#or a super conservative state government

[exeggcute]

this isn't the first time we've seen evidence that the current climate of anti-trans panic in the US has largely been manufactured by (or at the very least, stoked by) a small number of conservative interest groups, but the leaked materials from this group do make it pretty clear that trans people are being used a wedge issue to increase republican turnout:

In a member briefing video, one of Ziklag’s spiritual advisers outlined a plan to “deliver swing states” by using an anti-transgender message to motivate conservative voters who are exhausted with Trump.

although it does seem like they believe their own rhetoric and aren't "just" willing to turn trans people into collateral damange:

Other internal Ziklag documents voice strong opposition to same-sex marriage and transgender rights. One reads: “transgender acceptance = Final sign before imminent collapse.”

and somehow this is only the tip of the iceberg here:

a charity funded by mega-wealthy christian donors who think that secular mega-wealthy donors are more generous than christians (much to unpack there lol) and want to close that gap

the fact that it's set up a tax-exempt 5013c org but 100% operating as a PAC, which according to a little group called the IRS is super duper illegal

general christian nationalist shit, including a belief that “the biblical role of government is to promote good and punish evil” and that “the word of god and prayer play a significant role in policy decisions"

using a tool called eagleAI that "claim[s] to use artificial intelligence to automate and speed up the process of challenging ineligible voters" in a bid to kick 100k+ voters off the rolls in swing states

a seven-pronged plan that extends into non-political avenues like the entertainment industry, like a goal to make 80% of movies produced either have a G or PG rating and offer a tidy moral

the hobby lobby family is here because of course they are

[reasonsforhope]

Interior Department Announces New Guidance to Honor and Elevate Hawaiian Language

"In commemoration of Mahina ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, or Hawaiian Language Month, and in recognition of its unique relationship with the Native Hawaiian Community, the Department of the Interior today announced new guidance on the use of the Hawaiian language.  

A comprehensive new Departmental Manual chapter underscores the Department’s commitment to further integrating Indigenous Knowledge and cultural practices into conservation stewardship.  

“Prioritizing the preservation of the Hawaiian language and culture and elevating Indigenous Knowledge is central to the Biden-Harris administration's work to meet the unique needs of the Native Hawaiian Community,” said Secretary Deb Haaland. “As we deploy historic resources to Hawaiʻi from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, the Interior Department is committed to ensuring our internal policies and communications use accurate language and data."  

Department bureaus and offices that engage in communication with the Native Hawaiian Community or produce documentation addressing places, resources, actions or interests in Hawaiʻi will use the new guidance on ‘ōlelo Hawaiʻi (Hawaiian language) for various identifications and references, including flora and fauna, cultural sites, geographic place names, and government units within the state.  The guidance recognizes the evolving nature of ‘ōlelo Hawaiʻi and acknowledges the absence of a single authoritative source. While the Hawaiian Dictionary (Pukui & Elbert 2003) is designated as the baseline standard for non-geographic words and place names, Department bureaus and offices are encouraged to consult other standard works, as well as the Board on Geographic Names database.  

Developed collaboratively and informed by ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi practitioners, instructors and advocates, the new guidance emerged from virtual consultation sessions and public comment in 2023 with the Native Hawaiian Community. 

The new guidance aligns with the Biden-Harris administration’s commitment to strengthening relationships with the Native Hawaiian Community through efforts such as the Kapapahuliau Climate Resilience Program and Hawaiian Forest Bird Keystone Initiative. During her trip to Hawaiʻi in June, Secretary Haaland emphasized recognizing and including Indigenous Knowledge, promoting co-stewardship, protecting sacred sites, and recommitting to meaningful and robust consultation with the Native Hawaiian Community."

-via US Department of the Interior press release, February 1, 2024

--

Note: I'm an editor so I have no idea whether this comes off like as big a deal as it potentially is. But it is potentially going to establish and massively accelerate the adoption of correctly written Native Hawaiian language, as determined by Native Hawaiians.

Basically US government communications, documentations, and "style guides" (sets of rules to follow about how to write/format/publish something, etc.) can be incredibly influential, especially for topics where there isn't much other official guidance. This rule means that all government documents that mention Hawai'i, places in Hawai'i, Hawaiian plants and animals, etc. will have to be written the way Native Hawaiians say it should be written, and the correct way of writing Hawaiian conveys a lot more information about how the words are pronounced, too, which could spread correct pronunciations more widely.

It also means that, as far as the US government is concerned, this is The Correct Way to Write the Hawaiian Language. Which, as an editor who just read the guidance document, is super important. That's because you need the 'okina (' in words) and kahakō in order to tell apart sizeable sets of different words, because Hawaiian uses so many fewer consonants, they need more of other types of different sounds.

And the US government official policy on how to write Hawaiian is exactly what editors, publishers, newspapers, and magazines are going to look at, sooner or later, because it's what style guides are looking at. Style guides are the official various sets of rules that books/publications follow; they're also incredibly detailed - the one used for almost all book publishing, for example, the Chicago Manual of Style (CMoS), is over a thousand pages long.

One of the things that CMoS does is tell you the basic rules of and what specialist further sources they think you should use for writing different languages. They have a whole chapter dedicated to this. It's not that impressive on non-European languages yet, but we're due for a new edition (the 18th) of CMoS in the next oh two to four years, probably? Actually numbering wise they'd be due for one this year, except presumably they would've announced it by now if that was the case.

I'm expecting one of the biggest revisions to the 18th edition to add much more comprehensive guidance on non-Western languages. Considering how far we've come since 2017, when the last one was released, I'll be judging the shit out of them if they do otherwise. (And CMoS actually keep with the times decently enough.)

Which means, as long as there's at least a year or two for these new rules/spellings/orthographies to establish themselves before the next edition comes out, it's likely that just about every (legit) publisher will start using the new rules/spellings/orthographies.

And of course, it would expand much further from there.

[elljayvee]

image source: statista

Young friends, I'm asking you to vote. I'm asking you to get your friends to vote. I know it can feel like you don't have any power, and in a lot of ways, that's because those 70 million Baby Boomers are, genuinely, still holding onto it. About 70% of the US Senate is Baby Boomers and Silent Gen. There's more Silent Gen folks than there are Millennials. I generally think intergenerational conflict nonsense is, well, nonsense -- there's a LOT of Baby Boomers who are on the same side, politically, as I am, and a lot of younger people who are flat-out Nazis like JD Vance. But look at how much power they're holding.

And the only way to change that is to vote, and to run -- but the number of people who can run and want to run is smaller than those who can vote. You can change the political balance and the age balance in our government by voting.

Gen Z had historically high turnout for 18-24 yr olds in the last Presidential election, and I'm super chuffed about that -- but it was still only about 28% of eligible voters. Overall, turnout was about 66% across all age groups -- and Boomers turned out at nearly 70%. Pew Research has talked about how largely the differences in success and failure of candidates are not due to preference (who the population as a whole would LIKE to win) but due to differences in voter turnout (who actually shows up to vote).

image source: brookings.edu

The United States is a LOT less conservative/fascist on a population level than it is on an elected official level, and differential voter turnout is why. Voters under 30 are the most likely to support candidates who aren't creepy fascist motherfuckers, and there are millions of you who aren't going to the polls.

Voter suppression is real, and there are lots of people working to counter it, but efforts to counter voter suppression only go so far if people aren't showing up in the first place. Gen Z -- on a population level, over 60% of you don't like creepy fascists! That's great, but not liking them needs to be backed up with action. Please get out there and vote like you care about keeping creepy fascists out of power. It's not as fun as dunking on them on the internet, sure. But it's very effective.

I want you to vote, young friends. I want everyone over 18 and younger than 60 to crank those numbers out, but I especially want everyone between 18-40 at that polling booth, ready to go. I want to see sky-high, record-smashing young voter turnout in this election -- and I want to see it at the next election, and the one after that. I want there to BE a next election. These motherfuckers tried once to overturn an election -- by legal challenges and by force -- and the way to make that not happen again is to shut. it. down.

Please. Vote.

[copperbadge]

I was watching hockey earlier today and it got me wondering what sports are played in Askazer-Shivadlakia. Football & surfing’s been mentioned, what else is played in the country? Does it snow enough in the highlands for there to be any winter sports enthusiasts? What’s the state of women’s professional sports? Does the country compete in anything internationally? The Olympics are awful, but does the Ask send a delegation of athletes anyway?

It's not something I've thought a lot about outside of football, I admit, though thinking about the football program has clarified some aspects of it. Mainly I just am not entirely sure how a lot of sports...work, so I kind of stay hands-off.

Askazer-Shivadlakia has never been a super wealthy country. Jason was a bit of a traditionalist and Michaelis was concerned with modernizing but he wasn't an innovator per se, unless pushed; by the end of his reign the country was reaching a point where it had the kind of money to sustain a university or expand its public services fairly radically, but only just. Gregory is a big part of that because he trained as an economist, and while he's only been king for about two years, he's been working in the administration for much longer. He's been able to institute changes that have led to a comfortable surplus in the budget.

So for example, Michaelis wouldn't let the government fund a professional sports team of any kind because the money it would take was already being spent on the youth sports program. He felt that giving kids the chance to play sport was more important than sustaining a team, and said that their athletes were a gift they gave the world. And now that elite players are returning from playing abroad with money and the intention to spend it on supporting a team, his investment is actually, unexpectedly, paying off. Michaelis just wanted the kids of his country to learn self-discipline and good sportsmanship but in doing so he also ensured that if you leave the Ask to seek your fortune as an athlete, once you've got a fortune, you come back home to spend it. And Gregory's work means the government can help.

Football and F1 racing are the two big passion sports the Shivadh follow, though F1 is a fandom, not a pastime. There's decent surfing but that's more a tourist thing. Definitely there are regions that get cold enough for winter sports, but like surfing most of the ski/board sites are tourist-focused, places that ranch dairy cattle in the summer and then host tourists in the winter when the cows are in the warmer lowland pastures. Undoubtedly there are Shivadh snow sport enthusiasts and the country supports them if they compete internationally (both in terms of cheering them on and financially) but there's no program or deep tradition of it. If I ever actually write about those areas extensively that might change, though.

Women's sport has equal support to men's generally, whatever level that might be -- Askazer-Shivadlakia has always been relatively progressive but when Michaelis was elected, Miranda made it her business to push legislation that explicitly protected things like equal funding for women's sport and education and access to birth control and abortion. (She's also the reason weed is legal and Gerald can get Adderall in Europe, where it's banned in a lot of places; there's something to be said for the scion of old conservative nobility who is simply ready to wreck shit.)

There is no golf. Michaelis detests it personally and there's no room for it anyway. If they ever build Askazarama Amusement Park, they might get a mini-golf course.

I don't really know how the Olympics and other international competitions work. If there are talented athletes who want to compete and seem capable of qualifying, there's state funding for them, but there's no formal program where like, the MPs sit down every two years and pick out the top athletes they want to send. Likely most people interested in elite sport competition have to leave the country to train, and represent other countries as a result -- like Paolo in the football novel, who left when he was a young teen to attend a junior academy in France and entered professional play from there.

Shivadh still feel ownership of them, mind you. For example, Felix (the love interest in the football novel) played on the Italian national team and kicked a winning goal in a World Cup for Italy, but Askazer-Shivadlakia consider that cup theirs. A Shivadh did it, ergo it is a Shivadh victory. If an athlete were to say, represent France in an Olympic decathlon and take the gold, they would consider that to be a gold medal for Askazer-Shivadlakia.

The country is very excited about finally having a football team of their own. Shivadh Royal Football Club could lose every game it ever plays and still nobody would let a word be said against them. Fons-Askaz on match day is just a sea of hideous orange Shivadh RFC jerseys that say NARAN JUICE on the front. (Their major sponsor is local juice box and sports drink maker Naran Juice Box Co.)

[kp777]

By Julia Conley

Common Dreams

Sept. 25, 2024

New polling suggests that "a willingness to take on millionaires, billionaires, and the politicians who serve them plays well everywhere," said one columnist.

Dan Osborn, a mechanic and union leader running to unseat Republican U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer in Nebraska, told an Omaha news station on Tuesday that recent polling showing a highly competitive race didn't come as a surprise to him.

"It's what I'm seeing on the ground," he toldKETV of a Survey USA poll showing 45% of respondents supporting him, compared with 44% backing Fischer. "People, I think, are ready for a change."

Osborn describes himself as a "lifelong Independent," and has not sought or accepted endorsements from either major political party.

He does have the backing of the United Auto Workers, which said in June, "It's time for labor to get behind candidates who look like us, talk like us, and know the issues facing working-class people."

Osborn began working as an industrial mechanic for a Kellogg's plant in 2004, and eventually rose to the presidency of his union local, Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers, and Grain Millers (BCTGM) Local 50G.

In that role in 2021, he led 500 of his co-workers at the cereal plant in a work stoppage that lasted 77 days, with workers protesting a two-tier hiring system that left new employees with lower pay and no pensions and demanding fair working schedules and pay.

The strike forced the company to agree to cost-of-living raises, no plant closures through 2026, and no permanent two-tier system.

"I've gone up against a major American corporation," Osborn toldThe New York Times in February. "I stood up for what I thought was right, and I won."

The Fischer campaign and its supporters have taken notice of the senator's opponent as multiple polls have shown the two candidates neck-and-neck. Last month, Fischer was up by just one point, with 23% undecided.

Conservative super political action committee Heartland Resurgence has spent $479,000 in a new ad campaign opposing Osborn, repeating the same false claims about his support for abortion care as those Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made at his debate against Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris earlier this month: that Osborn "supports abortion until the moment of birth."

Osborn told the independent rural news outlet Barn Raiser in March that he believes "a woman's decision on whether or not to have an abortion is between her and her doctor, it's not the federal government's place to dictate those things to people. Deb Fischer believes in a complete abortion ban. I strongly disagree with that position."

In an ad released this week, Osborn is seen next to a stand-in for Fischer, who wears a blazer decorated with the logos of some of her major corporate donors: Northrop Grumman, which has given her $64,827 over her career; Union Pacific Corp., which has donated $141,651; and Goldman Sachs, which has donated $18,200 this election cycle.

Osborn says in the ad that the Senate is made up of "millionaires controlled by billionaires."

"Deb Fischer is part of the problem," he says. "She's taken so much corporate cash she should wear patches."

Columnist John Nichols said the latest poll numbers in Nebraska suggest "that a willingness to take on millionaires, billionaires, and the politicians who serve them plays well everywhere."

Pro-worker media organization More Perfect Union pointed to earlier polling in July that showed Osborn and Fischer tied 42-42.

"Fifty-seven percent of the state's GOP voters say they're open to voting for an Independent," the outlet reported. "Osborn, a long-time union worker, could kick a Republican out of the Senate."

[xf-cases-solved]

S1E14: Gender Bender

Case: In what is arguably one of the most "why did you write this??" plots so far, our dynamic duo (per Mulder's request, I might add) investigate the deaths of five victims who appear to have, like... been fucked to death? Or something?

Actually I have to interrupt my own summary here, bc I just looked up the Wikipedia page (yes, bc I was trying to remember the state, shut up), and Glen Morgan is apparently quoted as saying he wanted "an episode with more of a sexy edge." How that ended up being this particular episode, I cannot say. That is an X-File in and of itself.

But I digress. People are dying of mb really high levels of pheromones caused by super mind-blowing sex. Sure. Also no one is sure if this killer is male or female. (They somehow manage to not even entertain the idea that any of the victims might have been gay, which I thought was an impressive feat of elephant avoidance.)

ANYWAY. Their investigation leads them to Massachusetts, where a bunch of sci-fi not-Amish people are chilling out doing not-Amish people things. Stuff kind of just snowballs from there. Mulder jumps down into the not-Amish people's ritual cellar with no backup and then proceeds to reprimand Scully for being reckless; Scully (for the first, but unfortunately not last time) almost bangs someone bc she is being manipulated due to some supernatural phenomenon; I laugh A LOT alone in my work office bc I had forgotten the stupid twist ending; and Nicholas Lea is a starving artist who has to take the roles he's offered if he ever wants to be bumped up to recurring character status. Sigh. Hustling the club scene used to be so simple...

Does someone die in the cold open: Yes. He is fucked to death. Or something.

Does Mulder present a slideshow: Yes! Of dead people! Who were fucked to death! Or something!

Does the evidence survive the investigation: The evidence doesn't even stay on this planet.

Whodunit: A horny alien cosplaying as a gender fluid Amish person. No, seriously.

Convictions: Zip.

Did they solve it: No. This is my very first explicit no with no qualifiers. They 1. did not figure out the cause of death definitively, 2. did not apprehend the suspect, 3. lost literally all of their evidence, and 4. the government wasn't even hiding anything this time, they just got outsmarted by some horny aliens and were left with nothing. In fact, I bet they actually know less now than when they started. Failure from top to bottom, guys, good work.

[how do i determine if a case is solved? check the scale here: x]

THIS EPISODE IS SPONSORED BY: Anxiously clenching your butthole while crossing your fingers and praying that your faves don't say anything TOO problematic. Are you educated in the systematic inequalities facing minorities in the world? Are you aware of how socially accepted language and behaviors have evolved over time to become more inclusive and less prejudiced? Do you also happen to be watching a show that was made pre-21st century, and "oh god, are they doing an episode that revolves around *gender*? Oh Christ. Oh no. Oh God"? Never fear! Anxiously clenching your butthole while crossing your fingers and praying that your faves don't say anything TOO problematic is here!

*This product is versatile, and can also be used in a variety of situations, including, but not limited to: Seeing your favorite celebrity's name trending online and not being sure why; introducing your trans friend to your socially conservative grandma; or being forced to listen to your boss's opinions on "woke culture" after your coworker casually mentioned seeing a black person in a new TV show.

Get clenchin'!

***

General Total Stats:

(green means stat has changed since last ep; red means new stat added to list)

Total Cases *Definitively* Solved So Far: 6 (streak ended. brutally)

Total Number of "Mulder/Scully, it's me" phone calls: 1

Total Number of Times Scully Has Conveniently Not Seen Something Crucial: 4

Total Number of Times Mulder Has Been in Mortal Danger: 5

Total Number of Times Scully Has Been in Mortal Danger: 4 (upped it another half point, bc i don't thiiiink the guy coercing her intended to put her life in danger. he just ("just") wanted to sexually assault her, but also apparently fucking those guys kills you, so. another toss up)

Total Number of Sexually Charged, Uncomfortably intimate, and/or Flirty Moments Between Friendly Coworkers: 8 (for an episode that was meant to have a "sexy edge," it was deeply unhorny all around, even between our good good coworkers. they should have brought back that horny fire expert from episode 12 to bring up the heat, pun not intended)

Total Number of Autopsies Scully Has Performed On Screen: 1

Total Number of Times Scully Plays Doctor: 1

Total Number of Times Mulder Talks to an Informant: 5

Total Number of Times People Making Out in a Car Are Hurt or Killed: 2 (when i made that stat, part of me was like "mb i am misremembering how often that happens, and it won't even come up that much," and then it happened in the very next episode)

Total Number of Nosebleeds: 4

Total Number of Times Mulder Has Tasted/Sniffed/Touched Something Questionable Without Following Proper Safety Procedures: 2 (don't touch and sniff the weird alien goo wall??? i know for a FACT you keep rubber gloves in your pocket)

Total Number of Times Someone Says "Trust No One": 1

Total Number of Times Someone Says "I Want to Believe": 2

Total Number of Cigarettes Cigarette Smoking Man Has Smoked: 2

Total Number of Maggie Scully Sightings: 1

Total Number of Alex Krycek Sightings: still 0, but like, uh... definitely the closest we've come so far

Total Number of Times I Had to Look Up What State the Episode Takes Place in Even Though I Literally Just Watched It: 4 ½ (yeah i couldn't even pretend that i paid attention)

Total Number of Times I Had to Look at an Episode's Wikipedia Page to Fill This Out Because It Was Fucking Confusing and/or Too Boring for Me to Pay Attention: 2 (i didn't need to, but i did read the wikipedia page anyway just out of pure curiosity, bc why did they write that episode? i mean like, i was entertained, which ig makes it a win, but also just... why?)

[mariacallous]

Few things are more fundamental to a society than its traditions. They guide our actions through difficult and changing times. They keep us grounded and steady. They build on the wisdom of our forerunners. At least, that is the way conservatives, usually, look at the world.

But on one issue—school vouchers—some conservatives are playing the role of radicals. The general goal of vouchers is to allow families to use government funds to pay tuition at private schools, including religious schools. The idea has been around for more than a half-century but had gone almost nowhere in the U.S., until very recently. In just the past few years, it has gone from the political desert to a core issue that is sweeping across Republican-led states.

The general idea of vouchers is radical enough, but the particular form of these new programs is far more so. Fourteen states and counting have now passed legislation creating voucher (or education savings account) programs that share some key properties. They are universal (or nearly universal), meaning that all families are eligible. They involve no meaningful public accountability or way to judge their success. They allow private schools to charge tuition over and above the voucher amount. And, finally, they are flexible in that funds can be used even to cover homeschooling expenses and other educational goods and services, such as computers and tutoring.

These aren’t just any vouchers. They are “super-vouchers,” as I call them, that promise to produce the most radical change, of any kind, in U.S. education in at least 70 years. It represents not just a change in policy or strategy but a rejection of three foundational traditions: separation of church and state, anti-discrimination, and public accountability for educational processes and outcomes funded by taxes.

In this post, I describe the threat that today’s universal voucher programs present to these traditions, and I attend to some potential counterarguments from voucher supporters.

The separation of church and state tradition

America’s education traditions can be traced far back in our history. While the U.S. Constitution does not mention education, it was an issue actively discussed by the nation’s founders, and other elements of the Constitution have a heavy bearing on education. The First Amendment includes the Establishment Clause, which prevents Congress from either supporting or limiting the free exercise of religion. This language has long been understood to imply that governments should not fund religious organizations (including religious schools), especially in a way that preferences one religion over another.

As a result of education’s omission from the Constitution, primary responsibility for education was ultimately delegated to the states. Education is one of only a few topics covered in every state constitution—with all states guaranteeing universal access and most specifically mentioning public education. To many, this means that education should be not only funded by the government but accessible to all, subject to public oversight, and, yes, non-sectarian (non-religious).

It’s easy to see how vouchers, especially the new breed of them, violate these principles. Vouchers provide government funds to churches, despite the historical separation of church and state. Voucher advocates argue that today’s voucher systems are legal, and our current Supreme Court seems to agree, but that doesn’t change the fact vouchers will entangle the government and religion. With any voucher program, the government must decide which schools are eligible to receive funding. Will the public—in particular, citizens in red states where universal ESA programs are most popular—be just as willing to fund Islamic, Hindi, Mormon, Jewish, and atheist schools as they are Christian schools? That’s not clear. Even if states treat all religions equally, some very public battles over religious schools will surely follow. Already, many voucher-supported religious schools have been the subject of front-page newspaper headlines regarding their most controversial teachings. We should expect this to continue.

Voucher proponents sometimes try to refute the idea that the separation of church and state for schooling even applies, pointing out that publicly funded schools taught religion in the early 1800s, with children reading from the Bible. However, a more complete telling of our history would note that the need for a separation between church and state became clearer as the country—and its students—grew more diverse. We shouldn’t use past wrongs to justify making the same mistakes today.

The anti-discrimination tradition

The U.S. Constitution, under the Fourteenth Amendment, establishes equal protection before the law. Ratified in the wake of the Civil War, this was meant to remediate the blatantly unequal treatment of Black people in every aspect of life, created by slavery. The Fourteenth Amendment can be viewed as reinforcing the accessible-to-all principle embodied in state constitutions.

This was not nearly enough, however, to provide meaningful access to Black Americans. Civil War Reconstruction efforts on education were modest and short lived. The Court’s 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision also established the principle of “separate but equal.” Even that low standard for access was not achieved, as few states provided more than a pittance in funding for Black schools. They were anything but equal for at least another half century. Then came the Court’s landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, which reinterpreted the Fourteenth Amendment and rejected the separate-but-equal doctrine in schools. The decision began to slowly reorient public education towards an anti-discrimination tradition. Solidifying it was the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which banned discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, and national origin, and expanded the federal government’s authority to enforce anti-discrimination law in publicly funded programs (including public schools).

Most forms of vouchers undermine the anti-discrimination tradition. While private schools cannot legally discriminate based on race because of the Civil Rights Act, they can discriminate on most other dimensions, including religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, class, income, and disability status. Moreover, the protections against racial discrimination are stronger in public schools, with additional avenues for recourse available to public school students through the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.

Discrimination issues often arise in admissions, and private schools leaders believe strongly in their right to selective admissions requirements. Put another way, private school leaders feel they should be able to determine which students get in and which get turned away. While not all admission requirements are inherently problematic, private school admissions practices leave the door open for discrimination. And with potential discriminatory treatment hidden behind opaque admissions practices, it will be exceedingly difficult to identify discrimination where it occurs. When schools are allowed to discriminate on one set of factors, it is difficult to prove that a student is discriminated against based on other factors, such as race.

This is not just an abstract argument. The conflict between integration, discrimination, and vouchers was plain to see in the wake of Brown. Segregationists searched for ways to sidestep the Court’s decision. One main solution they stumbled upon: school vouchers. They understood well that vouchers would allow them to continue their discrimination.

Voucher advocates might resist my argument about the tradition of anti-discrimination, pointing to supposed examples of discrimination in public schools. For example, public schools “discriminate” against children who do not live within their geographic boundaries. It’s true that some families cannot afford to live in expensive neighborhoods with well-resourced schools. However, public school boundaries, for all their faults, are designed to ensure that all students have access to a public school—one of the core tenets of public education. When parents drive by a school, their children might ask, “Can I go to that school?” There’s a big difference between answering with, “No, dear, because we don’t live in this neighborhood” and “No, dear, because the school doesn’t want you.”

It’s worth noting, too, that voucher advocates need the universal accessibility of public schools for voucher programs to work. With voucher-supported schools allowed to discriminate in admissions, it’s the guaranteed availability of a neighborhood public school that ensures that no child will be denied access to any school at all.

The public accountability tradition

In the U.S., school districts operate under (typically elected) boards that provide public accountability—specifically, democratic accountability to the electorate. This approach has been the norm since the early 1900s. So, both in word and deed, public accountability has been a core principle for longer than anyone reading this can remember.

More recently, state and federal governments clawed back some of that power from local districts, especially through test-based accountability policies. One driving force behind the push for state and federal accountability was rising education spending from these levels of government. Taxpayers wanted to know what they were getting for their money, and test results were one way of measuring the return on their investments.

Even if one prefers a heavier dose of market accountability—giving families more choice—the government is still an important partner. If we want families to have more choices, then we should also want them to have more information, which the government is well positioned to provide.

Today’s voucher programs are unwinding our accountability traditions. They’re allowing families to use public funds to send their children to schools that do not operate under elected school boards. These schools are subject to little, if any, test-based accountability, and they need only meet the minimal bar of accreditation to participate. The recent crop of universal vouchers even fails in providing the information needed for market accountability. Yes, some students in some voucher states will be required to take some type of standardized test. However, it’s unclear whether and how these results will be reported, and even if they are widely available, parents will not be able to compare across disparate tests.

Voucher advocates sometimes point to programs like Social Security and the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) as programs that provide benefits to eligible recipients to make their own consumption decisions with few strings attached. But these programs give little reason to overthrow the public accountability tradition in education. This is basically saying, “yes, our voucher program ends the public accountability tradition in an area so important that the Founding Fathers and every state constitution includes it, but that’s okay…because we also give money to the elderly to make sure they can buy groceries.” If you find that logic confusing, I don’t blame you.

The Great Unwinding

It is no exaggeration to say that universal vouchers are unwinding two centuries of public education tradition, from the nation’s founding days to the present. We are not just talking about any traditions. These are traditions with roots in the First Amendment and our state constitutions, and ones that have shaped the foundational contours of K-12 education in this country.

Voucher advocates might point out that the Supreme Court has reversed itself on vouchers in recent years, giving reason to believe that today’s programs are legally permissible. But U.S. and state constitutions aren’t just legal documents to be interpreted by lawyers and judges. They convey larger, foundational principles and traditions at play that have guided American life, including education, for centuries. The public broadly supports these traditions, regardless of what the courts say.

We do need to upend traditions from time to time. Brown v. Board upended the disgraceful mistreatment of and discrimination against Black Americans. That was a widely accepted step forward. Is it time to end church-state separation, public accountability, and anti-discrimination? You be the judge.

[batboyblog]

"My Name is Harvey Milk and I'm Here To Recruit You!"

If you don't know Harvey Milk was the first openly gay man elected to public office, to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977. To this day Harvey remains the most famous queer person elected to office maybe in the world. His short and tumultuous time in office was dominated by the fight for gay rights. In the late 1970s there was a huge backlash against the rise of gay rights spearheaded by a group called "Save Our Children". Across the country they organized elections to revoke local gay rights ordinances in Miami, Saint Paul, Wichita and Eugene in the summer and fall of 1977. In 1978 a California state Senator John Briggs brought forward a citizens referendum, Proposition 6, which would ban gay people and supporters of gay rights from being teachers any where in the state of California. The last year of Harvey's life was consumed with the struggle against Briggs who he debated across the state. In the end the Briggs Initiative was defeated 58-41% with Harvey's home of San Francisco turning out over 70% against. The national anti-gay fever broke and "Save Our Children" never recovered.

Harvey opened every speech he ever gave with "My name is Harvey Milk, and I'm here to recruit you" In the 1970s rather than accusing gay people of "grooming" children (an idea that didn't exist then) they were accused of "recruiting" them. "Recruiting our children to the homosexual lifestyle". So Harvey used it as a joke but also a battle cry

Today it feels like every day there's more bad news. Across the country state legislatures are trying to ban trans health care for minors and even adults. Local school boards are banning books about LGBT people (and others). States are trying to ban drag. violence and the threat of violence are trying to stop companies from doing Pride and attacking Queer events. The internet is flooded with "groomer" attacks on our humanity. There are days it does feel like the 1970s all over again.

BUT! we won then, and there are many lessons we can take from Harvey and his struggle and use to win the fight against the current wave of hate plunging American in darkness. Harvey's been gone a very long time so... My name is Max and I'm here to recruit you, here are some things I want everyone to do.

VOTE BITCH!

Are you an American citizen 18 years of age or older? Are you registered to vote? if the answer is no, register to fucking vote bitch, here check out what you need. If you want registered, click the link any ways and double check. If you're 16 or 17 years old good news more than half the states in America allow you to "preregister" so you're all signed up and become a registered vote right on your 18th birthday. Whats more ask every vaguely left of center person in your life, everyone who supports LGBT rights, if they're registered to vote and if any one says "no" bug the shit out of them till that changes.

But more than just registering to vote you have to go and vote, yes every election. Right now across America conservative queerphobes are using local elections that get little to no attention and are often very low turn out to take over and push wildly extreme and hateful agendas. Local school boards across America are banning books that have LGBT characters or themes. They pushing policies that refuse students the right to their correct names and pronouns. They want to require schools to out students to their parents against their wishes. Check Vote411 or ballotpedia to find what elections are happening around you.

Candidates on a local level, school board, town/city council, county government, even up to state Rep and state Senate candidates are almost always very responsive to questions. Email everyone running and ask them where they stand, you will get answers I PROMISE you will get answers. Its the easiest thing to do and everyone who has the right to vote in this country should do it, vote in every election.

"But I live in a super blue area my vote doesn't matter" SHUT UP! SHUT UP! even if every local election is Democratic it can be more progressive, ask local candidates what they're gonna do to push LGBT rights forward. Will your local school board push teaching LGBT history? respect trans students pronouns? will your local library board host a drag queen story hour and put together programs for pride? ask! push them! let local candidates know!

"but I live in a super red area my vote doesn't count" BULLSHIT! where ever you are there's a local election that can swing to the non-shitty side if people show up, you can be the difference in a school board election. No matter what stand up and be counted.

Come Out Come Out Wherever You Are.

Since the earliest days of the movement in the 1950s and 1960s before Stonewall, through Harvey Milk's time in the 1970s through to right now, the most powerful tool we have is to come out. It is easy to hate the homosexual, the transgender as an abstraction, as a stereotype as an unrefuted lie. It is so much harder to hate a brother, a sister, a son, a daughter, a friend, a neighbor, your lawyer, your doctor, the mailman, your 8th grade English teacher. In 1978 Harvey said:

"Unless you have dialogue, unless you open the walls of dialogue, you can never reach to change people's opinion. In those two weeks, more good and bad, but more about the word homosexual and gay was written than probably in the history of mankind. Once you have dialogue starting, you know you can break down prejudice. In 1977 we saw a dialogue start."

Thats what they're scared of, thats why they're freaking out in Target, why they're trying to shut down Drag Queen story hours and take away the books. Ignorance and hate lives in darkness and dies in the light. In 1978 gay men and lesbians went door to door in California and introduced themselves to strangers to explain the harm Briggs would do to them. They vote for us 3 to 1 if they know they know one of us.

It shouldn't be like this, it should be when you're ready when you have all the words, but they're coming for us all so come out come out wherever you are. If you know your parents will love you but you've been holding off because it's scary or stressful, nows the moment. If you're a grown ass adult who lives on your own and don't need mom and dad's money to pay your rent, tell them, no matter how much it hurts, call them on the phone, write them a letter if you have to. Does your family know but they asked you not to tell grandma, grandma, great-aunt Marge because they're old or whatever, or your aunt and uncle who are born again Christians. Listen if they still vote they could be hurting you and if they really love you they shouldn't want to do that, tell them! tell them who you really are, and it might be the work of years to bring that person around, but you never know till you try it.

Are there family members you have who know and love you but you know they're conservative and still vote Republican and you've been avoiding talking to them about it because it's awkward? Stop avoiding it, explain it to them, explain that it's not "just politics" explain to your loved ones that they ARE hurting you. If they don't hear it the first time, don't stop, if they love you they shouldn't hurt you.

Come Out at Work, Come out at your bowling league, come out to that friend of a friend you see sometimes, wear a pin, rainbow shoes, a shirt in public, tell your co-workers, your clients, your Church, your Synagogue. Wear that rainbow pin, that pronoun t-shirt, put a sticker on your car, your bag, your phone. If it's safe for you to be out in a space, claim it, COME OUT WHEREVER YOU ARE.

COMING OUT AS TRANS OR NON-BINARY

COMING OUT AS LESBIAN, GAY, OR BISEXUAL

Go To Pride This Year.

Conservatives are trying harder than any time in my lifetime to shut down Pride. Florida and Tennessee have passed laws that will limit pride events. Terrorists are threatening and attacking brands that are doing Pride themed events and products. These events and products go back at least 20 years but the violence of attacks against them is really new. So the only answer is to GO TO PRIDE. I don't care if crowds are not your thing, I don't care if its 97 degrees out the day your city does it, I don't care if your local pride is small and embarrassing, I don't care you might see that one ex, I DON'T CARE. If you physically can go to a pride event this June DO IT. If you're scared to be seen, wear a mask, go in drag, put make or body pant over your tattoos whatever you need to do. If we want to have Pride again next year in many areas this year needs to be a show of force. If you've never been and you never go again this is the year, do it, go, find the Pride event closest to you and do it.

Get Involved Whore!

So far I've offered you pretty easy asks for things you can do, voting, coming out, going to Pride. Now comes the harder ones, get involved. In 1978 gay men and lesbians knocked on doors and told voters across the state of California how an anti-gay measure would affect them personally. If they had the nerve less than 10 years after Stonewall to go to strangers houses and come out to them, I believe you can do it too. Get out there, knock doors, make phone calls, mail postcards, wave signs. Talk to Voters from anywhere, find your local Democratic Party, check out LGBT Democrats in your state, check out groups like the HRC and PFLAG

if you've got money give to HRC, give to GLAD, Give to The National Center for Lesbian Rights all 3 of whom have been the tip of the spear fighting the insane anti-LGBT laws coming out of the states.

If you don't have money, check out The Victory Fund thats supports LGBT candidates and find one close to you and sign up to help. Can't find anyone? try Run for Something that supports young progressives. If you live in a Blue area of a blue state, you can check the Sister District Project which links up volunteers with swingy districts across the country. Swing Left does much the same on a more federal level

crazy right wing extremists can count on organized support from Churches and far right groups. You, yes you, talking to you Glenn! HAVE TO be the support network, the volunteer base for LGBT candidates and their allies and supporters. You have to HAVE to get out there, give if you have money, knock on doors, call, text, write letters go to a protest, sit at a booth, register people to vote, hand out literature, WHATEVER whatever. You can do it, please give at least one weekend over the next two years to a political campaign, be it a local school board candidate, town council, working for the Democrats or volunteering through the HRC or a progressive group, the people who want to destroy you are out working to win elections, you have to be too.

Fucking Run, why not?

This is the last thing, the hardest thing and the thing I don't expect everyone to do. Run, yes really, run for office, yes you, yes I mean it. If the crazed insane conservative who thinks Hillary Clinton drinks child blood out of kids like a juice box is qualified for School Board to ban all the books with queer people or black folks, you are MORE than qualified. I don't care if you're a high school drop out with face tats, you're more qualified than these people, so do it, if you've ever thought of it, do it. Frustratingly dozens of dozens of offices across this country are filled every day but uncontested elections only one person signed up, hell that person can be you why not? Look into it Last year 41% of the seats in the Florida Legislature went uncontested, 37% of the seats in Texas, 53% in Tennessee, 58% in South Carolina. It's not for everyone, but if you've ever wanted to, ever thought about it, take this as your sign, do it. Do you have a friend who's so smart, cool, involved and just better than you in every way and you think they should run the world? Nominate them, give them a push to run

I think Harvey put the importance of electing queer people better than I ever could so

Somewhere in Des Moines or San Antonio, there’s a young gay person who all of a sudden realizes that she or he is gay. Knows that if the parents find out, they’ll be tossed out of the house. The classmates will taunt the child and the Anita Bryants and John Briggs’ are doing their bit on TV, and that child had several options. Staying in a closet, suicide, and then one day that child might open a paper, and it says “Homosexual elected in San Francisco,” and there are two new options. An option is to go to California or stay in San Antonio and fight. Two days after I was elected, I got a phone call, and the voice was quite young. It was from Altoona, Pennsylvania, and the person said, “Thanks.” And you’ve got to elect gay people so that that young child and the thousands upon thousands like that child know that there’s hope for a better world. There’s hope for a better tomorrow. Without hope, not only gays, but those Blacks, and the Asians, and disabled, and seniors. The us’s. The us’s without hope, the us’s give up. I know that you cannot live on hope alone, but without it, life is not worth living. And you, and you, and you have got to give them hope. Thank you very much.

If you read all this thanks, I can't make anyone do anything of course, but whatever you choose to do, I'll be out there knocking doors. I wish I did not live in such dark times but as Gandalf The Gray said "So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.” 

Finally to all my Queer brothers, sisters, and siblings, even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or kiss you. I love you. With all my heart, I love you.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Wajahat Ali at The Left Hook Substack:

Donald Trump is apparently strong, fit, vigorous and a self-proclaimed “very stable genius.”

So, it’s odd to learn that he knows nothing about Project 2025, the blueprint for a second Trump Administration, which his own super PAC has referred to as “Trump’s Project 2025.” It is also supported by the most influential conservative think tanks and donors. Perhaps Trump, a 78-year-old man, has lost several steps due to his old age and this explains his sudden amnesia, alongside his numerous gaffes and brain farts. It’s troubling that a man running to be the President of the United States allegedly knows “nothing” about an expansive document created by the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank that lays out in detail exactly what will happen on the first day of Trump’s second Administration. Trump adds, “I disagree with some of things they’re saying and some of things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.”  Well, what does he disagree with exactly?

Does he disagree with Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts who made headlines this week when he said America is in the process of a “second American revolution” and warned the majority it would be bloodless only “if the left allows it to be?” Does Trump, as stated, “wish them luck” with this Project 2025 endeavor, which by the way Kevin Roberts says Trump gets “full credit” for creating?  Or does Trump agree with Project 2025’s full agenda, which includes gutting the administrative state, purging the government and installing MAGA loyalists, attacking women’s rights, weakening Social Security, annihilating the Department of Education and the Environmental Protection Agency, suspending immigration to the United States, and cutting disability pay for veterans by $160 billion? (Max Burns has a solid Twitter thread which outlines other horrific aspects of the plan.) 

[...] Hang Project 2025 around their necks, and let them succumb under all its rancid, oppressive weight. 

Wajahat Ali has a simple strategy regarding Project 2025 and the GOP: “Hang Project 2025 around their necks, and let them succumb under all its rancid, oppressive weight.”

See Also:

Robert Reich's Substack: Beware: Trump is Project 2025

[communistkenobi]

Hi, you tend to have well-thought-out political opinions (I don't always agree with you, but your reading liveblog were the kick in the ass to make me read Orientalism, and you have managed to change my mind more than once), maybe might have a better answer here than me.

Is there an ideological reason that American (b/c it typically is, god help me) left-of-center types love electoralism so much online (and offline too, tbh. College continues to deal new and fun kinds of psychic damage), but only in the context of the general national elections? I so often receive various extensive breakdowns of reasons that I MUST vote for Biden in 2024, but less about the benefits of, like, getting really invested in my city council elections or the school board.

We have so many freaking elections for goddamn everything because the US/Canada are fuck-off huge that it's super easy to argue for the importance of participating in electoralism and instead I (especially recently) see so many people picking the worst hill to die on, that I really struggle to. Well. Understand why.

I’ll speak mostly to Canada since that’s where most of my formal knowledge comes from and also because I live here lol. Also a lot of what I’m talking about is coming from books I’ve read - Still Renovating by Greg Suttor for example is a pretty in depth history of social policy (primarily housing) in Canada, it’s very dry but is useful for this conversation. This is off the dome and not meant as a PSA or anything, it’s my own perspective, if people want sources for what I’m discussing I can go dig those up, but I’m just putting this disclaimer at the top in case this post leaves my circle.

To answer your question, my instinct is that it’s because north american democracy is increasingly necrotic and disconnected from the general public (with the usual list of caveats about how much liberal capitalist democracies have ever been “for the people”). Reading up on social policy in Canada directly post-WWII is pretty bleak when comparing it to today - social housing used to be a robust part of the housing market, people were paid far better and had far more economic security, our healthcare was freshly socialised and invigorated, the promises of the Keynesian welfare state were generally being met (for a predominantly white middle class electorate, of course), and so on. Even conservatives were basically on board with these things in the 60s, at least in Canada, although that obviously did not last long. And over the decades we have become entrenched in neoliberal cutbacks, the gutting of public institutions, the sale of public space and utilities, the downloading of responsibility for social welfare onto provincial and then municipal governments who have smaller budgets and more limited institutional power, the massive expansion in public-private partnerships, the militarisation of the police - these things really kicked off in the 80s/90s in Canada and have showed little signs of stopping or even really slowing down since (something that also obviously happened in the US). People make the joke that if libraries were suggested as a policy goal today it would be called a communist plot, but it’s true - all of the shit the government offered us forty years ago is unthinkable to even suggest now. Life in general has gotten more difficult as private wealth and deregulation has taken a progressively stronger hold on domestic affairs. This happened slowly over the course of decades, and as political horizons shrunk in terms of what you could expect/demand of your government, there was a real air of this being inevitable, not a result of conscious political decisions but just some organic outcome that no one had control over (“the invisible hand of the market”). Democratic civic responsibility demands we vote as citizens of our country, but for all the reasons outlined above plus a bunch of others I’m sure I’m forgetting, the liberal conception of democratic participation shrunk to the ballot box alone.

And while we all joke about everyone having the historical memory of a goldfish, I think the pandemic made this a deeply dissonant position to hold onto - we saw the government seemingly awake from a long slumber to exercise its might. It placed eviction bans on landlords, enforced mass quarantines and social distancing measures, provided economic relief to people who lost their jobs, stationed itself inside every building and public space to enforce mask mandates, rolled-out universal vaccination programs that were mandatory if you wanted to keep your job - we saw the government flex its power in labour, in housing, in healthcare, in civic life, and at the border in a way previously unheard of, particularly for people who were not alive to experience the welfare state of the 50s and 60s and even 70s. The state revealed itself as the life-structuring force it always had been before receding again, telling everyone to go back to normal as if nothing had happened, as if millions of people had not died in a global plague, as if it had not just demonstrated to everyone in the country that the state can at the drop of a hat order your landlord to stop evicting you and your boss to give you paid time off. This of course didn’t really happen in the US, or at least not nearly to this degree, which resulted in the deaths of over a million people.

So now when politicians perform this same incapacity to do anything, when they trot out hyper-specific policies that might benefit a couple thousand people at most, when they make stupid non-promises and shrink away from even mild forms of social democracy (eg Sanders-style campaign promises), I don’t know how much people buy it. I’m not particularly optimistic about the pandemic radicalising large amounts of people, but I think even if it doesn’t, we saw what happened! And we’ve all seen a million fucking articles about how people don’t want to go to work anymore, about labour shortages, we’ve seen essentially every sector of labour go on some kind of strike in the past two or three years - there is popular organised political participation happening far away from the ballot box, and is only growing in power by the day. Socialism is now a word that exists in the national consciousness, something that was unthinkable even a decade ago. Currently right now we are seeing an international conversation about (and global popular support for) indigenous sovereignty, we are seeing a full-throated articulation of what a LandBack policy would look like, and this comes on the heels of the national Canadian conversation of residential schools and missing and murdered indigenous women. Decolonisation is now a household term. In the case of the US, we are seeing people make the very obvious point that America can conjure billions of dollars to bomb hospitals and civilians, but any social policy to help its own citizens is too expensive, pie in the sky fantasy nonsense.

And by the same token, there is organised right-wing and fascist violence happening in the streets, massive increases in hate crimes, insane political stunts and demonstrations like the Freedom Convoy and 1 Million March 4 Children (inspired by the Capitol Hill storming in the US), Qanon plots to kidnap and execute elected officials - things that right wing parties are actively encouraging, particularly the PPC and CPC. More and more we see that electoral politics is the domain of the far-right, whose culture war issues have the best chance of being realised through the sacred portal of the ballot box. Democrats can’t even offer people legalised abortion now!

I think this is why liberals are in a state of hysteria. A healthy liberal democracy does not require constant, unrelenting reminders to “vote your ass off.” Liberals are very much aware, even unconsciously, that voting does less and less of what they want every single day - you see this openly admitted to by American liberals, who are now doing Hitler % meter calculations about which fascist to vote for come the next federal election. Voting itself is what matters, even as they openly, frantically admit it will do nothing but slightly delay the inevitable.

So to like directly answer your question: I think it has less to do with federal elections as a specific political strategy and more just an expression of anxiety about the fact that voting does not do what you want it to do, or what it once did - perhaps encouraging larger questions if voting does anything at all. If national federal elections don’t do anything, if you voting for the most powerful position on the planet doesn’t really change very much regardless of who’s in power, what is the point of voting at all? So I don’t think they are articulating an actual political strategy or way of doing politics, because by their own admission it’s not going to do much of anything (while at the same time being an existential crisis). I’m in a similar boat to you, I vote in smaller elections where I feel they will do some measure of good (in part because municipalities are responsible for so much more of civic life than they were a few decades ago), I have engaged with the Ontario NDP for several years (although that has come to an end now because of their position on Palestine). Electoralism is a compromise, it is an avenue for potential good, but not always, or even most of the time.

Thankfully there are other avenues for politics - labour organising, protesting, mutual aid support networks, getting involved with community work, even something like local neighbourhood councils. Those are places of political potential, and a single person’s presence in them can make a legitimate noticeable difference (speaking from several years of heavy involvement in community orgs). I have never really felt like I was making a change while voting, but I have felt that way helping community members not get evicted, or offering them free daycare a few times a week, or running programs from lgbtq kids who don’t want to go home after school. Those things legit save peoples’ lives, a lot of them are low stakes relative to their benefit, and they help stave off the alienation and loneliness I know everyone feels. Obviously you run into the same structural problems you would everywhere else, it’s not a paradise by any stretch of the imagination, but they are so many avenues outside of voting that do actually help people around you.

And I think if liberals admit that these actions are more powerful, more effective than voting, they are admitting to themselves that their core beliefs are wrong, that the communists and anarchists are correct and have been correct long before their dumbass was born. They can no longer point to any institution that gives a fuck about them as a defense against left-wing critiques of liberal electoralism. I think that is part of what animates their hysteria, their temper tantrums, their screaming about the only thing to do is do nothing at all. It is a full-throated defense of self-defeat. They are wailing as everything they believe in dies. I’d be pretty upset too if that were me! Luckily I grew out of that when I was like 19

[vintageseawitch]

i'm tired of evil winning so much. it doesn't matter some good things could happen; evil will be there in no time to destroy any decent progress. i'm tired of being terrified i'll lose my rights. i'm tired of being powerless about this & not being able to help others across the globe who have already lost their rights. i'm tired of how useless the UN actually is. i'm tired of the US being a global superhero by being murderous bullies. i'm tired of fascism rising again. i'm tired of WWII being romanticized but now people think that little Austrian artist with the even smaller mustache had some good ideas actually. i'm tired of human rights violations happening & there are zero consequences for it. i'm tired that the majority of humanity as well as currently living flora & fauna will have to pay the price for the greediness of the few. i'm tired of always hearing about a countdown to when we can never reverse climate change while those who are actually the major problem - the US military, big oil, & others - are able to get away with this. i'm tired of the bloated military industrial complex. i'm tired of having less rights than literal corpses. i'm tired of useless CEOs. i'm tired of billionaires. i'm tired of people thinking billionaires are geniuses instead of actually greedy sociopaths who will happily pay you nothing if they could get away with it. i'm tired of people thinking our government wouldn't do that when they actually totally would & have already done it in some capacity. i'm tired of "voting for the lesser of two evils." i'm tired of old, out of touch people being in charge. i'm tired of people being proud of their willful ignorance. i'm tired of the white-washing of history. i'm tired of people not giving a fuck about the environment. i'm tired of people not being able to afford homes when there are more empty houses than there are homeless people. i'm tired of workers labor being exploited so they get paid a time while their bosses get a dollar. i'm tired of learning my generation & younger are the most educated but the most overworked. i'm tired of older generations who had so much handed to them want to make sure someone else doesn't get the same because lead poisoning have made them into sociopathic cowards who refuse to see the truth & will vote against their own interest just to fuck over people they fear & misunderstand. i'm tired of people claiming protesting against genocide means you're antisemitic & should be silenced. i'm tired of book banning/burning. i'm tired of xenophobia when so many of us are descended from illegal immigrants. i'm tired of men still getting upset over a hypothetical question instead of doing some self-reflection. i'm tired of the patriarchy, rampant misogyny, & toxic masculinity. i'm tired of men not thinking anger counts as an emotion. i'm tired of rapists getting away with their crimes because "what about their future" & "what was she wearing" when it's actually not about sex but power instead. i'm tired of "not all men" to silence legitimate points. i'm tired of people who make false claims of being raped not facing any consequences so it's harder for real victims to come forward. i'm tired of being so afraid of being assaulted & getting pregnant with my rapists baby that i took my state of fertility in my own hands because i'm afraid of my government even as my obgyn said not to worry. i'm tired of the christofascist movement that is gaining momentum. i'm tired of project 2025 being a real possibility & people claiming "they wouldn't do that." i'm tired of how openly fascist conservatives are now. i'm tired of people drinking that kool-aid so hard. i'm tired of the bootlicking. i'm tired of cops & their undeserved diplomatic immunity so they can literally commit murder & get away with it. i'm so. fucking. tired. this country is hell & has helped make the world hell. america has never been great. it's just super effective propaganda & brainwashing that has been wildly successful.

i just want hope that doesn't feel delusional. i don't want to give up but i'm so tired.

[thecanadianweeb]

Barbie Movie Review (TW: Spoilers!)

So I saw the barbie movie yesterday with my GF and her mother too.

Since people were wearing pink to the movie, i wore my pink Y2K tracksuit that my aunt got at a flea market for me. My gf wore a pink dress with a leather jacket. My tracksuit totally fit the vibe! Anyways my theater was full of gays, including us.

So the movie starts really wholesome, with feminism as it's motto... until barbie starts having an existential crisis. Then she goes to the weird barbie, the black sheep of barbieland. The weird barbie tells her that whoever is playing with her at the moment is causing the crisis. Then she goes to the real world and ken is the tag-along (man) child.

In the real world, barbie meets Barbra Handler while sitting on a bench, while trying to regain memories of who was playing with her.

she finds out that it was a high-schooler named Sasha. she goes up to find her, while ken starts getting into conservative politics.

Eventually, Mattel themselves finds out that barbie has escaped her world and ended up in the human realm. they then send out agents to get her because it could have serious consequences on both worlds.

Barbie soon finds Sasha, but then gets roasted by her because she hates barbies due to unrealistic (body) standards. Barbie sits down on the curb of the school and cries until Mattel's agents find her. Barbie is kinda happy to see them because she's always wanted to see what some of her creators have done. Meanwhile, Gloria, Sasha's mom is picking her up when she sees barbie getting picked up by Mattel but is too late.

When barbie is at Mattel headquarters, she explores the building and goes to the CEO's office. They then put her in a box that nearly kidnaps her, so she makes a run for it while the agents chase after her! Meanwhile, Ken is going back to barbieland with his new political agenda.

While running away from the Agents, Barbie runs into Ruth Handler, The mother/creator of Barbie itself! She tells barbie a secret escape method and it works! Barbie then meets Gloria and her daughter. They stare for a bit with a lot of queer-coded Sapphic tension. Then barbie flops into the car due to the agents catching up. Which cues a car chase scene!

in this car chase scene, Gloria and barbie talk about their problems and find out that SHE's the one that's messing with her life. Gloria also talks about her male partner is all by himself, practicing his spanish on duolingo. eventually they get away from the agents safely, and barbie takes the two newfound friends back to barbieland, which has now been turned into kendom. Barbie is obviously unhappy, because her friends have been turned into sex slaves with maid outfits! (Weird, right?) The constitution was also about to be changed too!

Barbie then becomes incredibly depressed and goes to the only refuge left: Weird Barbie's house! the other barbies which weren't brainwashed were staying there for safety as well. Then there's a narration stating that Margot Robbie probably wasn't the best actress for this scene, because ya know.

The Mattel agents realize that changes have aleady been made to both worlds and send the agents into barbieland to stop it as well!

Then there's an actual commercial for a depressed barbie doll, which is super funny. but also kinda sad.

Gloria and Sasha decide to go back to the real world, but ken has issued the construction of a Donald Trump-esque wall! And what's worse, Someone hitched a ride on the pair's Car! Turns out that it was just Allan, and he's actually a nice guy trying to escape the conservative government. Then out of nowhere, He literally jumps out and punches the Construction workers, serving as a distraction!

Gloria and Sasha have an "Oh Sh*t, we gotta help her" moment and go back to help save Barbieland! they end up finding her in the strange Barbie's house. And Gloria gives an inspiring speech about life and it's hardships. She's also wearing a shirt with the Lesbian flag colors on it!

Eventually, the refugee barbies and Gloria come up with a plan to undo the ken Regime (that's what I'm gonna call it) and bring order back.

this plan includes cheating on all of the other ken dolls and making them fight against each other, lord of the flies style.

it ends up working and everything is back to normal. when the kens come back from a homoerotic lord of the flies battle, they see that their changes have been undone and are upset. Ken tries to seduce barbie, but she ignores it bc they are both gay in denial or possibly bi/aro, etc. the girls then tell the kens that they are enough if they stop being stupid and actually be supportive for once.

Then the agents meet up and talk to barbie saying that's she's the hero and deserves a happy ending with ken. Barbie disagrees, saying that she doesn't know who or what she wants to be. Then Ruth comes back and tell her about how she was her actual mother and it's up to her to decide her destiny in an inspiring speech. Barbie then decides to stay in the real world and it's unclear if the portal was left closed or open. Same thing with ken and barbie being gay. All it shows in the end is barbie asking if she's celibate, which is a recurring joke in the film.

I think since it has an ambiguous ending, barbie might actually be in a poly relationship with Gloria and her partner.

Anyways, TLDR, Barbie has an existential crisis, gains a girlfriend (Both ways ig) and discovers herself.

If you are a Parent, don't bring your children to this movie unless they can handle mature topics or you are willing to explain stuff. it is rated PG-13 in my country, however. Other than that, A great movie! (unless you have mommy issues)

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Who is brave enough to back Brazil’s global tax on billionaires? The answer will define our future

It would raise $250bn to help offset some of the damage the super-rich cause. Yet they’ll do everything to stop it in its tracks

Who is government for? It’s a question we should never stop asking. The answer that keeps coming back is “not the majority”. For example, the first phase of the Covid-19 pandemic produced remarkably consistent polling results. Repeated surveys showed fewer than 10% of people wished to return to the pre-pandemic economy. The great majority wanted to see one good thing emerging from the trauma of the illness and the measures used to address it: a fairer, greener, kinder economic system.

But the Conservative government had other ideas. It announced what then prime minister Boris Johnson called a “significant return to normality”. His normality, of course. The structure of the Covid bailouts ensured that the big banks gained massively, often at the expense of small businesses. Executive pay and dividends for shareholders soared, while lowlier workers lost incomes and livelihoods.

I think we are all either vaguely or painfully aware that, regardless of changes of government, our needs will be met only if they coincide with the demands of capital. If they run directly counter to those demands, however great and consistent our wishes might be, they scarcely stand a chance.

The response to the pandemic was one test of that proposition. Now the world’s governments face another. Last week, Brazilian climate minister Ana Toni explained a proposal put forward by her government (and now supported by South Africa, Germany and Spain), for a 2% global tax on the wealth of the world’s billionaires. Though it would affect just 3,000 of the super-rich, it would raise around $250bn (£195bn): a significant contribution either to global climate funds or to poverty alleviation.

Radical? Not at all. According to calculations by Oxfam, the wealth of billionaires has been growing so fast in recent years that maintaining it at a constant level would have required an annual tax of 12.8%. Trillions, in other words: enough to address global problems long written off as intractable.

You would need to perform Olympian mental gymnastics to oppose Brazil’s very modest proposal. It addresses, albeit to a tiny extent, one of the great democratic deficits of our time: that capital operates globally, while voting power stops at the national border. Without global measures, in the contest between people and plutocrats, the plutocrats will inevitably win. They can extract vast wealth from the nations in which they operate, often with the help of government subsidies and state contracts, and shift it through opaque networks of shell companies and secrecy regimes, placing it beyond the reach of any tax authority. This is what some of the global “investors” in the UK’s water companies have done. The money they extracted is now gone, and we are left with both the debts they accumulated and the ruins of the system they ransacked. Get tough with capital, or capital will get tough with you.

The Brazilian proposal, which will be put before the G20 summit in Rio in November, has already been dismissed by the US treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, who suggested there was no need for it. On whose behalf does she make this claim? Not ours. Wherever people have been surveyed, including in the US, there is strong support for raising taxes on the rich.

Continue reading.

[booasaur]

There's been a lot of talk about the upcoming US elections in November, but before we get to that, the primaries are still going on. I've seen people say to research your local progressives and support them, but ANY American can donate to or even volunteer for other candidates! At the least, everyone can boost the important primary races so that potential voters might see what's going on.

The NY 16th district is safe Democrat territory and whoever wins this primary will be all but guaranteed to win the general election. It will happen in 10 days, June 25th, and today (June 15th) is the last day to register for it.

I've seen a lot of frustration and arguing on the left about Democrats and Palestine, but this actually unites both sides! Jamaal Bowman, who already holds the seat, is one of the most pro-Palestine government officials we have. George Latimer, his challenger, is funded heavily by Israel's lobby in the US:

And as the case has been these last years, pro-Israel politicians are simply less progressive.

And even if you don't care about Palestine enough to let it affect your politics, do you trust this guy to hold the line against conservative policies and to support liberal ones?

He's not just going to favor the rich, he's literally racist! He said Bowman, who is Black, won last time because of George Floyd! He compared people going after Andrew Cuomo for sexual harassment to Emmett Till (a Black 14-year-old boy who was lynched in 1955)!

This is a dig at Dearborn's high Muslim population (and bizarrely, also at the gays because of San Francisco??).

You can donate or phonebank even if you're in a different state or district. If you support Palestine AND you want to use electoral politics to push the Democrats left, supporting Bowman however you can is a no-brainer.

[iwriteaboutfeminism]

i worry a little about the message that because the current state of things is bad it must be the sitting president's fault.

yes biden has failed loudly in a handful of areas that progressives care about deeply and should not be sheltered from that criticism, but the fact is biden as president has done quite a bit out of the view of the media that genuinely will make this country more livable (particularly for queer people, union workers, etc.)

has the democratic party done enough to counter the rise of far right sentiment either in terms of policy or messaging? god no.

but also failing to acknowledge the things the democrats get right only reinforces this culturally conservative moment we're wading through. democrats notice the rise of right wing populism, try to triangulate to what the perceive as the new center (i.e. center-right/far-right), piss off their progressive voters, and then finally make the asshole republicans look good in comparison

again i dont want to spare biden from criticism. you're right that he NEEDS to step down if the democrats want to stand a chance in the election

but in working towards that goal, spreading a message akin to "well gas prices are super high rn fuck joe biden" that removes the complexity will only cause more disillusioned young progressives to stay home and more moderates/independents feel okay with supporting trump in spite of how god awful he is

sorry for the long rambly ask. i just wanted to throw some of these ideas around since (like basically every marginalized person in the us) i care DEEPLY about creating as much incentive as possible to vote against trump

Thanks for writing in and sharing your thoughts and perspective!

I have no problem with people talking about Biden's positive accomplishments. In fact, I think political campaigns should be much more about a candidate's positive accomplishments and plans to actively pursue future accomplishments, than to nearly exclusively fear monger (however accurately) about their opponent. People certainly understand the use of voting against a candidate, but they really do prefer to vote FOR a candidate.

Anyway, my criticism of people calling Biden our most progressive president is that it seems to overstate the facts to the extent that they threaten disbelief and ultimately lessen the effectiveness of that argument.

I think it would be more effective to list Biden's positive accomplishments in a "these are good things for a government to do, and I want to support the party/candidate who does things like this," type of way, rather than, "If you don't agree he is individually the BEST thing that has EVER happened to the American presidency, then you MUST be a filthy fascist." It's just obviously taking it too far.

Admittedly, the average American does not follow politics closely, but they're experts in their personal, everyday lives. And because people mostly don't follow politics closely, most people don't make political decisions based on ALL the available facts. They make decisions based on the information they're exposed to everyday. If Biden was as progressive a President as some people claim him to be, I promise that more people would have noticed, because most of the biggest progressive priorities are the kinds of things that would directly impact everyday life.

There is definitely a sizable list of good things that Biden has done. I think that stands on its own, and adding onto that with the claim that those things make Biden a progressive superstar only really makes people DOUBT the impact of those things because they know the superlative isn't true because that's definitely something they would have noticed. It's actually counterproductive to what they're trying to do by making that claim.

Once (hopefully) Biden steps aside, I hope the party is able to focus on the sizable list of good things they will actively pursue to make people's everyday lives better.

[a-dorky-american]

Screw it, I'm bored, so let's do some late-night headcannons.

Neither of the Italian brothers are shy when it comes to romance or the "horizontal tango"... Like, at all. Some of the stuff they say (mainly Romano) is enough to make France blush. They are HEAVY flirts to the ladies (and the boys if you're Italy). Does this flirting get them far? No, no it doesn't. But hey, A+ for effort.

Japan looks like he would own a pet hampster and use he/they pronouns, neither of which I can explain.

I took a Tennessee History class this spring semester and learned that, while the state was still the Southwest Territory, fighting was a very big form of entertainment (it was almost considered a badge of honor to have been in a brawl), so I like to think that America would head on down to soon-to-be Tennessee to watch a good fight (he wouldn't fight anyone himself in fear of hurting them with his super strength).

Cameroon has a wildlife conservation center in his own home and the animals terrify cameronian public officials or visiting nations whenever they come over. His pet lion has to have SOME friends besides Cameroon to play soccer with, after all.

I'd bet money that England takes up knitting like the old man he is. I'd bet f*CKING MONEY-

Speaking of old men, China! While he is fascinated by modern society (with all it's ups and downs), China will always be a man of tradition at heart. He just can't let go of his glorious art or culture from centuries ago.

France canonically has a fear of computers, so I like to think that, whenever he needs to print something out or send an email to someone, he'll ask America or some other European nation to do it for him so that way he doesn't even have to look at the "glorified government watchdog," as he calls them.

Well, that's all I can think of for now. Feel free to comment below or reblog!