#then again my gender crisis is worse than the political situation in the world

[shibusawa-breeder]

tbh do you think shibusawas gayass would ever be more attracted to a male reader

More as in more than female reader? no clue tbh , on bigger level I don't think he would care?? Cause if we're thinking more canon version he is so shallow IF he were to like someone , it would be on simple basis in his brain at first. He weirdly likes this person and is attracted , that's enough for him to consider this person worth keeping. He would think of them as his most precious gem metaphorically. But simple answer , Yes I think he likes cock (he won't admit it though) so just rattle his brain by pushing him on the bed and his world changes sdkfhsdf

[gayenerd]

These are “outtakes” from Billie Joe’s 2010 Out Magazine interview. The link is still up, but for some reason they took out his answers about masculinity and femininity????? And those are obviously the most interesting answers! Anyway, here’s the whole thing I had saved in a doc

March 19, 2010

Billie Joe Armstrong Tells All

Photo: Kurt Iswarienko

Our April Broadway issue features Green Day's front man Billie Joe Armstrong chatting about music, politics, and the new musical, <i>American Idiot,</i> based on the band's last two albums. The writer of the piece (and former Popnography editor) Shana Naomi Krochmal filed the following exclusive extras from her interview with Armstrong that didn't make it into the piece. In them, Billie Joe touches on masculinity, his queer influences, and meeting Lady Gaga:

ON MASCULINITY:

Out: Is masculinity important to you?

Billie Joe Armstrong: I think it can come in handy, if it’s used the right way.

What’s the right way?

I think you learn a lot from Little League baseball. Like how to be a good team player, what do you do in situations when you’re at bat and it’s just you and another person. When you lose, how do you deal with losing? When you win, are you a good winner? And a graceful winner? How do you contribute to a team situation selflessly? I think there’s a lot of leadership skills in that. I don’t know if that’s masculinity or just good leadership or just life lessons. I just used Little League baseball because it’s male dominated.

Do your kids play?

They did. My oldest is done now, and my youngest one does. It was a real good bonding experience. I think masculinity is a lot more feminine than people give it credit for. Or it can be. Jim Morrison seemed very masculine to me, but also completely feminine at the same time. That balance in between -- and it’s not those morons on the bus in Borat. That’s not masculinity, that’s insecurity at its worse. Masculinity is something that women can have.

What is feminine about you?

I’m not sure. Let me think. It’s all about being a well rounded a person. I think being a singer is very feminine. Being a singer is a very feminine thing -- performing is definitely. Women have a lot more courage I think than men do, in a lot of ways -- if you think about what Madonna does or Lady Gaga or Beyonce. Women have a much easier time of reinventing themselves than I think men do. Hmm, I think -- a little bit of eyeliner. [Laughs] But I think there’s a big difference between vanity and femininity. I think that feminine side has served me a lot more than my masculine side has in a lot of ways.

ON PERFORMING AT THE GRAMMYS:

That was such a great night. There’s a whole thing where you’re worried about the awards part of it, and it can make you kind of irritable, kind of stressed out. But the great thing is that we had a chance to play with the cast, which has never really been done before.

ON THE MOST EMOTIONAL PARTS OF THE SHOW:

When Rebecca [Naomi Jones] sings “Letterbomb,” that really blows me away. The scene where Tunny’s on the gurneys and they’re singing “Before the Lobotomy.” And “Last Night on Earth” is an amazing scene with the couple doing this heroin dance. Tony [Vincent] is singing the song -- the first verse while they’re slamming smack -- and then the next verse is Mary coming out with a baby that she’s had with a guy who turns out to be a loser father. I get chills thinking about it right now. The juxtaposition between the two scenes is like -- wow.

ON WRITING AN ORIGINAL MUSICAL:

I’d definitely be interested in it. I think we’re in a really rare situation where this is gaining momentum. I don’t want to screw it up by working on something else. I’d love to do something with Michael [Mayer]. I’ve always wanted to see what it would be like to score a film -- but this, this is even more special, I think.

ON KNOWING TOO MUCH:

When you start getting into politics, what I’ve realized is that if it seems to be black and white, it’s shooting off into so many different directions. You can’t really keep up with what’s happening in the House of Representatives. Things like Hurricane Katrina, Haiti, troops in Afghanistan, financial crisis -- even Tiger Woods. It seems to be one thing after the next.

ON HIS QUEER INFLUENCES:

My uncle. There were different punk singers, from a guy named Cretin Chaos in Social Unrest to guys like Morrissey. And also guys that would genderbend a little, like Bowie, or Mike Ness from Social Distortion wearing makeup. I’ve always liked music that was non-gender specific, like the Replacements song called “Androgynous.” It was just always those little things or people that were willing to make you think, whoa, that’s not what I’m hearing on the radio these days.

ON MEETING LADY GAGA AT THE MTV VIDEO MUSIC AWARDS:

She had this outfit on -- she had so much shit on her when she walked by! She couldn’t move her arm because she was going on to do her performance, and it was like shaking hands with someone in a cast. She had this handler that was like, “Don’t touch the costume! Don’t touch the costume!” She said something about how she loved Dookie so much she used to lick the pages. I thought it was really cool. She’s influencing a lot of young people, and she’s doing it in a way that’s provocative. And a lot of people don’t realize that she’s an artist, and she’s been one for a really long time. She’s taking something that Bowie or Madonna did and taking it a step further.

ON WHAT IT MEANS TO BE “PUNK ROCK”:

That’s like a 10 part answer. I think of it as something that you need to have of your own. For me it’s about community. I think it’s kind of spiritual in its own way, because people fight over it so much and the meaning of it. It’s a sense of self-discovery. But also a new set of ideas and a new poetry, a new music that you discover that you notice that no one else is really into, or goes against what other people are normally into. It’s like you’re free to be an individual and taking on new ideas and challenging old ideas. I think it has a lot to do with burning down the establishment to create something new. But at the same time, you find relationships within that too. It’s something that’s supposed to empower you. It’s about starting something new. Part of the problem with a lot of punk rock is that people believe that it’s supposed to be one thing. Everything for me starts off with punk rock when I’m writing songs -- it’s almost like I’m stripped down to the bare bones of music again. It’s kind of in my DNA in this point.

ON HIS WIFE, ADRIENNE:

She’s great. She’s beautiful. Without her, I don’t know what I’d do. She empowers me to challenge myself in a lot of ways. She inspired the song “American Idiot” by playing me this Midnight Oil song that she really loved. She runs a store called Atomic Garden, all about sustainable living. She’s really active in NRDC, politically. Sometimes I think she’s a hell of a lot more interesting and a cooler person than I am.

ON HIS “MISERABLE” HIGH SCHOOL EXPERIENCE:

Academically you have to completely re-figure out how to prioritize your life. And suddenly you feel like the whole fucking world is against you because they’re prioritizing for you. And it’s forced on you. And if you don’t get it at that age, if you don’t catch it -- that’s what happened to me, I didn’t prioritize anything. I just got to a breaking point where it was like, by my later high school years, “You’re all full of shit anyway. Everyone’s full of shit. I know what I’m doing, and fuck school, and fuck schoolwork, and I’m not going to go to fucking college anyway, and I’m gonna play in a rock band, and you’re all gonna be sorry.” You get vengeful -- it’s a natural instinct, all those hormones going and shit.

ON BEING HAPPIER AT AGE 38:

I kind of feel like things are getting better. It goes in stages. I loved my early twenties. I hated my late twenties. I was a drunk. I was trying to figure out how to be a father, a husband, but I still wanted to live my life like a crazy punk rock rock star. You start noticing things about yourself. You have to change your health habits. But you don’t want to change. In your twenties, change is hitting you over the head whether you like it or not. Right when I got to about 30 I was like, thank God that’s over. But it gets complicated again.

[whitehotharlots]

So we’re just gonna straight up embrace conservatism?

A few months ago I came across the story of a group of young trans activists who wrecked up the opening of a feminist library in British Columbia. To avoid accusations of taking sides or whatever, here’s what the feminists had to say about it, and here’s what the trans activist kids had to say about it. (Direct link: https://www.facebook.com/notes/gag-gays-against-gentrification/response-to-vancouver-womens-library/379623995740078 )

Both sides agreed that the activists physically disrupted the opening of what was purported to be a feminist space, caused several hundred dollars worth of property damage, threatened physical violence against the library’s proprietors, and demanded that a dozen or so books be removed from the shelves.

I decided not to write about this. Firstly, because engaging with trans discourse in any way other than nodding politely guarantees you will be accused of Literal Murder, and I just don’t want to mess with that. More importantly, I felt I couldn’t say anything that wouldn’t amount to a simple, maybe even pedantic observation: namely, it’s kinda weird how we’ve begun to fear subjectively perceived, metaphorical “violence” so intensely that we’re willing to accept literal, physical violence as a response to it. It’s easy to make fun of people who say that using gendered pronouns is a direct cause of murder or whatever, but these people aren’t just obscure cranks anymore--they control the discourse; we’re living in the world they’ve built. 

Here’s a sample of what I tried to write:

Here, in the interest of objectivity, it’s traditional for a writer to point out the tremendous amount of danger faced by those trans people who committed violent acts against the cis feminists and have demanded that the cis feminists radically alter their own space. A writer should re-cite the oft-cited statistic that over twenty trans people were murdered in 2015--and that, no doubt, at least half of them were beaten to death with a copy of Andrea Dworkin’s Pornography. And I don’t mean to be facetious: should a trans activist suggest that these books were being wielded as literal, physical weapons, there might at least be a smidgen of logic behind their demands. But such a connection, however tenuous, is never proffered. We are left instead with a vague implication by association: the trans activists understandably don’t like trans people being murdered and they also don’t like books they assume question the essentialist foundation of their self-understanding, therefore a responsible author will make sure to establish a sense that the former is indeed caused by the latter. Or, if it’s not a case of actual causation--since obviously it’s not and no one would ever be so daft as to suggest that it is--at the very least we should respect the trans activists’ sensitivities toward literature they find upsetting, seeing as they’re acting out of a sense of extreme fear that they at least believe to be justified. Criticizing them at lashing out would be like getting mad a cornered raccoon for showing its teeth.

Just… can you believe this? Honestly? Here, very real violence and property damage is excused simply by putting in the context of the emotional state of those who committed it. Can you imagine any parallel situation taking place in contemporary America? A black man would have a much more solid case in going down to his local police station and wrecking up the place. Police violence against black people is an actual, direct, and literal thing--no flimsy metaphors are required to explain it. If such a thing were to happen, however, the black guy would be killed or imprisoned and his actions would be condemned in all but the most radical of spaces (try to find a mainstream publication that supported Chris Dorner. You can’t). Or more on point: let’s say a group of radical zionists entered a store the specializes in classical music, so at to disrupt a talk about Wagner. They post threats on social media. They wreck merchandise. They tear down posters, shove some elderly classical enthusiasts, cause several hundred dollars worth of damage, and leave a manifesto demanding that certain naughty works be banned. Again: they’d most likely be arrested. They would find no defense within the mainstream press. Their sense of victimhood would certainly not be used as justification for their actions, and no serious person would yield to their demands that certain works of music be banned from stores.

So… yeah. I was having trouble not sounding dismissive. But since then other shit has gone down, and it’s dawned on me that this tendency to prize the metaphorical over the literal isn’t new. It’s very old. It is, simply put, the general grounding of the American conservative worldview. It just happens to be coming from woke people now. 

For an example, take a look at a piece about trans activists vandalizing a rape crisis center with death threats. The vandalism was, of course, denounced on all sides. But check out the phrasing here: 

Trans people face employment and housing barriers, Jenkins said, and the graffiti could be a product of a trans person’s pent up frustration. Vancouver Rape Relief, she said, is a visible organization at which to point a finger.

“A lot of the actions of Vancouver Rape Relief through exclusion of trans women I think are symbolic of society’s disdain for trans people generally,” she said.

“So I can understand that for someone who is having a really hard time generally, this is a symbol of everything that is wrong with the world that is treating me terribly — which is no excuse, but I can see how someone could get to that point.”

Just… fucking seriously? Again, can you imagine this kind of even handedness being afforded to any other marginalized group? The only time you see violence regarded in such an apologetic or celebratory manner is when cops and soldiers do it. 

But, oh, it gets even weirder and stupider:

More graffiti adorns the sidewalks of Commercial Dr., further east from the Vancouver Rape Relief location. In support of trans people, the message “Trans women are women” appeared on sidewalks near Grandview Park earlier this summer.

Another message reads “Lesbians unite,” coupled with a double Venus symbol. Claire Ens, president of the Vancouver Dyke March and Festival Society, said the two Venus symbols are a coded threat to trans people.

“The two Venus symbols, that may seem innocent and to some even a call for lesbian rights and women-power, but in fact it is the opposite,” she said.

Two Venus symbols, side-by-side, is a larger symbol for “biological essentialism,” she said, a belief that peoples’ identities are determined by their genitals or chromosomes, which is inherently discriminatory to trans people who may have genitals that don’t match outdated ideas of what it means to be a man or a woman.

“The Venus symbols are meant as a warning sign to trans women, to state that trans women are not included nor welcomed, and is a perfect example of ... ‘dog whistling’ (because it is) innocent to those who aren’t in the know about it (but) harmful and hateful specifically to trans women,” she said.

Oh... oh dear. 

I’m reminded of the time when I was in 8th grade and my best friend did some weird art project where he put an arrow through a George Jetson doll he won at the carnival and painted the wound with a red marker. His mom found the doll. She spoke with her evangelical busybody cunt friends at work, who informed her that the “ritualistic sacrifice” of stuffed animals was a surefire sign that the boy had been brainwashed by Satanists. She then had him involuntarily committed. A state official determined him to to be depressed but not under any demonic influence, and so he was released under the condition that he start going to cut-rate therapy, where yet another evangelical busybody cunt informed him that the doll was, in fact, a sign that at least one satan lived within him (possibly several) and advised his mother to throw out all of his cds and videogames and keep him under constant watch. Oddly, this did not help with my friends’ depression. Made it a lot worse, in fact. Kicked off about a decade of severe substance abuse. But that’s neither here nor there--the point is, he did something objectively harmless that a bunch of hateful conservatives found offensive, and demonizing and bullying him was a small price to pay to get him to stop doing said harmless-but-offensive things. He might not have meant the plush art project to be a sign of aggression. A dispassionate observer would most likely not regard it as such. But the subjective, spiritual harm suffered by his mother engendered a violent reaction, and the cruelly conservative social structures of our community prized her perceived victimhood over any actual harms, and so they therefore encouraged her to damage the boy so as to make herself feel more safe. Nobody wins. Everyone was worse off. But the woman got some momentary catharsis, and that’s what was important.

Uhh… shit. I was gonna try to connect this to something else, but I think maybe I made my point. If you don’t agree with me yet, you’re never going to. But just remember, pedantic as this argument may be, there’s a reason censorship has historically resided in the conservative purview. There’s also a reason why it used to be considered virtuous, in liberal spaces, to not regard your own tastes and pet peeves as moral issues that warranted vicious remediation. Conservatives are conservatives, regardless of their color of their skin, the people they like to fuck, or whether or not they regard themselves to embody the gender they were asigned at birth. Cruelty is likewise always cruel. A cunt is a cunt. And there’s nothing to be gained by denying these basic truths.

[sassaetcie]

[TW evocation of suicide]

So, huh.

I usually don’t talk about myself for a lot of reasons but for once I will.

You must know that coronavirus broke out in France too. I’m French. 

I’m worried because racism has been rising for like years. But it is even worse since the corona started spreading. I’m afraid because this country might worsen again (because yeah, Macron is a complete dumbass ignorant of our pain and troubles, I think you’ve seen that even NOW some Gilets Jaunes/Yellow Vests protest. Even with the coronavirus outbreak. Because if they stop, the government will use it to spread fake news that we’re satisfied? I don’t know. That’s likely or not. People are despaired and paranoid. 

I’m not even talking about the ones piling up pasta and toilet paper because this one part almost leads to the government regulating sellings (we’ll see that in a few days) due to the current lockdown. 

So, what’s the deal? People are terrified and selfish in this crisis. My own mom starts saying that she doesn’t disagree anymore with Marine Le Pen (she’s a far-right politician in France), and the far-right is taking advantage of Macron’s mutual hatred while the far-left/left is being spat on by media. 

I’m afraid that future elections will result in even more racism, LGBTQIA+phobia and precarity. I’m afraid because of course, I’m concerned as a Lesbian and my mother should be as well because she didn’t have a proper education so she probably is more and more easy to manipulate (by politics). 

I’ll probably vote for far-left or left in 2022. But there’s been a high percent of absention. People are tired of governments doing shit (not that other countries are not tired, I’m sure). We always have the same dumbfuck faces saying the same lies. So they’re tired and they don’t vote because they’re not represented. So the only ones voting are the ones still hopeful in the far-left/left. Spoiler: we’re not that much, as it seems. But the boomers and non-educated easy to manipulate (education in France is fucking shit, by the way and stresses out a lot of children, I’ve been depressed by school for like... 1 or 2 years? And that was only the period when I thought of killing myself everyday. Speak of teenage crisis or whatever, that’s not normal. There shouldn’t be a teenage crisis, fuck.) or migrants afraid of other migrants taking their places (?) (I can’t blame them for fearing an already difficult situation, though) ARE going to vote. As a Lesbian woman student who doesn’t want children and has a lot of problems with work (I don’t know if I can speak of a trauma, but I burst out of tears and had panick attack some time ago when my mother told me to go to work to earn a bit of money for saving, and I even more wanted to kill myself at work. Although it was ONLY A MONTH.), I stand no chance in a far-right society. Maybe I just dream of an utopy of whatever, but I’m tired of cynism and haughty attitude. 

What’s the use of saying “mankind is shit” (although it’s true for the most of it as for now in my country, at least) and looking down on the others just to feed up your ego if you’re rich and successful? You have the right to feel that way if you have troubles, whether you want to kill yourself, have troubles to work, troubles to study, to pay your studies because this system is shit, because this world is “not for you”, whatever. But cynism really became redundant one you’ve dried it up. I want to hope. Although it hurts sometimes. I don’t want to fall in despair and depression ever again. I’m tired of these adults having more power than me and yet looking down on us and saying our species is shit.

It is true. We are parasites compared to other animals. Our existence is useless, we only feed on others. I have found how to not fear death anymore, but I can’t impose it on others. But we still can do something, I’m sure of it. 

I’m sorry if I offended you in any way. I have troubles to express myself and I’m better on writing fiction, to be honest. 

I just want you to be happy, whoever you are, as long as you wish not to kill any people with different color, orientation, gender or whatever. 

[gryphons-of-aentha]

The Approximate Plotline of the Gryphonverse (pt. 3)

This is the part where everything gets very weird, jarringly fast. I suspect there must be a way to rework some of this to make it cohesive enough with the first two parts to compile it into one story, but for now I’m afraid we’re stuck with massive, strangely meta genre whiplash.

it also becomes more apparent that the reason all this coincides with Earth dates in real time is that I’ve been making a lot of this up as I go for over ten years now.

So Kyran, and shortly thereafter Iadra, who chased him through the portal, suddenly find themselves on Earth circa 2008. Or rather an alternate timeline Earth that was created when some human teenagers with a basement laboratory, and an interdimensional being badly disguised as a talking dog, accidentally tore a hole in reality, which is what Kyran’s hastily-made portal led through. The humans (and space dog) quickly become entangled in the gryphons’ conflicts as it becomes apparent that the connection between their worlds isn’t going away on its own and none of them know how to close it. A couple years and several shenanigans later (during which Talon and Iadra have reunited and befriended the humans and dog-alien, and Kyran has made enemies of them), Aentha and Earth remain strangely linked and everyone starts to notice signs of something strange at work.

(it’s here that I should mention that the humans, in the original series of short stories I wrote documenting this when I was fifteen, were pretty much self inserts of me and my brother for shits and giggles/stand-ins. Due to conflicts with certain potential subplots that have cropped up that I want to use, this is no longer canon, but it means the Wielder is currently not much more than an empty character slot because I haven’t figured out how I actually want to approach him as a character, aka I am trapped in Jonathan Sims purgatory and don’t know how to get out. So aside from things he definitely does because it’s required to progress the plot, there’s basically a conspicuous void there right now. also the sword was originally called the Ancient Katana™ [the ™ is somehow pronounced but nobody can figure out why or how, and speaking the full name causes the lights to flicker even while outdoors] because I was making fun of all the stupid and sometimes kind of racist tropes that crop up with chosen one narratives, but these days I’m not sure where that falls on the line between “making fun of a dumb racist trope” and “just being racist” so I’m shelving that until I get some second opinions on that one)

Unbeknownst to anyone, larger forces are at play in this pseudo-Earth: an entity similar in nature to the Powers of Darkness, but that feeds on narrative tropes rather than suffering and is substantially more powerful, was drawn by the first Rift created by the humans, and has been manipulating events on Earth in order to trap everyone in a repeating narrative that provides it with a consistent energy source. This comes to a head when one of the humans accidentally becomes some kind of Chosen One known as the Wielder (according to the space dog, who is the only one versed in this stuff) by finding a magic sword that can manipulate both interdimensional energy and narrative tropes (among other things). Kyran, meanwhile, has been looking for this sword, because during some events that tore the Fourth Wall (an actual thing in this story) he realized that he’s been cast as the villain in whatever story they’re all stuck in and therefore can never actually win, which he’s becoming increasingly desperate to do since he’s now back in debt with the Powers of Darkness and needs to resolve this situation and focus his attention back on Aentha and overthrowing Shale. The sword can potentially solve both of these problems, and also make him immensely powerful. With the Entity still manipulating everything, this leads to him inadvertently becoming the Wielder’s arch nemesis but gets him no closer to actually claiming the sword.

Eventually Kyran manages to break reality enough to force a confrontation with the Wielder on neutral ground where the Entity’s narrative won’t prevent him from winning, but due to some unforeseen external factors fails again, and gets his soul bound to the sword. This essentially traps him in a pocket dimension unless summoned by the Wielder and renders him physically unable to cause any actual harm to the Wielder or his allies. On the plus side, the Powers of Darkness can no longer reach Kyran, so as long as he’s bound to the sword and by extension the Entity, he’s safe from any consequences he’s racked up. Incidentally, it also cuts off the by-then-considerable hold the Powers of Darkness had over his mind. No longer clouded by the influence of a malevolent multiconsciousness and with not much to do while trapped in the void, he engages in some actual self reflection for the first time in his life and isn’t thrilled with the conclusion (this by no means makes him instantly a better person, but it does gradually lessen the degree to which he’s an abject asshole). He also discovers that due to his gryphonic heritage, he has a limited amount of control and mobility in interdimensional space (though the sword prevents him from going to any physical dimension) and he finds his way to a gryphonic ruin that seems to have once been part of either a temple or a library, and discovers more about gryphonic history than any Aenthian gryphon ever has. The Wielder mainly leaves him to his own devices in there, since they’re still enemies but at this point there’s not much either of them can really do to the other, and while the sword’s power to bind some beings is intended as a kind of familiar mechanic, Kyran is really not the kind of bound creature to be anything but a belligerent hindrance if summoned. Also every time they interact it tends to end with someone getting stabbed.

The destruction Kyran caused in his bid for the sword, meanwhile, created a schism that broke all known gateways between Earth and Aentha, trapping Talon and Iadra back in their own world. Not knowing what happened to the humans or Kyran, and with no way to find out, they mainly just go back to their lives, now living almost entirely on the outskirts, since things between Andolia and the neighboring gryphons are still getting worse. After a year or two they have a son, who they name Iadros (gryphonic tradition is to name the firstborn cub after the mother regardless of the cub’s gender) and mainly stay occupied with that until the political situation gets dangerous enough for the gryphons that they start to consider ways to access Earth again, with the idea that maybe the Wielder’s Chosen One status would help them solve the whole mess, but at the very least to get Iadros out of harm’s way while he grows up.

About five years after the schism was created, circa 2017, they finally find a way back, unknowingly thanks again to gryphons being powerful interdimensional beings who created a number of their own pathways and pocket dimensions between worlds. As it turns out, things have been developing on the Earth side as well. Kyran and the Wielder have, if not become friends, at least reached a kind of truce, since it turns out when rendered unable to be an evil warlock Kyran’s default state is “Genealogy Aunt but make it goth,” and he’s trying to track down the lost origin world of gryphons, partly for something to do while he’s been trapped in a pocket dimension for five years and partly out of the newfound desire to do something non-destructive for once. It’s almost less of a redemption arc than a quarter-life crisis that happens to lead in a positive direction. Anyway, he needed the Wielder and the sword in order to travel to other worlds on the trail of this lost dimension, and has at least agreed to not stab anyone with letter openers in exchange. Probably helps that they’ve all gone from a gaggle of cosmically-overpowered teenagers to slightly more emotionally mature cosmically-overpowered twenty-somethings.

After some time of this, during which more monster-of-the-week things happen in the course of this ultimately fruitless search for the lost world, it becomes apparent that Kyran probably isn’t interested in killing them all anymore and the Wielder offers to free him from the sword (this will not reattach his soul to his body; his soul currently resides in a crystal from which it can’t be unbound, but giving the crystal to him will separate his will from the sword and the Wielder and he’ll be able to travel around physical reality on his own again). He refuses, knowing that both the Powers of Darkness are probably looking for him at this point and the Entity has a vested interest in him remaining the villain, and he’s very certain that he doesn’t have the willpower or actual power to fight them off and they’d end up back at square one. Especially since the whole soul-trapped-in-a-crystal thing makes him vulnerable to specifically that kind of danger. As long as he remains bound to the sword, the Powers of Darkness can’t get to him to call in his significant debt, and the Entity can’t do anything because technically he’s still the villain of the story and is being forced by the sword’s power to not fight the Wielder. Technically. This was the point where I awkwardly realized I’d accidentally set up a perfect gay enemies-to-lovers plot and had to completely rethink the Wielder as a character because I love that trope too much to just not use it.

Anyway, Talon and Iadra aren’t thrilled to learn that Kyran and the humans are on more or less amicable terms now, since their last few interactions with Kyran have done nothing to indicate that having him around will be conducive to safely raising a child and Iadra in particular has still not forgiven him for what he did to Talon, and without five years of context, the fact that the three (four counting the talking space dog) of them are kind of working together now feels like a bit of a betrayal.

There’s no time for this to really come to a head, because their attempt at magic-sword-based rules-lawyering has actually not fooled or appeased the Entity at all, and it’s very set on returning equilibrium. It tries a couple tactics to get Kyran to turn on everyone or vice versa, including but not limited to sending a double of him to Earth to cause problems (it doesn’t work because the sword renders that impossible and they all know that) and trying to provoke the talking dog who still doesn’t really like him into acting on it (he doesn’t because he has a moral compass and better things to do), but the arrival of Talon, Iadra, and Iadros provides exactly the opportunity it thinks it needs, and it finds a way to hijack Iadros. And unfortunately there’s going to be yet another part to this.

[rotationalsymmetry]

I’m trying to train myself, when I start writing an essay in the tags, to write a new post instead. I grew up white and middle class and English-speaking and generally mainstream/privileged. That meant that I grew up trusting the police. I assumed they were there to help me and people like me, and I did not assume that meant me and other white people. I mean, I have a pretty ingrained “speak to police officers politely and respectfully” thing, and there’s a touch of fear to that, but it’s a “if you did something wrong, being polite means you might get off lightly” kind of fear, not a “you could die” kind of fear. There’s still an underlying assumption that the police are basically good and just. There is a process of unlearning this, that is not done. I can still be surprised. I can still have trouble believing certain reports of police brutality (not towards protesters, I’ve experienced that) but to people who are just trying to go about their lives and haven’t even done anything. And that is such a huge difference: yeah, white Food Not Bombs activists have been hauled off and arrested for serving food in public, yeah, white anti-war protesters or anti-globalization protesters might get tear-gassed, shot in vulnerable spots with rubber bullets, have their property confiscated, etc. But generally only in situations where you’re knowingly putting yourself at some risk. Not being able to opt out of police assholery ever, not if you’re having a rough day or rough year or your dad just died, or you’re pregnant, or you don’t have a backup childcare option if you get arrested, that’s...that’s something else entirely. There, uh, let’s use a braid metaphor. Or a rope metaphor, since I only have two strands right now. Let’s twist them together, make them stronger than either one alone. One, the system doesn’t work for me, it harms me. Two, it’s even worse in certain nameable ways for other people. One, my feelings of isolation and mental illness issues aren’t just a me thing, they’re facilitated by a culture that encourages isolation and mental illness and that frames mental illness as an individual problem rather than a public health crisis. Two, some people who have those exact same problems have a much harder time accessing appropriate medical care, and if they do access medical care it’s more likely to not be culturally appropriate. (And, being seen as having a mental illness can cause more problems than it solves; medical mental health care is not always a good thing.) One, I don’t want to sell my time for money; there seems to be if anything an inverse correlation between how well a job pays and how much it positively contributes to society. Two, being able to sell my time for money and have everything I need and a good chunk of what I want (materially speaking) is an incredible privilege, and being able to get away with being as much of a slacker as I was in my 20′s and not end up starving, sleeping on the street, or unable to access medical care is an incredible amount of privilege that lots of people don’t have. As badly as the system works for me, it’s much worse for a lot of people, people who might have really valuable ideas about how to do things better, people who have a more thorough perspective about what’s going on right now so I should listen to them. One, I was pushed too hard in high school, and that harmed me. Two, I was treated like I was going places which is basically a good thing, and lots of other people didn’t get that (or were treated like they were going to exactly one place, namely prison) and...What do I do with that? I don’t know. One, I grew up in a family where I was more or less discouraged from acknowledging most emotions, especially disruptive emotions like anger. Two. There were also a lot of really positive things about the way I was raised, including an intact family who expressed love and financial security and speaking the same language at home and at school and not being told I was wrong or less than because of my ethnicity or race or religion, things that other people didn’t have growing up. And as a writer, the ones sound real and from the heart, and the two’s mostly sound pretty fake and posture-y. Does that mean I’m still too oblivious, that I haven’t really internalized what it means to not have the privileges I’ve had? Does it mean privilege is just a shitty way of looking at things? (How do I feel about this on axes where I’m marginalized, how do I want men to understand gender and straight people to understand sexual orientation and abled people to understand chronic illness?) I think...I think I want privileged people, on axes where I’m marginalized, to understand that it’s not about them at all. Not to see their privilege, but to see the bullshit I have to deal with (the sexual harassment and fear of rape and the frikkin pockets issue and compulsory femininity and the way heterosexuality is the default and queers aren’t represented enough and the way that medical research often takes study results about men and assumes that applies to men and women and the way that products targeted at women cost more for less content (Luna bars cost more than Clif bars and are smaller, for instance) and the way that yeah I don’t like Zoom meetings either but they’re still often the difference between me being able to connect with people vs not at all and I know that once pandemic fears die down enough everything’s going to be in  person only again, and the way that doctors just assume I’ll magically not have any trouble getting to appointments even if I’ve told them enough that they should be able to infer as much, and the way that everyone asks “so, what do you do?” as small talk and the way no one knows how to handle “so how are you?” “still sick” because we know what to say when someone’s temporarily sick or dying but not when someone is going to be sick for the rest of their lives, and the way I have to feel ridiculously grateful when a group makes any effective effort at all to be inclusive because the bar shouldn’t be this low but it is.

Yeah, all that. To see that and go “oh, wow, you shouldn’t have to deal with all that, that’s not right, what can I do?” and then do it. Or at least listen while I vent, ‘cause complaining doesn’t fix things but it makes things more tolerable while they’re broken.) (And I notice they’re not all the same. I want to be seen as mighty for overcoming my illness-related BS, both the illness itself and especially the way the world isn’t set up for people who are chronically ill, especially doctors who of all people you’d think their job would require knowing how to interact with chronically ill people ffs, but if someone was all like “oh wow, you’re so strong for being bisexual” I’d just be like, wut? because that’s not how I see myself at all. And of course the disability/chronic illness thing varies; some disabled people (people who are visibly disabled more often, I think) can’t stand the “you’re such an inspiration” thing, but of course as someone who isn’t visibly disabled I don’t get that, so I haven’t developed that “you what huh?” reaction yet.)

[tirorah]

The Tradition of Change

Full disclosure: I live in the Netherlands. I’m a cis gay female who had the fortune of being born in an open-minded family. 

I could be defined as a third generation immigrant. I say “could” because there’s a technicality in the way, but one side of my family does have foreign roots. However, because there’s a lot of Dutch blood in my veins, very few people would ever identify me as someone of partly foreign descent at all. 

Honestly, I’m not sure if it even counts anymore. But all of the above does affect my opinion. 

In current times, where our political climate seems increasingly turbulent and toxic, I often encounter arguments revolving around one thing: culture. More specifically, the perceived loss of this culture through our expanding, increasingly interconnected world, and of course immigration, the ultimate hot topic of the current social climate. 

Note how I mentioned “perceived” loss instead of actual loss. Because lately, whenever this subject is brought up, the first question on my mind is: What is culture? And is it even possible to lose it to such a degree that it completely destroys a country’s sense of self? 

Spoiler alert: my answer is no. Feel free to dive under the cut for a lengthy explanation. 

So let’s take a look at the first question, what is culture? A quick Google search gave me a nice definition:

The ideas, customs, and social behavior of a particular people or society.

Sounds about right to me. With that in mind, allow me to give you a general overview of Dutch social culture. 

In recent history, we’ve profiled ourselves as a country of tolerance. Tolerance towards everyone, irrespective of gender, romantic/sexual preferences, ethnicity, and religion. Tolerance towards other things too, like certain kinds of drugs, prostitution, 16 year-olds consuming alcohol (raised to 18 in 2014) and even illegal downloading (no longer allowed from 2014 onward as well.)

But when one narrows it down to day-to-day interpersonal interaction, we see an additional layer. For example, your average Dutch person is rather allergic to what we consider open, excessive displays of egoism or vanity. The reason for this is a general notion that we, and by extension our fellow citizens, have to “behave normally.” 

“Behaving normally” is expressed as a set of social guidelines that we as a people enforce upon others--and ourselves, ideally. It basically means one should act with a certain amount of manners, modesty and decency. There’s nothing wrong with being yourself, standing out, and being successful, as long as you’re not a nuisance to others (rubbing our noses in it) and you keep your feet planted on terra firma. 

In comes our current predicament: other cultures. I like to think most of us tend to at least tolerate them--as long as they fit in our Western definitions of basic human rights, of course--even if we think some of them are weird or don’t make sense. But for a lot of people, this is easier said than done when immigrants bring other cultures here.

And therein lies the rub. Right now there’s a growing sense of discontent among the population, caused of course by a multitude of factors. But I consider these two the most visible of them: 

1) The ‘08/’09 economic crisis which we’re still recovering from, leading to increased, long-term unemployment, budget cuts and less financial security in general; 2) Political upheaval (internationally too) and a current ruling government that, for all its efforts, makes mistakes and doesn’t do enough for some people.

Which is then followed up/accompanied by: 3) The perceived flood of migrants (again, “perceived” because we actually get in fewer refugees, total amount and percentage, than the general populace thinks) bringing in foreign values which, due to incidents, start to be considered incompatible with ours.

Know anything about the human psyche, and the logical followup is people blaming 3) for making 1) and 2) worse. The longer this situation lasts, the more extreme those views may become, and the more they can spread. This makes it easier, and to my personal dissatisfaction, more acceptable to blame outside influences for one’s problems. 

So why the economic and psychological tangent? Because I believe economic problems, compounded by a biological fear and rejection of the unknown, and further complicated by a minority that is actually racist, is the main catalyst for the allegation that foreigners are attempting to “destroy” our culture.

Nothing about this is strange. We humans are animals like any other, and we have what’s called a herd-mentality. We live and thrive in groups, and in nature, groups must be protected from outsiders that often wish to do harm or upset the established hierarchy. So we’re essentially hard-wired to do this, especially when we fall on hard times. 

When security and stability is at risk or on the decline, we instinctively look for something to hold on to, a beacon of certainty and peace. The closer to us, or the identity of “us”, the better. This leads me into customs, or traditions. What better comfort than things we’ve cherished for a long time and are seen as a typifying part of our culture? 

This is all well and good, mostly, until you add in the rest of the world. Countries in general tend to have different histories and values, sometimes wildly so, and when those conflict...well...

http://www.debatingeurope.eu/2014/12/05/zwarte-piet/#.WKMt7m8rLAU

I chose this tradition to talk about because it’s the most prolific one, it’s a children’s celebration so people get extra wound up, and it’s easy to understand why many call it racist. As you can see, a long-standing tradition in one country can be seen as offensive in another. It’s a logical consequence of a world that’s always connected.

For us, especially as a people who have always endeavored to be a haven of tolerance, this is a heavy blow. The issue challenges the notion that traditions are fine because they’ve "always been this way.” It forces us to question our degree of tolerance itself, which is a pillar of our national identity. It makes us wonder if we actually practice what we preach. Or it should. 

The actual, visible result is, much like the immigration debate, an argument split up into different “sides.” In this case, we have a vocal side calling for big changes or even removal of the tradition, “fighting the good fight”, while calling the other side “racist.” The other vocal side, the “racists,” yell back they’re protecting “their culture” and “their country.” Finally, there’s a quieter group in the middle who is either utterly sick of it all or doesn’t care (anymore.) 

To add to this, some add that our Black Pete custom has already become less racist over the years (the removal of the accent, for example) and are of the opinion this should be enough. To do any more would be an “unnecessary attack” on our “tradition” which then constitutes an attack on our “culture” and “identity.” 

This brings me to my opinion, and the point of this post.

I believe that destroying or stealing a culture is impossible, short of incredibly drastic actions like China’s Cultural Revolution. This is because of the following:

Culture is not static. It never has been and never will be. 

Our values and morals have shifted massively over the course of history. It’s those values and morals that shape our behavior and ideas in the first place, and with them a fundamental part of our culture. 

When I look at it like that, I could even argue this evolution is actually the oldest tradition of all, in any culture. A tradition of change, as it were. (#ShamelessTitlePlug) 

We can’t lose our culture to change, because the evolution is what keeps it alive and current. Without these changes, we’d still be colonizing distant lands or calling homosexuality a disease. 

In fact, what is culture but a reflection of us as a people? And we’ve changed massively over the years. It’s one of our best traits.  

So instead of blaming each other all the time and allowing ourselves to be consumed by toxicity, I think it’s far healthier for us as individuals and as a society to accept this. There is no “Us vs Them” to be had here. It’s simply a matter of Us, and whether we like it or not, we have to learn to live together. 

Of course, I’m not saying we should just accept anything and call it a day. Change is not inherently good. And as someone who personally doesn’t deal well with sudden upheavals, I can understand that the way our world seems to be changing more and more rapidly is scary. 

That’s why we need to question that change. We need to question everything. Other people’s actions and beliefs, but also our own, thoroughly if we can spend the time to do so. 

But it’s equally important to question the status quo we’re always trying so hard to cling on to. 

What we shouldn’t do is question the validity of change itself, whether it comes from within or without, and whether it’s gradual or sudden. 

Critical thinking is a massive part of what makes humanity the dominant force it is, warts and all. If we stop doing that, it’s my opinion we could very well regress into a time where war, not peace, is the norm. 

Respect the past and move on to the future. 

Do you have any questions, thoughts or nuances to share? Do you disagree with me and want to make a case for your view on these matters? Should I lay off the quotation marks? Please feel free to share your opinion.

[evanessa258]

Parable of the Sower: Blog Post #2

2 Real life issues that could occur:

One incident I view possibly happening is a mass drug epidemic where economic decline results in companies increasing the price of drugs, focusing production on opioid drugs, and drugs of addictive manners, while lowering supply of health focused drugs with minimal addictive qualities. Doctors will become pressured to prescribe drugs, even those not necessary, in order to boost sales and their practices. People would be seeking shelter from addiction, attempts of forced drug use, and escape from this new chaotic life.

Another incident would be if the vaccine for covid-19 is never achieved and society is forced into permanent quarantine. However, my angle on what the issue would be is not economic, but the fact that there would be a rise in mental health issues such as depression. People would be seeking socialization and community, at the risk of death, in order to help recover the mental quality of life over the physical.

2 Quotes to apply:

One Earthseed quote that stood out to me was on page 167, “Kindness eases change.” During these times of the world changing as we know it, there is no room to spread hate. At that moment a person should really reflect to themselves to see how they are so willing to make a deteriorating world an even worse place due to their own words or actions alone. Kind words and actions could help ease those stressed, addicted, depressed, or however they feel into knowing a hope and guiding them to possible resources.

Another quote that spoke to me was on page 153, “In order to rise, From its own ashes, A phoenix, First, Must, Burn.” This quote is so important because often people feel weak for perspectives of pain as they enter into new phases and chapters of their lives. During a large pandemic or crisis negative feelings can still be stigmatized but I view this quote as saying those processed feelings are necessary to achieve the desired goal of the change that is present, or to even survive the situation one is faced with.

I would choose to seek shelter in either farmland or in the wilderness with access to water. I feel this environment is best because in the case of the first crisis, we are away from any established stores or factories that can help prevent temptation while being able to create necessary resources, as well as being far enough off the grid to possibly survive without being forced into quarantine once again. 

In order to become part of the community a person must not be oppressive of others race, gender, class, sexuality, or religion. I am not including politics for the sake that typically certain political groups are more oppressive than others, and even those who feel they aren’t oppressive may not realize how their political view is oppressive until this time comes. The goal of this community is to ensure that social pressure is not what is putting more negative pressure on those who are addicted or depressed. Those negatively affected by the epidemics are definitely allowed, as the goal of this community is to uplift those who are seeking help, happen to find us, or even just need food and shelter for a day. There is no room to judge those who do not oppress in these times. Understanding others and their perspective is a goal.

Leadership would be in the form of direct democracy, where although I am the main person creating this community, that can always be subject to change. Issues can be addressed on a weekly or monthly basis that allows changes to be instilled quickly as to allow for creating a structure suitable for most people in the most possible ways.

Future technology would include both greenhouse technology to better control larger crops in these larger structures ensuring more reliable crops. I would also hope to have medical workers and chemists to help develop modified versions of addictive drugs to reduce the addiction rate or even to help establish new versions of certain health medicines such as insulin.

The community would survive by using agricultural resources as well as bring any technology from the cities and factories to help establish people friendly technology. We would also survive by also creating labs, rehabilitation centers, schools, and even leisure facilities voted upon which to create next. These will not be meant to pressure those in the community, but to allow for the options to be present and for people to learn and help others. Schools will continue to teach elementary level subjects, but help to integrate two major changes; humanities studies such as cultural anthropology and psychology that allow for others to begin to understand other people’s perspectives, while erasing the blatant lies of white history, and early introduction to specialized subjects that way students can become introduced to STEM concepts as early as they desire on top of ensuring humanity knowledge is presented. 

[courage-a-word-of-justice]

Grimms Notes 1 | Spec Ops Asuka 1 - 2 | Boogiepop 3 | Price of Smiles 2 - 3 | Kaguya-sama 1 | Mob Psycho II 2 | Morose Mononokean II 2 - 3 | Shield Hero 2 | My Roommate is a Cat 2 | Girly Air Force 1

Grimms Notes 1

Somehow, from the opening shot having an easy-to-draw-and-animate non-very-threatening monster, I can tell this is a game adaption.

…Likwise, when I have complaints about the birds in the OP being CG, you know this is an anime.

I think this “handing down the role of Red Riding Hood” thing is interesting. However, the humour Tao was going for at the time…was so not me.

I think all Tao said was that it was dangerous (in the audio). I think the subber was trying to insert a Zelda meme…what an evil agenda…(partially joking)

“…scary black thing…” – Do you mean the monster? If you mean the wolf monster and not the other clawed creature from the beginning of the episode, then that’s not black. That’s purple.

I think Brain’s Base is trying to make Red look creepy with her dead ahead stare, but…as much as I don’t like a fisheye lens, we could really use some right now.

Okayyyyyyyyyy…I knew anime could make anything a weapon, but a bookmark? That’s stretching credulity a bit. How is that badass??? C’mon, even healing was – kinda – badass in Merc Storia because it had a purpose. A bookmark is just used for keeping your place in a book. Unless it’s one of those metal ones that falls out of books all the time, they don’t hurt flies.

Seriously, doesn’t Goliath get defeated by David??? In better news, I thought Tao was vaguely hot, but Robin Hood…ooh…

I have no idea why Alice’s weapon is a sword, btw.

Waitttttt…wuh? “I’ll show you how to be a real lady”???? *eyes of skepticism* At least the other ones make sense and aren’t as gendered – but notably Cinderella is a healer when they could’ve done something cooler, like the Little Mermaid or something (to tie into siren mythology).

Obviously Evil Villain is Obvious. Nothing new to see here.

Well…that was mildly unsatisfying…

Spec Ops Asuka 1

For some reason, I call Magical Girl Special Operations Asuka “Spec Ops Asuka”. Well, at least it makes sense…*shrugs*

Karambit. Surprisingly, it’s a weapon I’ve never heard of before…

Exposition dumps have never been this clunky before! Oof!

Whiskey Charlie? Like…WC? Toilet??? (I’m not sure everyone will get that joke, but okay.)

I’d probably translate the episode title to “Comeback of the Magical Girl”. It starts with a relative clause, so it should be that way in English too.

The ol’ transfer student cliché. *sigh* Anime, anime, anime…why you do dis to me? Not that I mind it, I wouldn’t be so deep if I weren’t…

What’s the name of Nozo-chan’s friend again???

“Franz on the Waves” seems to be a play on “Kafka on the Shore”.

Le sigh…I get the feeling this was written by a dude to satisfy male fantasies by pretending to use girl power as a symbol.

Seriously though, if you thought Sailor Moon was bad at keeping identities…Asuka has it worse. I mean, Rapture Asuka = Asuka Ootori. It’s really obvious in English…

A thug man with a metal hand drinking tea from a tiny cup…now there’s a real source of humour!

(Trigger warning: prostitution discussion) - “…whoring yourself out.” – Err…that’s definitely not what I expected to see in an anime like this. I haven’t shied away from Shield Hero, but this I did a really big double take on for all the wrong reasons. Even with Sayoko to hold Nozo-chan back, I still think Nozo’s being really, really insensitive here.

Okay…the rules of long hair state you must pull your hair out from towels. They missed a good opportunity to do that shoujo sparkle thing with that, y’know, even if to create mood whiplash.

There is something to be said about bystander effect here, I think, and how people award proactivity rather than being passive...especially with magical girls and those other kinds of people who act as “heroes” during times of crisis.

Oh, of course, terrorism. Because we want our magical girls political now…*le sigh*

“Live your life for the sake of those who died.” – This reminds me of the situation with cian-aemilian all over again. I’m pretty sure I’ve said something of a similar nature in the past due to it. Update: my exact quote was “…what can the living do but keep those who have gone in their memory?”

…and of course, people who watch magical girls from afar use drones, because that’s going to outdate this show in a good 10 – 20 years. *le sigh*

Well, colour me impressed. I was about to jump ship due to the shoddy quality, but I think that quote at the end felt like a dig at me personally in the best (yet worst) way possible.  I did laugh a tonne at how stupid the gore looked, though, which might be a problem…

Boogiepop 3

Is it just me, or has Echoes cleaned up now enough to be kinda…hot?

Waittttt…which of them is “Niitoki-kun”? Sorry, I just don’t think I’m 100% comprehending all the names being flung about here. Update: Niitoki is the class prez gal.

Somehow I knew he was going to stab Echoes with the pen, but I was still slightly surprised to see it happen.

Hmm…that episode was a lot more impressive than the last two. Things actually made sense, now that we know the background of them,

Price of Smiles 2

I see 2D mechs. They may be stationary, but I’m still impressed…they’re basically a dying breed these days.

Why do these mechs have shields, anyway?

I like how the twins poked fun at Joshua’s “passion and will” thing.

Oh no…judging from their reaction…did Joshua die???

End of episode segment…keep watching.

Kaguya-sama 1

This is my final premiere…so I’d better make this count. I read somewhere the narrator was overpowering and read the first volume of manga, but otherwise that’s all I know about this.

I think that shot that replays in the OP is part of one chapter of the manga.

Tori…Tottori…geddit? Oh, never mind.

20th Century Fox, much?

The weed was a good touch. I don’t remember that being in the manga. (No, I’m not talking about that weed…which you can smoke…)

“Who’s Hayasaka?” you ask. Good question. Even I didn’t know, so I had to ask Google. Hayasaka…is Kaguya’s valet! If you know that, then you can laugh about it!

If you want a sausage octopus, just go ask your team of chefs for one, Kaguya!

Mob Psycho II 2

I’m pretty sure Ura Sunday is where Mob Psycho is serialised…

Is this the real Junji Ito adaption (LOL)?

Mononokean II 2

Why is Ashiya good at finding metal objects anyway? (If there is an explanation…) It’s only metal items and not anything else, right?

So the Justice is this frumpy purple-haired dude? I think I outgrew this kind of dude once I got over Urushihara…

There are CGI tadpoles, but they’re kinda hard to see against the 2D background…

Come to think of it, Abeno may be the master of the Mononokean, but it seems he reports directly to the Legislator. Is there a guy/youkai like that for the Justice (and presumably the other dude) as well?

Moja falling into the water was too adorable!

Oh great (LOL), the Legislator is basically baiting Abeno with “that’s not water!” from Grand Blue…

I just realised Abeno’s so big in comparison to Ashiya…n-not that I mind of course…(lel)

Aoi? Who dat? Update: Oh yeah…that guy (?) was the first master of the Mononokean. Sorry, I may have watched the 1st series twice, but that was at the start of 2017.

Shield Hero 2

“…is diseased and has a mental disorder.” – Well, I thought it honestly couldn’t get any worse, between slavery and rape accusations. It just did. Again, I don’t condone this stuff, but a story’s a story, no matter how depraved.

Seeing a story about the pits of despair naturally means you can see people get better – I think that’s why we need to have both stories that are light and fluffy + dark and dreary.

I see Naofumi keeps a Balloon (<- how I’ll refer to balloon monsters from now on) at his side all the time now, LOL. By the way, when he bought that ball, I honestly thought he was going to offer Raphtalia a Balloon instead of getting her a proper ball…

Update: Not sure if Naofumi’s inability to taste stuff is because of the betrayal or because of the fact he changed worlds…or maybe even something else?

My Roommate is a Cat 2

I see Bliss wallpaper...either someone has good taste in default wallpapers or a very outdated computer!

Is it alright to feed cats bread…? I’ve never fed a cat.

They say pets are like their owners, huh? Subaru is very much like the cat.

Wait, why are all the pets that are out and about do-Update: Forget I asked. There are some cats outside as well…

I’ve never seen a Japanese word processor with genkouyooshi to type into vertically, come to think of it.

Talking to cats is fine and dandy, I think, assuming they understand you as well. Anyways, I think Subaru got the name “Haru” from “sunny” (hare).

Ah! Kitty too cute!...I wish that could be a review, but sadly…it can’t be.

Post-credits segment…keep going.

Oh, that post-credits segment was so good, even if it did need some explaining to an audience that only knows English!

Update: I read the character bios from the official site, and turns out Haru is a girl.

Girly Air Force 1

I’ve seen mixed opinions about this (as in, read too many impressions on it and they don’t neatly go one way or another), so I’m taking the plunge while I still have time to.

You can tell your protagonist is great when the first word he says is “S***!”

EGG? “Defective girl”? I know I’m watching something with a lot of context here…but seriously, this was definitely made for dudes. Jusssssssssssst saying.

See? What did I say? After your first kiss, it’s only a matter of time before-erhem. I’ll stop ranting now.

So…what languages does Minghua know, exactly?

Wait, so what was Kei doing in China? Better question! (sings in a teasing voice “Eloping, eloping, Kei was eloping!”)

As much as I think free tuition is a good thing…I’m with Minghua. Don’t go risking your life when you just escaped for your life not too long ago.

*sigh* Kei, Kei, Kei…what do you think you’re doing?

…and I LOL. I LOL so hard at how they tossed Kei into the boot but laid down Minghua like a baby.

But seriously, why the name “Daughter”???

Egao no Daika 3

I found and heard Huey! I can leave this show if I wanted to now…

The fact people are red or blue, and sometimes you can’t tell which is which, is powerful colour symbolism.

Spec Ops Asuka 2

Well…that (perception magic) explains one of my questions from last time.

I kep thinking that Sayako is the sort of girl who would become a magical girl…in the traditional sense.

Pigeon fight! The fight I never knew I needed…kind of.

I’ve watched enough anime to know the new transfer student is Kurumi…geez.

Mononokean II 3

For some reason, I didn’t realise this until most of the episode had gone…but Egen is a tengu, right?

Make sure you watch closely for the “like him [Ashiya]” bit…it’s funny when you find out.

I find it the most surprising that Abeno is calling himself an idiot…hmm.

[technicaldr]

What A Googler’s Leaked Manifesto Teaches Us About The Importance of Managing Your Online Reputation 

We live in an age when thoughts and opinions are shared as rapidly as they’re formed. The ubiquitous, instant access to online visibility in such culturally and politically-charged times puts constant pressure on the public to participate and make their voices heard. Sharing opinions online is considered by many as a new form of political activism — of doing your bare minimum diligence as a citizen of a digitized world.

 This equates to a common compulsion to bring awareness to certain actions and opinions of others as a means to debunk, refute, and oppose. Visibility and awareness, while generally seen as advantageous (there’s no such thing as bad press, right?), are now used as weapons against perceived ignorance, wrongdoing, and the like. With this compulsion, however, comes the need for what we may call a responsibility to your reputation. Take for example the recent viral, sociopolitical news story of the “Google Manifesto.”

A Series of Unfortunate Events

To recap: James Damore, now-former Google engineer, caused an outcry within and outside the company after releasing what he called a “manifesto” about diversity in the tech industry, arguing that biological differences between men and women are the reason for the industry’s infamous gender gap, and that the company’s diversity policies are essentially futile and disadvantageous. According to Damore, the memo had circulated internally for about a month, during which time he asked for feedback and input.

 The 10-page document, which claimed Google’s programs designed to hire more women were “lowering the bar,” was then leaked online where it quickly went viral in a concert of shares, comments, tweets, and articles by a public loudly declaring that it proliferated harmful, sexist ideologies. In a matter of days, its language and ideas were deconstructed and analyzed a million times over, a flurry of statements were made and amended, Damore was fired, the manifesto was taken down, and a lawsuit was filed.

 Google fired Damore on August 7th, just two days after one of the first articles about the manifesto was published, reportedly for violating the company’s code of conduct by “advancing harmful gender stereotypes in [the] workplace,” and undoubtedly for garnering a lot of unwanted attention. It became clear that Google didn’t want their name attached to the manifesto as they condemned Damore and his document.

 Damore’s responses have been swift and public. He’s filed a labor complaint, citing “a legal right to express [his] concerns about the terms and conditions of [his] working environment and to bring up potentially illegal behavior.” He also hasn’t shied away from offering up personal statements and online interviews. On Sunday, August 13th, he defended himself in Reddit’s Ask Me Anything forum, where he was met with a bevy of supporters, including some female programmers. But he also encountered critics who argued some of those supportive voices were fake users.

 This series of events has prompted many ethical, cultural, political, and legal questions. Did Google have the right to fire him? Some experts say maybe not. Would Damore have been fired if the document hadn’t gone viral? He believes he wouldn’t have.

But legalities, politics, and ethics aside, other questions we’re left asking include, what’s next for Damore, his future, and his reputation? What does his experience, which calls to mind many before him, like Uber’s CEO Travis Kalanick and his recent forced resignation, teach us about living and working in such a digitally-public, share-happy, and vocal society?

There Actually Is Such A Thing As Bad Press

First, the entire situation is evidence of the fact that nearly every move an individual makes has the potential to turn into a tweet, a status, or an article — for better or worse. The same is true for companies and every move they or their employees make. As we’ve witnessed, not even Google is immune to this reality. In other words, it’s easier than ever — practically effortless — to become part of a story you aren’t the author of.

 For those whose reputation is critical to their livelihood (and whose isn’t, because everyone looks up everyone for everything), this fact must influence how you carry out your daily work and life. In a society where Googling is a reflex, the Damores, the Kalanicks, and Googles of the world simply cannot afford knee-jerk, uncalculated choices and actions that allow the Internet-at-large to control their fate.

 The issue of “it’s my right” and related legal actions are often top-of-mind for handling a crisis, but this is a short-sighted approach. Gaining and maintaining control of your narrative in such a tumultuous online landscape is a challenging, long-term strategy and warrants serious investment in the form of a management plan or team, especially for those closer (than what’s now normal) to the public eye.

 Second, no matter how careful you are, some form of bad press is likely over the course of a career. People have different opinions and ideas of what is right and wrong, and everyone makes mistakes of varying subjective degrees of severity. We just happen to now function in a time when the Internet is able to flare up and immortalize a story, regardless of what may or may not be true. This spectrum of bad press can range from an unfavorable review to a full-fledged scandal that can threaten a lifetime’s worth of work. This, again, makes it essential to have a team and plan already in place, both so you are less susceptible to damage and so the necessary recovery process is as painless and effective as possible.

 Damore says he has no regrets, but it’s only been about a week and the consequences are piling up. He’s lost his job, he’s about to enter a legal battle, he’s gained a long list of critics, and his name is, at least for now, synonymous with a sexist scandal, despite his claims otherwise.

 Will it be harder for him to find work going forward? How will his personal life suffer? It’s unclear how the rest of his story will unfold or how much he’s investing in having control over it, but we can be certain the Internet is watching and won’t be quick to forget his claim to infamy.

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[porchenclose10019]

Aid Workers In 4 Countries Facing Famine Warn Trump's Cuts Could Cost Lives

There are now 20 million people on the brink of starvation across four countries grappling with extreme food shortages and conflict. But as the world suffers one of its most severe humanitarian crises in decades, President Donald Trump is threatening to drastically reduce foreign aid as part of his administration’s “America first” budget. 

Trump’s proposed cuts come at a time when aid organizations say that more funding is desperately needed to save millions from dying. United Nations officials declared the world’s first famine in six years in parts of South Sudan in February and now fear that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are edging toward similar preventable crises.

“Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people [in these countries] will simply starve to death,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator Stephen O’Brien warned in March. Days later, Trump unveiled the blueprint for his 2018 budget, which seeks “deep cuts” to humanitarian initiatives abroad. 

The defunding of some U.S. foreign aid programs is already underway. Last week, the Trump administration halted all grants to the U.N. Population Fund, an organization that provides reproductive health care in more than 150 countries.

As the president awaits congressional approval for his proposed 28 percent slash in funding for USAID, which already accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, experts working in each of the four at-risk countries talked to The Huffington Post about what such cuts could mean for their regions at this time.

Many aid officials agree that an increase in aid is not a panacea to the many humanitarian challenges facing Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria and South Sudan, but that more funding is desperately needed to stop these crises from plunging even deeper. 

“We’ve always depended on very generous support in the U.S.,” World Food Programme Regional Director Valerie Guarnieri told HuffPost at a U.N. media briefing Tuesday. “Any reduction [to foreign aid] in the U.S. budget would impact on our ability to reach people who are in need and our ability to avert a catastrophe.”

Nigeria

In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s militant insurgency has killed thousands of people, forced millions to flee their homes and spurred an immense hunger crisis. UNICEF estimates that 450,000 children will suffer severe acute malnutrition this year, at least 90,000 of which could die without urgent treatment. 

The waves of displacement resulting from Boko Haram attacks and the group’s conflict with government forces have created a complex humanitarian crisis in which areas of northeast Nigeria are too unstable to safely deliver aid. 

“It’s not a mathematical equation of we’ve got this amount of people, they need this amount of stuff, let’s just get a truck in and they’ll be good,” said Patrick Rose, crisis communications specialist for UNICEF. “The truck arrives, it gets blown up. The next truck arrives, it gets hijacked. The next truck arrives, and people have moved by that point.” 

In July of last year, UNICEF was forced to temporarily suspend its work in northeast Borno state after Boko Haram attacked an aid convoy.  

The security situation is so severe that there are currently 1.78 million displaced citizens in Nigeria, and more than 8 million more are in need of humanitarian aid. It’s believed that 2,000 people died last year in a famine-struck Borno town that has been inaccessible to aid agencies.

There is also a longstanding shortage of funding and attention to the crisis, Rose said, which U.N. officials stated last year was greater in scale than aid organizations had anticipated. People are in desperate need of services ranging from malnutrition treatment to psychosocial support for trauma.

“It would be simplistic to say that under [President Barack] Obama everything was great and now under Trump everything is bad. We’ve got a compound deficit of compassion for this crisis,” Rose said.

But if the U.S. were to decrease funding and ignore the mounting need, officials warn it could allow the humanitarian situations to deteriorate even further.

“Certainly this is not the time to shy away,” Rose said. “Once we start to see an erosion of leadership within the global order and architecture ... we start to see an erosion of rights very, very quickly.”

Somalia 

Unrelenting drought conditions and armed conflict in Somalia have triggered mass displacement, which has in turn led to a cholera outbreak and human rights abuses including gender-based violence. Some 6.2 million Somalis require humanitarian assistance, including hundreds of thousands of malnourished children.

The outlook in Somalia seems grim, but Peter de Clercq, U.N. humanitarian and resident coordinator for Somalia, says there is hope for improvement ― if adequate resources are secured.

“By being preemptive and working with regional authorities, so far the situation hasn’t gone as badly out of hand as it could have ― we haven’t declared a famine,” he said. “It hasn’t happened, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen. We’ve been able to stave it off, and we hope that through very strong involvement and if we get the resources we need, we’ll be able to avert a famine.” 

Fundraising efforts in Somalia a year ago were focused on crisis prevention, including maintaining resilience and keeping people’s livestock alive, said de Clercq, who also serves as deputy special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Somalia.

But the targets were missed and the resources remained out of reach, he explained, and now humanitarian efforts have turned toward saving lives.

“We launched an accelerated assistance appeal early this year, as we could see the situation spiraling more and more in a negative direction,” he said.

In late 2016, the U.N. issued an urgent plea for $864 million in funding to support Somalia’s most vulnerable people throughout all of 2017. As the crisis worsened, that appeal soared to $825 million for the first six months of this year alone.

Aid agencies in Somalia are already struggling to reach populations in regions occupied by al-Shabab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group. Trump recently approved more aggressive airstrikes against al-Shabab militants by the U.S. Army, but experts fear this will put civilians in greater danger.

South Sudan

Weeks before Trump released his budget blueprint, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir formally declared a famine in parts of the country.

As the five-year-old nation sinks deeper into economic collapse and armed conflict, the need for foreign aid is only getting stronger.

Violence between warring government and rebel forces has expanded into a feud between ethnic groups with no end in sight. The chaos is causing mass displacement and disrupting farming activity, which has devastated South Sudan’s vital agriculture industry.

The famine is “wholly man-made; a result of the conflict,” said David Shearer, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in South Sudan. “More than half of the population will face food shortages and will need food assistance.” 

A severe drought has stretched on in the southeast of the world’s youngest country, and a continued cholera outbreak has claimed thousands of lives since 2014. At least 100,000 South Sudanese are now facing death, and 1 million more languish on the brink of starvation.

“This is a largely agrarian society where people rely heavily on what they grow. So unless farmers can get back to their fields and start planting again, especially in the coming weeks as the rainy season approaches, vast numbers will remain dependent on aid,” explained Shearer, who heads the U.N. mission in South Sudan. “That’s not what they, the international community or the government wants, but it is the reality we face.”

Political corruption has led the crisis to rapidly deteriorate, as Kiir’s government has obstructed access to aid workers and drastically hiked the cost of their permits. His regime has also been accused of looting aid supplies. 

At least 700,000 people have fled to Uganda at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day. Shearer warns that some of those who remain “are so scared of the brutal fighting ― that often targets civilians ― that they are hiding out in swamps.”

“The U.S. has traditionally been very generous and gives more than any other country,” said Shearer. “With so many humanitarian crises in the world today, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to raise funds to support the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people.”

Yemen

Yemen’s two-year civil war has left the country’s health facilities a shambles, millions suffering from severe malnutrition and aid organizations stretched to their limits. In a country that faced longstanding humanitarian challenges before the conflict, Yemen is now experiencing one of the world’s worst hunger crises. 

“Over the past two years the situation has really steadily deteriorated and is going from bad to worse,” said Robert Mardini, the Middle East regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

One child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen of preventable diseases, according to UNICEF. The ICRC warned last month that Yemen, along with Somalia, was three to four months away from famine conditions.

“The dynamics of the conflict today make it very difficult to organize, for instance, overnight massive food distribution operations,” Mardini said. He described how constant shelling and conflict in the city of Taiz last month made what should be a straightforward route into a convoluted and arduous journey.

“What used to be a 10-minute walk took my team four hours via a donkey track through the mountains,” Mardini said.

Houthi rebels, allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have been in open civil war with loyalists of the internationally recognized president, Abdrabbah Mansour Hadi, for two years. Saudi Arabia supports Hadi and has been conducting an airstrike campaign that has killed thousands, as well as a naval blockade that has complicated aid shipments. 

Increased conflict, especially around the key port of Hodeidah, could further cut off shipments and push the country into famine. Aid agencies and rights groups are calling for increased aid and a political solution to the conflict as soon as possible, warning that the alternative is a spiraling hunger crisis and increased death toll.

The U.S. instead is continuing to offer military support to the Saudi-led coalition as well as increasing U.S. airstrikes that target al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen. This ongoing conflict has created a man-made hunger crisis in which aid funding is desperately needed but is limited amid the fighting.

“Even if we had 2 billion U.S. dollars tomorrow, we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems in Yemen. It’s not only about money,” Mardini said. 

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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[rtawngs20815]

Aid Workers In 4 Countries Facing Famine Warn Trump's Cuts Could Cost Lives

There are now 20 million people on the brink of starvation across four countries grappling with extreme food shortages and conflict. But as the world suffers one of its most severe humanitarian crises in decades, President Donald Trump is threatening to drastically reduce foreign aid as part of his administration’s “America first” budget. 

Trump’s proposed cuts come at a time when aid organizations say that more funding is desperately needed to save millions from dying. United Nations officials declared the world’s first famine in six years in parts of South Sudan in February and now fear that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are edging toward similar preventable crises.

“Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people [in these countries] will simply starve to death,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator Stephen O’Brien warned in March. Days later, Trump unveiled the blueprint for his 2018 budget, which seeks “deep cuts” to humanitarian initiatives abroad. 

The defunding of some U.S. foreign aid programs is already underway. Last week, the Trump administration halted all grants to the U.N. Population Fund, an organization that provides reproductive health care in more than 150 countries.

As the president awaits congressional approval for his proposed 28 percent slash in funding for USAID, which already accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, experts working in each of the four at-risk countries talked to The Huffington Post about what such cuts could mean for their regions at this time.

Many aid officials agree that an increase in aid is not a panacea to the many humanitarian challenges facing Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria and South Sudan, but that more funding is desperately needed to stop these crises from plunging even deeper. 

“We’ve always depended on very generous support in the U.S.,” World Food Programme Regional Director Valerie Guarnieri told HuffPost at a U.N. media briefing Tuesday. “Any reduction [to foreign aid] in the U.S. budget would impact on our ability to reach people who are in need and our ability to avert a catastrophe.”

Nigeria

In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s militant insurgency has killed thousands of people, forced millions to flee their homes and spurred an immense hunger crisis. UNICEF estimates that 450,000 children will suffer severe acute malnutrition this year, at least 90,000 of which could die without urgent treatment. 

The waves of displacement resulting from Boko Haram attacks and the group’s conflict with government forces have created a complex humanitarian crisis in which areas of northeast Nigeria are too unstable to safely deliver aid. 

“It’s not a mathematical equation of we’ve got this amount of people, they need this amount of stuff, let’s just get a truck in and they’ll be good,” said Patrick Rose, crisis communications specialist for UNICEF. “The truck arrives, it gets blown up. The next truck arrives, it gets hijacked. The next truck arrives, and people have moved by that point.” 

In July of last year, UNICEF was forced to temporarily suspend its work in northeast Borno state after Boko Haram attacked an aid convoy.  

The security situation is so severe that there are currently 1.78 million displaced citizens in Nigeria, and more than 8 million more are in need of humanitarian aid. It’s believed that 2,000 people died last year in a famine-struck Borno town that has been inaccessible to aid agencies.

There is also a longstanding shortage of funding and attention to the crisis, Rose said, which U.N. officials stated last year was greater in scale than aid organizations had anticipated. People are in desperate need of services ranging from malnutrition treatment to psychosocial support for trauma.

“It would be simplistic to say that under [President Barack] Obama everything was great and now under Trump everything is bad. We’ve got a compound deficit of compassion for this crisis,” Rose said.

But if the U.S. were to decrease funding and ignore the mounting need, officials warn it could allow the humanitarian situations to deteriorate even further.

“Certainly this is not the time to shy away,” Rose said. “Once we start to see an erosion of leadership within the global order and architecture ... we start to see an erosion of rights very, very quickly.”

Somalia 

Unrelenting drought conditions and armed conflict in Somalia have triggered mass displacement, which has in turn led to a cholera outbreak and human rights abuses including gender-based violence. Some 6.2 million Somalis require humanitarian assistance, including hundreds of thousands of malnourished children.

The outlook in Somalia seems grim, but Peter de Clercq, U.N. humanitarian and resident coordinator for Somalia, says there is hope for improvement ― if adequate resources are secured.

“By being preemptive and working with regional authorities, so far the situation hasn’t gone as badly out of hand as it could have ― we haven’t declared a famine,” he said. “It hasn’t happened, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen. We’ve been able to stave it off, and we hope that through very strong involvement and if we get the resources we need, we’ll be able to avert a famine.” 

Fundraising efforts in Somalia a year ago were focused on crisis prevention, including maintaining resilience and keeping people’s livestock alive, said de Clercq, who also serves as deputy special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Somalia.

But the targets were missed and the resources remained out of reach, he explained, and now humanitarian efforts have turned toward saving lives.

“We launched an accelerated assistance appeal early this year, as we could see the situation spiraling more and more in a negative direction,” he said.

In late 2016, the U.N. issued an urgent plea for $864 million in funding to support Somalia’s most vulnerable people throughout all of 2017. As the crisis worsened, that appeal soared to $825 million for the first six months of this year alone.

Aid agencies in Somalia are already struggling to reach populations in regions occupied by al-Shabab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group. Trump recently approved more aggressive airstrikes against al-Shabab militants by the U.S. Army, but experts fear this will put civilians in greater danger.

South Sudan

Weeks before Trump released his budget blueprint, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir formally declared a famine in parts of the country.

As the five-year-old nation sinks deeper into economic collapse and armed conflict, the need for foreign aid is only getting stronger.

Violence between warring government and rebel forces has expanded into a feud between ethnic groups with no end in sight. The chaos is causing mass displacement and disrupting farming activity, which has devastated South Sudan’s vital agriculture industry.

The famine is “wholly man-made; a result of the conflict,” said David Shearer, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in South Sudan. “More than half of the population will face food shortages and will need food assistance.” 

A severe drought has stretched on in the southeast of the world’s youngest country, and a continued cholera outbreak has claimed thousands of lives since 2014. At least 100,000 South Sudanese are now facing death, and 1 million more languish on the brink of starvation.

“This is a largely agrarian society where people rely heavily on what they grow. So unless farmers can get back to their fields and start planting again, especially in the coming weeks as the rainy season approaches, vast numbers will remain dependent on aid,” explained Shearer, who heads the U.N. mission in South Sudan. “That’s not what they, the international community or the government wants, but it is the reality we face.”

Political corruption has led the crisis to rapidly deteriorate, as Kiir’s government has obstructed access to aid workers and drastically hiked the cost of their permits. His regime has also been accused of looting aid supplies. 

At least 700,000 people have fled to Uganda at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day. Shearer warns that some of those who remain “are so scared of the brutal fighting ― that often targets civilians ― that they are hiding out in swamps.”

“The U.S. has traditionally been very generous and gives more than any other country,” said Shearer. “With so many humanitarian crises in the world today, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to raise funds to support the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people.”

Yemen

Yemen’s two-year civil war has left the country’s health facilities a shambles, millions suffering from severe malnutrition and aid organizations stretched to their limits. In a country that faced longstanding humanitarian challenges before the conflict, Yemen is now experiencing one of the world’s worst hunger crises. 

“Over the past two years the situation has really steadily deteriorated and is going from bad to worse,” said Robert Mardini, the Middle East regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

One child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen of preventable diseases, according to UNICEF. The ICRC warned last month that Yemen, along with Somalia, was three to four months away from famine conditions.

“The dynamics of the conflict today make it very difficult to organize, for instance, overnight massive food distribution operations,” Mardini said. He described how constant shelling and conflict in the city of Taiz last month made what should be a straightforward route into a convoluted and arduous journey.

“What used to be a 10-minute walk took my team four hours via a donkey track through the mountains,” Mardini said.

Houthi rebels, allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have been in open civil war with loyalists of the internationally recognized president, Abdrabbah Mansour Hadi, for two years. Saudi Arabia supports Hadi and has been conducting an airstrike campaign that has killed thousands, as well as a naval blockade that has complicated aid shipments. 

Increased conflict, especially around the key port of Hodeidah, could further cut off shipments and push the country into famine. Aid agencies and rights groups are calling for increased aid and a political solution to the conflict as soon as possible, warning that the alternative is a spiraling hunger crisis and increased death toll.

The U.S. instead is continuing to offer military support to the Saudi-led coalition as well as increasing U.S. airstrikes that target al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen. This ongoing conflict has created a man-made hunger crisis in which aid funding is desperately needed but is limited amid the fighting.

“Even if we had 2 billion U.S. dollars tomorrow, we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems in Yemen. It’s not only about money,” Mardini said. 

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2p7jYe0

[repwincoml4a0a5]

Aid Workers In 4 Countries Facing Famine Warn Trump's Cuts Could Cost Lives

There are now 20 million people on the brink of starvation across four countries grappling with extreme food shortages and conflict. But as the world suffers one of its most severe humanitarian crises in decades, President Donald Trump is threatening to drastically reduce foreign aid as part of his administration’s “America first” budget. 

Trump’s proposed cuts come at a time when aid organizations say that more funding is desperately needed to save millions from dying. United Nations officials declared the world’s first famine in six years in parts of South Sudan in February and now fear that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are edging toward similar preventable crises.

“Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people [in these countries] will simply starve to death,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator Stephen O’Brien warned in March. Days later, Trump unveiled the blueprint for his 2018 budget, which seeks “deep cuts” to humanitarian initiatives abroad. 

The defunding of some U.S. foreign aid programs is already underway. Last week, the Trump administration halted all grants to the U.N. Population Fund, an organization that provides reproductive health care in more than 150 countries.

As the president awaits congressional approval for his proposed 28 percent slash in funding for USAID, which already accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, experts working in each of the four at-risk countries talked to The Huffington Post about what such cuts could mean for their regions at this time.

Many aid officials agree that an increase in aid is not a panacea to the many humanitarian challenges facing Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria and South Sudan, but that more funding is desperately needed to stop these crises from plunging even deeper. 

“We’ve always depended on very generous support in the U.S.,” World Food Programme Regional Director Valerie Guarnieri told HuffPost at a U.N. media briefing Tuesday. “Any reduction [to foreign aid] in the U.S. budget would impact on our ability to reach people who are in need and our ability to avert a catastrophe.”

Nigeria

In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s militant insurgency has killed thousands of people, forced millions to flee their homes and spurred an immense hunger crisis. UNICEF estimates that 450,000 children will suffer severe acute malnutrition this year, at least 90,000 of which could die without urgent treatment. 

The waves of displacement resulting from Boko Haram attacks and the group’s conflict with government forces have created a complex humanitarian crisis in which areas of northeast Nigeria are too unstable to safely deliver aid. 

“It’s not a mathematical equation of we’ve got this amount of people, they need this amount of stuff, let’s just get a truck in and they’ll be good,” said Patrick Rose, crisis communications specialist for UNICEF. “The truck arrives, it gets blown up. The next truck arrives, it gets hijacked. The next truck arrives, and people have moved by that point.” 

In July of last year, UNICEF was forced to temporarily suspend its work in northeast Borno state after Boko Haram attacked an aid convoy.  

The security situation is so severe that there are currently 1.78 million displaced citizens in Nigeria, and more than 8 million more are in need of humanitarian aid. It’s believed that 2,000 people died last year in a famine-struck Borno town that has been inaccessible to aid agencies.

There is also a longstanding shortage of funding and attention to the crisis, Rose said, which U.N. officials stated last year was greater in scale than aid organizations had anticipated. People are in desperate need of services ranging from malnutrition treatment to psychosocial support for trauma.

“It would be simplistic to say that under [President Barack] Obama everything was great and now under Trump everything is bad. We’ve got a compound deficit of compassion for this crisis,” Rose said.

But if the U.S. were to decrease funding and ignore the mounting need, officials warn it could allow the humanitarian situations to deteriorate even further.

“Certainly this is not the time to shy away,” Rose said. “Once we start to see an erosion of leadership within the global order and architecture ... we start to see an erosion of rights very, very quickly.”

Somalia 

Unrelenting drought conditions and armed conflict in Somalia have triggered mass displacement, which has in turn led to a cholera outbreak and human rights abuses including gender-based violence. Some 6.2 million Somalis require humanitarian assistance, including hundreds of thousands of malnourished children.

The outlook in Somalia seems grim, but Peter de Clercq, U.N. humanitarian and resident coordinator for Somalia, says there is hope for improvement ― if adequate resources are secured.

“By being preemptive and working with regional authorities, so far the situation hasn’t gone as badly out of hand as it could have ― we haven’t declared a famine,” he said. “It hasn’t happened, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen. We’ve been able to stave it off, and we hope that through very strong involvement and if we get the resources we need, we’ll be able to avert a famine.” 

Fundraising efforts in Somalia a year ago were focused on crisis prevention, including maintaining resilience and keeping people’s livestock alive, said de Clercq, who also serves as deputy special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Somalia.

But the targets were missed and the resources remained out of reach, he explained, and now humanitarian efforts have turned toward saving lives.

“We launched an accelerated assistance appeal early this year, as we could see the situation spiraling more and more in a negative direction,” he said.

In late 2016, the U.N. issued an urgent plea for $864 million in funding to support Somalia’s most vulnerable people throughout all of 2017. As the crisis worsened, that appeal soared to $825 million for the first six months of this year alone.

Aid agencies in Somalia are already struggling to reach populations in regions occupied by al-Shabab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group. Trump recently approved more aggressive airstrikes against al-Shabab militants by the U.S. Army, but experts fear this will put civilians in greater danger.

South Sudan

Weeks before Trump released his budget blueprint, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir formally declared a famine in parts of the country.

As the five-year-old nation sinks deeper into economic collapse and armed conflict, the need for foreign aid is only getting stronger.

Violence between warring government and rebel forces has expanded into a feud between ethnic groups with no end in sight. The chaos is causing mass displacement and disrupting farming activity, which has devastated South Sudan’s vital agriculture industry.

The famine is “wholly man-made; a result of the conflict,” said David Shearer, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in South Sudan. “More than half of the population will face food shortages and will need food assistance.” 

A severe drought has stretched on in the southeast of the world’s youngest country, and a continued cholera outbreak has claimed thousands of lives since 2014. At least 100,000 South Sudanese are now facing death, and 1 million more languish on the brink of starvation.

“This is a largely agrarian society where people rely heavily on what they grow. So unless farmers can get back to their fields and start planting again, especially in the coming weeks as the rainy season approaches, vast numbers will remain dependent on aid,” explained Shearer, who heads the U.N. mission in South Sudan. “That’s not what they, the international community or the government wants, but it is the reality we face.”

Political corruption has led the crisis to rapidly deteriorate, as Kiir’s government has obstructed access to aid workers and drastically hiked the cost of their permits. His regime has also been accused of looting aid supplies. 

At least 700,000 people have fled to Uganda at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day. Shearer warns that some of those who remain “are so scared of the brutal fighting ― that often targets civilians ― that they are hiding out in swamps.”

“The U.S. has traditionally been very generous and gives more than any other country,” said Shearer. “With so many humanitarian crises in the world today, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to raise funds to support the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people.”

Yemen

Yemen’s two-year civil war has left the country’s health facilities a shambles, millions suffering from severe malnutrition and aid organizations stretched to their limits. In a country that faced longstanding humanitarian challenges before the conflict, Yemen is now experiencing one of the world’s worst hunger crises. 

“Over the past two years the situation has really steadily deteriorated and is going from bad to worse,” said Robert Mardini, the Middle East regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

One child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen of preventable diseases, according to UNICEF. The ICRC warned last month that Yemen, along with Somalia, was three to four months away from famine conditions.

“The dynamics of the conflict today make it very difficult to organize, for instance, overnight massive food distribution operations,” Mardini said. He described how constant shelling and conflict in the city of Taiz last month made what should be a straightforward route into a convoluted and arduous journey.

“What used to be a 10-minute walk took my team four hours via a donkey track through the mountains,” Mardini said.

Houthi rebels, allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have been in open civil war with loyalists of the internationally recognized president, Abdrabbah Mansour Hadi, for two years. Saudi Arabia supports Hadi and has been conducting an airstrike campaign that has killed thousands, as well as a naval blockade that has complicated aid shipments. 

Increased conflict, especially around the key port of Hodeidah, could further cut off shipments and push the country into famine. Aid agencies and rights groups are calling for increased aid and a political solution to the conflict as soon as possible, warning that the alternative is a spiraling hunger crisis and increased death toll.

The U.S. instead is continuing to offer military support to the Saudi-led coalition as well as increasing U.S. airstrikes that target al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen. This ongoing conflict has created a man-made hunger crisis in which aid funding is desperately needed but is limited amid the fighting.

“Even if we had 2 billion U.S. dollars tomorrow, we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems in Yemen. It’s not only about money,” Mardini said. 

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2p7jYe0

[grgedoors02142]

Aid Workers In 4 Countries Facing Famine Warn Trump's Cuts Could Cost Lives

There are now 20 million people on the brink of starvation across four countries grappling with extreme food shortages and conflict. But as the world suffers one of its most severe humanitarian crises in decades, President Donald Trump is threatening to drastically reduce foreign aid as part of his administration’s “America first” budget. 

Trump’s proposed cuts come at a time when aid organizations say that more funding is desperately needed to save millions from dying. United Nations officials declared the world’s first famine in six years in parts of South Sudan in February and now fear that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are edging toward similar preventable crises.

“Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people [in these countries] will simply starve to death,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator Stephen O’Brien warned in March. Days later, Trump unveiled the blueprint for his 2018 budget, which seeks “deep cuts” to humanitarian initiatives abroad. 

The defunding of some U.S. foreign aid programs is already underway. Last week, the Trump administration halted all grants to the U.N. Population Fund, an organization that provides reproductive health care in more than 150 countries.

As the president awaits congressional approval for his proposed 28 percent slash in funding for USAID, which already accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, experts working in each of the four at-risk countries talked to The Huffington Post about what such cuts could mean for their regions at this time.

Many aid officials agree that an increase in aid is not a panacea to the many humanitarian challenges facing Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria and South Sudan, but that more funding is desperately needed to stop these crises from plunging even deeper. 

“We’ve always depended on very generous support in the U.S.,” World Food Programme Regional Director Valerie Guarnieri told HuffPost at a U.N. media briefing Tuesday. “Any reduction [to foreign aid] in the U.S. budget would impact on our ability to reach people who are in need and our ability to avert a catastrophe.”

Nigeria

In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s militant insurgency has killed thousands of people, forced millions to flee their homes and spurred an immense hunger crisis. UNICEF estimates that 450,000 children will suffer severe acute malnutrition this year, at least 90,000 of which could die without urgent treatment. 

The waves of displacement resulting from Boko Haram attacks and the group’s conflict with government forces have created a complex humanitarian crisis in which areas of northeast Nigeria are too unstable to safely deliver aid. 

“It’s not a mathematical equation of we’ve got this amount of people, they need this amount of stuff, let’s just get a truck in and they’ll be good,” said Patrick Rose, crisis communications specialist for UNICEF. “The truck arrives, it gets blown up. The next truck arrives, it gets hijacked. The next truck arrives, and people have moved by that point.” 

In July of last year, UNICEF was forced to temporarily suspend its work in northeast Borno state after Boko Haram attacked an aid convoy.  

The security situation is so severe that there are currently 1.78 million displaced citizens in Nigeria, and more than 8 million more are in need of humanitarian aid. It’s believed that 2,000 people died last year in a famine-struck Borno town that has been inaccessible to aid agencies.

There is also a longstanding shortage of funding and attention to the crisis, Rose said, which U.N. officials stated last year was greater in scale than aid organizations had anticipated. People are in desperate need of services ranging from malnutrition treatment to psychosocial support for trauma.

“It would be simplistic to say that under [President Barack] Obama everything was great and now under Trump everything is bad. We’ve got a compound deficit of compassion for this crisis,” Rose said.

But if the U.S. were to decrease funding and ignore the mounting need, officials warn it could allow the humanitarian situations to deteriorate even further.

“Certainly this is not the time to shy away,” Rose said. “Once we start to see an erosion of leadership within the global order and architecture ... we start to see an erosion of rights very, very quickly.”

Somalia 

Unrelenting drought conditions and armed conflict in Somalia have triggered mass displacement, which has in turn led to a cholera outbreak and human rights abuses including gender-based violence. Some 6.2 million Somalis require humanitarian assistance, including hundreds of thousands of malnourished children.

The outlook in Somalia seems grim, but Peter de Clercq, U.N. humanitarian and resident coordinator for Somalia, says there is hope for improvement ― if adequate resources are secured.

“By being preemptive and working with regional authorities, so far the situation hasn’t gone as badly out of hand as it could have ― we haven’t declared a famine,” he said. “It hasn’t happened, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen. We’ve been able to stave it off, and we hope that through very strong involvement and if we get the resources we need, we’ll be able to avert a famine.” 

Fundraising efforts in Somalia a year ago were focused on crisis prevention, including maintaining resilience and keeping people’s livestock alive, said de Clercq, who also serves as deputy special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Somalia.

But the targets were missed and the resources remained out of reach, he explained, and now humanitarian efforts have turned toward saving lives.

“We launched an accelerated assistance appeal early this year, as we could see the situation spiraling more and more in a negative direction,” he said.

In late 2016, the U.N. issued an urgent plea for $864 million in funding to support Somalia’s most vulnerable people throughout all of 2017. As the crisis worsened, that appeal soared to $825 million for the first six months of this year alone.

Aid agencies in Somalia are already struggling to reach populations in regions occupied by al-Shabab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group. Trump recently approved more aggressive airstrikes against al-Shabab militants by the U.S. Army, but experts fear this will put civilians in greater danger.

South Sudan

Weeks before Trump released his budget blueprint, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir formally declared a famine in parts of the country.

As the five-year-old nation sinks deeper into economic collapse and armed conflict, the need for foreign aid is only getting stronger.

Violence between warring government and rebel forces has expanded into a feud between ethnic groups with no end in sight. The chaos is causing mass displacement and disrupting farming activity, which has devastated South Sudan’s vital agriculture industry.

The famine is “wholly man-made; a result of the conflict,” said David Shearer, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in South Sudan. “More than half of the population will face food shortages and will need food assistance.” 

A severe drought has stretched on in the southeast of the world’s youngest country, and a continued cholera outbreak has claimed thousands of lives since 2014. At least 100,000 South Sudanese are now facing death, and 1 million more languish on the brink of starvation.

“This is a largely agrarian society where people rely heavily on what they grow. So unless farmers can get back to their fields and start planting again, especially in the coming weeks as the rainy season approaches, vast numbers will remain dependent on aid,” explained Shearer, who heads the U.N. mission in South Sudan. “That’s not what they, the international community or the government wants, but it is the reality we face.”

Political corruption has led the crisis to rapidly deteriorate, as Kiir’s government has obstructed access to aid workers and drastically hiked the cost of their permits. His regime has also been accused of looting aid supplies. 

At least 700,000 people have fled to Uganda at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day. Shearer warns that some of those who remain “are so scared of the brutal fighting ― that often targets civilians ― that they are hiding out in swamps.”

“The U.S. has traditionally been very generous and gives more than any other country,” said Shearer. “With so many humanitarian crises in the world today, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to raise funds to support the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people.”

Yemen

Yemen’s two-year civil war has left the country’s health facilities a shambles, millions suffering from severe malnutrition and aid organizations stretched to their limits. In a country that faced longstanding humanitarian challenges before the conflict, Yemen is now experiencing one of the world’s worst hunger crises. 

“Over the past two years the situation has really steadily deteriorated and is going from bad to worse,” said Robert Mardini, the Middle East regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

One child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen of preventable diseases, according to UNICEF. The ICRC warned last month that Yemen, along with Somalia, was three to four months away from famine conditions.

“The dynamics of the conflict today make it very difficult to organize, for instance, overnight massive food distribution operations,” Mardini said. He described how constant shelling and conflict in the city of Taiz last month made what should be a straightforward route into a convoluted and arduous journey.

“What used to be a 10-minute walk took my team four hours via a donkey track through the mountains,” Mardini said.

Houthi rebels, allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have been in open civil war with loyalists of the internationally recognized president, Abdrabbah Mansour Hadi, for two years. Saudi Arabia supports Hadi and has been conducting an airstrike campaign that has killed thousands, as well as a naval blockade that has complicated aid shipments. 

Increased conflict, especially around the key port of Hodeidah, could further cut off shipments and push the country into famine. Aid agencies and rights groups are calling for increased aid and a political solution to the conflict as soon as possible, warning that the alternative is a spiraling hunger crisis and increased death toll.

The U.S. instead is continuing to offer military support to the Saudi-led coalition as well as increasing U.S. airstrikes that target al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen. This ongoing conflict has created a man-made hunger crisis in which aid funding is desperately needed but is limited amid the fighting.

“Even if we had 2 billion U.S. dollars tomorrow, we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems in Yemen. It’s not only about money,” Mardini said. 

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

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[exfrenchdorsl4p0a1]

Aid Workers In 4 Countries Facing Famine Warn Trump's Cuts Could Cost Lives

There are now 20 million people on the brink of starvation across four countries grappling with extreme food shortages and conflict. But as the world suffers one of its most severe humanitarian crises in decades, President Donald Trump is threatening to drastically reduce foreign aid as part of his administration’s “America first” budget. 

Trump’s proposed cuts come at a time when aid organizations say that more funding is desperately needed to save millions from dying. United Nations officials declared the world’s first famine in six years in parts of South Sudan in February and now fear that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are edging toward similar preventable crises.

“Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people [in these countries] will simply starve to death,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator Stephen O’Brien warned in March. Days later, Trump unveiled the blueprint for his 2018 budget, which seeks “deep cuts” to humanitarian initiatives abroad. 

The defunding of some U.S. foreign aid programs is already underway. Last week, the Trump administration halted all grants to the U.N. Population Fund, an organization that provides reproductive health care in more than 150 countries.

As the president awaits congressional approval for his proposed 28 percent slash in funding for USAID, which already accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, experts working in each of the four at-risk countries talked to The Huffington Post about what such cuts could mean for their regions at this time.

Many aid officials agree that an increase in aid is not a panacea to the many humanitarian challenges facing Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria and South Sudan, but that more funding is desperately needed to stop these crises from plunging even deeper. 

“We’ve always depended on very generous support in the U.S.,” World Food Programme Regional Director Valerie Guarnieri told HuffPost at a U.N. media briefing Tuesday. “Any reduction [to foreign aid] in the U.S. budget would impact on our ability to reach people who are in need and our ability to avert a catastrophe.”

Nigeria

In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s militant insurgency has killed thousands of people, forced millions to flee their homes and spurred an immense hunger crisis. UNICEF estimates that 450,000 children will suffer severe acute malnutrition this year, at least 90,000 of which could die without urgent treatment. 

The waves of displacement resulting from Boko Haram attacks and the group’s conflict with government forces have created a complex humanitarian crisis in which areas of northeast Nigeria are too unstable to safely deliver aid. 

“It’s not a mathematical equation of we’ve got this amount of people, they need this amount of stuff, let’s just get a truck in and they’ll be good,” said Patrick Rose, crisis communications specialist for UNICEF. “The truck arrives, it gets blown up. The next truck arrives, it gets hijacked. The next truck arrives, and people have moved by that point.” 

In July of last year, UNICEF was forced to temporarily suspend its work in northeast Borno state after Boko Haram attacked an aid convoy.  

The security situation is so severe that there are currently 1.78 million displaced citizens in Nigeria, and more than 8 million more are in need of humanitarian aid. It’s believed that 2,000 people died last year in a famine-struck Borno town that has been inaccessible to aid agencies.

There is also a longstanding shortage of funding and attention to the crisis, Rose said, which U.N. officials stated last year was greater in scale than aid organizations had anticipated. People are in desperate need of services ranging from malnutrition treatment to psychosocial support for trauma.

“It would be simplistic to say that under [President Barack] Obama everything was great and now under Trump everything is bad. We’ve got a compound deficit of compassion for this crisis,” Rose said.

But if the U.S. were to decrease funding and ignore the mounting need, officials warn it could allow the humanitarian situations to deteriorate even further.

“Certainly this is not the time to shy away,” Rose said. “Once we start to see an erosion of leadership within the global order and architecture ... we start to see an erosion of rights very, very quickly.”

Somalia 

Unrelenting drought conditions and armed conflict in Somalia have triggered mass displacement, which has in turn led to a cholera outbreak and human rights abuses including gender-based violence. Some 6.2 million Somalis require humanitarian assistance, including hundreds of thousands of malnourished children.

The outlook in Somalia seems grim, but Peter de Clercq, U.N. humanitarian and resident coordinator for Somalia, says there is hope for improvement ― if adequate resources are secured.

“By being preemptive and working with regional authorities, so far the situation hasn’t gone as badly out of hand as it could have ― we haven’t declared a famine,” he said. “It hasn’t happened, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen. We’ve been able to stave it off, and we hope that through very strong involvement and if we get the resources we need, we’ll be able to avert a famine.” 

Fundraising efforts in Somalia a year ago were focused on crisis prevention, including maintaining resilience and keeping people’s livestock alive, said de Clercq, who also serves as deputy special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Somalia.

But the targets were missed and the resources remained out of reach, he explained, and now humanitarian efforts have turned toward saving lives.

“We launched an accelerated assistance appeal early this year, as we could see the situation spiraling more and more in a negative direction,” he said.

In late 2016, the U.N. issued an urgent plea for $864 million in funding to support Somalia’s most vulnerable people throughout all of 2017. As the crisis worsened, that appeal soared to $825 million for the first six months of this year alone.

Aid agencies in Somalia are already struggling to reach populations in regions occupied by al-Shabab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group. Trump recently approved more aggressive airstrikes against al-Shabab militants by the U.S. Army, but experts fear this will put civilians in greater danger.

South Sudan

Weeks before Trump released his budget blueprint, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir formally declared a famine in parts of the country.

As the five-year-old nation sinks deeper into economic collapse and armed conflict, the need for foreign aid is only getting stronger.

Violence between warring government and rebel forces has expanded into a feud between ethnic groups with no end in sight. The chaos is causing mass displacement and disrupting farming activity, which has devastated South Sudan’s vital agriculture industry.

The famine is “wholly man-made; a result of the conflict,” said David Shearer, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in South Sudan. “More than half of the population will face food shortages and will need food assistance.” 

A severe drought has stretched on in the southeast of the world’s youngest country, and a continued cholera outbreak has claimed thousands of lives since 2014. At least 100,000 South Sudanese are now facing death, and 1 million more languish on the brink of starvation.

“This is a largely agrarian society where people rely heavily on what they grow. So unless farmers can get back to their fields and start planting again, especially in the coming weeks as the rainy season approaches, vast numbers will remain dependent on aid,” explained Shearer, who heads the U.N. mission in South Sudan. “That’s not what they, the international community or the government wants, but it is the reality we face.”

Political corruption has led the crisis to rapidly deteriorate, as Kiir’s government has obstructed access to aid workers and drastically hiked the cost of their permits. His regime has also been accused of looting aid supplies. 

At least 700,000 people have fled to Uganda at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day. Shearer warns that some of those who remain “are so scared of the brutal fighting ― that often targets civilians ― that they are hiding out in swamps.”

“The U.S. has traditionally been very generous and gives more than any other country,” said Shearer. “With so many humanitarian crises in the world today, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to raise funds to support the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people.”

Yemen

Yemen’s two-year civil war has left the country’s health facilities a shambles, millions suffering from severe malnutrition and aid organizations stretched to their limits. In a country that faced longstanding humanitarian challenges before the conflict, Yemen is now experiencing one of the world’s worst hunger crises. 

“Over the past two years the situation has really steadily deteriorated and is going from bad to worse,” said Robert Mardini, the Middle East regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

One child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen of preventable diseases, according to UNICEF. The ICRC warned last month that Yemen, along with Somalia, was three to four months away from famine conditions.

“The dynamics of the conflict today make it very difficult to organize, for instance, overnight massive food distribution operations,” Mardini said. He described how constant shelling and conflict in the city of Taiz last month made what should be a straightforward route into a convoluted and arduous journey.

“What used to be a 10-minute walk took my team four hours via a donkey track through the mountains,” Mardini said.

Houthi rebels, allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have been in open civil war with loyalists of the internationally recognized president, Abdrabbah Mansour Hadi, for two years. Saudi Arabia supports Hadi and has been conducting an airstrike campaign that has killed thousands, as well as a naval blockade that has complicated aid shipments. 

Increased conflict, especially around the key port of Hodeidah, could further cut off shipments and push the country into famine. Aid agencies and rights groups are calling for increased aid and a political solution to the conflict as soon as possible, warning that the alternative is a spiraling hunger crisis and increased death toll.

The U.S. instead is continuing to offer military support to the Saudi-led coalition as well as increasing U.S. airstrikes that target al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen. This ongoing conflict has created a man-made hunger crisis in which aid funding is desperately needed but is limited amid the fighting.

“Even if we had 2 billion U.S. dollars tomorrow, we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems in Yemen. It’s not only about money,” Mardini said. 

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2p7jYe0

[rtscrndr53704]

Aid Workers In 4 Countries Facing Famine Warn Trump's Cuts Could Cost Lives

There are now 20 million people on the brink of starvation across four countries grappling with extreme food shortages and conflict. But as the world suffers one of its most severe humanitarian crises in decades, President Donald Trump is threatening to drastically reduce foreign aid as part of his administration’s “America first” budget. 

Trump’s proposed cuts come at a time when aid organizations say that more funding is desperately needed to save millions from dying. United Nations officials declared the world’s first famine in six years in parts of South Sudan in February and now fear that Nigeria, Somalia and Yemen are edging toward similar preventable crises.

“Without collective and coordinated global efforts, people [in these countries] will simply starve to death,” U.N. humanitarian coordinator Stephen O’Brien warned in March. Days later, Trump unveiled the blueprint for his 2018 budget, which seeks “deep cuts” to humanitarian initiatives abroad. 

The defunding of some U.S. foreign aid programs is already underway. Last week, the Trump administration halted all grants to the U.N. Population Fund, an organization that provides reproductive health care in more than 150 countries.

As the president awaits congressional approval for his proposed 28 percent slash in funding for USAID, which already accounts for less than 1 percent of the federal budget, experts working in each of the four at-risk countries talked to The Huffington Post about what such cuts could mean for their regions at this time.

Many aid officials agree that an increase in aid is not a panacea to the many humanitarian challenges facing Yemen, Somalia, Nigeria and South Sudan, but that more funding is desperately needed to stop these crises from plunging even deeper. 

“We’ve always depended on very generous support in the U.S.,” World Food Programme Regional Director Valerie Guarnieri told HuffPost at a U.N. media briefing Tuesday. “Any reduction [to foreign aid] in the U.S. budget would impact on our ability to reach people who are in need and our ability to avert a catastrophe.”

Nigeria

In Nigeria, Boko Haram’s militant insurgency has killed thousands of people, forced millions to flee their homes and spurred an immense hunger crisis. UNICEF estimates that 450,000 children will suffer severe acute malnutrition this year, at least 90,000 of which could die without urgent treatment. 

The waves of displacement resulting from Boko Haram attacks and the group’s conflict with government forces have created a complex humanitarian crisis in which areas of northeast Nigeria are too unstable to safely deliver aid. 

“It’s not a mathematical equation of we’ve got this amount of people, they need this amount of stuff, let’s just get a truck in and they’ll be good,” said Patrick Rose, crisis communications specialist for UNICEF. “The truck arrives, it gets blown up. The next truck arrives, it gets hijacked. The next truck arrives, and people have moved by that point.” 

In July of last year, UNICEF was forced to temporarily suspend its work in northeast Borno state after Boko Haram attacked an aid convoy.  

The security situation is so severe that there are currently 1.78 million displaced citizens in Nigeria, and more than 8 million more are in need of humanitarian aid. It’s believed that 2,000 people died last year in a famine-struck Borno town that has been inaccessible to aid agencies.

There is also a longstanding shortage of funding and attention to the crisis, Rose said, which U.N. officials stated last year was greater in scale than aid organizations had anticipated. People are in desperate need of services ranging from malnutrition treatment to psychosocial support for trauma.

“It would be simplistic to say that under [President Barack] Obama everything was great and now under Trump everything is bad. We’ve got a compound deficit of compassion for this crisis,” Rose said.

But if the U.S. were to decrease funding and ignore the mounting need, officials warn it could allow the humanitarian situations to deteriorate even further.

“Certainly this is not the time to shy away,” Rose said. “Once we start to see an erosion of leadership within the global order and architecture ... we start to see an erosion of rights very, very quickly.”

Somalia 

Unrelenting drought conditions and armed conflict in Somalia have triggered mass displacement, which has in turn led to a cholera outbreak and human rights abuses including gender-based violence. Some 6.2 million Somalis require humanitarian assistance, including hundreds of thousands of malnourished children.

The outlook in Somalia seems grim, but Peter de Clercq, U.N. humanitarian and resident coordinator for Somalia, says there is hope for improvement ― if adequate resources are secured.

“By being preemptive and working with regional authorities, so far the situation hasn’t gone as badly out of hand as it could have ― we haven’t declared a famine,” he said. “It hasn’t happened, but that doesn’t mean it’s not going to happen. We’ve been able to stave it off, and we hope that through very strong involvement and if we get the resources we need, we’ll be able to avert a famine.” 

Fundraising efforts in Somalia a year ago were focused on crisis prevention, including maintaining resilience and keeping people’s livestock alive, said de Clercq, who also serves as deputy special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in Somalia.

But the targets were missed and the resources remained out of reach, he explained, and now humanitarian efforts have turned toward saving lives.

“We launched an accelerated assistance appeal early this year, as we could see the situation spiraling more and more in a negative direction,” he said.

In late 2016, the U.N. issued an urgent plea for $864 million in funding to support Somalia’s most vulnerable people throughout all of 2017. As the crisis worsened, that appeal soared to $825 million for the first six months of this year alone.

Aid agencies in Somalia are already struggling to reach populations in regions occupied by al-Shabab, an al Qaeda-linked extremist group. Trump recently approved more aggressive airstrikes against al-Shabab militants by the U.S. Army, but experts fear this will put civilians in greater danger.

South Sudan

Weeks before Trump released his budget blueprint, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir formally declared a famine in parts of the country.

As the five-year-old nation sinks deeper into economic collapse and armed conflict, the need for foreign aid is only getting stronger.

Violence between warring government and rebel forces has expanded into a feud between ethnic groups with no end in sight. The chaos is causing mass displacement and disrupting farming activity, which has devastated South Sudan’s vital agriculture industry.

The famine is “wholly man-made; a result of the conflict,” said David Shearer, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general in South Sudan. “More than half of the population will face food shortages and will need food assistance.” 

A severe drought has stretched on in the southeast of the world’s youngest country, and a continued cholera outbreak has claimed thousands of lives since 2014. At least 100,000 South Sudanese are now facing death, and 1 million more languish on the brink of starvation.

“This is a largely agrarian society where people rely heavily on what they grow. So unless farmers can get back to their fields and start planting again, especially in the coming weeks as the rainy season approaches, vast numbers will remain dependent on aid,” explained Shearer, who heads the U.N. mission in South Sudan. “That’s not what they, the international community or the government wants, but it is the reality we face.”

Political corruption has led the crisis to rapidly deteriorate, as Kiir’s government has obstructed access to aid workers and drastically hiked the cost of their permits. His regime has also been accused of looting aid supplies. 

At least 700,000 people have fled to Uganda at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day. Shearer warns that some of those who remain “are so scared of the brutal fighting ― that often targets civilians ― that they are hiding out in swamps.”

“The U.S. has traditionally been very generous and gives more than any other country,” said Shearer. “With so many humanitarian crises in the world today, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to raise funds to support the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people.”

Yemen

Yemen’s two-year civil war has left the country’s health facilities a shambles, millions suffering from severe malnutrition and aid organizations stretched to their limits. In a country that faced longstanding humanitarian challenges before the conflict, Yemen is now experiencing one of the world’s worst hunger crises. 

“Over the past two years the situation has really steadily deteriorated and is going from bad to worse,” said Robert Mardini, the Middle East regional director of the International Committee of the Red Cross.

One child dies every 10 minutes in Yemen of preventable diseases, according to UNICEF. The ICRC warned last month that Yemen, along with Somalia, was three to four months away from famine conditions.

“The dynamics of the conflict today make it very difficult to organize, for instance, overnight massive food distribution operations,” Mardini said. He described how constant shelling and conflict in the city of Taiz last month made what should be a straightforward route into a convoluted and arduous journey.

“What used to be a 10-minute walk took my team four hours via a donkey track through the mountains,” Mardini said.

Houthi rebels, allied with former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, have been in open civil war with loyalists of the internationally recognized president, Abdrabbah Mansour Hadi, for two years. Saudi Arabia supports Hadi and has been conducting an airstrike campaign that has killed thousands, as well as a naval blockade that has complicated aid shipments. 

Increased conflict, especially around the key port of Hodeidah, could further cut off shipments and push the country into famine. Aid agencies and rights groups are calling for increased aid and a political solution to the conflict as soon as possible, warning that the alternative is a spiraling hunger crisis and increased death toll.

The U.S. instead is continuing to offer military support to the Saudi-led coalition as well as increasing U.S. airstrikes that target al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen. This ongoing conflict has created a man-made hunger crisis in which aid funding is desperately needed but is limited amid the fighting.

“Even if we had 2 billion U.S. dollars tomorrow, we wouldn’t be able to solve all the problems in Yemen. It’s not only about money,” Mardini said. 

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2p7jYe0