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(via Cartoons from the Issue of October 7th, 2013 : The New Yorker)

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(via Cartoons from the Issue of October 7th, 2013 : The New Yorker)

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The Hunger Strikes at Guantánamo Bay Prison Revealed in Poignant Animated Video via Open Culture

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Molly Crabapple - Art in the age of the Ubiquitous Image

Molly Crabapple recently gave a talk at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society entitled "Art in the age of the Ubiquitous Image".

Video of the talk here (scroll down)

Summary:

Two hundred years ago, artists had the monopoly on image making. Now, every parade or disaster is accompanied by ten thousand twitpics. In a world where mobile technology has made images instantaneous and ubiquitous, what does visual art have left to say? Drawing on her experiences doing illustrated journalism around Guantanamo Bay and the Greek economic crisis, Molly Crabapple speak about the role of art in a world captured by a million cameras.

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The Story of Solutions (by storyofstuffproject)

The Story of Solutions explores how we can move our economy in a more sustainable and just direction, starting with orienting ourselves toward a new goal. In the current 'Game of More', we're told to cheer a growing economy -- more roads, more malls, more Stuff! -- even though our health indicators are worsening, income inequality is growing and polar icecaps are melting. But what if we changed the point of the game? What if the goal of our economy wasn't more, but better -- better health, better jobs and a better chance to survive on the planet? Shouldn't that be what winning means?

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(via John Coltrane’s Handwritten Outline for His Masterpiece A Love Supreme | Open Culture)

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Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Jailed Pussy Riot Member, Ends Hunger Strike

The hunger strike is over. Read the moving account of life in a Russian prison at n+1:

Why I Am Going on Hunger Strike

Excerpt:

On Monday, September 23, I am declaring a hunger strike. This is an extreme method, but I am absolutely convinced it is my only recourse in the current situation.

The prison wardens refuse to hear me. But I will not back down from my demands. I will not remain silent, watching in resignation as my fellow prisoners collapse under slave-like conditions. I demand that human rights be observed at the prison. I demand that the law be obeyed in this Mordovian camp. I demand we be treated like human beings, not slaves.

It has been a year since I arrived at Penal Colony No. 14 [henceforth, PC-14 — Trans.] in the Mordovian village of Partsa. As the women convicts say, “Those who haven’t done time in Mordovia haven’t done time at all.” I had heard about the Mordovian prison camps while I was still being held at Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 6 in Moscow. They have the harshest conditions, the longest workdays, and the most flagrant lawlessness. Prisoners see their fellows off to Mordovia as if they were headed to the scaffold. Until the last, they keep hoping: “Maybe they won’t send you to Mordovia after all? Maybe the danger will pass you by?” It didn’t pass me by, and in the autumn of 2012, I arrived in the prison country on the banks of the Partsa River.

My first impression of Mordovia was the words uttered by the prison’s deputy warden, Lieutenant Colonel Kupriyanov, who actually runs PC-14. “You should know that when it comes to politics, I am a Stalinist.” Colonel Kulagin, the other warden (the prison is administered in tandem) called me in for a chat my first day here in order to force me to confess my guilt. “A misfortune has befallen you. Isn’t that right? You’ve been sentenced to two years in prison. People usually change their views when bad things happen to them. If you want to be paroled as soon as possible, you have to confess your guilt. If you don’t, you won’t get parole.” I told him right away I would work only the eight hours a day stipulated by the Labor Code. “The code is the code. What really matters is making your quota. If you don’t, you work overtime. And we’ve broken stronger wills than yours here!” Colonel Kulagin replied.

My whole shift works sixteen to seventeen hours a day in the sewing workshop, from seven-thirty in the morning to twelve-thirty at night. At best, we get four hours of sleep a night. We have a day off once every month and a half. We work almost every Sunday. Prisoners “voluntarily” apply to work on weekends. In fact, there is nothing “voluntary” about it. These applications are written involuntarily on the orders of the wardens and under pressure from the inmates who help enforce their will.

No one dares to disobey (that is, not apply to go to the manufacturing zone on Sunday, meaning going to work until one in the morning). Once, a fifty-year-old woman asked to go back to the dorm zone at eight p.m. instead of twelve-thirty p.m. so she could go to bed at ten p.m. and get eight hours of sleep just once that week. She was not feeling well; she had high blood pressure. In response, a dorm unit meeting was called, where the woman was scolded, humiliated, insulted, and branded a parasite. “What, do you think you’re the only one who wants more sleep? You need to work harder, you’re strong as a horse!” When someone from the shift doesn’t come to work on doctor’s orders, they’re bullied as well. “I sewed when I had a fever of forty Centigrade, and it was fine. Who did you think was going to pick up the slack for you?”

I was welcomed to my dorm unit by a convict finishing up a nine-year sentence. “The pigs are scared to put the squeeze on you themselves. They want to have the inmates do it.” Conditions at the prison really are organized in such a way that the inmates in charge of the work shifts and dorm units are the ones tasked by the wardens with crushing the will of inmates, terrorizing them, and turning them into speechless slaves.

Read the rest

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Seven Tips From Ernest Hemingway on How to Write Fiction via Open Culture

Not just relevant for fiction.

The tips are as follows ...

To get started, write one true sentence.

Always stop for the day while you still know what will happen next.

Never think about the story when you're not working.

When it's time to work again, always start by reading what you've written so far.

Don't describe an emotion - make it.

Use a pencil.

Be Brief.

Read the full article here.

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Affordable Care Act Vs. ObamaCare via OBEY GIANT

I always enjoy Jimmy Kimmel, but his segment exposing people’s semantic vulnerability was especially amusing and terrifying. The piece asks people which they prefer, the Affordable Care Act or ObamaCare (they are the same thing). Certain Republicans and people like the Koch brothers have bombarded the public with so much disinformation that most people dislike the name “ObamaCare” but like the ideas contained within it. Get the facts… don’t believe the hype! Check it out.

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“The more radical the person is, the more fully he or she enters into reality so that, knowing it better, he or she can transform it. This individual is not afraid to confront, to listen, to see the world unveiled. This person is not afraid to meet the people or to enter into a dialogue with them. This person does not consider himself or herself the proprietor of history or of all people, or the liberator of the oppressed; but he or she does commit himself or herself, within history, to fight at their side.”

 - Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed (via oddratheodd)

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South on top

(via 40 Maps That Will Help You Make Sense of the World «TwistedSifter)

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It’s not about jobs. It’s not about securing energy supplies. It’s not even about the money. The government’s enthusiasm for fracking arises from something it shares with politicians the world over: a macho fixation with extractive industries. ... Extracting resources, like war, is the real deal: what politicians seem to consider a proper, manly pursuit. Conserving energy or using gas from waste or sustaining fish stocks are treated as the concerns of sissies and hippies: even if, in hard economic terms, they make more sense. ... Extraction is an ideology, gendered and gendering, pursued independently of economic purpose. As Cameron says, without shale gas “we could lose ground in the tough global race.” It doesn’t matter whether the race is worth running. It doesn’t matter that it’s a race towards mutually assured destruction, through manmade climate change. The point is that it’s tough and a race. And that’s all a politician needs to feel like a man.

The Macho Politics of Extraction

George Monbiot – Resource Testeria

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Stamping Money is NOT Illegal ...

If you have been frustrated by the bureaucracy around political corruption and campaign finance reform, take direct action to make your voice heard! Check out the site started by Ben Cohen, long time progressive activist and co-founder of Ben & Jerry’s. I may do a money stamp for them. Turns out that stamping money is not illegal, but it is a great canvas for discouraging political bribery that should be illegal. Get stampin’!

(via Stamping Money is not Illegal - OBEY GIANT)

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I want to make a promise to you, the reader. And I don't know if I can fulfill it tomorrow, or even the day after that. But I put the bastards of this world on notice that I do not have their best interests at heart. I will try and speak for my reader. That is my promise. And it will be a voice made of ink and rage.

Hunter S. Thompson, The Rum Diary

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The Home Orchard Part 2

(via Permaculture News - Tree Care Videos (California))

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The Home Orchard Part 1

(via Permaculture News - Tree Care Videos (California))

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Every time I pick up the scythe — whether I’m cutting a corner of orchard grass in the pasture or making my way into the brambles — I realize how effortless it is, especially when the blade is sharp. No fumes; no roaring engine; no whining plastic string; and no safety gear, like boots and earplugs. The scythe is nearly silent. Its subtle swish allows you to imagine the venerable sound of a field full of men and women with scythes, working in pattern. After a while, you seem to become one of them.