Saturday, 22 June 2024

FROM this week’s news ON: politics & democracy, and international affairs, including the war in West Asia [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 (when I remember) 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 the war in West Asia, 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 (please note: this is a cut down and/or  version of what I used to do): 

 

the war in West Asia (note: I object to the colonial term “Middle East”), in imperialistic Israel, Gaza, and adjoining nations: 

Note: my usual preamble to these posts can be found on the post at https://politicalmusingsofkayleen.blogspot.com/2024/04/from-this-weeks-news-on-war-in-west_24.html. I will omit the full version of that from now on for the sake of brevity, but the main points are:   (i) I do not give violent extremists/other mass murderers the oxygen of publicity, nor the satisfaction of using the t word;   (ii) _____ have for many years been identified as genocidal;   (iii) I consider a safe place for Jewish people must exist because of the world's collective failures on antisemitism - everywhere, not only Germany of the 1930s/40s, but the Arab nations’ proposal for a single nation with Arab and Jewish provinces should have been given more consideration, IMO;   (iv) now, Israel's existence can ONLY be morally justified as part of a two state solution where Palestine becomes a modern, functional, prosperous sovereign nation-state;   (v) I note   https://theconversation.com/when-is-criticism-of-israel-antisemitic-a-scholar-of-modern-jewish-history-explains-220995   on when criticism of Israel becomes antisemitic;   (vi) Israel’s conduct since the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin and the collapse of the Oslo Accords has been both devastating to its victims and damaging of its standing, and its conduct now risks an even more self-damaging Pyrrhic “victory”;   (vii) note that the ICJ has issued preliminary directions, but not made a formal finding regarding genocide.





on human rights and human suffering (on both sides) aspects:



on military aspects:


  • “Israeli army in urgent need of troops amid rising casualties in Gaza”   https://www.france24.com/en/middle-east/20240619-israeli-army-urgent-need-troops-amid-rising-casualties-in-gaza   “The head of the Israel Defence Forces said the army is facing troop shortages amid rising casualties in the war against Hamas in Gaza. Yet enlisting more troops is difficult due to rising public opposition to the war and an open conflict between Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his defence minister.”   A bit like the problems Russia is having - and for similar reasons ... However, it also emphasises that destroying _____ has not happened     


regionally:



internationally:

 

  • “Examining the ADL’s Antisemitism Audit”   https://jewishcurrents.org/examining-the-adls-antisemitism-audit   “A line-by-line reassessment of the organization’s data illuminates the flaws in its methodology.”   The examination found anti-Zionism was being wrongly conflated with antisemitism     

 


global:  

 

  • “A Nation of Settler Militias”   https://drdevonprice.substack.com/p/a-nation-of-settler-militias   “What “An Indigenous People's History of the United States” by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz teaches us about the genocide happening today.”   Although focused on the USA, this applies to other colonised nations as well, in my opinion      




  • “Misinformation might sway elections — but not in the way that you think”   https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-01696-z   “Rampant deepfakes and false news are often blamed for swaying votes. Research suggests it’s hard to change people’s political opinions, but easier to nudge their behaviour.”   The examples include outright lies - albeit lies aimed at getting people not to vote in US primaries, or decide not to vote, etc. Some of this can be overcome by compulsory voting, preferential voting, and the USA getting rid of its amathiac presidential college system     


Australia: 


 



  • “The National Anti-Corruption Commission has fallen at the first hurdle”   https://theaimn.com/the-national-anti-corruption-commission-has-fallen-at-the-first-hurdle/   “The decision by the head of the NACC not to proceed with any further investigation into the Robodebt scandal was greeted with 900 complaints about the decision.   The Inspector of the National Anti-Corruption Commission, responsible for overseeing the agency’s operations and conduct, has declared that it will commence its own investigation into the matter due to the overwhelming and sustained uproar.”      


  • “I hate paying tax!”   https://theaimn.com/i-hate-paying-tax/   “Donations for favoured charities and causes should not be a means avoiding the responsibility of paying taxes.”   Despite the title, this is actually a call for tax reform to make sure the rich also do their share      


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.

 

 

 

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. 

Note that, as with my main blog [see here], I am cutting back on aspects of my posts.

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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