Friendly suggestion to folks who feel inspired to spout out "hot takes" about how awful the modern world is because capitalism, patriarchy, wokeness, or whatever your favorite folk devil may be:
Study some history. Even just a LITTLE will make your opinions far less stupid.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 23, 2024
THIS RIGHT HERE.
The information in a ten-minute video, if written out, can be read in about 90 seconds, and skimmed even faster. Video is an *incredibly* inefficient way to disseminate most kinds of information. https://t.co/710rI4krnA
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 25, 2024
If your headline or lede in a story about an appeals court decision comes across like a trick True-False question, you're doing journalism wrong.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 26, 2024
Whenever my income tax is dramatically higher than I expect (which happens in about 40% of years), I always get very upset about it, even when I can technically afford it without *completely* draining my business account. Paying tribute to warlords doesn't sit well with me.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 27, 2024
Since Harvard doesn't seem to think proper terminology is important, I'm here to inform you that librarians call this an anthropodermic binding.
You're welcome. https://t.co/MkGJ5EmltY
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 29, 2024
The US is & always has been a nation of immigrants; the current denial of that is sheer madness. Many white folks seem to have convinced themselves that they're the indigenous population, when the very oldest European families have only been here for 500 years (and most < 200). https://t.co/ymQ2P1cqJX
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 30, 2024
"Imagine" is the right word. You could also imagine getting there by wishing, a Star Trek transporter, astral projection, magic carpet, one of your own fleet of private jets, or burrowing underground with Bugs Bunny, all of which are roughly as realistic as this rail fantasy. https://t.co/n5RgXz0gzD
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 30, 2024
If you think I *want* the US to fall, you haven't been reading very carefully. What I've always said is that its fall is *inevitable*, not *desirable*. You might as well imply that it matters whether those aboard "want" an airplane to fall if its engines stop.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) March 31, 2024
Getting rid of AUTHORITARIANISM is the solution. Rare non-authoritarian religions are not the problem, and secular authoritarianism is not an improvement over the religious kind. "We can brutalize you because you're a criminal" = "We can brutalize you because you're a sinner". https://t.co/Pp56akFNVh
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 1, 2024
I guess it must be comforting to have a mind so narrow and shallow that it can truly sum up its beliefs in short, chantable slogans. Ignorance is, as they say, bliss.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 2, 2024
PROTIP: If you aren't *very* familiar with the topic you're opining on, avoiding the phrase "of all time" will help you avoid sounding like a 13-year-old dumbass.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 3, 2024
Those working to promote a partisan agenda are politicians, even if they aren't themselves running for office.
Politicians lie so constantly only fools, madmen, and little children believe them.
Calling your political group "Truth" (in any language) doesn't change that. https://t.co/UY9oUlYwVD
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 4, 2024
There are pathetic attempts at "negging", and then there's this. https://t.co/VUINnl7zBK
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 5, 2024
That is, of course, known to the rulers, which is why they usually excuse campaigns of aggression (military or political) by telling the Great Unwashed that "They're coming for our jobs!" or "…our land!" or "…our women!" or "…our Precious Way of Life!" or "THE CHILDREN!!!"
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 7, 2024
Whenever I see a headline proclaim that "we" (meaning Americans or Westerners or whoever) did some stupid, destructive thing, I always say "I didn't".
I know it's both childish & pointless, but it gives me some small measure of cost-free satisfaction.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 10, 2024
You can see it in all kind of laws & popular beliefs: no sex offenders near a school, the mere *possession* of a taboo substance being a "crime", banning flag-burning, equating representations of women or children with the real article, etc.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 12, 2024
The problem, of course, is that authoritarians will claim these are "isolated incidents", just like every time a cop commits rape, robbery, mayhem, or murder is an "isolated incident". Definitely not a predictable result of bad laws & policies, no sirree! {banjo music} https://t.co/GCJy4zZW2B
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 12, 2024
To be fair, it wasn't much of an "empire" by that point; it was barely larger than modern Greece. https://t.co/ofT9BDqIAZ
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 13, 2024
Wisdom is reaching the point where you actually understand the meaning of the expression, "Youth is wasted on the young."
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 13, 2024
It's not bad enough that many people are so stupid they actually believe that wealth consists of big piles of paper money a la Scrooge McDuck; some of them ALSO appear to believe it spoils over time like food.
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 16, 2024
Recently, Grace asked me to make her stuffed bell peppers, so we had them for dinner last night. Just thought y'all might like a picture. I use an adaptation of a recipe I found many years ago in "River Road Recipes", a south Louisiana cookbook published in 1976. pic.twitter.com/IGHa6FwAM5
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 18, 2024
"Inmate" is one of those words that isn't quite a euphemism, but is still much softer-sounding than "prisoner", and far more dehumanizing. When one hears "prisoner" one remembers that it means a person confined by violence. But "inmate" sounds more like "patient". Use "prisoner".
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 19, 2024
War is the health of the State, at the expense of the health of the body politic it infests like a cancer. https://t.co/pQ4IExyoMK
— Maggie McNeill (@Maggie_McNeill) April 21, 2024