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Samuel Miller McDonald

11 Dec, 4 tweets, 2 min read

https://twitter.com/AlishaGrauso/status/1337263317727866880

sorry to pile on but not only do Americans not share this kind of collective mythology (it's not movies), I'd go as far as saying that most of us would struggle to imagine what it would be like to have that kind of shared mythology: the-trouble.com/content/2018/7…

https://twitter.com/AlishaGrauso/status/1337263317727866880

But I do agree with the original sentiment that dismissing fantasy fiction as 'kiddie shit' is silly

tldr from those screenshots: Norse mythology (etc) offered a sense of place in a deep timeline extending far back & forward, and a place in the universe. Fantasy fiction today offers shared stories, but doesn't play that kind of role cosmologies have for people

again, apologies to op for adding to the onslaught, but I think it's important to make this distinction. Also aside from building a sense of meaning, mythologies sometimes fueled wars and sanctioned atrocities, definitely not kiddie shit!

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Samuel Miller McDonald

@sjmmcd

13 Dec

https://twitter.com/cdelvallejr/status/1337775582994702337

This is obviously stupid and dangerous for a lot of reasons, but the last card ("No science. No shutdown.") stuck with me because I think it speaks to something that those of us involved in knowledge production and dissemination could pay more attention to

https://twitter.com/cdelvallejr/status/1337775582994702337

I think a lot of non-scientists/journalists believe there’s a Knowledge Orb in a lab in a tower somewhere, and you just ask it a question & out comes perfectly true information. When they find that the information is faulty, they want to throw the Orb out the window

Of course a lot of the rampant anti-intellectualism today is the product of a concerted campaign by ruling class orgs to divide-and-conquer the ruled classes by creating oppositional epistemologies (if we don’t have a shared reality, we’ll never unite against them)

Read 21 tweets

Samuel Miller McDonald

@sjmmcd

3 Dec

https://twitter.com/TarvariousWWMT/status/1334341498368897024

This "angry business owner" is 100% correct that the government should have responded by giving every family enough to survive a long lock down. Instead, government policy funneled trillions in wealth to the already-wealthy. He's right to be angry

https://twitter.com/TarvariousWWMT/status/1334341498368897024

Even at the beginning, all the data suggested that simply giving people the financial means to self-isolate would go a long way toward decreasing the impacts of the virus. The government did the opposite, demanding partial, poorly targeted lock-downs without financial support

And the result? The virus spread quickly, more people died, many small companies have shuttered, public institutions like museums are closing. Meanwhile, the largest corporations—and their wealthy investors—reap massive rewards and expand their market share

Read 4 tweets

Samuel Miller McDonald

@sjmmcd

8 Oct 18

I’m seeing lots of enthusiasm for addressing climate change today. This is a delight. I'm also seeing lots of smart voices go right up to the edge of the big question: what do we Do?

But few or none are quite going over the edge and confronting the answers to that big all-important question…

That’s not to say people aren’t saying “Here’s what we do!” There are lots of prescriptions flying around. I’ve contributed to that deluge ineffectually. There’s no shortage of things we must Do..

Read 24 tweets

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