"This Committee was initially created during the McCarthy Era, a dark time when the federal government repressed and persecuted American citizens for their political beliefs [...]" To the voices that will be heard / May they speak loud and clear. #academicsky #writingsky www.npr.org/2025/10/01/n...

so many dead canaries and we just keep on mining

Every couple hours it's like a new level of absurdity unlocks: Oldheads are avoiding (Boomer) parents' bewildered texts, The Chronically Online feel like they're on crazy pills, all while The Hypocrisy™ burns through yet another layer of the social contract. The vibes aren't just off. They're gone.

What are you reading right now? Fiction, non-fiction, speculative, genre, you name it. #academicsky #writingsky

WTF. Project MUSE is an academic lifeline! Cutting access is deliberately hurting researchers' access to multiple knowledge bases! Horrible. #academicsky #writingsky

The vibe these days: All the juice has been squeezed. The violent re-squeezing for the last few drops. A vending machine stops working. Cue banging, rattling, more banging, more rattling. Nothing. Irresponsible persons clicked on obvious malware. All computers jitter, freeze, bluesceen. #humpday

A necessary read. Considering developments, this is a good reminder of the macro-currents at play. It's noteworthy that Klein & Taylor frame what's happening as a religion-adjacent global assault. Yes, it's bad. No, it's not hopeless. #academicsky #writingsky www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-i...

/rant on/ This commitment to deep dysfunction is entirely baffling. So many people are committed to keeping a sick system going, it's unconscionable. Not just a few: millions. What is this religion-adjacent faith in a system that clearly only serves a handful of people?1/5 #academicsky #writingsky

It's like he's actively looking for The Yuckiest Thing To Do and hitting it bullseye each time 🤢 Beyond weird.

You know that saying, "How you get them is how you lose them"? *looks at History of the United States of Yikes* ..ethnic cleansing, religious extremism, brutal racialized oppression, vicious misogyny, massive wealth theft, horrific hypocrisy.. *looks at news cycle* Huh. #academicsky #writingsky

The heartbreak at witnessing the deciders in beloved institutions click their heels and salute is understandable. It might help to look at other countries to see how they dealt with this shift, because it's going to get much worse. *cracks open Klaus Mann's Mephisto* #academicsky #writingsky

What a disturbing amount of pple seem to refuse to understand is that the Disunited States of WTF exist on a planet and everybody is watching. The revolting portrait in the attic is on full display & millions are vomiting into their purses, morally puking into flower pots. #academicsky #writingsky

Something is rotten in the State of You Know Where. #academicsky #writingsky

We are seven months in, and the speed with which vital civic institutions are capitulating to authoritarian demands we once would have regarded as inconceivable in an established liberal democracy is jawdropping. I hadn't thought I was polyannaish about America, but it's really stunning.

Wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't at least 50% genAI wrecking autocorrect. That mess sneaks into everything like toxic pollen, adding unnecessary letters, changing correct words into nonsense. Autocorrect is basically Automess now. And thus the Enshittification continues 😒 #academicsky #writingsky

Honest question: Are you reading any fiction right now? #academicsky #writingsky

Bad Moon Rising #academicsky #writingsky

Stay safe out there. Take it slow and drink your water. #academicsky #writingsky

This is where we are right now. Except it's not even remotely funny. #academicsky #writingsky

Welp.

I live in a world where I am supposed to just accept that this sentence exists

Enjoy your canned vegetables for Thanksgiving, people. This is only going to get worse.

Just lived through one of those, "Why are The Womenz talking to me, Important Man"-meetings. Incredible. One lady finally had enough and broke down the tricky problem that needed solving. Lo, behold, Important Man hadn't read the initial memo. Everyone else in that meeting: #academicsky #writingsky

This video encapsulates the current "historical moment" pretty well. #academicsky #writingsky

The fact that everyone still writes work emails and stays professional in meetings like nothing world-changing is happening makes it all so much worse. At what point does one's commitment to old normalcies break? Makes those first scenes in Arrival look pretty accurate tbh #academicsky #writingsky

Reminder: Take a break. You need it. #academicsky #writingsky

AI slop on main? Blocked. "You didn't earn the knowledge for yourselves, so you don't take any responsibility for it. You stood on the shoulders of [artists] to accomplish something as fast as you could, [and] you patented it, and packaged it, [and] now you're selling it." #academicsky #writingsky

Think of all the deliberate decisions and intentional choices that had to be made to get you to this point. Every step of the way, every single person made a decision. Every step of the way, every single person made an active choice. Nothing about this is a coincidence. #academicsky #writingsky

The planetkilling plagiarism machine needs to be stopped, yes.

I can't with this insistance on ever more Dependence Tech. And yes, searches have a goal: Finding what you're looking for. Yes. However: finding all those strange & interesting things on the way was what made OG web searches wonderfully whimsical, a little weird, and impressively informative. 1/4

It's escalating, isn't it. #academicsky #writingsky

One dream I have is that one day physical scientists and biological scientists recognize that they don’t have the same systemic training in social analysis that their colleagues in the humanities and social sciences do and that this means we need help when it comes to doing politics

A thread🧵 for those of you on your publishing journey #writing #writingcommunity

"But Keir wanted you to know that Keir had always had it in for foreigners. He wasn’t the sort of prime minister who would play politics with other people’s lives. No. He had always believed this stuff ... There was nothing more Labour than targeting immigrants." www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Thread 🧵 #reading

It's like watching those late-night B-movies where the Smug Protagonist who moved into ~The Cursed House the Locals Tried to Burn Down Twice~ hears a noise. "Don't check. Please don't check," you tell the screen, but of course they check and now half the family got eaten b/c Horrific Horrors. 1/4

"It's becoming much rarer to zone out and just let the mind wander, but that's when we think in ways that broaden our horizons [...]." Zoning out was much easier back in ye olden dayes when "doomscrolling" was a band name at best 🫠 #academicsky #writingsky www.bbc.com/news/article...

This looks bad. Like avalanche coming down a mountain bad. Q3 and Q4 are going to be fun. /s #humpday

We need! We need! We need! Do it. Do it small (baby steps) Do it imperfect (mistakes will be made) Do it bit by bit (don't rush) You know exactly what you can do right now. Do it. It scares you? Ok. It p*sses you off? Fine. Do it anyway. #academicsky #writingsky

Too many people confuse kindness with weakness. And then are shocked when the generous person who's been nothing but kind morphs into John Wick. Suddenly it's, "How could you" & "Why are you doing this?" All the while they've been instigating. Surprises me every time. #academicsky #writingsky

<•The North Remembers•> would be a great tagline right now. But alas, Season 8 and copyright #academicsky #writingsky

It got worse, didn't it. #academicsky #writingsky

things "Conclave" got right that are worth keeping an eye on as things progress: --the Italian bloc resents its dwindling influence --there are two flavors of Americans & they hate each other --the global south sticks together --the implicit endorsement of the last guy is terrifically important

Once had a course discussion about this way back in the Before Times. Given the responses, it was likely the first time the young people had to grapple with how the norms of our day-to-day lives are built on violence and negotiation. It was eye-opening in more ways than one #academicsky #writingsky

When you realise how much work needs to be done to get everyone's skillset up to scratch. Meanwhile, there's Sentient Malignancy & Carbon-based Nonsense to contend with, but at least the sun is shining and spending time outdoors is once again the fun, life-affirming option #academicsky #writingsky

There's this chapter in C. Criado Perez' book on data bias, where the author talks about assumptions so ingrained, they affect mundane things like snow-cleaning & how these unquestioned blind spots regarding Who is What, in any given space, materially shape our world #academicsky #writingsky

Remember wondering why an entire people let vilest crimes happen while going about their daily business? That question is being answered in real time right now Btw: There is a point of no return and falling off that moral cliff-edge is a catastrophe that wrecks generations #academicsky #writingsky

Remember to rest and recharge #academicsky #writingsky