Such a privilege to be in conversation with @prisonculture.bsky.social, @flexlibris.bsky.social, and @mskellymhayes.bsky.social around public libraries!

This is a holy day for my people (i.e. book-loving millennial gays) variety.com/2025/film/ne...

The #1 lesson from yesterday’s blowout: Humanities majors killed on the job market 1) Mamdani- Africana Studies 2) Spanberger -French 3) Sherill - Global History

Go experience this chart (I know, I know) because it’s really smart design - the physical experience of trying to look at it of it gives you a visceral understanding of the scale. I love this. LOOK AT THIS CHART RIGHT NOW 👀

crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their consultants

This needs as much coverage as protests or ICE raids. Los Angelenos FTW. ❤️🙌

This is some absolute bullshit

More than a hundred libraries on federally recognized tribal lands across the country were notified that their congressionally appropriated grant had been terminated midcycle. Those communities are at risk of losing their local libraries and the history they hold.

You would think this is bribery, since it is. But SCOTUS has ruled in Snyder v US that bribery only counts if it’s money in a burlap sack with “$$” stenciled on the side and if the guy with the sack has a big mustache which he can twirl. abcnews.go.com/Politics/tru...

A Chicago Pope implies the existence of an MLA Pope and APA Pope

LA County to slash $89M but give sheriff’s department a boost. New spending plan shrinks some budgets but adds $9.5 million to the sheriff’s department. lapublicpress.org/2025/04/la-c...

Really excited for this one - can’t wait till my copy shows up!

Examples of some important things IMLS supports that matter to EVERYONE: * Civic education/access to voting * STEM & making in libraries * Accessibility for libraries and museums * Expanding broadband access * Supporting preservation of historical sources

It’s honestly been a huge lifeline to organize with all my neighbors during this horrible crisis - laist.com/news/housing...

THIS is the reality on the ground.

This is the experience of so many of my neighbors (particularly renters) in Altadena. Millions of dollars are getting raised for “fire aid” and meanwhile regular folks have nowhere to live.

Just had a sample of the Eaton Fire ash that is in my driveway run on the department XRF. Is there titanium (new house paint)? Yup. Lead (old house paint)? You betcha. Heavy metals? Check. Treat that ash like it's toxic folks (because it is)

One of the best post-election “wtf happened” data breakdowns I’ve seen (and one of the only ones that’s been genuinely explanatory vs defensive or prescriptive)

Sometimes working with manuscripts gets us really, really close to the people from the past allowing us to hear their voices. This is a story of a letter from a schoolgirl to her teacher, written probably sometime at the end of the 9th or the beginning of the 10th century. A thread 🧵 #medievalsky /1

Joining your Friends of the Library group is extremely cool, extremely 2025 - be like @kimkelly.bsky.social!

Absolutely fire take, absolutely correct, will always bring a Little Guy home with me from a museum

Roses are redde Noble are the manatees Yf we wante a bettir future Teach artes & humanityes

This whole thread is interesting AF - it also makes me feel better about my messy desk with stacks of paper everywhere. I am in a long proud tradition of messy desk havers!

Please join if you’re interested in learning more about how to build local power around public libraries in your community!

Sending support and care to all our trans siblings and comrades today ❤️

These rates for undergrad tutorial teaching are pretty much what I got paid at Oxford *fifteen years ago* as a PhD student and that was garbage money THEN.

And if you’re a would-be library trustee in SLC (or anywhere!) consider the For The People training cohort - it is like the X-Men but for libraries and with less time travel (but not ZERO time travel) www.librariesforthepeople.org/cohort

This part. Public goods and services exist because by definition they can't, won't, and shouldn't be profitable in and of themselves because they exist to improve society, which is basically anathema to capitalism, which exists solely to extract maximum profit.

Kurt Vonnegut, Man Without A Country (2005): “[The] America I loved still exists, if not in the White House or the Supreme Court or the Senate or the House of Representatives or the media. The America I love still exists at the front desks of our public libraries.” That’s how I feel, too. AND…

temba, his bread bowl full

an encounter [ #art ]

Whoever’s weeklong malaise let my kitchen get into this state has some explaining to do and regardless of the fact that it was me, I think it’s extremely rude that I have to clean it.

I’m a public librarian in a degenerating democracy, and I am pleading: Care about your library. Use it. See what programs and events it offers. And pay attention to its governing body. See who the trustees are. Consider running yourself. Libraries will need all the community support they can get. 📚

True story! Also - you can run for office to help your local public library. Do you know how it works? Where the money comes from? Who sets policy?

Please come! If you are curious about how to build local power and help the public library in your community, this open house is *very much* for you.

Medieval psalters be like 🌺🌿🌿🌿🌿🌺🌱🌱💫 🌿🟡🟡🟡🟡🟡🌼🌱💫 🌿🟡🟦🟦🟦🟦✨🌱💫 🌿🟡🟦🤴🏾🦄🌝🟦🦚💫 🌿🟡🟦🟦🟦🟦✨🌱🍆 🌿😼🟦🤺🥀🏹🟦🐕💫 🌿🟡🟦🌸🦜🐉🟦🌱💫 🌿🟡🟦🏹🐒🐝🟦🌱💫 🌿🟡🟦🟦🟦🟦eatus vir 🌿🟡🟡🧜‍♂️🟡🟡🌷🌱💫 🌺🌿🌿🌿🌿🌺🌱🌱🌼

Haymarket has TEN ebooks on the work of liberation that are free for download for the next week. Ten. They include LET THIS RADICALIZE YOU, HOPE IN THE DARK, HOW WE GET FREE on the work and lessons of the Combahee River Collective, and more:

If libraries are your passion, here’s a place to start thinking about how to defend them. If nothing else, find out when your library holds their board meetings and start attending. Lots of them are on Zoom now!

Want help with that? Check out librariesforthepeople.org for a library of resources as well as applications for our upcoming candidate cohort!

I had no idea about any of her struggles - this profile of fantasy author Susanna Clarke is absolutely worth it (gift link to full article): www.nytimes.com/2024/10/25/b...

This graph is astonishing. The people that bang on about “natural birth” and “women have been doing this forever without help” need to be forced to stare at this until their eyes water.

The arguments in this case are completely fucking insane. It’s a far right Dobbs-style effort to overturn long accepted precedent. Book bans and abortion bans always come out of the same playbook.

Bluesky hive mind - are there folks doing current research on the impact of money in local elections? Super-local, like school board and city council level. I’m investigating a question about contribution limits and how/if they impact “outside” (non-candidate) spending by PACs, c4s, and/or IECs.

"Knowing who to be mad at is praxis." - @prisonculture.bsky.social just now at the Socialism conference 💗

Other great academic sentence intros include “Of course,…” [stuff that does not seem self-evident but ok go off I guess] “Memorably,…” [nope nobody remembers wtf this is] “Arguably…” [lfg it’s fight night]

listen i am not saying the electoral college is utter nonsense but did the founding fathers take into consideration los angeles district 3 i am just asking

Exactly this for me too as a young person: “[I]t was science fiction that invited me to question the dominant politics of the world I was inhabiting, and it was science fiction that mirrored that world in ways that told me, Yes, all of this is as fucked up as you think it is.”

I like: Public libraries Old-timey buildings All plants Most foods Every single cheese, ever Goats Being in the ocean - and also Aquariums Reading English chapel sung evensong Music that you feel in your body My partner & my dog Dancing Riding motorcycles (but not too fast) Fireplaces Museums