As discussed previously, on Fridays, I present my weekly social media roundups. Note that toots of articles generally include header images from the articles, which I don’t include here unless their creators happen to have released them for use under a free license, and I notice. Most have not, or I don’t notice. But I now add my commentary here, where I don’t feel restricted by message length.

diagrams showing the division of the day and of the week

Also, I don’t generally attach pictures to posts with quotations.

9:03 – Mon 29 May 2023

Image Not Shown: A middle-aged woman helps an older man walk while she carries a bag of groceries

GOP’s proposed expansion of SNAP work requirements targets many low-income people in their early 50s — but many of them already work from The Conversation

It’s reasonable to expect that the new work requirements would force many people to make hard choices between the caregiving arrangements for their loved ones and keeping their benefits.

Hashtags: #SNAP #GOP

Eventually, this game needs to end, right? At some point, people have to stop hearing their fantasy that everybody who receives public assistance can secretly work full-time and treating it like a legitimate political opinion.

12:04 – Mon 29 May 2023

Quoted on Mastodon

If you are always trying to be normal you will never know how amazing you can be.

Susan Ahn Cuddy

Hashtags: #Quotes #AAPIHeritage

9:06 – Tue 30 May 2023

Image Not Shown: A revolutionary technique to restore coral reefs was tested at Royal Burgers' Zoo in the Netherlands. Marine restoration is one of the policies needed to achieve sustainable wellbeing, experts say

Forget GDP growth, it’s sustainable wellbeing we need to aim for from openDemocracy

The root cause of these crises is our societal addiction to an outdated economic paradigm based on the single-minded pursuit of GDP growth at all costs.

Hashtags: #GDP #Sustainability

I don’t know that I necessarily believe the proposed alternatives, but GDP certainly doesn’t make any sense.

12:06 – Tue 30 May 2023

Quoted on Mastodon

Women have helped shape our world, yet still do not receive the recognition and compensation they deserve.

Colleen Hanabusa

Hashtags: #Quotes #AAPIHeritage

9:02 – Wed 31 May 2023

Image Not Shown: Former President Jimmy Carter is shown during a reception in Plains, Georgia, July 10, 2021

Jimmy Carter, 3 Months Into Hospice, Is Aware of Tributes, Enjoying Ice Cream from Voice of America

The hospice care announcement prompted ongoing tributes and media attention on his 1977–81 presidency and the global humanitarian work the couple has done since co-founding The Carter Center in 1982.

Hashtags: #JimmyCarter

It makes me happy that Carter has done well, but also bothers me that the media has all but abandoned the story of Carter’s health, whereas we get updates whenever ⚞ahem⚟ certain other former presidents do or say pretty much anything.

12:01 – Wed 31 May 2023

Quoted on Mastodon

So, it’s one thing to say “there should be accountability,” but when we think about and define “accountability” based on bad actors and bad deeds, part of our system of justice tells us that, yes, there should be serious, swift, and severe consequence, but also we must look to those who were harmed and ask, “Are we doing enough to allow them the ability to recover from that harm?”

Kamala Harris

Hashtags: #Quotes #AAPIHeritage

9:01 – Thu 01 June 2023

4 icons representing saving News from big tech
4 icons representing saving News from big tech
Image credit: CC-BY, the Electronic Frontier Foundation

To Save the News, We Must Shatter Ad-Tech from the Electronic Frontier Foundation

…there are millions of transactions every single day in which Google (representing a publisher) tells Google (representing the marketplace) about an ad-slot for sale; whereupon Google (representing many different advertisers) places bids on that ad-slot.

Hashtags: #Media #AdTech

I doubt that’ll solve the overall problem, which has many other factors, but we still need to break this nonsense apart.

12:02 – Thu 01 June 2023

Quoted on Mastodon

Nothing so deadens the sympathies and shrivels the power of enjoyment as the persistent keeping away from the great opportunities for helpfulness and a continual ignoring of the starvation struggle which makes up the life of at least half the race.

Jane Addams

Hashtags: #Quotes #LGBTPride

9:04 – Fri 02 June 2023

Content Warning: Right-wing media

Image Not Shown: A nine-by-nine grid of people who you'd rather not look at

Things are getting ugly in the right-wing media ecosphere from Daily Kos

Their job is to provide ahistorical scaffolding, reinforcing the unsophisticated belief they should blame structural inequalities in our country on everyone but the billionaire class.

Hashtags: #Media #SoreLosers

Good for them. I hope they all rip each other apart, so that their conspiracy-mongering nonsense can crawl back into the shadows where it belongs.

12:07 – Fri 02 June 2023

Quoted on Mastodon

He took the imperial hand and shook it in the glad-to-see-you-but-keep-off English fashion.

Frederick Rolfe

Hashtags: #Quotes #LGBTPride

Bonus

Because it accidentally became a tradition early on in the life of the blog, I drop any additional articles that didn’t fit into the one-article-per-day week, but too weird or important to not mention, here.

girl in pink and brown long sleeve shirt and pink pants sitting on yellow slide
girl in pink and brown long sleeve shirt and pink pants sitting on yellow slide
Image credit: by Wilber Wong, free to use under the Unsplash License

7% of the United States is a ‘play desert’ from Futurity

For example, the study found that the Southwest is lacking not only in access to play areas but also in whether parents find those areas acceptable and accommodating.

I honestly probably would’ve guessed higher, but we should still probably fix this.

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Credits: Header image is Circular diagrams showing the division of the day and of the week from a manuscript drafted during the Carolingian Dynasty.