#uganda news articles

[thehopefuljournalist]

unrelated- what's your favorite news story recently?

Hello, thank you so much for asking!! I've had a hard time because this week was actually full of news stories and I'm working on releasing them all to you guys!

But let me tell you about my favourite one from today :)

As an activist, working within my own country and out especially in climate-related themes, I believe in people-power, fully. I know, of course, that some people have more power and influence than others, but there's no denying that there's strength in numbers.

This recent, huge, protest in New York is such a hopeful turn, I think. I love seeing that I'm not the only one worried, that I'm not alone in my fighting. With numbers, we have a bigger chance of winning over our world leaders, and by doing that, to protect ourselves and our futures.

Well, this is my favourite news story from the past two days.

This past Sunday, 75K climate activists took to New York's streets in a “march to end fossil fuels”

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez criticized the US continuing to approve fossil fuel projects, something which the Biden administration did earlier this year with the controversial Willow project in Alaska.

“We are all here for one reason: to end fossil fuels around the planet,” Ocasio-Cortez told a rally at the finish of the march, which ended close to the UN headquarters where world leaders will gather this week. “And the way we create urgency is to have people around the world in the streets.”

“The United States continues to be approving a record number of fossil fuel leases and we must send a message, right here today,” adding that despite record profits the support for the fossil fuel industry was “starting to buckle and crack”.

“This is an incredible moment,” said Jean Su of the Center for Biological Diversity, who helped organize the mobilization. “Tens of thousands of people are marching in the streets of New York because they want climate action,"

“This also shows the tremendous grit and fight of the people, especially youth and communities living at the frontlines of fossil fuel violence, to fight back and demand change for the future they have every right to lead,” she said.

The march came during Climate Week, as world leaders gather for this week’s UN general assembly, and a UN climate ambition summit on Wednesday.

On Friday, the national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said Biden was not currently scheduled to take part in Wednesday’s UN climate summit. Biden has been praised by climate activists for last year passing a historic $369bn climate law but criticized for allowing oil drilling projects and the expansion of gas facilities in the Gulf of Mexico.

A decision for Biden to stay away from the UN climate ambition summit is “unacceptable”, said Su of the Center for Biological Diversity. “The time is now for Biden to lead on the world stage, and show he means it when he calls climate change the existential threat to humanity.”

During the march, the Rev Lennox Yearwood, head of the Hip Hop Caucus, likened today’s climate movement to the US fight for racial justice. 

Youth climate activist Vanessa Nakate, from Uganda, said: “When we say that we want climate justice, we’re not just talking about transitioning to solar panels. We are talking about leaving no one behind when you’re talking about addressing the injustices that come with the climate crisis."

Article published September 17, 2023 - The Gaurdian

Another article, interviewing a young climate activist

[calvinphil]

One Year of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act: A Human Rights Crisis

The Anti-Homosexuality Act, enacted in Uganda a year ago, has had devastating consequences for the LGBTQ+ community. This draconian law has led to widespread persecution, human rights abuses, and has forced many to seek refuge and asylum abroad.

LGBTQ+ individuals face daily threats, including forced evictions, blackmail, and unwarranted arrests. Torture and degrading treatment in police custody, such as forced anal examinations, have become alarmingly routine. Human rights defenders advocating for LGBTQ+ rights also face violence and intimidation.

The Act has severely disrupted the lives of LGBTQ+ individuals, causing job losses and heightened economic hardships. Many are denied basic rights and opportunities due to their sexual orientation or gender identity, leading to increased food insecurity and homelessness.

The hostile environment has driven many LGBTQ+ individuals to flee Uganda, seeking safety in other countries. This forced migration underscores the urgent need for international intervention and support.

International pressure on the Ugandan government is crucial to repealing this discriminatory law. Western countries must offer refuge and support to those escaping persecution.

For more detailed information, visit the [full article on Bond](https://www.bond.org.uk/news/2024/05/one-year-later-the-ongoing-struggle-of-lgbtq-community-under-the-anti-homosexuality-act-in-uganda/).

[banji-effect]

Lots of great news on HIV prevention coming out in just the last few days (this article in addition to the person cured after stem cell treatments):

A twice-yearly injection could help prevent HIV infections, according to the results of a new study described by medical experts as a breakthrough. In a randomized trial involving more than 5,000 young women and girls in South Africa and Uganda, none of those who received the prevention shots contracted HIV. The results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Wednesday. “This appears to be a new breakthrough for HIV prevention. If these injections can be widely distributed at low cost, it would dramatically reduce the risk of new HIV infections worldwide,” said Sarah Palmer, co-director of the Center for Virus Research at the Westmead Institute for Medical Research in Sydney, who was not involved in the peer-reviewed study. “It is especially encouraging this research focused on young women in Africa who are so highly at-risk for HIV infection.” Worldwide there are about 1.3 million new HIV infections every year, with women and girls accounting for 44 percent of them. In sub-Saharan Africa, that proportion is 62 percent.

[reasoningdaily]

Across a sterile white table in a windowless room, I’m introduced to a woman in her forties. She has a square jaw and blonde hair that has been pulled back from her face with a baby-blue scrunchie. “The girls call me Marmalade,” she says, inviting me to use her prison nickname. Early on a Wednesday morning, Marmalade is here, in a Finnish prison, to demonstrate a new type of prison labor.

The table is bare except for a small plastic bottle of water and an HP laptop. During three-hour shifts, for which she’s paid €1.54 ($1.67) an hour, the laptop is programmed to show Marmalade short chunks of text about real estate and then ask her yes or no questions about what she’s just read. One question asks: “is the previous paragraph referring to a real estate decision, rather than an application?”

“It’s a little boring,” Marmalade shrugs. She’s also not entirely sure of the purpose of this exercise. Maybe she is helping to create a customer service chatbot, she muses.

In fact, she is training a large language model owned by Metroc, a Finnish startup that has created a search engine designed to help construction companies find newly approved building projects. To do that, Metroc needs data labelers to help its models understand clues from news articles and municipality documents about upcoming building projects. The AI has to be able to tell the difference between a hospital project that has already commissioned an architect or a window fitter, for example, and projects that might still be hiring.

Around the world, millions of so-called “clickworkers” train artificial intelligence models, teaching machines the difference between pedestrians and palm trees, or what combination of words describe violence or sexual abuse. Usually these workers are stationed in the global south, where wages are cheap. OpenAI, for example, uses an outsourcing firm that employs clickworkers in Kenya, Uganda, and India. That arrangement works for American companies, operating in the world’s most widely spoken language, English. But there are not a lot of people in the global south who speak Finnish.

That’s why Metroc turned to prison labor. The company gets cheap, Finnish-speaking workers, while the prison system can offer inmates employment that, it says, prepares them for the digital world of work after their release. Using prisoners to train AI creates uneasy parallels with the kind of low-paid and sometimes exploitive labor that has often existed downstream in technology. But in Finland, the project has received widespread support.

“There's this global idea of what data labor is. And then there's what happens in Finland, which is very different if you look at it closely,” says Tuukka Lehtiniemi, a researcher at the University of Helsinki, who has been studying data labor in Finnish prisons.

For four months, Marmalade has lived here, in Hämeenlinna prison. The building is modern, with big windows. Colorful artwork tries to enforce a sense of cheeriness on otherwise empty corridors. If it wasn’t for the heavy gray security doors blocking every entry and exit, these rooms could easily belong to a particularly soulless school or university complex.

Finland might be famous for its open prisons—where inmates can work or study in nearby towns—but this is not one of them. Instead, Hämeenlinna is the country’s highest-security institution housing exclusively female inmates. Marmalade has been sentenced to six years. Under privacy rules set by the prison, WIRED is not able to publish Marmalade’s real name, exact age, or any other information that could be used to identify her. But in a country where prisoners serving life terms can apply to be released after 12 years, six years is a heavy sentence. And like the other 100 inmates who live here, she is not allowed to leave.

When Marmalade first arrived, she would watch the other women get up and go to work each morning: they could volunteer to clean, do laundry, or sew their own clothes. And for a six hour shift, they would receive roughly €6 ($6.50). But Marmalade couldn’t bear to take part. “I would find it very tiring,” she says. Instead she was spending long stretches of time in her cell. When a prison counselor suggested she try “AI work,” the short, three-hour shifts appealed to her, and the money was better than nothing. “Even though it’s not a lot, it’s better than staying in the cell,” she says” She’s only done three shifts so far, but already she feels a sense of achievement.

This is one of three Finnish prisons where inmates can volunteer to earn money through data labor. In each one, there are three laptops set up for inmates to take part in this AI work. There are no targets. Inmates are paid by the hour, not by their work’s speed or quality. In Hämeenlinna, around 20 inmates have tried it out, says Minna Inkinen, a prison work instructor, with cropped red hair, who sits alongside Marmalade as we talk. “Some definitely like it more than others”. When I arrive at the prison on a Wednesday morning, the sewing room is already busy. Inmates are huddled over sewing machines or conferring in pairs over mounds of fabric. But the small room where the AI work takes place is entirely empty until Marmalade arrives. There are only three inmates in total who regularly volunteer for AI shifts, Inkinen says, explaining that the other two are currently in court. “I would prefer to do it in a group,” says Marmalade, adding that she keeps the door open so she can chat with the people sewing next door, in between answering questions.

Those questions have been manually written in an office 100 kilometers south of the prison, in a slick Helsinki coworking space. Here, I meet Metroc’s tall and boyish founder and CEO, Jussi Virnala. He leads me to a stiflingly hot phone booth, past a row of indoor swings, a pool table, and a series of men in suits. It’s an exciting week, he explains, with a grin. The company has just announced a €2 million ($2.1 million) funding round which he plans to use to expand across the Nordics. The investors he spoke with were intrigued by the company’s connection to Finland’s prisons, he says. “Everyone was just interested in and excited about what an innovative way to do it,” says Virnala. “I think it’s been really valuable product-wise.”

It was Virnala’s idea to turn to the prisons for labor. The company needed native Finnish speakers to help improve its large language model’s understanding of the construction-specific language. But in a high-wage economy like Finland, finding those data laborers was difficult. The Finnish welfare system’s generous unemployment benefits leaves little incentive for Finns to sign up to low-wage clickwork platforms like Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. “Mechanical Turk didn’t have many Finnish-language workers,” says Virnala. At the same time, he adds, automatic translation tools are still no good at Finnish, a language with only 5 million native speakers.

When Virnala pitched his idea to Pia Puolakka, head of the Smart Prison Project at Finland’s prison and probation agency, she was instantly interested, she says. Before the pandemic, another Finnish tech company called Vainu had been using prisoners for data labor. But Vainu abruptly pulled out after a disagreement between cofounders prompted Tuomas Rasila, who had been in charge of the project, to leave the company.

By the time Virnala approached her with his proposal in 2022, Puolakka was eager to resurrect the AI work. Her job is to try and make the relationship between Finnish prisons and the internet more closely resemble the increasingly digital outside world. So far, she has been installing laptops in individual cells so inmates can browse a restricted list of websites and apply for permission to make video calls. She considers data labor just another part of that mission.

The aim is not to replace traditional prison labor, such as making road signs or gardening. It’s about giving prisoners more variety. Data labeling can only be done in three-hour shifts. “It might be tiring to do this eight hours a day, only this type of work,” she says, adding that it would be nice if inmates did the data labeling alongside other types of prison labor. “This type of work is the future, and if we want to prepare prisoners for life outside prison, a life without crime, these types of skills might be at least as important as the traditional work types that prisons provide,” she says.

But how much data labeling offers inmates skills that are transferable to work after prison is unclear. Tuomas Rasila, the now estranged cofounder of Vainu, who managed the prison project there for a year, admits he has no evidence of this; the project wasn’t running for long enough to collect it, he says. “I think asking people, who might feel outside of society, to train the most high-tech aspect of a modern society is an empowering idea.”

However, others consider this new form of prison labor part of a problematic rush for cheap labor that underpins the AI revolution. “The narrative that we are moving towards a fully automated society that is more convenient and more efficient tends to obscure the fact that there are actual human people powering a lot of these systems,” says Amos Toh, a senior researcher focusing on artificial intelligence at Human Rights Watch.

For Toh, the accelerating search for so-called clickworkers has created a trend where companies are increasingly turning to groups of people who have few other options: refugees, populations in countries gripped by economic crisis—and now prisoners.

“This dynamic is a deeply familiar one,” says Toh. “What we are seeing here is part of a broader phenomenon where the labor behind building tech is being outsourced to workers that toil in potentially exploitative working conditions.”

Toh is also skeptical about whether data labor can help inmates build digital skills. “There are many ways in which people in prison can advance themselves, like getting certificates and taking part in advanced education,” he says. “But I'm skeptical about whether doing data labeling for a company at one euro per hour will lead to meaningful advancement.” Hämeenlinna prison does offer inmates online courses in AI, but Marmalade sits blank-faced as staff try to explain its benefits.

Science

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By the time I meet Lehtiniemi, the researcher from Helsinki University, I’m feeling torn about the merits of the prison project. Traveling straight from the prison, where women worked for €1.54 an hour, to Metroc’s offices, where the company was celebrating a €2 million funding round, felt jarring. In a café, opposite the grand, domed Helsinki cathedral, Lehtiniemi patiently listens to me describe that feeling.

But Lehtiniemi’s own interviews with inmates have given him a different view—he’s generally positive about the project. On my point about pay disparity, he argues this is not an ordinary workforce in mainstream society. These people are in prison. “Comparing the money I get as a researcher and what the prisoner gets for their prison labor, it doesn't make sense,” he says. “The only negative thing I’ve heard has been that there’s not enough of this work. Only a few people can do it,” he says, referring to the limit of three laptops per prison.

“When we think about data labor, we tend to think about Mechanical Turk, people in the global south or the rural US,” he says. But for him, this is a distinct local version of data labor, which comes with a twist that benefits society. It’s giving prisoners cognitively stimulating work—compared to other prison labor options—while also representing the Finnish language in the AI revolution.

Without this kind of initiative, Lehtiniemi worries that non-English languages are being locked out of this next generation of technology. Smart speakers still struggle to understand Finnish dialects. “Not all Finnish people speak English very well, so there's a need for these local forms of data labeling as well,” Lehtiniemi says. Metroc isn’t the only company that has been forced to get creative about finding Finnish data labor. In 2011, the national library created a game to incentivize volunteers to help digitize its archive. In 2020, broadcaster YLE teamed up with Helsinki University and the state development company VAKE to ask volunteers to donate recordings of them speaking Finnish.

There is a sense in Finland that the prison project is just the beginning. Some are worried it could set a precedent that could introduce more controversial types of data labeling, like moderating violent content, to prisons. “Even if the data being labeled in Finland is uncontroversial right now, we have to think about the precedent it sets,” says Toh. “What stops companies from outsourcing data labeling of traumatic and unsavory content to people in prison, especially if they see this as an untapped labor pool?”

It's also not clear whether labor conditions in Finland's prisons—which famously focus on rehabilitation—could be replicated in other countries with a less progressive approach to justice. In the US, 76 percent of prisoners report that prison labor is mandatory, according to civil rights group, the ACLU. “The prison system in the United States is very, very different from what we have in Finland or Nordic countries. It's a completely different idea,” says Rasila. “In Finland, there is an exclusively positive feeling around the project because everyone knows that this is very voluntary.”

AI companies are only going to need more data labor, forcing them to keep seeking out increasingly unusual labor forces to keep pace. As Metroc plots its expansion across the Nordics and into languages other than Finnish, Virnala is considering whether to expand the prison labor project to other countries. “It’s something we need to explore,” he says.

[allthecanadianpolitics]

"She was nearly ripped from her three-year-old daughter, but in a sudden reversal, a Toronto personal support worker who faced deportation despite having worked on the front lines during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic can now stay in Canada permanently.

After going public with her story, Fatumah Najjuma has won her fight for permanent residence.

On Friday, she received word that her permanent resident application on humanitarian grounds was granted.

"This means a lot to me because I have been given a chance to live, stay and raise my baby girl," Najjuma told CBC Toronto, thanking her lawyer, advocates, her friends and the many strangers who supported her.

"As I am her only living parent, she is going to grow up a happy child because her mother is present in all her life."

Najjuma, 29, had been facing deportation to Uganda — a country she says she fled for her life after being disowned by her family and for her religious and social affiliations.

Her deportation date had been set for Jan. 7. But after garnering tens of thousands of signatures in an online petition, a campaign by advocacy groups and telling her story to CBC News, her removal was delayed in late December.

Now, her fight is over. But she says she remains concerned about the countless others who find themselves also facing deportation despite Canada's commitment to work towards granting status to undocumented workers.

"I shouldn't have to fight for basic rights," she said. "Everyone deserves status so we can live a good life. I encourage all migrants to speak up and raise their strong voice.""

Full article

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

[shivshaktimachtech]

Flat Liquor Bottle Single Side Labeling Machine

Company Overview: Shiv Shakti Machtech is a Supplier, Exporter, and Manufacturer of Flat Liquor Bottle Single Side Labeling Machine. The Flat Bottle Single Side Labeling Machine can handle various container shapes, including flat, round, oval, hexagonal, and rectangular. It is designed to apply single stickers to bottles, controlled by PLC and a touch screen. This machine is ideal for labeling square, flat, oval, and round containers used in medicine, daily chemicals, food, cultural supplies, and electronics. Bottles are fed into the machine via a feeding belt. An electric eye sensor detects the bottle and sends a signal to the labeling control system. The label dispensing motor processes the signal and applies the label at the appropriate time. The label is reinforced as the product passes through the cover device, completing the labeling action. Specifications: Flat Liquor Bottle Single Side Labeling Machine Label Gap: Maintains a maximum gap of 3mm between two labels. Country of Origin: Made in India. Speed: Capable of labeling up to 90 bottles per minute. Brand: Shiv Shakti Machtech Material: Constructed from Stainless Steel 304. Conveyor Height: Set at 850mm. Weight: Approximately 200kg. Bottle Type: Suitable for all types of flat surface products. Automation Grade: Fully automatic. Usage/Application: Designed for sticker labeling. Shiv Shakti Machtech is a Flat Liquor Bottle Single Side Labeling Machine served worldwide, including, Algeria, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, The Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Botswana, Brazil, Brunei, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, Colombia, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Costa Rica, Cuba, Cyprus, Denmark, Dominica, Ecuador, Egypt, Guinea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Finland, France, The Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Guyana, Hungary, Iceland, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, South Korea, North Korea, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lebanon, Libya, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Moldova, Monaco, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar (Burma), Namibia, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Singapore, Slovakia, Somalia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, South Sudan, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates (UAE), United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Vatican City, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, Zimbabwe. For further details or inquiries, feel free to reach out to us. View Product: Click Here Read the full article

[grandmaster-anne]

Summary of The Princess Royal's visit to Uganda (25-28 October 2022)

The Princess Royal, accompanied by Sir Tim Laurence, on a four-day visit to Uganda in support of a number of her Patronages.

Day One

The Princess Royal started the visit at the Medical Research Council (MRC), Uganda Virus Research Institute (UVRI) and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), Ugandan Research Unit. 

Her Royal Highness is Chancellor of LSHTM, and their Uganda unit is an internationally recognised centre of excellence. During the visit, The Princess toured the facilities and learnt more about the unit’s work to conduct high quality, energy efficient research that is contributing to the development of strong health policies for the control of infectious and non-communicable diseases.

Her Royal Highness later had an Audience with the President of the Republic of Uganda, His Excellency Mr. Yoweri Museveni.

Day Two

As Patron of Opportunity International UK, The Princess Royal opened Opportunity Bank Uganda Nakivale Branch at the Nakivale Refugee Settlement UNHCR Base Camp. Opportunity International is a charity that works alongside local partners to ensure that people have the access to loans, training and saving to help to help work their way out of poverty. Her Royal Highness unveiled a plaque to mark the opening of the charity’s first bank in a refugee settlement.

In Sangano, The Princess then met members of the Wenzetu Women's Group to discuss how Opportunity International has worked with the group to assist families of people with disabilities. Her Royal Highness later visited Unleashed Youth Employment Project to meet refugee entrepreneurs who have benefitted from Opportunity Bank loans.

Day Three

On the third day of Her Royal Highness’s visit, met families in Kyangwali Refugee Settlement in Uganda, to learn more about the impact conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has had on children’s lives. Uganda currently hosts 5 million refugees – the largest refugee population in Africa. The Princess visited a school in Kyangwali Refugee Settlement where she joined a Save the Children Catch-up Club and took part in an activity with children to work together and build a story from pictures. Later, Her Royal Highness also met children who have fled their homes due to the ongoing conflict in the DRC and are being supported by Save the Children’s child protection activities at a Child Friendly Space. The Princess Royal became the Patron of Save the Children UK in 2017 after serving as the charity’s President since 1970.

Day Four

On Friday 28th October, The Princess Royal, as Patron, Sense International, accompanied by Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, was due to visit the Salama School for the Blind in Mukono District, Uganda. As a result of the tragic fire at the school on Monday, Her Royal Highness visited the charity at its Head Office in Kampala, where Her Royal Highness met charity representatives and families it supports.  The Princess Royal also had opportunity to pay her respects to those affected, by observing a minutes silence. 

Her Royal Highness has shared the following message:

'I was shocked to hear the news of the tragic loss of life.  The work of Sense International across many countries is hugely appreciated, working with such a vulnerable group of children.  Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and staff.'

To finish her visit in Uganda, The Princess visited the ‘Safe Way Right Way Driver’ Training Centre to learn about Transaid projects in Uganda. Her Royal Highness toured the driver training yard and met women trainee drivers taking part in the HGV training programme. Safe Way Right Way’ was launched in 2013 in response to the huge rise in demand for HGV and PSV drivers. Transaid’s road safety work focuses on influencing safe driver behaviour with long term programmes in Uganda, Tanzania, and Zambia.

Article by The Royal Family

[lgbtqiamuslimpedia]

LGBTQI+ rights in Gambia 🇬🇲

LGBTQI+ Gambians expriences routinely discrimination, harassment, persecution in the Gambia, not exprienced by non-LGBTQ+ Gambians. There's no visible LGBTQI+ activism, nightlife in Gambia.

Legality of Homosexuality

Same-sex sexual activity is illegal for both males and females in the Gambia. Female same-sex sexual activity is a crime under the new amendment of Article 144 (since 2005). The 2014 Amendment of the Criminal Code of the Gambia introduced the punishment of so-called “Aggravated Homosexuality” with up to life imprisonment. [The amendment inserts Section 3 of Uganda’s Anti-Homosexuality Act into Section 144A of the Gambian Criminal Code].

In 2017, largest political party United Democratic Party (UDP) condemned the mass persecution of LGBTQI+ community. They also promised that they will decriminalize homosexuality in the country if their party is elected. But later UDP's leader Ousainu Darboe strongly condemned the idea of decriminalization of homosexuality.

The Amended Criminal Code of Gambia states that,

Article 144 (Unnatural offences):

(1) Any person who—

a) has carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature; or

b) has carnal knowledge of an animal; or

c) permits any person to have carnal knowledge of him or her against the order of nature; is guilty of a felony, and is liable to imprisonment for a term of 14 years.

(2) Carnal knowledge of any person against the order of nature includes –

a) carnal knowledge of the person through the anus or mouth of the person;

b) inserting any object or thing into the vulva or anus of the person for the purpose of simulating sex, and

c) committing any other homosexual act with the person.

Article 144A (Aggravated homosexuality):

(1) A person commits the offence of aggravated homosexuality where the –

a) person against whom the offence is committed is below the age of eighteen;

b) offender is a person living with HIV Aids;

c) offender is a parent or guardian of the person against whom the offence is committed;

d) offender is a person in authority over the person against whom the offence is committed;

e) victim of the offence is a person with disability;

f) offender is a serial offender; or

g) offender applies, administers or causes to be administered by any man or woman, any drug, matter or substance with intent to stupefy or overpower him or her, so as to enable any person to have un-lawful carnal connection with any person of the same sex.

(2) A person who commits the offence of aggravated homosexuality is liable on conviction to imprisonment for life.

Article 147 (Indecent practices):

(1) Any male person who, whether in public or private, commits any act of gross indecency with another male person, or procures another male person to commit any act of gross indecency with him, or attempts to procure the commission of any such act by any male person with himself or with another male person, whether in public or private, is guilty of a felony and is liable to imprisonment for five years.

(2) Any female person who, whether in public or private, commits any act of gross indecency with another female person, or procures another female person to commit any act of gross indecency with her, or attempts to procure the commission of any such act by any female person with herself or with another female person, whether in public or private, is guilty of a felony and is liable to imprisonment for five years.

(3) In this section, ‘act of gross indecency’ includes any homosexual act.

History

The criminalisation of male homosexuality in the Gambia began in colonial era, when it was under British control as the Gambia Colony and Protectorate. The colonial Criminal Code (1933) of Gambia was implemented in 1934; its provisions, proscribing consensual sexual activity between males as "carnal knowledge against the order of nature" have remained in force to the present. Female homosexuality wasn't a criminal offense in colonial Gambia.

Amendments to the code have included changes to criminalise sexual behavior between women as "gross indecency" by the Criminal Code (Amendment) Act, 2005, and 2014 provisions dealing with "aggravated" homosexual offences that attract higher penalties, including life imprisonment, solitary confinement.

Same-sex unions, marriages

Gambia does not officially allow same-sex unions, marriages. Its considered a huge taboo in Gambian society. In past, religious leaders & clerics openly spoke against same-sex partnership & LGBTQ rights. In 2020, conservative religious leader Ebrima Sillah said in his friday sermon that “the gay marriage is happening every day in the country unknowingly [...]” However, there's no relevant evidence of same-sex wedding happened in Gambia.

Discrimination

The Gambia has no laws for protection of residents against discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, & HIV status. Homophobic Gambian President Yahya Jammeh fostered a hostile environment for LGBTQ+ residents during his presidency. He said that laws "stricter than those in Iran" against homosexuals would soon be introduced. He publicly vowed to "cut off the head" of any homosexual caught in the country. Since then Gambian police & national intelligence agency started targeting LGBTQI+ members of Gambia. Many were tortured during police custody, many fled the country to escape homophobic violence.

On June 2008, two Spanish gay men were arrested by Gambian police and detained at Kotu police station. On 23 December 2008, Frank Boers, a 79-year-old man from the Netherlands, was arrested at Banjul International Airport when officials found him in possession of pornography, including nude pictures of himself and some Gambian men. A Banjul court found Boers guilty of indecency with those men and sentenced him to pay 100,000 Gambian dalasis (£2,500) in lieu of a two-year prison sentence.

Former president Jammeh often gave anti-LGBTQ+ rhetorics in his speech. Notably, on 7 December 2009, Jammeh said, "We will not encourage lesbianism and homosexuality in the military. It is a taboo in our armed forces. I will sack any soldier suspected of being a gay or lesbian in the Gambia. We need no gays in our armed forces." He further advised the army chiefs to monitor the activities of every members and deal with soldier's homosexuality in the military.

According to 2011 US Department of State's Human Rights Report claimed that "there was strong societal discrimination against LGBTQI+ individuals, some of whom were shunned, although there were no reported incidents of physical violence against LGBT individuals during the year”.

On 9th April 2012, Gambian police arrested 18 gay men from a bar in the Tourism Development Area. They were charged with "indecent practice among themselves at a public place" According to police testimony in court, the arrests were made because 2 of them were "wearing women's cloth", carrying handbags, and "walking like ladies". Their names & pictures were shared in the local newspaper (without their consent). On 1st August of 2012, the court dropped all charges against them due to lack of evidence. According to the Gambian Daily Observer, two Gambian women and one Nigerian man were arrested on charges of indecent sexual practices in 2012. In 2013, President Jammeh rejected the LGBTI rights recommendations at the UN General Assembly. Further, he called for additional legislation to protect “so called traditional values & religious sensitivities” in Gambia. This led to the Gambian National Assembly unanimously passing the Aggravated Homosexuality Bill in August 2014, which was lifted word for word from the Ugandan Anti-Homosexuality Act. The word “aggravated” appears only in the title of the amendment, but as there is no definition for the terms used, it is unclear what this means. The law also states that those who commit acts of homosexuality as “serial offenders” will be subject to life imprisonment. The discriminatory nature of the new legislation & it's lack of clarity over application sets Gambia apart from other regional countries on LGBTQI+ issues. In 9th October 2014, he signed this new anti-LGBTQ legislation. In December, three men were charged with “engaging in homosexual activity” in violation of the Criminal Code’s “aggravated homosexuality” provision.

According to HRW Africa, the new law sparked a witch-hunt against LGBTQ+ people in Gambia, with at least 14 documented arrests. Some of them were tortured by police. Detainees said they were told that if they did not “confess,” and also provide the names of other so-called offenders, a device would be forced into their anus or vagina to “test” their sexual orientation. Some fled the country for the fear of punishment.

In 2014 ex-president Jammeh’s nephew, Alagie Jammeh's pro-LGBTQ post on Facebook that sparked nationwide controversy, he got death threats from his people. In 2017 he asked for an asylum in the USA because he feared arrest in Gambia.

In 17th May 2020, on the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia, EU delegation of Gambia uploaded pro-LGBTQ+ post, where they were urging to protect LGBTQ+ people. This sparked anger among religious & political leaders of Gambia. Many homophobic gambians gave anti-LGBTQI+ rhetorics against EU and LGBTQ+ community. In 2020, well-known human rights activist & faith leader Baba Leigh was slammed by conservative religious leaders for his egalitarian stance on homosexuality. He & his organization National Human Rights Commission were accused of promoting homosexuality & immorality in the country.

In July 2023, a Sierra Leonean fashion influencer named Victor Vickish Wilson was publicly harassed for crossdressing in Senegambia. He was dragged out of a vehicle by homophobic youngsters. He was accused of being ''gay''. Soilders of Senegambia harassed him, stripped his cloths. Some people made video of that & posted on social media. Eventually, he was detained in Banjul. The leader of the opposition Gambia Action Party (GAP), Musa Ousainou Yali Batchilly, opposed homosexuality in the Gambia.

Batchilly made these comments while reacting to a viral video of a man identified as Victor Vickish Wilson, a Sierra Leonean who was dragged out of a car a few days ago around Senegambia by a group of people including women for dressing like a woman.

He said a government led by GAP will accord zero tolerance to homosexuality and enforce maximum punishment to individuals found wanting.

In the video, Victor could be heard saying “I am not gay, I am a crossdresser.” While the attackers continued yelling at him, he tried to explain but the group weren’t interested in what he wanted to say. He added: “Why are you doing this to me?”

Mr. Batchilly also condemned the act while blaming the government led by President Adama Barrow for not enforcing laws that protect the cultural values in the country.

He said the video has triggered the violation of human rights cognizant of the fact that the majority of the Gambians are Muslims.

“All religious doctrines in the world abnegate this inhumane act.; the Gambia should not be an exception. The government has failed to protect the cultural rights and values of our nation since President Barrow ascended power due to selfish reasons,” he claimed.

Commenting further, the GAP leader promised to criminalize same-gender marriage or affairs to ensure that people with religious identities continually worship their beliefs without being dirty or filthy

Recognition of Gender identity

The Gambia does not allow citizens to change their legal gender. Since 2013, the country has criminalized gender expression under the Section 167 of the Criminal Code; cross-dressing is punishable by up to 5 years in jail or a fine of 50,000 Gambian dalasi.

In Wolof speaking communities, non-binary & effeminate males are known as gūrdigan or gordigen (means man-woman). Gūrdigan people are also found in Senegal & Mauritania. Most gūrdigans are born as male, few are intersex. Gūrdigan are very much associated with femininity. Historically they played role of entertainers in various ceremonies, matchmakers between men and women.

LGBTQI+ Association, Activism

There are no public LGBT organizations in the country. Few LGBTQI+ rights groups, networks maintain a low profile in the country due to country's strict laws.

Hope Life International, an international org. based in the Gambia, aims to provide relief and support to those affected by poverty, disease, natural disasters, human rights violence & abuses. Hope Life International is a member org. of ILGA. Besides, HRW, Peace Corp, ACDHRS, Interfaith Diversity Network of West Africa (IDNOWA), UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Gambian Human Rights Commission, West African Human Rights Defenders Network also defends rights of LGBTQI+ Gambians.

Yankuba Keita, a human rights activist based in Gambia, advocates for LGBTQ+ community. He also works with the African Centre for Democracy and Human Rights Studies (ACDHRS), which promotes awareness on human rights issues. Alajie Jammeh become beacon for LGBTQ+ community, when he spoke against Yahya's treatment of LGBTQ+ citizens. He also advocated for equal rights of LGBTQ+ community. For his LGBTQ+ activism, Alajie risked his life, got death threats. He was shunned by his family, relatives & friends. Even Gambian government officials threatened him to revoke his scholarship, if he returned home.

Mohammad Sonko is a Canada-based LGBTQ+ activist who advocates for rights of LGBTQ+ people. Sonko is reportedly the first gambian who came out as gay in Brikama, Gambia. He was persecuted for being gay in his home country, later he took refuge in Canada.

Summary:

Same-sex sexual activity - ❌

Equal age of consent - ❌

Recognition of same-sex unions,marriages - ❌

Anti-discrimination laws in the provision of goods and services - ❌

Anti-discrimination laws in all other areas (Incl. indirect discrimination, hate speech) - ❌

Anti-discrimination laws in employment only - ❌

Right to change legal gender - ❌

LGBTQ+ people allowed to serve openly in the military - ❌

MSMs allowed to donate blood - ❌

[blueiight]

ur notes on the uganda post soothed my soul a bit bc even when ppl try 2 put those laws into the context they bring it back 250 years when in reality american evangelical groups have poured at least $20 million usd into uganda over 10 years to get these extreme laws passed. it's been well documented and yet reporting on this new law still acts like it's a homegrown phenomenon instead of a well-funded, decades long campaign waged by foreign religious fundamentalist organizations.

ya exactly! i swear on my life there was a documentary in 2013 & articles dating back to 2009 that all accounted how american radical evangelists threw the bank at uganda in spreading their ideology. viral memes clowning the funny african man talmbout poopoo but hes rly part of a power structure, jesus comics that came from american evangelical printing presses to uganda.. u can even go so far back as 2003, an article on religious NGOs in eastern africa [kenya+uganda]. sadly it seems even ur most well intended leftist radical self ordained third worldist is painfully ignorant to the modern realities of the african continent + has to go back 70 or 250 years ago as if african ppl stopped living on the continent after 1870 or 19whatever the fuck arbitrary date their knowledge bank is operating from.

[maaarine]

Bibliography: articles posted on this blog in 2023

Posted in January

To grasp how serotonin works on the brain, look to the gut (James M Shine, Psyche, Jan 03 2023)

Thousands of records shattered in historic winter warm spell in Europe (Ian Livingston, The Washington Post, Jan 02 2023)

“Il faut que tu sois belle maintenant” : en Égypte, des femmes libérées du voile restent prisonnières des diktats (Aliaa Talaat, Al-Manassa via Courrier International, 20 nov 2022)

Mystery of why Roman buildings have survived so long has been unraveled, scientists say (Katie Hunt, CNN, Jan 06 2023)

Colombia’s surrogacy market: Buying a baby for $4,000 (Lucía Franco, El País, Jan 04 2023)

How to spot an eating disorder (Phillip Aouad & Sarah Maguire, Psyche, Jan 11 2023)

UAE sparks furious backlash by appointing Abu Dhabi oil chief as president of COP28 climate summit (Sam Meredith, CNBC, Jan 12 2023)

Don’t tell me that David Carrick’s crimes were ‘unbelievable’. The problem is victims aren’t believed (Marina Hyde, The Guardian, Jan 17 2023)

Baromètre Sexisme 2023 : "La situation est alarmante", estime le Haut Conseil à l'Égalité (Juliette Geay, Radio France, 23 janvier 2023)

—

Posted in February

Spain approves menstrual leave, teen abortion and trans laws (NPR, Feb 16 2023)

Are Men the Overlooked Reason for the Fertility Decline? (Jessica Grose, The New York Times, Feb 15 2023)

American teenage girls are experiencing high levels of emotional distress. Why? (Moira Donegan, The Guardian, Feb 16 2023)

Figures that lay bare the shocking scale of toxic influencer Andrew Tate’s reach among young men (Maya Oppenheim, The Independent, Feb 17 2023)

Why psychological research on child sex offenders is important (Meetali Devgun, Psyche, Feb 22 2023)

Derrière les chiffres des féminicides, des visages et un continuum de violences contre les femmes (Fanny Declercq, Le Soir, 27 fév 2023)

—

Posted in March

English is not normal (John McWhorter, Aeon, Nov 13 2015)

Are Iranian schoolgirls being poisoned by toxic gas? (BBC News, March 03 2023)

‘Why do we need a supermodel?’: Backlash after Fifa makes Adriana Lima Women’s World Cup ambassador (Henry Belot, The Guardian, March 02 2023)

New Human Metabolism Research Upends Conventional Wisdom about How We Burn Calories (Herman Pontzer, Scientific American, Jan 01 2023)

Polish woman found guilty of aiding an abortion in landmark trial (Harriet Barber, The Telegraph, March 14 2023)

How Diet Builds Better Bones: Surprising Findings on Vitamin D, Coffee, and More (Claudia Wallis, Scientific American, Jan 01 2023)

Met police found to be institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic (Vikram Dodd, The Guardian, March 21 2023)

Chinese Dating App Does the Swiping for Singles to Find Love (Nikki Main, Gizmodo, March 21 2023)

Aphantasia can be a gift to philosophers and critics like me (Mette Leonard Høeg, Psyche, March 20 2023)

—

Posted in April

Facts Don’t Change Minds – Social Networks, Group Dialogue, and Stories Do (Anne Toomey, The LSE Impact Blog, Jan 24 2023)

Uganda’s failure to jail child rapists as teen pregnancies soar (Tamasin Ford, BBC News, April 17 2023)

Italy risks ‘ethnic replacement’ because of low birth rate and high immigration, says minister (Nick Squires, The Telegraph, April 19 2023)

Putin, Trump, Ukraine: how Timothy Snyder became the leading interpreter of our dark times (Robert P Baird, The Guardian, March 30 2023)

India overtakes China to become world’s most populous country (Hannah Ellis-Petersen, The Guardian, April 24 2023)

—

Posted in May

Des crèches ferment toutes les semaines, « et ce n’est pas près de s’arrêter » (Le Soir, 5 mai 2023)

People in comas showed ‘conscious-like’ brain activity as they died, study says (Hannah Devlin, The Guardian, May 01 2023)

Chinese woman appeals in battle for right to freeze her eggs (The Guardian, May 09 2023)

Women CEOs: Why companies in crisis hire minorities - and then fire them (The Guardian, DG McCullough, Aug 08 2014)

Glass cliffs: firms appoint female executives in times of crisis as a signal of change to investors (Max Reinwald and Johannes Zaia and Florian Kunze, LSE Business Review, Aug 19 2022)

—

Posted in June

Afghan women in mental health crisis over bleak future (Yogita Limaye, BBC News, June 05 2023)

Support Of Amber Heard Alongside French Feminists & Cinema Figures (Melanie Goodfellow, Deadline, June 05 2023)

Why is Japan redefining rape? (Tessa Wong & Sakiko Shiraishi, BBC News, June 07 2023)

Catching the men who sell subway groping videos (Zhaoyin Feng & Aliaume Leroy & Shanshan Chen, BBC News, June 08 2023)

Netherlands to provide free sun cream to tackle record skin cancer levels (Kate Connolly, The Guardian, June 12 2023)

The Cause of Depression Is Probably Not What You Think (Joanna Thompson, Quanta Magazine, Jan 26 2023)

—

Posted in July

‘Farsighted impulsivity’ and the new psychology of self-control (Adam Bulley, Psyche, Feb 03 2021)

Can a perfectionist personality put you at risk of migraines? (Shayla Love, Psyche, July 25 2023)

—

Posted in August

How Loneliness Reshapes the Brain (Marta Zaraska, Quanta Magazine, Feb 28 2023)

Why religious belief provides a real buffer against suicide risk (David H Rosmarin, Psyche, Aug 07 2023)

—

Posted in September

What Are Dreams For? (Amanda Gefter, The New Yorker, Aug 31 2023)

Rape Cases Seize Italy’s Attention and Expose Cultural Rifts (Gaia Pianigiani, The New York Times, Sep 03 2023)

Councils in England in crisis as Birmingham ‘declares itself bankrupt’ (Heather Stewart and Jessica Murray, The Guardian, Sep 05 2023)

Nearly one in three female NHS surgeons have been sexually assaulted, survey suggests (Jamie Grierson, The Guardian, Sep 12 2023)

Domination and Objectification: Men’s Motivation for Dominance Over Women Affects Their Tendency to Sexually Objectify Women (Orly Bareket and Nurit Shnabel, Sep 09 2019)

In Spain, dozens of girls are reporting AI-generated nude photos of them being circulated at school: ‘My heart skipped a beat’ (Manuel Viejo, El País, Sep 18 2023)

When the human tendency to detect patterns goes too far (Shayla Love, Psyche, Sep 19 2023)

—

Posted in October

My Brain Doesn’t Picture Things (Marco Giancotti, Nautilus, Oct 04 2023)

“Inverse vaccine” shows potential to treat multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune diseases (Sarah C.P. Williams, The University of Chicago, Sep 11 2023)

Poland election: exit polls point to Law and Justice defeat as Tusk hails ‘rebirth’ (Shaun Walker, The Guardian, Oct 16 2023)

—

Posted in November

What I have learned from my suicidal patients (Gavin Francis, The Guardian, Nov 22 2019)

Did natural selection make the Dutch the tallest people on the planet? (Martin Enserink, Science, Apr 07 2015)

Tumblr Is Always Dying (Elizabeth Minkel, Wired, Nov 14 2023)

How accurate is the new Napoleon film? Sorting fact from fiction (Andrew Roberts, The Sunday Times, Nov 19 2023)

Far-right party set to win most seats in Dutch elections, exit polls show (Jon Henley and Pjotr Sauer and Senay Boztas, The Guardian, Nov 22 2023)

Climate change: Rise in Google searches around ‘anxiety’ (Lucy Gilder, BBC, Nov 22 2023)

—

Posted in December

The sexual assault of sleeping women: the hidden, horrifying rape crisis in our bedrooms (Anna Moore, The Guardian, June 15 2021)

Afghanistan: Taliban sends abused women to prison - UN (Nicholas Yong, BBC News, Dec 15 2023)

Longitudinal Associations Between Parenting and Child Big Five Personality Traits (University of California Press, Nov 18 2021)

Scientists Pinpoint Cause of Severe Morning Sickness (Azeen Ghorayshi, The New York Times, Dec 13 2023)

[yonadave]

“I’m Not Anti-Mutant Just Anti-Krakoa '' - Why We Should Compare Krakoa to Israel.

When HoX\PoX came out in 2019 I was living in Jerusalem and talking to a friend about it and eventually the question went up “Do we want to talk about Krakoa and Israel?” The answer was a resounding no. Unfortunately for me, some of the latest issues of X-Men titles made the connection between my actual homeland and my fictional favorite Island-state clearer and clearer. I don’t know if the writers meant to make the connections I see, but they are there and in order to truly understand what we’ve seen as the road to Fall of X is being published we need to look at the triangle of Israel, Anti-Zionism, and Anti-Semitism in real life. 

Since we are talking about a volatile subject we do need to put on some very basic ground rules. Many critics of Israel claim Zionist would use the Anti-Semitisim card in order to ignore valid criticism. While my side of the issue needs to understand that not every criticism of Israel is antisemitic, the other side needs to understand that not all Anti-Zionism is automatically not Anti-Semitic. Anti-Semites also use criticism of Israel to ignore criticism of their own anti-semitism. In my opinion, both sides of this equation are not opinions rather basic recognition of reality needed to talk about this issue. The point of this article is not to prove that Israel is the source of all evil or to justify its existence/importance. This is about understanding what the plot of a comic book means to readers living in the real world and vice versa.

The Naive - Krakoa as Ugande.

While I decided to write this specifically during my reading of Duggan’s X-Men issue 23, I think it is best to start at House of X issue 1. It’s hard to ignore the parallels between Krakoa and Israel when Magneto, a Holocaust survivor, is hosting foreign ambassadors in Jerusalem. The new mutant nation was showing what Krakoa is, and what it has to offer to other nations. Host of the Cerebro podcast, Connor Goldsmith, brought up Krakoa as Israel without the Palestinian Issue. Since Krakoa is a newly formed island it can represent the good in the Zionist project without the bad - the fact that the country was formed in a land that was already populated. As an Israeli who is temporarily living in the US, this seems to be a desire shared by many left wing jews who want to love Israel but feel like they cannot due to the plight of the Palesstinians. Jonathan Hickman himself, while being a guest on said podcast, said that Magneto represented a form of politics evolved and better than humanity’s politics.

This aspiration, formed out of both of these hopes, reminded me of two Zionist naive works. The first one is a parody song by the Israeli comedic trio “Ma Ka’shur” - Why Not Ugande. The song, released in 2008 celebrating the 60th anniversary of the state of Israel, claims that Theodore Hertzel, as a symbol for the entirety of the Zionist leadership, was wrong to decline the British Uganda Scheme to create a Jewish national home in Uganda instead of our ancestral homeland. The chorus of the song begins with the words “Why not Uganda, why not Uganda, we do not go on busses” refering to the waves of suicide bombers who bombed Israeli busses during the time of the Oslo Agreement and during the first couple of years of the second Initifada. This naive view of the early days of the Zionist movement assumes that the Zionist project would not be opposed in Uganda. 

The other work is from the writings of Rav Avraham Issac Kook, a rabbi who’s writing would eventually be the basis of the contemporary Religious Zionisim movement in Israel. Rav Kook was heavily influenced by European philosophers who believed that WWI was the last war in history. In his most famous book “Orot” (Lights in Hebrew) he writes “We have left the global political stage [after the destruction of the second temple and the beginning of the Diaspora YT] due to an external source forcing us, in a way that also reflected our inner wishes. Until that glorious time where a kingdom can be run without wickedness and cruelty.” (Orot, Lights out of Darkness, War, Passage 3) 

Thinking that if only Zionism went a few dozen miles to the side everything would be perfect is as silly as saying that WWI is the last war in history and that’s why the Zionist project is going to be perfect. But this silly naivety can also become insidious. Krakoa started out as a perfect nation, harming no one while helping everyone. But that wasn’t enough. Setting the bar for what humanity expects of Krakoa so high that no other country could ever pass it, while expecting the mutant nation to do it is a ruse. Even when they ran a seemingly perfect country it wasn’t enough because Krakao’s actions were never the issue. Not when Krakoa is morally wrong, not when it is morally right. From its birth, Krakoa could never be accepted by those who prosecuted mutants. The problem would always be the existence of Krakoa because the world that hates and fears mutants cannot accept that they would have control over their own future. 

The Good - Krakoan Pharmawashing

Since its inception the island nation of Krakoa has performed many outreach programs. The krakoan miracle drugs were the big opener of the nation’s international activities, the X-Men team built and lived in the tree house to help people outside of the island and now we’ve also seen Mutant First Strike, a team meant to act as disaster relief. It would be one thing if those efforts would simply fail to move the needle of public opinion towards mutants, but we see how these efforts are being used in anti mutant/Krakoa propaganda. 

The mutant medicines are seen in the pages of X-Force and Wolverine to be a point of contention by those who oppose the island nation. In X-Men 22 we even see that Orchis are blaming mutants for poisoning their medicines. Sure, the lie is because Orchis are the ones who put the poison in, but all I could see is Krakoa being blamed for poisoning wells. Israel was also accused several times in poisoning wells, but the source for these rumors seem to come not out of fact, since those haven’t been presented, but out of the centuries old antisemitic trope of Jews poisoning wells. 

In the real world, Israel is being blamed for “Pinkwashing the Occupation”; later on it also evolved to other issues like Veganwashing. The pinkwashing campaign does not mean that the good Israel does can not cancel out its wrongs, which is an actual critique. It started, back in 2010 as a critique saying the Israeli government uses its LGBT community to hide our atrocities. It also evolved, and today, in its extreme form Israel is blamed that many of the good we do (such as promoting green energy and vegan products) are only done in order that we can continue and oppress the Palestinian people. Every other country has done both good and evil, and reasonable people can see that a country, or people, can be both at the same time. But if you view a group as demonic then even its best qualities must be viewed in that light.  

The Bad - Why Is It always Sentinels

I started writing this after reading X-Men 23. In this issue, Orchis, a global union of many anti-mutant groups, use of a sentinel as a proposed vehicle for peace and feint of ignorance made my blood boil. Orchis propaganda claims they “do not know” why the X-Men decided to attack a sentinel. The intentional use of Sentinels, the most recognized symbol of mutant oppression, is not foreign to me. While being accused of being a Nazi is pretty common for most people on the internet, it’s different when it’s used against the victims of that regime. When Roger Waters wanted to ‘criticize’ Israel he chose to do so wearing Nazi uniforms. Many Arab countries who ethnically cleansed their Jewish population blame Israel for committing that act, without an inch of recognition for what they did to the ancient Jewish Communities they used to have. The choice of Sentinels was not meant only to bait a response from the X-Men, it was meant to hurt them by reminding them all of their shared trauma. 

The only thing I was missing in the issue was the claim that Orchis isn’t Anti Mutant, it is simply Anti-Krakoa. But Duggan already wrote that scene in his original Marauders run at the Dawn of X. And while it is not said explicitly here, Orchis are asking us to believe that the use of sentinels is not out of mutant hatred but due to something else. The idea that mutants shouldn’t attack a sentinel is absurd, but claiming that mutants are not allowed to defend themselves in face of clear aggression actually does makes sense. Because even after Israel spent decades developing a defensive technology that doesn’t hurt any Palestinian, we are still being blamed for using it, as famously seen made by Jon Oliver regarding the Iron Dome. In the last year we have seen so much bad spewing out of Krakoa, but the hatred came before all of that. Krakoa is primed to be a quick excuse for mutant hating bigots, just like Israel is used by many anti-semites regardless of all the bad and good that comes out of my country. 

One of the common conceptions surrounding X-Men comics is that the mutant metaphor is problematic since minorities are in a position of weakness while mutants have super powers. But while Jews and Israelis do not shoot lasers from the eyes we are at the bottom of every conspiracy theory. From space lasers from the right to being blamed for American police brutality on the left, we are attributed fictional powers and being blamed for them long before the forming of Zionism as a modern political movement in 1840. Krakoa isn’t Israel, it is better than we could ever hope to be and it is worse than we will be able to become. Krakoa is mostly a fictional state, something that we will never be again. So the answer to Israel-Palestinian conflict would not be found in the Fall of X, but looking at the hatred, be it justified or Antisemitic, surrounding Israel is a great way to write visceral scenes that sticks with the reader. Especially now as things are about to take a turn for the worse for my favorite made up nation. 

I do not know what the Fall of X has in store for us. I truly hope we are not about to witness the end of Krakoa, but I know it’s a possible outcome. Both from watsonian and the doylist perspective Krakoa was always going to fail. In the pages of Powers Of X issue 6 we learned that Xavier, Magneto, and Moira , the founders of Krakoa, knew the threats that are facing this miracle island and are not sure they will make it in the long run. From an industry perspective, many fans simply assume that Krakoa can’t last since every big change in comics gets pushed back eventually into the status quo. Not to mention that no one thinks that the MCU is going to let Krakoa in. 

Even if Krakoa doesn’t fall, the threat of the destruction of the nation is on full display in previews we’ve seen. And that’s the point, most countries in the world are not under constant threat of complete annihilation, but Krakoa and Israel are. When we criticize most nation we demand a regime change, not promoting relocating millions of people, but that is always the explicit goal of anti Krakoa and Anti-Zionist campaigns. You do not have to support Israel in order to be a “true” X-Men fan, but it is my opinion that the best way to understand this age of comics, and the best way to write it, is to lean in on the Israel metaphor.

[new-berry]

So right at the end it gets potentially skeevy. This is some of the actual fic so my agonised and irritating complaining makes more sense. But this what I mean about so much blether. There are many many words like this:

diligently opens the email Lorena sends. There’s an account of the court case from six years ago when the government was banned from putting the deaged into hotels for monitoring.

“Could be worse!” She has texted with three exclamation marks. “I’m glad you two can talk about football, and you can look out for him!”

He has never wanted to play football less. He wants to stay quietly here. Get to know this willowly new version of the man he thought he knew well.

There are a list of the tests that were done. Nothing major, blood tests, virus screening. Nothing was ever found. DNA was taken and compared. There is no difference between the samples. Lorena has noted that this journalists daughter was put in one of the hotels. ‘She drove so much if this!’ Lorena has written with more exclamation marks. ‘She should be an OBE!’

The courts insist that everything should be destroyed. The lawyers within the NHS had argued people were allowed to offer DNA, but they couldn’t insist. Plenty of people want to they say.

He types “deaged hotels” Into the search bar. There are first hand accounts where people have to admit they don’t actually remember anything. The staff working there saying it was a lot of video games, napping, and junk food.

The Spanish government site says five days is the longest reported case, but it’s often less than 48 hours.

The people who ran the hotels said they got used to a confused or angry adult, waking up somewhere strange, wanting it be away from all these kids.

The youngest reported case was 12. But this was from China and has an asterisk. The oldest reported case was 19. Uganda say they have never had cases.

It mostly occurs to people in their twenties. Psychologists wonder if it’s people wanting to escape pressure.

A report from the Ministry of Youth affairs suggests archly that younger people are just more welling to admit when they deage.

There rest of their reporting is stastical are very few cases in their 30 or 40’s. None reported from anyone in their sixties.

Helen Mirren was nominated for an Oscar playing a family living with the affects of a deageing, you can watch the movie for free on BBC plus.

It is more common in men. Less common with people with children or a partner.

He only skims the guardian articles. Boris Johnson photographed with his mouth open cuts funding to the special services. Scuttlebutt says this is to hide that the hotels that housed them were usually owned by his mates.

Jerermy Clarkson pens a lengthy screed about kids that won’t face up to their responsibilities that he doesn’t read. Princess Anne nods severly next to a group of nurses in one of the now decommissioned hotels.

There is a rumour site where people collect reports of celebrities who may have deaged. There are several footballers and he quickly posts a picture on Instagram of him and Win and the caption “protocols met! but I’m not alone!”

The seventh link down is high lighted becuase he has visited it before: “de-aged hotel- secret camera revals twinks caught getting…”

He clicks onto his homepage and clears his browsers history.

[76crimes]

Malign influence of Ugandan homophobia is spreading to neighboring Congo

[pbandjesse]

I had a good day off all things considered. The consideration being I am so sleepy. I almost feel like I have a cold. But it wasn't a bad day.

I had very few goals today. I wanted to clean. I wanted shake shack. And I wanted to go buy flat back earrings at old navy. And I would accomplish those goals.

I woke up this morning later then I like. But after we got home last night I ended up being up super late working on a planning document for Uganda. I think it's going to cost $6k. Which is rough but James thinks we can do it and James is much more frugal so I believe them. Hopefully I'm overestimating how much, but there are variables I just don't know yet. Like the hotel rooms because they are going to get a discount. And like what food will be. We also need visas and yellow fever vaccines. So I was up until 2 reading articles and writing up my findings. I would end up moving to the kitchen because James kept flailing in their sleep. Where Sweetp alerted me to a giant fucking bug. So large I actually woke James up to come get it.

But after that I went back to bed and actually was convinced there was a bug on my tablet and my heart rate went so high I was like. It's time to go to sleep.

When I did get out of bed I washed my faced and got dressed. And then I was right into cleaning. I started in the bathroom. I have found I am avoiding some stuff because my body hurts or I'm like afraid it'll make my body hurts. So I did not do the floors and I did not pull the box from under the sink or like the trash or anything. I did take the stuff out of the shower and cleaned the tub the best I could. But I am for sure being a big baby about anything that has to do with bending.

But I got good cleaning done. And finally started working on getting rid of some kitchen stuff. I decided the best way to do it was to pull out everything I don't want to get rid of. So then James can pair it down from there. I would clear out the cubbies so I could store them there for the time being. This would take a while though. Just moving stuff. I would have to go and get the ladder to get up to the hall shelf.

I would get a lot accomplished. And felt pretty good. I decided it was time to head out into the world.

I really liked my outfit and felt very cool. And was looking forward to shake shack. I was struggling a little when I got there though and was having trouble understanding people talking to me and I don't know why?? Everything just sounded garbled. So I got confused and didn't use the coupon I had which just made me upset with myself. But I'll save it for another time.

I did enjoy my food. I sat inside. I did spill some ketchup on myself but I tried to not let it bother me. For some reason the food made me cough like crazy. Which made me very uncomfortable. But I was trying to not let it stop me.

I went across the street to old navy and looked around for a while. I was surprised how expensive everything was even in the clearance. Old Navy clearance used to be so good!

I did find the earrings I wanted. I wanted flat back earrings and I am very happy with the ones I got. I may go back for another because I got two different ones and I didn't think I would love them as much as I am so now I want matching ones. The only real issue is they are internally threaded and are very hard to put on!! At least they make me feel pretty.

The coughing was making me feel super tired. And when I got home I was so tired I was dizzy.

I would have to spend like a half hour trying to get my broken hoop earring out with two pairs of pliers. Which was not fun and hurt my ears and then putting on the new earrings was a struggled it was tough. But I was so extremely tired.

So as soon as I could I got changed and got in bed and I was out.

I slept until 430. And when I woke up James was here. I don't know if it was the AC or what but my throat hurt so much. And I wanted something. James would get me ice cream and I asked for water but they weren't listening when I tried to tell them that my water bottle had lemonade in it and I yelled to the next room to grt their attention and hurt my throat and was just so upset I was just like. Leave me alone. And that wasn't nice. I would apologize and they would say it's okay but it's not fair that I let myself fall apart and be mean. Hate being mean.

James would order us pizza for dinner. I mostly wanted the salad I got with it. It was just nice sitting together and eating. James walked to go pick it up and apparently they didn't get the notification so they had to quickly make it and so the crust was a little soft but it was fun. I still liked it.

While James was gone I vacuumed and cleaned the kitty litter and refilled our hand soap. And it was a nice evening.

I would spend some time collecting things and putting stuff away. I restuffed my bear DJ because he had gotten so floppy. He's very full now.

I took a salt bath and watched a spooky video. And James met Lane downstairs to get some stuff together for James's philly bike ride tomorrow. I'm glad someone is acting as like a relief vehicle just in case. Makes me feel more secure.

And now we are in bed. And I am really hoping I can fall asleep quick. I love you all. Sleep well!!

[shivshaktimachtech]

10 Head Liquor Bottle Filling Machine

Company Overview: Shiv Shakti Machtech is a Manufacturer, Supplier and Exporter of 10 Head Liquor Bottle Filling Machine. 10 head liquid filling machine is an advanced packaging device equipped with ten filling heads that work simultaneously to fill containers with wine, liquor, vodka, spirits, whisky, Gin. This machine is designed to handle high-volume production with accuracy and efficiency, making it ideal for industries requiring rapid and consistent liquid filling. Standard Features: Sanitary flow meters equipped with tri-clamp fittings Bottom-close fill head valves to prevent drips Servo-driven fill head assembly for bottom-up filling and height adjustment 316 stainless steel pressure vessel, positioned low for easy cleaning CIP system with a spray ball in the vessel, process program, and fill head trough Sanitary product infeed control valve with air-to-open, spring-to-close actuator Intuitive PLC control system for ease of use Allen Bradley PLC control with Ethernet capability On-the-fly product weight adjustment Servo-controlled nozzle diving motion for precise bottom-up filling Tool-less adjustments for quick changeovers Modular construction allows for future upgrades Over 100 programmable recipes UL-approved control panel CE-compliant interlocked safety guards Shiv Shakti Machtech is 10 Head Liquor Bottle Filling Machine in serves worldwide, including, Algeria, Angola, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, The Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Botswana, Brazil, Brunei, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, Colombia, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Costa Rica, Cuba, Cyprus, Denmark, Dominica, Ecuador, Egypt, Guinea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Finland, France, The Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Guyana, Hungary, Iceland, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, South Korea, North Korea, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lebanon, Libya, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Moldova, Monaco, Mongolia, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar (Burma), Namibia, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Singapore, Slovakia, Somalia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sudan, South Sudan, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates (UAE), United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Vatican City, Venezuela, Vietnam, Yemen, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. For further details or inquiries, feel free to reach out to us. View Product: Click Here Read the full article

[gps-map-update]

GPS Navigation Update map 2023

This time, for our GPS navigation, we have updated the maps of Europe, Australia, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Africa, which are the latest versions at present.

country:Europe, North America,South America,Australia, Middle East, Southeast Asia, Africa,Russia

update time: 2023.5.1

Applicable Model：Q5-1/X20-1/X20-1-C/X20-2/X20-3/X30/X50

download link:

MapList:

Europe：Albania,Andorra,Austria,Belarus,Belgium,Bosnia Herzegovina,Bulgaria,Croatia,Cyprus,Czech Republic,Denmark,Estonia,Faroe Islands,Finland,Former Yugoslav RepublicofMacedonia,France,Georgia,Germany,Gibraltar,Greece,Hungary,Iceland,Ireland,Italy,Kazakhstan,Kosovo,Latvia,Lithuania,Luxembourg,Malta,Moldova,Monaco,Montenegro,Netherlands,Norway，Poland,Portugal,Romania,SanMarino,Serbia,Slovakia,Slovenia,Spain,Sweden,Switzerland,Turkey,United Kingdom,Vatican City,

Australia：Australia, New Zealand

MiddleEast：Bahrain,Iraq,Israel,Jordan,Kuwait,Lebanon,Oman,Qatar,Saudi Arabia,United Arab Emirates

Africa：Angola,Botswana,Burundi,Cote D Ivoire,Egypt,Ghana,Kenya,Lesotho,Malawi,Morocco,Mozambique,Namibia,Nigeria,Reunion,Rwanda,South Africa,Swaziland,Tanzania,Tunisia,Uganda,Zimbabwe,Brunei Darussalam,India,Indonesia,Malaysia,Philippines,Singapore,Thailand,

North America: USA+Canada+Mexico

South America: Argentina,Bolivia,Brazil,Cayman Islands,Chile,Colombia,Costa Rica,French Guiana,Guadeloupe,Martinique,Panama,Peru,The Bahamas,Uruguay,Venezuela,

Southeast Asia: Brunei Darussalam,India,Indonesia,Malaysia,Philippines,Singapore,Thailand,

Russia: Russia, Belarus, Ukraine

Please check the first article for how to update the map！！