Dr. Katja Thieme (she/they)

Pinkerite has a section on Pinker in this report.

www.mergatroyd.org/pinker/pinke...

I joined Bluesky because I thought it was going to be a safe place for me as a trans woman. There was so much promise of it being a permanent social media home.

We all deserve a straightforward answer from management if they'll protect their users from harm, or if they'll protect abusers instead.

Police Said They Surveilled Woman Who Had an Abortion for Her 'Safety.' Court Records Show They Considered Charging Her With a Crime Court records show that the narrative Flock and a Texas Sheriff's Office has told the public isn't the whole story, and that police were conducting a 'death investigation' into the abortion.

NEW: In May, a Texas police department said they used the powerful Flock surveillance network against a woman who had an abortion "for her safety"

Newly obtained court records show it was a 'death investigation,' and they considered charging her with a crime

www.404media.co/police-said-...

As basic question from an ex-police reporter: Can some of our journalists detail the training regimen all these new federal agents receive? The lethal incompetence involving use of force and perameters of the 4A suggests they are just handed guns, masks and badges and told to go fuck people up.

One of the more incredible stories out of LA this year has been how a taco review blog became the best on-the-ground coverage of ICE raids in the city.

They do a dispatch every day, follow-up on the kidnapped people (which almost no media outlet has done), and fact-check government claims.

True enough.

bsky.app/profile/junl...

Once you see it, you can't unsee it.

bsky.app/profile/mady...

Here's the core of recent content moderation questions relating to bsky. Or, why #JesseSingal is still here.

Amen to that.

Stalker Already Using OpenAI's Sora 2 to Harass Victim A journalist claims that her stalker used Sora 2, the latest video app from OpenAI, to churn out videos of her.

“…that Sora is being used for stalking and harassment will likely not be an edge case, because deepfaking yourself and others into videos is one of its core selling points.”

Far from an edge case, it’s the primary use case.

Well, it's Peter Shamshiri writing on it in this case, not me. I'm glad though it made you feel affirmed in your sense of sanity.

But this time posing as if it's actually liberal.

This was, ultimately, the point of substack: throw money at reactionary bloggers, claim that this is a new media and not just fissioning off the clicky bits from legacy publications, then let the price of media giants drop enough for all the worst people to buy them up and install their media pets.

The aim is the destruction of actual journalism. Indeed.

bsky.app/profile/katt...

Meanwhile, OpenAI is being sued because its chatbots encouraged a child to kill himself. It helped a mentally unwell veteran to kill his mother. As @hypervisible.blacksky.app but it, OpenAI is nothing less than a "social arsonist." And it's plowing ahead to keep the bubble inflated.

The dog whistles. They ring and ring and ring.

"Journalism that respects our audience enough to tell the truth plainly—wherever it leads."

It's both, isn't it. Big double and triple helpings of bias and incompetence.

“Bari Weiss has no idea what she’s doing. CBS News is a newsroom, and Bari has never run a newsroom (The Free Press does publish some real reporting, but the vast majority of its output is punditry). She’s never even really been a reporter. Her editorial output is embarrassing.”

A painful part about being disabled and forming community among other disabled folks is the loss factor.

We live in a country that does not value life, and certainly not disabled lives.

I feel like another mutual gets lost to the system monthly and it's so damned disheartening.

"The comedians who have agreed to perform in the Riyadh Comedy Festival are just global court jesters, willing to sell some yuks to the highest royal bidder – even if said Royal, Mohammed bin Salman, has billions in one hand and a bone-saw in the other."

Judge’s house fire being investigated; 3 hospitalized SLED is investigating a house fire in Colleton County on Saturday afternoon that has left three hospitalized.

Yikes! Judge Diane Goodstein had reportedly received death threats in recent weeks following a ruling against the Trump administration. Her home has now been destroyed in an apparent explosion and fire, which is under investigation. Three people have been hospitalized. www.wistv.com/2025/10/04/s...

Every week my inbox is clogged with reminders and announcements of research grants that only work for people who already hold other research grants or are otherwise embedded in highly conditioned grant structures.

It’s a machine. There is no reason for politeness. There’s reason to not add polite words, in fact.

If you do it because it’s ingrained, sure I can see that.

For the purpose of using the tool, tho, the most direct language makes more sense.

no like the spiritual warfare that evangelical christians talk about constantly. demonic energies unleashed by their enemies and so on

For anyone who would like to hear it, I can only say the best about the 90+ students I am currently teaching in my first-year writing courses. They are sincere about learning. They bring as much of their full selves into the class as they feel capable and safe to do so. 1/

disclosure: i (an anonymous voice on the internet) have done (run) a lot of small team IT in corporate world + have a lot of ties to university IT, and i could write a tome on "Microsoft is quicksand, one 'this shitty deal is too good to pass up' after another." it creeps up from every side.

I read that comment as starting from the premise that the does team not treat its users as a community in which users have a say. If we go from there, then what are users to them?

Suspending Link after he pointed out the how following Jonathan Chait after being accused of transphobia does not allow you to beat the transphobia allegations. In fact, it does the opposite.

To be clear: suspending Link was certainly a choice. And we know what KIND of choice it is.

Billy Joel Doesn't Know Why More People Aren't Cracking Nazi Skulls "Those creeps are going to march through the streets of my country?" he asked David Marchese. "Uh-uh."

Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you one of the most punk headlines I've read