Power Companies

I am not going to waste my energy trying to be clever about this, and I am sure that many people haven noticed the same things I have with recent tech company power plays.  Gmail has done several advances to have power over everyone’s communication lately, and I am sure others have noticed that sometimes you go to click on an email and all of a sudden the screen shifts down and you have clicked on an ad instead.  I also just now noticed that they are moving old emails up in the list to suggest that you reply.  Maybe that is helpful for people, but it seems a little confusing to me.  Spell check has also gotten more aggressive in recent months, making it hard to confirm your original word choice, and the other day I typed an email where google was literally putting a word in front of me each time I typed something, and “suggesting” actual email content.  It was very distracting and hard to think of what to say. Probably people can turn some of those features off, but it is still a weird controlling thing that reminds me of some of facebook’s tricks like that sometimes.  When I work on my website on Squarespace, I can’t easily log off and have to leave the site and come back to it to finally simply log out.  I believe that is so they can get another click to report for their stats.  There is something weird about this stuff, and controlling in an immature way, and there is also a dishonesty that to me is a terrible and dangerous thing on a scale that the tech resources have.  I am so thankful for all the ways I have benefited from all those awesome things like gmail and facebook, but I think that people should always remember the ways that millions of regular people have contributed and are part of that success. The way facebook always tries to roll out changes and stay ahead of any possible regulation could seem like a good way to function as an alternative source of power and leadership for our country and world, but I think that for everyone to decide that some of these guys are above legal oversight might not be the great system that people think it is. There are benefits to public authority and laws enforced by representatives of people with interests beyond just financial or being self-serving, and with the threat of low wages and trafficking that people face in our society, going ahead and just letting the tech people make their own decisions with no accountability is probably not the cool revolutionary idea that many people seem content to allow.

“Commemorative”

Putting Christina McAuliffe on a coin before Harriet Tubman is on the 20 dollar bill is nothing but a hate crime, and Trump should be the next astronaut for the challenger program.

Revisiting

I might share blog links soon, and I just want to repeat a solution idea I have mentioned before after many years of hoping the best for immigrants. It is similar to raids except I think people should find all the immigrants and print out an ID card for them, granting anyone easy instant citizenship.  And then, because there truly are problems with trafficking and abuse, the other task involves simply enforcing criminal law, which should be stricter against all abusers, rapists, and murderers, including Americans who are ruining lives as much as other bad people. There is a lot I don't know about what is happening all over our crisis-filled country, but I do think that simple concepts of welcoming people and protecting everyone from harmful abusers is in fact possible, as rightful moral things usually are. Also, has anyone thought of inviting Mexico to be part of the United States? It would be a nice gesture, considering everything Mexicans have done for our country.

recent consarns

Obviously I am slowing down with these mad blog posts, but I feel like mentioning two recent bothersome things. One is that I have gotten to a point where I really don't know what news stories are true, and don't have any news source that I trust in more than a partial way. People have been talking about this issue for a long time, but I did for a while feel like I could kind of get a picture of what's going on from skipping around and reading between the lines.  But honestly, now I go to sites and look through the headlines and genuinely don't know if there are any stories that I can believe. It could be paranoia or other mental problems, but I have a feeling that it is more likely that my mental problems are more of a result from wrongs like that and not the cause.

Then the other thing is something I have been meaning to mention for a long time, which is my disappointment that New York subways are not more accessible to disabled people and moms with strollers. I am confused about why a city as important as New York would not provide for people in that way, and honestly I thought that certain laws required that. I think that the Access-a-ride service is a pretty good step (get it, "step," like the hundreds of steps people have to carry strollers up with children in them who could get their face smashed if they are dropped?), but I think the disability van program is not the same as treating everyone with justice and service. And if a place as advanced or as potentially advanced as New York could have been won't do what is right, then I think that a lot of places and maybe the whole world is in a lot of trouble.

Ok I am remembering a third thing, which is just to make sure I say on this blog that I do think Trump is racist, and I also think he has a competence and sanity problem bad enough for immediate impeachment. I have thought so for a long time, even after holding out some very unpopular hope after decisively not voting for him.  The outrageous Harriet Tubman 20 dollar bill reversal was what really made me feel the urgent need to express my horror, but there has been a delay in me sharing my political views, and I am really sorry about all the reasons for that.  I mostly do what I can when I can, and I hope that everyone who has more official responsibility to intervene will succeed in preventing worse atrocities than what has already been happening.

next possible mad blog topics

are some children in fact being used as human shields in invasions disguised as migration, and then again as shields for political groups who are happy for the supposed leverage against people who did what they were supposed to

something suspicious going on with companies like twinkies and toys r us declaring bankruptcy and then coming back just a few years later with the same brand value

profit vs. gouging: productive commercial competition versus blocking resources to then charge people for access to basic supplies and services.

Neither Nor

In her book called Hunger, Roxanne Gay wrote about how she had to buy an extra seat on planes sometimes, but then the airline would want to let people put their stuff in her extra seat.  And she said it was like they wanted something both ways.  And I have noticed that a lot of injustice and mistreatment is exactly like that. When I was in college, my mom wanted me to get a job instead of doing volunteer and camp experiences, but then wanted to make me report my spending to her.  But I had my own money because I had had to work instead of doing the things I wanted to do. She could not have it both ways. But people do find a way to demand opposite things from people, and I think it is happening with a lot of our country’s problems.  A lot of people want to ignore things like immigrant needs and poverty and say that is the government’s job, but they also want to say that the government should be limited and not interfere and have any resources or power. The goal is to starve people out of the systems of food and health.  The insurance companies do it too, by wanting to collect premiums from everyone and cover health care for no one.  I mean why don’t they just come to our house with a gun and take our cash. When they do, I will do what I learned from the show called Electric Company when I was a kid.  There was a hold up and a muppet said to someone, “Your money or your life?” And the person said “I’ll take ‘your money’.”  And the bad muppet handed over the money.

only the messenger

   Well everyone, this is just a quick post about such a minor little change in the texting on my phone, which I am sure is just nothing to worry about, just like every other little advance that facebook and other technology does all the time, where they gain just a little bit more power over our actual socializing.  I noticed now that my friends can hit "like" on one of my texts.  Private texts, of course, but for how long?  I think the weird power plays of making everyone sign up for messenger, and then changing the way people select who they are going to send a message to have always had this hint of something that could happen some day, which is that facebook just decides to go ahead and make everyone's messages public instead of private.  no big deal, of course. When you are just trying to "change the world," you have to do stuff like that, don't you?  I think the threat is also there with google and google docs, and some people who think they might be some kind of deity are looking forward to someday letting everyone google through anyone's private and hopefully scandalous and even incriminating emails from the past thirty years.
   But I think that is when people will see why people sometimes have to use force and intervention to put a stop to oppressive and violating societal wrongs.  Hopefully once that happens, Iran will have stolen enough of our technology that we can reboot facebook and twitter with a little more consideration for people's boundaries.