Brain-O: The Incident | stderr – Marcus Ranum recently had a not-quite-a-stroke, and wrote about his experience.  A scary and fascinating story.  Wish for his full recovery.

Sympathy for Anton Ego: An Antifan Manifesto | osteophage – Coyote aims to persuade readers of the positive possibilities of negative fandoms.  Of course, I didn’t need to be persuaded, I was already on board.  I’m of the belief that the best way to enhance appreciation of a thing is to read (or write) a scathing criticism of one or more of its aspects.  It’s true that antifandoms and hatedoms have a poor reputation, and well-deserved in many specific examples.  But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Making Sense of VRChat, the “Metaverse” People Actually Like | People Make Games (video, 38 min) – Some good journalism exploring VRChat, a space where people can inhabit avatars in a virtual space.  They interview lots of people to understand how they use it, talk about why everyone’s an anime girl, and the threat (and potential) of corporate colonization of virtual space.

The Satanic Panic is Incredibly Weird | Thing of Things – Ozy Brennan talks about the Satanic Panic 1980s, and why it seems to be missing from our collective memory.  It doesn’t fit into the political narratives on either side.  Although, the Satanic Panic is exactly the sort of thing my father likes to talk about, so I knew this stuff…

CFI should have titled it: We are the only identity that matters | Bolingbrook Babbler – William Brinkman draws our attention to an awful editorial by the CEO of Center For Inquiry.  This is just the tip of the iceberg–the only publicly viewable article in a whole magazine issue about “Humanism and Wokism”.  See also PZ Myers.  Some years ago I criticized the Council for Secular Humanism (a CFI division) for posing as anti-racist but often veering into colorblind racism.  And look how far we have come, with the CEO openly complaining about the “cancellation” of Richard Dawkins over a single transphobic tweet (there was actually a lot more than that, but whatever).  She’s probably upset the Richard Dawkins Foundation (another CFI division) is not attracting as many donations these days.  Boohoo.  Burn it down.

The Hunger | Contrapoints (video, 57 min, cn: drug addiction, depression, dark and depressing in general) – In case you thought Contrapoints had disappeared forever, here’s the latest.  It’s a fictional dialogue exploring why people resort to religion–and why they resort to drugs.  Drug addiction is a serious public health issue among queer people, which likely has a lot to do with social stigma and lack of support.  That’s why, during pride month, when everybody is wringing their hands about increasing corporatization, I am much more worried about corporate sponsorship specifically from alcohol companies.

Monosexuality and Bisexuality | verilybitchie (video, 28 min) – An older video, which talks about the word monosexual, defending it against common criticisms.  The funny thing is, you could substitute “monosexual” -> “allosexual” and “bisexual” -> “asexual”, and it’s almost exactly the same thing.  “Allosexual privilege” was a big flamebait topic back in the day, at virtually the same time that “monosexual privilege” was–the skit in the second half pretty much captures what was going on.