i’m not an expert, but thru the years of tension surrounding gender/sex and participation in sports, i have always wondered why it isn’t as strong a talking point in leftist circles to push for. no gender/sex division in sports. and where weight or stature matters, to classify players by weight/stature, like in boxing. and i understand arguments that gendered upbringing means some people’s baseline capacity dwindles compared to others, but especially if it’s children we’re talking about, just. train them all with the same diligence, same basic skill set. and go from there. and again, i clearly understand why a right winger’s philosophy is against this, but i don’t understand why, in my real life conversations with leftists who care about either trans/intersex/marginalized children’s well-being, sports in general, or both, that isn’t even more common a talking point
I recently found my “gold” hammer after misplacing it. It’s my favorite tool ever because it looks like a regular hammer trying to be fancy,
but then you twist both halves and unscrew it to find a flat-head screwdriver in the middle.
BUT, if you twist the very end and unscrew that
you find a phillips screwdriver.
BUT DON’T THINK THAT’S ALL THERE IS!THERE’S MORE!! unscrew the very end again to find a smaller flat-head screwdriver!
BUT THAT’S STILL NOT THE END!!
unscrew the end of this screwdriver to find a final, teeny tiny, flat-head screwdriver
look at how cute it is!
it’s like a matryoshka doll of tools.
I have one of these and I keep it in my IT toolkit because that teeny little screwdriver is the right side for laptop casings, but because it lives inside a large object it’s harder to misplace than a standard tiny screwdriver. Also because the look on a client’s face when you bring out a brass hammer to fix their laptop is absolutely wild.
Another colab with my boyfriend Ruuubick, this time set in the world of my lore, Looming. Featuring Jack the wyrm, clockwork rats that spin golden wheels of time, and Godmother Grimalkin, a giant and temperamental cat.
Some myths that need debunking because they’re being pushed by bots and it’s making me angry:
1. “He’s gonna declare martial law!” Okay, so what then? This isn’t something you can enforce nationwide on a country of 350 million people with a military that has a combined force of less than 3 million people, including all support and logistics staff. That doesn’t equal half the population of Los Angeles. Y'all need to fucking stop acting like we’re approaching a mythical point where shit gets “serious.” We’re already there. People are already being disappeared.
Civilians are already being killed in the streets. We’re there. And you know what? They’re already getting near the limits of their ability to force compliance. ICE is dedicating a double digit percentage of their manpower to Minneapolis and they’re not controlling shit. People are pushing back. Your default response when the administration says “We will force you to do this” shouldn’t be “Oh no they’re gonna make us do this!” It should be “Fuck you. Make me.”
2. “Americans are doing nothing!” I did a post about this recently, but it bears revisiting: I don’t know where the hell you’re getting this, because everywhere that ICE or other arms of the federal enforcement apparatus go, they are being pushed back on, humiliated, driven out of neighborhoods, and shown the door. People are fighting back on a truly awe inspiring level. Stop assuming that “doing something” looks like an armed mass of civilians storming Washington and fighting the military in a pitched battle. This is movie bullshit. The world has not looked like that since the early 20th century. What you are seeing, right now, is what “doing something” looks like. Stop it stop it stop it. We ARE doing something, in vast numbers.
3. “He’s gonna cancel elections!” This one has been pushed by bots for the last year, and big name people have been picking it up, and it frustrates the hell out of me so I’m going to hold your hand and tell you bluntly: He. Cannot. Do. This. There is no mechanism. Elections are controlled by the states, and they decide when they happen. There is no federal mechanism for control of elections. What’s Trump gonna do? Post soldiers at every polling place in every swing state? Do you know how many polling places there are in every district? How much manpower this would require? He doesn’t have the people to do it. He doesn’t have the mechanical ability to do it. There are no tools to execute this plan. Is he gonna try to make elections unfair? You bet your ass, but our elections have never been fair. Voter suppression has always existed and will continue to exist until we fix it… but a blanket ban of elections or even some ability to make them not happen? Lol. He doesn’t have the manpower or the means.
But what if he did? Let’s game this out: Congress–or at least the House of Representatives–is not a perpetual body. At the end of 2026 the current congress ceases to exist, and the next one isn’t convened until the following year. Mike Johnson will cease to be Speaker at the end of the year and wont be Speaker again in ‘27 unless his party wins a sufficient majority to elect him. Remember if there are no elections then republicans will not have their seats in 2027. There will be no congress, and without congress, Trump does not have a mechanism for governance. I dunno about you, but those Republican reps like having their jobs, their staff, their salaries, and all the perks that come with office. They do not get those if there is no Congress. That is not something they want.
But he said he was gonna! And? So fucking what? He says a lot of things. He issued an executive order at the start of his second term ordering all school districts in the country to immediately cease teaching “DEI” whatever the hell that means. Do you know what most districts that weren’t actively kissing his ass said? “That’s nice. Make me.” And then he didn’t, because the states control their own education systems, not Trump. His words don’t have the force of law, and are limited by what he actually has levers of power to accomplish. We are **still having elections.** Several happened last week. The States decide this. Trump doesn’t.
The Midterms are gonna happen. They’re gonna matter and they’re gonna have consequences. And you all need to stop acting like he has power over things he doesn’t just because he says he does. That’s propaganda and you’re falling for it.
As with all things Authoritarian, when Trump says “I’m gonna force you to do this,” your response should be as I articulated above:
“Fuck you. Make me.”
I love you all. Be safe. Don’t comply in advance. Don’t give them power they don’t have just because they say they do.
I love these wild sorts of relationships that only came into being in the 20th century, “playing the voice of the same character in different languages”
