janea4old

Immigration raids in Bakersfield, California - the Border Patrol rounded up anyone who looked like they might be a farm worker. (Bakersfield isn't at the border.) https://www.eastcountymagazine.org/surprising-immigration-raid-kern-county-foreshadows-what-awaits-farmworkers-and-businesses “It was profiling, it was purely field workers,” said Sara Fuentes, store manager of the local gas station. Fuentes said that at 9 a.m., when the store typically gets a rush of workers on their way to pick oranges, two men in civilian clothes and unmarked Suburbans started detaining people outside the store. “They didn’t stop people with FedEx uniforms, they were stopping people who looked like they worked in the fields.” Fuentes says one customer pulled in just to pump gas and agents approached him and detained him. .... a man and woman drove up to the store together, and the man went inside. Border Patrol detained the man as he walked out, Fuentes said, and then demanded the woman get out of the vehicle. When she refused, another agency parked his vehicle behind the woman, blocking her car. Fuentes said it wasn’t until the local Univision station showed up that Border Patrol agents backed up their car and allowed the woman to leave. “They were stopping cars at random, asking people for papers. They were going to gas stations and Home Depot where day laborers gather,” said Antonio De Loera-Brust. “It’s provoking intense anxiety and a lot of fear in the community.” The president of the industry group California Citrus Mutual said: “We’re in the middle of our citrus harvesting. This sent shockwaves through the entire community. “People aren’t going to work and kids aren’t going to school. Yesterday about 25% of the workforce, today 75% didn’t show up.”

The ICE (immigration) raids have begun. They have stated plans to go into places like churches and schools which were traditionally off-limits. They are starting with "sanctuary cities". They raided place in Newark yesterday without a warrant. Some of the people taken were U.S. citizens, including a military veteran. They just don't care. https://www.nj.com/essex/2025/01/newark-mayor-ice-raided-business-without-a-warrant-detained-us-citizens.html

Tractor Supply said, back in June 2024, that it was ending diversity and climate initiatives https://apnews.com/article/tractor-supply-ends-dei-climate-goals-ab9e570d39095de6bead7fbfe76a6edc As Trump opposes all DEI Walmart already rolled back its DEI policies back in November https://apnews.com/article/walmart-dei-inclusion-diversity-f2fc1ab086186ec6600c38950d8d2c74 McDonalds ending DEI https://apnews.com/article/diversity-dei-goals-companies-lawsuits-eb052e0b420824485041263b7df1f715 Target is ending its diversity goals https://apnews.com/article/target-dei-supreme-court-diversity-7f068dfee61a68a9a1f82b94e135b323 BUT -- in contrast -- January 2025: Costco defends its diversity policies (the Costco board and the Costco shareholders) Some thinktank wanted Costco to rollback/end DEI, The board said no, and at the shareholders meeting yesterday 98% of the shareholders agreed to vote against the rollback of diversity (in other words, the shareholders voted to support diversity) https://apnews.com/article/costco-shareholder-proposal-diversity-dei-0330f448741b35f2f788a36948ff3f95

I know! Days has beds in various homes/hotels/etc all with the same headboard. It's nuts.

The Episcopal Diocese of Washington DC Service on Repentance (regarding needed Reparations) (as described two posts up) January 24, 2025 will be livestreamed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ8PJj2xx6w

Book by Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde "How We Learn to Be Brave: Decisive Moments in Life and Faith" https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/705987/how-we-learn-to-be-brave-by-mariann-edgar-budde/

Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde statement: On January 24, 2025, at Washington National Cathedral, I will preside and preach at “A Service Toward Repentance,” a liturgy of truth-telling and repentance for harms done within our diocese to Black persons, from the enslavement era through the present. Here is her diocese's full statement/description about the event: https://edow.org/2025/01/09/showing-up-for-one-another-in-vulnerability-and-love/ (This was event was already long-planned) Episcopal Diocese of Washington DC page on Reparations https://edow.org/ministries-programs/equity-and-justice/reparations/

https://bsky.app/profile/coltonlittle.bsky.social/post/3lgbocsyagk22

I personally never much attention to threadstarter graphics on community threads -- sometimes I noticed them, and sometimes I didn't. I liked how things were, long ago, when various people took turns starting threads, and there was no expectation to have specific graphics, although sometimes people put them in for fun, informally. I just wanted to read the discussions. I get the idea of the admins now wanting to make it fair and make everyone equal, as well as orderly about the timing of when a thread begins. So whatever works to get that done. And thus it makes sense for the admins to start the threads. Especially since we have a new soap coming!

All federal offices ordered to shutter their diversity offices. Including NASA. Remembering all the work of actress Nichelle Nichols (Uhura from the original Star Trek). In real life, she worked with NASA to bring diverse astronauts into NASA. (There's a movie about the work she did, called "Women in Motion".) Sally Ride and Guion Bluford came in through this program. That NASA diversity office, signed away with the stroke of the orange one's pen... https://nasawatch.com/trumpspace/internal-nasa-memo-on-diversity-erasure/ . Federal employees ordered to dismantle their DEI offices. If the DEI offices don't dismantle themselves, then the other employees in those agencies are supposed to report that it still exists, and you can get in trouble for not reporting. WTF century is this? Government agencies ordered to not honor Black History Month, Women's History Month, etc. Orders against racial discrimination in federal contracting -- in place since Lyndon Johnson in the 1960s -- rescinded by the orange one's pen.

Here's a link to the above-posted newspaper item "Debut of Maryland soap opera spurs hope for genre’s future" (Carroll County Times / Baltimore Sun) Commentary by freelance writer Debra Rughoo January 20, 2025 https://www.baltimoresun.com/2025/01/20/debut-of-maryland-soap-opera-spurs-hope-for-genres-future-guest-commentary/

Congresswoman Summer Lee of Pennsylvania https://www.instagram.com/repsummerlee/p/DFLrJLzNYxQ/

Queen Sugar was created and produced by Ava DuVernay. 90% of the cast was black. Ava DuVernay hired a bunch of directors for the series, and EVERY one of the directors was female. The three siblings were played by Rutina Wesley, Kofi Siriboe, and Dawn-Lyen Gardner. Their aunt was played by Tina Lifford. All very strong and complex characters and actors. Greg Vaughan was one of the very few white actors on the show. He played the intermittent love interest of Rutina Wesley's character. (I won't spoil the details on that) "Queen Sugar" was like a nighttime soap but more serious. Lots of political and cultural themes in addition to romance. Things that made me think. Yet entertaining, too. I found Rutina Wesley, Kofi Siriboe, and Tina Lifford to be mesmerizing, I just couldn't wait to watch their scenes. Such great actors, and so believable. On Queen Sugar, Dawn-Lyen Gardner's character was married to Timon Kyle Durrett's character. She discovers that he cheated on her. This is near the beginning of the Q.S. series, so I'm not spoiling much. The confrontation wasn't the same as with Karla Mosley's scenes in the BTG promo, but I felt some of same energy in how Timon played his reaction to the confrontation in the BTG promo.

Timon Kyle Durrett was part of the main cast of "Queen Sugar". Queen Sugar was a series about three siblings in Louisiana who inherit their father's sugar cane farm. Timon played the husband of one of the siblings. Excellent series, I suggest binging on it while waiting for BTG. First aired on OWN. All six seasons are up on Hulu. They can be purchased to stream on Amazon Prime.

Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez of New York https://bsky.app/profile/acyn.bsky.social/post/3lggmpphm3p2a

1843, the fictional Ebenezer Scrooge in England https://www.themorgan.org/collections/works/dickens/ChristmasCarol/9 The Republicans want to bring the USA backwards to such attitudes. Except that the fictional ghosts were eventually, later in the story, able to open Scrooge's heart. I don't think the Republicans are interested in opening their hearts.

--------------------------------------------- https://www.science.org/content/article/trump-hits-nih-devastating-freezes-meetings-travel-communications-and-hiring/ Trump has ordered the National Institutes of Health to cancel their review panels on cancer research. “The impact of [Trump’s] collective executive orders appears devastating,” one senior NIH employee says. --------------------------------------------- https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/21/health/hhs-cdc-fda-trump-pause-communication/index.html Trump is now ordering health agencies to stop warning Americans about bird flu and to halt publication of scientific reports. This comes as egg prices are expected to skyrocket in the coming days. ---------------------------------------------

Also with RFK Jr. as the new head of the Dept. of Health ... He's a known anti-vaxxer. So between RFK Jr and Trump, we simply won't get reliable information from the CDC and NIH anymore. They apparently don't care if everyone dies in the next pandemic, because there will be no agencies to communicate anything reliable. Also Trump is ordering the USA to no longer fund the WHO (World Health Organization). WHO is international and not run by the USA but it received money from the USA. WHO would be one of the only agencies left to properly inform Americans of health crises, but it will be drastically defunded. Well I guess Americans can turn to agencies in other countries for information

During Trump's prior term as president, he dismantled the website of the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) -- and the info was saved *only* because conscientious people saved the data when they saw what was happening. The ecological data was restored to the EPA website when Biden became president. In the past two days, Trump has already issued a freeze on communications from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) and the NIH (National Institutes of Health), so I'm sure the CDC website is next.

That article quotes the website of the CDC (US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), specifically the CDC Division of Adolescent and School Health, for definitions of sex and gender. However, sadly, Trump is in process of dismantling the CDC, and I think a lot of that website will disappear or be drastically changed.

Time interviews Bishop Mariann Budde https://time.com/7209222/bishop-mariann-budde-trump/

https://www.instagram.com/p/DFI7OZZS5gw/ - (adding extra spacing to prevent the IG post from bleeding down into the next SON post)

U.S. society (and a few other countries, too, maybe? ) nowadays: the juxtaposition of Elon Musk making the nazi salute at the Inauguration event, and the sane gracious Bishop Mariann Budde speaking truth to power.

Originally posted as a twitter thread July 8, 2020 by ‪iamragesparkle (http://www.michaelbtager.com) Reposted as bluesky thread November 21, 2024 by ‪iamragesparkle.bsky.social‬ The bluesky thread starts here: https://bsky.app/profile/iamragesparkle.bsky.social/post/3lbidcyttps2b I was at a sh!tty crustpunk bar once getting an after-work beer. One of those sh!tholes where the bartenders clearly hate you. So the bartender and I were ignoring one another when someone sits next to me and he immediately says, "no. get out." ‪And the dude next to me says, "hey i'm not doing anything, i'm a paying customer." and the bartender reaches under the counter for a bat or something and says, "out. now." and the dude leaves, kind of yelling. And he was dressed in a punk uniform, I noticed ‪Anyway, I asked what that was about and the bartender was like, "you didn't see his vest but it was all nazi sh!t. Iron crosses and stuff. You get to recognize them." And i was like, ohok and he continues. ‪"you have to nip it in the bud immediately. These guys come in and it's always a nice, polite one. And you serve them because you don't want to cause a scene. And then they become a regular and after awhile they bring a friend. And that dude is cool too." ‪And then THEY bring friends and the friends bring friends and they stop being cool and then you realize, oh sh!t, this is a Nazi bar now. And it's too late because they're entrenched and if you try to kick them out, they cause a PROBLEM. So you have to shut them down. ‪And i was like, 'oh damn.' and he said "yeah, you have to ignore their reasonable arguments because their end goal is to be terrible, awful people." And then he went back to ignoring me. But I haven't forgotten that at all.