Cedar Riener
criener.bsky.social
Cedar Riener
@criener.bsky.social
College professor, cognitive psychologist, textbook author. Also interested in science writing, social justice, politics and anti-racism. Proud member of AAUP & AFT Local 6741. Personal account. Views are my own and do not represent RMC, AAAS or SCHEV
Reposted by Cedar Riener
More than 650 members of the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, acting in their individual capacities, publicly signed on to endorse the Articles of Impeachment introduced in the House on Dec 10, 2025 by Representative Haley Stevens.

drive.google.com/file/d/1iQKK...
NASEM Signers.pdf
drive.google.com
February 12, 2026 at 4:23 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
I assign this every year. Necessary read in these terrible times

www.nybooks.com/online/2023/...
February 12, 2026 at 6:42 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
Here’s the thing: All non-violent political movements are engaged, at some level, in a contest of persuasion. In such a contest, images matter. Optics matter. Always.
February 12, 2026 at 5:23 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
In light of this deeply illegal activity at NSF and the ongoing attack on American science, I'm posting the slides from my 2017 talk at the American Physical Society about the Nazi take over of German physics/why German is no longer science's lingua franca 🧪

🧵 1/26
drive.google.com/file/d/1_MCm...
January 31, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
I’m not exactly sure what the reckoning should look like, but the field of the learning sciences needs to confront its roots in the work and words of Roger Schank and his misogyny and racism.
Late Northwestern professor maintained relationship with Epstein
Content warning: This story contains mentions of sexual misconduct with minors. Late McCormick Prof. Roger Schank maintained close contact with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and was offered a...
dailynorthwestern.com
February 12, 2026 at 2:58 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
rather than tailing a fundamentally incoherent slice of the electorate one could instead simply have a view of what should be done and try to advance it politically

bsky.app/profile/edbu...
The basic fallacy in chasing votes by being "tough on immigration" is that the modal American's position on the issue is "Deport the Bad ones and keep the Good ones," and they alone know who is which, and that simply does not translate into workable policy. So this kind of gestapo stuff (1/2)
January 27, 2026 at 4:18 PM
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good time for all of us to revisit this thread
It is hard to grasp but large masses of Americans are both racist/xenophobic AND not racist/xenophobic enough to applaud what Trump is doing. It's goldilocks shit, they want a level of racism/xenophobia calibrated exactly to their personal preferences, and you just can't make that policy. Don't try.
January 27, 2026 at 4:16 PM
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Boy sounds like a great time to fire tens of thousands of Haitians with TPS working in the healthcare sector, I’m sure that’s going to go well!
February 12, 2026 at 1:19 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
Fascists only need to win one election to destroy democracy, whereas democrats have to win every election to preserve it. That’s why fascists cannot be allowed into politics, why a tolerant society must never tolerate fascism or it will lose its tolerance. It’s the Popper Paradox and we’re living it
February 12, 2026 at 1:37 PM
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OSU student paper, The Lantern, has been doing great reporting on state government overreach into OSU and public higher education in general, see www.thelantern.com/2026/02/ohio...
Ohio State professor on administrative leave after assaulting journalist
An Ohio State professor was placed on administrative leave following a physical confrontation with a cameraman attempting to interview former Ohio State President E. Gordon Gee. Luke Perez, an assista...
www.thelantern.com
February 12, 2026 at 1:40 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
OSU AAUP @osuaaup.bsky.social gets the final word in the NY Post story
February 12, 2026 at 1:36 PM
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damn you're telling me that sin taxes work to reduce consumption of socially harmful goods while keeping them legal and thus avoiding the problems of criminalization?
Oh hell yes
February 12, 2026 at 1:34 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
To everyone thanking me, much appreciated but not why I posted! Pls support your local immigrant defense group like:

The Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota: www.ilcm.org/donate/

Or my hometown LUCE: www.lucemass.org/donate

Or Google your city/state & “immigrant defense” to find your local heroes!
February 12, 2026 at 12:29 AM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
Meanwhile, DHS shows its contempt for the judiciary in a different way. In dozens, likely now thousands, of cases, DHS openly defies court orders.

Minnesota courts enter orders forbidding ICE from moving noncitizens who’ve filed habeas petitions out of Minnesota. They move them anyway.

16/
February 11, 2026 at 9:56 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
Legal status doesn’t matter: if you exceed ICE’s melanin threshold, you get snatched. It is ethnic cleansing. There is no other word for it.

The news has shown you video of these often violent detentions. What you don’t see is what happens to these individuals after.

I’ve had a front row seat.

7/
February 11, 2026 at 9:56 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
15 years ago when I went to law school, 12 years ago when I began practicing… hell, a month ago, I wanted nothing to do with immigration law.

On January 14, however, what I wanted stopped mattering.

5/
February 11, 2026 at 9:56 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
I work for a Minneapolis-based firm. MPLS was and is under attack by the federal government. Hundreds of people are being snatched off the streets. Undocumented immigrants, DACA recipients, asylees, asylum seekers, refugees, lawful permanent residents, citizens.

6/
February 11, 2026 at 9:56 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
I don’t really know what I expect in posting this, but maybe some people see it and can learn from it.

I’ll call it “lessons from an unwilling immigration attorney.”

1/
February 11, 2026 at 9:56 PM
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Every photo from Minneapolis looks like this. Cops decked out with guns and full tac gear facing off against people in bathrobes, parkas, and sweatpants armed only with whistles and cell phones.

Yet every verified MAGA chode on X dutifully calls it a riot or violent insurrection.
February 11, 2026 at 11:50 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
These men out here sending emails from their university accounts being like “hello mr sex crimes I’ve been thinking about it and we should bring back the word shrew ok gotta go to my disciplinary hearing byeee”
February 12, 2026 at 1:25 AM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
"It is totally inappropriate and against the separations of powers for the DOJ to surveil us as we search the Epstein files. (US Attorney General) Bondi showed up today with a burn book that held a printed search history of exactly what emails I searched." - Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA).
February 12, 2026 at 12:43 AM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
My doomer-worry about AI is not that the LLMs become omnipotent and take over the world but that the wealthy and powerful use it as a means to consolidate power and marginalize or lay off skilled workers and also everything about our technological and political and social life gets worse
February 11, 2026 at 8:20 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
Congressional Republicans are going to deprive D.C. of $700 million in revenue and repeal a local program projected to reduce child poverty by 20 percent, solely to spite District residents and make us suffer. They’re also throwing our tax filing into utter chaos. This is a disaster.
February 11, 2026 at 11:07 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
My friends who are in tech are getting destroyed by AI.

My friends who are established writers are like "bring it, Claude, I'll have your ass hanging on a flagpole by morning."

Just anecdotal, but still.
a lot of "AI hype" discourse makes more sense when you realize that a lot of initial LLM/GenAI hype envisioned replacing artists and PhDs, and its actual impacts have been much greater on coders and other tech workers

creatives/experts see "AI" as underperforming hype, techies see it overperforming
February 11, 2026 at 6:27 PM
Reposted by Cedar Riener
I fear that men are about to do what men do. They are about to characterize any sober thinking about power as non-technical and therefore unserious.

We have seen this pattern over and over again in tech criticism. Women and people of color repeatedly lead on understanding tech changes.
February 11, 2026 at 5:55 PM