BC SOCIETY
Saved by @SteveeRogerr

#MakeAbleistsUncomfortable many of the concepts and values in your culture are permeated with ableism (and frequently other prejudices, esp racism). Ability, intelligence, hard work, productivity, beauty, charisma, leadership, participation (in activities, in society, etc),

 independence, resilience, authority, communication, and so many more. I would say that MOST concepts in this culture are widely used in ableist ways.

So supporting disabled people isn't just a simple list of actions to do when we're around, of what the right terminology is, etc.
It's about examining the concepts, and especially what is portrayed as good/ideal and bad/something to overcome, that come up in your everyday life, and how they are used. Are they being used to prioritise some kinds of bodies and minds and social groups over others?
Are they being used to reinforce or to challenge ableist ideas and structures? Are they being used to maintain the status quo or to improve things? When you think of an intelligent person, are they more likely to be disabled or non-disabled? If the latter, are disabled people
more likely to be considered unintelligent? Does that perhaps mean that your concept of intelligence is too narrow, is unfair in some way? And does it result in you - and non-disabled society in general - devaluing the insights and minds of disabled people?
Do the same for the other concepts: when you think of 'a [attribute considered positive in this culture] person', are most/all of the people you're thinking of non-disabled? Do you associate positive qualities with the abled world, and negative ones with the disabled world?
This extends into fiction as well; examine the tropes associated with both heroes and villains, and side characters for that matter. Not just whether characters are explicitly disabled, but also whether traits of disability (e.g. "crooked" bodies, "deformed" faces, "robotic"
communication, etc) are used, and for which characters. And even when disabled people are the heroes, is it only if they conform to certain concepts (e.g. beauty, intelligence, charm, ability) that are still centring around non-disabled people, non-disabled bodies and minds and
communication and culture? Are their ways of experiencing and expressing these concepts authentically disabled, or is there a pattern of non-disabled writers creating disabled heroes - but only if they still conform to and uphold ableist, abled-centric ideas of various concepts?
How do you conceive of ability? How much room is there for a wide range of disabled people within that concept?
How do you conceive of intelligence? Same question.
How do you conceive of beauty?
How do you conceive of health?
How do you conceive of power?
Etc.
That's not to say that a person - real or fictional - must have any or all of those particular traits. Expanding those concepts to include disabled ways of embodying them all is good, but we should also question why we value each of them in the first place, and whether people
have to have them - even in disabled-inclusive ways - in order to be valued. Even when you open the concept of beauty to include disabled bodies and minds and modes of self-expression, does a protagonist need to be beautiful at all? Protagonists who are beautiful in notably,
authentically disabled ways are great, AND protagonists who aren't beautiful in any notable ways are great. "Everyone can be beautiful in their own way." and "Not everyone has to be beautiful, and not being beautiful doesn't diminish a person's worth." are both true.
The point is: examine the concepts, particularly the ones marked as either Good or Bad, Desirable or Undesirable, that you interact with in everyday life. Which are attributed to abled people and which to disabled people? Expand these concepts, learn from disabled people about
our ways of experiencing and expressing them. While also questioning exactly why each of these things is valued (even if it seems like "common sense"; even common sense is, at least in part, a cultural construction) and whether people have to have it to be worthy of recognition.
It's only when you're fundamentally changing the way you conceive of things, and especially of people and society and what we should be, that you'll really be finding true acceptance and recognition of disabled people.
This also relates to which words and ideas are used as insults. Especially given that some of those words (especially the ones relating to supposed low intelligence, such as 'moron', 'idiot', etc) have actually been medical terminology for disabled people at some point.
If you're using the words and concepts associated with disabled people as insults, you're using disabled people as insults. Even if it's subconscious, it shows that you think of us as lesser, as worse compared to abled people, as something that it's bad to be compared to.
The #MakeAbleistsUncomfortable hashtag is by
@MizTeeFranklin. As thanks for it, you can support her fundraiser here (CW: domestic violence, attempted kidnapping):
https://t.co/9gMpaN8bCp

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Noah Smith
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@Noahpinion
1/OK, I should really write another thread about university-centric regional development, because I think people often make some (very understandable) mistakes when thinking about this issue.

2/The biggest myth, I think, is that universities help regions by educating locals as undergraduates.

Skeptics of universities say: "But most of the people who graduate end up leaving."

3/In fact, most of what a university does for a regional economy is NOT about educating local kids.

Educating local kids is good for the nation, but doesn't help a region much.

The way a university helps a region is through

4/Undergraduates usually leave town after graduation.

But university RESEARCH pulls in OTHER smart people from other regions, and they stay there.

Here's a paper showing that this is the main way universities increase a region's human capital:

5/Research also pulls in business investment.

Companies want to partner with university labs, so they can commercialize the technologies the labs produce. So they invest in the labs, and sometimes they even put their offices in the town.
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\U0001f1fa\U0001f1f8 SheNerd the Deplorable \U0001f1fa\U0001f1f8
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For those traveling to DC on Jan. 6th, I'm a native to the area and I would like to share with you what I will be doing this time and what I have done for the last two rallies...1/
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Abir Ballan \U0001f60a
Abir Ballan 😊
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I have just received information about a family that has locked up their child at home in isolation because she complained of some aches in her body. They suspected the child as having C19. She was tested and after a couple of days, the test came out negative. 1/n

The girl has already been in isolation for 4 days. Now they are waiting to do another PCR test today to check again because they fear that the first test was done too early and it didn't detect covid. So this little girl will remain in isolation for at least another 24 hrs. 2/n

This is idiocy. Insanity. Ignorance. Cruelty. Simply a crime against children.
The stupid fear and the stupid policies are driving parents to abuse their children. 3/n

Children are not the main source of C19 transmission.

"transmission of SARS-CoV-2 from children under 14 years of age was minimal in primary schools"
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\U0001f30d Scott Newgent \U0001f30d
🌍 Scott Newgent 🌍...
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A thank you to Twitter for teaching me a trans man the truth about transgenderism. I’m no longer lost!

A thread for the headships at Twitter:

What transgenderism is and what it is NOT - What I learned as a Twitter 👩‍🎓 graduate thread.

1.Abigail Shrier & JK Rowling are leaders of a world wide cult that believes woman are equal to men and must be stopped @AbigailShrier

2.I am a real man, bio is wrong; I gave birth through my penis hole that I was led to believe by evangelicals was my vaginaWICKED Christians

3.Just because I transitioned doesn’t mean I know more than a 6 year old & I should be ashamed & embarrassed to believe I know more than people or children who have never been through or witnessed or dealt with medical transition

4.Gender Dysphoria is NOT a mental illness & should never be challenged & medical transition should be administered at, “Mom/Dad I feel like a..” IMMEDIATELY NO QUESTIONS ASKED

5.Children know more than adults & understand consequences without having to go through situations, educational purposes, or have a fully developed brain for hindsight - it’s quite amazing.
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Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF)
Internet Freedom Found...
@internetfreedom
THREAD: Almost a year into the launch of Aarogya Setu, there is still little to no public data on its benefits. Yet, many of its flaws are well documented. Now it's going to be used for vaccine rollouts despite meager progress in public

Experts have been warning us about Aarogya Setu's capacity for surveillance. Post integration with COWIN, it will likely become a permanent part of our health data landscape. We've written to the NIC with key concerns, because here's what we've learnt in 1 year:
2/n

To justify violation of privacy, necessity and proportionality have to be proven. Aarogya Setu has disregarded these principles - we know because we analysed its Data Protocol, which MeitY released after public pressure. It fails to satisfy the basic threshold of legality.
3/n

A lack of transparency has pervaded the ecosystem. RTIs on Aarogya Setu failed to receive adequate answers. In fact, we had to send a legal notice because CIC refused to let RTI activist Saurav Das attend his own show cause hearing regarding critical info about Aarogya Setu.
4/n

Issues have been raised about the non open-source nature of the app. Even when the source code was released, it was the code for an earlier version of the app that was made available. The server-side code of the app was not available at all.
5/n
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UNTOLD STORY OF QUEEN BHAVASHANKARI OF BENGAL - A 🧵u must read

Know the role of Naga Sadhus

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One of the most underrated empires to ever grace India is the kingdom of Bhurshut from central Bengal.

1/


A medieval powerhouse this kingdom stood firm against the Pathan invasion from Orissa twice, and with each time devastating the enemy forces.

Along with this, we also have to note that this was the time when the empire was under the reign of a widowed queen named Bhavashankari.

She wasn’t even born in a royal family and yet she achieved what most of the kings couldn’t do

This begs the question, why does no one remember this great kingdom?

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Bhurshut empire thrived from 15th century till late 18th century as an independent kingdom while acting as tributary state with full autonomy.

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What’s even more puzzling is that no one knows about the great queen Bhavanshakari who thrashed the Pathans single handedly without the aid of their allies.

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Noah Smith
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Krugman is, of course, right about this. BUT, note that universities can do a lot to revitalize declining and rural regions.


See this thing that @lymanstoneky wrote:

And see this thing that I wrote:

And see this book that @JamesFallows wrote:

And see this other thing that I wrote:
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**Thread on Bravery of Sikhs**
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Rani Jindan Kaur, wife of Maharaja Ranjit Singh had illegitimate relations with Lal Singh (PM of Ranjit Singh). Along with Lal Singh, she attacked Jammu, burnt - https://t.co/EfjAq59AyI


Hindu villages of Jasrota, caused rebellion in Jammu, attacked Kishtwar.

Ancestors of Raja Ranjit Singh, The Sansi Tribe used to give daughters as concubines to Jahangir.


The Ludhiana Political Agency (Later NW Fronties Prov) was formed by less than 4000 British soldiers who advanced from Delhi and reached Ludhiana, receiving submissions of all sikh chiefs along the way. The submission of the troops of Raja of Lahore (Ranjit Singh) at Ambala.

Dabistan a contemporary book on Sikh History tells us that Guru Hargobind broke Naina devi Idol Same source describes Guru Hargobind serving a eunuch
YarKhan. (ref was proudly shared by a sikh on twitter)
Gobind Singh followed Bahadur Shah to Deccan to fight for him.


In Zafarnama, Guru Gobind Singh states that the reason he was in conflict with the Hill Rajas was that while they were worshiping idols, while he was an idol-breaker.

And idiot Hindus place him along Maharana, Prithviraj and Shivaji as saviours of Dharma.
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ashkan soltani
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BREAKING: @CommonsCMS @DamianCollins just released previously sealed #Six4Three @Facebook documents:

Some random interesting tidbits:

1) Zuck approves shutting down platform API access for Twitter's when Vine is released #competition


2) Facebook engineered ways to access user's call history w/o alerting users:

Team considered access to call history considered 'high PR risk' but 'growth team will charge ahead'. @Facebook created upgrade path to access data w/o subjecting users to Android permissions dialogue.


3) The above also confirms @kashhill and other's suspicion that call history was used to improve PYMK (People You May Know) suggestions and newsfeed rankings.

4) Docs also shed more light into @dseetharaman's story on @Facebook monitoring users' @Onavo VPN activity to determine what competitors to mimic or acquire in 2013.

https://t.co/PwiRIL3v9x
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Andy McCabe has some explaining to do.


Andrew McCabe was reported to the FBI’s Office of Public Affairs for making an unauthorized leak of classified info to the media about @GenFlynn in early February 2017.

If you’ve wondered exactly who it was who leaked the classified info from that intelligence report on @GenFlynn’s phone calls with then-Russian ambassador Kislyak to the media, you are right now seeing a huge honking clue who it was.

To those responding to this info by sneering "Nothing's gonna happen":

Up.

Your.

Game.

You just might be too stupid to be following me.

The then-Deputy Director of the FBI get's caught targeting @GenFlynn with an illegal leak so he can 'investigated' by Peter Strzok?

Now that we know it was McCabe who set up Flynn for a fake 'perjury' investigation by his pet attack dog, Peter Strzok, the next name that's going to surface is...Joseph Pientka.
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