#center for war and society

[back-and-totheleft]

World War III may be inevitable

Iconic director Oliver Stone is not optimistic.

Fifty years after the end of the Vietnam War, and nearly 35 years since his film "Platoon" debuted, America is still hopelessly enamored with violence, and Washington, encouraged by the tandem power centers of Wall Street and the media, is still engineered for war.

“Our country is sabotaging itself. Why do we keep going back” in search of a necessary enemy? He asked. “We track a pattern of intervention, there is a repetition” that will eventually lead us to another world war.

Grim thoughts, given in a conversation moderated by (Ret.) Col. Greg Daddis, Iraq War veteran and director of the Center for War and Society at San Diego State University. Daddis is also USS Midway Chair in Modern U.S. Military History (Thursday’s event was held on the USS Midway museum) and a board member at the Quincy Institute, which partnered in the event.

Stone’s own experiences as a 20-year-old Army infantryman during the most tumultuous years in Vietnam (and politically, socially, back home in the U.S.) — 1967-1968 — formed the basis for Platoon, which won Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director in 1987 and is considered one of the most important and viscerally impactful Vietnam War films in Hollywood history. It is the first in his Vietnam War trilogy, which includes "Born on the Fourth of July" (1989), and "Heaven and Earth" (1993).

As a young man inspired by the tales of mythological Odysseus and a father who had served in World War II, he was driven to war by wanderlust and the frenetic unfocused energy youth. His time in combat there, in his words, took the scales from his eyes and upon returning to an “country he no longer knew” set him on a course of discovery, his mind and creativity coalescing around a burning skepticism of the government, social convention, and conformity.

This is all detailed in his excellent 2020 autobiography, “Chasing the Light” which charts Stone’s youth, his time in Vietnam, and his screenwriting/directing career though “Platoon.”

He didn’t directly mention the recent elections or the current conflict in Ukraine on Thursday night, but insisted that the “strong compulsion” to use war not only as a driver of industry but as the first tool in the box for resolving foreign disputes, still fueled Washington policy. Despite all of the failures of the last 50 years, “it’s impossible to break that lock” that war has on the collective psyche, he said. Even “Platoon” which is a searing indictment of the what he calls the Three Lies of the military and war, has failed to turn the society against interventionism.

“No film is going to change people if you don’t want to be changed,” he said, charging that military recruitment had actually gone up after the film was released.

In recent years, Stone has courted controversy with his series of interviews with Vladimir Putin and his questioning of the Washington/Western narrative of that war. The only mention he made to that was that “I have been passionately driven and for that I’ve paid a price,” and criticized censorship (his 2016 documentary "Ukraine on Fire" had been initially banned on You Tube and then reinstated).

“Free speech is a right, not a privilege” he said, to applause from the room. Of the current political dynamic, he lamented that the “neocons are here from the last administration as well as this administration, they are not going away."

“We’ve made one mistake after another on foreign affairs, there is no reason why we cannot be partners with Russia and China. We don’t need a war.”

Unfortunately, the country’s love for was is “a religion,” he said. All one can do is keep resisting it. His entire life after Vietnam seems to have sprung from that adage. “Be a rebel, and that’s the best way to be.”

-Kelley Beaucar Vlahos, "Oliver Stone: World War III may be inevitable," Responsible Statecraft, Nov 16 2024

[the-evil-skull]

I hate Chiss naming customs. Who was the genius who said "hey what if your family determined irrevocably how your name, THE CORNERSTONE OF YOUR IDENTITY, was formed, and the only way to change it was to go to another family and you cant be free of it unless you reach a certain rank in the military! And what if your social status was determined by whether you're adopted!" Shut the fuck up I am going to kill you in real life

[loveinsomesacredplace]

Taps the invisible neon sign - season 3 of the summer i turned fandom avoidant is going to be rough for people who love Belly, and want good things for her irrespective of which man she chooses at the end. I’ve made my preference for which man I want her to choose, obviously - but the heart of this tumblr is, and always will be team Show! Belly first.

She is my favorite, she will always be my favorite, I think shipping by moral purity is stupid, love triangles, even shoddily constructed ones are supposed to be messy, blaming the bulk of the issues the characters have on Belly, and tying her value only to the man without delving into anything else about her is a limited and sad way to build a romance heroine, and I can’t ship a ship if I don’t love both the characters, and the fans who don’t and loudly proclaim the man to be their fave by a far shot are not fans I understand.

Sorry I couldn’t be your writer, show Bells!

The thing is, joking aside - I don’t need Belly to be anyone’s fave because she’s mine, and the energy I bring to the function is an early 00s fan of deemed flawed/unlikable female characters that a lot of people don’t like.

[flagwars]

Vexillological Association Flag Wars: Round 4, Bracket 1

[delxenofic]

war bunny has a "fans of watership down will like this" blurb like every animal fiction book has to pull in readers but here it feels justified to me

[evandore]

desperately trying to still figure out the name of the sport caroline plays cause everything i come up with sounds stupid until i look at real sports and its like. football...baseball....basketball....

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Stephenie Meyer's sci-fi novel The Host is like. it's almost so much. the alien bodysnatchers at the center of the plot are like Animorph's yeerks if they got really into cottagecore. no, they don't want intergalactic war and domination! they want intergalactic peace and domination! they make every planet they visit a peaceful socialist utopia and like, okay, yes, they have to violently take over the bodies of a planet's native inhabitants to do it. yes, they have to suppress the unwilling minds of their host bodies. yes they are for all intents and purposes committing a genocide of their chosen planets' initial inhabitants and then puppeting their husks around playing at homogeneous, sanitized versions of the cultures they destroyed. the alien main character mentions that even episodes of the Brady Bunch were scrubbed because they were deemed too violent. and they call themselves souls, which is so loaded on so many levels. impossible not to read into the spiritual connotations, especially when written by an author coming from the mormon church which so highly values mission trips. just by sympathizing with humans who don't want to be possessed, by helping them hide out and stay free, our protagonist becomes a pariah, an outlaw from her own society. peace is valued above all else but not peace for the colonized, who are meat to be processed. it's better this way. they had so much potential but squandered it with foolish violence so now we have the right to overtake them and make them live correctly. isn't it beautiful now? isn't everything perfect? there's like almost so much happening in this story except Stephenie's a fucking mormon so she never draws any meaningful connections to anything and the happy ending is that the alien brain parasite protag is gifted the body of a beautiful coma patient that she can "ethically" puppet around, easy peasy problem solved. also there's a fucking love triangle.

[bluemoonbun]

Reader is implied to like feminine things, though gender identity is kept ambiguous.

Damian was a good brother. That’s what he always told himself. He was a good brother, a good son. He was cold, rude, and erudite, but he was able and willing to help anyone who needed it.

When he arrived at Wayne manor, Bruce told him the general run down of why you were to be avoided when it came to anything vigilante related. You were still pure, a year younger than Damian but without any of the pain. The only one in the Wayne manor that could have a shot at becoming a normal person. Damian envied that, but kept it to himself. His anger often boiled to the top, drops of green venom dripping from his mouth when you tried to annoy him into spending time with you.

Your complaints of him ignoring you was scalding water on his already raw nerves. Why would you complain about not being the center of attention for five damn seconds? He would trade anything for the life you had. A life where you could lay around after school and never worry about a rogue bullet lodging itself in your arm, or a poisonous plant releasing psychedelic spores into an open wound.

You could and would never join the Robins. You were weak; it was in your blood. Always sickly, always the pacifist. You wouldn't survive a day in his life. And you weren't living his life; you were living his dream.

But apparently the effort the family was putting in wasn’t enough.

He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t noticed that the manor felt… off about two weeks before the fight with Joker. He couldn’t trace it for the life of him at first. When he realized by the second week that he hadn’t spoken to you in days, or really seen you around the manor at all, he wrote off the worms writhing in his stomach. You must’ve been busy with a class assignment and had little time to annoy him with your demands of time together.

After the fight, however, he was a war of a thousand emotions. How dare you leave them? Why would you turn away an easy life fat on nepotism for a group of murderers, con men, the dredges of Gotham’s society?

Were you truly that desperate to be acknowledged that you’d turn your back on the family who did everything for you? He hopes you’re happy there, since you were clearly so upset at not being given attention.

Over time, however, things start to change. A few days after Jason made a full recovery, Damian looked at one of the drones Tim managed to get a chunk of code from. It took a lot of trial and error, and the development of an entirely new program to grab some of the code before it bricked itself, and enough all nighters and energy drinks that any doctor would faint, but it was managed. The code was dense, optimized to work with the least bloat possible, well tagged variables, and even a handful of comments in the code.

//Buy Bane those Boston Donuts from the donut shop on 5th //Why does this code need to be here so it doesn’t auto brick itself. What is in the code protecting it from the wrath of God //Louie likes Texas barbecue ribs. Possible treat? //DO NOT FEED THEM WHOLE RIBS. COOKED BONES BAD. //SINCE WHEN WAS THIS VARIABLE A STRING??? IT WAS AN INT 5 LINES AGO //Help the hopeless lesbians get together. //Would Harley and Ivy dating make Harley my mom or Ivy my big sister? Both???

His eyes skimmed the retrieved comments, laughing at a few. It seems that Bane, Poison Ivy, and Harley Quinn were the most common subjects of the notes, though a few mentioning the Iceberg lounge asking what non-alchoholic drink you’d like added, or Riddler offering you another puzzle to keep your mind active. Even Joker was mentioned, though it seemed mostly transactional.

It was strange seeing you in this light. You seemed to have a lot of spice in you, but a heart made of gold. You were definitely surprised whenever one othe villains offered to take you on some trip to amusement parks, regular parks, even just willingly watching anime with you. It was odd to see. Surely someone at the house did those things with you? He didn’t but he was extremely busy with school and vigilantism. Jason was legally dead, so surely he had all the time in the world.

“How was I supposed to relate to them? They’re what, 12 and into shit like that one with the cat looking dog thing and the robot girl. I have shit to do. Y’know, managing Crime Alley?”

Well, Dick had come over to hang out plenty of times. Surely he’d spent at least a few hours with you every now and then? “I have an entire team and criminals to manage of in another city, Damian. I don’t have as much time as you think to do whatever it was with them they’d wanted to do”

Maybe Tim? “I have college and stuff, Damian. And I don’t have the energy to put into hanging around them. I’d probably just be sleeping most of the time.

Bruce? “I have to manage you, Gotham, and the Justice League, Damian. I barely have time for myself.”

… Alfred? “I tried, Master Damian. However I’m constantly pulled thin between so many tasks. Besides, all you have is school most days, and you’ve had summer vacations and weekends. Shouldn’t you’ve had plenty of time to spend with your younger sibling?”

… He did have the most time outside of vigilantism. And it took him a week to realize you were missing.

You had to realize that they were under extreme stress though, right?He couldn’t spend all his free time with you. He had his own friends to hang out with. How were you two even supposed to relate?

One day at dinner, the thoughts were thrashing in his head, slamming against soft tissue and tearing through brain matter. He aimlessly poked at the food on his plate.

“You alright, replacement?” Jason asked, pausing in his extremely rare dinners with everyone else. Alfred had promised him a tray of fudge to take home this time around, and nobody made fudge quite as good as he did.

“… They were gone for two weeks.”

Everyone stopped eating as he continued.

“Two weeks. Two full weeks before they showed up at that fight. Did anyone here even know? I only noticed after a week and assumed they were just holed up in their room with a class assignment or something.” He was rambling. Everyone was quiet and looking at each other. How did it manage to slip past everyone? They were detectives, for Christ’s sake.

They were your family.

—

Dinner ended with guilt wrapping around their throats and pulling.

Eventually, all of them found themselves in your room. It had been emptied, but showed no signs of struggle. All the small items, the comforter, and your clothes were gone. But what was taken left something behind. Copies of photos of you winning state level competitions, letters requesting your attendance at seminars, photos of gold medals and blue ribbons spread across the floor. Most damning of all was the most recent photo. A certificate by some big time tech company being handed to you. Edward Nashton stood behind you, a firm, reassuring hand on your shoulder.

When had this happened? They never remembered hearing of something like this. A news clipping on the back told them it was maybe a week before you left.

“The Wayne prodigy stated that their family had more important things to see to than such an occasion. I can’t imagine something more important that either of my kids being recognized by a multi-million dollar tech company! I remember postponing an anniversary with my husband to celebrate our child placing second in the science fair. But I guess that’s just the Waynes for you!”

That’s just the Waynes to you.

But it’s ok. He can make it better. He can be a good big brother. He can spend time watching anime with you and decorating your room with lace and fairy lights and go makeup shopping with you. You just need to come home. Now.

---------------- Taglist! Ask to be added!

@jjsmeowthie , @jsprien213 , @ladyrosemone

[fuckyeahisawthat]

Controversial opinion among Dune book fans maybe, but I loved the changes they made to Chani's character. Making her a fedaykin who is already an experienced fighter before Paul arrives was a brilliant choice. Dune Part Two is a war movie, and this puts her at the center of the action, side by side with Paul, and gives her a much more active role than she has in the book.

We got a hint of where things were going in the beginning of Dune Part One. The first thing we ever know about movie Chani is that she's a fighter. She serves as a voice for the Fremen, telling us the story of their struggle from her point of view. I wrote here about the difference this change makes compared to other adaptations of Dune, what a perspective shift it is to have the world of Arrakis introduced not by an outsider, describing it as a dangerous but valuable colonial prize, but by one of its native inhabitants, who tells us before all else that it's beautiful, her home that she's fighting to liberate. I am so, so glad that the second movie followed up on this characterization.

I never found Chani and Paul's love story in the book particularly convincing, because why would this woman, who already has a prominent and respected place in Fremen society, even give the time of day to her deposed would-be colonizer, let alone fall in love and have children with him? Without a compelling reason for Chani to love Paul, she ends up feeling like a prize to be won, and "indigenous culture personified as a woman to be wooed (or conquered) by the colonizing man" is a trope we've seen and don't need to repeat.

But as soon as you tell me it's a barricade romance I get it. Cool cool cool, I know exactly what this relationship is now and it makes sense. Movie Chani doesn't respect or even particularly like Paul when she first meets him, and she doesn't think he's the fulfillment of any prophecy. She comes to respect him, and eventually love him, through his actions. He's brave--sometimes recklessly so. He fights well. He's willing to stick his neck out on the front lines with the other Fremen fighters. He can (after a little help) hack surviving in the harsh desert environment. He's not too proud to learn from others. He seems to genuinely want to be her equal in a common political struggle. All these qualities make sense as things she values.

Fighting side by side as equals is just about the only way I can see movie Chani falling for Paul. And it fits perfectly with the film's pattern of reversals that Paul's capacity for violence would initially be one of the things Chani likes about him, only for her to be repelled later when she sees what he becomes.

And as for Paul, well, he's had people deferring to him his entire life. Someone who doesn't take any shit from him is probably refreshing. He seems to like people (Duncan, Gurney) who challenge him and engage in a little friendly teasing--and aren't afraid to go a few rounds in the sparring ring.

It's easy to speedrun a romance when you're spending all your time together in mortal danger fighting for a shared political cause. Especially if you then start winning in a war your people have been fighting for decades. Are you kidding me? That is the perfect environment for intense battle camaraderie to turn into romantic love, and lust.

It makes sense that this version of Chani never believes Paul is any kind of messiah. Of course a character like movie Chani wouldn't believe in or trust some outside savior to liberate them. She's been working to liberate her own people for years. The more Paul invokes the messianic myth, the more he starts sounding once again like someone who plans to rule over them, and the more uncomfortable Chani becomes. In this way she becomes a foil to Jessica, the two of them representing the choices Paul is pulled between. It's a great way of externalizing the political and philosophical debates that often happen within characters' heads in the book.

And of course this version of Chani would leave Paul at the end of the film. It's not just the personal, emotional betrayal--although that stings. What common cause does she have with someone who just declared himself emperor and is sending her own people off in a war of conquest against others? Given the important role she plays in Dune Messiah, I am super curious to see how they get her back into the story, but girl was so valid for being willing to just gtfo. Given that she has the last shot of the whole movie, I'm sure she'll be back somehow, and I can't wait to see what they do with her character in any future installments.

[wilwheaton]

America’s post–World War II university system was the envy of the world, driving innovation and medical and scientific research that made the U.S. economy boom and raised standards of living around the world. But the idea that the modern government imposed the will of what Ronald Reagan called “a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital” on the laws of God and the natural laws of the United States was a powerful tool to undermine the modern government. In a 1971 memorandum for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, lawyer Lewis F. Powell Jr. wrote that “the American economic system,” which he defined as the “free enterprise system,” “capitalism,” and “the profit system,” “is under broad attack.” Powell identified college campuses as the center of this attack and called for setting up right-wing think tanks and speakers’ series to advance the interests of business, restoring what he called “balance” to textbooks, and for pressure on colleges to appoint right-wing faculty members, all in the name of “strengthening of both academic freedom on the campus and of the values which have made America the most productive of all societies.” As Republicans embraced economic individualism and religion, they also embraced anti-intellectualism. Their version was not unlike that of the early colonists, in which rural Americans, especially those in the West, claimed their evangelical religion made them more worthy than the urban Americans in the East who far outnumbered them. When Republican presidential candidate John McCain tapped evangelical Alaska governor Sarah Palin to be his running mate in 2008, he acknowledged the growing power of that demographic.

 Heather Cox Richardson

[back-and-totheleft]

Director Oliver Stone leads lecture on impacts of Vietnam War 50 years later

During the Vietnam War, USS Midway’s below-deck hangar quartered iconic fighter jets like F-4 Phantoms and F-8 Crusaders. These days, the space is a showroom for the USS Midway Museum’s restored planes, helicopters, and flight simulators that help tell the story of the United States military’s proud tradition of aviation innovation.

There is also space carved out of the vast hangar for special events. Last Thursday, San Diego State University’s Center for War and Society and the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft hosted renowned American film director Oliver Stone to share a different story about our country's military history.

“Vietnam at 50: Documenting the Legacies of America’s Forever Wars,” the title of Thursday’s talk by Stone, examined how the Vietnam War, and other wars before and after, shaped foreign policy and American society, and set the tone for so-called “forever wars” the U.S. has found itself involved in since the end of Vietnam.

Academy Award-winning film director and screenwriter Oliver Stone leads the "Vietnam at 50: Documenting the Legacies of America’s Forever Wars" lecture aboard USS Midway on Nov. 14, 2024Open the image full screen. Academy Award-winning film director and screenwriter Oliver Stone leads the "Vietnam at 50: Documenting the Legacies of America’s Forever Wars" lecture aboard USS Midway on Nov. 14, 2024. (SDSU) Guided by questions from Gregory Daddis, director of the Center for War and Society and USS Midway Chair in Modern U.S. Military History, Stone began the talk with details of his early life, growing up a son to an Army Lieutenant Colonel who served on President Eisenhower’s staff in Paris, France and post-occupation Berlin, Germany during World War II, and how his father’s anti-communism stance influenced his own ideology.

“As the war ended and the U.S. became more conscious of the so-called Russian threat … He joined the band because I guess that’s one way to get ahead,” Stone said.

It wasn’t fear, so much, that pushed Stone to enlist in the Army during Vietnam. He talked about how he spent a year in South Vietnam as a teacher and left the country with more questions than answers.

“I didn’t feel like my education was complete. I was still confused about what was going on because I didn’t understand all of the politics … I went back because I didn’t feel that I knew enough. I didn’t want to be a fraud,” Stone recounted. “I felt like I had to go to this war to understand it. I had to go back. I had already seen a bit of it from the fringes, but I went right into the heart of it in ‘67.”

He also briefly discussed a period of several years following his return from war during which he struggled with, and eventually overcame, various mental health challenges, and how he settled on film school.

“You can get a college degree from watching movies? Why not?” Stone quipped.

Stone went on to direct a trilogy of Vietnam War-focused films that address the brutality and politics of the conflict, starting with “Platoon” in 1986. The film was based, in part, on Stone’s own experience on the frontlines, for which he was awarded a Bronze Star for valor. The film won four Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director.

“Born on the Fourth of July” (1989) is based on the autobiography of Ron Kovic by the same title. Stone again won the Academy Award for Best Director.

The last film of the trio was “Heaven & Earth” (1993), based on the memoirs “When Heaven and Earth Changed Places” and “Child of War, Woman of Peace” by Vietnamese-American writer Le Ly Hayslip, who was in attendance Thursday on USS Midway.

“No film is going to change people if they don’t want to be changed. A lot of people saw that movie and signed up. A lot of them went to the Iraq War … You can’t say that [it’s anti-war]. You can just say, ‘Here it is,’” he said.

Throughout the lecture, Stone spoke about the nation’s military-industrial complex and how it evolved and influenced U.S. action in different conflicts spanning the 20th century, and the aftermath of those conflicts on foreign policy.

One of Daddis’ final questions for Stone was about legacies, and what the most important legacy of the Vietnam War was.

“Obviously nothing. Nobody paid attention and we keep going back to war. We’ve made one mistake after another in foreign affairs. We’re not a very smart country diplomatically. Had we been cooler, we could’ve gotten along with everybody in this world, with one or two exceptions. There’s no reason why we can’t be partners with Russia and with China, and we could have economic competition. We don’t need a war,” Stone said.

“We as a nation continue to wrestle with the legacies of our long and divisive war in Vietnam, even 50 years on,” Daddis said. “So to have one of America's foremost film directors share his thoughts on that war with our students and community is truly special. It's vital for us to consider how popular culture and film shape our conceptions of war and of the militarized foreign policies we undertake. And because Stone is both a veteran and a director, he brings a unique view to how Americans consume stories about wars and the soldiers who fought in them.”

Stone’s lecture was the fourth in the Center for War and Society’s ongoing J. Fred and Susan Oliver Speaker Series. The lectures are intended to foster informed dialogue around the impact of a militarized U.S. foreign policy on society. Student involvement is a key to the sponsorship. Last Thursday, nearly 25 SDSU students attended the lecture alongside scholars, guests, guests and military-affiliated organizations.

This year’s lecture event was co-sponsored by the Quincy Institute, the Washington, D.C. thinktank whose mission is to “promote ideas that move U.S. foreign policy away from endless war and toward vigorous diplomacy in the pursuit of international peace.”

-Rafael Avitabile, "Director Oliver Stone leads lecture on impacts of Vietnam War 50 years later," San Diego State University, Nov 19 2024

[dre759]

I listened in amazement to the story of how the Soviet Union had solved the problems of economic inequality among the various nationalities in a period of 20 years. This accomplishment was all the more breathtaking in view of the fact that many of these nationalities had been nomadic tribes which had not even reached the feudal stage of social development. Many had no written language and lived at a social level characteristic of about 1000 A.D. The professors were somewhat embarrassed that it had taken so long to achieve these results. But, thought I, if within 20 years after the establishment of a socialist America, [African-Americans ]can erase the ill effects of 300 years of persecution and oppression, I, for one, would be highly satisfied. The Soviet achievement was all the more remarkable because it was accomplished during a period which included counter-revolution, civil war and World War II. Furthermore, during these years the Soviet Union had to depend entirely on its own resources.

…

Soviet successes in promoting economic equality of different peoples have been accompanied by achievements of equal magnitude in the sphere of education. Of these, Professor G. Glezerman writes: "An educational newspaper estimated in 1906 that it would take at least 4,600 years to wipe out illiteracy among the Central Asian peoples. According to the most optimistic estimate, it said, the Tajiks, if they survived as a people, could expect to be literate in the year 6500. The Soviet State, however, wiped out illiteracy in the Central Asian Republics in two decades."

…

Before the revolution Bashkira's 198 schools were run entirely by priests. Today the Republic has 5,000 elementary and secondary schools, 60 specialized secondary schools, seven colleges and a university. One out of every four inhabitants is engaged in some form of study. Bashkira has 20 research institutes. Employed in its educational and research establishments are 158,000 specialists, including 54 holding the degree of doctor of science and 777 candidates of science. Before the revolution Bashkira did not even have an alphabet or literary language of its own. Today it publishes about 500 books annually, in a total printing of 3,000,000 copies. It has seven professional theaters, 3,000 cultural recreation centers and 2,000 libraries.

…

Soviet society is not perfect. Old habits are not easily changed; and, even after many years of Soviet power, many ideological problems remain. But only a utopian dreamer or a peddler of dishonest ideas would attempt to blow up minor defects out of all proportion to their place in the totality.

Whatever ideological problems in regard to racial or national chauvinism the Communist Party and the Soviet government have yet to overcome, the central fact is that the Soviet people have shown the world that racism is not inherent in man. They have shown that once the exploiting classes are removed from power, once exploitation is abolished, the various races of mankind can live in peace.

Ghetto Rebellion To Black Liberation by Claude M. Lightfoot (Pages.146-147, 149, 151)

[fadingtimetravelqueen]

Honoring the Heroes of D-Day: Preserving the Legacy of World War II Veterans

As we commemorate the 79th anniversary of the D-Day landings, it is essential to reflect upon the profound impact of this momentous event in world history(more)

[srslylini]

When I read the text and it said "At the center is Piltover" I genuinely knew everything I had to know about what happened in season 2.

And then he goes and talks about Zaun and the way it's portrayed? What.

"A society of thieves, smugglers and makeshift svengalis"?

The way this immediately tells us all we need to know about his views in this kind of social conflict. Who is the reason Zaun has no other choice, Linke? Why can't they do anything but steal? Why can't they live like the rich people in Piltover, Linke?

It's almost like the people who are rich and privileged, looking down on those who have no other choice, is EXACTLY the problem????

I thought they understood that rich people making themselves feel better, for example by calling (poor) people savages, is not actually the right thing.

In season 1, by the way, they showed the council doing crimes themselves and STILL making themselves feel better than those they deem less. If you remember it, they showed Jayce who was starting to get hated because he stopped the others from doing illegal shit. If you remember, they showed the council corrupting each others votes and fucking doing crimes.

I thought, and now this is totally on me, they fully understood that the privileged people had more than double the amount of blood money than those they deem "bad". I thought they also understood that the privileged people just have all the water in the world to wash the blood off and continue to act as if nothing ever happened.

So that's on me.

"The people of Piltover need to decide: Take back control of its city's underground by violent force and risk a civil war, or let Zauns dangerous evolutionary advances go their way"

eye twitching

I'm not even going there because what the FUCK. Dangerous? Evolutionary? Advances?

But do you know what the writers themself say with this? That they agree with Caitlyn.

They agree with Caitlyn on all, that also means they agree that there is "good ones in Zaun I guess", this means the first 3 episodes weren't actually setting anything up and that also means

"Vi is one of the good ones".

[doyoulikethissong-poll]

M.I.A. - Paper Planes 2008

"Paper Planes" is a song by British hip hop artist M.I.A. It was released on 11 February 2008 as the third single from her second studio album, Kala (2007). It samples English rockband the Clash's 1982 song "Straight to Hell", leading to its members being credited as co-writers. A downtempo alternative hip hop, pop track combining African folk music elements, the song has a less dance-oriented sound compared to other songs on the album. Its lyrics, inspired by M.I.A.'s own problems obtaining a visa to work in the USA, satirise American perceptions of immigrants from war-torn countries, and said that the issue was probably "them thinking that I might to [sic] fly a plane into the Trade Center".

M.I.A. had wanted to work with American producer Timbaland for the album Kala, but her application for a long-term US work visa was rejected. This was allegedly due to her family's connection to the Tamil guerrillas, commonly known as the Tamil Tigers, a claim M.I.A. denied. Her visa problems were also attributed to her criticism of the Sri Lankan government's discrimination and alleged atrocities committed against the Tamils, with whom M.I.A. shares an ethnic and cultural heritage. She expressed this on her politicised debut album Arular. The unexpected success of "Paper Planes" paralleled M.I.A.'s condemnations of the Sri Lankan government's war crimes against the Tamils, generating accusations that she supported terrorism.

The song received widespread acclaim from contemporary critics, who complimented its musical direction and the subversive, unconventional subject matter. It won awards from the Canadian Independent Music Awards and the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), and earned a Grammy nomination for Record of the Year. The song has received praise in publications such as NME, Pitchfork and Rolling Stone, each naming it among either the best songs of the 2000s decade or of all time. The review aggregator Acclaimed Music reports it as the second-most acclaimed song of the 21st century.

"Paper Planes" was used in the theatrical trailer for the 2008 stoner comedy Pineapple Express, directed by David Gordon Green, which catapulted the song to mainstream success in the US. "Paper Planes" and the DFA remix appear on the soundtrack to Danny Boyle's drama Slumdog Millionaire, released in 2008. The video game Far Cry 3 (2012) begins with "Paper Planes" used in the opening cinematic sequence.

"Paper Planes" received a total of 68,9% yes votes!

[ouroborosmoons]

Hamas says will not engage in truce talks unless Israel halts 'hunger war' on Gaza

Basem Naim, a Hamas political bureau member and former Gaza health minister, told AFP there is “no sense in engaging in talks or considering new ceasefire proposals as long as the hunger war and extermination war continue in the Gaza Strip.”

Naim urged the international community to pressure the Israeli regime to end the "crimes of hunger, thirst, and killings.”

His remarks came hours after Israel threatened that it would launch an intensified offensive on Gaza, which, according to Tel Aviv, would entail “the conquest of the Gaza Strip and the holding of the territories.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that the new campaign will involve Israeli forces holding on to the seized populated territory and significant displacement of the population.

Nearly all of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million has been displaced, often multiple times, since the regime launched its genocidal war on the territory in October 2023.

The humanitarian situation in the besieged territory has grown increasingly dire since Israel blocked the entry of medical, fuel, and food supplies into Gaza in mid-March when it broke a two-month ceasefire agreement.

The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS) warned this week that food supplies have now “completely run out” in both local markets and humanitarian distribution centers in Gaza.

“The population is once again at extreme risk of famine,” the PRCS said. “There is an inability to meet even the minimum daily needs of over a million displaced people.”

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) also reiterated the need for the immediate entry of humanitarian aid and warned Israel against “politicization” of the aid.

Indirect talks—brokered by Qatar and Egypt— have continued since Israel broke the ceasefire, but yielded no results.

Qatar, a key mediator in Gaza truce talks, said Tuesday that it was still pursuing efforts for a Gaza ceasefire even though Hamas said it wasn’t interested in further talks.

“Our efforts remain ongoing despite the difficulty of the situation and the continuing catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip,” said foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari.

He said talks were focused on getting aid into Gaza and “the necessity to stop weaponizing aid, which Israel has been doing... since the first day of this war.”

PressTV