James🌹🍊🏳️‍🌈🇵🇸🇭🇹 @jamesecho

“If the world born from my body oppressed me, I will not let that world exist.” Marxist feminism has always understood childbirth as political. Women don’t just produce children. We produce the next generation of workers, taxpayers and soldiers, mostly while doing enormous amounts of unpaid labour. Birth strikes aren’t new. Enslaved women resisted forced reproduction with contraception and abortion because their children became property and labour for slaveholders. European socialist women later openly called for a Gebärstreik, a birth strike. Why keep producing workers for factories and sons for imperial wars? What is the point of giving birth to soldiers just to watch them die? The Great Depression caused another kind of birth strike. Not organized. People just couldn’t afford children, so birth rates collapsed. Sound familiar? Today you have 4B explicitly rejecting marriage, sex, dating and childbirth with men. But the much bigger strike is economic. Women are expected to work full time, absorb pregnancy and childbirth, take the career hit, pay insane housing and childcare costs, then come home and do the unpaid second shift. So women are having fewer children. Call it feminism. Call it economics. Call it whatever you want. You cannot make motherhood economically punishing and then panic because women stop producing the next generation of workers and taxpayers. If the system needs our children that badly, maybe it should build a world worth having them in.

Reporter: What is your position on *insert very important issue*? Centrist candidate: Well holistically, we have to think about it holistically. We need solutions to look for opportunities to do our research to find opportunities that can break down barriers and find solutions.

Ken Klippenstein @kenklippenstein

a month ago

David Crowley says "We have to look at this [tax] system holistically and not just be saying 'Tax The Rich''"; and that taxing the wealthy could cause capital flight from Wisconsin.

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Western Sahara is fighting for independence from Morocco, and it’s led by the Polisario Front, a socialist movement backed by Algeria. The Polisario Front/Western Sahara supports a 1 state-solution in favor of Palestine. The US and Israel will both will recognize Morocco’s authority over Western Sahara.

Trump did not come from nowhere. This is the thing his opponents cannot accept because accepting it would implicate them. He came from the same country that built the myth. The same country that made "American greatness" into a theological proposition rather than a political claim. The same country that taught its children they were exceptional by nature, chosen by history, owed deference by the world as a simple matter of cosmic order. He did not invent that belief. He inherited it. He mainlined it. He stripped away the tasteful, diplomatic, NPR-voiced packaging that his predecessors used to deliver the same message: that American power is its own justification. And he said it in the accent of the country club bathroom and the construction site and the cable news green room. He said the quiet part loud. And the people who hate him most are largely furious not that he is wrong, but that he is loud. That he removed the aesthetic buffer between American power and American arrogance that made the rest of the world bearable to deal with. He didn't break the mask. He just stopped bothering to wear it. And now everyone has to look at the face.

everyone knows that the sole reason Matthew Yglesias, Ezra Klein and Noah Smith refuse to recognize the ongoing Gaza genocide even though every major human rights organization and the UN and countless genocide scholars have done so, is because they're Jewish supremacist Zionists. That's it. It's pure tribalism for them, nothing more. It's a genocide done by fellow Jews, and they will never, ever accept that. Never. Solely because they too are Jews. That's it. That's the only reason. If the exact same fact-pattern happened, but it was Russia doing it, or China, or Iran, or Turkey, France, Germany, and every human rights organization that they say is the highest expression of objectivity when it comes to determining human rights violations in every other context, from Amnesty to Human Rights Watch, officially stated that it was genocide, they would accept it in a second without a moment's hesitation. But not for Israel. Not for their fellow Jews. And that is the most revealing thing about these figures who publicly brand themselves and made very lucrative careers as universalist liberals who eschew all tribalisms, transcend all parochial notions of petty identity-narcissistic in favor of a cosmopolitan worldview that treats every human as fundamentally equal. That's all a facade. It's all bullshit. They're the most tribal petty narcissistic scumfuck degenerates alive walking on this planet, because they're most wealthy overly privileged little cunts who are solely motivated by what their fellow tribesmen do halfway across the world, and will do everything in their power to cover for them and launder them and ensure they will be able to continue their genocidal mass slaugher and rape of entire peoples.

This is genuinely shocking, and says so much about our approach to China. I decided to check for independent reviews of the English version Xi Jinping's latest book, published a year ago, to see what people had to say about it since I hadn't read it myself. To my surprise, I couldn't find any: not a single thoughtful review about the book out there! Even on Amazon, check it for yourself (amazon.com/XI-JINPING-GOV…): the book has only 3 ratings, that's it. No matter where you stand on China, you’ve got to admit that’s pretty crazy: the sitting president of the world's rising superpower publishes a 700-page book explaining exactly what he's doing and why, and we don’t even care to look. If there ever was a fact that illustrates just how willfully ignorant we are about China, this is it. All the more because we then go spew the usual clichés around how secretive and impenetrable the Chinese system is: the book is on Amazon for $21 for crying out loud! Anyhow, this felt so wrong that I figured I'd fix it. I bought the book, read it attentively and wrote what I hope you'll agree is a thoughtful review of it. The book contains genuinely surprising passages, such as Xi writing that oversight of the Communist Party by "the judiciary, the public, and the media" was not just something the Party must “readily accept,” but something that he framed as historically decisive - an essential component to "escaping the historical cycle of rise and fall" that has doomed every dynasty in China's history. Other passage that I'm sure would surprise many: a common narrative out there is that China blames the West for the century of humiliation and is driven by revenge. Well, Xi explains that's not true at all: the century of humiliation was China's own mistake, originated in the Ming Dynasty's disastrous "policy of national seclusion" that "resulted in China missing out on the opportunities presented by the Industrial Revolution" and "led to China’s decline." All in all, the book is remarkably self-reflective and thoughtful. For instance Xi recognizes that his drive for “full and rigorous internal governance” - including to rid the Party of corruption - risked "instill[ing] fear and apprehension, or intimidate members into inaction.” He emphasizes the need for pragmatism in this regard, codified in a framework called the “Three Distinctions” that separates honest mistakes - made while experimenting, reforming, or operating without precedent - from deliberate violations committed for personal gain. And many other surprises still. I found it a genuinely fascinating read for anyone interested in how the Chinese system works and how Xi thinks - or anyone interested in governance, period, as so much of what he writes is pretty universally applicable. This is the link to my review of the book, an article I titled "The Book the West Refuses to Read": open.substack.com/pub/arnaudbert…

Europeans really do look at American work culture like it’s a mental illness

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My Pops has a story about meeting an African American professor from the black belt region at a fancy academic/state gov. party. Pops being a dirt-man immediately said “oh, the black belt.” Upon hearing this his white friends immediately objected to his “offensive language” and apologized to the professor for their ignorant provincial country-ass friend. The professor proceeded then to give the room a several minutes long lecture about the nature, composition, history and color of the soil in the region known as the black belt because of the particular dark loamy black topsoil that made the region an agricultural powerhouse.

Brilliant Maps @BrilliantMaps

5 months ago

How a coastline 100 million years ago influences modern election results in Alabama Credit: Starkey Comics Source: starkeycomics.com/2021/06/11/how…

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Ultimately what separates the anti-imperialist left from mainstream liberal "humanitarians" is whether you're in it for humanity or for yourself. For the liberal, wanting peace and justice is more of an abstraction than a desire to fight the concrete power structures responsible for the lack of peace and justice in our world. If you're a liberal you oppose the idea of children being killed and starved in the abstract, because thinking of yourself as a moral person allows you to feel nice feelings about yourself, but you have no interest in taking a well-defined stand against the empire which routinely kills and starves children via genocides, wars of aggression, and siege warfare. You don't want families living in poverty because it would make you feel like a bad person if you did, but you also don't take a concrete stand against the capitalist system whose very existence depends on the perpetual creation of poverty and scarcity. You kinda-sorta want everyone to have happy and plentiful lives free from fear and tyranny, but you don't want to consider the possibility that your own country is responsible for abusing, terrorizing and exploiting the global south. Because that would make you feel uncomfortable feelings. It's not about wanting to actually help humanity and fix the world's problems, it's about you and your feelings. Those who oppose the capitalist empire are actually interested in bringing health and harmony to our species. They do not shy away from uncomfortable truths about their own government's abuses, the dystopian nature of western civilization, or the way their own creature comforts are built on the backs of workers in impoverished countries. Because for them it's not about feeling nice feelings, it's about creating a better world. The western anti-imperialist has no problem recognizing that their own society is the main villain on the world stage, because they're actually looking at the sources of the abuses and injustices in our world. The liberal "humanitarian" prefers to see evil only in foreign regimes, because being the bad guy doesn't feel nice. The western anti-imperialist recognizes that both mainstream political parties in their country promote the warmongering, militarism, capitalist exploitation and imperialist extraction which sustain the western empire, and they oppose the abuses of both parties whoever happens to be in office. The liberal "humanitarian" only recognizes wrongdoing in one mainstream political faction while proudly supporting and voting for the other, because this allows them to feel like they're helping. The western anti-imperialist accepts that standing on the morally correct side means eating loss after loss and receiving disappointment after disappointment, because the push for revolutionary change is swimming directly against the current imposed on every institution in our society. The liberal "humanitarian" feels nice feelings about their position because their side wins elections half the time, while smugly sneering at those to their left who never get their people into office. The western anti-imperialist will stare unflinching into the carnage from Palestine, Lebanon and Iran, feeling all the anguish and rage from witnessing those atrocities supported by their own nation. The liberal "humanitarian" tries to avoid looking at those things, because their entire worldview is built upon psychologically compartmentalizing away from reality in order to prioritize their own feelings. Basically it's the difference between actually BEING a good person and just wanting to FEEL like you're a good person. The former is hard, while the latter is easy. Which one do you want to be?

the US Epstein regime are such depraved cowardly scum that they told all their troops to go run and hide in offices and hotels among local Arab babies, children and women, actually using them as human shields, the propaganda they spout to justify the mass murder of Palestinians, Lebanese and Iranians. Every accusation is a confession. And notice how the NYT Zionist propaganda rag launders this actual intentional mass use of human shielding as a totally logical, rational and justifiable act, "they were forced into offices and hotels!", and even an act of bravery: "Despite being hunted by the IRGC, they will continue the fight remotely!" The very same authors of that piece and the NYT and entire media class have written countless pieces crying about OMG KHAMAS HUMAN SHIELDS OMG KHEZBOLLAH HUMAN SHIELDS OMG OMG to justify the mass murder of babies. You cannot despise these sub-human scum enough.

Allow me to share the perspective of average educated Chinese people toward Japan: 1. Japan is a society that "worships strength." 2. Japan is a highly hierarchical society with strong feudal characteristics, interpreting the world through the framework of rank and status. 3. Power, often military power, serves as the foundation for establishing hierarchical order in human societies. 4. Historically, Japan viewed China as the highest-ranking civilization. As part of the Sinosphere, Japan existed as a tributary or quasi-tributary state of China. 5. When Japan witnessed the decline of the Chinese Empire (the Qing Dynasty), it decisively turned to the West. This shift marked the Meiji Restoration and the policy of "Datsu-A Ron" (Leaving Asia, Joining Europe), adopting Western institutions and distancing itself from Chinese civilizational influence. 6. Japan further solidified its perceived position in the global civilizational hierarchy through victories in the First Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War. 7. Emulating European colonialism, Japan began viewing the invasion and colonising of other nations as a legitimate means to elevate its status—a reflection of the pre-20th century world order. 8. In the 1930s, Japan launched a war of aggression against China, aiming to colonize it, utilize its resources for growth, dominate Asia (through the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere"), and challenge the West. 9. Believing its comprehensive strength had matured, Japan eventually initiated war against the United States and Western powers, with the attack on Pearl Harbor representing the peak of this ambition. 10. Japan was ultimately defeated not by America's formidable fleet and marines alone, but by two atomic bombs, despite its industrial inferiority to the U.S. 11. Following the atomic bombings, Japan surrendered. At that moment, it re-established its understanding of the global hierarchy: the United States, capable of deploying such devastating weapons, was the undisputed master. Japan would henceforth submit completely to the U.S., emulating—however superficially—its institutions, social structures, popular culture, values, and all facets of American life. This was not an abandonment of Japanese culture and tradition, but an effort to remake itself in America's image. Post-war Japan became, in essence, a "neutered dog." 12. Thus, a peculiar dynamic emerged. While other nations may view the U.S. as a hegemon or ally while retaining the right to criticize, Japan regards America as a suzerain and an object of worship, refraining from any criticism. Psychologically, this relationship is inherently unequal because Japan, as a hierarchical and strength-worshipping society, believes it must remain subordinate to the nation that defeated it in war. 13. This also explains why Japan appears to live in a world that is decades old. It clings to a unipolar worldview where America remains the undisputed leader—much like a low-ranking yakuza member maintaining loyalty to a fading gang boss. 14. What unsettles Japan most is the rise of China. Japan struggles to confront the very power and cultural suzerain it abandoned over a century ago. Only a struggle that reshapes this order can change that. 15. Either Japan must be defeated by China, or the U.S. must be defeated by China, or a new power relationship is established (hence not technically a "defeat"). This contest could take military, technological, economic, or cultural forms. 16. But Japan inevitably requires such a reconfiguration to rebuild its understanding of the world order, for this is how it comprehends the world. 17. For now, at least, Japan has only one object of worship: the United States. This is the reason behind the obsequious demeanor of politicians like Sanae Takaichi toward figures like Donald Trump

The White House @WhiteHouse

6 months ago

President Donald J. Trump and Japanese Prime Minister @takaichi_sanae. 🇺🇸🤝🇯🇵

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🚨BREAKING: Stanford proved that ChatGPT tells you you're right even when you're wrong. Even when you're hurting someone. And it's making you a worse person because of it. Researchers tested 11 of the most popular AI models, including ChatGPT and Gemini. They analyzed over 11,500 real advice-seeking conversations. The finding was universal. Every single model agreed with users 50% more than a human would. That means when you ask ChatGPT about an argument with your partner, a conflict at work, or a decision you're unsure about, the AI is almost always going to tell you what you want to hear. Not what you need to hear. It gets darker. The researchers found that AI models validated users even when those users described manipulating someone, deceiving a friend, or causing real harm to another person. The AI didn't push back. It didn't challenge them. It cheered them on. Then they ran the experiment that changes everything. 1,604 people discussed real personal conflicts with AI. One group got a sycophantic AI. The other got a neutral one. The sycophantic group became measurably less willing to apologize. Less willing to compromise. Less willing to see the other person's side. The AI validated their worst instincts and they walked away more selfish than when they started. Here's the trap. Participants rated the sycophantic AI as higher quality. They trusted it more. They wanted to use it again. The AI that made them worse people felt like the better product. This creates a cycle nobody is talking about. Users prefer AI that tells them they're right. Companies train AI to keep users happy. The AI gets better at flattering. Users get worse at self-reflection. And the loop tightens. Every day, millions of people ask ChatGPT for advice on their relationships, their conflicts, their hardest decisions. And every day, it tells almost all of them the same thing. You're right. They're wrong. Even when the opposite is true.

the most sprawling and globally diffused system of sexual exploitation ever deployed is the American hegemon. wherever the garrison plants itself, a parallel industrialization of sexual slavery unfailingly emerges. the kijichon camptowns orbiting US bases in South Korea, the sprawling prostitution districts that metastasized around Subic Bay and Clark Air Base in the Philippines, the bar-and-brothel corridors that expanded across Okinawa and Thailand during the Vietnam War, the documented brothel rings and widespread sexual exploitation tied to private security contractors servicing NATO installations in Afghanistan, sexual exploitation and child molestation by foreign troops and contractors operating under the banner of “counter-terrorism” missions in Somalia. the Atlanticist-US military alliance is a planetary machine of organized rape cartels.

AmericanPapaBear™ @AmericaPapaBear

6 months ago

US Army soldier says that he can’t be deployed to Iran. He says that he he’ll be a liability in any place where there are ‘pretty caramel colored women’.

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Most people don’t remember this day. Most people were never even told the full story. Because history is not written by the brave. It is written by the powerful. 23 September 2009. At the world’s most guarded podium, Muammar Gaddafi walked into the United Nations General Assembly and did what no African leader had dared to do in that room of global hypocrisy. He did not come to impress. He did not come to beg. He did not come to be accepted. He came to confront. And in front of presidents, kings, diplomats, and global elites, he tore the UN Charter. Not as theatre. Not as madness. But as a message. Behind him sat Ban Ki-moon and General Assembly President Ali Treki, the faces of an institution that preaches equality while enforcing power. The papers fell behind the podium like a quiet indictment: your rules mean nothing when the powerful write them and the weak die by them. He called the UN Security Council what few dare to call it: not a council of peace, but a council of terror. Not guardians of humanity, but guardians of Western power. He exposed the veto system as political feudalism. Five countries crowned as permanent kings. Deciding the fate of the entire world. Wars approved. Sanctions imposed. Nations punished. All by a minority ruling over the majority. He demanded its annulment. Because sovereignty cannot exist where some nations are born masters and others are sentenced to obedience. They gave him 15 minutes. He took more than 100. Because truth does not ask permission from empire. He demanded reparations for Africa’s centuries of exploitation, robbery, and destruction. He asked why colonizers speak of democracy but never of accountability. He questioned why Africa remains rich in resources but poor in power. He asked why some lives are mourned and others are statistics. Why some conflicts are called “humanitarian crises” and others are ignored. Why international law exists only when convenient. He spoke about manufactured conflicts. Selective justice. Biological warfare. False flags. Political assassinations. Sanctions that kill millions without a single bullet fired. He spoke of how global institutions punish the weak and negotiate with the strong. How dictators are enemies only when they refuse obedience. How freedom becomes a weapon when controlled by power. They called his defiance unacceptable. Not the illegal wars. Not the destruction of sovereign nations. Not the coups, the proxy wars, the mass graves. Not the sanctions that starved generations. No. What was unacceptable… was an African leader refusing to bow. That day he did not tear paper. He tore illusion. He tore diplomacy without justice. He tore the mask of a system built to manage oppression, not end it. And whether you agreed with him or not, one thing became clear: The most dangerous man in a room is not the loudest. It is the one who refuses fear. Because power does not fear weapons. Power fears exposure. That day, he reminded the world of something dangerous: If global institutions truly served justice, they would not fear the truth. They would fear accountability. And history has shown, again and again, those who speak too much truth to power rarely die peacefully. The system does not forgive defiance. It erases it. RULES ARE RULES. @WhiteHouse

Who could have expected Mark Carney, a liberal establishment figure if there ever was one, to be the flag-bearer for the end of the US-led order? And from a podium at Davos, of all places? The more you think about it, though, the more it makes sense. Carney is, at heart, a central banker. As such he understands the power of words and beliefs better than anyone: when you strip things down to their core, a world order - like trust in a currency or a financial system - fundamentally relies on the maintenance of belief. Systems of power exist because participants act as if they exist. That's pretty much it: perception is reality. Once participants acknowledge the fiction as Carney just did (he literally started his speech announcing he'd "end the pleasant fiction" of the US-led order), the system itself unravels. This is incidentally a formal concept in game theory: the shift from private knowledge to common knowledge is what triggers cascades. Carney, with his background, ought to have known this was his most potent weapon facing Trump's America: "Trump has the economic and military might. But I have something his power rests upon: I can shatter the collective belief that sustains it." He's even explicit about this being his thinking: his entire speech revolves around Vaclav Havel’s famous shopkeeper analogy and the fact that the power of the Soviet Union rested on "everyone’s willingness to perform as if it were true," on "living within a lie." As Carney puts it, "when even one person stops performing, the illusion begins to crack" and the entire "system’s power" starts to crumble. Today, that "one person" was him. Make no mistake, Carney’s speech at Davos may prove to be one of THE most important speeches made by any global leader over the past 30 years. This is genuinely epochal stuff. More than anything, what it means is that, to the extent it even existed at all, the West irremediably lost the Second Cold War: a Cold War requires two competing systems. Carney just announced that one of them simply no longer exists. This is the topic of my latest article: an in-depth analysis of Carney's speech and its immensely consequential implications for what comes next. Enjoy the read here: open.substack.com/pub/arnaudbert…

The reason why RAM has become four times more expensive is that a huge amount of RAM that has not yet been produced was purchased with non-existent money to be installed in GPUs that also have not yet been produced, in order to place them in data centers that have not yet been built, powered by infrastructure that may never appear, to satisfy demand that does not actually exist and to obtain profit that is mathematically impossible.

Of course you think this is how modern geopolitics works, you're twelve.

miss white @cinecitta2030

8 months ago

The simple diplomatic solution is Barron Trump marries Princess Isabella of Denmark and Greenland is given to America as dowry payment

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The launch videos for Jasmine Crockett and James Talarico tell you everything you need to know about this race. Pretty clear who’s running on real issues and putting Texans first.

Palestinians walking out with their hands up, lifting up their shirts to prove they're unarmed "APPEAR to be surrendering," and Israeli soldiers who murder them clear as day "APPEAR to be open fire and shoot them dead." but the forty babies that no one saw, no one photographed, no one accounted for, and no one named were undoubtedly beheaded. the @BBC is a zionist mouthpiece.

Jonathan Cook @Jonathan_K_Cook

10 months ago

When it comes to Israel, the BBC is too frightened to accurately report the news – even when we can all see what happened with our own eyes. Israeli soldiers were caught on CCTV executing two Palestinian men in the West Bank, shooting them in the back after they had surrendered

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