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, 4 tweets, 2 min read
Something happened today I’ll remember forever. A discussion on dictatorship for @BBCFreeThinking. This is Francesca Santoro L’hoir. Born 1933. As a little girl she acted with Chaplin in The Great Dictator. Could you read the last speech for us, I asked? She did. Devastatingly.
Here she is on the set with Chaplin, and in her scene in the movie as Aggie.
You can hear her talking tonight with another starry cast - @ETemelkuran @peterpomeranzev and Frank Dikotter - about old dictators and new authoritarians. Goes out 10pm tonight. bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00…
And here’s the speech complete - still full of extraordinary power.
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Matthew Sweet
@DrMatthewSweet
So as we’re all here, puzzling over the moment an apparent LaRouche activist used Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal to troll @AOC, it might be a good moment for me to list Lyndon LaRouche’s ten most insane conspiracy theories, just so it’s clear who they are.
1) The Queen controls the international drugs trade, to fund the British Empire, which still rules the world in secret.
2) The Queen, Obama and the Duke of Edinburgh plotted to reduce the world’s population to 1 billion by starting a nuclear war. (Obama very much the junior partner in this.)
Read 16 tweets
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Matthew Sweet
@DrMatthewSweet
It’s that moment when your obscure research subject pops up in the news. Yesterday @AOC was confronted by a woman claiming to be a climate activist at a town hall meeting. Her proposal to solve the climate crisis - “eat the babies”.
. @AOC did not denounce this woman. She thought that she was suffering from some kind of mental illness, and treated her kindly. But all kinds of figures on the right and the alt-right have pounced on the story. Including the President.
So who was this woman? Not a climate activist. Not even, perhaps, someone with a mental illness. She is a representative of the bizarre political cult once led by Lyndon LaRouche. Previous targets for this kind of stunt include @Janefonda Olof Palme & Michael Dukakis. Now @AOC.
Read 12 tweets
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Matthew Sweet
@DrMatthewSweet
Because my thoughts on @naomirwolf's @ViragoBooks Outrages are scattered in threads, and I'm being asked about details, I thought I would put them all in one place. Hope everyone thinks this is okay. You'll find our @BBCFreeThinking interview here. bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00…
For the record: Outrages says that the Victorians executed men for having sex with each other. This is a big claim that goes against every history of the subject I have read, and it is wrong. No Victorian man was ever executed for sodomy.
What I thought I would do is pick a short passage from the book (pp. 71-2) and go through it in detail. @naomirwolf is taking a second look at her work, and, I think, with great generosity, has offered to share her findings as she goes. This is pretty decent of her, I think.
Read 15 tweets

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Richard James
@RichJamesBits
I have reached a whole new level of #PISSEDOFF.

I didnt think such a #dark and #scary state, or level, could be reached. It may top 12-14-17's causation. It's. That. Bad. So, I've prepared a statement...

docs.google.com/document/d/1_J…

#PascoSheriff #HaveYouAllNoShame @CigarCityBeer
Dear @FBI,
I must implore you ask your colleauges in @FBITampa to help research this new level of #PISSEDOFFNESS. As locals, they may offer a special indepth knowledge of this new level I have reached. This is not fair & law enforcement must #investigate. No one deserves this.
This is my #apogee of #Pissedoffness.
If #motherfuckers & #tears werent a noticable level.
If #HUSH or #INTIMIDATION tactics being deployed didnt strike a chord.
If #EVIDENCE, PROOF, or 30k Bonds didnt #WOW YOU.
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Ms. Entropy / سيدة الفتنة
@MsEntropy
I genuinely believe that students teach us more than our professor egos generally care to admit.
This is a little PSA for faculty, because I’m not talking about exclusively intellectual development, but also about the importance of remembering how to be a decent human being.

Something happened today, and it is really bothering me.
I don’t teach or have office hours today, but I was working at the office, and my door was cracked. I saw one of my students flit by the mailbox where I return their graded papers for pickup.

I just felt like something was..off. Because I email them the second papers are ready.
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no one calls me that.
@parkerandcooley
Something happened today.

Waited on a patron; an frail-looking, very slow-moving elderly man with a great big smile who was eager to pay his late fine for the movies he’d had out. “I was just in the hospital,” he told me. I asked if he was feeling better now and he assured me,
“oh yes, much better, thank you!” We have an amnesty policy for senior citizens and don’t make them pay late fines, and I told him to put his money away. “No, no, please, take it, consider it a donation then,” he pressed on, sliding the money back to me. I took it from him and we
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Tessa
@ClacesShadow
Shane is fangirling about meeting Rebekah and Kol, the Original vampires, and bragging about not being able to be compelled. Then Bex tells Kol to beat the location of the cure out of him. Lol. Imagine meeting your idols and they beat the shit out of you.
Back to this. "Truth or dare, Elena?"
"Dare." Damn that's brave.
"I dare you to tell Stefan the truth about Damon."
Sweetie, that's truth not dare, but I am here for this.
"Seriously?!" Caroline being there for Stefan again.
Bex is being really childish though
"Being with Damon makes me happy." HSHDFLK YES IT DOES.
"Makes you happy? Clowns make you happy Elena. Dig a little deeper."
Actually, clowns do quite the opposite of making me happy, but to each their own Rebekah. 🙈
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