The Polyamorous Misanthrope

In early 2025, Atlanta resident Samuel Tunick was on his way home following a trip abroad. After landing in the US, customs agents demanded access to his Pixel phone, which was running an alternative version of Android called GrapheneOS. Rather than hand over his data, Tunick used a clever feature of the software to delete everything. Now, he’s facing federal charges.

The first hearing in this case happened last week, according to The Guardian, during which government attorneys and agents claimed that Tunick was subjected to a standard secondary interrogation at an international airport. During that encounter, agents were “looking for anything that’s prohibited.” However, Tunick’s legal team alleges he was targeted for his activism.

Book summaries and propaganda below:

give it a name

sit peacefully with it in your lap

figure out what it needs

tell your partner about the need, so you can collaborate to help the hedgehog

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DON'T MONETIZE YOUR FANFIC!!!!!

Seriously, y'all, don't request money for writing fanfiction! Let's say you write a fanfic starring the Disney Princesses, the crew of the USS Enterprise, Sonic the Hedgehog, Mario, Batman, and Percy the Small Engine fighting the Daleks in Middle-Earth; you then think "I bet I can make money off this!" So you set up something for that on PayPal or Venmo or something. The lawyers belonging to those people who own the characters you use will find out either by idly surfing the internet or from someone else in that company's employ and go after you for breach of copyright! And, I'm sorry to say, they will win!

"Then why does AO3 ask for money?!" I hear you ask? They ask for it to help maintain their servers. Running servers needs security updates, coding, hardware repairs, and all that has a price tag. They're not making money on YOUR writing or established fandoms.

"What about official crossovers like Sonic and his friends in DC Comics?!" That required negotiations between their parent companies, and part of those negotiations included a cut of the profits for all parties involved. Even the great fanfic writers don't have that extensive of a network.

"God didn't use any different dirt to make me than the first lady of the land."

As an educator I couldn't NOT do a bit of a deep dive into the remarkable life of Lucy Craft Laney, which was at once rewarding but also a little disheartening. Born free in 1854 Georgia to formerly-enslaved parents who had been able to purchase their freedom, Lucy was one of those freakishly talented children who was fully literate by the age of four... and translating Greek and Latin texts by the age of twelve. After graduating high school, she enrolled at Atlanta University (which would later be Clark Atlanta University) in 1869, but was discouraged from pursuing her preferred major: the classics, particularly Latin. Instead she secured a teaching degree in 1873 (as was tacitly encouraged of Black women at the time).

After ten quietly-unfulfilling years of teaching in various schools around Georgia, in 1883 she went for broke and chartered her OWN school specifically for Black students, in Augusta: the Haines Normal and Industrial Institute (named for an early benefactor, Francine E. H. Haines). Later benefactors would include the Presbyterian Board of National Missions, which had turned down Laney's original charter proposal! In its first year the school boasted six students, but by the end of its second year enrollment stood at more than 200. In 1890 the school launched Georgia's first-ever kindergarten for Black children. By 1912 the Haines Institute would employ more than 30 teachers and topped enrollment at 900 students, and its footprint occupied an entire city block. The school curriculum was even expanded to offer a fifth year of College Preparatory courses... one of which was Latin, taught by Laney herself.

Haines broke the mold, in that it established itself as not only an industrial and teaching school but also as an important cultural center; a space where Black students and their families could gather in safety and exchange ideas and creativity. The school hosted many concerts, performances, and guest speakers as it grew --not the least of which included Mary McLeod Bethune (see Lesson #49 in this series), Nannie Helen Burroughs (see Lesson #138), and W. E. B. Du Bois (see Lesson #1). Du Bois in particular then spoke at length about the school during his travels; famously sharing photographs and expounding upon its promise at the 1900 Paris Exposition. Through her and her school's regular association with such trailblazers, Laney became active in the Niagra Movement (forerunner to what would become the NAACP), and was one of the earliest members of the NACW (which has been extensively covered throughout this trading card series). In 1909, President Taft visited the campus and remarked that he had "seen nothing in the way of efficiency and of self-sacrifice that could compare with the work of Miss Laney."

Granny Weatherwax comes to me

speaking words of wisdom:

Do they know what truth and kindness even look like? Do they understand that nothing is solved except with honesty and compassion? Do they know healing?

These things are real. It is possible to embody them. All the hollow "thoughts & prayers" that you've seen on social media is nothing. But there is something real that everyone reflexively apes when a tragedy comes. They want to live in a world of compassion but they're scared to nurture that seed because of the hollowness and irony of fascism.