Rec
for the most part, people do the best they can given their circumstances and just want to live how they have been conditioned to believe is right. don’t fault someone for performing how they are expected to within a system that is flawed.
changes come from within, and the alienation of the unknowing victims of institutions dissolves collective power and makes change harder to achieve. forgive individuals, hold power to accountability.
changes come from within, and the alienation of the unknowing victims of institutions dissolves collective power and makes change harder to achieve. forgive individuals, hold power to accountability.
Jul 18, 2024
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Shoot this reminds me of how a certain group of individuals I know say they support trump bc of xyz college they went to….like the college is the circumstance so they can’t think any different 🧐🧐🧐
Aug 4, 2024
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Rec
✊I fully acknowledge my privilege this recommendation. I have the privilege to be able to build bridges because, though I am able to be dismissed because I'm a femme-presenting woman, I am much less viscerally threatened in general because I am white.
That being said, I feel like I have turned a new leaf in that I largely refuse to contribute to in-fighting discussions. In my mind, we are all in a race against the 1% but they have tricked us into thinking we are in a race with each other. I have decided to let go of the race. I have decided that whether they fear, pity, hate, whatever me, I'm going to value "the opposition" as people and when they are able to figure out who we should be actually fighting, I will be there happy to provide resources and supplies that I have in the aid of this goal. Until then, I'll be around.
The isolation that has been bred since long before I was born has just destroyed a sense of community, something that I yearn so much for. I know that people do things that bring me harm. For instance, I still take many COVID precautions and am part of two COVID safe communities. However, I know that the large majority of the population no longer cares and does, unwillingly or not, participate in a lack of overall health safety for me and my family, as well as their own safety. But I'm not going to isolate, I'm going to take precautions to continue to be part of community. I believe folding people in together is the only way forward.
My brother is a huge fan of Elon Musk, which is so gross and awful. I used to shut down conversations about this but I've decided to be open, honest, and present with him about this. I check Elon's behavior to him, let him know that I believe his actions are on purpose and that my brother is making nazi sympathizer choices with his thoughts and actions. I also let him know that when it's ready to fight, I want him to be on our side, which he states he would be (idk). That's all I can do. Keep communication open. Keep connection open. Make these sympathizers not fear "the others" because I am willing to participate and provide and talk.
Now, none of this means I'm willing to lay down as terrible beliefs ravage our society. I am still able to be critical of others choices and I will defend myself and my family against harm if need be. I just believe that the core of most of the harm and violence comes from the top. I believe that people are emotionally thrown for a loop when they come to a conversation with fear-based hostility and find community-based hospitality in response.
I will continue to advocate for the people who are being brutalized our community. I believe, however, that they need to hear us first. They need to see us as human, and I think part of that is showing them that we see them as human. Yes, flawed scared scapegoating humans that need to be held responsible for their actions if and when they participate in violence. I'm not talking about conceding or finding "common ground" in our beliefs beyond the basic humans need food water shelter (and love if they're about that). I may acknowledge their fear, the influences that they have been under, and the things surround their hate. I will try to come at it at as loving as a place as I can, always reminding myself that they were once babies shaped to view the world as this big scary thing filled with monsters, taught by the actual monsters who want to control everything.
Again, I'm only recommending this if you have the energy to do so. I think a lot of people have tried for years and then get burned out. I get that, I think getting stronger within your own community would help grow the ability to then reach outside and communicate. At the same time, my friend and I were talking about how some people are just "front of house" and some are "back of house" and the front of house people can be the ones interacting with society and the back of house can build the inside. We don't all have to do everything, let's find out strengths and build on those to get through, and maybe even past, the shit show we find ourselves living in today.
That being said, I feel like I have turned a new leaf in that I largely refuse to contribute to in-fighting discussions. In my mind, we are all in a race against the 1% but they have tricked us into thinking we are in a race with each other. I have decided to let go of the race. I have decided that whether they fear, pity, hate, whatever me, I'm going to value "the opposition" as people and when they are able to figure out who we should be actually fighting, I will be there happy to provide resources and supplies that I have in the aid of this goal. Until then, I'll be around.
The isolation that has been bred since long before I was born has just destroyed a sense of community, something that I yearn so much for. I know that people do things that bring me harm. For instance, I still take many COVID precautions and am part of two COVID safe communities. However, I know that the large majority of the population no longer cares and does, unwillingly or not, participate in a lack of overall health safety for me and my family, as well as their own safety. But I'm not going to isolate, I'm going to take precautions to continue to be part of community. I believe folding people in together is the only way forward.
My brother is a huge fan of Elon Musk, which is so gross and awful. I used to shut down conversations about this but I've decided to be open, honest, and present with him about this. I check Elon's behavior to him, let him know that I believe his actions are on purpose and that my brother is making nazi sympathizer choices with his thoughts and actions. I also let him know that when it's ready to fight, I want him to be on our side, which he states he would be (idk). That's all I can do. Keep communication open. Keep connection open. Make these sympathizers not fear "the others" because I am willing to participate and provide and talk.
Now, none of this means I'm willing to lay down as terrible beliefs ravage our society. I am still able to be critical of others choices and I will defend myself and my family against harm if need be. I just believe that the core of most of the harm and violence comes from the top. I believe that people are emotionally thrown for a loop when they come to a conversation with fear-based hostility and find community-based hospitality in response.
I will continue to advocate for the people who are being brutalized our community. I believe, however, that they need to hear us first. They need to see us as human, and I think part of that is showing them that we see them as human. Yes, flawed scared scapegoating humans that need to be held responsible for their actions if and when they participate in violence. I'm not talking about conceding or finding "common ground" in our beliefs beyond the basic humans need food water shelter (and love if they're about that). I may acknowledge their fear, the influences that they have been under, and the things surround their hate. I will try to come at it at as loving as a place as I can, always reminding myself that they were once babies shaped to view the world as this big scary thing filled with monsters, taught by the actual monsters who want to control everything.
Again, I'm only recommending this if you have the energy to do so. I think a lot of people have tried for years and then get burned out. I get that, I think getting stronger within your own community would help grow the ability to then reach outside and communicate. At the same time, my friend and I were talking about how some people are just "front of house" and some are "back of house" and the front of house people can be the ones interacting with society and the back of house can build the inside. We don't all have to do everything, let's find out strengths and build on those to get through, and maybe even past, the shit show we find ourselves living in today.
Jan 31, 2025
Rec
🌎I am lucky to have had the circumstances in my life that has led me to question authority, not take things at face value, and to focus on building community to combat feelings of hopelessness. This has been long and arduous and only possible because I didn't have to deal with other resources in my life being scarce.
Scarcity creates a survival-mode and flight/fight/freeze/fawn are the ways people live within that mode. It is near impossible to think philosophically or critically when you are being provided scarcity.
I think there is some amount of innate desire of humans to be taken care of right? In an animalistic way. The unnatural and inhumane use of capitalism has for so many people created a gap within that desire of being taken care of and actually being taken care of.
I believe that the combination of this survival mode/fight-flight-etc. and the chasm that many people feel of that intense unmet desire to be taken care of has led to the situation that we find ourselves in today. These people were not born to be these fearful, distrustful, paranoid, cagey people. They were babies who needed to be taken care of. They were babies and children who, through circumstances outside of their control, were not taken care of. Yes, as adults they "should" be able to make better decisions and how one grows up "shouldn't" dictate what they do to others. But that's an easy thing to say when you have those resources and have *no idea* what it feels like to have not had them. This is pretty much a mixture of the other responses, because compassion and knowing that people are hurting is basically what makes me not mad at them. I get frustrated and I wish the circumstances were different, and I will defend myself or others if need be from violent behavior, but I do not hate these people. I am mad at the selfishness that has been able to be bred in this society through hundreds of years.
Scarcity creates a survival-mode and flight/fight/freeze/fawn are the ways people live within that mode. It is near impossible to think philosophically or critically when you are being provided scarcity.
I think there is some amount of innate desire of humans to be taken care of right? In an animalistic way. The unnatural and inhumane use of capitalism has for so many people created a gap within that desire of being taken care of and actually being taken care of.
I believe that the combination of this survival mode/fight-flight-etc. and the chasm that many people feel of that intense unmet desire to be taken care of has led to the situation that we find ourselves in today. These people were not born to be these fearful, distrustful, paranoid, cagey people. They were babies who needed to be taken care of. They were babies and children who, through circumstances outside of their control, were not taken care of. Yes, as adults they "should" be able to make better decisions and how one grows up "shouldn't" dictate what they do to others. But that's an easy thing to say when you have those resources and have *no idea* what it feels like to have not had them. This is pretty much a mixture of the other responses, because compassion and knowing that people are hurting is basically what makes me not mad at them. I get frustrated and I wish the circumstances were different, and I will defend myself or others if need be from violent behavior, but I do not hate these people. I am mad at the selfishness that has been able to be bred in this society through hundreds of years.
Jan 28, 2025
Rec
🤝it’s genuinely very hard for me to be mad at another person—unless they are genuinely being unreasonable and deliberately hurtful towards me. but even so, they usually have their own reasons
everyone’s allowed to live differently and make different decisions based on how they grew up and grew into the person they are, and i think understanding how inherently different we all are from each other is actually very important—not enough people grapple with that, we don’t actually sit down and comprehend that before reacting and objecting other people
i also think we need to be more comfortable with saying “i understand why you think this is the case, i just don’t agree with you, and that’s totally ok”
everyone’s allowed to live differently and make different decisions based on how they grew up and grew into the person they are, and i think understanding how inherently different we all are from each other is actually very important—not enough people grapple with that, we don’t actually sit down and comprehend that before reacting and objecting other people
i also think we need to be more comfortable with saying “i understand why you think this is the case, i just don’t agree with you, and that’s totally ok”
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Jun 2, 2025
Rec
📴I consume a lot of music regularly, and a huge part of keeping a fresh diet of new listens going is having enough sources of recommendations that aren’t an algorithm that either 1) reinforces your existing listening patterns, keeping you stagnant in your tastes, or 2) platforms whoever paid enough to push their product to the top, serving you something that may not inherently be of inferior quality, but may not align with your tastes, may not be exciting beyond just being a new release, and realigns your current listening habits to be more in line with what the average user on the platform is also listening to — which socially might have benefits but which creates a homogeneity of consumption that can become bland since you’re listening to something really just because it’s the next product on the assembly line to have its public moment and not because anything about the music actually captured your attention. the current landscape of streaming is designed to keep you at an all you can eat buffet where you take what’s served to you, and as a result a lot of us have forgotten how to look at a menu and order.
so what does taking a more active role in your own music curation look like? for me, it’s meant not using streaming as a primary listening platform. I mostly use my local Apple Music library on my phone that I curate with the vestigial iTunes Library framework that’s still a part of Apple Music on my laptop. probably going to find an alternative soon since apple seems to be cutting integration progressively. I like this method because it forces me to choose what to sync to the limited storage space I have, forcing me to take inventory of what I actually listen to and what I can offload. the files I get are mostly from Bandcamp or Soulseek depending on whether it’s available for purchase or entirely unavailable online (as is the case for a lot of electronic music that was on vinyl only, which is where soulseek comes in clutch). I also have freedom here to change the ID3 tags to better sort and organize, rate, change track info, and track my own listening data.
Bandcamp and other music purchasing platforms are great because 1) it reshapes my relationship to music away from consumerism and back towards curation. I have to pay actual money for this thing now if I want to use it, so i’m forced to consider its value (usually i’ll stream a release first to gauge my interest). 2) having to spend money helps me to course out my meals so to speak, as i’ll buy a few releases i’ve accumulated in my cart over the month and cash out on Bandcamp Friday when 100% of my money is actually getting to the artist (TOMORROW IS BANDCAMP FRIDAY BTW!!!), and between purchases I can actually chew and savor and digest my last orders, they don’t get swept up in the deluge of new releases. my plate is full until i’m done and then I order more. also for the times of the year like now when new music isn’t coming out as regularly I take time to find older music that I would normally overlook while keeping up with new drops. currently very into early 80s/late 70s music with early digital production, kinda stuff that would evolve into synthpop and dance music.
so how do you know what to order? for me, I’m getting recs through trusted curation platforms. whether it’s bandcamp daily, y’all lovely folks here on PI.FYI, friends, or most importantly musicians who I follow on socials that share their tastes through posts, stories, playlists on steaming, interviews, etc. I like this last one especially because it’s kind of like a musical game of telephone. if I like an artist and they share their interests and influences it’s like every layer in this process is stretching my palate further from the sound that I was originally interested in and into a new territory that has some shared DNA but would never have been recommended to me by an algo because there’s no shared category or label between them, only the musical influence and interpretation of it made by the artist. as an example, I was a huge Skrillex stan, he signed KOAN Sound to his label, they collab with Asa who collabs with Sorrow, Sorrow takes huge influence from Burial, Burial makes some ambient adjacent stuff and takes huge influence from 90s rave music and drum and bass and 2000s rnb, now i’m listening to Brandy - All in Me, William Basinski, Aphex Twin, none on whom would get recommended by Spotify to me from Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites.
LAST thing i’ll say — because in yappin about this i’m realizing how actually passionate about this subject I am: MAKE LISTS! playlists are cool, but they can flatten your music into vague categories of “vibes” and “aesthetics” and encourage picking one-off songs from artists that you never form an active audience relationship with. I make a practice of making my own year end lists of top 25 albums (plus some honorable recs and top individual songs) and keeping them in a notes doc that I regularly update and rearrange over the course of the year. this forces me to consider the actual relationship i’m forming with what i’ve ordered for myself. did I like it in the moment but it didn’t have staying power? is it slowly growing on me? it also encourages taking albums as a whole. maybe I liked one or two tracks a lot but the rest wasn't resonating. that’s ok! maybe I rank it lower but now i’ve actually taken time to consider it, it’s in my library, and maybe (quite a few cases for me) something I ranked like bottom 5 albums becomes a retroactive favorite from that year as my tastes evolve. also 25 albums to take with me from each year is really more than you'd think, i struggle sometimes to even find 25 that I formed a true connection with. I think the biggest thing the itunes era ruined that led into now is the single-ification of music, the ability to separate the hits from the deep cuts. albums are meant to be taken as a whole, and then once you've really sat with the whole you can find what actually stuck. even then I like to keep the whole around because soooo often i’ll write off a track that yeeeears later I come to love. trust the artist, they made it like they did for a reason.
aaannyyyywayy TLDR: get recs organically, be more active in deciding your listening patterns, fr*cken pay artists yall, trust the artist embrace the album, really consider what you consume
so what does taking a more active role in your own music curation look like? for me, it’s meant not using streaming as a primary listening platform. I mostly use my local Apple Music library on my phone that I curate with the vestigial iTunes Library framework that’s still a part of Apple Music on my laptop. probably going to find an alternative soon since apple seems to be cutting integration progressively. I like this method because it forces me to choose what to sync to the limited storage space I have, forcing me to take inventory of what I actually listen to and what I can offload. the files I get are mostly from Bandcamp or Soulseek depending on whether it’s available for purchase or entirely unavailable online (as is the case for a lot of electronic music that was on vinyl only, which is where soulseek comes in clutch). I also have freedom here to change the ID3 tags to better sort and organize, rate, change track info, and track my own listening data.
Bandcamp and other music purchasing platforms are great because 1) it reshapes my relationship to music away from consumerism and back towards curation. I have to pay actual money for this thing now if I want to use it, so i’m forced to consider its value (usually i’ll stream a release first to gauge my interest). 2) having to spend money helps me to course out my meals so to speak, as i’ll buy a few releases i’ve accumulated in my cart over the month and cash out on Bandcamp Friday when 100% of my money is actually getting to the artist (TOMORROW IS BANDCAMP FRIDAY BTW!!!), and between purchases I can actually chew and savor and digest my last orders, they don’t get swept up in the deluge of new releases. my plate is full until i’m done and then I order more. also for the times of the year like now when new music isn’t coming out as regularly I take time to find older music that I would normally overlook while keeping up with new drops. currently very into early 80s/late 70s music with early digital production, kinda stuff that would evolve into synthpop and dance music.
so how do you know what to order? for me, I’m getting recs through trusted curation platforms. whether it’s bandcamp daily, y’all lovely folks here on PI.FYI, friends, or most importantly musicians who I follow on socials that share their tastes through posts, stories, playlists on steaming, interviews, etc. I like this last one especially because it’s kind of like a musical game of telephone. if I like an artist and they share their interests and influences it’s like every layer in this process is stretching my palate further from the sound that I was originally interested in and into a new territory that has some shared DNA but would never have been recommended to me by an algo because there’s no shared category or label between them, only the musical influence and interpretation of it made by the artist. as an example, I was a huge Skrillex stan, he signed KOAN Sound to his label, they collab with Asa who collabs with Sorrow, Sorrow takes huge influence from Burial, Burial makes some ambient adjacent stuff and takes huge influence from 90s rave music and drum and bass and 2000s rnb, now i’m listening to Brandy - All in Me, William Basinski, Aphex Twin, none on whom would get recommended by Spotify to me from Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites.
LAST thing i’ll say — because in yappin about this i’m realizing how actually passionate about this subject I am: MAKE LISTS! playlists are cool, but they can flatten your music into vague categories of “vibes” and “aesthetics” and encourage picking one-off songs from artists that you never form an active audience relationship with. I make a practice of making my own year end lists of top 25 albums (plus some honorable recs and top individual songs) and keeping them in a notes doc that I regularly update and rearrange over the course of the year. this forces me to consider the actual relationship i’m forming with what i’ve ordered for myself. did I like it in the moment but it didn’t have staying power? is it slowly growing on me? it also encourages taking albums as a whole. maybe I liked one or two tracks a lot but the rest wasn't resonating. that’s ok! maybe I rank it lower but now i’ve actually taken time to consider it, it’s in my library, and maybe (quite a few cases for me) something I ranked like bottom 5 albums becomes a retroactive favorite from that year as my tastes evolve. also 25 albums to take with me from each year is really more than you'd think, i struggle sometimes to even find 25 that I formed a true connection with. I think the biggest thing the itunes era ruined that led into now is the single-ification of music, the ability to separate the hits from the deep cuts. albums are meant to be taken as a whole, and then once you've really sat with the whole you can find what actually stuck. even then I like to keep the whole around because soooo often i’ll write off a track that yeeeears later I come to love. trust the artist, they made it like they did for a reason.
aaannyyyywayy TLDR: get recs organically, be more active in deciding your listening patterns, fr*cken pay artists yall, trust the artist embrace the album, really consider what you consume
Feb 29, 2024
Jun 4, 2025