Marcela’s weekly digest: 13th December

Hi, I’m Marcela: I’m a comedian, I live Brooklyn, and I really like to tell people how to feel about the news. After wowing zoomers all over on TikTok by giving them news with a sense of humour and anarchy, I decided to start a weekly Sunday newsletter to share my feelings about more news. 

My weekly newsletter has evolved into this beautiful Tuesday weekly news column for shado which also covers international news. I hope the newsletter keeps you informed and makes you laugh a little. We live in hell and I believe humour helps keep this place a little bit cooler.

Today I’ll be sharing my feelings on The New School adjunct educators’ strike, the attempted merger of Kroger and Albertsons, Eric Adams being a terrible landlord (redundant, I know), and China reducing its zero COVID restriction.

Onto the news…

News that made me bring up Marie Antoinette

On November 16th, adjunct educators of The New School, a university in so-called New York City, went on strike for reasons all workers go on strike: low wages, bad working conditions, and employers who do not care.

No one has ever gone on strike for being treated well, just like no one has ever gotten high from eating a CBD edible. Yet for some reason, employers act like it’s unreasonable for workers to not want to be exploited and people get angry with me for refusing to ingest CBD.

What reason could this be? Is it because employers want workers to simply shut up and accept exploitation? The answer is yes, no reason to wonder anymore. I, however, am still wondering why people will just not accept that I don’t like CBD.

Since exploiters are going to exploit, The New School threatened to cut off the striking workers’ wages and health insurance instead of listening to their demands. The New School relies on the adjunct teachers to teach 90% of their classes precisely to exploit their labour. So adjunct teachers asking for more money were meddling with the administration’s villainous capitalist plans.

The New School administration’s villainous plan is every capitalist’s villainous plan: forcing workers who do the actual labour to work at the verge of starvation while the president of The New School makes 1.2 million dollars and gets free housing. The New School might call itself new but its administration is taking old ideas from Marie Antoinette.

Thankfully the students of The New School were not following Louis XVI’s playbook and decided to take over The New School University Center until the striking adjunct workers’ demands were met.

I say, thankfully, because the university was trying to teach these students that workers don’t matter, but the students were like, this is a lesson we are not going to learn, we know a villain when we see one.

The solidarity of the students and workers, who want to use The New School as an educational institution, against the administrators, who want to use the university as a piggy bank, led to the union reaching a tentative agreement with the striking workers.

Proving once again that solidarity is the only thing that stands between us and exploiters, like CBD is the only thing that stands between me and getting high.

News that made me compare grocery stores to CBD

In case food isn’t expensive enough for most people who live in the so-called United States of America, two large grocery stores, Albertsons and Krogers, are attempting to merge to create one source of exploitation. I feel like this is just another time corporations are answering the question is there a limit to how evil we can get? with a resounding no.

Albertsons and Kroger are claiming their merger is for good and not evil because corporations are as treacherous as whoever convinced you CBD works. The two companies told the Senate that the merger would allow them to compete with Amazon and Walmart, leading to cost savings, which would be passed on to the customers. Surprisingly the pants of the person telling these lies did not immediately combust because this is a lie no one would believe unless they take CBD to get high.

Kroger and Albertsons do want to compete with Amazon and Walmart, but not in the ways they claim. They don’t want to have more power in the market to improve things for the consumer. Kroger and Albertsons want more power in the marketplace so they can exploit workers and consumers and pass the savings gained from exploitation to their owners.

Okay, these two grocery stores are definitely worse than the people who tricked you into taking CBD. The worst that CBD can do is keep you sober, not oppress you.

News that made me call the mayor of so-called New York City an evil overachiever

Eric Adams, the mayor of so-called New York City and a man that I’m still trying to figure out who voted for, is a landlord. Eric Adams, a former cop, didn’t think being a cop was bad enough. He had to add landlord to his list of crimes because, when it comes to being awful, Eric Adams is an overachiever.

Since Eric Adams was elected I’ve been asking everyone who I meet whether they voted for him because I honestly wanted to know why they did it? I haven’t found anyone who has admitted to voting for Eric Adams. 

Based on this story, I’m realising the reason why I haven’t found anyone who voted for Eric Adams is because I don’t talk to landlords or cops or people who like them unless I’m yelling at them.I also want you to understand that I’m a comedian and not a political survey so these are just my feelings.

When I saw a former cop who wants to be paid in cryptocurrency, I was like, yuck gross no. However, the people who love the exploitation and oppression a landlord/cop can bring to the table were like, yummy. The people who voted for Eric Adams voted for maximum oppression and he has not been a disappointment.

Eric Adams isn’t just a terrible mayor, he is also a terrible landlord who makes his tenants live with rats! He is facing a fine of $300 for creating a rat safe haven in his rental property in Brooklyn. He is contesting this fine, because of course he is. No landlord has ever accepted they have done anything wrong because being a landlord is doing something wrong.

Also, Eric Adams thought he could get out of the summons for his ratty situation because he is too busy being mayor. I’m happy Eric Adams was forced to defend himself being a landlord because anytime Eric Adams is prevented from carrying out his mayoral duties, the people who live in this city are a little safer.

News that made me tell you to wear a mask

The Chinese government has relaxed its zero COVID policy after countrywide protests from people of China who feel like putting people in a quarantine camp or locking them in their home is a little over the top. We all know when the government uses the word “camp” it does not mean a fun place like a band camp where nerdy teens get to play the trombone without being bullied.

When the government says camp, they mean a camp where you will be bullied consistently. As a teen who went to band camp to play my trombone without the fear of ridicule, I do not like a camp run by bullies. So I completely understand why people protested against the zero COVID rules that involve a government camp.

Now before you come for me and say, hey Marcela, why do you want to turn China into Florida, a place where politicians refuse to accept COVID exists, hear me out.

I want COVID restrictions to prevent the virus from spreading because not doing so is  ableist.

I, however, do not think preventing COVID from spreading should include sending people away to a non-fun camp. There must be something in between locking people in their apartment and letting thousands of maskless people share COVID filled air indoors.

I’m not a doctor but I’ve read, masking while indoors, testing regularly, contact tracing, and not licking poles can help prevent the spread of COVID. So maybe we should all do this instead of thinking there are only two options: non-fun camp or breathing in COVID with thousands of maskless people at a Taylor Swift concert.

News that made me ask once again who voted for Eric Adams 

Last week on TikTok I talked about Eric Adams’ very evil plan to involuntarily hospitalise homeless people:

@feelthenewswithmarcela Eric Adams is awful and landlords are awful and we should all get together and boo them so they can go away #landlord #ericadams #housingisahumanright ♬ original sound – Feel the News

That’s it for the news, see ya next week,

Marcela