I'm riffing on Michael Hardt's infamous (among some) commentary on Bartleby the Scrivener in "Empire": Bartleby's refrain, "I would prefer not to," writes Hardt, "is the beginning of liberatory politics.”

It's why--in something I'm working on now--I want to suggest that *resistance* is insufficient and inadequate to the moment. What we need is *refusal.* If resistance accepts (tacitly, implicitly) the terms of conflict, then refusal rejects them outright.

Yet more LeGuin: "To distinguish free enterprise from self-censorship takes a most uncomfortable degree of vigilance. And that so easily becomes paranoia."

More: "The strange thing about the Russians is that they do believe in art, in the power of art to change the minds of men. That is why they censor it."

LeGuin continues: "We are not a totalitarian state; we continue to be a democracy in more than name--but a capitalist, corporate democracy. Our form of censorship rises from the nature of our institutions. Our censors are the idols of the marketplace."

LeGuin continues: "We are not a totalitarian state; we continue to be a democracy in more than name--but a capitalist, corporate democracy. Our form of censorship rises from the nature of our institutions. Our censors are the idols of the marketplace."

YES 🙌 REFUSAL!!! “The only way to defeat suppression, oppression, and censorship—and where there is institutionalized power, there is censorship—is to refuse it.”

Omg I just got chills; this is from Ursula LeGuin’s essay about We (1973-77)

YES 🙌 REFUSAL!!! “The only way to defeat suppression, oppression, and censorship—and where there is institutionalized power, there is censorship—is to refuse it.”

Omg I just got chills; this is from Ursula LeGuin’s essay about We (1973-77)

[From Orwell's review of We (1946), comparing it to Brave New World]

"It is this intuitive grasp of the irrational side of totalitarianism--human sacrifice, cruelty as an end in itself, the worship of a Leader who is credited with divine attributes--that makes Zamyatin's book superior to Huxley's."

"'What have people--from the very beginning of humanity--prayed for, dreamed of, agonized over? It was all so that some day, somebody would tell them once and for all what happiness is, and then chain them to that happiness.'"

"'What have people--from the very beginning of humanity--prayed for, dreamed of, agonized over? It was all so that some day, somebody would tell them once and for all what happiness is, and then chain them to that happiness.'"

Reminds me of Korean friends telling me they'd rather go hungry than eat in a restaurant alone, which always made me sad

It’s a really bad movie, even by hagiographic movie standards. Charlize Theron does an excellent Megyn Kelly impression. That’s it. That’s the movie

(Game)cock tease

Stevland Rocks, Stevland Rocks!

I love it! But when I brought it to a Friendsgiving once upon a time, someone referred to it as “hot balls,” and it has unfortunately stuck as a joke my partner likes to tell 🤣