Rainbow capitalism has repeatedly failed my people -- from Dylan Mulvaney through to the workers of Grindr.
Large tech companies (especially west-coast tech companies) have taken to using LGBTQ+ people as a sort of ornament, or worse, moral offset -- sure, BigCorp might be a ruthless monopolist, but oh gee look how many _N_ they hired, for several different values of _N_. Sure, we might be throwing whole sectors of the economy into monopolized penury, but OMG we have RAINBOWS and we are NOT AFRAID TO FLY THEM.
The backlash against queers has as much to do with the use of my people as props by the ruling class as it does with the (still significant) freestanding prejudice against us.
We will not get free until #GirlBosses are treated just the same as regular bosses: socioeconomic 'guards' in a globe-wide Stanford Prison Experiment.
Separately, but not unrelatedly, the leveraging of Buddhist and other appropriated Eastern spiritual cant and tropes as tools of psychological discipline (Mindfulness for layoff anxiety! Yoga for shipping pressure!) is of grave concern as well.
The future that center-left liberals want is a nonbinary gig worker meditating on a rainbow yoga mat on an AI-led mindfulness retreat. As a leftist, and a Buddhist, and a queer, I say: we have as much to fear from this 'near enemy' as from our far enemies.
> It is really not so repulsive to see the poor asking for money as to see the rich asking for more money. And advertisement is the rich asking for more money. A man would be annoyed if he found himself in a mob of millionaires, all holding out their silk hats for a penny; or all shouting with one voice, “Give me money.” Yet advertisement does really assault the eye very much as such a shout would assault the ear. “Budge’s Boots are the Best” simply means “Give me money”; “Use Seraphic Soap” simply means “Give me money.” It is a complete mistake to suppose that common people make our towns commonplace, with unsightly things like advertisements. Most of those whose wares are thus placarded everywhere are very wealthy gentlemen with coronets and country seats, men who are probably very particular about the artistic adornment of their own homes. They disfigure their towns in order to decorate their houses.
> People are taking the piss out of you everyday. They butt into your life, take a cheap shot at you and then disappear. They leer at you from tall buildings and make you feel small. They make flippant comments from buses that imply you’re not sexy enough and that all the fun is happening somewhere else. They are on TV making your girlfriend feel inadequate. They have access to the most sophisticated technology the world has ever seen and they bully you with it. They are ‘The Advertisers’ and they are laughing at you.
> You, however, are forbidden to touch them. Trademarks, intellectual property rights and copyright law mean advertisers can say what they like wherever they like with total impunity.
> Fuck that. Any advert in a public space that gives you no choice whether you see it or not is yours. It’s yours to take, re-arrange and re-use. You can do whatever you like with it. Asking for permission is like asking to keep a rock someone just threw at your head.
> You owe the companies nothing. Less than nothing, you especially don’t owe them any courtesy. They owe you. They have re-arranged the world to put themselves in front of you. They never asked for your permission, don’t even start asking for theirs. - Banksy
It doesn't give me a lot of hope we'll be able to reclaim our public spaces from being littered with ads anytime soon.
Large tech companies (especially west-coast tech companies) have taken to using LGBTQ+ people as a sort of ornament, or worse, moral offset -- sure, BigCorp might be a ruthless monopolist, but oh gee look how many _N_ they hired, for several different values of _N_. Sure, we might be throwing whole sectors of the economy into monopolized penury, but OMG we have RAINBOWS and we are NOT AFRAID TO FLY THEM.
The backlash against queers has as much to do with the use of my people as props by the ruling class as it does with the (still significant) freestanding prejudice against us.
We will not get free until #GirlBosses are treated just the same as regular bosses: socioeconomic 'guards' in a globe-wide Stanford Prison Experiment.
Separately, but not unrelatedly, the leveraging of Buddhist and other appropriated Eastern spiritual cant and tropes as tools of psychological discipline (Mindfulness for layoff anxiety! Yoga for shipping pressure!) is of grave concern as well.
The future that center-left liberals want is a nonbinary gig worker meditating on a rainbow yoga mat on an AI-led mindfulness retreat. As a leftist, and a Buddhist, and a queer, I say: we have as much to fear from this 'near enemy' as from our far enemies.
https://mindfulness-alliance.org/2019/02/09/near-enemies-of-...