Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 26m

Never convinced by "SNP should focus less on independence" arguments whenever they so much as mention the raison d'etre of their party, sprry

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Julia Serano @juliaserano.bsky.social · 1d

apparently the new Netflix show Monster: The Ed Gein Story invented an "autogynephilia" backstory for their serial killer (because of course they did!). so time to re-up my collection of writings on this pseudoscientific zombie theory...
juliaserano.medium.com/autogynephil...

Autogynephilia, Junk Science, and Pseudoscience

plus links to my academic articles, online essays, and explainers on the topic

juliaserano.medium.com

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Sharon @sharonk.bsky.social · 2h

thiel, man, what the fuck are you talking about

He describes the plot of Watchmen, a 1986 graphic novel involving superheroes grappling with moral questions about humanity against the backdrop of impending nuclear war:

The antihero Ozymandias, the antichrist-type figure, is sort of an early-modern person. He believes this will be a timeless and eternal solution – eternal world peace. Moore is sort of a late-modern. In early modernity, you have ideal solutions, ‘perfect’ solutions to calculus. In late modernity, things are sort of probabilistic. And at some point, he asks Dr Manhattan whether the world government is going to last. And he says that ‘nothing lasts forever.’ So you embrace the antichrist and it still doesn’t work.

Thiel later finds biblical meaning in the manga One Piece, discussing how he believes it represents a future where an antichrist-like one-world government has repressed science. He believes that the hero, Monkey D Luffy, represents a Christlike figure.

In One Piece, you are set in a fantasy world, again sort of an alternate earth, but it’s 800 years into the reign of this one-world state. Which, as the story unfolds, gradually gets darker and darker. You sort of realize, in my interpretation, who runs the world and it’s something like the antichrist. There’s Luffy, a pirate who wears a red straw hat, sort of like Christ’s crown of thorns. And then towards the end of the story, transforms into a figure who resembles Christ in Revelation.

Thiel, along with a researcher and writer at Thiel Capital, explored these ideas at greater length in an essay for the religious journal First Things earlier this month.

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

He's handing weapons to them on a plate. Now unless the conditions are identical to 2011, the unionists will be like "sorry, can't give you a referendum, precedent ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ like you said"

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

Swinney's insistence that only an SNP majority (rather than a pro-indy majority) gives Scotland the right to a referendum is extremely irritating and his latest stuff about "if we get an SNP majority we get a referendum because precedent" is extremely fucking stupid

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

I saw Halloween tinsel today and it's broken my brain a bit

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

Daily Mail readers watch Les Miserables to cheer on Javert

Hanniba-LINA Lecter 💀 @agirlcalledlina.bsky.social · 19h

He’s right

Shoplifting is justified for Brits living in poverty, says Green Party's new hard-left leader Zack Polanski - and he says he would do it himself if he was poor

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Fergus Murray @fergus.oolong.co.uk · 3h

'Antifa, which is to say anti-fascists: not an organisation, but a term for everybody who is opposed to fascism'

pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 3h

Journos need to always challenge the right-wing framing of "antifa" being a specific organisation that can be banned or restricted. Just straight up be like "but that's nonsense, it doesn't exist" every time

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2h

Yes, gloss it every time just to show how stupid it is!

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 3h

(journos are not going to do this)

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 3h

Journos need to always challenge the right-wing framing of "antifa" being a specific organisation that can be banned or restricted. Just straight up be like "but that's nonsense, it doesn't exist" every time

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 3h

"ban antifa" in practice means "make it illegal to be left-wing" and that's the point

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C. Buckthorn @cbuckthorn.bsky.social · 7h

This is amazing. I laughed out loud www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

As 32-year-old Rich points out, though, "it's not like using ChatGPT guarantees success".
When he met someone in a bar one Friday night and swapped social media handles, he asked AI what his next move should be.
ChatGPT discerned that sending an initial message on Monday midmorning would set the right pace. "Then it gave me some options for what the message could be," says Rich.
"Keep it light, warm, and low-stakes so it reads as genuine interest without urgency," the bot advised. "Something like: Hey Sarah, still laughing about [tiny shared moment/reference if you've got one] - good to meet you!" Rich went back and forth with ChatGPT until he felt they'd hit upon exactly the right message ("Hey Sarah, it was lovely to meet you") but sadly she never replied, he says. "It's been two weeks now."

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Greg Jenner @gregjenner.bsky.social · 6h

You may call it ‘Chatfishing’, but I shall only refer to it as ‘Cyrano de Berger-App’
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

‘I realised I’d been ChatGPT-ed into bed’: how ‘Chatfishing’ made finding love on dating apps even weirder

Where once people were duped by soft-focus photos and borrowed chat-up lines, now they have to watch out for computer-generated charm. But it’s one thing to use a witty phrase – another thing entirely...

www.theguardian.com

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 20h

Argh yeah

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🦇🤘 Rigg-or mortis 🔶️🏳️‍🌈 @rigg.lgbt · 1d

Really interesting thread here

Philip Purser-Hallard @purserhallard.com · 1d

It occurs to me that the Doctor's polyethnic identity in recent times recontextualises Peter Davison's casting in quite an interesting way.
(For context, although you'd be unlikely to guess it by looking at him, Davison's paternal family is Guyanese. He has close relatives who are visibly Black.)

Peter Davison, a fair-skinned blond man, as the fifth Doctor, circa 1982.

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Natalie Bennett @nataliegreenpeer.bsky.social · 21h

A profound rethinking of the history of #biodiversity.

"In new view, plants did not colonize a barren wasteland, but rather world prepared for them over eons by the ancient and persistent activity of the fungal kingdom."

scitechdaily.com/earth-was-a-...

Earth Was a Fungal World Before Plants Existed

Fungi arose long before plants, shaping Earth with early soils and nutrient cycles. Their hidden legacy shows they may have prepared the world for life to flourish on land.

scitechdaily.com

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 21h

Singing Kettle

Quintessa Knight @quietblkgrl.blacksky.app · 22h

What would be the wildest concert for a fight to break out at?

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 21h

But also good lord, that style of subtitles is even worse when it's people talking over each other, DO PROPER CAPTIONS

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 21h

Love this, and a lot of politicians who claim to be pro-trans could learn from it

Bold Politics with Zack Polanski @boldpolitics.bsky.social · 22h

Solidarity with all trans and intersex people having their existence debated every time a tv host hasn't done their prep and can't think of any more questions

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Rose Schmits @roseschmits.bsky.social · 21h

Incredibly refreshing to see a uk politician just say yes a woman can have a penis and can you be normal about trans people if you dont want them to have a dick fund their transition awesome love this guy

Bold Politics with Zack Polanski @boldpolitics.bsky.social · 22h

Solidarity with all trans and intersex people having their existence debated every time a tv host hasn't done their prep and can't think of any more questions

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ceej @ceej.online · 2d

damn. hoping it at least signifies something

William Shakespeare @shakespeare.lol · 2d

It is a tale
Told by an idiot

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2d

One day I'll go to a mental health at work meeting that addresses how the work can be made less stressful rather than how staff can be made more resilient

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Simon Pegg @simonpegg.bsky.social · 2d

"Sir. A second image meme of this type has just dropped."

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pickwick @pickwick.bsky.social · 2d

No, I refuse this

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