#Climate Pact

[corepaedianews]

COP27 will be remembered as a failure – here’s what went wrong

Mark Maslin, UCL; Priti Parikh, UCL; Richard Taylor, UCL, and Simon Chin-Yee, UCL Billed as “Africa’s COP”, the 27th UN climate change summit (otherwise known as COP27) in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, was expected to promote climate justice, as this is the continent most affected but least responsible for the climate crisis. Negotiations for a fund that would compensate developing countries for the…

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#climate change #Climate Pact #Climate summit 1.5℃ #COP27 #Corepaedia #corepaedianews #Egypt #Fossil fuels #Glasgow #Loss and damage #Sharm el-Sheikh #UN #كوربيديا #كوربيديا للاخبار

[kp777]

By Antonio Gutteres

Common Dreams

Sept. 20, 2023

The following are remarks, as prepared for delivery, given by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres at the start of his Climate Ambition Summit in New York on September 20, 2023. For Common Dreams' coverage of the speech, see here.

Excellencies, friends,

Our focus here is on climate solutions—and our task is urgent. Humanity has opened the gates of hell. Horrendous heat is having horrendous effects. Distraught farmers watching crops carried away by floods; sweltering temperatures spawning disease; and thousands fleeing in fear as historic fires rage.

Climate action is dwarfed by the scale of the challenge. If nothing changes we are heading toward a 2.8°C temperature rise—toward a dangerous and unstable world.

We must make up time lost to foot-dragging, arm-twisting, and the naked greed of entrenched interests raking in billions from fossil fuels.

But the future is not fixed. It is for leaders like you to write it. We can still limit the rise in global temperature to 1.5°C. We can still build a world of clear air, green jobs, and affordable clean power for all.

The path forward is clear. It has been forged by fighters and trailblazers—some of whom are with us today: activists refusing to be silenced; Indigenous Peoples defending their lands from climate extremes; chief executives transforming their business models and financiers funding a just transition; mayors moving to a zero-carbon future; and governments working to stamp out fossil fuels and protect vulnerable communities.

But if we are to meet the 1.5°C limit and protect ourselves from climate extremes, climate champions, particularly in the developing world, need solidarity. They need support, and they need global leaders to take action. Action to reduce emissions.

The move from fossil fuels to renewables is happening—but we are decades behind. We must make up time lost to foot-dragging, arm-twisting, and the naked greed of entrenched interests raking in billions from fossil fuels.

The proposed Climate Solidarity Pact calls on major emitters—who have benefited most from fossil fuels—to make extra efforts to cut emissions, and on wealthy countries to support emerging economies to do so.

And the Acceleration Agenda I proposed calls on governments to hit fast forward so that developed countries reach net zero as close as possible to 2040, and emerging economies as close as possible to 2050 according to the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities.

It also urges countries to implement a fair, equitable, and just energy transition, while providing affordable electricity to all: by ensuring credible plans to exit coal by 2030 for OECD countries and 2040 for the rest of the world; by ending fossil fuel subsidies—which the IMF estimates reached an incredible $7 trillion in 2022; and by setting ambitious renewable energy goals in line with the 1.5°C limit.

The Acceleration Agenda also calls for climate justice. Many of the poorest nations have every right to be angry. Angry that they are suffering most from a climate crisis they did nothing to create. Angry that promised finance has not materialized. And angry that their borrowing costs are sky-high.

We need a transformation to rebuild trust. Governments must push the global financial system towards supporting climate action. That means putting a price on carbon and overhauling the business models of Multilateral Development Banks so that they leverage far more private finance at reasonable cost to developing countries.

All parties must operationalize the Loss and Damage Fund at COP28. Developed countries must meet the $100 billion commitment, replenish the Green Climate Fund, and double adaptation funding. And everyone must be covered by an early warning system by 2027—by implementing the Action Plan we launched last year.

At the same time, my Acceleration Agenda calls for business and financial institutions to embark on true net zero pathways. Shady pledges have betrayed the public trust. Shamefully, some companies have even tried to block the transition to net zero—using wealth and influence to delay, distract, and deceive. Every company that truly means business must create just transition plans that credibly cut emissions and deliver climate justice, in line with the recommendations of my High-Level Expert Group.

Excellencies, friends,

The future of humanity is in your hands—in our hands.

One Summit will not change the world. But today can be a powerful moment to generate momentum that we build on over the coming months, and in particular at the COP.

We can—and we must turn up the tempo. Turn plans into action. And turn the tide.

Thank you.

#antonio guterres #climate solidarity pact #climate ambition summit #climate crisis #climate change

[ihrc-hq]

IHRC Secretary-General, Rafał, Assumes New Role as European Ambassador

IHRC Secretary-General, Rafał, Assumes New Role as European AmbassadorThe Secretary-General of the Transnational Intergovernmental Organization International Human Rights Commission-IHRC, Prof. h.c. Rafał Marcin Wasik assumes a new role with the European Commission as European Climate Pact Ambassador with immediate effect.An official correspondence issued by the European Commission,…

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#European Climate Pact Ambassador #European Commission #Fidelis Onakpoma #International Human Rights Commission #Secretary-General IHRC Rafał Marcin Wasik

[earaercircular]

Climate-neutral economic restructuring: "Industrial Pact" should help

When converting the North Rhine-Westphalian industry in Germany to climate neutrality, the Ministry of Economic Affairs[1] relies on cooperation between all stakeholders. The so-called "Industrial Pact for Climate Neutrality and Competitiveness"[2] was launched on Thursday 15-12. In addition to the state government, 20 industrial companies and 11 industry and technology associations have been involved so far, as the ministry reported in Düsseldorf.

The parties involved want to first develop guidelines for the climate-neutral transformation of industry. In spring, the focus will be on the topics of recycling management, use and storage of separated carbon compounds and sustainable process heat. The industry pact is designed as a process that is intended to identify ongoing measures to accelerate the conversion. The process is organized by the national company NRW.Energy4Climate.

"The industrial state of North Rhine-Westphalia is characterized by strong value-added networks and stable supply chains," explained Economics Minister Mona Neubaur (Greens). Thanks to the physical proximity and the close interdependence of the companies, production in NRW is economically attractive and sustainable at the same time. "If we design the climate-neutral transformation intelligently, we can expand these advantages based on our location, maintain added value and secure important jobs."

Source

dpa-infocom: Klimaneutraler Wirtschaftsumbau: "Industriepakt" soll helfen, in: Süddeutsche Zeitung, 15-12-2022; https://www.sueddeutsche.de/wirtschaft/verbaende-klimaneutraler-wirtschaftsumbau-industriepakt-soll-helfen-dpa.urn-newsml-dpa-com-20090101-221215-99-912072

[1] The Ministerium für Wirtschaft, Industrie, Klimaschutz und Energie (Ministry of Economic Affairs, Industry, Climate Action and Energy) of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, focus on key issues that define the future: we are pushing ahead with the digital transformation of state government services and support businesses on their path into the digital age.  When it comes to the energy transition, we are banking on innovation and technological advances in the pursuit of our aim to turn North Rhine-Westphalia into Europe’s most modern, climate-friendly and environmentally sustainable centre of industry. https://www.wirtschaft.nrw/en

[2] In German: "Industriepakt für Klimaneutralität und Wettbewerbsfähigkeit". North Rhine-Westphalia is ambitiously driving forward the conversion of its industry towards climate neutrality. In order to shape the transformation in such a way that added value is maintained in the state and the location is strengthened for the future, the state government has concluded the industrial pact for climate neutrality and competitiveness with around 20 industrial companies and 11 industry and technology associations. https://www.wirtschaft.nrw/landesregierung-schliesst-mit-unternehmen-und-verbaenden-industriepakt-fuer-klimaneutralitaet-und

#industrial pact #sustainable industry #climat-neutral transformation

[alicemccombs]

#antonio guterres #climate solidarity pact #climateactionnow #healearth

[reasonsforhope]

"At nearly 150 acres, the Jardim Gramacho landfill in Rio de Janeiro was one of the largest and most infamous in all of Latin America. Now it’s a mangrove forest teeming with life.

Decommissioned 11 years ago, between 1970 and 2012 the dump, bordering Rio’s famous Guanabara Bay, received 80 million metric tonnes of trash from the area’s Gramacho neighborhood.

Now, a public-private partnership led by the Rio Municipal Cleaning Company has returned the area to nature, specifically mangroves, one of the most valuable of all ecosystems.

Planting 24 acres of mangroves at a time, today the forest stretches out more than 120 acres and is the largest mangrove area of the bay.

“Before, we polluted the bay and the rivers. Now, it’s the bay and the rivers that pollute us,” a lead official on the project told Africa News. “Today, the mangrove has completely recovered.”

Other organizations have taken action to restore mangroves along the bay as well. The non-profit Ocean Pact funded the Green Guanabara Bay Project which successfully restored 12.5 hectares or around 25 acres of mangroves.

According to some estimates, 1 acre of mangrove forests can store more carbon in roots and soil than 4 acres of even the most biodiverse rainforest, making them paramount to any world climate mitigation strategy.

Furthermore, their impressive lattice work of roots and insane durability means that storm surges impacting mangroves lose about 66% of their kinetic energy without even destroying the trees.

Lastly, coastal fishing communities, in [four] words, cannot exist without mangroves. They act as nurseries and perfect habitat for all kinds of fish and crustaceans that small-scale fishermen rely on for their daily bread."

-via Good News Network, 7/31/23

-video via Africanews, July 26, 2023

#brazil #mangrove #mangrove forest #fishing #tropical storms #hurricanes #storm surge #pollution #landfill #garbage #rio de janeiro #guanabara bay #Youtube

[qqueenofhades]

So it looks like Sinema, having gotten her requisite pound of flesh for her billionaire hedge fund buddies (basically, they agreed to keep the carried-interest tax loophole and replace it with an excise tax on stock buybacks), has finally agreed to support the Inflation Reduction Act, otherwise known as the $740 billion "pretty much Build Back Better but we are calling it something different" bill that Manchin and Schumer came out with. If/when it passes, which could be as soon as this weekend, the Democrats will have achieved -- with a 50-50 Senate with two habitual Manchurian candidates, a four-seat House majority, a rampantly fascist opposing party, a Supreme Court openly bent on destroying democracy and personal liberty, and an active criminal investigation into the previous administration -- at least the following:

The American Rescue Plan, aka the first post-inauguration $1.9 trillion Covid relief package, which was the largest investment in the working class since the New Deal;

The bipartisan infrastructure bill, which is the first major structural and transportation modernization and systemic overhaul for the country since the 1970s;

The first significant gun safety legislation in 30 years and since at least the Clinton administration;

Multiple executive orders now signed on protecting abortion rights and access to reproductive care, including travel out of state if necessary;

A bill in the works to officially codify same-sex marriage and thus protect it from SCOTUS;

Reauthorization and improvement of the Violence Against Women Act, including strong new protections for LGBTQ+ and Native American victims of domestic abuse or sexual assault, including the ability for Native courts to prosecute non-Native offenders for sex crimes for the first time in history;

Finally (FINALLY) making lynching a federal hate crime;

The largest climate legislation ever passed in America (this bill), which also establishes a federal minimum 15% corporate tax rate and lowers healthcare costs, including for essential medications like insulin, by, like, a lot;

Passage of the PACT Act, aka expanding healthcare for disabled veterans exposed to burn pits, also the biggest expansion in this field for a generation despite Republicans briefly killing it in an outburst of pettiness;

Consistent big packages of support for Ukraine, rebuilding of foreign alliances, huge bipartisan support for including Sweden and Finland in NATO (hahahaha fuck you Josh Hawley);

The CHIPS act, which creates tech and manufacturing jobs in America and was made even sweeter by how thoroughly they fucked over McTurtle to do it (since oh boy does he deserve a taste of his own medicine);

Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first Black woman on SCOTUS, and not an awful white supremacist stand-in like Clarence Thomas, but a genuinely progressive and thoughtful jurist;

Cancellation of almost $6 billion in student loans for the poorest and most defrauded borrowers, such as those who attended scam for-profit "colleges";

And so on and so forth!!!

So like. Please tell me more about how the Democrats are incompetent, their leadership is bad, they are in Disarray TM, you are a terrible person if you support Biden or give them any credit at all, and you're just not excited to vote because they haven't done anything. Like yes! There is a lot more to do! Despite them suddenly deciding to play ball on this particular occasion, Manchin and Sinema still need to be made irrelevant as soon as possible! But as I said, this is happening with the thinnest of imaginable Congressional control, as the other party is literally trying to destroy democracy in real time before our faces. That is not irrelevant.

Also: ruby-red Kansas curb-stomped an attempt to outlaw abortion rights, and approximately 77% of the entire country supports this current bill. The generic Congressional ballots have all shown major movement toward Democrats, and frankly, I have a feeling that we have only just started to see the full impact of post-Roe fallout. So if you get off your asses, quit whining, and put the work in, we could actually win the midterms and then do EVEN MORE!

So yeah. Uh. Food for thought.

#hilary for ts #politics for ts #'but biden didn't give me a pony!!!' #'sTudEnT lOaNs!!!' #oh like the ones you have not paid a single penny on since he took office #the legislative agenda enacted thus far represents progress in every single left wing issue #and in utterly terrible circumstances #so yeah if you are still saying this #please stfu forever

[blackopals-world]

The Prince and the Dragon (part 1)

M/M

Masc!Noble!Yuu x Malleus Draconia

In celebration of the new year's smut raffle winner!

Malleus meets the Prince of the Black North. After failing to impress he gains the ire of the man. The words of the king burn in his ear " Once my son set his mind to a task there is very little one can do to dissuade him."

Malleus had once again missed the year's annual royal summit. Just as he had in previous years. But not all was lost as the queen of the Black North had extended an invitation to the castle after hearing about the mix up from his grandmother.

The Black North or the Demonic Kingdom was known for its reclusive nature. They had never gone to war with other Kingdoms nor had allies. They had never even formed a marriage pact with another royal family. For these reasons no one pays them much attention. Make no mistake everyone fears and respects them for the obvious reason.

The Black North gets its name for its frigid climate but also its monsters. The people of the north stand at a barrier where monsters live and thrive and naturally the people of the land are built to fight and tame them. The kingdom prevents the monsters from leaving except for small ones deemed acceptable enough to be tamed and kept as pets.

All that said it was good to remain on their good side because if something were to happen to the kingdom then the world would be flooded with monsters that even mages would struggle to kill. And it's better that they had no interest in the other nations.

Malleus had heard many things about the North, mostly that they were savage and barbarians. That they drank blood, and ate raw flesh. But imagine his shock when he arrived with his entourage that it was all true.

The king stood above even Malleus in height along with his men. Malleus also had also no idea what he was seeing. The king was fair like the snow that fell outside the palace walls. His hair was silvery white that fell to the height of his calfs. He wore no armor that day but had monster teeth strung on his waist as trophies. And his eyes were like fresh blood dripping on snow.

Malleus felt the hair on his neck stand on end as Lilia approached the king like an old friend.

"Roth! It's been forever!" Lilia said approaching the king.

Like a cat the king squared his shoulders ready to put distance between himself and the fey.

"General Vanrouge. I haven't seen you since the war." King Roth said coldly without an ounce of emotion.

" Yes, we were younger then. You were still just a prince who left his kingdom just to fight in war. I learned firsthand just how bloodthirsty you lot are. I can't believe anyone believed you were fey, you so bad at lying too." Lilia despite his small size seemed to perturb the king.

"I'd rather you kept quiet general." The tips of the king's pointed ears turned red despite his stoic appearance.

The two new continued their banter as Malleus, Silver and Sebek watched bewildered as Lilia managed to cow the imposing royal with teasing.

When Roth turned his attention to the boy's his ruby eyes had a glint in them, as if he had seen a ghost or several.

"I see familiar faces." Roth walked over to the group. "Malleus. You look just like your mother."

Roth's lip curled in a subtle smile.

Then his eyes moved to Silver and low growl erupted from his throat. The rumble could be felt physically radiating from him.

"Roth, calm down. This is my son Silver. You know he shares a resemblance to you, you even have the same hair." Lilia stood between the two before the demon let out a huff or was it a sigh.

"Hmmm, force of habit. Let's go to the banquet hall. Introductions have gone too long and dinner is waiting." He said taking the lead.

Then group settled as the queen arrived.

She was quite energetic and bubbly. Her long black hair rivaled her husband's reaching her ankles. Long hair was apparently a symbol of authority here. Her deep sapphire eyes held warmth and mischief and the red ring that framed her pupils spelled danger. Her claws looked delicate compared to her husband but the tips were clearly dyed red and not with paint.

"My my, what a group of young strapping lads we have. I've wanted to meet you since I heard of your escapades from Her Majesty. She said you were such lovely children. I hope you enjoy your time here." She said sweetly as she clapped her hands twice.

The servants arrived with a feast of local and foreign foods.

"I had the cooks prepare everything to your liking. My dear Roth told me that your kind don't eat like we do. I understand perfectly though, I was the same when I was human." The queen smiled when the group gave her puzzled looks.

As the dinner continued Malleus observed the royal couple as the queen talked the king gave one-word answers. The king always let his beloved take the lead and the queen showered her stiff husband in affection. They were rather harmonious. Malleus found himself being a bit jealous perhaps because he wished he had parents like that or to have that kind of relationship.

The doors of the banquet hall opened as a new person arrived. A young man dressed in royal red and gold strolled into the room. This would not be out of the norm if not for his appearance. The man was spattered this blood, in one hand he held a dagger and in the other, a huge monstrous black boar was being dragged by the split neck.

Malleus and the other let out a gasp as the royal couple only smiled.

"Father." The young man said dropping the boar on the table. "I wanted to bring something more fitting for a proper feast home. Fresh ashen boar."

"Very good Yuu. You've hunted well." The king smiled as he praised the bloody prince.

"Let me introduce our son. Prince Yuu. He's a bit headstrong but I hope you boys will get along. Fostering relations between our Kingdoms is important after all and I wish for the future kings to be friends." The queen said, he smile begging everyone to bare with her.

The prince didn't acknowledge the guest or his mother's request. He immediately began cutting up the boar on the table in a gory display. Sebek immediately reached as Silver gasped.

"HOW DARE YOU TAINT HIS HIGHNESS'S EYES WITH SUCH A VALGUR DISPLAY!" Sebek yelled standing up.

A knife flew across the room just as Silver dragged the fey back to his seat. The knife embedded where Sebek's head would have been in the wall.

"You are in the court of Ars Goetia. You will pay respect to our customs. What is a feast without fresh meat from a powerful beast? Do you shun such delicacies in your land?" The prince said crossing his arms.

Lilia elbowed Malleus and gave him a look.

Malleus knew he had to say something.

"My apologies for my guard's harsh words. He is unused to foreign customs. He means no hard. Still, I am quite shocked, I was told your kind eat fresh meat but I hardly thought it was true. You are quite bold." Malleus said praising the prince.

The prince hummed and simply went back to carving the boar.

Malleus took this as acceptance as the response mimicked the king's. The table breathed a sigh of relief as Yuu calmed down.

The prince placed the cuts of red meat on plates as he respectfully served the king and queen and then to Malleus and Lilia. He didn't bother giving any to Silver and Sebek until everyone else had been served.

The king and queen cut into the raw meat with their claws as they gave up the pretense that they were more civilized than what the stories told.

The guests were more than hesitant to eat the meat.

Lilia smiled wildly was he cut into his slab of meat. The others watched him for what he did next.

"This reminds me of when you would leave dead animals around camp, Roth. You were trying so hard to be helpful. You were like a lost puppy when I told you to stop." Lilia said teasingly the king again.

Queen Ula giggled placing a hand on her husband's as his ears turned red.

"Ehm...Yuu. Our guests can't eat raw meat either. It's best you try not to feed them thing like that. They see it as a threat, not a gift." The king said scolding the boy lightly.

The prince gasped in shock before letting the servants take the boar away to be cooked this time.

As the group returned to eating with more varied appetites now Malleus tried the meat. It's texture was foreign but the taste was quite good. Thankfully he knew it was safe from Lilia eating it without a problem. However, Silver and Sebek weren't permitted to do the same. Half-fae and humans just can't eat raw boar.

As he ate he noticed the prince eating cooked meat. He found it strange until he realized.

"I had no idea. You don't share the same aura as your parents. I had assumed you were a demon. I had no idea you were human." Malleus said as he gestured to the prince's less sharp features.

Ula's eyes widened as she heard this.

Yuu immediately stood slamming his hands on the table. A growl erupted from his throat, one far less threatening than his father's.

"How insightful your highness? Anymore observations?" Yuu said low and dangerous.

Malleus wasn't aware if he had said something wrong and continued.

"Oh, no. I just think it's an impressive feat to take down a wild boar for a human." Malleus said taking another bite of the boar.

The prince didn't spare Malleus another glance.

"Father, mother may I be excused? He asked politely.

They nodded and that would be the last Malleus would see of the prince for the night.

In the coming days, the prince made himself scarce. He was often out hunting monsters or tending to his tamed monster Grim.

All the while Malleus learned of the demon's culture. They prided strength above all and they didn't hide the doubt they had in their heir. They didn't despise humans but they found their weakness appalling. They however adored their queen who in her own words was once human but she also claimed not to be a demon herself. She was supposedly something else entirely, not completely demon but not human.

The next time Malleus met the prince was out in the stables. He had heard they house a unique mount only found here. Silver had apparently wanted to see as well.

Standing next to a mount-sized wolf creature with a saddle was the prince and Silver.

The prince smiled wryly tilting the other man's chin up to look at him as he sat on the wolf's back.

Malleus heard the prince's gentle remarks.

"Are you sure? I would treat you very well here." He said charmingly.

"I'm quite fine. I serve his highness and only him." Silver said pushing the hand away.

The prince sighed.

"Come on, you heard him right. He doesn't really think much of humans." Yuu said smugly.

Silver shook his head.

"You don't know him. He may how said something insensitive but your insecurities aren't his fault. He's the person I choose to serve not you." Silver said firmly.

The prince huffed.

"That's a shame. You would benefit greatly from training here with me. I'm not asking you to serve me. I have plenty of servants. I want you because you and I are alike. It's unfortunate, though. I hate to feel like I'm losing." The prince laughed as he rode off.

Malleus was puzzled by the prince more than ever. He was hot and cold.

The king and queen warned him "Once my son set his mind to a task there is very little one can do to dissuade him."

What the prince wanted was the question. He had a fondness for Silver that couldn't be ignored, something Sebek wasn't happy about.

Malleus was also on the receiving end of this attention except it was a challenge. The prince seemed to size the dragon up and judge his every move. He hoped the prince had seen something he liked because he received an invitation to a night hunt from the demonic prince.

"Show me your true strength Draconia. One future king to another. Come hungry." The note read.

Malleus felt a shiver go up his spine. He had never seen someone so bold, so forward. He even felt a bit weak imagining Yuu whispering that in his ear.

(Sorry, smut in part 2)

#yuuniverse #noble!yuu #twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland x reader #malleus x reader #malleus draconia #malleus draconia x reader #twst malleus #twisted wonderland malleus #malyuu #mallyuu

[shadowtriovibes]

i think i'm gonna love you (for a long, long time)

Pairing: Sebastian Sallow x f!MC

Word Count: 3.2k

Rating: E

Warnings: 18+, aged-up characters, explicit sexual content, oral sex, unsafe PIV sex, enemies to lovers, rivals with benefits, love confessions, slightly sentient Room of Requirement

Summary: request: "what if seb and reader have been academic rivals since they’ve started hogwarts, are basically enemies, and seemingly can’t stand each other. meanwhile everyone knows of their rivalry, BUT what they don’t know is that the two take their aggression out on each other by sleeping together … and maybe seb eventually admits his feelings when someone tries to flirt/sleep with reader and seb gets pissy and jealous…"

But not even three days had gone by before you were at it again – this time with Sebastian lifting you onto an unused potions stand and burying his face between your thighs. Afterward you heard yourself saying filthily enticing nonsense to Sebastian to coax him into pressing inside you, fucking you so hard that a whole stack of empty cauldrons next to you tipped over – and even then you didn’t stop. You have not and will not talk about it. "Take out your wand," you growl. "Take off your clothes," he counters.

To this day, neither you nor Sallow will admit which one of you found the Room of Requirement first.

If you ask him, he’ll swear up and down that he found it first. As his story goes, he’d been wandering the Astronomy Tower in a frenzy, pacing back and forth in front of that batty tapestry with the dancing trolls and thinking that he desperately needed somewhere where he could grow magical plants with the same kinds of results he would get back home in Feldcroft.

Sebastian isn’t exactly a green thumb, but he’s nevertheless determined to excel in Herbology, just like he does in all his classes. Magical plants are overflowing with life and therefore especially challenging to someone like Sebastian, who firmly believes that he can track down a book that will help him solve just about anything. But to succeed in Herbology, he needed planters, and good soil, and most of all a consistent climate like the temperate hamlet in which he grew up.

Then the Room of Requirement appeared, offering a spacious greenhouse-like room full of empty planters, limitless fertilizer and a shelf full of books on Herbology.

You, on the other hand, contend that he’s utterly full of it.

You had obviously found the Room of Requirement first because Professor Sharp had specifically mentioned its existence to you. (Of course, it was an attempt to stop you from lingering in his potions classroom at all hours trying to improve your brewing skills.)

When you had entered, you were greeted by an array of squeaky-clean cauldrons, a dozen potions stations, shelves of exotic ingredients in glass jars – even a hopping pot!

Neither of you had known that the other was aware of the Room’s existence until one late autumn evening in your sixth year when you’d both arrived at the same time to do some after-hours studying.

To say that you and Sallow had a complicated relationship is a severe understatement. Academic rivals, occasional friends, frequent adversaries… no one really knew where the two of you stood on any given day. By your sixth year, you both were competing to be at the top of your class and your friendship was extremely tenuous at best. The stress of your upcoming N.E.W.T. exams was tangible, and while neither of you said anything to the other, both of you felt overwhelmed – and you needed that Room.

You’d nearly dueled for it right there in the hallway, but then the door to the Room quickly appeared and inside you’d discovered that it had efficiently rearranged itself to suit both your needs.

You made a pact that the east wing full of bubbling potions and self-cleaning cauldrons was to be your domain, and the west wing’s long rows of planters bursting with plant life would be Sebastian’s. For the rest of the year, you’d simply tried to avoid each other as much as possible.

—

“You’re a right foul prick, you know that?” you tell Sebastian as the door to the Room slams shut behind you.

“What is it this time?” he asks lazily, trimming a few leaves off of a dittany plant without sparing you a glance.

“You cheated today at Crossed Wands,” you insist.

You shrug off your robes and drop your school bag to the floor, leaving your belongings in a messy heap feet from the Room’s entrance. As soon as Sebastian hears your bag hit the ground, he sets down his shears.

“You’ve finally gone mad,” he says simply. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it?”

“You cheated,” you repeat. “Even Lucan thinks using Diffindo was a step too far.”

“I missed, didn’t I?” he reminds you as he turns around. “Though judging by the state of you, that’s hard to believe.”

Admittedly, you are quite disheveled. You’d practically sprinted up the stairs of the Astronomy Tower to give Sebastian a piece of your mind, and now you’re red-faced, a bit sweaty and your hair is a wild mess.

“I have half a mind to hex you right here, right now,” you seethe.

Sebastian rakes his gaze down your body and smirks.

“Did you come all this way just for a rematch?” he asks, his voice low.

That’s all it takes for the energy in the room to shift wildly.

You are not proud of this, but ever since the beginning of your seventh year, you and Sebastian have been sleeping together. It’s just a ridiculous amount of sex, really.

You can’t even remember how it started. You just remember that one day, the two of you were standing in the middle of your shared Room arguing ferociously about whether you could help yourself to some of the lacewing flies flitting around Sebastian’s Mallowsweet bushes.

The next thing you knew, your back was against a bookshelf and your arms were wrapped around Sebastian’s neck while he kissed you breathless. Moments later, your skirt was pushed up around your waist and he was pressing two fingers inside you and it was bloody brilliant.

After he’d deftly gotten you off and you’d returned the favor with your mouth, you quickly sprung apart and didn’t say a word to each other.

But not even three days had gone by before you were at it again – this time with Sebastian lifting you onto an unused potions stand and burying his face between your thighs. Afterward you heard yourself saying filthily enticing nonsense to Sebastian to coax him into pressing inside you, fucking you so hard that a whole stack of empty cauldrons next to you tipped over – and even then you didn’t stop.

You have not and will not talk about it.

“Take out your wand,” you growl.

“Take off your clothes,” he counters.

Your hands twitch at your sides as you consider your options. Wand or skirt? Vengeance, or satisfaction?

Sebastian looks entirely too satisfied with himself when you mumble a curse under your breath and reach behind you for the clasp of your skirt.

He quickly unbuttons his own shirt while you step out of your shoes and roll down your stockings. Lately whenever the two of you strip off your clothes, it turns into an unspoken race that Sebastian wins almost every time, though you insist it’s only because he doesn’t have to wear corsets.

At least he’s not too much of a prick to make you take off the offending garment yourself, even if it’s mostly an excuse to get his hands on your body as soon as he can.

Sebastian is still wrestling with the last hook on your corset when a door appears in the middle of the back wall of the Room, creaking open with absolutely no subtlety.

(You had both been horrifically embarrassed the first time the Room had offered you a bedroom, but since then you’ve grown to appreciate it.)

Sebastian roughly marches you inside and pushes you down on the bed. You snap at him to watch it, not so hard up for him that you won’t go and get your wand.

He simply raises an eyebrow at you like he doesn’t believe you and joins you on the bed, turning you over onto your stomach.

“I’m not a dog, Sallow,” you protest.

“Let me get a look at you first,” he explains. “Got you in the back at Cross Wands, I just want to check that it’s closed up.”

You fall silent at that. Rather than firing off a witty retort about how it’s so typical that he’d cast a spell at you with your back turned, you reach for a pillow and wad it up under your head, letting him trace his fingertips over a sensitive, freshly-healed burn wound on your shoulder blade.

“Are you sure you’ll be alright on your back?” he asks quietly.

“Yes,” you answer, just as softly. “Poppy put some salve on it for me, it’s fine.”

“Good,” he murmurs.

Before he lets you turn around, he presses a soft kiss over the wound. It’s unsettling at first. It feels sweet, apologetic – possibly even claiming. Those are not words you associate with Sebastian Sallow of all people, who is brash and unrepentant and certainly not dependable.

(These are all things you remind yourself daily to try to stop being so stupidly, foolishly in love with him.)

Then it’s over, and he’s got you on your back with his hands on your tits while he’s determinedly tonguing at your clit, stubbornly set on making you come with just his mouth as if to prove that he can.

—

You’re in an especially foul mood several weeks later when Leander pulls you aside after Charms class.

“Can I help you?” you ask annoyedly.

Your patience for Prewett has gone down significantly since you were younger. As a spoiled young man about to enter the wizarding world, he’s become haughty and pretentious and remains not particularly talented.

He’s nothing like Sebastian, your lovesick brain tells you, which makes you sincerely sick of yourself as well.

“Perhaps you can,” he says teasingly. “I was thinking about going down to Hogsmeade this weekend and I wanted to invite you to join me.”

“I don’t have time, I need to study,” you tell him, trying to beg off.

“You do seem particularly aggrieved today,” Leander points out. “Why don’t you let me take you to the Three Broomsticks for a Butterbeer?”

“Leander, I’m just not interested,” you insist, moving to duck around him.

“Quit being ridiculous, we’ve been playing this little game for far too long,” he says arrogantly, reaching for your hand to stop you from walking off.

Before he can touch you, a fiery spell arcs through the air and lands squarely on Leander’s palm. He yelps in pain as he pulls back his hand, cradling it to his chest.

“What the bloody hell was that?!” he demands. “Did you do that?”

“I did, Prewett,” you hear Sebastian’s voice say.

You glance behind you and notice that he’s leaning far too casually against the wall outside of class, lazily spinning his wand in his fingers.

“You seem to have a really hard time understanding the word ‘no,’” Sebastian observes. “That thick-headedness, is that something all Gryffindors have, or is it just you?”

As a Gryffindor yourself, you shoot him a look.

“Bugger off, Sallow,” Leander replies. “This is none of your business, you prat.”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong,” Sebastian says, his voice formidably even. “If you can’t keep your hands to yourself, that’s very much my business.”

“Since when do you give a damn about her?” Leander challenges. “You two hate each other, everyone knows that.”

“We don’t,” you mumble. “Sebastian, he just – we’re competitive, that’s all. But we’re friends.”

“‘Competitive?’ He’s nowhere near your level,” Leander sneers.

Sebastian scoffs, and you brace for him to go on and on about his many accomplishments – all earned, of course – but instead he says, “Obviously, Prewett, as there’s no one in this entire school who’s good enough for her, myself included. But you don’t have to try so damn hard to fall to the bottom of the list.”

Good enough?

You blink, stunned. Leander looks bewildered as well, but then he demands, “Is that what this is about? You’re in love with her?”

“What?” you laugh. “Of course he’s not.”

“Of course I am,” Sebastian says easily. “Hopelessly, in fact.”

You must have fallen and smacked your head off the statue outside of class when Leander tried to grab you, you think. That’s the only way any of this makes any sense.

“You’re pathetic,” Leander guffaws. “Merlin, Sallow, I actually feel bad for you!”

Again, you brace yourself for Sebastian to throw a litany of devastating curses toward Leander, but instead he simply shrugs and tucks his wand away.

“Go right ahead, mate,” he says, reaching for your hand.

Mindlessly you let him take it, lacing his fingers with yours while Leander just gapes. Without another word, Sebastian leads you toward the stairs up to the Astronomy Tower, the small crowd of students who’d gathered to watch the whole debacle swiftly parting for him.

“Sebastian,” you hiss. “What were you thinking back there?”

“Evidently I wasn’t,” he says under his breath.

“You have to apologize to Leander, and tell him you were just joking,” you say anxiously, fretting the whole way up the stairs. “He’s going to tell the entire school otherwise, and they’re all going to believe that you–”

“That I’m in love with you?” he cuts you off. “Good.”

“Good?!” you sputter. “But it’s not true!”

Sebastian comes to an abrupt stop feet from the room to the Door, a dumbstruck look on his face. “What do you mean?”

“You aren’t in love with me,” you say deliberately, as if you’re trying to communicate with someone who’s been concussed by a Bludger. “You don’t even like me, you can barely stand me.”

He’s wordlessly watching you pace and rant at him, his expression drawing tighter.

“It’s different in the Room, that’s not – that’s just physical,” you insist. “I understand that, Sebastian.”

“That’s what you want?” he asks, his voice sounding rougher than usual. “Just meaningless sex?”

“That’s what it’s always been, hasn’t it?” you ask desperately.

You feel like you’re going a bit mad. You never talk, you just strip each other bare and cling to each other unrelentingly like anchors while you get each other off, you thought that that’s all you could ever expect from him.

“Not for me,” Sebastian says bitterly. “Not for a while.”

“You… you never told me,” you breathe, your fingers twitching at your sides as though your hands have to reach out for him.

“I was scared!” he shouts. “I knew you didn’t feel the same way and I didn’t want to stop, I couldn’t stop, so I didn’t tell you.”

Merlin, you’re both so damn stupid, you realize.

“But you’re wrong,” you tell him, still tensed up like you’re both about to draw wands at each other. “Sebastian, I’ve been in love with you for ages.”

Before either of you says another word, the door to the Room of Requirement swings open unprompted, and you become keenly aware of the sound of fourth-year students stomping up the stairs to their Astronomy lesson.

“Inside,” he murmurs, and the two of you quickly duck into your Room.

Sebastian reaches for you as soon as the door melts away. But this time instead of tugging off your tie or fumbling with the waistband of your skirt, he simply holds you against his chest, nose buried in your hair.

“Say it again,” he pleads.

“I love you,” you confess, lips pressed to the hollow of this throat. “I’m mad for you, Sebastian.”

“I need you,” he growls as his hands slide down from your back to your ass, easily sliding underneath your skirt. “I need you like this.”

He pulls you into a desperate kiss, and you can’t help but smile against each others’ lips when you hear that bedroom door creak open.

He marches you inside just like he had before, but this time you appreciate that his hands are gentle on your body as he maneuvers you toward the bed. You step out of your skirt and stockings and let him take off the rest, helping himself to slow, lazy kisses in between pulling garments off of you.

“Sebastian,” you eventually whine. “Hurry up.”

“Merlin, you’re still the same as before,” he laughs delightedly. “I’ll never catch a break with you, will I?”

“Never,” you grin.

Sebastian divests you of your corset and you lie down on the bed to watch him take off his own uniform. You’ve known him for so many years now, but in the past year, you’ve closely watched him grow from a boy into a man – solid, broad and deceptively tall.

“Come here,” you whisper, and he practically throws himself onto the bed.

“Can I ask you something?” he whispers against your jaw.

“Anything,” you breathe.

He pauses for a beat before murmuring, “Do you think it will be different now? Since we love each other?”

You pause to consider, but then you tell him, “I don’t think so, no.”

“Why’s that?” he asks curiously.

“Because we’ve been in love with each other this whole time,” you tell him softly. “So it’s not that different, really.”

Sebastian makes a heartbreakingly fond sound before he starts kissing down your body, single-minded in his quest to pleasure you.

You lose track of time while he’s licking you open, deliriously babbling words of praise and pleas for more until you realize you’ve both certainly missed your last class of the day. You don’t think you or Sebastian has ever missed a class, certainly not since your O.W.L.s, and now here you are with your legs spread and your love’s tongue on your clit and you can’t even remember what class you just missed.

He makes you come twice before he entertains the idea of letting you catch your breath, but he doesn’t give you much time to recover before he’s throwing your legs over his shoulders and sinking inside you, his brow furrowed and his mouth hanging open.

“Bastian,” you whine. “Please.”

He’s perhaps a touch too gentle with you at first, romanticizing your first time together as actual lovers rather than rivals letting off some steam.

But by now you’ve done sinful things in this bed more times than you can count, and you need the Sebastian who routinely whispers pure filth in your ear until you’re trembling on the edge of your climax – and he’s happy to deliver.

You’re nearly bent in half by the time he spills inside you, softly groaning your name. You slide a hand down your body to rub your clit and make yourself come one last time, desperate to reach your peak with him still inside you.

“Let me,” he grunts, nudging your hand away so he can finish you himself.

You’re completely spent by the time Sebastian pulls out of you and collapses next to you in bed. He tugs you against his chest and nudges a leg between yours, and that’s the first thing you notice that’s different than before.

You get to stay with him.

Despite knowing full well that you’ll surely miss dinner if you fall asleep, you both quickly drift off curled around each other, soaking in the peace and quiet of your Room.

—

The next morning, you and Sebastian wake up in a very different Room than the one you’ve occupied for the past two years.

Instead of a strict divide between your space and Sebastian’s, your bubbling cauldrons and bursting planters are tucked up together in thoughtful pairs — dittany next to the Wiggenweld cauldrons, knotgrass by your simmering Invisibility potions and so on.

“This is brilliant,” Sebastian observes after you get redressed and pace the length of the room together. “Why didn’t we do this earlier?”

You shoot him a withering look. “You know precisely why, Sallow.”

He laughs brightly and bumps his shoulder against yours.

“Regardless, good luck separating them now,” he murmurs. “What’s mine is yours, love.”

“What’s mine is yours,” you agree, a content smile on your lips.

#hogwarts legacy #sebastian sallow #hogwarts legacy fic #sebastian sallow fic #sebastian sallow x mc #sebastian sallow x reader #sebastian x mc #sebastian x reader #my fic #enemies to lovers #rivals with benefits c'mon now!!! #also it's late and i'm sleeby but i wanted to post this for the lovely anon who requested it #i hope it's coherent it's unbeta'd as always

[legalkimchi]

Geopolitics is not what you think.

It is interesting to me that how we view issues of global politics and how academics and certain political actors view the issues have such a huge separation.

For instance, when people view the russian invasion of ukraine, they think of a simple power grab, or they don't understand why russia would want to do that.

When i was talking to a friend, who is a geopolitical expert, about the russian war against ukraine, he pulled out a topographical map of europe. Geopolitics is the study of how geography affects politics. it is NOT a general term for international politics.

The easy answer is Russia's need for a warm water port. If you know russia's borders, you would know that all of it's major ports are in the north and they freeze in the winter. They don't have a good port in the black sea that stays unfrozen. Sevastopol is the port in Crimea. While technically Ukrainian territory, it has been controlled by Russia since 2014.

The second point he made was looking at the moutains. See the map above. Then let's look at a map of the warsaw pact

Understanding moutain ranges and how they are defensible, you start to see why NATO and the Warsaw pact involved those specific countries. it creates a natural bottle neck in Germany. This also goes into why Poland gets invaded so much. it is a flat territory without natural boundaries that makes it easy to attack, and if you want your border to be a mountain you have to go through Poland. Without the countries to make up its borders anymore, Russia lacks natural boundaries. Instead of the carpathian mountains, they have simple grassland.

Then you talk to demographers as to why russia is aggressive, you see that since the end of the cold war, russia's death rate has exceeded it's birth rate. this causes a decline in population and a "demographic crisis." the average age in russia is over 40 years old. this stagnation has rippling effects throughout the country. with an older workforce, they don't have a surplus younger generation to pay for the care of the older generation. they are experiencing migration out of the country of individuals with experience and education needed in the country. They are, in short, a nation in panic.

In the international relations field, you see discussions of the lack of political influence. Russia once held a spot as one of two superpowers in the world. a regional giant who's influence shook the way international politics operated. From 1950-1989 there were really only two countries in the world that everyone needed to pay attention to: the Soviet Union and the United States. everyone else was a pawn. There was the First world, the US and her allies, the Second World, the Soviet Union and her allies, and the Third world, the non-aligned nations. (which, by the way, is where that phrase came from. a "third world" country was thought as a country so unimportant, neither the US or USSR cared about you.) in this climate, Russian, who still held what was considered the second most powerful military in the world (though... not so much now) felt they were under appreciated. China was the emerging economic powerhouse.

This is something i went into in my IR video. (as i have an IR background)

What is amazing about all this analysis is that different fields point to different reasons as to why russia invaded. and similar analysis could be done other regions. any conflict can be analyzed in this manner. the disputes in africa are interesting because the easy answer to why there are so many wars in africa is "colonialism." and i think it does make a useful, simplified solution. but it foregoes the other realms of analysis as to why these conflicts are happening.

not sure what made me procrastinate on making a video and writing this out. i needed a break from editing. I hope you found this interesting.

#war #geopolitics #international relations #Youtube

[opalfairy]

DnD classes? In MY Scum Villain?! It's more likely that you'd think

Or I decided to merge two of my hyperfixations for efficiency's sake

So, it all started with this post, where I got to think really hard about which DnD class would suit Binghe the best and, like a flash of lightning, my third eye opened wide with the realization that (at least to me) both Bingge and Bingmei are Paladins. Specifically, Bingge is an Oath of Vengeance Paladin and Bingmei is an Oath of Devotion Paladin.

Now, although I think Bingge is pretty self-explanatory, I think I have to elaborate a little more on Bingmei because at first glance having our dear protagonist be a Devotion Paladin sounds a little weird until you remember that a Paladin's Oath can be to anything or anyone and... you see where I'm going with this... you cannot convince me that Binghe wouldn't swear absolute devotion to his Shizun. All of his tenets would also revolve around Shen Qingqiu so if they are not expressed exactly as written on the rules, just know that it is our boy interpreting them in his own way.

And of course, after thinking about this for so long, I had to try and match some other character to DnD classes (although I won't expand on that too much, at least for now [may change my mind later and add more stuff])

SQH is a College of Whispers Bard pretending to be something else (now... what that something else is, I haven't gotten that far)

MBJ is a Storm Sorcerer (maybe homebrewed to be related to snowy climates rather than storms) (this is the one I have the least conviction about so if anyone has a better idea please do tell)

At first with LQG I was like "he is the fighterest fighter to ever fighter" but then I thought about it a little more and now I'm convinced he is a Hunter Conclave Ranger.

SHL is a Way of the Open Hand Monk

YQY is... and hear me out here... a Pact of Hexblade Warlock (of course his pact is with the Xuan Su sword, which is deeply cursed)

SJ!SQQ is an Inquisitive Rogue, though the general public thinks he is a College of Lore Bard

SY!SQQ is the College of Lore Bard, however he also has a single level in Warlock (his patron is the System) (after thinking about it, I believe the System aligns itself better as an Archfey patron, and SY's wifebeam is him using Fey Presence to charm everybody around him without even realizing what he's doing)

Anyways, if you think that a different class/subclass would fit a character better, or if you have ideas for characters that I didn't mention, you are more than welcome to add on!! I would love to hear different opinions on this!!

#svsss #scum villans self saving system #luo binghe #shen qingqiu #shen yuan #shen jiu #liu qingge #shang qinghua #sha hualing #mobei jun #yue qingyuan #dnd #dnd classes

[tanadrin]

Rarely do we predict the end of the world two or three generations hence; it’s always “this generation will not pass away before all these things have come to pass.” And I’m sure there are a lot of reasons for this—if you’re running a genuine doomsday cult, for instance, you don’t want to put the doomsday too far off. And I *think* part of the driving force there is that it’s really hard for us to imagine that the world will continue once we are gone, more or less intact. Like, it’s really weird to look at small children and know that, if everything goes right, they will see and do and think things you will never share in. That your life before they came along will be nothing more than the thinly imagined world beyond the borders of photographs that your parents’ or grandparents’ was before you. That however important and accomplished you are, the world will continue to spin when you have died.

That’s a hard fact to get your head around! And it’s sort of the inverse of the way we ofte treat our childhood as cosmogonic, as the default state against which all else rises and falls. We are prone to a solipsism where the bounds of the word are the bounds of our lives. That’s not a novel idea, but it does make me very skeptical of any eschatology positive or negative. The world has, so far, an extremely good track record of zero transformative catastrophes or eucatastrophes that take place with the sound of trumpets in the twinkling of an eye. Sure, it has lots of moments of *change.* Whole ages of them—dramatic sometimes, but always continuous. Differentiable, you might say, in that however rapidly the status quo is in flux you can see there is one, and how we got here from a previous state.

And not only do doomsayers have a pretty lousy track record, they frequently exhibit telltale signs that their doomsaying is based in something other than careful deduction—like Paul Ehrlich not only missing the Green Revolution (a forgivable error perhaps) but digging in even further the more reality continued to drift from his apocalyptic forecasts. One cannot help but think of Harold Camping, continually reissuing his predictions for the Second Coming. But also—peak oil was wrong; climate change has been bad but looks like it will not be “the end of industrial civilization” bad; a NATO/Warsaw Pact nuclear war never came to pass, (although arguably that’s the one that was in a lot of ways the most rational, and where we got luckiest). The non-doomsday-prophet types look at these fortunate turns and go “thank God that never happened!” But some people seem truly disappointed—after all, if the word will outlast you, how special can you or your era really be?

#nuclear war feels like the most rational thing #to have been doom and gloom about #it would be really really bad #in a way that I think is hard to comprehend #but still a lot of predictions for what it would actually look like #do not seem to me to be accurate #like you don’t want to understate it #you don’t want to be one of those Air Force psychopaths #that was like ‘we can totally win an ICBM exchange’ #but I don’t think the risk was ever quite ‘the end of industrial civilization’ #and certainly not human extinction

[kp777]

By Andrew Freedman, author of Axios Generate

Axios

Nov. 7, 2022

An array of climate statistics released over the weekend provide a sobering backdrop for global climate negotiations kicking off in Egypt.

Why it matters: The new data provide the most complete and up-to-date look at climate conditions through 2022, depicting a world of worsening impacts.

As COP27 gets underway, our planet is sending a distress signal," said UN secretary-general António Guterres, in a video message Sunday.

Zoom in: The report, timed for the start of the COP27 negotiations in Sharm el-Sheikh, finds that the past 8 years have been the world's warmest on record.

The provisional "State of the Global Climate" report notes that the pace of sea level rise is increasing, with 10% of the increase since 1993 occurring in just the past two and a half years.

"Although we still measure this in terms of millimeters per year, it adds up to half to one meter per century and that is a long-term and major threat to many millions of coastal dwellers and low-lying states," said World Meteorological Organization head Petteri Taalas, in a statement.

The dominant cause is now melting land-based ice from Greenland, Antarctica and mountain glaciers, studies show.

By the numbers: Glaciers in the Alps lost a record 3 to 4 meters of ice this summer as Europe saw a series of intense heat waves.

For the first time on record, no snow lasted through the summer season in Switzerland, the report states.

The Greenland ice sheet's string of years of losing more ice than it gained extended to 26 years.

In addition, the first instance of rainfall during September was recorded at the top of the Greenland ice sheet, a possible sign of the melt season extending later in the year.

Between the lines: The report finds that the world is on track to see its fifth or sixth-warmest year on record this year, with global average temperatures currently running about 1.15°C (2.07°F) above the preindustrial average.

The authors at the WMO, a UN agency, tie the lack of a record warmest year in 2022 to the third-straight year of cooling La Niña conditions in the tropical Pacific Ocean.

The next El Niño year is likely to be the world's warmest, and some early projections show a possible El Niño developing in 2023.

Ocean heat content reached record levels in 2021, with recent studies showing such trends continuing and increasingly resulting in extreme weather events over land.

The report touches on a litany of climate change-related disasters this year, from flooding in Pakistan to drought and extreme heat in China.

What they're saying: Guterres on Monday called for a "climate solidarity pact" between rich and poor nations to limit the severity of global warming in a COP27 speech.

#climate solidarity pact #cop27 #sea level rise #extreme weather #glacial melt #ocean warming #climate change #climate crisis #environment

[tastesoftamriel]

I’d love to hear your take on Tamrielic coffee culture! Imperial cappuccinos, Breton cafe au lait, Redguard iced coffee with lemon…so many options~

Coffee varies in popularity among the Provinces, but almost everyone enjoys a good strong cup of bean juice (and it tastes much better than stamina potions)!

Altmer

Coffee isn't the favoured drink of most High Elves, but it is enjoyed in small amounts around Summerset. The most popular way of drinking coffee there is a simple espresso, served in small cups for sipping alongside small cakes and biscuits in the afternoon. While some complain that espresso is too strong and bitter for their tastes, a good brew is smooth, rich, and flavourful, with notes of vanilla and fruits.

Argonians

Black Marsh is one of Tamriel's foremost producers of coffee due to the rich soil and warm climate that makes growing coffee relatively easy compared to other Provinces. Egg coffee sounds bizarre, but this Argonian take on the cappuccino is one of the best ways to drink coffee in my opinion! A strong brew, sweetened with sugar, is topped with firm, whipped sweetened egg whites and served piping hot. Simply stir the egg into the coffee before it has time to set, and you have all the benefits of a milky coffee without the milk.

Bosmer

Believe it or not, the Bosmer have found a way to make delicious coffee that's Green Pact compliant! While it sounds unsavoury, Wood Elves in Valenwood pick out undigested coffee beans from the dung of civet cats, who eat wild coffee fruits. The beans are washed thoroughly and roasted, with the civet cat's digestive system purportedly aiding in the fermentation of the bean, giving the resulting brew a rich and robust flavour. This 'luwak' coffee has become so famous that it's become a pricey export to other parts of Tamriel.

Bretons

Cream and coffee go hand in hand in High Rock, generally with a couple of sugar cubes or flavoured syrups or caramel for a rich beverage. Using cream instead of milk helps to ease the bitterness of Breton coffee, which is unfortunately made by boiling coffee grounds. As any coffee aficionado knows, boiling your coffee makes it rather sour and unpleasant, making the cream and syrups a must.

Dunmer

Of the races, the Dark Elves are probably the least enthusiastic about coffee as it is not native to Morrowind. However, coffee culture from around Tamriel has made the beverage more popular among the younger generations of urban Dunmer, who infuse their beans with marshmerrow during the roasting process. Served black in tall cups with a pinch of marshmerrow sugar, this simple drink is unique in flavour due to its sweet, candy-like aroma. For those with a taste for the exotic, add a splash of guar milk.

Imperials

In Cyrodiil, coffee is usually drunk with milk. Cappuccinos, made by topping coffee with frothed steamed milk are particularly popular, not least due to the fancy art that can be made by pouring the coffee into the milk in intricate patterns. While in itself it's not a particularly remarkable beverage, it's an Imperial staple that's enjoyed from the Colovian Highlands to Blackwood by young and old.

Khajiit

The Khajiit are famous for their drip coffees, in which coffee grounds are placed in small metal filters that slowly drip into a small cup, halfway filled with moon sugar-sweetened condensed milk. The resulting brew is very strong, very sweet, and bound to wake you up after the first sip.

Nords

Coffee is not particularly popular in Skyrim, but it's served as plainly as it gets: strong and black, and sometimes with a spoonful of sugar. However, what it's served with is unique to the Province. Coffee cheese, which is a slightly chewy and porous cheese, is dipped into the coffee and nibbled on as you sip your brew. I know it sounds weird, but give it a try and you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Orcs

Orcish coffee is always served with copious amounts of sugar and echatere milk. This simple drink is especially favoured by Wrothgarian echatere herders, who keep their energy levels up by sipping on this beverage throughout the day from echatere-skin flasks.

Redguards

Coffee is widely grown in the Bantha, making the drink a native Hammerfell staple. Whether it's served black, with sugar, or goat milk, coffee is often infused with spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla, and even chili. Another popular way of drinking coffee the Redguard way is the amusingly-named 'dirty chai': a strong double espresso mixed with equal amounts of spicy chai and frothy goat milk, and served with sweet pastries and biscuits as an accompaniment.

#Asks #tes #the elder scrolls #worldbuilding #world building #Coffee

[mariacallous]

As 400 million Europeans get set to elect 720 EU parliamentarians in June, polls are predicting big gains for right-wing populists. As a result, for the first time since the European Parliament was directly elected in 1979, it is expected to have a solid majority on the right. This will mark a “sharp right turn” for Europe, the European Council of Foreign Affairs (ECFR) recently noted. The consequences for European politics and policy are already coming into view.

The center-right European People’s Party (EPP) and the left-leaning Socialists and Democrats party (S&D) are again expected to finish in first and second place, although both may lose a handful of seats. The EU’s far-right groups, Identity and Democracy (ID) and the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), will improve their tally mainly at the expense of liberals and Greens. According to ECFR, populists are likely to be the top vote-getter in nine countries, including Austria, the Netherlands, France, Hungary, Poland, and Italy. In nine others, including Spain and Germany, they could emerge as strong second or third-place contenders.

ID—which includes the main anti-immigrant and Eurosceptic parties in Germany (Alternative for Deutschland or AfD), France (National Rally), and Italy (the League or Lega)—is likely to become the EU parliament’s third-largest group after elections are held between June 6 and 9. The ECR is led by Georgia Meloni, Italy’s prime minister and leader of the post-fascist Brothers of Italy party, and is home to Sweden’s Sweden Democrats and Poland’s Law and Justice party (PiS). If authoritarian Hungarian leader Viktor Orban’s Fidesz party, a member of the EPP until a few years ago, joins the ECR as expected, the far-right could claim a quarter of the total seats.

Political machinations already seem to be underway among some establishment parties to create cooperation with this newly powerful bloc. Experts say if the EPP, the strongest conservative party in the EU, welcomes far-right politicians in its fold or co-opts their policies, as it has lately been accused of, the balance of power in Europe will decisively shift to the right and have major implications for not just the EU’s common agenda but may also influence how member states decide critical policies.

“I think in our campaign we will ask the EPP to be pragmatic, to pick the alternative to a center-left majority,” Marco Campomenosi, a Lega politician and the head of the Italian delegation in ID, told Foreign Policy.

Experts say any such shift will have major implications for the EU as a whole, tainting its recent promises to pursue a humane migration policy and to establish rule of law at home that encourages democratic checks and balances. An empowered far-right may also keep coordination on a common defense policy to the bare minimum in the face of a looming threat from Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The EU’s flagship Green Deal climate framework, which has set a goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, is also at stake, as the populists try to push the EU to erode its commitment to renewable energy development and other climate policies.

Charlie Weimers, a member of the far-right Sweden Democrats that supports Sweden’s minority center-right government, said, his party’s priority is to push for a “Migration Pact 2.0,” with more stringent measures to stop the influx of immigrants than already listed in the new migration pact. “We need to stop asylum,” he told FP over the phone. “We need breathing space to deal with the immigrants already here otherwise we can never catch up.”

Lega’s Campomenosi said, “it’s not about the money” but about the “trouble” immigrants make. (Under the new migration pact an EU member state which refuses to accept an asylum seeker should pay a sum of 20,000 euros to an EU fund.) “If there are too many immigrants they can’t be integrated,” he added.

Three far-right parliamentarians told FP that with bigger numbers in Parliament they will be able to apply more pressure on the EU commissioner to throw out or dilute the green deal.

It “needs to go away,” Joachim Kuhs, the acting head of the AfD delegation in EU which is polling as the second strongest party in Germany, told FP in his office in the parliament. “It should be repealed and replaced,” Weimers added.

The liberal groups say the center-right has strengthened the far-right by co-opting its policies and forming alliances in individual member states.

Pedro Marques, a vice president of the S&D group, said the EPP parties have been “eroding the Cordon Sanitaire,” erected to keep the far-right out of governments and important positions. “The EPP is dancing with the far right,” he added, with grave consequences for the future of the union.

The cordon sanitaire is crumbling in many European nations. In Italy, the far-right is in power, in Sweden the center-right government is backed by the far-right. In Austria, center-right and far-right have been in a coalition, and the latter is polling ahead of all others in the run up to national elections. In France, Marine Le Pen is leading the polls, and in Germany, the conservatives have hinted at future cooperation at a regional level with the far-right AfD.

The legitimization of the far-right isn’t limited to member states. Ursula Von Der Leyen, a member of the EPP and EU commissioner, has alluded to Meloni’s inclusion in her grouping. She said it wasn’t clear which parties will remain in the ECR after the elections and which will leave, and “join EPP.”

Hans Kundnani, writer of a book called Eurowhiteness, said the boundaries between the ID, ECR and the EPP have always been “very fluid.”

“As soon as Meloni indicated she won’t be disruptive in the Eurozone, that she won’t be pro-Russian, centrist pro-European EPP said that’s great, we don’t mind,” Kundnani said. “The center right has no problem with far-right at all, they just have a problem with those who are Eurosceptic.”

Experts say Von Der Leyen has often backed off on key policies to appease the far-right. Just over the last few months as the farmers protested against the provisions of the green deal, the far-right found another issue to mobilize against mainstream parties. During election season, Von Der Leyen quickly conceded and granted several concessions to the agriculture sector that will affect the 2050 net zero target.

The best example of how the EU commissioner validated the far-right’s worldview, Kundnani argued, was when she created a post for an EU commissioner to promote a European way of life.

“The big theme of the European far-right is that the immigrants threaten European civilization,” he said. When Von Der Leyen created the position, she framed “immigration as a threat to the European way of life,” and in doing so legitimized the far-right.

It is unclear if co-opting the far-right’s talking points benefits the center right in keeping their traditional voters from moving towards populists, but there is an emerging consensus that it strengthens the radical right in the longer run. For its part, the far-right has moderated its own positions on many issues to appeal to the voters more to the center. The far-right parties say they are no longer calling for an exit from the EU, but merely to reform it from within. They say they back Ukraine and not Putin.

Many parties on the far-right advocate return of border controls in violation of the EU’s founding principle of free movement of people and goods. Last year, the AfD described the EU as a “failed project,’’ while Sweden Democrats said they had “good reasons to seriously reevaluate our membership in the union.” There is still a lingering suspicion that the rank-and-file members of the far-right parties harbor sympathy for Putin. Last month, Lega’s leader Matteo Salvini deflected when asked if he blamed Putin for Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s sudden death.

The parliamentarians of the ID and ECR with whom FP spoke expressly rejected Von Der Leyen’s proposal to appoint a dedicated defense commissioner to improve coordination among member states on matters of defense.

“We say that we want to manage immigration in a humane way, we can do better to manage the borders,” added Marques of the S&D. In response to the far-right’s demand to externalize the screening of asylum seekers, he said it was difficult to find credible partners. “We did this agreement with the Tunisian authorities, but when we tried to go there to check the conditions, to see how European money will be spent, they said we don’t want your agreement anymore. These have to be credible partnerships.”

The center-left S&D party simply dismisses the moderated stances of far-right parties as a charade. They believe the far-right simply wants the benefits of being in the union, not the costs that sometimes come with upholding its values. “They want an EU without the rule of law, without humanity,” Marques said. “That’s not what we built after the Second World War. They want to change the EU into something that it isn’t. Their values are not European.”

[jeremywhitley]

Official NEW GRAPHIC NOVEL announcement! THE DOG KNIGHT from @mackidsbooks and Feiwel and Friends is the first in a brand new series from @jeremywhitley, Bre Indigo & Melissa Capriglioni and it's coming in May!

You can pre-order the book right here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250756725/thedogknight

When non-binary middle schooler Frankie Bryant saved a dog from a couple of bullies, they had no idea it would change their life. They were offered a chance to become The Dog Knight, the protector of the sacred pact between humans and dogs.

Now they have the ability to hear and understand dogs, to see the invisible forces threatening the world that only dogs can see, and the assistance of The Pawtheon, a council of super dogs, representing the best of all values dogs hold most dear.

But before Frankie can take the job officially, they must complete a series of trials to show that they have these traits dogs value: Loyalty, Kindness, Honestly, Justice, Stubbornness, and an impeccable sense of smell.  But the forces of chaos want Frankie to fail, so it won't be easy! But it will be fun and entertaining for all ages from middle grades on up!

Check out what other comics creators had to say about The Dog Knight: "A delightful story of fate-of-the-world friendship and adventure, filled with a ton of heart... and tails too." -- Unbeatable Squirrel Girl author Ryan North @ryannorth

"The Dog Knight is a classic hero's journey with a unique, relatable hero wearing a very silly hat. I mean helm. And a lot of very charming dogs. I really like it, and I am saying that as an avowed cat person." - Dana Simpson, Phoebe and her Unicorn

"A well crafted story about the struggles of children who identify as nonbinary. The Dog Knight shows us that when we are true to ourselves and stand up for what’s right, everybody wins; A powerful lesson in leading by example, illustrated in spectacular fashion." --Andrew Aydin, coauthor of MARCH and RUN

We know this book is undoubtedly going to get push back in the current political climate, so if this is something you want to read, we really encourage you to pre-order the book, share this post, and tell all your friends, family, librarians, book sellers, comic book sellers, followers, and even random strangers. 

We’re so excited to share this with you!

Find out more and preorder here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250756725/thedogknight

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