We Don't Have to be Assholes

Yet many people refuse to admit they are contributing to our divided country

Photo by Intricate Explorer on Unsplash

Bluesky is getting overrun with zionists, and they’re assholes. They love nothing better than to call virtually everyone antisemitic, and they will immediately start personally attacking you. They are even meaner when you give them facts they do not want to believe. They are very much like MAGA in that way. I honestly don’t know how the Democratic Party will survive with so many zionists dividing the Party. They love that almost every member of Congress is owned by AIPAC, and if you suggest an elected Democrat should not be owned by AIPAC, they relentlessly attack you.

In case you're not familiar (but you probably are if you're reading this), a zionist is someone who believes Israel should exist no matter the cost. No matter how many Palestinians have to be murdered. No matter how much land has to be stolen. And they love to ask you the gotcha question, “Do you think Israel has a right to exist?” People have a right to exist, but nation states do not. And Israel is a nation state of mostly Europeans (and 60,000 Americans), most of whom do not practice Judaism.

Zionists and “Blue MAGA" (Democrats who refuse to entertain ANY criticism of the party) are alienating the rest of the Democrats and especially the true left who are against a party that primarily caters to billionaires and the donor class. (I think Blue MAGA would be against that, too, if they bothered to acknowledge it.) But sometimes people's viewpoints are based on the benefit they're getting.

There is overlap between zionists and Blue MAGA, and they're all pretty bold and nasty. Zionists think you should listen to and heed everything they (total strangers who often aren't even using their real names on Bluesky) say over listening to experts and thoughtful, progressive leaders. They apparently don't see Democracy Now, Gabor Mate, or Haaretz as reliable sources anymore. One of the zionists I encountered on Bluesky, who was a very, very white woman, kept calling me “white woman" as an insult. Along with that, she somehow managed to turn being from Vermont and giving hugs into negative things. She was very emotionally immature and acted like she had some sort of privilege over me.

Believe me, it was partly my fault for engaging at all. (To be clear, several of them started in on me, and I made the mistake of responding.) I don't generally engage MAGA or zionists (who, incidentally, also overlap) because their viewpoints are based on years of exposure to propaganda and living in an echo chamber.

How will Democrats come together when we can't even agree on genocide? When we can't agree on freedom of speech? (Liberal states and institutions under Biden began the crackdown on peaceful protests against the genocide.) We can't agree on how damaging the military industrial complex is (or we wouldn't keep feeding it). We can't agree on foreign influence in our government (unless it's Russia). We can't agree on who the underdog is in a fight (unless it's Ukraine) when clearly it's the side without the most technologically advanced military in the world (and where most people are unarmed civilians).

We are losing Black voters to Trump. Like, it would be one thing if they decided not to vote at all, but they're actually changing to Republican and not feeling bad about it. They know they've been pawns of the Democratic Party for too long, and they don't owe the Party anything. Quite the opposite. Same with the working class. We've been on a slow slide to where we are for quite a while.

The Democratic Party should be ashamed of what it’s become, but I don’t think they have any shame… just dollar signs in their eyes. If we want things to change, we are going to need a shared vision, to stop this in-fighting, and to hold the Democratic Party accountable.

Political Hobbyists

I can’t stop thinking about this quote, which I think is from Let This Radicalize You.

"Many college-educated people think they are deeply engaged in politics. They follow the news - reading articles like this one - and debate the latest developments on social media. They might sign an online petition or throw a $5 online donation to a presidential candidate. Mostly, they consume political information as a way of satisfying their own emotional and intellectual needs."

According to Hersh, a political hobbyist debating the latest headline protest is "no closer to engaging in politics than watching SportsCenter is to playing football."

How does this quote make you feel about your current political engagement?

👀 Life Observations

Bike Helmet Expiration

I decided to take a longer than usual bike ride recently, and despite the route being on the bike trail, I chose to wear my helmet. Having not worn it in years, I got to wondering if bike helmets “expire”. I live in a very hot, humid place so plastics and other materials can easily degrade over the years.

Helmets do, in fact, expire. With normal use, you should replace your helmet every 3-5 years. With light use every 5-8 years. My helmet is 10 years old, and I can see where the sun has faded the color in places.

I’m sad because I love my helmet, and they, of course, don't make the same one anymore. I especially love the high visibility orange color.

I bought mine at a beloved local bike shop, and the owner gave me a discount because it was cheaper online (and I spent a lot of money at the cafe that used to be in the bike shop).

I texted the owner of my beloved Brompton dealership who sent me a photo of the helmets he had. There was a bright green Abus that I looked up online to see that it has a light on the back.

Interestingly, I looked at the date on the Abus helmet at the bike shop, and it was 2020… so already 5 years old. I decided to take a chance that it would last 5 more years since it had never been out of the box.

The helmet is incredibly well-ventilated, which is needed here in Florida. It came with a very small visor (also needed in Florida), and I changed it out for a larger one I had on hand.

What's the longest you've ever kept/used a bicycle helmet?

Buying a House

Oof, this stuff is stressful. I put an offer on a house early last week. It was not the house I wanted, but it was the house I thought I needed. It was not in Troy, NY. It was in the village of Greenwich, NY.

Why did I pick this house? Well, it was built in 2004, so the structure was very new. And the price was right. They were asking $139,900 and had lowered the price like 12 times since 2023 when they started off asking a whopping $285,000 for this property.

The building itself was hella quirky. It’s technically a 1.5-story house. But it’s not a multi-story house. It’s an apartment over a (for lack of better word) garage, and the two are not connected. The top floor has to be called a half floor because the ceilings are less than 7” in some places. (It slopes down to conform to the shape of the roof.)

The zoning is commercial, but the downstairs has the big furnace, oil tank and water heater scattered in different locations, so whatever you did down there would have to take that into consideration.

The apartment itself was… depressing… and would’ve needed some cosmetic attention. On top of that, the taxes on this place were pretty high, and the village was reassessing EVERY YEAR and raising the assessment. They had this building at $190,000, and there’s no way that was the market value.

I offered them $130,000.

Immediately after I made my offer (which I thought was a sane and practical thing to do), I started having intense anxiety. Like, “I need to control my breathing” anxiety. I was freaking out thinking I had just made a monumental mistake.

Well, apparently an extra $10k off the price was a bridge too far for them and they came back saying they wanted full price… after lowering the price a dozen times over more than a year’s time. I did not accept their counter offer. My prediction is that they’ll end up taking what I offered (from someone else) or less.

I felt a huge sense of relief when they didn’t accept my offer. My body knew that wasn’t the right move. I think the Universe saved me from a bad outcome.

It's really stressful in general making big life decisions alone. I did call a trusted friend when I started feeling anxious, and she had some very practical and encouraging things to say.

I'm touring another house with my realtor today. It's much older but even more inexpensive and single story since I ain't getting any younger. Every house in my price range is a little quirky. I just have to decide what kind of quirky I can live with.

⏰️ Currently

🧿 Walked a labyrinth yesterday and ruminated on the desire to trust myself to make good decisions, even if they scare me.

📒 Trying to find the energy to create some more sources of income to go along with my book… like a course, a workbook, and a journal.

🧘‍♀️ Am working to have a clearer sense of confidence about my future