Some immigrants have gone a week without showers. Others sleep on bare floors. Medications have gone unprovided. As detentions have soared, former detainees, lawyers, family members and lawmakers tell us conditions in facilities across the country have become intolerable.

Concerns Grow Over Dire Conditions in Immigrant Detention

nytimes.com

please stop using AI

WIRED@wired.com · last yr.

A new analysis of AI hardware being produced and how it is being used attempts to estimate the vast amount of electricity being consumed by AI. www.wired.com/story/new-re...

CFP: Farmers and Rural Lifeworlds in Current Narratives and Discourse, Bolzano, Italy, 4-5 Dec 2025 networks.h-net.org/group/announ...

fun fact three fighter jets is roughly equivalent to the NEA’s 2024 budget

📢TOMORROW: Understanding Authoritarianism: Lessons from Ukraine and Europe online panel with Marina Levina, Julia Khrebtan-Hörhager, David Boromisza-Habashi and me exploring how communication studies can contribute to countering authoritarian rhetorics and fictions www.natcom.org/zoom-meeting...

NCA VLO: Understanding Authoritarianism: Lessons from Ukraine and Europe. - National Communication Association

Understanding Authoritarianism: Lessons from Ukraine and Europe. Registration is required for this event. If you have not registered, please click here to do so. Title: Understanding Authoritarianism:...

natcom.org

Upcoming: Canadian Environmental Crime Symposium at Ontario Tech U to launch the new Canadian Environmental Crime Research Network May 8 & 9 in person and online. Register at link.

Canadian Environmental Crime Symposium

Get Tickets on Humanitix - Canadian Environmental Crime Symposium hosted by Ontario Tech Faculty of Social Science and Humanities. Ontario Tech University, Bordessa Hall, 55 Bond St E, Oshawa, ON L1G ...

events.humanitix.com

*Upcoming Event* Understanding Authoritarianism: Lessons from Ukraine and Europe hosted by the National Communication Association, 23 Apr. 3-4:30pm EST. Learn from comm scholars about how culture & communication connect rising authoritarianism in Europe & the US. Free Registration; please share!

NCA VLO: Understanding Authoritarianism: Lessons from Ukraine and Europe. - National Communication Association

Understanding Authoritarianism: Lessons from Ukraine and Europe. Registration is required for this event. If you have not registered, please click here to do so. Title: Understanding Authoritarianism:...

natcom.org

This is very, very, very bad

Joseph Cox@josephcox.bsky.social · last yr.

New from 404 Media: ICE just paid Palantir tens of millions for "complete target analysis of known populations." Shows Palantir is actively working on, and updating, the technical infrastructure underpinning the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts www.404media.co/ice-just-pai...

In the Bay Area, pedestrian cross-walk signal voices were hacked to imitate Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk, and not in a good way. Here’s a sample in Redwood City:

This month's roundup shares scholarship by @emilyreisman.bsky.social, @landstuff.bsky.social, @zeniakish.bsky.social on agrarian platform capitalism, news and commentary on recent rural-related happenings, a map of news access across the state of Nebraska, and more!

Roundup: April 11, 2025 — The Rural Reconciliation Project

A periodic collection of recent research, analysis, and other notable rural items.

ruralreconcile.org

"The Ethiopia lawsuit is one of the only measures of accountability Meta currently faces in the Global South for how its platform has been weaponized by military and paramilitary groups to destabilize nations and target ethnic minorities."

Kenyan lawsuit against Meta will test Big Tech accountability

A Kenyan court will hear a $1.6 billion lawsuit that alleges Facebook helped incite genocide in Ethiopia. The case could be a model for those looking to hold platforms responsible for online hate and ...

compiler.news

Columbia gives Trump basically all he asks for, fires their president when it seems she may not comply fast enough, and then still gets all its remaining funding frozen. These demands are not good-faith demands about antisemitism. They are efforts to break universities.

Science Magazine@science.org · last yr.

Exclusive: Weeks after President Donald Trump’s administration ordered NIH to pull $250 million in biomedical research grants to Columbia University, the agency is freezing all remaining grant money owed to the university until further notice. scim.ag/4if5Rg1

Upcoming event with some stellar communication colleagues organized by the fantastic Marina Levina. More details coming soon! Online and open to all.

This is a very clear explainer of the structure of university Boards for those outside academia. This is who is bowing to the Trump administration.

Joseph Howley@illdottore.bsky.social · 2y ago

Arjun Appadurai and Sheldon Pollock on boards of trustees: “Who actually runs Columbia University?” www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

That facial recognition system at Madison Square Garden sure has been REALLY great for proving that all the worst predictions and fears us researchers have had about facial recognition were accurate and valid: www.theverge.com/news/637228/...

Madison Square Garden’s surveillance system banned this fan over his T-shirt design

MSG uses tools like facial recognition on attendees.

theverge.com

New Rubio order (leaked to me) directs the State Department to spy on student visa holders and applicants social media for "a hostile attitude toward U.S. citizens or U.S. culture (including government, institutions, or founding principles).” www.kenklippenstein.com/p/exclusive-...

Exclusive: Trump Admin Spies on Social Media of Foreign Students

Ideological purge of foreign students revealed in new leaked directive

kenklippenstein.com

Three Ways to Support Detained Farmworker Organizer Alfredo “Lelo” Juarez: labornotes.org/blogs/2025/0...

👇🎯 The public isn't going to understand this, unless the presidents of R1 universities around the country <loudly> & <collectively> get out into the public square & start explaining this & calling out the existential threat to the entire 🇺🇸 university system. The silence is deafening right now.

Tom Pepinsky@tompepinsky.com · 2y ago

The public really needs to understand this. Every university system in the world rests on public funding, there has never been an alternative model at any time in history. We have universities for literally the same reason that we have roads and armies.

NEW: It’s unclear whether new NIH guidance will impact active grants, but it appears to halt opportunities for future funding of studies focused on the health effects of climate change. One climate health expert called the directive “catastrophic.” @anniewaldman.bsky.social/@fastlerner.bsky.social

NIH Ends Future Funding to Study the Health Effects of Climate Change

It’s unclear whether the guidance will impact active grants, but it appears to halt opportunities for future studies. One climate health expert said the directive would have a “devastating” impact on ...

propub.li

A great injustice has been served in denying Dr Steven Thrasher tenure. Defend academic freedom wherever you have the power to do so.

dr. thrasher, an american writer in ex(archia)(xile)@thrasherxy.bsky.social · 2y ago

My statement on being denied tenure at the Medill School of Journalism drive.google.com/file/d/1BBBI...

Virtually every leading First Amendment scholar in the country--conservative and liberal--has joined this statement warning that the Trump administration's threats to Columbia University risk deterring and suppressing constitutionally protected speech.

Academe@academemagazine.bsky.social · 2y ago

New on Academe Blog: academeblog.org/2025/03/20/a...

Excellent fellowship opportunity for Ukraine scholars at the University of Basel, Switzerland: uris.ch/news/call-fo...

Call for Applications: Two URIS Fellowships at the University of Basel (2026)

Apply now for a six-month research and teaching stay at the University of Basel! Open to scholars in the humanities, social sciences, and cultural studies with a focus on Ukraine. Deadline: 28 April 2...

uris.ch

Northwestern should be ashamed that they've bowed to political pressure, thereby threatening us all. They hired Steven, in part, for the very social justice activism they are now denying him tenure over. I'm proud to call @thrasherxy.bsky.social a friend and appreciate his courage.

dr. thrasher, an american writer in ex(archia)(xile)@thrasherxy.bsky.social · 2y ago

My statement on being denied tenure at the Medill School of Journalism drive.google.com/file/d/1BBBI...

Pleased to share this new collaboration with colleagues who research questions of access and inequality in digital agriculture across diverse geographies in Nature Food. What would inclusive and just ag innovation look like? @naturefood.bsky.social @landstuff.bsky.social @janeezirigwe.bsky.social

Digital agriculture will perpetuate injustice unless led from the grassroots

Nature Food - Situating digital agriculture within recent histories of uneven agrarian development reveals its potential to perpetuate injustice. To avoid this outcome, we argue for innovation...

nature.com

Israel killed at least 174 children in its ceasefire-shattering assault on Gaza on Tuesday, making it one of the deadliest 24 hours for children in Gaza’s history.

Israel’s Assault Marks One of the Deadliest Days for Children in Gaza History

“Israeli forces have signed a death warrant for Palestinian children in Gaza,” one rights group worker said.

truthout.org

I love this piece on beefing up Canada's food systems resilience in the face of Trump's threats to our sovereignty: theconversation.com/why-canada-m...

Why Canada must treat its food system as a matter of national defence

Faced with both a trade war and annexation threats, Canada must confront whether its domestic food systems can feed its population in a crisis.

theconversation.com

An entire @nytimes.com video on the need for power at AI data centers (& on tech companies now procuring energy) which never even mentions the words #ClimateChange, let alone notes that we need to phase out fossil fuels now to halt heating at a relatively safe level. I'm so tired.

The New York Times is the first to put out comprehensive estimates on the cost of a year without U.S.A.I.D. and they’re higher than I thought: - 1.65 million deaths from AIDS - 500,000 from lack of vaccines - 550,000 from lack of food aid - 290,000 from malaria - 310,000 from TB

Amanda Marcotte@amandamarcotte.bsky.social · 2y ago

Killing children is by design, I'm afraid. "Pro-natalists" like Musk claim they aren't racist, but their pressure to have children is solely focused on white women, while they back policies that literally kill of non-white children. He's a eugenicist. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...