#Indian Soldiers Attacked

[sayruq]

3 thoughts on this:

Economy - Israel's economy took a hit in October that was comparable to the economic tremors caused by the COVID-19 outbreak. It is effectively in a major recession today. The longer they drag out this war, the worse their economic condition will be. Foreign capital will continue leaving the country as it seems incapable of stabilising. While the continued use of reserves means 300,000 Israelis will be unable to work, not to mention the millions of dollars Israel has to spend to mobilise its reserve every day. The longer the war goes on, the more people will end up leaving the country. 470,000 have left in October and November with no intention of returning while over 300,000 settlers are internally displaced. Both of those numbers are bound to go up as the war continues. This means that Israel is missing hundreds of thousands of Israeli workers. A few weeks ago, Israel struck a deal with the Indian government to get 100,000 workers after tens of thousands of worker migrants fled the country. That plan fell through thanks to Indian trade unions. Now Israel is turning to African States in a desperate attempt to replace the Gazan workers it's currently genociding. We will see if that plan works as Africans are by and large pro Palestine. Plus the Yemeni naval blockade is growing more and more intense every week as a direct response to the genocide in Gaza. In short, Israel's economy can't withstand a long war. America cannot help prop up the economy as it will soon be facing its major economy issues in the coming years including a housing crisis and likely a recession.

Military defeats - Israel cannot defeat Hamas. It cannot win a war inside Gaza. It failed to do so in 2014, it's failing right now. It has lost hundreds of military vehicles including the (formerly) vaunted Merkava-4. The estimated number of injured soldiers stands at 10,000+ while the Resistance is still intact and capable of carrying out dozens of military operations against IDF and the surrounding cities and settlements every day. The IDF has never looked more weak than it is right now. Hezbollah has been employing a military strategy dubbed the escalation ladder, in which one end of the ladder is no war and the other end is total war. It has continuously escalated against Israel, attacking deeper and deeper into its territory, and it will continue until there's open war between Israel and Lebanon. The point of the escalation is to give Israel time to leave Gaza but as that's not something the Israeli government is planning on doing, we're looking at a region war in 2024 (so far we have a regional conflict and whilebits serious, it's not yet war). Just like it can't win in Gaza, Israel can't defeat Hezbollah and occupy Southern Lebanon like its leaders have been threatening to. It certainly can't take on the Ansar Allah group in Yemen.

West Bank - every week, there are clashes between Israeli forces and the Resistance in the West Bank and it's growing more and more intense. The best way to describe the region is 'powder keg.' Israel has responded to Oct 7th by detaining thousands of Palestinians and killing hundreds. There's a growing popularity of Al Qassam Brigades and other militant groups in Gaza. There also seems to be coordination between the Gazan and West Bank resistance groups, as in they would carry out operations at the same time. The longer the war on Gaza goes on, the more likely that war will also break out in the West Bank.

Many, many more Palestinians will die. This plan, more than anything, is a call for the continued slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza.

But the longer this goes on, the closer Israel gets to collapsing.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Most of the daily crimes against Palestinians on the West Bank take place only a few miles from the homes of Israeli citizens within the pre-1967 borders of the state. Particularly vicious events are sometimes reported, in relatively subdued and peripheral ways, in Haaretz, the only respectable newspaper in the country, and also, rarely, on the evening news that everyone watches. Still, even peace-oriented, left-wing Israelis often express shock when I tell them of witnessing violent attacks by settlers and soldiers on Palestinian shepherds and peasant farmers. It is as if that kind of knowledge were pushed away from conscious awareness, or as if the knowledge itself exists somewhere in the mind but knowledge of that knowledge does not. (Classical Indian logicians claim that one doesn’t know something unless one consciously knows that one knows it.) In short, much of the population of Israel has lived through the last five decades in varying modes and intensities of denial. Here’s a typical example. One night in late July I slept in the Bedouin village of Ras al-‘Ain in the southern Jordan Valley. Adjacent to the village, in a fiercely hot, arid zone, a cool, clean stream flows down from the hill country. The villagers need that water to survive and to sustain their herds of sheep and goats; each day they fill up five or six tankers, hitched to tractors, from the stream. Israeli settlers from the illegal outposts nearby are doing whatever they can, including committing vicious attacks, to block Palestinians’ access to the water; the goal is to dry them out so that they will have to leave their homes. The army, the police, the Civil Administration, and the military courts are all colluding with the settlers in their ongoing minibattle with the shepherds. Our activists are by the stream, night and day, to protect the Palestinians as best we can. We spent an hour or two that evening fending off knife-wielding, masked young thugs from the settler outposts who were trying to block a lone tractor and its attached tanker from bringing water to the village. Often Israeli settlers from the older settlements, who may be less prone to violence than those from the new outposts and are usually Orthodox, come to picnic by the stream. A friend of mine, a long-standing member of the Israeli peace camp and an Orthodox Jew—and thus adept in the settlers’ language—spoke to two of these middle-aged settlers about the situation in Ras al-‘Ain. “What?” they said. “You mean there is violence here? That’s impossible.” A total surprise—for people living in the heart of the West Bank, on stolen Palestinian land. I don’t think they were pretending to be shocked. Mainstream Israelis living in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem are even less likely to grasp the reality of systematic state violence directed against innocent Palestinians when news of it somehow filters into the public sphere. Simply stated, they don’t want to know, or maybe they don’t much care.

21 August 2024

[pregnantseinfeld]

"The winning of constitutional independence in any given African territory has to be correlated with winning of independence everywhere else on the continent and in Asia, so as to determine to what extent the so-called peaceful handover of power was really peaceful and was due to the goodness of the colonizers, and to what extent it was an option forced on them by examples of violence in particular colonies and by the threat of violence implicit in any nationalist movement which had shaped the people into a single resolute force. It is, for example, palpably obvious that the French learned from defeats in Vietnam that they should quit the whole of Indochina 'peacefully', rather than perish at other Dien Bien-Phus. The French repeated their high-handed actions in Africa and found that the national war of liberation threatened to reduce the French 100-franc note to a piece of worthless paper, and had already bequeathed the National Assembly in Paris with a succession of jack-in-the-box premiers. There was clearly a connection with the unsuccessful French wars of repression in Algeria and the haste with which they tried to establish acceptable African governments in West Africa.

As for the British, Malaya haunted them in Asia and the example of Kenya gave them diarrhoea in Africa. True, they did suppress the Mau Mau land and freedom army, but at what cost! Imperialism is not imperialism if it costs more to suppress the exploited than the imperialists receive in surplus. The British knew that it was wise to proceed with African independence rather than court more Mau Mau. Even in far-off British Guiana, the popular movement of the 1950s could exert some leverage on the British by threatening them with Mau Mau.

India is often given as the classic example of non-violent transfer of power from the imperial power to the indigenous nationalist forces. But it should be remembered that India had a powerful current of mutinous soldiers and other political traditions opposed to the non-violence of Gandhi. The British retreated as much from the threat of millions of Indians lying peacefully on the roads and railways as from the possibility that they might get up and strike back, given the example of those nationalists who were attacking British life and property before and during the Second World War."

Walter Rodney, The British Colonialist School of African Historiography and the Question of African Independence

[conkreetmonkey]

Splatoon 3 is wild because imagine if you were living in Japan due to a recent economic and cultural boom, and suddenly a space shuttle with a mutant house-sized T-rex riding it suddenly burst from the center of Mt. Fuji and disappeared into space without explanation, and all you ever find out about what the fuck that was about is that Zuckerburg mysteriously disappeared the same day and was never seen again, but still "officially" ran Meta through an open secret Queen-Elizabeth-being-in-good-health gaslighting campaign, and everybody kind of suspected he may have been connected but never figured out anything conclusive.

Also the T-rex is now orbiting the earth in the fetal position like the guy from Jojo, and there are rumors of a substance that, if touched, turns you into a half-dinosaur monster. Nobody understands any of this but Meta employees just keep going to work and pretending Zuck still exists. The same 12 prerecorded voicelines constantly squak from the PA system.

Oddly, the statue in front of Meta HQ of a T-rex eating a human changes overnight into one of a giant human eating a tiny T-rex. Nobody noticed the switch, despite the statue being in a constantly bustling area. It happened shortly after the shuttle incident.

Jack Black's tiny clone, Lil' Jack, now wears a headset at all times and has been acting really shady since the incident. Also they're both hyperintelligent, immortal velociraptors found in an ancient cryogenic chamber who spend their days judging college football and eating the legally harvested flesh of hillbillies. Lil' Jack is probably plotting to kill Big Jack, but Big Jack doesn't seem to care, growing fat and lazy, sleeping on public benches in a bed of throw pillows. Also, he's very open about the fact that, as a velociraptor, humans look delicious, but he hasn't actually eaten anybody aside from the aforementioned hillbillies because he's civil.

Everyone is just expected to move on with their lives after this. This is normal to you.

The local art school was recently attacked by giant sea serpents, which were actually hideously bioengineered hillbillies, fulfilling a biblical doomsday prophecy, and they were driven back by Meta's army of minimum wage, part time child soldiers armed with warcrimey jury-rigged weaponry. The sea serpents had giant frying pans grafted into their mouths, which launched primitive tactical nukes made by filling garbage bags with their explosive blood. They still exist, and occasionally defend their comrades, but spend most of their time in the deep sea.

The local homeless emo twink everyone's attracted to is a closet millionaire who sells bootleg clothing in exchange for live rats, which he messily devours behind closed doors. He's also 8 feet tall and British and only has one eye.

North Korean refugees now flood the western world, after a greasy 14 year old hipster, under the guidance of Ariana Grande and Taylor Swift, beat Kim Jong Un in a mech battle, and the EDM remix of the Japanese national anthem they performed caused like half the soldiers to immediately realize North Korea sucks ass and defect. One of these individuals, 7 foot tall hypergenius, becomes a newscaster alongside a nepo baby rapper with dwarfism who likes to eat entire jars of mayo, and also they're a popular band. Also also, they may or may not be gay. Almost the entire population is gay, so this isn't a huge deal.

The new local newscasters are a famous Japanese lion tamer, an Indian girl with a bloodline trait allowing her to control snakes, and a Brazillian man the size of a smart car who exclusively communicates via grunts.

Gods, souls and zombies are objectively real, and you're effectively immortal because real-life respawning was invented a while ago. It works like a Keurig, but with mucus instead of coffee. Submersion in water kills you.

A good deal of the population is a hivemind. They pretend to be individuals for no reason.

Almost all men are now femboys.

Despite all this, you still have to go to work at 9 tomorrow.

[hussyknee]

Unrolled twitter thread by Progressive International (@ProgIntl)

30 Sept 24 • 4 minute read • Read on X

On 30 September 1965, the Indonesian military, working closely with the US government, initiated a coup that would depose President Sukarno and install the brutal, 30-year dictatorship of General Suharto.

In the dark years that followed, the dictatorship massacred over a million Indonesian communists, with the CIA and US diplomats drawing up “kill lists” for the Indonesian military. The operation would become a template for the US’s regime change operations for decades to come.

Major-General Suharto with Indonesian Army in 1966

In 1945, President Sukarno led Indonesia to independence from Dutch colonial rule. He championed the Non-Aligned Movement and hosted the historic Bandung Conference, a meeting of Afro-Asian states, in 1955.

First President of Indonesia Sukarno making a speech circa 1945

Opening the conference and forecasting what was to come, Sukarno said: “We are often told ‘Colonialism is dead’. Let us not be deceived or even soothed by that… Colonialism also has its modern dress, in the form of economic control, intellectual control, actual physical control by a small, but alien community within a nation.”

Leaders attending the Bandung Conference 1955 in Bandung, Indonesia. From left: Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Ghanian Prime Minister Kwame Nkrumah, Egyptian Prime Minister Gamal Abdel Nasser, President Sukarno, and Yugoslavian Prime Minister Josip Broz Tito.

By 1965, Indonesia possessed one of the world's largest communist parties, the PKI. The PKI had a mass membership and mobilized vast numbers of people in the battle against Indonesia’s ruling class.

Campaign of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) in September 1955.

Terrified by the strength and organization of Indonesia’s people, the Indonesian military’s 30th September Movement began to purge the PKI.

Men suspected of being IPK members being transported under guard by an armed Indonesian soldier

In the early hours of 1 October, a group of military conscripts murdered six high-ranking generals. Blaming the deaths on the PKI, Suharto used the attacks as a pretext to seize power. CIA communications equipment allowed him to spread false reports around the country and begin a long campaign of anti-communist propaganda.

The US had tried to overthrow Sukarno for years; in 1958, the CIA backed armed regional rebellions against the central government. In 1965, they did all they could to aid Suharto’s murderous power grab.

The campaign soon became genocidal. On islands like Bali, up to 10% of the population was massacred — and luxury hotels soon began to appear over the killing fields.

One US embassy staffer told the US press that Suharto’s military “probably killed a lot of people, and I probably have a lot of blood on my hands, but that's not all bad.”

Time Magazine referred to the killings as “the West’s best news for years in Asia”.

A cable from the US embassy’s first secretary, Mary Vance Trent, to the State Department referred to events in Indonesia as a “fantastic switch which has occurred over 10 short weeks”. It also included an estimate that 100,000 people had been slaughtered.

Cementing his power, Suharto became president in 1967. His ‘New Order’ policy allowed Western capitalism to exploit Indonesia’s cheap labour and plunder its natural resources. Civil rights and dissent were suppressed.

In one of the world’s most populous countries, any possibility for the emergence of a new, democratic political project was eliminated. Richard Nixon described Indonesia as “the greatest prize in Southeast Asia”. Suharto would not leave office until 1998.

U.S. President Ronald Reagan stands with Indonesian President Suharto in the White House South Lawn at the arrival ceremony for Suharto's State Visit. Oct 12, 1982

CIA officers described Suharto’s rise to power and anti-communist purge as the “model operation” and “Jakarta” soon became the codeword for anti-communist extermination programs in Latin America, where hundreds of thousands were massacred in regime change efforts engineered by Washington.

[krsnaradhika]

90% of you bhakts can’t even tell how many shlokas there are in Gita. All you know is Modi Modi. Hopefully you’re run off this site

Dunno what sort of people you're surrounding yourself with because my circle of Sanātanīs and I know there are 18 chapters and 700 verses in the Shrīmad Bhagavad Gītā. The sermon was heard by Sanjaya and Shrī Ānjaneya apart from Pārtha Arjuna. The Mahābhārata is also called the Jaya Samhitā and the fifth Veda. 108 Upanishads are best known (although there are only 10 main ones) along with 4 Vedas, namely - Rigveda, Yajurveda, Sāmaveda and Atharvaveda— Rigveda being the primal text. There are several Vedāngas and 18 Purānas. Itihāsas are a different category altogether. There are 8 (or sometimes 7) Chiranjeevis or immortals, 10 main avatars of Shrī Vishnu (apart from Bhagwān Krishna Dwaipāyana Veda Vyāsa, Devī Mohinī and so on). There are 12 Ādityas, 11 Rudras, 8 Vasus and 2 Ashwinī Kumāras which make up to 33 koti of gods. Don't project lmfao. Touch some grass. We proud bhakts do not sit on Instagram 24/7, we sit with books and we possess maryādā which you seem to lack.

And by that logic all of you leftists are like Barkha Dutt who disclosed the locations of Indian soldiers on live tv to terrorists during the 26/11 attack? All of you are like Rahul Gandhi who mocks India on a foreign soil? All of you are like Manmohan Singh who invited the terrorist Yasin Malik and greeted him cordially? Do you support terrorists and bootlick the Congress who did not bat an eye on the agony of Chitpawan Brahmins of Pune and the Hindus of Kashmir? Be for real.

You'd know what a bhakt is if you had met a true bhakt (which you use as a slur/ demeaning term. Very liberal of you by the way. And then we bhakts are the ones who are problematic). Shoo away from my blog.

[the-californicationist]

Cali's Kinktober: Day 18

Kinktober Masterlist dis manibus - "for the ghost" Simon "Ghost" Riley x f!reader Kinks > possessive, dub con, ghosts?? Full tags on AO3 - MDNI - Read at your own risk.

In your little town of Sleepy Hollow, it’s usually not hard to make the news. But, when the headlines start bringing up ghosts from the past, and your fellow residents make claims that a ghoulish biker is attacking drivers on Route 330, you start to regret being the lone journalist in town. Legend has it that the masked rider is on the hunt for the most perfect sacrifice, and he won’t stop his reign of terror until he finds it.

Warning: actual ghosts, possession, dub con?, general spookiness

Yellowed teeth and a dangling cigarette, the stench of sweat and cheap tobacco, shaky hands and disordered movements, plus a wardrobe of ill-fitting, oil-stained jorts with a crooked-cropped Bud Light tee shirt completed Brandi Reddman’s signature look. Mrs. Reddman was standing in her usual spot outside of a dilapidated Pilot truck stop on the corner of Hatchet and Simmons. But, the leather-skinned, bleached-blonde, trailer park queen didn’t go by her late husband’s surname anymore. She preferred to be called by her well-earned title: Beaumont Brandi.

“And don’t you go putin’ no damn Reddman on my fuckin’ report,” she glared at you from her perch on the bright red bollard just outside her favorite Pilot truck stop, “Don’t even know what I’m gettin’ a goddamn ticket for. Two consentin’ adults can do whatever the hell they like, cain’t they? Ain’t this still America?”

“Ms. Brandi,” you sighed, “I’m not a cop. I’m a reporter. And I’m not sure what you want me to do when Mr. Brunson calls me down here to tell me about you tearing up his dumpsters again. You know there's a whole town full of people upset about the destruction of property here.”

Your stomach turned just thinking about writing this ridiculous article. What would the title even be? The Trash Takes Itself Out: a Sleepy Hollow tale. Or, Lot Lizard Strikes Again! With a full cover spread? No. This could not be your life. You tried to control the look of disdain on your face. 

“It wasn’t even me! That asshole is crazy!” Brandi protested, the cigarette in her mouth holding onto her dry, cracking lip with nothing more than God’s will at this point. 

“He said he saw you and a certain truck driver come out of the alcove just a few hours ago,” you reiterated.

“Hell, no. I ain’t gonna fuck no John in no smelly-ass dumpster. I’m a high class lady,” Brandi gestured to her ensemble, “And I’m tellin’ you, that lock was busted before I even stepped over here this mornin’. It’s that damn haint is what it is.”

The Haint of Sleepy Hollow. The Hollow’s Hell Rider. The Ghoul of 330. He went by many names, or sometimes, he was just called The Ghost. 

Back in the late seventies when everyone was doing a little too much of everything, your town earned a bit of a reputation. There had been a string of disappearances off of the local highway, Route 330, and locals claimed to have seen a masked soldier on a motorbike, fresh home from Saigon, carrying his M16 slung across his back and wearing a skull mask over his face. He was riding an Indian 900, blacked out with no headlight and no plate. 

Of course the truckers had been the first ones to sound the alarm, and there was a city-wide manhunt for any bikers matching that description. But back then, no one had cameras in their hands as readily as they did now, so it was all just a bunch of hearsay and over-exaggerated stories about the boogeyman. 

But, that’s all it was. Just stories. There was no masked rider. 

“Hey, you got another one of those?” Brandi pointed to the pack of smokes in your pocket that you’d brought along to bribe her with. 

You sighed, lighting one for her and then for you. You told yourself you needed it to get through the rest of this conversation. 

As she took a long drag, her timbre changed. She became quieted by her own voice, it seemed.

“I seent him, though. He was there. Parked under the bridge.”

She pointed to the overpass, her wrinkled finger trembling a bit as she guestered to the black shadows under the highway. You followed her line of sight, trying to imagine a dark rider in a skull mask, parked in the umber and looking for vengeance in the most boring town in New England. 

“Did he do anything?” You asked, trying your best to scrounge up something more interesting than sex work in gas station parking lots for this write up. 

Beaumont Brandi stared into the darkness with you, remembering��� or maybe she was just fucking with you. But, it didn’t seem like it. She took another puff of smoke into her mouth, hissing it out through her stained teeth, 

“No, but it felt like he was looking for somethin’. Felt… lonely. I dunno.”

Shaking you from the eerie moment Brandi had crafted between you both, a big, rumbling Mack truck pulled into the back lot, turning your gaze away from the bridge. Your interviewee hurried to smoke one more pull from her pilfered cigarette and gathered up her glittery, denim purse. 

“That’s my ride. See you around,” she said, her voice still distant and restrained, lacking all of the ruffled animosity she’d presented to you earlier. 

You stayed there, watching her scamper across the wide, drab concrete field, dodging pot holes and puddles, heading for the blue semi that had just parked in the trucker wash station. You watched her until she knocked on the door, standing on her tiptoes to reach the wide passenger window, shuffling around until the latch popped open and she disappeared inside. 

The dark hollow of the highway’s bridge caught your gaze as you turned away from Brandi and her “ride”, and a cold chill shot down your spine. As you peered into the shadowy underpass, a lone biker, all in black, was sitting on his Indian motorcycle, staring right at you. His body was enormous. Even though the bike he rode was large, he was simply unfathomably tall and broad. When he leaned forward on the handlebars, idling there, his shoulders bulged in his leathers, threatening to break free. He was wearing a full-face helmet, but you could feel his eyes burning into your skin. 

The problem was, you had no idea how he got there. You hadn’t heard his engine rev, and you knew you would’ve been able to listen to the roar echo through the underside of the highway, it’s enclosure making an accidental amplifier. 

You stared back at him, but you reached into your pocket and clutched your car keys. Everything in your body was telling you to run. So, you quickly turned away, needing to force yourself to break your gaze, making yourself walk briskly back to your beat-up Miata. 

Get in, and drive away, you told yourself. Get in. Drive away. Get in…

You were trying to calm yourself down, your mind feeding you a million excuses as to why you hadn’t heard him approach, or telling yourself it was just a guy on a bike and not a ghost, but you could still feel your heart in your throat, pounding away like a fist inside your veins. 

Popping open the door to your car, you climbed in and immediately shut it behind you. Luckily, the soft canvas top of your ratty old convertible was already pulled up, but the sooner you got back to your apartment, the better you would feel. You cranked the engine, threw it in reverse, and sped off out of the gas station parking lot, sending your work bag spilling out across the floor. 

As you pulled onto Hatchet, you headed east, avoiding 330. You tried to tell yourself it was because you enjoyed the senic route instead of the shorter path, but you knew that was a lie. 

Behind you, you heard the roar of a bike. 

You looked in your rearview mirror, but you didn’t see any headlights. Then, as you checked the side mirror, you saw him. It was the blacked out biker from the bridge. He was riding close to your back wheel, sitting in your blindspot, staring hard at you. 

He followed you for miles. You doubled back, avoiding red lights, trying to make circles so he would get tired of tailing you, but he never did. If anything, he was getting braver and braver, moving his bike up and down the length of your car. Getting in your way, toying with you just to get a reaction. 

You tried to speed up, but your junker was no match for his machine. So, you turned into a neighborhood, trying to lose him in the curvy, bumpy side streets. 

He followed, and you felt your breath catch in your chest. With every turn, he would drive up next to your window to peer inside, staring straight into your eyes. You almost hit the curb, and when you finally exited the neighborhood, you took a right, trying to race him on a wider road. 

It was one lane, but he didn’t seem to care. He reached out and planted his gloved hand on the glass of your driver’s side window as if he was trying to touch you through it, and you screamed at him through the glass, illogically,

“Leave me alone!”

He threw his head back, and you knew he was jeering at you. If a masked, faceless being could laugh, that’s what it would look like. 

You had no idea what else to do, so you got aggressive. You swerved, trying to sideswipe him, desperate to get rid of your masked tormentor. 

He dodged, nimbly moving himself out of your way. Then, he was right behind you, so you slammed on the brakes. 

There was no way for him to stop in time. No way. 

But, it didn’t matter. You watched in horror in your mirror as his bike and his body dematerialized, and he faded into a black mist, filling the interior of your tiny car, and reconstituting itself in your passenger seat. Your nose filled up with the smell of stale cigarettes and something undeniably masculine. His body filled in next to you in inky layers, pouring from a gas to a solid like smoke into a bottle, and what was supposedly impossible was becoming very, very real in your car. 

You screamed, pressing the brakes even harder, coming to a full, screeching stop in the middle of the road. No one was behind you yet, but you wished there would be. You prayed for someone - anyone - to turn down your street and find you stopped in the middle of it. 

The ghost - because what else could he be? - was staring straight at you, as if he was waiting for something.

“Leave me alone,” you begged, your voice feeling so small and strained. 

You were staring into your own eyes, seeing your face as it was warped and contorted in the gleaming black shine of his helmet visor. Suddenly, you felt your car lurch forward, and it was moving on its own. You tried to turn the wheel, and your foot was glued down onto the brake, but nothing you did mattered. The car was driving itself.

You yanked at your seatbelt and pulled on the door handle, trying to throw yourself from the car, but it wouldn’t budge. You ripped at the handle even harder, trying to slam your shoulder into the door, ignoring the pain. In a last-ditch effort, you reached into the steering column and pulled the keys from the car, hoping to kill the engine. But, it didn’t. Your vehicle was taking you wherever your ghost wanted to go, and there was nothing you could do about it. 

With your keys held tightly in your fist, you lashed out at the biker, using the metal shards to rake across his mask, scratching the visor. 

The speed with which he reacted startled you, and as his hand wrapped itself around your wrist, he tilted his head to the side as if to study you, curious about you and your choices. 

You felt your throat burn with despair, and tears ran from your eyes. 

“Please don’t kill me,” you sobbed, trying to pull your wrist away. 

He yanked your arm to his chest, tugging your body closer to his, forcing you into his space and taking you almost out of your seat, if it wasn’t for your belt. 

You were face to helmet with him, and you could smell the menthols that inexplicably clung to his clothes. He could touch you, and you could touch him. He felt so real, so warm. And yet…

Slowly, he reached out to you with his other hand to touch your face, caressing your cheek and wiping away a stray tear. The feel of his leather glove was so gentle against your skin, it made your head spin. His earlier aggression was still fresh in your mind, and you sobbed from the fear. 

Out of nowhere, a pickup truck swerved around your stopped car, blaring its horn at you, kicking up dirt from the side of the road, obviously upset at the stopped Miata in the middle of a street. 

In the few seconds your attention was snatched from the ghost in front of you, he disappeared. Your passenger seat was immediately empty, and you were alone once more. Your car was dead since your keys were in your hand, and the clicking of a warm engine cooling down was the only noise you heard. 

Another car was honking behind you, less aggressively than the pickup, but it moved around you and you turned back in your seat. 

As you drove home, you were numb. You couldn’t reconcile anything that happened to you, and you had no words to even describe it. You thought about driving to the police, or to your office so that your phantom biker wouldn’t know where you lived, but something in you laughed at your naivety. Why would that matter? He was a ghost. He could reach you no matter where you were. You might as well leave your front door wide open for how much good it would do you. 

When you finally crawled into bed, you left every light in the house on, but it didn’t help.

It was 0417 when you jerked out of your restless sleep, opening your eyes in your unusually bright room. You were breathing heavily, trying to calm yourself down, and the horrors of the night before felt more like a bad dream than a true memory. 

You looked around, trying to determine whether you could manage to go back to sleep or not, when a faint noise pricked your ears. It was coming from outside your apartment window, down in the parking lot below your balcony. 

You sprang out of bed and pulled your curtain. There, parked and sitting on the side of his bike, was your ghost. He was looking up at your window, his arms crossed over his chest. He looked like he was waiting for you. Waiting for you to say something, to do something. But, you didn’t know what.

Grabbing your keys, you flew out of your door and rushed down the stairs, hurrying to see if you could catch him. But, he was gone. You didn’t even know what you wanted to say to him, but you needed to know the truth. Your instincts as a reporter were driving you forward. You craved answers, needed them. 

You turned back around and headed for your car, starting it up and driving out of your complex, back onto the street. You headed for the highway, and he was waiting for you, parked on the shoulder. He took off, and you followed him, swerving in and out of early morning commuters, pushing your crappy Miata to its limit. 

He took the exit toward the old part of town, turning on the road to Ichabod Farm, cutting his speed and letting you catch up to him. Then, as he got further and further away from civilization, the farms turned into forests, and the roads went from pavement to dirt. Just as the sun was staining the clouds with its pink dawn, he stopped, sticking his leg out as a kickstand, and turned around to look at you. 

You waited, sitting in your car, but after a while, nothing changed. He was still just sitting there, staring back at you. So, you killed the engine, and you climbed out of your car. 

“Who are you?” You called to him, willing your voice to carry in the quiet morning. 

As if he was tired of your questioning, he turned forward. He swung his leg over the body of the bike, and stood beside it, still waiting for you. 

You started walking around to the front of your car, beginning to feel like you were a rabbit being led into its own trap, a lamb to its slaughter, and your skin tightened, the hair prickling on the back of your neck.

He put his hand out, gesturing toward the bike. 

“Do you want me to go with you somewhere?”

He seemed impatient. He stalked forward, marching in black leathers and boots, and grabbed your wrist just like he did in the car. 

“Wait! Hey! Wait, no!” You tried to fight him, but he held you fast, dragging you over to the bike. 

He lifted you without struggle and sat you on the back of his seat, and he climbed in front of you, bringing the bike back to a loud roar. He took off, nearly toppling you over, and in your shock, you wrapped both of your hands around his middle, holding on for dear life. 

To your shock, he turned off of the road and into the trees. The leaves made his tires slip and the roots of the tall yews made the ride bumpy and wild. You gripped him tighter and tighter, trying to remember which direction you were going, sure that he was taking you straight to your death, but just in case you escaped, you wanted to be able to try and make it out of the woods.

Suddenly, you came to a clearing. In the middle of it stood a huge, dead tree. The trunk had been struck by lightning, and the branches hung low, dipping towards the ground. Its roots were gnarled and popping like broken bones out of the dark earth, and it gave you a sense of immediate dread. 

He stopped the bike, throwing down the kickstand and climbing off. Then, he held out his hand to you. 

You looked at his helmet for a moment, trying to determine what he wanted, and then you realized he was trying to help you down. You placed your hand in his and felt him support you as you climbed off of the old motorcycle. 

He released you, and he stood beside you, looking up at the tree. 

You waited for a moment, again unsure about what he was trying to show you, but then you stepped forward. Something compelled you to touch the tree’s wide, twisting trunk. 

You were suddenly aware of the state of your dress. You were in socks, sleep shorts, and a tattered old tee shirt, shivering from fear and from the chilly morning. But, still, you stepped forward, moving with your hand out towards the tree, trying to ignore the pinch of stray rocks and sticks beneath your feet. 

Right before you touched the bark, you looked over your shoulder at the biker, and he was still standing there, waiting for you. 

So, you pushed forward, laying your palm against it, and you were instantly overwhelmed with flashes of images and sounds, memories which were not yours. You saw him. It was your ghost. He was fighting in a war with muskets and swords, and then he was in a trench with grenades. You watched him crawl on his belly through a wet, dense jungle. Then, you felt the heat and the sting of desert sands, and watched him dragging the bodies of his friends from the rubble of a bombed building. 

As quickly as they had begun, the visions stopped. You looked back at the masked rider, and he stepped toward you. His hands went to the neck of his jacket, and he raked the zipper down, revealing his bare chest and belly. He was riddled with scars, but he looked very much like a real man. The jacket fell with a thud on the forest floor, and he moved to shuck off his helmet. 

You watched the reveal with wide eyes and an open mouth. Black, inky smoke surrounded his face. He didn’t have a head. It was only a skull mask, cracked and broken around the edges, perched on him where his face should have been. It was just a swirling darkness, nothing else. His head was gone. 

Your heart nearly stopped.

“What… happened….” You managed to ask, your voice lower than a whisper. 

The helmet clattered to the ground, rolling until it rested against a thick root. 

He walked toward you, and you were staring into two black pits where there should have been soft brown eyes. You’d seen him in the vision. You knew what he should look like. And yet, all you were left with was this ghastly form. 

His body was warm. You could feel it as he towered over you, mere inches away from your face. You reached up to touch his cheek like he had touched yours in the car, and he let you. As your hand swiped across his jaw, you saw flesh appear where there was none before. More and more, you touched him, painting his face back on with your hands. You moved over his eyes and nose and mouth, feeling the softness of his lips and watching in awe as he became a man again. 

“Oh, my God.” You gaped, watching his face twist into an unknown expression, “You’re…”

“You made me real,” he spoke, his words sounded hellish; the noise was a terrible smear of shadow and violence. It was as if a million of voices were speaking at once. 

“I…” You were trying to talk, but he wasn’t interested. 

He leaned forward and slanted his mouth against yours, kissing you with a smoky musk on his tongue, forcing you to open and take his writhing muscle inside of your cheeks. He was breathing just as raggedly as you were, pushing himself onto you, dragging you to the leaf-covered ground. 

He repeated his mantra, gasping it, his timbre full of disbelief,

“You… made me… real…”

His mouth was on you again, the top half of his face still hidden by the skull mask. He kissed your neck, and you felt his gloved hands grabbing at your clothes, shoving down your shorts. 

“What are you doing?” You whispered. 

“You.” His voice reverberated through you like a snarl of thunder. You could feel the sound move through your bones, “You can bring me back to this place.” 

The air was cold as it billowed across your skin when he pulled away your shirt. The leather of his gloves was such a rough contrast to the smooth, furry expanse of his chest and belly, and he crushed himself against you, pressing you with all of his weight into the forest floor. 

Your mind was in a haze. All of the magic and memories from the tree were whirling around you. His many lives, all stacked together, repeated like the rings of its trunk, year after year, his wars, his scars. All of them now real and raised to the touch. 

His mouth moved over you, hungry and wanting. You weren’t ready to be taken so roughly, with so little regard, in the dirty, dank mud of this clearing. But, you wanted to be. You found yourself completely captivated by his movements, his hands, and the way he consumed you, making you feel like you were the key to his entire existence. 

You spread your legs for him, and he had the audacity to laugh softly in his ghostly throat, rolling his hips between your legs to fit himself there, spreading you further with his wide body. 

You felt the button of his leather pants loose and dangling, flapping open against your thighs which meant…

His cock lolled across your mons and belly, warm and hard. He humped himself against you, rutting along the curve of your tummy and teasing you with a preview of his strength. You reached down very slowly, stroking him carefully, barely touching his velvety foreskin, feeling the slip of it as he moved against your hand.

He let out a long, heated moan, his breath warm as it surrounded your neck, and he whispered to you in his million voices,

“Give yourself to me,” he chanted, “Bring me back.”

No sooner could you whisper back your consent than he grabbed you by your jaw and forced you to look into his black, soulless eyes. He notched his cock at your trembling hole, letting it dip into the wetness he had crafted there. Then, he pushed forward, stretching your walls around him, making you take his drooling head, raking himself in and out so that he could go deeper and deeper with each thrust. 

You cried out, grasping your hands around his shoulders, and he squeezed your face in his huge paw, making you feel like he might break your jaw if he held you any tighter. 

Once he was fully sheathed within the hollow of your body, he moved with a powerful, pistoned thrust, slamming himself through you and making your core heat from his friction. You felt yourself being broken by him, the parts of you that were holding together your sanity were slowly slipping away with each punishing movement, and the deeper you allowed him to fuck you, the further away from reality your thoughts were. You were back in his memories, imagining his life before, his warfare, ancient and modern, and all you could think about was why he would want to be back here. What did he want? Was it you?

His hand slipped between your lips, and he pressed into your throat, rubbing your tongue and making your jaw ache from his pressure and invasion. You tried to suckle from him, taking his fingers past your teeth, licking and slurping up your own spit from his glove. 

“Such a good girl. Perfect for me. A new vessel.”

Vessel? What were you holding?

You whined, trying to understand, and he silenced you with a growl, low and deep. He was fucking you at a pace full of fire and fury, and your whole body felt like it was being pounded into submission. You could hear the wet, gushing slapping noises that his cock was making as it churned inside of you. Your legs felt weak, and you couldn’t help but leave them hanging open, allowing him to fill you as deep as he could go. 

Your mouth burned from his fingers, and your pussy was begging to come, clenching and shaking with need. He felt you, and he pushed through your shuddering quim harder and harder, using you to bring himself to his own crescendo, joining you on the edge. 

“You’re mine…” He hissed, moving himself right against your most pliant spot, massaging you up to a tumbling explosion of feeling and fervent want. 

As you came, you screamed, but it was muffled by his invasive hand. He came with you, filling you as you tightened around him, dumping his thick load into your hole, smearing it all over your lips with each covetous thrust. 

Then, you couldn’t believe what you were seeing. He was melting into you, his body turning back into mist, covering your skin and seeping into your flesh. You felt him inside of you, curling and twisting around all of the parts that made you who you were, turning them for his own benefit, staining your soul with his own. 

You gasped, searching for air, watching helplessly as the last thing you saw before he disappeared completely was the black sockets of his skull mask, and it felt like he was smiling. 

You lay there, alone, and yet full of him. He was feeling and sensing and thinking right alongside you. And he was… playing with you. You could feel him moving his cock deep within you even though, when you looked down, there was nothing there. 

“Please…” You begged, closing your legs together, trying to stop the sensation from happening.

“Pretty thing,” the Ghost chuckled, “We’re just getting started.”

[aru-loves-krishnaxarjuna]

Ok BCs I am tired of all this shit

Like LITERALLY

CAN NEWS CHANNELS LIKE NOT SHOW ABOUT POLITICS AND JUST FOCUS ON OTHER TOPICS FOR ONCE!?

NO BECAUSE ACCORDING TO MY KNOWLEDGE, THERE EXISTS MORE THAN POLITICS.

A 6 year old Hindu girl, was BRUTALLY r@ped and murdered in Kashmir! WHAT WAS THE GIRL'S FAULT? WHAT DID SHE DO?

Terrorists have attacked on the Kashmiri Hindus and news channels be like: aw man fvck that shıt we gotta show politics, that is bűllshıt

I mean, YOU CAN FOCUS ON THE MORE IMPORTANT AND CRUEL INCIDENTS IN THE COUNTRY, AM I RIGHT?

Ok i understand that without politics, the government won't work BUT CAN YOU NOT SHOW ONLY THAT SHĪT? BECAUSE I AM SICK OF THIS

Yea I also know that the NEET results came out, and what happened with the students so that is important too but CAN YOU ALSO SHOW/TALK ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE KASHMIRI HINDUS?

NO I AM NOT RANTING BECAUSE THEY ARE HINDUS OR KASHMIRIS, I AM RANTING BECAUSE THEY. ARE. ALSO. HUMANS.

WHAT ABOUT THE PEOPLE AND THE TEMPLES? WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN? WHY, WHAT WAS THEIR FAULT?

Show them incidents, dear Indian news channels, don't be shy, because I do think that you are being incompetent about it :)

MORE THAN 16 FUCKING PEOPLE DIED! A CRPF soldier was killied in the Kathua attack on 11th June, more than 10 People were killed on 9th June in the Reasi attack, and 5 soldiers along with SPO are fucking injured. So i would like you news channels TO NOT SHOW POLITICS ANYMORE AND TO SHOW THESE EVENTS AS WELL, DAMNIT!

Ok I am sorry about my rant and all this but i am just pouring out my feelings about it. Ik i am just 13 but still, I think this is very very VERY wrong

[weirdheadcanons]

Fic Idea

Okay, I kinda ended up stumbling into another Batfam series idea...

Love the Baby Robins trope, but of course, if you actually think about it it is horrifying to have a twelve year old investigating serial killers in Gotham...

So currently I'm more or less coming up with Supernatural Batfam ideas to cancel out the child soldier angle of Robin.

I wanted a series idea where Bruce is actually doing the right thing - or at least, choosing the least damaging option - by making the kids Robins.

So, this one.

In Indian folklore, it is believed that those who die an unjust death can come back as Other.

Which flavor of Other can vary, going from vampiric ghosts to local gods.

The usual pattern in the lore is that, those who die unjust deaths - especially if they died young - come back vengeful, dangerous.

Deadly. Not just to the ones who wronged them, but to everyone. They are furious, destructive, lashing out at every living thing.

So when someone comes back like that, the local people begin to try and pacify them. Give them offerings. Pray to them. That goes on long enough, the Other becomes benevolent. Becomes a local guardian spirit instead of vengeful demon.

Basically you deal with a destructive Other by literally taming them with love.

Thinking about how this can fit Gotham Rogues.

A lot of them had tragic pasts. Pasts that could very well have killed them.

So the Rogues can be the vengeful Others. Jack Napier who died falling into that chemical vat, Harleen Quinzel killed by a trigger happy cop during an Arkham Breakout when she was trying to protect her patients, Harvey Dent dying after the acid attack, etc.

Batman starts out hunting the vengeful Others, wanting to lock them away forever (Arkham has special units which work better than normal cells would but not good enough), but his method of dealing with Others has to change when he sees the Graysons die.

Dick falls too. And unlike his parents, he won't move on, becoming an Other... on the way to becoming one of the vengeful Others, one of the demons.

Bruce can't lock a child away in Arkham - even an Other child.

So he and Alfred basically calls in every contact they have, trying to figure out some way to prevent the kid from turning into one of the haunters.

And finds out it is possible for an Other to become a guardian spirit, if enough positive emotions are directed their way. Love and worship.

Hence, Robin.

The Light of Gotham. Adorable, popular. Hero-worshipped.

Turning from vengeance to Guardian spirit...

[ltwilliammowett]

The East India Company ships

The East and West India Company ships were not ship types in the usual sense. They were generic terms for a series of merchant ship types that travelled between Europe and the overseas colonies in the East and West. Common features of these ships were three masts, several cannons and a high bulwark to make it more difficult for attackers to board them. Their valuable cargo made the ships attractive targets, so they often travelled in convoys, accompanied by medium-armed merchant ships or frigates for protection. But let's go into more detail.

The East Indiaman 'Earl of Abergavenny', off Southsea, by Thomas Luny 1801

The ships of the East India Company were the ships of the English East India Company, a public limited company (shipowners at the early time of the East India Company contributed their ships to the company and received a certain share in the company in return. They received a proportionate share of the company's overall profits and received a dividend even if their own ship was lost, since the 18th century the company build their own ones as well.) which traded with Asia from 1600 to 1834. The company had a monopoly on trade with the East Indies, China and other regions, and its ships carried goods such as spices, tea, silk, cotton, porcelain and opium. The company also played an important role in the colonisation and administration of India and other territories.

East India Company ships at Deptford, by English School, c. 1660

The ships of the East India Company were known as East Indiamen or as Indiamen and were among the largest and most modern of their time. They were designed to withstand long voyages, carry heavy cargoes and defend themselves against pirates and enemy ships. They were also equipped with cannons and muskets and had a crew of sailors, soldiers, officers and passengers. Because of the need to carry heavy cannons, the hull of the East Indiamen - like most warships of the time - was much wider at the waterline than on the upper deck, so the guns on the upper deck were closer to the centreline to increase stability. This is known as a tumblehome. The ships usually had two complete decks for accommodation within the hull and a raised aft deck. The aft deck and the deck below were lit by galleries with square windows at the stern. To support the weight of the galleries, the hull lines were full towards the stern. As mentioned above, the ships were armed and painted to look like a warship and an attacker could not be sure if the embrasures were real or just painted, and some Indiamen carried a substantial armament.

Two views of an East Indiaman of the time of King William III, by Issac Sailmaker, 1685

The Royal Navy acquired several East Indiamen during the Napoleonic Wars and made them fourth rate ships (e.g. HMS Weymouth and HMS Madras), perpetuating the confusion of military ships with merchant vessels as prizes. In some cases, the East Indiamen successfully fended off attacks by the French. One of the most famous incidents occurred in 1804 when a fleet of East India ships and other merchant vessels under Commodore Nathaniel Dance successfully fought off a squadron commanded by Admiral Linois at the Battle of Pulo Aura in the Indian Ocean. And during this time, some of the ships were even travelling under the protection of a Letter of Marque, which allowed them to make their own prizes.

The East Indiaman 'Prince of Wales' disembarking troops off Gravesend, 1845, by John Lynn, 1845 or later - She was built by Green's of Blackwall in 1842 to a design known as that of the "Blackwall Frigates" - Indiamen with the single-decked appearance of frigates.

The ships of the India Companies were not only involved in trade, but also in exploration, diplomacy, warfare and scientific research. They visited many harbours and islands, built factories and forts, fought in battles and wars, negotiated treaties and alliances and collected samples and data. With the advent of the smaller and faster Blackwall Frigates in 1834 came the end of the great Indiamen as these small frigates sailed much faster.

[whencyclopedia]

Sand Creek Massacre

The Sand Creek Massacre (29 November 1864) was a slaughter of citizens of the Arapaho and Cheyenne nations at the hands of the Third Colorado Cavalry of US Volunteers under the command of Colonel John Chivington, resulting in casualties estimated at over 150 in the Native American encampment, which was in compliance with the policies of US officials.

Black Kettle (l. c. 1803-1868), chief of the Southern Cheyenne, had consistently sought peace with the White settlers since signing the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851. He rejected the call to war of others – including Chief Tall Bull of the Dog Soldiers and Roman Nose (Cheyenne Warrior) – and continued to trust in the assurances of the representatives of the US government that the Cheyenne would be left in peace. These representatives were under the impression that Black Kettle spoke for all the Cheyenne in signing the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 or the Treaty of Fort Wise in 1861, but he had no control over other chiefs like Tall Bull (l. 1830-1869) or Roman Nose (l. c. 1830-1868), who continued to resist the encroachment of Euro-Americans on their lands.

Hostilities escalated in June 1864 with the Hungate Massacre, in which the killing of a White family was attributed to Cheyenne warriors. John Evans (l. 1814-1897), then governor of Colorado, sent word to the Native communities that any who were friendly toward the United States should seek safety near Fort Lyon, and all others would be considered hostiles. Black Kettle – along with other chiefs including White Antelope (l. c. 1789-1864), Little Wolf (l. c. 1820-1904), and Chief Niwot (Left Hand) of the Southern Arapaho (l. c. 1825-1864) accepted the invitation and moved their people to Big Sandy Creek, about 40 miles (65 km) northwest of Fort Lyon.

On the morning of 29 November 1864, Colonel John Chivington (l. 1821-1894) led the Third Colorado Cavalry in a surprise attack on the encampment – even though Black Kettle, as instructed, was flying the American flag and the white flag above his lodge – slaughtering over 150 innocent people, mostly young children, women, and the elderly. Afterwards, Chivington claimed this engagement was a great military victory against an armed alliance of Cheyenne and Arapaho until reports of survivors – like the Cheyenne-Anglo interpreter George Bent (l. c. 1843-1918) – and soldiers like Captain Silas Soule (l. 1838-1865) – contradicted him.

The ensuing investigation established the conflict as a massacre of innocents with only a small armed force of Cheyenne and Arapaho warriors in the camp killed defending themselves and their families. Still, the event was designated a "battle" by the press of the time and is often still referred to as such in the present day. In 2007, the area of the massacre was declared a National Historic Site, and, in 2014, Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper gave an apology to the descendants of those murdered at Sand Creek; but the policies that made that massacre possible have never been acknowledged, and the US government has never offered a similar apology.

Background

The California Gold Rush of 1848 sent scores of miners and their families through the lands of the Arapaho, Cheyenne, Sioux, and others, disrupting their lives, scattering – and killing – the buffalo (the primary food source of the Plains Indians), and destroying the prairie with their wagons and cattle. Clashes between the Natives and settlers led to the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851, establishing territories for Native American nations in the region which, according to this treaty, the United States had no claim to.

Black Kettle, and other chiefs, signed the treaty trusting in the word of the US delegates that they would not be bothered any further. The treaty was never honored by the White settlers or their government, however, and was completely discarded in 1858 during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush. When the Natives again fought to defend their lands, another treaty was offered – the Treaty of Fort Wise of 1861 – which the US government and its citizens paid no more attention to than the one they had presented to the people of the Plains in 1851. The Dog Soldiers – one of the military societies of the Cheyenne – responded to the invasion with armed resistance under their leader Tall Bull while Roman Nose led his own band in defense of Cheyenne lands in what came to be known as the Colorado War (1864-1865).

Fort Laramie Treaty 1868

U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (Public Domain)

Although Black Kettle – and other 'peace chiefs' – rejected the course taken by Tall Bull and Roman Nose, they could do nothing to stop them. The Cheyenne had a representational government, the Council of Forty-Four, which made decisions for the whole nation, but the chief of each band was free to accept or reject their conclusions. The council had nothing to say regarding declarations of war which were the responsibility of individual chiefs of military societies. Black Kettle's signature on a treaty did not in any way bind Tall Bull to recognize it.

Continue reading...

[probablyasocialecologist]

Since the Portuguese empire clung to the coasts instead of moving inland to colonize territory, it needed to develop a fluid state for governance of its global archipelago of fortified enclaves. To manage some twenty feitorias on the coast of India alone, the crown appointed a viceroy who, after 1530, would rule that country’s Estado da India (State of India) from a capital at Goa lined with impressive stone structures that had the look of Iberia in Asia. That enclave would also serve as headquarters for a Portuguese community scattered across Asia that eventually grew to some fourteen thousand, half of them Catholic clerics and the rest officials, soldiers, and merchants. This geopolitical array of forts linked by fleets proved reasonably capable of absorbing attacks by massed Asian levies—repelling assaults from stone ramparts, drawing support from nearby ports, and evacuating safely if necessary. The result: an imperial juggernaut that allowed the Portuguese to dominate the vast Indian Ocean with a few dozen ships and several thousand soldiers, neutralizing more powerful Asian monarchs whose enormous land armies were drawn from a vast Indian subcontinent with 150 million people.

Alfred W. McCoy, To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change

[captain-price-unofficially]

Indian soldiers in British service man a Lewis gun as they come under attack during WWI.

[matan4il]

Daily update post:

The IDF reported using a trap successfully against Hamas terrorists in Gaza, luring dozens of them into a building, which was known as a Hamas command center, and which was then hit. At the same time, terrorists have the option to stay alive, if they surrender. The IDF said in the past week, it has arrested and taken to Israel for investigation over 200 surrendered Hamas terrorists.

One of the arrested terrorists described how Hamas uses kids as human shields when transporting explosives.

I'm never going to stop saying this: the people who truly care about Palestinian kids should VERY MUCH care that this is how they're being used by Palestinian terrorist organizations. Using kids as terrorists is a war crime. Using kids as human shields is a war crime. If these war crimes perpetrated against Palestinian kids don't bother someone, they're not truly pro-Palestinian, they're just anti-Israel.

I mentioned in my daily update post yesterday, that the IDF can now point out the exact networks of tunnels that allowed them to transform an entire residential neighborhood, into a fighting zone. Today, the IDF shared a 3D model demonstrating the findings on the ground, in a visually clearer way, you can find it at this tweet.

If you've been following the news or my daily update posts, then you know that the Yemenite terrorist organization, funded by Iran, started by attacking "Israeli ships" (some of which had no connection to Israel), then laid a blockade to the entire Red Sea for all ships (claiming they're being attacked for sailing to Israel, even though ships headed for Egypt also sailed through this sea), prompting an international coalition of now over 20 countries, and led by the US. Today, a Liberian ship "with a connection to Israel" experienced a drones attack not too far from India. The attack caused a fire, but no person was harmed, and the Indian fleet responded to it. An Iranian official then announced that, "If the Israeli and American aggression will continue, they can expect the closure of even more maritime routes to take place."

The same Iran, which funds an international network of Islamist terrorism (Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis), and which is currently threatening the global economy, not to mention is responsible for every person dead due to the war started thanks to its funding, is holding an international summit today "to help Palestine" (as if there wouldn't have been way more Palestinians alive right now, if it weren't for Iran), and people from no less than 50 countries are participating. Iran should be a pariah internationally, but it's not. That should scare all of us.

The International Red Cross has been repeatedly criticized since the beginning of the war in Gaza, for practically doing nothing for the Israeli hostages, and for having covered up for Hamas' abuse of medical facilities in Gaza. Now, the IRC is proving how seriously it takes this criticism... by appointing as its next director general a controversial senior from UNRWA, the UN agency that helps exclusively the Palestinian refugees. Beyond the clear bias that he would bring to the position, he also is a disputed figure, who had to resign from his UNRWA position, following accusations of ethical abuses there.

I keep mentioning the many fronts on which Israel is being attacked. On our northern border, Hezbollah continues to fire at and destroy Jewish towns, and the only reason you don't hear more about it, is because most civilians have been evacuated, well over 100,000 people. But civilians have been killed there, and the soldiers who are there to protect the border, have been killed as well. Yesterday, a Hezbollah rocket killed 19 years old Amit Hod Ziv (on the left below):

And two other Israeli soldiers who were killed in Gaza yesterday are 31 years old Tal Shoa (center), and 21 years old Shay Ayali (right), who was a cadet in the officers course. They both served in unit 669, the IDF's search and rescue elite unit, which has operated in many countries around the world to save people when natural disasters strike. Unit 669 soldiers during the war risk their lives, when they go into the worst war zones, to get wounded soldiers out, give them emergency first aid, and get them to a hospital as soon as possible. Unit 669 soldiers do the same for surrendered wounded terrorists.

So far, 140 soldiers have been killed in the fighting in Gaza. In total, from Oct 7 on, 472 Israeli soldiers have been killed, including girls without combat training, who were slaughtered in their pyjamas.

This is 36 years old Lior Atias, and her 6 years old daughter Alma.

Lior was a veterinary nurse, and a volunteer for Elem, an NGO that helps youth at risk. She was at the Nova music festival as part of her volunteer work, together with a whole team from Elem. Lior is one of three Elem volunteers, who were among the 367 Israelis massacred by Hamas there.

May all their memories be a blessing.

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

[homosexuhauls]

By Vidya Krishnan

GOA, India — My niece was just 4 years old when she turned to my sister-in-law in a packed movie theater in Mumbai and asked about gang rape for the first time.

We were watching the latest Bollywood blockbuster about vigilante justice, nationalistic fervor and, of course, gang rape. Four male characters seized the hero’s sister and dragged her away. “Where are they taking Didi?” my niece asked, using the Hindi word for “elder sister.” It was dark, but I could still make out her tiny forehead, furrowed with concern.

Didi’s gang rape took place offscreen, but it didn’t need to be shown. As instinctively as a newborn fawn senses the mortal danger posed by a fox, little girls in India sense what men are capable of.

You may wonder, “Why take a 4-year-old to such a movie?” But there is no escaping India’s rape culture; sexual terrorism is treated as the norm. Society and government institutions often excuse and protect men from the consequences of their sexual violence. Women are blamed for being assaulted and are expected to sacrifice freedom and opportunity in exchange for personal safety. This culture contaminates public life — in movies and television; in bedrooms, where female sexual consent is unknown; in the locker room talk from which young boys learn the language of rape. India’s favorite profanities are about having sex with women without their consent.

It is the specific horror of gang rape that weighs most heavily on Indian women that I know. You may have heard of the many gruesome cases of women being gang-raped, disemboweled and left for dead. When an incident rises to national attention, the kettle of outrage boils over, and women sometimes stage protests, but it passes quickly. All Indian women are victims, each one traumatized, angry, betrayed, exhausted. Many of us think about gang rape more than we care to admit.

In 2011 a woman was raped every 20 minutes in India, according to government data. The pace quickened to about every 16 minutes by 2021, when more than 31,000 rapes were reported, a 20 percent increase from the previous year. In 2021, 2,200 gang rapes were reported to authorities.

But those grotesque numbers tell only part of the story: 77 percent of Indian women who have experienced physical or sexual violence never tell anyone, according to one study. Prosecutions are rare.

Indian men may face persecution because they are Muslims, Dalits (untouchables) or ethnic minorities or for daring to challenge the corrupt powers that be. Indian women suffer because they are women. Soldiers need to believe that war won’t kill them, that only bad luck will; Indian women need to believe the same about rape, to trust that we will come back to the barracks safe each night, to be able to function at all.

Reports of violence against women in India have risen steadily over the decades, with some researchers citing a growing willingness by victims to come forward. Each rape desensitizes and prepares society to accept the next one, the evil becoming banal.

Gang rape is used as a weapon, particularly against lower castes and Muslims. The first instance that women my age remember was in 1980, when Phoolan Devi, a lower-caste teenager who had fallen in with a criminal gang, said she was abducted and repeatedly raped by a group of upper-caste attackers. She later came back with members of her gang and they killed 22 mostly upper-caste men. It was a rare instance of a brutalized woman extracting revenge. Her rape might never have made headlines without that bloody retribution.

Ms. Devi threw a spotlight on caste apartheid. The suffering of Bilkis Bano — the defining gang rape survivor of my generation — highlighted the boiling hatred that Indian institutions under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a Hindu nationalist, have for Muslim women.

In 2002 brutal violence between Hindus and Muslims swept through Gujarat State. Ms. Bano, then 19 and pregnant, was gang raped by an angry Hindu mob, which also killed 14 of her relatives, including her 3-year-old daughter. Critics accuse Mr. Modi — Gujarat’s top official at the time — of turning a blind eye to the riots. He has not lost an election since.

Ms. Bano’s life took a different trajectory. She repeatedly moved houses after the assault, for her family’s safety. Last August, 11 men who were sentenced to life in prison for raping her were released — on the recommendation of a review committee stacked with members of Mr. Modi’s ruling party. After they were freed, they were greeted with flower garlands by Hindu right-wingers.

The timing was suspicious: Gujarat was to hold important elections a few months later, and Mr. Modi’s party needed votes. A member of his party explained that the accused, as upper-caste Brahmins, had “good” values and did not belong in prison. Men know these rules. They wrote the rule book. What’s most terrifying is that releasing rapists could very well be a vote-getter.

After Ms. Bano, there was the young physiotherapy student who in 2012 was beaten and raped on a moving bus and penetrated with a metal rod that perforated her colon before her naked body was dumped on a busy road in New Delhi. She died of her injuries. Women protested for days, and even men took part, facing water cannons and tear gas. New anti-rape laws were framed. This time was different, we naïvely believed.

It wasn’t. In 2018 an 8-year-old Muslim girl was drugged and gang raped in a Hindu temple for days and then murdered. In 2020 a 19-year-old Dalit girl was gang-raped and later died of her injuries, her spinal cord broken.

The fear, particularly of gang rape, never fully leaves us. We go out in groups, cover ourselves, carry pepper spray and GPS tracking devices, avoid public spaces after sunset and remind ourselves to yell “fire,” not “help” if attacked. But we know that no amount of precaution will guarantee our safety.

I don’t understand gang rape. Is it some medieval desire to dominate and humiliate? Do these men, with little power over others, feeling inadequate and ordinary, need a rush of power for a few minutes?

What I do know is that other men share the blame, the countless brothers, fathers, sons, friends, neighbors and colleagues who have collectively created and sustain a system that exploits women. If women are afraid, it is because of these men. It is a protection racket of epic proportions.

I’m not asking merely for equality. I want retribution. Recompense. I want young girls to be taught about Ms. Bano and Ms. Devi. I want monuments built for them. But men just want us to forget. The release of Ms. Bano’s rapists was about male refusal to commemorate our trauma.

So we build monuments with words and our memories. We talk to one another about gang rape, keeping it at the center of our lives. We try to explain to our youngest, to start protecting them.

This is how the history of the defeated is recorded. That’s what it all boils down to: a fight between forgetting and remembering.

[3rdeyeblaque]

On Dec 15th, we venerate Elevated Ancestor & Saint Tataηka Íyotake aka Chief Sitting Bull on the 133rd anniversary of his passing 🕊 [for our Hoodoos of First Nations descent]

Sitting Bull, of the Hunkpapa Lakota, was a fierce political leader & holy man known to be a great father, husband, & friend to all. Under him, all the Lakota bands united for survival in the Northern Plains, as he spearheaded their resistance against European invasion. He was known for his legendary courage, unyielding defiance toward U.S. military power, & contemptuous of the many broken U.S. political promises.

Tatáŋka Íyotake was born to a prominent family of chiefs on the Grand River in present-day South Dakota at a place called, "Many Caches" - known for its abundant food storage pits. He was given his name, which described a buffalo bull sitting intractably on his haunches. This, he would grow live up to.

As a young man, Tatáŋka Íyotake joined two prominent groups within his community. He became a distinguished member of the Silent Eaters (a group concerned with tribal welfare) & leader of the Strong Heart Warrior Society. At 14, he joined his father & uncles on a raid against the Crow. Here, he first encountered White soldiers as the U.S. Army had mounted a broad campaign in retaliation for the Santee Rebellion in Minnesota, enchanting the Lakota had no affiliation with. That following year, in 1816, Tatáŋka Íyotake fought U.S. troops again at the Battle of Killdeer Mountain. Later, in 1865, he led a siege against the newly established Fort Rice in North Dakota. Widely respected for his bravery & insight, in 1868, Tatáŋka Íyotake became Head Chief of Lakota Nation.

By 1874, the stage for war between Sitting Bull & the US Army was set once an expedition led by General George Armstrong Custer confirmed gold had been discovered in the Dakota Territory’s the Black Hills, an area sacred to the Lakota bands. This land was decreed off-limits to white settlement by the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868. Despite this ban, prospectors began a rush to the Black Hills. Once U.S. government efforts to purchase the Black Hills failed, the Fort Laramie Treaty was dismissed. The commissioner of Indian Affairs decreed that all Lakota not settled on reservations by January 31, 1876, would be considered hostile.

Rightfully so, Sitting Bull and his people held their ground. In March, 3 lines of federal troops invaded the area. Sitting Bull summoned the Lakota and their allies, the Cheyenne, & Arapaho to his camp on Rosebud Creek in Montana Territory. There, he led them in the sundance ritual, offering prayers to Wakáŋ Táŋka (Great Spirit). Sitting Bull slashed his arms 100 times in sacrifice for his people. During this ceremony, he shared that he'd had a vision. He saw soldiers falling into the Lakota camp like grasshoppers falling from the sky.

Inspired by this vision, the Oglala Lakota leader, War Chief Crazy Horse, set out for battle with a band of 500 warriors at the Battle of the Rosebud. To celebrate this victory, the Lakota moved their camp to the valley of the Little Bighorn River. They were joined by 3,000 more Native warriors who had abandoned the reservations to follow Sitting Bull.

On June 25th, the U.S. 7th Cavalry launched their attack under George Armstrong Custer. They rushed the Indian encampment as if in fulfillment of Sitting Bull’s vision. Yet they were severely outnumbered & thus defeated. White outrage at this military catastrophe spurred thousands more cavalrymen to the area. Over the next year, they relentlessly pursued the Lakota bands.

Though many were forced into surrender, Sitting Bull remained defiant. In May 1877, he led his band to Canada, beyond the reach of the U.S. Army. When a U.S. General traveled north to audaciously offer him a pardon in exchange for settling on a reservation, Sitting Bull angrily dismissed him.

Four years later, in the wake of European invaders driving the Buffalo to near instinction, Sitting Bull found it nearly impossible to feed his people. So, he moved south to face surrender. On July 19, 1881, Sitting Bull’s young son handed his father’s rifle to the U.S. commanding officer of Fort Buford in Montana. Through this action, Sitting Bull hoped to teach his son “that he had become a friend of the Americans.” He also said, “I wish it to be remembered that I was the last man of my tribe to surrender my rifle.” He asked for the right to cross back & forth into Canada whenever he wished & for a reservation of his own on the Little Missouri River near the Black Hills. Instead, he was sent to Standing Rock Reservation. His warm reception there raised Army fears about a fresh uprising. So, Sitting Bull and his people were taken further down the Missouri River to Fort Randall. They were held as prisoners of war for nearly 2 more years.

Finally, on May 10, 1883, Sitting Bull rejoined his tribe at Standing Rock. The Indian Agent in charge of the reservation was determined to deny him any special privileges. And so, Sitting Bull was forced to work in the plantation fields. Yet when a delegation of U.S. Senators came to discuss opening part of the reservation to Whitea, he spoke forcefully, though futilely, against it.

In 1885, Sitting Bull was allowed to leave the reservation to join Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show. He earned $50 a week for riding once around the arena. Sitting Bull also named his price for his autograph & picture. Unable to tolerate White society any longer, he stayed with the show for 4 months.

Returning to Standing Rock, Sitting Bull lived in a cabin near his birthplace on the Grand River; still rejecting the seeds of the colonialism - Christianity & giving up the traditional ways of life - as the reservation’s rules required. He did, however, send his children to a Christian school because he believed the next generation of Lakota would need the education of their oppressors to survive in the new world.

Here, he had another vision. He saw a meadowlark on a hillock beside him say,“Your own people, Lakotas, will kill you.” Nearly 5 years later, this vision would come to fruition.

In the fall of 1890, a Minŋecoŋjou Lakota named Kicking Bear came to Sitting Bull with news of the Ghost Dance, a ceremony that promised to rid the land of colonizers & restore the Indian way of life. Lakota had already adopted the ceremony at the Pine Ridge & Rosebud Reservations, and Indian Agents there had already called for troops to bring the growing movement under control.

At Standing Rock, the authorities feared Sitting Bull, still revered as a powerful spiritual leader, would join the Ghost Dancers as well. They sent 43 Lakota police officers to seize him. Before dawn on December 15th1890, the officers burst into Sitting Bull’s cabin & dragged him outside, where his followers were gathering to protect him. In the gunfight that followed, one of the Lakota police officers shot Sitting Bull in the head.

Today, Sitting Bull rests close to his birthplace near Mobridge, South Dakota. A granite shaft marks his grave.

"They claim this mother of ours, the Earth, for their own use, and fence their neighbors away from her, and deface her with their buildings and their refuse." - Sitting Bull.

We pour libations & give him💐 today as we celebrate him for his inspirational leadership, fearless figuring spirit, power in prayer, & his deep faith in Great Spirit.

Offering suggestions: a smoking pipe with tobacco, Lakota music, bison meat served with wild potatoes & prairie turnips

‼️Note: offering suggestions are just that & strictly for veneration purposes only. Never attempt to conjure up any spirit or entity without proper divination/Mediumship counsel.‼️