Wait, the state is prosecuting bail fund organizers for money laundering, and indicting people who passed out flyers under RICO racketeering charges??
YES, it’s for real.
This is not what democracy looks like.
👉🏿 https://apnews.com/article/atlanta-cop-city-protests-rico-charges-3177a63ac1bd31a1594bed6584e9f330
I posted about this on Cohost, but this shit is heinous and horrifying and CANNOT be allowed to find success
Their cult teaches them that the world is full of scary monster people who hate them for being so good and loved by god. If you swear at them and call them names or get in their face you’re just doing the cults work for it.
I’m not saying you have to listen to their presentation or try to debate them (and really getting into a debate without thoroughly understanding what they’re being taught will just make things worse)… I am just saying to be polite and say no thank you like if they were trying to hand you a flyer for something you don’t care about.
It’s easier for them to see the world outside their bubble as less scary if they see everyday people just going about their business and being as nice to them as you are to everyone else. This goes doubly for anyone who happens to dress modestly, not swear, and not drink or smoke because whatever you believe, they’ll see you as a “good” person who happens to strangely have no interest in their “message”, and that might be enough to get some curious about the possibility of themselves living in the real world.
It’s sometimes hard to be nice to people who seem to represent something you dislike. Just remember these “elders” are sheltered young men, some of which are getting their first real contact with people of other/no faiths.
They aren't being sent out to actually convert people, they are being sent out hoping that they will be harassed and treated poorly so they view those outside the cult as dangerous and evil and stick to the safety of the familiar group.
You being mean to some teenager isn't sticking it to anyone, you're doing exactly what their church elders want to happen.
PLEASE READ THIS.
Please read this.
Don't do the church's work for them.
If you're kind to enough of them, they put you on a block list.
They were such sweet kids, they'd turn up at my door with the thatch of raspberries out front and try to share their word with me, and I'm me, so, I fed them.
Then it was one of the wee 'elder's' birthday, so I made him a cake, and all the little lads came, and they asked about my books and board games and CCGs, I was just a nice frumpy middle aged Jewish lady, I was no threat, so I fed them and made them cakes and took them to the local gaming store and listened when they talked.
One loved yu-gi-oh cards, and it turns out, one of the other wee lads, we'll he loved him back, so I got them in touch with some resources so they had support and a different way to pay for college, they're still together 15 years later, they have dogs, they send me ecards on their birthday. No-one figured out I'd.helped them, I was just the nice lady who made them tea and listened when people were slamming doors.
The next one really wanted to be an artist, so I left out art books and resources, my eldest shared their coptic markers, they draw comic books now, no idea why his folks were insisting he needed to be a dentist, but, he's not a Mormon anymore, (not a Jew either before anyone makes any counter conversion claims).
The first 2 lads were the only dramatic ones, the rest went back into the network but, like Hugh of Borg, they spread the word, sometimes I'd get Mormons from other cities come and make the journey to break bread at my Sabbath table and be seen.
I still think very fondly of that time.
Many of those boys still email me now and then.
Most of them aren't Mormons anymore.
Someone higher up spotted the pattern and suddenly no more Mormons at my door.
I was blacklisted, for kindness.
So there you go, if you don't want Mormons at your door, just love those kids for a couple of years, feed them, help them, and eventually, no more will be allowed to visit
One of my HEMA instructors used to live down the road from a LDS church. He'd get a lot of Mormon kids showing up. Rather than turn them away, he made a deal: he would listen to what they had to say, and in exchange they would help him with his gardening. Apparently Mormons love gardening or something, cause they got really into it. They would talk, he would listen, and they would garden together for a few hours. Then when they finished he'd send them on their way.
Now, these Mormon boys, of course, asked him to read their scripture, and instead of turning them away or politely declining, he obliged and read a little bit. And took notes. And when the Mormon boys came back the next week, he said, "So I read what you asked me to, and I have a few questions." He would very politely break down the contradictions and fallacies of what he had read. Not in any kind of "gotcha" kind of way, but with actual honesty and genuine intentions. And the boys would discuss this with him and he'd have more questions and this would go on for some time until the gardening was done and he'd send them off.
This would rinse and repeat for a few months. He knew when they made their rounds so he would always make sure to be out doing gardening when they showed up. He'd have read more of the Mormon Bible or the Book of Mormon and he'd have more questions prepared. He and the Mormon boys would discuss it, do gardening, and then part ways for the week.
Eventually, this caught the attention of the higher ups, and one of the authority figures of the local Mormon Church showed up along with these boys. My instructor gave him the same treatment. Kindness and questioning, critical but earnest and in good faith. They talked, gardened, and then parted ways.
I think he said he stopped getting Mormon boys showing up after that. Turns out, the LDS Church doesn't like it when you try and talk to their younger members in a way that might make them question their belief in the Church's doctrines.
My partner is always really kind to the lil missionaries. Whenever they come around, he offers them water bottles, sits out on the porch, and chats with them, asks how they’re doing. He wants to show them that the outside world isn’t all bad, one kind conversation at a time.
Humans have finally managed to land on Mars, only to find a locked safe buried in the Martian soil. The key is apparently on Earth, but no one knows where.
The galactic council watched on to see how humanity would handle the task, much as they had with several species before. What the test was supposed to show was whether or not a species of violent nature could ever be brought to work together. They finally picked something up, another ship already headed to Mars? Was it possible humans were that clever to have found the key, maybe it was more specialists and equipment to analyze the locked crate to ensure it was safe to open. A few minutes after landing, they got another broadcast from the red planet.
“This is the LockPickingLawyer and today I’ve got something quite special, this locked alien chest. First of all I have to thank everyone who recommended me for the job, I’m honored that you all thought of me. Now let’s get to work”
The council representatives were confused as they started analyzing the translation, before even getting through the name he spoke something haunting
“Normally I don’t say things like this but this lock is quite unique, however with no security pins it will still be quite quick.”
“There we go, a click on 3… “
All the species of the galactic council sat dumbfounded, they spent many galactic cycles refining and perfecting their study and in all their time not a singular race had tried this method. Click after click, even in such an intricate lock the human had only spent around five minutes tampering with it.
“There we go, now while I can’t open this as part of my video I can say that I at least have a clue what the key should look like in case it ever gets locked again. I admire the design choices and the fact that at least it was harder to get open than anything Master Lock has made”
Most folks on this site were either children on September 11, 2001, or weren’t even born yet. But America went crazy for about a year afterwards. Here’s some highlights that I remember that might not be in your history books:
Besides dumb shit like that…it’s really hard to overstate how completely the national mood and character changed in the span of a day, or how much of the current culture war is a result of the aftermath. (9/11 was the impetus for the sharp rise in power of the Evangelical Right, who made themselves utterly odious and the following backlash helped the rise of the current Progressive Left, for instance.)
This so much. I was 2 when 9/11 happened and of course I have absolutely no memory of it, but I always find it fascinating hearing other people’s experiences.
One I hear a lot is that “it’s the only time Americans really came together, regardless of race or religion” and boy do I hate to hear that because are you fucking sure??
Muslims and any Brown person was vilified after the attacks. Aside strangers and peers immediately changing the way they treated Brown folks, white Americans were playing vigilante causing problems for anyone who “looked like a terrorist”, some even going so far as murder! Or did y’all just not notice that part?
Americans really came together after 9/11, maybe if you were white.
9/11 changed the way the news operated.
The 24 hr news network model, the same one so responsible for half my generation’s parents and grandparents becoming brain rotted conservative zombies, rose to prominence with the coverage of 9/11. Like triple digit gas prices and disgusting islamophobia, it never went away.
I was a middle schooler, maybe 11 or 12, and our homeroom teacher turned on the class tv after the first plane hit. We got to watch the second plane crash live. School kind of didn’t happen that day.
The girl I'm dating and I both think that we sleep on the left side of the bed. I'm coming to terms with the fact that she may be a psychopath and I don't know what's real anymore.
Which option has the sides of the bed correctly labelled?
#1
#2
Neither #1 nor #2 but a secret third thing
See Results"left" and "right" are both relative terms determined relative to a person. The correct answers are port and starboard.
the headboard is the stern
Yeah this one seems pretty straightforward. I'm sure there's some exceptions, but every depiction I can think of, including IRL race car beds, agrees.
I use 'Prompt' and 'Off-Prompt'
The correct options are “wall side” and “open side”.
I’ve heard some people have both sides of their bed hanging out in space, but that’s just not valid.
Activists in Tasmania have stuck up more honest promo stickers inside Coles & Woolworths stores, the two dominant supermarket chains in Australia.
We know you want to burn down capitalism.
But for today, just don’t answer your boss’s call off the clock.
We know you believe in ACAB and think they all should get the wall.
But for today, just don’t call 9-1-1 on the guy screaming outside of your apartment.
The memes are fun. The memes are aspirational and keep us reaching for the horizon.
But look down, too, at what actually is.
Endure pains now—suffer the inconveniences now—knowing that they likely involve unpleasantness.
The Revolution™ is fun to imagine and involves no pain. But the real world does involve pain, and it’s necessary to exercise the muscles needed for future work and opportunities.
What's more the small stuff can really matter in ways that have nothing to do with individual preparation. We're conditioned to either think we have no influence in our communities, or that the mundane work of caring for people immediately around you is useless in the grand scheme. Neither of those is true. Investing yourself in justice for people around you helps create a culture of mutual support that is *needed* for people to exercise political agency within systems designed to atomize and oppress.
Every mundane, unglamorous bit of work has an impact, even when it doesn't feel revolutionary, if it's able to alleviate the grinding suffering that gates so many people out of political agency. When the "small" inmediate problems of our lives are made less pressing, when our confidence is bolstered by the knowledge of support from people who are physically HERE and involved in our lives...that's when we start having more of the will and ability to do the kinds of work commonly considered revolutionary.
The idea of starting a tenant union or affiliative group can be daunting or impossible! You know what still has an impact? Getting to know one neighbor.
