All Midwest is pretty much the same

"It doesn't have to be like this. We could have it so much better"

Unsubscribe to any services that you can, specifically ones that sponsor crime or child labor or poverty wages or genocide: Spotify, Starbucks, Target, Amazon, Temu, Shein, Walmart, Home Depot. The list goes on and on.

It's basically impossible to cut them all off, but giving up a lot of the worst offenders is actually surprisingly easy, and you also get to feel a little self-righteous about it.

As a treat.

Do not use AI on purpose for generative reasons, especially ChatGPT. Like, never. Don't repost it. Take it down when someone tells you that you accidentally posted it. Keep up-to-date on how to spot it. I fell for one just yesterday that was so, so real I actually started crying after someone pointed out the inhuman strength flaw. I was so fooled.

I believe Threads is 85% bots. Don't go there. The algorithm is a rollercoaster of ragebait.

Set up a monthly recurring donation to a local food bank, to Palestine, to an activist of color. Even one dollar matters. Maybe think about canceling one of your subscription/streaming services and giving that money to donations.

Charity is supposed to be a little painful, a little difficult. Look at your luxuries and ask if you couldn't give a few to someone else.

When you are moved by someone making positive moves in their community, give them money. Add engagement onto their social media to help increase their visibility.

If they make me cry or teach me something new, I try to give them money. Again, not always, but if they really gave you something? Why not give something back? Most creators have tip jars or “buy me a coffee” type donations that make it really simple.

When someone asks you for help, help. Especially if it is inconvenient for you. Give a coworker a ride home when their car breaks down. Buy groceries for someone who just had surgery. Shovel someone's driveway. Find a local GoFundMe to donate to. Give a generous tip at a local business or restaurant. Hand a twenty to an unhoused person without waiting for a reaction or adding any commentary.

Be kind. Find something to compliment on a stranger and say it. Hold the door open. Get something down from the top shelf. Listen to a child. Laugh with an elderly person. Pet a dog. Watch a sunset. Remember why you're alive, and why you matter. Focus on what your light is in all this darkness.

Follow activists on Instagram- there are a lot. The more you follow, the more you will see. Share education and fact checking. Make sure you have facts- validate your sources.

If you hear a phrase over and over again, ask why. Ask the source, and the intention. Never accept the easy answer, or one that makes you feel superior to someone else. If you feel supercilious, you're actually probably wrong.

Ask me how I know.

Learn how to hear things about being white or about the American propaganda machine without taking it personally. It does hurt, and that hurt feels like an insult. It's not. It is painful to unlearn all of this, and to realize that in spite of your best efforts, you absolutely have participated in white supremacy.

If reading that makes you upset, you're who I mean. It's hard to accept. All white people are raised racist and have to learn their way out, and there is no other option.

That's not disrespectful, and it's not meant to be a gotcha. I was the same way at one time, thinking, “Fuck you!!!! I have fought for alll of the rights since always,” but that was just a sign of the work I needed to do.

And still need to do. I myself am always a work in progress.

If you don't know what to do or how to react to something, see what Black women are saying about it. Do not chime in on their comment section, especially to flatter, pander, or critique. If their comments make you bristle, they're true and right, and meant for you to read and see and absorb.

Learn about early civil rights movements. Learn about The Black Panthers *from Black people.* Watch The Thirteenth. If you haven't, watch the recent documentaries about Hurricane Katrina. Really wrap your arms around who America is before we begin the discussion of how she needs to change.

Know your enemy. Stay aware of their moves. It does you no favors to completely ignore their message, to block out everything difficult to see or read.

Especially because it is very popular. You can pretend it isn't, but it is. Look at the crowds for Erika Kirk. Watch how a fired racist immediately gets hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations, $88 at a time.

You cannot afford to not know their propaganda and be prepared to fight it. Condescending conversations don't bring change. Lectures are for students.

Know your rights, know the law. Do not ever talk to the police. Lawyer, lawyer, lawyer. You do not have any friends in a room full of badges. White people are bred to be obedient- do not comply in advance.

People are going to keep dying. More and more, until we do something violent.

Learn to shoot a gun. Memorize phone numbers of people you love. Learn to drive a manual car. Learn to read a physical map, and my combat veteran partner says reading a topographical map is even more valuable. Learn how to start a fire. Get flint and magnesium. Pack a go bag. Have water purifying tablets. Get a radio. Have a meeting place for loved ones for when we lose the internet. Have an escape plan. Learn to fish. Learn how to clean a fish. Learn to sew. Have cash on hand. Think of what items you own that you may be able to barter for if needed. Start walking, build up your stamina.

How can you run for your life if you can't run?

This isn't going to stop- I need everyone to understand this. They just got away with murdering a white woman on camera. I can already feel the news cycle shifting away, and they've already disappeared him from his house.

He was in ICE for over ten years, by the way, so he was hired by Obama’ administration. Some people are still not ready to talk about that, either. The inaction of Obama is what radicalized me, and the strong-arming of Bernie Sanders galvanized it.

People are going to keep dying, the way people have always been dying in this country. Because white supremacist pedophile billionaires have a death grip on this country, and white people are raised to be obedient, and it will be our destruction.

No one is coming to save us. We are on our own. They are going to start pulling all of us from our homes and interrogating us. I have been waiting for it for years, if I'm honest. When do the Internet Police come to my door to ask me questions about my social media?

You cannot ignore your way out of this. There is no voting. There are no elections. This is a fascist takeover by a cabal of child raping drug addicts. They will not let go. People are cheering them on, in fact. And those with the ability to do something are doing nothing.

Who do you want to be in this moment in history? What do you stand for? What are you willing to die for? Do you want to be proud of staying human in an inhuman time?

Please. We need you. I need you. Please, you have to see all of this and come with us now. Please, our children are being killed and dismembered and handed over to poison-fingered pedophiles all over the world.

I can't sleep at night. The other night I dreamt that everywhere I went, everyone was sobbing. The grocery store, the park. Every single person, heaving with sobs.

I feel like I'm being torn apart. I wake up so viscerally upset every morning that I'm almost sick, so furious that I feel physically violent. It ebbs slowly over the first few hours I'm awake, but it frightens me, if I'm being honest.

Is it perimenopause or is it the end of the world as we know it? Oh, man.

imagine there was a man in the story who went around giving speeches about the importance of the lottery as a tradition. He said the casualties were unfortunate, but also an inevitable price of freedom. Imagine he treated those who sought to end the senseless cycle of violence with condescension and derision, calling them idiotic, naïve, and diseased.

yet when that man was selected for the lottery and stoned to death, everyone mourned him and said how unfair it was that a bright young family man should die so soon. And when people pointed out that this man was killed by a system he adamantly defended and worked to perpetuate, they lost their jobs and were shunned from the community as insensitive and monstrous.