Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
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rerbelding.bsky.social
Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
@rerbelding.bsky.social
Historian of American responses to the Holocaust, author of "Rescue Board" (Doubleday, 2018). Love cats, books, TV, travel, teachers, fighting for a better world. Opinions mine.
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Saving this screenshot from Threads as a new reaction image
January 3, 2026 at 4:41 PM
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Fuck off, 2025.

But huge high five to everyone who pushed back against fascists and bigots and will continue to do so in 2026 and beyond!

We are going to win.

All these fascists bound to lose.
January 1, 2026 at 4:47 AM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
I don’t mean to sound extreme, but I don’t think we should have torture camps for people with criminal records either.
December 23, 2025 at 1:51 AM
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The name "Popular Science" doesn't mean we shift our coverage depending on public opinion. It means we cover relevant subjects that are rigorously researched, reliable, and grounded in reality.

And trans lives are grounded in reality.

We see y'all. No matter what.

www.popsci.com/science/tran...
First-of-a-kind study shows encouraging data for trans kids who socially transition
Ninety-four percent of participants in a new study stood firm in their trans identity after five years, and "detransitioning" is rare.
www.popsci.com
December 18, 2025 at 5:16 PM
Holding my trans friends and family especially close today. You deserve to live with dignity as your full beautiful selves, and may the ghouls who are trying to vote and bureaucratize you away never find peace.
December 18, 2025 at 4:52 PM
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My big tent doesn't include transphobes who want children to die. Sorry, not sorry, throw them all into the sun.
December 18, 2025 at 1:37 AM
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There's a joke about the origins of many Jewish holidays: "They tried to kill us, they failed, let's eat."

But some of us *were* killed in those days, and some were killed today.

This is a holiday about hope, persistence, and light shining when it shouldn't be possible.

May all the killing end.
December 14, 2025 at 11:51 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
one of the coolest things about ChatGPT is how you can actually just never use it. you can fill your whole entire life with simply not once using it. it's incredible.
November 25, 2025 at 4:15 PM
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I have been thinking about this line today, on the value of editors, from the late great John Bennet, for no reason in particular.
November 18, 2025 at 2:14 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
I’d like to please juxtapose Jill Lepore’s complaints about how whiny #MeToo students made Harvard a miserable place with the former President of Harvard’s texts to Epstein seeking advice on trying to date a student.
The emails have Summers reporting to Epstein about his attempts to date a Harvard economics student & to hit on her during a seminar she was giving.
November 16, 2025 at 12:44 AM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
Just thinking again how Democrats asked people to accept short-term suffering in order to give space to prevent long-term, worse suffering and then said, "Thanks for suffering in the short-term. You'll get to suffer long-term too so that our Thanksgiving plans don't get disrupted."
November 10, 2025 at 1:18 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
Absolutely correct
American politics makes a lot more sense when you realize that the GOP is afraid of pissing off the GOP base, and the Dems are afraid of pissing off the GOP base, but neither party is afraid of pissing off the Dem base.
November 10, 2025 at 1:38 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
Here's another bit of conventional wisdom Zohran completely blew away: His speech was at well above a 10th-grade level. It was complex, erudite, punctuated by deep and fluent references. You don't have to condescend to voters with baby talk! Part of re-establishing norms is speaking like an adult.
November 5, 2025 at 5:14 AM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
There are issues we can compromise on! But if you let bigots into the “big tent” you’re actually shrinking it because you’ve just told whole demographics that they’re not really welcome.
October 20, 2025 at 2:59 PM
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Retired Army Sgt. Brian Wofford spoke to me this morning at the Oklahoma City #NoKings protest. Didn’t expect him to be carrying his DD214 so I asked some warmup questions like when he got out and whether his injury was service-related.

He paused while describing the car bomb in Iraq to say this:
October 19, 2025 at 12:42 AM
Merry Wives @shakespeareindc.bsky.social was so much fun. If you need a break from scrolling and the doom of DC, go see this show. 10/10, just a room of joy.
September 28, 2025 at 3:25 AM
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I know it's ethically a no-no, but I still think the New Yorker could make a fortune if they had a Cameo-like service where you could pay for Isaac Chotiner to call a friend saying he'd like to schedule an interview to ask them a few questions.
September 25, 2025 at 12:59 PM
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beautiful
August 28, 2025 at 10:19 PM
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I Am An AI Hater. “But I am a hater, and I will not be polite. The machine is disgusting and we should break it. The people who build it are vapid shit-eating cannibals glorifying ignorance. I strongly feel that this is an insult to life itself.” [anthonymoser.github.io]
August 29, 2025 at 12:20 AM
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"Recently I took a friend in a pink shirt to lunch. Insensitively, I led him into a gourmet sandwich shop. Suddenly I saw his face light up as he was confronted with sandwiches named “Padrino” and “Pomodoro” and ingredients like soppressata, capicollo and a striata baguette....
August 12, 2025 at 12:27 AM
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The worst single-day crime spree in modern Washington history, of course, took place on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump issued no order to the National Guard to intervene -- Mike Pence did -- and later pardoned the perpetrators.
Citing a nonexistent crime crisis, Trump plans to take over the Washington DC police and put troops in the streets of the nation's capital. Contrary to his claims, violent crime in DC is at a 30-year low. @katierogersnyt.bsky.social Campbell Robertson Chris Cameron www.nytimes.com/live/2025/08...
Here’s the latest.
www.nytimes.com
August 11, 2025 at 8:14 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
Jesus Christ, these people are just so goddamned scared and weak all the time.
Rick Scott: "DC is not safe. People don’t just walk the streets in DC and feel safe anywhere around DC. I mean, I gotta be careful in what I do. I've got people in my office that are very careful about where they go. So this is great when Donald Trump is doing."
August 11, 2025 at 6:39 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
I literally sent my children (14 & 11yo) on a scavenger hunt around D.C. last week BY THEMSELVES. They walked, they took the bus, and they took the metro/subway. These folks are either the biggest liars for their own political purposes or the biggest bunch of sheltered wimps on the planet. Or both.
Rick Scott: "DC is not safe. People don’t just walk the streets in DC and feel safe anywhere around DC. I mean, I gotta be careful in what I do. I've got people in my office that are very careful about where they go. So this is great when Donald Trump is doing."
August 11, 2025 at 6:38 PM
My brain has responded to today's news by deciding that I need a mental loop of Rage Against the Machine's "Killing in the Name of."
August 11, 2025 at 4:02 PM
Reposted by Rebecca Erbelding (she/her)
None of the problems DC has, not a one, wouldn’t be improved if DC had statehood.
August 11, 2025 at 12:02 PM