~ Scooby Doo and the Loch Ness Monster ~

“Range Life” by Jordan Bolton

Prints on Etsy

Even if you don’t live there, if you still live somewhere in the states, please, listen up.

“The MA legislature and governor just proposed dangerous social media surveillance legislation that would require everyone in the state, including adults, to upload a government ID or submit to a face scan to create a social media account. If something like this passes here, it will spread to other states faster than activists can fight back.

I have an op-ed out in today's Boston Globe explaining why this legislation would hurt kids and help Trump attack LGBTQ youth and undocumented folks. You can read it here (no paywall) https://archive.ph/rAK4P

If you're in MA, please send this to your state senators and the governor! They need to read it! You can also use this tool to easily call the key lawmakers who will be making decisions about this: https://www.stoponlineidchecks.org/ma “

- Fight For the Future Signal chat

I encourage reading EFF’s article linked below as it goes into the greater details of the legislation aside from this, but key notes:

• Forces everyone (not just kids) to upload a government ID or submit to a facial recognition scan to create a social media account or post online, even on educational sites like Wikipedia

• Force parents to send even more sensitive information to Big Tech companies to “verify” custody in order for a minor to create an account (think: sending a birth certificate to Mark Zuckerberg to let your teen create an account)

• Allow unsupportive parents to lock queer and trans youth off the Internet, restricting access to life-saving community and information with zero recourse

• Expand the Trump admin’s surveillance capabilities, making it easier for them to persecute people organizing protests, monitoring ICE, and criticizing the administration

• Cost Massachusetts tax payers enormously, as the legislation is clearly unconstitutional and would face legal challenges.

• Specifically harm undocumented folks who use social media to warn communities about ICE activity and raise money for family members

• Fine smaller and non-profit tech platforms like Mastodon and Bluesky out of business, further expanding the monopolies of Big Tech platforms

It is one of many of the worst pieces of digital surveillance legislation right now in the states.

If you’re in MA, please call and write to your state senators and governor through EFF’s article below, and if you’re not, either spread the word or call them too, but, don’t give them your ZIP code so they don’t know where you are.

Well, as winter turned into spring, I started biking home from work. A long, circuitous route that took me through residential areas, and past offices and businesses. Offices and businesses that were closed for the day. And yet their signs were still lit up. The lights were still on inside. There were TVs playing in empty breakrooms. All the computers in the school district offices stayed on, their monitors not even going to sleep, all night. Paused to take a break in an empty strip mall once and when I leaned against the glass of a restaurant I could hear the music still playing inside.

Because why does it PERFECTLY establish one of the core themes of the game?? EVERYTHING you do after Ostagar is bringing people together. Running around, gathering the most unexpected allies you can get just to end the Blight. You have a witch of the wilds, a chantry sister who is secretly an assassin, yet another assassin who actually tries to kill you, a soldier from this completely foreign nation who just went there because his boss got curious about the blight, an old lady who's somehow still able to stand on her feet just by some spirit miracle (even a literal spirit was like "damn, I have to come help those idiots") and an angry drunkard dwarf (okay, that last one is kind of typical fantasy companion but I love how they subverted the idea. Oghren is the most stereotypical dwarf to ever dwarf and yet all the other dwarves despise and mock him for it). And also don't forget a literal stone statue that hates all humanity (and birds)

All the major quests revolve around bringing different groups together to fight the Blight. The Landsmeet is, at its core, about bringing the Ferelden nobility together to finally do something about the Blight. Heck, you can even recruit the MAIN ANTAGONIST because more men fighting the darkspawn is ultimately more important than revenge. And also if you agree to Morrigan ritual it also brings a whole new being into this world, just to have a greater chance at surviving the final battle.