portuguesemusketeer

[portuguesemusketeer]

So anyways I remembered I could reblog posts

[portuguesemusketeer]

the generational gap between me and the people my age who use chat gpt

[portuguesemusketeer]

I read fanfic called "Early June" and decide make screencaps of all the funny

Thoughts: fanfic good and very fun. one of those everyone has to live type deals but I think thats fine. this one's for the girls. I am very attached to june egbert now

@triptychgardener @gendertrickster <- these guys made it good job

[portuguesemusketeer]

[portuguesemusketeer]

Oh no

[portuguesemusketeer]

Rockets are political, of course. Of course! Rockets are one of the most complex and pricey elements of a (complex and expensive) space program. Civil space is pork and special interests all the way down. Military space is black budgets and unaudited waste all the way up. Private space is the result of stacking so much paper (= power, which corrupts) that you can withstand the intensely money-losing nature of space development for long enough that maybe you come out profitable. Political decisions with political outcomes every step of the way.

But I grew up in a time when both The Left and The Right hated space equally. Space is an expensive government project, so one hates it for its use of resources. Maybe you think that money should Fund Our Schools, maybe you think that money should Cut Our Taxes; comes out the same either way. The Republicans all laughed Newt Gingrich out of the room in 2012 for proposing a moon base, and you just know that, if he'd been the R presidential nominee that year, the Democrats would have done the same.

So it's been easy to think for most of my life that support for some kind of space program was... apolitical. A small bipartisan crew of Congresspeople, plus a small cadre of true believers: the Carl Sagans, the Bill Nyes, the Neil DeGrasse Tysons, and me.

The successes of SpaceX over the last few years have reminded the chattering classes about space, and I hate it. It's impossible to get away from: on Twitter, on Tumblr, in political magazines, in real life, everywhere you go, inescapable.

The successes of SpaceX's rocket development show that SpaceX "should be nationalized" (nobody knows what this means). The successes of SpaceX's rocket development show that the space program "should be privatized" (nobody knows what this means). All credit for the successes of SpaceX belongs to the SpaceX employees, cruelly oppressed by their Apartheid Emerald Mine Dictator Elon Musk. SpaceX's successes are so stark because their competitors, NASA and Boeing, have Gone Woke and have workforces that are 80% unionized disabled Hispanic women, who are of course incapable of designing rockets. SpaceX is some sort of complex crypto scam, and its rockets always blow up. NASA is some sort of shell-game handout to the indigent, and it produces nothing but elite coastal drag queen story hour lesbian interpretive dance. Elon Musk claims to want small government, but all SpaceX revenue is just government subsidies. Elon Musk is a real-life Hank Rearden, beset on all sides by scheming bureaucrats who hate progress for evil, possibly communist, reasons. SpaceX wants to colonize Mars, which is colonialism, which is evil. SpaceX wants to colonize Mars, which is good because otherwise the commies will get there first. Starlink is space junk that will destroy astronomy, the space program, and several indigenous religions, and also, it's vaporware that doesn't work at all. Starlink makes terrestrial Internet totally obsolete, and any regulatory obstacles in their way are put there by hostile interests and fifth columnists.

It's all so tiresome. It's all so stupid. SpaceX is a genuinely successful company, and its successes have improved the speed and cost of both the civil and the national-security space program, while also spawning an ecosystem of me-too rocket startups and small, nimble satellite builders. That's the whole truth. The chattering classes don't care about the truth at all. They don't care about space at all. They have no background on the issues. They're just riding into a fun new arena, shooting from the hip, and trying to score points on each other.

This rant is inspired by a cute little exchange I saw on Twitter:

Shut the fuck up Keith. Shut the fuck up everyone in the comments saying "also that would be stupid, since you have to be a US citizen to work at SpaceX." You don't even know enough to know you know nothing. This is a minor wrist slap about how the ITAR category of "US persons" (which includes asylum seekers) is described in SpaceX's online job postings. SpaceX had a much worse EEOC situation in the early 2010s related to online job postings that resulted in a big fine and the replacement of the entire recruiting team for exposing the company to legal issues, but that wasn't on frog Twitter, so you don't care about it, do you? This is all just another front in the culture war to you.

Shut the fuck up Wanye. Do you know how expensive Trump's first round of tariffs made aluminum? Do you know that you're looking at hundreds of tons of stainless steel in that video, which Trump is promising to skyrocket (sorry) the price of if he's elected? There are elements of national security space that have been doing really well under Biden that might be obliterated under Trump, and there were other elements doing well under Trump that were obliterated under Biden. Do you know which are which, and which you prefer? Do you even care? Just another front, etc.

I hate you all. Get away from my life's work, and get out of my fandom. Stop talking about the company I gave five years of my life to. If you negatively polarize the left against the biggest driver of the modern American space industry, we're fucked, and the points you scored on Twitter won't matter.

(I might do a follow-up on how Elon is making all this Much Worse when I calm down a little, but rest assured, he's the tip of the spear of this tendency.)

(I might do a follow-up on some stupid-ass leftist I saw yesterday when I calm down a little, but rest assured, the left is also not sending its best here, and they're trying their hardest to speedrun negative polarization.)

[portuguesemusketeer]

up, down, and around // lisbon, portugal // april 2024 // ©

[portuguesemusketeer]

I thought it would be an hour of listening to screaming and looking at pictures of draculas, but it was so much for frightening than fathomed

[portuguesemusketeer]

Ever since I was a kid I compulsively scan clover patches for a four-leaf clover. I never find one. The other day in the park, I happened to glance down at my feet and somehow spotted one instantly. This particular high might last me the rest of the month.

[portuguesemusketeer]

Contribution of European countries to the development of Europe's new rocket, Ariane 6.

[portuguesemusketeer]

Resume

Tumblrina (2021-)

Unprofessional Poster (2022-)

Train fan (20??-)

Gay Man ([Redacted]-)

[portuguesemusketeer]

we had a true lost in translation moment with flag signalling today

some background: the international code of signals is used as shorthand for communicating important information between vessels unto this day. everyone carries a flag alphabet for this purpose and you can raise flags separately or together to indicate conditions and requests.

so when my crew mate informed me that the navy boat we were passing had two signal flags up i asked him to relay me the message because i was busy downstairs.

here is what he saw through the binoculars:

the flag on the left is Alpha (I have a diver down; keep well clear at slow speed) and the right one is Bravo (I am taking in or discharging or carrying dangerous goods.) the vessel most likely had clearance divers out to remove underwater explosives and wanted others to steer clear.

however, my beloved crew mate only vaguely recalled that Alpha stands for divers and Bravo stands for dangerous. so imagine my surprise when they hesitantly relayed that

"the navy...wants us to know that their divers know how to fight?"

[portuguesemusketeer]

This also means 'stop telling people to kill themselves because you don't like them'

"I think bad things shouldn't happen to people, EXCEPT WHEN-"

No, stop that, if you're gonna be against the bad thing in question you really ought not to discriminate; otherwise it's tantamount to allowing it to go on as-is.

[portuguesemusketeer]

"I think bad things shouldn't happen to people, EXCEPT WHEN-"

No, stop that, if you're gonna be against the bad thing in question you really ought not to discriminate; otherwise it's tantamount to allowing it to go on as-is.

[portuguesemusketeer]

Batman Beyond S01E13 “Ascension”

[portuguesemusketeer]

it's pretty well-established that lots of ostensibly leftist, progressive people suddenly abandon their stated values when they're confronted with something that makes them feel bad.

for example

people who balk at voting for a progressive candidate who has done things they don't agree with, even if that candidate is the only one in the ring against a much more conservative candidate they strongly oppose

people who want prison abolition, except they feel all rapists should be incarcerated for life.

people who believe you should be allowed to write what you want, unless the subject matter is violent/sexual/insert objection here (there are lots of variants)

people who want homelessness to be reduced, but block a homeless shelter from being built in their neighborhood because they want to protect their house's market value.

people who want their drug of choice to be legal, but are vehemently against the decriminalization of a different drug because they're afraid that crime will increase.

there's a lot of situations like these. they occur within all of us, on a regular basis. many of us would protest that that's not true, because we want to be ideologically perfect or whatever. and other people haven't realized that's what's happening, but we feel it in our bodies: we carry the cognitive dissonance with us as stress, discontent, anger. people get so defensive when we're called out on this cognitive dissonance -- because the cognitive dissonance itself is wounding us, and it's preventing us from acting in accordance with our values.

this phenomenon -- this clash between our values and our feelings -- at its root, this phenomenon is passive in its values and active in its feelings. a person who believes in dismantling the gender binary, but in practice they reinforce the binary when they decide all men including trans men are inherently dangerous.

I've been thinking about this, of late, and to illustrate it I'm going to do the hard thing and admit to not being A Pure and Irreproachable Leftist:

I'm a white woman in my mid-20s. When adult black men come near me on the street, I get tense, avoid eye contact, and reach to secure my purse, fearing harassment.

This is a racist act. Like, this is a classic racial microaggression.

It would be easy to do a few things, here. First, I could deny it to myself. I could claim that it's got nothing to do with race -- but if I were honest, it does.

Second, I could justify it. I could say, I'm a vulnerable woman in a patriarchal society, I'm likely to be the victim of harassment and violence. This is just self-defense, which makes it OK.

Third, I could pretend it didn't happen. I could turn my thoughts away from the reality, refuse to acknowledge the situation, and avoid considering it altogether. I don't need to feel the discomfort of Being Racist when I value anti-racism if I don't think about my actions and feelings.

These are all so easy to do. And they're replicated in the situations I described above, all the time. They make me into an exception, they obscure the situation, they erase the dissonance between what I'm doing and what I believe in.

Instead, I've chosen to think about this critically. What's actually happening? Where is the disconnect developing? Is the fear I'm experiencing realistic?

When I'm alone in public, I am often approached by people asking me for money, and most of the people doing this in my area are black men due to systemic poverty along racial lines, and when they ask me for money I say no and feel scared they'll get angry. I have started to react with defensiveness and anxiety when this happens, and now I'm doing that even before it happens--just when some of the conditions line up.

So what can I do, if I want my actions to align differently?

I can't necessarily stop myself from getting anxious and acting on a defensive instinct--but I can recognize that I'm doing that and make a conscious choice to resist it. To let go of my purse, to make eye contact, to practice a different habit. Ideally, with time, the new habit can take the place of the old instinct. It's not just a physical habit, either: I remind myself that the people who approach me for money are doing a very difficult thing, something that must feel deeply humiliating to them, because their need is so great.

Okay. That's a start.

But there's another, deeper layer to this racism, and this is the layer I want to address next. If all I do is try to correct my way of thinking, I'm unlikely to fully change my behavior, because I'm still going to be stressed out by the experience. I'll still feel anxious when strangers approach me, and I'll feel guilty for feeling that way, because I don't want to be a person who reacts to black strangers walking by with a sense of fear and anxiety.

So I asked myself, what is within my power to do so this is a less scary thing for me?

I could again react with racism. I could move to a white suburb and avoid the problem. I could shop only at the more expensive grocery store, where I've never been approached for cash, and get gas at stations in rich neighborhoods.

This, I know, would not solve my core problem, because it doesn't align with my values.

What I've been thinking about doing, what I'd like to start doing, is carry an envelope of cash in my purse. and here's why:

If I'm anxious when I'm put on the spot by someone asking me for money and refusing, I can solve that by not refusing.

Once or twice, I've responded to being approached for money by actually giving them the cash. And while I was indeed anxious and stressed in the moment, panicking over whether I should or shouldn't do it, when I gave them the cash and chatted briefly, it felt good, not bad. I was happy, afterward, because I felt that I'd done the right thing and helped someone who needed it.

I know I have disposable income to spare. Actually being asked for money happens maybe once a month; if I had ten $10 bills in an envelope that was earmarked for this situation, I could go about six months to a year without feeling that anxiety, because I would know what I was going to do, and I could do it without guilt. I could be the kind of person who gives from her abundance, who treats people in poverty with dignity and respect, and stops reacting in fear when approached by black strangers (since being asked for money would stop being a stress-inducing experience).

This approach requires me to do a couple of things:

1. Do literally anything about the situation.

When I said before that this phenomenon of cognitive dissonance is a passive phenomenon, this is what I mean! It's so easy to do nothing, feel anxiety and guilt and anger about the situation, and just go on suffering. But it won't make things better. I cannot accept a passive role.

2. Make a sacrifice that serves my values.

I like having spending money, and I am nervous that being reckless with my money will hurt me in the long-term. I could decide that this course of action isn't worth the cost to me; but if I believe in anti-racism, in helping people who are struggling financially, in building a better world -- that has a cost, inevitably, and I need to be prepared to pay it if I want to see it happen. If more people were prepared to pay the costs of building a better world, we could see the damn thing done.

If I wanted to, I could take this another step deeper: It would be great if poor black members of my community didn't have to resort to asking strangers for cash. If there were other resources to pull more people out of poverty. If I champion anti-racism and anti-poverty as values, I can get involved in larger initiatives that will help with the systemic side of the issue, too. But I have to take action and make sacrifices -- sacrifices of money, time, energy.

Being realistic, I cannot give the same money, time and energy to every cause and value I hold. I have to work, and do the tasks to maintain my own life. I have to pay rent. I cannot pour from an empty cup. So although I can extrapolate this to basically every issue I care about, I have to acknowledge the limits I have.

I realize that this whole thing sounds very "it's all about Me and My Feelings." But the point is that of course it is. If we can accept that people make choices based on how we feel, we can decide what courses of action can both support our values and make us feel good, instead of resigning ourselves to cognitive dissonance that paralyzes us into inaction.

how does this work for you?

Consider why your values have come into conflict with your feelings.

Question the underlying instincts causing those feelings.

Separate your feelings from the situation . If they are unrealistic or inappropriate to the situation, you can remind yourself of that when the situation arises. If your feelings are because you're passionate about something, consider fulfilling that passion in a different way that honors your values.

Change your reactive habits. Reassess the reactions you have that are out of alignment with what you believe. Determine what you can be doing instead.

Develop a proactive practice that addresses the core of your feelings and supports your values. Proactive practices require you to take action and make a sacrifice -- maybe of ego, maybe of energy, maybe of time or money.

(Optional) Engage with groups and movements that implement proactive practices on a larger scale. We all only have so much to give, so choose which of these to engage with based on what will be meaningful to you.

To take a topical example: many people in the USA don't want to vote for incumbent president Biden in the 2024 presidential election, because he's acting in support of Israel's genocide in Palestine.

This is a reasonable feeling to have on its own! but it is also known that the other main candidate, Donald Trump, would be even more supportive and permissive of this genocide, in addition to implementing many other policies that are outright dangerous to the health and safety of basically anyone living in the USA (as well as plenty of people outside the US).

If voting for Biden is viscerally unpleasant and stressful because of the genocide in Palestine, it is a reasonable thing to feel bad about. But it's also true that not voting, or voting for a different candidate, is an act that increases the odds of Donald Trump becoming president again, which would make the situation worse. Denial, or abstention, or trying to justify that choice, won't make that material reality any different.

If you know that voting Biden out won't help Palestinians, what are you trying to achieve? What can you do instead? What actions can you take that support your values?

Can you vote for down-ballot candidates that are pro-Palestine and advocating for a ceasefire? Can you donate money to initiatives helping people in Palestine? Can you pressure your existing representatives to withdraw support for Israel's genocidal war? Can you encourage less passionate people in your life to do the same?

If this is a deeply important cause for you, can you get involved with local organizations that are taking action to support Palestinians?

Can you accept that to live your values is to pay the cost, in money, in ego death, in energy, in time?

[portuguesemusketeer]

just read some recent american history (im quite into american tv shows) and there appears to be this rule where if you have gloves that don't fit you murder is legal, very interesting culture