randwolf

Meta, the company controlled by babyfash Trump fan Mark Zuckerberg, the board of which thought it was reasonable to support Fascist politicians in the hope of avoiding regulation, and whose Facebook service has or had a “17-strike” policy for known sex trafficking accounts and not only doesn’t remove fraud posts but charges known fraud operations higher rates for their ads, puked this vile mixture of plagiarism, artist’s blood, and AI sludge posing as photography onto BART station walls in San Francisco:

And of course it’s shit. Of course it’s shit. Holy gods, it is such hot garbage, and I’m not even talking about the implied higher situational awareness of someone wearing an AI PHONE ON THEIR FACE over people looking down at their regular phones

tho’ that’s a pretty fuckin’ hot take for them to have right there too, I have to say

I’m talking about the raw clownery of this image. Holy hell. Let’s zoom in at one of the insults to imagery:

And I’m not even mentioning the ghost in the room, by which I mean the four ghosts in this one particular rendered room:

And I have to ask:

HOW CAN ALL THIS STILL BE THIS SHITTY AND PASS MUSTER FOR THEM? HOW?

Christ it’s so insultingly bad. It’s infuriatingly bad. As photography substitute, as AI generated Not Art. It’s… it’s like it’s Anti-art, an opposite of art that mocks the real, that imitates while degrading both itself and its opposite.

Anybody can make bad art. I’ve made plenty. Also some good art.

But it takes real work to make anti-art.

And that’s what makes me want to fucking scream.

We all know how monstrously wealthy Fuckerberg is. How much money he and his company have. How he could jerk off with thousand dollar bills, wipe himself clean, and burn the dirties the rest of his wretched life and not even notice the difference.

So when you see that they’d rather put out this slapdash, revolting, uncaring – no sneering insult of a render than pay a photographer and a few models a few bucks for an afternoon photo shoot, what’s that say?

It’s not the money. He has all the money. All of it. Well, him, and the other TESCREAL fascists.

I think… I think I have to think… that it’s a matter of principle for them. A sick principle, but a principle nonetheless. It has to be, because otherwise it makes no. goddamn. sense.

I literally have to conclude that they hate art, and even more, hate artists. They have to, to consider this better. It must be principle for them to not care about artistic creative work, to not pay artistic workers. It has to be principle to hold all that in contempt, to say, “see? We just steal everything you’ve ever done, throw it into our churn machine, and then rub out our own version in half an hour to show you’re not any better than us. And you can’t do shit about it.”

They’ve made it clear that they’d not only spew this kind of rancid splatter, this metaphorical scrawl of shit, urine, blood, and theft across the walls of a city than break that principle.

And they’ll enjoy it.

I used to think, once upon a time, that Syndrome from The Incredibles was a little too on the nose,a little too pointed, maybe – dare I say it – a little too cartoonish for even a cartoon.

I’m starting to think maybe he wasn’t on the nose enough.

But that’s flippant, and maybe a little too easy.

What I really feel is that… I’m finally starting to understand – really understand, at a gut level – what Hayao Miyazaki meant when he called AI “art” an insult to life itself.

Because, well, almost anything can be art. Art is an observation and an intent, as much as anything else, and handing that mantle to something which has no awareness, no observation, no actual knowledge of meaning, no ability to opine, no personhood at all, a chum machine with less actual awareness than a housefly maggot…

…how could that be anything less than an insult to life, itself?

It took me a while to understand, Hayao. But I think I’ve finally got there.

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.

I bought something for my second bike trailer build on Saturday.

The trailer’s basically been done for weeks already. I’m adding details and accessories now, like, I want to sew a cover, and I want to add reflectors. So I took it for another little shakedown ride, this time to a hardware store I found out had DOT-grade adhesive reflectors in stock for… more money than I’d like, but not unreasonable money.

Here’s what I’ve done with those stickers so far. I think it’s pretty good. The rear view is my biggest concern, given that my bike is well-lit, and this… frankly ugly flash photo… makes the reflectors pop well, showing how they’d reflect headlights. It’ll help:

But it occurred to me as I was doing all this that…

This is the first time I’ve bought something for this project.

The trailer frame was salvaged from a semi-wrecked kiddo hauler abandoned outdoors for over a year. The platform is made from a cargo pallet someone illegally dumped and I salvaged; the metal clamps holding it in place I shaped out of old building strapping. I literally found the warning flag pole on the street, and it inserts into a metal tube salvaged from a housemate’s broken laundry rack. I made a flag for it from scrap fabric. The cage is made from Buy Nothing-listed DIY cube shelving, the kind that never really works right, but there’s nothing wrong with the wire squares that a whole bunch of zip ties can’t fix. Other parts are 3D-printed, designed by me, printed by me, at home.

Everything else was just ordinary supplies I already had.

But when it came to the reflectors… I looked around a little, but then… I just went and bought something. And I have kind of mixed feelings about that!

I mean, it’s fine. Really. At some point, I’m going to want to replace these tyres, too, and that’s a purchase – they were also in the outdoors for at least a year and as a result are semi-rotted. They’re only still usable because I used a lot of silicone glue to make a reinforcement coat on the walls. (Hey, it’s not stupid if it works, and it works.) So sooner or later, money was going to be spent.

But even so, just buying something – even if it’s something you legitimately can’t make at home, like DOT-spec reflective material – feels like cheating. I kinda don’t like it.

Part of it is that I started making these cargo carriers around the time Anna got laid off, and even after she finally got a new job earlier this year, I kept the same approach. Sure, it helped that I already had basically everything I needed by that time, but also, we’re trying to make up for a lot of lost money and time, so I kept doing things the same way.

Until today, when I didn’t. I did it the normal way instead. It’s a very normal thing. You need an item, a part, whatever – you can just buy it.

And… maybe… maybe it’s just how extremely abnormal everything else is right now, in this endless emergency… but…

I just don’t know how I feel about that.

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.

Anders Puck Nielsen speaks on the Trump/MAGA’s new U.S. National Security Strategy document:

It is official US policy to work towards regime change in European countries, and to weaken or even destroy the European Union.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAh-xEteBz4

This is correct. The document is very clear on that point. But here’s more from Anders:

The United States sees it as a strategic priority… that MAGA movements come to power in Europe, and they intend to use the means that they have to support such movements in the fight against the current centrist governments.

These are some very dramatic statements that have raised deep questions about whether there is any foundation for NATO to function going forward if the United States sees it as a strategic priority to undermine the governments of other NATO countries. …

It’s really hard to see how there can be an alliance any more. The reality is that the views expressed in this [policy document] are in many ways identical to the Russian viewpoints on Europe and the Russian goals of regime change in European countries.

He further discusses the document’s demands for ‘free speech,’ in the sense of ending social media moderation and opposing the exclusion of hate speech, the lifeblood of MAGA fascism. There are several demands in the document around these topics, which he sees – correctly – as focused on helping Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg push MAGA/fascist propaganda into Europe through their algorithmically-driven propaganda machines.

Elon Musk’s “X” is the bigger threat, of course. As Nielsen puts it: “If you’re European, then it is a national security priority to stop using X.” Elon Musk bought Twitter to turn it into a fascist propaganda fountain, as opposed to Zuckerberg’s primary intention of making as much money as possible, working with fascists if that’s what gets the job done.

I have, of course, been saying that it’s time to stop using X since a few months into Elon Musk’s takeover of the site because of this exact reason, but, well – who the fuck listens to me?

Anders’s final key takeaway here is that this document doesn’t show a MAGA-led US deciding not to care at all about Europe, but instead shows a US deciding to care very much about Europe – mostly western Europe – with the specific and stated intention of installing MAGA governments, telling Europe that they must be MAGA – fascist – to be allied with the US.

This move would be an extension of what MAGA see as “their” western hemisphere, which other than western Europe means North and South America, including Greenland.

Naturally, this process would include granting Russia and Trump’s second-best pal Putin their own sphere of influence in the east. This portends the US’s impending betrayal of Ukraine, and later, a betrayal of the Baltic states, Poland, probably a couple of others (Moldova? Romania? Bulgaria?) as well.

But why? Does Trump love Putin and Orban that much?

I believe It’s more than that, and more than Trump’s ego, believe it or not. It’s more than his desperate longing to be a dictator and it’s more than his sheer will to steal every dollar in sight. Trump and MAGA, well… they are definitively fools, morons, white nationalists, imperialists, longing for a white imperial past. But I still think that Putin has more choate strategic plans than Trump, and I still think Ukraine is a climate war, so…

…shall I post this line again? Sure, I’ll post this line again. Here’s what I think Putin really wants – not what he’ll get, what he wants. It’s a minimum goal, to “secure” the nation:

That’s oversimplified, of course, but this is a small map and a big thick line. The reality would be far different, and most likely more like existing national boundaries, but still: it gets the idea across.

Meanwhile, when Russian maximalists and propaganda shills talk about how “we should march all the way to Paris” – which they do, repeatedly – here’s what I think they want:

And what do these lines have in common?

Mountains.

Tall, easier to defend, mountainous, migration-blocking borders.

It’s simple-minded in a lot of ways, I suppose, but so is keeping the border at the Rhine and that kept French foreign policy busy for a few centuries, so border politics don’t have to be all that complex.

Putin et al – they know climate change is real. Trump’s a decaying fool and might not know now if he ever did, but Putin? He knows. But heading a petrostate dictatorship with lots of far-northern land? He doesn’t want to stop it, because it’s the outsourced expense of allllllll Russia’s money, and if billions die, well, that’s the cost of doing business.

I call map one Putin’s Wall. Map two? Let’s call it Solovyov’s Wall, since as far as I can tell he’s the most famous proponent of “marching all the way to Paris.” Soloyvov’s Wall isn’t attainable – it won’t happen, it’s (ugh) aspirational – but I do think Trump wants to give Putin his wall, and that Putin has enough trust in Russia’s ability to handle MAGA that he’s willing to let Trump and his replacements handle the west.

Personally, I think MAGA has enough interest in a semi-mythical White Europe that they’re willing to do it. As long as they’re lead by the right – white, fascist – governments.

Hence, this hideous betrayal of a document.

That said, let me be real clear about something: On their own, Russia cannot attain Putin’s Wall. It’d take a complete American betrayal and European capitulation for them to have any chance. They cannot do it alone.

But thanks to MAGA and Trump, they’re on the edge of getting that American betrayal. They want to push that betrayal to completion. If they get it, then they’ll help the US make MAGA happen in Europe, in order to get the second necessary condition of European collapse and capitulation.

Russia’s no match for the EU as a whole. But torn apart? Picking off one little country at a time is… it’s not easy, it’s absolutely not, but they’re willing to kill as many of their own as is necessary for as long as is necessary to do it. Particularly if they’re ethnic minorities. And since nobody wants to flee a climate disaster to a war zone anyway, so he wins either way. Whether deterred by mountains or by war, refugees would go elsewhere, or not at all.

And that’s why I think this is a climate war. Not a war triggered by climate changes in Russia, but by Russia wanting to keep oil and gas going forever and keep out the people that will starve and kill.

You noticed Iran saying that Tehran will have to be abandoned as a capital, didn’t you? It’s more corruption and incompetence than climate change – but it’s a bit of all three. Climate change has moved the timetable. Made things worse. And yet, we’re just getting started.

So, then. Where are we? Ah, yes. How this all plays out.

There’s a bit of a feeling out there that Trump is weakened and even some who think that this nightmare is… more or less over. That Trump is a “lame duck,” that there is no MAGA without him.

That’s partially true. Trump is weakened. MAGA is, too, and they’ve been dependant upon his stardom – and fandom – to reach critical mass. They will be badly wounded – but not out – once he goes.

But none of that means this is over. The more trouble MAGA and Trump think they’re in, the more Trump and MAGA will lash out, trying to push their fascist power fantasies into existence. We will all see more betrayals, more sabotage, more oppression – the ICE army of white supremacists they’re working to summon into existence, funded by the so-called “big beautiful bill,” will actively work to dwarf the violence and abuses we’ve seen this year.

It’s their vision of the future, and they’re going to fight for it. It’s what they want, it’s what they’re all in to get, and it’s what they will do anything to achieve.

And they will not go down quietly. Take heart in the recent massive election shifts. Take heart in Trump’s decay and weakness and failing… opinion polls. Take heart in the America First/MAGA civil war. Take heart in all of it.

But do not, for a moment, think this is actually over.

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.