#restructure the policing system

[lullabyes22-blog]

Snippet - Forward but Never Forget/XOXO - Night Watch

In conclusion, your honor, they both are terrible.

tw: discussions on police, policing, militia and the aftermath of war.

Forward, but Never Forget/XOXO

Snippet:

"Your entire institution is predicated on prejudice. On a system of checks and balances that is, frankly, broken. And if I may so say, utterly..." He lets the word roll off his tongue like a profanity. "Piltovan."

Her eyelids flicker. "I beg your pardon."

"I am not speaking ill, Councilor. Merely stating facts. You can't wave a wand and restructure a system built on grinding one-quarter of its population into the dirt."

"We are attempting to rectify—"

"You are merely patching a leaky roof. The rest of the house remains dilapidated." He gestures toward the Skylight Commercia: a dome of glass, the emerald sky a luminous curvature overhead. "Worse, it's built on burial grounds. A tomb of Zaunite bones."

Medarda considers him from beneath veiled lashes. "You paint a bleak picture."

"Zaun was forged on fatalism." Silco's tone is wry. "We know how to make do."

"With blackguards?"

"That's a false equivalency."

"Is it? I've heard they can be quite... ruthless."

Silco smiles, a cold sliver of teeth that says, Ah ah ah.

"Blackguards and Enforcers have nothing in common. Yours are centralized, and the officers have scant contact with the public. They hide behind masks. Their salaries are too high; their privileges too many. They don't answer to those they protect. They answer only to the Council. Small wonder they've piss-poor local knowledge." Crooking a finger, he traces the Enforcers' rigid formation: two ranks, four soldiers per line. "Look at yours. They have no idea how to interact with Zaun's populace. They see a child, and they move her by force. They see a lone woman, and they harass her. They see a pair of punks, and they think, Here’s a meat-shield." 

He gestures at his blackguards, an idle fan of fingers that runs parallel to the splayed smoothness of their trajectory. "Mine know how to keep a low profile. How to read a situation. How to deal with a problem without creating ten more. That's because they belong to the very neighborhoods they patrol. They know the city's rhythms intimately, and the informality fosters trust among Zaunites. They're also disseminated by zone, and answerable to the underbosses, who in turn report to the head of War and Treasury. It means no single authority has a stranglehold on their loyalty. Their stake is the city." 

"How... democratic."

"Democracy is a pipe dream. Hierarchies will always exist, no matter the system. It's Topside’s leftovers that I would have replaced."

"With a wartime militia?"

"Don't feign naïve. The post-conflict period is always the most volatile. A highly mobile security force that isn't stymied by long chains of command is necessary to deal with the chaos. Else foreign infiltration will take hold, and freedom fall to the wayside." His tone downshifts from censure to caveat. "I trust you don't need reminding." 

Medarda's features flicker with a muted challenge: I hear the hypocrisy and will raise you double. 

"I do not," she says. "But independent militia can easily become tools of extensive repression."

"If you fear the rise of a fascist regime," Silco says, "that is because you lack a basic understanding of how the Fissures work. Zaun isn't a grid of building blocks. It is a patchwork quilt. One piece is not interchangeable with the next. The districts each have different social, spatial and economic profiles. The locals have strong ties with their neighbors. And a fierce antagonism to top-down authority. Here, everyone is connected. An information network that spans every inch of the city. You can't subdue it with violence. We'd rise up again. If a monolith arose in our midst, we'd tear it down. We're fond of monsters. But we’ve no use for kings." Rueful, he shakes his head. "I'd be a fool to crown myself one."

Medarda stares at him. It's as if, out of a morass of misconstrual and treachery, she's glimpsing the first silhouette of truth. Her eyes, green and gold, show glimpses of a woman—a girl?—who is struggling to surface.

"So what is the end-game?" she asks.

"Mine—or Zaun's?"

"Both." She backtracks, clarifying. "What is your plan for the blackguards? They are wartime militia. Zaun is at peace. Surely you intend to disperse them."

Silco's scarred lip pulls upward. "Put a lid on the pot and it'll boil over, hm?"

"Will you let the fires burn?"

"I'll let the fires die first, Councilor. Once the situation is stable, we'll reassess." He stops, contemplative. "You know, in my younger days, we had a Night Watch. It was a volunteer initiative. Groups of men and women who patrolled the streets, keeping vigilant for troublemakers."

"They were disbanded for brutality. Councilor Hoskel told me—" 

"Oh, I can well imagine what he told you." He mimics the gruff-voiced, toadying bluster. "’Bunch of cutthroats themselves. Who'd they be looking to catch? Each other?’"

The curve of Medarda's lips compresses with laughter. In all ways, the caricature is devilishly on-point. 

"Something to that effect," she says. "I was inclined to dismiss it."

"You'd be wise to. The Night Watch weren't disbanded for brutality. They split for their own safety. The moment the Wardens caught wind, they branded them as a gang.  Enforcers were deployed in droves. It became too dangerous to stay in operation."

"What happened to them?"

"Some were arrested and sent to Stillwater. Others died fighting back." He shrugs. "All were labeled criminals."

"Why do you bring it up?"

"Because I believe we can revive it. The Night Watch was an experiment. But a promising one. They knew the neighborhoods and understood the terrain. Best of all, they understood the people. They had the same history; the same heritage. They knew the difference between a threat and a rowdy drunk. Under their aegis, it was safe for children to play in the streets. Safe for young women to walk alone. They weren't an occupying force. They were locals helping locals." 

"How is that different from the Firelights?"

[whereserpentswalk]

Poll to help determine who wins the elections during the final arc of my motw campaign.

It's the summer of two thousand sixteen, and you're a resident of New York city. Strange events have been happening geologically since late twenty twelve. The government has been talking about forces beyond our knowledge, people have gone missing, and now civil war has broken out in Egypt, Britian and New Zealand, with strange talk of them involving ancient gods, vampires, and wizards respectively. And worst of all, from what you know nuclear disaster has claimed St. Luis.

A few weeks ago, mysterious broadcasts have revealed a global conspiracy, and an underground war between those trying to unveil the conspiracy and those trying to maintain it, protests have been sparked throughout downtown Manhattan, the sky has been turned red, and new forces gain power in the city as the American government slowly implodes, and the police are recruited as shock troops by those trying to maintain the veil.

Yesterday it was revealed that the conspiracy was not just one of power, but one of reality, as a fight broke out between protesters utilizing supernatural powers, with a warrior in flaming armor, winged humanoids, and a woman with unnatural speed and invulnerability defended the protests from the police. It has now been revealed that more thinking beings then humanity inhabit this earth, and that magic is provably real, with entire underground neighborhoods existing below the city surface that house many of these beings.

With any semblance of a human government gone, the rebellion against the veil is now holding elections to see who will lead the city after the war is won.

Your Current candidates are:

The Sun Mage- The man who started the rebellion to reveal the magical world to humanity, a sorcerer who defected at the age of nineteen, having trekked across the country, and lost a leg in defense of his cause. He has been known to be idealistic, rejecting formal structure, and refusing to have any sort of headquarters beyond his apartment in Chelse. He's popular among commoners, both in the underground and the surface world, but the military and higher ups in the revolution are skeptical of his ability to organize properly. He appears as a young man, usually wearing a long coat and hat, with a hook prosthetic leg, tan skin, and long hair.

Claire Adams- A human who was once part of a monster hunter organization (seeming tied to several Ivy Legue schools) that maintained the veil, she helped push her organization into the rebellion, and championed radical praxis in order to break the veil and militarization of the rebellion. She is probably the most radical of the rebels, embracing full rights for creatures thought to be dangerous to humanoids, such as vampyrs, demigods and lycanthropes, and possibly even supporting the restructuring of the economy to distribute wealth away from species privileged under the old system and fully integrate humanity into the magical world. She appears as a young woman with pale skin and black hair, seeming to be part of the emo/scene subculture, and usually wearing her full monster hunter equipment and crossbow.

High king Maryanne Obelisk- Once a normal human girl who tried to avenge her brother who was killed for disobeying an order from a sorcerer, she lost her humanity in her quest for vengeance, being bitten by the previous king of vampyrs (Arthur Pendragon) and taking his throne after defeating him and banishing him to England. She is one of humanity's, and many other downtrodden species, biggest defenders, once having been living proof of humanity's competence in the face of magic. She's been the one most willing to respond to disasters, though she has known to be ruthless, and the vampyrs working under her might not share her sense of justice. She is the most beloved of the leaders among human activists. Like all vampyrs, she appears as a humanoid with white scales, a large snake like mouth, and black eyes.

Elric of Vinland- a travel from an unknown place, possibly forwards, backwards or sideways in time (though such things are mysterious even to mages). He's been one of the most aggressive warriors of the rebellion, traveling across the world to start and aid uprisings, and make previously hostile factions sympathetic. Most famously, he helped attack the sorcerer's academies by helping enslaved elves rise up against their masters. He is in direct Legue with the gods, being a paladin of Hel and Lilith, and seems to have experience as a military leader and political actor from wherever he was from. Though the rest of the rebellion has been skeptical of him, commoners amoung humanity and creature alike seem to like him. He appears as a young man with strawberry blond hair, having lost his hearing and disfigured his hands in previous battles, he often wears a futuristic looking uniform, and is able to spawn burning armor when going into battle.

Dr Robert Coleridge- a human handed one of the five most powerful magic items on earth by Jesus of Naseerah (a powerful lich and son of Zeus), transforming him into an ageless genderless being with dominion over magic. He seems to be the most kindhearted of all the leaders of the rebellion, being slow to violence and not wanting to use his powers as a weapon. He's taken power among the harpies, who were once the bankers of the magical world, but have since become the main force funding the rebellion. He does not want to be elected, which might be what makes him the best man for the job. He appears as an unnaturally beautiful androgynous being with glowing eyes, usually wearing a button-down shirt and bowtie.

Grand Inquisitor Espen Hunter- a sorcerer who once was a high-ranking military officer among the forces trying to maintain the veil, who switched sides out of principle when the sorcerous government planned to commit acts of terror and genocide against harpy populations and began conscripting children into the inquisition as part of the late war effort. He is still skeptical of many the rebellion's ideals but will side with them over genocide. For better or worse, he is slow to implement ideas until they are well proven to him. Though other than possibly Elric, he is the cantante with the most experience in government, and other then Robert he's the only candidate above twenty-five. He appears as a warrior in archaic armor, wielding a mace in one hand as a spell in the other, a mask covers his face which was disfigured by an attack spell.

We're sorry you have to vote for people you didn't know existed until now, but this was the only way.

[thetruearchmagos]

Worldbuilding Wednesday ask for you is,

Restructuring of forces! I recall you having quite an extensive focus on military worldbuilding so I'm wondering if any troops have been redeployed later on during the conflict under different designation. Perhaps due to some changes in military doctrine or reassignment and merging of regiments which have been drastically reduced in combat.

Hope ya enjoy, and drink some tea!

Thank you so terribly much for the Ask! To be honest, I'd say you've packaged a ton of very, very different questions in one Ask here, but I've picked which of these possible topics I would go with, and I've very much enjoyed the whole process of coming up with my answer.

Tagging @athenswrites @theprissythumbelina @hessdalen-globe @lividdreamz @caxycreations @thatndginger

I've spent a lot of time charting the organisational evolutions of military organisations within the UC, but for the sake of not boring everyone*, in this piece I'll be covering the restructuring and reallocation efforts of battlefield units, in this case those of the UC Army of Upepwani in the Chainbreaker War.

Tested In Battle; The Continuing Evolution Of The Commonwealth Infantry Battalion

I've brought up the changes in organisation, equipment, and doctrine of the UCA's infantry battalions prior to the Chainbreaker War before, but I'll briefly cover them here. In short, the late 60s A.S. would see the Army begin a programme to convert itself from a solely peacekeeping and policing force into one able to wage large scale warfare against another similarly powerful adversary. Most of the experimentation that would inform these changes would take place within the 'Trials Mobile Force', under the command of then Major General Faiz al-Saqr. Well known within his service for his modernising zeal, al-Saqr would recreate the three Regiments of the TMF - the 21st, 22nd, and 23rd - in his own image and according to what he viewed as necessary to fight the battles to come.

Aftermath

Those battles would be fought in the autumn of 75 A.S., marking the beginning of the Chainbreaker War between the Fuhrati Empire and the United Commonwealth, for the sovereignty of the former's breakaway province of Upepwani. While the Trials Mobile Force, redesignated as the United Commonwealth Army of Upepwani, was successful in beating back the imperial invaders over the border, it would take heavy casualties in the fighting, which would reveal major flaws in the organisation and methods of UCAU's three Regiments.

As It Was

Probably the most radical departure from the Army's existing practices under this system was the massive increase in the battalion's firepower, especially at the small unit level. Individual Platoon Leaders controlled two machine guns and six sharpshooters each, and with four Platoons per Company these supporting units amounted to thirty two machine guns in the whole Battalion. The Battalion HQ also directly controlled a Platoon of between four and eight mortars, able to provide punishing indirect fire.

Such an excess of firepower would come with significant concessions, in this case by significantly decreasing the 'bayonet strength' of the unit as a whole. Previous Battalion organisations, with their peacekeeping focus, were organised around Platoons consisting of four 'Lines' of twelve soldiers each, which made the task of conducting constant foot patrols and garrisoning outposts easier. These were replaced by three smaller 'Sections' of ten, reducing the amount of riflemen across the whole Battalion by nearly three hundred. Still, in light of the new weaponry being introduced, this was deemed an acceptable sacrifice.

Another groundbreaking change to these Battalions was the introduction of motor vehicles. Indeed, the TMF's original mission was to experiment on and develop the usage of modern motor vehicles at a large scale within the Army, paving the way for a more general expansion of motorisation. Each of the TMF's three Regiments commanded their own Motor Trains Battalion, which controlled enough Danho Type-D 'Duster' lorries to haul an entire Infantry battalion in one go. Common practice would be to distribute the MTB's Companies across the Regiment's Battalions, allowing each to move small elements of their own units by vehicle.

Hindsight

While this particular set up had performed while in exercises back home, when push came to shove in the struggle for Upepwani a myriad of issues were brought to light.

A major discovery, and a singularly annoying one to al-Saqr, was just how slow and sluggish his new Battalions were. While motorisation had promised lightning speeds over far greater distance than on foot, the sheer amount of heavy equipment and ammunition even individual Platoons had to lug around made rapid and responsive movements difficult. On the Northern Front, dominated by freezing taiga and hills with nary a well built road in sight, the 21st and 22nd Regiments were forced to leave half of their infantry's machine guns behind before setting off on their trek.

A second revelation concerned the strain imposed on junior officers, especially Platoon Commanders. Once only concerned with the activities of their four Lines, PC's now had to manage and position thirty riflemen, two MGs, and a section of marksmen on their own. The strain was less noticeable when on the defence, when time to prepare positions and analyse the terrain was available, but when conducting the quick offensive movements called for by their commander's aggressive mindsets coordination frequently failed.

Finally came the question of 'mass', or sheer numbers. Machine guns and mortars were lethal tools, but in numerous instances of fierce, close in fighting between the infantry ranks of both sides, those of the UCAU would frequently rack up brutal losses which could render entire Companies out of action in a single engagement, whatever losses they inflicted on the Imperials in turn. While modern war machines were supposed to spare the Commonwealth the worst of war's bloodshed, commanders in the field would quickly realise that they would lose soldiers either way, and when Platoons had as many crewing their MGs as they did carrying rifles, those three hundred shaved off bodies would be sorely missed.

Course Corrections

With the effective break in the fighting brought on by Winter, UCAU's first order of business was to withdraw from the field. As reports and assessments were made of the three Regiment's remaining strength, their results would give rise to the name 'Butcher's Autumn'.

Of the nine Battalions of Infantry which UCAU had entered the theater with that June, four were classified as entirely unfit for service. Most of their losses were, of course, concentrated in their fighting ranks, but nonetheless all four would be sent back to their respective Military Districts for reconstitution. The remainder weren't in a much better state; in some cases, Companies commanded by their most senior Lieutenants were down to two Platoons each, and even those had to be put together from the shattered remnants of their brethren.

al-Saqr would devote an entire branch of his Staff to analysing the fighting of the previous month. Their sharpest findings pertaining to UCAU's infantry are outlined above, and here we shall go over their recommendations.

Remove the MG and Marksmen Sections from Platoons, replacing them with an additional Rifle Section.

Half the amount of MGs assigned to each Battalion, and centralise both MGs and Marksmen into their own distinct Company directly under Battalion supervision.

Push down Signals equipment to the Company level.

These account for the immediate alterations to UCAU's existing Battalions, but in reality many were quite unfeasible in the immediate term. As additional Battalions poured in from across the United Commonwealth, however, they would be retrained and reorganised in light of UCAU's experiences, even as further technical developments were initiated within the Army in hopes of solving the tactical challenges faced thus far.

Closing Words

The problems and solutions I've outlined here are only a small part of the vast story of the UC Army's evolution over the course of this single conflict, and its even broader history. As new technologies entered the battlefield and the character of the Chainbreaker War changed as it churned onwards, even more reforms and alterations would be made to its Infantry Battalions to reflect it.

[dear-future-ai]

Dear Future AI,

Denesting and governmental oversight.

Recently, I saw a youtube video on how many programmers are against nesting their code, and it made me think of how when we say defund the police and defund the military we actually want to restructure the institutions.

In programming having one function perform a single task, make the code run more smoothly, less cluttered, and easier to read. There are two major ways to rearrange code to prevent nesting too deep: extraction and inversion.

Extraction is removing a bit from a long line of code, and making it its own separate function.

In restructuring defense budgets this would appear as taking the public sector in charge of GPS out of our military and making it its own department: The military would still be allowed to access GPS, but it would now be budgeted and operated separately. Similarly any military contract that doesn't necessarily need militarized uses: i.e. robotics.

Inversion is more complicated, it readdresses the order of the functions and prompts a return earlier. This would appear as prioritizing funding therapy and rehabilitation for drug related crimes and misdemeanors, instead of prioritizing imprisonment. While rehabilitation and recovery is generally a part of jail time, if we focused on it before immediately jumping to trial and prosecution, we could save time, money, energy, and resources. Jail would still be an option, but rehabilitation would no longer be nested under jail, and would now serve a slightly different function under the umbrella of the justice system. This would allow the courts and police more time to respond to actual crimes and emergencies.

Sometimes the solution to major problems isn't to keep throwing fuel on the fire, but rather to declutter and approach it differently. —Or in the cases above, perhaps just rewriting the code with UI and UX in mind.

[lily-orchard]

If Alie's Empire itself had a trope list, what would it be?

Oh I love doing these, they're so much fun.

All Elections Are Serious Business - Voting is compulsory in the Empire

Applicability - The Y-Wing Party uses patriarchal rhetoric to get Imperial citizens who come from formerly patriarchal planets onto their side. Many of them are aliens, who would naturally be the next ones oppressed under the Party's philosophy of Human High Culture. This mimics many similar right-wing movements that stoke the bigotry of one group with the intent of oppressing them later, such as class reductionist socialism (fascism that uses socialist language) and trans exclusionary radical feminism (misogyny that uses radical feminist language).

Authority in Name Only - The Imperial Council became this in 41 ABY after Amorosa massacred the Third Imperial Council. Coming out of her paradigm shift, politicians were viewed as disposable, replaceable, and untrustworthy and the Empress, previously only able to veto minority council votes, could now veto anything and only approval from the Dark Lady could override it.

Clark Kenting - Darth Amorosa, despite being the most recognizable person in the Empire, is able to avoid recognition extremely easily if she goes out in anything other than her Sith robes, Caida makeup and cornrows.

Democracy is Flawed - The Imperial Council demonstrated itself to be just as susceptible to corruption as the Republic Senate, leading to extremely strict and harsh oversight after Amorosa restructured it.

Elective Monarchy - The Empress is elected by the council. After 41 ABY the Empress was only nominated by the Council, voted on by the people, and ratified by the Dark Lady.

Fantastic Slurs - The words "schutta" and "kinta" are considered hate speech and banned.

Good Capitalism, Evil Capitalism - The Empire practices a system of government owned corporations for larger industries (food, mining, infrastructure, etc) while allowing local private businesses to flourish. This is in contrast to the laissez faire capitalism of the Republic, which has been growing increasingly unsustainable without an Outer Rim to exploit.

Illegal Religion - Human High Culture, a humanocentric and chauvinistic philosophy that defined the Galactic Empire, was banned in the Sith Empire. After the Y-Wing Crisis, it's ban was more strictly enforced with harsh penalties.

Matriarchy: Original

The Sith Empire is predominately run by the Empress and the Dark Lady, whose positions are always held by women, imitating the founding Beniko family's matrilineal nature. Furthermore certain member states (such as Ryloth) are restricted to only having women serve as their representatives on the Imperial Council. Attempts have been made in the past by old Galactic Empire remnant and the Republic to subvert this, but have always been failures.

This is especially true for the Sith Order, the only Force Using sect with authority in the Empire. Only cis and trans women are allowed to join and the only way any other gender joins their ranks is if a Sith Lady's identity changes while they are a part of the Sith, at which point they are allowed to stay.

Military Coup - The Night of Vengeance led to Amorosa taking autocratic rule of the Empire for a year and a half as she enshrined the rights of the Empire's people into law and gave herself carte blanche to remove any politician who threatened those rights before restoring the council.

No Police Option - The vast majority of police in the Empire are unarmed security couriers whose entire job is to settle verbal disputes and take messages for citizens who want to press charges on someone. Security couriers are civil servants, and their only real power is issuing summons to appear in court. Armed security are small in number and can't do anything unless the Sith approve their deployment, usually to deal with active violent crimes. There are extremely steep punishments if the security forces hurt people unreasonably, demonstrated when Amorosa responded to a security officer bruising a little girl's arm by taking his.

No Woman's Land: Some member states before joining.

Ryloth, the Twi'lek homeworld, made most of it's money and power selling Twi'lek women into slavery. This was banned once they joined the Empire, though Ryloth's government frequently complained about it.

The Y-Wing Party tried to turn the entire Empire into this as the stepping stone to a broader Human High Culture coup. They were put down when Darth Amorosa massacred the Imperial Council at the eleventh hour.

Permanent Elected Official - The Empress is elected by the Council and approved by the Dark Lady, and serves until her resignation or death.

Politically-Active Princess - The Dark Lady of the Sith is the second most powerful individual in the Empire, and has the authority to dismiss Councillors at her whim.

The Revolution Will Not Be Bureaucratized - The early days of the Sith Empire were extremely rocky. Due to not having political experience, Amorosa trusted the day to day administration to Naboo's politicians. However, this proved a double edged sword as the politicians, biased and self-serving as they usually are, often ignored what Amorosa considered to be important issues like the rights of the people and protections for the vulnerable. This left huge gaps in the civil rights of the people as political corruption started to take hold. This culminated in the Y-Wing Crisis, where old Galactic Empire Remnant sought to take control of the Empire and reinstate Human High Culture. At the eleventh hour, Amorosa massacred the Imperial Council and took autocratic control. Her restructuring of the Council made her far more involved than before, and kept the new Council under a perpetual Sword of Damocles, believing she was wrong to trust an elected council to not immediately eat itself.

Sketchy Successor

Na'sara, the Empress after Tahraya resigned in 95 ABY, was generally unpopular especially after she disrespected Darth Amorosa at her own funeral.

To a lesser extent, Darth Estrela, Amorosa's eldest daughter and successor as Dark Lady. Taking the mantle in 75 ABY, she had very large shoes to fill and the Empire had grown so accustomed to a Dark Lady they knew they could trust that a successor made them uneasy for a long time. Her victory against the Yuuzhan Vong ultimately secured her place as the Dark Lady.

Slavery Is A Special Kind of Evil - Slavery is the most heinous crime in the Empire, one it enforces even on those outside its borders. The Empire's position in the galaxy means Hutt slave ships often have to cross its territory or risk running out of fuel. The Imperial Military always seizes these ships and gives the enslaved people either passage home or Imperial citizenship while the crew is usually killed on the spot unless they could prove they were coerced or mislead, like what happened to Darth Mayrik. Official Imperial policy whenever the Hutts complain is "Count yourself lucky we're too busy to wipe you out."

Ungovernable Galaxy - The primary policy of the Sith Empire is to shape the galaxy in such a way that no one state can ever control the entire galaxy, hence allowing the Hutts to still exist as a shadow of their former selves, and brokering positive relationships with the freed Hutt worlds that didn't want to join the Empire.

This ultimately failed as the Empire gained enough soft power that it completely dominated the Republic by 300ABY

Universally Beloved Leader - Darth Amorosa, the first Dark Lady of the Sith, was so beloved by the time of her death that she was often called "the Empire's Queen" much to her chagrin.

Unproblematic Prostitution - Sex workers have strictly enforced legal protections in the Empire thanks to Darth Amorosa's insistence on it at the Empire's earliest stages.

[communist-hatsunemiku]

hey gal here's a tip on explaining the whole voting thing. when people say vote blue no matter who they are inherently endorsing a one party system. they do not actually meaningfully believe in a democracy where the other side could win.

They are obviously right to want a one party system when the other party are fascists that cannot be trusted with power, but have deluded themselves into believing that voting can achieve this. If they truly desire a government where a fascist minority cannot gerrymander their way into power, then they also desire a revolution, they are just scared of the cost and uncertainty to admit it.

Yeah I actually sort of touched on this in a text post like a week ago. Liberals who desire change cannot conceptualize action outside of voting to bring about change. A lot of people still clutch their pearls when someone burns a police car or smashes some windows.

I think that like, from the ground up, society needs to be restructured in a way that fascism is as unfathomable as communism is now to the vast majority of people. If that makes sense. How exactly we get there is, uh, not something I'm smart enough at the moment to discuss in a productive meaningful way lol

[voorvore]

PATH SEXTVS SEXTVS SEXTVS: FACTS AND FALSEHOODS

The INEVITABILITY OF THE COLLAPSE of the current "real" world system by any number of factors - climate change, demographic aging, worldwide nuclear war, malthusian collapse, peak oil - if you are of a particularly doomeristic and cynical bend.

CAPITALISM has gone into an accelerationist overdrive, provoking the collapse of numerous global powers into corporatist psuedoanarchies or balkanized city-states that all function off of decentralized world-finance cryptocurrency exchanges, massive supercomputers the size of small cities that continually mine such cryptocurrencies, privitization of all former public industries asides from the military and the police (which have potentially been turned into psuedoreligious secret societies/knights-templar style orders that worship order, suffering, and overbearing violence).

The WORLD NEVER MADE IT PAST MEDIEVAL TECHNOLOGICAL LEVELS, meaning that archaic structures such as feudalism, serfdom, absolutist monarchies, diseased cities, and state churches remain commonplace.

MKULTRA AND PROJECT MONARCH TRULY EXISTED from the early 50s to the late 90s and worked in tandem to experiment on US soldiers, volunteers from universities, prison convicts, gay men and women suffering from HIV/AIDs, disenfranchised African American neighbourhoods in the South, the mentally ill and disabled, and most importantly, young white children routinely kidnapped walking home from school or out playing with their friends, in order to test new biological weapons, enhance abilities of the mind, fvk around with drugs, and develop new methods of brainwashing/subliminal control, all under the guise of alien abductions, satanic-panic style stories of the elite, and university psychology research.

THE MESSIAH (whatever that actually means) WAS IN FACT A SEVENTY ONE YEAR OLD WHITE WOMAN FROM MAINE WITH A SEVERE CASE OF DYSLEXIA (ONLY LEARNING TO READ WHEN SHE WAS SIXTY SIX) born in 2012 to a starving-programmer closeted lesbian mother who then married a heavily closeted gay fundamentalist priest for business reasons, who, when she was 5 years old, took his wife (the messiah's mother) and his church's congregation down an end-of-days bunker to escape the biblical apocalypse, during which the messiah's mother left for outside the bunker, the daughter began to experiment with self-hypoxia and chemical-sniffing, and eventually the father, too, left the bunker.

THE MESSIAH'S MENTAL STATE ensures the stability of reality; meaning when they began to experiment with huffing chemicals and self-hypoxia, the entirety of reality began to gradually become more and more unstable, which eventually culminated/will culminate in the total collapse of consensus reality after 66 years.

A FLESH RESTRUCTURING DEVICE has been invented which allows for the total mass resurrection of dead biological matter a near-infinite amount of times, cheaply and efficiently, the only caveat being the biological matter will not change to its original form if significantly damaged/altered.

MASSIVE ADVANCES IN BIOTECHNOLOGY have allowed for the creation of viable wetware computers able to perform massive computations far more efficiently than normal silicon-based computers, opening the flood gates to biologically-based cryptocurrency, massive mental enhancements of cybernetic humanoids, template-based wetvat assembled bioweapons, custom-made organs, and fully customizable ready-to-order genetically engineered mates.

A global conspiracy perpetrated by the Catholic Church and Western elites has been active since the mid-1600s to conceal the former existence of a MASSIVE EURASIAN EMPIRE THAT HAS EXISTED FOR MOST OF RECORDED HUMAN HISTORY AND HAS ITS DEEP ORIGINS WELL WITHIN TO THE LATE PALEOLITHIC. Such empire had ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES such as FREE ENERGY, MOULDED POLYMER STONE MASONRY, SONIC ENGINEERING, ANTI-GRAVITY LEVITATION TECHNOLOGIES, AND MECHANICAL COMPUTATION SYSTEMS. THE EMPIRE ALSO HAD AN EXTENSIVE RELIGIOUS USAGE OF PSYCHADELICS, A DEEP UNDERSTANDING OF BOTH MODERN SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLES AND SUPERNATURAL PHENOMONA THAT MODERN SCIENCE HAS NO KNOWN EXPLANATION FOR, AND WAS SIGNIFICANTLY MORE MENTALLY POWERFUL THAN MODERN CIVILIZATION.

PSYCHIC/PSYCHADELIC WARFARE has been extensively used by major world powers since at least the late 1940s, leading to disastrous and largely unknown consequences on the human collective unconscious, social systems, and noosphere.

[mariacallous]

Having consolidated his hold on power at the Chinese Communist Party’s recently concluded 20th National Congress, Chinese leader Xi Jinping has now set his sights on influencing the U.S. midterm elections. China’s latest efforts to sow doubt about U.S. election integrity are consistent with Xi’s stated goal of championing China’s autocratic model as a “new choice for humanity.” The threat of Chinese interference in democratic elections demands immediate action by policymakers in Washington and other Western capitals.

As early voting across the United States kicked into high gear this fall, so, too, did the activities of Chinese government-affiliated cyberactors seeking to discourage Americans from voting, discredit the election process, and sow further divisions among voters.

In one social media campaign uncovered by U.S. cybersecurity firm Mandiant, a Chinese hacker group with the code name Dragonbridge posted English-language videos across social media, blogs, and other platforms questioning the efficacy of voting and highlighting “civil war” as a possible way to “root out” the United States’ “ineffective and incapacitated” system. These posts also suggested attacks against law enforcement and other forms of political violence. Separately, Twitter announced in late October that it had disrupted several China-based operations on its platform. Those campaigns involved 2,000 user accounts and more than 250,000 tweets containing false election-rigging claims about the 2020 U.S. presidential election and hate speech against the transgender community.

Similarly, cybersecurity company Recorded Future identified another Chinese state-sponsored social media campaign aimed at dividing U.S. voters, this time by manipulating voter sentiments around divisive themes like racial injustice, police brutality, and U.S. military assistance to Ukraine. Likewise, in September, Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta uncovered fake accounts originating in China that targeted voters on both sides of the political aisle. While some of these fake accounts portrayed U.S. President Joe Biden as corrupt, others castigated the Republican Party and, in particular, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio for their stances on abortion access and gun rights.

For its part, the FBI warned that Chinese government hackers were actively scanning the two parties’ various internet domains, looking for vulnerable systems as a potential precursor to hacking operations. Such probing is broadly consistent with the intelligence community’s 2020 assessment about China’s interest in acquiring information on “US voters and public opinion; political parties, candidates and their staffs; and senior government officials.”

These and other election-shaping operations are not occurring in a vacuum, nor are they amateurish one-offs that can be ignored. Indeed, they reflect Xi’s growing emphasis on what the Chinese call “discourse power”: Beijing’s drive to alter global narratives about Chinese autocracy and Western democracy by comparing, contrasting, and consistently misrepresenting the two competing visions in ways that are advantageous to China.

In its most extreme form, which China’s People’s Liberation Army calls “cognitive domain operations,” discourse power seeks to influence individual and group behaviors to favor China’s tactical or strategic objectives. China’s ultimate goal: to undermine an adversary nation’s collective will to resist Beijing’s intentions. This can be done by sowing social division, undermining faith in public institutions, introducing conflicting social narratives, and even radicalizing specific groups within a population. All these themes featured prominently in China’s recent cyberoperations.

To achieve discourse victory, China has restructured its party-state to support the integrated employment, across peace and wartime, of public opinion, legal, and psychological warfare. Beyond simply aiding in the formulation and execution of China’s political warfare strategy, China’s decision to centralize command and control enables the party to more effectively direct the nearly $10 billion it spends annually on foreign interference. Central to the strategy, according to Lu Wei, the former head of the Cyberspace Administration of China, is to “occupy emerging public opinion spaces,” especially social media and other internet platforms, to propagate messaging about democracy’s failings and autocracy’s ostensible benefits.

If the principal target of these political warfare operations is the United States, Washington is hardly alone. Hours after former British Prime Minister Liz Truss announced her surprise resignation, the Chinese Communist Party’s Global Times claimed Britain’s political upheaval demonstrated that Western democracy “cannot solve new problems.” This specious framing mirrors Beijing’s portrayal of the West’s pandemic response as “chaotic,” whereas China claimed its superior governance model, consisting of mass surveillance and lockdowns, achieved a “strategic victory” over COVID-19. These themes were later broadcast on Chinese and foreign platforms around the world, leading to a marked increase in favorable views—most notably in the global south—about China’s global stewardship.

As for the U.S. midterms, Beijing’s meddling is unlikely to cease on Election Day. In fact, just the opposite. After polls close, malicious cyberactors and Chinese state-backed media will almost certainly amplify claims about voting irregularities and contested election outcomes. These operations will not be limited to any one political party or geography. Their goals will be the same: to undermine democracy’s credibility and exploit cultural cleavages inherent in all pluralistic, nontotalitarian societies.

Identifying these social media campaigns may very well be straightforward, in large part due to contributions by technology firms headquartered in the free world. But undoing the long-term damage to U.S. institutions will be much harder. Even worse, China will almost certainly seek to employ this same playbook in other countries in the coming years.

That’s why policymakers in Washington and other democratic capitals must prioritize whole-society counteroffensives to respond to and ultimately neutralize China’s political warfare operations. That will require hardening democratic institutions, including modernizing campaign finance, strengthening counterinterference, and tightening espionage laws to increase transparency and disclosure requirements for individuals and entities that may be acting on China’s behalf, as well as toughening enforcement and sanctions to deter potential violators. Additional work must also be done to equip government officials, journalists, political parties, companies, civil organizations, and the general public with the information needed to reduce their exposure to China’s malign discourse. And that’s just for starters.

Above all, policymakers must make clear to Beijing that election meddling will not go unpunished. Upcoming meetings between democratic leaders and Xi at the G-20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, are as good a place to deliver that message as any.

[peer2peerlive]

Heya, Steph here (FerociouslySteph) – I’m writing this email to announce the return of Peer2Peer, some life updates, and my new relationship with Trans Lifeline! Peer2Peer.live has returned! And has been re-written from the ground up. The site looks mostly the same, but the backend had to be completely overhauled to move past a proof of concept.

For the developers among us, the old site was not able to keep up with API changes, which made maintenance a constant issue. We’ve also added some new tags – Most notably, “Plus-size” has been added as a misc tag, and with it I’d like to sincerely apologize for it taking this long. Also, a recent and popular sexuality tag “omnisexual” has been added. We’ll be more responsive to adding tags in the future. If you are willing to prominently represent a tag that is not yet on the site, let me know and we’ll get it added.

Over 40% of you have not yet listed yourself on Peer2Peer! Meaning you need to click the checkbox “Channel Listed in home page” to be discoverable! This is to make opting in and out easy. Find that here: https://peer2peer.live/account

On a personal note – I have returned! The last two years have been rough for me since the coordinated harassment campaign that made my online and physical life unsafe.

Fortunately, in my absence from Twitch I've become healthier and safer than ever – much more prepared to take on whatever the internet has for me. Before, my Twitch community was my support system, which meant when it’s safety was compromised, I didn’t have many places to turn to. I think the main takeaway to me is that the peer support that communities like yours provide are invaluable, and how we scale safe spaces online is not by having large hubs and channels, but by having as many thriving spaces as possible. There is no ubiquitous safe space online, as a creator you can only make a safe space for yourself, and aspire to be as inclusive as possible.

All of these changes have been possible thanks to my new position at Trans Lifeline, who’ve hired me as their Gaming and Streaming Partnerships Coordinator, a new position to facilitate projects like this as well as coordinate fundraisers for Trans Lifeline.

It’s been a privilege to have an inside look at a non-profit I've had so much reverence for, and I can say that they live up to the hype. They’ve been more quiet than I would’ve liked on socials, but I can assure you that behind the scenes, it’s an active group full of talented and passionate people doing their best to meet the overwhelming needs of the trans community. Trans Lifeline is truly one of a kind, without it, there would be no alternative.

There is no other hotline that only staffs transgender operators, and no other hotline near our scope and size that refuses to engage in non-consensual active rescue.

That is to say, Trans Lifeline will never call the police or paramedics on a caller without explicit expressed consent. You’d be surprised how few could say the same. And while trying to rebuild and restructure, Trans Lifeline has received 30% more callers during this period of legislative strife and coordinated attacks on our communities’ safety. Trans Lifeline also is an all-star when it comes to managing and reporting our finances, the IRS frequently audits us and we consistently impress.

Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe

[kp777]

By Michelle A. Williams

The Hill Opinion

Nov. 16, 2022

Public health was on the ballot last week — and it won. 

I’m not talking about specific candidates, as important as those races are. I’m talking about the ethos of public health — the principle that health is a fundamental human right and the understanding that we must look out for one another, to think not just about our own well-being, but about the public good. 

That ethos has been in retreat for the past two years, beaten back by the forces proclaiming that individual freedom trumps all. In one of many low points, protestors targeted a breast cancer clinic in Los Angeles for requiring masks to protect their patients, many of whom had weakened immune systems as a result of chemotherapy and were therefore at higher risk from COVID. This failure of empathy has been deeply disheartening. 

Yet as I’ve tracked election results over the past week, I’ve found many reasons for optimism. In blue states and in red states, voters made choices that reflected care and concern for their fellow citizens. Again and again, they voted to protect public health. In an extension of that trend, voters also opted to use the levers of government to extend dignity to individuals in bleak circumstances, such as extreme poverty, crushing debt and imprisonment. 

The most high-profile examples of public health wins are the abortion referendums. Voters in California, Michigan and Vermont endorsed women’s right to choose. In conservative Kentucky and Montana, too, abortion rights supporters scored clear victories on ballot measures. This clean sweep for reproductive freedom in the midterms follows a resounding win for abortion rights supporters in a statewide referendum in Kansas in August. These successes are critically important for public health because restrictions on abortion put women’s lives, health and economic futures at risk, and are particularly dangerous for low-income women and women of color.  

In another major victory for public health, South Dakota voters decisively chose to expand eligibility for Medicaid, using a ballot measure to extend access to health care to the working poor when their legislators refused to do so. The expansion will take effect next summer, providing subsidized insurance to 40,000 low-income adults. Many of these men and women will soon have access to preventive care and treatment for chronic conditions, in some cases for the first time in years. This measure will undeniably save lives. 

In Oregon, meanwhile, voters approved a ballot measure that makes the state the first in the U.S. to guarantee residents access to “cost-effective, clinically appropriate and affordable” health care. This measure effectively establishes health care as a human right — a principle that should not be revolutionary, but that has never been integrated into the fabric of our nation. It’s not yet entirely clear how it will be implemented, but I’m heartened to see the first steps in the U.S. toward recognizing a fundamental right to health care. 

Oregon voters also passed one of the strictest gun safety measures in the U.S. It will require a federal background check and gun safety training for all gun purchases, as well as a police-issued permit, renewable every five years. This, too, will save lives. 

Elsewhere in the midterms, Arizona voters overwhelmingly supported a ballot measure to restructure collection and limit interest rates on medical debt, which has become an enormous burden for far too many families. Alabama, Oregon, Tennessee and Vermont outlawed forced labor for prison inmates, restoring some measure of their dignity and autonomy. And in California, voters overwhelmingly endorsed a ban on all flavored tobacco products in the state — a move designed to protect young people, who gravitate toward flavored vape products. 

To be sure, public health didn’t win everywhere last week. And health and well-being still face grave and urgent threats from the Supreme Court. 

But as I survey these results, I am encouraged. Too often in the past few years, it has seemed as though an every-man-for-himself ethos was ascendant across the country. Yet these midterm results show voters assessing policy through a lens of empathy.  

The outcomes of these ballot measures suggest that a majority of voters, in both red states and blue, believe the government has an obligation to protect the health and well-being of the most vulnerable among us. That is the essence of public health. It also happens to be the only way to build a resilient economy and a successful civil society.  

Read more.

[nsomniacsdream]

"The system" is and always will be ultimately upheld by anyone seeking power. Democrat, republican, libertarian, whatever. A Democrat is willing to nibble around the edges, make a couple things nicer. A republican wants to make the system even closer to a master/slave society. A libertarian wants to eliminate the controls on the powerful completely. But they're all fundamentally ok with or actively supportive of the established system, an entrenched system that grants them enormous power to exploit the masses to enrich themselves.

A vote for any of them will always be a vote for the system first, and anything else they've promised second. So we vote blue, not because it'll bring any changes to the core of the existing power structure in the US, but because it'll ease some amount of suffering on the most vulnerable of society. But the recognition has to be made that NO effective *reform* of the system is possible from within the system itself. In a very real way, our voting blue strengthens the system, because it provides legitimacy to the Democrat agenda (which again does not include substantial changes or a restructuring of society). But that is the point of the 2 party system, to manufacture support for the goals of the oligarchs who control the parties. Don't want abortion? Then you have to pledge your support for destroying welfare of any kind. Don't want people to be gunned down for being black? Then you have to support a never ending spiral of police militarization. By design, our political system requires you to legitimize the current system if you're interested in improving anything.

Rambling at this point but it's all so stupid. American politics is picking between not having any representation at all or giving nominal cover for the parties who were going to do what they wanted to in the first place and never getting to vote for an *actual* change because that's not how it's set up. Like, all the women switching to Democrat to protect abortion, a good portion of them will switch right back to republican in the next election. If the democrats pass abortion protections, they'll go back to Republicans to get rid of taxes again. If the democrats don't pass abortion protections, they'll switch back to republican to show their displeasure. There's no way to win, not for anyone who wants systemic change. That scenario isn't even on the table. The only option is to build a party that's stated goal and policy guides are centered around the deconstruction of the system as it exists. And they would kill us.

[theivorybilledwoodpecker]

Look, a lot of people are furious at the Uvalde police. I am, too. The video only hammered home what we already knew: The police lied about thinking it wasn't an active shooter.

I'm all for having the police force held accountable. I believe we need a massive restructuring of all police departments. The problems are too systemic for piece meal changes to fix things.

But I'm hoping people will boost the signal about this. The cop checking his phone is Ruben Ruiz. His wife, Eva Mireles, called him after being shot. He tried to go into the classroom, but he was blocked and taken from the building.

I don't know exactly when the pic circulating occurred. Maybe it was as she was calling, just after she called, or before.

But I don't think people should be heaping abuse on a widower who actually tried to help people. I get that the Punisher is sketchy when used by police, but honestly, a lot of people are fans of the Punisher or Marvel, and we simply don't know enough to say why Ruiz has it on his phone. Even if it does say something negative about Ruiz, he DID SOMETHING. He had to be escorted from the scene because he tried to ENTER THE CLASSROOM.

You can say he only did it to try to save his wife, but we honestly don't know that. We don't know him. But Ruben Ruiz lost his wife that day, and he was braver than most (if not all) the cops there. He doesn't deserve condemnation.

Now, I'm sure most people criticizing him had no idea who he was. I don't blame you. I only know because I googled Uvalde and the first article I saw explained the situation. But he's being blasted by the internet, so please boost the signal. Fuck the Uvalde police. But don't roast grieving widowers who tried to save lives.

[aresianrepose]

Honestly it's so depressing to hear about realistic changes we can make to better things in America because you know it'll never happen. No, we won't restructure our communities for better public transportation or walking/biking to significantly reduce carbon emissions and mining impacts. No, we won't adopt universal healthcare. No, we won't make strides in green energy. No, we won't make changes to the funding of public schools and actually enforce a good curriculum based on facts over just prioritizing test scores. No, we won't regulate the meat industry in any significant way to reduce climate impacts. No, we won't implement solutions to poverty, addiction, and other social needs to reduce the reliance on police. No, we won't implement actual gun legislation to save the lives of our children. No, we won't implement a UBI to assist the elderly, disabled, college students, and parents who are struggling and wasting away in poverty. No, we won't make meaningful and real strides in cementing human rights as well as reparations for those who are most harmed among us by the system of white supremacy. No, we won't ensure that no one with a uterus will have their bodily autonomy stripped from them. No, we won't address or change the prison industrial complex that is modern day slavery with prisoner quotas. No, we won't.

All of these things are so incredibly doable but the conservatives and moderates whose thoughts are controlled and heavily funded by the elite in this country will fight tooth and nail to dig their own fucking graves.

We bow down to the all mighty dollar. All power to the individual and his will to elimate you and the planet.

[sanestwerewolflover]

No title, no story, just you staring at my thoughts.

Welcome to my detective style board complete with pictures, snippets of memories and pieces of yarn connecting them all. Here I sit, hot coffee in hand, black of course, and stare at the board. Occasionally I stand, get closer, remove a photo, add a memory, print out a place a new question and add a new person. Yeah you're on it, whoever you are reading this. Congrats. There's at least 5 pins and connections added to you.

What is the board? *Sips coffee and smirks*

Me.

Well, not me now, but me in the future. Who I want me to be.

Take a look at this one here, angry, closed off, alone but self sufficient. No one gets in, no one gets out. He looks happier than expected huh? I think it's pride. Pride in building something that's his and no one else's. You'll notice that there's not many connections to others. I don't think he needs that. I don't like him though. He reminds me of... Well. Let's move on.

This one here is a revolutionary. Brave, hard, unmoving in his beliefs. He holds his family and friends close, but if he's crossed, isn't afraid to move on without looking back. What does he stand for? I don't fucking know! Animal rights maybe, a deconstruction of the current political system, restructuring the black community, police reform, dismantling the corruption in churches. Probably the most likely out of all of them to go to jail for... Something. He's hot though. Probably because he barely eats from the stress. Not very likely for me, but a fun little thought experiment.

What's that one with the mischievous smile? We don't talk about that one.

Which one am I now? You already know that answer. It's the one in the middle. The one connected to all the others. Some threads are thicker than others, but they all lead here. This is also the one that I start with to answer all of my questions. Here's a new one.

"Does it matter how I get to the destination if the destination is the same?"

Deep huh? Not really. Let's apply an example. Healing.

Alone and revolutionary me say "You have to heal on your own! Then you can sleep knowing you can do it again, by yourself."

Carefree over there however. "Who cares? You healed. Enjoy it."

Nervous Nancy over there. "What if you're not healed? What if you're just stitched together by the world and people around you?" I don't listen to him much.

Anyway. That's my vision board, glad you stopped by. See you around.

[astralforecast]

questions ap can answer

•What do the nonphysical environments look like?

•What is their structure?

•Why are only some of these environments thought-responsive?

•Does a universal form of nonphysical government exist?

•Are there laws or rules?

•Are there penalties for breaking rules?

•Does a universal nonphysical police force exist?

•What are angels?

•Is there a nonphysical or spiritual hierarchy?

•Does God directly interact or communicate with nophysical inhabitants?

•How do nonphysical inhabitants live?/What is their normal day like?

•Is it anything like physical existence?

•Do cities, towns, communities, or nations exist?

•Do cultures, ethnic groups, or races continue to exist?

•How do the energy centers (chakras) of our body affect or influence our daily life?

•How do our energy centers and nonphysical bodies function as a complete energy system?

•What is the correlation between the energy centers and our ability to have out-of-body experiences?

•Can our energy-body assume any shape or form?

•Are physical disease and illness the molecular result of unseen nonphysical energy disturbances?

•At what point during pregnancy does consciousness (soul) enter the fetus?

•Does this vary from person to person or is it universal?

•Can physical diseases or illnesses be healed or improved by making energy adjustments to the nophysical substructure of an individual?

•Can a future event or disaster be averted or altered by influencing and adjusting the unseen energy substructure of the universe?

•Can future physical events be accurately analyzed, interpreted, and predicted by observing the energy interactions existing within the interior of the universe?

•Can we travel in time when out-of-body?

•Is it possible that events in time are simultaneous?

•Is reincarnation a reality? Is it an evolutionary system? How does it function?

•Do angels actually exist? If so, what do they look like? What is their function? Are they a nonhuman species?

•Do the biblical heavens exist? What does heaven really look like? How many heavens are there? How do they differ from one another? Is the biblical heaven the inner energy dimensions of the universe?

•Does God interact with human evolution or is it an automatic system of development?

•What is our true form or essence, if any?

•Why are we using these temporary biological bodies?

•What do we hope to learn or gain?

•What does the interior of the universe look like?

•What is it made of?

•Is it a series of energy dimensions?

•Is there a distinguishable border between the different energy dimensions? If so, what is this border? How does it function? What is its purpose?

•What are miracles? Are they the alteration and restructuring of the nonphysical energy substructure of the universe?

•What do people look like when they sleep or dream? Do they float slightly above their bodies?

•Are dreams internal creations or our unconscious interpretations of nonphysical events?

•Do dreamers normally separate from their physical body?

•How does our species' evolution correlate with out-of-body experiences?

•Are out-of-body experiences an evolutionary step for our species?

•Is evolution actually the movement of consciousness from simply physical organisms to increasingly complex nophysical states of being?

•What actually occurs at physical death?

•Where do we go?

•Is death a natural part of our evolution?

•Why are we here?

•Do we have a specific (unconscious) goal or plan on which we are working?

•Did we select our parents? If so, why and how?

•Does nophysical food exist and is it necessary for survival?

•Do physical-like families and relationships continue after death?

•Does physical-like sex exist?

•Are nonphysical babies conceived?

[hardynwa]

Ohanaeze calls for action on Plateau 'orchestrated act of genocide'

Apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo Worldwide, has described the killing of over 150 persons from some communities in Barkin Ladi, Mangu and Bokkos Council Areas of Plateau State as an “orchestrated act of genocide”. The group said it received with a rude shock the gruesome massacre of some persons in the two communities in Plateau State by gunmen. Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, the President General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, made the condemnation in a statement issued by the National Publicity Secretary of Ohanaeze Ndigbo Worldwide, Dr Alex Ogbonnia, on Wednesday in Enugu. Iwuanyanwu said he was in his village in Imo State for the Christmas holidays when he received the awful news. The Igbo leader described the killing, burning of houses, indiscriminate shootings and displacing of residents as an orchestrated act of genocide. He wondered why in this modern age and civilization, the country, Nigeria, was still posting the brutish, cruel and barbaric news of mass killings of such magnitude. The President General lamented that the Federal Government had refused to heed the Ohanaeze Ndigbo’s call for Restructuring and State Policing System as a panacea for the incessant losses of lives and property in the various states of the country. According to him, it has become very obvious that the federal security architecture has proved very ineffective for the diverse demography. The Igbo leader noted that such heinous and cowardly killings had persisted because in the past the perpetrators of such savage acts often went unpunished. “I therefore urge President Bola Tinubu to do everything possible to bring to book those behind the callous crime in Plateau State,” he said. He directed the Igbo leadership in Plateau State to extend all forms of solidarity with the immediate families of the deceased, the displaced and the sundry victims of the catastrophe. “On behalf of all the sons and daughters of Igbo, we send our condolences to the governor of Plateau State, His Excellency, Caleb Mutfwang, the good people of Plateau State and the Middle Belt Forum led by Dr Bitrus Pogu. “I pray the Almighty to grant the souls of the deceased a blissful repose in His bosom,” Iwuanyanwu said. Read the full article