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jon ben-menachem

@jbenmenachem.com

18K followers 860 following 7.5K posts

criminalization, abolition, labor, politics, journalism—social science theory & methods too. sociology phd candidate @ columbia. @swcolumbia.bsky.social

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · Apr 17

It shouldn't matter if Trump’s victims have criminal records. If we only defend the “innocent,” the fascists will argue that their victim “was no angel.” An anti-fascist rhetoric that carves out exceptions for imperfect victims is a gift to our opponents.

New from me for @us.theguardian.com:

What is a ‘criminal’ immigrant? The word is an American rhetorical trap | Jonathan Ben-Menachem

Labels like ‘gang members’ and ‘terrorist supporters’ are an easy way to make humans disposable

www.theguardian.com

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 1m

Also, if the idea is to get governors and state AGs mobilized against the feds -- I'd settle for simply refusing to use state and local cops to support federal abductions. This is way easier than criminal charges and they're still fucking up

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 6m

If Dems regain power and fill the DOJ with liberal lawyers again, it's fine for them to pursue those cases. But let's not get ourselves distracted by that as a main demand or organizing focus..

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 7m

I won't use any organizing energy opposing the criminalization of feds, but I really think people should be focusing on restorative initiatives for victims / communities first. We already saw the results of Jan 6 prosecutions---they're already back on the streets.

Robert Cruickshank @robertcruickshank.com · 18m

While I think ICE agents should face criminal charges for their kidnapping of immigrants, they should face long, and perhaps lifetime, prison sentences for anything like this involving kids. An ICE agent willing to do this is not someone who should be out among society even after Dems retake power.

Caitlin G. DeAngelis @caitlindeangelis.bsky.social · 1h

ICE kidnapped a 7th-grader with a pending asylum claim and spirited him out of state without notifying his parents, seemingly with the cooperation of the local police in Everett, MA.

www.bostonglobe.com/2025/10/12/m...

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Old White Nepo Hat @kenwhite.bsky.social · 29m

Unfortunately the warnings were ”being cops” and “having tear gas”

Heather Cherone @heathercherone.bsky.social · 48m

A federal judge ordered federal agents last week to issue two warnings before using tear gas.

Witnesses said they heard no warnings and none can be heard on videos, @chicago.suntimes.com reports

Heather Cherone @heathercherone.bsky.social · 51m

Federal agents deployed tear gas after Albany Park residents protested to their attempts to detain a resident of the Northwest Side neighborhood, @vimiller.bsky.social reports for the @chicago.suntimes.com

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 13m

funnily enough, re: your musing about "how does the median ASR article change," one comment I notice in Perrin's post is the concept of "surprising" evidence. This is actually the part of sociology that should be first to go. No more "gift wrapped puzzles" journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1...

Puzzling in Sociology: On Doing and Undoing Theoretical Puzzles - Ashley Mears, 2017

One typical way to motivate a sociological argument is to present the research question as a puzzle. Unlike in physical sciences, sociologists work backward to ...

journals.sagepub.com

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 22m

I think it kind of comes down to whether we think "viewpoint diversity" means something like "organizations are obligated to hire X individuals with Y viewpoints" or something like "we should publish research that meets a certain threshold regardless of ideological implications"

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 48m

honestly so sad how microsoft hasn't made a good product in my adult lifetime

Pavel @spavel.bsky.social · 8h

bitch what

Onedrive settings. A toggle for using AI to detect and identify faces is set to on. The caption says, you can only turn off this setting 3 times per year.

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Pavel @spavel.bsky.social · 8h

bitch what

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BronSays @bronsays.bsky.social · 5h

www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

"A prominent anti-DEI campaigner appointed by Meta in August as an adviser on AI bias has spent the weeks since his appointment spreading disinformation about shootings, transgender people, vaccines, crime, and protests."

Meta AI adviser spreads disinformation about shootings, vaccines and trans people

Critics condemn Robby Starbuck, appointed in lawsuit settlement, for ‘peddling lies and pushing extremism’

www.theguardian.com

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Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 8h

"Look at the picture... One of these is a member of a private militia that supports the President and was involved in a violent effort to overturn the election, the other is an agent of the state. Can you tell the difference?" donmoynihan.substack.com/p/purge-merg...

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 7h

I think using the concept in the case of domestic labor is more defensible than, say, describing the effort it takes to write a reply in a dating app chat.

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

Sorry this one maybe more relevant onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

<em>Journal of Marriage and Family</em> | NCFR Family Science Journal | Wiley Online Library

Attempting to explain why biological sex remains the primary predictor of household labor allocation, gender theorists have suggested that husbands and wives perform family work in ways that facilit...

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

I think SCOTUS would be unable to prevent federal law enforcement budgets from being zeroed out at the very least, but yeah I agree with the structural point

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

I think this is a well-explored case in scholarship! pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...?

Emotion work is characterized as activities relevant to the enhancement of significant others’ emotional well-being and the giving of emotional support (e.g., offers of encouragement, listening closely to partner; Erickson, 2005). Emotion work is an important construct in predicting divisions of household labor, childcare and relationship satisfaction, and contributions to family life (Erickson, 2005; Holm, Werner-Wilson, Cook, & Berger, 2001; Pfeffer, 2010; Stevens, Minnotte, Mannon, & Kiger, 2006). Emotion work is distinguished from other kinds of work in that the former cannot be delegated to individuals outside of the partnership or group (Erickson, 2005), and from emotional labor, or work occurring in the paid or public sections of the market economy (Hochschild, 1989).

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

The thing that's really distinctive about the status quo is that feds are being used specifically to punish partisan enemies. Criminalization is always already political, but it has not been partisan...

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

There would be real downsides to this (for example the ATF plays a key role in firearm industry regulation) but I'm really at a loss to describe other alternatives

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

If we regain power, what can be done to prevent this from happening again? Could we remove the federal government's ability to engage in domestic law enforcement?

Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 9h

New, from me:
Trump's 3 step plan to create a military omniforce
1. Purge - those deemed disloyal
2. Merge - different parts of law enforcement/military
3. Surge - impose the omniforce on Dem cities; instigate unrest; assert dominance; silence dissent
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/purge-merg...

Purge, Merge, and Surge

Trump is creating a omniforce of armed loyalists to establish his police state

donmoynihan.substack.com

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Countess Sappho @countess-sappho.bsky.social · 1d

YOU HEARD THEM

Meme image of Shinji from Evangelion leaning forward in a folding chair with his heads in his hands. Text around him reads "GET IN THE FUCKING FROG" and there are two depictions of someone in inflatable frog suits

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

the one piece read isn't far off lol

jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

emotional labor is a thing that happens *at work*. i will be pedantic about this until the bitter end en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emotion...

The sociologist Arlie Hochschild provided the first definition of emotional labor, which is displaying certain emotions to meet the requirements of a job.[1] The related term emotion work refers to displaying emotions you don't feel within the private sphere of one's home or interactions with family and friends. Hochschild identified three emotion regulation strategies: cognitive, bodily, and expressive.[5] Within cognitive emotion work, one attempts to change images, ideas, or thoughts in hopes of changing the feelings associated with them.[5] For example, one may associate a family picture with feeling happy and think about said picture whenever attempting to feel happy. Within bodily emotion work, one attempts to change physical symptoms in order to create a desired emotion.[5] For example, one may attempt deep breathing in order to reduce anger. Within expressive emotion work, one attempts to change expressive gestures to change inner feelings, such as smiling when trying to feel happy.[5]

While emotion work happens within the private sphere, emotional labor is emotion management within the workplace according to employer expectations. Jobs involving emotional labor are defined as those that:

require face-to-face or voice-to-voice contact with the public.
require the worker to produce an emotional state in another person.
allow the employer, through training and supervision, to exercise a degree of control over the emotional activities of employees.[1]
Hochschild (1983) argues that within this commodification process, service workers are estranged from their own feelings in the workplace.[1]

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Jack Sapoch @jacksapoch.bsky.social · 4d

One of the earlier and most-viewed examples was an animation of Al Shifa Hospital, published in October 2023.

The “underground command room” was recycled from a 2022 IDF animation of an UNRWA school in Tel Al-Hawa; the street above was built from prefab @kb-3d.bsky.social storefronts

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Jack Sapoch @jacksapoch.bsky.social · 4d

Others assets came from scans made by the Scottish Maritime Museum of their boat-building workshop which was downloaded (via @sketchfab.bsky.social) and reimagined by the IDF adornments for underground missile factories.

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Jack Sapoch @jacksapoch.bsky.social · 4d

We traced over 30 unique assets to Washington-based 3D creator Ian Hubert, who makes bespoke models created for his sci-fi project Dynamo Dream, available to his Patreon subscribers.

Scans of parking lots, antennas, and pipes were repurposed as Hamas and Iranian military sites

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jon ben-menachem @jbenmenachem.com · 8h

this is maybe the most offensive misuse of the term emotional labor that i've ever heard lmao

Mizzy Blundell-Straw MP 🌹 @mizzyblundellstraw.bsky.social · 14h

The emotional labour of thinking

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Prisonculture @prisonculture.bsky.social · 22h

I am happy that more people see that the police state is a BIPARTISAN project.

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