iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Anil Dash @anildash.com · 03/10/2026

Just bumping into this again with people _reflexively_ using the word "grape" or a 🍇 emoji and not even realizing they're doing it. It's all part of the same system, where the men running these companies make platforms that don't even let people accurately describe the crimes that they enable.

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Sam Thielmonster @samthielman.com · 02/10/2026

looks a lot like the name getting thrown around by Michael Tracey etc as the Jane Doe in the Cornell 7 case is the wrong person, but the Pervert Squad has decided to ruin that girl's life just in case and her selfies are now everywhere on Twitter since she's pretty and seems confident

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Taniel @taniel.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

NEW: It's that time of year: time to launch my annual guide to November's elections! I guide you through over *650* interesting elections, & why they matter. Judges, AGs, govs, mayors, lawmakers, AGs, county & school boards—plus many (many) ballot measures. Oh, & Congress. Explore & bookmark!

boltsmag.org

Your Cheat Sheet to the 2026 General Elections - Bolts

Congressional races will take center stage on Nov. 3, but they’re just the tip of what to watch. Prosecutors and governors, attorneys general and sheriffs, school boards and mayors, utility... Read Mo...

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Mike Finger @mikefinger.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Just asked Victor Wembanyama if he’d ever consider promoting a sports betting company. “Absolutely not. I will never do that. Honestly, I think it's very sad to see some players promote it. .. Everybody does whatever they want, but without me.”

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Nixon was pardoned already. This is an effort to rehabilitate him as the victim, and his investigators as villains.

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Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

"with Claude, we will no longer need lightly stoned weirdos who work at record stores because they are neurodivergent as hell and some band you've never heard of but is about to change your life is their special interest" these tech bros really hate anyone who was cooler than them in high school

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Kat Abughazaleh @katmabu.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

A man replied to this saying in earnest that women need to get organized and fight for our rights and men will follow. We did that. We do that. We mobilized the largest single day protest in global history on every continent and yet I have fewer rights than my mom did at my age.

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Truthout @truthout.org · 29/09/2026

An NFL official reportedly threatened to remove Houston Texans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair from his game earlier this month unless he removed his memorial for an 8-year-old Palestinian girl killed by Israel in Gaza.

truthout.org

NFL Threatened to Ban Player From Game for Honoring Slain Palestinian Girl

Texans linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair wrote Wafaa Akila, the name of an 8-year-old girl killed by Israel, on his face tape.

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kottke.org @kottke.org · 29/09/2026

Whoa, for the 50th anniversary of Songs in the Key of Life, Stevie Wonder has released four additional songs from that recording session. “We didn’t add these songs to the album, but they were part of what I was feeling and discovering as we made it.” [pitchfork.com]

pitchfork.com

Stevie Wonder Unvaults Four Songs in the Key of Life Tracks

“We didn’t add these songs to the album, but they were part of what I was feeling and discovering as we made it,” says Wonder

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Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 27/09/2026

Women trying to succeed in Silicon Valley AI and effective altruist spaces are reporting feeling serious social pressure to attend sex parties - where people have reported being sexually assaulted, like below. Events like Aella’s “Slutcon,” which is happening again this weekend.

Ann Pierce
@itsannpierce
20h
I am disheartened by this as well. I already lost a bunch of followers for agreeing with @tautologer, but it's saddening to see local nerdy women being caricatured as Karen-like outsiders and getting pushed out of the scene. This is exactly why you hear so few concrete, names-attached stories of sexual harrassment and assault. I'm told there is a history of discrediting these because the "slut normalization" thing is top priority and these stories get inconveniently in the way of spreading this ideology.
I got roped into attending last year's Saturday Slutcon party because so many local and out-of-town friends were there (to echo sentiments @tautologer expressed about "slut events becoming central to the larger scenes). Mostly I hung out with people I knew and that was great. But in the course of my 3-ish hours there, there were 2 times my "no" was not accepted by a man I didn't know, and I was physically pushing a huge guy off of me who was rubbing his penis on me, who continued to do it despite my physical force against him, and after I finally wriggled away from him, told him I wanted to dance alone etc., he came back and did it again.
This was scary and bad, but it didn't even cross my mind to report this because one of the other people who didn't accept my "no" earlier in the night was the bartender (an officially sanctioned authority at the event), and I knew the event was organized exclusively by women into CNC (who are vocal about how rapey behavior turns them on), so I figured this sort of thing would just get me laughed at. And anyway, I heard there were a lot of other incidents like it. Later though, someone encouraged me to report this story to the organizers, and despite my embarrassment I did, so *they know* that this and other incidents happened. This is why they cut the Saturday night party this year and created a larger training program for the flirt girls - *because* of things like this last year. Yet the narrative bein…

People who haven't been to Slutcon are saying "it's just group therapy," "it's just innocent flirting." But the environment is much like a sex party in that many people are nude, there is making out and sex acts happening out in the open. I think it's pretty unreasonable to expect that every nerdy girl who likes rationalist bloggers or is into EA/AI safety should automatically be comfortable with this! That if she's not, there's something wrong with her, we don't want her in our scenes, etc.
Not to mention, it's explictly an event *for men*, where men are the clients and the "flirt girls" are the product. Last year I overheard an exchange where a man felt "led on" by a flirt girl and was trying to get her punished/kicked out. (A dynamic that seems inevitable in this context!)
Anyway- it does sound like they've upped their consent education a lot this year, are more organized, and that's good! As I've told my friends who are attending: I hope they have fun!
I heard several accounts last year of women who had no problems and really enjoyed the event. That's great!
Just... can we live in reality about this? There are real reasons why male-female sexual dynamics are tricky.
Encouraging autistic men who can't yet read body language to go around asking to see womens' boobs is maybe a bit ill-advised. Maybe not everyone should be/identify as a slut; maybe it's not for everyone.
And yeah, filtering the Bay Area Al safety scene down to only women who are super comfy with this eliminates *most* women - including many of the really smart, nerdy, weird women who've been in the larger scenes for years. What a loss for humanity.
I absolutely understand why people with a minority sexuality would want to create belonging, would want to create spaces for people like themselves. But why do it like this/at this cost?

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Roger Parloff @rparloff.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

When Trump launched “the largest deportation operation in the history of our country” without ICE facilities to accommodate it, inhumane overcrowding was inevitable. Judge Kaplan’s 9/24 ruling shows the results. Diagrams simulating a NYC holding cell in Aug 2025 look like slave ships. 1/5

Hold Room 1(820.78 sq. ft.)
With 87 people
(out of 193 people total)
Lying Down/Sitting
Diagram showing the largest tenth-floor hold room containing eighty-seven detainees in which each rectangle represents one lying-down detainee with the average height and shoulder width of an adult man and each circle represents one sitting-down detainee with the average shoulder width of an adult man. PX303, Ex. 1.

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Paris Marx @parismarx.com · 25/09/2026

An individual in Canada used ChatGPT for eight months to plan one of the country’s worst mass shootings. Yet, if you listen to politicians and media, the real threat of AI is a fantastical scenario where it might wipe out humans in ten years. They need to stop getting fooled by tech deceivers.

disconnect.blog

The media has the AI threat all wrong

Generative AI is harming people today. We don’t need to waste time fantasizing about science fictional scenarios.

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Scott Horton @robertscotthorton.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

She was an FBI agent. She started an investigation of the murder of Renee Good. Trump forced her to reclassify it as an ICE agent assault. She was then forced to resign. Her evidence confirms that a cover-up of the homicide has been undertaken, directed from the highest levels.

cnn.com

FBI agent who initially investigated fatal ICE shooting in Minneapolis has resigned | CNN Politics

The FBI agent who initially began working with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to investigate the fatal ICE shooting of Renee Good has resigned from the bureau, two sources familiar with...

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Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 22/09/2026

Back in 2023, deep-pocketed Effective Altruist funders launched a remarkably successful takeover of DC tech policy: today we're seeing the results in the form of "AI safety efforts tightly focused on distant existential doom, not AI taking jobs, scamming people, or harming the environment today."

politico.com

How a billionaire-backed network of AI advisers took over Washington

A sprawling network spread across Congress, federal agencies and think tanks is pushing policymakers to put AI apocalypse at the top of the agenda — potentially boxing out other worries and benefiting...

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Dave Karpf @davekarpf.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

NYT tech reporter sings the praises of Meta Muse. It can do everything for you! Even set your fantasy football lineups! My dude... you know that's called "cognitive surrender," right? www.nytimes.com/2026/09/22/t...

"To test Muse, I experimented with it nonstop for two weeks... I had it perform dozens of day-to-day tasks, including (...) setting my fantasy football lineups."

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Taniel @taniel.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

In Maryland, just fifty miles from DC, a sheriff has targeted and attacked local immigrants for over twenty years. The harm to those communities is breathtaking. a NEW must-read, just weeks from his latest reelection race... (in a county that Harris won over Trump).

boltsmag.org

“We're Afraid on a Daily Basis”: How a Maryland Sheriff Targeted Immigrants Long Before ICE Raids Spiked - Bolts

Frederick County’s sheriff turned his office into a force multiplier for ICE before such collaboration became commonplace. As he again faces voters this year, the harm to immigrant communities is impo...

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Nick Field @nickfield.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

The State AGs were on pace to kill the Paramount/Warner Bros by litigation and delay until Gavin Newsom stepped in and turned the tide. Now the Trump loyalist Ellisons will control CNN and HBO. Don't ever, ever forget that Newsom stabbed us in the back www.wsj.com/business/med...

wsj.com

Exclusive | Newsom Expresses Concerns About State Antitrust Suit Against Paramount

The California governor has told people involved in the suit that blocking the $81 billion deal could harm Hollywood jobs.

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Zzzach @truckface.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

These were my favorite shows of the aughts. The world needs to know that The Young Offenders and @timbaltz.bsky.social's Shrink are as good as everything else on here. Watch if you haven't!

A list of my favorite TV series of the 2000s, in no particular order. Detroiters; The Young Offenders; Six Feet Under; How to with John Wilson; Sweden's The Bridge; Baskets; Shrink; Arrested Development; I Think You Should Leave; Breaking Bad.

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Nathan Kalman-Lamb @nkalamb.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

ICE abducted a WBB player while she was traveling with her Kentucky State team in early August at Louisville airport. She has been imprisoned for 1.5 months and denied care for a serious ACL injury. It is the responsibility of universities and the NCAA to protect their players. They have failed.

Aminata Seck, 26, a student-athlete at Kentucky State University, was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at the Louisville Muhammad Ali International Airport while traveling with her school's basketball team Aug. 7, said Sadiqa Reynolds, a lawyer helping coordinate Seck's case.

Seck's team was headed to New York for a tournament, and she was taken into custody after going through airport security, said Reynolds, former president and CEO of the Louisville Urban League.

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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

If you're a Dem who thinks you'll gain something by going anti-trans, look at Gallup's "most important problem" and Fox News' "most important issue" polling and see where trans issues rank. Whoever told you going anti-trans is a savvy or necessary move spends too much time on X and should be fired.

Gallup polling. "LGBTQ rights" moves between 0 and 1%.

Fox news polling. Wokeness/transgender issues at 0%.

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Max Kennerly @maxkennerly.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

"This election is about the threat of trans kids" is the worst possible messaging for Dems yet so many candidates are leaning into it. No voter will flip R->D over it. Low-info voters read this as "you're focused on bullshit that doesn't affect me" while the base reads this as "you're an asshole."

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Alvaro M. Bedoya @bedoyausa.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

People think "Hollywood" is rich and famous. The reality? Film and TV is a national industry. It's a blue collar industry. And it is an industry free fall. My latest for @newrepublic.com on how the Paramount merger would crush blue collar workers who can not afford it newrepublic.com/article/2136...

newrepublic.com

There’s a Blue-Collar Hollywood—and the Paramount Merger Will Kill It

Hollywood isn’t all glamour. It’s thousands of line workers. And a Paramount takeover of Warner will make their lives even more precarious.

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Shobita Parthasarathy @shobitap.org · 19/09/2026

Older adults, people with accents, and people with disabilities struggle to be understood by AI agents. This affects their access to health care, transit, and other essential services. This is an existential risk for them. It is happening NOW. And it needs to be regulated.

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jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 18/09/2026

RFK Jr. wants people to get sick. He wants them to get sick and he thinks it is a good thing if they die, since those who live will have "natural immunity" and emerge stronger and fitter.

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Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 18/09/2026

So about that batshit insane AI millenarian Silicon Valley sex cult running much of big tech….from Sonia Joseph: siliconvalleynotes.substack.com/p/agi-cnc-an...

Sonia Joseph y @soniajoseph_
To the journalists contacting me about the AGI consensual non-consensual (cnc) sex parties—
During my twenties in Silicon Valley, I ran among elite tech/Al circles through the community house scene. I have seen some troubling things around social circles of early OpenAl employees, their friends, and adjacent entrepreneurs, which I have not previously spoken about publicly.
It is not my place to speak as to why Jan Leike and the superalignment team resigned. I have no idea why and cannot make any claims.
However, I do believe my cultural observations of the SF Al scene are more broadly relevant to the Al industry.
I don't think events like the consensual non-consensual (cnc) sex parties and heavy LSD use of some elite Al researchers have been good for women. They create a climate that can be very bad for female Al researchers, with broader implications relevant to X-risk and AGI safety. I believe they are somewhat emblematic of broader problems: a coercive climate that normalizes recklessness and crossing boundaries, which we are seeing playing out more broadly in the industry today. Move fast and break things, applied to people.
There is nothing wrong imo with sex parties and heavy LSD use in theory, but combined with the shadow of 100B+ interest groups, leads to some of the most coercive and fucked up social dynamics that I have ever seen. The climate was like a fratty LSD version of 2008 Wall Street bankers, which bodes ill for Al safety.

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Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie @audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app · 18/09/2026

i'm not over Alito saying we shouldn't count ballots that are mailed on or before Election Day but arrive shortly afterwards bc they can “radically flip” the “apparent outcome” cannot stress enough that, until all ballots are counted, there's no outcome to flip! ballsandstrikes.org/scotus/alito...

ballsandstrikes.org

A Brief History of Sam Alito’s Delusional Obsession With Voter Fraud

His conduct in several recent cases suggests that Alito is deep in the right-wing conspiracy theory weeds.

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Adam Bates @abates.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

bro you had one job

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Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 17/09/2026

Great piece by @xriskology.bsky.social on how the effective altruism cult has helped destroy actual philanthropy - with dangerous and deadly results for many people in need:

realtimetechpocalypse.com

Effective Altruism Is a Dangerous Cult — Here's Why

Understanding the "Scientology of Silicon Valley." (7,700 words)

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Alex Winter @alexwinter.com · 17/09/2026

AP News: "Building damaged by strikes collapses in Gaza, killing 21, as perilous living conditions persist." The conditions in Gaza are dire for the displaced civilians. They rely on donations to survive. Please give to my dear friend and her family. And to others. 🙏   chuffed.org/project/1981...

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Gillian Branstetter @gbbranstetter.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

I don't think people really understand the psychic impact of knowing that multiple times a day every day your friends, family, coworkers, neighbors, and everyone who could ever have any power over you is being flooded with agitprop designed to make them hate you

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Puff the Magic Hater @mskellymhayes.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Google is killing journalism: "At Truthout, we anticipate a loss of roughly $500,000 in online revenue as a result of this massive traffic plunge in the next year alone."

truthout.org

We’re Already Living Through Journalism’s Dystopian Future

AI is devouring our industry and undermining access to factual information. We all have a duty to fight back.

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Rolling Stone @rollingstone.com · 15/09/2026

‘Widow’s Bay’ Wins Outstanding Comedy Series at 2026 #Emmys 🏆 www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv...

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DiscussingFilm @discussingfilm.net · 15/09/2026

Stephen Root has won Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for ‘WIDOWS BAY’ at the Emmys.

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Jay Willis @jaywillis.net · 15/09/2026

Really can’t get over the fact that in the Supreme Court’s mail-in ballots case, Sam Alito’s official position is “I know this rule would disenfranchise millions, and I know the law says I’m supposed to consider that fact, but I don’t care and won’t do it”

ballsandstrikes.org

Samuel Alito: Disenfranchising Millions of Voters Is No Big Deal If Mister Trump Wants It

For Alito and Thomas, there is no greater injustice than Donald Trump not getting what he wants, when he wants it.

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Jason Koebler @jasonkoebler.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

AI doom or not, something has shifted with AI recently. The guardrails that kept AI sitting in a chatbox are gone, the models are better, there's more compute. AI agents are everywhere. They are annoying as hell. IMO the situation is going to get much worse www.404media.co/theres-a-100...

404media.co

There’s a 100% Chance AI Agents Are Already Ruining the Internet

“AI agents” now have enough power and permission to be extremely annoying online.

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Amy @lolennui.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

She’s an Emmy winner!!!

@katiedippold tweet:

TBT to Halloween when I dressed as the babadook but my friend's house had more of a grown ups drinking wine vibe

(Image of Katie in full babadook costume and makeup surrounded by people in casual clothes)

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Jay Willis @jaywillis.net · 15/09/2026

Genuinely an insane paragraph from Sam Alito. “Voter fraud is real and scary and we have to stop it, so the fact that implementing Trump’s mail ballot rule will disenfranchise millions is legally irrelevant.” Brain melted. A right-wing podcaster in a robe. www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25p...

___, (slip op., at 9) (internal quotation marks omitted).
As for the equities, the Government has a strong interest
in enforcing the rule, and implementing it will also “en-
hance the visibility of Federal Ballot Mail” in order to better
detect election fraud. 91 Fed. Reg. 54972. On the other side
of the balance, the plaintiff States invoke the practical ef-
fects of implementing the rule close to the midterm elec-
tions. I take that problem very seriously, but it is not
enough to convince me to deny the application.
First, as the District Court acknowledged, the States dis-

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

A recurrent theme in this excellent story about China’s progress is that people there regard Trump as essential to their success, including his ability to drive scientific talent from the US www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

In Beijing, a think tank at Renmin University recently published an assessment titled
"Thank Trump," which wryly hailed his efforts to hasten the "twilight of an empire," by undermining America's alliances, civil service, scientific institutions, and democratic credibility. In the past two years, the international approval rating of the U.S. has dropped nearly forty points, according to a worldwide survey by the Alliance of Democracies; in multiple polls, China now rates higher than the U.S.

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Katie Hinde @mammalssuck.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

"The whole “Oh no, our models went rogue” thing … When a bridge collapses, you don’t analyze whether the bridge was ethical or sentient or why it decided to collapse. You ask, who is the person who built this bridge to be so flimsy?" www.wired.com/story/one-of...

wired.com

One of AI’s Fiercest Critics Says All the Doom Talk Is ‘Meant to Distract Us’

Timnit Gebru argues that AI companies are stoking fears of extinction to avoid discussing actual harms, like autonomous weapons.

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scwiba @scwiba.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

This man won his primary by 30 points.

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Will Bunch @willbunch.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

How is ICE making record arrests? I found the answer in Pa. coal country, where cops lured by a promise of federal $$$ have embraced ICE's 287(g) and are throwing up checkpoints, raiding job sites, arresting 100s, and terrorizing their communities My special report www.inquirer.com/opinion/penn...

inquirer.com

In Pa. coal country, local police join with ICE to bring arrests, fear | Will Bunch

Pa.'s Schuylkill County is the new face of Trump's mass deportation, as local cops lured by federal cash bust scores of migrants.

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Dave Levitan @davelevitan.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Just further enshrining the canonical conservative belief that being called racist is worse than being racist.

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Alejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net · 10/09/2026

No matter how much you throw trans people under the bus, you are still going to get attacked. All you've done is betray a vulnerable minority, anger your base, and made the issue front and center.

Alt Text:
Screenshot showing two sequential posts on X by journalist Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) discussing Texas politics:
* Top post: Text reads, "Paxton on Talarico: 'He wants to transition your kids!'" accompanied by an embedded video frame of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton speaking at a podium in a dark suit and red tie.
* Bottom post: Text reads, "Talarico says he would vote in favor of a national ban for transgender surgeries for minors," above a video thumbnail from Fox News Channel featuring a woman anchor in a red blazer, with lower-third banners reading "EXCLUSIVE," "SHIFTING THE REINS?", and "TALARICO STANCE DIFFERS FROM EARLIER COMMENTS."

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Douglas Reyes-CeroÑ @dreyesceron.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

the ending of the Frances Tiafoe vs. Alex Michelsen match with Tiafoe giving a long hug to Michelsen after the final tiebreaker point #USOpen

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Faine Greenwood @faineg.com · 08/09/2026

It’s cool how two of the richest men in the world are now locked in competition to see who can splatter the most child sexual abuse content across the internet

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ghost malone ergo propter bones @proptermalone.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

I think MAHA is very straightforwardly the triumph of the snake oil salesmen and the way we beat it is the same way you always beat snake oil salesmen: regulate their claims

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