#noticed this especially with a lot of leftist influencers

[delusionalteengirl]

I’m not “switching up on a celebrity because it’s cool now to hate them” I’m “switching up on them” because as they got more and more famous their takes just got more and more out of touch with reality

[psychotrenny]

Liberals say a lot of dumb shit, but if you're going to bother critiquing it then you need to understand what they're trying to say in the first place. Like "Late Stage Capitalism" isn't an especially useful or coherent term, but you can't dismiss it with "just say Imperialism" because that is very obviously not what people are talking about when they use it. Even just by contemporary usage, you should notice how it's nearly always employed by people complaining about declining quality of life (i.e. cuts to social safety nets, reduced domestic regulations, growing mismatch between costs of living and wages) within the Imperial Core. You never hear left liberals use it to discuss even the most obviously evil manifestations of Imperialism (i.e. coups and election subversion, "unjust" invasions, dropping napalm on children etc.) that even they are willing to criticise sometimes. In the contemporary discourse, it's functionally just a way to critique Neoliberalism by comparing it to Social Democracy- both are still equally Imperialist systems. Like "The Highest Stage of Capitalism" is consistently used by ML to mean imperialism, while "Late Stage Capitalism" is mostly used by Liberals to complain about getting an insufficient share of the loot.

There's also a need to consider that the idea of "Late Stage Capitalism" wasn't even popularised by left liberals; they merely adopted it and became its most enthusiastic users/abusers. The original use of the term "Late Capitalism" was in the early 20th century by reactionary (but Marxist influenced) German sociologist Werner Sombart to describe the state of capitalism in his time. However, by the 1960s it was most popular among members of the Frankfurt school of Marxism when discussing the features of the Post WW2 era. Its first popular use in English was in the 1975 translation of the thesis Late Capitalism by Belgian Trotskyist Ernest Mandel, but the person who popularised it the most was probably USamerican Marxist Frederic Jameson. He used it in his 1991 essay "Postmodernism or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, which effectively engaged in the sort of "society has become soooo superficial and consumerist" critique that liberals are happy to eat up. This implanted the phrase firmly in the heads of Anglophone Imperial-Core Left Liberals and adjacent revisionists, and by the 2010s as more and more people were drawn into that whole milieu ("became radicalised" as they like to put it) the phrase spread and spread and now you see it everywhere in any vaguely "leftist" space.

Now this whole summary isn't an attempt to defend the phrase by discussing its pedigree; I don't think it was ever a very good or useful phrase and that developments in global capitalism can be discussed without declaring the dawn of a new epoch based on a disconnected jumble of often superficial changes. My point is that the phrase has a whole history of its own; it's not something that got thoughtlessly made up one day and any meaningful critique of the phrase has to consider this. You need to meet people where they are at, based on what they're actually saying and not what it roughly sounds like they're saying. When you treat "Late Stage Capitalism" as just the Liberal version of "Highest Stage of Capitalism" because the two phrases sound kinda similar, it's criticism of the most superficial and idealist type. In your attempt to "pwn the liberals", you've ended up talking like one

[drdemonprince]

what was your journey from libertarian to leftest/anarchist like?

well, as a teen i hated authority and society and wanted complete freedom so i was a libertarian. then i realized i was gay and trans and libertarianism weren't gonna do shit for me. when obama won in 2008 i noticed that i felt relieved, even though i had not voted for him. I went away to academia shortly after that, and became surrounded by liberal people, all of them doing research with a liberal point of view, and what do you know, product of my social environment and queer and desperate for acceptance among the group that said they cared about me, I became a liberal too.

over time academia mistreated me and rejected me for who i really was, and i started to transition and realize that i was disabled. i became more left-leaning frankly because it seemed like that was the only way to be able to survive as what i was, identity wise, and find anyone at all who would correctly gender me or tolerate me. if you want to be able to hang out with other trans people and have them treat you right, there are values you basically have to say that you subscribe to. anyone who didn't subscribe to those political values was mistreated, viewed skeptically, talked to like they were dumb, and ostracized. and some of those values did make sense to me, whereas others didn't.

i saw people pushed to the social margins for being libertarians, for instance, as if that is a political ideology that carries any danger when some random trans woman with a very weak social support system says in a support group that she maybe kinda subscribes to it. i was even terrified of people finding out that i used to believe in anything "wrong" according to the social dogma, for a while. but i tried to make the most sense of the confusing tangle of community held beliefs as i could, so that i wouldnt be completely ostracized from both straight and queer society at once. and so I was vaguely leftist, but with a confused understanding of systemic oppression based on identity (among lots of other things, like abolition and anti-colonialism), and a deep terror of ever saying anything that would ever get me criticized/cancelled/viewed as a bad person.

and then the pandemic happened and i wasn't so beholden to mass community scrutiny anymore. i read a ton i looked at how politics actually plays out, and i got a little bit more capable and secure in myself and came to similarly feel awed by how much people are really capable of when they aren't being controlled or dependent upon approval in order to survive. and anarchy basically asserted that it had always been there in me, i just hadn't known the name for it. and by then i felt safe and strong enough and had enough faith in others to decide it was okay to have opinions that others disagreed with, and that i wouldn't starve out in the cold if i gave voice to them.

like a lot of people, i had misconceptions about what anarchism really was and writers like Graeber, Wengrow, Solnit, etc really disabused me of that notion and made me understand that it wasn't a scary worldview at all, it was the most human and accepting one there really was out there.

My political journey has not been especially principled or philosophical, it has been emotional, intuitive, and rooted in a lot of social influences. i think that's what most political ideologies are about for people, ultimately, belonging and safety.

I was originally a political scientist by training and in that field's body of research we see that most people do not have consistent political belief systems, they agree to a mish-mosh of statements and support various policies that don't all add up in a logically explicable way. they also don't tend to have stable views over time. just as i think morality is a pretty bad explanation of why humans do what they do, and why we help eachother and avoid doing harm, it's very evident that political ideology is a piss poor predictor of political behavior or affiliation. the far clearer explanation far more consistent with the evidence is that people politically align themselves based on their social milleu and their feelings.

this is why i always feel myself holding back from dying for a cause, and blanch when MLMs start talking about needing to do all they can to bring about communism with an almost religious fervor (beyond the fact that such thinking also doesn't line up with a lot of communist thought and theory about how capitalism falls anyway). i dont think that any of these ideologies really carry all that much weight or influence people's actions, affiliations, or political behavior on the level we all pretend that they do. i dont think they're "real". anarchy is more of a philosophy of how to relate to other people in daily life, for me, rather than a religion about how the world needs to be or where we specifically need to be heading. it's more big-I Ideological for plenty of other people, and again, i blanch when they start preaching about it as if their whole life is in service to the idea of it. I think we do anarchism by living as if we're free, every day. and that's what i care about, if i'm being honest. feeling free, safe, and cared for by some other people, without conditions, right now.

[serpentface]

What’s Couya’s perspective/mental state during the lead up to White Calf Exploits? What does she think is going on in general, or irt omens and hallucinations, and how is that fed into by her social/interpersonal/personal history, or her relationship with religion?

A lot of the abuse she experienced in her childhood was partly rooted in/influenced by her being autistic. Children with developmental disabilities that notably impact their functioning are often conceived of as having not properly been incarnated in their bodies and missing parts of their soul (this is especially the case with severe intellectual disabilities, which unfortunately is often responded to with infanticide if detected soon after birth).

Couya would be considered fairly ‘high functioning’ as an adult, given she's taught herself to mask most behaviors (the most pronounced symptom is her consistently and very noticeably avoiding eye contact, and otherwise she just comes off as quiet, overly blunt, and strange) but had pronounced and dramatic symptoms as a child (having meltdowns, going nonverbal, taking a very long time to learn to speak, etc). This is not something that parents are given any societal equipment to understand or deal with. There are certainly some parents of autistic children in this setting and cultural context who love their kid (even children they believe to be half-empty) and try the best they can, but Couya was mostly raised by a mother who hated her, being seen as a living breathing insult in that she was born in an affair, a living reminder of her own traumas, a compounding of the shame of having birthed a premature sickly infant and never successfully conceiving again. So there wasn’t going to be a supportive outcome here.

Her mother would quite explicitly impart to her that she was something half-formed and empty, not really a whole person, not fully human. Janeys learned to parrot this. Her father never verbalized this notion and was far kinder to her, but was clearly in agreement that something was wrong with her. Couya grew up with this messenging and fully internalized it.

One (semi)positive way she learned to cope with this is by recontextualizing herself as an empty vessel in a positive sense, something uniquely primed to be filled and shaped, specifically in the context of her religious beliefs. All Odonii are conceptualized as living vessels for aspects of Odomache, and an empty vessel can hold more than one that is already full. She might not be a full human, but maybe this just makes her better in service to her God. This is the psychological backdrop that primed her for everything else.

WRT the pilgrimage, she is a true believer, and wholly accepts that the sacrifice and re-incarnation of the Odomache is vital to restoring God’s connection to Its lands/the sacrifice-rebirth cycle and should end the drought. She is, however, coming into it with significant doubts about the royal family’s role to play. Faiza is completely loyal to (and partly puppeting) the Usoma Stavis Amanti, but Couya doesn’t share her faith in him.

At this point, six years into a famine that has been handled absolutely disastrously, public opinion of the royal family is in the pits. A once fringe politically radical argument that the institute of dynastic emperors is a godless foreign import that should be replaced with native Wardi religious practices in the form of a priest-emperor (usually assumed to be the Odomache) has become a fairly popular public sentiment. This is especially the case given the death and defilement of the previous Odomache and loss and presumed destruction of her body (preventing God Itself from being able to naturally reincarnate, halting the cyclical flow of its spirit) is seen as what initiated the drought to begin with. (Don't mistake this for like, proto-leftist sentiment, this is just about replacing a dynastic emperor with a god-emperor and shifting into a religious-nationalist theocracy).

Couya had already seen the logic in this radical sentiment; she had great pride in her order and agreed with the notion that it would provide far better leadership and public unity than the increasingly weak and unpopular Amanti dynasty. But initially she kept this to herself (especially as a representative of a pilgrimage that was, in large part, a desperate display of unity between a fracturing priesthood-military and the imperial family) and was willing to go along with things, it was far more important to perform the rites than to perform a coup.

There’s significant pre-established and widely held beliefs in dreams being potential omens, particularly dreams had by those in the priesthood, which may be visions directly from God (or specifically the Face they serve). Early into the pilgrimage, Couya has an EXTREMELY evocative dream that is highly suggestive to her as prophetic guidance from God Itself:

She is in the palace district of the city of Wardin. The streets are filled with slowly rising floodwaters. She finds the calf dead in the water being torn at by feral dogs. She kicks away the dogs and lifts the calf to its feet, which is now alive but feeble. It’s behaving entirely like a normal baby cow, even sucking at her fingers looking for milk, but in the dream it is self evident that This Is God Itself. Couya knows she HAS to get It to the palace, and lifts it onto her shoulders and wades through the water. One dog follows her and is jumping up, trying to bite at the calf, and Couya’s hands are full and she can’t do anything. There are people watching and she’s like “hey can someone get this stupid dog away from me” but no one makes a move.

Hibrides is suddenly walking with her and the dog is gone, and starts talking about how the calf is good meat, hard to come by in these times, they should get it to a butcher. Couya is in disbelief like "Hibrides what the fuck are you talking about. This is God. You can’t just eat It." God moos in agreement. Hibrides concedes, and is just kind of There for the duration, and dream-Couya is now thinking about how she’s going to have sex with her once she’s done with her task, this is self-evident in a dream-logic way, as if it’s an inevitable part of the process she’s undergoing.

They make it to the palace with the water now up to their necks and Couya kneels on the steps, placing God on the top of the stairway. It is suddenly no longer a calf but a full grown bull aurochs, crowned in three curved pairs of horns. It has an erection. This is Mitlamache in the flesh. It says something to her that she knows is very, very important, but she can’t remember it. At this point the dream tone-shifts and she’s like ‘Cool. Okay now it’s time to plow my brother’s hot wife’ but tragically wakes up before this can occur.

How she interprets the dream:

It is a full description of the incoming journey and situation. God is severed from power, weak and vulnerable and threatened, and needs the protection of its people. Couya seems to be the only one capable of helping it. Through her actions, It is revived and manifests as Mitlamache in its wholeness, ready to restore severed death-rebirth cycle and renew the land’s fertility. It is only restored upon being brought to the palace, suggesting that the increasingly popular belief that the imperial family should be ousted in favor of the Odomache as priest-emperor is the correct way to go. This is a call to arms, a signal that her role in things will be vital, and guidance as to what needs to be done. Not really sure what the Hibrides thing is about but whatever.

Literal mundane meaning of the dream (given I am trying to write this as a realistic dream and this character’s brain processing memories and anxieties):

It’s a manifestation of wider cultural anxieties about the current situation, though displayed through a flood rather than drought (slow, creeping threat). The dogs are compoundations of this threat, being reviled animals attacking something sacred, reflecting cultural anxieties about the empire being torn apart from outside and within (active, immediate threat). ‘God’ is feeble and weak and Couya wants to give herself to save it, it's her duty, she's an empty vessel. The active threat of the dog is maintained for a while, reflective of feelings of constant external threats along the way. People watch on but no one is willing to help her- feelings of isolation, feelings that she's the only one that can do this. The calf becoming a bull aurochs with three pairs of horns and a prominent erection is just how Mitlamache is usually depicted in art, not a directly psychosexual thing. Hibrides is there because Couya has a crush on her, there ARE undercurrents of sexual frustration there.

So like after having this dream she’s primed to think she has a key, very important role to play. This does not immediately translate to her being like ‘Okay so I’m supposed to be the Odomache’, it’s initially just a signal that her intended job of being one of the calf’s emissaries is uniquely critical. The conclusion that she is to become a god-emperor is the end result of a long spiral of events, further (mostly more liberally interpreted) dreams, hallucinations and religious delusions, but it all is based in the aforementioned factors: She understands herself as an empty vessel, and she has recieved messages from God that she is to be the one to restore it. It eventually becomes a fairly obvious conclusion.

One other MAJOR perceived omen along the way is (while Couya, Tigran and Palo and the calf are separated from the group) the three of them being stalked through a more densly treed patch of savannah by a pair of starving wild lionesses. They are inadvertently saved when a bull buffalo separates from its herd and charges at the lions (as a common form of anti-predatory aggression, a large bull could usually drive away two starving lionesses), only for a male lion to appear from hiding and the three lions to kill it instead. Couya's in the middle of a particularly intense break from reality and witnesses this in a dreamlike state, with the meaning feeling very obvious and as very directed symbolism. The wild bull, a sacred animal to Mitlamache like the calf, has given its life to save the people and the sacrificial calf. The starving lions (Odomache) consume its corpse and regain strength in its death, emerging victorious. It seems to be a very pointed signal of how things are going to go, a strong message aimed at Couya specifically.

A lot of it is things that happen on the pilgrimage, with the final tipping point in her mental journey being a massacre of civilians in a Loberan farming village (after an attempt to extract Charitable Tribute For The Pilgrimage goes horribly wrong). This happened in large part because of Stavis Amanti’s relative weakness, deference to his advising parties, and complete inability to control his troops (and this Did truly become a massive and extremely significant stain on the Imperial family’s reputation and started a chain of events that would eventually spiral into a civil war). Watching Imperial citizens, supposed to be under the protection of the Usoma, being slaughtered was an ultimate signal to her that the Imperial Family is corrupt, weak, godless, and must be replaced. And at this point a combination of other factors has persuaded her that she’s the only one that can do it, certainly not Faiza (who has been the presumed candidate for Odomache and is loyal to the royal family). This is where it fully solidifies into hijacking the rites and planning a coup.

[meeda]

I’ve been struggling to find a way to properly word this for my mental health blog but i just feel like it’s too complex a topic to attempt to cover so I’ll just ramble about it here on my semi private blog

here are some of my thoughts on the attitudes I’ve witnessed online in regards to schizophrenia and its relation to bigotry

I’m noticing a trend online (twitter and tiktok specifically) of people uncritically and carelessly conflating schizophrenia with bigotry and far right conspiracy theories. Calling their qanon relatives schizophrenic. Calling antisemitic talking points schizoposting. Just today i saw someone call jkr schizophrenic because of an odd tweet she made, wondering if her transphobia developed into to schizophrenia (like what????)

now, there’s a LOT of discussion to be had about how psychosis and paranoia can affect critical thinking, how delusions can be religious or politically influenced, how intrusive thoughts can make us think things we don’t normally believe, how schizophrenia can cause someone to think or act in unpredictable ways, how psychosis can manifest in groups, etc. Schizophrenia is a thought disorder, after all.

But i think people (specifically non schizophrenics) are doing schizophrenics a major disservice by implying that bigoted ideas are caused by schizophrenia or vice versa. I’m not saying that there are no bigoted schizophrenic people, or that a schizophrenic person can never be racist/sexist/etc. But you guys have got to stop treating the two things like they’re inherently correlated, and you especially need to stop thinking you can diagnose strangers on the internet with a serious mental illness like schizophrenia because they post racist tweets online.

Like come on, do you guys know how that makes the rest of us feel? Do you think throwing us under the bus helps us in any way? Do you think it helps someone like me, a queer schizophrenic person of color, feel any better about myself that you think my illness is known as the racist antisemitic illness? Do you think it won’t add to the stigma, the ostracism, the discrimination? Do you think that your careless, flippant attitude towards an already very stigmatized illness will have no consequences for us?

Over the years we’ve made some slow and steady progress in fighting the schizophrenic stereotype of “crazy psychotic violent killer,” but now we have a new stereotype to battle, the “batshit racist qanon schizoposter” that self proclaimed leftists and mental health advocates who you think would know better are perpetuating uncritically.

World Schizophrenia Day is coming up later this month and i felt the need to say something about this trend I’ve noticed. Non schizophrenics, I really encourage you stop buying into this idea that schizophrenia is the evil racist brain disorder. It’s so much more complicated than that, and schizophrenia affects an incredibly diverse group of people from different backgrounds. The schizospec community is full of wonderful, creative, and loving people. Stop trying to see the worst in us, stop speaking for us, and give us a chance to share our own voices and experiences.

[tobiasdrake]

Innuendo Studios has a lot of really good videos on politics and the complexity of our political environment. The Cost of Doing Business talks about the influence of white privilege on liberal and conservative politics, especially on leftist activism and political moderates.

To borrow a diagram from him, with the note that this applies not only to race but sex, gender, sexuality, etc. as well.

This diagram shows the spectrum of racial ideologies in American discourse. You may notice that all of these people are white; That's part of the point this diagram is making, as actual targeted minorities are too often excluded from discourse of their own rights.

You don't get to have a table of 25 straight people, 25 gay people, 25 bi people, and 25 aces discussing marriage equality. You're more likely to see a table of 97 straight people and 3 LGBT people discussing marriage equality. That's how systematized oppression works.

A problem a lot of us have been keenly aware of is the fact that Trump's success with his party means that this guy:

...the Collaborator, who allegedly disagrees with the ideological principles of the bigot but is nonetheless more than happy to march in lockstep with him? With the rise of Trumpism, he is becoming more and more comfortable stepping closer and closer to the out-and-proud bigot.

That's what began happening in 2016, following the electoral defeat of Hillary Clinton by Donald Trump.

In the wake of 2024, what we are seeing is this guy:

The Moderate, who supports the rights of targeted minority groups but only with permission and cooperation from the Collaborator? Who explicitly operates on behalf of targeted minorities and not alongside them?

Who thinks of himself as beyond racism, sexism, homophobia etc. and consequently chooses not to examine his own beliefs and consider how he contributes to privileged belief systems.

What we're starting to see in the wake of 2024's election is that as these guys:

...continue to make the belief systems of hate more politically palatable and viable? As they go about making ideas of white supremacy and heteronormativity and patriarchy into politically viable platforms that can be spoken of openly?

This guy:

...is starting to become more and more aware of how much more he has in common with this guy:

...than he does with these guys:

And the consequences of that are dire.

This is why it is so, so important that Democrats remain skeptical of the "too woke" narrative, resist attempts by the Left to normalize the Right's new positions and continue business as usual, and use the primary to replace those politicians who join hands with them. Because if we allow all three of these guys form coalition with each other?

The consequences will be devastating for this guy:

Also, just throwing this out there, but anyone who thinks Harris was "running on wokeness" is probably only saying that because she's a black woman.

No reasonable assessment of her campaign would ever conclude that she was too far left. There's really only one possible factor someone might use to come to that conclusion.

So.

Y'know.

Adjust your opinion of those politicians speaking out accordingly. Some accusations say more about the people making them than about their targets.

[fatehbaz]

ughhhhhhhhh noooo stop it! aha! don’t release non-native earthworms in random plots of soil for enhancing gardens or free bait, don’t do it anywhere in North America lmaoooo! stop, it’s so dangerous and extremely harmful, with devastating and surprisingly dramatic and visible biome-wide effects! haha popular tumblr blogs should stop repeatedly and widely sharing advice recommending the release of non-native earthworms and calling it “anti-imperialist praxis” and “bioregional autonomy” and “vegan self-suffiency” lol! dooooon’t! it straight up destroys soil and outright kills forests :/ it directly causes death of understory plants; death of iconic species like goblin fern and serviceberry; elimination of vital fungal networks providing both soil structure and tree-to-tree nutrient-sharing; loss of native invertebrates and amphibians; savannification of the boundary between woodland and tallgrass prairie; death of red maple, sugar maple, and red oak stands; and especially harms hardwoods forests of the Great Lakes and Midwest lmao seriously stooooop it >:(

Anyway for real, I sure hope no one is deliberately releasing non-native and invasive earthworms, or bait worms, anywhere on Turtle Island/North American land, especially west of the Mississippi River or north of the Wisconsin glaciation. Earthworms and bait worms sold in stores are, by and large, not species native to the continent. They severely harm forests and soil ecology, leading directly to disruption of fungal networks; death of saplings and seedlings; death of forest understory plants; replacement of typical understory species with grasses; mortality in adult trees, as well; changes in pH; and other harm, especially devastating in northern hardwoods forests of the Great Lakes region.

Not gonna name names, but several times this year, popular blogs from the [forest-lover, anarchist/leftist/solarpunk, Moomin-fan, environmentalist-ish] realms of Tumblr have widely shared advice recommending the release of non-native earthworms or bait worms into the wild, as a form of “praxis”. I’ve got these posts screenshotted, but since I generally respect people in these circles - and in the interest of avoiding discourse and drama - I’m not going to share them. (A popular post was widely shared in February 2019; another “release store-bought earthworms” post was shared in December 2019.) I appreciate where their hearts are at. But:

Source: [x].

Some things:

From a Phys dot org summary of Great Lakes Worm Watch:

"The western Great Lakes region, which is the area we're focused on, has no native earthworms," says ecologist Cindy Hale, a research associate with the Natural Resources Research Institute at the University of Minnesota in Duluth. Native earthworms in the region were all wiped out after the last Ice Age. The current population was brought by Europeans hundreds of years ago, (soil was often used as ballast in ships) and they’re now changing the face of local forests. Anglers are adding to the problem by dumping worms that don't end up on the end of a hook.

With support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), Hale's team created the Great Lakes Worm Watch website and outreach programs to stop the spread of non-native earthworms and to clear up the common misconception that they're harmless. [...] Earthworms may be small but when they take over a forest, the impact is dramatic. They cause the rapid incorporation of organic material into the soil, changing its structure, chemistry and nutrient dynamics. What's known as the duff layer is suddenly removed, and this duff, or decaying organic material on the forest floor, is habitat for several species of insects, spiders, small vertebrates, bacteria and fungi. It is also the primary rooting zone for most plants."What's really the biggest negative effect on the plants directly is the removal of their rooting zone. It can cause mortality of adult plants but, furthermore, it can cause a loss of reproductive potential. A lot of these native plants have seeds that have very complex seed dormancy and germination strategies," says Hale.

--

Caption by Shireen Gonzaga for EarthSky: “A forest understory with a high diversity of native plants, the result when there are no earthworms in the soil. Image courtesy of Paul Ojanen.”

Caption by Shireen Gonzaga for EarthSky: “Forest soil with an abundance of non-native earthworms can result in a bare understory. Image courtesy of Scott L Loss.”

Non-native worms disrupt fungi networks, alter soil pH, damage seedlings, and allow grasses to gain stronger footholds to replace native/natural forest understory plants (from an EarthSky review of 2016 research by German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research):

Bottom line: European earthworms, introduced by early settlers, are changing the physical and chemical characteristics of soil in northern North American forests, creating a decreased diversity in native plants. [...] At the top soil layer, earthworms convert fallen leaves to humus. That’s a good thing if you’re growing a garden, but, in a natural forest, it causes a fast-tracking of the release of nutrients instead of allowing the leaf litter to break down more slowly, as it would without the earthworms.

Also, as they burrow through the ground, earthworms disrupt the mutually beneficial symbiotic relationship between fungi and plants. Some deep-burrowing worm species change the pH of upper soil layers by mixing in alkaline soil from deeper in the ground. [...]

All of these changes adversely affect native plants that did not evolve in such conditions. For instance, the goblin fern is rarely found in areas with high earthworm density. Other native plants facing threats include largeflower bellwort, trillium and Solomon’s seal. Earthworms also consume the seeds and seedlings of some plant species, influencing what grows in the forest understory.

In some locations, grasses, with their fine root systems that quickly absorb nutrients, dominate the forest floor. Non-native invasive plants that evolved in soils containing earthworms gain an even stronger foothold in these forests.

--

Cindy Hale, the prominent University of Minnesota-based researcher of non-native earthworms in the Great Lakes region, has published this book through Kollath-Stensaas Publishing:

--

Non-native worms harm birch trees specifically and hardwood forests generally (excerpt from University of Toronto research, 2016):

The worms can cause dramatic changes to ecosystems by altering soils, reducing leaf litter and disrupting microbial interactions, which reduces biodiversity. Now it seems they are also eating plant seeds in the wild, potentially altering the make-up of forest communities. (…)

“They eat a lot more seeds than we think,” says Cassin [ecologist at University of Toronto in Mississauga], now at the Ontario Invasive Plant Council in Canada.

The study shows another way that earthworms can alter forest ecosystems, particularly for small-seeded species such as birch, says Lee Frelich, an ecologist at the University of Minnesota in St Paul. (…)

Once earthworms have invaded a habitat, they are almost impossible to eradicate, says Erin Bayne, of the University of Alberta in Canada. Conservationists must instead work to keep worms out of pristine habitats, he says, for example by restricting the use of worms as fishing bait and by controlling accidental transport of contaminated soil.

--

Non-native worms lead to wildflower, fern, and sapling death. In hardwood forests, this loss is probably due partially to how worms degrade the duff layer; the loss of this layer also provokes soil erosion and directly eliminates the forest floor shelter of larger invertebrates and amphibians. When saplings cannot establish themselves, there is tree loss. (From Minnesota Department of Natural Resources)

Studies conducted by the University of Minnesota and forest managers show that at least seven species are invading our hardwood forests and causing the loss of tree seedlings, wildflowers, and ferns.

--

Sugar maples, important both for forests and human food production, are devastated by the worms (from several years of research by Michigan Technological University across multiple national and state forests in the Upper Great Lakes):

A new study suggests that non-native worms are eating up the forest floor, causing sugar maples to die back and perhaps harming other forest dwellers.

Sugar maples are prized as much for their valuable lumber as for their sugary sap and dazzling fall colors. In Michigan alone, they are the basis of a multi-million-dollar industry. But several years ago, foresters began noticing that the crowns of the big trees appeared unhealthy, with bare limbs and little new growth. “They were losing trees before they could harvest them.” (…)

--

Great Lakes Worm Watch has some fun links and resources:

You can download a comprehensive key that helps identify earthworm species. Available for free, via Great Lakes Worm Watch:

Text from Great Lakes Worm Watch: “Different plant species respond to earthworm invasions differently. Some native plants appear to be very sensitive, so much so, that they can rapidly disappear when earthworms invade a forest. Some examples of these plants include…” 

Worm Watch: “If earthworm invasion leads to changes in the mycorrhizal community of fungi, the diversity of plants that make up the understory would be dramatically changed. Fungi are a preferred food of many earthworm species and they graze it heavily, which could dramatically impact the abundance and composition of fungi in the soil.  By grazing fungi on or near plant roots, the earthworms not only can damage the roots, but they prevent the plant and fungi from forming the symbiotic relationship where mycorrhizal fungi exchange nutrients and water for carbohydrates with green plants.  If the fungi can't get enough food, they will die back even further.  For some of the native plants that need mycorrhizal fungi, especially when the plant is young and small, survival will be difficult if earthworms prevent this relationship from being formed.”

-

NO MUSHROOMS

[eabhaalynn]

My 11 Songs of the Decade (because 10 would be boring and is overdone.)

Cigarette Daydreams – Cage the Elephant

The song… This is the closing song of Cage the Elephant’s 2013 album, Melophobia, and the third single released from this album. It describes the pain of someone’s search for their own identity through the musings of a parted lover.

For me… To this day, this is the song I cry to. This always has been me and my friend Iona’s song. It will forever be inseparable from the Ulster Museum and Botanic Gardens in Belfast, from rainy summer’s days and rants about our seemingly massive problems with GCSEs and girls from school. When she went abroad for her gap year, I couldn’t bear to listen to it. It’s another one of these songs that manages to articulate what it feels like to be young and thinking too much.

Key lyric…If we can find a reason, a reason to change Looking for the answer If you can find a reason, a reason to stay Standing in the pouring rain

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvVJ0v6Vta8

Ribs – Lorde

The song… This is a deep house influenced electronica song that discusses Lorde’s stress over ageing. It was released on her debut album, Pure Heroine, in 2013. It begins ambiently and builds to become increasingly more frantic as the song progresses.

For me… Despite being released when I was a young teenager, this song was written when Lorde was sixteen or seventeen. It articulates exactly what it feels like to be that age, at that stage of life. I’m quite sure teenagers across the globe can relate to that. This song has been the soundtrack of my teenage years, the imagery is both relatable and accessible. Listening now, it gives me a sense of nostalgia, a yearning to be back where I was a year, or two or three years ago. Even now, it is the sound of being alone in a crowd. It is musically perfect, and a piece of exceptional songwriting.

Key lyric…This dream isn't feeling sweet We're reeling through the midnight streets And I've never felt more alone It feels so scary, getting old

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qaeoz_7cyE

Sign of the Times – Harry Styles

The song…  This is Harry Style’s debut single as a solo artist. It was released in early 2017 and appears on his self-titled debut album. It is a power ballad with eclectic influences from genres such as soft rock, indie rock, glam rock and psychedelic soul. It features Styles’ vocals alongside choral harmonies throughout. It is essentially about avoiding emotion during times of grief and hardship.

For me…This is the song of me leaving school (for the first time). Listening to it now coughs up all the feelings of relief, and yet uncertainty. Excitement, but also nerves. Summer 2017 was a turning point for me. I had had a terrible couple of years over my GCSEs, and overall, my second school was a far better place for me to be than my first one ever was. At the time though, I didn’t know this. Sure, how could I? This song helped me figure out my feelings, and make sense of feeling happy when I really didn’t know what I should have felt at all.

Key lyric…We don't talk enough, we should open up Before it's all too much Will we ever learn? We've been here before It's just what we know

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qN4ooNx77u0

Ride – Lana Del Rey

The song… This song comes from Lana Del Rey’s third EP, Paradise, released in 2012. It served as the first single of this re-release. It is a ballad that includes, among other themes, parental problems, loneliness and alcohol misuse. Del Rey sings over a string drenched, piano driven melody.

For me… This is the song of every summer. It has never been an exceptionally happy song for me, but it is the embodiment of what it is to feel young and alive, if a little bit tired. The glamour of it, alongside the acknowledgement that everything isn’t perfect, but that they will be okay if you just go with the flow, was exactly what I needed at the time it was released. The blissful uncertainty of the summers of being 14 and 15, partnered with the irrelevance of the future, is exactly what this song will always be about for me.

Key lyric… Been trying hard not to get into trouble But I, I've got a war in my mind I just ride, just ride

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Py_-3di1yx0

Don’t Delete the Kisses – Wolf Alice

The song… This is the second single from Wolf Alice’s second album, Visions of a Life. It is characterised as dream pop, synth pop, shoegaze and indie rock. Frontwoman Rowsell referred to it as “one of those, you know, ‘head out the window on a long drive’ kind of tunes.’

For me… If ‘ribs’ is the sound of being seventeen, then surely this is the sound of falling in love. This song is the ultimate love song. I am absolutely convinced of it. It is greater than any one person as it is simply the sound of the feeling. I am very lucky that I actually was falling in love for the first time at the time this was released. I will always be indebted to Ellie Rowsell for being there to tell me in plain English how I was feeling. This song has defined every ‘lovey dovey’ mood I have been in for the last two and a half years. I’m sure most people of my age feel the same. It was written for the era we are living in and it is perfectly suited to it.

Key lyric…I see the signs of a lifetime, you 'til I die

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqxE-zppu30

Motion Sickness – Phoebe Bridgers

The song… This is the third single from Phoebe Bridger’s 2017 Debut album ‘Stranger in the Alps.’ It describes “being in love with someone who is super mean to you… like conflicted feelings.” Bridger’s stated to radio station KCRW that the song was written about fellow musician Ryan Adams.

For me… Admittedly, I discovered this song late in the decade. But it’s a song about feelings. Like, really hard feelings. This decade, and especially the latter half of it, threw up a lot of feelings, about a lot of things. I suppose this is fairly standard for most people approaching the end of their teenage years. It’s angsty, without being too bothered about anything. It’s raw and honest; articulating everything I’ve felt about everyone at one stage or another, and I’m equally, I’m sure it articulates enough people’s feelings about me.

Key lyric… You said when you met me you were bored And you, you were in a band when I was born

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9sfYpolGCu8

A & E – Brand New Friend

The song… This illustrates the rise and fall of a relationship, and in doing so highlights the more melancholic acoustic side of Northern Irish indie pop group Brand New Friend. It was initially released in 2016 as the closing song of their debut EP, American Wives, but was remastered and re-released on their 2017 album Seatbelts for Airplanes.

For me… This is the song of the medicine application. Bearing in mind I know this band, and know that there is a well-developed meaning to the song that has nothing to do with me, this is the song that I have listened to, and seen live, countless times from the day I decided I wanted to be a doctor to the day I got into medical school and beyond. It is a rare and beautiful connection to have to a song like this, and one for which I am forever going to be grateful. Now, I can’t hear the song live without bawling my wee eyes out. I have come so far, and the band have too, and the song has been with us every step of the way. That truly means the world to me.

Key lyric… She wants to be a paramedic / Wants to save a strangers life / Now she wants to hold my hand / Does she know she’s saving mine?

https://open.spotify.com/track/5RmOfF1s5zW2B942H9OGXT?si=hsauA8iXQN6mXQnL8s0fBw

Brazil – Declan McKenna

The song… McKenna initially self-released this song in December 2014. It is critical of FIFA, of their awarding of the 2014 World Cup to Brazil without addressing the deep rooted and extensive poverty affecting the Nations people. It gained widespread media attention throughout the FIFA corruption scandal, before featuring on his debut album, ‘What do you think about the Car?’ in July 2017. It is an indie rock song that is driven by guitars and synths.

For me… This song was the sound of 2016 and 2017. It was released a while before this but I was fairly late jumping on the bandwagon. It’s a political song, speaking of the injustices behind FIFA and their 2014 World Cup in Brazil. As an angry little leftist, I have always appreciated this. I can only appreciate it more knowing that Declan McKenna himself was only fourteen when he wrote it. For me the song has many happy memories attached to it, from the long summer walks from my house to the nearest village to see my friends who were working as sailing instructors, to attending a tiny gig of Declan McKenna’s in the Oh Yeah Centre in Belfast and being about 6 feet from his face while he was 6 feet from the cusp of fame.

Key lyric…Because you've had your chances, yeah you've had enough I'm gonna burn your house down to spread peace and love

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duHjQ3BE6D8

Robbers – The 1975

The song… This is the sixth single from the 1975’s self-titled debut album. It was released as a single in May 2014. The song’s concept follows an ill-fated robbery, and was inspired in part by the 1993 film ‘True Romance.’ It is essentially about a relationship in which the partners are too focused on each other to notice the destruction they are each causing.

For me… This song is fairly definitive of my teenage years as a whole. The narrative of a toxic relationship that the writer could not, or would not leave, was one that I always managed to connect to, across all aspects of my life as a young teenager, encountering uncomfortable situations within school and with different people and groups of friends. Matty Healy was (and honestly still is) one of the biggest crushes I’ve ever had. I’ve now heard this song live three different times, at three completely different phases of my life. It is a song with so much meaning, and yet one that has grown and evolved with me throughout the decade.

Key lyric… Now everybody's dead And they're driving past my old school And he's got his gun, he's got his suit on She says, 'Babe, you look so cool'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iyy3YOpxL2k

Get Well Soon – Ariana Grande

The song… This is the final song on Grande’s 2017 album ‘Sweetener,’ it is a soul ballad with layered vocals, and is inspired by Grande’s personal anxiety and trauma following the May 2017 terrorist attack following her concert in Manchester. In memory of the 22 victims of this attack, there is a 40 second moment of silence at the end of the song.

For me… I am, and have been, a very anxious person for a very long time. This is something I have never really hid away from, but also never felt up to talking openly about. This song manages to describe the feelings associated with anxiety in a way I have never heard any mainstream musician attempt before. Ariana’s concert which was attacked in May 2017, that which inspired this song, immediately followed her concert that my father and sister had attended, and so the whole song and sequence of events is and always has been very close to home for me.

Key lyric…I'm too much in my head, did you notice? (Girl, what’s wrong with you? Come back down)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXU4P6j3TNY

She’s Thunderstorms – Arctic Monkeys

The song… This is the first song from the fourth studio album by arctic monkeys; Suck it and See, released in 2011. It originated when Alex Turner was looking for a new way of complimenting someone. It begins with an Eastern inspired riff and is fairly heavily guitar led, characteristic of this period in the Arctic Monkey’s discography

For me… I’d be lying if I said this isn’t one of my favourite songs of all time. I chose it for this list because it is my favourite song by the arctic monkeys, who are my favourite band. Its subject, Alexa Chung, basically leads the life I wish I had. Even more so at the time this song was written than now. I remember being twelve or thirteen and just wanting someone to write something like this for me. The sheer detail of the lyrics is beautiful and so captivating, they played a huge part in helping me find my love for music in an accessible way. I loved, and still do love, the relationship they had. I feel like it translated so well into his music, and into the popular culture that shaped my teenage years exceptionally well.  

Key lyric…Here is your host, sounds as if she's pretty close When the heat starts growing horns She's thunderstorms

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQSQnHh4rPE

[pebblestein]

most pro worker since fdr? huh? dems used to at least put effort into pretending to rip off fdr with the green new deal or whatever. you remember that the majority of her target audience was the middle class and how they would all get tax cuts?

1. notice i said the dems in my original post, although im sure even you would agree pretending like she never influenced or agreed with joe biden’s policies would be a little absurd

2. By what metrics did the democrats help the working class outside vibes as you put it? Abstract guarantees and figures about gdp increasing or real wages rising or inflation going down are not economic realities for the working class in America, who have seen their position continually decrease. They are able to view in stark contrast the difference between this posturing about these macro scale features and see their lived experience where housing, food, and the overall cost of living keeps rising continually. And since the democrats can not engage with this justified anger in terms of class struggle, they will then turn to the reactionaries who tell them that gas prices are up because joe biden and the immigrants pushed the gas price button or whatever.

3. I don’t include trump in my post because I thought we were discussing leftism. You talk more about hasan in your post then him. Trump ran a more pro worker campaign than harris. It is not a pro worker campaign I agree with, but he did. This is what fascists do. Fascists take the building blocks of class struggle and divert it away from class, focusing class anxiety onto outside threats such as immigration or some other conspiracy. This is especially easy to do with disgruntled white men and women, who can easily be convinced that their declining economic position can be blamed on immigrants or minorities or the like, rather than the ever increasing profits of the ruling class. Look at mussolini for a better historical parallel. The democrats this year fully ran a campaign in favor of the petite bourgeoisie, allowing class struggle to remain politically uncontested so that trump could then tell the working class that he will solve their problems through mass deportation (indeed, this seems to be his only answer to solving any problem, only further speaking to the infantile nature of the harris campaign to offer any alternative rooted in class). Was harris a better choice than trump? Yeah? I think the individual chess pieces on the board of the bourgeoisie are materially unimportant when both will ultimately wage a campaign of genocide and repression.

I’m not an online only leftist or whatever. I think it’s deeply ironic you say that after you spend a whole post ranting about hasan piker as if whatever he does on twitch matters, even though you also seem to hold the position that online leftism doesn’t matter. You then proceed to call me similar to a joe rogan podcast bro (another online personality I might add). I don’t listen to this podcast as I have better things to do with my time, but from what I understand rogan and his listeners are largely disgruntled bernie sanders supporters and working class men. It makes sense they would speak to this sort of resentment with the democrats. Refer to what I said earlier about trump’s appeal to the working class. That’s ultimately who I support, the working class, not whatever blue maga stooge they throw up on stage at rallies. We live in reactionary times, so of course the workers will be reactionary. That’s part of the struggle part of class struggle. A lot of the things you complain about in your original post here are things that don’t matter materially off the internet, so I think your comment here may be speaking to deflection on your part. These sort of things matter less in real life organizing. Get away from your bad idea of what “leftism” is and go get out in the real world whatever form that takes and make it so, even if the form is likely something I would disagree with. We never have enough fighters for a better future.

Rant on Leftism post 2024 Election:

Post Election has been a time of deep reflection for me as a leftist. Kamala, the most obvious choice for president since Obama's first time running lost decisively due to 100s of factors. While I and most liberals I saw were devastated that a rapist and fascist won, when I looked to leftists I followed and respected, I realized how many were white or white passing cis het men. Yes, this is also about Hasan Piker. I saw these people claim Kamala lost because of her merit as a person and that her marketing strategy failed the people.

"Democrats failed because they are out of touch and ran away from helping the working class," or "Their messaging was horrible, it missed it's mark and should have been pandering more to x group."

I sat back and watched as Hasan and other leftists gloated about being right and spending hours a day hating liberals for caring and trying to find other reasons why she lost. Hasan, during his election coverage, had on 2 other white cis het dudes who each spent most of their air time hating on the dems. It amazed me to see this man who preaches leftism everyday of his life completely forget about Queer people, poc, and women. They just stopped mattering to him for about a week because he had to spend every second saying how Kamala lost because of a personal failure and there was no other reason. Her policies were bad, she was a bad candidate, she was a bad vice president, she personally failed on certain issues, etc.

You'd think someone who understands structural issues would see the fact white people voted nearly 3/4ths with men at nearly 2/3rds and so confidently dent race and gender had nothing to do with the outcome. When the uneducated white male population voted nearly 90% for Trump and essentially won him the election. Those guys, who when polled said the price of eggs was the number 1 reason the voted for Trump, those guys who didn't know what a tariff was... they were the ones Kamala failed because her messaging wasn't dumb enough for them. That was a moral failing on the part of democrats somehow.

Now, I fucking hate the DNC. But I'm not selfish enough to not vote for them over a single issue when not voting means you're helping the fascist who wants to take away human rights. Ariund 3 million people voted 3rd party, their vote wouldn't have won it for Harris, but around 6 million less people voted for Harris than they did Biden despite the fact they ran the exact same race.

"Her messaging didn't make people want to vote." I'm sorry, if you need the vice president to tell you to vote against fascism to be inspired to vote, you're just a shitty person who doesn't care and no amount of jingoism would change that. You aren't voting for the person who agrees with you on everything. You vote for the one who you think could represent your values and wants to the country.

But leftists went on a half year long campaign to shame people voting for Biden and Harris. They didn't shame people for voting Trump btw, they only shamed you if you voted Harris. Hasan never said it outright, but for 6 straight months, he had 40 hours of non-stop hate for Kamala every week and pure doomerism looking at every right leaning poll he could find. Yet he stands firm that he had no part in the election. He says that he could've if the Dems reached out and that other streamers of a similar size had major impacts, but he had no impact whatsoever.

I'm sorry Hasan and any other leftist creator who spent this the last few months solely hating on Harris and encouraging others to not vote, but you are part of the reason she lost. Yall selfishly chose a single issue over human rights to protect your fragile morals. You reap what you sow, and unfortunately, everyone who voted for Harris and wanted to keep human rights is forced to sow with you.

I get the hate for liberals. They are often useless and problematic. They often side with fascists over leftists. They will blame everyone but themselves. But I'm sorry, I can't blame queer people, poc, and women for being loyal to dems. Yes it was due to leftist organization, but liberals gave women the right to vote, they made national parks, they passed gay marriage, they did roe v wade, they signed in civil rights, etc.

They did do these things. As evil as the DNC is, to act as if they are this pure evil stain as bad as the GOP who wants to take away all those things is pure delusion. As a leftist, to ignore the material reality of the world in favor of black and white thinking if lazy. You are lazy if you equate the Dems to the GOP. You are rejecting nuance in favor of convenience. To say they are the same cause nationalism and military, ignoring their vastly different domestic policies is genuinely harmful to the very communities the domestic policy affects.

If you are a leftist and want real change, either pick up a brick and start lighting buildings on fire or start organizing and being ready to cooperate with liberals. Unless you're willing to die or be imprisoned for the cause, you are not a revolutionary. You are privileged and hiding behind a screen. Acknowledge that privilege and use your time and effort to begin to form communities and help.

Me complaining about leftists is part of the problem. It's more leftist infighting. But it's important because the divide between leftists and liberals allowed a Fascist to win. No matter who you blame, reality won't change. Do not listen to men on what women should do now, there are leftist women who you should listen to. This applies to queer people, people of color, and every intersection of them. Black trans women have been the pillars of real change in the US for half a century now, do not forget that.

And as a cis white guy myself, my criticism and rant here should be questioned. I do not know everything. Unlike Hasan, I'm not going to pretend to know every answer.

Leftists, it sucks, but right now, liberals are what is stopping a full fascist takeover, not us. Criticize them - the DNC should be criticized. But don't let that distract you from the actual enemy. A rapist, racist, sexist fascist is president. Him and his allies are the enemy, and like it or not, we have to actually work with liberals to survive the next 4 years. Idc that they are capitalists and don't understand Marxist theory. Once a fascist takes power, no amount of socialist book clubs will just end that. Reading theory at people and endlessly trying to gain the moral high ground in every scenario isn't productive.

We could've had 4 very productive years as leftists critiquing the Democrats and pushing forward our ideas for progress. Unfortunately, we no longer have the ability to do that. The GOP will kill a leftist before listening to them.

Our hope is in local communities. Get leftists on tickets, and help them run. Get leftists in any position of government, no matter how small. We need a comprehensive plan at every level of government, not just a few 3rd parties stealing money in donations every 4 years. A dem running unopposed should be met by a leftist. If you live in a blue state, write to your governor to expand asylum services to political refugees from other states.

I'll be honest. I'm so fucking tired. The last 2 weeks have been hell for me mentally and physically. Literally, the worst possible outcome happened, and the biggest leftists were so happy they could dunk on liberals. Leftists fled to echo chambers and coping while liberals were left scrambling for answers, and panicking their rights would be taken away. Both sides attacked each other.

Hasan will only see more revenue with Trump as president. He will still be a rich white passing cis het guy in a deep blue area. The reality is that no amount of policy would've changed the outcome of the election. Most people voted for trump because eggs were 8$ and for no other reason. Google trends show that voter regret is high. "Can I change my vote?" was up 1400% the week following the election. "What is a tariff" has had its biggest peak ever post Election. No amount of marketing can fix stupid.

It's why continuing to educate and support locally funded things is vital. For as much as I hated on Hasan in this post, I still think his streams will be important and worthwhile. Shit is gonna suck a lot before it gets any better. We don't have to be the reason it doesn't get better tho.

Also, for others who are struggling mentally like I am, live. Live because Trump is still alive, and it would be a shame if you died before that sack of shit. Live out of spite because so many want you dead. Stay alive because that is the ultimate form of rebellion..

[panicinthestudio]

There’s a disturbing trend of the right-wing and conservatives in Canada and the States trying to connect with the broad political demands including democratic and electoral reform, universal suffrage, the right to protest including amnesty for arrested demonstrators, and independent investigation into accountability for police brutality in Hong Kong. While the record-breaking demonstrations, creativity, and on-going violence has received a lot of media attention, there hasn’t been as much with regard to nativist, localist, and populist elements within the movement that are--for the moment--in solidarity with local pro-democratic leftists and progressives. Meanwhile, more traditional economic and social conservatives are allied and aligned with pro-Beijing and establishment politics.

All of them have begun to show their influence in the usually politically apathetic (read: low voter turnout) but conservative and centrist-leaning Chinese diaspora communities, our media, and social networks. It’s reopening tensions between three major generations of immigrants: the aging and established generation of primarily Southern Chinese and Chinese diaspora, many who migrated early on or escaped war, civil unrest, and changing post-colonial sovereignty, often through places like Hong Kong; the recent decades of increasing mainland Chinese migrants; and their descendants who are born and/or raised in countries like Canada while retaining familial, professional relationships, even citizenship or residency abroad.

Owing to the protesters’ need for international support and solidarity, there is a significant amount of attention being placed on upcoming elections in places with large diaspora communities. As the SCMP article states, there are an estimated 300,000 Canadians (expats not necessarily of Chinese or Hong Kong origin) living in Hong Kong whose adult population are able to vote as of this year, another 500,000 people of Hong Kong descent in Canada, as well as 650,000 first generation mainland Chinese eligible to vote. The 2016 Census indicates there were 1,769,195 Canadians identifying themselves as having singular or partial Chinese ethnic origin, making it one of, if not the, largest non-native and non-European ethnic minorities in Canada, discounting a more specific breakdown of various direct origins and reasons for migrating. Many of these constituents are focused in the metropolitan areas of Ontario, BC, and to a lesser extent Alberta and Quebec, the four provinces comprising a significant majority of the seats allocated in the House of Commons, making them a sizeable target for exploiting the current protests for domestic political gain.

This isn’t new either, I distinctly remember in previous federal and provincial elections the Conservative Parties putting out different and often misleading ads targeting Cantonese and Taiwanese separate from mainland Mandarin Chinese, using disinformation and using gross racist or xenophobic narratives; the degrees of written and spoken unintelligibility between different Chinese languages; and statements that escaped media attention having not been directly translated into English or French. A particularly odious example was Jason Kenney in his role as Harper’s multicultural minister during the 2015 campaign trying to make political hay of prominent NDP members’ interracial relationships with Chinese Canadians, some of whom are notable politicians in their own right like Olivia Chow; as well as the Liberals’ economic and political past with China in the Pierre Trudeau and post-Trudeau Liberal years.

Now social media like Facebook and the Chinese-owned and surveilled WeChat, are being mobilized with Chinese-language advertising and smear tactic platforms in a manner inconsistent with Canadian law, with limited to no oversight on the side of the companies and lacking accountability in their use, particularly in Scheer’s Conservative Party disinformation campaign. Just last month, China and India, among other countries, were identified as having efforts to influence Canadian parties, candidates, and voters this election. 

Thus far Andrew Scheer is the only party leader to make a statement in support of the pro-democracy Hong Kong protests, or at least in opposition to Beijing. Meanwhile, Trudeau is being projected as relatively weak in his stance on China or the protesters and their demands, especially in light of the ongoing extradition and security controversy around Huawei and CFO Meng Wanzhou, the detention of two Canadian citizens, recent socio-political reverberations due to trade disputes with China, and changing demographics within the diaspora communities themselves.

The NDP and Green Party have made limited statements at various points during the summer’s protests, with Jenny Kwan NDP MP for Vancouver East being notably outspoken. Organizations bridging the expat and diaspora communities have also formed, such as the officially unaffiliated Canadian Conservatives in Hong Kong having hosted a voter registration drive, and the Canadian Friends of Hong Kong (formerly Vancouver Friends of Hong Kong) aimed at highlighting modern Chinese government influence and its separation from the broader Chinese Canadian community, in addition to other solidarity groups and protests in the past few months.

***

I haven’t posted much about the current election cycle--not because of apathy--but the ballooning complexity of the situation in Hong Kong. I’ve dedicated a significant amount of my time here to covering it regularly, as the English-language coverage is often limited in scope and comes from a rather small circle of tumblrs. Things remain high-strung, it puts a strain on my community and extended family, and increasingly how it plays into larger international, federal, and broader identity conflicts and tensions.

As second-generation Chinese Canadian myself, I’m not terribly torn about my own political opinions and allegiances or on the issues that matter to me, domestic or otherwise. People with even stronger ties to the mainland and Hong Kong are another matter with growing issues of nationalism, sovereignty, as well as conflicting political and personal interests. I do find it worrying that in the diversifying of domestic political opinion and intentions, that the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong are being used as political instruments here and elsewhere.

Just noticed the length, it’s possibly longer than the original linked article itself. Apparently, I had a lot more to say on the matter than I thought.

@abpoli, @allthecanadianpolitics, @onpoli, @pnwpol, @politicsofcanada, @torontopoli

[arosebyan0thername]

Look. The thing is that it is sometimes just not possible to win political arguments against people, even with facts. I've been conditioned to be very very careful about telling my dad the source of news articles when arguing, because I can read him twenty different articles about the same thing, from twenty different sources, and he will tell me that every one of them is "fake news" written by the Leftist Media, which is, of course, controlled by the democratic politicians. This list of fake news broadcasters includes literally all of the most well known news stations, including the BBC, which isn't even an American company! They would have no reason to be influenced by American politics! The only news sources a lot of conservatives will accept are conservative, or occasionally "centrist" (read: conservative but won't say any racial slurs outright), and most of these are smaller companies who simply won't report on anything that goes against their views, or will often skew stories to make them sound worse than they are (I've noticed this happens especially with stories involving transgender people; a headline might mention a boy getting naked in a girls' locker room at school, when really it's about a trans girl changing her shirt, with a bra on underneath just like all the cis girls, and a transphobic parent found out and complained). You can no longer cite the news as fact in political matters and it is the direct result of propaganda spread by a president who does not want people to believe what the news has to say about him.

[bi-dazai]

@ leftists saying that “no one died at tiananmen” - you have no idea what the fuck youre talking about and you need to shut up

the fact that you believe that it is “capitalist” or “trotskyist” propaganda that protesters were killed under deng xiaoping’s china (you probably dont even know who that is) is just disgusting. if you took five seconds to look past social media and read some actual research by credited historians and human rights activists you’ll find that, yes, actually, china does have and has had some pretty damn dark atrocities on their hands in the past few decades. 

im going to cover the very basics, going from an in-depth study i did into the massacre two years ago that took up half of my final year of high school. for reference i received a very high grade on this project, however i will be looking back at my sources and not at my essay itself in order to keep bias out. however it’s also important to know that you can access every one of the sources im going to use without even a university tertiary papers allowance, since i went to a public school which had no subscription of any kind to a paper database, and any papers and academic journals i would have to raid the internet for or pay for out of pocket. 

this post, despite being the basics of the situation, is also fairly long. you know why? this is a complicated fucking situation with a lot of elements at play here to understand. funny that, that you cant actually understand this kind of event by looking at a bunch of youtube videos talking about it from a political perspective without actually understanding what the fuck happened. huh.

on sourcing

this post isnt an essay. im not going to use an academic standard of reference or neutrality here. what i will do is occasionally link to some good articles throughout the essay and list all sources at the end of the post. understand that all facts and statements made in this post are from verifiable and creditable academic sources which i have evaluated, including evaluating the author of second-hand sources from a leftist perspective.

1) student protest in china

student protest is a pretty staple aspect of chinese culture and has been for a while. im not chinese myself, and im not a scholar of chinese history, but student protest has been described in many texts to have precipitated much of 20th century china’s development, one example being the student-led may fourth movement of 1919 which led to the creation of the Chinese Communist Party.

the tiananmen square protests were a series of protests which constituted, in significant amounts, university students. the history of modern, communist china is known to rest on university students, and student activisim was embraced and encouraged by mao (read the below point). for the chinese government to turn so brutally on that protest is extremely telling of a shift in doctrine and attitude, and makes the tiananmen square one of the most important moments in demonstrating the modern state of china’s relationship with criticism and protest, as well as its roots.

2) mao vs deng xiaoping

i understand that a lot of leftist ‘hesitation’ to believe that the chinese government massacred children in the late 1980s comes from the leftist appreciation for mao zedong. in the 1960s china began to shift back into a class system, and in response mao created the ‘Red Guard’, which was basically him encouraging students to follow his ideals and criticise the rise of old bourgeois and bureaucratic habits. mao didn’t want a class system reoccurring and he understood that communist china had been raised on the shoulders and hard work of chinese university academics and students. 

i just want to point out that the tiananmen square massacre happened in 1989. mao zedong died in 1976. mao zedong had been dead for over a decade when it happened.

the man in charge of china when mao zedong died was deng xiaoping, who was known for being extremely critical of mao’s followers and had a militaristic attitude and foundation - in fact, he was known for having a fair few military ties. deng xiaping fully succeeded mao by 1978, and became known for enabling further chinese economic freedom (which led to the class system returning at a much greater rate; however also proposed greater freedom to criticise the government in theory - in theory. yeah that didnt happen). deng xiaoping also put into effect the infamous one child policy (which pushed families with more than one child into further poverty and encouraged parents to abandon female babies). deng xiaoping also executed thousands of criminals in an attempt to curb crime rates. 

i could go all day into deng xiaoping’s reign over china. there were other dark effects of his rule - lower wages for academics; a widening gap between rich and poor; extreme corruption; and inflation that soared on food prices in the mid-1980s which led to many poor chinese citizens starving. this man was, to put it simply, evil. to associate him with mao at all is ridiculous. even time magazine noticed how different china had become - the september 26 1983 cover headline was literally “banishing mao’s ghost: deng xiaoping”.

he was not mao zedong. if your taking sides with the chinese government and trying to see this from a “capitalist propaganda” perspective is because youre a maoist, then youre clearly misunderstanding who was in charge here. even before mao died he was losing power while deng xiaoping was gaining it through his military ties. the 1970s and 80s was a period of rapid transformation into hell in china. the china of the 50s and 60s is extremely different from that of the late 80s.

3) the democracy movement

the protest in early june 1989 was part of a greater student movement that had been carrying on and picking up fervour throughout the mid-to-late 1980s in china. majorly comprised of university students and academics, it sought to oppose the blaring issues and evils of deng xiaoping’s rule. protestors had been filling tiananmen square even in early 1987, their reach spanned many cities and protests often reached one million people.

the democracy movement, as it was called [there was also the peoples liberation army but the democracy movement is the overarching movement], criticised the lack of communication between protestors and the communist party, unemployment, wage gaps, and demanded democracy. the movement was tolerated, however, with little to no violent opposition. this peaceful attitude cannot be accredited to deng xiaoping - many historians have credited this to the influence of general secretary hu yaobang who was dismissed in 1986 for being too permissive. 

throughout the late 1980s and especially in 1989, the protests began to heat up and non-academic chinese citizens began to also participate. in mid-april 1989 hu yaobang died, and the catalyst for a massive intensification of the protests began. tiananmen square is considered the centre of political power in beijing - a short time after hu yaobang’s death around 600 students and teachers laid a wreath for him in the square. many others in the following days also laid wreaths for him, and the demands of the democracy movement were again enunciated.

4) the massacre lead-up

over the next few months thousands of students occupied tiananmen square, frequently holding hunger strikes while attempting still to communicate with the deng xiaoping-led communist party. millions across the country were in solidarity.

on may 20th 1989, martial law was declared against the protests, and troops began to be stationed across beijing. millions of protestors still turned up, and it was reported many troops at this period refused to shoot the protestors despite their orders.

a statue of the goddess of democracy was also raised in tiananmen square by protestors, and, ahead of a visit from mikhael gorbachev, a hunger strike also took place. these protests continued every day and gained immense amounts of support from the chinese public.

[photo credit shelly zang]

5) the massacre

by early june the protests were still going strong and still gaining traction fast. on the night of june 3rd, the troops stationed in beijing began to mobilise, and this time the soldiers obeyed martial law. the troops were heavily armed and deng xiaoping did not hesitate to order the army to deploy military vehicles such as tanks to clear out the protesters using the violence he had used when he had executed criminals. 

if youre unwilling to believe, for some reason, blood was shed, then here: a news site by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Australia’s public news service (which is fairly left-leaning, especially in its journalists), which summarises the massacre and includes many, many pictures of the violence, suffering, and bloodshed. MASSIVE TW FOR VIOLENCE, DEATH, BLOOD, GORE

with the sheer volume of fleeing protesters and the entire force of the chinese army being pushed down on the beijing populace, many soldiers did not know or had no involvement in the killing - many, upon learning of it, immediately flew the white flag and fled. 

6) the death count

to this day, the count of the amount of civilians and protestors who died in the massacre is unknown. it will probably never be known. 

in 1989 and 1990 amnesty international human rights investigators collected testimonies from witnesses and attempted to calculate the death toll. testimonies concluded that it was highly likely that, in the early morning hours of june 5th, the army collected the bodies lying on the street, piled them into heaps, and burned them. if the death count was counted then it is likely it will never be released and/or never be able to be confirmed. it was also reported that several hundred people, mainly protesters now in hiding, were executed between june and august. in 1990 thousands were still in jail for their participation and, at this point in time, ill hazard a guess that theyre either still in there or are dead. the surviving leaders of the democracy movement fled the country almost immediately.

a safe estimation of the death toll, with both physical and witness testimony, puts the death toll of soldiers at perhaps a dozen, and the death toll of civilians between 400-several thousand. blood and burned tanks stained the streets of beijing for a time after the massacre, and a recreation of a bloodied sect of street remains in wroclaw, poland, as a response in solidarity with the victims.

this is the memorial. this is a recreation of an actual piece of street. what you see is a bicycle, toppled and crushed, and the heavy tracks of a tank. the red paint - that’s the blood of a massacred chinese civilian.

7) general current status

now going through a lot of my old notes, i found two very good slides of quotes i made during my note-taking period that just about sums this section up:

[full sources will be at the end of the post]

8) leftists and my interpretation

i know that it can all seem that the perception of the chinese government as bad and scary and terrible is all a capitalist propaganda piece to demonise china. some of this perception is, and a lot of this perception also falls into orientalism. however the government that was created and left by deng xiaoping is nothing short of evil, and taking its side as a stance against capitalism when the tiananment square massacred a whole heap of pro-maoist activists is...well. it’s uneducated and idiotic. its also highly offensive because these are people who would align with leftism. these people were killed by a violent, classist government that sought to become capitalism, all for peacefully attempting to negotiate openly with deng xiaoping’s policies. they were massacred, hunted down, imprisoned. there is nothing else to say here, no controversy. denying this happened is along the lines of holocaust denial and it disgusts me to see my fellow leftists engaging in such right wing conspiratorial thought. 

please, please reblog this. i think a lot of people understand vaguely what happened but dont truly understand. and while im not suggesting im an expert - all ive done is provided a basic summary with some extra explanation from a leftist perspective - and chinese history isnt even my forte - i would prefer to teach those what i know and open up discussion from proper chinese history scholars and chinese leftists themselves.

i also hope that this gives perspective to the current student protests in hong kong, and why student protests being shut down signals the proper end of the chinese communist era and china’s shift to totalitarian capitalism and fascism. 

i would love for some chinese leftists, historians, and scholars to add in if you feel.

SOURCES/FURTHER READING:

Books, Papers, Newspaper Articles:

Amnesty International (1990) China: The Massacre of June 1989 and its Aftermath, 17th March, 1990

Harding, H. (1990) The Impact of Tiananmen on China’s Foreign Policy, National Bureau of Asian and Soviet Research, December 1990

Kristof, N.D. “A Reassessment of How Many Died in the Military Crackdown in Beijing”. The New York Times, 21st June, 1989.

Laidlaw, R. (1994) China: A Documentary History, MacMillan, South Melbourne

Richelson, J.T., and Evans, M.L. (1999) Tiananmen Square, 1989: The Declassified History [Online] Available at: https://nsarchive.gwv.edu.BSAEBB/NSAEBB16/, Accessed 1st August, 2017

Laidlaw, R. (1994) China: A Documentary History, MacMillan Education Australia, South Melbourne

Amnesty International (1990) China: The Massacre of June 1989 and its Aftermath, 17th March 1990

 Summaries and Discussions:

Leslie, T. (2014) Tiananmen Square massacre: Look back on how the crackdown unfolded [Online] Available at: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-06-04/how-the-tiananmen-square-massacre-unfolded/5496454, Accessed 8th August 2017

Nathan, A.J. (2009) The Consequences of Tiananmen [Online] Available at: www.resetdoc.org/story/00000001371, Accessed 1st August 2017

Ping, H., translated by Robertson, M. (2015) How the Tiananmen Massacre Changed China, and the World [Online] Available at: www.chinachange.org/2015/06/02/how-the-Tiananmen-massacre-changed-china-and-the-world/, Accessed 8th August, 2017

Rayman, N. (2016) 6 Things You Should Know About the Tiananmen Square Massacre [Online] Available at: https://time.com/2822290/Tiananmen-square-massacre-facts-time/, Accessed 1st August 2017

*i couldnt seem to find the “wang” source in my reference list however i do vaguely recall it being quoted amongst one of the above sources. if anyone is curious ill see if i can properly sniff it out

[random-thought-depository]

In my experience, science fiction that depicts the USA as an independent and powerful state centuries in the future is actually pretty unusual. The only one I can think of offhand is Alien/Aliens (I think?). The much more common trope is that future humanity is supposedly united and equal in some sort of federation (in which the USA would only be a sort of province if it exists as an administrative entity at all), but the political institutions and culture of this federation seem very Western and especially USA-influenced/inspired (e.g. you hear about a President rather than a Prime Minister) and the cast is noticeably full of white people and people with English names.

I think the first part is more plausible than the second part. Political institutions are one of the West's very successful cultural exports and empire-derived institutions can way outlast the empire itself (see, e.g. Latin in Medieval Europe), so I can totally buy that in 2250 Earth is ruled by a government called the Federation which has political-economic institutions that owe a lot to the Western liberal and leftist political traditions and sends out starships with names like Enterprise. But a statistically average slice of the command structure of a Federation starship would logically reflect the demographics of the world as a whole and hence would not consist of two US Americans, a Japanese man, a Russian, a Scotsman, a Kenyan, and a woman whose nationality is indeterminate but who's a white blonde with an English name; realistically it'd probably be more like a Chinese man, an Indian, a Japanese man, a Russian, an Indonesian, a Kenyan, and an Egyptian. A similar critique would apply to science fiction like e.g. Babylon 5.

So I think what future people find funny might be less "it's funny that they thought the geopolitical order of 2020 would still be around now" and more "it's funny that they implicitly depict a unified and equal global society as having the demographics and culture of a cosmopolitan twentieth century US city." Though, of course, what future people find funny about present depictions of their time depends a lot on what the future society is like.

all those sci-fi movies in the future where all the heroes are Usamerican will be so funny in the future like 😂😂😂 girl your empire is not surviving this century 😂😂😂

[beautyofendlessforms]

Ramble about the current mess in brazillian politics, evangelical take over and the crazy flat-earthers...

To begin with, I don’t think most people in charge believe flat earth and other such nonsense ideas, they are just manipulating the population. Perhaps some of them like Damares Alves are truly faithful to their beliefs, but most of them don’t care about it at all, they’re just going in that direction as that benefits them immensely.

The fact is that Bolsonaro owes a lot the evangelical community and mainly the pastors who campaigned for him, such as Silas Malafaia and Edir Macedo, so he’s allied and attuned his discourse, now its time to satisfy their whims. Whats better than putting someone like Damares there, who is an artifact from the middle ages and a highly controversial figure which does two things at the same time:

She satisfy evangelicals and caters to their interests

She also serves as a smokescreen as her shocking ideas keeps us busy

While we’re busy and shocked by her medieval declarations, the Bolso government can advance on the matters of true importance such as selling the entire state and enslaving the population by taking away their rights one by one. Soon there will be nothing left while we’re worried by those declarations, which are horrifying nonetheless but I don’t thing these are the true goal of the new system.

All is about money and control, so if the evangelical narrative serves it well, they adopted it. That’s why people like me have been warning others about the dangers of this new theology of prosperity which took over, because:

Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.— Voltaire

In fact, evangelicals have been rising to positions of power in the last few decades and their population had increased immensely, while the catholic population is dying out as we speak.

Evangelicals have been successfully integrated in br politics a long time ago and they managed to form a political block called the Evangelic congressional bloc which has started roughly in 2002 elections and has grown expressively both in size and influence since them.

Catholics were once in power and had great influence, as my grandparents told me how the population used to look up and ask the priest what politics to vote for, etc.. but this has largely fallen out of fashion and the catholic population became increasingly secular, and usually more tame as they rarely take the bible as law nowadays (at least for what I know of).

While these people are in decline, the evangelical movements have attracted more and more people and they have fundamentalist facets, they mostly follow the doctrine of prosperity so this ideology served perfectly in the new ultra-capitalist paradigm.

This all brought a change in the scenario and prepared the population for what is happening right now, this wasn’t a sudden change. The traps were already settled and the population was becoming increasingly fundamentalist in the past few years and I started noticing it clearly on my own life as they started demeaning more and more power and control over laws, schools, etc..

So, imo even if most people in this new government never wanted a religious take over, personally, they owe these people. This is coming one way or another.

The fact that brazil has become a right wing ultra capitalist country is not what worries me the most, its the way they glued those ideals to conservative morals and that worked to well… exactly because it goes very well with the predominant ideology I mentioned (prosperity theology), it just works wonders.

The fact that this is all happening reflects the nature of brazillian population and its ignorance, also this place has historically a very bad educational system which affected the capacity of decision and rational thinking of the population. The groundwork was mostly done by an insufficient educational system and pastors in the last decade have absorbed most of the population under the wings.

However not only evangelicals have been following these ideas, and recently a nice portion of the catholics have joined in this holy crusade, and they openly say science is not necessary, they laugh at intellectuality.

This haunts me every single minute of my life.

This kind of thinking is dragging us to all the problems we have right now but especially the denial of global warming among other problems.

All of those ideas had some root planted here but now they are mainstream and even criticizing them leads to stares and questions. This wouldn’t be possible if the groundwork wasn’t there already. If these ideas had no acceptance in the population they wouldn’t be used as bait like now, the population has to be extremely ignorant and deeply problematic for something like this to word. I doubt such thing would happen somewhere else or on a country which has a good basis of education.

This is why whats happening here is so much more scary than what is going in most right wing governments, its resembling more a theocratic new order. Its not fair to compare what happened here to Trump imo, while there are certainly similarities, this movement took us to a direction which has far darker implications. We are literally tearing apart all that happened in the last century and reversing back to a colonial state, both on the way the state is functioning but also on mindset.

I used to say we were turning back to the dictatorship era (1964) but now you can clearly see facets of far older eras, some say we’re close now to 1930′s but I see the way the clergy and fear of science is taking over reminiscent of the pre-Renascence era. The major proof of this is that we’re right now undermining the very basis of the age of reason, all that scientists and philosophers and thinkers in general have worked so hard to achieve, to free us from ignorance, its all being treated like shit and undermined.

Enlightenment values are being attacked from all sides.

The foundation of modern values is being systematically undermined in a way that no one takes it seriously anymore, womens issues are moaning, racism doesn’t exist, science and arts need surveillance under the clergy,

They did this successfully with undermining human rights, them they proceed to attack the basis of the law/rights system and now they attacking even science and empiricism and I wonder what will be left after that…

“This Brazil, stitched from a patchwork of dogmas, might be a fascinating topic of study if it didn’t put the whole planet at risk. Ideological discourse serves to instil the notion of destiny and to ensure cohesion within a population frightened about everything it might lose, from salaries and jobs to symbolic positions in the realms of race, gender, and sexual orientation. When Bolsonaro says he’s going to “free Brazil from political correctness”, he’s pledging to break both the “chains” that force people to respect minorities and those that curtail devastation of the Amazon forest…..

Without the world’s biggest tropical forest, there is no way to control global warming. If Bolsonaro’s messianic capitalism is not stopped, life on this planet will be much worse for everyone. For a contingent of neo-Pentecostal evangelicals, this may be welcomed as an apocalypse preceding the final salvation of “true believers”. For most of humanity, it will bring nothing but horror and suffering – perpetuated by the stupidity of a species with delusions of grandeur. “

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/10/jair-bolsonaro-brazil-minorities-rainforest

This is one of the best texts I recently found which sums up the feeling. The feeling that we are being dragged to the mud by other people’s beliefs, its horrifying. I don’t want to be part of this new future.

The summed up version is: I don’t think the governments goal is flat earth and taking Darwin out of schools, its actually something related to the resources found there. They don’t give a damn about the whole evangelical narrative, but since it this goes well with their plans, why not?

However we have some very good texts pointing to the opposite, that this was all planned.. such as:

“What he calls Communism are values such as human rights, the importance of science, or freedom of speech. Bolsonaro’s fight is not against marxist thought; it is against Enlightenment values.

One of the main arenas where the fight against takes place is academia and schools, where Bolsonarista thought hopes to replace the current curriculum with a far-right approved version. Under the pretense of impartiality, Bolsonaro’s followers are trying to police students and professors. Through a campaign of paranoia, everything can become subversive or biased. Calls for more racial justice in a deeply racist country become “moaning” and “an attempt to divide the nation”. History lessons on the dictatorship become “leftist brainwashing”. Sex education and anti-homophobic bullying lectures should be banned from classrooms, as being in contact with such themes might give students strange ideas.

Scientific evidence on global warming is classified as globalist dogma.The main problem for Brazil is that Bolsonaro has every chance of winning this battle. The average Brazilian person does not read more than one book a year; they believe WhatsApp chains to be as truthful as newspapers, and the public school education is at a constant crisis. Brazilians have no regard for their history, and they were deliberately kept ignorant for years.”

https://www.newstatesman.com/world/2018/11/brazil-bolsonaro-s-fight-not-against-marxism-against-enlightenment-values

TL;DR: This is all a backstage so the true plan can unfold:

Either way we’re damned. I see a clear picture forming in the horizon and its not something I want to be a part of.

[laundryandtaxes]

I hope this isn't weird but I just noticed the "Atheist" in your bio and it's nice to see avowed leftists actively use the term. The reactionary nature of nu-atheism (or whatever it's called) kinda made me stop IDing with it for awhile and I'm increasingly learning that that's pretty defeatist. Do you think as atheism and more broadly irreligiousness grows in numbers that'll become more and more apolitical, or will there be almost a mini culture war over the issue?

I mean I think the very vast majority of atheists aren’t super political about it already- really nasty types are a very small subset. I think a culture war is already sort of happening and religious and especially Christian influences are losing in many places- the number of atheists in this country grows yearly as a result of that conflict already going on. But most people don’t get up in arms about it.

Frankly I am one of /those/ atheists who does oppose religiosity and religion in their own right but I oppose lots of things that I don’t think should be forcibly banned or necessarily repressed. I just choose to not be a dick about it.

And this isn't weird, no worries!

[greatvocalmajority]

Great Vocal Majority Podcast Volume 61: TRANSFORMATION: TODAY'S LEFTISTS AND YESTERDAY'S LIBERALS

TRANSFORMATION: TODAY'S LEFTISTS AND YESTERDAY'S LIBERALS

Back in 2007, when I first got wind of Barack Obama, an exciting newcomer to the national political scene, it was immediately recognizable to me, through his rhetoric, that he was NOT a Liberal in the sense of what that term had come to mean from the FDR era forward. Obama used much of the traditional rhetoric of Liberals, but he also expressed a good deal of leftist rhetoric.

What's the difference?

Liberal rhetoric advocates for a more activist federal government as a COMPLEMENT to certain limitations the private economy (ie., individuals and businesses) has in addressing societal inequities. The role of government for a liberal, is to do what nobody else can to address those problems. Conservatives disagree with this, of course. They place more faith in the free market and insist inequities can be alleviated more efficiently and effectively if government's role was limited to keeping the markets open, free and fair.

Leftists have a compeletely different view from Conservatives and even from Liberals. Leftists see government as a competitor to the private economy, and ultimately having total control over it. For Leftists, government has a mostly hostile and predatory position toward businesses. Unlike Liberals, Leftists use the power and authority of government to compel large, leading corporations as administers of government policy. It would be beneficial at this point to use examples as a way to illustrate the differences between Liberals and Leftists.

President George H. W. Bush signed legislation that required handicapped access to public accommodations. This was a Liberal intervention. Today, handicapped parking, and wheel chair accessible ramps are a ubiquitous feature of American life. The government set up certain standards and guidelines and businesses followed them. It was designed to address an issue of access for a significant number of Americans.

President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare into law. This was a leftist intervention. The guidance in Obamacare was so comprehensive, it thoroughly transformed the health insurance, service and delivery segments of the American economy into tools of government policy. For example, insurance companies had their offerings dictated to them. They were given limitations in terms of administrative costs. Doctors were required to track tens of thousands of additional diagnostic codes, making backoffice administration far more costly. Virtually everything done by insurance companies, doctors, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies and the like, had their behavior controlled by law or regulations having the force of law. This is not Liberal. It authoritarian control of an entire industry by government, claiming to be acting in the "public good."

The problem with government involvement, whether it is by Liberals or Leftists is that it politicizes whatever it touches. Decisions are then made, not on the economic efficacy or the medical efficacy in the case of Obamacare, but on the political efficacy. Political clout often will overrule common sense. Pressure group politics can provide outsized influence into the decisionmaking process, causing the misappropriation of resources. This can lead to disastrous outcomes when a particular group's influence is effective in garnering more resources to their issue than would otherwise be warranted.

This occurred even before the adoption of the Affordable Care Act when more research funding was directed at the disease of AIDS than cancer. AIDS affects only a tiny portion of the American population compared to cancer. Yet, activist groups were effective in compelling the Federal government to devote more funding to AIDS. This is what leftism leads to.

So, when America elects a Leftist as President, such as Obama, the federal bureaucracy becomes saturated with civil service appointments allied to a leftist government ethos. This becomes highly problematic. All one needs to do to understand just how problematic it becomes, is to look around the world where Leftists have gained a foothold into the national government. In just about every case, almost without any exceptions, once given power, leftists do not relinquish it. Rather, they become more radicalized, encouraged by their earlier successes in acquiring power. The failure of their policies are of little importance to them. They hold a fanatical devotion to acquiring power and an unshakable belief that a powerful central government is the best way to address societal inequities. Failures are never attributed to the shortcomings of their ideas, but rather to the opposition to those ideas.

The election of Donald Trump as President caused an earthquake across the American political landscape. It cannot be overstated. Trump represented an incredible and disruptive change to the body politic. Simply by being elected, he exposed how insular the Washington establishment had become. This was true for almost all of the political power structure in Washington which is much more than the politicians and their staff in the House of Representatives and the Senate. It also includes the Federal agencies, lobby groups, registered and unregistered agents of foreign governments, and the national media. Nearly all of them were put on notice with Trump's election. Add into this cocktail, the fact that America had just endured 8 years of a Leftist President appointing bureaucrats throughout the federal bureaucracy, and it should become clear why America seems so divided today.

It is a complex issue. The radicals on the Left are making it an incendiary one. While Trump may enjoy devoted supporters across the country in average Americans, where he has between 45%-50% approval, he has no such core of support in Congress reflecting that fact. He is hated, literally, by the entire Democrat Party which is no longer Liberal, but Left, thanks to Obama, nearly all of the news media, and powerful entrenched bureaucrats in the Federal agencies, as well as former agency heads and bureaucrats who are now free to publicly express political leanings we are supposed to believe they never allowed to influence them while they were government employees.

Here is the bottom line, folks. Once Leftists have been able to insinuate themselves into the government, you cannot expect them to honor the traditions we have had in America for more than two centuries. The Left is happy and willing to burn the house down and blame it on their political enemies. Compromise with the Left is impossible because they aren't interested in compromising. They are out to destroy. Yet, this is but one part of the challenge to President Trump. He's got more than the Left to contend with. Even Republicans, who for years, tried to negotiate and compromise with the Left, only to get their heads handed to them, continue to believe the political paradigm hasn't changed. This IS the fundamental transformation of America Barack Hussein Obama spoke about, people. This is it. This is who they are. This is what they're about.

Even if President Trump left office, everything you hear now, would be said about Mike Pence. And even if there was no President Pence and if it were another Republican, say President John Kasich or President Jeff Flake, or even President Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio, the very same attacks would be taking place on that Republican. Don't kid yourself. It would only differ by degree. We have ample evidence to prove this point.

Take the example of Bret Kavanaugh. Is there anyone less threatening from all appearances? Anyone who, based on his record, seems more open minded? More family oriented? More civic minded? Yet, even he is castigated and villainized as a threat to freedom. The treatment of Kavanaugh should inform us all of what the Left will do.

We have already seen a Leftist and supporter of Bernie Sanders, another Leftist, attempt mass murder of Republicans. We have seen Leftists harrass Cabinet level officials in their homes and in public accommodations like restaurants. We have seen Leftists deny service to people based on their politics. We have seen leftists riot. We have seen leftists physically assault Trump supporters leaving a rally. But that's not all: We have seen a leftist member of Congress demand the President be overthrown in a military coup. We have seen another leftist member of Congress stir up bitter anger and encourage people to confront and harass anyone in President Trump's administration. We have seen members of Congress accuse President Trump of treason over something he said in a press conference. We have seen supposedly apolitical members of government agencies in the Obama administration declare the President a traitor and call for his impeachment.

I could make this list a lot longer. But the point should not be lost here. Leftists are not Liberals. Liberals never and would never do what these Leftists are doing. They are the ones doing Vladimir Putin's work for him. They are the ones undermining confidence in our government and especially the President and his administration. If anyone is committing sedition or treachery, it is the LEFT!

The sooner Americans wake up to the fact that it is the Left who is poisoning the political dialogue in America, and vigorously and unambiguosly repudiates it, and demands the government be flushed of this kind of subversion, the better off America will be.

  https://fundedresearch.cancer.gov/nciportfolio/search/funded;jsessionid=84F8C1410CD3B2037AC131702B7D4E12?action=full&fy=PUB2016&type=site

    Check out this episode!