Artemis

I'm a bisexual anti-capitalist, artist, & aspiring propagandist. We're not free until we're *all* free.

Guillermo del Toro fan account. Anarchist pep-talks are provided free of charge. Solidarity forever!

Profile pic & banner are images of GI Robot from Creature Commandos

#nobot

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Last Notes

2026-06-29 17:49:13 UTC

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@nprofile…5qg3
Yes, exactly this kind of thing!

2026-06-16 18:24:34 UTC

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Purge night would be a great time for climate defenders & saboteurs of all kinds.

2026-06-15 15:02:41 UTC

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Ohhhhhhh.
It's actually easier in some circumstances to stand up for yourself if *you* have been punished for it vs. having mostly watched others be punished for it, isn't it?
Having experienced how much it sucks to be punished vs how much it sucks to just shut up & let shit happen, we'll choose the temporary pain of being punished over the long-term pain of being mistreated.
But perhaps if you only watch & think "couldn't be me," it's actually much harder to get the courage to push back.

2026-06-15 14:59:06 UTC

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Which of us 6 children advocate for themselves & which usually don't?
It splits half & half right down the middle. Myself, my little brother, & our little sister are vocal about our needs. Not without anxiety. There is a lot of self-doubt, but we know that we have to stand up for ourselves.
Our 3 older siblings though? Much less likely to stand up to unfairness, even when they are on the receiving end.

2026-06-15 14:55:29 UTC

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My parents didn't mean to, but they taught my older siblings a lot of quite antisocial things through how they parented *me*.
It's not isolated. It wasn't just my experience. My siblings watched & learned. They learned that being unkind is ok, but it's not ok for someone to complain of it.
I would have to guess that they didn't just learn not to worry about being considerate but that they also didn't learn to object when they are the ones not receiving consideration. It's a trap.

2026-06-12 14:30:12 UTC

The word of the day is disobedience: "a refusal to submit to the arbitrary demands of an 'authority'."

2026-06-09 12:18:54 UTC

I can't believe how long it took me to check out the Paris Paloma song "Labour".
Every woman who has been in an unequal relationship where her love & labour were exploited for her partner's convenience will resonate so strongly with this.
My first marriage drained me of my joy while I served my husband's needs.
This song could have come from my soul.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=jvU4xWsN7-A

2026-06-08 14:42:19 UTC

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I am convinced that the primary reason being fat is associated with risk of early death is that doctors won't treat fat people until they lose weight.
I don't know how many stories I have heard about fat people who—after YEARS of going to the doctor complaining of health issues & being sent away without any further investigation—found out they were in advanced stages of cancer (or another illness) that should have been caught & treated long ago.

2026-06-08 14:23:12 UTC

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The size of people's bodies is not the problem: abuse, oppression, & deprivation are.
Let's end poverty & see what people's health looks like THEN.

2026-06-05 22:19:33 UTC

"Jack of all trades, master of none" is just AuDHD.

2026-06-05 19:48:32 UTC

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@nprofile…rcnq
I believe the thing that most recently caught my attention was watching a movie where British people were pronouncing certain Hindi words & it was really jarring to hear them spoken that way.
I wouldn't expect an American to pronounce them correctly. I would expect an American to pronounce them using the "foreign language pronunciation rules."

2026-06-05 19:44:50 UTC

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@nprofile…rcnq
It's more of an affectation used to indicate "this is a foreign word," not a serious attempt at correct pronunciation.

2026-06-05 19:42:14 UTC

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@nprofile…rcnq
There's a fuzzy area when it comes to words passing into the lexicon. Is "croissant" a French word or is it an English word derived from French?
But again, it's not about correct pronunciation at all. It's a feature of spoken American English that people tend to pronounce non-English words using a different set of pronunciation rules than they use in their ordinary speech. One feature is lengthening vowels, for instance "a" will frequently be long instead of short.

2026-06-05 16:51:55 UTC

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What *always* throws me for a loop watching British TV & movies is how people tend to pronounce non-English words as if they were just ordinary English words. Zero thought into how someone else would pronounce it.
Unfortunately I'm having a hard time thinking of examples off the top of my head, even though it happens all the time.
I don't know what caused that difference to develop, & I don't necessarily have an opinion about it, but I have to admit that to my American ear, it sounds so rude.

2026-06-01 15:55:46 UTC

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Is thinking about your death a "bad thought"?
Are people really trained to shut down reflections on the most basic facts of life as though there is something wrong or dangerous about contemplating simple reality?
Who is telling people that thinking about those things is bad, & how do you get people to stop chasing away every uncomfortable thought once they've learned the habit? Can we create a culture where it's normal to be aware of our own impermanence? Or is that too much to ask?

2026-06-01 15:51:04 UTC

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A lot of people just constantly shove down all their unpleasant thoughts & ignore all their uncomfortable questions, huh?
Is this how it goes? "Hmm. I wonder what will happen when I die. What does it even mean to die? What remains of us afterwards? Wait! That's a bad thought. Don't think about that!"

2026-06-01 15:46:23 UTC

If you're able to acknowledge that we all age & die eventually, congratulations! You are ahead of most people, it would seem.
The amount of denial people have about aging is absolutely wild. If you've been watching people get old your whole life, how have you not been mentally preparing yourself for this reality in your own life?
Why don't we learn to handle change & death, given that these are constants in all of our lives? Time passes, things change, & all living things eventually die.

2026-05-28 13:28:34 UTC

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And have they backed off on their ridiculous demands just because it isn't working for them? No! They are literally out there calling every woman with a belly pooch disgusting while complaining that women won't have their babies.
These contradictions can function when you have women trapped & under control. Without having the control, however, it's all very counterproductive.

2026-05-28 13:24:32 UTC

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Being a woman right now feels like having people scream absolutely horrible things in your face & then pout & complain that you don't appreciate them. It's being a target for hatred from people who expect in return that you will coddle their fragile male egos.
These men don't realize we are human. That's pretty clear because they don't think in terms of "what would incentivize a person to go along with what I want?"

2026-05-28 13:20:37 UTC

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It's hard to incentivize women to want this when the "incentives" are just severely curtailed versions of the rights we enjoy right now because we fought to not have them denied to us.

2026-05-21 15:29:32 UTC

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I sometimes see people say "I can't practice mindfulness because I have ADHD", & while I don't show up in their mentions telling them they are doing it wrong, it often seems like they feel that way because they have been poorly taught, which saddens me.
It is NOT true that having a busy brain that responds to all kinds of stimuli (& creates its own stimuli when not enough is available) means you can't practice mindfulness in a beautiful & beneficial way. You may benefit from it more than many.

2026-05-21 15:19:57 UTC

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Mindfulness is a practice. It's something you do actively, not a passive state of mind. When you do it, you improve your capacity for it even more.
It's fine if the practice of mindfulness is not for you. That's your choice, but if you *do* want to practice mindfulness but feel like you fail at it, give yourself some grace & let go of the self-judgment. Even when you are "failing" at it, you are participating in the practice.
Recommended reading: You Are Here by Thich Nhat Han.

2026-05-21 15:13:34 UTC

I think I got this from Pema Chodron, but it is also related to teaching from Thich Nhat Han.
If you are practicing mindfulness, then one of the things you will become aware of is how much thinking you do that pulls you out of the present moment. You are being mindful of *yourself* when you perceive that. You are observing yourself without judgement or anger.
You label the thoughts "thinking" & allow them to pass. That's part of the practice, not a failure.

2026-05-21 12:47:02 UTC

So Trump dumped a bunch of money into the primaries to get pro-Trump Republican candidates...
Is he going to commit the same money to the general election?
Gotta be honest, I doubt it.

2026-05-20 15:53:28 UTC

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If I weren't on Fedi, I think I would feel a lot more despair over the world right now, & it's not just the fact that there are a lot of like-minded folks here nor that in many corners of it we try to cultivate a culture of kindness, as great as those things are.
It's such a fucking relief in the age of AI & walled gardens & information control to have an Internet space created by & for human beings. Not for corporations. Not for bots. Not for data harvesting.
An Internet for Humans.

2026-05-20 15:47:06 UTC

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The future is human.
There are a lot of things that seem like they should be automatable, but when there is such concerted effort being put toward keeping us ignorant & disconnected from each other, our solutions are going to be powered by people.
I think decentralized networks of people sharing & connecting are the only way that we maintain an Internet for Humans.
(Is IFH anything already that would make it confusing? "Internet for Humans" seems like a pretty good term/identifier)

2026-05-20 15:18:04 UTC

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I see lots of people recommending curated lists of links to sites/resources, which I think is a great partial solution (there is a diversity of options, & the answer is almost certainly not one single approach).
A place to start would be looking at the resources we have in our own areas of expertise or interest & creating annotated lists with links.
Without hosting that somewhere, it's not much use, but if I started now, once I figure out how I want to share that info, I'd be ready to go.

2026-05-20 13:53:20 UTC

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@nprofile…4eh0
I love it!

2026-05-20 12:49:05 UTC

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I guess in a sense I already use Fedi as my search engine.
If I'm not in a rush & don't need a result right now, it works pretty well to post & ask people "where can I find...?"
I will eventually get some people pointing me to real resources that they find valuable.

2026-05-20 12:38:26 UTC

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I know that the non-corporate web exists, because here I am on Fedi.
Google searches mostly bring me results from what is effectively a different Internet: an empty corporate wasteland. Google doesn't want me to find anything else.

2026-05-20 12:33:09 UTC

So we *really* need to come up with solutions to make the living Internet (the part with real people) navigable, huh?
This isn't just obnoxious. This is an effort to make sure you don't find anything on your own or stumble into anything unexpected.
I used to be an expert at using Google to find stuff, but it's been years since any of that worked.

2026-05-20 12:33:09 UTC

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I don't know that the solution is another search engine, at least not one that resembles what search engines are now.
I want to be able to find stuff put out by actual human beings, not AI slop or SEO garbage.
How do we make it possible to still find new connections & information in such a hostile space?
To me, it's not a search problem per se. We have to get out of the zombie-web. We have to be able to find & link together the real, living Internet.

2026-05-19 17:18:02 UTC

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So I think that's kind of the sticking point. If I'm really unmasking, then I'm not going to be predictable. I'm going to have different energy sometimes.
It's not so much that I fear that unmasking through the PMDD symptoms would make me an asshole. I'm more afraid of being a disappointment & a "bummer".

2026-05-19 17:18:02 UTC

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I think one of the struggles I have here is that I kind of HAVE tried this in the past, but if people expect the "Tigger" version of me at their social event & I show up with distinct "Eeyore" energy, it seems to really disappoint.

2026-05-19 17:10:40 UTC

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I think I do try to give people a consistent experience of me even though as mentioned in this thread, I don't actually have a consistent experience of myself.
I don't know what it would mean to stop forcing myself into that. Could I just be quiet & moody for a week & a half out of every 4 as long as I'm not a dick to anyone?
Is it ok to not be ok?

2026-05-19 17:05:35 UTC

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Normally I disguise this quite well & people only occasionally get glimpses of how I'm feeling. Now I feel like if I continue with the "being myself" thing, I'm about to become very unpleasant. I don't want to carry the load of disguising everything I feel & experience, but how do I let go of that when at least 1/4 of the time I feel that I'm easily annoyed & reactive?
Maybe it will be easier & I will experience less distress if I don't mask my way through it though? Maybe?

2026-05-19 17:05:35 UTC

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It's one thing to say I'm going to stop filtering myself & masking when I'm at a point in my cycle where I feel grounded, but I guess I don't know how to picture unmasking while in distress.
I realized it was Hormone Disaster Time because my spouse was concerned about me earlier. I was quiet & moody, & it worried him. I don't know what to do with that.

2026-05-19 16:57:25 UTC

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I guess I don't know what to do with my PMDD in light of my unmasking journey. Do I stop pretending to be ok when I'm in the throes of hormonal bullshit? Do I stop filtering myself to please others even when I'm especially irritable?
Am I even "allowed" to cut down on masking if the "me" underneath is exhausted & grumpy? Is that okay? How much honesty is too much?

2026-05-19 16:50:03 UTC

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The best part is that I get to look forward to going through the hell of perimenopause before I'm finally done with this period bullshit.
I don't believe in "intelligent design" because the user experience of piloting this flesh-mech is pretty shit. If someone designed this, they were not good at their job & did not go through the QA process. 😅

2026-05-19 16:38:48 UTC

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Anyway, I give menstruation a 1/10 & do not recommend.

2026-05-19 16:35:00 UTC

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When my parents gave me the full picture that I would most likely be dealing with the negative mental/emotional impact of this stupid hormonal cycle for 40 years or so, that's when I started to wonder if being a woman actually *was* a curse from God.
I don't believe in God anymore, so I guess that's not it, but damn. It really, truly feels like a curse.
It's so fucking scary to think about trying to do anything to relieve it because it might fuck up my barely existing equilibrium even more.

2026-05-19 16:22:44 UTC

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At minimum, 2 out of every 4 weeks suck for me because of my menstrual cycle. That's such fucking bullshit.

2026-05-19 16:20:47 UTC

Feeling...on edge today, just a bit.
Probably just hormonal. At this point I think my pre-menstrual problems kick in about a week & a half before my period starts, & I just spend 10 days or so with heightened anxiety & a feeling of irritation & malaise until finally I have the relief of my period starting & mostly "only" have to deal with blood & cramps.
I should at least ask a medical professional about hormone therapy, but I'm honestly terrified of the experience of fiddling with that.

2026-05-19 16:20:47 UTC

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I'm really tired of going on this pattern of emotional ups & downs that repeats every 4 weeks. It's exhausting, & I hate it so much. I'm pretty sure I'm dealing with PMDD here, not your standard PMS, & it is an absolute *bitch*.
After 20+ years of this shit, it's hard to deal with the fact that I might have another 20 more.

2026-05-19 12:41:41 UTC

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"different than California = east coast" is an assumption that *really* irritates me because it's just pure erasure of anyone you consider beneath your notice.
Again, is anyone actually *surprised* that many people in the middle of the country view the folks who forget they exist with suspicion? Is it shocking that this attitude breeds resentment & distrust when it sounds like you're saying that their existence is completely meaningless to you?

2026-05-19 12:34:39 UTC

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That's what makes me go "what is that?"
How could you possibly *really* know what may be distinct about your region if you don't have any awareness of other regional cultures? Aren't you missing some vital information?
But then again, painting all of California with one brush is already a MASSIVE generalization & a conflation of different regional cultures, itself. California is a big state with distinct regions.

2026-05-19 12:31:07 UTC

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When folks on the coasts (& it's more often East than West) do this whole "forgetting most of the country exists thing" I still find it actually disturbing.
All this annoyance kicked off by someone basically claiming that caring about other people is an "east coast ethos", contrasting with their impression of what people in California are like, with no mention of anywhere else, which suggests that they believe anything that (seems to) differ from CA culture must be unique to the east coast.

2026-05-19 12:31:07 UTC

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So I'm mad that the folks I met in Tennessee were super dismissive & told me they simply didn't care about where I was fun, but if I'm being "fair" about it, if I was from properly rural Tennessee, I effectively would have gotten the same response. But it isn't just the wealthy who do this; it's also the less wealthy who live in the wealthier regions.

2026-05-19 12:22:00 UTC

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Some of this is less about region & more about money. A lot of rich people who live in the middle of the country basically don't actually think of themselves as living here. In their hearts, they imagine they live somewhere "civilized".

2026-05-19 12:21:59 UTC

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If we were going to get into regional differences, folks around Philadelphia were SO MUCH FRIENDLIER to me than folks in Tennessee, but the area just south of Nashville could not really be considered representative of the state. It's where the money concentrated. They kind of think of themselves as an outpost of civilization in the barren wasteland that is the rural South, which they also don't care about.

2026-05-19 12:21:59 UTC

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Then again, I think I actually should be fair to the people I knew in the Philadelphia area that they were actually significantly LESS disdainful of my background than the wealthy folks of Tennessee. There is a money aspect here where the more wealth someone has, the less interest they have in anywhere that "sounds poor" to them.

2026-05-17 21:48:45 UTC

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Trump's ICE army has been terrorizing our cities for more than a year.
Government thugs abduct people off the fucking street & beat anyone who tries to do anything about it. My brother dedicated several weeks to helping feed & protect his neighbors, & I was absolutely terrified for him the whole time. It could have been him getting shot.
Is it that hard to understand that we are NOT safe, & we are NOT free? (& it was already a police state before Trump got his hands on it for god's sake)

2026-05-17 21:40:24 UTC

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I mean, did you miss the part earlier THIS YEAR where government agents shot a guy on the street for trying to check if someone being assaulted by the thugs was ok?
They went through Minneapolis not just beating, abducting, & killing people, but also doing property damage & stealing shit along the way because the president wanted to punish the state for not being subservient enough. He wanted to make Minnesotans pay.
But you would simply fix this if you were a US citizen? Uh-huh.

2026-05-17 21:23:02 UTC

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But I presume these people are not angry about injustice but angry that they personally feel that their safety (& finances) are threatened.
There doesn't seem to be any compassion in this perspective. Just anger & self-righteousness. No practical advice either, which you'd think if it was so easy & obvious, they could provide.

2026-05-17 21:19:12 UTC

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I want to say to them: so you're European? Then take some time to figure out if the wealth of your particular nation comes from colonized & enslaved people elsewhere in the world. Find the corruption & exploitation in your system. Then I guess you should figure out how to fix that, since you're such a genius. Report back once you're finished.

2026-05-14 17:00:46 UTC

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@nprofile…hw75
This is some real reply guy nonsense.
You're in my mentions picking a fight about something unrelated to what I was talking about.
Check my bio & you'll see I'm an anarchist. So yeah, this whole "you'll learn in time that authoritarian governance is good actually," is a pretty pointless thing to tell me. I'm not interested.
I could tell you what anarchy means for creating justice & equity for all, but you're not here to listen to me, so it's not really worth my time, is it?

2026-05-14 16:53:59 UTC

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@nprofile…hw75
Ah. Well, the US is a carceral state that creates slaves & crushes marginalized peoples by enforcing "the law", so something isn't working out very well with "lawfulness".

2026-05-14 16:47:37 UTC

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@nprofile…hw75
Well, that's something they removed.
This article is more about the folks who quit including the senior folks carrying much of the institutional knowledge.

2026-05-14 16:08:44 UTC

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I don't think the FBI is a force for good. ACAB includes the FBI, but damn, it's kinda weird watching the fascists hollowing out structures they need to be able to carry out the increased oppression they want to enact.

2026-05-14 16:04:50 UTC

It's relatively easy to destroy institutions. It's not easy to build them or repair structural damage.
The Trump admin are acting like cartoon characters, busily sawing off the supports that are holding them up.
"Top FBI agents fled Trump’s chaos in droves — and it can't be fixed anytime soon"
https://www.alternet.org/trump-fbi-2676894809/

2026-05-12 18:37:28 UTC

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Socially, people get to place demands on you for no reason other than the fact that they want to.
Triple that if you're a woman.
And that's just how we go around interacting with each other for some goddamn reason.

2026-05-12 18:29:27 UTC

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A lot of social conventions really ignore consent.

2026-05-12 18:28:27 UTC

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Honestly it's fucking weird how—as long as it's not considered intimate/private—there seems to be a social expectation to be willing to talk about anything people ask about, & if you aren't willing, you're supposed to duck & dodge the questions rather than simply decline to indulge someone's curiosity.

2026-05-12 18:23:55 UTC

Ohhhh!
If someone asks you questions about something you don't want to talk about, you don't have to give deflections & partial explanations.
You can say "I don't want to talk about that."
It's possible they'll think you're rude. But you aren't obliged to explain yourself simply because someone asks.
My friend was asking me questions about something she didn't know was a sore subject, & I kept giving partial answers, & she kept asking. I could have just said I didn't want to answer. Huh.

2026-05-11 17:09:32 UTC

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I suppose it probably goes both ways.
I think perhaps we were both in search of mirrors, both trying to find ourselves revealed in the eyes of someone else.
I however developed the tendency to try to reflect others. At first I did so in hopes of feeling accepted at all even by losing myself, but later I developed the expectation & belief that the other person was supposed to see & respond to me, as happened in my best & happiest friendships.

2026-05-11 17:05:58 UTC

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No wonder I have been so stuck on her & unable to move on. I took parts of her—unhealthy, unhappy parts—into myself. I've never known how to untangle myself from her.
In my unconscious, unknowing imitation of her, I became so fearful, because SHE was afraid.
The anxiety to be loved & the desperate attempt to find love by offering myself up as a mirror were me. The fear of the judgment of others? The pathological fear of failing to conform? Not me. Not inherently.

2026-05-11 17:05:58 UTC

Another piece of this: I think perhaps I have been so hung up on my relationship to my sister BECAUSE I didn't understand that some things I thought were "me" were actually me reflecting *her*.
Some of the things I thought were "her" were actually things she imitated me on, but I didn't understand the bleed over. I was the driving force behind every one of our "shared interests", but she just sort of absorbed them into herself, into the her-me that was us as sisters.

2026-05-10 16:10:06 UTC

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Good bi representation ain't nearly as rare as good ace representation (sorry folks), but it can be pretty hard to find. It is certainly getting easier though!
There's no questioning of whether someone's "really" bi. There's no emphasis or significance being put on ending up with a person of a specific gender. It's just, "this person is bi, & here is their partner."
I'm a big fan of that.

2026-05-10 16:03:11 UTC

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One later-introduced character is shown to be bi, & another character discovers she's bi during a timeskip, & is dating her business partner when we jump a few months ahead.
Other than a few times where she is getting used to a queer relationship & a few people making "huh. She's dating a woman now" remarks, no one has much to say about it. She's had male partners & now she has a female partner, & it's just treated as so normal it doesn't even need to be explained.
LOVE it.

2026-05-10 16:03:10 UTC

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And let's talk bisexual representation:
One character early on has the realization he's bisexual, & there is a whole song & dance about him discovering he's bi (literally a song & dance, because this show has musical numbers).
BUT we also get 2 bi characters where it's not even treated as any kind of surprise or big deal.
I like both. There is too much bi erasure NOT to celebrate & talk about bisexuality, but also it's fucking normal, & I like to see it depicted that way.

2026-05-10 15:52:10 UTC

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Also it is so rare to see women's sexuality so openly & realistically depicted on TV. Rebecca is horny as fuck, & sex is a big part of her life, & I love that.
It's representation I didn't even know I needed.

2026-05-10 15:33:31 UTC

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So I watch through it when I need to process something, & by the time I'm partway through season 4, I'm usually also coming to grips with something I needed to work on emotionally.
Like I said, this show just does not seem to work for a lot of people, but for me, it's been an amazing source of healing. So fucking cool.

2026-05-10 15:33:30 UTC

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is my emotional healing show. It's not for everyone (not by a long shot), but I love it so much.
When I've shown it to people, they've gotten turned off by all the unhealthy & dysfunctional behavior that most of the characters display in the 1st season, but it all pays off as they slowly develop emotional health & awareness, & once we get to the 4th season, the characters are healing their trauma, speaking their truth, & building stronger, more honest relationships.

2026-05-08 13:00:06 UTC

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Of course, some wealthy people have done very well under Trump, mostly the *extremely* wealthy.
I think many somewhat wealthy (& even very wealthy) people are shocked to find out that in this phase of wealth consolidation, THEY are being locked out too.

2026-05-08 13:00:06 UTC

Headline: "Ex-Trump official reveals buyer’s remorse among Wall Street insiders" (for getting Trump elected).
I don't suppose this regret has led these individuals to question whether they are actually as clever as they think they are?
In the year 2024, it was obvious to so many people that Trump only cares about Trump, that he was in mental decline, & that he was gearing up to do some real ridiculous shit in his second term.
Hilarious that these shitheads thought that would be good for them.

2026-05-07 15:08:08 UTC

It's probably distasteful that on a recent walk with my husband I said we were playing "Marines & Viet Cong" (like "cops & robbers" or "cowboys & I'm-not-going-to-say-it"), & we were on the trail of the Marines because I kept seeing cigarette butts on the ground.
But we were watching the Ken Burns documentary at the time, & that is LITERALLY one of the ways the Viet Cong could track US Marines through the jungle.

2026-05-07 13:58:57 UTC

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I'd be quite interested to know the order in which some of these strikes occurred, given that they took place over a couple weeks.
Did they immediately target the important tactical equipment like radar & satellite installations & then hit barracks & other targets later?
They say that they reviewed satellite images from the war’s start through April 14, so you'd think they might be able to provide a timeline, but no.

2026-05-07 13:58:57 UTC

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One of the reasons the IR may not consider inflicting mass casualties on US Forces a good idea is that Americans tend to start to see red when they feel like "the troops" have been harmed en masse.
I don't believe "maximum lethality" is an advantage for them when their diplomatic situation in most of the world is so shaky, & I just don't see evidence that they were trying to do that.

2026-05-07 13:58:57 UTC

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An inconsistency in the narrative:
>“The Iranian attacks were precise. There are no random craters indicating misses,” said Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies and a retired Marine Corps colonel
This does not align with the claim that the IR intended to inflict mass casualties. If they were hitting their targets with a high degree of accuracy AND they were selecting their targets for maximum lethality, you would expect more deaths.

2026-05-07 13:22:29 UTC

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I *almost* want to read the full Washington Post story, so I can look at what isn't said & what questionable things are implied, but I don't want it enough to create an account for the Bezos shit paper.
This shit is cover-up too. This is still minimizing the damage to US military capabilities. It's just doing so with a little lip-service to reality.

2026-05-07 13:18:50 UTC

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For Iran, destroying US military infrastructure has a lot more fucking value than taking lives, but they're still not talking about that, even when they are reporting on the damage done.
They aren't talking about what the damage means.

2026-05-07 13:18:49 UTC

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Here's the fucking deal: wars aren't won by killing the largest number of people. If the US military didn't fucking learn that in Vietnam, then I guess they are never going to learn it, but it seems to me that the IR—under an existential threat—is fighting strategically to win & that it's a fucking mistake to assume that their goal is to kill the most Americans they can.

2026-05-07 13:13:59 UTC

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Everything on a US military base is infrastructure, even the McDonald's. This is where they house, feed, & placate their personnel.
Spouse says stopping at the 5th Fleet HQ in Bahrain was such a relief because it was like stepping into a mini-America. It felt like home, & that was part of its purpose.
This quote makes it sound like the only thing on a military base an enemy could actually want to destroy is the stuff with the most direct "military" function. That's just fucking silly.

2026-05-07 13:13:58 UTC

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>“The Iranians have deliberately targeted accommodation buildings across multiple sites with the intent to inflict mass casualties,” image analyst William Goodhind told the Post. “It is not just equipment, fuel storage and air base infrastructure under fire, but also soft targets, such as gyms, food halls and accommodation.”
This is the part of the WaPo reporting I don't believe.
I don't buy that the main reason for targeting common areas as well as "infrastructure" was mass casualties.

2026-05-07 13:13:58 UTC

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One of the reasons I don't buy it is that there weren't mass casualties. Quite a few people were injured, but not many killed. I'm not buying that the IR was going for the greatest lethality. I still believe that they were trying to render these places non-functional.
I think that's what is STILL not being talked about, even when the media are literally reporting on the fact that the damage is much more extensive than initially acknowledged.

2026-05-07 13:13:58 UTC

The WaPo reported yesterday what we all already knew: the damage to US bases in the Gulf region is more extensive than the Trump admin admits to.
I didn't read the original article because Bezos's rag won't let me read for free without creating an account.
However, in reports on the WaPo report, I saw a quote from it by one of the image analysts.

2026-05-05 14:32:51 UTC

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What matters is what's happening & what these people are doing.
They fucking lie constantly. They say ridiculous things because they are a) out of touch, b) very ignorant, c) trying to distract & d) not actually good liars.
Dissecting their lies is a fucking distraction.
Again, I don't think it's something we shouldn't talk about—I just made a Lucille Bluth joke about Todd Blanche—but I'm sick of the pretense that laughing at their nonsense is journalism.

2026-05-05 14:28:28 UTC

So...I don't think there is any problem with you & I talking about the absurdities of the Trump admin & the ridiculous things they say & do.
However, it's starting to bother me more than ever watching all the supposed "journalists" focused on "debunking" obviously false claims or theorizing what Trump meant by some remark he made to project strength or manipulate the market or just because he had to say SOMETHING.

2026-05-05 14:18:55 UTC

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It really sucks how much AI has devalued the information you can find online, but it has made stuff that had become almost obsolete valuable again, so that's an interesting reversal.
I plan to create a library of reference books for my art from wherever I can pick up photograph books cheap. Maybe I'll hit some thrift store book sections this weekend.

2026-05-05 14:12:12 UTC

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Anyway, I'm going to hit up the clearance section at Half Price Books to see what I can find for books with pictures of birds, flowers, & other natural things. They often have those big books full of photographs for 2 or 3 bucks a piece.

2026-05-05 14:12:12 UTC

It really sucks that it's very hard to just find reference images online anymore.
I want to look at peacock feathers, & I just don't know if I can trust that any given image is real. Even if it seems to be from a legit site... how do I know they weren't duped?
It's so fucking shitty.
One can't help but think that making real information difficult to find is the purpose of generative AI.

2026-05-05 14:02:46 UTC

My brain doesn't really believe in "time". I think this is largely an ADHD thing, & it can be a real problem. If I could do something now, I could also do it a minute from now, or an hour from now, or tomorrow, so what difference does it make?
I say as I delay all productive work indefinitely.

2026-05-01 17:37:57 UTC

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The question is not really "how much will it cost?" but "is it even possible to rebuild & if so, what resources would be required to do that? How long would it take?"

2026-05-01 17:35:15 UTC

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They keep framing it in number of dollars to repair, but I actually think more important is how long it will take to repair & how much manpower would be required. Not to mention, how tf do they plan to keep safe from Iran while rebuilding & in the future?
I think we see a reduction in US military presence in the area whenever this bullshit all falls apart, simply because they have no options.

2026-05-01 17:29:39 UTC

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"Three officials told NBC News there was later extensive damage to the headquarters building for the U.S. Navy in Bahrain"
Uh-huh. The 5th Fleet is fucking *suffering* right now.

2026-05-01 17:27:48 UTC

This is what I have been saying!
And you may see "warehouses" listed & think "no biggie", but we are talking about the supply hubs for US Armed Forces in the Persian Gulf. This is where they go to stock up food. What if they aren't able to keep large stores of refrigerated food? That's a fucking problem.
But also runways, hangars, radar arrays, & satellite communications to name a few others.
https://thehill.com/policy/international/5849646-iran-damage-us-military-bases/

2026-05-01 17:27:48 UTC

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When the REAL extent of this is known... it's going to be wild.
Iran went aggressively after US military infrastructure in the Gulf, & it's a huuuge problem for the US, whether the Pentagon will admit to it or not.

2026-05-01 13:37:21 UTC

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@nprofile…rzr2
Yes, absolutely. They need to end no-fault divorce because the only way to get the labor they want out of women (while doing no labor themselves) is by literally trapping them.
And yes, they don't seem to understand that if they want healthy, long lives, they should probably NOT trap people with no way out but their death.

2026-05-01 13:37:21 UTC

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@nprofile…rzr2
Not to mention, I know they are trying to do other things as well to push women into marriage, but if they throw out no-fault, then it's going to be harder to convince women to marry them in the first place.

2026-05-01 11:40:59 UTC

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But yeah, in my experience many douchey men actively work hard for years to give their wives reason to leave. They aren't just passively shitty. They are trying to use their shitty behavior to change what their wife does.
The thing is, it works so well that the change their wife makes is to stop being their wife.
These men are surprised that the women they tormented get up & leave once they realize the torment isn't going to stop. I don't know how that could be a surprise, but it is.