Hey, Mom! The Explanation.

Here's the permanent dedicated link to my first Hey, Mom! post and the explanation of the feature it contains.

Saturday, June 6, 2020

Hey, Mom! Talking to My Mother #1201 (SoD #1936) - It's Not Enough - WEEKLY HODGE PODGE for 2006.06


Hey, Mom! Talking to My Mother #1201 (SoD #1936) - It's Not Enough - WEEKLY HODGE PODGE for 2006.06

Hi Mom, I was going to make this the 1200th HEY MOM post, and then I decided to do a BLACKOUT post, though two days late, and made that one number 1200, which bumped this post by one.

So, some reflection of numbers.

1800 days ago you died, Mom.

1201 HEY MOM posts.

1936 posts on this blog, of which close to 1800 are in daily succession, which leaves 735 since I quite doing daily HEY MOMs almost two years ago. All those posts, over 1200 dedicated to you, Mom.
It's not enough. Originally, HEY MOM was conceived as a way to continue conversations with you, Mom. But it was also a way to pay tribute to what you gave my life, both you and Dad, but especially you as you were present through more of my childhood out of necessity and circumstance. I am trying to show the world that I have good values, ones you instilled in me, and to show how much you meant to me by dedicating myself to this task of blogging daily. I did HEY MOM for three years straight, every day. And now I am closing in on the five year anniversary of your death. Is it enough? Have I done enough to match the contributions you made to my life and what I feel I owe you? No, I don't think so. Nothing will ever be enough. But it's something, at least.



That said, though this is the weekly hodge podge, Mom, a gallimaufry of nonesuch, whatever caught my attention in the last week, it is mostly about the protests over the deaths of African Americans, most notably and recently, George Floyd, and about the deeply entrenched racism in our culture. And this is a subject that was not close to your heart, Mom. Growing up in a somewhat overt racist home and community, you continued to be afraid of black people as an adult. Though not demonstrably racist, though you never used the n-word, and wouldn't have, you were not comfortable with black art, black music, or really with black people, mostly; male, suit-wearing, educated college presidents were an exception.

I wonder if you would have agreed that the murder of George Floyd was horrible and unacceptable. Even if you did agree with the tragedy of the situation, I doubt you would have been in support of the protests, especially those that have turned violent, such as the glorious and symbolic torching of a Minneapolis police station. Though I often have idealized you since you died and believed you have changed since (because I can feel it) and would react differently today than you did throughout your life, I also remember how you actually were, and I love you despite not agreeing with everything you said or felt.

I am on my own journey to grapple with my white privilege and the inherent cultural racism to which I have contributed through inaction, indifference, and ignorance. All of the white people need to walk this same path.

I am trying to find the best way as both a writer and an educator to take action in these times when action is what is needed far more than more hollow words that ultimately will support the status quo: let's be reasonable.

Maybe the time for being reasonable has passed. Maybe now is the time for owning, freeing, setting loose the rage that the injustices of racism inspire in us (and if it hasn't inspired in you, why not?); now is not the time to be passive, to be reasonable. I am not really interested in allowing messages of hate to have their voice in an attempt to be fair and to allow space for those discussions. I realize that approach would be efficacious and rational, but emotionally, it is not satisfying. I do not respect the hate others profess, and I do not respect or wish to give safe space for others to vocalize the equivocating their "I am not racist but" rhetoric. Being anti-racist is not about opening dialogue with the oppressors and allowing them to attempt to justify and rationalize. Anti-racism means expunging those voices and feelings, so that we can live in a world that is equal for all and safe for all.

And yet, I know that exterminating those voices will only lead to the same problems again. We're living in a time of backlash, a time when the racist among us have felt emboldened by a racist president to let the hate out: Make America Hate Again. Not allowing the haters to work through their hate and come out the other side to acceptance and not mere tolerance is the process in which we need to engage. I know that rationally, but emotionally, I am not sure I have the patience for that work. Mainly, I just want to tell them to shut the fuck up and get the fuck out of my class room. Granted, not the most progressive educational statement. That's why it's the emotional response. Probably the racist among us react with similar dismissal to my impassioned rage about racism.

And there is so much work to do. There is so much rhetoric that is just false. Like the current narrative about the police. As these protests continue, there's a constant re-affirming of the good cop versus bad cop story. Yes, there are good cops. Many police officers who have dedicated their lives to public service, and they actually serve and protect without a major incident of misconduct. But this false narrative circulating that 99% are good and only 1% are like Derek Chauvin is completely WRONG.

As these protests go on, and we see more and more examples of police brutality, as more and more black men are killed, as police are beating the shit out of people who are cowering on the pavement, as police are pulling PPE masks off people's faces so to better pepper spray them, as police are knocking down 75-yr-old men and pass them by without helping them up, as we see -- or we do not see nearly enough -- all of this brutality, then it's not likely that the story that 99% of cops are good and 1% are bad is likely to be true. I am not arguing that 70% are bad. I am not sure what the numbers should be, but 99-1 are not the right ones. My experiences with police over the years has been more 50-50 than anything else. There are some real assholes out there in the world, and many of them are cops because either the profession attracts a larger percentage of assholes or the job makes them into assholes simply as a defense against the legitimate threat they face on a daily basis. I get that. Doesn't make it right.



WE are living in a historic time.

"It's not enough." When I said that earlier, I was planning to connect the dots analogously. Like my efforts are never enough for what I owe my mom, my parents, what we well meaning white people can do to heal the racial divide is never enough, but something is something. DO SOMETHING.

We have to join together in action and do something, anything, to take the steps forward for real change.

And we have to effect change without erecting barriers, like "let's not go so far that the pendulum swings the other way." Really? Is that what we're worried about? Are white people really going to be worried about becoming the oppressed under the boot heel of racism? Like that would EVER happen in this country. Its so ridiculous. But if it were to happen, maybe that's what we really need. We need role reversal. White people need to not just lose their privilege but live in a new world in which other people have the privilege and they are the oppressed, someone has a knee on their necks. If we lived in THAT world, it would not take 400 years of lynchings, degradation, and hatred to reach a boiling point in which ENOUGH IS FUCKING ENOUGH.

See that? The same word. What we white people can do is never enough and the point at which those of us who are enraged have reached, especially those whose brothers and sisters are being lynched, they have reached that point of ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

No barriers to change. Don't ask for the change to be reasonable and nonviolent when the oppression has been neither reasonable nor non-violent. Don't ask for space to work out your veiled racist or overtly racist and hateful rhetoric because you've had the entire history of white domination of other race groups to talk about that. There's been more than enough space given to that "discussion."

Now is the time for #BLACKLIVESMATTER because that's what is happening NOW: black lives are in danger and without power.

Like you can hear and see in this great video:



POLICE SHOOTING AT INNOCENT, NON-PROTESTING PEOPLE!

https://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2020/05/30/light-em-up-video-appears-to-show-law-enforcement-shooting-paint-rounds-at-citizens-on-their-porch/




MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — A video posted to Twitter Saturday night is going viral after apparently showing law enforcement in Minneapolis shooting paint rounds at residents on their porch after curfew went into effect.
Tanya Kerssen posted the video to Twitter shortly after 9:30 p.m., showing what she says is the Minnesota National Guard and Minneapolis police sweeping her residential street in the Whittier Neighborhood.
In the video, the officers are seen approaching the residents and repeatedly yelling at them to get inside their house. After a few demands, one can be heard yelling “light ‘em up!” That’s when one officer appears to fire a paint round at the residents, who run inside.
Meanwhile, a WCCO photographer was struck by a rubber bullet and arrested by the State Patrol Saturday night. He was released from custody after a couple hours.
The curfew went into effect at 8 p.m. in Minneapolis.

Minneapolis curfew: Police chase protesters, journalists | City Pages

DO YOU NEED MORE EXAMPLES??



And how about this?? People relaxing on a warm night on their porches in a Minneapolis neighborhood are shot at by police fascists in an effort to "enforce the curfew."
Yeah, 99% are good and 1% are bad.... right.
And, so, as you can see dear reader, I am angry, still full of rage, and frustrated at white people who are still a long way from accepting that we are all complicit in the systemic racism.

 THAT'S WHAT SYSTEMIC RACISM IS.

Just because I have never used the n-word as a racial epithet, just because I have never called 911 because a black teenager in a hoodie was walking on my street, just because I have never lynched anyone, none of that exonerates me from being complicit in a thousand small ways to the systemic racism of our world, makes me complicit through silence and inaction, makes me RESPONSIBLE for all the ways my white privilege has afforded me an advantage that black people do not have.

No amount of good work I have tried to do is ENOUGH.

But that does not mean I should stop trying and working and raging.

So, welcome to the HODGE PODGE. Lots of varied and interesting things this week but mostly about the protests and racial divide in our country. But there's a few less serious things here, too.

Thanks for tuning in and reading, or even just scrolling and skimming. A quick skim is almost as good as a slow and considered exploration.

George Floyd mural painted in downtown Portland | kgw.com
https://www.kgw.com/article/news/local/artist-paints-george-floyd-mural-on-boarded-up-windows-of-apple-store/283-9f7f9b36-c6eb-4a0f-a5c1-3a128a4801c0



A cop in Vallejo, California, shot and killed a San Francisco man suspected of attempting to loot a Walgreens early Tuesday morning, but the police waited a day and a half, until Wednesday afternoon, to release news of the killing. At a presser outside Vallejo's City Hall, Police Chief Shawny Williams explained that Sean Monterrosa, 22, was kneeling in the parking lot of the store, but the officer thought Monterrosa had a gun and shot him "due to this perceived threat." It was apparently really threatening, because the cop fired five shots through his own windshield. One of those five shots hit and killed Monterrosa. Who was, we'll say again, on his knees.

Turns out Monterrosa didn't have a gun. Instead, he had a hammer in the pocket of his sweatshirt. Or as Williams put it, "Investigations later revealed that the weapon was a long, 15-inch hammer," so even if it wasn't a gun, and Monterrosa wasn't brandishing it, he was still very dangerous, don't you good law abiding folks agree?









I would like to apologize to my friends, teammates, the City of New Orleans, the black community, NFL community and anyone I hurt with my comments yesterday. In speaking with some of you, it breaks my heart to know the pain I have caused. In an attempt to talk about respect, unity, and solidarity centered around the American flag and the national anthem, I made comments that were insensitive and completely missed the mark on the issues we are facing right now as a country. They lacked awareness and any type of compassion or empathy. Instead, those words have become divisive and hurtful and have misled people into believing that somehow I am an enemy. This could not be further from the truth, and is not an accurate reflection of my heart or my character. This is where I stand: I stand with the black community in the fight against systemic racial injustice and police brutality and support the creation of real policy change that will make a difference. I condemn the years of oppression that have taken place throughout our black communities and still exists today. I acknowledge that we as Americans, including myself, have not done enough to fight for that equality or to truly understand the struggles and plight of the black community. I recognize that I am part of the solution and can be a leader for the black community in this movement. I will never know what it’s like to be a black man or raise black children in America but I will work every day to put myself in those shoes and fight for what is right. I have ALWAYS been an ally, never an enemy. I am sick about the way my comments were perceived yesterday, but I take full responsibility and accountability. I recognize that I should do less talking and more listening...and when the black community is talking about their pain, we all need to listen. For that, I am very sorry and I ask your forgiveness.
A post shared by Drew Brees (@drewbrees) on


Drew Brees stands by apology over flag comments in response to President Trump


In a message addressed to President Donald Trump on Friday night, Drew Brees stood by his apology for earlier comments on "disrespecting the flag," after Trump wrote that the New Orleans Saints quarterback should not have changed his stance.
Brees was following up on his pledge to be an "ally" for the black community in the fight for racial equality and social justice.



MLB players say teams 'depriving America of baseball games'





https://warrenellis.ltd/marks/buy-your-own-nuclear-reactor-control-system/

Buy Your Own Nuclear Reactor Control System


WARREN ELLISLINKS AND BOOKMARKS
Sharp-eyed reader Adrian McEwen just spotted this and sent it to me. Buy your own decommissioned nuclear reactor control and monitoring system. The details at the auction site are basically non-existent, but the current bid is a mere eighty quid. I mean, you know the shipping is gonna kill you. And I have nowhere to put it. But still. I can daydream. When I was very very little, my dad built me a “spaceship console” to play with, and this would absolutely be the fifty-years-later version for me. Thanks, Adrian.










https://boingboing.net/2020/05/29/chicago-mayor-lori-lightfoot-h.html

Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot has 2 words for Donald Trump: 'It starts with F and ends with U'





Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has had it with Donald Trump's bullshit threats of violence against Americans.

"Being black in America should not be a death sentence," she said at a press conference today, regarding the police killing in Minneapolis of George Floyd.

“I will encode what I really want to say to Donald Trump,” Lightfoot said.

“It's two words: It begins with F and it ends with U."

The mayor was addressing Trump's "When the looting starts, the shooting starts" social media posts.

"I pray for the day we can eradicate two plagues in our face; COVID19 and racism," the Mayor continued.







Political cartoon


I usually never look to Fox News for anything, but this is good, and so I went and grabbed the Twitter message from Minister Zarif of Iran.

https://www.foxnews.com/world/china-mocks-us-cant-breathe

Iran similarly attacked the U.S., tweeting an altered press release in which the State Department attacked Iran amid ongoing protests in 2018.
"Some don't think #BlackLivesMatter," Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said. "To those of us who do: it is long overdue for the entire world to wage war against racism. Time for a #WorldAgainstRacism."




Political cartoon


https://www.politico.com/cartoons/2020/06/05/the-nations-cartoonists-on-the-week-in-politics-000149?slide=0

Donald Trump Is Our National Catastrophe

With malice toward all; with charity for none.
But the point here isn’t that Trump is responsible for the nation’s wounds. It’s that he is the reason some of those wounds have festered and why none of them can heal, at least for as long as he remains in office. Until we have a president who can say, as Lincoln did in his first inaugural, “We are not enemies, but friends” — and be believed in the bargain — our national agony will only grow worse.


Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant, Armenia


WARREN ELLISLINKS AND BOOKMARKS






Photo via SocMod. What I particularly enjoy about this photo, aside from the retrotech porn, is that they’re wearing the hats from THUNDERBIRDS.


Art Cullen, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his work at the Storm Lake Times in northwest Iowa, has a vivid report on how the pandemic is shaking and reshaping his corner of the world. “Lake Avenue, the main street in our town of about 15,000 where 30 dialects are spoken by an immigrant workforce, is empty,” Art writes. “But the Tyson pork and turkey plants steam on, with more than 3,000 employees filing in day and night to grind your sausage.”
The most terrible news of the week was the death of George Floyd under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer. 
So as not to leave you totally depressed: epidemiologist Daniel T. Halperin has a persuasive argument for reopening schools in the fall. And we have three more smart ideas for our “solutions” file, which is now 40 items long.


Border Patrol Flies Anti-Terrorism Drone Over Minneapolis Protestors

As Coronavirus Hospitalizations Rise in the US, Many States Hide Their Data

EU's Greenhouse Gas Emissions Continue To Fall As Coal Ditched

Many Scientists Warn CDC's New Death Rate Estimates Far Too Low

Watch Live: SpaceX Launches NASA Astronauts to ISS

IPv6 Adoption Hits 32%. Will Stats Show How Many Returned to the Office?

Eight Amazon Workers Have Now Died from Covid-19

Western Digital Gets Sued For Sneaking SMR Disks Into Its NAS Channel

Eye-Catching Advances in Some AI Fields Are Not Real

Tunguska Meteor That Blasted Millions of Trees in 1908 Might Have Returned To Space

https://it.slashdot.org/story/20/06/04/0351227/anti-racism-sites-hit-by-wave-of-cyberattacks

Anti-Racism Sites Hit By Wave of Cyberattacks (bbc.com)










Posted by BeauHD  from the cause-and-effect dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC:Cyber-attacks against anti-racism organizations shot up in the wake of the death of George Floyd, a leading provider of protection services says. Cloudflare, which blocks attacks designed to knock websites offline, says advocacy groups in general saw attacks increase 1,120-fold. Mr Floyd's death, in police custody, has sparked nationwide civil unrest in the US. Government and military websites also saw a notable increase in attacks. Cloudflare says that after Mr Floyd's death and the ensuing violent clashes between police and protesters, it saw a noticeable jump in the amount of requests it blocked -- an extra 19 billion (17%) from the corresponding weekend the previous month. That equates to an extra 110,000 blocked requests every second, it said.

The problem was particularly acute for certain types of organizations. One single website belonging to an unnamed advocacy group dealt with 20,000 requests a second. Anti-racism groups which belong to Cloudflare's free program for at-risk organizations saw a large surge in the past week, from near-zero to more than 120 million blocked requests. Attacks on government and military websites were also up — by 1.8 and 3.8 times respectively.
https://news.slashdot.org/story/20/06/03/2220229/uk-willing-to-admit-nearly-3-million-from-hong-kong-if-china-adopts-security-law

UK Willing To Admit Nearly 3 Million From Hong Kong If China Adopts Security Law (npr.org)










Posted by BeauHD  from the controversial-security-laws dept.

schwit1 shares news that UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he would be willing to allow more than 2.8 million people from Hong Kong to live and work in the country if China implements a controversial proposed national security law on the former British colony. The law could take effect as soon as this month, and would expand mainland China's control over Hong Kong. NPR reports:Johnson wrote in a column that appeared in The Times of London that the law would infringe on the "one country, two systems" agreement China reached with Britain in 1997 when Britain ceded control of the territory. He added that the law "would curtail [Hong Kong's] freedoms and dramatically erode its autonomy."

If China were to implement the law, Johnson wrote, Britain is prepared to take in around 350,000 people from Hong Kong who already have British National (Overseas) passports and 2.5 million who would be eligible to apply for them. He also noted that the U.K. would be making "one of the biggest changes in our visa system in history." It would allow Hong Kongers with these passports to come to the U.K. for a renewable period of a year. The current system allows them to come without a visa for up to six months. The potential new system would include a right to work and, potentially, a path to citizenship. Johnson did not elaborate in the column about how the 2.5 million people eligible for a British passport would be able to attain one, or how arrivals from Hong Kong would attain citizenship."Many people in Hong Kong fear that their way of life -- which China pledged to uphold -- is under threat," Johnson wrote. "If China proceeds to justify their fears, then Britain could not in good conscience shrug our shoulders and walk away... I still hope that China will remember that responsibilities go hand in glove with strength and leadership."

The law would authorize mainland China to prevent "secession, subversion, terrorism and foreign interference" in the semi-autonomous city. "One part that has got people worried is the suggestion that China could set up its own institutions in Hong Kong responsible for security," reports the BBC.

"Hong Kong was handed back to China from British control in 1997, but under a unique agreement -- a mini-constitution called the Basic Law and a so-called 'one country, two systems' principle," the report adds. "They are supposed to protect certain freedoms for Hong Kong: freedom of assembly and speech, an independent judiciary and some democratic rights -- freedoms that no other part of mainland China has." People in Hong Kong believe the law will result in a loss of these freedoms and could see Beijing punish people for criticizing the country, as happens in mainland China.
state-police-fuck-12-gt-img

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/gregg-popovich-george-floyd-protests/

EXCERPT:

Popovich then took a moment to imagine a different kind of leadership.

 “It’s so clear what needs to be done. We need a president to come out and say simply that ‘black lives matter.’ Just say those three words. But he won’t and he can’t. He can’t because it’s more important to him to mollify the small group of followers who validate his insanity. But it’s more than just Trump. The system has to change. I’ll do whatever I can do to help, because that’s what leaders do. But he can’t do anything to put us on a positive path, because he’s not a leader.

https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/29274781/spurs-coach-gregg-popovich-says-white-people-call-racism-no-matter-consequences

San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said the "country is in trouble" and that he is "embarrassed as a white person" to know that George Floyd could die in such a horrific way as a police officer with a knee on Floyd's neck went about his job in such a "nonchalant ... casual" manner.
"In a strange, counterintuitive sort of way, the best teaching moment of this recent tragedy, I think, was the look on the officer's face," Popovich said in an emotional video released by the Spurs as part of their #SpursVoices series on social media. "For white people to see how nonchalant, how casual, just how everyday-going-about-his job, so much so that he could just put his left hand in his pocket, wriggle his knee around a little bit to teach this person some sort of a lesson -- and that it was his right and his duty to do it, in his mind.
"I don't know. ... I think I'm just embarrassed as a white person to know that that can happen. To actually watch a lynching. We've all seen books, and you look in the books and you see black people hanging off of trees. And you ... are amazed. But we just saw it again. I never thought I'd see that, with my own eyes, in real time."



https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/29275324/why-matters-roger-goodell-say-colin-kaepernick-name


Goodell's statement also did not mention the name "Kaepernick," the surest sign yet that the NFL is unserious about the actual work that needs to be done to make this right. Goodell apologized for the NFL not listening to players, and even this basic, ostensibly conciliatory statement is false. The NFL did listen to players. It listened to Malcolm Jenkins. It listened to Anquan Boldin. It listened to white players, such as Drew Brees and its white ex-players-turned-broadcasters, such as Boomer Esiason, who were offended by Kaepernick's position. It listened to its white fans. The NFL did a lot of listening -- and concluded the course of action was to punish black people -- which they have not undone. Even when trying to reach the truth, Goodell still could not tell it.
Confronting the truth about racism and its effects is when America is not at its aspirational best, but its defiant, denying worst; it fails looking in the mirror at its true self in ways in which Germany and South Africa have succeeded. America has not yet proved it is willing to put in the hard work. Goodell's statement might have helped the NFL win the short-term battle to mollify its young stars of tomorrow, but it will lose in the long term because it is not Watson or Mahomes or Odell Beckham Jr. who require the apology. It is Colin Kaepernick.
Included prominently in the nationwide protests is the gesture of taking a knee toward the American flag. It's a distress signal indicating that the country has not lived up to the democratic ideals it spreads across the globe -- ideals it tells soldiers that their uniforms and flag represent, ideals Americans believe separate them from countries that jail, kill and otherwise silence their citizens. It is Colin Kaepernick's symbol, and it is used everywhere -- by children and high school students who reference him as their inspiration, and now by police and politicians to quell public anger directed at them to suggest finally, after so much time, a willingness to listen.
It is also the symbol NFL owners used as justification to destroy Kaepernick's NFL career. In 2017, it was the NFL that sent the message nationwide that kneeling was illegitimate, and by extension, criticism of police. Three years later, the NFL carries the greatest burden of any sports league to rectify the damage it now admits it has done.

charlamagne tha god

https://www.espn.com/video/clip?id=29251326

Charlamagne tha God demands equality for black people in America


Radio host Charlamagne tha God joins First Take to call for an immediate change in America regarding equality.




Twins outfielder Byron Buxton calls Minnesota his baseball home, and he took to Instagram to demand progress and justice in the wake of Floyd's death.





https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/29253109/colin-kaepernick-compatriot-brandon-marshall-2016-action-ringing-true


ENGLEWOOD, Colo. -- Former Denver Broncos linebacker Brandon Marshall, a college teammate and longtime friend of Colin Kaepernick's who kneeled for "The Star-Spangled Banner'' before eight games in the 2016 season to protest excessive use of force by police and social injustice, said he hopes people are now ready for what his and Kaepernick's message was almost four years ago.
"Back then, we were called rogues, people said that we didn't deserve jobs, but this is what we were talking about then,'' Marshall said Monday. "I think people are looking at [Kaepernick] now like, 'OK, maybe he knew.' People didn't want to hear the message after, 'Oh, they were kneeling.' They didn't want that message, weren't ready for it, didn't listen.
"I hope, and I look at it, I hope people are ready for the message. I really hope they're ready for change.''

Marshall said he has spoken to Kaepernick in recent days in the wake of George Floyd's death while in police custody in Minneapolis and the protests that have followed across the country.
"We talked some about what's happened -- and this is why he started the Know Your Rights foundation -- and I asked him if he needed me to do anything or what I could do to help,'' Marshall said. "He said right now, at the moment, he's concentrating on legal assistance for the protesters, but we'll talk more moving forward.''


How racist policing took over American cities, explained by a historian

"The problem is the way policing was built," historian Khalil Muhammad tells Vox.
By Anna North

EXCERPT:

Social science played a huge role. What we’d call today “academic experts” of one kind or another, were part of the effort to define black people as a particular criminal class in the American population. And what they essentially did was they used the evidence coming out of the South, beginning in the first decades after slavery. They used the census data to point to the disproportionate incarceration of African Americans. They were almost three times overrepresented in the 1890 census in southern prisons.
So that evidence became part of a national discussion that essentially said, “Well, now that black people have their freedom, what are they doing with it? They’re committing crimes. In the South and in the North, and the census data is the proof.”
And so people began to build on that data and add to it. Police statistics began to become more important in determining how black people were doing, whether they were behaving or not. We quickly moved from census data to local data, from South to North, and we begin to see the consolidation of a set of facts that black people have a crime problem.






Impressive four minute mash-up of 50 music videos from 1988


https://boingboing.net/2020/05/29/impressive-four-minute-mash-up.html

The Hood Internet cut up bits of 50+ music videos from 1988 and mashed them into a four minute video. It would make the perfect soundtrack to a montage of 80s movie montages.



https://creativecommons.org/2020/06/05/a-statement-of-solidarity-and-work-to-be-done/
A Statement of Solidarity and Work to Be Done

Creative Commons
June 5, 2020
Creative Commons offers solidarity and joins the millions around the world who are mourning the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Nina Pop, Ahmaud Arbery, and others. We recognize that they are the latest victims of systemic racism and institutionalized violence not only in the United States but globally, prompting anti-racism and anti-police brutality protests in over 30 countries; from Australia to Mexico to Turkey. CC stands with those grieving and protesting against these injustices against Black people, and with those fighting for justice, representation, and equality around the world.
Our community continually challenges us to be more critical of the social, political, legal, and economic systems in which we work. At last year’s CC Global Summit, open community members Adele Vrana and Siko Bouterse encouraged us to ask, “Whose Knowledge?” This simple yet important question challenged us to face the persistent injustices and inequalities that have infected the internet since its creation, leading to some voices being raised and others being silenced. Of course, this digital world is a reflection—and sometimes a magnification—of our physical world, and the issues and barriers people regularly encounter online often mirror their realities offline. 
As a leader in the open internet and open access movement, we recognize our responsibility to counter discrimination and racism within ourselves, our organization, our global network, and the communities in which we participate. We must do more to lend our allyship and resources to help end the centuries of injustice that have led to the murder and oppression of Black, Indigenous, and people of color across the globe.
CATEGORY:About CC

https://tech.slashdot.org/story/20/05/30/2343245/what-would-the-internet-look-like-if-america-repeals-section-230

What Would The Internet Look Like If America Repeals Section 230? (wbur.org)






Posted by EditorDavid  from the liable-for-libel dept.

"REVOKE 230!" President Trump tweeted Friday, and NPR reports that the movement to revoke its safeguards "is increasingly becoming a bipartisan consensus... But experts caution that eliminating the legal protections may have unintended consequences for Internet users that extend far beyond Facebook and Twitter.""We don't think about things like Wikipedia, the Internet Archive and all these other public goods that exist and have a public-interest component that would not exist in a world without 230," said Aaron Mackey, staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital civil liberties nonprofit.

Without Section 230, experts argue, sites would have less tolerance for people posting their opinions on YouTube, Reddit, Yelp, Amazon and many other corners of the Internet...

The tech industry, unsurprisingly, is fighting hard to preserve Section 230, said Jeff Kosseff, the author of a book about Section 230, The Twenty-Six Words That Created the Internet. "The major platforms came into existence because of 230," Kosseff said. "Without 230, their operations would have to be substantially changed." In particular, Facebook, Twitter and Google would likely become aggressive about removing content and may side more often with complaining users, Kosseff said. Mackey with the Electronic Frontier Foundation agrees."It could create a prescreening of every piece of material every person posts and lead to an exceptional amount of moderation and prevention," Mackey said. "What every platform would be concerned about is: 'Do I risk anything to have this content posted to my site?'"

Another possible ripple effect of repealing, Kosseff said, is making it more difficult for whatever company is hoping to emerge as the next big social media company. "It will be harder for them because they will face more liability at the outset," Kosseff said. Eric Goldman, a professor at Santa Clara University Law School and co-director of the High Tech Law Institute, said rescinding Section 230 could reduce the number of online platforms that welcome open dialogue.
White House protesters tear-gassed for Trump photo-op outside church.

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2020/06/02/five-things-june-2-2020/
Oh, not much going on in the world at the moment, is there?
Here are today’s five things:
Trump gassing peaceful protestors to walk to a photo op: I think we’re all used to the president being appallingly tone deaf, but this one seems destined for the top ten collection (I’m hesitant to rank it any higher at the moment simply because there are at least eight months left in his presidency, and he’s going to be more desperate as he goes along). The fact that the tear-gassing begun during his “Oh boy I sure wanna do me some martial law” speech, and then the president walked over to the church and held up a Bible like a cudgel, surely did give the event symbolism. Just not the symbolism he was aiming for, and definitely not the symbolism history will provide it.
The topper, of course, is that the Church was neither told he was coming nor wanted him to be there. As the Bishop Mariann E. Budde noted:
“He did not pray. He did not mention George Floyd, he did not mention the agony of people who have been subjected to this kind of horrific expression of racism and white supremacy for hundreds of years. We need a president who can unify and heal. He has done the opposite of that, and we are left to pick up the pieces.”
Mind you, gassing protestors and wielding the Word of God like a club makes the president’s base of racists and Really Bad Christians happy, and he wants them happy with him because no one else is, or will be. Trump is not the anti-Christ, but I tell you what, if a Democratic president did exactly the same things Trump is doing now, the same Very Bad Christians who are oozing with joy over Trump would be tossing the term around with impunity. But that hypothetical president wouldn’t be the anti-Christ, either. Just a very very very very very bad president.




















https://www.thedailybeast.com/shaun-king-keeps-raising-money-and-questions-about-where-it-goes-3

Shaun King Keeps Raising Money, and Questions About Where It Goes

EXCERPT:

But 14 months after launching, almost none of what King promised to build has appeared and the site has struggled with issues that alienated many subscribers. The headquarters and television studio was quietly shuttered last summer, and all Atlanta-based staffers laid off. The mobile app disappeared for over a year, and the “full news site” displays branded The North Star apparel for sale alongside relatively scant original journalism. 
King told me in an extensive email exchange for this story in early April that The North Star’s stumbles, including the dearth of deliverables promised, can be chalked up to the same overzealousness that has been the downfall of his other projects—the result of his tendency to take on too much, too soon.
“When we launched The North Star, virtually every advisor I had insisted that we should not do written articles, podcasts, and video news at the same time,” King wrote. “I just knew we could do it. They were right.”

But seven former employees of The North Star—three of whom spoke anonymously out of fear of reprisal by King, and six of whom were told they had to sign nondisclosure agreements to receive severances—said the issue was less King’s over-ambition than his absenteeism, insistence on absolute control, and radical incompetence. They said he had little interest in feedback from staffers he had ostensibly brought on for their lengthy résumés and media experience, despite his own lack of the same. Two iterations of broadcast news shows were scrapped, and their staffs and hosts fired, before they ever aired, and Dixon was pushed out even as money poured in and the site remained underpopulated. 

Coronavirus: Monkeys steal COVID blood samples in India


https://boingboing.net/2020/05/29/troop-of-monkeys-attack-lab-as.html

Troop of monkeys attack lab assistant, steal COVID-19 samples


The badly written dystopian fiction that is our global pandemic continues.


A gang of monkeys attacked a laboratory assistant and escaped with a batch of coronavirus blood test samples, it has been reported.
The bizarre incident saw the troop of primates launch their assault near Meerut Medical College in Delhi, India.
According to local media, the animals then snatched COVID-19 blood test samples that had been taken from three patients and fled.





Hello friends,


We hope you're all keeping safe and well, or as much as you can be in the circumstances. In case you haven't found it yet, we've compiled some resources for life in the time of coronavirus that we hope you might find useful. Otherwise, keep on scrolling to find out what we've been up to this month.

Love,
The F-Word Team

“Hollywood” is not for straight white people: deal with it

Alessia Galatini pushes for Netflix’s latest release to get the recognition it deserves

Sexuality, power and social justice in the #MeToo era


"When I Say Yes has gained its well-deserved place within the #MeToo timeline. The book unpicks many of the global concerns and sensitives surrounding the movement and stitches them together in a string of powerful and reflective statements, deliberations and, often kept unanswered, questions. By doing this, author Carolin Emcke makes it clear that there’s no turning back for #MeToo and that issues surrounding power, sex and gender can no longer be ignored."

We can’t let coronavirus become the latest excuse for men who commit domestic violence

Annie McLaughlin discusses the danger of mainstream media using Covid-19 as an excuse for increased levels of domestic killings of women by men

Lovelorn in Lockdown


"I am falling in love with you and it’s making me do stupid things is a 14-minute series of videos of ‘Bryony’ addressed to a man she exchanged email addresses with a couple of years ago and has a sudden desire to contact. This desperation for connection will no doubt resonate with her audience at a time when many of us are participating in endless and often thankless Zoom quizzes to maintain any kind of link with other people."
Wondering what's on?
We've got you covered.
From the archive

Frida Kahlo meets Grayson Perry: Laura Callaghan’s mural arrives at FACT, Liverpool

Rachel Kevern discusses the work of Irish illustrator Laura Callaghan, with a focus on her new mural

Down the rabbit hole

Lauren Hossack finds Olivia Sudjic's Sympathy an insightful and compelling exploration of our increasingly digital lives

Our picks from across the web
Advice for trans victims of domestic abuse during lockdown

BAME women make up 55% of UK pregnancy hospitalisations with Covid-19

How LGBTQ+ people across the world have been affected by coronavirus
Humans are not the virus – don’t be an eco-fascist

‘I feel like a 1950s housewife’: how lockdown has exposed the gender divide

UK launches unprecedented attack on trans rights, will ban transition before 18


https://maxonwriting.com/2020/05/30/uncle-hugos-bookstore-in-minneapolis-burned-down-during-riots-gofundme-open/


Uncle Hugo’s Bookstore in Minneapolis Burned Down During Riots, GoFundMe Open (Now Paused)

So this one hit me a little.
I’ve never been to Minneapolis (and this post will not be about the rioting or the situations associated with it, as I’m not trying to invite a firestorm of angry, opinionated people). I’ve never once set foot in Uncle Hugo’s Science Fiction Bookstore. I’ve never even ordered from them.
But I have heard stories about them. This is the place that picked up a self-pub book to sell before indie was a real thing and started sending it to publishers with notes along the lines of ‘here’s how many copies I bought, why are you not publishing this?’ From the stories I’ve heard at cons and from other authors, they’ve flat-out kickstarted a lot of careers.
The store itself is only halfway regarded as a store by many, given that the owner loved collecting rare Sci-Fi books. Many also referred to it as a “museum of Science Fiction literature.”
And well … last night it was burned to the ground. Complete loss. Here’s a picture of what the place normally looked like:
48411962_1590855961865178_r
Given the stories I’ve heard about this place, this one hit even me. I’ve never even been there but I’ve heard the stories.
Worse, it seems that the insurance will not cover civil disturbance. At least, not to the degree that would be needed to recover from such a loss.
A GoFundMe page has been started to raise funds for recovery from this. EDIT: The GoFundMe has been paused while the owner works out his options. The GoFundMe was started by a fan, who has paused it at their request. If a GoFundMe by the owner goes up, I’ll update this link.




https://www.tor.com/2020/05/30/2019-nebula-award-winners-sarah-pinsker-amal-el-mohtar-max-gladstone/

Announcing the 2019 Nebula Awards Winners!


Sat May 30, 2020 10:02pm


This weekend, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America has been holding its annual Nebula Awards conference. Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, this year’s panels, readings, and award presentations have been moved online.
Among this weekend’s events is this year’s Nebula Awards ceremony, which honor the best science fiction and fantasy writing published in 2019.
The winners (in bold) and finalists are as follows:

Novel

  • A Song for a New Day, Sarah Pinsker (Berkley)
  • Marque of Caine, Charles E. Gannon (Baen)
  • The Ten Thousand Doors of January, Alix E. Harrow (Redhook; Orbit UK)
  • A Memory Called Empire, Arkady Martine (Tor)
  • Gods of Jade and Shadow, Silvia Moreno-Garcia (Del Rey; Jo Fletcher)
  • Gideon the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir (Tor.com Publishing)

Novella

  • This Is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone (Saga)
  • “Anxiety Is the Dizziness of Freedom”, Ted Chiang (Exhalation)
  • The Haunting of Tram Car 015, P. Djèlí Clark (Tor.com Publishing)
  • Her Silhouette, Drawn in Water, Vylar Kaftan (Tor.com Publishing)
  • The Deep, Rivers Solomon, with Daveed Diggs, William Hutson & Jonathan Snipes (Saga)
  • Catfish Lullaby, A.C. Wise (Broken Eye)

Novelette

  • Carpe Glitter, Cat Rambo (Meerkat)
  • “A Strange Uncertain Light”, G.V. Anderson (F&SF 7-8/19)
  • “For He Can Creep”, Siobhan Carroll (Tor.com 7/10/19)
  • “His Footsteps, Through Darkness and Light”, Mimi Mondal (Tor.com 1/23/19)
  • “The Blur in the Corner of Your Eye”, Sarah Pinsker (Uncanny 7-8/19)
  • “The Archronology of Love”, Caroline M. Yoachim (Lightspeed 4/19)

Short Story

  • “Give the Family My Love”, A.T. Greenblatt (Clarkesworld 2/19)
  • “The Dead, In Their Uncontrollable Power”, Karen Osborne (Uncanny 3-4/19)
  • “And Now His Lordship Is Laughing”, Shiv Ramdas (Strange Horizons 9/9/19)
  • “Ten Excerpts from an Annotated Bibliography on the Cannibal Women of Ratnabar Island”, Nibedita Sen (Nightmare 5/19)
  • “A Catalog of Storms”, Fran Wilde (Uncanny 1-2/19)
  • “How the Trick Is Done”, A.C. Wise (Uncanny 7-8/19)

The Andre Norton Award for Outstanding Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy Book

  • Riverland, Fran Wilde (Amulet)
  • Sal and Gabi Break the Universe, Carlos Hernandez (Disney Hyperion)
  • Catfishing on CatNet, Naomi Kritzer (Tor Teen)
  • Dragon Pearl, Yoon Ha Lee (Disney Hyperion)
  • Peasprout Chen: Battle of Champions, Henry Lien (Holt)
  • Cog, Greg van Eekhout (Harper)

Game Writing

  • The Outer Worlds, Leonard Boyarsky, Megan Starks, Kate Dollarhyde, Chris L’Etoile (Obsidian Entertainment)
  • Outer Wilds, Kelsey Beachum (Mobius Digital)
  • The Magician’s Workshop, Kate Heartfield (Choice of Games)
  • Disco Elysium, Robert Kurvitz (ZA/UM)
  • Fate Accessibility Toolkit, Elsa Sjunneson-Henry (Evil Hat Productions)

The Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation

  • Good Omens: “Hard Times”, Neil Gaiman (Amazon Studios/BBC Studios)
  • Avengers: Endgame, Christopher Markus & Stephen McFeely (Marvel Studios)
  • Captain Marvel, Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck & Geneva Robertson-Dworet (Marvel Studios)
  • The Mandalorian: “The Child”, Jon Favreau (Disney+)
  • Russian Doll: “The Way Out”, Allison Silverman and Leslye Headland (Netflix)
  • Watchmen: “A God Walks into Abar”, Jeff Jensen & Damon Lindelof (HBO)
Kate Wilhelm Solstice Awards were presented to John Picacio and David Gaughran.
The Kevin J. O’Donnell, Jr., Service to SFWA Award was presented to Julia Rios.
The 35th Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master honor was presented to Lois McMaster Bujold.









Kamala Harris Is President Of Making Trump Republicans Sh*t The Bed After the first Democratic debate, we wrote about Kamala Harris's performance with the headline "Kamala Harris Shows America What She'll Do To Trump, If You'll Let Her." The way Harris commanded the stage of eight million Democrats that night and ran the room like she owned it, the way she cut through with authority and emotion and humor ... well, it was somethin', all right! We've been following Harris for years (even back when sHe WaS a CoP!), but we really started paying attention in the Trump era, as we watched her terrify Jeff Sessions and terrify her male GOP colleagues on the Senate Judiciary Committee. (sHe WaS aCtUaLlY a pRoSeCuToR.) She mopped the floor with Bill Barr. She did it to Brett Kavanaugh. Even Dead John McCain would pound the table and stomp around at Harris, because that impertinent lady simply would not stop asking impolite questions of Republicans. How ruuuuuude. Do you not know who John McCain's daughter is?! We've had a sneaking suspicion that Kamala Harris is literally the only person we want to see on a debate stage with Donald Trump, along with a sneaking suspicion that she is literally the only Democratic candidate who might make Trump try to weasel out of said debates. And it sounds like that sneaking suspicion is shared in the White House and among Republican operatives! But where that fact makes us giggle, it sounds like it's making Trump and his acolytes shit the bed. Womp womp! More @Wonkette
A post shared by Wonkette (@wonkette) on




https://boingboing.net/2020/05/30/deep-spock.html

Deep Spock


Jarkan deepfaked Leonard Nimoy into the 2009 Star Trek movie, replacing Zachary Quinto in the scene where he meets an older version of himself from a parallel universe. This is surely going to be entering the regular toolkit of cinema soon enough, resurrecting the dead for new films. It's already more natural and convincing than CG--compare to digital Moff Tarkin, for example, which just looked like a videogame cutscene to me. But it also fails more completely; it's still Quinto at odd angles.




https://science.slashdot.org/story/20/06/04/239233/the-galaxys-brightest-explosions-go-nuclear-with-an-unexpected-trigger

The Galaxy's Brightest Explosions Go Nuclear With an Unexpected Trigger (sciencemag.org)








Posted by BeauHD  from the cause-and-effect dept.

sciencehabit writes:Type Ia supernovae, a bright and long-lasting brand of stellar explosion, play a vital role in cosmic chemical manufacturing, forging in their fireballs most of the iron and other metals that pervade the universe. The explosions also serve as "standard candles," assumed to shine with a predictable brightness. Their brightness as seen from Earth provides a cosmic yardstick, used among other things to discover "dark energy," the unknown force that is accelerating the expansion of the universe. Astronomers have long thought that the blasts come from white dwarfs, burnt out stars once like our Sun, reignited after stealing material from a companion red giant. But evidence is mounting that other mechanisms may be causing white dwarfs to explode, making their standard candle status a puzzle.


https://tech.slashdot.org/story/20/06/04/2341201/instagram-just-threw-users-of-its-embedding-api-under-the-bus

Instagram Just Threw Users of Its Embedding API Under the Bus (arstechnica.com)








Posted by BeauHD  from the permission-required dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica:Instagram does not provide users of its embedding API a copyright license to display embedded images on other websites, the company said in a Thursday email to Ars Technica. The announcement could come as an unwelcome surprise to users who believed that embedding images, rather than hosting them directly, provides insulation against copyright claims. "While our terms allow us to grant a sub-license, we do not grant one for our embeds API," a Facebook company spokesperson told Ars in a Thursday email. "Our platform policies require third parties to have the necessary rights from applicable rights holders. This includes ensuring they have a license to share this content, if a license is required by law."

In plain English, before you embed someone's Instagram post on your website, you may need to ask the poster for a separate license to the images in the post. If you don't, you could be subject to a copyright lawsuit. Professional photographers are likely to cheer the decision, since it will strengthen their hand in negotiations with publishers. But it could also significantly change the culture of the Web. Until now, people have generally felt free to embed Instagram posts on their own sites without worrying about copyright concerns. That might be about to change.Instagram's announcement follows a recent court ruling where photographer Elliot McGucken sued Newsweek for copyright infringement for embedding his post on their site without permission. "Newsweek countered that it didn't need McGucken's permission because it could get rights indirectly via Instagram," reports Ars Technica. "Instagram's terms of service require anyone uploading photos to provide a copyright license to Instagram -- including the right to sublicense the same rights to other users. Newsweek argued that that license extends to users of Instagram's embedding technology, like Newsweek."

"But in a surprise ruling (PDF) on Monday, Judge Katherine Failla refused to dismiss McGucken's lawsuit at a preliminary stage," the report adds. "She held that there wasn't enough evidence in the record to decide whether Instagram's terms of service provided a copyright license for embedded photos."

The report goes on to note that courts have previously "ruled against plaintiffs in embedding cases based on the 'server test,' which holds that liability goes to whomever runs the server that actually delivers infringing content to the user -- in this case, Instagram." It adds: "Instagram's decision to throw users of its embedding API under the bus makes the server test crucial for cases like this."






WEEKLY PANDEMIC REPORT

Anyway, as usual, here's the weekly links to the data about cases (lower than reality) and deaths (lower than reality, also) due to COVID-19.

Data can be found here, as always:

COVID-19 Dashboard by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University (JHU)

This is also a good data site:

Worldometer - Coronavirus info




75 Burning Man Photos That'll Blow Your Mind






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Reflect and connect.

Have someone give you a kiss, and tell you that I love you, Mom.

I miss you so very much, Mom.

Talk to you soon, Mom.

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- Days ago = 1800 days ago

- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2006.06 - 10:10

NEW (written 1708.27 and 1907.04) NOTE on time: I am now in the same time zone as Google! So, when I post at 10:10 a.m. PDT to coincide with the time of your death, Mom, I am now actually posting late, so it's really 1:10 p.m. EDT. But I will continue to use the time stamp of 10:10 a.m. to remember the time of your death, Mom. I know this only matters to me, and to you, Mom. Dropped "Talk to you tomorrow, Mom" in the sign off on 1907.04. Should have done it sooner as this feature is no longer daily.

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