Joe Litobarski 🇪🇺 🔌 📵 🔌 🇺🇸

Great piece by @joelitobarski.bsky.social in @ourkindredfuture.bsky.social !

ourkindredfuture.com/the-eu-shoul...

The EU should unplug from US tech - Joe Litobarski Imagine the United States had a democratic dashboard to judge the health of their political system. Right now, almost all the lights would be flashing red. Democracy relies on shared norms of civil di...

New blog post - "The #EU should unplug from US tech": joelitobarski.com/the-eu-shoul...

I enjoy the way people keep remembering that this is the plot of the movie *Elysium*.

People literally saw a science fiction film a decade ago and decided it had to be real.

Pritzer gets the mechanics of authoritarianism – systemic intimidation, seizing control of elections, etc. – in a way others in national democratic leadership don't or won't say out loud.

Graphic with the headline “London is the greatest city in the world” set against a bright view of the River Thames with the Shard, Tower Bridge and the city skyline. The text celebrates what makes London special: regularly voted the number one city in the world, incredible diversity with over 300 languages spoken, world-class transport, world leader in finance tech and life sciences, best museums and galleries many free to visit, world-leading nightlife, food sport and music for every taste, host to the world’s best sporting events, home to seven Premier League clubs, globally-ranked universities, a city where you can be yourself and love who you love, and a place for everyone.

I’ve said it once, I’ll say it again.

Ignore the haters, London is the 🐐

I just broke the news that our tech partners tracked over 277,000 devices in and around State Farm Stadium yesterday. They came from all across the country because Charlie pointed us all to Christ, and in his martyrdom given us the courage to do the same.

Proud to announce our unnamed tech partners tracked the cell phone locations of hundreds of thousands of people without their knowledge or consent

BREAKING — Notices for the Disney+ price increase went out at noon ET today, confirming my scoop from last night. Details: www.vulture.com/article/disn...

Dry summers, dirty water: the river Cam’s slow collapse The river Cam faces crisis from sewage pollution, over-abstraction, and inaction – locals fight to save its wildlife and natural flow

Five years ago, they warned the River Cam was only ‘one or two dry summers from crisis.’

That crisis has arrived – sewage, pollution, abstraction, and a dying chalk stream.

See why it matters.

Kate Moore reports during
#BigRiverWatch from @theriverstrust.bsky.social

The false 17th-C science of creating ghosts. PALINGENESIS. A fave topic. Take a living thing, burn it to ashes, grind it to the finest powder, then heat or nourish it. The image of the original would appear. Based on the idea that every molecule contained the imprint of the whole.

Returning to Church Won’t Save Us from Nihilism Engaging in ritual for ritual’s sake only deepens nihilism.

New article by me for @mitpress.bsky.social on the rise of "Nihilistic Violent Extremists" and why David Brooks is wrong to think that Church and "believing in belief" is the solution to nihilism rather than recognizing such empty rituals as the cause...
thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/returning-to...

They are hiding behind their rage and grief to avoid looking at what they are doing

Their grief and rage is real, and it very hard to hold space for that when our grief and rage is belittled and dismissed, every time

Their feelings are treated as facts, ours treated as punchlines. For years

Three arrested on suspicion of spying for Russia The two men and a woman were all arrested in Grays, Essex, the Metropolitan Police says.

#BBCNews - Three arrested by the Met on suspicion of spying for Russia
www.bbc.com/news/article...

like many old oil hands, in the 1970s Robert Redford became an advocate for solar energy:

Worried about Wikipedia as well. Easy to imagine a pretext post-Kirk: "refusal to remove claims our people are 'fascist' or 'far right'", "refusal to name far-left Antifa terrorist editors", etc.

Indeed. We don't know the terms of the settlement with the record labels, but certainly Universal and Sony (quite rightly) don't want to be seen as attacking the preservation of historical digital memory right now. But other actors might not settle out of court.

I do think we need public social media platforms to be developed by trusted public broadcasters, like the BBC. They can exist in competition with private-owned alternatives, that's fine, but should have public discourse as their mission and not just entertainment and profit.

I'm worried about the Internet archive.

Strong argument for moving Bluesky's data infrastructure to the EU

ABC Pulls Jimmy Kimmel Off Air for Charlie Kirk Comments After F.C.C. Pressure

I cannot think of a democracy anywhere in the world where this sort of thing could happen. www.nytimes.com/2025/09/17/b...

Starmer and Badenoch are handling the far-right march all wrong A look back to the days of Enoch Powell suggests a better model

superb column from @stephenkb.bsky.social

“racism does not diminish through rising GDP but through the willingness of politicians to argue against it….”

www.ft.com/content/fbbd...

Which government? The Trump administration (the one Musk belonged to)?

Robinson and Farage’s ‘civil war’ narrative is warping voters’ minds. How is any government supposed to counter it? | John Harris Whatever the reality of Britain today, our social media feeds are full of anger, violence and disorder – and that’s the reality politicians must confront, says Guardian columnist John Harris

"This is how reality and its representation online fall into a feedback loop. Phone videos show ever-increasing chaos, and people are convinced to join the massing forces who think the only answer is some kind of nativist authoritarianism."

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Nation on edge: Experts warn of “vicious spiral" in political violence after Kirk killing The assassination of right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk marks a watershed moment in a surge of U.S. political violence, one that some experts fear will inflame an already-fractured country and inspire more unrest.

I know Europeans don't want to hear it. I know it seems inconceivable to many here. But the US is headed toward a very dark place, and that will also shake the foundations of our continent here.

Everyone needs to have their eyes open.

Charlie Kirk called me a ‘lunatic’ and a ‘prostitute’ and demanded I be deported.

Nothing, *nothing*, justifies killing him, or robbing his kids of their dad.

We don’t know the identity or motive of the shooter but murder can *never* be the response to political disagreements.

Larry Ellison dislodges Elon Musk as world’s richest person Ellison’s shares in the technology giant Oracle are currently valued at $389bn (£287bn), just ahead of Musk’s $384bn (£283bn) fortune US tech billionaire Larry Ellison has overtaken Elon Musk as the world’s richest person after shares in Oracle, the business he co-founded, rocketed in early trading on Wednesday. Ellison’s wealth has surged after the company, in which he owns a stake of 41%, reported better than expected financial results. Continue reading...

Larry Ellison dislodges Elon Musk as world’s richest person

Opinion | Stop Acting Like This Is Normal

“It’s been about six months since Schumer decided that it wasn’t the time for a fight. … Democratic leaders have had six months to come up with a plan. … If the plan is still nothing, then Democrats need new leaders.”

Mm-hm.

We have a paper on how Labour's strategy is disastrous.

There's an exclusive coverage in @newstatesman.com

www.newstatesman.com/politics/202...

This is it. Badenoch proves that it’s possible to work your way to the top, destroy the most successful political party in the western world in less than a year, and open the door to the radical right if you just believe in yourself

There's still a lot of "oh he'll fail to consolidate a full-blown authoritarian regime," as if that means the threat can be dismissed, let's just keep going like we'll get our turn back in power soon enough. But that's entirely contingent on what we do now. There's no guarantee it won't go that far.

The constitutional framework isn't one issue among others, something you talk about but then move on to the details of whatever normal legislative policies you'd prioritize if your party wins the next election. Nothing else matters when you're losing the laws and institutions that let you do that.