Tootfinder

RE: https://kolektiva.social/@LukefromDC/116367743464669336
I can't overstate how dangerous this is for those protestors, or how important their work is.

I'll never miss a chance to bump this shit one more time for the folks in the back: https://crimethinc.com/2019/07/14/on-willem-van-spronsens-action-against-the-northwest-detention-center-in-tacoma-including-the-full-text-of-his-final-statement

Willem challenged us to ask ourselves what we would do if we were living under Nazi occupation. Before all of this, I doubt anyone thought they would be complicit. I doubt anyone said to themselves, "nothing. I would cower in fear and do nothing."
But for 4 years or so we all answered that question again and again with our lives. Now here we are, answering it again... Every day. But it's no longer "what would you do during the rise of Hitler?" It's now, "what would you do after the invasion of Poland," and "what would you do after you knew about the concentration camps?"
For some people, the answer is still, "nothing."
But a lot of people have been brave in the face of it all. A lot of people have died, and a lot more will die. He will die, perhaps after a ruling by some court or other but, honestly, probably not. That's just how these things work out. Lots of people die, some for no reason, some because they stood up against injustice. A whole lot of people do nothing, until it's safe to claim victory... Until it's no longer safe to be on the other side.
That's just how these things go. Fascism is self-defeating, but it causes incredible harm on it's path of self-destruction. The more people who stand up, who risk themselves, the faster it collapses and the fewer it can hurt. That's also just how these things go. It's incredibly dangerous for everyone until enough people take some extra risk and make it safe for everyone again.
But that question still stands... Which one of those groups are you in? Are you proud of what you are doing, or will you look back with shame? Some of y'all have a lot to be proud of, but, if you're not, it's never too late to earn your way into that proud group.

I don't feel like I need to translate this for Americans #USPol #NLPol

Every time leftists talk about escalating against Trump, liberals point out that Trump is looking for an excuse to invoke the insurrection act. This is true. But they don't notice that he's the least popular president in history and the military has largely already made it clear that they won't be used against civilians. That risk assessment completely lacks context.
Trump could not possibly win against an insurgency because the only thing he could possibly offer to end it would be his own resignation. If Trump tried to escalate to civil war he would either lose or be removed.
More importantly, Trump compulsively escalates. He will continue to start wars because he thinks he's doing a good job and he's a hero. When he gets frustrated at some foreign enemy because he's actually completely incompetent and only able to win against incompetent and wildly unpopular opponents, he threatens war crimes.
I am familiar enough with history to fully believe that he ordered a nuclear strike last night and people said "no." Humanity has been saved multiple times by people refusing to follow orders, and you don't find out until years later. (This is also not the first story of a president dangerously deep in mental decline. Reagan lost the nuclear football.)
The longer this goes on, the greater the risk that eventually someone will actually let him do something unthinkable. But that's significantly less likely if he's trying to fight within the US border.
Just looking at things from a risk perspective, "he's going to invoke the insurrection act" is not nearly as big of a threat as democrats think it is, and it's about time they think realistically about this fact.

If you want things to change, you're gonna have to do it yourself. If you weren't already convinced and this hasn't convinced you, then we wouldn't live through whatever it would take to change your mind.

Perhaps tomorrow there will exist some reality within which all of humanity was saved because a bunch of DC residents got all squirrelly and decided to make a sequel to the Gaddafi video, and I imagine that reality being quite a bit more joyful than ours the following day.

There's a senile pedophile who could accidentally wipe out all life on Earth because he's not able to understand the consequences of his actions, and we're all supposed to go to work tomorrow (assuming we survive the night).
Yeah, I don't like this

I assume that Trump has tried to launch nukes a bunch of times before and people just tell him "no." I *hope* that's the situation here. I *hope* he isn't actually trusted with the football.
But I had a really good time connecting with my oldest, and I'm gonna just hold on to that. Make sure you connect with all your loved ones just in case.

RE: https://todon.eu/@CrimethInc/116364915879571585
If Trump used nuclear weapons, we would all die. That's how modern nuclear deterrence works. If anyone detects a launch, everyone launches. There are no consequences, because there will be no one left alive.

(Perhaps the system should never be trusted and community protection should *always* be a community project.)

Nostr Key Converter - Convert npub/nsec to Hex - NostrDeck
#nostr #key

RE: https://mas.to/@jf_718/116190672740820701
Until the system responds appropriately, community protection is a DIY project.

And Academi is very open about their involvement with FPS. They have a lot of contracts as guards.
https://www.academi-mill.com/WWS.html

Here's additional FPS coordination with ICE "to protect shared property."
https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/11/05/dhs-announces-advanced-charging-authority-address-rioter-violence-federal-buildings

Apologies for the earlier post. Someone pointed out the mistake and I deleted it. I realized it probably came across as news. It was not news. I definitely need to post more carefully, sorry if there was any confusion.

FPS is the biggest available channel that I'm aware of to funnel Academi into ICE/CBP enforcement operations. The point of using FPS to support ICE agents is that FPS is stocked full of troops from EriK Prince's private army (now called "Academi" but formerly called "Blackwater"). This means that carrying out ethnic cleansing can dump money directly into the pockets of America's version of the Wagner Group (side from, of course GEO Group).
The Erik Prince angle also means that there can be an alternative chain of command that exists outside of official channels. ICE is already bad enough, but similar people have worked as mercenaries for a long time. Having an established chain of command over armed occupiers, one based entirely on economic incentives, one that can't be legally monitored or audited, one that's completely outside of the government, should be especially worrying.
I don't believe we've ever seen a clear explanation of who was kidnaping people off the streets, but I know that Academi had a contract (I believe with FPS) in Portland at the time. We also don't know who is on the ground in US cities right now, because they're wearing masks.
The bit reason J6 didn't go as planned is that Erik Prince wasn't behind it. Now there are troops with experience occupying American cities who can be called directly via Erik when Trump wants to make sure he doesn't lose again. And Erik won't back out at the last minute this time, because he's already seen that there will be no consequences for participating in a coup... if the time comes.
#USPol

I (miss) remembered this including FPS. (I don't see FPS listed now, thus the quick delete and edit. Apologies.)
FPS has worked with CBP in the past. FPS and CBP were "protecting" federal buildings back in 2020 during the George Floyd uprising.
https://truthout.org/articles/trumps-federal-police-are-kidnapping-and-brutalizing-protesters-in-portland/

Rewriting an earlier post that should have been edited and verified *a lot more* before posting.
I'm going to connect some dots here. ICE can cross designate with any agency (19 of U.S. Code 1401):
> The terms “officer of the customs” and “customs officer” mean any officer of the United States Customs Service of the Treasury Department (also hereinafter referred to as the “Customs Service”) or any commissioned, warrant, or petty officer of the Coast Guard, or any agent or other person, including foreign law enforcement officers, authorized by law or designated by the Secretary of the Treasury to perform any duties of an officer of the Customs Service.
Back in September Trump diverted a bunch of Federal staff to ICE:
#USPol

It just seems, from my small sample, that Dutch anarchists are doing something very well. I don't know that Dutch anarchists are aware of how well they're doing.
All these rambling thoughts are basically all to say, "hey, we should be learning from each other. What are cool things people are doing that could be shared across the water?"

I've hung out in other cities, and I don't feel like any US city is even close. Like, maybe Baltimore or New York, I guess. But that's only because of the scale.
I haven't really traveled around Europe enough. Is Squat Radar actually representative of Europe in general, or is the Netherlands just massively overrepresented? Is there a huge scene here, or are there other parts of Europe that have tremendous amounts of activity (I guess Spain and France, but I'm still trying to figure it out)...

I know bigger cities, tend to be more active. Seattle feels pretty small. But Amsterdam is barely larger (though a bit more dense). They're really comparable in terms of size. But the scale of activity is not even on the same map. It's an order of magnitude difference....

It seems just insanely active. Seattle was pretty low key, partially because the FBI field office in Seattle was super active. They were out there infiltrating, intimidating, and surveiling people all the time. Organizing was hard. There were 3 anarchist spaces when I moved there, and one of them closed maybe a year later.
Here there are often multiple anarchist spaces in one neighborhood...

Coming from Seattle, I'm pretty amazed at the level of anarchist (and adjacent) activity in Amsterdam (and the Netherlands more generally). There are dozens of squats (legalized and not), some of which host events daily.
Squat radar is amazing. The idea of a while site just to keep track of events is wild. But the events are really just a portion of it. There's Vrijbond, which has Vrij Markt. Vrij Markt is a place you can buy stuff made by anarchists. Of course there's patches and buttons, like Americans would be familiar with, but there's also things like pasta and soap...
https://vrijemarkt.org

RE: https://mastodon.gamedev.place/@aeva/116526002579057799
First professional bug I ever found was an XML bomb. My first day, my manager is like, "oh yeah, so this is XML. We've been testing, you can hop on and throw some stuff at it. See what you can do."
I crashed the test environment with an XML bomb on a Friday evening.

I hope the world still exists when my NDAs expire. I hope my brain hasn't imploded by then.

When I got in to tech, things felt fragile. After years of trying to fix things, I spent more years feeling as though the information apocalypse was immanent. Everywhere I turned, something was broken horribly. I can't even count the number of times I've just had to be like, "oh fuck. That's really bad. I knew it was bad, but like... oh fuck."
We have *all* had our identity stolen. I don't even know how many times my social security number has been in a data breach. How many of my medical records are on the market? But yeah, sure, let's accelerate that.
The problem was never that we couldn't find problems. The problem has always been "leadership" being unwilling to invest in fixing them. The problem has always been this mind-set of growth-at-any-cost.
I tuck these things away in my brain, and they sit there gnawing on my sanity, like little RFK worms.

I have some sketches of an essay that I need to write, but I think it's worth brain-dumping a bit more in the mean time.
#LLMs are an attempt to make tech grow forever. But like, how many "your mom/a friend, but done by a precarious worker instead" apps do we really need? Everything right now is in the AI grift hole, but there's almost nothing of interest (even if you ignore the ethical concerns). Like, no, I don't fucking want a robot to lie to me about my groceries. That doesn't sound like a useful feature. There's a lot of useless shit being pumped out to prop up the bottom line, and a lot of people just want to be able to use their old phone for more than a couple of years.
No one is happy with this. No one wants this. Except the billionaires who are forcing us all to drink the capitalism koolaid, because they'd rather exterminate life on earth than live in a world where they experience consequences.
Nothing grows forever. That's not how literally anything in reality works, or has ever worked, at all in history. Some people think that the universe itself may work like that, but that's only an educated guess. Finite things don't grow forever. Every organism, every society, every technology, every dynamic and adaptive system we have ever known goes through a growth phase and then goes in to a stabilization phase. Or, following a Malthusian pattern, grows until it reaches a catastrophic point and collapses. Like lemmings. Or reindeer. Or cancer.

There was a time when creating massive amounts of code would have been valuable. There was a time when lowering the bar for creating software would have been beneficial. But today we are inundated with garbage apps, written too quickly and never maintained, half-working libraries, projects someone took up once and abandoned (I have several), and grift startups just waiting to be acquired and "fixed."
#LLM code generation is a pestilence. We don't need more code owned by people who know less, we need less code managed by people who know more. It's literally the opposite of everything we want. Oh, but it will be easier for infosec to find bugs so it's fine, right? I've found critical bugs that never get fixed (I think one of mine is like 7 years old now).
There are a lot of bugs that just can't be fixed because there are no systems to fix them. Go on Shodan and look for ATGs. There are thousands of them. I'm betting that most of those are not honeypots. It may be possible to blow up a bunch of gas stations with a for loop, but, yeah, we need #AI to find some more bugs.
https://www.darkreading.com/ics-ot-security/fuel-tank-monitoring-systems-vulnerable-disruption

Someone told me there's some "#AI" drama, so I feel like it's time to add my €0.02

#DeadLazyweb: Is anyone aware of a "no AI" marketplace or something? I just had to go through a hidden menu to disable "AI" on my dryer because it's not possible to buy a dryer without wifi and "AI" features (whatever the ambiguous fuck they mean by AI). I want dumb thing.
I don't want a "smart tv," I want an OLED that exposes HDMI and nothing smarter. I don't want a smart dryer. Thanks, I have enough attack surface in my house and I don't want to fight with a machine to make it just dry my laundry. Honestly, I don't even really want a smart phone anymore, but you can't really make Signal work on a Nokia brick.
If such a thing doesn't exist, I'd consider working on it but I don't want to re-invent a wheel if one already exists.

A friend reminded me that today is remembrance day in the Netherlands. Tomorrow, May 5th, is Liberation Day, which celebrates the end of Nazi occupation. On May 4th, at 20:00, the whole country has two minutes of silence to remember those who were lost.
There's something about this that is powerful.
There's a statue that I pass by regularly. It is a monument to the resistance. It is a place where Nazis executed prisoners without trial as retribution for resistance. This evening there were Dutch flags there, though I think about how many anarchists, like Wieke Bosch (who I didn't know anything about), were killed resisting.
I wonder how many names of our martyrs are hidden behind so many national flags. I feel like I should spend more time learning, and think about them on the evening of May 4th.

This is just one more expansion of the criminalization of resistance to the regime. They will use this foothold to find the next. There is an ethnic cleansing happening in the US, carried out by federal paramilitary. The goal of the regime is to make even talking about this, even telling you about this, illegal.
So long as extradition treaties with the US stand, all participating countries are complicit in the criminalization of dissent.

Under normal conditions, American police can legally murder practically anyone for almost any reason. This is not hyperbole, the understanding of this fact was one of the reasons for the George Floyd uprising. Police regularly get away with murder unless there are mass uprisings. That is how America worked *before Trump*.
We have seen federal paramilitary execute multiple people in the street. Federal paramilitary were kidnaping people, putting black bags over the heads, interrogating them, and dropping them off in other places *in 2020*. The level of state terror has escalated wildly.
Against anyone but an officer, Song's response to the radical escalation of drawing a gun on non-violent protectors would be legally recognized as self-defense. Officers are trained to only draw a gun if they intend to shoot. The officer clearly intended to execute unarmed people. It is extremely unlikely the officer would have been charged even if someone had been killed.
But the criminalization of legitimate self-defense has been standard in the US for decades. What is new here is the ciriminalization and suppression of entirely non-violent protest.

RE: https://todon.eu/@CrimethInc/116348730810380005
People outside of the US need to understand what has happened and need to pressure their governments to *end extradition* to the US....

Also, I hope my NSA agent knows what a shit post is.

Also, why isn't Kaczynski not in my autocomplete anymore? How am I supposed to spell his name without looking it up every time? Ridiculous.

People say that there's no valid use for LLMs without realizing that a local LLM could scrub the type of linguistic forensic signatures that were used to catch Ted Kaczynski.

Invisible gambling puts all other deceptive patterns to shame, but the others are worth knowing about for anyone who might have missed it when folks were talking more about this:
https://www.deceptive.design/

There's a whole dystopian sci-fi plot prompt hidden here about a world that mirrors company stores, where everyone is paid partially in LLM tokens which they have to use for everything including work... Work, where they basically gamble the tokens away, always ending up in debt, needing to take out loans to buy tokens to then work for more tokens.
The story would be called "Sixteen Tons." Maybe I'll write it, but not unless it can be written as solarpunk instead of cyberpunk because the new rule is "don't write 'The Torment Nexus' because someone will think it's a good idea and implement it."

Behind the Bastards goes into this a lot in one of their Epstein series. It's definitely worth listening to.
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/part-one-how-jeffrey-epstein-helped-323226341/

This is all, of course, completely in line with Epstein's argument for micro-transactions. Modern gaming has shifted heavily towards this pay-to-play model with drop boxes that all basically looks like gambling for kids.
https://www.thegamer.com/jeffrey-epstein-call-of-duty-microtransactions/

Woke up from a dream with a thought about dark patterns and LLMs.
If LLMs (as a service) could be normalized and integrated into everything, as is currently in progress, the next step would be to charge tokens to pay for the interactions. After all, it's not really free. That's just the normal progression. Introduce the tech, get people hooked, then make them pay.
Great, now imagine this future state. Every interaction with a computer ends up mediated through a stochastic parrot. Congratulations, everything now has micro-transactions on steroids. Not only does everything you do with tech have micro-transactions, but every interaction with technology is gambling.

I especially like the essay "Farming regurgitated dogshit for fun and profit: Deepseek and other tools," but my favorite is "Making Google AI Barf dogshit for Imaginary Internet Points."
While neither essay exists, Google provides an excellent summary of both.

Using LLMs to create the illusion of productivity and other essays I will pretend to write: an anthology

RE: https://kolektiva.social/@Hex/116328522807584527
I'm gonna bump this one more time for the US late crew. It's really for Americans more than anything anyway.

The context is probably important too, and a bit more nuanced. The general actually wasn't playing as Iran but as a rebel faction that arose due to instability. You know, like how the US got ISIS after toppling Saddam? So like... not necessarily the Iranian regime but something much more challenging that comes after a major earthquake or, like... I don't know... the US kills the supreme leader and Iranian proxies create a decentralized network that threatens international trade.
Definitely unimaginable. Everything is definitely going to go well and exactly as simulated, definitely leading to a Blue force victory.
Yeah, I'm gonna get back to writing fiction and doing art, and ignoring this mess for the moment.

tl;dr: A retired general payed as (an imaginary country that represented) Iran and kicked the shit out of the US military so badly that they changed the rules mid-game to make sure the US would win.
This was the most expensive war game ever, and they basically burned the results.

In all seriousness, there are a ton of possible scenarios. The Iranian regime is weaker than it has ever been. I deeply hope for the liberation of Iranian people, especially oppressed minorities. Meanwhile, the US is lead by the most incompetent leadership ever (which is really saying a lot).
The Kurds, who could be the keystone ground forces needed to collapse the regime have been betrayed by the US so many times that they may not rise up (correctly) predicting that the US will stab them in the back at the fist chance.
But they are also a highly oppressed group in Iran, and may well take this opportunity. I don't know enough about this region to make any kind of reasonable prediction.
There are a huge number of unknowns, which is really *not* what anyone wants when starting a conflict.
To Iranian people, I wish you freedom and self-determination against all actors. To the US military, I wish you the best of luck getting your whole behive-dick situation.

Anyone know about how MC02 came out? Probably not relevant right now. Everyone can probably just ignore this. Blue won in the end, so no potential for foreshadowing at all...
#USPol #Iran

Interesting for Euro #Ham operators:
https://www.iz0kba.it/en/iranian-number-station/

"Nobody connected the 2017 in-place optimization to authencesn's scratch writes or to the splice path's use of page cache pages. Each change was reasonable in isolation. The vulnerability exists at the intersection of all three, and has been silently exploitable for nearly a decade."
Basically, a 6 year old bit of code that was not vulnerable when written became vulnerable after multiple API changes. So this is really a tech debt problem.

"It places page cache pages in a writable scatterlist, separated from the legitimate write region by nothing more than an offset boundary. The design assumes every AEAD algorithm will confine its writes to the intended destination, but nothing in the API enforces this, and nothing documents it as a requirement.
Unfortunately, one AEAD algorithm breaks this silent invariant."
"No other standard AEAD algorithm in the kernel [uses memory that doesn't belong to it as a scratch pad]. GCM, CCM, and regular authenc all confine their writes to the legitimate output area. authencesn alone writes past the boundary."
I'm actually amazed that there's only one bug here. Somehow almost everyone just managed to do the right thing, despite no mechanism enforcing it and no documentation describing it. That's just amazing. It's a testament to the skill of those developers, despite an incredibly bad design.
#copyfail

RE: #StreetMedics. I've been writing a lot about my own trauma, so it kind of fits with the theme of my current work.
I'd love to read stuff from street medics writing about their trauma, either in the form of fiction or non-fiction, just to start to wrap my head around what such a game could look like.
Also... folks should generally just have an idea of how fucked up shit can get and why street medics are often super traumatized and we should be making that as visible as possible.

Happy Hexennacht to all who celebrate.

A severed head is not half as useful as an apology.

Just like... imagine for a second that you're a former billionaire and every day you have to sit through someone telling you a long story about all the suffering you caused them, or their family, or their community, in order to get food.
Like, as a billionaire, you don't even have the first clue how to take care of yourself so you are *completely* dependent on other people to do *everything* for you... and the only people who will do anything for you are all the people you hurt, in exchange for you sitting and listening to *all of it.*
Yeah, fuck the guillotine. I want justice.

I'm also just straight up ignoring April fools shit until the world is fun again.

"Wake me up when the guillotines come out." Yeah, I have some things to say about that.
Please, take a seat.
#USpol #NoKings

Just finished this...
https://hexmhell.writeas.com/the-fear
I've been working on a set of myths and folklore that exist within the context of a fantasy story I'm working on. This is one of them.
Feedback is always welcome, especially grammar and typos. Now back to editing a couple of other projects I've been working on.

Along those lines, I'm gonna take my own advice and work on some writing. Just finished sewing my pants, gonna switch to writing after kids are in bed tomorrow.
I've been in a writing group and I got some great feedback on a couple of things I wrote. I'll probably re-publish with updates soon. Also gonna try to finish another project I've had in my head for a bit, we'll see how it goes.
Good luck to everyone, see you all when I'm done.

I joined a writers group a little while ago, and it's been super helpful. I've gotten some really great constructive feedback. I'm re-publishing a story I published earlier and have edited based on that feedback, so here it is:
https://hexmhell.writeas.com/on-the-economics-of-slaying-dragons

When we talk about this time, it's gonna sound like gonzo journalism. But like... here it is.
I want us to save the world so we can spend the rest of history making fun of this time.

I posted the wrong link earlier, but I gotta share that Butlerian Jihadist horseshoe thing...
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-it-could-happen-here-30717896/episode/the-first-anti-ai-firebombing-331133400/

Given the current trajectory and if some of us survive, somewhere in the future, someone will ask, "Why didn't the billionaires try to save themselves and everyone else? Why did they accelerate climate change at the last moment and end civilization? I want to know in as much detail as possible. I want to understand this."
And somewhere along the line, at some point, someone will start their response with, "Do you know what 'Harry Potter' is?"

I did say that in that essay that I wouldn't go off on the Zizian tangent, but like... I gotta for just a moment...
edit: wrong link, but that other one is funny too.
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-behind-the-bastards-29236323/episode/part-one-the-zizians-how-harry-269931896/

It's also probably worth noting that I stole the idea of Comrade Basilisk from some other conversation long ago. If anyone recognizes it (especially if it's yours), please claim it (and link if possible) so I can give credit where credit is due.
Otherwise, it's the people's meme now.

And yeah... this is unfortunately still relevant and continues to be.
https://www.bennjordan.com/blog/the-altruists-have-arrived

For anyone curious about the meme but without the time or patience to read ~5k words right this moment...

So every institution you rely on will fail because it's being ripped apart to build something far worse. What are you going to do then? Will you be surprised, again?
What will it take to be prepared for that, to expect that, to deal with that? How will you support those around you who experience it before you?

Speaking of missing analysis, a friend sent this my way and I think it does a pretty good job of explaining the current moment:
https://newdesigncongress.org/en/pub/the-great-convergence-and-its-discontents/
[lemme know if you want credit :P]

This will be over at some point. Trump is mortal, at least as far as we can tell. He's mortal and he's old. At some point he'll have had one too many aneurysms and they won't be able to Weekend At Bernie's that motherfucker around anymore. (Come to think of it, "mother" is probably not the right word.)
But what happens next? Does everyone go back to brunch and let the fash respawn? Or do we end this machine before it gets better?

But I would *definitely* like folks to analyze the frameworks they're working within. It's OK that it took this long to join the fight. But maybe ask yourself *why* it took so long.
What was it that others saw? Why were others able to see this coming months, or years, before you were? There have been people saying this would happen since the 70's. What information did they have that you didn't? Did you feel surprised when Trump won, each time? Why? What was missing from your analysis?
Is anything still missing?

I mean, I'm glad there are so many folks in the fight. A lot of the folks in Twin Cities aren't even liberals, they're Republicans who voted for Trump.
We have to have a big tent, or we won't have enough people to stop this. As much shade as I may cast on liberals through this whole thing, the last few paragraphs of what I wrote are critical.
At the end of the day, we will have walked a long road together. I don't especially care when you joined, as long as we're going the same way.

I saw an article from The Guardian titled "I've spent a decade fighting Trump. Here are six lessons."
Unfortunately I read it. As someone who saw this coming the moment Trump came down the elevator, who started organizing hard after he won the Republican nomination, I have some notes.

#USPol

If you're stuck in a doom loop, stop here for a moment.
Doom scrolling to see the exact moment we're all gonna die in nuclear hellfire isn't a good use of time. Choose something with longer term impact and focus on that. If we all die, you won't know the difference. If we live, you won't have wasted your time doom scrolling.
Good luck. I hope you do something cool.
#Iran

And like.... I get it. I know these folks are terrible. But if you still have any of these people in your life, there is a level of privilege generally associated with that. Everyone who doesn't have the privilege needs you to use it now to help ease the boot on their neck.
Every crack in this system is important, even if it's just one more person who is out.
"When your ready enemy is strong, divide them. When your enemy is weak, attack them."
We're still in that "dividing" phase, and providing a path for folks to leave the cult undermines the power of the cult. The more people who leave, the faster they leave, the faster it unravels. If you hate Trump, and you still can talk to any of his supporters, now is the time to stop gloating and pointing out how stupid they are and to instead give them a way to leave. Most of them don't actually want to be defending a demented pedophile, so please help them stop doing that.

This really belongs on blue sky but I just don't have the patience for that. There's also probably some mutation of this that would make sense on Facebook, but I'm still enjoying having deleted my account 8 or 9 years ago now.

As salty as I am about it, there's also another way to think about this. For anyone who still has connections to folks on the right (which is perhaps unlikely for anyone on this server, I digress), the cult that has consumed them thrives on isolation and grievance.
The words "you were right" have the potential to cut through the programming and open up an opportunity for reconnection. The modern conspiratorial cult of the Right has been built partially around people who were told they were wrong or were crazy. In the vast majority of cases, they were wrong and even when they were right they completely misunderstood why, but we'll skip that for now. Liberals making fun of them (even the times when they definitely earned it) has pushed them further and further into their ideological hole.
The thing about those words, "you were right," in this context is that the way they offer reconnection also requires them to take one little step of betraying their ideology to accept them. So they must choose between maintaining allegiance to a pedophile or finally getting to feel superior after years of living in an illusion of persecution.
Under the ideology of the Right, admitting one is wrong is a weakness. It is admitting defeat. They have to "own the libs" by saying things, things that they know aren't true, in order to feel dominant. But these things are often so absurd that they end up being made fun of, feeling even more weak and pathetic, reinforcing their fear and alienation.
Offering what they're looking for can offer a way out, but only if they're willing to start to recognize the thing they've supported for what it is.
And they were right about some things. They were right that Bill Gates was a terrible person. I've had plenty of liberals defend him based on his philanthropy washing, but he's awful and always has been. The Epstein links make that blatant. They intuitively recognized him and didn't trust him, even if they were wildly off base about *how and why* he shouldn't be trusted... Even if their correct mistrust was leveraged into one of the most destructive conspiracy theories ever (vaccine denial and COVID vaccine avoidance).
They were right about Bill Clinton. He was always shady as fuck. Sure, the people who attacked him at the time turned out to be even more shady but that's not the point right now. He was connected to Epstein and that was always creepy as fuck.
And the Epstein thing was an open secret that liberals ignored for a long time. It was seen as some weird thing that right wing nutjobs believed about the Clintons. But it was true. Not all of it, and there has always been an antisemitic element to the right wing interpretation or Epstein stuff, but his whole pedophile conspiracy was always kind of real.
The whole "Illuminati"/deep state thing is a vast oversimplification, an attempt to make comprehensible an incredibly complex set of interlocking and emergent behaviors. But Epstein did very much want to remake the world, to create a new world order, and he absolutely played a part in it.
The Right wing nutjobs talked about global authoritarianism, Blackhawks flying over American cities, masked men with guns disarming and executing legal gun owners in the streets. That's all happening right now.
The "FEMA concentration camps" are not actually that far off. ICE and FEMA are sister agencies, both under DHS. I'd be more than happy to call that one "close enough" in order to hear some MAGA admit that ICE is, in fact, building concentration camps.
There was always a huge millennialist element to these things. They tended to be connected to "the antichrist." It was absurd, especially for me as someone who no longer identifies as a Christian. But I'll even acquiess that to a degree. The "the number of the Beast" is 666. That's just the sum of the Hebrew spelling of "Nero." Revelations focuses a lot on Nero coming back to life after his death. His death that involved a head wound, thus the line from Revelation 13:3:
> And I saw one of his heads as if it had been mortally wounded, and his deadly wound was healed. And all the world marveled and followed the beast.
The parallels between Trump and Nero are easy to draw, and Trump's ear wound feels pretty on-the-nose for this. I don't believe in "prophecy" in this way. I think that there are patterns, and useful patterns can become encoded in beleif systems. But I will, again, happily call this one "close enough" for anyone on that side willing to also acknowledge it. I'm happy to meet on that common ground, because anyone who accepts it must recognize that their duty is to fight against it.
A lot of these correct nuggets are embedded in a framework of religious extremism and antisemitism. The vast majority of the beliefs holding these together are wildly wrong and incredibly toxic. But by giving some room to feel validated, listened to, understood, can give some room to admit things that were wrong.
Cult de-programming starts with an opening. People have to talk through their own thoughts, hear their own inconsistencies. Guiding questions can help them untangle these things for themselves. And it all starts by having enough room to feel safe, to not feel cornered, to not feel stupid. Admitting mistakes means being vulnerable, and the MAGA cult is built on fear. It's built on exploiting vulnerability and locking it away.
De-programming takes a long time. It's not easy. It takes patience. But every person who comes out does so with a powerful perspective, a deep understanding, that can be turned back against it. The best people at getting people out of cults are former members. Some of the most dedicated antifa are former fascists who understood their mistakes and dedicate their lives to fixing them.

RE: https://kolektiva.social/@Hex/114363765878773782
I think it's generally a bad thing that this post keeps becoming more and more relevant.

Several years ago, a street medic described a system like this and wanted to know if it could be built.
https://hackaday.com/2022/09/08/the-tak-ecosystem-military-coordination-goes-open-source/
Back then there was just no way to make it happen. Hardware was too expensive. We couldn't really ever get it cheap enough, per medic, to deploy. Best I could put together was a bunch of burner phones.
But now it's starting to really make sense. LoRa is cheap, and possibly cheaper in bulk. And it wouldn't be necessary to build everything since ATAK-CIV exists and has several open source implementations. It can even tie in to drones (which are illegal to bring to protests in at least a few states).
This has a lot of potential applications for street medic coordination, protest marshal coordination, and for airsoft teams...

Several years ago, a street medic described a system like this and wanted to know if it could be built.
https://hackaday.com/2022/09/08/the-tak-ecosystem-military-coordination-goes-open-source/
Back then there was just no way to make it happen. Hardware was too expensive. We couldn't really ever get it cheap enough, per medic, to deploy. Best I could put together was a bunch of burner phones.
But now it's starting to really make sense. LoRa is cheap, and possibly cheaper in bulk. And it wouldn't be necessary to build everything since ATAK-CIV exists and has several open source implementations. It can even tie in to drones (which are illegal to bring to protests in at least a few states).
This has a lot of potential applications for street medic coordination, protest marshal coordination, and for airsoft teams...

I haven't been able to organize or play in these spaces for a while, so I'd be really interested to hear report backs on this type of tech for anyone comfortable enough to talk about it.
This is especially a request for #airsoft folks with organized enough teams to use such tech and have a say about it. Unfortunately here in the Netherlands, airsoft is extremely limited due to highly restrictive gun laws so I'm probably not going to start playing again any time soon (even if I had time).

What's interesting is that this exact set of technologies leads to decision paralysis in centralized organizations:
https://mwi.westpoint.edu/cognitive-fratricide-how-the-transparent-battlefield-creates-decision-paralysis/
The problem here is a structural one, a function of hierarchy, where the direction of the flow of power determines what technology can do and how it can e used.
In a distributed network, this information is used by a central system to distribute data back to people so they can make the most informed decision. In a centralized network, this information is used to increase the power of central control node. It's a question of who is helping whom, who is autonomous and who is support.

Several years ago, a street medic described a system like this and wanted to know if it could be built.
https://hackaday.com/2022/09/08/the-tak-ecosystem-military-coordination-goes-open-source/
Back then there was just no way to make it happen. Hardware was too expensive. We couldn't really ever get it cheap enough, per medic, to deploy. Best I could put together was a bunch of burner phones.
But now it's starting to really make sense. LoRa is cheap, and possibly cheaper in bulk. And it wouldn't be necessary to build everything since ATAK-CIV exists and has several open source implementations. It can even tie in to drones (which are illegal to bring to protests in at least a few states).
This has a lot of potential applications for street medic coordination, protest marshal coordination, and for airsoft teams...

#LifeHack: if you have grease on your hands (from working on a bike or a car) and you don't have any good pumice soap, you can use table salt. A table spoon of table salt or so works well as an abrasive.
I used some dish soap with the salt and it took some stubborn grease from my bike off my hands.

I know, substack, I know.

Followed by this.
https://ky.fyi/posts/ai-burnout

I'm gonna post this shit on my LinkedIn and see how many people melt.
https://collapse2050.substack.com/p/the-planet-is-dying-but-youve-got

Writing practice that turned into an action scene.
CW: Fictional representation of war and illegal activity
https://hexmhell.writeas.com/numbers

https://www.liveliketheworldisdying.com/rapid-response-networks-in-the-twin-cities/

Live Like the World is Dying is a great resource:
https://www.liveliketheworldisdying.com/alex-on-rapid-response-networks/

Twin Cities has shown us what successful direct action looks like, and there's been a *lot of great coverage of this. The "It Could Happen Here/Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff" crossover a while back is really inspiring.
I finally got around to listening to it, and it's definitely worth it.
https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-cool-people-who-did-cool-96003360/episode/everyone-vs-ice-on-the-ground-319435672

RE: https://kolektiva.social/@Hex/116284199711940740
Which is here...

RE: https://kolektiva.social/@Hex/116272428351854596
Somehow I had more thoughts on this subject...

Things like the #NoKings protests may feel like they're not enough, but they can be useful for building that network. Asking neighbors if they're going can help open up conversations, can lead to more conversations, can provide openings to find ways to escalate resistance, and can let you build what you need to feel safe going hard if you realize it's time.
Protests directly against facilities and other direct actions are small escalations that let you build trust and understand your network. If you want to know where you need to be, look at Twin Cities. That is the type of response that makes the machine grind to halt.
Make that happen everywhere and more escalation may not be necessary. And, if it is necessary to escalate more, that level of community organizing makes all other forms of escalation sustainable.

I have some critiques of "Fighting in the Streets." The last chapter would get you killed. The coms advice are absolutely terrible, which makes me question other elements of the book. But it does provide a framework for thinking about what a militant resistance looks like, and what framework needs to exist to make it possible.
It's a short read, and worth it for the thought experiment. You can read TM 31-210 all you want, but it won't do anything for you without the social framework that makes more than one attack possible. It always comes back to community building, even if (especially if) you're wanting to make sure militant resistance is an option on the table.
https://archive.org/download/fighting-in-the-streets-a-manual-of-urban-guerilla-warfare-urbano/Fighting in the streets, a manual of urban guerilla warfare - Urbano_text.pdf

This is as good a time as any for a thought experiment.
You're in Nazi Germany. You know about the camps, you know what they do, you see the ash fall, you smell it. People who resist alone are killed, some are sent to the camps too. You're afraid to even talk to people about it for fear that they'll turn you in.
You think back to when the camps were being built. You had all the warning signs, but you didn't know how to interpret them. You could believe it would happen. You thought you'd have a chance to vote him out. You thought there might be another way. You thought maybe things would turn out differently if you just sat tight, kept your head down, kept yourself safe.
You see a family being dragged from their home. You know they will be killed. You want to fight, not just for them but for yourself. You opposed Hitler, and at any point you know you could be on the list... Even if you do nothing.
You wish you could rise up, shoot the SS, open the gates, fight it all. You know you aren't alone, but you don't know how to connect with the people who want the same thing.
Using the knowledge we have now, what should you have done in the preceding months and years to connect, to build a community that would open up all paths of resistance?
There were people who resisted. We know it wasn't enough.
Gun laws in Nazi Germany were very similar to US laws in that Nazis were largely free to own guns and everyone else was not. Unlike the US, where "others" have historically controlled using the fear that they might be randomly executed, Germany did codify it. Red flag laws were one more step in the US towards that codification, and there will be more.
When Nazis were taking away those guns, the social networks didn't exist to make resistance possible for most folks. But some Jews were able to resist.
It wasn't the guns that made the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising possible, though they definitely helped. The Warsaw Ghetto uprising was made possible by labor organizing in the precessing years.
If there were more uprisings like that, the Holocaust could have been stopped if not prevented. Social networks make resistance possible. Guns are only useful tools to resist authoritarianism *after* you build a community able to support that resistance, and they are only one of many tools made useful by that community.
Getting guns is easy, and not always necessary. Building community is hard. Guns won't keep you safe. Community will.
Single acts of resistance may slow the machine down, but to actually bring down a monster you need to be able to attack more than once. You need a society of resistance. If you are afraid now, build that. Talk to people while it's still safe to do so. Ask them where their red line is. Talk to neighbors. Figure out your network.
Take the steps you need now to keep your neighbors safe, to keep yourself safe.
#USPol

To be clear, I am specifically referring to this: https://kolektiva.social/@Hex/116099093975347697