Steve Hammett @bitflips@qoto.org

The opportunity to debate easily observable things with someone demonstrating a deliberate unwillingness to observe them is not as enticing a proposition as some people seem to think.

Whenever somebody dares say "maybe the people with the power to fix broken things should at least try to fix that broken thing," invariably someone demands a full detailed plan of operation—not as a way of figuring out how to make that aspiration come to reality, but as a way of quickly shutting the aspiration down; it's like they're self-appointed middle managers for useless politicians.

Today’s Leitmotif.

RHUL #UCU picket lines this morning, students and staff alike! ✊🏼✊🏼✊🏼

The future of #biodiversity…

Am on strike today and will not be posting anything today. #ucuRISING

"Instead of listening to their people's protests the Chinese Government has chosen to crack down further," Mr Sunak helpfully explains in a lovely crisp bow tie.

In other news ...

This literature clock is the most wonderful thing I’ve seen in a long time. Checking the time becomes a moment of pure joy 😍

https://literature-clock.jenevoldsen.com

I've collected some #Mastodon 🦣 #instances to help with the #TwitterMigration focused in #inclusion, #accesibility and #minorities. They look like safe spaces for most of us. I'd appreciate the boost and new recommendations to add to the list:

🔗🇬🇧 https://ableism.rip/about - space to fight ableism
🔗🇬🇧 https://disabled.social/about - for disabled people
🔗🇬🇧 https://neurodifferent.me/about - neurodiversity and neurominorities
🔗🇬🇧 https://iaccessibility.social/about - interest in assistive technology
🔗🇬🇧 https://blacktwitter.io/about - history and voices for black people
🔗🇬🇧 https://lgbt.io/about - for LGBT+ and allies
🔗🇬🇧 http://queer.party/about - queer-oriented instance
🔗🇬🇧 https://tech.lgbt/about - for tech workers, academics, students, and others interested in tech who are LGBTQIA+ or Allies

Please boost to reach more people!

Nationalism: Being proud of things you haven't done & hating people you've never met.

I don't want to choose between two evils. I want to choose between good and evil.
I'd choose good. If that makes me a "crank" then I'm a crank.

This never gets old. Sadly. 😁

Two UK universities will deduct pay for the time staff are on strike, but they also expect staff to catch up with all the teaching they missed afterwards, otherwise they'll continue to deduct pay!

Guardian article: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2022/nov/27/universities-condemned-over-threat-to-dock-all-pay-of-striking-staff

#highered
#ucurising

This is absolutely wild: a Nepali student who flew to the UK to take up a university scholarship with a valid visa and proof of his uni place was detained at the border and held in custody for 12 days, leading to him losing his place.

Adding insult to injury, while a spelling mistake in his bank letter was part of the reason for disbelieving him, the Border Force's letter to him made several spelling mistakes https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/nov/26/treated-like-a-criminal-nepali-student-wrongly-detained-at-uk-border-loses-uni-place

Help please.

I want to refresh the list of UK legal follows I post every Monday (mainly for the benefit of Newbies).

Suggestions please for those using *this* medium well for promoting the public understanding of law (including yourself when appropriate).

Not just accounts who happen to be lawyers, or those who post or do good stuff elsewhere, but good Mastodon legal posters.

Also EU/US/elsewhere suggestions welcome.

Universities condemned over threat to dock all pay of striking staff https://www.theguardian.com/education/2022/nov/27/universities-condemned-over-threat-to-dock-all-pay-of-striking-staff?CMP=share_btn_tw

Time for a more dramatic #sunset from my beloved #BurnhamOveryStaithe #Norfolk #photography #boat #boathouse #Coast

If you enjoy someone's post on #Mastodon go ahead and click the star. If someone tells you that's meaningless because there's no #algorithm, ignore them. Sure, boost the post too if you want others to also see the post, but don't think telling someone you like what they posted is somehow unimportant. In real life I don't tell someone, "good job," or "well said," or "I love that," for the sake of some algorithm, I do it because I'm human and they are too. It's fundamental to being truly social.