Hey Y'all!

My band is about to leave all the meta properties for BlueSky (never made a twitter account thankfully), and as we post our countdown to going dark I'd love to add a link to each post sending people towards some deserving charities and mutual aid groups. I started by compiling the links that Sophie and Margaret shared at the top of the great dismal swamps episodes, but I'd love to get some more. If y'all would be so generous as to leave links in the comments plus a little description about each group that would be... cool.

Things I'm especially interested in directing support towards right now include trans/ queer support and advocacy, migrant services, abortion access, and homeless services (NOT patronizing, rules-laden/ relief light shelters please.) I'm also probably interested in a bunch of other things, so don't be shy to share.

Thanks!

(BTW, we're gonna be trying to start up a little local movement in our scene to get out of these toxic spaces using #Xodus and #ZuckOff, so feel free to spread the word)

I was gonna type it out and post it somewhere but if someone already has it, that’d save me some time

In ancient fun bit of synchronicity, the Lions Led By Donkeys podcast is currently in the middle of a series on the pseudo-Christian peasants and ronin revolt that Margaret mentioned at the start of today's episode. Definitely worth a listen.

Since 2016, I have watched the Democratic Party and a bunch of left-leaning organizations give impassioned speeches about the importance of getting together and fighting against hate. They will give a ten minute speech full of lofty ideals and then in the last paragraph when people are all energized and looking for something to do every speaker will just say get out and vote.

It feels very frustrating. You just have this one button to press. Putting aside the problems of a two-party system where the candidates are more or less chosen based on the availability of wealthy benefactors, They have managed to convince everybody that they can't do cool things.

Listening to this podcast I've noticed that a lot of the people who do cool things have already being outsiders to the system. Some of them were mentally ill, like the Fountain House folks. Some of them were racially profiled as outsider. Some seem to have been crime-affiliated, like maybe the young lords and the Black Panthers. In other cases, they were just laboring women.

In all cases, nobody seemed to care what they thought. So they didn't get roped into the ways of thinking that were more common. Nobody was telling them vote to fix things because nobody wanted them to vote or maybe they didn't even have the right to.

Don't read this as me telling you not to vote. Voting is probably as important as putting on your shoes. But just because you put on your shoes doesn't mean you're going somewhere. But if you don't put them on, you're not probably going anywhere.

We need everybody to have a mental shift away from pushing the one button over and over. Or maybe we just need people on the left to have that shift. People on the right already do other things. They join militias and have extremely active church groups.

This is a personal response to a large women's event in my city recently where everybody was united on the problems. A very large group of people who were all very frustrated and concerned over their dwindling rights. The speakers were impassioned and they had the agreement of the crowd and then they offered them exactly one tool. Push that vote button when you get the chance in a couple years. In a red state.

I think the disenfranchised people already know better. Maybe the people who are yelling at folks about their voting habits are doing it from a place of privilege that has ironically taken away all of their tools for doing anything for themselves, like they are living in a gilded cage.

We need cool people to do cool stuff now more than ever. And I don't think there will ever be an episode of this podcast about how all these people voted this one way this one time.

Hi Magpie, hi Sophie…

I don’t know how you’d make it happen but, please please please make this film/ mini series! Maybe approach the Good Lord Bird people. The political climate is perfect for it to have a meaningful impact. Drain the swamp and all.

I'm currently in a Social Studies Teacher Training program that prepares history majors for careers as social studies teachers in the state of CA. As part of that, I am having to think about what I'm likely to be hired to teach. While my real love within history is more in the realm of Ethnic Studies, the truth is that as a white person, I'm not sure I want to teach at any school that would have me as an Ethnic Studies specialist. I especially find pre-Civil War US history to be dull as nails. I had resigned myself to the fact that I'll probably have to teach US history, and that my future holds a lot of boring Founding Fathers crap.

But the Great Dismal Swamp episodes of the pod, and especially the tangent about Ben Franklin and Sophie and Margaret's conversation about what a good US History teacher she'd be, have me really rethinking my biases about teaching the first semester of US History. I'm facing it with a lot more curiosity and openness, and a lot less dread, than I was before.

So... Thanks, Magpie^(TM) !

From Margaret Killjoy and transcribed by /u/defeatrepeatedoften these are the Venmos of people doing good work in LA:

@peoplesstrugglesfv : Supplies and distribution for the San Fernando valley

@sundays-1312 : Deliver supplies to encampments

@ktownforall : Emergency supply distribution for the unhoused, this is also the one Sophie described as wonderful

@jtownaction : Mutual aid unhoused Little Toyko

@aetnastreetsolidarity : direct relief unhoused San Fernando valley

@dykesarekosher : East side, Skid Row, 3+ drivers

@ftsla (NOT ftsla-) : Meals for firefighters

@allpowerbooks : Community bookstore that distributes supplies

@seventhstcollective : Long Beach emergency response preparation group

From Jamie Loftus:

Displaced Black Families Mutual Aid: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1pK5omSsD4KGhjEHCVgcVw-rd4FZP9haoijEx1mSAm5c/htmlview

Follow Theo Henderson and We the Unhoused here: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/1119-we-the-unhoused-66071889/ https://x.com/TheoHen95302259

Follow Alissa Walker and Torched here: https://www.torched.la/ https://bsky.app/profile/awalkerinla.bsky.social

Follow SELAH here: https://www.selahnhc.org/volunteer https://www.instagram.com/selahnhc/?hl=en

Follow Mychal here: https://www.instagram.com/mychal3ts/?hl=en

Loved the Vancouver Island shoutout this episode!

I grew up there and if there were ever somewhere you could imagine rounding a corner and seeing a dinosaur it’s Vancouver island. It’s a wet, rugged, tree and fern covered beautiful place.

Also, I climbed the waterfall in that picture as a deeply stupid young man.

According to Hy Thurman, leader of the Young Patriots Organization, another branch of the rainbow coalition, Cha Cha passed away today (Jan 10). He said “Cha Cha dedicated his life to the revolution, we can’t let him down”

I really like this podcast and thought it was really cool to have the D&D episode come out before Gencon last year. I think it would be cool if Margaret went this year and cover the games she plays. Maybe interview a few indie developers. It's a fun convention and Indianapolis is welcoming of all people.

Margaret, I don’t know if you’ll see this, but I would watch the fuck out of an Oscar Wilde biopic! Especially one you write!

Maybe you can take Caitlin Durante’s screen writing class? I hear they have a masters degree in screenwriting from Boston University. Ever heard of it?

Specifically part 2, Margaret mentioned a band called Bull of Apis, Bull of Bronze. A lifetime ago I used to DJ a college radio station alongside one of the band members and can vouch, they're an excellent person and they contribute to some truly incredible music. If you're into black metal or ambient music at all, definitely look them up on Bandcamp and consider supporting! Don't let the fascists take hold of transgressive art!

I've got a friend asking questions about the protests in India that led to Britain pulling out, and I feel like there was an episode of cool people about it. Does anyone remember?

In Bella Ciao part 1 Margaret stated that "Bella Ciao" isn't how Italians would actually say "goodbye beautiful" as it would be more correctly said "caio bella". I'm not here to dispute that, and after listening to the rest of the series, I now know the song wasn't originally a resistance song.

However, for the partisan/resistance/revolutionary version of the lyrics I think the backwardness of the title "beautiful goodbye" fits better. Rather than the singer saying goodbye to their beautiful romantic partner, the singer is saying "this is my beautiful goodbye", to me the song is saying "I may not return, I may die on that mountain, and be buried under those flowers, but I do this so all the people I love can live on" as they march off to fight the fascists, and even though this is my semi drunk interpretation I think it is just as beautiful as any romantic love song.

And I put on a 4 hour long mix of different versions of Bella Ciao -- now all the kids are humming it in the hallways.

Can we have an episode about the person that founded steampunk? I've heard she’s really cool

My husband and I have decided to undertake a pastaquest this year. We are trying as many different shapes of pasta as possible and ranking them on a number of factors. Our dog will also be evaluating the 'crunchability' of each shape in its raw form. I didn't realize that this resolution would also be a giant middle finger to fascists. I guess it's true that the personal is political.

I remember Margaret talking about a quote from I think the Soviet Union about how when people give beggars money, make the donators happy.

I want an episode on Joe Hill. He has been a hero of mine for many years. Idk if he was a perfect cool person but I want to know the history.