Not enough demoralizing discourse on here today. Here are some prompt contributions: - Complaining about people chewing loudly is ableist. - Riding the train implicates you in the legacy of imperialism. - Laser light shows are hostile to veterans. - You're a bad socialist if you don't use Pinterest.

One day soon it is going to happen, and I am going to dance with all of you in the streets of Oakland until dawn.

I hate Microsoft Word's "Editor Score." I asked you to check my spelling, not give me a goddamn grade!

What's wild is that you just KNOW that if it was actually a pink triangle tattoo he would have suspended his campaign months ago.

I am hopeful that Americans will finally start to take the material threat of fascism seriously once they learn why they're called "screwworms."

I'm so sick of federalism man, nobody should be forced to learn this much about Maine politics, there are like fifteen people who live there and I hate all of them.

Highly, highly recommend this article.

Well, fuck. (I went long on the history of this terminal but one tl;dr is that we're in a cold civil war on fossil fuels and Oakland is a point of resistance with some truly heroic local defenders.) www.oaklandreviewofbooks.org/unpaid-debts/

"The state’s prison vacancy rate stood at 2.99% as of April 30, roughly nine months after the measures, which are triggered when state prisons are more than 97% full, went into effect. Only a couple dozen people have been granted parole since then..." sentinelcolorado.com/state-and-re...

"Garcia believes the “primary driver” of these abnormally high failing rates is due to a “vast increase in academic dishonesty” due to students’ usage of large language models..." www.dailycal.org/news/campus/...

Watching intelligent and goodhearted people completely spiral out on here sucks so much, especially because engaging is usually counterproductive. The one upside is that the empathy I feel for them helps me forgive myself a bit for my own history of humiliating online meltdowns.

A nationwide tax revolt is the last thing we need right now. When did this country become so addicted to self-immolation?

Is the story about the parthians pouring molten gold down the throat of Crassus's corpse to mock his lust for wealth true? Probably not, no. But will I continue to tell the story anyway? Yes.

The nation's thift stores are full of 50cent copies of Anita Bryant records and the only people who even know who she is are queer nerds who annually celebrate the time she got pied in the face. In the end, we will win.

tfw the president stops taking his SSRIs :(

Growing up my dad always told me that if something is worth doing, it's worth taking the time to do it right. It's been great advice for life in general but TERRIBLE advice for academia.

I love that the standard defense for Graham Platner's Nazi tattoo is "He's not a bigot, he's just the stupidest man on earth, you should vote for him."

tl,dr; Scientists no longer allowed to use federal funding to publish, attend meetings, or talk to the public. They cannot collaborate internationally. Grants can be cancelled for any reason, at any time, political appointees have a final say over what gets funded, and who gets funded.

As of this morning, @thenewschool.bsky.social is de facto replacing its History department with a “Center for the American Experience,” which is funded by private and undisclosed donors. The New School has been New Colleged, and there’s no GOP to blame here. Our anti-fascist identity is over.

I'm not worried that my em dashes make my writing look like AI, because there isn't an LLM on the market that writes as poorly as I do. Feast your eyes on my unmistakably human mediocrity.

Thinking about a few years ago when every nonfiction book had a title like "Pooped!: True Confessions of an Accidental Proctologist."

Something fun we learned as we were thinking over this one: the border between Piedmont and Oakland is carved with Flock cameras ... (Image courtesy of @deflock.org)

I don't understand why so many people hate it when people talk about their dreams. I love it! Have any of you had any cool dreams recently?

“They still don’t want to let go of it,” said Terrance Winn, an advocate and former prisoner at Angola, in an interview with Truthout. “They are holding on to this slavery replica, because that really all it is — it’s just a model of slavery they are holding on to.” truthout.org/articles/fed...

The best proof that the Bay Area Book Festival is a major event in the publishing industry: Chuck Tingle will be speaking.

[standing blindfolded in front of a firing squad, unable to determine the political contingency preparing to execute me]: Yeah I thought The Force Awakens was okay. Not great but not the worst in the series either.

Continuing my annual tradition of googling "jacarandas" because I forgot what they look like since the last time they bloomed.

Quick personal life update: there is a cat sleeping in my lap.

White House social media intern desperately trying to drum up popular support by hinting that "ballroom" might just be slang for "basketball court."

I'm starting to feel concerned that nature is not in fact healing.

I've been reading old comics from the 1930s, and the best surprise so far is that Superman/Clark Kent originally worked as a reporter in... Cleveland, Ohio.

"The number of prisoners paroled under [Governor Jeff] Landry has plummeted to its lowest point in 20 years, due in part to a law he signed that cedes much of the power of the parole board to a computerized algorithm." www.propublica.org/article/loui...

CoreCivic should be dismantled in its entirety. theintercept.com/2026/05/24/i...

Regular reminder that Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz is the son of David Horowitz. Yes, THAT David Horowitz.

The chasm between liberal philosophy and liberal politics is really just astounding. Like how the hell are you going to praise John Rawls while hand-wringing over freedom in Palestine?

PLEASE STOP TRYING TO SHOOT THE PRESIDENT! Conventional bullets are made of lead, which can accumulate to toxic levels in vultures and other carrion bird species that feed on dead presidents.

I went to the Ballers season opener intending to write a vibe report, but I've been procrastinating on writing a vibe report because I had a lot of mixed feelings about it and feel like writing them out will just accelerate my transformation into a hater.

Ain't no rule that says a dog can't be the next James Bond.

Bill Cassidy's career may be over, but at least he was a Republican with integrity who bravely stood up to Trump by *checks notes* uh, giving him everything him he wanted.

Am I the last person on earth to learn about this picture of Walter Benjamin in Ibiza because lmaooooo

Are *you* subscribed to @oaklandreviewofbooks.org?

I regret telling my therapist that I am studying prison because now he is always asking if grad school FEELS like a prison to me, when in fact my research has made it clearer than ever than my experience in grad school is so incredibly unlike being incarcerated that... wait. Ohhhhhhhh!

my alma mater, the R1 public University of Utah, is now subject to a state law mandating 4/4 loads www.sltrib.com/opinion/comm...

"The therapy generally proved tolerable, without the taste-related side effects often seen with Paxlovid and with similar toxicity, overall, to that of the placebo." Yes! Yes! Yes!

"David Venturella, who previously worked for the agency under the Obama and Bush administrations, and has spent the last year overseeing lucrative contracts between ICE and detention facilities, will replace Todd Lyons at the end of the month." Unbelievably corrupt. www.kqed.org/news/1208360...

I'm pleasantly surprised they let me get away with this one. This is what will appear on the screen above the stage when I accept my diploma on Wednesday.

"... researchers found that a patchwork of state, federal and local policies allow data center operators to avoid publicly disclosing their actual water use. California lawmakers tried to address this last year, but California Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed the measure." calmatters.org/environment/...

Biden could have solved so many of our problems by inviting Kendrick Lamar to perform at his inauguration, resulting in the instantaneous aneurysmal death of every single congressional Republican.

"The new Odyssey movie isn't historically accurate" oh no that's awful! Hey, did you know that modern historians now have doubts that divine intervention by various gods living on Mount Olympus played a major role in ancient Greek warfare, and that the Trojan War itself probably never happened?