Cedar Riener

it’s only an echo chamber when it’s the left. when it’s the right they call it some bullshit like the Agora or the Town Square

Abstract of panel on connecting regular people to politics. Why has voting decreased among low income non voters? Too much of politics ignore non voters, how do we bring back in

Next panel includes @daniellaurison.bsky.social , @povertyscholar.bsky.social and @dorianwarren.bsky.social on bridging the political disconnect. How do we build a more inclusive democracy?

Description of panel on race, gender in political staffers

First panel has James R Jones (Rutgers-Newark, Prof, studies racism in Congress), Beth Pearson (chief of staff, Sen. Warren, fmr AAAS-STPF fellow with ASA) and @alondra.bsky.social on Personnel is Policy. They reflect on how sociological training&research affected their policy paths

Psyched to be here at Peopling Politics, Bringing the People Back in, a symposium on race, class and inequality in US politics.
Excited to hear some of my longtime intellectual heroes outside of psych like @daniellaurison.bsky.social , @alondra.bsky.social and @povertyscholar.bsky.social

@vahousedems and @vasenatedems - Collective bargaining means stronger families, stronger communities, and a stronger VA economy. We need a CB bill that includes ALL workers, including higher AND home health care workers! drive.google.com/file/d/1ItRS...

Moonlight is always the forgotten stepchild, even though it’s the first black film with an all black cast to win Best Picture.

If you thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail anytime after 2002, you hiked on rock stairs that I built during the summers of 2001-02. This involved digging up huge pieces of granite, flying them through the woods on a winch line, slicing them with a rock drill, & fitting them onto the hill like a puzzle

Marc Andreesen said on a podcast that there was no point being a socially responsible wealthy person anymore because “the bargain” had been broken and you would be criticized no matter what, because he melted his brain following random Twitter accounts (he followed me for a bit). Too big a risk!

Yeah like to put things in perspective, the damage done by Sergey Brin’s ex-wife single handedly funding large segments of the anti-vax movement probably undid shitloads of positive public health work done through philanthropy. The ability to use that money for evil shit is just far greater.

They’re active, looking to stay that way and responsible enough to keep an appt a couple times a week for 2 months or so.

I always tell my friends who are looking for a man over 40 that I have found them. They are all at physical therapy.

Jesse singal literally wrote a whole article about an imaginary me and then asked people to be furious at his fantasy version of me.

The industrialization of language production is destroying the artisanal production of text.

We should be clear about what this is: The real subsumption of life under the logic of capital

Screenshot of the exchange: “If anyone actually believes that, that's terrifying.” Me: “I'm sorry but lots of people believe it, and they are not necessarily wrong. Writing is not just personal expression. Most writing in the world is functional, workaday, conmoditized. People are paid to do it or are coerced (school). You can't be an observer of what writing is and not accept that.”

In another thread, I suggested/asserted that LLMs are deeply compatible with the general economy of writing. I received the well-meaning response anonymized below, and I am reposting my reply.

As someone who has survived multiple jaw bone infections and needed several endodontic treatments for tooth infections, let me tell you that this man died in one of the most painful ways possible

They tortured him. An untreated tooth infection is torture.

a lot of critiques in aughts alleged that pentagon was influencing video games and in truth the relationship seems to be the other way around

What I mean by continued attacks. Sweeping federal control and ideological tests in the name of accountability for measurable outcomes.

Brown University researchers launch AI legislation tracking and analysis portal As a tool for researchers, lawmakers, journalists and the public, the CNTR AISLE Portal provides analysis of state- and federal-level AI bills pending across the U.S.

Great resource for anyone engaged or interested in US AI policy and governance from @geomblog.bsky.social and his team www.brown.edu/news/2026-03...

I hope we can all start organizing and expanding our solidarity, even when it is inconvenient or awkward because we are going to need each other in this new era of attacks in higher ed.

The same urgent student activist energy that occupies a building is needed when it comes time to protect the institution they love and the faculty that nurtured their love of learning and focused their curiosity into a career path.

But now is the time for admin, students and faculty to recognize that organizing is needed to save higher ed and help save democracy. We all must see that the same AAUP that sues T admin for cancelling grants or vile incursion also helps faculty when admin wants to fire w no basis.

Another link in this is also faculty. Faculty as a whole are far less protected with shift away from tenure and toward contingent, part time share.google/EYoYLPa6pAfA...
But we tenured have also shrunk our political organizing, or even organizing ourselves as we've withdrawn into disciplinary silos.

But also linked with a youthful urgency that is so so valuable. So many admins in the past few years have stifled this with many measures both byzantine bureaucratic and direct, because student activism threatens "brand" of college to donors, to policymakers, to parents, even to prospective students

I do like this op ed as well as the efforts he describes. But higher ed admins should reckon with how they've both encouraged political apathy and discouraged political engagement from students. Student political engagement often linked to activism & like so much learning, awkward, not quite right.

“Geoff Manley — the neurosurgeon who saved my life — was chief among them. In the ICU & throughout recovery, he paired extraordinary technical mastery with something rarer: an instinct to level with patients and families. He explained what he knew, what he did not yet know, & what depended on time”

“Increasingly, research supports the idea that medicine works better when it acknowledges this democratic psychology. Peer-support models improve adherence, mental health, & long-term outcomes across chronic disease, cancer…patients engage more deeply when someone “like them” is part of the picture”

What Alexis de Tocqueville taught me about recovering from a brain injury When we are ill, we need expertise more than ever, yet our agency feels fragile. The best clinicians recognize this, a patient writes.

“In democracies, people grant legitimacy not only to those with superior knowledge but also to those whose experience mirrors their own. We listen not just vertically, to institutions, but horizontally, to one another. And we often listen better to the horizontal voice.” @jackiantonovich.bsky.social

I wish we had a Norwegian consumer council! What a great ad.

A blue T-shirt with a picture of Doc Brown from Back to the Future, the term "Deranged Activity", and a graph of NIH funding curves from 2021-2026.

I even got a new T-shirt made for the occasion (which should arrive on Friday.

2/2

If you ever want to read a paper for free and can't find it otherwise, email the lead author and politely ask for a copy. You will not be bothering the person. You will in fact make their whole entire day. I have had scientists get so excited I asked they sent me everything they ever published.