Thinking a lot lately about how we forgot about the 1918 flu because it never appeared in any of our preserved media.
Whether we like it or not, history is more often preserved in popular literature (whatever form that takes) than in the classroom.
By not recording the real, ongoing impact of the pandemic on our daily lives, we are doomed to repeat it.
It may have started as an attempt to avoid trauma, but now it is part of the propaganda machine.
https://stockroom.wandering.shop/media_attachments/files/112/082/415/622/491/006/original/f8c21c3445efbaa3.jpg
Unpopular opinion: I have always been in favour of HS2, our rail system is badly in need of modernisation, and having seen the difference a fast train means between York and London, I know what that can do.
Not saying there's been no problems, but it was actually a pretty important project. Sometimes you do just gotta INVEST.
Just heard that the Health Secretary is using the 'issue' of permitting transgender people to be treated on wards with other people of the same gender as a distraction from the NHS strikes.
Let me repeat: rather that talk about the NHS strikes and NHS underfunding, the Health Secretary is pursuing a crusade against sick trans people.
I am SO furious. SO disgusted.
This. On top of everything else.
My rage has robbed me of words.
OK, I am fucking angry about this.
Talked for the first time on a Zoom call to a doctor today about IBS and the first Facebook Ad I see?? Begins with a man saying 'DIARRHOEA!'
I scrolled away as fast as I could, but not before I saw the text underneath confirm it was about IBS.
This is the EXACT REASON Zoom should be sued into oblivion and fined vast quantities of cash for their data harvesting policies. #ActionForME need to GET OFF ZOOM. Your clients' personal info is being stolen.
It's official! Today is my last day in my current job. I'm looking forward to getting some solid rest and recovering my baseline #MECFS #ChronicIllness
>What about the fact that authors are now expected to do a lot of their own marketing?
Or the fact that an advance is no longer received as a whole IN ADVANCE.
Or the fact that publishing contracts are now coming out with clauses that require permission to feed your works into the plagiarism machines?
Or the fact that the biggest publishing houses are unrepentant about using AI 'art' on their covers?>
>All of this can be boiled down to one thing: the publishing industry has sacrificed the written art on the altar of shareholder profit.
It feels unlikely that I can have a book traditionally published before the industry entirely fragments into a death churn of meaninglessness.
It guts me that all of this happened in the last 20 years or so.
It could all be undone by regulation, but I don't see any will to make that happen.
I feel like my childhood dream is already over. I missed the window
#WritersCoffeeClub 9/24. What are your biggest bugbears with publishing?
My God, where to start?
How about the idea that you have to write only one type of thing to be successful and target your 'niche'. My favourite authors write cross-genre and I will too!
Or that you MUST read enough recent books to find at least two similar enough to your own to be comps. It's deeply ableist.
I am well-read. I have a fucking Eng Lit degree. I'm also fucking SICK. I'm lucky if I finish one book a year!>
>What about the fact that authors are now expected to do a lot of their own marketing?
Or the fact that an advance is no longer received as a whole IN ADVANCE.
Or the fact that publishing contracts are now coming out with clauses that require permission to feed your works into the plagiarism machines?
Or the fact that the biggest publishing houses are unrepentant about using AI 'art' on their covers?>
'The Problem with Gentle Critiques': https://www.tumblr.com/rhube/727978130583732224/the-problem-with-gentle-critiques?source=share
I've been thinking a lot lately about how much of Pretty Woman's (actually very good) critique of capitalism went over my head because it spends too much time enjoying the luxuries of wealth. Accidentally wrote an essay about it this morning.
#PrettyWoman #Capitalism #anticapitalism #film #movie #socialism #WorkerSolidarity
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