Notices by Madeleine Morris (remittancegirl@mstdn.social)

@dyckron

Ah, yes. The GOP. the Party of law and order.

hahahahah

I have had the pleasure and honour of having Turkish co-workers at my university, who were so ridiculously over-educated and such polymaths it was embarrassing to the rest of us. I think what breaks my heart most is that I absolutely fell in love with Istanbul - which, of course, I understand, is not all of Turkey.

But it was one of the most quietly tolerant and inclusive cities I’d ever been to. Perhaps because of its history - millennia, perhaps because of its geographic location.

photo by Ümit Bektaş

All because Erdogan doesn’t want to have to run against the very popular Mayor of Istanbul.

I really hope people can hear me on this.

When people say that Trump is joking about this or that, Trump doesn’t joke. He literally cannot joke.

When he says he’s ‘joking’, it’s simply something he flew up the flag pole to see if it would fly, but it didn’t. So then he says he’s joking.

But he’s never joking.

A true joke takes something Trump doesn’t have.

Just a reminder: The Mayor of Istanbul had his university degree stolen from him, so that Erdogan could invalidate his candidacy.

Guess who else takes away people’s university degrees in punishment for the politics they hold?

The US.

In the gardens of the Mesquita, the intricate design of watercourses, from orange tree to orange tree.

@SuneAuken
It baffles me that, being as rich as he is, he wouldn’t have at least a couple of advisers who would game it out for him.

@thepoliticalcat @emory @Nonilex

@thepoliticalcat

You know, I have always been passionately and deeply interested in the psychological details of complicated, dodgy people. But recently, I’ve completely lost interest in it. I don’t give a fuck why he is the asshole he is. Much like Trump. I won’t give them the dignity of being interested in why they are the shits they are.

@SuneAuken @emory @Nonilex

@thepoliticalcat

The thing is… Ted Bundy or Jeffrey Dahmer are legitimate puzzles.

But Musk and Trump are not puzzles. They are so fucking banal. Arendt was spot on when talking about the banality of evil. These fuckers are so deeply banal.

@SuneAuken @emory @Nonilex

From the pov of US Immigration, I guess the point is to have all these people telling horrific stories of their treatment as a cautionary message about visa conditions.

But what it does is make many thousands of the kind of tourists they’d like to see visit the US say: ugh, maybe we go to the South of France this year?

What is really indicative about this case is the lack of measuredness with which these people are being treated.

People have mixups with their visas and the conditions of their visas all the time, all over the world. Detaining someone for over 2 weeks, chaining them like a criminal, and holding them incommunicado - so that their family doesn’t even know if they’re on the plane out… is the most obscene over-reaction.

It tells you that terror and cruelty IS the objective. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cly67j35y99o

Having travelled to some pretty dodgy and autocratic places in my life, my advice is not to travel to the US if at all possible.

If you do have to travel there:

1. Make sure your passport has more than 6 months left to run.
2. make sure your visa is absolutely complete and covers you for exactly what you plan to do in the country
3. take ALL social media apps off your phone. If you use your real name on any of your accounts, change it before travelling.

@cstross Whoa. Well, it’s about time.

So here are some more parts of Black American military history this racist, autocratic oligarchy has tried to erase:

The 761st Tank Battalion

https://web.archive.org/web/20241001083857mp_/https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3481039/austin-morgan-freeman-discuss-upcoming-documentary/ #dontforget

https://archive.ph/M9dRi

@inthehands Yes. I have a thread about it.

It completely erases the concept of what a degree is.

https://mstdn.social/@Remittancegirl/114177558707667037

Seriously, I am going to say it again. There are many, many wonderful universities in Europe. Some even teach in English.

It’s a hell of a lot cheaper. The standards of scholarship are excellent. You can access a LOT of financial aid.

And you get to experience life in another country.

Why the fuck would anyone choose America now? For status? Because I suspect they’re going to lose that damn fast.

Who the fuck is going to hand over hundreds of thousands for a degree that can get revoked if they don’t like your political opinions?

Because today it’s an opinion on Gaza. But tomorrow, who the fuck knows… they don’t like you for being vegetarian? Trump decided to get a hate-on for Descartes?

https://www.newsweek.com/columbia-revokes-degrees-pro-palestine-student-protesters-2044596

The silver lining of what is happening at Columbia (and sure to happen either publicly or quietly at other US institutions) is that it will erode the often undeserved reputations of US Universities as premier learning/research institutions.

They are over-priced and often the degrees are more status symbols than any measure of a scholar’s worth.

Students of the world… there are excellent universities all over Europe. Attend one.

Having taught at University level for 15 years, I have always found it disgusting that students are forced into a lifetime of debt to educate themselves.

Yes, a degree can help with your career, and enhance your life individually, it also contributes greatly to the collective intellectual wealth of the community you live in.

It should be affordable and accessible to all who want it.