Val Weston

A knock on the window and a glimpse of America’s surveillance future “This is taking a big and very scary step toward a kind of totalitarian checkpoint society,” a privacy advocate warns in a special France 24–Mother Jones report.

"This isn't a border checkpoint. This is your neighborhood. ICE is now running facial recognition on phones — stopping people on the street, scanning faces in real time. What happens when the algorithm is wrong?"

The Moment They Can’t Control You, You Become a B*tch How I no longer shrink to make men happy

The Moment They Can’t Control You, You Become a B*tch by @MsTsitsi85 medium.com/bitchy/the-m...

YouTube video by Forbrukerrådet - Norwegian Consumer Council A Day in the Life of an Ensh*ttificator

Brilliant.
youtu.be/T4Upf_B9RLQ?...

Paying New Mexico Legislators Could Open the Door to More Women at the Roundhouse - New Mexico Commission on the Status of Women New Mexico’s citizen legislature has long been a point of pride, but it has also created a significant barrier to who is able to serve. Two bills introduced during the current legislative session, Hou...

"Paying legislators a modest, median-based salary would not make legislative service lucrative—but it would make it possible."

nmcsw.org/paying-nm-le...

#HoldTheLine: The Battle for Truth | Maria Ressa | TEDxXavierSchool #HoldTheLine: The Battle for Truth | Maria Ressa | TEDxXavierSchool As a journalist in Asia for almost thirty years, Maria Ressa tells us her never-ending passion and determination to seek the truth....

One of many good nuggets in this talk:
"If you don't have facts, you can't have truth. Your truth grows out of the facts that you have, and if you don’t have truth, you can’t have trust. If you don’t have any of these, then democracy is impossible."

www.ted.com/talks/maria_...

a black and white photo of a woman with the words " a happy anna howard shaw day to us all " above her ALT: a black and white photo of a woman with the words " a happy anna howard shaw day to us all " above her

😏https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Howard_Shaw_Day

Kristi Noem AND Stephen Miller must go.

Hey, national media editors at @nytimes.com, @wsj.com,
@washingtonpost.com, @theatlantic.com, @latimes.com, and many others. How about if you stop referring to ICE as "law enforcement"?
Because it's clear that's not what are.

Two US governors — a Democrat and a Republican — on why there's hope for democracy Two current US governors — Democrat Matt Meyer of Delaware and Republican J. Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma — trade notes on how to rebuild trust without partisan theater. In this special segment of "On the ...

Lots of good nuggets in this one.

www.ted.com/talks/matt_m...

This is actually the really simple story of the collapse of American democracy. You can explain America’s constitutional collapse in a single coherent sentence:

6 Statistics That Prove Feminism Is Better for Men, Too Believe it or not, I don’t want men to suffer

Maria Cassano has some interesting thoughts on my 2nd favorite F word.

medium.com/fourth-wave/...

This is a project that @valwestonnm.bsky.social and I have been working on for quite some time.

Don't like clickbait? Don't click Doesn't it seem like a lot of online news sites have moved beyond reporting the news to openly inciting your outrage (and your page views)? News analyst Sally Kohn suggests — don't engage with news th...

@jcbrandon.bsky.social and I often say "you don't have to participate" but we may need to update that to "you have a societal obligation not to participate."

Studies Show That Predators Target Women Based on One Thing Attackers all chose similar victims  —  and it wasn’t what they were wearing.

"Female rage is an extremely effective survival strategy because it doesn’t seek to overpower men’s bodies. Rather, it short-circuits their brains."

medium.com/bitchy/studi...

"We create, conflate, perpetuate binaries that create divisions in our society."

A liberating vision of identity that transcends labels How can we move past society's inclination to box people in with binary thinking and labels? Social work professor Jioji Ravulo believes we need to embrace multiplicity, exploring how Indigenous persp...

"It's all of us as a broader society that needs to be part of a shared conversation to decolonize, deconstruct and disrupt binary ways of thinking, feeling and behaving."

Powerful TED Talk from a truly charming speaker.

www.ted.com/talks/jioji_...

Existing in the Age of Dupe-Culture Philosophy Why are we ghost quoting for clout now?

Spot on.
medium.com/@kristieb/ex...

Overheard at the dentist office–
Receptionist: “I’m still busy scheduling all the people with broken teeth from over the weekend” 😲🎃🍬

Quick-Build Projects Lead to Improvements in Pedestrian Safety: Here's How! Quick-build projects have the potential to improve pedestrian safety, as demonstrated during a workshop and event for the Road to Zero.

"Basically, drivers adopt the speed dictated to them by the design of the road."

americawalks.org/improving-pe...

screenshot of Facebook post from New Mexico Wilderness Alliance regarding form to report abuse of public lands during government shutdown.

Bringing this over from FB for public lands advocates.
www.nmwild.org/report-an-is...

In Which Nadine Amuses a Dragon and Makes Autumn Happen

Backcountry Hunters & Anglers Readies Grassroots Network for Roadless Rule Comment Period Backcountry Hunters & Anglers is the voice for our wild public lands, waters and wildlife.

"The National Forest System already contains twice as many miles of roads as the U.S. interstate highway system. Expanding this network would fragment wildlife habitat, degrade water quality, and increase wildfire risk."

www.backcountryhunters.org/backcountry_...

Public media stations in rural America say emergency alert funding is in jeopardy Without congressionally approved funding, public media stations say communities will be left with aging infrastructure amid growing risks from extreme weather.

Without congressionally approved funding, public media stations say communities will be left with aging infrastructure amid growing risks from extreme weather.

🏕️ The REI Labor Day sale ends this weekend. If you’re camping curious, here’s a short list of what to buy at the sale. (Also, please feel free to hit me up with any questions)

→ What car camping stuff to buy at REI this year

But when you let the government take people's children without due process and detain people indefinitely without access to council, you are failing the test. What's happening to immigrants now is a preview of where we're all headed if we fail to act." 2/2

Erika Pinheiro: What's really happening at the US-Mexico border -- and how we can do better At the US-Mexico border, policies of prolonged detention and family separation have made seeking asylum in the United States difficult and dangerous. In this raw and heartfelt talk, immigration attorn...

And this was back in 2019 😥
"The dystopian immigration systems being built up in first-world countries are a test of citizens to see how far you're willing to let the government go in taking away other people's rights when you think it won't happen to you. 1/2

www.ted.com/talks/erika_...

How I went viral for getting vaccinated Ethan Lindenberger never got vaccinated as a kid. So one day, he went on Reddit and asked a simple question: "Where do I go to get vaccinated?"

Great short talk with several key messages. He's talking about vaccines but the larger message of staying true to data but using authenticity to connect with people about that data to promote change has such broad applications, especially in today's supercharged political climate.

An explanation of Trump’s DC takeover: though crime in the city is at a 30-year low, interest in the Epstein Files is at a 30-year high

You know, that's a good point I hadn't considered. 💯

Right there with ya!