Trump appoints acting director to transform museums and libraries into indoctrination centers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Folks, it’s Friday. Are you not following his deranged pregame pattern? He’ll rant all day, then Weekend at Bernies.

Unless you live on Venus, its actually Saturday. Shocked that Dems can even be this stupid

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fwiw, it is not just writing, although it can definitely be seen there. In music, there are no new white male conductors in the US or Europe, and spots for new white male musicians in orchestras and symphonies are non-existent.

I don't think this administration will, is capable of, fixing this. But at least they noticed it's a problem.

A lot of orchestras have switched to blind auditions, so I’m not sure what point you are tying to prove exactly. That without affirmative action, white men aren’t getting the spots they used to get and presumptions of superiority they used to get simply by virtue of being white? Not quite the “problem” you are making it out to be.

Principals are selected by committee, not blind audition.

Locking white men out of the arts was fine on January 19th, supported by everyone. Now it is not.

It's hard enough to be an artist. We should support all them, not just POC LGBTQIA+, and women artists.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

All the book banning where I live is on the right-wing side, and man do these snowflakes love to ban books. As for literary fiction, it’s become a woman-dominated art form. You’d have to convince me that’s the result of some DEI vendetta and not simply supply and demand. Men just don’t read as much, and they don’t seem to be writing as much. On the other hand gaming, which is itself a vital art form, is dominated by men.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

All the book banning where I live is on the right-wing side, and man do these snowflakes love to ban books. As for literary fiction, it’s become a woman-dominated art form. You’d have to convince me that’s the result of some DEI vendetta and not simply supply and demand. Men just don’t read as much, and they don’t seem to be writing as much. On the other hand gaming, which is itself a vital art form, is dominated by men.

I live in a deep blue area and here the banning is mostly from the blue end.

And actually, just to be clear, I agree with you. But what I am saying is that you are fighting a war of perception here, and so long as people think that Trump is just correcting excesses, and not engaging in authoritarianism, this is going to be met with a collective shrug.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks, it’s Friday. Are you not following his deranged pregame pattern? He’ll rant all day, then Weekend at Bernies.

Unless you live on Venus, its actually Saturday. Shocked that Dems can even be this stupid

Read the date on the embedded tweet. Slowly. Then find a calendar and look up what day of the week March 21, 2025 is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

All the book banning where I live is on the right-wing side, and man do these snowflakes love to ban books. As for literary fiction, it’s become a woman-dominated art form. You’d have to convince me that’s the result of some DEI vendetta and not simply supply and demand. Men just don’t read as much, and they don’t seem to be writing as much. On the other hand gaming, which is itself a vital art form, is dominated by men.

I live in a deep blue area and here the banning is mostly from the blue end.

And actually, just to be clear, I agree with you. But what I am saying is that you are fighting a war of perception here, and so long as people think that Trump is just correcting excesses, and not engaging in authoritarianism, this is going to be met with a collective shrug.

I’m also from a deep blue area, and other than some discomfort about the casual use of racist terms in Huck Finn (part of what Twain was going for to prove his larger point btw), not really sure what “book banning” you are seeing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

Here’s the problem, though: the pendulum doesn’t swing evenly. Every time there’s a small swing to the left, where women and PoC and LGBTQ+ start to get a little more representation, a more level playing field, more rights, right wing authoritarian men go ballistic. In order to “correct” for this, they feel the pendulum has to swing back to 1930s Germany (or 1850s Alabama, whichever). Over time, the Overton window gets shoved further and further right.

It’s the same phenomenon where if a movie crowd scene contains 17% women, men perceive it as 50-50. If a woman speaks up in a class discussion more than 15% of the time, she’s perceived as dominating it. https://thenoosphere.substack.com/p/why-even-a-few-women-at-the-top-feels

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

All the book banning where I live is on the right-wing side, and man do these snowflakes love to ban books. As for literary fiction, it’s become a woman-dominated art form. You’d have to convince me that’s the result of some DEI vendetta and not simply supply and demand. Men just don’t read as much, and they don’t seem to be writing as much. On the other hand gaming, which is itself a vital art form, is dominated by men.

I live in a deep blue area and here the banning is mostly from the blue end.

And actually, just to be clear, I agree with you. But what I am saying is that you are fighting a war of perception here, and so long as people think that Trump is just correcting excesses, and not engaging in authoritarianism, this is going to be met with a collective shrug.

No one believes the "excesses" lie. It's just what they say with a wink when they get caught. Look at the direct quote in the OP.
Bigotry is explicitly the goal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

All the book banning where I live is on the right-wing side, and man do these snowflakes love to ban books. As for literary fiction, it’s become a woman-dominated art form. You’d have to convince me that’s the result of some DEI vendetta and not simply supply and demand. Men just don’t read as much, and they don’t seem to be writing as much. On the other hand gaming, which is itself a vital art form, is dominated by men.

I live in a deep blue area and here the banning is mostly from the blue end.

And actually, just to be clear, I agree with you. But what I am saying is that you are fighting a war of perception here, and so long as people think that Trump is just correcting excesses, and not engaging in authoritarianism, this is going to be met with a collective shrug.

I’m also from a deep blue area, and other than some discomfort about the casual use of racist terms in Huck Finn (part of what Twain was going for to prove his larger point btw), not really sure what “book banning” you are seeing.

DP

Do they even teach Huck Finn anymore? Heck, I'm not even sure that kids today have to read Gatsby. In DCPS I think they replaced Gatsby with the Autobiography of Malcolm X. They barely read any fiction at all.

It seems to me that, us adults, are arguing based on our own out of date experiences. But we're no longer talking about whether the Awakening is a worthwhile addition. It's now whether there is any value at all in pre-21st century fiction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

You are good with "authoritarian rule" Ie dictator King don?

[Anonymous]

Also FWIW while not a man, recent pulitzer prize winner, Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver highlights the plight of impoverished white folks in Appalachia in the context of drug addiction.

[Anonymous]

While we are at it, we can also highlight Anthony Doer, pulitzer prize winning writer of the beautiful WWII novel, All the Light We Cannot See, and more recently, Cloud. Cuck Coo. Land.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You guys can scream and shout about how publishing isn’t discriminatory against white men, religious people, straight people, etc all you want. You might even be telling the truth and of course it is nuanced. The world of high literary fiction is different than the world of romantasy which is different from short story, etc. I suspect that the actual story is a lot more complex and nuanced.

But the point is that perception matters here, and the perception is that education, libraries, and publishing have swung to the far left. So, many voters won’t see these actions as authoritarian. They’ll see them as correcting the excesses of the past decade. I do not agree with this myself, I am just saying what I think a lot of people think now.

Essentially this: if you or someone adjacent to you lobbied for books to be banned or restricted because they were allegedly hateful, or if you favored excluding authors based on identity, you don’t have a lot of ground to stand on as far as complaining about authoritarianism. You had a chance to stand up for free speech and you didn’t take it.

All the book banning where I live is on the right-wing side, and man do these snowflakes love to ban books. As for literary fiction, it’s become a woman-dominated art form. You’d have to convince me that’s the result of some DEI vendetta and not simply supply and demand. Men just don’t read as much, and they don’t seem to be writing as much. On the other hand gaming, which is itself a vital art form, is dominated by men.

I live in a deep blue area and here the banning is mostly from the blue end.

And actually, just to be clear, I agree with you. But what I am saying is that you are fighting a war of perception here, and so long as people think that Trump is just correcting excesses, and not engaging in authoritarianism, this is going to be met with a collective shrug.

I’m also from a deep blue area, and other than some discomfort about the casual use of racist terms in Huck Finn (part of what Twain was going for to prove his larger point btw), not really sure what “book banning” you are seeing.

DP

Do they even teach Huck Finn anymore? Heck, I'm not even sure that kids today have to read Gatsby. In DCPS I think they replaced Gatsby with the Autobiography of Malcolm X. They barely read any fiction at all.

It seems to me that, us adults, are arguing based on our own out of date experiences. But we're no longer talking about whether the Awakening is a worthwhile addition. It's now whether there is any value at all in pre-21st century fiction.

Agree. But we're actually two generations behind. There was what children were learning in school from the Aughts and Teens and what kids today are learning in school, from the Teens and Twenties. Very few books at all, and nearly all are modern and have an specific agenda, usually LGBT or POC or both.

We're all fighting battles that not only have already been won years ago, no one even remembers them anymore.

[Anonymous]

I live in a deep blue area and here the banning is mostly from the blue end.

Big difference from book banning and keeping inappropriate books out of school libraries that serve minors.

There are plenty of good,, solid books for kids without putting in graphic novels of sexual activity.

No one is keeping those books from being published or sold. You are free to purchase them for your children, if you wish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fwiw, it is not just writing, although it can definitely be seen there. In music, there are no new white male conductors in the US or Europe, and spots for new white male musicians in orchestras and symphonies are non-existent.

I don't think this administration will, is capable of, fixing this. But at least they noticed it's a problem.

A lot of orchestras have switched to blind auditions, so I’m not sure what point you are tying to prove exactly. That without affirmative action, white men aren’t getting the spots they used to get and presumptions of superiority they used to get simply by virtue of being white? Not quite the “problem” you are making it out to be.

Principals are selected by committee, not blind audition.

Locking white men out of the arts was fine on January 19th, supported by everyone. Now it is not.

It's hard enough to be an artist. We should support all them, not just POC LGBTQIA+, and women artists.

L

Kind of weird to assume that white guys are being disadvantaged because they are no longer the de facto winner in every competition. People who aren’t straight white males can also be capable leaders and have the sort of star power that excites donors and sells tickets. Everyone there has the chops.

Just because white guys used to systematically exclude everyone who wasn’t a white guy from consideration doesn’t mean people are getting even. But I could understand how equality might feel like oppression when you’re used to privilege.