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International Events VIII: Been living under a rock so long


TheLastWolf

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Thousands of Cubans are leaving Cuba every week -- going mostly to Mexico -- to escape the government and Russia -- and the horrific conditions of a state w/o any money or revenue to provide even the most minimal of services. The state has clamped down really hard on any news out of Ukraine other than rah rah rah Russia, while the Cubans, by-and-large, support Ukraine's struggle. People are doing very imaginative brilliant manuevers to get news and get news out of Cuba. though the state has choked off the internet.

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Big Boat Big Stuck, Again
A year after the Ever Given blocked the Suez Canal and upended global commerce, one of its cousins—the Ever Forward—is aground in the Chesapeake Bay.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/03/ever-forward-chesapeake-bay-boat-shipping-supply-chain.html

Nobody knows what or how or why this happened.

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.... In the first two months of 2022 alone, nearly 30,000 Cubans attempted to enter the United States, most of them through Mexico. Data from prior months shows an average of between one and two thousand a month.

Some are escaping Cuba’s economic crisis, as shortages have led to mass hunger, and the Cuban peso has effectively lost half its value in the past two months. ....

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/24/cubans-exile-political-crackdown-mexico-migrants

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Hate has been exploding all over the globe. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/03/29/india-movie-kashmir-files-screams-go-to-pakistan/

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The collective conscience of India is being altered beyond repair with hatred so potent that it even consumes the seemingly most unlikely people — such as the elderly man who arrived in a wheelchair to the theater to watch “The Kashmir Files.”


Two weeks ago, I gathered the courage to go watch the film against the advice of family and friends. “The Kashmir Files,” which portrays the exodus in the 1990s of Kashmiri Pandits, a minority Hindu community, has triggered anti-Muslim hate chants in theaters across India. As soon as I entered the theater in Mumbai, the audience broke into cries of “Bharat Mata ki jai” (Glory to India), a nationalist chant that has been repeatedly weaponized against Muslims. The man in the wheelchair soon joined the chants of “Sab mulle aatankwaadi” (Muslims are terrorists).

I left before the movie even began. I tried again the next day. A group of teenagers sitting in the front row soon began chanting “Bharat Mata ki jai.” I was seated in the fourth row, between an expectant mother and an elderly man who spoke proudly of how history in India was being redeemed under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The film began, and within 20 minutes there were disturbing scenes of Muslims lusting after Hindu women and a Muslim neighbor betraying his Hindu friend to support terrorism. There were scenes of Muslim kids flaunting Kalashnikovs and insulting Hindu deities. At one point in the movie, a Muslim militant tells a Kashmiri Hindu who wore attire depicting a Hindu god that only those chanting “Allahu akbar” will be allowed to flourish in Kashmir.

That’s when the audience started chanting “Jai Shri Ram” (Glory to Lord Ram). The teens in the front row whistled and started clapping at the slogans. Scenes of Muslims in skullcaps brutally murdering Hindus drew painful gasps from the audience.

The expectant mother seated next to me turned to her husband: “These Muslims are born bastards.” Unable to take the hate, I informed them that I am a Muslim and the language they were using was hate speech against my community. “Hate is what your religion teaches, not ours,” the woman responded. Others seated near us started cheering her statement, and I left the theater, just 30 minutes into the movie, feeling humiliated and physically unsafe. A man yelled at me “Ja Pakistan!” (Go to Pakistan). ...

 

Yet ... I shamefully, miserably feel that the US has led the way for this contemporary era of mad ethnic, spiritual and gender hatreds nurtured by so many, for personal>political>power, because we've never put racism in its place -- behind us.

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9 minutes ago, Zorral said:

Hate has been exploding all over the globe. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/03/29/india-movie-kashmir-files-screams-go-to-pakistan/

Yet ... I shamefully, miserably feel that the US has led the way for this contemporary era of mad ethnic, spiritual and gender hatreds nurtured by so many, for personal>political>power, because we've never put racism in its place -- behind us.

Tendency for Americans to think everything is to do with them is very high.

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2 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Tendency for Americans to think everything is to do with them is very high.

India and Pakistan have plenty of hate for each other without our involvement.  It doesn’t make jingoistic nationalism in the US any more comforting or less problematic.

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7 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

India and Pakistan have plenty of hate for each other without our involvement.  It doesn’t make jingoistic nationalism in the US any more comforting or less problematic.

Empires fall and expanding civilizations compete. Tale as old as time.

I went through my years of hating what he USA has become but I realize now it is the last, best hope for Western ideals to prevail. USA is still ground zero for the world, make no mistake.

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Well, if those of other nations prefer to take umbrage at the courtesy and fair-mindedness proffered by not shaming/blaming/calling out others for crimes some of us know our own nations have committed -- particularly committing right now by the unveiled racism one of the parties expresses nonstop every minute of every day --  in favor then, of giving credit for fostering and nurturing hate as political forces to themselves -- go right ahead. 

As mentioned, everybody's hands are bloody up to the armpits and into their hearts, particularly the UK, which is so bloody it has stolen, hidden and destroyed evidence.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/04/04/the-british-empire-was-much-worse-than-you-realize-caroline-elkinss-legacy-of-violence 

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/29/books/review/caroline-elkins-legacy-of-violence.html

https://www.libraryjournal.com/review/legacy-of-violence-a-history-of-the-british-empire-2134257

resist expressing\ umbrage even at the courtesy proffered at not shaming/blaming/calling out others for crimes some of us know our own nations have committed as well. 

resist expressing\ umbrage even at the courtesy proffered at not shaming/blaming/calling out others for crimes some of us know our own nations have committed as well. 

Continue with the umbrage. As They Say, "where angels fear to tread." 

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21 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Your laughing emoticon response to Zorral above.  Was that unintentional?

That's the vehicle to express disrespect and immaturity. 

*Without engaging or eliciting a response.

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3 hours ago, Week said:

That's the vehicle to express disrespect and immaturity. 

*Without engaging or eliciting a response.

Thugs, fools and cowards learn nothing, whether from books, from history or experience.  Thus it is neither bizarre nor baffling, their declarations of resentment at being persistently baffled, thus declaring what they don't know doesn't exist.

They will laugh hard and despise someone who responds to a long discussion of cricket with, "This is gibberish," because obvs, the person hearing/readng gibberish doesn't know anything about cricket, yet cricket and the language obvs exist. 

Ya, there are so many of them, and so relentless and so old and tired, we smell troll tactics where they appear. Sad. Or :rofl:  You decide!

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Sri Lanka is in an economic crisis. Here's what it's like for people on the ground

https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/02/asia/sri-lanka-economic-crisis-protests-intl-hnk-dst/index.html

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For weeks, Sri Lanka has been battling its worst economic crisis since the island nation gained independence in 1948, leaving food, fuel, gas and medicine in short supply, and sending the cost of basic goods skyrocketing.


Shops have been forced to close because they can't run fridges, air conditioners or fans, and soldiers are stationed at gas stations to calm customers, who line-up for hours in the searing heat to fill their tanks. Some people have even died waiting.
But Thursday night marked an escalation in Sri Lanka's ongoing economic crisis.


Following the protests, the police imposed a curfew and the President ordered a nationwide public emergency, giving authorities powers to detain people without a warrant. On Saturday evening, Sri Lanka declared a nationwide 36-hour curfew, effectively barring protests planned on Sunday -- but protests went ahead Saturday anyway.

 

 

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