ABrockwell @aebrockwell@qoto.org

We've all had a day or two to process what the Supreme Court just did.

The battle for our country and for the rule of law, not of oligarchs, lies ahead of us. Let us recommit to it now, and with grave determination resolve to turn this tide back in 2024.

I am ready. Are you?

To recap: Supreme Court justices nominated by a president who lost the popular vote and confirmed by Senators representing far less than half the country have eliminated abortion rights, green-lighted anti-LGBTQ discrimination, and ended affirmative action.

In one year.

#WritingWonders 6.29 — How would you feel if your book got banned?

The whole idea of banning books fills me with anxiety and rage. It's one thing to prevent your children from reading something, or to persuade your family and friends to choose not to read something, but to presume you know well enough to prevent strangers from being able to choose?

In my experience, actions like banning books are to show solidarity with a group in which an individual wants gain power, or to gain power by preventing other people from thinking for themselves. It disgusts me.

I write stories that push the limits, though I'm no Lenny Bruce or Judy Blume. In a story, you might read passing references to a morning-after "potion" being available from the school nurse, or see race-biased language spoken—purposefully, not gratuitously. If you never encounter the devil, will you truly appreciate a saint?

I always worry about offending people who don't understand cautionary tales in fiction or are incapable of recognizing satire. Worse, I worry about people who do recognize this and want to protect their social position or power base by censorship.

How I'd feel about my book? Until it happens, I really don't know. Wanting to know the reasons, at very least, to fix if I made a mistake. Not happy, at very least.

#BoostingIsSharing
#CommentingIsCool

#fiction #fantasy #sf #sff #sciencefiction #writing #writer #writers #author #writingcommunity #writersOfMastodon #book #books #Bookbans #bookbanning

me: sorry but i can't sign this NDA

them: why not?

me: i signed an NDA that prevents me from signing NDAs.

them: wow. with who?

me: i'm not allowed to say

If you ask people why we don't see more high-risk science, you get different answers. Researchers tell you that granting agencies won't fund it. Funders tell you that researchers won't propose it.

Many non-artists don't seem to realise that just sitting staring into space is an integral part of the creative process.

#art

If #Putin goes today, who will lead the #Tories and the US #Republican Party?? 🤔

#GOP #tories #ToryCorruption #TorySleaze #Russia

Dr. Peter Hotez, professor of pediatrics and molecular virology and microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine has been attacked all weekend by Musk and Rogan on the bird site. Dr Hotez is a vaccine scientist and a threat to disinformation con artists like the two twits mentioned above. He will have a new book out soon and it is important to spread his book title message far and wide.
#FactsMatter #DisinformationKills #VaccinesWork #Science #Medicine #Canada #USA

Just because you are very wealthy doesn’t mean you have interesting ideas or even a firm grip on reality.

The ability to produce unlimited amounts of plausible-looking garbage at essentially no cost, and to crowdsource that kind of vandalism to millions of randos by disguising it as something fun, destroys that capability. It's a DDoS attack on written knowledge.

Flying pigs are supposed to be the epitome of the impossible, and yet the grocery store is careful to specify that this is ground pork.

@itisiboller @ShaulaEvans

“Commander Vimes didn't like the phrase 'The innocent have nothing to fear', believing the innocent had everything to fear, mostly from the guilty but in the longer term even more from those who say things like 'The innocent have nothing to fear'.”

Terry Pratchett, Snuff (a Discworld novel)

Me, explaining all of the social media sites I'm on and their differences

If you're not familiar with the term Thagomizer I promise that you won't regret reading this Wikipedia article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thagomizer

"Let that sink in. The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee thinks it’s perfectly fine to store nuclear secrets in a box on an open stage. And he thinks that federal prosecutors who’ve taken an oath to protect the United States from all threats foreign and domestic are weaponizing the government if they try to secure these nuclear and other national security secrets in their rightful place."

~ Linda Chavez

#Trump #crime #criminal #Republicans #JimJordan
/1

https://plus.thebulwark.com/p/trumps-best-defense-is-no-defense-at-all

The way that the media are fawning over @geoffreyhinton 's supposed "whistleblowing" is just appalling. Here's the latest from Bobby Allyn at NPR:

https://www.npr.org/2023/05/27/1178575886/-the-godfather-of-ai-warns-of-ai-possibly-outperforming-humans

& a short dissection:

>>

One of my greatest fears from day 1 of the idea of Trump as president was him having access to the most top secret intel of the US. (Many others had this same fear.) Trump is a unique threat to the national security if the country. The many in the GOP who support this dangerous buffoon are despicable.

Of course he wants to be reelected in order to save himself from jail time. Easily predictable and also a threat to the rule of law.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/06/11/trump-indictment-president-00101406

@sethhalleway Definitely reading it aloud (even if it's just in a whispery voice). It forces you to really read each word, so it's much easier to spot grammar errors, missing/duplicate words, some typos etc.

I am very concerned about the future of AI. Not because of the risk of rogue machines taking over. But because of the homogeneous, one dimensional group of men who are currently involved in advancing the technology.

Concerned AI researcher

We are on the water and harsh shelling starts... Suddenly I hear the #music - #Ukrainian #anthem that keeps playing regardless the ongoing shelling.

We turn to another street and on the roof of a completely #flooded house, we see a #saxophonist
I thought that I had already seen a lot in my life, but I will remember this moment forever. There was so much dignity, persistence and invincibility...
Oksana Jóhannesson (Оксана Йоханнессон)

#Ukraine 🇺🇦

(1 Minute) YouTube📽️ 🔗 https://youtu.be/SZ79paFwB44