#and the people who threaten violence/murder if *their* free speech is violated

[secularprolifeconspectus]

Why Anti-Abortion isn't Fascist (& How Pro-Abortion Is)

I think many people conflate "fascism" and "fascists" with "oppression" and "oppressors". You don't have to be fascist to be an oppressor, but fascism is inherently oppressive.

I refer to the definition provided by Robert Paxton of fascism, "a particular set of tactics to seize power".

Now, how do the anti-abortion and pro-abortion camps stack up? Let's start by defining their most basic positions:

Anti-abortion: All humans are people. It is murder to kill people, especially the dependent, who are powerless and captive, thus utterly at your mercy.

Pro-abortion: Some humans aren't people. It is slavery to force people to sustain other humans with their bodies and labor, especially non-people.

Neither of these stances on their own is intrinsically fascist, but they sure do make the opposing side look fascist. But here's the thing: according to Paxton, fascism isn't an ideology or a belief. Rather, fascism is a set of tactics.

Paxton identifies the following as fascist tactics:

Suppression of liberties

Incarceration of opponents

Prohibition of strikes

Unlimited police power

Military aggression

Fearmongering

Violence

Propaganda, promoting: rejection of rights and democracy, anti-socialism and nationalism, group exclusion and allegiance

In order to isolate abortion access alone as the fascist factor, with other variables controlled so as not to confound, we must compare two groups from the same side of the political spectrum. So, I am going to compare two left-wing groups for this exercise: Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising (PAAU) and NYC for Abortion Rights (NYCFAR).

See how each camp stacks up below the cut ↓

Pt. I: Tactics

Suppression of liberties

PAAU: allegedly suppresses freedom of religion by imposing their beliefs (but their rationale for fetal personhood is secular, not faith-based). Obstructs privacy by counseling patients and tresspassing.

NYCFAR: suppresses freedom of speech and press by calling for "no airtime for antis." Attempts to obstruct free exercise of assembly, protest, and religion every month by blocking Witness for Life.

Incarceration of Opponents

PAAU: openly anti-carceral. Opposes incarcerating anyone for complicity in abortion.

NYCFAR: members regularly express desire for opponents to be incarcerated and violated within prison.

Prohibition of Strikes

PAAU: supports unionization of the working class. Refuses to cross picket lines in solidarity.

NYCFAR: promotes Planned Parenthood despite their known union busting and worker abuses.

Unlimited Police Power

PAAU: believes in community defense. Minimizes contact with police. Lobbies against DOJ and FBI.

NYCFAR: members frequently call for the police to arrest Witness for Life leader Fr. Fidelis and to enforce illegitimate sanctions against Red Rose Rescue members that violate the Right to (be) Rescue(d).

Military Aggression

PAAU: while PAAU's activists may appear militant, they are committed to non-violence in principle and practice.

NYCFAR: some members participate in the aggressive guerilla militia of Jane's Revenge, which destroys property to intimidate and threaten escalation to violence.

Fearmongering

PAAU: the accusation that they fearmonger about later abortion is verifiably false and they can back up their claims with forensic evidence and data.

NYCFAR: fearmongers that abortion bans reduce access to ectopic pregnancy and miscarriage treatment, that people will be convicted or will die.

Violence

PAAU: holds that abortions are brutality, exploitation, excessive force, abuse of power, and violations of freedom from deliberate violence.

NYCFAR: many incidents of assault of pro-life activists, including sexually assaulting a priest and intentionally wounding a sidewalk counselor.

Propaganda, promoting:

Rejection of rights

PAAU: supposedly rejects right to bodily autonomy (yet supports access to contraception, gender-affirming care, and sterilization.)

NYCFAR: rejects the human right to life as inalienable, restricts freedom from deliberate violence to a privilege for the perfect and planned.

Rejection of democracy

PAAU: works within democracy to amass power, such as through lobbying and campaigning.

NYCFAR: advocates for legislative bypass of the Supreme Court and against checks and balances fundamental to constitutional democracy.

Anti-socialism

PAAU: embraces socialist and other economic left frameworks for addressing the material needs of parents, children, and families in crisis.

NYCFAR: protects a capitalist profits-over-people corporation and neoimperialist billion-dollar industrial complex that exploits the working class.

Nationalism

PAAU: as misfits both among pro-choice progressives and pro-life conservatives, doesn't identify with a particular nation or tribe.

NYCFAR: identification with the pro-choice "nation" and leftist "tribe"; disenfranchise preborn to gain socioeconomic power for the left.

Group exclusion

PAAU: policy is only exclusionary of individuals and groups who promote hate and use violence against others; all humans have human rights.

NYCFAR: excludes an entire class of humans from equal rights by claiming that they are clumps of cells and calls for their extermination.

Group allegiance

PAAU: unifies outcasts from the mainstream pro-life movement, members share principles from a diverse set of other social movements.

NYCFAR: allegiance to "sisterhood" and "the block"; gatekeeps feminism and socialism as belonging solely to the pro-choice movement.

Pt. II: Principles

Paxton defines a single core principle to fascism: gain power by any means necessary. His contemporary, Burley asserts that "Fascism promotes the concept of innate inequality and inescapable social hierarchies... a person's rank in society is determined by aspects of identity that are beyond their control." Fascists seize power for the "master" group.

Let's look at how each group fits this principle:

Innate inequality

PAAU: dehumanizes pregnant humans by using them as incubators to gestate clumps of cells into babies; discriminates based on sex and gender.

NYCFAR: dehumanizes preborn humans by using them as currency to purchase the liberation; discriminates based on age, ability, and location.

Social hierarchy

PAAU: treats pregnant people as second-class citizens by restricting reproductive autonomy and thereby their socioeconomic mobility.

NYCFAR: treats preborn people as untouchables outside the class system who may be exploited and discarded with impunity and no recourse.

Master group

PAAU: upholds the paternalistic patriarchy of old, rich, abled, religious, white cishet men against their own interests in order to siphon off power.

NYCFAR: upholds ableist adult supremacy in order to defend their power and "born privilege" over the most powerless members of humankind.

Pt. III: Elements

Stemming from this, Paxton suggests several common (but not definitive) elements in fascism, including: group primacy, victim mindset, rejection of individualism and liberalism, enhanced sense of identity and belonging, idolization of a leader, sublimation of violence, collaboration with elite to protect private property, and economic autarky.

You can't generalize either stance as fascist, but you can certainly find fascist factions and actors within either respective movement. Let's see if either of these leftist groups fit the bill:

Group primacy

PAAU: explores cognitive dissonance with curiosity and openness. Prioritizes wellbeing of individuals over image of group. Works across the aisle to build coalitions over shared goals.

NYCFAR: cognitive dissonance is dismissed and denied. Sacrifices wellbeing of individuals to maintain power of group. Unwilling to collaborate with opponents to achieve common goals.

Victim mindset

PAAU: praxis is non-violent, radical solidarity with primary victims via rescue, recognizes abortion is murder but murder isn't justified in return.

NYCFAR: justifies sexual assault and physical battery of opponents by identifying as victims of violation of consent, violates consent in return.

Rejection of individualism & liberalism

PAAU: encourages critical thought, dissent treated as opportunity for learning and growth, loose framework for ideals allows individualism.

NYCFAR: unity requires uniform adherence to collective ideals, shuts down critique to maintain status quo, dissent treated as threat to cohesion.

Enhanced sense of identity & belonging

PAAU: encourages sense of intrinsic self-worth and dignity, self-esteem tied to personal integrity, morale independent of group gains and losses.

NYCFAR: group esteem dependent on extrinsic perception of success, over-identification with "the cause" leads to reactionary internal policing.

Idolization of a leader

PAAU: Randall Terry erroneously purported to be leader; atheist founder; decentralized leadership, structured in autonomous affinity groups.

NYCFAR: defends Planned Parenthood despite accusations of racism; mythologizes abortion providers and denies allegations of misconduct and harm by victims.

Sublimation of violence

PAAU: teaches organizers "you've got to learn to take a hit" and to never retaliate against violence with more violence, explicitly non-violent.

NYCFAR: frames violence against peaceful protesters as romanticized struggles against fascist powers by grassroots activists.

Collaboration with elite to protect private property

PAAU: collaborates with Catholic Church to uphold women as private property of men (despite being a feminist organization).

NYCFAR: collaborates with ruling class old money such as the Rockefeller Foundation to uphold oppression of working class via abortion trauma.

Economic autarky

PAAU: advocates for socialist programs, mutualist aid, and radical community care to give poor people self-sufficiency so parenting is a feasible option.

NYCFAR: advocates for reproductive autonomy, aka the right to a dead baby, to give poor people economic self-sufficiency and unburden the State.

Discussion & Conclusion

Full disclosure: I am a staff member of Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, and I wrote this analysis on my own time as my own idea.

I was recruited by PAAU because I believed in its principles. As such, obviously I conclude that PAAU beats the allegations: we are not fascists, and being anti-abortion is not fascist because ideologies themselves cannot be fascist. Rather, it is our leftist contemporaries in the pro-choice movement who are using fascist tactics to defend their exploitation of preborn people to expand power for the "master race" of born people.

There absolutely are fascist and oppressive individuals, groups, and factions within the pro-life movement. Those who are violent I refuse to cooperate with, and I refuse to resort to fascist tactics to advance our cause.

I believe I have proven NYCFAR to be (to use their lingo) "Fash", ironically. And I think most of the pro-choice movement also resorts to fascist tactics, in part because pro-choice is inherently pro-violence.

Your view of which stance you see as oppressive is founded upon whether or not you understand the preborn to be full and equal people to you and I, but violence is unequivocally done to living preborn human organisms by abortion regardless of your fetal personhood perspective. Pro-Choice is Pro-Violence, and as such they are quick to resort to violence to seize power.

So for my anti-abortion homies, here's two quick responses you can take from this:

Pro-Aborts accuse us of having fascist beliefs, but fascism is a set of tactics, not a set of beliefs.

Pro-Aborts use fascist tactics such as fearmongering and violence to seize power.

[shaftking]

Apparently Brazil made it so that dickheads who spew homophobic hate speech can be thrown in prison and bitches are actually cheering this violation of human rights, people are supposed to be free to say whatever the fuck they want no matter what which is the entire point of freedom of speech. No one is committing a crime by saying God awful bullshit unless they're also threatening violence or murder on top of that. If it's legit then we really are living in a world of braindead retarded clowns.

Bitches really think that banning and censoring speech is something that will only be used against people they disagree with.

[infinitywizard1207]

Our President And The Issue Of EJKs In The Philippines by Santino Fernandez

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely-Lord Acton”  

These words to me are important as they reflect a huge societal issue happening right now in The Philippines. This issue has to deal with the police and how they abuse their power towards the people of my country.  It is no secret that Police Brutality is running rampant in some countries right now. Just last May, America experienced a great tragedy with the murder of George Floyd.  The cop killings in the US are rampant but in the Philippines they are as bad if not worse.

Ever since 2016 our president Rodrigo Duterte has been on the so called “War on Drugs.”    In this campaign he promised to rid the country of dangerous substances by the end of his  six year term. However all it has done is create more damage  as this so called “Drug War” targets the poor and less fortunate.  In the years since Duterte has taken office he has implemented Extra Judicial Killings also known as EJKs in the country.   An EJK is when the government sanctions the killing of people or drug addicts  in the country as long as there is evidence.  There is no due process any more and these addicts are not taken to a court of law. These addicts are shot in the streets in cold blood without any hesitation or remorse.

Since the implementation of EJK in our country there have been up to 5000 deaths caused by the EJKs. However human rights groups say it is way beyond 12,000 already.  Human rights groups have been siding with the people because it is a violation of democracy. According to our democratic law everyone deserves their day in court but Duterte prefers to not do that and instead kill the offenders.  In a direct quote from the man himself he says that he will protect the cops who commit the EJKs. Duterte says- “That’s our deal. When I said that you go and destroy the drug industry, destroying means destroying, including human life.” He said police officers who have faced difficulties in carrying out their duties should never stress over it as he says  "I'll take care of you.”  

This has caused many corrupt cops to abuse the power and protection given by the president. Because of this protection the deaths caused by the EJKs have risen rapidly claiming the lives of men, women, and children alike.  One of the many victims was Kian De Los Santos a 17 year old boy in high school who was gunned down by cops.   The official statement by the police was that allegedly Kian drew a firearm on the cops and it prompted them to fire back.  Witness reports and a closed-circuit TV, though, showed two men pulling Kian around a basketball court in civilian wear. At the site of the confrontation, two small sachets of alleged shabu, a .45 calibre firearm and four shot cartridge cases were found. Witnesses have reported that they ordered Kian to run and handed him a gun. The Caloocan policemen believed Kian was a drug runner, but the accusation was vehemently refuted by the teenager's parents.  

However it is not just physical damage and the loss of life that these EJKs cause but mental damage as well.  Human Rights watcher  Carlos H. Conde has investigated the trauma caused by the EJKs. One of Carlos’s subjects was a girl whose father was gunned down by the police which has created massive trauma.  In a direct quote from Carlos-“What struck me deeply was the level of trauma that these kids have, When I talked to her about that, she was very articulate and forthright, but you could sense the deep psychological trauma that she suffered in witnessing the violence and also being reminded every day of what happened to her father”

These children paint a harrowing picture of the long-lasting consequences of the murders. Another harrowing example of  how EJK effects children are three anonymous brothers. These three brothers, who were 15, 13 and 10 when their father was killed over two years ago, now live on the streets, after being essentially deserted by their mother, do not attend school and work menial jobs for rent. A 5-year-old boy's mother said he threatened to kill one of his friends and cover him in packing tape. "It's the same way the boy's father was discovered 19 times after being stabbed, his head wrapped in tape and a sign placed near him reading, "I'm a drug pusher. Don’t emulate me.”

From July 1, 2016 to June 30, 2019, the Philippine National Police announced that 5,526 criminals were killed during police operations. However, according to reports by domestic human rights organizations, this figure does not include the thousands of suspected gunmen killed in incidents that are not seriously investigated by the authorities, raising the death toll to as high as 27,000. Human Rights Watch reports and reputable media sources such as Rappler and Reuters say that these vigilante-style shootings were committed either by police officers themselves or by police-related killers.  This has resulted in many cases with regards to the violation of human rights but only one case was brought to justice and it was the case of Kian.

Even today there are victims of this abuse in power. On Dec 20 2020 a mother and her son were killed by a policeman in Pampanga.  This policeman by the name of Jonel Nuezca shot a middle aged woman by the name of Sonya Gregorio and her son by the name of Frank Gregorio.  This whole incident was recorded on video and shows Nuezca take out a gun and shoot Sonya in the head, then shoots her son while they clutch each other, then shoots each of them a second time. The video soon went viral, prompting an internal investigation of the police officer and murder charges. He has handed himself in to the police but this is again a harsh reminder of how rampant this abuse of power is.

The presidents reach of power also extends over to the media and government. The United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a resolution in July 2019 urging the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to send a briefing on the human rights situation in the Philippines in June 2020, putting international pressure for transparency to bear. The Duterte administration reacted by demanding the termination of all financial aid talks from the 18 countries adopting the resolution.

Journalists are also being silenced as well.  This is the case with the company of ABS-CBN  news network and the famous journalist Maria Ressa.  In the case of ABS-CBN the company was accused of political bias.  Duterte accused ABS-CBN of not being impartial or fair during the 2016 elections. These accusations go even further when the President accused ABS-CBN of aiding Duterte’s political competition.  During the hearing for the franchise’s renewal the house of representatives voted on closing ABS-CBN after 25 years of news. Critics of the president say he's gone after media outlets who have closely reported his drug war, which since he took office in 2016 has left thousands of people dead. By government order, ABS-CBN ceased operations of its free TV and radio channels after its 25-year franchise expired in May.

This has caused massive repercussions amongst the Philippine society as 11,000 workers were left without a job and let go.

However there are massive long term effects as well.  ABS-CBN was the number one news network in the country and their network reached across the various provinces. With no news network most of the country is not informed on the various events in the country.  This was the case in November 2020 when Typhoon Ulysses hit the Cagayan Valley. Since there was no news of the upcoming Typhoon the residents of that province were unprepared and not ready. The result was a staggering amount of deaths in the Cagayan valley as well as a massive amount of damage.  All this is the result of Duterte wanting to silence his critics because of his actions in the drug war.

Another example of Journalism being silenced is the case of Maria Ressa. Maria Ressa was the CEO of the news website Rappler.  This news website vehemently criticized and watched  Duterte’s movements and approached towards the drug war.  Ever since the 2016 election  Rappler has been a harsh critic for Duterte but in 2020 Maria Ressa was jailed. The allegations according to the court were “cyberlibel” which is equivalent to 200,000 pesos in damages plus a few years in jail. Ressa’s arrest sparked anger in millions including famous journalist Amal Clooney.  Many have stated that this is an act that takes away the freedom of speech. A right that we Filipinos have because of our democratic government.  Amal has said her self that “the court had become complicit in a sinister action to silence a journalist for exposing corruption and abuse”.  

Rappler scrutinized Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte's government, revealed bot armies and corruption, and reported his ruthless anti-drug campaign, which, by some reports, has resulted in tens of thousands of extrajudicial killings. In exchange, Rappler was criticized as trading "fake news" by the president, and his administration launched multiple lawsuits against him. In addition to the cyber-libel allegations, Ressa is also facing further prosecution for libel, two court proceedings alleging unlawful foreign ownership of her enterprises, and inquiries into her old tax returns. The numerous allegations made against Ressa could lead to prison sentences of about 100 years.

Various journalists have also been  victims to Duterte’s silencing.  In November, one journalist had been killed: news anchor Eduardo Dizon of Mindanao's Kidapawan City, who was shot dead on July 10. At least one of them, Brandon Lee, was seriously wounded in an assault by a gunman in the northern Philippines in August.   But it doesn't stop there as Duterte has passed an Anti Terror Bill which at close examination controls our freedom of speech.  Under the statute, a criminal suspect can be arrested without trial for 14 days, a duration which may be extended to 24 days. Human rights lawyers argue that it breaks a constitutional requirement that after three days of arrest, an individual must be convicted. The anti terror law also will  monitor any social media discourse related to offending the president or his administration.

Even today the ruthless reign of Duterte continues as the police are given more power while the masses suffer. During the lockdown the president has stated that he will kill anyone who violates it. “My orders to the police and the military, if anyone creates trouble, and their lives are in danger: shoot them dead.”   This has created  fear amongst the masses as well as a new view on how the people see our government.

In my personal opinion this is not what a leader is supposed to be. Before I started on this essay I put a quote about power and I feel this is more relevant now than ever. Duterte’s absolute power has corrupted the government absolutely.  It has made the police think they are untouchable and has caused the poor people to suffer.  Our president is waging a war on drugs that is not effective at all and the Filipino people are paying the price.  A good leader in my opinion is one who puts the people first and not his agendas.  A good leader is someone who takes the Filipino people’s lives into consideration and does not murder them in cold blood. So with this current societal issue happening in our country I ask that you spread the awareness of how bad our president is.  Hopefully this country will change for the better and it will see a brighter tomorrow. In the end it is really up to the Filipino people and if they want their country to change.

“People should not be afraid of their governments, governments should be afraid of their people.”

V from V for Vendetta

Sources-

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/philippines

https://humanrightsmeasurement.org/extrajudicial-killings-in-the-philippines/

https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/961396/duterte-to-cops-kill-criminals-if-you-have-to-ill-protect-you

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/what-happens-to-the-families-left-behind-in-dutertes-deadly-campaign-against-drugs/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/philippines-police-brutality-mother-shot/2020/12/21/0a5f9762-4358-11eb-ac2a-3ac0f2b8ceeb_story.html

https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/

https://www.hrw.org/tag/philippines-war-drugs

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46381697

https://cnnphilippines.com/news/2018/11/29/Kian-delos-Santos-murder-Caloocan-police-guilty.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/4/2/shoot-them-dead-duterte-warns-against-violating-lockdown

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/10/world/asia/philippines-congress-media-duterte-abs-cbn.html

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/15/maria-ressa-rappler-editor-found-guilty-of-cyber-libel-charges-in-philippines

https://reliefweb.int/report/philippines/philippines-typhoon-vamco-ulysses-cagayan-valley-region-impact-and-response-24

https://www.npr.org/2020/07/21/893019057/why-rights-groups-worry-about-the-philippines-new-anti-terrorism-law

[creepingsharia]

Twitter locks out Creeping Sharia for tweet on jihad in Austria, Biden’s Muslim migration pledge

As we have warned for years, sharia law is creeping in to American society and eventually you will not be able to discuss Islam except in glowing terms or you will face retribution, if not death.

Mere mention of facts and posting video of what a politician says he will do will be deemed unIslamic, blasphemy or fitna, punishable under sharia law, and now punishable by big tech companies in the U.S. Email from Twitter below:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Your account, @creepingsharia has been locked for violating the Twitter Rules.

Specifically for: Violating our rules against hateful conduct. You may not promote violence against, threaten, or harass other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or serious disease.

Austria: Muslim kills at least 4, injures a dozen more in Vienna jihad attack Known jihadi had been jailed for trying to join ISIS but released early! @JoeBiden has vowed to flood America with refugees from Muslim countries - bringing terror with them

SAVE AMERICA 🇺🇸 stopthesteal.us @creepingsharia Please note that repeated violations may lead to a permanent suspension of your account. Proceed to Twitter now to fix the issue with your account.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The fix according to Twitter is to delete the tweet.

Here is the post that tweet in question links to: Austria: Muslim kills 4, injures 17 in Vienna jihad attack; killer had been jailed for trying to join ISIS but released early!

It is sourced from the AP, ABC News and the Daily Mail.

They haven’t asked those sources to remove their tweets on the jihad attack.

Here is a video of Joe Biden saying he will end "Trump’s unconstitutional Muslim ban.” 

Twitter has not asked Joe Biden to remove his video.

In fact, Twitter has no problem allowing Biden to spew blatant lies - the travel ban is not unConstitutional and it’s not a Muslim ban. In fact, Muslims refugees have steadily come to the U.S. during the so-called ban. October refugee report here.

Biden has vowed to increase the refugee flow by up to 700% and will increase the number each year. From Biden’s own Medium website:

And the U.S. government and private organizations have reported that immigrants and refugees from Muslim countries have brought terror to the U.S. and killed Americans. We have reported on dozens of these throughout the years. One report by the Cato Institute is linked and excerpted below.

Terrorists by Immigration Status and Nationality: A Risk Analysis, 1975–2017

Foreign‐​born terrorists were responsible for 86 percent (or 3,037) of the 3,518 murders caused by terrorists on U.S. soil from 1975 through the end of 2017.

There are other reports as well.

While some may not like or agree with the tweet and may even hate the fact that Joe Biden wants to expose Americans to foreign terror risk, that does not make it hateful or untrue. It doesn’t even appear to violate Twitter’s own rules.

It simply proves that Twitter does not believe in free speech, let alone their own TOS’s, and will enforce sharia law, selectively, on anyone they disagree with.

We have appealed this suspension.

If Americans do not stand up for their rights, their rights will be lost or worse, as George Washington told his troops:

From George Washington to Officers of the Army, 15 March 1783

With respect to the advice given by the Author—to suspect the Man, who shall recommend moderate measures and longer forbearance—I spurn it—as every Man, who regards that liberty, & reveres that Justice for which we contend, undoubtedly must—for if Men are to be precluded from offering their sentiments on a matter, which may involve the most serious and alarming consequences, that can invite the consideration of Mankind; reason is of no use to us—the freedom of Speech may be taken away—and, dumb & silent we may be led, like sheep, to the Slaughter.

Please share this blatant censorship and discrimination on your social media sites.

Thank you.

Update 1: 11/13 - still no response from Twitter after submitting numerous tickets and emails to Support and even canceling our appeal.

We now have an account on Gab - a service that touts itself as the “free speech” platform.

Update 2: 11/13 - Twitter has denied our appeal

-----------------------------------------------------

We have created an account on a service that dubs themselves as building “freedom of speech software.”

Find us there at https://gab.com/creepingsharia

Oh, and #StopTheSteal!

[thechanelmuse]

Rituals reinforce social norms, values, and beliefs. Rituals can empower some groups and individuals; rituals can also serve to weaken and oppress others. The ritual of immediate and expected black forgiveness for the historic and contemporary suffering visited upon the black community by White America reflects the complexities of the color line.

Black Americans may publicly—and this says nothing of just and righteous private anger, upset, and desire for justice and revenge—be so quick to forgive white violence and injustice because it a tactic and strategy for coping with life in a historically white supremacist society. If black folks publicly expressed their anger and lack of forgiveness at centuries of white transgressions they could and were beaten, raped, murdered, shot, stabbed, burned alive, run out of town, hung, put in prisons, locked up in insane asylums, fired from their jobs, their land stolen from them, and kicked out of schools. Even in the post civil rights era and the Age of Obama, being branded with the veritable scarlet letter of being an “angry” black man or “angry” black woman, can result in their life opportunities being significantly reduced.

The African-American church is also central to the black American ritual of forgiveness. A belief in fantastical and mythological beings was used to fuel struggle and resistance in a long march of liberation and dignity against white supremacy, injustice, and degradation.

The notion of “Christian forgiveness” as taught by the black church could also be a practical means of self-medication, one designed to stave off existential malaise, and to heal oneself in the face of the quotidian struggles of life under American Apartheid.

Likewise, some used Christianity and the black church to teach passivity and weakness in the face of white terrorism because some great reward supposedly awaits those who suffer on Earth. The public mask of public black forgiveness and peace was also a tool that was used during the long Black Freedom Struggle as a means of demonstrating the honor, humanity, dignity, and civic virtue of black Americans–a group who only wanted their just and paid for in blood (and free labor) civil rights. […]

Whiteness is central here too. Whiteness imagines itself as benign, just, and innocent. Therefore, too many white people (especially those who have not acknowledged, renounced, and rejected white privilege) view white on black racial violence as some type of ahistorical outlier, something that is not part of a pattern, a punctuation or disruption in American life, something not inherent to it, and thus not a norm of the country’s social and political life.

Read more

Christianity is a hell of a conditioning drug used by white chattel slave owners who instilled a docile nature into enslaved Africans in America (in this case) through Bible scriptures, wiring them to be forgiving to their masters who own, whip, sexually violate, starve, and murder them in cold blood. This docile, forgiving behavior was passed down to their offsprings with Black people appointing themselves in the position that was once occupied by the white chattel slave owners (Pastors/Ministers) to continue the conditioning. Upkeep.

Black Christians will find a bible verse to demonize the way gay people choose to live their lives. They’ll profess their own scripture on proper dress code in the name of Jesus, even if it’s not their life. But the second a white person murders, violates, or mistreats their Black loved one or someone Black, in general, they immediately forgive, excuse, and cape for those descendants of white chattel slave owners as if they are the victims and out of fear of going to hell because Jesus forgave them… (Whether if their white ancestors owned enslaved Black people or not, they are still nesting, thriving, and benefiting from their space in white supremacy.)

The way sanctified Black people are with the Christian faith flows in the same vein of the “We Sick Boss” syndrome. Like Malcolm X stated in his speech, “The House Negro and the Field Negro” (1965) :

“And he could talk just like his master - good diction. And he loved his master more than his master loved himself. That’s why he didn’t want his master hurt. If the master got sick, he’d say, “What’s the matter, boss, we sick?” When the master’s house caught afire, he’d try and put the fire out. He didn’t want his master’s house burned. He never wanted his master’s property threatened. And he was more defensive of it than the master was.”

Black Christians are unknowingly conditioned to keep that white supremacist house from burning down…in the name of Jesus…

[staff]

Our Community Guidelines are changing

To keep Tumblr the constructive, empowering place it should be

It was a little more than 10 years ago that we introduced the humble reblog, not knowing how much it would change the growing Tumblr community. The ability to take one person’s idea, build on it, and share it as something new transformed Tumblr from a simple blogging site into a place where people were talking, exploring, learning, and growing through reblog chains.

We’ve been thinking about that a lot recently—the kind of place we want Tumblr to be, and our responsibility to you here and out in the world.

At its core, Tumblr is a place to express yourself and connect with others who share your interests. Over time a knot of diverse, kinetic, passionate communities sprang up. You can jump from things you love into things you didn’t even know existed. And it’s on all of us to create a safe, constructive, and empowering environment where you can continue to do that.

Our Community Guidelines need to reflect the reality of the internet and social media today and acknowledge that the things people post and share online influence the way others think and behave.

The following updates will go into effect on September 10, 2018 and can reviewed here.

We won’t tolerate hate speech

We believe in a free and open internet but we can’t ignore that the internet is being exploited by hate groups to organize, recruit, and radicalize with horrifying efficiency. Updating our Community Guidelines and internal procedures is necessary to address a very real threat to members of the Tumblr community.

When it comes to hate speech, we’re redrawing the line between what’s uncomfortable and what’s unacceptable, and have struck 41 words of gray area from this section in the Community Guidelines. It now reads:  

Hate Speech: Don't encourage violence or hatred. Don't post content for the purpose of promoting or inciting the hatred of, or dehumanizing, individuals or groups based on race, ethnic or national origin, religion, gender, gender identity, age, veteran status, sexual orientation, disability or disease. If you encounter content that violates our hate speech policies, please report it.

[DELETED: If you encounter negative speech that doesn’t rise to the level of violence or threats of violence, we encourage you to dismantle negative speech through argument rather than censorship. That said, if you encounter anything especially heinous, tell us about it.]

Keep in mind that a post might be mean, tasteless, or offensive without necessarily encouraging violence or hatred. In cases like that, you can always block the person who made the post—or, if you're up for it, you can express your concerns to them directly, or use Tumblr to speak up, challenge ideas, raise awareness or generate discussion and debate.

While the deleted language was well-intentioned (and we still need your help reporting hate speech) a post shouldn’t have to be “especially heinous” to merit reporting.

We’re also banning the glorification of violence and its perpetrators

Not all violence is motivated by racial or ethnic hatred, but the glorification of mass murders like Columbine, Sandy Hook, and Parkland could inspire copycat violence. With that in mind, we’re revising the Community Guidelines on violent content by adding new language to specifically ban the glorification of violent acts or the perpetrators of those acts:

Violent Content and Threats, Gore, Mutilation: Don’t post content that includes violent threats toward individuals or groups—this includes threats of theft, property damage, or financial harm. Don't post violent content or gore just to be shocking. Don't showcase the mutilation or torture of human beings, animals (including bestiality), or their remains. Don't post content that encourages or incites violence, or glorifies acts of violence or the perpetrators.

Lastly, we’re eliminating any ambiguity in our zero-tolerance policy on non-consensual sexual images

We’re adding a very simple statement (in bold below) to our existing policy on harassment to remove any uncertainty:

Harassment. Don't engage in targeted abuse or harassment. Don’t engage in the unwanted sexualization or sexual harassment of others.

Posting sexually explicit photos of people without their consent was never allowed on Tumblr, but with the invention of deepfakes and the proliferation of non-consensual creepshots, we are updating our Community Guidelines to more clearly address new technologies that can be used to humiliate and threaten other people.

So what can you expect going forward?

The new Community Guidelines will go into effect on September 10, 2018. After that, if we determine a post or blog is promoting hatred, glorifying violence, or is engaging in the unwanted sexualization of another person, it will be taken down. This includes (for example) posting Islamophobic, anti-Semitic, or anti-LGBTQ+ content to promote or incite violence or hatred; using symbols of hate movements to intimidate or harass others; and the glorification of mass murderers.

Of course, context is everything. Posts and blogs that generate open, constructive debate are always welcome here. A heated conversation about race or gender identity in media is not hate speech, nor is a factual, educational history of Jim Crow.

An overwhelming amount of care and nuance is needed to evaluate reports fairly and accurately, so we’ve increased the size of our team to review the reports we receive.

What should you do if you see content that violates the CGs?

Report it. We’ve added hate speech reporting to the mobile apps. Just tap the airplane icon on any post to open this menu 👇 — then tap Report (flag button) > Something else > Hate speech.

One last note

We are fierce defenders of free expression. We want Tumblr to be a place where people come to be themselves and engage diverse points of view through constructive dialogue. The lines we’re drawing today around hate speech, violence, and non-consensual sexual content are designed to protect that vision.

We’ll continue to review and revise our Community Guidelines to make sure they remain an accurate reflection of our community and its values. And as part of our commitment to transparency, we’ll always make sure previous versions are available on our public GitHub repo.

You’re going to have opinions on these changes and what more we can do. We encourage you to share your thoughts (especially constructive feedback) in the notes. And if you feel that Tumblr is no longer for you, there’s a whole world of internet out there.

❤️ Be kind to each other, Tumblr.

[madamlaydebug]

18 LESSONS OF THE LAW OF ONE

Ma'at (The Kosmic Order)

And The "Universal Mother"

The Advancement of Human Consciousness is evidenced by the development of a Kosmic structure that the Ancient Egyptians called MA'AT. This system was handed down from the Gods to Man and the Pharaoh was the personification of MA'AT.

MA'AT is the Egyptian Goddess of the Physical and Moral Law of Egypt, of ORDER and TRUTH. The aim in Ancient Kemet (Egypt) was for a person to become One with the Goddess. The path to the development of Goddess-like qualities was through the development of specific Virtues.

Each Soul was judged in the Hall of MA'AT (depicted in the 'Book of The Dead' and Book Five of 'The Book of Gates') when they died. The Heart (conscience) was weighed against the feather of MA'AT (an ostrich feather) on scales which represented Balance and Justice. If their heart was heavier than the feather because they had failed to live a Balanced life by the principles of MA'AT their heart was devoured. If, however, the heart Balanced with the feather of MA'AT they would pass the test and gain Eternal Life. At certain times it was ASAR/AUSAR who sat as Judge in the ritual, and many other Deities were involved in the ceremony, but the scales always represented MA'AT.

In the weighing of the wrongs done in this life against the INTENT of the Heart, MA'AT makes a distinction between SINS and TRANSGRESSIONS. A sin was considered a violation of the Laws of the Gods and Goddesses. That is, Laws pertaining to the Ordinances and Requirements which the Gods and Goddesses had given for their worship. Transgressions on the other hand, were offenses against fellow mortals, their possessions, or the Earth -- or that portion of the Earth on which we live. Therefore, sins were against God or Goddess, but one's transgressions were against mortals. All transgressions may be forgiven, but not all sins.

MA'AT is also the God of Balance, Rythm and the Cycles -- the Primal Laws of the Universe that SUPPORT CREATION and prevent it from falling into chaos. The Good and the not-Good moved the Cycles of the Universe. The Good and the not-Good came out of the Same Source, the Void, the Sekhem, the Source of Infinite Potential and Love.

In this crucial role She stands for BALANCE and HARMONY. Her power was beyond the Pharaohs' who declared themselves Beloved of MA'AT and upholders of Her laws. There were Seven Cardinal Principles/Virtues of MA'AT to achieve human perfectibility.

These principles are:

TRUTH

JUSTICE

BALANCE

ORDER

COMPASSION

HARMONY

RECIPROCITY

Woman is the LAW-GIVER and Man is the LAW-ENFORCER.

MA'AT as a Spiritual Principle, is more than Justice, it is DIVINE JUSTICE, personified in the Goddess, (NTRT) MA'AT, who exemplifies the ETERNAL LAWS of the Universe as, RIGHT and TRUTH.

These Virtues encompass all of the following:

(1). Control of Thoughts

(2). Control of Actions

(3). Devotion of Purpose

(4). Have faith in the ability of [your] [teacher] to Teach [you] the Truth.

(5). Have faith in [yourself] to Assimilate the Truth

(6). Have faith in [themselves] to Wield the Truth

(7). Be free from Resentment under the Experience of Persecution.

(8). Be free from Resentment under the Experience of Wrong.

(9). Cultivate the ability to Distinguish between Right and Wrong and

(10). Cultivate the ability to Distinguish between the REAL and the UNREAL.

MA'AT transcends specific Ethical rules (which differed according to different times and different peoples) and instead focuses on the NATURAL order of things. That being said, certain actions were clearly against MA'AT as they increased the effect of chaos and had a purely negative effect on the world.

In addition there are 42 Negative Confessions also called, "42 Declarations of Innocence" or "42 Affirmations of MA'AT." They were 42 in number because there were 42 "Nomes" (called districts/states today) in Kemet at that time.

These principles have been termed "Negative Confessions" because they usually begin with the negative, "I have not." However, these principles of Right and Truth, are in fact AFFIRMATIONS of what one has not done in this life to live by MA'AT.

I have not done iniquity.

I have not robbed with violence.

I have not stolen.

I have done no murder; I have done no harm.

I have not defrauded offerings.

I have not diminished obligations.

I have not plundered the Neteru.

I have not spoken lies.

I have not uttered evil words.

I have not caused pain.

I have not committed fornication.

I have not caused shedding of tears.

I have not dealt deceitfully.

I have not transgressed.

I have not acted guilefully.

I have not laid waste the ploughed land.

I have not been an eavesdropper.

I have not set my lips in motion (against any man).

I have not been angry and wrathful except for a just cause.

I have not defiled the wife of any man.

I have not been a man of anger.

I have not polluted myself.

I have not caused terror.

I have not burned with rage.

I have not stopped my ears against the words of Right and Truth. (Ma-at)

I have not worked grief.

I have not acted with insolence.

I have not stirred up strife.

I have not judged hastily.

I have not sought for distinctions.

I have not multiplied words exceedingly.

I have not done neither harm nor ill.

I have not cursed the King. (i.e. violation of laws)

I have not fouled the water.

I have not spoken scornfully.

I have never cursed the Neteru.

I have not stolen.

I have not defrauded the offerings of the Neteru.

I have not plundered the offerings of the blessed dead.

I have not filched the food of the infant.

I have not sinned against the Neter of my native town.

I have not slaughtered with evil intent the cattle of the Neter.

The 77 Commandments of Ancient Kemet (Egypt) and the 42 Affirmations are the original source of the 10 Commandments of the bible, and the Lesser Commandments of the Books Deuteronomy and Numbers.

They are known as "The Divine Code of Human Behavior".

Thou shall not cause suffering to humans

Thou shall not intrigue by ambition

Thou shall not deprive a poor person of their subsistence

Thou shall not commit acts that are loathed by Gods

Thou shall not cause suffering to others

Thou shall not steal offerings from temples

Thou shall not steal bread meant for Gods

Thou shall not steal offerings destined to sanctify spirits

Thou shall not commit shameful acts inside the sacro-saints of temples

Thou shall not sin against nature with one’s own kind

Thou shall not take milk from the mouth of a child

Thou shall not fish using other fish as bait

Thou shall not extinguish fire when it should burn

Thou shall not violate the rules of meat offerings

Thou shall not take possession of properties belonging to temples and Gods

Thou shall not prevent a God from manifesting itself

Thou shall not cause crying

Thou shall not make scornful signs

Thou shall not get angry or enter a dispute without just cause

Thou shall not be impure

Thou shall not refuse to listen to words of justice and truth

Thou shall not blaspheme

Thou shall not sin by excess of speech

Thou shall not speak scornfully

Thou shall not curse a Divinity

Thou shall not cheat on the offerings to Gods

Thou shall not waste the offerings to the dead

Thou shall not snatch food from children and thou shall not sin against the Gods of one’s city

Thou shall not kill divine animals with bad intentions

Thou shall not cheat

Thou shall not rob or loot

Thou shall not steal

Thou shall not kill

Thou shall not destroy offerings

Thou shall not reduce measurements

Thou shall not steal properties belonging to Gods

Thou shall not lie

Thou shall not snatch away food or wealth

Thou shall not cause pain

Thou shall not fornicate with the fornicator

Thou shall not act dishonestly

Thou shall not transgress

Thou shall not act maliciously

Thou shall not steal farmlands

Thou shall not reveal secrets

Thou shall not court a man’s wife

Thou shall not sleep with another’s wife

Thou shall not cause terror

Thou shall not rebel

Thou shall not be the cause of anger or hot tempers

Thou shall not act with insolence

Thou shall not cause misunderstandings

Thou shall not misjudge or judge hastily

Thou shall not be impatient

Thou shall not cause illness or wounds

Thou shall not curse a king

Thou shall not cloud drinking water

Thou shall not dispossess

Thou shall not use violence against family

Thou shall not frequent wickeds

Thou shall not substitute injustice for justice

Thou shall not commit crimes

Thou shall not overwork others for one’s gain

Thou shall not mistreat their servants

Thou shall not menace

Thou shall not allow a servant to be mistreated by his master

Thou shall not induce famine

Thou shall not get angry

Thou shall not kill or order a murder

Thou shall not commit abominable acts

Thou shall not commit treason

Thou shall not try to increase one’s domain by using illegal means

Thou shall not usurp funds and property of others

Thou shall not seize cattle on prairies

Thou shall not trap poultry that are destined to Gods

Thou shall not obstruct water in the moment it is supposed to run

Thou shall not break dams that are established on current waters

MA'AT is at the Heart of understanding Ancient Kemet Civilization in its entirety, and is the foundation of its longevity. It is bound to and fused with Ethics (including Justice and Truth) and Universal Order (Kosmic Order, Social Order and Political Order).

However, they also understood that it was not possible to be perfect, just BALANCED. The Universe is ORDERED and RATIONAL. The rising and setting of the Sun, the flooding of the Nile and the predictable course of the Stars in the Sky reassured them that there was permanence to Existence which was central to the Nature of ALL things. However, the FORCES of CHAOS are always present and threaten the BALANCE of MA'AT.

Reciprocity -- often called the Golden Rule -- simply states that we are to treat other people as we would wish to be treated ourselves. To apply it, you imagine yourself on the receiving end of the action in the exact place of the other person (which includes having the other person's likes and dislikes). If you act in a given way toward another, and yet are unwilling to be treated that way in the same circumstances, then you violate the rule.

To apply the Golden Rule adequately, we need KNOWLEDGE and IMAGINATION. We need to know what EFFECT our actions have on the lives of others. And we need to be able to imagine OURSELVES, VIVIDLY and ACCURATELY, in the other person's place on the RECEIVING END of the action.

With Love, Light, Knowledge, Imagination, and the Golden Rule, we can progress far in our moral thinking. The Golden Rule is best seen as a CONSISTENCY Principle. It doesn't replace regular moral norms. It isn't an infallible guide on which actions are right or wrong; it doesn't give all the answers. But it does prescribe consistency -- that we DO NOT have our actions (toward another) be out of HARMONY with our desires (toward a reversed situation action). It is a test of our moral coherence. If we violate the Golden Rule, then we violate the Spirit of Fairness and Compassion.

The Golden Rule is well suited to be the standard to instill ORDER against the chaos that otherwise permeates the Universe. Rather than a Code of Justice, MA'AT is the BALANCE to be applied in order to restore HARMONY to Society , and thus to the Universe. The basis of the Golden Rule's equality is summed up by a simple explanation of MA'AT that the Egyptians attributed to the Creatress-Creator: "I made every man like his fellow."

Humanity's evolution of CONSCIOUSNESS is hereby illustrated. MA'AT is not based on what one did that was wrong during one's life, but on one's INHERENT EQUALITY.

Each of us is duty bound to RESTORE and defend MA'AT.

The way of MA’AT was to Act out of the Center of Consciousness, the Heart. Acting out of the Heart is called the Virtue of Love.

As one progresses in Knowledge on the Service To Others pathway, the more he or she incorporates the Principles of MA'AT into his or her life. It is the FOUNDATION of Human Life and is about the promotion of Sanity, Order, Balance, Harmony, Peace, and Justice among Human Beings.

The excellent condition of the Ancient Egyptians was attributed to their application of these Metaphysical Realities in their daily life -- in other words -- TOTAL COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS.

"As above, so below, and as below, so above."

.

[xxladylovexx]

The crusade to cancel my talk at Toronto Public Library

Meghan Murphy

October 18, 2019

This week, three Canadian writers launched a petition demanding the Toronto Public Library cancel a room rental for a sold-out event, ‘Gender Identity: What Does It Mean for Society, the Law, and Women?’ Sounds frightening, I know.

The local women organizing the event, a group called Radical Feminists Unite, asked me in June if they could bring me to Toronto to speak about gender identity legislation and women’s rights, unhappy that the debate was not being given space in their city. This is not an uncommon sentiment. The events I have been asked to participate in generally have been organized by regular women who have serious concerns about how gender identity ideology and policy could affect, and already is affecting, women’s sex-based rights. Canada in particular has been resistant to this discussion. Due to media blackouts, harassment, bullying, threats of violence, smear campaigns, censorship, and ostracization, a few brave women have had to force the conversation, at great risk.

In January, a couple women took it upon themselves to organize an event in Vancouver, ‘Gender Identity Ideology and Women’s Rights.’ These women had no budget, no public or political power, no history in activism or organizing events, and no agenda, other than to open up a conversation they feel is desperately needed. The panel, held at the Vancouver Public Library, featured me and two other longtime feminist activists with impeccable records fighting male violence against women. The organizers and I received numerous death and rape threats, were protested, and were libeled by politicians and the media. The VPL forced us to move the event after hours (to 9:30 p.m. on a weeknight), claiming that protesters posed a risk to patrons and staff. They attempted to charge us thousands in security fees in an effort to pressure us to choose another venue, surely aware we didn’t have that kind of budget. The chief librarian, Christina de Castell, issued a statement saying the library did not agree with ‘the views of Feminist Current,’ my website. Castell did not say which views the library disagreed with (protecting women’s sex-based rights or the idea that sexist gender stereotypes are not innate?), but regardless, she should not have taken a position, as a representative of a public institution meant to be neutral, nor should she have spoken on behalf of the VPL, as not everyone at the library is in agreement with her apparent opposition to both biology and women’s rights. Vancouver’s mayor labeled me ‘despicable’. Canada’s national public broadcaster, the CBC, located across the street from the library, refused to cover the event or contact me for comment, despite hosting a panel prior to the event, speculating whether panelists might say anything constituting ‘hate speech’. Of course none did. Despite protests, the event went off without a hitch and was incredibly respectful, inspiring, and galvanizing. The impassioned talks are available on YouTube for anyone to watch and see for themselves.

But why bother? Listening to words and forming an educated opinion based on said words is no longer a popular pastime.

Things have played out similarly in Toronto. The primary difference is that it is now writers leading the charge. You know, people who should be invested in reading and using words correctly.

Not only that, but writers of all people should be defending freedom of expression and a public library’s decision to uphold its mandate, which, per the TPL’s response to the petition, is to ensure meeting rooms are available to the public ‘on an equitable basis, regardless of the beliefs or affiliations of individuals or groups requesting their use’. The statement goes on to say: ‘As a public institution, our primary obligation is to uphold the fundamental freedoms of freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression as enshrined in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.’

This response was unacceptable to the writers and thousands of Torontonians (many of whom I’m certain would consider themselves ‘progressive,’ even ‘feminist’) wanting my talk canceled. Indeed, those who have signed the petition, ‘Stop Hate Speech from Being Spread at the Toronto Public Library,’ have publicly stated I am guilty of ‘hate speech’ and compared the organizers to a ‘hate group’. The petition, authored by Alicia Elliot, Catherine Hernandez, and Carrianne Leung, reads:

‘Those who want to disseminate hate speech today know that they can misrepresent, then weaponize the phrase ‘freedom of speech’ in order to get what they want: an audience, and space to speak to and then mobilize that audience against marginalized communities. While everyone has freedom of speech, we want to once again point to the limits of those freedoms when certain acts and speech infringe on the freedom of others, particularly those in marginalized communities. We also want to point out that hate groups do not have a right to use publicly funded facilities to meet and organize. This is precisely why TPL has a community and event space policy: to determine who and who does not have the right to use its facilities. There is a difference between denying free speech—and what is known as deplatforming, which is when you refuse to allow hate speech to be disseminated in your facility. This has been an effective tactic to stop those who capitalize on spreading hate speech, such as Meghan Murphy.’

The problem is I’ve never engaged in hate speech. I have made very basic statements about biology, such as ‘men aren’t women’ and ‘male bodies and female bodies are different.’ I have also argued that some spaces should be women-only, including changing rooms, transition houses, and prisons. I have said that individuals cannot change sex through self-declaration and that a boy is not a girl because he prefers dresses to pants. I have said that women have particular rights in this world due to the fact of being born female. I have said that women have not experienced discrimination in the workplace, in the home, in universities, and in politics because of anything they feel or because they somehow ‘identify’ with feminine stereotypes. In fact, it is the desire not to be limited to gender roles that inspired feminists’ ongoing fight.

Usually, I say this all warmly. I’m not generally an angry person but quite jovial, in fact. I don’t spend much of my energy hating anyone beyond slow walkers and morning people. I’m just telling the truth.

The writers who initiated the petition say they will no longer participate in events held at the TPL unless the library cancels my talk, which is fine, I suppose. It is their prerogative if they wish to hold readings for their friends in spaces untainted by free thought. Surely the condos their parents bought them have shared rec rooms available for such gatherings? Cozy bubbles seem better suited for those needing to protect themselves from triggers such as people with different opinions and experiences, anyway.

The whole scene strikes me as nauseatingly elitist, especially the entitlement with which these ‘progressive’ people approach members of the public — in this case, women with no particular social, political, or economic power — as though they should have the power to determine what we all think or say. As though they have the right to dictate what a library, of all places, should allow to be discussed within its walls.

These protesters are primarily middle- and upper-class people who have had access to opportunities most people in this world have not. Who live in relative safety, free from state persecution — who have the privilege of freedom in a world that continues to host dictatorships and incredibly repressive regimes that quite literally jail and murder those who fail to toe the party line. They have taken a postmodernist theory invented primarily within the walls of academia — that is, the notion that material reality is determined by inner feelings — and are attempting to impose it on the general public via force. These people have taken on the position of dictator, threatening to throw those who won’t adopt their nonsensical mantras in jail. Indeed, a former politician with the NDP, Canada’s leftist party, publicly claimed the event was ‘illegal’ while her supporters said I should be jailed.

On Thursday, Toronto mayor John Tory said he had contacted the library in an attempt to have the event canceled and is ‘disappointed’ the library declined to do so. What is in fact ‘disappointing’ (indeed, appalling) is that the mayor of Toronto does not understand the TPL’s mandate as a public institution and opposes freedom of expression.

These leftists seem unaware that opposition to free speech has not treated their presumed heroes kindly. They have so easily forgotten Emma Goldman, who was imprisoned for distributing information about birth control. And Rosa Luxemburg, arrested and killed by the GKSD, a German paramilitary unit instructed to suppress the communists. Surely the suffragettes deserved to be jailed and beaten for fighting to win women the right to vote, as their ideas were deemed too ‘radical’, not only by their opponents but other feminists and abolitionists. They have apparently not paid much attention to the female activists arrested and tortured in Saudi Arabia for advocating that women be allowed to drive. Journalists continue to be murdered in Mexico for reporting on police corruption and the drug war. But no matter. Protecting free expression is clearly a relic of the past, before we had multi-billion-dollar social media companies on hand to police dangerous speech. (‘On top of that, she has been banned from Twitter for violating their Hateful Conduct Policy’, the petition reads, as though In Big Tech We Trust is an appropriate mantra for supposed social justice advocates.)

At what point in history has suppressing subversive speech benefited the marginalized? Or anyone, really?

The CBC again failed to include the organizers or myself, the speaker, in its ‘coverage’ of the event. On a segment that aired Wednesday, Gill Deacon, host of Here and Now Toronto, spoke with Elliot, who stated that I was ‘trying to take away the rights of people’, ‘preach[ing] against human rights’, and did not believe ‘transwomen should have protections’ under the Human Rights Act or Criminal Code, claiming this constituted ‘spreading hate’. That none of this is accurate was of no concern to Deacon or Elliot. The CBC sees no need to allow me to speak for myself and explain my apprehensions because, I assume, my arguments are so reasonable people might agree with me. While Elliot claimed that I was ‘lying’ when arguing that gender identity legislation could override women’s rights, this has, unfortunately, already happened, as we’ve seen men transferred to women’s prisons, where they have assaulted female prisoners; women forced to leave shelters and transition houses on account of being made to share rooms with men; women and girls made to compete with and against males in sport; women’s organizations denied funding for having a women-only policy; and of course as we’ve seen a number of estheticians dragged to the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal for declining to wax a man’s balls, because that man claimed to be female. What Elliot says there is no evidence for, there is ample evidence for. Which of course she would know, had she ever read my work, listened to my talks, or engaged in conversation with me, rather than using her platform to spout bigoted nonsense.

Ironically, if not for free speech, these individuals would not feel so safe to libel those they don’t like — which appears to be the go-to strategy of the Woke and Online. One wonders why they believe their speech should protected — even when hateful or slanderous — but not the speech of others. It is a modern hypocrisy I will never understand.

Unfortunately for these protesters and petitioners, the TPL will not be canceling the event, and I will continue to speak the truth in the face of threats, slander, harassment, ostracization, and actual hate speech. I will do this not because I have anything personally to gain from doing so but because I could not live with myself otherwise. I will not be silent while women’s rights are eroded, and I will not lie either under duress or to make friends. My integrity is worth more to me than my comfort or popularity, and yours should be too.

Meghan Murphy is a writer in Vancouver, British Columbia. Her website is Feminist Current.

[miscellanyblue]

Neo-Nazi white nationalist announces Republican bid for N.H. state legislature

An unapologetic white nationalist has announced he is launching a Republican bid for a seat in the New Hampshire House of Representatives. “I refuse to sit back and watch the state I love turn into a 3rd world dumping ground while traitors and Anti-Whites try and silence anyone who opposes it,” wrote Ryan Murdough, a 38-year-old Holocaust denier who has been active in white nationalist causes for over a decade. “I will always stand up for the interests of White people in New Hampshire and I will never apologize and never back down.”

In a series of social media posts, the New Hampton resident signaled he will seek the Republican nomination in Belknap District 1, a single-seat district currently held by Republican Rep. Harry Viens, a one-term legislator from Center Harbor. “I am sick and tired of watching New Hampshire be invaded by 'Diversity ' while our so called leaders cuck out and do nothing but cower in fear of being called 'racist,’ ” Murdough wrote.

Despite omitting the vicious ethnic slurs and racial epithets that routinely fill his social media posts, Murdough’s announcement was subsequently removed by Facebook for violating the platform’s community standards on hate speech. “My original post has been censored by the Jews who run Facebook,” he complained.

If Murdough follows through and files a Declaration of Candidacy next year, it will be his second run for public office. In 2010, the Republican state party disavowed his candidacy for the state House after the Concord Monitor published a letter to the editor in which Murdough promoted his candidacy and called on “white people in New Hampshire and across the country to take a stand” and establish “our own homeland.”

“Mr. Murdough is a despicable racist,“ then-party spokesman Ryan Williams responded. "His racist views are abhorrent and he is not welcome in the New Hampshire Republican Party.” Murdough ultimately received 296 votes in the GOP primary but finished last among the five Republican candidates and failed to advance to the general election.

‘Anti-Whites in New Hampshire’

In his campaign announcement, Murdough identified himself as the founder and president of NH Nationalists, an unincorporated group without any other publicly-identified members; though Murdough claims he has established chapters in several New Hampshire counties. Over time, Murdough has both taken credit for and disassociated himself from the group.

Last year, NH Nationalists gained notoriety with a webpage titled “Anti-Whites in New Hampshire” that featured a list of prominent Granite Staters and their contact information. The list came in response to a well-publicized gathering of business executives, nonprofit leaders and government officials who explored how the state can attract a more diverse workforce. The Union Leader reported that at least a half-dozen of the diversity forum attendees subsequently received threatening phone calls and emails.

Murdough’s link to NH Nationalists was first reported by Miscellany Blue, a story that earned us a spot on the “Anti-Whites in New Hampshire” list. Soon afterward, Murdough acknowledged that the webpage prompted a call from the FBI, writing on social media that they were “concerned about the safety of the people on the list due to the information that is listed on it. In particular, the contact info for the State Representatives was supposedly most concerning to them.”

A couple of months later, Google shuttered the NH Nationalists website, which had been hosted on its Blogger platform. Murdough then launched a new “Anti-Whites in New Hampshire” webpage, along with a racist and anti-Semitic blog, on his eponymous website. Recently, that site was also shut down, this time by WordPress.com, for violating their terms of service.

‘The Swastika is the solution’

For the upcoming campaign, Murdough says he will not agree to any interviews with “anti-White” media outlets. “I will use Gab to communicate as it is possibly the last bastion of free speech online,” he wrote. If Murdough’s social media posts presage his campaign, it will be a toxic stew of racist, anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi rhetoric.

On Gab, Murdough responded to the recent mass shooting in New Zealand with an open letter to the state’s mosques and synagogues: “We condemn the shooting in New Zealand but to be honest we really don't care about dead Muslims. We care about our own people and we are sick of your third world culture ruining our nations.”

“We do not support violence toward anyone but we are sick of Jews promoting third world invasions into every White nation,” he continued. “We are tired of our women being raped and murdered at the hands or your pet Africans and being demonized for opposing the savagery. As far as we are concerned the blood is on your hands.”

Murdough embraces Nazi ideals and denies the horrors of the Holocaust. “In my opinion, the most important truth we need to tell is the truth about Hitler and expose the Jewish lies regarding the Holohoax,” one Gab post read. “It's impossible to read Mein Kampf and not realize he was right and has been lied about for 70+ years,” added another.

“The reality is that the Swastika is the solution,” Murdough wrote on Stormfront. “Putting Jews and anti Whites in camps IS the solution. Our enemies want us to run away from the Swastika but we should be running to it.”

[bullet-farmer]

Nazis and other violent people on Twitter: send death threats, harass vulnerable people, send their followers to harass vulnerable people, “joke” about murder and violence, sling sexism, racism, and homophobia around like goddamned tetherballs. 

Twitter: Welp, that’s free speech *shrug emoji*.

Me on Twitter: makes a joke about how Roseanne Barr and Laura Loomer should just get “stoned for fifty years on pot and leave us all alone” (left beneath a gif of them smoking up). Twitter: YoUr AcCoUnT vIoLaTeD tHe RuLeS yOu ArE nOw SuSpEnDeD uNlEsS yOu DeLeTe ThIs TwEet. I’ve appealed it because this is fucking nonsense. This wasn’t even a case of someone saying something mild like “men are pigs” or whatever. This wasn’t anywhere close to being a threat. When my former therapist dumped me last year, she accused me of threatening her and her staff. A lie. I have never threatened anyone in my life, online or off, and never will. I do not stand for anyone--yes, even faceless people and/or AI at big corporations--accusing me of something I didn’t do and demanding that I confess to it. I draw a thick line there. “But it’s just one tweet. Just delete it and get on with life.” No. I will not. Yes, life is filled with compromises, and sometimes those compromises are deeply uncomfortable. But when we start allowing people to strongarm us into confessing to things we have not done just so we can “keep the peace,” we surrender one more bit of our souls to authoritarianism.  It doesn’t matter if this is just one silly tweet, or even if an algorithm just picked it up by accident. We should never compromise with systems that hold power over us--and, yes, social media platforms are now one of those systems--when they demand we do something they have no right to demand of us. If my appeal is unsuccessful, I will let that account be suspended indefinitely.  I do not compromise when it comes to signing false confessions.  I also do not cede to hypocrisy. If Twitter wants to be a larger version of Gab, where hateful people get to run riot under the aegis of “free speech lolz” while punishing people on the left who have done nothing at all against their TOS, then I  want no part of its alt-right agenda. 

[warmbeebosoftbeebo]

Why don't you get your nose out of what other people are into kink wise?? Because even anal is uncomfortable and unpleasant for people and they would consider that violating and triggering. If you don't like the things someone says or posts then fuck off and unfollow instead of shame them for what they enjoy. Kink shaming is not cool dude. I'm sure there's plenty of people that hate anal and you wouldn't like being made to feel like a freak for liking it. Grow up.

oh, boy, buckle up.

i brought it up in a new post, not naming her or alluding to her post, because it is something seen so fucking often both in this fandom and on the internet generally. she also specifically said for him to squeeze his arm around her neck till she passes out. if she had said something like “i’d like him to stroke my neck while i hold my breath as long as i comfortably can and one or both of us plays with my pussy till i come” i would barely have cared, and it wouldn’t have gotten me back on my soap box again. she responded to my post in a reblog and i responded back. she initiated the conversation between us with that reblog. and i responded back, trying to explain my views clearly albeit longly, once. 

men choking women is a common sexual act, a meme, and a threat online, and within this fandom. “if you don’t like it fuck off”? honestly, that’s telling women to leave the public square and go back to the kitchen and bedroom and laying back and thinking of england if they can’t handle “robust speech” or sexuality in media in public. i couldn’t be online or in this fandom if i couldn’t handle seeing it, or refused to see it. 

here’s another link on the dangers of strangulation https://tonic.vice.com/en_us/article/jpnj5x/how-risky-is-it-to-be-choked-during-sex

this whole “anti kink shaming” thing is just.. if kink shaming is terribly wrong, then we literally cannot criticize anything ever, bc everything is “kinky” (a sexual turn on, a fetish) to someone somewhere. and this is an old joke, but what if your kink is kink shaming? thought we couldn’t criticize any kinks?

the reality is, almost everyone, at least those with any ethical discernment kink shames *something.* if they couldn’t find *anything* that was shrouded in “omg hot sexy stuff” objectionable, i’d honestly be scared of them, and would hope at least that victimized people would have to deal with them.

what about all sorts of dangerous things that are eroticized? i’m thinking specifically about purposely seeking out hiv (mostly men), unprotected pia, knowingly exposing another to a significant risk of contracting hiv (also men; women simply don’t pose the same risk both re “sexual” fluids other than blood and how it is contracted sexually, receptive pia being the highest risk, followed by receptive piv). re: you can talk about choking, being choked, say vaguely that you should do it safely, but not talk about WHY it’s dangerous, what stats are on injury and death, what can happen, etc is like saying you can talk about pia and condoms, but not hiv or other risks of injury from it. i didn’t focus on the danger/risk of pia in my initial post, but it is high, way higher than people think or want to believe. should we not be concerned with those who want to infect other people with hiv, and people who want to be infected or is that prudish, immature kink shaming? 

i’m sure there’s things you kink shame. for example, let’s examine pseudo child pornography eg a 18-19 girl pretending to be and usually looking like a naive 14 years old or younger child, with a man in his 40s while they roleplay that he’s her father/stepfather/friend’s father/uncle/coach while he “introduces” her to sex, usually violently, with a focus on men “ruining” and “spoiling” “innocence.” is that fine and dandy? is a father with teenage or preteen daughters watching this and whacking off to it fine and dandy? considering the rates at which girls are abused by their mom’s boyfriends and husbands, what if a man living with a woman and her kids whacks off to this? what if he finds himself fantasizing about her 12 year old daughter?

how about necrophilia? what if a man can only get hard, turned on, come if the woman he’s with *pretends to be dead*? what if he strangles a woman “consensually” until she passes out, then either continues or starts to enter her with his penis? what if he tells women he can only be turned on if he inflicts enough violence on her that he could have killed her?

a few years ago, there was an rcmp cop in canada, jim brown, who was found to have a “kink” for the kidnapping, torture (including bondage and use of knives)  and murder of women. he had porn of it, he looked for women to roleplay it, he posted porn he had made online, etc. one news story describes it thusly: “progresses from an apparent street scene of a woman walking past Brown sitting on a wall; he overpowers her; he hog-ties her, and he imprisons her in a cage.In one image, Mulgrew notes, Brown appears to be wearing only his regulation-issue Mountie boots and is aroused carrying a huge knife while the naked woman cringes in terror.” he also worked tangentially on the robert pickton case (a serial killer who murdered dozens of women, mostly indigenous and mostly in prostitution). was he a man who should work on such a case? should he be a cop hearing women’s stories of male sexualized violence? should he be looking at photographic and other evidence of rape, torture, kidnapping?

to get more obviously back on topic, strangulation is the third leading cause of male-induced/violent death for women, second only to murder with knives and guns. strangulation is the second biggest red flag for lethal male violence, second only to him threatening you with death. imagine if we eroticized other leading causes of death for other groups of people: shooting someone during sex, stabbing them in the torso, etc. carefully and safely, of course. how about complications during pregnancy and birth in teen girls? that’s the number one killer of girls 15-19 worldwide. why not turn that into something sexy too? car accidents are also a common cause of death. let’s sex that up too. heart disease and cancer are big killers too. lets look at the leading cause of violent death for young black men: homicide. for black boys, it’s unintentional injury. why not eroticize what leads to their deaths too?

interestingly, the “rough sex gone wrong” defense came to the public’s attention in another strangulation murder case https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/08/nyregion/consent-sexual-assault-rough-sex.html

and here’s a recent case, a rare one in that the man seems genuine in his remorse because he quickly confessed, of a young man strangling a young woman to death in seconds. she also had an interest in it and sought it out. she died anyway. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5492075/Killer-strangled-woman-death-sex.html “the pair had a ‘shared interest’ in ‘erotic asphyxiation’ …Chloe had died in 'seconds’ after he had seized her neck during sex.”

the ads i linked to featuring men strangling women: what do you think of those? how do you feel about how it’s portrayed in pornography? is opposing those kink shaming too, because lots of people, esp men, get off on it, and the men who make that porn generally want to make such pornography and usually have a lot of hatred for women. same with those who make the ads. they find it arousing.

it boggles my mind on how things that people would get raked over the coals for if they presented as humorous, gets a free pass because some guy somewhere gets an erection from it. like that rcmp cop? can you imagine if he was telling jokes like that in a comedy club? what the same people who defended him would be saying instead? but seek out vulnerable women when you’re a white male police officer, “roleplay” with them, make porn of it n post it online n you’re the bdsm martyr of the year, cruelly punished for your private life by prudish busybodies who need to mind their own business and keep their noses out of people’s bedrooms. there’s that public vs private divide. anything sexual is private, even when public, and you cannot criticize the private. rape jokes are bad, terrible, trivialize rape and sexual trauma and misogyny, but rape play is hot as fuck. you can humor shame and speech shame but don’t dare kink shame.

now onto why i referenced anal stimulation and entry, inc pia. i did so precisely bc most females experience of it with males is rape, painful, unwanted, etc. the more it happens, the more likely it is to be rape. the increase in college age people engaging in pia is treated like a big catcally joke and proof of sexual liberation and how awesome porn is and how it’s hot sex, but it is almost universally rape for young women and girls. strangulation and choking of women is seen similarly, and women and girls are expected to eroticize, engage in, and tolerate both. i brought it up precisely bc i like anal stimulation (as outlined in that post, excluding pia) but recognize that it is profoundly harmful in how it is practiced especially for girls growing up and young women, as well as women generally. if i was glib with anal entry of women (with a penis or something smaller) in my fic or posting about what i want to do with b, i’d want people to pull me up on it. it would be contributing to this coercive, painful sexual environment women and girls are in where they don’t want it and find it painful even though they are told they should, sex should be painful for women, women are a collection of openings for male use, etc. i purposely reign myself in and keep it to myself most of the time because of this.

you cannot read panic fic, surf tumblr, etc without certain “kinks” namely strangulation (and to a lesser extent choking), and daddy kink and dd/lg smacking you in the face. similarly, if i smacked someone in the face with how i depicted anal entry of women with men, i’d hope they’d rebel against it, tell me about it, etc. by all means, kink shame away. someone engaging critically with what i post doesn’t make me fucking melt or shivel up, literally or figuratively, and if you (general you, including me) post something publicly, we can expect reaction to it, esp if it’s not a direct confrontation but a “i’ve noticed this happening on tumblr/in fic/etc…” i’d say letting undue critique roll off one’s back, or engaging back n forth as two people wish to, is growing up. and hon, i’ve felt like a freak sexually, but not for that interestingly, but for my interest in tribadism and outercourse. not severely, but it was and sometimes still is there. 

[colorlatina]

Turning Anger into Action - My Story as a Texan in Colorado.

When Senate Bill 8 passed in Texas last year, I remember feeling not necessarily shocked, but sad. As a Latina born and raised in San Antonio, TX, I have always known that the climate around abortion rights and access in my state has always been threatened. I was sad because my friends who run abortion funds were going to have to work much harder to help people get abortions. If people really wanted, SB8 would allow them to sue them for their work. That itself is just scary.

But another emotion for me is anger. Anger is often presented as a negative emotion, and abortion abolitionists have used “angry” to characterize proponents of abortion as such. However, anger is an emotion that can guide us to action, especially among communities of color. When I switched my major to Ethnic Studies my sophomore year of college, I often found myself angry in response to what I was learning. A lot of the history of violence against communities of color, including my own, was new to me–I didn’t learn any of this in high school. But reading Audre Lorde’s speech The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism in the spring helped me make sense of this anger.

Audre Lorde delivered The Uses of Anger in June of 1981 at the National Women's Studies Conference in Connecticut. She says, “Anger is loaded with information and energy…Any discussion among women about racism must include the recognition and the use of anger…rest assured, our opponents are quite serious about their hatred of us and of what we are trying to do here”. The hatred Lorde spoke about in regards to racism can also be seen in regards to the anti-abortion movement. On March 9th, the Colorado House Health & Insurance committee heard HB22-1279, the Reproductive Health Equity Act. During testimony very late at night, a representative asked a witness this question:

“You [the witness] referenced Jeff Durban, who…was in front of this committee several weeks ago. And through different news articles, became very clear that he believes women should be executed for having an abortion. I’m curious if you have that same belief.”

The witness responded:

“I am a Christian and I abide by God’s law. God’s law says that thou shall not murder, and the penalty for murder is death.”

There was complete silence in the room after that. Only audio was streamed and I was listening at home, but even without the video, I just knew there was a chill in there. Even my mother–who is religious and against abortion–found that answer shocking.

This blatant hatred for myself and so many others who believe in the right to make decisions around family planning with dignity, of course, is angering. My favorite quote from The Uses of Anger is, “Anger is a grief of distortions between peers, and its object is change”. We grieve the inequalities, separations, and differences amongst the communities/identities we belong to caused by colonialism, slavery, systemic racism and violence, machismo, war, reproductive oppression, etc. But the anger resulting from this grief is comforting to me knowing that the object, or goal, is change.

As Latinxs, regarding our reproductive rights, we have lots of reasons to be angry. From the treatment of Mexican women at “well-baby clinics” in LA County in the 1920s-40s to the treatment of Latin American immigrant mothers and pregnant people at the US-Mexico border today, our rights have historically been violated by individuals and the state. This particularly highlights one tenant of reproductive justice–that we have the right to raise children in an environment free from violence and oppression from all these things. So much happening in the world right now that influences our decisions as Latinx youth to have or not have a family, and when, if so. In addition to simply not wanting a child and/or to continue a pregnancy, climate change, housing, access to contraception, and other issues are factors in those decisions. The safe and healthy environment children deserve is not always accessible to those who want them. Neither is an environment free from violence.

Some of us live in areas where our fundamental reproductive rights are protected, but even for those this applies to, those rights are threatened by the hundreds of abortion bans and restrictions that have been introduced across the US the past few years and continue to be, like Texas SB8. They are also threatened by two anticipated rulings from the Supreme Court that could overturn Roe v. Wade. In Colorado, reproductive rights have been well protected: it was the first state to decriminalize abortion in the late 60s. Despite this, Colorado ranks nearly last in its protections for abortion access. There is no state law that expressly protects this fundamental right, if Roe were to be overturned. This is why we need the Reproductive Health Equity Act now. In this current moment, RHEA can be that “object of change” for our anger. If passed, RHEA will cement in Colorado statute that “every individual has a fundamental right to use or refuse contraception; every pregnant individual has a fundamental right to continue the pregnancy and give birth or to have an abortion; and a fertilized egg, embryo, or fetus does not have independent or derivative rights under the laws of the state”, therefore protecting us no matter the Supreme Court decisions.

I think that sadness I feel from the situation in Texas represents the grief Lorde refers to in a way, because not only do I worry about my friends, but I also become increasingly more different than my parents and their beliefs–a distortion. But I’m proud to work with COLOR Latina as the Youth Policy Fellow because it allows me to use my anger from this to take action in one unique way. RHEA is an empowering bill, and now that it has passed the Senate and is on its way to the Governor's office, we should use the energy from our anger to fuel our support to be established as law. It will make a monumental impact on the protection of reproductive rights in Colorado, and it sure as hell can make an impact in Texas and the nation overall.

[philosophycorner]

Disclaimer: None of the examples I use are my own personal views of any one person or group.

I don't consider his examples of hate speech to be hate speech. Censoring a Bible verse that promotes anti-Semitism is not the same as censoring a living, breathing individual saying, like one person I got banned from Tumblr, "put Jews in ovens." Verses promoting hatred against Jews, Christians, practitioners of other religions, homosexuals, and women are often overlooked because religious people, especially in the West, tend to be pacifist moderates -- and thank goodness! The hate speech I have in mind is the hate speech of the alt-right, White supremacists who have turned their hate speech into hate crimes.

When a little boy is lynched, in the modern day, there's a problem. When these same White supremacists become police officers and cut the life of Trayvon Martin short, there's a problem. When these same officers are choking and shooting Blacks and getting away with it, there's a problem. The hate speech of the alt-right and a huge number of Trump supporters has translated into hate crimes: beatings, lynchings, shootings, and even a case in where a crazed driver mowed down some 20 people, injuring 19 of them and killing one. Unless we focus on extremists, the hate speech of the religious is more so an annoyance that their religion doesn't prove itself true by winning everyone over; the mere fact that other religions exist is irritating to some Christians and sometimes that'll lead to derisive speech against Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and so on.

That doesn't, however, translate to a Christian murdering a huge number of Muslims or Hindus or what have you. Sure (!), it's happened, most recently in Norway. In such cases, it's best to consider the kind of speech being used. "I hate Jews because they crucified our Lord and Savior" is a far cry from "I hate Jews and they should be put in ovens." "I hate Muslims because to them Jesus is a mere prophet that's inferior to Muhammad" is a far cry from "I hate Muslims and I think we should murder them where they stand." As with anything, there's nuance; there are degrees. People like dichotomies and binaries and Hitchens, for all the talk of small prefrontal lobes and the idiocy of our species, falls into the same trap of making this a black and white issue. It's not!

The gray areas are there! How many of us, in general, speak to the air when we're angry and say "oooohhhh, I could kill someone right now!" Does this qualify as hate speech? Not necessarily, especially since it's directed at no one in particular. And how many of us actually go out and kill someone because we're angry? Now, if you go to church and are made to feel vile because they talk about the lifestyles of a homosexual or a promiscuous individual, and you then get so angry that you talk about killing Christians, now we have a problem! So before you even have the chance to hurt one of the congregants, you should either be hit with a fine or put in jail for, at the very least, a misdemeanor. When you have Bible Belt Christians threatening to put a shot in me if I ever step foot in their state, that's dangerous hate speech against atheists. When you have a politician or public figure fueling hate against a religious or ethnic group, you have an individual who is attempting to incite violence against a group of people.

Joshua Feuerstein, for instance, is on record saying that BLM protestors should be filled with lead because, to his small mind, they're a threat to police. Protesting police brutality isn't a protest against police; it isn't a call to arms against the police. It isn't even a call to arms against racist officers. It's a call for departments in every state to screen their would-be officers; it's a call for stricter background checks and more important, it's a call to acquit these officers should they abuse the power of their badge!

There's no hate in that, but there's certainly hate in asking people to fill BLM protestors with lead. Joshua Feuerstein, for that reason and a host of others (e.g., letting his kids handle firearms), should already be serving the minimum sentence for a felony, a full seven years. That kind of hate speech, especially when you have millions of subscribers who admire you, is unacceptable! Hate speech, like pretty much anything, has degrees of severity. It can be as minor as "I hate so and so sports player for hurting my team's chances and I'd kick him right in the ACL if I could!" to "I hate so and so group of people and I'd love to watch them suffocate." The former is minor and is that sort of heat-of-the-moment thing you find when people are watching sports events; the latter is repulsive and should be prosecuted the same way a crime should. We shouldn't wait for someone to be injured or murdered to take action.

The US, at the moment, is filled with hate against minorities and women. The ICE is snatching up immigrants while they're trying to make a living for their families. They're not doing anything wrong and here they are being treated like animals. This is all because of an Administration that has declared war on everything the Left stands for. Religious freedom only matters for Christians; human rights belongs only to citizens and men -- and at this (!), not even all men, but White men; even children's rights are being violated as there's been an assault on education in inner cities.

Speaking about Mexicans, women, Blacks, and Muslims in such generalities has fueled much of the hatred we see. We are literally in a time in where Trump supporters think the country belongs solely to them and not also to people who stand for everything they're against. Enough is enough! This video isn't a defense of free speech. It's tip toeing around what severe hate speech looks like. "Hasidic Jews look funny" is anti-Semitic no doubt, but it's not hate speech. All freedoms have limits and that's been lost when it comes to freedom of speech, so as long as people are free to say whatever manner of violence they think, they'll act on those thoughts as well. And if that's a rod for my own back, it's only because I'm dumb enough to be a hypocrite and speak in a violent and hateful manner about a given group. That'll be my own fault. But aside from racists, who have drawn first blood for centuries, I have never incited hatred against a group; nor have I called for the injury or deaths of groups I disagree with. People lack nuance and any defense of free speech that defends hate speech proves that.

[musingsofmaniacs]

The Battle for Our Souls

The biggest casualty of strongmen getting elected that not a lot of people talk or think about, because as Trevor Noah puts ‘Ain’t Nobody Has Time for That’, is the social and personal psyche. There are always two ways to win over, rule or lead people. One is to unite them. To appeal to the similarity, to remind them that there are far more things that unite us than divide us. This is difficult, because humans are evolutionarily primed to focus on the contrasts. Woody Allen once said that if only two people remain on earth after rest of humanity has destroyed itself, the left-handed guy will take on the right handed one. Uniting people is slow painful task where success comes in excruciating increments, where for every one step forward, one risks sliding two back.

Or you could just divide people into tribes that hate each other's guts and make sure your tribe votes harder than theirs. This divide-and-rule strategy is as old as humanity itself, though the motto (divide et impera) is attributed to Philip II of Macedonia. Machiavelli called it an effective strategy to weaken enemies.  British used it in India and advanced into the subcontinent at an astounding pace. And Donald Trump used it to propel himself from a joke candidate to a joke President, only it’s not so funny this time.

Trump has succeeded so well in doing this, that his statement about shooting someone at 5th Avenue in New York and getting away with it seems horrifyingly accurate. In Trump’s tribe, The Man can do no wrong, and any evidence against him make people question the facts themselves. As Trump progresses in office, he keeps alienating his opponents more and more, while his base gets consolidated and strengthened by the day. At this rate 2020 will be less of a battle of ideals and issues and more of a ‘Might-is-Right’ contest between two group.

There was an article in The Economist on how moderates have become an extinct species. Moderate voices will always become a casualty when the discourse takes sharp turn towards ideological extremes. The Republican Party has effectively cannibalised voices with veneer of sanity, and replaced them with gun-toting-Bible-thumping-sons-of-soil; where they would rather vote in a peadophile with tribe loyalty than a moderate critical thinking maverick.

Technology was once a great uniter. It helped the cause of democracy with Arab Spring, India’s Anti-Corruption movement, Net Neutrality and so much more. We elevated the Techpreneurs to messianic figures proclaiming the gospel of hyper-connectedness and outreach. Today, we have to an extent confronted the damage these glorified advertising corporations and their tools can inflict on the state of the nation. The Cambridge Analytica scandal has cast Mark as the villian. The fact remains though that it is foolish of us to feign shock over what we always suspected, and in fact knew, these Ad-holes were up to, and that we would gladly give up privacy for the convenience of sharing a selfie of us with our breakfasts.

The mechanism employed to delegitimise the opponent is straight out of Joseph Goebbels playbook. By constantly referring to your opponents with an unkind adjective, like ‘Crooked Hillary’, ‘Low-Energy Jeb’, ‘Lying Ted’, he is making sure these people are dehumanised and reviled by his support base. Constantly badgering people with lies like election fraud, wiretapping, ‘witch hunt’ and crowd size makes the fan base buy into the idea of widespread conspiracy. Hell, Trump has even thrown FBI into jeopardy to increase his support among his base.

The ruling party in India has adopted a similar strategy to delegitimise opposition, with its highly effective social media machinery belting out catchphrases and blurbs like ‘Pappu’ and aggressively sharing memes about how great their Exalted Highness is. The discourse has descended into primitive tribalism so badly, that the supporters are finding it difficult to see any wrong in the rape of an eight year old girl. Systematic, some subtle and some not so subtle, efforts to equate loyalty and blind Nationalism to patriotism is underway. Party spokespersons ask us to be grateful that people are not jailed for speaking out against the government. Leaders bayed for arrest of the family after a man was lynched for alleged possession of beef, conveniently ignoring the brutal mob justice part or even describing the mob as innocent! That the most populous state in the country is now ruled by a fanatic whose government does not regard Taj Mahal as a monument worthy of endorsement. School textbooks are being tweaked to suit the ideology of the ruling party, extolling the virtues of debatable schemes rolled out by the government and disregarding achievements of previous governments.

That’s all OK, but what’s it got to do with you and me?

Image Courtesy: FunEcho, YouTube

Valid question. That takes us to where we started. Let’s begin with Trump. Everytime the POTUS tweets, that becomes the news. Trump is keenly aware of this. And he was a reality TV star. So he keeps peppering them with generous doses of outrageous statements. Martin Scorsese used a similar trick to get Taxi Driver approved with R rating with its bloody scenes. MPAA wanted to give the film an X, but by submitting the film uncut again and again, he desensitised the censors and got them to give an R. We now accept that the leader of the free world will bully anybody who opposes him using unkind words absolutely unbecoming of a man of his stature. We accept that a president can just support Nazis and not expect impeachment at all. As the administration turns the government into a cemetery, the public is letting smaller skeletons slide. In India, the fringe has come out of hiding. We are finding it okay, and even legitimate that there be a sound logic to murder of a senior journalist for her strong views against The Party. Demonising minority community and dissing them openly is becoming more and more mainstream. Leaders who have called for violence against the minorities, who have engineered riots, who have made fake exodus claims, are now finding themselves elected and popular, because they work ‘18 hours’ a day and ‘transfer non-performing bureaucrats’. That when a violent opposition towards a mediocre period drama resulted in a school bus with kids getting stones pelted, the social media devotees defended by commenting at least nobody was injured.  That when pointed about States violating freedom of speech, one gets responses such as ‘Do you have guts to make a movie on the other religion’.

There is a decline in the political and moral discourse. The emphasis is less on merits and demerits of ideas and more on the person or the party behind it. When this happens, debates gets infused with sentimentality. When you have an opposing political stand to a coworker or a friend or family, things get taken personally and suddenly, you are an enemy. You are to them, trying to undermine the effort of a man working 20 hour days trying to save the country from decay that everybody else had wrought upon for 60 years. Imagine the arrogance we allow when we idolise people that were once considered fringe and vilify everybody else who have had an important role to play in the country’s history. Nehru may have made mistakes, but he did what he thought was best for the country. So did Gandhi..

When we mainstreamise the fringe, where do we go from there? When we shut our eyes to rationality and reason and have unquestioning and blind faith in a party or a man, it undoes the centuries worth of works of soldiers and writers and philosophers and saints and statesmen who fought for ideals that ask us to rise above the petty tribalism. The very idea that the ideals, the morals, the rights, the institutions are greater than a person, a party, a caste, a religion or a group might be at stake here. The great war today is not between right and left, between Trump and Dems, between One Man and the 19 odd parties; it is between the works of centuries that has woven a fragile fabric of our socio-economico-politico-moral existence with enough checks and balances and our primitive instincts that threaten to tear it all apart, testing these checks to the limit.

In other words, it's a battle for our collective souls.

References:

1. Taxi Driver: https://books.google.com/books?id=40UTI-uUHpwC&pg=PA108&dq=%22We+got+congratulated+on+changes+that+we+never+made%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=iU1mUqH7HYeTrgf6kYCQDA&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%22We%20got%20congratulated%20on%20changes%20that%20we%20never%20made%22&f=false

2. The Economist Article: https://www.economist.com/united-states/2016/01/14/the-centre-cannot-hold?fsrc=scn/fb/te/pe/ed/thecentrecannothold

3. The war on textbooks: https://washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/06/01/indias-new-textbooks-are-promoting-the-prime-ministers-favorite-policies-critics-allege/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.0cfb5af3c8e4

4. Beef over beef: https://firstpost.com/india/dadri-lynching-take-action-against-akhlaqs-kin-for-eating-beef-says-adityanath-2811776.html

[sinrau]

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It’s such obvious hypocrisy that we need to blink twice at its glare.

Donald Trump and Mike Pence leaned heavily into the convention electioneering vision that Joe Biden’s America would bring about lawlessness without end in the streets.

But they never acknowledged in their convention presentations to mask-free audiences on federal property (electioneering that itself violates the Hatch Act) that the violence they see is happening right here and now – on their watch.

If they and Team Trump supporters are right about the overwhelming need for Law & Order, why isn’t that overwhelming force in play right now? If the overnight fires being set in the streets of Chicago, Portland and now Kenosha, where is the response that Trump claims would happen in the future.

Where is the reckoning between what Team Trump says should be and what actually is?

And then, if they are right about having successfully guided America through the dangers of coronavirus, why are deaths still rising beyond 180,000 Americans? Trump was praising FEMA for quick response to this week’s hurricanes after having taken emergency money from FEMA to pay for Wall construction.

And, if their jobs-oriented economic recovery program is V-shaped and on track, why did another million workers just apply for unemployment, and why are millions out of jobs, healthcare, reliable food supplies and even the basic protective gear to allow a safe return to schools and work? Or that hurricanes are gaining strength in climate change, a topic never mentioned in the convention?

In other words, where is the reckoning between what Team Trump says should be and what actually is?

It’s always someone else’s fault – Democratic mayors or governors or The Left, or without even being in office, Joe Biden and crew. Republicans were so busy patting themselves on the back this week, treating coronavirus as passed and gone, decrying violence by leftist protesters who may, in fact, include right-wing groups and touting a would-be economy that forgets the very people that the party says it wants to help that we are left wondering why Trump and Pence want their jobs altogether.

Where Is Trump?

Trump’s 70-minute acceptance of nomination stemwinder speech last night was big on fear and self-congratulations and weak on explaining why his words are so far off the mark. If Trump’s analysis of what we face daily were on the mark, we wouldn’t find ourselves facing seemingly insurmountable problems.

He will send in the National Guard into Kenosha, he said, but he didn’t— the Democratic governor did. Trump promised to cure us of the pandemic when what he has done is lean on FDA scientists to speed quack theories and premature treatments and undermine the preventive use of masks. Trump promised international strength as he distances from allies, and he re-promised his role as job creator when jobs have disappeared for millions.

The reality is that this White House has abandoned leadership to Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity—playing to fear-mongering on the one hand, and the NBA on the other. Why do we have sports figures halting their play to remind us that we need to reconsider our societal approach to policing? Why possibly do we need Tucker Carlson to defend vigilantes carrying guns to protect businesses, as he did this week in response to the arrest of a 17-year-old teen on charges of murdering protesters?

Could it be that talking trash and cleaning it up are different efforts, requiring an understanding of complexities, and taking in information, doing the harder work of coordinating effective responses – and above all, actually listening to understand what is at issue?

If Team Trump is the only answer to Law & Order needs, what is this administration doing other than threatening mayors and governors? Where are they about either getting both left and right-oriented militia groups to stand down or to get to the real issues fueling protest altogether? Where are they as leaders to help the public keep in perspective the acts of relative few middle-of-the-night violators as against the tidal wave of peaceful protests about policing and systematic racism in America?

Instead, they hide behind pointing to the prospect that under Biden, there will be lawlessness without acknowledging that what they see as a future danger is happening right now.

Actually, the Justice Department is entering into investigations in individual cases, like justifications for police in Kenosha to shoot seven times at point-blank range into the back of Jacob Blake as he reached into his car, where yes, there was a knife on the floor. There were also three little boys in the car.

Where are they – and more importantly, why shouldn’t we be judging them as the group that can’t keep order on the streets – or get the issues at the basis of it all into a better place for a more peaceful resolution?

How about we stop beating the drum about what might happen with Biden and consider what is happening with Trump?

Can They Do Better?

In the case of Portland, deployment of federal troops—unmarked federal customs agents and marshals—worsened the situation. In its bluster, this White House assumes that it can do a better job of policing than local authorities. It assumes that the only issue on the table is the aftermath of protest, not its underlying causes.

It is easy to call out slogans. It is hard to set things right.

Isn’t this government learning that from pandemic or hurricanes or immigration or healthcare or dozens of other pending issues? We’re busy now giving a hand when the president or vice president actually even acknowledges that there have been coronavirus deaths, as if that passes for “all of government” coordinated planning.

One truth here is that there are signs of militias, including those associated with white supremacist themes, that have popped up regularly in these overnight confrontations, often leaving the police who show up to quell unrest caught between anti-government factions on more than a single side. But that’s not the fear that is being stoked by the speeches by Trump and Pence, who rather draw broad conclusions that pit Black Lives Matter against peacekeeping efforts by police.

This is the administration that has stopped examination of police department tactics altogether, that has moved the civil rights division towards anti-affirmative-action defense, that only seeks out Black citizens at election time. When and how do they get judged – as compared with the threat that things will be worse under Biden, who they say will destroy white suburbs, schools, business and tax structures.

There is basic hypocrisy in the messages this week from Trump and Pence: The other side is to be judged by the future effects of its policies. Trump-Pence is to be judged on the worthiness of its mottos.

It takes some huge gall to ignore reality.

Trump’s delusion and reality: White House has abandoned leadership to Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity

[floridaprelaw-blog]

The Summer of Love… And Violence: The Aftermath Of CHOP

By Henry Jacobson, Florida State University Class of 2020

July 30, 2020

Seattle’s CHOP (Capitol Hill Organized Protest) zone arose from the BLM protests that erupted after the unjustified murder of George Floyd.Protestors in Seattle, Washingtondesignated six blocks of the city as a police-free zone. Referred to as CHAZ (Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone) or CHOP (Capitol Hill Occupied Protest), the area was claimed by the protestors when the local police precinct was evacuated by the police in efforts to not escalate tensions. The zone lasted without police interference for 24 days, from June 8th to July 1st. In that time political parties debated, and people formed their opinions about CHOP. The mayor of Seattle, Jenny Durkan, said in an interview that the whole event might be deemed a “summer of love” [1]. By July 1st, when police re-entered the zone, there had been four shootings resulting in two dead and more injured.

Two fatal shootings occurred in CHOP. The first happened in the early morning hours of June 20th. 19-year-old Lorenzo Anderson was shot multiple times and died later at the hospital. A 33-year-old man was also shot and arrived at the hospital in critical condition [2]. The men were not picked up and driven by an ambulance and experienced EMTs because of the zone being blocked off and the removal of the police. Instead, the men were carried to the nearest hospital by medical volunteers within the zone. The second shooting involved more teenagers, “a 16-year-old boy was killed and a 14-year-old boy was wounded early Monday morning when they were shot at 12th Avenue and East Pike Street in the protest area known as CHOP, in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood” [3]. One of the teenagers was brought by a private vehicle to the hospital, the other arrived 15 minutes later in an ambulance. The crime scenes of both were ruled as being tampered with by the investigators that arrived later. The Zone’s lack of police presence and barricades made it impossible for public agents to arrive in a timely fashion. No arrests have been made pertaining to both fatal shootings. Both deceased victims were teenage black men. These acts of violence within the CHOP zone spurred the police to reenter the zone on July 1st. Regarding the murders, Chief of Police, Carmen Best had this to say: “Enough is enough.Two African American men are dead, at a place where they claim to be working for Black Lives Matter. But they’re gone, they’re dead now”[3].

Seattle’s government eventually responded to the killings by issuing executive orders to leave the area. “More than three dozen people were arrested during the early-morning ouster, charged with failure to disperse, obstruction, assault and unlawful weapon possession” [4]. Once the police had swept all of the people out of the area, government sanitation workers were left with scrubbing the area of graffiti and trash. “’I was just stunned by the amount of graffiti, garbage and property destruction,’ Seattle Police Chief Carmen Best said after she walked around the area” [4]. No doubt the cleanup will take time and a fair amount of taxpayer money. The zone had no named leader and so it is hard to say if it had detailed goals or if it accomplished any of its goals. Some demands that were seen graffitied around CHOP called for the removal of 50 percent of the police force’s funding. Mayor Durkan did not oblige this request. She did, however “. . . [propose] a more modest $76 million cut amid a "reimagining" of police functions in Seattle” [5].

As with any major event, there are legal repercussions. “More than a dozen businesses in Capitol Hill filed a class-action lawsuit Wednesday evening against the City of Seattle for how officials handled the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest, known as CHOP.The businesses based in Capitol Hill said they support free-speech rights and the efforts of the "Black Lives Matter" movement, but they filed the 56-page class action because of the constitutional rights of employees and residents in the Capitol Hill area” [6]. The businesses that were inside the CHOP zone witnessed the destruction of private property and felt unsafe from some of the protestors. Some business owners were threatened that attempts to remove graffiti would be met with vandalization or burning of their property [6]. Due to the social and cultural aspects of the protests, the businesses were reluctant to bring their case forward. But the slow action of the local government and mounting economic losses eventually persuaded the businesses to go forward with the class action lawsuit.

Private Citizens have also joined together to file a class-action lawsuit against the city. Jacob Bozeman, a Washington attorney, stated that “Allowing a group of people to say who comes, who goes, that's a violation of the 1st, 4th and 14th Amendments” [7]. He does have a point. Bozeman brought up another good point when he said, “what if every special interest group wanted to take over a portion of the city?” [7]. The government allowed a private group of citizens with political goals to occupy public property. This group set up barricades and monitored the activities that occurred within the premises while not allowing police and emergency services in. Imagine how a citizen that resided in the CHOP would feel if they held no or a conflicting political opinion with the mob of protestors. Knowing that police response would be delayed or non-existent if violence erupted. Citizens pay taxes and should be guaranteed a variety of city services in exchange for that payment. This was not the case in CHOP. The local government’s response and actions did not instill confidence in the minds of citizens that desired to feel safe.

________________________________________________________________

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/06/12/seattle-autonomous-zone-capitol-hill/

[2] https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/teen-who-died-in-chop-shooting-wanted-to-be-loved-those-who-knew-him-recall/

[3] https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/shooting-at-seattles-chop-protest-site-leaves-2-in-criticalcondition/#:~:text=Two%20people%20have%20died%20and,protesters%20before%20CHOP%20was%20formed.

[4] https://nypost.com/2020/07/01/seattles-chop-full-of-destruction-after-cops-oust-protesters/

[5] https://komonews.com/news/local/durkan-best-slam-50-defunding-of-seattle-police-offer-compromise

[6] https://komonews.com/news/local/capitol-hill-businesses-file-lawsuit-against-city-for-handling-of-chop

[7] https://www.foxbusiness.com/money/chop-seattle-class-action-lawsuit-bozeman

Photo Credit: Cedar777