David Pritchett
@davidpritchett.bsky.social
Author of Mossback: ecology, emancipation, and foraging for hope in painful places
https://tupress.org/9781595349910/mossback/
tracker, disciple of wonder, student of curiosity
davidpritchett.substack.com
davidpritchett.net
https://tupress.org/9781595349910/mossback/
tracker, disciple of wonder, student of curiosity
davidpritchett.substack.com
davidpritchett.net
Reposted by David Pritchett
i find this image so fascinating. it is both a literal example of authoritarianism but also a second-hand reproduction of the aesthetics of other authoritarian states. it's like a simulacra of authoritarianism whose purpose is to attempt to make the simulacra real.
This is a real photograph of Washington, DC this week, where the United States president has ordered military occupation in peacetime, and ordered the display of colossal portraits of himself.
www.wsj.com/politics/pol...
www.wsj.com/politics/pol...
August 28, 2025 at 1:38 PM
i find this image so fascinating. it is both a literal example of authoritarianism but also a second-hand reproduction of the aesthetics of other authoritarian states. it's like a simulacra of authoritarianism whose purpose is to attempt to make the simulacra real.
Reposted by David Pritchett
staging a show-and-tell about a fake genocide during a real genocide to the government that has done the most to seek justice for that real genocide is designed to break our brains. They know what they are doing. www.cnn.com/2025/05/21/w...
Trump ambushes South African president in Oval Office with video | CNN
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa sat in awkward silence as he listened to a video US President Donald Trump played in the Oval Office. CNN’s Larry Madowo reports that Trump was pushing debunked...
www.cnn.com
May 21, 2025 at 7:24 PM
staging a show-and-tell about a fake genocide during a real genocide to the government that has done the most to seek justice for that real genocide is designed to break our brains. They know what they are doing. www.cnn.com/2025/05/21/w...
Reposted by David Pritchett
Things only happen cos leftists make them happen (sootyempiric.blogspot.com/2025/03/the-...). Even to the point that far rightists wouldn't have been racist unless, alas, the left exercised their monopoly on agency to make them so. One of the genuinely puzzling features of our ideological landscape!
May 7, 2025 at 7:06 AM
Things only happen cos leftists make them happen (sootyempiric.blogspot.com/2025/03/the-...). Even to the point that far rightists wouldn't have been racist unless, alas, the left exercised their monopoly on agency to make them so. One of the genuinely puzzling features of our ideological landscape!
Reposted by David Pritchett
The response to this piece on end times fascism co-authored with @naomiaklein.bsky.social has been pretty astounding. I'm reposting in case you missed it.
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. We must build a movement strong enough to stop them.
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. We must build a movement strong enough to stop them.
The rise of end times fascism | Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. Our task is to build a movement strong enough to stop them
www.theguardian.com
May 5, 2025 at 9:23 PM
The response to this piece on end times fascism co-authored with @naomiaklein.bsky.social has been pretty astounding. I'm reposting in case you missed it.
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. We must build a movement strong enough to stop them.
The governing ideology of the far right has become a monstrous, supremacist survivalism. We must build a movement strong enough to stop them.
Reposted by David Pritchett
“If I die, I want a loud death. I don’t want to be just breaking news, or a number in a group, I want a death that the world will hear.”
She was about to get married; a film about her life in Gaza had just been finished.
10 of her family were killed with her.
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...
She was about to get married; a film about her life in Gaza had just been finished.
10 of her family were killed with her.
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...
‘If I die, I want a loud death’: Gaza photojournalist killed by Israeli airstrike
Fatima Hassouna, who had been documenting war in Gaza for 18 months and was subject of new documentary, killed along with 10 members of her family
www.theguardian.com
April 18, 2025 at 6:20 PM
“If I die, I want a loud death. I don’t want to be just breaking news, or a number in a group, I want a death that the world will hear.”
She was about to get married; a film about her life in Gaza had just been finished.
10 of her family were killed with her.
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...
She was about to get married; a film about her life in Gaza had just been finished.
10 of her family were killed with her.
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/a...
Reposted by David Pritchett
I am reminded of a thing I like to say about lying and it being bad for the health of society
April 13, 2025 at 11:28 PM
I am reminded of a thing I like to say about lying and it being bad for the health of society
Reposted by David Pritchett
Ron DeSantis is pushing to let employers schedule children as young as 14 for an unlimited number of hours, including overnight shifts.
At the same time, Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would let employers pay kids below minimum wage.
www.orlandoweekly.com/news/florida...
At the same time, Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would let employers pay kids below minimum wage.
www.orlandoweekly.com/news/florida...
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis pushed for child labor rollbacks behind the scenes, records show
Email communications first obtained by Orlando Weekly through a public records request show that staffers from DeSantis's office emailed draft legislation for Republican lawmakers to file.
www.orlandoweekly.com
April 8, 2025 at 6:12 PM
Ron DeSantis is pushing to let employers schedule children as young as 14 for an unlimited number of hours, including overnight shifts.
At the same time, Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would let employers pay kids below minimum wage.
www.orlandoweekly.com/news/florida...
At the same time, Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would let employers pay kids below minimum wage.
www.orlandoweekly.com/news/florida...
Reposted by David Pritchett
In place of that knowledge is a vastly complex distribution of knowledge labor that demands mutual respect across domains. I express the trust in the roads, mechanics, and manufacturers every time I get behind the wheel of my car.
April 8, 2025 at 11:20 AM
In place of that knowledge is a vastly complex distribution of knowledge labor that demands mutual respect across domains. I express the trust in the roads, mechanics, and manufacturers every time I get behind the wheel of my car.
Reposted by David Pritchett
A lot of things are breaking right now, but possibly most alarming is the straining to breaking of this otherwise invisible net of social trust that is as necessary as the road, power lines, and water pipes. Indeed, it is the implied social contract infrastructure of all of those tools.
April 8, 2025 at 11:21 AM
A lot of things are breaking right now, but possibly most alarming is the straining to breaking of this otherwise invisible net of social trust that is as necessary as the road, power lines, and water pipes. Indeed, it is the implied social contract infrastructure of all of those tools.
Reposted by David Pritchett
I expanded my thread on the Kristi Noem video into an essay here. slowcivilwar.substack.com/p/thats-bait (And yes, I know substack is a problem. Migrating soon.)
That's Bait
Kristi Noem and fascism's sadistic eroticization of power
slowcivilwar.substack.com
March 27, 2025 at 8:04 PM
I expanded my thread on the Kristi Noem video into an essay here. slowcivilwar.substack.com/p/thats-bait (And yes, I know substack is a problem. Migrating soon.)
Reposted by David Pritchett
Also think so much of this Fred Moten quote. But also think of how totally culturally and spiritually bankrupt authoritarian and fascist cultures are. It damages and dehumanizes you to be like that
March 19, 2025 at 2:41 AM
Also think so much of this Fred Moten quote. But also think of how totally culturally and spiritually bankrupt authoritarian and fascist cultures are. It damages and dehumanizes you to be like that
Reposted by David Pritchett
I wish people who want to be defeatists would start by defeating their own urge to spread their spirit of surrender. It's not helpful and it's not an accurate assessment of the present or the possibilities. Yes, we're in a hideous crisis. Yes, there's lots to do and lots of people trying to do it.
February 3, 2025 at 5:53 PM
I wish people who want to be defeatists would start by defeating their own urge to spread their spirit of surrender. It's not helpful and it's not an accurate assessment of the present or the possibilities. Yes, we're in a hideous crisis. Yes, there's lots to do and lots of people trying to do it.
Reposted by David Pritchett
Trump has rescinded Biden’s Executive Order 14087, “Lowering Prescription Drug Costs for Americans,” which included things like lowering state Medicaid costs for the most expensive therapeutics, reducing Medicare payments for proven drugs, and creating a flat, $2 Medicare copay for generic drugs
Trump’s initial orders reverse Biden on health care costs, protections from discrimination
Trump's executive orders took aim at Biden's priorities, from drug pricing to gender discrimination.
www.statnews.com
January 21, 2025 at 2:56 AM
Trump has rescinded Biden’s Executive Order 14087, “Lowering Prescription Drug Costs for Americans,” which included things like lowering state Medicaid costs for the most expensive therapeutics, reducing Medicare payments for proven drugs, and creating a flat, $2 Medicare copay for generic drugs
Mountain lion, meadow vole skull in a great horned owl pellet, old black bear print, and kangaroo rat among other tracks found this morning.
January 20, 2025 at 8:24 PM
Mountain lion, meadow vole skull in a great horned owl pellet, old black bear print, and kangaroo rat among other tracks found this morning.
So pick a trail to follow, and be a bit more tied to the creatures with whom you share the landscape. Stalk the lion and feels your claws grow, your hunger roil. Pursue a deer and feel the antler nubs sprout from your scalp.
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
We All Live in the Tracks of Others
Like the hawk moth, be transformed
open.substack.com
January 6, 2025 at 7:48 PM
So pick a trail to follow, and be a bit more tied to the creatures with whom you share the landscape. Stalk the lion and feels your claws grow, your hunger roil. Pursue a deer and feel the antler nubs sprout from your scalp.
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
Reposted by David Pritchett
Outraged by the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, a wilderness survival trainer spent years undercover climbing the ranks of right-wing militias.
He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was ProPublica reporter @josh-kaplan.bsky.social.
propub.li/3DGXECO
He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was ProPublica reporter @josh-kaplan.bsky.social.
propub.li/3DGXECO
The Militia and the Mole
Outraged by the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, a wilderness survival trainer spent years undercover climbing the ranks of right-wing militias. He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was a ProPublica reporter.
propub.li
January 4, 2025 at 12:00 PM
Outraged by the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, a wilderness survival trainer spent years undercover climbing the ranks of right-wing militias.
He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was ProPublica reporter @josh-kaplan.bsky.social.
propub.li/3DGXECO
He didn’t tell police or the FBI. He didn’t tell family or friends. The one person he told was ProPublica reporter @josh-kaplan.bsky.social.
propub.li/3DGXECO
Reposted by David Pritchett
I talked with my friends @prisonculture.bsky.social, @deanspade.bsky.social, @emanabdelhadi.bsky.social, and @shaneburley.bsky.social about activism and organizing in 2025 and how we should move into the next phase of struggle.
Wading Into 2025: How to Begin
“We live in chaotic, disastrous times, but amid that madness, we can still find each other and fight for each other.”
organizingmythoughts.org
December 31, 2024 at 3:52 PM
I talked with my friends @prisonculture.bsky.social, @deanspade.bsky.social, @emanabdelhadi.bsky.social, and @shaneburley.bsky.social about activism and organizing in 2025 and how we should move into the next phase of struggle.
The bigger question in my mind is which universe does not have is careening toward many crises steered by a plutocracy? Hope is a thing with multiple quantum states…
www.newsweek.com/google-quant...
www.newsweek.com/google-quant...
Google says its new quantum chip may prove parallel universes exist
Google's Willow chip is reigniting discussions about the possibility of parallel universes.
www.newsweek.com
December 16, 2024 at 7:26 PM
The bigger question in my mind is which universe does not have is careening toward many crises steered by a plutocracy? Hope is a thing with multiple quantum states…
www.newsweek.com/google-quant...
www.newsweek.com/google-quant...
I don’t have a million dollars to donate like Zuckerberg or Bezos, but as an act of good faith toward our new president’s inauguration, I’ve decided to donate this intricately bespoke suit for him to wear.
December 14, 2024 at 9:11 PM
I don’t have a million dollars to donate like Zuckerberg or Bezos, but as an act of good faith toward our new president’s inauguration, I’ve decided to donate this intricately bespoke suit for him to wear.
We need elders. All of us…
As in human societies, the transmission of knowledge is vital to animal cultures. The endangered Egyptian vulture depends on pre-migratory gatherings to share safe routes. With so few elders in the Balkans, juveniles often fly straight over the sea & perish there.
www.theguardian.com/environment/...
www.theguardian.com/environment/...
Saving ‘old and wise’ animals vital for species’ survival, say scientists
Hunting bigger, more experienced animals eradicates memories and knowledge crucial to group survival, research suggests
www.theguardian.com
December 13, 2024 at 2:51 AM
We need elders. All of us…
Thinking with woodrats about how to make this place more beautiful.
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
Shelter and the Warmth of Other Bodies
Paying Attention to Woodrat
open.substack.com
December 10, 2024 at 5:22 PM
Thinking with woodrats about how to make this place more beautiful.
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
open.substack.com/pub/davidpri...
Gutted.
lithub.com/a-glass-of-w...
lithub.com/a-glass-of-w...
A Glass of Water, a Burning Boy: Fady Joudah on Images From Gaza
A young man burning alive in his makeshift hospital bed singed the unspeakable into world memory—a short memory, a hyperactive memory with attention-deficit, a deliberately porous memory without in…
lithub.com
December 7, 2024 at 9:43 PM
Gutted.
lithub.com/a-glass-of-w...
lithub.com/a-glass-of-w...
Reposted by David Pritchett
PEN International has launched an archive to commemorate the lives & work of the many writers so far killed in Gaza.
It is a detailed honouring of each person.
“I am Nour El Din Adnan Hajjaj, a Palestinian writer, I am 27 years old & I have many dreams...”
www.pen-international.org/war-on-write...
It is a detailed honouring of each person.
“I am Nour El Din Adnan Hajjaj, a Palestinian writer, I am 27 years old & I have many dreams...”
www.pen-international.org/war-on-write...
War on Writers: A look at writers killed in Gaza — PEN International
www.pen-international.org
December 6, 2024 at 8:33 PM
PEN International has launched an archive to commemorate the lives & work of the many writers so far killed in Gaza.
It is a detailed honouring of each person.
“I am Nour El Din Adnan Hajjaj, a Palestinian writer, I am 27 years old & I have many dreams...”
www.pen-international.org/war-on-write...
It is a detailed honouring of each person.
“I am Nour El Din Adnan Hajjaj, a Palestinian writer, I am 27 years old & I have many dreams...”
www.pen-international.org/war-on-write...
Reposted by David Pritchett
This is not wishful or optimistic thinking on my part because I think a U.S. with a lot more violent insurgency is going to be a bloody nightmare that will harm a lot of people who aren’t rich or powerful.
I think MAGAs and their oligarch supporters really haven’t fully reasoned through “we’re going to make Americans as poor and desperate as possible to turn them into peasant vassals, but we’re also going to make sure they can still get lots of guns.”
OK this is something I've thought about for a long time. They've adopted a policy position of taking away everything from everyone but weapons. Like they're actively mainstreaming suppressors now.
December 5, 2024 at 4:31 PM
This is not wishful or optimistic thinking on my part because I think a U.S. with a lot more violent insurgency is going to be a bloody nightmare that will harm a lot of people who aren’t rich or powerful.
"What we’re called to ask is why the murder of one man must be described as unspeakable violence, but the systemic denial of life to 100,000 people is an acceptable business practice."
Dom Helder Camera called institutional violence "the mother of all violence".
www.jphilll.com/p/whats-a-li...
Dom Helder Camera called institutional violence "the mother of all violence".
www.jphilll.com/p/whats-a-li...
What's a life worth?
On the murder of UnitedHealth CEO Brian Thompson
www.jphilll.com
December 5, 2024 at 4:37 PM
"What we’re called to ask is why the murder of one man must be described as unspeakable violence, but the systemic denial of life to 100,000 people is an acceptable business practice."
Dom Helder Camera called institutional violence "the mother of all violence".
www.jphilll.com/p/whats-a-li...
Dom Helder Camera called institutional violence "the mother of all violence".
www.jphilll.com/p/whats-a-li...