Tootfinder

Cw: discussion of #transphobia; JKR; politics and power
Someone in a Facebook group I'm in asked:
"What the f☆☆k has JK Rowling got to do with removing the appalling Zionist Keir Starmer & the rest of our neoliberal NATO supporting warmongering parliamentary representatives from power?
Asking for a very angry feminist socialist lesbian disabled 70 year old."
I thought this was actually a deceptively good question, so I thought I'd share my answer here...
The thing to understand is that trans rights and trans healthcare are being used as a 'wedge issue' by the right wing: something to divide and distract us while they get on with their usual business of plundering everybody.
Rowling, as a billionaire with a huge platform and a great deal of time on her hands, has done more than practically anybody else to drive this wedge deeper.
Like every scapegoating campaign used by the right - against gay people, immigrants, minorities, benefits claimants and so on - the anti-trans moral panic has serious, material consequences for its targets.
The ones who benefit from these hate campaigns (and often fund them, directly or indirectly) are largely indifferent to the harm caused; the distraction and division are the main points, but stoking fear and hatred are time-worn methods of achieving those.
Hope this helps!

As long as the middle is more concerned with keeping the left out than about having the right in, the right will remain in power. And at some point the middle will cease to be relevant.
🤷‍♂️
#neoliberalism

Dual-Port Grid-Forming Interconnecting Power Converters in Hybrid AC/DC Grids
Josep Ar\'evalo-Soler, Mehrdad Nahalparvari, Dominic Gross, Eduardo Prieto-Araujo, Staffan Norrga, Oriol Gomis-Bellmunt
https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.19625

Dual-Port Grid-Forming Interconnecting Power Converters in Hybrid AC/DC Grids
Interconnecting power converters (IPC) are the main elements enabling the interconnection of multiple high-voltage alternating current (HVAC) and high-voltage direct current (HVDC) subgrids. These converters can be classified either as grid-forming or grid-following. These roles can be assigned to both ac and dc terminals. This work compares state-of-the-art single-port grid-forming and grid-following control schemes with a dual-port grid-forming control scheme, which can simultaneously form a …

Machiavelli, the patron saint of neoliberalism.
"If you want to hold on to your wealth and power, you better be prepared to do evil things from time to time"

This looks like it will be an excellent symposium on March 7, on open science as a reform movement.
https://www.cos.io/critical-perspectives-on-the-metascience-reform-movement
Will pair well w/ @…

Symposium: Critical Perspectives on the Metascience Reform Movement
Metascience is often defined as the scientific investigation of science itself with the aim to improve science. This ‘improving’ part of metascience has been called a reform movement. While the intention to improve science is generally laudable, metascience and the associated movement(s) are not without their critics. The metascience reform movement has for instance been characterized as among other things, neoliberal, positivistic, atheoretical, technological, moralizing, bureaucratic, hom…

This https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.13969 has been replaced.
initial toot: https://mastoxiv.page/@arXiv_csHC_…

"This is not a data problem": Algorithms and Power in Public Higher Education in Canada
Algorithmic decision-making is increasingly being adopted across public higher education. The expansion of data-driven practices by post-secondary institutions has occurred in parallel with the adoption of New Public Management approaches by neoliberal administrations. In this study, we conduct a qualitative analysis of an in-depth ethnographic case study of data and algorithms in use at a public college in Ontario, Canada. We identify the data, algorithms, and outcomes in use at the college. W…

🤯 Pro-Market Third Way Policies Caused Electoral Disaster
https://jacobin.com/2024/02/stephanie-mudge-third-way-left-parties-neoliberalism-history/

Pro-Market Third Way Policies Caused Electoral Disaster
Sociologist Stephanie L. Mudge examines how and why center-left parties across the world swallowed the neoliberal gospel — only to demolish their own social base.

Automatic Authorities: Power and AI
Seth Lazar
https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.05990 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2404.05990

Automatic Authorities: Power and AI
As rapid advances in Artificial Intelligence and the rise of some of history's most potent corporations meet the diminished neoliberal state, people are increasingly subject to power exercised by means of automated systems. Machine learning and related computational technologies now underpin vital government services. They connect consumers and producers in new algorithmic markets. They determine how we find out about everything from how to vote to where to get vaccinated, and whose speech is a…

"This is not a data problem": Algorithms and Power in Public Higher Education in Canada
Kelly McConvey, Shion Guha
https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.13969

"This is not a data problem": Algorithms and Power in Public Higher Education in Canada
Algorithmic decision-making is increasingly being adopted across public higher education. The expansion of data-driven practices by post-secondary institutions has occurred in parallel with the adoption of New Public Management approaches by neoliberal administrations. In this study, we conduct a qualitative analysis of an in-depth ethnographic case study of data and algorithms in use at a public college in Ontario, Canada. We identify the data, algorithms, and outcomes in use at the college. W…