Reality is a multi-dimensional, continuous state space where outcomes exist in a probability distribution, rather than at discrete points
Compressing this complexity into binaries ignores variables and the non-linear interactions that define what we would call âthe real worldâ
You want to know what imperial conditioning looks like from the inside?
It looks like a person who knows that the United States has the largest prison population in the history of human civilization, and still describes other countries as "unfree."
It looks like a person who knows their healthcare system allows people to die from rationed insulin, and still describes other countries' economics as "failed."
It looks like a person who watched their government spend $2.3 trillion over twenty years building a state in Afghanistan that collapsed in just 10 days, and still trusts that same government's assessment of which other countries are "stable" or "democratic" or "ready for self-governance."
It is not stupidity.
It is something more structurally interesting than stupidity.
It is what happens when the story a person needs to believe about themselves is in direct conflict with the evidence their own eyes can see, and the story wins.
Not because the evidence is unclear.
But because the cost of following the evidence to its conclusion is too high.
Better a comfortable contradiction than an uncomfortable clarity.
The empire is built on that choice, made daily, by millions of people.
Welcome to the era of Iran acting as a global player.
For the first time in over 300 years, Iran has proactively taken action to protect its allies, its national interests and stop ongoing crimes against humanity.
Leen Hijaz, valedictorian at her high school in North Carolina, said the following in her graduation speech:
"Before I leave the stage, I have one last thing to say. Every single person here has a voice; we have the privilege to use it when millions around the world are struggling and suffering to be heard. Whether itâs the millions suffering in Palestine, Sudan, Congo, Afghanistan and so many other countries around the world, or families being torn apart by ICE. These are not just an issue here; they are happening there, theyâre happening right here as I speak. My point is, weâre not given a voice to stay silent."
Corey Robin, a political theorist at Brooklyn College, writes: "The mere mention of Palestineâmaybe ICE, tooâsent the high school principal, Melissa Moore, hurtling across the stage to seize the microphone from Hijaz, and stop her from saying these unapproved words.
Just look at this photograph: A young Muslim woman, speaking out, and a desperate, terrified principal trying to shut her down, lest the student say something unauthorized, disapproved, discordant with the views of an increasingly small clique of government officials and voters.
It's so pathetic. It reads like a comic play by VĂĄclav Havel. It looks like the desperate last days of the Soviet Union. I can only hope Hijaz speaks for a generation that will, one day, sweep all this garbage into the dustbin of history".
âMy name is Amos Goldberg. I am an Israeli Professor of Holocaust Studies. For nearly 30 years I have researched and taught the Holocaust, genocide and state violence.
And I want to tell whoever is willing to listen that whatâs happening now in Gaza is a genocide.
A year ago when October 7th happened, like all Israelis I was in shock. It was a war crime and a crime against humanity. 1200 people - more than 800 of them civilians - were killed in one day. Children and the elderly were among those taken hostage. Communities were destroyed. It was outrageous, traumatizing, personal. Like most Israelis, I know people who were killed, who lost loved ones or whose loved ones were taken hostage.
But immediately afterwards came Israelâs response and within weeks thousands of civilians were killed in Gaza. It took me some time to digest what was unfolding before my eyes. It was agonizing to confront that reality. I was reluctant to call it a genocide.
But if you read Raphael Lemkin â the Jewish-Polish legal scholar who coined the term âgenocideâ and was the major driving force behind the 1948 United Nations Genocide Convention â what is happening in Gaza now is exactly what he had in mind when he spoke about genocide.
It does not need to look like the Holocaust to be a genocide. Each genocide looks different and not all involve killing of millions or the entire group. The United Nations Genocide Convention explicitly asserts that genocide is the act of deliberately destroying a group in whole or in part. Those are the words.
But there does need to be a clear intent.
And indeed, there are clear indications of intent to destroy Gaza: Israelâs leaders - including the prime minister and the minister of defence - and many high-ranking military officers, media personalities, rabbis, as well as ordinary soldiers were very open about what they wanted to achieve. There were countless documented incitements to turn the whole of Gaza into rubble and claims that there are no innocent people living there.
A radical atmosphere of dehumanization of the Palestinians prevails in Israeli society to an extent that I canât remember in my 58 years of living here.
Now that vision has been enacted. Tens of thousands of innocent children, women and men have been killed. Over a hundred thousand were wounded. There is a near total destruction of infrastructure, intentional starvation and blocking of humanitarian aid. There are mass graves and reliable testimony of summary executions. Children that were shot by snipers. All the universities and almost all hospitals are gone. Almost all the population is displaced. There have been numerous bombings of civilians in so-called âsafe zonesâ. Gaza does not exist anymore. It is completely destroyed. Thus, the outcome fits perfectly with the stated intentions of Israelâs leadership.
Lemkin - that scholar who coined the term âgenocideâ - described two phases of a genocide. The first is the destruction of the annihilated group and the second is what he called âimposition of the national patternâ of the perpetrator. We are now witnessing the second phase as Israel prepares ethnically cleansed areas for Israeli settlements.
And therefore, I have come to the conclusion that this is exactly what a genocide looks like. We donât teach about genocides in order to realize it retrospectively. We teach about it in order to prevent it and to stop it.
But like in every other case of genocide in history right now we have mass denial. Both here in Israel and around the world.
But reality cannot be denied.
So yes, it is a genocide.
And once you come to this conclusion you cannot remain silent.â
- Statement to Led By Donkeys, December 2024
- Photo: Parliament Square, London, 8.40am, 4th December 2024
In order to protect the human person in the age of #ArtificialIntelligence, we must once again reflect on the common good, the universal destination of goods, subsidiarity, solidarity and social justice. #MagnificaHumanitas
https://t.co/Oe8yclDxkr
Let us learn to be rich in a different way: more attentive to relationships, more intent on valuing the common good, more attached to the local area, more grateful in welcoming and integrating those who come to live with us.
finding out the artemis ii astronauts talked with poets and studied poetry so they knew how to properly convey what they were seeing in words and saying that the arts played a huge role in their time in space. oh my god
A common disease among cinema studies academics or culture writers is a disconnect with life that isnât directly linked to faculty politics or the woes of turtleneck social circles where people read Saul Bellow and have cheesy affairs. These people canât tell you about Dune.
GM
Icarus_I (2023)
kinda crazy looking back on my older work and being able to not only see growth but also consistency. the Icarus series pushed me to become a better sculptor and world builder.
collected by @diusxx