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hussyknee · 2 years ago

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do u really not see the difference btwn writing fanfic on the internet and buying a game whose storyline is actively being written by white supremacists and having the money go directly into the pocket of the most vocal & influential terf in the UK? that's not even touching all of the other racist and offensive bs in her series inc her antisemitism, appropriating first nations cultures, her asian racism, etc? i guess thats why you dont have 'antisemitics dni' on your blog

First, let me be clear – I do not give one single shit about Harry Potter. They are the best memories of my extremely shitty adolescence, I still read fanfic from time to time, but other than that, if I never hear the word "Harry Potter" again it will be too soon. I care about the fact that you clowns are

encouraging bullies and endangering mentally ill marginalized fans

leeching the air from leftist and queer discourse

fuelling a Western culture war that distracts from combating systemic transphobia

making suffering Black and brown communities, who mostly see white and Western trans people, think that trans people don't have any real problems beyond video games

Now, on to your ask:

I said never said not buying the game was the same as writing fanfic on the internet. I said that the furor over buying the game is leading to everyone who had anything to do with Harry Potter, including just writing fanfic, being bullied. I've had to unfollow so many people for reblogging posts attacking people for being in the *fandom*.

Asking people to refrain from doing something to prove that they care, especially demanding that they don't, has never in the history of activism worked. Black people have been speaking out against copaganda shows forever and STILL get harrassed. Indigenous people have been asking people to boycott Avatar and gotten nothing. Some people comply, but more do the thing simply out of contrarianism, and the entire issue becomes a culture war divided along political affiliation. People on the right go out of their way to do the thing, the people on the center and center-left won't really care, and people who identify as leftist divorce themselves even more from the rest of the left as being no better than the right, which eventually devastating results when it comes to actual elections and agitating for political change.

What works a lot better is harm reduction. Pirating is harm reduction, asking the HP fandom to offset JKR's fuckery by making their own merch, promoting indie games and donating to trans healthcare funds is harm reduction. People won't stand for being policed, but they like giving and also not paying for stuff with a clear conscience. You would have raised so much fucking money and promoted so many different things in all this time you've spent giving the game negative engagement clicks and keeping it trending on social media so long after its release.

You keep insisting that people shouldn't be fans because JKR equals her fandom with her own influence. This is called buying into the right-wing narrative. The woman is delusional (I can't think of a non-ableist word atm, and I honestly think that she's not all stable) and you're enabling her and her terf cult. We created the online HP fandom ourselves back in the aughts, before there was any merch, before movie rights were ever sold to WB, a full decade before her advertising machine ever woke up to the fact that an internet fandom existed. JKR has lost relevance for HP fans a long time ago; imagine the slap in the face for her if the fandom starts countering her bigotry by very prominently engaging in trans activism? The JKR terf cult in the HP fandom are a minority, like TERFs themselves (they're only so loud because the right-wing promotes the shit out of them). The vast majority of fans are just the kind of vaguely well-meaning cis people who don't agree with transphobes but are pretty ignorant about trans issues. And I do mean the vast majority, because literally a billion people grew up on her books and only a bare fraction is on social media at all, and even fewer even see the leftist drive to boycott the franchise.

Let's talk demographics. Because of the aforementioned vastness of consumers, the majority of HP fans are cis het, abled, neurotypical Millennials. Because of the way internet penetration works, the majority of HP fans online and even in fandom are white or Western. Leftist spaces mostly attract young and marginalized people, and transformative fandom is full of neurodivergent women and queer people. Which means the majority of people you're reaching are young queer neurodivergent people who have limited economic power themselves. And the people most vulnerable to and impacted by policing and harrassment are trans, Black and brown, Jewish, mentally ill, poor. Do you see the problem? You're policing the very bottom rungs of the socio-economic ladder on the off-chance of maybe influencing a privileged few who might give a damn.

This is literally why we say that boycotts, especially over social media, don't fucking work. Firstly because they penalize the most disenfranchised consumers, it's hard to reach enough people to even explain why they matter, it's hard to keep up with the constant discourse and changing information, and it relies entirely on performance. Someone can stay quiet or nod along furiously to whatever you're saying and then just...go out and buy the thing. Social censure doesn't work when you have the option of not having to face the consequences. Contrary to hellsite opinion, the Fantastic Beasts franchise died because it sucked, and Harry Potter is dying because it's fading from relevance and JKR is being an embarrassment. The wider market doesn't even know y'all exist.

As for the game being racist and antisemitic...you come on my blog, a South Asian who has been in fandom for twenty years, and try to tell me about racism in media???? NINETY-NINE PERCENT OF ALL MEDIA IS RACIST AND ANTISEMITIC YOU ABSOLUTE CLOWN. I'm from South Asia, our children grow up on books written by colonizers! LORD OF THE RINGS is white supremacy! NARNIA is white supremacy! Disney and Marvel is one of the biggest figures in US military industrial complex that razed the Middle East to the ground. It's so ubiquitous that we have to accept the racism and white supremacy as a matter of course to engage with any Western media! And even then fandom is so racist it's hard to even exist in it! We get run out of it when we try to talk about it. You suck on white supremacy every single day you live like it's your Mum's teat! Do you know what it's like to hear whiteys ranting that people who consume this one game they hate are being antisemitic and racist??? While still fawning??? Over cop shows???? And Disney???? And sending Black people??? Death threats??? Over a game???

I don't say "anti-Semites DNI" for the same reason I don't say "racists DNI". Nobody identifies as a racist or antisemite, that's not how systemic oppression works. Radfem and Zionist and Communist are political identities. Radical feminism is underpinned by transphobia and racism, Zionism is currently entrenched in Palestine occupation, Western communists refuse to acknowledge USSR and Global South genocides. See how that works?

Bitch, you didn't just come at me about JKR's indigenous cultural appropriation when I was among the few who were trying to discourage people from supporting Fantastic Beasts back in 2016 and literally got flamed for it. You people did not give a single shit about Natives back then, and you don't give one now. Just like you don't actually care about Jews and never did. I literally never heard about why and how openly alt-right people keep getting this kind of power and position in the gaming industry. Conversations about antisemitism in gaming and antisemitic tropes in entertainment haven't gotten this much traction. No wider revelations about how entertainment media directly funding and promoting social harms. But sure, it's about antisemitism and racism and has absolutely nothing to do with a mess of white queers realizing they can weaponize it like a cudgel against anyone they believe are against them. We know you whites. You care about excuses to take the moral high ground without having to do any self-interrogation or cost to yourself.

Finally, to give y'all one example of where the current discourse around this stupid shit is at:

Fuck you.

#harry potter #fuck jkr #transphobia #antisemitism #racism #fantastic beasts #western leftists #white privilege #white people #imperialism #knee of huss

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emcandon · 1 year ago

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Eyyyy I got asked to write an essay about big robots and digressed into mulling over monstrous metaphors

There’s Bones in that Bot By Emma Mieko Candon When people met me at 25, the wrongness of my body was immediately apparent. It was the thinness, the frailty, the new scars and fragile veins. Another clue: the walker and its cat-mauled tennis balls. So too the oxygen tank—the fancy kind you keep in a bag that spurts air up the tube into your nose only when you inhale. Tst-tst-tst. Even when I graduated to a cane and a steady gait, I made no effort to hide the red tangle of knotty scars at my throat, though I did my best to contain the chronic cough. (A mistake, BTW. Cover your mouth, but don’t hold it in. Great way to put even more stress on the flesh apparatus.) I had by then long since been convinced by Donna Haraway’s thesis of cyborg humanity—that we as entities exceeded our flesh the second we developed tool use, and that it got even worse when we introduced the context of gifts and possessions. But as the years go on, the extended thing-ness of my body only grows more apparent. I am artificial and constructed; I am alive because I have been built. I thought this was what brought me to a fascination with robots and AI—the extension of humanity through embodied machines! But no, my friends said. We remember the whole Gundam thing. The Machine is a Monster Right, the whole Gundam thing. About that.

This might sound weird coming from someone who’s just put out a book about beautiful giant robots, but I’ve never really been interested in robots—at least when they aren’t moving. When a giant robot is just standing there/floating in space/being a Gunpla model, a monument to itself, my eyes pass over its silhouette as they would any other large structure. Perhaps I’m impressed by its artistry, or intrigued by the underlying design, but it isn’t really an object of curiosity.

But when that titan lifts its hand? When its leg rises and its foot crashes down—when it turns its arm to reveal the medium of great violence?

Then I am afraid. Then I am fascinated.

I am drawn to large machinery in the way I am to monsters. When I describe something on the magnitude of a spaceship, I know it can be warmth and a home, but it is also, to me, an existential threat of size and speed and impact. My body is all too familiar with its own fragility. I cannot perceive this immensity without thinking of my fundamental physical relationship to it.

I don’t know that I was thinking any of this, even on an intuitive level, when Gundam Wing first stomped into my life—when it was Toonami’s heady alternative to Dragon Ball Z that I was instantly in love with for the pretty boys and twisty political intrigue. Now, though, I am well versed in the brittle nature of my body, and I have been taking new hikes through Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, then more recently (it just finished! go watch it!) Gundam: the Witch from Mercury. Both series are immediately and intimately Gundam at its best:

1. an interrogation of exploited bodies in the context of vast systems and machines

2. the absurd and precious possibility of human connection.

Ah, right, and 3., the eternal backbone of Gundam as a narrative: War…bad???

The Monster is People

War bad. Seems silly. Pithy. Of course war bad. No one right with their mind, body, or soul wants war.

Do they? Enh. Reality seems to beg to differ. War is happening, right now, all over, in all its ugliness and horror. The great machines of nation, capital, hunger, and hatred grind our smallness through cruelty after cruelty. And for all these great things are the dire mechanisms, it is small human hands that pull the triggers and incise flesh. It is a devouring cycle, it is corrosively sick, we are so pitifully trapped.

I struggle to write this with any kind of resonance or meaning. War bad. Simple, two words, three letters each, and yet abysmally less than the entirety they gesture toward. How many more words would I need? How many more letters and syllables and theories and treatises and grotesqueries must I lay down to properly express war?

Because you have to say something. The nothing is worse. Deadly.

But how? How do you encapsulate the monstrous enormity? How do you even begin?

I don’t know, I don’t know. But I see how some have tried.

The People is the Machine

Giant robots are shockingly silly. They’re physically impossible. They’re often being painted bright LEGO colours or being constructed out of mechanized lions. As often as they’re the centre of gritty stories of human suffering (with a touch of transcendent human connection), they’re goofy warriors for goodness, light, and the power of friendship, taking part in schlocky melodrama. When asked by a stranger what I write about, I say “Oh, giant robots” in the most self-effacing tone. SILLY!

Here’s the thing: this genre has a legacy, at least in Japan. There, mecha stories arrive in the aftermath of World War II, during which Japan both suffered and was the perpetrator of unconscionable violence. And in that aftermath, the Japanese government was (and still is) often eager to honour only its own dead—and to sweep under the rug all the horrors it committed.

How do you live with that? How do you breathe? What do you say?

I don’t think it’s always—or even usually—conscious. Maybe you just find yourself drawn to the idea of samurai and ronin, men of violence bound by rigid hierarchies and honour codes. And maybe you particularly like to write stories where their moral centres are flayed open by the commands of their superiors. “Kill that man,” says the lord. “This doesn’t seem right,” says the samurai—as he kills the man, and then has to somehow goddamn live with it.

Maybe this is what you need to express the overwhelming pressure of complicity and silence.

Or maybe you find yourself thinking in terms of the sheerly absurd. Monsters of incredible magnitude. Robots of like immensity. Maybe you use them to evoke atrocities lived and visited upon your world and body. Maybe it seems only right that they should also dance, that they should be cartoonish caricatures of human experience. Because maybe this metaphor of ludicrous size and self is just the best way to articulate a raw immensity that you cannot otherwise grasp.

Maybe that’s why the robot needs to be larger than the world should ever let it be.

They’re Metaphors, Harold

Small wonder that, when I started writing a book driven by the dissolution of my body, I reached for the magnitude of mechs. It wasn’t intentional. It just happened. Here was an idea perfectly fashioned for a story of total self-destruction and survival. I wasn’t looking to express how I had been let to live because of my artificial hips, or because of the machines that pumped air and blood out of and back into my body. I was trying to capture a giant.

No. That’s not right. I was trying to say that I had been captured by that giant.

No. That’s not right either. I was trying to say that the giant had pulverized me, and that in so doing, it had made me part of it, and that now I live with the tremors of its weight in my every step.

I got so fucking big.

#the archive undying #writing

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lorde-spooky · 2 years ago

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Okay, partly true and partly false. Punk was always an *economically* leftist subculture from the beginning, but economic leftism and social progressivism weren't always synonyms like they're considered to be today. Of course now it's obvious (to most people) that since our modern capitalist system was built on racist foundations, you cannot be effectively anti capitalist without being anti racist (same goes for the oppression of any marginalized group of people), but at the time this wasn't commonly accepted in leftist circles. The (US) government very deliberately tried to put down economic leftism in black communities which is one of the many things that led to the FBI's assassination of Fred Hampton. Crenshaw's creation of intersectional theory in '89 was really the lynchpin that led to the modern left's acceptance of socially progressive movements to the point where the two are basically synonymous today. (Barry Goldwater arguably accidentally created the link between left leaning economic policy and progressive social policy when he tried and failed to win the presidency by running on a segregationist platform in 1964 as a republican, forever linking his party to white supremacy)

Moving on from that tangent, there was always anti racist or feminist members of the movement, however in the seventies they were absolutely the minority by a wide margin. Punk was an incredibly hostile environment for POCs for the vast majority of it's history and (like most alt subcultures) still tends to put pale and skinny members of the community on a pedestal as the embodiment of the movement and aesthetic, even if it has shifted to be slightly more socially inclusive in the past decade or so.

Just to cover my bases with the rest of punks history with progressive social movements. The Riot Grrrl movement was the first prominent push for feminist representation in punk and that didn't start until the late eighties (or early nineties depending on who you ask). The LGBTQ community only really gained prominence in punk circles in the past twenty years (although it's been bubbling under the surface ever since the start of the Riot Grrrl movement). And of course there's certain poser groups who love to say that the real punks are conservatives, completely misunderstanding the meaning of counter culture.

Punk is, however, counter cultural. It's been anti capitalist from the beginning, and even though some of the progenitors of the movement were profoundly off the mark, it's obvious now that to be punk, you have to be anti capitalist. To be punk, you have to be anti racist. To be punk, you have to be feminist. To be punk, you have to support LGBTQ rights, and the rights of any human being. To be punk you have to look at the bigoted systems and machines that our society is founded on and want to tear them down. Punk is more than an aesthetic, it's a social and political movement.

Wearing a leather jacket and mohawk doesn't make you punk. I could dress like a victorian aristocrat but I will always be more punk than any fascist right wing stooge no matter how many spikey belts or patches and pins he wears. Simply because of my beliefs. Johnny Ramone was a poser and if he wasn't already dead I would say that to his face.

(PS: @slutdge I'm sorry for screenshotting and reposting, but i couldn't reblog and as you can tell I had a lot to say about the topic. I agree with your sentiments and i think your heart is in the right place but I'm a pretentious asshole who loves historical context)

#punk #punk music #punk rock #discourse #leftist #leftism #the ramones #listen i spent a ton of time writing this #it's almost 2 am #I'm adding a couple tags to justify the effort i put in

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whatisonthemoon · 2 years ago

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The Rev. Moon, the Unification Church, and the KCIA

The following is excerpted from "The Death Squads: Bringing in the Kingdom of God Through Terror, Torture and Death" (1996) by S.R. Shearer

In addition to the Americans, the Argentineans, the conservative Catholic Church, and various right-wing politicos, business leaders, and the military - with their attendant intelligence apparatus - there was a final component to the deadly mix which constituted the environment in which the Death Squads worked: specifically, the World Anti-Communist League (WACL) of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon. WACL became involved in these operations as a result of its Korean connections - connections which also led back to Phoenix..

WACL is a Moonie front organization with strong ties to the KCIA (a creation of the American CIA); its ultimate allegiance is to the Rev. Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church.

Moon, of course, is no friend of democracy. He is a theocratic authoritarian who considers himself to be the Son of God and the new Messiah.[22] Moon believes that Jesus failed in His earthly mission to save man through His death on the cross; in addition, Moon claims that Jesus had sex with the women who followed Him.

As early as 1978 newspapers like the Washington Post began to pick up on the connections between Moon (WACL) and the Latin American Death Squads. For instance, one such article which appeared in the Post describing these connections carried the headline: "The Fascist Specter behind the World Anti-Red League."[23] In 1984 these connections were further explored in a series of columns by Jack Anderson.[24] Other publications carried additional articles detailing these connections and the Nazi components which comprised these elements.[25]

ORIGINS OF THE UNIFICATION CHURCH

In the light of all this, it might be fair to ask, what was it in the history of Moon and the Unification Church which would have led to such links between what ostensibly is supposed to be a religious organization and Nazi-oriented, right-wing Death Squads? The tides which produced these strange relationships originated in the very early 1950s in the murky right-wing political, religious and military currents which swept through Korea as a result of the Korean War; specifically in the wrath of Korean President Syngman Rhee and other right-wing elements in the Korean military who were furious at Truman and Eisenhower for not prosecuting the Korean War through to a successful conclusion - by which they meant the re-unification of the Korean Peninsula under President Rhee.

Right-wing elements in the United States were also enraged; many saw in the U.S. "surrender" the outlines of a sinister conspiracy. Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin went so far as to blame the U.S. "surrender in Korea" on the machinations of a White House clique besotted by "bourbon and benzedrine;" in a rage, he actually called the President a "son-of-a-bitch" from the floor of the Senate. Senator William Jenner of Indiana, echoed McCarthy's rage; he too saw the silhouette of an ominous conspiracy; he went on to declare that "... this country today is in the hands of a secret inner coterie which is directed by agents of the Soviet Union." Both groups - right-wing Americans on the one hand, and right-wing Koreans on the other - felt they had been stymied in Korea by a vast, underground intrigue which had seized control of the United States and which was aiming at the destruction of the Free World; they perceived themselves as engaged in an immense struggle against an implacable foe which not only controlled Communist China and the Soviet Union, but powerful, secret elements in the West as well (i.e., the "Illuminist Conspiracy"). This view of things was only strengthened when Rhee was toppled in April of 1960 with Eisenhower's help.

It was this witches' brew of virulent right-wing politics which gave birth to the aberrant theology and politics of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon and the Unification Church; Moon became as much a believer in the existence of the "world-wide communist (Illuminist) conspiracy" as had been Korean strongman Syngman Rhee and Senators Joseph McCarthy and William Jenner. Moon believed that the conspiracy could only be stopped by uniting the Western World under the banner of "Christianity" (by which he meant his own weird blend of New Age philosophy and aberrant religious teachings). Thus, Moon's movement was (is) as much a political movement as it is a religious movement; it is the result of a strange convergence of extreme right-wing politics (which stem not only out of sources in Korea, but also elements in the United States) and a bizarre mixture of fanatical, authoritarian religious beliefs.

There are, of course, many such movements throughout the world; but what has given Moon's organization such power is the relationship it enjoys with the government of South Korea - a relationship which endows Moon's religious empire with unlimited funds, business fronts, and access to sensitive intelligence matters - things which no other religious association in the world enjoys - outside of the Vatican; and it is precisely these things which have bought Moon entrance - if only through the back door - into America's Religious Right; the Religious Right in this country has seemingly found itself unable to resist the allure of Moon's money, the high-paying jobs he is able to offer through his various business fronts, and the excitement generated out of his intelligence (KCIA) contacts.

THE DEATH SQUADS AND THE REV. MOON

All this brings us back to Moon's involvement with Latin America's Death Squads; Moon's involvement originated as a result of his contacts with the KCIA, and the KCIA's involvement flowed out of Korea's connections with the Vietnam War. Korea was one of the very few U.S. allies which actively participated militarily in Vietnam alongside American forces. ROK (Republic of Korea) forces thus came into direct contact with Phoenix.

The KCIA was thrilled with Phoenix - and this favorable impression was passed on to WACL where the KCIA, as already indicated, exercised a great deal of influence; as a result, WACL soon became a purveyor of Phoenix-like operations throughout the world as an effective means of combating the spread of communism - so much so that in Latin America many of the Death Squad networks which were later established became synonymous with Moon and the Unification Church. Indeed, investigative reporter Russ Bellant writes that "... the ... Death Squad network{26} (in many of the various Latin American countries) is (in instance after instance) also the Latin American branch of Moon's World Anti-Communist League (WACL)."[27] For example, in Argentina, the Death Squads and WACL were so closely identified that in Buenos Aires the various Death Squad cadres constituted in fact the main Argentine branch of WACL.[28] These kinds of connections between the Death Squads and the Unification Church were repeated throughout Central and South America. So closely and effectively did Moon and the Death Squads cooperate in Latin America that they were actually responsible - along with Nazi fugitive Klaus Barbie - in helping to establish a Nazi-style state in Bolivia in 1982.[29] And what about the individuals who constitute the membership of these organizations? - they have been variously described as a mix of Hitler collaborators, anti-Semites, right-wing politicos, rich businessmen, etc. - all of whom hold to an unshakable belief in a world-wide conspiracy directed against capitalism and Christianity[30] - the same kind of ideological mix which - to a large degree - can be found in the CNP (the principle coordinating agency bringing together members of the Religious Right with members of the political right and the business right) today.

Full article: https://www.antipasministries.com/html/file0000105.htm

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activatebutterflyshield · 1 year ago

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I finally put all the Eras out on paper together! It gave me a chance to fiddle with the designs of some, and I can now say that I’m mostly satisfied with how they look, at least in greyscale. A full list of who’s who and lore stuff below the cut

For those of you who don’t know, the Eras are gods that embody the different ‘eras’ of humanity’s history. I tried to draw them in roughly chronological order going counterclockwise from Chatter (the fox) but it’s not very obvious, so this list will also be in chronological order. Hopefully it’ll help you pick out who’s who.

Chatter starts us off, a very simple red fox who wears a belled collar of rope. They’re the god of Prehistory, of subsistence hunting and gathering, of desperate survival and freedom.

To their left is Songbird, who is meant to be a somewhat generic songbird with the tail of a superb lyrebird, a species which can mimic sounds they hear. She is very brightly colored, and also carries the flute, though sometimes it is the harp or the drum. She is the god of Antiquity, a rather broad swath of time that encompasses the creation of true art; drama, song, painting, sculpture, etc.

To her left is the Expanse, a wolf pierced by a sword, arrows, and laurel branches. He is the god of the Roman Age, of conquest, of great militaries, of sacrifice for a time one will not live to see.

Slightly down from him is the Mimic, an insect that resembles a wasp with wings like a butterfly. Their wings are patterned with eyes and mouths, and their antennae bear flowers that smell of incense. They are the god of the Middle Ages, that time when the church was powerful and the people feared what they did not understand.

Down and to the right is the Splendor, a lion with a scorpion’s tail and dragon’s wings; a manticore in all but the face. He wears a crown and a pair of (usually golden) manacles. He is the god of the Renaissance, the time of glittering palaces and bloody wars.

To his right is the Wanderlust, a shark whose mouth is full to bursting with cotton and coffee and indigo, whose fins bear the cross of the conquistadors, and whose tail is wrapped both in silk and the irons of enslaved people. He is the god of the Age of Sail and Exploration, of discovery, travel, exploitation, and all those who have no home.

Above him is the Contradiction, mostly a cat, partly a few different dinosaurs, with feathers and slick skin and bone. Their lantern is a both a light in the dark and the consumer of knowledge deemed forbidden. They are nebulous; most say that they are the god of the Scientific Revolution, though some believe that they were born as late as the discoveries of she who sells sea shells by the sea shore.

Up and to the left of them is the Industry, a dragon with smokestack horns, brick scales, and a tail like a sewing machine. His legs are stained with soot, and his eyes are the bulbs of Edison, the better to survey his vast domain. He is the god of the Industrial Revolution, of commerce, mass production, over abundance, and pollution.

To his left is the Duty, a horse with a gas mask face and hair of barbed wire. His saddle is harnessed with the ribbon of a Purple Heart, and he breathes noxious chemicals that burn the lungs and blind the eyes. He is the god of the World Wars and their ilk; most every needless loss of life for the sake of a selfish goal belongs to him.

Below him is the Fluctuation, a blind deer who carries the scales and whose fur is made of smoldering documents. Her antlers dip and peak and dip again, as unpredictable as fortune itself, be it in stocks or natural disaster. She is the god of the Great Depression, of fortune and misfortune, of fire and earthquakes and justice.

Under her is the Speculation, a snake with a mane of tentacles and a crest that bears the signal SOS. Their gaping chest pours out a mist darker than the night, and their mouth is shackled shut. They are the god of the Cold War, of intrigue, politics, secrets, and what you cannot know.

Lastly, to their right is the Progress, an eyeless whale with metal skin and visible circuitry. It is always neon-lit by advertisements and power bars, fueled by endless cables and intangible money. It is the god of the Information Age, of constant consumption, connection, togetherness, and a brave new world.

I’ve still got a lot of non-era gods to put up; Beyond (big ol’ bat + night sky + sputnik), Monument (mossy giraffe carrying the pyramids and a testament to the desire to be great), Fable (fluffy turtle with stars in its eyes), and Lodestone (blind crab or maybe rhino or perhaps a unicorn that’s a walking metaphor about purpose) are still yet to come! Except for Beyond, who you can see in glorious neon colors here:

#my art #worldbuilding #layered earth #pencil #oc #i love most of these funky guys #except industry he’s materialistic and a jerk #art #animal art #animal drawing #traditional art

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mariacallous · 2 years ago

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This story is part of a joint investigation between Lighthouse Reports and WIRED. To read other stories from the series, click here.

In a sparsely decorated corner office of the Danish Public Benefits Administration sits one of Denmark’s most quietly influential people. Annika Jacobsen is the head of the agency’s data mining unit, which, over the past eight years, has conducted a vast experiment in automated bureaucracy. Blunt, and with a habit of completing others’ sentences, Jacobsen is clear about her mission: “I’m here to catch cheaters.”

Denmark’s Public Benefits Administration employs hundreds of people who oversee one of the world's most well-funded welfare states. The country spends 26 percent of its GDP on benefits—more than Sweden, the United States, and the United Kingdom. It’s been hailed as a leading example of how governments can support their most vulnerable citizens. Bernie Sanders, the US senator, called the Nordic nation of 6 million people a model for how countries should approach welfare.

But over the past decade, the scale of Denmark’s benefits spending has come under intense scrutiny, and the perceived scourge of welfare fraud is now at the top of the country’s political agenda. Armed with questionable data on the amount of benefits fraud taking place, conservative politicians have turned Denmark’s famed safety net into a polarizing political battleground.

It has become an article of faith among the country’s right-wing politicians that Denmark is losing hundreds of millions of euros to benefits fraud each year. In 2011, KMD, one of Denmark’s largest IT companies, estimated that up to 5 percent of all welfare payments in the country were fraudulent. KMD’s estimates would make the Nordic nation an outlier, and its findings have been criticized by some academics. In France, it’s estimated that fraud amounts to 0.39 percent of all benefits paid. A similar estimate made in the Netherlands in 2016 by broadcaster RTL found the average amount of fraud per benefit payment was €‎17 ($18), or just 0.2 percent of total benefits payments. The perception of widespread welfare fraud has empowered Jacobsen to establish one of the most sophisticated and far-reaching fraud detection systems in the world. She has tripled the number of state databases her agency can access from three to nine, compiling information on people’s taxes, homes, cars, relationships, employers, travel, and citizenship. Her agency has developed an array of machine learning models to analyze this data and predict who may be cheating the system.

Documents obtained by Lighthouse Reports and WIRED through freedom-of-information requests show how Denmark is building algorithms to profile benefits recipients based on everything from their nationality to whom they may be sleeping next to at night. They reveal a system where technology and political agendas have become entwined, with potentially dangerous consequences.

Danish human rights groups such as Justitia describe the agency’s expansion as “systematic surveillance” and disproportionate to the scale of welfare fraud. Denmark's system has yet to be challenged under EU law. Whether the country’s experiments with machine learning cross a legal line is a question that could be answered by the European Union’s landmark Artificial Intelligence Act, proposed legislation that aims to safeguard human rights against emerging technologies.

The debate about welfare in Denmark changed in October 2012, when officials asked residents to send in photos of suspected welfare cheats in their local area. The call led some left-leaning commentators to warn of a “war on welfare,” and arrived as the far-right Danish People’s Party—which criticized the government for “luring” immigrants with welfare benefits—rose up in opinion polls.

Within a year, consulting firm Deloitte released an audit of welfare fraud controls in Denmark, finding them inadequate to detect fraud in an increasingly digitized welfare system. The auditors, commissioned by the Danish finance ministry, estimated the “short-term savings” of a new “risk-scoring infrastructure” to be €126 million.

Deloitte’s vision was realized in February 2015 with a bill that overhauled the Danish welfare state. It proposed a massive expansion of the Public Benefit Administration’s powers, including the ability to store and collect data on millions of people, access other authorities’ databases, and even request data from foreign governments. Largely unnoticed at the time, it also called for the creation of a “data mining unit” to “control for social benefits fraud.”

The bill was backed by all of the major political parties in Denmark and became law in April 2015. That month, Jacobsen left an IT job in the financial sector to become Denmark’s first head of data mining and fraud detection.

As Jacobsen got to work, conservative politician Troels Lund Poulsen took office in June 2015 as Denmark’s new employment minister. He implemented random airport checks to catch welfare recipients taking undeclared vacations, and proposed giving the new data mining unit access to welfare recipients’ electricity and water bills in order to detect where they were living. He was joined by a growing chorus of supporters, with one municipality reportedly asking for data from cell towers to track where welfare recipients were staying. “It’s about politics,” Poulsen said in March 2018. “It is important for me to send a clear signal that we will not accept social cheating and fraud.”

Jacobsen’s critics have accused her unit of conducting mass surveillance, but she argues that there are clear safeguards that prevent overreach. Jacobsen says her algorithms don’t actually cancel benefits—they only flag people as suspicious. Ultimately, it is up to a human fraud investigator to make the final call, and citizens have the right to appeal their decisions. “You are not guilty just because we point you out. There will always be a person that looks into your data,” she says.

The majority of Danish residents flagged for investigation are found innocent. Of the nearly 50,000 cases selected by the data mining unit in 2022, 4,000, or 8 percent, resulted in some form of punishment. In the cases where wrongdoing was found, the data mining unit has managed to recover €‎23.1 million—a significant return on its annual budget of €‎3.1 million.

But the scale and reach of Denmark's data collection has been criticized by the Danish Institute of Human Rights, an independent human rights watchdog, and the Danish Data Protection Authority, a public body that enforces privacy regulations. Justitia has compared the Public Benefits Administration to the National Security Agency in the US, and claimed that its digital monitoring of millions of Danish residents violates their privacy rights.

Jacobsen says the agency’s use of data is proportional under European data protection laws, and that preventing error and fraud is important to maintain trust in the welfare state. The Public Benefits Administration is also looking to have its algorithms check citizens earlier in the process, when they first apply for benefits, to avoid situations where they have to repay large sums of money. “Most citizens are honest; however, there will always be some citizens who try to get welfare benefits that they are not entitled to,” Jacobsen says.

Jacobsen also argues that machine learning is fairer than analog methods. Anonymous tips about potential welfare cheats are unreliable, she claims. In 2017, they made up 14 percent of the cases selected for investigation by local fraud officials, whereas cases from her data unit amounted to 26 percent. That means her unit is more effective than anonymous tips, but nearly half of the cases local investigators decide to take on come from their own leads. Random selection is also unfair, she claims, because it means burdening people when there are no grounds for suspicion. “[Critics] say that when the machine is looking at data, it is violating the citizen, [whereas] I might think it’s very violating looking at random citizens,” Jacobsen says. “What is a violation of the citizen, really? Is it a violation that you are in the stomach of the machine, running around in there?”

Denmark isn’t alone in turning to algorithms amid political pressure to crack down on welfare fraud. France adopted the technology in 2010, the Netherlands in 2013, Ireland in 2016, Spain in 2018, Poland in 2021, and Italy in 2022. But it’s the Netherlands that has provided the clearest warning against technological overreach. In 2021, a childcare benefits scandal, in which 20,000 families were wrongly accused of fraud, led to the resignation of the entire Dutch government. It came after officials interpreted small errors, such as a missing signature, as evidence of fraud, and forced welfare recipients to pay back thousands of euros they’d received as benefits payments.

As details of the Dutch scandal emerged, it was found that an algorithm had selected thousands of parents—nearly 70 percent of whom were first or second generation migrants—for investigation. The system was abandoned after the Dutch Data Protection Authority found that it had illegally used nationality as a variable, which Amnesty International later compared to “digital ethnic profiling.”

The EU’s AI Act would ban any system covered by the legislation that “exploits the vulnerabilities of a specific group,” including those who are vulnerable because of their financial situation. Systems like Jacobsen’s, which affect citizens’ access to essential public services, would also likely be labeled as “high risk” and subject to stringent requirements, including transparency obligations and a requirement for “high levels of accuracy.”

The documents obtained by Lighthouse Reports and WIRED appear to show that Denmark’s system goes beyond the one that brought down the Dutch government. They reveal how Denmark’s algorithms use variables like nationality, whose use has been equated with ethnic profiling.

One of Denmark's fraud detection algorithms attempts to work out how someone might be connected to a non-EU country. Heavily redacted documents show that, in order to do this, the system tracks whether a welfare recipient or their “family relations” have ever emigrated from Denmark. Two other variables record their nationality and whether they have ever been a citizen of any country other than Denmark.

Jacobsen says that nationality is only one of many variables used by the algorithm, and that a welfare recipient will not be flagged unless they live at a “suspicious address” and the system isn’t able to find a connection to Denmark. The documents also show that Denmark’s data mining unit tracks welfare recipients’ marital status, the length of their marriage, who they live with, the size of their house, their income, whether they’ve ever lived outside Denmark, their call history with the Public Benefits Administration, and whether their children are Danish residents.

Another variable, “presumed partner,” is used to determine whether someone has a concealed relationship, since single people receive more benefits. This involves searching data for connections between welfare recipients and other Danish residents, such as whether they have lived at the same address or raised children together.

“The ideology that underlies these algorithmic systems, and [the] very intrusive surveillance and monitoring of people who receive welfare, is a deep suspicion of the poor,” says Victoria Adelmant, director of the Digital Welfare and Human Rights Project.

For all the complexity of machine learning models, and all the data amassed and processed, there is still a person with a decision to make at the hard end of fraud controls. This is the fail-safe, Jacobsen argues, but it’s also the first place where these systems collide with reality.

Morten Bruun Jonassen is one of these fail-safes. A former police officer, he leads Copenhagen's control team, a group of officials tasked with ensuring that the city’s residents are registered at the correct address and receive the correct benefits payments. He's been working for the city’s social services department for 14 years, long enough to remember a time before algorithms assumed such importance—and long enough to have observed the change of tone in the national conversation on welfare.

While the war on welfare fraud remains politically popular in Denmark, Jonassen says only a “very small” number of the cases he encounters involve actual fraud. For all the investment in it, the data mining unit is not his best source of leads, and cases flagged by Jacobsen’s system make up just 13 percent of the cases his team investigates—half the national average. Since 2018, Jonassen and his unit have softened their approach compared to other units in Denmark, which tend to be tougher on fraud, he says. In a case documented in 2019 by DR, Denmark’s public broadcaster, a welfare recipient said that investigators had trawled her social media to see whether she was in a relationship before wrongfully accusing her of welfare fraud.

While he gives credit to Jacobsen’s data mining unit for trying to improve its algorithms, Jonassen has yet to see significant improvement for the cases he handles. “Basically, it’s not been better,” he says. In a 2022 survey of Denmark’s towns and cities conducted by the unit, officials scored their satisfaction with it, on average, between 4 and 5 out of 7.

Jonassen says people claiming benefits should get what they’re due—no more, no less. And despite the scale of Jacobsen’s automated bureaucracy, he starts more investigations based on tips from schools and social workers than machine-flagged cases. And, crucially, he says, he works hard to understand the people claiming benefits and the difficult situations they find themselves in. “If you look at statistics and just look at the screen,” he says, “you don’t see that there are people behind it.”

Additional reporting by Daniel Howden, Soizic Penicaud, Pablo Jiménez Arandia, and Htet Aung. Reporting was supported by the Pulitzer Center’s AI Accountability Fellowship and the Center for Artistic Inquiry and Reporting.

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harleiquina · 1 year ago

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Dare I say that it can get more damaging than that?

I know, its a meme, its meant to be funny... but Libertarianism has become a thing in my country (Argentina) in the last couple of years and there's a good chance that our next president will be a Libertarian. Ironically, I don't see him as a right-wing nut (if anything, he's center with right tendencies) but his followers are and they scare me -one of my aunts being one of them-.

Context below the line... or you can just scroll down to look at the picture of a llama with a machine gun. It's a real thing, I swear.

In 1930 Argentina was a thriving country, we had eradicated illiteracy and money was flowing thanks to our vasts fields of cereal and our animals. There are even articles from England saying that Argentina needs to be stopped because we were becoming too powerful. Still our political landscape was fraudulent, people didn't get to vote whoever they wanted (the vote was not secret and it wasn't even necessary for anyone to show up to vote. The most common practice was the owner of a ranch/home picking up all his workers IDs and voting for them).

And so came a period of one military coup after another. In one of those came a rather familiar name for all of you: General Juan Domingo Perón.

While being part of the military goverment, Perón worked in our Ministerio de Desarrollo (some kind of Social Services Department). While there he started to "work" for the workers (whether he started to do it because he did believed they deserved a better lifestyle or if he always saw the chance of earning their trust to fullfill his own greed is something I can't confirm or deny. But all the things he's done gave him a ride-or-die loyalty from the working and lower classes that continues to this day).

Perón won the elections and became President formalizing his political party El Peronismo (a marriage between Capitalism and Socialism -allegedly-). I won't deny that he did build schools, hospitals, roads and gave the working class, his descamisados (shirtless, as he and Evita called them) lots of rights -8hr shift, paid vacation and such-... but it would've been honest and loable if he admitted that all those things were thought and presented in our Congress by his opposition (The Radicals), he just signed them because he knew that it would give him power among the people.

Thanks to the approval of the Female Vote (the real reason why we got it was because Perón knew he was about to lose the next elections, so having a few thousands of women voting for him as a "Thank you" was a good tactic to remain in power) he got a second presidency... that wasn't as good as the first one because he pretty much emptied our national bank account (both building stuff and giving his wife the greatest jewellry collection in Latinamerica + tons of Channel and Dior outfits. He did got somethings for himself, of course, like houses).

Then comes a period of Radical Goverments that never ended their term because Peronistas were always an easily violent group of brainwashed people that uses violence when they don't like not having a Peronista Goverment and some more military coups to try and get some order amidst the chaos (not just social but economical as well).

1973 Perón wins again (or is given the victory. One of his followers run for President with the promise that if he won he would bring Perón back from his exile in Spain to make him President) this time with his 3rd wife as Vice-President (Evita was the 2nd wife, in case you didn't know) . He dies in 1974, and Isabelita becomes President. In addition to the economic chaos thas has been building up in the past 30something years, now there is a civil war on the streets between peronistas (through their Peronista Youth and Montoneros) vs anyone that opposses them (military, radicals, socialists, others) many civilians died in terrorist attacks. Isabelita forms the Triple A, some sort of peronista CIA, allowed to capture, "interrogate" (read torture) and kill the Goverment's enemies.

So of course, another military coup was in place. And this time they didn't come to play. Between 1976 and 1983 we had the bloodiest military coup in our history (part of the Condor Plan, created in USA) that ended up with the simbolic number of 30K Disappeared (1. According to the facts, The Disappeared are below 10 thousand. But it was settled in 30 because there might be more that no-one claimed as Disappeared and also for Shock Value™️. 2. The Disappeared are those that were abducted, illegally imprisioned and tortured to never been seen again. Many were students, entire families including pregnant women and pretty much anyone that could be "suspicious" whether they were innocent bystanders or not). The Military Goverment also injured our economy, factories were closed (would you believe that we used to build trains and planes?), a system of rations were created, and borders were closed to avoid bringing exported goods (a very clumsy yet old formula to "activate the national industry" that always comes back regardless the year we are in).

Rest assured that by the end of their rule (1983 after their failed attempt of retaking the Malvinas -or Faulkland- Islands to turn themselves into heroes for The Argentinian People and ended up with 649 dead soldiers and 1063 wounded -bear in mind, they weren't soldiers. They were kids doing the Mandatory Military Service that got shipped into a battle they shouldn't have fought- and many of those who returned ended up with serious mental issues and ended their own lives once back home) we had a big problem both social and economical. Alfonsín's presidency ended sooner (again, thanks to the Peronistas) with a historical Hiperinflation. And then came more Peronistas (like Menem) others that never ended their term (De la Rua) our 11 days with 7 presidents (all of them Peronistas) and in 2003 we got the Kirchnerismo.

The Kirchners (husband and wife) created their own branch of Peronismo and with it a new system to steal the People's money. Add to this a significantly low in the quality of our education (that I've witnessed with my own eyes since I was a student during this years) that technically began in 1940 with Perón.

Social Assitance is assigned with no regulation at all to anyone that applies for it (costing millions per month) and the destruction of our educational system created a generation of people that don't need or want to work (and whoever says a generation can say about 3 or 4 generations of people that lives off the State). Among the Ni, Ni generation (Ni, Ni is like Doesn't, Neither and it comes from a popular phrase "X doesn't work, neither studies") the crime rate has increased because yes, the State gives you money but sometimes its not enough; studying is stupid and working is hard... so we better go out and steal stuff. Since these people are protected by law because "nobody chooses to be poor, the only thing they can do is go out to steal and kill while at it" the working class lives in fear of being gunned down for 5 pesos (it has happened, many times). The police and other armed forces have been heavily defunded, because we cannot allow them to have the needed gun power to take over the Goverment ever again... so we will give them the tools they deserve

100% real, no fake. The Goverment gave llamas with machine guns to the Army in Jujuy to fight the drug traffic. Yes, Jujuy is a province up North with hard terrain... but really? Llamas? Is it easier to train llamas to move around in those grounds than a bunch of soldiers?

Yes, we did have Mauricio Macri as our President between 2015 to 2019, he was the only non-Peronista President that ended his term in due time. He did made things worse (but because our country is in such a bad shape that we have to reach rock bottom in order to try to save anything. Honestly in 2015 I was convinced that it was easier to just let Argentina die and begin a new country with a new set of rules and a new name). Some things did started to improve slowly thanks to his intervention... but the Primary Elections came and with it the possible return of The Kirchnerismo... so the country not just shoot itself on the foot, but took a nice dive in the nicest volcano nearby.

So... now in the 2023 we have:

-An inflation rate between 4-5% PER MONTH that might end with a annual inflation of 120% and the ghost of Alfonsín's Hiperinflation is everywhere.

-Our national coin (Argentinian Peso) more than devaluated (across this decades we already removed 13 zeroes off of it). 1 US dollar is about 940 pesos at this moment (8:26 am October 10th) I wouldn't be surprised if I end the day with a Dollar that costs 950 pesos or more.

-Many different dollar cotizations. The "official one" (that is just a number placed by the State, its not the real value and everybody knows it) and pretty much one for each kind of industry/way to get dollars to the country. The ones that we care the most are usually around 6 (screencapture I just took. The Market hasn't opened yet so its due to changes)

State Dollar: 365.50 pesos, Free Dollar (AKA Blue Dollar. This is the real value): 945, MEP Dollar (Virtual Dollar): 839.14, Tourist Dollar: 731, Counted with Liqui (the one that comes from selling bonds or shares): 882.14. And the Blue dollar is divided. If you want to buy 1 Dollar you have to pay 935 pesos but if you want to sell it you should receive 945.

- A more than below level in education. Kids can't solve basic math nor understand a text.

-Insecurity everywhere.

-Corruption everywhere.

-Over 13 taxes that industries have to pay and that makes prices and unemployment go up (it is very expensive to hire people, so there are formal jobs that pay very little and, of course, nobody takes them)

-A never ending list of Ministeries and other excuses to employ people in the State (with very good salaries) + this jobs only exist due to Nepotism and nothing else.

So of course... a weird guy with a weird hairdo talking about Libertarianism and how the Market should regulate everything and we should take the dollar as our coin sounds appealing.

Ideology aside, due to all the chaos we are living in a lot of people are looking back at the time of the Dictatorship... yes, the one with 30k Disappeared... with loving eyes. They claim that "there were no robbers on the street, education was good -not as good as before, mind you- we all had work and food to eat -once again, memories fail. There was a ration system and sometimes you couldn't even buy sugar whenever you needed it-" + "if you didn't messed with the militars, you were safe" (oh, what a lie!). Many of those that think like that are voting for Milei (the Libertarian) because he has a rather violent approach -shock value at first, that gave him the basic cornerstone for his party- that many took at face value and project in him the idea that he will rule with an iron fist. An idea he never truly stated (he only talks about economy, he is not very well versed in any other topic and thinks that Economical and/or Marketing tactics are aplicable to everything) and most likely won't apply... because first and foremost he is an economist and because he wouldn't hold any real power if he gets to sit in the Presidential Chair (his political party is pretty much still in diapers, he has no governors, mayors or any other authority aside from a few Reps in Congress... and by "few" I mean less than 5 in a group of 257 representatives + 72 senators). Argentina despises Dictators (unless they are Peronistas 🙄) so ruling with Presidential Decrets or Vetoes is off the table.

Considering the real possibilities of him getting to be our President... is more than likely that he won't do everything he is promising now. He won't be able to do a single thing of everything he says!

His followers will hate him and might take action to "solve things". This might lead to a Civic Dictatorship as bloody -if not more- than the last one we had. This is our real threat and my major fear.

#lets face it- nobody will read this #you are all here for the llama I know

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arcticdementor · 6 months ago

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I attended a political event recently in my country, that a mainstream party had vaguely endorsed, but more of a general right wing-anti-tax protest. You had people from the fringe parties, and people and speakers from the fringe of the fringe parties. We did the protests, then all ended at a large venue where there were coffee, donuts, and speeches… My god the speeches. Some admittedly were well prepared, the representative of the mainstream party who showed up at the end was very professional befitting a former and probably future politician. But in-between you had rolling, unprepared, barely understandable speeches about chemtrails, sovereign citizenship, and UN Agenda 2030 conspiracies, all mixed with real concerns about local government taking property rights… And I’ll admit I got damned frustrated. “This is why we lose”, I thought. Echoing a dozen different think pieces on the “Stupid Right”, many from right wingers themselves. I was embarrassed that this was the state of political organization and human capital on the “far right” What is wrong with these people? I thought, and I’m sure many of have thought. Well nothing. The problem is with you!

…

Every Single Grassroots Political Movement is populated by cranks of various amounts of semi-retardation, and every single one spends an inordinate amount of time at best humouring them, or worse, taking them 100% seriously. I’ve seen this in mainstream political parties when you talk to any of the volunteers. And I’ve seen this on University campuses where if you let your left wing friends drag you to one of their meetings you’ll be serenaded by barely articulate native activists, feminist extremists who want everyone to pray to Gaia, Black “we wuz” radicals, and every kind of queer identity you can possibly imagine, giving just as, if not more, retarded takes in even worse coherence, and seemingly actively trying to derail every attempt at meaningful policy advancement or coalition building in favour of struggle sessions and “consciousness raising”. Say what you will about the sovereign citizen guy… He had a whole list of meaningful proposal with direct political actions to take which, setting aside the theory, would actually make public employees and local councillors probably fold up and cave out of the sheer misery of dealing with it.

…

Part of me thinks this is why Left wing organizers are perpetually convinced they’re the little guys fighting against a vast right-wing Koch Funded machine out to crush them… because, in spite of getting state funding for protests and stainglassed cathedral-high rooms to organize from… They spend 80+% of their time listening to the losers of the losers. So then why is it right wing intellectuals are convinced their side is stupid? Well because left wing stupidity doesn’t count, in fact you’re racist for noticing it. Left Wing and Right Wing commentators will bemoan the stupidity of the right… Because the cranks on the right are working class heterosexual white people. You won’t lose your job for pointing out the idiots and trying to shame people for associating with them… By contrast it actually takes a great amount of bravery to point out that a Native Activist seemingly has an IQ of 75, cannot string a sentence together, and nothing she said is pertinent to the discussion at hand, you’d almost certainly lose your job for it. Likewise if left wingers pointed out a barely articulate Black Woman’s “lived experience” gives her no authority to speak on anthropological matters of Ancient Egypt, or told a Genderqueer aging Trans “Feminist” to stop alienating the muslims in the room at a Free-Palestine event.

…

It’s a neat trick isn’t it? The regime has trained us to tolerate any stupidity from Women, immigrants, gays, blacks, natives, non-christians, and their voting coalition of urban cranks and lumpenproles more generally. Whereas white, heterosexual, christians, and non-feminists? Well that roofer better fucking have a fully developed legal theory when he opens his mouth and he damned well better deliver it with adherence to all the university educated shibboleths or he’s a loon and a conspiracy theorist.

…

You see, the US and other English Democracies pretend they have had coherent Common Law traditions stretching back hundreds of years to at least their founding and, when the Whig Liberals and Lawyers get self important enough, to Magna Carta itself and the Ancient rights of the proud Yeoman Englishmen. But really America and every other English speaking nation is vastly more like the French system where the entire constitutional regime gets thrown out and retconned every 50-80 years and all your rights are up for grabs in whatever new numbered “Republic” they declare.

…

Listening to sovereign citizens talk, at least half the stuff they mention is actually really well precedented if not 100% established law in some area of early 20th and 19th century jurisprudence. They’re just taking rights that 100% existed in 1920s America, or were 100% established in 1850s Canada and are still the laws that nominally apply to deeds and property doled out to the pioneers… and then demanding those ancient rights be respected in the present day (for the most part, there is a whole lot of woo in there also). To take maybe the most famous example that Sovereign Citizen and other legal “revisionist” types are probably gesturing at more than shadows on the wall.

…

The US Federal Income Tax has a very weird legal corpus. It was ruled unconstitutional in 1895 in Pollock Vs. Farmers, then of course the 16th amendment was passed in 1913 to allow it… However the actual laws that authorize and extend the income tax to most Americans are very nebulous. The 16th Amendment just grants the power to congress to pass a law authorizing an income tax… Congress still actually has to pass a law.

…

Setting aside the fact that the way the income tax is implemented clearly violates the 4th and 5th amendment requiring you to render access to your personal records and confess to details of your income, violating your right to be secure in papers and effects, and to avoid self-incrimination. Irwin Schiff (Father of prominent libertarian and gold trader Peter Schiff) died in prison for his tax protest, making the constitutional legal argument that no law was ever passed mandating the vast majority of Americans, who don’t own corporations, pay federal income tax. This may sound absurd but if you know the history of the income tax, it’s not implausible. The income tax, in its post 16th amendment version, was originally pitched as a narrow tax on the ultra-wealthy. This changed during the new deal and specifically WW2 in which the Executive branch basically expanded to have godlike power and ran roughshod over the constitution, congress, and the legal order… During this period the Income tax expanded to resemble the current system… And if you know anything about how FDR ran the government during WW2, its really plausible that at no point was that expanded modern version of the income tax authorized by congress, or revisited and approved by Congress. Indeed if you know anything about how laws are written it’s very likely in no subsequent revision to the tax code did congress ever revise that “omission”. And instead simply refers to those required to file returns or other vagueries… without ever having legally established a requirement the majority of Americans do that. If you think of all the demands the income tax makes, not only that you pay, but that you declare, file, backup, and RETAIN documentation that incriminates you to hand over without a warrant or without any right to appeal to the 5th amendment… Well every element of that, even if we pretend it is constitutional, (16th amendment didn’t void 5th and 6th, and 1913 original intent doesn’t envisage the modern system) would require EXPLICIT non-euphemistic black and white LAW from congress, passing the house, senate, and then veto… and did I mention all this was happening during ww2?

…

Notably Irwin’s more famous son Peter does not advise you apply it to your own taxes because the tax court system is set up to avoid acknowledging the argument. You’re not going to get to the Supreme Court.

…

The fact it is, presumably/arguably legalistically, constitutionally, and morally correct does not serve you as an individual in court…. But let’s imagine… oh say…. If an election was stolen. Imagine you had the rightful president who actually won the election, and 5-10 governors who support him… And they suddenly all demanded Americans stop paying their taxes and told “the truth” that you never had to pay taxes, and no American has ever had to. Not only would the fact that the arguments are probably technically correct make a huge difference, the fact that it is merely persuasive and convincing means that tens of millions of Americans would suddenly stop paying income tax, far beyond what the IRS or tax courts could ever hope to enforce. Suddenly those legal arguments would have to go to SCOTUS and be taken very seriously…

…

Right wing Americans need their own version of consciousness raising and appreciating the “different ways of knowing” marginalized white Americans and right wingers have. We’ve been trained by generations of left wing television, schooling, and academia to defer and treat the most noxious and stupid bleatings of uninformed women, non-whites, gays, and religious minorities as sacrosanct pieces of insight we’re supposed to wrestle with… whilst at the same time we’ve been treated to presume any white male over a certain age with unusual mannerisms or a disregard for left wing shibboleths is dangerously low status and deranged, when in reality it is the opposite. Looking at the past 50-60 years, the Grumpy Granddads, hilly-billy mystics, and aging conspiracy theorists have consistently been more right than the mainstream. If in 2002 you had to pre-commit to believing everything Alex Jones said, or everything CNN said for the next 20 years… You’d have been a fool to pick CNN. Indeed if you took their diet and medical advice you’d probably be dead. The Archie Bunkers and Deryl Gribbles have consistently been years ahead of the mainline right for seeing the truths of the regime. Now obviously like Greek heroes consulting the oracle at Delphi, or spirit questers visiting shamans… you have to assume you won’t understand half of what they say, most of it will fly over your head, and a good chunk probably isn’t even meant for you but the other spirits in the room… But the signal to noise ratio of our hermits and kooks are thousands of miles beyond whatever left wing diversity chicks are getting from the native grifters they entertain at their campus events or the black “we wuz” consciousness raisers they shovel money at.

#kulakrevolt #substack #read the whole thing #irwin schiff

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frankterranella · 2 years ago

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It’s time to reinstate the assault weapons ban

Question: What do Evelyn Dieckhaus, William Kinney and Hallie Scruggs have in common with my grandson, Bryce Terranella. Answer: Yesterday they were all nine-year-olds attending schools in mostly rural states. Today only my grandson is alive. The other three will never see their 10th birthday because they were killed by AR-15 military-grade weapons bought legally by a person with no police record and no history of violence. Just someone having a bad week with easy access to a killing machine. People using guns are increasingly killing people. In 376 separate school shootings, more than 348,000 students have experienced gun violence since the infamous 1999 Columbine school shooting. And troublingly, the problem has escalated exponentially since the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting. It’s a problem that is getting much worse every year. And you know what else has escalated since 2012? The sales of AR-15 military assault weapons. A killing machine invented for soldiers in Vietnam is now the most popular rifle sold to civilians. About 2.8 million AR-15s were purchased in 2020 alone. What has changed to make the 21st Century the century of unparalleled mass shootings? Clearly, the ease of access to guns is a major contributing factor. Fifty years ago, the NRA supported the use of rifles designed for hunting. Now they defend the right of civilians to own military weapons. No true hunter needs an AR-15 to shoot a deer or a moose or even a bear. What has changed is that the AR-15 has become a symbol (like a red MAGA hat) of extreme right-wing politics in this country. Republican candidates routinely display their AR-15s in campaign ads! Because of politicians like this, it is now easier to buy one AR-15 capable of killing hundreds of children than it is to buy an abortion pill capable of killing only one unborn child. And this is justified as defending the “freedom” of Americans. How about the freedom of children to live without fear that any day at school may be their last day on earth? We had a ban on military-grade weapons like AR-15s back almost 30 years ago. In 1994 Congress outlawed the manufacture and sale of semiautomatic assault weapons and large-capacity ammunition magazines. This was done as part of the “Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994.” It should be noted that the provision, while sponsored and passed by Democrats, was supported at the time by Republican presidents Ford and Reagan. The law had a sunset provision and when it came up for renewal in 2004, the by-then Republican-controlled Congress, urged by the gun manufacturers, let it expire. It is also important to note that the 1994 assault weapons ban did not mandate any confiscation of guns. It included a grandfather clause that allowed for the possession and transfer of weapons and ammunition that were otherwise lawfully possessed on the date the law took effect. So the fear-mongering over “the government coming for your guns” was never justified. And in fact, the ex post facto law prohibition of the U.S. Constitution (Article 1, Section 9, Clause 3) would never permit such action. Yet that has not stopped gun advocates from using the threat of confiscation to rally opposition to gun control laws for decades. Because the 1994 assault weapons ban was only in effect for 10 years and did not affect existing guns, it is impossible to say whether such a ban would actually have any significant effect today when more than 16 million people now own at least one AR-15 (about 1 in 20 U.S. adults). But reinstating the assault weapons ban would eventually have an impact since the vast majority of the weapons now in circulation were purchased in the last 10 years. So if the assault weapons ban had been renewed in 2004 and 2014 (and perhaps the sunset provision removed from the law), these guns would not have been able to be purchased legally as the Nashville shooter was able to do. A new ban would at least slow the spread of these killing machines. The "Assault Weapons Ban of 2023" (S.25) would merely reinstate the 1994 law and, without expanding the reach of the 1994 ban, would add a much more detailed description and listing of the weapons covered so that there would be no ambiguity what guns were banned. Again, no existing guns would be confiscated. The bill was introduced on January 23, 2023 and is currently before the Senate Judiciary Committee. The text is available at congress.gov. The proposed law’s text says that its purpose is to regulate assault weapons “to ensure that the right to keep and bear arms is not unlimited.” Clearly, all Constitutional rights have limits. The First Amendment does not protect pornography. The Second Amendment should not protect the possession of assault weapons (or nuclear weapons for that matter). If you are moved by this issue and want to do something about it, I urge you to visit momsdemandaction.org. This is an offshoot of Everytown for Gun Safety that is committed to ending gun violence. I see it as a Right to Life issue. So it should be supported by people across the political spectrum as the 1994 ban was. One of the most fundamental ways that we can make America great again is to reinstate the assault weapons ban. We owe that to our children, and to all Americans.

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wing-ed-thing · 4 years ago

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Lab Assistant (Szayelaporro x Reader, Part II)

Synopsis: Szayelaporro takes on a complete Arrancar.

Word Count: 2,180

Tags/Warnings: Fem!Reader, Fake Science, Science Project to Lovers, Slow Burn (Arrancar are solitary and this one’s death aspect is Madness, let’s be real here), Slow Build @blankensee

Notes: Okay but homeboi is TӦLL. Szayelaporro is 6′1, 6′1 y’all see this? Ooh boy is it getting hot in here? The Thing-Winged series bug has officially kicked in.

You were the only Fracción that Szayelaporro allowed into his laboratory, but even as you sat on the exam table, you couldn’t help but think that perhaps you had done something wrong. You crossed your ankles and folded your hands in your lap. Szayelaporro sat at his desk, like usual, but penned down the types of notes that he would typically leave for you. A large piece of machinery reached out a mechanical arm to encompass the whole of your hollow mask. Szayelaporro had stood to observe you quite some time ago and you were left to wait, back straight and silent. A series of artificial jewels clung to you kanzashi mask, their glow casting a crimson color over the dimly lit laboratory.

He spoke your name. His soft voice cut through the air, reverberating off of the tall walls and high ceilings. Szayelaporro rose from his seat and turned to you. You could hear a faint bubbling coming from somewhere in the dimness.

“Yes, Master Szayelaporro?” Your voice could have easily blended in with the white noise of the laboratory. He stood in front of you, fiddling with the equipment above your head. His honey colored irises lazily migrated to the corners of his eyes in a disapproving glance downward. You stared forward.

“What is it that we did wrong today?” You pursed your lips but didn’t dare to move otherwise. A phantom hourglass hung over your head. Your response best be good and come quickly.

“I did not receive an order to attack Master Nnoitra. I did not believe it to be wise to.” Szayelaporro let a frown slip from his neutral expression. He continued to tinker with his device. You could feel the cool metal on your mask like dental tools on your teeth. Szayelaporro let out a hum.

“Passing the blame onto me, are you?” The claw of the machine buckled under his firm hands and caused a tugging against your outer layer of bone. You recoiled, a hand tightly gripping the table below you. You squeezed your eyes closed, in more discomfort than in any pain. Your head tilted to your far right as you leaned upwards, attempting to decrease the tension on your mask.

“No, Master Szayelaporro. I apologize for the lack of care that went into choosing my words.” The Octava Espada said nothing. You felt him continue to work the machine above you. You shifted again.

“Stop moving, I’ve almost got it.” And when the data machine finally released you, you restrained yourself from shooting up a hand to rub your head. Instead, you sat still, letting Szayelaporro’s cold hands caress your face as he inspected his work. You could sense another look of dissatisfaction.

“Have they been repaired?” He rolled the largest of your gems between the fingers of his other hand, watching it gleam as he poured in the slightest bit of reiatsu.

“For now,” Szayelaporro answered, “We’ll see how they hold up.” He gripped your chin, turning your head to meet his stare. His expression narrowed. “When I tell you to come to my side, you do as I say. When someone like Nnoitra tries to touch you, you defend yourself. These are my additional orders to you.” You nodded, your jewelry glinting a singular time.

As he turned back to his data, you slid down from the examination table. Your heels met each other. Once again, your hands rested folded in front of you.

“Shall I get back to work now?” Szayelaporro took a moment. He ignored your inquisition and continued to type in some sort of data or another into his recording instrument. He paused, and when you thought that he’d answer, he flipped through yet more papers. You stood a few feet behind him awaiting his answer, and when he finally turned you were met with a withering scowl.

“Must I really dismiss you?” He questioned rhetorically, swiftly passing by you with a few papers in hand. You did not move. “Go restock the canyon crystals and do eat something while you’re away.” You nodded to yourself and gave a quiet farewell to your master. He did not answer, per usual, and you let yourself out of the laboratory. Szayelaporro’s glare followed you. “This better work. I am sick of having disobedient Fracciónes.”

***

Hueco Mundo didn’t hold much beauty. All in all, the landscape was mostly vast, empty, and dead. Szayelaporro didn’t seem like he enjoyed fieldwork very much. You supposed that he would prefer experimenting rather than finding his own minor lab materials. You, on the other hand, preferred spending a bit of time away from the Palace and you were grateful that Szayelaporro trusted you to do even the mundane tasks. Truth be told, you excelled in gathering quality items for the lab. You had an eye for the best spots to pick from. You caught live specimens with an almost sixth sense and your speed remained nearly unmatched in the Octava Espada’s Palace. That factoid on it’s own didn’t feel very impressive to you, but you still took pride in it nonetheless.

You trudged across the sand, a field collection kit in your arms. The whole package easily encompassed the whole of your torso. Your feet sank down into the substrate. Surely by now, the grains had begun to gather in your boots. You stopped where you stood, letting the kit droop in your desperate grasp. You looked back at the Palace which still loomed over you. You had hardly made it anywhere. With a sigh, you turned back the direction you were originally headed. Szayelaporro didn’t like when you took too long.

“Can I help you with that?” As soon as you caught sight of the slender, eye patched face, your eyes went wide. You gripped the bulky kit in your arms, lips forming a thin, panicked line. You slowly turned away before immediately speeding off. A shout came from behind you causing you to trip. “I’m not here to hurt you!”

You yelled out for Szayelaporro. A cloud of sand exploded around you as you fell. A dark shadow appeared above you and you launched your equipment up in defense. Your pursuer caught the kit in his arms, his body forced back the slightest bit at the impact.

“Stay back!” You warned, scrambling up and unsheathing your zanpakutō. The fragments in your mask glowed a deep red. Tesla raised up your box in defense, his sword hanging by his hip.

“Master Nnoitra isn’t with me!” You blinked a few times, lowering your weapon slightly, but not by much. Tesla shifted his hands, maneuvering them forward to lay flatly on the sides of the container. He held it away from himself as he lowered his posture, a silent effort to show that he meant no harm. “You looked like you could use a hand. What is this all for?”

Your knuckles turned white around your trembling sword handle. Tesla remained low, calm and still. You took a step back, sheathing your zanpakutō. You tentatively approached, letting Tesla return your equipment to you. The box dropped like a weight in your arms.

“I’ve been sent to collect canyon crystals,” You answered, picking up your knee to readjust your grip before you turned on your heel to trudge away. Tesla frowned. He followed, strolling alongside you. Your back bent backwards a bit.

Wordlessly, Tesla accompanied you all the way to the canyon, about a few miles out from the Palace. He remained eerily silent, but in his defense, so did you. Fracciónes serving under masters such as yours were discouraged from speaking early on, so smalltalk certainly didn’t come easily. You kept a close eye on the other Arrancar out of your peripheral, but his posture only screamed polite and nothing more. Another fold of your lips and you turned your attention back forward. Quite frankly, you didn’t know how to handle this. You rarely got the opportunity to be in the company of other complete Arrancar, not including Szayelaporro.

At the edge of the ravine, the kit slipped in your arms and Tesla instinctively reached out an arm to catch it if you lost your grasp. You paid him no mind and instead hiked up a knee once again and continued on. You tilted your head, focusing on your footing as you descended into the chasm. Even at the surface, the space was dark and hollows of different designations howled in the depths. Tesla followed you down, his face gradually overtaken with shadows.

And in the pitchest of pitch black you saw them. Small glimmers in the darkness. You stumbled forward, the Fifth Espada’s Fracción close behind. You sat down in front of the small gathering of luminescent crystals and finally set down your burden. Tesla preferred to stand, on guard at the many noises around you. You quickly sorted through the bounty. Upon finding a quality bundle, you opened your materials box to pluck out a small pick. You felt Tesla’s stare. Arrancar were never truly creatures of companionship in your experience, but when solidarity came, it usually came quietly.

“These are Reiatsu Gems or canyon crystals. They are known to be excellent conductors of spirit energy,” You explained, voice ever-soft. The luminescence cast a faint light upon your face. You lowered a specimen into your extraction box, the glow retreating into the contained dimness. Standing, you heaved up your kit and moved deeper into the murk. Tesla followed. You passed by another gathering of crystals, then another. You felt Tesla beside you.

“What was wrong with those?” He asked, equally as quiet as you had just been.

“Not ready to be harvested,” You answered promptly.

“How can you tell?” You stopped at a small batch. The crystals grew diagonally out of the canyon wall at about waist level. You put your kit down and crouched down.

“See these here?” You gestured to the dimmest section of gems. “This place is filled with reiatsu, they should be glowing more.” You directed your attention to the brightest of the bunch. “See? These shine a little bit brighter.” And with your pick you extracted them.

You continued on, trudging around in the immensity of the ravine. You performed your field work diligently. The kit gradually began to fill with valuable specimens. Tesla came forth from the darkness, a glowing coming from his palm. He wordlessly presented it to you to inspect. You gave a grateful nod and carefully placed it in your box.

The journey up served to be more difficult than the journey down and your load had since doubled in weight. Tesla patiently waited as you struggled back up the canyon, at that point still refusing any kind of assistance. You plopped the kit on the sand at the top before pulling yourself up. Your body half hanging into the abyss, Tesla offered you a hand. You glanced at it, then back at him, and after a second of deliberation, you placed your hand in his. But a moment after you had found your footing and had your package back in your arms, a horde of adjuchas surrounded you and quickly.

Tesla scowled and flared his spiritual pressure. You looked up at him, beginning to piece together that his scowl served more as an unfortunate resting expression than any sort of intimidating grimace. Either way, the adjuchas were not discouraged. Tesla placed a hand on his zanpakutō and you sighed. He looked on in confusion at the disappointing shake of your head and curiously accepted your kit as you handed it to him.

“I have orders,” You exhaled, unfortunately not feeling any hungrier than usual. And as the gang of adjuchas lunged, too greedy for flesh and soul energy to recognize their opponents, you struck. Your blade made short work of them and your mask ornaments glowed. You tore into mask after mask, canines bared, and when you made it to the last one, you offered it to Tesla. He wanted to decline, but after some thought, he didn’t have it in him to decline a free meal.

***

“Adequate.” That encompassed all Szayelaporro had to say about the crystals you gathered. You placed them neatly at one of the lab tables as you cleaned and reorganized the field gear. Szayelaporro toyed with your gathered gems, inspecting them with a critical eye. He lifted one to his nose, taking in a slight inhale. “And why does this one smell vaguely like Nnoitra Gilga?”

“His Fracción accompanied me on my field work today.” Szayelaporro stared at you blankly, setting the bundle of crystals back down in disdain.

“You should have told him to go away.”

“And I did. I raised my sword against him like you told me to, but he did not seem to pose any threat. He was particularly interested in the Reiatsu Gems so he followed me.” Szayelaporro nodded once, appearing to be somewhat deep in thought, but his face remained expressionless.

“Let him accompany you next time as well.” The room was cast with a dull gleam.

“Yes, Master Szayelaporro.”

Notes: As much as I feel like Szayelaporro likes to make a show, I feel like he wouldn’t be as flamboyant when he thinks he doesn’t have an audience. I have too many Szayelaporro headcanons. I tried to make a single post with all of them but it’s like too many to fit. I’ll post those at some point. It’s in my drafts rn.

Thank you to all who liked, reblogged, followed and otherwise supported. Your support means so much and is greatly appreciated.

#Thing-Winged series kick #Szayelaporro x reader #Szayelaporro Granz x reader #szayelaporro granz #szayel aporro granz #szayel #bleach headcanon #bleach headcanons #bleach imagines #bleach imagine #bleach x reader #bleach x you #bleach x y/n #bleach #tesla lindocruz #nnoitra #nnoitra gilga

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dragonladdie · 4 years ago

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Xeno-Hiraeth

Warning: The following document delves into topics such as (systemic)racism, classism, colonization, (implied)genocide, and slavery. This is not to promote, justify, humanize, or normalize these things in any way, shape or form, and, quite frankly, the opposite of the story's initial message.

The author does NOT approve of such things. If you think any of the above is justifiable in ANY manner, you can leave right now, thanks.

Lore

Xeno-Hiraeth was the first ever planet made by the Seraphs, a race of divine entities with the power to create entire galaxies with the simple flick of their wrist.

There are four sapient species on this ancient planet: The proud dragons, the reclusive lungs, the gentle sphinxes, and finally, the mageia, the first Beings, and made in the Seraph's image.

Not only is Xeno-Hiraeth the first world, it is by far the largest. It is infinitely larger than our Earth, and far more magical. It's teeming with wild magic and a myriad of magical and strange creatures. At its center is Cor Meum, seven continents surrounding the Heartland. The Heartland holds the Capitol, where the Queen resides.

As previously said, there are four sapient species of Xeno-Hiraeth. You would believe the mageia would rule the world, as they were the first Beings, and are made in the Seraph's image. You would be correct, but, millions of years ago, when all but one Seraph suddenly vanished from the cosmos, the mageia fell into chaos.

The mageia waged war on each other, dragging the other three races with them. This started the Cold Age. After thousands of years of distrust, chaos, and all-out war, the remaining Seraph could no longer speak to their people.

They ended up turning the world over to the dragons and lungs, giving them a secret gift that allowed them to reunite the world again. They were supposed to rule the land together in order to retain at least some form of unity. But, another thousand years later, after high tensions, the dragons and lungs turned on each other. The lungs ended up breaking from the dragons and went into hiding, making dragons the singular dominant species of Xeno-Hiraeth.

Sphinxes are a somewhat independent species, and try not to get involved with the other three species' affairs. They normally exist in one of twelve clans, but few unlucky sphinxes live their lives as personal servants and slaves to dragon nobility, and are treated as wealth statuses rather than individuals.

Geography of Notable Landmasses

Heartland

The Heartland is the central continent of Cor Meum. A vast valley surrounded by mountains, and at its center is the Capitol, the largest metropolis in the world. The Capitol is mostly inhabited by dragons, and is also where a good 60% of dragons in Xeno-Hiraeth live. The Heartstone Palace is both the tallest and largest built structure in Cor Meum as well, and it's tallest tower can be seen from miles in any direction. The Heartstone Palace is the home of the Queen and their family.

Makatu Valley

The continent just North of Heartland is a combination of floating isles and mountains. It's the home of the longmas' kingdom, Sahar. Mistiko, the capital city for Sahar is located between one of the two largest mountains on Cor Meum, known as the Twin Peaks. Instead of sitting at the foot of the two mountains, the city actually stands on the top of a huge floating aisle, just above their peaks. It's only accessible by airships and flying.

Rama Forests

The continent of Rama sits upon a rich iron mine that stretches down and out for miles. Even though they have a seemingly infinite amount of it, every scrap of metal is treated graciously, and no amount is wasted. On the surface are lush forests on the foot of a small mountain range. The capital city, Stonehill, sits on the base of said mountain range.

Taiao

The continent of Taiao is a combination of forest and open plain, perfect for the diverse population of Alam. Taiao has bountiful lands to raise crops, and thus there are countless farming villages across the continent. The "capital" of Alam is called the Thicket, which is a town surrounding a huge tree. Inside the tree is the High Sage and their council, made up of all sorts of backgrounds.

Vjetar Plateau

The Vjetar plateau is located at the furthest Northeast point in Cor Meum. The only way up is by flying, airships, or making your way up Zephyr's Road, a dangerous foot trail filled with predators and rogues. Atop the plateau is a flat, lush steppe occasionally dotted with rich forests. There is a small patch of frigid mountains to the north, and the west drops off into the sea. The soil is adequate for the nation's agricultural needs, and produce farms are the majority of what you will find when exploring the land. The capital city of Gisa stands in the middle of a windy meadow.

The Sear

The Sear is a scorching desert to the West of Cor Meum. The farther center you go, the hotter the sun beats, and the taller the sand dunes stand. But, smack in the middle of the desert, springs the Blessing Oasis. It's the largest oasis in the Sear, and most of the qilin population lives here.

The Wai Peninsula

The Wai peninsula is home to Ngaru, the native kingdom of the kelpies. To the Northern entrance to the peninsula are swamps, marshes, bogs, and mangroves. Then, there's the Iridescent Jungle. Though it's a gorgeous sight to behold, it's filled with dangerous animals and man-eating plants. Then, once you finally make it out of the jungle, you are rewarded with a calm, tropical paradise. The capital city is located on the shore, along with the Summer Palace. But, during the winter and fall months, the royal family retreats to the Underwater Palace. A secret entrance on the surface is provided for non-kelpie visitors.

Kahore Mountains

Nihil, the native kingdom of the nix, is based underground and in the mountains of Kahore. The entirety of the continent is just mountains that stretch almost completely off the Eastern coast of Cor Meum. The capital city of Covert lays below the surface of Titan's Maw Summit, the largest mountain in the world.

Ledas

A combination of icy plain and taiga to the north of Cor Meum. It is mostly unexplored by the other Beings, and is occupied by the Fa and Noh sphinx clans.

The Barrier Mountains

Several oceanic mountain ranges that erupt from the water, and surround Cor Meum. There is presumably nothing past these mountains, only open ocean. However, all voyages that set out past these mountains never return. Rumor has it that beyond these mountains lies the secret home of the lungs.

Additional landmasses

Within the Barrier Mountains are several other small islands, whether they humbly sit on the water or float above it. None of them are big enough to be marked fully as continents, however, and most of them are colonized by dragon villages.

General Society

The Queen is a hereditary, gender-neutral title worn by the ruling dragon. It's passed on from parent to oldest child, but it's not unheard of for the crown to go to one of the Queen's spouses, siblings, or even a trusted Council member if either they believe their children aren't cut out for the job or die before they have any.

The King is the first spouse of the Queen(the King is also a gender-neutral title). The King acts as an advisor to the Queen as well as a companion, and is incredibly influential. Consorts hold no political power, but may hold certain influence as well, depending on their background/actions outside of the palace walls.

The current Queen is Nefriah, and her heir is her first son, Valo. She has one spouse, King Solan. Their other children are Naika, Naseem, Kasigo, and Vanja.

That being said, there are no gender roles in Xeno-Hiraeth! Gender identity and expression is something that is a personal preference, and is figured out during childhood(all children are referred to with they/them pronouns at first, unless they choose differently later on). Androgyny is the dominant gender expression, and no individual would be made fun of, judged, or barred from certain tasks/jobs for their gender identity and/or expression, or lack thereof.

While the Queen rules over both dragons and mageia(and to some extent, the sphinxes), it's the Omnis-Sovereign who carries out the laws to the mageia. The Omnis-Sovereign is typically a longma mageia who not only rules their own kingdom, but the other kingdoms as well. While all kingdoms have their individual leader or leaders, they all answer to the Omnis-Sovereign, and the Omnis-Sovereign answers to the Queen. The current Omnis-Sovereign is Jerome.

The Prophet is the religious leader of Cor Meum, and secondary advisor to the Queen. Their job(supposedly) is to make sure the will of the Seraph is followed. They also are responsible for keeping the Queen in check. They are hand-picked by the Queen themself, and serve until death. The current Prophet is Rek'yen.

The Queen's council consists of the King, Prophet, General, Treasurer, High Mage, Archive Keeper, Charter, and High Judge. King Solan currently doubles as the High Mage.

There is an unspoken racial hierarchy amongst the mageia, in order of preference of the dragons; the longmas, the re'em, the dryads, the perytons, the qilins, the kelpies, and then the nixes.

Disabilities are not usually an issue in Xeno-Hiraeth. Non-verbal and/or deaf beings are taught some form of sign language, or given a slate to write your thoughts down. Blind individuals are taught to use their other senses to make their way around, and/or given a guide(whether they be a Being or familiar), or a cane to feel around with as you step. For those with lost limbs, there's a number of different prosthetics to choose from, and there are special prosthetics for different jobs and activities(including wings!).

In regards to technology, think steampunk-esque. Tech such as robotic prosthetics, arcane-powered machines, airships, explosives, and simple firearms such as pistols, bayonets, and shotguns are craftable items.

Tharcanas are enchanted items, all with differing abilities. Some examples would be a piece of jewelry that immediately returns to the owner of it's ever stolen, a small orb that gives off light when needed, a flute that puts listeners to sleep, bracers that give the wearer super strength, etc.

Being Biology & Info

Dragons and Lungs

Dragons and Lungs have a rather… chaotic biology, to say the least. While they can't be classified into several distinct races, almost every dragon or lung family has something unique about their pedigree. For example, some families may be able to grow plant life on themselves, or breathe fire, or have insect-like wings, etc.

Curiously enough, some dragons and lungs have similar features, such as some dragons having manes down their topline, and lungs having small, vestigial wings.

No matter what their features are, dragons are the largest species, standing at around 7-8 ½ feet at the shoulder. They are typically scaled, with at least one pair of wings, and at least one horn.

Lungs, on the other hand, are only slightly taller than the average mageia, but have long, snake-like bodies. They have fur and/or scales, with a mane down their topline/around their head like a lion. They usually have at least one horn.

Mageia

Mageia are huge creatures(the average mageia is about 6 ½ feet at the shoulder) with a canine-like head filled with sharp teeth, front paws(or claws, or talons) back hooves(can be one toed or cloven) a horse-like mane, and a lionel tail.

The mageia have seven races, each with their own unique features:

Longma biology

Pure longmas are mageia who share a common ancestor who was half dragon. All Longmas have at least one horn and draconic wings.

Pure longmas always have:

draconic wings

at least one horn

Longmas can have:

scales somewhere other than the topline, wings, and tail

scales along their topline

serpentine tails

draconic fins

Additional info

Famously pompous and devoted to individualism, Longmas are proud, innovative, and fiercely passionate.

Traditionally classist, recent years have seen the ladder to success grow more accessible, but the line between nobility and commoners remains distinct and nearly impossible to cross.

Longmas consider themselves the ideal and dismiss other mageia as uncultured, barbaric entities.

The gap between Sahar's civilian classes is significant, with the nobility sitting comfortably at the top of the ladder. The Nobility are revered, or at the very least begrudgingly respected, by the lower classes. Their political significance is rivaled only by their implied wealth, which may or may not be as grand as an individual noble claims. Nobles are the only longmas who have surnames, portrayed by their House. While there is some wiggle room for wealthy commoners to rub shoulders with the elite, they are unlikely to be accepted as an equal.

Re'em biology

Re'em are readily identified by their horns, which range from the traditional single spiral to jagged monstrosities, sometimes made of gemstone and metal.

Pure re'em always have:

horn(s), typically on the head.

Pure re'em can have:

Horns made of minerals such as precious gemstones, metals, glass or rock

Gemstone/metal attributes

Additional info

The re'em of Lux are proud people, known for their prowess in battle. Thus, friendly sparring is a common pastime for young re'em, though older re'em enjoy the activity as well.

When a re'em dies, a replica of their horn is carved and shaped from the same gemstone/metal that their real horn was made from. Simply painting a clay sculpture is an alternative to those with simple keratin horns.

Although the re'em have a reputation in other kingdoms as being uneducated, simplistic brutes, intellectual prowess is lauded, and complex, strategy-based games are enjoyed in households.

A single back hoof stomp is a more "aggressive" greeting, and thus is conducted by soldiers and rowdy adolescents, the harder/louder the more impressive.

Dryad biology

A pureblooded dryad is identified by the plant or animal life that thrives from their body. Plant life usually goes through seasonal changes or stagnates at full bloom, but there are always anomalies. A depressed or sick dryad usually suffers from wilted, or even withered growth.

Pure Dryads always have:

plantlife (or plant-esque, such as coral, bark, rocks/minerals/gemstones, etc.) growing from their body

Dryads can have:

extra hair (such as an extended mane down their top line).

antlers.

gemstones.

bark or rock like texture on their body.

Additional info

When hunting and farming, no part of the plant or animal goes to waste. Anything one does not eat is made into jewelry, tools, or simply fertilizer for the next batch of crops.

Outsiders are welcomed, but watched carefully. The dryads of Alam are hospitable and friendly to all, but won't hesitate to give you the boot if you choose violence.

The native mageia of Taiao live in peace with the environment, never taking more than what they need. Wastefulness, in any capacity, is not tolerated. What you take from the land is a blessing, and should be treated as such.

The High Sage is the religious leader of Alam. They interpret signs seemingly sent by the Seraph themself, predict the success of the next year/harvest, and make sure traditions are followed, and outdated ones are updated. The Council are the political leaders, and do most of the paperwork, overseeing official events, recounting population, distributing resources, etc.

Peryton biology

All pureblooded perytons will have at least one set of wings. Feathered wings are the most common, but there are plenty of individuals who sport wings reminiscent of bats, and rarer still are the individuals who grow insect-like wings.

Pure perytons always have:

at least one set of wings(wings can be feathered, bat-like, or insect based)

Perytons can have:

feathering on the body.

feathers in place of a mane or tail.

more than one set of wings.

Additional info:

The perytons are proud, loyal, and cunning, and reside in a nation shrouded in mystery. While often misunderstood, they have a rich history and culture that defines them.

There is so much freestanding land in Vjetar that it is commonplace just to petition for a small plot to build on, and more often than not, it will be granted.

Most families in Sirocco are rather large, as couples generally have anywhere from three to seven children.

The Divine is the kingdom's spiritual leader, acting as the conduit through which the last Seraph makes their will known, while the clerics act as the kingdom's clergy and healers. While the Divine rarely leaves the Holy Temple of the Seraph, and never leaves the great city of Gisa, Clerics live all throughout the nation and assist where the Divine can not.

Qilin biology

The Qilin is immediately recognizable by the presence of body scales and antlers. This race is almost entirely resilient to heat.

Pure qilins always have:

at least one antler, though typically two.

scaling somewhere on their body.

Qilins can have:

antlers that resemble various different deeror antelope.

Additional info

Qilins of Hariq are hardy survivors, a family of mostly nomadic individuals joined together by their mutual love and respect for every member of the Sear.

Humble, accepting, and naive, these gentle mageia are trusting of others to a sometimes dangerous fault. Though they make up the smallest population, they are not to be trifled with: every member has received some form of combat training, and their desert home is a frightful place to wage war.

The traditional qilin would die for their virtues and the safety of another.

Deeply spiritual and fixated on being one with and coexisting with the world, the qilin ways are mystical and rooted in their religion.

Kelpie biology

Kelpies will always possess two forms that they are able to shift between: a land form for traversing terrain, and a water form that allows them to swim and breathe underwater. The aquatic half of a kelpie can be based on fish, cetaceans, octopi, seals, or any other marine creature.

Pure kelpies always have:

a land form.

a water form.

Kelpies can have (in both forms):

fins and scales.

a fishtail.

stingers, tentacles, barbels - anything that correlates to their aquatic animal(s) really.

bioluminescence.

Additional info

Kelpies are famously the most accepting of outsiders, and thus hybrids are not a rare sight in Ngaru.

They are skilled soldiers, fishers, and sailors, but extremely superstitious. Angering the last Seraph is said enough to damn you and your family for generations.

While they are accepting of outside races, they stay as distant as they possibly can from the other nations, and try not to get mixed up in their politics.

As a collective community, Ngaru generally works together to keep themselves in check to prevent interference from the dragons.

Nix biology

Though they lack the fantastical features of their counterparts, there is beauty in simplicity. Rare genetic mutations can give this race additional eyes or even visible auras.

Additional info

Since nixes lack any interesting features, they're seen as boring, tasteless individuals, which is far from the truth.

They're secretive and selective on who they let into the Underground, and fewer ever get to see the capitol city.

The nation is built on a sense of community, and secrets rarely stay hidden for long.

A lot of nixes travel the continents of Cor Meum in hopes of finding wealth elsewhere, and it isn't uncommon to find a travelling Nix merchant setting up shop in the streets in a completely different continent than their own.

Hybrids

Opinions on hybrids vary from kingdom to kingdom. In Sahar, Lux, Sirocco, and Nihil, hybrids are frowned upon or at the very least judged, but in Alam, Hariq, and Ngaru, it's not as much of a big deal. Still, most hybrids are vagabonds, finding their place elsewhere, outside the binary kingdoms.

There is a rumor floating around that off the shore of the Wai Peninsula is a floating isle that is a safe haven for hybrids and wayward beings of the like, conducted by a longma with strange abilities and a gun-slinging nix. They're referred to as the Devil's Duo. Urban legend says that they're a pair of adopted siblings who took control of a ship that once hauled kidnapped sphinxes to slavery. Now, they recruit runaways and misfits, looting and raiding unsuspecting ships, whether they be in the water or the air. This group of misfits is called the Vindicators. The Duo's true names are unknown to all but this group.

Sphinxes

The Sphinxes are felines about the size of an Earth horse, with wings and talons like birds. They naturally belong to one of twelve clans, and usually communicate in a series of both feline and bird-like sounds(such as, but not limited to: chirps, hisses, meowing, cawing, roars, etc). This language is referred to as Dimali colloquially amongst the Sphinxes.

The Sa Clan

The vast desert sand dunes are occupied by the Sa, the smallest of all the clans. The Sa sphinxes closely resemble sand cats, but with a more slim face. They have longer fur that sprouts between their toes to protect their feet from the hot surface sand. Sa culture surrounds on how precious water is, treating water wells as sacred locations. The Sa worship snake spirits, and have elaborate hunting rituals for the rare giant serpents of the Sear.

The Ri Clan

The Ri are a very reclusive clan, preferring to hide deep in their forests surrounded by ancient trees and spirits. They are typically much smaller than the average sphinx, and display dark colors with rich reds on their fur. They have small, "kitten-like" faces with mildly fluffy tails. The Ri are adept with magic, often hoarding their secrets from outsiders. It is said that they have a close connection with the lungs, which is where they derive their magical knowledge.

The Tas Clan

The Tas live in the tropical rainforests of the Wai peninsula. They're the most colorful and vibrant of the sphinxes, with an endless range of fur colors and patterns. Their wings are similar to cockatoos. These sphinxes have a special fondness for feather and fur dyes, and can produce every conceivable color(including UV reactive and glowing dyes).

The Fa Clan

They occupy Ledas, the snow covered isle to the north of Cor Meum. This clan is nomadic, wandering their large territory to hunt and sustain themselves. They're the only sphinxes that hunt whales, more specifically the ivory B'Eshuul whales. These sphinxes have long, white fur and are similar to Norwegian Forest cats. They are so similar physiologically to their slightly southern neighbors, the Noh, that they might be considered a subgroup of them.

The Noh Clan

To the southern part of the Ledas are the vast pine forests, the home of the Noh Clan. Like the Fa, they have long fur and resemble Norwegian Forest cats, only their fur is more darkly colored. Both are also large, tough, and cold-resistant. With dark colors, keen instincts, and incredible strength, they make excellent hunters and warriors.

The Wen Clan

The sphinxes of the Wen occupy an island southwest of Cor Meum dominated by ancient red trees and volcanic activity. While they tend to be more disconnected from the other clans, it's not entirely by choice. There are many rumors about the Wen that make even dragons fear them. From their close connection to volcanism, to the idea they are spirit possessed, or possibly immortal. Tall and graceful, the sphinxes of this clan bear pale fur and sleek, noble eyes. They also have unique feather arrangements and tufted ears, which adds to their exotic profile. They have a knack for creating delicate and beautifully crafted jewelry and adornments.

The Fen Clan

The Fen sphinxes occupy the coastal cliffs of the Vjetar plateau and the islands surrounding it. Characterized by their bright orange colorization, they are shipbuilders and explorers. Having mastered the art of navigation, they bring goods and news from distant islands that are untouched by any of the four Beings. Sphinxes of Fen have more narrow, elongated wings similar to seabirds. This clan has close ties to the Noc, who have provided star charts to them for generations.

The Noc Clan

The Noc are loosely based in the mountains around the continent, mostly nomadic and nocturnal. The sphinxes of this clan are very owl-like, with large eyes and wings built for stealth. They are known to be great astronomers. They are often traders of secrets and information.

The Pel Clan

The clan of Pel occupy a large swath of land between the Sear and Taiao. Tricksters at heart, they are fond of poisons, venoms, and weaving. Mythology for the Pel surrounds storms and lightning, and the most impressive thunderstorms can be found in their territory. Though they're tricksters at heart, their elixirs are mainly used for medicine crafting. They are excellent runners for their species as well, mastering the art of long distance travel.

The Ku Clan

The Ku Clan make their homes in the northernmost point in the Sear, and their territory is a mix between red canyons and pine forests. They tend towards a rusty red color in the canyons, but to the north their coat coloring is grey and ticked. The typical Ku home is an elaborate, carved out chamber in the canyon walls, often with multiple chambers. After many generations of the practice, masonry and stonework are common skills. The Ku territory is rich with salt deposits, which is mined and sold to generate some of the greatest wealth amongst all the sphinx clans of the continents.

The Mal Clan

The sphinxes of Mal inhabit the dense mangrove and marshes between Wai and Taiao. They're the largest clan next to the Fa and Noh, with short fur in different shades of brown, and large, webbed wings. These sphinxes have the unusual ability to breathe underwater, and have developed fins on their topline, webbed talons, and a fish-like tail. Even though they're big clunky, these fins make them surprisingly aerodynamic, making them some of the best fliers amongst the sphinxes. They worship fish and water serpent spirits, and have a deep connection to the winged snakes of the swamps called amphipteres.

The Lin Clan

A mysterious, secretive clan who dwells in perpetual darkness beneath the surface of Cor Meum. They are very much bat-like, with large, beady eyes, huge ears, and bat-like wings that have finger-like appendages at the top to help them grip the cave walls. Their patron spirit is the Iron Root Spirit, also called the Mirror Tree. On the surface, it looks like a normal tree, but its roots take form to grow another tree seemingly growing from the cavern ceiling. Stories say that it talks to all of those able to listen, and will sometimes bestow the iron legs of their ancestor, Diersha. Rumored to be extinct, the Lin Clan spends their days mining and crafting prosthetics, unbothered by the world above… and blissfully ignorant of its current state.

Enslaved Sphinxes

Sphinxes that are owned by dragon nobility. Most are born into slavery, while others are clan sphinxes kidnapped by slave traders. Those who are born into slavery do not typically have any specific features to any one clan, but rather a cluster of hybrids of sick, selective "breeding" over generations. Many have grown accustomed to this life, and keep their heads low in order to survive. The existence of these slaves are exactly the reason why most sphinx clans keep far away from the other Beings.

#she's finally done @~@#Joka #Joka story #worldbuilding #fantasy world #xeno-hiraeth #mageia #dragons #lungs #sphinxes #racism tw #classism tw #colonization tw #genocide tw #slavery tw

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mostlysignssomeportents · 5 years ago

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The far right is dominating the information wars through "keyword signaling"

It's an old story: someone searches Google for a common keyword -- "jews," "women," "black people" -- and gets back a bunch of far-right conspiracist/genocidal garbage; Google gets embarrassed, twiddles some search-weighting knobs, and the results change.

This is a problem, if you're a dark search-engine optimizer trying to hasten the end-times race-war. You put all this effort into link-farming and other sleazy tactics, only to have your work wiped out at the stroke of a keyboard.

But there's a more enduring way to dominate the information landscape: "keyword signaling." That's when you dream up a conspiratorial term that no one else is using (think: "crisis actor") and then totally own the information space around that term, so that anyone who searches on it finds your confirming information. Then you get your media-political machine to spread the term around -- say, by getting Devin Nunes or Sean Hannity to talk it up -- and the potential supporters for your conspiracy who are downstream of their rhetoric search for the term and only find information that bolsters their case. In the absence of disconfirming information, their theories seem credible. And since the "reality-based community" isn't bothering to search on these nonsense terms, they rarely, if ever, generate the kind of PR crisis that will prompt Google to put its thumb on the search-results scales to change the kinds of results those terms generate.

The far right is locked in an information-domination Cold War with the big platforms. From Boris Johnson's tactical use of nonsense to push down unflattering search results to gaming the refs at Facebook, the right understands that making their fringe ideology seem central requires the successful domination of the information sphere. After all, people who believe that the vast majority of the world deserve to be subjugated are always going to be in a minority (by definition!), so you need a lot of sock puppets to complement your network of dark-money thinktanks and blitzvertising to make yourself seem numerous enough to be relevant.

Francesca Tripodi form Data & Society studies the use of keyword signaling by the right, and has published the definitive research on the subject.

In a Wired op-ed, Tripodi shows how current events are being shaped by this simple tactic, whose practitioners are firmly entrenched in right wing media, Congress, the Senate and the White House itself.

https://boingboing.net/2019/10/15/one-weird-trick.html

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96thdayofrage · 3 years ago

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The Black Wall Around Barack Obama: Who Does It Protect Him Against?

When we build a black wall around Barack Obama, we are only protecting him from accountability to us.

The presumption that Barack Obama, no matter what he does or doesn't do, enjoys nearly unanimous black support is a veritable wall around the president. But who does it protect him against? Republicans? Banksters? Tea partyers, warmongers, torturers? Or does it protect him against black people and the left, his supposed base?

It was the summer of 2007, and I was in the study of a prominent black Atlanta pastor. The conversation turned, as did so many that season to the coming presidential election, still a good 16 months away. “We've got to unite and build a wall, a solid black wall around Brother Obama,” the reverend declared.

I tried to ask whether one man's career was really more important than the needs of forty million black people, what obligations candidate Obama would owe the black community, and how we might ensure these were fulfilled. But the pastor wasn't hearing any of this. All the obligations, in his view, seemed to flow from the bottom up, while the power flowed from the top down. It's never easy to stop a preacher on a roll.

“If we can build that solid black wall,” he continued, “if we can unite black people behind Brother Obama, he will have the power to do anything he wants to do. Can't you see it?” he asked. “If we do that, nothing any of his opponents say or do will be able to touch him.” Almost four years later, it looks like black America's legacy leadership are still following the pastor's playbook.

The black political wall around Barack Obama is a reality, and one of the president's most powerful political assets. It trades upon African America's historic credibility as a people of struggle, the people who produced Nat Turner and Ida B. Wells, Charles Hamilton Houston, Kwame Toure and Martin Luther King and many, many others.

White liberals and progressives often tend to follow the lead of black America, whether right or wrong. You want to know what you should do? The president's black and black people are supporting him? What else do you need to know? But who is inside that wall, and who is outside? Who does the black wall the Atlanta preacher described protect Barack Obama against?

The black wall around Barack Obama doesn't protect him from the war makers and war criminals of the bipartisan military industrial complex.

From the beginning, the architects of the Bush-Cheney policies of torture and unjust war have been on the inside of Barack Obama's wall, not outside it. With U.S. troops in 144 countries, the most powerful person in government outside the White House is the Secretary of Defense. Obama was the first president in U.S. history to keep a Secretary of War (the office's pre-1948 name) from the other party. He ran promising to expand the military, to escalate the war in Afghanistan, crack down on the Palestinians, continue the provocations and threats toward Venezuela, Cuba, Iran and so forth, and to close Guantanamo and end illegal torture.

In office Obama kept Guantanamo and the network of global secret prisons remain open. He “legalized” torture, declined to prosecute Bush-Cheney crimes. This president has kept all his warlike promises, breaking only his peaceful pledges. The president has viciously prosecuted whistle blowers, like those who leaked video of U.S. troops gunning down innocent civilians in Iraq.

The black wall around Barack Obama protects the president, but it protects the war machine too. But while black America remains the most antiwar section of the U.S. polity, black critics of the imperial wars are not heard. They are on the outside of Obama's black wall.

Don't criticize the dear leader too loudly, they are told, lest you weaken him. Look--- over there --- it's President Michelle Bachman!

The black wall around Barack Obama doesn't protect him from greedy Wall Street banksters and corporate thugs.

Like the war makers, the banksters were inside the Barack's wall long before the inauguration, even before the election. When George Bush couldn't pass his own bailout bill through Congress, he had to summon Barack Obama to D.C. Obama halted his campaign for a week or two and lined up Democrats to vote for the Bush bailout. Without their votes, it could not have passed. Once in office, Obama doubled down on the bailout, doling out more than $21 trillion to his benefactors thus far.

Homes are the principal assets of most who have them. The continuing wave of foreclosures, disproportionately affecting black families, is the most serious raid on black wealth in decades, widening the already vast wealth gap between blacks and whites.

The black wall around Barack Obama protects the president, and the banksters with him. Those opposed to the foreclosures, who want to rein in and prosecute Wall Street predators, who organize against foreclosures find themselves outside Barack Obama's black wall, not inside it. ACORN registered voters to elect this president. But Obama stood by and watched them falsely accused, smeared and broken.

Look --- over there! It's the Tea Party! Circle the wagons, get back in line!

The black wall around Barack Obama doesn't protect him against the forces aiming to privatize public education

From the beginning President Obama has been an enthusiastic supporter of efforts to blame and defame public school teachers, and to charterize and privatize public education. As Chicago Schools CEO his infamous Secretary of Education fired hundreds of dedicated, qualified Chicago teachers in order to replace their schools with charters. Obama has taken Duncan's failed Chicago policies national, firing for example, a whole school district of teachers in Providence, Rhode Island. Obama's Race To The Top forces states to reorganize public education to suit the dictates of the Gates, Broad and Walton Family Foundations, the private sector actors who gave birth to the charter school industry, which is firmly inside Barack Obama's black wall.

This week the president is scheduled to make his first public appearance since announcing his re-election campaign at the national convention of Al Sharpton's National Action Network, along with Arne Duncan. Together with Newt Gingrich, Duncan and Sharpton have been campaigning for charters and school privatization nationwide for the last two years. Gingrich, Duncan and Sharpton, the three stooges of corporate school reform are firmly inside Barack Obama's black wall, along with their foundation benefactors. Public school teachers and the communities they server are as usual, on the outside, but required to man the barricades for Obama's re-election.

Watch out! It's Mike Huckabee and Mitch Romney! You don't want that to happen, do you?

The black wall around Barack Obama doesn't protect him against Republican-led assaults on democratic rights.

Restrictive voter-ID laws are proliferating in Republican-led legislatures across the country with the clear intent of reducing the number of student and minority voters. Perhaps the first was in Georgia, where the Voting Rights Act gives the US Justice Department authority to block any changes in election law that disproportionately affect blacks. The wave of disenfranchisement could have been prevented. But black legacy leadership didn't pressure the Obama administration, and the Department of Justice didn't lift a finger.

The traditional black leadership are so bankrupt that when right wing propagandist Andrew Breitbart smeared Shirley Sherrod, a local human rights activist of 45 years standing, even the NAACP, who doubtless knew her history, rushed endorsed the calumny. Shirley Sherrod, along with millions of black, brown and young voters are on the outside of Barack Obama's wall.

Republican governors and legislatures in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Indiana have passed ambitious efforts to end public sector unions, ban union political contributions. Michigan passed a measure that would let governors overrule or dissolve school boards and local governments by declaring a “fiscal emergency” and appointing an individual or corporation to rule in their place.

But the fiscal hawks are inside Barack Obamas wall, not outside it. The president himself promotes the fictions that “national debt is like family debt” and that cuts in wages, benefits, Medicare, Medicaid and social security are the solution to his fictitious problem.

Unions are outside Barack Obama's black wall too, although he gratefully accepts their campaign contributions, and allows their leaders to sit on commissions and meet with him from time to time. Union leaders invited the president to come to Madison, Wisconsin during the face-off with the legislature. Fortunately, he declined. They invited the vice-president. He demurred. They invited the Secretary of Labor. No way. Here again, the president's freeze on the pay and rights of federal workers set the stage for Republican moves to take it one step further.

Look --- over there! It's President Sarah Palin! Can you live with that? Shut up and drink your kool-aid.

In every case, the black wall around Barack Obama protects him not from Tea Partyers and Republican foes, whom he is anxious to meet more than half way. The black wall around Barack Obama protects him from accountability to black people, to his supposed base.

Increasingly we can expect the White House and its allies will demand that all grassroots political agitation and organizing not explicitly connected with turning out the vote for the president and his party cease. That's been the traditional pattern. Antiwar movements, housing and human rights work, all of it folds in even numbered years, as activists allow all their efforts to be diverted into electing Democrats.

As 2012 looms, the black wall around Obama remains a crucial asset. It's why his first campaign appearance will be on the arm of Al Sharpton. The pressure will be on to circle the wagons again, to build the wall higher. As the pastor predicted, the black wall around Barack Obama wall insulates the president against his foes, not from the right, but from the left. It protects the president not against the Pentagon, the banksters, the corporate thugs, the privatizers and the Republicans, all of whom he seems to get along with just fine --- but against us. It makes him democracy-proof and people-proof. It protects him against his own supposed base.

It's time for black America to answer the questions the Atlanta pastor wouldn't. What's more important? Stopping the foreclosures, ending war and mass incarceration, reining in the banks and corporadoes, saving the public education and the environment, creating jobs and doing justice? Or protecting and prolonging the career of one man, a man who doesn't protect us?

Bruce A. Dixon is managing editor at Black Agenda Report, and based in Marietta GA, where he serves on the state committee of the Georgia Green Party.

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