tools for commensality 🧿RE: https://assemblag.es/@inquiline/116393292245545697
this may be more important antifascist praxis than is currently acknowledged (the article about Mpls is strong on this point)
Oh, Chicago was doing it too!
Protesters mock ICE, Broadview police at dildo day of action outside detention center
The spectacle saw hundreds of phallic items, big and small, flood the designated free speech zone—a small barricaded area where people have been permitted to demonstrate since President Trump’s mass deportation blitz swept through Chicagoland.
articulating more of why i think this protest repertoire is important:
IMO jiggling colorful dildos are semiotically effective in a way that many/most objects or symbols can't be--they kind of only look silly and because of the (queer) sex for pleasure element, they can't be reclaimed by fascism. there are very few objects like that
do i like consumption & plastic (silicone) waste? no. but as a collective improvisation to locate symbolic repertoires that contest fascists? i'm ok with it
a counterpoint here, i should not have said that categorically the fash can't claim dildos:
https://kolektiva.social/@kiwi/116400309122322932
anyway, my point overall is the collective improvisations (plural), not actually the dildos
TinDrum@inquiline pretty well understood limitation of theory's failure to anticipate weaknesses in the model yeh?
i reckon it might be fair to say much of what's happening now's demonstration of that failure to anticipate and therefore to think outside of models
if i understand what yr saying, i don't think that this is a failure by people doing dildo protests--the DC counterexample notwithstanding (it's important), the preponderance of semiotic meaning right now is pretty squarely anti-fash. symbols are polysemous and ambivalent, pretty much
i don't see how we "think outside of models". we think with models until we break or refashion them
what i'm trying to draw attention to here is not actually dildos but the collective improv
@inquiline i was being cheeky, the idea some symbol or other can't be appropriated is weird to me, can probly argue it's an emotional assessment
i had a friend who proclaimed trump yesterday's man when he came down that escalator. she didn't seem to think it was worth considering there was anything to consider
gotcha! i have literally written elsewhere about fascists appropriating everything even liberation language so it was simply a hasty-fingers sloppy overstatement to say this symbol *couldn't* be appropriated, my bad there
(it's also why, after a point, it's not worth trying to pick words and symbols they can't appropriate, they will try anyway, no matter what)
have you seen the rejoinder to the golden escalator? https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/golden-toilet-sculpture-dc-trump-lincoln-bedroom-bathroom-1234779264/
may (or may not) interest your friend 😂
Adam Greenfield@inquiline The locus classicus of dildo-centric political theater is of course the Kasparov dildocopter press conference of 2008.
ophiocephalic 🐍@inquiline
Late to this, but wanted to offer up an additional datapoint. In one of the Unicorn Riot fascist chat board leaks during the first Trump term, I can recall a long thread in which the fash plotted with great excitement on appropriating various progressive elements to poison them.
At a certain point one of them started posting his mockups for turning queer symbols like the color flags into fascist ones, dumb shit like rainbow swastikas and so forth. All the other nazis immediately turned on him for being "too gay" and hounded him out of the chat.
I found this instructive on the prospect of queerness as fash-bane, as you reference. Earlier attempts in that period to weave homofascism into the movement did not endure. Wondering if @kiwi 's example works more as a signifier from the kind of boneheads who still consider "gay" to be an insult, rather than an appropriation per se
interesting, thanks. i regret my hasty wording in my post (but opted to post again rather than edit)--it's obviously complicated, and too simplistic to say any symbol means only one thing
(silly me, have even written elsewhere about fascists cooping liberatory language. but posting and nuance do not always mix perfectly, as i learn over and over, lol)
@inquiline
No, I think you're on to something. This is an important subject because stealing other people's symbols, images and ideas are all these new fascists are able to do. They are incapable of creativity or originality, everything in their "culture" is either stolen or mimicked
Bill Seitz@inquiline Pranksters vs Autocrats
https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501756061/pranksters-vs-autocrats
https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501756061/pranksters-vs-autocrats
Pranksters vs. Autocrats by Srdja Popovic and Sophia A. McClennen | eBook | Cornell University Press
The Lawrence and Lynne Brown Democracy Medal, presented by the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State, recognizes outstanding individuals, groups, and organizations that produce innovations...
JohnNot easy to clean up either, esp for incel anti-queer betafash.
mivox is exhausted 
@inquiline If it makes you feel any better, actual silicone dildos are safe and inert. Not really “plastic waste” at all…
(That said, they’re also expensive, so I’d assume the majority being thrown at ICE are the cheap shitty ones, chock full of phthalates.)
as i understand it silicone doesn't degrade as in the form microplastics but it also doesn't really degrade much(?). but more to the point, you're right, people probably aren't shelling out for quality product to hurl at ICE!! just a guess 😂
@inquiline Pure silicone is like squishy pure glass: not going anywhere, but it’s also not contaminating anything by being there either. 😂
(Source: I’ve been internet friends with one of the pioneers of platinum silicone sex toys for decades.)
elilla&, autostopowiczka@inquiline for similar reasons I think clown protests are underrated—this used to be a trend but I haven't seen a gaggle of clowns cartoonishly standing off to riot police in a while
tlariv@inquiline
But of course using them for cornhole.
But of course using them for cornhole.
possibly the most midwestern photo of all time
@inquiline
NGL, I teared up a little.
NGL, I teared up a little.
@inquiline i'd be right into this if they were paper mache or something
i'm pretty confident that this is a situation where innovation would not be frowned upon 😂
@inquiline ok sure and it's not appropriate to be getting critical on this kind of detail but it's just such a huge symptom writ large that mass protest is hoeing through plastic consumer products that're unlikely to be reused for anything (nor recycled)
@inquiline it also occurred to me the bulk of those pussy hats were made of rayon or whatever
@inquiline i mean seems to me a huge part of the joy in sharing images of protestors is the hand made signage
how would it be if all the signage were pre-made corflutes or whatever
@inquiline soz i hate that it bothers me so much but it really does
i agree with the critique but i think where i land with this is that the scale of waste here is de minimis compared to the scale of destruction (very much including plastics in ecologies) that's happening with fascists in power. so if this makes them look small and foolish, it's for the greater good and i care less than i might
however here's some papier mache protest art for you, from Mpls in January (sorry for Bsky link):
https://bsky.app/profile/douglasfarmer.bsky.social/post/3mcngyo2ijk2s
@inquiline yes, no argument but even so the point stands imo
if folks have time to get their signs made up at kinkos with text they found in insta it's not gonna hit quite the same when they could've used that time to whack it up with a sharpie and their own personal rage induced quips
jelly dildos make great missiles and they bounce and wobble and they're just great for purpose, no argument on that score. scale of destruction of th admin's not in question as against the comparatively minimal waste but it's not such a stretch to link consumer culture and indiff to petro waste to the genesis of this particuloar facist formation
@inquiline i don't wanna waste your time, i completely accept your points i just hate this particular aspect of contemp protest is all. i'll do it quietly tho, carry on
there is really a lot going on here, agree. if you're interested i like this essay by heather davis which takes up this topic, in a way.
https://heathermdavis.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Philosophia_Davis.pdf
@inquiline thank you!
saucerlost@inquiline
I think this was all started by Big Dildo to increase sales
...I also think I was looking for an excuse to say "Big Dildo"