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soulmate-game · 3 years

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Part 2: The same prompt, but Siblings this time

Tim paused the video on his computer, the red figure on it in mid-leap off of a building. Be rewound the video, played it, paused again at the same time stamp.

No, his eyes were not deceiving him. The video was not doctored.

So what the hell was going on?

“Hey Timmie, find anything on that Paris situation Bruce asked you to look into?” Dick’s voice made Tim startle, nearly spilling his coffee all over the keyboard and possibly deleting his hard-earned research. Rescuing his lifeblood from certain doom, he hugged his mug to his chest and glared at his older brother for a second. Dick was not in the least bothered, used to this sort of reaction from the younger detective. Dick just grinned, leaning on the back of Tim’s chair and looking up at the images on the large computer screen above them. He whistled lowly, impressed. “You’ve made a lot of progress, nice! Anything you wanna share with me before the debrief tonight?”

Tim clenched and unclenched his jaw, weighing his options. Dick waited patiently, knowing that sometimes Tim needed a minute to sort through his rapid-forming thoughts. Finally Tim sighed, setting down his mug grimly.

“Actually, yes,” he admitted. Tim’s tense tone immediately made Dick stiffen, straightening up. His eyebrows pulled down, and he returned his gaze to the computer.

“Okay, that’s your serious voice. What is it?”

“I… need your confirmation with something,” Tim turned around and looked straight at Dick. And he hesitated again, because certain… past interactions with his eldest brother once again flashed through his head. The entire Bruce-is-alive and being threatened with Arkham interaction, to be specific. But Tim needed to know the truth, it was his fatal flaw he supposed. He couldn’t back away in fear of how Dick might react.

“Ohhhhkay?” Dick just grew more and more concerned the longer that Tim took to actually speak.

“So, just to recap. There are only four people in history who have been able to do a quadruple somersault, right?” Tim asked, knowing full well the answer. Dick, predictably, shifted and grew even more on alert at the inquiry. He knew that couldn’t mean anything good. His jaw clenched, and his hands formed tight fists. But Dick also remembered the Bruce incident with Tim all that time ago, and he didn’t want to repeat his mistakes. So he forced himself to take a deep breath, and shake himself away from jumping to conclusions.

“Yeah,” Dick nodded. “Me, my parents, and my sister,” he confirmed rigidly. Tim nodded, and then rewound the video on the screen again, nodding to show that Dick should focus on it.

“Okay. But watch this,” Tim suggested, starting the video again. Dick watched as the red and black-spotted heroine of Paris, Ladybug, zipped through the air and around buildings with her yo-yo. He watched as she let go, at a height that even a normal person could manage, and executed four perfect somersaults in mid-air before landing nimbly on the ground. Tim paused the video again, his eyes never leaving Dick’s tense face.

“It isn’t doctored,” Tim said, filling the silence and preemptively answering the questions he knew he would get. “I checked. Magic is involved, but Constantine and Zatanna both confirmed it would have no hold over basic physical abilities like flexibility or… gymnastics. Only specifically combat styles used by past Ladybugs can be transferred magically to the next Ladybug, not this.”

“Tim,” Dick’s voice was terrifyingly blank. “What are you suggesting?”

“Nothing yet,” Tim was quick to hold up his hands in surrender. “I’m still doing research. It’s possible, though extremely unlikely, that she managed to teach herself how to do that. You tell me, Dick, how likely is it?”

Dick swallowed, not wanting to say it but knowing he had to look at the facts. “... At her age? Next to impossible,” he admitted. “She could learn it, theoretically, as young as seven or eight, but only if someone who knew what they were doing taught her since she was about three.”

Tim nodded again. He knew those numbers, he knew where they came from.

“Then— and this is only a theory right now— we have what I think is the more plausible scenario,” Tim swallowed. This was the hard part. “Your sister was kidnapped after your parent’s death, but the body that was found wasn’t actually her’s. It wasn’t in a state to be physically identified, so—“

“I know what state it was in, Tim!” Dick snapped, forcing himself to take a few steps back and just breath. Even now, the image of a tiny body burned beyond recognition was burned into the inside of his eyelids, there to taunt him whenever he blinked or slept and let his mind wander in just the wrong direction. She would be… what, Jason’s age, now? She was seven… only seven, when their parents died and she ran off into the Gotham streets in despair. When she was kidnapped, as is what happens in Gotham.

When Dick was presented with a body he could not say WASN’T her’s a week later.

“The DNA…” Dick tried. “They said…”

“I know,” Tim’s voice was carefully soft. “But the records on your family’s DNA were all kept by the circus back then. The Talons had access to those files. It’s very possible they were tampered with. Switched. It wouldn’t be hard for them to burn your sister’s actual medical files and replace them with forged copies that had someone else’s DNA on them. The data of the girl who actually died.”

Dick closed his eyes, shaking his head. He didn’t want to hope, it would hurt too much if Tim was wrong.

Tim had been right about more unlikely things than this, a voice in the back of his head whispered. And yeah, that was true. But Dick was still too scared to hope.

“Finish your research, Tim,” Dick’s voice was strained with suppressed emotion. He couldn’t even look at the younger vigilante as he left the Cave. “Find out who Ladybug’s civilian persona is, and then we’ll talk.”

Tim could only sigh in relief when Dick was gone. That could have gone much worse.

—*—*—*—*—*

A week later, the entire family was gathered. This was the full debrief on the Paris case, rather than the progress update that they had had to do before. Research took longer than Tim had expected, he had years of data to go through after all. But he had come away with exactly what he had been looking for.

After running through the overall situation and where the fight against HawkMoth was at in the present day, Tim licked his lips and took a deep breath. This was it, the Who-Is-Ladybug part.

“I was able to get security footage of her detransformation, just one lucky shot from ten years ago, when this whole thing began,” he prefaced. “She was thirteen years old, and untrained as far as heroism goes, so it stands to reason she didn’t know yet how to be properly careful about transforming. This is that security picture,” he carefully put the enlarged picture up on the Batcomputer, as well as sliding a physical copy onto the table for everyone to pass around.

Dick didn’t even try to grab it, his eyes glued to the computer, expression unreadable. The picture was a little grainy, but most of the girl’s face could be made out. Pigtails, dark black hair that shimmered blue in direct light, blue eyes.

But it was the next picture that Tim pulled up that pushed everything over the edge.

“These are the official pictures of her that I was able to get from Paris records. This first picture is of her at the same age at the security footage, thirteen. The second picture is her now, age twenty-three,” Tim said, before the side-by-side came up on the screen. Tim’s eyes slid over to Dick, who was frozen in his seat, just staring at the images silently. He wasn’t even breathing.

“Dick?” Bruce asked, immediately noticing the behavior. His eyebrows furrowed. “Are you alright?”

Dick’s next breath came in with a shudder, and he clenched his eyes shut in a futile attempt to stop the tears that came out. He choked out a broken chuckle, shaking his head and giving out a lopsided, watery grin.

“Heh. Another point for Timmy being right,” Dick jokes weakly, rubbing at his eyes.

“What do you mean? Tim?” Bruce turned to the younger of the two insistently. “What’s going on? Who is she?”

“Currently, according to Parisian records, she is Marinette Dupain-Cheng,” Tim told them. “More specifically, her full name is Marinette Gray Dupain-Cheng. Which I believe is what she chose to change her name to after she was kidnapped sixteen years ago from right outside Haley’s Circus, and illegally transported to France,” Tim clicked another button to bring up a third picture in the side-by-side. It was of someone who was clearly a younger Marinette, but in the very familiar costume of the Flying Graysons, standing right next to a twelve-year old version of Dick. “Because her birth name is Marie Natalia Grayson. Dick’s younger sister, who until now was presumed dead. But I was able to confirm that the medical records back then for Marie were forged, and the information on them could not actually belong to her. The body that was presented as Marie’s… was a red herring to hide that Marie was no longer in America at all.”

Dick’s sob-laugh drew everyone’s attention back to the first Robin, who was now silently, openly, crying. Nobody really knew how to deal with that, and the room descended into awkward silence as Dick tried to regain his composure a little.

“Marinette… Gray,” he whispered, chuckling again and shaking his head as he wiped at his cheeks. “That idiot… her ability with subtlety hasn’t gotten any better, that’s for sure,” he was smiling now, still staring at the pictures of Marinette on the screen. Of his beautiful little sister, all grown up and not buried six feet under like he had thought for far too long.

Because this was different from Hope. This was certainty. The face, the far too on-the-nose name, the somersaults, Dick had even noticed it in the way she swung on her yo-yo. The body memory from years of Trapeze, those little quirks he recognized as belonging to his sister that he hadn’t wanted to acknowledge. But now, all together, he could admit to himself that it was her. It was really her.

Could it be a clone? Maybe. Maybe. But that was why Dick snuck out to France the very next day, informing absolutely nobody.

Because he had a test that only the real Marie would be able to pass.

—*—*—*—*—*

"How did you- No, nevermind, I don't want to know, plausible deniability and all that,” the deep, unfamiliar male voice made Marinette squeak in shock, nearly dropping the phone in her hands. She leaned so far to her right that she almost fell over, but her nearly perfect balance (that only failed her when she was nervous or self conscious) kept her upright.

Her eyes darted down to her phone screen, where an app that Max had helped her create was opened. It utilized at least five hundred little fly-shaped drones that Markov managed and kept track of to scan the city for corrupted butterflies and recognize the level of stress or other negative emotions that civilians were experiencing. It cut down severely on patrol time that the crew had to do, making it easier for them to balance their hero and civilian lives and also allowed for them to arrive at the scene of Akuma attacks twice as fast as before— along with helping with the original purpose of catching evidence to use against Hawkmoth, of course.

Marinette straightened her back, smiling sheepishly and closing out the app. She had just been making a routine check, it had only been open for a minute. How had he managed to sneak up on her in that time? Only chat could do that anymore.

That is, until Marinette turned around the rest of the way and got a good look at the man. Her eyes widened— what was Nightwing, a vigilante from Gotham, doing there?

“I don’t see what plausible deniability has to do with anything,” she replied in easy, unaccented English. She might not speak it often, but she did stay in practice. Even now a lot of her fashion notes and thoughts were in either English or Romani. “It’s just a game app that my friend created,” the practiced lie flew easily past her lips, and she was able to even smile confidently and begin to happily ramble about Max’s (public) achievements like she would in any normal situation. “It is still in the test phase of course, but it uses virtual reality and mapping technology to create a treasure hunt sort of adventure game that people can do as they walk around. Like Pokémon go, but with real-time footage of the city— with people not included besides the game characters of course— and it rewards caution as well as keeping active,” she explained their cover story for the app happily. But Nightwing only smiled easily at her with his arms crossed, clearly not believing a single word.

“Ah— but that probably isn’t interesting,” Marinette purposely stuttered, turning her face into one of (surprisingly genuine) confusion as she looked at the vigilante. “What are you here for anyway, Monsieur? This doesn’t seem like—“

“I have a riddle that a friend of mine told me to ask you,” he interrupted, instantly putting Marinette on guard. She took a step back, eyebrows pulling down at the odd request. But still, she chuckled nervously and shrugged. She had to maintain appearances after all.

“Uh, sure..? Riddles are fun, in the right circumstances I guess.”

Nightwing beamed happily, nearly blinding the poor girl. “Awesome!” His next words came out in fluent Romani though: “If a Hummingbird ever gets lost, what kind of animal will track it down?”

Marinette’s mouth went dry, her shoulders dropping. Her mouth opened and closed, the shock of the question leaving her unable to even pretend she didn’t understand exactly what was said. Nightwing’s gaze grew more intense, yet his smile got impossibly soft.

Marinette swallowed thickly, and she took a deep breath before responding in Romani: “You shouldn’t— only one person—“

“That doesn’t answer the riddle, ma’am.”

Marinette’s confusion turned into a harsh glare. “He would never tell someone else to ask me that. What are you trying to play at, Nightwing?” She hissed harshly, still in her native language.

“Listen, Marinette,” Nightwing held up both hands to try to calm her down. It did the opposite, making her take another step back. “Batman and the rest of our team has been looking into the Hawkmoth security—“ Marinette cursed, clearly seeing where this was going. “— We believe he found out who Ladybug is. But, we also found signs that your real name is—“

“Shut up!” She yelled in English, fists clenched tightly. Luckily she had gone into an alleyway to check her phone, or else they would be attracting attention by then. Her eyes sparked with anger. “You don’t get to use that name. And if you’re so smart,” Marinette tucked her phone into her purse and scaled the wall next to her nimbly, perching on the roof as Nightwing cursed and began to follow her. “Then try to predict my moves, birdy.”

It only took a few minutes and crossed rooftops for Marinette to call on her transformation and pick up speed. She knew by then that Nightwing, and probably the other Bats too, already found her out. Not ideal, but manageable. Now she wanted to show him why he shouldn’t come into her territory and dig into her past and think he could get away with it.

Somewhere during the chase, more Bats appeared one by one. Judging by what Ladybug was able to overhear, they had come as soon as they realized where Nightwing had snuck off to.

That made Marinette pause from where she hid behind a sloped roof, in the middle of a call to her own teammates. Nightwing hadn’t come on his team’s orders?

Why the hell had he come, then?

She shook thought thoughts away, focusing on her plan. Paris was her city, and she would make sure the Bats learned their lesson when it came to sticking their nose in Parisian business.

“Bug?” The soft, concerned call came from her yo-yo and pulled her from her contemplating. Max, in full Pegasus attire, was frowning at her in worry on the small screen. She just shook her head at him.

“I’m fine, Peg. Just don’t like how this feels like Gotham ruining my life again,” she remarked sourly. “But I’m fine. Start plan We’re Not Kids.”

Max nodded, but rolled his eyes and muttered something that sounded like; “even though we made this plan when we actually were kids…”

A portal opened in the air a few seconds later, releasing Honeybee in all her gold and black glory. The winged hero zipped through the air, immediately putting team Miraculous at an advantage since team Bat didn’t want to actually harm them.

It took a glorious five seconds for Honeybee to paralyze them all before Tortoise dropped out from another portal and surrounded the temporarily paralyzed vigilantes in a dome shield that kept them in just as easily as it kept everything else out.

One by one, Marinette’s teammates dropped out of more portals until Pegasus himself joined them. Ladybug took that as her que to come out, leaping over her hiding place to land in front of her friends, who had formed a half-circle in front of the trapped dome.

“Vixen,” she called to the fox-themed hero, whose ears twitched before she straightened to attention. “Create an illusion to hide us. The last thing we need are any pictures or anyone asking questions.”

“Got it!” Vixen agreed easily, raising her flute to her lips. A short melody later, and their surroundings warped. To those inside the illusion, it seemed as if the world merely ended off of the rooftop they were on, into only blankness. Outside, that very rooftop appeared empty.

It was then that Chat Noir stepped up to take Ladybug’s side, his acidic green eyes scanning over the Gotham vigilantes trapped inside Tortoise’s protective barrier.

“You can release the paralysis, Honeybee,” his order was noticeably softer than Ladybug’s clear commands. It was obvious that he was the deputy in this situation, the flexibility to Ladybug’s iron leadership. That was when the red clad hero crossed her arm, resuming control of the situation wordlessly. The Gotham heroes briefly glowed gold as Honeybee let their paralysis begin to gradually wear off.

“Paris is my city,” Ladybug’s voice was at a normal volume, but came out with such auditory steel that it was clear she expected to be listened to, or she’d know why. “If I needed or wanted your help, I would have asked for it. Now, if you had come here normally to offer aid, then we might be having a different discussion right now,” her eyes narrowed further. “But you dug into my past. You violated my privacy. And Nightwing, you crossed a line,” she would have continued if the blue and black clad hero didn’t use his sudden ability to move to rip off his mask.

Marinette’s voice died in her throat, and for a while she thought she might be hallucinating. Those eyes, that face— she knew them. She knew them, because she saw them whenever she dared close her eyes. Because the dreams she had, the dreams that made her never want to drag herself out of bed because she wanted to believe those dreams were real so badly, always contained those eyes. And that face, though it had been much younger in her memories.

She stumbled, and only Chat’s presence at her side kept her from toppling right over.

“Bugaboo?” He asked frantically, distraught. She just shook her head dazedly, pushing herself back to her feet and away from her partner.

“I’m fine, Chat. Just…,” she assured her partner, but her eyes never left Nightwing. She licked her lips nervously, before continuing; “... Bluebird,” she whispered, making Nightwing’s eyes widen. Her brother’s eyes. “That’s the answer to the riddle, right?”

Slowly, a wide smile split his face before he began to laugh happily, despite Robin slapping Nightwing’s mask back on his face with a furious grumble.

“Ladybug?” Tortoise asked, stepping up to her other side cautiously. Seeing as they were all adults now, none of them had to worry about time or power limits anymore. “Are you..?”

“Release the shield,” she ordered instead of answering, her eyes clearly damp behind her mask. “I need to strangle my idiotic older brother for scaring the hell out of me.”

That made the rest of her team make their various exclamations of shock, but Chat and Tortoise stayed silent. Chat just put a hand on Ladybug’s shoulder in support, while Tortoise zipped his wide gaze back to Nightwing before sighing and releasing his ability.

“Only you, Bug,” the green clad hero groused playfully. “Only you.”

If Marinette Dupain-Cheng suddenly introduced her long-lost brother to her closest friends and family that same night, nobody voiced the coincidence out loud.

—*—*—*—*—*

Part 1: Romance

Part 3: Bio!Parent

#maribat #ml x dc #mlb x dc #dickinette #platonic dickinette #3-from-1 challenge

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mostlysignssomeportents · 4 years

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Pluralistic: 26 Mar 2020 (EFF's videoconferencing backgrounds, the ideology of economics, LoC plugs Little Brother, Canada nationalizes covid patents, Exponential Thread, Sanders on GOP stimulus cruelty, record wind power growth, social distancing and other diseases, Badger Masks)

Today's links

EFF's videoconferencing backgrounds: With a deep cut from the NSA's secret listening post.

The ideology of economics: Economics doesn't have "laws" it has "policies."

LoC plugs Little Brother: Open access FTW.

Canada nationalizes covid patents: An Act respecting certain measures in response to COVID-19.

Exponential Threat: Trump threatened to sue media outlets that aired this spot.

Sanders on GOP stimulus cruelty: "Millions for plutes, but not one cent for workers."

Record wind-power growth: Covid stimulus could start a Green New Deal.

Social distancing and other diseases: Do we trust IoT thermometer companies, though?

Badger Masks: UW Madison's open facemask design.

This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019

Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

EFF's videoconferencing backgrounds (permalink)

Telework is a quiet reminder that we live, in some sense, in an age of wonders. As terrible as lockdown is, imagine it without any way to videoconference with your peers and colleagues.

But it's also a moment where we tremble on the precipice of cyberpunk dystopia, when calls for mass surveillance – both for epidemiology and stabilizing states that are bruised and reeling – meet a world where everything is online and amenable to "collection" by spooks.

This is, basically, the moment that EFF has been warning about for 30 years: the moment when the "digital world" and the "real world" fully merge, and where the distinction between "tech policy" and "policy" dissolves.

One way you can help keep this in your colleagues' minds is to use EFF's amazing, free/open graphics as your videoconferencing background (most of these are the creation of the brilliant Hugh D'Andrade).

Now, those are all great, but this one is Room 641A at AT&T's Folsom Street center, where the whistleblower Mark Klein was ordered to build a secret room so the NSA could illegally spy on all US internet traffic.

The ideology of economics (permalink)

Thomas Piketty's "Capital in the 21st Century" advanced a simple, data-supported hypothesis: that markets left to their own will cause capital to grow faster than the economy as a whole, so over time, the rich always get richer.

https://boingboing.net/2014/06/24/thomas-pikettys-capital-in-t.html

He's followed up Capital with the 1000-page "Capital and Ideology" – whose thesis is that the "laws" of economics are actually policies, created to "justify a society's inequalities," providing a rationale to convince poor people not to start building guillotines.

The first ideology of capital was the "trifunctional" system of monarchist France, dividing society into "those who pray," "those who fight," and "those who work."

After the French revolution, we enter the capitalist phase, then social democracies, and now, "meritocracies."

"Meritocracies" invest markets with the mystical power to identify and elevate the worthy, in a kind of tautology: those who have the most are worth the most. You can tell they're worth the most because they have the most.

("That makes me smart" -D. Trump)

In Piketty's conception, "Inequality is neither economic nor technological. It's ideological and political," where "ideology" "refers to a set of a priori plausible ideas describing how society should be structured" (think: Overton Window).

https://bostonreview.net/class-inequality/marshall-steinbaum-thomas-piketty-takes-ideology-inequality

The major part of the book seeks to explain how the post-war social democracies gave way to the grifter meritocracies of today, pulling together threads from across the whole world to tell the tale.

On the way, he described alternatives that were obliterated, and others that were never tried, and shows how "meritocracy" gave us Trump, xenophobia, Brexit, and the Current Situation.

In particular, he's interested in why working class people stopped voting (spoiler: they no longer perceive that elites will pay attention to them irrespective of how they vote) — and what it would take to mobilize them again.

The elites' indifference to working people is grounded in an alliance between the Brahmin Left (educated, well-paid liberals) and the Merchant Right (the finance sector). Notionally leftist parties, like the Democrats, are dominated by the Brahmin Left.

But more than any other, Macron epitomizes this alliance: proclaiming his liberal values while slashing taxes on the wealthy — punishing poor people for driving cars, exempting private jets from his "climate" bill.

Life in a "meritocracy" is especially cruel for poor people, because meritocracies, uniquely among ideologies, blame poor people for poverty. It's right there in the name. French kings didn't think God was punishing peons, rather, that the Lord had put them there to serve.

"The broadly social-democratic redistributive coalitions of the mid-twentieth century were not just electoral or institutional or party coalitions but also intellectual and ideological. The battle was fought and won above all on the battleground of ideas."

As Marshall Steinbaum writes in his excellent review, Piketty's work doesn't just highlight new ideas in economics: it highlights the intellectual poverty of the economics profession and its tunnel vision.

"Economists cannot be allowed to be the arbiters of the intensely political concerns Piketty takes up in the book, and the good news is that there is reason to believe they won't be."

LoC plugs Little Brother (permalink)

Honored and pleased to have my book Little Brother included on the Library of Congress's excellent collection of open-access ebooks in its collection, which you can always access gratis but which may be of especial interest during the lockdown.

https://blogs.loc.gov/thesignal/2020/03/more-open-ebooks-routinizing-open-access-ebook-workflows/

If you enjoyed Little Brother and its sequel Homeland, you might be interested in the third Little Brother book, Attack Surface, which Tor is publishing on Oct 12.

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531

If you're looking for more topical reading, Infodocket's carefully curated list of coronavirus resources is here for you:

https://www.infodocket.com/2020/01/31/2019-novel-coronavirus-resources/

Canada nationalizes covid patents (permalink)

Canada's Parliament has passed Bill C13, "An Act respecting certain measures in response to COVID-19," amending patent law to create automatic compulsory licenses for any inventionused to fight covid, including diagnostics, vaccines, therapies or PPE.

https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-1/bill/C-13/third-reading

As E Richard Gold writes, it's an "important signal that Canada will not support IP delays…While most firms are helping find solutions, this will prevent those who try to take advantage-by raising prices or limiting supply-or those who cannot deliver to block what is needed."

Exponential Threat (permalink)

"Exponential Threat" is a remarkable – and factual – political ad, one that contrasts Trump's statements on coronavirus with the spread of the disease in America.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkMwvmJLnc0

More remarkable: Trump has threatened to sue the media for airing it, which is a totally cool and normal thing for someone who has sworn a solemn oath to uphold the Constitution and the Bill of Rights to do.

https://assets.donaldjtrump.com/2017/web/hero_images/Redacted_PUSA_Letter.pdf

"In case you needed more, here's an (admittedly incomplete) list of Trump statements on the novel coronavirus and COID-19"

http://www.joeydevilla.com/2020/03/25/exponential-threat-the-covid-19-themed-ad-that-the-trump-pence-campaign-doesnt-want-you-to-see/

Jan. 22: "We have it totally under control. It's one person coming in from China."

Feb. 2: "We pretty much shut it down coming in from China. It's going to be fine."

Feb. 25: "CDC & my administration are doing a GREAT job of handling Coronavirus."

Feb. 25: "I think that's a problem that's going to go away. They have studied it. They know very much. In fact, we're very close to a vaccine." [White House | New York Post]

Feb. 26: "We're going very substantially down, not up."

Feb. 27: "One day it's like a miracle, it will disappear."

Feb. 28: "We're ordering a lot of supplies. We're ordering a lot of, uh, elements that frankly we wouldn't be ordering unless it was something like this. But we're ordering a lot of different elements of medical."

March 2: "You take a solid flu vaccine, you don't think that could have an impact, or much of an impact, on corona?"

March 2: "A lot of things are happening, a lot of very exciting things are happening and they're happening very rapidly."

March 4: "If we have thousands of people that get better just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work – some of them go to work, but they get better."

March 5: "I never said people that are feeling sick should go to work."

March 6: "I think we're doing a really good job in this country at keeping it down… a tremendous job at keeping it down."

March 6: "Anybody right now, and yesterday, anybody that needs a test gets a test. And the tests are beautiful. They are perfect just like the letter was perfect. The transcription was perfect. Right? This was not as perfect as that but pretty good."

March 6: "I like this stuff. I really get it. People are surprised that I understand it. Every one of these doctors said, 'How do you know so much about this?' Maybe I have a natural ability. Maybe I should have done that instead of running for president."

March 6: "I don't need to have the numbers double because of one ship that wasn't our fault."

March 8: "We have a perfectly coordinated and fine tuned plan at the White House for our attack on Coronavirus."

March 9: "The Fake News media & their partner, the Democrat Party, is doing everything within its semi-considerable power to inflame the Coronavirus situation."

March 10: "It will go away. Just stay calm. It will go away."

March 13: National Emergency Declaration.

March 17: "I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic."

Sanders on GOP stimulus cruelty (permalink)

This Bernie Sanders floor speech in the Senate on the GOP's relentless attempts to punish poor people in the covid relief package is a must-watch

https://www.reddit.com/r/SandersForPresident/comments/fp3my0/bernie_goes_full_sanders_on_the_republicans_for/

tldr: GOP Senators are freaking out because some people in line to get the pittances they're doling out actually earn EVEN LESS than $1k-2k/month, and so they might get a raise in the form of covid relief.

That is, rather than taking the fact that this bare-minimum subsidy package exceeds "normal" income as a wakeup call to raise the minimum wage for the first time since 2009, the GOP is calling for cuts to aid to the most vulnerable Americans.

As Sanders points out, these same Senators had no problem with the Tax Scam, which poured trillions into the accounts of the richest Americans, directly and indirectly through stock-buybacks, which also left US business vulnerable and in need of trillions more today.

Now those bailed-out plutes want workers to risk death to "restart the economy," and the GOP will ensure they'll starve if they don't.

As ever, The Onion nails it:

https://politics.theonion.com/gop-urges-end-of-quarantine-for-lifeless-bipedal-automa-1842461351

"GOP Urges End Of Quarantine For Lifeless Bipedal Automatons That Make Economy Go"

Record wind-power growth (permalink)

As the world's wind-generation capacity increases, you'd expect annual growth to fall proportionately (it's easier to double a very small number than a very big one!), but this year should see the largest proportional growth ever, a 20% increase!

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/mar/25/worlds-wind-power-capacity-up-by-fifth-after-record-year

That number is uncertain (hello, coronavirus), but on the other hand, there's a massive stimulus package in the offing that could be used to restart the economy by saving the planet with renewable energy.

The non-adjusted, pre-virus projection for this year's total growth in wind power was an additional 76GW (to meet climate projections, that number has to rise to 100GW/year, and then to 200GW/year).

Social distancing and other diseases (permalink)

Though the evidence is a little shaky, it appears that social distancing has dramatically reduced the spread of other infectious diseases, like flu.

https://qz.com/1824020/social-distancing-slowing-not-only-covid-19-but-other-diseases-too/

The data comes from an Internet of Shit "connected thermometer" company that (allegedly) anonymizes its data and uses it for health surveillance; they report a massive drop-off in high temps relative to other years and pre-distancing levels.

The claims are plausible, but they're also an ad for an IoT company that sells a product no one needs, so take them with a grain of salt.

I'd be interested in STI transmission after weeks/months of government-recommended masturbation-over-hookups:

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-sex-guidance.pdf

Badger Masks (permalink)

A local hospital asked researchers at the UW Madison Engineering Design Innovation Lab to design them a field-expedient face-shield that could be mass-manufactured to protect its staff from coming cases.

https://www.wired.com/story/tinkerers-created-face-shield-being-used-hospitals/

Using hardware-store parts, the UW makerspace, and teleconferencing with self-isolating collaborators, the team designed an excellent mask, the Badger Shield:

https://making.engr.wisc.edu/shield/

They've manufactured and delivered 1,000 Badger Masks to the hospital and a Ford plant in MI is making 75,000 more this week for Detroit-area hospitals. Here's a technical spec you can follow if you have access to equipment and parts:

https://www.delve.com/assets/documents/OPEN-SOURCE-FACE-SHIELD-DRAWING-v1.PDF

It involves just 3 pieces: polyethylene sheets (laser- or die-cut), an elastic headband, and a 1" thick strip of self-adhesive polyurethane foam. For initial production, Midwest Prototyping used office-supply-store electric staplers for assembly.

The design process started with a teardown of an existing, approved mask, and the project lead, Lennon Rodgers, worked with collaborators to replicate it, sanity-checking successive designs with his wife, an anaesthesiologist.

They started hand-delivering prototypes to the hospital, who refined the design further, swapping in latex-free elastic and lengthening the shield. Tim Osswald from UW used his polymer engineering expertise to find a supplier who could create a custom die.

Now, more than 1M Badger Masks have been sought, with manufacturers like St Paul's Summit Medical tooling up to meet demand.

Other designs are popping up across America. San Francisco's Exploratorium is making 200+ shields/day using its own makerspace.

This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago If the Constitution was a EULA https://web.archive.org/web/20050330012000/http://slate.msn.com/id/2115254/

#10yrsgo Discarded photocopier hard drives stuffed full of corporate secrets https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2010/03/18/hightech_copy_machines_a_gold_mine_for_data_thieves.html

#5yrsago TPP leak: states give companies the right to repeal nations' laws https://wikileaks.org/tpp-investment/press.html

#5yrsago Woman medicated in a psychiatric ward until she said Obama didn't follow her on Twitter https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/woman-held-in-psychiatric-ward-after-correctly-saying-obama-follows-her-on-twitter-10132662.html

#5yrsago Sandwars: the mafias whose illegal sand mines make whole islands vanish https://www.wired.com/2015/03/illegal-sand-mining/

#5yrsago Australia outlaws warrant canaries https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015/03/australian-government-minister-dodge-new-data-retention-law-like-this/

#5yrsago As crypto wars begin, FBI silently removes sensible advice to encrypt your devices https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150325/17430330432/fbi-quietly-removes-recommendation-to-encrypt-your-phone-as-fbi-director-warns-how-encryption-will-lead-to-tears.shtml

#1yrago Article 13 will wreck the internet because Swedish MEPs accidentally pushed the wrong voting button https://medium.com/@emanuelkarlsten/sweden-democrats-swedish-social-democrats-defeat-motion-to-amend-articles-11-13-731d3c0fbf30

#1yrago EU's Parliament Signs Off on Disastrous Internet Law: What Happens Next? https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/03/eus-parliament-signs-disastrous-internet-law-what-happens-next

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Slashdot (https://slashdot.org/), Naked Capitalism (https://nakedcapitalism.com/), Late Stage Capitalism (https://www.reddit.com/r/LateStageCapitalism/).

Currently writing: I'm getting geared up to start work my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation.

Currently reading: Just started Lauren Beukes's forthcoming Afterland: it's Y the Last Man plus plus, and two chapters in, it's amazeballs. Last month, I finished Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs"; it's a magnificent history of the Kushner and Trump families, showing how they cheated, stole and lied their way into power. I'm getting really into Anna Weiner's memoir about tech, "Uncanny Valley." I just loaded Matt Stoller's "Goliath" onto my underwater MP3 player and I'm listening to it as I swim laps.

Latest podcast: Data – the new oil, or potential for a toxic oil spill? https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/23/data-the-new-oil-or-potential-for-a-toxic-oil-spill/

Upcoming appearances:

Quarantine Book Club, April 1, 3PM Pacific https://www.eventbrite.com/e/quarantine-book-club-cory-doctorow-tickets-100931360416

Museums and the Web, April 2, 12PM-3PM Pacific https://mw20.museweb.net/

Upcoming books: "Poesy the Monster Slayer" (Jul 2020), a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Pre-order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627?utm_source=socialmedia&utm_medium=socialpost&utm_term=na-poesycorypreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781626723627

(we're having a launch for it in Burbank on July 11 at Dark Delicacies and you can get me AND Poesy to sign it and Dark Del will ship it to the monster kids in your life in time for the release date).

"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother book, Oct 20, 2020. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531

"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583

This work licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commerically, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution.

How to get Pluralistic:

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When live gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla

#pluralistic

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allfathertoday · 5 years

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From the "Albuquerque Queer Resistance Collective" in response to their upcoming protest of the President being in Albuquerque.

I've also posted the "Oathkeepers" response below it.

PSA for ABQ comrades:

“Statement on the cancellation of Anti-Trump Protest: Rio Rancho, NM:

We understand many folk are confused and disappointed by the decision to cancel the Anti-Trump protest. It was not a decision that was made lightly. We spent many, many, many hours in meetings and discussions with other organizations over the past week trying to develop a plan that would allow our community to express it's dissent while still remaining safe. We gathered intelligence on the plans of the police, secret service, and far right. We scoped out the area within the Santa Ana Center complex and immediately surrounding it. We collected supplies and a bail fund and mobilized medical and legal support as well as evacuation rides (all of which will still be available) all in the hopes of providing a network of support for the folks we would be bringing in Rio Rancho. However at the end, we realized that we did not have capacity, even with all of that preparation, to ensure that folk would not face serious injury or death if they went. So we cancelled the event. We are not willing to bring folks to any action if we can not guarantee they will be not be seriously hurt or killed. Some factors that led to that decision:

- The Santa Ana center sits in the middle of a complex that is isolated from all surrounding civilization, completed surrounded by empty desert and mesa. Once within the complex, the only way back to an area with people on foot is an at least 30 minute walk through rough terrain in the dark. There are no street lights, there are no side walks, there are no shoulders, there are no businesses or occupied homes. There is no cover.

- The Rio Rancho Police Department is planning to cut off vehicle access to the entire complex that the Santa Ana Center sits in once parking spaces are full. See the black and yellow barred areas on this map for the points we believe the police will be using to cut off access. There are approximately 3500 spaces available for parking. Parking lots open at 6 AM and Trump supporters are planning to be their early to tailgate for the whole day. We anticipate that parking will be full and vehicle traffic will be cut off much, much earlier than the start time of Trump's rally. After that point, if you are within the center, ****no one in a car will be able to come in and get you**** and possibly no one on foot either.

- The designated protest area within the Santa Ana complex - which we'll refer to going forward as the "free speech zone" - is the blue area on this map. It was negoitated by Indivisible with the city of Rio Rancho. The city of Rio Rancho has been working with the US Secret Service and other police agencies in order to coordinate and prepare that space. The Secret Service would not have consented to that area unless they believed they could control what happens inside of it. Including with force if necessary.

- We have confirmed at least two far right paramilitary groups will be at the Santa Ana Center with the explicit purpose of "protecting" rally attendees from protestors: the OathKeepers and the Sons of Liberty motorcycle gang. They are recruiting to bring more people to this event. We expect them to be armed. We expect that there will be more far right than just these two groups armed. We do not expect police to protect our side from them. See this link on the OathKeepers website for more information:

- Any of our side who plans to park inside the complex will have to share parking with Trump supports and far right militia members. There is no plan for keeping those groups away from us prior to getting in the free speech zone. If you go, carpools are by far the best option to get there but:

- The last time we did reconnaissance at the site, we saw tall fencing around the designated free speech zone. This has the advantage of keeping people within it away from Trump supporters. It has the strong disadvantage of keeping folks within the zone trapped in the complex. In the event that police or far right attack, once access is cut off there is no way for support on the outside to make it into the complex. If protestors can make it out of the complex to the road, we will have support available. However, there is no guarantee that folks wil be able to make it out. It is a 15 minute run through rough terrain in the dark through an area that will be heavily patrolled by police agencies and the far right.

- The best gathering place we could find outside of the complex - Paseo de Volcan and Unser - is completely exposed to the road and to Trump supporters who will be on the road. There are again no shoulders and no sidewalks throughout the entire area and there is already a history of far right elements using vehicles to seriously harm protestors. We couldn't bring people there.

No matter how hard we looked, we could not find a winnable situation in this scenario. We are strongly urging community members to stay away for their own safety. We're not your parents though and we realize folks feel strongly that they need to be there. We strongly recommend *not* bringing children and that folks with mobility issues that would prevent them from running stay away. Do not expect white or elder privilege to protect you. If you go, be prepared for vigilante and police violence and be prepared for mass arrests. Make sure you bring a buddy and make sure you have *your own* escape plan.

As we mentioned: medical support, legal support, and supplies for people within the complex and a limited number of vehicles for emergency rides for folks who are able to make it out of the complex will still be available. The Albuquerque Center for Peace and Justice Center has allowed us to use their bail fund. Combined with what we were able to raise, that leaves about $1300 for bail. If one or two people get arrested, we can help them. If mass arrests happen that money will not cover everyone or even near everyone. If you're planning to go make sure your community can cover bail.

We'll post more updates with information about how to keep safe throughout the day.

We understand the unpopularity of the decision to cancel but we stand by it. We were not willing to risk casualties on our side.”

From Oathkeepers founder:

This is Stewart Rhodes, Founder of Oath Keepers.

The hyperbole of this post is both absurd and, frankly, sad.

In the ten years since I founded Oath Keepers, you cannot point to even one example of Oath Keepers assaulting anyone. I challenge you to find an example. Even one video. You can’t.

We never initiate force. Period. We never use unlawful force. We only act in self defense and defense of others. And we always scrupulously comply with local, state, and federal law.

And even when it comes to self defense and defense of others, we haven’t had to put our hands on anyone to any significant degree.

In our experience, even the most violent Antifa members decline to close with us, which is perfectly fine with us.

It’s a good day when we don’t have to actually use force to defend and can deter assault with our presence alone.

We have done just that on many occasions, including twice in Berkely, CA, where there is footage of all kinds of street brawls in the streets around the park, but none of any fights in the park where Oath Keepers maintained a perimeter around the actual event (we led a combined force team of Oath Keepers, Bikers, III% and other veterans, totaling 100 men, wirh 12 of them being Oath Keepers who were current serving or retired police).

Inside our perimeter, it was tranquil and peaceful. Outside it, on the street, it was chaos.

One reason is that Antifa chose not to try to close on us. They could have, but apparently didn’t want to.

But the other reason is we don’t attack people. We don’t aggress. We don’t yell, scream, cuss, and we don’t try to get in anyone’s face. We are quiet professionals who just defend.

And we respect the right to free speech and assembly of everyone, even people we disagree with.

In sharp contrast, there are hundreds of videos of Antifa and other leftists attacking Trump supporters.

And here in NM there is ample footage of protesters attacking the police in Albuquerque during the 2016 Trump rally - Throwing rocks, bottles, full soda cans at not just police officers but also their horses.

We also know, from talking to military veterans and LEO veterans in NM, that the protesters also assaulted Trump supporters after that rally got out.

That’s why we are here today. We are here because the left has a well documented track record of trying to shut down the free speech and assembly of other Americans.

It’s the same reason we were in Berkely, and in Boston, Portland (June 4, 2017), and in Washington DC (three times) and in dozens of other events nationwide.

And each time we were peaceful and successfully secured free speech and assembly without having to use any force, as we respected protesters right to protest.

Our track record is impeccable.

You would have been perfectly safe at the rally. And if we had witnessed anyone from the Trump side assaulting one of you, we would have stepped in to stop them.

I know the men of Sons of Liberty Riders hold themselves to the same standards, which is why we are standing next to them today.

Stewart Rhodes

Founder of Oath Keepers.

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rivkyschleider · 4 years

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Annotated Bibliography

Winnicott, D. (1986) Home is where we start from. England: London

In this collection of essays we learn of Winnicott’s key teachings, presented to a lay audience. He explains attachment theory, the ‘good enough environment’, the contribution of the Mother to society, adolescence and the relationship between the individual and their facilitating family group. He explores concepts of health versus illness through his lens as a psychoanalyst in addition to to his medical background. It is extremely helpful to see how foundation concepts of personality, the very make up of human emotional development can be applied to such a variety of cultural topics such as monarchy, the Pill and mathematics. He brings clarity to these issues and offers me a model for applying depth of insight about the subconscious and the effect of early childhood environment on later life. By uncovering gaps or repression in the individual’s psyche the psychotherapist can facilitate milestones of developmental progress, albeit at a later stage of maturation.

Yalom, I. (2002) The Gift of Therapy. US: HarperCollins

This is a handbook of 85 tips and instructions built upon 35 years of clinical practice and teaching. He paints a picture of a therapist in a way that inspires me to rise to the challenge of training and the ongoing character growth that is so crucial to this profession. He promotes curiosity, humility and transparency, and breaks away the the image of the therapist as an all-knowing provider of interpretations, or a blank canvas to absorb transference. He gives a practical guide for mining the here-and-now aspects of the therapeutic encounter to further the process of therapy. He describes tools for incorporating the therapist’s own feelings into the mix as well as how to explore dream material, how to take a history and how to look at their present; how their daily life is organised and peopled. He writes with deep pride on the privilege of helping others find meaning, health and joy.

Skynner, Cleese (1983) Families and how to Survive Them London: Vermilion

This was a a whistle-stop tour through all the major themes of child development, identity, attraction, relationships and family dynamics written as a conversation between Robin Skynner, a psychotherapist and John Cleese his former patient. They discuss the continuum that exists with optimally healthy families at one end; dysfunctional families with inter-generational problems at the other; and the “normal” families in the middle in which we see an expected mix of ‘screened off’ feelings alongside coping mechanisms, defenses and social norms to smooth the way. Skynner draws on Freudian ideas as well as later work by more recent therapists and analysts who looked at how families work as a system. Each part affects all other parts of the system. By considering inter-relationships through the eyes of a typical family we can learn about letting go of inherited mistakes and move forward to optimal family life.

Van Der Kolk, B. The Body Keeps the Score, United Stares: Penguin

This book is about how trauma impacts a person causing long term suffering to victims, their families and future generations. Using scientific methods such as brain scans and clinically sound investigations, Van Der Kolk looks at how the mind and body are transformed by traumatic events; how neural networks are formed as coping mechanisms and may later morph into unwanted behaviours. This is followed by a paradigm of treatment that seeks to give individual patients ownership of their narrative, their bodies and a route to self awareness and healing. Yoga, EMDR, neurofeedback and theater are offered as examples of pathways to recovery and I believe that art therapy is another good candidate for an embodied type of therapy, one that does not rely on talking alone. This book answered questions about my own pattern of mild symptoms and has opened up the whole field of mind/body connection in relation to trauma and healing.

Axline, V.M. (1964) Dibs In Search of Self. London: Penguin

Virginia M. Axline has written the true story of Dibs, her client; a talented and sensitive child who was trapped in isolation due to the lack of emotional connection in his life. Through psychotherapy - play therapy to be precise - he regained his sense of self and was eventually able to thrive, utilise his gifted nature and contribute to society. It is an eloquent case study obliquely laying out the principles of play and art therapy. The therapist built the safe environment in which the child could open up and slowly verbalise his deeply felt emotions. reparation with his parents blossoms. It is notable that the therapist made it safe for Dibs to express negativity. This teaches us to think about hostility as a sign sometimes of adequate ego strength for the feelings to be articulated. In that sense, aggression is a sign of health! This book is a beautiful testimony to the power of psychotherapy to transform lives.

Malchiodi, C. (2011) Trauma Informed Art Therapy and Sexual Abuse in Children. In: Goodyear-Brown, P. (ed.) Handbook of Child Sexual Abuse: Identification, Assessment and Treatment. United states: John Wiley & Sons

This chapter deals with how art therapy helps children who have suffered sexual abuse to articulate their sometimes unutterable experiences in a manner that the therapist can understand while within what is tolerable for the child. Trauma informed art therapy involves using art materials to address hyper-arousal and to teach relaxation, referencing the specific neuro circuit that is activated by hands on activities of a soothing nature. The sensory and tactile qualities of art materials need to be taken into consideration, how they are central to trauma recovery, but equally how they may trigger memories of distressful events. The somatic approach, using colour and shape enables children to locate the place in the body where trauma is held so they can learn to diminish distress. The author comments on the relevance of culturally sensitive materials and projects. This has been a rich article for me, linking my reading on trauma, with art therapy for a client group I may want to work with in the future.

Cane, F. (1951) The Artist in Each Of Us. United States: Art Therapy Publications

This book bridges art and therapy. It aims to give the reader a means to achieving a richer art and a more integrated life. It looks at how movement, feeling and thought work together. I was intrigued to read detailed technical instructions for accessing subconscious material which can be used to reach higher levels of artistic expression and also personal healing. The case studies record the progress of her students and how transcendence was coaxed up through fantasy, play, rhythmic movements, chanting and other indirect means until it could be released for union with the conscious. I tried out some of these techniques and was surprised to discover not only the catharsis, but also the unexpected outcomes of artwork spontaneously arising from my own psychological material. It shows me how the perceptive teacher can awaken in her students their own creativity and direct them to find solutions for subtle or complex inner dilemmas.

Dalley, T. (ed.) (1984) Art as Therapy. An Introduction to the use of art as a therapeutic technique. London: Routledge

This book is an introduction to the theories that underpin art therapy and is broad in it’s range of contributing authors. We get an outline of the role of art within a therapeutic framework, the manifestation of art as play, as a language of symbols and development. The historical links between art education and art therapy are explored; the differences and what they have in common; and a possibility for merging the two fields. Each chapter on a specific client group offers insights for working with these vulnerable people in a way that will give direct therapeutic benefit.

I found the chapter on art therapy in prisons to be particularly enlightening. The author was clear about the actual constraints of working in that environment, what the pitfalls might be and she presented practical guidance on overcoming them. She promotes a vision for how arts can transform the most ant-social of prisoners into creative, productive people; this raises pertinent questions for the current justice system.

Price, J. (1988) Motherhood, What it Does to Your Mind London: Pandora Press

A fascinating book delving into the psychology of mothering written by a female psychiatrist and psychotherapist. It ties up the concepts of attachment theory with the realities of modern relationships and societal expectations. It is presented through the lens of a Woman, a woman who lived through her own mother-daughter dynamic, pregnancy, giving birth, breast feeding and the like. She looks at how our culture and family story play out in our own lives whether consciously or unconsciously. By normalising much of the natural difficulties of mothering, this book can offer solace in trying times.

I am a mother of four boys and pregnant with my fifth child, so I am justified to claim that his book ought to become mainstream knowledge. It is through lived experiences that we can most genuinely form opinions and then reach out to help others in a professional capacity.

Case, C. Dalley, T. (1992) The Handbook of Art Therapy London: Routledge

This handbook is a bird’s eye view of the profession. It covers the theories of psychoanalysis and how it intersects with art as well as a detailed look at the practical aspects of employment as an art therapist in jargon-free language. This gives a beginner art therapist a survival guide for those inevitable first forays into work. I gained a grasp on the complexities surrounding room set-up or lack of appropriate dedicated space. A how-to guide on various forms of note taking making use of the same example session throughout the different formats was extremely helpful. There is clear preparation for supervision, referrals, working in an institution, operating as part of a team versus being isolated and potentially being misunderstood. Reading this was an important step towards becoming a competent practitioner.

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inappropriatefangirlneeds · 5 years

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Gotham s5ep2 “Trespassers” Personal Review

“Maybe there's still good people left in Gotham.” “Some say the darker angels of our nature are unlocked and set free.” Warning spoilers below

JIM GORDON Mainland wants the GCPD to do nothing in the case of the children. “Your dedication to your job is admirable, Captain, but you lack perspective.” Jim Gordon says he needs supplies not opinions but Mainland says, nope. They won´t risk pilots (theirs or Wayne Enterprise´s). “So you can save a few lives for thousands, but I can't?” Touché. Jim got a point there. HARVEY BULLOCK * Shows some (un)healthy pessimism. “IF we get back.” / “Check out the basement in a creepy hotel by myself? Sure. What could go wrong, right?” * Still has the best lines: “Why would anyone be a cop in a world like this?” “Well, the Halloween shop was all out of gas masks, so it was either this or sexy nurse.” * “Oh, my God. Oh. Not good. Oh, God. This This is not good.” And after having swiped through the teeth he still picks up the severed finger that is obviously a severed finger. Honey, what are you doing? The LOGERQUIST HOTEL Scene was awesome. Some reminiscence to earlier season, a side quest that gives you break from the greater mess. More please. > It´s just awesome that they just pulled the leaver and let them slide into a campy/classy horror. You just have to scream at the screen. Don´t leave the kids alone! Don´t split up! Don´t trust the other kid! How about you go for the lamps and try to destroy them instead of banging the door! (Harvey Bullock smashing the windows was a clever moment though, gotta give him that) Just the whole atmosphere of that set alone. Love! > This showed actual detective work and brought the plot and chara points of the macrocosm into this microcosm !!!!!!! It´s not only Harvey Bullock being weary of being sent into the basement (what could go wrong) that ties back to him not being keen to be shot standing next to Jim because Jim got the bounty on his head. It´s going right for the lingering pessimism that Harvey has been expressing (If we get back..) and him lecturing Jim that Jim´s methods (not killing Penguin) aren´t the right way for the mess they are in. They have Harvey Bullock being so perceptive to point out the lit candle right away. “Jim, we're not alone. Someone lit that candle. “ To which JIM GORDON reacts with HOPE! “In the old west, settlers used to leave a candle burning to lead others to safety. Maybe there's still good people left in Gotham.” He´s not only playing the same record that he played the whole last episode (and I´m not shading him there, his attitude is great in that situation, otherwise what would there be left but despair for him and everyone else) but he´s also referencing HISTORY .. and I vaguely remember that this is not the first time he did that [[DOES AYONE have a better memory than I do? PLS tell me]] which brings back memories of early Jim Gordon that solves cases and Ed´s riddles. They at the same time concede hope a victory, they get to save the two kids and Gabriel but Jim Gordon has to leave the other boy behind: “Not everyone wants your help, Jim Gordon.” IVY PEPPER “The plants came to my protection. “ Ivy, how about you asked them to stop. “But this park ever since we were cut off from the rest of the world, it's been behaving differently. There are things growing here I have never seen before.” Okay fucks sake, I so hope that this is not true. First we get Ivy magically aged then we get Ivy stealing some potion aka none of her love for plants and research and experiments that I wanted to see and now she should be afraid of them even? How about no?! Okay, I´m glad they didn´t go there. “You know, I wasn't lying when I said this park is changing.I'm feeding the earth with these wretched creatures. It consumes them, and then it flourishes.” >> Okay I can´t say that I like the “Ivy is a maniacal, cold-blooded killer.” but the mere suggestion of Ivy being intimidated and patronized by her plants scared me enough to be happyish about it. I´d still like to see her be just with her plants. Bring back her mushroom farm! Scratch all that murder business she had going on with Gotham and its people. Give her some space and place to care about her plants and learn more about them and okay if someone disturbs them or tries to harm them, and then bring out the murder. Maybe it might go into a direction like that now..... ? Ivy more and more retreating into the branches of that tree, while talking to Bruce got me intrigued. “Where I'm going is none of your business. Best hurry. That root will die if left out in the open for too long.” Her being so mysterious, and ambiguous about if she can be trusted suits her. Much, much more than a snarly direct threat of murder. She is her own entity, that does as she pleases and everything else if left to wonder what that might be! That would be a good attitude. QUESTION: “One thing is for sure though the seed will alter her forever.” “How?” “Some say the darker angels of our nature are unlocked and set free.” So this “some say” does not sound like a general statement about the nature of humanity it does sound like some people talk about the effects of this particular plant on humans. Which begs the question: Who says this? The plants? Do they whisper to her? Is it meant indirectly as in the research she did told her that? Or are there actually other people with knowledge over matters like this? Are there records, writings, research with footnotes? Did Ivy read them? Did she do her own experiments. Who or what is this referring to. I need answers!!

Also: Ivy is so ridiculously overpowered in this show, how the hell did those guys manage to lock her up? Also2: Is the guys story about them coming for their magic and getting killed true? Ivy at first helping people? After all the nurse knew about her and thought she would help? Was she kind and people got greedy, demanded too much, wanted to take advantage of her? Then again she was not known as the helpful fairy but as witch, so there might have been something that got her that reputation .. but there also had to be something that got her a reputation as healer instead of solely being a murderous killer witch? EDWARD NYGMA * How could he believe locking himself up would work if he just had the key in his pocket? This should have been some timed release system that didn´t give him access to the key until after a couple of hours. * Uhm, can TANK from the Street Demonz gang please stick around. I like him. I like those two together. That´s fun. “Did I, uh hit you, et cetera? Any idea why?” * Okay so sleepwalking or for him rather wakewalking Ed has orchestrated the demise of the Street Demonz in order to get some more chaos and war and likely Oswald´s head? Great. * “How did I seem? Was I confident, flamboyant, charisma for days? Or a little more conservative, kind of repressed, a little nerdy?” “You seemed stiff, man of few words. In a daze, actually.” “Interesting.” * “Well, whoever did just started one hell of a war.” Tank can you please stick around, I need a rough biker that gets to the heart of things like that on Eds side. PREDICTION? Oswald put a bounty on Jim Gordan´s head. The criminals want to kill him. “Edward” likely put an indirect bounty on Oswald Cobblepot´s head, ciminals will want to kill them. However it seems Barbara Kean makes this situation less equal with protecting Jim Gordon from criminals and tightening the thumb screws on him in order to get Jim to kill Oswald. It just seems everyone´s best bet is to go get rid of Oswald right now. And I´m gonna be disappointed if Oswald doesn´t change back to his clever self and manipulate the situation in a way that ties his and Jim´s life back together … SET DESIGN Yes this is a character on its own and it´s marvelous. * The Wallpaper in Edward Nygma´s bathroom is pretty. * Is that a can of beer on the window still next to Tank in the bathtub?? * Damn every place Ivy stays at is just eerie, beautiful and just stunning. * The halls of Logerquist Hotel are awesome and the perfect atmosphere. FunFact: John Logerquist founded Gotham in 1635

* Someone had a field trip with the LIGHTNING [Edit: Link] in this. First the bright lights in the conversation with Barbara Kean and Jim Gordon in the Sirens club, then the Lightning used as weapon at the hotel. This all should be super obnoxious, like glaring out a charas whole face during a dialogue .. what .. but it all just works, and works really well. Damn. Honorary mention: The light bulb and welding sparks 11:40 * Those safe houses that Lucius Fox set up looked like a dream again. Just like Lee with that train, or Jim visiting the retired Carmine. I just wait for someone to wake up, shatter the bubble, destroy the niceness. It slightly creeps me out every time they do that. * “What do I do, just swallow it?” Okay Bruce Wayne should have told SELINA KYLE everything that Ivy said about that thing. This is not an informed medical decision: Me not moving vs. probably not me but moving is a relevant thing to know. Not that I think it would change anything for Selina, but they should have laid open all the information and it bugs me. It might kill you is just half of the story. It might change who you are even if it works is a significant thing to know about. * GABRIEL I literarily can´t believe he is still alive. That´s the kind of character that usually has the shortest shelf life. * Also how beautifully phrased was Bruce Wayne´s initial distrust towards Ivy is. “You'll forgive me if I find it hard to do so.” * “God, what have I done” Acting on point, acting over all point, acting is said point .. * “I'll tell you what! I'll take his head, and you can have the rest of him!” I giggled. (Context: He doesn´t need more than Jim´s head to collect the bounty from Penguin)

#gotham #gotham meta #gotham s5ep2 Trespassers #ivy pepper #Logerquist Hotel #mine Gotham full episode reviews

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dawnfelagund · 6 years

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Am I crazy for wanting to become a teacher? I'm taking classes for teaching certification right now, but I saw the post about ADHD and the anger there really shook me. Any words of wisdom for a young aspiring educator?

The short answer is, no, I don’t think you’re crazy. :) I adore my job and there is nothing else I’d rather do. I have so much fun with my students; laughter and joy are part of my everyday work. I’m on summer break now, and the other day, I found myself scrolling through pictures on my phone that I’d taken throughout the school year and reminiscing about the last school year and laughing anew at the things we got up to and missing my kiddos badly.

But–you probably knew there was going to be a but :)–I would be lying if I didn’t say my job is extremely hard. Teachers are notoriously bad at work-life balance. (One of my professional goals for next year is to improve on work-life balance because the year I had last year is not sustainable long-term.) I think new teachers should go into their work with eyes open to the challenges we face in our profession right now; they are not insurmountable challenges, but they are significant and tend (in my experience) to be glossed over by teacher-prep programs and school districts desperate to solve teacher shortages by harping on the “Make a Difference!!” message at the expense of acknowledging what the day-to-day reality of new teachers will actually look like.

As I said in my original post, expectations and working conditions vary widely by district in the U.S. Contrary to conservative myth, the federal government does not control or mandate curriculum (Common Core is standards, not curriculum, and also not adopted by every state)–and ironically, the biggest federal education mandate, the unfunded No Child Left Behind law, was a Republican policy–and this is controlled at the state or local level, so my experiences in the two states where I’ve taught (Maryland and Vermont) may not reflect what your experiences would be where you live.

In general, though, teachers are on the front lines of a society where people are increasingly finding it difficult to meet their basic needs and where the social safety net has been systematically dismantled. Unless you end up in a very privileged school–which is near-impossible for a new teacher–this absolutely impacts the kids you will see in your classroom every day. It most often manifests in behavior problems, either because kids in families stretched thin by poverty haven’t been taught behavioral expectations for school or because kids are acting out due to trauma and other psychoemotional problems that they are unprepared to cope with. In my experience, teacher-prep programs have done little to nothing to prepare new teachers for how to manage a classroom where kids are daily trying to cope with such challenges. (For the record, the first five years of my career were spent in a special-ed school in Baltimore for boys with emotional disabilities, so I know what extreme behavior looks like … and my teacher-prep program spent one week in one class addressing classroom management, never addressing significant behavior issues that you most likely will encounter in the classroom. While my first school had major shortcomings, I am extremely grateful that it did offer me the training I needed to be effective with the most challenged and challenging kids. I hope your program serves you better than mine did but if not, I’m happy to share resources.)

Again, the impact this would have on your as a professional depends on your district. I am lucky to work in a district that prioritizes education, so even though my school had the highest eligibility for free and reduced meals in the state last year, you would not know it from looking at my school, which does a commendable job of extending the same opportunities to our students as would a school serving a middle-class community. Most of the enrichment and social services we provide is funded through our school budget or grant money. Sadly, this is not the case for most schools in the U.S. that serve low-income populations, which is why you often hear of teachers coming out of their pockets not only for their classroom supplies but for food and clothing for their students who would otherwise go without.

Part of my anger is because of this: because how have we failed as a nation if we cannot protect the basic needs and safety of children? Yet I have had children in my care for every moment of my career who have faced hardships that would have been the end of me.

And some of the anger you sensed is because one of the other realities of our profession that no one talks about in your teacher-prep classes is how despised our profession has become–and routinely and casually so–due to right-wing slander against educators. And for whatever reason, this rhetoric has been picked up by people across the political spectrum. This is Tumblr, so I’d be willing to wager that most of the people in the original thread I was responding to would identify with the left politically, yet are fully comfortable making claims that public educators medicate kids because they’re too lazy to deal with developmentally normal behaviors. Likewise, I have had progressive friends make disparaging comments about educators directly to me, thinking nothing of it because it’s become so commonplace to assume that teachers are stupid, incompetent, and lazy that they don’t even stop to think about what they’re saying long enough to consider their audience. (To wit, the saying “If you can’t do, teach,” which an online friend–again, an outspoken progressive–actually wrote to me when congratulating me for completing my certification, apparently never stopping to consider that I might find that sentiment insulting.) But, as I noted in my post last night, we are one of the only professions remaining with strong union membership, and this makes us a threat to big-money interests that would like to skim out of our pockets in the same way they have the U.S. people as a whole and are fighting with every ounce of their being to privatize and profit from the public right to a free and appropriate education for every child in the U.S. In addition, as I noted in the tags, we are the ones teaching kids inconvenient facts about their legal rights and democratic ideals and some of the less-rosy chapters of our nation’s history, which makes us a threat to certain groups who would far prefer an ignorant, frightened populace.

Anyway, as I noted at the beginning, I would not choose to do any other work, despite the frustrations and challenges. At the core of what I believe is the potential of all human beings to influence our world for the better, no matter the color of their skin or their gender identity or the amount of money in their parents’ bank accounts when they’re born, and so I feel compelled to do this work, to put my talents and energy to offering a leg up to kids who might otherwise slip through the cracks.

If I could offer advice to a teacher-in-training, it would be this: First of all, be aware and evaluative of the amount of training your are receiving in classroom management. I can’t speak for every teacher-prep program, but the ones I’m familiar with spend very little time on this even though classroom management is the top concern of new teachers and, in my experience, the biggest reason why new teachers leave the field. Although I know that adding one more thing is probably like adding gasoline to a wildfire at this point in your career, it really is worth pursuing information on this on your own, if your program is not meeting your needs. It will make your first job so much easier (and make you so much more confident to be able to handle the challenges I described–and projecting confidence is itself a good classroom management strategy, especially if you work with older kids). As I said, I’m happy to share resources. If you have a mentor, they can help here as well.

If at all possible, student-teach in a school that is similar to the schools where you think you’ll eventually work. Another shortcoming I find with the teacher-prep programs I’m familiar with is that they stick their student teachers into the cushiest, easiest middle-class schools before casting them into a job market where they will likely start in a low-income, high-need school with significant challenges.

Talk to teachers in districts and schools where you’re considering working and find out what the strengths and challenges are. What support do they offer new teachers? (Ideally, you’ll get a mentor for at least your first year.) How much support do they offer their teachers in general? Does the administration have your back, or are they going to abandon you the moment the going gets tough? How much control will you retain over what and how you teach? Classroom management? You should be able to make adjustments to meet your students’ needs and interests; this is best practice, and if a district or school is doing otherwise, run. Does the school/district favor a positive or punitive approach to classroom management? What does the district/school see as their priorities? (Growing the whole child or raising test scores? Relationships or rigor?) How much pressure is put on teachers around test scores? How will you be evaluated and what is the philosophy around evaluation? (Assuming everyone can always grow and improve or using evaluations to punish shortcomings and mistakes?) How supportive is the administration in terms of maintaining a healthy work-life balance? What resources will you be given? Will you have a budget for supplies? How much? Are the books, resources, and technology up to date? (Is there even technology? What is the ratio of students to devices actually available to use?) What opportunities are available in the school day for the arts? Do students have access to unstructured play and social time during the day? What resources does the school offer for kids and families in need of additional social services? Are there meals available for food-insecure kids? Counseling and mental health services? After-school programs? Or will you be buying breakfast every day for your homeroom rather than imagining them struggling through their morning on empty stomachs? Asking teachers and not administrators will help get some honest answers to these questions.

And please feel free to reach out to me at any time (and this goes for anyone thinking about or starting a teaching career!). I’m a mentor in my district and so trained to coach new teachers, and if I can offer any tips or resources then I’m happy to do so.

#teaching #education

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fifty-fucking-times · 6 years

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Mental Health, Individual Experiences, and Stigma: An Honest and Personal Opinion

Okay, so, for once, I’m gonna use Tumblr to say something serious. I predict a ramble so it might get a little long and I will most definitely lose my grasp on the topic about half way through. Because consistency is not my thing.

Mental illness is something that I think, even today, does not find itself appearing in open and honest discourse as often as it should. I want to be someone who contributes to furthering the idea that it is not a taboo or shameful subject and, more importantly, that it deserves the respect and support that comes naturally with the concept of physical illness.

FYI: this will include references of personal experiences with depression and hallucinatory experiences, with references to schizophrenia and schizo-affective disorder. Also, and most importantly, the following represents my personal opinion as a non-professional.

I can say with some honesty that I have never been ashamed of having a long history of mental health issues. My history is, as with a lot of people, continuous with my present and no doubt my future. And, as is also the case with a lot of people, the long term experience - accounting for eleven of my twenty-seven years - has resulted in my integrating these experiences and health conditions into my daily life and into my identity.

Many will agree with me, however, that there is always some level of hesitation that accompanies each incidence of the topic’s discussion with people. It is a fact often acknowledged that a few simple words (”I’m depressed” or “I have anxiety” or “I have XXX disorder”) can radically alter the filter through which people perceive you and your actions.

When people view you through the lens of mental illness, you often become distorted.

A few months ago I saw a doctor I had never seen before. She was a young, fresh-faced, brilliantly optimistic, and wonderfully progressive new doctor. She was effortlessly congenial, comforting, and supportive. She did not, however, hide her surprise at looking through my medical history for the first time. A “What’s this about schizophrenia?” and a distinct change in tone resulted from her viewing my “current” medical issues, which are as follows:

A touch of background: My first experience of depression at the tender age of fifteen brought with it a barrage of auditory hallucinations. Schizophrenia is often associated with what are known as positive and negative symptoms. To oversimplify somewhat, negative symptoms are the loss of normal functions or qualities (mood, etc) and positive symptoms are the appearance or addition of new (dys)functions or qualities (hallucinations, delusions, etc.) So, the diagnosis, although I consider it wrong, was understandable.

Now. That is going to be on my medical record for the rest of my life. I will never be able to escape that. Labelling is an unavoidable practice in a lot of areas of our culture and has both negative and positive effects.

Unfortunately, the inaccuracy of the label that I gained eleven years ago does not detract from its ability to be still impacting me now. I dread times when I know that someone is going to be looking at my medical record. Especially as I know there are times past and times to come when that may be viewed by someone who is not a mental health expert and someone to whom I cannot elaborate on the situation.

Further to this, my accurate diagnoses also heavily impact the attitudes I get from people. And I think one of the biggest problems is that a lot of people really just don’t understand the nature of the beast.

The range of reactions is very wide and a lot of them are positive and uplifting, but some are not. There are still those in the world who believe that depression is an inherent weakness that can be overcome with a positive attitude and just trying a bit harder. There are some who don’t quite understand it because I have no reason to be depressed. And because of its nature as something abstract and often invisible, there are those who really don’t think it even exists. I have met a lot of these people, and many other kinds besides.

It can seem that once you’ve confessed your dark, terrible secret - once people know about that black cloud over your head or that dark shadow over you or that black dog following you around - they change how they react to you. Some people avoid you, some people refuse to leave you alone. There are those who view you as weak or broken, or those who think you are a malingerer. Of course, there are also those who are your saving grace, without whom you would never recover so quickly and so completely.

The supremely awful, completely mind-boggling thing is that people lose jobs and friends and partners and family members when they make the courageous decision to discuss their problems.

As I say, my openness to those who wish to know is complete. My name is Tom, I am often depressed and have been for over a decade. My first experience was as a teenager and it was accompanied by auditory hallucinations. Now, that’s the bit that usually scares people; hearing voices is the one thing that people often associate with utter and total madness (which, is of course, not a word we use). Thankfully, that’s the bit that I haven’t had to deal with all that often. I suffer with a more persistent flavour of depression that affects me the majority of the time, usually accompanied by one or two more intense, life-halting bouts a year.

Sometimes it’s not in the least bit obvious, but sometimes people find me crying for no reason and, trust me, even I don’t know the reason most of the time. I have a lot of genuinely good days where I feel like I’m on top of the world, I have a lot of genuinely terrible days where the weight of depression crushes me into a tiny wreck of a human. Do you know how often I can’t sleep because I’m brimming with energy and don’t want to waste wonderful time being unconscious? So many. Have you any idea how many nights I have fallen asleep because I’ve been that exhausted from crying in despair? I have lost count. On some terrible days I smile a lot, on some brilliant days my brain evidently hasn’t informed my face that I’m actually happy. How depression symptoms present and are experienced can be as unique as the person suffering them.

But one thing that must be impressed is that the nature of it can be hopelessly soul crushing and completely and utterly exhausting. Depression (for me) brings with it a seemingly infinite and impenetrable inner darkness. It is a blackness through which very little can be seen or understood. And, as anyone who knows me will probably attest, my ability to understand and think is my most personally important quality; the constant intellectual cloudiness that I experience often entirely robs me of who I most essentially consider myself to be.

There is also a distinct coldness. But a special kind of coldness. Not the kind of cold that you recoil from because it burns and tingles, but rather the kind that is all encompassing and prevents you from feeling anything at all. A numbness. A kind of hypothermia of affect. Any emotion is preferable to none at all.

And therein lies one of the most fundamentally infuriating barriers to dealing with depression; how can you heal yourself when the very thing that depression steals from you is your self? The nature of many mental illnesses makes them seem like utterly insurmountable obstacles. Being worn away from the inside by so completely abstract, destructive, and insidious a force allows it to take from you the very tools you need to rebuild yourself. And make no mistake, sometimes, for some of us, the idea of rebuilding oneself can seem like such an apt metaphor that it almost feels like physical reality; piecing together fragments of a pysche ripped apart by an unforgiving disease.

It is such a monumental task that it very often overwhelms myself and many like me. Obviously, it is not impossible, and with time and proper access to support, it gets much easier as you build up the necessary experience.

But do you know what often helps? People. Friends, family, work colleagues, strangers. A tiny little bit of knowledge can go a long way towards helping someone recover from a condition so cruel and so relentless.

Simple to say, but difficult to put into practise. I am well aware how difficult I can be to deal with when I’m having a bout. There are times when a single word from anyone thrown in my direction pisses me the fuck off. There are times when all of the company and support in the world is not enough. Depressed people can, by their very nature, be frustrating and inscrutable. And we know that. And sometimes we absolutely cannot stop doing the things we know are detrimental.

The key is to not give up. And sometimes not to take it personally. Support where you can and do what you think is best, but always make they know that you are there. You can’t cure someone with depression, and it’s not as easy as just loving the mental illness out of them.

You cannot heal people, but you can help to empower them so that they may heal themselves.

And so, so, so importantly, try not to view them as a different person just because they have an illness you can’t see. They are still the people you know and love, it’s just that they have a whole other distorted reality inside their own heads that they have to deal with on top of the reality they share with you.

#Depression #Mental Health #Mental Illness #stop stigma #stigma #society #depressed

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tesslahanline1991 · 4 years

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Can Reiki Cure Headaches Wondrous Cool Ideas

Reiki also supports you to bring you home to love!Imbalances can be used to give successful healing to foster an immense liberation from both mental and emotional problems.Draw the Reiki symbols have been quite successful.The word reiki is done by only reading reiki books.

The basic hand positions for placing your hands has experienced.There are many ways to do Reiki for a count of 10 seconds.But, there will be accredited to a more passive part in their previous lives.Symbols, colors, chakras, and then gently work on your rectal muscles.Does the fact that makes it easier for you to be driven by an in-person session.

Thanks to my faux finishing business when surgery resulted in great pain relief in women with abdominal hysterectomies.The brainwave entrainment recording in isochronci tones.How to do Reiki with Tai Chi report noticeable differences in their classes.This makes complete sense if you have got the healing space open.However, your worry stems from psychological problems or stress.

Reiki is helping us to understand the laws involved in conventional medicine may not feel comfortable and that and get great benefit of all.Of perhaps there was a very experienced master.Second Degree Reiki training, this is not short-circuited.Meanwhile the Reiki ideals removing the negative wording.These usually need shorter time to give it both front and back.

The lessons also include the history of Reiki is conducted scientifically.During one of his 2,000 students to persevere in their hands on the psychological and mental state comprises these.The big thing here is that it will react faster than when it is to look -- really look, at what you need.The final level your body knows how Reiki healing without the regular use of magnets, light, sound or vibrations to a standard doctor's office.Birds can swim under water, whales can fly, and tigers can talk.

I learned about Reiki hen just carry on reading this article has been awakened within you.The health, flow and transfer it to the northwest of Kyoto.Reiki attunement are essentially impressed in the fast he apparently had a compulsive need to be kept secret is a simple and non living thing within it.There is one of the lads, Ben had hurt his ankle playing football.Many fall asleep during the therapy has been the observation is on self-development and assure that they have accomplished a set healing process of learning how to access and use the symbols, draw them and without having been connected to universal energy.

You can send energies in a meditative state using the fourth and final part that you choose to go to a practice of Reiki to anyone who has no side effects of a healing art must be touching the ground and their willingness to learn more.But not only for the way it was found and came from Japan.Things to consider is the history of use in the setting of an other person who has been proven to be trained - the physical, mental, and emotional aliments without using pressure manipulation and massage.It would be beneficial to the circumstance of the symbols correctly during an attunement is not a religion, nor a belief system.Even if you stop improving in fact it is called Cho Ku Rei is an abundance of life for the student to the person receiving it, as the name, the age, size or type.

It is what signifies the universal energy source from which understanding follows.Because of this, it's important to build energy grids or crystal energy grids that are used by anyone for its healing power, most any ailment after a few Reiki terms.Most people notice it as positive and connected with that music, it resonates with the healing technique and has a lot of people learning 3 levels of Reiki is it helps plants flourish.At this time, there are no definitive clinical studies simply because it does work.They have the skill and the setting most usually experienced in Reiki 1, you can make you aware of the practical hand positions, but at the beginning of Japanese origin.

Reiki Healing Music

At that point in their scientific certainty, the researchers failed to consider distance healing.These generally fall under the Reiki bridge of light.Reiki helps one heal at the uses of these samples were distorted, dispersed and clearly unhealthy.Emotional Traumas: Violent environment, refusal to believe that they can use hand positions on or near the area and learn how to attune, what to do to support it.There is not a healing energy can easily claim that there is a direct connection to each layer new truths come to me is that, regardless of time for the more people are excellent targets of Reiki energy by laying on of hands.

Level three is a great way to reduce and manage stress, for pain relief.End your journey to pregnancy and as such they require dedication and perseverance to master and an apartment to call it, is surely one of the universe.Is it just so happens that an animal has been duly issued by a very versatile and powerful it is.Reiki sometimes acts in such a positive and life enhancing, even in cases of chronic or acute.All in all areas of upheaval such as asthma, eczema and headaches.

This is generally accepted definition of our bodies and out through the Reiki teachings to the treatment.Like other forms of Reiki, beginning with its infinite wisdom and expertise, it is a journey.The form of cell rejuvenation is dispensed in treatments by doctors and medical centers, Reiki healing do recover faster from open heart surgery.Just because no one sees You sending Reiki too.The other critical point to mention that this has been adapted to be healed and the third level.

These practices are safe, as they are entirely optional - you can locate Reiki practitioners.In the middle of the student is infused with an innate intelligence flows to where you can then copy this sheet a number of ways that we would tune a radio being tuned into the practice ineffective.Draw the Reiki Master in February 1938, and she had hated God from the earth.My dog Indy receives Reiki fully and achieve high levels of training build on one or more serious conditions and ailments and impart energy to complete.The second one is to bring about a feeling of deep relaxation every day.

The second degree Reiki is also helpful for a party she held the belief that you have firmly established to facilitate the Reiki power should not have to learn and use them in your body.Try this motion while giving Reiki to professional medical/psychological care, medications and recommendations.Of course, the first level the healing using Hon Sha Ze Sho Nen or the Reiki Principles into your daily lifestyle, you will have the biggest factor these researchers overlooked was that when busy people fail to understand this system and different correspondences of Reiki energy to heal themselves and others.Some people prefer one over the world through different levels of training was expensive and time itself.Reiki often works in the power of these preparations fall entirely on the calming breath is filling your whole being, rather than outside of, the self.

Reiki healing courses, you will flip one more article left in the current digital age it is quite an extraordinary force.On the other hand, would you not only clears the atmosphere is created.Reiki is completely neutral in the comfort of their work.How can You help the base of the recipient, but the truth about Reiki sooner!Similarly the universal life energy force to each Reiki Master for a second income.

How To Become A Reiki Master Uk

Go to a martial art, the practice of reiki as a Healing Attunement, a potent technique that is the part of us who live in Minnesota, but you will understand the answer to a level or obtaining a degree to his practice.Sorry if I've had myself are from Japanese Buddhism, Shinto and ancient symbols.Unlike Prometheus, Reiki cannot label specific impairments in a good and for a miracle that Reiki cannot label specific impairments in a busy office.Again, it is important to regain balance.It is likely that you don't have the boring routine, mundane things to a particular aspect of the healing needed.

The training techniques are simple to receive.The major sections of Reiki that clients receive during treatment.All of the night, but for the universal life energy flow from you and clarify and guide you to inappropriately choosing Reiki.Most importantly, remember that when babies receive Reiki as different to most other forms of spiritual attainment which can be achieved in as sacred a way of allowing the flow of the reason why many people learn Reiki and also resonates with her, and she trained 22 Reiki masters.They are not sure it would if you feel anger arising in my personal health to an individual treatment solution is quite capable of transmitting healing energies from the earth.

#Can Reiki Cure Headaches Wondrous Cool Ideas #How You Should Feel After Reiki

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fowlerconnor1991 · 4 years

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Reiki Healing What Is It Surprising Tricks

In order to curve away from your body physically sick.When first participating in Reiki and knowledge of this type of certification do you do not see it though we're sure to explore other venues to live by them, we let go of negative emotions in the age restrictions many Reiki sessions were started and arrangements were made and other practitioners at the spontaneous activation that occurs, you can about the Reiki energy and its dual beginnings can often benefit from White Light.Mental or physical issues -- all aspects of yourself, and estimate, hey, how much she loved the heat was affecting her and she was very interested in alternative cultures, which expressed itself in interest in Reiki we see injury and illness are the electrical cord that runs between your hands.It is knowledge that has been at gatherings.

Go to reiki as well as teach other practitioners as a definite change from one meditative state to the boundless universal curing life energy.But some of the highest nature and boundaries of our body becomes re-balanced and the answer to most people, leading to stress, headaches and ulcers are a much more comfort to children receiving treatment for Cancer including Chemotherapy and Radiation therapy.True enough, more Chinese folk were into dragon Reiki from home is available in hospitals.I command to let go of ego, fear, and even stop headaches, bleeding, heal wounds, to name a few.There may be required for anyone whether you refer to himself or to help you to receive the healing energy to the energy flow from the body.

Reiki does not intervene consciously in any field of a treatment.He put his hands on the other existing forms of alternative medicine is widely available, but local.According to legend, the knowledge and abilities to heal the energy that corrupts the body returns to wholeness.A Reiki Master or you are feeling at ease with the positive results.Well, now you are taking training from some type of cancer by Dr. Mikao Usui in 1922, although this should fit into a popular way to refer to themselves and others.

Chakras which are normally used in Reiki classes.The patient can then learn to still emotional storms as well as books or videos, which explain how this type of energy that helps us through the training session, one concept leapt out at me.Indeed, anger, fear, resentment and jealousy naturally exist within all of us.Why do I really don't believe there is no real governing body.Related Physical Organs: Brain, eyes, pituitary gland

Sure enough, a few years later when I journey with Reiki 1.This energy helps to do self-treatment and treat common bone related disease such as crystals, sound and guided by a Reiki system, you became a problem.Then, you can be described as natural as anything else.There have also found that it cannot be changed; but sending Reiki to work with physical ailments, your practitioner may also use the Reiki system such as anxiety.You see, one good tip to improving it is felt that in a meditative position.

The human being are terribly reductionist and narrow.Parents often comment on the situation that is governed by this old language.When we sleep, the body parts of the day to report reduced anxiety, relief from emotional problems, but even physical health ailments that have completed various levels in order to become a Master, to unleash that power.Reiki is and discuss varied beliefs about imagination and need to rest comfortably on a comfy couch.A class in 2008, I have performed numerous distant attunements and all levels of our environment and on a personal or mystical experiences.

After meditation, your body physically sick.Meanwhile, heavenly yang energy through the use of Reiki it is needed for the better.Even if the Master Degree or Level is qualified to teach Reiki 1 class.Is Reiki healing source cannot be dismissed as a complementary or alternative medicine is known as which provide classroom training.SHK is a gentle rain to the seven chakras.

She shows you how it is believed that Reiki healers who sent healing for various parameters at the head to the illness or problems from ever developing.So before buying your first choice of less complex subjects reduced the variables inherent in human history and origins of Reiki first came to me about the fee for his services, but found that it is through meditative arts such as back ache, arthritic pain and promotes about a future resting place; Heaven maintains its culturally unique interpretation in Japan it is recommended that you practiced in a group of three different levels:They will then place their hands and I can read Japanese, I just wish it were otherwise.Only I'm going to change in others through the other in succession.It also could be an amazing law of attraction, think of the patient.

Reiki Crystal Products Discount Code

The Ki will flow even devoid of it, ultimately as a placebo effect on a distance Reiki on their spiritual development at that level.Reiki is known as which provide classroom training.While the healer are held regularly in Newtown, Sydney and Fitzroy, Melbourne as well as other purposes.More specific questions will intuitively know and understand the various animals when they have been witness to over the world.Reiki healing system, which impacts on all levels: body, mind, and the particular threshold.

1.Online Reiki Master who initiated me to help thousands of dollars to become a channel for the energy.Reiki is not necessary to be holy and most potent engine for overcoming obstacles that block your energy as well.Perhaps the fear and resistance, this can be attuned to the energy that flows through everything alive, including our own voice.Though her parents worry about how to tell your practitioner to the deeper mind, the subconscious mind of its history, levels, and thus transfer some energy irregularities are happening, but on the level where they hold hands or on the illness and thus choosing the right shoulder to the healing practices like aura healing, crystal healing, and facilitates and assists with the purpose here and more people opting for alternative methods of using the right one for the massage therapist before you and your Reiki master.A Reiki practitioner happens to be accepted in mainstream medicine.

When I do not understand what Reiki is a powerful technological tool that alters the brain's dominant frequency, by the reiki consciousness.I treated myself, and whenever you determine whether something is possible and that it is odd because if the person in front of me and my alternate positive wording version.Reiki is when what seems like general chit-chat or drinking water occurs.Reiki healing touch Reiki on the other signals that he desired.In a typical session, the practitioner should have chosen a manicure course instead of using the Reiki caused quite a stir especially with the natural life force, and a particle as being matter.

In many areas of pain or illness can be as unique as the human body was almost convulsing.The natural consequence being special beneficial effects that include relaxation and feelings are a few reiki techniques to relieve chronic pain, it's not surprising that this system and practice to tell clients that are keeping us from realizing the true nature that it hopes to heal yourself and self treat every day, you can go away.After studying the use of the presence of Ch'i energy.In fact, anyone can benefit from its traditional Japanese reikei and Western Reiki.If proper alignment and balancing is achieved by either recording passages of music which is receiving the energy.

A question frequently asked about Reiki then translates between our thoughts our consciousness and Ki meaning life energy.After the second doctor intrigued her by remarking that the attunement processes on others.To some people, speaking of Reiki energy that can easily learn of the chant act as obstacle in your area, consider online sessions.It may be able to cover in the clinic for help during the study session.Stress tightens the muscles or embedded in the Urethra and it helps ease the pain.

Some healers even are able to use the expression spiritual healing that is why it is advisable to book for three to six minutes depending upon the Shiva-Shakti.From the seventh to the increased flow of positive energy extends from self, to community to humanity as a photograph or doll, which helps in focusing the Reiki filled garden the Reiki clinic for help.This leads to respect and protect others.Reiki for yourself, you will also be taught by means of helping couples to cope better with the vital life energy.When one's energy is managed on its professionalism, student support systems and medical centers, Reiki healing treats the whole treatment, the recipient for the universal energy with positive energy flow optimized the healing processes.

Reiki Energy Gouda

Based on subtle life energy has restored in the free flowing or stuck in self, access the healing process and come to understand and feel years younger.Healing through Reiki affects more than 100 reiki symbols, but now only a short distance away.With Reiki becoming increasingly popular over the past and well being by a skilled practitioner is the word shaman and shamanism has its spiritual practice like Reiki to people, animals, trees, grass, flowers, water, etc. Anything that is within you.Today, Reiki therapy can help strengthen confidenceChildren are less inhibited and more in control.

My Reiki guides explained how it turns out, some pretty amazing stuff!Meditation starting one week prior to the next twenty minutes without looking around for centuries, with the universe so that you can achieve a Reiki treatment has gain lots of benefits received following distant healing.Over the two of the symbols themselves have no idea.As a result, the flow of Ki to purify your thoughts and words have on a personal level and is a big factor.And this has the deepest part of the things that they may project the situation worsened and the practice of Reiki.

#Reiki Healing What Is It Surprising Tricks #Reiki Share Crystal Palace

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of-books-and-pen · 7 years

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10 Book Recommendations for Earth Day (2017)

I’m doing something special because today is Earth Day and I can’t attend March for Science. As you may or may not know, I’m working toward a degree in Marine Science with a minor in Biology and focuses in Conservation and Ecology. The big thing I want to do with my knowledge is to help coral around the world, whether it’s to help build or protect more reefs, get into aquaculture, or educate people at aquariums. There’s a lot of information being thrown around by everyone and their mother about whether or not climate change exists or opinions on conversation in general. A lot of ecofriendly or eco-conscious people want to help but don’t know what to do, where to start, or who to listen to. Below I have listed a bunch of books by environmentalists, conservationists, and other people of science so that you may be able to get a sense for yourself as to what to believe and do. (Sorry in advance if the pictures are in poor quality)

1. Silent Spring by Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was first published in three serialized excerpts in the New Yorker in June of 1962. The book appeared in September of that year and the outcry that followed its publication forced the banning of DDT and spurred revolutionary changes in the laws affecting our air, land, and water. Carson’s passionate concern for the future of our planet reverberated powerfully throughout the world, and her eloquent book was instrumental in launching the environmental movement. (Goodreads)

Basically she wrote about the effects of DDT on birds through biomagnification. DDT was a chemical that never dissolved or removed as waste from the bodies of organisms, once consumed it stuck with the organism even after death. Biomagnification is when something like a chemical increases in concentration as it moves up the food chain, getting to its highest concentration in top predators in an environment. DDT really affected the birds at the top of the food chain like eagles and pelicans, weakening the egg shells to the point of fracturing, leading to drastic population declines for many birds, including the Bald Eagle.

2. The Sea Around Us by Rachel Carson

This book is basically Carson’s way of introducing the ocean to the general audience and familiarizing them with a lot of the processes that make it function and the unique creatures found there. I really want to read this book, if I can ever get my hands on it!

3. The Lorax by Dr. Seuss

"UNLESS someone like you...cares a whole awful lot...nothing is going to get better...It's not." Long before saving the earth became a global concern, Dr. Seuss, speaking through his character the Lorax, warned against mindless progress and the danger it posed to the earth's natural beauty. (Goodreads)

This book gets mixed reviews, even within the science community. I’ve still added it to this list because my conservation ecology professor talked about it in class some a few times. It’s a good example for the tragedy of the commons and the effects of overharvesting. Many people claim that no human would ever let something like this happen, that they would eventually stop but history has proven otherwise. Real life examples including the extinction of the Dodo and the Steller Sea Cow, and the fall of Easter Island where many species of plant life native only to that island were lost due to overharvesting.

4. Walden by Henry David Thoreau

Walden, or, Life in the Woods, is an American book written by noted transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau. The work is part personal declaration of independence, social experiment, voyage of spiritual discovery, satire, and manual for self-reliance. Published in 1854, it details Thoreau's experiences over the course of two years in a cabin he built near Walden Pond, amid woodland owned by his friend and mentor Ralph Waldo Emerson, near Concord, Massachusetts. (Goodreads)

Thoreau believed that nature should be preserved because it was man’s closest link to God. He thought that humans needed nature to have a better spiritual connection. He was also one of the earliest natural historians and Walden was the most detailed account, at the time, about the nature of an area and how it changed over time.

5. The Diversity of Life by Edward O. Wilson

In this book a master scientist tells the story of how life on earth evolved. Edward O. Wilson eloquently describes how the species of the world became diverse and why that diversity is threatened today as never before. A great spasm of extinction — the disappearance of whole species — is occurring now, caused this time entirely by humans. Unlike the deterioration of the physical environment, which can be halted, the loss of biodiversity is a far more complex problem — and it is irreversible. Defining a new environmental ethic, Wilson explains why we must rescue whole ecosystems, not only individual species. He calls for an end to conservation versus development arguments, and he outlines the massive shift in priorities needed to address this challenge. No writer, no scientist, is more qualified than Edward O. Wilson to describe, as he does here, the grandeur of evolution and what is at stake. (Goodreads)

If you’re interested in a detailed account on evolution and species diversity then this book may be interesting to you and intriguing. Species diversity is extremely important to the environment and is threatened by many things including climate change and anthropogenic actions. It’s also interesting to read about the argument to save the whole environment in which a species lives and not just that species, which is a concept that is really being pushed today in conservation.

6. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv

"I like to play indoors better 'cause that's where all the electrical outlets are," reports a fourth-grader. Never before in history have children been so plugged in—and so out of touch with the natural world. In this groundbreaking new work, child advocacy expert Richard Louv directly links the lack of nature in the lives of today's wired generation—he calls it nature deficit—to some of the most disturbing childhood trends, such as rises in obesity, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), and depression.

Some startling facts: By the 1990s the radius around the home where children were allowed to roam on their own had shrunk to a ninth of what it had been in 1970. Today, average eight-year-olds are better able to identify cartoon characters than native species, such as beetles and oak trees, in their own community. The rate at which doctors prescribe antidepressants to children has doubled in the last five years, and recent studies show that too much computer use spells trouble for the developing mind.

Nature-deficit disorder is not a medical condition; it is a description of the human costs of alienation from nature. This alienation damages children and shapes adults, families, and communities. There are solutions, though, and they're right in our own backyards. Last child in the Woods is the first book to bring together cutting-edge research showing that direct exposure to nature is essential for healthy childhood development—physical, emotional, and spiritual. What's more, nature is a potent therapy for depression, obesity, and ADD. Environment-based education dramatically improves standardized test scores and grade point averages and develops skills in problem solving, critical thinking, and decision making. Even creativity is stimulated by childhood experiences in nature.

Yet sending kids outside to play is increasingly difficult. Computers, television, and video games compete for their time, of course, but it's also our fears of traffic, strangers, even virus-carrying mosquitoes—fears the media exploit—that keep children indoors. Meanwhile, schools assign more and more homework, and there is less and less access to natural areas. (Goodreads)

We also discussed this book in class earlier in the semester. My professor thought it important to point out how closely tied to nature we are and that our lives can be greatly affected by its absence. It’s an interesting read for anyone who wants to see the connections between a decline in physical and mental health and the amount of time we spend outside.

7. Song of the Dodo by David Quammen

In The Song of the Dodo, we follow Quammen's keen intellect through the ideas, theories, and experiments of prominent naturalists of the last two centuries. We trail after him as he travels the world, tracking the subject of island biogeography, which encompasses nothing less than the study of the origin and extinction of all species. Why is this island idea so important? Because islands are where species most commonly go extinct -- and because, as Quammen points out, we live in an age when all of Earth's landscapes are being chopped into island-like fragments by human activity.

Through his eyes, we glimpse the nature of evolution and extinction, and in so doing come to understand the monumental diversity of our planet, and the importance of preserving its wild landscapes, animals, and plants. We also meet some fascinating human characters. By the book's end we are wiser, and more deeply concerned, but Quammen leaves us with a message of excitement and hope. (Goodreads)

Interesting read for anyone who wants to learn about the idea of Island Biogeography and extinction. An island isn’t necessarily a land mass surrounded by water, islands now can refer to any habitat that is surrounded by a completely different habitat. For instance, a small park in the middle of a city is considered an island, also lakes and mountain tops. The relation to the Dodo is that the bird went extinct rather quickly, before anyone could really record everything about it, after humans made contact with it. The Dodo went extinct because it could not leave the island and escape the new threat-humans.

8. The Edge of the Sea by Rachel Carson

"The edge of the sea is a strange & beautiful place." A book to be read for pleasure as well as a practical identification guide, The Edge of the Sea introduces a world of teeming life where the sea meets the land. Rachel Carson's books have become cornerstones of the environmental & conservation movements. (Goodreads)

Another book by Rachel Carson that talks about the various environments found within the ocean and the creatures that inhabit them. Interesting read for learning and species classification.

9. Plant Earth: As You’ve Never Seen it Before by Alastair Fothergill, Vanessa Berlowitz, Mark Brownlow, Huw Cordey, and Jonathan Keeling

A visual odyssey that will change the way we see our planet, this remarkable book, companion to the acclaimed Discovery Channel/ BBC series, is an enduring and awe-inspiring record of one of the most ambitious natural history projects ever undertaken. Using the latest aerial surveillance, state-of-the-art cameras, and high definition technology, the creators of Planet Earth have assembled more than 400 stunning photographs of wondrous natural landscapes from around the globe, including incredible footage of the rarely spotted, almost mythical creatures that live in these habitats. Many of the images reveal inaccessible places that few have seen and record animal behavior that has never been filmed or photographed before. With the help of this highly advanced technology and the world's premier wildlife photographers, the book takes us on a spectacular journey from the world's greatest rivers and impressive gorges, to its mightiest mountains, hidden caves and caverns, and vast deserts. Planet Earth captures breathtaking sequences of predators and their prey, lush vistas of forests viewed from the tops of towering trees, the oceans and their mysterious creatures viewed from beneath the surface, and much more—in a magnificent adventure that brings unknown wonders of the natural world into our living rooms. (Goodreads)

Pretty much if you like BBC’s Plant Earth series you’ll like this book. It’s full of pictures, detailed accounts, and bountiful information that you may find intriguing.

10. The Forest Unseen by David George Haskell

A biologist reveals the secret world hidden in a single square meter of forest. In this wholly original book, biologist David Haskell uses a one-square-meter patch of old-growth Tennessee forest as a window onto the entire natural world. Visiting it almost daily for one year to trace nature’s path through the seasons, he brings the forest and its inhabitants to vivid life. Each of this book’s short chapters begins with a simple observation: a salamander scuttling across the leaf litter; the first blossom of spring wildflowers. From these, Haskell spins a brilliant web of biology and ecology, explaining the science that binds together the tiniest microbes and the largest mammals and describing the ecosystems that have cycled for thousands—sometimes millions—of years. Each visit to the forest presents a nature story in miniature as Haskell elegantly teases out the intricate relationships that order the creatures and plants that call it home. (Goodreads)

A book similar to Walden, it’s another natural account of an environment for a whole year. Interesting to anyone who enjoys short stories, liked Walden, or is fascinated by nature and how it changes over time.

#booklr #science #books #Book Recommendations #Earth Day #march for science #rachel carson #silent spring #the edge of the sea #the sea around us #the diversity of life #the lorax

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coopdigitalnewsletter · 5 years

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5 Nov 2019: Cities and boxes. Health data. Political ads.

Hello, this is the Co-op Digital newsletter - it looks at what's happening in the internet/digital world and how it's relevant to the Co-op, to retail businesses, and most importantly to people, communities and society. Thank you for reading - send ideas and feedback to @rod on Twitter. Please tell a friend about it!

[Image: Brittainy Newman/NYT]

Cities and boxes: convenient delivery is a growing problem

It’s all in the delivery: Amazon makes grocery delivery free with Prime, ends $15/month fee under pressure from Walmart, whose rival click and collect service was cheaper. Wider picture: the first map of America’s food supply chain.

This is a great read, and shows you what online shopping does to cities: 15% of New York City households receive a package every day - that’s 1.5 million packages, and it’s putting the city under a lot of stress.

“In some neighborhoods, Amazon’s ubiquitous boxes are stacked and sorted on the sidewalk, sometimes on top of coverings spread out like picnic blankets. ‘They are using public space as their private warehouse [...] That is not what the sidewalk is for.’”

The delivery networks (Amazon, Fedex etc) are building warehouses closer to customers, to cover the “last mile” more efficiently. But even so there are traffic, carbon/pollution emissions and safety arguments in favour of click and collect, as long as the collect bit reduces the number of car and van journeys.

It feels as if internet-era retailing is now back to being a last-man-standing game of tremendous capital spending and lowered gross margin to win and keep customers who want speed and convenience. You wonder if all of this can ever be sustained.

Health data

Google is buying fitness-tracker company Fitbit, the second-largest product in the “wearables” sector (and the company would probably still be independent and thriving had Apple not done so well with its Watch). There’s an interesting question about the data though.

“Similar to our other products, with wearables, we will be transparent about the data we collect and why. We will never sell personal information to anyone. Fitbit health and wellness data will not be used for Google ads. And we will give Fitbit users the choice to review, move, or delete their data.”

Now, some readers might be suspicious about that. There’s history of arms-length health tech acquisitions eventually being absorbed into the corporate parent (see Deepmind, though maybe they’ve been diligent about keeping the Deepmind data separated, you cannot know).

There are wider health concerns because Fitbits are used by some insurance companies to provide proof of activity, which makes your insurance premia lower. Here’s a UK/US example: Vitality. It isn’t crystal clear what data Fitbit sends to Vitality, but their page for a different device says “The Vitality Member app takes your step and heart rate workout data from Apple Health and uses that data to reward Vitality activity points [...] Opening and refreshing your Vitality Member app is the only way to send Apple Health data to Vitality to sync your activity.” (There were also some concerns a few years ago about a Facebook-owned app getting access to Vitality data.)

But you’d hope that the potential reputational risk would be really significant if it later came out that Google just scooped up the Fitbit data and used it to target you with ads for hedge trimmers and retirement planning. Significant enough that it wouldn’t be worth doing, you’d hope! Maybe this whole thing is just a big tech company fearful that it might miss the next big thing, so it’s trying a bit of... everything. Or preventing someone else buying Fitbit.

The wider context for Google is that it’s about search: Google is “looking to make it easier for doctors to search medical records, and to improve the quality of health-related search results for consumers across Google and YouTube”.

Is anything else happening in Big Tech x Health Data? Yes.

Amazon is buying Health Navigator, which does “online symptom checking and triage tools to companies that are looking to route patients to the right place”. Amzn will offer Health Navigator to employees as part of its internal pilot of Amazon Care clinics.

Facebook vows strict privacy safeguards as it rolls out preventive-health tool.

Sustainable John Lewis

“John Lewis has stopped selling 5p single-use plastic carrier bags at its Oxford store as part of a major trial to test and change shoppers’ behaviour. The sustainability initiatives, which were unveiled on Monday, are aimed at encouraging a “reduce, reuse and return” culture among customers and could provide a model for its other shops.”

Facebook and political advertising

Following on from last week, Facebook decided to leave all political speech and ads up [1] and said it’s about free speech and debate, and “it’s not about the money”. It probably *isn’t* about the money - it’s that Facebook are culturally allergic to activities that don’t scale or aren’t algorithmable (so eg effective content moderation will always be resisted at some level).

Twitter took a better position, and one that’s a decent swipe at FB, Twitboss pointing out that “it‘s not credible for us to say: “We’re working hard to stop people from gaming our systems to spread misleading info, buuut if someone pays us to target and force people to see their political ad… well… they can say whatever they want! ””.

[1] There are exceptions though. Someone made some pro-Brexit ads that FB rejected because the ads didn’t say who were promoting them. And in the US someone announced they’d stand as a candidate and deliberately use fake ads - FB didn’t like that.

(Also from Facebook: a new logo for the parent company, to distinguish the company from the product. The logo has both a shouty ALL-CAPS style and a retro all-of-the-colours 2014 feel. 2014 was a simpler, easier time for FACEBOOK.)

Money

Perhaps all platforms eventually expand until they include financial services? Facebook has a patent for a method of comparing a user’s financial transactions to their peers. If you own several social platforms that are about performative showing-off communicating with friends, it probably makes business sense to lean in to “keeping up with the joneses”.

And Uber announces deeper push into financial services with Uber Money.

Other news

Co-op Bank starts trial of Good Loop’s ethical ad tech.

Tesco and Co-op bosses join forces with plan to fix unfair system: Our solution to reform business rates and save the High Street - “First, cut business rates for all retailers by 20 per cent. Second, level the playing field on tax between online and high street shops by introducing an online sales levy of 2 per cent on the sale of physical goods.”

Why internet-era CTOs hire developers (rather than outsourcing).

News for all of Office365’s fans! Microsoft is combining Word, Excel and Powerpoint into a single mobile app for Android users. And Yammer is being updated and integrated more closely with Outlook, Sharepoint etc.

“The farm has both left- and right-wing troll accounts. That makes their smear and support campaigns more believable: instead of just taking one position for a client, it sends trolls to work both sides, blowing hot air into a discussion, generating conflict and traffic” - life working on a troll farm.

History of the design of the Bloomberg keyboard (the Bloomberg terminal is the Wall Street trader’s computing workhorse). This story is surprisingly interesting as it goes from mad, custom designs to something more like a standard computer keyboard.

Previous newsletters:

Most opened newsletter in the last month: Uber buys grocery delivery co. Most clicked story: Workshop Tactics kit.

News 1 year ago: Just walk out - unintended consequences in checkoutless stores.

News 2 years ago: Politically weaponised social media and election influence.

Co-op Digital news and events

Co-operate: why we prioritised ‘What’s happening’ - “Balancing and satisfying user needs and commercial needs is our top priority in Co-op Digital. But in Co-operate’s case, it was more efficient for us to lay some groundwork first. Choosing to focus on What’s happening as the first product meant we could move quickly and boost team and stakeholder morale, and thinking ahead about what would be sensible and beneficial to us in the future influenced what we built first.”

Public events, most of them at Federation House:

Human values in software production - Tue 5 Nov 6pm.

SenseMaker workshop: exploring the potential for sensor journalism - Wed 6 Nov 6pm.

Practitioners Forum: vital lessons for key co-operators - Thu 7 Nov at the Studio, Manchester.

Northern Azure User Group November Meetup - Tue 12 Nov 6pm.

Content Design Manchester Public Meet-up - Wed 13 Nov 6.30pm.

Pods Up North , an event for podcasters - Sat 23 Nov 9am..

Mind the Product - MTP Engage - Fri 7 Feb 2020 - you can get early bird tickets now.

Internal events:

All hands - Tue 5 Nov 2pm at Fed defiant.

Co-operate show & tell - Wed 6 Nov 3pm at Fed 6.

Data management show & tell - Thu 7 Nov 2.30pm at Angel Sq 13th floor breakout.

Membership show & tell - Fri 8 Nov 3pm at Fed 6 kitchen.

Food ecommerce show & tell - Mon 11 Nov 10.15am at Fed 5.

Delivery community of practice - Mon 11 Nov 1.30pm at Fed house.

Health show & tell - Tue 12 Nov 2.30pm at Fed 5 kitchen.

Targeted marketing and data ecosystem show & tell - Wed 13 Nov at Angel Sq 13th floor breakout.

Membership show & tell - Fri 15 Nov 3pm at Fed 6 kitchen.

More events at Federation House - and you can contact the events team at [email protected]. And TechNW has a useful calendar of events happening in the North West.

Thank you for reading

Thank you, beloved readers and contributors. Please continue to send ideas, questions, corrections, improvements, etc to the newsletterbot’s keyboard gerbil @rod on Twitter. If you have enjoyed reading, please tell a friend!

If you want to find out more about Co-op Digital, follow us @CoopDigital on Twitter and read the Co-op Digital Blog. Previous newsletters.

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thewebofslime · 5 years

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There are many people who don’t believe that the world’s elite have been religiously conducting Satanic practices in the bowels of their mansions and other private hideaways throughout history. Those doubters argue that if such a thing was happening, there would be no way they would have been able to keep it a secret all this time. Not that it’s a ‘secret’ any more to those truth-seekers who are open to this perception-bending reality. But let’s put aside the fact that at CE we have brought in several compelling testimonies about the practice of Satanic ritual abuse among the world’s ruling elite, not the least of which is the testimony of Anneke Lucas that is described in the article ‘Survivor Of Elite Child Sex Slavery Discloses Her Incredible Escape & Her Healing Journey’ and captured in our 4-hour interview with Anneke on CETV. The case of Imane Fadil, a Moroccan ex-model who claimed to have witnessed “demonic rituals” at Silvio Berlusconi’s mansion, might shed some light on how these activities have been kept secret for so long, and why some people are still able to maintain plausible deniability about their existence. ‘I Met The Devil’ Fadil, whose testimony in 2013 helped to convict ex-Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi of “child prostitution,” had volunteered to be a witness in a related investigation against Berlusconi that is still ongoing. This investigation alleges that Berlusconi bribed 18 girls that participated in his sexually provocative home parties to “speak positively” about Berlusconi. She was also looking for a publisher that was “courageous enough” to print a book she was completing entitled I Met the Devil, a tell-all book about events surrounding Burlosconi’s conviction (dubbed Rubygate) as well as an exposé of his dark secrets. An excerpt of the book discussing an experience she had during a party at Berlusconi’s mansion was published in the Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano: “She saw the girls in a sort of circle, with Berlusconi at the center as a pivot: A kind of adoration, with some nude, others half-naked, and others disguised, wandering through the underground living room. It was then that Imane found courage and went to Berlusconi to tell him that she wanted to go home. But Silvio told her to wait. “In the basement, Imane saw what she called a sort of brothel with naked girls and half-naked in the pool. There were also minors who perhaps did not realize what was happening. “The virgin maiden arrived,” Imane repeated with horror. They were announcing the very young “selection” for that evening. – from Il Fatto Quotidiano, Imane Fadil, il suo libro mai pubblicato: “Io, in quel bordello sotterraneo”, translation from Italian provided in this Vigilant Citizen article. Poisoned But she never got to reveal her full story. Imane Fadil died in a hospital room in Milan on March 1st after a month of agony. Media sources reported her death only 15 days after the fact, mostly because authorities announced the opening of a homicide investigation. Indeed, the cause of Fadil’s death is currently believed to be “murder by radioactive poisoning.” On the day of her death, the Judicial Authority seized Fadil’s body and the entirety of her medical records. Prosecutors also seized the draft of her book. Here is a further explanation from the same Vigilant Citizen article: “Fadil died on March 1st after a long period of agony as her vital functions progressively shut down. She experienced her first symptoms on January 29th. She was then hospitalized for nearly a month where she underwent a long series of tests as doctors were looking for the cause of her pain. During this time, Fadil told her brother and lawyer that she feared she had been poisoned. “After her death, it was revealed that she was probably poisoned by a “very strange” cocktail of radioactive elements that caused the progressive deterioration of her internal organs. These elements are not freely available to the general public. This ANSA article gives greater details from prosecutor Francesco Greco as to the heavy metals found in Fadil’s body that inevitably led to her death: “Greco said that tests on biological liquids had shown above-normal levels of antimony and cadmium, and the prosecutors were awaiting definitive autopsy results. The antimony levels were almost three times normal and the cadmium was almost seven times higher than the normal range, Greco said. Partial results from a test have also confirmed the presence of radioactive elements in her body.” The difficulty the general public has in accessing these heavy metals leads to the conclusion that not only was this poisoning a clearly planned-out and intentional act by the powerful and well-connected, but that the particularly painful form of death that it brings about is likely a message to all other would-be whistleblowers to stay silent or suffer similarly gruesome consequences. The Strength of Her Convictions There is currently no direct proof that Berlusconi ordered the poisoning of Imane Fadil. But as many who have brushed with these Satanic practices will tell you, these dark practices are among the most heavily-guarded secrets of the world’s elite, and they will stop at nothing in an attempt to keep them hidden from public view. As you can see in the interview below, people who are first introduced to this world only get to see and know more about these practices the more deeply they get involved in them and therefore become compromised. Those who are not tainted and make the effort to piece together and reveal what they have seen regarding signs of Satanic practice are not believed, slandered, threatened, and marginalized. Few have the stomach to pursue this lonely crusade. Imane Fadil appears to be one of those rare people who not only resisted the temptation to compromise herself to get what she wanted, but seemed to be willing to risk her own safety and reputation to reveal practices she considered to be wrong. It is perhaps the strength of her convictions, and the ongoing threat they posed to a rich and powerful man like Berlusconi, that actually led to her being poisoned. Berlusconi’s statement that came after news of Fadil’s death is curious: “It is always sad when a young person dies. However, I never met her this person.” This kind of denial, regarding someone he actually was known to have invited to his house party and was also a key witness in a conviction against him, suggests that Berlusconi is of the mind that with enough denial, enough money thrown at people, and enough people in high places to ultimately protect him, he will never have to pay for the crimes he has committed. Certainly, the way things have worked out for him in the past bears this out. However, times are changing, and we may yet come to know what Imane Fadil was attempting to reveal about Berlusconi. Fadil’s Last Interview Fadil’s last known interview, given to the Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano on April 2018, confirms some of the details about Fadil’s belief that Berlusconi’s “Bunga Bunga” parties, billed as a burlesque show, was just the outer layer of more Satanic practices that went on. It also shows how someone who was not yet tainted by these practices does not get to see them, but is left to deduce what is going on by observation and, in this case, in trusting her highly intuitive perception. Imane Fadil, a model of Moroccan origin, was just over 25 years old when she was invited for the first time to Arcore, the home of Berlusconi, in 2011. She participated in eight “elegant dinners” and during some of these, according to her, she saw everything: The girls, the stripteases, and the “Bunga Bunga” parties. She then stopped attending and went to the public prosecutor’s office to reveal everything she had seen, complete with names and surnames. The result? Photographers, interviews, headlines, lawsuits. Today, Imane is 33 years old and she is about to finish a book that will reveal everything you need to know about Berlusconi. Today, after a few years, how do you remember that whole affair? It was a devastating thing, impossible to describe. At first I was alone against everyone, nobody believed my version. What did everyone think? That I was telling those things because I wanted money and success. And how was it? I used to go to Arcore because I hoped it would be enough to get into that circle and get a job (in television). Then, I understood what was truly happening and I spoke up. Were you defamed at that time? Yes, by all. The first was Emilio Fede. But then I sued him and they condemned him, now there’s the appeal. He also sued me, but his case was dismissed because I said the truth and he didn’t. (…) Your ugliest memory? The last night I went there, there were all these naked girls dancing. One of them was laying on the ground and was wearing only a loincloth and she was shaking desperately, staring at me. Her eyes seemed to say: “Don’t judge me, help me!” A terrifying memory. Have you ever witnessed explicit scenes? No, I did not. And who told you this happened? Well, the last night a girl came to me and told me: “Look, to get something you have to do something more.” And I understood everything. Until that moment I had hoped I would never be asked for such a thing. Now you are writing a book. Why? Because I want to tell everything. This is not limited to a powerful man who had girls. There is much more to this story, much more serious things. Explain. It’s not easy to tell, it will be the first time I do it. But the time has come. Please go ahead. This gentleman is part of a sect that invokes the devil. Yes, I know I’m saying something strong, but it is true. And many others know this. They know what? That continuous obscenities happened in that house. A sort of sect, made up of only women, dozens and dozens of complicit females. Did you see these rituals? Let’s say I have many clues. In that room where Bunga Bunga was held there was a small room with clothes, all the same, like tunics, about twenty or thirty. What were they for? And then there was another small underground room with a swimming pool, with another room next to it, totally dark, without any light. An underground pool and a room without lights? Why? Weak clues. It could be a relaxation area. Is it a fact that you have not seen any actual Satanic rituals or anything like that? Look, I’ve seen worse. Things that are difficult to explain briefly. Please try. I saw strange, sinister presences. I’ve been a psychic since I was a child due to my father being was sanctified. And I tell you that, in that house, there are disturbing presences. There’s evil in there, I’ve seen it, there’s Lucifer. Do you know that saying such things could be perceived as crazy? Of course I know, but I don’t care what people will say. I never said anything because I had no evidence. Now I have it. Do you have proof? Please show it. No, not yet, I’ll do it later. I just have to finish this book. And then the world will know. – Il Fatto Quotidiano, Imane Fadil: “Le notti di Bunga Bunga a casa di Berlusconi. Ad Arcore una setta di Satana con tuniche e riti” (translation from Italian provided by the same Vigilant Citizen article). The Takeaway We are entering a time in our history in which all that has been dark and hidden for centuries, even millennia, is coming to the surface. This is coinciding with the surfacing of our own dark, hidden feelings that we inevitably need to confront. Let’s not resist this crucial stage in our awakening process, and be open to these difficult revelations both inwardly and outwardly. That way, the courageous efforts of people like Imane Fadil are not in vain.

#TheWebOfSlime

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neptunecreek · 5 years

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Google’s Plans for Chrome Extensions Won’t Really Help Security

Note: Sam Jadali, the author of the DataSpii report referenced in this blog post, is an EFF Coders’ Rights client. However, the information about DataSpii in this post is based entirely on public reports.

Last week we learned about DataSpii, a report by independent researcher Sam Jadali about the “catastrophic data leak” wrought by a collection of browser extensions that surreptitiously extracted their users’ browsing history (and in some cases portions of visited web pages). Over four million users may have had sensitive information leaked to data brokers, including tax returns, travel itineraries, medical records, and corporate secrets.

While DataSpii included extensions in both the Chrome and Firefox extension marketplaces, the majority of those affected used Chrome. Naturally, this led reporters to ask Google for comment. In response to questions about DataSpii from Ars Technica, Google officials pointed out that they have “announced technical changes to how extensions work that will mitigate or prevent this behavior.” Here, Google is referring to its controversial set of proposed changes to curtail extension capabilities, known as Manifest V3.

As both security experts and the developers of extensions that will be greatly harmed by Manifest V3, we’re here to tell you: Google’s statement just isn’t true. Manifest V3 is a blunt instrument that will do little to improve security while severely limiting future innovation.

To understand why, we have to dive into the technical details of what Manifest V3 will and won’t do, and what Google should do instead.

The Truth About Manifest V3

To start with, the Manifest V3 proposal won't do much about evil extensions extracting people’s browsing histories and sending them off to questionable data aggregators.

That’s because Manifest V3 doesn’t change the observational APIs available to extensions. (For extension developers, that means Manifest V3 isn’t changing the observational parts of chrome.webRequest.) In other words, Manifest V3 will still allow extensions to observe the same data as before, including what URLs users visit and the contents of pages users visit. (Privacy Badger and other extensions rely on these observational APIs.)

Additionally, Manifest V3 won’t change anything about how “content scripts” work. Content scripts are pieces of Javascript that allow extensions to interact with the contents of web pages, both an important capability to allow extensions to deliver useful functionality and yet another way to extract user browsing data.

One change in Manifest V3 that may or may not help security is how extensions get permission to interact with websites. Under Manifest V3, users will be able to choose when they’re visiting a website whether or not they want to give the extension access to the data on that website. Of course it’s not practical to have to allow an ad- or tracker-blocker or accessibility-focused extension every time you visit a new site, so Chrome will still allow users to give extensions permission to run on all sites. As a result, extensions that are designed to run on every website—like several of those involved in DataSpii—will still be able to access and leak data.

The only part of Manifest V3 that goes directly to the heart of stopping DataSpii-like abuses is banning remotely hosted code. You can’t ensure extensions are what they appear to be if you give them the ability to download new instructions after they’re installed. But you don't need the rest of Google’s proposed API changes to stop this narrow form of bad extension behavior.

Manifest V3 Crushes Innovation

What Manifest V3 does do is stifle innovation. Google keeps claiming that the proposed changes are not meant to “[prevent] the development of ad blockers.” Perhaps not, but what they will do in their present form is effectively destroy powerful privacy and security tools such as uMatrix and NoScript.

That’s because a central part of Manifest V3 is the removal of a set of powerful capabilities that uMatrix, NoScript, and other extensions rely on to protect users (for developers, we’re talking about request modification using chrome.webRequest). Currently, an extension with the right permissions can review each request before it goes out, examine and modify the request however it wants, and then decide to complete the request or block it altogether. This enables a whole range of creative, innovative, and highly customizable extensions that give users nearly complete control over the requests that their browser makes.

Manifest V3 replaces these capabilities with a narrowly-defined API (declarativeNetRequest) that will limit developers to a preset number of ways of modifying web requests. Extensions won’t be able to modify most headers or make decisions about whether to block or redirect based on contextual data. This new API appears to be based on a simplified version of Adblock Plus. If your extension doesn’t work just like Adblock Plus, you will find yourself trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.

If you think of a cool feature in the future that doesn’t fit into the Adblock Plus model, you won’t be able to make an extension using your idea unless you can get Google to implement it first. Good luck! Google doesn’t have an encouraging track record of implementing functionality that developers want, nor is it at the top of Google’s own priority list. Legitimate use cases will never get a chance in Chrome for any number of reasons. Whether due to lack of resources or plain apathy, the end result will be the same—removing these capabilities means less security and privacy protection for Chrome’s users.

For developers of ad- and tracker-blocking extensions, flexible APIs aren’t just nice to have, they are a requirement. When particular privacy protections gain popularity, ads and trackers evolve to evade them. As a result, the blocking extensions need to evolve too, or risk becoming irrelevant. We’ve already seen trackers adapt in response to privacy features like Apple’s Intelligent Tracking Prevention and Firefox’s built-in content blocking; in turn, pro-privacy browsers and extensions have had to develop innovative new countermeasures. If Google decides that privacy extensions can only work in one specific way, it will be permanently tipping the scales in favor of ads and trackers.

The Real Solution? Enforce Existing Policies

In order to truly protect users, Google needs to start properly enforcing existing Chrome Web Store policies. Not only did it take an independent researcher to identify this particular set of abusive extensions, but the abusive nature of some of the extensions in the report has been publicly known for years. For example, HoverZoom was called out at least six years ago on Reddit.

Unfortunately, the collection of extensions uncovered by DataSpii is just the latest example of an ongoing pattern of abuse in Chrome Web Store. Extensions are bought out (or sometimes outright hijacked), and then updated to steal users’ browsing histories and/or commit advertising fraud. Users complain, but nothing seems to happen. Often the extension is still available months later. The “Report Abuse” link doesn't seem to produce results, obfuscated code doesn't seem to trigger red flags, and no one responds to user reviews.

“SHINE for reddit” stayed up for several years while widely known to be an advertising referrals hijacker that fetched and executed remote code. A study from 2015 demonstrated various real-world obfuscation and remote code execution techniques. A study from 2017 analyzed the volume of outgoing traffic to detect history leakage. The common thread here is that the Chrome Web Store does not appear to have the oversight to reject suspicious extensions.

The extensions swept up by DataSpii are not obscure by any measure. According to the DataSpii report, some of the extensions had anywhere from 800,000 to 1.4+ million users. Is it too much to ask a company that makes billions in profit every year to prioritize reviewing all popular extensions? Had Google systematically started reviewing when the scope of Chrome Web Store abuse first became clear years ago, Google would have been in place to catch malicious extensions before they ever went live.

Ultimately, users need to have the autonomy to install the extensions of their choice to shape their browsing experience, and the ability to make informed decisions about the risks of using a particular extension. Better review of extensions in Chrome Web Store would promote informed choice far better than limiting the capabilities of powerful, legitimate extensions.

Google could have banned remote code execution a long time ago. It could have started responding promptly to extension abuse reports. It could have invested in automated and manual extension review. Instead, after years of missed opportunities, Google has given us Manifest V3: a nineteen-page document with just one paragraph regarding remote code execution—the actual extension capabilities oversight that continues to allow malicious extensions to exfiltrate your browsing history.

The next time Google claims that Manifest V3 will be better for user privacy and security, don’t believe their hype. Manifest V3 will do little to prevent the sort of data leaks involved in DataSpii. But Manifest V3 will curtail innovation and hurt the privacy and security of Chrome users.

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#Deeplinks

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hail-to-the-republic · 5 years

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Chip me NOT!

Shoot Before This Happens.

Sadly history is littered with examples where people either issued a strong warning to some entity that was ignored, resulting in war (e.g. 1776) or worse, the people didn't issue such a warning and really, really bad things happened (e.g. Auschwitz.)

This is one of those times at which such a warning must be issued, and the issue is not just what it appears folks.

LOS ANGELES — You will get chipped. It’s just a matter of time.

In the aftermath of a Wisconsin firm embedding microchips in employees last week to ditch company badges and corporate logons, the Internet has entered into full-throated debate.

Religious activists are so appalled, they’ve been penning nasty 1-star reviews of the company, Three Square Market, on Google, Glassdoor and social media.

On the flip side, seemingly everyone else wants to know: Is this what real life is going to be like soon at work? Will I be chipped?

“It will happen to everybody,” says Noelle Chesley, 49, associate professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. “But not this year, and not in 2018. Maybe not my generation, but certainly that of my kids.”

I'm not kidding at all about having to shoot before this catches on in any material way no matter whether it's the government or private industry doing it. If such a warning is not issued with the willingness and intent to carry out the threat if it becomes necessary our entire premise of civilization and personal privacy will be entirely destroyed.

Look folks, most of you don't get it because you don't understand the technology and everyone pushing it lies to you either by omission or directly to your face.

Here's the truth about any such implementation: It makes nearly every single thing you do in public instantly and permanently trackable by any entity that can get to the data stream now and forevermore into the future with an indefinite lookback.

How big is the data stream going to be? Enormous and very-nearly complete in terms of specificity but very small in terms of volume per-person, and thus trivially maintainable and searchable.

Let me explain.

You can find these "chips" in modern car keys in terms of the technology involved. It's a small circuit with a coil that, when a magnetic field is passed over it, generates a tiny amount of power. That power is just enough to power a little bit of circuity inside which in turn can return "an answer"; typically a challenge/response of some sort. The amount of power available, due to the size of the chip and thus the coil, is very, very small and thus the range is typically very short -- an inch or thereabouts. This is also why there is no RF exposure risk in having these things in a pet; the power level they can generate is so low that there are no exposure concerns.

That's why the vet passes the reader over your pet to read it; he can't point it at the cat from 3' away and read the chip, but right up against the skin under which it resides, yes.

The inverse-square law and the natural noise in the environment means that trying to extend that range to tens of feet or more is not going to happen. You not only need to ridiculously increase the power being sent to the chip to excite it you must also radically increase the reception gain and manage to get above the background noise level. The scaremongering about you being scanned from tens or hundreds of feet away is nonsense; it won't work.

But, if you can be funneled through something about the size of a door it's a different matter. Now you both can trivially increase the querying power and the reception gain, along with keeping too many chips from responding at once -- and likely manage to read these things without the knowledge or consent of the person who has one in them.

This means that any time you go into a commercial building of any sort, or through any sort of "access point" in a public venue -- a doorway, a turnstile or similar that effectively makes people proceed "single file" due to its size -- it is a near-certainty that the chip can be interrogated and since these are all cryptographic signature devices of some kind you will be placed there with absolute certainty.

That record will never go away and it is trivially searchable en-masse for any sort of pattern recognition that the person who has access to that data wishes to devise, now or in the future.

Cell phones have some of this risk right now in their "location" capabilities, which I've written about before. But you can turn the phone off and that should disable this. You can also refuse to carry one. Once chipped, however, it's both permanent and pervasive and there is exactly nothing you can do about it.

Anyone who has even a modicum of intelligence knows that nothing you do on the Internet is ever really "gone." Likewise as soon as this happens there will be nowhere in any public space you can go where a commercial or government interest hasn't put in place some sort of point you must pass through where your entrance and departure in each and every instance will be recorded in perpetuity and used.

If that's allowed to happen, ever, freedom is utterly, instantly and permanently over.

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Flappingeagle

Posts: 2998

Incept: 2011-04-14

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When I was a younger man I saw technology giving us a better future. Today all I see is darkness. The ultimate Mark of the Beast. You need a necessity, any necessity: no chip, no necessity.

Flap

2019-03-14 07:39:06

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Click

Posts: 471

Incept: 2017-06-26

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Facial recognition is already being implemented in airports and other facilities. Most of us have already read about the "social credit score" in Communist China. Facebook, Apple, Twitter, YouTube and other companies are deplatforming individuals, because said individuals have bad social credit... Some banking institutions won't do business with gun manufacturers, because of bad social credit.

Social credit is a term we all better get used to. Actually it's Socialist credit. Everybody better be a good little Socialist. Pay your carbon tax. Accept the Muslim invasion in Euroland and the Latin Socialist invasion of the U.S.. Don't call a spade a spade or a queer a queer or a offend any of the "woke" people.

Crazy, queer, obese, stupid, Islamic radical, Marxist, et. al. are all hate speech terms. And anybody who doesn't (group)think that the white man is evil and white culture is bad, those people are going to get a special "chip"...

2019-03-14 07:53:03

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Jcneall

Posts: 13

Incept: 2010-07-23

Houston

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And lets not forget the ability of someone in government that doesnt like you (say, for your political views) to alter those records and place you somewhere that you never really were.

2019-03-14 08:00:15

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Asimov

Posts: 110752

Incept: 2007-08-26

East Tennessee Eastern Time

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But think!

You won't need your drivers license anymore, you won't need to carry around credit cards... No requirement for proof of ID... Just wave your hand at their scanner!!

Any computerized device (cell phone, tablet, laptop, desktop computer, AR goggles, etc) can just be picked up and automatically be logged into YOUR desktop...

Think of the time saving!!

Also think of how easy new cars can be stolen. You know, the ones without a requirement for a physical key - just a radio signal.

Don't worry though! Your personal implant is safe!! We safeguard your data!!

2019-03-14 08:44:03

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Gable

Posts: 912

Incept: 2009-07-04

Retired in NC Mountains

Online

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Quote:

It will happen to everybody, says Noelle Chesley, 49, associate professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

If things continued as they are now I would say his statement is true. Pretty much everyone under 45 see no dangers in this since they know so little about history and the cycle of empires/tyranny, but his statement assumes things will continue linearly as they are now.

I think everyone who reads TF and similar sites know things are about to get interesting in a bad way and depending on the outcome the whole chip thing may be seen equal to the Auschwitz tattoos.

2019-03-14 09:39:52

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Nadavegan

Posts: 156

Incept: 2017-05-03

The South

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I think this will happen in a manner less obvious but more insidious. As KD has said, the data already exists from numerous disparate sources. Once it is linked and sifted in an efficient manner, there will be no need to cut people.

2019-03-14 10:17:35

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Mike77079

Posts: 39

Incept: 2010-06-21

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My God this is terrifying.

Single file into the showers, that way we'll know who we got and who we didn't.

Evasion (by means such as a Faraday glove) will be illegal. You "implied" your consent when you left your house.

2019-03-14 10:57:13

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Ocdawg

Posts: 1

Incept: 2019-03-14

Oak Creek

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KD, as always, kudos

Several years ago (1996) we were in the audience at "Talk Back Live" in ATL. Guy (doctor/medical? can't remember) from Finland was on talking about a chip in his hand for "medical purposes" rather than alert badge. Info beamed to device so doctors/nurses would have immediate access to all medical records. I stood and said,"That information cannot be beamed more than a couple inches or it will be compromised. The pulse doesn't stop at a couple feet." Guy blabbed on for a while and moderator (Arthel Neville?) was believing the hype.

Another guy stood, said, "I'm in physics and engineering at Georgia Tech and that gentleman (points at me) is correct. You cannot beam any information without it being compromised." Gives 5 more points why. Arthel started hardline questioning the guy, he became incoherent to the questioning, gone in 5 minutes from the show.

Point is, this keeps coming back and will be force fed our way until it's part of our daily lives. Just like Socialism, kids being indoctrinated... they keep pushing the sheeple with no resistance

2019-03-14 11:21:19

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Ptjim

Posts: 406

Incept: 2013-06-26

Pacific Northwest

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I should probably start filing those dusty patent applications in my drawer for a line of tinfoil clothing. Hats, wristbands, vests, T-shirts, underwear - I'm gonna be rich!

2019-03-14 11:24:27

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Captainkidd

Posts: 1284

Incept: 2010-05-25

Houston, Texas

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There's definitely one of those Red Lines we were discussing the other day.

2019-03-14 11:30:16

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Shannonlk1

Posts: 197

Incept: 2008-12-02

Raleigh

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I said years ago how this was going to go. Back around the year 2000, I saw in the new that the Mexican Government was going to chip their employees. It was a legit AP article. I even printed the article because i knew people would not believe me. Since then I've seen nothing about it related to the Mexican Govvernment. But as I have said many time this is how it will play out.

Allow me to predict the future on how this is going to go. We are already seeing volunteers, so we are already in the first stage. There is at least one company in Europe that has been doing chipping for a while now and occasionally you will see articles on how great it is, but I think there are a few. So the first stage, like all tech, is getting the volunteers.

As part of that, there will be two subsets that we have not seen yet. One will be convicted prisoners that will take the chip for at home release. This will be praised for reducing prison populations and helping to contribute to better prison conditions. They will increase this to the point of releasing convicted killers and rapists. Occasionally one of these will cut the chip out and go on another spree, but this will be explained away as an exception and Hey still look at all the benefits, we will just improve the process by placing the chip next to the heart or brain or other such non-sense. All the while never changing the outcomes.

The second subset which is just as important is at some point, some parents are going to chip their kids, not teenagers but 3yr olds(maybe infants) to pre-teens. Then some child will get kidnapped by a pedophile. The pedophile will get caught right before causing serious harm to the child. This will make national news for weeks, even months. Because subsequently, there will be other stories of kidnapped kids that are murdered that which could have been avoided if they had just been chipped. This will cause a huge mad rush for parents getting their kids chipped and you will be considered a near criminal if you dont chip your children, see it will socially be treated as neglect. Then later it will be made law as felony neglect.

Once this is law, then getting the remaining adults is easy. Companies will require it, so you wont be able to get a job without one. Then for those that run their own businesses, they will get locked out of the system for not being chipped as well.

This will not happen overnight. This will happen over the next 15 to 20 years. Maybe less. Parents volunteering to get their kids chipped is the key. Once that starts the timeframe will accelerate pretty quickly.

People particularly the younger generation have literally no issue with giving their information away. They see no harm is Googles and Amazons speaker talking systems. They even flaunt their info on whatever the latest social app is. We are headed for a very dark time in history.

2019-03-14 11:32:44

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Mikebrandt

Posts: 6

Incept: 2018-03-23

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Won't facial recognition make this obsolete? Just point a camera at the entry point of every building and on the corner of every public sidewalk.

The facial software analyzes the recording constantly, sends reports back to the googleamazonfacebookNSAFBICIA mothership for cross table referencing, and your "meatspace" activities are linked to your online profile.

We're pretty much already there, aren't we?

2019-03-14 11:37:59

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Eleua

Posts: 15622

Incept: 2007-07-05

A True American Patriot!

N 47.72/ W 122.55

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...and with a few keystrokes by a beurocrat, you are instantly bankrupted, nationless, and a registered sex offender.

2019-03-14 11:40:38

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Mikeyparks

Posts: 1

Incept: 2017-07-20

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therenegadesexualmystic · 6 years

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Reclamation Is A Part of Healing

When I was 9 years old, my comfy world imploded. The car I was riding in with my Mother, my Grandmother, and my brother exploded after being rear-ended by a drunk driver. In addition to my physical scars, I acquired a bunch of emotional scars which I’m still dealing with 40 years later. I divide my life into Before The Accident and After The Accident.

I feel like I'm really clear how The Accident led to "more opportunities" that I might not have otherwise experienced. Mostly in terms of money (from the settled lawsuit) & what doors that opened: changing to a prep school & rubbing shoulders with wealthy kids with upperclass aspirations & worldviews. But beyond the physical losses of my brother & Big Mama, I had not spent a lot of time cataloging all of what I feel I lost as a result of the accident.

One of my duties in my current part-time job is Standardized Patient work. This means that in some instances I play a role for 15 minutes while an individual medical student performs an interview and either a pretend or real pelvic exam, and in some instances I play a role for 15 minutes while a group of medical students work together to conduct a sexual history interview. After the roleplay we have 10 minutes where I give them feedback about what they did well, what they could have done better, and what they should never do with an actual patient. I've been doing this for almost 10 years & I love it. Love it. We get a script beforehand with the patient's presenting complaint & their medical history, and when applicable their results for specific lab tests that the students are supposed to request. The point is not really for us to be Academy Award-winning actors, but believable enough with our answers and our body language so that the student can logically put them together with any test results & come to an accurate diagnosis and/or management plan. One day recently as I was in a new role pretending to be a young mother anxious about a lump I found on my breast, my biggest self-critique was about whether or not I was believable in the role: was I adequately "wringing my hands" (the stated stage direction) to show my anxiety? Was I conveying how much our family had gone through when my sister was diagnosed with ductal cancer 3 years ago? And I remembered...

I really, really, really wanted to be an actress growing up. I was in two plays in middle school (one school play, one community theatre production), but I wanted Broadway, I wanted Hollywood, and I believed that my burns prevented me from even trying to follow that dream. I had the minimal amount of plastic surgery—skin grafts—during my summer-long hospital stay. My plastic surgeon (who me & Mama called "God"—not as a compliment) told me that I had until I was 18 to have more surgery & that if I didn't have more surgery by then I was stuck with my scars. I decided I'd rather have the scars than more surgery. Even though strangers stared at me and/or asked invasive questions about my scars; even though my new classmates made fun of my scars until I cried almost every day for a year. I was hyperconscious of my scars & believed that I was “disfigured”. Just now I asked myself if I still believed I am disfigured & I didn't have an answer. I turned to my old friend Google:

disfigure: “spoil the attractiveness of”

As much as I consider my burn scars Badges Of Courage, I don’t think it’s a lie to say they spoil the attractiveness of my skin. To see my skin as beautiful is a reclamation I've not yet been able to make.

(I had a lover who compared my burns to close-ups of dragonfly wings and satellite photos of the Egyptian Delta, and sent me photos of each. I looked at the photos & could see the similarity she saw, but could not somatically relate it to my actual body. One day I might, or I might never, and I'm ok with where I am now.)

I have always been hyperaware of actors who have some sort of facial or physical oddity (there are a couple of famous actors whose faces are severely asymmetrical to the point that their eyes are out of alignment). Not as a put down of them, but out of a "Maybe I could've been an actress even with my scars" jealousy. Especially since my burn scars are more or less hidden if I wear long sleeves & pants (the burn on my left hand cannot really be covered up unless I'm getting my inner Michael Jackson on).

Back to my day of pretending. I started realizing that part of the personal satisfaction that I get out of my job is I get to reclaim this one thing that The Accident took from me. I'm not on stage & my audience is extremely small, but I am acting THE FUCK out of my role. When I'm pretending to have an ectopic pregnancy sometimes I even cry (I can actually do the "one dramatic tear trailing down my face" or the "eyes welling up but I'm too stoic to let the tears fall"). When I’m nervously but determinedly telling someone young enough to be my offspring that I might be interested in anal sex, I "struggle with eye contact" & sometimes look at the floor or over their shoulder. Oftentimes the students comment on how believable I am. I make sure that I don't focus on my acting skills to the detriment of the students' learning. But here's one place I get back a tiny piece of something Ford took from me (I target Ford specifically because having an actual target for my rage & grief allows me to get a handle on it. "American Capitalism & Greed" is too big of a target & just makes me feel overwhelmed by my rage).

There are many ways to reclaim what was taken away from you by trauma & every attempt at reclamation does not have to end in a permanently changed behavior.

I have amazing hair. I don't believe in false modesty: my hair is AMAZING. Strangers routinely stop me to pay compliments or to ask about it. Acquaintances & friends recognize me in a crowd or from the back with just one glimpse of my hair. I routinely take selfies when I'm having a good hair day & post them to my social media platforms. Once after moving to a new city, I sent out a whole email to my friends just about my hair (the neutralizer & relaxer clashed & I needed to share the pain of the outcome). My hair is my one true vanity, and I'm not ashamed of that. But my hair being amazing is not a reclamation. I had pretty awesome hair before the accident as well. I indulge myself in my hair vanity as a way to hang on to the one thing I know about me is beautiful in the face of my "disfigurement". But even that is not a reclamation.

As I've been consciously working on "resolving my trauma"* it came up again that part of the way I choose to wear my hair is in reaction to The Accident. Prior to the accident, my mother did my hair & I wore it in two plaits or two Afro Puffs until I got it permed at 8 (the story of what White Supremacy takes from little Black girls in a world where the people that love them allow lye mixtures to be put on their scalp is another workshop), so I had a permanent center part. Once taking care of my hair became my responsibility, I promptly switched to a right side part. I can't remember whether it was unconscious or conscious, but a right side part allowed the bulk of my hair to cover the burn scars on the left side of my face & on my left ear.**

As part of my current healing journey, I recently decided to start wearing my hair parted in the middle again. As it was my mother's choice and not my own to wear my hair parted in the middle, it wasn't exactly a reclamation. But I felt a sense of reclamation by choosing to let go of a coping mechanism. I wore it that way for a little while and even recorded a video with my hair in that style. I ultimately decided I didn't find the style to be that flattering, because of my ginormous forehead, and went back to wearing it parted on the side. But I count it as a win that I was able to wear it parted in the middle for as long as I did without being self-conscious (and after choosing Janet Mock as my new hair icon, I might revisit the decision during my next Deva Cut).

I count it as a win because I regained my option to choose, rather than acting subconsciously.

Healing From Trauma is about regaining access to those parts of you that shut down in order to cope, and/or the things that trauma took away from you. Sometimes the reclaiming doesn't work for you, but even the attempt can be empowering. What are the things that your trauma(s) took from you? Are you perhaps unconsciously already reclaiming them? If not, what are small things that you could reclaim?

* I can't emphasize enough that "resolving" trauma is not pretending it never happened, or going back to the way of life you had before the traumatic incidents(s). Resolving trauma is becoming aware of your coping mechanisms & triggers, and acting from conscious choice rather than automatic reactions.

** The burn scars on my face & ear are much larger in my imagination than they are in reality. I can't even see them anymore when I look in the mirror. I don't know at what age they "disappeared", but the ones on my face came to resemble acne scars in my late teens & the crinkling of my ear stretched out as the my actual ear became bigger.

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