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In view of the totalitarian thought control that's rapidly descending on the U.S. and the other side's desire to punish their enemies, it's not going to be enough. https://twitter.com/WoodFenton/status/1358416084081070081
I need Amazon to sell books for the foreseeable future. That means I'm not free to say what I really think on Gab or anywhere else. Every time you engage in speech on the Internet, somebody is monitoring you and looking for an excuse to come after you.
If you say the wrong thing, they can whip up a mob to mass-report you to Amazon and get your books removed.
People have already lost their jobs for having an account on Parler. Not for anything they said, just for having an account.
People have already lost their jobs for having an account on Parler. Not for anything they said, just for having an account.
I have it easier than some, because political diatriabes have never been part of my brand. In real life, I'm a bitter, angry, combative person. Watching your country die can do that to you. I made a decision early on to keep that aspect of my personality out of my books.
For the time being, I'm going to make as much money as possible off Amazon. Smarter people than me are working on alternative systems, but they won't be widely adopted until things get REALLY bad. The transition won't be smooth or painless.
I still think it's a good idea to sign up at the mint-green place and start building a backup network for indy SF/F. For most people, you're not likely to be punished just for having an account.
On a related tangent, I knew about Bitcoin long ago, but I never mined it and I don't regret not doing so. Why? Because I know that governments can make Bitcoin worthless with a stroke of a pen at any time, on the pretext that it facilitates illegal activity.
There's a very real possibility that at some point in the future, making claims of e******* f**** will be a Federal crime. They can easily come up with a plausible rationale, such as labeling such claims as a form of v**** suppression.
Free speech platforms that allow this kind of speech will be declared illegal and the government will shut them down. If they're hosted overseas, access will be restricted and they'll only be accessible via VPN's. Some of those VPN's will be honeytraps set up by the Feds.
The coming decades are going to be VERY bad. We may already be living in a totalitarian one-party state. If you know what to expect, you'll be better prepared and you won't be blindsided.
The only way out is going to be s********n, and it won't happen peacefully. Any attempt will be brutally punished by full-scale occupation, probably by foreign troops who are less likely to have divided loyalties.
The ruling party is very open about their plans. They're already equating dissidents with the Taliban or the NSDAP, and talking about military action "to make sure this never happens again."
Because of where I live and the industry I work in (music and radio), I don't have a single person I can confide in. I'm surrounded by people who are hostile to everything I believe in. At times, I question my whole life and wish I'd moved to West Virginia instead.
The past three months have made me angrier than I've ever been in my life. Angry, but not demoralized. T**** was a black swan event that nobody could have predicted, and it won't be the last. The ruling party will always overreach and be undone by their own actions.
I'm grateful to have a community of like-minded people. Knowing that I'm not crazy makes things a lot easier. Thanks for listening.
