good morning everyone in my phone who makes me feel less alone in my human experience
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.
Discussions of trans women in sports often focus on elite/professional sports which honestly I find it hard to care about but the more common scenario of “we’re going to legally ban a high school girl from playing sports with her friends because she’s trans” is just profoundly evil
i remember when utah's (republican) governor ended up vetoing a law banning transgender students from playing high school sports when he looked at the numbers, and there were only four trans students in the state playing sports at all. he released a clumsily worded but surprisingly compassionate statement about the decision.
I must admit, I am not an expert on transgenderism. I struggle to understand so much of it, and the science is conflicting. When in doubt, however, I always try to err on the side of kindness, mercy, and compassion. I also try to get proximate, and I am learning so much from our transgender community. They are great kids who face enormous struggles. Here are the numbers that have most impacted my decision: 75,000, 4, 1, 86 and 56. 75,000 high school kids participating in high school sports in Utah. 4 transgender kids playing high school sports in Utah. 1 transgender student playing girls sports. 86% of trans youth reporting suicidality. 56% of trans youth having attempted suicide. Four kids and only one of them playing girls sports. That’s what all of this is about. Four kids who aren’t dominating or winning trophies or taking scholarships. Four kids who are just trying to find some friends and feel like they are a part of something. Four kids trying to get through each day. Rarely has so much fear and anger been directed at so few. I don’t understand what they are going through or why they feel the way they do. But I want them to live.
of course, it didn't amount to much. they overrode his veto. it's just so cartoonishly evil. an entire state's political body so desperate to terrorize this one little trans girl.
No cat has ever hated me by the way. So the question is, what are you guys doing wrong
Pro tip: don't pick a super niche specialism that people think they know a lot about because you'll forever be mad.jpg
Vinyl records are circular because it's an efficient use of space: the grooves that encode the music are laid out in a spiral on the disc, so that the needle only has to move as far as the disc's radius to read the entire thing. Before this clever idea was thought of, the grooves were instead laid out in a straight line, and every LP was a narrow rectangle more than a thousand feet long. To flip an album to side b at least two people were needed, one at each end, coordinating via shouted instructions.
