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imaginedreamwrite · 1 year ago

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Like No One Does

Part 1: An Empty Line

The block of text had made you take a pause when you stepped back into the back room for a moment, the name across the top of the screen was one you’d never really texted before. You were aware that Danah had given Ari Levinson your number, she’d admitted to it a few years ago; however, you’d never received or read any of the texts he attempted to send.

Before today.

Now, the text message was staring up at you while you were running off your feet dragging around bottles of champagne for rich and snobby councillors in the city. It was short, it was to the point, but there was an adage of flirtatiousness that seemed to hang under the initial message.

'I need an assistant. Hear me out before you turn me down, sweetheart.’

You had wanted to ignore the message, you wanted to delete the text and act like you’d never received it in the first place. It would’ve been easy enough to act like there was a glitch, and you’d never gotten the text in the first place. It would’ve been easy to act like you weren’t being poached by your childhood best friend’s older brother, a notorious flirt.

You and Danah were opposites, in many societal ways.

Danah Levinson was born wealthy to parents who made themselves a healthy living by opening and running four different bakeries and cafés in the city. Each of them was inspired by Jewish food with stark reviews that had led the businesses to have a thriving following and loyal customers.

You were born to a low-income family with parents who had struggled to get pregnant in the first place. While you were loved and cared for to the best of your parents' abilities, their health issues had always seemed to overshadow most of your life, leaving you struggling at the best of times.

You had met Danah when you were 8, after your mother had visited in the hospital during a sick spell by Danah’s mother as a community outreach volunteer. Her mother was one of the kindest people you’d ever met, a bleeding heart who had expelled as much help upon your family as possible.

It was her mother who had helped you get into a better school through sponsorship, and it was Danah’s parents who had helped take you in when both of your parents had grown too sick and needed to be in hospital for weeks. Regardless of the societal standings that were different for yourself and Danah, you had become best friends.

You were thick as thieves, and throughout your years of being best friends with Danah Levinson, you’d gained a lifelong friend and sister.

When you were accepted into university under a scholarship, Danah and yourself had become roommates, and you’d often be sent care packages from her mother as if you were her daughter as well.

Through Danah, you had known Ari Levinson. Her brother was well known to be a notorious flirt, someone who rarely showed up to Sunday night dinners without someone on his arm. There always seemed to be a date or a fling on his arm, no matter the occasion, and it was a sight you’d gotten used to over the years.

It had pissed Danah off to no end, seeing these girls hang around her brother, who were quick flings. She had never approved of a single date her brother had, though both of them knew that the dates he chose to be with were temporary and nothing had gone past a few weeks.

When you were 19, you had experienced Ari Levinson’s flirtations for the first time. You’d spent the summer with Danah after your first year of university at her parents' place, and that was when it had begun. You’d been blissfully unaware of whatever attraction Ari might have had for you until Danah had scolded him for flirting, considering that you’d had a boyfriend.

Once you were aware of it, it was almost hard to miss the way he would let little comments slip. During the fast Hanukkah you’d spent with Danah and her family, when you were 19, Ari had deliberately gotten you different gifts than he had given his sister.

With the last night of Hanukkah being the time when he had given you the nickname ‘Princess’ along with a charm that was meant to bring you good luck. It was nothing you’d looked too far into, since you were on the rocks with your boyfriend, and you were missing your parents, who had died a year and half prior.

The next year of university, the last year before you dropped the program, Ari had offered a few internships through his company that was skyrocketing in value and power in the business world. During these trips to the school, he would take Danah out to dinner, and offer the chance for you to go with them, though you had sparsely joined in.

After you had dropped out of university to dive into work to pay down your parents' medical bills, Danah and you had continued to have that inseparable friendship and sisterhood. Nothing had changed with the Levinson’s, you were still invited to Sunday dinners, you had still watched movies on Thursday nights with Danah.

And every Hanukkah, Ari had gifted you a little charm that had correlated with the one from the year prior.

You never allowed yourself to look too far into the gifts, you never allowed yourself to think of everything you’d been given as anything more than him taking some kind of pity on you. You wouldn’t allow yourself to imagine the possibility of this infamous playboy and flirt, who had always seemed to have someone new on his arm.

Likewise, you had too much chaos in your life as it was, too many other things to focus on, and your best friend’s older brother was not one of them. Danah had, to her credit, told Ari to fuck off on more than one occasion on your behalf, though you wondered if her reasoning was because of his past with exes.

She didn’t want to lose you as a friend if you happened to go out with Ari and things hadn’t worked out, nor did she want things to be uncomfortable with her brother.

'Don’t leave me on read, give me an answer.’ His next message had re-centred your focus, and you’d looked at the message before you hastily sent a reply and shoved your phone into the deep depths of your bag.

'I’m busy at work. I can’t talk.’ You set your phone away and stepped out of the back room. You were heading through the walkway behind the front of the high-end restaurant, stopping at a table with a fake smile plastered on your face.

Every part of your body ached when you started the climb to your apartment. The seemingly endless day of catering to people who wouldn’t have cared about you if you hadn’t been the one bringing their food, was grating on your every nerve. That fake plastered smile and the unseemly way you had to tamp down your true feelings about being verbally or physically accosted by people who didn’t give you a shit, was all becoming too much.

Unfortunately, with you dropping out of university halfway through your degree, it had left you with student loans that were piled on top of your parents' medical bills. Between the three avenues for loans, you were left desperate for work and would have taken anything you possibly could. As it was, you were working two jobs already to pay down the debt that was saddled to you, and you were drawing your energy down to dismal levels.

You dropped your things by the front door of your apartment and slammed the door behind you, with more force than necessary, and walked into your bedroom. You stripped out of your work clothes and kicked them to the side in favour of a pair of sweats, and one of your old campus tees. You yanked both of them on, and secured your hair off your shoulders before you left your bedroom.

You moved across your small apartment and walked into the kitchen, barefoot and tired. You had no drive to spend more energy making something, and your instinctual desire was to grab a package of ramen and rip the top open. After drumming the flavour into the bag and shaking it up, you moved toward your couch and crashed onto the left side.

You turned the tv on and put whatever your remote first settled on, using it more for background noise than anything. As the series started, you picked at your dry ramen noodles and ate what you could, your attention drifting toward your phone. You unlocked your screen and first went to instagram.

The first post you’d seen when the app loaded was one of Danah’s, the first few pictures were of herself and her on again-off again boyfriend, the one that Ari really didn’t like. The next three were pictures of the Sunday night dinner they had together, the tags linked to how she felt annoyed by her older brother.

You scrolled down to the other few posts in your feed before you came upon an ad for some clothes, something you’d never buy for yourself, but it was targeted to your age group. Without watching the whole ad, you continued to scroll, and your thumb had hovered above one of your high school friends that you’d followed, when another message from Ari had come through.

Messages that you had missed, or ones that had come through later than they should have.

'You busy, sweetheart? Danah said you were working all night. Come out with me, I wanna talk to you.’

'I know you’re ignoring me, princess.’

'You’re not giving me a choice, baby. I’m coming to talk to you.’

You were already halfway through texting back when three solid knocks on your apartment door had interrupted you. You tossed your phone to the side and stood from where you had been sitting on the couch, Netflix still playing in the background.

As you slowly opened the door, your heart both plummeted and stopped beating with a single look at the man on the other side. Ari was waiting for you on the other side of the door, not wearing his usual tailored Armani or Tom Ford suit. He was wearing a pair of dark wash jeans, making him look even taller than he was, and the shirt he was wearing a Patriots shirt that he’d had for years.

“What are you doing here? I mean…why are you here?” He had smiled down at you, one foot crossed over the other, and his shoulder was resting against the doorframe.

“I don’t like being ignored, princess. You going to let me in, so we can talk?” His smile was charming, and that playboy personality that so many women had fallen for was clearly flourishing.

You’d heard of some of his exes in the past, and Danah had not been shy about talking about the women she had met, had given you the impression that Ari was almost entirely insatiable. Though you personally had never met any of his exes or his hookups, you couldn’t have avoided them entirely. It was impossible for you not to have knowledge of his vivacious love life, even if you hadn’t been a visual witness.

“You show up to my place unannounced and just think I’m going to let you in because you don’t like being ignored?” You crossed your arms over your chest, your eyes zeroing in on the takeout bags in his hands.

“I hope you weren’t going to eat that shit, baby.” Ari scoffs at the idea of you eating dried uncooked noodles, the bag that’s still in your hand. “I bought your favourite.”

“You don’t know my favourite.” You step aside and let him in anyway, closing the door behind him with a soft click.

As he moves further into your apartment, small as it is, he sets the takeout bags on the secondhand coffee table you have, and then he looks back at you. Regardless of you being best friends with Danah since you were children, and the obvious societal differences between you and the Levinson’s, their entire family treated you like you were their own.

“Give me some credit, sweetheart.” His grin, and his eyes, had become more pronounced and brighter respectively. “I know more about you than you think.”

“Why are you here anyway? You have any idea how late it is?” You keep yourself at a distance, watching Ari with thinly veiled interest as he unpacks the food he brought for you, his smirk still present.

“You ignored me.”

“I was working.” You argued your case, and crossed your arms over your chest as he sat down on your couch. Your random Netflix show was still playing in the background, and Ari had moved your iPhone to the coffee table, effortlessly making himself at home.

“You work too hard, princess.” You swore he used pet names more than your birth given name, the affectionate little quips had been something you were accustomed to. “We should talk.”

“About the job you want me to take? Or about the fact that you broke into my apartment—“ “Babe,” Ari’s grin widened, and he laughed huskily, “you let me in. I didn’t break in, besides we’re hardly strangers.”

You were at odds with yourself, knowing that he was right, and you had let him in. And you were irritated with your body’s natural reaction to the smell of the spices that radiated from the takeout container. Ari likely had gotten your favourite, it smelled the same, and it was from the same restaurant that was a favourite with yourself and Danah.

“So you bring food to coerce me?” You inched forward, sitting down on the edge of the couch as tension, both sexual and physical, bubbled between you two.

“You’re not that easy, darling.” Ari had spoken with admiration, and slid a container toward you. “But I thought we could talk in person. After you eat.”

“I was eating—“

“That shit?” Ari scoffed and reached out toward you, pulling the sleeve of your old campus t-shirt up your shoulder. “That’s not food, that’s…”

“Food that needs to be cooked.” You mumbled under your breath and sat cross-legged on the couch, popping the lid off the container, your stomach growling. “Ramen is delicious, by the way.”

Ari handed you a fork, without saying a word to you after your latest protest, and slowly sank back onto the couch cushion. He grabbed his container, setting it on his thick thigh, and then looked at you out the corner of his eyes. His blue irises were breathtaking, another feature of his that had stolen hearts left right and centre, and you’d often been intimated by the colour.

“You look tired.” It was an observation made while he watched you eat, almost like he was proud of himself for taking care of you, albeit momentarily. “You’re going to kill yourself working this hard, love. And then what?”

“Then you’ll have to find someone else to annoy.” You rolled your eyes, barely retaining your ignorance of the way he was looking at you, and the way he was speaking to you.

Danah hated when Ari flirted with you because she was afraid of losing someone who was like her sister, and she was scared that Ari would break your heart.

And you were just stubborn enough to keep yourself emotionally distant from anyone wanting to potentially ask you out or date you. You had to keep yourself focused and pay off the debts that you incurred from student loads, and the debts that fell to you from your parents' medical history.

“I’m serious, sweetheart. I’m not leaving until you hear me out, at least.” Ari had popped the lid off his own takeout container and started eating with you, almost like you were a normal couple.

Almost as if he weren’t your best friends’ older brother, and you weren’t a single emergency away from being broke entirely.

“It’s triple what you would make working both your jobs, you’d get benefits and damn good ones. Medical insurance, three weeks vacation…” Ari reached out toward you, his hand cupping your chin as he turned your head and made you look at him.

“I travel a lot, you would come with me. You could get the hell out of this shit-hole.”

“I like my shit-hole.” You felt your heart fluttering, tension was thickening as a figurative electrical storm was brewing between you. “But if it suits his majesty, I’ll think about it.”

“Good,” his smile, and eyes, softened, “good girl. Finish eating your dinner. I have rugelach for you.”

“From your mother?” You smiled to yourself, halfway done the food he brought for you. “She makes the best rugelach I’ve ever had.”

Ari dropped his hand from your chin, to pull your shirt back up your shoulder. His fingers had lingered for a minute, before he pulled away and reached for your remote. He looked back toward your cheap television and ended the show you had been watching, speaking softly to you.

“I’m putting something else on.”

#ceo!Ari Levinson x reader #ceo!Ari Levinson x female!Reader #ari levinson x reader #ari levinson x female!Reader #ari levinson x reader fluff #best friend’s brother!Ari Levinson #best friend’s older brother!Ari Levinson x reader #like no one does series #like no one does part 1 #like no one does masterlist #like no one does

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cree-n-jewish-thoughts · 14 days ago

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It's sad when colleges and universities all over the world are bending for antisemites...

Councillor of Toronto questions post secondary school teachings.

Hmm, let me see you give these professors with literally no life experience, tenier and a nice paycheque, have entirely lived through a text book (most part), and then the class has the same bias as them... Huh... Wonder why?

I'm pretty sure post secondary schools are also bound to a core curriculum, correct?

Also, if you don't feel safe at your school, feel free to check your school charter about violence and harassment.

You wanna mess with the big boys? Sound educated, sound professional, only use facts, take images as evidence.

I know one professor from a uni, and I 100% guarantee she is an antisemite. I dated her daughter and I did not tell any of them I was Jewish it felt unsafe) and teaches political science. I took her class, she couldn't teach. And yes to the nasty woman who is scowling at me during dinner, you are not a real doctor, so why don't you check yourself MP????????

Your uni is one of the worst lulz byeeee

#jumblr #antisemitism #jewish #israel #i stand with israel #am yisrael chai #leftist antisemitism #right wing antisemitism #hold post secondary institutions responsible #hold students accountable #hold staff accountable #remove tenier positions #rampid antisemetism in universities and colleges #the type of doctorate that gets up when someone is choking and asks for a DM

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greetings-inferiors · 6 months ago

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I just finished the re up and a.) it is so funny that almost half of these endings are girls falling in love with nicole. In one route the councillor even goes ‘you two are lesbians lol’ and b.) what is that secret video ending?? I saw some people say that they think it’s hinting that you’d control Jecka in the next game, which would be really interesting, as while in the original she was great she really shines in the re up.

Honestly I’m just sad there’s only 7 endings I know they’re way longer so there’s about the same content (maybe even more, it took me 4 hours compared to the original’s 3), and the routes are actually better overall due to the more linear (or at least it feels that way) progression letting more things develop (Nicole’s mum working for a Jewish food place providing catering for the mein kampf reading, that’s a lot of setup), but it loses the interconnectedness of the original. They’re both great in different ways. I just want more. I love all these characters. I really like how Jecka actually wants to better herself and go to college and stuff. Her disowning Nicole after she abused ari does so much for her character. Nicole’s a car barrelling down the motor way at a hundred miles an hour, it’s fun to watch how s he crashes and burns, but Jecka’s just a genuinely nice (at times), funny, and smart girl. It’d be interesting to see a class of 09 where she’s the protagonist be an anti-anti-visual novel, where she is more sincere and empathetic in the wacky fucked up world she and Nicole inhabit.

Also it’d be funny to see if they make it a 3 for 3 for having a lesbian protagonist even with the straightest girl in the ensemble.

#text post #randyposting #class of 09 #nicole class of 09 #jecka class of 09 #class of 09 the re up

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ella-is-scarlet-exclusive · 8 months ago

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Mordecai you have to stop. Your people are too Jewish. Your refusal to bow is too proud. The king's guards and councillors are too plotting. They will hang you on a 50 a'ma high tree.

#purim #mordecai

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beardedmrbean · 10 months ago

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A Toronto man has been charged with public incitement of hatred after police allege he held a "terrorist flag" during a demonstration last weekend.

Police say the 41-year-old man allegedly waved a flag of "an organization listed as a terrorist group by Public Safety Canada" while marching through the city's downtown on Sunday.

Speaking at a Toronto Police Services Board meeting Thursday, police Chief Myron Demkiw called the charge "unprecedented," noting the "very high threshold" to charge anyone with a hate propaganda offence.

"We're not putting up with this kind of hateful conduct," said Demkiw, at a news conference Thursday.

"This type of allegation points to an extremist, hateful perspective that we do not welcome in the city."

Police have not confirmed what the flag depicted or what group it was associated with. Speaking to the board, Demkiw said he would "not be complicit in providing a platform to both acknowledge or promote the hateful ideology."

The man is set to appear in court in Toronto on Feb. 23.

Antisemitic incidents make up 53% of reported hate crimes since Israel-Hamas war began: Toronto police

2 Toronto councillors say they want fire at Jewish-owned deli probed as possible act of terror

The chief said Toronto has seen more protests since the start of the Israel-Hamas war than any other city in Canada, and those demonstrations have escalated recently.

He also announced Thursday that demonstrations on the Avenue Road bridge over Highway 401 will now be prohibited as they pose a threat to public safety and have made many in the surrounding Jewish community feel intimidated.

Demkiw said people who ignore the ban can expect to be arrested "if necessary" and any activities that take place on the bridge will be investigated "with a criminal lens."

2 antisemitic hate crimes reported so far in 2024

Demkiw also provided the board with the latest details on the force's hate crime statistics, saying hate crime calls to Toronto police were down in December.

Demkiw said there were 10 reported hate crimes last month compared to 48 in November — a 48 per cent decrease. The shift is the first to come after the force raised alarm about the sustained spike in calls starting Oct. 7.

He called the recent figures "good news" but warned antisemitic incidents are still a major concern, representing a majority of all hate crimes in 2023. There were 132 total incidents reported compared to 65 in 2022.

This year, there have been two antisemitic hate crimes reported so far, one of which was a suspected arson attack against a Jewish-owned deli store in North York.

To date, the force also received 145 reports from people using the recently launched hate graffiti web form, police said.

"Let me be clear and unequivocal, our commitment to keeping our city's Jewish community safe is unwavering," Demkiw said.

"I will say this once again and as many times as necessary: violence and hate will not be tolerated."

It was the PFLP flag,

Demkiw and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met on Wednesday to discuss the recent and "alarming" increase in antisemitic incidents and what more can be done to keep Jewish Canadians safe. The meeting came after two Toronto councillors asked the federal government for help fighting antisemitism in Toronto.

"As partners, we'll continue to do what is necessary to tackle hatred in all its forms," Trudeau said in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

From October to December, the force received an average of 190 hate-related calls, up from the average of 47 for all the months prior in 2023.

Demkiw notes the second highest increase were LGBTQ+ hate crimes, going up from 40 in 2022 to 66 reported in 2023 There was also 35 reported anti-Muslim, anti-Palestinian and anti-Arab hate crimes last year compared to 12 the year prior, marking it the third highest category.

Between Oct. 7, 2023 and Jan. 10, 2024, the force said its arrested 54 people, resulting in 117 charges related to hate crimes. The most common charges were mischief, assault and uttering threats.

#nunyas news

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mostlysignssomeportents · 1 year ago

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This day in history

The Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop summer fundraiser is almost over! I am an alum, instructor and volunteer board member for this nonprofit workshop whose alums include Octavia Butler, Kim Stanley Robinson, Bruce Sterling, Nalo Hopkinson, Kameron Hurley, Nnedi Okorafor, Lucius Shepard, and Ted Chiang! Your donations will help us subsidize tuition for students, making Clarion — and sf/f — more accessible for all kinds of writers.

#15yrsago Super Man and the Bugout reading: what if Superman had been a nice Jewish boy from Toronto https://ia801603.us.archive.org/5/items/TheSuperManAndTheBugout/SMBO.mp3

#15yrsago Law prof and cop agree: never ever ever ever ever ever ever talk to the cops about a crime, even if you’re innocent http://www.tuccille.com/blog/2008/07/eight-reasons-even-innocent-shouldnt.html

#15yrsago Candian band staples CC-licensed CDs to phone-poles with anti-Canadian-DMCA messages https://web.archive.org/web/20080801204812/https://torontoist.com/2008/07/the_craft_economy_kill_bill_c61.php

#15yrsago UK tech-czar’s ridiculous, fatuous podcast interview — hilarious gag interview https://web.archive.org/web/20080804093334/https://fishnchippapers.typepad.com/tomorrow_fish_n_chip_pape/2008/07/if-ever-there-was-a-clear-statement-of-what-is-wrong-with-transformational-government-and-the-nis.html

#15yrsago Uni of Nottingham: Grad students researching terrorism aren’t allowed to look at terrorist documents on US anti-terror gov’t sites https://web.archive.org/web/20160315042221/https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/researchers-have-no-right-to-study-terrorist-materials/402844.article?sectioncode=26&storycode=402844

#10yrsago Researcher wins NSA cyber-security prize, says freedom is incompatible with the NSA “in its current form” https://www.lightbluetouchpaper.org/2013/07/19/nsa-award-for-best-scientific-cybersecurity-paper/

#10yrsago Bank forecloses on wrong house, changes locks, steals tons of stuff, won’t compensate owner in full https://www.popehat.com/2013/07/26/want-to-burglarize-a-house-with-impunity-then-nickle-and-dime-the-restitution-it-helps-to-be-a-bank/

#10yrsago Canadian Tories distribute fake Braille flyers about disabled initiative https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/conservative-flyers-on-disabled-initiatives-contain-fake-braille/article_e500f631-3cc1-5b81-b4a3-db7f0b7edb2d.html

#10yrsago At VW’s request, English court censors Usenix Security presentation on keyless entry systems for luxury cars https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/jul/26/scientist-banned-revealing-codes-cars

#10yrsago Bribery: pro-NSA Congressional voters got twice the defense industry campaign contributions https://www.wired.com/2013/07/money-nsa-vote/

#10yrsago NSA college recruiting ad, 1976 https://www.flickr.com/photos/joeholmes/9384778371/lightbox/

#10yrsago NV court marshal sexually assaults woman, then arrests her for complaining while judge looks on https://web.archive.org/web/20130726035500/https://www.8newsnow.com/story/21557505/cover-up-alleged-in-clark-clark-family-court

#5yrsago Android’s keyboard will no longer autocomplete “sit” with “on my face” thanks to me https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nicolenguyen/sit-on-my-face-android-autocomplete

#5yrsago The Russian equivalent to Alexa is a “good girl” but not too friendly, and is totally OK with wife-beating https://aeon.co/essays/can-emotion-regulating-tech-translate-across-cultures

#5yrsago Calgary malls caught secretly using facial recognition to characterise shoppers’ age and gender https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/calgary-malls-1.4760964

#5yrsago The Cyberdeck: a homebrew, 3D printed cyberspace deck https://www.reddit.com/r/Cyberpunk/comments/8yyayp/just_designed_and_3d_printed_a_cyberdeck_time_to/

#5yrsago Trumpian Ontario premier Doug Ford will gut Toronto’s city council to punish his Tory rivals https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/ford-to-slash-toronto-city-council-to-25-councillors-from-47-sources-say/article_8d99a5f5-caeb-58d2-a6eb-1db261560a02.html?

#5yrsago James Comey: A freak of nature with the power to cloud liberals’ minds https://clickhole.com/step-right-up-and-feast-your-eyes-on-the-unfathomable-c-1825329399/

#1yrago Peter Thiel’s evil, but he’s not an “evil genius”: How to criticize self-mythologizing villains https://pluralistic.net/2022/07/28/descartes-was-an-optimist/#ordinary-mediocrity

#1yrago Your computer is tormented by a wicked god: Bootkits are why we can’t have nice things https://pluralistic.net/2022/07/28/descartes-was-an-optimist/#uh-oh

#pluralistic

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revcleo · 1 year ago

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Honestly like, this post is kinda nuts in a few ways. Like it's true that Anish Kapoor has been subject to anti-semitism, but it's not very often. Most people don't even know he's Jewish unless they are either obsessively anti-semites, or adding it as a fact in one of his profiles.

His installations are not regularly the target of antisemitic graffiti, his sculpture in Versailles was the target of some very weird antisemitic graffiti. He thinks it was an inside job, possibly by the local councillor who sued him for leaving it on the sculpture, saying that he was spreading hatred, which then got him prosecuted by french courts for leaving antisemitic graffiti on his art. Additionally graffiti was also added on his sculpture in support of his art, and he may have gilded some of the anti-semitic graffiti after the fact? Like put gold leaf on it or something? https://news.artnet.com/art-world/kapoor-vandalism-anti-semitic-330664 From what I can tell, that's the only real time he's been subject to anti-semitic attacks on his art.

He personally doesn't seem to care about the thing with stuart semple any more, though Semple does still use Kapoor as a bit of an advertising thing, which he was almost sued for, but i think part of why Kapoor doesn't really care is probably because it made him more popular as well, since there's not really genuine anti-Kapoor mania, people were pissed off at first because like, the contract is stupid, that company can work with more than one artist, as shown by the fact they have worked with an architect to create an art piece:

Asif Khan reveals super-dark Vantablack pavilion for Winter Olympics 2018

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxkvKJmlyHQ

It's not considering breaking Kapoor's contract because he's technically an architect rather than an artist, he's made a building, even if it's entirely for art reasons.

He does still have an entirely ridiculous contract with them, and he doesn't even use their black for his Kapoor Black stuff [there's a picture of one of his assistants working for him spraying it onto something in a hazmat suit, so I doubt it's vantablack just a pigment] (unlike some artist studios like Hirst who are known to have a bunch of underpaid artists working for them I've not seen anything about kapoor's team of assistants) though I would be surprised if everyone he works with gets properly paid, like I know he also works with a bunch of engineers to make his bean etc. but do all the people in the fabrication process get paid the millions he does?

It's true he's not a tory, he's even spoke up for Corbyn and for Shamina Begum, and he identifys as a "lefty liberal" https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/mar/13/anish-kapoor-interview-isis-shamima-begum-racism so people should definitely stop on that.

But also I doubt that Stuart Semple's fortune (whether it's less, more or equal to Kaapoor's) is entirely based on underpaying 5 people in 2014 https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/artist-stuart-semple-in-row-with-assistants-who-say-they-weren-t-paid-9132088.html which the article implies happened when he wasn't paid for a show in hong kong.

I think it would be good for semple to advertise on his own front now, he's been working as a liberator of colours for a while, with these ones etc:

He's also had this: https://stuartsemple.com/project/england/

By adding ENGLAND to your cart you confirm that you are not Teresa May, you are in no way affiliated to Theresa May and to the best of your knowledge information and belief ENGLAND will not make it’s way into the hands of Theresa May.

(though this is a few prime ministers ago now lol)

But yeah Kapoor has a unique license, and he could say other artists are allowed to work with Surrey MicroSystems the way that Asif Khan already has, but he isn't dissolving the contract for whatever reason, even though he's barely using VantaBlack it seems he has like, Kapoor Black. (he's only used it for one sculpture so far at the Venice Biennale)

I just think it's pretty disingenous to be like "I dislike people manipulating the facts" and then do so yourself. Like all in all, Kapoor has been subject to some weird anti-semitism in that french situation, but it's 100% correct that he has an exclusive contract with a firm which produces a cool substance for not really a good reason, Stuart Semple has not paid people stuff in the past, but that was 10 years ago and as far as we know he hasn't built his empire on not paying 5 people, though he has gotten a bunch of popularity from his pretend beefing with Kapoor.

Kapoor and Semple both seems like pretty decent fellas and should like, just work on their own things. Kapoor is doing some cool and very bloody looking paintings https://www.designboom.com/art/anish-kapoor-blood-red-and-vantablack-venice-art-biennale-2022-04-21-2022/ , and Semple is currently destroying his art, you can go and bring your own paintings too.

I'm not sure if it like fits with the exhibition or what to like, paint over his paintings to say you shouldn't destroy art with hammers and stuff.

#plenty of people do destruction of their own art it's not unusual

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insidecroydon · 9 months ago

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Labour suspends Jewish councillor for voting for peace

Our Lambeth correspondent, KEN INGTON, on the latest scandal that threatens to cause ructions at Brixton Town Hall Front page news: how the Workers’ Daily characterised the suspension of four Labour councillors. Entirely accurately Labour has again outraged its own members for a purge of four councillors in Lambeth who refused to vote against calls for a humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza. One of…

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#Bell Ribeiro-Addy #Croydon #Croydon North #Croydon North and Streatham #Labour #Martin Abrams #Steve Reed OBE #Streatham St Leonard&039;s

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mariacallous · 9 months ago

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Fascism begins with political violence on the streets. In 1922, Mussolini ordered his supporters to march on Rome and threaten to overthrow the democratic government.

In the early 1930s gangs of Nazis and communists fought for control of Berlin’s streets. In 1999, a mysterious bombing campaign, that killed dozens of people and destroyed apartment blocks in Moscow and Volgodonsk, allowed Vladimir Putin to take power by posing as a strongman, who could keep Russians safe.

The UK is experiencing its own version of fascistic violence.

As befits the modesty of this country we have a quintessentially British version of fascistic intimidation. Nothing too grand or showy is on display. Nevertheless, violence and the threat of violence is successfully perverting the course of democratic life.

In the chaos of yesterday’s attempt by Parliament to pass a motion on the war in Gaza it became clear that MPs were not frightened of the party leaders and whips but of Islamist terrorism and mobs at their homes and offices.

Paul Bristow the Conservative MP for Peterborough was clearly scared. He wanted to back a motion from the Scottish National Party, which was the most pro-Palestinian motion on offer.

But procedural infighting led to it being withdrawn.

It sounded as if he wanted to support the SNP motion because of a desire to divert men making rape and death threats.

People had misrepresented his position, he said. ‘Someone suggested on social media that they would show my wife a real man. Someone else suggested that they would attack me and my family. Already today, Labour councillors in my patch are tweeting that I have not supported a ceasefire’

He wanted to vote for the Scottish National party motion on a ceasefire but could not. He asked the speaker, ‘Can you advise me how I can make my constituents clear of my views, given that I was not able to vote?’

There’s a saying knocking about in the Jewish community: ��it starts with the Jews but it never ends with the Jews’. It’s the modern version of Pastor Martin Niemöller’s refrain that ‘first they came for…’

It ought to be possible in theory to deplore the brutality of the Israeli assault on Gaza without bringing anti-Jewish racism and violence to the UK.

But as the Jewish self-defence group the Community Security Trust pointed out there was an upsurge of antisemitic attacks within hours of the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October.

They weren’t protests against the Israeli invasion of Gaza. It had not then begun. But a celebration of a pogrom.

Inevitably, the first UK politician to suffer was Mike Freer, the pro-Israel Conservative MP for the Jewish constituency of Finchley and Golders Green. He said he was resigning from politics at the next election because of ‘a constant string of incidents’ including death threats.

He revealed that, before the Gaza conflict, Ali Harbi Ali, the Islamist who was to go on to murder the Southend West MP Sir David Amess in 2021, had tried to find him.

But if people thought hatred would be confined to Jews, they did not understand the reach of antisemitic conspiracy theory.

As I and other veterans of the wars on the Labour left can tell you, the concept of Jewishness is now unmoored from reality. It can’t be contained. Step away from left-wing orthodoxy and the gentile becomes a Jew and is denounced as a ‘Zionist’, even if they have never visited a synagogue in their life.

Anyone can be Jewish these days, and anyone can be marked as a target of conspiratorially driven violence.

The reason why Labour broke with all precedent and forced the Speaker to allow its motion was that it was frightened for its politicians. If Labour MPs did not have a motion they could support, the left, the SNP, and political Islam could paint them as standing by and abstaining as the body counted mounted in Gaza.

There have been demonstrations outside the offices of the London Labour MPs Vicky Foxcroft and Rushanara Ali.

On the Tory side, protestors targeted the home of Tobias Elwood while his children were in the house.

I don’t want to be melodramatic. Compared to fascist marches on Rome and bombs in Russian apartment blocks, the violence in the genteel UK is not much to look at.

But it is not nothing.

When the British public see the results of votes on Gaza, should they believe that their politicians are voting out of conviction or out of fear?

Lucy Powell, the Labour leader of the House of Commons, spoke in Parliament today of the ‘long shadow’ of violence being cast over political life.

MPs do not like talking about it for fear of attracting attention to themselves and their families, she continued. They do not want to come across as whingers.

But they worry about the targeting of their homes, and believe the intimidation will get worse during the election campaign.

Lethal political violence is real. It comes not just from the Islamists who killed Sir David Amess but from the far right, which killed Jo Cox in 2016.

Yet until they turn lethal, the initial threats that so alarm politicians can seem trivial.

We have the right to protest. Demonstrating outside a politician��s home on a public highway is barely a crime: it is a breach of the peace if it is anything at all. Meanwhile everyone in public life experiences foul abuse on social media.

But do not diminish it. A little fear goes a long way, and as Lucy Powell told the Commons, ‘Unfortunately, it is starting to affect people’s decisions and their behaviour’.

Unless the police and courts become considerably more authoritarian than they are today we will see two consequences.

Sensitive people will back out of politics. You might want to say that MPs should butch-up and grow a pair, but be careful what you wish for. Do we really want to be represented by a succession of preening tough guys (for most would be guys) who don’t care about the safety of their families or even have families?

The other consequence is perfectly obvious. It won’t just be Islamists and their allies who use the threat of violence. If the threats work, and they clearly do, for they persuaded the Speaker to tear up the rules yesterday, why should not others follow fascistic tactics?

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speedyposts · 10 months ago

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Chicago becomes latest US city to seek ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza

Chicago has become the latest city in the United States to call for a permanent ceasefire as Israel’s war on Gaza nears its four-month mark, placing more pressure on President Joe Biden before November’s election to help end the fighting.

After weeks of rowdy public meetings, councillors in the US’s third largest city on Wednesday narrowly approved the nonbinding resolution 24-23. The tie-breaking vote was cast by Mayor Brandon Johnson, who also had to temporarily clear the council chambers during the heated session.

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The symbolic declaration includes a call for humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip and the release of all captives held in the enclave.

“Do I believe that the words that we speak today, how we vote today influences directly international policy? I don’t. I don’t have those illusions,” said Alderman Daniel La Spata, one of the resolution’s sponsors. “But we vote with hope. We vote with solidarity. We vote to help people feel heard in a world of silence.”

The ordinance remained largely unchanged over the past few months despite urging from the council’s sole Jewish member, Alderwoman Debra Silverstein, who sought more support for Israel and criticism of Hamas.

“We all want an end to the bloodshed and an end to the war. But it is vital to understand what caused the conflict, and we should pass a resolution that addresses the issue responsibly,” she said during the meeting. “We should not pass a resolution unless it makes clear that Hamas cannot and should not attack again.”

Israeli attacks have devastated the Gaza Strip since Hamas fighters launched surprise attacks inside Israel on October 7 that killed about 1,140 people, mostly civilians, according to Israeli officials. Israel retaliated with a relentless air and ground offensive that has killed nearly 27,000 people, about 70 percent of them children, women and the elderly, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza.

The US under both Democratic and Republican presidents has been giving Israel $3.8bn in military aid annually, ranging from fighter jets to powerful bombs. But in recent months, Israel’s relentless military campaign on Gaza has exposed deep divisions in the US amid growing anger over the Biden administration’s foreign policy.

The passing of the resolution means that Chicago has now followed cities such as Atlanta, Detroit and San Francisco to be calling for a ceasefire.

An analysis of city data by Reuters news agency this week showed that at least 48 US cities have adopted symbolic resolutions calling for a halt to Israel’s Gaza bombardment, with six others passing resolutions advocating more broadly for peace. At least 20 have passed resolutions condemning Hamas’s October 7 attacks.

Most of the ceasefire resolutions have passed in Democratic states like California, though at least 14 have passed in swing states like Michigan that could be decisive in Biden’s re-election bid, most likely against Republican former President Donald Trump.

Many of the ceasefire calls are modelled after Missouri Congresswoman Cori Bush’s “Ceasefire Now” resolution, which also urges the release of captives and an increase of aid into Gaza.

At least nine of the ceasefire calls were in Michigan, where Arab Americans account for 5 percent of the vote and Biden’s 2020 margin of victory over Trump was less than 3 percent. An October poll showed Biden’s support among Arab Americans had plunged to 17 percent from 59 percent in 2020.

“Arab Americans will not vote for Joe Biden, no matter what. That’s it. They’re done with Biden,” Sam Baydoun, a Wayne County commissioner, told Al Jazeera this week.

“That’s the bottom line. Joe Biden is not going to be able to regain the trust of the Arab-American community,” he said, reflecting the frustration of many members of the Arab-American community over Biden’s unwavering support for Israel.

Douglas Wilson, a Democratic strategist in the swing state of North Carolina, said the war “is something that’s going to be on voters’ minds” in the upcoming election.

“It’s gonna be an issue here and in all the swing states because of the Muslim populations in these states, the Jewish populations in these states and the Black and brown population [in] these states,” Wilson told Reuters.

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qudachuk · 11 months ago

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Former Labour councillor Harriet Bradley has since apologised for the social media post.

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datkidwholovestacobell-blog · 1 year ago

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My Virtual Escape 2 - Chapter 2

On April 1st, 1924, I began to serve my sentence of detention in the Fortress of Landsberg am Lech, following the verdict of the Munich People's Court of that time. After years of uninterrupted labour it was now possible for the first time to begin a work which many had asked for and which I myself felt would be profitable for the Movement. So I decided to devote two volumes to a description not only of the aims of our Movement but also of its development. There is more to be learned from this than from any purely doctrinaire treatise. This has also given me the opportunity of describing my own development in so far as such a description is necessary to the understanding of the first as well as the second volume and to destroy the legendary fabrications which the Jewish Press have circulated about me. In this work I turn not to strangers but to those followers of the Movement whose hearts belong to it and who wish to study it more profoundly. I know that fewer people are won over by the written word than by the spoken word and that every great movement on this earth owes its growth to great speakers and not to great writers. Nevertheless, in order to produce more equality and uniformity in the defence of any doctrine, its fundamental principles must be committed to writing. May these two volumes therefore serve as the building stones which I contribute to the joint work. The Fortress, Landsberg am Lech. At half-past twelve in the afternoon of November 9th, 1923, those whose names are given below fell in front of the FELDHERRNHALLE and in the forecourt of the former War Ministry in Munich for their loyal faith in the resurrection of their people: Alfarth, Felix, Merchant, born July 5th, 1901 Bauriedl, Andreas, Hatmaker, born May 4th, 1879 Casella, Theodor, Bank Official, born August 8th, 1900 Ehrlich, Wilhelm, Bank Official, born August 19th, 1894 Faust, Martin, Bank Official, born January 27th, 1901 Hechenberger, Anton, Locksmith, born September 28th, 1902 Koerner, Oskar, Merchant, born January 4th, 1875 Kuhn, Karl, Head Waiter, born July 25th, 1897 Laforce, Karl, Student of Engineering, born October 28th, 1904 Neubauer, Kurt, Waiter, born March 27th, 1899 Pape, Claus von, Merchant, born August 16th, 1904 Pfordten, Theodor von der, Councillor to the Superior Provincial Court, born May 14th, 1873 Rickmers, Johann, retired Cavalry Captain, born May 7th, 1881 Scheubner-Richter, Max Erwin von, Dr. of Engineering, born January 9th, 1884 Stransky, Lorenz Ritter von, Engineer, born March 14th, 1899 Wolf, Wilhelm, Merchant, born October 19th, 1898 So-called national officials refused to allow the dead heroes a common burial. So I dedicate the first volume of this work to them as a common memorial, that the memory of those martyrs may be a permanent source of light for the followers of our Movement. The Fortress, Landsberg a/L., October 16th, 1924 TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION In placing before the reader this unabridged translation of Adolf Hitler's book, MEIN KAMPF, I feel it my duty to call attention to certain historical facts which must be borne in mind if the reader would form a fair judgment of what is written in this extraordinary work. The first volume of MEIN KAMPF was written while the author was imprisoned in a Bavarian fortress. How did he get there and why?

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