Notices by Alx 🐈 (alx@mastodon.design)

To conclude, for me sustainability is first and foremost a cultural problem, and we can solve it only through a profound cultural change. Now this is the core of my PhD so, for the sake of everyone here, I will not dig into that, it would be long and tedious and not without major debates.

My dissertation doesn't write itself and my clients' graphics don't design themselves (AI crowd don't dare answer this) so I'll end it here.

Be nice to each other, we need to come together for this fight.

The core of the problem in mainstream 'sustainable design' is that it buys into the individual responsibility for a climate breakdown that is instead a collective issue. Patronising consumers to 'buy better' without ever addressing who is actually incentivised to keep these levels of consumption high misses the point, and frankly, perpetrates the status quo.

6/

Designers - as the profession is intended today - are themselves a product of the industrial revolution, and actively contributed for it to expand. That's something designers refuse to reckon with, so they keep focusing on materials, product, circular economy and what not. There are some designers and architects doing great stuff out there, but they are far from being the norm of 'sustainable design'.

5/

Ok #ReplyGuys this post is going wild. A 🧵 :

- I recycle, because in the mist of nothingness, we all cling onto something.

- recycleability of plastic: it doesn't matter, because 1) recycling is a matter of policy and of energy (no, it isn't cost-free) 2) the injection of new plastic outnumbers and it's faster than the recycling process. Focusing on the material properties isn't enough

1/

- switching industrial materials with 'more natural ones' without addressing the inherent societal problem and a culture of overproduction incentivised by the unequal distribution of power will not cut it

- I've been working on unconventional materials for architecture and design for 15+ years, collaborating with a variety of experts. I'm open to discussions surrounding wood and clay and even other materials like bamboo (my favourite) but I don't need to be patronised about forestry

2/

- I'd kindly recommend the 'overpopulation' crowd to shut up unless they first acknowledge: 1) a smaller section of the whole world population is the one causing the bigger damage, 2) overpopulation is functional to capitalism bc it needs a larger workforce to exploit to function, 3) reproductive rights, women emancipation, economies of care, assisted dying, dignity for the elders are key in the discourse.
Again, I'm open to serious convos about it, but eugenics isn't my gist.

3/

The biggest problem with 'sustainable design' is that the mainstream approach consists in 'how can we both keep the cake and eat it', so we have design magazines like Dezeen praising stuff like 'design student makes a sustainable avocado out of beans', so that millennials like me can keep having avocados all year round without feeling guilty about the exploitative economy of all-year-round available food.

4/

“You can't recycle your way out of the climate emergency. Practically speaking, you can't even recycle. All those plastics you lovingly washed and sorted ended up in a landfill or floating in the ocean. Plastics recycling is a hoax perpetrated by the petrochemical industry, who knew all along that their products would never be recycled.”

@pluralistic couldn’t find better words to describe my agony every time I have to deal with “sustainable design”

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/24/mall-ninja-prophecy/#mano-a-mano

#ClimateDiary

Yesterday night I wanted to draw some fairies, my little way of retiring from reality. However this is the only thing that came out. I don't know, I would probably delete it later. I wonder if Palestinians and all the Arab people suffering because of Western imperialism could ever forgive us.

Monday writing lecture:
find the passive and the active voice in The Guardian's headlines, or how to paraphrase 'we have double standards and journalism can fuck off to the sun':

20 Palestinians 'die' in an anonymous 'strike' in Gaza, while Israeli soldiers are 'killed' by Hezbollah.

Throwing a soup on a painting gets you 20 months in jail, committing a genocide and carpet bombing your neighbouring country gets you to the UN stage.

!!! Please boost !!!

I accidentally (and stupidly) blocked the entire mastodon.social domain, removing around 100 followers/following. If I was following you or you were following me, please just let me know: hit the follow button and I'll follow you back.

What for a #FollowFriday post, does it show that my brain is not fucntioning properly?

#Follow #Followers #mastodon #Fediverse #boost

PLEASE BOOST - I mistakenly blocked Mastodon.social again!

I needed to block someone who was cheering on the Lebanon attack on mastondon.social and instead made the mistake to block the entire domain

There is no warning (bad design) when you block a domain.
Anyway, if you where following me on there, please re-follow.
If you have problems on why I was blocking someone cheering a terrorists attack, you can move on and away from me.

#Follow #Followers #mastodon #Fediverse #boost #block

@deivudesu
*minors.
Only Westerns have children.

Starmer just decided Fascism is cool.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/16/uk-pm-seeks-immigration-lessons-from-italys-meloni

#migrants

The land of my grandparents is becoming a desert, while tourists exacerbate the pressure on resources which are becoming scarcer and scarcer.
Tourism for me has always been another form of colonialism: locals left with the scraps of the land that they inhabit while tourists use the latest resources available. The BS of a tourist-based economy is destroying the land of my childhood, and the contempt I feel for it is unspeakable.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/aug/19/the-land-is-becoming-desert-drought-pushes-sicilys-farming-heritage-to-the-brink

#ClimateDiary

"We call upon our colleagues in the homeland and internationally to support our steadfast attempts to defend and preserve our universities for the sake of the future of our people, and our ability to remain on our Palestinian land in Gaza. We built these universities from tents. And from tents, with the support of our friends, we will rebuild them once again."

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/5/29/open-letter-by-gaza-academics-and-university-administrators-to-the-world

@academicchatter

#palestine #gaza #AcademicMastondon #academia #AcademicFedi #Scholasticide

@aral I guess Putin and Xi are really enjoying the show.

@aral I already have a spare Windows laptop that I wanted to use to install Linux and start exploring it. Any advice for a dummy non-developer like me to start (even just a link with instructions)

“ “Never again” must mean never again by anyone, against anyone. If this call is not applied to Palestinians, there can never realistically be any hope that others will apply it to Jews – especially in an era in which so much anti-Semitism goes ignored because it does not fit into the pro-Israel/pro-Palestine dichotomy.”

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/3/13/criticism-of-israels-war-and-occupation-is-not-anti-semitism