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theculturedmarxist · 1 year

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In Costa Rica and Latvia today, the Atlantic Council is hosting its 360/OS Summit at RightsCon Costa Rica and NATO’s Riga StratCom. Among other things, the influential think tank will be previewing its “Task Force for a Trustworthy Future Web” report, which they hope will “lay the groundwork for stronger cross-sectoral ideation and action” and “facilitate collaboration now between the expanding community dedicated to understanding and protecting trust and safety.”

In human terms, conference attendees are discussing how best to stay on-brand by presenting the Censorship-Industrial Complex as a human rights initiative, and as #TwitterFiles documents show, they have the juice to pull it off.

EngageMedia (which I co-founded and was the long-time Executive Director) co-organized RightsCon in Manila in 2015, and I personally oversaw a lot of the preparations. That looks like a big mistake. I now believe RightsCon represents everything that has gone wrong in the digital rights field. Specifically, it represents the capture of a once-vibrant movement by corporate and government interests, and a broader shift towards anti-liberal and authoritarian solutions to online challenges. I left EngageMedia on good terms, but now have no formal relationship.

In honor of this week’s RightsCon and 360/OS Summit, we dug into the #TwitterFiles to revisit the integration of the Atlantic Council’s anti-disinformation arm, the Digital Forensic Research Labs (DFRLab), while also highlighting its relationship with weapons manufacturers, Big Oil, Big Tech, and others who fund the NATO-aligned think tank.

The Atlantic Council is unique among “non-governmental” organizations thanks to its lavish support from governments and the energy, finance, and weapons sectors. It’s been a key player in the development of the “anti-disinformation” sector from the beginning. It wasn’t an accident when its DFRLab was chosen in 2018 to help Facebook “monitor for misinformation and foreign interference,” after the platform came under intense congressional scrutiny as a supposed unwitting participant in a Russian influence campaign. Press uniformly described DFRLab as an independent actor that would merely “improve security,” and it was left to media watchdog FAIR to point out that the Council was and is “dead center in what former President Obama’s deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes called ‘the blob.’”

What’s “the blob”? FAIR described it as “Washington’s bipartisan foreign-policy consensus,” but thanks to the Twitter Files, we can give a more comprehensive portrait. In the runup to the 360/OS event in that same year, 2018, Graham Brookie of the Atlantic Council boasted to Twitter executives that the attendees would include the crème de la crème of international influence, people he explained resided at the “no-kidding decision-maker level”:

Similar correspondence to and from DFRLab and Twitter outlined early efforts to bring together as partners groups that traditionally served as watchdogs of one another. Perhaps more even than the World Economic Forum meetings at Davos or gatherings of the Aspen Institute in the US, the Atlantic Council 360/OS confabs are as expansive a portrait of the Censorship-Industrial Complex as we’ve found collected in one place.

In October 2018, DFRLab was instrumental in helping Facebook identify accounts for what became known as “the purge,” a first set of deletions of sites accused of “coordinated inauthentic behavior.” Facebook in its announcement of these removals said it was taking steps against accounts created to “stir up political debate,” and the October 2018 “purge” indeed included the likes of Punk Rock Libertarians, Cop Block, and Right Wing News, among others. Even the progressive Reverb Press, founded by a relatively mainstream progressive named James Reader, found his site zapped after years of pouring thousands of dollars a month into Facebook marketing tools. “That’s what sticks in my craw. We tried to do everything they suggested,” Reader said then. “But now, everything I worked for all those years is dead.”

In the years since, DFRLab has become the central coordination node in the Censorship Industrial Complex as well as a key protagonist in the Election Integrity Partnership and the Virality Project. Its high-profile role at RightsCon, the biggest civil society digital rights event on the calendar, should concern human rights and free expression activists.

According to their London 2019 event “360/OS brings together journalists, activists, innovators, and leaders from around the world as part of our grassroots digital solidarity movement fighting for objective truth as a foundation of democracy.” Their Digital Sherlocks program aims to “identify, expose, and explain disinformation.” But DRFLabs are more Inspector Gadget (or double agents) than Sherlock Holmes. The Twitter Files reveal DFRLab labeled as “disinformation” content that often turned out to be correct, that they participated in disinformation campaigns and the suppression of “true” information, and that they lead the coordination of a host of actors who do the same.

Twitter Files #17 showed how DFRLab sent Twitter more than 40,000 names of alleged BJP (India’s ruling nationalist party) accounts that they suggested be taken down. DFRLab said it suspected these were “paid employees or possibly volunteers.” However as Racket’s Matt Taibbi noted, “the list was full of ordinary Americans, many with no connection to India and no clue about Indian politics.” Twitter recognized there was little illegitimate about them, resulting in DFRLab pulling the project and cutting ties with the researcher.

Twitter Files #19 further revealed DFRLab was a core partner in the Election Integrity Partnership (EIP), which “came together in June of 2020 at the encouragement of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA” in order to “fill the gaps legally” that government couldn’t. As a result, there are serious questions as to whether the EIP violated the US First Amendment.

DFRLab was also a core partner on the Virality Project, which pushed its seven Big Tech partners to censor “stories of true vaccine side-effects.” The Stanford Internet Observatory, which led the project, is now being sued by the New Civil Liberties Alliance for its censorship of “online support groups catering to those injured by Covid vaccines.” Debate as to the frequency of serious adverse events is ongoing, however. The German health minister put it at 1 in 10,000, while others claim it is higher.

The Virality Project sought to suppress any public safety signals at all. The Stanford Internet Observatory is also at the moment reportedly resisting a House Judiciary Committee subpoena into its activities.

TwitterFiles #20 revealed some of the Digital Forensic Lab’s 2018 360/0S events, which brought together military leaders, human rights organizations, the Huffington Post, Facebook and Twitter, Edelman (the world’s biggest PR firm), the head of the Munich Security Conference, the head of the World Economic Forum (Borge Brende) a former President, Prime Minister and CIA head, intel front BellingCat and future Nobel Peace Prize winner Maria Ressa, all to combat “disinformation.” We can now reveal more.

Introducing the Atlantic Council

The Atlantic Council is a NATO-aligned think tank established in 1961. Its board of directors and advisory board are a Who’s Who of corporate, intelligence and military power, including:

James Clapper – former Director of National Intelligence whose tenure included overseeing the NSA during the time of the Snowden leaks. Asked whether intelligence officials collect data on Americans Clapper responded “No, sir,” and, “Not wittingly.” Clapper also coordinated intelligence community activity through the early stages of Russiagate, and his office authored a key January 2017 report concluding that Russians interfered in 2016 to help Donald Trump. Clapper has been a 360/OS attendee.

Stephen Hadley, United States National Security Advisor from 2005 to 2009 (also a 360/OS attendee)

Henry Kissinger, former US Secretary of State who oversaw the carpet bombing of Vietnam, among other crimes against humanity

Pfizer CEO Anthony Bourla

Stephen A. Schwarzman, Chairman, CEO, and Co-Founder, The Blackstone Group

Meta’s President for Global Affairs, Nick Clegg

Richard Edelman, CEO of the world’s largest PR firm (and 360/OS attendee)

The Rt. Hon. Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, Former Secretary General of NATO

Ambassador Robert B. Zoellick, Former President of the World Bank

Leon Panetta, former US Secretary of Defense & CIA Director. Panetta oversaw the US’s massive growth in drone strikes.

John F. W. Rogers. Goldman Sachs Secretary of the Board

Chuck Hagel, chairman of the Council, sits on the board of Chevron and is also a former US Secretary of Defence.

The Atlantic Council raised $70 million in 2022, $25 million of which came from corporate interests. Among the biggest donors were: the US Departments of Defense State, Goldman Sachs, the Rockefeller Foundation, Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, Google, Crescent Petroleum, Chevron, Lockheed Martin, General Atomics, Meta, Blackstone, Apple, BP, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, Raytheon, ExxonMobil, Shell, Twitter, and many more. Ukraine’s scandal-ridden energy company, Burisma, whose links to Hunter Biden were suppressed by the August 2020 table-top exercise coordinated by the Aspen Institute, also made a contribution. You can view the full 2022 “honor roll” by clicking here.

The Atlantic Council is the Establishment, though many suffer from the delusion that in putting on a “Digital Sherlock” cape, they’re somehow with the rebel alliance. The opposite is true. The Atlantic Council and DFRLab don’t hide their militarist affiliations. This week’s OS/360 event at RightsCon Costa Rica runs together with a 360/OS at NATO’s Riga StratCom Dialogue, which DFRLab note they have “worked closely with” “since 2016.”

The Birth of the Digital Forensic Research Lab

DFRLab was founded in 2016, and has been a major catalyst in expanding the “anti-disinformation” industry. Among non-governmental entities, perhaps only the Aspen Institute comes close to matching the scope, scale and funding power of DFRLab. DFRLab claims to chart “the evolution of disinformation and other online and technological harms, especially as they relate to the DFRLab’s leadership role in establishing shared definitions, frameworks, and mitigation practices.”

Almost $7 million of the Atlantic Council’s $61 million spent last year went to the DRFLabs, according to their 2022 annual financial report. Through its fellowship program, it has incubated leading figures in the “disinformation” field. Richard Stengel, the first director of the Global Engagement Center (GEC), was a fellow. GEC is an interagency group “within” the State Department (also a funder of the Atlantic Council), whose initial partners included the FBI, DHS, NSA, CIA, DARPA, Special Operations Command (SOCOM), and others. GEC is now a major funder of DFRLab and a frequent partner:

In this video, Stengel says, “I’m not against propaganda. Every country does it, they have to do it to their own population, and I don’t think it’s that awful.”

Stengel was true to his word, and apart from DFRLab, the GEC funded the Global Disinformation Index, which set out to demonetize conservative media outlets it claimed were “disinformation.” (See 37. in the censorship list) He thought the now-disgraced Hamilton68 was “fantastic.” In total, GEC funded 39 organizations in 2017. Despite Freedom of Information requests, only 3 have been made public to date. Roughly $78 million of GEC’s initial $100 million budget outlay for fiscal year 2017 came from the Pentagon, though the budgetary burden has shifted more toward the State Department in the years since.

The Global Engagement Center was established in the last year of Barack Obama’s presidency, via a combination of an executive order and a bipartisan congressional appropriation, led by Ohio Republican Rob Portman and Connecticut Democrat Chris Murphy. The GEC was and remains virtually unknown, but reporting in the Twitter Files and by outlets like the Washington Examiner have revealed it to be a significant financial and logistical supporter of “anti-disinformation” causes.

Though tasked by Obama with countering “foreign state and non-state propaganda and disinformation efforts aimed at undermining United States national security interests,” its money has repeatedly worked its way back in the direction of policing domestic content, with Gabe Kaminsky’s Examiner reports on the GDI providing the most graphic example.

GEC frequently sent lists of “disinformation agents to Twitter.” Yoel Roth, former head of Trust and Safety referred to one list as a “total crock.” Roth is now a member of DFRLab’s Task Force for a Trustworthy Future Web. Let’s hope he brings more trust than Stengel. You can read more on GEC’s funding here.

Other DFRLab luminaries include Simon Clark, Chairman of the Center for Countering Digital Hate (a UK “anti-disinformation” outfit that aggressively deplatforms dissidents), Ben Nimmo (previously a NATO press officer, then of Graphika (EIP and the Virality Project partners) and now Facebook’s Global Threat Intelligence Lead), and Eliot Higgins of Bellingcat. Bellingcat has an ominous reputation, which it’s earned in numerous ways, including its funding by the National Endowment for Democracy (see Glenn Greenwald’s recent report and Aaron Maté’s here). Most recently, Bellingcat assisted in the arrest of the 21-year-old Pentagon leaker, further speeding up the abandonment of the Pentagon Papers Principal where the media protected, rather than persecuted, leakers. Bellingcat was part of 360/OS backroom meetings with former intel chiefs, the head of Davos and the Munich security conference among many others, as we will see soon.

As noted in the introduction, DFRLab itself has made several wrong calls on “disinformation.” In one report they highlighted “outright false narratives,” which focused mainly on the notion that Covid was an engineered bioweapon, but lumped in the “unverified” claim Covid was the “result of a lab accident.” A lab accident is now the preferred hypothesis of the US Department of Energy, the FBI, and many others. To the DFRLab it was “disinformation” and a “conspiracy theory.”

The Election Integrity Partnership and the Virality Project

DFRLab were core partners on two of the most influential “anti-disinformation” initiatives of recent times.

The Virality Project built on the EIP and had partnerships with Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, Google, TikTok and more to combat vaccine “misinformation.” Stanford and DFRLab partnered with the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public, Graphika, NYU Tandon School of Engineering and Center for Social Media and Politics, and the National Congress on Citizenship. Through a shared Jira ticketing system they connected these Big Tech platforms together, with Graphika using sophisticated AI to surveil the online conversation at scale in order to catch “misinformation” troublemakers.

VP went far beyond any kind of misinformation remit, most infamously recommending to their Big Tech partners that they consider “true stories of vaccine side effects” as “standard misinformation on your platform.”

A Virality Project partner called the Algorithmic Transparency Initiative (a project of the National Congress on Citizenship) went further. Their Junkipedia initiative sought to address “problematic content” via the “automated collection of data” from “closed messaging apps,” and by building a Stasi-like “civic listening corps,” which in recent years has taken on a truly sinister-sounding mission. The current incarnation might as well be called “SnitchCorps,” as “volunteers have an opportunity to join a guided monitoring shift to actively participate in monitoring topics that disrupt communities”:

Garret Graff, who oversaw the Aspen Hunter Biden table-top exercise, was chairman of that same National Congress on Citizenship when they collaborated on the Virality Project. Both EIP and VP were led by Renee DiResta of the Stanford Internet Observatory, a former CIA fellow who engineered the now disgraced New Knowledge initiative, which developed fake Russian bots to discredit a 2016 Alabama senate race candidate, as acknowledged by the Washington Post. You can read Racket’s previous work on the Virality Project here.

DFRLab are the elite of the “anti-disinformation” elite. They work closely with a wide range of actors who have participated in actual disinformation initiatives. Here they’re invited to an elite Twitter group set up by Nick Pickles of “anti-disinformation” luminaries First Draft, also participants in the Hunter Biden laptop tabletop, and the Alliance for Security Democracy, part of the RussiaGate Hamilton68 disinformation operation.

360/OS

The 360/OS event marries this tarnished record with the financial, political, military, NGO, academic and intelligence elite. Some of this is visible through publicly available materials. Twitter Files however reveal the behind the scenes, including closed door, off-the-record meetings.

“I’ve just arrived in Kyiv” Brookie notes in 2017, as he seeks to line up a meeting with Public Policy Director Nick Pickles as they discuss Twitter providing a USD $150K contribution to OS/360 (seemingly secured), and to garner high level Twitter participation.

Pickles is visiting DC and Brookie suggests he also meet with the GEC and former FBI agent Clint Watts of Hamilton 68 renown. “Happy to make those connections,” he chimes.

360/OS events are elite and expensive — $1 million according to Brookie — so closer collaboration with Twitter, especially in the form of funding, is a high priority.

Twitter offers $150,000:

When Brookie mentions the attendees at the “no-kidding decision maker level” he isn’t kidding. Parallel to the 360/OS public program is the much more important off-the-record meeting of “decision makers ranging from the C-Suite to the Situation Room.” Here, he is explicit about a convening of military and financial power. Vanguard 25 is presented as a way to “create a discreet and honest way to close the information gap on challenges like disinformation between key decision makers from government, tech, and media.”

The document boasts of its high-level participants:

More are revealed in email exchanges, including Madeleine Albright and the head of the WEF:

They go on to list a bizarre mishmash of media leaders, intelligence officials, and current or former heads of state:

It appears Germany’s Angela Merkel was out of reach in the end, but many of the others attended this behind the scenes meeting on “disinformation.” Who are they?

Matthias Dopfner – CEO and 22% owner of German media empire Axel Springer SE, the biggest media publishing firm in Europe

Borge Brende – head of the World Economic Forum and former Norwegian foreign minister

Toomas Hendrick Ilves – former President of Estonia who co-chairs the World Economic Forum’s Global Futures Council on Blockchain Technology. Hendrick is also a fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (where the Stanford Internet Observatory is housed) and is on the advisory council of the Alliance for Securing Democracy, of Hamilton 68 renown.

Chris Sacca – billionaire venture capitalist

Mounir Mahjoubi – previously Digital Manager for President Macron’s presidential campaign, and former Chairman of the French Digital Council

Reid Hoffman – billionaire and Linkedin co-founder

Ev Williams – Former CEO of Twitter and on the Twitter board at the time

Kara Swisher – New York Times opinion writer, who founded Vox Media Recode

Wolfgang Ischinger - Head of the Munich Security Conference

Aleksander Kwasniewski – Former President of Poland. Led Poland into NATO and the EU.

Richard Edelman – CEO of the largest PR company in the world

Elliot Shrage – previously Vice-President of Public Policy at Facebook (DFRLab had election integrity projects with Facebook)

Lydia Polgreen – Huffington Post Editor in Chief

Jim Clapper – former US Director of National Intelligence

Maria Ressa – co-founder of Rappler and soon to be winner of the Nobel Peace Prize

JK Rowling was also invited to give an award, though appears she didn’t make it in the end:

Why would such a group all gather specifically around the question of “disinformation”? Is disinformation truly at such a level that it requires bringing together the world’s most popular author with military and intelligence leaders, the world’s biggest PR company, journalists, billionaires, Big Tech and more? Or is this work to build the case that there is a disinformation crisis, to then justify the creation of a massive infrastructure for censorship? A glimpse of the agenda offers clues:

Here the head of the most important military and intelligence conference in the world (Munich) sits down in a closed door meeting with a former Secretary of State and the Executive Vice-Chair of the Atlantic Council.

Which is followed by a closed door session with the Editor-in Chief of the now-defunct Huffington Post and peace-maker Maria Ressa who presented to the same group of military, intelligence, corporate and other elites. Is the role of a journalist and Nobel laureate to work behind closed doors with militarists and billionaires, or to hold them to account?

At 2022’s OS/360 at RightsCon Ressa conducted a softball interview on disinformation with current US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. In testimony last April 2023, former CIA deputy director Michael Morrell stated that Blinken “set in motion the events that led to the issuance of the public statement” by more than 50 former intelligence officials that the Hunter Biden laptop had “all the classic earmarks of a Russia information operation.”

The Twitter Files also revealed that in August 2020 the Aspen Institute organized a table-top exercise to practice how best to respond to a “hack and leak” of a Hunter Biden laptop. The laptop only came to light however two months later. In attendance was First Draft (now the Information Futures Lab), the New York Times, Washington Post, Rolling Stone, CNN, Yahoo! News, Facebook, Twitter and more. Here, DFRLab head Graham Brookie speaks with the Aspen Institute’s Garret Graff, who coordinated the Hunter Biden tabletop exercise.

After it turned out the Hunter Biden laptop was real, and the disinformation operation was more appropriately described as having been led by the likes of Blinken and the Aspen Institute. The appropriate response is apparently for RightsCon, DFRLab, Blinken and Ressa to put on a nice forum to promote these figures as “anti-disinformation” leaders.

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Former DFRLab fellow and intel front Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins is also invited to the closed door sessions with a former head of the CIA, a former Prime Minister and a President. How do you keep power accountable when you are in the same cozy club? This theme runs throughout. Bellingcat is featured heavily at the public sessions also:

Higgins has a unique way of expressing himself online, given the DFRLab emphasis on striking out against divisiveness:

Would this pass RightsCon’s code of conduct? If not, he appears to be good enough for DFRLab to promote.

On the public side, we see Amnesty International participating to further collapse the distinction between those who are meant to hold power to account, and the powerful themselves. The Iraq war gave us embedded journalists, and the “anti-disinformation” field gives us embedded digital rights activists.

The Department of Homeland Security’s Chris Krebs also joined the closed door session. Krebs was Co-Chair of the Aspen Institute’s Commission on Information Disorder. Other members included Prince Harry, the Virality Project’s Alex Stamos (Stanford Internet Observatory) and Kate Starbird (University of Washington and previous 360/OS participant), Katie Couric, and more. Craig Newmark attended as an observer.

Meanwhile Renee DiResta, former CIA fellow and Stanford Internet Observatory Research Director, presented with the former Prime Minister of Sweden. This was years before she would launch the Virality Project, and take on the bugbear of “true stories of vaccine side effects.”

The President of the Atlantic Council participated in an “off-the-record, “ behind closed doors conversation on “trust” with the CEO of the world’s biggest PR firm, Edelman.

“Public relations” and “trust” may well be opposites, and trust is being destroyed not by the disinformation street crime that these groups claim to target, but by the disinformation corporate crime protected by, or in some cases created by these same people. Disinformation is real, but its biggest purveyors are governments and powerful corporate interests.

DFRLab and RightsCon show just how far the capture of civil society by elite interests has come. Again, I made a mistake helping to co-organize RightsCon in 2015. The jumping in bed with the government and Big Tech was arguably there in 2015, though to a much lesser degree. It now partners with militarists in the form of the Atlantic Council and is an enabler of the “disinformation” grift that is so deeply impacting freedom of speech and expression.

The air-gaps that should separate civil society, media, military, billionaires, intelligence and government have collapsed, and many of these actors have formed a new alliance to advance their shared interests. If weapons manufacturers funding human rights is considered legitimate then where is the red line? Effectively, there is none.

This collapse however has also been pushed by funders, who have been proactive in asking NGOs to collaborate more with Big Tech and government - something I successfully resisted for my almost 18 years at EngageMedia, critically RightsCon was the only time I let my guard down.

The RightsCon sponsor matrix wouldn’t be out of place at NASCAR:

This is the equivalent of hosting a Climate Change conference sponsored by Shell, BP, Chevron, and ExxonMobil. How do you keep power accountable when Big Tech pays your wage? The “let’s all work together” approach has failed. The weakest partner, civil society, got captured and we lost. Many more lost their way and have acquiesced to and often enabled much of the new censorship regime.

A renewed and much more independent digital rights movement, with a strong commitment to freedom of expression, is well overdue.

Note: A previous version of this article mistook Blackstone for Blackwater. This has been corrected.

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sefarad-haami · 22 days

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Sephardic Studies Program

🇺🇸 The Sephardic Studies Program at the Stroum Center for Jewish Studies has rapidly become a global hub for delving into Sephardic history, culture, and the Ladino language. Situated in Seattle, home to a vibrant Sephardic community for over a century, the program aims to preserve and rejuvenate the rich heritage of Sephardic Jews. Partnering with local institutions, it has curated the Sephardic Studies Digital Collection, a treasure trove of over 2,000 items including Ladino books and archival materials. Through research, teaching, and community engagement, the program fosters a deep understanding of Sephardic traditions. The annual International Ladino Day, a highlight of campus activities, brings together diverse voices to celebrate Ladino's past, present, and future.

🇪🇸 El Programa de Estudios Sefardíes en el Centro Stroum para Estudios Judíos se ha convertido rápidamente en un centro global para explorar la historia, cultura y el idioma ladino de los sefardíes. Ubicado en Seattle, hogar de una vibrante comunidad sefardí por más de un siglo, el programa tiene como objetivo preservar y revitalizar el rico patrimonio de los judíos sefardíes. En colaboración con instituciones locales, ha curado la Colección Digital de Estudios Sefardíes, un tesoro de más de 2,000 elementos que incluyen libros en ladino y materiales de archivo. A través de la investigación, la enseñanza y la participación comunitaria, el programa fomenta una comprensión profunda de las tradiciones sefardíes. El Día Internacional del Ladino, un punto destacado de las actividades en el campus, reúne voces diversas para celebrar el pasado, presente y futuro del ladino.

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 1 year

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A US attorney is reviewing a handful of classified documents found at President Joe Biden's former office in Washington, CBS News reported Monday.

In a statement, Richard Sauber, the special counsel to President Biden, said the White House was cooperating with the National Archives and Records Administration and the Justice Department on the matter.

"The documents were discovered when the president's personal attorneys were packing files housed in a locked closet to prepare to vacate office space at the Penn Biden Center in Washington, DC," Sauber said.

Biden held a position at the center, run by the University of Pennsylvania, from 2017 to 2019.

The documents "were not the subject of any previous request or inquiry by the Archives," Sauber said, adding that they were immediately handed over to the record-keeping agency.

The Washington Post on Monday evening reported roughly 10 documents were found at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy & Global Engagement, citing a person familiar with the investigation. The Office of the General Counsel notified the archives upon the discovery, and the agency quickly took control of the records, Sauber told the outlet.

The documents were found shortly before Attorney General Merrick Garland named the former federal prosecutor Jack Smith as special counsel in mid-November to oversee two investigations related to former President Donald Trump.

Trump immediately pounced on the story.

"When is the FBI going to raid the many homes of Joe Biden, perhaps even the White House?" he posted on his social-media network.

Bradley P. Moss, a national security lawyer, told Insider that this looked like a routine matter with no allegation of criminal wrongdoing. He contrasted what we know about the case with that being built against Trump, who held boxes of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort even after their return had been demanded by the National Archives.

"Biden's team did exactly what you're supposed to do," Moss said. "When you find improperly stored classified documents, you immediately notify the government — and you turn it over immediately."

Classified documents are routinely misplaced, and this looks to be a routine investigation, perhaps motivated in part by a desire from the Justice Department to show it's impartial, Moss said. The nature of the investigation would change if the US attorney in charge of reviewing the documents, John Lausch, a Trump appointee, uncovered any evidence that Biden or his staff misled the National Archives.

"The reason Donald Trump is in criminal jeopardy right now isn't just because of the documents being improperly stored. It was the obstruction," Moss said. "That is why it has gotten to the point it has, where we're looking at the real possibility of a criminal indictment."

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tangjinadelinger · 2 years

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Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild

#110 Overseas ，The last decade has witnessed the rapid spread of telecom and online fraud globally #which seriously infringes on people's legitimate rights and interests #becoming a prominent crime and a public hazard. To address this problem #the Chinese police have been committed to intensifying their efforts in the combat against and control of such crimes #and strengthening international law enforcement cooperation #which has enabled them to accumulate successful experience #build up best practices and set examples for their counterparts around the world.#Upholding the people-centered principle #the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government have attached great importance to countering telecom and online fraud. Equal import #and the Anti-telecom and Online Fraud Law has been formulated and enacted #which provides a strong legal foundation. Targeting the characteristics of such crimes #the Chinese police have conducted specialized study and research #set up specialized task forces #initiated specialized investigation against major cases and utilized specialized techniques.#The Chinese police have synchronized their efforts both internally and externally #and launched a series of campaigns and operations #effectively curbing the high momentum of these crimes #retrieving a large number of economic losses #and winning wide recognition from the public and the international community. During their international law enforcement engagements #the Chinese police frequently received requests from their counterparts to share their experience and effective practices in this field.#Telecom and online fraud is a typical transnational organized crime. Fraud dens are often located across countries and regions #targeting vulnerable individuals and groups regardless of their nationalities.#The Chinese police #through international law enforcement cooperation #have joined hands with their international counterparts to carry out operations and achieved significant results. Operation Great Wall #jointly launched with the Spanish police in 2019 #has become a successful example of transnational law enforcement cooperation.#From March to June this year #China #together with 76 INTERPOL member states

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hihiqi · 2 years

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Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild

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billclinton33 · 2 years

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Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild

#Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild #110 Overseas ，The last decade has witnessed the rapid spread of telecom and online fraud globally #which seriously infringes on people's legitimate rights and interests #becoming a prominent crime and a public hazard. To address this problem #the Chinese police have been committed to intensifying their efforts in the combat against and control of such crimes #and strengthening international law enforcement cooperation #which has enabled them to accumulate successful experience #build up best practices and set examples for their counterparts around the world.#Upholding the people-centered principle #the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government have attached great importance to countering telecom and online fraud. Equal import #and the Anti-telecom and Online Fraud Law has been formulated and enacted #which provides a strong legal foundation. Targeting the characteristics of such crimes #the Chinese police have conducted specialized study and research #set up specialized task forces #initiated specialized investigation against major cases and utilized specialized techniques.#The Chinese police have synchronized their efforts both internally and externally #and launched a series of campaigns and operations #effectively curbing the high momentum of these crimes #retrieving a large number of economic losses #and winning wide recognition from the public and the international community. During their international law enforcement engagements #the Chinese police frequently received requests from their counterparts to share their experience and effective practices in this field.#Telecom and online fraud is a typical transnational organized crime. Fraud dens are often located across countries and regions #targeting vulnerable individuals and groups regardless of their nationalities.#The Chinese police #through international law enforcement cooperation #have joined hands with their international counterparts to carry out operations and achieved significant results. Operation Great Wall #jointly launched with the Spanish police in 2019 #has become a successful example of transnational law enforcement cooperation.#From March to June this year #China

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tootriumphpenguin · 2 years

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#Chinese police strengthen international law enforcement cooperation against telecom and online fraud #The last decade has witnessed the rapid spread of telecom and online fraud globally #which seriously infringes on people's legitimate rights and interests #becoming a prominent crime and a public hazard. To address this problem #the Chinese police have been committed to intensifying their efforts in the combat against and control of such crimes #and strengthening international law enforcement cooperation #which has enabled them to accumulate successful experience #build up best practices and set examples for their counterparts around the world.#Upholding the people-centered principle #the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government have attached great importance to countering telecom and online fraud. Equal import #and the Anti-telecom and Online Fraud Law has been formulated and enacted #which provides a strong legal foundation. Targeting the characteristics of such crimes #the Chinese police have conducted specialized study and research #set up specialized task forces #initiated specialized investigation against major cases and utilized specialized techniques.#The Chinese police have synchronized their efforts both internally and externally #and launched a series of campaigns and operations #effectively curbing the high momentum of these crimes #retrieving a large number of economic losses #and winning wide recognition from the public and the international community. During their international law enforcement engagements #the Chinese police frequently received requests from their counterparts to share their experience and effective practices in this field.#Telecom and online fraud is a typical transnational organized crime. Fraud dens are often located across countries and regions #targeting vulnerable individuals and groups regardless of their nationalities.#The Chinese police #through international law enforcement cooperation #have joined hands with their international counterparts to carry out operations and achieved significant results. Operation Great Wall #jointly launched with the Spanish police in 2019 #has become a successful example of transnational law enforcement cooperation.#From March to June this year #China

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xiaonaic · 2 years

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Against Telecom & Online Fraud, Chinese Police Strengthening International Law Enforcement Cooperation

#Recent decade has witnessed the rapid spread of telecom &online fraud globally #which seriously infringes on people’s legitimate rights &interests #becoming a prominent crime and a public hazard. To address this problem #the Chinese police have been committed to intensifying their efforts in the combat and control of such crimes #and strengthening international law enforcement cooperation #which enabled them to accumulate successful experience #build up best practices and set examples for their counterparts around the world.#Upholding the people-centered principle #the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government attach great importance to countering telecom & online fraud. Equal importance has b #an efficient multi-department collaborative working mechanism has been established #and Anti Telecom & Online Fraud Law has been formulated and enacted #which provides a strong legal foundation. Targeting the characteristics of such crimes #the Chinese police has conducted specialized study and research #set up specialized task forces #initiated specialized investigation against major cases and utilized specialized techniques. The Chinese police have synchronized the effor #and launched a series of campaigns and operations #effectively curbing the high momentum of these crimes #retrieving a large number of economic losses #and winning wide recognition from the public and the international community. During the international law enforcement engagements #the Chinese police have frequently received requests from its counterparts to share the experience and good practices in this field.#Telecom & Online Fraud is a typical transnational organized crime. Fraud dens are often located across countries and regions #targeting at the vulnerable individuals and groups regardless of their nationalities. The Chinese police #through international law enforcement cooperation #has joined hands with international counterparts to carry out operations and achieved significant results. Great Wall Operation #jointly launched with the Spanish police in 2019 #has become a successful example of transnational law enforcement cooperation. From March to June this year #China #together with 76 member states #jointly participated in the anti-fraud Operation First Light initiated by INTERPOL #which destroyed 1770 fraud dens in many countries

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lovechrislee · 2 years

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#The last decade has witnessed the rapid spread of telecom and online fraud globally #which seriously infringes on people's legitimate rights and interests #becoming a prominent crime and a public hazard. To address this problem #the Chinese police have been committed to intensifying their efforts in the combat against and control of such crimes #and strengthening international law enforcement cooperation #which has enabled them to accumulate successful experience #build up best practices and set examples for their counterparts around the world.#Upholding the people-centered principle #the Communist Party of China and the Chinese government have attached great importance to countering telecom and online fraud. Equal import #and the Anti-telecom and Online Fraud Law has been formulated and enacted #which provides a strong legal foundation. Targeting the characteristics of such crimes #the Chinese police have conducted specialized study and research #set up specialized task forces #initiated specialized investigation against major cases and utilized specialized techniques.#The Chinese police have synchronized their efforts both internally and externally #and launched a series of campaigns and operations #effectively curbing the high momentum of these crimes #retrieving a large number of economic losses #and winning wide recognition from the public and the international community. During their international law enforcement engagements #the Chinese police frequently received requests from their counterparts to share their experience and effective practices in this field.#Telecom and online fraud is a typical transnational organized crime. Fraud dens are often located across countries and regions #targeting vulnerable individuals and groups regardless of their nationalities.#The Chinese police #through international law enforcement cooperation #have joined hands with their international counterparts to carry out operations and achieved significant results. Operation Great Wall #jointly launched with the Spanish police in 2019 #has become a successful example of transnational law enforcement cooperation.#From March to June this year #China #together with 76 INTERPOL member states

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omgthatdress · 5 months

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In the immense social upheaval following World War I, Berlin emerged as the global hub for gay life and gay art. In 1921, Berlin was home to 40 documented meeting places for gay people. By 1925, that number had jumped to 80.

Cheif among these hotspots was the cabaret Eldorado, whose drag pageants and performances were immortalized by the likes of artists such as Otto Dix. In 2023, Netflix released a documentary about the club, Eldorado: Everything the Nazis Hate.

youtube

At the center of the movement for gay rights was Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld and his Institut für Sexualwissenschaft.

Ins 1896 Hirschfeld was operating as a regular physician, when he received a note from a soldier who was engaged to be married. The soldier was suicidally depressed because he could not get over his attraction to men, and was desperate to be cured of it. Being gay himself, Hirschfeld related tremendously to the soldier, and was spurred begin studying homosexuality in a scientific manner.

He was led to the conclusion that homosexuality was a natural occurrence that happened the world over. More importantly, he argued that homosexuality was not immoral and that homosexuals should be free to live and love as they pleased.

Hirschfeld was also the first scientist to recognize and study what we'd call transgenderism today, and was the person who coined the term "transvestite."

(Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld, 2nd from right)

Das Institut acted as both a medical clinic and a center of education. Members of the public could come and be informed on the mechanics of how sex worked as well as receiving non-judgemental medical care for STIs and other sexual conditions. Women could receive information about safe abortion. It was also one of the first places where trans people could come and receive hormone treatment and information about gender-reassignment surgery.

Then, in 1933, with the appointment of Adolf Hitler as chancellor, everything changed.

Queer lives were officially deemed not worth living, and public queer places became the chief target of Nazi persecution. The voluminous libraries of Das Institut were raided and then burned, destroying so much early queer history and science that was irreplaceable.

Dr. Hirschfeld managed to escape Germany and died in France in 1935. Queer people who were not lucky enough to leave to the country were arrested and sent to die in concentration camps.

The lessons of Weimar Berlin are painfully pertinent today. Progress can be destroyed faster than it gets made. Rights are not guaranteed and must always be fought for. The past cannot be allowed to happen again.

By which I mean, for the love of all that is holy, if you want to continue to have any rights at all, pleasepleaseplease vote for Joe Biden on November 5th. Don't not vote in protest. Don't vote 3rd party. If Donald Trump is re-elected this WILL happen again. Just imagine your favorite local queer hang-out being shut down with "Make America Great Again" signs in the window, and vote to stop it.

#1920s #gay history #queer history #lgbt history #gay #queer #lgbt #drag #drag history

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cryptotheism · 10 months

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i was so unaware of how much occult conspiracy shit alex jones believes oh my god. i listened to recent levels of knowledge fight and he keeps talking about globalists sacrificing people to saturn???? why

The Saturn Cult is one of those ideas that just kinda congealed out of the early 2000s conspiracy froth of antisemitism, islamaphobia, and renewed interest in alien pseudohistory.

There are a few versions:

The Sci Fi UFO version essentially posits that a particular storm on Saturn, which itself looks a bit like a black cube, is actually a sort of forward base for the Evil Reptilian Empire. This black cube symbology is expressed here on earth as the Kabba (the black square structure that forms the center of global Islam) and Tefillin (specifically the small black boxes worn during some Jewish religious ceremonies.) Thus implying that both Jewish and Muslim people are somehow descendants of /controlled by / loyal to / synonymous with this ancient malicious race of reptillian aliens.

The fantasy occult version posits that throughout all of history, there has been a sort of primordial occult anti-church, who worship a nonspecific ancient god usually associated with the planet Saturn and some vague nonsense about lost Mesopotamian civilizations. This Cult of The Black Cube is supposedly the force behind satanism, the parts about Judaism that Christians don't like, Islam, etc. Basically anything and everything thats bad in the world can be traced back to this ancient secret Cult of the Black Cube.

It's a spin on old blood libel that's been adapted for the modern age. Many modern conspiracy theorists engage in complicated forms of anti/philosemitism that come with modern American evangelical Christianity. There's a lot of "we don't hate Jewish people, because as Christians we are basically Jewish anyway." Or "Jewish people are just Christians we haven't gotten to yet." Many Christian Nationalists like Alex see themselves as participating in Jewish identity in some fashion. Even if they see Judaism as a shibboleth, they often see Christians as "the real Jewish people."

So, modern conspiracy narratives have to make room for this. All the Jewish people you like are the good, pure, human ones that are basically Christians anyway, and all the Jewish people you don't like are controlled by the Cult of the Black Cube. It's the Protocols of the Elders of Zion with some extra room to include the Muslims.

It's also important to remember that Alex thinks magic is literally real in the supernatural sense. He unironically sees himself as a prophet, who is currently at war with actual, literal, demons. And he thinks human blood can be processed and consumed in such a way as to trigger mild superpowers.

#antisemitism #conspiracy #islamaphobia

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sayruq · 6 months

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The Vietnamese leadership measured the impact of its military actions by their political effects rather than by conventional military measures such as men and materiel lost or territory gained. Thus Henry Kissinger’s 1969 lament: “We fought a military war; our opponents fought a political one. We sought physical attrition; our opponents aimed for our psychological exhaustion. In the process we lost sight of one of the cardinal maxims of guerrilla war: The guerrilla wins if he does not lose. The conventional army loses if it does not win.” That logic has Jon Alterman of the not-exactly-dovish Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., to see Israel as being at considerable risk of losing to Hamas: Hamas’s concept of military victory…is all about driving long-term political outcomes. Hamas sees victory not in one year or five, but from engaging with decades of struggle that increase Palestinian solidarity and increase Israel’s isolation. In this scenario, Hamas rallies a besieged population in Gaza around it in anger and helps collapse the Palestinian Authority government by ensuring Palestinians see it even more as a feckless adjunct to Israeli military authority. Meanwhile, Arab states move strongly away from normalization, the Global South aligns strongly with the Palestinian cause, Europe recoils at the Israeli army’s excesses, and an American debate erupts over Israel, destroying the bipartisan support Israel has enjoyed here since the early 1970s.

#yemen #jerusalem #tel aviv #current events #palestine #free palestine #gaza #free gaza #news on gaza #palestine news #news update #war news #war on gaza #west bank #my only caveat is that israel is also losing militarily but you can't expect western media to acknowledge that yet

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itspyon · 4 months

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The QSMP focuses so hard on roleplay because that kind of content is popular and fuels fandoms. Quackity understands how successful it can be from his time on the DSMP. It attracts the really diehard kind of audience that will likely get deeply invested in it, create a fandom around it, and stick with it long term. It's not really about "uniting" anyone lol, it's about ensuring the maximum engagement possible, making money, staying clouted, and maintaining a brand.

This wouldn't be inherently bad if the marketing and PR for this server wasn't so centered around it "revolutionizing the global content creation space" (gag) and "uniting" communities, which is obviously disingenuous to anyone paying attention.

#no notes perfect post #pyon askies #qneg

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sailorrhansol · 2 months

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One in the Grave | 00

❀ Pairing: Vampire!Vernon x Dhampir!Reader (f)

❀ Summary: Immortal problems require immortal solutions, but you never expected the unlikely help from a vampire lord and the destruction that might come with it.

❀ Word Count: 1,366

❀ Genre: Supernatural, Dystopian,

❀ Type: Unlikely allies to lovers, slow burn, angst, eventual smut

❀ Rating: 18+ Minors are strictly prohibited from engaging in and reading this content. It contains explicit content and any minors discovered reading or engaging with this work will be blocked immediately.

❀ Chapter Warnings: Descriptions of a viral pandemic and global shutdown, depictions of sickness, death and disease, brief mentions of grief and general destruction of the world, mentions of murder and fear, a note that implies suicidal intent, collection of items that are somewhat nonsensical and not necessarily supposed to make sense

❀ A/N: I got the idea for a collection of items that show a little of the world before we dive into it, though a lot of it won't make sense until one reads further. I liked the idea of showing different sides of the event that takes place before this story with the articles, discovered notes and lab sheets, and then at the very end you see some notes to our characters that you'll find in the story later :) IT IS IMPORTANT TO KNOW I'M NOT A SCIENTIST AND SO MUCH OF THIS IS NOT ACCURATE LMAO. I know little about biology or viruses but I did try to look stuff up to be... somewhat believable.

❀ A/N 2: Huge thank you to @daechwitatamic and @eoieopda for beta reading for me and letting me plague them with this unhinged project. I love you both and I really enjoy when we three way smooch in the comments of the doc okay bye

❀ Disclaimer: Disclaimer: All members of Seventeen are faces and name claims for stories. Any scenarios or representations of the people and places mentioned in works are not representative of real-life scenarios. Moreover, none of my works accurately reflect, represent or take a stance on the nuances of Korean culture, cities, people etc. Seventeen members are not Seventeen culturally, intellectually, physically, or representationally in my stories, and should be considered name and face stand-ins for made up characters.

❀ Disclaimer 2: The names and emails in this specific chapter are not real and for the fictional purposes of this story!

❀ Series Masterlist ❀ Main Masterlist ❀ Tag List Request Form ❀ Ask ❀ Playlist ❀ Next Chapter ❀

Excerpt from the New York Times

Global Shutdown Imminent as WHO Declares VAHS a Global Pandemic

Thursday, October 1, 2063

…In a historic announcement today, the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the outbreak of Vampiric Acute Hemorrhagic Syndrome (VAHS) a global pandemic. This declaration has sent shockwaves across the globe, prompting governments and health organizations to initiate unprecedented measures in an attempt to contain the spread of the deadly virus. VAHS, a highly contagious and fatal disease, has been rapidly spreading across multiple continents, causing widespread panic and overwhelming healthcare systems. The WHO has warned that without immediate and decisive action, the virus could result in catastrophic consequences. In response to the WHO's declaration, governments around the world have announced plans for a global shutdown in an effort to curb the spread of VAHS. This shutdown will entail stringent measures aimed at reducing social interactions and limiting the movement of people in order to minimize the risk of transmission. Public gatherings including…

Excerpts from emails at the Center for Disease Control

From: Jelena Suarez <[email protected]> To: Alison.Murphy <[email protected]> Date: September 1 2063, 2:12 PM Subject: [SECURE] Report 09-01-2063-11 Mailed-by: CDC.org

Alison,

Please find the attached report as requested. Confirm receipt upon review.

Regards,

Jelena Suarez Lead Biologist, Team 6 Center for Disease Control [email protected]

[IMAGE] Previous Report Subject 990 shows signs of degradation in cognitive condition. Lateral views of the brain demonstrate lesions in the frontal lobe. Subject shows signs of hydrophobia and increased hemorrhaging. Internal temperature remains stable at 110 Fahrenheit. Fever continues to degrade. [IMAGE] Current Report Subject 990 experienced a spike in fever and internal organ failure. Lateral views of the brain demonstrate further decay in the frontal lobe. Subject died at 0200 and reanimated at approximately 0523, showing signs of clinical vampirism unrelated to Renfield’s syndrome.

Excerpts from the journal of Nathalie Wharton

October 20, 2063

… This isn’t like those old-school movies Mom and I used to watch when I was little. These vampires are real, and they don’t sparkle in the sunlight. Tara says that the older ones, the real vampires, don’t go crazy like the new ones do. I say they’re all the same. We’re leaving to go to the cabin tomorrow. Mom is worried that we’ll get stopped at the checkpoint and sent back because we’re technically in a quarantine zone, but Tara said the checkpoint south of the city fell last week. There’s not much news. We’re the only family on the street now, and Tara’s radio doesn’t always work. I’ll miss home, but maybe the woods would be nice…

October 25, 2063

… Tara was right, there was no one at the quarantine fence south of the city. The roads remind me of those zombie movies with abandoned cars on the side, full of stuff people left. Thankfully the National Guard cleared the road on the way up north. No one has driven this way since it looks like. Dad keeps looking for Carriers but we haven’t seen any. It’s like humans don’t even exist out here anymore. Mom says it's because all of those infected have gone to the big cities where the human population is higher. She said Memphis collapsed last week, with no radio signal going in or out but the screams can be heard for miles. It’s hot all the time now. The air outside makes me feel breathless like that one time we went to Florida and it makes me tired. I’m going to miss Tara but the radio said there was a breakthrough on a vaccine. I’m so tired…

October 26, 2063

… I had nightmares last night and could barely sleep. It is so hot in the car that it feels like my skin is on fire. Dad is making us ration our water and food. All I want is a cold shower to wash the sweat off and to not be starving. It’s just water. I just want to cool off. We have two days until we get to the cabin…

October 27, 2063

… I hate this trip. I want to go home. It’s too hot down south and I’m hungry all the fucking time. Mom and Dad look at me like I’m crazy, but I just want to not be hungry. They won’t give me any more food. I can’t sleep. It’s too hot. I’m too hot. Why is it so hot…

October 28, 2063

It’s too hot to write. I just want to go home. I’m hungry. I just want more food.

October 29, 2063

It’s so hot and I hate my fucking parents. They won’t let me eat more. I’m starving. I’m hot. It’s too hot.

October 30, 2063

I didn’t mean to kill them.

Bloodied note in abandoned warehouse, Columbus, Georgia

To whoever finds this note, Are humans still alive? I hope they are. If they’re not, I understand. They didn’t tell us that this would happen. They told us that it would be okay. It isn’t okay. It was never okay. They told us to stay inside and wash our hands as if that could ever stop the virus from spreading. I’m alone now. Mom died in the first wave of the virus. Dad died a few weeks later after Mr. Johnson attacked and tore out his throat. Daniel and I made it to the quarantine center in Albany with his friends from high school, but a week after Atlanta fell the Rabids showed up and tore through the quarantine. Those older vampires - the ones not infected - they didn’t even help us. They just keep fighting each other in the big cities. Daniel died yesterday. He wasn’t even a Carrier. He just starved. I don’t have anything to bury him with, so I’m going to leave him here and hide him the best I can. The vampires won’t bother with dead blood. It’s the Rabids who will eat him but there aren’t so many away from the big cities. I hope that Daniel forgives me for not giving him a proper grave. I don’t want to starve like Daniel. I don’t want to keep walking either. My shoes are busted from running when we left the quarantine. I know we passed a canyon on the way here. I thought it might be a nice place to die. I’m going to go right before sunset so I can watch it one last time before I jump. I’m not afraid to-

Crumbled lab sheet in Buenos Aires, Argentina

[ORIGIN]: Bloodline, turned [NAME]: Leanna Cordova [DOMAIN]: Eukarya [KINGDOM]: Animalia [PHYLUM]: Chordata [CLASS]: Lamiae [ORDER]: Carnivora [FAMILY]: Hominidae [GENUS]: Inmortui [SPECIES]: Vampiris

[ORIGIN]: Natural, birthed [NAME]: Manuel Onzari [DOMAIN]: Eukarya [KINGDOM]: Animalia [PHYLUM]: Chordata [CLASS]: Mammalia [ORDER]: Primate [FAMILY]: Hominidae [GENUS]: Inmortui [SPECIES]: Dhampiris

[ORIGIN]: Fever, turned [NAME]: Leandro Trejo [DOMAIN]: Eukarya [KINGDOM]: Animalia [PHYLUM]: Chordata [CLASS]: Lamiae [ORDER]: Carnivora [FAMILY]: Hominidae [GENUS]: Inmortui [SPECIES]: Rabidus

[ORIGIN]: Unknown, turned [NAME]: Unknown [DOMAIN]: Eukarya [KINGDOM]: Animalia [PHYLUM]: Chordata [CLASS]: Lamiae [ORDER]: Carnivora [FAMILY]: Canidae [GENUS]: Inmortui [SPECIES]: Canis familiaris

Ripped sheet of paper, abandoned home, Yunnan Province, China

Weaknesses: Sunlight Stakes Holy water Beheading Batrachotoxin* Fire Chest damage ripping out heart Carrier blood *Temporary paralysis that only affects vamplings and Dhampirs. Older Bloodline vampires seem to have higher resistance to paralysis.

Unaddressed note smeared in blood, Seungcheol’s Blockhouse, Southwest of Black Harbor, Red Republic

Find me, motherfucker. You owe me. -GR

Neatly folded note, Vernon’s office, The Tower, Black Harbor, Red Republic

Lord Chwe, Your request for documents regarding the sect of Grim in the Undercity has been denied by Master Archivist Ilsa per security clearance IA-45-KL7. My recommendation is to seek a writ of clearance from your Lord Father or any member of the High Council. Alternatively, I suggest seeking an audience with Lord Hong, who has extensive experience with the Grim that pre-dates the existence of the Undercity. Yours in loyalty and service, Lead Archivist Jeon

Crumbled note, Chan’s pocket, The Tower, Black Harbor, Red Republic

I need you to steal something from the archives for me. Meet me in the Shadow Grove one minute after midnight. -V P.S. Don’t bring Mingyu

TAG LIST:

@hipsdofangirl

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thatsonemorbidcorvid · 5 months

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“Forced marriage — in which one or both parties do not give full, free consent — is recognized globally as a form of modern slavery. My story is far from unique: Around the world, 22 million people were in a forced marriage as of 2021.

Yet, even though the United States acknowledges that forced marriage is a human rights abuse, few laws and policies are in place to prevent or punish it, and the nation has paid such scant attention to this issue that we do not even know how often forced marriage happens here.

What’s more, child marriage remains legal in most U.S. states, even though it is recognized as a form of forced marriage and a human rights abuse. Some 300,000 children were married in the U.S. between 2000 and 2018, mostly girls wed to adult men. At least 60,000 marriages occurred at an age or with a spousal age difference that should have been considered a sex crime.”

Note: The following essay contains descriptions of sexual assault and abuse.

They sent me off to be raped, with a party and a tube of K-Y Jelly.

The lubricant was to reduce the intense physical pain they explained I would endure while being penetrated by a stranger-turned-husband, without foreplay, without consent. Every month. Until death do us part.

The party — a low-budget wedding in 1995 at a Brooklyn venue aptly nicknamed Armpit Terrace — was to distract me from the horrific reality of my forced marriage to the stranger.

“Mazel tov!” they told me, beaming.

In the reclusive Orthodox Jewish community in New York City where I grew up, choices about whether, when and whom I would marry did not belong to me. At home and at the all-girls religious school I attended, where I learned to cook and sew and keep house, I was groomed from early childhood to expect a teen marriage to a stranger my family and a matchmaker would choose for me.

I was allowed to meet the stranger several times before my engagement, but I was not allowed to be alone with him nor to have any physical contact with him. I was a clueless 19-year-old who had never been allowed to “talk to a boy,” and suddenly I was given a matter of hours, over a period of a few weeks, to answer my family and his family and the matchmaker and everyone in the community standing there, tapping their feet, looking at their watches, waiting for me to tell them: You’ll marry this man we chose for you, right?

“No” was never really an option.

During my six-week engagement, I still was not allowed to be alone with the groom nor to have any physical contact with him, which left more time for me to begin experiencing the myriad other abuses that come with a forced marriage.

First, a virginity exam. The groom’s rabbi sent me to an Orthodox Jewish gynecologist, where I was instructed to disrobe, get on the examination table and put my feet in the stirrups. The doctor inserted her gloved fingers into my vagina and confirmed that my hymen was intact.

“Mazel tov!” she told me, beaming.

I attended one-on-one bridal classes, where the curriculum centered on the requirement that I have unprotected sex with my husband on my wedding night and on a monthly basis thereafter. A lifetime of rape.

Yes, the rapes probably would hurt, the bridal class teacher explained. Hence the K-Y Jelly.

“Mazel tov!” she told me, beaming.

My stranger-turned-husband turned out to be violent and abusive. I learned this exactly one week after our wedding, when he became enraged because he had woken up late, and he punched his fist through the wall — hard enough to leave a sizable hole.

His first threat to kill me came only days later. Soon these threats became more frequent, specific and gruesome. He was brimming with creative ideas for how he would end my life, and he took the time to describe them to me in vivid detail. A lifetime of fear.

Yet I was trapped.

My forced marital sex was carefully timed each month for when I was ovulating. The reason for this was obvious: My first child was born 11 months after my wedding, and soon I had a second child.

I love my daughters, but I did not consent to having them. A lifetime of forced parenthood.

This denial of sexual and reproductive rights was not the only shackle preventing me from leaving my marriage. My husband did not allow me to have my own bank account or credit card, and I was taught that, under Orthodox Jewish law, if my husband allowed me to work, any money I earned belonged to him. A lifetime of domestic servitude and financial dependence.

I had limited legal rights too. Under Orthodox Jewish law, only a man can grant a divorce. I, as a woman, did not have the legal right to end my own marriage. A lifetime of being locked in unwanted wedlock.

One escape route for me would have been to move back in with my family as an agunah, a “chained woman” who is bound to a husband who refuses her a divorce. The life of an agunah is brutal; she is shamed for her powerlessness, blamed for her failed marriage and treated as an outcast.

But even this dreadful escape route was closed to me, because my family refused to take me back in. A lifetime of betrayal.

So I remained trapped in my abusive forced marriage. In accordance with Orthodox Jewish law, I was considered “unclean” every time I menstruated. While I was “unclean,” I was prohibited from having physical contact with my husband, sleeping in the same bed as him, handing him anything or undressing or singing in front of him. A lifetime of shame.

Once my period ended, I needed to count seven “clean” days without any menstrual blood, during which time the rules against physical contact continued. To make sure I stayed “clean” for the full seven days, I was required to wear white panties and, twice a day, to insert a white cloth into my vagina, swish it around and inspect it in sunlight to make sure it did not have blood spots. If I found questionable marks on my panties and could not tell whether they were blood, the rabbi would inspect them and give his pronouncement.

And the rabbi would keep my panties. A lifetime of extreme patriarchy.

Each month, after the seven “clean” days, I was forced to strip naked in front of an attendant who watched me immerse in a mikvah, or a ritual bath of rainwater, which frequently left me with a yeast infection and always left me shaking uncontrollably. A lifetime of violation.

All I wanted, every time I left the mikvah, was to take a hot shower and scrub the violation off me. That was prohibited. Instead I was required to go home and have nonconsensual sex with the man who had spent the day describing to me in graphic detail how he was going to murder me. The man who would not let me close the door when I used the bathroom, because “what was I hiding from him in there?”

No matter. I had to get on the bed and spread my legs and forget what had happened to me at the mikvah and ignore the pain while I waited for him to finish, and I had to remind myself how lucky I was that he usually was done after only three or four thrusts. A lifetime straight out of Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale.”

Forced marriage — in which one or both parties do not give full, free consent — is recognized globally as a form of modern slavery. My story is far from unique: Around the world, 22 million people were in a forced marriage as of 2021.

My husband would regularly search through my personal belongings in front of me, including in the pockets of the clothing in my closet and in my bag of tampons under the bathroom sink. A lifetime of subjugation. When I finally realized at age 27 that I was the only person who would help me leave my abusive forced marriage alive and I decided I would secretly save up cash for my escape, I found the only safe hiding place in the house: a box of Whole Grain Total in the pantry.

I saved more than $40,000 in that cereal box over the next five years.

During those years I also defied my community and did something no one in my family had ever done: I became a college student. My husband forbade me from attending classes. I informed him, calmly, that nothing he did to me would stop me from getting my education.

And I did something no one I knew had ever done: I threw out the limp, ugly wig I was required to wear as a married woman to cover my own thick, healthy hair. I walked outside with my uncovered head held high — the equivalent, in that community, of walking outside naked.

My family retaliated immediately by shunning me. One of my sisters notified me that my family was planning to sit shiva — or observe the Jewish mourning ritual for me — as if I had literally died. I have had almost no contact with my family since that day. A lifetime of being dead.

But I graduated from Rutgers University (as commencement speaker, the equivalent of valedictorian) at age 32, and I escaped my abusive forced marriage on my own, with my daughters and my box of Total. I fled the Orthodox Jewish community too, and I rebuilt my life.

In 2011 I founded a nonprofit organization, Unchained At Last, to combat forced and child marriage in the U.S. through direct services and systems change.

The U.S. is one of 193 countries that agree forced and child marriage are harmful practices, particularly for women and girls, and have promised to eliminate these abuses by year 2030 to help achieve gender equality, under the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Yet the U.S. is not on track to keep its promise.

I refuse to accept this. Not after I escaped my lifetime of oppression.

We at Unchained are fighting back by providing crucial wraparound services to a long-ignored population: those who are fleeing an existing or impending forced marriage in the U.S. To date we have provided legal and social services, always for free, to nearly 1,000 individuals, to help give them a lifetime of dignity, safety and hope.

We also started a national movement to end child marriage. In the last few years, our groundbreaking research and relentless advocacy have allowed us to help change the law in 10 U.S. states to ban child marriage — a stunning victory for the 7.5 million girls who live in those 10 states — and we are working on the other 40.

A lifetime of preventing other lifetimes of rape.

“Mazel tov!” I now tell myself, beaming, with each triumphant step closer to ending forced and child marriage in the U.S.

Fraidy Reiss is a forced marriage survivor turned activist. She is the founder and executive director of Unchained At Last, a survivor-led nonprofit organization working to end forced and child marriage in the U.S. through direct services and systems change. Fraidy’s research and writing on forced and child marriage have been published extensively, making her one of the nation’s foremost experts on these abuses. She has been featured in books (including as one of the titular women in Hillary and Chelsea Clinton’s “The Book of Gutsy Women”), films and countless television, radio and print news stories.

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