#and that the war just doesn’t meet the criteria of a genocide

[notaplaceofhonour]

welp, time to take the “leftist podcast that’s most normal about jews” award away from knowledge fight 🙃

[mali-umkin]

You know, although it's commonly referred to in that way, what happened in Cambodia in the 70s is actually not recognised as a genocide as per UN definition by many scholars (intent to destroy one specific ethnic or religious group cannot be proven). That is because 'genocide' has a strict, perhaps narrow definition, designating a precise phenomenom. The fact something isn't a genocide, or falls short of one criterion either because it is indeed not present or because it simply cannot be proven, does not make it less important, less atrocious, less despicable, less of a crime against mankind and a stain in history. Although there's no issue with wanting to extend the definition, debate the terms or just argue that all criteria are met, don't get lost in a debate that ultimately makes us fall into a trap where only those acts labeled 'genocide' receive attention or are deemed the West's responsibility. There's a true hierarchy of suffering created here, one I cannot agree with. Intent to massacre, ethnically cleanse, war crimes, crimes against humanity, the will to annihilate people in a given place should be enough to demand full attention and action. Definitions are especially important, but that governments or international bodies avoid intervention if a situation doesn’t meet a strict legal threshold tells us exactly how legal definition is a double-edged sword and something we should not blindly rely on to further our claims. Think about it - we have never had so many legal terms to designate crimes of all sorts, never had so many legal precedents; it has never been so easy for governments to argue over terminology to avoid action.

[kendrixtermina]

People be throwing around the word “genocide” like candy these days & that’s a problem because it dillutes the meaning. You can only cry wolf so often before it stops being taken seriously, and as genocide is serious as can be, that’s a bad thing. 

Genocide means trying to eradicate a group, actually making some effort to kill em all or at least severely reduce their numbers & disrupt/destroy their culture on purpose. 

That is NOT done or attempted at any point nor is it ever so much as implied in any of the texts that there was any systematic deliberate butchering of civilians.  (as opposed to, say, when Morgoth takes over Gondolin and Nargothrond, where its made very clear that there was systematic slaughter, only a very reduced population escaped, and anyone who got captured was enslaved)

Indeed it’s rather indicated that there probably wasn’t, seeing as Maedhros is horrified when ione individual underling of Celegorm’s throws the princes out in the forest for personal revenge. 

There is very much a lesson intended here that it is inevitable that in any conflict like this, innocents will be harmed and that therefore one should avoid war when possible, but it’s very much implied that they weren’t trying to kill civilians on purpose. 

The kinslayings weren’t genocide, just regular ol’ warfare. Which, don’t get me wrong, is bad enough in itself, there is very much War is Hell theme going on. 

But while it’s still bad, it simply doesn’t meet the criteria for genocide. the objective was very much “steal the ships”/ “seize the rocks”, not kill ppl for killing’s sake and it is never mentioned in any of the text that they killed anyone but those who resisted them (not saying they were wrong to resist - not wanting your boat-that-is-also-a-master-artwork stolen is pretty natural) 

The Third kinslaying might arguably classify as a “war crime” by modern standards because the people of Sirion were refugees & they were actually using the silmaril as a ressource,  at this point M&M are unambiguosly supposed to be in the wrong/be in error in the narrative, but still not genocide, because, again no one was going around killing as many people as possible just for the sake of killing them. 

"elves should just get over the kinslayings 🙄🙄 feänorians aren't bloodthirsty murderers they have ✨motive✨😌😌 and besides why not just give up the silmaril and not get kinslayed 🤔🤔 ever think about that??" biting maiming murdering

[ld61061]

Of NotDonalds & The Rest of Us

The issue confronting our nation is not what to do about Donald Trump, with all due respect to everyone making a name for themselves by being NotDonald.

Donald’s an important side effect, but that’s all.

We have made a monolithic culture and economy with no room for most people. I’d argue that the only reason we aren’t in a state of complete collapse is that there are still huge blocks of the working class that can’t see what that monolithic culture has in store for them. The over-the-road truck drivers, the radiologists, virtually every retail worker, bank tellers, fast food workers, front desk clerks -- most do not believe what small farmers, cobblers, coal miners, bakers, blacksmiths, grocers and candlestick makers already know to be so: our ability to make a decent living is more fragile than we can allow ourselves to believe.

We must take conscious steps to expand our culture and preserve space for humans in the economy or we are going to have a war. Soon.

If the fact of Donald’s continued existence and the fact that he will win again in 2020 -- yes, I said that -- if Donald’s political existence illustrates anything, it is that there is a huge and growing sector of our nation which understands itself to be on the defensive. The resounding response from progressives and centrists to Trumpeters is that they aren’t entitled to feel oppressed. Not only that, say the NotTrumpers, if Trumpeters do feel oppressed, it’s because they’re white supremacists, deluded by Fox News or good ol’ evangelical freaks. Or maybe all three.

Let me humbly suggest that isn’t true.

We created or continue to create room for the protected classes due to race, country of origin, sexual orientation, age, family status, disability and now nonbinary genders, but we have never so much as nodded to those adults who cannot construct an argument or process data. Yet they are with us and always will be, unless we are going to embrace eugenics and/or genocide.

We just don’t have a word for garden-variety people whose intelligence doesn’t work in our economy. Plenty of insults, nasty memes on facebook (which might as well be magic to most of us) but nothing neutral. Even “average” doesn’t really fill the need. Those so truly devoted to their spirituality that they voluntarily limit their own freedoms are not much better off.

We should know by now that if the human brain doesn’t have a word for a concept, the concept may as well not exist. We don’t have words for well over half of the people on the bell curve and we wonder how they can hate. Really?

We have long since created a world of narrowing options for those bored by concepts, who feel most comfortable with a tool in their hands. The disempowered feel that disregard, even if they can’t explain it or provide data to support it, and they’re angry. Legitimately and reasonably angry. Increasingly, in the absence of a tool they can use to make a living, the tool they pick is a vote for an extremist. Or a weapon which they then turn on whomever is nearby.

Simply put, I don’t give a shit how smart or dumb we are, we don’t have time for this. Mother Nature has us on the clock. We need to either get humanity off this rock or fix the environment -- or both -- or she’s going to fix the problem. We’re fighting instead of fixing because more than half of us are terrorized by an economy we don’t understand and can’t say why, get shouted down when we try to contribute and really have no recourse but this moron in the White House.

As long as we have angry people who are unheard -- or worse, heard but disregarded -- we will have angry masses for the Trumps of the world to lead as surely as the rest of the world has Wahhabists. We will have mass shooters. We are growing shooters as fast as the Saudi Royal Family grows terrorists.

So what do we do?

We need a new Bill of Human Rights added to the Constitution. Quickly.

Minimally, we need to legally preserve people’s right to make decisions based on whatever criteria they deem worthy. Sovereignty of Choice. Yes, that will validate and protect haters, but validated and protected haters don’t hate for long -- there’s no traction. And really? When it’s your child starving because the economy has passed you by or the climate has rendered you unworthy of being fed, you won’t care about data either.

Secondly, the basic needs of the least of us must be elevated over even the most important needs of any corporation. Put another way, the right of any human being anywhere to live their life unmolested and to meet their own basic needs should never be abridged or denied by the property claims of a corporation.

Thirdly, the Constitution must preserve and nurture human diversity, even if that means we end up with states full of haters who are determined to terrorize anyone that isn’t them. We can have a strong central government without trying to legislate love and tolerance. Put another way, we can make slavery illegal -- that is within our ability as a society. But to make people tolerant of those with differences? It simply doesn’t work, no matter how brutally we suppress the intolerant. We can tolerate the existence of the intolerant and use their economic clout in a domestic manner in much the same way as we currently work with foreign dictators we might despise.

There’s work to be done if we’re going to survive the mistakes we’ve made in getting our civilization this far. Our resources and energy must be concentrated on cleaning up our mess, restoring corporations to a deeply second-class existence, orienting tech to restore and preserve a sustainable living environment and most importantly, to point us towards new planets, or quite simply every last one of us -- average or amazing -- we are all going to end.

[blue-flyfins]

"The only thing that my headdress has in common with a traditional, ceremonial, Native American headdress is its shape. Other than that it doesn't resemble in the symbols on the headband, it is made from a different animal, it is dyed the wrong colour. The shape is similar but everything is totally different. Making it not a traditional, ceremonial, sacred headdress." - Social Repose/ Richie Giese Wow. There are so many things wrong with this. 😠 This guy and his audience have been disrespecting Indigenous people everywhere. With such a large following of people he has influenced people into believing that a headdress isn't sacred if it doesn't meet certain criteria, ie. the last picture of someone in costume for Halloween as him with a headdress on. That the struggles that Indigenous people face can be forgotten if the details aren't the same. Like years of residential school, cultural assimilation, years of war, genocide and death, racism, sexism, land theft and so much more aren't sacred to him. On top of not having earned the right to wear a headdress or war bonnet, he isn't Indigenous. The only reason he is wearing it is to get attention and to stand out from other content creators. He is still doing it as well. He just made a new headdress a week ago and continues to upload videos. He is disgusting and blatantly disrespectful. Sources: Social Repose's Twitter, GothicLionheart on Deviantart https://www.instagram.com/p/CInn8BrBkcC8Kct0ywH87vwvgHGUx3NCcQfwak0/?igshid=10xonvbmbgkr

[lewepstein]

The War on Empathy

In Harper Lee’s iconic novel, “To Kill A Mockingbird,” Atticus Finch counsels his daughter Scout on the values of compassion and forgiveness.  He says to her, “You never really know a man until you stand in his shoes and walk around in them.”  His words are at the heart of the golden rule, “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you,”  the central tenet of most religions and the basis of our civil society.

Compassion is the quality that moves us to treat others kindly.  It is closely connected to empathy, that uniquely human ability to imagine what it would be like to stand in the shoes of others - to understand their plight and feel their pain.  It is the force within that impels us to treat family, friends, colleagues and even strangers in the manner that we would want to be treated ourselves.  It is also the quality most under assault during the tenure of Trump.

As a therapist, I see empathy as rooted in our earliest relationships - in the ways that we learned to love our caregivers and to internalize the values that they taught us by their words and deeds.  To love thy neighbor as thyself pre-supposes an open-heartedness that extends to the rest of humanity, a quality that also allows us to be kind and respectful toward our fellow citizens.  It doesn’t mean that we will never have conflicts or be called upon to make tough decisions about policies and people.  It does mean that whether in the corporate boardroom or the oval office we are aware of the impact that our actions have on the lives of others.

On the other side of the compassion and empathy spectrum there is pathological narcissism.  In this disordered personality the self is the province of grandiose, exaggerated preoccupation.  There is a grasping for unlimited success, power and “ specialness,” and especially admiration.  And there is a sense of entitlement so great, that there should be automatic compliance with one’s expectations.

The behavior of the pathologically narcissistic individual is often exploitative of others.  He will take advantage of others to achieve his ends.  At the core there is a lack of empathy, an unwillingness to recognize or identify with the feelings or needs of others.  The narcissist is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him.  He shows arrogant and haughty behaviors and attitudes and he will often experience criticism as an emotional injury.

It has probably become obvious by now that the  psychological profile I have just laid out is that of our current president.  What should still come as a shock is that the words in the last two paragraphs describing this pathology come directly from the Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders published by the American Psychiatric Association.  They are the criteria used for diagnosing an individual with a “Narcissistic Personality Disorder.”  Any five of the characteristics listed would qualify an individual for such a diagnosis.  Donald Trump exhibits all nine.

Our president’s narcissistically driven lack of empathy has been highlighted in his recent comments to the family of an army sergeant who died in an ambush in Niger, in the line of duty.  Instead of offering comforting words, Trump is reported to have said, “Well I guess he knew what he was signing up for.”  But anyone who has followed Trump’s rise as a media personality has witnessed this type of callous disregard for human pain and suffering in the dramas enacted on “The Apprentice.”

Naomi Klein, social activist and author, in her call to action, “No Is Not Enough,” describes how The Apprentice delivered Trump’s “brand” as well as his  central sales pitch:      

 Trump  was saying to viewers that by unleashing your most selfish and ruthless side, you are creating jobs and fueling growth.  Don’t be nice, be a killer.  In later seasons, the underlying cruelty of the show grew even more sadistic.  The winning team lived in a luxurious mansion - drinking champagne in inflatable pool lounges, zipping off in limos to meet celebrities.  The losing team was deported to tents in the backyard nicknamed “Trump Trailer Park.”  The tent-dwellers, whom Trump gleefully deemed the “have-nots,” didn’t have electricity, ate off paper plates and slept to the sounds of howling dogs.  They would peek through a gap in the hedge to see what decadent wonders the “haves” were enjoying.

Trump took the ever-widening income and equality gap and turned it into a spectator sport.  In essence, the message was step over the losers and become a winner like him.

Historians looking back at this era may forever speculate about what combination of fear, outrage, prejudice and  alienation allowed people to vote for an emotionally disturbed man in such numbers - to mistake grandiosity for caring and cruelty for authenticity.  But the war on empathy did not begin with Donald Trump.  He is simply the latest politician to do battle against the forces of unity, compassion and love.

Demagogues and right-wing politicians always mobilize their followers against a scapegoat, usually a marginalized and powerless group such as immigrants or an ethnic minority that is easy to demonize.  The end result of this type of rhetoric can be lynchings, policies of ethnic cleansing and genocide.  Instead of promoting  empathy, an image is projected onto the group that fosters fear, envy and hatred.

Trump’s characterization of Mexicans immigrants as rapists and murderers is just the latest manifestation of this cynical tactic.  Reagan’s damning portrayal of African- American women as “Welfare Queens” who were ripping off the system or George H.W. Bush’s profiling of formerly incarcerated black men as “Willie Hortons,” who would be freed by liberals to kill again also played into the racial stereotype of African-Americans as marginal citizens and  criminals to be hated and feared.  Mitt Romney’s statement during a fundraiser, secretly caught on someone’s cell phone about the “makers and the takers,” revealed his underlying contempt for those in our society who owned little and were less fortunate and less ruthless than he had been.

Many of the party bosses of the modern Democratic party are no less cynical than their Republican counterparts.  While wrapping themselves in the mantle of empathy and compassion and portraying themselves as the representatives of the disenfranchised - African- Americans, the LBGTQ community, women and Latinos - their actual policy positions when in power belie their soaring rhetoric.  Working people have learned in the last fifty years that most Democrats are a tepid ally at best and will almost always abandon their interests in favor of the party’s wealthier, urban, corporate elites.

There was a reason beyond racism and sexism why Trump had such an appeal to rural and small town, white, working class Americans.  After generations of neglect and policy positions that ignored the needs of small town and rural working class whites, it was difficult for Hillary Clinton and other Democrats to make the argument that they felt their pain or had their backs.

Even greater than the undercurrent of racism, xenophobia and classism in the current war on empathy is the backlash against the gains that women have made since the modern feminist movement began in the 1960s.  It is not insignificant that empathy and compassion are traits that distinctly fall on the feminine side of our traditional  gender roles.  Terry Real, the author of numerous books on patriarchy and gender stated the following in a recent article:  

So here’s a sobering thought: suppose Trump was elected not despite his offensive, misogynous behaviors but, at least in part because of them….What we are witnessing is a reassertion of masculinity’s most difficult and harmful traits,aggression, narcissism, sexual assaultiveness, grandiosity and contempt.  Real quotes the 2016 Presidential Gender Watch Report which summarizes several surveys this way: “Trump supporters are much more likely than Clinton voters to say that men and women should ‘stick to the roles for which they are naturally suited,’ that society has become too soft and feminine, and that society seems to ‘punish’ men just for acting like men.’”  Real goes onto say,” I want men to hold fast to those elements that are good and right about the traditional male role - courage, loyalty, competence - but men also deserve to have access to emotion, particularly the vulnerable emotions that connect us to one another.”

On the feminine side of the empathy quagmire, it is crucial for women to finally get it that it is not their job to protect men from their disowned fragility. I have read a number of quotes from  women who voted for Trump in which they excused his boasts about pussy-grabbing and other assaultive behaviors by rationalizing that “he’s really a good, caring man underneath.”  This to me is the same misplaced empathy that I have witnessed  in my office by wives who have brainwashed themselves into believing that their abusive husbands really loved them, when the evidence they were presenting should have convinced them to get out of that relationship immediately.

Right- wing pundits and media personalities such as Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity have also fanned the flames of a resurgent patriarchy by characterizing  women fighting for their rights as “feminazis,” once again demonizing  a vulnerable group and promoting hatred in place of the understanding and compassion that should be our guiding light.

In our nation’s history, empathy has not always been under attack as it is today.  The fact that the economic crisis of the 1930s had a title: “The Great Depression,”  provided a bulwark against the perception that poverty was a personal failure.  There was no moral condemnation when a family was left homeless or a breadwinner was selling apples on the street because he had lost his job - no Trump Trailer Park as a dumping place where the “haves” could direct their derision toward the shamed “have-nots.”  As with the World War that arose in the following decade, there was some shared understanding that we were all in this together - at least if you weren’t dark-skinned or a Japanese American - and that making sacrifices for one’s fellow citizens was a virtue to be extolled.

If the political leaders who we elect represent some aspect of who we are as a people then we should probably label Donald Trump our “Narcissist in Chief.”  His singularly selfish ethic of “looking out for number one” to the exclusion of compassionately looking out for others is the hallmark of his leadership.  It also reflects back to what is deeply flawed about our society.

What was once something called the “common good”-  appointments and funding that empowered government departments like the Environmental Protective Agency to safeguard our drinking water from toxic and carcinogenic substances has been sold off  to the highest corporate bidder.  But there is also a large segment of our working class population that is unwilling to give up what they see as their right to purchase and sell weapons of mass  destruction - in essence their adult toys called assault weapons - even at the cost of the on-going slaughter of school children and other fellow citizens.  The leader sets the standard by placing his personal economic needs and self-aggrandizing political image ahead of the common good, and this, in turn, validates and promotes a culture of narcissism and self-indulgence in the society at large.

In the long view of history regimes come and go and societies periodically regress into the dark ages of nationalism and authoritarian rule.  But no empire, nation or leader has been able to withstand the forces of progress for long.  Disenfranchised social classes will continue to struggle to bring about a more equitable redistribution of our planet’s wealth and fossil fuels will inevitably be replaced by cleaner forms of energy - hopefully before we create more environmental disasters.  

What is less clear to me is the answer to the question: What will be the outcome of the war on empathy?   Will the forces of  patriarchy, racism, and narrow self-interest continue to degrade our relationships with one another?   Will the reflexively fear-based parts of us continue to be exploited by leaders so that we as a society periodically lose our moral center?  If so, we will continue to elevate leaders who are shallow, opportunistic reflections of our narcissistic selves.     

We continually need to relearn the lesson that a society is only as advanced as the political and social consciousness of its citizens.  It would be difficult for any student of history to deny that the “Realpolitics” of the last hundred years based on our many “isms” - communism, state capitalism, rule by plutocrats or by patriarchal religious heads has only produced more repressive, authoritarian regimes and human suffering.

If there is a next American or world revolution it will only bring about lasting change when those promoting the war on empathy have been drowned out by a vast chorus of people who are uncompromising in their shared values of empathy and compassion.  The “new man” and “new woman” will need to have evolved in ways that will allow them to create the new society. This new, vocal majority will never allow itself to be divided by fears and prejudices about the so called “others” because they will have evolved to the point of understanding that the so called “others” are simply manifestations of themselves in another era or context.  When this type of change occurs, and the global mind reaches some kind of critical mass, a fierce and compassionate humanism will replace the era of narcissism.  Only then will we be ready to create the type of world in which we would all want to live.

[radthursdays]

#RadThursdays Roundup 06/29/2017

A tweet by @ccspox with a picture of them holding a sign that asks, "Who gave me the right to marry?" The Supreme Court is crossed out, and the answer, "trans women of color throwing bricks at cops" is circled. The tweet says, "ready for #SFPride tomorrow 🌹". Source.

Pride

Softball: A tiny comic by Sophia Foster-Dimino‏ (alt text for the images), created for the Queers & Comics Conference.

Decolonial Love: A How-To Guide: "At its heart, decolonial love is actively creating a space for our histories as Indigenous/racialized survivors of colonization (we’re all survivors, babe) to be acknowledged within our relationships. Decolonial love is an accountable love that reciprocates our beauty and wholeness as Indigenous/racialized peoples. Decolonial love steps out of western heterosexuality, homosexuality, and queerness to form unique bonds between two people, regardless of gender or sexuality. Decolonial love also affirms our partner’s gender and spirit. It embraces our bodies as they are, whether this is brown or white, larger or smaller, and cis or trans. Decolonial love is simply love as we are, broken and figuring it out together."

A tweet by @newyorkyearzero with a picture of a New York City Correction Department's prisoner transport van. The van has "NYCD" and "CORRECTION" in huge rainbow font and the slogan "Pride, Equality, Peace". The tweet says, "take a pride ride in the gay prisoner transport van". Source.

Our Work Isn't Done

Trans-Led Coalition Shuts Down Chicago Pride Parade: "Trans and queer communities, leading groups of accomplices, gather in a unified stance against the annual Chicago Pride Parade and Festival. We disavow the numerous atrocities done to the legacies of our ancestors and foremothers in the movement for trans and queer liberation, and the ever-increasing corporatization, whitewashing, gentrification, racism, and cisnormativity that have infused Pride for decades. This year, like so many years before, our communities have reached a breaking point. The trans community of Chicago has risen up to explicitly denounce the Chicago Pride Parade and Festival, and to announce our intention to once again form our own spaces, to better serve and represent our own pride and liberation. The Compton’s Cafeteria Riots and the Stonewall Riots are how we mark the legacy of Pride: Strong, proud, and unapologetic trans resistance in the face of a world that continues to prefer our bodies as corpses in the ground, rather than revolutionaries in the streets."

How Can The Queerest Generation (Ever) Still Believe In Gender Roles?: "Would millennial men’s opinions about gender be different if gay marriage had gone down a more feminist path? Maybe not: Toxic masculinity is strong in this country, and misogyny at home seems to be especially intractable. But imagine the impact we could have had; instead of gay cake toppers and vapid “love is love” slogans, a campaign that had invested the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on gay marriage advocacy to building support for brave trans teenagers. Imagine a movement that stood up for its trans and gender nonconforming members as fiercely as Black Lives Matter does. Or, at the very least, imagine a gay marriage movement that had refused to abandon trans people to pass legislation. Success might have taken longer that way; I might not be gay-married right now. But if that meant that both cis and trans women dealt with less daily oppression, then I have to think I’d be okay with that."

Queer and Chechen: No Place To Hide: Video of a panel discussion with Russian LGBT activists who have spearheaded evacuation efforts of gay men in Chechnya who have been held in unlawful detention centers, tortured, and killed as part of a campaign against LGBT people. You can also read text notes and a summary of the talk, originally posted on the RUSA LGBTIQ – San Francisco Bay Area Facebook page.

Riot police officers arrest LGBT activists during a gay pride rally in St. Petersburg, Russia in June 2013. The rally was considered illegal under the Russian federal law “for the Purpose of Protecting Children from Information Advocating for a Denial of Traditional Family Values”, which targets those who “promote non-traditional sexual relations to minors” and was unanimously approved by the State Duma just weeks before this photo was taken. Source.

Fucking Over Poor People

The End Will Be Delivered By Amazon Drone: If something else doesn't kill us first. "'The rich will sit secure in the knowledge that their replicators and robots can provide for their every need. What of the rest of us?' Frase argues, persuasively, that a world ravaged by disease and hunger brought on by climate change, combined with the total independence of the wealthy from the need for human labor, will lead to mass extermination. 'In a world of hyperinequality and mass unemployment, you can try to buy off the masses for a while, and then you can try to repress them by force. But so long as immiserated hordes exist, there is the danger that one day it may become impossible to hold them at bay. When mass labor has been rendered superfluous, a final solution lurks: the genocidal war of the rich against the poor. …An exterminist society can automate and mechanize the process of suppression and extermination, allowing the rulers and their minions to distance themselves from the consequences of their actions.' The Bezoses and Thiels of the future will not even have to get their hands dirty. In his conclusion, Frase points out that this isn’t so implausible. The descendants of the exterminators may not even feel too guilty about it. How, after all, did North America come to provide such an abundant home for the children of European conquerors?"

After the Fire: "As with many similar buildings across the country the exterior of Grenfell Tower had recently been covered in an aesthetically pleasant cladding—partly to increase insulation; partly, and, many suspect predominately, to please the eyes of wealthier residents of the surrounding area. This morning, Scotland Yard announced that the panels had failed safety tests conducted as part of its investigation, and that a manslaughter enquiry was consequently being launched. The Metropolitan Police have “seized . . . material” from various companies involved in installing the renovation work. Though it’s too soon to know exactly where the blame lies, it has become clear that an active decision was made to convert a tower housing hundreds of low income, predominately ethnic minority individuals into a twenty-four-storey tinder box."

The Fire Last Time: “Against a welfare state founded partly on the idea of redistributing social and physical risks — the risks of unemployment, of injury, of poor health — we have a property system that actively produces risk for specific sets of people. This system manufactures, sustains, and transfers risk onto working-class people. Then it burns down their homes, willing to sacrifice lives in the pursuit of profit.”

Gay rights activist Barbara Gittings picketing Independence Hall in Philadelphia, PA in 1965. Her sign reads “HOMOSEXUALS should be judged as individuals.” Source.

Issues

Why Are So Many Adults Today Haunted by Trauma?: "I think normalcy is a myth. The idea that some people have pathology and the rest of us are normal is crude. There’s nothing about any mentally ill person—and it doesn’t matter what their diagnosis is—that I couldn’t recognize in myself. The reality is that, in every case, mental illness is an outcome of traumatic events. And by trauma I don’t mean dramatic events. There’s a difference. Fundamentally, it has to do with whether human needs are being met or not. Since we live in a society that largely denies human developmental needs—doesn’t even understand them, let alone provide for them—you’re going to have a lot of people affected in adverse ways. Most of the population, in fact. And so then to separate out those who meet the particular criteria for a particular diagnosis from the rest of us is utterly unscientific and unhelpful. More to the point, you need to look at what is it about our society that generates what we call abnormality?"

Trump’s travel ban will go into effect tonight: "The Supreme Court reinstated parts of President Trump’s travel ban this week, banning nationals from six Muslim-majority countries — with the exception of those who have a 'credible claim of a bona fide relationship' to a person or entity in the U.S. — until it hears oral testimony on the case in the fall. […] The State Department also limited which family relationships are considered 'close' enough to be bona fide. Only 'close family' members like spouses, parents (including in-laws), siblings (including step-siblings), and children (again, in-laws included) of U.S. citizens from the six countries included in the ban can enter the country, the cable reveals. Grandparents, cousins, nieces and nephews, brothers and sisters-in-law, fiancés, and other 'extended' family members of U.S. citizens aren’t considered close enough to make the cut. 'Even if the actual familial relationships may seem distant through the lens of American culture, they may not be distant in those cultures. Also just factually, there are people who aren’t closely related to you, in that sense of the term, but they’re still close to you. How do they prove the bona fides of their relationship?' It’s unclear whether refugees who have already connected with resettlement agencies in the U.S. will be allowed to enter the country."

Activism

More than 40 protesters arrested in 'die-in' at Capitol. Many forcibly removed from wheelchairs: "Dozens of disabled men and women were arrested after participating in a 'die-in' protest outside of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's office at the Capitol. The demonstration, organized by the national disability group ADAPT, was staged in response to the Senate GOP's healthcare plan, which proposes drastic cuts to Medicaid. It's the primary source of funding for services that allow [disabled people] to live at home, sparing them from institutionalization."

All the News You Didn’t Even Know Was Going Down: News about protests against the Republican health care plan, Trump presidency awfulness, a law in North Carolina that makes it "legal for men to finish a sex act as long as it began consensually", ongoing reports of abuse against J20 protestors, killer cops, deportation resistance, and indigenous resistance.

Illustrated Guide to Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War: Updated listing of prisoners by the NYC Anarchist Black Cross. Write a letter!

Direct Action Item

Did you know that the World Health Organization classified homosexuality as a mental health disorder until 1990? LGBTQ+ rights have expanded substantially in recent years, but things are still shit basically everywhere, and getting worse. So consider giving some of those sweet capitalist exploitation-bucks to these well-reviewed charities, selected for Pride Month by Charity Navigator.

Seven colorful muppets stand side by side, forming a rainbow. The muppets are, in order: red, orange, yellow, green, turquoise, indigo, and violet, as in the 7-color version of the Rainbow flag. Source.

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In solidarity!

What is direct action? Direct action means doing things yourself instead of petitioning authorities or relying on external institutions. It means taking matters into your own hands and not waiting to be empowered, because you are already powerful. A “direct action item” is a way to put your beliefs into practice every week.