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This week’s question comes to us from Gwen Dubois:

How do I keep functioning in a capitalist world?

I am going to tell you a very shameful story.

Erika got me a Kit Kat clock for Christmas. For those who are unaware, a Kit Kat clock is shaped like a cat, with a clock in its belly, and eyes and a tail that go back and forth like a metronome. I’m sure you’ve seen one. They go back to the deco age of the 1930s, and if you’ve ever dated someone with bangs they have one in their kitchen. They’re usually black. Erika got me a kelly green one. (Go birds. Fuck ICE. Free Palestine.) I was very happy to get it.

On Christmas night, after friends and family had all left, I decided to hang up my Kit Kat clock. I rummaged through the junk drawer (I’m kidding, they’re all junk drawers.) until I found two C batteries, inserted them in the clock, then hung it up. The eyes and tail weren’t moving. I gave the tail a little push. Nothing. Hmm. I took it down and checked the batteries, which had expired in… 2018. Batteries expire? I decided to deal with it tomorrow. The next day I walked up to my local ma and pa drugstore (I’m kidding, it’s a fucking CVS) and bought a fresh pack of C batteries. I went home, put in the new batteries, put the clock back on the wall, and… nothing. Gave the tail a little push, and… nothing. This time I decided to see if the clock itself was working. I checked the time, came back 30 minutes later, and… the clock was working. This most likely eliminated the batteries as the source of the problem. By this point Erika was on the internet doing what she does best, research.

Readers, there are a lot of videos out there on fixing Kit Kat clocks.

We tried a few different things and none of them worked. Finally, we found a video that told us the most likely culprit was that the magnets used in the clock to make the eyes and tail move probably weren’t strong enough but could be easily fixed by adding more magnets to the clock. I was into this solution for two reasons: magnets and a reason to go to the hardware store, which I love. So off I went to the local hardware store.

“Do you have 8mm by 1mm neodymium magnets?” (The video was very specific.)

“All we have is what’s in the case.”

They weren’t in the case. No biggie, there’s another hardware store five blocks away, and it was a nice day for a walk. Sadly that store didn’t have 8mm by 1mm neodymium magnets either.

(Fun medical fact! Neodymium magnets come with very large warnings about keeping them away from children and idiotic adults who will think it’s funny to swallow them, except that they’re so strong they’ll get stuck in different parts of your colon and accordion your colon when they attract each other, as magnets do. The results aren’t good, but on the upside the surgery is incredibly expensive.)

Having struck out at the two local hardware stores I could walk to, I decided to wait a few days and go to the even bigger, but still locally run, hardware store by work. (Shout-out to Center Hardware!) Which I did. They had an extensive supply of magnets, neodymium and otherwise (No, I don’t know what the difference is.), but unfortunately, not the specific size I needed.

Here comes the shameful part. At this point I was so frustrated that I opened the Amazon app on my phone and ordered 8mm by 1mm neodymium magnets, which of course they had. A couple days later a shame-filled envelope showed up at my door with one hundred 8mm by 1mm neodymium magnets inside. (I need two.) And, yes, I realize I hadn’t exhausted all other options, including other online options, before resorting to Amazon. But I let frustration get to me and took the easy way out.

None of this specifically answers your question, but it’s related and I needed to get it off my chest. Still, I feel like I at least tried to buy these magnets at three local stores before letting frustration get the better of me. And what I’m maybe saying is that it’s sometimes hard to use the system differently than it's been designed to work. Because at this point, the system is definitely designed to get me to go to Amazon first.

A few days ago I was sitting in the local dogpark when the ever-popular topic of San Francisco’s downtown came up. Apparently another big store had shuttered. And the Old Men of the Dogpark™had much to say about “the state of things” including crime sprees and other make-believe bullshit that was keeping people from doing their shopping downtown. As they’re saying this I’m watching various Amazon trucks circle the park. Finally I asked one of them when he’d last bought something at Amazon.

“Last night.”

“Where would you have bought that before Amazon?”

“Downtown.”
Three things are happening here: our options are disappearing, we’re being sold a bullshit narrative about why our options are disappearing, and the evil alternative—which isn’t an alternative at all because it’s killing all its competition—feels incredibly easy. Because it is. You open your phone. Every item you could ever want is there. You push a button. It comes to you. Your city dies.

I’m gonna turn into an old man for just a minute. There was a time, not that long ago actually, when I could’ve walked four blocks to a Radio Shack and said “You got magnets?” And they would’ve showed me a wall of magnets. Then, just to rub it in, I could’ve stopped next door at Tower Records and spent an hour looking at magazines before picking out a record and walking back home. And I honestly miss doing shit like that, but I realize that these are part of my past, and trying to convince people that my past was better than their present is incredibly annoying, doesn’t solve shit, and is deserving of all the eye-rolls you are now giving me. And yet… Radio Shack was fucking glorious. Rant over.

So how do we function within capitalism?

I lied. Rant not over. Not quite. Because the lesson we can take from how “things used to be” is that we used to have options. The endgame of surveillance capitalism is to take away as many options as possible, which sounds to me a lot like a company store. Where your dollar can only go to the one place that provides the thing you need, at the one price it costs, at the one quality it’s offered. And honestly, if I were to look outside and see a lot of joy and happiness and people enjoying their one life here on Earth I’d be inclined to say “Good job, here’s my dollar!” But that’s not what I see.

Half my neighbors are afraid of being shot in the face by the government, and the other half are providing that same government with their own surveillance data by covering their homes in nest cams inside and out. Orwell fucking wept.

Unfortunately, capitalism is here and will probably remain here for the foreseeable future. Even if we, hopefully, start adopting some of the tenets of socialism, we will be interweaving it with capitalism. Which means we need to be more intentional about where we put our dollar, and we need to be aware of what we’re actually trading for our dollar.

Once upon a time (here he goes again), if I went to the hardware store and bought a light bulb that is exactly what I got. A light bulb. Depending on the hardware store my purchase might trigger a subtraction to their inventory database, and if they were really fancy, there might be a record that I bought a light bulb which might could be useful in a few years if I were to go back, be confused, and ask them if they knew what kind of light bulbs I’d bought last time. But for the most part, me walking out with a pack of light bulbs was the end of the transaction. These days, a light bulb purchase is the beginning of a transaction. You screw in the lightbulb, you fire up your lightbulb app, you set up a scenario, you get the light bulb to talk to your phone, you make it behave depending on your phone’s distance to it, or the time of day, etc. All of this creates juicy data that is then bought and sold by the light bulb company, the app manufacturer, and probably Palantir who then sells it to ICE so they know when you’re home. Motherfucker, you just needed a light bulb, man. So yeah, I miss the capitalism where I exchanged my dollar for your light bulb and that was the end of that. Turns out smart homes are anything but. Peter Thiel does not need to know what kind of light bulbs you use. Or when you’re home.

If we are going to keep functioning in a capitalist world we need to be more careful about where we are spending our money. The local hardware store will only be there as long as you keep using it. Same for the local grocery store, the local café, the local record store, the local pet store, etc. And while it might be easier to get something delivered to your door, I’d encourage you to pay those folks a visit once in a while. Those people are part of your community. Jeff Bezos is barely part of humanity. He does not deserve your dollar. The people at Target do not deserve your dollar. The union-busters at Whole Foods do not deserve your dollar. As someone who does a lot of shipping of zines, books, and assorted other shit, Uline does not get my dollar. (Special shout-out to the DSA for sending out their calendar in a Uline mailer. Fuck yeah, I’m gonna call your ass out on that!) And yes, sometimes the right thing is gonna cost. $8 might seem a great price for a t-shirt—and if all you have is $8 and you need a t-shirt, go ahead and get it!—but selling you an $8 t-shirt means somebody somewhere is getting fucked. (To be fair, if you are at a concert and a t-shirt is $80, the person getting fucked is you.)

The TL;DR on functioning in a capitalist world is to move a little slower, with a little more intention. Your dollar helps people stay in business. Be careful where you put it. I’m not saying it’s easy. As I told at the top of the story, I shamefully let frustration get to me and I took the easy way out. This’ll happen. But every time we keep doing it, we get closer and closer to having no other options than having to shop at a company store run by white supremacists.

America has one neck, and it’s the economy. If you want to change how things are going, you have to change where you’re putting your dollar.

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🙋 Got a question? Ask it! It’s fun for both of us.

💰 Speaking of where you put your dollar, gimme $2/mo and help me keep writing this newsletter.

📣 There are a few seats left in next week’s workshop. If you’re job hunting this workshop will help you get your dollar. Grab ‘em!

🍉 Please give what you can to the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund. The ceasefire is bullshit.

🏳️‍⚧️ Please give what you can to Trans Lifeline.

Over ten years ago I wrote that we need to flip the office. Instead of going to work, we should be going to socialize, converse, and collaborate. Productive solo time is not for the office. Knowledge workers can be productive anywhere but at the office. This is just as pertinent today. There are times when people need to be together, though with video conferencing and proper meeting management we can get a lot done with distributed work.

Even with good meeting practices available and amazing technology, management has consistently been asleep at the wheel. A few years ago I worked with an organization that was returning to hybrid work with some mandated in-office days and some flexible days. I was informed by experienced staff that hybrid work would lose people, as three days in the office and two from anywhere would not be good enough. Who would not agree? Those with families, long commutes, accessibility issues, or people to care for. I was told that it would be a good 40% of people not happy with this type of hybrid work. And soon the attrition accelerated.

Either management has not learned anything over the past decade or management is actively subverting their own workforce to satisfy their need for control. I think that it’s both.

The new year will bring some big changes to the rules on in-office work for many employees across the country — including tens of thousands of provincial government staff in Ontario and Alberta, who will soon be required back in the office full time.

As of Jan. 5, Ontario provincial government employees will be expected to work in the office five days per week.

Alberta’s public service is also returning to full-time, in-office work in February to “strengthen collaboration, accountability and service delivery for Albertans,” a spokesperson for the Alberta government said. —CBC 2026-01-02

Drs Strakowski and Johnson discuss a new way to understand bipolar disorder — as dysregulated reward processing rather than a primary mood disorder.
Medscape Psychiatry

Last Thursday, the Trump administration released a proposed rule prohibiting hospitals that receive Medicare or Medicaid funding from providing any gender affirming care to minors, even when privately funded.

This rule will foreclose access to gender-affirming care for families seeking care at hospitals, even those that have private insurance or are able to self-fund the treatment they need. Some states may pay for gender-affirming care through Medicaid, but hospitals would still be foreclosed from providing this care if they do not want to lose federal funding. The proposed rule is revolutionary in that it radically expands the use of Medicare and Medicaid as policy weapons.

Read the rest…

There’s no question this week. This newsletter is part two of last week’s newsletter.

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My father was buried on Sunday in the town of Alcobaça, where he grew up. The service, which included a full Catholic mass at my mother’s request, was held in a small chapel right next to the cemetery. The same cemetery that contains my grandparents, my sister, and several other relatives. But before you start picturing some old European gothic chapel made of stone, with a high ceiling, and featuring incredible gargoyles, this chapel was recently built, and featured all the charm of an airport Marriott conference room. (Also, he wasn’t actually buried on Sunday. The funeral service was on Sunday and then his body was driven off to a crematorium a few towns away, and buried a few days later, but that feels like a technicality, and “my father was buried on Sunday” seemed like a stronger opening line, so we’re going with that.)

I was the only son in attendance. (And yes, I am mentioning this in a very petty manner. But also, think of it like Chekhov’s gun. It goes off in the third act, and pulls the story together in a deeply satisfying way.)

The service was attended by a few family members and by my father’s friends. All of them asked me if I remembered them, which I did not. All of them asked me how my brothers were doing, and while I was tempted to make up fantastic stories (They’re off-planet and couldn’t make it back in time), or to tell the truth (They’re fascists now!), I ended up going with a non-committal “They’re fine.”

Let’s do a little geography. Alcobaça is located 13 kilometers from Nazaré, home of the world’s largest waves. (If you’ve seen HBO’s 100 Foot Wave you’ll know what I’m talking about.) My goal was to end this trip staring at those waves. So I was playing this little game where every well-meaning comment was just a wave coming at me. Rolling. Breaking. Washing over. Big waves. I was not at this service to do any mourning. That wasn’t my role. My role was to be someone all these people could say what they needed to say to and then move on. My mourning, which was still formless for reasons, would happen later. It would be between me and the sea, and the sea hates a coward.

Everything was a wave.

You’re the spitting image of your father. Wave. Let it break. Let it wash over you.

Your father and I spent a lot of time together. Wave. Let it break. Let it wash over you.

Your father was a good man. Wave. Let it break. Let it wash over you.

Your father often spoke about how proud he was of you. Wave. Big wave. 100 foot wave. Let it fucking break. Dive under. Be with the sea. Let it wash you ashore.

For the record, my father never once told me that he was proud of me. I’d made my peace with this a long time ago. The first in a long line of burials. But to find out that he was telling this to others ended up filling me with rage. It’s one thing to believe your father hasn’t given you a second thought. It’s another thing altogether to know that he has, but withheld this information from you—and apparently you alone—your entire life. It’s a mindfuck, and ultimately an act of cowardice. For fuck sake, tell your children you are proud of them. It’s the smallest of acts. Deliver it directly. Say it with your chest. Say it before you can no longer say it. Say it before they are hearing it from a stranger and wanting to pry your coffin open to ask you one last question. Because you’ll never be able to answer that question.

My father’s coffin was small. Smaller than I expected. Sitting in the middle of the chapel, a picture of him in front of it. I was expecting something larger. More imposing. He was so large in life. Looming over me as a constant threat of rage and violence. Covering all light. Covering his entire family in shadow. And now he was small. And in a box. And still. I walked up to him, and wished for a second that he could know that I was there. To know that he hadn’t broken me. To know that I wasn’t a coward. But I knew, and that would have to be enough.

During the service, the priest spoke about Jesus’ sacrifice, as priests like to do. And he spoke of fathers and sons. (Catholicism is a man’s game.) He spoke about how God the Father sacrificed his only begotten son blah blah. And I wondered if there wasn’t a better gospel. One where Jesus lives a nice long life. One where he meets someone and encourages her to follow her dreams, but also brings her (or him! or them!) blankets when they’re cold. A gospel where Jesus has kids and teaches them how to fish, or woodworking, and bandages their knees when they trip. A gospel where Jesus and his family are gathered together for Christmas and he receives lots of gifts (Jesus would get birthday gifts on Christmas). A gospel where Jesus teaches his kids kindness, and is there for them when they need someone to listen. A gospel where Jesus is your first call after a breakup and drops everything to meet you at the bar. A gospel where Jesus gets a dog, and ends up hanging out at the dog park. A gospel where Jesus picks you up after school and attends your soccer games, and isn’t one of those asshole parents who yells at the ref. A gospel where Jesus reminds you to make every minute count. A gospel where Jesus eventually slows down a little bit because his knees start to hurt, and maybe he grows a little paunch, but still enjoys working in his backyard garden, and eventually teaches his grandkids how to pull weeds so the tomato plants have room to grow. And maybe he has a few olive trees and makes his own olive oil. A Gospel where Jesus dies peacefully in his sleep, surrounded by family, and friends, and they miss him when he’s gone.

I wonder how different our lives would have been if my parents’ faith was centered on how to live a good life, instead of how to die a dramatic death. A good life is worth more than a dramatic death. A good life plants seeds in soil that a dramatic death steals to bury our sins.

The priest continues about how our suffering in the here and now ensures our place in paradise later, and I think, silently, that he can go fuck himself. Which may be unfair, as he is playing his role, as I am playing mine. All of this is happening as my mother, playing hers, holds onto me and cries loudly and I think of big waves.

After the service ends the mortician asks us if we’d like the coffin open and I say “NO.” before my mother can get an answer out.

The next day I meet my mother to help her tie up some loose ends, and she decides this is a good time to chew me out in public for never being there for them, being negligent in my duties as a son, not being there for my father when he needed me, telling me she needs me because she is mourning my father, and honestly I stop listening after a few lines and start thinking of big waves. Breaking. Washing over me.

“We have loose ends to tie up, correct?”

“Yes, but first I want to stop at this pastry shop and pick up some sweets for your brothers.”

The ones who love us least are the ones we try hardest to please.

The day before my flight back I wake up at dawn and take the bus to Nazaré. I walk along the beach, towards the large cliff where I see the funicular that takes you to the top. This is where I spent summers with my grandparents. The beach is calm. The sun is shining on the cliff, doing a whole postcard-worthy thing. In the summer this beach is crawling with tourists, and the smell of sardines being grilled on the sidewalk. Today it’s empty. It’s raining a little bit. It’s perfect. I’ve always appreciated the beach more in the winter, when the sea reclaims what’s theirs. I ride the funicular to the top of the cliff where I walk along a small winding road to the lighthouse at the tip.

More geography: the cliff separates Nazaré, a small fishing village with a nice calm beach from Praia do Norte (the north beach) which is where the big waves are. The big waves are caused by an undersea canyon right offshore that doesn’t extend to Nazaré. So you get a calm beach and you get a big wave beach, split right down the middle by a giant cliff. Duality. Metaphor. Blah blah.

I ended up missing the 60 foot waves, and the surfing competition that came with them, by a day. Which is fine, because although the waves weren’t as big it also meant less people, which fit what I needed to do. Which was staring at the ocean for a while. Which I did. I watched the big waves beat the fuck out of that cliff for a couple of hours. I watched the cliff stand there and take all of those beatings. Unbent. Unbowed. I watched waves form. I watched them grow. I watched them break. I watched some of them reach the shore, while others crashed into the cliff. I watched the sea put on a show. And the sea doesn’t put on shows for cowards, because the sea hates a coward.

If you’re waiting for the moment where I pulled out my father’s ashes and threw them into the sea it isn’t coming. One of the errands we’d done the day before was to settle up with the funeral agency. My mother asked when my father’s ashes would be returning and the funeral director said “Oh, they’re already here” as he rolled back his office chair and clipped the urn which was leaning against the wall on the floor with one of the chair wheels, giving a very satisfying clink.

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Thanks to everyone who sent kind words last week. They were incredibly helpful and nice to read. And thanks to everyone who’s been patient about the erratic schedule of the newsletter lately. This will be the last one of 2025. We’ll start back up, hopefully on our regular schedule in January. Which means…

🙋 Send me questions! I can’t answer questions if I don’t have them. And answering a question let’s me know that I’m helping someone, which is nice.

💰 If you enjoy my newsletter please consider “subscribing” for $2/mo. You get exactly the same shit you get for free, but it’s a nice thing to do if you can.

🎉 However you celebrate this time of year, and with whomever you choose to celebrate it with, please know that I love you. And I wish you happiness. Things may suck, but you don’t.

🍉 Please consider donating to the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund. If we’re going to celebrate the birth of Jesus, we should stop bombing the place where it happened.

🏳️‍⚧️ Please consider donating to Trans Lifeline. And if there is a trans person in your life, please let them know they are loved, and they are here, and the world is so much better because they are here.

mprindle writes: The Texas Attorney General sued five major television manufacturers, accusing them of illegally collecting their users' data by secretly recording what they watch using Automated Content Recognition (ACR) technology. The lawsuits target Sony, Samsung, LG, and China-based companies Hisense and TCL Technology Group Corporation. Attorney General Ken Paxton's office also highlighted "serious concerns" about the two Chinese companies being required to follow China's National Security Law, which could give the Chinese government access to U.S. consumers' data. According to complaints filed this Monday in Texas state courts, the TV makers can allegedly use ACR technology to capture screenshots of television displays every 500 milliseconds, monitor the users' viewing activity in real time, and send this information back to the companies' servers without the users' knowledge or consent.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.