It's not even: "I don't use this, so why should I pay taxes for it?"
It's: "I am completely unaware of the tremendous, heroic efforts that are required on a day-to-day basis to keep civilization running, and me personally safe, healthy, and comfortable, and I refuse to educate myself on the subject - so why should I pay taxes for it?"
The machinery of civilization is becoming ever more complex, yet people are still crying out for "simple solutions", as if there is such a thing anywhere outside of the fevered imaginations of populists.
I've seen a lot of voices saying that " #Mastodon does not need to grow to be successful", and "we don't need to put in more effort to welcome new users", and frankly this attitude is pissing me off.
"The reason that social media did not work as promised is not because we misunderstood the nature of the internet and the possibilities of digital connectivity, but because oligarchs took over the digital space."
If there is any chance of using social media as a force for democracy, we desperately need a system that cannot be taken over by the oligarchs. And, right now, the #Fediverse is the best candidate for this.
Thus, there is homework that needs to be done. We cannot just rest on our laurels and proclaim that the tech is already good enough, and that the #Fediverse tech approach somehow magically solves all the problems of other social media platforms. We need to get away from the overwhelmingly white male European/North American user base and look for ways on how to increase #BIPOC user participation - not to mention participation of users from Asia, Africa, and South America.
If we try to maintain the Fediverse as the home of a small, incestuous group of people with a particular tech slant, the oligarchs will win.
And this is really the black, rotting heart of the #EffectiveAltruism movement: It is nothing more than excuse to plunder the present for a highly hypothetical distant future.
Look, I am not saying that humanity won't ever spread out among the stars, assuming that we survive the present crisis - though I bet it won't be during these bastards' lifetimes (since the needed tech is nowhere available). However, if the actual goal is "more Mozarts and more Einsteins", then they could do far more for this right now.
Both Mozart and Einstein grew up in relatively privileged families who made it possible for their scions to follow their passions. In contrast, the Capitalist system that both Bezos and Musk encourage grinds most of the people working in it - especially at the lower ends - into the dust, creating a vast overworked and underpaid underclass.
How is human ingenuity supposed to prosper under these situations? How can a new Mozart or Einstein arise if their parents struggle to make ends meet as a part of the vast supply chains Bezos and Musk are commanding?
If they don't take care of the people living right now, then why should we trust the ideology of these bastards to encourage the growth of the human spirit in the future?
They are NOT humanity's saviors - but merely an expression of the sickness of our times.
Since this post is making the rounds, I want to point out that the kind of bigotry that fuels fascism has a long history.
As my area of research is German #folklore , I am currently writing a series of essays on #antisemitism is expressed in old German folk tales. Here is the first essay - any feedback is welcome!
I see a lot of people sharing blanket condemnations of all of those who still remain on #Twitter / #Xitter , and I need you to slow down a bit.
Sure, in some cases this is justified - journalists should really know better. But there are a lot of communities on that platform that are vital to many people's well-being that haven't been replicated on the #Fediverse or elsewhere. Take #BlackTwitter - while #BlackMastodon is growing, it's still minuscule in comparison. The number of Twitter users in #Pakistan is staggering, while they are only a handful on #Mastodon . And so on, and so forth. Twitter was a lifeline to many marginalized people, and it still is - even though it gets worse every day - and we need to recognize this.
As a white European guy, it was easy for me to walk away from Twitter (I still have an account there, but I only post "you should go to Mastodon" stuff these days) - since it is easy to find people of a similar background to interact with. But this is NOT true for everyone!
So I'd like everyone to show a bit less contempt to the remaining Twitter users in general, and put some more effort in how to make the Fediverse friendlier to marginalized voices. Because there is MUCH work to be done here!
Meanwhile, over on #Twitter , #ElonMusk contemplates removing the block function because fascist commentator Andy Ngo complained about getting blocked by Antifascists.
#FolkloreMoment : I've been translating a lot of vampire folklore from northeastern Germany as of late. And they are not at all similar to modern media portrayals of the phenomenon.
For starters, they rarely if ever actually leave their graves. Instead, all their "feasting" is usually done via some sort of sympathetic connection to their victims (usually their relatives).
The reason why someone becomes a vampire after death also varies a lot. But the account I am currently translating ("Der Vampyr im Wendlande"/"The Vampyre in the Wendland Region") has a particularly interesting take on this.
You see, people will become vampires if they have been weaned off their mother's breast twice as infants - that is to say, the first attempt at weaning them off mothers' milk didn't take. They must survive to become adults, but then, once they die, they will become vampires. They are also called "Dubbelsüger" or "Doppelsauger" - "Double Sucker" for this reason.
And then, once they are dead, they will sit up in their graves and attempt to suck their own breasts - presumably because they are so used to sucking breasts during their infancy. And this "sucking" is then somehow transferred to their next of kin, who will become pale, scrawnly, and weak until they finally die.
Quite a difference to the usual Anne Rice-type vampire, isn't it?
(Incidentally, I will publish the full translation of this account on my Patreon page this December.)
My name is Jürgen, and I translate old German folk tales into English - not just tales from the Brothers Grimm, but from the hundreds of other 19th century German folklorists out there.
To date, I have translated more than 500 tales. You can learn more about my project here (and you can get a free ebook version of my first book if you subscribe to my newsletter there):
A suggestion for those who still wear masks because of #COVID :
If you get questions why you are wearing one, simply say:
"Because I don't want to infect anyone."
This shifts the conversation away whether or not you are a "coward" for worrying about a "harmless flu" or whatever rot is making the rounds. If the persons talking to you interpret this to mean that you are infected right now, they might back off and leave you alone - a win.
If they actually ask you about it, you can say: "I don't know - it's been a while since my last test. Better to be safe."
And if they ask whether wearing a mask doesn't bother you, you can answer:
"I have neither hypersensitivity with things touching my skin, nor any respiratory ailments that would make breathing with a mask difficult. So the discomfort is only minor, and I am more than happy to make that sacrifice for others."
This ought to make them squirm, for it implies without stating that those who refuse to wear masks are either selfish, or that they have some kind of disability that would make wearing one intolerable. And since COVID denial and ableism go hand in hand, it should be interesting for them to try and weasel out of this one. #CovidIsNotOver
A reminder: I put the locations of all the German-language folk tales I've translated on an interactive map, with links to both my translations on my Patreon (the "balloon" shapes link to publicly visible posts) and to the original German-language sources.
Check out what supernatural events took place in your part of Germany!
I originally studied physics. And like many of those who graduated in the #STEM fields, I developed a certain prejudice against the #Humanities.
Today I can say that I was wrong.
And the most important lesson of the Humanities is that the life experiences of others are valid even if they are different than your own - something too many people forget. It's too easy to become a judgmental asshole if you ignore that lesson.
A question: Has anyone done a survey on the cost of running a #Mastodon instance - both in terms of expenditures for running and maintaining the software on a server, and the time the admins have to spend on running and administering it?
And how does this scale depending on the number of users? #FediHelp
I can't meaningfully speak about the situation in the #MiddleEast , since there do not seem to be any even vaguely neutral news agency whom I could even trust to give me the facts of the situation. The disinformation is overwhelming all noise. I want the war there to end, but who is even working for peace, at this time - and who is merely fanning the flames?
But I can speak out about bigotry at home, here in Germany. And one ongoing strain of anti-Jewish bigotry here in Germany is the so-called "Schlussstrichdebatte" - dismissing the #Holocaust as a one-time aberration in German history.
But when you actually study German history - and #folklore , my own field of specialty - it quickly becomes clear that the Holocaust was unique only in its scale, not its nature. There no shortage of violent and murderous anti-Jewish bigotry.
I've touched this briefly in last year's essay, but maybe I should return to this topic, translate relevant texts and discuss them and their implications in more detail. Maybe this is a way in which I can meaningfully contribute to fighting bigotry.
I suspect that the introduction of moveable type to Germany greatly contributed to both witchcraft panics and anti-Jewish pogroms.
Even before the first actual, regular newspaper was published in 1604, Germany was rife with "news sheets" that printed all sorts of lurid and fantastical tales in order to increase sales. Think of modern-day tabloids or FOX News at their worst. And all those tales must be true, or else they wouldn't have been printed, right?
Some of the tales are rather amusing (like the Sankt Andreasberg cat that gave birth to 300 kittens and a goat in a single night while under the influence of a comet). But then there's a tale of a Jew who supposedly tried to "torture" blessed altar bread and, when he could not destroy it "with fire or water", he tried to "bake it into a cake". And then the dough became red, and he beheld a vision of Baby Jesus within the oven...
Such tales took on lives of their own, and helped keep all sorts of bigotries alive. Just like modern-day social media do...
(By the way, if anyone can give me some recommendations for scholarly works on the early era of mass printing, I am all ears - so far, I've mainly picked up individual anecdotes.) #printing#witchcraft#antisemitism#history
For the record, when I keep harping on my urgent wish that the #Fediverse becomes more universally used as a social media platform, I do not mean that everyone should federate with #Threads and the like - the very last thing we need are massive instances with lousy or no moderation who ruin everything for the rest of us. Instead I want:
News media, NGOs, companies, governments, political parties, and all sorts of other organizations running their own #ActivityPub feeds should be as normalized as running a Twitter/X feed or a Facebook page is for them now. Again, this does not mean that everyone has to federate with all or any of them - just that you can, and that they are making a real effort to be here.
And I know I am repeating myself, but we absolutely must develop a more diverse user base. The Fediverse is still overwhelmingly white, and overwhelmingly based in Europe and North America (with the exception of Japan, which has a large user base of its own. #Mastodonbadly botched the #BlackTwitter migration, and we are still paying the price.
In too many countries, and in too many communities people still overwhelmingly use X or Facebook or TikTok because that's the only way of reaching others in the same community. If we want to change that, we need to step up our global outreach game and listen to their concerns - instead of scolding them for being Bad People because they remain on Bad Platforms (yes, that kind of scolding happens rather frequently around here).
And I consider this to be a matter of urgent necessity. Sure, we could just stick with what we have, and remain a small, self-referential community that is largely ignored by the outside world. But it is clear to me that commercial social media is doing untold harm to the world day after day, and the sooner we get away from this, the better.
1/ One part of the #Fediverse which I think is still criminally underutilized is #BookWyrm . I, too, created an account months ago, only to ignore it for a long time. But now I'm finally making strides in indexing my library, and I want to share what I have learned about making this process as smoothly as possible.
First, of course, you will need your own BookWyrm account - the following website can help you with choosing an appropriate instance (as with Mastodon and other Fediverse platforms, there are multiple instances to choose from).
One aspect in which German folklore is lacking is giving its supernatural creatures cool names.
I mean, Japanese folklore apparently has names for any weird haunt you could name. But German folklore is like:
"Okay, there's a weird iron pig haunting the town. It has a tall shrub growing out of its back. It can also transform itself into bird and a porcupine and turn invisible, and has a tendency to pull off the trousers of miners.
But no, it doesn't have a specific name because Sod You, Encyclopedia Writers!"
And this isn't just a hypothetical example, either - I translated the tale featuring this critter last weekend.
Are there any non-shitty options for writers who want to get paid for their articles and writings?
This is of personal interest to me as well - I fortunately avoided Substack, but I am on Patreon, which seems to be going through its own enshittification cycle.
I know that discussing things like "monetizing the #Fediverse " are unpopular, but we still need to survive in this Capitalist hellhole we all live in - and I'd like it if there was some way of doing that as a writer without being dependent on dubious large platforms whose corporate owners put short-term profits over ethics every time.
I know everyone here is aware how much #Twitter has gone the drain since Elon Musk took over, but #Facebook is almost as bad.
As an example, Germany is currently experiencing abnormal warmth for this time of the year - and on every weather-related Facebook page mentioning this, there are hundreds of posters either cheering this on ("Awesome! I like it warm!") or denying that this is an aberration in the first place.
They are out there in force and outnumbering everyone else by at least a 10:1 margin - and thus give the impression that they are representative of public opinion. And with this, they are shaping the opinion of other Facebook users.
So there's the same problem as with Twitter - spend lots of time and effort in countering their claims wherever they appear? Or retreat and leave an entire social media platform to them - in the (possibly vain) hope that we can build better structures here on the #Fediverse that will eventually supplant Facebook and the others?
