The Message That Goes Unheard

Librarians

As a librarian working to preserve and disseminate knowledge and books, I hope that in the future people will enjoy finding everything we've saved and learning about all the people who didn't obey in advance and how.

Very grateful for the librarians.

Consensus and Privilege

Consensus is produced by privileging particular perspectives.

Haslam, S. A., Alvesson, M., & Reicher, S. D. (2024). Zombie leadership: Dead ideas that still walk among us. The Leadership Quarterly, 35(3), 101770. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.leaqua.2023.101770

Do good for its own sake. Do well out of spite. ✨🌈

My new motto for the fascist era.

On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons

Which lesson would you like to know more about?

Do not obey in advance.

Defend institutions.

Beware the one-party state.

Take responsibility for the face of the world.

Remember professional ethics.

Be wary of paramilitaries.

Be reflective if you must be armed.

Stand out.

Be kind to our language.

Believe in truth.

Investigate.

Make eye contact and small talk.

Practice corporeal politics.

Establish a private life.

Contribute to good causes.

Learn from peers in other countries.

Listen for dangerous words.

Be calm when the unthinkable arrives.

Be a patriot.

Be as courageous as you can.

Snyder, T. (2017). On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century. Crown.

Hope and hopelessness

Feeling Revolutionary is feeling that our current situation is not enough [...]. Feeling revolutionary opens up the space to imagine a collective escape [...]. Practicing educated hope, participating in a mode of revolutionary consciousness, [...] is the enactment of a critique function. It is not about announcing the way things ought to be, but, instead, imagining what things could be.

Duggan, L., & Muñoz, J. E. (2009). Hope and hopelessness: A dialogue. Women & Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory, 19(2), 275–283. https://doi.org/10.1080/07407700903064946

A Call for Constructive Engagement

As leaders of America’s colleges, universities, and scholarly societies, we speak with one voice against the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education. We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight. However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses. We will always seek effective and fair financial practices, but we must reject the coercive use of public research funding. [...]

Signed by so many leaders of colleges and universities, even by some high profile ones such as Yale, Princeton and Brown.

https://www.aacu.org/newsroom/a-call-for-constructive-engagement

Teaching to transgress

Again and again, it was necessary to remind everyone that no education is politically neutral.

hooks, bell. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as the practice of freedom. Routledge Taylor & Francis Group.

When I teach my library and information science students, that's the kind of library I envision, and I hope to inspire them to create it.

people talking about "lesbian rights" going "U CAN'T BE A TRANSMASC/TRANS MEN LESBIAN THAT'S LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE YOU ARE THREATENING ALL OF THE LESBIANS AROUND U!!!!!!!" meanwhile i was at the library earlier and saw one of the staff members with a shaved head had a water bottle with a sticker saying "cultivate lesbian JOY!" and so i decided to go "hey nice i'm a lesbian too!" and that person & the transfem next to them both erupted with joy. nobody got mad about my beard. nobody got mad about how deep my voice is. those two, who are very used to seeing me there as that's where i print labels for my job, were overjoyed to see another lesbian.

i didn't get 20 questions. i didn't get "your voice is deep are you a MAN????" nobody bitched about my facial hair. nobody got mad that a person passing for a cis man at the time said it was a lesbian. instead i received nothing but joy, the others giggling and saying that we were the Lesbian Corner. nobody got mad, there was nothing but joy. a transmasc lesbian & a transfem lesbian shared the exact same joy it it bothered no one. no fighting. NONE. no being mad about my appearance or my voice. this is what lesbian community is REALLY about. diversity among lesbians. accepting lesbians no matter how they look, sound, or what their gender is.

this is the spirit of lesbianism, not getting angry when someone is a lesbian "wrong".

The Importance of the Act of Reading

First, I would like to reaffirm that I always saw teaching adults to read and write as a political act, an act of knowledge, and therefore as a creative act.

Freire, P. (1983). The Importance of the Act of Reading. Journal of Education, 165(1), 5–11. https://doi.org/10.1177/002205748316500103

Gorilla Of Destiny, who call themselves "world leading researcher in magic science", has a few words to add that just speak to me.

[...] I want to talk about why anti-intellectualism is so important to them, and then ways that you as an individual might be able to help against it.

Now, the first big reason they do this is because they're wrong.

[...] if you start listening to the expert, then you're going to realize they're wrong and not just wrong, obviously wrong.

There's also a few other reasons, like they don't want you actually thinking critically, and that's what a lot of degrees teach.

So what can you do? Well, there's a few things, but it is difficult. Read. Read anything, honestly. Non-fiction, fiction, doesn't matter, just keep reading.

[...] being able to research will be a very important skill in the coming years.

The other thing you've got to do is make sure you're not putting down different studies. STEM degrees are not inherently better. Trust me, I did one. All education is valuable, especially in the arts.

Sometimes they go after specific intellectuals rather than all of them at once. [...] Though from what I can tell, this is just the opening gambit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBnA6AhbTEs

The Enemy

The Professors Are the Enemy.

So, according to J.D. Vance, I am the enemy. For people like him, education and knowledge are almost as frightening as empathy and compassion.