#Just some facts about Corporate

[inkskinned]

one of the things that i think we should pay attention to, socially, about the disney v. desantis thing is that it is really highlighting the importance of remembering nuance.

in a purely neutral sense, if you engage in something problematic, that does not mean you are necessarily agreeing with what makes it problematic. and i am worried that we have become... so afraid of any form of nuance.

disney isn't my friend, they're a corporate monopoly that bastardized copyright laws for their own benefit, ruin the environment, and abuse their workers (... and many other things). this isn't a hypothetical for me - i grew up in florida. i also worked for the actual Walt Disney World; like, in the parks. i am keenly aware of the ways they hurt people, because they hurt me. i fully believe that part of the reason florida is so conservative is because it's been an "open secret" for years now that disney lobbies the government to keep minimum wage down, and i know they worked hard to keep the parks unmasked and open during the worst parts of Covid. they purposefully keep their employees in poverty. they are in part responsible for the way the floridian government works.

desantis is still, by a margin that is frankly daunting, way worse. the alternative here isn't just "republicans win", it's actual fascism.

in a case like this, where the alternative is to allow actual fascism into united states legislation - where, if desantis wins, there are huge and legal ramifications - it's tempting to minimize the harm disney is also doing, because... well, it's not fascism. but disney isn't the good guy, either, which means republicans are having a field day asking activists oh, so you think their treatment of their employees is okay?

we have been trained there is a right answer. you're right! you're in the good group, and you're winning at having an opinion.

except i have the Internet Prophecy that in 2-3 months, even left-wing people will be ripping apart activists for having "taken disney's side". aren't i an anti-capitalist? aren't i pro-union? aren't i one of the good ones? removed from context and nuance (that in this particular situation i am forced to side with disney, until an other option reveals itself), my act of being like "i hope they have goofy rip his throat out onstage, shaking his lifeless body like a dog toy" - how quickly does that seem like i actually do support disney?

and what about you! at home, reading this. are you experiencing the Thought Crime of... actually liking some of the things disney has made? your memories of days at the parks, or of good movies, or of your favorite show growing up. maybe you are also evil, if you ever enjoyed anything, ever, at all.

to some degree, the binary idealization/vilification of individual motive and meaning already exists in the desantis case. i have seen people saying not to go to the disney pride events because they're cash grabs (they are). i've seen people saying you have to go because they're a way to protest. there isn't a lot of internet understanding of nuance. instead it's just "good show of support" or "evil bootlicking."

this binary understanding is how you can become radicalized. when we fear nuance and disorder, we're allowing ourselves the safety of assuming that the world must exist in binary - good or bad, problematic or "not" problematic. and unfortunately, bigots want you to see the world in this binary ideal. they want you to get mad at me because "disney is taking a risk for our community but you won't sing their praises" and they want me to get mad at you for not respecting the legit personal trauma that disney forced me through.

in a grander scheme outside of disney: what happens is a horrific splintering within activist groups. we bicker with each other about minimal-harm minimal-impact ideologies, like which depiction of bisexuality is the most-true. we gratuitously analyze the personal lives of activists for any sign they might be "problematic". we get spooked because someone was in a dog collar at pride. we wring our hands about setting an empty shopping mall on fire. we tell each other what words we may identify ourselves by. we get fuckin steven universe disk horse when in reality it is a waste of our collective time.

the bigots want you to spend all your time focusing on how pristine and pretty you and your interests are. they want us at each other's throats instead of hand in hand. they want to say see? nothing is ever fucking good enough for these people.

and they want their followers to think in binary as well - a binary that's much easier to follow. see, in our spaces, we attack each other over "proper" behavior. but in bigoted groups? they attack outwards. they have someone they hate, and it is us. they hate you, specifically, and you are why they have problems - not the other people in their group. and that's a part of how they fucking keep winning.

some of the things that are beloved to you have a backbone in something terrible. the music industry is a wasteland. the publishing industry is a bastion of white supremacy. video games run off of unpaid labor and abuse.

the point of activism was always to bring to light that abuse and try to stop it from happening, not to condemn those who engage in the content that comes from those industries. "there is no ethical consumption under late capitalism" also applies to media. your childhood (and maybe current!) love of the little mermaid isn't something you should now flinch from, worried you'll be a "disney adult". wanting the music industry to change for the better does not require that you reject all popular music until that change occurs. you can acknowledge the harm something might cause - and celebrate the love that it has brought into your life.

we must detach an acknowledgment of nuance from a sense of shame and disgust. we must. punishing individual people for their harmless passions is not doing good work. encouraging more thoughtful, empathetic consumption does not mean people should feel ashamed of their basic human capacities and desires. it should never have even been about the individual when the corporation is so obviously the actual evil. this sense that we must live in shame and dread of our personal nuances - it just makes people bitter and hopeless. do you have any idea how scared i am to post this? to just acknowledge the idea of nuance? that i might like something nuanced, and engage in it joyfully? and, at the same time, that i'm brutally aware of the harm that they're doing?

"so what do i do?" ... well, often there isn't a right answer. i mean in this case, i hope mickey chops off ron's head and then does a little giggle. but truth be told, often our opinions on nuanced subjects will differ. you might be able to engage in things that i can't because the nuance doesn't sit right with me. i might think taylor swift is a great performer and a lot of fun, and you might be like "raquel, the jet fuel emissions". we are both correct; neither of us have any actual sway in this. and i think it's important to remember that - the actual scope of individual responsibility. like, i also love going to the parks. Thunder Mountain is so fun. you (just a person) are not responsible for the harm that Disney (the billion dollar corporation) caused me. i don't know. i think it's possible to both enjoy your memories and interrogate the current state of their employment policies.

there is no right way to interrogate or engage with nuance - i just hope you embrace it readily.

[coquelicoq]

we get a lot of really great stuff in system collapse about murderbot's relationships with ART and ratthi, which makes sense, because it spends almost the entire book with them. but i also love how even though mensah isn't there for most of the story, other people keep reminding mb of her:

chapter 2, page 25: “From ART’s personnel file, she [Karime] was older than Mensah and she didn’t look like an intrepid space explorer, either, even in the protective environmental suit.”

2, 27: “It took Karime three seconds to process the abrupt statement. (She was almost as good at not looking annoyed as Mensah was.) She kept her expression neutral and patient.”

2, 28: “In the underground colony room, Karime lifted her brows. ‘Another occupied site?’ I thought she was being careful not to show too much reaction. It was the way Mensah would have played it.”

4, 70: “Iris looked at me and I saw her hesitate, because her hesitation looked a lot like Dr. Mensah’s hesitation. And I realized I really didn’t want to go down there.”

5, 104: "Iris has that same thing as Dr. Mensah, the thing where she’s able to look and sound calm under circumstances where shit is possibly about to go down.”

it's spent so much time with her and it knows her so well and respects her so much that she's the model against which it compares all other humans. it thinks about her when they're not together. it's protective of her. it has such total faith in her competence. it (non-romantically) loves her and doesn't want to not see her again. idk man, it just gets to me! and they were teammates (oh my god they were teammates!!)

bonus:

I said, aloud, "You have to be kidding me." (ch. 2, p. 28)

seven pages later, in reaction to the same thing:

Mensah had had time to review the feed video. She muttered, "Oh, you have to be kidding me." Yeah.

twinsies 🥰

[ehh-is-the-name]

It's past 11 on a school night and I'm fucking crying over robot sentience.

I could never understand what it would feel like to be created with the intent to kill and maim. Maybe, the intent to work and be worked, but not kill and maim.

I will never understand what it's like to be created with the intention of being a product for the masses, either. I think, I hope, I beg, no one does.

I will never ever be able to fully comprehend why hours of people's work, time, and money would be put into formulating my sentience only for me to be seen as disposable. Even if I could be improved, even if I were "defective", there is no reasonable justification for giving me emotions only to dismiss them by pushing me as a product for a year before starting anew.

It's... It's cruel, to the machines. Sentient or not, it's cruel. Though, I guess we are cruel.

[benevolenterrancy]

I think this was probably pre-Hogan and the underground network, when information wasn't really getting in and often bad news about the homefront couldn't be verified. When it sometimes became just a bit too overwhelming to deal with in the dark and the cold...

[horce-divorce]

I don't know how to explain to you chucklefucks that for the most disenfranchised among us, NOTHING HAS FUCKING CHANGED since Trump left office. We know how bad it was, we were fucking here. And we are TELLING YOU, not speculating about the future, we are TELLING 👏YOU 👏NOW that nothing fucking got better for us and some of us ALREADY have nothing left to lose THANKS TO BIDEN AS WELL. NOT JUST TRUMP. WE HAVE BEEN DOING THIS SHIT ALL ALONG. Not JUST once Trump got to office!!! And NO IT HAS NOT BEEN FUCKING EASIER. WTF. Incoming tranmission from Planet Neoliberal Voter Privilege.

You stupid pricks don't even seem to realize that Trump leaving office DIDNT MEAN HIS APPOINTEES ALL WENT WITH HIM. THEYVE STILL BEEN THERE THE WHOLE TIME. Alive and WELL AT WORK helping to push some of the worst antiqueer legislation we've seen in DECADES while Biden, who barely has 2 brain cells left to rub together, decomposes before our very eyes.

If you think TRUMP was the thing that brought neo-nazi fascism to the mainstream, you are so comfortably privileged to have gotten to ignore it, to have never fucking heard it until then. And you are way too out of touch to be addressing the people you think you're talking to rn!

The "sign off on your glorious revolution" bit really gets me. Lmao. What a fundamental misunderstanding of the issue. What a hilarious way to misconstrue entire swaths of political ideology. You think Policial Jesus is going to come and save your ass, so we must think that too, huh?

Shits gonna hit the fan this year regardless of who "wins" the election, and it's not merely because of The Orange Man. It's also because of everyday lay people like this OP who have merely been privileged enough to ignore the suffering of your neighbors until now. Your privilege is running out, not because the revolution is coming, but because the hegemony that affords you that privilege cannot continue indefinitely. That machine runs on a profit-growth-extraction paradigm and we are running out of resources to extract from.

I don't know how to explain to these fucking people that you are the tone deaf motherfuckers we're talking to when we say you need to stop talking and learn. You have reblogged support of BLM and UBI and Palestine but at the end of the day you *don't fucking listen* to what we're saying in those posts. At the end of the day you are not hearing our cries of pain. And its pretty fucking ridiculous to turn around and point at people EVEN LESS PRIVILEGED THAN YOU and say "don't you realize that YOU'RE going to threaten MY safety and stability with your uncouth actions?" Well, bully for fucking you, because we already lost that! It's been gone! It never came back for some of us after Trump left!!!! You got to plug your ears and pretend the pandemic was over while millions of us became disabled and homeless for the first time as a result!!! While BIDEN admitted HE DOESNT THINK ABOUT IT ANYMORE!!!!! You got to go back to your life while protestors railing against our tax dollars being used for GENOCIDE are being injected with KETAMINE by the COPS!!!! If you thought TRUMP was that fucking scary! At least he outright said what he was doing!! Biden is continuing his work with ICE, continuing to increase surveillance and crack down on any kind of protestor, cop cities are expanding UNDER BIDEN, DEMOCRATS ARE ALSO VOTING FOR MASK BANS!!!!!!!

It is SOOOOO BLATSNTLY SELF CENTERED to think that you losing the privilege of a comfy life is the biggest threat to ""our democracy"" rn. YOU got to ignore how bad shit was until now. Some of us NEVER HAD THAT LUXURY. Our democracy fucking died decades ago and YOU got to keep playing Weekend at Bernies with it's corpse while the rest of us dug our own graves. And now you're scared because you stand to end up like us.

Lol. Lmao. Get fucked. This type of attitude is only furthering the class/social divides that already exist between voters and WILL. NOT. get anyone to vote harder for Biden. In fact, it just makes me wanna fist fight a Democrat even more than I already did.

First they came for the indigenous, and you didn't say anything bc you got yours. They came for the immigrants, and you didn't say anything bc you've always been a citizen. They came for the prisoners and their voting rights and you said if they didn't want to lose their rights they should follow the law, even while they made it illegal to mask, to protest, to be gay and trans in public- its so easy to just follow the rules! They came for the trans kids and you said, but we already have gay marriage, I thought it was safe to be queer now, and I dont have trans kids so I don't see how this affects me... they came for palestine and you said Oof. Well. That's the price of freedom for me, I guess!

And now they're coming for you and none of the other targets are left to feel worried for you, because we have already been living through your worst nightmare, UNDER BIDEN.

You look fucking stupid.

if you could EVER find a dem as outspoken and angry for the people as trump is for the white 1% then maybe we wouldnt be having this discussion.

[awakefor48hours]

I’m gonna be a little controversial and say Wish was actually a good movie.

[theres-whump-in-that-nebula]

I kind of want to try making mead or ambrosia 👀

Obviously not right now because I have Shit To Do; but maybe during the summer after I’ve moved

[lwoorl]

I'll say it: "Oh all AI artists do is write a stupid description and immediately get an image with no effort, there's no art in that" is the new "Digital painting doesn't count as art because it takes no effort"

[you-have-made-a-fatal-error]

need to shell out for a new laptop before the end of the year - for a lot of reasons but mainly bc support ending for win8.1 makes fixing the current beast rather pointless :/ (and. admittedly. there is a lot to fix. she's old and she has suffered.)

but my current beastie is from the last gen of laptops with a disc drive and the thought of using an external/usb disc drive is enough to make me cry tears of blood

[rimouskis]

when I first started my job, I'd often overplay my emotional detachment to it because I had moved from a high-emotional/personal-involvement industry into a soulless corporate one.

and to, like, justify that decision and explain it to my high-emotional/personal-involvement peers from that old industry, I'd be like "lol I don't really care, you know? the job suits my skill set and I can do it, so it's all good:)"... but I've come to the realization that I actually really enjoy doing the labor of my job and it's weirdly hard to admit that!!

[vegaseatsass]

Oh btw that Never Let Me Go episode ruuuuuuuuled

[bioswear]

simply put, you do NOT want men like Ron Shitstain DeSantis to think they have power that exceeds a megacorporation’s, especially not one of THE largest, most established, and powerful corporations in history

[lemondropletters]

I know I’m making a joke but you really don’t understand how angry I am at the recent news.

[Video Captions: “Why are you the way that you are? / Honestly, every time I try to do something fun or exciting, you make it not that way. / I hate so much about the things that you choose to be.”]

[arolesbianism]

Hi guys guess who's literally shaking rn from excitement

[supreme-leader-stoat]

You're fresh out of college and looking for a job. Everyone is hiring. Nobody who's "hiring" is actually hiring. You finally get a call back from somewhere you barely remember applying to (though the voice on the other end sounds synthesized). You pull up the job listing again real quick. The company name and the fact that the listing is for "Minion" are kind of concerning, but you know what, you've interviewed with enough evil corporations by now, you can handle one wearing its true colors on its sleeve. At this point it's a matter of making rent or moving back in with your parents, and as much as you love your family, you can't imagine spending another summer dealing with your brothers' antics. You agree to the interview.

The man who greets you is an enthusiastic older German(?) man who's either way too into cosplay or just that committed to the bit, judging by the lab coat. He made cookies. The tray of cookies is proffered to you by a ten-foot-tall robotic caricature of a 50s businessman. You take a deep breath to calm yourself. You bite into one of the cookies. It's delicious.

You ask the boss about his business model. "Oh you know, a little of this, a little of that, I bounce from project to project a lot." He mentions that his end goal is becoming the undisputed ruler of the surrounding counties. "Really? Not the whole world?" you ask. "I like to set realistic goals," he replies.

As he gives you the tour of his "evil lair," ingrained instincts are screaming at you to report this guy to some kind of authority figure. You remember the salary. You decide that you can always bust him after getting your first paycheck.

The boss asks when you can start. Caught off guard, you say "tomorrow?". Your boss(?) says he'll see you then.

On the way out, you bump into your stepbrother's girlfriend. Your boss introduces her as his daughter. You both silently agree to sidestep the subject for now and act like this is your first time meeting.

You show up to your first day of work. Your boss is putting the finishing touches on a giant machine that was definitely not there yesterday. You are nonplussed. You ask him what it's for and he launches into a convoluted explanation involving his parents always forcing him to put his shirts on backwards so the tag was in front. You think he should probably talk to a therapist.

Your brothers' exotic pet breaks down the wall. You stare at him. He stares at you. Incredulously, you say his name. "Oh, good, you two already know each other!" your boss says. You mention that you used to live with him. "What? Perry the Platypus, you never mentioned having a roommate."

This is what I like to imagine Candace Flynn's life is like, post P&F.

[libraford]

It is possible to interact with people whom share opposing views and no this is not about pineapple on pizza. In fact, it is imperative that you learn how to be civil with some people who you may find difficult to agree with.

At work, Youngin would often tell me that the guy that trained him (Ginger) was a misogynist. I had never met Ginger, and I had very little to say on this matter. But I would ask Youngin some questions about him because I like to know the other seasonal workers a little. I ask about Ginger- first words from Youngin's mouth 'he's a misogynist.'

I asked him why he thought that. (There are many misogynists at this location, as someone that is woman-shaped I see it often, I am comparing notes.)

"We were on our way to a location and a driver was going really slowly. When he got around her he said 'fucking women drivers.' Like he was going out of his way to prove that the driver was a woman."

The last month or so, Youngin worked exclusively with me because I knew that it was a matter of time before he said something that pissed off one of the guys. He was not going to get along with people here, it just wasn't happening.

When he left, everyone wanted to know what he was like to work with. And I finally got to have a conversation with Ginger.

"I'd like to ask you something a little strange- he said that on his first day there was an issue with a driver going slowly. Can you tell me about that?"

"Oh yeah! She was going super slow and when I got around her I said 'yup- little old lady driving.' And he was like 'what's that supposed to mean?' And I just kind of dropped it, but I hear he was saying I was a misogynist over it?"

So I give Youngin some grace because he's young, he's got a social bubble that's very liberal, he has not met very many people that weren't part of that kind of scene. But he often talked about how every person here has said something that pissed him off and he seemed really surprised that I (woman-shaped queer liberal) would be okay working with all these sexist homophobes.

And I give grace to Ginger because he had no reason to think that his words would be interpreted like that. What he was saying was normal to him. This is... somewhat the culture of landscaping jobs. And its not even close to the worst thing I've heard out of these dudes mouths. (Literally had one of the dudes comment that he would like to 'motorboat' one of the pedestrians.)

It was weird for Youngin to carry that with him for the whole two months that he worked here, over a very... small comment.

Every single person I've worked with here has said something that has given me pause and I tuck it away to rant about later and then I let it go. If it gets out of hand, I talk to one of the bosses about it. I know how to contact HR. I came into this place knowing that I was going to disagree politically with most of the people that I work with because I'm coming in to a culture that is fundamentally different from my own.

If I am being frank, I find the overt bigotry somewhat better than the corporate bullshit of 'we value your contributions, but won't be granting your accommodations request out of fairness to other workers' or the glass cliff or literally being fired for my sexual orientation but phrased with 'oh you just weren't a good fit for the culture here.' I at least know what I'm getting into when I come to work. I know what not to talk about. Last time I thought I was safe to talk about something queer with my boss she blindsided me with some transphobic garbage.

Its admirable to stick up for the marginalized people in your life, but part of changing minds is knowing the time and the place to comment. I think I've changed more minds at this warehouse by being a visibly out lesbian at work than I have by making carefully crafted speeches.

That is fine. It is fine to disagree. Sometimes you have to work with racists, homophobes, and assholes. That is part of being an adult. You talk about things like... sports or TV or weather or some cool bug you saw. Finding common ground with people who are different from you in many ways is an important part of socialization and it sucks to think you have anything in common with a jackass but look- you're spending 7-ish hours with these people and at some point some of them are going to say stupid shit. You are going to say stupid shit also. I have said my fair share of stupid shit. Deal with the fact that you're all stupid shits.

And for fuck's sake, wear your hardhat.