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Hi. Been a while. Might as well dust this thing off.
Since last we met, I moved out on my own into an apartment in NYC, conveniently in the same building as my sister. It's been hard getting used to city noises, but nice to have my own space and the place has a great view. I've been managing better than expected, honestly. Helps that NYC has so many options to get things delivered to your door so I don't have to worry about running errands when I'm not up to it.
But I'm now in line to get a puppy at the end of the year. My nieces and nephews really want me to have one. (Especially my younger nephew who has been having some health issues.) I miss having a dog. But I haven't had a puppy since I was a year old. It'll be interesting learning to deal with that energy and training needs. Wish I could adopt a shelter dog, but my niece is highly allergic, to the point that a brief exposure to the wrong breed sent her to the ER. We can't take any chances. But we know that she's okay with a goldendoodle because her neighbor has one from the same breeder I'm using. So she'll still be able to come visit, if only for a few hours at a time.
In other news... I'm done with Facebook. I got pulled in there because it was the only place to keep in contact with some of my oldest online friends. But between the privacy issues, the way thezy handled (or, rather, didn't handle) Russian interference in the 2016 elections, the way they're refusing to fix anything for the 2020 elections, and the launch of their news tab, I just can't stay there any longer. A news tab with stories they curate themselves? And, worse, Brietbart is one of their "trusted sources" that the tab will be pulling from? Absolutely not.
Here's the thing. Richard Spencer is a neo-Nazi. He calls his group "the Alt-Right." Some of the "very fine people" at Charlottesville were his. He thinks America should be a White homeland and that anyone who isn't a straight White Christian English-speaking American male is basically subhuman.
When Andrew Brietbart turned control of his fringe Right conspiracy blog over to Steve Bannon, Bannon proudly said that his goal was to turn Brietbart into "the platform for the Alt-Right." He's called Spencer a brilliant leader and openly admires his ideology. And, indeed, Brietbart is a White Supremacist outlet thinly veiled as a fringe Right news site. Their stories are virulently sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic... you name it, they've said as vile a thing as you care to imagine. They're the ones who started the conspiracy theory that Obama had to have been born in Kenya because America couldn't have possibly elected a Black president. (They also took it further, saying that Obama was secretly gay and had married a man in college, among other things.)
Every vile lunatic racist thing Trump has said in the last decade has come from Brietbart. That Obama was born in Kenya, that Mexicans are rapists, that John McCain wasn't a war hero, that we need to ban all Muslims... all that and more came from Brietbart. And then he hired Bannon to run his campaign (after Russian operative Paul Manifort had to quit). And when he took office, he created a new job on par with White House Chief of Staff (top level cabinet position) just for Bannon to fill.
There's a very simple, clear, short, straight line from Richard Spencer to Steve Bannon to Donald Trump. Which is why Brietbart has gained popularity in recent years. But that in no way excuses Facebook deciding that their blend of Nazi propaganda and fringe conspiracies counts as a "trusted news source." If they're going to be elevating that as real news, I am done with the platform even if it costs me friends I've had for decades.
So here I am, dusting off my old, long-neglected blog. Or at least trying. We'll see how it goes. But it's a shame to leave DreamWidth's #1 seed account entirely unused, right?
So, how have y'all been? What's new with you? Assuming anyone still reads my page...
Since last we met, I moved out on my own into an apartment in NYC, conveniently in the same building as my sister. It's been hard getting used to city noises, but nice to have my own space and the place has a great view. I've been managing better than expected, honestly. Helps that NYC has so many options to get things delivered to your door so I don't have to worry about running errands when I'm not up to it.
But I'm now in line to get a puppy at the end of the year. My nieces and nephews really want me to have one. (Especially my younger nephew who has been having some health issues.) I miss having a dog. But I haven't had a puppy since I was a year old. It'll be interesting learning to deal with that energy and training needs. Wish I could adopt a shelter dog, but my niece is highly allergic, to the point that a brief exposure to the wrong breed sent her to the ER. We can't take any chances. But we know that she's okay with a goldendoodle because her neighbor has one from the same breeder I'm using. So she'll still be able to come visit, if only for a few hours at a time.
In other news... I'm done with Facebook. I got pulled in there because it was the only place to keep in contact with some of my oldest online friends. But between the privacy issues, the way thezy handled (or, rather, didn't handle) Russian interference in the 2016 elections, the way they're refusing to fix anything for the 2020 elections, and the launch of their news tab, I just can't stay there any longer. A news tab with stories they curate themselves? And, worse, Brietbart is one of their "trusted sources" that the tab will be pulling from? Absolutely not.
Here's the thing. Richard Spencer is a neo-Nazi. He calls his group "the Alt-Right." Some of the "very fine people" at Charlottesville were his. He thinks America should be a White homeland and that anyone who isn't a straight White Christian English-speaking American male is basically subhuman.
When Andrew Brietbart turned control of his fringe Right conspiracy blog over to Steve Bannon, Bannon proudly said that his goal was to turn Brietbart into "the platform for the Alt-Right." He's called Spencer a brilliant leader and openly admires his ideology. And, indeed, Brietbart is a White Supremacist outlet thinly veiled as a fringe Right news site. Their stories are virulently sexist, racist, homophobic, transphobic, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic... you name it, they've said as vile a thing as you care to imagine. They're the ones who started the conspiracy theory that Obama had to have been born in Kenya because America couldn't have possibly elected a Black president. (They also took it further, saying that Obama was secretly gay and had married a man in college, among other things.)
Every vile lunatic racist thing Trump has said in the last decade has come from Brietbart. That Obama was born in Kenya, that Mexicans are rapists, that John McCain wasn't a war hero, that we need to ban all Muslims... all that and more came from Brietbart. And then he hired Bannon to run his campaign (after Russian operative Paul Manifort had to quit). And when he took office, he created a new job on par with White House Chief of Staff (top level cabinet position) just for Bannon to fill.
There's a very simple, clear, short, straight line from Richard Spencer to Steve Bannon to Donald Trump. Which is why Brietbart has gained popularity in recent years. But that in no way excuses Facebook deciding that their blend of Nazi propaganda and fringe conspiracies counts as a "trusted news source." If they're going to be elevating that as real news, I am done with the platform even if it costs me friends I've had for decades.
So here I am, dusting off my old, long-neglected blog. Or at least trying. We'll see how it goes. But it's a shame to leave DreamWidth's #1 seed account entirely unused, right?
So, how have y'all been? What's new with you? Assuming anyone still reads my page...