#Texas referendum act
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Carter Sherman and Lauren Gambino at The Guardian:
Kamala Harris’s Friday visit to Arizona was planned before the state’s top court upheld a 160-year-old law that bans almost all abortions. But the news galvanized the vice-president’s message, one that has already yielded stunning victories for liberals since Roe v Wade fell nearly two years ago. That message is simple: abortion bans happen when Republicans are in charge.
“Women here live under one of the most extreme abortion bans in our nation. … The overturning of Roe was without any question a seismic event, and this ban here in Arizona is one of the biggest aftershocks yet,” Harris said at the Tucson event. “Overturning Roe was just the opening act of a larger strategy to take women’s rights and freedoms … We all must understand who is to blame. Former president Donald Trump did this.”
The ruling from the Arizona supreme court arrived on Tuesday, just days after a Florida supreme court ruling cleared the way for a six-week abortion ban, a decision that will cut off access to the procedure before many women even know they are pregnant. These back-to-back rulings roiled the United States, raising the already high stakes of the 2024 elections to towering new heights. Activists in both states are now at work on ballot measures that would ask voters to enshrine abortion rights in their states’ constitutions in November.
Democrats are hopeful these efforts – and the potential threat of more bans under a Trump administration – will mobilize voters in their favor, because abortion rights are popular among Americans, and Republicans have spent years pushing restrictions. Democrats have made abortion rights a central issue of their campaigns in Arizona, which was already expected to be a major battleground, and Florida, a longtime election bellwether that has swung further to the right in recent years. For Joe Biden, who is struggling to generate enthusiasm among voters, turning 2024 into a referendum on abortion may be his best shot at defeating Donald Trump. But it remains an open question whether the backlash to Roe’s overturning will continue to drive voters in a presidential election year, when they may be more swayed by concern over the economy and immigration.
“In public polls that might just ask: ‘What’s your most important issue?’ You’re going to see abortion in the middle, maybe even towards the bottom,” said Tresa Undem, a co-founder of the polling firm PerryUndem who has studied public opinion on abortion for two decades. “But when you talk to core groups that Democrats need to turn out, it’s front and center.” A recent Wall Street Journal poll found that Trump held double-digit leads when swing state voters were asked who would best handle the economy, inflation and immigration, but they trusted Biden more on abortion. A Fox News poll in March found that most voters in Arizona believe Biden will do a better job handling the issue of abortion, but it was less of a priority than the economy, election integrity and foreign policy.
For Biden, abortion is “the best issue for him right now”, Undem said. “All of the data I’ve seen on this upcoming election, young people are not nearly as motivated to vote as they were in 2020. And so in places like Arizona, the total ban – and I don’t make predictions ever – I do think it is going to turn out young people, especially young women.” The Biden campaign has released two abortion-focused ads this week, including one that features a Texas woman who was denied an abortion after her water broke too early in pregnancy. (She ended up in the ICU.) Indivisible, a national grassroots organization with a local presence in states across the country, said volunteer sign-ups to knock on doors in Arizona spiked 50% following the state supreme court’s ruling. Its members in Arizona are helping to organize rallies in support of reproductive rights as well as events to collect signatures for the ballot measure.
When Roe fell, abortion rights’ grip on voters was far from guaranteed. Mitch McConnell, Senate Republicans’ longtime leader and an architect of the conservative supreme court majority that overturned Roe, brushed off outrage over its demise as “a wash” in federal elections. Although most Americans support some degree of access to the procedure, anti-abortion voters were more likely to say the issue was important to their vote than pro-abortion rights voters. The fall of Roe changed that. Anger over Roe was credited with halting Republicans’ much-promised “red wave” in the 2022 midterm elections, while pro-abortion rights ballot measures triumphed, even in crimson states such as Kansas and Kentucky. Last year, when Virginia Republicans tried retake control of the state legislature by championing a “compromise” 15 week-ban, they failed. Democrats now control both chambers in the state.
“When Republicans offer compromises, I think a lot of voters are inclined not to see those as what the Republican party really wants long-term but what the Republican party thinks is necessary to settle for in the short term,” said Mary Ziegler, a University of California at Davis School of Law professor who studies the legal history of reproduction. “They know that Republicans are aligned with the pro-life movement and the pro-life movement wants fetal personhood and a ban at fertilization.”
With the respective state supreme courts in Arizona and Florida upholding cruel abortion bans, Democrats are set to pounce on backlash against abortion bans to guide them to victory in Arizona, Florida, and the whole nation.
#Abortion Bans#Abortion#Democrats#Democratic Party#2024 Elections#Arizona#Florida#2024 Presidential Election#2024 Election Polls
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Separatist and irredentist movements in the world
Texas
Proposed state: Republic of Texas
Region: Texas, United States
Ethnic group: Texans
Goal: independence
Date: 1990s
Political parties: -
Militant organizations/advocacy groups: Texas Nationalist Movement
Current status: active
History
1528 - the first Europeans arrive in Texas
1685 - first settlement
1810-1821 - Mexican War of Independence
1832 - Anahuac Disturbances
1835-1836 - Texas Revolution
1836-1846 - Republic of Texas
1845 - annexation of Texas into the U.S.
1861 - secession from the U.S.
1861-1865 - American Civil War
1995 - provisional government proclamation
2005 - creation of the Texas Nationalist Movement
2021 - Texas Independence Act
Many different tribes inhabited Texas before the European arrival, including the Apache, Caddo, Comanche, Chochtaw, and Wichita. The region was under Spanish control until Mexico’s independence in 1821, when it became part of the Mexican Empire.
The Anahuac Disturbances against the Mexican government were the prelude to the Texas Revolution of 1935-1936, after which Texas declared independence and formed the Republic of Texas. Nine years later, it fulfilled its wish of annexation into the United States. However, following the outbreak of the American Civil War, it seceded from the country and joined the Confederacy.
Having rejoined the U.S. in 1865, Texas did not make any more secession attempts until 1995, when the Republic of Texas group claimed to have reinstated a provisional Texan government. In 1997, the group split into three, one of which became the Texas Nationalist Movement.
Secessionist sentiments grew after Obama became president in 2012 and were fueled by the Brexit vote. In 2021, a bill to organize a nonbinding referendum on independence was filed by a Republican member of the Texas House of Representatives. Another bill was introduced to add a referendum to the 2024 election ballot.
Texans
More than 30 million people live in Texas, of which 42.5% are non-Hispanic whites, 39.3% are Hispanic, 12.8% are African Americans, and 6.1% are Asian Americans.
The main language of the state is English, but Spanish is spoken by around 30% of the population. The largest religion is Christianity, practiced by 75.5% of Texans, with Protestantism being the most common denomination.
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Holidays 2.28
Holidays
Action Line Day
Aduros Nau (Elder Scrolls)
Burgsonndeg (celebrates end of winter; Luxembourg)
Car Keys and Small Change Day
Community Day (Andalucia, Spain)
Dia de Andalucia (Day of Andalusia; Spain)
DNA Discovery Day
French Connection Drug Bust Anniversary Day
Gone-ta-Pott Day [every 28th]
HIV is Not a Crime Awareness Day
International Hygge Day
International Jewish Day of Constructive Conflict
International Repetitive Strain Injury Awareness Day
International Underlings Day
Kalevala Day (Finland)
Linus Pauling Day (Oregon)
Metamour Day
National Black Heroes Day
National Customized Wheel & Tire Day
National Essay Day
National Heart Healing Awareness Day
National Koe Wetzel Day
National School Governors’ Awareness Day (UK)
National Science Day (India)
National Time Refund Day
National Tooth Fairy Day [also 8.22]
National Vegan Lipstick Day
Nylon Day
Parachute Jump Anniversary Day
Peace Memorial Day (Taiwan)
People’s Sovereignty Day (Benin)
Public Holiday (Kuwait)
Public Sleeping Day
Read Me Day
Snowshoe Day
Spade Day (French Republic)
Teachers’ Day (Arab nations)
Transportation Act Anniversary Day
228 Memorial Day (Taiwan)
World Day without Facebook
World Living Conditions Survey Day (China)
World Sustainable Energy Day
World Tailor’s Day
Food & Drink Celebrations
Chocolate Soufflé Day
Global Scouse Day (UK)
National Pancake Day
National Singani Day
Nature Celebrations
Barley Day (Unity, Prosperity; Korean Birth Flowers)
Floral Design Day
Smokey the Bear Day
Independence, Flag & Related Days
Andalusia Day (Referendum Day, Made them Autonomous from Spain; 1980)
Colorado Territory (Created by Congress; 1861)
Evanoria (Declared; 2017) [unrecognized]
Gapla (Declared; 2019) [unrecognized]
Independent Hidden State of Tranquility (Declared; 2009) [unrecognized]
Independence Recognition Day (Egypt; 1922)
Tangub City Charter Day (Philippines)
Territory Day (Colorado; 1861)
New Year’s Days
Bituun (Mongolia)
Dangpa Losar (Bhutan)
Gyalpyo / Gyallo Loshar (Nepal)
Tibetan New Year (Losar) [thru 3.2]
4th & Last Friday in February
Carnival Friday [Friday before Ash Wednesday]
Comfort Food Friday [Every Friday]
Field Trip Friday [Last Friday of Each Month]
Finally Friday [Last Friday of Each Month]
Five For Friday [Every Friday]
Flapjack Friday [4th Friday of Each Month]
Flashback Friday [Every Friday]
Flatbread Friday [Last Friday of Each Month]
Flirtatious Friday [4th Friday of Each Month]
Friday Finds [Every Friday]
Fry Day (Pastafarian; Fritism) [Every Friday]
International Stand Up to Bullying Day [Last Friday] (Also 3rd Friday in Nov)
Katsuyama Sagicho begins (Japan) [Last Friday]
National CSA Day (Small Farm Central) [Last Friday]
National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend begins [Last Friday thru Sunday]
National Skip the Straw Day [4th Friday]
Rabbit Rabbit Day [Last Day of Every Month]
Rare Disease Day [Last Day of February]
Texas Cowboy Poetry Gathering begins [Last Friday]
TGIF (Thank God It's Friday) [Every Friday]
Thank a Resident Day [4th Friday]
Yukon Heritage Day (Canada) [Last Friday]
Weekly Holidays beginning February 28 (4th Week of February)
Maryland Vegan Restaurant Month (Various, Maryland) [thru 3.30]
Festivals On or Beginning February 28, 2025
Adelaide Festival (Adelaide, Australia) [thru 3.16]
Carnival of La Bañeza (La Bañeza, Spain) [thru 3.8]
Carnival of Nazaré (Nazaré, Portugal) [thru 3.5]
Carnival of Torres Vedras (Torres Vedras, Portugal) [thru 3.5]
Carriacou and Petite Martinique Carnival (Hillsborough, Grenada) [thru 3.4]
César Awards (Paris, France)
Chuck Wagon Cook-off Competition (Pigeon Forge, Tennessee) [thru 3.2]
Clearwater Sea-Blues Festival (Clearwater, Florida) [thru 3.2]
Enlighten Canberra (Canberra, Australia) [thru 3.10]
Fantasporto Film Festival (Porto, Portugal) [thru 3.9]
Fuego Austral (Buenos Aires, Argentina) [thru 3.4]
Inter Varsity Folk Dance Festival (Sheffield, United Kingdom) [thru 3.2]
Las Tablas Carnival (Las Tablas, Panama) [thru 3.5]
Maltese Carnival (Valletta, Malta) [thru 3.4]
Mid-South Farm & Gin Show (Memphis, Tennessee) [thru 3.1]
National Fiery Foods & BBQ Show (Albuquerque, New Mexico) [thru 3.2]
North Texas Irish Festival (Dallas, Texas) [thru 3.2]
Old Tavern Rat Barleywine International Brewfest (Portland, Oregon) [thru 3.1]
Panama Carnival (Panama City, Panama) [thru 3.6]
Rabadan Carnival in Bellinzona (Bellinzona, Switzerland) [thru 3.4]
Recife Carnival (Recife, Brazil) [thru 3.4]
Rio Carnival (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) [thru 3.8]
São Paulo Carnival (São Paulo, Brazil) [thru 3.5]
Virginia Wine Expo (Richmond, Virginia) [thru 3.9]
Feast Days
Abercius (Christian; Martyr)
Alicia the Volcano Rabbit (Muppetism)
Anna Julia Cooper and Elizabeth Evelyn Wright (Episcopal Church (USA))
Apple Wealth Cakes Day (Starza Pagan Book of Days)
Cake Day (Pagan)
Evil Clown Day (Pastafarian)
Fearn Tree Day (a.k.a. Alder; Celtic Book of Days)
Feast of the Martyrs of the Plague of Alexandria (Christian)
Februalia (Ancient Rome)
Hedwig of Poland (Christian; Saint)
Heraclitus (Positivist; Saint)
Hilarius (Christian; Saint)
Ken Kesey Day (Church of the SubGenius; Saint)
Lupicinus (Christian; Saint)
Mar Abba (Christian; Saint)
Matronalia (Day of Juno Lucina; Pagan)
Oswald of Worcester (Christian; Saint)
Proterius, Patriarch of Alexandria (Christian; Saint)
Romanus of Condat (Christian; Saint)
Rufinus (Christian; Saint)
Sabbatu (Everyday Wicca)
Saxon Cake Day (Offering cakes to the Gods & Goddesses)
Velja Noc (Spirits of the Dead visit living relatives, overseen by Veles, Lord of the Dead; Old Slavic)
Zamyaz (Ancient Persia; Everyday Wicca)
Lunar Calendar Holidays
Chinese: Month 1 (Wu-Yin), Day 4 (Xin-Chou)
Day Pillar: Metal Ox
12-Day Officers/12 Gods: Establish Day (建 Jian) [Inauspicious]
Holidays: Spring Festival Golden Week
Secular Saints Days
Ivan Albright (Art)
Mario Andretti (Sports)
Milton Caniff (Art)
Michel de Montaigne (Philosophy)
Luka Doncic (Sports)
Frank Gehry (Architecture)
Tessa Hadley (Literature)
Ben Hecht (Literature)
Brian Jones (Music)
Chris Kraft (Science)
Paul Krugman (Economics)
Colum McCann (Literature)
Vincente Minnelli (Entertainment)
Linus Pauling (Science)
Bernadette Peters (Entertainment)
John Tenniel (Art)
John Turturro (Entertainment)
Cindy Wilson (Music)
William Zorach (Art)
Lucky & Unlucky Days
Lucky Day (Philippines) [13 of 71]
Prime Number Day: 59 [17 of 72]
Tomobiki (友引 Japan) [Good luck all day, except at noon.]
Umu Limnu (Evil Day; Babylonian Calendar; 10 of 60)
Unfortunate Day (Pagan) [14 of 57]
Unlucky Day (Grafton’s Manual of 1565) [14 of 60]
Premieres
Axe Me Another or Heads You Lose! (Rocky & Bullwinkle Cartoon, S1, Ep. 28; 1960)
The Big Show, by Pierre Clostermann (Novel; 1948)
Celebrate, by Three Dog Night (Song; 1970)
Clean Up Week (Aesop’s Film Fable Cartoon; 1925)
Coach (TV Series; 1989)
Crazy Cruise (WB MM Cartoon; 1942)
Dancing on Air or the Pottsylvania Polka (Rocky & Bullwinkle Cartoon, S1, Ep. 27; 1960)
Dog, Cat and Canary (Columbia Favorites Cartoon; 1954)
Donnie Brasco (Film; 1997)
A Duck Amuck (WB MM Cartoon; 1953)
Eleven Kinds of Loneliness, by Richard Yates (Short Stories; 1962)
The Elusive Idea (Gaumont Cartoon Comics Cartoon; 1917)
Ernest & Celestine (Animated Film; 2014)
The Fighting Blood of Jerry McDub (Keen Cartoon; 1916)
A Fool’s Errand (Krazy Kat Cartoon; 1927)
Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen (Final Episode of M*A*S*H; 1983)
Gravity’s Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon (Novel; 1973)
Happy Go Lucky (Heckle & Jeckle Cartoon; 1947)
Hare-Abian Nights (WB MM Cartoon; 1959)
In My Own Words, by Ne-Yo (Album; 2006)
The Jesus Rolls (Film; 2020)
Justice League: Doom (WB Animated Film; 2012)
The Lake of the Dead, by André Bjerke (Novel; 1942)
The Mail Coach (Aesop’s Film Fable Cartoon; 1926)
The Mambo Kings (Film; 1992)
Methodist Protestant Religion (Deed of Declaration; 1784)
Mister Roberts, by Thomas Heggen and Joshua Logan (Play; 1948)
Molly Moo-Cow and Robinson Crusoe (Rainbow Parade Cartoon; 1936)
Murder on the Orient Express, by Agatha Christie (Mystery Novel; 1934) [16]
Not Now (Betty Boop Cartoon; 1936)
Pieces of You, by Jewel (Album; 1995)
Pluto Junior (Disney Cartoon; 1942)
Pretty in Pink (Film; 1986)
Spirit in the Sky, by Norman Greenbaum (Song; 1970)
Spook and Span (Casper Cartoon; 1958)
Tombeau de Couperin, by Maurice Ravel (Suite for Piano; 1920)
Tom Jones (a.k.a. The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling), by Henry Fielding (Novel; 1749)
Trade Mice (Oswald the Lucky Rabbit Cartoon; 1938)
Train, by Train (Album; 1998)
University of Deseret, n.k.a. University of Utah (School; 1850)
University of Illinois at Urbana (School; 1867)
University of Pittsburgh (School; 1787)
Waco: Rules of Engagement (Documentary Film; 1997)
War, by U2 (Album; 1983)
The Way of All Pests (Color Rhapsody Cartoon; 1941)
”Weird Al” Yankovic in 3-D, by Weird Al Yankovic (Album; 1984)
Wendy (Film; 2020)
What’s Brewin’ Bruin? (WB LT Cartoon; 1948)
Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do, by Studs Terkel (Nonfiction Book; 1974)
Today’s Name Days
Oswald, Roman, Silvana (Austria)
Bogoljub, Roman, Teofil, Vikica (Croatia)
Lumír (Czech Republic)
Øllegaard (Denmark)
Vilmar, Vilmer, Vilmo (Estonia)
Onni, Sisu (Finland)
Romain (France)
Detlev, Oswald, Roman, Silvana (Germany)
Kyra, Marianna (Greece)
Ákos, Bátor (Hungary)
Antonietta, Erminio, Romano, Teresio (Italy)
Justs, Skaidra, Skaidrīte (Latvia)
Romanas, Vilgardas, Žygimantė (Lithuania)
Maren, Marina (Norway)
Chwalibóg, Józef, Makary, Nadbor, Roman (Poland)
Gherman, Ioan, Vasile (Romania)
Zlatica (Slovakia)
Hilario, Román (Spain)
Maria (Sweden)
Chance, Chauncey, Linus, Macey, Macie, Macy (USA)
Today’s National Name Days
National Mario Day
National Tessa Day
Today is Also…
Day of Year: Day 59 of 2025; 306 days remaining in the year
ISO Week: Day 5 of Week 9 of 2025
Celtic Tree Calendar: Fearn (Alder) [Day 3 of 28]
Chinese: Month 2 (Ji-Mao), Day 1 (Wu-Chen)
Chinese Year of the: Snake 4723 (until February 17, 2026) [Ding-Chou]
Coptic: 21 Amshir 1741
Druid Tree Calendar: Pine (Feb 19-28) [Day 10 of 10]
Hebrew: 30 Shevat 5785
Islamic: 29 Sha’ban 1446
Julian: 15 February 2025
Moon: 1%: Waxing Crescent
Positivist: 3 Aristotle (3rd Month) [Heraclitus)
Runic Half Month: Tyr (Cosmic Pillar) [Day 8 of 15]
Season: Winter (Day 70 of 90)
SUn Calendar: 29 Gray; Eighthday [29 of 30]
Week: 4th Week of February
Zodiac:
Tropical (Typical) Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 10 of 30)
Sidereal Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 16 of 30)
Schmidt Zodiac: Capricorn (Day 7 of 27)
IAU Boundaries (Current) Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 12 of 23)
IAU Boundaries (1977) Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 13 of 24)
Calendar Changes
杏月 [Xìngyuè] (Chinese Lunisolar Calendar) [Month 2 of 12] (Apricot Month) [Earthly Branch: Rabbit Month] (Modern Name: èryuè; Second Month)
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Holidays 2.28
Holidays
Action Line Day
Aduros Nau (Elder Scrolls)
Burgsonndeg (celebrates end of winter; Luxembourg)
Car Keys and Small Change Day
Community Day (Andalucia, Spain)
Dia de Andalucia (Day of Andalusia; Spain)
DNA Discovery Day
French Connection Drug Bust Anniversary Day
Gone-ta-Pott Day [every 28th]
HIV is Not a Crime Awareness Day
International Hygge Day
International Jewish Day of Constructive Conflict
International Repetitive Strain Injury Awareness Day
International Underlings Day
Kalevala Day (Finland)
Linus Pauling Day (Oregon)
Metamour Day
National Black Heroes Day
National Customized Wheel & Tire Day
National Essay Day
National Heart Healing Awareness Day
National Koe Wetzel Day
National School Governors’ Awareness Day (UK)
National Science Day (India)
National Time Refund Day
National Tooth Fairy Day [also 8.22]
National Vegan Lipstick Day
Nylon Day
Parachute Jump Anniversary Day
Peace Memorial Day (Taiwan)
People’s Sovereignty Day (Benin)
Public Holiday (Kuwait)
Public Sleeping Day
Read Me Day
Snowshoe Day
Spade Day (French Republic)
Teachers’ Day (Arab nations)
Transportation Act Anniversary Day
228 Memorial Day (Taiwan)
World Day without Facebook
World Living Conditions Survey Day (China)
World Sustainable Energy Day
World Tailor’s Day
Food & Drink Celebrations
Chocolate Soufflé Day
Global Scouse Day (UK)
National Pancake Day
National Singani Day
Nature Celebrations
Barley Day (Unity, Prosperity; Korean Birth Flowers)
Floral Design Day
Smokey the Bear Day
Independence, Flag & Related Days
Andalusia Day (Referendum Day, Made them Autonomous from Spain; 1980)
Colorado Territory (Created by Congress; 1861)
Evanoria (Declared; 2017) [unrecognized]
Gapla (Declared; 2019) [unrecognized]
Independent Hidden State of Tranquility (Declared; 2009) [unrecognized]
Independence Recognition Day (Egypt; 1922)
Tangub City Charter Day (Philippines)
Territory Day (Colorado; 1861)
New Year’s Days
Bituun (Mongolia)
Dangpa Losar (Bhutan)
Gyalpyo / Gyallo Loshar (Nepal)
Tibetan New Year (Losar) [thru 3.2]
4th & Last Friday in February
Carnival Friday [Friday before Ash Wednesday]
Comfort Food Friday [Every Friday]
Field Trip Friday [Last Friday of Each Month]
Finally Friday [Last Friday of Each Month]
Five For Friday [Every Friday]
Flapjack Friday [4th Friday of Each Month]
Flashback Friday [Every Friday]
Flatbread Friday [Last Friday of Each Month]
Flirtatious Friday [4th Friday of Each Month]
Friday Finds [Every Friday]
Fry Day (Pastafarian; Fritism) [Every Friday]
International Stand Up to Bullying Day [Last Friday] (Also 3rd Friday in Nov)
Katsuyama Sagicho begins (Japan) [Last Friday]
National CSA Day (Small Farm Central) [Last Friday]
National Girl Scout Cookie Weekend begins [Last Friday thru Sunday]
National Skip the Straw Day [4th Friday]
Rabbit Rabbit Day [Last Day of Every Month]
Rare Disease Day [Last Day of February]
Texas Cowboy Poetry Gathering begins [Last Friday]
TGIF (Thank God It's Friday) [Every Friday]
Thank a Resident Day [4th Friday]
Yukon Heritage Day (Canada) [Last Friday]
Weekly Holidays beginning February 28 (4th Week of February)
Maryland Vegan Restaurant Month (Various, Maryland) [thru 3.30]
Festivals On or Beginning February 28, 2025
Adelaide Festival (Adelaide, Australia) [thru 3.16]
Carnival of La Bañeza (La Bañeza, Spain) [thru 3.8]
Carnival of Nazaré (Nazaré, Portugal) [thru 3.5]
Carnival of Torres Vedras (Torres Vedras, Portugal) [thru 3.5]
Carriacou and Petite Martinique Carnival (Hillsborough, Grenada) [thru 3.4]
César Awards (Paris, France)
Chuck Wagon Cook-off Competition (Pigeon Forge, Tennessee) [thru 3.2]
Clearwater Sea-Blues Festival (Clearwater, Florida) [thru 3.2]
Enlighten Canberra (Canberra, Australia) [thru 3.10]
Fantasporto Film Festival (Porto, Portugal) [thru 3.9]
Fuego Austral (Buenos Aires, Argentina) [thru 3.4]
Inter Varsity Folk Dance Festival (Sheffield, United Kingdom) [thru 3.2]
Las Tablas Carnival (Las Tablas, Panama) [thru 3.5]
Maltese Carnival (Valletta, Malta) [thru 3.4]
Mid-South Farm & Gin Show (Memphis, Tennessee) [thru 3.1]
National Fiery Foods & BBQ Show (Albuquerque, New Mexico) [thru 3.2]
North Texas Irish Festival (Dallas, Texas) [thru 3.2]
Old Tavern Rat Barleywine International Brewfest (Portland, Oregon) [thru 3.1]
Panama Carnival (Panama City, Panama) [thru 3.6]
Rabadan Carnival in Bellinzona (Bellinzona, Switzerland) [thru 3.4]
Recife Carnival (Recife, Brazil) [thru 3.4]
Rio Carnival (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) [thru 3.8]
São Paulo Carnival (São Paulo, Brazil) [thru 3.5]
Virginia Wine Expo (Richmond, Virginia) [thru 3.9]
Feast Days
Abercius (Christian; Martyr)
Alicia the Volcano Rabbit (Muppetism)
Anna Julia Cooper and Elizabeth Evelyn Wright (Episcopal Church (USA))
Apple Wealth Cakes Day (Starza Pagan Book of Days)
Cake Day (Pagan)
Evil Clown Day (Pastafarian)
Fearn Tree Day (a.k.a. Alder; Celtic Book of Days)
Feast of the Martyrs of the Plague of Alexandria (Christian)
Februalia (Ancient Rome)
Hedwig of Poland (Christian; Saint)
Heraclitus (Positivist; Saint)
Hilarius (Christian; Saint)
Ken Kesey Day (Church of the SubGenius; Saint)
Lupicinus (Christian; Saint)
Mar Abba (Christian; Saint)
Matronalia (Day of Juno Lucina; Pagan)
Oswald of Worcester (Christian; Saint)
Proterius, Patriarch of Alexandria (Christian; Saint)
Romanus of Condat (Christian; Saint)
Rufinus (Christian; Saint)
Sabbatu (Everyday Wicca)
Saxon Cake Day (Offering cakes to the Gods & Goddesses)
Velja Noc (Spirits of the Dead visit living relatives, overseen by Veles, Lord of the Dead; Old Slavic)
Zamyaz (Ancient Persia; Everyday Wicca)
Lunar Calendar Holidays
Chinese: Month 1 (Wu-Yin), Day 4 (Xin-Chou)
Day Pillar: Metal Ox
12-Day Officers/12 Gods: Establish Day (建 Jian) [Inauspicious]
Holidays: Spring Festival Golden Week
Secular Saints Days
Ivan Albright (Art)
Mario Andretti (Sports)
Milton Caniff (Art)
Michel de Montaigne (Philosophy)
Luka Doncic (Sports)
Frank Gehry (Architecture)
Tessa Hadley (Literature)
Ben Hecht (Literature)
Brian Jones (Music)
Chris Kraft (Science)
Paul Krugman (Economics)
Colum McCann (Literature)
Vincente Minnelli (Entertainment)
Linus Pauling (Science)
Bernadette Peters (Entertainment)
John Tenniel (Art)
John Turturro (Entertainment)
Cindy Wilson (Music)
William Zorach (Art)
Lucky & Unlucky Days
Lucky Day (Philippines) [13 of 71]
Prime Number Day: 59 [17 of 72]
Tomobiki (友引 Japan) [Good luck all day, except at noon.]
Umu Limnu (Evil Day; Babylonian Calendar; 10 of 60)
Unfortunate Day (Pagan) [14 of 57]
Unlucky Day (Grafton’s Manual of 1565) [14 of 60]
Premieres
Axe Me Another or Heads You Lose! (Rocky & Bullwinkle Cartoon, S1, Ep. 28; 1960)
The Big Show, by Pierre Clostermann (Novel; 1948)
Celebrate, by Three Dog Night (Song; 1970)
Clean Up Week (Aesop’s Film Fable Cartoon; 1925)
Coach (TV Series; 1989)
Crazy Cruise (WB MM Cartoon; 1942)
Dancing on Air or the Pottsylvania Polka (Rocky & Bullwinkle Cartoon, S1, Ep. 27; 1960)
Dog, Cat and Canary (Columbia Favorites Cartoon; 1954)
Donnie Brasco (Film; 1997)
A Duck Amuck (WB MM Cartoon; 1953)
Eleven Kinds of Loneliness, by Richard Yates (Short Stories; 1962)
The Elusive Idea (Gaumont Cartoon Comics Cartoon; 1917)
Ernest & Celestine (Animated Film; 2014)
The Fighting Blood of Jerry McDub (Keen Cartoon; 1916)
A Fool’s Errand (Krazy Kat Cartoon; 1927)
Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen (Final Episode of M*A*S*H; 1983)
Gravity’s Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon (Novel; 1973)
Happy Go Lucky (Heckle & Jeckle Cartoon; 1947)
Hare-Abian Nights (WB MM Cartoon; 1959)
In My Own Words, by Ne-Yo (Album; 2006)
The Jesus Rolls (Film; 2020)
Justice League: Doom (WB Animated Film; 2012)
The Lake of the Dead, by André Bjerke (Novel; 1942)
The Mail Coach (Aesop’s Film Fable Cartoon; 1926)
The Mambo Kings (Film; 1992)
Methodist Protestant Religion (Deed of Declaration; 1784)
Mister Roberts, by Thomas Heggen and Joshua Logan (Play; 1948)
Molly Moo-Cow and Robinson Crusoe (Rainbow Parade Cartoon; 1936)
Murder on the Orient Express, by Agatha Christie (Mystery Novel; 1934) [16]
Not Now (Betty Boop Cartoon; 1936)
Pieces of You, by Jewel (Album; 1995)
Pluto Junior (Disney Cartoon; 1942)
Pretty in Pink (Film; 1986)
Spirit in the Sky, by Norman Greenbaum (Song; 1970)
Spook and Span (Casper Cartoon; 1958)
Tombeau de Couperin, by Maurice Ravel (Suite for Piano; 1920)
Tom Jones (a.k.a. The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling), by Henry Fielding (Novel; 1749)
Trade Mice (Oswald the Lucky Rabbit Cartoon; 1938)
Train, by Train (Album; 1998)
University of Deseret, n.k.a. University of Utah (School; 1850)
University of Illinois at Urbana (School; 1867)
University of Pittsburgh (School; 1787)
Waco: Rules of Engagement (Documentary Film; 1997)
War, by U2 (Album; 1983)
The Way of All Pests (Color Rhapsody Cartoon; 1941)
”Weird Al” Yankovic in 3-D, by Weird Al Yankovic (Album; 1984)
Wendy (Film; 2020)
What’s Brewin’ Bruin? (WB LT Cartoon; 1948)
Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do, by Studs Terkel (Nonfiction Book; 1974)
Today’s Name Days
Oswald, Roman, Silvana (Austria)
Bogoljub, Roman, Teofil, Vikica (Croatia)
Lumír (Czech Republic)
Øllegaard (Denmark)
Vilmar, Vilmer, Vilmo (Estonia)
Onni, Sisu (Finland)
Romain (France)
Detlev, Oswald, Roman, Silvana (Germany)
Kyra, Marianna (Greece)
Ákos, Bátor (Hungary)
Antonietta, Erminio, Romano, Teresio (Italy)
Justs, Skaidra, Skaidrīte (Latvia)
Romanas, Vilgardas, Žygimantė (Lithuania)
Maren, Marina (Norway)
Chwalibóg, Józef, Makary, Nadbor, Roman (Poland)
Gherman, Ioan, Vasile (Romania)
Zlatica (Slovakia)
Hilario, Román (Spain)
Maria (Sweden)
Chance, Chauncey, Linus, Macey, Macie, Macy (USA)
Today’s National Name Days
National Mario Day
National Tessa Day
Today is Also…
Day of Year: Day 59 of 2025; 306 days remaining in the year
ISO Week: Day 5 of Week 9 of 2025
Celtic Tree Calendar: Fearn (Alder) [Day 3 of 28]
Chinese: Month 2 (Ji-Mao), Day 1 (Wu-Chen)
Chinese Year of the: Snake 4723 (until February 17, 2026) [Ding-Chou]
Coptic: 21 Amshir 1741
Druid Tree Calendar: Pine (Feb 19-28) [Day 10 of 10]
Hebrew: 30 Shevat 5785
Islamic: 29 Sha’ban 1446
Julian: 15 February 2025
Moon: 1%: Waxing Crescent
Positivist: 3 Aristotle (3rd Month) [Heraclitus)
Runic Half Month: Tyr (Cosmic Pillar) [Day 8 of 15]
Season: Winter (Day 70 of 90)
SUn Calendar: 29 Gray; Eighthday [29 of 30]
Week: 4th Week of February
Zodiac:
Tropical (Typical) Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 10 of 30)
Sidereal Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 16 of 30)
Schmidt Zodiac: Capricorn (Day 7 of 27)
IAU Boundaries (Current) Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 12 of 23)
IAU Boundaries (1977) Zodiac: Aquarius (Day 13 of 24)
Calendar Changes
杏月 [Xìngyuè] (Chinese Lunisolar Calendar) [Month 2 of 12] (Apricot Month) [Earthly Branch: Rabbit Month] (Modern Name: èryuè; Second Month)
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Austin opened up police misconduct files. Now, state lawmakers want to lock them back up.
A bill that's making its way through the Texas Legislature could undo years of litigation, a citywide referendum and countless hours of public back-and-forth about civilian oversight of the Austin Police Department.
The Austin Police Oversight Act, which passed by a 4-to-1 margin in 2023, allows public access to police discipline records.
But if Senate Bill 781 passes, it could bar these records from public view.
How did we get here?
Austin and lawmakers in the Texas Capitol have, for years, been locked in what could be described as a choreographed dance.
Austin zigs, passing local rules on everything from trees to police funding to property taxes to ride-hailing to worksite protections to, even, plastic bags.
State lawmakers zag, targeting those local rules, often undoing them altogether.
In Texas, police are legally required to release files related to complaints against police officers if they're disciplined.
That could be anything from firing an officer to a couple days' suspension.
Complaints that don't result in discipline are, in some departments, confidential.
That was the case at Austin Police Department for years, but the Austin Police Oversight Act (APOA) made them publicly available — along with the suggestions from the city's civilian-led Office of Police Oversight.
Kathy Mitchell, who works with Equity Action, pushed to get the APOA on the ballot in 2023, and said the measure gives more insight into how APD's disciplinary system works.
Mitchell said prior to APOA's rollout, the police department would announce that an officer was suspended, or fired, but the statements lacked any real detail.
Mitchell said publishing stuff like this holds the department's feet to the fire.
Opponents said the scrutiny would have a chilling effect on police officers.
But so far, Mitchell said that hasn't been the case.
"The sky has not fallen," she said.
Austin City Council Member Chito Vela said King's bill wouldn't necessarily be the end for the Austin Police Oversight Act.
When the city and Austin's police union agreed to a new contract last year, it locked in the APOA — and the contract "may trump the bill," Vela said.
"Regardless of what the Legislature does, we're going to have full access … to police disciplinary records for the next five years," Vela said.
Vela and others at City Hall knew a bill like this would be filed during the legislative session; that's why they pushed so hard to pass the police contract before lawmakers convened in January.
He said the bill wouldn't overrule the city's agreement with APD's union.
"If we had said no to the contract, this kind of bill could have gotten filed and could have gotten passed … We would have been in a worse position ," he said.
"That's why I wanted to take advantage of the opportunity that we had to lock in that transparency and accountability."
Not all law enforcement agencies have a failsafe like Austin does
If the bill passes, law enforcement agencies across the state will be required to bar police discipline records from public view.
That includes the Texas Department of Public Safety, and major city police departments, like Dallas, that don't have permanent contracts on the books.
Republican state Sen. Phil King, who authored the bill, did not respond to an interview request for this story
Vela said if his bill passes as written, it would be a "horrible blow" to police transparency in Texas.
"Sunshine is the best disinfectant," Vela said.
"We have to be able to see what our public servants are doing — whether they're city managers or police officers or transportation workers. The public has to have access to these records in order to understand their government, in order to be informed, and in order to provide oversight and accountability which ultimately lies with the people."
Mitchell said the bill is nearly guaranteed to get a hearing — and could make it through the Texas Senate's Criminal Justice Committee.
For now, she said, Austin's police transparency policy is protected, though she's not as optimistic as Vela.
"We have a little more transparency … that's what we have," she said. "That's what voters voted for."
S.B. No. 781
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED AN ACT relating to certain files maintained by a law enforcement agency regarding certain employees of the agency.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1.
Subchapter J, Chapter 1701,
Occupations Code, is amended by adding Section 1701.45351 to read as follows:
Sec. 1701.45351.
DEPARTMENT FILE.
(a) In this section, "department file" means a file maintained by a law enforcement agency for each license holder employed by the agency for the agency's use.
(b)
The head of a law enforcement agency or the head's designee shall maintain a department file on each license holder employed by the agency.
(c)
A department file must contain any letter, memorandum, or document relating to the license holder not included in a personnel file maintained under a policy adopted under Section 1701.4535, including any letter, memorandum, or document relating to alleged misconduct by the license holder for which the agency determines there is insufficient evidence to sustain the charge of misconduct.
(d)
As provided by Section 1701.451, a law enforcement agency hiring a license holder is entitled to view the contents of the license holder's department file.
(e)
A law enforcement agency shall provide contents from a license holder's department file to the commission in accordance with:
(1)
Section 1701.4522(b)(1)(D); or
(2)
a request by the commission as part of an ongoing investigation relating to the license holder.
(f)
Except as provided by Subsections (d) and
(e), a law enforcement agency may not release any information contained in a license holder's department file to any other agency or person requesting information relating to the license holder.
The agency shall refer the person or agency requesting the information to the agency head or the head's designee.
A department file maintained under this section is confidential and not subject to disclosure under Chapter 552, Government Code.
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Is US Alarmism Over China's 'Grab' of American Farmland Justified?
— Sputnik International | Monday June 3, 2024
In this Sept. 22, 2015 photo, a central Illinois farmer races against the sunset to harvest his cornfield field near Farmingdale, Ill. With most of this year's corn and soybeans harvested, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is boosting its expectations for the size of the crops. Sputnik International. © AP Photo/ Seth Perlman
US Lawmakers Claim China is on a Buying Spree of American Farmland even though private investors and firms from the People's Republic are nowhere near the club of top five foreign owners of the country's land.
The US House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture passed the Farm, Food and National Security Act of 2024 (Farm Bill) 33-21 on May 24. Explaining why the move is a "big win" for the US, Congresswoman Ashley Hinson told the Daily Mail that the proposed legislation would help prevent "Communist China" from grabbing American land.
"Communist China shouldn't be allowed to buy another acre of American farmland, nor should we rely upon our top foreign adversary for key parts of our food supply chain," Hinson told the media outlet.
In reality, Chinese private investors and firms possessed less than 1 percent (or 349,442 acres) of all foreign-held agricultural land in the US as of December 31, 2022, according to the Farm Service Agency of the United States Department of Agriculture.
The Chinese possessions are spread across the US, including in Texas (162,167 acres); North Carolina (44,776 acres); Missouri (43,071 acres); Utah (32,447 acres); and Virginia (14,382 acres).
For comparison's sake, Canadian investors own 14.2 million acres or 32 percent of all foreign-owned US land, ranking top of the list. Thirteen million acres are held by Dutch investors (12 percent), while Italians (6 percent), Brits (6 percent), and Germans (5 percent) follow. The remaining 17.1 million acres are held by various smaller international landowners, including China.
All in all, foreign investors held a stake in over 43.4 million acres or around 3.1 percent of all US agricultural land.
There is nothing particularly new about acquiring foreign farmland. American investors routinely buy land and real estate abroad, for example. US and European companies are planning to acquire Ukrainian arable lands once hostilities are over, given that the moratorium on the sale of agricultural land in the country was lifted on July 1, 2021.
The act was passed in March 2020 and stipulated that in 2022 only natural persons would be authorized to buy land. However, starting from July 2023, corporate entities would also be allowed to buy up to 10,000 ha (24,710 acres) of land each, while foreigners would be granted the right to buy Ukrainian land only after a referendum concerning the issue.
Remarkably, the Oakland Institute – a California-based progressive think tank – revealed on February 21, 2023, that over 28 percent of Ukraine’s arable land is already in the possession of European and North American entities or Ukrainian oligarchs. The report was fiercely criticized by the Western mainstream press.
However, in April this year, Polish President Andrzej Duda appeared to confirm the think tank's findings by telling the Lithuanian press that "industrial agriculture (…) is not really run by Ukrainians; it is run by big companies from Western Europe, from the USA. If we look today at the owners of most of the land, they are not Ukrainian companies."
The trend appears to be deep-rooted. In July 2009, Der Spiegel shed light on "modern colonialism" exercised by big American and European investors who massively bought up cheap land in crisis-ridden countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America.
'Espionage' Accusations
While some US lawmakers and think tanks admit that China's land holdings in the US are quite modest, they accuse the Chinese of using their land to spy on the US military on behalf of Beijing. No evidence has been provided to back up the allegations, however.
The only case circulated by the Western media concerns China-based food producer, Fufeng Group, which acquired 300 acres of land 16 miles away from the Grand Forks Air Force Base in North Dakota. No proof of Fufeng Group's apparent "espionage" has been presented so far.
The Heritage Foundation, a US conservative think tank, even went so far as to claim that any Chinese real estate purchases or mere leases deserve suspicion.
"Chinese ownership of any real estate may be a concern if it is near critical infrastructure, whether or not it is agricultural land," claimed the think tank. "Adding further complexity, national security concerns may be present even in non-ownership interests in real estate – for example, if a Chinese tech company leases office space across the street from the Pentagon or acquires an easement to build wind turbines near a military base."
US lawmakers and think tanks' fight against "Communist China" resembles nothing so much as a McCarthy-style crusade over a "Red Scare". The ongoing speculations about China's "land grab" coincided with the overall deterioration of US-Chinese relations. Team Biden is raising stakes in the ongoing trade war against China and is continuing to militarize the island of Taiwan and the Philippines to preserve Washington's waning hegemony in the Asia Pacific.
#Sputnik International#China 🇨🇳#United States 🇺🇸#US Alarmism#Grabbing | American Farmlands#Crying Babies | US Lawmakers#Ekaterina Blinova#Andrzej Duda | Joe Biden | Texas | Europe#Land | Farmer | Agriculture | Espionage
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Sold Cloak | Episode 3 - The Unbreaking
Website URL: https://www.soldcloak.net Episode URL: https://www.soldcloak.net/episode-3 Subscribe URL: https://www.soldcloak.net/subscribe
Dan, Ethan, and Jack actually do talk about recovering from collapse in this episode. Good on them. Points of discussion include:
Assuming there has been a collapse, how would we handle it?
Ethan’s hypocrisy in adjusting his microphone.
Just as there are stages of preparation, there are stages of recovery.
Texas’ more primed posture for secession (er, cot… oops).
Rebuilding from the smallest unit (individual, family, or homestead), and expanding.
Going Galt: the anecdote of the missing honest handymen.
The aging workforce of regular, blue collar jobs, and the shift in public education away from blue collar work.
Your group, its members, and their skill sets and locations.
Dan’s droopy mic stand.
A disadvantage of the “grab the go bag and flee to the lake house” plan compared to the homesteading plan.
The Walking Hungry – the urban fallout after instant collapse.
The unfruitful fruit of our modern produce.
“Apocalyptic” does not mean everyone is dead.
The long-term fate of the cities.
Rebuilding Republic: discerning when to connect with other groups, and when not to.
Corrections:
Ethan stated that Vermont was independent for a couple of weeks. However, the State of Vermont was technically independent for 14 years but sought to be annexed by the United States and never intended to remain independent.
Ethan was mostly correct regarding the Texas secession bill, but some of the details were wrong. The results of the referendum would have been non-binding. Even if the people voted to secede, the Texas legislature could still decide not to.
Ethan needs to catch up on the last 2,355 years of history; the city of Tyre used to be as he described: old city on the coast, new city on the island. However, Alexander the Great built a causeway that eventually became an isthmus making the island a peninsula. The city has spread beyond those ancient bounds. Minus a serious history point for Ethan.
Notes and Links:
NERC map showing the power grid regions of the U.S. and Canada; Texas has its own interconnection.
Texas Independence Referendum Act HB 3596, 88th R.S. (2023) - 2 year exit strategy. It appears almost identical to the Texas Independence Referendum Act HB 1359, 87th R.S. (2021) - 5 year strategy.
An article on state dependence on the federal government, and an article explaining why such articles can be misleading (if you have curiosity and time).
The different fates of once-similar cities: modern Ashkelon and modern Gath.
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Texas Becoming It's own country
Texas is supposedly trying to leave the union and become its own country. This means they will no longer be apart of the United States they will be on their own.
There will no longer be any government aid such as insurance, disability, retirement or money. They will have their own money and everything else.
Knowing the United States will fight for Texas back if it ever did become a country only because it has a lot of resources needed for us, it will not be pretty and anyone will be drafted for the world and no one is protected from it so anyone with a disability or anything will be drafted.
Texas already is throwing women who miscarried and had an abortion into jail. They are also throwing doctors who basically preformed the abortions in jail.
Texas is starting to sound like the countries overseas now that I am actually thinking about it since they are taking women rights.
The only reason I feel they are doing this is because they basically support Trump and his doings all while saying Biden wasn't legitimately elected.
This only started because Trump told everyone he was going to jail and if you look at it, he isn't in jail when he said he was going to be, they are still trailing him or whatever they are doing.
He is basically causing chaos and riots and wanting to basically take back the white house and government control by force.
#texit#texas#texas becoming its own country#texan#texas referendum act 2023#Texas referendum act#referendum act#conspiracy#conspiracy theorist#conspiracy thinking#conspiracy thriller#conspiracy theorist keith#conspiracy theory
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Ummmm. Sooooo, the Texas GOP has made talks of seceding from the Union. That's a thing
Good lord. I take a week away from news and THIS emerges? Fucking hell.
That second link outlines the key Texas GOP's platform:
On Texas seceding from the U.S.: "We urge the Texas Legislature to pass bill in its next session requiring a referendum in the 2023 general election for the people of Texas to determine whether or not the State of Texas should reassert its status as an independent nation."
On the 2020 election: "We reject the certified results of the 2020 Presidential election, and we hold that acting President Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. was not legitimately elected by the people of the United States."
On gender identity: "The official position of the Texas schools shall be that there are only two genders: biological male and biological female. We oppose transgender normalizing curriculum and pronoun use."
On voting rights: "We urge that the Voting Rights Act of 1965, codified and updated in 1973, be repealed and not reauthorized."
On abortion: "We urge lawmakers to enact legislation to abolish abortion by immediately securing the right to life and equal protection of the laws to all preborn children from the moment of fertilization."
On the United Nations: "The United Nations is a detriment to the sovereignty of the United States and other countries; because of this we support ... Our withdrawal from the current United Nations."
On the new bipartisan gun proposal: "We reject the so called 'bipartisan gun agreement.'" (U.S. Sen. John Cornyn is a chief negotiator for the gun package, which emerged just weeks after a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers at a Uvalde elementary school.)
I can't even comprehend the levels of bullshit and fucked up ness here. These assholes say they oppose PRONOUN USE like that makes any GD sense.
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1. "It is important to have an abortion and to represent the importance of representing it. Because this is what happened by cutting women off from the opportunity to be artists. They did not represent their private lives, they did not represent their desire, they did not represent their bodies, they did not represent their lives. And all these images are missing from history, but they are especially missing in OUR life. It’s Annie Ernaux who said that there is not a museum in the world where there is a painting called "The abortion”.
So this scene may happen a little abruptly but it’s not to forget that art creates memory...”
This is my favorite painting. It has never been completed." - Céline Sciamma
2. Untitled, 1998, by Paula Rego. Part of her "Abortion Series" that she created as a response to a failed referendum to legalize abortion in Portugal. Rego's paintings in the series have been credited with changing public sentiment so that a second referendum to legalize abortion in 2007 was successful.
We remember the jubilance of our Argentinian sisters when abortion was legalized in that country in December 2020. Mexico ruled that abortion is not a criminal act in September 2021--in reaction to a copycat law following Texas' shameful law criminalizing abortion. Colombia legalized abortion in February 2022. Meanwhile, folks in the US are bracing for the end of Roe v Wade, when our right to have an abortion would no longer be protected.
#portrait of a lady on fire#portrait de la jeune fille en feu#retrato de uma jovem em chamas#타오르는여인의초상#portrait nation#portrait survey#celine sciamma#adele haenel#noemie merlant#luana bajrami#valeria golino#female gaze#lesbian films#queer cinema#abortion#abortion rights#reproductive rights#bodily autonomy
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AUSTIN, TX — In a landslide victory during a special statewide referendum this week, Texans overwhelmingly voted to have a giant airship pick up Austin via tow cables and drop the city off in California.
As the city is mostly inhabited by Californians who left their state due to the cost of living, high taxes, and crime - and then proceeded to vote for the same policies in Texas - the move is just "setting things right" by sending immigrants from the Golden State "back where they belong," according to the bill's sponsors.
The act took effect immediately, and a massive, lumbering dirigible slowly crawled over the city, its ominous shadow eclipsing the coffee shops, microbreweries, and vegan hemp handbag stores below. Liberals screamed and attempted to flee, but it was too late. Harpoon cannons blasted massive steel cables into the Pennybacker Bridge, the Independent skyscraper, and various other anchor points throughout the city. The airship then rose into the sky, lifting the city along with millions of Austin progressives thousands of feet into the air.
"Oh no!" cried recent Texas transplants Timpani and Steve Strudelfudd as the ground shook and they nearly fell off their electric scooters in downtown Austin. "This is, like, totally, like, one of those earthquake things from back home! Hold onto your lattes!"
The city was safely transported back to California and dropped off in a nice rural area north of Santa Clarita. Texas is once again safely red, and many Austin residents reportedly don't even realize they've been transported to California.
As for any progressive transplants still living in Texas, Governor Abbott has vowed to continue secret midnight flights of these liberals back to their home countries of California, Washington, and Oregon.
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Hey my friend! So sorry for your Brexit woes. In the States we have some wingnuts pushing for Texas to leave the US. (!) It’s like some sort of contagion. Ugh. 😑 Good to know you’re back home and safe.
Good to hear from you! In truth, whilst brexit was the biggest act of self harm in history, it almost certainly boosted the independence argument in Scotland. Many Scots voted to remain in the UK in the 2014 referendum because they fell for the tory lie that it was the best way of ensuring we stayed in the EU. Fast forward to 2016 and suddenly brexit was a reality, despite 62% of Scots voting to remain in the EU.
Worse was to come under Boris Johnson. He did what his far right puppeteers wanted and executed the hardest of hard brexits. In doing so, he threw Scottish exporters under the bus and effectively destroyed our fishing industry. We're not alone; the Northern Ireland protocol that has been so important in keeping the peace there was also tossed onto his bonfire of vanities. Wales is slightly different for lots of reasons, but nonetheless the nationalist spirit is rising there too...
Britain is no longer the UK. It's an international laughing stock and more of a disunited kingdom than I can recall at any time in my life. Many Scots (and I hesitate to say a majority because that would need a referendum) want out from under Westminster rule. If nothing else, the Supreme Court's decision makes it clear that the so-called voluntary union is anything but. Thus Scotland, and indeed each of the devolved territories, are effectively colonies.
Westminster knows it cannot survive without Scotland's enormous fiscal contribution. We generate enough energy - from renewable sources - to power our nation and still have enough to export. The North Sea oil fields in Scottish waters, which the tories asserted in 2014 were exhausted, now miraculously have many more years life in them (handy that, when you're trying to fill the £multi-billion black hole that your last leader created in the space of just a few weeks).
Scotland has hydro power, wind power, timber and water. The latter will become the new oil in the near future. We have tourism and world-renowned whisky. We can revitalise our fishing and seafood industries if we have unfettered access to the European Market.
We're big enough and strong enough. It's time. My personal view is that Scottish Independence has built into an unstoppable movement. Now it's a matter of when and how, not if.
I visited Texas & Louisiana a few years back. Texas in particular was very different to my other experiences in other parts of America. Yes it's a big state and yes it has oil, but secession? In truth I'm not qualified to judge.
And yes, we're back home in the place that I love. It was good to see our daughter and meet our future extended family. It was a genuine pleasure to feel that warmth that I've felt so many times from folks in countries throughout Europe. But there's nothing quite like the Highlands & there really is no place like home.
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Alrighty Texas Becoming UNHINGED
“ Texas Could Vote to Secede From U.S. in 2023 as GOP Pushes for Referendum “ -Newsweek
Texas Republicans also approved a resolution declaring that President Joe Biden was "not legitimately elected," signaling the continued support for former President Donald Trump's baseless claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election.
The Texas GOP's new party platform also called for full repeal of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Other planks also indicated a further shift to the right for the party, giving prominence to culture issues. The platform describes homosexuality as "an abnormal lifestyle choice," and also declares that the party opposes "all efforts to validate transgender identity."
The platform also calls for a total ban on abortion and "equal protection for the Preborn." Abortion is currently prohibited after around six weeks of pregnancy in Texas, but an imminent ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court could overturn the decision in Roe v. Wade that guaranteed abortion rights nationwide and trigger a law in Texas making abortion illegal.
The new Texas GOP platform also states that the education system should focus on "imparting essential academic knowledge, understanding why Texas and America are exceptional and have positively contributed to our world, and while doing so, also offer enrichment subjects that bless students' lives."
It calls for students to learn about the "Humanity of the Preborn Child," including teaching that life begins at fertilization. It also demands that the state legislature pass a law prohibiting the teaching of "sex education, sexual health, or sexual choice or identity in any public school in any grade whatsoever."
Like legit, the fuck is wrong with this state
2022 TEXAS GOP PLATFORM DOCUMENT
HERE’S AN ENTIRE THREAD ON THE GOP PLATFORM DOCUMENT
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I forgot to send on my voting story. Ok so my brother and I both got mail in ballots, and let me tell you how we both forgot to mail it in so we just thought to bring them to our voting location. The lady there kinda yelled at us? She was confused and didn't know how to go about it. And honestly I just took it because we were the idiots who didn't mail in our ballots. We had to rip them up and they just us new ones to fill out in person and submit. Not exciting, but a story for void snippet. 👀
Anonymous said: Hi!! I'm so excited for void! I voted today around 30 minutes before the polls closed in my neighborhood because I had to wait for my dad and brother to get home from work since they wanted to go all together hehe. It was a pretty fast process! We just pressed buttons on screens (compared to last election where we had to bubble in everything by hand) plus, I got to keep the stylus that they gave us and it works on phones too! 🥰🥰 Thank you! I love your writing so much 💜💜💜
Anonymous said: I did mine through mail me and my husband did and we went to the post office a little while back and then he took us on a nice little date afterward and we got ice cream! Also I love void💖 keep up the good work
Anonymous said: VOTES FOR VOID??? I love democracy and I love VOID! So since May I've (temporarily) moved back home from New York to Indiana RE: covid; I've voted absentee for the both the primaries and presidential election (I'm still in IN rn...blah). I voted early and mailed in my ballot for the presidential election (about 3 weeks ago). Made sure my family was voting (brother mailed it in, mom dropped off a ballot, and dad did early voting) and encourage them to put up a Biden sign in our yard <3
Anonymous said: HI BEE! I ALSO VOTED TODAY! IM 21 SO THIS IS MY FIRST TIME VOTING FOR THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION (my 18th bday didnt make the cutoff since im a december bday) im so happy to have done my part! I made sure to study up on the judges and policies and everything! Luckily the polling place didn't have a line so i was able to get in, get my ballot, and fill it in right away! I even dragged my mom and cousin to come with me. I made a joke on snapchat to encourage my friends to vote too. It was a pic of my "i voted" sticker with a caption saying "omg youre so sexy when you vote aHaha" -🦙
Anonymous said: this is my first time doing this so, so i hope i’m sending this correctly! i voted early in late september by mail! i live in a swing state, so it’s really important for me to vote and not waste time!! bc of my age, this is my first time voting so i’m really nervous 😅
Anonymous said: I voted by email! I'm overseas so I wasn't sure if my ballot would actually make it through in time, so I decided to go electronically. Had to sign a waiver saying I understand that my vote won't be anonymous but I haven't been given a reason to suspect voter suppression/fraud in my state, so I'm happy I think...!
Anonymous said: hi, i voted early on oct 24th. my absentee ballot didn't come in, so i had to travel back home to vote (~3 hour drive). when we got there, there was a ton of people outside the polling place, but no lines, so i was in and out pretty quick. it was my first time voting, so i had all the candidates i was voting for written down on a tiny receipt so i wouldn't forget 😅. my mom was with me, so she voted too. took a pic with my sticker (mask on for extra covid-ness) and went home. drove back the next afternoon!
whippedforkook said: Hi Bee. 💕 I voted in early October - nearly a month ago! 😱 It’s been really weird with all the lead up to the election because it felt like it should have been done once I cast my ballot! A lot of my friends have volunteered to get out the vote: writing postcards to voters, texting, phone banking, working the polls, curing ballots. I didn’t volunteer at all this year, but I hope that all of my friends’ hard work and everyone else’s is enough. I’m also hoping and praying that I will be in a better place mentally for 2022 so that I too can volunteer. Our work starts with 2020 not ends. 💕 Wishing you well. 💕
begineuphoria said: I went and voted last Friday as it was our last early voting day. No way was I going to wait until today with the crowds of people in my area that still act as if masks are somehow infringing on their rights. 🙄 It was a rather normal experience for the most part. Other than having to use a coffee stir stick to press the buttons on the machine to vote. In and out within five minutes.
Anonymous said: I voted down the street at this pretty park this morning. I got up at 5:30 and it was freezing. Luckily I wore like 30 layers and stood outside for 2 hours. Some nasty orange man supporters were rude but everyone else was pretty nice. A really cute older couple was playing soccer with pine cones and kicked it towards me to play too. Not the worst time tbh.
Anonymous said: Did mail-in voting in California! Extremely exhausting and took forever to research all the propositions - they are notoriously tricky in hiding their flaws and one side tends to outrageously outspend the other. But in the end I felt really good about my research and decisions! No need for you to post a snippet for this story - would like to save that to read sometime in the future ;) Thank you so much for doing this!
joonsgotthejuice said: Votes for void??? I am here! I went last Thursday and it was chaotic bc I kept going past the poll place but the line was soooo long so my mom called me and woke me up like "its pouring rain and the line is super short get up I'm gonna pick you up" so thats the story of how I got dressed in 5 minutes and dragged my ass to vote in the rain <3
Anonymous said: i voted early on thursday it was cold and rainy but i went in the late afternoon and thankfully the only waiting i did was a few minutes for an elevator i got very lucky and while waiting for the results is awful the relief that came from voting in general was just great
Anonymous said: Wheeew the polls just closed and I finally got to cast my ballot yayyy ( I was the one working the polls from earlier) it’s been a really really long day and we actually had surprisingly good turnout. I saw a woman try to vote for someone else who claimed to be “helping” and I saw a woman who I’m pretty sure was on some typa something 👀 Overall though I really I’m really thankful for people like you who encouraged people to get out and vote. I hope the odds are in our favor❤️🤞🏼
chelsea-chee said: Hello Bee! Today surprisingly my elderly father wanted to vote so I brought him out with me. He only cared about voting for Biden, which meant I got to help decide who he should vote for with the rest of the candidates and amendments! Say hello to baby bee for me as well! 💖
Anonymous said: Okay I gonna got a chance to vote today and the process wasn’t that bad actually. I went in just now and it wasn’t that busy( thankfully) so no lines. I’m from Texas and it’s gonna be almost impossible to turn this state blue, but every vote counts! I love that you are getting people to vote and also sharing your experiences as well!
owl-orgy said: Dropped off my mail in ballot at a polling location! I originally wanted to vote early in person because I was worried my signature wouldn’t match closely enough but ended up just turning it in and double checked today to make it said “ballot accepted and counted”!
Anonymous said: I voted in person this afternoon, better late than never I guess. I was gonna go last week but then I got cramps from hell. There was no one in line in front of me, I think my county early voted because it was packed everyday the last few weeks
Anonymous said: I voted early a couple weeks ago. Exciting thing though that did happen was I got both my parents to vote for their first time ever.
Anonymous said: I had a mail in vote. So, I filled it out and dropped it in at the ballot box at my library. (I also checked out books for the first time in years, so I had fun!)
bubblyjiminnie said: I literally just finished voting. Lucky for me, the line and wait wasn’t very long, and it was a nice enough day that the short amount of time I had to spend in line outside of the building wasn’t too bad. My social anxiety when it comes to stuff like this tends to be high but that’s what I get for waiting until Election Day instead of going the mail in route. This was only my second time voting, but I’m glad that I did 😊
Anonymous said: I turned my ballot in last week :) I’m not a big fan of crowds and I hate make spur of the moment choices but despite that the first time I was able to vote back in 08 my Mom pressured me into voting in person because “you’d have to experience it at least once in our life”. And ever since then I comfortably vote by mail. I take my time, do all of my research, listen to music, and best of all don’t have to deal with people.
Anonymous said: here in Washington state it’s super easy to vote. I dropped my ballot off in mid-October and it’s already been accounted for! Mail in voting and drop box voting is fantastic and provides equal opportunity and access. Sad to see some people in red states misinforming Americans about it! We also have a referendum for implementing mandatory sex ed, including teaching respect, empathy and consent as part of the curriculum so I was happy to vote yes on that too!
unionrox006 said: I voted about 2 weeks ago by doing a mail in ballot. The other eligible to vote members of my household did the same. We chose to vote by absentee ballot because both my mom and I have an autoimmune disorder, so we have to be careful going out in the pandemic. Tbh, the ballot layout was a bit confusing at first as was all the paperwork and required IDs and documents. But my dad explained it to me and we got them filled out and mailed off. Kinda mad I didn't get a sticker for it though
bluetostone said: Love this and so excited for the next chp of void! I early voted a few weeks ago and because I live in a pretty rural county I was in and out of my polling place in a few minutes. No sticker though 😢. I live in a swing state so it could go either way in terms of delegates. Just praying everyone is safe tonight as the results roll in...though, won't we not know for sure for a couple of days or weeks?
Anonymous said: My mom, sister, and I received our early voting ballots a while ago and I took the longest to fill mine out because it was making me anxious :,( but I did return it before it was due. I checked our ballot statuses and mine and my moms were accepted but my sister’s said they hadn’t received hers back. Then she got another ballot so she filled that one out too and I took it yesterday 👍👍 I think she got two because she changed her address late so they sent two?
vixsynsblog said: Non-interesting voter story: I'm paranoid and live in a highly divided area, so I filed mail-in ASAP, mailed it a few days after cause neighbors are nosy and don't understand boundaries. Was able to track my ballot through my credit company, which was nice. Only thing I was missing was my sticker. Never got one✊😔. So I had to improvise and write it in pen on my disposable mask. I'm working all this week so if riots break out from either side, I'll be at work. Prayers for the safety of others🙏
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Waaah!!! Thank you all for voting!! You are all my heroes. I am so grateful and proud of you. I’m sorry I ran out of time to respond to you individually. I’m going to drop two big scenes from Chapter 7 in gratitude (one of which will be familiar to my patrons and one won’t). I’m hopeful I will have the whole next chapter out very soon. Love you all!
Void spoilers below the cut.
When you wake up in the morning, there are still no signed HR forms in your messages. Had you been a fool to think they were interested? How much time does it take to decide such a thing? Perhaps just by putting the idea out there explicitly, it had lost all of its taboo appeal.
There is a calendar reminder waiting for you: Today is chili pepper pollinating day. At least this gives you an excuse to talk to Hoseok.
You find the science officer in the lab as always, sitting with his knee up against his chest. Hoseok doesn’t look well. He’s got dark circles under his eyes.
“Hey, um…” You shuffle your feet. Want to fuck me? No wait…“You don’t look good. Were you here all night?” you ask.
He blinks at you, bleary-eyed. “Um, was I? Yeah.. I suppose. Lost track of time.” He rubs his eyes, before looking you up and down, then casting his gaze back to the floor.
All you want to do is ask about the forms. Or the meeting. Or what he thinks of you now. But you don’t. “I need to pollinate the chili peppers today.” Usually Hoseok is the person who assists with that. “But I can get one of the other guys to do it if you need the sleep.”
“No!” Hoseok lurches forward, standing up a bit to rapidly and needing to put his hand back on the bench to steady himself. “I mean, I’m fine.”
You should disgaree with him. He is exhausted. But you’d like more time to talk to him.
Pollinating the chili peppers is both time-sensitive and time-consuming, hence why it took two of you to get the job done. There were no insects on your ship to do the job for you and if they didn’t get pollinated, they wouldn’t bear any fruit. Your chili peppers were your favorite crop. Not only a vital source of Vitamin C, but all your food benefitted from having a bit of spice added to it.
You and Hoseok head for the greenhouse together. The intital set-up gives you something to talk about in the beginning. Hoseok gathers the pollen from one flower onto a paintbrush, then hands it over to you to paint onto the stigmas of each little flower on the next plant in the line.
Slowly the conversation dries up as you fall into a silent rhythm. Other than just enjoying the chili peppers, you must admit that this was one of your favorite tasks on the ship because of the high likelihood that the two of you would brush hands peridically. Always gave you butterflies. But today he seems extra intent on keeping his distance from you. Was he disgusted by you now? His hands are trembling.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
His hand twitches so hard that a little rain of yellow pollen cascades onto the floor. He curses in frustration before turning to face you. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Um, yes, I’m fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“This, um, plan of yours…” he gestures to the vague tension in the air. “It doesn’t feel like you.”
“I’m trying to save the mission. That has always been my top priority.”
“Yeah, I’m still not clear on how this benefits the mission.”
“Yoongi said…” you start to say, but are cut off my Hoseok’s derisive snort.
“Look, if you’re in love with Yoongi, just go date him, okay? Don’t feel obligated to include the rest of us out of pity.”
You frown. “I’m not… I’m not in love with him. It’s just sex. Just biology.”
“This isn’t you!” Hoseok argues back. “You hated the idea of anyone of us ever treating you that way. And now you just want all of us to… to… use you like that?” He splutters out the end of the sentence.
“No one is using me! This is my plan! I’m in charge!”
He sighs. “Well, I can’t be a part of it. Excuse me.”
______
Taehyung finds you in the gym. It’s good to see him up and about, even if his arm is still in a sling.
“Hey, so I need to talk to you about this, um, ape sex thing.” He fishes awkwardly into his pockets and pulls out his tablet. Maybe Jimin was right. Is Taehyung going to be the first to take you up on your offer?
You pause your jog on the elliptical machine. You wish you weren’t so sweaty and gross for this conversation. Taehyung is such an intimidatingly attractive man with those strong eyebrows and that perfect skin.
Taehyung opens up the tablet and flips to the form. It’s happening. He’s going to sign the form. Shit. Then what will you do? It’s one thing to say you want to have sex with your whole crew, but what if he’s hoping to go right now? You need a shower.
Taehyung has really nice hands. Long strong fingers delicately navigating the touch screen. It seems totally improbable that a man this attractive would be into you, even if you were the only woman in the universe. It just adds to your suspicions that hormones are driving everyone crazy. Perhaps if you slept with him once, he’d lose all interest.
He finds the form and then turns his gaze up to you, staring you down with those eyes. It’s a good thing that Taehyung rarely turns his full gaze on you, because it is almost too much to bear. Shit, is he just going to sign it? Is he waiting for you to give him some sort of signal?
“You can’t do this to Jimin,” he says.
“What?” Not what you were expecting. “Do what to Jimin?”
“This.” He gestures over the HR form. “Signing these forms with everyone. Having sex with everyone. You’re going to destroy Jimin.”
“Jimin’s the one who suggested this whole thing in the first place.” It’s a lie. You know its a lie. Or at least a gross exaggeration. But Jimin was the one who first brought up the idea of sharing. All for the benefit of the man in front of you now.
“No way.” Taehyung scoffs, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow. “No way was it Jimin’s idea that you sleep with the whole crew.”
“Well…” You can’t bear his gaze anymore and look down at the floor. “He wanted me to sleep with you.”
That surprises Taehyung. He puts down the tablet. “What? Why would he want that?”
This is awkward. “He, um, thinks you’re in love with me.”
“What?” There is only surprise on Taehyung’s face. It’s actually a relief to see that Taehyung is just as shocked by that idea as you were. “Why does he think that?”
“I don’t know…” You feel kind of dumb now. Of course, Taehyung doesn’t feel that way about you. Look at him. “Cause you told him you were jealous. Cause you can’t stand to be in the same room as us…”
Taehyung bites his lip. “Oh, um, shit, sorry, that’s not what I meant.”
If Taehyung isn’t jealous of Jimin...
“Taehyung…” He looks up, biting his lip. “What did you mean? Who are you jealous of?”
Taehyung’s eyes widen, but he doesn’t say anything. Instead he reaches for his microphone and mutes it. Out of respect, you mute yours as well. He glances toward the camera in the corner of the room, then stands up and begins unzipping his jumpsuit.
“Um…” You are distracted by the golden arms that peak from either side of the tank top as the zipper reaches his groin. “What are you doing?”
“Need something to block the camera.”
“We have towels,” you mutter. But he’s already stripping out of his shirt. The musculature of his back ripples. He hangs the shirt off of the camera to block the rest of the room from view.
“Yeah, but this way anyone watching will think we’re having sex.” His chest is just as attractive as his back and you flush at the sight of it. Mercifully, he zips back into his jumpsuit as he returns to his position in front of the exercise machine.
“You want them to think we’re having sex?”
“Don’t you? It plays right into your whole save the mission with bonobo sex plan.”
“I suppose.” Though the plan was also supposed to be that there would be no more secrets between the crew. “What plan of yours does it play into?”
“The one where Jimin doesn’t realize I’m in love with him.”
“You’ve never tried to tell him?”
Taehyung laughs wryly and shakes his head. “How would that conversation go? Hey man, I know we’ve known each other for years and I’ve already seen you naked and that you just think of me as a friend, but I’m in love with you. I know that’s awkward but now you have to spend the next twelve years with me, knowing that I’m attracted to you when you don’t feel the same way.” Taehyung sighs. “Doesn’t sound like a good plan to me. If he doesn’t feel the same way, I’ve just ruined the friendship for nothing and then I don’t even have that.”
“Yeah… I get that.” There’s something touching about realizing that Taehyung has been fighting the same battle as you for the last two years.
“I couldn’t tell anyone before launch because what if they wouldn’t let me go then? You know?”
“Yeah, the director wasn’t big on sending anyone who might ‘complicate’ the mission.” The two of you share a sad knowing smile.
“Yeah… And I thought it would be fine, you know? I like women too. I’d just date women until launch and no one would know. I wasn’t planning on falling in love with my roommate.”
“I don’t think any of us really knew what this would be like.”
“I knew it was going to be a problem. I should have pulled out…”
Your mind flashes back to that moment of doubt when Hoseok talked you into still coming on the mission.
“But I couldn’t just let him go off into space without me. Even if he’d never feel the same way, at least he’d still be in my life.”
The emotion in Taehyung’s words makes your eyes begin to mist. “You really do love him.”
“Yeah,” Taehyung sighs again. “But he’s in love with you.”
“Well, he thinks he is.”
“What does that mean?”
“He only feels like that about me cause he thinks I’m the only option.” You wonder if maybe he would feel differently if he knew about Taehyung’s feelings.
Taehyung frowns and shakes his head. “You don’t give him enough credit.”
“Oh come on, you know him. How many women did he date while we were in training?”
“A few…”
“And how many of them was he in love with before he found the next one?”
Taehyung bites his lip. He can’t really argue with that. “So why are you with him then, if you don’t think it’s real?”
You shrug, rubbing your arm. “He wants me. It’s nice to feel wanted, I guess.”
“You know you could have that with any man on this ship right?”
You scoff. “They’re all suffering the same delusion. It’s only-available-vagina syndrome. I just want us all to fuck and get it out in the open. Maybe if we could get it out of our system, they would see I’m nothing special. And then we can get back to the mission.”
Taehyung eyes you up and down. “You don’t give yourself enough credit either.”
You shrug. “You wait and see. Jimin will get bored of me. They all will.”
The two of you both slump backwards in your seats, mulling over your shared woes. Taehyung bends down and picks up the tablet again. “So what should I do with this?”
“Obivously, you don’t have to sign it. I should have realized that not everyone would be interested.”
“Jimin thinks I’m in love with you?”
“Yeah…”
“Is it okay if we let him think that for now? At least until I figure out how to tell him the truth?”
“Okay.”
Taehyung smiles and signs the bottom of the form, then sends it to you. Your phone lights up with a message. “Thank you,” he murmurs before he leaves.
#I'm not going to answer asks about the spoilers right now#because I want people to be able to avoid them until the chapter drops#but that should be sometime in the next week or so#votes for void
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Events 5.18 (after 1920)
1922 – Seamus Woods leads an Irish Republican Army attack on the headquarters of the Royal Irish Constabulary in Belfast. 1926 – Evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson disappears in Venice, California. 1927 – The Bath School disaster: Forty-five people, including many children, are killed by bombs planted by a disgruntled school-board member in Bath Township, Michigan. 1927 – After being founded for 20 years, the Nationalist government approves Tongji University to be among the first national universities of the Republic of China. 1933 – New Deal: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs an act creating the Tennessee Valley Authority. 1944 – World War II: Battle of Monte Cassino: Conclusion after seven days of the fourth battle as German paratroopers evacuate Monte Cassino. 1944 – Deportation of Crimean Tatars by the Soviet Union. 1948 – The First Legislative Yuan of the Republic of China officially convenes in Nanking. 1953 – Jacqueline Cochran becomes the first woman to break the sound barrier. 1955 – Operation Passage to Freedom, the evacuation of 310,000 Vietnamese civilians, soldiers and non-Vietnamese members of the French Army from communist North Vietnam to South Vietnam following the end of the First Indochina War, ends. 1965 – Israeli spy Eli Cohen is hanged in Damascus, Syria. 1969 – Apollo program: Apollo 10 is launched. 1973 – Aeroflot Flight 109 is hijacked mid-flight and the aircraft is subsequently destroyed when the hijacker's bomb explodes, killing all 82 people on board. 1974 – Nuclear weapons testing: Under project Smiling Buddha, India successfully detonates its first nuclear weapon becoming the sixth nation to do so. 1977 – Likud party wins the 1977 Israeli legislative election, with Menachem Begin, its founder, as the sixth Prime Minister of Israel. 1980 – Mount St. Helens erupts in Washington, United States, killing 57 people and causing $3 billion in damage. 1980 – Students in Gwangju, South Korea begin demonstrations calling for democratic reforms. 1990 – In France, a modified TGV train achieves a new rail world speed record of 515.3 km/h (320.2 mph). 1991 – Northern Somalia declares independence from the rest of Somalia as the Republic of Somaliland. 1993 – Riots in Nørrebro, Copenhagen, caused by the approval of the four Danish exceptions in the Maastricht Treaty referendum. Police open fire against civilians for the first time since World War II and injure 11 demonstrators. 1994 – Israeli troops finish withdrawing from the Gaza Strip, ceding the area to the Palestinian National Authority to govern. 2005 – A second photo from the Hubble Space Telescope confirms that Pluto has two additional moons, Nix and Hydra. 2006 – The post Loktantra Andolan government passes a landmark bill curtailing the power of the monarchy and making Nepal a secular country. 2009 – The LTTE are defeated by the Sri Lankan government, ending almost 26 years of fighting between the two sides. 2015 – At least 78 people die in a landslide caused by heavy rains in the Colombian town of Salgar. 2018 – A school shooting at Santa Fe High School in Texas kills ten people. 2018 – Cubana de Aviación Flight 972 crashes in Santiago de las Vegas after takeoff from José Martí International Airport in Havana, Cuba, killing 112 of the 113 people on board. 2019 – United States presidential election: Joe Biden announces his presidential campaign.
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Veganism, of course, is rooted in social justice – a detail that has faded from view as it has gone mainstream. But even in its dilute 21st-century form, veganism remains confrontational: it casts people’s dietary choices in harsh relief, and people are by nature defensive. In countries where meat is prohibitively expensive for many, people are sometimes vegetarian or vegan by necessity; in the affluent west, not eating meat is an active choice. This makes it a rejection of a lifestyle and a rebuke to the majority’s values – especially in a country (such as the UK) still struggling to escape the long shadow of rationing. We are conditioned to like animals and decry animal cruelty, and yet we are also brought up in a culture that revels in the bacon sandwich, the Sunday roast, fish and chips. One simple explanation for why people don’t like vegans is because they show how confused humankind is about food choices and how illogical its decision-making can be.
And yet none of this really gets to the heart of what it is about vegans that makes people so upset. Calling them humourless or militant, sanctimonious or annoying or hypocrites – all of these terms are just smokescreens for what it is that people really feel, which is fear. Vegans are unsettling and uncanny: they live among us, speak like us, behave like us – but for one significant exception. Meat may be murder, but to some people, the prospect of life without it is even worse.
There is no justification for the amount of meat we eat in western society. The resources that go into humanely rearing and butchering an animal should make its flesh a borderline-unattainable luxury – and, indeed, in the past, it was. Meat always used to be the preserve of the wealthy, a symbol of prosperity.
In the course of just over a century, meat went from unattainable luxury to dietary cornerstone; these days, we feel entitled to eat meat every day.
In the internet age, the consumption of meat is visibly aligned with a certain kind of conservative alpha-masculinity. Before he found infamy eating raw flesh, Gatis Lagzdins was best known for hosting a YouTube channel peddling racist ideology and rightwing conspiracies about the Illuminati. Among the alt-right and affiliated circles online, the derogatory term “soy boy” has been adopted along with other terms such as “cuck” and “beta” as a way of mocking so-called social justice warriors for their perceived lack of vigour. This echoes a finding in the MacInnis/Hodson study, in which respondents from a rightwing background, who seek to uphold traditional gender values, see something alarmingly subversive and worthy of derision in any man who prefers tofu to turkey.
This loaded use of food-derived epithets cuts both ways. In the UK, the term “gammon” gained currency in the early 2010s as a pejorative apparently inspired by the puce skin tone of enraged, middle-aged middle Englanders. Food has always been bound up in personal identity, and thus inextricable from politics. In their etymology, common terms such as “diet” (Greek for way of life) and “regime” (Latin: rule) are metaphors for a struggle over what it means to lead one’s life correctly. The very concept of orthorexia (whose sufferers obsessively exclude foods from their diet that they consider harmful) has at its root a corrupted idea of “correct” eating. It is impossible to talk about diets without also talking about the implied inadequacies of those who do not follow them; to paraphrase Brillat-Savarin, tell someone what to eat and you tell them who to be.
The vegan conversation, then, is a stand-in for much bigger things. When we talk about veganism we are talking about environmental and social change; we are also contemplating the erasure of tradition (Texas barbecue! The Sunday roast! The sausage roll!). We are also tabling a long-overdue referendum on how our food choices affect us and the world around us. And as much as its popularity has been pumped up by concepts like flexitarianism, ultimately veganism’s goal is a world in which the annual per-capita consumption of animal products is precisely zero. No wonder things have got so heated.
With a few notable exceptions – most of them religious – meat has retained its primacy in cultures across the world. It originally became a status symbol because it was harder to obtain than plant matter – even a small animal could run away, and if caught, was capable of inflicting wounds that could prove fatal in a world before antibiotics. As society became hierarchical, there was no greater token of status than the ability to eat meat on a whim.
Our fetishisation of meat has not lessened – on the contrary, forecasters predict rapid increase in meat consumption in developing countries over the next decade. As a ready source of protein, meat remains the great aspiration, the surest proof of prosperity.
As Carol J Adams wrote, the words we use shield us from the moral consequences of carnivory: we eat beef, not cows, pork, not pigs, while a cabbage remains just a cabbage wherever it is in its life cycle. Our language ennobles meat at the expense of veg: strong, muscular types are “beefy”, lazy people are “couch potatoes”, unresponsive ones “vegetables”. Turning our back on meat-eating is not as simple as changing from pork to Quorn: it requires us to reject some entrenched values.
But the body of evidence suggesting that we eat too much meat is approaching the point where it becomes undeniable. A UN report identified destruction of forests and emissions from cattle and other intensive farming practices as major factors driving the climate crisis towards a point of no return.
In coining the term “ecocide” – and classing it as a crime against humanity – Mansfield framed the debate in different terms. We might portray the current moment as a precipice, and the growing interest in plant-based diets as the surest way back to safety. In this interpretation, the war on vegans is the act of a doomed majority fighting to defend its harmful way of life.
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