#italian elections 2018

[joshiji-darling]

ㅤ 🪸͟ ָ֢ ’’ 𐙚˙⋆.˚ 𝓶𝓮𝓮𝓽 𝓴𝔀𝓸𝓷 𝓼𝓾𝓲𝓷 ๋࣭ ⭑⚝

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kwon suin masterlist

ᯓᡣ𐭩 ࣪. basics ୭ ˚. ᵎ

birth name: kwon suin 권수인

birth date: 1995..14..02

birthplace: goyang, gyeonggi province, south korea

residence: nonhyeon-dong, gangnam-gu, seoul

occupation: celebrity, artist, singer, dancer, producer, founder&director of Darling Entertainment

nationality: korean - greek (dual- nationality)

ethnicity: korean

languages: english, korean, french, greek, italian, japanese, chinese

height: 170cm

weight: 45kg

blood type: O+

partner: doh kyungsoo (exo's D.O)

status: married

mbti: infj

debut: 2007

ᯓᡣ𐭩 ࣪. career ୭ ˚. ᵎ

history:

2007 - duo group 'darling (달링)' with shin ryeonha (신련하)

2012 - debuts as a soloist

2015 - debuts with seventeen

2016 - debuts as an actress in descendants of the sun

position in seventeen: co-leader, main vocalist, producer, lead dancer, visual,

suin's/ 'darling's fandom: dearest (디어에스트)

her emojis: 🐋🪼🪸🪷🍡🌊🪐🎀🧸🫧🖇🩰

social media: @sususuinkw.n

weverse: @sususuinnova

brand ambassador: graff,, patek philippe,, dior,, alexandar mcqueen,, hermès,, van cleef& arpels,, brunello cucinelli,, bottega veneta

ᯓᡣ𐭩 ࣪. trivia ୭ ˚. ᵎ

she is seventeen's co-leader, meaning she shares the leader position with s.coups. this was because she was elected as leader by all the members and the company, but suin felt that s.coups would make a great leader, so they comprimised by having themn both leaders

she is the oldest member in seventeen and is their senior as she debuted in 'darling' in 2007

some of her nicknames include; original visual,, blueprint,, the trend,,original ace,, nation's center,, nation's daughter,, miss korea, korea's voice,,

she is a-list celebrity in hollywood, not just in korea

she was under a company called 'whipser' when she was active in 'darling' and for her solo career, then pledis was bought into her company. but in 2019, suin left whisper and started her own company named 'darling entertainment' after her group.

meaning she is the founder and director of the company

she is the creator of aespa

seventeen, ateez, aespa, btob, day6, and taemin are now under Darling Entertainment

she produces 80% of seventeen's songs alongside woozi, but she produces 100% of her own songs

she is the most credited artist, and the youngest artist to be awarded that title. she has credit for 600+ of her own songs, not included songs she produced for others.

she is the most known and recognized name in the korean industry

"if you don't know kwon suin in korea, you are a spy"

she is the hidden ace of going seventeen, she rivals jeonghan

she bought a multi-million penthouse in korea and she has another penthouse and vacation house in greece

she created the trends in kpop (not including her fashion influence); photocards, lightsticks, fansite, fansigns, fansign calls, fancams, idol content, tiktok challenges, singing osts, random dance, having lore, ending fairy, dance breaks, highlight medley, brand ambassador, dance practice, behind the scene videos, encore, personalised in-ears and mic, western collabs,

she popularized idols appearing in variety shows by appearing on "running man" and boosting their ratings

she was the first idol to have 'pre-releases' and an intro and outro track

she has an emotional support spoon

she was an ivf baby

she was the first idol to be a "new years couple" (when dispatch reveals couples on new years ykyk)

her ears go red when shes shy

she made the name 'carats' for the fandom

she concerts usually lasts for 4-6hrs, but once she had a 9hr concert and still didnt finish her entire discography

locals: "i don't know kpop, but i know suin and bts"

she is unfortunately the female idol that has been in the most danger

her newest nickname is "idol with the most aura"

and yes, suin and kyungsoo are married, they married in 2019, kyungsoo proposed in 2018, and they announced their relationship and engagement in the mv for "only" which even included their proposal video

ㅤㅤ kwon suin masterlist

comment for requests!

[reality-detective]

SHADOW GAMES_

_It should be clear to you now that Vivek Romaswamy is running a shadow campaign for Donald Trump and military operations.

_ ( kash Patel intensionally placed VIVEK)

_it should be clear now that Elon Musk intentionally collapsed Ron Desantis election campaign. Desantis was forced to run by both white hats and blacks hats ( he's playing both sides) .... The idea behind the blackhats plan is for Desantis to endorse Nikki Haley for President..... But white hats have a plan to EXPOSE a massive corruption scandle against desantis connected to money laundering ( Epstein affiliated associates ) and more. After the EXPOSURE of Desantis his voters WILL endorse TRUMP_

_-

-

_The DEEP STATE SHADOW CAMPAIGN>

BLACKROCK CIA IS BEHIND THE FUNDING OF NIKKI HALEY . > THE DEEP STATE IS PUTTING THEIR HOPES BEHIND HALEY and want to have Republican president in place.

.. But the [ ds] also want a Hollywood celebrity> The Rock to run ( he is a back up incase the Epstein EXPOSURE leads to cia. Military industrial complex system money laundering operations connected to Nikki Haley could bring her down)

The deep state are also pushing for Michelle Obama to come into the mix..

[ they] want to make sure they have several candidates in place.

____

WIRES>]; The CIA are trying to rally the youth and black communities to endorse a celebrity for president ( this will be The Rock) ....

_ Now you understand why KEVIN HART has been constantly co-starring with Dewayne Johnson the rock in movies together.

>>> The CIA. Caa intensionally planted Kevin Hart into Hollywood and comedy scene.

_

_ NOW_ White Hats have activated certain celebrities to go after exposing Kevin Hart as PLANT.

From Kat Williams to Power House Dave Chappelle are going after Oprah the cia occult operations several black celebrities and musicians are going to expose the Satanic industry. From Los Angeles to Middle America to New York City, the pedophilia corruption, sex extortion music industry to Satanic rituals is all going to collide with the EPSTEIN SAGA.

I have been telling you all these EVENTS were going to happen.. Now it's happening

.....

SHADOW GAMES _

_

BEHIND THE SCENES>]; THE USSF HAS THE MCAFEE [ KILLSWITCH], THE JULIAN ASSANGE [ KILLSWITCH] >

THE [ EPSTEIN KILLSWITCH]

_This means they have all the hidden keys that placed inside Internet Killswitch operations that holds all the evidence of the world satanic corruption of the CIA. Pentagon. Ex presidents. Celebrities and full world corruption connected to Israeli/ cia/ mi6 ELITES [ EPSTEIN] OPERATIONS.

PANIC INSIDE THE PENTAGON 🔥 AS THE USSF AQUIRE ALL THE KEYS!!!

(Cheyenne mountain. USSF space x/ RUSSIA INTEL/ ITALIAN INTEL/ WHITE HATS IN CHINA INTELLIGENCE

>>>> ALL HAVE COPIES OF THE BIDEN LAPTOP!!!!

and CIA Epstein corruption data in their own countries already since 2018.

SHADOW GAMES

_Countries across the world are getting ready for THE STORM _EVENTS

and arrest wars and know their own intelligence agencies are going to initiate the cyberwar blackouts.

__

No matter what happens.. Everything is heading to military intervention in all major countries. ( 11.3)

Mil.WIRES>]; U.S. CANADA. UK. AUSTRALIA NEW ZEALAND GERMANY FRANCE ITALY POLAND>>>ALL IN TALKS BEHIND THE SCENES TO INITIATE MARSHAL LAW PROTOCOLS AND MILITARY PROCEDURES AND COMMUNICATIONS <

_

Everyone is preparing for the incoming summer EXPOSURE of the planned PANDEMIC of 2021 and the full EXPOSURE of the death vaccines and full corruption linking military intelligence agencies and banks and leaders to the world pedophile extortion sex ring and money laundering ring.

- JULIAN ASSANGE 🤔

[pietroleopoldo]

While looking at my old blogs I ended up rewatching the John Oliver's segment about the 2018 Italian elections and it's scary how he kinda ended prophesying that the next prime minister would have been a random person who was never active in Italian politics

[msclaritea]

Box Office: ‘Civil War’ Starts Off With Impressive $2.9M in Thursday Previews

Alex Garland's controversial movie about the political divide in America easily scored the best preview number ever for A24.

BY PAMELA MCCLINTOCK

APRIL 12, 2024 9:18A

Alex Garland‘s dystopian action movie Civil War has started off its North American box office run with an impressive $2.9 million, a record for indie studio and distributor A24.

The $50 million movie about a divided America is a big swing for A24 as it tries to produce bigger movies, and is its most expensive production to date.

Civil War is tracking to open north of $20 million, although one leading tracking service has a slightly lower range of $19 million to $20 million. As with the preview number, that would be record for A24, beating the $13.6 million opening of A24’s horror pic Hereditary in 2018.

A24 and writer-director Garland held the movie’s world premiere last month at the South by Southwest Film and TV Festival, an ideal venue since many of the attendees are younger adults, the film’s target demo.

Set in the near-future, the story follows a wartime photojournalist (Kirsten Dunst) and her colleagues as they make their way across a hostile and divided United States of America that has been torn apart under the authoritarian rule of a three-term president (Nick Offerman). Yet the film shys away from red state/blue state divisions, and the politics behind the conflict are generally left unexplained, other than to say that one of the president’s first first actions was to disband the FBI in an apparent nod to former President Donald Trump, who has called to “defund” the Bureau.

Civil War‘s timing surely isn’t a coincidence as it hits cinemas amid a contentious election year in which President Biden and former President Trump are once again the leading candidates for their respective parties as Trump seeks to return to the White House

At a SXSW panel following the film’s premiere, Garland said it made sense to release Civil War now, although it’s not as if there is anything new about the contentious political discourse gripping the country.

“I think all of the topics in in [Civil War] have been a part of a huge public debate for years and years. These debates have been growing and growing in volume and awareness, but none of that is secret or unknown to almost anybody,” Garland said. “I thought that everybody understands these terms and, at that point, I just felt compelled to write about it.”

Cailee Spaeny, Jesse Plemons and Wagner Moura also star.

2012–2013: Founding and early years

A24 was founded on August 20, 2012, by film veterans Daniel Katz, David Fenkel, and John Hodges. Katz formerly led the film finance group at Guggenheim Partners, Fenkel was the president, co-founder and partner at Oscilloscope, and Hodges served as "Head of Production and Development" at Big Beach. The name "A24" was inspired by the Italian A24 motorway Katz was driving on when he decided to found the company.

Guggenheim Partners provided the seed money for A24. The company was started to share "movies from a distinctive point of view". In October 2012, Nicolette Aizenberg joined as head of publicity from 42West where she was senior publicity executive.

The company began its distribution of films in 2013. The company's first theatrical release was Roman Coppola's A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III, which had a limited theatrical release. Other 2013 theatrical releases included Sofia Coppola's The Bling Ring, Harmony Korine's Spring Breakers, James Ponsoldt's The Spectacular Now, and Sally Potter's Ginger & Rosa.

In September 2013, A24 entered a $40 million deal with DirecTV Cinema, where DirecTV Cinema would offer day-and-date releases 30 days prior to a theatrical release by A24; Enemy was the first film to be distributed under the deal. That same year, A24 entered a deal with Amazon Prime, where A24-distributed films would be available on Amazon Instant Video after becoming available on Blu-ray and DVD.

2014–2017: Television and later productions

In May 2015, A24 announced that it would start a television division and began producing the USA Network series Playing House, as well as working to develop a television series that would later become Comrade Detective, produced by Channing Tatum. The company also announced that they would also finance and develop pilots.

In January 2016, Sasha Lloyd joined the company to handle all film, television distribution and business development in the international marketplace. The company, with cooperation from Bank of America, J.P. Morgan & Co. and SunTrust Banks, also raised its line of credit from $50 million to $125 million a month later to build upon its operations. In April, the company acquired all foreign rights to Swiss Army Man, distributing the film in all territories, and partnering with distributors who previously acquired rights to the film, a first for the company. In June, the company, along with Oscilloscope and distributor Honora, joined BitTorrent Now to distribute the work of their portfolio across the ad-supported service.

Eileen Guggenheim Breaks Silence, denies Introducing Women To Epstein

New Court Documents Reveal More About Epstein's Relationship With JP Morgan Chase

Beef is Criticized After star's Resurfaced Rape Comments B

Does HBO's Euphoria Really Glamourize Drug Use?

Euphoria Season Two Review: Far Too Much Nudity, Sex and Violence

Michelle Yeoh Says Hot Dog Fingers Scene With Jamie Lee Curtis Was ‘Most Beautiful Love Story

Not much time is shown in this universe. All the audience knows is that Evelyn works at a pizza shop. She is shown wearing a ridiculous costume and waving around a sign.

"A24 and writer-director Garland held the movie’s world premiere last month at the South by Southwest Film and TV Festival, an ideal venue since many of the attendees are younger adults, the film’s target demo..."

Penske Media Corporation (PMC /ˈpɛnski/) is an American mass media, publishing, and information services company based in Los Angeles and New York City. It publishes more than 20 digital and print brands, including Variety, Rolling Stone, Women's Wear Daily, Deadline Hollywood, Billboard, The Hollywood Reporter, Boy Genius Report, Robb Report, Artforum, ARTNews, and others. PMC's Chairman and CEO since founding is Jay Penske.

President Trump awards Medal of Freedom to Roger Penske | Fox News Video

In addition to media publications, Penske Media Corporation owns the Life Is Beautiful Music & Art Festival and is a 50 percent stakeholder in South by Southwest. It is also the owner of Dick Clark Productions which includes the award shows Golden Globe Awards, American Music Awards, Streamy Awards, Academy of Country Music Awards, and the Billboard Music Awards.

Jay Penske--NACSCAR Heir ARRESTED...and It's A Pisser

@aeltri I'm a bit fuzzy on the details. What was that you told us, recently, about Pizza and Hotdogs?

[dailyanarchistposts]

As May Day Approaches

Following this press conference, the government hoped that its official announcements would finally take the life out of the yellow vest movement, defusing the social tension that has built up. However, in the hours following Macron’s speech, several well-known yellow vest figures expressed their dissatisfaction with his proposals, calling for further demonstrations. In the end, even if some yellow vesters were sidetracked by Macron’s announcement, it was difficult to predict whether people would massively take the streets for the 24th act of the yellow vest movement.

On Saturday, April 27, about 23,600 yellow vesters demonstrated in France. For this new day of action, the epicenter of the movement was the city of Strasbourg. As the European elections will occur in a month, an “international call” was made to gather and march towards the European Parliament. Some Belgians, Germans, Italians, Swiss, and Luxembourgers participated as well. About 3000 demonstrators walked through the streets of Strasbourg, confronting police and engaging in property destruction. In the end, 42 people were arrested and at least 7 injured—three police officers, three demonstrators, and one passerby.

At the same time, two demonstrations took place in Paris. The first, organized by trade unions, drew about 5500 demonstrators, among them 2000 in yellow vests, while the other, mostly composed of several hundreds of yellow vesters, did a tour of all the major corporate media headquarters to ask for “impartial media coverage.” Other gatherings also took place in Lyons, Toulouse, Cambrai, and elsewhere in France. (All of the figures provided here are from the French authorities.)

If we compare the total number of participants in this 24th act to the other national days of action, it is undeniable that it attracted fewer participants. Does that mean that the government has finally gained the upper hand over the movement? It’s unclear. It is possible that some yellow vesters stayed home from the 24th act in order to prepare for May Day.

Last year, the intensity of property destruction and confrontations with police during the May Day mobilization of anarchists and other autonomous rebels compelled the government to cancel the entire traditional trade union march. In view of the tense social and political situation in France today, who knows what May Day 2019 could bring?

If the government attempts to cancel or repress demonstrations in Paris this May Day, the situation could become explosive. Not only because the police have adopted aggressive new law enforcement strategies over the past few weeks, but also because several calls have been made for yellow vesters to join autonomous rebels at the front of the traditional Parisian afternoon procession for the “ultimate act.” The objective is set: Paris is to become the capital city of rioting.

Here is an English adaptation of one of the calls, entitled Pour un 1er mai jaune et noir:

For a yellow and black May Day! “When the government violates the rights of the people, insurrection is for the people and for each portion of the people the most sacred of rights and the most indispensable of duties.” -Article 35 of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (1793) Macron’s government has decided to crush the current social protest by force, reaching a level of repression never seen before: prohibitions of demonstrations, deployment of soldiers, the use of armored vehicles, the use of chemical markers and weapons of war against protesters, jail sentences in spades, hands torn off, blinded protesters… During the demonstration of May Day 2018, the Prefecture of Police counted 14,500 demonstrators “on the sidelines of the trade union procession” (almost as much as in the traditional procession) including 1200 “radical individuals.” On March 16, at the time of act 18, it was 1500 “ultra violent” ones who were present among the 7000 demonstrators, according to the figures of this same police. Today, what frightens the state is not the rioters themselves, but the adhesion and understanding they arouse among the rest of the population. And this despite the calls, week after week, for everyone to dissociate themselves from the “breakers.” If there is one group that currently strikes France with all its violence, it is not the “Black Bloc,” nor the yellow vests; it is rather the government itself. We are calling on all revolutionaries in France and elsewhere, all those who want this to change, to come and form a determined and combative march. Because if repression falls on everyone, our response must be common and united. Against Macron and his world, let’s take the street together to revive the convergence of anger and hope. Let’s get ready, let’s equip ourselves, lets organize ourselves to overthrow him and drag him through a day in hell. War has been declared!

[1] “Proportional representation” would mean that if, for example, 30% of voters vote for the Green Party, then members of that party would receive 30% of the total number of seats. So far, legislative elections offer no proportional representation—even if a party receives a large percentage of votes, it might not gain many seats at the assembly. People have been complaining about this “unfair process,” so now the government is willing to increase proportional representation in elections. Unfortunately, for several years now, the National Front has usually received around 20–25% of votes but only currently holds 6 seats out of the 577 in the Assemblée Nationale. Increasing proportional representation will give them more power in the decision-making—although, of course, it’s not clear to what extent Macron will actually follow through on his promises. Of course, there is no option for people who have grown disillusioned with government itself: that perspective will never be “proportionately represented.” This is why the government refused outright to recognized blank votes.

[mariacallous]

Italy is, notoriously, not a nation of readers, with Italians spending on average far less time reading books than many other Europeans. Yet, lately, a book has monopolized the nation’s political conversation. The author, Roberto Vannacci, is an army general whose political thoughts lean reactionary, to say the least. In the past year, he has become one of Italy’s most prominent right-wing figures. Indeed, he has come close to eclipsing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in domestic media coverage.

Vannacci, 55, also happens to be the star candidate of the anti-immigration party the League in the upcoming European Parliament elections. He was picked as a candidate by party leader Matteo Salvini—despite the opposition of some League officials, who viewed the general as inexperienced—in an attempt to regain the visibility that the League has lost since its main ally and rival, Meloni’s Brothers of Italy, usurped Salvini’s support base and rose to power.

Only a year ago, Vannacci was completely unknown to the wider public. Throughout the first half of 2024, one could hardly turn on the TV or open a newspaper without bumping into his name. It seems almost as if every week the general is at the epicenter of a new media storm: the most recent one about an interview he did with La Stampa in April, where Vannacci declared that “Italians are white, statistics say so,” and accused gay people of “showing off as exhibitionists.”

As soon as his candidacy was announced in late April, the progressive Democratic Party rushed to issue an (inadvertently counterproductive) statement urging Italians to ignore him.

Born into a military family (both his father and grandfather were professional soldiers), Vannacci served in Italy’s special forces in Iraq and Afghanistan in the 2000s, then led the army’s prestigious Folgore battalion, took part in the nation’s anti-Islamic State task force in 2017 and 2018, and served as a military attaché to the Italian Embassy in Moscow in 2020-2022. Yet fame came, unexpectedly, last August, when Vannacci was holding the not-so-glamourous position of head of the Military Geographic Institute in Florence.

In his free time during his service at the institute, Vannacci had written and self-published a book titled Il mondo al contrario (“The World Upside Down”). “I wrote the book for personal satisfaction. I thought it would be spread among my friends and would sell 300-400 copies,” Vannacci said in a phone conversation with Foreign Policy. But, to its author’s own surprise, the book became a huge success—the fifth-bestselling title in Italy in 2023—making Vannacci a better-selling author than Ken Follett and an instant celebrity. Despite being self-published, The World Upside Down had sold 200,000 copies by early 2024. (Italy’s publishing industry is small. By comparison, Prince Harry’s memoir, Spare, which was the country’s top seller, sold just over 300,000.)

The views of the book were so extreme that even Italy’s defense minister, Guido Crosetto—who co-founded the Brothers of Italy with Meloni—had to reprimand him: Vannacci was first replaced as head of the Military Geographic Institute and then suspended from the military for 11 months.

Organized into chapters, each dedicated to a specific theme, from environmentalism to multicultural society up to LGBT-related issues and animal rights, the book is a compendium of ultra-conservative personal philosophy, in which Vannacci sees the West threatened by feminism, environmentalism, the LGBT community, and animal rights.

His tirade rests on what he frames as buonsenso (“common sense”), the belief that all these modern ideas are insane, with little need for explanation: “Normality is heterosexuality. If everything seems normal to you, however, it is the fault of the plots of the international gay lobby.” Same-sex marriage or adoption? Come on, it’s just nuts—it’s common sense that a family is husband plus wife. Women want to work outside the house? Nonsense, “even if they work, they don’t feel fulfilled.”

Vannacci presented himself as the voice of the silent majority, which is hostage to some noisy minorities—and he was in some ways proved right. The message resonated with many Italians, who found in his book a manifesto for their own thoughts.

In an interview, Vannacci described himself as a “patriot.” He added that he views his literary endeavor as a defense of “our culture, our traditions, our roots, if only for the respect of our ancestors, our fathers, of our grandparents.”

In his book, the general exalts Italy’s greatest historical figures—going back to Aeneas, Julius Caesar, Dante, Galileo, and Garibaldi—and takes pride in having, supposedly, their glorious ancient blood in his veins, a staple of Italian nationalistic nostalgia.

Political scientist Mattia Diletti, who teaches at Rome’s Sapienza University, notes that his nostalgic discourse echoes Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” rhetoric.

The success of The World Upside Down lies in the portrayal of a world that, being “upside down,” one must “overthrow this morally, socially, politically corrupt elite. We must return to the ancient values that are within Italian society,” Vannacci writes.

This type of rhetoric resonated with Italian conservative voters, especially since Meloni, the head of a party that has its roots in postfascism, ended up being more moderate than her fanbase expected. For instance, she sided with the United States and European powers in supporting Ukraine, despite pro-Russian and anti-European Union sentiment enjoying some popularity on the right. On LGBT rights and abortion, Meloni’s reactionary rhetoric was never followed by major action: LGBT rights (or the lack of thereof) have remained unchanged since the pre-Meloni era, and the country’s abortion law has remained unchanged.

“Vannacci is a sort of rebellion against the thinking of the current times,” said Francesco Borgonovo, the deputy director of the conservative newspaper La Verità. The cultural battles waged by the suspended general, Borgonovo noted, are precisely the same cultural battles that right-wing parties had waged during the electoral campaigns but then did not deliver after they came to power.

“He puts together ideas in a somewhat bar-room way,” appealing to “right-wing people, who now feel betrayed by the parties that are now governing Italy, which they helped to elect,” Borgonovo said.

Diletti of Sapienza points out that part of Vannacci’s success is precisely that of presenting himself as an outsider who tells things as they are. In a country where the political class is widely discredited, Vannacci succeeds by presenting himself as “the non-politician who speaks the truth to politicians.”

Today, Vannacci is at the epicenter of Italy’s political debate, not only due to his EU candidacy. After his first book’s success, he recently published an autobiography.

Paradoxically, being elected to the European Parliament could dim his star: As an MEP, Vannacci’s image could be downgraded from “firebrand general” to mere “politician,” a term many Italians have come to loathe.

Although Vannacci’s fame might be transitory, his message will likely last: According to Diletti, “He put his name and face on them, but the ideas he expressed are part of Italian society.”

[heidengamedev]

Welcome to my gamedev blog!

My name's Heiden and I'm a solo developer with a passion for quirky emotional narrative games!

Work In Progress:

Who's That Mokemon?! (Working Title)

Being made for Yaoijam 2024. A comedy RPG where two boys go on an adventure to break the sleeping curse on their village! Will feature 64 creatures to wrangle, train and evolve. Form your very own mokemon party, kiss your rival and discover the secrets of the island!

There's no way I'm going to be able to finish during the two month jam, but will be diligently working on it during the jam!

Finished Games (in reverse chronological order):

Hug Embassy (2024)

Hug Embassy is looking for a new intern! Could that be you? A short 10k VN with hugging mini-games that can be played in-browser in a single sitting.

Available for Windows and Browser. Free.

Half Haunt Halloween (2023)

Move back home to your supernatural family and earn enough money to prevent the electrical company from shutting off your power! A 30k tragicomedy money raiser about making do with what you've got when the whole system is rigged against you. Also your little brother is a weeb. Nya~!

Available for Windows and Mac. Commercial Release.

A Heart of Butterblue (2023)

City girl Phebe has just inherited a farm. Her father was also just murdered and her grandfather is mysteriously missing. But she's mostly focused on adapting to her new routine.

A 30k horror western VN/farm sim with fully playable farming mechanics (plant, water, harvest, sell, plant), a foraging system, active clock and three characters to get close to and attempt to befriend.

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Steam. Free.

Tomorrow for Mar (2022)

Cast spells on a large cast of quirky characters as Mar attempts to pass their university final while battling the world's most obvious crush. Awkward.

A 2.5D VN with puzzles.

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Steam. Commercial Release.

Also available in French and Italian.

Ziva and the Wolves (2021)

Ziva is dying and there is no cure. Two knights both want the same legendary sword for opposing reasons. The three of them travel deep into the depths of the Goddess' temple to determine the fate of their lives.

A 5k VN with puzzles that take the form of SRPG battles.

Available for Windows and Mac. Free.

Heart is Muscle (2021)

Flex your way to become mayor! The town of Swoleville elects their mayor by way of a flexing contest, and poor Boro has just lost to his archrival. He's got 24 hours to contest the results but also-- the world might be ending?!

A comedy RPG/VN about getting stronger, helping people and saving the world!

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Steam. Commercial.

A New Don (2021)

Fia is set to inherit the title of Donna in one week, but has to survive the rest of the family's murder attempts first to get there! Features a nameable giant pet hog.

A 24k mafia-themed otome thriller with two LIs each with their own ending and a slew of bad ends.

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Browser. Free.

Also available in Spanish.

Kill the Prince?! (2020)

A prince is being married against his will. An assassin(?) is hired to take care of the issue. Wait, what? This game is gay?

A 5k comedy VN with espionage mechanics and four weird outfits to dress our assassin up in.

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Browser. Free.

Also available in Portuguese and French.

The Girl With The Gray Hair Awakens (2019)

A girl wakes up in a room with no memory and no color. Die, continue, die, continue again, and you might break the cycle.

Made in 72 hours as a 'flash gamedev challenge'.

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux and Browser. Free.

The Bog's Heart (2018)

Travel deep into the heart of the bog to find a cure for Meg's mom! But also your dog starts talking? That can't be normal.

A short (~5k) VN with puzzles made for Acejam 2018.

Dr. Frank's Build-A-Boyfriend (2017)

Dr. Frank's ex-boyfriend just stole his research and he's out for REVENGE. Build yourself the hottest bestest boy ever to SHOW UP his STINKY EX!!!!!

A 18k black comedy with point and click elements and a crafting system as well as a customizable custom made boyfriend!

Available for Windows, Mac, Linux, Steam, Nintendo Switch, Playstation Store, Microsoft Store.

Itch.io and Steam version Free. Console Port with New Epilogue Commercial.

Elvine (2013)

Elvine flees a horrible attack on her village to the ruins of an old castle. There she awaits news of the outside world while the ghosts of the past creep up on her...

A 32k somber otome game with two LIs and four endings. The first game I ever made!!! Look at how far I've come, omg.

Available or Windows, Mac and Linux.

[justbeingnamaste]

🚨 Conservative Populist Giorgia Meloni set to be Italy’s first female PM - The Media Assault Begins !

September 25, 2022

NewsTreason.com Commentary -

In any other world at any other time, the news out of Italy today would be universally hailed as groundbreaking.  

Headlines about the "Glass Ceiling" being shattered would be flashed across the TV and print news, while phones and tablets would be abuzz with push notifications about one of the most significant elections in modern European history.  

At 6pm EDT, Giorgia Meloni, a Populist, Nationalist Conservative, "projected" by the mainstream media (suppression) polls to win just 21% of the electorate, instead won 45% of the vote and is set to become Italy's first ever female Prime Minister. 

As Italy has been crushed by tyrannical COVID measures, stifling inflation, energy shortages, corruption and trampled freedoms (sound familiar?), the people have stood up, protested, educated themselves, organized, and have now selected a candidate that they feel best-represents their interests for a brighter future.  The shift has been nothing short of seismic -  Meloni's party won just 4% of the vote in the 2018 elections.  

This story is one we should all support - A great awakening of "the people" and victory for a candidate who campaigned on an Italy-first platform focused on family values, economic prosperity, safety, ending corruption and restoring citizens' rights.  That candidate also happens to be a female, further cementing the victory into the annals of history.  A happy ending for all, right?

Of course not.

Unfortunately, Giorgia Meloni is the "Italian Trump."  And I can't take credit for that, as it's already filtered through the news and across social media.  She is not a part of the Globalist establishment, so the media must now convince you and the rest of the world that she's a.....wait for it......FASCIST.  The fear-mongering, smear stories are already out, complete with the comparisons to none other than Benito Mussolini.  Giorgia Meloni can't be controlled by the establishment, so they must deploy all of their media tactics to destroy her.  

Does any of this sound familiar?  It certainly should, unless of course you still think Trump is really the second coming of Hitler.  In that case, I can't help you - please seek professional care.  

So, how do we already know the media's plans?  Well, it's quite easy once you know the play book.  As I write this, it's less than an hour after the news broke.  I simply opened Google and typed in "Meloni" and then went to the "news" tab (what a joke).  In case you just came out of a coma, you know by now that the "headlines" which Google's extensively manipulated algorithms show first, are almost always the complete opposite of the truth.  And this time, it's no different.  There is a reason (besides the CIA-named Operation) that we refer to the fake news as the Mockingbird Media.  As expected, within minutes, they went all-in on the "Fascist-Mussolini" narrative.  With the exception of the a Tweet below, every other screen cap you see were ALL on the FIRST page of Google "News:".....

https://www.newstreason.com/post/conservative-populist-giorgia-meloni-set-to-be-italy-s-first-female-pm-the-media-assault-begins

[voskhozhdeniye]

Fascism, which has always been with us, is again ascendant. The far-right politician Giorgia Meloni won enough votes in a coalition with two other far-right parties, to become Italy’s first female prime minister on Sunday.

Meloni got her start in politics as a 15-year-old activist for the youth wing of the Italian Social Movement, founded after the World War II by supporters of Benito Mussolini. She calls EU bureaucrats agents of “nihilistic global elites driven by international finance.” She peddles the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory that non-white immigrants are being permitted to enter Western nations as part of a plot to undermine or “replace” the political power and culture of white people.

She has called on the Italian navy to turn back boats with immigrants, which the far-right Interior Minister Matteo Salvini did in 2018. Her Fratelli d’Italia, Brothers of Italy, party is a close ally of Hungary’s President, Viktor Orban. A European Parliament resolution recently declared that Hungary can no longer be defined as a democracy.

Meloni and Orban are not alone. Sweden Democrats, which took over 20 percent of the vote in Sweden’s general election last week to become the country’s second largest political party, was formed in 1988 from a neo-Nazi group called B.S.S., or Keep Sweden Swedish. It has deep fascist roots. Of the party’s 30 founders, 18 had Nazi affiliations, including several who served in the Waffen SS, according to Tony Gustaffson a historian and former Sweden Democrat member.

France’s Marine Le Pen took over 41 percent of the vote in April against Emmanuel Macron. In Spain, the hard-right Vox party is the third largest party in Spain’s Parliament. The far-right German AfD or Alternative for Germany partytook over 12 percent in federal elections in 2017, making it the third largest party, though it lost a couple percentage points in the 2021 elections.  

The U.S. has its own version of fascism embodied in a Republican party that coalesces in cult-like fashion around Donald Trump, embraces the magical thinking, misogyny, homophobia and white supremacy of the Christian Right and actively subverts the election process.

Economic collapse was indispensable to the Nazis’ rise to power. In the 1928 elections in Germany, the Nazi party received less than 3 percent of the vote. Then came the global financial crash of 1929. By early 1932, 40 percent of the German insured workforce, six million people, were unemployed. That same year, the Nazis became the largest political party in the German parliament.

The Weimar government, tone deaf and hostage to the big industrialists, prioritized paying bank loans and austerity rather than feeding and employing a desperate population. It foolishly imposed severe restrictions on who was eligible for unemployment insurance. Millions of Germans went hungry. Desperation and rage rippled through the population.

Mass rallies, led by a collection of buffoonish Nazis in brown uniforms who would have felt at home at Mar-a-Lago, denounced Jews, Communists, intellectuals, artists and the ruling class, as internal enemies. Hate was their main currency. It sold well. 

The evisceration of democratic procedures and institutions, however, preceded the Nazis’ ascension to power in 1933. The Reichstag, the German Parliament, was as dysfunctional as the U.S. Congress.

The reconfiguration of society under neoliberalism to exclusively benefit the billionaire class, the slashing and privatization of public services, including schools, hospitals and utilities, along with deindustrialization, the profligate pouring of state funds and resources into the war industry, at the expense of the nation’s infrastructure and social services, and the building of the world’s largest prison system and militarization of police, have predictable results.

At the heart of the problem is a loss of faith in traditional forms of government and democratic solutions. Fascism in the 1930s succeeded, as Peter Drucker observed, not because people believed its conspiracy theories and lies but in spite of the fact that they saw through them.

Fascism thrived in the face of “a hostile press, a hostile radio, a hostile cinema, a hostile church, and a hostile government which untiringly pointed out the Nazi lies, the Nazi inconsistency, the unattainability of their promises, and the dangers and folly of their course.” He added, “nobody would have been a Nazi if rational belief in the Nazi promises had been a prerequisite.”

As in the past, these new fascist parties cater to emotional yearnings. They give vent to the feelings of abandonment, worthlessness, despair and alienation. They promise unattainable miracles. They too peddle bizarre conspiracy theories including QAnon. But most of all, they promise vengeance against a ruling class that betrayed the nation.

[warningsine]

The former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has died aged 86.

The media tycoon, who led three Italian governments between 1994 and 2011 and whose Forza Italia party is a junior partner in the current ruling coalition, had been suffering from leukaemia for some time.

Berlusconi was one of Italy’s most flamboyant politicians, making a political comeback in 2017 despite a career tainted by sex scandals, countless allegations of corruption and a tax fraud conviction.

He died at the San Raffaele hospital in Milan, where he had spent six weeks this spring undergoing treatment for a lung infection linked to a chronic myelomonocytic leukaemia before being readmitted.

Born in Milan in 1936 to a middle-class family, Berlusconi began his business career in property development before going on to found Mediaset, Italy’s largest commercial broadcaster. He also owned AC Milan football club between 1986 and 2017.

Forza Italia was founded in 1993. A year later, Berlusconi was the first prime minister to be elected without previously having held a government office and his second term in office, between 2001 and 2006, is the longest served by any Italian leader since the second world war. He returned to power in 2008 but was forced to resign in 2011 amid an acute debt crisis.

Berlusconi was convicted of tax fraud in late 2012, for which he served his year-long sentence doing part-time community service at a residential home in Milan. His ban on running for office was lifted in time for the general elections in 2018, when Forza Italia ran in coalition with the League and Brothers of Italy but fell short of the 40% required to govern.

In 2019, Berlusconi won a seat in the European parliament and in general elections in October 2022 his party returned to power in a coalition led by Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy. Berlusconi was also elected as a senator.

Nicknamed Il Cavaliere (the knight), Berlusconi was often considered the “kingmaker” in Italian politics.

In 2016, he had surgery to replace a faulty aortic valve, and was admitted to hospital with Covid in September 2020. He had lingering complications related to the virus, an experience he described as “the worst of my life”.

He married twice, and was in a relationship with Francesca Pascale, 37, for seven years before a relationship with 33-year-old Marta Fascina, an MP with Forza Italia with whom he had a “symbolic marriage” in March 2022. He is survived by five children.

[beardedmrbean]

Italian voters go to the polls on Sunday with a right-wing coalition dominated by the Brothers of Italy party, which can trace its origins to a post-World War II neofascist movement, widely expected to win.

Following the 2022 success of the Swedish Democrats (SDs) and Marine Le Pen's National Rally, this is sparking fears that parties with neofascist origins, even if they now reject the label, are becoming embedded within European politics.

The Brothers of Italy are led by 45-year-old Giorgia Meloni, who is on track to become both Italy's first female prime minister and its most right-wing since World War II.

Its origins can be traced to the Italian Social Movement (ISM), which was founded by a group of Benito Mussolini's supporters in December 1946.

The ISM merged with a more mainstream right-wing party in 1995, repudiating overt fascism to form the National Alliance. This was rolled into Silvio Berlusconi's The People of Freedom party in 2009, before a 2012 breakaway including Meloni formed the Brothers of Italy.

Meloni has pledged to defend "God, country and family," calling for a "naval blockade" to prevent illegal migrants reaching Italy. As a youth she called Mussolini a "good politician, the best in the last 50 years," though she has since disowned this stance.

The Brothers of Italy strongly denies that it is fascist, though it maintains the ISM's tricolor flame as its logo and had to suspend a candidate who compared Meloni favorably to Hitler.

Over the past four years, the Brothers of Italy party has seen an explosion in popularity, going from just 4 percent of the vote in 2018 to polling at 24 percent early in September.

The party has been assisted greatly by the collapse in support for two other radical parties, the anti-establishment Five Star Movement and Matteo Salvini's hard-right Lega, following spells in government.

Meloni has gained support by pledging to tackle migrant crossings of the Mediterranean, which saw nearly 60,000 arrive in Italy between January and November 2021.

Meloni is also benefiting from Italy's worsening economic situation, with growth forecast to shrink sharply in 2023 after Putin's invasion of Ukraine caused energy prices to soar.

Notably, however, the Brothers of Italy do not support leaving the Euro or EU, back NATO and are in favor of arming Ukraine to fight Russian aggression. These more mainstream policies have helped detoxify the party for traditional conservatives.

Speaking to the U.K. newspaper The Guardian, Petros Fassoulas, secretary-general of European Movement International, said the party had learned from Brexit: "Meloni, just like other far-right populist leaders, has learned from the example of the U.K. and the chaos that leaving the EU has caused.

"Their intention isn't so much to attack the EU; their intention is to take over from within and transform it into something closer to their ideas – a nightmare for all of us here in Brussels."

Earlier in September, the hard-right SDs came second in Sweden's parliamentary elections, taking 20.5 percent to the Social Democrats 30 percent. As the overall right-wing bloc was bigger, this could see the SDs enter government, if they can agree a deal with the Moderate Party and other factions.

The SDs were founded in 1988, with a number of its early lead figures coming directly from the far-right. Gustaf Ekström, the party's first auditor, was a Waffen-SS member during World War II, while Anders Klarström, the SDs' first chairman, had been a member of the neo-Nazi Nordic Realm Party.

However, like the Brothers of Italy, the SDs worked to rehabilitate their image, while benefiting from growing public concern about immigration, Islamist fundamentalism and surging fuel prices after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The party has also benefited from a surge in violent gang crime, which it links to immigration and failed integration efforts. In 2022, up to the election, Sweden recorded 273 shootings that killed 47 and injured another 74, some of whom were random bystanders.

The country has also been hit by a wave of crime related explosions, many caused by hand grenades, with 100 attacks reported in 2019 alone.

Speaking to London's Financial Times newspaper, Mattias Karlsson, the SDs ex-leader and chief ideologue, said: "We have accepted more immigrants than we could integrate and in its place, an American-inspired gangster culture has taken root."

After the election results were announced, SD leader Jimmie Åkesson wrote: "We have had enough of failed social-democratic policies that for eight years, have continued to lead the country in the wrong direction. It is time to start rebuilding security, welfare and cohesion. It is time to put Sweden first."

In June, Marine Le Pen's hard-right National Rally saw an explosion in support during French parliamentary elections, from 7 seats to 89 in the National Assembly.

The party, then called the Front National, had been run by Marine's father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, who was convicted of Holocaust denial after calling the gas chambers a "detail" of World War II.

Marine Le Pen sought to moderate the party after taking over in 2011, expelling her father in 2015. She also toned down her party's Euroscepticism after Britain's 2016 Brexit vote, ending a plan to take France out of the euro.

In April, Le Pen secured her party's best-ever result, losing the presidential election to Emmanuel Macron by 58 percent to 42 percent.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

#20yrsago Feral hippos haunt druglord’s estate https://web.archive.org/web/20030210201621/http://asia.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=ourWorldNews&storyID=2097687

#20yrsago McDonald’s can award A-levels in UK https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/7211958.stm

#15yrsago Romanian manga ��� manga meets Metal Hurlant meets Marvel https://www.forbes.com/2008/01/09/romanian-manga-comics-forbeslife-globalpop08-cx-cd_0109doctorow.html

#15yrsago Good As Lily — ass-kicking girl-positive graphic novel for young readers https://memex.craphound.com/2008/01/30/good-as-lily-ass-kicking-girl-positive-graphic-novel-for-young-readers/

#10yrsago Guy makes a game about his crappy job working for Canadian tax authority, loses his crappy job https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2013/01/30/revenue_canada_worker_fired_for_his_online_customer_service_game.html

#5yrsago Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, JPMorgan Chase announce new health insurer ‘free from profit-making incentives and constraints’ https://money.cnn.com/2018/01/30/news/companies/amazon-berkshire-jpmorgan-health-insurance/index.html

#5yrsago After industry adopts open video standards, MPEG founder says the end is nigh https://blog.chiariglione.org/a-crisis-the-causes-and-a-solution/

#5yrsago Meet Hereditary Congressman Dan Lipinski, an anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ Illinois “Machine Democrat” who opposes the $15 minimum wage https://theintercept.com/2018/01/29/dan-lipinski-illinois-3rd-district-marie-newman/

#5yrsago Convicted criminal Silvio Berlusconi returns to Italian politics as a kingmaker https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/29/world/europe/berlusconi-italy-election.html?smid=tw-share

#5yrsago Berlin regulates Airbnb and safely deflates its housing bubble while returning 8,000 rentals to the market https://www.dw.com/en/berlin-housing-law-replenishes-housing-stock-for-renters/a-42360345

#5yrsago What youthquake? Jeremy Corbyn’s election surge was drawn from all age groups, not a mob of first-time young voters https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/the-myth-of-the-2017-youthquake-election/

#5yrsago Inside big tech’s last-minute scramble to comply with Europe’s new privacy rules https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/28/technology/europe-data-privacy-rules.html

#5yrsago Starlings: razor-sharp stories and poems from Jo Walton https://memex.craphound.com/2018/01/30/starlings-razor-sharp-stories-and-poems-from-jo-walton/

#5yrsago The in-depth tale of Bylock, the Turkish messenger app whose 1×1 tracking GIF was the basis for tens of thousands of treason accusations https://arrestedlawyers.org/2018/01/21/ever-changing-evidence-bylock/

#1yrago The battle for Ring Zero: The esoteric argument I have been having with myself since 2002 https://pluralistic.net/2022/01/30/ring-minus-one/#drm-political-economy

[head-post]

EU migration deal helpless in face of small boats

Europe’s sea lanes were crowded last weekend. On Sunday, more than 700 migrants crossed the English Channel from France to England, bringing this year’s total to 18,342 – 13 per cent more than in 2023. On the same day, 421 migrants on twelve boats landed on the Italian island of Lampedusa, and since then more migrants have arrived, totalling more than 500, The Spectator reports.

The diversity of nationalities of the migrants who have arrived on Lampedusa is a surprising and disturbing snapshot of the crisis facing Europe. The people who have disembarked have come from Egypt, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Ghana, Gambia, Ghana, Malaysia, Nigeria, Liberia and Syria. There are now too many gangs operating in Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

Some migrants are travelling on their boats from Libya, others from Tunisia. The latter route is cheaper, with migrants paying smugglers between £500 and £1,500 (the cheapest route is from Sfax, which is 116 miles west of Lampedusa). The cost per seat in a boat sailing from more distant Libya ranged from £3,000 to £7,000.

The cost of crossing the Mediterranean to Europe highlights what American scholar Stephen Smith explained in his 2018 book The Scramble for Europe: migration is being made by Africa’s young middle class, not by the poorest and most oppressed.

The internet and social media allow this demographic to see what they see as great potential for personal growth in Europe; according to Smith, these young middle class people resent the “elder rule” in Africa that limits this growth. In his book, Smith predicts that migration from Africa has only just begun and will increase significantly in the coming decades.

Asian migrants rush to Europe

Africans are not the only ones who see Europe as the promised land. Increasingly, it is becoming a destination for South Asians, particularly Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis.

Almost 40,000 migrants have arrived in Italy this year, 7,615 of them from Bangladesh, the highest number of any country. Italian authorities fear the figure will rise in the coming months, given the recent political turmoil in Bangladesh. Student protests that began in July turned into a large-scale uprising against Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Hundreds of people were killed and the prime minister fled, leaving behind an unstable country under an interim government that has promised to hold parliamentary elections soon, according to The Spectator.

The unrest in Bangladesh is similar to that in a huge number of countries in the developing world in recent years, with seven coups d’état in Africa since 2020 and conflicts ravaging Sudan, Syria and Yemen. In each case, one of the consequences is increased migration to Europe.

The European Union is struggling to contain this huge outflow of population. Over the past 18 months, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has signed agreements with Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Mauritania and Lebanon in the hope that their governments can control the flow.

Forthcoming leaders’ talks

The number of migrants crossing Europe is down on 2023 – 94,009 arrived in Italy in the first seven months of last year – so the EU strategy is paying off. Nevertheless, tens of thousands of migrants continue to arrive, paying substantial sums of money to the well-organised criminal gangs that control the routes. The political vacuum in France and the election of a Labour government in the UK will push these gangs to expand their illegal business, The Spectator reports.

This week it was revealed that Keir Starmer held talks with his Italian counterpart Giorgia Meloni on the issue of illegal immigration. The British Prime Minister believes that tackling criminal gangs is the most effective way to stop the boats.

That’s unlikely to work. There are too many gangs operating in Asia, the Middle East and Africa right now. Destroy one and another will take its place, attracted by relatively easy wealth.

According to a report by the Global Initiative to Combat Transnational Organised Crime, a single human smuggling gang can earn up to one million dollars (£780,000) a month. It may not be as lucrative as the drug trade, but unlike that trade, it is not the smugglers who bear the risk, but the people being smuggled. It is they who are at risk when they climb into a flimsy boat and take to the high seas.

But it is the huge masses of people who are willing to take this risk. Europe is their dream, and they will not be deterred by the danger or the deals the EU has made.

Read more HERE

[sa7abnews]

Sporting gender and race: Lessons from Imane Khelif humiliation

New Post has been published on https://sa7ab.info/2024/08/11/sporting-gender-and-race-lessons-from-imane-khelif-humiliation-2/

Sporting gender and race: Lessons from Imane Khelif humiliation

“I send a message to all the people of the world to uphold the Olympic principles and the Olympic Charter, to refrain from bullying all athletes. Because this has effects, massive effects. It can destroy people, it can kill people’s thoughts, spirit and mind. It can divide people. And because of that, I ask them to refrain from bullying.”

These were the words of 25-year-old Algerian boxer Imane Khelif during an interview with SNTV, a sports video partner of The Associated Press, on Sunday, August 4.

Khelif made these comments after facing severe bullying, including accusations that she is a trans woman, following a heated row about gender eligibility.

The gender row began when Italian boxer Angela Carini abandoned her qualifying match with Khelif on August 1, just 46 seconds into the first round, citing safety concerns after a powerful blow to the face.

Following this match, critics targeted Khelif on social media, including contentious figures such as US election candidate Donald Trump, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling, and far-right Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

Hungarian opponent Anna Luca Hamori further inflamed the situation by comparing Khelif to a devil-like monster on Instagram and spreading transphobic sentiments before their match last week.

Despite the bullying, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has strongly supported Khelif, as well as Taiwan’s Lin Yu-Ting, who also faced bullying during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

On August 3, IOC President Thomas Bach stated, “We have two boxers who were born as women, who have been raised as women, who have a passport as a woman, and who have competed for many years as women.”

Discrimination against women of colour is nothing new

The gender row reveals a troubling pattern of discrimination against people of colour.

Throughout her tennis career, which began in the mid-1990s, Serena Williams faced intense scrutiny over her physique.

Despite turning professional at 14, winning 23 Grand Slams, overcoming numerous injuries, and surviving a near-fatal birth experience, Williams’s muscular build was frequently criticised.

“People would say I was born a guy, all because of my arms or because I’m strong,” Williams told Harper’s Bazaar in 2018.

“I was different from Venus: she was thin and tall and beautiful, and I am strong and muscular — and beautiful, but, you know, it was just totally different.”

Similarly, South African runner Caster Semenya faced discrimination after her 800m victory at the 2009 World Championships.

Despite being identified as female at birth and raised as a girl, Semenya was sidelined for 11 months due to regulations concerning hormone levels.

She has a condition known as differences in sex development (DSDs), which results in naturally high testosterone levels.

The latest athlete to face such scrutiny is Indian wrestling star Vinesh Phogat, who was disqualified from her gold medal bout at the Games for being 100 grams overweight.

These accusations against women of colour not only humiliate actual trans girls and women, who are often denied high-level competition opportunities, but also unfairly target cis women of colour, punishing them for their achievements and questioning their very identity.

This situation also highlights hypocrisy in the Olympics.

Why was Khelif vilified, slandered, and even pressured to provide childhood photographs to prove her gender, while Dutch volleyball player Steven van de Velde, who was sentenced to four years in prison in the UK in 2016 for raping a 12-year-old girl when he was 19, received far less scrutiny? 

Although the player has now been removed from the Games, a clear double standard is evident this year.

The female battle against testosterone 

The controversy surrounding Khelif has deeply impacted not only her, but also her family, and the broader female community, particularly women who suffer from high testosterone levels.

Elevated testosterone, can lead to unfair scrutiny, especially in women with conditions such as Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS) or Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH).

Notably, 37% of female Olympians have PCOS, a condition that contributes to 70% of hyperandrogenism cases.

PCOS symptoms, for example, include acne, excessive body hair growth, and scalp hair loss, and the condition affects an estimated 5% of women.

Testosterone, a sex hormone produced by both men and women, is at the heart of this row. Although we don’t know if Khelif has disclosed any medical conditions that may cause high testosterone levels, one thing is certain: having the so-called ‘male hormone’ is nothing to be ashamed of.

Aless Bove, a nutritional therapist at The PCOS Expert, shared her thoughts on women with elevated testosterone: “While conditions like PCOS can reduce the quality of life for many women, it can also be a superpower. Testosterone is often labelled a ‘male hormone,’ but we need it in regulated amounts for energy, mood, and bone health.

“Elevated testosterone does not determine gender identity, but it affects around 5-10% of women and is linked to certain medical conditions. It can also fluctuate depending on lifestyle, diet, and stress,” Bove explains to The New Arab.

Three women with PCOS, who chose to remain anonymous, shared their feelings about the Khelif controversy.

Sarah* expressed her sadness: “I felt very saddened by Khelif’s case. The impact this has had on the world makes me angry about humanity and how people can hurt each other without compassion and empathy.

“Everyone has scars and has gone through struggles, and no one should be judgmental, no matter what.”

She added that the harsh comments about Khelif’s physical appearance reminded her of high school bullying, feeling like a return to a playground where kids are mean.

Layla* shared similar sentiments: “When I first saw the situation surrounding Khelif, I felt sorry for her, much like I did for intersex athlete Caster Semenya years ago. After seeing influencers like Jake Paul suggest giving her opponent a ‘fair chance’ against someone who wasn’t ‘male,’ my frustration grew.

“I, too, have elevated testosterone levels that I cannot control despite my best efforts. I can only imagine how heart-wrenching it must have been for Khelif to see the world turn on her overnight for something she cannot control,” Layla adds. 

“Athletes train for years for their moment in the sun, and Khelif’s moment was stolen from her because of a chemical imbalance within her body that the world failed to understand. The so-called ‘controversy’ is morally repugnant and deeply offensive.”

Jasmine* voiced concern for Khelif’s mental health: “I found it incredibly sad and really sympathised with Khelif. As a woman with PCOS, you are always conscious of symptoms making you appear less ‘female.’ The cruel trolls and narrative surrounding Khelif are likely to be triggering for her and could significantly affect her mental health.”

Urgent need for change

Recent events demonstrate the urgent need for significant changes to prevent the humiliation of misgendering.

This also extends to unnecessary revisits of past injustices. For example, amid the ongoing gender debate, critics have fixated on Khelif, highlighting her previous disqualification from competition due to “elevated levels of testosterone,” which allegedly did not meet the eligibility criteria.

This change is not just a matter of discussion; it is critical, particularly given that Khelif has recently received death threats.

So, what actions are necessary to protect these women’s mental health?

First, testing practices must undergo major improvements. 

Despite advancements from visual exams in the 1930s to more sophisticated chromosome and testosterone tests, the International Boxing Association’s (IBA) handling of Khelif and Yu-Ting’s testing remains unclear.

The IBA has not disclosed the details of the tests or the reasons for the boxers’ disqualification, citing confidentiality.

On Wednesday, July 31, the IBA stated that the two boxers “did not undergo a testosterone examination but were subject to a separate and recognised test, the specifics of which remain confidential.”

IOC spokesman Mark Adams affirmed that all participants in the women’s event were “complying with competition eligibility rules.”

He noted, “These athletes have competed many times before for many years, they haven’t just arrived, they competed in Tokyo.

“Testosterone is not a perfect test. Many women can have testosterone which is in what would be called ‘male levels’ and still be women, still compete as women.

“This idea that suddenly you do one test for testosterone and that sorts everything out — not the case, I’m afraid.

“I hope we’re all agreed that we’re not calling for people to go back to the bad old days of sex testing, which was a terrible thing to do.”

Bove argues that improving testing involves addressing the complexities and natural variability of high testosterone in women.

She suggests that incorporating medical insights can provide a better understanding of how hormone levels affect performance and health.

Bove adds, “Why should women be excluded for something that naturally occurs in their bodies? Policies should be inclusive, consider natural hormonal variations, and maintain transparent criteria to ensure fair competition.”

She also notes that while women with naturally higher testosterone may have certain advantages in sports, this does not mean their gender should be questioned.

Bove illustrates this by pointing out that Jamaican runner Usain Bolt’s muscle composition, which contributed to his speed, was due to genetics rather than an unfair advantage.

Preventing disinformation in media reporting is also crucial, as media coverage can frame narratives and shape public opinion.

For instance, The Daily Mail’s headline, “Olympics gender row boxer Imane Khelif bursts in tears and declares ‘I am a woman’ – as she gloats about ‘winning a medal for Algeria and Arabs’ having guaranteed at least a bronze after her quarter final victory,” questions Khelif’s gender and portrays her as self-congratulatory.

To add insult to injury, this framing not only perpetuates racial biases but also intensifies the bullying Khelif has endured.

“Journalists and sports officials should receive diversity and inclusion training to promote transparent reporting standards, and ensure that policies are informed by a broad range of perspectives,” says Bove. 

“Media outlets should be evaluated for balanced and accurate coverage, and sports organisations must implement anti-discrimination policies to foster an environment of respect and equality.”

While there’s a long way to go to get these improvements in place, some changes are currently being discussed.

A Joint Paris 2024 Boxing Unit/IOC Statement on Thursday, August 1, indicated that the IOC needs National Boxing Federations to reach a consensus around a new International Federation for boxing to be included in the sports programme of the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games.

As Khelif prepares to compete against Chinese boxer Yang Liu for the gold medal this Friday, we can only hope that the focus will remain on the Algerian boxer’s talents and not on trolling. 

*Name changed to protect identity

Zainab Mehdi is The New Arab’s Associate Editor and researcher specialising in governance, development, and conflict in the Middle East and North Africa region

Follow her on X: @zaiamehdi

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 8.3 (after 1940)

1940 – World War II: Italian forces begin the invasion of British Somaliland. 1946 – Santa Claus Land, the world's first themed amusement park, opens in Santa Claus, Indiana, United States. 1948 – Whittaker Chambers accuses Alger Hiss of being a communist and a spy for the Soviet Union. 1949 – The Basketball Association of America and the National Basketball League finalize the merger that would create the National Basketball Association. 1958 – The world's first nuclear submarine, the USS Nautilus, becomes the first vessel to complete a submerged transit of the geographical North Pole. 1959 – Portugal's state police force PIDE fires upon striking workers in Bissau, Portuguese Guinea, killing over 50 people. 1960 – Niger gains independence from France. 1972 – The United States Senate ratifies the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. 1975 – A privately chartered Boeing 707 strikes a mountain peak and crashes near Agadir, Morocco, killing 188. 1977 – Tandy Corporation announces the TRS-80, one of the world's first mass-produced personal computers. 1981 – Senegalese opposition parties, under the leadership of Mamadou Dia, launch the Antiimperialist Action Front – Suxxali Reew Mi. 1997 – Oued El-Had and Mezouara massacre in Algeria: A total of 116 villagers killed, 40 in Oued El-Had and 76 in Mezouara. 1997 – The tallest free-standing structure in the Southern Hemisphere, Sky Tower in downtown Auckland, New Zealand, opens after two-and-a-half years of construction. 2004 – The pedestal of the Statue of Liberty reopens after being closed since the September 11 attacks. 2005 – President of Mauritania Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya is overthrown in a military coup while attending the funeral of King Fahd in Saudi Arabia. 2007 – Former deputy director of the Chilean secret police Raúl Iturriaga is captured after having been on the run following a conviction for kidnapping. 2010 – Widespread rioting erupts in Karachi, Pakistan, after the assassination of a local politician, leaving at least 85 dead and at least 17 billion Pakistani rupees (US$200 million) in damage. 2014 – A 6.1 magnitude earthquake kills at least 617 people and injures more than 2,400 in Yunnan, China. 2014 – The genocide of Yazidis by ISIL begins.[4] 2018 – Two burka-clad men kill 29 people and injure more than 80 in a suicide attack on a Shia mosque in eastern Afghanistan. 2019 – Six hundred protesters, including opposition leader Lyubov Sobol, are arrested in an election protest in Moscow, Russia. 2019 – Twenty-three people are killed and 22 injured in a mass shooting in El Paso, Texas. 2023 – Worst floods hit major parts of Slovenia.

[theculturedmarxist]

Yves here. We are overdue on giving a full-bore treatment on Project 2025, but this post will hopefully serve as a starting point. Sadly, ambitious and well-organized right wing campaigns to greatly increase the acceptance of their social and policy agenda have proven to be extremely successful, witness the Powell Memo and the Project for the New American Century. Trump is the explicit target of this Heritage Foundation scheme. Because the first Trump presidency was very much a “dog that caught the car” event, Trump had perilous little in the way of plans, and on top of that, weak cabinet members. For instance, Steve Mnuchin’s tax reform plan was an embarrassment, barely rising to the level of a napkin doddle. So after that misfire, the Administration took up the anti-tax lobby’s plan, include their off-the-shelf language. Trump might be a tad better prepared to be President if he wins again, but that does not make him any less receptive to pre-packaged programs from his fellow travelers. So this initiative very much bears watching.

By Diana Cariboni, who started writing for Tracking the Backlash in 2018 and is now openDemocracy’s Latin America editor. She was previously co-editor-in-chief of the IPS news agency and led its Latin America desk for more than ten years. She wrote the book ‘Guantánamo Entre Nosotros’ (2017) and won Uruguay’s national press award in 2018. Originally published at openDemocracy

Last month, populist leaders from around the world gathered for the Europa Viva 24 summit in Madrid. Headlines from the event were dominated by the big names in attendance – Argentinian president Javier Milei, France’s Marine Le Pen, Chile’s José Antonio Kast, and Italian and Hungarian prime ministers Giorgia Meloni and Viktor Orbán – and the fact it ended in a diplomatic row between Argentina and Spain.

But away from all of this noise and fury was a lesser-known speaker: Roger Severino, a former official in Donald Trump’s administration and the vice-president for domestic policy at influential US think tank The Heritage Foundation.

In a six-minute speech delivered in Spanish, Severino described Trump as a victim of lawfare launched by “the lefties” and said young people are subjected to a “culture and a medical system” that tells them to “explore all sexual appetites at age of 10” and that “abortion is not about destroying babies but about healthcare”.

Adding that young people are also taught “that if you are uncomfortable with your sex you were probably born in the wrong body, and surgeries can fix that mistake”, he said: “I’m here to tell you that God doesn’t make mistakes.

Severino is one of the architects of the Heritage Foundation’s blueprint for a second Trump term, named ‘Project 2025’. This aims to reshape the federal state in 180 days, fire tens of thousands of public servants and replace them with people loyal to the conservative cause, undermine the separation of powers, attack public education, and erase or restrict the rights of women, LGBTQ people, workers, migrants and Black people.

It also seeks to dismantle policies to tackle climate change and push for an energy agenda reliant on fossil fuels.

Its plan for doing so is set out in the ‘Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise’, an 887-page playbook published by the think tank, whose mission is “to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual liberty, traditional American values, and strong national defence”.

It is not absurd to say that some of the Heritage Foundation’s suggestions may well become law if Trump is elected in November. The politically well-connected organisation was founded in 1973 and published its first ‘Mandate for Leadership’ as Ronald Reagan took office in 1981 – later boasting that Reagan had enacted more than 60% of its policy recommendations.

Severino, who was Trump’s director of the Office for Civil Rights at the Department of Health and Human Services, wrote Project 25’s section on health. Of the 199 times the word ‘abortion’ is mentioned throughout the document, 149 are in this chapter, which urges the federal government to remove (or restrict as much as possible) any sexual and reproductive healthcare and rights whose oversight it has responsibility for.

Severino suggests eliminating the approval of abortion pills and banning their distribution by mail; barring the use of federal funds to transport people seeking an abortion in a state where it’s illegal to one where it isn’t; cutting federal funding to Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers; and removing emergency contraception from workers’ health insurance coverage.

In contrast, it’s hard to find any proposals to tackle the US’s real public health crises: opioids, falling life expectancyand rising maternal and infant mortality rates. This is perhaps unsurprising; the Heritage Foundation sees the Supreme Court’s overturning of the 1973 Roe decision that protected abortion up to 23 weeks as a victory – but also as “just the beginning”.

In the two years since Roe’s repeal, 21 states have banned or drastically restricted abortion, and legislative and judicial battles are raging in others attempting to follow suit. But the number of abortions carried out annually has actually increased, according to multiple studies – and so grow the dystopian battleplans for the continued war on reproductive autonomy. Several US cities have made it illegal to use their roads to transport people seeking abortions from a state where abortion is prohibited to one where it is permitted.

Project 2025 wants the Department of Health to go further still, urging it to “protect life, conscience and bodily integrity” and place “strong respect for the sacred rights of conscience” at the top of its agenda. Severino’s chapter calls for legislation requiring states to record data on abortions, including the number of terminations carried out, the reasons for them, the method used, the length of the pregnancy, and the state of residence of the person seeking an abortion.

It also suggests that scientific research conducted with public money should focus on “the risks and complications of abortion” and on “correcting and not promoting misinformation about the health and psychological benefits of giving birth compared to the health and psychological risks of intentionally taking a human life through abortion”.

But Project 2025’s focus isn’t only on reproductive health.

The president who takes office in 2025, the foreword says, must “remove from every existing rule, regulatory agency, contract, grant, regulation, and federal law the terms sexual orientation and gender identity, diversity, equity, and inclusion, gender, gender equality, gender equity, gender, gender-sensitive, abortion, reproductive health, reproductive rights, and any other term used to deprive Americans of First Amendment rights” (which protects freedom of religion, freedom of speech and press, and the right to petition the government for redress of grievances).

The future government must also “immediately cease the collection of data on gender identity, because it legitimises the unscientific notion that men can become women (and vice versa) and encourages the phenomenon of the constant multiplication of subjective identities”, Severino adds.

An Anti-Rights Past and Future

The Heritage Foundation is not the only highly influential institute involved in the writing of Project 25. Of the 100 organisations that sit on its advisory board or directly contribute to the playbook, several have been crucial to the advancement of extremist agenda in the US in recent decades and years.

In 2018, four years before Roe was overturned, Mississippi banned abortions after 15 weeks in the state – with legislation modelled on a bill conceived by the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), which the Southern Poverty Law Center lists as an anti-LGBTQ hate group and which sits on the Project 25 advisory board. The law was challenged and stayed by two courts on the grounds that it was unconstitutional because it violated Roe.

The law’s promoters took the case all the way to the Supreme Court, aiming to challenge and ultimately overturn Roe. Their strategy relied on the court having a right-wing majority, which was ensured by Leonard Leo, a conservative lawyer and activist who has founded a network of groups and funding hubs. Leo, who had already been influential in the appointment of three other justices, successfully lobbied Trump to appoint three anti-abortion members to the court – achieving a conservative supermajority of six out of nine justices. Leo’s network of nonprofits has reportedly donated millions of dollars to organisations that sit on the Project 2025 advisory board since 2021.

The result has been that around a third of women of reproductive age in the US, as well as other people who do not identify as women but can get pregnant, now live in a state where abortion is banned or severely restricted, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

The Heritage Foundation, ADF and Leo didn’t answer our requests for comments.