can do that to teach gentiles actual Israeli history cuz there is a DIRE shortage of facts about Israel in… basically everyone. For example: people have a hard time grasping the idea that calling Jews Nazis is antisemitic, so here’s the explanation I’ve found works the best; Nazism without Jew-hatred is not Nazism. There are plenty of other words for what is left over, but NOT Nazism. Holocaust education has been horrifyingly whitewashed to make it as little about Jews as possible and to make people feel less guilty, and now we’re in a society that Holocaust survivors say is way too similar to the 1930s. Jews cannot be Nazis because Nazis are inherently violent antisemites.

mainstream leftism needs to get tf over itself. Surprise, the world is not black and white. They try so hard to fight the Middle East into their fucking Democrat/republican oppressed/oppressor bullshit. Sometimes they remind me of Christian Nationalists with how much they want to be persecuted. Pushing American politics is a) fucking stupid and b) how is it NOT racist?? Like, you’re willfully ignoring the Actual Lives of Actual Middle Eastern people so that you can talk about them how you talk about fucking Long Island, cuz you can’t handle learning anything new. And you’re saying you’re antiracist. Also, I think Westernizing/Americanzing also relates to all the genocide claims. Americans (+ Westerners) have not been in an actual war in ages. Especially not one on their own soil, where people want to destroy them. There is not memory or experience of that in American/Western consciousness, which has left a dire misunderstanding as to how war works. War is horrible. It’s bloody and cruel and heartbreaking, because it’s war. You can be sad for suffering that’s happening in war without lying about history or the law. All that does is make you sound like an idiot and make your “cause” sound less and less legitimate. (Especially when the found of your “cause” was besties with Hitler!!)

I try to be civil to the ones who aren’t horrible and put cracks in their mindset, but… Jesus Christ. Most of them are stupid on purpose. I have never met people so willfully ignorant. See: the apartheid claims. All their examples are about people who… aren’t in Israel?? That’s like saying Mexico is an apartheid to Americans. They’re DIFFERENT COUNTRIES???

Also: their actions have consequences. Besides the GIGANTIC rise in antisemitic hate crimes (which really should be the prime example, but the world’s decided they don’t care too many times)… most of the shit they’re saying HURTS the people they’re “trying” to defend. “Jews aren’t indigenous cuz they were in wherever” so indigeneity stops when you get murdered and kicked out of your land? Is that what you’re saying? When’s the cut off, two massacres or three massacres? They sound like “oh well the Cherokee have been here for millennia but MY family has been here for four whole generations, after my great-grandpa killed a bunch of them”. They claim they’re “anticolonial anti-imperialists” and then help what is arguably the most successful colonial empire (I mean hello, the audacity and confidence you have to have to call yourself indigenous to a place named for the people you’re killing when the place you ARE from is still named after you??? Arabia anyone??). And they’re not only hurting Jewish rights, but the rights of all the other indigenous peoples of MENA- Amazigh, Druze, Samaritans, etc. They just use whatever words they want. “Genocide” isn’t a fun trivia word, it’s a fucking LEGAL WORD. ALSO they like to say “every accusation is a confession” and it’s just… that’s projecting bro. There’s so many examples, but I think the best is: “Jewish independence is a racist genocidal movement” and they say that cuz their’s IS. They do know that they’re supporting a genocide that the “Palestinian cause” has been trying to do for decades, they will just only admit it when they’re trying to frame Jews for it.

ALSO ALSO… the fucking racism of low expectations. “What did you expect them to do?” about Oct 7. Idk, maybe NOT mass rape people??? I’ve literally heard people say that it’s “their tradition”…. WHAT? How is it not racist as fuck to sum up someone’s “culture” as murder-rape-violence? If I keep going I won’t stop but… listen to the podcast Jew Wanna Talk’s episode Queers for Palestine: Beyond Chickens for KFC. They explain it better than I can.

I got way off-topic and this got kind of convoluted but… yeah. People need to take responsibility for themselves even if it’s uncomfortable. Suck it up. Also, learn the literal basics of antisemitism before you call the 1 Jewish country “pedophilia heaven-murder town where they eat all the Good Babies”, cuz you sound like a Nazi. Or Roman. Or Soviet. Or Medieval. Or [insert other antisemite here].

and shout out to josh_a on Instagram, he’s a legend. And Dara Horn.

Sending love from Canada ❤️ Am Yisrael Chai 💛💛

every single bit of this!!! go off!!

👏👏👏

be proud of yourself!!! it’s hard to break out of these patterns and cycles and you did it!!

i did anthro/archaeology and jewish studies ahhh i’m excited you want to do anthro and study in israel!! 💙💙

[shouts-into-the-void]

Just read screenshots of the Aaron extra chapter and I have so many thoughts, so here they are:

It's always so funny to me to be reminded of the fact that the animosity between Aaron and Neil is mostly one-sided. Like, Neil finds Aaron frustrating, but all the antagonistic stuff he does to him is ultimately in service of helping him in some way and while he's angry when Aaron provokes him, he otherwise regards him with disinterest and even expresses the desire to see what he's like when he's relaxed and enjoying himself during the party with the Vixens. Meanwhile Aaron just really hates that man.

I really appreciated Nora using this chapter to clear up some of the gripes a lot of the fandom has had with Aaron's character in the past and confirm that Aaron's comments to Nicky have to do with his cousin making graphic and unwanted sexual advances on their teammates, and his accusations towards Neil were from a place of concern for his brother. I also liked that it was pointed out that of course he would have at least some internalized homophobia due to being raised by religious zealots in a conservative area, but is unlearning it due to Nicky.

On a similar note, I'm glad that we were provided the context that Nicky's inappropriate behavior is a defense mechanism to weed out people who might hurt him rather than legitimate advances, because I think the fandom tends to forget that he is also a character with extreme trauma written outside of the "perfect victim" stereotype. His actions aren't okay, but the entire point is that they are the result of what he's had to endure just like every other member of the team

The implication that Andrew specifically signed with the Foxes so Aaron could go to college

Aaron and Andrew have the same nervous habit of picking at loose thread

It causes me physical pain to see Andrew clearly trying to open up to Aaron about his self-harm, but because his way of communicating is less straightforward (he doesn't lie, but he because he stuggles to confront and be open with his emotions, he presents the truth in flowery, vague language) and because the two dont really know or understand each other, Aaron can't fully grasp the implications of what he's saying

On the subject of things that cause me physical pain: baby Aaron telling his mom that he wanted to be a neurosurgeon like the people on TV and her laughing and saying he'd never make anything of himself. Fuck Tilda Minyard, all my homies hate Tilda.

Andrew is so uncomfortable, someone Get Him Out of There.

Going off that and his nervous habits (that Aaron mentions he did often enough to be noticable as a habit premedication), I am highkey wondering if the reason Sober Andrew doesn't talk to anyone outside Neil is because he's just. Socially Awkward.

We get a little bit of insight into Andrew's "misogyny" (I personally think distrusting certain people as a result of extreme personal trauma is a little bit different than just being sexist, in the same way women distrusting men because they're used to being harassed and belittled isn't misandry, but that's up to your personal opinion) and that his distain for Katelyn comes from the fact that he thinks she's stringing Aaron along and will turn out to be awful like his previous girlfriends (there's also a notable implication that Aaron has the same self-destructive tendencies as Andrew, and may be why he went out of his way to get him into college and on the straight-and-narrow) also see that this extends to Bee as well despite their close relationship, with him being so afraid that she'd reject him for being gay that he can't even look at her while talking about Neil, probably made worse by the fact that she's a maternal figure for him, which is where this trauma response originates.

Aaron is the only person on the team who's aware that Andrew hasn't slept with Neil, and the only one to grasp the significance of the fact that they've gotten close to that point already despite Andrew's trauma, outside of Renee

It was overall really interesting to see inside Aaron's head (I actually wouldn't mind a book from his perspective, he has a similar way of thinking to Neil but much more grounded) and to see Andrew through the lense of someone who just views him as Just A Guy

[just-some-user-hunny]

Yandere team green and bastard!reader

(Alicent edition)

. At your initial arrival, Alicent is filled with mortification. Her lips thinned, tongue held between her teeth, doe brown eyes wide and stern as she stands by her husband's side and awaits for the scolding Daemon is about to receive. To return you at once, as you should have no place in the castle walls. However she's not met with any of that- and she's both furious and offended by Viserys's standoffish acceptance of you.

Even Rhaenyra takes you into her arms, which adds salt to the wound. She wished she could shriek at her husband- to demand an explanation of his actions. Another bastard roams the halls, whilst you all turn a blind eye. I have legitimate heirs, whilst you treat them like air. So it's safe to say she's not terribly happy about your arrival.

The grand echoing hall was filled with the hushed whispers and murmurs as the grand wooden doors were heaved open in the snowy haired princes arrival- gossiping hushed voice arose like a tide amongst the people as Daemon swaggered in with his chin held high and mighty. All with a wailing, kicking child held firmly under his arm like they were a wild alley cat. His expression was unreadable, yet fierce.

Everyone fell still at the sight. Rhaenyra's face pales, her palm settling upon her naval in shock, and viserys simply gawks a little in confusion upon his seat at the iron throne. Jace and Luke shuffle closer to their mother.

"Daemon, what is the meaning of this?", viserys commands. Alicent squeezes her children's shoulders, tucking a young curious Helaena into her side, and a scrunched-brow Aegon behind her. Aemond is unreadable. She casts her husband a wary look, which goes unnoticed.

"I am returning my child home, brother. That is all".

"that is all?" Rhaenyra speaks up. Her voice trembles a little in anger. But her eyes fall upon you, and her expression immediately softens.

Viserys seems to be in deep thoughts, his brow crinkles, before he sighs deeply in defeat.

"bring them closer, let me see".

Alicent shoots him a look. Yet again, she goes unnoticed.

Your feet drag across the floor a little as you're forced to the foot of the throne. The hundreds of peering eyes that leer above you make you squirm and fall silent, afraid, and the courtroom is uncomfortably silent now, it seems everyone is holding their breath awaiting for the kings say. The man- Daemon, you've learnt, stands behind you like a wall. Your back pressed to the front of his legs, and his gloved hands squeezing your shoulders to keep you still.

You look upon the pale haired man who sits upon the frightening looking throne, which seems to be made from an accumulation of soldered swords. Jagged and glinting in the pale sunlight that streams through the tall windows. Your little head is still confused and overwhelmed, but the crown upon his brow confirms to you that this man who is inspecting you must be an important king.

"Hello, little one". Viserys greets you in a soft hushed voice, as if not to startle you.

You find yourself silently staring back at him, still wary. He looks you over- amethyst eyes glancing across the features of your face, before leaning back into his jagged throne.

"she has your eyes". Viserys simply remarks, a softened smile appears upon his face. Daemon smiles back, taut lipped and eyes glinting like embers. Pleased by his brother's response.

You're ushered quickly afterwards towards the pale haired woman who stands close, two dark haired boys hiding behind her with their mousy doe eyes and cherub faces. You don't particularly want to be touched by strangers right now, but her gentle touch upon your shoulder gives you a little comfort- a stark contrast to your new father's possessive iron grip. She shares a look with him, the two seemingly having a conversation with their eyes alone, but she folds you close to her regardless.

Alicent watches, burning. Eyes, throat, stomach. Churning and boiling.

. Alicent is distant and leering at the beginning. She watches you get coddled and swaddled up by Rhaenyra, her boys tending to you with their little faces and hands. Petting your hair, clumsily wiping away tears, and sharing their toys with you. She struggles with the reality that you are accepted by the king, discontent churning in her stomach.

. She does all she can to avoid you- even going as far to dissuade her children from interacting with you. At the dinner table, she treats you like you are invisible. In the day, she tugs Helaena away after she spots you two in the garden lifting rocks to watch bugs together, and she finds herself glaring at Rhaenyra and Daemon more often than usual.

. However, it is inevitable for her to fall into a maddening descent to ultimately adore you too. No matter how coldly she treats you, you always seem to peer up at her with your big mousy eyes back. Always in soft curiosity. She watches the way you treat helaena so kindly, the two little girls always seemingly playing in their own world and gently handing spiders to one another to save them from getting swatted in the throne room. She also finds herself growing more and more distraught whenever she catches Aegon tormenting you for your lineage, swatting and scolding him whenever he pulls your hair and calls you a bastard. She often finds herself wondering why. She should despise you, hate your very existence in this family, and yet she cannot find herself to.

. Perhaps it is because you too have very little autonomy and freedom in the scenario. Her heart aches whenever she sees you pressing your little face to the glass panes of windows, yearning to capture a glimpse of the oceans horizon. Or scrambling at locked doors and gates to escape, blubbered sobs leaving you as you call for your mother.

. The moment she finally gave into her yandere thoughts is when you bump into her one day, your ornate silk dress and shoes wet and worn down to scrap, running from a knight. You're an inconsolable wreck, having just been carried back in by a fretful knight after catching you bolt out of an unlocked gate outside in the courtyard. He had just been able to catch you once you were knee-deep in seafoam, crying and sobbing to go home.

With your little face buried into her emerald green skirts, she wryly dismisses the guard.

She hesitates, contemplating, before scooping you up from under your arms to hold you like a crying babe. You whimper and sob into her soft coils of chestnut hair, little hands scrambling to cling to her like she were a life raft.

"I want- I want my mummy".

. It was like her breath had frozen in her body. Mummy. You want your mummy.

Emotion swept through her at your words, her own waterline stinging. She understood now. You're trapped here, just like she is. Your mother is gone, just like hers.

Her breath stutters out in a long breath to steady herself, before she cradles the back of your head and tucks you closer. Your little legs cling around her waist as she soothes into your hair, uttering a soft "I know".

Me too.

. After that occurrence, and finding herself reluctant to hand you over to Rhaenyra once the fretful woman found you two, her view of you changed. She no longer ignored you at the dining table, often sending you kind and remorseful glances, her thumb brushing over your cheek tenderly. Tension grows thick between her and Rhaenyra, but she lets it linger. If it means she gets to speak and spend time with you, then let their little war go on longer.

. She often encourages playdates between Heleana and you, along with reading and language lessons with Aemond. Aegon, to her disheartenment, seems to want nothing but to torment you and keep your attention to himself- no matter if it's positive or negative attention. Aegon is often slapped and scolded whenever he treats you poorly, torn into with her protective and scorning words.

"You are not to touch her Aegon, do you understand? ' she'll scold, grabbing him by the ear as he hides away into himself like a door mouse and meekly nods. His eyes burning with tears as he watches you walk away hand in hand with Helaena, Aemond following close by your side.

. Alicent is keen to spoil you for attention, as well as Rhaenyra is. They both want you as their own. Alicent is keen to gift you beautifully ornate leather books with emerald green ink lettering and intricate illustrations, finding delight in your reactions when she gifts them to you herself. She may even gift you a stead of your own, despite Rhaenyra's or daemons dislike for the thought of you on a horse. She'll attempt to convince viserys to have you be allowed to learn to ride horseback on the grounds alongside her sons, just to give you a taste of 'freedom'. Although she may condemn your freedom, hypocrisy at its finest, she still wants to make you as happy as possible. It's also a way for her to make you get along with her children, using you almost as a tool to cement herself a safe standing within the family. You get along so well with them, after all. It'd be a tragedy to tear you away from Helaena, the poor girl will cry for months if that were to happen.

. So although it is a rocky start with Alicent, she eventually softens to you because how can she not? She sees a part of herself in you and grows protective and enraptured. The tension between her and Rhaenary thickens because of it, and it brings a growing conflict between the greens and blacks over where you stand. Eventually you may grow overwhelmed and tired of the war and the fighting and miscommunication and revenge, that you may ultimately take off on your dragon and disappear. Another name in the history books, your whereabouts a mystery, and your name a myth. But we may see where you end up eventually, and where you stand in the dance of the dragons is up to you.

A lot of these headcanons are based early on in season one. I'd like the reader to appear around the time that Daemon married Rhaenyra, so that they'd both be your parents in this scenario, and alicent would be a godmother figure to you. I'm still figuring out the timezone that the reader appears in considering the events that take place, like Aemond losing his eye, so I'd love to hear suggestions!

[cowboysanddragons23]

While the Van der Linde gang is an outlaw gang, it operates more as a cult:

-Zero tolerance for criticism and questions: Dutch can't stand when someone questions or doubts him (ex. When John starts questioning him at Clemens Point, Dutch tells him that doubting means the end, aka weakness and forces him to say "Yes, Dutch." or when Uncle calls him out in a humorous manner, he threatens to kill him under the guise of following the joke).

-A belief that former followers are always wrong for leaving and there is never a legitimate reason to leave: Javier and Bill call John and Arthur traitors for abandoning them and Dutch, even though it was clear that Dutch was losing his sanity, he was going to get them all killed and both of them were trying to salvage what's left of the gang, a train of thought that lasts even after the gang disbanded.

-Lack of meaningful financial disclosure regarding money: Dutch constantly prattles about the fact that they need more money and at one point, he hid a box of money in one of the gang's hideouts.

-Abuse of members: While Dutch is not physically abusive of members, he is an abuser of the psychological variant (ex. When Molly raises legitimate concerns about how he is ignoring her and not paying her attention, he always dismisses her as delusional, even outright saying "I never met a woman with so many needs.")

-Absolute authoritarianism without accountability: If there is one thing that Dutch shows the most is his inability to take responsibility for his actions (ex. When he blames John for being the reason why the Saint Denis Bank heist went wrong, accusing him of being a rat, even though the main reason it went wrong was because Dutch was too reckless with his robberies to the trolley station and the boat, along with his kidnapping and killing of Angelo Bronte, the most powerful man of Saint Denis).

-Unreasonable fears about the outside world that involve evil conspiracies and persecution: Dutch fears civilization because it represents everything he hates and instills very irrational fears amongst them (ex. When Dutch tells John the law chases them because the gang represents everything they fear, yet ironically, after the gang disbands, Tilly has a happy life married to a lawyer and John has a normal life as a member of society).

-Cult of personality: The most obvious one. Dutch is seen like a father and a messiah amongst the gang (ex. In Red Dead Redemption, John tells Reyes that Dutch saved him, Bill and Javier.)

-Illegal and dangerous behaviour: The van der Linde are a gang of outlaws at first, but they ended up becoming the Wild West equivalent of domestic terrorists, with their attacks on the Cornwall Train, the Saint Denis Bank, a US Army Train....

-Charismatic leader: Dutch oozes charisma anytime he speaks, albeit of the superficial kind that has an iron hand on the people of his gang, which Kieran lampshades.

-Us VS Them mentality: Dutch enforced a very black and white view about their enemies, even outright admits so when he killed Bronte ("It is us or him.").

-Isolation and love-bombing: Once again, Molly is the biggest victim of this, with Dutch charming her into going with him and making her feel isolated on the gang, in order for her to depend on him and him alone.

-Time and energy: In the camp, you are expected to upgrade Dutch's tent first before upgrading the rest of the camp. And Dutch demands that money is put on the box, yet he himself never contributes to the box.

[monstercangirlofficial]

People have to understand that, as soon as you are in a callout, you are marked, and are labelled with a discrediting attribute that you're burdened with. This reduces and delegitimazes your voice and your ability to be trusted and interacted with, leading to being ostracized and excluded. That is the point of the callout. After being marked and labelled, those who aren't stigmatized will avoid contact with the "stigma bearer." When marked, anytime the stigma bearer is recognized, they generate a response of aversion and disgust in those who have seen or are aware of the callout, which they rationalize and justify through the notion that those who receive callouts "deserved it"

This way, the stigma is seen by others as transferable by association and as a threat that's understood as a fair and legitimate reason to keep a safe distance, as to avoid becoming a stigma bearer. When those who aren't associated, and are sufficiently separated from the stigma bearer, support and defend the stigmatized, they become "infected" by association. But, those directly marked will always be affected the most, as they're exposed first and more widely. When labelled as a stigma bearer, the perception of you being unsafe is spread around as a warning, which is done under the guise of maintaining the safety and sanctity of the community

People don't even have to believe in the callout for the stigma to work. They don't even have to see the original post, if others relay the information through other means. Once the stigma is created, it stays almost permanently. When the callout has been around for long enough misinformation will also become easier to spread, as the original source is harder to track, and it becomes "common knowledge." It may even become in fuel for another callout, creating a history or track record, as "they were already called out before." This is why the callout is inherently effective. The callout is designed to be a weapon first, making sure it damages and stigmatizes the "brand" of a user. This way, their url, name, mutuals, posts and even profile picture bear the stigma

This policing of "bad actors" is weaponized to get rid of those that are undesirable within the community, and callouts are used against those that are marginalized, as they usually lack the social resources to retaliate, and because they're seen as "reasonably capable" of doing what they're accused of. Those that divert from the norm are also the most likely to be in risk of suffering real life consequences when separated from their communities and support nets, and callouts are intentionally made to socially murder them and their brand. This is why these warnings are shared "just in case," so people can feel morally righteous for defending the community, as it is easier than taking tangible actions to stop actual issues

Callout post are designed and intentionally spread to socially murder others, and the more likely the targets are believed to be guilty, the more effective the callout post is. People will only jump to defend targets of callouts when they're sure they're innocent (which you can only know if you personally know who's being targeted). But nobody deserves callout posts, and thinking that people who are guilty deserve them too, perpetuates this problem, and is part of the reason why callouts are so effective. Callouts don't stop abusers or abuse

Evidence will be fabricated, people will lie, spread rumors, and things will be blown out of proportions, but, even if the accusations are real, ask yourself what narrative a callout is fabricating. People making callouts know that most victims of them haven't actually harmed anyone, so they instead paint them as groups that "have the potential to harm others." You're left to fill in the blanks with whatever morally repugnant thing they could've done. Just the suggestion of possible fault and wrongdoing will make most people react with aversion and disgust, and this is enough to turn a target into a stigma bearer. People will avoid them, because the feeling of rejection is strong enough to rationalize stigma bearers as abusers

The weaponization of "the truth" is also an issue in itself. People making callouts will lie, and then it's on the stigma bearer to prove that's a lie, but only to their audience. It's also specially difficult for a stigma bearer, because they have to prove they didn't do something, and how do you prove you didn't do it when your voice is being put into question by the callout? Once the callout is out there, any statement in it will be taken at face value and spread, unless challenged or ignored. Focusing on "what parts are true" is also a weapon of the callout, as the debate of the validity of a callout also helps it to spread, as stigma bearers want to clear their names, but this leads to curiosity in onlookers, which spreads the stigma

When you're targeted by a callout post (and survive the social isolation), you don't learn a lesson, you don't grow, you're not allowed to change and be reintroduced to your community. It doesn't matter if you're innocent or guilty, because people don't even have to believe a callout post in order to act on the implicit call to action and harassment. If others consider you a danger you will be isolated and bullied, sometimes to the point of suicide, and the people who decided to target you will consider this a victory. Callouts aren't interested in rehabilitation and growth, they're not interested in questioning the institutions and contexts that allow for the abuse of power and real harm to be done. Callouts are a means for quickly obtaining social capital for removing "bad actors" and keeping the community "clean"