Is the US a dystopia?

Totally. There's a Tt creator whose specialty is gardening who at one point made a video debunking the trend among "suburban white mom" types of making videos about how a non-white man was "shadowing" them at the grocery store, or a flyer left on your windshield is a sign that you've been "marked" for "trafficking," and other similar content. She has been absolutely SLAMMED with hyperbolic screaming posts and death threats from people who were sicced on her account from rw sites.

Anyone who pays any attention at all to the discourse about "trafficking" knows that the so-called epidemic of sex trafficking as cast by movies like Taken and that asshole's documentary, is a white-supremacist, right-wing conspiracy theory. No one is kidnapping white women or girls at Walmart. Anyone who emphasizes and benefits from the narrative around "rescuing" women and girls is automatically suspect.

That guy has ties to the Mormon Church, whose more extreme adherents are FAMOUSLY sex trafficking young girls and labor trafficking boys all over the US. He could start a lot closer to home and do more good with way less money.

Sorry--I've been down this particular rabbit hole a lot!! And I've had a right-wing weirdo cry on my shoulder about "saving the children" while being anti-immigrant and anti-LGBTQ and moving to Texas so they could keep their guns when the "woke mob" tried to outlaw them.

― Ima Gardener (in orbit)

dead fucking right, this bullshit about "trafficking" is very tied to the bullshit about "grooming"... a couple years ago when i first saw trans people being accused of "grooming" i was livid, now i'm just resigned and determined. this is how it's gonna be, huh? this is how they gonna fuckin' play this. nothing new. they did the same shit with gay people back in the '70s and '80s and now they're just going back to the same playbook. and the people who are making these accusations are the real fucking abusers. the mormon church? one of the two biggest organized patriarchal organizations in the country. the other one is the roman catholic church. i still get pushback here when i talk about what the roman catholic church is doing, institutionally, the way its patriarchy promotes a culture of abuse. the mormons, the mormons aren't any fucking better. people focus on "magic underwear" or some shit and they don't talk about how women are systematically degraded and abused by that church. because, you know, they say that's _anti-christian_, _anti-religious_.

a whole fucking lot of us know what's really going on, what's the scope of the problem, who's doing it. but people don't want to believe it. they don't see it, because they're looking the other way, they've been taught their whole lives to look the other way, and they don't want to see it. i don't fucking want to see it either. it wrecks me, on a daily basis, fucks me up. i can barely talk about it, but i'll keep doing it as long as i can, no matter how fucking crazy it makes me.

yes, the us is a dystopia. it's driven by patriarchy, predominantly christian patriarchy, and patriarchy is dystopian, particularly for a little over half of the population.

pardon my ranting, i'm having a really shitty week.

and the people who are making these accusations are the real fucking abusers.

qft. one of those things i wished i'd known sooner was just how common projection as a deflection tactic is. how was i supposed to know that 'he who smelt it dealt it' was a profound truth about humanity when i first heard it at 11.

see also: "i know you are, but what i am i?"

rubber/glue

https://mmiwusa.org/

Laurel - THANK YOU. Agree with every single thing you said. These white ladies thinking they're going to get kidnapped and trafficked at their local Target drive me fucking insane. I saw someone on TT try to claim that 1 in 4 American woman will experience either an attempted kidnapping or be kidnapped. Um. What? Don't get me started on the sound of freedom movie/guy. My dad's wife buys into all this shit and it's so infuriating.

one of those things i wished i'd known sooner was just how common projection as a deflection tactic is.

My God, is it ever!

Reminder that it’s also these sex trafficking goons that have helped get anti-SWer legislation passed (including by Kamala Harris, natch) and further endangered the lives of SWers.

it's interesting to me because a lot of my ideas and beliefs early on were modeled on what i saw in the media, how i saw other women, particularly other white women, act. early on i was really worried that someone would kidnap and murder me off the street. that belief didn't serve me very well at all. i found that focusing on those risks got in the way of my ability to protect myself from the actual risks i face.

i also feel like focusing on things that i'm not really at risk for, and particularly acting like i _am_ at a high risk for those things, is kind of rude and disrespectful towards people who do are at significant risk of being hurt in those ways. it's kind of like me trying to overwrite the terrible things other people have actually experienced with my disproportionate fears for myself. it's even worse to see how much institutions with power and influence lean into that narrative, reinforce and bolster these irrational fears. like i said, i had those fears, i was taught those fears, and i needed to unlearn them, it was in my own best interest to unlearn them.

and yeah otm table, i do have friends who do SW and this legislation to "protect" them doesn't, it hurts them. if people want to protect sex workers, they should start actually listening to sex workers, that's my controversial opinion

I saw someone on TT try to claim that 1 in 4 American woman will experience either an attempted kidnapping or be kidnapped. Um. What?

I saw discussion of this point, which I also think is likely, that this person is conflating their risk of being kidnapped/trafficked with their VERY LIKELY risk of being s. assaulted at some point in their lives, which IS about 25% of women as reported although I assume that's a massive undercount. So yes, the resulting panic and fear is doing the work of obscuring that we're most likely to be assaulted by our intimate partners, family members, and people we know. Duh.

i found that focusing on those risks got in the way of my ability to protect myself from the actual risks i face.

Yeah, exactly.

Otm re SWers obv

yeah actually io your saying that really helps me kinda put into focus just how those irrational fears helped to keep me in an abusive relationship

when i came out suddenly i'm part of a community where the lifetime incidence of being an SA victim is over 50%. and i have this tremendous fear of being sexually assaulted, and i say, you know, _statistically_. _statistically_, you know, i'm at high risk, so i need to be aware and take precautions. that's what i tell myself. and the precautions i take are precautions against _outsiders_, _strangers_. people i don't know.

at the same time, the incidence rate being what it is, i'm now around a _lot_ of SA victims. and i see what SA does to a person, see the ways in which people who've had SA respond to what's happened to them. this might sound weird, but the best way of being able to tell if someone is an SA victim is if they _act_ like an SA victim. when i see how SA victims act, get to know it firsthand, it starts being pretty clear to me that hey, wait a second, that's exactly how i react. my fear of SA isn't _statistical_, isn't _rational_, it's _visceral_. to the extent that i figure, well, i've probably been sexually assaulted at some point. probably i just don't remember it because repressed memories. i did (maybe still do) actually have repressed memories. generally they were things i avoided and didn't want to think about, and this was something i wasn't trying to avoid, but i figure, you never know. (That's the thing, isn't it? It's so hard to feel like I actually _know_.) meantime i'm apologizing to my then-spouse for the way i instinctively recoil in terror whenever they touch me. of course it couldn't be anything to do with _them_. has to be something wrong with _me_.

i genuinely... i'm genuinely shocked at how much denial i was in. how much pressure i still feel, internally, to say it didn't happen. all of the lies i was taught about SA - lies the patriarchy taught me - that still run through my head, even though i know they're not true. the way i have to talk about it over and over again, to reinforce and affirm to myself that yes, if i look at the facts, that was what happened. they sexually assaulted me.

i also kinda understand why. leaving my ex was very difficult. my life is materially worse in a lot of ways for having done it. and - ok i know every abuse victim says this - but i genuinely do believe i _was lucky_. i see some people try to get away from their abusers, and their abusers try to take everything they have, in terms of material resources. all my ex did was try to convince me to kill myself. i mean that sucked, i don't want to minimize how awful that was, but a lot of people have it bad in ways that i didn't. don't have the same opportunity to take control of their own life that i do. because there isn't support for SA victims. people don't even _believe_ SA victims, most of the time. for some reason people believe women more, particularly white women, when they talk about some shadowy nebulous conspiracy to kidnap women off the street.

because when some guy brags about sexually assaulting women and people like him _more_ for doing that... it's easy to feel helpless, hopeless. it's easy to feel despair. it's really tempting to me to grab onto anything i can, anything at all, to help me feel like... i mean, feel not just like i have some control, but so people will fucking RECOGNIZE me as a victim. because most women who experience SA don't get recognized or accepted as victims when it's an intimate partner, a relative, a co-worker. only when it's an _alien_.

so yeah i do feel pressured as a woman, particularly as a white woman, to act in ways that serve and promote patriarchy. and it fucking sucks that so many women give in to that pressure. i'd almost call the situation... dystopian.

geeez sorry for sucking at posting recently, i was tired posting and completely missed the context of this revive. the disingenuous right-wing obsession with "trafficking" is indeed nauseating. obviously when it comes to vulnerable communities experiencing this kind of thing, i mean, that's a whole different discussion

YES.

To get back to scott's original point a bit, I think -- America was already a dystopia for the unprotected. The most at-risk people in America are undocumented, indigenous, Black, queer. Policies exclude them, laws don't protect them, the news doesn't cover them.

Let the rage fill you the next time your sister in law or that other parent at T-ball says they heard that their friend's cousin found a piece of tape on their bumper and called the police, or tells you that 300,000 children are abducted from playgrounds each year so "Mamas be safe out there."

Literally just googling that catchphrase for this post brought me to a video someone made with 7 paranoid things she does at the gas station to keep her kids "safe" while pumping gas, INCLUDING LOCKING HERSELF OUT OF THE CAR. Maybe it's different with smart fobs these days. The idea that your kids are safer if you completely lock your car up while getting gas and standing right next to it--the only thing that's going to do is cause 300 people to lock their kids in the car with the keys inside because their hands were full.

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/09/20/energy/three-mile-island-microsoft-ai/index.html

Funny thing is that it's usually the data centers that generate TMI.

Wow at that TikTok

There was some definite weird modem backwoods old west to the two yokels that were following the carrion birds to find the dead body of that highway shooter outside of London KY this week. They were live streaming when they found the body while buzzards dined. They were pretty pleased with the 25k they got paid in reward for finding the nutcase gunman. Pretty damn dark if you ask me.

NEW: In the last 15 out of 24 hours of his life inside the Montgomery Co. jail, Kevin Hall was confined to a WRAP — a restraint system that is similar to a full-body straight jacket — while he believed he was having a heart attack, the lawsuit alleges.https://t.co/MaAEw24Kdl

— Taylor Six (@TaylorSixHL) October 3, 2024

jesus that whole article is like worst case scenario dystopia, one detail after another. not for the squeamish. also belongs in the defund the police thread or whatever that one’s called

i never check the listings for the local movie house here because the guy who bought it is a trumper who showed 2000 mules and fuck giving him my money but i glanced at the showings and it was megaplopapuss and transformers and beetlejuice and wild robot and dvd revival showings of texas chainsaw massacre and beerfest(!!) and i concluded that i live in a dystopia.
its the only movie theater for miles and miles. i have to drive to a haunted mall half an hour away to find another one.

hey, at least it exists... still sad

scariest dystopian headline:

There Is No Climate Haven. We All Live in Florida Now.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/07/opinion/hurricane-helene-climate-danger.html

Do the listings specifically say they’re playing Texas Chsinsaw Massacre on DVD, not the current 50th anniversary 4K re-release?

There Is No Climate Haven. We All Live in Florida Now.

negroni export biz about to blow up

also i figured central mass would be better for movies tbh. sending biz plan for scott's "reel movie xanadu." custom built negroni bar and storm shelter features

"Do the listings specifically say they’re playing Texas Chsinsaw Massacre on DVD, not the current 50th anniversary 4K re-release"

oh its probably 4k but still 35 mm or go home, no? i've never seen it on film. might even be tempted to see it at a trump theater on film.

they no longer have the ability to show film at this theater. the place is sad. ancient 30s place that has gone to hell.

reminds me of when i moved to philly in the 80s and you could still go to all the old huge art deco places to see movies and everything was basically a fire hazard. buckets all over the place to catch the water from the roof. center city had a bunch of them.

"Florida threatens to criminally charge TV stations airing abortion rights ad"

^ one of our local county judges here, who is very much anti-MAGA, did a breakdown of the absurdity of the statute the Florida DOH is trying to use in an attempt to charge the tv stations. from what I understand, the stations thankfully haven't pulled the ads, but DOH obviously has no intent to prosecute, they just wanted to get tv stations to pull the ads out of fear.

The apparatchik who issued the threat got fired.

https://www.tampabay.com/news/florida-politics/elections/2024/10/12/top-florida-health-department-attorney-resigns/

fired scapegoated

in this case scapegoated is fine with me, too

the actual fuck? surge pricing for groceries?

Families are struggling to put food on the table. I sent a letter to @Kroger about their decision to roll out surge pricing using facial recognition technology. Facial recognition technology is often discriminatory and shouldn't be used in grocery stores to price gouge residents. pic.twitter.com/KwvQB8dfwK

— Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (@RepRashida) October 15, 2024

What?!?

Wasn’t some fast food franchise “exploring” that option, then when news stories appeared, people freaked out and the franchise backpedaled?

Yeah, but I don't think they added the extra evil twist of using facial recognition technology to determine prices people would be "willing" to pay. this is supremely fucked up.

Good point

This is some dark shit

Kroger's has been doing it for years, just not for this specific purpose: https://www.goodmanallen.com/walgreens-and-kroger-sued-for-using-cameras-with-facial-recognition/

beyond fucked up.

Oh yes. Not only would water be more expensive when it was hot out, but it might be more expensive after work when more people are shopping or it might be more expensive for YOU if facial recog determines that you are personally or demographically likely to be able to pay more.

“There oughta be a law” became a cliche ages ago, but…

As much as I am against the carceral state in this country, there's an argument for locking up whatever executives pitched this under the fucking prison.

all billionaires should be frozen in Liquid Nitrogen and kicked repeatedly by martial arts experts

all billionaires should be frozen in Liquid Nitrogen and kicked repeatedly by martial arts experts

This interview between Hassan Minhaj and JB Pritzker (a billionaire) is interesting and worth watching:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9Llmi16s30

i am very interested in never watching that.

JUSTICE WARRIORS a very good comic by Ben Clarkson + Matt Bors just released its second tpb; I bought both last week, have only read the first, but can report that it strongly (and hilariously) affirms the premise of the thread

As much as I am against the carceral state in this country, there's an argument for locking up whatever executives pitched this under the fucking prison

Just beat them to death with bags of avocados.

i am very interested in never watching that.

― scott seward

i on the other hand am totally watching it

his cousin is jennifer pritzker, who is i believe the world's only trans billionaire

wikipedia says she's only worth 2.2 billion dollars, as opposed to j.b.'s 3.5 billion

you may know her from every single transphobe coming up with the same elaborate conspiracy theories about her that right-wingers have about warren buffett

the other thing is that when you're talking about illinois politicians

i genuinely can't say this man is making illinois politics _worse_ haha

-

it is genuinely a thing i struggle with

because there are _gross_ financial inequities among trans people

it's one of the major stressors among trans people... you have these STEM transfems (mostly white, some asians in the mix as well) who make pretty good money

i'm not super emotionally or financially stable right now, but i did have a systemic advantage going into transition

and i don't really _know_ how precarious i actually am

my boomer mom has plenty of money and is doing fine and feels like she's poor. she's on a fixed income and in assisted living and is worried that she'll live long enough that the money will run out. and maybe she will.

i have more money than most of my friends and people just openly say to me "maybe you should get different friends" because the people i hang out with are constantly poor and desperate

fuck i don't know

i try hanging out with people who aren't poor and desperate and i still don't fit in because i'm still pretty fuckin' desperate

none of which has anything to do with pritzker ig

i mean having watched that podcast pritzker is

well the first thing is that he talks like a politician, which is to say, he doesn't answer the questions he's asked

he's not genuinely engaging with minhaj, everything turns into talking points, everything turns into a campaign speech

this is condescending and dumb and i hate it

-

second off, although pritzker compares himself to humphrey, the whole "happy warrior" thing he does remind me more of theodore roosevelt

a scion of privilege choosing to engage directly in an extremely corrupt political system

ultimately i'd say he failed, at least in terms of new york, which, god, i don't think that state has ever been not corrupt

i also, though, am not generally the sort of person to sort people into "good" and "bad" categories. i think the _idea_ of the billionaire, the _idea_ of anyone holding that much disproportionate power, is bad. and i am at the same time a pragmatist. that's kind of weird, i mean, i'm a communist, but i'm a communist for entirely practical reasons. i think on some level... i mean minhaj doesn't show every one of pritzker's billionaire relatives, and jennifer doesn't have as much money as the people he does show. but jennifer pritzker is a billionaire and i think it's pragmatic of minhaj to not bring her up. it makes things more complicated than they need to be, even if he _is_ talking about jb's billionaire relatives.

even if i had the ability, i wouldn't immediately expropriate, say, jeff bezos' wealth. that's the difficult thing, that kind of approach doesn't actually _work_ when it's tried. i'd go a lot farther than pritzker, but i do see someone as pritzker who... the likelihood isn't high that he'll have any long-term positive effect on illinois politics. i kinda think illinois politics are beyond redemption. but that's not to say he can't do long-term good. theodore roosevelt did long-term good, along with long-term harm. i think it's important to acknowledge both, the role he had in entrenching institutional racism as well as the role he had in trust-busting. so i can't call him "good" or "bad" but some of the things he did were good, in the long-term. new york city still will tell you nonstop about their drinking water and that they have the best pizza because of it. i don't know about the pizza. but they do have good tap water.