Saturday, 20 January 2024

FROM this week’s news ON: politics & democracy, and international affairs [Note: Content Warning - links to reports on bigotry/hate, violence/abuse/war. Reader discretion is advised]

Note: CONTENT WARNING - some of this content is about upsetting, disturbing or triggering events & attitudes. Seek competent help - including professional - if you need it. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that linked articles may contains names and/or images of deceased people. READER CAUTION IS RECOMMENDED! For anyone distressed by anything in this post, or for any other reason considering seeking support, resources are available in Australia here, here, and here. In other nations, you will have to do an Internet search using terms such as “mental health support - <your nation>” (which, for instance, may lead to this, this, and this, in the USA, or this, this, and this, in France [biased towards English-language - my apologies]), or perhaps try https://www.befrienders.org/. 

Note: in my “from the news” posts, quotes are shown italicised and blue, my comments are in a different shade of blue, and “good” items are shown in green. I have loosely grouped the posts where such seemed reasonable, but that is subjective (i.e., my opinion - others are free to disagree), and challenging, as some posts belong in multiple “groups”.

From this week’s news on politics & democracy, and international affairs (note: I may continue to add links for a few days, possibly up to a week, after these are published), and noting the conflicts, listed here, for instance, and other global issues, such as those listed here, that may not have made it into this weeks news: 

 








  • “When it comes to housing, decentralisation shows that going up isn’t the only option”   https://www.thenewdaily.com.au/opinion/2024/01/15/decentralising-housing-solution   “Fifty years ago, the Whitlam government foresaw the problem of overcrowding in our major capitals and launched an innovative decentralisation plan.   As with many of his other policies – most notably, Medibank and what is now the NDIS – Gough was ahead of his time.   Lack of modern communications technology was the main obstacle facing its implementation ... The internet has solved the communications problem and COVID has shown us the way.   We no longer need to corral white collar workers in towering office blocks in soulless central business districts – requiring them to spend hours each day commuting to and from work.   It’s time to revisit the Whitlam decentralisation plan”   I agree with the sentiment that high density is often due to lack of choice, and note that it often comes with protections we do not have. I strongly agree that we need affordable options to suit people’s preferences - and I add that the range has to include tiny homes. I also add that overcrowding is a particular problem - especially when combined with bigotry   “Renters know they are the losers in Australia’s housing system – and as their anger rises, so will their protest vote”   https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/jan/16/the-greens-rental-price-cap-policy-labor-government-anthony-albanese  


  • “What’s it worth to work from home? For some, it’s as much as one-third of their wage”   https://theconversation.com/whats-it-worth-to-work-from-home-for-some-its-as-much-as-one-third-of-their-wage-217554   “A significant proportion of Australian workers – about one-fifth – would be prepared to sacrifice between 16% and 33% of their salaries for the right to work from home, which works out at A$12,000 to $24,000 of those workers’ salaries”   See also   “This company has worked remotely for 1,000 days. Here's what they have learned | SBS News”   https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/this-company-has-worked-remotely-for-1000-days-heres-what-they-have-learned/xfblt9zkl   “the findings only cover so-called knowledge workers, or those who work online, not retail staff, factories or many essential services.   And for many bosses, tension remains around trusting workers they can't see.”   The research covered the company and 200 others, identifying blocks to productivity, and that “Almost all (99 per cent) of executives agreed work will become more distributed in the future”   Remote work will become the norm - when managers become competent enough as humans to get over their paranoid fixation on being able to supervise workers like an 18th century factory boss gazing out over rows of bent, sweating and broken backs ...  


My links for activism post may aid any activism you may decide to do on any/all of these. If you do, don’t get too fixated on specific instances of problems - important though they may well be: take a moment to also consider the broader issues these incidents and groups of incidents may suggest/reveal.

Note: as with other mass murderers/serial killers/and the like, violent extremists and other evil people/groups crave publicity, so I refuse to give that to them - including not using their names (which is a policy adopted by good law enforcement and media for other mass murderers - as I can do as I am a secondary news source: the name(s) are in the primary sources if people wish to know them).

 

Assumptions / basis 

In writing this, I have assumed / started from the following: 

  • this blog states quite clearly that it is about political and human rights matters, including lived experience of problems, and thus I will assume readers are reasonable people who have noted the content warning in the post header;

Possible flaws 

Where I can, I will try to highlight possible flaws / issues you should consider:

  • there may be flawed logical arguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan  Myers’ free online course “Clear and Present Thinking”; 
  • I could be wrong - so keep your thinking caps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.

 

If they are of any use of interest, the activism information links from my former news posts are available in this post. 

 

If you appreciated this post, please consider promoting it - there are some links below.

Remember: we need to be more human being rather than human doing, and all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering”.

Copyright © Kayleen White 2016-2024     NO AI   I do not consent to any machine learning aka Artificial Intelligence (AI), generative AI, large language model, machine learning, chatbot, or other automated analysis, generative process, or replication program to reproduce, mimic, remix, summarise, or otherwise  replicate any part of this post or other posts on this blog via any means. Typo’s may be inserrted deliberately to demonstrate this is not an AI product.     Otherwise, fair and reasonable use is accepted under Creative Commons 4.0 on an Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike basis   https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/  

 

Posted by at
Labels: , , , , ,

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)