Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 18h

Also, for no reason at all, if someone wants to buy me this inflatable Mothra costume, I would absolutely love that. I’d buy it myself but they don’t sell it here in Canada. Boo.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 18h

This is hilarious and delightful, and even though the situation is very serious overall, this also shows how ridiculous of an overreach Trump/Miller/Noem/ICE are making.

Courtney Vaughn @courtneyvaughn.bsky.social · 19h

Streets are still closed off in front of the Portland ICE facility at 8:30pm. Protesters have gathered on a side street. Dance party in progress.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 1d

"An article in the Federalist" is an incorrect sentence, as it suggests that the Federalist is a legitimate news source, versus a bunch of edgelords disguising their unfiltered thoughts as journalism.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 1d

LMAO, 'plenary authority'?

Stephen Miller continually shows that he doesn't have a fucking clue what he's talking about, and the dangerous thing is that he's in a position to weaponize that incompetence.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 1d

I use this example all the time when speaking about sovereign territories and the fact that from an international law perspective, Indigenous land is not state land in the American context.

New York State is going to be paying up, very soon.

UAINE @mahtowin1.bsky.social · 2d

A federal judge has sided with the Seneca Nation in a decades-long Thruway dispute with NY state. What comes next?
www.wgrz.com/article/news...

Federal judge rules New York lacked right to build Thruway on Seneca land

A federal judge just sided with the Seneca Nation in a decades-long Thruway dispute—but what comes next?

www.wgrz.com

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 1d

It has been shown time, and time again, that when you are able to provide basic support for folks, such as UBI, not only are they able to thrive, but there are significant increases in measurable indicators of economic health, such as purchasing power.

Mike Sowden @mikeachim.bsky.social · 2d

Damn. This is amazing. £325 per week, paid monthly, for 3 years - and the result was a profit for the Irish economy:
www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employmen...

Post from Threads user rodneyowl: "Ireland has declared the Basic Income for Artists scheme permanent. This will be officially announced in tomorrow’s budget. Details to follow. Congratulations to all who fought for it and the present and future artists of all sorts in Ireland. That includes me 👌We’re just comin to the end of a 3 year pilot scheme. It’s been a roaring success. For every €1 paid out to the 2000 participants, the government got €1.46 back. Can’t argue with that. Other countries are already taking note."

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 1d

The warm and fuzzy hit of dopamine that I get from watching the 1970s/80s vintage CBC ident (the “Exploding Pizza”) is underrated.

youtu.be/u7zj81gOrLQ?...

CBC Television ID (70s-86)

YouTube video by MarkNF82

youtu.be

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

The firing of a comms staffer for BC MLA Jon Rustad, for openly spreading residential school denialism should be a very stark eye-opening for folks.

This shameful behaviour is becoming very mainstream--I worry that one day very soon, we will see Poilievre start spouting denialism talking points.

APTN News @aptnnews.bsky.social · 2d

Once a fringe conspiracy, residential school denialism is becoming more mainstream.

On the latest APTN News InFocus, host Cierra Bettens speaks with Métis student Benjamin Kucher about why confronting denialism is critical to reconciliation.

Listen: pod.fo/e/336612

InFocus: Confronting residential school denialism: How a new generation is pushing back against a growing threat

This week on APTN News InFocus, host Cierra Bettens examines the growing threat of residential school denialism in Canada. Once confined to the internet’s fringes, denialism has entered the mains...

pod.fo

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Reposted by ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin)

Wilderness Committee @wildernews.bsky.social · 2d

We joined hereditary leaders from Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan, the City of Victoria and Stand.earth to speak at a press conference to kick off the fall session of the BC Legislature.
We’re calling for respect for First Nations rights and title and real climate action, not more subsidies for polluters.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

The critical killjoy in me says that Jay's crashout over the past few days is a dead ringer for what happens when white women (and women with proximity to whiteness) get called out by marginalized folks on poor behaviour--they quickly deflect, lash out, and retreat into strategic innocence.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

This is probably a very hot take (pun fully intended), but if your coffee experience is ruined by the fact that your coffee and donuts are being handed to you by a brown immigrant, you can always make your coffee at home. Donuts, too, if you're feeling culinarily inclined.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

Someone said, "We should stop giving jobs to people that come from certain countries and give them to our Indigenous peoples here in Canada", and the follow-up comment was "You'll have to get the bottles out of their hands first", and I'm like, sheesh, never wasting an opportunity to be racist, eh?

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

When I look in the comments section of a Tim Horton's Facebook post regarding Orange Shirt Day, and see folks somehow managing to bring in anti-immigrant dog whistles into the midst of their anti-Indigenous racism.

I Don'T Know What I Expected GIF

ALT: I Don'T Know What I Expected GIF

media.tenor.com

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

I think that if there is a move to do this more broadly, there needs to be improvements in public transportation access — it does not do to take away mobility for folks and not provide them with reasonable alternatives.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

I believe they do this in BC--you have to get your doctor to sign off on your fitness to drive at age 80, age 85, and then every two years after that.

In fact, when I got my driver's licence in BC, I had to get my family doctor to sign off that I was safe to drive as a diabetic.

Jen Jennings @jenjennings.bsky.social · 3d

We invented graduated drivers licenses for teens. They worked. But we leave 80-year-olds to “see how it goes.” Every family suffers on their own. But this is a shared social problem, not a personal one. We need conditional licenses for older drivers. Daylight. Local. Annual medical check-ins.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

I feel like when the edgelord cohort is making these kinds of reasonable takes, it's a clear sign there's some major fear on the political right.

LA Legault ⚜️ @lalegault.bsky.social · Jul 31

Hey guys, I think some sort of portal has opened up:

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

Not sure! I can ask the instructor!

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 2d

This week: I return (virtually) to Texas State University to speak about qualitative methods in Geography!

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 3d

Like any bully, they will back down the moment they don’t feel like they can act with impunity.

Cristian Farias @cristianfarias.com · 3d

This video of Chicagoans intervening to save a man from being abducted off the streets by ICE is making the rounds on Instagram.

Community action works.

Source: www.instagram.com/reel/DPZL2AL...

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 3d

If white folks like to call people who point out hate crimes “Jussie Smolett”, what do we call white folks who make up false claims about Black crime? ‘Carolyn Donham Bryant’? ‘Barbecue Becky’?

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 4d

It’s amazing how many Israeli military “accidents” seem to focus on hospitals, doctors, press, aid workers, etc.

Nathan Kalman-Lamb @nkalamb.bsky.social · 4d

MSF staff are universally understood to be engaged in an essentially sacred form of work. For a state to nonetheless continuously murder them is a testament to a truly unthinkable degree of depravity.

msf.org/msf-denounce...

This morning, an attack carried out by Israeli forces killed Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) staff member, Omar Hayek, and seriously injured four others. The attack took place on a street where our teams were waiting to take a bus to the MSF field hospital in Deir al Balah, Gaza.

All staff were wearing MSF vests, clearly identifying them as medical humanitarian workers.
We express deep sorrow and outrage over the killing, which occurs less than two weeks after another MSF colleague, Hussein Alnajjar, was killed by the Israeli forces, in Deir Al Balah.

Our thoughts are with Omar’s family and colleagues at this tragic time. Omar, 42 years old, is the fourteenth MSF colleague to be killed in Gaza since 7 October 2023.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 5d

As a Geography PhD, I can confirm that this is how wars get started.

In fact, a war started on the street corner near my house here in Victoria.

It was a war between a goose and a crow, but if you let birds get into wars, next thing dogs and cats will be fighting, and then it'll be human wars.

Loquacious Scribble, PhD @loquaciousscribble.bsky.social · 5d

It's the corners. Portland's smaller than average block length means there are more street corners and that's where wars start.

It a geographical fact.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 5d

It feels a bit odd to be celebrating another new article, but the fourth installment of our series on queering feminist geographies has been published in Gender, Place, and Culture. Again, grateful to @queergeog.bsky.social for bringing me on as a co-author.

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

www.tandfonline.com

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 5d

If I ran an app that suddenly grew in userbase due to another established social media app being taken over by alt-right fascists, I might be more mindful of my audience/customer base. However, what do I know? I just have a PhD in Geography. I'm sure this will work out fine for Jay in the long run.

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ᓃᔪᑲᒥᑳᐸᐤ Niiyokamigaabaw Deondre Smiles, Ph.D. (he/they/wiin) @niiyokamigaabaw.bsky.social · 5d

You've got to be established for a bit before you pull the "Oh yeah, where are you gonna go" card.

Jay 🦋 @jay.bsky.team · 5d

You could try a poster’s strike. I hear that works

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