Among many other things, Frederick Douglass was one of the very first important theorists of photography, a fact that historians have been exploring for a couple decades — and that the white photography world continues to largely ignore. Here's an intro. www.nps.gov/articles/000...

The only white South African I’ve known personally is a lovely person but I’m totally guilty of making this assumption.

Just my 2 cents but Mekka pointed out last year that fascism arrived for Black Americans decades ago & it was a major turning point in how I view current events.

People who haven’t lived it have *no idea* how much It sucks to live in a car-dependent area when you don’t have a car.

Your isolation is not accidental. It’s intentional. A client of mine recently attended two international tech conferences and reached out to share his experience. The first, he said, was “status quo white dudes and a handful of women.” The second, Mozilla Festival, felt completely different:

The fearmongering we have seen from some Jewish institutions and leaders surrounding Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani is harmful, overblown, and risks needlessly deepening divisions in the city and in our community. 🧵

i will eternally flog this point: it’s not just morally wrong to cave on defending marginalized people, it is bad politics failing to aggressively stand up for “your people” reads as weak, even if the listener don’t fully agree w/ you. “if they won’t defend X maybe they won’t defend me either?”

Lauro Elementary - Federal Hill, Providence RI

Please do not defend Nazi tattoos in the mentions of Black people. Or Jewish people. Or in my case, Black Jewish people. Enough is enough. Honestly

This is the result of a lot of people pretending racism is one of the greatest taboos in our culture while failing to address racism substantively. People are appalled by the idea of being called racist while being totally committed to upholding racism throughout society.

I got triple-vaxxed on Friday w/covid, flu and pneumonia shots. Yay for modern medicine but I'd do the pneumonia shot separately if I had a do-over.

Aside from the joy of shouting into an empty void, what’s the point of this site if its leadership is trying to be as fascist as Facebook?

Looking forward to the Red Dawn reboot where a gang of unruly high school kids retreat to the woods to save their city after it’s been taken over by ICE.

Antifascist "alarmists" were right about all of it. And I really, really hope folks can think about what that means for who they should listen to moving forward.

If you take a swing at a martial artist, you’d better be ready to spar.

The ACLU that has spent decades defending the free speech rights of Nazis is now gleefully fundraising off the Jimmy Kimmel firing. 🤮

I joined this community recently and I‘d love for you to check it out. It’s almost an anti-Facebook, a community directly opposed to white supremacy while also providing a space for white people to unpack their internalized racism in a moderated environment.

IF this is true-- and it's a big if, remember who is running the FBI right now-- please be aware that back when I was monitoring 8chan and later Terrorgram, this is EXACTLY what Nazis urged their followers to do. They encouraged each other to do mass murder and then frame the left for it.

Loomer deleted the post on the left this morning

Political violence disproportionately hurts people with less power, not people with more power. Political violence will disproportionately hurt people of color and women and LGBTQ people. It’s not fair, but that’s the way it works. Celebrating political violence means at best indifference to that.

The answer is simpler than you think

I'm not so sure about this new Austin logo guys

Federal Hill, Providence, where the official neighborhood bird is the fire alarm, going off for no reason.

Listening to old recordings of me and friends from back in the 80s and I'm so glad now that I took the time to shoplift the really good Maxell tapes.

Drinking blue water before you go to sleep will help balance this out

I don't know. It just bothers me how Dems will justify not addressing actual issues because they might "distract from kitchen table issues" but then allow themselves to get roped into discussing whatever dumb shit the Republicans want to talk about.

Aretha was an icon and still somehow under appreciated. I read a story once about a misguided audio engineer who added a compressor to Aretha’s vocals while recording her. It’s standard for most vocalists but Aretha was…Aretha. She reportedly glared at him and said “I’m my *own* compressor”. 🫣

As good a reason as any to visit Philly, I guess?

I think a lot of these “perfect is the enemy of good so we’re ok with anti-trans candidates” are just privileged white people facing adversity for the first time in their entire lives and are so fucking fragile and terrified they’re willing to do anything and kill anyone to protect themselves.

June '96, during a preview at a theater in San Francisco: "This Independence Day, Los Angeles will be destroyed" followed by raucous cheers from the entire audience.

We need to teach people the difference between being uncomfortable and being unsafe. Because the discomfort of the safest people is endangering the most vulnerable, all day every day.

We moved to Providence last March and I immediately started to worry about the election because it was obvious people here didn’t feel nearly the same urgency we did in the red states. And now here we are. 😞

Fascism in the US isn’t new—the difference now is that it’s impacting white people too.

My mother used to send me to the store to buy cigarettes when I was 7.

Happy Bastille Day!

“Everyone has their reasons, that’s what’s so frightening. People can find a way to justify any action, no matter how evil…You can’t judge people by what they think or say, only by what they do.” — Kira Nerys, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine

If you care about Medicaid, I need your help. These kids are the best chance we have of saving Medicaid. Families are on the way to DC. We need to cover van rentals and hotel rooms. I will not, I will NOT, waste your money or time. Can you help get this donation link in front of your people?

I think Zohran Mamdani demonstrated pretty handily that he’ll protect Jewish New Yorkers when the seniormost Jewish elected official in the city was detained by jackbooted thugs and he was on the scene demanding his release in minutes

It’s not a bad movie but Eraserhead was a terrible choice for a blind date.

I slept thru a five-hour standoff between SWAT and the guy in the apartment across the hall from me.

To my New England friends—take the upcoming heat seriously. Stay hydrated, remember your electrolytes and avoid direct sun. Sudden irritability or mental confusion may be early signs of heatstroke—go find water and a/c immediately.

It’s one word in Texan

If Gavin Newsom gets arrested, his mug shot will be *insufferable*

So we all have a job, and it is to loudly support the protesters. They are at the front lines of democracy right now.

@pftompkins.bsky.social is a national treasure and I hope everyone appreciates the restraint I showed by not yelling “Mr Peanut Butterrrr” at the top of my lungs every time he was on stage. ❤️

Miss Rachel isn’t on Bluesky, but her posts about Gaza should be. I wish this wasn’t so unusual to see from people with big platforms.

The best thing Joe Biden ever did was send Rahm Emanuel to Japan for three years.

Wow Bluesky is full of posts rn about why the Israeli embassy guy who got shot last night was a bad guy actually (implied: and therefore a legit target) But, babes, the shooter did not do internet searches on them beforehand. He shot two random folks who came out of the Capital Jewish Museum. 💔

Like, we do all get how killing random people based on their religion or nationality is always bad, right???