Daniel Munksgaard

Teaching Professor at the University of Rhode Island, scholar of hate speech. It's a growth industry.

[Thorne 🌸 @ExistentialEnso]

A lot of people have interpreted "it's not antisemitic to criticize Israel" (true) to mean "antisemitism is fine if it's in service of criticizing Israel" (bad, bad, bad, bad, BAD)

[Pizza @number_pizza111]

Richard Nixon’s campaign kidnapped a woman and injected her with sedatives to keep her from speaking to the press.

[Not a Good Jewish Girl✡️ @estherzelda0514]

Even if dead and diseased children do not move you, USAID is a direct investment in America's prosperity, security, and global power.

We create new markets and trading partners by helping nations transition from crisis-mode aid recipients to stable, thriving economies. This goes double for nations that did have stable infrastructure, but are weathering civil war or natural disasters. The support also keeps people from becoming economic migrants to Europe or the US.

The wealthier these developing nations become, the more that they can cultivate markets to buy American exports of luxury goods and services. We also have a large agricultural sector that can and should sell to other countries rather than being subsidized by tax payers not to grow more food that Americans do not need.

When America invests in government stability abroad, especially in transportation infrastructure and education, it reduces extremism, civil wars, and the need for expensive military interventions. This saves American lives and, once more, decreases the level of migration that can destabilize surrounding destination countries that are close to the brink themselves. Refugee camps are net-recipients of aid, and often full of people that cannot work. Reducing refugee camps is a net good.

Also, USAID was the most powerful tool of soft power America had outside of its cultural output. We get access to alliances, overseas operational bases, and ways to counter the influence of China, Iran, or Russia that we otherwise would not have access to, for pennies on the dollar. Further, we do it in a nice aid package that you can sell to the peaceniks with the picture of starving children, rather than being honest that we're seeking Forward Operating Site/Bases.

Even outside of purely military security, USAID keeps us save by giving advance warning of pandemics and outbreaks at their source before they start arriving at JFK. We can keep an eye on how dangerous strains of zoonotic diseases are mutating and where hotspots are, so we can respond quickly and shut down borders or restrict migration before we get to pandemic levels of spread. This also lets us keep an eye on diseases like TB, which America doesn't much worry about anymore, but could become antibiotic resistant and quickly overwhelm us once more if we do contribute to curbing overseas spread.

On further security grounds, allowing USAID to hand out assistance to those only that do not participate in illicit networks keeps people out of the international drug and weapons trade. Those drugs wind up in our country, and those weapons cause civil wars that create migrants that want to come to America. Reducing the desperation that drives illegal migration worldwide is positive.

All told, USAID was our global insurance policy. For a fraction of the total federal budget, we stabilized volatile regions, combatted transnational threats, and built partners we rely upon for future growth and safety.

But we threw it away because uneducated vice-signaling dorks thought being mean to other people on purpose to piss off the libs is way more important than America's best interests.

[Florida Data Geek ✝️🇺🇦🇬🇱 @MappingFL]

It never ceases to amaze me that it’s so hard to people to say

- Oct 7 was an unjustifiable attack against civilians and a crime against humanity

- Israel’s far-right gov used the attack to perpetuate a genocide in Gaza and other Palestinian lands

BOTH of these things are true

[シュナ @chounamoul]

教育機会を男が独占してた頃は「男は女より知能が高い」と言ってたのが、初等教育の普及で女子の成績が良いと分かると「女子は早熟！男子は後から伸びる！」になり、大学の成績も女子に抜かれた今は「男は分散が大きいから天才が多い！」になってる。こういう妄言はそろそろ撲滅していい頃合いだと思う

[Matthew Sitman @MatthewSitman]

Actually it was quite common for people to say, for example, that PEPFAR was one thing you really did have to hand it to George W. Bush for, a genuinely transformative program that saved millions of lives. Seriously!

[Sasha Gusev @SashaGusevPosts]

Periodic reminder that you cannot breed out a polygenic and the generational response to selection is extremely slow. The Nazis sterilized or killed nearly all schizophrenics in Germany (a far more heritable phenotype than criminality) and yet the incidence increased.

[John Attridge @John_Attridge]

People say that academics spend an inordinate amount of time exploring niche research questions, but this is unfair. We also make exaggerated claims about the significance of these questions

[blissful rage eggcelent @Astro_Eggcelent]

The most enlightening thing to learn about bugs is that they can't molt without losing their wings permanently

So, most bugs spend 99% of their life and ecological impact as nymphs or larvae, and the winged forms we know them for are actually their "suicidal sex robot" phase

[Shadi Hamid @shadihamid]

Well said. It's anti-semitic to conflate American Jews with the state of Israel and its policies, which would suggest some kind of dual loyalty. It's always critical to make this distinction as clear as day.

[Daniel Munksgaard @DrMunks]

@ijbailey "Why do people insist on fighting the guy whose entire schtick is 'I pick fights with everybody about everything'?"

[Daniel Munksgaard @DrMunks]

@MikeReissWriter Don't underestimate algae, man, that stuff nearly froze the earth to death billions of years ago. Orange never stood a chance against green.

[one dozen rats at a keyboard @PanasonicDX4500]

the whole Tom Malinowski fuck up was proof that AIPAC isn’t actually some Machiavellian org pulling the strings in Washington but just a bunch of rich guys who coasted on near universal bipartisan support and then started floundering the first time they faced political headwinds

[cav empty @cavempty_]

i likely died many years ago and this is all a fabrication created as a sort of purgatory for me whether thats to to teach me something or punish im not sure but i appreciate all your efforts in making this feel so real

[Daniel Munksgaard @DrMunks]

@Noahpinion Funny enough, one of the main constituencies that helped get enough support for the 19th Amendment were people who wanted to ban alcohol. Good things can happen for cynical reasons.

[Jill Filipovic @JillFilipovic]

It’s true that when your friends text you, they generally have to remind you of their political views, where they went to college, and where they live.

[Michael @aGuyOnMyPhone]

When asked explicitly “who is my neighbor” Jesus tells a parable in which the answer is a persecuted racial minority which he deliberately sets up in contrast to the members of your tradition, blood, culture, etc who bear power and prestige

[Fujoshi's Island @Dauragon]

The beautiful thing about the ogre meme imo is that all of the anxiety is coming from a genuine effort to engage with the work. It is admirable to be Ogre. In college the class Ogre during literature courses was a crucial participant cause they would always ask the best questions