Yannic Rack

Freelance journalist. 🇩🇪 in 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿.

Account inactive.

[George Monbiot @GeorgeMonbiot]

This is my farewell post. I am not deleting this account, as I don’t want to lose the archive, and I don’t want my name taken by imposters. But, for as long as Musk owns the platform, I’ll no longer use it. I’m now posting at https://t.co/0iVBaQEKGy.

Since Elon Musk bought this site, he has transformed it from one on which millions could converse as equals into his personal megaphone. Now the world’s richest man uses it to wage his class war, transferring blame for the ills of capitalism onto vulnerable minorities, boosting the grimmest and most antisocial accounts while suppressing the humane voices with whom he disagrees.

He has used X not only to subvert the election for the US presidency, but to create a role for himself in US politics which, though he has never stood for election and would not be eligible, grants him immense power over the citizens of that nation. This site has been used as a tool to help replace democracy with oligarchy.

Musk claimed, on purchasing the platform, to be a “free speech absolutist”. He is in fact a prolific censor, suspending dissenting accounts and using lawsuits to shut down free speech, while employing an algorithm to increase the reach of his own posts 1,000-fold. He cannot abide a level playing field.

He has permitted or encouraged the growth of a ghost army of bots and trolls to degrade the experience of all who disagree with him. Their task is not just to abuse opponents but, perhaps more importantly, to drown intelligent conversation with a tsunami of stupidity. They respond to data with denial, expertise with execration, insight with insult, humour with hatred and thinking with thuggery. They suck the meaning out of everything. The stupidity trends in one direction: in the service of economic power. It is a weapon used to suppress the possibility of a better world.

Many years ago, when I lived in Brazil, I learnt that the military dictatorship had actively sought to suppress educational levels in schools, as it saw a well-informed population as a political threat. A confused, distracted and ignorant population is easy to manipulate. Now this counter-educational model is being rolled out worldwide, and Elon Musk is its primary sponsor.

I stayed here long after I first considered leaving, as I believed it was wrong to cede the ground to an oligarch and his minions. But I came to see that those of us who do not subscribe to Musk’s grim project are being used as groundbait: stimulating the feeding frenzy of 15-minute, 24-hour hate that now powers this platform. We can no longer build anything of value here. Brute force – the unmediated power of money – has beaten humanity, intelligence, humour and democracy.

On Bluesky I can be the person I want to be, a better person than I am on X, where it is almost impossible not to get dragged into the mud. I feel I can be understood because I am not confronting a deliberate effort to misunderstand me. So I can speak more quietly.

There is no guarantee that Bluesky will not also one day be monetised by its owners or captured by self-serving billionaires. But for now it remains a place in which interesting and enjoyable conversations can be had, kindness can be shown to strangers and a better world can be imagined. I hope to see you there.

[Smithsonian Magazine @SmithsonianMag]

Every year in the rolling hills of the Scottish Borders, one of Europe’s largest equestrian events commemorates a lawless time that shaped the region’s identity. https://t.co/N4wuns2qi6

[Yannic Rack @yannicrack]

@patrick_hruby Hey Patrick -- just dropped you an email via your website.

[Yannic Rack @yannicrack]

Spent a few days in Cornwall to write about a controversial climate trial, green tech sceptics and how not to win over a community.
https://t.co/nUJBZC9Hdn

[Joshua Hunt @viajoshhunt]

Every journalism school should have at least one professor who worked as a full-time freelancer within the past 5-10 years—someone who has made a living solely from freelance writing and can teach students how to navigate what is effectively a separate journalism industry.

[Craig Welch @CraigAWelch]

Calling all freelancers: Pitch @hakaimagazine and editors @judeisabella and @cestmoiLanglois. They are smart, thoughtful, interested in storytelling — and they care DEEPLY about how they treat their writers.

Trust me. It's a special place. https://t.co/IlvH3go3Bn

[Laura Paddison @laurapaddison]

I went to Mexico to try to unravel why a former shipwreck-hunting company turned seabed miner is suing the country for billions of dollars. It was a twisty story https://t.co/MthO5Oq6Bp

[Eric Umansky @ericuman]

Three years ago, I got some footage that I couldn’t get out of my mind.

It showed the first police killing captured on body-worn cameras in NY.

The NYPD didn’t want anyone to see it.

It eventually launched me on the biggest story I’ve ever done, w/ @NYTmag

[THREAD]

[Ben Rhodes @brhodes]

My reaction: "Henry Kissinger exemplified the gap between the story that America, the superpower, tells and the way that we can act in the world." https://t.co/PGrpT5DU95

[Heidi Blake @HeidilBlake]

My latest for @NewYorker. The world's largest carbon offsetting firm sold environmentally worthless credits, while the developer of its biggest project secretly moved of tens of millions of $ paid by Gucci, Porsche, Nestlé & others into offshore accounts. https://t.co/Z1dJEDwrz4

[Yannic Rack @yannicrack]

Read my cover story on the rise of Britain's rogue rewilders in the next edition of Positive News, out in print Oct. 4!

[Positive News @PositiveNewsUK]

We’re excited to reveal the new issue of Positive News magazine. For our cover story, we meet the guerilla rewilders who are reintroducing lost species of butterflies, birds and beavers into nature-depleted Britain. Out 4 Oct, subscribe to get your copy: https://t.co/FL0otLyzjA

[Yannic Rack @yannicrack]

I wrote about crumbling dinosaur sculptures, detail-obsessed Victorians and passionate paleontologists for @smithsonianmag! https://t.co/WPC6exGVHi

[Yannic Rack @yannicrack]

https://t.co/Kkamqo0V3M

[Yannic Rack @yannicrack]

Wrote about the passionate people trying to save Scotland's peat bogs, which cover more than a fifth of the country. The stakes, here and elsewhere, couldn't be higher—peatlands store more carbon than all of the world's plants combined. https://t.co/hsFMeZ5fcj

[Earth Island Journal @earthislandjrnl]

Instead of acting as a natural carbon sink, Scotland's peatlands now account for 15% of the country’s carbon emissions. The country hopes to reverse that decline and one man, in particular, is playing a major role in its wetlands restoration effort.

https://t.co/lc17xAlepD

[Inkcap Journal @inkcapjournal]

Tree officer Simon Ffoulkes has spent four decades working with trees. In that time, he has witnessed the impacts of climate change up close.

In our latest feature, @yannicrack looks at the toll of warmer drier weather on the urban forest.

Read more: https://t.co/k4xDWOJwYX

[Sophie Yeo @some_yeo]

Just published the latest feature in @inkcapjournal. I love it when people pitch me stories involving on-the-ground reporting. This one is by @yannicrack.