Category: action

action inspiration resist

One Small Resistance Action Every Day

By Mary | by Mary

I have seen the term “5-alarm fire” used multiple times to describe the destruction the Trump administration and Musk’s DOGE are wreaking against the U.S. Constitution and democracy. I’ve used the term myself, in fact. At this point, with the administration imprisoning immigrants and visitors from other countries with little to no evidence against them, forcing giant law firms and universities to capitulate to Trump’s whims, attacking organizations that promote diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility,…

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action challenge inspiration resist

Resources for the Resistance

By Mary | by Mary

Wow, it’s been a helluva six weeks, hasn’t it? Elon Musk and Donald Trump, along with their enablers, are shredding U.S. democracy and the federal government at a pace so rapid it makes my head spin. I thought there were more safeguards in place, what with the whole three-branches-of-government-separation-of-powers thing. But, the Framers of the Constitution apparently didn’t foresee one political party acting in bad faith (gerrymandering, preventing people from voting, stacking the Supreme Court,…

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action preservation technology

Download Your (Dot) Gov Info ASAP

By Mary | by Mary

Friday, January 31, 2025. That’s the day I read a Reuters article that said Elon Musk had locked Office of Personnel Management (OPM) staff out of computer systems containing the data of federal employees. I heard the same day he was seeking access to Treasury Department payments systems (the U.S. government’s bank account) and he got it that weekend. That night, while trying to fall asleep, I had the sinking feeling that this narcissistic, unelected…

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action challenge how-to technology

Diving Deep on the Opt Out Cyber-Cleanse

By Mary | by Mary

Can I just say … Mastodon is great! I follow several people there who are part of the free and open source (FOSS) tech movement and are working to free themselves from online surveillance. It was there that I learned of the Opt Out Project by Janet Vertesi, a sociology professor at Princeton University who works at the intersection of society and technology. She opted out of Google in 2012 (an eternity ago in tech)…

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action history ideas pragmatic historian

Defenders of Democracy

By Mary | by Mary

Do not capitulate to the authoritarian in advance. I have heard this advice from pro-democracy experts numerous times over the past few months. It’s critical advice when faced with an incoming President who promises to be a vindictive dictator from Day One. In the United States, all of us hold the freedom of speech dear, especially the freedom to criticize our government officials, and this is one area, among many, where we should not capitulate.…

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