#capitalism gains less if there's less people to exploit

[balkanradfem]

Do you think that low birth-rates are a problem?

I think they're the opposite of a problem :)

[zinjanthropusboisei]

"This makes me think about the person who stole the Free Farm Stand. We had laughed it off as a mistake, of little consequence. But the mindset that claims permission to convert a free gift to private property, robbing the community for individual gain, is of the highest consequence. Our petty thief deserves a name, so let's call him Darren, after the CEO of ExxonMobil. We often lay the blame for the outcomes of cutthroat capitalism on the "System." There's merit in that, given the complex layered interactions, but no excuse. Let's remember that the "System" is led by individuals, by a relatively small number of people, who have names, with more money than God and certainly less compassion. They sit in boardrooms deciding to exploit fossil fuels for short-term gain while the world burns. They know the science, they know the consequences, but they proceed with ecocidal business as usual and do it anyway. Their behavior feels to me like the same kind of arrogant entitlement as Darren the Farm Stand thief or Darren the Planet Wrecker. They're all thieves, stealing our future, while we pass around the zucchini."

Robin Wall Kimmerer, The Serviceberry (p.70)

����👏👏👏👏

[eugenedebs1920]

Just a little fun wordplay 😊

We no longer stand in solidarity. There were periods when we did. These periods saw the biggest gains and the greatest successes of the masses and the middle class.

In the mid to late seventeen hundreds a collective of average people, some educated, some not, some of moderate wealth, others without. With the cumulative efforts, and rebellious spirit, these men, and a ragtag group of immigrants, fought off the mightiest global military forces, while at the same time, composing a series of ideas that would guide a free and prosperous society for centuries.

Theres always bad concepts, arbitrated by bad actors. Characters whose personal agendas of greed and self indulgence overpowers all aspects of decency and humanity. This was the case of the slave owning south.

As this young nation had shown before, there was no tyranny that couldn’t be bested. Again, an aggregation of peoples joined forces for the plight of humanity. For the freedom of the most vulnerable among them, a long, bloody, brutal war was carried out. Again, those who stood for the good of the common man toppled a hierarchy of wealthy, racist, tyrannicals.

Less than a century later a buzzing came from across the Atlantic. A charismatic overlord saw a susceptibility in his people. He would prey upon this by demonizing and lambasting those who weren’t arian, attesting the root of Germany’s woes lay in these immigrants poisoning the blood of their nation.

The largest conflict the world had ever seen commenced. Our cousins in England had bombs dropping on their doorsteps. The manufacturing of equipment and ammunition would prove to not suitable to subdue the forces against them. Again, a coalition of immigrants and native born American slaves would rise together in the fight against totalitarianism. Again their resolve would be victorious.

At home the powers of industry and capital would subjugate the workers of America. Making vast sums of wealth off exploitation. The accumulation of workers, all immigrants, men and women, brown and white, would capitalize on their numbers against the capitalists numbers of capital, showing that without a workforce the power of industry lies not in the wealth one holds but in the richness of solidarity. Again, this patchwork of peoples would, for now, would conquer despotic forces.

Society would see a period of great prosperity after the labor movements and the devastating war. That is with the exception of those stolen from the continent of Africa and forced to be here against their will.

The tether of reconstruction was long snapped and the menace of oppression in the south had ensnared in its provocations an atmosphere of violence and a thraldom of segregation, disenfranchising an already marginalized people.

Again, a plurality of common poor peoples amassed for the battle against those who contended their superiority over them. An exercise of non violent direct action through the plethora of peaceful persons would placate to the general population the putridness of the prejudices cast upon them by immoral ignorant racist, bringing to light their struggles. Again, the community of conciliating colored Americans coincided to overcome their oppressors.

At the same moment the military industrial complex Eisenhower had warned of, continued to manufacture conflict. This time in south east Asia.

This was a war where the richest county in the world, with the most advanced weaponry, combated communism on some of the poorest people on the planet. The atrocities, like never before, came through the screens, and into the living rooms of every American home. An anti-war, pro love revolution would sweep the nation. Again, the whole of these heartfelt hippies helped in the masses hearing that the horrific hurt perpetrated to these peasants across the globe was harmful to humanity and entirely wrong.

Where we stand now the masters of men have maniacally manufactured a mistrust amongst us.

They have seeded the sourness of the soul throughout our society. This syndicated system of separation from our various sects has shattered our symbolic social structure so severely, simple salutations have strained our sense of sensibility. Systematically dividing the civil citizens in seismic shakes of uncertainty.

A proud and progressive people, pushed apart purposely so politicians and powerful players of commerce can profit by polluting our planet and our perception. Pontificating on a provocation promoted to produce pre manufactured prejudices poised to poison person against person as the prerequisite for prestige.

We have shackled ourselves to the self indulgence of a capitalist culture only curating the catastrophic collapse of the middle class, whilst the cumulative cancer of cash corrodes the contemporary consciousness, cultivating corruption and canceling our once mighty congregation of caring and compassionate countrymen.

Before brethren born by the same bloodshed, serendipitously say our goodbyes, may we not bask in the blessings befallen between us, embracing the brotherly bonds, and the battle brought on by breaking that brokerage long ago, so difficult to ascertain again. Our best bet is to let bygones be bygones and believe that better beginnings rise in the dawn. Because brother, you are my family beyond blood our betterment is best bestowed building upon bridges not barriers, bound by bravery in the land of the free.

[puckpocketed]

Hello. You might have seen this floating around on twt:

link 1 // link 2, archive link

If by any chance you or someone you know are thinking about joining in on the challenge… no one can stop you but I implore you as someone who makes art, as someone with friends in an often-exploited creative industry, as someone who lives in late stage capitalism alongside you and has seen this play out before: proceed with caution.

Read the fine print on that form. There is NO guarantee of an internship, much less a job at the end of it. I haven't gone further than this form, but if anyone reading this does, and if there's no written agreement that your work won't be used without credit to you + payment for services rendered - RUN.

This is a common corporate tactic to get free labor out of people. I'm not saying this is necessarily what’s happening; for all we know this was done as a completely innocent move to drum up some fan engagement and as a genuine search for talent for their analytics team. WHO KNOWS. But I can't ignore that I’ve seen this situation play out again and again, at every scale.

Job interviews, when they ask you how YOU think they should improve their systems, how YOU would solve their problems? When they require that you do some problem-solving for them, and it goes beyond a simple task? That’s a free consultation you’re giving them, that's free work you or someone else should be getting paid for.

When big streamers/influencers ask their fans to join in on a fan art contest to choose their new pfp/banner? That’s hundreds, possibly thousands of pieces of free art they never would’ve gotten otherwise. They could've gone to the trouble of paying someone in-house to do it, hiring someone for that position, commissioning a professional for a piece. It's free work from their dedicated fans.

In this case, Utah HC is asking fans to not only choose/provide their own dataset, but to do a complex analysis on it AND do the work of visual and verbal communication to senior management, who likely do not have a deeper grasp of the concepts and will need it simplified. The stipulation that you will present your work could be ANYTHING!! The "five page deliverable" is already bananas to me, having dipped my toe into what analytics is and how complex the fun ones are. Condensing it all is WORK. The presentation portion may include speaking time and answering questions; the groundwork for doing this effectively may include producing data visualisations, making spreadsheets, time consuming write-ups. Maths and science communication is hard. It is WORK. They are asking for free labor.

Many have already called it out, but it's still gaining traction via retweets from big accounts uncritically sharing it. I found out through the official Puckpedia account. Jack Han called it out pretty eloquently on twitter and on his substack:

Many people aspire to work as an analyst in the NHL. Earlier today the Utah Hockey Club gave those people a glimmer of hope. Utah’s Summer Analytics Challenge is unusual in that it doesn’t provide a dataset or detailed instructions. The open-ended contests contrasts with other public (ex: Big Data Cup) or private (ex: NHL team interview) events. In those scenarios, participants are given proprietary data to clean, model and analyze, which influence direction and methodology. Meanwhile, Utah is seemingly happy with anything as long as the writeup is under five pages long. Utah’s contest also stands out in its near-total absence of legal fine print. There are no mention of intellectual property implications, which is perhaps fitting when the team is asking participants to bring their own data and analysis. [...] Open casting calls such as Utah’s analytics challenge start out as a lose-lose-lose proposition: > The employer loses because it will have to invest massive human resources to trawl/filter/evaluate/reverse-engineer the hundreds of write-ups it is sure to receive, with no guarantee that any of them will be of use > Applicants lose because the vast, vast majority of them will have nothing to show for their efforts, while a tiny minority risks having its IP stolen > Good ideas lose because they’ll be born into an environment where their parents (the applicant & the employer) have no defined relationship and won’t be in a position to grow together

link, archive link

I do try to keep things light on this blog, but this is super personal for me <3 thank u for listening

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserve in our archive

By Julia Doubleday

(About a lot more than covid, but talks a lot about it later on)

This week, The Guardian reported that the 1.5 degree climate target agreed upon at the 2015 Paris talks is now “deader than a doornail.”

This will come as little surprise to the public, which has watched as loathsome politician after grinning salesman after equivocating lawyer has steered us ever closer to catastrophe as years and promises fade.

Decades ago, upwardly mobile people in the West were living in a happy delusion. As the Greed-is-good 80s gave way to the Dotcom 90s, the ruling class sold their vision of the future: a rising tide lifts all boats. More money for me means more money for all. Let’s all get rich and happy.

Globalization, neoliberalism, and capitalism, the three ingredients of prosperity everywhere, for everyone, forever. Cut regulations, let businesses thrive, let the markets reign. National borders should constrain people, not capital. In 1991, the USSR collapsed. In 1992, Francis Fukuyama published The End of History. As big business thrived, the Democratic party sprinted toward the center, with the Clintons pioneering “triangulation” and The Third Way. The markets roared. Then in 2001, 9/11 kicked off the 21st century, and a new era of global instability and warfare; the rest, as they say, is (even more) history.

The moments before- the moment where capitalists’ fantasies looked poised to come true- weigh heavy in the minds of our political elite. In the 90s, it all seemed possible; you could denude the rainforest because the rainforest was, after all, infinite; Coca-Cola could suck down all the clean water it desired; big ag could monocrop the hell out of the land; no two countries with a McDonalds would ever go to war; and meanwhile, the middle class would grow, standards of living would increase around the world, everyone would be better off! It was win/win/win/win/win! All those environmentalists and communists were passé; they’d been wrong. The best way to save the Earth, and the people on it, was through economic development.

But capitalism sows the seeds of its own destruction, and now, in 2024, we all watch in horror as the planet heaps punishment after punishment on the species too arrogant to understand the warnings we’re generously given. Every emergency light is flashing red- change course or perish. Our feckless leaders seem incapable of understanding.

It’s not only the Earth that has suffered as the decades of exploitation accumulate. The workers, too, feel the crush as the ruling class cannot resist taking more, more, more for itself. Although distributing its ill-gotten gains more fairly would preserve its own position for longer, those at the top are too deluded, too greedy, too loyal to the belief system of their cult to understand this. Leftist, environmentalist, indigenous voices that were once marginalized now gain audiences through social media.

So, we come to the point that the contradictions of capitalism are intensifying. Workers in the West can no longer envision themselves getting a college education, making a decent living, buying a 4-bedroom home, retiring with a pension. Workers around the world, meanwhile, who manufacture our things, continue to suffer inhumane standards of living. Although the most extreme poverty lessens, over half of workers still live on less than $10/day. The global middle class doesn’t materialize anywhere other than, arguably, China, free from the clutches of the IMF and its predatory structural adjustment programs.

It is against this backdrop that the Democratic Party attempts, every two years, to defend the status quo.

The Democratic Party is a party ferociously committed to looking backwards. They yearn for 1995, when the future was neoliberal deregulation, triangulation, and the Clintons. When Fukuyama announced that history had ended, it seems like a lot of Democratic officials stopped reading.

Now, you might be thinking to yourself, what the hell does this all have to do with the election just passed? Surely, you’re not arguing that the Republican party is the counter-weight here, the anti-capitalist foe? Not at all. No, the Republican party is capitalist, hyper-capitalist. They have, however, faced the reality that the status quo will not continue as is. There won’t be a future where a diverse, global family shares in the wealth produced by capitalism, where the poor are raised up to become the global middle class and globalization saves the wretched of the Earth.

The communist, socialist, or leftist alternative vision of our future is to dismantle the machine of exploitation that destroys, kills, denudes, and steals resources and workers. In order to have a planet, and workers who share in its bounty, we need to rethink the way we govern ourselves and our resources, drastically. And allowing a teeny tiny group of people- billionaires- to have outsize influence over political and economic policy flies in the face of democratic governance itself.

The fascist vision of the future is to buckle in, turn the machine up higher, and kill anyone who gets in the way. Protect the billionaires at any cost, while understanding very well that it is billionaire vs humanity itself. Get your followers to identify with the former and hate the latter. Build walls, keep out climate refugees. Deport people en masse. As things get worse, blame minorities. Distract people with culture wars, misogyny, racism, transphobia; same as it ever was. As the extinction-level outcomes of climate change materialize, shove your followers into a bottomless vortex of conspiracy, let them be dragged to the bottom, sputtering, swearing, soaking and drowning. Republicans, now led by Donald Trump, don’t act as though there will be enough to “go around”; they act as though they are going to divide society into “winners” and “losers,” with the “losers” condemned to low-wage labor, prison, deportation, or death.

This is how feckless liberalism condemns us to fascism. It offers us no future, while silencing the leftists who try. It’s no longer believable to say you represent workers and donors, oil companies and the environment. You have to pick one. When the chips are down, you have to pick a side.

The public is living through the collapse of what briefly appeared stable: a globalized, capitalist economy, deregulated in accordance with the principles of neoliberalism. This global economic system, little-bound by the laws of individual states and thus more powerful than pseudo-democratically run states, is running up against the physical limitations of the planet. Oil is not infinite. Polar ice caps melt. The methane in the permafrost is a climate bomb. Monocropping degrades the soil. More climate disasters mean less arable land for agriculture. Continually overusing groundwater means water shortages.

You can’t run a global society on the principle that what makes money for a private company today is always beneficial, and what harms the collective in the long-term is never detrimental.

The Democrats’ problem is that they will not acknowledge what has become clear to so many of us: that their “triangulation” 90s-era compromise, their brilliant idea of representing both big business and workers is simply not possible. The interests of these two groups diametrically oppose one another, and the capitalist mythology that rich people getting richer helps everyone get richer didn’t turn out to be true. As rich people and corporations have gobbled up an unprecedented proportion of American wealth, they’ve also grabbed up all the land and property, pushing homes out of reach for ordinary workers. When rich people own all the homes, how can poor people own those same homes? Capitalist dogma refuses to acknowledge constraints on resources, refuses to blink as we watch our homes flood, our fields turn barren, our cities begin to suffer water shortages.

The growing dissatisfaction with Democrats’ doublespeak came to a head in 2015. Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders launched a longshot Presidential campaign against pre-selected nominee Hillary Clinton. What happened next shocked political analysts and observers. Clinton came into the race with the support of every major player in the Democratic establishment, every media endorsement, and a billion-dollar war chest. Sanders, conversely, boasted nothing but a straight-talking style, a refusal to accept corporate PAC money, and a few oft repeated talking points about the billionaire class.

Fueled by $27 donations, Sanders’ campaign went on to win 23 contests, but was dragged down by the unanimously hostile response from Democratic insiders, political commentators, media outlets, and, unsurprisingly, the donor class. A party that was interested in winning vs. the powerhouse Trump campaign would’ve taken seriously a grassroots campaign that was able to perform so well with so many disadvantages. Instead, the Democratic party and its Superdelegates repeatedly put its finger on the scale for Clinton, leading to the disastrous first win for Trump in 2016.

Now, finally, I’m getting to COVID.

A big part of the Democrats return to power in 2020 was COVID. That’s not my opinion; that is what exit polls tell us about voters’ decision to turn out for Joe Biden. The top two reasons Democrats had for turning out to the polls in November of 2020 were racial justice issues and the pandemic.

Democrats never seemed to understand how reluctantly the public returned them to power. It wasn’t an, “oh, thank God, Joe Biden is here,” vote. It was a “we have to get this fucking guy [Donald Trump] out of here” vote. A good chunk of the party was still angry at the way Sanders had been treated. Workers were still suspicious that Democrats were promising to represent them during campaign season, then going on to represent donors. But frankly, the country was in crisis.

In November 2020, vaccines were not yet available for COVID-19. The nation was headed into a winter wave that would kill hundreds of thousands. And, importantly, the media didn’t downplay these deaths, it emphasized them. When a hundred thousand died, their names made the front page of the New York Times. The Democrats capitalized on the gore. When 220,000 had died, Biden announced that “no one” who had overseen that kind of death should remain President. 800,000+ Americans have died of COVID during his Presidency, which he has yet to resign.

Yes, yet again, Democrats pulled a bait and switch. Just like with immigration, racial justice, police violence, climate change and indigenous land rights, Democrats cried their crocodile tears right up until the Inauguration, then dried their eyes. AOC famously went and sobbed at a detention center during Trump’s Presidency, which she did not do again during Biden’s term. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer wore Kente cloth and kneeled in solidarity with George Floyd in a roundly mocked photo op before going on and giving the police more funding under Biden. I always thought it was a nice touch that Nancy’s mask was around her chin.

And Biden, Harris, and their spouses held a memorial at the reflecting pool for the 400,000 Americans who died of COVID under Trump the night before their Inauguration, only to never again mention Americans dying of COVID en masse again when they actually had the power to do something about it.

In short, Democrats went Back to Brunch, in a big way. The politicians, the analysts, the media allies, the donors, the pundits, and upper-middle-class Karens, the people with “I’m With Her” bumper stickers on their BMWs, the consultants, the actors, the data guys, the people who don’t notice the cost of groceries, they all together, astonishingly quickly, said thank you immigrants, Black people, disabled people, indigenous people, trans people, we won’t be needing you anymore, and went right back to pretending neoliberal capitalism isn’t about to hurl us all over a cliff.

My focus is COVID. I followed closely as, in the delusional world of the Biden liberal, getting COVID (a virus which damages the brain, heart, and immune system) twice a year became a totally okay and in fact laudable thing. I watched as wearing a mask went from being socially positive, to being socially ok, to being socially negative, as Bidenism reverted from anti-Trump to its true form; pro-capital. To protect capital, people need to accept this new condition of employment: more, repeated sickness, zero protections and ongoing risk of disability.

Their catchphrase for accepting this new, degraded quality of life was “back to normal.”

But while I focused on COVID, this wasn’t the only arena where Democrats pushed people “back to normal”. While Trump was in office, the Democrats succeeded in riling up their base about immigration, climate, and racial justice. As soon as they got power back, they tamped it all back down. As far as Democrats were concerned, Trump was in the rearview. So now everyone could go “back to normal.”

No more crying in front of detention camps.

No more kneeling in Kente cloth.

No more masks, COVID tests, or memorials for hundreds of thousands dead.

Donald Trump won this election because 19 million Democrats who turned out for Joe Biden failed to vote. Everyone has their own opinion about why. To me, it seems that in 2020, the public pushed Democrats back into the White House not excitedly, but reluctantly and conditionally. Instead of understanding that they owed the voters, particularly the most marginalized, this last chance at power, Democrats smugly swaggered back into the Oval Office and slammed the door behind them.

“See ya next cycle!” they called over their shoulder. Is it a wonder they didn’t?

For four years, the Biden Administration and “resistance libs” have been acting as if Donald Trump was a bad dream, fascism creeping across America a bad dream, COVID a bad dream. None of it was “real,” we all woke up and wanted “normalcy”, everything went “back” to what it should be, we all threw our masks away and returned to brunch. But that was never what the voters, who elected Biden in desperation, asked for.

We asked for a party, for leaders, who were ready to confront the crises brought into sharp relief under Trump, not bury them.

So wake up now, liberals. Trump was never your nightmare, Biden was your silly little fantasy. Dark Brandon can’t save us. The donor class can’t save us. Triangulation and deregulation and big legislation with giant handouts for oil companies can’t save us. And anything that can’t save us now, will doom us.

Because normal isn’t coming back. The crisis isn’t over. It’s only getting started.

[hypermascbishounen]

I have very little patience for people that take the 'representation' in this show seriously, given what we know about the people making it. But also what I know about the industry they inhabit.

I grew up with someone who made it into the western comic book industry. They were radicalized into the alt right through it, and the process started at a prominent sequential art school.

They were taught very blatantly that art from other cultures or people who aren't white, is inferior, competition, and the only thing to do with it is "elevate" it via appropriation, as an industry standard. The school was incredibly white, while in a very black area.

Once they started working, they found multiple bigots who feel they're being "silenced", and even more people - some well intentioned, but many not - who absolutely see minority stories as a way to advance their own careers. And they do often get the idea that it's nice of them to do, bc in a nepotistic and insular environment, their main pushback will be from a neonazi working for the same publisher.

Not everyone there is white or racist, but it can be very hsrd to be a poc, or to write a story that isn't defining its minority characters by their minority status, bc your justification to even write them is probably being pitched directly against a white supremacist. And it's very hard to treat the work of other cultures respectfully, when your bosses boss doesn't want their works to take any sales away from an adaptation.

So the whole system from the bottom up is designed to filter for bigotry and reinforce white supremacy, whether it's someone who sees writing black people as "pandering" to someone who see writing black people as pandering and they deserve a biscuit for doing it. Same for other races, queerness, or any other topic that could be connected to civil rights. Animation is not much better than comics on this, their industries overlap.

And ultimately: the main function of this is that the majority of people working in comics and animation will still be white. And that the poc working in the industry, have to play by the rules of white people, who dictate how they are written about.

N!Isaac and N!Annette are not black creations, they are more or less mouthpieces for how black people are percieved by people who aren't black, which is they exist to teach others lessons. Same with N!Isaac as a muslim, or N!Annette as a girl - they are Lessons for Christians or Men. Their entire existences revolves around white men, from a wider storytelling context(and also in story in Annettes case).

As far as I'm aware, Shankar has been the only poc in a particularly prominent position in nfcv's writing. And as much as I don't really care for his writing either, I don't doubt Ellis was hard for him to work with and was probably ultimately deferred to often. That the best nfcv has to offer minorities materially irl, is an indian-american possibly being spited by a big name white guy sex-pest throwing a tantrum, I'm really not feeling like all rep on this show is likely to be flawless and beyond criticism. Least of all when I can feel so much contempt for the Japanese source material off of this "adaptation" in general.

As bad as it may sound, it really seems to me that N!Isaac and N!Annette have both been written as Perfect Minorities™.

OG Isaac was the perpetual second one. Not incompetent by any means, but you know the deal, he was salty as hell that Hector was just a tiny bit better :P In the show, the dynamic is flipped: it's Isaac who is Dracula's special babyboy. But he is the special babyboy to such an exaggerated degree that he makes Hector's inclusion not only completely useless, but even detrimental: why would Dracula bother to hire an average Devil Forgemaster, without a shred of physical prowess, who he considers to be "a child in a man's body", and who he had to resort to lie to (Hector literally shouts in the war room that he doesn't enjoy the needless suffering Dracula is causing)... when Isaac by all means is strong, smart (allegedly), much more efficient in Forging, and 100% on board with Dracula's extermination plans to the point of being the only person Dracula can trust?

The story would improve if Hector, again, was the better Devil Forgemaster, even with his pesky morals. But we can't have that, can we? They were absolutely adamant, for whatever reason, that Isaac had to be black, despite him being probably the worst character to make black and Muslim. And black people can't be inferior, right? They can't need the help of a white person lesser POC, right? So Isaac in the show has become literally untouchable by the narrative. He gets everything he wants. He gets all the sympathy, because boohoo don't you feel bad that the guards are a bit mean to him, of course he should kill them all and turn them into monsters. He gets all the badass scenes, hell he literally gets wounded once in the whole show. He gets to be Enlightened.

And Annette... well, we talked about it plenty of times. Annette has Special God Powers. Annette gets coddled by total strangers. Annette has the right to hurt Richter where it stings the most without anyone calling her out. No one dares to point out Annette's genuine mistakes or bad behavior, even the most confrontational character after herself, Maria. Annette gets to make a Rousing Revolutionary Speech to the same French people she looks down upon. Annette gets to have the most prominent character arc, while Richter is left bumbling around and gets one (1) cool scene.

Representation in NFCV seems to be limited to three characters: 1) the narrative's darlingest babies who can do no wrong because they need to be popular on twitblr, 2) cardboard cutouts with barely a speaking line to pretend our world is more complex than it actually is, and 3) jesus christ please think more than three seconds next time.

Let's be perfectly real here:

both Isaac and Annette are the way that they are to appeal to a very specific,wide and vocal crowd on social media, the same crowd who cries for representation, by which they usually mean utterly perfect characters who can do no wrong and can easily vent their frustrations on other cast members because people, through these characters, can feel vindicated for their own frustrations. Frustrations that can be justified in a way, especially where racism is involved, but it essentially means that characters like Annette and Isaac are not really characters, but rather they are meant to be power fantasies of sorts. They're there to be black characters who are very strong and look down on the white oppressors etc. And you know what? There's nothing wrong with power fantasies, but only as long as they're written competently. Otherwise you don't really have a power fantasy. You have a weird amalgamations of Mary Sues mixed with social media discourse

This is especially blatant with Annette since, at least with Isaac, I don't think he ever uses the color of his skin as a justification for his attitude (he uses his religion but that's another can of worms).

I am almost certain that characters like these are inserted partly because it's a no-lose scenario, because you absolutely cannot criticize them without being accused of bigotry. This is made all the worse by many ACTUAL bigots chiming in and making any actual discourse impossible. I'm sure that big corpos like Netflix know this by now: create a character who's a minority who the US public cares about (I need to specify that last part because I get the feeling that people would not get nearly as uppity about, oh I dunno, Roma characters? Native American characters? Because social justice is only about those "cool" minorities that the public has been taught to think are worth it, anyone else barely even registers on the radar), write them in a way that satisfies the social media pseudo activist crowd, wait for the bigots to show up in order to easily paint any detractor as a racist, thus creating a very easy equation of "show has representation= good. Bigotry= Bad. Hate the show= You're a bigot"

I say "almost" because there's always the possibility that the guys behind the wheel genuinely think they're doing a great job

This may sound crazy, but look at all the praise they get, look at how much encouragement they get. And all this goes beyond NFCV, this sort of phenomenon is very widespread so it wouldn't surprise me if even the Deats brothers think they're masters of representation who can do no wrong because if enough people keep saying one thing without pause then you're bound to think it's the truth.

For instance I am pretty certain that Deats and the gang genuinely don't think that Alucard's threesome is not rape, or Lenore's treatment of Hector. Because they're not conventional depictions of rape and if you go ask most people on social media, hell even on the street across your own home, they'll most likely tell you the same.

I hate NFCV but what I think I hate more is the overall social climate that lead to its creation

[misterbitches]

I have mixed feelings about the episode!

If I hadn’t have gone online I would have been more of a blank slate. It’s good to know my criticisms are affirmed by others but it doesn’t mean this show is weak because even with the faults this episode was still entertaining at the very least. I feel crazy! Like some of my issues with the social commentary so far are dealt with—not remediated per se but addressed—or tended to.

The whole marriage thing isn’t a bad scenario typical of a BL imo because it makes sense. Patriarchy has everything to do with the hoarding of wealth. You have to make sure a woman has limited options for offspring to preserve a familial/blood line. Marriage is a business practice (it isn’t final or static but marriage and love are not interchangeable and “love” is a very specific goal that is hard to meet particularly if you are poor) and even if Rosé doesn’t want it, that’s how you secure capital…via legacy and literal financial bonds (presented as familial).

Rosé isn’t a good person. As much as Save is a bitch and Hope is…whatever he is (and agree with the user that said they should have kissed there!) the show is telling us over and over that THESE PEOPLE ARE POOR GUYS. THEY HAVE NO MONEY. I don’t know if the audience understands what that means fully. That means that Tattoo’s actions are not the same as Arun’s or even Joke’s; Jack’s poor decisions aren’t the same as Joke’s; Save is being absolutely insane and fucking ridiculous and wow I hate him but even his decision is not the same. You see how much hospital bills are, not having insurance, INSURANCE LITERALLY BEING TIED TO YOUR JOB AND THE NUCLEAR FAMILY. Things these people do not have, nor should not have to have, and the pains you go through to do everything right so the state says and you still get fucked.

That’s why the whole ~dOn’T sTEaL~ would piss me the fuck off! Jenny’s character makes complete sense! I know this is an easy way for us to express this idea of never being able to “get out” but poverty isn’t actually a cycle. Poverty is man made, it is not real. A cycle suggest something inevitable where an underclass would always have to exist, some sociogenetic defect that you just can’t beat and the cure (money) is just too hard to find (as in made up but never freely given). What makes that cycle relevant? Capitalism. This term has bred such reification i swear. It makes it seem like this is something they can GET OUT OF and BREAK on their own volition (with no direct action against the capitalist class/elites like you know…robbing them)

To be wealthy is to inhibit a class position, a social category, in which your livelihood depends on the subjugation of others. It’s obvious that Boss has limited money—and that dwindles—he relies on his boss. He is a manager, an inbetween, a boss but not The Boss. He is a cop essentially (cops have more autonomy tbh) to literally protect private property and collect and give to his bosses. They’re also all landlords and deserve to die.

Anyway there is no cycle as a real tangible thing one can take control of. There are people who choose their comfort and life over others and exploit to maintain, retain, and gain. ANY type of wealth hoarding is immoral. Richness is immoral.

Every single one of these people who suffer are in this position because of rich people. The monopoly was literal and exaggerated metaphor but rich people HATE and i mean HATE they LOATHE they resent disdain the poor. They hate you. They hate me and I’m not even poor! It is not a (referent-less) cycle! These are deliberate choices being made by others to make sure ppl stay poor—women, children queer ppl, darker ppl, the disabled…

If we focused less on the actions of those who have had to work in service of the pillagers and more on the pillagers and why the FUCK these people do this and get to do it, maybe Jack’s choices would make sense. Yes they are frustrating but I don’t necessarily think this is bad writing considering that Jack’s life could be made a living hell if he “got another job” which…ok but where? Who will hire him? How quickly will he make that money? With what skills when he has one very good one that could be used AND this money could be made immediately?

Are these particular choices stupid or do they exist in a broader story that is unfolding? Obviously this is a tv show beyond bl bc this episode was like completely story related and I enjoyed that. There was def some stuff where i was like wow this seems a bit rushed and it does seem like filler but it also technically isn’t…? If I’m thinking beyond what I would like to see with romance. If I think of it as more of s general show that is openly queer but that’s just the life of the show…then was this an outlier or does it fit? Even if it doesn’t I still get to understand more of what they think abt the world…? Idk i liked this episode i go back and forth! But it was a good way to spend my hour.

Also rose’s plan is fucking disgusting neoliberal drivel and insulting lmao when joke threw that all i could think of was bush and that shoe

[marxistlesbianist]

We hear a great deal about the crimes of communism but almost nothing of its achievements. The communist governments inherited societies burdened with an age-old legacy of economic exploitation and maldevelopment. Much of precommunist Eastern Europe, as with prerevolutionary Russia and China, was in effect a Third World region with widespread poverty and almost nonexistent capital formation. Most rural transportation was still by horse and wagon.

The devastation of World War II added another heavy layer of misery upon the region, reducing hundreds of villages and many cities to rubble. It was the communists and their allies who rebuilt these societies. While denounced in the U.S. less for leaving their economies in bad shape, in fact, the Reds left the economy off Eastern Europe in far better condition than they found it.

The same was true of China. Henry Rosemont, Jr. notes that when the communists liberated Shanghai from the U.S.-supported reactionary Kuomintang regime in 1949, about 20 percent of that city’s estimated 1.2 million were drug addicts. Every morning there were special Street crews “whose sole task was to gather up the corpses of the children, adults, and the elderly who had been murdered during the night, or had been abandoned and died of disease, could, and/or starvation” (Z Magazine, October 1995).

During the years of Stalin’s reign, the Soviet nation made dramatic gains in literacy, industrial wages, health care, and women’s rights. These accomplishments usually go unmentioned when the Stalinist era is discussed. To say that “socialism doesn’t work” is to overlook the fact that it did. In eastern Europe, Russia, China, Mongolia, North Korea, and Cuba, revolutionary communism created a life for the mass people that was far better than the wretched existence they had endured under feudal lords, military bosses, foreign colonizers, and Western capitalists. The end result was a dramatic improvement in living conditions for hundreds of millions of people on a scale never before or since witnessed in history.

Michael Parenti, Black Shirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism

[therealparasites]

On today's episode of Pseudoscience Nonsense: H. Pylori infection confirmed!

First off, I have no clue how these geniuses came to the conclusion that a parasite = every known bacteria, virus, etc. but here we are 😐

So, what is H. Pylori?

It is a common type of bacteria that infects your stomach. It has the potential to damage tissue in your stomach and part of your small intestine. The infection can cause inflammation, and in some cases can lead to peptic ulcers in your upper digestive tract.

H. Pylori is common. Lots of people have it, and lots of people don't end up with ulcers or show any symptoms of infection (but it still is a big cause for ulcers).

Howeverrrrrrr

You still don't wanna play around with H. Pylori. This bacteria goes after your stomach lining by releasing enzymes that make your stomach acid less acidic, and weakening the lining. This means your stomach will be at a greater risk of being damaged by acid, and strong digestive fluids! Which ya know would then lead to sores and ulcers.

What causes H. Pylori?

Experts believe the infection is spread from person to person by mouth. So kissing an infected individual, eating food that isn't cleaned or cooked properly, drinking contaminated water, or coming into contact with infected vomit or poopy.

Now that we all know about H. Pylori, let's talk about the pictures! We see a group member has been diagnosed with an H. Pylori infection and doesn't want to treat it with medications. Not the best move considering ulcers can eventually wear down your stomach lining and cause bleeding, holes in your stomach wall, blockages if the ulcer is blocking the path for food to leave your stomach, AND STOMACH CANCER (oh wait they think cancer is parasites too 😬)

Thankfully, Ms. Haley has a (bullshit) cure for them! For the very low price of $185 a month, she'll send you...*checks notes* PDF files??? Of 'codes' to read???? Seems very legit, definitely not somebody grifting and capitalizing on someone else's fears!! Why trust doctors who spent years of their life in school to learn about these things when Haley has the cure in the form of pixels on a screen!?

In conclusion, y'all just wash your hands after you use the bathroom and before you eat, cook your food properly, and don't drink lake water and you'll be ok. And if you truly suspect you may have some kind of parasitic infection, PLEASE IM BEGGING just go see a doctor.

(disclaimer: I'm not a doctor or nurse of any kind, I just have a strong sense of justice and DETEST those who exploit others for capital gain😘 all info on H. Pylori brought to you by the Johns Hopkins website)

[ketsuarting]

My theory is that Alastor was a total fraud, that he didn’t kill all those overlords, but instead took credit for someone else’s secret killing of them, to raise his rep, and then slowly acquire some actual power through soul collecting. And that this was the reason he would make a deal with *someone*, for some real power in case he ever found himself in an actual fight, either with the real killer, or someone else entirely. To say most of the time he was smiling it was to cover genuine nervousness, an everlasting fear that someone, anyone would recognise him for the fraud he is. To say the real reason he didn’t join the Vees was that he knew they would figure him out. Like if you look at ‘Stayed Gone’, you know how Vox glitches out during the song and it seems Alastor does it from afar? The previous part of the song has Vox skip down the hallway to the other Vees while singing, and on his first step, ONE OF ALASTOR’S SYMBOLS GLOWS ON THE FLOOR BEFORE VANISHING. This barely lasts a few frames, but it is real, it is there, to say Alastor’s power is based on the illusion of it: he is a powerful demon now, sure, but not all-powerful. Hence why his duets were always about getting under the other’s skin: because they are more powerful than him, but do not know it. Lucifer being the first he would go up against to actually know himself more powerful, hence Alastor’s annoyance, not wanting weakness to give way to further weakness. Maybe in the present after his deal he thought he had that power, hence why he looked so confused when Adam beat him: he really thought the power he was given was enough to stand against him and win. Given the Vees will apparently be main characters next season, and we’ve gotten to know some of the current overlords, I would not be surprised if the big mystery next season is overlords going missing again, only this time Alastor will be unable to take responsibility for the disappearance, and we the audience will learn the truth of what he is, or rather what he’s not.

I wanna agree in part to this, because I also believe Alastor is playing up his skill for more than it is.

He's the radio demon, that MEDIA. And the strongest parts of media is rephrasing data to the masses as to mislead them. This, in turn, would also be Vox's strength, and thus those two are locked into an eternal battle of (mis)information.

That's also why alastor probably engaged in the stayed gone rap duel in the first place. He position is already precarious what with the 7 year absence, but if vox now starts gaining foothold in their little war? Alastor would be fucked long term.

Alastor is also clearly BETTER at what he does than Vox. Because vox is less of a show host demon and more of a CEO/Producer demon. I collect strong allies to put in front of the camera, he himself isn't really a face for TV (haha see what I did there?)

I do believe though that Alastor has some inherent strength. He is adept in the arcane more so than your average demon, his voodoo capabilities are presumably what give him a leg up in hell.

Also. Alastor was a MURDERER. A serial killer at that!!! Presumably that's actually not what most people did before hell. For example: angel dust got into hell for his drug addictions, husk for his gambling addiction. Valentino probably landed his ass down there for exploitation (though he shows a carelessness for the lives of those he considers property), velvette I assume will be revealed to either b cyber bullying of sabotaging competition and Vox seems to be in hell for crimes of capitalism. (These are mainly head canons but My point is more that these people aren't in hell for murder explicitly.)

Alastor is powerful, but he DEFINITELY is lying and obfuscatinga bout how powerful exactly. It works to his benefit. Unlike Vox who has the urge to PROVE his strength at every turn.

And this is actually something they're polar opposites on. Vox is honest to a fault. Literally, to a fault. He NEEDS hell to know that the demon is back. He NEEDS them to realize that he doesn't want them to even give him their time of day. He needs velvette and Valentino to witness his whole manic episode about it.

Meanwhile Alastor couldn't be honest if his life depended on it, literally. He must have known that he can't beat Adam. Deep down he must have realized how FUCKED he would be. But he either a) deluded himself that he stands a chance or b) lied to the other in order to safe face.

Also a big part of alastor are his deals. He literally bluffed himself into a position of power, by misleading others into deals that would benefit him much more than them.

Husk retained his power, but how does it matter if Alastor wields it?

Charlie has to do one favor that 'harms no one' but what if it ends up being something that benefits people that are purely evil?

His deals suck ASS and people fall for it anyways because he either gives them no other option or make them feel like they're having the upper hand for once.

But at the end of the day he is just a sinner. If Lucifer wanted to he could obliterate his Twink ass in a second. Adam too, could've absolutely finish alastor, but he delighted in the radio demon running away from him. Probably because Adam understand what kind of blow to the go that must've been to the guy.

[balkanradfem]

It was a while ago I read this tumblr post, which still comes to my mind every time I think about the future. It was explaining in an insightful way, how it's not a violent revolution that will bring forward the better future, it's slow and consistent change of our everyday life, of our habits, the resources we use and the way we go about achieving things. If we're hoping for a future where we're not dependent on capitalism, not destroying the environment, not robbed of our labour for a fraction of the money we need to survive, we'll have to slowly die capitalism out, by changing our own living habits.

If a sudden shift happened, and capitalism stopped functioning overnight, for most of the people that would be unsurvivable,  all of the resources, food, jobs and life-sustaining services would stop. And we can't afford that. But, if instead we slowly backed away from it, generated alternatives, created communities and systems that can sustain us without capitalism, then it would only be a matter of time before capitalism is fully dead, with everyone alive, everyone safe. And this slow shift would be able to happen through decades and generations, and it would still be a great positive shift, with a future in sight. Capitalism offers no survivable future, seemingly ready to last as long as it can by destroying whatever is left from the environment and people alike, for the benefit of the few.

So let's see how we got here, or how I feel, looking back, we got here.

People used to be less dependent on a global system of distribution of resources, even just a 100 years ago; survival and trade skills were passed down in families and communities, and people would be able to make inside of their home and communities, a big percentage of things that we today would buy at the store. In those times there was no other way to gain those resources but by relying on people's knowledge, skill and labour. The future, however, promised a more convenient and easy way to gain all those resources, because they would be made by machines, and thus cheaper. And things kept coming in cheaper, for no visible labour required; you just needed to have money to buy them, which not everyone had.

But this too, would change as cheaper and cheaper things arrived, and it became less convenient to make those things yourself or within your community, and more convenient to just trade some money, and have it all be done for you. For people then, it could mean less energy spent on survival, more leisure time, more health and longer lifespan – except, it didn't, because the jobs that they needed to earn that money, tended to take all of that away. So still, there was a lot produced at home or within the communities, independent workshops and artist shops, so people within in the community would benefit from each other, instead of benefiting some faceless global corporation.

And now we know where this went; conveniences started lining up to the point where not having a certain convenience meant that you were below the norm. They sometimes got mixed up with inconveniences, but those inconveniences were 'necessary'. For instance, pollution became necessary, highways, huge trucks delivering goods, the oil industry, destruction of forests and habitats, exploitation of the poor, extinction of certain animals, and by the end of it, the climate change.

When I was born, my mother and grandmother still attempted to pass some skills that their mothers taught them; I remember being taught how to knit at the age of 5, the activity which at that age, seemed awfully tedious and was soon abandoned, and my grandmother showed me how to crochet, which I also soon forgot. After the age of small child, they both looked at the world, shrugged and decided 'she won't need it', and they have stopped trying to teach me any skills of the sort.

Buying things, rather than making them, already seemed the norm. People were readily telling you that you are stupid for trying to make something, when you could get it in the store, for very little money. Having animals at home, or growing food, was slowly getting replaced by buying it cheap, or buying tons of snacks, and biscuits and cakes, which now you could get pre-packaged, readily available to consume at your leisure. If it brought lots of waste from packaging, plastic and other non-degradable materials, nobody cared, it was new, convenient, and available, and we would have it, and live luxuriously.

Soon nobody seemed to talk anymore, about what we used to do before we were able to buy anything we could possibly need at the store; nobody would tell me what were the names of the native plants, and which ones I could make into teas, I was instead told to change my priorities because this kind of behaviour will never get me any money. All of my efforts to do arts and crafts, to forage, to make things from scratch, to paint and invent stories, were called frivolous, because they would not generate the one thing that was now the only thing worth generating: money.

It simplifies things a lot, instead of making various, interesting, self-made and beloved items that would all require different knowledge and skills, a human is now required to put all of their talents into 1 thing that would generate revenue, and then do that one thing, for entire life, and this would present a normal life on earth now. This was how it was presented to me, and it was before I found out that keeping one job for the whole life, was no longer an option, that changing jobs was the norm and was not often volountary.  I did not, however, understand how doing that one job would not make someone go insane, and nobody was explaining that to me, it was just, the life.

So while the world was shifting into this new concept of 'make nothing but money', the first millionaires started to appear, the billionaire was not even conceptual, having 1 million was equal to being the richest person on the planet. That is pretty laughable to us now. Back then, it felt like heading into a new exciting world, but we know better now. We understand that lives consisting of a job and thousands of conveniences, easily sends a human being into a depression. We understand that relying on a job to keep us alive, and having constantly to compete with everyone else unemployed, to get one, has brought us to a place where others are a competition, not a resource, not a community. We understand that living in a world where we have to market ourselves as a resource, causes a lot of us to lose self confidence and the feeling of value, while it sends others into obsession with becoming popular, gaining perceived value, gathering a public image, that would later prove to be profitable.

By this time, unknown to us all, this life of convenience and consumerism had caused immense damage to the environment, and we were mostly kept in the dark about it, so we wouldn't complain. We learned about the holes in the ozone layer, but were told it was merely the fault of certain aerosols, and the rest of the stuff was fine. We would in the future get to watch oil spills and devastation of animal habitats, never fully connecting it to corporations who were responsible. Acid rains were mentioned, but we were told they caused by the new pesticides, but it was the fault of the farmers, they said, who simply used too much of it. Now we know it was the exhaust fumes from cars, factories and coal power plants. Climate change was barely mentioned, and even less believed in. And now, we can no longer ignore it.

So, what do we do in order to progress? We obviously can't go back to where we came from, but we are now made aware that the amount of energy and resources we're consuming, and the amount of toxic waste we're creating, will devastate the planet to the point where a big chunk of it will become inhabitable, millions of both people and animals, will end up dead if we keep going. But wait! How can I blame the people for any of this, when it's obviously the corporations that are doing the most damage, lobbying and hiding what is in actuality going on? And you're completely correct, I would have to say, it is corporations, and for the most time, we really didn't know the extent of damage they were doing. So why are the corporations exactly doing all of this? For profit. And who's giving them all that profit? Well, the consumers, by consuming all of the oil, energy, goods, resources and products they make. So how do we take down the corporations? By not giving them any of the profits. But, we can't do that in the current state of the world, we need cars, and food, and that food to be shipped and delivered from the distant lands, and we are all depressed and if we can't at least have our favourite snack, food we're used to, little treats and pieces of clothing that make us happy, we no longer feel like we can live!

And that's where the slow and meaningful habit shift comes into place. The thing is, we're not the same people we were 50 or 100 years ago, we don't have the skills of our ancestors, we're not used to producing our own resources, we are out of touch with nature, and we struggle to find our communities and feel valued. But we also have, so much more information and education at our fingertips. We have more scientific data, we have more access to information, we have more people creating public resources, we have the experiences and wisdom of generations back, only waiting for us to reach out, to tap into what the humanity knew  centuries ago.

We're made to do various activities! We thrive on changing our habits by season, even by weeks. We thrive in communities, with no competition for resources. We love creating art, music, crafts and beauty just for fun, and the communal value of it cannot be compared to money. We don't like being reduced into human resources or labour force, we don't like repetitive activities that don't produce results or seem nonsensical, we don't like to be stuck within one room for most of the day, we don't like being replaced when we stand up for our rights.

I can already see a lot of people valuing all of the things on this planet that cannot be exchanged for money, but have intricate value in our lives and experiences; wild animals, plants, forests, environments and ecosystems filled with life, little stories and jokes we tell to each other, making crafts just for the sake of making things, creating their own clothes or fabrics, learning how it was done in the past; growing food, foraging, herbalism, basketry, making of soap and fixing things on our own, visible mending, connections and building communities, we are remembering it's what we want and need, and we're not going to build it the way it was in the past; we're going to do it our own way, with the knowledge and experience we have, the way we think is the best. All we need to do is start small. Do one little shift that takes you one tiny step away from consumerism. Add one little enrichment in your life that doesn't have anything to do with money or purchasing. Find little ways to save on energy that doesn't make any dips in your happiness or comfort levels, that only requires a little bit of your attention or focus to do.

Big shifts are not sustainable, and are not survivable, but we didn't get here by a big shift; we got here by a series of small, almost invisible shifts that we barely felt were happening, until it was our new normal. We can do small, painless shifts too, but this time, they're going to be conscious, purposeful, with thoughts of the future behind it, and they're going to come from us. Not the corporations, not the money holders, but us, pushing the future to the direction that we want.

[dailyanarchistposts]

B.7 What classes exist within modern society?

For anarchists, class analysis is an important means of understanding the world and what is going on in it. While recognition of the fact that classes actually exist is less prevalent now than it once was, this does not mean that classes have ceased to exist. Quite the contrary. As we’ll see, it means only that the ruling class has been more successful than before in obscuring the existence of class.

Class can be objectively defined: the relationship between an individual and the sources of power within society determines his or her class. We live in a class society in which a few people possess far more political and economic power than the majority, who usually work for the minority that controls them and the decisions that affect them. This means that class is based both on exploitation and oppression, with some controlling the labour of others for their own gain. The means of oppression have been indicated in earlier parts of section B, while section C (What are the myths of capitalist economics?) indicates exactly how exploitation occurs within a society apparently based on free and equal exchange. In addition, it also highlights the effects on the economic system itself of this exploitation. The social and political impact of the system and the classes and hierarchies it creates is discussed in depth in section D (How do statism and capitalism affect society?).

We must emphasise at the outset that the idea of the “working class” as composed of nothing but industrial workers is simply false. It is not applicable today, if it ever was. Power, in terms of hire/fire and investment decisions, is the important thing. Ownership of capital as a means of determining a person’s class, while still important, does not tell the whole story. An obvious example is that of the higher layers of management within corporations. They have massive power within the company, basically taking over the role held by the actual capitalist in smaller firms. While they may technically be “salary slaves” their power and position in the social hierarchy indicate that they are members of the ruling class in practice (and, consequently, their income is best thought of as a share of profits rather than a wage). Much the same can be said of politicians and state bureaucrats whose power and influence does not derive from the ownership of the means of production but rather then control over the means of coercion. Moreover, many large companies are owned by other large companies, through pension funds, multinationals, etc. (in 1945, 93% of shares were owned by individuals; by 1997, this had fallen to 43%). Needless to say, if working-class people own shares that does not make them capitalists as the dividends are not enough to live on nor do they give them any say in how a company is run).

For most anarchists, there are two main classes:

Obviously there are “grey” areas in any society, individuals and groups who do not fit exactly into either the working or ruling class. Such people include those who work but have some control over other people, e.g. power of hire/fire. These are the people who make the minor, day-to-day decisions concerning the running of capital or state. This area includes lower to middle management, professionals, and small capitalists.

There is some argument within the anarchist movement whether this “grey” area constitutes another (“middle”) class or not. Most anarchists say no, most of this “grey” area are working class, others (such as the British Class War Federation) argue it is a different class. One thing is sure, all anarchists agree that most people in this “grey” area have an interest in getting rid of the current system just as much as the working class (we should point out here that what is usually called “middle class” in the USA and elsewhere is nothing of the kind, and usually refers to working class people with decent jobs, homes, etc. As class is considered a rude word in polite society in the USA, such mystification is to be expected).

So, there will be exceptions to this classification scheme. However, most of society share common interests, as they face the economic uncertainties and hierarchical nature of capitalism.

We do not aim to fit all of reality into this class scheme, but only to develop it as reality indicates, based on our own experiences of the changing patterns of modern society. Nor is this scheme intended to suggest that all members of a class have identical interests or that competition does not exist between members of the same class, as it does between the classes. Capitalism, by its very nature, is a competitive system. As Malatesta pointed out, “one must bear in mind that on the one hand the bourgeoisie (the property owners) are always at war amongst themselves… and that on the other hand the government, though springing from the bourgeoisie and its servant and protector, tends, as every servant and every protector, to achieve its own emancipation and to dominate whoever it protects. Thus the game of the swings, the manoeuvres, the concessions and the withdrawals, the attempts to find allies among the people and against the conservatives, and among conservatives against the people, which is the science of the governors, and which blinds the ingenuous and phlegmatic who always wait for salvation to come down to them from above.” [Anarchy, p. 25]

However, no matter how much inter-elite rivalry goes on, at the slightest threat to the system from which they benefit, the ruling class will unite to defend their common interests. Once the threat passes, they will return to competing among themselves for power, market share and wealth. Unfortunately, the working class rarely unites as a class, mainly due to its chronic economic and social position. At best, certain sections unite and experience the benefits and pleasure of co-operation. Anarchists, by their ideas and action try to change this situation and encourage solidarity within the working class in order to resist, and ultimately get rid of, capitalism. However, their activity is helped by the fact that those in struggle often realise that “solidarity is strength” and so start to work together and unite their struggles against their common enemy. Indeed, history is full of such developments.

[lucas-grey]

Let's talk about motives and the battle of good versus evil in Hitman!

Hitman is not Disney and there is no black and white here. The battle of good versus evil is not so easy to define. Is there even such a thing as "the good"? And who are the bad guys?

Let's start with Grey.

The war that Grey is waging against Providence is, on the one hand, a fight against the elite. A war against capitalism and external control. Grey wants to tear down the walls of the ivory towers on which the rich and powerful who control world affairs in the backgrounds sit. He doesn't like the fact that a small group of people have so much power.

On the other hand, this war is also personal. Grey has experienced first-hand what it means to be defencelessly at the mercy of this power, to be created, exploited and abused by it.

So is Grey the good guy in the story?

It's not that simple. Grey is a murderer. He has killed people for money, for his own gain and we know that he does not shy away from torture. He teamed up with other murderers and terrorists who were no less brutal. Did he have any other choice? Of course he did. He could have tried therapy 😅 Instead, he does whatever it needs to do his revolution. And if he has to walk over dead bodies to do so, then so be it. His motives may be noble, but his methods are certainly not.

So is Providence the evil in the story?

Well, you can at least say that their intentions are less noble than Grey's. The members of Providence, especially the Constant, lust for power. In other words, exactly the opposite of what Grey wants. Providence lives in a decadence of inviolability. They control entire political systems and hold the strings in their hands simply because they are rich and powerful. Whether individual members of Providence are bad people per se remains to be seen. The system itself certainly is.

To summarise, there is no such thing as good and evil in Hitman. Even 47 and Diana, who are more or less dragged into this war between Grey and Providence, literally have their skeletons in the closet.

In this world, no one is noble, no one rides in shining armour on a white steed, no one wears a superhero suit with a billowing cape. And if they do, their equipment is still covered in blood.

[maxellminidisc]

I really do think people need to start building an awareness of consumption around art. Like if you're talking about reading and film in pure numbers a year, music in how many sales you contributed, how many likes or follows your art gains you on social media, etc, you're absolutely falling into that consumptive mind set. And you need to step back and realize how uncomfortable and evil it is that you are ALSO being exploited there along with the art you're consuming.

And I'll be sympathetic and say it's not your fault! It's the result of capitalism, it's a result of carefully built and perfected strategy by industries decade after decade to reduce art into a product that you move on from one to the next. It's no longer about giving art its proper enjoyment, it's time to get up close and personal with you, to induce a passion for artistic curiosity, or inspire at the capacity it could. I'm not saying none of these things are possible anymore, but that the space for art to do these things feels like its shrinking from what I see and hear around me regardless of generation!

And I mean regardless of generation! I'm frankly sick of people blaming kids for the consumption of music and subculture especially when like whats to blame is the exploitation and sort of prepackaged shell of art and subcultures being the standard for most of what they engage with, especially online. And let's not act like people older than them havent fallen under the draw of short form formats for everything from videos, music, and literature. The lack of absorption alone I see in people my age and older in art they engage with as well as a lack of meaningful engagement as it is worries me sometimes.

My point is, I think we should at the very least think about how we engage with art and especially industries in the arts. I'm not saying never to buy an album, watch a movie, or read a book. But like consider why you feel like doing any of these things needs to be a numbers game for you, be it sales numbers you're increasing or how much media you can cram in as little time, instead of a personal transformative interaction! Idk I guess with every passing year that one Brian and Roger Eno quote gets more and more relevant to me and I guess I'll end with it. It goes:

"I think being slow is a gift to the world,” says Brian. “To say to people: you can enjoy things that are slow, where nothing much appears to happen. That’s a very important, anti-capitalist message. Capitalists want you to be constantly stimulated, consuming, and doing something different from what you were a minute ago – it’s about distraction. Stopping you staying in one place for a length of time because that doesn’t make any money.”

He continues: “So to have music, or forms of art, that say, ‘You don’t need very much,’ during a time when we’re harvesting the results of over-consumption, those are actually very important messages – you can make do with less.” Roger echoes this: “It allows you time to put distance between yourself and the frenetic.”

[simplysnaps]

Sorry if this is a dumb question but as someone who's kinda dreading the career they went to school for (I went for art) and kinda just wants a stable desk job with benefits now: do you have any advice on how someone looks for them? Like, what even IS a desk job? (Again sorry if this is stupid but I have deadass no clue how or where to get a job that's not retail 🥹)

I've gotten a few asks like this, so I figured I'd answer one for everyone. The short answer is: No, I don't have a magic bullet that will land you a desk job making $50k/year with a 401k and benefits. I wish I had an answer, I wish there were safeguards in place that protected everyone from asking a highly unqualified 24-year-old girl for career decisions. I wish you all could get/have what you need. But since y'all asked for my advice, here's what I have to offer. Once again, I am just some girl, I'm not a business-god:

#1: The website I found my job on is https://otta.com/. It's a great place to find jobs in the tech field. It's where I found the job I'm currently working at!

#2: It's easier to find a job when you have a job. I know this seems like old-fashioned advice your racist uncle gives you at Thanksgiving, so lemme reiterate it as a socialist trans girl you follow. This advice is TRUE. You are less desperate and less inclined to make silly decisions/concessions if you're currently employed. Our existing system is literally designed from the ground up to exploit desperate workers who are given the decision to either work or DIE, so yes... In our current system, being employed PERIOD is preferable to not being employed. There will always be someone to work harder for less compensation, so you have to make yourself "worth something" by having additional options. This is fucked, and I wish it weren't the case, but the way to gain "capital" as an employee is to have mobility and options. Be in a position where you're able to tell someone "No, I'm better than that. I'll find something else." If you're not in that position, I'm truly sorry. I wish I had more advice for you. Like I said, I'm not an expert at job-matching, I'm just a girl who's been asked by dozens of people at this point for direction.

#3: Be kind to yourself. If there's anything I've learned in the last year+ of therapy, it's that we have to be kinder to ourselves. None of us are "where we want to be." Trust me, I know. I was in a terribly abusive situation far too recently, but now it feels like such a distant dream. So if you're currently in that position, I have a few things to say to you: Firstly, it gets better. I know that feels like something better-off-people say to us just to make themselves feel better, but I can personally confirm this. Unless you're literally dead, there is the possibility that things get better than they currently are. It can happen. I was once hopeless, thinking life could never get better. Now I'm financially independent with savings and a nice apartment. It's POSSIBLE. If it can happen to me, it can happen to you. Just try to believe it can. Secondly: Be willing to endure the shit jobs until you find a job that you can actually tolerate. Endure/tolerate are two entirely different things. I once endured my job. Now I tolerate it. Do you think I love working customer support? No! But I'm fine with it! I like it some days! That's what's important! Just... not wanting to unalive yourself at the end of the day!

#4 is for the folks who can MOVE: I can't relate to this one as an asthma disabled gal, but I have heard that it's quite simple to "sell your body" for money. This isn't sex work, it's actually factory/shipping work. If you're able-bodied and can work exhausting hours, maybe consider a job at a FedEx joint, or an Amazon warehouse. Like I said, this isn't advice for getting a great job, it's advice for getting enough money to survive. If you are physically able to lift/move stuff without collapsing/dying, maybe consider this option! It is grueling and draining, but it pays a fat check for the damages. This isn't ideal for the long-term, but can serve you well for a hot minute if you have the physical health to survive it.

#5: Just hang in there. You're beautiful, and I know everything feels like hell at the moment, but please trust me as someone who's been there that it can get better. It did get better. Someday, everything you're enduring will be a story you tell your loved ones, a tale of what you used to endure. It will show them where you came from, but it won't be where you are. You can beat this. You will beat this. I know you can, because I truly believed I was doomed to my place in the world. I hope you understand that I'm not a grifter, I'm not trying to sell you a magic solution to your problems. I'm openly admitting that I cannot help you. But what I can offer is a promise that it can get better. Not that it will, but that it can. And that's worth pushing through, right? I know it can, and I know it will. The alternative is death, which is oblivion anyway. That means, statistically, it must get better! Otherwise it'll be "nothing," which is null and void!

So get out there, champs! Or hang in there! Either, or! Try to focus on #1, it's the most important! I love you all.

[rubra-wav]

I really hope that people get that even tho he's a pathetic whiny bitch (affectionate) who's absolutely desperate for attention - especially attention of a genuinely romantic long-term supportive nature, Vox is still not a good person and I hope I'm not portraying him too much as such in my work. 😭

While the above is true, he will still exploit, lie, and cheat anything and everything if it gives him personal gain in some way.

He's everything that's awful about capitalism personified. He's an enabler for Val (and is literally jealous of the person he ABUSES). He definitely abuses his work staff, and he absolutely reeks of unregulated maladaptive traits and internalised bullshit, etc. Etc.

Idk man. I feel like in my work, I haven't shown it enough, but I wanna keep things as accurate as possible. When part 2 of Snap comes out, I'm definitely gonna be showing that a bit more in that lmao (yeah I'll say it, it's gonna be fuckin infuriating for most of it rip.)

I've seen people portraying him like an angel in fanfic, and it bothers me because he's straight-up scum even though I absolutely love him.

Compared to what Val has got going on he's a lot better, but he's still an absolute cunt and I see so many people forgetting that lmao. He's not an innocent baby in a bad relationship, he's an evil cunt in a bad relationship (AND his hands are certainly not clean in that either. He's also a bastard too - just to a much less noticeable extent)

If reader ever actually dated this man, they would find the most high maintenance asshole on earth who would need to be taught basic respect and boundaries from scratch and taught real consequences for his actions AND hed probably actively be fighting doing that as well. (There's a post i have planned about what it would be like actually dating him that will go into that more)

ANYWHO, he is not some innocent baby in need of protecting who would suddenly forego all of his bad behaviours at once, he'd need a fuckton of checking, behaviour management, etc or he'd be a horrendous asshole to be with.