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General News Discussion Thread

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just to share my personal thoughts regarding racism (as an Indian-American who hangs out with mostly Asian-Americans):

Racism against Asian-Americans is not uncommon but I don't feel as severe as it is against Blacks, Latinos, or Muslims. I am certain this is due to class differences. Asian-American immigrants tend to be wealthy because those who have immigrated in recent years have been relatively well-off and educated compared to the rest from the home country. So the "model minority" stereotype exists, as most Asian-Americans that the average person meets will not have had to deal with generational poverty and suppression, or immigrating as a refugee from a war-torn country.

* I do realize this isn't a contest of who experiences the most racism. But Gato isn't off to be suspicious of those crying racism when the actions of China government are criticized. This is a known strategy and we should be wary of it. Recall prominent Jewish politicians crying racism when Israel is criticized for example
 
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There's a whole lot that could be said (and has been said) with varying degrees of sensitivity, but I feel it all boils down to:
Nationalism is a disease, authoritarianism and racism are the symptoms. Don't see why I can't dislike that behavior if it's coming from Chinese Leftists anymore than I fucking loathe it coming from the alt-right and Trump.
 
I've never gotten the "produce an alternative" argument whenever these false binaries are pointed out. I'm not a policy-maker or a diplomat who can pull the solutions to these problems out of a hat. Neither is the author of the article--perhaps it's exceedingly academic in that sense (if this is what you meant by corny then I take your point) since it doesn't necessarily contain much of a call to action beyond "be media literate," but yeah that's very much not the sum total of what I chose to take away from this.
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But like how can you make the claim that something is a 'false binary' in the first place without demonstrating viable alternatives to that? "Both sides being bad" is like, I can understand that position, but I think that in itself is not equivalent to "there must be some better way of doing this" unless the argument is that they are fundamentally the same?

The media literacy thing you talk about is really important and complicated to me. It's good to be media literate but it's also necessary to understand that nobody is immune to propaganda, and that the vast majority of the media in the west is anti-china/anti-communist. So I feel like you get a lot of people who think they're media literate, and legitimately try to be as careful and disciplined as they can, but they've been swimming in western propaganda for possibly their entire lives, and so they have big loud alarm bells go off when they see the rare stuff that's openly pro-china. Meanwhile they're internalizing tons of anti-china/anti-communist rhetoric without catching it because it's just way harder to have your sensors go off to something that you're submerged in.

I know this doesn't address your whole post, you're right that there's more to the article than just this though for sure.
 
Oglemi said:
So, unmarked police in Portland. Thoughts? Surprised it hasn't been mentioned here yet.

https://www.npr.org/2020/07/17/8922...arked-vehicles-to-grab-protesters-in-portland
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Very much some "then they came for x" vibes. Trump has announced plans to send troops to Oakland (Cuccinelli's casual mention of deploying this kind of program nationwide notwithstanding). He's also implied the existence of some kind of plan related to New York City. So assertions that this has been more of a practice operation for the administration seems clear.

“I’m gonna do something, that I can tell you. Because we are not gonna let New York, and Chicago, and Philadelphia, and Detroit, and Baltimore, and all of these – Oakland is a mess, we’re not gonna let this happen in our country. All run by the liberal democrats” (https://thehill.com/homenews/admini...s-he-will-send-federal-agents-to-major-cities)

For context: the guy in charge of federal troops in PDX, Chad Wolf (unilaterally appointed as 'Acting Secretary' of the DHS by Trump bypassing traditional confirmation hearings for a position as Undersecretary which are still underway), is also one of the people behind the family separation policies used by ICE under Nielsen in 2018. So understand that similar practices have been honed for the last couple of years (and even before that under Obama) by immigration officials--this is not some Republican war dog pulled out of the shadows, it's a very bipartisan legacy.

The takeaway from this stuff is that this kind of operation will be expanded, and it will be incredibly easy for the government to do so simply because they can utilize existing infrastructure built up around ICE and CBP (the latter's hypothetical jurisdiction already covers about 2/3rds of the American population - https://www.aclu.org/other/constitution-100-mile-border-zone ). It's an explicitly targeted gross abuse of power--the advantages of spreading federal control, violence, and paranoia in cities where people are protesting the status quo / with mayors and governors that oppose him are painfully obvious. Hopefully the suits against this delay it long enough for something to shift, but I very much doubt it.

e: to be clear,by "this kind of operation" I mean federal agents driving around in unmarked cars and vans with the ability to arrest basically anyone without stating a reason for arrest and detaining them for upwards of 20 hours without any outside contact. Not to mention the incredible violence being meted out by federal troops (an internal DHS memo mentioned that they do not have specific training in riot control or mass demonstrations). Perhaps you haven't seen the video of the Navy veteran being fucking WHALED on with a baton for standing still in front of some feds -
https://twitter.com/x/status/1284726088187310080
(TW for police violence ofc)

https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/dh-stacticalagent-memo1/d490e392eab7d7d6/full.pdf
https://int.nyt.com/data/documenttools/dh-stacticalagent-memo2/bcc35f3303958cac/full.pdf
DHS memos regarding feds.

e2: article on Chris David, the guy beaten by the feds in said vid: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...like-a-punching-bag-in-portland-idUSKCN24L2CP
 
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https://lawandcrime.com/high-profil...-mass-hysterectomies-at-ice-detention-center/

blatant eugenics going on in ICE concentration camps. believable and not surprising that this would happen given how immigrants have been systematically dehumanized, absolutely repulsive nonetheless. understand that these are the consequences of a long history of american exceptionalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy that has never been reckoned with politically and never will be within the confines of american "democracy". this is not some isolated event or (exclusively) part of the "trump phenomenon" but a logical consequence of all that the american empire is and all that it will be if radical political change is not achieved
 
termi said:
https://lawandcrime.com/high-profil...-mass-hysterectomies-at-ice-detention-center/

blatant eugenics going on in ICE concentration camps. believable and not surprising that this would happen given how immigrants have been systematically dehumanized, absolutely repulsive nonetheless. understand that these are the consequences of a long history of american exceptionalism, white supremacy, and patriarchy that has never been reckoned with politically and never will be within the confines of american "democracy". this is not some isolated event or (exclusively) part of the "trump phenomenon" but a logical consequence of all that the american empire is and all that it will be if radical political change is not achieved
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Given the history of the gynecologist in question, this looks more like standard Medicare/Medicaid fraud (with obviously reprehensible consequences for these women) than some kind of genocidal plot. Malpractice of this kind is pretty common in situations with poor/elderly/minority patients who often have no choice but to trust the fist and only doctor they consult, and could even be called a logical consequence of unaccountable government healthcare systems.
 
moonbound said:
Given the history of the gynecologist in question, this looks more like standard Medicare/Medicaid fraud (with obviously reprehensible consequences for these women) than some kind of genocidal plot. Malpractice of this kind is pretty common in situations with poor/elderly/minority patients who often have no choice but to trust the fist and only doctor they consult, and could even be called a logical consequence of unaccountable government healthcare systems.
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im not sure what your point is, i never mentioned a "genocidal plot" because genocidal practices already tend to happen in highly unequal societies without there being any sort of deliberate plot. a gynecologist who has been deemed guilty of malpractice or w/e (didnt read your legal document, next time you link me a boring source please give me a summary of its contents) being installed in an ICE facility obviously wouldn't have happened to begin with in a system that values the lives of nonwhite immigrants equally to those of white americans. if we add this case to the mountain of evidence that refugees in ICE camps are treated as less than human, it becomes apparent that even if nobody is presently plotting to start killing refugees off systematically, it is not unthinkable that such a thing could happen whenever "the situation calls for it"
 
I have done work related to program integrity for Medicare and Medicaid. Putting the genocidal stuff aside (lol) I’m furious that the government settled any suit against this doc. Had they actually been convicted on that False Claims Act case, they’d have ended up on the Do Not Pay list and not been able to be used for any government services such as these.

My understanding is that when a case like this is even brought it means the facts are a home run and they’re pretty guaranteed to get a conviction so any settlement annoys me.
 
https://www.npr.org/2020/09/18/1003...nsburg-champion-of-gender-equality-dies-at-87

let the
2701_1947_detail__26664.1577651753.jpg
of SCOTUS begin
 
p grim news tonight with the barrett confirmation. but a little while ago i promised myself to respond to setbacks with action, not despair. which is why i have just taken out what theyre calling a "blood mortgage" to donate to nancy pelosi's reelection and speakership campaign. i didnt really read the fine print on the contract before i signed it, but i would like to thank thiel capital for the opportunity to contribute 50,000 to strong women and to make our majority work!
 
Well, this is certainly one of the most blatant displays of corporate greed from the music industry that I've seen in a while.

It's oldish news on an internet-scale, being ~5 days old, but it's been catching fire on YouTube all day...Thom Tillis is taking over $100k USD in PAC donations from music industry giants, while adding an amendment to a bill that would criminalize the use of copyrighted music on YouTube, Twitch and other streaming platforms. This article sums it up really well while listing the donations he's been taking. It's absurd. The biggest is $20k from Comcast, christ almighty.

So to summarize, this bill would get you done in for listening to Kanye on Twitch (which banned the word simp btw, sad). Maybe not put in jail, but it's being criminalized, so uh...yeah. Bad things will happen. Legal things. The worst part? He wants this passed in days, and Amazon, which owns Twitch, hasn't even commented.

If you don't want to read the article, here's a screenshot of his more...large donations.
1608174009706.png


I did a quick search into this senator's history, as this kind of stuff usually doesn't go unnoticed...but holy shit, his corruption is beyond the pale. This guy is absolutely in bed with the tech industry, with him going on record opposing net neutrality as well. He co-sponsored the bill that would end it, as well as signed a bill that allowed internet companies to sell your information without permission. He's also gone after the Internet Archive on the grounds of copyright law, which certainly matches with his playbook considering what he's doing now. He's done a lot worse outside of this, like being pretty damn anti-LGBT, and spent your tax dollars on trying to criminalize same-sex marriage. This is the least of it, he received $4.4mil from the NRA during his 2014 senate campaign and proceeded to do a lot of weird shit with laws, then after the Orlando Shooting, voted to increase background checks for guns but opposed a ban on terrorists taking guns, as if to maximize profits for the gun businesses. He's actually scum of the earth.

YouTube Lawyer Ian Corzine did a nice review of this;
He says to donate to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an internet freedom organization. There is a record of their legal cases here.

Gonna take the opportunity to plug my man Mutahar too;

I highly doubt this will actually pass, but considering the US's history of injustices against internet freedom, and how it typically ends up affecting other countries due to its own monopoly, better safe than sorry.

United States hold politicians accountable for corruption challenge
 
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This could just be localized or otherwise coincidental, and I haven't seen anything from news sources, BUT just as an fyi I know of at least 2 people + my boyfriend whose PSN was hacked this morning/weekend. If you have a CC on your PSN I would disable it and update your passwords, there may have been another leak/exploit found over the past week/month with the launch of the ps5.
 
So it's been a couple of days since Brexit happened, and already, there are quite a few issues! Who woulda thought, eh?

Apparently there's been issues with haulage already, due to paperwork and the like being completely disorganized. The interesting thing I want to look at though is that British residents of Spain have had issues flying back. They were told their residency papers (specifically the NIE/green cert, it seems) were no longer valid, contrary to travel advice provided and confirmations from both the UK and Spain themselves. Apparently, there are some people whose paperwork is no longer sufficient as well, as said here.

Some tweets from people with the issue;
https://twitter.com/x/status/1345348038458552321
https://twitter.com/x/status/1345429105995616261
https://twitter.com/x/status/1345478703871111169
https://twitter.com/x/status/1345497633952059393

There seems to be more to the story, but it's the gist. Official sources are saying this shouldn't be happening, at least.
 
The riots/protests/storming of the US Capitol building today is not good, no matter how you look at it. I'm not going to post any links or anything because it's been all over the news, and it would be a feat of humankind for someone to say that it didn't happen. Sadly, one person died, and pretty much the US was humiliated, but at least the election process will continue for now. Also I heard that Donald Trump got suspended from Twitter for 12 hours, which is kinda funny. Anyways, everyone stay safe out there, whether it's from Coronavirus, Political violence, Racial violence, or just unhealthy stress.
 
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