tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-381448892024-03-17T22:01:52.601-05:00GondwanalandGondwanaland: a moral panic-free zoneUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger971125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-44832054563402249282024-02-23T11:46:00.002-05:002024-02-23T11:47:34.982-05:00Free Julian Assange! (Petition)This message comes from independent Presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.: Our nation stands at a critical juncture, where the very essence of democracy and free speech hangs in the balance. Individuals like Daniel Ellsberg, John Kiriakou, Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, and Julian Assange have bravely exposed government corruption, shedding light on injustices that threaten Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-7974658845330170072024-02-15T23:50:00.003-05:002024-02-20T18:41:47.984-05:00The American Creed and Revolutionary RegenerationThis evening I took part in a lively Braver Angels Film Club discussion of the film American Creed. I made several interventions in the chat, of which I consider the first the most important. In this, I took off from the words of one schoolchild in the film who said he thinks freedom means "no one can boss you around," observing that today most Americans don't enjoy freedom in this sense. I used Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-30475152370668915812024-02-13T11:59:00.004-05:002024-02-20T18:47:01.856-05:00FIRE to Supreme Court: Stop Government Bullies from Intimidating Social Media Platforms In a new friend-of-the-court filing, FIRE asks the Supreme Court to prevent government officials from coercing private social media platforms into censoring speech.From https://www.thefire.org/news/fire-supreme-court-stop-government-bullies-intimidating-social-media-platformsIn Murthy v. Missouri (formerly referred to as Missouri v. Biden), a federal court of appeals held officials from the Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-73589285238288133292024-02-05T17:22:00.004-05:002024-02-05T17:34:44.147-05:00Standing Together Fourth National Convention in HaifaThis news from Standing Together, the binational Israeli-Palestinian peace and justice movement: On Friday over 1000 Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel came together for our fourth National Convention! We voted for our national leadership and discussed the need to build a new path - toward justice, equality and peace in Israel/Palestine. We started the day with a performance from theUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-69767907447495545422024-02-04T15:09:00.004-05:002024-02-20T18:50:57.006-05:00RQ Requiem Issue Release PartyRoot Quarterly is releasing another issue.The details:ISSUE RELEASE PARTY REQUIEM ISSUECover ArtSynthesis #8 by John Singletary. 40 x 41, 2012SATURDAY FEB 10‘Requiem’ Issue Release Party7 - 10 p.m.Old Swedes’ (Gloria Dei Church)927 S. Water Street Philadelphia, PA 19147Join us for cocktails, art, music, and lively conversation. Kids table with drawing supplies available.Free parking in lot Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-9795517995419067502024-01-23T15:45:00.006-05:002024-02-20T18:51:54.405-05:00Today's Free Speech Hypocrites: Bill Ackman and Larry SummersIn the latest "free speech" hypocrisy, Bill Ackman and Larry Summers attack the Jewish historian appointed to head Harvard's antisemitism task force.https://fstube.net/w/8QPv8NN13CYSYvY3qtDXiSUnknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-2744876447044212032024-01-20T17:04:00.003-05:002024-01-20T17:23:33.518-05:00Trump’s Iowa Victory Marks Total Establishment CollapseI've never been a Trump supporter, but I'm disgusted at how the establishment is trying to interfere with the democratic process in his case. In this video, independent liberal Glenn Greenwald discusses Trump's unprecedented blowout victory in the Iowa caucuses and the establishment's inability to digest it:https://fstube.net/w/vkFQ5YMbzvWEexZdcXCHUCIf you don't like the manipulations of Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-9037217917742650562024-01-19T09:51:00.000-05:002024-01-19T09:51:59.220-05:00Penn Faculty for Justice in Palestine | Announcement statement of Palestinian solidarity chapter formation"The movement for justice in Palestine has become crucial to the defense of academic freedom."This appeared in yesterday's Daily Pennsylvanian:"We write to announce the formation of Penn Faculty for Justice in Palestine (PFJP), a collective of those who support the teaching and research mission of the University, including faculty, lecturers, staff, and graduate employees. We have constituted Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-27277626687033306072024-01-15T11:50:00.001-05:002024-01-15T11:50:21.992-05:00Without Free Speech, Today Is Just a MondayA message from FIRE for Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday:Today, the vast majority of Americans agree with Martin Luther King Jr. that we should be judged not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character. So it’s easy to forget just how radical King’s ideas were in his time.Unpopular ideas are often hated, as are the people who voice them. In 1966, Americans were nearly Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-13432223179100348372024-01-08T16:28:00.000-05:002024-01-08T16:28:59.844-05:00Remembering David Bowie “I saw David many times [..] and it was always great.”Today would be rock star David Bowie’s 77th birthday, and Philadelphia will be holding a week-long celebration. What follows is one fan’s remembrance of him. “Journalist Michael Kaplan interviewed former teenage groupie Lori Mattix, also known as Lori Maddox or Lori Lightning, for Thrillist about her relationship with Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-39133109268330545002024-01-06T17:11:00.000-05:002024-01-06T17:11:30.774-05:00Standing Together Gets Started on New Academic YearThe Israeli peace and justice group Standing Together is jumping into action on its campus organizing now that the academic year has belatedly started. They sent out this message about it:Happy New Year! The start of 2024 marks the opening of the academic year in universities and colleges in Israel - finally!
The
academic year was supposed to begin in October but was delayed until
this Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-72076532516498598132023-12-30T15:31:00.001-05:002023-12-30T15:31:43.111-05:00Become a Card-Carrying Member! A message from Nico Perrino with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression:In recent years, FIRE has been accused — incorrectly — of being a conservative organization. We’ve defended conservative students from censorship on college campuses, and we reject the idea that “hate speech” is equivalent to violence. So those who don’t understand free speech sometimes lump us in with the Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-67431440343258630322023-12-17T23:50:00.002-05:002023-12-18T00:03:41.986-05:00Bombing the LibraryOkay, I confess: that was a baity title. I have not in fact bombed any libraries, nor do I plan to. But I did drop a couple truth bombs into a library censorship debate the other night.Organized by Braver Angels, it posed, "Resolved: Don’t ban or censor books at schools or public libraries for patrons sixth grade and older." By the time I got my turn to speak, about fifteen minutes Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-82018686960423666522023-12-14T00:44:00.000-05:002023-12-14T00:44:34.110-05:00Standing Together Webinar This Sunday!The binational Israeli peace and justice organization Standing Together is holding a webinar this Sunday, 12/17/23, to inform supporters about their organizing efforts. As the invitation states:After over two months of war, death, and destruction, where do we go from here? Join us on Sunday December 17th (1pm EST / 8pm Jerusalem) for a webinar, where you'll meet members of Standing Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-21899561924142827172023-12-04T14:22:00.003-05:002023-12-04T14:22:27.946-05:00Screenshots Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-54675607299652235502023-11-17T16:16:00.002-05:002023-11-17T16:39:43.582-05:00Bush Didn't Want You Even Knowing This Letter ExistedGeorge W. Bush kept the vast majority of Americans -- including me -- from even knowing about Osama bin Laden's 2002 "letter to America." Now, thanks to TikTok, we can all read it. In this video Glenn Greenwald talks about why it was censored and what we can learn from it.It shouldn't need saying that one doesn't have to subscribe to bin Laden's religious-totalitarian ideology to appreciate the Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-39820807147668886372023-11-03T15:26:00.004-05:002023-11-03T15:27:31.910-05:00Young Voters Stand Up for Open Primaries in PennsylvaniaAn announcement from Open Primaries:
Americans are rejecting the
Democratic and Republican Parties and going independent, and young
voters are leading the way. 61% of 18 to 24-year-olds identify as
independents – a 50% increase since 1998.
Students
for Ballot PA, a group of
students from 16 different PA colleges is becoming a powerful voice in the effort to open primaries to all
voters. Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-24252177381022197342023-10-31T17:03:00.000-05:002023-10-31T17:03:59.187-05:00A Love Story for Halloween It sounds more like a story for Valentine's Day, but it was on this date in 1913 that the influential historians Ariel (1898-1981) and Will Durant (1885-1981) were married. Their remarkable love story began on the first day Ariel (born Chaya Kaufman) walked into his classroom and they were married a year later.Learn more about their story in the video linked below.https://fstube.net/w/Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-62037039630048366742023-10-18T08:04:00.001-05:002023-10-18T08:04:54.442-05:00Milo's 39th: The Tragedy of a GrifterToday is the 39th birthday of Milo Yiannopoulos, a social influencer whose trajectory is significant in the recent evolution of US politics. From NewgonWiki: "Milo Yiannopoulos (born Milo Hanrahan, 18 October 1984) is a British media influencer (banned Twitter account @Nero) and online alt-lite personality known for his role in #Gamergate, ridiculing of feminism and 'regressive' leftism, andUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-85283507149561637772023-10-14T17:27:00.003-05:002023-10-14T17:43:16.064-05:00The Middle East Needs the Fourteenth Amendment: My Message to the White HouseAt the urging of an email from Dr. Cornel West's Presidential campaign, I left a message on President Biden's website today, as well as those of Senators Casey and Fetterman and Representative Boyle:I demand that my taxes stop being used to fund the Israeli occupation that has given rise to the current bloodshed. Make clear that the resumption of aid is conditioned on unilateral action to Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-81034444558952815412023-10-12T14:46:00.000-05:002023-10-12T14:46:19.180-05:00Election Endorsement: Vote for Seth! My thinking about electoral politics over the past few years has been focused on searching for strategies for breaking the grip of the orchestrated culture wars that both big capitalist parties have been promoting to keep working-class people in their thrall by getting us polarized along tribal partisan lines rather than uniting on a class-wide basis.Because of the way we've been induced toUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-57164126554051014762023-10-07T16:16:00.000-05:002023-10-07T16:16:00.847-05:00Student Workers Rally at Penn The other day student workers rallied on Penn's central green after voting overwhelmingly to form a union. Above is a group picture taken at its conclusion. I'm in the second row near the extreme left, with a blue baseball cap on.The Daily Pennsylvanian's story on the rally can be read here, and a video panorama I took of the crowd can be seen here.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-55904556252682884322023-10-05T23:32:00.001-05:002023-10-05T23:32:30.302-05:00Behind the ButtonYesterday, as I was sitting in Mark's Cafe in Van Pelt Library, someone who looked to be a Penn undergrad pointed to one of the buttons on my sweatshirt and said he'd be very interested in learning how I came to be wearing it. So I told him.A number of years ago, I read in the paper about a city employee who claimed to be intimidated as a Jew by a Palestinian flag that someone had posted on an Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-76076064152298559392023-10-01T21:06:00.001-05:002023-10-01T21:06:53.401-05:00Ageist Superstition Is Not Okay: Answering Verity VioletThe plural of "anecdote" is not "data."In a superlong post partially screencapped below, Verity Violet lists numerous age-gap relationships involving famous people, restricting herself in sexist fashion to those between an older male and a younger female although in reality they occur in all combinations of age and sex. Then she asserts that this is "not okay."Here's what the science shows: "Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-38144889.post-34444904265315431782023-09-25T10:49:00.000-05:002023-09-25T10:49:06.878-05:00Why You Shouldn't Tell Someone That Everyone's a Little AutisticIt's not true, and it's extremely annoying to be told this as an autistic person. I wrote about one aspect of how being autistic is a qualitatively different way of experiencing things in this post: https://stripey7.blogspot.com/2019/03/a-new-window-on-myself.htmlThe video by Amanda (IAmMindBlind) pictured above: https://fstube.net/w/dTcSBWKS45J2k6kHFfMy2t Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0