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The Present Age Weekly Recap: April 1, 2022
www.readtpa.com
TPA Weekly Recap

The Present Age Weekly Recap: April 1, 2022

No jokes, I promise.

Parker Molloy
Apr 1, 2022
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The Present Age Weekly Recap: April 1, 2022
www.readtpa.com

Welcome to the weekly recap. In this post, I’ll be linking to my work from the week, sharing some stories from others I thought were interesting, and providing a few casual thoughts on [gestures at everything]. If you’d like to receive this weekly email ONLY, please go to your account page and under “Email notifications” uncheck every box except “TPA Weekly Recap.” If you don’t want to receive the weekly recap, leave all boxes except “TPA Weekly Recap” checked.


From me this week: Twitter can’t bring itself to enforce its own rules, artificial intelligence-generated art is pretty amazing, and she who shall not be named.

On Monday, I wrote about Robert Foster, the former Mississippi legislator who called for trans people and those who support us to be executed… and about Twitter’s unwillingness to enforce its own policies. As I’ve said over and over, if Twitter (or YouTube or Facebook or any other social media site) wants to make its platform a free-for-all where you can say anything you want, they can absolutely do that. But if it’s going to continue to pretend like it enforces its rules against hateful conduct, it needs to actually do that.

The Present Age
Twitter needs to get its act together
Over the weekend, I saw a series of tweets that just… genuinely set me off. And I want to talk about it. (There’s going to be some discussion of some really awful anti-trans/anti-LGBTQ rhetoric here, so consider this your warning.) Robert Foster is a former member of the Mississippi House of Representatives and failed 2019 candidate for governor. If you…
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10 months ago · 32 likes · Parker Molloy

And it now seems like Foster has deleted his Twitter account. Not sure why or when he did this, but the fact that it says “This account doesn’t exist” indicates that he did it on his own and it wasn’t the result of Twitter enforcing its rules.

And then on Tuesday, I wrote about a really cool new artificial intelligence-powered art tool called MidJourney. Words really don’t do it justice, so please click through to that story to see a bunch of examples of what it’s capable of doing.

The Present Age
This art was made by a computer
Last week, I saw a tweet from Brielle Garcia about a new AI art visualization tool called MidJourney. I’ve messed around a bit with AI-generated art in the past, but MidJourney is just… well, I want to show you. First, here’s the thread that caught my attention…
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10 months ago · 17 likes · 6 comments · Parker Molloy
Twitter avatar for @ParkerMolloy
Parker Molloy @ParkerMolloy
1. I wrote about using @midjourney's AI art tool here: readthepresentage.com/p/midjourney-a… 2. Here's what I got when I asked it to make me a cartoon duck holding a baseball bat and Elon Musk with lobster claws for hands
Image
Image
5:21 PM ∙ Mar 29, 2022
80Likes11Retweets

And finally, yesterday, I wrote about trans rights and whether or not J.K. Rowling qualifies as “the new Anita Bryant.” The truth is that I don’t really know. There are a number of misperceptions about why trans people “canceled” her (I hate the term “cancel” when the actual action is more, “Oh dear god, why would I continue to give my money to someone who says these things about people like me/people I care about??”), and despite what Dave Chappelle said, it’s not just that she said “gender is fact” or “sex is fact".” Give it a read if you’re a subscriber.

The Present Age
The new Anita Bryant, pt 1.
The other day, Owen Jones, a columnist at The Guardian, shared a Twitter thread that I really think people need to check out. It details a story from another time that feels all-too-familiar to a lot of us today. This piece is going to be lengthy, it’s going to include a lot of blockquotes, and it’s being written by me on March 31, 2022, which just so happens to be Transgender Day of Visibility. And I’m tired. And I’m sad. And I’m really worried about the future…
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10 months ago · 6 likes · Parker Molloy

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Posts from others that I want to draw attention to:

Jessica Valenti has a great piece pushing back on conservatives’ latest attempt to smear LGBTQ people as “groomers.” Definitely worth checking out.

All in Her Head by Jessica Valenti
Who Really Sexualizes Kids?
This week, Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill into law, banning any mention of sexual orientation or gender identity in state classrooms. The law’s language is so sweeping that it effectively criminalizes teachers using books about different kinds of families, or even administrators talking about their same sex spouses…
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10 months ago · 43 likes · 7 comments · Jessica Valenti

Over at Discourse Blog, Rafi Schwartz explains why Republicans got angry with Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) over his ridiculous claims about orgies and cocaine but not any of the other horrific stuff he’s said and done before and since joining Congress. Simply put: because this made fellow Republicans look bad.

Discourse Blog
The GOP is Finally Mad at Madison Cawthorn For Mentioning Orgies
Let me start out by saying that I firmly believe that Madison Cawthorn has never been invited to an orgy in his entire life. There are a couple reasons for this, namely, that hosting a successful evening of consensual group sex requires everyone involved feeling safe and comfortable, which is unlikely around a…
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10 months ago · 14 likes · 6 comments · Rafi Schwartz

This piece by Teddy Wilson at Radical Reports is a great summary of what he does best: offers streamlined, easy-to-understand information about the right. Definitely worth giving him a subscribe to stay in the loop on what’s happening in Trumpworld and elsewhere in the conservative cesspools.

Radical Reports
Who are Peter Navarro and Daniel Scavino?
The U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack announced that on Monday the committee will vote on a “report recommending that the House of Representatives cite Peter Navarro and Daniel Scavino, Jr. for criminal conte…
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10 months ago · 1 comment · Teddy Wilson

And once again, Dan Pfeiffer has a must-read piece over at The Message Box about Clarence Thomas and accountability.

The Message Box
Holding Clarence Thomas Accountable
To fit with a longstanding pattern, the Washington Post and CBS News jointly broke a huge story not long after Jon Favreau and I finished recording Pod Save America. According to the Post: Virginia Thomas, a conservative activist married to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, repeatedly pressed White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to pursue unrelen…
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10 months ago · 75 likes · 12 comments · Dan Pfeiffer

That’s it for this week! Please leave any questions, comments, feedback, or recommendations (definitely recommendations) in the comments below. Have a good weekend, everyone!

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