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mandy brown

@aworkinglibrary.com

1.1K followers 100 following 250 posts

Thinking about reading, work, and technology. Helping people do their best work despite the ravages of capitalism at everythingchanges.us. Posting from https://aworkinglibrary.com/thinking/. I log in about once a week.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · May 30

I’ve spent the last year reading, thinking, and talking with workers about AI and I’ve concluded that AI is not a technology—it’s an *ideology*, and it must be engaged with as such. https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/toolmen

Toolmen

Even the best weapon is an unhappy tool.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 18h

A word about annual review season and being human. https://everythingchanges.us/blog/re-views/

Re-views | everything changes

Be a five at being human.

everythingchanges.us

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 1d

May I remind people that the range of responses you have to a leader you disapprove of is quite broad: insubordination, sabotage, malicious compliance, slow execution, decision paralysis. Get creative! https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/oct/07/cbs-news-staffers-react-barri-weiss-appointment

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 2d

A thing you can do when the doom gets to be too much is reread a book you loved. https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/case-for-rereading

The case for rereading

What thoughts are you thinking with?

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 5d

YES

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 5d

Supremacy thinking is the refusal of observation. https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/beyond-credibility

Beyond credibility

To believe in supremacy is to refuse to see what’s right in front of you, over and over and over again.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 6d

A whole lot of actually very talented leaders are about to learn that management is the worst place to exercise their leadership.

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 7d

“Because no citizen who simply settles for being a consumer of democracy should expect to have a real democracy ever again.” https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/01/opinion/charlie-kirk-media-truth-trump.html

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 8d

If you’re noticing a parallel between the way people in the administration are demeaning most Americans and the way your boss is now treating you, you are in very good company. (Tyranny in government begets tyranny at work begets tyranny in the home.)

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 11d

“The disenfranchised men of the manosphere disdain women, and yet women continue to be asked to feel pity and concern for them.” https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v47/n16/emily-witt/do-you-feel-like-a-failure

Emily Witt · Do you feel like a failure? In the Manosphere

The winners in an autocracy have little in common with the losers, but putting on aviator sunglasses or a leather jacket...

www.lrb.co.uk

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 13d

One of the ways that supremacist ideologies function is by refusing rest: https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/hurry-up-quick

Hurry-up-quick!

The purpose of haste is to prevent any semblance of rest.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 14d

A corollary to no ethical consumption under capitalism is no ethical *employment*: there is no where you can work and keep your hands clean. The choices are about where to draw the line, and how to mitigate the harm on your side of it.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 14d

“Common decency, then, stigmatizes people that do not participate in it—removes them from voluntary association.…We indeed have to live with one another, but terms and conditions apply.” https://www.bostonreview.net/articles/how-can-we-live-together

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 15d

“For me, there are two main rewards for working. One is the continual discovery within myself of new ideas; the other is deeper understanding of a problem.” https://everythingchanges.us/blog/work-problem/

Work problem | everything changes

Virginia Valian has a work problem: she struggles to do the work she wants to do.

everythingchanges.us

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 16d

always Sunday. (It's the day of my local farmer's market, and gathering food and cooking is part of the ritual.)

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 16d

“If you would look away from the words of Charlie Kirk, from what else would you look away?” https://www.vanityfair.com/news/story/charlie-kirk-ezra-klein-tanehisi-coates

Charlie Kirk, Redeemed: A Political Class Finds Its Lost Cause

By ignoring the rhetoric and actions of the Turning Point USA founder, pundits and politicians are sanitizing his legacy.

www.vanityfair.com

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 16d

Nearly two years since I made a regular practice of turning my digital devices off one day a week and I cannot overstate how restful it is. I won’t make a virtue of it—I don’t believe in virtue!—but those days are so intensely *alive,* and that’s enough.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 19d

We are well past the point at which talking uncritically about AI should be seen as deeply embarrassing. https://ethanmarcotte.com/wrote/against-stocking-frames/

Against the protection of stocking frames. — ethanmarcotte.com

“Artificial intelligence” is a failed technology. It’s time we described it that way.

ethanmarcotte.com

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 19d

“The class struggle has been transformed into an internal struggle against oneself.” https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/self-exploiting-workers

Self-exploiting workers

Competitors instead of comrades.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 22d

On refusing to do what you’re told. https://everythingchanges.us/blog/not-doing/

Not doing | everything changes

At will.

everythingchanges.us

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 25d

Judith Butler: “Did you consider not complying with this request?” https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/sep/12/uc-berkeley-trump-administration-antisemitism

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 26d

thank you, that means a lot!

mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 26d

“Living a life well lived must surely include coming to an acceptance of your own finitude.” https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/to-live

To live

Do not let anyone take your regret from you!

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · 27d

Deskilling in action. https://www.404media.co/the-software-engineers-paid-to-fix-vibe-coded-messes

The Software Engineers Paid to Fix Vibe Coded Messes

Linkedin has been joking about “vibe coding cleanup specialists,” but it’s actually a growing profession.

www.404media.co

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · Sep 5

What if our work is *all* the things we give a fuck about? https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/everything

Everything

Workers must identify with everything they do.

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mandy brown @aworkinglibrary.com · Sep 1

“We must dare to prepare ourselves for the Exodus from ‘work-based society’: it no longer exists and will not return.” https://aworkinglibrary.com/writing/exit-strategy

Exit strategy

“We must learn to see [work] differently: no longer as something we have—or do not have—but as *what we do.*”

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