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Some Interesting Things I Read Today (14 August)

related tags: #ShortReading

• Charlotte Head: I was sentenced as a terrorist. Now my barrister is on trial for defending me [2026]

A barrister is being prosecuted in the UK for supporting their client, who is being charged as a terrorist for their solidarity with Palestine. You know, the Palestine that is enduring a fucking genocide that the UK is tacitly and explicitly supporting. Discusses all sorts of chilling effects happening.

• Marisa Kabas: Political operative behind Graham Platner's rise accused of sexual assault [2026]

Really unsurprising that where you find one abuser, you find more. (Which is very glib, I recognise, but it's exhausting how often these guys can be told on for a dozen other things... and everyone's like “yeah, they make mistakes.” And then we've got to deal with even more heinous bullshit because their behaviour goes entirely unchecked. Fuck that.)

• Daniel Falcone: The Odyssey Is Facing a Boycott for Filming in Occupied Western Sahara [2026]

More information about what's been happening in Western Sahara. Though the boycott is unlikely to be a success in terms of an actual boycott (sadly), it is a success in that a lot more people are far more aware of this situation today than they had been. Though... Awareness can only do so much, and it'd be nice to see collective action to stop any or all of these injustices in whatever ways possible. (I'm not naive; I know it's difficult to do.)

• CrimethInc: Post Modern Times: Post Mortem

I think there are explicit avenues of analysis that were excluded from this that really need to be addressed (beyond more than a footnote). There is little conversation about the hierarchy within the Post Modern Times, which would've been an invaluable understanding of how they were operating. Were they continuing to operate under a standard service model? If so, why? Were they doing any other activities in the building, adding to the communal atmosphere? Or was it explicitly a restaurant? The latter means that people who come in are unlikely to talk to each other outside of their own groups. This isn't so much a post mortem as it is a speculation that is attempting to not “moralise” despite the fact that the very topic their addressing is primarily around class and race. (Also, what is wrong with moralising? If white people stop going to places because more Black people show up, there is still a component of racism even if those white people aren't doing it through explicit racism. The same is true of how people treat homeless people; there is a component of not wanting to occupy the same space as homeless people, even if it's not explicit anti-homeless behaviour. I think the framing of this is strange.)

Some Interesting Things I Read Today (28 July)

related tags: #ShortReading

• USC Annenberg Media: USC Sold dead bodies to US military to train IDF medical personnel [2025]

Absolutely disgusting that the University of Southern California (along with University of California, San Diego; the University of Maryland, Baltimore; and the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston) were selling bodies that were gifted to them, giving themselves a profit (on bodies they had largely obtained through donation) while also using the bodies for things that their former owners might actually not have consented to when they opted to donate their body (as most people do so for the training of HOSPITAL medical staff, for the development of new medical techniques, or for the continuance of some forensic learning).

Most people do not consent to freely giving their body, which was donated with a purpose, so that it can be sold to the US miliary and then used in training genocidaires.

• Emily Wilson: An Uncomplicated Man [2026]

Review by Emily Wilson, known for being the first woman to translate The Odyssey into English, on Christopher Nolan's film. Definitely worth a read, I think, even if you don't plan on watching the movie. This kind of highlights a frequent problem in most retellings, but it's understandable that it'd exist in a Nolan film:

Many of the film’s implicit values directly contradict those of Homer’s poem. Deception, warmongering, extramarital sex, cruelty to animals, abusing women and yearning for honour – all perfectly fine in the world of Homer – are, in this version, very bad. This is not in itself a problem, but it is a problem if the film’s own values and vision don’t hang together, and if the characters’ motivations don’t make sense on their own terms.

• Mohamed Sleiman Labat: Christopher Nolan's Odyssey used occupied land as a film set. That feels like a betrayal [2026]

After learning in the above review that this was a thing that happened, a friend sent this article written by a Sahwari man discussing the fuller context to this issue (such as how Sahwari are not allowed to document their everyday life under Moroccan occupation).

Some Interesting Things I Read Today (26 July)

related tags: #ShortReading, #GraeberStuff

• David Graeber: Concerning the Violent Peace Police (2012)

A letter that Graeber wrote in response to Chris Hedges misrepresenting Black Bloc. Some interesting bits and pieces. Was suggested in response to critiques around discussions of violence. I may want to come back to this because of my frustration with parts of it.

• Josef Burton: The Modern Passport Has Eliminated Fraud, Forgery, and Heroes Who Can Bend the Rules to Save Lives (2026)

Interesting exploration of the modern passport. It doesn't fully explore the history of passports, but does look at how they've changed over the decades to be hellish creations.

• Noah Hawley: What I Learned About Billionaires at Jeff Bezos's Private Retreat (2026)

Meh, but it at least has some useful bits. Overwhelmingly, it's annoying that this is about an event from 2018. Took a while for Hawley to, you know, realise some things, I guess.

• Sophie Hurwitz: Gwyneth Paltrow Just Goopified Drone Warfare (2026)

Not long, low-info, but it does provide a good highlight of how the wellness industry works with state apparatuses and also is accepting of laundering reputations of people who should be labelled as war criminals.

• Gigi G: PSL's Top Propagandist Resigns, Publishes Tell-All Letter (2026)

More PSL-internal drama. Highlights known issues of them sweeping abuse under the rug, being authoritarian, and acting as such while pretending to engage in anti-colonial or anti-imperial politics. One funny sentence includes, “[Smolarek] says members caught reading Jacobin... are treated as security breaches.” Considering Jacobin is such a patsoc outlet, I'd also treat them as a security breach... but for a different reason. (This is a joke. But also, I wouldn't read the Jacobin.)