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tanadrin · 1 month ago

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@grimogretricks

For people saying that airport security is wholly theatre and that it doesn't do any good- certainly it seems they've gone overboard on certain things, but what is your explanation as to why hijackings and terrorist attacks involving planes are MUCH less common than they used to be?

Sorry that this is mostly off the dome, and has less references than I would like. We argued this stuff to death in the aughts, though ultimately the political incentives in favor of security theater were just too great. Everyone is terrified of the potential backlash of not being seen to do enough in advance of the next big terrorist attack, I guess. And to be clear, we are talking mostly about post-9/11 airport security measures as being security theater. Some degree of airport security has been necessary since people started getting on airplanes with guns and informing the pilot that, hey, guess what, we're going to Cuba instead of Miami today.

But the big reduction in airplane hijackings came with the institution of metal detectors to keep guns off airplanes after a couple high-profile hijackings in the 1970s. But remember that these incidents were of a very different character than what we now think of as the risk to airplanes: they were certainly a problem, but the modus operandi of hijackers in this era was to force the plane to fly to a non-extradition country and land safely. 9/11-style hijackings, that used the plane as a bomb and killed everyone aboard, were on nobody's radar--when the goal was blowing up the plane and killing passengers, bombers generally used bombs planted in checked baggage, which requires different security measures from passenger screening.

Two security changes occurred after 9/11 that made future such hijackings basically impossible: one, probably most importantly, was that passengers understood they no longer could count on hijackers having an interest in surviving the hijacking. This change in passenger behavior was immediate: later that same year when a guy tried to bomb an airplane (using a really ineffective device hidden in his shoe) passengers immediately acted to restrain him. The second important change was reinforcing cockpit doors and keeping them locked: this makes hijacking airplanes with knives (the only major modality left to most would-be hijackers) functionally impossible.

All the other intense passenger screening and security measures implemented after 9/11 has been repeatedly shown by security researchers to be pretty ineffective, not even very reliable at stuff like keeping knives off airplanes. For years after 9/11 there were endless news stories about law enforcement running drills at airports and weapons making their way through security. A lot of later security measures, like liquid limits in carry-on baggage, came from terrorist plots that didn't even make it off the drawing board (and are unlikely to have ever worked anyway), and seem mostly to be overzealous ass-covering by transportation security officials.

And, finally, we should note that the real security threats to airplanes in the post-9/11 era seem to have come come from two sources that are basically impossible to protect against using traditional security methods, and for which passenger-based security screening is useless: anti-aircraft missiles and suicidal pilots (plus an honorable mention to aircraft companies trying to skirt certain regulatory requirements).

Despite what decades of American media would have you believe, elaborate plots targeting transportation infrastructure and involving like a dozen people are actually not at the top of the list of terrorist methodologies--why time and money training members of your organization to fly planes into buildings, when you can just use social media to convince a guy to drive a car into a crowd of bystanders, or stab somebody on the street? It's much cheaper, and much, much harder to guard against. Random lone-wolf terrorism is, unlike the kind of elaborate plots portrayed on TV, and one-off real-life examples like 9/11, basically impossible for security services to guard against in advance. But in order to justify the war on terror, and large budgets for security services on anti-terrorism grounds, it was necessary to play up the threat of such plots, even if by its very nature 9/11 was impossible to repeat. For similar reasons, the post-9/11 era also played up the threat of Islamic extremism and large overseas terrorist networks, even though far-right extremists acting in small groups also have managed to kill huge numbers of people in spectacular ways.

So for all these reasons, and those noted at the top, the political incentives around transportation security means that passenger screening measures in airports are almost guaranteed to be a one-way ratchet, even if they don't work. It's a bit like the fabled anti-tiger amulet--it's easy to say the lack of tigers is proof it's working! Even if the real reason there are no tigers about is that you live in Ohio. The media environment post-War on Terror helped create a public appetite for and approval of such anti-tiger amulets, too, of course. This was not by any means a purely top-down phenomenon.

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loriache · 10 months ago

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World Map Notes: the Elven Northern & Southern Central Continents

These nations are where all the elves in the story except Marcille and Thistle are from. This post collects all the information I could find about these two nations, and included a bit of analysis based on that information.

TL;DR (includes both fact and my speculation):

The Northern Central Continent is a feudal monarchy with a strong class system, as well as strict borders, & could probably be considered an ethnostate. It's deeply hierarchical, and the queen is a traditionalist - so it's probably very structurally biased against non-elves and half-elves.

Elves in the NCC practice cannibalism in some rural areas!

The Southern Central Continent is more diverse, with a large tallman population on its South Coast.

To elves, "Court Magicians" exclusively refer to those serving the elven queen - a prestigious role that seems likely to be only open to nobles.

The SCC may not be a monarchy, though it's not clear what kind of leadership or societal structure it does have.

The NCC will habitually take anyone involved in ancient magic as a criminal to prosecute on their terms, regardless of jurisdiction, but this depends on their political influence and ability to pressure local leaders to agree to extradite the criminal.

Elves VS Dwarves and Gnomes may have been at war around the time of the Golden Kingdom being sealed. This conflict also may be one of the factors pushing the kingdom to be sealed in the first place.

The "Central Region" might be the origin of the "Common Tongue" that our characters speak.

Northern Central Continent

The Adventurer's Bible | p. 132

For this place to have a high quality of life, and also a declining population - especially when it's so close to the Western Continent, which is stated to have poor quality of life - there must be strictly maintained borders and a strong anti-immigration policy. Based on the attitude of the elves, I wouldn't be surprised if it was very difficult to move there unless you are also an elf.

It could probably be considered an ethnostate - and while in these kinds of fantasy worlds, that's pretty common. Take Rivendell, or Moria, in LOTR - they take for granted that these kinds of different fantasy races will live in separate communities.

But that isn't actually realistic, and I think Kui has considered it as more of a politically established status quo rather than an obvious natural result of having magically distinct "races". Which, even in Dunmeshi, I think is a difficult and not-terribly-accurate way to represent politics - racism does not emerge from actual, physical differences between races, after all.

But Dunmeshi's presentation of this idea is interesting, because of the recognition that if there is an "elven nation" which prioritises the interests and rights of elves over other races, that is because there's a deliberate, concerted effort to keep it that way.

But there's a small section of the NCC with a high tallman population - I wonder what kind of community they have, and how they fit into the strict elven hierarchy?

The Adventurer's Bible | pp. 134 & 136

Kabru and Rin, and other kids like them, who are adopted or taken as adopted children(rarely - the way Milsiril treats Kabru is not perfect, but she's deliberately attempting to be better than other elves.... meaning other elves are usually worse)/pets/objects by elven nobles, as well as accomplished or notable individuals who earn the elves' favour/are "invited" to stay (such as they try with Laios at the end of the story) would be an exception.

Other long-lived races could probably (...?) visit, but given the historical conflict between elves, dwarves, and gnomes, I think they'd also be pretty hostile to many of them coming to live on the NCC, even if they see them as more like equals.

Social Structure & Nobility

The Northern Central Continent is an absolute monarchy under a 372 year old queen, Heimeya (IDK what the official romanisation of her name will be).

...With extended "nobility", which are the group that the canaries' guards draw from. We don't get much clarification of what sort of structure their nobility has, what titles there are, and where our characters who are nobles fall into it.

Pattadol (House of Vari), Mithrun (House of Kerensil), and Milsiril (House of Tol) are nobles.

Mithrun's noble house, Kerensil, is apparently a well-known family of investors! I wonder what sorts of businesses they invest in & what the elven economy is like?

Milsiril's house, on the other hand, is a well-known military family. I wonder if Kabru could claim the surname "of the House of Tol". He did go to family gatherings after all. But if he was comfortable doing so and it would be accepted, I would assume he'd have done so when introducing himself to the canaries.

Flamela is a distant relative of the queen, who has additional status due to exhibiting the genetic trait associated with their queens, extremely dark skin.

The queen is a "staunch traditionalist" who wouldn't even acknowledge a half-elf like Marcille. Nice! I really feel bad for Kabru and Rin growing up as tallmen in this sort of culture.

Court Magicians

While generally this is a term for any magic user who serves in a royal court, in the Northern Central Continent it seems to carry a lot of esteem; even just as the daughter of one, Pattadol assumes Marcille has the right to boss her around and to handle highly secret, highly illegal ancient magic secrets.

That makes sense, as in the society of the Northern Central Continent, you'd be directly serving the elven queen. But also, she has enough Court Magicians that Pattadol would not expect to know Marcille's mother's name, but few enough that it would be a big deal and Cithis would know about it if one had a half-elf child.

I don't think it's remotely unlikely based on that to assume that this role is only available to nobles.

A "Court Magician" who doesn't serve the NCC Queen isn't a "real" Court Magician in the eyes of NCC elves. Those short-lived monarchs would be happy just to have an elf around regardless of whether they were actually any good at magic.... according to Cithis.

Magic seems very important to the society of the NCC elves. The queen communicates with her subordinates via familar, and the birds we see surrounding her seem like they are some kind of magic - perhaps not familiars since we see her familiar, but some other kind of scrying?

Also, based on the fact Pattadol assumes a Court Magician would be serving the Queen of the NCC, we can theorise that perhaps whatever structure the SCC has, it isn't a monarchy....? Heimeya is "the queen of the elves", after all - that doesn't sound like there's another elven monarch competing for the title just next door.

Ordinary People

Apparently the NCC is a safe place and life is easy -- but given the strict class system, I kind of expect that varies a lot depending on the family you're born into.

The only elves we meet who are not nobles are the convicted criminal canaries, so it's hard to get a sense of what life is like for them from that. Cithis was apparently a wealthy fortune teller with "an intense jealousy for those born noble or wealthy." So I assume she was not born into comfort.

Apparently "There are also primitive villages deep in the woods and underground, and in some regions cannibalism is still practiced." Which is awesome. Based on her videogame elves art I think Kui's probably making a little nod to Divinity: Original Sin elves, who can absorb memories through eating the flesh of others. Elves in dungeon meshi don't have this trait, but I wonder if there is a magical ritual or some kind of cultural practice with a similar intention.

Cuisine

Marcille's mother didn't think much of the elven cuisine.

Liricmumwarel is fancy candy given out by the elven queen the shape of which conveys blessings.

Elf Cake is a crumbly dry cake that Kabru and Thistle don't think much of. I've heard someone discuss what it's likely to be made of, but I am afraid I don't recall.

Southern Central Continent

The Adventurer's Bible | p. 132

It seems like the Southern Central Continent gets a lot more immigration and has a more diverse population, especially along the south coast (near the Western Continent). That south coast has a high tallman population.

Fleki and Lycion are from the Southern Central Continent. Fleki got into ancient magic for the money, so you can assume there's probably class disparity there too; things are noted by Kui to be more "disorganised" than the NCC. Not a bad thing at all - the NCC is definitely too "organised" in my books. But that does potentially also mean there's less, e.g., bureaucracy, central organisation, less of a social safety net. But then again, in the NCC I doubt that whatever "safety net" there is, is available to everyone.

We can't extrapolate much from Fleki & Lycion's personalities, because they clearly aren't in the most stable societal position, and I get the sense that they're the countercultural type - they probably don't represent the type of person typical to the SCC. Also, our NCC characters are all either nobles or used to navigating high society (Cithis, Kabru to an extent) so they aren't exactly a typical "ordinary NCC person" as a basis for comparison either. However, there's less of a "strict set of social rules" type of feel to the SCC characters, fitting with my suggestion that the SCC may not be a society with a strong feudal element.

Geopolitics & Conflict

The fact that, despite their being from the SCC, Fleki and Lycion are in the Canaries, who work directly under the NCC's Queen, implies that the the NCC feel entitled to process and prosecute people who commit ancient magic-related crimes regardless of any notion of "jurisdiction". This is backed up by the way that they were going to take Marcille - but that is something that the governor of the Island had to give permission for, which Laios is able to withdraw. So I assume that the NCC elves apply pressure on various world leaders to extradite criminals involved in ancient magic.

The SCC would cooperate with this, since they're allies, even if they don't have a great relationship (according to the World Guide).

The NCC are also clearly able to take half-foots without trouble, as we see by Chilchuck saying he's known half-foots who got involved with "black magic" (ancient magic) and were disappeared by the elves. But I doubt gnomes or dwarves are giving people up easily - though that probably doesn't go for dwarves like Senshi and Namari, without strong community ties.

Long before the current times, elves fought dwarves & gnomes. There might have been more than one of these conflicts...? While long ago, this war isn't "ancient" (like the ancients who sealed the demon into dungeons, before their world was mostly destroyed by it).

Thistle, Delgal, and the Golden Kingdom were (I believe) caught up in one of these conflicts, which used Melini as a staging ground - thus why Thistle was pushed to seal the entire kingdom in the dungeon.

To do this, Thistle unseals a dungeon created by the "ancient people". These could be the "ancients" who created the dungeons, before the apocalypse. Or they could be another, still extinct, society.

Regardless, at least one of these conflicts seems to have taken place after the golden kingdom was sealed - so, within the last 1000 years.

Though, this could refer to a different, more localised conflict between the Golden Kingdom and their dwarven neighbours.

The order of events is that the Golden Kingdom was sealed (1000 years ago or so) > Dwarves took over > Elves stole the land from the Dwarves ("long ago" by the Island Lord, a tallman's, standards) > Elves gave the land to a local lord, who was either an ancestor of the Island Lord, or the Island Lord himself. The Island Lord is himself a descendant of the lord who poisoned Delgal's father, as is noted in the World Guide. However, it isn't impossible for there to be large gaps of time between these events, which could put the elf / dwarf wars at a more recent date.

The fact we know that the elves stole the land from the dwarves, and then granted it to a political actor who was relevant during the events of the Golden Kingdom flashbacks we see suggests to me that the events were roughly contemporaneous. If they were, that puts at least one of these conflicts at roughly 1000 years ago.

So, the elf/dwarf & gnome conflict is "long ago" by short-lived standards, but would be considered "modern" by the long-lived races, if you ask me. At least, the equivalent of the World Wars for us - recent history, even if we weren't alive.

I'm guessing the "Elf King" from the below panel in fact was a word that's more gender-neutral in Japanese, since the "Western Elves" definitely have a queen.

Language

When Kabru says the "Central region" I expect he means the region where the NCC and SCC is.

The fact that he observes that the lack of any accent means he's from the Central Region is really interesting. It could mean two things;

either they switched to speaking in the language spoken on those continents, which Kabru would naturally know, having grown up there. It's 100 percent possible, but I think this would be noted in the story.

or, the language that gets called "the common tongue", the one that all our principle characters speak for most of the story, originated from the elves in the Central Continent. Or at least it's the same one that the elves use, and their political influence is great enough that their accent gets to be considered not an accent at all. The fact they were "granting" land in this area to tall-man lords suggests a large enough historical influence in the area that this is quite plausible to me.

Mithrun absolutely does have an accent - nobody speaks without an accent. His accent is just politically and socioculturally normalised to the point of being considered the "default/proper" way to speak - like received pronounciation in English.

The common tongue isn't ubiquitous everywhere - not just Kuro, but Kiki and Kaka are also noted to be studying the common tongue. The Tansus were born on the Eastern Continent, so probably gnome communities there speak their own language - Kiki and Kaka grew up primarily surrounded by gnomes after all.

It's also quite likely that Kabru, specifically, because of where he grew up, would consider Mithrun's way of talking to be the default "not an accent" accent. His adoptive mother surely has the same upper-class NCC accent. I expect that other characters might experience it as more "marked".

This isn't a world where everyone speaks the same language everywhere; the common tongue is called that, but there are many different languages. Kabru and Chilchuck are two characters who are adept with many of them - Kabru speaks the language of the kobold, and probably lots more. Chilchuck works as an interpreter as part of his union stuff - I can tell you from experience that that's a hugely valuable skillset in that context, as many of the people who most need union representation are people who don't speak the dominant language, or at least not fluently.

If you got all the way to the end of this post.... thank you for reading, I love you. Check out my other World Map Notes under that tag on my blog; I've made a few so far and there will almost certainly be more. Next I'm thinking the dwarven nations...? But I could be persuaded if someone had a preference.

Also, anyone got any speculation on what, exactly, is the previous time that Heimeya ate a person/monster/chimera that this panel implies:

We really don't have anything to go on whatsoever, but I think it's a fun tidbit.

#og post #dungeon meshi manga spoilers #dungeon meshi meta #dunmeshi #dungeon meshi analysis #delicious in dungeon spoilers #dunmeshi spoilers #delicious in dungeon #dunmeshi meta #the canaries #milsiril #mithrun #kabru of utaya #i feel sooooooo sane to have made this. but it has some super interesting details imo #colour coding only on the TLDR just cause I dont want ppl to take my theories as fact #character info I drop without a panel comes from the world bible #world map notes

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gwydionmisha · 2 years ago

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#New Mexico #Michelle Lujan Grisham #Abortion #Sanctuary States #News

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adrl-pt · 6 months ago

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Saving Activist Andrey Gnyot. VPN Protest. Charity Lecture by a Political Philosopher.

You are watching the news from the weekly rally at the Russian Embassy in Lisbon. Today is August 24, 2:30 PM.

Since the end of last week, Belarusian and Russian activists have been holding a protest demanding that Belarusian activist Andrey Gnyot not be extradited to dictator Lukashenko. On August 21, Andrey and his lawyers shared the details of his case on the European Radio channel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-upcgkIwWSA

On August 25 at 2 PM, we will gather in front of the Serbian Embassy in Lisbon at Rua de Alcolena 11. https://www.facebook.com/events/1043644033328903/

If you cannot come, please take photos with posters and send them to us at [email protected].

Sign and share the petition that could help Andrey in the Serbian court. https://www.peticije.online/slobodazaandreja

Also, support the fundraising for his legal defense. https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-andrey-gnyot-save-his-life

We believe it is important to support Andrey because we understand the problems that dictator Lukashenko creates for Belarusians. Recently, with great difficulty, the rock band Bi-2 was saved from deportation to Russia. https://www.change.org/p/thailand-free-bi-2-rock-band

Currently, Russian citizen Vladislav Arinichev is under threat of deportation from Croatia. The reason is that Putin labeled him a "terrorist" and "extremist" for his anti-war statements. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU2JQ9NArqo

In April, Novaya Gazeta Evropa reported that Rosfinmonitoring is adding both people suspected of terrorist activities and, for example, employees of an Orenburg gay bar in a case about the alleged "extremist LGBT movement" to this list. This list already contains more than 14,000 people, including well-known journalists, politicians, and theater figures. https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2024/04/02/s-nachala-2024-goda-spisok-terroristov-i-ekstremistov-rosfinmonitoringa-popolnilsia-na-rekordnye-669-chelovek-17-iz-nikh-nesovershennoletnie-news

Back in 2018, Novaya Gazeta reported how law enforcement agencies find "extremism" in social media posts. https://novayagazeta.ru/articles/2018/08/21/77560-etot-spisok-grazhdanskaya-smert

In the Freedom House Internet Freedom Rating, Russia ranks fifth from the bottom, while Belarus is seventh. https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-net/scores?sort=asc&order=Total%20Score%20and%20Status

On August 23, the director of the "Internet Protection Society" Mikhail Klimarev reported disruptions in the work of Telegram, WhatsApp, and Viber. https://t.me/zatelecom/28739

On July 26, he shared two working methods for bypassing the blocks and slowdowns of YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbTGhCYFIsY

These are the Ceno Browser and VPN generator. https://censorship.no/ru/download.html https://t.me/vpngeneratorbot/?start=BrSh2607

The Telegram channel "Tech Talk" published a link on how to purchase Amnezia VPN while bypassing the blocking of their main site. https://t.me/ru_tech_talk/543

They also provided instructions on how to connect MTProxy, which helped with Telegram blocking in 2018. https://t.me/ru_tech_talk/544

While Russians are protesting by installing VPNs, Ukrainian journalist Yuriy Butusov burned the files of Russian draft dodgers at the Sudzha military registration and enlistment office, calling them "smart people." One of the comments under this video reads: "One Ukrainian soldier helped these people more than their native Russia." https://www.youtube.com/shorts/qaeEidnquCE

On August 27 at 7 PM, we will hold a charity lecture on what a revolutionary situation is. The lecture will be given by political philosopher Ilya Budraitskis. We recommend registering using the phone number listed on the poster so that we can better understand how many viewers will attend. https://www.facebook.com/events/1021147643042506/

We are holding this event as part of our regular support for the Netherlands Orphans Feeding Foundation, which works to return stolen Ukrainian children. If you can't come, please make a donation from home. https://www.every.org/orphans-feeding-foundation/f/help-us-return-the-deported

Proofs and links are in the description. Subscribe and help!

#freeandreygnyot #belarus #philosophy #vpn

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infamousbrad · 27 days ago

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This is your second-to-last warning.

Back when fanatical anti-abortion judges were getting appointed in Trump's first term, people on Facebook asked me how scared should they be? And I drew the comparison to the role that the Fugitive Slave Act played in the run-up to the US Civil War, to lay out three levels of alert, because repealing Roe would be your third-to-last warning.

If Roe v Wade was repealed, I said, have a discussion with your loved ones and dependents where you try to get them to imagine having to flee, and come back to it, if not every night, often enough to keep the possibility in mind.

When the first attempt is made to extradite a doctor or pharmacist or other volunteer from a free state to an anti-abortion state, for a crime not illegal in that state, I said start active preparations in case you're going to need to flee. (More on that in a bit.)

When that extradition request fails, and it will fail, you should expect a Republican Congress like this one to pass "Fugitive Slave Act 2.0," requiring free-state local law officials to assist out-of-state law officials and/or bounty hunters in bringing "abortionists" to justice, just like they did last time, and expect this Supreme Court to uphold it. When that happens, get yourself and your loved ones to safety in a free state or, honestly, abroad if you can. Because ...

The last time these very same states tried this, they found that private citizens and local law enforcement in the free states went to extreme lengths to buy time for escaped slaves to escape, delaying out-of-state bounty hunters in every way, the Supreme Court be damned.

If you're still here when that bridge is crossed, you volunteered to live through a civil war. Because the anti-abortion states are going to find out that it is physically impossible to enforce their will on free states while remaining in the United States.

The outcome will be the same, because the conditions haven't changed. The army will take their side? Nearly the whole army took their side last time, too. Didn't help once the food and bullets ran low, which will happen again this time. Last time it ended with their cities shelled and burned to the ground, their economy in a shambles that it still hasn't recovered from, and there's no plausible story that ends the next civil war, if they're determined to have another one, on any other terms.

Yesterday ...

... a Louisiana grand jury issued an order to extradite a New York pharmacist for remotely prescribing mifepristone to a patient in Louisiana. Not only was that legal, but New York state has a shield law, requiring local law enforcement to defend the pharmacist or anyone else so indicted. And it's just what I predicted, because that's what they did last time.

With this Congress, expect a "Fugitive Abortionist Act." They'll have to suspend the filibuster in the Senate to pass it, so there's some hope yet. But by the time it passes, if it does, you will need:

Up-to-date travel papers. A passport is best, but for Gods' sake at least have up-to-date REAL IDs for yourself and your dependents. And ...

Cash. Preferably stashed off-premises, maybe diversified, and at least some of it out of the country or in a local credit union in the free state you're going to if that's your choice.

A transportation plan. Where are you going and how are you going to get there? And, finally, and most importantly ...

An agreement. Promise each other, in advance, that once physical resistance to extraditions ordered under the Fugitive Abortionists Act (or whatever they end up calling it) makes the news? Screw inertia, screw work, screw the fact that you might not have a plan for a place to live when you get there, screw all the reasons to stay, you need to promise each other that, if that day comes, you are going to implement your escape plan, and not wait another day.

Because, to expand on what I said above, if you wait until armies are on the march and checkpoints go up because borders are closing, you will have waited too long, and wherever you are on that day, that's where you're going to be when US cities start looking like Aleppo, like Mariupol, like Gaza.

#us politics #abortion #margaret carpenter #nightingale medical #it can happen here #associated press

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nando161mando · 8 months ago

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the50-person · 2 years ago

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The risk goes beyond formal arrest and extradition. The bounties on offer may encourage vigilantism, and sympathetic governments may turn a blind eye to or even facilitate extra-legal rendition of the eight exiled activists.

This is illustrated by the 2015 case of the five Hong Kong booksellers who disappeared from various locations, including Thailand, and later showed up in China where they “confessed” to crimes in the state media.

#hong kong #human rights #china #chinese #news #anti-extradition #and so the world spins

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oribellame · 7 months ago

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Hello, there's an important context to this illustration I made.

Paul Watson is one of the founding members of Greenpeace and the founder of Sea Shepherd and Captain Paul Watson Foundation.

"On July 21 2024, Captain Paul Watson was arrested by Danish police upon arrival in Nuuk, Greenland, onboard the M/Y John Paul DeJoria. Danish authorities claim that the arrest was made due to an international arrest warrant issued by Japan, related to his anti-whaling campaigns in the Antarctic more than a decade ago.

Paul faces the possibility of extradition to Japan, where he could spend the rest of his life in prison."

Please consider informing yourself on the official website of Captain Paul Watson Foundation, spreading the word, and signing the official petitions.

#free paul watson #sea shepherd

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vigilantkilliforniakatholixxx · 2 months ago

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You don’t hate the legacy media enough folks. The Associated Press uses a passive beta voice when reporting on this Christmas market terror attack in Magdeburg, Germany. As if the car simply drove itself peacefully, and the affected number of people small and insignificant. It wasn’t a “group of people” — it was an entire mass of people whose bodies were flung by the force of the impact, and many more who were crushed beneath the wheels as the vehicle zig zagged its way through the packed market driven by a terrorist saudi man (who we now know was a zionist!!!). edit - new info -

The suspect behind the Christmas market attack in Germany has been identified as Talib Al-Abdulmohsen, an anti-Islamic pro zionist terrorist and atheist.

Wanted in Saudi Arabia for terrorism and trafficking girls to Europe, he was granted political asylum in Germany, which refused his extradition despite the charges. edit - Reality: he was self-identified leftist, anti Islam progressive, and Zionist. He did NGO work to traffic more former Muslims like himself into Europe. Does that sound like a far-right position? His main gripe with Germany, and the reason he said he would carry out a terror attack, is Germany not doing enough to give asylum to women from Saudi Arabia. This was a pro-immigration terror attack by a foreigner who should never have been in Europe, regardless of his beliefs.

#now look up who is responsible for forced mass immigration...i will wait #pray for the victims

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 26 days ago

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By: Andrew Doyle

Published: Feb 1, 2025

I do not much like the destruction of books. As a form of protest, it conjures sinister images from the past, most notably the Pathé news reels of brownshirts and students gathered around a pyre in Berlin’s Opernplatz under the watchful eye of Joseph Goebbels. The Nazis had raided libraries, universities and other private collections to harvest works by political dissidents, sexologists, “degenerate” artists and any others deemed to be “un-German”. Books by Left-wing authors such as Karl Marx, Bertolt Brecht and Rosa Luxemburg were publicly incinerated, along with fictional works by the likes of Thomas Mann, Franz Kafka, Victor Hugo, Oscar Wilde and James Joyce. This was philistinism in its purest form.

The symbolism of a burning book is, therefore, the repudiation of the very notion of freedom. And yet this same freedom means that we must be able to burn books if we so desire. The Nazis, of course, were destroying the property of others, an authoritarian act designed to eliminate whole branches of thought. This is not to be conflated with an individual who chooses to vandalise his or her own property. The trans activists who burn J.K. Rowling’s books and post the footage online are making fools of themselves, but they are also exercising their right to do so in a free society.

This is a distinction worth bearing in mind when we consider the murder of anti-Islam campaigner Salwan Momika, an Iraqi man who had been awaiting a verdict in Sweden for the crime of “agitation against an ethnic or national group”. Momika had publicly burned a number of copies of the Quran during the summer of 2023. He was shot dead during or just before a live stream on TikTok at his home in Södertälje on Wednesday. The details are as of yet unclear, but there are suggestions that the assassination may have involved a foreign power.

Momika had been granted temporary residence in Sweden in 2018, although his frustration with his adopted country’s lacklustre commitment to freedom of speech led him to seek asylum in Norway in March 2024. After just a few weeks, the Norwegian authorities had him deported back to Sweden. According to Momika, the prosecutor in his trial had been seeking his extradition back to Iraq because of his criticisms of Islam. Back in August, he had posted the following on X: “Sweden and Norway have identified me as a threat to their security. Yes, I am a threat to the Islamization project of the West, which is being pursued by your Leftist communist government that is deceiving the citizens and making the country Islamic. So I have come to awaken the people and thwart the Islamization project of the West, and I will not be afraid of you.”

In cases of this kind, it has become depressingly inevitable that commentators will seek to blame the victim. After the publication of Salman Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses in 1988, the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran issued a fatwa calling for the author’s murder. Instead of taking a united stance against a foreign regime threatening the life of a British citizen, pundits and politicians engaged in endless debates about whether Rushdie had brought this on himself. Crime novelist John Le Carré stated that “there is no law in life or nature that says great religions may be insulted with impunity”, and that “there is no absolute standard of free speech in any society”. It should go without saying that powerful theocrats do not require protection from the hurtful words of novelists.

Last month was the 10th anniversary of the massacre at the offices of the French magazine Charlie Hebdo. Initially, world leaders were united in their condemnation of terrorists who had butchered cartoonists for drawing satirical caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed. Thousands gathered at vigils and held placards bearing the words “Je Suis Charlie”. PEN America — an organisation devoted to the principle of free expression — created a “courage award” for Charlie Hebdo. That was until dozens of members of PEN, including writers such as Joyce Carol Oates and Junot Díaz, signed an open letter in protest. Charlie Hebdo, they claimed, had mocked a “section of the French population that is already marginalized, embattled and victimized”. This was, of course, to misidentify the target. The cartoonists weren’t “punching down” at the Muslim minority, but rather “punching up” at the authoritarianism of institutionalised religion.

We never seem to learn that appeasement of religious extremists only makes them stronger. Our collective failure to take a firm stance for artistic liberty in the Rushdie affair has made it more difficult to uphold the principle today. That Momika was on trial in the first place suggests that Sweden’s commitment to freedom of expression has been subordinated to the creed of multiculturalism. According to the BBC, following Momika’s campaigns in 2023 the Swedish government had “pledged to explore legal means of abolishing protests that involve burning texts in certain circumstances”. Yet Momika’s copies of the Quran were his own property, and he was free to dispose of them as he wished. We might take the view that his method of protest is insensitive or provocative, but in a free society such behaviour is a matter of individual conscience.

The victim-blamers have been predictably vocal. Within hours of the news of Momika’s murder, television personality Bushra Shaikh posted the following on X: “Some of you may disagree but the public desecration of any holy book should be viewed as a hate crime and the offender should face consequences”. She later clarified that by “face consequences” she was not supporting murder, but rather the principle that the “government decides on the punishment”. And yet Shaikh’s logic defeats itself. Her post has been widely interpreted as hate-filled and authoritarian. Does this mean that, if the government were to designate the public advocacy of blasphemy laws a “hate crime”, she would be content to be prosecuted?

Those who endorse authoritarianism, in other words, are laying a trap for themselves. If we look to the state to punish our detractors, where does that leave us when the values of those in power no longer align with our own? Momika has been blamed for the riots and the international diplomatic rows that ensued following his campaigns, but the peaceful protester is not responsible for those who break the law in response. Last summer, the Guardian published a piece that presented his Quran-burning as evidence of a “racism crisis”. One of the Swedish Muslim interviewees was quoted as saying: “I understand you are allowed to think and feel what you want, this is a free country, but there must be boundaries. It’s such a pity that it has happened so many times and Sweden doesn’t seem to learn from its mistakes.”

Those of us who still believe in liberal values will baulk at the suggestion — and the implied threat — in claiming that we are mistaken to support freedom of expression. Moreover, there is nothing racist about burning a copy of the Quran. Islam is a belief-system, not a race. The criminalisation of “Islamophobia” makes about as much sense as prosecuting citizens for “Marxistophobia” or “Freemarketcapitalismophobia”. Had Momika burned a copy of The Communist Manifesto, would there be calls to modify the law to see him incarcerated?

Increasingly, Western societies are pandering to religious zealots who are willing to resort to violence to achieve their aims. Members of the ruling class are undeniably afraid. During Prime Minister’s Questions in November 2024, the Labour MP for Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley, Tahir Ali, asked Keir Starmer whether he would establish “measures to prohibit the desecration of all religious texts and the prophets of the Abrahamic religions”. Starmer replied: “I agree that desecration is awful and should be condemned across the House. We are, as I said before, committed to tackling all forms of hatred and division, including Islamophobia in all its forms.” A better response would have been: “Blasphemy laws are incompatible with the values of a free country.”

It is undeniably the case that Islamic theocracies are intolerant to dissent, but we have only ourselves to blame if we capitulate to pressure from foreign powers to undermine our commitment to secularism. Pakistan’s prime minister Imran Khan, for instance, blamed the radicalisation of Islamic terrorists on the French president Emmanuel Macron’s tolerance for the right of citizens to blaspheme against Islam. In October 2020, he tweeted: “President Macron has chosen to deliberately provoke Muslims, incl his own citizens, through encouraging the display of blasphemous cartoons targeting Islam & our Prophet PBUH.” President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey even cited Momika’s Quran-burning in an attempt to scupper Sweden’s bid to join Nato in 2023.

But blasphemy only makes sense to the faithful. Stéphane Charbonnier (known as “Charb”), the cartoonist and editor-in-chief of Charlie Hebdo who was among the victims of the 2015 atrocity, addressed this point in an “open letter” completed just two days before his death. “God is only sacred to those who believe in him,” he wrote. “If you wish to insult or offend God, you have to be sure that he exists… In France, a religion is nothing more than a collection of texts, traditions, and customs that it is perfectly legitimate to criticize. Sticking a clown nose on Marx is no more offensive or scandalous than popping the same schnoz on Muhammad.”=

This is the spirit of secularism — the French tradition of laïcité — that other countries in the western world should emulate. The problem is not the complaints from those who seek the implementation of sharia in democratic nations, but those in power who fail to reject such demands unequivocally. The murder of Salwan Momika should be a wake-up call for the West. Continued appeasement will only guarantee further bloodshed. For all the short-term risks of defending free speech, our long-term security depends upon it.

"Why can't you just comply with our authoritarian religious codes?"

Because you want me to. Your religious codes are for you, not me.

This is literally terrorism. We are supposed to be afraid of what will happen to us if we don't submit to Islamic totalitarianism. That is reason enough to not just resist, but actively oppose and defy Islamic totalitarian demands.

#Andrew Doyle #Salwan Momika #islam #islamic violence #this is islam #quran #quran burning #islamic terrorism #blasphemy #blasphemy laws #Charlie Hebdo #religion #religion is a mental illness

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