Mel Moderato

Melissa Antunes
Brazilian Travesti
Two-time medalist at the Brazilian Astronomy and Astrophysics Olympiad
Fix the machine.
The world is dying.

@lulaoficialbluesky.bsky.social @janjalulasilva.bsky.social @dilma.com.br @aoc.bsky.social @crockett.house.gov @governor.ca.gov @vonderleyen.ec.europa.eu

24/
You can skip the metaphors; the math stays:
• 1/0 is undefined.
• Anything ×0 stays 0.
• A welfare function with people at 0 isn’t “neutral,” it’s engineered cruelty.

Real question for states, churches, markets, platforms, pundits:

What’s your zero?

23/
Definition of an economy:

An economy is a logistical administration of commodified energy (@IEA, @FAO, @ILO, @WTO)
with a lexicographic constraint that:
• no one is disposable,
• no land/water/climate is burnt for short-term gain,
• every model answers to those it set to 0.

22/
Working definition:

Queer economics = the science that:
1️⃣ treats every body & ecosystem as a hard constraint,
2️⃣ counts what capitalism/statecraft wrote off as “externality,”
3️⃣ audits every index, law, dogma, biz model with:

“Who’s your zero, and who chose that?”

21/
Back to cyberpunk: @GreatDismal’s corps owning data + @JanelleMonae’s dirty computers map:

Stack = code + cops + capital.
Zero = whoever is “bug/glitch/waste.”

Queer/Black/migrant/sex-worker lives sit closest to the system’s divide-by-zero point, so their theory is sharpest.

20/
Bottom-up metrics already exist:
• participatory budgeting (@pbbudgeting),
• community climate indices,
• @UNDRR risk maps,
• @WHO equity stats.

Queer econ says: move them from appendix to dashboard. Let those at highest risk define what “acceptable” looks like.

19/
“But that will paralyze policy.”

Good.

If your policy only “works” by:
• sacrificing disabled people in pandemics,
• flooding villages,
• deporting Queer refugees to torture,
• burning biomes for cheap beef,

then paralysis = prudence. The fix is changing the zero, not the spin.

18/
Lexicographic constraint, in econ-speak:

For any policies x,y:
if x sets any group/ecosystem to 0 (death/unlivable) and y does not, then y ≻ x regardless of growth/efficiency/returns.

No model that treats some humans as expendable is “welfare-maximizing.”

17/
@ruthbenghiat shows how strongmen stretch labels like “vermin,” “degenerates,” “enemies.” Zero analysis translates:
• call a group “degenerate” → lower their weight in the welfare function;
• call them “threat” → justify pushing them to 0.
You rewrote the algorithm.

16/
Enter @ButlerSocSci @feministkilljoys @bellhooks & Brazilian Black/putafeminists (e.g. Feminismos Plurais): lugar de fala = standpoint. Zero analysis is the quantitative cousin: your “view from nowhere” that erases trans/sex worker/favela/refugee is actually from somewhere very specific.

15/
If scripture is only liturgy, never art, you hide the craft:
• parable as political code,
• metaphor as risk model,
• apocalypse as crisis forecast.
Call it untouchable dogma and elites can launder necropolitical choices as “God’s will,” not policy.

14/
Religion is also a zero question. Bible/Torah are crafted texts by communities under empire, not raw dictation. @ASOR_org @SocBibLit show layers, edits, genres. Zero analysis: who is “chosen”? Who becomes “enemy/abomination”? That’s a welfare function on parchment.

13/
Call it affective-artistic capital (upgrade on Bourdieu):
• @RecordingAcad charts, radio, playlists, stan metrics, cancel cycles
= how we decide whose feelings, trauma, joy, labor count in culture—and whose art is treated as disposable content.

12/
Pop does the same math:
• @KeshaRose “Rich, White, Straight Men” → who counts whom?
• @MarinaDiamandis “Savages” → normalized violence.
• @ladygaga x @BrunoMars “Die With A Smile” → romance on the brink.
• @taylorswift13 TTPD → love under metrics.
All ask: who gets to be >0?

11/
Why cyberpunk canon (@GreatDismal, @JanelleMonae) matters: Neuromancer, Dirty Computer show data + bodies + networks as 1 system: whoever owns the code decides who’s ghosted/erased. Cyberpunk isn’t neon; it’s a warning about who your zero is in platform capitalism.

10/
The “median guy index” ≠ “the people.” It’s a statistical avatar: usually male, cishet, majority, citizen, formal worker. Everyone else = “externality.” Queer econ rewrites the function: no externalities, only first-order constraints.

9/
@UNDP IHDI, @OECD & @Oxfam show averages lie when the floor collapses. Zero analysis: stop optimizing the median guy; optimize the worst-off. If min(health, safety, dignity, planetary viability) = 0 for any group, your “growth” is necropolitical.

8/
Political science calls courts, central banks, donors, lobby-heavy legislatures veto players. Zero analysis asks: who do they never protect? If @IMFNews @WorldBank @OECD guard debt but sacrifice kids, refugees, forests & Queer people first, the veto is colonial.

7/
@AchilleMbembe: necropolitics = power deciding who may live/ die. The @UN Genocide Convention names only the loudest version. The system already killed when a welfare cut, poisoned river, visa ban, denied asylum pushed specific groups to 0.

6/
@KateRaworth’s doughnut: inner ring = social floor, outer ring = planetary ceiling. Zero analysis: the doughnut is a zero-shaped veto. Crossing floor or ceiling is not an “unfortunate tradeoff” – it’s an illegal move in a sane system.

5/
Formal move:

An economy is the logistical administration of commodified energy with a lexicographic constraint.

Logistics = chains, ports, code, care, finance.
Commodified energy = food, fuel, power, attention.
Lexicographic constraint = no person/ecosystem can be 0.

4/
Most “median-guy” indices hide the zero:
• GDP per capita loves an oil boom, ignores the favela.
• “Average” wage erases informal/care/sex work.
• Risk models price Black & brown lives as cheap volatility.
That’s bias, not “neutrality.”

3/
Queer economics = the science that counts the uncounted. It borrows tools from @Noahpinion @paulkrugman @ThomasPiketty (inequality, r>g, trade, risk) and asks: who’s missing, whose death is a rounding error, who never becomes a “representative agent”?

2/
Call this zero analysis: for any model, index, law, sermon, biz plan, ask: who is set to 0? (no voice, weight, protection, data). If it’s Queer/Black/poor/migrant/planet → that’s necropolitics (@AchilleMbembe).

1/
Let’s play a game: what’s a zero? Not vibes—math & policy. In algebra, 0 is what you can’t divide by. In politics, 0 is whoever you treat as expendable. Every system quietly answers.

compartilhem se puder, leiam, mas é importante mesmo.

eu não sei até onde meu algo vai aqui, mas gente, o problema é sério. se vocês virem o post, entra no meu perfil e leia a questão de Madagascar. isso é fundamental.

46/
Je termine: si un système ne garantit pas la viabilité des plus exposé·es et ne tient pas sous plafond écologique, il n’est pas “neutre”. Il est organisé. Et on peut l’organiser autrement.
— Mel

Sinon, c’est l’austérité pour les pauvres et l’impunité pour les puissants.