someone: are you a man or a woman?

me: (serial killer voice) oh, obviously, i am a man. i have always felt this way since— oh, wait, wait! no, i am a woman! to you, i obviously look feminine and have long hair, right? oh wait, maybe i am androgynous, best of the both worlds? or am i neither of them, or maybe i am all of them, or maybe one moment i am one and other something else? OOOH, WHICH ONE IS IT, DETECTIVE~?? WHICH ONE IS IT?? HAHAHAHAAAA

Remember that whole "The FBI is saying US citizens should use E2EE apps!"

Yes well but now they are also saying "we're planning on mandating backdoors for us in them though" 🙄 https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2024/12/08/fbi-warns-iphone-android-users-change-whatsapp-facebook-messenger-signal-apps/

If you were against the invasion of Panama, no one called you a "Noriegaist." If you were against the first war on Iraq, the no fly zone, and the second invasion and Occupation of Iraq, no one called you a "Husseinist." But for like a decade, if you express any criticism of Western Imperialism against Syria, you hear words like "Assadist" and "Tankie."

There is a lot happening right now and we need to be clear-eyed and sober in our analysis. If you're dismissing people in this way, you need to stop. Silencing investigation and discussion of what the U.S., Turkey, England, Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and the gulf states are doing right now, who is backing, arming and supporting HTS, and what the impacts will be in Syria, Gaza, Lebanon, and Iran (as well as historic Palestine, Turkey, Iraq, etc) is wrong.

If there are incorrect critiques or observations, we should engage with them in good faith and denote specific issues. But get the fuck out of here with corny "Tankie" shit.

This month, I'm sharing 31 of my favorite albums instead of an annual wrap-up playlist created by an evil corporation.

3 of 31 is At This Age by Signals Midwest. This one is more of a sentimental fave than a critical darling. I first encountered Siggies as an opener for Bear vs. Shark at the Grog Shop in Cleveland, Ohio. As a charming homegrown act, they were every bit as electrifying and bombastic and fun as any headliner should be.

It was a significant day for me. Up to that point, my adult life had felt like a failure. I was dead broke and had started to lose hope that things could get better. I had spent my first few years in Ohio deeply depressed, which is an appropriate response to moving to Ohio. But now, things were looking up: I had just finished my first year of law school, and it was the day before I was due to start a summer externship with a federal judge. For the first time in my life, I was a straight-A student and top of my class. And I was gonna see Bear vs. Shark, which was a dream come true.

And so these guys who had been the life of the party between openers climbed on stage and started ribbing the audience. Just all smiles. They jammed out a few bars of the Reel Big Fish version of "Take On Me," said "we don't do that kind of thing anymore," and started singing raucous, touching orgcore singalong bops about the emotional cost of growing up. I've never seen anyone jump so high while playing guitar. I fell in love.

The record is a sort of love letter to Cleveland that, after spending four years there, was instantly legible to me: "We rode our bikes downtown to the river/ we tried to build ourselves a home/ between rusting rapid transit stations/ and whiskey ginger revelations/ this magazine opens, a full color spread to a girl trapped in gray scale who looks back at me and says 'you don't get to look at me like that; you don't get to tell me 'oh, it ain't so bad.''" I, too, had spent the last few years "draining my battery down, calling [my] friends back home;" and regretting the fact that I knew "I perpetually owe [friends] a phone call, but talking is either a bridge or a brick wall." More than anything else, I "always thought at this age I would be settling in to a major city. Always thought at this age I would be further than I am now." My wife and I "drove the length of Nebraska and talked opportunities we couldn’t pass up, about the idea of movement as purpose and wanting to capture it all." And here was some guy singing all of these immediate personal truths right at me in my vocal register.

None of my friends like this record as much as I do. It didn't find them at the right time. But it's my favorite. It's forever associated with the moment I started to feel like I was capable of something again. I don't always need it, but I inevitably come back to this album. If I ever see these guys again, I'm gonna try to buy them dinner. I hope you like it, too.