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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃

@ryanmcgreal.bsky.social
1.8K followers 5K following 1.4K posts

Solvitur ambulando. Off course but constantly correcting. One of Penny’s favourite scent clouds. (he/him)

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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
“We meet again, Trebek”
Mural of Jeopardy host Alex Trebek on the wall of Sudbury High School, which he attended while growing up in Canada.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Breënter Breunite Breconcile
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Toronto skyline across Lake Ontario from Vineland Station
Photo of the Toronto skyline with the distinctive shape of the CN Tower. The sky is dusk with a few scattered clouds and Lake Ontario is dark blue.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
The world is watching. But we’re no longer waiting passively for a few tens of thousands of American swing voters to save us. quandyfactory.com/blog/297/the...
quandyfactory.com
The World is Done Waiting For America to Return - Ryan McGreal
Personal website for Ryan McGreal
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
For the first time in the postwar era, countries that have been invested in the international system now regard the US not as the pillar that holds the system up but rather as a strategic risk to hedge against. A fundamental shift has been set in motion that will play out over the coming decades.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Andy Burnham after hearing Ursula von der Leyen announce that a the European Union is willing to accept associate members
Meme of Andy from Parks and Recreation looking excited
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Dipn asserts that it is rationally self-serving for other countries to rush to recognize sovereignty. But his analysis doesn’t apply to the current US president, who would regard the absolute chaos that would ensue from him recognizing a secession in Alberta or Québec as a feature, not a bug.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
This is a bracing and informative read from Stéphane Dion on the legal hurdles ahead of any potential secession from Canada. www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/arti...
theglobeandmail.com
Opinion: Here’s what it would take for a province to lawfully separate from Canada
Canada may be an outlier in allowing for provinces to secede, but there’s no right to leave unilaterally
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
“Under current global policies, Canada warms five degrees above preindustrial levels by century’s end. Under a scenario with no climate policies, warming reaches 6.9 degrees and the area burned by wildfire climbs 287 per cent. Under net zero, warming stabilizes after 2050 and reaches 3.5 degrees.”
theglobeandmail.com
Ottawa issues comprehensive climate report that reflects country’s physical transformation
From retreating glaciers to wildfires and marine heat waves, climate change will likely become even more pronounced, assessment finds
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
With senior Trump administration officials openly calling for the breakup of Canada, a couple of thoughts: 1) This may well have the effect of suppressing sovereigntist sentiment in Quebec; and 2) It supports my contention that most Alberta separatists are just wannabe Americans in drag.
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Reposted by Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃
ValeMB @valpmb.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
🧵
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Enshittification is what happens when a relationship ceases to be reciprocal but retains enough dependency that the exploited party can’t easily leave. In this sense, it’s a general theory of what happens to relationships under asymmetric power.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
My proposal is that the economic dynamics which repeatedly produce enshittificatory business models are quite analogous to the psychological dynamics in a person with narcissistic personality disorder, which repeatedly produce abusive relationships.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
The narcissist uses psychological manipulation techniques to keep you trapped, feeling guilty, feeling locked in, feeling powerless to assert your own value and walk away. Exactly like enshittification.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
In an abusive relationship with a narcissist, the narcissist’s objective is to make the relationship as lucrative for them - and as immiserating for you - as possible without you actually leaving. Exactly like enshittification.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
But in an enshittified relationship, the benefit flows almost entirely in one direction, as the more powerful, selfish and shameless entity does everything it can to manipulate, abuse and take advantage of the captive user community.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
In a healthy business relationship, much like a healthy personal relationship, it is mutually fulfilling and mutually beneficial.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
The trap. You are locked into an abusive relationship, desperate to escape but feeling like you have no recourse. By the end, the relationship has become purely instrumental and exploitive, with you serving as the supply for the service’s insatiable incentive to extract ever more value from you.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Intermittent reinforcement. If you do continue to assert your own value in the face of devaluing and gaslighting, the service will calibrate its behaviour to retain you by offering just enough intermittent reinforcement to keep you locked in.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Blame-shifting. When you start to notice that you are being exploited, the service twists reality and tries to make you feel guilty about having unrealistic expectations.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Devaluing. Once you’re locked in, the service starts ratcheting back the value it provides to you, shifting its focus to extract ever-increasing value from you. Exploitation. The relationship becomes increasingly one-sided as the service feeds off your attention and labour.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Consider the parallels: Idealization and love bombing. At first, the company woos you with great service and support, almost too good to be true. Attachment. You pour your time, energy and resources into the service, locking in and becoming dependent on it.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
🧵 Something occurred to me this morning: the natural history of enshittification as @doctorow.pluralistic.net describes it closely resembles the pattern of a relationship with someone who has narcissistic personality disorder.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
Most pundits severely underestimate the cumulative effect of four years in which the Democratic Party was led by someone who rapidly lost the capacity to communicate or defend the party’s principles and values.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
I’m not sure Democrats really appreciate just how fundamental this rupture is for Canadians. We know in our guts that we’re never more than 60,000 voters in a handful of swing states away from becoming the next President’s punching bag. I don’t think we’re ever going back to the way things were.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
It’s good to have a good go-to breakfast! I don’t have a microwave so oatmeal involves admittedly a pretty modest amount of work to bring a pot of water to a boil, add oats, simmer, etc. But overnight oats are so much better! 30 seconds of work after dinner and tomorrow’s breakfast is made.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Does everyone else already know about overnight oats and I’m just woefully late to the party? This is the best thing to happen to breakfast on as long as I can remember!
Photo of two mason jars in a refrigerator. The jars are partially full and contain quick oats, oat milk, hemp hearts and blueberries.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
The air quality in the B.C. interior is apocalyptic right now. We just drove through Salmon Arm and the AQI hit 570, which is literally higher than the scale goes.
Photo of dead trees in front of a ridge through a smoky hazePhoto of dead trees in front of a ridge through a smoky haze
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
I wonder what she would think about the enormous enduring legacy of her novels.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
As horrifying as WWII was, its end inaugurated an historic era of cooperation and goodwill among a group of countries that had been at war more or less continuously for centuries. Injustice, inequity and oppression certainly didn’t end, but the countervailing forces of justice made real progress.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 22/07/2026
From time to time I like to read The Second Coming by Yeats to cheer me up. It comforts me somehow to know that the state of affairs felt just as disjointed and irreparable in 1919 as they do in 2026. They were able to persist through it, and we can too.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
Every dollar we spend building new fossil fuel infrastructure is a triple -hit on the future: it directly increases our rate of greenhouse gas emissions, it commits more capital into continued fossil fuel extraction, and it displaces investment from non-emitting energy systems.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
“Canada’s area burned has surged, and it has surged in step with warming: hot, dry fire seasons burn far more forest, with area burned rises roughly 80% for each 1C increase in fire-season temp.This relationship is robust to a variety of statistical tests and controlling for confounding variables.”
theclimatebrink.com
Canada's boreal wildfires aren't just bad forest management
Higher fire season temperatures are strongly correlated with increased area burned
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 20/07/2026
Today’s reminder that wars are really easy to start and really hard to end www.washingtonpost.com/national-sec...
washingtonpost.com
U.S. teeters on all-out war with Iran after more troops are killed
A service member was killed in action in Iraq, and another set of unidentified remains was found at the site of an Iranian missile attack in Jordan, U.S. Central Command said.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 18/07/2026
The sun is super eerie right now #hamont
Photo of a tall building, looking hazy. To the Lowe right behind the building, the low-hanging sun is a deep blotchy orange red
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Reposted by Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃
Angry @angrystaffer.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
For everyone hyping up Trump’s speech tonight like it’s going to be some kind of revolutionary proof of election fraud: Why is he saying it on national television and not to a grand jury? Why has nobody been charged with anything? Should be a slam dunk case, right?
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
It’s so much worse than that. We always knew exactly why public health was monitoring infectious parasites. The Trump administration simply decided they don’t think the federal government has a role to protect people’s health.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
Deer at the foot of the Dundurn Stairs #hamont
Photo of a young deer standing on a path among the dense green leaves of deciduous trees in a northern Carolinian forest along the Niagara Escarpment
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
Lovely view of downtown #hamont
Overlooking downtown Hamilton from the top of the escarpment
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 16/07/2026
A whole Hamilton Spectator article about the historically poor air quality in Hamilton due to wildfires and not a single word about global warming or climate change. #hamont
Photo of the Hamilton Spectator article “Hazy smoke disrupts city’s air quality” by Annaliese Gumboc, published on July 16, 2026.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
Sun’s out
Photo of the sky above downtown Hamilton, ON. The sky is greige and the sun is a hazy pink dot.
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Reposted by Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃
Frances @frances2023.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
Ontario election dates should be legislated to be held in "wildfire season", not February
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
Well, Canada’s climate policy is certainly tuned to a dead channel.
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Reposted by Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃
Martin Z.ombie @pxtl.ca · 15/07/2026
The sky above the port was the color of an IBM 5155 after a video card crash.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
We are failing to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, we are at this very moment approving massive public investment plans that will further increase our emissions. What is the value of economic growth when the planet becomes uninhabitable?
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
This isn’t normal. It’s happening because of global warming, which is caused by the massive quantities of heat-trapping gases that humans continue to pour into the atmosphere.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
The sky is greige and the air pollution index is almost as high as the scale goes. We are breathing smoke from massive wildfires hundreds of km away, damaging our cardiovascular systems and lungs. Are we going to allow this to become normalized, something to shrug off as an expected part of summer?
Ontario Air Quality Index for downtown Hamilton at 11:00 AM on July 15, 2026. Current index is 10, meaning very high air pollution.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
I’m reminded of the British navy discovering what causes scurvy and how to prevent it, then implementing a health policy, then forgetting the policy and letting scurvy come back. Except it took them decades to forget what they knew and it only took America about a year.
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Ryan McGhoul 👻💀🎃 @ryanmcgreal.bsky.social · 13/07/2026
The folks who brought you new screwworm and Ebola outbreaks have just released another banger: severe explosive diarrhoea caused by Cyclospora, a microscopic parasite that the genius running the US Health Department stopped monitoring a little over a year ago.
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