Tolkien fundamentalists, like any fundamentalists, read into their text the world they themselves long for and then claim it is the only true reading and, indeed, a blueprint for the real world. Fundamentalisms are reactions to a modernity in which a group perceives themselves to have lost power and authority. They retreat into an imagined mythic past that they assert is more legitimately real than the world around them.

With LotR, it's *literally* mythic, ironically.

I am hereby requesting that when you see something that seems too wild to be true and also confirms your priors, you stop and consider if your initial reading is correct, or if there's something else going on here.

recruit.apo.ucla.edu/JPF04991 On first glance, this looks like a job posting for free teaching labor. But is it?

The text is boilerplate, it doesn't specify what the teaching load is or any other responsibilities of the position, and it says twice that they won't pay you a dime.

So what's up?

This can't be stressed enough--don't repeat Evangelicals' claims that they read the Bible "literally." They have an interpretation just like any other Christians do; they just describe that interpretation as the literal meaning and people tend to say ok, I guess so?

https://twitter.com/irenemcho/status/1504851651328282628

It's a neat trick that fools people into thinking that Evangelicalism is more authoritative than it actually is--"well, they're just reading what the Bible says, I guess they're more serious about it than Christians who put their own spin on it."

No. Just no.

Dickens had a sensitivity reader--her name was Eliza Davis, and she helped him understand (after the fact) that his portrayals of Jews were antisemitic. He even changed some text in later editions.

Dickens didn't think of himself as antisemitic until she showed him the problem.

https://twitter.com/ST_Culture/status/1494660153962115072

The story of Eliza Davis, her corrections, and Dickens's acceptance and understanding:

jewishcurrents.org/charles-dicken…

the tenure committee

https://twitter.com/IL0VEthe80s/status/1502686390122954761

Statler: "Say, Waldorf, why haven't you published anything lately?"

Waldorf: "I lost my typist years ago."

Statler: "Oh right, my condolences on your wife's death!"

https://twitter.com/GroovyHistory/status/1487893510078582790

and their big single

And for my next feat of mind-boggling prognostication, I will: Good ol' JP here is so bad at the basics of science that he can't conceive of the differences in scale and applicable forces of a stock and the climate.

I can't predict where one water molecule will go if I toss a glass of water in his face, but I can predict that he'll get wet.

Just so we're all on the same page here, this is the nudity-containing image that the Mcminn County School Board objected to as pretext for removing Maus from the curriculum.

You probably can't tell, but that's the author's mother in the bathtub where she died of suicide. I cropped it because the image of suicide is clear in context, and I didn't want to just drop that into your feed unannounced.

It's a gut-wrenching moment in the story, where Spiegelman includes his actual underground comic story about the tragedy and its impact on his life.

In case any of you have a cat who has been experiencing colitis or IBS-like symptoms, you may way to try eliminating thickeners like xanthan gum, guar gum, and carrageenan from their diet.

Knute had developed the worst poos, but taking him off these ingredients fixed it FAST. Knute's medical history is COMPLICATED to say the least, but he's had gastric issues for years, at least partly caused by the pile of meds he has to take for his heart. It got really bad in the last few months, and we really worried for him. Grain-free did nothing for him.

Ethics professor who won't comply with vaccine mandate proves self incapable of job duties, making the vaccine question moot.

https://twitter.com/LFPress/status/1435680798741499909

tired: hemlock

wired: ivermectin

I'm gonna need everyone to quit using #AmericanTaliban and #TexasTaliban--not only are they xenophobic copouts that ignore the role of white American Evangelicalism behind the Texas law, but they also get the timeline mixed up. This form of US Christianity PREDATES the Taliban. I know you think you're being cute, but trust me, white American Evangelicals have never needed to look abroad to get ideas about how to enact oppression here at home.

The Texas abortion law is rooted in whiteness, Christianity, and Americanism.

I was born in the 70s and was a voracious reader as a kid, meaning that I internalized a huge amount of implicitly racist, sexist, homophobic, nationalist, and colonialist ideas even while being exposed to all the feel-good united-colors-of-benetton celebrations of diversity. In the 80s, kids were still consuming tons of media that was decades old, which very often contained outdated ideas of what constituted full humanity. And a lot of 80s pop culture was really pretty awful on that front.

This media instilled implicit biases in my developing mind.

R drinks a huge thermos of this herbal tea every day, so we get it in serious bulk and of course keep it in this old tea bin from a long-time new york tea shop in the shop, the same bin could be used for a variety of teas by rotating the label at the top

kids today are too young to remember when the world's largest blockbuster location covered several states in the western US. that seemed normal back then.

https://twitter.com/mnolangray/status/1366242705244782592

you could wander the shelves of VHS tapes for days

Jacob Louis Richter, my great-great-great-great grandfather, 1803-1871 The wild thing is how much he looks like my father, even animated like this. I have to admit that the AI has done a pretty good job!

CPAC WEEKEND PLAYLIST

CPAC WEEKEND PLAYLIST

how the fuck did he get tenure this bunny has a question that's really more of a comment

It's really something that the unified messaging from the right, including elected officials, Fox News folks, and the seditious mob, has simply become "Let us do what we want and no one gets hurt." The right has fully embraced the reality of white nationalist violence and decided that it works for them. They saw a tool that was too good not to pass up--and after all, they know that if they simply relied on democracy, they'd lose their grip on power.

I've now seen a couple of interpretations of @Schwarzenegger's video as going too easy on the Nazis. It's a very odd reflex that some people have to view any attempt to understand the *human* motivations of evil people as an excuse for their behavior. That's counterproductive. @Schwarzenegger Schwarzenegger's story of his abusive ex-Nazi father is a warning to the Proud Boys--whom he compares to the villains of Kristallnacht--that if they continue down this path, they will be broken, guilt-ridden shells. That is, if they survive the fire they are trying to kindle.

please, my $2,000,000 home, she is very sick here's free advice for these middle class people:

switch to public schools and move your toddler to a less chi-chi daycare.

boom, i just saved you about four grand a month, or way more than the average US individual income.

And you get to keep paying your $8800 house payment!

A SCOTUS decision in a religious freedom case that goes against the petitioner is not "anti-religion," any more than one that upholds a claim to religious freedom is "pro-religion."

This phrasing feeds the idea that civil secularism is anti-religion.

thehill.com/opinion/judici… I don't know if you've heard, but the line on the right for quite some time has been that the liberal courts are attacking religion every chance they get, and anything short of "do what thou wilt, evangelicals" is evidence of an atheistic hatred of all religion.