Saturday, 9 March 2024

FROM this week’s news ON: politics & democracy, and international affairs [Note: Content Warning - links to distressing reports on this topic. 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 thiis 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: 

  • “Cultural evolution”    https://theaimn.com/cultural-evolution/   “Culture evolves, it changes over time, but that change can go forward or backward, no gains made can be considered permanent, we need to be constantly vigilant to ensure that the rights we have in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are not threatened. These include civil and political rights, the right to life, liberty, free speech and privacy. It also includes economic, social and cultural rights. In other words, to be who we are, to believe what we believe, to not be vilified for who we may be, but to not vilify those we disagree with. The rights and freedoms we have, need to be the rights and freedoms we accord to others.”   

 


 

  • “Traditionalism: the belief that could doom us all”   https://theaimn.com/traditionalism-the-belief-that-could-doom-us-all/   “It can be difficult to understand what connects free market devotees, white ethnostate militants, Christian Nationalists, tech bros and mere conservatives in the West. One concept that can help understand their rough alliance is traditionalism. In fact it draws together an international contingent that shares goals and enemies, shaping domestic and foreign policy against the interests of the majority.”   “My Malaysia Ordeal shows how Religion can Fuse with Nationalism to Silence Dissent”   https://www.juancole.com/2024/03/malaysia-religion-nationalism.html   “My research shows that there is a rising global trend against dissenting and minority religious views. Analysing this trend is crucial to understand why right-wing populist leaders are now ruling diverse countries, such as Turkey, Russia, Israel and India, and how they may come to power in other places, including the United States.”         “New Zealand is under siege by the Atlas Network”   https://theaimn.com/new-zealand-is-under-siege-by-the-atlas-network/   “Just as the Atlas Network-connected Advance body intervened in the Voice referendum in Australia and, in recent weeks, a by-election, similar organisations spawned from the American model are distorting New Zealand’s politics from within as well as from without.”         On that, the recent byelection in the electorate of Dunkley has shown that the conservatives are, in my opinion, a dying brand. See   “From a recent Australian byelection:   is patriarchy is finally starting to die out?”   https://politicalmusingsofkayleen.blogspot.com/2024/03/from-recent-australian-byelection-is.html  
  • “Burkina Faso prosecutor says some 170 people 'executed' in attacks on northern villages”   https://www.france24.com/en/africa/20240303-burkina-faso-prosecutor-says-around-170-people-killed-in-attacks-on-northern-villages   “Burkina Faso has been grappling with a jihadist insurgency ... that spilled over from neighbouring Mali in 2015.   The violence has killed almost 20,000 people and displaced more than two million in Burkina Faso   ...   Anger at the state's inability to end the insecurity played a major role in two military coups in 2022. Current strongman _ has made the fight against rebel groups a priority.”   


  • “ACT government considers response after court rules Sofronoff’s calls with journalist gave rise to impression of bias”   https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/mar/04/bruce-lehrmann-prosecution-walter-sofronoff-shane-drumgold-impression-bias-court-ntwnfb   “Shane Drumgold, the former ACT director of public prosecutions, is “looking forward to moving on with his life” after a supreme court ruled Walter Sofronoff’s extensive communications with a columnist at The Australian newspaper gave rise to an impression of bias against him during an inquiry into the Bruce Lehrmann trial.”   This is being reported as a partial victory    “The Sofronoff saga has shattered whatever confidence we had in our legal system. Here’s what went wrong”   https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/06/walter-sofronoff-report-shane-drumgold-justice-kaye-bruce-lehrmann   “Confidence in the legal system is founded upon an assumption of independent, bias-free decision-making. The judgment of Kaye tells us that assumption is false – the conduct and result of Sofronoff’s inquiry shatters whatever confidence there was in the system.   ...   Sofronoff has defended this, saying he was following a practice that commissioners make direct personal contact with the press. Sofronoff might think that, but no lawyer I know agrees with him. Everyone has been shocked by his conduct.”   by Geoffrey Watson, “former counsel assisting the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption and a director of the Centre for Public Integrity”   The actions described in the article are astounding - and the journalist concerned is continuing  


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/  

 

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