Romano70

Music, Art, Human Rights, Development, Public Policy, Finance, Politics, Internet, Brazil, France.

[Grant Maxwell @grantmaxwell]

“Accepting otherness is possible precisely on the condition of assuming the multiplicity within oneself.” Guattari

[Isabella M Weber @IsabellaMWeber]

One of the upshots of the Economist’s attack on Daron Acemoglu is that the key dividing line is not about methodology. You can literally be the most decorated mainstream economist but if you land on the “wrong” side, you are ousted.

The key dividing line is whose side you are on: workers or big business.

[kristina. @cosmepolitics]

***2026 now

[Gilles Babinet @babgi]

Je n'ai pas le souvenir d'avoir refermé un livre en ayant le sentiment que nous entrons à ce point dans un nouveau paradigme politique, du fait qu'une frange non négligeable du monde de la tech californienne est acquise à l'idée qu'il faut accélérer et que, pour accélérer, la démocratie est un problème. Il ne s'agit pas un épiphénomène : ceux qui défendent ces idées ont désormais une forte influence - économiquement, cognitivement et socialement - sur des milliards d'individus au travers de leurs plateformes. Une influence qui, selon l'auteur Gil Duran (exclu de X par Elon Musk pour avoir critiqué le manifeste de Alex Karp) , s'inspire du fascisme, ce qu'il développe longuement au début et au milieu de son ouvrage. Évidemment, c'est polémique. Mais il faut prendre le temps de lire cet ouvrage convaincant, parce que documentée par les déclarations des uns et des autres, parce qu' appuyée sur leurs références bibliographiques (The Sovereign Individual, The Cathedral...) et parce que cela met en exergue l'ampleur de la pénétration de ces idées dans le monde de la technologie. Et non, il ne s'agit pas de quelques esprits enfiévrés ; il s'agit d'individus parmi les plus grandes fortunes de ce monde, qui placent peu à peu leurs technologies, leurs agents dans différents systèmes politiques, économiques, sociaux... aux fins de faire tomber la démocratie et de faire advenir leur projet. Pour ceux qui en doutent, Il faut avoir à l'esprit que le Vice-président des USA ne serait pas là s'il ne défendait pas également ces idées, parmi d'autres. Il a reçu $ 15 millions de Thiel pour sa campagne et a été l'objet d'un lobbying efficace de la part du monde de la tech pour être le "ticket" de D. Trump
Disclaimer : j'ai une profonde aversion pour le complotisme et je ne me serais pas permis d'écrire cela s'il ne me semblait pas que la dynamique est réelle, et déjà fortement engagée.
La conclusion de ce livre est on ne peut plus claire : nous ne pouvons plus nous permettre de demi-mesures. Il convient de construire un projet politique, avec en son coeur ce nouveau paradigme technologique. Si nous voulons construire un monde où les données ne sont pas exploitées contre les individus, où les algorithmes ne déforment pas le réel au profit de quelques-uns et où la richesse ne se concentre pas exclusivement entre les mains du capital, il va falloir comprendre ce qui est en train de se jouer.
Cela pose des questions fondamentales : avons-nous réellement besoin d'une société organisée autour de plateformes controlées tout au plus par quelques milliers de personnes à l'échelle de la planète ? La richesse de ces individus peut elle continuer d'être considérée comme acceptable lorsqu'elle appelle un pouvoir qui concurrence celui des Etats ? Faut-il inventer de nouvelles architectures économiques et numériques qui protègent les données privées — personnelles, culturelles ou industrielles ? Comment empêcher que certains de ces acteurs s'approprient des prérogatives qui n'ont, par nature, aucune raison de l'être, comme la monnaie ?

[#WOMENSART @womensart1]

Yayoi Kusama (1929-2026) RIP.

[Pixel Symphony @Pixel0Symphony]

RIP Yayoi Kusama.

Pink Dots-Let Me Rest in a Tomb of Stars (detail). 1993-94.

So sad to hear of her passing 🩷🩷

[Robin Rimbaud - Scanner @robinrimbaud]

Farewell today to the high priestess of polka dots, Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama (1929-2026). Her work was unforgettable and for her, a means to survival. It’s playful, psychedelic, compulsive, beautiful and slightly unsettling all at once. Into infinity and beyond Yayoi! 🔴🟡⚫️

[Connor Lounsbury @ConnorLounsbury]

There will never be a more iconic entrance. Tim Curry, you will never be forgotten. 💔

[Cik ala t'cha @Ann_Aurore]

Leila Forés

[Taste of Cinema @davidcinema]

There are always great movies that dare to challenge the norm. We present you The 30 Most Controversial Movies of All Time: https://t.co/1ZqNObrqcl

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

There's one interesting dimension of the US's sanctions on the ICC 👇 that, as far as I saw, no media caught.

The US has sanctioned many ICC officials over the past few years but Abdoulaye Seye - one of 2 persons sanctioned this time (the other being ICC President Tomoko Akane) - was the first non-elected one.

So there is something quite unique about his case.

Seye's role at the ICC? Senior Trial Lawyer and Head of the Team handling the Situation in the State of Palestine (I know, quite a mouthful): in other words, the guy is the ICC's lead lawyer on the Palestine case.

Already, that alone should make it absolutely obvious that these sanctions have nothing to do, as Marco Rubio wrote, with "protecting Americans" but everything to do with protecting Israel.

But that's not the only thing special about Abdoulaye Seye.

See, ICC judges are elected officials: they serve non-renewable nine-year terms, and these terms are staggered so that one-third of the bench (6 judges out of 18) comes up for replacement every three years. All 124 member countries vote by secret ballot.

And that's where things get interesting: the next election is coming up in December this year and Seye is actually candidate to becoming a judge, proposed by his country of Senegal (https://t.co/z8fNaXMqME).

There are 14 candidates running for the 6 judge seats (https://t.co/6D2AXA7tCF) and Seye is the only one sanctioned by the U.S., which actually puts him at enormous practical disadvantages versus the other candidates.

For one thing, very concretely, the election takes place at the UN in New York, and being on the US sanctions list means being physically barred from entering the United States.

And it's not just about the vote itself. The whole campaign plays out in New York over months: in particular during the UN General Assembly in September, the High-level meetings, the candidate public roundtable interviews on November 4–5, and the Assembly of States Parties (ASP) session in December. That's where candidates meet delegations and lobby for votes.

The other 13 candidates will be freely doing this. Seye cannot do any of it.

So there is actually a huge election meddling angle to this: with these sanctions, the US is effectively rigging the race by banning one candidate from the entire campaign trail.

Perhaps more importantly, it also re-raises the question of whether the US is a fit place to host international institutions at all.

It's painfully obvious that a host country that weaponizes its territory to influence elections at international institutions (which, in the case of the ICC, it doesn't even belong to) is not an appropriate ground: for their own survival, these institutions should be as far away and as insulated from the US as possible.

It also raises the crucial question of how the rest of the world should respond.

The insanity here is that almost no other country globally - be in the West or the Global South - stands with the US on this, save for a handful of exceptions (like Israel). Yet they all behave like deer in the headlights (or, as we say in French, like "ostriches burying their head in sand") and do absolutely nothing concrete about it besides meaningless "we're preoccupied" statements.

The EU's behavior is particularly egregious in this regard. They too host a number of international institutions, such as... the ICC! ICC bench elections may be occurring in NYC but it's in The Hague, Netherlands, that the institution is physically located (I visited the place last year with my daughters: https://t.co/WyUgXUylj8).

So, given that they oppose these sanctions and literally host the court, you'd expect the EU to take some measures to protect the institution and the officials targeted by the sanctions.

All the more because they have a tool designed EXACTLY for this purpose: the so-called "blocking statute", a regulation that prohibits EU entities from complying with extraterritorial US sanctions.

On its own website the EU describes it as "an important achievement of unified EU action to protect EU operators, whether individuals or companies, from the extra-territorial application of third country laws" (https://t.co/W3IbD6Ummg)

It's perfect: activate the blocking statutes, and European banks can no longer close ICC officials' accounts, cancel their credit cards, or freeze their transactions just because Washington says so.

It's exactly what China did (they have their own "blocking statute") when the US started sanctioning Chinese refineries to prevent them from buying Iranian oil (see ): they activated their blocking statutes, making it illegal for Chinese companies to comply with these US sanctions and there is jack shit the US can do about it. It's a very powerful legal tool.

Yet, incomprehensively, the EU refuses to activate it. The blocking statute sits there, purpose-built but completely unused, while European companies have no choice but to enforce America's sanctions.

It's insane: the EU literally standing by while Washington destroys the lives of people on European soil - they oppose it, have the perfect tool to fight it, but they stand by. Again: incomprehensible.

All the more incomprehensible because it's actually a golden geopolitical opportunity for Europe: if Europe wants to be taken seriously as an independent actor on the world stage - as it keeps saying it does - there is literally no easier win than this. Activate a tool you already have, protect an institution you already host, defend a principle you already claim to believe in.

The fact that even this is too much unfortunately tells the rest of the world everything it needs to know about what European "sovereignty" actually means in practice.

[Meditations in Color @MeditateColor]

Angelo Testa, Macbeth. 1982.

Colored ink on illustration board.

[Pixel Symphony @Pixel0Symphony]

Franco Grignani, Unknown. 1965.

[Jostein Hauge @haugejostein]

Daron Acemoglu blasts The Economist over their bizarre critique of him: “Your central verdict that I am 'oddly unconvincing' rests on unnamed economists revealing their true opinion of me over a few drinks. No persons who have been offered drinks to get to this truth are named. Would you publish a letter asserting that, over a few drinks, most people tell me that your newspaper is no longer worth subscribing to? The only person quoted with such views is a blogger, Noah Smith, a thin basis for judging a lifetime of academic work [...] If this is the best you can do with a body of work spanning 33 years, then it is your critique that is 'oddly unconvincing.'”

[Medo e Delírio em Brasília @medoedeliriobr]

Vai se criando um clima terrível

[Muhsin Bey @MhsnBeyy]

Ünlü Alman filozof Friedrich Nietzsche, 1889 yılında İtalya’nın Torino kentinde yaşadığı travmatik bir olayın ardından zihinsel ve bedensel melekelerini kaybetti. Bakıma muhtaç şekilde yatağa bağlı geçirdiği 11 yılın sonunda, 1900 yılında hayatını kaybetti. Peki, neydi bu travma?

​Nietzsche o gün Torino caddelerinde yürürken, bir fayton atının bitkinlikten yürüyemez hale geldiğini ve sürücüsünün onu acımasızca kırbaçladığını gördü. At acı içinde yere çöktüğünde Nietzsche koşarak gitti ve ata sarıldı. Belki de ona bir şeyler fısıldadı. Ardından evine döndü ve bir daha hiç konuşmadı; ölünceye dek sürecek sessiz bir yaşama çekildi.

Kendi iç dünyasındaki kırılmaların da etkisiyle Nietzsche, o gün insanlığın acımasızlığına isyan etmiş ve adeta insanlıktan istifa etmişti.

​Benzer bir duruşu, felsefi derinliğiyle tanınan Macar yönetmen Béla Tarr’da da görürüz. Tarr, 2011 yılında sinemayı bırakmadan önceki bu son yapıtıyla insanlığın sıradanlığına ve bu sıradanlığın getirdiği kötülüğe isyan etti.

​İnsan olmaktan utandığı için midir bilinmez, yönetmen sinemaya veda ettiği bu filmde Nietzsche’nin sarıldığı o atın ve sahibinin birkaç günlük yaşamını konu aldı. İzleyenlerin içini ürperten bu yapıt, sinema tarihine damga vuran Torino Atı filmidir.

​Filmde diyaloglar ve insan varlığı minimuma indirgenmiştir. Ruhunu kaybetmiş, yalnızca hayatta kalma güdüsüyle temel ihtiyaçlarına odaklanmış bir baba ile kızının kasvetli ve acınası yaşamından bir kesit sunulur. Herkesin kolayca tüketebileceği türden bir film değildir elbette.

​Kendi karanlığıyla yüzleşmeye cesaret eden izleyiciyi derin düşüncelere sevk eden, bittiğinde insanı olduğu yere çivileyip uzaklara daldıran sert bir yapımdır.

​Umarım zihnen ve ruhen hazırlıklı bir şekilde izlersiniz.

[Mario Macis @Mario_Macis]

What kind of question is this? One could just as easily ask whether The Economist’s reputation is justified by its journalism. Daron Acemoglu is a Nobel laureate, one of the most influential economists alive, and the author of an extraordinary body of scholarship that has shaped entire fields. Serious criticism of particular papers is of course fair game. This kind of insinuating framing is something else.