#youre not getting Liberal Points for this one

[theclearblue]

Not my usual type of post but it's impressive every time how fucking shit liberals are at politics it's crazy. Liberals today have been dog piling on Chappell Roan for this statement. But what does blindly endorsing the Harris campaign do? Absolutely nothing, her audience is majority queer and already know about the GOP's platform to take away their rights, they aren't going to be voting for Trump. But if liberals keep on with "vote blue no matter who" and can't even bluff that your vote is up in the air around key issues, never willing to pressure politicians, we will never see liberals actually do anything meaningful in office.

An endorsement from Chappell Roan for Kamala Harris is useless, but saying "These are the issues I want the democratic party to address before endorsing them" brings more attention to those issue and actually builds pressure for them to actually listen to the people in their party.

Roe v. Wade should have been codified. LGBTQ+ protections should have been much more extensive. Liberals putzing around and arguing "both sides" as a genocide has been going on for a year now is disgusting and vile. These are all failures of the democratic party (and there are countless more). No wonder Chappell Roan doesn't want to endorse them! Liberals don't make the steps to actually put in place protections for vulnerable groups, and then act shocked every time Republicans easily roll those rights and policies back.

A vote is more powerful than I think a lot of people give credit to, but I think a lot of people don't know how to leverage that power effectively. An undecided voter (even posing as one) will get you heard out on the issues you care about a lot more than someone who votes blue no matter who. I do believe Kamala Harris will win this election in November. But to apply no pressure to her campaign as liberals point at Trump and say "he's way worse!" Yeah, obviously. Everyone even slightly left leaning knows that already. But the democratic party is never going to move forward if the only time they act is when their backs are up against the wall with fascist opposition. Let it be known what issues affect your vote, where the democratic party is failing, speak out on what matters to you. Do not be afraid to pressure your politicians just because the other guy is worse.

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #47 – City of Last Chances by Adrian Tchaikovsky

This book was recommended to me by a few different people, and in any case I am generally a pretty big Tchaikovsky fan. So of course I’m only getting around to reading it now, however many months later. Having put it off so long for no good reason at all, I can say that the book is in fact very good. Not Tchaikovsky’s best work (that’s still Children of Time in a walk), but a good read and one that left me curious (if not exactly excited) about checking out the sequel.

The story takes place in Illmar, the eponymous City of Last Chances – scarred and oppressed, tyrannized by cursed dukes and conquering imperialists, built upon a dangerous and unreliable route to other worlds and forever attracting the sort of people with no better options available to them. While the book has any number of characters, it’s really the city itself that is the star of the story – a story of how the theft of an imperial magistrate’s ward before he makes an experimental voyage through the gateway in the woods leads to a whole series of byzantine intrigues and bloody misadventures, culminating in an abortive revolution against the Pallseen who occupy and rule them. Which in one sense is an absolutely massive spoiler and in another just feels like stating an inevitability that was obvious from the first chapter.

The book was apparently quite heavily marketed as harking back to the whole New Weird trend of a decade or two ago – marketing that is lived up to wholly and entirely. The whole book absolutely drips with Mieville and Vandermeer. The oblique worldbuilding, the mundane day-to-day life built around the opportunities and inconveniences of some intrusion of the sublime, the awkward intersection of ancient magic and industrial bureaucracy, and so on, and so forth. The Reproach in particular feels very Area X (or very Roadside Picnic, as you prefer), but in general the city feels like absolutely nothing so much as Bas-Lag with the weirdness dial turned down from an 11 to a 5 or 6.

It’s a real triumph of the book, I think, that the world genuinely feels vast and strange even beyond the points where it matters to the story - that all the little asides and the ways something affects a certain character feel like just small parts of something far grander and more uncanny than anyone can hope to understand. Maybe I’m just painfully tired of rpg-system worldbuilding, but it’s an effect I dearly love.

Much like Bas-Lag, Ilmar is very clearly a magical fantasy city going through a magical fantasy 19th century industrial revolution (instead of steam engines its demonic slave labor contracted and imported from the Kings Below). The meat of the book is playing into the whole tradition of the idealistic, virtuous but tragic liberal revolution – 1848 in Berlin or Vienna, the June Days and Commune in Paris, Warsaw a dozen different times, Les Mis. You know the type. Students singing patriotic old songs, workers rising up against class oppression, ‘revolutionaries’ who are mostly cowardly nobles pining after lost privileges and criminal syndicate putting on airs being caught flat-footed by events. You can probably tell the basic story in your sleep. But for such a venerable genre, this book's honestly probably the best rendition of ‘fantasy 1848’ I can recall. Something which won it my instant affection.

The other thing the book just overwhelming shares with the Mieville’s Bas-Lag books is a very keen sense of the necessity of revolution combined with an extreme cynicism towards anyone who might actually carry it out. The university students are sincere believers, and also naive sheep the narrative views with condescension (at best). The professional revolutionaries are all power-grabbing hypocrites who have wrapped themselves in the flag. The workers syndicates have a real sense of solidarity among themselves, and also none at all to the demon slaves that are used and broken powering the mills and factories. And so on. The overall thrust of the book is a tragedy not in the sense of railing against the inevitable, but in the sense that triumph and revolution were absolutely possible – indeed plausible – but for the flaws and frailities of the revolutionaries who might have accomplished it.

Not to say that it's misanthropic – the book is very humane towards the vast majority of its POVs. Of which there are enough for ‘vast majority’ to be a meaningful term. It was something like 130 pages in before any character got a second chapter through their eyes, a feat I had previously only seen in Malazan – and that’s not including the chorus chapters which just give a half-doze vignettes from across the city. But yes, most characters (even the ones who are really just viscerally repulsive) are shown through their own eyes as someone who is at least understandable, if not particularly sympathetic. The sheer size of the cast in a 500 page book mean that no one character or set gets that many chapters from their perspective (you could easily have written as long a book about roughly the same events with half or less of the cast), but some of the dynamics that are very lightly touched on are just incredibly compelling. Its enough to make you wish this was a series that would ever get any fanfiction written about it, really.

Given the way the book is so deeply concerned with oppression and violence on the basis of culture, class, and nation – imperial occupiers, native population, refugees and immigrants used and scapegoated by both – it is kind of fascinating that this is a world where misogyny and (possibly? Not very explored, the only example of a queer relationship we see is hardly going to be concerned by normative society) homophobia just flatly don’t exist. Which would be less interesting if it was unusual, really – the same could be said about very nearly every recent sci fi or fantasy book on the same lines I can recall. Interesting because it is very much not the case in Melville’s stuff – the cultural impact of Ancillary Justice continues to echo down the years, I guess. So yes the imperial police inspector will extort sex out of a brothel owner in exchange for not stringing up the entire workforce for peripheral involvement with the resistance, but also this is entirely gender-neutral. Something very modern about how oppression is imagined relative to the ‘90s or ‘00s (or just a different genre of self-consciously feminist novel a few book shelves to the left).

But yeah, great book, I am compelled. No idea where the sequel would be going, but will probably hunt it down sooner rather than later.

[quoigenicfromhell]

Genuinely what is wrong with some of y'all. It's perfectly fine to not want to talk to/invite anti-endos into your spaces, *obviously*. I don't usually wanna talk to anti-endos! But like, again, do you think having the only interaction with endogenics antis get being screaming matches and hate will at all help us????

I grew up in a conservative echo chamber and if the only interaction I ever got from liberals were ones proving my parents were correct about them, I would never have thought to question my beliefs. This is basic harm reduction, people?????????? The way some of yall are treating human beings like the literal devil just because they believe something harmful, as if we all haven't done that at sole point, makes me not want to associate with yall.

[irnhero]

.

[whywoulditho]

if you're still not boycotting israeli products, protesting against the genocide, sharing the news, asking for a ceasefire, I am judging you. I know my followers, I know my mutuals. I know the ones who selectively interact with my anime shitposts and ignore the ones about palestine. I am seeing you and I am judging you. I won't call you out on your bullshit personally, because if you can still ignore this humanitarian crisis while being active online and seeing all those posts, you're just not worth trying to reason with. But know that if you still choose to be silent, if you still think this issue is too political or complicated you're an ignorant, pathetic little bitch. you can't live without your starbucks? grow the fuck up. you think celebrities don't owe anyone their support and it is okay for them to stay quiet when it's the brown, the muslim who suffers? you're fucking delusional and you're pathetic. you think you get to turn a blind eye because it's not effecting you? you're a self-centered whiney little toddler. stay in your bubble and keep quiet all you want, i know you will lie to your kids one day and tell them you stood with palestine.

none of us are free until all of us are. free palestine 🇵🇸

[widevibratobitch]

doing my sillygoofy research and accidentally coming across a mention of wolfgang mozart's capital M Misogyny that i have never heard of before like what do you MEAN my 18th century specialest white boy wasn't exactly a raging feminist 😭😭

[bambinification]

Yknow how people say having to live with your parents forever as a disabled adult gives you poison damage? Yeah.

[indi-glo-archive]

ppl who only conditionally care about child abuse based on whether the victim makes them uncomfy while they're being abused contribute to a real life child's abuse by sending hate asks regularly, attempting to gaslight them, calling them terrible names, accusing them of terrible things, telling them directly how much they hate the characters the child relates to and enjoys talking about, and being generally racist and ableist in a way that seriously might have scarred me for life, making a literal teenager hate their hobbies, favorite shows, and the people who enjoy those things, and ultimately cyberbullying a child out of multiple fandoms because they don't want to think critically or acknowledge their own faults, all while being 35 and really embarrassing themselves because someone half their age has a better grasp on the concept of nuance than them: more at 6

but noooo, y'all "love neurodivergent/disabled people," have "racists/ableists DNI" in your bios, and don't say slurs, which is all you have to do to not be racist/ableist, so *I'm* some psycho black bitch and you're a wittle angel like the fictional character you infantilize

(P.S. I swear to fucking god if people respond to this post with "but he sexually assaulted someone" and ignore literally every other personality trait/experience he had that could've been relatable to a child abuse survivor and the way people mistreated me, a real human being, which Charlie is not by the way, I will start doing the things you wanted to do to Ben)

[thedreadvampy]

callout posts will truly be like:

and the post they're talking about will be like

and then they'll be like "what do you mean I'm overstating harm?"

[bluesofasalamence]

It feels kinda annoying seeing posts about the NRA when they haven’t been politically relevant for the past 10 years, and even more annoying when liberals blame the NRA for not being able to pass gun control

like. the NRA has only 5 million members. Over 100 million people in the US have guns. They literally represent less than 5% of all gun owners, if they vanished or went bankrupt tomorrow liberals still wouldn’t be able to pass gun control because gun owners are one of the most politically active groups out there and they’re not interested on becoming felons overnight because of liberals passing ineffective laws that ban certain guns based on aesthetics and doubling the police budget instead of trying to help the average citizen so they don’t have to go to crime to make ends meet

This whole story of “Those things are hard to do, passing gun contrrol is much easier” sounds completely untrue every day that passes

[tam--lin]

Apparently the speech and debate league I was deeply involved with in highschool is featured in Shiny Happy People and no one except my mother thought this was worth mentioning!!!

[crippledanarchy]

I wish I was still a hairstylist at this age cause at 18 I did Not know how to respond to grown women crying about how miserable their marriage made them but now I would be the number one advocate for You Are Allowed To Get A Divorce

[madlori]

I see posts going "Okay, I'll vote for Kamala, I GUESS IF I HAVE TO" and "omg if that's the best we can do I suppose I'll support it" and I'm like...

What do you people fucking WANT?

Let's run down how she's rated politically by some organizations that we vibe with, kay?

ACLU = 93% on civil liberties

AFL-CIO = 100% on trade unions

Human Rights Campaign = 100% on queer rights

League of Conservation Voters = 91% on environmentalism

NARAL = 100% on reproductive rights

NRA Fund = 7% on gun rights (we LIKE a low score on this one)

NEA = 100% on education

Planned Parenthoos = 100% on reproductive rights

In addition, GovTrack (which is a nonpartisan tracker) places her in the MOST politically left-leaning categories of Senators. So we've got a very liberal, woman of color who's spent her career trying to mitigate draconian tough-on-crime laws to benefit the accused and keep black people out of prison and decrease recidivism and that's somehow...just barely tolerable.

So I ask again...what is that you're dissatisfied with? Is it Palestine? as recently as March she was calling for a ceasefire and demanding aid to Gaza. Keep in mind she's pretty constrained as to what's possible to do in this situation.

Is it just that she was a prosecutor? That is an important job that needs to be done and we WANT people doing it who aren't rah-rah tough-on-crime Gestapo types, which she is not. We need prosecutors who are addressing the root causes of crime and looking for ways to help people escape the cycle, which she has done to the point that she was often called SOFT on crime.

So what is your objection here? Is it that her politics aren't 100% aligned with a bunch of Tumblr socialists? I got news for you...we Tumblr socialists DO NOT REPRESENT THE ELECTORATE. If such a candidate existed, they would not win.

Democrats struggle sometimes because our tent is large. Republicans just want you if you're a straight white man and preferably rich. There's room for a lot more types in the lefty side, but sadly that means a lot of room also for dissention among the ranks. This is how they get us. Let's not let them, huh? Just a suggestion.

[tim-official]

the current trend of "tumblr users embarrassing themselves by proudly announcing why they don't listen to any music made by black people" is really astounding.

i cannot help but think this is a direct result of liberal White Guilt and how people have interpreted "anti-racism" as form of cultural self-segregation - the kind of person who thinks trying to cook chicken curry is cultural appropriation, or sends white people anon hate for wearing a kimono (yes, this kind of discourse happened). like, "oh, no, i could never participate in this culture, i'd get my evil white hands all over it! it would be more Progressive if I only did White things."

if you're a poc you've seen this, i'm sure - this deer-in-the-headlights stare you can get from white people when you play music / show art / share a story / anything that is Racially Coded, this total refusal to actually engage with it out of fear that it is in some way Wrong for them to have any opinion on it. because they read somewhere that it's bad to use AAVE but the only lesson they actually learned from that is "gotcha, white people are not allowed to interact with other cultures as punishment for my White Crimes. this helps to fill up the gaping pit of my white guilt and makes me one of the Good People." this transforms their discomfort around non-white cultures (black culture, especially, i should add) into a kind of virtue

anyway if you are white and reading this. go listen to some fucking haliu mergia. ethiopian jazz. will knock your dick right off. go listen to rap or reggae or bollywood and have a genuine reaction to it - like, an actual, from-the-heart reaction. you are allowed to not like some of it. but you will definitely like at least a little. yes, you can compare it to lemon demon (or whatever) if that helps you get into it and that's your only point of reference. maybe don't say that part out loud. but don't, like, separate yourself from it, like you are seeing it in a museum and the only polite thing to do is go "ahh, huh, very interesting, so much culture here."

[lucybellwood]

Lemme tell you a gay little story about an eagle.

Our town (~9,000 people) has a couple garages, but there's a big one on the main drag. My family has been going there for decades. I drive past it every day.

There used to be a huge pine tree on the corner of their lot, but last year it became a hazard and had to be taken down.

Shortly thereafter I drive by and see they've hired a guy to chainsaw sculpt the stump into a bald eagle.

Birds own my heart, but nationalism makes me twitchy. I withhold outright condemnation of the eagle, but I'm skeptical. (The original owner—an objectively Good Dude—sold the business to a younger couple a few years ago, and I don't have any knowledge of their whole deal.)

Then it turns out someone on staff is really into making costumes for the eagle. Every holiday. Every month. Stuffed turkey, witch costume, menorah headpiece, bunny ears. These people love to dress their bird.

The changing of the eagle suit becomes a source of joy every time I drive through town.

Until June, when the eagle is bare.

Now look, maybe I'm expecting too much asking my garage to celebrate Pride. But this is a small town. Every time I drive by that stupid eagle—this thing that has previously brought me so much joy—I feel hurt. I feel reminded that there are plenty of people in my liberal bubble who don't consider my community worthy of celebration. I drive to work, I feel bad. I drive home, I feel bad. The eagle is mocking me.

Then my A/C quits working.

So I book an appointent to bring my car in—and realize what I have to do.

I pick all this up at a thrift store for under ten bucks. I print the shirt with some weird heat-transfer fabric crayons I find in a cupboard. I loop gold elastic around the sunglasses and pray they'll fit on the eagle's head. (It is also important to draw your attention to the price of the feather boa.)

(Nice.)

My reasoning is thus: if I show up with a complete costume ready to go, someone will have to look me in the eye and say "We don't believe in that," at which point I'll be finding a new garage. But if they let me dress the eagle, then people in town get to have the joy I've been missing since the start of the month.

I listen to a lot of hype-up jams on my way over. I hate confrontation. I also don't wanna have to find another garage. I want to believe that this decision isn't actively antagonistic, but I'm not particularly hopeful.

I talk through the A/C issue with the guy at the desk, hand over my keys, then take a deep breath.

"Who's in charge of the eagle?"

"Oh, that's all Dylan. Second bay from the end."

I walk down the row of hydraulic lifts and find a disarmingly smiley middle-aged man pouring fluid through a funnel. I introduce myself and explain that, since the Pride parade is this Sunday and the eagle seems to be missing a costume, I have taken the liberty of making one myself, and can I get his blessing to go put it on?

Dylan grins this absolutely giant grin and goes

"Oh hell yeah."

So that's what's up now.

Happy Pride.

[wild-at-mind]

'They’re like the drunk guy at the bar who can’t use the right words but is a better ally then the liberal college educated scum bag.' No one loves making fun of the 'liberal college educated scumbag' like a right winger so I guess this is where the right and this kind of leftist finally agree. A happy day. :')