ceoln @ceoln@qoto.org

It’s depressing that there is probably an entire generation of people who only got to know the internet through venture capital driven apps and companies that only cared about manipulating people for their attention. And don’t fool yourselves, we (the people who grew up on the open web) let that happen as well.

In some sense we’re back to the late 90s with *the open web* being a thing that a lot of people explore for the first time now.

I am fighting these coverups myself and working on a book. If you can please do follow and support this vital work on my
#patreon - I share exclusives, advance work on #propaganda #disinformation and updates www.https://patreon.com/emmalbriant thank you.

@BylineTimes The continued coverup of #CambridgeAnalytica’s role in the US and UK is so unbelievably bad. Given my role in the scandal I’m familiar with the extent of it. Those journalists and academics who kept pooh-poohing the firm as snake oil and a non-issue really should be ashamed. They enabled the suppression of vital public interest information by subduing concerns and therefore the public pressure that was so badly needed for us to get the story out and make an impact.

Empathy is what makes us beautiful. Kindness heals even the coldest heart. It is the duty of poets, activists, filmmakers, historians, and artists to continue fighting the war against empathy.

We have to start somewhere.

Countries that don’t have more guns than people do not have our problems. Start there.

You will find me among the trees, healing my trauma, trying to find the words.

https://open.substack.com/pub/heidicuda/p/where-is-the-love-words-to-heal-trauma?utm_source=direct&r=1tfo38&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

I received a beautiful letter from a member of law enforcement who thanked me for my work exposing disinformation and radicalization. The sender said their entire department is QAnon - including superiors.

When will President Biden declare cognitive warfare a national emergency.

Want to see the #DiamondPainting I just finished. It's Euryale. I'll do Medusa next. #hobbies

If you believe policing "used to be about serving and protecting," please know the institution was specifically created to maintain and control slave populations, and later used to enforce Jim Crow laws. The system is sadly operating exactly as intended.

https://gen.medium.com/slavery-and-the-origins-of-the-american-police-state-ec318f5ff05b

I watched the joyous skateboarding montage of #TyreNichols.

He could be your friend, your brother, your kid. In fact he is. So is:

#TrayvonRice
#GeorgeFloyd
#FreddieGray
#SamDubose
#PhilandoCastile #TerenceCrutcher
#AltonSterling
#JamarClark
#JeremyMcDole
#WilliamChapman II
#WalterScott
#EricHarris
#AkaiGurley
#MichaelBrown
#EricGarner

#saytheirnames

It will never cease to amaze me that we said, "hey, actually, it *does* matter if Black people live or die," and that made white people lose they muthafuckin mind.

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #politics

the hard truth is that shifting our taxes away from violence (status quo militarized police forces in all our cities) and toward community care and healing (mobile aid units, housing and warming shelters, crisis care, etc) takes focused, dedicated, relentless, tedious, and endless community organizing.

From all of us.

Impacting city budgets requires citizens self-organizing change at every level: social, political, and economic.

No getting around it, the work is hard and it never ends.

Biden has supportive words and appeals to be peaceful for Black folk brutalized by police, but billions of dollars of extra funding for the cops. I'd prefer it if he had kind and supportive words for the police, and gave us the billions of dollars of funding.

Biden has new laws to further criminalize the behavior of innocent Black people brutalized by cops. I'd prefer it if he made new laws to criminalize the behavior of cops that brutalize innocent Black people.

This asymmetry reveals a lot.

Now now, let's make sure that protests against a privileged caste allowed to beat citizens to death in the street with impunity are _peaceful_.

Yeah, you're finally punishing the cossacks when a few of them happen to be Black. But keep it _peaceful_.

Because _peaceful_, well-behaved, respectful protests always lead to the real change. Which is why American cops stopped murdering people for sport several decades ago. See, it all works out. Peaceful.

Remember if you're driving to a protest: make sure your ride is 100% tip-top and legal. Check your tags, brake lights, tint, registration, etc.

Beautiful, moody, mystery/suspense with a bit of supernatural, THE ICE SINGS BACK by M Jackson. Missing child in the Pacific northwest means something different to 4 different women. #ewgc @bookstodon

As an aside because this managed to ruin my day someplace else online recently:

Anarchism is by nature a socialist ideological position. The very first international gather of anarchists started with defining who is an anarchist. The first like of that definition is "first you must be socialist."

Anarchism without socialism is fundamentally reactionary in nature; so if you're an "anarcho something" that isn't a socialist? I'm bucketing you with the nazis and I don't give a fuck if you howl.

Decades of research prove that the best way to end homelessness is...

Give people a home. Seriously. That's it. No strings, no prerequisites, no faith-based, holistic, means-tested, yoga-cebtric meditation parole. Just a home.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2356643-we-can-reduce-homelessness-if-we-follow-the-science-on-what-works/

Right, mastodon, need some help here from all of you:

What platform will I be able to find good #fantasy #steampunk #stories by up-and-coming authors?

My eternal gratitude to everyone who can make this do the rounds on the #fediverse

#reading #books #writing #newAuthors

Okay, well here we go. I never quite got the hang of Twitter, but here I am because I like what Mastodon stands for and I want to find a community of #sciencefiction lovers and/or other #author types. Greetings Mastodon and #bookstodon and in particular my #cyberpunk people.