KelsonV @KelsonV@wandering.shop

Check for a bail fund for protestors in your city at https://bailfunds.github.io/

I've donated to one of the local Portland ones (the first listed has a dead website, but the other is active)

On a lighter note a lot of people are going to try and paint these protests as being nothing but violence and stuff on fire.

So here's a video of a bunch of "protestors" calmly hanging out and distributing free supplies. Community matters, friends. The only thing on fire here is the barbecue:
https://twitter.com/zellieimani/status/1266789151589924865

If you are not Black, take a moment to check yourself. If you're trying to deny the existence of "outside instigators" make sure you're not unwittingly being one yourself.

This is not your protest. You don't get to march in, yell "LOL FUK DA POLICE" and start throwing bricks around. Show some damn respect.

To directly quote one organiser: "Like I say to all my white brothers and sisters, we appreciate y'all being out here supporting us, but this is not your space."
https://twitter.com/Freeyourmindkid/status/1266626242905886721 (video in link)

Stand with Black protestors. Support them. Stand between them and the police. And do what everyone keeps telling you to do online – listen first before you open your mouth or start doing things no one asked for.

Otherwise, you're just being performative and appropriative. And... yeah, don't do that.

The second thing is something I've seen over here as well as on Twitter. Leftist types talking about the "myth" of outside instigators and something something liberals.

There are Black people on the streets protesting for their lives, telling us that not everything is right out there. But I keep seeing white people acting as if they know better. The best* part is when they dismiss those Black people as "liberals" and tell them to shut up.

*may not actually be the best part.

We have photographic proof that there are undercover cops on the streets, and reports of at least one of them directly instigating violence. They're not difficult to spot (see the attached image and description for an example). And we all know that entrapment is part of the playbook for US police.

Hell, cops are starting most of the violence even when they're in uniform.

So. We need to straighten out a few things. I was following the protests on Twitter all night last night, and noticed two recurring themes.

The first is that a lot of Black protestors have been talking about how their protests were peaceful until a bunch of white people showed up and started wrecking shit.

Apparently, Black organisers have had to ask white protestors to calm down, and some Black protestors have had to put out literal fires which white people started.

We all know who gets the blame in these things. We all know who faces the harsh consequences and who gets to walk home without much hassle.

There are a bunch of reports of this stuff in a thread by @FreeYourMindKid@twitter.com (I trust him as a reliable source):

https://twitter.com/Freeyourmindkid/status/1266598693647638528

no one is free of bad opinions.

you can be a great person and occasionally still run across Some Bullshit buried deep within you because you grew up in a society that is FULL of fucked-up opinions about POC (esp. BIPOC), queer people, trans people, fat people, disabled people, etc.

when people call you out for this, your job is to listen and sit with what you have been told, not to kneejerk and pull away.

you want to talk about doing the work? *that's* the work.

letting the bullshit go unchecked allows it to propagate. there are two scenarios:

-either your friend didn't know, you just saved them a lot of heartache and embarrassment later, and they're not going to unwittingly keep spreading Some Bullshit

OR

-your friend DID know and that's how you find out they are Full Of Bad Opinions

and BOTH are fucking awkward in the moment, tho one is salvageable.

you gotta call 'em out anyway, because to do otherwise is to enable oppression.

This article about the current decades-long work to recalibrate the notion of "height" in US geological surveys and so forth is fascinating and reminds me so much of like... in a video game engine when you get too far away from the origin and start losing precision in your floating point numbers and suddenly your physics starts to glitch

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/22/science/maps-elevation-geodetic-survey.html

Green Flashes: Sun, Moon, Venus, Mercury

Image Credit & Copyright: Marcella Giulia Pace

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap200530.html #APoD

What the news doesn’t show about protests in Minneapolis and Louisville - Vox https://www.vox.com/first-person/2020/5/29/21274891/george-floyd-cop-arrested-minneapolis-breonna-taylor

Minnesota Freedom Fund: https://minnesotafreedomfund.org/donate
Reclaim the Block: https://secure..everyaction.com/zae4prEeKESHBy0MKXTIcQ2
Black Visions Collective: https://secure.everyaction.com/4omQDAR0oUiUagTu0EG-Ig2
Northstar Health Collective (Medical Donation): https://www.northstarhealthcollective.org/
MN Healing Justice Network/Spiral Collective (long haul care, ongoing trauma response, immediate funds to healers): https://www.paypal.me/spiralcollective?fbclid=IwAR3XFW9E1uNOgF8lKBlrUq2jgJVxpa2upgR_CWXoyhgFphhXavOxi2213iA
Unicorn Riot (on the ground independent & radical coverage) https://unicornriot.ninja/donate/

Sharing this here in case it isn’t making the rounds in the fediverse: a handy Google doc for people to do their own homework on how to be better allies and anti-racist: https://docs.google.com/document/u/1/d/1BRlF2_zhNe86SGgHa6-VlBO-QgirITwCTugSfKie5Fs/mobilebasic

A lot of people are talking this and saying things more wise than I can, so I won't belabor the point. But if you have some monies hanging about (I'm looking at you, fellow tech workers, most of us do) consider donating today to one of the causes recommended by the MFF. They have links on their main web page: https://minnesotafreedomfund.org.

here are some places you can donate, if you are able:

Official George Floyd Memorial Fund: https://www.gofundme.com/f/georgefloyd

Minnesota Freedom Fund (pays bail for those who cannot): minnesotafreedomfund.org/donate

Reclaim The Block (coalition demanding Minneapolist divests from policing and invests in alternatives): https://secure.everyaction.com/zae4prEeKESHBy0MKXTIcQ2

Black Visions Collective (MN an organization dedicated to Black liberation and collective liberation): https://secure.everyaction.com/4omQDAR0oUiUagTu0EG-Ig2

(cont)

extraordinarily cursed brain worm of the day

If you really want to know WTF is going on with Trump's social media order, read Eric Goldman's thorough post: https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2020/05/trumps-preventing-online-censorship-executive-order-is-pro-censorship-political-theater.htm