#migrant reception

[abirdie]

Gael García Bernal in Desierto (2015, dir. Jonás Cuarón)

(these gifs also feature Alondra Hidalgo)

Gifs are all 540px wide so you can click to see larger.

[other gael filmography gifsets]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Mike Luckovich:: GOP strategy in its totality

* * * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

September 18, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Sep 19, 2024

Today, at a White House reception in celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, President Joe Biden said: "We don't demonize immigrants. We don't single them out for attacks. We don't believe they're poisoning the blood of the country. We're a nation of immigrants, and that's why we're so damn strong."

Biden’s celebration of the country’s heritage might have doubled as a celebration of the success of his approach to piloting the economy out of the ravages of the pandemic. Today the Fed cut interest rates a half a point, a dramatic cut indicating that it considers inflation to be under control. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has maintained that it would be possible to slow inflation without causing a recession—a so-called soft landing—and she appears to have been vindicated.

Federal Reserve chief Jerome Powell said: “The labor market is in solid condition, and our intention with our policy move today is to keep it there. You can say that about the whole economy: The US economy is in good shape. It’s growing at a solid pace, inflation is coming down. The labor market is at a strong pace. We want to keep it there. That’s what we’re doing.”

Powell, whom Trump first appointed to his position, said, “We do our work to serve all Americans. We’re not serving any politician, any political figure, any cause, any issue, nothing. It’s just maximum employment and price stability on behalf of all Americans.”

Powell was anticipating accusations from Trump that his cutting of rates was an attempt to benefit Harris before the election. Indeed, Jeff Stein of the Washington Post reported that Trump advisor Steven Moore called the move “jaw-dropping. There's no reason they couldn't do 25 now and 25 right after the election. Why not wait till then?” Moore added, "I'm not saying [the] reduction isn't justified—it may well be and they have more data than I do. But i just think, 'why now?’” Alabama senator Tommy Tuberville called the cut “shamelessly political.” 

The New Yorker’s Philip Gourevitch noted that “Trump has been begging officials worldwide not to do the right thing for years to help rig the election for him—no deal in Gaza, no defense of Ukraine, no Kremlin hostages release, no border deal, no continuing resolution, no interest rate cuts etc—just sabotage & subterfuge.”

That impulse to focus on regaining power rather than serving the country was at least part of what was behind Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance’s lie about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. That story has gotten even darker as it turns out Vance and Trump received definitive assurances on September 9 that the rumor was false, but Trump ran with it in the presidential debate of September 10 anyway. Now, although it has been made very clear—including by Republican Ohio governor Mike DeWine—that the Haitian immigrants in Springfield are there legally, Vance told a reporter today that he personally considers the programs under which they came illegal, so he is still “going to call [a Haitian migrant] an illegal alien.”

The lies about those immigrants have so derailed the Springfield community with bomb threats and public safety concerns that when the Trump campaign suggested Trump was planning a visit there, the city’s Republican mayor, Rob Rue, backed by DeWine, threw cold water on the idea. “It would be an extreme strain on our resources. So it’d be fine with me if they decided not to make that visit,” Rue said. Nonetheless, tonight, Trump told a crowd in Long Island, New York, that he will go to Springfield within the next two weeks. 

The false allegation against Haitian immigrants has sparked outrage, but it has accomplished one thing for the campaign, anyway: it has gotten Trump at least to speak about immigration—which was the issue they planned to campaign on—rather than Hannibal Lecter, electric boats, and sharks, although he continues to insist that “everyone is agreeing that I won the Debate with Kamala.” Trump, Vance, and Republican lawmakers are now talking more about policies.

In the presidential debate of September 10, Trump admitted that after nine years of promising he would release a new and better healthcare plan than the Affordable Care Act in just a few weeks, all he really had were “concepts of a plan.” Vance has begun to explain to audiences that he intends to separate people into different insurance pools according to their health conditions and risk levels. That business model meant that insurers could refuse to insure people with pre-existing conditions, and overturning it was a key driver of the ACA.

Senate and House Republicans told Peter Sullivan of Axios that if they regain control of the government, they will work to get rid of the provision in the Inflation Reduction Act that permits the government to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies over drug prices. Negotiations on the first ten drugs, completed in August, will lower the cost of those drugs enough to save taxpayers $6 billion a year, while those enrolled in Medicare will save $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket expenses. 

Yesterday Trump promised New Yorkers that he would restore the state and local tax deduction (SALT) that he himself capped at $10,000 in his 2017 tax cuts. In part, the cap was designed to punish Democratic states that had high taxes and higher government services, but now he wants to appeal to voters in those same states. On CNBC, host Joe Kernan pointed out that this would blow up the deficit, but House speaker Mike Johnson said that the party would nonetheless consider such a measure because it would continue to stand behind less regulation and lower taxes.

In a conversation with Arkansas governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, his former press secretary, Trump delivered another stream of consciousness commentary in which he appeared to suggest that he would lower food prices by cutting imports. Economics professor Justin Wolfers noted: “I'm exhausted even saying it, but blocking supply won't reduce prices, and it's not even close.” Sarah Longwell of The Bulwark added, “Tell me more about why you have to vote for Trump because of his ‘policies.’”

Trump has said he supports in vitro fertilization, or IVF, as have a number of Republican lawmakers, but today, 44 Republican senators once again blocked the Senate from passing a measure protecting it. The procedure is in danger from state laws establishing “fetal personhood,” which give a fertilized egg all the rights of a human being as established by the Fourteenth Amendment. That concept is in the 2024 Republican Party platform.

Trump has also demanded that Republicans in Congress shut down the government unless a continuing resolution to fund the government contains the so-called SAVE Act requiring people to show proof of citizenship when registering to vote. Speaker Johnson continues to suggest that undocumented immigrants vote in elections, but it is illegal for even documented noncitizens to do so, and Aaron Reichlin-Melnick of the nonprofit American Immigration Council notes that even the right-wing Heritage Foundation has found only 12 cases of such illegal voting in the past 40 years.

Johnson brought the continuing resolution bill with the SAVE Act up for a vote today. It failed by a vote of 202 to 220. If the House and then the Senate don’t pass a funding bill, the government will shut down on October 1.

Republican endorsements of the Harris-Walz ticket continue to pile up. On Monday, six-term representative Bob Inglis (R-SC) told the Charleston City Paper that “Donald Trump is a clear and present danger to the republic” and said he would vote for Harris. “If Donald Trump loses, that would be a good thing for the Republican Party,” Inglis said. “Because then we could have a Republican rethink and get a correction.” 

George W. Bush’s attorney general Alberto Gonzales, conservative columnist George Will, more than 230 former officials for presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, and 17 former staff members for Ronald Reagan have all recently added their names to the list of those supporting Harris. Today more than 100 Republican former members of Congress and national security officials who served in Republican administrations endorsed Harris, saying they “firmly oppose the election of Donald Trump.” They cited his chaotic governance, his praising of enemies and undermining allies, his politicizing the military and disparaging veterans, his susceptibility to manipulation by Russian president Vladimir Putin, and his attempt to overthrow democracy. They praised Harris for her consistent championing of “the rule of law, democracy, and our constitutional principles.” 

Yesterday, singer-songwriters Billie Eilish, who has 119 million followers on Instagram, and Finneas, who has 4.2 million, asked people to register and to vote for Harris and Walz. “Vote like your life depends on it,” Eilish said, “because it does.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[beardedmrbean]

Justice Minister Paul Van Tigchelt (Open VLD) is under fire for comments he made about migrants and their contribution to the Belgian economy.

Featuring as a guest on the podcast 'Talks With Charly', Van Tigchelt was asked about his views on whether it was possible to prevent migrants from entering Belgium, to which he replied: "Of course not. Something like that is impossible, unnecessary and undesirable."

He went on to emphasise the economic role migrants play here. "Who takes care of our care? Who will lay my water pipe? Who cleans my windows at home?"

Podcast host Charly Badibanga then took offence to the insinuation that migrants only contribute to Belgium via low-skilled work, and the Justice Minister quickly sought to nuance his comments. "Sorry for expressing myself incorrectly, but take away migration and our economy will come to a standstill."

He added that figures such as directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah and former football players Marouane Fellaini and Vincent Kompany are a testament to the "wealth" that migration has brought to Belgium.

'Stereotypical'

Van Tigchelt's comments demonstrated a "stereotypical" view of work performed by migrants but was not off the mark regarding the economic impact of reduced migration, says Eva Van Belle, a migration and labour expert at VUB.

"It is difficult to predict the impact a migration policy change would have on the economy, but what we do know is that the rate of migration we have today is good for growth," she told The Brussels Times. "There is a positive fiscal effect too, as migrants contribute more to public finances than what they cost. If we stopped migration, this positive effect would disappear."

The perception that a high proportion of migrants work in low-skilled positions is due to the fact that Belgium lacks any clear strategy to attract high-skilled individuals. In addition, a cinched domestic labour market coupled with discrimination faced by people from migrant backgrounds pushes many of them to unskilled positions. Nevertheless, migrants make up significant portions of professional sectors too, such as IT, healthcare and consulting.

Migration is an enormous topic for political parties ahead of federal elections on 9 June. Van Tigchelt's liberal party Open VLD wants to increase controls at EU borders and make family reunification conditions much more stringent. The party calls for more humane conditions for asylum seekers awaiting a decision on their application despite overseeing a worsening reception crisis since being in government.

[touchlikethesun]

one fun little thing about linguistics is that the stages speakers go through during their lives and the stages internet users go thru when integrating a new online community are actually quite similar.

so like, the first stage, broadly, when talking about language acquisition, a speaker starts with having no competence, but a huge receptiveness to the linguistic data around them. this is why babies learn to speak so fast. in online communities, a new comer won't have all the right vocab, they won't have learned/assimilated to the ways of "speaking"/communicating in the community, and can kinda easily be identified as like, not being from here (think of the way tumblr users can sometimes spot twitter migrants)

after learning the norms, and the basics of communication in a community, the speaker enters an adolescent phase. in irl speech communities, this is when someone's most receptive to new slang or linguistic innovations, but as these speakers grow up, the innovations become the standard. in online communities there's a very very similar adolescent phase (that has nothing to do with age, and just time spent in the community), where someone is fully integrated into the community and is in the centre of linguistic innovation for the community (often means coming up with new vocab, and sometimes can mean changes in other conventions like typing style, punctuation usages, etc.).

after the adolescent phase, in the adult phase, a speaker has a lot of linguistic competence (they can... speak... well... idk how else to describe it), but they are much more resistant to innovation, and hold on to the way that they spoke as a young person as being the objectively correct way to speak, looking down on the younger generation for their slang and their innovations. think of how boomers and gen x make fun of gen z slang. in online communities, i don't see this as being so much of conflictual relationship, but what is similar is that people that have been in online communities for extended periods of time will hold on to the way of communicating that was popular when they were in their adolescent phase, and won't be able to as easily adapt to the new ways of communicating, and this marks them as being an "elder", or long-time member, of the community.

the comparisons aren't always completely spot on, but there are enough parallels that i can have a lot of fun paying attention to this in the online communities that i'm a part of lol

[evilsoup]

based

A statement put out by the young migrants said, “For a year now, we have been challenging the public authorities by occupying buildings and disrupting events, because we know that we can expect nothing from this racist and repressive government. “As a result of our actions, Paris City Council has shown that it is capable of providing emergency accommodation for hundreds of undocumented foreign minors.” They said that “given the seriousness of the situation”, the council’s inaction “is not good enough”. “Temperatures outside are falling. We refuse to continue sleeping outside, repressed every day by the police.” Those involved in the occupation put out a call for others to come and join, saying, “No more nights on the streets for unaccompanied minors!” The occupation began during a conference held by the charity Red Cross on “Reinventing the reception of refugees in France” on Tuesday afternoon. “We have given Paris mayor Madame Hidalgo one last chance to receive us,” the young migrants announced one day before beginning the occupation. “Without a response from her, we will be forced to take action again.”

[ineffable-opinions]

Dear ineffable opinions,

In one of your posts, you had discussed Bad Buddy claiming that the show was making fun of queer people's appropriation of the word wife. Can you explain why you think so?

Dear anon, I have decided to answer this one only and not the other ones. Sorry to have worried you. I have gone through the posts you mentioned and am not offended. I appreciate corrections and critiques. I believe in discourse and that's why I haven't blocked anyone. The delay in answering was for me to be sure about what I wanted to say on top of what I had already said.

For context, anon here discussed my comments about Bad Buddy with @lurkingshan which generated a discussion (linked here and here) that I can't take part in thanks to me being on the block list.

I will first reiterate the points I have raised previously and then discuss something broader that may be slightly off-topic while trying to address the criticism. I deeply appreciate comments and corrections, so please mention me so that I can learn too.

I discussed Aof Noppharnach and Bad Buddy as well as the use of the term เมีย ‘wife’ twice: in Part 1 and Part 3 of my meta series MAME & BL Literacies. The discussion with lurkingshan was without the proper context as most of the responses were going off anon’s ask alone.

The use of that term “wife” (เมีย) by Thai queer men is well documented. Narupon Duangwises and Peter A. Jackson in their 2021 paper Effeminacy and Masculinity in Thai Gay Culture: Language, Contextuality and the Enactment of Gender Plurality note insertive partner or fai ruk being called “husband” (phua) and receptive partner or fai rap being called a “wife” or mia in Thai gay culture. In the book Male Homosexuality in 21st-Century Thailand based on the longitudinal ethnographic study of Thai queer men, JWL van Wijngaarden highlights the difference between referring to one’s partner as “wife” (mia) and simply as “boyfriend” (faen) and how much more the former is valued. The Kothi-Panthi queer culture in India/South Asia also use such forms of endearment. The perception that the term is a pejorative is popular in English-language discourse thanks to ethnocentric perspectives. Also, the way Aof Noppharnach shamed the use of the term เมีย ‘wife’ in Bad Buddy in spite of its usage by queer people, especially the little people among them, is evidence enough of the contempt and disregard he can bring in through his positionality as an “auteur”, which is very unfortunate.

The issue is not the rejection of the term itself. Any creator can do as they please. But the term in question is one used by the little people (ordinary people who do not have much power) among the queers in Thailand, as is evident from the academic sources mentioned above. This is where Aof as a creator and Bad Buddy as a popular media product stand out as a sour thumb for me.

Here is the scene that is being discussed:

There are plenty of Thai viewers endorsing the scene on YouTube, highlighting the incongruence between the term mia and the LGBTQ+ model of queerness, as in case of the top comment (screenshot and machine translation attached).

The incongruence is not random.

It is in part related to the origins and adoption of different models of queerness and what is considered appropriate in each. Thailand's ‘indigenous’ (for a lack of a better term) conceptions of queerness, that has existed long before the LGBTQ+ model was formed, are now interacting with the latter. Not to mention the performance of genders including masculinities in Thailand and elsewhere.

This is not a phenomenon unique to Thailand in any way. I have highlighted many similar interactions such as those in present-day India (with clear schism between those who subscribe to different models on the lines of class, caste, location, language, migrant status, ethnicity, and religion, opportunities for intermingling, intermixing, and creation of glocal variations) and 20th century Japan (where the glocalized version of LGBTQ+ model replaced pre-existing model after a process that took decades) [more on it here and here]. There is an undeniable hegemony of the model that emerged in the West for reasons well known.

As is the case anywhere, the ones to get marginalized within a marginalized community are those who wield lesser power. These are the queer folk who are not privileged enough to air their grievances through the products of one of the most popular media companies in Thailand. These are queer folk who are passive recipients of not only this type of media but also the culture which produces it.

BL as a genre predates LGBTQ+ model and is in extricable linked to Japanese indigenous conception of male-male sexuality. (I have discussed this in length here and here.)

BL in Thailand is a space where different models of queerness – indigenous models of queerness in Thailand, that which was borrowed from historical Japan via BL, and the LGBTQ+ model that is gaining universality - interact. That is why, from Japan, we simultaneously have a ‘kathoey’ main character in I'm the Most Beautiful Count (which has a historical setting) as well as contemporary-setting characters that may embrace terms from the LGBTQ+ model and also those who embrace, reject, or are neutral about mia (เมีย ) and phua  (ผัว). This is where BL literacy or lack thereof might interfere, as is the case with Bad Buddy. That's the point of the meta series and source of discussion in the first place.

It is not a neutral rejection of the term mia that we get in Bad Buddy. It is loaded with explicit mention of triumph as a sentiment (GMMTV used the same in the title of the video and the screenshotted top comment points it out too) attributed to calling someone one’s mia and consequently subjugation implied in Pat’s admission of unease.

As @isaksbestpillow has rightly pointed out and I have discussed earlier (in the context of Malayalam descriptor for androphilic men ‘kundan’ which is the equivalent of the Japanese term wakashu, meaning 'young male’ in its dialect of origin in Kozhikode), not everyone uses the same words in the same way. There is significant spatial, social and temporal variation in the popularity of terms like mia among queer community in Thailand. This I learned from the academic sources mentioned above.

Regarding the very valid issue @happypotato48 raised, I am reminded of what Alan Williams wrote (quoted below) in his 2015 article titled ‘Rethinking Yaoi on the Regional and Global Scale’

As an observation of yaoi's 'post/modern' form, consider how a common utterance in the genre—when a character claims that he is 'not gay, but just in love with a man'—has both homophobic (or modern) temporal undertones but also non-identitarian (postmodern) ones. Consider too how yaoi fans often identify as 'straight/gay/lesbian' and so on, due to the preponderance of such labels in their societies, but also have an attraction to yaoi that crosses identitarian borders. Following Mizoguchi Akiko [another BL scholar] who identifies as both an 'out lesbian' and a 'person of yaoi sexuality,' I too identify as 'gay' out of habit, but the label has a rather dated feel to it when compared to the circulation of desire in yaoi fandoms.

I think that while acknowledging that Kongpop’s declaration (in Sotus 1 episode 10 iirc) sure has heterosexist implications that might be detrimental under the identitarian model that is furthering queer liberation at the moment, there are queer possibilities cutting across sex, sexuality and sexual orientation that are neither new nor obsolete. Also, whether it is embracing of one model over another or going through them as one ages or as the trends change, queer plurality should always be welcome, especially when they are contradictory – our queer dialectical, so to speak.

To conclude, I am grateful to anon for bringing this discussion to my attention and I am sorry for delaying and causing you to worry. Ad hominem (dismissing my argument based on my nationality and sexuality, both of which are beyond the point) attack aside, to borrow @lurkingshan's words, I have not made any ‘claims about how queer people in Thailand may feel about this term or Bad Buddy's intentional rejection of it’. It is precisely because ‘Bad Buddy was in fact made by a queer Thai man… Aof Noppharnach speaking directly to his own community and commenting on the tropes of the genre that he does not find helpful to queer men’ I thought it was worth addressing.

To make things clearer, let me give a completely different example: RRR (2022) [hopefully familiar to my readers] was not problematic for having the themes it had in the movie, instead it was so because of their handling along with the positionality of its creator when compared to the little people who could only consume RRR and its casteist, anti-Adivasi, and communalist effects.

I am always happy to be criticized.

and for maintaining the veneer: All scholarly works that I have referenced

[love-mariam]

"Big black eyes with fine soft wrinkles at the corners and rather smooth lids. His mouth was a nice, smiling mouth. The nose was neat and finely made; he didn't disdain it. And the eyebrows: he liked these best of all because they were very black and straight, not broken, bushy, and they were drawn high enough anove his eyes so that he had an open expression, a look of veiled wonder that others might trust. Yes, it was a very pretty young male. "

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"And now and then, quite distinct from the human voices, there came to him immortal voices too. Others like him out there, thinking, feeling, sending a warning? Far away their powerful silvery cries, yet he could easily separate them from the human warp and woof.

But this receptiveness hurt him. It brought back some awful memory of being shut up in a dark place with only these voices to keep him company for years and years and years. Panic. He would not remember that. Some things one doesn't want to remember. Like being burned, imprisoned. Like remembering everything and crying, terrible anguished crying.

Yes, bad things had happened to him. He had been here on this earth under other names and at other times. But always with this same gentle and optimistic disposition, loving things. Was his a migrant soul? No, he had always had this body. That's why it was so light and so strong.

Inevitably he shut off the voices. In fact, he remembered an old admonition: If you do not learn to shut out the voices, they will drive you mad."

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Trump Cuts Suspend UN Agency Actions for Migrants in Brazil

The announcements raise concerns in programs like the Operation Welcome, which speaks of 'significant challenges'

The International Organization for Migration (IOM), the UN arm for the issue, was forced to suspend its activities in Brazil that depend on US funding for the next three months following the cuts made by Donald Trump.

The situation directly impacts programs like the Operation Welcome, for receiving migrants from Venezuela, and projects for the integration and reception of immigrants and refugees in at least 14 states. The IOM is one of the main supports for the Brazilian government in this area.

The report confirmed with interlocutors speaking off the record that all IOM activities in Roraima are suspended. Employees of the organization also fear for their professional future. The notice from Washington arrived at the end of last week stating that, starting from last Saturday (25), any spending should be halted.

Continue reading.

[khalidistan]

Originally published to Twitter on October 11, 2021. Full piece under the cut.

Much of the Squid Game fandom neuters and infantilizes Abdul Ali, the Pakistani migrant worker who participates in the games as Player 199, and this is part of a larger problem where brown men must be emasculated in order to receive any grace or humanity.

“Gendered identities do not exist independently of other factors, and must be viewed as intertwined with, for example, race or ethnicity if we are to understand the hierarchical organization of identities.” —Maryam Khalid

Ali is polite and formal in his interactions with the other Koreans because he has a power differential with all of them. John Lee writes “Ali’s character is an undocumented migrant worker from Pakistan. What that means is that as far as social hierarchies go, Ali is WAY at the bottom of it. It explains why he’s been unpaid by his employer for months” (1). Ali acts subservient because he’ll get beaten if he doesn’t. He’s supposed to express how “grateful” he is for the assistance.

Ali acts subservient because he’ll get beaten if he doesn’t. He’s supposed to express how “grateful” he is for the assistance.

But Ali has demonstrated multiple times that he can fend for himself. He advocates for his fair pay to his Korean boss, even wrestling his paycheck out of his boss’s hands. During the night fight he fights on his own with a metal beam before reuniting with his team. He even has the courage to mock Mi-nyeo after she spews xenophobic statements at him, defending his honor and calling her out on her hypocrisy and doubt of the team’s strategy.

People want to make Ali out to be naïve but fail to recognize that he immigrated to south Korea from Pakistan. He knows nothing of the language and customs. Heather Chen writes that Ali is “an outsider and knows that the odds would always be stacked against him in the unpredictable competition.” Ali cannot be naïve, because Ali is given no reason to doubt Sang-woo’s kindness from earlier: Sang-woo provides bus fare after the first game, offers bread, and shares companionship with Ali all the way until the marble game.

East Asia has a huge racism and colorism problem. Ali is forced to be submissive. He is docile because if he isn’t, he’s immediately labeled a threat. That is the dichotomy people are missing. Why do brown men walk on eggshells when they have to answer to authority or go through security checks? Brown men can either be cunning, savage, sneaky terrorists, or they can be naïve, dumb, effeminate and castrated. There’s never any middle ground or nuance to understanding them.

“The colonized man is simultaneously a boogeyman incapable of redemption, unworthy of saving/advocating for and excluded from occupying a position of vulnerability—that’s reserved for their ‘women & children’ counterparts—while also in-need of (white/colonial) civilizing, fascinating.” —Joshua Briond

Khalid writes that “Orientalist notions of the masculinity of the ‘Eastern’ male as uncivilized also inherently ascribe primitiveness, ineptness and a certain amount of weakness to the barbarized ‘other.’” Those doomed to the mythical Orient are automatically placed lower in masculinity than their white and colonial counterparts.

However, this reduced masculinity co-exists, paradoxically, with the idea that men from the Orient are simultaneously aggressive, belligerent, and violent. Elgin Brunner writes: “Such a framing—the association of the enemy with barbarism, as opposed to the self, which is civilized—includes two, often simultaneous, moves, that is: the ‘hypermasculinization’ of the enemy on the one hand, and his ‘effeminization’ on the other… The very same opponent is, by virtue of being categorized as a cowardly barbarian, rendered effeminate.”

It’s true that Ali is compassionate, looking out for others and not expecting things in return. But the woobification of Ali into a bumbling fool is more than gross misinterpretation—it’s character assassination and fails to recognize how race influences his reception by the community.

Works Cited:

Brunner, E. M. (2008). Consoling display of strength or emotional overstrain? the gendered framing of the early “War on terrorism” in transatlantic comparison. Global Society, 22(2), 217–251. https://doi.org/10.1080/13600820801887223

Khalid, M. (2011). Gender, orientalism and representations of the ‘other’ in the War on Terror. Global Change, Peace & Security, 23(1), 15–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/14781158.2011.540092

VICE MEDIA GROUP. (2021, October 6). A shout-out to Ali, a character too pure for the dark humanity in 'squid game'. VICE. Retrieved from https://www.vice.com/en/article/5db74b/ali-netflix-squid-game-character-interview-anupam-tripathi

Link to original Twitter thread

[antifainternational]

LEEDS REPORTBACK: Yesterday Leeds AFN joined the newly formed coalition "Yorkshire Against Hate" in opposing a rally organised by "Mick" (English Bulldog) who is a part of the migrant hunter grift. Unfortunately migrant hunters received minimal attention from antifascists while Patriotic Alternative had the spotlight. This allowed them to tap into public opinion and direct anger towards migrants instead of the neoliberal economic policies and degradation of public services that led to people becoming poorer.

Prior to the demo concerns were already arising with Alek Yerbury already expressing concerns that the police weren't alerted and not much prior planning had occurred.

On the day Yorkshire Against Hate took the space early on outside the hotel before the far right could create much of a relevant presence and receptive messages from asylum seekers inside the hotel.

Despite the heavy police presence and fenced off zones, antifascists managed to break the kettle and meet the far right where a few scuffles had unfolded.

The far right crowd had a couple of noticeable figures including a Walter Mitty type and a Proud Boys Britannia member Warren Gilly.

A major barrier to organizing was the SWP that attempted to police the YAH bloc.

Overall the day went well with no arrests on our side and far right being outnumbered.

Yorkshire Against Hate is a newer coalition and did quite well in spite of that.

[beardedmrbean]

Swedish border guards will be given the power to search migrants’ smartphones to look for evidence of destroyed passports under a new law backed by the country’s Right-wing coalition government.

The law comes as part of a wider push to speed up deportations of failed asylum seekers to drive down migrant numbers amid fears they are being recruited by Sweden’s organised crime gangs.

Officials believe migrants entering Sweden may have used their phones to take photos or make digital copies of their passports and other documents before destroying them on arrival at airports.

Swedish officials said identifying migrants was vital if the person was to be deported after a failed claim.

‘They might keep a copy’ 

“Next week, we are going to receive a government inquiry on increasing the possibilities for the police to look into iPhones to find the documents that have been scanned there,” Anders Hall, state secretary for the ministry of justice, told The Telegraph.

“When you tear up your passport, you might keep a copy or a photo in your phone because sooner or later you might need it. This will give the legal basis to make it possible to look for them.”

The government expects the law to enter into force in 2025-26 after a consultation period.

Sweden now says there are more emigrants than immigrants for the first time in 50 years after toughening asylum rules since Ulf Kristersson took power as prime minister in 2022.

His conservative coalition is propped up by the hard-Right Sweden Democrats, which was partly founded by Nazi sympathisers and remains formally outside of government despite coming second in a 2022 election dominated by fears over migration and crime.

“We signed up for a very detailed agreement, both in terms of law enforcement and migration,” Mr Hall said.

“The Sweden Democrats have more or less full insight into what we are doing. We are constantly having meetings with them, telling them where we are implementing.”

He pointed out that despite the uproar over the cooperation with the Sweden Democrats, the opposition Social Democrats had not voted against a single migration measure brought forward by the government.

“There was much ado about nothing,” he said before adding that the Sweden Democrats were being encouraged to be more responsible through their brushes with government.

Mr Hall was in London this week to brief UK government officials on Sweden’s crackdown.

Other measures include boosting voluntary repatriation, as well as deportations.

Naturalised citizens and families of migrants could be offered money to leave the country as part of a voluntary return scheme that already offers refugees about £720 and travel costs.

As a rule, asylum seekers should live in reception centres or return centres rather than private housing. 

The government has also introduced rules making it possible to strip serious criminals or terrorists with dual nationalities of their Swedish nationality.

Accepted refugees are also no longer granted permanent residence as a matter of course. Instead, their claim is reviewed every three years.

Sweden is among EU member states calling for tougher rules to make deporting failed asylum seekers easier.

Increasing numbers of claims are being made by migrants arriving in the bloc legally in airports before destroying their papers.

In 2015, 13 per cent of all asylum claims in the EU were made in Sweden but that was down to 2 per cent in 2023. In 2023, Sweden received 12,600 asylum applications, which is lower than in 2020, and is expected to be the lowest since 1997.

[foster-the-world]

Aw, man

Last night the district wide school board meeting turned into a debate about Israel. With some claiming the DOE is not doing "enough." Apparently enough means they haven't yet written a email condemning the kidnappings in Israel? With claims they would have already sent a letter if it was black people. I guess the district is waiting on a legal team to approve language. So it should go out today or tmrw. Not good enough for these people. I don't get it. The DOE did send a letter condemning racism and it doesn't do shit to protect my kids. We are still in the most segregated school system in the nation. I am 100% confident the man claiming they "would have already done it if it was black people." made sure his children were in the majority white schools. The anti-racism letter didn't change his desire to segregate his children so why would a anti-semitism letter help jewish students? Writing a letter condemning the kidnappings in Israel is not going to protect my kids one bit nor help the children who were kidnapped. Our district has migrant children pouring in every single week. Let's talk about how we can support them. Letter or no letter I do not care.

I left that meeting to go to our schools PTA meeting. We did spend a good amount of time talking about how we can help the new migrant children who started at our school last week. Apparently 1000 more children entered the district on Friday - set to start next week. My 2nd graders class got three more students last week. Rebel's 1st grade class got two more students. We've been working on our Spanish at home and making sure the girls include them. I'm so glad we are at a school where we teach the kids to welcome their new friends. I have no doubt the uniform, clothing, coat drive will be fully funded - even though we have a school full of low income parents who aren't exactly rolling in the dough.

This morning I'm talking to the Principal about the clothing/Halloween costume drive when she gets a text message and looks horrified. Apparently a lower grade kid told their teacher they can't be around them because they are Jewish and their Mom told them Jewish people are dangerous. So fucked up. Poor baby being taught that hate and poor teacher having to hear it from a student she pours her hard work into.

I'm not really worried about my girls hearing shitty things. As mentioned they are tough and can handle themselves. The toughness does mean they can be jerks but also means they wouldn't hesitate to fight back if someone says shit like that to them. People have said other shitty things to them and they returned with the 6yo version of "go fuck yourself" and were indignant more then hurt. *Obviously they didn't use the f word. They have a solid group of friends in their class who would know to defend them. Although we are going to have a talk about what to say if someone talks negatively about Juduism or if they hear someone say anything racist/prejudice/etc to themselves or any of their friends. We've had the general talk before but probably need to be more specific on the Jewish side of things. Every year my husband and I bring Hanukkah celebration stuff to their class. Everyone is always very receptive. Last year Bee's teacher was Jewish. They've generally had at least one jewish family in their class - although that dwindles in the older grades. We live two doors down from the JCC - so they go to classes there so do get to spend time around Jewish children regardless. This semester they are taking an art class there and we go to the shabbat dinners sometime.

Bee has a Ukrainian girl in her class - well her grandparents are from Ukraine. So Bee came home last year talking about how people are murdering babies "as soon as they come out" in the Ukrainian war. Now this year her little friend is from Israel - so she comes home with more horror stories he hears from home and interprets into six year old language. The world we are giving our children is not okay.

[kirinda-ondo]

I think one of the many factors in the difference of reception between the Twitter and Reddit refugees is the level of willingness to interact and engage with Tumblr culture

With the Twitter migration there were a LOT of posts basically slamming it into their heads that they need to reblog things or change their icons and titles in order to not be mistaken for bots and not rely on an algorithm (Tumblr DOES have one contrary to popular belief but it sucks and almost everyone has it turned off) and the Twitter users just never really seemed to want to adapt for the longest time there

But the Reddit migrants are jumping right and they are reblogging and tagging and hitting post limit and engaging with the site and its culture and I see a lot less posts about "here's what you need to do to survive on Tumblr" because they're just fucking doing it and it's just such a nice contrast that I think we are generally a lot more welcoming to that

[ausetkmt]

New York mayor 'shocked' that migrant children as young as nine months secretly sent to his city

New York's mayor said he was shocked that at least 239 minors arrived incognito after being separated from parents on the Mexican border.

While Donald Trump signed the end of a policy of separation of families at the border that provoked outrage in the United States and abroad, Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio went into a a reception center for migrant children in Harlem, where a television crew had filmed the previous night some girls arriving secretly, apparently separated from their parents at the border.

The segregated minors included a nine-month-old baby and traumatized children, many with lice, bedbugs or contagious diseases.

Mr De Blasio emerged from the reception centre saying he was "shocked to learn" how many children separated from their parents had been sent to New York, explaining that this single center in Harlem had received 239 children without the knowledge of city authorities.

"How is it possible that none of us knew that there (were) 239 kids right here in our city?" he said. "How is the federal government holding back that information from the people of this city and holding back the help that these kids could need?"

"The mental health issues alone, they made clear to us, are very real; very painful," De Blasio stressed.

The Cayuga Center, which has classrooms in a six-story building across the street from an elevated train line, has a federal contract to place unaccompanied immigrant children in short-term foster care. Officials at the center did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment.

Mr De Blasio said the staff there told him it has taken in about 350 children since President Donald Trump's administration implemented its "zero tolerance" policy this spring calling for the criminal prosecution of all adults caught crossing the border illegally.

He is off to join other US mayors Thursday in Texas to visit a childcare center and denounce the migration policy of the Trump administration.