theoneandmolly

[theoneandmolly]

While these protests succeeded in disrupting normal operations at the targeted arms companies, they were unable to meaningfully halt the manufacture of weapons, in part because the group best poised to shut down production was conspicuously absent from each of the actions: the companies’ workers. More than two million US workers are employed by the weapons industry, which produces over 80% of all of Israel’s arms imports, including “precision guided munitions, small diameter bombs, artillery, ammunition, Iron Dome interceptors and other critical equipment,” according to the Pentagon, as well as F-35 aircraft—the most advanced fighter jets in the world. In the past month and a half, Israel has used these weapons in a genocidal assault that has killed more than 14,000 Palestinian civilians in Gaza, at least 5,600 of them children. The violence has prompted direct action against the Israeli war machine’s supply chain, with protesters targeting not only munitions factories but also ships transporting arms to Israel and financial firms with significant investments in the weapons industry. But unlike in many other parts of the world, where weapons workers have led the disruption in response to an urgent call for solidarity from Palestinian trade unions, in the US, unions in the weapons industry have so far remained outside the fray.

This is despite the presence of tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of unionized workers in the US weapons industry, some of whom are employed at the very factories that protesters have attempted to shut down this fall. As journalist Taylor Barnes reported earlier this year, each of the five major Pentagon contractors—Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, and General Dynamics—employs some unionized workers, although union density at the firms ranges from as low as 4% at Northrop Grumman to as high as 32% at Boeing. Many of these unionized workers belong either to the International Association of Machinists (IAM), or to the United Auto Workers (UAW), which is part of a renaissance in the US labor movement. […]

For anti-war labor organizers in the United States, unionized weapons workers present a paradox: Serving such members ostensibly requires making weapons industry jobs stable and remunerative, but the principles of global solidarity call for dismantling the war machine altogether. Traditionally, US unions have only pursued the former mandate. As one anonymous local union president in the industry put it to researcher Karen Bell earlier this year, “my top priority is trying to make sure that we have work in jobs in the United States . . . I don’t make a lot of judgments on anything other than, what can you do to keep the people I represent in work? That’s my job, and to be anything other than that, it would really be a disservice to the people that are paying my salary.” Rather than questioning their role in the industry, unions have reconfirmed their relationships with weapons companies since the start of Israel’s assault on Gaza. Last month, 1,000 IAM members in Arizona and 1,100 UAW members across the Midwest separately ratified new contracts with Raytheon and General Dynamics respectively, during a period when both companies were actively implicated in the mass killing of Palestinian civilians. When the Raytheon contract deal was announced on October 22nd, one IAM leader said he was “proud to support our Raytheon members and excited for this contract’s positive impact on their lives��—a statement that highlights the seemingly irreconcilable conflict between the economic interests of weapons industry workers and the anti-war, anti-genocide movement.

…

The US labor movement has long been implicated in the country’s wars abroad. In a famous December 1940 radio address, President Franklin D. Roosevelt asked unions and bosses to come together in the fight against global fascism by rapidly converting the US peacetime economy into a wartime one. “I appeal to the owners of plants, to the managers, to the workers, to our own government employees to put every ounce of effort into producing these munitions swiftly and without stint,” he said. “We must be the great arsenal of democracy.”

…

[After the Cold War,] a genuine conversion to a peacetime economy never materialized, in large part due to lobbying from the major Pentagon contractors, and to Democrats’ fear of looking “weak” in comparison to war-rabid Republicans. “In the absence of a vision for what would replace the national security state, the arms industry worked on dual-use technology to serve civilian and military purposes, turned to the export market, and consolidated,” writes journalist Indigo Olivier. “Since the 1990s, the number of prime contractors in aerospace and defense working directly with the Pentagon has dwindled from 51 to five due to a dizzying wave of mergers and acquisitions in the industry. With this new monopoly power, arms companies turned more of their attention to elected officials.” Through decades of successful lobbying, the arms companies have continued to secure lucrative Pentagon contracts, further entrenching an economy of permanent war. The gears of this war machine are greased by military aid packages to US allies—the largest of which by far is an annual $3.8 billion for Israel—which are required to be spent in full or in large part on US arms, thereby acting to subsidize the US weapons industry.

Weapons workers keep this war industry up and running, not only by laboring within it, but also by contributing to its popular legitimacy. As tens of thousands of Americans repeatedly take to the streets to call for an immediate ceasefire in Israel/Palestine—a move favored by 68% of the electorate—President Joe Biden has cited weapons industry workers in his bid to sell voters on sending $14.3 billion in supplemental military assistance to Israel. “Patriot missiles for air defense batteries, made in Arizona. Artillery shells manufactured in twelve states across the country—in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texas,” Biden said in his October 19th Oval Office address, namechecking battleground states in next year’s presidential election. Explicitly echoing Roosevelt, he continued: “Just as in World War II, today patriotic American workers are building the arsenal of democracy and serving the cause of freedom.” In the weeks after the address, Biden’s aides reportedly circulated talking points to congressional allies arguing that supplying Israel with weapons would create manufacturing jobs for US workers. But despite Biden’s attempt to harken back to a time when the labor movement was fully invested in the US war machine, some present-day unionists—in the tradition of predecessors like Reuther and Winpisinger—are beginning to challenge the idea that war is essential to workers’ well-being.

[theoneandmolly]

You know that Chris Fleming line that goes "Call yourself a community organizer even though you're not on speaking terms with your roommates"?

I honestly think every leftist who talks about the "revolution" like Christians talk about the rapture needs to spend a year trying to organize their workplace. Anyone who sincerely talks about building a movement so vast and all-encompassing that it overwhelms all existing power structures needs the dose of humility that comes with realizing they can't even build a movement to get people paid better at a badly run AMC Theaters where everyone already hates the manager.

[theoneandmolly]

remembering when the something awful forums made a word filter that changed the word "females" so it was surrounded by Ferengi emoji (we called em 'smilies' not emoji back in the day) so it looked like this:

because someone was sick of incels using the word to refer to women

[theoneandmolly]

Reblog to hug prev poster (they need a hug)

[theoneandmolly]

reblog if you need a hug

[theoneandmolly]

Reblog to hug prev poster (they need a hug)

[theoneandmolly]

Reblog to hug prev poster (they need a hug)

[theoneandmolly]

An adaptation of Sherlock Holmes set in a world in which the fictional character/literary juggernaut Sherlock Holmes, and all the subsequent adaptations thereof, still exist.

Sherlock Holmes (pronounced Holl-mess, as he is constantly reminding people) just had the misfortune of having parents who really liked the books, and his attitude towards his fictional counterpart is pretty much the same as that of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Sherlock runs a Youtube Theory channel called Mysteries Unwrapped with Sherlock Holmes. He has received no less than seven cease and desist letters from the Conan Doyle estate, all of which he has so faded managed to rebuff by pointing out that that's literally his name.

(No he won't change his name. He's Sherlock Holmes the real live human person. Let Sherlock Holmes the non existent fictional character change his name.)

John is Sherlock's flatmate. Sherlock almost refused to live with him once he realised that it would mean staying with a medical student named John, and only gave in once John pointed out that: a) he's a biomedical student, which is completely different from an md, and b) his surname isn't Watson.

It's now been three years, which is long enough for them to have developed a genuine friendship, and for John to have a) started working towards his PhD in biotechnology, and b) for him to start dating somebody with the surname Watson.

Sherlock can feel the narrative closing in.

His Youtube channel is meant to be focused on lost media, fan theories and stuff like that, but he keeps accidentally stumbling upon and then solving genuine crimes.

His brother Mycroft may or may not have chosen that name after he transitions specifically to annoy him.

He doesn't even live in London, but somehow the only flat they could afford was on a street named fucking Baker Street.

Sherlock Holmes and the Unescapable Power of the Narrative.

[theoneandmolly]

why does it feel like lou is the physical manifestation of your brain waiting to see what’s on the other side of a brennan monologue

[theoneandmolly]

"he's like a woman to me!!!" not true because if he was a woman to you you wouldn't give a fuck about him

[theoneandmolly]

[theoneandmolly]

Here's this week's episode!

[theoneandmolly]

I’ve started playing dnd again and the campaign I’m in has the pitch that we all must be characters from written works. The plot is we got thrown out of our own stories and must find our way back.

I am Hamlet, a warlock who made a pact with his Dad’s ghost (it’s absolutely his Dad’s ghost, he wasn’t tricked at all, ignore the fiend patron type) to get revenge on his Uncle. But this post isn’t about him.

Because our cleric, the one entrusted with keeping the party full of heals, the only person with healing magic, is House MD.

“Wait Iz!” You cry. “House MD is a television show, not written fiction.” You’d be correct. Which is why our cleric House is not from the television show.

He’s from a fan fiction.

It’s as funny as it sounds.

[theoneandmolly]

me: Storytime—I Bought That Mysterious Amulet You Said Was Cursed ‼️‼️

my apprentice: why are you talking like that

me:

my apprentice: is it the curse

me: My Apology Video (I F*cked Up!) 😱 Should Have Listened To My Apprentice 😭

[theoneandmolly]

this line delivery has lived in my head for 10 years

[theoneandmolly]

me

[theoneandmolly]

Toxia Antenbellion Submission by WillWeaverRVA