zx3 @zx3@driveinsaturday.org

A STATEMENT OF INTENT:
the purpose of the Drive-in is to disseminate subversion, create community, and spread joy.
we live in a time of negative chaos and authoritarian nonsense. we are watching the Great Western Machine die from the inside, and its death throes are causing real harm to those we love. there is no accounting for the damage that those in power will do before they are stopped. it is little comfort to intuit that change is coming, because change is incremental, and inevitably arrives later than needed. Until then we must fortify ourselves.
how do we do this? by reminding each other that there is no such thing as a Perfect System. all things made by humans are imperfect and break when pressure is applied to the right places. laughter, pointed criticism and derision is one way to apply this pressure.
coming together on a regular basis as friends, comrades and lovers is another. we remind each other that we are not alone in this howling vortex, that each one of us is a source of light and strength for each other.
lastly is joy, which we need, which we deserve. we deserve joy even in times of crazy darkness, even when our little efforts and silly games seem pointless. it is joy that makes it all worthwhile.
the Drive-in is a haven for these things, if nothing else. it would be folly to declare our puny efforts to be integral. but speaking for myself only, when i read about the ongoing horrible shit going on in the world, i start looking forward to DiS--putting together the playlist, choosing the movie and the videos and putting together the interstitials and picking out the pre-show materials, hoping it makes those who attend a little happier, feel a little bit less alone out there. i look forward to seeing my friends.
i don't mean to inflate the Drive-in's importance. i don't mean to imply that its existence overrides the necessity of critical activism, which i need to carry out more of on my part.
but i want to make sure that everyone knows the intent by which i and others continue to produce Drive-in content. we are in this for the long haul.
DiS has always been, and will always be, a refuge and a place of kinship and love.
Long Live the Fighters.

i wonder of the "Transformers: The Movie" soundtrack ever gets tired of saving my fucking LIFE

https://youtu.be/4tc6UbEYI4M

RasPi's become even more cop-friendly:

https://www.engadget.com/sony-investment-will-put-ai-chips-inside-raspberry-pi-boards-083503462.html

WELP time for bed *takes handful of pills* you guys have fun in there while i go pass out

oily rainbow around the moon. how'd it get there

butter or guns?

guns that shoot butter. quandary solved forever. NEXT

i believe in the Users.

i believe in the Grid.

i believe that in there, in the Digital Frontier, is our destiny.

i believe that corporations, brands, and politicians have no place there.

i believe queer folk, trans people, internet weirdos and techies lay proper claim to the Grid, as we were its earliest natives.

i believe in our ability to use the digital world to improve the real world, and vice versa.

i believe in spite of it all. tell me why i should panic about the latest crisis and i will believe twice as hard.

we are the ones we have been waiting for.

so how do you feel about fanservice?

A: our collective childhoods have been strip-mined again and again in the name of endlessly regurgitating successful IP that drowns out whatever creativity was left in the entertainment industry, and movies that mindlessly feed us little bits and pieces of things we're already familiar with just to make us salivate on cue like Pavlov's dogs should be shunned by anyone who appreciates quality in their media diet.

B: *long, shuddering exhale, as if fighting back the urge to strangle someone* Listen, you...you cretin. You shell of a man. You wretch of an excuse of a human being. I live in the year of Our Lord Twenty Twenty Three, and in every. Single. DAY. some new existential nightmare is thrust upon me unwillingly, as if it were a flaming turd dropping from a great height directly into my morning's Cheerios. I have lived through a century's worth of crises in the last twenty years. My mental landscape would make Hieronymus Bosch projectile vomit. I have learned not to think too much about the future. I WILL THEREFORE PARTAKE OF WHATEVER GIVES ME SMALL AMOUNTS OF JOY AND SO HELP ME GOD NO DEGREE OF SHAME WILL STOP ME. I will suck the last drops of dopamine from any experience like a starving hyena slurping marrow from a bone. Have I, at last, made myself clear to you? YOU, WHO STAND UPON THE DUNGHEAP OF THE WORLD AND MAKE DEMANDS OF ME? BUT ENOUGH TALK! HAVE AT YOU! *frenzied screaming, wet sounds of rocks hitting meat*

(If your answer is B, you should go see the Super Mario Bros. movie right now. like, NOW. go, my friend. vaya con dios.)