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ausetkmt · 11 months

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Newsweek: Ron DeSantis Accused of Being 'Pro-Slavery' Due to New Florida Curriculum

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is facing new criticism over his state's new curriculum for African-American history in which some say is "pro-slavery."

DeSantis, a Republican who is running for president in 2024, has made his embrace of right-wing social causes a cornerstone of his style of politics. He has decried "woke" education, signing into law requirements about how race can be taught in Florida schools as educators across the United States grapple with conservative efforts to limit discussions of diversity, including African American history, in public schools.

Advocates for more restrictive lessons on race have argued all sides of a political or historical debate should be presented in schools. Critics, however, are accusing DeSantis and other Republicans of attempting to erase the history of slavery, and that students should learn about this topic in its entirety.

This standard has sparked criticism from educational and civil rights leaders, who have accused Florida Republicans of seeking to whitewash the history of slavery.

Representative Eric Swalwell, a California Democrat, accused DeSantis of being "pro-slavery" over the educational policy.

"Please keep this simple: If you require schools to teach the 'personal benefits' of slavery you are pro-slavery. Ron DeSantis is pro-slavery," the Democratic lawmaker tweeted on Saturday.

— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) July 22, 2023

DeSantis defended the standards when pressed by a reporter, saying that he "wasn't involved" in writing these standards, which were "not done politically."

"I think what they're doing, is I think that they're probably going to show some of the folks that eventually parlayed, you know, being a black smith, into doing things later in life," the Florida governor said. "But the reality is all of that is rooted in whatever is factual."

Newsweek reached out to DeSantis' office for comment via email.

Still, many others also condemned the new standards.

Will Hurd, a former congressman from Texas who is also running in the GOP 2024 presidential primary, tweeted on Friday, "Unfortunately, it has to be said – slavery wasn't a jobs program that taught beneficial skills. It was literally dehumanizing and subjugated people as property because they lacked any rights or freedoms."

Unfortunately, it has to be said – slavery wasn't a jobs program that taught beneficial skills. It was literally dehumanizing and subjugated people as property because they lacked any rights or freedoms.https://t.co/4JjIgeDhKX — Will Hurd (@WillHurd) July 21, 2023

Jaime Harrison, the chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), slammed the policy as "disgusting."

"The much anticipated DeSantis reset: Teaching our kids that slavery had its benefits," he tweeted on Friday. "Disgusting."

Vice President Kamala Harris, during a speech at Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Inc.'s 56th national convention in Indianapolis on Thursday, described the standards as an attempt to "gaslight us."

"Just yesterday, in the state of Florida, they decided middle school students will be taught that enslaved people benefitted from slavery," she said. "They insult us in an attempt to gaslight us and we will not stand for it. We who share a collective experience in knowing we must honor history in our duty in the context of legacy. There is so much at stake in this moment."

#Ron DeSantis Accused of Being 'Pro-Slavery' Due to New Florida Curriculum #florida #desantis lies #gop #white supremacy #systemic racism #revisionist history of america #all lies #american history #Black Lives Matter #Black History Matters

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gwengifterror · 5 months

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Some insightful words from Nelson Mandela (6-12-1990), who was once considered a "terrorist" by the colonial super powers of the world (US / UK *and friends*) to then later be awarded such honors as the Nobel Peace Prize and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He is an example of a person utilized as a token for revisionist history.

"They [Arafat, Castro, Gaddafi] fully support the anti-apartheid struggle. They do not only support it in rethoric, they are placing resources at our disposal for us to win the struggle. That is the position."

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prettyhighforawhiteguyblog · 7 months

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I hate how Naruto always cuts to the Hokages. It reminds me of Mt Rushmore and all the hatred, derision, genocide, and racism. Which reminds me of who my people are today with our roots embedded firmly in that evil while we arrogantly deny our roots even as we continue to bear their fruits.

#Naruto #mt Rushmore #America #history #know your history #only them can you find how to heal and be healed #fuck the revisionists

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determinate-negation · 8 months

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i really hate the revisionist holocaust history that is dominant in america and i really recommend ken burns documentary the u.s. and the holocaust. a lot of people know about hitler taking inspiration from the us but not the true degree of apathy and antisemitism from the american public, and us political and financial entanglement with the nazis. also, the holocaust and especially its jewish victims were not publicly discussed until years after the war and holocaust survivors in displaced persons camps across europe were kept in horrible conditions by their american “liberators.” the way that american history is constructed to explain its role in ww2 and reasons for supporting israel is false

ill just add this quote from the guardian review

“There are fascinating details about the complicity of most Hollywood studios, for whom Germany was a big market. About 80 million Americans went to the movies once a week in the 30s, but when they were there they would hear nothing against the Nazis. In 1938, a poll asked Americans if they felt Jews were to blame, partly or entirely, for what was happening to them in Germany. Two-thirds of respondents said they were.”

#history #mine #antisemitism #shoah

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deacons-wig · 2 months

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I'd prefer if we never got to see the origin of Vault Boy and Vault Tec's branding in the same way I'd rather not get a canon answer of who started the War or how. That's the point of War Never Changes.

Vault Boy is a sinister figure in his cheerful embrace of Armageddon. Giving the Vault Tec brand a face and a name and a backstory feels so unimportant to what is actually interesting about Fallout. What's important to me is the big picture pre war, and the details of what comes after.

What is interesting to me is exploring how propaganda is designed to convince people how close they are to annihilation--or homelessness, unemployment, obscurity, or being The Other and therefore destined to suffer--in hell, in oppressions, being ostracized. Honestly insert any sort of marginalization or suffering here. Crony capitalism uses propaganda to market products designed to manipulate people into buying distance between themselves and that annihilation. Putting themselves "behind the thumb" of Vault Boy, so to speak. Buying a lifestyle. Vault Boy does it with a wink and a smile, inviting those who can afford it to buy their way to safety while using capital and fear to perpetuate the cycle. I don't need the specifics to understand this.

Some ghoulnaysis below the cut:

I'll admit, my initial reaction to pre-war Ghoulgins being the inspiration for Vault Boy was funny! Mr. Cooper Howard, washed up actor experiencing an existential crisis being shoehorned into corporate propaganda that then haunts him for the next 200+ years? Selling manifest destiny, racism, the Rugged Individual, the revisionist history that cowboys were a) white and b) more than a brief footnote in the history of the colonization of North America's west. The commodification of entertainers/creatives/public figures. Selling identities to be packaged into a product that will outlive them? Only to have that person live alongside that role they regret (?) playing... kinda tasty, if we have to give Vault Boy a backstory, though I didn't get a clear sense of his actual feelings about being used as a propaganda guy which I think is a failure of the show to commit to the narrative they set up, which happens with a lot of the show's (lack of) engagement with Fallout's larger themes anyway.

But The Ghoul (stupid name!!! weird and boring choice!!!) is just such an uncompelling and repellent character to me. I love a good bad guy or even anti-hero, but honestly he lacks any interiority. He's an evil karma character (eats people, waterboards and mutilates people, sells people to organ harvesters...like? that literally makes you evil in the games...) but the narrative pushes him as an antihero or someone with gray morality because he what..."likes" dogs? And isn't as decayed or unsettling looking as other ghouls (implying handsome=good or interesting). People aren't afraid of him because he is a ghoul, they're afraid of him because he's evil and will hurt them! Sometimes for no reason! I see the callback to the director telling him to shoot his co-star and Cooper saying he's "the good guy," but is that why he becomes so fucking evil post war? Really?

I don't know why he does what he does other than...the world sucked before and sucks now so he might as well represent the basest of human behavior? That seems to be the thesis of the show--unless kindness and community is engendered (by the vaults, by Management, by a civic government, by corporations) people will descend into chaos.

So why have this poorly executed anti-hero be the origin of Vault Boy? What are the narrative choices being made here? Is it just Rule of Cool?

Personally I would like a pathetic, rotting wet cat of a ghoul, some sort of carved out husk of a washed up movie star either trying to relive his glory days, or avoid them--having given up hope of finding his family after 200 years--being dragged into Lucy's orbit and being constantly reminded of his Vault Boy fame, that she is a walking Vault Girl with her Okey Dokey's and Golden Rule. He'd be a joke, a footnote of the old world. He'd be mean and snarky, even unpredictable and uncooperative--have a public persona of friendly curiosity and a private, cynical one.

Pathetic Ghoulgins would remind audiences of the cost of capitalism and imperialism without resorting to the thesis that war never changes means that people are inherently cruel and will resort to violence, rather than existent corporate and political power structures intentionally create the conditions in which people accept perpetual cycles of exploitation and harm for the sake of their own safety and comfort, despite knowing the cost of maintaining the status quo, and not seeing or believing that distance between the status quo and total annihilation is measured by the smiling thumbs up of a cartoon mascot.

I'm sure there are other ways The Ghoul could have been a successful character as well but.... That's satire. That's interesting. That's Fallout.

#fallout #fallout tv #fallout prime #fallout tv show #the ghoul #cooper howard #vault tec #“let people enjoy things” well i enjoy critical analysis #i dislike the big picture of the show but i love fallout enough to dig through the mess #fotv critical #fallout critical

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crooked-wasteland · 7 months

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The rapresentation of abusers in helluva boss is something that particularly frustrates me, Stella in particular, it seems to be done just to victimaze certain characters not to show the complex dynamics of those relationships. It seems to me the writers aren't mature enough to handle these topics properly.

Abuse: The Heart of Vivienne Medrano

Christmas 1962, a man renowned the western world over for his revolutionary approach to animation sat in a withering melancholy as he watched what could only be called a cinematic masterpiece based on a novel classic. Walt Disney, now in the twilight years of his life, saw the walls closing in and his legacy coming to a close. This man, who pioneered the animated feature film, saw his greatest accomplishment as his greatest obstacle. The man responsible for the tales brought to life of Cinderella, Snow White, Pinocchio, and Dumbo felt trapped in his achievement. “I wish,” Walt lamented, “I could make a picture like that.”

To Kill a Mockingbird was a piece that challenged its audience. The discussion of a white man defending a black man in southern America, decades before the civil rights movement. The movement that, at the time the movie hit cinemas, was in its infancy. Released during the height of the historically revisionist counter movement taking place to combat the rising push of African Americans towards their human rights. The last film Walt Disney ever saw the production of before his death in 1966 was The Jungle Book, a movie that was the epitome of “Safe” and a message that upheld the status quo of segregation.

It wasn’t until 1972 that the media of animation became raucously adult with those political and challenging concepts Disney felt were unattainable. Fritz the Cat was an X-rated animated film composed of vignettes that were unapologetically perverse, violent, and aggressively political. Critical of politicians and the police with a sympathetic if exploitative lens towards the LGBT and racial minority communities Brooklyn-based director Ralph Bakshi grew up around. Bakshi proved that animation was not strictly a child-friendly media and that adult animation could be financially and critically successful.

(For more on Ralph Bakshi's career and animation history)

If one has ever had the opportunity to listen to a Brad Bird (director of Ratatouille and The Incredibles) interview, it is clear to see that the success of Bakshi was generally quite limited. That animation is considered a genre and not a medium of art has resulted in animated films being knee-capped in the box office. There is far more potential to animation, highlighted by Howard Ashton in his collaboration with Disney studios during the Renaissance. Responsible for resurrecting the feature-length animated movie through The Little Mermaid and credited for the monumental success of Best Picture Award winner Beauty and the Beast, Ashton once said that the potential animation was ideal for musical theatre. The limitless possibilities given the medium gave the possibility of introducing Broadway to the common folk who didn’t live in New York and otherwise couldn’t afford the theater. He was quoted saying that live action musical films were “an exercise in stupidity,” highlighting the freedom that comes with a blank page.

However, the success of animation, and media in general, comes down to the message the media wishes to send. The reason the Disney Renaissance films have enjoyed their position as cornerstones of pop culture and creativity was because it did introduce the artform of musical theater into homes and made them readily accessible to everyone with an even heightened sense of fantasy that revitalized Walt’s ethos of making films for the child in everyone.

With Bakshi, it was the loud and violently political message of a revolution taking place. This continues in adult animation with the Simpsons, a series critical of hyper-capitalist America and the fallout of Reagan’s economic disaster that the effects of which are still being felt today and a satire of toxic masculinity and abusive family dynamics.

So, ultimately, the value of a piece of media is a cross between its social artistic influence and the message the creators are intending to make. While Medrano’s influence on the field of indie animation is often mischaracterized as a “pioneer”, the fact is that indie animation and pilots have existed and been funded before Spindlehorse existed. It is simply that Medrano has had the spotlight handed to her for the myth surrounding the production and subsequent success of his indie projects. Artistically, her influence can be summarized as a double-edged sword. For some, she is the motivation for inspiring artists to connect with the community to one day, hopefully, create their own work. On the other hand, she is the cautionary tale of why investing in an indie project is a financial risk for an audience member and a risk to the community as a whole that poses a real danger of making the indie sphere financially cannibalistic, as her public persona is off-putting to “normies” and her show is simply not good.

Much like Disney, the man in 1962, and Disney the company circa 2023, the revolution of animating "because you can" loses its luster very quickly. Without something profound to say, an entire company, regardless of its social influence, can fade into irrelevance despite still being "successful". The story of Disney is a cautionary tale for Indie animation as a whole and Spindlehorse in specific.

And that is the other axis on this chart. Her narrative lacks a message worth telling, and that’s very much due to her not having anything worthwhile to say.

“I really liked when things and shows and stories allow the characters to be flawed, and allow them to grow and to change. And I think that’s something that’s, you know, the world is not black and white. And I like things that explore the gray and that and the complexity, of life and mistakes and of things like that.” - Vivienne Medrano

It is not for want of mockery that I carefully transcribe Medrano’s words in her interview. To read the words aloud tells the story just as clearly as I have set out to do here. This is someone who is highly inspired by better media, who has ideas and a belief that she has something to say. But that is where the belief ends. There is no conclusion to that thought any more than there is one in the unfocused and run-on sentences she rambles along throughout the interview. She talks of “Things” without clarity, because she herself is a fundamentally incurious individual who has never once spent the time critically analyzing herself, let alone the work of others to better grasp what about it resonated with her. She merely consumes art insatiably and without any substance. Like a diet of fruit, it has a superficial veneer of positive value. Fruit would be considered healthy as it is “natural”. However, it is the nutritional equivalent of candy, lacking vital components that are necessary to sustain basic life, it is pure sugar. Her work, similarly, lacks any value of depth that would qualify as meaning.

Which comes back to what the message is in her work.

When it comes to others in the field of indie animation, Medrano does not have many friends. In response to the Lackadaisy situation, creator Tracy explained why she returned Medrano’s donation. For one, the donation was not Medrano’s money, but money she crowd sourced from her employees. While the $5k for the producer spot of the fundraiser would have not been a dent in her personal wallet, Medrano is so uninterested in supporting fellow creators while presenting an impression of camaraderie that she instead took money from the people she is in charge of the paychecks for to get her name in the credits of another creator’s work. In regards to why Medrano was declined her support, it was due to numerous individuals who had such an awful experience working for Medrano that they did not want her involvement associated with the project to any extent. When the money was returned, she made the situation extremely public and encouraged harassment by liking tweets attacking Tracy and the Iron Circus team.

A well-known member of Medrano’s crew, Hunter B, was leaked speaking crassly of other animation projects that were still in the process of production, met with support from other members in the discord. One of these creators being Ashley Nicoles from Far-Fetched. A former friend and creative partner on the Hazbin Pilot whose podcast streams featuring Edward Bosco and Michael Kovach single-handedly maintained interest in the show until the winter of 2021, free of charge. Ashley once spoke of how Medrano would speak disparagingly of an employee to her, saying that this individual was “Too unstable to work with”. Which, regardless of whether or not that is Medrano’s honest opinion, counts as defamation by an employer. It is the exact reason why most previous employers will not give a negative, detailed review of a former employee, maintaining instead to verify facts of the employment. If Erin Frost was more experienced and less involved in social media exposed culture, they could have easily sued Medrano and Spindlehorse for damaging their reputation in their field of employment.

Which circles back to Medrano’s self-assigned message of her show:

“Abusers rely on your silence. They rely on knowing you can’t retaliate without consequence. That they can tell any lies and vague around without getting called out. But we see you, and you don’t have the power you think you do anymore. A message I put into my work. “Fuck you!” - Vivienne Medrano

Medrano, who has vague and sub tweeted individuals like Lackadaisy Tracy, The Diregentlemen, Michael Kovach, and Ashley Nicoles. Medrano who has instigated and incited harassment campaigns knowing that no one can call her out without severe and relentless backlash from her cultish fanbase that she personally encourages through positive reinforcement of liking the tweets of fans. Medrano who relies on the silence of other creators in the field due to the fear of her ire collapsing their projects before they even have a chance to begin.

Vivienne Medrano with an extensive abusive history that continues to this day, has something to say about abuse.

What Medrano has to say about abuse comes from someone who has the position of superiority in all of her relationships, but feels like she’s the outcast and bullied loser. Her self insert that is repeatedly expressed in every character at one point or another is how easily they abuse those around them just because they can, but that the narrative justifies their “acting out” because they are sad. According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, “An abuser externalizes the causes of their behavior. They blame their violence on circumstances.”

Indeed, the lists of abusive characteristics and traits, according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, overwhelmingly encompasses the characteristics shown by characters like Loona, Blitz and Stolas that Medrano repeatedly has attempted to rationalize, justify and minimize. Which, “An abuser often denies the existence or minimizes the seriousness of the violence [including emotional and mental abuse] and its effect on the victim and other family members.”

It is not surprising, then, that the conversation of abuse in Helluva Boss is often infuriating. The narrative underplays the harm done by characters we are supposed to see as “good”. Not allowing for them to grow or change, but ignoring and minimizing the behavior, justifying it through circumstances and perpetuating the false belief that victims are not, themselves, abusers.

One of the first blog post rants I ever made about mental health and abuse was the affirmation that not all victims of abuse are survivors. I wholly stand by that. Victims of abuse perpetuate abuse. A victim and an abuser are one in the same, whereas a survivor is someone who has actually done the difficult work of being self-critical. And the one thing we all are very aware of is how much Vivienne Medrano rejects criticism.

#helluva boss critical #helluva boss criticism #helluva boss critique #vivienne medrano #vivziepop #vivziepop critical #spindlehorse critical #spindlehorse criticism #vivziepop criticism #helluva boss #perpetuating abuse #narcissistic abuse #abuse breeds abuse #essay writing

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southernmermaidsgrotto · 1 year

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Hoodoo, Rootwork and Conjure sources by Black Authors

Because you should only ever be learning your ancestral ways from kinfolk. Here's a compilation of some books, videos and podcast episodes I recommend reading and listening to, on customs, traditions, folk tales, songs, spirits and history. As always, use your own critical thinking and spiritual discernment when approaching these sources as with any others.

Hoodoo in America by Zora Neale Hurston (1931)

Mules and Men by Zora Neale Hurston (1936)

Tell my horse by Zora Neale Hurston (1938)

Let Nobody Turn Us Around: An African American Anthology by Manning Marable and Leith Mullings, editors (2003)

Black Magic: Religion and the African American Conjuring Tradition by Yvonne P. Chireau (2006)

African American Folk Healing by Stephanie Mitchem (2007)

Hoodoo Medicine: Gullah Herbal Remedies by Faith Mitchell (2011)

Mojo Workin': The Old African American Hoodoo System by Katrina Hazzard-Donald (2012)

Rootwork: Using the Folk Magick of Black America for Love, Money and Success by Tayannah Lee McQuillar (2012)

Talking to the Dead: Religion, Music, and Lived Memory among Gullah/Geechee Women by LeRhonda S. Manigault-Bryant (2014)

Working the Roots: Over 400 Years Of Traditional African American Healing by Michele Elizabeth Lee (2017)

Barracoon: The Story of the Last "Black Cargo" by Zora Neale Hurston (2018)

Jambalaya: The Natural Woman's Book of Personal Charms and Practical Rituals by Luisa Teish (2021)

African American Herbalism: A Practical Guide to Healing Plants and Folk Traditions by Lucretia VanDyke (2022)

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These are just some suggestions but there's many many more!! This is by no means a complete list.

I recommend to avoid authors who downplay the importance of black history or straight out deny how blackness is central to hoodoo. The magic, power and ashé is in the culture and bloodline. You can't separate it from the people. I also recommend avoiding or at the very least taking with a huge grain of salt authors with ties to known appropriators and marketeers, and anyone who propagates revisionist history or rather denies historical facts and spreads harmful conspiracy theories. Sadly, that includes some black authors, particularly those who learnt from, and even praise, white appropriators undermining hoodoo and other african and african diasporic traditions. Be careful who you get your information from. Keeping things traditional means honoring real history and truth.

Let me also give you a last but very important reminder: the best teachings you'll ever get are going to come from the mouths of your own blood. Not a book or anything on the internet. They may choose to put certain people and things in your path to help you or point you in the right direction, but each lineage is different and you have to honor your own. Talk to your family members, to the Elders in your community, learn your genealogy, divine before moving forwards, talk to your dead, acknowledge your people and they'll acknowledge you and guide you to where you need to be.

May this be of service and may your ancestors and spirits bless you and yours 🕯️💀

#hoodoo #conjure #rootwork #black hoodoo authors #Youtube #hoodoo books #african american conjure #african american history #black history #black folklore #african american folklore #black magic #african american magic #witches of color #ATRs #Spotify

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porterdavis · 4 months

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Without consciously choosing to, I watched two damning movies the last two nights. I had somehow never seen 1970's Little Big Man, and I finally found enough time to watch the bloated 3 1/2 hours of Killers of the Flower Moon.

Both are reality-based chronicles of the treatment of Indians by whites in the US, and it's hard to imagine worse behaviour. Both movies are masterpieces, although each could have benefitted from some judicious editing for length.

I think I will wait a while before watching Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.

America's history is replete with ugly chapters: Tulsa race riots, Trail of Tears, slave hunters, internment camps, lynchings. No amount of the revisionist history promulgated by the right today will ever erase them. They need to be known, taught, and learned from.

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vivaciousoceans · 24 days

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In 1771, New York passed the Act to Confirm Certain Conveyances and Directing the Manner of Proving Deeds to Be Recorded, legislation gave white women some say in what their husband did with their assets.

In 1774, Maryland passed a similar law. It required a private interview between a judge and a married white woman to confirm her approval of any trade or sale by her husband of her property.

In 1787, Massachusetts passed a law allowing married white women, in limited circumstances, to act as femme sole traders, allowing them to conduct business on their own when their husbands were away.

In 1839, a Mississippi law passed giving white women the right to own enslaved Africans, just as white men were.

These are just some of the laws that allowed white women to be able to participate in the enslavement of Africans. This idea that white women have been completely beholden to white men and their whims, since the United States of America has existed, is just disingenuous revisionist history. White women have always been complicit in not just upholding white supremacy, but participating willfully.

#teya talks #antiblackness #white supremacy

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beardedmrbean · 5 months

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The Biden administration is removing William Penn from Philadelphia.

New plans by the National Park Service to renovate Old City’s Welcome Park include removing the centerpiece statue of William Penn permanently and redesigning the park to highlight Native American history — a move that has angered Pennsylvania’s Republican leadership.

The plan is a major shift, considering that the park was built on the site of Penn’s home, the Slate Roof House, and is named for the ship, Welcome, that transported him from England. Penn actually landed first in 1682 near the intersection of the Delaware River and Chester Creek in Chester.

Welcome Park is part of Independence National Historical Park and was completed in 1982 on designs by Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates to commemorate the 300th anniversary of Penn’s arrival.

The wide-open park across from the former site of City Tavern aims to tell the story of Penn’s vision for the city. Although a lesser-known area of Independence Park, it provides visitors with an overview of the city layout and history of Penn’s landing. The Penn statue includes a farewell ode to Philadelphia, imparting “what love, what care, what service, what travail have there been to bring thee forth.”

Now, the National Park Service wants to rehabilitate the park in time for the 250th birthday celebration of America in 2026. The park on Second Street between Chestnut and Walnut Streets has fallen into disrepair with rows of broken granite floor.

Representatives for the National Park Service could not be reached for comment Monday. They are seeking public comment on the proposal, according to their website.

Plans announced Friday call for “an expanded interpretation of the Native American history of Philadelphia” in consultation with Indigenous nations of the Haudenosaunee, Delaware Nation, Delaware Tribe of Indians, Shawnee Tribe, and the Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma.

Designs would keep some parts of the current park, including the original Philadelphia street grid, but the “Penn statue and Slate Roof House model will be removed and not reinstalled,” according to the plans.

Republican outcry

“The decision by President Biden and his administration to try and cancel William Penn out of whole cloth is another sad example of the left in this country scraping the bottom of the barrel of woke-ism to advance an extreme ideology and a nonsensical view of history,” Pennsylvania House Republican Leader Bryan Cutler (R., Lancaster) said in a statement.

Cutler said the treaty signed by Penn with Native Americans was historical and with “mutual respect shown between Penn and Native tribes.”

“This issue is also deeply personal to me,” Cutler said. “The first Cutlers came to Pennsylvania in 1685 on the ship Rebekah, not long after Penn’s arrival in 1682. They came to Pennsylvania because they were Quakers who shared Penn’s view of religious tolerance and peace.”

Cutler said removing the statue creates an “absurd and revisionist view of our state’s history.” He said he plans to introduce a resolution honoring William Penn and “encouraging” the National Park Service to halt the plan.

Pennsylvania State Sen. Scott Martin (R., Berks) and chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, on social media called the plan “absolutely disgraceful.”

Native Americans

Welcome Park, though not necessarily the statue of Penn, has also been the site of some resentment among Native Americans. The plot had been given to the Haudenosaunee (Six Nations from the Iroquois Confederacy) in January 1755 by John Penn, William Penn’s grandson. In the 1700s, Native American groups often visited Philadelphia for diplomatic and trade meetings. They sometimes numbered in the hundreds and visited so frequently that John Penn asked the Provincial Council of Philadelphia to consider setting aside a piece of land for these gatherings. The delegations often refused to negotiate treaties until they could stand on their own ground and build a council fire.

A 2020 Inquirer article chronicled a trip by six women from the Iroquois Confederacy in upstate New York to reconnect with the patch of tribal land on the site of Welcome Park.

“I anticipated a park in a natural pristine state. Like any other park, it would have trees, grass, water,” said Louise McDonald (Native name Wa’kerakátste), a Mohawk Bear Clan Mother from Akwesasne, N.Y. “I was frozen for a minute because I felt it had been choked and that it wasn’t a true representation of the original intentions of the space. It just seemed to be purposely buried with a cover-up narrative. There certainly seems to be a feeling of erasure intended to remove any spirit that would imply that we were once there.”

Penn in Philly

William Penn’s likenesses will still remain in Philly. The statue of Penn atop City Hall is a landmark, visible from many parts of the city.

And there is another Penn statue at Penn Treaty Park off North Delaware Avenue at the corner of East Columbia Avenue and Beach Street. Legend says Penn and a local Lenape clan made a peace agreement under an elm tree. The original “treaty elm” has long been replaced, but the park contains an obelisk and plaque memorializing the agreement, as well as a statue of Penn.

The discussion of the Penn statue’s removal is not the first time in recent years that Philadelphia has seen a struggle over statues.

The statue of Frank L. Rizzo, the late mayor and police commissioner, was ordered removed from in front of the Municipal Services Building in 2020 by then-Mayor Jim Kenney amid sweeping protests after the murder of George Floyd. Also in recent years, people have petitioned to have the Christopher Columbus statue in Marconi Plaza removed, though it still remains. _______________________________________

Time to start finding problematic people the folks on the left like and tearing monuments to them down, maybe Fredrick Douglas was sexist, we already know MLK was a Zionist that should count against him for some people, know who else was a Zionist

Wonder where the "Ruth Sent Us" group is now.......

Maybe we find something bad Harriet Tubman did and start to disqualify her, she may have been mean to native Americans or something.

Given enough time they're going to find something wrong with everyone that has a statue eventually.

Start with every single statue and bust of karl marx

#anonymous

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hero-israel · 9 months

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The fact some (not all) Palestine activists say the colonization of America is a “finished project” while that of “Occupied Palestine” isn’t is stomach-churningly repulsive, not only because of the antisemitism and revisionist history is it shows how to these so-called “decolonialism activists”, Native Americans are, like Holocaust Jews, some fantasy victims in the past to be used as metaphors for their agenda and absolutely nothing else

They don't want to give up a smidgen of their American privilege and comfort, so they say it's not necessary because of some "finished" level of colonization they made up. I'm sure Native Americans are comforted to hear so-called progressives declare they have been finished off. They are still very much facing problems, which Americans could very much help with a whole hell of a lot sooner than they could with I/P, but the sort of people who make awful takes like that presume that since Native Americans aren't blowing up school buses they must either be all dead or have no problems anymore. It's like a REVERSE colonization: only Palestinians know how to suffer, if anyone is doing it differently it doesn't count.

The major waves of Zionist settlement in Palestine happened at the exact same time as the "closing of the American frontier." States like Idaho, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Utah, are all younger than the Yishuv and have far smaller populations than Israel does today. It would be more politically achievable, and far more beneficial, to uncreate any number of those. These people are showing not just their antisemitism, but also their laziness and lack of imagination.

#israel #palestine #western frontier #closing of the frontier #native americans #leftist antisemitism #jumblr

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 7 days

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By Susan B. Glasser

“Guilty.” Donald Trump had avoided the word for so long that it was understandable to think he might never face it. When he was finally hit with a criminal conviction, soon after 5 p.m. on a sunny late-May afternoon, he had to sit and listen inside a New York courtroom as the label he so dreaded was directed at him again and again—thirty-four guilties, one for each of the thirty-four felony counts against him. Too bad the television cameras weren’t able to record this historic moment. We the people will be left to imagine what it looked like when the only former American President to go on trial became the only ex-President to bear the title of “convicted felon.”

Trump himself seemed a bit stunned—deflated, even. Speaking to reporters outside the courtroom, he offered a lacklustre rant, a sort of mashup of his greatest hits: “This was a rigged, disgraceful trial”; “I’m a very innocent man.” Soon, he was complaining about “millions and millions of people pouring into our country right now, from prisons and from mental institutions.” Was his standard-issue inflammatory anti-immigration diatribe related to his falsifying of business records in a 2016 hush-money payoff to the adult-film star Stormy Daniels? Trump didn’t care. “We have a country that’s in big trouble,” he said, before returning to the matter at hand. “This is long from over.” Then he turned his back and left.

What Trump lacked in truly incandescent rage, however, was soon supplied, in excess, by his followers—a backlash that unfolded as a carefully choreographed and truly unprecedented assault on the legitimacy of the American legal system. It struck me as no less threatening for having obviously been planned largely in advance. “Kangaroo court. Banana republic,” one social-media post from the Trump White House veteran Nick Ayers read—a pithy summation of much of the maga response. Senator Roger Marshall, a Kansas Republican, called the verdict “the most egregious miscarriage of justice in our nation’s history,” proving both that he does not know our nation’s history and that hyperbole in defense of their leader is considered the most forgivable of G.O.P. sins.

Rewriting history—and, at times, even outright inverting it—is one of the signatures of Trumpism, as it is of so many authoritarian political movements. In Washington on Thursday morning, hours before the verdict, Senator Marco Rubio posted on social media an old newsreel video of revolutionary justice being meted out in front of thousands of spectators at a sports palace in Fidel Castro’s Cuba. “The public spectacle of political show trials has come to America,” he wrote. A day earlier, in another social-media post, he had compared Trump’s hush-money case to “the kind of sham trial used against political opponents of the regime in the old Soviet Union.”

Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, surely knows better: Trump will not be summarily executed, as so many hundreds of thousands were in the Soviet purges. He won’t even have to wear an orange uniform if he does, in fact, end up serving time—inmates in New York are actually banned from doing so. After the verdict came out, on Thursday evening, Rubio complained again about “a political show trial.” Like Trump himself and many of his followers, and with no apologies to Woody Allen, he blamed Joe Biden for the whole travesty of a mockery of a sham.

Few Republicans dared to dissent from this instant new orthodoxy. Their lockstep statements made one long for the old bipartisan clichés about the sanctity of the courts and the wisdom of a jury made up of one’s peers. Indeed, when one prominent Republican, the former Maryland governor Larry Hogan, who is now running for Senate, ventured to offer the formerly standard comforting mush about respecting the verdict and reaffirming the rule of law that “made this nation great,” the reaction from other Republicans was swift and stunning. “I don’t respect this verdict,” the Utah Senator Mike Lee posted, in response to Hogan’s tweet. “Nor should anyone.” Chris LaCivita, one of Trump’s top campaign advisers, was so offended by Hogan’s defense of the American justice system that he appeared to publicly threaten his Senate bid. “You just ended your campaign,” LaCivita wrote to Hogan on X.

The blunt language set off all my post-2020 alarm bells—the Party that calls on its followers not to respect the courts is one that has already shown it can next order them to the streets. If this is how they are talking now, what will they do if the presiding judge in the trial, Juan Merchan, orders Trump imprisoned? The sentencing is currently set to take place on July 11th, just four days before the opening of the Republican National Convention. Is it fanciful, alarmist, or shrill to envision angry Trumpists storming the Manhattan courthouse? No, of course not. They have already shown what they’re capable of.

I found one of the statements reacting to the verdict especially chilling. It came from House Speaker Mike Johnson. There was nothing particularly notable about what Johnson said—he used the same buzzwords about “the weaponization of our justice system” and the “absurd verdict” that so many of his Republican colleagues did. The difference was that Johnson, unlike many of the empty suits who bluster around Washington, has already taken actions to rewrite history to suit Trump’s version of events—a project that will be crucial in determining whether Trump can overcome the stigma of a criminal conviction to win back the Presidency in November.

Just last week, in fact, Johnson’s House Republican majority went so far as to literally decree the fact of Trump’s trial off-limits. The episode, which did not get much attention at the time, is worth recounting in a bit of detail, because it hardly seems believable. And because it may be a preview of things to come.

The fight began a week ago Wednesday, when Jim McGovern, a Massachusetts representative who, for years, has been the decidedly unflashy top Democrat on the House Rules Committee, began debate on a procedural motion by criticizing the do-nothing 118th Congress, which is on track to be the least productive in recent memory. The session has been, McGovern concluded, “a stunning indictment of their ability to get anything done.” The matter would have ended there had McGovern not had a few more things to say on the topic of indictments—and, more specifically, Trump’s four pending ones. Perhaps, McGovern theorized, House Republicans were offering lame measures to debate on the floor “to distract from the fact that their candidate for President has been indicted more times than he’s been elected,” or that “the leader of their party is on trial for covering up hush-money payments to a porn star for political gain.”

This language earned him an admonition from the Republican congressman presiding, who told McGovern to “refrain from engaging in personalities towards presumed nominees for the office of the President.” Incredulous, McGovern pointed out the hypocrisy of reprimanding him for stating the simple fact of the charges against Trump, while Republicans regularly take to the House floor to inveigh against the “sham” legal proceedings. Eventually, he picked up a well-thumbed copy of Jefferson’s “Manual,” the original parliamentary bible for the U.S. Congress, drawn from centuries of British tradition. He noted its prohibition on speaking “irreverently or seditiously against the King,” and added, “Is that what this is about?”

When McGovern then had the temerity to enumerate all Trump’s various criminal cases, a Republican congresswoman from Indiana jumped in, demanding that McGovern’s words be “taken down”—that is, struck from the official record. And sure enough, when the ruling came back, the archaic prohibition on trashing the kings of yore was indeed cited, and McGovern’s words were officially deleted on the grounds that he had accused Trump of “illegal activities”—as if McGovern were somehow just slinging charges on his own rather than referring to actual cases in courts of law. Trump is no sovereign, regal or otherwise—not yet, anyway. But, in the House overseen by his party, unpleasant events concerning him can officially be written out of history with the bang of a gavel.

Now that Trump has become the first former President in American history to be convicted of a crime, will the MAGA Congress ban that information, too? What happens when McGovern, or one of his Democratic colleagues, goes to the floor to read out Thursday’s stunning news, all thirty-four counts of it? The jury’s word may have been “guilty,” but it is far from the last one we’ll hear.

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idolatrybarbie · 7 months

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series masterlist

pairing: post-canon!francisco "frankie" morales x fem!journo!reader

notes: an excerpt from my upcoming winter series, revisionist history.

“I’m not interested,” he grumbles, moving to shut the door in your face. You jam your foot in the doorway before he can.

“Mr. Morales, I’d just like a moment of your time,” you say, the words rushing out of your mouth.

He presses against the other side of the door harder, slowly crushing your toes. “Not interested. Now get your foot out of my goddamn door—”

“Why would the U.S. government have a reason to draw up a warrant for your extradition?” you ask.

You know it’s the only thing that will catch his attention. You’d been hoping to lead into it, lull the man into a sense of personable security before you sprung the trap on him. He stares at you now, the door ajar, his mouth slightly agape. Maybe that’s why they call him Catfish.

“Excuse you?”

“I’m here because the government is currently in communications with the Republic of Colombia about your extradition to South America. Along with,” you pull out your pocket notepad, reading off what you’ve scribbled there, “Santiago Garcia, and William and Benjamin Miller.”

“This isn’t funny.” His voice is low, a timbre rough as gravel. “How could you know that?”

“It doesn’t matter,” you say. “The fact is that I do. And whatever you did in Colombia? The government knows too.”

“Why are you here?”

You open the file folder under your arm, pulling out a blurry surveillance photo. “This is you, right?” Francisco doesn’t have to nod for you both to know it is. “I’d like to help you, if I can.”

#speaking #frankie morales #pedrostories #frankie morales x reader #triple frontier #fic: revisionist history

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talokanda-forever · 11 months

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THESE THOUGHTS HAVE BEEN PERCOLATING FOR A WHILE

This is a long one. My hope is to eventually distill this into a TikTok edit, but keeping things short and sweet is not my strong suit—obviously. But I also may not ultimately have the time. 😬 I must thank @cutelatinagirl for her recent “deep dive” posts. The way you’ve formatted them helped me gather my thoughts for this one.

When viewing the attacks and accusations made against Tenoch over the past few months ONLY within the context of his vocation as an actor, it doesn’t make much sense. It is illogical for the powers that be, with virtually unlimited influence and resources, to take time to not only insult him but degrade and dehumanize him on various social media platforms. He is an actor. Tenoch himself has stated he has no political power. He does not come from an influential family with a lot of money. And I know some tend to think because someone is an actor they must be ‘rich.’ I obviously have no visibility to Tenoch’s finances, but I’m going to hazard a guess that he doesn’t have a vault filled with gold coins that he swims in from time to time like Scrooge McDuck.

However, when viewing this coordinated smear campaign in the context of Tenoch’s social activism, it should not be surprising. Unfortunately, it should have been expected. We have seen this before in the US—most notably during the civil rights movement of the 60s and 70s.

I have often mused at how the conditions Tenoch so vividly conveys about racism/classism/colorism in Mexico seem to align with where we were in the US 60+ years ago. It is evident to me that he has actually studied our civil rights movement. Unlike today’s white-supremacy-denying politicians in the US who can only quote a couple of lines of Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream speech as evidence that he would not have agreed with the Black Lives Matter movement (GTFOH).

Revisionist historians would have us think MLK was a universally beloved figure while he was still alive. That could not be further from the truth. You’d think his assassination would be enough evidence to the contrary, but nah. So how do mischaracterizations of history such as this get a foothold? Because those in control of the narrative decide what information is shared with the masses, and what remains obscured— and they do so BY DESIGN. Sounds an awful lot like what’s happening with Tenoch.

What is not widely disseminated is that the FBI took an active role in discrediting civil rights leaders in order to silence their voices and prevent their messages from mobilizing the masses.

The screenshot below was pulled from the ACLU website at this link:

I highlighted those portions that seem to apply most to what Tenoch is experiencing. Although the breaking up marriages bit doesn’t fully apply since he’s been divorced for some time, the accusations that have been made could very well have an impact on any current or future relationships. And don’t come at me with, “Well, these tactics were used in the US years ago and has nothing to do with Mexico in 2023.” This is more about human nature. The objective of the FBI is no different than the objective of a piece of shit billionaire media mogul. RETENTION OF POWER. The goal of employing such dirty tricks to take out those who are a threat is not restricted by an artificial, man-made border. And guess what? The FBI and CIA have had a presence throughout Latin America longer than most of our parents and grandparents have been alive, so don’t think their dirty tricks weren’t passed along to those nations. They have been in practice ever since. The people in power today are the offspring of those who were in power yesterday, whether by blood or in spirit.

COINTELPRO involved not only wiretapping, but as the investigation showed, attempts to disrupt, discredit, and defame perceived political radicals. Hoover targeted few figures as relentlessly as Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. (There is a similar fixation on Tenoch) The charge, Communist influence in the civil rights movement. FBI Director, Hoover:

Below is an excerpt of a transcript found on the NPR’s website about some of the activities by COINTELPRO specific to MLK. The full transcript can be found here:

(Soundbite of 1970s report)

Mr. J. EDGAR HOOVER (Former FBI Director): The Communist Party of America is doing everything in its power to steal the minds and the souls and the hearts of our young people. (Tenoch is constantly aiming in message to youth because the power to change the future lies with them)

CHIDEYA: In August of 1963, Reverend King gathered more than a quarter of a million Americans on the Mall in Washington to champion Civil Rights.

(Soundbite of 1970s report)

Rev. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. (Civil Rights leader): Free at last, free at last. Thank God, Almighty, we're free at last.

CHIDEYA: That march spurred Hoover to action. A little more than a month later, the FBI Director petitioned the Attorney General, then Robert F. Kennedy, to approve a wiretap on King's telephone. (High profile appearances by Tenoch are soon followed up with coordinated online attacks—see more on that below) Kennedy only agreed, according to his attorney Nicholas Katzenbach, in order to protect King.

(Soundbite of 1970s report)

Mr. NICHOLAS KATZENBACH (speaking as Robert F. Kennedy's attorney): He did not let Hoover tap King's wire. That would be used, really, as almost proof that King was being influenced by Communism. Bobby thought that if he tapped it he would find out that you were not.

CHIDEYA: And in fact, Kennedy was right. The Church Commission found that the wiretap showed that Dr. King did not support Communism. (Fabricated charges with no independently corroborated evidence) And that his two associates who may have been allied with the Communist party didn't influence King's views or his organization. (Associates (PP) are the offenders but Tenoch constantly gets pulled in by association and because of his visibility) But documents suggest that Hoover's campaign against King was as much personal as political. (Fixated on Tenoch like they’re chasing a white whale) And the rift between the two men deepened in 1964.

Although what’s going on with Tenoch shouldn’t be surprising, it doesn’t make it any less irrational. Why? Because it is rooted in FEAR of losing power. Actions rooted in fear many times don’t make sense on the surface. Those who have gained power through the covert and overt subjugation of marginalized communities must also find ways to maintain that power. Remember, those who owned plantations were outnumbered by the men and women they enslaved. But there was a SYSTEM in place that kept them terrorized, disoriented, and disorganized.

Tenoch is stirring the masses and he is doing so on an international level where Mexico’s cultural elites CANNOT CONTROL THE NARRATIVE.

As some have pointed out, like @cutelatinagirl in the Tweet below, the timing can’t be ignored. Neither can the reach of his message. Releasing statements on certain platforms only in English (MER’s response to Tenoch’s only public statement) and constantly @ing Disney speak to why they are so desperate to slander Tenoch in such a public manner. Truth and facts be damned. It doesn’t matter that they have no proof. They are willing to take the risk as long as they are successful in their primary objective of taking him down.

Also, let’s not forget about this year’s Festival Prieto. I recall comments linking Tenoch’s statements about Jesus being black with how Messiah-like he looked in the footage of him walking through the crowd to get to the stage (see the video below from a post by @luzsp9-1981 ). I tried to find the exact comment but couldn’t so I’m paraphrasing. For those of us who aren’t triggered by seeing Tenoch adored by fans—many of whom are part of marginalized communities—it was taken as a lighthearted comment. I audibly giggled. However, when someone has a fear of their power being challenged, or worse yet diminished or stripped, these same images become concerning and are no laughing matter in their eyes. And there is no question his activities and online responses are being monitored. Tenoch appeared at Festival Prieto on May 25th. MER shat her half-baked Tweet on June 9th. More than enough time to coordinate a new phase of the attack.

I know we are a generation that prides itself on being well-informed and media savvy. You can’t hoodwink and bamboozle us like our unfortunate predecessors who didn’t have a world of information at their fingertips in the form of smartphones, tablets, and wearables. No siree! However, bullshit wrapped in slick packaging, designed to look like what we perceive as credible information, is still just bullshit. We have ALL been duped at some point. It is exhausting at times to dig deeper and to NOT stifle our curiosity. But we have got to stop acting like asking questions when you don’t fully understand something is a character flaw. Or that remaining neutral when a SA accusation has been revealed BY CHOICE in a PUBLIC FORUM somehow demonstrates you are a heartless bastard/bitch who denies assaults ever happen at all. Sorry, but I’m not casting aside my critical thinking skills just so Tumblrland, Instaville, and the Twitterverse might recognize me as a caring human being for the millisecond that my post/reel/Tweet is retained by the reader.

@cutelatinagirl @cantstayawaycani @observers-journal @sarahivi @luzsp9-1981 @aolechan @oakzap425 @love-too-believe @soledadmiranda @venting402 @v4mpires0ap

#tenoch huerta #tenoch huerta mejia #jose tenoch huerta mejia

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arokel · 2 months

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something that's been bugging me about the bitb book for a while but i haven't been able to articulate is what i guess i'd call its... compartmentalization? like i really like DJB's commitment to not overlooking the actions of the nazi party in germany during the timeline of the book, but the way he keeps those parts of the book totally separate until the boys get to Berlin/Grünau kind of serves in my opinion to frame it as something that had nothing to do with america at that point - or as if the 1936 olympics was the only contact between the united states and germany that mattered up until america entered the war. and that's just not true.

and to me this feels like a symptom of a larger problem with the book: DJB doesn't want anything to complicate his hero's journey narrative. he wants the olympic rowing committee to force the boys to raise funds, but he doesn't want to talk about how they got screwed over by Avery Brundage's mismanagement of the AOC in general and just passed the burden on to the athletes. he wants the Huskies to win a nail-biting victory over Cal in the olympic qualifiers but he doesn't want to mention that Cal had swapped out their number five at the last minute because he was rowing with broken ribs. and he wants to talk about the letter from Bobby's dad but not about how most American athletes - including Bobby - didn't give much thought to the political situation in Germany before or while they were there.

it's a truth of American history that the peace movement in the United States was huge in the 1930s - much bigger than the boycott movement which DJB also barely mentions. it's not that no one saw the warning signs (though the nazis did successfully keep a lot of things hidden), it's that most Americans didn't care, and the narrative we tell now about Jesse Owens defying Hitler's racist rhetoric to win gold obscures the real story: that American journalists were prevented from accurately reporting on the real situation in Germany; that antisemitism at home played a huge part in the way American athletes and tourists turned a blind eye to the things that seemed just a bit off about Berlin; that the nazis fooled the Americans so well because, deep down, the country wanted to be fooled.

idk i just wish the book spent a little less time on a revisionist narrative for the sake of a thrilling story and a little more time on telling a compelling story within an accurate historical context. it's possible to do both. the boys in the boat just doesn't, and that's kind of a bummer.

#the boys in the boat #this is a controversial take but whateverrrrr #not targeting anyone in the fandom btw it's just kind of bugging me the more i look back at the book #meta #i guess

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