#undocumented destinations

[portalwalker]

Sometimes it was good to listen to music. It brought back nostalgic memories of more innocent times. Sure, they were tainted into a bittersweetness now, but there was something nice about thinking back.

Which is why Maria's smile is almost sad and mostly wistful as she is nodding her head along to an unheard tune, humming something under her breath. She doesn't have earbuds or headphones, but she's keeping the beat to what sounds like a route or location theme from a Pokemon game.

Was she aware enough beyond the song to react if a passerby came up and talked to her? Or was she lost in her own little world?

[i-eat-mold]

just here to say that gertrude robinson is the single funniest character. she is THE character. she dies before the show even starts. shes an old lady that adopted an edgy teen and traveled the world. She is the avatar of one of the fourteen elditch horrors that feed on primordial fears, she had basically infite knowledge of everything and her plan to stop one of the rituals of a cult of another one of said list of eldrich horrors was to blow it up with a bunch of c4. we only find out about this because she stored all of the explosives in a random storage unit and the aforementioned edgy teen with mommy issues (who by the way, is dead, but when he died she sneaked into the morgue to put him inside a book) speaks through the book to the woman's succesor who, by the way, has no idea what the fuck is going on because neither she nor anyone else has bothered to explain shit to him, and tells him that she kept something important in the unit. we only find out about this after 100 episodes of the show. She feeds her subordinates to an all consuming monster/god, but its ok i guess. Later on (earlier on? at the same time? in a different timeline? after?) the literal end of the world and the end of the end of the world shes back and still has to deal with this stupid teenager who at least doesnt spend half his life focused on dyeing his hair and the other half about finding murder books (not as books about murder but as in, books who actively murder). She is a well experienced arsonist despite having no affiliation with the actual official arsonists club that is yet another cult to yet another one of the previously mentioned eldritch horrors. She is, however, metaphysically tied to the Chosen One, the Messiah of said cult, or some shit. She is absolutely terrible at her actual office job (on purpose). She dismembered a guy (who was her assistant) and probably commited several undocumented crimes against humanity. Once again, she has all seeing abilities and barely noticed her favorite assistant was torturing a coworker. She dares her murderous boss to kill her and gets surprised when he does so. When asked what to do about a literal Monster Pig, her advice is to encase it in cement. She was such a bitch. Her plan B was always to set things on fire. Her plan A was often to set things on fire. One of these instances was approved by her boss (the one who killed her). It is canon that the reason she started all this shit in her life was because the fire cult killer her cat. She sacrified another one of her assistants who became an avatar of the literal concept of Insanity but it was just a other thursday for her. She knows on a first name basis pretty much every person and monster affiliated with the eldritch horrors that she tries to keep at bay on the daily. She stopped a ritual for The Lonely by making the place a tourist destination. She has an ebay account. Instead of performing a ritual for the God that she was affiliated with, she wanted to destroy it and planned to 1. blind herself, and 2. set fire (yet again) to her workplace. It didnt work, because and her boss, who was also the one who was going to perform the ritual, finds her right before and kills her after she says he has no balls to do so. Also she is voiced by the mother of the main character's voice actor (who he named with his own, full, legal name) and the series' writer, which are the same person. Shes the worst, shes the best, i love her, we will never get anyone like her again, we need more characters like her.

[probablyasocialecologist]

In Almería lies the world's largest concentration of commercial greenhouses, often referred to as ‘the sea of plastic’. This vast expanse of polytunnels, housing millions of kilos of fruits and vegetables mainly destined for export, stretches for hundreds of kilometers, a white panorama until the horizon. Also within this sea of plastic dwell the migrant workers who work to ensure Europe's supermarkets are stocked year-round. While they perform the vital task of ensuring Europe's all-season access to fresh produce, these workers often live in a state of physical and institutional vulnerability. This state of affairs remained largely hidden, until recent shocks like the Covid-19 pandemic and armed conflicts exposed the fragility of our food supply chains. Spain issues approximately 150,000 permits annually for seasonal laborers (European Parliament 2021). However, within just the province of Almería, there are more than 100,000 migrants working in greenhouses, 80% of them holding undocumented status in the country. This lack of legal recognition leaves the workers off official records, denying them universal rights such as labour rights and access to formal rental contracts. It is a dire situation that forces many to call the shanty towns surrounding the greenhouses their homes. During my research, I often heard how some workers pay up to 6,000 euros annually to greenhouse managers for the working contracts necessary to seek legal status in the country, turning the quest for legalization into a profitable business.  Almería serves as a primary entry point for migrants traveling from West and North African countries to Europe. For those who cross the Mediterranean without visas - the majority of greenhouse laborers - this work is virtually the only option for income generation on arrival. While informal greenhouse jobs provide financial support to workers and their families back in their home countries, they also perpetuate vulnerability in livelihoods and employment, highlighting and embedding a stark contrast between EU citizens enjoying affordable food and the undocumented migrant workers compelled to work in precarious conditions to provide it.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Paul Blumenthal at HuffPost:

Former President Donald Trump’s most significant policy plank in his third presidential campaign is to implement a system of mass deportation to remove up to 20 million noncitizens from the United States, a plan that apparently aims to not only remove people living here illegally but also to chase away ― or accidentally round up ― U.S. citizens as well.

He is promising to deploy the military and deputize local police officers to round up millions of people, detain them in makeshift camps and then ship them off to other countries ― whether or not the destination is the person’s country of origin. This plan is billed as targeting only those who have come to the country or reside in it illegally, with a special emphasis on supposed migrant gang members. It offers a story of those who deserve to be here and those who don’t. Those who are part of the national community and those who exist outside its bounds and, perhaps, its laws. But 79% of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. have been living and participating in American communities for more than 15 years. They have married U.S. citizens, hold jobs that prop up their local and national economies and have children and grandchildren who are citizens. Ripping these people out of the country and away from their families will ripple through every community in the country.

“Communities are like a fabric ― the way that the threads are interwoven,” said Heidi Altman, federal advocacy director for the National Immigration Law Center’s Immigrant Justice Fund, an immigrant rights nonprofit. “If you snip at one, eventually the whole of the fabric comes loose.” This plan to tear communities apart will also ensnare U.S. citizens, green card holders and others here legally, either by accident or with intent. Trump and his advisers are already saying that’s what they’ll do. Tom Homan, Trump’s former acting head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was asked in a “60 Minutes” interview that aired Sunday whether there is a way that Trump’s mass deportation plan could remove undocumented people without separating them from their families. “Of course there is,” Homan said. “Families can be deported together.” What Homan is saying, without saying it directly, is that mixed-status families, with some family members who are U.S. citizens and others who lack legal status, can choose to self-deport if they wish to remain together.

There are currently 4.7 million mixed-status households in the U.S., according to the Center for Migration Studies. Among those households are 5.5 million U.S.-born children living with one undocumented household member and 1.8 million U.S.-born children living with two undocumented adults. In total, there are 9.7 million Americans who live in households with at least one undocumented resident. Trump and Homan propose an impossible choice: your citizenship and your home or your family. Similar mass deportations and detentions in the country’s history have done the same. The incarceration of Japanese immigrants and Japanese-Americans during and after World War II ensnared citizens and noncitizens alike. So, too, did the imprisonment of Germans, Italians and people born under the Austro-Hungarian Empire during both world wars. Trump’s inspiration for his mass deportation program, President Dwight Eisenhower’s Operation Wetback, similarly resulted in the deportation of significant numbers of U.S. citizens to Mexico.

But none of those programs was of the scale or scope that Trump imagines. There are an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S., according to the 2022 American Community Survey. Other surveys and estimates have found similar numbers. But Trump and his allies talk about deporting 20 million to 30 million people. There is no source for such a number. That would invariably mean targeting people with some kind of legal status, whether temporary or permanent. “They seem to be gleefully suggesting that they would include people here with some legal status in these roundups,” said Matthew Lisieki, a senior research and policy analyst at the Center for Migration Studies, a think tank that focuses on global migration. A deportation program that removes 11 million people or even more than 20 million would affect every single community in the country, invariably sweeping up even larger numbers of U.S. citizens and legal residents, taking them away from their families and putting them into jails, incarceration camps and, potentially, off to another country. As Homan’s answer on “60 Minutes” indicates, that’s a feature, not a bug. Trump has already proposed invoking laws that could be used to sweep up unnaturalized U.S. residents who have legal status.

The Alien Enemies Act of 1798, which Trump says he will use, allows the president to effectively suspend due process for anyone of a particular nationality or national origin when the U.S. is at war or is invaded by that nation. Invoking this law may prove challenging since the U.S. is not currently in a declared war, much less one against any of the Latin American countries that represent the point of origin for most undocumented immigrants in the U.S. And though Trump claims that the migration of people into the country amounts to an “invasion,” federal courts since the 1990s have largely rejected efforts by states claiming that the word “invasion” in the U.S. Constitution should be interpreted to include the voluntary migration of people across borders.

Still, it is possible that the courts today would take a different approach and declare that the president’s invocation of an invasion by immigrants is a “political question” that the judicial branch will not interfere with. That could give Trump a free hand to implement a brutal and sweeping deportation program. “There are no explicit limitations on what kinds of regulations the president can promulgate under the law,” said Katherine Yon Ebright, a counsel at the progressive Brennan Center for Justice and author of a paper on the Alien Enemies Act. The law has been invoked three times during conflicts with actual foreign nations: during the War of 1812 and both world wars. In each conflict, the president has not only directed deportations and detentions but also promulgated restrictions on noncitizens who had come from the foreign belligerents.

[...]

When Trump was in office, immigration officials ramped up the use of these inaccurate gang databases to identify and deport undocumented residents. Considering Trump has falsely claimed in his campaign speeches that “migrant gangs” have “conquered” entire cities, such an effort would likely be radically scaled up. This could lead to removal of people with legal status as well as those who don’t. Residents who have legal status under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program ― so-called Dreamers who were brought across the border by their parents as children ― have been incorrectly identified as gang members by local police and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. That would be one way to strip them of their legal status.

Trump’s top immigration adviser, Stephen Miller, has promised to “turbocharge” efforts at denaturalizing U.S. citizens. When in office, Trump ramped up denaturalization efforts with one Homeland Security budget document proposing up to 700,000 investigations into naturalized U.S. citizens. Civil denaturalization can be done to people who obtained their legal status illegally or are the child of someone who did so, who deliberately lied about a fact in their application for citizenship, obtained citizenship through military service but was then dishonorably discharged or by becoming a member of a subversive group. This last reason could implicate U.S. citizens incorrectly placed on gang databases or otherwise identified as gang-affiliated by law enforcement. Databases can only be used to identify the legal status of residents who have had interactions with law enforcement or certain government agencies. If Trump intends to ramp up deportations to the level he claims, his efforts would need to target workplaces and neighborhoods. This would, invariably, involve racial profiling by placing checkpoints or performing sweeps in heavily Latino neighborhoods or worksites. Such sweeps would undoubtedly ensnare U.S. citizens and inflict fear in everyone ― citizens and noncitizens alike ― within these communities.

Donald Trump’s diabolically fascistic plan of mass deportations is eerily reminiscent of the interning of Japanese-Americans in World II: a moral and economic calamity that would undo America.

Read the full story at HuffPost.

[charlotte-of-wales]

a summary of the Monaco Tea, creds to the lovely anon who sent me the article <3

btw most of the information on the family was in article one, the latter were more just info on real estate + off shore accounts

again, this info is all coming from the former accountant of the family:

Prince Rainier III was seriously considering changing succession laws so Caroline would be the head of the family and Monaco as he found Albert to be weak. Albert is said to be the "despised member of the clan" who would stutter while speaking to his father. Rainier even looked into what this would mean to the Grimaldi name since Andrea - at the time 17 - obviously carries his father's name (Casiraghi) and not his mother's (Grimaldi). Rainier told the ones carrying the investigation that this was done in case Albert died.

the funds from Albert's state endowment and his private funds would be mixed all the time.

Albert would say yes to essentially everything his family asked for, including a $30 million apartment for Stephanie

Palmero (the accountant) would frequently buy things for the family to keep "their privacy". He bought Charlene's engagement ring and multiple properties for the Grimaldi's in France. He would pay property taxes for those properties and have the family pay him back.

Caroline and Stephanie would frequently make use of and sell family property (Rainier's cars, family jewelry and art, etc) without letting him know, even though they technically belonged to Albert.

Caroline is in charge of the family's castle in Marchais, which he had an issue with as she would always go off budget.

he makes a note to pay attention to Pierre Casiraghi as he is very ambitious and his dealings in real estate could create problems (spoiler alert: it did)

Caroline is said to hate Charlene

the allowance that Charlene, Caroline and Stephanie receive increases constantly, which worried Palmero. As of late, they were: 1,5 million euros for Charlene, 900.000 for Caroline and 800.000 for Stephanie yearly. This follows the family hierarchy.

 Jazmin Grace receives 86,000 dollars per quarter. In February 2010, Palmero had to spend $5,000 “extra for her birthday”. Albert also bought her a $3 million apartment in New York City.

Albert spends almost a million a year funding Nicole Coste's (the mother of Albert's second illegimate child) fashion business. It's all in Alexandre Coste's name as Nicole fears that Charlene might create issues when Albert dies.

loots about Charlene. She frequently demands high sums in cash, her personal chef is $300 a day, she has multiple undocumented people from the Philippines working in her staff, the celebrations for the birth and baptism of the twins was well over half a million euros, in eight years Charlene spent around 15 million euros when she received 7.5 million euros in endowment (the Palace didn't deny this and said that the accountant was simply told to pay the difference with the family's personal funds), she spent 965,000 on a villa in two and a half months, her office decoration cost a million euros, she requested 3 x 300,000 for her brother's house.

Palmero made sure to change Monaco's regency laws so in case something happens to Albert while Jacques is underage Charlene won't be regent. Instead, the principality will be ruled by a regency council.

Albert has a secret apartment in Monaco, bought by one of Palmero's secret companies. He also got rid of problematic photographs of Albert (hinted at blackmail).

there was a whole system for hiding sums used on "special missions". They were labeled DS (for special destinations) and with time were used to pay for an informal intelligence unit that operated within the police force of the principality. They'd collect information on those close to the family and even on politians of the principality. He would also pay journalists to paint a good picture of Monaco while Hollande was president in France and was constantly criticizing tax-havens.

the DS accounts would be used to hide over-budget situations, including budget for the children's nannies and the budget for the wedding.

they were terrified of the Panama papers, as a lot of money laundering funds go through Monaco and the family had accounts on Panamanian banks.

a link between a Russian billionaire and the Monegasque Minister of Justice was revealed in 2017 and the Minister was forced to resign. An investigation was launched by a French judge and there was fears that the palace would be involved: jurisdictional immunity was granted to members of the sovereign family by order. There was rumours that the French judge wanted to hear the Prince as a witness......he was told to leave the principality. He was accused of having, through his “behavior perceived as authoritarian and vexatious”, “endangered the proper functioning of the criminal justice system”.

the real estate market is a big point of collision here and a big focus of article 3. Nothing too interesting to report - Palmero says he tried mingling in the market to break down the monopoly of real estate owners in Monaco (centered around a bestie of the Casiraghi brothers) while Albert claims Palmero had close ties with some of the developers and tried mingling with things that were of interest of the government in order to make money. The real estate issue was what eventually led Palmero to be fired. Palmero and a former laywer of Albert who was his childhood bestfriend and is also now a persona non grata claims that Albert is now fully under the influence of the bestie of the Casiraghi brothers who now controls the real estate in Monaco.

Palmaro is STILL paying property tax on properties he bought for the family!! crazy!!

Palmero detailed a number of off-shore accounts that hold about 250 million euros of the family's fortune including a company created specifically for Charlotte Casiraghi. He passed on the information from that account to Albert's new accountant at a monitored meeting.

Albert's explanation is lowkey....pathetic. He claims he told Palmero to move all of his family's assets from off-shore accounts to Monaco but Palmero never did it and that was that. He claims he was never able to obtain a precise statement on the family assets due to Palmero's secrecy and Albert just trusted him. He claims Palmero would act in his name and refuse to delay his decisions.

[reimeichan]

I'm really starting to enjoy the stage of DID recovery I'm at. It's got a funkiness to it that I don't see others talk about all that much, where it's like... kinda hard to pinpoint what state my system is in at any point in time, but not distressingly so? And also not in a dissociative way like before. It's like, I'm able to feel all these bits of me flowing in and out of my consciousness and sense of identity and I lack any sort of solid definition of what this version of me wants to be or what my destination is. I'm just kinda going with the flow now instead of trying to steer us in any particular direction.

It's definitely a lot less stressful than it used to be and it feels like my brain has calmed down pretty significantly. It's less noisy in my head and I'm now realizing some of that was because there were parts of me who felt like they couldn't be heard before now don't feel the need to scream and bang on the walls to be noticed. And because we're less dissociated from each other, we can more immediately share thoughts and feelings instead of having to manually pass those things around to each other.

I've still got that ADHD buzz, but I'm now realizing the way I described it as being "50 trains of thoughts all at once" or "having 50 tabs open and all of them are playing different audio" no longer feels like it properly describes my experiences anymore. It's more like... I have a game running and that's the main thing I'm focusing on, but I also have a youtube video guide for something I'm trying to do in the game, while I'm also got notepad open to take notes, and another window open to crosscheck information. And maybe a couple random tabs open that are completely unrelated. Still got a lot of tabs and windows up, but they're more aligned to the same or similar purpose.

I do still have the different parts and alters and we still have new (as in unknown or undocumented) parts showing up pretty much daily, but they tend to get caught up to speed fairly quickly and even the ones who are very split off from the rest of the system don't feel as scary to handle (and feel less scared themselves) since we have such a strong support network and various other tools and resources at our disposal. I still feel like we're generally different and separate parts, but we also blend and fuse and influence each other in ways that feel a lot more fluid. Instead of having to purposefully communicate things with each other every time it's now a lot more instant and the hard barriers between each of us feel more and more arbitrary as the days go on. Kinda like looking at a map? Where you see the borders on the map, but at the end of the day you remove all of that and the landscape tells a different story and shows how all those "countries" are actually connected and one giant landmass. And those borders are still important to understand how they're there and why they exist, but it's not the whole story and can actually distract you from the bigger picture.

I dunno, I know I'm definitely in a transitional period of my healing and that's why things feel so vague and nebulous but I'm not complaining. If anything I'm pretty excited for what's to come.

[gatheringbones]

[“You might be thinking that we seem to be talking about people smuggling rather than people trafficking, and that those two things are different. People smuggling is when someone pays a smuggler to get them over a border: in UK law, human trafficking is when someone is transported for the purposes of forced labour or exploitation using force, fraud, or coercion. It’s tempting to think of these as separate things, but there is no bright line between them: they are two iterations of the same system.

Let’s break it down. It is common for people to take on huge debts to smugglers to cross a border. So far, so good: clearly smuggling. But once the journey begins, the person seeking to migrate finds that the debt has grown, or that the work they are expected to undertake upon arrival in order to pay off the debt is different from what was agreed. Suddenly, the situation has spiralled out of control and they find themselves trying to work off the debt, with little hope of ever earning enough to leave. Smuggling becomes trafficking. The discourse of trafficking largely fails to help people in this situation, because it paints them as kidnapped and enchained rather than as trying to migrate. It therefore seeks to ‘rescue’ them by blocking irregular migration routes and sending undocumented people home— often the very last thing trafficked people want. Although they might hate their exploitative workplace, their ideal option would be to stay in their destination country in a different job or with better workplace conditions; an acceptable option would be to stay in the country under the current, shit working conditions, but the very worst option would be to be sent home with their debt still unpaid.

By viewing trafficking as conceptually akin to kidnap, anti-trafficking activists, NGOs, and governments can sidestep broader questions of safe migration. If the trafficked person is brought across borders unwillingly, there is no need to think about the people who will attempt this migration regardless of its illegality or conclude that the way to make people safer is to offer them legal migration routes. People smuggling tends to happen to less vulnerable migrants: those who have the cash to pay a smuggler upfront or have a family or community already settled in the destination country. People trafficking tends to happen to more vulnerable migrants: those who must take on a debt to the smuggler to travel and who have no community connections in their destination country. Both want to travel, however, and this is what anti-trafficking conversations largely obscure with their talk about kidnap and chains.

Our position is that no human being is ‘illegal’. People should have the right to travel and to cross borders, and to live and work where they wish. As we wrote in the introduction, border controls are a relatively new invention – they emerged towards the end of the nineteenth century as part of colonial logics of racial domination and exclusion. (ICE, the brutal American immigration enforcement police, was only created in its modern form in 2003; the previous iteration of it is as recent as the 1930s, an agency called Immigration and Naturalization Services.) The mass migrations of the twenty-first century are driven by human-made catastrophes – climate change, poverty, war – and reproduce the glaring inequalities from which they emerge. Countries in the global north bear hugely disproportionate responsibility for climate change, yet disproportionately close their doors to people fleeing the effects of climate choas, leaving desperate families to sleep under canvas amid snow at the edges of Fortress Europe. As migrant-rights organiser Harsha Walia writes, ‘While history is marked by the hybridity of human societies and the desire for movement, the reality of most of migration today reveals the unequal relations between rich and poor, between North and South, between whiteness and its others.’

A system where everybody could migrate, live, and work legally and in safety would not be a huge, radical departure; it would simply take seriously the reality that people are already migrating and working, and that as a society we should prioritise their safety and rights. Some journalists and policymakers argue that migration brings down wages. However, the current system, wherein undocumented people cannot assert their labour rights and as a result are hugely vulnerable to workplace exploitation, brings down wages by ensuring that there is a group of workers who bosses can underpay or otherwise exploit with impunity. Low wages and workplace exploitation are tackled through worker organising and labour law – not through attempting to limit migration, which produces undocumented workers who have no labour rights.

However, instead of starting from the premise of valuing human life, the countries of the global north enact harsh immigration laws that make it hard for people from global south countries to migrate. You don’t stop people wanting or needing to migrate by making it illegal for them to do so, you just make it more dangerous and difficult, and leave them more vulnerable to exploitation. Punitive laws may dissuade some from making the journey, but they guarantee that everyone who does travel is doing so in the worst possible conditions. Spending billions of dollars on policing borders actively makes this worse, without addressing the reasons people might want to migrate – notably, gross inequality between nations, which in large part is a legacy of colonial – and contemporary – plunder and imperialist violence.”]

molly smith, juno mac, from revolting prostitutes: the fight for sex workers’ rights, 2018

[psychic-refugee]

Xavier Thorpe had always been interested in art. It had been his passion since he was young.

He dreamt of galaxies and spaceships, of a man with flowers and tall aliens who graciously accepted them.

His art was world renowned in the sci-fi world. He was commissioned to do cover art for novels and made a tidy living from concept art for blockbuster films.

He had his own art studio in SoHo that was a popular destination when the Star Trek convention and other like events were in town.

Lately, he had dreamt of a woman with dark hair and agate eyes. He painted her over and over again, unlike anything he had ever done before. Those paintings were in his private collection, and none had ever seen them.

Unbeknownst to him, his studio got repeat visitors from a pair that always wore crisp black suits. The studio manager always politely asked them if they were interested in purchasing a piece, but they always said no.

It didn’t occur to the manager that it was odd that he never remembered them, even when they visited nearly every day for the past several weeks. They were always so discreet and nothing about them had ever stuck in his mind.

“Well, that’s definitely a Betazoid,” Agent A commented as he studied the painting.

“It’s not just a Betazoid, it’s Reittan Grax,” Agent W specified quietly, “And it’s a far more flattering portrait than he deserves.”

Agent A simply laughed, he knew his partner was one to hold grudges and the biennial Betazoid Trade Agreement Conference being held on Earth was a headache for the Organization globally.

As they studied all the art on display, they also took note of Bolians, Mizarians, and Zakdorns.

They had all the public and non-public records of Xavier Thorpe. From all their research, he was as human as they came.

The question was, how was he painting aliens that were not known to humans? At first their boss, Agent L had suspected an undocumented alien merely capitalizing on actual alien likenesses in order to make Earth money and a life for themselves. But Xavier Thorpe had all the proper records and history, even their most prolific forger would have a hard time mimicking a human life so well.

They were sent to investigate and had lucked out that day as Xavier needed to consult with his manager about his next showing.

Xavier was left speechless when he literally met the woman of his dreams.

Agent W and Agent A were suspicious when it looked like Xavier recognized Agent W, which should have been impossible.

They did their usual protocol when they introduced themselves by implying they were government agents, their badges held no actual seal of any U.S. government agency, but most of the human population was never that observant.

Xavier had been nervous, but he answered their questions honestly. His answers all matched up to his paperwork and they each discreetly performed tests with their advanced technology.

Xavier Thorpe was human and of Earth, there was no denying that.

“Thank you for answering our questions,” Agent W started to wrap it up, they would need to head back to HQ to debrief Agent L and get guidance of what to do next. She took out a silver cylindrical tube, ignoring Xavier’s confused look.

She set the time and date for him to forget, and with a quick flash, she started to do her normal spiel,

“You never saw…” her words died on her lips when Xavier simply looked confused rather than dazed.

“What did you just flash me with?” the flash wasn’t painful, nor did he have any idea why she did it, but he could have been epileptic for all she knew. It was just rude and dangerous.

Agent A frowned at the neuralyzer, wondering if it was broken. It had never happened before to his knowledge, but he wasn’t sure what else to think.

She flashed him again, and again Xavier was not affected by the device. In fact, he got annoyed and smacked it out of her hand.

She frowned at him and he frowned right back at her,

“You’re gonna give me a seizure or something,” he griped.

Xavier also wasn’t entrenched in the sci-fi fandom for nothing, so he put together the two nameless agents in sunglasses while indoors and the weird doohickey they flashed in his face.

“Is it safe to say that you guys are part of some shadow government?”

Both agents sighed deeply, and Agent A rolled his eyes.

The Men in Black were a known secret amongst the sci-fi nerds, and they wondered if others were immune to the neuralyzer and that’s how they ended up on Reddit all the time.

Xavier brought them back to his apartment and showed them the paintings of Agent W.

They were beautiful and well done, and Agent W almost shed a tear for they were snapshots of her past life, before she became an Agent.

When she had a family and a dream to become a writer.

They took him to MiB headquarters and Xavier was amazed that so much was hidden under their very noses. He had passed the HQ building several times and never would have thought it held a secret government agency.

They ran some tests and Agent L explained,

“Xavier, you are the rare human that has psychic ability. It’s why you dream of aliens that have visited our planet and why the neuralyzer does not work on you. Normally we would make you disappear, put you in a sort of exile to preserve the secret of alien life and protect Earth. However, with your abilities, I believe you would be ideal for our special unit.”

“Special unit?” Xavier took it all in stride, he thinks he always believed there might be some truth to his dreams.

“Yes, it’s not just extra-terrestrials we deal with. It’s a secret even to most of our most senior agents. Most of the time, it’s more than enough to know aliens exist. If they also knew the supernatural existed as well…well some have had to retire early,” was all she would say.

Xavier considered his options. He certainly didn’t want to go into exile, and he wasn’t particularly close with anyone. He hadn’t even spoken to his father in years, and he didn’t have any close friends.

He could only think of Agent W, and the dreams of them together. He felt he was where he was meant to be.

So, he accepted Agent L’s offer. He traded in his paintbrushes for his own neuralyzer, and his paint splattered camo pants for a bespoke black suit.

You will not stand out in any way. Your entire image is crafted to leave no lasting memory with anyone you encounter. You’re a rumor, recognizable only as deja vu, and dismissed just as quickly. You don’t exist. You were never even born. Anonymity is your name. Silence, your native tongue. You are no longer part of the system. You are above the system. Over it. Beyond it. We’re “them.” We’re “they.” In the absence of light, darkness prevails. We stand against the vampires, the demons, and the forces of darkness; to stop the spread of their evil and the swell of their numbers.

The words of Agent L echo in his mind as he puts on the suit.

There are things that go bump in the night…we are what bump back.

He developed his psychic abilities under the guidance of Agent L. He was glad to see that Agent W and Agent A were given promotions and assigned to his unit.

“Welcome,” Agent L began, “Our unit is a secret within a secret. We are the Outcasts. This is our newest agent, Agent X.”

Agent W nodded respectfully, but from the heated way she eyed him up and down, rather liking him in a black suit, Xavier, now Agent X, knew his dreams would be coming true sooner rather than later.

[eatmangoesnekkid]

Bellydance Week 7 v.2

Someone I know texted me saying that she thought she saw me biking in the rain on a busy street while undulating my spine and gyrating my shoulders and hips underneath my coat. Was that you?

"Yes it was me, Mama."

I left out a little later than usual hoping that the rain would ease up. It never did. In fact, it was raining so hard by the time I got on my bike that I couldn't see what was right in front of me. Eyes half-closed, I kept pedaling away. It was cold AF. It was rainy AF.. The weather was just....shitty AF. I could have opted out of not going today, blamed it on the weather, and just laid back in the warm bed. It would have made sense and been understood. But I won't melt and I'm no coward, so off I go on my 22 minute bike riding journey in less-than-ideal circumstances. "I'm going to make this bike ride feel good," I thought to myself.

I'm a magical woman, a lover archetype, and a real alchemist. And I understand the assignment of consciousness-how what we do today or how our perceptions today impacts our future to come. With that understanding, I tinker with my body --guide it into believing that I'm in an ideal experience-feeling warmth and lighthearted energy flow through my body, shimmying my shoulders, arching my spine, moving my hips on my bike seat. It all feels so good and what could have been an awful ride in cold rain with me lamenting like on how cold it was turned into me smiling at what was. By the time I got to the studio, my jacket was soaked. My pants were soaked. My scarf was soaked. My face was soaked. And yet my heart was soaked open as part of the wide rainy sky as I kept biking, undulating, and smiling to my destination.

I know that this biking moment in cold rain is actually full of warmth, mystery, and goodness. It is quiet undocumented moments like this that nobody but you ever see that makes a great dancer, artist, writer, teacher, musician, or lover. It is part of the practice.

That's why I don't understand women who resort to being jealous or insecure of other women who put in that work, the spirit, the time to get to their next level. Body goals. Health goals. Flexibility goals. Life goals. Creative goals. Project goals. Abundance goals. Relationship (s) goals. How are you going to be jealous of a woman who will bike in cold ass rain drenched in stained clothes while dancing to the sounds of rainfall without complaint?

I intimately know what it is like to run away from or numb one’s real power. And I know what it is like to stand fully in it again.

Jealousy is a very real and truthful human emotion, and one of the greatest shadows in the female lineage. If you don't alchemise jealousy, this vital life force will burn you in other ways. I have been on both sides of jealousy much of my life, but over the last decade or so, it is not an emotion I personally lean into. If nothing else, I know that it is possible to graduate beyond certain emotions, where the use of them becomes less and less to non-existent.

And the greatest truth is that resilience is built in the hard, unpretty, difficult moments. When life gets undeniably tough in less-than-ideal circumstances, I say quietly to my self "make love to it, Indy....get all that juice and shit out of it!" Sure, biking in warmer sunny weather would be so nice, but it is not what's happening for me right now. And somehow not merely accepting that reality, but drinking the juice from it, gives my body provisional strength and softness. It is this moment that plants a new seed that demonstrate that I'm serious and ready for that next level. --India Ame'ye, Author

[meret118]

He is promising to deploy the military and deputize local police officers to round up millions of people, detain them in makeshift camps and then ship them off to other countries ― whether or not the destination is the person’s country of origin.

. . .

79% of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. have been living and participating in American communities for more than 15 years. They have married U.S. citizens, hold jobs that prop up their local and national economies and have children and grandchildren who are citizens. Ripping these people out of the country and away from their families will ripple through every community in the country.

. . .

This plan to tear communities apart will also ensnare U.S. citizens, green card holders and others here legally, either by accident or with intent. Trump and his advisers are already saying that’s what they’ll do.

Tom Homan, Trump’s former acting head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was asked in a “60 Minutes” interview that aired Sunday whether there is a way that Trump’s mass deportation plan could remove undocumented people without separating them from their families.“Of course there is,” Homan said. “Families can be deported together.”

There are currently 4.7 million mixed-status households in the U.S., according to the Center for Migration Studies. Among those households are 5.5 million U.S.-born children living with one undocumented household member and 1.8 million U.S.-born children living with two undocumented adults. In total, there are 9.7 million Americans who live in households with at least one undocumented resident.

Trump’s inspiration for his mass deportation program, President Dwight Eisenhower’s Operation Wetback, similarly resulted in the deportation of significant numbers of U.S. citizens to Mexico.

But none of those programs was of the scale or scope that Trump imagines. There are an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S., according to the 2022 American Community Survey. Other surveys and estimates have found similar numbers. But Trump and his allies talk about deporting 20 million to 30 million people. There is no source for such a number. That would invariably mean targeting people with some kind of legal status, whether temporary or permanent.

“They seem to be gleefully suggesting that they would include people here with some legal status in these roundups,” said Matthew Lisieki, a senior research and policy analyst at the Center for Migration Studies, a think tank that focuses on global migration.

A deportation program that removes 11 million people or even more than 20 million would affect every single community in the country, invariably sweeping up even larger numbers of U.S. citizens and legal residents, taking them away from their families and putting them into jails, incarceration camps and, potentially, off to another country. As Homan’s answer on “60 Minutes” indicates, that’s a feature, not a bug.

[portalwalker]

Out in the Oregon woods, in a clearing just outside a small town, sat a larger-than-it-should-be wood cabin with a cursed sign on the roof -- no matter how many times it was fixed, "Mystery Shack" always turned into "Mystery Hack," which mostly amused the tourists who drove through every summer on road trips up and down the coast.

The tourist season was coming to an end as autumn approached, though, which meant that the people who lived in the large cabin could get to other business.

One of these inhabitants was sitting on the back porch with a brick of a laptop in her lap, one hand on her chin as she scrolled through something on the screen with her other hand. If it wasn't for the shift of energy that accompanied a portal opening, she might not have noticed the arrival of a familiar guest.

(( @white-fire-the-dragon ))

[lmenvs3000f24]

BLOG 4

To begin, I would like to dissect a quote which directly relates theories of interpretivism to The Gift of Beauty from the textbook. “Interpretation should instill in people the ability, and the desire, to sense the beauty in their surroundings -- to provide spiritual uplift and to encourage resource preservation." To me, this piece of text targets the actions which should be invoked through nature interpretation, including the heightened desire and drive to interact with natural beauty, holding our spirits high and engaging in conservation and preservation. Art in nature can take many different forms and is relative to different people with different backgrounds. Whether natural art embody a photograph, a painting, a technical skill like fly fishing, a natural phenomenon or something else, it will be perceived emotionally as well as intellectually from an audience. All the various art forms relating to nature are destined to help tell a story and provide a snapshot piece of insight into that setting, or that adventure.

A natural art form which relates to me is nature photography. From the time I was a young boy, I have been on an everlasting nature adventure, spending all my free time hiking rivers with my centrepin, catching snakes, mountain biking and kayak camping. Over the course of these countless adventures, there are too many amazing moments which go by undocumented, this is where our cellphones come into play! Within the last five years, my friend group has developed and as we get older, the trips become more magical and the more I feel the need to photograph them. I purchased a decent digital camera with a strong optical zoom feature and went straight to work. Nowadays, after wrapping up a fishing or camping trip, I have twenty to fifty saved memories which can never be forgotten. Not only have these photos added an artistic element to my time outdoors, but it has allowed me to take my story telling a next level and provide physical evidence of the topic at hand. Displaying fishing photo to people who are interested fosters a bonding experience where stories are shared, and natural interpretation is occurring on another level.

The beauty intrinsic within natural art can be used as a sort of hook for the outside audience to get involved and engaged with nature themselves. Art provides an alternative way for one to feel the effects of nature without existing within it. Aswell as it provides the individual creating the art, an outlet to demonstrate one’s true feelings and passion towards the outdoors.

In contrast to the art which has been a focus of my blog thus far, I would briefly like to draw a connection between nature and interpretive theatre. Theatrical productions can provide audience with a meaningful and memorable story which highlights a unique view. I remember as a student in elementary school, our class would visit the Backus Conservation Area in Long Point, Ontario to learn about local wildlife and pioneer life as this was a prominent area for pioneer settlement. The conservation area put on demonstrations where student employees would dress up as pioneers and act out or describe various aspects of their lives. This created a different form of interpretation and m ay have communicated information better to certain people of certain learning styles. Art is intertwined within nature interpretation through numerous routes and can help foster deeper understanding and engagement.

Liam McFadden

[laptoparmageddon]

I got this sketchbook for Christmas

Even though I'm primarily a digital artist, whenever my mom tells people I'm an artist they can't help but get me art supplies. Despite me having very little use for them and typically saving them to teach my brothers how to draw during blackouts, I don't complain. These things tend to be expensive but I just have too many.

So, I've decided to do something with this one. Since I'm unable to create my beloved game, Danger Trope, I'll will draw concept art in this book. Every time I wish it was real, I will add more and more of my undocumented thoughts.

The storyboards for the cut scenes I've been avoiding. The many character interactions in my head. Maps and monster designs. They will pile and pile within this book.

And if... if I'm ever able to make Danger Trope real. I will auction off this sketch book and use all the money for charity.

Though, my dream is only a dream. And it's very likely no one but myself will ever see the contents inside this book. There'd be no point without the context of the game anyway.

To the future, and my already destined failure.

[rockislandadultreads]

Book Club Recommendations: Immigrant Experiences

Of Women and Salt by Gabriela Garcia

In present-day Miami, Jeanette is battling addiction. Daughter of Carmen, a Cuban immigrant, she is determined to learn more about her family history from her reticent mother and makes the snap decision to take in the daughter of a neighbor detained by ICE. Carmen, still wrestling with the trauma of displacement, must process her difficult relationship with her own mother while trying to raise a wayward Jeanette. Steadfast in her quest for understanding, Jeanette travels to Cuba to see her grandmother and reckon with secrets from the past destined to erupt.

From 19th-century cigar factories to present-day detention centers, from Cuba to Mexico, Gabriela Garcia's Of Women and Salt is a kaleidoscopic portrait of betrayals—personal and political, self-inflicted and those done by others—that have shaped the lives of these extraordinary women. A haunting meditation on the choices of mothers, the legacy of the memories they carry, and the tenacity of women who choose to tell their stories despite those who wish to silence them, this is more than a diaspora story; it is a story of America’s most tangled, honest, human roots.

Ties That Tether by Jane Igharo

At twelve years old, Azere promised her dying father she would marry a Nigerian man and preserve her culture even after emigrating to Canada. Her mother has been vigilant about helping--forcing--her to stay well within the Nigerian dating pool ever since. But when another match-made-by-mom goes wrong, Azere ends up at a bar, enjoying the company and later sharing the bed of Rafael Castellano, a man who is tall, handsome, and white.

When their one-night stand unexpectedly evolves into something serious, Azere is caught between her growing feelings for Rafael and the compulsive need to please her mother who will never accept a relationship that threatens to dilute Azere's Nigerian heritage.

Azere can't help wondering if loving Rafael makes her any less of a Nigerian. Can she be with him without compromising her identity? The answer will either cause Azere to be audacious and fight for her happiness or continue as the compliant daughter.

Afterlife by Julia Alvarez

Antonia Vega, the immigrant writer at the center of Afterlife, has had the rug pulled out from under her. She has just retired from the college where she taught English when her beloved husband, Sam, suddenly dies. And then more jolts: her bighearted but unstable sister disappears, and Antonia returns home one evening to find a pregnant, undocumented teenager on her doorstep. Antonia has always sought direction in the literature she loves—lines from her favorite authors play in her head like a soundtrack—but now she finds that the world demands more of her than words.

Afterlife is a compact, nimble, and sharply droll novel. Set in this political moment of tribalism and distrust, it asks: What do we owe those in crisis in our families, including—maybe especially—members of our human family? How do we live in a broken world without losing faith in one another or ourselves? And how do we stay true to those glorious souls we have lost?

Nuclear Family by Joseph Han

Things are looking up for Mr. and Mrs. Cho. Their dream of franchising their Korean plate lunch restaurants across Hawaiʻi seems within reach after a visit from Guy Fieri boosts the profile of Cho's Delicatessen. Their daughter, Grace, is busy finishing her senior year of college and working for her parents, while her older brother, Jacob, just moved to Seoul to teach English. But when a viral video shows Jacob trying—and failing—to cross the Korean demilitarized zone, nothing can protect the family from suspicion and the restaurant from waning sales.

No one knows that Jacob has been possessed by the ghost of his lost grandfather, who feverishly wishes to cross the divide and find the family he left behind in the north. As Jacob is detained by the South Korean government, Mr. and Mrs. Cho fear their son won't ever be able to return home, and Grace gets more and more stoned as she negotiates her family's undoing. Struggling with what they don't know about themselves and one another, the Chos must confront the separations that have endured in their family for decades.

Set in the months leading up to the 2018 false missile alert in Hawaiʻi, Joseph Han's profoundly funny and strikingly beautiful debut novel is an offering that aches with histories inherited and reunions missed, asking how we heal in the face of what we forget and who we remember.

[atlantagaimmigrationlawyer]

Immigration Reform in Atlanta, GA: A Critical Issue for the City’s Future

Atlanta, Georgia, a vibrant and growing metropolitan hub, has long been a destination for immigrants seeking new opportunities in the United States. As one of the largest cities in the southeastern U.S., it boasts a diverse population that includes individuals from various cultural backgrounds. However, as immigration continues to shape the city's demographics, calls for comprehensive immigration reform have gained momentum, particularly in light of economic, social, and political challenges. This article explores the importance of immigration reform in Atlanta, focusing on its impact on the local economy, community, and the broader implications for Georgia.

Economic Impact of Immigration in Atlanta

Immigrants play a vital role in Atlanta’s economy. According to the American Immigration Council, immigrants make up a significant portion of the workforce in Georgia, particularly in sectors such as construction, agriculture, hospitality, and healthcare. In Atlanta itself, immigrants contribute not only as workers but also as entrepreneurs, with many opening small businesses that help drive economic growth and create jobs. In fact, immigrants are more likely to start their own businesses than native-born citizens, contributing to the city’s entrepreneurial spirit.

Despite this, Atlanta’s immigrant community faces numerous challenges due to the lack of comprehensive immigration reform at the federal level. Without a clear and fair path to legal status, many immigrants live in the shadows, unable to fully contribute to society or access basic services like healthcare or education. This creates an environment of economic instability, with individuals fearing deportation or exploitation by unscrupulous employers. Reforming immigration policies would provide these workers with the security they need to continue contributing to the local economy.

Social and Cultural Contributions

Immigrants in Atlanta have enriched the city’s cultural landscape. The diversity of languages, foods, and traditions has transformed neighborhoods and businesses across the metro area, with many immigrants settling in historically underserved parts of the city. Areas like Buford Highway have become known for their vibrant international markets, restaurants, and cultural institutions, making Atlanta a more dynamic and attractive place to live and work.

However, despite these cultural contributions, immigrants in Atlanta often face discrimination and barriers to integration. Without immigration reform, many are denied opportunities for upward mobility, education, and full participation in society. Providing a pathway to citizenship would allow immigrants to fully engage in civic life, strengthening the social fabric of the city and fostering greater understanding and cooperation between different communities.

Political Landscape and Calls for Reform

Immigration reform has become a polarizing issue in Georgia’s political landscape. While the state has traditionally leaned conservative, there has been growing support for reform in urban areas like Atlanta, where the immigrant population is more prominent. Local leaders, community organizations, and immigrant advocates have called for changes that would provide a pathway to citizenship for undocumented individuals, offer protections for immigrant workers, and ensure that families can remain together without the constant threat of deportation.

The failure of federal lawmakers to pass significant immigration reform has led many to question the status quo. With Georgia’s large Latino and immigrant populations, including communities from Latin America, Asia, and Africa, local leaders are increasingly pushing for reform at the state level. However, achieving meaningful change requires not only political will but also a broader shift in public opinion to view immigrants as an integral part of the community.

Conclusion

Immigration reform in Atlanta is not just a policy issue; it’s a question of justice, opportunity, and community. As the city continues to grow and diversify, it is essential that local, state, and federal governments take action to address the challenges faced by immigrants. Comprehensive immigration reform would not only benefit the economy but also strengthen the social fabric of Atlanta, allowing it to thrive as a city that welcomes people from all walks of life. With a growing consensus among local leaders and advocacy groups, the hope is that Atlanta’s future will be one where immigrants are recognized for their contributions and given the opportunity to fully realize their potential.

[kammartinez]

The Museum of the Bible was originally destined to host a collection of around five thousand Egyptian antiquities, including some funerary masks, a couple of Fayyum portraits, and other burial-related items. After the surrender of the fragments pilfered from the Egypt Exploration Society and the restitution to Egypt, the Museum of the Bible has been left with only forty-three papyri, among which are the former Dayton Theological Seminary pieces sold by Obbink. Numbers tell a merciless, bare truth: 99.14 percent of the papyri acquired by the Green family and donated or destined to be donated to the museum was of undocumented, and in some cases certainly illegal, provenance. They were stolen from the Egypt Exploration Society collection or looted and illegally imported from Egypt at some point.

-- from Stolen Fragments: Black Markets, Bad Faith, and the Illicit Trade in Ancient Artefacts by Roberta Mazza