Morning Comrades! Almost made it, the first week back here in the cold north and didn’t lose my shit and I am surprised more of you are here than at the beginning of the week. Nice. To kickstart this weekend I would like to draw your attention to this weekends drop that is available now through to Sunday. It features this incredibly annoying to make 4 colour screen print re-working the Patagonia logo into something a little more subversive. Available for the first time as a hoodie as well as a t-shirt for those of you that didn’t get a chance the first time around 2 years ago. I’ve got to be a little careful with this one because the brand loyal chad’s really got on my case about this one last time- so don’t be surprised if I am reluctant to put this one out again. I truly don’t need another lawsuit on my hands any time soon. Click the below images to be taken directly to the online store.
A big story that broke on Wednesday is that the Intercept got a hold of secret internal document from Facebook that a is s list of “dangerous and individuals and organizations”. Hardly surprising that the biggest media company in the world has such a list and acts responsibly ( cue sarcastic laughter ) to monitor and censor harmful content. Ahem. Right. Deep Breath. Continue. Again, I don’t think it is surprising that such a list exists, and here is the link to the entire list - to save you the trouble I went through it and we aren’t on it - but rather who is on that list and who isn’t.
We already know that FB is a corrupt & fascist shit show so there is no need to drive that point home again. We know that their content “moderation” is outsourced to hugely underpaid workers on the South East Asia that spend their days being viewing some of the most atrocious shit mankind puts on the net without any care for their mental well-being, let alone training on how to actually moderate “content”. Fact is, FB genuinely doesn’t give a rats ass as long as it sells advertising and the US Government leaves them alone to not pay taxes.
Facebook takes most of the names in the terrorism category directly from the U.S. government: Nearly 1,000 of the entries in the dangerous terrorism list note a “designation source” of “SDGT,” or Specially Designated Global Terrorists, a sanctions list maintained by the Treasury Department and created by George W. Bush in the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks. In many instances, names on Facebook’s list include passport and phone numbers found on the official SDGT list, suggesting entries are directly copied over.
That ties into this list, if you go through it, you will notice that it essentially mirrors the categorization of “extremism” the US Government uses and furthermore, mirrors their selection of organizations and people that they call a “threat”. Hardly surprising that this list then predominately includes POC’s, organizations from the Global South and so on, I found maybe one or two Far-Right European Terror Orgs on there, having a full list of well over 100 such organizations with names on my desk. You’re getting the point.
The DIO policy and blacklist also place far looser prohibitions on commentary about predominately white anti-government militias than on groups and individuals listed as terrorists, who are predominately Middle Eastern, South Asian, and Muslim, or those said to be part of violent criminal enterprises, who are predominantly Black and Latino, the experts said.
The materials show Facebook offers “an iron fist for some communities and more of a measured hand for others,” said Ángel Díaz, a lecturer at the UCLA School of Law who has researched and written on the impact of Facebook’s moderation policies on marginalized communities.
While the past two decades have inured many the world over to secret ledgers and laws like watchlists and no-fly bans, Facebook’s privatized version indicates that “we’ve reached a point where Facebook isn’t just abiding by or replicating U.S. policies, but going well beyond them.”
“We should never forget that nobody elected Mark Zuckerberg, a man who has never held a job other than CEO of Facebook.”
Read that article. It’s long, yes, but important. It further cements the long known fact that FB is dangerous, willfully so and that tackling this entity is a massive priority.
Workers in the United States are quitting their jobs at a record pace.
The latest Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey – JOLTS – from the US Labor Department showed that the number of Americans quitting their jobs jumped to 4.3 million in August. That is 2.9 percent of all employed workers in the US, marking the highest quits rate on record. I’ve been meaning to put together various generally unreported pieces of information together this entire week concerning, what looks like a Perfect Storm brewing in the US from this end. It is hardly surprising that getting all this information is incredibly difficult to almost impossible but here we go. It is no secret that the US is broken - I cannot imagine how difficult it must be to make ends meet in an economy that simply does no longer work for the vast number of people it relies. Aside from the fact that a huge number of people aren’t returning to work, what is even more interesting to see - and demanding action from everyone - is the number of strikes popping off, in the past few weeks alone. Remember, strikes are one of the most important tools in the fight against the capitalists and those striking deserve nothing but our unwavering support.
At the point of writing we are looking at a record number of at least 90`000 people on strike in the US, come Monday. Now, from an European perspective, hey, we do this all the time and rightly so but this hasn’t happened in my living memory in the US. We all need to keep an eye on this one and support where we can. I will continue with this come next week.
Feminism and Critical Masculinity.
Yup, we are going there. Whilst I am firmly planted in my marxist materialistic view on, well everything, over the last few years I have become increasingly aware of an additional element in that worldview and that is Feminism and Critical Masculinity. Now, I know right? What you just heard of feminism now? Clearly not, that righteous movement has been around for well over a hundred years and truth be told, and I am certain that goes for most of my comrades, outside of the often repeated “Smash The Patriarchy” Slogans we throw around, I seriously doubt many of us have actually sat down, read and listened to the decades of academic work done in this field. I know I haven’t, and whilst I am the first to proclaim my support in the destruction of the patriarchy, that sentiment is based on my marxist interpretation and analysis and does not come from a feminist perspective. To be clear, I do believe that feminism and critical masculinity play a role, a big one, in the entirety of materialistic class analysis and praxis without it replacing marxism to become Marxism.jpeg vol3. Hardly. However, I am increasingly becoming aware of the fact that without this important component we will not be getting anywhere and the truth is, I am a total novice outside of my own, internal, moral code. That’s not enough and with that we are going to be discussing this going forward, regularly. Now, the last thing anyone on this planet needs is another middle aged white dude like me explaining this and I will not do so. I will start reading and talking to comrades far more versed in these subjects and share their perspectives, their work and the work that we all believe will benefit us all here. Thank you for the many very special comrades in my life that have and will hopefully continue to educate me in this, that support this discourse on here.
For the time being and I was just recommended these two resources, my dear Comrades, let’s start. I will. I hope you will too. Stay tuned for upcoming contributions, interviews, thought pieces, resources and so on.
Sorely missed in last weeks newsletter, both Ana and Tatjana return with their columns on food & drinks.
Essentially, Lazanki are polish noodles with heaps of cabbage, mushrooms and bacon - we’re keeping it vegetarian here today - so enjoy!
Ingredients: 200g of white cabbage, 2 carrots grated, 1 sliced white onion, 1-2 sticks of celery sliced, 100g of tagliatelle, 80g of cream, 3 tablespoons of sour cream, 2 tablespoons of vinegar, 2 tablespoons of sugar, 2 teaspoons of sumach, 1 teaspoon of chili, lime juice from one lime, salt and pepper.
Step 1
Essentially, make a coleslaw with all of the above, let rest for 2 hours, make the pasta, mix with the coleslaw and thank me later.
As promised I'm gonna do give you a variety of stirred, shaken and 'easy-peasy built in glass'-type cocktails, so this week we're doing something that can be done almost all three ways. It's the pre- prohibition cocktail called STINGER.
The STINGER is a cocktail that in some form dates back to around 1890-1892, but under a different name. William Schmidt (died 1905) wrote a book called The Flowing Bowl (published 1902). By this time William Schmidt had bartended for something like 30 years in Chicago and New York, and had had several articles published about him and his drinks. From those, we know that he was quite the character and loved the press he got. Side note: I am would 110% sure that William Schmidt would have loved Instagram. In his book there's a recipe for a drink called the Judge, which is more or less what we now know as a Stinger. In 1914 another printed recipe for the Stinger pops up, and an article from 1923 credits Reginald Vanderbilt (yes that Vanderbilt) with it's creation. The water's murky when it comes to it's origin. While it is true that some form of the Stinger has existed since the 1890's, it is also true that Reginald Vanderbilt was very fond of the drink, and is supposed to have made and served his guests plenty of them as well. The Stinger quickly became a drink for the 'high society' back then and functioned mostly as an 'after-dinner drink'. It has also been featured in quite a few novels and American movies from the 1940's-1960's, but has since mostly flown under the radar.
The Judge cocktail was originally shaken (which is odd considering the ingredients), but the Stinger has since then also taken on both a shaken and a stirred form. In stirred form it can be served straight up or on the rocks. The specs also vary quite a fucking lot depending on both source and products. I personally stir it in a rocks glass with ice. This recipe will therefore do that version and follow the specs I like.
WHAT YOU NEED:
- Cognac (dry-ish if possible)
- White crème de menthe (very fucking important it's a white one) - Jigger
- Rocks glass
- Ice (I used a one big ice cube)
- Bar spoon
- Mint sprig or lemon peel (optional)
HOW YOU DO IT:
- Pour 4 cl of cognac and 2 cl of a white crème de menthe into your rocks glass.
- Add ice/a big ice cube and stir about 20 times round.
- If you want to garnish it, use a small mint sprig and place it on the ice. A lemon peel can also work to add a little freshness, but do discard it after spraying the oils onto the glass.
- Drink!