Beka > Recent Status Updates

Finally reading this (it's been on my list for a few years).

There wasn't as much panic about witches in Ireland because the culture there, compared to Scotland and England, was much more broadly accepting of Magic and The Other World. The latter countries slotted Christianity over their Magic beliefs and demonized all Charmers as servants of the devil.

Already I can tell it's going to be a powerful book.

Also: Scottish accents!

Ahhhh there have been parts that squeeze my heart and parts that make me want to kick my feet in glee (while commuting lmao).

"How's this for a symbol, Dad:
A brown child hopping on lily pads across this country's chest.
They can be running from their name -- Aiyana Stanley-Jones, Adam Toledo, Ma-Khia Bryant, Emmett Till, Trayvon Martin..."

Already sweet.

"Imagining someone as more than human does much the same work as imagining them as less than human."

"Colonial infrastructure was not built to strengthen communities. It was built to deplete them."

"The Sierra Leone physician Bailor Barrie once told me, 'if you want to understand why Sierra Leone is poor, you must look at a map of our railroads.' So I did. The railroads, built during Colonial rule, did not connect people to each other; they connected the mineral-rich areas of Sierra Leone to the coast of SL where those minerals could be exported. The British empire was in the business of resource extraction."

"Despite now technically having independence, many of the most valuable assets in Sierra Leone were, and still are, foreign-owned.
Even though their economy has grown, and life expectancy has risen, they remain deeply impoverished."

I wonder why😩

"As a friend once told me:
Nothing is so privileged as thinking history belongs to the past."

Finally.

"Imagine a world where we value care work on par with IT."

"Precarity forces families + communities to look for the Mothers, the ones who have shown they can hold it together, + ask them to hold even more.

When it's clear employers + policymakers aren't willing to invest in your community, the only option for survival is to mine the resources + talents of your own."

"When women prove they can hold it all together, we thank them by giving them more to hold."

"Married mothers could ask their spouses for more help at holding it all together but the fastest way to make a tight budget work is often with Dad at the office + Mom at home. Why? Because employers reward fathers w/Daddy Bonuses while subjecting moms to motherhood penalties limiting their wages + opportunities to advance."

"Sure, there are government programs that aim to prevent families from going hungry or getting stuck without a roof over their heads, but those programs aren't designed to lift families out of poverty -- they just make poverty a little easier to bear.
Moreover, those programs only protect the poorest among us. The message to the rest of us is to "figure it out on your own.""

A perfect follow-up read to my previously just finished!

"As early as the mid-19th century, feminists + socialists diverged on how best to liberate women. Wealthier women advocated for the Married Women's Property Act, + the right to vote, without questioning the overall economic system that perpetuated women's subjugation.

Socialists, such as the German theorists such ad Clara Zetkin + August Bebel believed women's Liberation required their integration in the workplace."

"Women's free labor in the home subsidized the profits of employers, because workers' families bore the cost of reproducing the future labor force."

"Personal independence requires the resources to make your own choices.

Free markets discriminate against women workers~ At the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the big bosses considered women inferior to their male counterparts: weaker, emotional, less reliable, and so forth. If women demanded equal pay, the boss would just hire a man instead."

"Groups seek certainty. Communities make room for change.

Groups focus on control. Communities foster connection.

In Groups, the question is "how do I stay in?"
In Communities the question is "how do we stay with each other?"

"Affinity groups based on shared identities support individual expression + empower their members. They allow disagreement + evolution.

Cults, by contrast, demand conformity, suppress dissent, + often punish departure with emotional, social, or financial consequences.

Understanding this distinction is vital."

"The shared vocabulary within a group can feel like home - but that intimacy can quickly shift into conformity."

"...That's what a group is at its core: humans with a shared belief, a mutual performance, a pact. When it's good, it's magic.

Whether it's a fandom, a workplace, a book club, a team, a marriage, found family, or a political cause, being part of something bigger than yourself can be profoundly fulfilling. (These can tap into our need to feel connected, be accepted, seen/validated.) But groups can also erase you."