Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

@profirmf.bsky.social

2.3K followers 1.5K following 620 posts

tired Islam, South Asia, race, & religion professor. podcaster. parent. enthusiastic killjoy. drama & drag & bad movie fan. adoptee. occasional TikTokker. she/her. (specifics @ profirmf.com)

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst @profirmf.bsky.social · Jul 3

our book is about systems of power—& especially religion

we say repeatedly that religion is what people do

the good & bad & everything

enough white Christian Americans are doing fascism that that is the whole game now

so study up

www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/757650...

Religion Is Not Done with You by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst, Megan Goodwin: 9780807012758 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books

A smart, irreverent, and accessible guide to thinking more deeply about how religion permeates and shapes the world around us –and why you need to understand the work it's doing Religion lurks...

www.penguinrandomhouse.com

1 12 19

Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst @profirmf.bsky.social · 4h

I forgot that happened and now I’m irate all over again

a little girl in a red and purple dress is making an angry face .

ALT: a little girl in a red and purple dress is making an angry face .

media.tenor.com

1 1

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 1d

It's easy to say white supremacy is guys burning crosses or going to college campuses and saying that Black gang members are the primary problem with gun violence in the United States

It's harder to admit that it's in all the small ways folks allow people to devalue Black life on a daily basis

1 31 130

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

carwil.bsky.social @carwil.bsky.social · 1d

Vanderbilt AAUP: "The Compact is a threat. It aims to control nearly every aspect of university operations. Reject this Trump loyalty oath."

vanderbiltaaup.org/2025/10/06/s...

Statement by the Vanderbilt AAUP Executive Committee on the “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education”

Vanderbilt’s AAUP chapter stands firmly against Trump’s “Compact,” which aims to control nearly every aspect of university operations. The compact contravenes federal law an…

vanderbiltaaup.org

6 6

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Anodyne @anodynesix.bsky.social · 2d

"If [Israel] is treating Greta Thunberg this way, imagine how they are treating [Palestinian] women and children."

Harms Committed @harmscommitted.com · 3d

"Turkish activist Ersin Çelik, who also participated in the Sumud flotilla, told Anadolu that Israeli authorities 'dragged little Greta by her hair before our eyes, beat her, and forced her to kiss the Israeli flag.'"
#Gaza #Palestine #Israel #California #USA #Turkey #Sweden #Incarceration #Genocide

Israel Condemned as Sumud Flotilla Organizers Report 'Harsh Treatment' in Detention | Common Dreams

US Congressman Ro Khanna demands the release of US citizen David Adler, mistreated in Israeli detention. Will Israel ensure his safety? Greta Thunberg subjected to harsh treatment. Protests worldwide…

www.commondreams.org

1 18 29

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 2d

Counterpoint: they voted for exactly this.
They might be occasionally uncomfortable with the openly sadistic violent aesthetic of fascism this administration takes such glee in (only aesthetically, mind) but this is what they voted for/what they want.
Rogan especially can stfu forever.

Rolling Stone @rollingstone.com · 2d

“I voted for none of this."

Prominent influencers, including Theo Von, Joe Rogan, and Andrew Schulz, are starting to distance themselves from the president they helped propel to the White House.

Story: www.rollingstone.com/politics/pol...

6 17 96

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

chip goines @chip.bsky.social · 3d

If you're as disgusted by ICE & US Border Patrol's brutality as I am, please remember that is why Sen. Elizabeth Warren & Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley pushed to abolish Qualified Immunity for police officers 5 years ago. It's time.

7 150 560

Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst @profirmf.bsky.social · 3d

my semi regular reminder to all of us who love to cite Mr Roger’s “look for the helpers” in times of stress

like when folks are being abducted by secret police

that that was advice for children to feel safe in times of crisis or need or fear

YOU are not the looker now

YOU are the helper

2 35 130

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Jonathan W. Gray @elmcitytree.blacksky.app · 3d

James Baldwin to Angela Davis in 1970, discussing white Americans:

Or, to put it another way, as long as white Americans take refuge in their whiteness— for so long as they are unable to walk out of this most monstrous of traps-they will allow millions of people to be slaughtered in their name, and will be manipulated into and surrender themselves to what they will think of-and justify—as a racial war. They will never, so long as their whiteness puts so sinister a distance between themselves and their own experience and the experience of others, feel themselves sufficiently human, sufficiently worthwhile, to become responsible for themselves, their leaders, their country, their children, or their fate. They will perish (as we once put it in our black church) in their sins—that is, in their delusions. And this is happening, needless to say, already, all around us.

4 940 2.4K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Kevin M. Kruse @kevinmkruse.bsky.social · 3d

The President of the United States is lying and/or delusional, and it seems like we should be talking about this and nothing else.

Ron Filipkowski @ronfilipkowski.bsky.social · 3d

The protests are on one block. Nothing is burning down. His justification for sending in troops is all based on lies.

130 870 2.7K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Chantal James @chantalalive.blacksky.app · 3d

Black people who have been suicidal will tell you hanging themselves from a tree outside was always off the table.

46 510 2.9K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Athul K. Acharya @athul.acharya.cc · 4d

‘Thunberg was “wrapped in the Israeli flag and paraded like a trophy.”’

Paul T. Levin @paultlevin.bsky.social · 4d

““They dragged little Greta [Thunberg] by her hair before our eyes, beat her, and forced her to kiss the Israeli flag. They did everything imaginable to her, as a warning to others,” the Turkish activist ErsinÇelik, a participant in the Sumud flotilla, told Anadolu news agency.”+

Israel accused of detaining Greta Thunberg in infested cell and making her hold flags

Activist tells Swedish officials she has been subjected to harsh treatment, including insufficient food and water

www.theguardian.com

6 88 180

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Governor JB Pritzker @govpritzker.illinois.gov · 4d

This morning, the Trump Administration’s Department of War gave me an ultimatum: call up your troops, or we will. It is absolutely outrageous and un-American to demand a Governor send military troops within our own borders and against our will.

1.5K 7.4K 24K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

jenn m. jackson @jennmjacksonphd.bsky.social · 4d

The Vice President of the United States used his social media page to tell Joy Reid, a private citizen with no connection to the government, that she should express "gratitude" for how this country has treated her.

Black women remain the most consistent targets in all of this.

1.9K 4.8K 18K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Chris Geidner @chrisgeidner.bsky.social · 5d

BREAKING: The First Circuit rejects Trump's executive order seeking to end birthright citizenship. In the New Jersey-led multistate case, the appeals court, in a 100-page ruling, keeps the nationwide scope of the injunction blocking the EO in place. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

The Government now asks us to reverse the preliminary
injunctions in these cases. We see no reason to do so. The
Government is right that the Framers of the Citizenship Clause
sought to remove the stain of Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 119
How.) 393 (1857), which shamefully denied United States
citizenship to "descendants of Africans who were imported into
this country, and sold as slaves," even when the descendants were born here. Id. at 403. But the Framers chose to accomplish that
just purpose in broad terms, as both the supreme Court in United
States . Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), and Congress in
passing § 1401(a) have recognized. The Government is therefore
wrong to argue that the plaintiffs are not likely to succeed in
showing that the children that the EO covers are citizens of this
country at birth, just as the Government is wrong to argue that
various limits on our remedial power independently require us to
reverse the preliminary injunctions.?

The analysis that follows is necessarily lengthy, as we
must address the parties' numerous arguments in each of the cases
involved. But the length of our analysis should not be mistaken
for a sign that the fundamental question that these cases raise
about the scope of birthright citizenship is a difficult one.
•It
is not, which may explain why it has been more than a century since a branch of our government has made as concerted an effort as the
Executive Branch now makes to deny Americans their birthright.

Thus, it is no surprise that, when presented with even
more uncontroverted evidence by the State-Plaintiffs about the
need for an injunction of the current breadth, the District Court
again found that a narrower injunction would leave unremedied
"administrative and financial harms." We therefore decline to
conclude that the District Court has abused its discretion in
fashioning relief. See Philip Morris, Inc. v. Harshbarger, 159
F. 3d 670, 680 (1st Cir. 1998) (explaining that "[als a general
rule, a disappointed litigant cannot surface an objection to a preliminary injunction for the first time in an appellate venue"
because doing so deprives the district court of the opportunity to
"consider [the objection] and correct the injunction if necessary,
without the need for appeal" (quoting Zenon, 711 F.2d at 478)).

The "lessons of history" thus give us every reason to be
wary of now blessing this most recent effort to break with our
established tradition of recognizing birthright citizenship and to
make citizenship depend on the actions of one's parents rather
than -- in all but the rarest of circumstances -- the simple fact
of being born in the United States. United States v. Di Re, 332
U.S. 581, 595 (1948). Nor does the text of the Fourteenth
Amendment, which countermanded our most infamous attempt to break
with that tradition, permit us to bless this effort, any more than
does the Supreme Court's interpretation of that amendment in Wong
Kim Ark, the many related precedents that have followed it, or
Congress's 1952 statute writing that amendment's words in the U.S.
Code.
The District Court's order for entry of the preliminary
injunctions is affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded for
further consideration consistent with this decision.

10 630 2.2K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

David Corn @davidcorn.bsky.social · 6d

Remember when Hillary Clinton called some Trump supporters “deplorable“?

250 670 2.9K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Mél Hogan / The Data Fix @melhogan.bsky.social · 7d

“And in this respect, I’m coming to understand the AI hype machine as part and parcel of the fascistic project. That’s not an analogy. I’m not saying AI is similar to fascism, or parallel to it. I’m saying AI is fascism.”

Mél Hogan / The Data Fix @melhogan.bsky.social · 7d

www.halifaxexaminer.ca/morning-file...

AI is fascism - Halifax Examiner

Eventually, fascism runs its course, just as the AI hype machine will. It's just a question of how much damage will be done before it's over.

www.halifaxexaminer.ca

9 130 340

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Sherrilyn Ifill @sifill.bsky.social · 7d

Zuck, Musk, Ellison, Altman are literally every mad scientist in 1960s films. Except they’re not scientists, and they’re not hot like Vincent Price.

New York Times Opinion @nytopinion.nytimes.com · 8d

Mark Zuckerberg has a vision for how A.I. could be used in Meta's universe.

But the actor and filmmaker Joseph Gordon-Levitt is here to point out a flaw in the technology: an apparent lack of guardrails around how the company's chatbot interacts with underage users. nyti.ms/3ILwCNo

13 120 450

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Tom Scocca @tomscocca.bsky.social · 8d

"CBS News editor in chief Bari Weiss" is the exact same deal as "Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth"

58 670 4.4K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Matthew J Kuiper @matthewjkuiper.bsky.social · 7d

From bad to worse doesn’t come close to capturing the situation. “Hospitals are overflowing, water is low and diseases are spreading as hundreds of thousands of Palestinians flee south to escape Israel’s expanded ground offensive.”

Gift article.

Gaza City Exodus Is Overwhelming Relief Efforts, Aid Agencies Say

www.nytimes.com

1 3 3

Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst @profirmf.bsky.social · 7d

Mazel tov!!!!

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Shaily Patel @vox-magica.bsky.social · 7d

my book_smoke & mirrors_ is out on oxford scholarship online. i have many feelings, mostly good! this was a difficult write for many reasons.

so i hope you find something useful in it if you read it.

Smoke & Mirrors: Discourses of Magic in Early Petrine Traditions

Abstract. Smoke & Mirrors: Discourses of Magic in Early Petrine Traditions is a book about how magic disappears from early Christian texts that feature

academic.oup.com

12 34 85

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 8d

Once again, it is *faculty*—not administrators—who brought this case and won. Including UC Faculty Association chapters of the AAUP.

Court Rules in AAUP v Rubio: Trump Admin Violated First Amendment

The AAUP and partners sued to block the Trump administration from carrying out large-scale arrests, detentions, and deportations of noncitizen students and faculty members for ideological reasons.

www.aaup.org

4 270 880

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Julian Sanchez @normative.bsky.social · 8d

The endgame for all of this is constructing a military that will obey orders when ordered to fire on citizens. That's the throughline to half of what Trump is doing.

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 8d

yeah, this is hegseth straightforwardly announcing that it is free play time for bigots in the ranks. and together with his comments on standards, he clearly wants to purge as many women, black and brown people as he can from the armed services. a white man's military.

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 8d

Hegseth: "We are overhauling an inspector general process that has been weaponized, putting complainers and poor performers in the driver seat. We are doing the same with the equal opportunity policies. No more frivolous complaints, no more anonymous complains ... no more walking on eggshells."

19 1.5K 5.3K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 8d

i'm guessing this is for his buddies who have been accused of war crimes or blatant racism

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 8d

Hegseth: "You should not pay for an earnest mistake for your entire career. That's why today, at my direction, we're making changes to the retention of adverse information on personnel records."

320 1.6K 8.9K

Reposted by Ilyse Morgenstein Fuerst

Kevin Gannon (now a Moo Deng fan account) @thetattooedprof.bsky.social · 8d

so 'war is peace' is what you're saying then

Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 8d

Hegseth: "As history teaches us, the only people who actually deserve peace and those who are willing to wage war to defend it. That's why pacifism is so naive and dangerous."

7 11 64