Old Fucking Punk @lwriemen@librem.one

EU abandons promise to ban toxic chemicals in consumer products - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/16/eu-abandons-promise-ban-toxic-chemicals-consumer-products shame on @EU_Commission

After MONTHS of contention to try to get #Ithaca's Common Council to reject a bad deal where "nonprofit" #Cornell ($10bn endowment) would effectively keep being subsidized by struggling working people, Cornell's Board of Trustees approved it on their end WITHIN 72 HRS of Common Council caving to Cornell.

Wealthy elites are more than happy to keep being subsidized by working people.

I uploaded a 4K video showing the struggle + links; pls share with prospective students.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x476D930cbw

#SUVs emit more #climate damaging gas than older #cars do, study finds | #AirPollution | The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/16/suvs-emit-more-climate-damaging-gas-than-older-cars-do-study-finds

#UK #Environment #GlobalWarming #ClimateChange #Pollution #Emissions #FossilFuels

Killing children anywhere is wrong. Killing civilians is wrong. Taking civilians hostage is wrong. Attacking music festivals is wrong. Shutting off food and water to millions of people is wrong. Apartheid is wrong

Apparently according to right-wingers this statement makes me (Ukrainian Jewish ancestry) an antisemite.

#Israel #Hamas #Palestine

A great explanation/take-down of one of my least favorite #economics concepts: efficiency.

https://lpeproject.org/blog/who-cares-about-efficiency/

When Foster #Parents Don’t Want to Give Back the Baby
==

In many states, #adoption lawyers are pushing a new legal strategy that forces biological parents to compete for #custody of their #children.

#Families #Moms #Dads #Kids #Courts #News #colorado

https://www.propublica.org/article/foster-care-intervention-adoption-colorado?utm_medium=social&utm_source=mastodon&utm_campaign=mastodon-post

Children's book publisher Scholastic is doing everything it can to please bigots, which is terrible for education: https://popular.info/p/scholastics-bigot-button?utm_campaign=email-post&r=qs4z&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

“Probably the most influential novelist of the post-war period.” —The Times

Two new books by James Kelman (and all Kelman books) now available for 20% off with coupon code OCTOBER until 11/1.

See them all https://blog.pmpress.org/authors-artists-comrades/james-kelman/

The vision for Aotearoa New Zealand being touted by one of the new Government's coalition partners relies on the maintenance of an extensive underclass of perpetual desperation, forever struggling just to keep their heads above water. This article describes how a vision like this works out in reality. No-one wants to be the United States of America. https://www.residentcontrarian.com/p/on-the-experience-of-being-poor-ish

The EU’s position of fining companies if people lie on social media is bumping into the messy reality that no one knows what the truth is in the middle of a war.

If they actually follow through on fines, the only reasonable solution would be to block anyone from talking about Israel & Hamas. Even a sitting US congressperson has posted images from a different event claiming they were from Gaza over the past week.

You can’t trust any breaking news from a war zone.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/10/14/propaganda-misinformation-israel-hamas-war-social-media/

It's offensive that the next Internet Governance Forum will be held in Saudi Arabia, which may be the world's most pervasive censor of online speech (up there with China): https://www.wired.com/story/united-nations-igf-saudi-arabia-russia/

ANNOUNCEMENT: We're in the process of mothballing our Twitter account, which was previously our most-used social media platform.

Please help us out by boosting our posts so that our followers can see our updates and to help us build our audience here!

Educational institutions of all levels should use and teach #FreeSoftware because it is the only software that allows them to accomplish their essential missions: to disseminate human knowledge and to prepare students to be good members of their community. https://u.fsf.org/1dz

I finally have a break from work to demo the Librem 11 again. I was impressed with the quality of the decryption screen and haven't seen pics online anywhere so I thought I would share that here. There are many things to love so far.

#purism #librem11 #linuxtablet #linuxmobile #linuxphone

I don't know if Sister Pat, my middle school social studies teacher, who made us learn our prayers to Mary and also was vehemently anti every component that contributes to war would be allowed to teach in the US now

She along with my religious ed teacher whose name eludes me, were bluntly anti-nationalism and anti-patriotism. They held interfaith dialogues after 9/11. They actively fought against indoctrination and propaganda in a way I am increasingly impressed by

I remember distinctly when the (democrat) US Secretary of State declared that killing half a million Iraqi children with our sanctions was "worth it" so that we could "send a message," so I'm sadly unsurprised that US liberals seem to be basically ok with this and that the Biden administration has given it's approval. And my gawd, listening to NPR's sterile, soulless coverage makes me so mad.

https://jewishcurrents.org/a-textbook-case-of-genocide

Surveillance-based advertising, where searching for a sneaker inundates you with sneaker ads, and which perverts the sociality of social media with ad-driven algorithmic curation, has corroded online culture. I would point out that attempts to get people to pay for culture have failed. One of the reasons for the demise of the Whole Earth Review was our principled refusal to accept advertising. If you want online culture without advertising, are you prepared to shell out for it?

It's so weird that left wing party Labour NZ did some actual left-wing stuff and got a huge majority, and then pivoted to ruling out doing pretty much anything that might impact the precious status quo and consequently didn't get those votes? SO WEIRD. If only lessons could be learned from this, but alas, the reasons why this happened will forever remain a mystery.

Latest cartoon: Doom Spiral
#politics #cartoon #war #israel #palestine #hamas #gaza

Excellent piece, and let’s stop touting “cheap” energy. It devalues it by promoting ever increasing consumption. It’s precious and valuable, whether renewable or fossil.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/13/opinion/climate-change-excessive-heat-2023.html