Blogaround

1. Confederate monument melted down to create new, more inclusive public art (October 26, via) "The project is called Swords into Plowshares, taken from a Bible verse in the book of Isaiah." Yessss.

2. With Funeral Portraits, a Photographer Gives Dignity to Rural Elderly (October 31) "But during her work trips to the countryside, Yang would hear villagers discussing their friends’ funerals and lamenting the absence of a portrait or the quality of the photo. 'In their eyes, it is a symbol of dying with dignity,' she said."

3. Chocolate: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) (October 30) This is about child labor on cocoa farms. I don't really know what to make of this... back when I was in college, I read a lot about fair trade chocolate, and I felt like I was morally obligated to only buy chocolate labelled "fair trade" rather than just regular chocolate. But... fair trade chocolate was so expensive, and seemed to only have dark chocolate available, and so many snack foods have chocolate in them, so it's impossible to avoid non-fair-trade chocolate... and the idea that there's slavery in the chocolate supply chain but somehow most people seem to be okay with it, except for a few activist groups here and there... it was all too big and impossible for me to reconcile with my understanding of reality. So eventually I just gave up, just kind of put it out of my mind and didn't think about fair trade chocolate any more.

In other words, it seems like if it's really true that most of the chocolate we buy is made by slave labor (or other exploitative working conditions), then ... shouldn't we all be more upset about that? How could this really be real?

But, maybe that's just how the world always works: Those of us who have more money get to pretend that everything's fine, and we set up our lives such that we don't have to see the damage that is being done to the poorest people in the world. And every now and then we spend a little extra money buying fair trade chocolate, and feel like we did a good thing.

4. Alabama Mayor Kills Self After Right-Wing Blog Outs His Cross-Dressing (November 4) [content note: suicide, queermisia/ transmisia/ anti-queer bigotry] This is really tragic.

5. Sam Bankman-Fried Faces 110-Year Max Sentence After FTX Trial—Here’s How Long Experts Think He’ll Be Behind Bars (November 3) "Sam Bankman-Fried was found guilty on all seven counts Thursday after a massive fraud and money laundering trial involving now-collapsed crypto exchange FTX and trading firm Alameda Research, charges that can lead to a maximum of 110 years in prison—and lawyers told Forbes he may face a decades-long sentence, unlike other white-collar defendants."

6. Sarah Huckabee Sanders Decides To Keep Obviously Innocent Man In Prison At Least Six More Years On Top Of 30 He's Already Served (November 4) 

Also from Wonkette: House Speaker Mike Johnson Pushing Christian Extremist 'Ex-Gay' Torture? LORDY THERE ARE TAPES. (November 3) Oh. So Mike Johnson used to work for ADF (Alliance Defending Freedom). Oh. 

When I was in high school, my parents were on the mailing list for ADF, so I read all their newsletters and propaganda- and I totally believed it. It was all about how "homosexuals" have a nefarious "agenda" to destroy marriage and all of society, or something. Years later, I found out all of that was bullshit, and actually LGBTQ people are just regular people, going about their lives, who want to have the same rights that everyone should have. 

Let me be clear: Every single thing that ADF does is built on a foundation of lying about queer people, and demonizing queer people. The bible says "do not bear false witness against your neighbor"- well, ADF bears false witness day in and day out. Their whole entire thing is bearing false witness against their neighbors. Also, the bible says "do not take the Lord's name in vain, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name"- well, ADF claims to be doing all these things in the name of God. They claim they are on God's side. They ask their supporters to pray that God will help them in their court cases against queer people having rights. I hope that the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses Their name.

The Wonkette article also mentions ADF's "Day of Truth" as a response to the "Day of Silence" (I remember a few kids in my high school participated in the "Day of Silence"- the idea is, you don't talk for the whole day, to show support for queer kids who are bullied and silenced). Well ADF invented the "Day of Truth" where high school kids should hand out propaganda to other students, about "the truth about homosexuality" (ie, it's bad, everyone who lives a "homosexual lifestyle" is unhappy, God can help you change, etc). Just disgusting. How will I explain ADF to my children?

7. Amazon Execs Intentionally Made Site Shittier to Rake in More Profit, New Quotes from FTC Lawsuit Show (November 3, via) "'Amazon’s online storefront once prioritized relevant, organic search results,' the complaint states. 'Following directions from its founder and then-CEO Jeff Bezos, Amazon shifted gears so that it now litters its storefront with pay-to-play advertisements. Amazon executives internally acknowledge this creates ‘harm to consumers’ by making it ‘almost impossible for high quality, helpful organic content to win over barely relevant sponsored content.’' "