letters from a weirdo

your weirdo friend

moved by the ghost of samuel l. clemens––sometimes creative, rarely fictional, unfashionably hopeful, hopefully practical, and unwaveringly invested in the common muppet. muppetgender.substack.com

  1. 18H AGO

    how to organize an entire-ass country

    Thank you, God, PJ Schuster, Karen RN, M Hope, Lizzy B, Tricia, and many others for tuning into my live video, where I discuss The Daisy Chain— a map for organizing your community at the hyper-local level to defeat political abusers who are trying to kill our democracy. If you’d like to learn more about The Daisy Chain, read more below: Like This Idea? Share It Offline + Outside of Social Media Platforms Neighbors, we are working against a weaponized algorithm. If this post has meant something to you, absolutely, restack it here. But also consider sharing it on other forms of social media AND directly to your friends via text, email, Signal, Discord, and the like. Print it out and make zines, tailored to your own communities. You have my enthusiastic consent! While I am resolute about being disciplined in strategic nonviolence, I am not worried about attribution. I’m not here to make a name for myself but here to make an impact. My reward is seeing fascism collapse in on itself, and preventing white Christian nationalists from simultaneously enacting a genocide and a world war (which, I can attest as someone who has studied them for fifteen years, is absolutely their aim). We can stop these jerks, but people need a map to learn how to move together. Share this map everywhere— and make it your own. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit muppetgender.substack.com

    1h 29m
  2. boycott men until morale improves

    1D AGO

    boycott men until morale improves

    This would be such a good time for married women to legally drop their husbands’ last names. Rename yourself entirely and update your birth certificate with a name that is all your own. Women don’t have to stick with what they’re handed just because it’s expected of them. The same goes to all other gender minorities. Naming oneself is powerful. It can also be an impactful protest in times like these. Don’t become smaller. Go on offense. You know what else would be fitting for times such as these? Create a real loneliness epidemic: no accepting dates with men, no sex with men, no entertaining marriage plans with men (except for divorce). women do not need men to fulfill them. this fascist moment has been brought to you by men who need women, queers, trans folx, and femmes to feel small so they can feel better. they threaten gender minorities because they themselves are threatened by the presence of people who don’t need their approval. it terrifies them. you can see this in how ICE threatens women and children with the worst abuse. masculinity isn’t just fragile. it’s broken. when your gender experience requires subservience from minority genders to feel comfortable: your gender is weak as f**k. throw it in the trash and try again. withhold all of your spending. stop going to any place of worship where a man is at the helm. withhold your social and material support from men. reclaim your time. reclaim your interests. don’t laugh at their jokes. don’t try to enjoy their hobbies. walk away from them while they’re talking. maybe if men felt this massive rebuke they’d take the goddamn hint. it’s not just fascist men either. it’s white men in particular, of all political leanings— they will defer to themselves in a room full of women and trans people with real expertise. they’ll just talk, with no data, and assume they’re not only right but worth listening to. because so many don’t care to be curious about others, they are boring as f^ck to talk to. they’ll invent an entire ass “male loneliness epidemic,” while emotionally neglecting their mates and refusing to heal their own s**t. they expect the gender fabulous to keep them in bubble wrap their entire gd lives. don’t pop a single baby bubble— or the man-baby just might kill you. recently a white man shot his twenty-three-year-old daughter after she questioned him supporting a child rapist as president. his need to annihilate his own daughter was an admission of his own guilt. even ostensibly open-minded men are often allergic to ceding the stage. they hog mics. they treat women and gender expand trans people like mascots. they give advice no one asked for. they give “feedback” to their gender minority peers whose accomplishments dwarf their own. because they lack humility, they cannot clock the irony. their perspectives are limited. they curate their lives within the tiny militarized borders of their comfort. they rarely look outward, appear to fear looking inward, and still somehow assume they’re the smartest people in the room. shame just slides right off them, solidarity rarely occurs to them, and, even when the world is burning around them, they always find a way to center themselves. it is pathetic. this has to stop. women and other gender minorities have been socialized to coddle grown-ass men for far too long, and it shows. the bar is on the gd floor with men. even now, as armed masked thugs invade the streets it is unarmed women on the front lines while men hide behind their computer screens. it’s time to raise the bar so high it shatters the glass block ceilings every-damn-where. also, while i’m here: i want AOC as president. no more men. they’re too emotionally stunted to govern properly. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit muppetgender.substack.com

    25 min
  3. they're scrapping the constitution + we the people need a plan

    2D AGO

    they're scrapping the constitution + we the people need a plan

    With the latest comments from DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and whoever is running Trumps Truth Social account, the Executive Branch has plainly demonstrated it is acting outside of the Constitution. That means we now have an illegitimate Executive Branch. Listen to Dr. Heather Cox Richardson explain the political landscape, if you need more context for the situation I’m describing: So what does this mean for us? It means that We the People are no longer obligated to listen to anyone or anything coming out of the Executive. Compliance stops now. Our current task is to work together, as a country, to remove these treasonous thugs and replace them with temporary executive branch stand-ins. This illegitimate executive and its collaborators need removed. What I’m proposing is a scalpel not a chainsaw. I’m not proposing an entirely new government. I’m proposing cutting out the cancer and healing the body politic. As an extraordinary measure, which is called for in extraordinary times, I call for a bipartisan coalition of governors (who already have executive experience in their states) to temporarily step into the roles of the executive branch, where they serve as stewards of our representative democracy. Each will serve in acting roles, and each will sign an oath to uphold our best democratic values until the next General Election. Volunteering governors will have their lieutenants serve in their place in their respective states. Proposing this bipartisan coalition of governors demonstrates a clear plan that shows good faith and creates buy-in. This is reasonable, and this is actionable. To achieve these two objectives -- (a) the removal of an illegitimate branch and (b) replacing the Executive with temporary, bipartisan governor-led slate-- we must: * Circulate this idea for revision and collective agreement. * Openly campaign fitting governors to serve in these roles. * Pull the emergency break by organizing a People’s Shutdown. Some call it a general strike, but that is far too vague for what needs to happen. This is about a systematized starving the economy and our institutions of the human capital and cooperation it needs to survive. Instead of the chaos these Illegitimates want to foment, we will self-govern at the hyper-local level, caring for each other, protecting each other, and refusing to participate with our abusers. We will refuse to be cowed. We must have a plan in place to respond to these anti-democratic threats. The time to begin earnestly organizing in preparation for this People’s Shutdown starts now. The task before us now is a massive, people-powered democratic rebuke. We prepare ourselves to hold this People’s Shutdown until the entire Executive Branch, plus the House Speaker, evacuate their offices. They have breached the terms of agreement, and we will withdraw our consent to be governed by despots. During the People’s Shutdown, we will govern ourselves. This is about organized and orderly civil disobedience. We hold the People’s Shutdown until these treasonous offenders evacuate their roles and our States’ governors create a temporary stand-in Cabinet for the Executive Branch. Once that happens (and it will), we will hold actual free and fair midterm elections, with hand counted paper ballots— to prevent techno-fascist skullduggery. The newly Congress, once seated, will pass drastic and immediate remedies to address harms. Should they be tempted to be fools, We the People will coerce them to represent us– for the first time since this democratic experiment began. Those Congressional electeds who lead in passing the remedies We the People demand will then be deemed eligible to run for President during the General Election. There are no political parties: only public servants. There is no try-- only do. I discuss how neighbors can organize to make this happen-- in detail, not just vibes, through a neighbor-led process called The Daisy Chain. ______ Who the heck am I? I’m a professor who studies the technical communication and people-powered structures in grassroots movements. I’m an engaged neighbor, veteran organizer, and mass-cooperation strategist. I’ve trained with pro-democracy organizations who help people (the world over) reclaim their democracies from autocratic rule. Above all, I’m an community college teacher, and my specialty is in helping people tackle complex problems by working together. We can do this, neighbor. To be blunt, this situation isn’t sustainable, our neighbors and our children are traumatized by this amoral rupture, and I’m offering up some pretty doable coordinates to get us out of hell. We owe it to young people to be the leaders this moment needs. I don’t want your money. I am not running for public office. I want you to out-organize the fascists. More to the point, I’ve created a scalable, customizable blueprint to make it happen: The Daisy Chain. I will elaborate on how to engage the Daisy Chain in future writings and recordings. Another important thing to know is that there are already people using the Daisy Chain to help organize their communities— in a block of red states, a handful of blue states, and at least one purple state. The plan itself requires simple daily actions that coalesce into neighbors reclaiming their collective power; it’s based on Gandhi’s Poorna Swaraj: Constructive Programme: It’s Meaning and Place. If you’d like to learn more, I encourage you to follow me. My content will always be free. Amplify this Message outside the Algorithm Organizers are intentionally being shadow-banned across social media platforms, including this one. If you like what you’ve read here, I encourage you to share it outside the algorithm, via: email, listservs, Discord groups, Signal chats, Reddit threads, text messages, Bible studies, zines, flyers, house parties, bar trivia nights, coffee-house leaflets, etc. I also encourage you to lift this message and claim it as your own. together we rise — by flightlessblrbs This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit muppetgender.substack.com

    35 min
  4. 4D AGO

    HIV Meds in Peril + Letters from Kids in Camps

    This live discusses two different stories: RFK + White Christian Nationalists Are Brewing an HIV Epidemic in Florida The state of Florida is trying to strip people’s HIV meds overnight, which won’t just lead to thousands of deaths but will create a national public health crisis. Here are some calls to action: * Raise hell over this with their representatives in the House and Senate. Call 202- 224-3121. Demand RFK be impeached and that they intervene to stop Florida’s unhinged attempt to wage a genocide against our HIV positive neighbors. Remind them that this wouldn’t just mean thousands of deaths in Florida but across the nation. * If you are in Florida, be sure to speak out now. There should public comment period, but Florida is trying to break the rules and take away your right to stop this. Call your governor’s office about this unhinged attempt at genocide. * Share this story everywhere, across every social media platform. And if you know someone in Florida, reach out to them directly and ask them to speak up in their state. Kids Are Writing Letters from Concentration Camps, Begging for You to Speak Out ProPublica released letters from children inside Dilley Concentration Camp, and while legislators have been reading out some of these letters on the floor of Congress, my guess is that many of you haven’t heard from these kids. I read their letters aloud, because it’s essential to bear witness and to speak out. * Call your representatives in the House and Senate, every goddamn day: 202- 224-3121. That’s the minimum we all ought to be doing. Demand Steven Miller, Kristi Noem, Russ Vought, and all the other white nationalist henchmen be removed from their positions. Demand the Flores Agreement be respected, and insist on an end to indefinite detentions. Demand money be clawed back from ICE and CPB. * See if a detention center is being planned in your area, and show up to your city/township council and demand no warehouses are used for concentration camps. You can’t just pretend this isn’t happening, folks. * It’s time to move beyond whistles and cameras and start actively hiding/ obscuring our targeted neighbors. This isn’t immigration enforcement; this a genocide unfolding before our very eyes. * Start building parallel systems of support in your postal code— today. Here’s how: This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit muppetgender.substack.com

    1h 23m
  5. Declaration of Dissent w/ your weirdo friend

    6D AGO

    Declaration of Dissent w/ your weirdo friend

    Evan Stern recently invited me to talk about a video essay I wrote, titled “Declaration of Dissent. Since this conversation is about that video essay, I link to it below: During our talk, Evan mentions how my invocation of boundary-setting matters so much right now. He was right to point out that there are laws the currently exist on the books but which have never been evenly applied to elites. I added to Evan’s point that people who have been traumatized by their government don’t even think they have the right to set a boundary to begin with— that’s why they want to keep people in trauma. Those who are alsolated and afraid make themselves small and allow abuse to go on, because they think there’s nothing they can do. But to be able to set a boundary and alchemize it into action, one first has to access and experience their own anger. This country does everything it can to pathologize anger, because those in power know anger, when alchemized, mobilizes positive change. So if you have been feeling frozen, or dissociated, in the face of what’s happening around you, I invite you to join us in this conversation. Maybe something we mention here will help shift something for you. Show Notes: Weirdo’s References * Jeannine Amber’s “In Her Own Words: Marissa Alexander Tells Her Story” * Kenyon Farrow’a “CeCe McDonald Deserves Our Support, ‘Innocent’ or Not” * Karen Matthew’s “‘I can’t breathe’: Eric Garner remembered on the 10th anniversary of his chokehold death” * Sam Levin’s “‘Hunted’: one in three people killed by US police were fleeing, data reveals” * Georgia Lyon’s “New poll finds voters concerned about presidential power and strongly support constitutional checks and balances” * Heather Cox Richardson’s “American Conversations: Zohran Mamdani” * Alan Johnson’s Power, Privilege, and Difference * Duluth Model’s “Wheel of Power & Control” * Richard Schwartz’s No Bad Parts * Janina Fischer’s Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors * Karla McLaren The Language of Emotions This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit muppetgender.substack.com

    1h 8m
5
out of 5
4 Ratings

About

moved by the ghost of samuel l. clemens––sometimes creative, rarely fictional, unfashionably hopeful, hopefully practical, and unwaveringly invested in the common muppet. muppetgender.substack.com