:>

yes, it took a very long time. but frankly the fact that i’ve moved from the “i genuinely hate myself” zone to the “eh i’m ok actually” zone is pretty fucking big for me.

This was funnier in my head.

woke: midsommar is a horror movie about a manipulative cult

to preface—ari aster is a Jewish man. he’s writing this story from someone directly affected by white supremacy (and if one doubts this: feel free to look at the white supremacist response to the film! it wasn’t positive)

anyway, the hårga are canonically neo-pagan white supremacists. ari aster has pointed this out in interviews explicitly, but if one pays attention and is familiar with white supremacy, it becomes painfully obvious.

many of the runes used commonly used among white supremacists.

the odal especially is seen throughout the film, down to the tables they sit at being arranged in an odal. this rune is used constantly by white supremacists to denote a love of White Heritage. what’s especially interesting about the use of the Odal is this—the particular way it’s drawn on many tapestries has the inclusion of “wings” or lines on the ends. The odal is most commonly drawn without these wings in modern usage….except, of course, used in the context of white supremacy. the odal with wings was the insignia of the 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division Prinz Eugen, and is still commonly used by neo Nazi groups today.

their leader, an old white woman who snarls about The Black One, wears the ansuz, despite them not seeming to worship Odin—this is, of course, another symbol used by white supremacists (hell, there’s a hate group that has a prominent presence in Sweden but exists worldwide calls the Soldiers of Odin). the inclusion of The Secret Nazi Language of the Uthark in the set at the beginning of the movie makes it clear this was intentional

also, there’s not a lot of evidence for the “age old rituals” they use (the ättestupa and blood eagle) actually existing—the idea of them though? absolutely relished by many white supremacists.

just getting into the rest of the movie—the colors are blindingly white, bright, and the characters of color stand out clearly against it. josh, who is the more obviously respectful and dedicated academic, is deliberately passed over in favor of Christian by the harga for information for their dissertations, and Christian outright rips off his topic. they kill the white characters for disrespecting the cult’s heritage—but kill the characters of color to show their devotion.

the movie is a MASTERFUL commentary on how white supremacists grow their numbers—they don’t start out with swastikas and genocide. they start out with a kind word, with a promise of understanding, of community.

“i lost my parents too” pele tells dani. he draws for her, he wishes her a happy birthday. the women dance with Dani, dress her up, comfort her. the cult makes her the may queen. she feels safe with them. she feels comforted, wanted. has an emotional bond with them, even as they slowly isolate her, and prime her to believe what they do.

as a Jewish person myself—this was all intentional. the horror for me isn’t just the cult. it’s that this happens every day, and more often than people would think. the horror is in the knowledge that this is how people are radicalized to scream “Jews will not replace us”, or shoot up a synagogue.

almost immediately it seemed like a lightbulb flipped on, and he mentioned he would look into it

Its called RECAPTCHA! The creator of CAPTCHA (Luis von Ahn) realised a lot of time was being wasted with CAPTCHA (worldwide we spend about 500,000 hours doing CAPTCHA every day)

So he wanted to put it to good use

The reason why CAPTCHA uses wonky letters is because computers can’t read them, but we can!

But when trying to automatically digitalise old books and documents this becomes a hindrance because computers often cant read the faded old letters. So the digitalising is done by humans (very costly and time consuming)

Anyway Ahn found out about these a integraded into captcha creating RECAPTCHA.

Everyday about 150 (sorry i meant 150 not 250) old books get digitalized this way. They are currently using it to digitalize the whole archive of The New York Times (since 1851)

reCAPTCHA Founded 2007. Overview reCAPTCHA is a free CAPTCHA service that helps to digitize books, newspapers and old time radio shows. reCAPTCHA improves the process of digitizing books by sending words that cannot be read by computers to the Web in the form of CAPTCHAs for humans to decipher.

Behind the scenes, Google reduced the frequency at which people were asked to complete these tests by performing behavioral analysis — reCAPTCHA can now run in the background and track how people use websites.

If a Google cookie is present on your machine, or if the way you use your mouse and keyboard on the page doesn’t seem suspiciously bot-like, visitors will skip the Street View test entirely. But some privacy-conscious users have complained that clearing their cookies or browsing in incognito mode drastically increases the number of reCAPTCHA tests they’re asked to complete.

Users have also pointed out that browsers competing with Google Chrome, like Firefox, require users to complete more challenges, which naturally raises a question: Is Google using reCAPTCHA to cement its own dominance?

This raises serious privacy concerns, given that Google’s revenue is primarily from its ad business, which relies on tracking data. You might worry that reCAPTCHA is essentially a secret ad tracker, hiding in plain site just like the Facebook “like” button embedded on web pages.

There’s no way to opt out of reCAPTCHA on a site you need to use, forcing you to either accept being tracked or stop using a given service altogether

A Google representative says “reCAPTCHA may only be used to fight spam and abuse” and that “the reCAPTCHA API works by collecting hardware and software information, such as device and application data, and sending these data to Google for analysis. The information collected in connection with your use of the service will be used for improving reCAPTCHA and for general security purposes. It will not be used for personalized advertising by Google.”

That’s great, and hopefully Google maintains this commitment. The problem is that there’s no reason to believe it will. The introduction of a powerful tracking technology like this is a move that should come with public scrutiny because we’ve seen in the past how easily things can go sour. Facebook, for example, promised in 2014 that WhatsApp would remain independent, separate from its backend infrastructure but went back on that decision after just two years. When Google acquired Nest, it promised to keep it independent but recanted five years later, requiring owners to migrate to a Google account or lose functionality.

For the same reason Google is able to build reCAPTCHA in the first place — its vast resources and reach — we should be suspicious of where all this might lead us.

The 13 Full Moons of 2020

🌑🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘🌑

🐺 Friday, January, 10th

❄️ Sunday, February, 9th

🐛 Monday, March, 9th

💗 Wednesday, April, 8th

🌸 Thursday, May, 7th

🍓 Friday, June, 5th

🌩 Sunday, July, 5th

🐠 Monday, August, 3rd

🌽 Wednesday, September, 2nd

🏹 Friday, October, 2nd

💙 Saturday, October, 31st

🐿 Monday, November, 30th

🥶 Wednesday, December, 30th

Retrograde Planetary Movements

Uranus Retro in ♉️ : Aug, 12 (2019) – Jan, 1st

Mercury Retro in ♊️+♒️ : Feb, 17th – Mar 10th

Pluto Retro in ♑️ : April, 25th – Oct, 4th

Saturn Retro in ♑️+♒️ : May, 11th – Sept, 29th

Venus Retro in ♊️ : May, 13th – June 25th

Jupiter Retro in ♑️ : May, 14th – Sept, 13th

Mercury Retro in ♋️ : June, 18th – July, 12th

Neptune Retro in ♓️ : June, 23rd – Nov, 23rd

Uranus Retro in ♉️ : Aug, 15th – Jan, 1st (2021)

Mars Retro in ♈️ : Sept, 9th – Nov, 14th

Mercury Retro in ♏️+♎️ : Oct, 14th – Nov, 3rd

Celestial Signs

♑️ Capricorn : Dec, 22nd – Jan, 19th

♒️ Aquarius : Jan, 20th – Feb, 18th

♓️ Pisces : Feb, 19th – Mar, 20th

♈️ Aries : Mar, 21st – Apr, 19th

♉️ Taurus : Apr, 20th – May, 20th

♊️ Gemini : May, 21st – Jun, 20th

♋️ Cancer : Jun, 21st – Jul, 22nd

♌️ Leo : Jul, 23rd – Aug, 22nd

♍️ Virgo : Aug, 23rd – Sept, 22nd

♎️ Libra : Sept, 23rd – Oct, 22nd

♏️ Scorpio : Oct, 23rd – Nov, 21st

♐️ Sagittarius : Nov, 22nd – Dec, 21st

Sabbat Festivals (Northern Hemisphere)

🕯 Imbolc – Candlemas : February, 2nd

🌺 Ostara – Vernal Equinox : March, 21st

🔥 Beltane – Mid Spring : May, 1st

☀️ Litha – Summer Solstice : June, 21st

🌾 Lammas – Harvest : August, 1st

🍁 Mabon – Autumnal Equinox : Sept, 23rd

🎃 Samhain – All Hallows’ Eve : Oct, 31st

❄️ Yule – Winter Solstice : December 21st

Sabbat Festivals (Southern Hemisphere)

🌾 Lammas – Harvest : February, 2nd

🍁 Mabon – Autumnal Equinox : Mar, 21st

🎃 Samhain – Witches’ New Year : May, 1st

❄️ Yule – Winter Solstice : June, 21st

🕯 Imbolc – Candlemas : August, 1st

🌺 Ostara – Vernal Equinox : Sept, 23rd

🔥 Beltane – Mid Spring : October, 31st

On New Year’s Eve, the last few hours of 2019, I wanted to write a collective divination session. What inspired this was the energies which seem to be swirling around us all, and how I feel we are all experiencing something very similar.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the astrological transits, specifically Capricorn Sun conjunct Jupiter which recently passed, as well as the Eclipse energies. I feel that we are all experiencing something very difficult and draining right now in relation to our goals. Whilst this time is difficult, it is also clear that there is a lot of growth and understanding coming out of this which will propel us forward in our endeavours. Whether you’ve made difficult decisions, survived tough exams, or finally taken the leap towards your goals, this current energy has probably placed you on the edge of a cliff and asked you to jump; sink or swim into the ocean below.

With all of this energy in mind, I felt compelled to establish it in a reading, a reading for us all, and that is what you will find in the rest of this post. So, please, click on and let’s see what we all need to hear about 2020 and moving forward into it. Be warned, this is no small, sweet collective reading, but an in depth look at life around us, and hopefully, it feels as personal as if I drew these just for you.