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@DocWatts Agree with your post above. We need to not be so optimistic we’re blind to current and future dangers, yet not be so pessimistic we’re paralysed into nihilism and non action. The progress narrative often suggests the path is rocky but in the right direction. In reality, the steps we take forward can generate such severe externalities and unforeseen consequences that the single step back becomes catastrophic, not only undoing the progress we thought we made but sometimes dragging us to the abyss. Also, some of those steps forward may be forward in the wrong direction - we need to differentiate between change and progress and not conflate change with progress - change is cosmetic, superficial and quantitative whilst progress is deeper, substantive and qualitative. Put another way, the three steps forward, one step back analogy assumes the steps forward and back are of equal weight. But the back step can be so profound and far reaching in its impact, that it completely negates, and even exceeds, any forward momentum. We need to redefine progress to be more holistic as it’s often easier to quantify the material, and harder to quantify the immaterial aspects of life that are much more meaningful. Focusing on materialist metrics over meaningful ones and simplistically saying the world’s better is too simplistic. We should ask - at what expense have scientific and technological advancements occurred? And have these translated into social and spiritual well being, or are they destabilising. Economic growth has occurred unequally and is now eroding buying power through inflation to the point of a whole “hustle culture” and gig economy needing to spawn. The pace of change and disruption requires people to reinvent themselves every few years or decades causing psychological distress and job insecurity that didn’t exist before. To illustrate, in the past people’s surnames often reflected their occupations ie Smith for blacksmiths, Baker for bakers, Miller for grain mill workers. We can develop all the tools we want (through science and technology ie progress and advancement) but what good is the tool if the user of the tool isn’t well enough to use them. Another way to put it is this: we are developing lifestyles but don't have life quality. A parallel to this is that we have extended lifespans but not necessarily health spans.

So Israel just assassinated a more rational political negotiator from Hamas and now have Sinwar who is way more emotional and vengeful as the new leader of Hamas - yet say they expect peace before statehood. It's actually Israel that has it backwards. Justice is more a prerequisite to peace than the other way round (as has been seen historically - South African apartheid, US civil rights movement, Northern Irelands Good Friday agreement to name a few) Peace isn't just the absence of conflict but the presence of fairness (human rights), equality (not of outcome like woke people demand) and the resolution of legitimate grievances (that when go unaddressed lead to illegitimate avenues to addressing those legitimate grievances such as terrorism). People under occupation aren't supposed to play some 'How to win friends and influence people' game where they need to prove their worth. The very international system of law that the West pioneered in setting up states who is occupied and what their rights are. These aren't negotiable. Yet, Israel thinks otherwise and stands alone at every UN resolution with US in it's corner embarrassing itself. They lay thick the hypocrisy that can be cut with a knife when the values and system of law they claim to up hold in reality aren't aligned with what their actions show.

@Consept Good info all round. I also think what adds to their anger regarding jobs is that a lot of the types of jobs migrants do can be done undocumented with cash payment allowing them to earn benefits on top of the work their doing - essentially playing the system. I'm not sure how much of this is being done but I wouldn't consider it a large proportion. Last I checked, 0.5% of UK's population is made up of asylum seekers, and 15% of immigrants aren't born in the UK. Some proponents of the far right claim this to be reverse colonisation or an invasion. A lot of issues are systemic in nature (low economic growth, demographic decline, urbanisation and atomisation), that then get attributed in a tribalistic manner towards immigrants or towards those that don't share the same colour, creed or beliefs. Whilst there are definitely legitimate grievances and a feeling of societal decay, the cause is wrongly identified. These are excesses of stage orange, which cause a reversion to stage red and blue ideologies. What is clear is that the face of urban Britain is changing at a very rapid rate, and they think that change is the cause of their societal decline. The legitimate grievance regarding immigration is that you can't have net migration being so high without improving and expanding the infrastructure needed to support that migration. The problem is when legitimate grievances are gone about in illegitimate ways and weaponised by nefarious interests and ideologues. Maajid Nawaz - ''Instigating riots as a distraction from the real causes of our problems is a tried and tested method used by those with power to maintain their grip. What you have all been witnessing is the mass-radicalisation of many of Britain’s white working classes, which occurred after many British Muslims had already been radicalised in the previous decades. This is a process of reciprocal radicalisation. The way such radicalisation works is by hijacking and monopolising existing legitimate grievances resulting in truths being used to spread division. When people ask me what are the causes of radicalisation, I say the causes are legitimate grievances that are exploited by hardened ideologues who then manipulate vulnerable young people by pointing to those legitimate grievances and radicalise them. Now, at no stage in the process of radicalisation is it suggested that the grievances are not legitimate. So if you look at Islamist radicalisation, whether it be the genocide in Bosnia whether it be the invasion of Iraq whether it be racism at home or whether it indeed be the civil liberties violations that occurred during the war on terror decade under George Bush and Tony Blair, these are all legitimate grievances like Guantanamo, that people can point to to say this is radicalising Muslims. In comes the hardened ideologue and exploits those grievances to manipulate the angry young teenage Muslim into a path of radicalisation. Why do I mention all this? Because Tommy Robinson has just been freed from prison. And Tommy Robinson is involved in this process of radicalisation. He and his supporters have some legitimate grievances that they point to, which end up radicalising themselves and the rest of their constituency. And we need to understand the process of radicalisation here to understand how to tackle it. Because the media silence around Tommy Robinson and why he went to prison and why he was revealed, or indeed the refusal to discuss some of the issues he raises, or indeed the desire to character assassinate the person that he is, won't make him go away, just as it doesn't make Trump go away.''

''The fact that Israel would not have responded to October 7 by ending the abuses which caused it doesn't change the fact that this would have been the correct thing for Israel to do. It just means the same depravities and injustices which gave rise to the state of Israel continue to exist and express themselves to this day. It means Israel itself is the problem. Which means the real issue with the objection "Well what SHOULD Israel have done in response to October 7 then?" is that it's asking the wrong question. The correct question to ask is, what should the world do about Israel? What should the world do about this murderous entity which keeps trying to drag the world into a horrific new war with Iran and its allies? What should the world do about this apartheid ethnostate whose relentless abuses were so egregious that Palestinians felt they had no choice but to carry out the October 7 attack? And when you peel back the layers of this question you find that the question underneath it is, what should the world do about the US empire? What should the world do about this massive globe-spanning power structure which feeds into Israel's abuses as a matter of policy to advance its own agendas of destabilisation and division in a geostrategically crucial resource-rich region? What should the world do about the international power structure centralized around Washington which continuously terrorizes and abuses populations around the world with the goal of capturing them all under a single power umbrella? I keep saying "the world" because this isn't just an Israel problem or a United States problem. Clearly. We stand here on the precipice of what could easily become a massive new war in the middle east because of Israel's actions and the US-centralized empire's psychopathic facilitation of them, which means this affects all of us. Even if we manage to avoid full-scale war this time, we know we'll be on the precipice again in a few years.'' - Caitlin Johnstone

I think the middle ground here is that both have legitimate grievances and histories from which they see the situation. Both sides have gone about those legitimate grievances in illegitimate ways. Things aren't binary (purely good vs evil) but more so a continuum or spectrum. It's easier to see and say that Israel are leaning more towards the negative end of the spectrum in this scenario - regardless of how radical or what stage colour the other side is. The scenario has radicalised them, and the larger power has had more of a hand in shaping that scenario. That doesn't absolve the other side from any responsibility, but there are limits to self agency. Agency and choices are constrained by the reality of occupation, economic deprivation and lack of sovereignty. Can we get angry at a gardener in a desert trying to grow flowers and failing? Or a bird with clipped wings trying but failing to fly? Their first priority is to rid themselves of their environmental constraints - and that is literally in their right. The West's very own laws rule that Israel is an occupying force which means the occupying group have certain inalienable rights including defence, even armed defence. If the West chest beats the supremacy of its development and heads the current world order and international system - then don't have that same system tell a dispossessed group of people that its in their right to defend themselves against a occupation, then gaslight them about their uprisings. It's not up to the occupied group to show the world they deserve not to be occupied because ''they have ascended to stage orange rationality over radicalism or religionism''. Thats a universal right. They aren't to be subjected to some demeaning test like some kids who need to show their grown ups. Both sides also aren't monoliths, there are factions within Zionism and Hamas / resistance groups with differing views. Theres a old video of one of the founders of Hamas saying they don't hate Jews but only have a problem with Zionism itself. But being realistic, no ones going to see the Israeli state disappear now that its established, and anyone hoping or planning on it aren't serious partners for peace. The video Leo shared of one of the current Hamas leaders spouting for the erasure of Israel despite not having the capability to do so, exposes their intention once they do have that capability ie a Palestinian state with a military. So of course Israel would thwart that. All serious players in the region know Hamas in its current form with its current rhetoric from some of its leaders simply can't be part of a serious governance structure after all this.

They've definitely made it un-inhabitable. According to the UN there are 40 million tonnes of rubble which could take up to 15 years to clear up before even getting started on re-building. ''Debris poses a deadly threat for people in the Gaza Strip as it can contain unexploded ordnance and harmful substances.'' @hundreth The objective might be to eliminate Hamas, but Hamas is just a avatar representing a cause. That cause is resistance to a situation, that situation is occupation (already known but further confirmed by ICJ earlier this month) and denial of Palestinian statehood, dignity and rights. As long as that exists, resistance in some form will exist. To get rid of Hamas we need to get rid of the situational cause for their existence. Of course this is easier said than done due to logistics, ideologies, resentment and entightlement. The remedy is simple, but difficult and full of hurdles. Gaza's situation and what Israel has made of it entangles them even more - the hope initially was that Palestinians would be cleansed to Egypt, but Egypt will never allow this. First, to not be complicit in ethnic cleansing and cause domestic uprising. Second, to not be caught in a fight with Israel if and when Hamas / some Palestinian resistance were to launch attacks from Egyptian lands. But then if they don't let Gazan's in they are also in a way complicit in their suffering in Gaza - this is Egypt's bind. With Gaza now destroyed and only habitable in some make shift tent territory for the foreseeable future, Israel has put 2 million people in this unacceptable purgatory which only shifts world opinion towards Israel in the negative the longer this goes on. It seems they want to shift attention to the North towards Hezbollah and Iran to deflect from the quagmire.

Good reminder of the objective, but good to remember that some objectives don’t reach their intended goals. If the goal is de-escalation and a ceasefire or end to the conflict, then I’m not sure if this achieves that in the macro. “Political assassinations and continued targeting of civilians in Gaza while talks continue leads us to ask, how can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on the other side?” tweeted the Prime Minister of Qatar. “So Israel murders Hamas political leader and key negotiator, Ismael Haniyeh, and wants us to believe it is serious about negotiating a ceasefire?” tweeted Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin. “And it kills him at the inauguration of Iran’s new president Pezeshkian, who campaigned for better relations with the West. Instead of a ceasefire and a regional de-escalation, Netanyahu is gunning for a full-scale regional war.” “Saying they want a ceasefire and then assassinating the guy they’d negotiate it with is a pretty clear sign of how serious Israel is about diplomacy,” tweeted Ajam Media Collective’s Alex Shams. Not to mention the breaching of sovereign jurisdictions including Irans. The last firework retaliatory display from Iran in response to the Syrian consulate attack was just a show of capability, not their actual competence if they had to go to war. They communicated with the US on when how and where they were going to attack so it could be intercepted (though even then a few failed) and to save face in order to de escalate tensions. Not sure what’s to come now but I don’t think they want a full on war either. They’re part of the BRICS network now and re-establish good ties with Saudi basically wanting to focus on economic development.

Here is a reddit post on the benefits of meditation which are quite detailed and which I find line up with my personal experience when I've been diligent with my practice also (20 min morning and night, sitting staring at a point on the wall while focusing on the breath). Here is the users post: ''When I meditate, I keep a journal where I record how my session went and how I felt meditation impacted my life on the day-to-day level. It's a record I can return to and read when I get discouraged or drift away from meditating for a period of time. It gets me back on track when I read and remember all the positive changes in my life, and pushes me to work through the difficult sessions. I used to always google "Benefits of Meditation" when I needed inspiration, but all the articles have the same, vague answers. I wrote up a list culled from my journal of my personal experiences with the more specific daily benefits of meditation I've experienced, and thought I'd share to remind everyone that it really is worth it to start meditating, get back to it if you've stopped, or just to keep going!!! I've been meditating for 2.5 years. I started doing ten minutes a day for a long time. I did a Goenka retreat about a year ago. Lots of long stretches where I got away from it in the meantime. Now I do an hour a day (ideally— more realistically I meditate maybe 4 times a week). I generally do half an hour of concentration then half an hour of insight/Vipassana. I believe most of these benefits accrue primarily from the insight work. This is just my personal experience, and many of them items overlap or build on each other. But most of these things I've found to be common results of meditation through discussing with friends and reading others' experiences. Meditation is the closest thing to a "magic" cure-all I've found in life so far. Please add your own benefits you've found, I think it will inspire people to keep working and coming back to the cushion. Easier to Talk Not Meditating: I'm pretty shy, so this is huge. I often freeze up, trip over my words, or get nervous and talk too fast when talking to people. Meditating: I find my words flow smoothly, I'll just spontaneously talk or add to the conversation without overanalyzing and freaking myself out about whether or not I'm saying the right thing and what people are thinking of me. Quick to understand and respond; appear more quick and intelligent. More Childlike Not Meditating: Get bogged down in the day-to-day difficulty of being a boring, jaded adult. Meditating: I get more playful, silly, smiley, curious. More likely to turn boring chores or responsibilities into an enjoyable game. Less guilt in doing things just for fun. Life becomes less of a slog and more of a game to explore and play with the opportunity for silly jokes and mischief. Confidence Not Meditating: Hesitant, unsure of self, confused, feeling inferior. Submissive, passive. Meditating: Best described as the sensation that I hold my own. I feel a kind of power, a trust in my own undeniable dignity as a human being, equally as precious and important as every other person. At work I act like a peer of my boss in how we interact (we're all just people after all) instead of being submissive, and his valuation of me and my work increases. Socially I feel less jealous of others— they're doing their thing and I'm doing my thing and that's cool. If they don't like it, well ¯_(ツ)_/¯ Sensation of Rest Not Meditating: Mind is crazy with half-thoughts, noisy and jabbering away. A sense of stress and urgency even if I'm ostensibly relaxing. Meditating: A sense of resting in stillness. A relaxed, light, open mind. Ability to look at what's in front of you and just see it, instead of papering over the reality with words, invented problems, and judgements. I would compare the difference in the state and texture of the mind as being like the contrast between your mind and emotional state after spending three hours procrastinating on reddit, clicking link after link, desperately searching for the next interesting or funny thing that will make you feel better, drowning in a flood of image/text/wiki/gif/joke/trick/pic/post insanity until you're exhausted. The mind after meditating regularly is more like how you feel after spending a spring afternoon walking through a lush, green forest. Language Not Meditating: Say the same things over and over again, using cliche formulations and phrases. Difficulty understanding another language. Meditating: Meditation seems to have a particularly strong effect on language for me. I speak more fluidly, and I use more complex and larger words perfectly which I forgot I'd even known. My speech has more variation and ingenuity, I coin new strange phrases and ways of describing things that people comment on. I speak Spanish (fluently-ish), live in a Spanish-speaking neighborhood, and work with a lot of Spanish speakers. I was shocked to find that I could suddenly fully understand the conversations happening around me in Spanish on the streets and the quick comments between my coworkers in Spanish. I could speak to them more fluently without having to stop and think about words and grammar, again using words I'd forgotten I even knew and flawlessly using complex grammatical formulations correctly that just came to me without my having to stop and arrange it in my mind. Less Procrastination Not Meditating: Put off doing little things (paying bills, laundry, texting someone back, etc). Mind supplies so many reasons not to do it now. Meditating: Seems to just cut that procrastination loop of thought completely sometimes. A small task is small. I just jump up and do it, without even letting my brain get started on all the reasons I shouldn't do it. I feel able to take action, where before I was stuck in a swamp of thought and worry. Less hesitation before action. I'll have a thought and I'll act on it. Not that I'm impulsive, it's more that I do the things I need to do without a dramatic mental battle. Desire to Clean + Organize Not Meditating: Really messy. Clutter and dishes and stuff everywhere. Can't find anything. Meditating: Very often have a strong desire to clean, organize, and put everything in order after meditating. Meditating is in a way like cleaning and organizing the mind. The internal sense of order makes me want to have external order. Or maybe for once I'm just actually paying attention to my environment instead of locked in my head. Clear space = clear mind. Sleep Not Meditating: Trouble falling asleep at night because of racing thoughts. Shallow sleep. Trouble getting up in the morning—lying in bed, not wanting to get up and face the day, drifting in and out of sleep. Meditating: Easier to fall asleep at night, especially if using breathing/relaxation techniques. Deeper sleep, wake up feeling more well-rested. Easier to get right out of bed and jump into the day. Consumer to Producer/Creator Not Meditating: Consume a lot of content, watch tv, browse reddit, half take in others' work. Meditating: I become more inclined to produce and create things rather than just passively take in the work of others. More likely to write, journal, create, comment, paint, express myself and build my own works and contributions. When I consume content, it is with deeper engagement and focus, since it's not just passive entertainment but something that's going to inform what I create. Consume Higher Quality Media Not Meditating: Browse reddit, news sites, internet junk, bad tv, instagram, Facebook, etc. Meditating: Start spontaneously wanting to read a novel or a book of nonfiction rather than browse the internet; choose watching a difficult and interesting movie over bad tv. Read more specific subreddits, rather than browsing through the "mainstream" pages. The quality of what I take in gets better, I feel better, and my ideas and worldview are more complex and diverse. I don't feel trapped in a loop of reposted internet content. Less Alcohol, Less Caffeine Not Meditating: Coffee every morning (and subsequent afternoon crash); moderate-to-heavy drinking. Meditating: Still drink coffee, but less. Because better rested and able to naturally concentrate more easily, don't need as much. Drink a LOT less. Meditation eases the same problems that alcohol purports to erase. Lessens the craving or need for alcohol to relax. I begin to value the clarity, balance, and focus that I've earned through the hard work of meditation too much to throw it away for the blurring, fuzzing effects of alcohol. Less drink, less hungover, more energy, more awareness, more health. Social & Personal Magnetism Not Meditating: Shy, loner, too lazy to stay in contact, nervous around others. Closed off to new people. Meditating: Often after meditating will feel strong spontaneous desire to text, talk to, or hang out with friends. Communicate with friends who live elsewhere or haven't talked to in a while. Tell my parents I love them. Have e-mail, fb message, and text conversations that are ongoing and friendly, rather than letting those things drop. Able to make new friends. I find I subtly develop a kind of personal magnetism that draws people to me, an open friendliness that people immediately pick up on. More likely to have little conversations with strangers or acquaintances that aren't the same awkward chit-chat. I feel that people are attracted to me, in that they want to be near me, talk to me, and trust me. It's probably a function of the increased attention and focus that meditation builds— people can sense that you really see them, really listen to them, really think they're "real." Remember Dreams & Lucid Dreaming Not Meditating: Rarely/never remember dreams. Meditating: Dreams are remembered intensely, multiple a night, rich in fantastical imagery. Dreams tend to be interesting/positive/symbolic. Easier to lucid dream. When meditating you are constantly reminding yourself to be conscious throughout the day, and so it becomes a habit that continues into your dreams. You'll be in a dream and remember to become conscious, out of habit, and then realize, oh shit! I'm in a dream! Efficiency Not Meditating: Things take a long time, I get bogged down in minutiae. Meditating: I become very efficient. Things at work can take me half the time they took before. More able to see the big picture and sort out what's important and what's not. Able to use the present to set myself up for success in the future. Can work quite quickly with fewer mistakes because of greater focus, energy, stamina. Music Not Meditating: Half-listen to the same songs. Listen to less new music as I get older. Meditating: Music in particular becomes very alive and meaningful, the way it used to feel when I was younger. Like I can feel every note. I listen to new genres and bands, discover new music that I love. It's similar to listening to music on weed, but without the other impairing effects. Thinking Long Term Not Meditating: Bogged down in the day-to-day tasks and habits. Meditating: Will spontaneously begin to think of the big picture of my life. The overall direction, where I'm heading, what I'm doing to move in that direction— without freaking out and getting stressed. I think meditation helps us to look at our lives impersonally, and therefore helps us make more calm and intuitive choices without being clouded by our own self-obsession. I begin to calmly examine my life and plan into the future. I think openly and strategically about moving toward a more intentional and expansive life. Childhood Dreams Return Not Meditating: Listen to what society/others tell me I should do and how I should live my life. Caught up in the cycle of work and going out, stuck in the same old habits. Meditating: Again, spontaneously— my childhood dreams will float to the surface of my mind. They contain a certain wisdom. When I was younger, I never really imagined that so much of my future life would be spent in dark bars drinking with people I only kind of like. Is this how I want to live my life? I remember my images of my future life I dreamed of, my creative ambitions. Though many of them in their pure/extreme form are unrealistic (I'm probably not going to live in a treehouse) they contain a lot of information about how to reorient my life to be more inline with my deep desires (I go out into nature more, I buy plants for my apartment). The little things make a big difference. When we're kids we know that it's our fucking life and we can do whatever we want with it. As an adult, after meditating, I remember it's in my power to fulfill those wishes and dreams in many ways. More Adventurous Not Meditating: Do the same thing every day. Locked in habit. Meditating: Ideas for adventurous, little spontaneous things to do, deviations from the daily rut will jump into my head and I'll be more likely to act on them. This expands my world and enriches my daily reality. I usually don't even let those adventurous ideas make it to a conscious level, or if I do, I shut them down by asking myself Why would you do that? What's the point? Now I just think, why not? Visual Thinking Not Meditating: Hung up on words, chains of reasoning, pros and cons lists, the confusion of too much information to make sense of. Meditating: This is one of the most useful and most wonderfully mysterious of the effects of meditation I've noticed recently. I'm suddenly more able to think in images. While meditating or while going about my day, an image will appear to me, and I'll instantly know it's a visual metaphor for some problem in my life or a meaningful description in image form of a complex situation I'm trying to grasp. It cuts through the confusing bullshit of too many words or tortured forms of reasoning. There's only so much information we can hold in our minds at one time. An image can compress a lot of information into one visual. Think about looking at an image versus trying to completely describe everything you see in the image in words. It'd take a looooong time and a lot of words. We're deeply visual creatures (animals "reason" in images) and worked primarily in images before our species developed language. Many great thinkers use visual analogies to solve complex problems. Einstein was famous for this— he reasoned through relativity with his images of running alongside a ray of light, or his problem of the two people observing lightning hit a train. An image can simplify difficult problems into a metaphorical or story-like visual that I can work with and manipulate without getting all turned around in my head.''

@Nivsch Respect to your honesty. News: Within 12 hours, Israel's military appears to have killed Hezbollah's most senior military leader who was located in the outskirts of Beirut, as well as the leader of Hamas, who was in Tehran. Quite a escalation - looks like Bibi got some renewed confidence after visiting Washington.

Elon - ''The people of Venezuela want change!'' https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1818083055384322327 Not sure whats true or not with regards to whats currently going on there. US interference or actual cheating taken place by Maduro?

They claim October 7th had mass rape take place (some probably did) , which they deny investigation into. Then, when Israeli sources evidence actual systemic rape by their own IDF who are detained, they protest to get them out. Who knows if this is justice or just a PR stunt to appease the West since being pressured by the ICJ rulings, UK not objecting to ICC arrest warrants for Bibi and now saying they will limit or stop arms sales to Israel. More balanced Israelis will see these protesters as far right and lay blame to Netenyahu, Ben Gvir and the like. But these are symptoms of a situation which necessitates the dehumanisation of the other, which warps the minds and political landscape in order for the situation to keep on existing as it is - as a occupation dominating another group of people. You can’t occupy another group, without warping your own psychology in order to do so. Regular Israelis will do their best to compartmentalise away the reality of their states existence and focus on the fact they are a “democracy” with Western “values” to sleep better at night. They’re correct about sharing in Western values, but the worst one they share is supremacism.

Good summary of the most blatant lies. It’s a problem when people believe their own propaganda so bad they cocoon themselves away from reality. @Heaven Like most things, there is a spectrum, as with selfishness. Of course most humans will prioritise their family over others. But being selfish to such an extreme as to not care for others and collectively punish an entire group of people is inhumane. In dehumanising others, you dehumanise yourself, because it takes a stone heart to inflict such suffering. The irony is, you hail Israel and the West as democratic - which implies along with it human rights, law and order ie civilised. Yet, the very international system of law that the West created ruled Isreal as a apartheid state and occupier committing a plausible genocide - with international arrest warrants for the current head of that state (Bibi) who just spoke in front of congress - who clapped for him multiple times. The hypocrisy is so thick you could cut it with a knife, the moral bankruptcy among the political class is sickening to the point even every day people in the West don’t feel their politicians represent them. Meanwhile across the Atlantic pond: UK will not oppose right of ICC to issue arrest warrant for Israeli PM Netanyahu, says No 10 A Downing Street spokesperson says the matter is solely one for the court and that it believes "strongly in the rule of law and separation of powers” https://news.sky.com/story/uk-will-not-oppose-right-of-icc-to-issue-arrest-warrant-for-israeli-pm-netanyahu-says-no-10-13185164

From your other posts in other threads you definitely aren’t a leftist. I got you, so you’re saying corruption came about exclusively due to Western intervention. Depending on the definition of corruption, you can both be right in different ways. If we take corruption at its most basic to mean the abuse of power for private gain - that is a universal thing. If we take it to mean the abuse of power for private gain at a industrial scale then yes that could easily be at the hands of the West, simply because they have the ability and leverage to cause such outcomes. What they call intervention is actually disruption, and disruption causes all kinds of chaos which makes corruption rife. Unstable environment cause stable profits for corrupt hands - and the US’s biggest industry being arms means that peace is bad for a return on that investment. They literally secure stable profits and power through instability.

@Bobby_2021 Ideas are abundant, execution is scarce. You made a factual point about that, as did Leo about Musks ambition and work ethic. Many people can take a vision, take inspiration from one, or share with others in one. Very few have the will to see a vision through to fruition with all it entails. Even on the corruption / development back and forth earlier in the thread - Leo was pointing out that corruption and underdevelopment existed before Western intervention, maybe what he didn't give enough attention to was that fact that this is only perpetuated or made worse by Western intervention. Just as a example, I'v been in and out of Africa a lot in the past - its common place to bring a 'gift' when flying in as something to give airport security when they bother you or try tax you on something you are bringing in when they check your bags. A lot of daily interactions are like this especially if doing business or getting stopped on the road. Corruption is systemic and pervasive in developing countries, whilst in developed countries its just sophisticated - its that very sophistication though, which allows it to scale and have ripple affects far beyond its borders compared to developing countries forms of corruption which stays within their borders.

While Netenyahu is about to address Congress in USA, China has facilitated 14 Palestinian factions including Hamas and Fatah to sign a agreement of unity to end divisions and pave the way for postwar governance - https://edition.cnn.com/2024/07/23/china/hamas-fatah-palestinian-factions-beijing-intl-hnk/index.html UN top court says Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories is illegal - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cjerjzxlpvdo#:~:text=The International Court of Justice,Strip as soon as possible. Friday's international court of justice (ICJ) ruling was a wholesale repudiation of Israel’s legal justifications for its 57-year (and counting) occupation of Palestinian territory - https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jul/22/the-icj-has-demolished-israels-claims-that-it-is-not-occupying-palestinian-territories "Although the finding was hidden in legalese, the court ruled that Israel has imposed a regime of apartheid in the occupied Palestinian territory by virtue of its systematic discrimination against Palestinian residents. The A-word has been anathema in official Washington circles, despite detailed reports finding apartheid by Human Rights Watch and every other serious human rights organization to have addressed the issue.'' ''Lets remember that the country the West has protected, cherished, and idolised most religiously in all its years of existence, censoring and persecuting its own citizens for in the process is an apartheid state committing a century of ethnic cleansing and occupation and a current 10-month long live streamed destruction campaign that has been ruled as a plausible genocide. ''

Thats the problem, they think they have the right to land, when international law says they don't - the same international laws their Western sugar daddies set up. The West can't claim to be the beacon of democracy and rule of law while supporting a state that's making a mockery of both.

Isn’t it generally true that when people have children they tend to tilt towards conservatism. Like Russell Brand recently becoming a dad and now turning to Christianity. It's not just about faith - it's about the challenge of breaking down complex ideas for young minds. Distilling nuanced perspectives for kids isn't easy. So parents feel this pressure to present a solid identity, something their kids can latch onto and emulate. It's like they're trying to be a stable lighthouse in a often chaotic and confusing world. So most, out a of need for identity, belonging and convenience turn to religion. It's like a ready made kit of values and world views, neatly packaged in an easy to transmit format. It's the fast food of moral frameworks - quick, convenient, and easily passed down to the next generation. The issue is that along with those valuable life lessons comes a lot of baggage of religious literalism, dogma and half truths. This is why the left lacking a cohesive vision is a problem. It’s not enough for them to not like the rights vision, they need their own. They offer a freedom from (oppression, discrimination and dogma) but a freedom to .. something is missing, and people need something to unite around and offer guidance beyond just resistance to. People need frameworks, values and tools to evaluate what to do with their new found freedom otherwise they get lost in a sea of relativism, choices and mishandle their freedom. When you have a literal pregnant man emoji on a global messaging app almost quarter of the world use - that is easy picking for the right to point to as a excess of liberals / stage green which necessitates a pull back to conservatism and fuels their movement. 🫃🏻

The West hasn’t always caused underdevelopment in other regions, as seen in the case of Russia, but historically, it has perpetuated the underdevelopment and exploitation of many countries. Corrupt local elites often collaborate with international financiers, primarily from Western nations, to maintain this status quo. The issue isn’t about who started the development race, but rather who is currently obstructing the progress of other countries to maintain their dominance and superiority. Just like with your point on Russian underdevelopment relative to Europe, likewise, during the early medieval period Europe was a backwater compared to flourishing civilizations in the East. The Islamic Golden Age saw trailblazers like Al-Khwarizmi, Ibn Sina, and Al-Biruni making strides in science, medicine, mathematics, and philosophy that later lit the way for Europe’s Renaissance. Through the translation movement where Muslim scholars preserved and expanded on Greek and Roman texts, Europe got a sniff of its classical heritage again. Let’s not forget the Crusades - while European knights were off fighting, they also brought back Eastern innovations and knowledge that significantly shaped European development. Meanwhile, Russia was muddling through its own underdevelopment until Peter the Great came along and started copying Western Europe’s homework. He dragged Russia towards modernity by adopting Western technologies and administrative practices, that were heavily influenced by Eastern cultures - this just highlights how interconnected development in the world is. What the left lacks is appreciation of Western contribution to development, what the right lack is the appreciation of other cultures contributing to their own cultures formative years of development in order to maintain a feeling of “West is best” superiority. The West’s self congratulatory narrative conveniently glosses over critical chapters in its history or rewrites them.

True, we first need to define what we mean by progress or development. Development can be economic, ecological, political, social, or in terms of overall well-being. Who gets to define what is developed or not, and how well is the West even doing in these metrics? Economically, inequality is rampant, with debt maintaining the illusion of prosperity. Ecologically, the West exports pollution to the developing world and then congratulates itself for being green. Politically, they claim to be democratic but operate more like plutocracies or oligarchies, masked by slick PR and the spectacle of elections. Socially, urban life is marked by atomization, an epidemic of loneliness, and dysfunctional dating dynamics. Culturally, the West elevates the lowest forms of behavior, as seen with the latest viral sensation, the Hawk Tuah girl. Vulgarity and entertainment are glamorized, while grace and elegance are demonized or dismissed as "prudish." This contradiction is evident in the "passport bros" movement, where men seek traditional women from other countries. Health-wise, the majority of the population is medicated just to cope with the soul-crushing reality of this 'development’ - a dysfunctional system they'd like to export to the rest of the world. Maybe what is deemed "less developed" is just a different way of organising society. Maybe some places and people aren't underdeveloped - they're just differently developed, with priorities aligned to their environment and cultural values. Bhutan for example has its focus on Gross National Happiness instead of Gross Domestic Product. They've chosen to prioritise well-being, cultural preservation, and environmental conservation over unbridled economic growth. By Western metrics, they might lag behind, but who's to say their approach isn't more "developed" in terms of holistic human flourishing?

Money is the lifeblood of American politics, seeping into every corner of the system and corrupting it from within. It’s not democracy, it’s oligarchy with the lipstick of the democratic process. - The ballot box is a suggestion box. Voting has become a hollow ritual, a pressure release valve for public discontent rather than a genuine mechanism for change. We're given the illusion of choice, but the menu is curated by two parties not allowing for anything else. - As voting rights expanded, the relevance of those votes contracted. Allow the public to cathartically shout into a sound proof room, but let them know their grievances are heard. We've won the right to participate in a system that's been quietly hollowed out from the inside. Voting became democratised, but the power behind that vote has been diluted to homeopathic levels. - The Supreme Court ruled corporations with personhood status alchemizing them into people and money into speech. Money literally talks, but what language? Money became words. Words became votes. Votes became commodified. It's a legal fiction that's metastasized into a political cancer. By equating money with speech, they've essentially given megaphones to the wealthy while the rest of us are left shouting into the void. It's turned democracy into an auction house where policies go to the highest bidder. This unholy trinity - the neutered ballot box, the diluted vote, and the corporate citizen - forms the backbone of our modern oligarchy. It's a system where the appearance of democracy is maintained while its substance is stripped away, leaving us with a plutocratic skeleton wearing the tattered skin of a republic.

Tel Aviv's first deadly Houthi drone attack is pivotal as Israeli casualties in central Israel are unprecedented. Why does Israel escalate when counterstrikes are certain? It's not pragmatism, it's pathology. Some states build their identity on perceived supremacy. When faced with a counterforce that challenges that supremacy they don't seek peace - they instead try to prove their dominance and supremacy as it's existential to their core identity. New technologies, guerrilla tactics and geographical advantages have levelled the playing field. Smaller actors like the Houthis can now challenge vastly superior economic and military powers. Yemen's resilience against US/Western intervention proves this. It’s like Dune - desert nomads challenging the mighty houses. Israel's stuck in a loop of its own creation. Militarily superior, but tactically out smarted - yet their ideology won’t allow them to admit it. They'll keep escalating, chasing an impossible dream of total supremacy. This isn't unique to Israel. The US shows similar behavior against Russia, Iran, and China. The West is caught in this spiral. There's no brake on this psychosis except the weight of reality checking in to say “you aren’t as superior as you thought you were, and this doesn’t give the right to dominate over a people”. If the West / Israel keeping acting out reflexively as if they are the powers they think they are, the way they used to be - they will drive themselves towards isolation, irrelevance or destruction, all to affirm a deranged fantasy of eternal dominance.

I can’t embed links but will share some info and the source below. Bear in mind, NATO is an alliance who’s purpose is purported to be “defensive” of North American / European countries, yet their actions and rhetoric show otherwise: "Our best leverage to deter China is to collapse their economy" -Former US Ambassador to NATO in the 1st Trump Presidency, Kay Bailey Hutchison Link: https://x.com/rnaudbertrand/status/1813256291751440518?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ Orban: “China has a peace plan. America has a war policy. Europe is simply copying the American position.” One of NATO’s own has broken away and exposed the truth: the US and Europe are warmongers in Ukraine. Link: https://x.com/spiritofho/status/1811446524208914880?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ US ambassador, Eric Garcetti, is literally saying they (India) remain autonomous: "I know that India likes its strategic autonomy but in times of conflict there is no such thing as strategic autonomy". He goes on: "We will need to know that we are trusted friends, brothers and sisters, colleagues that in times of need - on the next day - will be acting together. They will know each others' equipment, they will know each others' training, they will know each others' systems." He also heavily implies he expects India to fight with the US in the East China Sea and Taiwan, saying that during joint US-India military exercises they "focused on humanitarian emergency but the lessons learned go beyond humanitarian emergencies to those moments we all pray will never happen whether they're on your northern border, whether they're in the East China Sea, whether they're in the strait of Taiwan." The US used to tell all those things to China just a few decades ago, when they needed it to counter the Soviet Union... And now that China has grown they want to use India to counter it, and will undoubtedly try to contain India if and when it also becomes too big... https://x.com/rnaudbertrand/status/1811809999947272653?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ Insane: Japanese media are now saying that Japan is a "tacit" NATO member. asia.nikkei.com/Opinion/Japan-… NATO keeps saying it's a "purely defensive" organization but if that's the case why expand to an entirely different continent? Expansionism is by nature aggressive and destabilizing. It's essentially mob boss behavior: you're going to get very nervous if a mob boss from another city starts "protecting" businesses in your area, especially if you know that their "protection" in their original city led to a deadly street war and the city's impoverishment... https://x.com/rnaudbertrand/status/1810698715440787825?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ Meanwhile, the new NATO Summit Declaration accuses China of being a "decisive enabler" of Russia's war effort in Ukraine, including by supplying "material support." This is the closest NATO has come to outright threatening China. Don't you feel so much safer now? https://x.com/mtracey/status/1811244114249199968?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ Strong response by China to NATO accusing it of being "a decisive enabler of Russia’s war against Ukraine”: "The US should reflect on the root cause of the crisis [...] The US must never expect China to pay for the mistakes they have made." x.com/upholdreality/… Full response: “We firmly oppose the US spreading disinformation about so-called China’s support for Russia’s defense industry, to which there is no supporting evidence. We deplore and reject the wrongful remarks of the US side. Rights after the Ukraine crisis broke out, the US falsely claimed that China was providing military support to Russia. To this day, the US has not offered any substantial evidence. Even US military chiefs admitted that China did not provide military assistance to Russia in the Ukraine crisis. Statistics actually show that over 60% of Russia’s imported military components and dual-use items come from the US and other Western countries. 95% of Russia’s key components destroyed by Ukraine come from the West and 72% of Western parts of Russia-made weapons come from US companies. How does the US explain that? https://x.com/rnaudbertrand/status/1811598260316045786?s=46&t=DuLUbFRQFGpB8oo7PwRglQ

True, it isn’t purely economic but taps into a few currents. Politics is downstream from culture, and economics plays a part in shifting culture too. Urbanisation concentrates and creates wealth (with inequalities), which also shifts attitudes with education and cosmopolitanism. A lot of different effects take hold in urban vs rural environments. Exposure to more diversity naturally makes you more open towards it, up to a point. Besides economics, it’s a cultural crusade against a culture (liberal) they view as too different to their own. Liberal attitudes are incubated in urban centres, which they find foreign from where they stand in rural or suburban environments. MAGA is the mutant child of cultural resentment and economic dispossession. They don’t care for capitalism or want to dismantle capitalism, they just want to be on top of it. We could say it’s not just economic dislocation, but the threat of cultural extinction in a globalising world of blurry homogeneity and gentrification. In their minds, the trans movement of blurring man and woman embodies this to which they lash out subconsciously - it’s an attack on identity and belonging. From India to Brazil, America to mainland Europe - people are looking at their societies and feeling like strangers in their own land. I The movement right is a wish to build a cultural bomb shelter from the onslaught of globalisation and to snap back from the excesses of liberal cities which hold disproportionate power and dictate to suburban / urban heartlands. Nothing embodies this excess like the emoji of a pregnant man on what’s app - a messaging app 2 billion people or 20% of the world use, including the more traditionally minded who are pressured to use it due to its wide use.

Chris hedges: ”My thoughts on the assassination attempt on former President Trump: The assassination of Trump would not remove the yearning of tens of millions of people, many conditioned by the Christian right, for a cult leader. Most of the leaders of the Christian right have built cult followings of their own. These Christian fascists embraced magical thinking, attacked their enemies as agents of Satan and denounced reality-based science and journalism long before Trump did. Cults are a product of social decay and despair, and our decay and despair are expanding, soon to explode in another financial crisis. The efforts by the Democratic Party and much of the press, including CNN and The New York Times, to discredit Trump, as if our problems are embodied in him, are futile. The smug, self-righteousness of this crusade against Trump only contributes to the national reality television show that has replaced journalism and politics. This crusade attempts to reduce a social, economic and political crisis to the personality of Trump. It is accompanied by a refusal to confront and name the corporate forces responsible for our failed democracy. This collusion with the forces of corporate oppression, which have impoverished the working class, fostered endless war, militarized our police, created the largest prison system in the world, licensed corporations to exploit the most vulnerable and transferred wealth upwards into the hands of a billionaire class, neuters the press, Trump's critics and the Democratic Party. Our only hope is to organize the overthrow of the corporate state that vomited up Trump. Our democratic institutions, including the legislative bodies, the courts and the media, are hostage to corporate power. They are no longer democratic. We must, like resistance movements of the past, engage in acts of sustained mass civil disobedience, especially strikes, and non-cooperation. By turning our ire on the corporate state, rather than Trump, we name the true sources of power and abuse. We expose the absurdity of blaming our demise on demonized groups such as undocumented workers, Muslims, African-Americans, Latinos, liberals, feminists, gays and others. We give people an alternative to a bankrupt Democratic Party -- whose presidential candidate is in clear cognitive decline -- that is a full partner in corporate oppression and cannot be rehabilitated. We make possible the restoration of an open society. If we fail to embrace this militancy, which alone has the ability to destroy cult leaders, we will continue the march toward tyranny.”

Regarding American led order and stability - the stability of American born corporate interests actually depends on instability for stable profits and power monopolisation. The reason I say born is because though corporate elites may be bred on American soil, they have outgrown their own countries and become transnational elites. This means, they couldn't care less if they serve the American people, the incentives are less when you can live in Miami or Dubai, or live in prosperous enclaved communities with security or private jet yourself to islands like New Zealand or the Caymans. Their immune from the side effects of their actions, the same way America is mostly immune from the side effects of their foreign adventurism and interventions due to being geographically blessed. They can go around the world dick swinging and flexing with little cost to themselves as they are protected by vast seas on both sides, an ally to their North and a weak nation to their South. The US is sooooo at threat from Russia and China who are in different continents - that it spends more on its military than the next nine countries combined. Investing this much in an industry demands a return, which peace doesn’t give. This is why Biden even historically said Israel is the best “investment” America could make - because they view things from a materialist, zero-sum, prey vs predatory perspective. The US has over reached and abused their power through a weaponised financial system which sanctions and economically carpet bombs countries that don't ''align'' with them to the point that the non Western world have had enough and are building a parallel system where no one has power over you, but where you have power with others. They trade with each other in their own currencies for example. The US isn't collapsing as a state or society, but as a hegemon - and to this they are lashing out. Both stages can produce individuals who commit unethical acts, but for different reasons. Stage Blue, because their morality is exclusionary. Stage Orange, because of disconnection to the soul (depth) in pursuit of the material (surface). What we call stage orange also has elements of stage blue married to it to make a dangerous combination ie Neocons or Ultra-Zionists = ancient texts married to modern tech with enough leverage to destroy at scale. Stage blue has a sense of morality that can balance and check power, but only within its own rigid framework that excludes those who aren’t in it and are deemed sinful or 'other'. Stage orange can lack morality in pursuit of the material or be morally relativistic to justify the unjustifiable. Its disconnect from the soul manifests in its shadow when the powerful tools it excels at developing (through science, rationality) are used to interfere and intervene in world affairs in unethical ways, rather than interact and integrate with others on the world stage. Stage blue is spiritually bloated (confined to cast creed or colour) while stage Orange is a spiritual vacuum - both can be dangerous to the world.