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DISASTER X

@disasterx.substack.com
38 followers 64 following 142 posts

Anthropology of cinema, with a focus on how Hollywood imagines/images pandemics. Also interested in the national security state, rule by permanent emergency, and authoritarianism.

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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 17/05/2026
Students asked what the apocalypse might look like. I always answered: "You should know. You are living it". To be more exact, we have had three large apocalyptic stages: (1) the development of cities and states; (2) the industrial revolution; and, (3) WWII. We are well into the post-apocalypse.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 17/05/2026
HYPOCRISY is so constant and ubiquitous, that one has to wonder whether it is just present in our culture, or is instead one of the foundations of "Western culture" and "Western civilization". I have encountered no other culture where hypocrisy is the norm, so routine as ours. #anthropology
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 16/05/2026
Note to academics: when speaking of capitalism, remember to automatically call it "neoliberalism" (or don't get published). Also, assume everything is "resistance" to "neoliberalism". Finally, never define anything. #anthropology
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 26/02/2026
Blocked again on X, just for saying that the only regret that Ilhan Omar should entertain is not having pelted a hammer at Trump's head.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 18/01/2026
If a #CivilWar breaks out in the US, the US dollar will be virtually worthless in the US itself. Americans would be wise to start stockpiling Canadian dollars, before it's too late.
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The New York Times @nytimes.com · 14/01/2026
Breaking News: China announced the world’s largest trade surplus ever, almost $1.2 trillion in 2025, as its exports flooded global markets.
nyti.ms
China’s Trade Surplus Surged 20 Percent to New Highs
A currency kept weak to help Chinese factories, combined with faltering consumer spending, propelled exports, while a campaign for self-sufficiency limited imports.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 13/01/2026
The only value in this story is this: DON'T BE A COMPLIANT LITTLE IDIOT LIKE THIS GUY. It's amazing how yielding everyone is, as if made of gelatin. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
newyorker.com
How My Reporting on the Columbia Protests Led to My Deportation
As an Australian who wrote about the demonstrations while on campus, I gave my phone a superficial clean before flying to the U.S. I underestimated what I was up against.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 12/01/2026
One of the disastrous, enduring impacts of Covid is that it further taught people to be fearful of the authorities and to be numbed into paralysis. As a result, Americans are not really fighting back against #ICE or #Trump like one might expect from a serious opposition.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 11/01/2026
Remember when all the US-based #Venezuela war lobbyists all proclaimed that "once Maduro is gone, the whole regime will crumble"? That didn't happen. Also, oil companies are not rushing in to "take" the oil. And now Americans are being warned to leave immediately. Not what "victory" looks like.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 10/01/2026
For those of you with accounts in Telegram (gutter that it is for neo-Nazis and assorted right wing lunatics...much like X), I have started a new channel: ANTHROPOLOGY against FASCISM & EMPIRE t.me/anthro_again... #anthropology
t.me
ANTHROPOLOGY against FASCISM and EMPIRE
Anthropological confrontation with the premises of imperial nationalisms, fascism, militarization, totalitarianism, and dictatorship.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 10/01/2026
#Trump seeking to monopolize #oil is increasingly looking like senile imperialism--just a little short of: "I've cornered the market on horse-drawn carriages!". Between coal and oil, he's stuck in the past. www.cnn.com/2026/01/08/c...
cnn.com
Trump wants to own Venezuela’s oil, but its largest oil customer is speeding toward clean energy | CNN
Energy experts say the US and China are diverging on the energy transition, with China sprinting far ahead on renewables and EVs, while the US doubles down on drilling oil at home and abroad.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 09/01/2026
Locked out of Twitter/X for a whole week now, starting today. It was based on the flimsiest of algorithmic logic, a product of calculated hysteria and intentional miscomprehension. That truly is the platform of fascist totalitarians, a mere version of Truth Social now.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 06/01/2026
Remember when you all dutifully quoted that "genius," David Harvey? The same one who argued that "the age of #imperialism is over" and event went into "reverse"? #Trump and #Venezuela proved him wrong. urpe.org/2018/01/11/a...
urpe.org
A Critique of David Harvey on Imperialism
By John Smith, David Harvey, author of The New Imperialism and other acclaimed books on capitalism and Marxist political economy, not only believes that the age of imperialism is over, he thinks it h...
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 06/01/2026
The failure of @concordia.ca to recognize, support, or validate years of research and teaching on imperialism, and on building a specifically Canadian #anthropology, now comes at a high cost...to the institution, its faculty, and especially to students. Enforced blindness and active marginalization.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 06/01/2026
As for #anthropology in North America, talk about imperialism was mostly shunned, unless it was reduced entirely to US militarism and nothing more. An entire superstructure was built to prevent people from thinking the thoughts and having the ideas that they desperately need today to confront #MAGA
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 06/01/2026
Canadians really are slow to wake up, it has to be said. Now I imagine everyone @Concordia is claiming their courses are "all about empire and imperialism," using the most tenuous and highly theoretical of arguments to draw links that their students will never follow.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 06/01/2026
For 20 years I taught courses explicitly about imperialism @Concordia, advocating for a Canadian #anthropology. The reward? Total marginalization, relegated to the status of fringe academic. Now everyone in Canada is talking about imperialism, and defending Canadian sovereignty.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 03/01/2026
Seeing Caribbean people cheering #Trump's attack against #Venezuela is a depressing reminder of how people schooled in the periphery think as if they are mentally American. The same is true in Canada for that matter. Laughing as the bully/massa beats one of your own to death.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 03/01/2026
If actually "convicted" in US courts, watch as the next Democrat in the White House will refuse to "pardon" Maduro. Book it. The Democrats are the fakest opposition to #Trump. #Venezuela
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 03/01/2026
Only one goal can suffice now: the total destruction of #Trump and his MAGA. The US is a criminal, terrorist, and imperialist regime, and people in #Venezuela suffer because of Trump's attempt at global dictatorship.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 03/01/2026
I never again want to hear #MAGA imperialists airing their gripes about imaginary "globalists" and the threat they supposedly pose. The only real threat is MAGA, and #Venezuela is the last word on that subject.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 03/01/2026
"TANGO RINASCITA" ("Tango Rebirth," in Italian) Music by the Paris-based Argentinian band, Gotan Project. I have not been enchanted by a video this much, in a long time. This shows some of the best of humanity, when creolization is allowed to happen. #anthropology
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 25/11/2025
Be careful when watching ANNIVERSARY. Here's why. See the full article at hollywoodfiles.substack.com/p/the-change... #Hollywood #democracy #anthropology
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 25/11/2025
Commercial of "The Change" as shown in ANNIVERSARY (2025). You can find similar motifs in MAGA campaign ads, and in Obama campaign ads. hollywoodfiles.substack.com/p/the-change... #Hollywood #anthropology
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 25/11/2025
Allegedly non-partisan and non-ideological, "The Change" renders *the state* the ultimate party. This is how class dictatorship will be sold to an unsuspecting, desperate America. Video clip from ANNIVERSARY (2025) Full article at hollywoodfiles.substack.com/p/the-change...
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 25/11/2025
Clean, cheerful, upbeat, and seemingly non-ideological and non-partisan: the new face of totalitarianism in the USA. Video clip from ANNIVERSARY (2025) #Hollywood #anthropology #totalitarianism
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 25/11/2025
Review of ANNIVERSARY (2025), a film that speaks to our fall back into totalitarianism. The US right now is very vulnerable to the emergence of a movement like "The Change," as all alternatives seem to have collapsed. See: disasterx.substack.com/p/the-change... #Hollywood #anthropology
disasterx.substack.com
The Change You Might Never Want
ANNIVERSARY (2025) is a powerful film for our fall back into totalitarian systems
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 17/11/2025
Whatever "Western culture" or "Western civilization" might be--if it even exists--it is something that the WORLD helped to make. We learned at least that much from the first generation of post-colonial studies in the 1990s. #anthropology
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 17/11/2025
Which is why junior--if he believed this--would now be telling his father NOT to remove those tariffs on hundreds of items. They are such a "success" after all, right? Also: they did not read the full paper, which details how tariffs increase unemployment and drops in production.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 17/11/2025
Did DeSantis ban #anthropology too? Because if he knew any, he might not be making the ignorant assumption that cultures thrive in isolation only. "Western culture" would never have been born in the cross-cultural Mediterranean crucible, had isolation been the norm. x.com/RonDeSantis/...
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 09/11/2025
It's astounding what a cesspit of suppression plus selective right-wing boosting that X has become. Even Grok says the suppression is worse now and the platform is degraded compared to pre-Musk Twitter.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 29/10/2025
When the #Trump regime tells media that #Venezuela "may" be attacked within "the coming weeks," it's the typical Trump head fake. That means the attack *will* be in *the next few days*. Trump is a perverse ghoul, so watch for an attack on Halloween night.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 29/10/2025
Asserting that its forces will attack "drug labs" in #Venezuela, when #Trump has linked to the entire state to drug trafficking, means they will attack all kinds of political targets and then retroactively call them "drug labs".
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 29/10/2025
Typical US propaganda ploys here: robing yourself in borrowed "innocence," to look "humanitarian". The US military has a history of visual imperialism where it casts itself as the global father, doctor, baby sitter, and chief. #Venezuela #Trinidad #TrinidadandTobago #anthropology #imperialism
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Robert Reich @rbreich.bsky.social · 25/10/2025
The richest man on earth owns X. The second richest man on earth is about to acquire TikTok and his family could soon own both Paramount and Warner Bros. The third richest man owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. The fourth richest man owns The Washington Post. See the problem here?
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Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 25/10/2025
The president announces an arbitrary price hike on Americans because his feelings are hurt by an ad accurately quoting Ronald Reagan’s criticism of tariffs
Canada was caught, red handed, putting up a fraudulent advertisement on Ronald Reagan’s Speech on Tariffs. The Reagan Foundation said that they, “created an ad campaign using selective audio and video of President Ronald Reagan. The ad misrepresents the Presidential Radio Address,” and “did not seek nor receive permission to use and edit the remarks. The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute is reviewing its legal options in this matter.” The sole purpose of this FRAUD was Canada’s hope that the United States Supreme Court will come to their “rescue” on Tariffs that they have used for years to hurt the United States. Now the United States is able to defend itself against high and overbearing Canadian Tariffs (and those from the rest of the World as well!). Ronald Reagan LOVED Tariffs for purposes of National Security and the Economy, but Canada said he didn’t! Their Advertisement was to be taken down, IMMEDIATELY, but they let it run last night during the World Series, knowing that it was a FRAUD. Because of their serious misrepresentation of the facts, and hostile act, I am increasing the Tariff on Canada by 10% over and above what they are paying now. Thank you for your attention to this matter!
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The Tennessee Holler @thetnholler.bsky.social · 26/10/2025
Congress basically doesn’t exist at this point
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 26/10/2025
It's now three times that my account on #Twitter has been locked. I have never seen this degree of censorship before. What an awful, hypocritical platform, run to uphold the official delusions of a tyrant.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 23/10/2025
#Trump's signature areas for 2025: * War * Corruption * Domestic militarization * Building dictatorship * Invented emergencies * Higher costs of living #MAGA voted for this. MAGA will be held responsible for all of it.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 22/10/2025
Everybody is talking about everything except the fact that we are on the eve of a monumental new #war, this one by #Trump against #Venezuela. That war will not be contained and will become regional. People in #TrinidadandTobago should take cover.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 21/10/2025
First #TrinidadandTobago agrees to support US military intervention in the #Caribbean, and then #Belize agrees to host deportees from the US. What a terrible, squalid time this region is experiencing, with pliant and corrupt leaders who ignore their own people's interests.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 21/10/2025
I would like to know how much #Trump is paying #Belize to keep people deported from the US. Who provides the shelter, food, and obviously security (since they are to be held against their will, in a country they have never been in before).
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 21/10/2025
#CostaRica ordered that all migrants deported there from the US had to be released, as they were being detained illegally & in violation of their human rights. That failed, so #Trump's stupid #MAGA imperialists went sniffing after #Belize as a substitute. www.bbc.com/news/article...
bbc.com
Costa Rican court orders release of migrants deported from US
The migrants were deported to Costa Rica in February after the two countries struck a deal.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 21/10/2025
Just insane. #Belize has signed a "Safe Third Country Agreement" with the #Trump regime, so migrants in the US can be deported...to a country that can't feed or house them, and where they will be detained illegally. www.breakingbelizenews.com/2025/10/19/b...
breakingbelizenews.com
Belize set to become a “Safe Third Country” under new US agreement
Belize is preparing to enter into an agreement with the United States to serve as a “Safe Third Country” for asylum seekers, a move that has stirred national discussion and raised questions about migration policy and capacity. The announcement came from Minister of Foreign Affairs Francis Fonseca, who detailed the government’s position and safeguards included in the draft agreement.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 16/10/2025
If I were to ever teach a university course again, of my own design, it would be titled: THE FREEDOM TO CHOOSE. It would be all about agency, ethics, (ir)rationality, and trying to learn what makes you a human individual.
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 16/10/2025
A key insight, that I wish I had learned long ago: ***If it's a difficult choice, it's the wrong choice.*** That applies to almost everything: buying a house; marriage; choice of subject area in university; I have an almost endless list of examples.
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Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 10/10/2025
“Stabilizing Argentina is ‘America First’.” 🇦🇷 🇺🇸
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Santiago Mayer @santiagomayer.com · 10/10/2025
History has taught us that Americans will tolerate government overreach when the economy is good. The question now is: will they tolerate fascism while eggs are $8, healthcare costs go up, and no one can get a job?
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Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 10/10/2025
The campaign against “antifa” is about establishing a beachhead for further attacks on speech and assembly rights. We see that today in the effort to preemptively label No Kings protesters as “terrorists.”
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DISASTER X @disasterx.substack.com · 10/10/2025
Does Everybody Hate Free Speech? Perhaps the experiment with democracy has reached its limits. disasterx.substack.com/p/does-every... #FreeSpeech #democracy #totalitarianism
disasterx.substack.com
Does Everybody Hate Free Speech?
Perhaps the experiment with democracy has reached its limits
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