#(which is just the term at least my family uses to mean indian immigrants living in Britain)

[benthic-girl]

Old white man asked me what my book was about at work and I had to sheepishly tell him it was about how the British ruined India, he said something about wishing how we could turn back the clock and do things right so idk thanks for not being an empire apologist old man, coulda hit me with a line about the trains

[purplesurveys]

969

What is your least favourite thing about your full name? I don’t know if it’s right to say I have a least favorite thing about it. At this point in my life I’ve gotten over complaining about anything about my name and I’ve ended up liking it, actually.

How good is your grammar? My fluency in both English and Filipino is pretty much perfect. Kinda called for when it comes to communications graduates, haha. But yeah I grew up speaking Filipino and then learned English through media, school, and my English-speaking friends, so my exposure has always been balanced.

Do you like the age you are? Idk I feel like age loses its significance when you’re like 20. < Yeah, same. The last age I got excited about was 20, but turning 22 this year felt a little boring and not just because I had to celebrate at home. I’m imagining it would be the same for 23, 24, 26, 27, etc and that I’ll only look forward to milestone years now, like those that end in 5 or 0.

Music. It’s amazing. Do you agree? It’s great, but I’m not as attached to music as most people are. It’s hard for me to get into new acts and I mostly stick to the artists and albums I’ve listened for years. Music can also sometimes be too emotional for me, so most of the time I prefer flocking to content that will entertain me when I’m sad, like sitcoms or YouTube videos.

What’s your favourite kind of poptart? I’ve mentioned this before but only like, five flavors ever get shipped to the Philippines. My favorite is chocolate fudge, but I’m sure I would have other favorites if we were able to have their whole flavor roster.

Do you like sunglasses? I don’t really care for them. They look nice and there are certainly a lot of cute and classy sunglasses designs out there, but ultimately I don’t like how it impairs my vision. No matter how bright it is where I am, I tend to not feel comfortable when everything I see has a black or brown tint to them. 

Do you think dreams can give us insight to things? I don’t know if it can give insights, but I believe that your general emotions and life experiences can have a hand in what dreams you end up having. In my case, whenever something is currently heavily troubling me I always, always end up dreaming about them.

Have any cheesy kids songs memorized? Depends on what you mean by cheesy kid’s songs. I don’t actually know what that refers to.

Besides your computer, what else is cluttering your desk? A Tupperware with peanut brittle, another Tupperware with a half-eaten brookie, two notebooks, my copy of Midnight Sun, my phone charger, a nearly-empty glass of water, and my night light.

Why is your worst enemy your worst? I don’t have an enemy...haven’t had one since, like, grade school.

What does your dad do? He’s an executive sous chef at a luxury liner. But his company and the nature of his work is obviously one of the most affected by Covid, so he hasn’t been in his workplace since February and it’s impossible to tell when he’ll be needed again.

How late do you usually stay up? During weekdays, I’m in bed by 9 or 10 PM. Work is exhausting most days. But on the weekends, I’m able to stay up til midnight or even a few hours beyond that.

The political spectrum. Where do you fall? The more radical side of the left.

Do those commercials from the ASPCA make you cry? They’re a US-based org so no I haven’t, but their ads probably do have the ability to make me cry.

When was the last time you visited a nail salon? I remember going inside a nail salon with Gabie in like 2017? 2018? because she had been trying to get me interested in pampering sessions for myself haha. I never saw the appeal though and if I remember correctly that was the only time I ever found myself inside of a nail salon.

What was the last thing you used sliced bread to make? My breakfast yesterday. I just used the bread to wrap a hotdog. 

If you had to eat one type (Chinese, etc.) of food which would it be? I would have absolutely no problem eating Indian food for the rest of my life. Their spices, the curries, breads, chutney, samosas, paneer? *chef’s kiss*

Enough about food. Have you used Wikipedia for a school report? I used Wikipedia all the time but use the sources on the bottom of the page. It was so easy to go around the whole “don’t use Wikipedia for research” when the sources cited in Wikipedia articles are always subject to strict review by the site’s moderators to ensure their credibility lol.

What is your favourite glass to drink from? I love my mom’s Starbucks mug. I use it all the time when she isn’t home.

When did your family immigrate to wherever you live now? We’ve never migrated, even though my mom had always wanted us to. If we pushed through with it, we most likely would have landed in either the US or Canada.

What does your room look like when you sleep? Completely dark. I also like keeping my windows open and my blinds partially open, because the cold air at night feels nice.

What tabs are open on your computer? The window I’m currently on is pretty loaded actually. There are six Tumblr tabs, 12 Bzoink tabs, two tabs on Google search, and one Wikipedia tab.

Are your fingers long, or short? They’re rather long. 

Reality TV: Love it, or hate it? OMG hahah I like most of them, but I can’t stand dating shows. As a demi, I just could never relate to the idea of casual dating and dating shows have always been super boring to me. I can binge most of the other reality TV shows though, especially cooking ones and KUWTK.

What time is it in the country you get the most of your heritage from? Welp, that’s a creative way to put it. 6:47 PM.

Do you use a top sheet? My current bedsheet doesn’t come with one but I do have other bedsheets with top sheets that I routinely change to.

How often do you engage in illegal behaviour? It comes up every now and then but it’s nothing more than illegally downloading books and movies lol.

Who is your favourite comedian? I’m not big on comedians but I came across Sindhu Vee’s stand-up comedy on Facebook a month ago and she’s sooooooo fucking hilarious. Jokes about extreme Asian parenting will never get old for me. I definitely wish more of her acts were available online.

Do people say you have an accent? Sometimes I’ll get compliments for being able to speak in English well, but idk about accents.

Could you tell me what the capital of Bosnia is without looking it up? Nope. I wouldn’t even be able to point at its general region on a map. Soz.

AOL: Do you use it? No.

Do you find Family Guy’s cutaway scenes funny, or annoying? I generally find cutaway scenes funny. I’m sure I would find Family Guy’s funny as well, considering I’ve enjoyed their humor styles in the past.

What colours are on your current shirt? Brown.

How many children do you want/have? Two.

Would you rather live in this decade, the 1960’s, or the 1910’s? 1910s. The very limited women’s rights and social issues of the time would be sucky to witness, but I’m still interested to see how different life was back then whether in terms of technology, how different my city used to look, or whatever.

Pepsi vs. Coke? Neither.

Do you think you look good with a hat on? Sure, I like hats :)

[humansofhds]

Naman Patel, MTS ’21

“It was beautiful to see my connection with Emerson, someone who intellectually influenced and inspired me to listen to my own light and make way for my own creative impulses. Then to end up in the institution that he attended, it comes full circle.”

Naman is a second-year master of theological studies candidate studying South Asian Post-Colonialism.

Emerson as a Guiding Light

I’m born of two Indian immigrants. They found their footing here in their early twenties and gave birth to me in New York and there I had a very interesting high school experience. That’s also the roots for my engagement with hip hop culture and black culture at large, because the school was split between an affluent white community and a black community and some brown kids. But, there was no place for me in the affluent white community, and I saw home and family among black kids who engaged with me, so rapping after school was the everyday.

I was really informed by the pressure that brown kids put on themselves about what they should do professionally, which is to become a doctor, an engineer, or a lawyer—that standard narrative. For me, I was going to be a pharmaceutical patent attorney because I saw in the pharmacy industry a huge lie, so I thought it would be really cool to go in there and break it down.

Then at some point that stopped making sense to me, so I transferred to Brandeis University, and I did that because I took this course called “Death, War, and Terrorism.” I realized that school can be an experience where you are in a seminar, the teacher lectures, but asks a series of questions and forces you to think of things. This is very new when you’re coming from science because science is very pedagogical.

Right before, I read Emerson’s Self Reliance and some of Emerson’s other work and he was hugely influential to me. The one quote that sticks with me is that he draws out this scene where a baby conforms to no one, but all conform to it, so in a room full of adults, the adults will begin to crawl and prattle with toys. This image was really beautiful and to me at least, it could explain the way I could think about the attitude and direction of innovators today hold, who have the courage to go and do what they want in the way that a baby does.

So then at Brandeis, I start taking a lot of courses in the humanities. I still was studying science and biology. After Brandeis, I do immunology research at Harvard Medical School for two years, investigating alternative means to a standard cancer treatment. During this time, I can’t not be in a place where I can’t have discussions about post-colonial theory, or social sciences, or the humanities at large.

I find my way back because I’m a performing poet in the Cambridge area and after one of my performances I run into some kids who take interest in my poetry. So we strike a discussion and have things to talk about and things to relate to in terms of identity, in particular to South Asia. Then they say, yeah we go to HDS, and I have no idea what HDS is. I keep showing up to HDS and I keep hanging out with them.

One of my friends asked why don’t I apply here. I needed to finish up my research and then I could go to med school though, but then my friend says this. So then I take the GRE, I apply and then I get in to HDS, and I call my parents and tell them I’m not going to med school and then their life dissolves.

One thing that made it more difficult for them to say no to me going here instead of med school, was that the school graced me with a scholarship. So I’m really grateful for that because without that, perhaps it would have been harder for me to say no.

When I was taking German, I took it in the chapel where Emerson gave his speech and that’s when it really clicked to me that Emerson actually went to this school. It was beautiful to see my connection with Emerson, someone who intellectually influenced and inspired me to listen to my own light and make way for my own creative impulses. Then to end up in the institution that he attended, it comes full circle.

Integrating Science Into the Critique of British Epistemology

My study has to do with South Asian Post-Colonial Studies, but specifically I’m interested in the British epistemology of the subcontinent and India in particular, because for me, this is a way by looking at not only the knowledge they produced, but then the knowledge that the subcontinent inherited through the process of nationalism from the Europeans. It is a way to explain a lot of the crises we see in the subcontinent that deal with categories of ethnicity and religion.

This year has been really nice because I am producing a thesis, aggregating the evidence that supports this argument, but I’m taking it a step forward and saying that perhaps a way we can combat this pollutant epistemology is by generating and disseminating alternative knowledge through medias that people are engaging with heavily now, through YouTube and Instagram.

At what point do we have enough concepts that are robust enough to visualize what’s going on, that maybe we can address it? So the way that I think I will continue practicing science, from my Brandeis education, is in my approach is that I see a symptom of British epistemology, I can locate it, I can see how it continues to proliferate, and I can see that I can compete for the attention that it gets and I can compete with the determinative things that it does to nation states.

The Fruition of .1325

I’m an MC and my Instagram is filled with that content in particular. I produce hip hop and have a band called 1325. When I arrived in Boston after graduation to start my immunology research, the research just wasn’t enough and inside I had stories to tell, but I wasn’t adept at a form that I wanted to tell the stories in. I did enjoy writing, but I loved that in hip hop, you could supplement your narrative with extra dimensions, mainly of sound and time.

I had one friend at Brandeis who I used to dance with and who I found out was an incredible musician because I stalked him on YouTube. He was doing sets with Berklee and he was touring India. Afterwards, I kept poking him and he told me to hang out with his friend.

His friend Hani has a very interesting life of his own, but he just came back from Germany. He was supposed to apply to med school, but he just wanted to play piano so well that with piano he could fundamentally play any other instrument. So I just started hanging out with him a lot.

I learned how to rap in a live setting with him and we started performing at open mics and then Ulas, the kid who I was initially poking at, got involved and then we performed open mics. The year before last year, we were featured at an open mic and last year we were asked to perform at the MFA. This year I performed at Terminal 5 in NYC, which garnered 3,000 people and that was an amazing experience.

The band started because I had an interest, but mostly because I had a community that fostered it and encouraged it. On one hand I have the band, Hani and Ulas to thank and then similarly HDS seems like the same thing. You have this deep desire and sometimes you think you’re alone, but then you externalize this and it turns out that they want to hang out with you and then you get put into that space and you have the potential to excel if you want.

I often think about where and who I would be without HDS. HDS gave me the space to take the first step, just for more space and time and allowing for me to think and with other people who are thinking about such creative and tremendous levels.

Hip Hop as a Form of Narrative

Me being a hip hop artist ties into the dissemination aspect of my academic interests because I think historically hip hop and rap has been the means by which analytic critics have been able to compose their observations into songs that are received by people.

In the beginning, if you make your music about joy and it draws people, then they trust you. You can take liberties about what it is you’re saying to them, but if you do it from the onset, perhaps you might not get listened to. I don’t want to have the megaphone of do this and don’t do that because I don’t want to lose interest.

It’s very important that I’m appealing to a broader range of people because the music is giving joy, but it’s doing it on different terms that’s conscious of how something that is popular and that can be listened to all the time can have a substantial impact on how people are socialized. So in that sense I can compete with other popular music that’s also doing the same thing, but I can show that it doesn’t have to be an integral, essential component of it.

The other things that I’m trying to do in the music is that I’m rendering experiences and thoughts on my own. I’m very inspired by Jay-Z who very simply takes his same narrative and then re-renders it. The idea with poetry is that poetry is not necessarily innovative, it’s just taking tropes and redeploying them beautifully and more beautifully. The tropes that I’m giving a lot of weight to is about self-reliance, overcoming odds, compassion, being conscious, being empathetic.

I am working on celebratizing myself and becoming famous. I don’t think this is a matter of luck. I’ve looked at it enough to see that there are certain things you have to do and you do them and then you’re famous. I’m working on that with the purpose that be the mode in which I can disseminate knowledge. HDS has been an instrument to the realization of my dreams.

Interview and photos by Kaitlin Wheeler

[mypictures3504-blog]

t was only 60 years ago that this would have been an unheard of sight in the south. By custom rather than by law, black folks were best off if they weren't caught eating vanilla ice cream in public in the Jim Crow South, except – the narrative always stipulates – on the Fourth of July. I heard it from my father growing up myself, and the memory of that all-but-unspoken rule seems to be unique to the generation born between World War I and World War II. But if Maya Angelou hadn't said it in her classic autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings | IndieBound, I doubt anybody would believe it today. People in Stamps used to say that the whites in our town were so prejudiced that a Negro couldn't buy vanilla ice cream. Except on July Fourth. Other days he had to be satisfied with chocolate. Vanilla ice cream – flavored with a Nahuatl spice indigenous to Mexico, the cultivation of which was improved by an enslaved black man named Edmund Albius on the colonized Réunion island in the Indian Ocean, now predominately grown on the largest island of the African continent, Madagascar, and served wrapped in the conical invention of a Middle Eastern immigrant – was the symbol of the American dream. That its pure, white sweetness was then routinely denied to the grandchildren of the enslaved was a dream deferred indeed. What makes the vanilla ice cream story less folk memory and more truth is that the terror and shame of living in the purgatory between the Civil War and civil rights movement was often communicated in ways that reinforced to children what the rules of that life were, and what was in store for them if they broke them. My father, for instance, first learned the rules when he first visited South Carolina with my grandfather in the 1940s. In our family's home county of Lancaster, Daddy asked the general store owner if he could buy some candy and ice cream, referring to the white man as "Sir". The store owner promptly grabbed my father by the collar, and yelled at him in the presence of my grandfather. Then he informed the elder man, "You'd better teach this little nigger to say 'Yassuh', boy! 'Sir' ain't good enough!" My grandfather grabbed his son and sped off. The late poet Audre Lorde had a similar narrative to Angelou's in her own autobiography, Zami: A New Spelling of My Name. She visited Washington DC with her family as a child, around Independence Day, and her parents wanted to treat her to vanilla ice cream at a soda shop. They were rebuffed by the waitress and refused service. She expressed disappointment at her family and sisters for not decrying the act as anything but "anti-American". She summed up the event: The waitress was white, the counter was white, and the ice cream I never ate in Washington DC that summer I left childhood was white, and the white heat and white pavement and white pavement and white stone monuments of my first Washington summer made me sick to my stomach for the rest of the trip. Why were black people allowed vanilla ice cream, but on the Fourth of July? Why then? After all, in 1852 Frederick Douglass railed against the idea of celebrating Americans' independence when blacks did not have their full, God-given freedom. "What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July?", asked Douglass of his audience when invited to speak in commemoration of the day. I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. Was that somehow the purpose of allowing the denied ice cream cone? Was it a pacifier? Was it a message to us that, as long as we obeyed the rules, we could still be occasionally rewarded with just enough to keep us patriotic and loyal? But perhaps it is pointless to ask for more than context. The period during which African Americans were not allowed to eat vanilla ice cream tells us a lot about where this memory is located in time: a period of great progress driven by black Americans themselves. It was a time when our forefathers fought for this country and when our foremothers organized marches to protest lynching; when the mass migration from south to north took place; and when labor organizations became vehicles for early pressure for civil rights. The nadir of black life in America – the period from the born at end of Reconstruction through the full entrenchment of Jim Crow – was firmly on its way out. That period of time also represented a closing of the gates of immigration from Europe, the slow rise of the United States as a world power, and the increasing unification of the idea and principles of "whiteness". In 1910, for instance, "white" did not mean Italian, Jewish, Greek, Polish or any of a variety of other ethnicities we now unequivocally associate with privilege. It was, instead, still a term largely reserved for the "old Americans" – those of northwestern European stock. But that changed – at least for some of the Europeans who wound up on America's shores. In the south in particular, new ethnic whites quickly did all they could to assimilate and then affirm their whiteness – to not do so was death, as demonstrated by the lynchings of Sicilians in Louisiana and the lynching of Leo Frank, who was Jewish, in Georgia in the pre-war decades. Little things took on outsized meanings, and each was another way to differentiate between those who "belonged", and those who were barely tolerated. Perhaps the memory of being denied vanilla ice cream is not a literal memory for most: maybe it is just commentary. There is fantastic power in this fascinating memory of Jim Crow life because it calls our attention to the deeper psychological consequences of legalized racism in American life. The racism of the time period was not just about dignity and self-esteem – it was embodied and mythologized in physical terms. So in a way, the denial of vanilla (and all its symbolic promise) was not so bad after all: indeed satisfaction, with "chocolate" is now emblematic of people of color being supported by and being self sufficient in their own communities. Without this exact satisfaction in our sense of beauty, worth, mind and purpose – without having learned to live without vanilla – we never would have fought to change the world.

[wendella]

OUTLANDER Outlander Season Finale: Who Are the “Men of Worth” in Season 4? by Natalie Zutter www.tor.com

After last year’s Outlander finale, which literally shipwrecked Claire and Jamie onto the shores of America, I was expecting a bigger cliffhanger ending to this season—that the letter the redcoats delivered to Jamie at River Run would be conscripting the poor Scot to fight on their side in the American Revolution. Then I remembered that it was only 1770, and that the next big war was a few years (or, I’m going to assume, one season) away. Instead, the season 4 finale, filled with resolutions both neat and messy, ends on Jamie getting a much more pressing, one-on-one assignment that reemphasizes this season’s enduring question: Can a good man do a bad thing and remain a “Man of Worth”?

Spoilers for Outlander season 4.

The thing is, it’s difficult to care too much about Jamie being ordered to hunt down Murtagh on behalf of Governor Tryon, because it seems too obvious that, between the two of them, they’ll be able to come up with a solution. That could mean faking Murtagh’s death or smuggling him back to Scotland, and thus away from Fraser’s Ridge, which would carry its own bittersweet heartache, but it’s not as if there’s an ideological chasm between them—hence the low stakes. It also seems a far-off problem when this season was more than a little uneven, and I’m still working through my frustrations with how the Brianna and Roger plots shaped the latter half of the season.

So, what feels like the most appropriate way to send off Outlander season 4 is to return to the theme linking the past thirteen episodes—good men doing bad things, bad men doing things that might have positive ramifications despite their intent—and reexamine the worthiness of Outlander’s men.

Jamie: If I were Jamie, I would be feeling like a right arse by the end of this season. First he helps outlaw Stephen Bonnet escape, out of a misguided sense of goodwill toward a fellow immigrant in this new country, only for that to blow up spectacularly in his face. Of course, he has no way of knowing how the consequences of his act of charity will lead to his daughter getting raped by Bonnet, but it’s a sobering lesson in the dangers of believing the best of your fellow man. Then Jamie swings to the opposite end of the spectrum by assuming that Roger is the one who violated Brianna, beating him senseless without taking a breath to consider, to question the circumstances, propelled by pure rage. Brianna is rightfully furious at him—and they have one of the best moments of the season, when Jamie screams and kicks a chair in frustration and Brianna snaps, “No! You are not allowed to be angrier about this than I am.” He’s clearly wrestling with so much self-loathing that, after twenty years of maturing and growing beyond the hot-headed lad he was when he met Claire, he has regressed back into an impulsive thug.

But Jamie has also learned self-awareness in the intervening decades, as he demonstrates in his incredible scene of vulnerability, asking Claire if she and Bree think that Frank was the better man. He got the girl—she went back in time for him—and he still doubts that he’s good enough. Sam Heughan has brought so much depth and nuance to a character who could have stayed a one-dimensional fantasy; watching James Fraser grow up has been one of the series’ greatest delights.

Roger: On the one hand, Roger endures indescribable pain and suffering as a slave of the Mohawk—the worst possible time travel experience, all because of a misunderstanding he was only partly to blame for. On the other hand, every time he’s offered the chance to be the good guy, he finds a way to be unlikable. Slut-shaming Brianna for being unsure about marrying him as a virgin was difficult to watch, especially considering that the next time they see each other, she was the one to compromise her comfort and pledge her life to him because of his unwillingness to budge. He reiterates multiple times that he had the chance to leave and kept coming back for her, but we only hear that through his telling, which casts him as some romantic hero. At the last minute of the episode he comes riding in on a horse, for crissakes, but that’s more than a day after Jamie and Claire return to River Run, believing that Roger was unwilling to join them.

Again, these are the kinds of choices one would not wish on anyone—such as being told that there is a good chance that Brianna’s baby is not his, and that to honor the terms of their handfast would mean committing to raising that child and spending the rest of his life in the past. If anything, as much as their plotline aggravated me, at least it forced constraints on Roger’s decision, instead of him getting to set the stakes. Roger is not a bad man, but he has demanded a lot of Brianna; I’m curious to see them build a more equal partnership going forward.

Stephen Bonnet: I’m still so impressed with how Bonnet went from charismatic stranger to fatal threat in the space of one episode, and how just a few acts of specific cruelty did so much to change the course of the Fraser family’s lives. Considering how we witnessed his turn in the premiere, it was difficult to muster up any real sympathy for him when Brianna confronted him with her emotional speech about how her child would be nothing like him. Offering up the ruby seemed like a rare moment of vulnerability for the criminal, but I suspect that was more of a formal obligation to contribute one positive thing to this bairn’s life than any regret for raping Brianna in the first place. Also, I’m not convinced that he perished in that prison, and am half-expecting that he will reappear, cockroach-like, next season to kidnap the baby that might be his.

Brianna’s son: Just born, and as far as I remember they did not mention his name. So, for fear of revealing the few book spoilers I stumbled upon in my research (ironic, I know), I’ll just reiterate that he’s a wee fighter and not tack on “like his da” since we are just ignoring his paternity. It was clear, though, that Bree was anxious to meet the little guy, in case she somehow saw Bonnet reflected in his face, but that upon taking him in her arms she was relieved to feel nothing but overwhelming love.

That said, from the moment that Brianna decided to keep the baby, there was no saving her plotline for me. But that’s a discussion for another piece.

Young Ian: I can’t feel anything but oddly maternal pride upon witnessing Ian’s character growth, particularly in this season but even stretching back to when he dragged his poor uncle and aunt across an ocean to save his overeager ass. The season premiere saw him grappling with the trauma of being raped by Geillis, of shaping his identity around what happened to him while not letting it define him; concurrently, he’s learned how to make himself a useful member of Fraser’s Ridge. Sure, offering to marry Brianna was classic dumb Young Ian; selling Roger to the Mohawk was nigh unforgivable. But he more than made up for it by offering up himself in Roger’s place, to live among the Mohawk and replace their dead member. Honestly, it was about time that Ian learned who he was without his blood relations there to protect him. And look how he made it through the gauntlet! That’s our boy.

Murtagh: It’s fascinating to see how the writers fit Murtagh into the narrative, considering that the character is kinda living on borrowed time—that is, he’s long-dead in the books, but they spared him in the adaptation. His and Jamie’s reunion in Wilmington scratched one of my narrative itches—that prolonged moment in which two souls, separated by time and distance, slowly recognize one another while the viewer is screaming omg, hug already!! But now not only are they caught up on the last decade-plus of each other’s lives, but they also recognize that they have landed on different sides of a growing conflict, due to their respective definitions of self-preservation. I’d like to see the series delve more into this next season, to really make it an impossible choice for Jamie.

Side note: Murtagh and Jocasta’s argument-turned-hookup, complete with her throwing whiskey in his face, was amazing.

Fergus: Under-utilized this season, stuck in Wilmington and mostly just reacting to the plot action when it comes to him. What would make Jamie’s dilemma more affecting would be if Fergus (who, it’s been established, can’t find work anywhere else) joins the regulators in earnest—making it twoloved ones that Jamie is contractually bound to hunt down.

Otter Tooth: The initial discovery of Otter Tooth’s skull made it seem as if he and his silver fillings would play a larger role in the season. While at first it was a surprise that it took only half of an episode to lay out his story, it also speaks to the utter tragedy of the failed time traveler. Unlike Claire, who finds a willing believer in Jamie when it comes to Culloden and other predictions of the future, poor Otter Tooth could not convince enough of the Mohawk to heed his warnings about the Iroquois being forgotten. Instead, he was branded a madman, hunted down, and forced to haunt this time and place, unable to bring about the change he so desperately wanted. Moreso than almost any other plot this season, it’s a thought-provoking story that Diana Gabaldon included, and the writers adapted. Plus, the post-credits visual of him in his present watching the two white boys play Cowboys and Indians was wrenching, and one of the series’ best of these little moments.

Lord John Grey: Poor Lord John puts up with a lot this season, mostly in the form of the daughter of the man he loves blackmailing him into marrying her, lest she out him to everyone. But this is the man who maintained affection for Jamie even after being friendzoned, who has proven over and over that he will put his own desires behind those of a child in need of a father, or a pregnant woman who will be dishonored without a husband. LJG is good people.

William: What a fierce, pouty li’l jerk. It’s too bad that we weren’t treated to the narrative weirdness of William’s half-sister Brianna becoming his stepmother, but perhaps he’ll reappear in future seasons.

Lesley: To be honest, I had barely registered him before he got his throat slit by Bonnet, but nobody deserves a death like that. RIP.

Frank: FRANK. His one cameo this season, in a number of revelatory and gutting flashbacks, was the perfect way to bring him back—especially since we see him through Brianna’s eyes, after years of him refracted through Claire’s perspective. But even Brianna doesn’t realize how many complicated feelings it layers on top of Frank’s motivations to know that he had the obituary the whole time and never let on to Claire that he knew about her supposed death. Not that I blame him, considering how she treated returning to their marriage as a consolation prize, but still.

George Washington: Presumably, but we only got a few scenes with him. I’m looking forward to (hopefully) more of the would-be President next season.

Rollo: Very Good Boy. Very glad he made it through the season and will accompany Young Ian on this new adventure.

[newstfionline]

Tuesday, September 28, 2021

China’s ‘hostage diplomacy’ standoff with Canada is over. But how much damage was done? (Washington Post) After more than 1,000 days spent languishing in separate Chinese prisons—largely cut off from the outside world, the sun and their families—the two Canadians detained in what was widely condemned as a brazen act of “hostage diplomacy” arrived in Canada on Saturday. Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor were detained in China in December 2018 on vague espionage charges, several days after Canada arrested Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer of Huawei Technologies, in Vancouver, at the request of U.S. officials seeking her extradition on bank and wire fraud charges. The Global Times, a state-run tabloid in China, quoted an expert in an article on Saturday who said China’s release of the Canadians “unlocks the bottleneck in China-Canada ties.” But Lynette Ong, an associate professor of political science at the University of Toronto, said an immediate thaw in bilateral relations was unlikely and that sour feelings would remain. “Going forward, I don’t think Canada-China relations will be the same as they were 1,000 days ago,” she said. “It’s fundamentally at a different point. … I think China has underestimated the cost of playing this game of hostage diplomacy. Its reputation has been tarnished tremendously.” Asked what the release of the two Michaels would mean for Canada’s relationship with China, Trudeau said on Friday that there would be time for “reflections and analysis” in the coming weeks.

America's Need to Pay Its Bills Has Spawned a Political Game (NYT) For nearly two decades, lawmakers in Washington have waged an escalating display of brinkmanship over the federal government’s ability to borrow money to pay its bills. They have forced administrations of both parties to take evasive actions, pushing the nation dangerously close to economic calamity. But they have never actually tipped the United States into default. The dance is repeating this fall, but this time the dynamics are different—and the threat of default is greater than ever. Republicans in Congress have refused to help raise the nation’s debt limit, even though the need to borrow stems from the bipartisan practice of running large budget deficits. Republicans agree the United States must pay its bills, but on Monday they are expected to block a measure in the Senate that would enable the government to do so. Democrats, insistent that Republicans help pay for past decisions to boost spending and cut taxes, have so far refused to use a special process to raise the limit on their own. Observers inside and outside Washington are worried neither side will budge in time, roiling financial markets and capsizing the economy’s nascent recovery from the pandemic downturn. If the limit is not raised or suspended, officials at the Treasury Department warn, the government will soon exhaust its ability to borrow money, forcing officials to choose between missing payments on military salaries, Social Security benefits and the interest it owes to investors who have financed America’s spending spree.

As Americans spend, credit card debt is ticking back up (Reuters) Early in the pandemic, there were encouraging and surprising signs about the decline of credit card debt. Now, that trendline seems to be changing. Many Americans stayed at home at the start of COVID-19 and did not spend like they usually do. They also received several rounds of emergency cash assistance, helping to chop away at those credit-card bills, at least temporarily. Spending is ticking back up—and the results are starting to show up on our monthly statements. In fact, 42% of those with credit card debt, or 59 million Americans, say they have added to their balances since the beginning of the pandemic, according to a new study by personal finance site Bankrate.com. This trend reversal is reflected in the most recent numbers of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Its Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit found that credit-card bills rose by $17 billion in 2021’s second quarter, to $790 billion nationally.

Chile to lift state of emergency as vaccines beat back COVID infections (Reuters) Chilean authorities announced on Monday the end of a state of emergency in force since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, a sign of life returning to normal following a sharp decrease in cases in the South American nation. The state of emergency, an extraordinary administrative measure approved by Congress early in 2020, had allowed the government to impose night-time curfews and forced quarantines on hard-hit districts amid the worst of the outbreak. The government said it would also relax restrictions on movement, liberalize limits on capacity at events and public spaces and earlier this month re-opened its borders to tourists. Neighboring Argentina last week also unveiled plans to ease coronavirus pandemic restrictions, including loosening strict border controls, allowing more commercial activities and getting rid of the mandatory wearing of face masks outdoors.

Why Haitians are fleeing Chile for the U.S. border (Washington Post) Along empty streets lined with shuttered businesses, there’s little sign of the bustle that just a few a years ago earned the neighborhood of Quilicura [in Santiago, Chile] the nickname “Little Haiti.” Increasingly restrictive migration policies here, and a belief that the United States has grown more welcoming to immigrants under President Biden, have led a wave of Haitians to abandon the country they once saw as a land of opportunity. “There’s hardly anyone left here now,” said 24-year-old Wilbert Pierre, pointing across the dusty road into the Tawtaw barbershop, where he is training to be a hairdresser. “Of all the people I’ve known in my four years in Chile, more than 100 have gone to the U.S. since March alone.” Tens of thousands of Haitians came to Chile, Brazil and other South American nations after the 2010 earthquake near Port-au-Prince that killed more than 220,000 people. Now feeling growing pressure here, thousands in recent months have traveled north. Many Haitians in Chile say they have faced discrimination and racism that have made it difficult to stay in Chile. One said, “We found that although Chileans themselves are good people, the system is racist, classist and elitist.”

Panic buying leaves up to 90% of fuel pumps dry in major British cities (Reuters) Up to 90% of British fuel stations ran dry across major English cities on Monday after panic buying deepened a supply chain crisis triggered by a shortage of truckers that retailers are warning could batter the world’s fifth-largest economy. A dire post-Brexit shortage of lorry drivers emerging after the COVID-19 pandemic has sown chaos through British supply chains in everything from food to fuel, raising the spectre of disruptions and price rises in the run up to Christmas. Hauliers, gas stations and retailers warned that there were no quick fixes, however, as the shortfall of truck drivers—estimated to be around 100,000—was so acute, and because transporting fuel demands additional training and licensing. Edwin Atema, the head of research and enforcement at the Netherlands-based FNV union, told the BBC that EU drivers were unlikely to flock to Britain given the conditions on offer. “The EU workers we speak to will not go to the UK for a short-term visa to help UK out of the [mess] they created themselves,” Atema said.

What’s in a name? Phil McCann lightens the nation’s mood (Guardian) A BBC reporter called Phil McCann delighted social media users on Saturday after he was sent to cover the UK’s petrol shortage. Reporting from a BP petrol station in Stockport, which had run out of petrol, people were quick to point out that he was clearly the best man for the job, since his name sounds like “fill my can”. Phil McCann soon began trending on Twitter, with one social media user pointing out that McCann was now part of a special club—alongside the BBC weather presenter Sara Blizzard and PC Rob Banks from Avon and Somerset police.

Strong quake hits Greece’s biggest island of Crete, one person killed (Reuters) A strong earthquake measuring 5.8 shook Greece’s largest island Crete on Monday and one person was killed when a church dome collapsed, authorities said. The quake, which sent people out of their homes and public buildings and caused considerable damage, was described by a Greek seismologist, Efthymios Lekkas, as a “thunderbolt” with strong aftershocks. A man died when the dome of a church in the town of Arkalochori caved in during renovation works, a police official said. Civil protection authorities said nine people were injured in the quake, which damaged many buildings. The tremor prompted many people in Crete’s main city Heraklion to rush outdoors. Schoolchildren were told to leave their classrooms, gathering in schoolyards and town squares.

Serbia-Kosovo tensions (Foreign Policy) Serbian fighter jets flew close to the border with Kosovo on Sunday in the latest escalation of tensions between the two governments in recent days. The most recent round of unrest has been sparked by Kosovo’s ban on Serbian vehicle license plates in its territory, a move that Serbia has enforced on Kosovar plates (the vehicles are allowed, but drivers must use temporary plates when driving across the border). Offices belonging to Kosovo’s Interior Ministry were set alight in the north of the country over the weekend, while grenades were thrown into another government building. Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti has accused Serbia of inciting ethnic Serbs living in the area to carry out the attacks. “Serbia is using Kosovo citizens to provoke a serious international conflict,” Kurti said on Saturday.

India’s farmers renew protests, challenging Modi government (AP) Thousands of Indian farmers blocked traffic on major roads and railway tracks outside of the nation’s capital on Monday, marking one year of demonstrations against government-backed laws that they say will shatter their livelihoods. The farmers have renewed their protests with calls for a nationwide strike on the anniversary of the legislation’s passage. The drawn-out demonstrations have posed one of the biggest political challenges to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who swept the polls for the second time in 2019. The government has defended the legislation, saying it is necessary to modernize agriculture and that the laws will boost production through private investment. But the farmers say the new legislation will devastate their earnings by ending guaranteed pricing and force them to sell their crops to corporations at cheaper prices. In neighboring Punjab and Haryana states—which are the country’s the two biggest agricultural producers—thousands of demonstrators also blocked highways, bringing traffic to a halt in some areas.

Concerned United Nations can only sidestep Myanmar crisis (AP) In his speech last week to open the U.N. General Assembly, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres bracketed Myanmar with Afghanistan and Ethiopia as nations where “peace and stability remain a distant dream.” He declared unwavering support for the people of the turbulent, military-ruled Southeast Asia state “in their pursuit of democracy, peace, human rights and the rule of law.” But the situation in Myanmar after the army’s seizure of power eight months ago has become an extended bloody conflict with ever-escalating violence. Yet the U.N. is unlikely to take any meaningful action against Myanmar’s new rulers because they have the support of China and Russia. China and Russia are among the top arms suppliers to Myanmar, as well as ideologically sympathetic to its ruling military. Both are members of the Security Council, and would almost certainly veto any effort by the U.N. to impose a coordinated arms embargo, or anything beyond an anodyne call for peace.

Afghanistan’s Taliban Warn Foot Soldiers: Behave, and Stop Taking Selfies (WSJ) A senior Taliban commander has warned the group’s military rank-and-file fighters to clean up their act as the group’s foot soldiers celebrate in newly captured Kabul, the Wall Street Journal reports. New Defense Minister Mawlawi Mohammad Yaqoob, chastised his recruits in a recent audio message, warning that their exploits, which have ranged from sightseeing to speeding, “are damaging our status,” and were too close to the behavior of the “warlords and gangsters of the puppet regime.” Yaqoob was particularly incensed by the fighters’ selfie obsession, which he said presented a security risk—particularly if sensitive locations or senior leadership were included in the shot.

Shadow contracts, corruption keep the lights out in Iraq (AP) In the Baghdad suburb of Sadr City, glossy election campaign posters are plastered alongside jungles of sagging electrical wires lining the alleyway to Abu Ammar’s home. But his mind is far from Iraq’s Oct. 10 federal election. The 56-year-old retired soldier’s social welfare payments barely cover the cost of food and medicine, let alone electricity. Despite chronic outages from the national grid, Abu Ammar can’t afford a generator. When the lights go off, he has no choice but to steal power from a neighbor’s line. He doesn’t have the right political connections to get electricity otherwise, he says, a frail figure seated in a spartan living room. In this country, if you don’t have these contacts, “your situation will be like ours,” Abu Ammar says. In Iraq, electricity is a potent symbol of endemic corruption, rooted in the country’s sectarian power-sharing system that allows political elites to use patronage networks to consolidate power. It’s perpetuated after each election cycle: Once results are tallied, politicians jockey for appointments in a flurry of negotiations based on the number of seats won. Ministry portfolios and state institutions are divided between them into spheres of control. In the Electricity Ministry, this system has enabled under-the-table payments to political elites who siphon state funds from companies contracted to improve the delivery of services.

[eagle-eyez]

Eighth graders aren’t generally known as dictionary aficionados. But Dhroov Bharatia, 12, has a passion for language.

“Nothing can express an idea as effectively as a judicious use of words,” he said by phone from his home in Plano, Texas. This love of vocabulary has made him one of 11 finalists in this year’s Scripps National Spelling Bee, adding him to a long line of South Asian American middle and elementary schoolers who have excelled at the competition.

It’s a well-documented relationship. Since 2008, a South Asian American kid has been named a champion at every Scripps bee. This year, two-thirds of the semifinalists were of South Asian descent, and at least nine of the 11 finalists are of South Asian descent.

Over the past two decades, spelling bees tailored to South Asian children have proliferated. So have spelling bee coaching companies founded by South Asian Americans. Flyers for local bees are handed out at Indian supermarkets, and the activity is spread through word of mouth at temple events.

A 2020 documentary, Spelling the Dream, followed four Indian American children preparing for 2017’s bee season and showcased just how much it means to South Asian American families.

“It is definitely a source of pride from an educational standpoint,” said Shalini Shankar, an anthropologist and the author of Beeline: What Spelling Bees Reveal About Generation Z’s New Path to Success.

But it is also something more: The bee has become an occasion for unity within the South Asian American immigrant community, and it all goes back to a historic victory more than three decades ago.

In 1985, Balu Natarajan became the first child of immigrants to win Scripps, prompting an outpouring of support from people of South Asian descent. “Many people who I’d never even met felt a connection to it,” Natarajan said. “I had no idea how much one could be embraced by a community.”

He became a well-known name in Indian American households around the country, which he described as humbling. “People in our community really do pay attention when one of our own is able to have success in something,” he said.

“Today, we have children and families in our community that are center stage when they go to the Scripps spelling bee,” Natarajan said. “It’s really a place of comfort. But back in the ’80s, we were just exploring it. We really had no idea that we were doing this for a community. We were just this tiny fraction of the participants.”

Natarajan has the photos to prove it: When he first competed in the Scripps spelling bee in 1983, he remembers only six contestants of Indian descent out of 137 students. A few of them gathered to take a photograph, documenting a small moment of togetherness — a stark contrast to the playing field of today.

The Bee Is Back

Every year, about 11 million children in the United States participate in school-level spelling bees. The first Scripps National Bee was held in 1925; because of the pandemic, it was canceled last year for the first time since World War II.

The words have gotten progressively more difficult over the decades — mostly because the kids have gotten a lot better. “Therapy” was a winning word in 1940, but in 2019, two of the winning words were “bougainvillea” and “erysipelas.”

In 2019, Scripps named eight winners for the cup — “octochamps,” they coined themselves. Previously, only two kids had ever tied for the win. Seven of the 2019 champions were of Indian descent.

“It’s not spellers against spellers. It’s spellers against the dictionary,” Ashrita Gandhari, a current finalist, said about the sense of camaraderie and companionship among the contestants.

That doesn’t mean she’s not in it to win it. Ashrita, 14, is spending about 10 hours a day practicing, and has three coaches to help her prepare. But part of her love for the bee has to do with the incredible support she receives from her community.

“I live in Ashburn, Virginia, and let me tell you, a lot of people here are of South Asian descent,” she said. “So many people — all my friends, my neighborhood, my community — they’ve all been super supportive. We’ve had parties, they even filmed a congratulations video for me, baked me cakes.”

Indian Americans are one of the younger, newer groups of immigrants in the United States. More than 60 percent of Indian immigrants living in the United States today arrived after 2000. “That’s not the case for most other Asian populations, Chinese, Filipino, Korean,” said Sangay Mishra, an associate professor at Drew University and the author of Desis Divided: The Political Lives of South Asian Americans.

Indian immigrants did come to the United States in earlier waves, particularly in the wake of the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act and the family-based immigration that followed. But the implementation of the H-1B visa program in 1990, which allowed for the entry of specialised foreign workers, brought in Indian immigrants in much larger numbers.

In 2016 and 2017, Indians accounted for almost 75 percentof all H-1B visa holders in the United States. This “changed the character of the community, in terms of skewing it more professional and more highly educated,” Mishra said.

Parents looked for hobbies for their children that prioritised “all kinds of educational attainment,” Shankar said. Spelling as an extracurricular activity soon began to spread by word of mouth. “They tell their broader ethnic community about it, and they bring each other to these South Asian spelling games, which are really accessible and held in areas where there’s a large concentration of South Asian Americans,” she said.

The hobby is also passed down — within families — to younger siblings and cousins. (“If the older sibling did it, the younger one often follows,” Shankar said.) That was the case for the 2016 Scripps champion, Nihar Janga, 16, whose passion for spelling was born out of a sibling rivalry going back to age 5. Watching his mother quiz his older sister, Navya, as she was preparing for the bee, Nihar started chiming in, reciting spellings even before Navya could finish.

“I looked up to the fact that my sister was participating in something like this, but I also wanted to be better at it. Eventually, it grew into my own love for spelling and everything it’s taught me,” Nihar said.

Navya and Nihar’s family, who live in Austin, Texas, first came across spelling bees through Navya’s bharatanatyam (an Indian classical dance) teacher, who was involved with the nonprofit North South Foundation.

The foundation has more than 90 chapters, hosts regional and national educational contests in a variety of subject areas, and raises money through these events for disadvantaged students in India. A spelling bee is among the contests run by the organisation, and it’s common for top contenders to continue on to Scripps.

Natarajan is now the foundation’s president, and it has become a powerhouse incubator. Five of 2019’s Scripps octochamps were involved in the North South Foundation.

Another prominent spelling bee on the practise circuit is the South Asian Spelling Bee, which is run by the marketing agency Touchdown Media and has been sponsored by companies such as MetLife and State Farm.

“At its height, it was really pumping in a lot of capital into holding these bees,” Shankar said. “They’d have a title sponsor and numerous smaller sponsors.” This gave spelling bees a lot more traction and momentum, she added: “It has an entire engine behind it.”

“The community created an infrastructure for the kids to really thrive and excel in this area,” she said.

More Than a Memory Game

For many students, spelling isn’t just a study, but also an all-encompassing way to learn about the world.

“Spelling is not just taking these 500,000 words in the English language and memorising them and then you win the spelling bee — that’s not how it works,” Nihar said. “I want people to think of spelling just like any other competition, like wanting to learn the story behind that field and learning how that field can apply to the world.”

“You can’t just eat protein powder and then go be good at football,” he added.

Dhroov said that one of his favourite things about spelling is how it intersects with his other passions, including music. “I worked on the ‘Carnival of Venice’ song on my alto saxophone, and that’s a piece where the dynamics are very important,” he said. “Knowing all these words — for example, ‘crescendo,’ ‘diminuendo,’ ‘ritardando,’ which means to slow down, ‘fortissimo,’ which means play extremely loud” allowed him to “bring emotion to the piece, make it come alive,” he said.

The amount of concentration necessary also inevitably leads to significant time commitments, and plenty of pressure on the kids.

“The level of our competitors has definitely increased. Some of our students prepare for the spelling bee as any other collegiate athlete would with the amount of preparation, the dedication, and the amount of time that they study,” said J Michael Durnil, the bee’s executive director.

Tarini Nandakumar was, at 10, one of the youngest semifinalists competing this year. Before she struck out in the semifinals, on 27 June, she said she wanted to finish what her older brother, Pranav, had started years before. “My brother got 19th place in nationals, so I wanted to continue and try and win,” Tarini said. Of how it felt to have made it that far, “It’s exciting, but also scary,” she said.

The pressure was high. And when Tarini, who is from Round Rock, Texas, didn’t make it to the finals, she felt a lot of disappointment. Many tears were shed at first, she said. Her parents tried to comfort her, and within just a few days, she said, she came around and was asking for help to start studying again.

“I’m very motivated to get better next time,” she said. “Or at least get in the top five.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Anna P. Kambhampaty c.2021 The New York Times Company

from Firstpost World Latest News https://ift.tt/3yo1Kb8

[dipulb3]

Progressive activists are wary over criminal justice under a Biden-Harris administration

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/progressive-activists-are-wary-over-criminal-justice-under-a-biden-harris-administration/

Progressive activists are wary over criminal justice under a Biden-Harris administration

In a series of interviews this summer, organizers told Appradab their angst over the records of Biden, who wrote the 1994 crime bill, and Harris, a former prosecutor, along with the pair’s outwardly supportive rhetoric for law enforcement, fuels their concerns about the future. And while Biden choosing Harris, a daughter of Indian and Jamaican immigrants, was in part a nod to influential Black women who wanted to see a reflection of themselves — Black and highly qualified– in the highest office in the land, the young activists said representation alone is not enough.

After a wide open primary that showcased the diversity of the Democratic Party, it ended with the nomination of the 78-year-old Biden, a moderate whose 1994 bill is often cited as one driver of mass incarceration, in part because of the “three strikes” law that ensured mandatory life terms for defendants with at least three federal violent crime or drug convictions.

Yet Democrats of all stripes have largely set aside their misgivings about Biden to focus on ousting Trump. That focus was amplified and sharpened following the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Republicans’ rush to fill her seat. It was buoyed further this week by the lack of charges brought against three officers for the killing of Breonna Taylor, the 26-year old woman shot in her own home while Louisville police were executing a search warrant, signaling the limits of this summer’s pressure campaign on legislative and judicial change.

View Trump and Biden head-to-head polling

Young progressive activists are reasoning that they stand a better chance of successfully pressuring Biden into taking up key elements of their cause than Trump, who has lambasted peaceful protesters and refused to condemn all but the most egregious acts of police violence.

“There are a lot of people, including myself, who aren’t excited,” Gicola Lane, a 31-year-old Black woman and criminal justice organizer from Nashville, told Appradab in an interview. “Because of what we have seen happen in courtrooms, in our own neighborhood and all over this country. And we know that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have played a part in that system.”

Still, she plans to vote for the Democratic ticket in the fall.

The lack of enthusiasm for Biden and Harris points to deeper concerns over their ability to unite the party absent what many perceive as an existential threat posed by four more years of Trump. Demonstrators on the front line of a wildly invigorated social justice movement see movable objects in Biden and Harris, where the current administration looms like a stone wall blocking their push for change.

“Voting is not an expression of my moral values, it’s a decision to choose the political terrain that we fight on,” Aaron Bryant, a 28-year-old Black man from Durham, North Carolina, told Appradab.

Bryant, an organizer and electoral justice fellow with Movement for Black Lives, plans to vote for Biden and Harris, but only as a means to an end.

“Do we want to fight on a political terrain that advantages the worst among the capitalist class and the right wing? Or do we want to fight on the terrain that advantages the middle of the road centrist moderate option? I think one of those options gives us as a movement a better opportunity to strategize and move forward,” Bryant said.

A blueprint

Simran Chowla, a 20-year-old Indian woman whose parents are of Punjabi and Bengali descent, said that she’s never before seen a South Asian woman like Harris reach this level of American politics.

“It’s been pretty monumental for me as a young Indian woman,” Chowla told Appradab.

Still, despite their similar backgrounds, Chowla said she does not have full confidence that a Vice President Harris — whom she plans to vote for — would represent her interests if elected.

An organizer with March For Our Lives DC and a lobbying lead for Team ENOUGH, a pair of gun violence prevention organizations, Chowla hopes to bring up her proposals to a Biden-Harris administration. She would like to see a defunding or redistributing of funds within the police, among other initiatives.

Neither Biden nor Harris support defunding the police, contrary to Trump’s insistence otherwise. Biden has voiced support for conditioning federal aid to police based on behavior and Justice Department intervention against departments who violate civil rights standards. Harris has often said the US needs to “reimagine” public safety and how the police and the communities they serve interact but has said violent crime should stay the remit of trained officers.

Biden has also voiced support for a federal ban on police chokeholds, reestablishing a Justice Department oversight panel that investigated police practices established during the Obama administration, and other steps to increase police accountability.

Alongside New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, Harris introduced the Justice in Policing Act in June, at the height of a national uprising against racism and the police killing of George Floyd and other unarmed Black people. The bill would create a National Police Misconduct Registry, provide incentives for local governments to conduct racial bias training for officers, and set caps on the transfer of military-grade equipment to law enforcement, among other initiatives.

And during her primary campaign, Harris released a plan that sought to end mandatory minimum sentences on the federal level, legalize marijuana, end the death penalty, and end the use of private prisons– a far cry from the policies she once enforced as California’s attorney general and the district attorney for San Francisco, positions that led to her being labeled a “cop” by young Black activists.

Among a litany of issues, she was criticized for disagreeing with a bill that would have required her AG office to appoint a special prosecutor to probe all deadly police-involved shootings in 2015, saying that the decision should be kept in the hands of local prosecutors. A year later, she pushed a law to expand the AG’s ability to appoint special prosecutors if district attorneys consented.

Some criminal justice activists say they have been heartened by the Biden campaign’s willingness to take some increasingly progressive positions on climate change — and believe that, with pressure and time, they could push a Biden-Harris administration in the same direction.

Zina Precht-Rodriguez, the deputy creative director of the youth-led Sunrise Movement, highlighted Biden’s revamped climate change platform, the product of deep engagement with leading activists and progressives like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, who co-chaired a task force on the issue that brought together Biden allies and supporters of Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

“Biden’s climate plan is unrecognizable from the plan he entered the race with, and you could say that extends to his rhetoric and how he speaks to young people,” Precht-Rodriguez said.

But asked if the Biden-Harris ticket is doing enough, she said, “I think the short answer would be, they could always do more.”

“It sort of speaks to the point of, you know, how we will push the ticket to the left,” Precht-Rodriguez said. “Voting is only one basic part of organizing, and we won’t win the Green New Deal just by voting one President or congressperson in.”

‘I don’t have faith that they’re fighting for my revolution’

Organizers have highlighted Biden’s stance that “not all cops are bad cops” as part of their critique that the ticket has not engaged in enough “deep listening” from those who are victimized by the police. It is evidence, they say, that Biden and Harris are more concerned with pushing back on attacks from Trump and the GOP than representing their movement’s priorities.

“It’s very clear that what they’re saying is completely opposite of what the movement is saying right now,” Lane said.

She works for Free Hearts, a Tennessee organization run by formerly incarcerated women that provides support to impacted families. Lane, who supported Sanders during the primary, challenged the pair to be open to a litany of policies produced over the summer to combat the current carceral state, like the BREATHE Act, which would divest federal funds from incarceration and policing and invest in community safety. That legislation is supported by progressive Reps. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan.

“I would like to see them not talk down on the movement. Instead of making it seem outrageous, actually challenge themselves to listen and adopt them on a federal level to really gain confidence of the people,” Lane said.

Rukia Lumumba, co-director of the Electoral Justice Project of the Movement for Black Lives, credited Harris for meeting with M4BL organizers to hear about the BREATHE Act before her selection as Biden’s running mate. But neither Harris nor Biden has endorsed it.

Ty Hobson Powell, a 25-year-old Black man and founder of Concerned Citizens DC, said Democrats’ current message doesn’t give him “faith that they’re fighting for my revolution in this moment.”

Though Hobson Powell says Biden and Harris have not aligned themselves with his desired policy changes, he acknowledged that the other side is further away from his vision of reform.

���When we talk about voting for anybody, that is understanding, that I will be settling,” he said.

In response to young organizers’ criticism of the lack of policy shaping to match their needs, Harris press secretary Sabrina Singh told Appradab the campaign understands “the need to address systemic injustices facing communities of color in criminal justice, housing, health care, and other aspects of society.”

“They’ve held listening sessions and virtual meetings with activists and community leaders to listen and learn and are committed to enacting their concerns into real and meaningful systemic change to achieve racial justice,” she added.

Additionally, both Biden and Harris have visited the battleground state of Wisconsin, speaking with Jacob Blake — a 29-year-old who was shot by police seven times in the back by a Kenosha police officer — over the phone and meeting with his family. Biden held a community meeting on September 3, where he condemned Blake’s shooting, as well as the violence and damage done to the city during subsequent protests.

‘She’s shown up to address these issues’

Jeremiah Wheeler, the 22-year-old Black Student Union President at Wayne State University, asked Harris how she would resolve injustices in the Black community at a recent campaign event in Detroit.

“I’m gonna need your help,” Harris told organizers and participants at the gathering on 7 Mile Road.

Wheeler told Appradab that Harris later reiterated the need to work both inside and outside the system to create change, something that Harris has said she’s done throughout her career as a prosecutor. He credited Harris for her engagement, but said this moment is less about the candidates’ individual backgrounds than their policy vision.

Like so many others, Wheeler said he will be voting for Biden and Harris, and encouraging others to do so, but that decision was as much about ousting Trump as an endorsing the Democratic ticket.

“We need to vote,” said Wheeler, who supported Sanders in the primary. “I don’t want to offer any more reasons on why not to vote, whether I feel we’re getting the gourmet meal that we rightfully deserve or we’re getting some fast food. Participation is key.”

Chelsea Miller, a 24-year-old Black woman and co-founder of civil rights organization Freedom March NYC, applauded Harris for convening an “intimate” video conference with racial justice organizations from around the country.

“She asked questions, we asked questions. It came from a place of understanding. I think it’s commendable that [Harris] would step into that space and create this opportunity for activists and organizers,” Miller said. “She’s shown up to address these issues.”

Asked what Biden and Harris could do to prove that they are serious about delivering change, Porche Bennett, an activist, mother and small businesses owner who spoke passionately at the community meeting with Biden in Kenosha, said the nominee’s time there “changed how people view him,” and called on Biden and Harris to hit the streets to make their case.

“Get out here and go through these neighborhoods. Without cameras,” she said. “Treat us like we matter.”

[dramallamadingdang]

Oh, God! Question meme! A really long one! Run! Hide!

Tagged by @ajaysims. *points* It's his fault! His! Not mine! ;)

This is really long, since it's a synthesis of two of these questions memes and I have verbal diarrhea. So, I cut.

Name: Katrina

Nicknames: Most RL people other than my kids and grandkids call me Kat because one syllable is less than three. :) Simmers call me iCad because that's what I chose to call myself when I started participating in the community. Hubby calls me Kitten. Kids call me Ma, usually in exasperated/long-suffering tones. Grandkids call me Mimi because I hate the usual things that grandmothers are called because they're associated with old people. I may be old, but I'm not old, y'know? :)

Zodiac sign: Taurus, but astrology is still bullshit.

Height: A hair less than 6'0/about 182cm. And very underweight due to digestive/metabolic issues mostly because of a malfunctioning liver. (No, not from alcohol. From having had asymptomatic Hepatits C that I most likely got from a blood transfusion in the early 80s, before they screened donated blood for that. It sucks, y'all. Cherish your liver. Baby it. Seriously. Stop with the alcohol. Just stop. Do weed instead.)

Orientation: In experience/practice: A Kinsey 2. In terms of the kind of person who attracts me: People with IQs over 130. I really, truly don't care what you look like, what gender you identify as, or what sex organs you have or don't have. Smart is seriously sexy. So, I'm sapiosexual. :)

Ethnicity: Whitey-white-white, yay! :| Glow-in-the-dark white. I-start-burning-in-the-sun-in-30-seconds white. Damn-near-albino white. Also, mostly of Welsh descent. Only sort of half-second-generation American on one side; my paternal grandma was one of those horrible immigrants who took a job away from a Real American(TM). She was even a somewhat illegal one, for a few months. But she was white and British so I guess that's OK.

(Sorry, as a person married to a man whose mum -- who is awesome -- was born in Mexico and who came here legally with her family when she was 7 and is a citizen but she still gets shit these days because she’s “a Mexican,” I've sorta come to really hate the kind of people who tend to call themselves Real Americans(TM).)

Favorite fruit: Okra, especially when part of aloo bhindi masala, an Indian dish. Okra IS a fruit. Really. Look it up. Also, tomatoes.

Favorite season: Autumn, when everything is dying. MWAHAHAHAHAH!

Favorite book series: Still Sharon Kay Penman's "Welsh trilogy." Also, though not really a series, per se: The Star Trek novels that were published in the 80s. They got mostly stupid after that, but there were some gems that were published in the mid-80s, before The Next Generation was a thing.

Favorite flower: Calla lilies. Usually used in funeral arrangements, along with Easter lilies, yay. Flowers of death! MWAHAHAH!

Favorite scent: Lilacs. Lavender. Honeysuckle. And this "rain" scent scented candle. It's so clean and fresh and not-perfumey, yet it manages to drown out the brine smell that eventually permeates everything when you live close to the shore...

Favorite color: Greens. All shades, although I prefer the yellower shades, especially the darker ones like army green. Also, orange.

Favorite animal: The spotted hyena, but I already extolled their many virtues the last time I did this list, so I'll refrain. Also, elephants.

Coffee, tea, or hot cocoa: Hell no, maybe, and yes please (if it's vegan), respectively.

Average sleep hours: Sleep? What is this word? *just came off a 38-hour work "day" a few hours ago, and I'm too wired to sleep.* YAY SHOWBIZ! :| But generally, when life isn't crazy, usually about 6 hours per 24 hour period. And I'm nocturnal, so those six hours are usually between about 0900 and about 1500. :)

Cat or dog person: Both person. And llama person. And alpaca person. And horse person. And snake person. And spider person.

Favorite fictional characters: Spock. (Well, actually, pretty much the entire original Star Trek crew except, well, Kirk. Whom I hate. With a passion. I really like Abrams-Kirk, though. Oddly enough. So it might just be that I can't stand Shatner...) The Cardassian characters from Star Trek: DS9, but especially Garak. Also, Julian Bashir and Miles O'Brien from DS9. Jack O'Neill and Rodney McKay from the Stargate franchise. KITT from the original Knight Rider. And Jayne Cobb from Firefly. (Hi, @eulaliasims!)

Number of blankets you sleep with: I'm in SoCal at the moment. No blankets because I tend to sleep in the warm part of the day. And when I do sleep at night, there's a furnace-like husband and a large, furnace-like dog in the bed with me. Blankets would be overkill.

Dream trip: Still Antarctica. Or space. But Antarctica is more likely at this point. ;)

Blog created: I think it was December of 2013. Maybe November. Ahhhh, those halcyon pre-2016 years...

Number of followers: Right now? 1443. It might change in an hour or so.

Time right now: About 0220 Pacific Time, Wednesday, March 22. One month and one day until my birthday. I expect presents, people! (Nah, I kid. Birthdays after 50 don't mean much. Hell, birthdays after 18 -- or 21, nowadays, I guess -- don't mean much. :) )

Last thing you googled: I was looking for some textures to use for some recolors I'm working on during downtimes at work.

Fave music artist: In terms of non-classical stuff: Queen, always and forever. But I also really like the Barenaked Ladies and other such alternative groups from the 90s as well as 80s New Wave stuff. Also, Metallica. In terms of "classical" stuff: Beethoven, always and forever.

Song stuck in my head: Beethoven's 8th piano sonata, 3rd movement. I was playing it at work today...on my cello. I'm working on arranging the entire sonata for solo cello...starting with the 3rd movement because I do better working on things backward. (Since I'd be willing to bet most people don't know the tune off the top of their head, here's Dubravka Tomsic playing it on youtube, if you're curious.

Last movie I watched: Star Trek Beyond. I liked it better than Into Darkness but not as well as the first Abrams-verse one...

Last TV show I watched: I have Stargate Atlantis paused on my computer screen at the moment. I plan to work on furnishing/decorating the house I put up for download tonight when I'm done with this, and I usually have a TV show playing while I build/decorate stuff in my game. :)

What I’m wearing right now: A pair of black sweatpants and a Telluride Daily Planet T-shirt. (That's the local newspaper at home. :) ) Boring white underwear. My fleece-lined moccasins because my feet are always cold.

The kind of stuff I post: Sims stuff, duh! At least on this blog. :) The other blog has the ranty/political stuff.

Why did I choose my url: Because I like to point and laugh at silly internet drama and because I own llamas, and I added dingdang because dramallama was taken and because of this song.

Gender: According to every one of those silly "What Gender Are You?" online quizzes, I am male, mainly because I'm a self-confident, argumentative, assertive, non-empathetic asshole who doesn't do "feelings." Yet, I have girl plumbing. Go figure. Meh, it's all just social conditioning and expectations, anyway, so...I rebel. I reject gender labeling and their associated roles.

Hogwarts house: I took a quiz once and it said Gryffindor. I've never read Harry Potter or seen any of the movies except one of them during an airplane flight...and I fell asleep during it, so...Yeah, I don't know what it means to be Gryffindor. Don't much care, either.

Pokémon team: Don't know anything about Pokemon, either.

Lucky number: 13 because I am anti-superstition. (Well, except when it comes to white pianos, of course, but I have hard evidence that they are evil, so it’s not superstition. ;) ) Or 42. Take your pick.

Dream job: I once said "Not having one" but then followed it up with "but that's boring." So, I decided to take on some work through June. And you know what? I'm gonna go back to "Not having one." I just need to find some volunteer work to keep me occupied for a few hours a day. Not for 38-hour "days," though. :p

Relationship status: I is married to my second husband. He's cute. And a lot younger than me, woooooooo! First marriage wasn't nearly so fun, though. The only good thing that came of it was my kids.

Pets: Oh, God. Most of them are back home in Colorado (where I have a 39-acre ranch) while I'm here in California, but:

A herd of llamas and alpacas, about 50 total at the moment, but "unpacking" season is approaching, so that number will be going up to about 65 soon. 5 horses 2 nanny goats...which actually belong to a neighbor but they're currently housed on my property, so...they count! 8 dogs 5 cats...although sadly that will probably be going down to four soon because the 18-year-old whose had health problems all her life is currently quite sick and likely won't be getting better. :( Also, there are a ton of barn cats, but they don't really count as pets. A flock of chickens. 1 rooster, the rest hens. 1 California kingsnake 5 tarantulas, various species 8 dragonfly nymphs. I think 2 will become dragonflies this year because I've had them for a few years now...

Last song you listened to: Beethoven's 5th piano concerto, for somewhat sentimental reasons.

Favorite TV Show: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. I love the original series a lot, too, but DS9 surpassed it in my book.

First Fandom: Star Trek, of course. I remember declaring that I would marry Spock when I grew up. I was 3 at the time, in 1967, watching the episode "Amok Time" (in which Spock almost gets married) in its original run. We'd only just gotten a color TV a few months before, so it was REALLY COOL. I also wrote a crapton of fanfic in the 70s/80s and a bit in the 90s. Even published a 'zine in the 80s. It was expensive as hell back then but SO MUCH FUN!

Randomly Tagging People I Don’t Think I’ve Tagged For This Thing Before: @randommindtime (It's what you get for following me!), @yandereplumsim, @elfpuddle, @halousims, @nuttydazesublime, and @kayleigh-83. As always, feel free to ignore for whatever reason. :)

[nakediconoclast]

Concern Regarding America

There are several concerns that I have regarding the future of America.

1) Guns.  A generic term that covers every weapon in the world.

2) Immigration.  Immigration really means migration.  There are two sub categories, both important to the American dream.

3) Education of our children.  Education at all levels.  Education makes it possible for the ignorant to become knowledgeable.

4) All other considerations stem from the first three.

1) Why is guns the first on my list?  Because without the means of self defense we a subject to unlimited violence by criminal idividuals, but, more importantly, by a criminal government.  

This country would not exist without guns.  Guns that were the equivalent of the enemy we faced.  Military style guns.  Guns were so important to the creation of the United States that the 13 states required the amending of the Constitution before they would agree to join into the union.

Guns have been a part of the American culture since long before the Revolutionary War.  We have used guns to protect ourselves from the Indians, the French, the British, the Spanish, the Germans, the Italians, the Japanese.  As a  matter of fact the japanese took special note of our guns, "They hide behind every blade of grass." (paraphrased)

According to the video "Innocense Betrayed", produced by Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, over 170 million people around the world were killed by their own governments during the 20th century.  That includes the United States.  

In the United States police have killed nearly 3300 people in the last nine years. (Wikipedia)  The use of SWAT teams has exploded.  Local police departments are being militarized by the acquisition of military equipment.  Police are regularly exonerated for the murders of civilians.  Civil Asset Forfeiture garners billions of dollars.(1)(2)(3) Government agencies are being armed:  The IRS, SBA, VA, HHS, the dept. of Education:  67 non-military federal agencies have acquired rifles, handguns, shotguns and billions of rounds of ammunition, 1.48 billion dollars.(4) For what?

You know just how important guns are because the Obama administration facilitated the sale and delivery to Mexican Cartels just so that they could declare that American guns must be more tightly controlled.  Obama simply followed in the footsteps of George W. Bush.  "Gun Free Zones" were purposely set up to provide excuses for more gun control.  Our children are being taught the propaganda that guns were never supposed to be in the hands of civilians.          

Some claim that Americans protect themselves, with guns, from criminals over 2.5 millions times each year.  Others claim the number is "only" about 500,000 times each year.  Either way the numbers show that guns are important to the protection of the individual.

Guns are an integral part of civilian America.  They equalize the weak and the strong.  They make it possible for Americans to protect themselves, their families, their friends, their property from predators of all stripes.  With over 357 million guns, one trillion rounds of ammunition and nearly 100 million civilian gun owners America has the worlds largest civilian militia.

Let history be our teacher:  In the 19th and early 20th centuries Russia, under the Tzar, was armed with millions of firearms.  If it had not been for the duplicity of the Reds and the U.S.A. the civilians would probably still be armed.(5)

2) Immigration is second on my list only because we'll need guns to protect us from immigrants/migrants.

As of today, March 19, 2018, it is estimated, by the U.S. Census bureau, that the population of the U.S. is 327.38 million people (6).

The number of immigrants into the U.S. since 1965 is estimated to be 72 million(7), but does not count Illegals(8). That's nearly 25 percent of the current population.    

Immigration is being used by the U.S. government and Globalists to destroy the American culture.

NAFTA, GATT, the WTO and many other agreements and organizations have and are working to destroy the industrial capacity of America.  Americans have not seen an actual increase in wages since the 1970's.  Their real incomes have actually stagnated or gone down(9).

It's being reported that the U.S. is essentially at full employment and yet there are over 90 million Americans that have stopped seeking employment.  That means that there are about 100 million Americans (about 30%) currently being supported by the other 60%.  Our debt to the world is over 21 trillion dollars(10) and congress is planning on passing a budget of at least another 1 trillion dollars.

The government of the U.S. is spending its' way into oblivion.  Since 1913 and especially since Nixon decoupled the dollar from the gold standard Americans have not stopped using that credit card.

Immigration illegal and legal is a huge portion of that debt.  Immigration has stifled wage growth in America.  The H1B program and H2B program and every other government immigration program has reduced the standard of living for every American.  Mandatory hospital care, mandatory schooling, EBT, WICK, SNAP, Medicaid, high crime rates, voter fraud are turning America into a third world hell hole.  

The Drug War has been a shooting war since its' inception.  The War on Poverty is also becoming a shooting war.  

Against historical laws, rules and policy Islam is being allowed to establish a foot hold in the United States.  All one has to do is look at Sweden, Britain, Germany, Italy and many other European countries to see the squalor and crime that accompanies the invasion of people that have no desire to assimilate.  People that actually have declared their desire to destroy the countries that they have invaded.  

LaRaza has declared "Reconquista" for the Southwest U.S.  MS13 gangs have invaded nearly every large American city.  South Florida has become "Little Cuba".  Minnesota is degenerating into Somalia.  Even in states like Idaho which used to have a large Aryan population they are seeing influxes of moslems.  In fact the Catholice church and many other Christian churches are making money by locating moslems in every state of the United States(11)(12).

Throughout history war has been the result of immigration.  

3) Education in America

We must face it.  Education in America has sunk to the level of Third World nations.  Or, maybe, it would be better to say that socialists and communists have hijacked the minds of our children.  In either case American parents and grandparents are to blame.  We did not pay proper attention to filth, ignorance and lies expoused by public school teachers.  

My father used to say, “On the first day of school parents should require teachers to show up at school an hour early.  That parents should carry with them to school a 2 x 4.  When teachers enter the school the parents should whack the teachers up side the head with the 2 x 4 to get their attention.  Then the parents should make it clear that every day will be the same if it is found that the teachers teaching is less than satisfactory.”

My father’s suggestion remains with me every day.  His suggestion is on my mind every time that I go to vote on some fool tax proposed by the local school system.  Taxes that are approved by fool parents. For the life of me I cannot understand why parents and grandparents don’t see the corruption being passed on by the schools of America.

Personally I believe that ALL public schools should be closed down.  Parents should homeschool their children.  

In my opinion reading and writing the english language, using proper grammar, should be the foremost requirement of all Americans.  It should be taught that a dictionary is an indispensible part of every person’s knowledge.  

I think that the english language should be the only government approved language of the United States.  That’s not to say that other languages cannot be learned.  Indeed, I would encourage people to learn several languages.

Arithmetic, mathematics, algebra, geometry, calculous, bookkeeping, accounting and economics should be required.  Logic and logical fallacies and philosophy are a must.  Ancient history and governments; the rise and fall of governments, cultures, religions and religious beliefs; European, Asian, African and Middle Eastern histories and governments should be extensively covered from all sides.  

American history from long before the Americas were settled must be required.  American history and government, the why’s and wherefore, must be learned and discussed from every aspect, good and bad.

I believe that no person living in the United States should be a citizen without first passing a citizenship examine.  All persons would have to pass an exam that would cover all of the above plus several basic practical requirements.

The practical requirements would include firearms handling, care and shooting, first aid training, basic automotive maintenance, hunting skills, foraging and survival skills.  Other survival skills would be encouraged such as hand to hand combat and weapons creation skills.

I want to see every American independent.  Every American must be capable of surviving and thriving independent of others.    

    (1) https://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2014/03/civil-asset-forfeiture-7-things-you-should-know

(2) https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2016-08-24/civil-asset-forfeiture-is-the-opposite-of-innocent-until-proven-guilty

(3) https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2016-08-24/civil-asset-forfeiture-is-the-opposite-of-innocent-until-proven-guilty

(4) https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2017/10/20/why-are-federal-bureaucrats-buying-guns-and-ammo-158-million-spent-by-non-military-agencies/#47b9d5ef64a1

(5) http://www.stolinsky.com/wordpress/index.php/2018/03/19/advice-from-a-russian-never-give-up-your-guns/

(6) https://www.census.gov/popclock/world

(7) http://www.pewhispanic.org/2015/09/28/modern-immigration-wave-brings-59-million-to-u-s-driving-population-growth-and-change-through-2065/

(8) http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/04/27/5-facts-about-illegal-immigration-in-the-u-s/

(9) http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/10/09/for-most-workers-real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/

(10) http://www.usdebtclock.org/

(11) http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/11/29/unholy-alliance-christian-charities-profit-1-billion-fed-program-resettle-refugees-40-percent-muslim/

(12) http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2017/04/05/catholic-group-calls-on-congress-to-support-refugee-resettlement/

[maziwainthemaking]

New Year, New-robi

Hello again rafikis,

Thanks for following my journey so far!

Although it feels like 2019 was yesterday, I’m about to ring in my 5-month anniversary here in Nairobi. Over the past couple of months, I’ve been lucky to welcome several visitors to this great country, spend more time in rural communities and local watering holes (not literally #TIA), and even just get accustomed to a mundane daily routine in this exoticized place where I used to be a wide-eyed visitor. All of this has helped me see Nairobi through new eyes and given me greater perspective on this fascinating metropolis.

Even if my observations aren’t any more insightful, I’m hoping that, at the very least, my Swahili has improved after spending a few months here. Although I won’t lie, most of these sayings are from the interwebs (except the last one which is a Papa Jamal classic).

1. Umoja ni nguvu: Unity is strength

For anyone who has moved from a small rural town to a big urban city, you’ll know that one of the most noticeable differences is the level of diversity - in race, language, income levels, religious beliefs, political views, food, fashion, architecture, you name it… and often, this diversity is unfortunately correlated with conflict, violence, or a clash of civilizations.

Countries in Africa tend to benefit (or suffer) from this diversity inherently, thanks to the colonial legacy of how land was divided on the continent. Homogenous tribes and cultures were separated by borders arbitrarily drawn by European colonialists, creating some of the most ethnically diverse countries in the world. Nairobi, being a large, cosmopolitan African city, embodies this diversity on many levels: not only through a mix of Kenyan ethnicities, cultures, and perspectives, but also a smattering of the colourful mosaic of people who have immigrated here from across Africa and the rest of the globe.          

At the risk of sounding like I’m making a political statement, which I am certainly not qualified to do yet, I would say that these diverse groups seem to live here in relative harmony. I wouldn’t go so far as saying Nairobi is safe - pretty much everyone who lives here has a story about a robbery or mugging (myself, unfortunately, included). However, given that its bordering nation, Somalia, known to be one of the most homogenous in Africa, has suffered from decades of unrest and infighting, you could conclude that greater diversity does not necessarily mean greater conflict.

Gaining a deeper understanding of Nairobi’s complex history has helped me untangle the resulting tapestry of cultures that has developed here over time, from large Bantu tribes like the Kikuyu, to the not-so-lovingly-named Kenyan Cowboys who remained here since the British rule, to the Indian ancestors of the railway labourers brought over by the Brits, the Arab traders who moved inland from the Swahili coast, to the more recent Chinese settlements that have formed as a result of their investments in infrastructure. Interacting with a broader range of communities here has given me a more nuanced perspective on the divergence between conservative and progressive opinions on religion, politics, gender roles, relationships, sexual orientation, family structure, and values that exist in this city. At the same time, I’ve been fortunate to experience the culture and creative expression that blossom from this juxtaposition of traditional and edgy, in the form of music, art, comedy, and dance, while also revelling in the ability to flip seamlessly from nature reserve to bustling city a heartbeat and switch between wellness retreat to raging nightlife within just a short Bolt ride. Though diversity can be seen in all flavours and colours here, Nairobians prosper by recognizing that there is more strength in unity than conflict.

2. Adui wa mtu, ni mtu: The enemy of man is man

Of course, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows here (in fact, the rains had been non-stop for months!) - you can’t have a conversation about Kenyan life without addressing the vast inequalities and corruption that exist. For the billions of dollars invested in the country through grants, foreign aid, and impact investment, there are still gaping holes in infrastructure, healthcare and education that are yet to be tackled. It seems that politicians, public officials, donors, investors, and aid workers might be getting in their own way when it comes to making significant progress on the systemic issues that plague the country. The war on corruption makes daily headlines here yet many parts of policy making, procurement, regulation, and enforcement are driven by political agendas and misaligned financial incentives.

Even policy efforts that I generally support can by driven by a politicized PR angle. For example, Kenya’s ban on plastic bags, known to be the toughest in the world, took 10 years to implement and enforce successfully. While this policy has made a significant impact on waste management, animal health, and overall environmental protection, it was championed by a highly publicized race for implementation among East African governments. One could argue that the ends justify the means, now that 24 African countries have successfully banned plastic bag use, until you step back and consider the greater threats to environmental conservation like the widespread use of diesel fuel or practices like trash burning that are still prevalent in these countries. Similarly, and closer to home for me, much fanfare has been made about maternal employment and breastfeeding policies in local media, now that all employers are required to provide a lactation space for new mothers. However, due to their non-existent enforcement strategy, only 40 companies across Kenya have actually created lactation rooms so far.

While these political concerns may seem lofty, they can become significant considerations in making career choices and conducting daily life in this country. To commercialize a new breast pump in this market, I know I’ll need a well-connected network that spans government, regulatory bodies, distributors, retailers, healthcare providers, and key opinion leaders to counter the inevitable pressure to comply with the bribery and bureaucracy that often infiltrates these sectors. Many of the industry conferences I’ve attended aim to tackle these challenges by crowd-sourcing solutions within the community or, at the very least, encouraging key players not to concede to this systemic corruption.

On a daily basis, while it’s impossible not to confront your privilege as a foreigner living here, it is also difficult to know how to maximize your positive impact: do you donate to your favorite charity, give cash directly to the people begging on the street, volunteer for programs in the informal settlements, or advocate for further policy change and enforcement through your network? The complex system of incentives and unintended consequences make it impossible to calculate the net impact of your every action. Organizations like “Give Directly” have extensive research on the positive impact of unconditional direct cash transfers to individuals living in extreme poverty, which eliminate the potential bureaucratic redundancies of social interventions targeted at these communities. My personal conclusion is that as long as we aim to ensure that man does not become the enemy of his own good intentions in these efforts, we can work towards making a net positive social impact.  

3. Haba na haba hujaza kibaba: Little by little fills the pot

Whatever qualms you might have with Kenyan society, if there’s one thing you can commend Nairobians for it’s their hustle. Everyone from your housekeeper to your manager is likely rocking a side-gig, whether its delivering Jumia orders or semi-professional stand-up comedy. Before Nairobi became a hotbed for entrepreneurship and terms like ‘impact investing’ were even invented, Kenyans had been pitching tents to sell their farm’s produce on the street and exporting their handicrafts around the world. Since then, strategic public and private sector efforts have continued empowering these entrepreneurs; for instance, through significant investments in enabling technology such as mobile payments.

All that to say, when it comes to innovative ideas and self-employment, I have known Nairobians to be extremely optimistic and perseverant. Which is why I am always pleasantly surprised to hear those three words that every girl dreams of, after I describe my business to any Kenyan: “It will work.”  

This simple phase hits on a very special insight that is an important ingredient in the makings of every entrepreneur: an unabashed optimism that things will work out. And if they aren’t quite working yet, it’s only a matter of time and hard work until they do. Little by little, we will all get where we need to go.

When you are starting to build the foundation of a business and testing the assumptions that are the basis of your idea, this type of encouraging and frequent reassurance can make a world of difference. While it’s important to be realistic, or even borderline cynical, about the positive market feedback you receive in contrived research settings like focus groups, sometimes it’s just nice to take a moment and indulge in some external validation from a total stranger that you’re not totally out of your mind - “it will work”.  

And this is the way we all support each other and survive here in our little bubble of dreamers and doers. Things are not always easy and sometimes you bump into cultural clashes or politics and bureaucracy, but these are all just hurdles in the rat race that we idealists happily skirt around in pursuit of our nobler ambitions. Knowing that we are all hustling and working towards the same broader goals, we gladly go out of our way to lend a hand, partner with each other, subsidize our services, and give free advice. Despite not living in an affluent country, people here are rich with positivity, tenacity, and generosity.

Asanteni sana! Until next time,

Sahar

[theliterateape]

American Discourse is an Ethnic Telephone Game

By Chris Churchill

As the demographics have changed in the United States over it’s long history and we become a more and more diverse country, there seems to be a major piece of reality that the dominant culture, i.e. white folks, is missing or ignoring.

There have been a lot of clashes regarding racial and cultural insensitivity by the dominant culture. Problems with the public reception of confederate flags, confederate monuments, monuments to heroes that don’t represent American ideals anymore, Christopher Columbus, Thanksgiving and so on. The list seems to grow daily. All these things that were once seen as part of the fabric of our culture, those things that made America, America, are now being dismantled in the public square and are being declared obsolete, insensitive and even evil.

And your aunt shrugs. She can’t believe it. Why are people trying to ruin my good time? Your dad scoffs. This is the way it’s always been. Are these people not real Americans? Maybe you can’t expect them to be “real Americans” if their feelings about America are not included in your understanding of what America means.

In fact, much of America remains baffled that anyone would question these long time American institutions and icons. Why isn’t Columbus a hero? Because he killed the Indians? Because he mislabeled the Indians? What’s wrong with Thanksgiving? We’re being thankful for a genocide? This is tough stuffing to chew.  Here’s the issue, though. The defenders of the old icons, idols and heroes are forgetting that it’s all about the audience. Who is the message intended for?

In most cases, the traditions in America were created by white people of European descent for white people of European descent. And when this nation was built, many of these white people thought that it would stay that way. Or at least, the idea that the demographics might change seemed so unlikely or so distant in the future that our founding fathers didn’t really concern themselves with it.

One good thing this country has managed to maintain, however, is the idea that it is a great place for all types of people. Welcome the immigrant! You’re free to be what you are here! As long as you aren’t hurting anyone, you are free to wear your clothes, eat your foods, practice your religion or lack thereof, and live your own unique truth. The greatest thing about America is it’s ability to embrace new philosophies and ideals as new people add to the populace. In a way, America is Borg. When you move here, we will assimilate you. And, by that, I mean in the way the Borg does.  We will accept all your knowledge and beliefs and incorporate them into who we are as a nation.

This means you don’t have to be like me to be American, supposedly. But again, it seems that a lot of people are missing this idea in the strawman arguments surrounding PC culture. People dismiss considerations for others as being politically correct when they don’t like considering another human's feelings. (Some might call that being kind but that’s another essay.)

Here’s what the dominant culture is missing: audience. Audience is the key in all the issues of what is beneficial to our culture. The dominant culture is still acting like there aren’t enough people of other races and faiths to really include them in the decisions as to what is appropriate in terms of public policy, what is important in terms of the inclusion of the needs of all Americans.

When we used to talk about Columbus discovering America, that was white, European Americans talking to other white, European Americans. Because, Columbus did discover America, if by discovering America, you mean you were the first of your people to notice it was there. Like the first astronomer to discover Neptune. We don’t really know if he was the first life form in the universe to notice it. We just assume he was the first human to see it through a telescope and write it down. And, of course, acknowledging Chris Rock’s famous words on the subject, there were already millions of people here when “America” was “discovered." 

One time I discovered a nice coffee shop. I mean, as far as my household and friends were concerned, I was the first one to recognize that it was a nice place to go. It doesn’t mean that the people who ran the coffee shop hadn’t already noticed they were there.

So now the audience is way different than it was before. America, due to it’s lovely capacity to take in and accept others, and partially due to our attempt to start making things right with those that we murdered or enslaved to get to this place, is a much more diverse place. America isn’t just people of white, European descent. We must accept that, usually, the term Traditional American Values doesn’t mean American at all. It often means European American Values and is bandied about as easily decoded code between whites who don’t want to include others' needs in their decisions about what America is and what America needs.

Real American discourse is the descendant of a slave telling a story to which white people can’t relate to a Latino friend. Real American discourse is the Chinese American and the Vietnamese American talking about something other than Kardassia and its inhabitants. Real American discourse also includes white people but it isn’t just white people. And it isn’t just land owners and aristocrats either. If this is America, then audience must be considered. The laws of the land, if this is truly a democracy, are decided by this audience. Understand and accept that the audience is different than it was two hundred years ago. “Traditional America” is a defunct mindset about only one type of American.

If America was a white man doing a standup bit, he would have to stop telling racist jokes by now. Because we are a bigger family and we should be able to see that all people are equal. All people deserve equal consideration. Jokes that are simply about the otherness of the other are only acceptable if the other agrees to the sentiment and finds humor in it too.

America is good when it embraces its audience. And it’s audience is everyone. Or, at least it should be.

[wionews]

Do you feel the gaze? We all are being watched

It first happened in 2009, again in 2012 and then it repeated itself in 2016. Three times in a span of seven years, Shah Rukh Khan, the Indian films actor was detained at the US airport and no form of wealth, success or fame could help him evade this situation.

Have you ever wondered what went wrong with a man who has achieved globally acknowledged stardom? Do you buy into the logic of it just being plain and regular protocol?  

I fully understand & respect security with the way the world is, but to be detained at US immigration every damn time really really sucks.

— Shah Rukh Khan (@iamsrk) August 12, 2016

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 Well, what happened to Shah Rukh Khan was not just an unfortunate incident but also a part of a larger mesh of issues concerning privacy, security and safety, both online and offline. It is the outcome of surveillance in the digital age where data points  are fed to the system, while grossly ignoring everything about the personality and character of an individual.     In Khan’s case, every other factor of him being a superstar, who travels in a business class, is loved by people all around the world was superseded by the data points that matched to someone who has a criminal history or can trigger false alarms. The data points that were picked up were: male, Muslim name, Indian, and from a certain age. 

  Imagine Brad Pitt coming to India and being taken aside as a potential terrorist. This is how dangerous our world is today.

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  Now imagine Brad Pitt coming to India and being taken aside as a potential terrorist. This is how dangerous our world is today. The image that these systems have of us is warped and is just based on these data points that are monitored by intelligence agencies. According to this, all of us can fall into one category or another and be framed for something we have not committed.

The Constant Gaze   Anja Kovacs who directs The Internet Democracy Project in India focuses on the Internet and human rights issues. The movement discusses the interplay of issues that most of us choose to ignore, of a state of constant surveillance, data privacy issues and government control of access and usage of the Internet.

She says, "India is not an exceptional situation but because it’s a diverse country--contradictions and inequalities are visible here. Challenges are more in your face here. Context is more visible."    In this context, she talks about how surveillance functions. She says, “The way it actually works is that somebody is watching you but what it essentially aims to do, is to police norms. Those who set these norms are often the ones who are watching and they decide how those who are being watched should behave. The thing about norms is that people say that if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear but all of this would be on the wrong side of the norm at some point. In the case of Shah Rukh Khan, it was denuded that he is a terrorist or is affiliated without him doing anything.”

  It's not just about someone watching you but policing norms. Those who set these norms are the ones watching and they decide how those who are being watched should behave.

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  Discussing the nitty-gritty and compulsions of living in the digital age, we came to the conclusion that surveillance is more rampant now as more cameras are being put in place everywhere and more number of companies are tracking us online--and that makes us all very uncomfortable.    What’s dangerous for a democracy to sustain, is that the government has access to all our data and whether they have a good reason or not, they continue to watch us.

Game of Algorithms   Anja adds, “They won’t go and check what I am talking about but if I talk about terrorism too often, and I am connected to other people who are talking about terrorism then at some point they might start looking into my profile. There have been many cases from New York where people have been picked up wrongly for something as small as ordering a pressure cooker. Law enforcement agencies picked up on a white middle-class American family of parents and one small kid for ordering a pressure cooker. For the intelligence agencies, that cooker flashed as an ingredient for making a bomb. Imagine the US police force wearing black suits entering a private property only to find nothing.   “This happens in a corporate scenario as well but the consequences aren’t the same. Facebook cannot throw you in jail but they along with other corporations are trying to shape your behaviour in insidious ways, to try and get us to do certain things. That's why at one point last year; Facebook had announced that they are tweaking their algorithms, as people are not sharing enough personal updates. We don't know whether they were successful in getting people to share but we do know that Facebook wanted people to share more, as they wanted to do something.

Facebook cannot throw you in jail but they along with other corporations are trying to shape your behaviour in insidious ways

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 “It's dangerous to see what they can do with the algorithms, like how they use it to drive political campaigns during elections and move towards targeted campaigns. In America for example, in this year’s elections, if we were seen as potential Trump supporters and possible voters, the messages we would get would be different because our profiles are different, unlike the earlier times when potential voters of a single party would receive same messaging.”

Also Read: Humour to the rescue: Memes flood Internet post-US election  

But not all is negative in this forever connected world. Surveillance vests power in the watcher and using this, the dynamics can change with different actors at play. She narrates how some slum colonies in Delhi where riots happened used surveillance as a tool for their benefit. The community itself bought CCTV cameras because they got fed up with the police arresting boys from the neighbourhood and blaming them for riots while according to the locals, the actual violence was committed by people outside of the community. She says, “They wanted to be in a situation where they can provide proof in future instances, so they reversed the gaze.” 

While surveillance continues at every level, be it in the workplace or public spaces; the kind that government indulges in online, is always riskier. The government of any country has the right to keep a check but it “ideally should happen only after the State has a suspicion on a person of a crime or any such affiliation”. In earlier times, the system didn’t necessarily work but “at least in theory there were some checks and balances that didn’t give enormous power to those doing the watching”.   Anja adds, “It means that as a society we have less and less control over setting the norms because somebody has set the norm and if we behave out of it, we will be penalised. We are not only just expecting it to happen but are more conscious and aware of our surroundings--how to behave in public spaces, what to say on social media, what data to pull out and etc.”

  As a society we have less and less control over setting the norms because somebody has set the norm and if we behave out of it, we will be penalised.

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How Open is the Internet?   A part of a movement that aims to make the Internet free and a democratic space for all, Anja explains that there is also something called nudging in public policy. Facebook also does nudging through tweaks to the algorithms so that they can incentivise you to do particular things.    Similarly, the Planning Commission of India, Niti Aayog also has a nudging unit now. She says, “What they want to do is to use data of popular government schemes and tweak them slightly so that more people can benefit from the policies. So nudging can be used for positive means as well but you can easily use it for negative purposes.   "There is no idea of what is being done with our data and who keeps a check. So it’s not just the traditional form of surveillance where they are watching people to catch them when they do something wrong but it’s really also about the insidious ways in which they are shaping the society, shaping people to do stuff without them knowing. As citizens, that’s a problem.”   While surveillance is an issue that needs urgent attention and scope for active and open discussions, there is also a big question around how open the Internet really is?   Anja simply answers that it depends on ways on how you use the Internet. She says, “There are still some ways of using the Internet that is much more decentralised where you have more control on your data but it’s a little bit more complex. There’s a reason why so many of us ended up on platforms like Facebook and Twitter as they made sharing of content so easy. But it’s true that there has been a shift to more and more centralisation on the Internet even though the technology remains decentralised.”    She emphasises on focusing on how these big companies are trying to escape regulations everywhere and how they are able to become so big without anybody questioning them. She adds, “Even Microsoft was put into antitrust regulations in the late 90’s because they had bundled Explorer in every system. Explorer is still installed in every Windows system but we now have the choice of using or not using it. Managing a very strong presence in browsers they had left users with no option. People complained that Microsoft was forcing them to use their own ecosystems in too many ways. The reason as to why many use Firefox or Chrome instead of Explorer is as a result of that.”

Cyber Security    When online we are usually privy to the eyes of many, even after checks and balances have been put in place. This concern gives fodder to cyber security, a term that is often used when talking about online safety for the weak and vulnerable.

Also Read: Are we going to lose our jobs to robots?

  Anja, however, is not pleased with the existing discourse on cyber security. She says, “The way it is present now--don’t do this, don’t do that is not helpful and it starts to become more like what we see in the offline space. Don’t wear this when you are out, don’t be out in the night etc., whereas if we want to make the Internet a safe place this is not the right approach. It’s good to be conscious of what you are sharing, who you are sharing it with. You have to be smart. But there is no one-size-fits-all approach and currently, that is what it sounds like. We have to learn basics of risk assessment, to think about what are the threats in my life, actors that I should be worried about.

National Cyber Security Policy 2013 (Source: Internet Democracy Project) (WION)

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 “We have seen in many accounts that parents are complaining about how their children have no sense of privacy and they also complain about children not sharing enough with them. So, clearly the children have a sense of privacy but who they see as threat actors while who their parents think are threat actors are completely different. As children, they see their parents as threat actors and stop sharing information with them. Parents think random strangers are threat actors.”   This also emboldens the fact that people must understand the consequences of what they do online and take informed decisions. Lurking dangers of the new-age technology are glaring and it is upon us to make informed choices, to completely avoid or at least diminish the loss value attached to any attack via the Internet.   Starting in 2011, The Internet Democracy Project has been focusing on the Internet and human rights issues. Their focus is on bringing together the domain of technology with ideas of democracy and social justice. However, in a world where authoritarian tendencies trump democratic values and promises of social justice are yet to be realised, it is a still a long road before misuses of technology can be stopped by brining in more accountability in the surveillance system.    (WION)

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[tinasheng-blog]

The Unique Mawlynnong People: A Media-Culture Comparison of Matrilineal Culture and Western Patrilineal Culture

In the 21st century, with the internet, television, radio and other media forms, there is more information available about different cultures and societies than ever before. One must only turn to Google in order to find endless videos, photographs, articles and data about the thousands of cultural minorities that exist across the globe. As knowledge and available information from these societies grows and grows, the many differences between the media-culture of these groups can become a little overwhelming. It can seem impossible to try and fully understand the differences in culture and tradition between, for example, a Salish First Nations person, a Syrian immigrant, a Chinese factory worker or an Indian rural farmer. The media-cultures of these people are just so different, whether you are focusing on language, traditions, history or social structure.

Figure 1 -  Ritual dance of Mawlynnong's Khasi culture – women are given a central position

On the other hand, on a very basic level, even the most different cultures usually share some common areas. For example, very different cultures might all engage in some kind of cultural or ritual dance or singing, even though the language and rhythm and even the scale used might be totally different. The importance of the family unit might be very central to all cultural groups, even though the way that family values are promoted in specific cultures can be totally different. So even for societies that initially seem like they have nothing in common from a media-culture point of view, often there is at least some basic cultural connections to work from.

This paper will focus on the media-culture of the people of Mawlynnong village, India. The group is chosen to be researched is because unlike almost all cultural groups today, the members of this village are part of a matrilineal and generally matriarchal tradition. While the cultural ‘footprint’ of the people of Mawlynnong is incredibly small (as you will see, the total population of the village is tiny) there are several key examples in which the media-culture of the Mawlynnong people emerge onto a global scale. As a comparison to these examples, modern western culture will be used – or at least the patrilineal parts of Western culture – as a way to highlight some of the key differences between typical Western culture and the Mawlynnong people.

However, such an undertaking immediately comes with a question; why bother investigating a matrilineal culture and why bother comparing it against patrilineal cultures? In my opinion, the answer is rather simple. Take, for example, the recent presidential elections in the United States. In the race between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, the idea of gender played a key role. Many people were interested in the idea of a women ruling the United States for the first time. After all, throughout human history, there are so few examples of women being placed in a position of power, either socially or culturally. The Mawlynnong culture, while very different from U.S and western culture, at least gives a real-world example of a situation where women have much more power. The Mawlynnong, therefore, become worthy of study in order to see what we can learn from a unique, modern example of matrilineal society and media-culture. By exploring the matrilineal people of the village of Mawlynnong, one can see up close how a culture is affected when it is matrilineal instead of patrilineal, providing a ‘mirror’ (as opposed to thinking hypothetically) to hold up against some of the patrilineal parts of Western culture that we sometimes do not even notice.

Figure 2 – Mawlynnong women dressed plainly

This issue will be examined primarily through the methodology of ethnography, as this offers the best chance to define and relate to the unusual social aspects of the Mawlynnong media-culture. The paper begins with definition and examination of some examples of patrilineal culture as expressed in contemporary media. This section will be followed by a brief introduction to the concept of matrilineal culture. Then the Mawlynnong village will be discussed directly, as well as the wider Khasi community that these villages are a part of. While the paper will discuss certain social practices and traditions, the paper will also focus on the Mawlynnong’s social practice of group cleaning and the practice of creating ‘living bridges’, and how these are expressed in various forms of media-culture.

Patrilineal/Patriarchal culture: Hidden in Plain Sight

Patriarchy “denotes a social structure where the actions and ideas of men are dominant over those of women” (Soman, 2009, p. 253). Typically, patriarchal societies are also patrilineal, meaning that the family name (and often family possessions) passes through the male line, often to the eldest son, rather than to female members of society (Soman, 2009). In general, patriarchal societies need not oppress women directly, but rather prioritize social, cultural, and economic practices that are aligned with goals from the male psyche and mindset (Soman, 2009). This kind of preference for male goals can take place intentionally, where people regard “women’s subordination as universal, God-given, or natural, hence immutable” (Lerner, 1986, p. 16). Of course, such prejudice can also take place unintentionally, where the person, people (or even entire society) acts in a patriarchal way without actually realizing their bias (Lerner, 1986).

In terms of media-culture, the influence of patriarchal and patrilineal societies can be either totally obvious or highly indirect, but either way it is incredibly common. Take the following Budweiser advert (featured both online and on television):

Figure 3 - A typical modern Western Budweiser beer advertisement

Here, the use of women as a means to sell alcohol makes for a rather obvious patriarchal image. Naturally, the image here appeals to the male psyche and male goals. One can only assume that the idea behind the advert is to associate purchasing Budweiser with the idea of meeting beautiful women. From a cultural, ethnographic perspective, the advert suggests a culture that at least has elements of a patriarchy, in the sense that clearly here male desires are being catered to at the expense of female desire (and arguably female dignity). Moreover, the image here could be said to suggest a trivialisation of women in society, reducing images of women to a kind of ‘window dressing’ designed to do little more than sell a product. While such sexualisation of women could be seen as a rather simple expression of the idea that ‘sex sells’, the dominance of such imagery throughout television, film and new media in Western culture suggests as much an exploitation of female qualities for the enjoyment of a patriarchal society as much as it is merely a sales technique.

A second aspect of patrilineal and patriarch societies is the preference in media-culture for activities that are primarily masculine. In modern times, the incredible rise of sport right around the world, both as an aspect of cultural identity and as mass entertainment, can be connected to patrilineal and patriarchal concepts. In particular, the rise of male sport icons stands out as an aspect of culture that denotes patrilineal and patriarchal societies. Online and on television, it is hard to avoid the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Tom Brady, Tiger Woods, or even slightly older sporting names like Wayne Gretsky. 

Figure 4 - Famous Soccer Player Cristiano Ronaldo is idolised by millions worldwide

Indeed, the dominance of male figures in the world of sport is so pronounced that sport has become “an arena of ideological battles over gender relations” (Messner, 1988, p. 197). Messner goes on to say that “organized sport has been a crucial arena of struggle over basic social conceptions of masculinity and femininity” and concludes that organised sport, as it exists today, “has become a fundamental arena of ideological contest in terms of power relations between men and women” (Messner, 1988, p. 197). While certainly there are many famous female athletes (tennis stars in particular stand out as being globally famous), typically it is the stereotypically male traits, such as strength, power, speed and decisiveness that are used to identify sporting stars in virtually all forms of media. 

Understanding Matrilineal Societies

Matrilineal societies are naturally structured quite differently than patrilineal societies. Typically, in matrilineal societies, the family name is passed down through the female line, with any possessions or titles that are to be passed down through generations also typically passing from female offspring to female offspring (Hartung, 1985). 

Figure 5 - Traditional Khasi culture song

Matrilineal societies, at their core, can be defined in situations where “a woman's ‘family’ remains the family of her mother, brothers, and sisters even after she marries” (Hartung, 1985, p. 661). In such scenarios, wives will retain their mothers’ family name, her children will retain their grandmother’s family name, etc. Interestingly, Hartung suggests that the creation of matrilineal societies was as a response to the same problems that led to the creation of patrilineal societies. This problem is the fact that “husbands risk investing a significant component of reproductive success in other men's children if wives engage in extramarital sex” (Hartung, 1985, p. 661). This, according to Hartung, was a big problem for earlier, more primitive societies. The problem is that, with no accurate way to distinguish one man’s offspring from the offspring of another man, males could not be sure if their children (and all the thousands of hours spent raising the child) might really be the offspring of another man  (Hartung, 1985). 

Figure 6 - Traditional Khasi dresses

Patrilineal societies are obviously one way of dealing with this problem, as they typically put considerable social, cultural and potentially even legal constraints on the sexual activities of women, usually far more than the restrictions placed on men (Hartung, 1985). In this way, societies would try to insure that patriarchal lines are maintained, while minimising the risk of female sexual activity breaking a family’s patrilineal lines (Hartung, 1985). However, matrilineal societies offer their own solution to this issue of sex and paternity. Matrilineal societies take advantage of the fact that, unlike the father, a child’s mother can always be correctly identified, for obvious reasons (i.e. they give birth to the child). From a social point of view, the immediate effect of focusing on the maternal line is that the continuity through generations can be identified without having to worry about the possibility of other sexual partners being involved (Hartung, 1985). Needless to say, whichever method a society uses to solve this problem, will dramatically affect the society in question. Beyond a solution to this age-old problem about paternity and maternity, the differences that can be created in a wider cultural sense can be very noticeable. In the following sections, the Mawlynnong media-cultures will be explored more directly, highlighting any unusual social and cultural aspects of the society that show up in examples of media-culture.

Mawlynnong: A Village of Khasi Culture

Having defined the origins and basic functions of matrilineal societies, and given some examples of how patrilineal societies are expressed in media-culture, it is now possible to study the people of the Mawlynnong village directly.

Figure 7 - Two Mawlynnong women wearing traditional clothing

Mawlynnong is located in north-east India, in the area north-east of Bangladesh (Nieves, 2015). The total number of people living in the village of Mawlynnong is quite tiny, roughly 500 people, making identifying media-culture specific to this village a difficult proposition (Nieves, 2015). The people of Mawlynnong identify as part of Khasi culture, an ethnic group made up of well over 1 million people (Mawrie, 1981). The Mawlynnong, for countless generations, have been a matrilineal society, with the youngest daughter inheriting “the lion’s share” of her mother’s property, as well as taking a central role in the decisions of the family (Mawrie, 1981, p. 17). Mawrie also notices that this matrilineal system goes back in time far enough to be tied to the Khasi myth about creation, which was done by a female god (Mawrie, 1981). This ties in with Hartung’s position highlighted in the previous section, that the creation of matrilineal societies was a solution to the ancient problem of sex and inheritance (Hartung, 1985). In this way, the Khasi matrilineal society is reinforced not just as a social and cultural necessity, but as a religious one too (Mawrie, 1981). All of this suggests that the Mawlynnong culture very much fits the general model of matrilineal societies that was discussed in the previous section.

In fact, as a matriarchal leader of the family, a Mawlynnong mother is assigned all sorts of religious and cultural roles of importance, from cremating older family members to feeding poor family members at religious feasts (Mawrie, 1981). Other unusual cultural practices include a tradition whereby married men often remain living in their mother’s home until they have had one or two children with their wife (Mawrie, 1981). It is also commonly found that men do much of the menial chores for the family that are commonly attributed to women in patrilineal societies (Mawrie, 1981). Compared to patrilineal and patriarchal societies, gone is any hint of the oppression of women. In fact, often times it can be the husband in the family unit who is given less responsibility and the more basic chores and tasks of the household (Bouissou, 2011). Some suggest that the family unit in Mawlynnong can actually oppress the male figure to some extent, with one Mawlynnong man commenting, unhappily, that “all he can do is play the guitar, sing, take to drink and die young” (Bouissou, 2011). While this final evidence is quite anecdotal, it does suggest that, very much like the stereotype of the ‘unhappy housewife’ in Western culture, so too can men take on this social role of positions are reversed. This role-reverse is another good example of how matrilineal seems to affect societies, and it is interesting to note that, by reversing the dominant social leader, the opposite gender is given the more menial tasks and responsibilities.

Khasi Culture: Living Bridges and Social Harmony

Pictured below (figure 8) is one of the so-called ‘living bridges’ of Meghalaya (Meghalaya is the region in which the Mawlynnong village is located). 

Figure 8 - A 'Living Bridge' made from roots and braches grown together over decades

These bridges are unique to this region and Mawlynnong’s Khasi culture, and go through an incredible process of creation over several generations. The bridges are Ficus elastica plants that are literally grown, piece by piece, decade by decade, into the shape of a bridge (Shankar, 2015). Over the years, the bridges can take a surprising amount of weight, and can be held up as an amazing, innovative ‘low tech’ solution to a very common engineering problem (Shankar, 2015). Beginning as tiny shoots that are little more than twigs, these bridges can take generations of care and growth before becoming strong enough to serve any purpose (Shankar, 2015). However, once fully grown, the ‘bridges’ form a vital travel route for the wider, mostly rural people of the region. They offer vital routes over rivers that might otherwise be impassable, or that would wash away traditional bridges during the wet season (Chaudhuri et. al., 2016). In this way the bridges exist both as an international media icon for a region that would otherwise be largely culturally anonymous, but also a vital piece of infrastructure for sustaining and enhancing everyday life. In terms of media-culture, these bridges are one of the few ways that Mawlynnong culture has truly become visible on a global level, with may websites, photographers and analysts focusing on construction methods, uses to the local people, cultural influences, etc. 

A second unique aspect of the culture of Mawlynnong village is the people’s attitude towards the the town itself. Renowned as “the cleanest village in India”, the Mawlynnong people have become totally devoted to maintaining the cleanliness of their village, a particularly unusual trait in Indian society (Badal, 2015). It seems that this focus cleanliness permeates through all of the village of Mawlynnong, with children doing quite a lot of work around the village before attending school or returning to focus on chores in their own homes (Badal, 2015). Such chores include sweeping leaves and garbage, separating various forms of garbage, separating organic waste from garbage and burying biodegradable waste (Badal, 2015). The incredible degree of cleaning, far beyond even Western standards, stands out as a unique aspect of Mawlynnong culture that has now been extensively documented online. It is another interesting example of a society that is uniquely matrilineal indirectly creating media-culture and managing to stand out from neighbouring cultures and societies. Along with the creation of the ‘living bridges’, it suggests a very different relationship with the natural world, and with how resources – either cultural, social or physical – are created and managed. 

Figure 9 - Mawlynnong Children carefully cleaning some grass 

Final Comparisons and Conclusion

Having spent some time focusing on differences between patrilineal and matrilineal cultures, several interesting aspects of the media-culture of the Mawlynnong people stand out. While the cultural footprint of the Mawlynnong village is extremely slight – as was mentioned, the total population rarely reaches more than 500 – there are at least two obvious areas where their media-culture that have moved out from north-east India. In particular, I focused on two examples that, through the internet, have emerged as examples of the media-culture of Mawlynnong. The first example I chose was the creating of the so-called ‘living bridges’ found in the region around Mawlynnong, which stand out as unique, multi-generational building projects unique to this culture. They stand as an example of how the Mawlynnong people think and act in relation to their environment and how they are willing to devote countless hours to projects that take many generations to complete. The second example I chose was the fact that Mawlynnong has become famous in India and the world as one of the cleanest villages in India. The many images of the town and people available online and in videos show us a place where the community seems particularly tightly knitted together. The focus on the issue of garbage – a problem all too commonly ignored in India – suggests a different cultural relationship with the environment and the world in general.

While throughout this exhibition I concentrated on highlighting differences between patrilineal, patriarchal societies with matrilineal, matriarchal societies, it is important to note that this was not done to propose a direct “cause and effect” relationship in any media-culture differences between matrilineal and patrilineal groups. Surely there are countless historical and cultural differences that set such different groups apart, none of which could hope to be explained by a simple cause-effect matrilineal/patrilineal model. However, in noting some of the differences between Mawlynnong culture and western, typically patrilineal culture, some interesting and unique media-culture situations nevertheless come forward. With so few examples of matrilineal societies, either in modern media-culture (or at any time in history), highlighting these points both shows up some obvious flaws in patrilineal cultures, but also suggests that, if given the chance, matrilineal, matriarchal societies also have a lot of interesting, positive cultural and social ideas to offer. More generally, it can sometimes be hard to see the flaws in one’s own culture and one’s own society. By focusing on a different media-culture that explores ideas that are very different to a traditional, patriarchal culture, it becomes possible to truly see just how strange one’s own media-culture can be. In this way, by focusing on examples of opposing media-culture, we can hope to learn more not just about the media-culture in question, but about ourselves, our own society and our own media-culture.

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