Janel Comeau
the entire concept of passports is weird, you try to visit a slightly different piece of the planet you were born on and then somebody goes "woah woah woah, first I need to see a very small booklet"
Jul 29, 2023 at 6:23pmWeb
Show threadAlbert CardonaJul 29, 2023

@VeryBadLlama

I call passports the branded cattle concept: this one is mine, this one is from your herd. Can’t cross the barbed wire, wouldn’t know who has rights over you—as opposed to you having rights. The very concept of citizenship is awkward; a leftover from the war between settlers and nomads, which the former won.

Passports are also an admission of societal failure: there’s this expectation that without the walled garden the status quo would crumble. Every time I use my passport I see the seams of the veil over our eyes, how thin and fragile and yet how strong the illusion that blinds our minds.

Show threadMichael GruarJul 29, 2023
@VeryBadLlama It gets weird(er) with two passports, "let me make sure I give you the correct small booklet based on your arcane set of booklet rules".
Show threadjnyroseJul 29, 2023
@mgruar @VeryBadLlama and god forbid you should wish to only cope with having to maintain one of your two booklets (depending on the rules).
Show threadPeter BrettJul 29, 2023
@VeryBadLlama The idea of passports is less weird than the idea of borders. "The people on the other side of this invisible line are *different* to the people on this side." #PostNationalism
Show threadsofia ☮️🏴Jul 30, 2023
@krans @VeryBadLlama well the idea of the border is just: someone owns the land and if you are on the land they own you. pretty straightforward, the question is mostly why we tolerate that. passports are definitely harder to understand.
Show threadmofumofuJul 29, 2023
@VeryBadLlama the entire concept of countries is weird and unnatural
Show threadHannekeJul 30, 2023

@VeryBadLlama @aishasie I can’t remember what exactly it was but recently I consumed a bit of scifi media where “we” met an alien race, they were from planet x and that was the whole conceptualisation; they together, from planet x, were a unit.

Then the story switched back to earth and they had to deal with borders and shit again.

Unfortunately that was not the point of the story, that could have been some interesting critique, but it was clear the author (seemingly) didn’t even think about it.

Show threadAisha SieJul 30, 2023
@h5e @VeryBadLlama Yeah. A lot of scifi media just blips us into a future where humanity has magically already become this one united front to participate as a whole in intergalactic events, skipping over what it took to get from our current fuckery to there. But I get it, I think this is the far bigger hurdle to imagine than all the tech.
Show threadHannekeJul 30, 2023

@aishasie @VeryBadLlama Well that kind I kind of find optimistic in that we apparently found unity (only to find new others in space to go to war with but ok)

But this one had the united alien race, and then humanity still divided their planet up in stupid little countries

Show threadAisha SieJul 30, 2023
@h5e @VeryBadLlama Yeeeeah, seems on brand!
Show threadKevin Teljeur ❄️Jul 30, 2023
@VeryBadLlama I have looked carefully at your small booklet, and it displeases me for some reason. You may not go here.
Show threadJames FlukerJul 30, 2023
@VeryBadLlama as a New Zealander borders always FASCINATE me. The idea that there's a piece of land here that's one place, and another just over there that's another place. And often going between the places is completely forbidden. It is WILD.
Show threadDon Hawkins - W7DAHJul 30, 2023
@VeryBadLlama Yup, puts it in perspective fur-sure. We humans are a goofy fooking bunch.
Show threadPhil LandmeierAug 20, 2023
@VeryBadLlama Haha. Yeah, passports date way back, thousands of years. Back when every land / country was governed by a monarch of some kind, all citizens were, in practice, property of the king. So naturally, you had to have the king's permission to leave the land. Since every land had similar rules, they checked to see if you had your monarch's permission to leave. Being outside your own country without paperwork meant you were either a vagabond or an outlaw, so you were arrested. Each country expected this behavior from other countries. In ancient Rome you needed permission of some kind or an obvious reason to be out on the road. After all, you might be an escaped slave.