The unimportant news thread

Started by Lethevich, March 05, 2008, 07:14:50 AM

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SimonNZ

Quote from: greg on July 17, 2019, 04:42:59 PM
Ok. Maybe not the best example since it was somewhat small scale and not really impactful.


Not the best example of censorship because not censorship.

greg

Quote from: SimonNZ on July 17, 2019, 05:15:14 PM
Not the best example of censorship because not censorship.
Not if you have a different definition.

You can self-censor. Or a bookstore can plan to sell books but later decide not to in order to censor what they are willing to sell (what they approve, basically). If you are stuck to defining censorship in only much more extreme cases (like only legal scenarios), then right, it isn't censorship.
Wagie wagie get back in the cagie

greg

Demoted by University for Views on Gender, Professor Sues

https://www.theepochtimes.com/demoted-by-university-for-views-on-gender-professor-sues_3005176.html



No room for debate. Just enforcement and financial loss, I guess.
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greg

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/kyoto-animation-studio-cultural-impact-and-loss-opinion/index.html

Wondering how many people have heard about what happened to Kyoto Animation studios. Apparently it has been on the news channels, being the worst mass murder in Japan in the last 20 years.

A really bad target to pick, in so many ways. They've made several shows that I watched 10 years ago that I think about nearly every day. And they are typically known for being second best only to Studio Ghibli when it comes to animation quality and also are known for being one of the few studios that pays its animators fair salaries.


Anyone who wants to donate (they got $1.7 million in donations in just three days, going way past their original goal):
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-kyoani-heal
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drogulus

     In India's Assam State, Residents Of River Islands Face Uncertainty Over Citizenship

Residents of Assam must submit paperwork — birth certificates, high school diplomas and other documents — to prove their citizenship. But literacy rates are low, and poverty runs high. Many people find it difficult to provide those documents.

Last year, the state government issued a draft NRC list, and some 4 million people living in Assam who thought they were Indian citizens were left off. This comes against a backdrop of efforts by India's central government to pass a bill that would effectively grant citizenship to many other undocumented immigrants, except if they are Muslim.


     See, there's more than one way to do "it". You can "you're not a citizen, get out" or you can "You're a Muslim, you're not a citizen". In this case being poor and illiterate isn't enough to de-citizen you, you have to be Muslim, too.
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Florestan

Quote from: drogulus on July 21, 2019, 07:19:01 AM
     In India's Assam State, Residents Of River Islands Face Uncertainty Over Citizenship

Residents of Assam must submit paperwork — birth certificates, high school diplomas and other documents — to prove their citizenship. But literacy rates are low, and poverty runs high. Many people find it difficult to provide those documents.

Last year, the state government issued a draft NRC list, and some 4 million people living in Assam who thought they were Indian citizens were left off. This comes against a backdrop of efforts by India's central government to pass a bill that would effectively grant citizenship to many other undocumented immigrants, except if they are Muslim.


     See, there's more than one way to do "it". You can "you're not a citizen, get out" or you can "You're a Muslim, you're not a citizen". In this case being poor and illiterate isn't enough to de-citizen you, you have to be Muslim, too.

Once upon a time, there were no IDs, no citizenship, no nothing. Once upon a time, one could have lived one's entire life, from the craddle to the grave, without ever meeting a state official. Buf we've come a long way from those dark times. In our modern, enlightened, progressive era we are watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. 

Sieg heil, Progress! Sieg heil, Liberalism! Sieg heil, Democracy!
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

drogulus

#3107
Quote from: Florestan on July 21, 2019, 08:31:36 AM
Once upon a time, there were no IDs, no citizenship, no nothing. Once upon a time, one could have lived one's entire life, from the craddle to the grave, without ever meeting a state official. Buf we've come a long way from those dark times. In our modern, enlightened, progressive era we are watched, inspected, spied upon, directed, law-driven, numbered, regulated, enrolled, indoctrinated, preached at, controlled, checked, estimated, valued, censured, commanded, by creatures who have neither the right nor the wisdom nor the virtue to do so. To be GOVERNED is to be at every operation, at every transaction noted, registered, counted, taxed, stamped, measured, numbered, assessed, licensed, authorized, admonished, prevented, forbidden, reformed, corrected, punished. It is, under pretext of public utility, and in the name of the general interest, to be place under contribution, drilled, fleeced, exploited, monopolized, extorted from, squeezed, hoaxed, robbed; then, at the slightest resistance, the first word of complaint, to be repressed, fined, vilified, harassed, hunted down, abused, clubbed, disarmed, bound, choked, imprisoned, judged, condemned, shot, deported, sacrificed, sold, betrayed; and to crown all, mocked, ridiculed, derided, outraged, dishonored. 

Sieg heil, Progress! Sieg heil, Liberalism! Sieg heil, Democracy!

     I never met a state official except going in and out of the country, or the post office. But then I live in a liberal country and I'm not a farmer.

     Now, come to think of it, I went to an IRS office last year. It had something to do with an inheritance. I went with my brother and we were yukking it up about something and the tax guy, who was used to dealing with normal consciousness of guilt people was acting puzzled and then got it. Incidentally, he was Chinese-American and after we did our business we said we were looking for a restaurant and he said something about how people often asked him if he knew a good Chinese restaurant and we laughed about that and as we were leaving I said "So, do you know any good Chinese restaurants?"

     It was just another day in liberal hell.
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Ken B

Quote from: drogulus on July 21, 2019, 12:08:07 PM
     I never met a state official except going in and out of the country, or the post office. But then I live in a liberal country and I'm not a farmer.

     Now, come to think of it, I went to an IRS office last year. It had something to do with an inheritance. I went with my brother and we were yukking it up about something and the tax guy, who was used to dealing with normal consciousness of guilt people was acting puzzled and then got it. Incidentally, he was Chinese-American and after we did our business we said we were looking for a restaurant and he said something about how people often asked him if he knew a good Chinese restaurant and we laughed about that and as we were leaving I said "So, do you know any good Chinese restaurants?"

     It was just another day in liberal hell.

Such a sheltered  life. Never taking a driver's test, never meeting a school teacher, a health inspector, or a cop. Rude of you to ignore the trash collectors though, they work hard and a polite nod isn't so hard.

drogulus

Quote from: Ken B on July 21, 2019, 12:42:16 PM
Such a sheltered  life. Never taking a driver's test, never meeting a school teacher, a health inspector, or a cop. Rude of you to ignore the trash collectors though, they work hard and a polite nod isn't so hard.

     Oh, those guys. I have met some of them. I don't find them particularly oppressive or threatening, or features of liberalism, or hell.
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Karl Henning

Quote from: greg on July 20, 2019, 04:47:39 PM
https://www.cnn.com/style/article/kyoto-animation-studio-cultural-impact-and-loss-opinion/index.html

Wondering how many people have heard about what happened to Kyoto Animation studios. Apparently it has been on the news channels, being the worst mass murder in Japan in the last 20 years.

I heard, although I have not followed the story closely.
Karl Henning, Ph.D.
Composer & Clarinetist
Boston MA
http://www.karlhenning.com/
[Matisse] was interested neither in fending off opposition,
nor in competing for the favor of wayward friends.
His only competition was with himself. — Françoise Gilot

Todd

Mush-brained lefties (ie, lefties) have a new form of imperialism to root for: Do the Brazil Amazon fires justify environmental interventionism?
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

Jo498

#3112
That's "White Man's Burden", 2nd (or 4th) edition, isn't it?

(I am not saying that it is wrong, just that one should openly admit what it is.)
Tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos, dans une chambre.
- Blaise Pascal

Todd

Quote from: Jo498 on August 31, 2019, 11:41:42 PMThat's "White Man's Burden", 2nd (or 4th) edition, isn't it?


4th. 

One would think if environmental degradation were truly a serious problem, then taxes (including tariffs, as it happens) that reduce consumption, along with massive wealth redistribution to less developed countries to enhance economic growth and equality in said countries would be vigorously pursued and advocated, with full throated vigor, by self-styled green types.  I think it's more likely that the intelligentsia will end up embracing an approach more in line with the esteemed Mr Douglas.  Since I live in the US, it won't directly impact me, so it's all good.  Now if you'll excuse me, I need to start shopping for a new 75 inch QLED TV.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

drogulus


     The Pats just signed Antonio Brown. How is this not an evil plot by the Hooded One?
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greg

Wagie wagie get back in the cagie

Todd

Quote from: greg on September 19, 2019, 07:28:39 PMIslam is right about women


Perhaps, but it's definitely wrong about bacon.
The universe is change; life is opinion. - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

People would rather believe than know - E.O. Wilson

Propaganda death ensemble - Tom Araya

greg

Wagie wagie get back in the cagie

amw

#3118
Quote from: Todd on September 01, 2019, 07:52:53 AM
One would think if environmental degradation were truly a serious problem, then taxes (including tariffs, as it happens) that reduce consumption, along with massive wealth redistribution to less developed countries to enhance economic growth and equality in said countries would be vigorously pursued and advocated, with full throated vigor, by self-styled green types.
That is indeed the position of almost all actual left parties (as opposed to liberals masquerading as leftists such as the DSA). Along with eg eliminating the US military, which is the world's largest individual polluter, and nationalizing or breaking up companies like Apple and Microsoft that chew through the world's stocks of rare earth minerals in order to produce electronic devices that fail within three years.

Quotethink it's more likely that the intelligentsia will end up embracing an approach more in line with the esteemed Mr Douglas.  Since I live in the US, it won't directly impact me, so it's all good.  Now if you'll excuse me, I need to start shopping for a new 75 inch QLED TV.
Thought experiment: why do almost all media outlets in the USA devote so much more attention to the Green New Deal and Greta Thunberg than, say, any proposal to redistribute wealth to the global south? (For that matter, why does the USA maintain strict sanctions on a number of oil producing countries that prevent them from diversifying their energy outputs?)

Also, this is probably obvious to all non-conservatives, but the Bolsonaro administration itself only exists because of imperialism, specifically the collaboration between members of the Brazilian judiciary and American corporate interests to overthrow and imprison any presidential candidate who posed a threat to Bolsonaro (and his right-wing party more generally). I generally disagree with him politically but Glenn Greenwald's work uncovering this has for once been unimpeachable. The role played by American evangelical missionaries to convert vast numbers of Brazilians (and people throughout the global south more generally) with the explicit support and funding of the US government also cannot be overlooked. Lawrence Douglas's article represents just another facet of this ongoing imperialist assault on Brazil and its natural resources, which as far as he and Trump alike are concerned, exist for the benefit of first world countries. The only actual way to "save the amazon" is to kick the USA, Canada, Europe and all their corporate interests out of it. But anyway.

André