Today's links

Scientific American endorses Harris: "Conservatism never fails, it is only failed."
Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
This day in history: 2009, 2014, 2019, 2023
Upcoming appearances: Where to find me.
Recent appearances: Where I've been.
Latest books: You keep readin' em, I'll keep writin' 'em.
Upcoming books: Like I said, I'll keep writin' 'em.
Colophon: All the rest.

Scientific American endorses Harris (permalink)

If Trump's norm-breaking is a threat to democracy (and it is), what should Democrats do? Will breaking norms to defeat norms only accelerate the collapse of norms, or do we fight fire with fire, breaking norms to resist the slide into tyranny?

Writing for The American Prospect, Rick Perlstein writes how "every time the forces of democracy broke a reactionary deadlock, they did it by breaking some norm that stood in the way":

https://prospect.org/politics/2024-10-23-science-is-political/

Take the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery, and the Reconstruction period that followed it. As Jefferson Cowie discusses, the 13th only passed because the slave states were excluded from its ratification, and even then, it barely squeaked over the line. The Congress that passed reconstruction laws that "radically reconstructed [slave states] via military subjugation" first ejected all the representatives of those states:

https://newrepublic.com/article/182383/defend-liberalism-lets-fight-democracy-first

The New Deal only exists because FDR was on the verge of packing the Supreme Court, and, under this threat, SCOTUS stopped ruling against FDR's plans:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/09/20/judicial-equilibria/#pack-the-court

The passage of progressive laws – "the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, Medicare, and Medicaid" – are all thanks to JFK's gambit of packing the House Rules Committee, ending the obstructionist GOP members' use of the committee to kill anything that would protect or expand America's already fragile social safety net.

As Perlstein writes, "A willingness to judiciously break norms in a civic emergency can be a sign of a healthy and valorous democratic resistance."

And yet…the Democratic establishment remains violently allergic to norm-breaking. Perlstein recalls the 2018 book How Democracies Die, much beloved of party elites and Obama himself, which argued that norms are the bedrock of democracy, and so the pro-democratic forces undermine their own causes when they fight reactionary norm-breaking with their own.

The tactic of bringing a norm to a gun-fight has been a disaster for democracy. Trump wasn't the first norm-shattering Republican – think of GWB and his pals stealing the 2000 election, or Mitch McConnell stealing a Supreme Court seat for Gorsuch – but Trump's assault on norms is constant, brazen and unapologetic. Progressives need to do more than weep on the sidelines and demand that Republicans play fair.

The Democratic establishment's response is to toe every line, seeking to attract "moderate conservatives" who love institutions more than they love tax giveaways to billionaires. This is a very small constituency, nowhere near big enough to deliver the legislative majorities, let alone the White House. As Perlstein says, Obama very publicly rejected calls to be "too liberal" and tiptoed around anti-racist policy, in a bid to prevent a "racist backlash" (Obama discussed race in public less than any other president since the 1950s). This was a hopeless, ridiculous own-goal: Perlstein points out that even before Obama was inaugurated, there were more than 100 Facebook groups calling for his impeachment. The racist backlash was inevitable had nothing to do with Obama's policies. The racist backlash was driven by Obama's race.

Luckily, some institutions are getting over their discomfort with norm-breaking and standing up for democracy. Scientific American the 179 year-old bedrock of American scientific publication, has endorsed Harris for President, only the second such endorsement in its long history:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/vote-for-kamala-harris-to-support-science-health-and-the-environment/

Predictably, this has provoked howls of outrage from Republicans and a debate within the scientific community. Science is supposed to be apolitical, right?

Wrong. The conservative viewpoint, grounded in discomfort with ambiguity ("there are only two genders," etc) is antithetical to the scientific viewpoint. Remember the early stages of the covid pandemic, when science's understanding of the virus changed from moment to moment? Major, urgent recommendations (not masking, disinfecting groceries) were swiftly overturned. This is how science is supposed to work: a hypothesis can only be grounded in the evidence you have in hand, and as new evidence comes in that changes the picture, you should also change your mind.

Conservatives hated this. They claimed that scientists were "flip-flopping" and therefore "didn't know anything." Many concluded that the whole covid thing was a stitch-up, a bid to control us by keeping us off-balance with ever-changing advice and therefore afraid and vulnerable. This never ended: just look at all the weirdos in the comments of this video of my talk at last summer's Def Con who are absolutely freaking out about the fact that I wore a mask in an enclosed space with 5,000 people from all over the world in it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EmstuO0Em8

This intolerance for following the evidence is a fixture in conservative science denialism. How many times have you heard your racist Facebook uncle grouse about how "scientists used to say the world was getting colder, now they say it's getting hotter, what the hell do they know?"

Perlstein points to other examples of this. For example, in the 1980s, conservatives insisted that the answer to the AIDS crisis was to "just stop having 'illicit sex,'" a prescription that was grounded in a denial of AIDS science, because scientists used to say that it was a gay disease, then they said you could get it from IV drug use, or tainted blood, or from straight sex. How could you trust scientists when they can't even make up their minds?

https://www.newspapers.com/image/379364219/?terms=babies&match=1

There certainly are conservative scientists. But the right has a "fundamentally therapeutic discourse…conservatism never fails, it is only failed." That puts science and conservativism in a very awkward dance with one another.

Sometimes, science wins. Continuing in his history of the AIDS crisis, Perlstein talks about the transformation of Reagan's Surgeon General, C Everett Koop. Koop was an arch-conservative's arch-conservative. He was a hard-right evangelical who had "once suggested homosexuals were sedulously recruiting boys into their cult to help them take over America once they came of voting age." He'd also called abortion "the slide to Auschwitz" – which was weird, because he'd also opined that the "Jews had it coming for refusing to accept Jesus Christ."

You'd expect Koop to have continued the Reagan administration's de facto AIDS policy ("queers deserve to die"), but that's not what happened. After considering the evidence, Koop mailed a leaflet to every home in the USA advocating for condom use.

Koop was already getting started. His harm-reduction advocacy made him a national hero, so Reagan couldn't fire him. A Reagan advisor named Gary Bauer teamed up with Dinesh D'Souza on a mission to get Koop back on track. They got him a new assignment: investigate the supposed psychological harms of abortion, which should be a slam-dunk for old Doc Auschwitz. Instead, Koop published official findings – from the Reagan White House – that there was no evidence for these harms, and which advised women with an AIDS diagnosis to consider abortion.

So sometimes, science can triumph over conservativism. But it's far more common for conservativism to trump science. The most common form of this is "eisegesis," where someone looks at a "pile of data in order to find confirmation in it of what they already 'know' to be true." Think of those anti-mask weirdos who cling to three studies that "prove" masks don't work. Or the climate deniers who have 350 studies "proving" climate change isn't real. Eisegesis proves ivermectin works, that vaccinations are linked to autism, and that water fluoridation is a Communist plot. So long as you confine yourself to considering evidence that confirms your beliefs, you can prove anything.

Respecting norms is a good rule of thumb, but it's a lousy rule. The politicization of science starts with the right's intolerance for ambiguity – not Scientific American's Harris endorsement.

Hey look at this (permalink)

The Secretive Dynasty That Controls the Boar’s Head Brand https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/13/business/boars-head-owners-listeria-outbreak.html (h/t Kottke)
Intuit asked us to delete part of this Decoder episode. We declined. https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/21/24273820/intuit-ceo-sasan-goodarzi-turbotax-irs-quickbooks-ai-software-decoder-interview (h/t Garbage Day)
And So It Goes https://gametek.substack.com/p/and-so-it-goes (h/t Metafilter)

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This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago 555 California security guards in San Fran threaten to punch sidewalk photographer, break his f*cking camera https://web.archive.org/web/20091025233149/http://calibersf.com/2009/10/23/i-will-break-your-fucking-camera/

#15yrsago Barclay’s terrible bank-security https://web.archive.org/web/20091028154706/http://www.links.org/?p=772

#15yrago Spectator throws out public safety, embraces sensationalism and AIDS denialism https://www.badscience.net/2009/10/aids-denialism-at-the-spectator/

#15yrsago Booklife: a guide to a sane, productive writerly life https://memex.craphound.com/2009/10/22/booklife-a-guide-to-a-sane-productive-writerly-life/

#10yrsago Carl Hiaasen’s “Skink No Surrender” https://memex.craphound.com/2014/10/22/carl-hiaasens-skink-no-surrender/

#10yrsago Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century, in 20 minutes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKsHhXwqDqM

#10yrsago The dirty secret of Google’s self-driving cars https://slate.com/technology/2014/10/google-self-driving-car-it-may-never-actually-happen.html

#5yrsago Educational spyware company to school boards: hire us to spy on your kids and we’ll help you sabotage teachers’ strikes https://qz.com/1318758/schools-are-using-ai-to-track-what-students-write-on-their-computers

#5yrsago New York Times abruptly eliminates its “director of information security” position: “there is no need for a dedicated focus on newsroom and journalistic security” https://twitter.com/runasand/status/1186775481615605760

#5yrsago The wonderful You Must Remember This podcast returns to tell the secret history of Disney’s most racist movie, Song of the South http://www.youmustrememberthispodcast.com/episodes/2019/10/21/six-degrees-of-song-of-the-south-episode-1-disneys-most-controversial-film

#5yrsago A visual history of Soviet anti-religious artwork https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2019/oct/23/down-with-god-how-the-soviet-union-took-on-religion-in-pictures

#5yrsago Bernie supporters are the most diverse of any Democratic presidential contender https://prospect.org/politics/aoc-endorsement-queens-rally-sanders-movement/

#5yrsago When the HR department is a robotic phrenologist: “face-scanning algorithm” gains popularity as a job-applicant screener https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/10/22/ai-hiring-face-scanning-algorithm-increasingly-decides-whether-you-deserve-job/

#5yrsago Japanese robot hotel chain ignored repeated warnings that its in-room “bed-facing” robots could be turned into spy devices https://web.archive.org/web/20191023135234/https://www.tokyoreporter.com/business/robot-hotel-operator-announces-modification-to-prevent-hacks-by-guests/

#5yrsago NJ school district bans indebted students from prom and field trips, refuses offer to pay off lunch debt https://www.inquirer.com/education/school-lunch-shaming-cherry-hill-tuna-prom-20191018.html

#5yrsago Hospital staff hang a banner celebrating the transfer of their “mischievous tyrant” boss < a href="https://twitter.com/OmoGbajaBiamila/status/1184715636406128640">https://twitter.com/OmoGbajaBiamila/status/1184715636406128640

#5yrsago Ernst and Young subjected women employees to “training” about keeping the company’s men happy https://www.huffpost.com/entry/women-ernst-young-how-to-dress-act-around-men_n_5da721eee4b002e33e78606a

#5yrsago The tactical evolution of #HongKongProtests: bolted-down barricades and calling out businesses https://memex.craphound.com/2019/10/22/the-tactical-evolution-of-hongkongprotests-bolted-down-barricades-and-calling-out-businesses/

#5yrsago Equifax used “admin/admin” as login and pass for an unencrypted server full of your personal data https://finance.yahoo.com/news/equifax-password-username-admin-lawsuit-201118316.html

#5yrsago Margaret Atwood’s “The Testaments”: a long-awaited Handmaid’s Tale sequel fulfills its promise https://memex.craphound.com/2019/10/22/margaret-atwoods-the-testaments-a-long-awaited-handmaids-tale-sequel-fulfills-its-promise/

#1yrago In defense of bureaucratic competence https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/23/getting-stuff-done/#praxis

Upcoming appearances (permalink)

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Eagle Eye Books (Decatur), Oct 23
https://eagleeyebooks.com/event/2024-10-23/cory-doctorow
TusCon (Tucson), Nov 8-10
https://tusconscificon.com/
International Cooperative Alliance (New Delhi), Nov 24
https://icanewdelhi2024.coop/welcome/pages/Programme
ISSA-LA Holiday Celebration keynote (Los Angeles), Dec 18
https://issala.org/event/issa-la-december-18-dinner-meeting/

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Recent appearances (permalink)

Maximum Iceland Scenario – Data Caps, 3rd Party Android Stores, Nuclear Amazon (This Week in Tech)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5MkCwktKz0
Speciale intervista a Cory Doctorow (Digitalia)
https://digitalia.fm/744/
Was There Ever An Old, Good Internet? (David Graeber Institute)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6Jlxx5TboE

A grid of my books with Will Stahle covers..

Latest books (permalink)

The Bezzle: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2024 (the-bezzle.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3062/Available_Feb_20th%3A_The_Bezzle_HB.html#/).
"The Lost Cause:" a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3007/Pre-Order_Signed_Copies%3A_The_Lost_Cause_HB.html#/)
"The Internet Con": A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245).
"Red Team Blues": "A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before." Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/.
"Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin", on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com
"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it "a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance." Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html
"How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism": an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html)
"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html
"Poesy the Monster Slayer" a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/.

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Upcoming books (permalink)

Picks and Shovels: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books, February 2025
Unauthorized Bread: a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2025

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources:

Currently writing:

Enshittification: a nonfiction book about platform decay for Farrar, Straus, Giroux. Today's progress: 764 words (69088 words total).
A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING
Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2025

Latest podcast: Spill, part one (a Little Brother story) https://craphound.com/littlebrother/2024/10/06/spill-part-one-a-little-brother-story/

This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

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