Jess Schomberg
LightNews LightNews
banner
schomj.bsky.social
Jess Schomberg
@schomj.bsky.social
1.7K followers 510 following 4.3K posts
Librarian, disability, union member 🏳️‍🌈
(they/them)

Contact info and various socials: https://linktr.ee/schomj
Posts Replies Media Videos
schomj.bsky.social
Reposting with alt text
Mass graves. Brittle bodies of starved and tortured families. Children looking up in terror at the men who, in moments, will become their executioners. This is El Fasher. Sudan: another blood-soaked playground where international and regional powers wage their wars through the lives of the Sudanese. At the center of this violence is the RSF - once the Janjaweed - and behind the RSF stands the UAE, which receives over 97% of Sudan's declared gold exports. The RSF funds its war machine by seizing gold mines and smuggling the gold to Dubai. where it is refined, anonymized, and converted into cash, weapons, and diplomatic protection. The UAE backs the RSF because the RSF provides it with cheap gold, a loyal proxv militia, regional leverage, ideological victory over Islamist-aligned political actors and control over strategic military and commercial corridors across Africa. This is the same RSF the UAE has deploved in Libya, Yemen and across the Sahel. And control of Sudan gives the UAE influence over the Red Sea corridor - one of the most critical shipping and military routes in the world. The UAE is not a spectator, it's an architect. For it, the collapse of Sudanese society - the destruction of a country rich in history, culture and political possibility - is not collateral damage It is the investment. SANA SAEED
November 5, 2025 at 9:29 PM
schomj.bsky.social
And now I'm ready for a November full of novellas! (Inspired by a post I can no longer find about making this month focused on novellas)
A stack of 5 books: The First Thousand Trees and We Speak Through the Mountains by Premee Mohamed, Mammoths at the Gate by Nghi Vo, Psychopomp & Circumstance by Eddn Roycd, and The Babysitter Lives plus Killer on the Road by Stephen Graham Jones
November 4, 2025 at 6:56 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Really loved this book, perfect mix of witty, gruesome, heartfelt, cynical
Holding the book The Works of Vermin by Hiron Ennes in front of cats
November 4, 2025 at 6:50 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Minneapolis

sahanjournal.com/public-safet...
Abdirizak Kaynan, the mosque's imam, said a worshipper confronted the woman when the woman entered the building through the side door. The woman made repeated threats that she was there to set the mosque on fire. Kaynan said another worshipper arrived and called 911, and they were told by the operator to call 311 instead. Kaynan then called 911 himself.
October 12, 2025 at 5:11 PM
schomj.bsky.social
@sparklebeam.bsky.social I couldn't find many short quotes to post because she's more prone to 2-pagers than 1-liners, but here's one!
TRICKSTER DRIFT Page 369 Just to hear something other than his own bones crunching, he sang "Someday," one of his favourite songs after he'`d broken up with Sarah. *Stop it," the cannibalistic [redacted] said. "No Nickelback!" "Or what? You'll eat me?" Jared said. Jared couldn't remember all the words, but he sang the bits that he could remember over and over, out of sequence, heartfelt, earnest. Cannibal [redacted] threw his foot at him. It sailed through his non-corporeal body. She furiously mojoed his body back together and shoved him back in it so she could strangle him. "Stop singing!" she screamed, her hands wrapping around his throat, throttling him like the brainless chicken she thought he was. Jared sang louder.
October 12, 2025 at 5:01 PM
schomj.bsky.social
repost with alt text
screenshot of a news article with the headline: Scoop: Apple quietly made ICE agents a protected class. Internal emails show tech giant used anti-hate-speech rules meant for minorities to block an app documenting immigration enforcement. By Pablo Manriquez. Oct. 08, 2025.
October 8, 2025 at 4:35 PM
schomj.bsky.social
On the one hand, this quote made me laugh.

On the other hand, they're following over 10k accounts and have a "no DMs" note. So, block time.

(If you are an actual person with a "no DMs" note: just change your permissions. You don't need a note. It makes you look like a bot.)
Screenshop of a bsky account called mesp13 with the quote "All tyrants end the same way. It is just a matter of time." along with a No DMs statement. It has 9,000 followers and is following 16,000 accounts.
September 29, 2025 at 5:38 PM
schomj.bsky.social
I did not know this

(From Anton Treuer's Everything You Wanted to Know about Indians)
Ojibwe people today use the term Oiibwe as a tribally specific term for self-reference (Ojibwe only) but also use Anishinaabe to refer to all Indians--Oiibwe, Dakota and others. The word Anishinaabe is used as commonly as Ojibwe by tribal members in everyday conversation, which has led to some confusion about their distinctions, but Ojibwe is tribally specific and Anishinaabe is inclusive of all tribes.
September 26, 2025 at 12:42 AM
schomj.bsky.social
doodle why would anyone need this?
screenshot of the optional description section of a doodle poll, where it says you can "get AI suggestion" for what to include
September 24, 2025 at 6:47 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Really looking forward to my shift ending so I can jump back into Dorley Hall
Book cover of Welcome to Dorley Hall by Alyson Greaves.
September 5, 2025 at 12:33 AM
schomj.bsky.social
This sort of thing is why I question anyone (it's usually white people) doing disability research and advocacy who's not also paying attention to racism and eugenics and carceralism
Blum points out that Spencer was not the first academic to develop the idea of biological predestination. He awards some credit to Cesare Lombroso, who wrote during the 1870s from his post as Professor of Legal Medicine at the University of Turin in Italy. Lombroso (1876/1912) believed criminality to be hereditary and he sought to distinguish the physical traits of murderers, thieves, and rapists through examination of their facial features and head shapes. He believed that criminals were physically similar to non-European races (especially Negroes and Mongols) and even to wild animals. Interestingly, a group of retardates (now called Down's Syndrome) were originally called "Mongolian Idiots"--the explanation being that they were throwbacks (atavistic retrogression) to the more primitive Oriental race!
September 4, 2025 at 6:58 PM
schomj.bsky.social
This was published in 1996, and I vividly remember the late '90s-early '00s being absolutely rife with social darwinist discourse. It could be the people I knew at the time but I remember it being a regular part of conversation.
After all, how else to account for the fact that a small number of well-educated rich men on a foggy little island in the middle of the North Sea had long controlled more than half of the world's commerce and ruled an empire that stretched in all directions, around the earth. What could justify the fact that subjugated colonial peoples were tirelessly exploited by their British masters, and British blue collar and day laborers worked under the most exploitative and dangerous conditions? Ideologies were needed that proclaimed the scientific correctness of free competition, that argued against any support aimed at relieving the squalid and unhealthy living conditions of the exploited working poor and colonial masses. "Innate superiority" explained to powerful upper-class men why they should enjoy the unbelievable affluence that resulted from widespread exploitation. It was supported by the view that everyone rose to their proper position through the operation of genetic endowment. Those who failed to rise were deficient in their supply of the proper genes. Social Darwinism could not help but be favored by the white male elite upper class.
September 4, 2025 at 6:47 PM
schomj.bsky.social
sure, ok, let's do a public reading of this

doi: 10.1007/BF02262739
The Psychological Origins of the White Male Patriarchy by George W. Albee Abstract: A white male patriarchy developed in England as the British empire grew, expanding its colonial exploitation around the world. A rational explanation was required to explain how a small number of men deserved to control this enormous and growing wealth. With Darwin's theory of evolution (survival of the fittest), Galton's studies of genius (rich and successful men were related to each other) and Spencer's insight that natural selection in human societies was Nature's way of getting rid of bad stock and preserving the best, the theory took shape. The theory was imported to America where it flourishes. Psychologists provided evidence to support the ideas of the ruling class: intelligence, mental disorders, crime and the addictions are all due to bad genes and bad brains. The defect model occupies the center of the stage. There is no need to act to remove injustice, sexism, racism, homophobia--the causes of distress are not social, they are internal, personal defects. Drugs will reduce the symptoms while the search goes on for the internal defects.
September 4, 2025 at 6:33 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Shittiest possible response to this comment, unlocked
‪cognitive dissonance is a helluva drug‬ posts: i'd just like you to know, as someone from this specific culture you're referencing, this is very offensive. ‪Liam Hogan‬ responds: Certainly, I would never intend offence. And, without meaning to deflect, if you have more to say on this, perhaps you could write a piece for this new publication? I'm sure they'll value input from those who dig deeper into folkloric origins.
September 4, 2025 at 3:47 PM
schomj.bsky.social
reposted with alt text
Worries about vaccination rates in dogs. As rabies seems to be spreading more in wildlife, veterinarians are especially worried about vaccine hesitancy spreading among pet owners, a dangerous trend that could lead to more dogs -- and their owners -- becoming infected. A 2023 study published in the journal Vaccine found in a nationally representative sample of Americans that nearly 40% believed canine vaccines were unsafe and 37% believed that vaccines could lead their dogs to develop cognitive issues, such as autism.
September 2, 2025 at 7:03 PM
schomj.bsky.social
reposted with alt text
A screenshot of a tumblr post with an image of a bottle of Ajax dish soap noting that their slogan is "stronger than grease" [as in food oils]. The poster says: and I was like okay yeah makes sense for a dish soap - wait. Ajax was a Greek soldier renowned for his strength. Ajax is stronger than all of Greece [the country]. Someone who worked at Ajax has literally waited 66 years for you to get this.
September 2, 2025 at 5:57 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Anyway, time to read this Uruguian book about maintaining relationships in times of chaos and strife
Pink Slime by Fernanda Trías, with a note that this book was on the National Book Award longlist
August 23, 2025 at 12:21 AM
schomj.bsky.social
if you're not sure who i mean by blue maga, it's assholes/AI bots like these, who seem to always have a follower/following ratio involving 10k people, and are either riling people up with alarmist takes or starting fights/stanning for assholes like newsom in an attempt to sway lurker opinion
Poster1: Hi. Trans person here. I’m living under a moral panic started by conservatives. Newsom has made it clear he’s willing to take marching orders from them regarding me and people like me. ‪Takin It To The Streets‬ / ‪@ dragonseeker He’s trying to save the country-not enough people voted a Liberal candidate prevent Trump. Obama is behind #Redistrict even though he certainly doesn’t agree w/ Newsom on his Right views. Don’t throw remaining Trans rights under the bus by complaining. FIGHT. Save Your Vote to Save Your Country
August 21, 2025 at 2:44 PM
schomj.bsky.social
George Bernard Shaw sharing Galton's eugenicist ideals doesn't surprise me but, even knowing how eugenical early 20th century progressives were, seeing Emma Goldman in this company is disappointing
Galton and his advocates believed that the social body could and ought to be improved by ridding the population of these people (L.J. Davis 2013, 3). State-sanctioned interventions - such as propaganda initiatives, strict immigration policies, strategic family planning, and involuntary sterilization of people with disabilities, criminals, and women who were Indigenous or racialized - supported this aim to enhance the social body by controlling problem populations" (Baker 2002, 672). Galton's old-style eugenics "enjoy[ed) wide currency" quickly spreading to Canada and America (Hansen and King 2001, 240). Eugenic beliefs were not fringe but rather endorsed by numerous influential people. After hearing Galton deliver a paper titled "Eugenics: Its Definition, Scope and Aims, famous playwright and cultural critic George Bernard Shaw (quoted in Saleeby 1911, 178) wrote, "I agree with the paper, and go so far as to say that there is now no reasonable excuse for refusing to face the fact that nothing but eugenic religion can save our civilisation from the fate that has overtaken all previous civilisations." Anarchist political activist and writer Emma Goldman (quoted in L.J. Davis 2013, 6), seemingly contrary to her anarchist politics, expressed similar sentiments, arguing that unless eugenic birth control policies were espoused, the state would in essence "legally encour- age the increase of paupers, syphilitics, epileptics, dipsomaniacs, cripples, criminals, and degenerates." Eugenic sentiments and policies were not specific to Nazi Germany and were not eradicated after the Second World War.
August 20, 2025 at 8:33 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Dude. Like I kind of new about this as a concept but I did not know these details. Ugh this is so dehumanizing.
Intersex, PGD, and the Eugenics Agendo Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) is a reproductive technology that can accompany in vitro fertilization (IVF). PGD screens the genetic material of possible implantable embryos. Originally developed to circumvent life-threatening genetic diseases (e.g., Tay-Sachs)' (Behrmann and Ravitsky 2013), PGD can be and is now used to test for hundreds of culturally devalued characteristics, like Down syndrome, deafness, blindness, and a variety of intersex variations (Amato 2016; Kaposy 2018). PGD can enact a prenatal exorcism of sorts to ensure that a potentially pregnant person does not house and gestate a supposed unviable, queer, crip, disabled, or intersex spectral monstrosity. This use of PGD concerns intersex activists and scholars. At the "Public Consultation on Protection against Violence and Discrimination Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity" (United Nations Human Rights 2017), intersex activist and co-founder of OII Europe Miriam van der Have stated, "Intersex is an undesirable outcome O pregnanCy and is visible in medical technologies such as PGD' whose use "may lead tO the erasure of intersex in society" In other words, intersex variations are presumed to be so innately objectionable, unviable, and disabling that technologies like PGD are developed and deployed to prevent the gestation of embryos and the birth of fetuses with intersex traits. The proliferation of PGD, van der Have notes, has the ability to decimate the intersex population.
August 20, 2025 at 8:18 PM
schomj.bsky.social
The world may be a lot these days but I have a cat on me and a new @haileypiperfights.bsky.social novel so right now is pretty good!
I am holding the book A Game in Yellow.
August 20, 2025 at 12:31 AM
schomj.bsky.social
100 years of sport segregation because sexism
This "protectionist discourse serves to justify sex segregation, sex testing, and the development ot supposedly inferior women-specific sports. Rather than accepting this "protectionist discourse, Dworkin and Cooky (2012, 22) point to the fact that sex segregation in sport was put forward historically when women outperformed men at athletic performances. For example, Jackie Mitchell, the first woman to sign a profes- sional baseball contract, struck out both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in 1936 ".. The commissioner of baseball was so perturbed that he banned women from professional baseball and they have been banned from the sport ever since. Softball, which is perceived as inferior due to the larger, slower ball, was then further developed as a sport specifically for women.
August 17, 2025 at 4:54 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Wild. All accusations are confessions since 1933.
Professor of sport management Lindsay Parks Pieper (2014) notes that German man, Hermann Ratjen, masquerading there is only one case of as a woman, which occurred at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Nazi Germany hoped that the Olympics would be a political showcase of their superiority. With the aim of winning the most medals, the Nazi regime instructed Ratjen, a Hitler Youth member, to live and compete as a woman. Adopting the name Dora, he lived and trained as a woman for three years, I cannot help queerphobic, but draw attention to the cognitive dissonance inherent in a sexist Nazi regime ordering Ratjen to cross-dress for years in order to prove the essential superior nature of the German people. At the Olympics, Ratjen [end]
August 16, 2025 at 5:28 PM
schomj.bsky.social
Helps me choose my next nonfiction read:
The water will come: rising seas, sinking cities Midnight in Chernobyl African American and Latinx history of the US Epistemic injustice by Fricker Madness by Hylton Authoring autism How to go mad without losing your mind The unteachables: disability rights and the invention of black special education The autism industrial complex
August 14, 2025 at 8:57 PM
schomj.bsky.social
The only reason I don't regret my time trying to do library assessment and related work is because it has helped me to immediately see the truth in this
The managerial mentality that undergirded Seashore's proposed education reforms continues to shape ideas about schooling and school reform today. This mentality assumes that control and management are achievable and desirable. Efficiency and economy, defined in terms of saving time and money, are high priorities: faster and cheaper are better. Today, as in the past, planning plays a central role in this managerial mentality. The planning that eugenicists promised would produce a better future, also in effect narrowed tuture possibilities. The question of how managerial models in education that focus heavily on planning similarly narrow imaginaries and limit future possibilities continues to be unasked. I have already argued that what Zygmunt Bauman described as char- acteristics of the modern rational, planned, scientifically informed, expert, efficiently managed, and coordinated- ⁃and what he claimed made the Holocaust not only reasonable but predictable, similarly made eugenics of a century ago seem reasonable. Arguably, the same managerial mentality currently leads to viewing students as objects of administration, as projects for improvement, and as plants in society's garden to be cultivated and tended " - or weeded out. It renders systematic, large-scale school projects of identitying measuring, labeling, sorting, ordering, segregating, selectively promoting, and selectively eliminating seem reasonable, rational, necessary [end]
August 13, 2025 at 9:27 PM