You raise an excellent point, and it honestly makes me think of Tyson Yunkaporta’s perspective on the actual historical purpose of free public elementary education: to retrain the human mind toward total obedience to the state. In order to mold a person into obedience, you have to take away their sense of agency, their ability to think for themselves, and their creativity. Children increase their understanding of the world and express their creativity through play, which includes pretending to be elements of the world such as animals. In removing the natural ability to be creative through play, you wrangle tighter control over how they think.

So I’m not saying the creators of this bill are actively intending to further force ingrained obedience in American servants citizens, but I’m also not saying that they’re totally unaware of the possibilities.

Awesome! I’ll add them to my list!

I want off this ride.

If American society as a whole devolves so much that I and everyone else are all fighting to survive together because we are all homeless, then society as a whole will look a lot different, structurally. I can’t speak to how resistance will look, in that case, because I don’t know what it will consist of. I imagine that we will have much better community support systems in place, since more will be needing them to survive.

I understand the community-first perspective. I agree that we survive together or die together. But we also can’t pour from an empty cup. I can’t help others if I’m fighting to survive, forced to spend time hunting down food and water and a warm bed, which also takes time away from protesting and helping others.

This American gets what you’re saying. I’m trying to figure out what I can do without ending up homeless.

That’s exactly what we need to take from this. Not that money is in control and that’s why they’re cracking down, but that they’re cracking down because they’re scared.

Young millennial, actually.

Just got three of mine updated. I just don’t understand the anti-vaccine sentiment from parents were have been vaccinated their entire lives and have no adverse effects.

Like. The critical thinking is in the negative.

It’s my generation’s joke that social security wouldn’t be available for us to retire on, but seeing it actively dismantled fills me with an indescribable rage.

Yeah, our civilization deserves to fall.

I assume soda and other bottled drinks are included in this warning, as well as any other container lined with plastic, and I think some canned drinks and food are….which, uh, sucks.

I used the tool where I could import my Reddit subs to find similar communities here, and it surprised me how many communities I was a part of that the Reddit algorithm never let me see posts from. Also, it highlighted how much more infrastructure there is to build here. It’s exciting! Like the creative energy of expanding the Wild West but without the decimation of entire indigenous communities and the murder of innocent people and animal species.

I’m in the process of switching to Proton too. I just opened the account; haven’t taken additional steps of switching login emails associated with all of my other accounts, yet. I’ll probably start with giving the new account to local grassroots organizations, first.

I’d like to learn more about what people have to say too!

I haven’t heard of those! Do you recommend?

I’ve basically abandoned Reddit as well. I’ve been on for so long, but this bullshit makes me feel unsafe. If the platform is going to so blatantly side with those who would happily let me die for a few dollars (health insurance companies), then I don’t need to give them my attention or data anymore.

I’m so glad you asked! It feels good to find kinship and community in this way!

Honestly—this is going to sound really woo-woo, but I’m not trying to—I encourage you to take the journey to find the resources yourself. Trust that your own curiosity will lead you to the right entry point and the right format for your mindset and life experiences, whether it’s book, movie, YouTube short, poem, or audiobook. The right teacher will appear when you ask the right questions. I can recommend the book that started me on this journey, but it may not resonate with you and you could lose interest.

But if you really don’t know where to start, I started with the audiobook version of Braiding Sweetgrass, and paid attention to her lessons on reciprocity and living life directed by the lessons of plants. I then moved on to Restoring the Kinship Worldview, and now I’m listening to Sand Talk. I’m also looking for documentaries.

Good luck on your journey! Let’s see how many others we can invite along with us!

I completely agree with all of your points. It’s really hard to break out of the belief that it’s far more comfortable at home, that other people are scary, that you don’t know how to meet people, etc., but you know what’s more scary?

Being absolutely and utterly alone.

It doesn’t have to be this way. We cannot thrive and become whole humans like this. We cannot save ourselves from tyranny like this. Making a bunch of comments online is not making real change out there.

I really hope we can figure out how to bring back third spaces/the commons, and soon.

“Amending this bill to require the Ten Commandments be made of bulletproof kevlar may actually be useful as a shield from gun violence, a real problem Texans face,” Samuels said.

Savage. Beautiful.

This isn’t directed at you specifically but at anyone who comes across these comments, and I’m including this information here because it directly influenced my initial comment above:

I’ve been doing a lot of listening to indigenous worldview and learning of indigenous values. It has really helped me identify where western civilization and culture has been lacking for millennia, but especially over the last few centuries.

I’ve come to understand that the damage starts when we are young when we learn that nature is an “it” without needs and that we cannot rely on or trust other people. We learn to either dominate or make ourselves small in our daily relationships in order to feel safe when we should be seeing the world and one another as gifts to be explored and shared.

It takes some listening and reflecting to figure out that what you’ve been taught is dangerous. I’m currently trying to figure out how I can learn more of these perspectives and also build a stable and trusting community around me.

I think that’s where we need to do the work to try and undo what’s happening both at the national level and in those who are supporting authoritarianism.

I’ll get off my soapbox now, but I wanted to share in case it resonated with anyone else.