Did anything unprecedented & important happen in America yesterday? 🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️

white reactionaries disenfranchising black voters to secure political power? that’s a jim crow. www.nytimes.com/2025/10/15/u...

Leo XIV comes out swinging hard in his first Apostolic Letter, esp §§80-81, insisting on the centrality of social movements and structural change and not JP2’s restrictions of liberation theology to individual dimensions. Vatican 2 and Medellín are back. www.vatican.va/content/leo-...

Another reporter fired JUST FOR ACCURATELY REPORTING WHAT CHARLIE KIRK SAID. They want that guy elevated to sainthood not because of what he did but DESPITE it. This shit is as fixed as wrestling.

This semester in my religion, gender, and sexuality class, I decided to mostly teach things published in the last 10yrs, including lots of stuff I haven’t gotten to really read. First up is Muslims on the Margins by @katrinadalythompson.com. And goodness, what a lovely way to begin.

R.E.M. “pushed the boundaries” of alternative rock Herbie Hancock “pushed the boundaries” of jazz Trump & RFK Jr. are “destroying public health & will be responsible for killing people” What is journalism, anyway? 🤷‍♂️🤦‍♂️

"this product is good because it's like having a pocket full of PhDs" just suggests to me you've never actually been in a room with a bunch of experts on a topic. You think you're going to come away with a quick, simple, easy-to-digest summary of their expertise? Think again.

This is why Charlottesville melted down its Lee statue. If the statue is removed and simply put in storage, it remains what @artcrimeprof.bsky.social calls “America’s strategic racism reserve.”

Nothing like the last week of summer before turning to semester prep to compel furious writing on that summer project that has slipped away for the last two months. (Why am I like this? Why do I always do this?)

👇🎯 A lot of folks don't seem to understand that 90+% of our authoritarian problem is the total failure of Article I of the Constitution, not Article III.

the republican party hates public goods and wants to force feed you and your family slop produced by its billionaire allies

Still the most arresting piece of art I have ever seen. Kehinde Wiley (American, b. 1977) “Judith and Holofernes” (2012) Oil on linen, 120 x 90 in. North Carolina Museum of Art

The “deal” that Brown made with the Trump admin is much more extreme than is being reported. It includes government oversight of course evaluations and no barrier to government interference in faculty hiring. Read it for yourself here: www.brown.edu/sites/defaul...

Excuse my language but what fucking business is it of the united states government whether Brown undertakes this kind of medical care for parents and their kids who fully consent to it and desire it? Insanity! Pure discrimination in an agreement trollingly cloaked in preventing discrimination.

A giant double standard around free speech and academic freedom happening around Palestine right now. "the publishers had demanded that the articles be submitted to a legal review late into the process."

Today marks 20 years since I came out for the first time, in quick succession, to myself, to God, and to the world. I have come to feel ambivalent about the required coming out plot line in queer lives, but this is still a significant day.

To wit, I have written almost 1000 words since the walk-inspired breakthrough.

“It’s not that traditional liberal learning is out of step with student demand. Instead, it’s out of step with the priorities, values and desires of a powerful board of trustees with no apparent commitment to liberal education, and an administrative class that won’t fight for the liberal arts.”

The delight of discovering that @zotero.org has finally added @chicagomanual.bsky.social 18th ed. Place of publication: begone! (Though I feel very mixed about not using 3 em-dashes for repeated authors in the bibliography. Looks wrong to see the repetition.)

Never underestimate the power of going on a walk and talking to yourself out loud (and avoiding the stares of neighbors) to work out a writing problem.

This is from an actual Republican Congressman, from the party that is also locking kids in cages in a concentration camp in Florida, hoping they try to escape and get eaten by alligators. This is today's Republican Party.

His victims got on the stand and shared some of the most horrific stories and he was acquitted anyway. This is why I get so angry when people blame victims for not speaking up or walking away. Why? Who will protect them, believe them, and guarantee proper justice?

The tradition of colleges and universities carrying maces in procession is as a sign of their independence and sovereignty over their own affairs, just like the UK House of Commons. The mace is a threat against tyrants. Bowing to Trump won't save UVa, just as it didn't Columbia. Stand up and fight.

How many pre-written "#MeToo Is Over" columns had to be shelved tonight?

The general consensus forming around this very correct sentiment is that students' use of AI is encouraged by the transactional nature of higher ed. The systemic issue is that college educators, for the most part, aren't the ones who have made education transactional. So how can we fix this system?

Again, the single greatest problem (among the many problems of being ruled by 9 Wizards In Robes) with SCOTUS is that its "conservative" members systematically ignore science, history, data, empirical evidence, & statistics. The fascism comes robed in parlor game theories, gut feelings, & anecdotes.

Truly one of the defining images of 2025 so far

I just went there to try and find the NYT coverage of the largest protests in modern American history and just kept on scrolling and scrolling and scrolling …

It’s remarkable the racist things upper middle-class white Boomer New Yorkers will say in public in the South, when they think they’re not being heard or that they’re in sympathetic territory. Yes, please, say more about “those people” on your flight or at Yankee Stadium.

the story today is of a profoundly low energy military parade being met with millions of americans in nationwide protests denouncing the dictatorial pretensions of the president

Based on crowd-sourced records of No Kings Day event turnout, and extrapolating for the cities where we don't have data yet, it looks like roughly 4-6 million people protested Trump across the U.S. yesterday. That's nearly 2% of the U.S. pop! Mobilized anti-Trump resistance is exceeding 2017 levels

Not only is Noem’s statement about “liberating” L.A. from its elected officials a massive escalation in the anti-democratic, authoritarian actions of this administration, but it also directly refutes the administration’s own reasoning and justification for sending in the national guard and marines.

“[The Senators and Representatives] shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same.” -Constitution, Art 1, sec 6

The LA protests will trigger a drumbeat of "law and order" messaging from the White House and their media allies as a prelude to invoking the Insurrection Act. This is entirely predictable, and any Dem or media outlet that facilitates this narrative will be aiding Trump's authoritarian project.

If confirmed, this would represent a version of Charlottesville, but where government officials are the ones driving into protestors

This is the summary

In just 130 days, Elon... -Secured even more contracts -Derailed at least 40 fed investigations of his corporations -Gutted agencies that regulate his business -Installed loyalists throughout the government Elon has fallen out with Trump, but he got exactly what he wanted.

University of Michigan paying cops to secretly follow students on and off campus. I'm sure everyone will feel really safe on campus now.

😭 (hey @spiritcitizen.bsky.social)

The child in this trustee’s scenario? Faculty. Who submitted their tenure files for consideration in accordance with the terms of their employment. Both sides have a responsibility in that contract, one to submit and one to review. I hope everyone really hears this.

I thought this story was horrific, but realizing it was an actor I long enjoyed only made it worse. My God.

Repeat After Me: AI Doesn’t Know Anything – Chuck Wendig

Headline says it all. www.science.org/content/arti...

Cis people have no idea just how stupid gender is about to get

The hysteria when you say, “nah I’m good” on all the chat bots is how you know they’re in the grips of roulette fever. You know the guy at a casino, shaking at 2 am, telling you how dumb you are not to get in on this?

This is really the perfect use of generative AI: to create a report whose purpose is solely to exist as A Report, which no one is supposed to read because no one involved in its creation even pretends to have the slightest genuine interest in the actual facts at issue.

1/Blockbuster ruling by Court of International Trade nullifying reciprocal tariffs and trafficking tariffs. It also severely handicaps attempts to reimpose. The Court in no uncertain terms rejects national security justification (something courts rarely do). www.cit.uscourts.gov/sites/cit/fi...

Elon Musk did not leave the Trump administration. He's making a sleight-of-hand show of leaving the Trump administration while still being very much part of it behind closed doors, and yet, reporters who should know better continue to put out shit like this uncritically.