BREAKING NEWS: Today SCOTUS ruled 8â1 in Chiles v. Salazar to strike down Coloradoâs ban on licensed mental health professionalsâ use of âconversion therapyâ on minors.
We condemn this ruling and all practices that purport to âchangeâ the sexual orientation or gender identity of LGBTQ+ people.
Theyâd rather the country be poorer and whiter than rich and diverse. Of course when the pie shrinks, the rich will demand the same amount and will tell you the crumbs youâre left with are because of immigrants or trans people or DEI. bsky.app/profile/apne...
Conservatives were on the record in January 2023 in the NYT saying explicitly that they targeted trans youth to be able to ban transitioning for everyone. They admitted it but then every dumb centrist was like "but what about the evidence on trans youth."
And here we are.
Kristi Noem has done a stunning amount of damage and itâs good sheâs gone.
But this doesnât change the fact that we need a complete overhaul of DHS, impartial investigations into the killings of two American citizens, and information on children that were taken from Minnesota.
The Fool's Freedom The sum total of these actions by the oligarchs to capture legacy media, manipulate the algorithmic control of digital platforms, and use the state to assault any remaining independent voices has created a terrifyingly effective new model of information control. It is a system that maintains the outward appearance of a free and diverse media landscape. We still have websites to browse, podcasts to download, and newsletters to subscribe to. Many will even be harshly critical of the oligarchs and the Trump administration. We still possess, in the narrowest legal sense, the right to an opinion. But this is a foolâs freedom. As Hannah Arendt noted, the most profound deprivation of rights occurs not when you are forbidden to have an opinion, but when your opinion is rendered meaningless. The oligarchsâ control over the critical infrastructure of information distribution is the ultimate choke point. They are the gatekeepers of relevance, the silent arbiters of what is seen and what is buried, what is amplified and what is ignored. This new reality destroys the very possibility of public accountability. An independent journalist can break a world-changing story, a citizen can voice powerful dissent, but if these are algorithmically suppressed, they cannot reach a critical mass. They cannot generate public outrage. They cannot hold power to account. This is speech without consequence, opinion without impact. Arendtâs concept of âaction,â meaning the speech and deeds through which we appear to one another and create a shared public world, is rendered impossible. We are witnessing the construction of a sophisticated, 21st-century propaganda state. It is a state that doesnât need to burn books when it can simply change the algorithm. It maintains the illusion of choice while ensuring, through a seamless integration of private ownership, state intimidation, and algorithmic control, that only one narrative prevails.
I wrote this last year about the oligarchs buying up all of legacy and social media. It's just as true now and extremely grim.
www.thedissident.news/the-oligarch...
so we paid the tariffs and now the corporations that passed the costs on to me and you are the ones that are going to be reimbursed, do i have that correct
This is what ICE looks like
Screenshot of a Wall Street Journal article titled "The Big Money in Todayâs Economy Is Going to Capital, Not Labor." Two charts show trends since 1980: corporate profits rising as a share of gross domestic income, while labor compensation steadily declines.
The Wall Street Journal just illustrated the core argument of my book: a system rigged to reward capital over labor is one in which even full-time work no longer secures the most basic material needs.
This is the economic order that produces the "working homeless."
www.wsj.com/economy/jobs...
If Jeff Bezos could afford to spend $75 million on the Melania movie & $500 million for a yacht to sail off to his $55 million wedding to give his wife a $5 million ring, please don't tell me he needed to fire one-third of the Washington Post staff.
Democracy dies in oligarchy.
Our founders, though deeply flawed, understood that democracy requires an informed citizenry and a government accountable to it people. Thatâs why the press is the only profession protected by the Constitution. Itâs also why autocrats and oligarchs seek to control and destroy it.
âMeasles outbreak at the prison for kidsâ sounds like something out of a Dickens novel
Itâs 2026, havenât we figured out yet that performative support is a good thing? Performative support demonstrates societal norms. Iâd much rather have brands making money off of pride than hiding from it again.
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Catherine O'Hara? Are you fucking kidding me? Fuck this year.
this is america
âIndependentâ is doing too much work in this first wave. They are arresting journalists and just like everything else theyâve done, theyâre testing the limits of our resistance by starting wt vulnerable margins.
If only weâd had a sign back in 2016 that Trump had authoritarian impulses that his supporters loved. Like, I donât know, enthusiastic chants of âLock her upâ aimed at his opponent, or something hypothetical like that.
I do not regret to inform you that we are going to win.
âAsking scientists to spy on and report on their fellow co-authorsâ is a âclassic hallmark of authoritarianism,â said Jennifer Jones, director for the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists
If anyone was still pretending this isnât just about excluding trans kids from public life, the Trump administration just opened a Title IX investigation into a Maine school district because a trans student is on a *co-ed* cheerleading squad.
Native Americans are being swept up by ICE in Minneapolis, tribes say www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...
ICEâs killing of Renee Good sent a clear message to Americans: oppose Trumpâs policies at your peril. Itâs hard to imagine a greater affront to the First Amendment. bit.ly/3Kq348R
This is why there is no free speech without anonymous speech.
This is why online ID checks / age verification is incompatible with the 1st amendment and human rights.
This is why "make everyone use their real names" is not a real solution to online hate & harm
www.politico.com/newsletters/...
Non-protesting dad just trying to hustle his kids, as young as 6mo, out of the neighborhood. ICE threw a flash-bang INTO HIS car, all 6 kids in the hospital now.
If anyone wondered how things turn against occupying armies there's a case study playing out in front of you.
The "what a week" meme from 30 Rock. Liz Lemon (played by Tina Fey) says "what a week, huh?" And Jack Donaghy (played by Alec Baldwin) replies "Lemon it's 6:30 AM on a Monday"
Mamdani is here describing a vision of working-class consumerism that resonates with the 19th century theorists of the âliving wageâ and shorter hours movements, whom I wrote about in my first book. âEight Hours for What Will,â very much included the arts, education, and pleasure.
Border Patrol officers arrived at a Minneapolis high school while students were leaving and tackled, sprayed chemical irritants, and handcuffed parents and teachers.
Public high schools in Minneapolis have canceled classes for the rest of the week following the incident.
For people who have not yet had ICE descend on their city, I think itâs hard to convey how all-encompassing their presence is. You constantly hear about the neighbors theyâve taken, get texts about where not to go that day, see signs from where people were taken, hear whistles from down your block.
thereâs just really no pretense of being able to protest against the trump government anymore
