#brown migrants

[anotherpapercut]

liberals in 2020: we'll push Biden left!

liberals in 2024: talking about the real actual ways in which Biden is definitionally a fascist who has not only not improved the circumstances many marginalized people live under but has actually made them worse is 'moral purity' propaganda invented by the right to sell more trump

[tatert07s]

White people claim Central Asians as white, but the moment a group of Central Asians commit a terroristic attack, suddenly all Central Asians are terroristic churkas. So, what is it? Are we only white when it’s convenient, to make your nonexistent culture seem spicy and appropriate our food, clothing, and traditions? We’re so white, that they physically assimilate our language and stop us from speaking our native tongue because that’s the language of the barbaric savages. Ahh, got it.

[rcannon992]

Cast skins: evidence of rebirth

[stupid-sloot-headcanons]

Me whenever the banjo section starts in the Carnivale opening

[dansnaturepictures]

The fourth post in my 2022 wildlife and photography highlights posts: Ten of my favourite dragonfly and damselfly moments and themes this year

Broad-bodied Chasers of Bentley Wood

I saw this species well at this key site for them this year a dragonfly I love, I took the first picture in this photoset of one.

A blog at the time: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/683624698018398208/7522-bentley-wood-before-leaving-today-i-enjoyed

My first ever Hairy Dragonfly at Fishlake Meadows in spring

It was nice to finally see one of these, a key moment of my dragonfly and damselfly year.

Blog on the day: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/684985624455938048/22nd-may-2022-blog-2-of-2-fishlake-meadows-me-and

A fantastic year of seeing Emperors with similarly grand Golden-ringed Dragonfly seen too

I saw so many Emperors and so well this year, what a pleasure and the Golden-ringed Dragonfly the dragonfly that got me into them was an important moment too.

A blog at the time: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/686526837858418688/08062022-moon-this-evening-view-out-the-back

Common Darter and Black-tailed Skimmer at Lakeside Country as we went into summer

Very thrilling late spring/summer moments with wonderful dragonflies to see so close to home. I took the second picture in this photoset of the darter and third of the skimmer.

A blog at the time: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/686615539259441152/090622-insects-birds-and-more-at-lakeside-and

One of my greatest dragonfly days of the year at Knepp in July with Scarce Chaser and Southern Hawker seen my first of the year the chaser only my second ever

Broad-bodied Chaser and Black-tailed Skimmers were ones I saw on this massive day of my year too. I took the fourth picture in this photoset of a Southern Hawker at Brownsea Island later in the year.

Blog on the day: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/688705790489542656/2722-knepp-blog-1-of-2-landscape-butterflies

Brilliant summer days of seeing Brown Hawker some of my best views ever and Ruddy Darter at Rutland Water where I took the fifth picture in this set of a Brown Hawker and Hickling Broad in Norfolk where I took the sixth picture in this set of a Ruddy Darter on our August weekend away for the Global Bird Fair.

Blog at the time: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/690136291495526400/15072022-part-2-of-2-hickling-broad-we-then

Migrant Hawkers at Lakeside and seeing them at other places a lot too

A moment I anticipated sparking a run of seeing this stunning dragonfly which was a key foundation to another great dragonfly and damselfly year for me. The run extended to other places in September. I took the seventh picture in this photoset of one at RSPB Radipole Lake.

Blog at the time: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/692051841113047040/08082022-lakeside-and-home-swift-crows

Azure Damselfly at Lakeside

In some brushing up of my ID knowledge between them and Common Blue Damselfly this year I realized one exciting one I’d seen at Lakeside in May and other sightings across the years were azure, so I was thrilled to see and reconnect to this species this year. I took the eighth picture in this photoset of it.

Blog at the time (edited after I’d realised this was an Azure Damselfly): https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/683532297998352384/06052022-lakeside-and-home-i-really-enjoyed

Late summer and autumn hawkers and darters

A lovely run seeing the Migrant Hawkers and Southern Hawkers and also Common Darters as the season went on especially at Lakeside but elsewhere too. I took the ninth picture in this photoset of a Common Darter at Stour Valley Nature Reserve in September.

A blog at the time: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/696121205591244800/22092022-lakeside-and-home-grey-wagtails

Four-spotted Chaser and Blue-tailed Damselfly at Thursley Common in May

I often ticked a pair of species for my year list on days in the beginnings of my dragon and damselfly year and these are species I love that I saw for the first time of the year that special day at a special place for these insects. I got the tenth picture in this photoset of the damselfly. I saw Large Red Damselflies memorably that day too.

The blog of the day: https://dansnaturepictures.tumblr.com/post/684261817237815296/140522-thursley-we-came-to-thursley-in-surrey

[teachandwrite-blog]

I

am

writing,

putting my

stories in bottles,

tossing them out into the sea,

hoping someone finds, reads, loves them,

sends their stories in bottles through the deep sea to me.

- trevor scott barton, ‘message in a bottle,’ @leftfootpoems

[esr10]

not saying this to be a contrarian, but i doubt the wife or daughters of a footballer who goes to saudi arabia is gonna have a directly negative/misogynistic experience. that said, they should not go to saudi arabia. like ever.

[najia-cooks]

[ID: A close-up on a dish with glossy noodles, spinach, carrot, mushroom, and sesame seeds. End ID]

잡채 / Japchae (Korean noodle stir-fry)

Japchae is a popular Korean dish made with glass noodles. Sweet potato starch noodles are fried in a flavorful sauce, combined with colorful, tender-crisp vegetables, and dressed with sesame; the result is chewy, savory, garlicky, slightly sweet, and highly satisfying. Because of its versatility and the ease of preparing large batches, japchae is frequently served for banquets at weddings and birthday celebrations.

"Japchae" is a compound of "잡" "jap" "mixed," and "채" "chae" "vegetables"; both syllables are Korean readings of Chinese characters ("雜" and "菜"). Like the name, modern japchae dishes combine Chinese and Korean elements: the cellophane noodles now considered central to the dish originated as a Chinese import towards the end of the 20th century. From the 17th century until then, japchae had been a royal court dish consisting only of stir-fried vegetables (frequently mushrooms, cucumber and radish).

Japchae, along with other Korean foods, is becoming more prevalent in the Philippines and Malaysia, by way of privately owned Korean restaurants usually owned by migrants. Dr. Gaik Cheng Khoo writes that, despite the South Korean government's campaign to promote the globalization of hansik (한식; Korean food), it is these independent restaurateurs who actually engage in Korean "gastrodiplomacy" by interfacing with clients in their particular contexts.

Recipe under the cut!

Patreon | Paypal | Venmo

Ingredients:

For the dish:

8oz (230g) 당면 / dangmyeon (Korean sweet potato starch noodles)

1 medium carrot, cut into a thick julienne

1 small yellow onion, sliced

2-3 green onions, cut into 2" pieces

6oz fresh spinach

1 cup (65g) sliced shiitake or wood ear mushrooms

4oz beef substitute of choice, or 1/2 cup (30g) soya chunks (chunky TVP)

1 clove garlic, chopped

Neutral oil, to fry

Sesame seeds, to garnish

Both dangmyeon (which may be also labelled "sweet potato vermicelli") and soya chunks / nutra chunks (from a brand such as Nutrela) may be found at an Asian grocery store.

For the sauce:

2 cloves garlic, grated

4 Tbsp Korean soy sauce

2-3 Tbsp brown sugar, to taste

2 Tbsp toasted sesame oil

1/2 tsp ground black pepper, or to taste

For the marinade:

1/2 cup vegetarian 'beef' stock from concentrate, or vegetable stock (only if using nutra chunks, which need to be hydrated)

1 tsp dark soy sauce

1/2 tsp brown sugar

1/2 tsp toasted sesame oil

Instructions:

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Meanwhile, prep your vegetables and mix all ingredients for the sauce and marinade.

2. Mix beef substitute and all marinade ingredients to coat.

3. Once the water is boiling, blanch the spinach for 30 seconds to a minute, until bright green. Drain and shock in cold water. Squeeze out excess water, roughly chop, and dress with a bit of salt.

4. In the same water, boil sweet potato noodles for 6-8 minutes, until translucent and softened. A firm pinch should break the noodle.

5. When noodles are fully cooked, drain and shock in cold water to halt cooking. Cut them in a few places with kitchen scissors to make them easier to eat. Toss with a bit of sesame oil to prevent sticking.

6. While noodles are cooking, begin stir-frying the vegetables. Heat 1 tsp oil in a medium skillet on high. Stir-fry carrots, onion, and a pinch of salt for a minute or two until slightly softened.

7. Set aside and add more oil to the pan; stir-fry mushrooms for a couple minutes until they have released their water. Add garlic and sauté until fragrant.

8. Add green onion and cook for 30 seconds to a minute; do not allow it to soften too much. Set aside.

9. If using nutra chunks: drain and reserve liquid. Fry for a minute on high, agitating often, to brown. Pour in the rest of the marinade and cook until dry. If using another beef substitute: fry according to package directions.

10. Heat another Tbsp of neutral oil in a large skillet and add in noodles and about half of the prepared sauce. Stir fry, tossing often, until fragrant. Remove to a bowl and stir in vegetables, beef, and the rest of the prepared sauce. Garnish with sesame seeds and serve warm.

Leftovers may be served hot or cold, as a side dish or a main, or over rice.

[muslimintp-1999-girl]

This planet is a joke. Black and Brown lives matter and if you stand with Israel you're not with us or one of us.

Israel Forcibly Injected African Immigrants with Birth Control

Fifty-two percent of Jewish Israelis identify with the statement by MK Miri Regev that African migrants are “a cancer in the body” of the nation, and over a third condone anti-migrant violence, according to the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) Peace Index for May 2012.

Israeli rabbi under fire for calling black people 'monkeys'. The chief rabbi of the Sephardic community used two slurs in his speech.

[racefortheironthrone]

OK, I'll bite - what's the deal with the United Farm Workers? What were their strengths and weaknesses compared to other labor unions?

It is not an easy thing to talk about the UFW, in part because it wasn't just a union. At the height of its influence in the 1960s and 1970s, it was also a civil rights movement that was directly inspired by the SCLC campaigns of Martin Luther King and owed its success as much to mass marches, hunger strikes, media attention, and the mass mobilization of the public in support of boycotts that stretched across the United States and as far as Europe as it did to traditional strikes and picket lines.

It was also a social movement that blended powerful strains of Catholic faith traditions with Chicano/Latino nationalism inspired by the black power movement, that reshaped the identity of millions away from asimilation into white society and towards a fierce identification with indigeneity, and challenged the racist social hierarchy of rural California.

It was also a political movement that transformed Latino voting behavior, established political coalitions with the Kennedys, Jerry Brown, and the state legislature, that pushed through legislation and ran statewide initiative campaigns, and that would eventually launch the careers of generations of Latino politicians who would rise to the very top of California politics.

However, it was also a movement that ultimately failed in its mission to remake the brutal lives of California farmworkers, which currently has only 7,000 members when it once had more than 80,000, and which today often merely trades on the memory of its celebrated founders Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez rather than doing any organizing work.

To explain the strengths and weaknesses of the UFW, we have to start with some organizational history, because the UFW was the result of the merger of several organizations each with their own strengths and weaknesses.

The Origins of the UFW:

To explain the strengths and weaknesses of the UFW, we have to start with some organizational history, because the UFW was the result of the merger of several organizations each with their own strengths and weaknesses.

In the 1950s, both Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez were community organizers working for a group called the Community Service Organization (an affiliate of Saul Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation) that sought to aid farmworkers living in poverty. Huerta and Chavez were trained in a novel strategy of grassroots, door-to-door organizing aimed not at getting workers to sign union cards, but to agree to host a house meeting where co-workers could gather privately to discuss their problems at work free from the surveillance of their bosses. This would prove to be very useful in organizing the fields, because unlike the traditional union model where organizers relied on the NRLB's rulings to directly access the factory floors, Central California farms were remote places where white farm owners and their white overseers would fire shotguns at brown "trespassers" (union-friendly workers, organizers, picketers).

In 1962, Chavez and Huerta quit CSO to found the National Farm Workers Association, which was really more of a worker center offering support services (chiefly, health care) to independent groups of largely Mexican farmworkers. In 1965, they received a request to provide support to workers dealing with a strike against grape growers in Delano, California.

In Delano, Chavez and Huerta met Larry Itliong of the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), which was a more traditional labor union of migrant Filipino farmworkers who had begun the strike over sub-minimum wages. Itliong wanted Chavez and Huerta to organize Mexican farmworkers who had been brought in as potential strikebreakers and get them to honor the picket line.

The result of their collaboration was the formation of the United Farm Workers as a union of the AFL-CIO. The UFW would very much be marked by a combination of (and sometimes conflict between) AWOC's traditional union tactics - strikes, pickets, card drives, employer-based campaigns, and collective bargaining for union contracts - and NFWA's social movement strategy of marches, boycotts, hunger strikes, media campaigns, mobilization of liberal politicians, and legislative campaigns.

1965 to 1970: the Rise of the UFW:

While the strike starts with 2,000 Filipino workers and 1,200 Mexican families targeting Delano area growers, it quickly expanded to target more growers and bring more workers to the picket lines, eventually culminating in 10,000 workers striking against the whole of the table grape growers of California across the length and breadth of California.

Throughout 1966, the UFW faced extensive violence from the growers, from shotguns used as "warning shots" to hand-to-hand violence, to driving cars into pickets, to turning pesticide-spraying machines onto picketers. Local police responded to the violence by effectively siding with the growers, and would arrest UFW picketers for the crime of calling the police.

Chavez strongly emphasized a non-violent response to the growers' tactics - to the point of engaging in a Gandhian hunger strike against his own strikers in 1968 to quell discussions about retaliatory violence - but also began to employ a series of civil rights tactics that sought to break what had effectively become a stalemate on the picket line by side-stepping the picket lines altogether and attacking the growers on new fronts.

First, he sought the assistance of outside groups and individuals who would be sympathetic to the plight of the farmworker and could help bring media attention to the strike - UAW President Walter Reuther and Senator Robert Kennedy both visited Delano to express their solidarity, with Kennedy in particular holding hearings that shined a light on the issue of violence and police violations of the civil rights of UFW picketers.

Second, Chavez hit on the tactic of using boycotts as a way of exerting economic pressure on particular growers and leveraging the solidarity of other unions and consumers - the boycotts began when Chavez enlisted Dolores Huerta to follow a shipment of grapes from Schenley Industries (the first grower to be boycotted) to the Port of Oakland. There, Huerta reached out to the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union and persuaded them to honor the boycott and refuse to handle non-union grapes. Schenley's grapes started to rot on the docks, cutting them off from the market, and between the effects of union solidarity and growing consumer participation in the UFW's boycotts, the growers started to come under real economic pressure as their revenue dropped despite a record harvest.

Throughout the rest of the Delano grape strike, Dolores Huerta would be the main organizer of the national and internal boycotts, travelling across the country (and eventually all the way to the UK) to mobilize unions and faith groups to form boycott committees and boycott houses in major cities that in turn could educate and mobilize ordinary consumers through a campaign of leafleting and picketing at grocery stores.

Third, the UFW organized the first of its marches, a 300-mile trek from Delano to the state capital of Sacramento aimed at drawing national attention to the grape strike and attempting to enlist the state government to pass labor legislation that would give farmworkers the right to organize. Carefully organized by Cesar Chavez to draw on Mexican faith traditions, the march would be labelled a "pilgrimage," and would be timed to begin during Lent and culminate during Easter. In addition to American flags and the UFW banner, the march would be led by "pilgrims" carrying a banner of Our Lady of Guadelupe.

While this strategy was ultimately effective in its goal of influencing the broader Latino community in California to see the UFW as not just a union but a vehicle for the broader aspirations of the whole Latino community for equality and social justice, what became known in Chicano circles as La Causa, the emphasis on Mexican symbolism and Chicano identity contributed to a growing tension with the Filipino half of the UFW, who felt that they were being sidelined in a strike they had started.

Nevertheless, by the time that the UFW's pilgrimage arrived at Sacramento, news broke that they had won their first breakthrough in the strike as Schenley Industries (which had been suffering through a four-month national boycott of its products) agreed to sign the first UFW union contract, delivering a much-needed victory.

As the strike dragged on, growers were not passively standing by - in addition to doubling down on the violence by hiring strikebreakers to assault pro-UFW farmworkers, growers turned to the Teamsters Union as a way of pre-empting the UFW, either by pre-emptively signing contracts with the Teamsters or effectively backing the Teamsters in union elections.

Part of the darker legacy of the Teamsters is that, going all the back to the 1930s, they have a nasty habit of raiding other unions, and especially during their mobbed-up days would work with the bosses to sign sweetheart deals that allowed the Teamsters to siphon dues money from workers (who had not consented to be represented by the Teamsters, remember) while providing nothing in the way of wage increases or improved working conditions, usually in exchange for bribes and/or protection money from the employers. Moreover, the Teamsters had no compunction about using violence to intimidate rank-and-file workers and rival unions in order to defend their "paper locals" or win a union election. This would become even more of an issue later on, but it started up as early as 1966.

Moreover, the growers attempted to adapt to the UFW's boycott tactics by sharing labels, such that a boycotted company would sell their products under the guise of being from a different, non-boycotted company. This forced the UFW to change its boycott tactics in turn, so that instead of targeting individual growers for boycott, they now asked unions and consumers alike to boycott all table grapes from the state of California.

By 1970, however, the growing strength of the national grape boycott forced no fewer than 26 Delano grape growers to the bargaining table to sign the UFW's contracts. Practically overnight, the UFW grew from a membership of 10,000 strikers (none of whom had contracts, remember) to nearly 70,000 union members covered by collective bargaining agreements.

1970 to 1978: The UFW Confronts Internal and External Crises

Up until now, I've been telling the kind of simple narrative of gradual but inevitable social progress that U.S history textbooks like, the Hollywood story of an oppressed minority that wins a David and Goliath struggle against a violent, racist oligarchy through the kind of non-violent methods that make white allies feel comfortable and uplifted. (It's not an accident that the bulk of the 2014 film Cesar Chavez starring Michael Peña covers the Delano Grape Strike.)

It's also the period in which the UFW's strengths as an organization that came out of the community organizing/civil rights movement were most on display. In the eight years that followed, however, the union would start to experience a series of crises that would demonstrate some of the weaknesses of that same institutional legacy. As Matt Garcia describes in From the Jaws of Victory, in the wake of his historic victory in 1970, Cesar Chavez began to inflict a series of self-inflicted injuries on the UFW that crippled the functioning of the union, divided leadership and rank-and-file alike, and ultimately distracted from the union's external crises at a time when the UFW could not afford to be distracted.

That's not to say that this period was one of unbroken decline - as we'll discuss, the UFW would win many victories in this period - but the union's forward momentum was halted and it would spend much of the 1970s trying to get back to where it was at the very start of the decade.

To begin with, we should discuss the internal contradictions of the UFW: one of the major features of the UFW's new contracts was that they replaced the shape-up with the hiring hall. This gave the union an enormous amount of power in terms of hiring, firing and management of employees, but the quid-pro-quo of this system is that it puts a significant administrative burden on the union. Not only do you have to have to set up policies that fairly decide who gets work and when, but you then have to even-handedly enforce those policies on a day-to-day basis in often fraught circumstances - and all of this is skilled white-collar labor.

This ran into a major bone of contention within the movement. When the locus of the grape strike had shifted from the fields to the urban boycotts, this had made a new constituency within the union - white college-educated hippies who could do statistical research, operate boycott houses, and handle media campaigns. These hippies had done yeoman's work for the union and wanted to keep on doing that work, but they also needed to earn enough money to pay the rent and look after their growing families, and in general shift from being temporary volunteers to being professional union staffers.

This ran head-long into a buzzsaw of racial and cultural tension. Similar to the conflicts over the role of white volunteers in CORE/SNCC during the Civil Rights Movement, there were a lot of UFW leaders and members who had come out of the grassroots efforts in the field who felt that the white college kids were making a play for control over the UFW. This was especially driven by Cesar Chavez' religiously-inflected ideas of Catholic sacrifice and self-denial, embodied politically as the idea that a salary of $5 a week (roughly $30 a week in today's money) was a sign of the purity of one's "missionary work." This worked itself out in a series of internicene purges whereby vital college-educated staff were fired for various crimes of ideological disunity.

This all would have been survivable if Chavez had shown any interest in actually making the union and its hiring halls work. However, almost from the moment of victory in 1970, Chavez showed almost no interest in running the union as a union - instead, he thought that the most important thing was relocating the UFW's headquarters to a commune in La Paz, or creating the Poor People's Union as a way to organize poor whites in the San Joaquin Valley, or leaving the union altogether to become a Catholic priest, or joining up with the Synanon cult to run criticism sessions in La Paz. In the mean-time, a lot of the UFW's victories were withering on the vine as workers in the fields got fed up with hiring halls that couldn't do their basic job of making sure they got sufficient work at the right wages.

Externally, all of this was happening during the second major round of labor conflicts out in the fields. As before, the UFW faced serious conflicts with the Teamsters, first in the so-called "Salad Bowl Strike" that lasted from 1970-1971 and was at the time the largest and most violent agricultural strike in U.S history - only then to be eclipsed in 1973 with the second grape strike. Just as with the Salinas strike, the grape growers in 1973 shifted to a strategy of signing sweetheart deals with the Teamsters - and using Teamster muscle to fight off the UFW's new grape strike and boycott. UFW pickets were shot at and killed in drive-byes by Teamster trucks, who then escalated into firebombing pickets and UFW buildings alike.

After a year of violence, reduced support from the rank-and-file, and declining resources, Chavez and the UFW felt that their backs were up against a wall - and had to adjust their tactics accordingly. With the election of Jerry Brown as governor in 1974, the UFW pivoted to a strategy of pressuring the state government to enact a California Agricultural Labor Relations Act that would give agricultural workers the right to organize, and with that all the labor protections normally enjoyed by industrial workers under the Federal National Labor Relations Act - at the cost of giving up the freedom to boycott and conduct secondary strikes which they had had as outsiders to the system.

This led to the semi-miraculous Modesto March, itself a repeat of the Delano-to-Sacramento march from the 1960s. Starting as just a couple hundred marchers in San Francisco, the March swelled to as many as 15,000-strong by the time that it reached its objective at Modesto. This caused a sudden sea-change in the grape strike, bringing the growers and the Teamsters back to the table, and getting Jerry Brown and the state legislature to back passage of California Agricultural Labor Relations Act.

This proved to be the high-water mark for the UFW, which swelled to a peak of 80,000 members. The problem was that the old problems within the UFW did not go away - victory in 1975 didn't stop Chavez and his Chicano constituency feuding with more distinctively Mexican groups within the movement over undocumented immigration, nor feuding with Filipino constituencies over a meeting with Ferdinand Marcos, and nor escalating these internal conflicts into a series of leadership purges.

Conclusion: Decline and Fall

At the same time, the new alliance with the Agricultural Labor Relations Board proved to be a difficult one for the UFW. While establishment of the agency proved to be a major boon for the UFW, which won most of the free elections under CALRA (all the while continuing to neglect the critical hiring hall issue), the state legislature badly underfunded ALRB, forcing the agency to temporarily shut down. The UFW responded by sponsoring Prop 14 in the 1976 elections to try to empower ALRB, and then got very badly beaten in that election cycle - and then, when Republican George Deukmejian was elected in 1983, the ALRB was largely defunded and unable to achieve its original elective goals.

In the wake of Deukmejian, the UFW went into terminal decline. Most of its best organizers had left or been purged in internal struggles, their contracts failed to succeed over the long run due to the hiring hall problem, and the union basically stopped organizing new members after 1986.

[socialjusticeinamerica]

This is why you can’t be polite with MAGAts. They are killers and we are the prey. Black, brown, lgbt, Dem, migrant, how many of us will die before we stand up and crush the RepubliKKKans. There must never be another one of them in office again.

Vote, protest, do whatever you can to stop this reign of terror once and for all.

[dansnaturepictures]

My Great British Wild Year: Part 3 of 5-Dragonflies, damselflies and other wildlife

I had a dazzling year of dragonflies, from perfect moments by a stream at Nant-y-Pandy (The Dingle) on Anglesey seeing a colossal Golden-ringed Dragonfly to Keeled Skimmers in Pig Bush, New Forest’s boggy areas I had so many wonderful moments. Four-spotted Chaser was a star of my year with enchanting times seeing them at RSPB Valley Wetlands and Cors Dddyga as well as Hickling Broad, with brilliant Broad-bodied Chaser a key species enjoyed too. Emperors in all their masterful glory including one seen egg laying, eye catching and bold Southern Hawkers and marvellous manoeuvring Migrant Hawkers were ones I enjoyed fine views of locally and further afield so many times through the year. Hawkers dominated my year with gripping moments seeing distinctive Brown Hawker and also a fantastically fresh new species for us the Norfolk Hawker a key moment in my year on July trips to Norfolk and Rutland. Black-tailed Skimmer was a shining constant on my Lakeside walks in summer weeks, passing on the baton to scintillating Common Darter as well as Migrant Hawker as the season and year went on, the Common Darter another I had a great year for also seeing some mating. Delicate Ruddy Darter and Hairy Dragonfly were good to see too. A pivotal moment in my dragonfly year and an enchanting spectacle came at Thursley Common in late September when I was amazed to see so many slick, dainty and fabulous Black Darters.

Norfolk Hawker at RSPB Strumpshaw Fen

Black-tailed Skimmer at Lakeside in June

A Common Darter that was magical to see at Lakeside in August

It was an Azure Damselfly year for sure with especially at Lakeside Country Park and also at RSPB Cors Ddyga these splendid damselflies seen well. Especially at Lakeside Blue-tailed Damselflies were a strong theme of my year seeing so many, with strong showings from Beautiful and Banded Demoiselle this year. Pinnacles of my dreamy damselfly year perhaps were at at Hickling Broad when we saw a precious Emerald Damselfly, seeing them again twice in the September week off at RSPB Minsmere and Thursley.

A Blue-tailed Damselfly I enjoyed seeing at Cors Ddyga too.

I enjoyed immersing myself in other parts of nature I am less familiar with again this year especially other insects with some epic things seen both new and that I had before. Beetles playing a big part in this with tremendous views of Green Tiger beetle at Bentley Wood again, a striking Rose Chafer beetle seen at South Stack, Chrysomela populi at Newborough, Cardinal beetle, Swollen-thighed Beetle, Oedemera lurida, Black-and-yellow Longhorn beetle at Lakeside, oil beetles, bold Bloody-nosed beetle, Black Clock beetle and Violet Ground beetle on the Norfolk and Rutland July weekends respectively, many splendid Common Red Soldier beetles in the summer and Black-spotted Longhorn beetle at Bentley Wood. I did well for caterpillars this year too with Oak Eggar, Fox moth, Yellow-tail moth, Peacock butterfly and Garden Tiger moth ones standouts. Common Field Grasshopper, Roesel’s Bush-cricket, Long-winged Conehead and giant Great Green Bush-cricket a sensation to see on an insect fest at Durlston made it a strong cricket/grasshopper year for me. As well as a fair few Hornets themselves I had a really good year for seeing Hornet Mimic Hoverflies in the summer again and my first ever Lesser Hornet Hoverflies, truly appealing insects. I had great moments seeing Long and Marmalade Hoverfly this year too. One of my greatest wild moments of the year came in early August when I was euphoric to fulfill a goal of a seeing a Wasp Spider in the grass of Lakeside Country Park. An outstanding arachnid, and another was a treat to see a few times this year beautiful Nursery Web spider in a strong year of spiders I had with Long-bodied Cellar spider another key species especially in autumn. I got excellent views of Common Lizard and Slow Worm in 2023.

An eyecatching Chrysomela populi

Grammoptera ruficornis and Black spotted Longhorn beetle at Bentley Wood

Hornet mimic hoverfly on hemp agrimony at Winnall Moors

[teachandwrite-blog]

Migrant Hearts

My

heart

loves home.

Winter snow,

spring mountain flowers,

summer salt in the deep, blue sea,

and fall leaves on colorful trees are art for my heart.

With tears in my eyes, my heart pulls on its brown tattered coat, black holey shoes, red wool scarf.

My heart is so tired, poor, huddled, wretched, homeless and tempest-tost. It loves its memories, family, home but it is yearning to be free.

Too many cold, deserted eyes at checkpoints in lonely streets pointed guns at my heart; too many clouds in rainy seasons empty of rain brought pain to my heart; too many coughs from my children's chests late into night broke my heart.

My heart picks up its battered suitcase, with tape all around its ends, lest it break open and spill out my father's favorite shirt, a love letter, a picture of my beautiful children, all that I have in the world, onto the ground.

Deep in the hull of a ship tossing on stormy seas; high on the roof of a train winding down a long, steep hill; barefoot on a dusty road,

silent, back to back, knee to knee, with poor people, with little children…migrant hearts.

With each step along the road our hearts whisper, "We’re here."

Each mile we long to hear, “We’re here.”

We hope for welcome.

Migrants

moving

our

hearts.

- Trevor Scott Barton, the color green, 2023

[liberalsarecool]

Abbott's performance is pure evil.

The migrants are almost all Catholics. Where is the US Catholic Church standing up for their own? Clearly they value white Catholics and are openly hostile toward brown Catholics.

White Christofascists like Abbott think Catholics are going to hell, anyways. What does he care.

[ausetkmt]

Arrests made amid fears hundreds of migrants may have died in boat that capsized off Greece

Rescuers scoured the seas off Greece on Thursday following a shipwreck that killed at least 78 migrants, as hopes of finding survivors dwindled and fears grew that hundreds more, including children, may have drowned inside the crowded vessel's hold.

Reports suggested between 400 and 750 people had packed the fishing boat that capsized and sank early on Wednesday morning in deep waters about 80 kilometres from the southern coastal town of Pylos. Greek authorities said 104 survivors had been brought ashore.

Outside the coast guard office in the port city of Kalamata, where survivors were transferred, a Syrian man whose wife was missing sought answers.

Kassam Abozeed, who lives in Germany, said he last heard from his wife, Israa, eight days ago. She had paid 4,124 euros ($5,940 Cdn) to travel on the boat, the 34-year-old said, showing a photograph of her on his phone.

The search operation had not recovered any bodies in more than 24 hours, and victims' bodies were transferred to a cemetery near Athens for DNA tests.

9 men arrested

Government sources said chances of retrieving the sunken vessel were remote because of the depth of the water.

A shipping ministry official said nine Egyptians were arrested over the shipwreck. Greek TV Skai reported that, according to witnesses, the vessel departed from Egypt and stopped at the Libyan port of Tobruk before setting sail for Italy.

At least 79 people killed after boat carrying migrants sinks off coast of southern Greece

A European rescue-support charity said there could have been 750 people on the 20- to 30 metre-long boat. The UN's International Organization for Migration said initial reports suggested up to 400 people were aboard. Its refugee agency, the UNHCR, said hundreds were feared missing.

"The shipwreck off Pylos marks one of the largest sea tragedies in the Mediterranean in recent memory," Maria Clara, the UNHCR representative in Greece, told Reuters.

Pope Francis, who visited Greece two years ago to draw attention to the plight of refugees, was "deeply dismayed to learn of the shipwreck … with its devastating loss of life," the Vatican said in a statement.

'Our last night alive'

Independent refugee activist Nawal Soufi said in a Facebook post that she was in contact with migrants aboard the vessel from the early hours of Tuesday until 11 p.m. local time. 

"The whole time they asked me what they should do and I kept telling them that Greek help would come. In this last call, the man I was talking to expressly told me: 'I feel that this will be our last night alive,' " she wrote.

Greece is one of the main routes into the European Union for refugees and migrants from the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

Aerial pictures of the boat released by Greek authorities hours before it sank showed dozens of people on the boat's upper and lower decks looking up, some with arms outstretched.

WATCH | Dozens of children feared missing from capsized boat: 

Dozens of children feared dead in migrant ship sinking

Survivors say more than a hundred migrant children may have been on the boat that sank off the coast of Greece, adding layers to the tragedy. Family members of some on board say they paid smugglers thousands of dollars for the crossing.

But Greek officials said people on the crowded decks repeatedly turned down attempted assistance from a Greek coast guard boat shadowing it, saying they wanted to reach Italy.

"You cannot carry out a violent diversion on such a vessel with so many people on board … without any sort of co-operation," coast guard spokesperson Nikos Alexiou told state broadcaster ERT.

Alarm Phone, which operates a trans-European network supporting rescue operations and received alerts from people on board a ship in distress off Greece late on Tuesday, said the captain fled on a small boat.

Government officials said that before capsizing and sinking at around 2 a.m. on Wednesday, the vessel's engine stopped and it began veering from side to side.

'Watery graves'

On Thursday evening, thousands of protesters rallied in Athens and the northern city of Thessaloniki demanding European Union migration policies be relaxed. A group of protesters in Athens hurled petrol bombs at police who responded with tear gas.

In Kalamata, protesters marched outside the migrants' shelter. "No to the EU's pact on migration," read one banner.

EU migration policy "turns the Mediterranean, our seas, into watery graves," leftist Greek leader Alexis Tsipras, prime minister in 2015-2019 at the peak of Europe's migration crisis, said during a visit in Kalamata on Thursday.

Under a conservative government in power until last month, Greece took a harder stance on migration, building walled camps and boosting border controls.

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The country is currently governed by a caretaker administration pending an election on June 25.

Greece's government spokesperson Ilias Siakantaris told Reuters that the biggest challenge for EU border states "is forging a comprehensive EU solution on migration and asylum that respects international law and inclusive humanism."

The United Nations has registered more than 20,000 deaths and disappearances in the central Mediterranean since 2014, making it the most dangerous migrant crossing in the world.