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coochiequeens · 5 days

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Common sense is returning.

James Crisp, EUROPE EDITOR 13 April 2024

Dr Hilary Cass said children who think they are transgender should not be given any hormone drugs at all until at least 18 CREDIT: Yui Mok

Belgium and the Netherlands have become the latest countries to question the use of puberty blockers on children after the Cass Review warned of a lack of research on the gender treatment’s long-term effects.

Britain has become the fifth European nation to restrict the use of the drug to those under 18 after initially making them part of their gender treatments.

Their use was based on the “Dutch protocol” - the term used for the practice pioneered in the Netherlands in 1998 and copied around the world, of treating gender dysphoric youth using puberty blockers.

The NHS stopped prescribing the drug, which is meant to curb the trauma of a body maturing into a gender that the patient does not identify with this month.

In Belgium, doctors have called for gender treatment rules to be changed.

Research into impact

“In our opinion, Belgium must reform gender care in children and adolescents following the example of Sweden and Finland, where hormones are regarded as the last resort,” the report by three paediatricians and psychiatrists in Leuven said.

Figures from the Netherlands and the United Kingdom show that more than 95 per cent of individuals who initiated puberty inhibition continue with gender-affirming treatments,” the report by P Vankrunkelsven P, K Casteels K and J De Vleminck said.

“However, when young people with gender dysphoria go through their natural puberty, these feelings will only persist in about 15 per cent.”

The report was published after a 60 per cent rise in the number of Belgium teenagers taking the blockers to stop the development of their bodies. In 2022, 684 people between the ages of nine and 17 were prescribed the drug compared to 432 in 2019, the De Morgen newspaper reported in 2019.

Pressure is also building in the neighbouring Netherlands to look again at their use. The parliament has ordered research into the impact of puberty blockers on adolescent’s physical and mental health.

Dutch protocol

The Telegraph understands that the Amsterdam Center of Expertise on Gender Dysphoria, where the protocol originated, is set to make a statement on the use of puberty blockers next week.

“I too thought that the Dutch gender care was very careful and evidence-based. But now I don’t think that any more,” Jilles Smids, a postdoctoral researcher in medical ethics at Erasmus University in the Netherlands, told The Atlantic.

Attitudes in the Netherlands have hardened against trans rights, with a bill to make it easier for people to legally change their gender being held up in parliament.

The Cass Review said that the NHS had moved away from the restrictions of the original Dutch protocol, and researchers in Belgium have also demanded those restrictions be reintroduced.

Belgium is regarded as one of the most trans-friendly countries in Europe. A minister in the government is transgender and people have been able to legally change their gender without a medical certificate for the past five years.

But the hard-Right Vlaams Belang party is currently leading the polls ahead of national and European elections in June.

It has called for “hormone therapy and sex surgery to be halted for underage patients until clear and concrete research has been carried out.”

‘Greatest ethical scandals’

In March, a report in France described sex reassignment in minors as potentially “one of the greatest ethical scandals in the history of medicine”.

Conservative French senators plan to introduce a bill to ban gender transition treatments for under-18s.

On Monday, the Vatican’s doctrine office published a report that branded gender surgery a grave violation of human dignity on a par with euthanasia and abortion.

Finland was one of the first countries to adopt the Dutch protocol but realised many of its patients did not meet the Protocol’s strict eligibility requirements for the drugs.

It restricted the treatment in 2020 and recommended psychotherapy as the primary care.

Sweden restricted hormone treatments to “exceptional cases” two years later. In December, Norwegian authorities designated the medicine as “under trial”, which means they will only be prescribed to adolescents in clinical trials.

Denmark is finalising new guidelines limiting hormone treatments to teenagers who have had dysphoria since early childhood.

In 2020, Hungary passed a law banning gender changes on legal documents.

“The import and the use of these hormone products are not banned, but subject to case by case approval, however, it is certain that no authority would approve such an application for people under 18,“ a spokesperson told The Telegraph.

In August, Russia criminalised all gender reassignment surgery and hormone treatments.

#Belgium #Netherlands #cass review #Using caution when giving children hormones shouldn't have been controversial in the first place #Dutch protocol #Amsterdam Center of Expertise on Gender Dysphoria #Attitudes haven't hardened against rights for trans people the public just wants a common sense approach to the issue

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nordickies · 2 months

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Sorry if this is a stupid question, but could you tell us more about Åland? 😅 What even is it? Is it a country, a state/province, or something else? (sorry, I have never heard of it before joining the Hetalia fandom)

I love your art, and I would love to see more of your OCs in the future!😊

Hello, anon! Don't worry, that's not a stupid question at all! I'm willing to bet most people are in the same situation as you, so I'd love to help out.

Åland Islands are an autonomous and demilitarised region of Finland. This self-governing region is made up of over 6,700 islands; only of which 65 are inhabited. In addition, there are around 20,000 smaller islands and skerries! The biggest island on the archipelago, and where 90% of the population lives, is Fasta Åland; which is only 45 km long and 55 km wide. The Åland Islands are connected to mainland Finland via the Finnish archipelago and its island clusters. But Åland's easternmost point is only 40 km away from mainland Sweden. The capital, Mariehamn, is located at an almost exact midpoint between Turku and Stockholm.

Up until the 19th century, roads were sparse, in bad shape, and thus practically useless in Nordic countries. The fastest way to transport resources, people, and information was by waterways. Thus, Åland acted as a vital connection between Sweden and Finland, especially when those two countries used to be one massive kingdom. Over the centuries, the islands developed a unique identity, shaped by the isolating harsh nature and influences from both the West and East.

Even though Åland is part of Finland, its only officially recognized language is Swedish. Since 1921, The Åland islands have had special privileges provided by the hembygdsrätt, which roughly translates to "home regional right." Simply put, a person is required to obtain this right before it's possible for them to own property on the island, vote in the local elections, or run a business - having Finnish citizenship is not enough. These rights were created to protect Ålandic identity during a time when Sweden and Finland fought over who the islands should belong to.

To be granted hembygdsrätt, certain conditions must be met; you must have Finnish citizenship, have satisfactory Swedish language skills, be registered in the Åland islands, and have lived in Åland for at least 5 years. Alternatively, if one of the parents has this right, it is also inherited by their child. However, you can also lose hembygdsrätt if you lose Finnish citizenship or live outside of Åland for more than 5 years.

Due to its location in the middle of the Baltic Sea, Åland has always been critical, and powers in the area have wanted to control it; it has been occupied by Swedes, Finns, Danes, Germans, Russians, French, and the English. This geopolitical importance is a reason why the islands have been demilitarized since the 1850s after the events of the Crimean War. Also, while Finland is a military conscription country, Ålandic men (with hembygdsrätt) are exempted from this duty.

Åland is not a sovereign country, but it has self-governing rights and its own government. Åland joined the Nordic Council in 1970 and has two representatives in it. Åland also held a separate referendum, and in 1995, it joined the EU at the same time with Sweden and Finland. Åland has a special status in the European Union, as it's considered a "third territory," meaning it's not part of the EU's value-added tax (VAT) or excise duty area.

Ålanders have a strong and separate national identity, even though they have a Finnish passport and speak Swedish as their native language. However, the separatist movement barely exists nowadays, and Ålanders generally don't see a reason to change the status quo. All the granted special laws and privileges by Finnish and international law are perhaps more helpful and prospering to this tiny island than seeking full independence.

As of December 2019, in a survey conducted by Åland Gallup, 78% of island residents supported Åland continuing to be a self-governing region of Finland. It has been a trend in gallups for decades at this point. Being part of Sweden was the least popular option, only getting 4% support, and becoming a fully integrated part of Finland got 5% of the support. 9% of respondents would support the full independence of Åland. In a survey by the Statistics and Research Institute of Åland (ÅSUB, 2008), 90% of the respondents stated that they were Ålandic and 60% felt that they were "completely Ålandic." On the other hand, only a quarter of the respondents considered themselves "completely Finnish," and one-fifth considered themselves "Swedish at some level." The option "European" was more popular than "Finnish," "Swedish," or "Finnish-Swedish". In the ÅSUB 2018 survey, most responders also felt a higher sense of belonging to "Nordic countries" than they did to "Finland" or "Sweden." Another interesting statistic: In Åland Gallup's May 2019 survey, 80.4% of Åland's residents said they would support Finland, and 19.6% said they'd support Sweden if Finland and Sweden were facing each other in an ice hockey match.

I could go on about the Ålandic history and what makes its identity unique, but let this be a quick introduction to this place! Feel free to ask more if you're interested. I could have simply answered it's not a country, but I think that would leave out a lot of important context. Maybe this also explains why I think Åland should have a separate personification from Finland. I hope this helps even a little bit!

#hws åland #culture/history stuff #oc talk

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useless-catalanfacts · 14 days

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Hello, how are you? First of all, excuse me for sending the message in English, I don't speak Catalan just yet.

So, recently I've been researching about the immigration in Europe and found out that Catalunya is one of the places in the Iberian Peninsula that has received the most immigrants throughout the years. So, I wanted to know: what are the feelings that most Catalans have on this matter? If you don't want to speak for most Catalans, I'd love to hear your own opinion!

I also ask this because recently I stumbled upon this video on Twitter, I don't know if you have seen it, where this guy named Quim Masferrer was interviewing a black woman and got VERY surprised that she spoke Catalan. Probably because he thought that she was an immigrant and could only speak Spanish. You mentioned in one of your posts that people usually tend to change to Spanish when speaking to black people, assuming that they don't speak Catalan.

Salutacions des del Brasil!

Hi! English is no problem at all, don't worry.

Yes, you are right that Catalonia is one of the places in Iberia that has received the highest amount of immigrant people. We started getting international immigration from outside Iberia in the 1990s, and since then it has continued growing.

According to elections results and polls, Catalonia's population has a better view of immigration than the average.

Share of votes for political parties in favour of restrictive measures on migration in the European Parliament elections of 2019. Source: European Union. You can see Catalonia is one of the greenest places (with lowest votes for parties that seek to restrict migration), and Catalonia's shape can be clearly seen from the greener tone it's painted in compared with its neighbours.

Every so often, polls are conducted on the topic and they always show something similar.

Catalonia has also held the largest demonstrations in Europe in favour of welcoming refugees (in 2017). This was a protest against the Spanish Government, which is the one who has the power on immigration and refugee issues, because they were not allowing enough refugees in, and people in Catalonia wanted to allow them in.

This is not to say there aren't racists, of course there are. Sadly, the fascist parties are growing in all of Europe, particularly among young men/boys. This is also happening here, with the Spanish supremacist party Vox. And outside of people who are directly fascists, racist beliefs still persist in other parts of the population, often ones who would like to get rid of their racist beliefs, but we live in a society.

What you mention about the black woman speaking Catalan is one of them (I saw the video when this episode was on TV, link here for anyone who wants to watch it). Well-meaning Catalan people who want to be welcoming do this when 2 problems come together: on the one hand, the fact that many people still aren't used to people who don't look or sound like they're from here actually being from here, and the fact that many people would be very surprised if any people who aren't originally from here would speak our language or even knowing that it exists. So when they see someone who looks African, Scandinavian, from any other part of the world, makes mistakes when speaking Catalan or sounds like they usually speak Spanish, the Catalan person will 99% of the time switch to Spanish with the well-meaning intention of making it easier for the person they see as "foreigner". This is often useless, because a person who speaks Mandarin or Wolof won't be helped by you speaking Spanish instead of Catalan, but our history has convinced us that it will.

People are not switching to Spanish on purpose to call the other a foreigner, they're doing because we come from centuries of illegalization, persecution and discrimination and we have internalized the idea that we are worthless, not "citizens of the world", and that only our most immediate surrounding speaks our "useless" language, while The World speaks Spanish, the respected and widely-spoken language that everyone admires. That's of course not true, someone who just arrived from, say, China might know as much Catalan as Spanish: that is, none. But in our minds, because of all these centuries of brainwashing through physical violence, the school system, media, etc, literally everything saying we're "provincial", "rural" and "worthless", and that we better hide the fact that we speak the language we speak if we want anyone to understand us, and that it's so so so rude to speak in Catalan instead of Spanish or to even be heard by a Spanish speaker when we speak Catalan; while also making us believe that the whole world loves Spanish and that most of the world speaks Spanish and that everything will be better if we speak Spanish- well, at the first moment of seeing someone they identify as a "non-Catalan", the Catalan person full of self-hatred will immediately use Spanish.

Of course, this is racist (nowadays many people whose ancestors are African have been raised in Catalonia, sometimes even born here, or might have been living here long enough to speak it! it's racist to assume that just because of their looks or accent, that they are foreigner, and that they can't know the language of the place they live in and that they need us to make the effort of switching to an "international" language instead). But if you speak in Catalan to a racialized person or a person who comes from Spain (outside the Catalan Countries), many non-migrant Catalans will call you racist for it, because they'll say you're making things hard for the immigrant for no reason. They'll say, "why would you bother them with Catalan? You should make things as easy as possible for them", with the underlying assumption that Catalan is worthless and we should give up our right to speak it when it slightly inconveniences someone. And, again, the view that the immigrant person needs us to simplify and speak to them differently from how we would speak to a non-immigrant person because they can't know this, is very racist, even though it's done thinking that it's just being polite and, sometimes, believing that it's anti-racist and that it would be racist to treat them like any other person. At the same time, this alienates immigrant, racialized and Spanish people from the community, effectively showing them that we consider them a foreigner and not one of us, and we don't transmit the feeling that they need to learn it to live here, so in the end some of them will only learn Spanish (why learn Catalan, if nobody will speak it to them? Everyone speaks to them in Spanish, so that gives the idea that that is the language they need to learn) which fuels this circle.

So yeah, most people will do this racist thing because they believe it's the non-racist and polite thing to do. But, like racialized people have been saying for a very long time, that is not true at all. I have heard many racialized people (including friends of mine) explain how strangers in shops and restaurants will speak in Catalan to everybody and, when turning to the racialized person, talk to them in Spanish, clearly singling them out for their looks as if they needed any help, as if they couldn't speak our language perfectly (and even if it wasn't perfect, so what?). Some days ago I saw it again, I was waiting at the queue of the CAP (local healthcare centre) and the nurse attended everyone in Catalan. When a Moroccan family arrived and asked in perfect Catalan what they needed, the nurse (for the first time in that whole time) answered in Spanish. The Moroccan women continued asking in Catalan, and the nurse continued answering in Spanish, until the 4th interaction in which the Moroccan girl who was speaking ended up switching to Spanish as well. I can't imagine how heartbreaking that must feel.

I hope this answered your question. I hope you will understand why people act the way they do when they switch, that is not a matter of wanting to treat foreigners or those read as foreigners badly (actually, all the opposite). I hope you won't be too harsh on us for this, because it's a result of our own oppression and a manifestation of our internalized Catalanophobia.

Now, message to the other Catalans reading this: absolutely judge yourself harshly if you do this. Reflect and change your ways.

#ask #strdst-lobby #sociolinguistics #racisme

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antifainternational · 2 years

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What can you tell me about the fascist groups in Ukraine?

So when talking about fascist groups in Ukraine, we have to talk about pre-2022 and now. Pre-2022 there were dozens of fascist groups operating in Ukraine, much like Russia, other European countries, and places like the United States. Groups with names like "Centuria," "Tradition and Order," "Wotanjugend," and "National Militia" patrolled the streets, intimidating and attacking immigrants, LGBTQ+ people and leftists/anti-fascists, just as they do in Russia, Hungary, the U.S., and many other countries besides. Our violent hate crimes research project documented attacks by fascist groups in Ukraine in 2020 and 2021, including the kidnapping and torture of a trans woman in April 2020; a coordinated attack on the Pride march in Odessa that same year; and three more attacks on LGBTQ+ people in Kyiv and Odessa in 2021. Of course, the most notorious of these groups is the neo-nazi Azov Battalion. We might not have this exactly right but we believe Azov rose to prominence along with Right Sector during Euromaidan in 2013 and 2014. Because the rebellion against the former dictator Yanukovich was successful and left a temporary power vacuum, Right Sector and Azov took advantage of it to the extent that they could. For Azov, this meant integration into Ukraine's military. That said, the gains made by the far right into the institutions of power in Ukraine were limited and for most, somewhat short-lived. This is reflected by the terrible showing of far-right/fascist groups in elections; by the 2020 raid on a Wotanjugend weapons/explosive cache by the Ukrainian secret service; and of course the election of Ukraine's first-ever Jewish president in 2019. Also, if we've given you the impression that Ukraine was and continues to be a haven for fascist thugs, we strongly recommend watching these interviews with Ukrainian anarchists from April. Now, a lot of people (including Putin) have attempted to use Azov's integration into the Ukrainian military as evidence that Ukraine is run by nazis, but when you consider that Azov at its peak would have accounted for just 1% of the Ukrainian military it becomes clear that the problem is no greater than most militaries, particularly in eastern Europe. Russia, in particular, is in no position to point fingers.

This brings us to the current situation in Ukraine, which is this: there is a powerful fascist group that is committing the lion's share of violence and is actually in control of large parts of the country. That fascist group is the Russian military. The Russian invasion of Ukraine is fascist in nature. It's not unreasonable to make comparisons to Hitler's policy of lebensraum here; Russian is committing acts of genocide against the Ukrainian people; and the OHCHR has, as of last month, documented over 11,000 Ukrainian civilian casualties. Meanwhile in Russia, it is illegal to say anything critical about the war or even to call it a war. All of which is to say this: if you're concerned about fascists in Ukraine, Anon, then most of your concern should be about the most violent fascists there - the Russian military. There are lots of anti-fascist, anarchist, and leftist groups - many of whom fought against fascists in Ukraine before the war - who are now armed and fighting against the Russian invasion. Those are the people who deserve your support and those are the people we've been supporting through things like our t-shirt fundraiser & Yellow Peril Tactical's patches/stickers fundraiser. Check out Rev Dia, Hoods Hoods Klan, Kharkiv Hardcore, Good Night Imperial Pride - all of which are good examples of leftist groups fighting the fascists right now.

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luimnigh · 7 months

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What happened to Brexit and the impact on the Irish border? It seemed like a really big deal and then Covid hit and I lost all news about it. I imagine putting a hard border there made life much worse for many commuters. Did the border become a target for terrorists the way some people worried it would? Also if you know anything about the situation in Hong Kong that seemed to fall off the radar too.

So the problem in regards to Northern Ireland and Brexit was that there were three option on where to place a border. And there needed to be a border, legally, in order to do customs checks.

Those options were:

Between the two islands and Europe, which couldn't be done because Ireland has no intention of leaving thr European Union.

Between Ireland and Northern Ireland, which would be a breach in the legal obligations set forth in the Good Friday Agreement, an internationally recognized treaty.

Between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, also known as the Irish Sea Border. But this would hurt the feelings of the DUP, the major unionist (pro-UK) party in Northern Ireland.

Now, the reason why the Irish Sea Border was unworkable was because Theresa May held an early election, and lost the Conservative Party's majority. So they turned to the DUP to supply them votes in Parliament. An Irish Sea Border became impossible, because the DUP would pull out of the supply agreement and end the government.

Then after May resigned, Boris Johnson held a new early election, and won a majority without the DUP. So guess what suddenly became an option again?

The UK finally did a deal with the EU that agreed to a Irish Sea Border, called the Northern Ireland Protocol, in December 2019. It means that officially Northern Ireland is outside of the EU, but agrees to follow all EU customs and free movement of good rules. There are no customs checks on goods moving from Northern Ireland to the rest of the UK, but there are customs checks on goods moving from the rest of the UK to Northern Ireland.

This upset the DUP, and in February 2022 they brought down the Government of Northern Ireland. Elections happened in May 2022, and they lost their position as Northern Ireland's largest party to their nationalist (pro-Ireland) rivals, Sinn Féin. This upset the DUP even more, so they've refused to start a new Northern Irish government (it's legally required that the biggest nationalist and unionist parties form a coalition to make the Northern Irish government).

So yeah. We avoided the hard border, but now Northern Ireland is without it's devolved government, and the UK Government doesn't care enough to force a new election. Ireland and Northern Ireland are becoming closer economically, while the UK and Northern Ireland are shifting away (with recent announcement of product packaging that labels items as being "not for EU"). The Unionists are angry, but not enough to do much more than their usual posturing and mild rioting.

Overall, probably the best we could have hoped for.

#uk politics #irish politics #northern irish politics #brexit #asks #deepdive002

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mariacallous · 4 months

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Last week, Germany’s domestic intelligence agency took the dramatic step of classifying the Saxony state branch of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party as a threat to democracy—a potential first step towards banning it outright as unconstitutional. “There can be no doubt about the extreme right orientation of this party,” declared Dirk-Martin Christian, president of Saxony’s State Office for the Protection of the Constitution.

Although Germany has, in the past, exercised constitutional powers in the name of domestic security to rein in hardcore far-right (and radical leftist) forces, the objects of censure were marginal neo-Nazi parties and associations that had no chance of coming to power—even at the municipal level or in coalition governments. The AfD is a different story. Opinion polls show the AfD as the strongest party by far today in eastern Germany; riding a powerful wave of anti-immigrant sentiment, it has also notched record tallies in western German state elections and is poised to win the most votes next year in the country’s eastern half. It could conceivably wield executive power, should conservatives—such as the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) or the pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP)—consider it in their interests to treat the far-right party as a legitimate expression of popular will.

Even though both parties say they rule it out, the option is not so far-fetched: Across the EU, conservative parties have turned far-right parties into governing coalition partners, including in Austria, Croatia, Denmark, Finland, Italy, Slovakia, and elsewhere. In the German state of Thuringia, the CDU, FDP, and AfD, all in the opposition but with a majority between them, now team up occasionally to bypass the leftist minority government.

Suddenly, Germans are seeing images of the political chaos of the interwar Weimar Republic flash before their eyes—the republic that ended ignominiously in the Nazi party’s victory and Adolf Hitler’s takeover in 1933.

This is why the agency’s ruling and a possible injunction against the AfD—the latter a highly controversial and risky option that is nevertheless gaining backers across Germany’s political spectrum—has observers questioning whether the Europe-wide surge of the far right can be stopped or slowed by legal measures.

The strategies pursued by the political class haven’t done the job thus far—on the contrary, the AfD is booming—and there’s a long history of banning extremist parties and associations in Europe, not least in Germany. Since mid-2022, both Germany and France arrested members of far-right extremist organizations involved in the planning of terrorist attacks. Under its autocratic leader Viktor Orban, Hungary, as well as authoritarian-ruled Poland, have been denied European Union funds, and in 2019, Orban’s party, Fidesz, was expelled from the mainstream conservative European People’s Party.

But Fidesz’s ouster wasn’t a prohibition, and the extremists in France and Germany did not belong to parties with representatives in the national parliament. In fact, the AfD is the second-largest opposition party in the German Bundestag after the Christian Democrats (and their Bavarian counterpart), and it says that it wants to come to power—democratically, through the ballot box.

The ruling makes Saxony the AfD’s third state branch to come under this level of red-button surveillance, which can include measures such as the German spy services’ covert observation and even infiltration of the party. All three state-level parties—Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia—are eastern German states with elections scheduled for next year. (In mid-April, the AfD’s nationwide youth organization was also deemed a threat to the democratic order and thus put under surveillance.)

Moreover, in the wake of Geert Wilders’s far-right Party for Freedom’s victory in the Netherlands in November, like-minded contenders across Europe, including the AfD, are expected to perform better than ever in June’s European Parliament election, an event that would have ominous ramifications for the European Union—and beyond.

Much like the rulings on Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia, Germany’s intelligence agency declared that leading members and functionaries of the Saxony AfD regularly express racist, Islamophobic, and antisemitic sentiments. It labeled the branch as one with “typically ethnic-nationalistic positions” and said that both it and its national youth organization work in tandem with known neo-Nazi and officially banned movements, such as the Reichsbürger movement.

The Saxony branch has a diverse membership, the intelligence agency found, but the party’s leadership adheres to the ideology of its “spiritual father and leader,” referring to “the right-wing extremist Björn Höcke, who now shapes and dominates the character of the entire state-level party.”

Höcke, the AfD’s high-profile, outspoken party leader in Thuringia, was on the party’s far-right fringe for years. But the party has drifted so far to the right that its standard-bearer is now the 51-year-old Höcke , a demagogue who publicly espouses revisionist theories of Germany’s Nazi past and employs racist slogans against immigrants. He was charged in June with using Nazi slogans at AfD campaign rallies—a crime in Germany, where the use of slogans, propaganda, and symbolism linked to “anti-constitutional” organizations is banned.

German law gives the constitutional court the authority to shut down a political party when it pursues anti-constitutional goals and is in a position to achieve these goals. In 2017, Germany’s highest court chose not to disqualify the National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), a thoroughly neo-Nazi party both in public profile and programmatically, on account of its diminutive size: The party of 6,000 people rarely breached the states’ 5-percent hurdles to be included in parliament and thus never came anywhere near entering government. This autumn, the constitutional court confirmed the expulsion of a former AfD official as a justice in a Saxon state court for constituting a danger to constitutional norms.

This year, the AfD saw representatives voted into official posts as a district administrator and a mayor (in Saxony-Anhalt) for the first time. Presumably, the AfD’s recent showing in the Bavarian and Hessian elections (15 percent and 18 percent respectively, which makes it the strongest opposition party in the regional legislatures) and polling numbers of twice that in eastern Germany endow it with a size unlike the NPD’s and great enough to pose a legitimate threat.

This, at least, is what a growing number of voices from all of Germany’s mainstream parties argue. Those voices are collecting supporters in the Bundestag, where a majority is required to bring the party before the constitutional court.

One of them is a lawyer and CDU parliamentarian from Saxony, Marco Wanderwitz, who argues that “there’s a good reason why the [German Constitution] gives us the option of banning a party,” as he told the daily Die Tageszeitung, “because a defensive democracy [wehrhafte Demokratie] has to wield very sharp swords against its greatest enemies. I have come to the conclusion that the AfD is now undoubtedly radical right wing. They are up to no good and are serious about it. We’ve got to use all of the options at our disposal to beat them. I’m afraid that without a court-ordered prohibition, we’re not going to be rid of them.”

Living in Saxony, Wanderwitz said, he observes how the AfD and its even more militant counterparts draw in disillusioned people and set a confrontational, aggressive tone. “In the parliaments, the AfD is on our backs every day,” he said. “It has thousands of employees who flood the internet and parliaments with right-wing extremist content 24 hours a day. At events in Saxony, I regularly experience that we’re met with burning hatred; we’re shouted at and threatened. I’m glad that there are loads of people standing between us and them outside the door. It’s something that feels a bit like what I imagine the early 1930s were like.”

Wanderwitz added that he thinks it is conceivable that the AfD garner 40 percent in the eastern elections come September. “What democracy here needs is some breathing space,” he said.

Other commentators shoot back that Germany’s democratic culture and the solid arguments of its political parties can beat back a populist party that spins outlandish conspiracy theories, apes Nazi slogans, and wants out of the EU.

“We can’t give the impression that we’re taking the easier route with a ban procedure because we can’t manage it any other way,” retorted Social Democratic lawmaker Sebastian Fiedler, who belongs to the Bundestag’s subcommittee for domestic security. “Well-functioning constitutional states can’t dismiss the way their own populations vote. We have to offer concepts that are convincing: here and now. Of course, the AfD is trying to attack the state from within, but the constitutional state is resilient.”

Fiedler and his parliamentary peers—not all of whom are opposed to putting the AfD on trial—argue that the state has other means at its disposal to mitigate far-right parties. In November, all of the Bundestag’s democratic parties passed a law that deprives the AfD from the kind of public funds that other parties use to finance foundations involved in public education work. They also argue there should be more funding for grassroots programs that strengthen civil society and fight fake news in the Internet. Wanderwitz and Fiedler—and just about all of their colleagues—agree that putting the AfD on trial and then losing would be a disaster, as well as a confirmation for the AfD that the mainstream parties are out to get it, based on the party’s specious rationale.

One of the strongest arguments against such bans is that outlawing a party doesn’t annul its supporters—and sometimes even turbocharges them. The Germans need only to look to Greece to see how the prohibition of a far-right party, the Golden Dawn, did nothing to dent the vote tallies of the Greek far right, which reorganized itself under new parties. Golden Dawn itself was disqualified from running in the election this year not because it was an immigrant-bashing, Holocaust-denying scourge, but rather because its leaders had engaged in criminal business activities.

Nevertheless, the party that captured more than 6 percent of the vote in 2015, when economic paralysis gripped the country, was out of the race. Instead, in June, three far-right parties made it into the national legislature, comprising the Spartans, backed by imprisoned Golden Dawn leader Ilias Kasidiaris, the pro-Russian party Greek Solution, and ultra-Christian Orthodox Niki (Victory). They captured 34 seats out of an available 300 and accounted for more than 12 percent of the vote.

It seems that Germany and Greece—in fact, just about all of Europe—will have to dig further down into their respective legal scriptures and political cultures to get at the toxins that threaten to imperil their democracies.

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tomorrowusa · 4 months

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It isn't just liberals who claim that House Republicans are in Putin's pocket.

Conservative Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) told the host of a rightwing podcast that some of his House colleagues have been compromised by the Kremlin.

A Republican Tennessee congressman accused his colleagues of being “compromised” by Russian spies and moneyed interests, who bed and then blackmail them to sway their votes. [ ... ] “The old honeypot,” the conservative representative, continued. “The Russians do that, and I’m sure members of Congress have been caught up. Why in the world would good conservatives vote for crazy stuff like what we’ve been seeing out of Congress?” [ ... ] “You’re visiting, you’re out of the country, you’re out of town, or you’re in a motel, or bar in D.C., and some — whatever you’re into, women or men or whatever — comes up and they’re very attractive and they’re laughing at your jokes, and you’re buying them a drink,” he explained. “Next thing you know, you’re in the motel room with them naked.” “And next thing you know, you’re about to make a key vote and what happens? Some well dressed person comes out and whispers in your ear, ‘Hey, man, there’s tapes out on you,’ or ‘Were you in a motel room on whatever [date] with whoever?’” Then comes the suggestion that “you really ought not be voting for this thing,” Burchett said.

So there are probably the equivalents of the famous "pee tapes" for members of the House GOP caucus.

Speaking of Donald Trump...

Putin ‘has Trump’s number’ and still sees him ‘as an asset’, says Fiona Hill

Vladimir Putin has had Donald Trump’s “number for some time … knows how to manipulate him” and still sees him “as an asset”, the former White House Russia expert Fiona Hill said, discussing the Russian leader and the Republican presidential frontrunner. “That’s literally [Putin’s] trump card,” Hill told the One Decision Podcast, hosted by Jane Ferguson, a reporter, and Sir Richard Dearlove, a former head of MI6, when asked if she thought the Russian president, bogged down in war in Ukraine, was betting on Trump beating Joe Biden next year and returning to power. Hill added: “The anticipation that Trump’s going to come back is something for Putin of a boon … he can play with that. He can use it as kind of a warning … scare the Ukrainians, the Europeans, the rest of the world. Putin is pretty confident, given his experiences with Trump in the past, that Trump will be quick to try to resolve the … war in Ukraine in his favor. “And, you know, obviously, Putin has had Trump’s number for some time, he knows how to manipulate him … he has been very good at the art of flattery with Trump. He sees Trump as an asset in many respects.” From 2017 to 2019 Hill was a senior national security aide in the Trump White House, eventually coming under the spotlight as a witness in Trump’s first impeachment, for seeking to blackmail Ukraine for dirt on political rivals. In 2013, she published Mr Putin: Operative in the Kremlin, a widely praised study.

Trump has done little to hide his Putin connection since 2015. Yet tens of millions of American voters can't wait to cast their votes for a Russian asset.

The Republican Party is apparently riddled with office holders doing Russia's bidding – either through blackmail or through manipulation.

The 2024 election is the clearest ever between American democracy and foreign totalitarianism. We should not take the outcome for granted.

#russia #republicans #russian assets #blackmail #donald trump #vladimir putin #honeypot #house gop caucus #tim burchett #tn-02 #fiona hill #россия #владимир путин #дональд трамп #трамп - путинский пудель #election 2024

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minazummers · 4 months

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The EU is poised to effectively become the world’s AI police, creating binding rules on transparency, ethics, and more.

By Melissa Heikkilä, December 11, 2023

This is not going to be perfect but it is at least a start. And it is worth to remember this if someone tells you not to vote in the 2024 European Parliament election because "the EU only cares about the curves of banana" or similar BS.

Only just over 50% of the people who were eligable to vote voted in 2019. If you don't show up to vote, the right certainly will.

#ai #Eu #eu law #eu politics #eu parliament #Yes i will keep bringing the election up this year

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djuvlipen · 7 months

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On 19 September in the town of Prato near Florence, Italy, a Molotov cocktail was thrown at an encampment of Romani people in yet another incident of violence targeting the Romani and Sinti community. Right-wing extremists are suspected of committing the attack, which caused property damage and fortunately no physical injuries to any of the people there.

The incident has sparked anger and fear among the Roma. According to the results of the investigation so far, the assailants threw the Molotov cocktail from a slowly-driving Fiat Punto passing by the Sinti village.

The attackers were lighting the Molotov cocktail as they drove into the village. Fortunately, nobody was physically harmed, but the fire caused significant material damage, including destroying the truck of a village worker.

That same locale and its residents first became known to the public on 1 March 2019 during an election campaign. An MP with the right-wing populist Brothers of Italy party, Giovanni Donzelli, together with leading representatives of the party Chiara La Porta and Cosimo Zecchi, drove into the location and said: “Places like these have to be razed to the ground. Get some jobs and find yourselves a new home, the party’s over.”

Donzelli was then investigated for inciting racial hatred, but avoided trial thanks to his immunity from prosecution as a member of parliament. Ever since, the community of Sinti living in the municipality have repeatedly faced hostile attacks.

“Each time these atrocities happen it reminds us of the hatred and hostility our community faces. It’s impossible to ignore. People are terrified,” Noel Maggini of the Khetane Roma and Sinti Movement for Italy said in a press release sent to news server Romea.cz.

“We are asking the police to properly investigate this with the aim of identifying those responsible for it and to protect the community until that happens in order to prevent further attacks,” Maggini said. Željko Jovanović, director of the Open Society Roma Initiatives Office, is asking: “Why haven’t any politicians condemned this attack?”

“We are calling on all political parties to publicly condemn this repugnant, criminal, racist deed and to express solidarity with the families of the victims of this attack,” Jovanović said, adding: “Since in Europe, from Germany to Italy, there is a trend underway toward the ultra-right, we are calling on European and on local politicians to be vigilant about growing nationalism and right-wing extremism, which inevitably leads to aggression and violence against Sinti, Roma and other minorities.”

#sinti #italy

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the-jam-to-the-unicorn · 2 months

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War Anniversary Press Conference

As always

it's not 1:1

quotes are marked

I paraphrase and summarize

I could get things wrong because too fast or I don't hear the translator or ...

(First few minutes are missing because of issues with my internet.)

Like everyone else in society, Ze says, he changed too. Got tougher.

He tries to be as honest as possible when he talks / to everyone. But sometimes he can't talk about all the details.

Ze says very important new detail about France support is coming soon - but he wants Macron to announce it

Ze still hopes in Congress support because otherwise he can't understand in which world we live in in

he met with Congress members and they know all the details what they need and Ukraine hopes for a soon decision

there are security garanties for the money from the US

Ukraine must be supported today not till the end or the end will come soon

the Poland matter is an internal matter, a political power struggle

using Ukraine as a pressure on EU insitutions is not fair

it is important to mantain the alliance with Poland, Ze says

if they don't find a solution, Ukraine will protect it's business

Russian matter is strong / intense in several places

Ukraine has reduced their advantage but they still have advantage

Ukraine has to reach the point where they can conduct a CO, until that point they will still loose land

but it's more important to not loose (more) people

Ukraine needs to put pressure on the partner's on the already agreed packages so Ukraine gets stuff and can succeed against Russia

the US support is not about money, it's about weapons

Ukraine has the weapons they have and that's it - they need more weapons to continue

there are different types of weapons

if US doesn't deliver, sime weapons could be given to Ukraine from other countries but that's difficult because not all countries want to give their weapons

Europe is really shifting and changing to increase production (ammunition, artillery, defense), their attitude towards the war is changing and understanding that Russia / Putin / the war is also dangerous to them

they start to understand that Putin will continue is war

Ze says the problem is not the military sector not being ready, the problem is that the European socities are not ready for Putin to come to them and he hopes Putin will not come to them - hence why it's important for Ukraine to be strong and fight (and defeat Putin)

Ze says Ukraine lost about 31,000 soldiers in the war so far

Russia: 180,000 (total amount 500,000 - KIA, WIA)

they don't know for sure how many civilians have been killed by Russia because several places are still occupied and people have been deported

every partner believes that Ukraine will be in NATO in the future

US and Germany are the main ones who have a lot to do with the invitation to NATO

Ze sees no risks of Ukraine in NATO

Ze and Putin had an unofficial meeting during the Nomady meeting in December 2019

Ze explained Putin that the agreements would not work and it would not work how Putin imagined it, especially with the troops still present

they talked about the possible frozen conflict for 20 years

they also talked about the exchange

Ze doesn't remember all the details because it's so long ago, like from a different life

Taurus missiles are important

Ze is thankful for the strong German support / support from the Chancellor

the US still stands above Germany and Ze sees the problem in the US not in Germany

but Ze is optimistic that US will move their position and they will get results / what they need

Ukraine speaks about jets with partners and that's all he wants to say

if partners continue their support depends on a lot of things: diplomatic contact, upcoming election results, society, ...

Russia will try everything to underminde the support

Ukraine improving the production in droes

everything is about making Putin a poorer person because that's what Putin cares a lot about

if the frozen Russian money is transferred to Ukraine it will weaken Putin, Ze thinks

big oligarchs and big businesses will not be happy (Russian ones)

if Putin gets poorer (like with transfering the money) he will start calling everyone not just Ze to stop the war

Ze knows that Canada supports Ukraine

the new document with Canada will support and strength Ukraine until they're in NATO

Ukraine would be happy if Aserbaidschan would support Ukraine and Ze thinkgs they would because they support the sovereignty of Ukraine

Ukraine is working on the countries who don't support Ukraine to join them

Ze thinks this is not the weakest moment

February 24 was a shocking moment

the most difficult period was that the world started to forget that the war is still going on, not only because of the Middle East

neverthelss they feel the effect with less weapons

the first year was all about survival, the second about resilience

third year will be a difficult year (elections, fatigue, ...), full of challenges, it's a turning year

this year will define the format of the ending of this war

Ze doesn't understand why they spilt the grain - he understands it's about politics but still doesn't understand it

it's bad that Poland's actions (the spilled grain) is playing into Russian Propaganda and that shouldn't be

it's not happening on Ukraine territory so Poland has to / can stop it, not Ukraine

Ze is not telling the Polish gouvernemnt what to do, that's not his right, but in regards of relations it's not right what the people do at the border

the longer this war goes the bigger will be the casualities (civilian, military)

losing time means losing money which is frustrating

the longer the war the longer the horrors for the people

the longer the war the longer it's hard for the countries who support

Ukraine can not loose time

(Huge part is missing because the livestream was having massive problems and made it impossible to follow.)

there has been evidence that Russia is using artillery and missiles from North Korea

there is nothing Ukraine can do besides help Ukraine

North Korea will continue to give weapons to Russia

Ukraine is not negotiating with partners on the use of their armys on Ukraine territory

strongest security guaranty would be Ukrain ein NATO

Ukraine will have a difficult time in the next few months because of the US

EU has shown their ability of leadership and support

Russia will prepare their CO at the beginning of summer / April if they can

Ukraine will be prepared for Russia

Ukraine will prepare their own planes

the US elections will show Ukraine what it will be after that

Ukraine prepares the first Peace Summit ad prepares the document about a just peace and the end of th war for Ukraine and everyone

what the end of the year looks like depends on a lot of factors

END

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deadpresidents · 2 months

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Latest books you have been reading?

Apparently I haven't shared the books I've been recently reading since the beginning of November. Usually someone reminds me to share my reading list every few weeks, so I think someone should be fired for dereliction of duty.

•Life After Power: Seven Presidents and Their Search for Purpose Beyond the White House (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by Jared Cohen -- Just released on February 13th, this is the follow-up to Cohen's excellent 2019 book, Accidental Presidents: Eight Men Who Changed America (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO).

•Borgata: Rise of Empire: A History of the American Mafia (BOOK | KINDLE) by Louis Ferrante.

•Soldier of Destiny: Slavery, Secession, and the Redemption of Ulysses S. Grant (BOOK | KINDLE) by John Reeves.

•The Border: A Journey Around Russia Through North Korea, China, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, Poland, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Norway, and the Northeast Passage (BOOK | KINDLE) by Erika Fatland -- A couple of months ago, I mentioned how much I enjoyed reading Erika Fatland's Sovietistan, and I was equally pleased with The Border, which has a subtitle nearly as long as the Russian border that she wrote about traveling around.

•Unruly: The Ridiculous History of England's Kings and Queens (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by David Mitchell.

•The Fall of Eagles: The Death of the Great European Dynasties by C.L. Sulzberger.

•George V: Never a Dull Moment (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by Jane Ridley.

•Adams and Calhoun: From Shared Vision to Irreconcilable Conflict (BOOK | KINDLE) by William F. Hartford.

•God Save Benedict Arnold: The True Story of America's Most Hated Man (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by Jack Kelly.

•Justinian: Emperor, Soldier, Saint (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by Peter Sarris.

•Magic: The Life of Earvin "Magic" Johnson (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by Roland Lazenby.

•Oracle of Lost Causes: John Newman Edwards and His Never-Ending Civil War (BOOK | KINDLE) by Matthew Christopher Hulbert.

•Mirrors of Greatness: Churchill and the Leaders Who Shaped Him (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by David Reynolds.

•Mansfield and Dirksen: Bipartisan Giants of the Senate (BOOK | KINDLE) by Marc C. Johnson.

•The World That Wasn't: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century (BOOK | KINDLE | AUDIO) by Benn Steil.

•Wide Awake: The Forgotten Force That Elected Lincoln and Spurred the Civil War (BOOK | KINDLE) by Jon Grinspan -- Available for pre-order now and will be published on May 14th.

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berniesrevolution · 11 months

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CATALYST JOURNAL

The Brexit crisis dominated British politics between 2016 and 2019. Its outcome will shape the UK’s relationship with Europe for decades. One factor above all decided that outcome: the determination of Britain’s right and center alike to contain a left-wing upsurge inspired by Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party.

Between 2014 and 2019, there were three upsurges that attempted to break the mold of British politics: the Scottish independence movement, the campaign for Brexit, and the mobilization around Jeremy Corbyn in the British Labour Party. They sought, respectively, to shrink the borders of the United Kingdom, to sever its links with the European Union, and to overturn the social settlement that has governed its class relations since the 1980s.

Their combined effect was to generate a political crisis such as Britain had not seen for decades, with its governing institutions effectively paralyzed for months at a time. The unresolved Scottish question is likely to remain a source of contestation over the years to come. But the outcome of the 2019 general election simultaneously buried Corbynism and ensured that Brexit would go ahead on terms dictated by Boris Johnson and the right wing of the Conservative Party.

The fact that these challenges unfolded more or less simultaneously was no coincidence. They all came in response to long-term dysfunctions of the British political system and its governing parties, which the economic crash of 2008 had greatly exacerbated, and they interacted with one another throughout the years of crisis. The campaign for Scottish independence, which requires careful study in its own right, was located exclusively in one part of the UK that has its own distinct political culture. In what follows, I will concentrate on the relationship between Labour and Brexit under Corbyn’s leadership, which was crucial for the fate of both, but which remains poorly understood in Britain itself, let alone the wider world.

Johnson’s triumph at the end of 2019 could not have happened without a convergence of interests between right and center in British politics that transcended their divisions over Brexit. When push came to shove, the leaders of these political tendencies joined forces to ensure the defeat of a left-wing project that appeared capable of forming a government. Johnson’s Brexit deal was a price that centrist politicians and opinion formers gladly paid in order to marginalize the socialist left and regain control of the Labour Party.

BEFORE BREXIT

Corbyn’s victory in the 2015 leadership contest came as an unwelcome shock to most Labour MPs, and to the country’s media. The tendency that he represented had spent the previous generation on the margins of the Labour Party, excluded from any position of real influence.1 When the party hierarchy decided to adopt a new system for electing its leader, entrusting the Labour membership with responsibility, they never imagined what was going to happen in 2015. Corbyn’s landslide owed at least as much to the weakness and complacency of Labour’s right-wing faction as it did to the discovery of unexpected strength on the British left.2

A large section of the Parliamentary Labour Party (PLP) simply did not accord the new leader basic legitimacy. Much of the British media followed their example, including ostensibly nonpartisan outlets such as the BBC, which reported on Corbyn’s leadership primarily from the vantage point of his factional opponents.3 This compounded the inevitable problems that stemmed from lack of experience and preparation time: Corbyn and his team had to do the work that would normally precede taking control of a major political party after they had already been thrust into the spotlight.

This was the backdrop against which Corbyn had to face the Brexit referendum during the opening months of his leadership. First coined as recently as 2012, the term “Brexit” referred to a political project that originated within the British right. Conservative prime minister David Cameron had agreed to hold a plebiscite on Britain’s membership in the EU because of pressure from his own right-wing current and the electoral competition of Nigel Farage’s UK Independence Party (UKIP). When the Conservatives unexpectedly won a majority of seats in the 2015 general election, ending their coalition pact with the Europhile Liberal Democrats, Cameron had to follow through on his commitment.

To the prime minister’s surprise, senior Tory politicians like Boris Johnson and Michael Gove decided to join the campaign against EU membership, which became known as the Leave camp — an effort that also had the support of Britain’s two most popular newspapers, the Sun and the Daily Mail. Right-wing opposition to European integration was hardly unique to Britain, but the purchase of such views within a major party of government certainly was. In the rest of the EU-15, one could never imagine a referendum of this kind being held in the first place.

Brexit posed a particular dilemma for Labour’s new left-wing leadership. Pro-EU attitudes were deeply entrenched in the Labour Party. This dated back in particular to a speech Jacques Delors had delivered to Britain’s Trades Union Congress in 1988, in which he promised to construct a federal structure that would “preserve and enhance the uniquely European model of society” based on “similar mechanisms of social solidarity, of protection of the weakest, and of collective bargaining. … It would be unacceptable for Europe to become a source of social regression.”4

The fact that European leaders never translated such rhetoric into practice, while embedding neoliberal doxa in the structures of the eurozone, barely registered with the British center left. This was partly because the prevalence of right-wing Euroscepticism obstructed any serious discussion of what the EU actually was, and partly because Britain stayed out of the single currency. It was easier to maintain unrealistic fantasies of a “social Europe” that had already taken shape because the EU played a very limited role in Britain’s own, largely homegrown form of neoliberalism.

(Continue Reading)

#politics #the left #catalyst #brexit #labour party #jeremy corbyn #uk

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jackredfieldwasmyjacob · 1 year

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i think this is a good example of the situation(tm) with spain and fascism and how it's very different to other european countries like italy or germany.

this news article says that the government pays more than 9000€ per year to mantain franco's tomb (and by the government it means, well, the taxpayers). for those who don't know, francisco franco was a fascist dictator (friend of hitler and mussolini) that ruled spain from 1939 til 1975. he died peacefully. in his bed. after 4 decades of ruling. this is one of the key points regarding all of this.

and you might be thinking... well, the right wing party must be the ruling party for this to happen! lol no. we are currently under a pretty left-leaning government (this will probably change next month btw, there's general elections on april 28th). this is the government who passed the so-called trans law. and, most importantly, this government exhumated franco's body from his monumental funerary monument to a normal cemetery.

this is the monument in question, btw, it's called valle de los caídos (valley of the fallen) and it was built by the people franco sent to concentration camps throughout the country.

and yes, you read that well. franco's body was here until 2019. the monument was visited (and still is visited) by tons of fascists, who would do the nazi salute, fly the francoist flag, and chant francoist chants. all while the police was just there (but that's no surprise, isn't it). now, those people just go to the new location of franco's tomb.

oh, btw, on april 24th 2023 (4 days ago as i'm writing this post) there was another exhumation in the valley of the fallen (i just found out that since 2022 its name officially changed to 'cuelgamuros valley'. sure), this time of josé antonio primo de rivera, son of the dictator of spain from 1923-1930, and founder of the falange española, a fascist organization that became the only political party during the franco regime (yes. this is the equivalent to the nazi party) that btw still exists as a political party. so that's also lovely. this shouldn't come as a surprise, as la legión española, the military faction most closely allied to franco before, during, and after the civil war, still exists and they parade sometimes. you've probably seen these guys, there's a weird thing where people thirst over them on twitter:

anyways, this all boils down to the continuist nature of fascism in this country. fascist symbols are not banned, and neither is the flag or the hymn. i heard so many times the cara al sol (the francoist anthem) in high school sung by the kids who thought being a fascist was cool. again, franco's body wasn't exhumated until 2019 and with tons of polemics, delays and protests (protests!!!!). primo de rivera's wasn't exhumated until this very year (also with protests). and, meanwhile, there's more than 1000 mass graves still unearthed in spain, most of them filled by republicans who either were killed during the war, or right after it. one of them is the poet federico garcía lorca, considered one of (if not the best) writer in spanish history, and killed for his sexuality in 1936 by francoist soldiers. and, with him, thousands of people have been lost to time. in 2022 (83 years after the war ended) the government opened a 'mass grave searcher' on the ministry website, in order to look if your lost relative had been discovered.

i've talked about this before, but as another example, my great-grand father was unjustly sent to prisioner in 1939 for being a republican. he even spent some years in death row before being released after 5 years. he was officially pardoned by the government in 2017. he died in 1989.

also, something that has been particularly evident during this government, is that fascists are very much alive and have a ton of power. and politicians are either one of them or scared of them. keep in mind that spain has had multiple military and fascist uprisings and coup de états in the 20th century, it's very recent history. that, summed with the terrible job done during the transition period of not divorcing themselves with the francoists or just banning everything to do with them (that 'terrible job' happened because well. there were a lot of fascists there), makes for fascism being painfully present in spain all throughout the 20th and 21st century, so it's always been here, and very obviously so, and that's why it's so fundamentally different from other european regions.

this is what happens when fascists win and fuck up everything. spain is a perfect example of it. i love maps, but everytime i see alternative history maps (and there's a ton of them) that are like 'europe but hitler won ww2' i get the irk because 1) the person making that post is probably a nazi, and 2) that's just what happened in spain. the 'nazis won au' is just 20th century spain. and the consequences of that still ooze to this date. so yeah. that's all i have to say i think.

#spain #tw: fascism #tw: nazism #i finally did it! the doñana post made me motivated enough to write a full-length post lol #this is just an informative post i guess? i don't think many people outside of spain are aware of our situation #i glossed out over a ton of stuff cause i'm not very informed about all of this but if anyone has any questions or wants me to tackle #anything else please let me know #and fellow spaniards feel free to add stuff to this post!!#anyways there's general elections in exactly one month so that'll be scary

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mariacallous · 2 months

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Lansing — Democratic lawmakers are condemning a social media post from Republican state Rep. Josh Schriver of Oxford that promoted "the great replacement" theory, a racist ideological belief that there's a coordinated global effort to diminish the influence of White people.

On Tuesday, Schriver shared a post of a graphic that depicted black figurines covering most of a map of the world, with white figures occupying smaller sections of Australia, Canada, northern Europe and the northern United States. The bottom of the graphic read "The great replacement!"

The graphic, initially posted by right-wing pundit Jack Posobiec, was reposted by Schriver with an emoji of a chart showing a downward trend on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

In a statement Wednesday to The Detroit News, Schriver said he loved "all of God's offspring" and believed "everyone's immense value is rooted in the price Christ paid on the Cross when he died for our sins.

"I'm opposed to racists, race baiters, and victim politics," Schriver said in the statement. "What I find strange is the agenda to demoralize and reduce the white portion of our population. That's not inclusive and Christ is inclusive! I'm glad Tucker Carlson and Jack Posobiec are sharing links so I can continue my research on these issues."

The "great replacement" conspiracy theory asserts there is a coordinated effort to dilute the influence of White people through immigration and through low birth rates among White individuals, according to the Anti-Defamation League. The theory has been linked to anti-Semitism, with some versions alleging it is Jews coordinating the so-called replacement.

The shooter in a 2022 Buffalo, New York supermarket shooting that killed 10, most of whom were Black, raised the theory in a manifesto as a motive for the killings, the Associated Press reported. The killer in the 2018 Tree of Life Synagogue shooting in Pittsburg blamed Jews for bringing non-white immigrants to the U.S.; a 2019 Poway, California synagogue shooter claimed Jews were responsible for the killing of White Europeans; and a shooter who killed 23 people at an El Paso Walmart in 2019 talked about a "Hispanic invasion" in his manifesto, according to the Anti-Defamation League.

At least a half-dozen Republican U.S. Senate candidates promoted the "great replacement" conspiracy theory in the 2022 elections, the AP reported.

House Speaker Joe Tate, a Detroit Democrat and Michigan's first Black speaker, said Schriver's "blatantly racist social media post" and later statement on the issue do not align with the chamber's values and are "deeply and personally" offensive.

Schriver's insistence that the issue was worthy of consideration "puts his ignorance on full display," Tate said in a statement, but is not an excuse for "proliferating obvious hate."

“Perhaps most disturbing is that his post uplifts a dangerous and tortured narrative that fosters violence and instability," Tate said. "His callous and reckless act is not within the spirit of what Michigan is, and it contributes to a hostile environment."

Rep. Jason Hoskins, a Black Democratic lawmaker from Southfield, also criticized the post Wednesday night.

"Michigan House Republican celebrates Black History Month by promoting racist and dangerous conspiracies that there are too many people of color," Hoskins wrote on X.

House Republican Leader Matt Hall, R-Richland Township, did not respond to a request Wednesday night for comment about Schriver's post.

Rep. Kelly Breen, D-Novi, condemned the post as "blatantly racist" and "dangerous rhetoric" that has no place in society or in the state Legislature.

"It saddens & infuriates me that a colleague shared this," Breen wrote on X. "For someone who claims to love God - Rep. Schriver is blind to the fact this would make Him weep."

Elected in 2022, Schriver represents the 66th District in the Michigan House of Representatives, which includes Addison, Brandon, Oxford townships and most of Oakland Township in Oakland County and Bruce and Washington townships in Macomb County. The Warren native is a graduate of De La Salle Collegiate High School.

Schriver serves on the House Natural Resources, Environment, Tourism, and Outdoor Recreation Committee.

Condemnation of Schriver's post extended beyond Michigan political circles.

The Northern Guard Supporters, a fan group supporting the Detroit City Football Club, also condemned the post and said the first term lawmaker was not welcome among the fan group. Schriver's wife plays for the Detroit City Football Club women's team, which plays in the Premier Arena Soccer League.

Nick Finn, who helps run communications for the group, said fans "won't tolerate that in our stands." On X, Northern Guard Supporters noted that the league included "players from all ethnic backgrounds in a high minority population city."

"It’s very upsetting to see something like that, one, from any representative in Michigan, let alone one directly connected to a member our team,” Finn told The News on Wednesday.

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