Andy Lowry @AndyLowry@qoto.org

If one is doing "labelling" of mental states, how does one know which is which? What phenomenological different distinguishes say "greed" from "generosity"?

#Buddhism

the 4 types of national anthems:

- Gosh, This Sure is an Attractive Piece of Land We've Got Here

- That One War in Particular was a Doozy

- We Only Sing Parts of This Song Now Because the Other Verses are Racist

- We Speak French and We Will Fucking Kill You

TL;DR: Seth Abrahamson is falsifying with his claim that Mastodon admins are secretly reading our DMs and his claim that they are "overlords" acting like "secret police" represents a very dangerous sort of finger-pointing associated with, well, secret police. Methinks the liar doth protest too much.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
One of the claims Seth Abrahamson makes on his post article is not only false it is sensationalism in a sort of inverted Alex Jones style:

Writing in "The Post" which might more appropriately be deemed "The Pest", he claims:

".. the sometimes-anonymous overlords of an individual Mastodon server can actually read your private messages without your knowledge... the level of content moderation on that site extended even to a secret police–like surveillance of users’ private communications..."

☝️ Regarding "the sometimes-anonymous overlords"

☝️☝️almost every significant instance is hosted by a person who gives their full legal name and in many cases they proudly state their business or place of employment and can be verified on Linked In. His use of the #weaselwords does not change the fact that his characterization of Mastodon admins as 'anonymous overlords' is both wrong and demagogic

☝️Regarding "can actually read your private messages without your knowledge...secretely"

☝️☝️​ there is full disclosure everywhere you look that DMs are not encrypted on Mastodon.

You are warned and advised to use email, Signal or some alternative for private comms. Abrahamson incorrectly characterizes DMs as "private" but they are expressly NOT private. No one thinks that but perhaps Abrahamson's cult of devotees.

Mastodon admins are probably the busiest techies on the planet who are not in a sweatshop like twitter where the threat of losing their work visa and a sadistic madman of a boss are driving them to work long hours.

They simply don't have the time to read or surveill anyone's DMs even if they wanted to.

☝️☝️It is technologically intricate and time-consuming to plow through DM. This can be fact checked with @tim @Gargron
@jerry or anyone at #admin

-
☝️Insofar as it is common knowledge that the DMs are not encrypted, if a harassing or threatening DM were sent they would have the ability to verify that they were sent as alleged. This is true of twitter and Facebook as well, for that matter.

☝️Regarding " the level of content moderation on that site extended even to a secret police..."

☝️ ☝️Aside from the distortions and falsifications, if true, these alleged Stasi/Gestapo/FSB surveillance activities would not be 'content moderation'. He is commingling the complex issue of #contentmoderation with the issue of #privacy in a bizarre false reality of his own making. To the extent it is at all intelligible, it would be some kind of illicit peeping tom malfeasance with no legitimate connection to content moderation. It seems like he is trying to leverage discontent with content moderation and parlay into a following by hitching it to his hyperbole.

Seems like the kind of thing that Trump does, but on a somewhat more sophisticated level. Sneaky, really.

☝️☝️ In conclusion ☝️☝️

Seth Abrahamson has a reputation evident on a search engine output in which unsurprisingly consistent with the above. And that is just one point among many in his article of Pest. Note also, the top return on #duckduckgo leads to an embarassing tweet that he deleted. Despite his sanitizing, the Duck Duck Go server retains the gist of the tweet, which I have posted here on another entire thread. This particular thread is restricted to his near-slanderous allegations about #mods and #Moderation

Gotta love tech journalists who describe Mastodon as "that impossible-to-use website." First of all, it's an app. C'mon. Second of all, aren't these the same people who write breathless explainers about the wonder of cryptocurrencies, which are not only impossible to understand but literally built from bullshit?

Here is my #Introduction, with hashtags. I’m an #author and essayist, part of, and hopeful about, the #TwitterMigration.

I write about #science and #technology and their cultural effects. My books include #Chaos, The #Information, and #TimeTravel, as well as biographies of Richard #Feynman and Isaac #Newton.

Free for the taking: Here's 30 days of reading at The Washington Post: https://wapo.st/30daypass?code=GVB-UNX-KVU-MAV

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@AndyLowry @DeanObeidallah
Propaganda does that! As a child in middle school I remember being shown what propaganda looked like so we would be able to determine for ourselves. That was a Republican initiative.
It's so strange seeing Russian sympathizers in our top government offices now, with Americans older than me supporting them. Used to, being called a Russian sympathizer was fighting words, now it's a Trumpists calling.
Real Americans don't support countries who wage war & break treaties.

I used to be married to an active, vibrant, happy young woman who decided one day to hang a bird feeder in the back yard, and now I’m married to a glassy-eyed, unwashed maniac that stands at the kitchen window all day screaming at squirrels.

📣 The Intercept newsroom is pleased to join you all on the fediverse to share our journalism, and to help support a decentralized platform that aims to be a better place to be. Please consider boosting this post so more readers know we’re here.

Ukraine's survival, Zelensky's triumphant speech - none of this was inevitable. Let's try to imagine what would have happened if the US and Europe had not helped Ukraine, if Russia had occupied the country, if the Ukrainian political class and creative class had been wiped out, if Russian troops were now based along the Polish border. What would the world look like now?

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/12/zelensky-congress-speech-us-ukraine-support/672547/

Shadow Diplomats Have Posed a Threat for Decades. The World’s Governments Looked the Other Way.
--

ProPublica & ICIJ identified more than 150 current & former consuls accused or convicted of #TaxEvasion #fraud #bribery #corruption or #MoneyLaundering.

Nearly 60 were tied to #drug or #weapons offenses, at least 20 others to violent #crimes.

https://www.propublica.org/article/honorary-consuls-shadow-diplomatic-immunity-governments

ANNOUNCEMENT: We're leaving Twitter and will be using Mastodon along with our already existing social media accounts.

See our reasoning and our other links in the editorial below.

https://doublesidedmedia.com/2022/12/21/we-are-leaving-twitter-heres-why-and-where-you-can-find-us/

Any pundit who is criticizing Pres. Zelenskyy's attire is failing to read the room, but moreover, they're just completely missing the point.

A country and its leader under immediate and existential threats have no time for suits and neckties.

He has no visible rank or medals or nametapes or epaulets or brass buttons or starched creases. He's wearing what women and men who are fighting on the frontlines in Ukraine are wearing.

He's wearing the urgency of the moment.

That's the point.

THIS JUST IN...

Hallmark Researchers Say They are Very Close to Developing a Second Movie Plot!

Someone please give Marjorie Taylor Greene a hundred bucks and send her to Charles Entertainment Cheese tonight, so she doesn’t embarrass us during President Zelensky’s address to Congress.

A reminder that Matt Gaetz had $482,321 in PPP loans forgiven.

Matt Gaetz doesn't own a company.

I'm losing my heart all over again to this 11.5cm tall #stag, carved from a single piece of wood & originally covered with gold leaf, with its vast branched leather antlers. Made in the 5thC BC as a finial for a #prehistoric #Scythian headdress, it was one of the artefacts in the #BritishMuseum's 2017 Scythian exhibition.
There's more about the exhibition at https://www.britishmuseum.org/blog/introducing-scythians. /1