Political scientist and sf fan Henry Farrell (previously)
argues persuasively that the dystopian elements of our everyday life
are best viewed through the lens of Philip K Dick (whose books
repeatedly depicted a world of constructed realities, whose true nature
was obscured by totalitarians, conspiracies, and broken computers) and
not Orwell or Huxley, whose computers and systems worked altogether too
well to be good parallels for today’s janky dystopia.
In the PKDverse, it’s increasingly hard to tell bots from humans (and
even the bots might struggle to tell whether they are or are not
artificial), and “centaurs” (human-machine collaborations) poison our
mediasphere with software agents
that periodically get puppeted by real-life trolls. These centaurs use
captured bits of human intelligence – Wikipedia scrapes, messages
harvested from social media – to impersonate humans when no human is
available to puppet them, but then summon human assistance when they
reach a crux that’s above their paygrade – a moment of truth when it is
possible to effect an epic troll, or complete the next phase of a giant
con.
The murders of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Sean Bell, Amadou Diallo, Sam Shepherd, and countless thousands of others at the hands of American law enforcement are not aberrations, or betrayals, or departures. The acquittals of their killers are not mistakes. There is no virtuous innermost America, sullied or besmirched or shaded by these murders. This is America. It is not broken. It is doing what it does.
America is a serial brutalizer of black and brown people. Brutalizing them is what it does. It does other things, too, yes, but brutalizing black and brown people is what it has done the most, and with the most zeal, and for the longest.
“There are no consequences for being so wrong all the time. Kristol and Wolfowitz and all the other people responsible for dragging us into Iraq should be pariahs who labor under the expectation of doing some measure of atonement for their stubborn and wrongheaded pursuit of a disastrous policy. Instead they get invited on to Sunday shows to discuss what we should do next in Iraq.”
“We birders experience a bit of an obsession with the Parulids every year, and the reasons are both obvious and not. No warbler can compete with the haunting songs of any Catharus thrush. And while some may come close, none that I know in the ABA Area glows from within like a male Scarlet Tanager or Baltimore Oriole. The migrations of shorebirds are more impressive in pure distance. The Empid flycatchers challenge us more thoroughly. The hawks more dramatic in their numbers. But still it’s the warblers that capture us. That we travel to bird festivals specifically to see. That I have tallied so diligently for myself this spring. That truly make or break spring migration for so many birders, particularly in the eastern part of the continent. They’re beautiful, sure. Their migration is remarkable and despite the balance being mostly variations on yellow or brown, many are knock-your-socks-off beautiful. But mostly, there are just so many of them. I’m convinced that the obsession with this family above all this time of year comes from their amazing diversity. And birders, being nothing if not fervent collectors of experiences (for good or ill), are left helpless before the wave of birds.”
An old piece from the Fangirl reblog book club, that I got stalled on and recently went back to. Reagan is one of my favorite parts of the book. SHe makes me miss my college roommate, even if they are not at all similar in the details.
THIS IS AMAZING!!!!!
LOOK! NO, LOOK!
LOOOOOOOOOK!!!!
IT’S ART’S WEDDING PHOTO! AND SIMON AND BAZ AND THE LEAVES!
AND REAGANNNNNNNNN!!!!!
(This Reagan is perfect.) (No, really, perfect.) (She’s perfect.)
AND THE SIMON SNOW BOOKS!
AND THE FAN ART OF BAZ ON THE THRONE!
IT IS FAN ART OF FAN ART.
SIMINI BLOCKER SHOULD BE GLAD SHE LIVES MULTIPLE STATES AWAY FROM ME, BECAUSE THIS ISN’T THE FIRST TIME I’VE WANTED TO HUG HER HALF TO DEATH.
I really like seeing your personal posts, even the whiny angsty ones, and particularly the strange boring ones. I like these little windows into your lives even if I’ve never seen pictures of you and all I really know is that we like a few of the same tv shows. Please continue to let me read your to do lists and your conversations with strange relatives.
