Joé McKen

@joemcken.net

1539 Followers 99 Following

Personal account · Freelance composer in Québec, Canada · Progressive godless civil-libertarian · He/him · Seize the day, but not today, I’m tired · Music account: @music.joemcken.net » Personal site: https://joemcken.net » See 📌 post for socials & more

Excerpt from ‘The Guardian’: “Kirk, a far-right political figure who served as a sort of Pied Piper for young Republicans through his Turning Point USA foundation, was shot dead in September last year. He was known for his racist and bigoted views, using his podcast to claim that ‘prowling Blacks go around for fun to go target white people’ and speculating: ‘If I see a Black pilot, I’m going to be like: “Boy, I hope he’s qualified.”’”
“DESCRIBE YOUR FAVORITE MOVIE AS BORING AS POSSIBLE” over a background of various movie posters (‘Titanic’ [1997])
Screenshot from Bluesky blog “Our Approach to Age Assurance”: “Update, September 26, 2025: Ohio has a law similar to South Dakota and Wyoming regulations, so we'll be implementing the same solution in Ohio, effective September 29th. “Update December 8, 2025: Virginia's age assurance law takes effect on January 1, 2026. We are making an update to comply and will not allow users in Virginia who are under 16 years old. “Update December 16, 2025: We have made an update to comply with Tennessee's age assurance law and will not allow users in Tennessee who are under 18 years old. “Update May 7, 2026: We have made an update to comply with Brazil's age assurance law and will restrict access to certain content and features for users in Brazil under the age of 18. “Update July 8, 2026: We have made an update to comply with Texas's age assurance law and will restrict access to certain content and features for users in Texas under the age of 18.”
Four-panel comic by Smooth Dunk (@smoothdunk2.bsky.social): First two panels are titled “Journalist Visits Twitter” Panel 1: Journalist is skipping happily through Twitter. Behind them, two people shout “Black people suck!” and “Gay people suck!” Panel 2: Journalist continues to skip. Two more people shout “Trans people suck!” and “Immigrants suck!” The second two panels are titled “Journalist Visits Bluesky” Panel 3: Journalist skips into Bluesky and someone immediately shouts “YOU suck!” Panel 4: Journalist is crouched on the floor, absolutely devastated. In the foreground is a piece of paper that reads “Today, I went to hell”
Screenshot of Wikipedia article “List of protests and demonstrations in the United States by size” #1 – March 2026 No Kings protests – 8,000,000 attendance – Second presidency of Donald Trump, democratic backsliding, deployment of federal forces in the United States, Operation Metro Surge, killings of Renee Good, Keith Porter, and Alex Pretti, and the 2026 Iran war – Widely regarded as the largest single-day protest in U.S. history […] #2 – October 2025 No Kings protests – 6,000,000–7,000,000 attendance – Second presidency of Donald Trump, democratic backsliding, deployment of federal forces in the United States #3 – June 2025 No Kings protests – ~5,000,000 attendance – Second presidency of Donald Trump, DOGE, increasing ICE presence #4 – 2017 Women's March – 3,300,000–4,600,000 attendance – Feminism #5 – Hands Off protests – 250,000–5,000,000 attendance – Second presidency of Donald Trump, political corruption, DOGE
Screencap of an excerpt from the quoted article: “After seeing the image, the president became "enraged," and White House officials removed it from their social media posts, sources told the outlet. Trump later wrote on Truth Social that the crowd had been "packed to the brim" with "at least 45,000 people."”
Screenshot of Ken “Popehat” White’s Threads timeline, with a post from five hours ago about today’s hike whilst on vacation in England, a post yesterday that simply reads “Scrying”, and the last post before that dating back to May.
Deck.blue screencap of 3 posts by Popehat (@kenwhite.bsky.social): One about his vacation in London, one where he mocks US leaders for threatening to kill negotiators, and an out-of-context reply. None appear to violate any rules.
Anonymized Bluesky post: “I'm not mad that you don't like the World Cup. “I'm honestly just sad for you. “It's like you're saying you've never understood the point of music or you think art is a waste of time.”
Weather website screencap: “Humidity: 100%”
Screenshot of a YouTube playlist page, with a red squiggly line badly drawn where video numbers once existed and now don’t
Screencap of Mike’s post with an arrow pointing to the reply counter, which reads “6”
Excerpt from The Guardian article “The world wants to ban children from social media, but there will be grave consequences for us all”: “While social media bans may seem like a prudent measure to protect children, they are not only ineffective, they endanger both children and adults. There is little evidence that social media is driving any type of widespread mental health crisis in children. Studies have repeatedly shown the opposite. Removing anonymity from the web, which will inevitably happen when tech companies are required to identify and ban children, allows for easier government tracking and censorship of journalists, activists and whistleblowers, who rely on online anonymity. And while some claim the laws would curb big tech’s power, only the largest tech companies have the resources to shoulder the extensive costs of age verification systems. Non-profit and indie platforms could be forced to close, consolidating big tech’s power further. Mass surveillance systems, once constructed, could also be easily leveraged by governments and bad actors.”
Bluesky post by Make It Make Sense‬ (@themimsshow.bsky.social‬): “What people get WRONG about Christian nationalism” [Post included a video of a dude in a suit and glasses in front of a mic. The post was published 5 hours previously and has 2 replies, 1 repost, and 0 likes.] Replies by Cody‬ (@codyjohnston.bsky.social‬): “This is a clip of someone saying several times that they don't even know what Christian nationalism means and the host doesn't bother offering a definition. Is the thing "people get WRONG" just that you specifically don't know what it means?” “Your shit sucks, guys. Sucks real bad.”
Garth McCann (Michael Caine) in ‘Secondhand Lions’ (2003), dressed like a ’50s Texas rancher and holding a shotgun in the doorway of a diner
Tweet by Jared Holt (@jaredlholt) on May 21, 2026: “Update in the Dalton Eatherly (‘Chud the Builder’) case: investigator say he lied about key details in what happened, which was captured on surveillance camera, and the court said he cannot use the money he fundraised from fellow online racists to bail out” Embedded link headline: “UPDATE: Courthouse shooter bond reset at $1 million, detectives find body armor, tick…”, with a photo of a racist wannabe-murderer looking very sad in court
Tweet by Andrew Kaczynski (@KFILE) on May 16, 2026: “Platner suggests to NYT he only learned of Nazi-connotations of his tattoo after campaign started. “I spoke in October to an acquaintance of Platner from more than a decade ago who said Platner spoke about his tattoo resembling a Nazi symbol. A second person told me that they learned of the tattoo years ago from the same person. “I also reviewed a text chain between the acquaintance and another person discussing Platner’s Nazi-like tattoo several months ago, before the story became public - seemingly before he learned of it.” [Attached screenshot of the NYT interview in question, where Platner claims he got his Nazi tattoo whilst serving in the Marines, wore it for 17 years supposedly without incident, and then only realized its significance during the campaign when the “establishment” dropped “opposition research” exposing it, at which point he had it covered up]
xkcd single-panel comic: A car salesman describes a car to another person. Salesman: “You won’t have to worry about gas prices OR electricity prices with our new pullback drive model. “At the factory, we put the car on the ground and tow it all the way backward until it starts clicking. “To drive forward, you just release the brake and it goes.” Comic alt/hover text: “How does the spring not run out almost immediately?” “We pull it back REALLY far.”
Screenshot of this night’s episode of ‘Last Week Tonight with John Oliver’, where John (a white man in a suit with short hair and dark-rimmed glasses) gestures to a picture of Steve Vladeck (also a white man in a suit with short hair and dark-rimmed glasses). The subtitles read, “>>Exactly. My son is right.”
New York Times guest essay on May 9, 2026: “Forget Climate Change. Democrats Need to Talk About Other Issues.” Illustration is a four-panel comic: A pair of hands holds up a smiling planet Earth; then the hands let it go, and Earth falls with a terrified expression until it disappears from view.
Screenshot of my Bluesky Home feed with two posts appearing back to back. The older post (bottom) is by Robert Reich, linking to a New Republic report that the FBI has launched a probe into the reporter who covered Kash Patel’s excessive drinking. Pictured is Kash Patel, looking like a wide-eyed dope in a tuxedo. The newer post (top) is by The Atlantic, reporting that “multiple people in Patel’s orbit” say he “distributed ‘Ka$h’-branded bottles of bourbon to bureau staff and civilians”. Pictured is a bottle of liquor with “KASH PATEL: FBI DIRECTOR” stenciled on it.
Screenshot of Ben Shapiro standing in a Home Depot parking lot holding a single plank of wood in a tiny plastic bag in one hand and the receipt in the other hand like a very normal human boy
Image of Ash Ketchum from ‘Pokémon’, posing like a shameful dweeb with a caption that reads “This fuckin’ guy…”
Certificate of Completion: Am I a Tech Bro? NOT A TECH BRO with a score of 17% agreement with tech bro ideas amIaTechBro.com
The most damaging episodes were the fatal shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, which Miller was at the center of. During his 10am calls with immigration leaders, Miller was demanding agents be sent out to areas in Minneapolis where DHS knew there was a heavy presence of protesters to 'force confrontations,' two DHS senior sources told the Daily Mail. One official noted that Miller repeatedly urged agents to engage protesters so the administration could win the 'PR battle.'
Banned from Reddit
Screenshot of my YouTube Notifications drop-down menu, where videos are presented in seemingly random order: 6 hours ago 1 day ago 1 hour ago 5 hours ago 22 hours ago Etc.
Bluesky post by Amy Ash (@lolennui.bsky.social): “(me making fun of your crop rotation idea and thereby holding our people back another 5000 years) jeff thinks the beans have to take turns lmao”
Screenshot of Wikipedia’s article about “Email”, where the Terminology section includes a line that “EMAIL was used by CompuServe starting in April 1981, which popularized the term”, with two citations – one of which, “[13]”, is circled
Screencap of Clearsky showing which blocklists I’m included in, featuring both “Crypto Quarantine” (for users who allegedly *like* crypto/AI/etc. too much) and “Techno-Pessimists” (for users who allegedly *dislike* crypto/AI/etc. too much)
Screenshot: — I’m generally a big Ken White fan, and I agree with the bulk of this essay, but I have never cared for his “first speaker” framework; it struck me as both too cumbersome and too convenient when I first read it, and it still does. Even so, I agree with the baseline view that we need to avoid the trap of protecting anyone’s expression at the expense of someone else’s, especially when there is a clear imbalance of “speech power.” But he really lost me here: “Or take Amy Wax, a loathsome bigot who thinks America would be better if my children—born in Asia, American citizens since we adopted them as infants—weren’t here. FIRE believes—correctly—that when Wax’s university seeks to discipline her for speech, it must obey its own rules and carefully consider the values of academic freedom and due process. FIRE also says, again correctly, that as far as it is concerned, ‘her viewpoint is beside the point.’ But then it goes further and offers her a platform to promote her views. That’s a ‘free speech culture’ ethos move. “‘Free speech culture’ becomes bad and unserious when it starts telling us that speech is morally neutral, that we should not make value judgments against it, and that there is no moral component to promoting it. I am committed to the defense of the legal right to speak, but the defense of speech does not require us to refrain from speaking frankly about moral truths. Giving Wax a platform to be a bigot is morally distinguishable from saying she should be free to be a bigot. ‘The only immoral thing you can say is that someone else’s speech is immoral’ is not an ethos worthy of respect.”
booooooo
Screenshot of an X/Twitter post by Bluesky (@bluesky) posted January 19, 2026 at 4:20 PM: “Sad Epstein isn’t alive to use Grok. He would have loved it.”
Jaz’s Bluesky stats site with nothing working and a “Error: NetworkError when attempting to fetch resource” message
“Joé McKen: 1,300 followers”
Arrested Development “but it might work for us” meme: MAN: The idea is that if reporters suck up to Trump enough, then he might not attack them and try to throw them in prison WOMAN: Well did it work for those people? MAN: No, it never does, I mean, these people somehow delude themselves into thinking it might, but… MAN: …but it might work for us.
“Let me do it for you” meme with long-nosed dog staring hopefully up at a person trying to reach into a can of Pringles
Screencap of the VLC media player icon, an orange cone with a white stripe, now adorned with a white-and-red Santa Claus hat (which only appears in in the days before and after Christmas)
Screenshot of a background building in ‘The Dark Knight’ (2008) with a sign above the door reading “Sweet Home Chicago”
A derp derping
Screenshot of ‘South Park’ where Donald Trump talks on the phone saying, “- And Hegseth, don’t just make a bunch of content.”
Real-life photo of Pete Hegseth holding a grenade in each hand and making a very serious face with the caption, “This is the Department of War!” I checked this time and it really is a real-life photo of … Wait, seriously? This is also just a screenshot of ‘South Park’ where Hegseth is a silly cartoon character? But that’s his real face! … Really? It isn’t? Damn.
Real-life photo of Pete Hegseth fast-roping down into the South Park police precinct and introducing himself at a soldier’s phone for a video and … Wait, sorry, I’m being told this is a screenshot from tonight’s ‘South Park’ episode and that this is actually a crude cartoon. I apologize for not being able to tell the difference.
The Lunduke Journal (@LundukeJournal): “If you hold the wrong view on [political topic] you’re not welcome here!” [Quoted tweet by Theo – t3.gg (@theo): “If you don’t respect our trans peers, unfollow me and stop interacting with my community.”] Reply by Windscribe (@windscribecom): “It’s not polite to make fun of the mentally ill” Reply by Theo – t3.gg (@theo): “Wild – the shitty grifter VPN company that inserted itself in OSS drama is transphobic. What a surprise!” Reply by Windscribe (@windscribecom): “Wild – a retarded ChatGPT wrapper maker doesn’t have common sense or reading comprehension. What a surprise!”
Screenshot from ‘School of Rock’ (2003) showing Jack Black and the other then-child actors whose names I’m too lazy to look up playing a kickass rock tune on a stage
Screenshot from ‘Frankenstein’ (2025), featuring a lone dark figure in a tattered coat (the Creature) standing in the distance on a flat icy plain, framed perfectly center against the darkening orange sunset. There is nothing but flat ice on the ground, nothing but empty sky above, creating a feeling of total desolation.
Screenshot from ‘Frankenstein’ (2025) showing an establishing shot of an old European manor home and its spacious grounds. The grass and trees are a lush green, the sky a bright blue behind the clouds. Even though the day is overcast, the scene is still brighter and more vivid than most exterior shots you’ll see in movies this year.
Email from X(itter) informing me my personal account, @joemcken, was automatically suspended for violating the rules against “inauthentic behaviors”.
[Single-panel comic of a stick figure named Cueball sitting at his computer with a humidifier labeled “E-21” making clicking noises behind him.] COMPUTER: Hey all! Does your E-21 humidifier make an annoying clicking noise? Mine did, but I finally figured out that there’s an easy fix, so I made this video in case anyone else… CUEBALL: Oh my god. Yes. YES. CAPTION: I know there’s more important work in the world, but I feel like these people deserve, at minimum, a statue. [HIDDEN HOVER TEXT: The statue should be in the likeness of whatever sculptor posted the sculpting tool repair video that was most helpful during the installation of the statue.]
Promotional photo of John Oliver, man with glasses in a suit and tie, holding a glass of wine whilst leaning against a barrel with a bottle of “CABERNET SAUVIGNJOHN” wine on it. He’s smiling affectionately, perhaps romantically, across the barrel at what he describes in the show as “himself if he were a horse”, except the horse has pouty human lips, grapes in its mane, and its own glass of wine in its hoof, somehow. The horse doesn’t look nearly as sure about this as John does.
Screencap of Bcounter (Bluesky user counter site) showing 40,007,135 users on Bluesky
Screencap of YouTube endscreen content with three stupidly oversized video thumbnails rather than the previous grid
Bluesky post by The Associated Press from the morning of October 19, 2025: “BREAKING: Israel strikes southern Gaza in test of ceasefire.”
Screenshot of Jaz’s Stats for Bluesky site showing an interactive “Daily Records” bar graph with all likes, posts and follows on the site over time. The visible period spans from July 12 to October 16, 2025; the records are all relatively steady, with no visible increase at all over the last few days.
Aftonbladet headline: “Greta Thunberg: ‘They kicked me every time the flag touched my face’ – Greta Thunberg on her days in Israeli captivity”
Bluesky screenshot of Heretical_i (‪@hereticali.bsky.social‬) replying to my post about all them nazis in the Republican Party with this impressive bit of whataboutism: “So you prefer fascists with tasselloafers instead of jackboots then?”
DuckDuckGo search results for movie posters by Drew Struzan, showing over a dozen iconic theatrical artworks for ‘Star Wars’, ‘Waterworld’, ‘Man of Steel’, ‘Harry Potter’, ‘Hellboy’, ‘Back to the Future’, ‘Blade Runner’, ‘Hook’, ‘Indiana Jones’ and more
Edited screencap of a YouTube video with the runtime of 1 hour 33 minutes circled in red and the title “Literally Every Leftist YouTube Video Nowadays”
Final screen from ‘Trust and Safety: Armed Conflict’ with a maxed-out progress bar and a “Thank you for playing!” message. At the bottom are three dials rating my performance: “Local impact” is at 100%, “Team capacity” is at ~45%, and “Public perception” is at ~80%.
Bluesky post: “As one would suspect about Kirk, he called the man who bashed Paul Pelosi’s head in with a hammer an ‘amazing patriot’ and encouraged people to bail him out.” Embedded Yahoo News UK link: “Right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk tells audience to post bail for Paul Pelosi's attacker “Right-wing commentator Charlie Kirk tells audience to post bail for Paul Pelosi's attacker Real America's Voice”