All posts
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On sex work and demand.
We could end sex work by pushing back against demand … but we need to help women feel less demand for money, not criminalize men’s demand for sex.
anti-prostitution feminists, anti-prostitution movement, Ayurvedic massage, border patrol, border policing, brothel-keeping laws, colonial legacy, colonialism, criminal justice, criminalization, criminalized transactions, decriminalized prostitution, demand, dismissive library listing, economics of criminalized transactions, elastic versus inelastic demand, feminism, feminist theory, GBI, global capitalism, global wealth tax, guaranteed basic income, human migration, human rights, human trafficking, immigration, immigration control, immigration enforcement, immigration policy, injustice, judges, Juno Mac, legislating morality, library listing, massage, massage therapists, massage therapy, misogyny, Molly Smith, Nordic model, objectification, objectification of women, policing, policing women, prohibition, prosecutors, prostitution, racism, racist enforcement, racist policing, Revolting Prostitutes, selectively enforced laws, sex, sex work, sex workers, sex workers rights, sexuality, Sweden, trafficking, undocumented immigration, undocumented migrants, War on Drugs, wealth tax, work, workers rights
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On writing.
By writing, we can prove that we really do exist. But not everyone in jail has access to even as much as a sharpened pencil.
action permanence, depression, deprivation in jail, drug trip, drugs, ego death, jail commissary, jail poetry, medicine, mushroom tea, pencil sharpener, pencils, pencils in jail, Portland, psilocybin, psilocybin mushrooms, psychedelic, psychedelic drugs, psychedelic medicine, psychedelics, PTSD, PTSD cures, Sacred Knowledge, shrooms, suffering in jail, teaching in jail, teaching poetry in jail, trip, trip report, William Richards, writing, writing in jail
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On bowerbirds, process, and happiness.
In a world where not everyone wins, we can either prepare to mope or learn to enjoy the process of our lives.
abolition, abolitionism, art, attention economy, Bestiary, birds, Bower, bowerbird, bowerbirds, children, corvids, crow family life, crow intelligence, crow smarts, crows, crows using tools, Donika Kelly, goal-oriented, goals versus process, jail, jail poetry, mass incarceration, mate choice, mate selection, mating, mating behavior, non-coercive mating, parenting, poetry, process-oriented, psychology, self-actualization, self-help, sexual choice, sexual selection, social media pyramid, storytelling, suffering in jail, teaching in jail, teaching poetry, teaching poetry in jail, tool use, tropical birds, War on Drugs, writing
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On telepathy and the battle for narrative control.
After William Burroughs experienced how pitifully he could be held in thrall by a small molecule, he developed a lifelong interest in telepathy and mind control. His own brain had been upended. Suddenly, he found himself devoting the vast majority of his time and money toward a single cause: obtaining a day’s ration of opiate. …
addictive technology, Apple, ayahuasca, battle for stories, behavioral change, behavioral modification, Benway, competing narratives, criminal justice, criminal justice system, Douglas Star, Facebook, false confessions, guilty plea, hooked on technology, how are criminal defendants charged, identity, incarceration, innocent people plead guilty, interrogation, interrogation techniques, jail, language battle, magnetic pulse, mass incarceration, mental conditioning, mind control, Naked Lunch, narrative control, neural polarization, Pavlov, Pavlovian conditioning, personality, personality modification, plea bargain, police, police interrogation, power, prison, prosecution, prosecutors, prosecutors determine charges, psyche, psychedelics, psychic warfare, psychology research, Queer, research into false confessions, Saul Kassin, Silicon Valley, social control, story battle, storytelling, subjugation, tech companies, tech-free kids, technology, technology companies, telepathy, thought control, TMS, transcranial magnetic stimulation, ultimatum game, unethical game design, why do innocent people confess, William Burroughs, Yage
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On the moon landing, and who benefits if you believe it was faked.
Who benefits if you believe the moon landing was faked? The people who want to prevent our government from helping you.
45, 50th anniversary, American moon landing, Area 51, astronomy, belief in conspiracy theories, can our government keep secrets, childhood hunger, childhood malnutrition, civil rights, cold war, conspiracy, conspiracy theories, conspiracy theories debunked, conspiracy theory, convincing people that the moon landing was real, crystal meth, debunked conspiracy theory, debunked moon landing conspiracy, Disney conspiracy, do people believe we sent a man to the moon, Donald Trump, drug addiction, drug use, drugs, faked photographs, government, government bureaucracy, government incompetence, government is the problem, government secrets, have humans been to the moon, have people been to the moon, health care, incompetence, incompetent government, International Space Station, jail, JFK, Jill Lepore, leaked government secrets, lemming conspiracy, lunar landing, mass incarceration, meth, methamphetamine, methamphetamines, moon, moon landing, moon landing anniversary, moon landing conspiracy, moon landing faked, NASA, oil company conspiracy, paranoia, PotUS, poverty, President, prison, Reagan, rocketry, Ronald Reagan, Santa conspiracy, send a man to the moon, sleep deprivation, speed, strategic incompetence, talking to people about the moon landing, teaching poetry, teaching poetry in jail, the eagle has landed, the moon landing, the moon landing was fake, trauma, Trump, UFO, UFO theorist, underfunded schools, was the moon landing faked, was the moon landing real, we sent humans to the moon, why fake the moon landing, why people believe conspiracy theories
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On translation.
Translation is imperfect, and dangerous, and we should all do it. The act of putting another’s thoughts into our words will bring us closer.
addiction, Cathay, Cherry, Christopher Logue, drug addiction, Ezra Pound, Hayden Pelliccia, Homer, imperfect translation, incomplete equivalence, Iraq, Iraqi translators, literal translation, literary translation, literature in translation, Mark Polizzotti, military interpreters, military service, military translation, mistranslation, Nico Walker, Perry Link, Sympathy for the Traitor, The Iliad, translated literature, translating literature, translating poetry, Translation, War Music
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On re-watching The Matrix, twenty years later.
The Matrix was, and is, an incredible film … but now, after all the school shootings, it’s hard for me to watch.
Alan Greenspan, American gun violence, angry young men, Christianity, Colombine, ethics, fear, Grant Morrison, gun control, gun violence, guns, high school, inequality, matrix, moral certainty, morality, Pareto optimal, Pareto optimality, Parkland, political ethics, political philosophy, school safety, school shootings, school stress, social contract, stress, student safety, students against gun violence, students for gun control, The Invisibles, U.S. politics
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On the celebration of Neanderthals.
Neanderthal were more like us than scientists once thought … but, in our current political atmosphere, I can’t feel comfortable celebrating them.
45, epidermal melanin, extinction, genetic inheritence, Homo sapiens, human evolution, human extinction, human migration, immigration, inherited privilege, macrofauna extinction, migration, migration laws, Neanderthal, Neanderthal DNA, Neanderthal genes, Neanderthal stories, Neanderthals, prehistory, President Trump, race, racism, Trump, white supremacists, white supremacy
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On national borders and the disappearance of our universe’s only known habitable planet.
We all share one planet, but selfish decisions made within a single nation’s borders could destroy it.
45, addiction, Amazon, Amazon Rainforest, Animal Man, biological abundance, biological diversity, biological fecundity, Brazil, Brazilian presidency, caterpillar, climate change, climate refuges, David Wallace-Wells, DC comics, deforestation, Donald Trump, environment, environmentalism, falling insect populations, fatherhood, fossil fuels, GBI, global warming, global wealth tax, Grant Morrison, guaranteed basic income, immigration, immigration crisis, inequality, insect populations, Jair Bolsonaro, Mexico, Michael McCarthy, Michoacan, Midwest, milkweed, mining in Michoacan, mining in the Amazon, Molly Crabapple, monarch wintering sites, national borders, oil, oil companies, parenting, pesticides, President Trump, raising caterpillars, raising monarch butterflies, raising Monarchs, refugee crisis, renewable energy, solar energy, The Moth Snowstorm, The Uninhabitable Earth, Trump, vegan, vegan comic books, vegan comics, vegan superhero, vegan superheroes, veganism, vegetarian comic books, vegetarian comics, vegetarian superhero, vegetarian superheroes, vegetarianism, Where Else Can They Go
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On power and species.
In comics, the people who believe their power gives them the right to dominate others are villains. And yet, consider the way we treat the other animals who share our planet …
All-Star Superman, animal PTSD, animal welfare, comics, DC comics, do animals feel trauma, do animals get PTSD, dominion, ethics, Grant Morrison, Harry Harlow, HIV vaccine, HIV vaccine research, how we treat other animals, hurricane, Hurricane Maria, John-Michael Bloomquist, lab animals, laboratory animals, Luke Dittrich, macaque, macaque colony, macaque PTSD, macaques, Miss Able, monkey colony, monkey PTSD, Patient H.M., Pit of Despair, poetry, post traumatic stress disorder, power, primate research, psychological harm, psychological research, psychology, psychology research, PTSD, Puerto Rican macaque colony, Rape Rack, research animals, research colony, research ethics, research macaques, research monkeys, scientific ethics, St. Francis Visits the Research Macaques of Modern Science, Superheroes, Superman, Superman versus The Hulk, Supervillains, The Hulk, trauma, vegan, vegan comic books, vegan comics, vegan superhero, vegan superheroes, veganism, vegetarian, vegetarian comic books, vegetarian comics, vegetarian superhero, vegetarian superheroes, Villains
Frank Brown Cloud 