masterjack42

[masterjack42]

"was Kamala actually “incredibly bad and offered zero of the things the people wanted or cared about”, though? she did receive 75 million votes, that’s not nothing."

It is sort of nothing.

Joe Biden in 2020 was the single most popular candidate in America history, he received 81 million votes. A staggering jump from Hillary's 65 million in 2016. In addition, Donald Trump in 2020 received 74 million votes. 2020 had the highest turnout in US electoral history by raw numbers.

There are always party loyalists who vote for whoever is running, but blowing a lead like that does suggest that many people who cared enough to vote in 2020 either no longer cared enough to vote or actively turned against the democrats. It's an anomaly only explainable by an exceptionally weak candidate.

yes, the Democrats ran a bad and confused campaign, and Kamala wasn't even the focus of it until way too late in the game, and she was an unpopular nonentity for much of the Biden administration, which certainly didn't help.

but it's still interesting to look at what makes people say you know what, let's try that Trump guy again, he didn't manage to tariff the entire world and deport all the Mexicans last time but maybe if he has four more years-- like it's interesting to think about what they might have wanted and whether or not they got it.

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[masterjack42]

hating is fun but sometimes you see someone only ever be a hater and never a lover and it's like. ok well do you like anything at all or do you only see the world in shades of bad to worse

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you have to be able to defend people who are receiving unjust treatment even if they annoy you even if you personally find them extremely annoying you still have to be able to stand up and say "well thats fucked up"

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early 20th century qaraqalpaq costume

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Some sketches I did of a Kazakh OC named Ashina. Her design was inspired by Otoyomegatari as well as Turkic/Central Asian culture

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Friendly reminder that you're not required to publicly take sides in any geopolitical conflict you don't understand.

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Batu Khan the founder of the Golden Horde

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No thoughts head empty just Genshin OCs and A Witch’s Life in Mongol 😔

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Fatima(Sitara) from A Witch's Life in Mongol

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Fatima(Sitara) from A Witch's Life in Mongol

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hard cider was invented when someone decided to make beer that tastes good instead of bad

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'Have you been listening at the door, Edgar?'

Getting this down before the saltburn director takes a huge dump on the book.

[masterjack42]

ok im going to #seriouspost for a second here. I don't think Harry Potter is a manifesto. I think it was a flawed passion project that millennials latched onto because of the fantasy of sticking it to their mean teachers and arbitrarily categorizing themselves (hogwarts houses; it's the thinking millennial's astrology). I think the fact that the series got popular when and how it did was very much a product of its time.

I don't think Harry Potter is the biggest symbol of JKR's bigotry. I think the most flagrant sign of that was how she responded to critics. I watched her become radicalized in real time. I watched how she doubled down on her racism when she was called out for the ways she promoted her tragically mid fantastic beasts movies. I watched her chase marginalized teenagers with a double digit follower count off of twitter for daring to criticize her thought process, and no one with any kind of power standing against her because she was the one who was paying them. This isn't to say Harry Potter is without flaws. This is to say she really didn't give a shit about that. Getting rich and powerful is a hell of a drug, and she had enough sycophants that she had no reason to care about what her critics were saying.

She was convinced that she was a martyr; a voice for the unheard; a leader for the ages, so of course her detractors were the bad guys. And I think we should take this to heart. We should see this as an example of how easy it is to get radicalized; if you think of yourself as a paragon of virtue, you are going to think that whatever you see as good and right is an objective fact. Most people don't know this, but the majority of terfs start out as trans allies. You are not immune to propaganda! You are not immune to falling into dangerous ideologies!!!

This is why the most important thing you can do as an activist is to listen. Do NOT think you're above being wrong; do NOT develop a god complex; do NOT form an identity out of being right all the time. Involve yourselves in the groups you claim to speak for. Listen to trans women; share resources that help trans women; familiarize yourself with the diversity of experiences that trans people have and the struggles they face.

No, none of you are as bad as JKR because you don't have her money or her power. You will likely never have the capacity for harm she does. But check yourselves. Do not affirm yourselves into thinking you always have the moral high ground. Watch yourselves; humble yourselves; check yourselves for signs of cult behavior and internalized prejudice. You are always learning. You will always be learning. Do not allow yourselves to get a power trip from brushing off marginalized voices.

[masterjack42]

TIL that Woodie Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land" was a sarcastic and mean-spirited response to "God Bless America", meant to criticize America for not becoming a communist country, abolishing private property, and establishing universal welfare during the Great Depression. (There's a reason why the last two verses are seldom ever performed) (Also, Guthrie supported the Soviet invasion of Poland, and opposed Finnish attempts at resistance when the Soviets invaded them, too)

I knew the bit about the song, didn't know about the Poland bit

interesting,

You know what one of the things I love about the US the most?

We do things like this, where we take something that supposed to be a criticism and then just flip the script on it.

One of my Favourites

I think this thing we do might be part of the reason folks round the world pop off with the most heinous things possible when someone says something like

'brits be saying it's chewsday'

Insults turn into points of pride.

I imagine it rubbed Woody raw at times knowing what was going on with his song, especially since both get played one after the other at 4th of July events.

[masterjack42]