Less than a month into the Trump administration, how is everyone feeling? Shay Stewart-Bouley writes for @damemagazine about how she is not scared, but angry. “Trump’s attacks on DEI represent a clear desire to take us back to the time when uppity Black folks like me were put in our place,” she writes. “He wants white men to be our rulers again and that doesn’t sadden me. It fills me with rage.”

https://www.damemagazine.com/2025/02/12/i-am-not-scared-of-this-administration-i-am-angry/

#BlackHistory @blackmastodon #TrumpAdministration #History @histodons #Politics #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Are the people being held at Guantanamo the “worst of the worst?” It’s hard to tell, since officials are not releasing details either about who they are, or what they’re supposed to have done. Luckily, @ProPublica and Texas Tribune are on the case. So far, their reporters have spoken to the families of two Venezuelan detainees whose only crime is illegal entry, and one who picked up a charge during detention. Those being held have not been able to speak to their families, nor to attorneys. “Never before have people been taken from U.S. soil and sent to Guantanamo, and then denied access to lawyers and the outside world,” said Lee Gelernt, the lead attorney in the ACLU case. “It is difficult to think of anything so flagrantly at odds with the fundamental principles on which our country was built.”

https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-administration-migrants-guantanamo-bay

#Guantanamo #Gitmo #Immigration #Venezuela #TrumpAdministration #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

In an editorial for @msfreepress, Kiden-Aloyse Smith discusses “Hood Feminism” by Mikki Kendall, and why its messaging around race and intersectionality is particularly resonant right now. “Despite Black folks making up 14% of the U.S. population, we make up 40% of missing-person cases for people under age 18,” she writes. “Black women’s and children’s cases are left untouched for decades — marked as runaways, marked as unworthy, marked as the ‘imperfect victim.’ When little Black girls go missing, it’s a deafening silence with a reminder that maybe if we were ‘good’ girls or white girls, we’d be found.”

https://www.mississippifreepress.org/editors-note-little-black-girls-are-not-fast-why-intersectional-feminism-is-the-only-true-feminism/

#Race #Gender #BlackMastodon @blackmastodon #Crime #Feminism #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Could spooky floating lights in South Carolina be earthquake farts? Our @ScienceDesk shared this story from Science News about Earth’s gassy problem.

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/earthquake-lights-spooky-south-carolina

#Science #Geology #EarthSciences #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

No humans were harmed in the making of the True Crime Case Files YouTube channel. Why? Because all the murder victims and storylines in 150 videos with names like “Sheriff Murdered After Affair With His Secretary Got Exposed” and “Wife Secret Affair with Neighbor’s Teenage Daughter Ends in Grisly Murder” were AI-generated. @404mediaco spoke to the founder of the channel, which had millions of views before it was taken down, about where he got the idea, and what he was trying to achieve (he claims a noble goal).

https://www.404media.co/a-true-crime-documentary-series-has-millions-of-views-the-murders-are-all-ai-generated/

#Tech #Technology #TrueCrime #Television #Entertainment #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Boca Chica Beach in the RIo Grande Valley, Texas, has been a secret place for generations of locals to fish, barbecue and camp. And then SpaceX came to town. @TexasObserver writes about how the launchpad and production facility for Elon Musk’s space-technology company loom over Boca Chica, and the efforts of some residents to resist further development.

https://www.texasobserver.org/remembering-boca-chica-beach-before-spacex/

#Texas #BocaChicaBeach #SpaceX #ElonMusk #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Rotting logs contain multitudes. @KnowableMag reports on how they’re home to critters, bacteria, fungi and more — and scientists are only scratching the surface of how the vital ecological process of breaking down wood works.

https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/living-world/2025/rotting-logs-mini-ecosystems-habitat-and-food

#Science #Ecology #Biology #Forests #Fungi ##Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has a history of removing elected officials from office or suspending them if they don’t comply with his agenda. It’s only getting worse as President Trump’s immigration crackdown kicks into gear. “This is a governor that looks for any reason to remove people when he can,” state Representative Anna Eskamani, a Democrat, told @bolts “It speaks to a trend of the consolidation of power among the few. It is incredibly unsettling to have that happen to our democracy.”

https://boltsmag.org/florida-republicans-immigration-deal/

#Florida #RonDeSantis #Immigration #Deportation #USPolitics #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

President Donald Trump is promising to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine — with the participation of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, but without Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says that’s not acceptable to him. @timkmak’s Counteroffensive looks at another country, Finland, which preserved its independence 80 years ago after war with Russia by giving up land and declaring neutrality. Will Ukraine be forced to do the same? https://www.counteroffensive.news/p/will-ukraine-be-forced-to-become

#Ukraine #Finland #UkraineRussia #Trump #Putin #Zelenskyy #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Of the 94 movies at the recent Sundance Festival, three came from Africa. For @thecontinent, Wilfred Okiche looks at Kenyan documentary “How to Build a Library,” Tunisian coming-of-age story “Where the Wind Comes From,” and “Khartoum,” which was made by four Sudanese filmmakers and a Brit, and tells the stories of five people who escaped to East Africa after the military coup in their home country.

https://continent.substack.com/p/review-africa-at-sundance-libraries

#Film #Documentary #Entertainment #Movies #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Are you marking Valentine’s Day this year? @TheConversationUS looks at how Victorian London went gaga for greeting cards. Back then, you were expected to send a Valentine in return regardless of your feelings, which meant you could buy cards with messages that proclaimed mutual admiration, encouraged patience, or politely discouraged future attention.

https://theconversation.com/how-valentines-day-was-transformed-by-the-industrial-revolution-and-manufactured-intimacy-247441

#History @histodons #ValentinesDay #GreetingCards #Lifestyle #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

Lastly, nobody reacted to this when our @CultureDesk shared the story but we thought it was fascinating. Back in the early 2000s, American elementary school students used to stack cups in gym class, and it was all down to a clown-turned-teacher named Bob.

https://defector.com/if-you-ever-stacked-cups-in-gym-class-blame-my-dad

#LIfestyle #UnitedStates #School #Education #Newstodon #NewstodonFriday #FollowFriday

@Flipboard @TheConversationUS nope

@Flipboard @TheConversationUS

Looking at thyself within the glass,
You appear lost in admiration;
You deceive yourself, and think, alas!
You are a wonder of creation.

😁 The Valentine for a narcissist !

@erikcats Same here!