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snarkyspice.bsky.social
AJ
@snarkyspice.bsky.social
18K followers 370 following 830 posts
Rabble rousing recently minted Chicagoan. Founding Writer of laborpainsmedia.com and Co-founder of The Flytrap.

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snarkyspice.bsky.social
Thanks for letting us know you didn't read any of it.
Unfortunately, I live(d) in a car-dependent community, so when I turned 17, just like everyone else, I picked up a driver’s license and an old beater that I drove for several years until it died and I replaced it with another old beater, and so on down the line until I achieved that brief middle class aspiration of a car note (since paid off) and a Prius that I drive (resentfully, thinking longingly of trains) on my peregrinations through Northern California. I treat the car as a necessary evil, grudgingly providing it with basic husbandry such as “oil changes” and “tires” and purchasing increasingly expensive “car insurance.” In my community, there is, technically, a bus. Strictly speaking. It exists. The closest station to my house is 1.4 miles away, which doesn’t sound that bad except that I live up a very steep hill, and did I mention that one of my legs doesn’t work super great? That’s a lot, especially if it is pouring down rain or you are hauling heavy groceries or have an enraged cat coming out of the K-hole in an alarmingly flimsy plastic box that you need to get from point A to B.
December 9, 2024 at 5:31 PM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
Bluesky now has over 10 million users, and I was #4,801,294!
Celebrating 10 million users 🎉 Number 4,801,294 AJ @snarkyspice.bsky.social joined February 14, 2024
September 16, 2024 at 10:03 PM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
This segment in particular.
Her apoliticism should not slide by. It should be noted that Renaissance is playing in Israel, which has led to “Break My Soul” becoming an anthem of sorts for Israelis waving their flag in screenings. Beyoncé has yet to make a statement about Palestine. But this silence is itself a statement. Perhaps she isn’t apolitical so much as an emblem of Black capitalism and wealth that seeks to maintain its stature.
August 23, 2024 at 12:22 AM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
Pretty much all of this applies to my life right now except the negative checking balance and the cat (because I can't afford to feed a pet on top of everything else right now).
I think about how I’m failing at life, at adulthood. I think about all the free content I’ve given away. All the times I didn’t negotiate so I wouldn’t be labeled difficult and ignored for future projects. All the times I knew I was being paid less, as a Black woman, but decided not to rock the boat. All the projects I fumbled. The deadlines I missed. Ultimately, this spiral of worry and overthinking leads me to the conclusion that no one wants me. No one wants to employ me. No one wants to pay me well. No one wants to love me enough to take care of me. And if no one loves me, how can I write about what I no longer experience? So I sit looking at my notes, looking at a blank screen, and overthink everything else. Like… Why does a job interview process take 3 months? DO YOU WANT ME OR NAH? My bank account is negative triple digits. I have $13. I am filled with shame and guilt. My cat is mad at me for rationing treats. Hire me so I can live. The bottom has fallen out, and I’m ready for the swell of a generous life again.
August 21, 2024 at 3:39 PM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
Somehow it's even worse than the headline manages to convey!
Two students who spoke on the condition of anonymity said that the class was facing the front of the room listening to a detective speak when they heard screams from behind them. Two women ran in, the students said, followed by a man wearing a ski mask who was holding a gun. Then gunshot sounds rang out. One of the students said she dove on the floor, scraping her knee. The other said she scrambled to find her phone so that she could text her mother. “I’m shaking and crying because I'm like, ‘Oh my god, I'm gonna get shot,’” she said. “It felt so real.” The students realized it was fake only after noticing that the cops in the room had done nothing to stop the pretend shooter, they said. Burlington School District officials confirmed the demonstration occurred, saying in a statement to Seven Days on Thursday morning that teachers knew officers might demonstrate a “gunshot-related crime” but not that it would happen without warning. In its statement, the Burlington Police Department said that school staff approved the demonstration’s content ahead of time and agreed to let parents and students know. The simulation would involve “fake firearms in a mock shooting,” the department said it wrote to school staff on May 23. “Do you think that sort of incident would be ok for your group of students? It is about as real life as you can get, and is certainly exactly the sort of thing we deal with most frequently.” “I think these students will be fine with this simulation,” school staff responded, according to the police statement. “We will give a heads up to parents and students.” It’s unclear whether the school district took that step. Neither of the students who spoke to Seven Days, nor their parents, were informed, they said. A district spokesperson did not return multiple calls for comment.
June 6, 2024 at 7:45 PM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
The idea that white NIMBY suburbanites are a vanguard of protection against fascism rather than a national bellwether for its popularity is certainly A Take.
A screenshot of a Bluesky thread User 1 (name redacted): Okay but that's the exact point here. These people are your allies, not your enemies. NIMBY liberal wine moms are a vanguard against Trumpism and fascism. User 2 (name redacted): I think you mean something other than vanguard, but you are overall right. Also I'll absolutely cooperate with them and try to give them the benefit of the doubt, I just can't help feeling they'll turn on us as soon as it gets hard or looks a little too scary or radical. Trust issues, I guess. User 1 (name redacted): No, I mean vanguard, pretty sure suburban liberal moms were at the forefront of anti fascism for years and have been far far more effective than any DSA chapter.
May 31, 2024 at 7:59 PM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
I LITERALLY JUST TEXTED A FRIEND ABOUT THIS AN HOUR AGO.
An iMessage screenshot which reads: "Sometimes I think about the really easy wins Joe Biden could've scored that would have given him a little bit of a boost in the eyes of the American public and getting rid of Louis DeJoy as postmaster general is absolutely one such thing."
May 21, 2024 at 8:50 PM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
🔥🔥🔥
But if we can sympathize in this respect with women who are drawn to the housewife fantasy, then we must also address the housewife’s immature side: her refusal of responsibility in the public sphere. The housewife lifestyle abandons the struggles of feminist advancement, community building, justice, and political engagement. It trades them for insularity, callowness, and superficial self-regard.
April 10, 2024 at 3:04 AM
snarkyspice.bsky.social
I want to share 2 bits of that email here because they're relevant to the ongoing conversation about her upcoming release. (Sidenote: I didn't realize there was a character limit to the alt text!)
I really appreciate that you pointed out the hollow spectacle of Beyonce's documentaries. (I'm not even sure if it's accurate to call them that because the popular understanding of a documentary involves an outside party and the subject doesn't have editorial/creative control, but maybe I'm just splitting hairs here.) We may have learned a few new things about her, but we don't really know anything about her interiority. As you said, we just have to take her word for it. I'm sure this is the case for many people — assuming they have an interiority we're not privy to, that is — but those people aren't trying to sell us the illusion of depth at $30 a pop on Fandango. Beyonce is not an activist and as far as I know she's never claimed to be one. But she is well past the point in her career where taking an actual stance on something inconvenient to the white masses could really impact her in a negative way. She does the half-in half-out, lukewarm thing instead of saying shit with her whole chest and it really gets under my skin. She's a billionaire. She'll be taken care of for the rest of her life, as will her entire immediate family and whatever descendants may come from her family line. What does she have to worry about in terms of taking a public stance? I think she's great at co-opting radical ideas and touching them juuuuuust enough that it'll cause ripples within her fanbase and the wider pop culture scene because she knows people will do the work of reading into her... everything for her. Beyonce doesn't have to grapple with the messiness of radical thought in public because the Beyhive will project that onto her with the scantest amount of ev
March 20, 2024 at 7:28 PM