Need to let loose a primal scream without collecting footnotes first? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid: Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful youāll near-instantly regret.
Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.
If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cutānāpaste it into its own post ā thereās no quota for posting and the bar really isnāt that high.
The post Xitter web has spawned soo many āesotericā right wing freaks, but thereās no appropriate sneer-space for them. Iām talking redscare-ish, reality challenged āculture criticsā who write about everything but understand nothing. Iām talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. Theyāre inescapable at this point, yet I donāt see them mocked (as much as they should be)
Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldnāt be surgeons because they didnāt believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I canāt escape them, I would love to sneer at them.
(Semi-obligatory thanks to @dgerard for starting this)
@sailor_sega_saturn @BlueMonday1984 here in Canada our prime minister (whoās no fan of Trump) used the word ādecisiveā too. I think at least some people are using the word because they know itās what he wants to hear. It makes my skin crawl, but I canāt argue there isnāt a logic in trying to maintain some power over him with flattery
The sheer speed and consistency with which Americaās institutions have rolled over if not enabled this kind of authoritarianism once it was backed up by fascist populism has been probably the most disheartening element of this whole election cycle. Weāve seen the NYTās quiet but inescapable embrace of transphobia and the transformation of the megacorporations fully into vessels for the personal interest of the shareholding/investing/billionaire class. The judiciary was pretty openly packed with loyalists during the first term, and the senate has been lost for, in retrospect, a very long time. It just seems like theyāve found the right buttons to push to make every single organization that was theoretically supposed to protect us from this kind of regime either stand aside or actively embrace it.
I feel like there are echoes of so much of what we talk about here that come into play here. Itās the disastrous consequences of the rot economy and shareholder supremacy not just undermining the tools that could have otherwise helped organize against this but also destroyed even the vague cultural distinction between the political interests of a company and those of its largest shareholders. Itās neoliberalism reflecting the rationalistās inability to acknowledge that values are not downstream from facts along with the growing influence of the exact illiberal ideologues that weāve tracked for years. I just donāt feel like any of that recognition translates into concrete actions I can take to try and keep the people in my life (or even in this community) safe, or at least safer.
@YourNetworkIsHaunted I think I feel similarly. Things are pretty dire in Canada, too. Right-wing populism is polling very high, our media landscape is mostly conservative-owned, and our communities are fractured. I donāt know what to do either, Iāve been feeling anxious and sick all week, but I think part of the answer has to be local, grass-roots community building, connecting disparate people together for empathy and communication, with minimal reliance on the institutions that got us here
I feel ya, having some real Cassandra moments these days.
I donāt see them grinding us down, though.