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bi-planeandsimple · 3 days ago

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I want to highlight a point made above that is incredibly incorrect “Stop changing the subject to conditions inside American prisons which are obviously able to be changed without having zero prisons.”

the conditions inside American prisons are not “obviously” able to be changed. Just like cops cannot obviously be reformed. If that’s the case, why hasn’t it happened in the 160 years of prisons post the 13th Amendment passing? Ditto with cops - why are all good cops Serpico’ed to this day? Why do cops still get away with murder and abuse? Why do prison guards? Because the brutality and racism and dehumanization are the point. They have been baked into these institutions from the get-go, and cannot be removed. It’s not an external boil that can be removed, it’s a foundational building block of the criminal Justice system.

We cannot talk about reforming prisons to improve their conditions seriously when the general American population has been so steeped in anti-criminal propaganda, and anti-black racism, anything that does not actively harm criminals - like providing air conditioning in a prison that routinely gets over 100 degrees, even when inmates are dying of heat stroke - is seen as a reward or luxury, instead of a human right. Many prisons in the south still do not have AC for this reason. Not to mention making it difficult for prisoners to see friends and family, to save money they earn, or to read books or watch movies (which can all cost money - money that inmates don’t have).

I mentioned the 13th Amendment above. That’s because the text of the 13th Amendment states “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction” slavery was never 100% abolished in the US or its territories - it only changed shape. It is not a coincidence so many black men and women are in prison. “Duly convicted” is a joke. It was not common for black men to serve on juries for decades in the south under Jim Crow, so how could black defendants be “duly convicted” by all-white juries? Not to mention all the barriers to hiring a good defense attorney - which still exist today. There will always be ways to circumvent “duly convicted” - remember the different mandatory minimums for the same exact drug? Crack cocaine vs powder? Bc one was used more by black peoples and the other was used more by white people?

i mean, The US still has territories!! Aka colonies! They have no voting rights but we can extract their resources from them and use them as cannon fodder in our armies. We are still literally a colonial power, of course white supremacy is baked in to all our institutions. slave masters never cared about the comfort or human rights of their slaves. So how can we “obviously” expect there to be real, meaningful reform of a system that exists to benefit American companies (providing free labor Aka slavery) as well as the current white supremacist power structure that is active in America to this day. This is why we cannot meaningfully talk about “reform” of prison- its antithetical to the purpose of prison. Reforming prison is like teaching a fish to walk. There’s a reason the fish isn’t walking - it was made for the ocean. Prison was made to grievously harm people, mostly black people. It was not built to protect society and certainly not to help victims. Harming people whether they are guilty or not and no matter what they are guilty of is it’s purpose. It has to be abolished completely. Abolitionists knew slavery could not be reformed - it had to be killed. Because slavery is antithetical to morality and humanity. It’s antithetical to the human rights every single person is born with, whether they are respected and acknowledged or not.

it benefits those in power for criminals to be seen as less than human. They can throw anyone in prison, can target any undesirable individual or group, (usually black people or Latinos, but also the mentally ill and more and more trans people) and then not be held accountable for how the prisoners are treated. Because the politician can say “well look, they committed a crime! They were “duly convicted” right?” Even if the whole trial was a sham. And then the inmates can be used for their labor - for free. Prisoners are forgotten and forsaken. They cannot vote while they are in prison, even though politics directly determines their fate - and often even after they have paid their debt to society, still cannot vote to affect the country they live in. Not to mention encouraging abuses of power against the powerless, guards against prisoners. Medical care withheld. Not providing a clean or safe place to sleep. Traumatizing prisoners with social isolation to the extreme. Prison does not reduce crime but then it was never supposed to. We cannot trust any government with the power to imprison anyone. Especially not a government in a white supremacist country like the United States. Racism cannot be divorced from the prison system. Racism - and specifically in this case white supremacy - is evil and so is prison, as it is primarily a tool of white supremacy.

#Prison abolition

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thesaltyace · 6 months ago

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Y'all I did NOT know this about Harris, and I think it's really critical that we all listen and understand as we approach this election. Video at the end.

This creator's video describes how progressive Harris was as a prosecutor -- actively going against the grain to the point she was accused of being soft on crime. Accused of being a social worker, not a prosecutor. She calls it being smart on crime. She's pushing for systemic changes to give real pathways to reintegrate incarcerated folks back into society and prevent their past from continuing to haunt them moving forward.

"Kamala's a cop" is a catchy dismissive response usually used to shut down conversation rather than add nuance. But this kind of reform is ESSENTIAL to work towards a present and future that treats incarcerated people with value.

I fell for it in 2020 and have thought "Kamala's a cop" without further inspection since - and I'm sobered by the realization that (you guessed it!) I'm not immune to propaganda.

A better system only follows liberal democracy, because library democracy allows for exploration of better systems. If authoritarianism takes hold, it will not allow for the exploration of better systems. We will have to fight tooth and nail just to try to get back to liberal democracy, and I suspect we could not achieve it in our lifetimes.

Harris isn't perfect. But she's a hell of a lot better than many leftists have led me to believe. Don't let perfection be the enemy of good. Don't let perfection be the enemy of harm reduction.

We can either help elect Trump and usher in authoritarian fascism, or we can help defeat him and pull things back in the direction we want to go. Not liking the choices doesn't absolve you from participating and doing the most good you can with the options available.

I'll link the original video in the replies. The original video has captions if you need them.

#kamala harris #2024 election #leftist hypocrisy #If we want better we have to put in the work over time. There are no instant solutions.#That means digging in our heels to prevent moving farther right.#Yep even if it means voting for a candidate you don't personally like or agree with.#Caring for your community means making strategic decisions to help everyone.#Voting your morals or whatever you call it is functionally useless in the presidential election bc of how our system works.#Save your moral votes for local elections - that's where you get the ball rolling. Put. In. The. Work.

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reasonsforhope · 1 month ago

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"This week was a big win for animals across Mexico.

On December 2, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum signed a set of constitutional reforms that will pave the way for a comprehensive federal animal welfare law. The changes represent the first-ever mention of nonhuman animals in the Mexican Constitution, marking a milestone achievement for Mexico’s animal rights movement, which has for years been drawing attention to pervasive animal cruelty and extreme confinement in the country’s growing meat industry.

“This is huge,” says Dulce Ramirez, executive director of Animal Equality Mexico and the vice president of Animal Equality’s Latin American operations. These constitutional changes come after two years of campaigning by animal advocacy organizations, including Igualdad Animal Mexico, Humane Society International/Mexico (HSI/Mexico), and Movimiento Consciencia.

These reforms are internationally unique. While national animal protection laws aren’t uncommon, most countries have no mention of animals in their Constitutions. Constitutions are “a reflection of socially where we are,” Angela Fernandez, a law professor at the University of Toronto, told Vox, making any constitutional reform symbolically a big deal.

Beyond Mexico, nine countries include references to animals in their Constitutions, but those mentions have generally been brief and open to interpretation. “Mexico is different,” Kristen Stilt, faculty director at Harvard Law School’s Animal Law and Policy Program, told Vox. “It’s longer, it’s more specific. It’s in several provisions. It’s not just a general statement.”

Plenty of countries have laws against animal mistreatment, including the US, where all 50 states have an anti-cruelty law, but that doesn’t mean they’ve been particularly effective at stopping violence against animals. Part of the problem is that these laws very often exempt farmed animals such as cows, pigs, and chickens, thereby excluding from protection the overwhelming majority of animals that suffer at human hands. That’s where Mexico’s reforms stand out: They’re intended to protect all animals, including farmed animals and other exploited species.

The reforms in Mexico, the world’s largest Spanish-speaking country, represent a major advancement in the status of animals globally. It could set a precedent for other countries in Latin America, where a vibrant animal rights movement has emerged in recent years, said Macarena Montes Franceschini, a fellow at Harvard Law School’s Animal Law and Policy Program.

Still, as one of the world’s top producers of beef, chicken, pork, dairy, and eggs, Mexico has an intensive animal agriculture industry much like the US, says Antón Aguilar, HSI/Mexico’s executive director. Business interests will undoubtedly want to influence the writing of animal welfare laws that could impact their bottom lines, as they have in the US and elsewhere. The question now is what changes the constitutional reforms will really bring to animal law in Mexico, and how effective they will be.

What will these reforms do?

The reforms comprise changes to three separate articles of Mexico’s Constitution. The most foundational change amends the Constitution’s Article 73, which dictates what Congress has the authority to legislate on. The article now gives the federal government the power to issue laws on animal welfare and protection.

Previously, animal welfare was largely left up to local and state authorities, and the result has been uneven laws and enforcement across the country. While all states in Mexico have animal protection legislation, just three include farmed animals: Hidalgo, Colima, and as of last month, Oaxaca, following pressure from animal advocates. And though Mexico does have a federal law on animal health that focuses on farmed animals and includes some broad mentions of animal welfare, it was created to protect human health rather than animals. The same goes for Mexico’s federal wildlife law, which was written with a focus on sustainability and conservation, rather than on protecting individual animals from cruelty.

Perhaps the most significant part of the reforms is an amendment to Article 4 of Mexico’s Constitution prohibiting the mistreatment of animals and directing the Mexican state to guarantee the protection, adequate treatment, and conservation and care of animals. The language is broad, Ramirez says, but she sees it as a substantial improvement over existing animal welfare laws. She and other advocates worked to ensure that no animals were excluded, particularly given that farmed animals have historically been left out of animal protection.

“It’s really, really important in Mexico to start with this first step — but a big one — because now it’s all animals” that are covered, Ramirez said.

The changes to Articles 4 and 73 tee up the creation of federal legislation on animal welfare. Under these reforms, Mexico’s Congress has been directed to write a first-of-its-kind General Law of Animal Welfare, Care, and Protection, a comprehensive bill that would address and develop regulations preventing the mistreatment of all types of animals, including farmed animals, wildlife, animals in laboratories, and companion animals, Aguilar said.

This general animal welfare law will need to consider animals’“nature, characteristics and links with people,” according to the reform decree released last week. What does this actually mean? Ramirez gave the example of chickens: Part of the natural behavior of these animals is to be able to spread their wings and move around. But if chickens are stuck in cages, as is standard practice on egg factory farms, they can’t do either of those things. Now, the idea is to develop legal criteria that would consider the ability to express these natural behaviors as part of their welfare. (The language could also be interpreted to prioritize human needs, however — particularly the reference to animals’ “links with people.” Animal Equality said it would interpret this through an animal welfare lens, and with the word “link” invoking what humans owe animals.)

Finally, Article 3 of Mexico’s Constitution, which pertains to the education system, was also amended to require that animal welfare be included in school curricula for grade school and high school students. Aguilar said this change could help “attitudes shift and change in a very enduring, long-term way” for future generations. But the new constitutional language is unspecific, and the devil is in the details.

What’s next for animal welfare in Mexico

Advocates in Mexico have two focuses going forward, Ramirez and Aguilar said: shaping the general animal welfare bill into a strong piece of legislation, and working with the Ministry of Education to get meaningful implementation of animal welfare into the national curriculum."

#mexico #north america #animal rights #animal welfare #animal cruelty #farming #farm animals #claudia sheinbaum #good news #hope

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mostlysignssomeportents · 14 days ago

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They were warned

Picks and Shovels is a new, standalone technothriller starring Marty Hench, my two-fisted, hard-fighting, tech-scam-busting forensic accountant. You can pre-order it on my latest Kickstarter, which features a brilliant audiobook read by Wil Wheaton.

Truth is provisional! Sometimes, the things we understand to be true about the world change, and stuff we've "always done" has to change, too. There comes a day when the evidence against using radium suppositories is overwhelming, and then you really must dig that radium out of your colon and safely dispose of it:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/19/just-stop-putting-that-up-your-ass/#harm-reduction

So it's natural and right that in the world, there will be people who want to revisit the received wisdom and best practices for how we live our lives, regulate our economy, and organize our society. But not a license to simply throw out the systems we rely on. Sure, maybe they're outdated or unnecessary, but maybe not. That's where "Chesterton's Fence" comes in:

Let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, "I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away." To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: "If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton#Chesterton's_fence

In other words, it's not enough to say, "This principle gets in the way of something I want to do, so let's throw it out because I'm pretty sure the inconvenience I'm experiencing is worse than the consequences of doing away with this principle." You need to have a theory of how you will prevent the harms the principle protects us from once you tear it down. That theory can be "the harms are imaginary" so it doesn't matter. Like, if you get rid of all the measures that defend us from hexes placed by evil witches, it's OK to say, "This is safe because evil witches aren't real and neither are hexes."

But you'd better be sure! After all, some preventative measures work so well that no living person has experienced the harms they guard us against. It's easy to mistake these for imaginary or exaggerated. Think of the antivaxers who are ideologically committed to a world in which human beings do not have a shared destiny, meaning that no one has a moral claim over the choices you make. Motivated reasoning lets those people rationalize their way into imagining that measles – a deadly and ferociously contagious disease that was a scourge for millennia until we all but extinguished it – was no big deal:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measles:_A_Dangerous_Illness

There's nothing wrong with asking whether longstanding health measures need to be carried on, or whether they can be sunset. But antivaxers' sloppy, reckless reasoning about contagious disease is inexcusable. They were warned, repeatedly, about the mass death and widespread lifelong disability that would follow from their pursuit of an ideological commitment to living as though their decisions have no effect on others. They pressed ahead anyway, inventing ever-more fanciful reasons why health is a purely private matter, and why "public health" was either a myth or a Communist conspiracy:

https://www.conspirituality.net/episodes/brief-vinay-prasad-pick-me-campaign

When RFK Jr kills your kids with measles or permanently disables them with polio, he doesn't get to say "I was just inquiring as to the efficacy of a longstanding measure, as is right and proper." He was told why the vaccine fence was there, and he came up with objectively very stupid reasons why that didn't matter, and then he killed your kids. He was warned.

Fuck that guy.

Or take Bill Clinton. From 1933 until 1999, American banks were regulated under the Glass-Steagall Act, which "structurally separated" them. Under structural separation, a "retail bank" – the bank that holds your savings and mortgage and provides you with a checkbook – could not be "investment bank." That meant it couldn't own or invest in businesses that competed with the businesses its depositors and borrowers ran. It couldn't get into other lines of business, either, like insurance underwriting.

Glass-Steagall was a fence that stood between retail banks and the casino economy. It was there for a fucking great reason: the failure to structurally separate banks allowed them to act like casinos, inflating a giant market bubble that popped on Black Friday in October 1929, kicking off the Great Depression. Congress built the structural separation fence to keep banks from doing it again.

In the 1990s, Bill Clinton agitated for getting rid of Glass-Steagall. He argued that new economic controls would allow the government to prevent another giant bubble and crash. This time, the banks would behave themselves. After all, hadn't they demonstrated their prudence for seven decades?

In fact, they hadn't. Every time banks figured out how to slip out of regulatory constraints they inflated another huge bubble, leading to another massive crash that made the rich obscenely richer and destroyed ordinary savers' lives. Clinton took office just as one of these finance-sector bombs – the S&L Crisis – was detonating. Clinton had no basis – apart from wishful thinking – to believe that deregulating banks would lead to anything but another gigantic crash.

But Clinton let his self interest – in presiding over a sugar-high economic expansion driven by deregulation – overrule his prudence (about the crash that would follow). Sure enough, in the last months of Clinton's presidency, the stock market imploded with the March 2000 dot-bomb. And because Congress learned nothing from the dot-com crash and declined to restore the Glass-Steagall fence, the crash led to another bubble, this time in subprime mortgages, and then, inevitably, we suffered the Great Financial Crisis.

Look: there's no virtue in having bank regulations for the sake of having them. It is conceptually possible for bank regulations to be useless or even harmful. There's nothing wrong with investigating whether the 70-year old Glass-Steagall Act was still needed in 1999. But Clinton was provided with a mountain of evidence about why Glass-Steagall was the only thing standing between Americans and economic chaos, including the evidence of the S&L Crisis, which was still underway when he took office, and he ignored all of them. If you lost everything – your home, your savings, your pension – in the dot-bomb or the Great Financial Crisis, Bill Clinton is to blame. He was warned. he ignored the warnings.

Fuck that guy.

No, seriously, fuck Bill Clinton. Deregulating banks wasn't Clinton's only passion. He also wanted to ban working cryptography. The cornerstone of Clinton's tech policy was the "Clipper Chip," a backdoored encryption chip that, by law, every technology was supposed to use. If Clipper had gone into effect, then cops, spooks, and anyone who could suborn, bribe, or trick a cop or a spook could break into any computer, server, mobile device, or embedded system in America.

When Clinton was told – over and over, in small, easy-to-understand words – that there was no way to make a security system that only worked when "bad guys" tried to break into it, but collapsed immediately if a "good guy" wanted to bypass it. We explained to him – oh, how we explained to him! – that working encryption would be all that stood between your pacemaker's firmware and a malicious update that killed you where you stood; all that stood between your antilock brakes' firmware and a malicious update that sent you careening off a cliff; all that stood between businesses and corporate espionage, all that stood between America and foreign state adversaries wanting to learn its secrets.

In response, Clinton said the same thing that all of his successors in the Crypto Wars have said: NERD HARDER! Just figure it out. Cops need to look at bad guys' phones, so you need to figure out how to make encryption that keeps teenagers safe from sextortionists, but melts away the second a cop tries to unlock a suspect's phone. Take Malcolm Turnbull, the former Australian Prime Minister. When he was told that the laws of mathematics dictated that it was impossible to build selectively effective encryption of the sort he was demanding, he replied, "The laws of mathematics are very commendable but the only law that applies in Australia is the law of Australia":

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/07/australian-pm-calls-end-end-encryption-ban-says-laws-mathematics-dont-apply-down

Fuck that guy. Fuck Bill Clinton. Fuck a succession of UK Prime Ministers who have repeatedly attempted to ban working encryption. Fuck 'em all. The stakes here are obscenely high. They have been warned, and all they say in response is "NERD HARDER!"

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/05/theyre-still-trying-to-ban-cryptography/

Now, of course, "crypto means cryptography," but the other crypto – cryptocurrency – deserves a look-in here. Cryptocurrency proponents advocate for a system of deregulated money creation, AKA "wildcat currencies." They say, variously, that central banks are no longer needed; or that we never needed central banks to regulate the money supply. Let's take away that fence. Why not? It's not fit for purpose today, and maybe it never was.

Why do we have central banks? The Fed – which is far from a perfect institution and could use substantial reform or even replacement – was created because the age of wildcat currencies was a nightmare. Wildcat currencies created wild economic swings, massive booms and even bigger busts. Wildcat currencies are the reason that abandoned haunted mansions feature so heavily in the American imagination: American towns and cities were dotted with giant mansions built by financiers who'd grown rich as bubbles expanded, then lost it all after the crash.

Prudent management of the money supply didn't end those booms and busts, but it substantially dampened them, ending the so-called "business cycle" that once terrorized Americans, destroying their towns and livelihoods and wiping out their savings.

It shouldn't surprise us that a new wildcat money sector, flogging "decentralized" cryptocurrencies (that they are nevertheless weirdly anxious to swap for your gross, boring old "fiat" money) has created a series of massive booms and busts, with insiders getting richer and richer, and retail investors losing everything.

If there was ever any doubt about whether wildcat currencies could be made safe by putting them on a blockchain, it is gone. Wildcat currencies are as dangerous today as they were in the 18th and 19th century – only moreso, since this new bad paper relies on the endless consumption of whole rainforests' worth of carbon, endangering not just our economy, but also the habitability of the planet Earth.

And nevertheless, the Trump administration is promising a new crypto golden age (or, ahem, a Gilded Age). And there are plenty of Democrats who continue to throw in with the rotten, corrupt crypto industry, which flushed billions into the 2024 election to bring Trump to office. The result is absolutely going to be more massive bubbles and life-destroying implosions. Fuck those guys. They were warned, and they did it anyway.

Speaking of the climate emergency: greetings from smoky Los Angeles! My city's on fire. This was not an unforeseeable disaster. Malibu is the most on-fire place in the world:

https://longreads.com/2018/12/04/the-case-for-letting-malibu-burn/

Since 1919, the region has been managed on the basis of "total fire suppression." This policy continued long after science showed that this creates "fire debt" in the form of accumulated fuel. The longer you go between fires, the hotter and more destructive those fires become, and the relationship is nonlinear. A 50-year fire isn't 250% more intense than a 20-year fire: it's 50,000% more intense.

Despite this, California has invested peanuts in regular controlled burns, which has created biennial uncontrolled burns – wildfires that cost thousands of times more than any controlled burn.

Speaking of underinvestment: PG&E has spent decades extracting dividends for its investors and bonuses for its execs, while engaging in near-total neglect of maintenance of its high-voltage transmission lines. Even with normal winds, these lines routinely fall down and start blazes.

But we don't have normal winds. The climate emergency has been steadily worsening for decades. LA is just the latest place to be on fire, or under water, or under ice, or baking in wet bulb temperatures. Last week in southern California, we were warned to expect gusts of 120mph.

They were warned. #ExxonKnew: in the early 1970s, Exxon's own scientists warned them that fossil fuel consumption would kick off climate change so drastic that it would endanger human civilzation. Exxon responded by burying the reports and investing in climate denial:

https://exxonknew.org/

They were warned! Warned about fire debt. Warned about transmission lines. Warned about climate change. And specific, named people, who individually had the power to heed these warnings and stave off disaster, ignored the warnings. They didn't make honest mistakes, either: they ignored the warnings because doing so made them extraordinarily, disgustingly rich. They used this money to create dynastic fortunes, and have created entire lineages of ultra-wealthy princelings in $900,000 watches who owe it all to our suffering and impending dooml

Fuck those guys. Fuck 'em all.

We've had so many missed opportunities, chances to make good policy or at least not make bad policy. The enshitternet didn't happen on its own. It was the foreseeable result of choices – again, choices made by named individuals who became very wealthy by ignoring the warnings all around them.

Let's go back to Bill Clinton, because more than anyone else, Clinton presided over some terrible technology regulations. In 1998, Clinton signed the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, a bill championed by Barney Frank (fuck that guy, too). Under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, it's a felony, punishable by a five year prison sentence, and a $500,000 fine, to tamper with a "digital lock."

That means that if HP uses a digital lock to prevent you from using third-party ink, it's a literal crime to bypass that lock. Which is why HP ink now costs $10,000/gallon, and why you print your shopping lists with colored water that costs more, ounce for ounce, than the sperm of a Kentucky Derby winner:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/30/life-finds-a-way/#ink-stained-wretches

Clinton was warned that DMCA 1201 would soon metastasize into every kind of device – not just the games consoles and DVD players where it was first used, but medical implants, tractors, cars, home appliances – anything you could put a microchip into (Jay Freeman calls this "felony contempt of business-model"):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

He ignored those warnings and signed the DMCA anyway (fuck that guy). Then, under Bush (fuck that guy), the US Trade Representative went all around the world demanding that America's trading partners adopt versions of this law (fuck that guy). In 2001, the European Parliament capitulated, enacting the EU Copyright Directive, whose Article 6 is a copy-paste of DMCA 1201 (fuck all those people).

Fast forward 20 years, and boy is there a lot of shit with microchips that can be boobytrapped with rent-extracting logic bombs that are illegal to research, describe, or disable.

Like choo-choo trains.

Last year, the Polish hacking group Dragon Sector was contacted by a public sector train company whose Newag trains kept going out of service. The operator suspected that Newag had boobytrapped the trains to punish the train company for getting its maintenance from a third-party contractor. When Dragon Sector investigated, they discovered that Newag had indeed riddled the trains' firmware with boobytraps. Trains that were taken to locations known to have third-party maintenance workshops were immediately bricked (hilariously, this bomb would detonate if trains just passed through stations near to these workshops, which is why another train company had to remove all the GPSes from its trains – they kept slamming to a halt when they approached a station near a third-party workshop). But Newag's logic bombs would brick trains for all kinds of reasons – merely keeping a train stationary for too many days would result in its being bricked. Installing a third-party component in a locomotive would also trigger a bomb, bricking the train.

In their talk at last year's Chaos Communications Congress, the Dragon Sector folks describe how they have been legally terrorized by Newag, which has repeatedly sued them for violating its "intellectual property" by revealing its sleazy, corrupt business practices. They also note that Newag continues to sell lots of trains in Poland, despite the widespread knowledge of its dirty business model, because public train operators are bound by procurement rules, and as long as Newag is the cheapest bidder, they get the contract:

https://media.ccc.de/v/38c3-we-ve-not-been-trained-for-this-life-after-the-newag-drm-disclosure

The laws that let Newag make millions off a nakedly corrupt enterprise – and put the individuals who blew the whistle on it at risk of losing everything – were passed by Members of the European Parliament who were warned that this would happen, and they ignored those warnings, and now it's happening. Fuck those people, every one of 'em.

It's not just European parliamentarians who ignored warnings and did the bidding of the US Trade Representative, enacting laws that banned tampering with digital locks. In 2010, two Canadian Conservative Party ministers in the Stephen Harper government brought forward similar legislation. These ministers, Tony Clement (now a disgraced sex-pest and PPE grifter) and James Moore (today, a sleazeball white-shoe corporate lawyer), held a consultation on this proposal.

6, 138 people wrote in to say, "Don't do this, it will be hugely destructive." 54 respondents wrote in support of it. Clement and Moore threw out the 6,138 opposing comments. Moore explained why: these were the "babyish" responses of "radical extremists." The law passed in 2012.

Last year, the Canadian Parliament passed bills guaranteeing Canadians the Right to Repair and the right to interoperability. But Canadians can't act on either of these laws, because they would have to tamper with a digital lock to do so, and that's illegal, thanks to Tony Clement and James Moore. Who were warned. And who ignored those warnings. Fuck those guys:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/15/radical-extremists/#sex-pest

Back in the 1990s, Bill Clinton had a ton of proposals for regulating the internet, but nowhere among those proposals will you find a consumer privacy law. The last time an American president signed a consumer privacy law was 1988, when Reagan signed the Video Privacy Protection Act and ensured that Americans would never have to worry that video-store clerks where telling the newspapers what VHS cassettes they took home.

In the years since, Congress has enacted exactly zero consumer privacy laws. None. This has allowed the out-of-control, unregulated data broker sector to metastasize into a cancer on the American people. This is an industry that fuels stalkers, discriminatory financial and hiring algorithms, and an ad-tech sector that lets advertisers target categories like "teenagers with depression," "seniors with dementia" and "armed service personnel with gambling addictions."

When the people cry out for privacy protections, Congress – and the surveillance industry shills that fund them – say we don't need a privacy law. The market will solve this problem. People are selling their privacy willingly, and it would be an "undue interference in the market" if we took away your "freedom to contract" by barring companies from spying on you after you clicked the "I agree" button.

These people have been repeatedly warned about the severe dangers to the American public – as workers, as citizens, as community members, and as consumers – from the national privacy free-for-all, and have done nothing. Fuck them, every one:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

Now, even a stopped clock is right twice a day, and not every one of Bill Clinton's internet policies was terrible. He had exactly one great policy, and, ironically, that's the one there's the most energy for dismantling. That policy is Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (a law that was otherwise such a dumpster fire that the courts struck it down). Chances are, you have been systematically misled about the history, use, and language of Section 230, which is wild, because it's exactly 26 words long and fits in a single tweet:

No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.

Section 230 was passed because when companies were held liable for their users' speech, they "solved" this problem by just blocking every controversial thing a user said. Without Section 230, there would be no Black Lives Matter, no #MeToo – no online spaces where the powerful were held to account. Meanwhile, rich and powerful people would continue to enjoy online platforms where they and their bootlickers could pump out the most grotesque nonsense imaginable, either because they owned those platforms (ahem, Twitter and Truth Social) or because rich and powerful people can afford the professional advice needed to navigate the content-moderation bureaucracies of large systems.

We know exactly what the internet looks like when platforms are civilly liable for their users' speech: it's an internet where marginalized and powerless people are silenced, and where the people who've got a boot on their throats are the only voices you can hear:

https://www.techdirt.com/2020/06/23/hello-youve-been-referred-here-because-youre-wrong-about-section-230-communications-decency-act/

The evidence for this isn't limited to the era of AOL and Prodigy. In 2018, Trump signed SESTA/FOSTA, a law that held platforms liable for "sex trafficking." Advocates for this law – like Ashton Kutcher, who campaigns against sexual assault unless it involves one of his friends, in which case he petitions the judge for leniency – were warned that it would be used to shut down all consensual sex work online, making sex workers's lives much more dangerous. This warnings were immediately borne out, and they have been repeatedly borne out every month since. Killing CDA 230 for sex work brought back pimping, exposed sex workers to grave threats to their personal safety, and made them much poorer:

https://decriminalizesex.work/advocacy/sesta-fosta/what-is-sesta-fosta/

It also pushed sex trafficking and other nonconsensual sex into privateforums that are much harder for law enforcement to monitor and intervene in, making it that much harder to catch sex traffickers:

https://cdt.org/insights/its-all-downsides-hybrid-fosta-sesta-hinders-law-enforcement-hurts-victims-and-speakers/

This is exactly what SESTA/FOSTA's advocates were warned of. They were warned. They did it anyway. Fuck those people.

Maybe you have a theory about how platforms can be held civilly liable for their users' speech without harming marginalized people in exactly the way that SESTA/FOSTA, it had better amount to more than "platforms are evil monopolists and CDA 230 makes their lives easier." Yes, they're evil monopolists. Yes, 230 makes their lives easier. But without 230, small forums – private message boards, Mastodon servers, Bluesky, etc – couldn't possibly operate.

There's a reason Mark Zuckerberg wants to kill CDA 230, and it's not because he wants to send Facebook to the digital graveyard. Zuck knows that FB can operate in a post-230 world by automating the deletion of all controversial speech, and he knows that small services that might "disrupt" Facebook's hegemony would be immediately extinguished by eliminating 230:

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/zuckerberg-calls-changes-techs-section-230-protections-rcna486

It's depressing to see so many comrades in the fight against Big Tech getting suckered into carrying water for Zuck, demanding the eradication of CDA 230. Please, I beg you: look at the evidence for what happens when you remove that fence. Heed the warnings. Don't be like Bill Clinton, or California fire suppression officials, or James Moore and Tony Clement, or the European Parliament, or the US Trade Rep, or cryptocurrency freaks, or Malcolm Turnbull.

Or Ashton fucking Kutcher.

Because, you know, fuck those guys.

Check out my Kickstarter to pre-order copies of my next novel, Picks and Shovels!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/13/wanting-it-badly/#is-not-enough

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linksqueerawakening · 7 months ago

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Miscellaneous LU Headcanons

Four doesn't cast a shadow. when questioned, they flatly state "it died" and refuse to elaborate. if pushed on the matter, they become more and more irritated, while still refusing to elaborate

Time always knows what time it is. you could wake him up in the middle of the night and before he's even fully opened his eyes he could tell you the time without having to even think about it

Hyrule has the most magic, but Legend knows the most magical theory, followed closely by Time

Warriors, Legend, and Four are the only members of the chain who are actually legit monarchists. like the others are pretty much neutral on the concept (tho Wild doesn't like how flora was treated with all the expectations and lack of freedom, but that's another matter entirely than being of the opinion that monarchy is inherently bad), they're fine with monarchy. they just don't have strong opinions one way or another, so long as the current holder of power isn't corrupt. meanwhile Four Legend and Warriors would probably fight you if you insinuated that hyrule's monarchy should be abolished

Legend and Fable are twins but it's a secret. and also due to Fable getting kidnapped and transformed in various worlds in some of their adventures, they're no longer the same age; Legend is 19, she's 16 or 17. they still look very similar so they used the excuse that they're cousins on their father's side

Legend used to want to be a knight very very badly when he grew up, because his uncle who raised him was a knight. the knights who were controlled and attacked him during Link to the Past were pretty much all trusted adults that he knew and admired. he stopped wanting to be a knight after that

Wild may be the best cook when they have good ingredients, but when the chain is down to the wire and they need to make every little bit count? Hyrules horrible concoctions are actually the best option. he can't make it taste good but he can make it keep you alive when there are no other options

Wind is the best at navigating without a map or compass due to his experiences on ships - he would rather have the tools, but he's pretty damn good at managing without

Four has a habit of referring to themselves with "we/us" pronouns ever since they were split and then reformed with the four sword. the other heroes don't know why, but sort of shrugged and started using "they/them" pronouns bc it seemed polite. Four is mostly unaware that they do this - green picked up on it but hasn't pointed it out to the rest of four bc he knows it'll make them stress, and it clearly hasn't caused any issues

Twilight is disarmingly charismatic but only when he's not trying. if he's talking to someone casually or even somewhat irritably, they tend to be completely taken by him, but if he's actively trying to be smooth it just comes across as awkward

Sky is the most mild mannered person you've ever met until you cross certain lines, at which point it's like a switch flips and he's so pissed that even the other heroes hesitate to deal with him

Discounting the hundred years in which Wild was unconscious, Warriors had the longest single adventure, with the war of eras lasting about 7 years. Legend's six adventures altogether may have lasted longer, but they were split up into multiple parts, not one long quest

Wild takes pictures of pretty much everything they can to show Flora whenever they're back home, because they know how much she wants to learn about the ancient past, like their species, their societies, and their magic

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dooberific · 30 days ago

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❝ 𝘛𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘢 𝘗𝘪𝘤𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘦, 𝘐𝘵'𝘭𝘭 𝘓𝘢𝘴𝘵 𝘓𝘰𝘯𝘨𝘦𝘳 ❞

harumasa x afab!reader

genre: slightly suggestive, we are back on the boy failure train

summary: reciprocity is the key to keeping all 'professional' relationships afloat

wc: 1.3k

note: I’m working on the requests submitted (plus my own ideas) and will have them queued to post over the next week or so! Thanks for the love ❤️

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer.” You drawled as you propped up on your elbows, sunglasses tipping down your nose with a grin.

The waves that rolled into Port Elpis had made for a perfect slow, rocking motion for a nap in the sunshine. It would have been a shame to not take advantage of it you had thought as you shimmied out of your top and stretched out across the deck of your boat.

It was a sun kissed day in heaven in your book, the gentle crank of your fishing pole and the distant song of the gulls working their magic to lull you into a state of peace until you heard the telltale thump of feet down the pier in your direction.

Harumasa sucked a breath between his teeth as he shook his head, fighting off a smile in the name of professional courtesy. “Tempting offer, but I’m on the clock so I’ll have to decline.”

You shrugged, pushing your glasses back up as you folded your arms back behind your head. “Suit yourself, law man.”

“You say that like your office isn’t right down the hall from mine.”

You groaned, plucking the half empty beer can from your side, waving it in the air like a trophy. “I’m trying to conveniently forget that right now, Asaba.”

It was one of your coveted days off, and you wanted nothing more than to forget everything related to hollows, H.A.N.D, and Section 5 in favor of a cold beer and a basket of greasy fries from the stand at the parking lot by the marina.

“I’m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you need something from me, and not that you get off on watching girls sunbathe.”

“You’d guess right, but it’s not that I don’t appreciate the view,” he corrected as he stepped off the pier and onto the boat, footing unsteady with the bobbing of the waves that lapped at the sides of your vessel.

He passed a Manila folder into your waiting hands, watching as you indiscernibly skimmed the contents behind your sunglasses. He crouched down beside you, head cocked as he watched your facial expression shift unpleasantly.

You snapped the envelope shut before raring back and smacking him across the chest with it, the force of your strike with the rolling of the boat dropping him from his heels to his ass with a oof!

“I told you I don’t do that kind of thing anymore. I’m a reformed—,”

“Member of society and a public servant, yeah yeah, but you are the only one who can help me with this!”

“We have a whole department dedicated to cyber-related cases, Asaba.”

“Okay fine you are the fastest way to get this done, but I’m practically begging on hands and knees here! Come on (y/n), we’ve been friends for years now. I wouldn’t ask you to do this if there was another way.” He rolled his lip out like a kicked puppy, but you could see the sincerity in his eyes even if he refused to fully break from his cheery, coy attitude.

You sighed, head thumping against the deck as you mulled it over. Truthfully you had your mind made up already, you both had a healthy exchange of professional favors in your histories, and what was one more? What you wanted was honesty, because if he was asking you to stick your neck out it was the least he could do.

He had taken to pacing the deck now, your silence more disconcerting for him than your difficult attitude was.

“This isn’t officially related to work is it?”

He was silent, arms crossed as he stared out over the rolling blue waves, the tails of his headband fluttering in the same wind that tousled his hair.

“No, it isn’t.”

Good enough, you weren’t one to pry too deeply. You already felt like you were a little more tuned into his personal issues than most others just from similar favors you had done for him in the past.

“I’ll help you.”

He whipped around, trademark smile curling his lips. “I knew you’d—“

“But you have to help me out first.”

You stretched your arms above your head with a yawn, back arching invitingly off the deck. “I have no intention of leaving this deck, so be a dear and grab my laptop from inside—that’s not the favor though.” You quickly added as he hurriedly went to fetch your computer per request.

“What’s the favor then? Gonna ask me to scrub barnacles off your boat?”

You snorted. “Nah, it’s just that on a day this pretty it’d be a shame to miss out on even an ounce of sunshine.” As you spoke your hands drifted from above your head, dragging slowly down the side of your neck to your chest as your shoulders bowed.

You didn’t miss the way his eyes locked onto the trail of your fingertips as they drifted lower, ghosting over the contours of your stomach before slipping into the waistband of your shorts. Your hips lifted just enough to slip them past the curve of your ass, shimmying the fabric down till it hooked over an ankle. You kicked them off in his direction with a grin, watching him fumble to catch them before you slung a bottle of sunscreen at him as well.

“Haru dear, be an angel and help me get my back.”

You certainly weren’t expecting company when you had picked one of your…flimsier swimsuit sets to wear as you lounged on the water today, but the thick way he swallowed as you rolled to your stomach, propped on your elbows and drew your hair aside had you grinning like a lovestruck teenager.

Shit, if he kept it up you’d have to invite him over more often.

“I don’t have all day here~” You chided, twirling your hair around your finger as you peered at him over your glasses coyly.

“R-right, sorry,” he tossed your shorts aside, white-knuckling the sunscreen bottle as he hit his knees beside you.

“Be gentle with me, Haru~” you cooed, relaxing your posture as you rested your chin on your crossed arms.

You couldn’t help the way you tensed when his hands met your sun warmed skin, the cool temperature of the sunscreen on his palms a stark contrast. You could feel the callouses on his hands scratch at your skin as his fingers flexed hesitantly, kneading into the muscles along the curve of your spine.

“You’re pretty good at this, I’d about pay to have to put your hands on me like this.” You mused aloud, feeling his hands pause just shy of the tie on the back of your swim top as he cleared his throat. You rolled your head to the side.

“Don’t forget to get under the straps good, don’t want any unnecessary burn lines.”

His hands drifted higher, sliding under the straps of your swimsuit top and across your shoulders, the pressure of his fingertips akin to a massage as he worked the sunscreen into your skin despite the tremble in his hands. You sighed dreamily as his hands retracted.

“Alright, you’re uh, you’re good.”

“Perfect, thank you for that.” You hummed happily before you hooked your legs around his waist and shifted your weight, throwing him flat against the deck as you pinned him, one hand braced next to his face as you leaned over his proned form.

You tsked, drawing his chin up with your fingertips, enjoying how blown his golden eyes were with your proximity. “Haru, you need to get outside more, your little cheeks are awful red.” You cooed, watching his skin flush down his neck.

You settled yourself back on his lap, wiggling your hips as he squirmed beneath you, your hands teasing the buttons of his shirt apart as you loosed the straps of his chest plate. Your hands splayed across his pectorals, as you leaned in close.

“This could take a while,” you whispered, lips almost grazing his as you took care to grind against his lap. His breath hitched, hands latching onto your hips.

“So how about you join me~?”

Rey 2024

#asaba harumasa #harumasa x reader #zenless zone zero #zzz harumasa #zzz #zzz x reader #harumasa zzz

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starfieldcanvas · 9 days ago

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"i support abolishing the legal edifice of The Family because it demonstrably does massive amounts of harm and it seems like we could probably do something else instead of that, but i haven't figured out all the specifics" is not significantly different from saying "i support abolishing the legal edifice of For-Profit Health Care because it does massive amounts of harm and it seems like we could probably do something else instead of that, but i haven't figured out all the specifics" except that the former is more viscerally disconcerting to the average left-leaning voter.

most Americans who support progressive policies do not know the material logistics of any of the policies they support. most Americans who support the abolition of for-profit health care do not know anything specific about how money is allocated to acquire medical supplies or skilled medical labor in a zero-profit model. and yet it doesn't scare lefties and liberals to voice that sort of ignorant "at best i know a few talking points"/"at best i've looked up some basic refutations of conservative talking points" type support because we're already vaguely familiar with things like non-profit religious hospitals and foreign countries with socialized medicine. there are stepping stones that seem to give us some sense that a zero-profit health care system could, perhaps, exist somehow, instead of just endless attempts to put reins and regulations on the for-profit health care system we already have.

but you know who absolutely treats people like idiots because they don't have the details of their better "free healthcare" world totally worked out? conservatives! fox news! they take the scariest possible consequence of the hypothetical alternative to the status quo and say "what's your answer for THAT, huh?" and when the interviewee doesn't know exactly how spending limits would be determined for end-of-life care or how exactly medicine would be distributed in a situation that requires rationing, or whatever, then suddenly we've got headlines about "death panels", and they're moving the conversation away from the real people really dying under the current real system and towards the hypothetical people who MIGHT die under the nonexistent alternative system.

questions like "well what about luring children out of parks" and "what's going to happen to the Known Murderers" and so on aren't inherently bad questions any more than "will there be spending limits on end-of-life care" and "how will we distribute rationed medicine" are inherently bad questions, but the thing with questions like this is it's fairly obvious when they're not being asked in the spirit of hashing out the practicalities of a better world and are instead being asked because the asker already thinks abolition is unworkable and is trying to enlighten (or, more often, humiliate) the person they're arguing with.

most left-leaning people aren't policy wonks. most people generally in favor of more egalitarian, less car-focused city planning do not actually know anything about city planning and could not answer specific questions about it if asked. most people who are pro open borders don't know what that would actually look like in practice. most people who support tighter regulations on food safety have no idea what those regulations would be. and when you do ask the people who ostensibly might know the answers to those questions, they often disagree with each other over specifics, because that is a pretty normal thing that happens when you get down to the nitty-gritty details!

perhaps my point here is that when i say i'm a prison abolitionist, a police abolitionist, a family abolitionist, etc, i'm saying i think we should figure out how to abolish those things, the same way i think we should figure out how to get rid of fossil fuels. you can't shake my opposition to fossil fuels by pointing out i don't know how to accomplish the transition or by pointing out i also support using less fossil fuels (reform!) or by pointing out that a flat ban on fossil fuels would fuck over poor people in the global south or by pointing out i don't know what will happen to people who rely on life-saving single-use medical plastics if we can't pump oil anymore. because none of that shit is relevant whatsoever. why would 'getting rid of this harmful system will be difficult' or 'getting rid of this harmful system will have consequences we'll need to address' dissuade me from believing we still need to figure out how to get rid of the harmful system?

sure i don't know how exactly we're going to get rid of it or what will happen afterward. but i think it's important to figure out how to get rid of it. thinking it's inherently bad and wanting to get rid of it makes me an abolitionist. either help me figure out how, or convince me the thing i think is bad is actually good, but those are your only two options, because "the bad thing is inevitable and can only ever be mitigated" is not an answer i am prepared to accept if we are talking about an artificial system constructed by and maintained by human society.

if you're annoyed at abolitionists because you think their political strategy is inconvenient to your own political goals, that's one thing, and it's sometimes true, but i'm an abolitionist, and in practice the stuff i agitate for and vote for is reform, because that's what's on the table—and that's what gets me closer to the possibility of abolition. if you're having trouble getting through to a specific abolitionist about lending their political support to a reform initiative, the trouble is not because they're an abolitionist, it's because they're a political idealist or political purist, which is a different problem and will certainly not be solved by trying to make them cough up nonexistent details on hypothetical abolitionist policy.

The other reason I'm generally annoyed with the "Abolish X" crowd who actually DO mean "abolish X" and not a watered-down version is that ime they very rarely have fully thought out the implications of what they're demanding and then get angry when other people ask about it.

"Family abolition means completely removing legal ties for family units and allowing all children the choice of where they live" okay. So if I see a three-year-old throwing a fit because she doesn't want to leave the park, and I go over and tell her if she comes home with me she can stay as long as she likes and then we'll get McDonald's on the way home, that three-year-old should have the ability to make that decision? The parent or guardian has no legal recourse to stop me from taking her? Cause if the answer's no, that's not abolition, that's reform baby!

"I'm done talking about what we'll do with rapists and murderers after we abolish prisons, it's all anybody ever wants to talk about!" Well yeah man! 98% of people just interpreted your words as "we're going to let murderers roam around killing people at will"! You need to explain very clearly what plans you have that will stop them that aren't incarceration or you're not going to make any headway! And if your answer involves any form of "well of course SOME people can't be allowed total freedom" - that's not abolition, that's reform baby!

I'm not even gonna touch the number of people who think we should abolish the police and replace them with what are essentially roaming squads of vigilantes dispensing "community justice", whatever the fuck that means.

Like these aren't "gotcha" questions, they're legitimate problems you're going to have to contend with. And if you wave away all these questions with "you're just making up ridiculous scenarios" and "we'll think of something to fix that once we destroy the current system", then yeah actually, I DO think you care more about sounding radical than about making any kind of change.

#i got kicked out of a local covid safety discord once because i said i didn't have much patience for purity politics #and gave the example of working with centrist old ladies on my HOA board to ensure the local homeless family could use our complex pool #and ensure we didn't call the cops on them for hopping the fence. and convincing them that security guards were too expensive. and so on.#someone who would look at that and think 'landlords are evil i won't work with them' would have seen a migrant kid in jail for trespassing #but they made me elaborate and i said i didn't have patience for the whole 'joe biden is doing genocide so we can't vote for him' thing #like trump wasn't going to do just as much genocide and also other bad things too. like #i can do fucking math here. more bad things is worse than less bad things come on now #and they kicked me out for Defending Liberalism #anyway. i can be a raging leftist abolitionist and also pragmatic #it's not the abolition that's the problem it's the abject lack of pragmatism.#of course i don't fucking know the details of exactly how we deal with murderers in a no-police no-prison society #do you know the exact details of how you want to reform the police so they actually catch murderers right now?#do you know the exact details of how you want to reform the prison system? or are you just gonna kinda gesture at the nordic countries #do you know how to imagine new systems that nobody has ever tried before? do you believe it's possible?#political idealism may be fucking annoying but rampant political cynicism is just as toxic #boots on the ground #what's the opposite of progress?#dove.txt #long post #pigs #prison industrial complex #think of the children #family abolition

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mearchy · 1 month ago

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I really love Jaster Mereel, the most “fine then I’ll do it myself” guy of all time. Like, after he killed his corrupt superior UHC style and got exiled for it he could’ve been on that vigilante shit. And he did come back ready for a fight- but not with a battalion, or another assassination. With a fucking entire new system of living and governing contained in a codex he wrote himself, based on ancient laws he wanted to resurrect. By all accounts he wasn’t even in academia or government before that moment, he was a cop. And the best part is he fucking managed to create a majorly consequential schism in Mandalorian society purely on the strength of having actually really good ideas in that big-ass academic magnum opus he spite-wrote. That’s some Protestant reformation shit!!!! I wonder if someone said to him during his sentencing like “you can’t just make up your own laws because you disagree with the ones we have” and he said oh word?? Insane, I love him.

#he could have stopped at some bullet points too or a manifesto would’ve worked #but bro wrote the whole book #he had THINGS TO SAY and he wasn’t going to stop at some measly hundred pages #NOBODY was doing it like him.#he said fuck you i’ll show you a government. and he fucking did #like his balls were huge but simultaneously i wonder if he even anticipated the impact it would have #martin luther nailed up those 99 theses hoping to spark debate in local academia not start a schism #mereel had to know the death watch was gonna try to kill his ass for publishing that but he did it anyway #and i wonder if it just completely took off from under him #and hey as a student of history i have to think ab what the actual societal circumstances were #that that movement was able to happen.#he must’ve been tapping into some really widespread discontent you know #jaster mereel #true mandalorians #haat mando’ade #mandalorians #mandalorian history #supercommando codex #mandalorian civil war #mandalorian culture #mine #my meta #sw

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thrashkink-coven · 4 months ago

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Special reminder to all the new Luciferians that forgot that he is the adversary, yeah, he’s gonna fuck with you FOR FUN.

If you’ve been working with Lucifer for a week or so and have started getting “conflicting” messages, you are not alone 😩. Lucifer loves to test us, he loves to see how deep our values go. He will purposely say things you disagree with or it would seem like he would disagree with just to fuck with you. This dude LOVES to debate.

For example, a large part of my relationship with Lucifer involved coming to terms with my neurodivergency. For weeks we were working on accepting my limits, being aware of my disorders and having patience for myself. But during a meditation I got the very strong message from him “People with mental illnesses are just looking for an excuse to be lazy”

and I was like ????? what the fuck???? No they’re not??? You fucking idiot???? Who am I talking to right now???? And he was like “yes and anyone who claims to have a disorder without a diagnosis are just looking for attention. Prove me wrong if you think differently”

and I blew up, providing so many arguments for why he’s wrong and why that stance is so stupid, and eventually after a while he was like “Hm… that’s interesting. I guess you’re right. Now that we’ve established this I guess we won’t need entertain the idea anymore”

and any time after that, when I was having self doubts, maybe I’m just faking it for attention, maybe I’m just lazy, Lucifer has been like “OH! So I guess I WAS right!” and I’ve been like NOOO!!!!!! YOURE WRONG!!! THE ENTIRE IDEA IS STUPID AND I WONT LET YOU TELL ME OTHERWISE!!!

and Lucifer will then be like “Oh, good then. Don’t let you tell you otherwise either”.

He will press your boundaries, even if only to make sure YOU know where your boundaries are. When writing a spell together Lucifer has been like “yes, we will also need to sacrifice a cat”

and I’ve been like “wtf no we’re not sacrificing a cat why the hell would I do that”

and he’s responded “Because I said so. You will obey my order without question.” (again, extremely out of character, this is a test’!)

until I finally put my foot down and say “I don’t care who or what you are, doing this goes against my core values and I will not abandon those for you or anyone. With all due respect I refuse to do this task”

and Lucifer will be like “I’m just fucking with you, I really liked the way you stood your ground against me though, that was very hot”

and for even less obvious things, Lucifer will test you. He wants to know why you think the things you think. We recently had a very long conversation about the concept of Pedophilia. Super uncomfortable, a conversation I didn’t know we’d ever have, but it was important. He starts by asking me if pedophilia is wrong. Um what??? Obviously???

“Why is it wrong? Explain your reasoning.”

Well because it hurts kids.

“What about non offending pedophiles? What about pre offending reformed pedophiles?”

You don’t have to have the answer to those questions, but you must understand that the answers to those questions matter, even though they are incredibly uncomfortable. Are there evil people? Do evil people deserve empathy? What is an evil person? I don’t like thinking about that, that’s the reason why I don’t have an answer. Lucifer will force you to come to that answer.

“How do we conduct a society where we prevent pedophiles from hurting children without creating another form of discrimination? Do you believe pedophiles deserve empathy? Do they deserve to die? How do we deal with murderers and rapists without becoming murderers and rapists ourselves? How do you console yourself with the reality that some people genuinely enjoy evil things? If you were the Emperor of Hell, how would you manage all the most wicked people who have ever lived? Why is incest bad? Why is murder bad? Do racists deserve to die? Do war criminals deserve to die? Who should be allowed to determine who deserves to die? How far does your empathy extend to people who have done horrible things? How does your moral compass navigate these complex scenarios? What is right and what is wrong? Why do you believe the things you believe?”

There will be times when it seems like he’s trying to do everything in his power to just disagree with you. It’ll seem like he’s leading you to argue with him, and that’s exactly what he’s doing. He’ll ask you questions that should seem like common sense. He’s establishing that not only is it okay to disagree with him, but that at times, he will force you to, to ensure that you are not deriving your own personal values from “whatever God tells you”. He will lie to you, just to see if you’re able to identity a lie. He will say things that he obviously doesn’t believe, only to hear why YOU don’t believe it. It’s important to be firm on your boundaries even if your God is pushing them. You should not be afraid to disagree. You should not be afraid to disobey if it is important to you. Lucifer is not a Shepard and you are not a sheep. You need to understand your own morality alone, without God, without a cheat sheet telling you the answers. and you need to be firm on those. To the point that if God Himself told you differently, you wouldn’t budge.

So if you’ve started working with him recently and are confused as to why he suddenly started saying things you disagree with, investigate what he may be trying to get across. You’ll learn a lot more about yourself.

#pagan #paganism #luciferian witch #luciferism #luciferian #lucifer devotee #theistic luciferianism #lucifer deity #lucifer morningstar #lord lucifer #lucifer #witchcraft #demonology #demonolatry

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pangaeaseas · 15 days ago

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The Problem of Religion in Harry Potter (or, what is Wizard God?)

tl; dr: I wish more hp fics did something with religion and the wizarding world

so to state my credentials up front: I've read a lot of hp fanfiction, a little on the Reformation and religious history--like, I have probably more background knowledge than the average person but I am very emphatically not an expert and have never actually taken a class specifically on any kind of religious history, and I'm an ex-Catholic who did ten ish years of religion classes. There are probably a LOT more people more qualified to talk about this than me but whatever I've never actually seen very much meta written out on this specific issue so I'm giving it a try. (if you have written or read such meta, please send me recs)

ahh the Problem of Religion one of the great unsolved mysteries of the hp world building (similar issues include What the Fuck is Going on with Ireland, How Does the Ministry Actually Work, What is the Population, etc) and I call it 'unsolved' because the fandom has no massively popular solution (like Lordships for the Problem of the Wizengamot) and in general tends to just not think about it, much like JKR originally did. Now IMO she probably intended most wizards to be, like, generically Church of England or whatever without much investment--basically copying the Muggle equivalent whenever it isn't spelled out how the two worlds differ, which is I think a lot of her un-filled-out world building is meant to be. Which. OK. You can do that, but, you know, religion is a very very important aspect of worldbuilding and in my opinion ignoring it and expecting it to be just the same as 1990s Muggle Britain is uninteresting and lazy.

This (wizards are meant to be some kind of Christian and probably Church of England just for simplicity's sake) is evidenced by things like Hogwarts having Christmas and Easter breaks, James and Lily having a Bible quote picked out by Dumbledore on their tombstone, and Draco Malfoy, most emblematically wizard of wizard characters who can be taken as a potential baseline, automatically saying things like 'Good God'. Which, you know, implies that the idea of a single God, and probably the Judaeo-Christian God because that's the same cultural background as the rest of Britain, is taken for granted by wizarding society. It doesn't necessarily imply anything about Draco's or even the Malfoys' personal beliefs, and of course you have other characters saying things like 'Oh my Merlin' and "Morgana" and things like that. Which in my opinion wasn't meant to be indications of some kind of Merlin or Morgana worship but more quirky and fun flavor things of the kind jkr loves to include without thinking out the implications. But you absolutely can take those statements that way--this post is absolutely not meant to dictate how people want to headcanon and I am absolutely here for giving wizards a well thought out pagan or Non-Christian religion, I just don't think that was the author's intent. There's also plenty of other things that imply Wizarding cultural Christianity that I'm not remembering off the top of my head.

And, of course, much better writers than me have extensively discussed all the Christian themes in HP. Of course, themes don't need to affect how people worldbuild in fanfic.

So: with HP canon, we are looking at a society that is probably culturally Christian and probably (key word) intended to be Church of England. But, because JKR wasn't putting much thought into it and basically just took a Chrisitian bedrock of society for granted, the implications of this are not really explored at all. So what I'm interested in is how fandom deals with it.

Mostly, that is...not at all, either taking cultural Christianity in the Wizarding World for granted the way JKR does or by ind of handwaving that wizards have evolved beyond the need for religion and that's just how it is. And that's perfectly fine! Not everyone wants to come up with a full, working, wizard society, and even if they are trying to worldbuild some aspects of wizarding society religion is often ignored, because people don't want to deal with it for often valid reasons (religious trauma, just disinterest, grew up agnostic, not Christian but thinks wizards probably are etc, etc, etc, ) Personally I wish more fics delved into what wizarding religious belief actually is, but to put it bluntly, that's just me. And I have never dealt with religion in my own fics. So don't takethis as judgement at all.

But there are interesting headcanons when people do choose to try and worldbuild religion in HP.

Fom what I've seen, one of the major ways to deal with religion in HP (aside from not dealing with it at all) is to give wizards, often pureblood wizards, some kind of pagan, often Celtic-inspired, religion. And this is quite defensible! Sometimes this is badly executed and/or turned into Death Eater apologia, but the idea of wizards having a different religion is really interesting and a good deal more interesting (IMO of course) than just not mentioning religion at all. Most fics that I've seen don't delve too deeply into, like the actual history and theology of these religions, but there are definitely some that do. (Also if you know any PLEASE send me recs). So if handled well, this is a great way to add some religion worldbuilding in the world of Harry Potter.

However, my personal favorite set of possibilities--obviously I have some personal bias as a history nerd with a long standing if never as deeply researched as I would like to interest in the history of Christianity and as an ex-Catholic--is that, well, we know the statute of secrecy started..when, exactly? 1690. So this much is obviously a result of JKR's Hollywood understanding of witch hunts (a subject for another time and someone far more qualified). For interested wrodlbuilders, we can take this as a guideline at best, as personally I think it would have taken a good deal longer than one year to agree on and implement something like the Statute and I tend to take 1690 as an end date, not a start. I also tend to take the Statue as a largely European phenomenon, at least at first. But, uh, what was happening in Britain at the time..oh, right...the Glorious Revolution....what was happening that created the conditions for the Glorious Revolution...oh, the English Civil War...which was because of...oh yeah, and what was also happening on the continent, maybe it involved, wait, thirty years..oooh, the Thirty Years War...wait weren't there a whole bunch of massive social shifts happening in Europe at this point in time isn't that funny but surely the stature of secrecy could be considered a part of these massive social shifts...all of which was heavily influenced by...you guessed it, the Protestant Reformation.

Wait. So. Maybe, the separation of Wizards from Muggles, at least in Britain, wasn't actually about Muggles hating wizards or wizards hating Muggles. Maybe it was about religion. Now personally I find this ABSOLUTELY FASCINATING. The possibilities, the possibilities...

Wizards had a massive religious civil war that created the blood status system in its modern form? Particular families have wildly different denominations? Excellent. Religion both in terms of level of religiosity and in terms of denomination is a blood status marker? Excellent. Purebloods are all Catholic (what does this do to both Catholic and not Muggleborns?) Excellent. Purebloods are all Puritans? Weird, but if you can pull it off excellent. Purebloods are all one of the wacky new denominations that sprung up after the Reformation and then either died out or conquered the world? Excellent. Pure bloods are all Lutherans who really hated Henry VIII? Excellent. One of my favoirite ways to create a wizarding religion was someone who had most pure bloods follow a denomination that split off from Catholicism in the Great Schism and then a small minority being Catholic, with the worlds splitting around the Reformation. Even the paganism headcanons can be incorporated: the Reformation could conceivably have made it much more difficult to keep practicing wizard paganism causing separation of the worlds.

Personally I would love to see a world that used the history of the Protestant Reformation super well, but it's not the only way to relate a Wizarding religion or a Wizarding religious history. I just wish more people tried to do that at all. Let wizards be religious! Or let them be irreligious but have thought about it, instead of just ignoring religion at all as something that might conceivably have influenced human societies. Maybe Wizarding Britain has state sponsored atheism. Just say that outright!

Another thing I'd like to see more fic doing is theology: how does having magic impact people's religious doctrine? Does every major religion essentially have a wizarding branch with its own theology because magic impacts their view of the world so much, or do most wizards simply follow the majority Muggle religion in their country with no modifications? if so, why? Do some wizards disagree, potentially violently, over how to incorporate magic into their religion? Do some people refuse to use magic because they think it goes against their religion? Etc etc etc you could go on forever. I've seen fic, which randomly enough was about Regulus Black, do this pretty well (or I thought so as a non-Jew) for Judaism, and I'd love it if done with other religions.

Anyway. Now I have to figure out how the hell religion works in the Wizarding Britain of my own headcanon.

#meta #my meta #harry potter #hp #my hp meta #hp meta #religion in hp #hp worldbuilding #hp world #my worldbuilding #headcanon #the Protestant reformation #hp and history #jkr critical #worldbuilding #fanfic advice #hp fanfic #hp fandom #hp fanfic advice

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