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Hal Duncan

@halduncan.com

2.6K followers 490 following 6.5K posts

Writer, editor, gardener--sometimes even in that order. Queer. He/thon, but mainly just cause thon's a guid Scots pronoun fur aebdy, whitever thur gender. Contact: hal AT halduncan DOT com

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · May 7

your intermittent reminder that the left/right axis is a spatial metaphor, not a reality, that the "centre" is not in fact a moderate middle ground but rather the *centre of power & privilege* protected by the vulgarly overt antisocialists operating on behalf of the polite paternalist antisocialists

a map of Dubrovnik's walled old town as illustration of Bastion Theory, in which the institutions of power that happen to be on the right of the map are labeled "THE RIGHT"; just beyond that to the right, the "FAR RIGHT" man the city walls, extending all the way round them to the gates; outside of those gates is labeled the LEFT; while the main part of the bastion of power & privilege is occupied by "CENTRIST FUCKS"

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Lux Alptraum @luxalptraum.com · 8h

TFW you paid $1400 to see Beckett’s most famous work without knowing anything about it

One Star Review of Waiting for Godot on Broadway
I recently attended Waiting for Godot on Broadway and spent over $1,400 for two Row C seats (103 and 104). I'm a longtime admirer of Broadway productions and even hold a season pass for Shea's Performing Arts Theatre, so I came in with genuine enthusiasm and high expectations. Unfortunately, this show was unlike anything ! have ever experienced —and not in a good way.
What I encountered was not the artistry, music, or emotional storytelling I usually associate with Broadway, but instead what felt like an endless cycle of nonsensical conversation between characters who seemed trapped in their own madness. I tried-truly tried-to find meaning, symbolism, or even a thread of emotional resonance. I stayed through the first half hoping the second would offer clarity. But by intermission, it was clear: this was a waste of both time and money.
Keanu Reeves is an actor I respect greatly, but I cannot fathom why he would agree to participate in such a disjointed, inaccessible production. His talent was lost in a performance that defied reason rather than provoked insight.
To anyone considering attending: unless you are drawn to highly abstract, nearly incomprehensible theater, I strongly caution you against this show. For the average, educated, thoughtful theatergoer, it is far more frustrating than fulfilling. In my opinion, this was the single most disappointing Broadway experience I've ever had - an unfortunate waste of money and, more importantly, of time.

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Mellow Lugosi’s Dead 🧛🏻‍♂️ @flyingtrilobite.com · 5h

This is not a photo of protestors in Portland “ICE fishing”, as clever as that sounds.

I can’t find the photographer so far, but it’s been online since at least 2013, and those are Toronto cycling cops, not American ICE agents.

Note the uniforms, shorts, bikes, and lack of masks.

Eric Alterman @ericalterman.bsky.social · 1d

Ice Fishing in Portland

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 4h

in a retaliatory move antifa tried to capture the girlfriend of one of the founders of fascism 2.0 but it turns out thats just an NFT of his anime waifu

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 4h

Nah, that's fa's girlfriend, antifa doesn't need ai wank fantasies

Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 4h

Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 5h

dumb fascist fucks don't even know they've got the founder of antifa herself, the antifa queen, and she let herself be captured as part of The Plan

Schrödinger's Sneetch Belly @rtodkelly.bsky.social · 9h

"the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa"

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 5h

dumb fascist fucks don't even know they've got the founder of antifa herself, the antifa queen, and she let herself be captured as part of The Plan

Schrödinger's Sneetch Belly @rtodkelly.bsky.social · 9h

"the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa"

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 5h

"the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa"

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Karen Dalton Beninato 🐦 @kbeninato.bsky.social · 5h

"the girlfriend of one of the founders of antifa"

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Adam Bonica @adambonica.bsky.social · 6h

As the Supreme Court term begins, keep this framework in mind: Autocratic Legalism.

Instead of “rule of law” (law constrains the power), we get “rule by law” (law as a weapon for power).

Authoritarians usually have to install allies. Trump started his second term with that step already complete.

The only effective opposition is through the language of morality and documented harm—not legal technicalities that can be swept away with a 6–3 vote.” The text is centered on a neutral background, with “morality” and “documented harm” slightly emphasized to underscore the moral and empirical contrast with “legal technicalities.”

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Cooger & Dark’s Pandemonium Shadow Podcast @gonebabygone.bsky.social · 6h

Rocky, a naturalistic drama about two outcasts falling in love that happened to have boxing in it that was followed by the kind of embarrassing Mary Sue bullshit usually reserved for politicians' fiction debuts

Matt Singer @mattsinger.bsky.social · 1d

Food for thought: What is the worst franchise made from the best movie?

15 Great Movies That Were Ruined By Becoming Franchises

These classic films should never have gotten sequels.

screencrush.com

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ouinne @ouinne.bsky.social · 6h

The only correct take on a fundamentally anti-human technology.

Screenshot of David Simon interview
SHAPIRO: OK, so you've spent your career creating television without Al, and I could imagine today you thinking, boy, I wish I had had that tool to solve those thorny problems...
SIMON: What?
SHAPIRO: ...Or saying...
SIMON: You imagine that?
SHAPIRO: ...Boy, if that had existed, it would have screwed me over.
SIMON: I don't think Al can remotely challenge what writers do at a fundamentally creative level.
SHAPIRO: But if you're trying to transition from scene five to scene six, and you're stuck with that transition, you could imagine plugging that portion of the script into an Al and say, give me 10 ideas for how to transition this.
SIMON: I'd rather put a gun in my mouth.

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The Car Chase from Chapell Ronin @jacobian.bsky.social · 10h

These people aren't liberals. They're tech libertarians. It's important to understand that, it contextualizes everything they do

They do not have good morals, their ideology is about finding ways to exempt themselves from the concept of morality in favor of "no one is responsible to anyone else".

Pookleblinky @pookleblinky.bsky.social · 15h

The COO of bluesky, Rose, is following the heritage foundation account on bluesky.

Soyweiser @soyweiser.bsky.social · 16h

She is the COO en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_o... of bsky. This is worrying because after the 'we are turning waffles into an anti-trans thing' by the CEO the CEO started to follow a transphobe. Shows a pattern.

Wonder when we find out one of them follows the discovery institute.

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 6h

If Kemi Badenoch thinks discourse analysis and phonetics are worthless things for English degree students to get taught she should be committed to that and stop doing discourse and using phonemes and such, just no speech acts from her ever again

Keith W. Dickinson @keithwdickinson.bsky.social · 18h

Apparently arts degrees are so worthless they need to be stopped, yet the product of those degrees is so valuable paying for it would bring down an entire industry.

Make it make sense.

Headline screenshot. The leader of the Conservative Party saying we need to "Curb students taking 'rip-off' degrees such as English."

Headline screenshot. The former leader of the Liberal Democrats, also former Meta employee, claiming that asking artists for permission to use their work (i.e. paying for it) would "kill" the A.I. industry.

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Amazing Digital Carcass @amagire.bsky.social · 9h

my "I'm disabling my moderation labeler completely voluntarily of my own free will" post has people asking me a lot of questions that are answered by my post,

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 6h

I'm guessing healthcare is the priority for the elite liberals just because a calamitous impact on prole healthcare might lead to another CEO getting popped, they sure as fuck don't seem concerned with the healthcare crisis entailed in death squads being unleashed

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 7h

bringing a flipchart of projected quarterly figures to a gunfight

Eric Michael Garcia @ericmgarcia.bsky.social · 8h

Durbin on whether Democrats can use reining in ICE in Chicago as a precondition to rein in the government says “can’t do that. It’s gotta be health care all the way.”

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 7h

translation: death squads; the murder of dissidents

Prem Thakker ツ @premthakker.bsky.social · 9h

My gosh. After the US bombed multiple boats in the middle of the ocean, murdering people on grounds that they were allegedly "carrying drugs," the US Attorney General says "Just like we did with cartels, we're going to take the same approach, President Trump, with Antifa."

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 9h

So it worked out rather well

A giant casserole dish of chilli con carne

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Tom Cox @dj-acid-reflux.bsky.social · 21h

Highland cattle are famous for their ability to "disco nap". Normally these brief, efficient sleeps will last between three and twenty minutes, deploying a variety of objects as pillows, including moorland boulders, cars or any particularly large dog or sheep who happens to be nearby.

A highland cow having a little nap on a boulder on Dartmoor (ok, it was actually scratching its head)

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Sarah McLaughlin @sarahemclaugh.bsky.social · 15h

It isn't just that you can't express verbal support for Palestine Action. You may also not even be free to simply question the government's decision to ban it. This is the most basic political expression — challenging how leaders govern. And yet.

Rick @rick-sco.bsky.social · 15h

Yeh, you can't even disagree with the action of declaring Palestine Action a terrorist group. Pretty sure they will just try to arrest anyone with the words Action & Palestine in what they deem to be the wrong order at this point. Some politicians are really in need of swift replacement.

Woman 'arrested' over 'I oppose proscription of Palestine Action' sign

A PROTESTER has claimed she was arrested for holding a sign saying “I do not support the proscription of Palestine Action”.

www.thenational.scot

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kate conger @kateconger.com · 12h

Jonathan Rinderknecht, a white man, was charged with starting the Palisades Fire. But on X, the company's news summary tab shows a photo of a black man.

Screenshot depicting posts on X, one showing the suspect accused of starting the Palisades Fire, a white man. The X news tab reports on the suspect's arrest, but shows a photo of a black man instead.

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 11h

The elite gatekeeper liberals are reframing it as a "purity test" that those who're utterly opposed to that fratriarchal purity testing won't just cave & accept a candidate they see as ideal in his hollow performative liberalism, disregarding that one "minor" case where his illiberalism's inarguable

Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 11h

The objections to Newsom are precisely because he actively enforces & defends that fratriarchal purity test in real terms. Those arguing against him and his ilk, for practical full-socialist civil rights reasons, are arguing the abolition of that existing purity test, opposing his drive to extend it

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Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 11h

Full socialism is advocacy for the abolition of that systemic purity testing which would see only rich able-bodied SWM in positions of power. Newsom's stans are applying that test in latching onto him in part on the most superficial basis that he looks straight from Central Casting for the role.

Hal Duncan @halduncan.com · 11h

It's an utter inversion too. Fratriarchy establishes its bastion of power & privilege on the abjection of Others: misogyny, racism, ableism, classism, queerphobia. Civil rights fight that purity testing, so gatekeeper liberals exist to purity test the Abject seeking access w/ respectability politics

Karl (sad trombone noise enthusiast) @brainnotonyet.bsky.social · 12h

NeoLiberals use the phrase “purity test” as a dog whistle for bigotry and open hatred for those seen as a threat to their power and influence.

✪ Jonathan H. Gray: “Professor of Halloweenery” ✪ @jongraywb.bsky.social · 12h

If you are willing to throw away entire groups of people to protect your insular strategy that will only protect you instead of protecting everyone then I don’t want your leaders and I sure as hell don’t want to be associated with you.

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