#who was also vocal on social justice issues

[scorpion-flower]

I know it's the bare minimum at this point, but for what is worth, I am glad Annie Lennox shouted in favour of a ceasefire in such a big event, such as the Grammys.

[beguines]

As neoliberalism has infected higher education, research on "mental health issues" in the academy has become increasingly conservative. My own subject area, sociology, is as guilty as any other. We have lost sight of what it means to think critically about the mental health system, to be able to challenge the work of the psy-professions, to interrogate meaningfully the production of knowledge claims on "mental disease," and to adequately contextualise the expansion of the psychiatric discourse with reference to theoretical sets of ideas which refer to labelling, power, and social control. We have effectively become pseudo-social psychologists whose research agenda is passed down to us by state agencies, requiring us to do little more than identify marginalised groups who can be labelled and policed by the psychiatric authorities and the criminal justice system. Having a once proud tradition of highlighting the systematic, oppressive practices of the mental health system, the sociology of mental health is now in severe danger of simply becoming another arm of the state. Far too much of what passes for "research" in the discipline is flawed from the beginning: it takes for granted that the mental health system is a fundamentally caring, scientifically sound discipline; it accepts mental illness diagnoses as valid and having a proved aetiology; and the empirical lens is focused outward on "undetected" pathologies in the general population rather than inward on the pathological behaviour of the institution of psychiatry and its allies. The result is that we end up with sociological research and scholarship which perpetuates the myths of psychiatric knowledge and aids the expansion of psychiatric hegemony (how many times have we read at the conclusion of such articles and books that there is a gap—an "unmet need"—in current mental health provision for which further resources and staffing is required?).

Thus, we need to resist the top-down state-run agenda and reject funding streams that tie us into conservative, surveillance-focused projects. We also need to be vocal in challenging the scholars who take on such projects and reproduce the same old nonsense on mental illness prevalence which reinforces the hegemonic view of black, female, young, LGBT, working class, and other marginalised populations as pathological. As always, sociological investigation needs to focus on the powerful rather than the powerless. This requires the revitalisation of a truly critical research agenda for the sociology of mental health in which the operations and practices of the psy-professions and their production of knowledge claims are prioritised. Research would then focus on the politics of diagnostic construction and professional power, on how psy-professionals turn subjective, personal understandings of human beings into categories of pathology, on the inner workings of the mental health system, on the conflicts and alliances made internally and externally to these professions, and on their constant need to justify mental health practice as medically and scientifically relevant.

Bruce M.Z. Cohen, Psychiatric Hegemony: A Marxist Theory of Mental Illness

[hotvintagepoll]

Gregory Peck is not only a certified hunk of a man but a great actor and a genuinely good person.

He starred in the film version of the novel Gentleman’s Agreement which was “Hollywood’s first major attack on anti-semitism” which features Peck as a magazine writer who pretends to be Jewish so he can experience personally the hostility of bigots and then calls out and exposes antisemitism and this film was made in 1947 like only two years after the end of World War II so historically an important film(I love this film and think its underated like its great and like Greg looks amazing as he rails against bigots). I could make an argument, and I have honeslty thought about writing a paper on it, that a majority of his films tackle some important issue whether it be antisemitism (Gentleman’s Agreement), racism (To Kill a Monckingbird), nuclear war (On the Beach), post-war discontent and PTSD (The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit), the futility of war (Pork Chop Hill) etc.

His daughter Cecilia said “ My father was a champion of stories that needed to be told, like To Kill a Mockingbird, Gentleman’s Agreement, and On the Beach. He was not afraid of films that championed diversity, equality, and tolerance. He was deeply intelligent, and also very funny in real life.”

He was against the House Un-American Activities Committee and their investigation of “alleged communists” in the film industry and signed a letter deploring their actions in 1947. He was outspoken against the Vietnam War, while at the same time supportive of his son who was fighting there. He produced the film version of the play The Trial of the Catonsville Nine about the prosecution of a group of Vietnam protestors for civil disobedience. Peck said “I decided to make the film because the play confirmed my thinking that the Vietnam War [was] an abomination.” His outspoken-ness against the Vietnam war and general political activism put him on Nixon’s “enemies list” (honestly what an icon).

He was a vocal supporter of a worldwide ban on nuclear weapons and was a lifelong advocate for gun control.

He and his wife Veronique often hosted dinners at their home in support of the arts and humanitatian or social justice causes. His daughter

He was Catholic but took a pro-choice stance on abortion and supported gay rights.

He was the president of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (1967-1970) and postponed the awards following the assasination of MLK.

He was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 for his lifetime humanitarian efforts and he also won the Jean Hersolt Humanitarian Award.

He didnt just play the handsome hero on the big screen he was one in real life.

Now some photos of him looking good:

Gregory Peck vs Paul Robeson

[copperpipes]

Someone sent an ask about green and black beetles and it got me thinking about DC's Martians' designs because of how I designed blue beetle and the fact that green beetle is martian. So I redesigned martians :]

I have lots of beef with american alien concepts (xenomorph too but less for various reasons) especially intelligent alien species' designs. Yes, i understand the audience needs to empathize with our alien heroes, Cameron, but then they stop being alien. Aliens don't need to be appealing visually, psychologically or socially to us at all, if you are intending to write them seriously.

But of course, all this applies only if you want your writing and design to be realistic or close to reality.

I have several noted points about DC's Martians I'd like to question and or correct in my design, I'll be going off of young justice's martian designs because those are the least human canon designs of them and the most interesting ones. (They can mostly be seen at the beginning of season 4 of YJ) here's the green beetle without the suit and miss martian for reference:

In the show martians are shown to not only have a variety in color but also body type (in some places) which is rare even in an animated show with just humans so big kudos for the animators on that, big fan.

AND martians have webbing between their fingers, arms and torso in this design which could point that they were a water dwelling species in the far past, so also a very big fan of that.

To the redesign:

I had a few ideas.

First I got rid of the teeth on the outside and turned them into a beak because that would be the same thing. Proportionally they are also quite different from the original.

I have some issues with martian abilities. The density shifting is ridiculous (leave it to the ghosts who can bend reality) flying would be unnecessary with the gravity on Mars, there shouldn't be a reason why they could do that. Telekinesis too, for what? What would be its purpose? For survival? They would have found a way without it and otherwise it is physically impossible. *huff*

But some are forgivable, like shape shifting and camouflage if you don't have bones which i solved and telepathy which could just be a very specific frequency only they could emit and hear, that could be adjusted depending on who they were speaking with (with the reading thoughts bit just make them loose the ability to lie, problem solved.) Of course that would also mean their vocal cords wouldn't be made for human speech, but that technology can solve.

The weakness to fire could just be because Mars is also a lot colder then earth.

Our biochemistry should be similar enough tho, carbon based n' all. @wazzappp i thought maybe you would want to see this :>

[peaches2217]

Having been raised in a cult that started off as a legitimate church and now seeking faith on my own terms, I’ve recently (as in, like, three days ago) developed a hyperfixation for researching various denominations of Christianity. It’s incredible, how little I knew about what denominations actually believe what.

TW: Reflections on religious extremism and experiences (nothing traumatic, I’m keeping this lighthearted, but I know it can be touchy!)

When my cult was still a church, it was an Assemblies of God church, and I’m fairly certain they still hold to a lot of that doctrine, just with even more heaping helpings of fire and brimstone and doomsday. We were taught to jokingly view Southern Baptists (or just “Baptists,” because they refused to acknowledge American Baptists and I didn’t even realize American Baptism was a THING until recently) as our rivals: they were our polar opposite in practice but equals in theology, and all other denominations just couldn’t get it right or were too scared to break free from Catholicism. We were told Catholics and those who worshiped and believed like them weren’t true Christians and destined for Hell. There was no interdenominational unity and collaboration, nor was there any encouragement to look at other denominations’ doctrine. Ours was right, the Baptists were close enough, and nothing else held any sort of merit.

(I’m pretty sure now they’ve even cut out the Baptist sympathetics, and while it’s become wholly self-contained, they’re still accepted as an AoG church — albeit a more extreme example of the denomination — but I can’t say any of that with certainty. I’d ask my dad but, well, he’s still wholly devoted to the cult, I don’t trust him to be objective in his view. 😅)

I briefly attended an Episcopal church before I moved last year, mostly because it was the polar oppose of what I was raised in and there was something very comforting about that (plus they’re openly supportive of things like LGBTQ+ rights), but ultimately my dad and FB friends kinda shamed me out of attending because “There’s no blessing in structure, sis!”. My hope was to start going to the Episcopal church here where I currently live, but when I showed up last week, there were exactly two people and they gave me rather dirty looks, so I quickly high-tailed it back to my car.

I ended up at a Methodist church because I was running behind and theirs was the only non-Baptist service that hadn’t started yet, and… I dunno. They had some trappings of my birth cult, sang some of the same songs, but there was also a structure to things like I’d seen in the Episcopal church. No hour-long praise and worship where you make a show of screaming and crying harder than anyone else, followed by an hour-long sermon that leads into another two-hour stretch of loud music and light shows and shouldaboughtahyundai steadIboughtakias until everyone was either unconscious or in a state of religious ecstasy; there was an order to things, with opportunities to take time in private prayer at the alter or at your seat, and the sermon was heartfelt and impactful but never once delved into the pastor screaming frantically into the mic. I followed their website to the official doctrine of the United Methodist denomination, and I was shocked to find that I agreed with most of it.

And that shocked me because, due to their notoriously liberal stances and heavy Catholic influence, my dad and those around me always told me that the Episcopal church isn’t really respectable. Most of them, however, consider Methodism a perfectly legitimate denomination that gets enough right to be deemed a proper church… and their doctrine isn’t much more conservative than Episcopalian doctrine. They have no formal stance on queer issues (which I’ll take over “Y’all are going to Hell” any day) but they’re vocal proponents of social justice and sexual education, both things I was taught growing up are evil.

And that’s the long-winded explanation of how I got to where I am now: digging deep into what each denomination actually believes, because I knew my viewpoint was limited by experience and further restrained by indoctrination and trauma, but holy fuck, I didn’t realize just how crazy my cult’s beliefs were until I started comparing all the doctrine. Of course doctrine isn’t everything, I know that, but the more I read, the more and more I realize that the faith I was raised in wasn’t all that Christlike after all.

A side note: my boss let me take half a day off on Sunday to go back to that church. The pastor’s husband came up and greeted me, told me his wife had mentioned meeting me, asked me a couple questions, standard New Person in Church-type stuff. I got about two questions in before I was shaking visibly and so scared I went briefly nonverbal, because for how kindly I’ve been treated and how strong my faith is, I’ve still got hella religious trauma. I alluded to being raised in church and had my trans and enby pride bracelets on, along with my bigender symbol necklace, so I’m pretty sure he could infer exactly why I was so scared.

He clasped my hand and said, in a quiet voice with a little smile, “You’re safe here. This is a safe place. We’re so glad you’re here.” I couldn’t say anything except thank you, but I hope it was enough to express just how deeply those words impacted me.

[number1blueoakfan]

red from pokemon is autistic

this isnt a new thing i js like psychoanalyzing him ok.

Red, in both the games and manga, show traits of ASD, or Autism spectrum disorder, or just Autism. In the games, it is much easier to spot, however.

1; Speech

In the games, he is completely nonverbal, with the exception of a few times where Red is shown to speak. (Copycat, Masters EX, etc) Masters EX timeline is… Confusing, though in the games, he only speaks once. (Copycat) In the manga, he is shown to speak a lot, though it is harder to see it as autism, it is a spectrum disorder, and one side of the spectrum is never being quiet/having trouble being quiet.

2; Special interests

In the games AND manga, Red very obviously has a special interest in pokemon, given he has caught every type in Kanto and completed the pokedex, he is very intent and interested in pokemon battles, and overall, that's just his major special interest.

3; Sensory issues

Though we don't see much explicit proof of this, I believe that Red has fabric related sensory issues. The reason being, he doesn't change his clothing at all until Masters EX and generation 7, excluding the original red and blue games. In fire red/leaf green, he is 11, in gold/silver/crystal, he is 14. In the pokemon world tournament, he is 19. Why do I mention this? Well, that's because Red wears the exact same outfit for 8 whole years, as opposed to Blue, who changes his outfit throughout the series. A lot, if not all autistic people struggle with fabric related sensory issues, and struggle to find clothing they like the texture of, which causes them to wear the same clothes over and over again.

4; repetition/patterns

Pokemon battles, in my opinion, especially pokemon type advantages and disadvantages, deal with pattern recognition. This is a trait of autism, which leads me to believe, with Red's special interest in pokemon and battling, he has some form of pattern recognition when it comes to typing of pokemon.

In the manga, he is also shown to repeat movements, pick up on phrases a few times, etc, which can count for repetition. The phrases can also count for echolalia in a sense, a common thing with autism. This can also apply to the copycat thing.

5; Stimming/Stimulation

For Red, this is a difficult thing to see. Since in most of his appearances, the sprites don't move, or do not move much, it's hard to decide if he is shown to stim. It's also hard, given he cannot vocal stim, since he is non-verbal. (Games) This is where the manga comes into play, since the manga is more expressive, since that is the point of the manga. To show scenes in more detail. In the manga, he is shown to flail his arms when he's frustrated, (entering saffron city, etc) repeat phrases, which ties into echolalia, etc. Also, in the games, he is shown to have little/no facial expressions.

I feel like him disappearing on Mt. Silver was because he was so overwhelmed and overstimulated all the time with being champion- And thus, ran away with little/no explanation.

6; Over or under empathetic?

Red is shown to be very empathetic towards pokemon, a few people, and that's it. In the manga, however, he is shown to be both overly empathetic and under-empathetic. While he is not super emotional, he still is a bit emotional in the manga. Tying into this, autistic people have a very strong sense of justice. This is shown in both the games and the manga, given team rocket.

7; high or low functioning?

Red is obviously a very high functioning character. He is intelligent, and strategic, given he enjoys pokemon battles.

8; Social

I feel like he was isolated for displaying autistic traits as a kid, hence why Blue(m) was (presumably) his only friend. Also, the scene in the manga where he calls Misty an idiot and gets confused on why she's upset- Peak bluntness, chat. (A trait of autism) He's very blunt and straightforward throughout the manga, as well.

9; overall overview– Is this character autistic?

Very obviously, yes! Red is autistic. He checks out a lot of the boxes, and definitely shows signs of ASD, the most prominent ones being him being non-verbal, his pokemon special interest, and the whole sensory issue thing.

EDIT: also the fact satoshi (THE CREATOR OF POKEMON) is autistic and i believe has stated that red and i believe ash were based off him. quirks brow

[ngdrb]

Kamala Harris' Rise to Prominence and

Political Vision

Background and Achievements

Kamala Harris is the current Vice President of the United States, making history as the first woman, first Black American, and first South Asian American to hold the position. Her rise to prominence is marked by a series of notable achievements throughout her career in public service.

Harris was born in Oakland, California, to immigrant parents from India and Jamaica. After earning her law degree from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law, she began her career as a prosecutor in the Alameda County District Attorney's Office. She later served as the District Attorney of San Francisco from 2004 to 2011, and as the Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017.

In 2016, Harris was elected to the United States Senate, becoming the second African American woman and the first South Asian American to serve in the Senate. During her tenure, she gained recognition for her work on issues such as healthcare reform, immigration reform, and criminal justice reform.

Political Vision and Proposed Policies

Kamala Harris' political vision revolves around promoting equality, justice, and opportunity for all Americans. Her proposed policies aim to address various critical issues facing the nation, including:

Women's Rights: Harris has been a vocal advocate for protecting and advancing women's rights, including reproductive rights and equal pay for equal work. She has pledged to fight against any efforts to roll back progress made in these areas.

Healthcare Reform: Harris has supported efforts to expand access to affordable healthcare, including protecting and strengthening the Affordable Care Act (ACA). She has also proposed measures to lower prescription drug costs and improve mental health services.

Climate Change: Harris recognizes the urgent need to address climate change and has proposed a comprehensive plan to transition the United States to a clean energy economy, including investing in renewable energy sources and promoting sustainable practices.

Immigration Reform: Harris supports comprehensive immigration reform that provides a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants and addresses the root causes of migration, such as violence, poverty, and corruption in countries of origin.

Criminal Justice Reform: As a former prosecutor, Harris has advocated for reforms to the criminal justice system, including addressing racial disparities, reducing mass incarceration, and promoting rehabilitation and re-entry programs for formerly incarcerated individuals.

Potential Impact and Challenges

Kamala Harris' political vision and proposed policies have the potential to shape a more equitable and inclusive future for the United States. However, she may face significant challenges in implementing her agenda, particularly in a divided political landscape.

One of the key challenges Harris may face is navigating the complex relationship between the executive and legislative branches of government. Enacting significant policy changes often requires cooperation and compromise across party lines, which can be difficult to achieve in a polarized political environment.

Additionally, Harris' progressive policies may face opposition from more conservative factions who prioritize traditional values or have different economic and social priorities. Overcoming ideological divisions and building consensus on contentious issues will be crucial for the success of her agenda.

Despite these challenges, Harris' experience, determination, and commitment to her principles position her as a formidable figure in shaping the future direction of the United States. Her ability to inspire and unite diverse constituencies, coupled with her pragmatic approach to policymaking, could prove invaluable in navigating the complexities of the American political landscape.

[readyforevolution]

One day in the future, there will be a place named the United States of Africa Federation. It will be a vast territory comprised of many countries. The leaders will convene and decide to unite the region to make it stronger, thus creating a federation.

In the United States of Africa Federation, there will be one prominent leader known as the President. The President will be the leader who will make all the significant decisions. However, the President will not be a dictator. The President will be elected by all the people within the United States of Africa Federation.

They will also have a single currency for all the countries - no more kwachas, nairas, or rand - just one significant currency called the Afri-dollar, making trading and other activities easier. Additionally, they will have one massive army known as the African Defence Force to protect the entire federation from bad actors and keep everyone safe.

The United States of Africa Federation will not be perfect. There will be complex issues to address. The Federation will have to figure out how to share resources and help all the people in need.

Overall, people will work together to create a better future for Africa. They will make Africa strong and proud. It will be a place where everyone will be equal and will respect one another.

This concludes the story of the United States of Africa Federation, prophesied by African revolutionaries who have advocated for the unity of Africa:

1. Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana): Nkrumah was a key figure in the Pan-African movement and played a crucial role in Ghana's independence from British colonial rule. He strongly advocated for African unity and was instrumental in the formation of the Organization of African Unity (OAU), now known as the African Union (AU).

2. Patrice Lumumba (Democratic Republic of Congo): Lumumba was an influential leader in the struggle for Congo's independence from Belgium. He envisioned a united Africa free from colonialism and exploitation. Unfortunately, his leadership was cut short by his assassination in 1961.

3. Julius Nyerere (Tanzania): Nyerere was the first president of Tanzania and a prominent advocate for African unity. He believed in socialism and played a crucial role in the formation of the OAU. Nyerere actively supported liberation movements across Africa and worked towards economic and political integration.

4. Amílcar Cabral (Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde): Cabral was a revolutionary leader and the founder of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC). He fought against Portuguese colonial rule and championed the idea of a united Africa. Cabral's ideas on liberation and African unity continue to inspire many.

5. Thomas Sankara (Burkina Faso): Sankara, often referred to as "Africa's Che Guevara," was the president of Burkina Faso. He advocated for self-reliance, social justice, and pan-Africanism. Sankara pushed for economic independence and called for African countries to break free from the shackles of neocolonialism.

6. Samora Machel (Mozambique): Machel was the first president of an independent Mozambique. He was a staunch supporter of African liberation movements and a vocal advocate for African unity. Machel emphasized the importance of self-determination and worked towards regional integration in Southern Africa.

7. Jomo Kenyatta (Kenya): Kenyatta played a crucial role in Kenya's struggle for independence and became the country's first president. While focusing on building a strong and independent Kenya, he also emphasized the importance of African unity and cooperation.

[stuffforthestash]

Modern Academic AU pt3

All this because I couldn't stop thinking about what kinds of classes Professor Raphael would teach... He's laughing up at me from hell, I just know it.

part 1 and part 2

------------------------------

Kagha (by request!) - Environmental Science. Will only teach courses about political lobbying and activism. She's also a militant vegan and active member of PETA, and won't shut up about it.

Dammon - College of Engineering. Teaches "Advanced Manufacturing Processes" and "Finite Element Analysis", and runs the machining shop. Also teaches a metal sculpture class when there's room in the Art School's budget. He's one of the faculty liaisons for several LGBTQA+ orgs on campus as well, and is completely oblivious to the fact he has a fan club (which is for the best, really)

Zevlor - Campus Security. A retired Green Beret who refuses to talk about his time in the service, he's well liked by most faculty and known to be a bit of an old school charmer. LOTS of rumors and speculation about what kind of injury got him discharged, and how he got it.

Barcus - College of Engineering. He teaches classes on Thermodynamics and Process Design & Safety. Has no idea how popular and well-liked he is by both students and staff.

Wulbren - Chemical Engineering Dep't Chair. He's brilliant, but also an asshole, and is constantly trying to weasel more grant money for his research into ethically questionable chemical compound modifications. Also makes his TAs teach all his classes for him.

Lorroakan - English Dep't Chair. Thinks he's hot shit for it but really no one else wanted the job. He makes his TAs teach all his classes AND do all his admin work, so he can spend all his time (and the department's money) on schmoozing with alumni and donors.

Blurg - Environmental Science. Isn't that great of a teacher but it's required for keeping the research grants coming in. Thankfully his passion and enthusiasm for topics like Sustainability in Agriculture make up for his shortcomings.

Omeluum - They're actually Bluurg's research partner and not technically a member of faculty, though they also act as his unofficial TA because otherwise Bluurg's course work interferes with their research timelines.

Nine-Fingers Keene (by request) - School of Business. Her classes are all advanced level and titled things like "Gaining The Competitive Edge". She also runs an entrepreneurial outreach program for young women seeking to start their own businesses.

Dame Aylin - VP of Diversity and Inclusion. She's very passionate about her job and a VERY vocal advocate for social justice issues like inclusivity, diversity, and accessibility. Completely incapable of keeping her personal life separate from her professional one, as she's a devout believer in leading by example.

Isobel - School RN. Is fiercely protective of students right to medical privacy and access to judgment free care, but is much better known on campus for being Dame Aylin's wife.

The Emperor - Board of Trustees. Outwardly just an ordinary Trustee, generally pleasant to interact with and actually rather good at rubbing elbows with students, faculty, and admin alike. There's just something off about them, enough that they've had multiple audits and inquests over the years despite nobody ever being able to find any actual signs of misconduct.

------------------------------

Sorry this set took a bit longer to figure out. A bunch of these characters were a real challenge to fit into roles that actually exist in reality, and I had to do a bit of research to find out wtf kinds of classes or departments certain fields of study even have. Ah, the things we do for the blorbos, amirite?

[dailyanarchistposts]

Class is an outdated attempt at socio-economically categorizing humans within the industrial society.

Marxists, especially the former Marxists, as well as all the Left tendencies inspired by Marxism, have relied on the same-old tripartite categorization of society dating back to Aristotle, now divided into three big classes. Contemporary sociologists of the Marxist schools of sociology will be using the stats of median income to show how they’re right about it; where indeed the «middle-class» exists and it’s been going down toward poverty levels in the last few decades, where the upper group of ultra-rich just kept getting wealthier and more powerful. All of it is true, yet only within a tiny, limited aspect of the mastodon. It shows us where most people are situated in terms of income, yet not saying much about all these people located elsewhere up or down the curve. That these people aren’t actually part of any unified class, within the tripartite model of “middle/proletarian”, “poor/lumpen”, or “rich”. In reality — or I mean closer to what could be the social reality — a median in statistics only best represents where a bell curve is located within a spectrum of linear-organized data.

Having lived through years of being on the workplace, in the streets, outside of academia, will reveal that the “world” is a much more complex and especially fluid, dynamic place; not made of categories and classes, but people. Especially groupings of people, constantly organizing and plotting for power. Either to gain more or maintain their “acquired rights”.

This narrow marxist interpretation also serves another purpose than showing the social inequalities capitalism creates. It is useful for hiding or overlooking the privilege-building or consolidation of these same groups of Left-oriented middle-class intelligentsia, or petty bourgeoisie commonly found backing Center-Left parties, NGOs, trade unions or more pervasively running a vast portion of the nonprofit sector, especially the sector more politically vocal about issues of social justice. They are struggling for their own elevation through the social ladder, in conflict with who they perceive – with a level of accuracy – as those limiting their access to higher positions of power.

Same goes for the «rich». As if you’d ask me, for instance, who is the richest person/family on the planet, that’s a question no one can definitely answer. Also an equally complex question : who are the « rich »? Not only wealth is a more complex notion than just net worth, but the super-wealthy do not only deal in monetary values... they’re also using other kinds of more «hard» assets and currencies like resources, precious metals, and now big data. The super-wealthy also tend to be super-connected people. Their wealth would not be very meaningful if this wasn’t a factor of power within social networks.

The question of their might makes it even more complicated when you look at their political schemes and networks. And even among this super-rich crowd, there are factions, milieus, gangs playing Monopoly with the world’s con-o-mies. Ever since Trump went into politics, for instance, this became clear there wasn’t only one power gang in the US, that the most repulsive of these, the White supremacist Christian ultra-conservatives, was engaged in an unprecedented battle against the neoliberal establishment, the dominant gang of the last few decades. This is even true in a totalitarian rule like China, who has different factions fighting within the Party, down to occasional vendettas, in order to consolidate power. Everywhere across capitalist societies there are smaller rich of the upper middle-class, all the way up to the mega-billionaires, with differing stakes in the industry, or gradients of political entry – and positions, from the progressive Left the Rothschild family and Soros to the ultra-conservative Far Right like Murdoch and the Koch.

Hence categorizing the “rich” is always more complicated than it seems. But to me, the ultra-rich aren’t as important as they used to be as social antagonists. I know they are doing terrible things, engaged in running awful schemes that keep billions of people into misery. And they are, in all appearance, holding the reins over governments, the media, NGOs you may work for, and most businesses you might work for.

However you might notice that your local progressive resources center for the homeless is managed by rather middle-class people. This is adequate, as here we are dealing with a charity service, notoriously structured by this same-old Christian binary relationship between haves mores and lesses, or between the higher-educated and the low-educated. The moment you’ll see a homeless resource center run by the homeless, well, that’ll no longer be charity, but rather autonomy. Yet social relations keep being structured into hierarchies between castes of different levels of privilege.

Society, being itself a wide-open pyramid scheme, is thus filled with a myriad of people involved in more or less filthy games that deprive others from having the same quality of life they enjoy. When it’s not about White nuclear families raveling in their comfy private bubbles on the countryside it’ll be urban hipsters keeping nice apartments for their artsy gangs of friends. You might even notice a level of disparities — and consolidation of privilege — within the milieus of the homeless, and the prisoners. But as usual, there’s a share of good economic motives behind all this privilege-building. In big cities targeted by intense gentrification, renters are better be organizing with friends, or building networks of friends, in order to share the rents between people they know so the rents remain as low as possible. That also gives the more radical-minded the possibility for conducting rent strikes on more large scales or do other kinds of anti-eviction or anti-hike campaigns that got more effects than just isolated renters filing formal complaints. Worker coops are a way for them to avoid « falling » in the streets by having decent self-managed jobs that may also contributed to accumulating social capital. As usual, collective organizing is a powerful flagship for gaining more power.

But then again, when more power is gained, what is done with it? When peer groups create their housing and workers’ coops, or even collectively-run squats wherever they still exist, what is the place left in their world, at the end of the day, to all the lesser-empowered outsiders? To those often ending up being — yet again — at the receiving ends of privilege-building social machinations. Being “socially-awkward”, being misfits or too “triggering” makes these seemingly more horizontal, democratic, collectivist schemes as yet again exclusive to those disabled, handicapped, aged, gendered, or just not enough socially-skilled for inclusion. Because, like in the rest of society, these projects are produced through in/out-crowd dynamics, generating social exclusion as byproduct. One way or another, it goes down to be facing locked doors, walls, fences, more sleeping on the sidewalks or at best navigating through precarious rents with deranged roommates… so therefore the social hierarchy of prisons is being maintained. Of course this has to do with landlords and « bosses » owning your life by the balls (e.g. a class relationship), but how do people also not reinforce this through caste dynamics? So even when these schemes are considered to be helpful or charitable, the separation they induce — here’s a place where these late Marxists known as the Situationists got it right) is still by essence, and functionally, alienating. However there is little doubt of the good that some of these people do, despite the alienating structures they’re working in.

How does a caste system works?

Essentially, with the reproduction of identitarian cults, clans or families, and more importantly their related cultures, that allows them to relate to each other. Culture — including cultural representations — is the tie that binds them; as cultures are being used as a means to reinforce the caste’s status quo, redefine its morals, and set the boundaries for inclusion/exclusion as well as serving other control imperatives. These aren’t patterns we observe through big social categories such as classes, that only defined by their mutual economic productive activity. The caste reproduces its own systems of representations and relations, beyond its mere socio-economic activity. The former actuates the other, and provides a kind of appeal, by hype, notoriety, prestige, edge, luxury or any other sort of added social value to it. A sense of privilege, without really providing with meaning.

I’ll be elaborating more on this in an upcoming text on countercultures and normalization, but in the Western rich urban hellholes we could have witnessed over the past years a movement from parts of the punk subcultures toward hipster, more streamlined upper castes of artsy citizenry. Mainstream fashion of the trendy urban lifestyles was reinvigorated by what used to be signifiers of marginal milieus... tattoos, piercings, punky black clothing and asymetric hairstyles, even dog-herding (that for some has been replaced with having children), are all now predictable, unsurprising elements of the urban environment, found in just about any of the world’s metropolis, even outside the Western world.

This has been a way to be part of the “in crowd”, to be accepted not not only into squats, but private rented spaces, get decent jobs at trendy hot spots, and more importantly, get relationships aplenty. That’ll be controversial to say about the same of the normalization of the “LGBTQ+” as social identities, that have played the same socio-economic roles and with the same ends, even tho by themselves they represent a fourre-tout of different minority gender identities and sexual preferences rallied together as one big category, for everyone under its banner to relate to regardless of its meaning for every one’s sensibility.

The idea is not to be criticizing any of these subcultures or their values, or even to be blaming urban trends for normalizing them, but to look into how caste dynamics are functioning, thanks in great parts to the use of cultural signifiers and their related politics. Also to realize how the individual, or the person as themself, is being kept silent and invisible by these caste politics, despite all the social media celebs, who’re really not standing for — and by — themselves but literally posing on a stage through a set of prefab representations. How if you aren’t identifying as one of the recognized identities, just choosing to identify as a “yourself”, or a “person”; this becomes a void for the social management of privilege and oppression. There are no non-gender pronouns for persons, only for lifeless objects, or groups to some extent.

This is — in my view — the deepest cause behind the epidemic of mass-killings we especially got in the US. While some of these are mostly based on demented ideologies of hate against more or less specific minority groups, many of the mass-killings are often committed by disenfranchised, misfit, socially-isolated males who for a reason or another, lacking a better analysis of what’s happening to them in this world, decide to stick it up to those they see as their most direct oppressors. Namely, the social castes in their environments. And in a way, it is true that crowd/mob dynamics tend to make human groupings in general to become more oppressive while losing self-awareness as their numbers increase in a given context.

If the Left would be truly understanding the dynamics of social exclusion, oppression and privilege, how do they work, perhaps they could be helping to some level against such sprees of murderous violence that only now benefits more despotic police controls of the public place. But the Left has remained stucked, as some anarchist critiques know, in this endless spiral of outdated analysis of social and political dynamics, centered on our well-known cartoonish representations produced by Marxists. Castes are defined by a lot more than just the productive activity of their members, and equally the socio-cultural reproduction that defines them goes beyond their mere socio-economic productive roles, when they got one in common, even if we consider society as meta-factory.

The issue of how Leftists could make it better, with a better analysis is beyond me. More so, it ain’t really my own interest. Still, I find it harder to not be caring about the mass-shootings, and in fact the « not in my lawn » approach to social problems might not so easily apply here, as anyone could potentially be affected by these sudden bursts of extreme interpersonal violence.

The purpose of such a perspective on social relations around us is to not be fooled by deluded beliefs in the radicality of our « projects » or initiatives, and to look at those with a more critically realistic lens that shows their shortcomings and weaknesses, standing in the way of the total anarchy or the social revolution you might be after. As to be reproducing caste relations can intrinsically undermine any initiative aimed at equity, autonomy or free association.

As I said too often, anarchists and nihilists have a specific opportunity — often wasted — of creating a social tabula rasa, that negates both the dynamics of privilege-building by putting the deeper issues of property and capital-building into question, while also, through patterns of free-based relations, to be making the issue of «social progress», pushed for decades by the Left, to become irrelevant.

Like there’s no need for work within the industry if we choose to liberate goods instead and creating a commons around everything, where everyone can enjoy shit without the trappings and hindrances of both bureaucracy and property, from being on welfare to «buying land», we’re still being submitted and deprived from an immediate relationship with the natural world. There’s no need for affordable housing if you find a way to occupy spaces for living, and especially shared living. There’s no need for better working conditions if you abolished the need for money — in the first place — in order to have good living conditions, as especially to be able... to just make friends, lovers, accomplices or just have a good conversation with some other human, regardless where they’re from. There’s no need for these demoralizing homeless shelters if you got organized squats where everyone has at least their shot at a living-together, and from which other occupation projects may arise.

The power of negation, is one not being asserted by the liberal agency. Neither the one of supposed « radicals ». Or this false negation will be held contained within their own communal bubbles, yet never outwardly-asserted. And in fact, the Marxists have an historical tendency at postponing negation, as revolution is an evolutionary process where, first, we must build the conditions for the proles to be able to negate the State and capital... as if they had found the secret to immortality!

Therefore, like with the rest of the liberal bourgeoisie, breaking the law, seeking pleasures against the dominant morals, will be reserved for the private space, of the caste, the communal in-crowd, or the family, or on a private island. And the more harmful immoralisms (such as rape, abuse and other violences) might also break loose due to the safety bubble promised by privatized spaces, in milieus where they hardly would be allowed to happen in broad daylight.

But are these really negation, or just reconstruction of same-old patterns of appropriation and exploitation, inherited from the dominant morals? A transgression ain’t necessarily negation of an order but rather its preset contradiction, as “rules are meant to be broken”. The “anti-” principle is not an “a-” principle, or abscence of principle; it is an against not a without. Satan exists because of God. So the bank robber or cryptominer is still after making big money, only innovating in their fulfillment of the well-known capitalist imperative (unless of course they throw the money in the streets). I ain’t saying it is wrong... only that it is not negation of an order and its values, where the person takes the liberty to make their own of the latter, asserts power over their own world, making themself emperor and god over it.

Absolute negation of all orders — the questioning of everything — is what is necessary to revert the power of the totality over ourselves. Therefore we cannot truly avoid or abolish these caste relations that separate us both from each other and from ourselves — as well as the world around us — without putting their imperatives, values under the crushing mill of the cold, concrete logic of total negation.

Property is not only theft. Fundamentally “property” is just not something that exists. Your comfort zone known as your household, or friend’s commune, or mansion on top of the hill... are only a privatized space made-up by capitalism’s territorializations and reinforced by walls, doors and locks. It is only «real» as far as it is a relational construct, enforced by the threat of judicial or interpersonal violence. You cannot pretend anarchism, even less «communism» while at the same time enjoying these levels of privilege provided to you by an invisible, unavowed caste system. Well you can... of course! But that is more of the same-old Victorian hypocrisy, reinforced by equally Victorian-era ideologies pretending to oppose the dominant system. You may choose to be a conservative so to be less an hypocrite — indeed — yet the status quo of the caste system will be maintained, only more bare. My postulate, that is not so important to consider, is that 19th century classical liberalism has kept Western civilization from being a full-fledged official caste system, or at least this was delayed by a century of class-defined struggles.

Regardless. The wild, the feral, the natural domain does not know these territorializations. Or neither cares about if they know. The wild one only cares about their own sustenance, protection, pleasure and well-being. Anything else, any attempt at accommodating with any level or sphere within the caste system, means becoming more civilized, or over-civilized, as these are the mostly-intangible yet highly-recognizable walls of civilization, defined by culture above politics and economics. A vagabond can keep freeloading luxury hotels or chic cafés, in order to partly avoid the misery related to homelessness, or even hang out at student parties or exec clubs, but what will chase him off from these spheres will not be their bank account, official status or even their political allegiances; it will be their external appearance, their tenure, their speech and etiquette.. or lack thereof. As the cultural standards are what makes these social categories to be castes. Not classes. Because, to repeat, castes are culturally-defined — more than socio-economically defined — groupings.

So I am not here posturing for an anticiv purity by rejecting caste relations; but this could be useful as an ideal for a direction. Or giving rationale and analysis to a life where the radical critical thought makes you a social misfit, anyways. It can be interesting to be social hacking across the cultural layers of this garbage every caste uses to reinforce themselves, and many of us do achieve this, to different levels of effectiveness. But then again, will be driven by a will that is your own, or only reflect the desires mass-produced for the masses to follow? As for every caste there are different means and modes to attain what everyone in this society is after.

Doesn’t the wild one only contents in seeking power over their own existence? Why, otherwise, would they be seeking any larger power, if not for chasing the aims defined by the dominant power dynamics? For having the privileges they envy so much from any of the castes above them, or for « ruling in Hell, instead of serving in Paradise »?

Perhaps because such dynamics as the terrorism of the judicial system are hindering on this self-power. That the goal would not be to become yet another layer of judicial system, like the call-out culture appears to be doing.

There lies the importance of the initial thesis of this tension. That the Marxist and Marxist-leaning tendencies of the Left have been from the start adopting the class struggle analysis in a way as to brute-force the emancipation of people only through their own hierarchical systems. This is why they’ll always be confined, mentally-restrained, to the notion that any self-empowerment, self-defense, and liberation can only be attained through mass social avenues and means; as these reflect, more deeply, the need for empowerment of a more or less specific caste of «intelligent» educated middle-class people, over what they’ll always perceive as a mass of people who are in the dark, who need saviors or organizers or hot-blooded, loud-talking revolutionary leaders to pull them out of their politically-induced trance.

Not to say this was the case of enlightened, fearless rebels like Fred Hampton, Geronimo, Novatore or Harriet Tubman. These were in my opinion more like the feral ones that undermined the consolidated powers of their times, the society subjected to a predominant caste. Needless to say… you’ll also notice they were also not our well-known arrogant, power-hungry White college kids from the suburban middle-classes.

So the Marxists need this vague, Cartesian model for a social category — the class — that is inherently defined by a position within the production chain of Industrial Society. As in their view, one cannot be else than a Worker, or a Prole (and perhaps including the lumpen prole) in order to take part in this class struggle toward the liberation of all the Workers. But are these leaders, or organizers, ever been really the Workers they claim to be leading to liberation? Aren’t they instead positing for their own empowerment over the Workers, by the use of these Workers workforce to push for a change of power dynamics, where this intelligentsia caste attain a higher privileged status within the processes of production? In the neoliberal society the best they’ll do is to have well-paid white collar positions, perhaps even an entry into state politics within a minority party. Which doesn’t discount for the sleazy corruption of the lawyers and real-estate profiteers taking higher positions of power within the dominant parties. But, restating the obvious that I said earlier, they’re all chasing the same sausage, only through slightly different means and modes. And think about... if they’d, once again, come to terms with the whole capitalist state like the Soviets did, they’d have the highest positions in society!

So you are anticapitalist? Great. But “anticapitalist”, just like “antifa”, is a negative position, which doesn’t say much as the kind of world you want in the place of the existent order. What does it means to you in daily life, beyond a few protests and graffiti?

You are maybe communist? Super. And given it is still subversive thing in many parts of the Western world, this gives you a little of rebellious edge. But then again, whose communism? If you are only after the Commune then which commune are we talking about? The Communal form of property Marx himself told us about, that the Ancient Greeks invented, those brutally partiarchic, slave-owning landlords, who weren’t that different, actually from the Founding Fathers? The Commune of Friends, where all you need is to become a “Friend” in order to be included and treated as equal? So what is it you call a Friend, then?

My intent here is not to drag everyone in the mud of their own grandiose projects or claims (no matter how I’d love to!) but to be looking into what people are really after, and for whose specific interest. As, like a Stirner would say, as far as the Commune is not my own, or as long it is not knocking at my door for any friendly motives, it is strange to myself; it means nothing to me, as it is only to the benefit of a specific group of others.

Not only it is not so much benefiting to me, but a very vague mass of «proles», comrades or Friends that I may or may not be part of, depending on the analysis of the leading core group in charge of defining the social categories and their narratives (also known as the “ID politicians”). And only my being included as a proletarian comrade I may benefit from the leftovers of this nomenklatura. I do eat the leftovers of proles on a regular basis, as part of my means of survival and for secondary ecological aims, but it is never as retribution for serving under the wing of this social category.

The world is driven not by money, but by narratives and their representations.

There were times where men couldn’t live without God. Or without a hunt. Or without fire. Equally, a « world run by money » is a capitalist, materialist narrative of the late industrial age. Such narrative, just like any other, becomes existent due to its supportive system of power relations. Yet it won’t necessarily be meaningful… most often it won’t. If you let yourself be defined and driven by these, written and drawn by a group of others, you let yourself, again and again, be fooled and controlled by the group(s) enforcing it, then it will become an unavoidable fact of existence. Hence this group de facto becomes a caste above you... the hierarchs owning all the secrets of your forever-delayed liberation. Accepting them to define me is accepting the hinges of their control over me.

And let’s make it clear to some of my potential detractors, that the Marxist Left here was used only as example among many other iterations. The Far Right or Alt Right, as we could witness over the past few years, tends to be more successful these days at their games of gaining domination over yet another mass of (much) less educated/intelligent peoples for their own caste benefit. They are, after all, connected to specific groups — the old White supremacist aspect of the wealthy establishment — fighting to regain the power they apparently lost through the Post-War, and especially post-Civil Rights Era neoliberal order. Instead of the class, they’ll be using the more retrograde social categories of race and/or national identity. These were, after all, the first identity politics of the Modern world, in the republican, industrial, post-religious world where scientism and Nation-States purportedly replaced the old religious ideologies. The retrograde Alt Right, more classic liberal than actually conservative (and much less « libertarian »), equally got their own priests and popes of social justice, pandering on inherently shallow, brutish definitions of the «human» as if due to being older, or before, they were any more accurate or righteous than the recent «corruption» of the LGBTQ+, the Women and the non-White social identities, undermining their former, ages-old domi-nation over bodies. Are these new categories produced by the new Left and reproduced by the social media empires – led by White normative men, by the way — any more authentic or accurate? I doubt that.

The only social identity that is accurate, is yours, or mine. The question that you may represent, not the prêt-à-porter answer. That is the only one, removed from even the official citizen and corporate definition enforced by the state from shortly after your birth as physical living being- that can define you.

Who are you? Or what are you?

Am I, the author, in a position to know better than you? I only know, for sure, that you may not be what you pretend, but something more, or less, or else. You may even possibly exist!

[ak11-content]

Our first guest is SELF's January cover star Ali Krieger. You may know Ali is a decorated soccer player who is coming off a national Women's Soccer league championship win with New York, New Jersey, Gotham last season, which also happened to be her retirement season. But Ali is quick to remind people that soccer is just something she does, it's not who she is. So I'll also add that she's a vocal advocate for important social justice issues, a mom of two and a great friend to her nearest and dearest. I had the pleasure of interviewing her for SELF's January cover story, which is out now, and I'm so excited to be talking to her again today. Ali, welcome to the show.

Ali: Hi. Thank you so much for having me.

Rachel: Of course. So let's get into it. Um, the first time we're gonna ask you, or the first younger self I'm gonna ask you to give advice to is your childhood self. So before we get into the advice, I'd love to know what were you like as a kid?

Ali: I, um, I was shy. I was reserved, um, somewhat calm. That's definitely not how I am on the, on the soccer field.

Rachel: (laughs).

Ali: But I, I just followed my brother around all the time. He was super active and, um, you know, just always wanting to play and, and hang out. So we had to really, we had a really good childhood. I feel like everything was at our fingertips. We grew up in, you know, uh, Dumfries in Northern Virginia. And, um, yeah, we were just hanging out with friends, playing sports, and just enjoying family time. Ultimately, I always wanted to just be around my brother hanging out, and I learned a lot from him too along the way.

Rachel: That's so cute. And he's 13 months older than you, right?

Ali: Yes, yes. We're 13 months apart. Mm-hmm.

Rachel: That's amazing. When did you start playing soccer?

Ali: I played soccer when I was about five or six. Um, I played with my brother on a team called Cosmos, an indoor team where we were like five and six years old. And, um, I remember our green jerseys and every time you'd score you get like a little, you know, iron on star on the back, and, uh, unfortunately I don't think I still have that jersey, but it was really fun because I just wanted to be as good as he was.

Rachel: That's really cute. Well, I, I guess, I guess you did catch up to him eventually.

Ali: (laughs). Yeah.

Rachel: (laughs). Well, when you think back on a time when you were a kid that you really could have used a little guidance from your current self, what comes to mind?

Ali: I think just only controlling the controllables. I think throughout life, you know, you have to fight through adversity. You endure a lot mentally, physically, emotionally, especially within sport. And it's okay to make mistakes, it's okay to fail because when you do, you learn the most. And so I think, you know, just being comfortable in that chaotic, um, environment because along the way I learned that not every coach is gonna like me. Uh, not every coach is gonna value me and appreciate me, but you, you know, have to continue to, you know, go down this path that you want and in order to, to be as successful as you want and how you dream. I think just having that advice, uh, would, would help a lot of the younger girls like it, or, and boys like it did for me.

Rachel: That's really great. And you mentioned you were shy. Was there anything that helped you kind of come out of your shell a little bit?

Ali: I think I was shy because my brother was just nonstop talking (laughs), so like, and I would just follow him and do whatever he did, so.

Rachel: Mm-hmm.

Ali: Um, and I felt comfortable in that. Uh, he was, you know, more of like, uh, a leader when we were younger and I just, you know, wanted to be like him and always around him. So, um, he would always do the talking for me. So I-

Rachel: (laughs).

Ali: ... think, um, eventually I broke outta my shell, but I think early on I was just, I don't know, just shy and reserved and then maybe soccer brought that other side out in me. And as, as I got older and I got, you know, better at the sport and I could feel that as a player, I, you know, gained more confidence.

Rachel: So the next younger self that I wanted to ask you about is what advice you would give to yourself when you were coming out. And I wanted to kind of preface this with queer people come out over and over again in their lives. So this question can apply to a specific coming out or maybe more when you're coming out to yourself 'cause both are important. Um, so I guess to me this is about a coming out that felt really significant to you and what advice you would give yourself when you were going through that.

Ali: Yeah, for sure. I mean, going way back when my brother came out to me when he was a senior in high school, I think it was towards the end of his high school, um, career. Um, and he was moving on to college and he was about to go to spring break and he sat down and he told me he is, you know, he's gay and he's into, um, men and I, I didn't really know what that meant. I was just happy that he expressed that to me and I said, "You know, I don't care who you love, I support you either way, and I love you so much." And so I think I'm lucky to, you know, I've, I've, you know, thought that at that age-

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: ... 'cause I just didn't know what it meant, you know, we were-

Rachel: Definitely.

Ali: ... we grew up in such a vanilla town and, um, you know, nothing was really visible when I was young. And so then moving on to college, I had this, you know, experience of seeing more visibility with, um, you know, queer individuals. And there were, you know, a couple pairs of, you know, individuals on my team who you know, came out as lesbian, but also just bi or, you know, just were discovering their sexuality at the time. And I didn't really understand it. I just thought men could be together.

Rachel: Yep. Mm-hmm.

Ali: So I'm grateful that I finally stepped into that space because then-

Rachel: Definitely.

Ali: ... a lot to me made sense, even though I had a boyfriend in college for like three and a half years. I then, you know, felt that there was something about me that might want to discover more. And, um, you know, going through this like self-discovery, um, and moving to Germany and playing there for five and a half years, I really, um, was more exposed to an environment that was, I think more accepting of, you know, um, my sexuality and discovery of myself. And I just kind of went for it. And I, you know, uh, was having really great experiences there and, and really finding myself more. And then coming back in 2012, um, that, that started with the NWSL and we started the league, um, and, and moved forward. And so I felt like coming back to the states with kind of this new perspective of, you know, life, but also, um, this new feeling I had of who I was as a human being and living my life, uh, more authentically and in this truth, I could then apply that to coming back home. And played in the NWSL. And then, uh, met my previous partner, um, and we were on the national team together. And then eventually in 2019, I mean, we were together for, since probably 2012, right around that time officially. And then from then till, you know, 2019, we didn't come out really because we were afraid we were gonna lose our job. But that was my, you know, that was a partnership where I felt super confident, comfortable. Um, but I was, I wasn't, as a public figure, I wasn't wanting to make it, you know, um, as public because that was the only thing at the end of the day where I could have some privacy.

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: And so that's what I valued and that was more so the reason why I never spoke on it. Um, and also we had the same job, so I was afraid we were gonna lose our job.

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: Playing at the highest level, you just dunno how people are going to react.

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: And so I was more aware of that. And then, you know, getting sponsorship deals and things like that, I wasn't sure how you know, people and brands were gonna react to, to me and, and her at the time. Um, but then in 2019, we just felt like, you know what F it. Like we we wanna live our lives true and authentic, and we eventually wanna start a family and like, this is us. Right. If you don't like it, then bye.

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: Um, you know, you need us more than we need you type of type of mentality. And so I think in 2019 was when we came out, um, as engaged. And then, um, the response was incredible. Which I never would've thought in a million years, um, unfortunately, which is crazy to say out loud.

Rachel: Yeah. Yeah.

Ali: But I, I never thought that it would be as good as it did, all of our brands and sponsorships. We even had more opportunities-

Rachel: That's amazing.

Ali: ... after the, we made this announcement and not everyone goes through that.

Rachel: Yeah. Yeah.

Ali: Right. Not everyone has that experience. And so I, I knew right away that okay, this is a situation where I feel super lucky and super grateful to be able to tell this story, uh, you know, a positive story of, you know, a queer couple or lesbian couple that, you know, had just come out and, and, uh, were engaged and he wants to live this life together. And so it, it, there's no right or wrong way to do it, it's just how you feel. And you have to make sure that it's what you want, not what anybody else wants. And that the right time for you might not be when somebody else, uh, asks you or when someone else, I don't know, puts it out there. It's just, it's, it's about how you feel and how you wanna approach it. And I felt like that time was good for me and I was willing to take that risk because I was afraid that I was gonna lose my job and, and other things in my life. So I just went for it and I just, I just felt it in my gut that it was right.

Rachel: Yeah. That's really nice. It's really scary, es- especially when the stakes are high like that. And it's, it sucks that we're still in a world where you weren't sure if it was gonna cost you endorsements or your role in this thing you worked so hard for. Like, but, you know, that's the reality. I'm glad that it went so well for you, but, you know, it's, it's still really scary. It's risky. I think it's so interesting what you said about that lack of visibility, because I think we're around the same age, and I've heard from so-

Ali: Yeah.

Rachel: ... many women this age when they're, who have had the reaction of like, "I didn't know women could be gay." Which is just, it sounds wild when you say that out loud, but like, I think we forget now because so much has changed. Like, it was like Ellen and that was it maybe, or like, maybe a joke on a sitcom, you know, like, it just, it was so different. And I think if you didn't see yourself, you're just like,"Okay, well I guess that's not me." And just like kept, you know, didn't think about-

Ali: Yeah.

Rachel: ... it again. And, and now so much has changed that a lot of women in their thirties and forties and older are realizing like, "Oh, this is something I was missing." And I think that's, that's so exciting because like you said, it is this expansive process where you realize there can be more for you. It's not, you're not losing anything. You have, you get to open yourself up to something new and that's so special.

Ali: Right. And I, you know, I, I was so happy that I was like, "Okay, this is what I've been feeling and missing. Like this is, these are a few answers now that I can take with me. That now I can kind of, you know, work on that and, and understand myself more on a deeper level," where before in college, I was like, "Who am I? What am I doing?" Why am I feeling this way? This is weird." Like, and, and so I feel now that I, from college stepping into, you know, my, um, my experience overseas, I was able to do a bit of self-discovery, which then gave me a whole new perspective on my life. And whether I wanted to be in a lesbian relationship or if I was, you know, experiencing, you know, more of bisexuality experiences. I, I was open to anything at the time because I was just like, "You know what? I could be free and this is me."

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: "And let's just see where this goes." And, um-

Rachel: That's amazing.

Ali: Yeah. And you kind of just fill your cup slowly and you start, you know, really discovering yourself more. And I, I really am so grateful for that experience. Um, and, and finally being in a, in an environment where it was okay, uh, to, to be me.

Rachel: Well, I wanna pivot a little bit to talking about career stuff, because you've obviously had this really long career really, like filled with a lot of highs, but also there were some lows. Um, so I wanted to talk about the advice that you would give yourself when you didn't make the National Women's Soccer team-

Ali: Mm-hmm.

Rachel: ... 'cause I think we all go through career setbacks, obviously, but with sports, I think it can probably feel incredibly personal and the stakes are very high. Uh, so maybe if you could start by kind of telling people what happened if they're not familiar with the situation, and then the advice you would give yourself if you had to do it all over again.

Ali: Yeah. So I, um, was basically in 2017, I think was trying to continue to make the team, every year you'd have to fight for contracts every January at the time where it was you know, you would get a contract with a national team, and it wasn't like a pay-to-play model where you get invited in now, um, at any moment. And so it's always a bloodbath at a January camp where we're all fighting to make the team. And at the beginning I did, but then slowly I had, you know, just, it was probably after World Cup in 2015 where things started to get a little rocky. And I started to recognize, "Okay, like there's other players coming in and the coach doesn't necessarily value me as much as before, even though I just played 2015 every game in the World Cup." And it just, you know, it was a really difficult year for me. Um, slowly but surely, I, you know, stopped getting called in. Um, and I didn't really get a reason for that. There was never really a, you know, kind of like a closure. That was why it was so difficult for me to move forward um, in my career at the time. And I was devastated. I didn't get called back for a whole year and a half, almost two years. And right before the next World Cup, I get a call because, um, you know, they were in need of, of a defender. And I think I had proved myself, uh, through that time period, and I made it really difficult for them to ignore me. You know, just had the super laser focus of, "I wanna achieve this, and I know I can do it and I'm gonna do it." And I'm, like I said before, I just made it difficult for them to ignore me. And so ultimately my coach at the time gave me a call. We didn't really discuss the, the last-

Rachel: (laughs).

Ali: ... you know, two years because I said, "I'm in a different space now. I'm in a different you know, um, you know, mentality. I am super focused on where I'm at. I don't wanna bring up the past. Let's just like move forward. What do you need me to do? I'm here for the team, I'm here for you, and let's make it happen. Right? Like, I, I'm, I'm open to whatever you need from me, uh, in order to help this team be successful." And so I ended up getting called back into the last camp before the team was chosen for 2019.

Rachel: Wow.

Ali: And somehow, some way I got back into the team right before it mattered most, and we ended up going to World Cup and we ended up winning. And I actually, um, I didn't play as often as they did in 2015 and 2011. But I did get a chance to go into, um, two games. And then the final, I had to, she called on me, uh, when one of our right back, um, Kelly O'Hare, who's my teammate now, she unfortunately had a bad head injury. It was like a concussion so, right before halftime. So then I get the call to, to go in and fill her spot-

Rachel: Wow.

Ali: ... in the second half of the final. And I couldn't believed that. I was just like, "Alright, this is why I'm here. This is exactly why."

Rachel: Yeah. [inaudible 00:15:41] you spent years preparing for this.

Ali: Yeah. Like, just these, these 45 minutes. "This is why I'm on this team right now." And we were 0-0 at the time. So I was so grateful that I could help the team win.

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: And we won two, nothing. And so that, that's kind of that experience. But I always tried to stay positive. It's easy to to get, you know, into your, into your head and, you know say all the things and reasons why, you know you're not there. But I immediately changed that perspective. I, trust me, it was a really dark time.

Rachel: Yeah.

Ali: And I remember, you know, uh, uh, just like wanting to just quit. And I was so frustrated, I was so angry for the longest time. But then I said, "You know what? Like, that's not me. I, I know how good I can be and I know how I can help this team. So let me turn that on, turn that around into a positive and, and get to work."

Rachel: Yeah. That makes sense. And sometimes it helps to let yourself have that period first-

Ali: Mm-hmm.

Rachel: ... just to be mad and to feel bad, and to not talk yourself out of it, or try to fix it-

Ali: Right.

Rachel: ... or go to the gym right away. Sometimes you just have to be upset-

Ali: Mm-hmm.

Rachel: ... and angry, and then you can get through it. But you're like, "I, I'll, I'll get there eventually. But today there's a little time for wallowing and, and mourning and just, you know, feeling bad," and there's nothing you can do. But it sounds like you really brought a level of focus that I'm just sort of in awe. 'Cause it's hard enough to train, but training when you're kind of down, when you're already, when you're coming from that like vulnerable position, I imagine is so much harder.

Ali: It is. It's really difficult. Yeah. But you just gotta push through. And then, you know, as athletes, you know, everything's at risk, right? But it's worth it in the end if it works out. And so you never know that answer until you try.

Rachel: So the last, um, pass up I wanna ask you about is a little bit more recent. Um, and I wanted to ask you about the advice that you would give yourself as a new mom. So as people listening, probably know you are mom to Sloan and Ocean, who are very young. So you were a new mom not so long ago, which is a famously really difficult period. And I'm curious what you, what advice you would give yourself looking back now?

Ali: Um, I would just say (laughs) buckle in because (laughs), nothing ever goes as planned. You could prep all you want, prepare for, you know, anything and everything. Um, but it really just day-to-day, you have to be willing to, um, kind of just be open to whatever comes. And, um, you always have to think of what if as a mom. So, uh, it's kind of like a spontaneous day-to-day. I, I never know what the day's gonna bring. I'm as prepared as I can be, but, you know, some days the kids can be great, some days they be terribly sick, some days they're gonna have tantrums, some days, you know, everything's gonna flow perfectly. And, you know, all the meals are gonna work out. I mean, I, I literally think that, um, I would tell myself just buckle in because, um, you have to make sure you're, you're open to anything that's, you know, that that could happen. And, and patience is gonna be key.

So no matter how my kids are acting or feeling, or I'm always trying to stay calm in the way that I speak to them too. Um, you know, if they're yelling and screaming and then I'm yelling and screaming and saying, "Stop, or Don't do this or that," you know, that's just not the way that I approach, um, you know, how I am parenting. And so I feel like if I stay consistent, even though sometimes I do wanna yell, and you gotta just like, you know, you get angry and you're frustrated and you just need like, two minute break and you wanna lock yourself into the pantry. But I, I try to stay as calm as I can and just kind of have like, you know a steady, a steady response.

Um, and then I think kids, young kids, ultimately they don't understand why they're feeling certain ways that they're feeling, whether that be really happy, sad, frustrated, all the things, uh, and all the emotions. I would tell myself just allow that to happen. And, um, and just embrace them more instead of tell them what to do about it. Because I would tell Sloan even now, 'cause sometimes she doesn't understand her feelings that you know, I just try to give her a hug and console her and embrace her because I always say, "Listen, it's okay to feel the way that you're feeling." Um, but if she's say throwing things or hitting something, or I'm always like, "It's okay that you're feeling upset or sad or angry or frustrated, but it's not okay to throw your things or your food or…” So I want to allow and give space for all the feelings and emotions because unfortunately as a kid, I don't, um, think that I expressed my feelings and emotions enough. So I think maybe telling my younger self before having kids just allow your kids to feel those emotions and feelings and, and just embrace, uh, the tantrums and-

Rachel: (laughs).

Ali: ... uh, the yelling and the crying and all the things, because those are emotions too. And those are just as important as being happy and excited and joyful.

Rachel: I think that's great advice for new parents. But I also think it's great advice for adults for themselves to just let themselves feel what they're feeling and, and name, what they're feeling and understanding why. I think a lot of people struggle with, you know, they, they know they're feeling something, but it is hard to name it or to understand why they are, you know, maybe acting out or are doing something that they don't, they look back and they regret. So I think just. all of us can probably benefit from pausing and thinking about our emotions, but not trying to stop them. But I imagine as a parent, you probably wanna step in and fix it, and it's really hard to just like step back and, and let them feel what they're feeling without intervening.

Ali: Right. And just giving them time to process.

Rachel: Definitely. All right, Ali, my last question for you, since this is about advice, is what is the best advice you've ever been given?

Ali: Okay. So Sue Bird actually told me this, and I think it was from Will Smith, a quote from him. I, uh, maybe we can fact check this.

Rachel: (laughs).

Ali: But, uh, when I was really going through that hard time, we went on vacation, um, with her and, and Megan and I had asked them both. I said like, "You know, what do you see? Do I hang out my boots? Like, am I that bad? Like, am I not... Like what am I not doing? Like what am I not seeing? This is crazy.” But she had said this to me that I had carried through every, ever since, um, and then she said, "As an athlete, or just even as a human being, um, if you stay ready, you never have to get ready."

Rachel: Rachel here. So we did fact check this, just to be sure. Turns out Will Smith is known for saying, "So if you stay ready, you ain't gotta get ready." And that is how I run my life. But Dejuan Walker AKA Suga Free wrote and performed the 1997 single titled, If You Stay Ready and it includes the lyrics, if you stay ready, you ain't gotta get ready.

Ali: And that is the mentality that I took into my training preparing to get back to the national team during that you know, tumultuous time. And that daunting, confronting time that I had, uh, those two years where I had kind of this whole self-discovery, but that was always in the back of my mind because I knew there was a possible phone call that would be coming. And I needed to be ready for that opportunity 'cause if I wasn't prepared and I wasn't ready, I wasn't gonna make it So I think that advice was gold for me in that moment. And I just, um, I took that along with me, uh, through those, you know, two years and, and then eventually made it back. And, uh, it all made sense then. And so I'm really grateful that she had, you know, given me that advice and that quote to, to really keep, uh, in order to, you know, achieve what I wanted to at the time.

Rachel: Well, that is a really lovely note to end this on, and really good advice. I think that can apply to a lot of different situations. So, Ali Krieger, thank you so much for being here, being our first guest, sharing your wise words with our listeners, and we're so excited to see what you do next.

Ali: Thank you. I appreciate the invite and I can't wait to continue down this path and, uh, support SELF and your podcast.

Rachel: Thank you so much. Advice To My Younger Self was produced by Hayley Fager and Rachel Miller, and edited by Hayley Fager. Peyton Hayes is our audio production coordinator, and Jake Loomis is our audio engineer. Caitlin Brody and Sergio Kletnoy are our talent bookers.

Transcript provided by Rev.com.

[brunelsblog]

This is a new YouTube video by NaleyByNature, where she interviews Meaza, who is a human rights activist for Tigray. Both Naley and Meaza are doing important work. Please spare some time to fully watch the video and share it.

Naley has also been vocal about social justice issues around the world, especially Palestine and Sudan. She is a great resource and you can find her on YouTube and TikTok. Consider supporting her work.

[chitsangenthusiast]

for awhile now i've been craving to do a fic/scene to this song but no earthly clue how to write it where it adequately matches the energy of the song and isn't a song fic

so imagine with me: marine biologist sokka, famous rocker zuko, and a night of karaoke

——

naturally, their entire thing starts with a concert.

zuko's playing in his home city, and all sokka needs to do is take an hour train in to see one of his favorite bands. easy enough, he's made the same commute countless times, and absolutely worth it, even if it means he's going alone when no one else's schedules line up to be able to tag along.

except the forecasted snow hits harder than it was supposed to during the concert, putting any outbound trains out of commission as well as any hopes for an uber willing to drive him the hour back to home. it's bad enough that he wouldn't risk asking his friends to come out to him, especially not katara, who was already on call tonight and whose probability of going into work just sky rocketed.

which means: a hotel. which means: he's pissed, and if he's going to be unexpectedly forced to spend the money to stay a night in the city then he's at least going to go waste more money and get blasted at a local dive bar he knows.

the older couple sitting next to him who he'd been commiserating with get up to brave the weather at the exact moment zuko walks in.

(the next morning, sokka wakes up to the distant sounds of zuko saying he got late check-out for him, then again to an empty room and a phone number scrawled onto the hotel note pad laying next to his dead phone.)

//fast forward, where zuko is trying to enjoy lunch with his friends in the city, except the paparazzi are relentless. but fate had granted it to be a beautiful day, with the bay sparkling invitingly, and one of the best seafood places happens to be on the route to sokka's favorite lunch spot.

they make eye contact across the street, and zuko pursues.

//fast forward, through several more nights spent together, several more paparazzi issues, a classic airport scene, the kiss that finally seals the deal.

//linger on the moment when zuko sneaks into a conference sokka is attending. the one with an importance that had been alluded to for the past month, where sokka even refused to schedule anything together in the two weeks leading up to it, the one where he laughed at the idea of zuko attending it as a show of support, but also hadn't explicitly stated he didn't want him to find a way to get in.

so zuko does, and he finds out that what sokka had vaguely described as a podium presentation was actually the keynote speech, given to a packed auditorium.

zuko knew sokka was smart, but he didn't know he was 'on the fast track to being renowned in his field' smart.

(it's hot, all that easy intelligence and confidence as he watches sokka just totally in his element. he jokes to mai later that he can't believe he fell in love to a total nerd.)

//linger on how, once he's said it out loud, the thought never leaves his mind.

//fast forward to (finally) karaoke night. sokka can sing, but zuko's never succeeded in getting him to sing along to one of his songs, despite sokka's unabashed proclamations of how big of a fan he is. until tonight (thank you katara and ty lee), and—oh.

oh.

zuko had encouraged him by saying he'd provide back up vocals (it's fun to watch sokka squirm at the idea of singing along with the lead singer of the song he's about to perform), and sokka declared he's going to face the tv the entire time to avoid seeing ty lee's phone bc of course she's recording to some social media live—

he forgets about the camera halfway through, forgets their friends are even in the room despite their cheering, because he loves this song, loves the theatrics, and he'll be damned if he doesn't do it full justice like he does every time he sings it. especially when he whips around, caught up in the vocals and the dramatic sway of his performance, and catches sight of zuko on the couch, microphone fully forgotten in his lap as he stares wide-eyed and open-mouthed at him.

sokka is hitting every note, every emotion that the song demands. he's doing perfect, he is perfect, and when he sidles close enough zuko can't help but cling to his legs, desperate and breathless as he stares up at him, utterly enraptured. he yanks on sokka's belt loops, tries to pull him down, an unconscious action fueled more by his pounding heart than any desire to end the performance—the last thing he wants is to end this—but sokka doesn't indulge him until the very end, during the small space of a breath right before the last few lines.

"together bound in madness," he sings, shakier then zuko performs it, sweeter then he could ever make it, then bends down to kiss zuko soundly, putting as much of his everything into this kiss as he is singing zuko's song, and only sokka is able to hear the rattled gasp zuko releases when he slips his hand into his hair to cradle the back of his head.

when he pops back up to do the big finish, his hand remains nestled in zuko's hair, grounding him. he savors both the iron grip on his hips and how zuko's head lays boneless against his palm.

the last ringing note, the end of the song, and sokka barely gets in a steadying breath before zuko is frantically tugging him back down to his mouth.

in the background, simultaneously hazy and so, so clear, he hears mai: "i can't believe we just watched zuko fall in love."

and yeah. yes.

he absolutely just did.

[baby-girl-aaron-dessner]

Just out of curiosity, given how critical you’re of Taylor Swift, do you boycott her financially? If not, then why? Is this a separating the art from the artist type of thing? Or is boycotting someone as popular as her achieves nothing so why bother? I understand people who are either in denial or ignorant about her to continue supporting her. But for people who see her for who she is, how can they still support her financially?

To answer your question, yes, I do financially boycott Taylor Swift as well as other artists whose music I love like Beyoncé. However, I do not boycott small/indie artists or artists like Hozier who are vocal on genocide and take part in social justice issues. For example, from the beginning of the Palestinian struggle, Aaron Dessner has supported the Palestinian cause, so I haven’t unfollowed him and I will continue to go to The National events.

In the last 10 years I have only bought one thing from Taylor Swift: concert tickets. Once for the 1989 tour and once for the Era’s tour. I have never bought merch or vinyls/cd’s either. Even when I wasn’t critical of her as a child, I was too poor to buy this stuff. For example, I remember when all my friends went to the Red tour, I had no money and my family was way too poor and unstable for me to ask my parents for concert tickets so I had no choice but to sit things like this out. I also forgot to mention that by the time 1989 came out, I saved up some cash and split the cost of a single CD that I shared with a friend.

I agree with you. Some people are able to seperate the art from the artist and I’ve tried doing this too. Taylor is an exception for me because she was the first western artist I was introduced to as really young child (during fearless). My father would download her music videos so that I could learn English 😭 So her music is extremely meaningful and nostalgic to me. This doesn’t mean I can’t apply my critical thinking skills and refrain from spending money on merch and things like that.

I will also point out that many die hard stans get upset with people like me because they only believe in two types of categories: Stan’s or unstans. They cannot conceptualise balance.

I do not believe that we have to either be led by blind fanaticism to like someone’s art or boycott them entirely if we chose to use our intellect.

I believe that we should apply critical thinking skills to all fields of life. This includes art. It is not difficult and helps us make better decisions. This does not diminish the love I have for a song like Cold As You because it will never cease to have nostalgic value for me.

Also, you’re right. Becoming disillusioned with celebrity worshipping and figures like Taylor is what prompted me to boycott her financially. I just can’t justify spending more than a ticket on her. And I feel bad about spending money on the ticket as it is.

[catgirl-kaiju]

i'm saying this as a trans man and someone who has watched this infighting that seems to be brewing for a long while so don't think i want to continue it further by dragging you in the mud of it all especially after seeing that you already get targeted by terfs i for one don't even follow genderkoolaid and have a lot of bad takes but i know that their good ones do circulate in my circles for things like databases for trans man hate crimes and what have you things that are invaluable to trans people to have as support in the community the baggage behind a lot of these words that get thrown around like "transandrophobia" just leave a bad taste in my mouth and i feel like if they will have any validity in academia and social justice all the theory will get ironed out in the next few years and so i just don't see any use defending THE WORD let alone THE SLUR THAT MANY USE but i think that it needs to be understood that the word """"transandrophobia"""" is not a organized school of thought with everyone attached to some discord group that has secret infighting targets and takes pot shots at trans women all i ever see is people using the word, talking about WHY THE SLUR IS A SLUR, and wanting to talk about problems trans men face without always having to use the word "misandry" because it is deeply upsetting that in so many ways we are born women, we live as women, and will never escape womanhood i feel like not being able to escape the things people perceive you as and the assumptions and fears (especially the fears people think are justified when they are very much not) are a universal trans experience and so it really hurts to just see people spot a basic word like "transandrophobia" being used in a post and deem an entire group of people bigots i see trans mascs and intersex people do the same for "tme/tma" where they just totally avoid anyone who uses these terms its tearing the community apart and making it harder to remember how much we have in common and bigots want us to be alone and defenseless like that... sorry that this was long winded, i'm sure you've heard all of this before i just felt i needed to vent because its really not about the blog its about the general way people navigate in fighting genderkoolaid is not someone i'm really willing to defend, let alone the other blogs that get tossed around that have been in heavy water so i hope i've made that clear here at the very least

hey i don't really follow what you're saying here. i'm not sure what slur the slur you're referring to is, and i'm very unclear what your point is abt transandrophobia. i'm also confused abt which intersex people u are referring to that don't like the terms tme/tma. i'm intersex and use those terms, and i've seen other intersex folks actually prefer those terms for discussions about transmisogyny because of how it shifts the focus away from very binary way that sex is talked about in the AGAB model.

this is, in general, confusing and makes me uncomfortable in ways i can't really articulate atm. i think chief among them is a kind of "but, what about me" vibe i'm getting from this at a time i am being more vocal than ever abt how transmisogyny affects me and other tma folks.

although i'm not sure what your stance on the term "transandrophobia" and the ideas behind it are, i can say that very much disapprove of it for reasons others have articulated so much better than i could. i think issues that uniquely affect trans masc folks are worth talking about, but i think the framing of conflating those issues with the way transmisogyny functions is just the wrong way to go about it. much like how "misandry" is not really a helpful way to talk abt the ways that cis men are affected by patriarchal systems, as those issues are not equivalent to the way misogyny functions. very telling that before the term "transandrophobia" was used, the same ideas were being described with the term "transmisandry"

[mariacallous]

For the third time since December, House Speaker Mike Johnson has failed to wrangle support for reauthorizing a critical US surveillance program, raising questions about the future of a law that compels certain businesses to wiretap foreigners on the government’s behalf.

Johnson lost 19 Republicans on Tuesday in a procedural vote that traditionally falls along party lines. Republicans control the House of Representatives but only by a razor-thin margin. The failed vote comes just hours after former US president Donald Trump ordered Republicans to “Kill FISA” in a 2 am post on Truth Social, referring to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, under which the program is authorized.

The Section 702 surveillance program, which targets foreigners overseas while sweeping up a large amount of US communications as well, is set to sunset on April 19. The program was extended by four months in late December following Johnson’s first failed attempt to hold a vote.

Congressional sources tell WIRED they have no idea what the next steps will be.

The program itself will carry on into the next year, regardless of whether Johnson manages to muster up another vote in the next week. Congress does not directly authorize the surveillance. Instead, it allows the US intelligence services to seek “certifications” from a secret surveillance court on a yearly basis.

The Justice Department applied for new certifications in February. Last week, it announced they’d been approved by the court. The government’s power to issue new directives under the program without Congress’s approval, however, remains in question.

The certifications, which are required only due to the “incidental” collection of US calls, generally permit the program’s use in cases involving terrorism, cybercrime, and weapons proliferation. US intelligence officials have also touted the program as crucial in combating the flood of fentanyl-related substances entering the US from overseas.

The program remains controversial due to a laundry list of abuses committed primarily at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which maintains a database that holds a portion of the raw data collected under 702.

Although the government says it only “targets” foreigners, it has acknowledged collecting a large amount of US communications in the process. (The actual amount, it says, is impossible to calculate.) Nevertheless, it claims that once those communications are in the government’s possession, it is constitutional for federal agents to review those wiretaps without a warrant.

An unlikely coalition of progressives and conservative lawmakers formed last year in a push to end these warrantless searches, many of the Republicans involved vocal critics of the FBI following its misuse of FISA to target a Trump campaign staffer in 2016. (The 702 program, which is only one part of FISA, was not implicated in that particular controversy.)

Privacy experts have criticized proposed changes to the Section 702 program championed by members of the House Intelligence Committee, as well as Johnson, who had previously voted in favor of a warrant requirement despite now opposing it.

“It seems Congressional leadership needs to be reminded that these privacy protections are overwhelmingly popular,” says Sean Vitka, policy director at Demand Progress, a civil liberties–focused nonprofit. “Surveillance reformers remain willing and able to do that.”

A group of attorneys—among the few to ever present arguments before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court—said in a statement on Tuesday that an amendment offered up by the Intel committee risked dramatically increasing the number of US businesses forced to cooperate with the program.

Declassified filings released by the FISA court last year revealed that the FBI had misused the 702 program more than 278,000 times, including, as reported by The Washington Post, against “crime victims, January 6 riot suspects, people arrested at protests after the policing killing of George Floyd in 2020 and—in one case—19,000 donors to a congressional candidate.”

James Czerniawaski, a senior policy analyst at Americans for Prosperity, a Washington, DC, think tank pushing for changes to Section 702, says that despite recognizing its value, it remained a “troubled program” in need of “significant and meaningful reforms.”

“The outcome of today was completely avoidable,” he says, “but it requires the Intelligence Community and its allies to recognize that its days of unaccountable and unconditional spying on Americans are over.”