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Dave Awl

@daveawl.bsky.social

Writer/Performer in Chicago. Early Neo-Futurist. Once & future Pansy King. Host of the Partly Dave Show. Russell Hobanologist. Old New Waver, erstwhile DJ. GNC/Queer. He/Him. I fly through the dark and I sing with the bees. https://linktr.ee/daveawl

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Dr. Lucky Tran@luckytran.com · 3d ago

Please stop saying “lockdowns.” There were never true lockdowns in the US, and it fuels far right narratives to repeat this inaccurate statement. You can say closures, you can say restrictions, or better, you can say public health measures which saved many lives.

Dr. Lucky Tran@luckytran.com · 6d ago

People still complain about “lockdowns” but we had none in the US. We had stay-at-home orders, where although businesses were closed, you could still go outside whenever you wanted. Other countries had far stricter rules, and yet have been much more accepting of them as they saved many more lives.

Chad Loder@chadloder.dev · 4d ago

The diarrhea lettuce company, Taylor Farms, uses slave labor contracted from the Arizona Dept. of Corrections. The backbreaking labor is often performed by imprisoned Mexican nationals who would be otherwise ineligble to work in the US. They are paid $1.50 an hour.

The Diarrhea Lettuce Company Has Been Linked to Forced Labor

The lettuce-producing Taylor Farms was linked to the widespread use of prison labor before its involvement in a cyclospora outbreak.

futurism.com

Dave Awl@daveawl.bsky.social · 4d ago

For Lughnasadh/Lammas, a poem about blackberries by the great Seamus Heaney. "You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it"

Screenshot of the poem Blackberry-Picking by Seamus Heaney. Text reads as follows. For Philip Hobsbaum Late August, given heavy rain and sun For a full week, the blackberries would ripen. At first, just one, a glossy purple clot Among others, red, green, hard as a knot. You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet Like thickened wine: summer's blood was in it Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for Picking. Then red ones inked up and that hunger Sent us out with milk cans, pea tins, jam pots Where briars scratched and wet grass bleached our boots. Round hay fields, cornfields and potato drills We trekked and picked until the cans were full, Until the tinkling bottom had been covered With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned Like a plate of eyes. Our hands were peppered With thorn pricks, our palms sticky as Bluebeard's. We hoarded the fresh berries in the byre But when the bath was filled we found a fur, A rat-grey fungus, glutting on our cache. The juice was stinking too. Once off the bush The fruit fermented, the sweet flesh would turn sour. I always felt like crying. It wasn't fair That all the lovely canfuls smelt of rot. Each year I hoped they'd keep, knew they would not.
Gillian Branstetter@gbbranstetter.bsky.social · 5d ago

El Sayed: "When it comes to trans rights, this is the right to get the health care that you need...It’s the right not to be discriminated against by your government because of who you are. Because what tends to happen is they come for theirs, then they come for yours"

The idea that we can assent to the taking away of anybody’s rights, and think that somehow the government won’t come for all of our rights, is itself the problem. And, look, I don’t need people to understand how they use their rights. I just need people to agree that the government shouldn’t be able to take any of our rights. I put my face on the ground thirty-four times a day, David. Most people don’t understand why I do it. I don’t need them to understand. I just want to have the right to do it. And when people decide that they want to take away my right to do that, I’ve got a problem.Now, I hope that everybody’s going to show up and say, No, no, no. You can’t stop that person or that community from reflecting and praying as they choose. Similarly, when it comes to trans rights, this is the right to get the health care that you need. That’s really what it comes down to. It’s the right to be who you are. It’s the right not to be discriminated against by your government because of who you are. Because what tends to happen is they come for theirs, then they come for yours, then they come for theirs. And at some point you live in a society where rights are negotiable, and that is not the America I was born in. It’s not the America I know and love. It’s not the America I’m going to allow somebody like Donald Trump to give us.
Mark Jacob@markjacob.bsky.social · 5d ago

Here in Chicago, where we unfortunately know Rahm Emanuel well, we marvel at how he gets the national press to help him manufacture the myth that he's some sort of visionary. No one here forgets that his administration covered up a police murder.

Politico headlline: Rahm Emanuel on Why Democrats Keep Losing
unraveled@unraveledpress.com · 6d ago

Chicago (and elsewhere)— We really, really need you to show up for this one. This amount of $ is a drop in the bucket for someone with means. A traumatized family is facing an emergency, and every second counts. We don't know where the detention pipeline could take this father next.

Andres A. Chavez@andral404.bsky.social · 7d ago

I know I have been uploading a bunch of money asks. But please consider helping my dear friend who is going through it. www.gofundme.com/f/aid-for-fa...

Dave Awl@daveawl.bsky.social · 7d ago

If I could get paid $4.6M for failing at something I promise I would get so good at failing. You would never have seen such glorious failing. I would perfect failing into a high art

Screenshot of Fox Business headline that says, Cracker Barrel to pay for outgoing CEO’s security, $4.6M severance after failed rebrand
dank serpico@abh93.bsky.social · last wk.

*standing up on the plane* okay i'm gonna read "america" by allen ginsberg. don't worry i'm not gonna do the n word part. okay. america i've given you all and now i'm nothing. america two dollars and twentyseven cents january 17, 1956. i can't stand my own mind. america when will we end the hu

Dave Awl@daveawl.bsky.social · last wk.

They don't want to acknowledge that the negligence and malevolence of their clueless Nero of a president is responsible for millions of Covid deaths, so they're desperately scapegoating a scientist whose competence helped save lives. These are the times we live in.

George Monbiot@georgemonbiot.bsky.social · last wk.

When I discuss huge systemic issues, people say "but what I can I do?" When I mention something meaningful you can do immediately, people say (as the replies here show) "but what's the point, in the face of the huge systemic issues?" There are, it seems, plenty of people who want to be helpless.

George Monbiot@georgemonbiot.bsky.social · last wk.

It's a point I've been trying to make for a long time: there is no good way to meet even 10% of current demand for animal products. They trash the living world, whichever way you do it. If you want to reduce your impact, switch to a plant-based diet. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Dave Awl@daveawl.bsky.social · last wk.

Rats have more empathy than some human beings I could mention "A rat will learn an effortful, non-obvious motor task, keep performing it for weeks, and eat about a chip and a half less chocolate than it otherwise would, in a setup whose only consistent outcome is another rat getting out of a tube."

In a University of Chicago lab, a rat left free to roam learned to open a tube and release a trapped cagemate, and when researchers added chocolate as a rival temptation, the rat opened both at much t...

A rat's instinct to help a trapped friend rivals even chocolate's pull—suggesting empathy runs deeper than appetite.

spacedaily.com

Dave Awl@daveawl.bsky.social · last wk.

If I were the Doctor I would absolutely use my Tardis for a very special episode where I rewrite the timeline to rescue this guy, and to hell with the Reapers

Patrick McCray@patrickmccray.bsky.social · last wk.

Remembering Silas Soule, born OTD in 1838. American abolitionist, conductor on the Underground Railroad, military officer, and hero for disobeying orders to participate in Sand Creek Massacre and then giving evidence against his commander. Murdered 1865. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silas_S...