#co-operative housing society

[advocatechenoyceil]

Property Transfer through Nomination in Housing Societies in West Bengal

Property transfer through nomination in housing societies is a crucial mechanism for ensuring the smooth transfer of property rights upon the death of a member. Continue reading Property Transfer through Nomination in Housing Societies in West Bengal

[jasslegal]

Online Legal Query offers expert services for housing societies, ensuring compliance with laws and regulations. Our team provides legal guidance on society formation, dispute resolution, member agreements, and more, helping you manage your housing society effectively and legally. Get professional support tailored to your society's needs.

[lua-magic]

Tenth lord and your professional life

Tenth house is house of karma and duty, tenth house says alot about the attitude that you will carry towards your work.

While, tenth lord wherever, it sits, that house will bring you professional success.

Let me be clear here, I am mentioning about "Vedic astrology " and morden era has got many jobs, and streams so in my blog I can't specifically tell which stream you can go or opt, because that also depends on your position of your Sun, Saturn and Venus in your chart.

Here, I will discuss how you can attract professional success and attract right career for yourself, so that you will get brief idea how astrology can help you in your professional life as well.

Tenth lord in first house 🏠

First house is you, so your professional success depends on you and your personality, more you work on your personality more successful you become.

Your professional life in your hands, and Only you control it.

Tenth lord in second house 🏠

Second house is of house of finance, so either you can work in financial sector or you can work with your family as well.

Second house is also of communication, so communication would play an important role in professional success.

Tenth lord in third house 🏠

Third house is house of efforts and courage, more efforts you would put in your professional life, more successful you would get

Third House is also of skills, so work on your skills development.

It also shows you can also work with your siblings.

Third house is also of travelling, so choose job that requires traveling.

Tenth lord in fourth house.

Fourth house is your comfort, and also your emotions, such natives can become good psychologists, therapist, psychiatry who understands mind and emotions.

Fourth house is also Home, so either you can work from home, or do some work related to home like real estate, interior decorator.

Tenth lord in fifth house 🏠

Such natives are good in teaching children, so they can go in teaching and education sector.

Fifth house is also of children, so native could work for children.

Fifth house is also of intellect, so such natives are intellectuals and enjoys work that requires intelligence.

Tenth lord in sixth house

Sixth house is of debt, and disease, and eniemies such natives could earn from other's problems, like they could become doctor, healer, lawyer, account.

Virgo is the sign of problem solving, such natives are great problem solver and enjoys work that requires problems solving abilities.

Tenth lord in seventh house 🏠

Seventh house is of partnership, such natives should always work in partnership, or involve your life partner also in your work.

Seventh house is also of public dealings, so such natives are great in dealing with public,.

Tenth lord in eight house 🏠

Eighth house is of secrets, so native can work in sectors that requires secrecy, like spy, Secret services.

Eighth house is also of research, so that can take up research oriented job.

Eighth house is also of occult and astrology

Eighth house also deals with other' s Money, so native can go in investment banking, insurance, banking.

Tenth lord in ninth house 🏠

Ninth house is of divine blessings, so your work has always divine blessings and luck.

Ninth house is of counseling and guidance, so native can work as an counsellor or as a coach.

Tenth lord in tenth house 🏠

Extremely comfortable position for tenth lord in its own house 🏠, such natives can take up any job role that they desire, they would do well in that.

Tenth lord in eleventh house 🏠

Eleventh house is of gains, native would gain alot from his work life

Eleventh house is also your social circle, so you can work with group of people like "co-operative society" . Eleventh house is also of social media and elder siblings so native can work in social media or with elder siblings..

Tenth lord in twelfth house 🏠

It is bit tricky placement, because twelfth House is of looses and transformations, so native could experience, lot of transformations in his/her professional life.

Twelfth house is also of devotion and giving, so you have to be devoted to your professional life without expectations.

Twelfth house is also of spirituality and foreign land, so you can work in spirituality or settle far from your motherland.

If tenth house has Rahu, then you can choose job profile that are unconventional, that no one in your family has done it.

Rahu is your vision, so keep your vision clear and big

If tenth house has ketu, then you need to go in job or service that requires helping others because ketu is liberation, and your job is to liberate people from their pain or problems

Ketu is intent so keep your intentions clear.

If your tenth house has, sun, then you are born leader and you will show way or direction to others..

If your tenth house has Moon, then you could good in cooking or do work related to mind , emotions and psychology .

If your tenth house has Mercury, Mercury is a business man, so you can go in business, or work related to documents, education field is also good for you.

If tenth house has Venus then work related to cosmetics, beauty and luxury would be good for you

If tenth house has Mars, then you have lot of Martian energy within you, and Mars is exalted in tenth house, so any work is good for you, you are good multi-tasker and a logical person, so any field that requires logic like engineering will good, Mars is also land, so land related jobs are also good, Mars is also security so Mars makes good police, army and security .

Jupiter in tenth house makes great counsllor and guide.

Jupiter is also spirituality and religion, so such person can go in spirituality as well

Saturn in tenth house, is exalted and its own sign, Saturn is planet that loves to serve others, so here you need to take your job as a service, and a way to serve others, even when you are at high position, don't act like boss and command others infact do all the work by yourself, because Saturn gets satisfied only when people below them are happy..

[punkpandapatrixk]

Full Sturgeon Moon in Aquarius ♦︎ Moon Magick Pick A Card

This year’s Full Sturgeon Moon in Aquarius is also a rare blue moon that occurred on 19 August (sorry this PAC is so late aaagh!!!). Following an insane influx of aenergy during the Lion’s Gate, the theme surrounding this blue moon is Perseverance. This period is all about amassing resources and gathering momentum.

I’ve a feeling this year’s autumn (Libra, Scorpio, Sagittarius) season is going to be massive and possibly even life-changing for the spiritually awakened ones ^^ You’ve got to be in the receiver mode of miracles and rare opportunities to really notice! Practically all the aenergies now are leading us to a greater sense of freedom to do what we want when we want.

Also, there’s this sense of…a mandate…? That should push Humanity towards liberating themselves from the enslavement of automation and AI. See, technology isn’t necessarily evil, right? Think about how great it is to have the kind of connectivity we have today; how amazing information dissemination has become in this Internet era.

Technology, just like currency, is impartial. In the end it all boils down to how you’re entertaining the evil agendas of evil people using tech for evil purposes. Become aware of your own habits and inclinations if you don’t want to be a fool-tool of the raggedy corporations. In essence, this Full Moon’s Aquarius aenergy is saying: ‘Use tech to your advantage instead of becoming a slave to it.'

‘Don’t be tech’s little bitch; make it your biotch.’

High time you reclaimed your divine birthright to co-create high-quality Reality instead of getting enslaved by tech that seeks to ‘map you out’. This the era you say to yourself: ‘I’m engineering a more prosperous Reality with my clear conscience.’

GNOSIS: The Dark Rise of Brain Rot Content by Moon

deck-bottom: XV The Devil Rx, Gold Astrologer (Simon Forman), Priestess of Ritual

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Pile 1 – Heart Filled with Sweet Colours

t r a n s f o r m a t i o n – Page of Cups

I see that you’ve transmuted very many negative aenergies within yourself, most of all, negative emotions as well as sensations in your body. Seems you were guided to do this by your Higher Self and team of Spirit Guides after having experienced an extreme level of suffering—could be emotionally or physically or both. When you arrived at the most extreme end of what you were struggling with, you couldn’t have gone any other way but to turn your situation around by reclaiming control over your own thoughts and emotions, which effectively shifted your directions and decision making.

There’s a really good quote that says this: ‘When a situation is good, enjoy it. When a situation is bad, transform it. When the situation can’t be transformed, transform yourself.’ You had to learn quite a bit and finally chose to do the last. You’ve known more; now you’re wiser; but wise people are sometimes very pure and childlike. And that’s the beautiful paradox of ‘growing up’ with compassion in your heart. You transformed yourself to be kinder and more loving towards yourself and the crazy-ass situations you found yourself in; now, it’s just easier to extend that love and compassion to the world outside of yourself~♪

t r a n s g r e s s i o n – 4 of Swords Rx

Many of you tuning into this Pile most likely have been in isolation mode for quite a while. The aenergy of this FM in Aquarius, namely the ruler of the 11th House of networking, is pushing you towards becoming social again. And this time everything is going to be (or has been) different. You’ll see that not only are the people in your physical Reality a lot nicer and more compassionate (like you’ve shifted timelines) but you’re also more capable of handling the low-vibing monsters that you may sometimes still have to interact with, with more patience yourself XD

Basically, you’re learning or have learnt to operate in society with more ‘tact’ now. You’ve spent a great deal of time learning to accept a more practical conception of ‘good and evil’ in the world. But to you, good and evil isn’t just black or white; you’re a person who’s come to understand the many colours of good and evil when applied in many different situations. This is wisdom, a gift, that not many have yet to grasp. Your ‘return’ to society is for you to expand this consciousness further and wider!

t r a n s c e n d e n c e – 10 of Wands

The vibe of your ‘return’ to society at large is reminiscent of the Gautama Buddha LMAO He returned to his hometown/home and became a teacher for those who weren’t yet awakened to the higher level of consciousness he had worked so hard to attain! So yeah, a ‘modern priest’ aenergy surrounds you very strongly here; although I find that the majority of you tuning into this Pile are actually quite cute XD Idk why I’m getting a strong ‘gamer girl’ vibe from you. You could also possess a strong sense of aesthetic of your own.

You’re a highly spiritually advanced being but in a cute package, is what I’m getting LMAO At this point in time, your communication skills are getting polished and refined, far beyond what you’re already capable of doing. You may want to look where your Mercury is located in your natal chart, what aspects it makes, and check out what you have in your 3rd House, as well as check out what House is ruled by Gemini ^^ The insight will empower you further at this point in time!

full moon self-care🔻🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘

Red Alchemist (John Dee) & Priestess of Intuition

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Pile 2 – Solid to Liquid, Calmly

t r a n s f o r m a t i o n – Knight of Pentacles

Hold up! You’re about to jettison down a new portal of adventure, pretty soon but before that, hold up; planning and a readiness of the mind is very necessary at this moment. This Moon Reading is very tardy so I’m going to be reading an aenergy that’s pretty much already transpired by the time you’re reading this XD More to come for you in the next FM in Pisces PAC regarding this aenergy, OK? But for the most part, I’m sensing that you’re still in preparation mode for something big that’s just around the corner for you.

Just like the liquid in the glass in the pic you’re attracted to, there’s something solid that’s turning to liquid, but slowly and naturally. You’re not being burnt or heated up to melt…you know what I mean? Because melting solid to liquid can be a painful experience for peeps who’ve been through a lot, right? The Universe is gracefully granting you a peaceful time to manifest your Life Purpose in the most natural and pleasant way just yet!

t r a n s g r e s s i o n – 5 of Pentacles Rx

So, enjoy this peaceful time. I sense that it’s possible that a lot of you tuning into this Pile have been SO used to chaos and drama—so used to bubbling madly at 110C—that now you don’t know how to just…be…when no stress, no drama is going on. It could be that you were a dramatic person before. Maybe you were toxic. Or maybe you couldn’t help but be that way because you were simply surrounded by toxic betches! But that’s all in the past, OK?

If you look around and become aware of where you are now, it becomes super clear how far you’ve carried yourself away from all of that low-vibrating Reality ^^v Understand that you’re ‘weaning off’ drama, chaos and other types of ‘addictions’ caused by high-level toxicity in your old Reality. I’m getting that this is the prime time to study as much as possible about ‘surviving narcissistic abuse’ to give you not only knowledge but also validation :D

t r a n s c e n d e n c e – Knight of Cups

Other than just ‘surviving’ trauma, if that part doesn’t necessarily ring true for you, there’s also this sense of just using this peaceful time to readjust yourself to a more spiritually attuned Life. Perhaps some of you are getting into crystals, meditation, healing audio tracks, subliminals and reiki. Maybe there are other ‘spiritual’ hobbies and practices beyond these ones hahah You’ll know if you resonate~ I’m being told that this Aquarius FM really does bring that sense of balance between ‘spiritual practices’ and ‘modern technological living’ for you.

Maybe you’re meant to know more about this (especially if you identify as a Starseed) but a lot of the human qualities that we classify as ‘positive mental states’ are…technology. Things like harmony, peacefulness, positive mindsets, intelligence…all of these are practically technology. There are ways we can trigger such ‘states of mind/being’ by means of…technology. So yeah…Imma leave you with that for now XD

full moon self-care🔻🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘

Green Magus (John Dee) & Priestess of Energy

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Pile 3 – Integrity Just Like Jelly

t r a n s f o r m a t i o n – Page of Pentacles

The other two Piles are very focused on the idea of rest and self-care, but as per usual, Pile 3 is always about going places and learning shit LMAO In this regard, if you’re not physically going places, this is indicating your mind going places through meditation, daydreaming, movie-watching, or documentary-binging. You know what I mean~ This the period you’re enriching your inner world through any means available to you at this moment.

Whilst doing this, don’t forget your water intake, OK? Vitamins and real foods are crucial for you at this moment. Your cells are digesting a lot of Light. Remember that Light is INFORMATION. That’s why Darkness is the absence of information, right? Light is Information; when Information is digested well it becomes Knowledge; when Knowledge is applied well it becomes Wisdom; when Wisdom is put to the service of all it becomes En-light-enment~

t r a n s g r e s s i o n – 7 of Pentacles

Prospering towards wisdom, I’m seeing that you’re currently being taught to be perfectly OK with things taking their sweet time to unfold! If this is the Pile you resonate with the most, you’re literally on the precipice of your grandest Life Purpose yet! Your Life Purpose is big, you know that, right? It could possibly even change the world or perhaps you resonate with having a Life Purpose that revolves around the creation of a Prototype what will alter the way Humans think or do shit~

This either shares a resemblance to Nikola Tesla or Adolf Hitler. This either takes on the archetype of Sadhguru or Teddy Bundy~ Your take LMAO Either way, you’re meant to disrupt your society and scatter it all! But that’s the thing, right? If you’re gonna be a social menace that’s in the service of Light instead of Dark, you’ve gotta learn to keep your INTEGRITY. Because… what was that again? Absolute power absolutely corrupts?

t r a n s c e n d e n c e – King of Swords

‘Nothing discloses real character like the use of power. It is easy for the weak to be gentle. Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish to know what a man really is, give him power. This is the supreme test.’ – Robert Ingersoll

‘It is from weakness that people reach for dictators and concentrated government power. Only the strong can be free. And only the productive can be strong.’ – Wendell Willkie

‘To have intelligence there must be freedom, and you cannot be free if you are constantly being urged to become like some hero, for then the hero is important and not you.’ – Jiddu Krishnamurti

Do you understand your role in the next chapter of your ARC? Not to be some kind of a narcissistic wielder of power but to be a gentle-albeit-passionate reminder for the people, that only they can save themselves from this pathetically enslaved existence of theirs caused by a lack of Integrity.

Got no integrity? Got no intelligence? Go succumb to AI already -__-;

full moon self-care🔻🌒🌓🌔🌕🌖🌗🌘

Gold Astronomer (John Dee) & Priestess of Integrity

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[astrosky33]

HOUSE MEANINGS IN ASTROLOGY

[READ] People often question why there’s so many meanings for each planet/house and the reason is so that you can learn more than just one thing about yourself through each placement. Otherwise astrology would be very vague and boring. These are all meanings that I’ve learned from my astrology classes at Kepler College

1ST HOUSE: identity/self, outward personality traits, outlook on life/approach to life, appearance, physical body, beauty, confidence, beginnings, how you initiate/ambition, your mannerisms, your outward behavior, physical fights, your presence, individuality, and passion

2ND HOUSE: money/finances (how we spend it, store it, and manage it), work, short term jobs, your work ethic, material possessions, self worth, values, emotional security, stability, financial security, how you meet financial obligations, your singing voice, giving/receiving, and resources (both material and non material)

3RD HOUSE: communication, your speaking voice/the way you talk, your mind, the way you think/your thinking skills, your perceptions, your opinions, your conscious mind, neighbors, siblings, interests, gossip, ideas/information, mathematics, literature, transportation (only ground not flying/air), local media, social media, cell phones, phone calls, visits, social activity, publishing, early education (before college), short trips, and short journeys

4TH HOUSE: homes/houses, family/family roots, your parents (particularly the mother/motherly figure), your inner child, emotions, foundations, your childhood, heredity, tradition, self-care, places of residence, real estate, properties, femininity, and conditions in early life

5TH HOUSE: children, childlike spirit, talent, creativity, drama, risk-taking, spotlight, romance (shows short term relationships, flings, hookups, and if long term relationships then only puppy love), hobbies, pleasures, objects of affection, vacations, games, speculation, fertility, concerts, festivals, and joy

6TH HOUSE: daily routine/day to day life/daily tasks, your health/fitness/the work you do on your body, your duties, self improvement, consistency, step-siblings, your hygiene, innocence, systems, service to others, co-workers, analytical nature, diets, animals, and your pets

7TH HOUSE: long term relationships, marriage, concern for others, attraction/attractiveness, charm, conflicts, partnerships, business partners, contracts, love affairs, open enemies, close associates, lower courts, negotiations, peers, agents, equality, harmony, and sharing

8TH HOUSE: major transformation, sex, death, longevity, changes, joint/shared finances, investments, stock market, your partners resources, taxes, inheritance, reproduction, seduction, intimacy (in general not only sexual), rebirth, merging, taboos, resurrection, loans, assets, secrets, mystery, businesses, spiritual transformation, magic (especially black magic), psychology, surgery/operations, trauma, periods, and the occult

9TH HOUSE: wisdom, law/laws, beliefs, religion, philosophy, higher education (college/university), viewpoints, languages, foreign environments, in-laws (your relatives through marriage), ethics, long journeys, travel, ideologies, higher courts, media, television, interviews, cross-cultural relations, grandparents, and learning

10TH HOUSE: your legacy, your career, your public image, your status, your reputation, fame, long-term goals, worldly attainment, sense of mission, responsibilities, recognition, authority, father/fatherly figure, experts, bosses, achievements, and professional aspirations

11TH HOUSE: friends, friend groups, gains, money made from career, desires, step/half parents, step/half children, uniqueness, inventions, technology, film, social awareness, influence, manifestations, hopes and wishes for the future, ideals, humanitarianism, associates (not just close ones), groups (in general), politics, social networking, where you make your debut into society, companions, allies, science, socialization/social interaction, clubs, organizations, and parties

12TH HOUSE: healing, the hidden, karma, karmic debts, old age, sleep, mental health, solitude/isolation, dreams (the ones you have when you sleep), hidden enemies, hidden causes, illusions, secret bed pleasures, spirituality, fears, losses, endings, escapism, impersonations, closure, need for withdrawal/privacy, afterlife, limiting beliefs, subsconcious memory, subconscious mind, hypnotism, self-undoing, hidden desires, the past, delay, and restrictions

MASTERLIST

MORE BEGINNER ASTROLOGY

PLANET MEANINGS

© 𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐨𝐬𝐤𝐲 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟑 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐞𝐝

[officiallordvetinari]

Below are 10 featured Wikipedia articles. Links and descriptions are below the cut.

On February 17, 1974, U.S. Army Private First Class Robert Kenneth Preston (1953–2009) took off in a stolen Bell UH-1B Iroquois "Huey" helicopter from Tipton Field, Maryland, and landed it on the South Lawn of the White House in a significant breach of security. Preston had enlisted in the Army to become a helicopter pilot. However, he did not graduate from the helicopter training course and lost his opportunity to attain the rank of warrant officer pilot. His enlistment bound him to serve four years in the Army, and he was sent to Fort Meade as a helicopter mechanic. Preston believed this situation was unfair and later said he stole the helicopter to show his skill as a pilot.

J. R. R. Tolkien, a fantasy author and professional philologist, drew on the Old English poem Beowulf for multiple aspects of his Middle-earth legendarium, alongside other influences. He used elements such as names, monsters, and the structure of society in a heroic age. He emulated its style, creating an impression of depth and adopting an elegiac tone. Tolkien admired the way that Beowulf, written by a Christian looking back at a pagan past, just as he was, embodied a "large symbolism" without ever becoming allegorical. He worked to echo the symbolism of life's road and individual heroism in The Lord of the Rings.

The construction of the first World Trade Center complex in New York City was conceived as an urban renewal project to help revitalize Lower Manhattan spearheaded by David Rockefeller. The project was developed by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The idea for the World Trade Center arose after World War II as a way to supplement existing avenues of international commerce in the United States.

The Coterel gang (also Cotterill, fl. c. 1328 – 1333) was a 14th-century armed group that flourished in the North Midlands of England. It was led by James Coterel—after whom the gang is named—supported by his brothers Nicholas and John. It was one of several such groups that roamed across the English countryside in the late 1320s and early 1330s, a period of political upheaval with an associated increase in lawlessness in the provinces. Coterel and his immediate supporters were members of the gentry, and according to the tenets of the day were expected to assist the crown in the maintenance of law and order, rather than encourage its collapse.

Eunice Newton Foote (July 17, 1819 – September 30, 1888) was an American scientist, inventor, and women's rights campaigner. She was the first scientist to confirm that certain gases warm when exposed to sunlight, and that therefore rising carbon dioxide (CO2) levels could increase atmospheric temperature and affect climate, a phenomenon now referred to as the Greenhouse effect. Born in Connecticut, Foote was raised in New York at the center of social and political movements of her day, such as the abolition of slavery, anti-alcohol activism, and women's rights. She attended the Troy Female Seminary and the Rensselaer School from age 17–19, gaining a broad education in scientific theory and practice.

Simonie Michael (Inuktitut: ᓴᐃᒨᓂ ᒪᐃᑯᓪ;  first name also spelled Simonee, alternative surnames Michel  or E7-551; March 2, 1933 – November 15, 2008) was a Canadian politician from the eastern Northwest Territories (now Nunavut) who was the first Inuk elected to a legislature in Canada. Before becoming involved in politics, Michael worked as a carpenter and business owner, and was one of very few translators between Inuktitut and English. He became a prominent member of the Inuit co-operative housing movement and a community activist in Iqaluit, and was appointed to a series of governing bodies, including the precursor to the Iqaluit City Council.

The St. Johns River (Spanish: Río San Juan) is the longest river in the U.S. state of Florida and it is the most significant one for commercial and recreational use. At 310 miles (500 km) long, it flows north and winds through or borders twelve counties. The drop in elevation from headwaters to mouth is less than 30 feet (9 m); like most Florida waterways, the St. Johns has a very slow flow speed of 0.3 mph (0.13 m/s), and is often described as "lazy".

Warlugulong is a 1977 acrylic on canvas painting by Indigenous Australian artist Clifford Possum Tjapaltjarri. Owned for many years by the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the work was sold by art dealer Hank Ebes on 24 July 2007, setting a record price for a contemporary Indigenous Australian art work bought at auction when it was purchased by the National Gallery of Australia for A$2.4 million. The painting illustrates the story of an ancestral being called Lungkata, together with eight other dreamings associated with localities about which Clifford Possum had traditional knowledge. It exemplifies a distinctive painting style developed by Papunya Tula artists in the 1970s, and blends representation of landscape with ceremonial iconography. Art critic Benjamin Genocchio describes it as "a work of real national significance [and] one of the most important 20th-century Australian paintings".

William Samuel Sadler (June 24, 1875 – April 26, 1969) was an American surgeon, self-trained psychiatrist, and author who helped publish The Urantia Book. The book is said to have resulted from Sadler's relationship with a man through whom he believed celestial beings spoke at night. It drew a following of people who studied its teachings.

Zebras (US: /ˈziːbrəz/, UK: /ˈzɛbrəz, ˈziː-/) (subgenus Hippotigris) are African equines with distinctive black-and-white striped coats. There are three living species: Grévy's zebra (Equus grevyi), the plains zebra (E. quagga), and the mountain zebra (E. zebra). Zebras share the genus Equus with horses and asses, the three groups being the only living members of the family Equidae. Zebra stripes come in different patterns, unique to each individual. Several theories have been proposed for the function of these patterns, with most evidence supporting them as a deterrent for biting flies. Zebras inhabit eastern and southern Africa and can be found in a variety of habitats such as savannahs, grasslands, woodlands, shrublands, and mountainous areas.

[dreamofmetoday]

ASTRO BASICS #2: UNDERSTANDING WHAT THE ASCENDANT (RISING SIGN) REALLY IS

the ascendant is the window to your entire natal chart. it is the window in which the native "looks out" of to see the world and in which others "look in" to see the native.

it is the worldview, philosophy and chosen life map of the native, the ascendant is what your soul chose* for you to aid you in this lifetime so it is through the ascendant in which the natal chart operates. 

in more grounded terms this means the ascendant affects the native's entire approach to life, what they think is the correct way to live and what they think is valuable in living a fulfilling life. 

because the ascendant is our chosen life map it means the solar return ascendant is the main focus of a solar return - the sign your solar return ascendant is in shows what you will be forced to focus on throughout that year. 

you will usually have a deeper understanding or appreciation of the sign the ascendant was in when you solar return ends, having learnt the lessons you needed to. often you will also meet someone important that has their sun or moon in the same sign as your solar return ascendant that affects you in some way (even if they're only in your life for that year), or you will suddenly begin dealing a lot more with someone of that sign.

while the ascendant is complex, you can find the main themes of the ascendant simply by looking at what house the sign rules:

aries - first house: the self - assertion and expression of the self, beginnings, habits.

taurus - second house: self-worth, money, earthly pleasures (food, sex, material belongings), comfort, luxury, security, five senses, habits and work ethic.

gemini - third house: thinking, opinions and communication, theory work, siblings and close friends, community and neighbours (what's "close” to you), early education, short trips.

cancer - fourth house: where we come from, early life that shaped us (what shapes us - emotional and psychological foundations), self-care, home, family, subjective thinking, comfort zone and comfort (coziness).

leo - fifth house: joy, hobbies, creativity, romance (courtship stage), fun, games, spontaneity, sex, children, self-expression, vacations, gambling, fashion, drama and theatrics.

virgo - sixth house: service to others (needing to feel useful), being served, health and disease, fitness, pets, work habits, daily routine, organisation, analytical thinking, co-workers, work environment, self-improvement, labour, enemies, sacrifice (“selflessness” house).

libra - seventh house: one-to-one relationships, attraction and repulsion, sharing, politics, blind spot (where we are self unaware).

scorpio - eighth house: intimacy and merging (including sex), other people's resources and shared money, death and transformation (rebirth), taboo, mystery (and deception), deep emotions.

sagittarius - ninth house: experience, expansiveness, higher education, religion and philosophy (continued learning and search for meaning - the need for something bigger than one's self), travel, wisdom, ethics, cross-cultural understanding.

capricorn - tenth house: career, achievement, longterm goals, purpose, public relations, public perception and social standing, reputation (needing a "brand" - what we want to be seen as), responsibility, authority figures.

aquarius - eleventh house: collective consciousness, groups, friends (acquaintances and networking), organisations, hopes, dreams, wishes, society and social awareness, technology and internet, humanitarianism, idealism.

pisces - twelfth house: dreams, unconscious, subconscious, spirituality, secrets, sacrifice, solitude, enemies, confinements, hidden things, self-undoing, confusion, karma, deep emotions, impressionability.

i recommend checking your previous solar return ascendant and asking yourself where life kept taking you and what you learnt, seeing how it relates to you - i believe this can help give you deeper understanding of the ascendant overall, both natal and solar return.

*even if you don't believe in life before earthly life or past lives, it is good to keep this in mind when considering how the ascendant works.

[lakesbian]

okay so 2.8. overall thoughts on rachel's introduction.

rachel not wanting a fifth person to join the team is ostensibly about the money she would lose from it, but it's more importantly about the fact that, as a disabled girl deeply unwanted by society, she has absolutely no trust in people. she can tolerate brian, lisa, and alec for the sake of the security and stability, but she doesn't trust them beyond the bare minimum. a strange person being brought into her house is deeply scary. she's used to every single new person she meets being a threat, someone with motives she can't read expecting her to operate based on arbitrary rules she can't understand. and because she has been taught that the only way to keep herself safe is to hurt people before they can hurt her (everyone will always want to hurt her), her immediate reaction to taylor Being There is to sic her dogs on taylor with hopes of scaring her off & securing her environment again. rachel autism lindt <3

brian is the second person we see breaking out the not-so-repressed violence and anger in this scene. he clocks rachel in the face, he says

“I fucking hate it,” Brian growled at the girl, putting emphasis on the swear, “When you make me do that.”

and he does some yelling about God Fucking Dammit. i think the crux of brian is that he consciously fervently does not want to be like his abusive stepfather, but the only alternative he's been taught was by his father...who is, unbeknownst to brian, also abusive. he's been taught that masculinity = good + mandatory and strength = masculine. his vision for himself as a Good Man who Takes The Lead and Cares For People involves stifling his 'weak' emotions and running himself ragged. he's not even very good at repressing himself compared to the other undersiders, so he's prone to outbursts like this sometimes--where, regardless of whether or not the violence he's engaging in is rationally justifiable, it's immensely charged w/ undertones of reminding him of exactly who he wants to avoid being.

it is Fully Understandable why, as a 17yo w/ zero training in conflict deescalation, the only way he can think to solve the matter of rachel violently siccing her dogs on someone is socking her. but "i fucking hate it when you make me do that" is still eerily reminiscent of some things his abusive stepfather has likely said to him before. he doesn't Want to be like that, but he doesn't know how to let himself be anything other than that.

(this situation w/ rachel and taylor sucks for him, ftr. he was so genuinely elated that he'd Acted Normal Enough to snap up this cool addition to the team, a girl with a good power who actively thinks along the exact same rational lines as him. which is important, because he needs the undersiders to succeed so that he can care for aisha like he feels he needs to. and then rachel busts in ruins what he's viewing as this great success by attacking taylor to drive her off. brian laborns bad day. rachel lindts bad day. tayor heberts bad day. lisa wilbourns deeply stressful day. alec vasils depression slump day.)

AND we get to watch taylor be violent and angry as well. that one is very simple there's not much to say about it. she's full of violent repressed anger (it's why she imagines beating the shit out of emma & co when she's being bullied in the halls prior to meeting the undersiders again), she usually holds it back because she recognizes that it would just cause the system to fuck her over more in the long-run, and here she realizes that there's no consequence of fighting back and proceeds to whale on rachel.

(i think that the reason she's primarily violent with her own human body here instead of w/ the bugs is because her usage of the bugs is frequently a form of dissociation--and here, rather than having to dissociate her way thru a violent situation, she's finally allowed to confront it head on and fight back w/ hands and feet As Herself. sucks and traumatizing to be attacked by dogs, but cathartic to be able to fight back.)

meanwhile: lisa is presumably vividly imagining slamming her own head into a brick wall and alec (badly depressed, seen far worse) doesnt even care with all the shit he's got going on

[chainmail-butch]

Imposing fines. The peasants work out fines for such offences as irregularities revealed by the checking of accounts, past outrages against the peasants, current activities which undermine the peasant associations, violations of the ban on gambling and refusal to surrender opium pipes. This local tyrant must pay so much, that member of the evil gentry so much, the sums ranging from tens to thousands of yuan Naturally, a man who has been fined by the peasants completely loses face.

Levying contributions. The unscrupulous rich landlords are made to contribute for poor relief, for the organization of co-operatives or peasant credit societies, or for other purposes. Though milder than fines, these contributions are also a form of punishment. To avoid trouble, quite a number of landlords make voluntary contributions to the peasant associations.

Minor protests. When someone harms a peasant association by word or deed and the offence is a minor one, the peasants collect in a crowd and swarm into the offender's house to remonstrate with him. He is usually let off after writing a pledge to "cease and desist", in which he explicitly undertakes to stop defaming the peasant association in the future.

Major demonstrations. A big crowd is rallied to demonstrate against a local tyrant or one of the evil gentry who is an enemy of the association. The demonstrators eat at the offender's house, slaughtering his pigs and consuming his grain as a matter of course. Quite a few such cases have occurred. There was a case recently at Machiaho, Hsiangtan County, where a crowd of fifteen thousand peasants went to the houses of six of the evil gentry and demonstrated; the whole affair lasted four days during which more than 130 pigs were killed and eaten. After such demonstrations, the peasants usually impose fines.

-

If you want to protest go big or go home

Mao Zedong, Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunnan

[blueiscoool]

4,000-Year-Old Ceramic Drainage System Discovered in China

The people of Pingliangtai built and operated the system without any help from a central state government.

China’s Longshan period which lasted from about 2600 to 2000 BCE is best known for its sophisticated pottery shapes, but their sophisticated plumbing is getting some well-deserved attention. A team of archaeologists found the oldest known ceramic water pipes in China, demonstrating that locals were capable of major feats of engineering without a centralized state government. The findings are described in a study published August 14 in the journal Nature Water.

The newly unearthed network of ceramic water pipes and drainage ditches were found at the ancient walled city of Pingliangtai, located in what is now the Huaiyang District of Zhoukou City in central China. The town was home to roughly 500 people during neolithic times and had protective walls and a surrounding moat. It sits on the Upper Huai River Plain on the vast Huanghuaihai Plain, and the climate 4,000 years ago saw large seasonal climate shifts. Summer monsoons could dump a foot and a half of rain on the region every month.

With all this rain, it was critical for the region to manage floodwaters. The people of Pingliangtai appear to have built and operated a two-tier drainage system to help mitigate the rainy season’s excessive rainfall. Simple but coordinated lines of drainage ditches ran parallel to the rows of houses to divert water from the residential area to a series of ceramic water pipes that carried the water into the surrounding moat, and away from the village.

The team says that this network of pipes shows that the community cooperated with one another to build and maintain this drainage system.

“The discovery of this ceramic water pipe network is remarkable because the people of Pingliangtai were able to build and maintain this advanced water management system with stone age tools and without the organization of a central power structure,” study co-author and University College London archaeologist Yijie Zhuang said in a statement. “This system would have required a significant level of community-wide planning and coordination, and it was all done communally.”

The network is made of interconnecting individual segments which run along roads and walls that divert rainwater. According to the team, it shows an advanced level of central planning and is the oldest complete system discovered in China to date.

The team was also surprised by this find because the Pingliangtai settlement shows little evidence of a social hierarchy. The homes within it were uniformly small and there aren’t any signs of social stratification or significant inequality amongst the population. Digs at the town’s cemetery also didn’t reveal any evidence of a social hierarchy in burials the way excavations at other nearby towns have.

The level of complexity that these pipes demonstrate also undermines some earlier understanding of archaeological finds that believe only a centralized state power could organize and provide the resources for such a complex water management system. Other ancient societies that used advanced water systems tended to have a stronger, more centralized government, but Pingliangtai shows that that centralized power was possibly not always needed.

“Pingliangtai is an extraordinary site. The network of water pipes shows an advanced understanding of engineering and hydrology that was previously only thought possible in more hierarchical societies,” study co-author and Peking University archaeologist Hai Zhang said in a statement.

The ceramic water pipes also show an advanced level of technology for this period in time. Like with Longshan pottery, there was some variety of decoration and styles, but each pipe segment was about 7.8 and 11.8 inches in diameter and about 11.8 to 15.7 inches long. Multiple segments were slotted into one another to transport the water over long distances.

According to the study, the team can’t say specifically how the labor to build this infrastructure was organized and divided. A similar level of communal coordination would also have been necessary to build the earthen walls and moat that surround Pingliangtai.

By Laura Baisas.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Mike Smith :: Las Vegas Sun

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 29, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 30, 2024

In December 2020, when the pandemic illustrated the extraordinary disadvantage created by the inability of those in low-income households to communicate online with schools and medical professionals, then-president Trump signed into law an emergency program to provide funding to make internet access affordable. In 2021, Congress turned that idea into the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) and made it part of the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law). 

The program has enabled 23 million American households to afford high-speed internet. Those benefiting from it are primarily military families, older Americans, and Black, Latino, and Indigenous households. In February, the Brookings Institution cited economics studies that said each dollar invested in the ACP increases the nation’s gross domestic product by $3.89 and that the program has led to increased employment and higher wages. It also cuts the costs of healthcare by replacing some in-person emergency room visits with telehealth.  

Slightly more of the money in the program goes to districts represented by Republicans than to those represented by Democrats, which might explain why 79% of voters want to continue the program: 96% of Democrats, 78% of Independents, and 62% of Republicans.

But the ACP is running out of money. Back in October 2023, President Joe Biden asked Congress to fund it until the end of 2024, and a bipartisan bill that would extend the program has been introduced in both chambers of Congress. Each remains in an appropriation committee. As of today, the House bill has 228 co-sponsors, the Senate bill has 5. 

Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has said he supports the measure, but House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has not commented. Judd Legum pointed out in Popular Information today that the 2025 budget of the far-right Republican Study Committee (RSC) calls for allowing the ACP to expire, saying the RSC “stands against corporate welfare and government handouts that disincentivize prosperity.” More than four fifths of House Republicans belong to the RSC. 

The differences between the parties’ apparent positions on the ACP illustrates the difference in their political ideology. Republicans object to government investment in society and believe market forces should be left to operate without interference in order to promote prosperity. Democrats believe that economic prosperity comes from the hard work of ordinary people and that government investment in society clears the way for those people to succeed. 

Wealth growth for young Americans was stagnant for decades before the pandemic, but it has suddenly experienced a historic rise. In Axios, Emily Peck reported that household wealth for Americans under 40 has risen an astonishing 49% from where it was before the pandemic. Wealth doubled for those born between 1981 and 1996. This increase in household wealth comes in part from rising home prices and more financial assets, as well as less debt, which fell by $5,000 per household. Households of those under 35 have shown a 140% increase in median wealth in the same time period.

Brendan Duke and Christian E. Weller, the authors of the Center for American Progress study from which Peck’s information came, say this wealth growth is not tied to a few super-high earners, but rather reflects broad based improvement. “A simple reason for the strong wealth growth is that younger Americans are experiencing an especially low unemployment rate and especially strong wage growth,” Duke and Weller note, “making it easier for them to accumulate wealth.” 

In honor of National Small Business Week, Vice President Kamala Harris today launched an “economic opportunity tour” in Atlanta, where she highlighted the federal government’s $158 million investment in “The Stitch,” a project to reconnect midtown to downtown Atlanta. This project is an initial attempt to reconnect the communities that were severed by the construction of highways, often cutting minority or poor neighborhoods off from jobs and driving away businesses while saddling the neighborhoods with pollution. 

While some advocates wanted to use the $3.3 billion available from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act to take down highways altogether, the administration has shied away from such a dramatic revision and has instead focused on creating new public green spaces, bike paths, access to public transportation, safety features, and so on, to link and improve neighborhoods. More than 40 states so far have received funding under this program. 

The administration says that projects like The Stitch will promote economic growth in neighborhoods that have borne the burden of past infrastructure projects. Today it touted the extraordinary growth of small businesses since Biden and Harris took office, noting that their economic agenda “has driven the first, second and third strongest years of new business application rates on record—and is on pace for the fourth—with Americans filing a record 17.2 million new business applications.” 

Small businesses owned by historically underserved populations “are growing at near-historic rates, with Black business ownership growing at the fastest pace in 30 years and Latino business ownership growing at the fastest pace in more than a decade,” the White House said. The administration has invested in small businesses, working to level the playing field between them and their larger counterparts by making capital and information available, while working to reform the tax code so that corporations pay as much in taxes as small businesses do.  

“Small businesses are the engines of the economy,” the White House said today. “As President Biden says, every time someone starts a new small business, it’s an act of hope and confidence in our economy.” 

In place of economic growth, Republicans have focused on whipping up supporters by insisting that Democrats are corrupt and are cheating to take over the government. Matt Gertz of Media Matters noted in February that “Fox News host Sean Hannity and his House Republican allies spent 2023 trying to manufacture an impeachable offense against President Joe Biden out of their fact-free obsession with the president’s son, Hunter.” At least 325 segments about Hunter Biden appeared on Hannity’s show in 2023; 220 had at least one false or misleading claim. The most frequent purveyor of that disinformation was Representative James Comer (R-KY), chair of the House Oversight Committee, who went onto the show 43 times to talk about the president’s son. 

The House impeachment inquiry was really designed to salt right-wing media channels with lies about the president and, in the end, turned up nothing other than witnesses who said President Biden was not involved in his son’s businesses. Then the Republicans’ key witness, Alexander Smirnov, was indicted for lying about the Bidens, and then he turned out to be in contact with Russian spies. 

Comer has been quietly backing away from impeaching the president until today, when he popped back into the spotlight after news broke that Hunter Biden’s lawyer has threatened to sue the Fox News Channel (FNC) for “conspiracy and subsequent actions to defame Mr. Biden and paint him in a false light, the unlicensed commercial exploitation of his image, name, and likeness, and the unlawful publication of hacked intimate images of him.” His lawyer’s letter calls out FNC’s promotion of Smirnov’s false allegations. 

Last year, FNC paid almost $800 million to settle defamation claims made by Dominion Voting Systems after FNC hosts pushed the lie that Dominion machines had changed the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. 

Legal pressure on companies lying for profit has proved successful. Two weeks ago, the far-right media channel One America News Network (OAN) settled a defamation lawsuit with the voting technology company Smartmatic. Today, OAN retracted a false story about former Trump fixer Michael Cohen, apparently made to discredit the testimony of Stormy Daniels about her sexual encounters with Trump. OAN suggested that it was Cohen rather than Trump who had a relationship with Daniels, and that Cohen had extorted Trump over the story.  

“OAN apologizes to Mr. Cohen for any harm the publication may have caused him,” the network wrote in a statement. “To be clear, no evidence suggests that Mr. Cohen and Ms. Daniels were having an affair and no evidence suggests that Mr. Cohen ‘cooked up’ the scheme to extort the Trump Organization before the 2016 election.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[dailyanarchistposts]

J.5.16 Are there any historical examples of collective self-help?

Yes, in all societies we see working class people joining together to practice mutual aid and solidarity. This takes many forms, such as trade and industrial unions, credit unions and friendly societies, co-operatives and so on, but the natural response of working class people to the injustices of capitalism was to practice collective “self-help” in order to improve their lives and protect their friends, communities and fellow workers.

There are, as Colin Ward stresses, “in fact several quite separate traditions of social welfare: the product of totally different attitudes to social needs … One of these traditions is that of a service given grudgingly and punitively by authority, another is the expression of social responsibility, or of mutual aid and self-help. One is embodied in institutions, the other in associations.” [Anarchy in Action, p. 112] Anarchists, needless to say, favour the latter. Unfortunately, this “great tradition of working class self-help and mutual aid was written off, not just as irrelevant, but as an actual impediment, by the political and professional architects of the welfare state … The contribution that the recipients had to make to all this theoretical bounty was ignored as a mere embarrassment — apart, of course, for paying for it … The socialist ideal was rewritten as a world in which everyone was entitled to everything, but where nobody except the providers had any actual say about anything. We have been learning for years, in the anti-welfare backlash, what a vulnerable utopia that was.” This self-managed working class self-help was the “welfare road we failed to take.” [Ward, Social Policy: an anarchist response, p. 11–2 and p. 9]

Anarchists would argue that self-help is the natural side effect of freedom. There is no possibility of radical social change unless people are free to decide for themselves what their problems are, where their interests lie and are free to organise for themselves what they want to do about them. Self-help is a natural expression of people taking control of their own lives and acting for themselves. Anyone who urges state action on behalf of people is no socialist and any one arguing against self-help as “bourgeois” is no anti-capitalist. It is somewhat ironic that it is the right who have monopolised the rhetoric of “self-help” and turned it into yet another ideological weapon against working class direct action and self-liberation (although, saying that, the right generally likes individualised self-help — given a strike, squatting or any other form of collective self-help movement they will be the first to denounce it):

“The political Left has, over the years, committed an enormous psychological error in allowing this kind of language [“self-help”, “mutual aid”, “standing on your own two feet” and so on] to be appropriated by the political Right. If you look at the exhibitions of trade union banners from the last century, you will see slogans like Self Help embroidered all over them. It was those clever Fabians and academic Marxists who ridiculed out of existence the values by which ordinary citizens govern their own lives in favour of bureaucratic paternalising, leaving those values around to be picked up by their political opponents.” [Ward, Talking Houses, p. 58]

We cannot be expected to provide an extensive list of working class collective self-help and social welfare activity here, all we can do is present an overview of collective welfare in action (for a discussion of working class self-help and co-operation through the centuries we can suggest no better source than Kropotkin’s Mutual Aid). In the case of Britain, we find that the “newly created working class built up from nothing a vast network of social and economic initiatives based on self-help and mutual aid. The list is endless: friendly societies, building societies, sick clubs, coffin clubs, clothing clubs, up to enormous federated enterprises like the trade union movement and the Co-operative movement.” [Ward, Social Policy, pp. 10–1] The historian E.P. Thompson confirmed this picture of a wide network of working class self-help organisations. “Small tradesmen, artisans, labourers” he summarised, “all sought to insure themselves against sickness, unemployment, or funeral expenses through membership of … friendly societies.” These were “authentic evidence of independent working-class culture and institutions … out of which … trade unions grew, and in which trade union officers were trained.” Friendly societies “did not ‘proceed from’ an idea: both the ideas and institutions arose from a certain common experience … In the simple cellular structure of the friendly society, with its workaday ethos of mutual aid, we see many features which were reproduced in more sophisticated and complex form in trade unions, co-operatives, Hampden clubs, Political Unions, and Chartist lodges … Every kind of witness in the first half of the nineteenth century — clergymen, factory inspectors, Radical publicists — remarked upon the extent of mutual aid in the poorest districts. In times of emergency, unemployment, strikes, sickness, childbirth, then it was the poor who ‘helped every one his neighbour.’” [The Making of the English Working Class, p. 458, pp. 460–1 and p. 462] Sam Dolgoff gave an excellent summary of similar self-help activities by the American working class:

“Long before the labour movement got corrupted and the state stepped in, the workers organised a network of co-operative institutions of all kinds: schools, summer camps for children and adults, homes for the aged, health and cultural centres, credit associations, fire, life, and health insurance, technical education, housing, etc.” [The American Labour Movement: A New Beginning, p. 74]

Dolgoff, like all anarchists, urged workers to “finance the establishment of independent co-operative societies of all types, which will respond adequately to their needs” and that such a movement “could constitute a realistic alternative to the horrendous abuses of the ‘establishment’ at a fraction of the cost.” [Op. Cit., p. 74 and pp. 74–75] In this way a network of self-managed, communal, welfare associations and co-operatives could be built — paid for, run by and run for working class people. Such a system “would not … become a plaything of central government financial policy.” [Ward, Op. Cit., p. 16] Such a network could be initially build upon, and be an aspect of, the struggles of both workers in and claimants, patients, tenants, and other users of the current welfare state. So a “multiplicity of mutual aid organisations among claimants, patients, victims, represents the most potent lever for change in transforming the welfare state into a genuine welfare society, in turning community care into a caring community.” [Ward, Anarchy in Action, p. 125]

The creation of such a co-operative, community-based, welfare system will not occur over night, nor will it be easy. But it is possible, as history shows. It will, of course, have its problems, but as Colin Ward notes, “the standard argument against a localist and decentralised point of view, is that of universalism: an equal service to all citizens, which it is thought that central control achieves. The short answer to this is that it doesn’t!” [Colin Ward, Social Policy, p. 16] He notes that richer areas generally get a better service from the welfare state than poorer ones, thus violating the claims of equal service. A centralised system (be it state or private) will most likely allocate resources which reflect the interests and (lack of) knowledge of bureaucrats and experts, not on where they are best used or the needs of the users.

Anarchists are sure that a confederal network of mutual aid organisations and co-operatives, based upon local input and control, can overcome problems of localism far better than a centralised one — which, due to its lack of local input and participation will more likely encourage parochialism and indifference than a wider vision and solidarity. If you have no real say in what affects you, why should you be concerned with what affects others? This is unsurprising, for what else is global action other than the product of thousands of local actions? Solidarity within our class is the flower that grows from the soil of our local self-activity, direct action and self-organisation. Unless we act and organise locally, any wider organisation and action will be hollow. Thus local organisation and empowerment is essential to create and maintain wider organisations and mutual aid.

To take another example of the benefits of a self-managed welfare system, we find that it “was a continual complaint of the authorities” in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century “that friendly societies allowed members to withdraw funds when on strike.” [Thompson, Op. Cit., p. 461f] The same complaints were voiced in Britain about the welfare state allowing strikers to claim benefit will on strike. The Conservative Government of the 1980s changed that by passing a law barring those in industrial dispute to claim benefits — and so removing a potential support for those in struggle. Such a restriction would have been far harder (if not impossible) to impose on a network of self-managed mutual aid co-operatives. Such institutions would have not become the plaything of central government financial policy as the welfare state and the taxes working class people have to pay have become.

All this means that anarchists reject the phoney choice between private and state capitalism we are usually offered. We reject both privatisation and nationalisation, both right and left wings (of capitalism). Neither state nor private health care are user-controlled — one is subject to the requirements of politics and the other places profits before people. As we have discussed the welfare state in the last section, it is worthwhile to quickly discuss privatised welfare and why anarchists reject this option even more than state welfare.

Firstly, all forms of private healthcare/welfare have to pay dividends to capitalists, fund advertising, reduce costs to maximise profits by standardising the “caring” process — i.e. McDonaldisation — and so on, all of which inflates prices and produces substandard service across the industry as a whole. According to Alfie Kohn, ”[m]ore hospitals and clinics are being run by for-profit corporations; many institutions, forced to battle for ‘customers,’ seem to value a skilled director of marketing more highly than a skilled caregiver. As in any other economic sector, the race for profits translates into pressure to reduce costs, and the easiest way to do it here is to cut back on services to unprofitable patients, that is, those who are more sick than rich … The result: hospital costs are actually higher in areas where there is more competition for patients.” [No Contest, p. 240] In the UK, attempts to introduce “market forces” into the National Health Service has also lead to increased costs as well as inflating the size and cost of its bureaucracy.

Looking at Chile, hyped by those who desire to privatise Social Security, we find similar disappointing results (well, disappointing for the working class at least, as we will see). Seemingly, Chile’s private system has achieved impressive average returns on investment. However, once commissions are factored in, the real return for individual workers is considerably lower. For example, although the average rate of return on funds from 1982 through 1986 was 15.9 percent, the real return after commissions was a mere 0.3 percent! Between 1991 and 1995, the pre-commission return was 12.9 percent, but with commissions it fell to 2.1 percent. According to Doug Henwood, the “competing mutual funds have vast sales forces, and the portfolio managers all have their vast fees. All in all, administrative costs … are almost 30% of revenues, compared to well under 1% for the U.S. Social Security system.” [Wall Street, p. 305] In addition, the private pension fund market is dominated by a handful of companies.

Even if commission costs were lowered (by regulation), the impressive returns on capital seen between 1982 and 1995 (when the real annual return on investment averaged 12.7 percent) are likely not to be sustained. These average returns coincided with boom years in Chile, complemented by government’s high borrowing costs. Because of the debt crisis of the 1980s, Latin governments were paying double-digit real interest rates on their bonds — the main investment vehicle of social security funds. In effect, government was subsidising the “private” system by paying astronomical rates on government bonds. Another failing of the system is that only a little over half of Chilean workers make regular social security contributions. While many believe that a private system would reduce evasion because workers have a greater incentive to contribute to their own personal retirement accounts, 43.4 percent of those affiliated with the new system in June of 1995 did not contribute regularly. [Stephen J. Kay, “The Chile Con: Privatizing Social Security in South America,” The American Prospect no. 33, pp. 48–52] All in all, privatisation seems to be beneficial only to middle-men and capitalists, if Chile is anything to go by. As Henwood argues, while the “infusion of money” resulting from privatising social security “has done wonders for the Chilean stock market” “projections are that as many as half of future retirees will draw a poverty-level pension.” [Henwood, Op. Cit., pp. 304–5]

Suffice to say, all you really need to know about privatisation of pensions and healthcare in Chile is that the military dictatorship which imposed it excluded the military from its dubious benefits. Such altruism is truly touching.

So, anarchists reject private welfare as a con (and an even bigger one than state welfare). As Colin Ward suggests, it “is the question of how we get back on the mutual aid road instead of commercial health insurance and private pension schemes.” [Social Policy, p. 17] As anarchists are both anti-state and anti-capitalist, swapping private power for the state power is, at best, a step sideways. Usually, it is worse for capitalist companies are accountable only to their owners and the profit criteria. This means, as Chomsky suggests, “protecting the state sector today is a step towards abolishing the state because it maintains a public arena in which people can participate and organise, and affect policy, and so on, though in limited ways. If that’s removed, we’d go back to a … private dictatorship, but that’s hardly a step towards liberation.” [ Chomsky on Anarchism, p. 213] Instead anarchists try to create real alternatives to hierarchy, be it state or capitalist, in the here and now which reflect our ideas of a free and just society. For, when it boils down to it, freedom cannot be given, only taken and this process of self-liberation is reflected in the alternatives we build to help win the class war.

The struggle against capitalism and statism requires that we build for the future and, moreover, we should remember that “he who has no confidence in the creative capacity of the masses and in their capability to revolt doesn’t belong in the revolutionary movement. He should go to a monastery and get on his knees and start praying. Because he is no revolutionist. He is a son of a bitch.” [Sam Dolgoff, quoted by Ulrike Heider, Anarchism: left, right, and green, p. 12]

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Bernard Lane

Published: Apr 14, 2024

Nine of the 15 gender clinics in a landmark international survey for the Cass review have admitted they do not routinely collect outcome data on their young patients.

This survey, together with a new evaluation of treatment guidelines for gender dysphoria, gives unprecedented insights into the workings of gender clinics around the world offering puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to minors.

In the 2022-23 survey, six clinics said they “routinely collected some outcome data”: one of these clinics gave no further detail; one noted the number of patients discontinuing treatment; another used measures of quality of life; two were taking part in cohort studies; and the sixth clinic repeated some baseline assessments. Nine clinics acknowledged “not routinely collecting outcome data.”

The report of the survey results1, published by researchers from the University of York earlier this month, identified clinics by country, not name. Of the clinics that took part, Australia and the Netherlands were prominent with five and four clinics respectively.

Poor data collection was central to the controversy over the London-based Tavistock youth gender clinic.

The Cass review had planned to run a data-linkage study—with help from adult gender clinics—to learn the outcomes of the Tavistock’s 9,000-odd former patients.

The missing long-term data would allow clinicians, young patients and parents to make informed decisions about treatment. The review said it was to be the largest study of its kind in the world.

However, six of the seven adult clinics refused to co-operate. One stated reason was that “the study outcomes focus on adverse health events, for which the clinics do not feel primarily responsible.”

Another adult clinic said, “The unintended outcome of the study is likely to be a high-profile national report that will be misinterpreted, misrepresented or actively used to harm patients and disrupt the work of practitioners across the gender dysphoria pathway.”

On April 12, however, The Times newspaper reported that the uncooperative adult clinics had “bowed to pressure to share [the] missing data”.

Mostly medical

In the York University international survey, ordered by the Cass review, all 15 youth gender clinics said they used a multi-disciplinary team, but researchers concluded there was a “paucity” of psychosocial therapy interventions such as psychotherapy or cognitive behaviour therapy. Five clinics did not offer any of these non-medical interventions in-house.

All gender clinics told researchers that “genital reconstructive surgery”—the creation of a pseudo vagina, for example—was “accessible only from age 18.” The youngest age for “masculinising chest surgery” (a double mastectomy) was reported as 16. In fact, there are documented cases in Australia of 15-year-olds approved for transgender mastectomy. Genital surgery is legally available to minors2 in Australia and practised in America.

“Only five clinics reported routine discussion of fertility3 preferences, and only two discussed sexuality4. Finland was the only country to report routinely assessing for history of trauma5,” the final Cass report says in its commentary on the survey.

In separate studies for the Cass review, three independent reviewers evaluated the quality of 21 guidelines for treatment of gender dysphoria in minors.

Included were international guidelines (from the Endocrine Society and the World Professional Association for Transgender Health or WPATH); documents from North America (for example, the 2018 policy statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics); from Europe (the guideline of the UK Royal College of Psychiatrists, for example, and Denmark’s); as well as guidelines from the Asia-Pacific and Africa.

“WPATH has been highly influential in directing international practice, although its guidelines were found by the University of York appraisal process to lack developmental rigour,” the Cass report says.

The York researchers chart patterns of “circular” cross-referencing between guidelines to create a misleading impression of consensus in favour of the medicalised “gender-affirming” treatment approach.

“The guideline appraisal raises serious questions about the reliability of current guidelines. Most guidelines have not followed the international standards for [rigorous and independent] guideline development. Few guidelines are informed by a systematic review of empirical evidence [the gold standard for assessing the evidence supporting a health intervention] and there is a lack of transparency about how recommendations were developed,” the Cass report says.

“Healthcare services and professionals should take into account the variable quality of published guidelines to support the management of children and young people experiencing gender dysphoria. The lack of independence in many national and regional guidelines, and the limited evidence-based underpinning current guidelines, should be considered when utilising these for practice.”

The Cass report says it is “imperative” that gender clinic staff be “cognisant of the limitations in relation to the evidence base and fully understand the knowns and the unknowns.”

[ Chart: Number of youth gender clinic referrals over time by country. Source: Cass report ]

Bum steer

Staff at the Tavistock clinic misled patients and parents, or failed to correct their misconceptions, according to a new report from the Multi-Professional Review Group (MPRG) given oversight of treatment decisions from 2021.

These shortcomings of clinicians included playing down the extent of the unknowns of hormonal treatment; not explaining that puberty blockers are being used unlicensed and off-label; not challenging the reassuring but false parallel with the licensed use of puberty blockers for precocious (premature) puberty; not discussing the possibility that blockers will pause or slow psychosexual development; and not sharing figures showing the vast majority of children started on puberty blockers will go on to cross-sex hormones supposed to be taken lifelong.

The MPRG was also troubled by clinical documents showing misunderstanding of “the outcome of physical treatments” on the part of patients and parents.

In the York University study of treatment guidelines for gender dysphoria, only two were recommended for use by all three reviewers. These were recent, more cautious policies from Finland and Sweden. Both followed independent systematic reviews showing the evidence base for hormonal and surgical treatment of minors to be very weak and uncertain. Like the Cass review itself, the 2020 Finnish and 2022 Swedish guidelines recognise that puberty blockers are experimental and should not be routine treatment.

Although all the guidelines in the study agreed on the need for a multidisciplinary team to treat gender-distressed minors, the “most striking problem” shown by analysis of these documents was “the lack of any consensus6 on the purpose of the assessment process”, the Cass report says.

“Some guidelines were focused on diagnosis, some on… eligibility for hormones, some on psychosocial assessment, and some on readiness for medical interventions7.

“Only the Swedish and [the 2022] WPATH 8th version guidelines contain detail on the assessment process8. Both recommend that the duration, structure and content of the assessment be varied according to age, complexity and gender development.

“Very few guidelines recommend formal measures/clinical tools to assess gender dysphoria, and a separate analysis demonstrated that the formal measures that exist are poorly validated.”

Nor was there any consensus on “when psychological or hormonal interventions should be offered and on what basis.”

A survey of staff at the Tavistock clinic, undertaken as part of the Cass review, found specialists divided on whether or not “assessment should seek to make a differential diagnosis, ruling out other potential [non-gender9] causes of the child or young person’s distress.”

Arguing for an ambitious research program well beyond a possible clinical trial of puberty blockers, the Cass report says the field of youth gender dysphoria is one of “remarkably weak evidence” where health professionals are “afraid to openly discuss their views” because of vilification and bullying.

“Although some think the clinical approach should be based on a social justice model, the NHS works in an evidence-based way,” the report says.

“The gaps in the evidence base regarding all aspects of gender care for children and young people have been highlighted, from epidemiology through to assessment, diagnosis10 and intervention. It is troubling that so little is known about this cohort and their outcomes.

“Based on a single Dutch study, which suggested that puberty blockers may improve psychological wellbeing for a narrowly defined group of children with gender incongruence [or dysphoria], the practice spread at pace to other countries.

“Some practitioners abandoned normal clinical approaches to holistic assessment, which has meant that this group of [gender-distressed] young people have been exceptionalised compared to other young people with similarly complex presentations.”

[ Chart: Age and sex on referral to the Tavistock clinic from 2018-2022. Source: Cass report ]

Who to trust?

The Cass report says the missing evidence “makes it difficult to provide adequate information on which a young person and their family can make an informed choice.”

“A trusted source of information is needed on all aspects of medical care, but in particular it is important to defuse/manage expectations that have been built up by claims about the efficacy of puberty blockers.

“The option to provide masculinising or feminising hormones from the age of 16 is available, but the [Cass] review would recommend an extremely cautious clinical approach and a strong clinical rationale for providing hormones before the age of 18. This would keep options open during this important developmental window, allowing time for management of any co-occurring [non-gender] conditions11, building of resilience, and fertility preservation, if required.”

The review stresses that “consent is more than just capacity and competence. It requires clinicians to ensure that the proposed intervention is clinically indicated as they have a duty to offer appropriate treatment. It also requires the patient to be provided with appropriate and sufficient information about the risks, benefits and expected outcomes of the treatment.”

“Assessing whether a hormone pathway is indicated is challenging. A formal diagnosis of gender dysphoria is frequently cited as a prerequisite for accessing hormone treatment. However, it is not reliably predictive of whether that young person will have long-standing gender incongruence in the future, or whether medical intervention will be the best option for them.”

Advocates for the gender-affirming approach assert that detransition and treatment regret are vanishingly rare, whereas suicide risk for those denied medical intervention is claimed to be very high.

The Cass report says: “It has been suggested that hormone treatment reduces the elevated risk of death by suicide in this population, but the evidence found did not support this conclusion.”

“The percentage of people treated with hormones who subsequently detransition remains unknown due to the lack of long-term follow-up studies, although there is suggestion that numbers are increasing.”

The report cites three reasons why the true extent of detransition is unlikely to be clear for some time—patients who decide medicalisation was a mistake may not wish to return to their former clinic to announce this fact; there is a post-treatment honeymoon period and clinicians suggest it may take 5-10 years before a decision to detransition; and the surge in patient numbers only began within the last decade.

Faced with uncertainty and a lack of good evidence, those with responsibility—from health ministers and hospital managers down to gender clinicians—rely on treatment guidelines supposed to advise on clinical practice according to the “best-available” evidence and expert opinion.

In the York University guideline analysis, the 21 documents were rated on six domains, the key two being the rigour of their development and their editorial independence.

“[Rigour] includes systematically searching the evidence, being clear about the link between recommendations and supporting evidence, and ensuring that health benefits, side effects and risks have been considered in formulating the recommendations,” the Cass report says.

Only the Finnish and Swedish guidelines scored above 50 per cent for rigour. Only these two documents, the Cass report says, link “the lack of robust evidence about medical treatments to a recommendation that treatments should be provided under a research framework or within a research clinic. They are also the only guidelines that have been informed by an ethical review conducted as part of the guideline development.”

“Most of the guidelines described insufficient evidence about the risks and benefits of medical treatment in adolescents, particularly in relation to long-term outcomes. Despite this, many then went on to cite this same evidence to recommend medical treatments,” the report says.

“Alternatively, they referred to other guidelines that recommend medical treatments as their basis for making the same recommendations. Early versions of two international guidelines, the Endocrine Society 2009 and WPATH 7th version guidelines, influenced nearly all the other guidelines.

“These two guidelines are also closely interlinked, with WPATH adopting Endocrine Society recommendations, and acting as a co-sponsor and providing input to drafts of the Endocrine Society guideline. The WPATH 8th version cited many of the other national and regional guidelines to support some of its recommendations, despite these guidelines having been considerably influenced by the WPATH 7th version.

“The circularity of this approach may explain why there has been an apparent consensus on key areas of practice despite the evidence being poor.”

Sometimes these gender-affirming guidelines seek to buttress a strong evidence claim with a citation to a study that is weak or involves a different patient group.

The Cass report notes that, “The WPATH 8th version’s narrative on gender-affirming medical treatment for adolescents does not reference its own systematic review [of the evidence], but instead states: ‘Despite the slowly growing body of evidence supporting the effectiveness of early medical intervention, the number of studies is still low, and there are few outcome studies that follow youth into adulthood. Therefore, a systematic review regarding outcomes of treatment in adolescents is not possible’.”

Despite WPATH insisting such an evidence review is not possible, this is precisely what health authorities and experts have undertaken since 2019 in several jurisdictions—Finland, Sweden, the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, Florida, Germany, and University of York research commissioned by the Cass review.

Yet in the 8th and current version of its guideline, WPATH makes the confident statement that, “There is strong evidence demonstrating the benefits in quality of life and well-being of gender-affirming treatments, including endocrine and surgical procedures… Gender-affirming interventions are based on decades of clinical experience and research; therefore, they are not considered experimental, cosmetic, or for the mere convenience of a patient. They are safe and effective at reducing gender incongruence and gender dysphoria”.

But WPATH “overstates the strength of the evidence” for its treatment recommendations, the Cass report says.

--

1 In the survey, there was one clinic each from Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Northern Ireland, Norway and Spain. The response rate was 38 per cent.

2 In Australia there is no good public data on trans surgery for minors.

3 Early puberty blockers followed by cross-sex hormones are expected to sterilise young people and may also impair future sexual function.

4 Some sizeable proportion of gender clinic patients might grow up in healthy bodies and accept their same-sex attraction were it not for trans medicalisation, according to testimony from detransitioners, clinicians’ reports and data.

5 Trauma from a history of sexual abuse, for example, or exposure to domestic violence is thought to be among the many possible underlying causes of what presents as gender dysphoria. The Multi-Professional Review Group (MPRG), given oversight of Tavistock treatment decisions from 2021-23, was troubled by the lack of curiosity by the clinic’s staff about the effect of a child’s “physical or mental illness within the family, abusive or addictive environments, bereavement, cultural or religious background, etc.”

6 Critics of the “gender-affirming” treatment approach say it is not mainstream medicine because the “trans child” in effect self-diagnoses while clinicians avoid differential diagnosis and attribute mental health disorders and other pre-existing issues to a “transphobic” society.

7 “In most cases [at the Tavistock clinic] children and parents were asking to progress on to puberty blockers from the very first appointment”, according to the MPRG.

8 In the MPRG’s opinion, the patient notes from the Tavistock “rarely provide a structured history or physical assessment, however the submissions to the MPRG suggest that the children have a wide range of childhood, familial and congenital conditions.”

9 Once referred to the Tavistock, patients typically were no longer seen by child and adolescent mental health services.

10 According to the MPRG, gender dysphoria in the diagnostic manual DSM-5 “has a low threshold based on overlapping criteria, and is likely to create false positives. Young people who do not go on to have an enduring cross-sex gender identity may have met the criteria in childhood. And early to mid-childhood social transition may be influential in maintaining adherence to the criteria. Sex role and gender expression stereotyping is present within the diagnostic criteria—preferred toys, clothes, etc—not reflecting that many toys, games and activities [today] are less exclusively gendered than in previous decades.”

11 The MPRG said it was “notable that until the child and family’s first appointment at [the Tavistock] they have received little, if any, support from health, social care, or education professionals. Most children and parents have felt isolated and desperate for support and have therefore turned for information to the media and online resources, with many accessing LGBTQ+ and [gender dysphoria] support groups or private providers which appear to be mainly ‘affirmative’ in nature, and children and families have moved forward with social transition. This history/journey is rarely examined closely by [Tavistock clinicians] for signs of difficulty [or] regret.”

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Critics have described "gender affirming care" - that is, sex-trait modification - as "medical experimentation." This is incorrect. In a medical experiment, you actually collect data and monitor the participants in the experiment. They don't do that. They're cowboys violating all medical ethics - "first, do no harm" - for ideology, money or both.

[themarconigraph]

Presentation to Mr. Bride, November 1912 issue of The Marconigraph

"An interesting little ceremony took place at Marconi House, London, on Wednesday, October 23rd, when Mr. Harold S. Bride was presented by the Marconi International Marine Communication Co., Ltd., with a gold watch " in recognition of having done his duty, and done it bravely" on board the R.M.S. " Titanic." In handing the gift to Mr. Bride, Mr. Godfrey C. Isaacs, the managing director of the company, referred with extreme regret -- a regret shared by all who attended the gathering -- to the unfortunate circumstances which prevented Mr. Marconi being present. He assured Mr. Bride that the Marconi Company highly appreciated the way in which he had performed his duty. It was unnecessary to say anything about what that duty was : the whole world knew it. In the name of the company, and in the absence of Mr. Marconi, Mr. Isaacs handed to Mr. Bride a little souvenir in the shape of a gold watch in which was inscribed just the mere plain statement of fact. Mr. Isaacs hoped it would prove some satisfaction to the recipient, when he was older in years, to look back to his earlier days and remember that he did his duty. Mr. Bride made a brief response.

The Liverpool Shipwreck and Humane Society have sent to the Marconi Company a silver medal and illuminated address for Mr. Cottam, and these will be handed to Mr. Cottam on his arrival in England. The address reads:

At a meeting of the committee of the Liverpool Shipwreck and Humane Society, held at the Underwriters' Room, Exchange Buildings, Liverpool, on the 4th day of July, 1912, it was resolved unanimously : " That the best thanks of the committee be presented to Mr. Thomas Cottam, wireless operator of the S.S. Carpathia,' for praiseworthy and humane service to the survivors of the R.M.S. Titanic,' which foundered April 15th, 1912.""