Sid

[thegaymertrainer]

I love otter

[hunter-rodrigez]

[sugary-sheep]

we need to put every animal in a big pot and boil them

[sugary-sheep]

well if tumblr user homophobia thinks I shouldn't do it!!

[wordfather]

the only way out is through but fuuuuuuuuuck fuuuuucckkkk cant i like scooch past or something

[sometiktoksarevalid]

[appalachiananarchist]

It's awfully funny how second amendment rights stop mattering when owning a gun becomes the only justification anyone can find for state-sponsored murder.

[sparrowsarecool]

Duckduckgo is doing a poll on whether people want A'I' or not, vote here:

Are you YES AI or NO AI? Vote now.

Big Tech doesn't care if you want AI or not. They should.

[codotafterdark]

It's currently at about 91% for NO, so let's help it out a bit and see if we can't pump that number up.

Just to REALLY drive the point home.

[retquits]

so don't get too comfortable.

high resolution free to download [ here ]

[audley-and-cherry]

My least favorite things about anti- UBI discourse is always the techbros whining that "nobody is going to work anymore! People will just watch Netflix all day!" and I have 2 responses:

1) Who the fuck cares. Who the fuck cares what people do with their time! That's kind of the fucking point!

2) People aren't going to stop laboring. Housework (look, it's right there in the word!) will still need to be done. So will maintenance on our homes and personal spaces. Children will still need carers, as will the elderly and disabled. There are millions of examples of ~work~ that we do all the time, uncompensated, that won't suddenly stop because we aren't forced to sell our labor to provide corporation's profits.

I'm not surprised that what is traditionally women's work is invisible to these dipshits, but it never fails to anger me.

Anyway. Join the IWW.

[sleepyowlet]

Field studies have been conducted in several countries now, and the result is always the same - people will just flop about for a couple of months to recover from the burnout most people who have a job live with, and then they look for something to do. Some get a job with reduced hours, and some start doing charitable stuff like volunteering in soup kitchens and teaching others to do whatever their particular skill is. They socialize more, they are happier, and on average, people will work more, not less.

But the thing is, employers suddenly have to think about how to make their jobs appealing enough for someone to come and do them! It's hard to find someone to work for you for long hours under horrible conditions, if they can just choose not to; which shows you how voluntary our current system actually is.

[trochaic-mutant-ninja-tetrameter]

🎶People won't stop working! If so, fuck it!🎵

[shanehollanderss]

they did it again

Live: Man shot by federal agent in south Minneapolis this morning, witnesses say

More than a hundred protesters and observers have gathered near E. 26th Street and Nicollet Avenue.

[livbensonfinalgirl]

police chief Brian O'Hara confirms the victim has died

The man shot by federal agents this morning has died, Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara told the Minnesota Star Tribune.

Several witnesses have already been transported to the Whipple building. ICE attempted to order local police from the scene, but O’Hara refused, sources said.

[amatyultare]

I am seeing a lot of folks in the notes saying "call it what it is: murder" and I sympathize with the emotion behind those statements. However, I would like to gently suggest a more honest, though disheartening, framing—

This, like Renee Good's killing, was a state-sanctioned extra-judicial execution.

These killings are not the result of individual "rogue" bad actors. And given the federal government's constant stream of positive and supportive statements about these killings, one can only conclude that ICE is doing what their bosses, i.e. the executive branch, has directed them to do. In other words: these aren't individual crimes, it's policy.

The US, at the federal level, has de facto declared a policy of extra-judicial executions against anyone believed to be "the opposition". That is very scary to consider, but I think it's important to grapple with the truth.

[srune]

only thing that comes to mind today.

[deadgenerations]

the fad of putting these little blurbs in TTRPGs was probably the most embarrassing bit of useless wanking the little industry scene has ever done, besides the time Warmahordes put a "this aint your daddys tabletop game!" in their rulebook.

does this serve any purpose other than to make the publisher feel like they're Doing Something, and to help consumers feel like their purchases are meaningful political engagement?

At the absolute minimum you could make a game which actually is a meaningful cultural expression of your ideals, or which is politically anti fascist in any way.

[sunspotpony]

So this is actually I can reassure you, the exact opposite of self indulgent wanking with no impact. It’s aggressively impactful in a very specific way—by making the nazis in the room very loud about the fact that they’re nazis.

I’m going to tell you about how a discord banner that was put up for pride month in the Lancer ttrpg official discord was so successful at getting bigots to out themselves, that it’s been the permanent official discord banner for 4 years now.

This is the updated version. It’s animated now.

But pride month 4 or 5 years ago, somebody made the server banner a Goblin mech dabbing in front of a trans flag.

And for your average person who joined the server, they just kinda went, lol cool.

For the trans people who joined the server, it made them feel extra safe.

And for the bigots who joined the server? They’d fucking bitch about it IMMEDIATELY. And promptly get banned.

And that month saw so many bannings of dipshits that they decided to keep that banner, because every single time a bigot joins the server, there is a high chance that they will out themselves IMMEDIATELY and be promptly banned.

While including text like this in a book is different than a community space, the reality is, fascists do not like being embarrassed or confronted about their beliefs; they have fragile egos.

So imagine you are going through the book with a group of friends, and you get to this block about “fascism bad,” and somebody is like, “I don’t know how I feel about this. It seems a bit stupid,” it immediately gets to raise a red flag for everybody that maybe this person isn’t, as cool to have at the table as they thought.

Similarly, you know how many bigots went and burned their beers/hats/shoes because some corporation supported trans people/gay people/Collin Kapernick?

This is performative, yes. But it’s not performative to puff up themselves as heroes. It’s performative, aimed right at the fragile skinned assholes who will boycott Oreos and Budweiser for “supporting the gays.”

It’s one of the FASTEST ways to reduce the number of virulent bigots in a community for ZERO COST.

Like, maybe the experience of the lancer discord is atypical, and fascists are learning to have thicker skins and lie about their beliefs better.

It’s still PROFOUNDLY CHEAP AND EASY to include this blurb.

So, it’s free, zero effort nazi repellent.

Frankly with that in mind, I’d regard anybody who ISNT doing this, as maybe a tiny bit cowardly.

It doesn’t fix the world— anyone who thinks the table top scene will magically save the day is a fool—but it does increase the odds that the hobby will be a safer place for more reasonable people, and not become a bastion of fascism like the wh40k fandom has.

[noctumsolis]

Like, maybe the experience of the lancer discord is atypical, and fascists are learning to have thicker skins and lie about their beliefs better.

It may be atypical but it's certainly not unique. Another example is the Heraldry discord I'm on, with an icon that is animated to switch its original colours and two other versions, displaying gay pride and transgender pride colours.

Bigots join, bigots mouth off, bigots get banned.

Sometimes we get a different flavour of bigot, ones who tolerate us queers but are racist as hell. They tend to out themselves, too, because it's a heraldry server. That fact alone makes them assume that we're all "European culture is best" and other racist bullshit. They get banned.

See also the Godot discord, with an icon that scrolls through pride colours in a beautiful way.

[trismeowgistus]

It even works for games famously infested with fascists like 40k. Games Workshop coming out with a (really rather tepid) statement of support of BLM had Nazis losing their minds in the comments fucking immediately

[walking-fandom]

I remember the meltdowns when the new Worls of Darkness books came out that this blurb is in. It's pretty easy to piss fascists off by just saying you don't want them there.

[crazy-pages]

The Pathfinder Facebook group did something like this on purpose as a honeypot and immediately banned all the bigots coming out of the woodwork, and immediately eliminated more than HALF of all incidents requiring moderators. Not just about bigotry, everything.

And that is TACTICALLY USEFUL.

Because game companies spend so much money moderating chat spaces (both forums and in-game chats) and they lose so much business when dominant third party online spaces associated with their game turn toxic. Hell moderation is the big money sink for social media. Managing that cost is one of the most difficult aspects of the business.

Now imagine telling a game or social media executive that you can eliminate half of their harassment in a single honeypot operation. Imagine telling them that you have a technique which surgically targets a majority of their most toxic members and immediately gets rid of them. Because that's what this is.

You slap up a big pride or power banner and an announcement that this company stands with [insert group here], or stands against fascism, and you take names on everybody who has angry or quibbling shit to say about that. And then you ban them all. And just like that the moderation load you're dealing with gets so much lighter. Keep it up with a similar announcement whenever a topical opportunity presents itself and you clean out any new trash which walks in too.

And it just so happens that the way to do this is to clear out the bigots and make a safe space for oppressed groups.

There are so many of these companies which are worried that by taking a stand like this they will hurt their user base. There are so many forums online with volunteer moderators who reflexively don't want to wait into politics because they think that will increase their workload. Give them good solid practical examples of this reducing their workload instead, and you will get some of them onboard.

Because this has a real measurable impact with the right follow through, and the impact is a general reduction in all harassment of everyone. And that is worth capital M Money and capital T Time to some people.

[voltaspistol]

Not an invitation to cocoon yourself in a self-care bubble for four years, but a reminder to the 24/7 worriers that you can literally write "To Do on Monday: Worry about ________" on a post-it note and stop worrying about it for one day while you recharge.

[quasi-normalcy]

Another point: Both your mental health and your ability to resist will be improved by finding a community. A sorrow shared is a sorrow halved. And apes together strong.

[monarcho-mysticism]

Of course! Fascism will be stopped by positive thinking! Make sure toncare about you mental health first and foremost. It is the most important part of the <current political climate>. Feeling good is more important than doing anything, atter all.

...you guys get that being herded into a complacent mindset of "i will resist fascism by chilling" is exactly what a fascist regime would do in 21st century, right?

[instant-bull]

I think you're reading too much into this, the post doesn't say "you can resist by doing fuckall", it says you shouldn't allocate every second of your life to active and constant resistance and state of worry because it is, in the long run, going to damage you, burn you out and impact your wellbeing. It's actually not healthy to keep the candle burning in both hands.

"Protect your mental health" doesn't mean "ignore everything at all costs to achieve a sense of blissful ignorance", it means that you should know your limits. If I spend every day constantly worrying about the rise of neo-fascism I will achieve nothing and worsen my personal condition. If I instead allow myself to be more in-and-out, work within a community but then come home and, say, play a game or watch a movie, I will be much more beneficial to the society

[lizardlicks]

The point isn't don't worry. The point is "worry about things you can actually do something about." For the things you can't do anything about, set them aside until you can make a plan. Sometimes you don't have access to the things you need right now. Sometimes you never will, and it's a job for someone else, and you need to stop obsessing over it. Prioritize fixing the things you have the skill set, resources, and mental bandwidth to handle. Let go of the rest and trust in other people.

The point is you are not an island and you can't do everything yourself. You need to take time to connect to and bond with people in order to build community. You also need to take time to rest because you're not a machine, and you still need to LIVE.

[everystarstorm]

You know how kids are supposed to be exposed to some level of dirt and grime as they grow up so their immune systems can learn what's a deadly disease and what just causes some slight irritation? And if a kid grows up in a too clean environment they're likely to develop severe allergies or a hyper immune disorder?

I think the over sanitation of the internet is doing similar things to people's psyche.

No that ship with an age gap isn't the same as pedophilia, you're just having the moral equivalent to hay-fever.

[ellewantsrevenge]

[kawuli]

so I was somewhere behind that sound truck in the first picture with @mythopoetry and @grison-in-space and an hour after the march was supposed to start we were shivering and wondering why we weren't marching, dammit.

well. we weren't marching because there were too many people in the way.

we left at that point to avoid literal frostbite, but as we were heading for the car they started moving.

Minnesota showed the fuck up.

[grison-in-space]

I kept yammering as we were waiting, is this going to be like the DC Women's March in 2017? Where I also showed up like an hour early and didn't march, because the crowds had taken over the entire marching route. I keep thinking, looking over the photos, that that's exactly what happened. We couldn't march because there were too many people in the way.

Minnesota showed up in a way that cannot be spun or repressed, dammit. We did it here, and we will continue showing up in our communities until ICE has retreated like the incompetent cowards they are.

ICE DELENDA EST

[chilewithcarnage]

when the treat you treated yourself to is mid

[chilewithcarnage]

when the treat you treated yourself to is mid

[cinemaocd]

How you can help Minnesota

Call your Senators and pressure them to vote to OPPOSE HR 7147 emergency funding bill which passed the House on Thursday. This bill will give ICE 10 billion to continue and expand their operations. This is the most important thing you can do to support us right now. This is especially true if you have a Democratic senator. They need to get 7 dems to flip to pass. This is being brought upon us because we are unapologetic Blue State. This is politically motivated. Please impress on your senators that they must hold the line.

Support the economic boycotts that Ice Out MN general strike started yesterday. There are a bunch of petitions/letters to various companies that support ICE and allow them to continue to terrorize us. Please sign the petition and demand they stand with Minnesota against ICE. Letter to Hilton Letter to Target Letter to Enterprise Letter to Home Depot Letter to D.R. Horton (construction company)

Donate to food shelves, rent relief organization, bail funds and other community aid groups. There are a lot of them listed here and on the same page there is a list of vetted private donations that is being kept up to date.

[leebrontide]

Actually, I’m gonna disagree a smidge with OPs mostly excellent post here.

I ALSO want those of you in red states screaming at your Senators. And I want you to pretend to be a lifelong republican when you do it. Yell about community and what-about-the-children and “this isn’t what I voted for why are spending billions on this when eggs still cost a million dollars” and yell about shooting a mom on the way from school one week and a nurse who treats veterans the next. About kidnapping a little boy right off the school bus and disappearing him across state lines. About ICE harassing police and law abiding citizens. About how they kidnap 3000 with no warrant and almost all of them are citizens. Call ICE agents every variant of “thug” and “lawless” that you can think of. Tell them you saw the videos and know ICE is lying and think you’re all too stupid to notice. Say you don’t want your government smashing peoples windows and carrying people off and saying they don’t need warrants. About gassing a minivan full of kids and an infant in the hospital. Tell them you didn’t want to believe what those Democrats said about Republicans and feel mad and ashamed and betrayed to see this.

Cause even Republicans here are PISSED OFF.

And every Republican elected in MN knows their party is fuuuuucked as far as MN goes. You can see even many of them posting begging for this to be over.

Your job is to put that fear into YOUR Republicans before this comes to your door.

[boamerry]

charge yalls vibrators this storm looks BAD