#the most recent numbers I can find are from 2014

[perfectlyvalid49]

I have a problem with Ilhan Omar’s antisemitism more than others because she has a significant number of Jewish constituents. She represents Minnesota’s 5th, which contains the heaviest concentration of Jews in Minnesota. I can’t find actual numbers that are recent, but to give an idea, her district contains the Minneapolis JCC, and her district is where you go to find the grocery stores that carry kosher meat.

I have a problem with Ilhan Omar as a person because when she was campaigning in 2018 she had several events at local synagogues, where her left leaning platform got tons of support and she came in and said how she loved Jews and loved Israel and never once mentioned that she supported BDS (a fact which she kept off of her website until AFTER the election,) and I don’t like liars. I know several people who voted for her who would not have done so if she had been honest about her platform, and that really bugs me.

“…….we should not have to tolerate antisemitism or bigotry for all Jewish students, whether they are pro-genocide or anti-genocide.”

- Sitting Congressperson Ilhan Omar

Next time anyone insists “the protests can’t be antisemitic, there are Jews involved,” remember that we have a sitting congressperson putting a target on the backs of all Jewish students who aren’t. A full grown adult member of congress is putting a target on the backs of young people her daughter’s age.

I really shouldn’t have to be explaining why it’s antisemitic to say that any Jew who doesn’t identify themselves as part of one particular group is “pro-genocide.” I really shouldn’t have to explain why it’s so insidious to say “antisemitism is wrong, no matter how genocidal so many Jews are 🥰” She knows exactly what she’s doing. The only question is, do they?

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[pyrrhiccomedy]

What sort of proof would you need to believe that a fundraiser was real?

I actually put in the legwork to verify one of these fundraisers today (I wanted to see how hard it was to actually vet one of these posts). It took about an hour, but I was satisfied by the end of it that the person in question exists, is who they are claiming to be, has a GoFundMe, and that the GoFundMe being spread around is probably the same one being linked to (I wasn't 100% satisfied by what I could find on that count? but I ended up in a place where I was reasonably confident). I'm happy to share my work, and have added it below.

I've gotten a lot of nasty messages since making that post accusing me of being anti-Palestine. My heart and money is 100% with Palestine, and I've given as much as I can afford, to reputable aid organizations. I believe both in a free Palestine, and doing your own research on the recipients of your money when you decide to financially contribute to a cause.

Anyway, this is the GoFundMe that I think is legit, and below is the legwork I did to reach that conclusion. While I still think it is better to give to a relief organization if your goal is improving the lot of the people in Gaza, I don't think this one is a scam.

This is the fundraiser for Eman Zaqout, who - first of all - is a real person! This is very easy to verify: Googling her name returns a LinkedIn with a complete work history (she is a molecular biologist), her profile with Unesco, and her profile with the Palestine Academy for Science & Technology. You know, the kind of stuff you'd expect to see when you Google someone. Great start.

Next step: Is the person running this GoFundMe the real Dr. Zaqout? (While I have some sources which say she is in a PhD fellowship and does not yet have her doctorate, she is listed as Dr. Zaqout at the Palestine Academy for Science & Technology, and I'd prefer to use the honorific in case it may in fact be more appropriate.)

So. Dr. Zaqout joined LinkedIn in 2014. And she does link to her Instagram from her LinkedIn, and her Instagram links to the GoFundMe. That's a great start!

However, it's worth mentioning that her contact information on LinkedIn was updated less than 3 months ago (which includes the link to her Instagram). Given the number of Palestinians whose accounts have been hacked or spoofed by scammers in order to lend their scams legitimacy, I don't love that change. That coincides with the surge in scam activity following the All Eyes on Rafah movement gaining momentum. Plenty of Palestinians have had their entire social media presences stolen by scammers.

However again - her LinkedIn (which, as established, may be compromised) also links to a TikTok account! And the TikTok account has video! And that sure looks to me like Dr. Zaqout in the video! While the photo of her on LinkedIn is no longer trustworthy since we know her account has been updated in the past 3 months, there is also a photo of her here at Palast.ps, which is a legitimate scientific organization. And yeah, sure, a dedicated scammer could have hacked that too, but there are also photos of her on LinkedIn that look like this:

It's not the best photo in the world, but it's identifiably her. Fabricating this kind of ephemera is more than I would expect of your typical charity scammer.

And in the most recent TikTok video of her, she's even talking about a GoFundMe, on 7/17! And she posted another video on 7/21 in which she is not seen, but you can hear her voice, and it does sound like her.

Today is August 2nd. The last two videos uploaded to Dr. Zaqout's TikTok are just photo collages, so they can't be used to verify that she still has control of her social media accounts. But for now, I'm prepared to say with some confidence that that woman is Dr. Eman Zaqout, that Dr. Zaqout is legitimately a Palestinian scientist, she did actually start a GoFundMe, and that she was posting about it as recently as 12 days ago.

All right all right, we are cooking folks. The last questions we need to answer: is this actually Dr. Zaqout's GoFundMe? The last scenario we need to rule out is that her social media presence was stolen in the last 12 days.

Let's start with that GoFundMe.

First of all, it's not being run by Dr. Zaqout. That's normal: GoFundMe isn't supported in Palestine, and all Palestinians will have to rely on friends or family abroad to set up their campaigns and collect donations on their behalf. This campaign is being run by a Mazin Fakak. I think that's supposed to be this Mazin Fakak, which makes sense; he is based in Quebec, and Dr. Zaqout either studied at or is in close affiliation with McGill University, which is in Quebec. He also lists Arabic as one of his spoken languages. So far this is a plausible connection for Dr. Zaqout to have. His LinkedIn profile also hasn't been updated in over a year, which makes me disinclined to think this is a recently-stolen scam account.

My one issue here is that when I Google Fakak, this is all that comes up. A LinkedIn profile created in 2014 that hasn't been touched in over a year, and two GoFundMe fundraisers for Palestinian families. And Dr. Zaqout never mentions Fakak anywhere. I would feel 100% confident of this fundraiser if she did.

But while my investigation into Fakak didn't turn up anything that confirms the connection to Zaqout, it also does nothing to disprove it, and the circumstantial evidence available to me lends credibility to the claim. So while I land somewhere around 80% on the verifiable credibility of this GoFundMe, please balance that against my 95%+ confidence in Zaqout's legitimacy, and the fact that she appears to still have control of her socials as of 12 days ago. If she posts on TikTok with another live video again (and not a photo slideshow, which can't be considered verification of anything), then I'd say this one is completely safe.

[inspired-lesson-plans]

Math, grade 7, Ratios and Proportional Relationships 7.RP.A.3: Use proportional relationships to solve multistep ratio and percent problems. Examples: simple interest, tax, markups and markdowns, gratuities and commissions, fees, percent increase and decrease, percent error.

Essential Question: How can basic calculations of percent change influence major world events?

Do Now: Calculate the percent increase or decrease in each of the following equations. x = (28 - 17.9)/28 x = (41.5 - 57.7)/57.7

Class Discussion: Remind students about how to perform basic calculations of increase/decrease factors. Ask them whether this calculation would be more complicated if the quantities were dollars instead of just numbers (answer: no). Ask them whether this calculation would be more complicated if the quantities were billions of dollars instead of just dollars (answer: no). Show students that they just performed the exact same calculations that Donald Trump did in order to decide what tariffs should be put upon Indonesia and Thailand, respectively.

Finally, ask students whether important global trade decisions should be calculated with 7th grade math skills, or if perhaps this is insufficient given the severe consequences that could arise from such a dunning-kruger error.

Direct Instruction: Explain what a Dunning-Kruger error is, if for no other reason than to communicate how absolutely maddening has it is for legitimate experts who have dedicated their lives to nudging fiscal policy in the right direction and then watch as their president makes the worst decision possible on purpose.

Take a moment to explain the difference between an import and an export, so that students understand what these billions of dollars actually mean in the real world. Feel free to call out anyone who has ever questioned whether or not they would ever use this kind of math in the real world. Show them that it's happening right now, and make sure they understand how terrifying that is.

Acknowledge the variables: x: total exports from US to country i m: total imports to US from country i tau (τ): calculated % tariff on all imports to US from country i epsilon (ε): elasticity phi (φ): passthrough

Ask students what they think elasticity and passthrough mean, then show students this passage from ustr.gov:

Parameter Selection To calculate reciprocal tariffs, import and export data from the U.S. Census Bureau for 2024. Parameter values for ε and φ were selected. The price elasticity of import demand, ε, was set at 4. Recent evidence suggests the elasticity is near 2 in the long run (Boehm et al., 2023), but estimates of the elasticity vary. To be conservative, studies that find higher elasticities near 3-4 (e.g., Broda and Weinstein 2006; Simonovska and Waugh 2014; Soderbery 2018) were drawn on. The elasticity of import prices with respect to tariffs, φ, is 0.25. The recent experience with U.S. tariffs on China has demonstrated that tariff passthrough to retail prices was low (Cavallo et al, 2021).

Ask students if this clarified anything about what elasticity and passthrough mean. Most will say "no", but if anyone points out that multiplying 4 by 0.25 cancels them both out, reward them. That student is correct, because elasticity and passthrough have been arbitrarily assigned so as to make this calculation so simple that even Donald Trump can understand it.

Modeled Learning: Show how to apply these tariffs to popular imports such as raw coffee beans. For example, the USDA report of coffee imports from 2024 (page 6) shows that the vast majority of raw coffee is imported from Brazil.

A simple search with Perplexity.ai tells us that in 2024, imports (m) = $42.3 billion and exports (x) = $49.7 billion, so the reciprocal tariff would be (x-m)/m = (49.7-42.3)/42.3 = 17.5%.

Thus, all coffee imports from Brazil will automatically be 17.5% more expensive.

Be sure to highlight that this is happening to every country in the world, even those with total populations less than 1000.

Higher Order Learning:

Students should consider the following facts:

There is very little territory within the United States that can grow coffee.

Almost all coffee in the world is grown within what is called "The Global South", where the climate is warm and the labor is cheap.

The US exports significantly more (sometimes vastly more) to countries in the Global South than we import from them.

Students should then answer the following questions:

What will this universal tariff calculation do to the price of coffee?

Is there any way that US coffee companies can import the same amount of coffee as before without passing on the cost to consumers? Why or why not?

Do you think this tariff program will equalize imports and exports between the US and other countries? What other impacts could it have, good or bad, across the world?

[bluelocksource]

Ego Jinpachi’s trivia (src: EGOIST BIBLE)

"You can't be the best striker in the world unless you're the world's most egotistical person."

☆ Character's color: White.

☆ Birthday: 31st March.

☆ Current age: 30.

☆ Zodiac: Aries.

☆ Current height: 189 cm.

☆ Foot size: 28.5cm.

☆ Blood type: AB.

☆ Hobby: Watching soccer, mainly European League.

☆ Favorite food: Cup yakisoba, cup noodle. "I banned them during my active days. These monster junk foods make you gain weight."

☆ Dislike/hated food: Protein. "There's no such thing as tasty protein."

☆ What goes best with rice: "Furikake made from crushed cup yakisoba."

☆ Favorite animal: Bell crickets. "Beautiful chirping sound but a bit gross in appearance."

☆ Favorite season: Other than summer. "You can't play soccer when it's too hot."

☆ Favorite manga: Magical☆Taruruuto-kun. "The work that fried my brain as a kid."

☆ Favorite movie: セッション (Session) "This is what chemical reaction is."

The original movie is called Whiplash (2014). In Japan, it released under the name セッション (Session).

☆ Favorite music: Nighttime background music of a babbling brook and the chirping of insects.

☆ Frequently read magazine: CHICHI (he's a subscriber).

It's a monthly magazine for learning about humanities.

☆ Favorite person: Hiromitsu Ochiai. "I think he's a rational genius."

☆ Favorite subject: P.E. and Psychology.

☆ Weak subject: Art. "I don't want to create art."

☆ Favorite place: Blue Lock Merchandise Sales Department. "They're selling a variety of items."

☆ Mushroom shoots vs Bamboo shoots: Mushroom shoots. "I feel a certain affinity with them."

☆ Ideal type: "Someone who does everything for me."

☆ Fixation: Physiognomy. "I find the faces of people who look hopeless to be irresistibly amusing."

☆ What would make him happy: Japan winning the World Cup.

☆ What would make him upset: "Someone taking football away from me."

☆ What he thinks his strength is: “I have no interest in anything other than soccer.”

☆ What he thinks his weakness is: “I have no interest in anything other than soccer.”

☆ What made him cry recently: “I haven't cried in a while.”

☆ Usual sleeping hour: 4 - 4 -2 (split sleeping style).

☆ Number of chocolates received from previous Valentine: 0 (it's futile).

☆ What he usually ends up buying from convenience store: Check out the new cup yakisoba and cup noodles.

☆ Place he washes first when taking a bath: Pouring hot water onto the crown of his head.

☆ What will he do if received 100 million yen: Strengthening Blue Lock facilities.

☆ How he spent his holiday: Thinking about how Japanese soccer can become the best in the world.

☆ What will he do during his last day on Earth: "Watching what I consider the best game of the Japan national soccer team. Currently, it's the 2005 Confederation Cup against Brazil."

note: i want to apologize in advance for any mistake made in the translation!

[univac1219]

Does your 1219 have a nickname?

Also, I was wondering if you have any fun stories surrounding it! Strange quirks it has or anything like that.

I'd love to see more photos if you're allowed to post them!

Thanks for the question! These are my favorite part about my blog by far.

Not exactly, the UNIVAC 1219 doesn’t have a nickname. I did realize recently that I should specify the pronunciation (Twelve-Nineteen), but it doesn’t have any nicknames. Apart from ‘the 1219’, it’s also regularly referred to as the CPU or just ‘the computer’.

Fun stories or weird quirks? Boy, I could fill a book with this machine’s weird quirks (or as we say, intermittent issues), but I’ll try to blitz through the most common ones:

Sometimes the computer will stop running and enter a WAIT mode. No reason, it just needs a break. We can’t fix it, it just has to decide to go back into operating mode.

The computer will often start attempting to communicate on IO channel 13. We’re not telling it to talk to anything, it just decides to try to.

One of our teletypes (the Kleinshmidt) stamps ink splotches into the paper rather than characters most of the time. However, this weekend it worked for the first time in 10 months! We didn’t change anything, it just had an extra cup of coffee or something.

The Digital Data Recorder, or the tape drive, has the most gremlins out of any of our units. The top handler works fairly well, but the bottom handler won’t properly read data, write data, move the tape forward, initialize the tape, or any number of other issues.

There’s more but hopefully this satisfies your curiosity.

Fun stories? Well, I can’t name any specific ones, but I can say it’s a very endearing machine. It’s the very last of its kind and being one of three individuals in the world responsible for it makes every issue that more frustrating. There is no real forum for it, the subject matter experts sit next to me and are often just as exasperated as I am.

But the unique nature of this situation make every successful diagnostic test that much sweeter. Every new addition (5.25” floppy drive via serial) that much cooler. I have an IBM PC-XT clone at home, but I thank my lucky stars every day that this big iron is what I get to specialize in.

As for more photos, I have none that are as grandiose as you would probably expect. I do have my working photos though. I took all my photos when I first started working on it and now I am more dedicated to fixes than photo-ops.

This is a photo of our finicky Kleinshmidt teletype. Still has blotches but it actually printed!

This is the back of the bottom handler. Pictured is the vacuum pump in the bottom left (so sudden stops just yank magnetic tape slack rather than ripping tape). The big cylinder in the center is a motor for running the magnetic tape handler itself. The big black ‘hose’ of wires coming out of the steel plate contains all the cables that come right off the handler’s head for reading and writing data!

This is the forward pinch roller of the bottom handler. It was replaced after this photo was taken as you can see the rubber has deteriorated in the 55 years this machine has been operating.

As for being allowed to post photos, that’s not an issue. The last 1219 was decommissioned in 2014 and now you can find all of its documentation online at http://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/univac/military/1219/

[valyrfia]

RE: This ask on fanfic, fandom, and lestappen

(preface with, I love fanfic and fandom, and I've written for very big and small)

I have never experienced such bad fandom etiquette as I have with 1633. I wrote one multi chapter fic for the ship and 99% of ao3 comments I got were people asking when I'd publish the next chapter, which has always been a big no no in fandom. I deleted the fic because it felt bad that people didn't want to engage with what I had written, but, just ask about my update schedule. Also, people changing the date of their published fic to be more recent, so, it appears at the top of the 'recently updated page'! I have never seen this in any fandom before now! AO3 isn't Instagram! If you tag correctly, people will find your fic if they want to read it.

People are pushing 1633 constantly in very public spaces like Twitter, Insta and TikToK, where we know these drivers have accounts and look at comments/posts about them or on their own posts. Just today on Twitter I see Dan Howell (which what a fucking weird intersection of my past and current interests) being asked at a public panel about lestappen, just because he's mentioned liking F1 in the past. I know it gets easy clicks and engagement because it is popular. But, it's so far removed from behaviour that was ever considered acceptable in fandom.

I remember, back in 2013/14 there was a huge backlash to people bringing up fictional ships to actors/writers. There was discourse after every Supernatural or Teen Wolf fan forum/con panel when someone would inevitably ask about Destiel or Sterek. People would argue whether fanon and ships were appropriate to ask the real people behind the show about.

RPF is fine, I have written, currently write and will continue to engage in RPF spaces. But, there are boundaries that you must keep if you are going to engage with it. Tumblr and AO3 have always been considered locked fandom spaces. If a person goes onto these sites and searches themselves out, that's on them. But, it's implied in fandom that you keep to just these spaces or private chats

(personally, I'm sad I just missed out on the livejournal days... I got into fandom when everything was being moved over from there and fanfic.net onto ao3)

I understand younger social media users are used to an algorithm finding content for them. And on sites like Tumblr where the algorithm sucks or ao3, which doesn't have one. You have to search out the content you want yourself. Liking and kudos isn't enough, you actually have to engage in meaningly conversations and comments if you want to make friends. That can be scary! But, it's a soft skill that is slowly getting lost and with it fandom etiquette is going down the drain.

This is like...one of the last big serious ask I want to reply to on this topic because not everyone agrees with me (which, fine), but OP you put a lot of time into typing this up so I will honour that.

I think fandom, much like a lot of other things nowadays, have become less about fun and more about hitting a certain number of likes and interactions. That's why people push Lestappen on other social media even though most of us have explicitly said "can you not, thanks". The changing the date of the fic to push to an 'algorithm' infuriates me and is a personal pet peeve of mine. There's one that's doing that now on the Lestappen tag and I've point-blanked refused to read it literally BECAUSE of the date changing. People will read your fic if they want to, constantly pushing it to the top of the 'Date Updated' list does nothing except piss people off.

I will say I think the fictional ship discourse of 2014 was maybe driven in part by the fact that being gay was still seen as something much more 'novel' than even now. If we think about when marriage became legal in the US and all that...I still think though that it shows a level of self-awareness and self-regulation that we've lost in fandom. As my partner and I often to lament to each other, we've become so individualistic that people have lost the concept of shame. It's an idea that YOU are the exception and something should cater to YOU, instead of the other way round. In the case of fandom, this comes out as people acknowledging fandom etiquette in an abstract way, but still logging into their twitter account (WITH THEIR FACES ATTACHED! WHICH! THIS IS A TANGENT BUT IT BAFFLES ME! WHAT HAPPENED TO DIGITAL FOOTPRINT!) and posting about RPF. Fandom is not an abstract entity, fandom IS the people that interact with it–from authors to artists all the way to those who consume the content.

Also, I also JUST missed out on the lj days–the great migration was happening just when I was getting involved in fandom and I can't help but feel like I missed out on something special.

[rustbeltjessie]

I normally save this kind of post for my side blog but! Here’s two things that have to do with discoveries about myself:

I recently unlocked a new celebrity crush. This has happened to me before, with different celebrities, but for me it works pretty much the same way as unlocking a new kink. With both, it’ll be like: hear about/see celebrity (or kink), go hmmm yeah I get why people are into them (it), but not my thing. And then like months or years later I’ll see something about it (them) again, or have a hot dream featuring them (or it), and suddenly it’s like oh! Okay yeah maybe it is my thing. Anyway. Not telling you who it is but whoooo buddy am I getting some good fantasies out of this.

I got absolutely blindsided today, by something I found that I wrote in the autumn of 2007, wherein I fully knew I was a trans guy. I’d found other writings from my past before, where I talked about gender stuff, but I had forgotten about this and how clear it was. The gist of it was: Yeah, I’ve realized I’m a boy. I have no real desire to go on hormones or have surgery of any kind, but I’m a guy. There was more to it than that but just like…I spent 2014-22 (and even some time since) going: I don’t know if I can really say I’m trans because xyz… How did I not fucking remember that I knew I was trans in two thousand and fucking seven?!

Edited to add: realization number two will change absolutely nothing in the immediate sense—I am still using the same pronouns (they, he, and she), I still consider myself nonbinary and genderfluid (I can be a nonbinary guy who’s still sometimes a woman, ok?), I am still not currently pursuing any sort of medical or surgical transition. The most significant thing about finding that piece of writing is that all the self-doubt is gone. I no longer have to question whether or not I’m really trans. I am, and I’ve known for a really long time.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Douglas Murray

Published: Feb 24, 2024

Like a number of ‘anti-colonialists’, William Dalrymple lives in colonial splendour on the outskirts of Delhi. The writer often opens the doors of his estate to slavering architectural magazines. A few years ago, one described his pool, pool house, vast family rooms, animals, cockatoo ‘and the usual entourage of servants that attends any successful man in India’s capital city’.

I only mention Dalrymple because he is one of a large number of people who have lost their senses by going rampaging online about the alleged genocide in Gaza. He recently tweeted at a young Jewish woman who said she was afraid to travel into London during the Palestinian protests: ‘Forget 30,000 dead in Gaza, tens of thousands more in prison without charge, five MILLION in stateless serfdom, forget 75 years of torture, rape, dispossession, humiliation and occupation, IT’S ALL ABOUT YOU.’ It is one thing when a street rabble loses their minds. But when people who had minds start to lose them, that is another thing altogether.

I find it curious. By every measure, what is happening in Gaza is not genocide. More than that – it’s not even regionally remarkable.

Hamas’s own figures – not to be relied upon – suggest that around 28,000 people have been killed in Gaza since October. Most of the international media likes to claim these people are all innocent civilians. In fact, many of the dead will have been killed by the quarter or so Hamas and Islamic Jihad rockets that fall short and land inside Gaza.

Then there are the more than 9,000 Hamas terrorists who have been killed by the Israel Defence Forces. As Lord Roberts of Belgravia recently pointed out, that means there is fewer than a two to one ratio of civilians to terrorists killed: ‘An astonishingly low ratio for modern urban warfare where the terrorists routinely use civilians as human shields.’ Most western armies would dream of such a low civilian casualty count. But because Israel is involved (‘Jews are news’) the libellous hyperbole is everywhere.

For almost 20 years since Israel withdrew from Gaza, we have heard the same allegations. Israel has been accused of committing genocide in Gaza during exchanges with Hamas in 2009, 2012 and 2014. As a claim it is demonstrably, obviously false. When Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, the population of the Strip was around 1.3 million. Today it is more than two million, with a male life expectancy higher than in parts of Scotland. During the same period, the Palestinian population in the West Bank grew by a million. Either the Israelis weren’t committing genocide, or they tried to commit genocide but are uniquely bad at it. Which is it? Well, when it comes to Israel it seems people don’t have to choose. Everything and anything can be true at once.

Here is a figure I’ve never seen anyone raise. It’s an ugly little bit of maths, but stay with me. If you wish, you might add together all the people killed in every conflict involving Israel since its foundation.

In 1948, after the UN announced the state, all of Israel’s Arab neighbours invaded to try to wipe it out. They failed. But the upper estimate of the casualties on all sides came to some 20,000 people. The upper estimates of the wars of 1967 and 1973, when Israel’s neighbours once again attempted to annihilate it, are very similar (some 20,000 and 15,000 respectively). Subsequent wars in Lebanon and Gaza add several thousands more to that figure. It means that up to the present war, some 60,000 people had died on every side in all wars involving Israel.

Over the past decade of civil war in Syria, Bashar al-Assad has managed to kill more than ten times that number. Although precise figures are hard to come by, Assad is reckoned to have murdered some 600,000 Arab Muslims in his country. Meaning that every six to 12 months he manages to kill the same number as died in every war involving Israel ever.

There are lots of reasons you might give to explain this: that people don’t care when Muslims kill Muslims; that people don’t care when Arabs kill Arabs; that they only care if Israel is involved. Allow me to give another example that is suggestive.

No one knows how many people have been killed in the war in Yemen in recent years. From 2015-2021 the UN estimated perhaps 377,000 – ten times the highest estimate of the recent death toll in Gaza. The only time I’ve heard people scream on British streets about Yemen has been after the Houthis started attacking British and American ships in the Red Sea and the deadbeat idiots on the streets of London started chanting: ‘Yemen, Yemen, make us proud, turn another ship around.’ Because like all leftists and Islamists there is no terrorist group these people can’t get a pash on, so long as that terrorist group is against us.

I often wonder why this obsession arises when the war involves Israel. Why don’t people trawl along our streets and scream by their thousands about Syria, Yemen, China’s Uighurs or a hundred other terrible things? There are only two possible conclusions.

The first is a journalistic one. Ever since Marie Colvin was killed it became plain that western journalists were a target in Syria. Not eager to be the target, most journalists hotfooted it out of the country. Some who didn’t fell into the hands of Isis. Israel-Gaza wars by contrast do not have the same dynamic and on a technical level the media can applaud itself for reporting from a warzone where they are not the target.

But I suspect it is a moral explanation which explains the situation so many people find themselves in. They simply enjoy being able to accuse the world’s only Jewish state of ‘genocide’ and ‘Nazi-like behaviour’. They enjoy the opportunity to wound Jews as deeply as possible. Many find it satisfies the intense fury they feel when Israel is winning.

Like being fanned on your veranda while lambasting the evils of Empire, it is a paradox, to be sure. But it is also a perversity. And it doesn’t come from nowhere.

==

"From the water to the water, Palestine is Arab."

This is the actual genocide.

[necrotic-nephilim]

thank you for the tag, @sasheneskywalker!!!

rules: answer and tag nine people you want to get to know better and catch up with.

favorite color: it changes regularly, but currently, a dusty/greyish purple

last song: Maps by The Front Bottoms

currently reading:

Butcher & Blackbird by Brynne Weaver is my current fiction read and i *hate* it with my entire being. don't read it.

Postcolonial Astrology: Reading the Planets through Capital, Labor, & Power by Alice Sparkly Kat is my current non-fiction read and so far, it's very good

i'm reading a lot of comics at the moment, but my main read is Manhunter (2004) which so far, is very good, i highly recommend. i'm also planning to read Midnighter (2007) and Black Widow (2014).

currently watching:

The Acolyte has been my most recent fixation so that's just on loop rewatching over and over in the background. a lot

i've been watching Pennyworth which is far better than i expected it to be, i'm really enjoying it

i also started Invincible, which i've been enjoying

idk if it counts but i've rewatched Madame Web a concerning number of times in the past few days.

currently craving: i'd kill for an Italian Cream Soda from tea2go rn

coffee or tea: tea. i used to be a big coffee person in my teens but my chronic illness doesn't like caffeine and it *really* doesn't like coffee so i just drink tea now, but i do love tea

hobby to try: the unrealistic hobby i'd like to get into a fanfiction binding, but that takes materials and resources i do *not* currently have. i think a more realistic answer is i've been meaning to get into marvel comics more.

current au: tbh the main AU i'm working on is a Lance Brunner-centric Post-Crisis fic where i'm completely rewriting his origins to make his death as Robin more significant but still something no one talks about, leading to the ressurection of Jason also reviving Lance and Jason going on his little spree, having no idea he's not the only dead Robin. i've figured out all of the backstory and how i want to characterize Lance, but the actual plot of the fic i'm still working out. i'm leaning toward Lance/Dick as a ship, but i haven't decided. i have so many notes and ideas though and i think it's funny to take a random one-off character from a random 60s comic and actually turn him into something substantial and how he'd shape the Batfamily. trust me i'm so close to infodumping about it here everyday.

i'm also working on a *really* messed up unhealthy Damian/Tim fic, where Damian purposefully breaks the timeline so Tim was never Robin and Damian was the third Robin instead. but when Bruce "dies" Damian realizes he has no idea where to start with finding Bruce so he has to go to a civilian!Tim for help, who has no idea the timeline was changed or that he was ever Robin in a different world. it's gonna be fun and fucked up and full of Damian's jealousy complex over Tim.

i don't know if i can come up with nine whole people to tag for this since i'm still new here but i can try: @searchforahero @divine-dominion @kevin-day-is-bi @kerakeriza @deepwithintheabyss

@maryshellyswife @alicemaem @justmyshittyspace @sandmanwhore and yeah that's all i got.just tagging some mutuals/ppl i see on my posts a lot!!!

[mariacallous]

There are more than 114,000 missing persons in Mexico, and that number is continuing to rise. Criminal violence in the country is at a record level, largely driven by gangs and drug cartels. Many of those missing are buried in clandestine graves all across the country.

To contribute to the solution of this complex problem, a group of scientists from the Center for Research in Geospatial Information Sciences (CentroGeo) put technology and data analysis at the service of the searches.

"I never thought I would have to work on this, but if this knowledge is of any use, now is the time to show it," says José Luis Silván, a geographer at CentroGeo. Years ago, as part of his doctoral work, he specialized in measuring forest biomass and human populations through satellite information. At that time, he was far from imagining the scientific work he is doing today: investigating the potential of drones, hyperspectral images, and protocols to detect clandestine graves.

In a recent article published in the International Journal of Forensic Research and Criminology, Jorge Silván and researcher Ana Alegre insist that studying the geographical environment is very important to understand in depth a crime such as disappearance. Thus, “due to its context and diversity of climates, the case of Mexico may represent an opportunity for the development of investigations.”

Finding burials requires hard work. All available information and resources must be optimized. Therefore, scientists have evaluated the use of remote sensing tools and have systematized information from previous findings. They seek to discover patterns in the behavior of the perpetrators and, with this, to find burials.

According to Red Lupa, 88% of the 114,000 cases of disappearances in Mexico occurred between 2000 and May 2024. 10,315 were registered in 2023, the most on record. This represents an average of 29 people per day. Jalisco, Tamaulipas, State of Mexico, Veracruz and Nuevo Leon are the entities with the highest incidences.

Justice is almost non-existent, with 99% impunity for this crime. For this reason, since 2007 alone, civil society has formed more than 300 search groups, mostly made up of family members who scour the land guided by witness statements or organized in general brigades. These groups have detected most of the 5,696 clandestine graves reported on Mexican soil.

The association United for Our Disappeared searches in the north of the country, in Baja California. One of its members, who preferred to remain anonymous, has been searching for his son for 18 years. He says they have been using pointed rods to detect graves for more than 10 years. This is one of the most widely used tools in Mexico for this purpose. "We fit the rod in where we suspect the earth was removed, insert it, pull it out and smell it. If there are bone remains or tissue, you can tell by the smell. It is a strong odor, easy to detect. It smells like organic matter in the process of decomposition."

Before, he says, they used a georadar—a device similar to a pruning shear that detects inconsistencies in the ground—but they abandoned this practice because it was not very useful. The radar responds to almost any kind of object, from chips to boats. The last time they used it, it returned 40 suspicious spots, but none were positive. In Mexicali, another group uses a drone to fly over areas and detect changes in the terrain. Others have used machines to dig holes instead of shovels. Some innovations are abandoned over time, but the use of rods remains.

In 2014, after the disappearance of 43 Ayotzinapa normalistas in Mexico, Silván and other CentroGeo professionals joined the scientific advisory board on the case. During the search for the students, different civilian groups and government brigades detected dozens of illegal graves. In less than 10 months, the Mexican Attorney General's Office counted 60 sites and 129 bodies in the state of Guerrero. As a result of the raids, 300 illegal graves were revealed. Since then, the number of clandestine graves has only grown.

No one anticipated the size of this horror. The report "Searching between pain and hope: Findings of clandestine graves in Mexico 2020 - 2022", exposes with hemerographic data that in those two years, 1,134 clandestine graves were registered, with 2,314 bodies and 2,242 remains. In proportional terms, Colima reported the highest rate of illegal graves, with 10 per 100,000 inhabitants. It was followed by Sonora, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Sinaloa and Zacatecas.

By number of cases, Guanajuato, Sonora and Guerrero stand out. These three entities account for 42% of the records. By April 2023, a journalistic investigation by Quinto Elemento Lab reported that the number of illegal burials reached 5,696 clandestine graves, and that more than half of them were detected during the current federal administration.

Employing his field of study, remote sensing, José Luis Silván uses images captured with satellites, drones or airplanes, from which he extracts geospatial information using knowledge of the physics of light, mathematics and programming. Multispectral and hyperspectral images capture subsurface information using sensors that record wavelengths of light imperceptible to the human eye, making them useful for searching.

In 2016, during a first study by CentroGeo researchers, they simulated burials with pig carcasses to evaluate the potential of using hyperspectral cameras in searches and learn what information from the sensors was useful to them. The Mexican researchers knew from research in other countries that successful detection with these techniques depends, in part, on being able to recognize how carcasses (and their spectral images) change in different soils and climates.

The experiment was carried out on rented land in the state of Morelos. There they buried seven animals and evaluated the light reflected by the soil at different wavelengths for six months. They concluded that a hyperspectral camera, which provides more than a hundred layers of data, has the potential to detect clandestine burials, although the technique is only effective three months after burial. They tried to arrange for the acquisition of a camera and drone (valued at 5 million pesos) through the National Search Commission, but were unsuccessful.

Faced with this, they began to evaluate more affordable alternatives, such as multispectral devices. Today, despite the fact that spaces such as the Commission for the Search for Disappeared Persons of the State of Jalisco (COBUPEJ—-with which they have a partnership—has acquired this equipment, no national strategy exists to deploy these technologies systematically.

Some time later, the scientists took on a bigger challenge. When they briefed the National Search Commission on the usefulness of remote sensing for locating burials, officials told them that in some regions of the Northwest, the greatest need was to locate substances used to conceal crimes. "They dispose of them in caustic soda or with chemicals, char them and incinerate them in the open air or in crematoria; they throw the remains away or bury them," the researcher says.

So, in 2021, Silván's group did another experiment, this time in Hidalgo and with a spectroradiometer, which measures how different substances reflect light. For that study, they tested the trace of substances used in crimes. They found that diesel, muriatic acid and blood treated with anticoagulants require more precise imaging to be located, but that most substances, such as caustic soda, lime, blood and those resulting from open burning could be detected with multispectral sensors, which are less expensive.

CentroGeo has also participated in the development of complementary strategies to identify areas with a high probability of harboring clandestine graves. One example is the training of mathematical models with the coordinates of previous findings and the characteristics of the sites preferred by criminals, which they call clandestine spaces and which define as those which are easy to access for perpetrators and of low visibility to the population.

In addition, they have been using the signs that decomposing bodies leave on the vegetation for years. As a corpse decomposes, it releases nutrients into the soil, in particular increasing the concentration of nitrogen. In plants, this element is linked to chlorophyll, which gives them their greenness. In experiments with buried pigs, they have observed that a chlorophyll indicator can be quantified through satellite images. They measure how fast this index grows to detect sites with anomalies. This tool is available on the "Clandestine Space" platform.

Silván says that to interpret the nitrogen signal, they must consider that the gas signal can also vary due to the use of fertilizers or rains that carry nutrients. The presence of nitrogen, then, is not definitive proof of the existence of trenches, but it provides indications that justify paying attention in certain regions. The National Search Commission has been trained to use this indicator.

In Baja California, a northern state with 17,306 missing persons cases, these strategies have already been used. They first analyzed 52 locations of known graves and deduced that, because of the way they were distributed, there was a high probability of finding more graves at a distance of between 18 and 28 kilometers from those already known. They also looked for possible "clandestine spaces" and identified that 32% of the territory of Baja California had the potential to be used for that purpose. Finally, they reviewed the concentration of chlorophyll in satellite images. The result was a useful accompaniment for some family brigades.

Recently, Ana Alegre and José Silván analyzed geospatial models that could explain the distribution of graves in 10 states. They found that the travel time it would take an offender to get from urban streets to the grave is the factor that most influences the location of graves. "The secrecy sought by perpetrators seemed less important than reducing the effort they invest in creating the grave," their article says.

In addition to collaborating with the government, CentroGeo researchers work with civil associations such as Regresando a casa Morelos and Fuerzas unidas por nuestros desaparecidos en Nuevo León (FUNDENL). Some time ago, the former asked them to survey a site. "We collected thermal images and three-dimensional models to provide information," says Silván. In addition, they gave a workshop for visual interpretation. Silván describes the members of "Returning Home Morelos" as dedicated people. "They want to find their loved ones, they are willing to learn anything, to analyze an image or fly a drone. To everything."

With information from the FUNDENL collective and support from the American Jewish World Service, CentroGeo created "Huellas de vida", a platform that crosses the information of unfound persons and unidentified bodies with data from objects found in clandestine burial sites in Nuevo León. The intention is to detect coincidences that will help solve cases.

The geographer points out that the investigation is advancing, while the forms and numbers of disappearances are multiplying. Other countries, he says, are installing ground penetration radars on drones, or are planning to use electronic noses as indicators of methane, an element that corpses release at a certain stage of decomposition. To search for missing persons from the Spanish Civil War, for example, patterns in geographic data were tracked to narrow down search sites.

The big pending issue is to evaluate the real contribution that geographic information has had in uncovering crime scenes. "It is complicated to have feedback, even with the National Commission, because they are not obliged to tell us where they have findings." It will be until they have the new reports when they will be able to collate the results and measure the impact of their contributions. For now, "it is complicated to attribute the findings to our tools and information".

For his part, the member of United for our Disappeared assures that the search groups are the ones who have found most of the clandestine graves currently located. The usual thing, he says, is that the governments do not have departments for this work and only search when they have declarations that oblige them to do so. With the collectives it is different, because "we receive anonymous information, and even if we have no information, we still schedule searches and go out".

Finding graves is the beginning of another loss. When they have reason to excavate, they use picks and shovels and, if they find human remains, the authorities (who usually accompany them) cordon off the area and proceed with their work. If they are not present, they call them. "From there, many times we don't know what's going on, we don't get feedback from the authorities. We say that the person we found is lost again." The problem is general, "the collectives complain that people get lost in the bureaucratic process". In few cases, they say, the Prosecutor's Office restores the identity of the disappeared.

While technology is integrated into the systematic searches, collectives such as United for our Disappeared ask society to share the information they have on missing persons. "We only want to find them, all the information that reaches the collectives is anonymous," says the interviewee whose identity we reserve. The authorities have accepted this, he assures.

For his part, José Silván comments that, as a result of the collaboration with COBUPEJ and other institutions, they are about to publish a book to disseminate techniques for the detection of graves that they tested during their work.n de fosas que probaron durante un año en dos sitios de inhumación controlados en Jalisco, así como otras experiencias recogidas a nivel nacional a través de la ciencia ciudadana que hacen las madres buscadoras. The book is entitled Interpreting Nature to Find Them and is coordinated by Tunuari Chavez, head of the COBUPEJ context unit, and Jose Silvan under the direction of commissioner Victor Avila.

[itstokkii]

A question about your two homelands: South Korea and Uzbekistan

How do you imagine their relationship? Do they know each other? What's others from central asian family relationship with Yong Soo?

teehee(ugly giggling noise)

their relationship is pretty good! recently uzb ordered a railroad system from korea, which is the first time a country purchased a railroad system from korea !! she's truly a trailblazer... mostly, given the economic status of uzb and korea, uzb benefits most from korea rather than the other way around.

the first step in uzbek-korean relations was from the late 90s to the 2000s. during this time, k-dramas first aired in uzbekistan, and the first uzbeks moved to korea mainly in the form of university students studying tech and science(and of which my dad was one of the first to do so lol). so the community was small, but tight.

some of these students would go back to uzbekistan and talk about how developed and nice it was, fueling more interest in korea. some would bring their families/spouses to korea(my dad brought my mom to korea lol), and some would even begin to export uzbek goods to korea(a family friend of ours did this with uzbek melons!! I miss them they were so delish..).

nowadays, the community is gigantic, and uzbeks are the 5th most biggest foreigner group in korea as of 2023. more korean restaurants and products are being introduced in uzbekistan(halal 신라면...what a dream...), though mainly in tashkent.

speaking of tashkent, there's a seoul park since tashkent and seoul are sister cities!! it was made in 2014. however, i don't live in tashkent nor do I have immediate family that does, so i've literally never been around tashkent except for the airport...

another big factor in uzbek-korean relations are the ethnic Koreans(고려사람) that live in uzbekistan. after china and america, uzbekistan has the 3rd largest ethnic korean population at approximately 174000. this was because koreans that immigrated to russia from the late 19th century to early 20th century were forcefully deported to central asia by stalin, accusing them of being japanese spies. since uzbekistan's landlocked with a slightly different climate and crops, they tried their best to mimic korean foods such as kimchi and japchae. uzbeks took note of this and began to eat it as well, as salads called morkovcha and funchoza. morkovcha's actually a popular topping on hotdogs in uzbekistan, which is kinda funny lol

I can see yongsoo taking her around korea to see all sorts of things. they rent hanbok and toured around gyeongbokgung, have a picnic at the han river, and when she feels homesick he takes her to an uzbek restaurant. the first time this happened she probably cried.

they also go cafe hopping, and it's one of her favorite things to do in seoul because of the diverse cafe scene in hongdae and seongsu.

he's one of the people she trusts with taking photos of her the most. he knows what kinds of poses fit the ambiance and vibe, and always angles the camera right. she proudly posts those photos on social media.

watching kdramas is a must!! she probably swoons for a lot of the male love interests lol, and fangirled a bit too hard at gong yoo when she watched goblin. she's glad there's less...intimate scenes compared to a certain other person's dramas...

due to frequent exchange and the sheer number of uzbeks in korea, uzbekistan knows more than enough korean to get around.

yongsoo always takes her to clothing stores and tries finding her pieces that would match her style. she trusts him immensely with this.

bro also gives her love advice lol. what can I say, he's a 2000 year old man trapped in a 20 year old's body. he's got both experience and charm! whether she takes his advice or disregards it is up to her...

he also has other advice regarding an outlook on life, and staying optimistic. he reminds her never to give up on her country and people, since even his war-torn country rose with the power of its people working hard in order to become the success it was today.

other casian countries' relationships speed round!!

kazakhstan: kazakhstan has CU stores, a korean convenience store chain. my kazakh friend showed me how the kazakh chains even have vanilla flavored milk, which is something we don't have here. however as far as im aware, the CU stores are mostly in metropolitan areas. kazakhstan also has an ethnic korean population! there's also more korean companies investing in kazakhstan since they're more developed.

Kyrgyzstan: I couldn't find much, but Kyrgyzstan does have a sizable ethnic korean population also

Tajikistan and turkmenistan: nothing really notable...T^T

in short, korea's known uzbekistan for longer and equally interacts with uzbekistan and kazakhstan!

[carpetedkitch]

Kiiiiiiiiitchyyyyyyyyy~ GLOMP

Hello! o/

If I may, what would your favorite team building RPGs be?

Hiiiiiiiiiii <3

OK SO

There's a dozen or so I could point to, but for now I'll spotlight 3 or so of my favorites, I'll try and be brief:

CRYSTAL PROJECT

Essentially an open world Final Fantasy 5, with extremely well crafted classes and boss fights. It's very light on story (as most of these games tend to be), but has incredible quality of life features, such as changing what classes you leveled for stat buffs, the ability to change classes basically on a whim, as well as CLEARLY EXPLAINED MECHANICS (it explains and shows how the emnity system works), which a lot of rpgs don't exactly... excel at. also it is ridiculously mod friendly, and has a thriving modding community, who are all very nice folks on their discord.

SCARMONDE

Jumping back a few years for inspiration, scarmonde is a similarly well-crafted and (relatively) simplistic rpg taking notes from the original Final Fantasy. You choose your four adventurers from 14 classes, developing their skills, eventually giving them subclasses which are borrowed from the previous 14, and making your way to the bottom of Scarmonde. I really enjoyed my time with the game but I do think it's emphasis on older mechanics (random encounters and a leveling system that can feel kind of arbitrary) tested my patience a little bit, but genuinely for the price it's a really solid game that hooked me for the time I played it. Pretty sure it's got an update for some postgame recently as well.

LABYRINTH OF TOUHOU 2

This was the game got me into Touhou as a franchise believe it or not lol. Genuinely, I fucking adore this game and what it has done for me personally, and there is a lot to love about how fun it is to teambuild with all of these characters, and how creative some of their skills tend to be, as well as the KINDS of team builds that are really supported by skills. Like a debuff focused team that tries to stack as many as possible, or even just one like fear, or forgoing debuffs entirely just to max out on buffs and nuke enemies from orbit with a giant rock courtesy of the onis. Almost no character feels like they're completely without a niche, and I really respect it considering the game is FUCKING OLD.

It came out in like 2012, and got some dlc in 2014. It was remarkable for it's time, however I cannot in good consience recommend the game for it's own merits UNLESS you've played and love the Etrian Odyssey formula, because that's mostly what it borrows from. There is a bit of a grind associated with it, and there are some fights that I will curse until my dying breath they were so shit to beat. Most of the time it did feel like a good puzzle but even then, the dungeon crawling could and usually was mind-numbing, and the puzzles especially in the midgame just kinda sucked. And that's not to mention how much of a letdown the postgame DLC was: it's literally just number bloat the game. SO, instead of posting THAT game's steam page, I will instead post THE THREEQUEL THAT'S CURRENTLY IN PRODUCTION LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOOO

To not go into too much detail, essentially take everything negative I had to say and ever will say about 2, and remove it from the equation. Genuinely the game I am most excited for this year, bar none.

Thank you so much for this ask I have been wanting to talk to people on here about these games FOREVER RAAAAAAAAAAH

[1863-project]

Hi!! I’ve followed u for a while and only noticed recently that your desc says you’re an archivist! Im also a history nerd and trying to go for archives as a job in the future, especially in NY which would be really fun. If it’s alright to ask, do you have any general advice/tips for future archivists, and what’s your favorite part ab the archiving job you do, or the archive itself (that you work with)? No worries if not, either way congrats on having the coolest job ever >:D!! - Fellow autistic archive enthusiast

Hello, future fellow archivist!

The most important thing is that if this is the career you want to pursue, you're going to have to go to library school and get a degree in archives and records management. I know it's a lot of work and gets expensive (I'm still in debt), but most big archivist jobs won't even look your way without that Master's degree, which does suck.

It also took me an extremely long time to land my current position. I finished grad school in December 2014, and I finally ended up here, in a proper archival job, in February 2024. That's nearly ten years of working temp positions and at reference desks at public libraries as I searched. Archival jobs can be few and far between, because once an archivist settles in, they're going to become the one who knows the collection best and stay for a long time, so stay sharp and apply to every opening you find! Don't be afraid to take on temp jobs and processing archivist projects because that experience goes a long way on both your resume and for you personally. It can be discouraging, but if you really want this, don't give up - it's an extremely fulfilling career path if you're passionate about history.

My current position is essentially a dream job for me because of the subject matter I'm archiving. If you're lucky, you'll hopefully have that experience too, working at a place where you have a lot of subject expertise and passion.

I cannot suggest volunteering enough, though. Even before I went to grad school, I was volunteering at historical societies, libraries, and museums to help out where I could and get my foot in the door. Those connections are important - you'll need references to tell the jobs you apply to how good you are at the work - but it's also a really good way to make sure you actually like the work in the first place! Archiving can be a lot of drudgery and repetitive cataloguing, and that's not for everyone. (As an autistic person it suits me just fine, but that won't be the case for every single autistic person, and certainly not every single person!)

The best thing about working where I do now is the relative safety compared to my previous job. I was at a public library for 5 and a half years before this as their local history librarian/a reference librarian, and it felt more and more unsafe for me, especially mentally, because I couldn't use certain accommodations on the reference desk and I was constantly doing emotional labor for patrons who saw the reference librarians more like social workers (even though the library had an actual social worker). I got to a point where I was non-functional at home when I wasn't working there, and it scared me. I was deeply burnt out by the time I managed to get my current position, and I'm still recovering now. I was actually assaulted at my former job - a patron put his hand on the back of my leg above my knee and started to move it up towards my ass, but he didn't get there because I hit him (the staff defended me on that one; we had video footage, too). That was in November 2021, and from that point on I felt actively unsafe at that job and less and less like I would be protected if things happened because of a number of changes that occurred afterwards.

But now I'm behind a door that locks. Patrons can't come directly up to me. Researchers have to make an appointment in advance or email or call me if they need information. I'm archiving. I'm not constantly doing reference work, not being thrown around at random to different branches because there aren't branches, just storage locations, not having accommodations like noise-cancelling headphones or my sketchbook taken away from me. I'm so much safer here, and it's a place I can start to heal from everything in.

I hope this answers your initial questions, and if you want details on anything, hit me up - I'm so glad to help people get started in archiving and figure out their next steps!

[inqilabi]

yes i was referring more to the MAGA communism stuff. I get it that they want to get the us working class’ attention bc thats most of trumps public (im not sure anymore correct me if im wrong, and also all types of men with no understanding of economics lol) ? or if its some kind of ragebait to get everyone’s attention?? it seems almost impossible to get americans to embrace communist ideas bc of the red scare and the return of “traditional values”

I do not understand Jackson Hinkle’s strategy for the moment i still have a lot to read on a lot of aspects (revisionism, mao etc)

Yeah the trump/MAGA base is generally working class. Farmer, trades people. There is a hierarchy for sure but largely I would say it leans more proper / industrial working class. Whereas the liberal base is Urban workers in service industries. And that can be anywhere from food service workers to professional managerial class which is also service industry. A large number of big Pharma and big Tech workers were liberal voters. Including all the millionaires and billionaires within these industries including Zuckerberg. Which as we know there is a recent change in Zuckerberg for example to a more trump-aligned politics now.

So there is this divide that has happened along productive versus non-productive workers. Industrial supply chain work is productive work.

I've talked about this before where the MAGA base started to have somewhat revolutionary potential in their views. A lot of them started to be anti-israel, anti-intervention anti-us imperialism. Which is something we typically use to see from the progressive/liberal base. That is what the original origins of the liberal base were - the anti-war movement. However now Liberals are pro war. They are pro-ukraine, they're typically pro Israel in the sense that they do the whole "both sides are wrong. Hamas are terrorists. Two State solution".

So the MAGA base went through an interesting dialectical flip. They used to be super patriotic about war but by 2014 or so they became super patriotic but against war. They were patriotic in the sense that they wanted reinvestment back into the United States in terms of industrial capacity. Rather than funding foreign wars. This is an objectively progressive position.

I personally think it's interesting that Trump has cut funding to USAID which is a literal to tool imperialism. He is not doing because he is progressive or because his MAGA base wants no foreign funding. But something else is in play now. Nevertheless I thought it was interesting that leftists have been crying about imperialism but it was Trump who pulls the modern USAID imperialist tool.

I imagine Trump will replace it with something else.

I think the MAGA Communism was a meme, kind of brilliant because it became is so popular that I saw it on national TV. And it got the Maga base to start considering communism as a viable alternative politics.

The thing about liberals is that they are so CIA psyoped to the point where they think they are doing Marxism or communism but what they're doing is neoliberalism. But the thing about the MAGA is that whenever they see capitalism they call it communism LOL very old school Red scare propaganda runs deep for them.

I think this last part is where Hinkle comes in and his strategy of appealing largely to MAGA. To subvert their view of communism and bring them to Communism.

Although Hinkle also appeals to them by using misogynistic language. Which I think is useless. Because I think even MAGA is now beyond redpill. There is an interesting development I find among conservative people where conservative women on a large scale are also becoming very educated and focused on career. They want to have families and have a career. There's very few that are kind of like, I'll just pop out babies as soon as I'm 19 or 20. So in a way I think even MAGA is post redpill now.

[absolutebl]

Please help me find that one bl I watched but can't remember the name of it, I want to find and rewatch it do bad! So that's what I remember about the movie:

I watched this movie on YouTube and it was not Thai or Korean. There are two guys who are not brothers, the one with the parents adopted the other one. Gave him many things, like money and house. So they're basically step brothers. The adopted one is in love with the main boy, after some struggles that I don't actually remember, the main boy falls in love with him too. But his father doesn't allow them to be together. With this being the reason, adopted one faked his own death and the main boy was in pain for a couple of years (I think it was like two years? But I'm not sure tho) After some time, the main boy coincidentally sees his lover working at a cafe. And they have a happy ending.

I've been looking for it for a really long timeeee 😭😭😭

This sounds right up my alley so I should know of it. It's stepbrother trope which is one of my all time favorites. (After comment consults I think this must be Irresistible Love - see notes at end)

My guess is something early from China, pre 2018? It could also be from the Philippines or one of the other BL producing countries that I don't track carefully. I think... not Japan, that doesn't seem like the right tropes or narrative bent for them.

It's possible, if you saw it on YT it was a fan rip with an alter end (like it really ends sadly but the fan decided to not include that?)

But you said specifically not Korea so Diary of Heong Yeong Dang (Drama Festival 2014) is out, and that was my first guess.

My second best guess is Thai, My Bromance the movie (2014) or (more likely) My Bromance the series (2016)? But you said: NOT Thai.

So my final pull is...

Find You In The Crowd (China 2017) but this is a microfilm and it's sad. At last check it was on Gaga.

You're not thinking of The Promise (Vietnam 2022) are you? No, that doesn't have the parental stuff and it's very recent.

That's the best I can do. Sorry, the spreadsheet and my brain failed you.

Here is some homework:

There is a 3 Part series from Ellene Noire II of YT round-up videos highlighting VERY obscure queer, LGBTQ+ and BL content (they named title and country in the cards), perhaps it's one of those? It has clips so that might trigger your brain better.

I've had these videos saved to process into my spreadsheet for ages but haven't gotten around to it since they really are some of the MOST obscure and I know it just throws off my numbers with "can't be found" columns.

If you figure it out, will you PLEASE let me know the name and country? It really does sound like my kind of BL. And if possible I'd love to try tracking it down.

Meanwhile here's my stepbrother trope round up post.

Notes

movie on YouTube

not Thai or Korean

2 guys who are not brothers

parents of one adopted the other one (stepbrother trope)

parents give adoptee many things, like money and house

adopted one is in love with the main boy

main boy falls eventually falls in love back

father doesn't allow them to be together

adopted one fakes his own death and the main boy was in pain for a couple of years

after some time, the main boy coincidentally sees his lover working at a cafe

Okay after consult with comments (with the exception of the bold bits I think this really has to be Irresistible Love).

Irresistible Love China 2026 - 2 Parts! 2 Endings!

Irresistible Love: Secrets of the Valet

YouTube

Irresistible Love 2 AKA Uncontrolled Love

YouTube

I not-so-secretly love this BL: Kidnapping, whipping boy, obsession, mutilation, very hard fought happy ending (in one version). Absolutely classic Chinese BL pre-censorship. It's a wild melodramatic ride.

This 2nd movie installment has 2 endings, one unhappy and censored and one basically happy. This series is quite violent, lots of tiggers, whipping boy chassis.

[yetisidelblog]

The GOP’s deadly Medicaid cuts will cost lives, for what? Trillions of dollars of tax cuts for billionaires.

The Republican budget cannot be implemented without gutting Medicaid: a direct attack on the health and well-being of over 70 million Americans, simply to hand trillions in tax cuts to billionaires and the ultra-rich.

A new report by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) makes it clear: slashing $1.5 trillion from healthcare funding, as the GOP budget calls for, cannot be done without massive Medicaid cuts. To the rich, it’s just more money in their already well-filled pockets -- but for countless low-income families, seniors, children, and people with disabilities who rely on Medicaid, it’s a death sentence.

Making these cuts to finance $4.5 trillion in tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans and big corporations is a cruel betrayal of working and middle-class people. The Republican budget prioritizes luxury yachts and stock buybacks over insulin, cancer treatment, and prenatal care.

A recent study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities clarifies the life-or-death impact of states’ decisions to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act between 2014 and 2017:

In states that expanded Medicaid, 19,200 older Americans’ lives, ages 55-64, were saved during this four-year period, compared to the preceding six-year period.

In the 19 Republican-led states that refused to expand Medicaid during this time period, 15,600 preventable deaths occurred (as of today, all but 10 of these states have expanded Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act).

If Medicaid had been expanded in all 50 states, nearly 35,000 deaths of adults 55-64 years old could have been prevented in those four years.

Send a message to Congress: Cutting Medicaid is a death sentence for thousands of Americans. Do not cut Medicaid now or ever!

Medicaid ensures millions of low-income families can access regular check-ups and essential surgeries, early-stage cancer diagnoses, treatment for heart disease and diabetes, lifesaving prescriptions, mental health care, and addiction treatments.

The GOP’s proposed cuts will lead to more people dying of untreated illnesses and more medical bankruptcies -- just so the wealthiest Americans can hoard even more wealth, further widening the gap between the rich and the poor in this country.

Despite these undeniable benefits, Republicans insist on directing the committee overseeing healthcare spending to slash at least $880 billion from healthcare programs over the next decade. The CBO confirms that this level of cuts is only possible by gutting Medicare, Medicaid, or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP); and of these, the most politically expedient is Medicaid.

Speaker Mike Johnson and GOP leadership claim they’ll find these savings by targeting “fraud and abuse.” That is a lie, plain and simple. The CBO analysis makes clear: There is nowhere near $880 billion going to fraud and abuse. The numbers show that these cuts will rip real healthcare away from real people, causing real harm to those who need it most.

Tell Congress: Medicaid saves lives. These are the biggest Medicaid cuts in U.S. history, just to line the pockets of the ultra-rich. NO Medicaid cuts now or ever.

Thank you for speaking out before it’s too late.

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@upontheshelfreviews

@greenwingspino

@one-time-i-dreamt

@tenaflyviper

@akron-squirrel

@ifihadaworldofmyown

@justice-for-jacob-marley

@voicetalentbrendan

@thebigdeepcheatsy

@what-is-my-aesthetic

@ravenlynclemens

@writerofweird

@anon-lephant

@mentally-quiet-spycrab

@therealjacksepticeye