Bijan Parsia
@bparsia.bsky.social
800 followers 2.6K following 3.3K posts
I am a Prof of Comp Sci at Uni of Manchester, UK. UCU NEC disabled member rep (2023-24). UCUCommons. All posts are my own behalf alone. He/him/they.
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Reposted by Bijan Parsia
sivav.bsky.social
The “compact” for higher ed is an unserious document written by unserious people from a position of spectacular ignorance. No one should take it seriously. Sadly, my bosses are taking it seriously.

newrepublic.com/article/2013...
Why This Essay Could Cause the University of Virginia to Shut Down
How Linda McMahon’s latest “compact” would do deep and permanent harm to American higher education
newrepublic.com
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
bretdevereaux.bsky.social
Gonna say it, not enough games about defeating Klansmen, Confederates or neo-Confederates.
stephentotilo.bsky.social
SCOOP: Last year, Ubisoft cancelled an Assassin's Creed game set during Reconstruction. Was to feature a Black Assassin who, among other things, fought the rise of the Klan

Sources: Leadership nixed it over concerns re: U.S. political climate, backlash to Yasuke

www.gamefile.news/p/scoop-ubis...
Scoop: Ubisoft cancelled a post-Civil War Assassin’s Creed last year
Company leadership deemed the project too controversial for the moment, sources tell Game File
www.gamefile.news
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
ucucommons.bsky.social
The first issue of our fortnightly newsletter has landed!

Featuring @markpendleton.bsky.social’s discussion paper to this Friday’s HEC, @hagenilda.bsky.social’s plea to Frances Corner’s successor and other interesting links and news. #UCU #UKHE #AcademicSky

ucucommons.substack.com/p/ucu-common...
UCU Commons newsletter #1
A new fortnightly round-up of union and sector specific news
ucucommons.substack.com
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
markpendleton.bsky.social
A new initiative from @ucucommons.bsky.social - key updates from our work in UCU, the union more widely, and highlight news from our sectors. Expect it to drop every two weeks.
ucucommons.bsky.social
The first issue of our fortnightly newsletter has landed!

Featuring @markpendleton.bsky.social’s discussion paper to this Friday’s HEC, @hagenilda.bsky.social’s plea to Frances Corner’s successor and other interesting links and news. #UCU #UKHE #AcademicSky

ucucommons.substack.com/p/ucu-common...
UCU Commons newsletter #1
A new fortnightly round-up of union and sector specific news
ucucommons.substack.com
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
jamellebouie.net
really can’t say enough about how mike johnson is a sniveling little coward of a man. a bayou-bred pushover with a dignity deficit that would embarrass renfield
atrupar.com
Q: Do you agree that the mayor of Chicago and governor of Illinois should be in prison?

MIKE JOHNSON: Should they be in prison? I'm not the attorney general. I'm not following the day to day on that
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
allergyphd.bsky.social
In a first, I don't know if I'm up to teaching the Cyborg Manifesto this morning
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
gravelinfluencer.bsky.social
Not the main point, but this section on the Medicaid work requirements shows that the Republican model of "efficiency" is simply creating a ridiculous new bureaucracy that will force people off Medicaid.
To implement the program, CMS will have to create "rules engines" for software developers to be able to account for a person's time, he explained. "What are the rules for work hours? How do you have to actually adjudicate it? For example, what if you're paid a salary, but there's no hours on there? So we are going to adopt a process ... Maybe, for example, we'll divide the salary you have by $15 an hour ... and then we'll just give you credit for that many hours." Another example: "What does it mean if you're at school 'halftime,' how many hours is that?" he added. "And then, if you're doing community engagement, who's allowed to credential you for community engagement? Do they have to be a 501(c)(3)? So we've been spending a lot of time on that."
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
emptywheel.bsky.social
Top candidates:
1) Lindsey the Insurance lawyer is DQed w/in days, making the indictment a nullity
2) Statute of Limitation problems
3) Discovery problems
4) Vindictive prosecution
5) Kash Patel melting down on the stand
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
alistairbarrie.com
I mean, you’d have thought they’d have been pleased.

Must be incredibly difficult at The Telegraph to balance their core philosophy of the inalienable right of everyone to own a second home in another country with their other core belief in a visceral hatred of foreigners.

So they don’t bother.
goodclimate.bsky.social
This lurid headline is about British tourists no longer getting away with overstaying in Schengen. Or being 'illegals', as it's often called in the UK.
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
eve.gd
This makes me so angry. These people view all life as training for lifelong servitude/work. There's no room for interest, enjoyment, and culture in their bleak vision of education. At least she'll never be in power to see it through. Though Reform are probably worse.
Badenoch: Curb students taking "rip-off" degrees such as English. The performing arts, sociology and anthropology are among the subjects the Conservatives would like to cut
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
revmelanienola.bsky.social
“One of the chants that has become ubiquitous at these protests at Broadview is, ‘Love your neighbor, love your God, save your soul and quit your job,’” said Black, who pastors at the First Presbyterian Church of Chicago. “Everybody chants that.”
jackjenkins.me
NEW: I spoke to clergy and faith leaders who've joined protests at the Chicago-area ICE facility.

Three say they've been shot with pepper balls, sometimes while praying.

All say ICE is also violating their religious freedom, and one is arguing it in court. religionnews.com/2025/10/07/i...
Religious protesters say ICE threatens religious freedom in Chicago
(RNS) — Despite potential danger, religious leaders and faith activists have been a visible presence at Chicago-area ICE protests, some waving signs with slogans such as ‘Love thy neighbor’ and ‘Who w...
religionnews.com
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
peark.es
Well that's not how appropriations work at all

*WHITE HOUSE TO TRANSFER TARIFF REVENUE TO FUND WIC: LEAVITT
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
theradr.bsky.social
Mourning those murdered by Hamas isn't incompatible with mourning those murdered by the Israeli state.

Demanding that the hostages return isn't incompatible with naming & demanding an end to genocide.

Naming the power imbalance & impact thereof doesn't desecrate those murdered two years ago today.
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
hagenilda.bsky.social
Broke: blaming institutions
Woke: blaming individuals
Bespoke: blaming disabled people's means of staying alive
florarenz.bsky.social
Well there are 1.6 billion cars in the world, so the impact of your asthma inhaler is…not remotely statistically relevant
cnn.com
CNN @cnn.com · 2d
The people who are most vulnerable to the hard-to-breathe air that comes with climate change may inadvertently be adding to the problem, new research finds. https://cnn.it/4pWQMoh
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
brendannyhan.bsky.social
My new op-ed with @lkfazio.bsky.social:

Trump sent a 'compact' to our universities. They should reject this devil's bargain.
Any institution that yields to these broad and intrusive demands would forever be subservient to the whims of the government.
www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnb...
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
gbrockell.bsky.social
Claim: 10 cars rammed ICE
Truth: No cars rammed ICE

Claim: She boxed ICE in
Truth: ICE boxed her in

Claim: She shot a rifle at ICE
Truth: She did not have a rifle

Claim: ICE returned fire
Truth: Only ICE fired

Claim: She drove herself to the hospital
Truth: Paramedics found her
bparsia.bsky.social
Now I have become Reviewer 2, the destroyer of minor revisions.

(I don't think I have become a *problematic* reviewer 2, but yes, the other reviewers did not identify the significant issues I did. I thought I was being generous in going with major rather than reject and I'm part of the problem?)
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
atherton.bsky.social
Ellison's CBS brought on the two editors that got NYT to publish Tom Cotton's 2020 op-ed calling for soldiers to shoot protesters in the streets. Hard to find a clearer editorial throughline than "anyone protesting murder by the state should be killed for it."
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
crookedfootball.bsky.social
Brezhnev, Andropov and Chernenko were all younger than Trump is now when they ruled the USSR. The Soviet Union was ridiculed in the West as a gerontocracy.
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
sharonk.bsky.social
it's funny how so many people seem to have read this in the monetary sense and not the value sense
sharonk.bsky.social
"A free education is incompatible with fascism. Education is likely to be one of the great battlegrounds upon which is waged an intense and desperate struggle for power."

—John Dewey and Goodwin Watson, “The Forward View”
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
polgreen.bsky.social
Not to be a pedant but Bari Weiss was a junior editor who occasionally wrote opinion pieces in the opinion section, not a columnist.
Reposted by Bijan Parsia
chanda.blacksky.app
I hope Ezra Klein will restrain himself from saying Bari Weiss is doing journalism the right way