nothing here but fungi bushido
issue 289 - 25th May, 2025
CJW: Welcome to another edition of nothing here, gang. It’s good to have you. If you would like to support us, you’ve got a couple of options:
Another thing you can do to help spread the word is forward this email to someone you think might enjoy it.
The Team
Daniel Harvey (DCH) - Designer, writer, provocateur. Pro-guillotine tech critic. @dancharvey
Marlee Jane Ward (MJW) - is also Mia Walsch. Writer & visual artist. Hates the internet.
Corey Jae White (CJW) - author, voidwitch, out of order.
Lidia Zuin (LZ) - Writer, fulltime goth and metalhead.
Climate Change & The Environment
CJW: Scientists Just Found Who's Causing Global Warming - Joe Wilkins at Futurism
A recent study published in the journal Nature Climate Change has found that the richest 10 percent of the world population are responsible for an astonishing two-thirds of observable climate warming since 1990. Basically, that small minority of the wealthiest among us contribute nearly seven times as much to extreme climate change as the entire lower-earning 90 percent of the planet.
It is known, but just in case you needed the reminder.
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DCH: Killer fungi to spread as climate heats up - Michael Peel at The Financial Times (archived copy)
“We’re talking about hundreds of thousands of lives, and continental shifts in species distributions,” said van Rhijn, a Wellcome Trust research fellow at Manchester university who specialises in fungal infections and microbial evolution. “In 50 years, where things grow and what you get infected by is going to be completely different.”
Nearly 4 million people die each year to poorly understood and poorly detected fungal infections already.
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Climate crisis on track to destroy capitalism, warns top insurer - Damian Carrington at The Guardian (via Sentiers) - CJW: Professor Farnsworth voice: Good news everyone!
Just the headlines:
Geopolitics & Empire
CJW: There’s no problem with babies starving to death in Gaza, just with their pictures - The Palestine Project
This is how political correspondent Moti Kastel described the consequences of not letting nine trucks loaded with baby food into the Gaza Strip: “And then we will encounter a phenomenon that we don’t want to see, at least not from the perspective of the international community, of pictures of babies starving to death and so on.” The tone of his speech matched his oh-so banal statement of the obvious. The problematic phenomenon is “pictures of starving babies”, in contrast to the massively different real babies actually starving to death. There is no problem with starving babies. There is a problem with their pictures, which will cause the fighting to stop.
It’s simply incredible how often members of the Israeli establishment will just openly talk about the genocide they’re deliberately and happily committing (while Western media does everything it can to help them get away with it despite all the evidence…).
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CJW: To my newborn son: I am absent not out of apathy, but conviction - Mahmoud Khalil at the Guardian
Deen, my love for you is deeper than anything I have ever known. Loving you is not separate from the struggle for liberation. It is liberation itself. I fight for you, and for every Palestinian child whose life deserves safety, tenderness and freedom. I hope one day you will stand tall knowing your father was not absent out of apathy, but out of conviction. And I will spend my life making up for the moments we lost – starting with this one, writing to you with all the love in my heart.
A beautiful and heartbreaking piece.
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CJW: The Rise of American Bushido - Secretary of Defense Rock
Furthermore, the “warrior ethos” and “cult of lethality” reflect a troubling inversion: rather than asking what tools are necessary to achieve a political outcome, policymakers and military leaders often ask what outcomes can be justified by the tools already at hand. The proliferation of drone strikes, raids, and air strikes becomes an end in itself. The enemy is not defeated so much as continually targeted. Victory is measured in kill counts, bombs dropped, and targets destroyed, not durable peace or political reconciliation. This tactical treadmill perpetuates conflict, erodes moral authority, and normalizes violence as policy.
An interesting piece on the rise of American Bushido and some (but not all*) of its repercussions socially, politically, and culturally.
*There's mention of war crimes by operators, but no mention of operators back in the US (whether on base or back in civilian life) becoming violent criminals, or the domestic abuse engendered by this warrior ethos bullshit.
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Netanyahu: Gaza Aid Scheme Offers Israel Symbolic Cover to Finish the Genocide - Jeremy Scahill at Drop Site News (DCH: as is recent protestations from countries like the UK and Canada)
Science & Space
DCH: Scientists Witness Lead Literally Turn Into Gold in The Large Hadron Collider - Michelle Starr at ScienceAlert
According to a new paper, CERN's Large Hadron Collider produced about 86 billion gold nuclei from high-speed lead nuclei during the facility's second run, between 2015 and 2018.
Accidental chrysopoeia. If you’re an alchemy nerd then you’ll also enjoy the symbolism behind the fact that mercury was also created as part of this process.
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DCH: We Emit a Visible Light That Vanishes When We Die, Says Surprising New Study - Mike McRae at ScienceAlert
An extraordinary experiment on mice and leaves from two different plant species has uncovered direct physical evidence of an eerie 'biophoton' phenomenon ceasing on death, suggesting all living things – including humans – could literally glow with health, until we don't.
I mean, if you didn’t think I was going to link to an article with the phrase “eerie biophoton” in it then you must be a new reader or something. :)
CJW: That is fucking weird and cool.
Tech & Design
DCH: Why we're unlikely to get artificial general intelligence anytime soon - Cade Metz at The New York Times (archive here)
That is why many other scientists say no one will reach AGI without a new idea -- something beyond the powerful neural networks that merely find patterns in data. That new idea could arrive tomorrow. But even then, the industry would need years to develop it.
AI isn’t a technology. It’s an ideology.
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DCH: Almost half of young people would prefer a world without internet, UK study finds - Raphael Boyd at The Guardian
The research reveals that nearly 70% of 16- to 21-year-olds feel worse about themselves after spending time on social media. Half (50%) would support a “digital curfew” that would restrict their access to certain apps and sites past 10pm, while 46% said they would rather be young in a world without the internet altogether.
I get it. The harms this age group in particular suffer on social media is staggering. As Paris Marx says, social media must be reigned in
If you’re like 50% of those surveyed and you want a digital curfew and you’re on an iphone then you can choose to set that up yourself. Go to settings, search for screen time, click on downtime and just choose the time ranges you want.
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Dispatch from the Trenches of the Butlerian Jihad - CJW: A great piece from friend of the newsletter, Andrew Dana Hudson, on ChatGPT use in the classroom, from his perspective as a teacher.
Society & The Culture
CJW: We can live well, even though we don’t have a higher purpose - Alexis Shotwell at Psyche
It could induce despair to give up the idea that we humans come into the world with a preset reason for living or a blueprint for how to make meaning with our lives. Taking this orientation means that there is no reason to live other than the reasons we give ourselves; we have only self-generated purposes to pursue. Instead of evoking despair, I find this idea quite beautiful. While existentially demanding, it is also ethically and politically satisfying to have no fate but what we make. We have no higher purpose. But we do have many ground-level, basic, human-scale, situated, soft, sweet, lower purposes. Indeed, the ordinary purposes that make up our lives are very much worth making our life’s work. There’s nothing better that we could possibly do than attempt to live well, on this good Earth, together.
A piece on living well without relying on a god or fate to provide a higher purpose, taking lessons from the writings of Ursula Le Guin. I've been on a minor Le Guin kick lately, and need to continue that… It's actually really interesting how often I see references to her work coming up in pieces related to thinking through and addressing our current crises. It could very well be that PKD is the most important 20th Century (SF) writer for understanding the present moment, while Le Guin could prove the most important for actually addressing it.
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LZ - Go bard or go home! Why are UK club nights going medieval?
This is so amazing. So in the UK, they are making raves with hardcore techno playing, but the setting is medieval and the mood is brainrot? Damn, I wish I still lived there or that they had something like this over here in Sweden. This is not exactly a new electronic music subgenre, although DJ Babiest Baby came up with a setlist mixing bardcore songs and hardcore techno, and one of the DJs in this party at Audible Mania does some bardcore versions, or rather medieval-style music with contemporary lyrics in Old English.
Still, the styling is impeccable, and it follows this major trend we're seeing in pop artists like Chappell Roan wearing armour and the comeback of the whole Joan D’Arc aesthetic. It's also so cool that they have a queer version and it embraces the appeal of the medieval fair featured in The Love Witch. I remember when I watched the movie and thought damnnnn I wish medieval fairs were this silly and queer, not only the same Manowar dnd vibes they usually have – which I do appreciate, but for the sake of diversity let's make it also silly and playful now and then, or just go full witchy plague doctor vibes too, I'm up for it too!
Hopefully, this year, I will make it to the medieval week in Gotland. I remember the year before the last, they had workshops for making potions and learning spells. This year, though, the theme is horses (yes, what the fuck), so I don't know. Maybe I will learn how to fashion a horse after the apocalypse horsemen?
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"The Chicago Sun-Times newspaper’s “Best of Summer” section published over the weekend contains a guide to summer reads that features real authors and fake books that they did not write was partially generated by artificial intelligence, the person who generated it told 404 Media." Chicago Sun-Times Prints AI-Generated Summer Reading List With Books That Don't Exist - Rachael King at 404 Media (DCH: NGL I bet Isabel Allende would right a hell of a book about climate change.)
Systems are crumbling – but daily life continues. The dissonance is real - Adrienne Matei at The Guardian - CJW: Speaking of, there's a new Adam Curtis series coming soon, called Shifty.
Just the headlines:
‘People are buying crossbows faster than I’d like’ – how prepping went mainstream in Britain - Zoe Williams at The Guardian
Sweden Expands Anti-Sex Work Law to Criminalize Paying for Custom OnlyFans Clips and Camming - Samantha Cole at 404 Media
Health, Cooking, and Related
CJW: "They’re just waiting for her to die": How austerity turns mental health patients into prisoners - Rebecca Wilks at The Lead
She points to Serenity-Integrated Mentoring [SIM], a scheme that until recently was in use at NHS Trusts across England and Wales. Devised by police officer Paul Jennings, the model was sold to the NHS as a cost-saving “innovation” by his private firm. Under SIM, the NHS worked with police to identify and monitor people who frequently used services like 999 and A&E. In a bid to discourage these “high intensity users” – often people in serious distress and at risk of self-harm – services were instructed to withhold care, threaten fines, or take other punitive measures.
“As services become more depleted, people seeking care are increasingly viewed as problems – they are costs to reduce and risks to manage,” Courtney says.
If you would like to be made angry and disgusted, there is plenty in this piece about the failures of the NHS to provide care for people in mental health crises that will do the trick.
Fuck austerity. Fuck for-profit health care. Fuck capitalism.
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Just the headlines:
A Devastating New Exposé of Johnson & Johnson Indicts an Entire System - Deena So'Oteh at The New Republic
Labour & Economics
DCH: Monopoly Round-Up: UnitedHealth Group Is Hated, Now It's Falling Apart - Matt Stoller
First, UHG’s CEO, Andrew Witty, abruptly resigned, shortly after the company reported worse than expected earnings due to their patient pool being especially sick and costly to take care of. It’s a company that doesn’t miss earnings projections to Wall Street, so this miss was notable; the resignation of the CEO is doubly unnerving to investors. Second, the Wall Street Journal reported that the firm is under criminal investigation for allegedly cheating the government out of Medicare money. The stock, which had been a Wall Street darling at roughly half a trillion dollar value, is down 50% this month alone.
Praise Luigi.
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"Bankrupt genetic-testing firm 23andMe agreed to sell its data bank, which once contained DNA samples from about 15 million people, to the drug developer Regeneron Pharmaceuticals for $256 million." 23andMe sells gene-testing business to DNA drug maker Regeneron - Steven Church, Gerry Smith at Los Angeles Times (DCH: that means your genetic data was worth about $17)
Just the headlines:
How phony job ads on Facebook and Telegram lure tech workers to scam compounds - Linda Yulisman at Rest of World
Movies + TV
MJW: Diarra from Detroit
This BET+ series is about the eponymous Diarra, an insomniac schoolteacher in the middle of a divorce who starts investigating a cold case after being ghosted. It’s part crimey-wimey, part mid-life dramedy (Diarra would kill me for saying ‘mid-life’), and is a fun and sometimes soapy romp through Detroit. The noir-style narration got a little on my nerves at points, but I really liked Diarra and getting into her world. She bucks the trope of being a strong Black woman by being a messy, flawed, cunning, and shrewd strong Black woman. Plus her outfits are chef’s kiss.
Music
LZ - Atlas Song by Anna Von Hausswolff
I love concerts, and I love concerts that are theatrical even better. This one was absolutely a treat! I have been a long-time fan of Anna's music, and for some time I thought she was Danish, while she's actually Swedish and from a city nearby (Gothenburg). Last year, she created the project Atlas Song with the Gothenburg Opera and Dance Company, which is a performance involving dancers and her as the main singer/instrumentalist. She does play some songs from her albums, especially a sort of out-of-tempo version of my favorite track, The Mysterious Vanishing of Electra – and Electra is her middle name, a very common thing among Swedes, but I think most of them are compositions specifically crafted for this piece.
I really like contemporary dance and how visceral it can be, and it truly is here in Atlas Song. The outfits also help a lot, and they change quite a few times during the performance, matching Anna's. It was “funny” how the production felt almost like pop star level, with the whole stage changing and adapting to Anna's presence, but the songs are not pop music, and it's loud, violent, it made me cry in silence many times and I would cry even more if I weren't in a public space.
Anna sings about strength, love, endurance, and growth, but also the power of allowing oneself to be vulnerable and seen. I have been listening to her song “Stranger” a lot recently because it describes the feeling of being pessimistic and lonely, unable to open one's heart to anyone or anything until there's this “stranger” who is in sync with one's heart. The Vanishing is also a song about feminine rage, the act of even daring to remove yourself from something (“who is she to say goodbye?"), and express the relief and the pain of release with some really loud and visceral screams that blend into a manic laugh. It's not only refreshing and emotive, but also impressive to see the extent of Anna's voice and talent.
I think she's touring other countries, though only in Europe. I have seen her play regular concerts elsewhere, too, but it's infuriating how many Swedish and Scandinavian musicians will play on the moon, even, but not here. Iamamiwhoami is going to São Paulo for the millionth time, but she never plays here (she's from somewhere near Stockholm). I only saw Björk because I went to Hamburg, because she didn't play anywhere in Scandinavia! It's almost funny, haha.
Another heads-up is that Anna has a track in The Substance. Remember the bloody part at the end and the powerful guitars playing in the background? That's Anna's “Ugly and Vengeful”. I hope this was just the first step to make her more known and her music featured in movies!
The Memes
