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Posts Tagged ‘racism’

Surveillance video is the great equalizer.  – Andrew Celli Jr. & Wylie Stecklow

I was never much of a KISS fan, but a little research points to this as the proper sendoff for Ace Frehley.  The links above it were provided by Dan Savage, Mike SiegelIncarcerNation, Violet Blue, The Onion, Nun Ya, and Jesse Walker, in that order.


From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

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[Journalists] act as a barrier against those who, through the ancient art of lying, seek to…rule by dividing.  –  Pope Leo XIV

Here’s a seasonally-themed a cappella medley called to my attention by Phoenix Calida; the links above it were provided by Aaron Ross Powell, Radley Balko, Ryan Cooper, IncarcerNation, Ryan Marino (x2), and Nun Ya, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

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There’s usually some kind of boogeyman…that justifies the building of a very extreme…policing apparatus.  –  Matthew Guariglia

It’s not unusual these days for a news item to fall into more than one category, so I have to figure out which is best; in such cases I typically link recent examples of the other applicable categories, or at least include them among the tags.  But sometimes the article does such a good job of analyzing the connections between the various categories, I feel it’s better to simply call my readers’ attention to the article and urge y’all to read it in its entirety.  This Reason article from a week ago today is a good example:

…On issues such as library books, abortion, gender, and even food, the culture war is now feeding the police state.  This phenomenon started in the states, and none have pursued it with more intensity than Florida and Texas, where governors and legislatures have competed to show that they’re fighting the hardest against what they call “woke”…[but] now…using criminal law, mass surveillance, [snitch] lines, and the threat of police violence to wage the culture war…is [becoming]…a danger to every American who wants to live, work, and travel without being monitored and menaced by the state…

…the…Trump…[regime]’s campaign against universities on such issues as anti-Israel protests, transgender athletes, and critical race theory were all preceded by Florida, wh[ich]…PEN America…[has] dubbed…the “blueprint state” for the White House’s run of education-related executive orders…The sheer number of bills churned out over the past few years by Florida and Texas is notable, especially in light of how petty the targets can be—drag queens, librarians, whoever might be using a certain bathroom stall…Also notable [is] those laws’ dismal track record in court.  Federal judges, even those appointed by Trump…have repeatedly struck down culture-war bills…represent[ing] a boundless paternalism…indistinguishable from the…identitarian politics that [proponents of such laws claim to oppose, such as bans on]…cultivated meat…[one] Texas [politician ludicrously defended as]…”plain cowboy logic“…in the bizarre, zero-sum logic of politicians like DeSantis and [Nebraska Governor Jim] Pillen, the freedom to eat bacon harvested from a pig that was alive and sensate before it was slaughtered is contingent on consumers never being given a choice to try an alternative…

…What makes the creation of new criminal statutes especially worrisome is law enforcement’s sweeping power to search and investigate targets…[via] vast, nationwide databases of personal information…facial recognition, cellphone surveillance, license plate tracking, sophisticated social media monitoring, and more…the huge surveillance architecture and data-sharing networks being created now won’t go back in the box when the current…[regime] is over, nor will they consider whether their targets used to have the right kind of politics…

There’s much, much more, bridging tags including Eavesdropping, Guinea Pigs, I Spy, The Last Shall Be First, Panopticon, Pyrrhic Victory, Thou Shalt Not, Thought Control, Universal Criminality, The Vultures Descend, Welcome to the Future, and many others.  So go read it!

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Y’all gonna have to kill me, I will kill myself.  –  Jarrell Johnson

I came to know and love jazz and swing not only via my grandparents, but also via Captain Kangaroo, which used to feature what amounted to music videos with puppets.  Alas, none of those bits from the show seem to be available online or anywhere else, but I did find this charming little slideshow backing one of the songs the Captain used to play.  The links above it were provided by Jesse Walker, Mike Siegel, Amy Alkon, Scott Greenfield, and IncarcerNation (x3), in that order.

From the Archives

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I have to spend quite a lot of money just to have fun.  –  guy obsessed with women being murdered

Counterfeit Comfort (#420)

If you’re a fan of “sex offender” registration, meet one of your bedfellows:

A man [nam]ed…Varun Suresh…has been charged…[for] stabbing…a 71-year-old [Fremont, California] man…to [death]…Suresh [told cops] that he [targeted his victim because he was a]…registered sex offender…

The Face of Trafficking

Note that cases of actual coercion don’t look much like the myths:

A [Pennsylvania] man [named Ramiro Caal Jolomana] is facing human trafficking charges…[because he] forc[ed] two young immigrant girls…ages 14 and 17, to work on a mushroom farm, with little compensation, while threatening to have them punished or deported if they strayed from him…The 14-year-old…was forced to work 16-hour shifts, seven-day work weeks, only to have her paycheck signed over to Jolomna and his wife…[she] was also…forced to perform domestic chores…The 17-year-old girl was…was…subjected to similar conditions…

Damned If You Don’t (#1243)

Cops will never stop these evil scams until there are criminal charges for their behavior:

…civil rights lawyer Jared Trujillo [used] TikTok to warn queer men about an [ongoing] sting operation…in New York’s Penn Station…Amtrak cops have been using the Sniffies app to target and arrest gay men on a charge of lewdness “even if their response is innocuous”…a similar scandal came to light in 201[4], when Port Authority p[igs]—including one [the herd thought it was hilarious to refer to by the sophomoric nickname]…”The Gay Whisperer“—were charged with…“public lewdness[” for merely using urinals in the men’s room.  Violent scams]…like this…disproportionately target Black and Brown queer men…[putting] these men a[t] even more at risk [from] ICE [goons]

Shame, Shame (#1514)

Do nitwits still think realistic porn cartoons are the worst use for this technology?

YouTube removed a channel that was dedicated to posting [computer]-generated videos of women being shot in the head following 404 Media’s request for comment.  The videos were clearly generated with Google’s new…video generator tool, Veo, according to [the] watermark…The channel…started on June 20, 2025.  It posted 27 videos, had over 1,000 subscribers, and had more than 175,000 views…All the videos…follow the exact same formula…a woman begging for her life while a man with a gun looms over her.  Then he shoots her.  Some videos have different themes, like…Lara Croft being shot, “Japanese Schoolgirls Shot in Breast,” “Sexy HouseWife Shot in Breast,” “Female Reporter Tragic End,” and Russian soldiers shooting women with Ukrainian flags on their chest…

Mad Libs (#1546)

Oh look, Maggie is right again, what a surprise:

OpenAI researchers [have finally admitted] that large language models will always produce plausible but false outputs, even with perfect data, due to fundamental statistical and computational limits…that cannot be solved through better engineering…[so-called “]hallucinations[“] stem…from statistical properties of language model training rather than implementation flaws…“Unlike [actual] intelligence, it lacks the humility to acknowledge uncertainty,” said Neil Shah…[of] Counterpoint Technologies…the OpenAI research [also] revealed that industry evaluation methods actively encourage…the problem…[by] penaliz[ing] “I don’t know” responses while rewarding incorrect but confident answers…

As I’ve said for decades: true intelligence requires the concept of “maybe”, therefore it is impossible to achieve with digital computers which must by their very nature reduce everything to “yes” and “no”.

To Molest and Rape (#1570)

When will the mainstream media admit that pigs in schools are a menace?

A [typical and representative Ohio cop paid to lurk in a high school to spy on, harass, and intimidate students has been] arrested [for, predictably, molesting]…a…student…Andrew Warren Bobb…was [also]…charged with tampering with evidence and violating a protection order after [he] was [order]ed to [stay away from his victim]…by [her] guardians…Bobb had [deleted incriminating pictures from his]…cell phone…

Walled Garden (#1570)

The word “Orwellian” is overused, but in this case it is absolutely spot on:

…UK…[censors are predictably pushing for more surveillance, claiming the misnamed] Online Safety Act…do[es]n’t go far enough.  For example…[encrypted] messaging apps [cannot be snooped into]…the [censorship bureau], Ofcom…[wants compulsory] biometric analysis…the entire time [any adult] is logged in…Using biometric systems which integrate into an operating system, platforms can verify the identity of a user throughout the entirety of their session.  To do this, the system, driven by [machine learning], will learn about an individual’s appearance, behaviour and voice to build an identity which the user can be verified against.  Then, when the user logs on, they are continuously monitored by the system…consistently [peering into everything they do] until they log out [and keeping it in a file any cop, spook, or other government busybody can pry into at will]…

 

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

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You’re not the minority anymore.  –  Old Karen’s friend

When Mike Siegel tweeted a TikTok video of Creepy Stare Piano Guy performing “My Heart Will Go On” on rubber chickens, I went to YouTube to find a copy I could embed, but it was not there.  However, this cover of the same song by a different deadpan rubber chicken musician was, so here you go.  The links above it were provided by Nun Ya (x2), Ryan Marino (x2), Mike Siegel again, and Radley Balko, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

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Who thought of this?  –  Brent Chapman

Everybody knows Popeye, but did you know he was introduced to the screen (he first appeared in the “Thimble Theater” comic strip in 1929) in a 1933 Betty Boop cartoon?  By the end of the following year he had already replaced Betty as the Fleischer Studio’s biggest star.  The links above the video were provided by Carol Fenton, Mike Siegel, Phoenix Calida, Ryan Marino, IncarcerNation, The Onion, and T. Greg Doucette, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

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Sorry, partisans: both vaccines and french fries are good.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-12T16:41:51.013Z

A Maggie story that will surprise no one:When I was about 16 politicians imposed a curfew on minors in our parish (county). I had never been especially interested in going out late until then, but after the curfew was imposed I started going on 3 AM walks every Sunday just to flout it.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-14T17:50:46.184Z

A word crying out for more widespread usage.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-16T07:50:27.486Z

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-17T17:22:30.905Z

Someone whose name isn't Maggie McNeill FINALLY had the intellectual courage to use the word that best describes Trump. http://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/18/o…

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-18T16:51:49.659Z

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-20T03:52:04.139Z

What kind of servile bootlickery is Google pushing?In a liberal republic, "those in positions of authority" should get the LEAST respect and the MOST derogatory language. Lèse-majesté is for autocracies.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-21T03:25:32.476Z

You have to admit it's funny (in a short of frustrating way) when career politicians try to engage with Trump's deranged mouth farts as though they were statements by a rational person. It's like watching them argue with barnyard fowl.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-21T18:40:32.072Z

Europe has been shaped by crusades against reality for quite a few centuries now.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-23T17:57:13.545Z

Protip: it's better to set your apocalyptic "predictions" far enough in the future that you won't still be alive when the passage of time proves you to be an idiot.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-24T03:05:09.833Z

Martin is apparently laboring under the misapprehension that he is a train.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-25T07:37:24.002Z

"Don't give money to strangers you meet on the goddamned internet."Done.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-26T07:29:49.402Z

Yes, decaying things often change noticeably on a daily basis. reason.com/2025/08/27/t…

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-28T16:48:42.823Z

1) "Father Justin" is the name of a program, not a person.2) There is no such thing as "AI"; programs cannot think.3) In Catholic doctrine a program has no soul & cannot be ordained to the priesthood.4) Chatbots function by word association; their action is more like shitting than "suggesting".

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-29T17:09:20.519Z

I find it difficult to believe that this thing is an actual human being rather than a plastic mannequin animated by the Nestenes or some other parasitic alien species.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-30T03:35:04.593Z

One important but unappreciated sign of America's decline is that these audiences are contented with merely booing people their grandparents and great-grandparents would've pelted with rotting vegetables.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-08-30T17:22:38.679Z

The most outlandish thing I would do is to have a miniature railroad installed on my property, so I could ride around in my very own choo-choo. Everything else I'd buy is pretty sensible.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-01T03:57:52.756Z

The only positive thing this monster has accomplished is dealing the death-blow to Americans' idolization of his family.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-01T16:52:48.744Z

The mad emperor now claims anyone may justify wanton violence by pointing at the intended victim & barfing the words "drug boat". I'm sure digitally-altered audio will soon be produced in which the lunatic who shot that 11-year-old prankster will be clearly heard to say "drug boat!" before firing.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-03T18:01:32.308Z

Read this as, "I'm praying every day for God to deliver us from the scourge of cancer and send us a bountiful harvest.""AI" is a cult.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-04T17:41:19.853Z

People ask why I don't have ads on my blog.Yes, they'd bring in money. But I couldn't live with myself if I enabled this kind of shit.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-05T07:22:26.399Z

ALL bending of the knee is symbolic kneeling. That is the exact, specific meaning of the gesture: "I should be kneeling to you, but our practical circumstances require me to keep moving so I'll just acknowledge my subservience and then move on."

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-06T17:36:40.009Z

There is no "debate".Politicians want to control X.Sensible people explain why that's a bad idea.Politicians invent propaganda justifying their control.Critical mass of useful idiots believe politicians.Politicians gain control of X.Decades of damage, waste, and other consequences follow.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-07T17:16:34.136Z

You misspelled "Master".

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-08T17:31:11.121Z

It's almost like a lot of people don't know the difference between static load and dynamic load, nor really grasp what the phrase "potential energy" actually means.Physics is hard.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-09T07:25:29.051Z

Not REMOTELY panicked enough. When he retreats into his Führerbunker and won't come out, I'll say he's NEARLY panicked enough.When he cries like a baby on the way up the scaffold steps, THEN he'll be panicked enough.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-10T07:46:49.657Z

Private ownership of something may possibly result in it being controlled at some point by someone you dislike and oppose.Government ownership of that thing makes that a certainty.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-11T17:36:19.407Z

Teacher reply: "Politicians and bureaucrats are not role models."

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:25:04.514Z

My rule is to treat everyone with respect (like a person) up until the moment they start barking "orders" at me as though I were a dog. To behave as a cog in an authoritarian machine is to voluntarily surrender one's humanity to that machine, releasing me from the obligation to pretend otherwise.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-13T17:25:40.274Z

At this point, I'm glad as long as it ENDS. Stroke, assassination, committed as a lunatic, impeachment, war crimes tribunal, eaten by rats, being picked up by aliens, riding into Heaven in a flaming chariot, I don't care. He's the fucking Marvin K. Mooney of Washington.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-14T07:30:10.016Z

Zuckerberg's living on the other side of the looking glass. Here's what actual scientists on OUR side of the glass have to say: maggiemcneill.com/2025/09/06/i…

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-15T17:17:24.605Z

This proposal met with general applause, until an old mouse got up and said: “That is all very well, but who is to bell the Cat?”

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-16T17:29:33.849Z

No mortal is worthy of worship. For one man or woman to worship another degrades the worshiper and deludes the one who is worshiped.

Maggie McNeill (@maggiemcneill.bsky.social) 2025-09-17T18:17:31.017Z

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Lords of the Flies

White supremacists are now trying to create panic among other bigots by claiming that the “white” race (by which they mean fair-skinned Caucasians) is vanishing.  Actually, what’s happening is that, since the most-developed countries are largely inhabited by Europeans and their descendants, their birth rates are most subject to the birth rate decrease which is typical of highly-developed societies, and thus the number of “whites” is slowly decreasing in relation to other genetic groups who inhabit portions of the globe where the birth rate is not decreasing as quickly.  But the mathematical, biological, historical, and sociological ignorance in which this manufactured hysteria is rooted isn’t as bad as its philosophical imbecility.

As I’ve previously pointed out, a species is merely a temporary configuration of genes “as permanent as a sand dune, albeit on a much longer time scale“.  And because they are not reproductively isolated from each other like species, human races are even less permanent; they are like clouds drifting across the sky, shifting in shape and conformation, growing or shrinking or merging or splitting, and humans only imagine them as fixed structures because we’re so short-lived.  Imagine a civilization of sand flies, each of whom lives only one day, panicking because their home dune is discovered to be getting smaller, while another nearby dune inhabited by slightly darker-colored flies is growing.  That’s what this kind of race panic sounds like to me.  Humans are a swarm of self-important flies having a collective conniption because they’ve learned that the manure heap they live in will, in the fullness of time, eventually rot away, and are trying to develop schemes to cement it into place and exterminate the cows who keep dropping new ones elsewhere.

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You stabbed me, you son of a bitch.  –  Shawn Popp

Modern young people are so used to pearl-clutching bluenoses having a cow over every item of mass media not appropriate for a convent, it would probably be difficult for them to accept just how much you could get away with on AM radio in the early ’70s, before the prunellas organized their censorship gangs.  The links above the video were provided by Popehat, Franklin Harris, IncarcerNation (x2), Mark Draughn, and Ryan Marino, in that order.

From the Archives

I find paywalls distasteful, and so many people find this blog valuable as a resource I just can’t bring myself to install one.  Furthermore, I find ad delivery services (whose content I have no say over) even more distasteful.  But as I’m now semi-retired from sex work, I can’t self-sponsor this blog by myself any longer.  So if you value my writing enough that you would pay to see it if it were paywalled, please consider subscribing; there are four different levels to fit all budgets.  Or if that doesn’t work for you, please consider showing your generosity with a one-time donation; you can Paypal to maggiemcneill@earthlink.net or else email me at the same address to make other arrangements.  Thanks so much!

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