I have not seen the new Star Wars but ambient levels of Star Wars have reached such a peak that I feel eminently qualified to review it without actually seeing the film or even reading a plot synopsis. In all honesty I probably will not watch it until I can assure that I will see a high definition version for free through whatever means comes to my disposal. What I have seen, the cross-promotions, the essays, and the toys, tells me everything I need to know to assess it as a piece of culture. Star Wars is not a movie, it is a platform for media and a financial vehicle. Star Wars has plot like America has elections. It’s almost a formality, the official pomp heralding in a new wave of characters, theories, and controversies. If we black box the film itself and instead look at all of the culture that spews out from its unknown (to me) depths, I think we get a much more cohesive (I’d even go so far as to say honest) assessment of the entire event. more...
Both are technology books that came out in 2015, and John Durham Peters’ The Marvelous Clouds is perhaps the best counterpoint, or antidote, to Sherry Turkle’s Reclaiming Conversation. Turkle is the avatar of digital dualism, seeing a real world that is natural versus technology that is inhuman and added on. Peters instead puts forward a view of media and technology as part of the environment, and the environment as inherently technological and itself a type of media. Peters doesn’t think of only one all-encompassing environment but of many elements, be they water or language or fire or digitality. Each is its own intersecting environment. Whether you like to think of digitality as part of one world or infinity worlds is an improvement over the digital dualist mistake of seeing two. more...
Too few people are concerned that a national political party has the technical ability to pull the plug on a campaign whenever it wants. When news broke that the DNC had indefinitely revoked the Sanders’ campaign’s access to essential voter data the story quickly coalesced around the facts of the data breach and the reaction by the campaigns and the party. At no point though, have we stopped and asked why or even how the Democratic National Committee controls the data that goes through the tools built and maintained by their private vendor NGP VAN. more...
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Marvel’s Jessica Jones is a dark and reluctant hero. An alcoholic private detective, Jones’ super-human physical strength remains largely underutilized when we meet her in the Netflix series opening episode. As the story unfolds, we learn that Jessica self-medicates to deal with a traumatic past in which a man named Kilgrave, who controls people with the use of his voice, held Jessica captive as his lover while forcing her to engage in violence and even murder. Their relationship ended when Jessica was finally able to resist his control—a quality unique to her—and Kilgrave was hit by a bus, leaving him presumably dead. The storyline of the first season is premised on Jessica learning that Kilgrave is still alive, has captured another victim, and is coming to reclaim Jessica. In turn, Jones hunts for Kilgrave to ensure that he dies, once and for all.
About halfway through the season Jessica realizes that Kilgrave is tracking her whereabouts by controlling her friend and neighbor Malcom Ducasse. To wrest Malcom from Kilgrave’s control, Jessica strikes a deal. She agrees to send Kilgrave a selfie at precisely 10am each day. At his direction, Jones even includes a smile. more...
What causes someone to turn to radical ideology and violence? It’s an important question, and one that has occupied the pages of many a newspaper, magazine, and blog as of late. In the case of ISIS, blame gets directed at many targets—the “backwardness” of Islamic beliefs, decades of military actions in the Middle East, global warming, Western-backed corrupt governments in the region, and of course, the internet. As Kashmir Hill notes in this excellent essay:
“Technology and the internet are being invoked in fearful terms because it is easier to point the finger there than unpack the multifold and complicated reasons behind these acts—the growth of hateful ideologies, racial and ethnic tensions, the ease of buying semi-automatic weapons, the long-term effects of an ongoing war waged by drones, and twisted minds that embrace violence.”
Barring some extreme changes in the political climate the following will be true of the American electorate in 40 years: There will be no living memory of a time when real income rose for anyone but the super wealthy. No one, save the oldest citizens will have had a post-9/11 adulthood with all of the normalization of war that entails. Schools will be understood as prime targets for extreme acts of violence even as rates of property and violent crime fall in the aggregate. The total lack of confidence in all established institutions with the exception of police, military, and small business will continue as major cities are washed away as governments look on and refuse to invest in any kind of infrastructure. This will also be happening as America reaches a major demographic milestone: whites (as we presently define them) will no longer be a statistical majority.
Given this sort of potential future, we should take a look at how younger people, respond to the kind of political rhetoric that is endemic to crisis, uncertainty, and fear: fascism. Everyone from Jeb Bush to your favorite anarchist barista knows and has said in no uncertain terms that Donald Trump is a fascist. One might be heartened to see that younger voters have not responded well to Trump’s campaign. According to RealClearPolitics, less than 2 percent of Trump’s supporters are under 30. According to Pew, only a third of millennials identify as Republicans while half identify as Democrats. An optimist might see this as a younger, more politically progressive electorate rejecting hate and fear mongering but I am more skeptical. Afterall, there is not a whole lot of ideological space between Trump’s “ban all muslim immigrants” and Democratic candidates’ universal agreement around the continued bombing of muslims using flying robots. Would if it’s just the messaging that turns Millennial away? Would if people who have spent most of their lives in the 21st century, do not respond the same way to 20th century authoritarianism? Any surprise at the popularity of the Trump brand is rooted in a willful ignorance of widespread, explicit white supremacy. What is more terrifying still, is that there are probably hundreds, if not thousands millions of Americans that think Trump does not go far enough. Even if Trump loses this time, we should take note of what his campaign reveals: a nascent and likely growing nationalist movement in America. One that I suspect will be fully baked and equipped with more effective messaging by the time post-millenial generations make up the majority of the voting public. more...
Donald Trump’s press release last night, on the heels of President Obama’s speech on the San Bernadino shooting, announced a policy proposal that perfectly sums up his bid for president. It’s terrifying, fascist, misguided, hateful. And it’s oh-so tweetable.
Maybe you’ve noticed Twitter’s new analytics feature. Maybe you haven’t. I kind of wished I hadn’t. It gives you a break down of how many “impressions” and “engagements” your tweets have garnered; impressions refers to views, and engagements include how many people clicked the tweet to see details, how many liked or retweeted, how many checked out your profile, etc. Each individual tweet gets its own breakdown, and you can go to analytics.twitter.com to see a general survey of your activity, from overall “impressions” to profile visits, mentions, and followers.
Content Warning: Racism (anti-black racism, xenophobia)
Authors note: This is an analysis of images; I debated to what extent the images themselves should be included and how much description I should provide. In this sort of research, there is always a risk of re-circulating the violent discourse that the you intend to critique. Ultimately, and for a variety of reasons, I decided to include the images. I’m interested in readers’ thoughts on this question, so please post in the comments if you feel inclined to do so.
As with any ethnic or racial identity, whiteness is a multitude. White supremacy takes many forms. And, as Jenny Davis showed us earlier this week, it’s been a hell of a year for white supremacy.