Pandora Parrot @pandora_parrot@beach.city

Works done. Time to swim!

I keep saying this, but https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/13/21368065/epic-fortnite-players-apple-block-updates-next-season-warning is some of the most "Jennifer Government" stuff I've seen yet.

Fight for your brands! Your cry for liberation *will* be capitalized upon!

OH: "Can't find good dystopian literature anymore."

"Why, is it too depressing?"

"No, it's too optimistic."

It me

"Why does everyone have to go around labelling themselves all the time? Aren't we all just human beings?"

As I understand and see it, labels serve several purposes:

- To name the oppression we receive.
- To name our community and culture as how it is distinct from the default assumptions of community and culture.
- To give us a banner under which to find one another
- To give us a banner under which to communicate to others en masse.

Lots of greedy companies in the news today: https://www.theverge.com/2020/8/13/21367906/uber-lyft-california-appeal-denied-driver-classify-employee?utm_campaign=theverge&utm_content=chorus&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter

https://twitter.com/FortniteGame/status/1293994211621167105

Uber, Lyft, and Doordash want to continue to abuse their employees by classifying them as "independent contractors" when they're not.

And Epic Games and Apple are fighting over who gets more money from Fortnite microtransactions.

And I mean real learning. Listen to different perspectives and gain an understanding of where that community internally disagrees and how they approach these things. What information do you lack that they are including in their analysis? Think about the cultural context people exist in and how they interact with the majority cultures in their society, as well as with their oppression.

No one individual fully represents a given community/culture/subgroup.

In my opinion, Listen to <marginalized group of> people means listening to many perspectives and learning from them to come to your own conclusions.

It doesn't mean finding some members of that group that think the same way you do and saying "See? I'm listening."

It also doesn't mean taking one person's conclusion and deciding they must absolutely be correct.

It's about learning.

Starting fresh to meet new people and make new friends in a new place at 40 is gonna be interesting.

And my favorite pupleness:

I've got a lot of different looks... :D

I still feel like no major politicians in US politics is quite as radical as I'd like, but there's several folks, like AOC, that give me a lot of hope for the future that we might be able to see things.

And the continued protests in major cities, and pressure to abolish ICE, police, and more, really mark a good place for folks.

Not to say that there isn't dissent. I've seen several BIPOC folks and a lot of white trans folks also criticizing this decision and saying its a step backwards against the Black Lives Matter movement and the police abolishment movement.

I'm still trying to gain better understanding of what's going on, but I think that this is probably the right decision for the rather centrist democratic party right now.

(Although I hear on paper, Biden/Harris are very progressive? IDK)

Watching the black folks on my twitter feed, especially the children of MLK Jr., sharing supportive messages about Kamala Harris is giving me a lot of hope.

I'm particularly noting the fact that Bernice King is specifically noting the imperfections of Kamala and reminding people that "strategy matters" and that "progress != perfection"

We have a ways to go to get where I, and others, want us to be, but it sounds like many black folks are happy about this step forward.

This thread should be interesting: https://twitter.com/EmilyGorcenski/status/1293316589044019204

I'm uncertain about her issues with trans folks. I know she denied bottom surgery to a trans person who was about to leave prison, and while that's super shitty, it's doesn't make me see her as massively anti-trans.

As for the fact that she's a cop, well, I've seen BIPOC folks both celebrating and condemning, so I'm just gonna listen for now. I'm not excited about her profession, but I'm also not directly affected as a white person.