#i signed up to help my local abortion fund

[blithesylph]

saw another post about voting and like. the reasoning to convince people to vote is always “to stop the republicans from doing even worse shit” and like isn’t that just fucking unbearably depressing? that’s it? we vote for democrats not because we believe in their ability to pass legislation we care about but because at least we’ll save ourselves some more time before it all falls to authoritarianism. is democracy really working out for us if this is how it’s going? i am almost 19 and this has been how it is my whole life and i feel so worn down. all i hear is talk and platitudes and i get emails from democrats as a call to action and we have the house and the senate and the presidency but it doesn’t fucking matter. sure i’ll vote in my very blue district and i’m sure the country will be saved.

#the thing is voting isn’t as appealing when the whole government looks rotten to the core to me #and do you think that i like not doing anything revolving around what i believe? #i feel so empty and helpless and i hate it #and people on the left say ‘organize!’ #but i truly don’t know what that means when i live in rural areas full of upper middle class people or college students #i don’t know what i can do #i signed up to help my local abortion fund #but i never heard back #i want to be useful and i want to help people but everything is vague and confusing and voting felt like one of the most hollow things i’ve #ever done #i voted for a local position this guy who wanted to make public transit free in our county #he lost to the incumbent #we deserve a better world than this and voting will never lead to the necessary changes #because you cannot vote out capitalism #this country is built on bodies upon bodies upon bodies and voting will never change the fact that death is in its very structure #the democrats may over all not be as evil as republicans but you cannot fucking deny that they are owned by corporations too #ok rant over

[idiopath-fic-smile]

untitled pro-choice Good Omens ficbit

A friend signed onto my ongoing "donate at least $25 to an abortion-related cause and I'll write at least 250 words in any fandom I've already written in, prompt of your choice" scheme. The prompt in question is kind of a spoiler but this is lightly Aziraphale/Crowley.

In June of 1959, Aziraphale and Crowley met at a small bar in Amsterdam to sample the local licorice candies (Aziraphale), check in on some seeds of oncoming social upheaval in the works for the 1960’s (Crowley), nurse a glass of two of Jenever (Aziraphale and Crowley), and to generally savor one another’s company along with the rather strong liquor (both again, also of course, neither would outright admit it for another six decades). 

What they were doing instead, ostensibly, was comparing notes, making sure that their miracles and demonic interference were continuing to cancel each other out. 

“Typical stuff, really,” said Crowley, knocking back his glass in one gulp if only to enjoy the mildly scandalized look on his companion’s face. (Could he take the opportunity to fleetingly pretend that Aziraphale’s wide eyes lingered for a moment on his lips, his throat? Surely longing for a celestial being was a kind of sin, at least the way Crowley did it.)

“Met a girl,” Crowley continued, “took the guise of another girl to urge her towards a road that will lead her to a life at constant odds with law, order, and the general institution of the family. Even helped her along with a few guilders, to really jump-start the depravity.”

(What he’d done, was give an unmarried nineteen-year-old named Anika enough money to make a short airplane trip to Sweden, where she would find sympathetic healthcare workers willing to provide a safe and locally legal end to the fetus inside her that she desperately did not want. It had taken a while, to get the message across, that all was paid for. She had been sobbing hard at first, requiring Crowley to really twist the definition of evil in order to justify the materialization and transfer of a clean black handkerchief.)

Aziraphale chewed his stroopwafel carefully. (It was far too late in the day for such things but surely adjusting the hours of the cafe across the street barely counted as divine intervention at all. He’d thought of explaining this little spot of mischief to Crowley, in the hopes of inspiring what might’ve been a glint of appreciation in the golden eyes behind those shades, but no, that was going too far, Aziraphale couldn’t possibly.)

“You know,” Aziraphale said, “funny you should mention ah, corrupting a young woman. My miracle involved a young lady as well.”

“Did it?” said Crowley, discreetly gesturing for the waiter to bring another round of Jenever.

“She had a bright life planned out for herself,” Aziraphale went on, “but had wound up in a spot of trouble. I cleared it up for her, of course, and now she’ll spend the next forty years studying law, and then crusading for justice as a barrister. She’ll improve the lives of countless others. I’m afraid I might’ve outdone you a bit, in this case, terribly sorry.”

(Many, many years later, they would discover that not only had Aziraphale also funded a Dutch teenager’s trip to Sweden for an abortion—her name was Marit—but they had somehow managed to put their respective projects in the same airplane. The same row, even.)

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” Crowley said. “I even arranged it so that she would bring down another girl with her, tempt her to a lifetime of, what-do-you-call-it, forbidden vice.”

“That’s nice,” said Aziraphale beatifically. “I set mine up with the love of her life.”

(Anika and Marit married in June of 2001, in their early sixties.)

(Aziraphale and Crowley nearly dropped their respective champagne glasses when they saw each other at the reception. It was extremely embarrassing.)

prompt: Hey, I'd like to request 250 words of Azirphale and Crowley both helping people seek abortions, and justifying it in their own ways.

(Want to prompt your own fic bit? Here is the original post. My fandoms include Captain America, Les Mis, Good Omens, Our Flag Means Death, and Zombies Run. I have plenty of spots still open and keeping busy is good for my brain in hard times.)

#abortion cw #current events cw #good omens fic #aziracrow #politics cw

[darling-child-tisarwat]

So not to get too deep but I’ve been absent lately and not working on creative shit cuz I’ve been putting that time and energy into mutual aid work. I’ve only been doing it for a couple weeks but like, IDK y’all it really is healing. Like I know the alienation and I know the theory but like, you don’t really get it until you do it.

I’ve been feeding unhoused people with my local chapter of Food Not Bombs and like, it really is as simple as getting up and deciding to help. You don’t have to have money. You can pick up food at food pantries and resource centers and simply cook food and drop it off. You can stay and serve food or do deeper work but like, you don’t need to wait for anyone to tell you it’s okay or to show you how. Just make food and start showing up and helping.

Idk like I went to costco and invested some of my own money into buying the paper plates/baby wipes, etc and there is something about seeing the concrete fact that people are eating tonight because I cooked that food and I brought them those bowls. It just makes me want to do it as much as I can, but also I have to pace myself so I don’t get burnt out or spend too much of my own money so I can continue to help.

And also we are working with a local women’s rights group that seriously just started up due to the Roe verdict and like, they are trans-inclusive (and actually have trans women and men and non-binary people in the org and in admin) and make a point to use non-gendered language in their signs and chants and flyers and put non-white members to the forefront and it’s just. We literally just decided to start doing this and now we are getting donations for abortion funds and going to start scheduling volunteers to escort patients to their abortion appointments for support.

Idk this is not to say anything about me, but more like, if you’ve been on the fence or afraid to risk yourself to help but want to, please just go once. Go once and see how it changes you. How it changes the community. One donation of food is one we wouldn’t have had before. One voice in the march is one we didn’t have before. Keep going if you can, if you are able, but you can help from home or in other ways.

Please don’t feel discouraged about the world and like it’s hopeless. I am fully realistic about it, and it’s going to get bad. So start learning now how to build those support systems. Start learning now how to protect the most vulnerable. It really does make a difference. It really is appreciated by our community members in need.

Don’t get bogged down in internet bullshit. Don’t fret over if something is worth it or if it’s politically whatever-the-fuck. Go put food in someone’s stomach. Go speak to people and ask them what they need. Work together. I swear it will make a difference and you’ll feel better too.

#personal #sorry to go on a rant i just feel bad i haven’t had time to write #but this is so important

[subdee]

Rain was absolutely pouring down but the Plaza was completely full at the #bansoffourbodies rally in Princeton today. We got a lot of drive-by support too, trucks honking, signs in the windows...

https://mobile.twitter.com/PPActionNJ/status/1525500462107086850

I'm even more pro-choice these days after my missed miscarriage earlier in the year. I opted for what's euphemistically called "the procedure" but is essentially an abortion and I was glad the doctor from Planned Parenthood was there because when she said she did this "all day every day" that was reassuring, actually. The procedure was quick, painless and safe and for that I am grateful. A friend who opted for the chemical route on her own pregnancy experienced a lot of side effects, heavy bleeding lasting for weeks afterward, and had to go back to the hospital for aftercare...

One in four pregnancies results in a miscarriage. 60% of women who choose to terminate a pregnancy already have children. Pregnancy is dangerous. Like other people have said, you can't "ban" abortions but you can ban access to medical care for women and other pregnant people.

...I know I'm preaching to the choir here but live long enough as a women / birthing person and you too will be convinced on this issue. Lately I see various attempts on social media to make Planned Parenthood "uncool" among the youth bc it's like, too mainstream maaaaaan, or something... or spread lies about their effectiveness, or try to drive a wedge between the advocates for women and the advocates from trans and LGBTQ+ rights, just as part of the general regressive movement that's been disguised as advocacy on social media.

But Planned Parenthood is a great organization so just jot that down, the doctor was wonderful and they do trans and LGBT+ advocacy too, screening for STDs, fighting to expand access to gender-affirming care, you name it. They do a lot more than abortions.

As weird as it feels to shill for an organization most Americans have already heard of, I'm gonna just go ahead and tell you they are good and don't be such a hipster about supporting a well-known org or getting involved with local/state politics that you let your rights get taken away! The next round of fights is at the State level, in some places to block anti-abortion laws and in other places, like New Jersey, where I live, to expand access to people from out of state who will come here to get their abortions. And also to protect those people from laws in their own states based around punishment & control, not support.

If you're in the US, no matter where you live, I guarantee there is a local fight going on right now around these issues.

#general lefty stuff #planned parenthood #us politics

[davidmariottecomics]

Pacing Yourself-Part 2?

Tumblr was giving me a hard time putting this all in one post, so the last one's all the really handy advice and this is mostly my shameless plugs!

Shameless Self Promo Did you know that right now, I've got new stuff in the shop on this very website?! It's true! For the holiday season, I've got bundles of comics I wrote, collections, and a print version of my Jimmy Squarefoot story with Becca! All stuff comes signed and personalized if you want. Some rare, harder-to-find covers are included in some of the bundles. I'm also throwing in some free gifts with every order! It'd be rad if you could buy some stuff particularly because both the cats are due for their annual wellness appointments/vaccine updates! 

You can also grab a digital copy of Jimmy Squarefoot at my Ko-Fi! Or you could get it from Becca, as well as a digital copy of their NSFW 18+ comic "Rivals" at their itch page! I think their Genshin zine's going to be up there before too long too. 

Or you can support Becca's post-con-season shop update! We're both clearing out a lot of our stuff from this year's convention circuit, but this is their first full on shop opening! Through tomorrow (maybe Tuesday) they're doing two exclusive pre-orders so you can get stuff this year that otherwise won't be on sale until the 2023 con-season begins. It's a sticker of Anya from Spy x Family and a print of Rika and Satoko from Higurashi: When They Cry - GAO. Pre-orders on their Pochita keychain are still open too, as well as literally like a ton of other keychains, stickers, prints, zines, and maybe even some other stuff? 

Even if you aren't in a position to buy something, it'd be cool if you could let your friends who might be interested know. 

Giving Tuesday As a reminder, we're also coming up on Giving Tuesday. It's a day for charitable action. You can donate money and time and resources and give back on a local level or a national one or an international one. Just to spotlight a few people and places who could use your help: the Colorado Healing Fund is a direct response to the Club Q shooting. Trans Lifeline is a peer-based support and resource center that helps trans people with emotional and financial support. The Transgender Law Center provides legal aid, resources, and advocacy. You can check out your local mutual aid network. Or your local abortion right advocacy organization or your local racial justice organization or your local domestic violence support center or your local LGBTQ community center or your local homeless shelter or just, y'know, like help a person in need in your neighborhood. I mentioned last week that Jeffrey Veregge's family and Tess Fowler & Chris Gutierrez both have ongoing GoFundMes for their current medical emergencies. Just try to do something. 

Which finally brings us to this week's regular features.

Things I've been enjoying this week: The first person to buy something from my shop! Thank you! Honestly, just like, some time off. The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade (This year was a little lacking, but I love the parade). Making a dope turkey! Becca's last little show of the year, which was on Tuesday. Having Anoosha Syed wrapping paper for gifts this year. Candy canes. Honkai Impact (Video game). Sonic Frontiers (Video game). Chainsaw Man (Anime & Manga). 

New Releases this week (11/23/2022): Transformers: Shattered Glass II #4 (Supervising Editor) Special shout-outs to G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero #300 (the final issue with a new record-breaking cover), Earthdivers #1's second printing (releasing the week before Columbus Day and having the second printing out for Thanksgiving is very apt), and Dark Spaces: Wildfire #5 (the final issue of the launch title of both the Dark Spaces line and the new IDW Original initiative). 

New releases next week (11/30/2022): Godzilla Rivals: Vs. Gigan (I didn't actually work on this, but the team that did is awesome and you should check it out)

Final Order Cutoff--Last chance for your store to guarantee release day copies for you (11/28/2022): Canto: Tales of the Unnamed World (Editor) Godzilla: Monsters & Protectors--All Hail the King #4 (Editor) Godzilla Rivals: Rodan vs. Ebirah (Editor) 

Pic of the Week: We put up our Christmas tree over the weekend and I got this very cute picture of Nadja sleeping under it. Also, some of the cool stuff up at Becca's shop!  

#godzilla #transformers idw #chainsawman #sonic idw #hanazuki #spy x family #higurashi #rika furude #satoko hojo

[penig]

No pictures, ‘cause we still don’t have a telephone, but today’s pro-Choice rally in San Antonio went smoothly. It helps a lot when you’ve got the current mayor and local big-name judge on your side. They actually opened the rally, which since they’re both men might’ve seemed a little off, but they talked about the women who convinced them to take pro-choice stands way back in the beginning and the need for a city-supported abortion fund so I think they knew that; and it sure is nice being sure the police will be on their best behavior.

The streets we went through could have been more crowded but I can see where a riverwalk march would’ve been impractical and there were crowds of tourists watching us go by from El Mercado. A guy with a siren machine  tried to disrupt the speakers at the rally with a “my sperm my choice” chant but his siren drowned himself out more than anybody else. The police lined their bikes up in front of him and the civilian peacekeepers in yellow vests monitoring the march on behalf of the organizers lined up behind the bikes and everybody else pointedly ignored him apart from the occasional muttered “Yeah, you had the choice to wrap it up first” and “Oh, like you’ve been laid in years.”

Damon was getting achy and I was a bit unsteady by the end of the march but there was lots of water available and we’d brought lots of ice, and we didn’t have to suffer any to do this. Damon carried the tall “ONLY SAFE ABORTIONS CAN BE BANNED” sign and the ice bucket, and I carried the smaller “ANTI-CHOICE = PRO-DEATH” and “WOMEN ARE NOT INCUBATORS” signs mounted on coathangers, one in each hand. I sacrificed my wimpiest coathangers, which was a mistake as it was a bit of a chore to keep them from flopping around. Other signs of note: “I don’t ask for much, but more rights than a corpse would be nice,” “Pro Life is a Lie; They Don’t Care if Women Die,” “If I wanted the Government in my Body I’d Fuck a Senator,” “Don’t Like Abortion? Ignore it Just Like You Do Foster Children,” and “I’m with Her” (arrows in all directions, carried by a man).  

Lots of volunteers at the voter registration booth. Lots of bottled water, free. Lots of old people, lots of young people, a fair number of children including a nursing baby with a mother whose sign was - oh, I’m probably remembering this wrong - something like “Mother by Choice, and You Get One, Too! Bans Off Our Bodies.” Also Corgis for Choice and a kid wearing a sign reading: “Boys will be Feminists.”

Damon wore his “Punch more Nazis, Shelter more Refugees” shirt and I wore my perky little dress with the cartoon mammoths, matching mask, and “Don’t Panic” necklace. Other outfits spotted were Wonder Woman, several variants on “Come and Take” or “Don’t Tread on Me” with uterus images, a lovely rainbow cape it was really too warm for but who could blame her, some flares that must’ve been dug out of the back of the wearer’s mom’s closet, and a full bisexual-flag hairdo.

We were all in good spirits but also really, really angry. The sheer fervor with which we changed “Abort Greg Abbot” should have chilled his blood from 50 miles away. We don’t like Governor Death in San Antonio, no we do not!

#non-sims #Pro-Choice Rally #San Antonio #I am so angry #also tired #but it feels good to have done something anyhow

[a-method-in-it]

I Say This With Love

It’s April 10, 2020, and I really do honestly and truly say this with love. Because I do genuinely love all of the young radical people on here. Depending who you talk to, I also am kind of a young radical, though by tumblr standards I am An Old. And you guys are great, you really are. But I need you to hear this. 

You need to stop pinning your hopes on Bernie Sanders. 

I like Bernie a lot. He was not my first choice in this primary, but he was absolutely my second. The fact that he lost to my second least favorite of the legitimate candidates (Marianne Williamson and Andrew Yang are not legit, don’t @ me) makes me really tired. I’m old enough to remember the time the Democrats nominated John Kerry to take on Dubya and look where that got us. I was looking forward to voting for Bernie in the primary -- and in fact I still will to help him shore up his influence going into the DNC -- and the last few days were not fun for me either. 

But it’s time to face facts. And the facts are these:

First, Bernie has dropped out. In this context, “suspending his campaign” means he is dropping out. It’s a way of dropping out that allows his name to remain on the ballot in whatever states already have his name on the ballot, but it means he’s dropped out. You can and should still vote for him to give him more political influence before the convention, but he will not be the nominee. That is the reality. It sucks. It is still the reality.

Second, harm reduction matters. That thing I mentioned above, about Kerry going up against Bush 43? Yeah, for those of you too young to remember 2004, Kerry couldn’t turn out the base and he lost. And do you know what happened in the next four years? Here is a short list:

Bush tried to privatize Social Security. Actually genuinely had a bill introduced into Congress that he planned on signing. 

He completely bungled the response to Hurricane Katrina, screwing over thousands of people, most of them black and low income

We added 21,000 troops in Iraq

Private contractors working for escaped hell demon Eric Prince, who Bush paid $1 billion in military contractor money to run around in Iraq playing soldier, opened fire into a crowd of Iraqi civilians in Baghdad, killing 17 innocent people

John Roberts was nominated and confirmed as Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, where his ass still sits, fucking us over to this day.

Bush vetoed funding for stem cell research.

He continued to deny that global warming was real, running out four more years on humanity’s clock.

And -- oh yeah! -- the whole goddamn economy crashed.

I really don’t care how little you like Joe Biden. I also do not like Joe Biden. But I promise you, however frustrating it would be to see him elected president, that is nothing -- nothing -- to what it would be like to go through four more years of Donald Trump. And if you disagree, please read any newspaper. 

Third, and this is the big one:

You need to stop pinning your hopes on a single candidate. That’s not how change happens. That’s not how movements happen. 

Politicians do not save us. Not even politicians we like. Not even politicians we agree with. Not even politicians who inspire us and care about us and try to do right by us. No, that’s not how it works. We save ourselves.  

So if you’re pissed off right now, then go unionize your workplace (advice for that here); join your local DSA; donate to Black Lives Matter or Planned Parenthood or the ACLU or Greenpeace or NARF or any one of the dozens of other organizations fighting the good fight; volunteer at an abortion clinic or homeless shelter or domestic violence shelter or food bank or conservation group or with anyone else doing good work in your neighborhood; sew face masks for your neighbors; join -- or start! -- a community garden or urban agriculture group; volunteer for a state or local politician with a good platform that you do believe in; sign up to register voters in your area; start calling your congress people every day; and for gods’ sake, vote blue in November.

To everyone who skimmed over that list because you think I’m full of shit and it was too long -- go back and read it because the fact that it’s long is my whole fucking point.

We need to save ourselves. And that starts with -- big sigh -- electing Joseph Robinette Biden (gods even his name is stupid). 

It just doesn’t end there. Honestly, if you want a movement to reshape the country, trying to just elect a person as president is objectively the least effective way to go about that. It’s trying to cut to the end. It’s building your roof before you’ve laid your foundation. It’s backwards. 

So pick yourselves up, brush off the dirt, patch up your bruises, and go build some foundations. 

I meant it when I said I love you guys. I believe you can do this, that we can do this. Please don’t prove me wrong. 

#politics #bernie sanders #joe biden #long sigh #looooooong sigh #the longest #i hate this election #i hate this election more than i hated 2016 #and i HATED 2016 #but i swear to god #trump is a goddamned fascist #and you know what happens #when you let fascists stay in power for EIGHT YEARS? #they don't leave #that's what #i love you kids #honestly i do #but i want there to be a world for you to grow up in #so i'm gonna need you #to please #PLEASE #not screw yourselves over #because if you think #that it can't happen here #or that it can't get worse #you're wrong #method speaks

[dispatchesfrom2020]

2020

What stories was I sleeping on?

So, what stories did I definitely miss before this project? Well, Atlantic Hurricanes and the Belarussian protests, for sure. Here are some of the other news I skipped out on during the year - or my recaps.

Ben Curtis/AP

1. Locusts Swarm 

An unusually wet 2019 led to swampy conditions across the Horn of Africa and western Asia - giving rise to a nearly biblical swarm of locusts. There are photographs where they literally seem to black-out the sun. The culprit? Climate change. The warming waters of the Indian ocean led to stormier weather - essentially more and bigger cyclones. It’s the worst outbreak of the crop-devouring pests in a quarter-century and it threatens food security across the region. The pandemic grinds international trade to a stop - obstructing many countries efforts to buy pesticides, equipment or bring in expert help to curb the infestation. Throughout the year, these swarms ballooned in size, stretching deep into Asia and across the Pacific ocean to Argentina and Brazil. An estimated 20 million people could face hunger and starvation and the UN’s World Food Program estimates that recovery could cost upwards of $9b USD in Africa alone.

Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

2. The Tigray War

For three decades the Tigray people held the balance of political and economic power in the country, tightly controlled through the Tigray People Liberation Front (TPLF), a Tigray nationalist party. In 2018 the Ethiopian election People's Revolutionary Democratic Front, led by Oromo Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali, won control of the country’s government.

Animosities boiled over when the Tigray province persisted with the 2020 election, despite government orders to postpone voting until 2021 due to the coronavirus. Prime Minister Abiy cut off funding to Tigray, incising local leadership. In November 2020, youth militias affiliated with the TPLF killed six hundred villagers in the border town of Mai Kadra - and allegedly attacked Ethiopian military bases. 

The government responded by shelling the Tigray capital of Mekelle. Ethiopia’s armed forces quickly took control of the city and surrounding towns, with the militias retreating into the mountains where skirmishes have continued. 

With Tigrayan people facing violent retaliation - they have faced furloughs from jobs, had bank accounts suspended, faced arbitrary raids on their homes, and been refused permission to board airplanes or travel overseas. Many have faced direct violence, especially from non-Tigray militias.

The conflict has seen incursions from Eritrean forces. Abiy was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize for his work mending the relationship with Ethiopia’s former colony-turned-neighbour. They share a common enemy now - Tigray. Eritrean forces slaughtered church-goers at a religious festival in early December, killing children and elders indiscriminately. These shadow forces of Fano militias and Eritrean soldiers have committed war crimes - including extrajudicial killings and rape. They even looted the church that allegedly houses the Ark of the Covenant.

The Tigrayan refugees have only one option: Sudan. One journalist writes: “Several [Tigrayan refugees] told me that they saw dozens of bodies along the route as they fled their shops, homes and farms and took to the long road to the border... in stifling heat.”

The New York Times series on Tigray was helpful in understanding more about the conflict and its historical and ethnic contexts. But I have to say - I feel unclear about what comes next. Will guerilla warfare between the Tigray militias and Eritrean-Ethiopian forces continue? Will the country face international consequences for their move towards genocide? I guess 2021 will decide.

A SolarWinds banner hangs outside the New York Stock Exchange on the company’s IPO day in 2018 - Brendan McDermid/Reuters

3. The SolarWinds hack

I chose to write about icebergs rather than this story for a reason. I wholly do NOT understand cyber security. Like, at all. My eyes glaze over when somebody tries to explain Wikileaks to me. I tried. I really did - I read like three articles trying to parse the details and make sense of anything and here’s what I got:

Hackers - almost certainly Russian - got into the US government secure networks. For a lot of departments. For months. It’s really, really bad. The government has a pretty blasé response to the disaster. Trump blames China. Agencies are turning directly to Microsoft for answers rather than their own cyber security people. It’s a blazing hot mess.

I’m going to continue to not understand this one, sorry.

Juan Carlos Ulate/Reuters

4. Civil Rights in 2020

The expansion of civil rights in Central/South America, with the legalization of abortion in Argentina in December and the introduction of gay marriage in Costa Rica in May, gave us something to celebrate in 2020. These new rights are the result of years - and decades - of organizing by activists in these two countries. 

Costa Rica is the sixth Latin-American country to legalize gay marriage. Argentina joins a short list of places in Latin America where abortion is fully legal - just Cuba, Guyana, Uruguay, and two Mexican states.

Some couples rushed to wed on the stroke of midnight - magistrates stayed up late into the night to marry couples. Marcos Castillo (L) and Rodrigo Campos (R) waited until the following morning - and celebrated with a masked kiss after their ceremony. 

Other notable moments in civil rights? New Zealand officially revoked their antiquated anti-abortion laws (which they’d been effectively ignoring for years anyway), Bhutan decriminalized homosexuality, Switzerland passed legislation that will allow people to change the gender on their government IDs, and Croatia struck down laws forbidding gay couples from fostering children. Albania banned gay conversion therapy - as did the Yukon, actually - and Barbados made discrimination on the basis of sexuality illegal.

Nicky Kuautonga/The Guardian

5. Oceania crushed the pandemic

Virtually all of the countries reported to be COVID-free during 2020 were Oceanic nations and island territories. Turkmenistan says they didn’t have any cases but they’re lyin’. -Tuvalu Kiribati, Nauru, Tonga, and Palau all ended the year with no cases, while Samoa and the Solomon Islands reported a few isolated cases in quarantine facilities as they re-opened the border to repatriate their citizens abroad. 

Some combination of strict travel restrictions, new hygiene rules, curfews, and early lockdowns kept most of these countries relatively untouched. While New Zealand and Australia experienced several flare-ups throughout the year, their targeted lockdowns helped eradicate community spread quickly each time, returning them to schools, workplaces and boozy brunches quickly.

Honourable mentions to Vietnam and Thailand - with 100 million and 70 million citizens apiece both have charted under 100 deaths to COVID - and Taiwan with only nine casualties.

Gulalay Amiri, a pomegranate farmer, surveys his slim haul. Fighting as worsened in many parts of Afghanistan after the United States announced they would withdraw from the country in 2021 - Jim Huylebroek for The New York Times

6. War in Afghanistan

In March the United States signed a peace-deal with the Taliban, promising to withdraw troops by May of 2021. The War in Afghanistan has lasted 19 years - the longest war in American history and the majority of my lifetime.

I don’t know how to feel about it.

During peace talks the Taliban refused to commit to recognizing the country’s elected government, disavowing Al-Qaeda or protecting women’s rights. They support limited education for girls - only up to the sixth grade.

I listened to a few podcasts by the Daily on the ground in Afghanistan with the current government’s security forces. Many of the young soldiers they interviewed were so young they’d never lived in a country governed by the Taliban - and they fiercely oppose the idea. It also appears that the Afghan government were often excluded from peace talks, finding out details of the American meetings with the Taliban through international news reports and Taliban statements on social media. 

Since the Taliban’s deal with the United States, Taliban bombings and attacks have continued, targeting both security forces and civilians. The Afghan government has pointed the finger at the Taliban for mass shooting at a maternity ward in Kabul that killed 24 women and infants. “They came for the mothers”, said horrified eyewitnesses.

For almost two decades, the western world has supported the ‘new’ Afghanistan - but it feels very fragile. Will a withdrawal lead those people that assisted coalition forces vulnerable to retaliation? It feels likely. The fighting between the Taliban and the Afghan government has been fierce - and come with high civilian casualties. The year is punctuated, nearly monthly, with news of new attacks in Afghanistan.

It reminds me of the end of the Vietnam war. America withdrew and two years later the south was retaken by the North. In the final days of the Vietnam war the United States evacuated around 150,000 civilians who had worked with American on the ground. Nearly a million others left the country by boat, seeking asylum at refugee camps in Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. Hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese people who had collaborated with the US-backed South were sent to re-education camps where they were sometimes tortured or starved. Is this what Afghanistan will look like? 

There’s no 'good’ solution - and for now the future of the war in Afgahnistan feels very opaque. I think I under-reported stories in the region as a result - it feels too complex to boil down into daily recaps.

Bobi Wine, 38, was detained by police for allegedly breaking COVID-19 restrictions while campaigning in Uganda’s upcoming presidential election - Abubaker Lubowa/Reuters

8. Ugandan election protests

Western media doesn’t seem to place a lot of importance on reporting in Africa - but what little attention they had for the continent focused on the anti-SARS protests in Nigeria throughout the fall. The attention on police violence in America raised the profile of these demonstrations - and the brutality of the government’s response, shooting at dozens of peaceful marchers gathered at the Lekki toll bridge.

But they were far from the only protests in Africa.

As Uganda prepared for an election early in 2021, the government forcefully cracked down on youthful dissidents - like presidential hopefuls Bobi Wine and Patrick Amuriat who were detained by police during the final campaign pushes in November. 

Wine, a young musician, has been arrested numerous times since he announced his candidacy. One occasion police beat Wine so badly he temporarily lost his vision - they also killed his driver. They raided his offices, confiscating election materials, and arrested supporters. His bodyguard will later be killed after being struck by a military truck while helping an injured reporter escape tear-gas during December protests.

Police record 56 casualties as they violently put down the large-scale protests - though human rights group have suggested the real number could be dramatically higher. 

Ariana Quesada holds a photo of her father, Benito. He died after an outbreak at the Cargill meat-packing plant where he worked. She filed a complaint with the RCMP, asking them to investigate conditions at the plant - Justin Pennell/CBC

9. Meat packing plants become coronavirus hotspots

Meat processing plants become super-spreaders - these often rurally-located factories see massive outbreaks across the United States and Canada. Their floors are crowded with employees working elbow-to-elbow, forced to shout over the loud din of machinery. The refrigeration - necessary for keeping the meat unspoiled - may allow the virus to live longer in the air.

By September of 2020, nearly 500 meat-processing plants had reported at least one case of COVID in the United States. And 203 had died. 

At a Tyson Foods factory in Waterloo, Iowa, staff allege that management placed bets on how many workers would become sick - and die. Supervisors began avoiding the floor, relegating their responsibilities to untrained workers. 

The plant reluctantly closed - by the time they re-opened two weeks later over a third of their 2,800 workforce had tested positive. Five workers died - including Isidro Fernandez, whose family is leading a lawsuit against the company.

In Canada, Cargill faces a similar lawsuit after an enormous outbreak in their High River facility that resulted in three deaths - two employees and one staffer’s 71-year-old father. They were: Hiep Bui, Armando Sallegue, and Benito Quesada. The company offered a $500 “responsibility” bonus for workers who didn’t miss any shifts - and discouraged employees from reporting any flu-like symptoms. Many of the factory’s workers are temporary foreign workers or new Canadians. 

10. The Nazca Lines

I forgot about this and am shoehorning it in now, but Peruvian archaeologists discovered another ancient line drawing in the desert outside of Lima - this time in the shape of a kitty cat.

Of all the archaeology finds this year - remains at Pompeii, a mammoth graveyard in Mexico, and a wealth of sarcophagi in Egypt - this is my favourite.

#2020 recap #2020 in depth

[exxar1]

Episode 10: We Don’t Win

1/23/2021

I recently started subscribing to John MacArthur’s sermon podcasts. I’d never heard of him until he and his congregation began defying the lockdown mandates in California last summer. Although I’d added his podcasts to my library, I had never actually listened to any of them until three days ago when his sermon from this past Sunday began playing automatically as soon as my phone’s Bluetooth connected to my car. I was about to stop the playback as I was in the mood for some upbeat music, but then changed my mind when I looked at the dashboard display and saw what podcast had started.

John began his sermon by listing all the blessings God had bestowed upon him and his church in the last six months of 2020. The more that he and his congregation defied Governor Newsom’s tyranny, the more God blessed their ministry. He said that 2020 had given him, personally, an immense amount of clarity, and I knew exactly what he was talking about. 2020, for many of us, helped us to see exactly what matters most in this world and what our priorities should be. As John moved on to the heart of his sermon, he said three words that have been rattling around in the back of my brain ever since.

“We don’t win.”

We Christians do not win in this world. This world belongs to Satan. It always has ever since the Fall. It is not the destiny of the believers in Christ “…to win on this battleground,” as John puts it.

“We don’t win.”

I first heard this sermon on Wednesday, the day of President Biden’s inauguration. In the two days since he took the oath of office, we Americans have seen quite clearly what this president has in mind for the future of this country. One of his first acts was to sign an order that gives boys and girls the right to roam freely in the public restrooms of the opposite sex. Boys who “identify” as girls will also have the right to thus compete in women’s sports if they so wish. Biden and his administration also made announcements that they plan to not only roll back all the restrictions that President Trump had enacted to try to stop the public finding of international and domestic organizations that support abortion, but to also expand the current laws of “reproductive and women’s rights” to allow abortions up to and including the moment of birth. (He even campaigned on this abhorrent promise.) Abortions will soon be allowed for ANY reason and will be made as convenient as a checkup at your local dentist.

It’s that latter part that should bet striking fear and sorrow in the hearts of EVERY American citizen, regardless of religious affiliation. Roe v. Wade was just the beginning of America’s fall from grace and prosperity, and if Biden and his administration succeeds in their enactment of these new laws and permissions, then our country’s fate is truly sealed. Any nation — any people — that allows the willful, rampant murder of the unborn will not survive very long. It is among the last, deadliest signs of genuine, moral decay, and that — along with all the social movements that are currently fighting to erase gender and promote tolerance of ANYTHING regarding sexuality — are why I firmly believe that we are closer than ever to the Second Coming of Christ.

“We don’t win.”

The Biden administration is under the power and firm control of the another insidious, deceptive, and abhorrent social movement that has gripped this nation since last June: Black Lives Matter. There is no longer true justice in America. John MacArthur stated in his sermon that America is now under a new form of law and order known as “social justice”. Under this new justice, the only ones who are right are the oppressed, and the guilty are the oppressors. Justice is now based on race and skin color, rather than truth and right. All the garbage surrounding “white fragility” and “anti-racism” has made it perfectly acceptable for everyone to racially discriminate and hate anyone whose skin is white.

“We don’t win.”

Black Lives Matter, in its efforts to alter and/or erase American history have set the stage for America’s very foundation, the system of capitalism, to also be destroyed. All the economic plans of the Biden administration — as well as a democrat controlled congress — will ensure that socialism will take hold in this country even worse than when Obama was president. The current leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement are proud, outspoken Marxists, and they have never tried to disguise or obfuscate their beliefs. They have already succeeded in getting their insidious doctrine of “critical race theory” into public schools at every grade level in all the major cities in the U.S. Within one or two generations, our country will be overflowing with the same brainwashed population that brought about the Russian Revolution, which plunged that country into decades of economic and moral darkness.

“We don’t win.”

I am not writing this blog to frighten or depress you. (Well, actually, yes you should be scared shitless right now. I know I am.) John ended his sermon by reminding all Christians that yes, we don’t win. We don’t win down here, that is. Earth has already been claimed by Satan and his forces of darkness. But, if we have accepted Christ as our Lord and Savior, then we will not have to suffer much longer in this mortal realm. Our only task right now is to serve God by staying faithful to him and spreading the gospel. And, when our life is over, we will join our Heavenly Father at his throne, and we will have a front row seat to His final plan. His heavenly forces will make war with the corrupted world and its lord, Satan, in that great final battle of Armageddon, and it’s here, where it matters most, that we will win.

Part of my reason for writing this post today was to remind myself of the true power of God. We serve and worship the same God that made a covenant with Abraham and Isaac. The same God that brought the Israelites out of Egypt and watched over them as they traveled in the desert. No matter how often His people forgot Him or sinned against Him, God never forgot them. His wrath was great, yes, and there were many times the Israelites were punished for their sins, but God always provided a way of forgiveness and redemption.

In the back of my Bible is a listed reading plan for the year. I decided to embark on this as part of my daily devotional and as a new year’s resolution. I have already finished the books of Genesis and Exodus, and, while I still remember from so long ago the stories of creation; of Abraham, Isaac, Esau, and Jacob; of Joseph getting sold into slavery in Egypt only to be in the right place and right time to save his brothers and family; of God delivering His people out of slavery in Egypt — I was now reading all of those accounts with fresh eyes. Right now, when our country is on a rapidly descending slope into sin, darkness, and moral decay, it gives my heart and soul a much needed peace to know that that God of the Bible is the same God that still watches over his people. I want to add the phrase “protects them”, but I’m honestly not sure that’s appropriate. God is watching over us, make no mistake about that, but He’s also a vengeful God, and his wrath is great.

America was once a Christian nation, but I have a hard time uttering that phrase just now. I don’t believe it’s true anymore, and we Christians are about to enter a new era of persecution and tribulation. The government mandates that were issued last year in response to the manufactured “pandemic” are a perfect example of the new persecution. As John put it in his sermon, “Satan did his best to shut down our church.” The Lord of Darkness did his damndest to shut down ALL churches in this nation, and he succeeded in many states — most of them blue. Here in Nevada, for example, almost all churches are still shut down for worship. Services can only be attended from home via livestream.

This is just the first step. The new laws and policies that the Biden administration has already enacted — or plans to enact — will only serve the heathen and the wicked. But we Christians still have the power to fight back, and we most definitely should while we still can. Just look at John’s church in California. I won’t go into the whole list here, but John’s ministry did not shrink or fail during 2020. Quite the opposite, in fact. He stated that his congregation expanded by more than 1,200 members in just the last quarter of the year. People were driving in from out of state to attend services! The church more than tripled its funding from offering and donations in 2020, more than they’ve received in the last decade alone, in fact!

It is in times of great adversity and great trials, that Christianity grows. America is the modern equivalent of the Roman Empire, and, like those Christians in the days of Nero and Caesar, the believers in America today will be shunned, spit upon, arrested, and yes, even put to death, while the rest of the nation celebrates “diversity” and “tolerance” and continues to slaughter the unborn in record numbers.

No, it’s not quite that bad for us believers just yet. But within one or two generations, perhaps even sooner, it will be. The current “cancel culture” that is serving as the militant arm of movements such as Black Lives Matter will very soon turn their wrath upon anything that is religious. True Christians, the believers that will not compromise on “diversity” and “tolerance” by watering down the gospel or allowing immorality such as gay marriage and transgender “affirmation services”, among other things, will be attacked and cursed as being un-American and “evil”.

No, we don’t win down here.

But we will one day. Our suffering here is but for a time. Soon enough, we shall be reunited in Heaven with our Lord and Savior at the foot of his throne. All trials and tribulations will cease and we shall rejoice with Him evermore.

Amen, hallelujah!

#john macarthur #Christian #faith #God #black lives matter

[stcviebudd]

Disclaimer: I am not black and am therefore not an authority on Black Lives Matter. I compiled these resources for my family using a variety of social media posts from black authors, and thought that it could be useful to others. I am happy to make alterations in response to feedback and suggestions, and my hope is to uplift black voices with this resource list. 

DONATIONS

Black Lives Matter

The Black Resilience Fund

In four days, the Black Resilience Fund has provided $43,123.81 in immediate support for Black people in Portland, Oregon, including a warm meal, groceries, and unpaid bills. Nonblack volunteers can sign up here and Black Portlanders in need of funds can request them here. 

Justice For Breonna Taylor

Support for the family of Breonna Taylor.

Business Support

Northside business support

Support businesses on Minneapolis’s Northside that have been impacted by recent demonstrations.

Du Nord Riot Recovery Fund

Du Nord Craft Spirits is a Black-owned distillery with a building that was damaged. They’ve “received a tidal wave of love and support from across the nation and many have asked how they can help… Therefore, Du Nord is establishing this fund to support black and brown companies affected by the riots.”

Pimento Relief Fund

Reclaim the Block is partnering with Pimento to provide black business without insurance relief after white supremacists set them on fire during the protests.

Rebuild The Block

Raising funds to support black businesses after the economic crisis and destruction through looting. 25 businesses will be selected per month to receive funds. 

Kentucky Reproductive Freedom Fund

EMW Women’s Surgical Center, the only abortion clinic open in Kentucky and one of only six black owned clinics in the USA, was damaged during the riots in Louisville. Learn more about EMW here.

LGBTQ Support

Black Youth Project

A Black Woman LGBTQ group dedicated to finding justice for black woman who face varying degrees of gender violence and racism

LGBTQ Freedom Fund

LGBTQ people are three times more likely to be jailed and are at risk of abuse. The freedom fund posts bail to secure the safety and liberty of people in jail and immigration detention. Learn more about their mission here. 

Bail Funds

Donate Through ActBlue

Split a donation between 70+ community bail funds, mutual aid funds, and other organizations

PDX Protest Bail Fund

The General Defense Committee Local 1 has established a fundraiser to cover bail and other legal expenses for protesters arrested in Portland, Oregon in connection to protests against George Floyd's murder by Minneapolis police, along with general police brutality. Learn more about the General Defense Committee here.

Masterlist of Additional Bail & Memorial Funds

Additional Organizations

Black Visions Collective

Seeking to expand the power of black people across the Twin Cities Metro Area and Minnesota. They develop strategic campaigns that operate on the local and national level in order to advance a concrete impact for people’s lives. Read more about their mission here.

Minnesota Healing Justice Network 

Provide a supportive professional community and mutual aid network for wellness and healing justice practitioners who also identify as IBPOC (indigenous, black, or people of color).

Reclaim the Block

Organizes Minneapolis community and city council members to move money from the police department into other areas of the city’s budget that truly promote community health and safety. They are encouraging donations to other organizations and have compiled a document of suggestions here.

NAACP Legal Defense Fund

Through Litigation, advocacy, and public education, LDF seeks structural change to expand democracy, eliminate disparities, and achieve racial justice in a society that fulfills the promise of equality for all Americans. Learn more about LDF here.

The Marshall Project

A nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization seeking to create and sustain a sense of national urgency about the US criminal justice system, striving to educate and enlarge the audience of people who care about the state of criminal justice. 

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)

Addressing civil liberties threats during the pandemic, including: demanding that vulnerable people in prisons, jails and immigration detention centers be released so they can practice the same social distancing and health precautions so vital to their well-being. Relevant to the protestors being jailed by police!

Campaign Zero

Organization dedicated to ending police violence in America by limiting police intervention, improving community interactions, and ensuring accountability. 

PETITIONS

Reopening Sandra Bland’s case

Banning/restricting tear gas

The “Hands Up Act”

Supporting legislation that prohibits police from shooting unarmed civilians

The Trayvon Martin Law

Calling for revisions to Neighborhood Watch Handbooks banning aggressors from using deadly force when they started the confrontation.

Banning the use of rubber bullets 

Rubber bullets can cause bone fractures, injury to internal organs, and even death. They should not be used on civilians for crowd control.

[content warning: slightly graphic header image of rubber bullet injury]

Firing and bringing charges against the officers who killed Breonna Taylor

Justice for Breonna Taylor (second petition) 

Filing charges against officers, paying wrongful death damages to her family, urging legislation to federally ban the “no-knock warrant”

Justice for Ahmaud Arbery

Justice for George Floyd

Pass the Georgia hate crime bill

Georgia is one of 4 states without a hate crime law, and their legislation has stalled in the Senate. Help it pass in memory of Ahmaud Arbery. 

Masterlist of additional petitions

EDUCATIONAL TOOLS FOR NONBLACK PEOPLE

National Resource List: Alternatives to Donating and Protesting

Masterlist of tools on how to be a better ally

Anti-Racism Resources: Articles, Books, Films, TV, Podcasts

“Where Do I Begin?”: A 28-day reading plan for white and non-black people of color

White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo (book)

Interview transcript with Robin DiAngelo about White Fragility

Why the Coronavirus is Hitting Black Communities Hardest by NPR: Codeswitch (podcast)

#blm #black lives matter #minneapolis protests #george floyd #breonna taylor #donations #petitions

[cookinguptales]

I've a small query (if it doesn't float your boat, no worries!) I was interested in how you got into learning languages, what led you to it? I've become curious since learning a new language as an adult has only increased my awe of multilingual folk (additionally, I vaguely remember a post about a request in exchange for a donation to charity, and wondered if there were any you'd like a donation to)

First of all, good luck with the language learning! It’s not easy as an adult, but I do think it’s worth it, both in terms of cultural fluency and brain elasticity.

My answer to the language thing is actually extremely complicated, so I’ll be putting it under the cut. I’ll put the charity stuff above the cut so more people can see it.

— I’d just like to warn you, though, before I start, that I have been locked in this house for over a month with no respite and I HAVE A LOT OF WORDS AND FEELINGS IN ME SO THIS POST HAS SO MANY OF BOTH OF THOSE THINGS!!

anyway

There are so many charities that I want to donate to now that it honestly makes my head spin. Every time I look at a site like GoFundMe it kind of makes me want to cry. So a lot of donations I’ve made have been to like local businesses, restaurants, etc. who will close down without help. (Also a lot of local native groups, who are disproportionately suffering right now.) I’ve also been donating to various food banks — Philabundance, a Philly-centric charity that deals with food insecurity in general, is a good one. That was a regular of mine even before the outbreak. I’ve also donated to a lot of the local services in the small town where I’m in now, though you’ll need to PM me if you want the name of that. (It’s… very small.) 

Off Their Plate is another great charity that’s been working with small restaurants (who can’t open for business) to get food to first responders. They’re partnered with World Central Kitchen, which is another fantastic charity that helps out during disasters. Plus well-known ones like Feeding America, No Kid Hungry (important while school is out and kids aren’t getting breakfast/lunch there), Direct Relief, etc.

(I uhhh may have overstrained my charity budget the past couple months. It’s odd how that adds to stress and relieves it at the same time.)

I tend to avoid religious charities, especially Salvation Army, because they’re occasionally discriminatory in how they distribute resources and we no longer have laws & oversight to make sure they don’t do shady shit. So I just avoid them in general now. I also avoid the American Red Cross because they’ve been known to misuse funds. Research is key!

I also worry about some of my regular charities, like Immigration Equality & Rainbow Railroad (helps LGBTQ people in dangerous countries immigrate to less dangerous ones), the Native American Rights Fund, various local abortion funds, RAICES (provides legal services to immigrants & refugees), the ACLU, Dysautonomia International, the Rainforest Action Network, etc… A lot of them are getting fewer donations than they’re used to because we’re in the middle of such life-shattering events.

If you are really interested in making a donation (please, please, please do) those are all good options. I also fully recommend looking up needy organizations, services, people, etc. in your own area. I try to donate to a healthy mixture of national/international organizations, local needs, and temporary issues du jour. (Disaster relief, bail funds for protesters, fighting new discriminatory laws, etc.) I would genuinely appreciate any donations, especially if you find a cause near and dear to your heart that I would never even hear about. Anything along these same lines, y’know? If you have anything you’d like me to do in return, just hmu.

I constantly stress about who to donate to — there are so many good organizations and so few dollars to give them — but at a certain point, every dollar to a cause you believe in counts. Every dollar you donate helps to make the world a little bit better for at least one person. That’s what I have to tell myself to calm myself down, haha. So even the smallest donation you make to any of these groups would mean a lot to me.

Anyway, onto the language stuff:

For me personally, I grew up bilingual. Deafness runs in my family, so I learned sign language from a very young age. Note: I say “sign language” rather than ASL. I learned sign language kind of organically, which ended up making a mess later in life. My parents mostly taught me, but so did my daycare (at a deaf school) and so did my babysitters and so did other family members, etc. The point is, not all of them used the same sign language. There was a wide mixture of ASL, SEE, and home signs and my current signing style is… problematic. lmao. My family all understands it (hey, they taught it to me) and I can have conversations with American sign language users, but I know they can’t love my signing lmao. I’ve considered sitting down and taking a legit ASL class for years, but there are so many classes I want to take… I don’t know.

After that, it largely became a case of taking languages whenever they were made available to me. I’ve always liked them. We moved around a lot when I was a preteen so I went to a lot of different schools. (4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th grade were all different schools.) It was rough at home and hard to make friends so I guess I threw myself into academics a lot. My sixth grade school was an odd one; it was a 6-8 grade school and you were supposed to take a crash course in three different languages in sixth grade so you could choose one and take it in 7th and 8th grade. I ended up taking Spanish, French, and German that year. I liked French best! But then we moved so it was kind of moot. (And I hated German, sorry Germans. My mouth doesn’t like the noises. It didn’t help that my teacher was weirdly sympathetic to Nazi-era Germany…? But I guess that’s another post.)

When we moved to Florida, you had to have special permission to take language classes in 7th grade. (FL doesn’t have great academics.) But since I’d already had some Spanish in NC, they let me take it! And then I moved schools again. This new school, my 8th grade school, I’d be in until I graduated 12th grade years later — but the employee turnover at that school was almost comedically bad?  I took Spanish for like a year and a half there and had three different teachers. So at this point I’d had 5 different Spanish teachers, all from different countries (where they spoke slightly different Spanish!), all reteaching the same ideas over and over again because they didn’t know where the last teacher had left off. In the end, my last Spanish teacher sent me to the school library with some textbooks because he felt like I was very good at languages and he couldn’t adequately teach me in the environment he’d been thrown into. (My high school was very terrible. So he was right.)

SO I SWITCHED TO FRENCH. I took French for 3-4 years in high school (can’t remember when I started) but the same shit started happening. By the last year, my French teacher had the French I, II, III, and IV students IN THE SAME CLASS and she just put the advanced students in small groups and had us do independent study. Sigh… Around this same time, I started three other languages. At this point, I was getting kind of accustomed to self-study so I applied for a Latin class in the Florida Virtual School and took a year of that. I also spent a summer studying at the University of Chicago when I was 16-17 and learned Middle Egyptian then. (Yes, I was an ancient cultures nerd even back then.)

The Japanese has always been an odd case. Like I said, my 8-12 education was fairly terrible. They had this thing where they used a computer program to teach kids math and the teacher kind of taught along? When I transferred to the school in the middle of 8th grade, the teacher didn’t know what to do with me so he just plopped me in front of a computer and told me to do as much as I could. They started me in… Pre-Algebra, I think? Which I’d already taken in sixth grade. So I ended up getting through Pre-Algebra, Geometry, Algebra, and Algebra II, which… wasn’t in the teacher’s plans. I’d kind of finished several years of math in like a quarter. And then they didn’t have any more classes. So he just told me to like. Sit quietly and amuse myself for the last few months of school?? (Terrible, terrible school.) So I went to the library and found a book about Japanese and started teaching myself that. I really, really liked Japanese! Like it’s a language that just clicks really well with the way my brain works, I think. It’s very logical, I like the syllabary, etc. And I think growing up signing helped me with pictographic languages like Middle Egyptian and Japanese. My brain easily connects visual symbols with concepts.

When I went to college, the plan was honestly to learn more Egyptian and start translating, and I kept taking French to help me read old research in various ancient study fields. I ended up transferring out of the NELC major, though, due to some ethical problems… I guess that’s another post. Several years into my RELS/FOLK degree I went to my parents like. Look. I love learning this stuff but none of it’s useful. Remember how much I loved Japanese? Can I go back to learning that? I could translate that and that’s a legit skill. So I applied to a program through my school and studied in Japan for a while and ended up really doubling down on that language. Weird how I came back to it years later, but I guess it was always the one I loved best.

I have a mind that’s very pattern-based, so I guess I’ve always loved learning languages and the patterns behind them. (This may be why languages with a lot of rule exceptions, like French, irritate me.) They’re like puzzles that I’ve always enjoyed teasing out. Unfortunately, the way my education bounced around meant that I never got a good grounding in most of those languages, so I’ve largely lost them. I can still read French fairly well and my Japanese is good… My Spanish is like. Enough to get me around in the southern US. My German is abysmal. I remember very little Latin & Middle Egyptian. (It’s been over 10 years, I guess.)

So I guess what I feel the need to say to you is that if you don’t use it, you will lose it. I did well in all my language classes. They’ve always been fairly easy for me. Like. Straight As, no problem. I don’t say this to brag. I say it so you know that even for someone like me, whose brain is fairly well-wired for languages, it’s very, very difficult to retain languages when you’re not using them. If you’re not used to taking languages or you started late in life, it’s even harder. So even on the days you don’t want to practice! You gotta practice! Ganbare! Bon chance!

#replies #god these are so many words #sorry to everyone #shaymeson

[tiny-christian-queer]

What would Jesus do?

I’m writing this at the middle of the night, because honestly, I spent sabbath in a very dark place and then got drunk, sent people messages telling them how and why I loved them... because I was so broken and hurt and I wanted to just die because I’d watched my government condemn another disabled person to death by refusing to fix a simple door and provide a motorised wheelchair the court had already said they HAD to give the man. So me being completely rejected by the government agencies for help, having so much difficulty fitting in at church, losing my home again and just being so so lost... I took a bottle of vodka and drank a forth of it while playing The Pretty Reckless (yeah... possibly the furthest you can get from church hymns) and trying to find a way to want to live again. Eventually I got to a playlist I made specifically to pull me out of such meltdowns and being drunk at that point I just lost it in tears and feelings and realised I just needed to tell some people that I really loved them and the things I’ve been too scared to say sober. Today, I don’t want to drink. I tried. Alcohol doesn’t taste sweet or like hope tonight. It’s just a bad decision in a bottle not something I want to skull for an epiphany.

But... I have been thinking about Jesus. What does Jesus do. For me, Jesus is like a weird acronym for life, Justice, encouragement, sharing, unity and strength.

That is what God is. He is justice. He encourages us. He tells us to share everything. Reminds us in unity there is strength, with him there is strength.

With love there is strength.

Jesus loves like no one else. God loves like no one else.

No one else is there to comfort me when I’m crying on the couch at two am because I stupidly started having feelings for someone I probably shouldn’t and my best friend has feelings for them too and I don’t know how to navigate this. But God listens. He says to me ‘what do you feel is right? Do you really believe that pushing your feelings down will help or would you rather kindly and tactfully talk to people and find out where boundaries lay so you can deal with this healthily?’

God is there when I’m completely smashed and crying and worried sick and screaming to the void: ‘I’m scared this person I love so much is going to hurt themselves by holding onto this vengeful hatred in her heart, it’s starting to stop her from seeing how incredible and amazing she is! Help me help her please, I don’t know what to say!’ And God sits next to me, holds me tight and says ‘tell them the truth child. Remind them why you and others love them and that this vengeance they have lost themselves too won’t bring it back, but love will. Because they are so loved but have just forgotten it. *name* is not vengeful because they feel like they cant win, they are just scared that they could be alone and unloved now. Tell *name* the truth so they can see it.’

God also sits on my shoulder and tells me to go back and edit every ‘she’ to ‘they’ because fear of Christian Tumblr judgment doesn’t mean I ignore my friends pronouns it took him forever to give them the bravery for. Because God tends to give me that mental disappointmented look everytime I forget to see my friends as they are and as he made them to be.

But that’s now what this post is meant to be about.

Sometimes when I start getting scared, God starts saying to me ‘What did my son do? What did he face that you’re facing and what about his path do you need to adapt to do now?’

So when I see people say ‘God would be so ashamed of you for that!’ I hear ‘I’m angry at you and I feel hatred and I’m scared and I don’t like it so I’m going to use something that I don’t believe can be hurt to shame you.’

But God can be hurt. He hurts all the time. Look at Jesus, look at Noah, look at Daniel, look at Cain and Abel... God constantly has his heart broken. But he still holds peoples hands. When I’m scared, when I’m hurting, my prayer is always, always ‘please make it stop. Please make it stop. Please make it stop as soon as possible and give me the strength to make it through or kill me right now. Just let me die and be done with this pain or help me by giving me strength and resources to get out of here’

But we can’t say ‘what would God do.’ Because we don’t understand what or why God does most of the time because he sees more than us. He doesn’t have control over us till we let him. God is consent culture in a nutshell, he will come in and do what we’ve asked for only when we let him and ask him and then he will take a step back and wait.

And we see this through our prayers and communication, but also through Jesus.

Jesus was the perfect kindness. He was only angry when people hurt each other. He protected and loved.

Mary Magdalene was a woman of the night and I will not sugar coat what that means; she was a prostitute. She worked her butt off to please men for money to get food on the table and support her community. She was a naturally loving and sweet person with a good heart. She worked having sex with men for money and those same men would shame and disgrace and mock her and so would other women of jealousy for what men went to her to provide. She was alone and an outcast even on days when she felt strong, her only community that truely accepted her were others like her. And I can tell you that because I’ve been there with other sex workers behind the scenes and I wasn’t in SW as a prostitute, but I knew the girls and guys who were and it’s hard and isolating work.

When Jesus and the others met her, the followers of Christ dismissed her for her job, for the fact men used her and threw (knowing men, probably literally thew) money at her for it. Because she was not fortunate enough to be a loved wife. Jesus showed her a kindness and refused to let others disrespect her. That is how she saw and knew him as the Messiah. Because he was kind and respectful to everyone, every woman, worker, man and child, no matter who they were, he saw that they mattered. That is why Mary and the perfume was so much more important, she knew what was coming and wanted to thank him and show him love and respect as he had for her. He had seen her.

Jesus was kindness to everyone.

My favourite post was about the cake debate ‘I don’t want to date the gays a cake’ ‘would Jesus bake the cake? Yes, yes he would.’ And that’s not all, He would celebrate their love and make the best damn cake of their lives because they were people and he loves all.

Jesus wouldn’t stand the KKK and Nazis would with a peaceful violence, would go and tear them apart (by this I mean call them out publicly, take back the Christian temples they’ve turned into hell dens and curse them out for ruining the message of love he had taught them and how dare they use his father’s name to massacre.’

Jesus would hear the teenager down the road had become pregnant and homeless and find her a place to stay where she’s safe, deliver her groceries once a week and being the amazing carpenter he is, build her a beautiful cradle and bring cloth diapers and bottles for the babe because they’re more sustainable and can be used more often in a pinch.

Jesus would help lobby the government saying ‘help out disabled’ and find charities and organisations and donate whatever time or money he could to them.

Jesus would be there with his church asking what accessible venues they could use for events so more people could make it.

Jesus would find someone to sign for the Deaf community and make sure they could be included.

Jesus would spread love in every which way.

Jesus is the man outside Planned Parenthood shouting everything other the abortions provided at each clinic. He helps women get in and out safely.

Jesus is the man screaming ‘SAFE MEDICAL TREATMENT IS GODS WILL, LOVE AND KINDNESS BEFORE JUDGEMENT AND CONDEMNATION’ at the crowds, bringing others with him to safely make a wall and protect people.

Jesus was a man who after a mass shooting would donate blood and help fund counseling services and share loving messages to people.

Jesus would be helping clean the streets, literally, with groups of men and women, walking with scoopers and trash bags, cleaning the city on their morning and evening walks before going home, cleaning up and then meeting at the local soup kitchen to help feed the poor while others read to children in a library or went and visited someone who just needs a friend.

Jesus and God, they’re nothing but love and sometimes I see this side of Tumblr, sometimes even churches and pockets of the Christian community become so lost in blind hatred they forgot that they’re love first and foremost. God is love and only when we listen will her hear him. For God is kindness and heart and justice and empathy and affection and honesty and strength and grace and dignity and respect and patience and perseverance and protection and encouragement and help and trust and everything.

We need to remember who it really is we’re following because we need to follow in their footsteps and be so kind and loving we are the ones God calls upon when the pain becomes so great it begins to drown us. We get to be the ones he calls to fix the world with our love. Just like Noah. Just like Moses. Just like Daniel. Just like Jesus.

[uhaliza-blog]

[ laura harrier, female, she/her] hey , there’s ALIZA CALLAS the TWENTY-FOUR year old local that i met recently. it’s easy to tell that they’re pretty EMPATHETIC but you’ll learn they’re pretty HEADSTRONG too. they’ve been living on the island for HER WHOLE LIFE and often spend time around SALA BOOK SHOP if you’re looking for them.

hey y’all i’m sierra! allow me to introduce you to my baby aliza! under the cut you’ll find her intro!

-unyielding, -morose +empathetic, +steadfast, ~secretive.

aesthetic: well-worn levis, 2am phone calls, worried thoughts, kind heart, sweat pants, designated driver, messy buns, & gentle smiles

just like…. trying her best, okay

a little distant but still polite and endearing if you don’t know her — a defense mechanism she relies on to keep at least some semblance of control over her bleeding heart. once you’re friends tho that’s it, she is emotionally attached to you and will be until her dying breath.

bi.bi.bi.gif

angelos callas was an established businessman, oil baron’s son, and married when he met candace rhodes, a nineteen year old sorority girl – what was intended to be a clandestine affair turned into a marriage and two children, sans-prenup due to angelos’s trusting and romantic nature.

naturally candace walked away with half his inheritance and an impressive alimony settlement once she had tangible proof of his infidelity in the form of aliza’s younger half sister.

her father had full physical custody of her and her brother growing up and he was a bit of a romantic mess, which meant more moves and stepmothers over the years that she barely bothered to keep track of then all.

after her mother resurfaced and only bothered getting custody of her younger brother, she continued to refuse to leave her hometown with her father. when he moved on to her next stepmother, she remained, alone in a house with too many rooms and ghosts of memories. she would’ve preferred an actual haunting to the loneliness.

once upon time, she was the IT GIRL in high school - prom queen teen dream with a rebellious streak that made her generally liked by everyone. the fact that her house was party central and parent-free helped a lot —  and her pathological need to be liked combined with a laissez-faire, breezy aura was as intoxicating as the crates of bourbon and vodka her father provided.

but she’s changed !! quite a bit since then, obviously maturing and having her heart broken a few times have been good for her, but she can still be coaxed into her more destructive moods.

the summer of her junior year of high school she fell pregnant, and it was something of an unspoken scandal – whispered about by women at cotillion luncheons and charitable auctions, especially when it became apparent she’d gotten an abortion. after all, she was and is still set to take on her father’s reign.

her high school romance crashed and burned spectacularly after a summer of fighting- mostly over her the baby, she vowed to never fall in love again. naturally, she fell in love immediately – and remained in love for the next couple years.

at twenty, she found herself staring down at a little pink plus sign once again, but this time there wasn’t dread curling in the pit of her stomach – she was almost excited at the prospect of becoming a mother. she’d been forced into the role the day her own had left her and her younger brother – now she was in a stable and loving relationship, with prospects and a trust fund. suddenly she wanted the baby.

up until this point in her life, aliza had never believed in the 'callas’ curse. something of a legend, it involved a witch and a daughter one of the original callas men had deflowered then refused to marry hundreds of years eariler. bad things happened, of course, but they happened to everyone; her superstitious grandmother only exacerbated paranoia by claiming every broken nail or burnt pie to be the result of some foolish curse.

then she miscarried.

at first, there was a lot her blaming herself, spiraling until she had almost convinced herself some higher power was punishing for her abortion that fateful summer. suddenly, her life became an endless cycle of positive pregnancy tests and heartbreak after heartbreak, waking up to sharp pangs and wet thighs.

her belief in the curse solidified when she lost her son; at twenty seven weeks, he was considered stillborn. the pregnancy she had truly believed in, had began to consider a success, and it had turned into her greatest heartbreak.

the dissolution of her relationship afterwards only further numbed her, convinced her even more that her blood and bones were cursed, bound to the tragedy that her great-great-grandfather had trapped her with.

lately she’s been fostering and adopting a lot of animals to keep herself from getting too lonely as she slowly emerges from her grief cocoon, and has been hooking up pretty indiscriminately with strangers at bars to feel something, which is probably only fueling the gossip mill

thanks for reading this long intro! like this and i’ll come to you to plot!

#leros.intro #hey y'all! #skskks just like this and i'll come to you for plots #pregnancy tw #abortion tw #miscarriage tw

[cmitroff19ahsgov-blog]

The 3 Ps Assessment: Parties, Political Interest Groups, and PACs

·    ·      ·        ·         Research the position of the following political parties on your issue: Republican (https://www.gop.com/platform/), Democrat (https://www.democrats.org/party-platform), Libertarian (https://www.lp.org/platform/), Green (http://www.gp.org/platform), and Peace and Freedom (http://www.peaceandfreedom.org/home/about-us/platform/full-platform).  Search party platforms.

1.       Include:

a.       A brief statement assessing the position of EACH party.  If you cannot find the party’s position on your issue please state so and provide a few general inferences as to why the party may not include this issue in their platform.

Democrat: Healthcare is a right: Everyone should contribute money to a single payer system and government should monitor healthcare funding. Democrats strongly support Medicare and Medicaid, and oppose slash funding and grant blocking. They want to reduce prescription drug costs, focus more on mental health and women’s rights.

Republican: Healthcare is a privilege: Republicans believe that healthcare should not be controlled by the government.  They reject Obamacare and want to reform Medicare and Medicaid so that it can function in our modernized society. They plan to modernize Medicare by prioritizing patient choice, financial competition, and protects patients against fraud. They also want to invest in block granting for mental health, which would allow doctors the flexibility to experiment with treatment options. They do not support abortions.

Libertarian: Free Market Healthcare: People should be able to choose their providers, their insurance, and their medicine. Libertarians emphasize the need for freedom in choosing healthcare systems.

Green: Healthcare is a right: The Green Party supports single payer healthcare and preventive care for all. They focus on helping those with AIDs/HIV related illnesses. They also believe in reducing illness through environmental reform: To improve public health, water, food, air must be improved. They support women’s choice.

Peace and Freedom: Healthcare is a right: The Peace and Freedom party strives for a democratic and publicly funded healthcare system. They emphasize education, prevention and nutrition.

b.       Do you agree with their position? Why or why not?

I disagree with Republicans and Libertarians because I think a  free market system is inefficient for healthcare. Since you can’t predict when you are going to become sick or injured, it’s not always possible to choose the best provider or treatment options. I side more with the Democrats, the Green Party, and Peace and Freedom in this case. I believe that healthcare is a human right. Despite all of this, the best system would attempt to fuse both systems together. For example, in France, which is known for having the #1 healthcare system by the WHO, 70% of healthcare is covered through public costs and taxpayers money, whereas the remaining 30% is covered by private sectors. This enables patients to have access to much  more affordable healthcare as well as stimulate the free market competition of private companies. In conclusion: We should be more like France.

c.        Which party position do you identify with most? Is that surprising? Would you vote for the Presidential candidate?

I agree with the democrats on this case for the reasons I mentioned up above. However, I also support the Green Party’s emphasis on the environment to help improve public health. I was very surprised and disappointed to find out how dysfunctional  our healthcare system is compared to other countries. Despite my support for a more socialized healthcare system, there are a lot of factors that make up a presidential candidate, so I don’t think that their stance on healthcare policy alone would determine my vote.

·         Please go to: http://votesmart.org/interest-groups

·         Under the state tab, choose national, then click on the issue tab and choose the category which represents your civic action issue.

2.       Identify one national interest group that represents your issue. Include:

a.       Interest group name: Planned Parenthood Action Fund

b.       A brief statement assessing the position/perspective of the interest group.

This Interest group is democratic: They advocate for affordable and accessible healthcare for all as well as support women’s reproductive freedoms.

c.        Visit the interest group’s website.  Spend a few minutes exploring and reading about what this group believes, what it wants to happen in Washington, and how it seeks to influence politicians. List five important pieces of information which gives a picture of what this interest group believes.

-Abortion: PPAF plans to vote against anti-abortion propositions in order to allow women to have access to safer and legal abortions.

-Birth Control: Planned Parenthood strives to give everyone access to birth control. They influence politicians by voting against many anti-birth control decisions the Trump administration

-Accessible Healthcare: Particularly for those discriminated against due to their gender, sexual orientation, or race. On their website, they repost and reference many news stories in which people were denied healthcare for discriminatory reasoning. By doing this, they bring what they consider important issues into the spotlight.

-Sex Education: To combat the lack of funding towards sex education, Planned Parenthood tries to protect any funding programs that are already in place, such as  Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP) and the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program (TPPP). They also actively try to provide sex education across different schools and communities.

-Fighting Back: PPAF works in courtrooms and collaborates with state legislatures to insure that the bills that are passed and the laws that are enforced prioritize women’s rights

d.       From your research, describe one (preferably current) piece of legislation, specific policy action, or candidate this group desires or endorses.

On May 30, 2018, PPAF announced their endorsement of Dianne Feinstein , who advocates for reproductive and LGTBQ+ rights. She also has a reputation of fighting for affordable healthcare.

e.        Where is this interest group located? Are there any local meetings you could attend? When?

Their main offices are located in New York City and Washington DC. There do not appear to be any local meetings, although there are many ways that one could contribute to their cause online.

f.        Are there volunteer opportunities? If so, what are they?  

The Interest group website did not have any clear volunteer opportunities listed, however, Planned Parenthood allows you to sign up as a volunteer and they notify you when there volunteer opportunities. For example, one can help educate others about sex education at pride festivals. In addition, the Planned Parenthood club at Acalanes has ways to get involved.

g.       Identify additional developments you find interesting from the website/group.

I was surprised at how much they cared about racial and LGBT groups. It makes sense, but from their reputation I had assumed they were focused more on women’s healthcare and non healthcare for everyone.

·         Return to http://votesmart.org/interest-groups . Under the state tab, choose California.

3.       Identify one state interest group that represents your issue. Include:

a.       Interest group name: Health Access California

b.       A brief statement assessing the position/perspective of the interest group.

Health Access California strives to provide high quality healthcare for all Californians.

c.        Visit the interest group’s website.  Spend a few minutes exploring and reading about what this group believes, what it wants to happen in Washington, and how it seeks to influence politicians. List five important pieces of information which gives a picture of what this interest group believes.

-Accessible care: They work to protect already existing healthcare programs like Medicare and Medicaid by assisting them with the funding necessary to keep them alive and improving.

-Consumer Protection: Works to make sure that all Californians have access to honest and reliable care.

-Expanding Coverage: Health Access has worked towards reforming healthcare through a single payer approach. They want to continue improving upon the Affordable Care Act

-They fund and wish to improve upon public buildings and employer-based benefits

-They strive to provide healthcare to those with pre-existing conditions

d.       From your research, describe one (preferably current) piece of legislation, specific policy action, or candidate this group desires or endorses.

They support SB 910 (Hernandez), a bill that would limit short-term coverage in insurance. This would allow patients with preexisting conditions to get the care that they need, allow more people in general to get healthcare, and prevent discrimination from insurance companies.

e.        Where is this interest group located? Are there any local meetings you could attend? When?

They are located in Sacramento. They don’t appear to have meetings. Like the Planned Parenthood website, you can subscribe to a list that notifies you whenever a meeting is approaching or happening. Specific meetings are not mentioned on the website.

f.        Are there volunteer opportunities? If so, what are they?  ‘

Their website asks volunteers to send letters to specific legislators that oppose the groups core ideals. By doing this, their voice can be heard, and politicians can make laws that agree with the group.

g.       Identify additional developments you find interesting from the website/group.

The website is disorganized and difficult to manage. I think that fixing this would help more people get involved.

4.       Finally, compare the two interest groups.  Which one seems more organized? More successful?  Who is their target audience? Supporters? Additional thoughts, concerns, observations welcome. Be sure to follow them on twitter.

Planned Parenthood Action Fund is more organized, successful, and has a larger audience. I think making abortion access one of their central priorities has gained a lot of attraction from liberals and has turned many conservatives away. I feel like they’re using the feminist movement as a marketing scheme to pull in more supporters.  I really like what Planned Parenthood is trying to accomplish with universal healthcare, but I worry that since they have become so politicized in the media, it will be more difficult for them to achieve their goals.

·      Please go to: www.opensecrets.org/pacs. On the left side, choose Industry Breakdown and pick the industry that best matches your issue.  Be sure to also check single issue and other.

5.       Choose one PAC or Super PAC that pertains to your civic action issue. Include:

a.       PAC name: Unitedhealth Group

b.       A brief statement assessing the position/perspective of the PAC.

They want to help people live healthier lives and make the American health system better for everyone.

c.        How much money have they raised/total receipt? How much have they spent? How much cash do they have on hand?

In 2018, they raised $3.2 million and spent $3 million. They have $242,591 begin cash on hand and $442,513 end cash on hand.

d.       How much of their budget is spent on: Republicans? Democrats?

In 2018, 47% of their budget was spent on Democrats and 53% on Republicans.

e.        Click Donor. Who are some of their donors? How does this reflect the interests of the PAC?

Most of their donors are individuals working in various healthcare industries. This makes sense, because the PAC strives to better healthcare in America.

[patriotsnet]

What Do Republicans Believe About Education

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/what-do-republicans-believe-about-education/

What Do Republicans Believe About Education

Energy Issues And The Environment

Majority Of Republicans Believe Education Is BAD For America

There have always been clashes between the parties on the issues of energy and the environment. Democrats believe in restricting drilling for oil or other avenues of fossil fuels to protect the environment while Republicans favor expanded drilling to produce more energy at a lower cost to consumers. Democrats will push and support with tax dollars alternative energy solutions while the Republicans favor allowing the market to decide which forms of energy are practical.

Where Do Democrats And Republicans Stand On The Issue Of Healthcare

The chasm between the parties approach to providing healthcare to Americans couldnt be more vast. Simply put, Democrats have had some form of healthcare reform on their agenda for nearly a century. Republicans not so much. They feel that the status quo is just fine. At the core is a philosophical disagreement about the role of government. Democrats believe that government should be responsible for the people in some ways, and Republicans believe that the less government, the better. In the current climate, this boils down to Democrats wanting to retain, improve, and expand the ACA, and Republicans working overtime to repeal it with no replacement.

How Far Apart Are Democrats And Republicans On School Reform

Reddit

Americans are more polarized than at any point in recent history.; On issue after issueabortion, the Affordable Care Act, or just about anything else Democrats stand on one side and Republicans stand on the other. It can be difficult for leaders to build consensus around policy when the two sides each have their own base of support.; But is the public so divided over school issues?;;;;;

Last year, Education Next conducted a poll asking Americans about 17 education issues.; On eight of these issues, there is no evidence that parties differ.; Democrats are no more or less supportive than Republicans when it comes to universal vouchers, vouchers for students in failing schools, tax credits for donations to scholarship programs for private schools, higher pay for teachers in hard to staff subjects, higher pay for teachers in hard to staff schools, and awarding tenure on the basis of student performance.;

There are differences on other issuesincreasing spending, raising teacher pay, government funded universal preschool, government funded preschool for low income families, charter schools, vouchers for low-income families, merit pay, tenure, and Common Corebut these differences hardly pit the parties in opposing corners of the ring.; In only one case does the majority from one party oppose the majority from the other.; Nearly three-fourths of Democrats favor more spending on public schools, and 54 percent of Republicans oppose it.;;;;;;;;;

Recommended Reading: How Many States Are Controlled By Republicans

Federal Government In Education

The Republican Party believes in doing away entirely with federal loans. College tuition, and its consequential debt, is rising uncontrollably. At this point, it is rising far above the rate of inflation. College debt in America, as of 2012, had exceeded the amount of credit card debt. Republicans believe federal loans exacerbate this problem by their lack of transparency, and the fact that they are often more expensive than private loans. For these reasons, republicans believe that the federal government should no longer issue student loans. Greater private sector participation in loans would drive tuition costs down. The party believes that the federal government should, however, serve as an insurance guarantor for private sector loans.

Crime And Capital Punishment

Republicans generally believe in harsher penalties when someone has committed a crime, including for selling illegal drugs. They also generally favor capital punishment and back a system with many layers to ensure the proper punishment has been meted out. Democrats are more progressive in their views, believing that crimes do not involve violence, such as selling drugs, should have lighter penalties and rehabilitation. They are also against capital punishment in any form.

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Do The Republicans Even Believe In Democracy Anymore

They pay lip service to it, but they actively try to undermine its institutions.

By Michael Tomasky

Contributing Opinion Writer

A number of observers, myself included, have written pieces in recent years arguing that the Republican Party is no longer simply trying to compete with and defeat the Democratic Party on a level playing field. Today, rather than simply playing the game, the Republicans are simultaneously trying to rig the games rules so that they never lose.

The aggressive gerrymandering, which the Supreme Court just declared to be a matter beyond its purview; the voter suppression schemes; the dubious proposals that havent gone anywhere yet like trying to award presidential electoral votes by congressional district rather than by state, a scheme that Republicans in five states considered after the 2012 election and that is still discussed: These are not ideas aimed at invigorating democracy. They are hatched and executed for the express purpose of essentially fixing elections.

We have been brought up to believe that American political parties are the same that they are similar creatures with similar traits and similar ways of behaving. Political science spent decades teaching us this. The idea that one party has become so radically different from the other, despite mountains of evidence, is a tough sell.

Or is there?

So were not there right now. But we may well be on the way, and its abundantly clear who wants to take us there.

For Teachers The Agenda Includes Bonuses And Tax Credits

To reward teachers who are highly effective, Republican lawmakers have proposed directing $50 million of the states $13.5 billion public education budget toward bonuses. They believe it is the biggest step the state can take to directly increase teacher pay set by local districts.

They deserve it, said Sen. Paul Lundeen, R-Monument and a bill sponsor. The reality is all teachers deserve more pay, but the teachers who are doing a great job are the first ones we should be getting more pay to.

Teacher pay is determined by local school districts, and bonuses offer the state a way to add more dollars to their compensation. Lundeen said 47% of Colorados public school teachers are currently rated as highly effective. Senate Democrats defeated legislation to this effect a year ago.

Republicans are also eager to draw more top-notch teachers into Colorados struggling schools through financial incentives included in a separate bill sponsored by Sen. Kevin Priola, R-Henderson, and Rep. Bri Buentello, D-Pueblo.

The state, Priola said, should at a minimum hold them harmless financially for doing the right thing and using their excellent skills to teach the kids that really need help closing the achievement gap.

Every teacher across this state invests in their students, not only with their time and with their energy and with their heart and their soul, but those teachers also spend dollars, Lundeen said. They pay for supplies to support the students in their classroom.

Read Also: How Many Republicans Are In The 116th Congress

Shift To Community Colleges And Technical Institutions

The first step is to acknowledge the need for change when the status quo is not working. New systems of learning are needed to compete with traditional four-year colleges: expanded community colleges and technical institutions, private training schools,online universities, life-long learning, and work-based learning in the private sector. New models for acquiring advanced skills will be ever more important in the rapidly changing economy of the 21st century, especially in science, technology,engineering, and math. Public policy should address all these challenges and to make accessible to everyone the emerging alternatives, with their lower cost degrees, to traditional college attendance.

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Republicans and Democrats Explained! What is the Difference?

Stay informed with WPR’s email newsletter.

Rep. Evan Goyke, D-Milwaukee, said there was no excuse for underfunding schools at a time when the state budget was sitting on a roughly $2 billion projected surplus.

“We have the money,” Goyke said. “We have the money to make the investments we need.”

As part of the GOP proposal, Republicans would also set aside $350 million in Wisconsin’s budget stabilization fund, commonly referred to as the state’s “rainy day fund.” While Republicans indicated that the funding could eventually go toward schools, there would be no limits on how a future governor and Legislature could spend the money.

“The money’s going to stay there,” said Sen. Duey Stroebel, R-Saukville. “It’s a safe place to put it.”

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Senator Jim Inhofe Republican Of Oklahoma

Incoming chairman of the Senate committee on the environment and public works

Inhofe is the poster boy for Republican climate change denialism, not only for his stridency on the issue but because he is the once and future leader of the key Senate committee on environmental policy. Inhofe will be able to lead the committee for two years before running up against term limits . This time around, Inhofes committee is expected to focus on transportation and infrastructure bills.

But it seems likely that Inhofe will devote some energy to blocking the regulation of carbon emissions. We think this because on 12 November he told the Washington Post: As we enter a new Congress, I will do everything in my power to rein in and shed light on the EPAs unchecked regulations.

Inhofe has climate change the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people, has said God, not humans, controls the weather, and has denied climate change in many other ways.

Gop Education Budget Would Spend $14b Less Than Evers On Schools

Thursday, May 27, 2021, 5:30pm

Republicans who run the Legislature’s budget committee parted dramatically with Gov. Tony Evers Thursday, passing a K-12 education budget that would spend $1.4 billion less than the governor asked for.

The roughly $150 million they would spend, which includes $128 million in state tax funding,;is hundreds of millions less than the increase they supported just two years ago, and it comes at a time when state government’s budget is as flush as it’s been in decades.

It also comes at a time when Wisconsin schools are receiving more federal funding than ever before through three coronavirus relief packages, a total of $2.6 billion that Republicans say reduces the need to spend state funds on schools.

“We would be so remiss if we did not account for that money as we move forward,” said Rep. Tony Kurtz, R-Wonewoc. “To me, this is a no-brainer.”

At the same time, the GOP education plan raised the prospect that Wisconsin might not qualify for the federal funds.;That’s because one of the conditions of receiving the federal money is that states maintain the amount they spend on education as a percentage of their overall budgets. As of Thursday, the budget crafted by Wisconsin Republicans would fall short.

“You’re not going to get it,” Sen. Jon Erpenbach, D-West Point, told Republicans. “One side of the aisle is not being honest here.”

In largely setting aside the governor’s proposal, Republicans rejected key pillars of Evers’ education budget.

Also Check: Leader Of The Radical Republicans

In Favour Of A Constitutional Monarchy

Not inherently undemocratic: Opponents of the republican movement argue that the current system is still democratic as the Government and MPs of Parliament are elected by universal suffrage and as the Crown acts only on the advice of the Parliament, the people still hold power. Monarchy only refers to how the head of state is chosen and not how the Government is chosen. It is only undemocratic if the monarchy holds meaningful power, which it currently does not as government rests with Parliament.

Safeguards the constitutional rights of the individual: The British constitutional system sets limits on Parliament and separates the executive from direct control over the police and courts. Constitutionalists argue that this is because contracts with the monarch such as the Magna Carta, the , the Act of Settlement and the Acts of Union place obligations on the state and confirm its citizens as sovereign beings. These obligations are re-affirmed at every monarch’s coronation. These obligations, whilst at the same time placing limits on the power of the judiciary and the police, also confirm those rights which are intrinsically part of British and especially English culture. Examples are Common Law, the particular status of ancient practices, jury trials, legal precedent, protection against non-judicial seizure and the right to protest.

What Is A Republican Republican Definition

April 11, 2014 By RepublicanViews.org

This article fully answers what a Republican is and gives the definition of a Republican in a fair, unbiased, and well-researched way. To start the article we list out the definition of a Republican, then we cover the Republican Partys core beliefs, then we list out the Republican Partys beliefs on all the major issues.

The Definition of a Republican:;a member of the Republican party of the U.S.

Source Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Also Check: When Did The Republican And Democratic Parties Switch Ideologies

History Of The Democratic Party

The party can trace its roots all the way back to Thomas Jefferson when they were known as Jeffersons Republicans and they strongly opposed the Federalist Party and their nationalist views. The Democrats adopted the donkey as their symbol due to Andrew Jackson who was publicly nicknamed jackass because of his popular position of let the people rule. The Democratic National Committee was officially created in 1848. During the civil war a rift grew within the party between those who supported slavery and those who opposed it. This deep division led to the creation of a new Democratic party, the one we now know today.

What Is Critical Race Theory And Why Do Republicans Want To Ban It In Schools

The latest front in the culture wars over how U.S. students should learn history and civics is the concept of critical race theory, an intellectual tool set for examining systemic racism. With roots in academia, the framework has become a flash point as Republican officials across the country seek to prevent it from being taught in schools.

In reality, there is no consensus on whether or how much critical race theory informs schools heightened focus on race. Most teachers do not use the term critical race theory with students, and they generally do not ask them to read the work of legal scholars who use that framework.

Some lessons and anti-racism efforts, however, reflect foundational themes of critical race theory, particularly that racism in the United States is systemic. The New York Timess landmark 1619 Project, which addresses slaverys role in shaping the nation, also has an associated school curriculum.

At least five Republican-led state legislatures have passed bans on critical race theory or related topics in recent months, and conservatives in roughly nine other states are pressing for similar measures. Some teachers have said they worry that the legislation will have a chilling effect on robust conversations, or could even put their jobs at risk, at a time when the nation is embroiled in a reckoning on race relations.

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America Should Deport Illegal Immigrants

Republicans believe that illegal immigrants, no matter the reason they are in this country, should be forcibly removed from the U.S. Although illegal immigrants are often motivated to come to the U.S. by companies who hire them, Republicans generally believe that the focus of the law should be on the illegal immigrants and not on the corporations that hire them.

Likely Voters Want Continued Government Funding For Teenage Pregnancy Prevention Programs Rutgers Researcher Finds

ASU Democrats vs Republicans: Federal Standards & Initiatives

Democrats and Republicans disagree on many policies but not on sex education for teenagers, a Rutgers-led national survey finds.

The study, published in the journal;Sex Education,;surveyed close to 1,000 likely voters who identified as Democrats or Republicans. The findings show a strong majority of them support sex education within schools and the continued funding by the government for teenage pregnancy prevention programs that include information about both abstinence and contraception.

“Sex education remains a vital component to reducing unintended teenage pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases among young people as well as providing young people with the information and skills they need to build healthy relationships,” said professor Leslie M. Kantor, chair of the department of urban-global public health at the;Rutgers School of Public Health. Recent attempts by the government to shift funding away from evidence-based pregnancy prevention programs and back to abstinence-only-until- marriage-approaches are out of alignment with what likely voters want.

“Planned Parenthoods mission includes providing sex education programs and resources that teach teens to make healthy, informed choices,” said Nicole Levitz, Director of Digital Products at;Planned Parenthood Federation of America;and a co-author of the study. “This study validates that most likely voters want comprehensive sex education for middle and high school students.

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No Federal College Loans; Just Insure Private Loans

Federal student aid is on an unsustainable path, and efforts should be taken to provide families with greater transparency and the information they need to make prudent choices about a student’s future: completion rates, repayment rates, future earnings,and other factors that may affect their decisions. The federal government should not be in the business of originating student loans; however, it should serve as an insurance guarantor for the private sector as they offer loans to students.Private sector participation in student financing should be welcomed. Any regulation that drives tuition costs higher must be reevaluated to balance its worth against its negative impact on students and their parents.

The Founders Studied History

The Founders studied the history of governments. They were very interested in what they read about the government of the Roman Republic. It was located in what is now the country of Italy. The Roman Republic existed more than 2,000 years before our nation began.

The Founders liked what they read about the Roman Republic. They learned some important ideas from their study of the government of ancient Rome. They used some of these ideas when they created our government.

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Long Drives, Air Travel, Exhausting Waits: What Abortion Requires in the South

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Just a quick walk through the parking lot of Choices-Memphis Center for Reproductive Health in this legendary music mecca speaks volumes about access to abortion in the American South. Parked alongside the polished SUVs and weathered sedans with Tennessee license plates are cars from Mississippi, Arkansas, Florida and, on many days, Alabama, Georgia and Texas.

Choices is one of two abortion clinics in the Memphis metro area, with a population of 1.3 million. While that might seem a surprisingly limited number of options for women seeking a commonplace medical procedure, it represents a wealth of access compared with Mississippi, which has one abortion clinic for the entire state of 3 million people.

A tsunami of restrictive abortion regulations enacted by Republican-led legislatures and governors across the South have sent women who want or need an early end to a pregnancy fleeing in all directions, making long drives or plane trips across state lines to find safe, professional services. For many women, that also requires taking time off work, arranging child care and finding transportation and lodging, sharply increasing the anxiety, expense and logistical complications of what is often a profoundly difficult moment in a woman’s life.

“Especially for women coming from long distances, child care is the biggest thing,” said Sue Burbano, a patient educator and financial assistance coordinator at Choices. “They’re coming all the way from Oxford, Mississippi, or Jackson. This is a three-day ordeal. I can just see how exhausted they are.”

The long drives and wait times could soon spread to other states, as the U.S. Supreme Court prepares this fall to consider a Mississippi ban on nearly all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, with no allowances for cases of rape or incest. Under a law enacted in 2018 by the Republican-led legislature, a woman could obtain a legal abortion only if the pregnancy threatens her life or would cause an “irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.”

Mississippi’s ban was promptly challenged by abortion rights activists and put on hold as a series of lower courts have deemed it unconstitutional under the Supreme Court’s landmark Roe v. Wade decision. That 1973 ruling, in concert with subsequent federal case law, forbids states from banning abortions before “fetal viability,” the point at which a fetus can survive outside the womb, or about 24 weeks into pregnancy.

Tennessee, Texas, Mississippi and several other states have since passed laws that would ban abortions after six weeks. That legislation is also on hold pending legal review.

Groups opposed to abortion rights have cheered the court’s decision to hear the Mississippi case, believing the addition of Justice Amy Coney Barrett gives the court’s conservative bloc enough votes to overturn Roe, or at least vastly expand the authority of individual states to restrict abortion.

But, for supporters of reproductive rights, anything but a firm rejection of the Mississippi ban raises the specter of an even larger expanse of abortion service deserts. Abortion could quickly become illegal in 21 states — including nearly the entire South, the Dakotas and other stretches of the Midwest — should the court rescind the principle that a woman’s right to privacy protects pregnancy decisions.

“If we end up with any kind of decision that goes back to being a states’ rights issue, the entire South is in a very bad way,” said Jennifer Pepper, executive director of Choices in Memphis.

The decades-long strategy by conservative white evangelical Christians to chip away at abortion access state by state has flourished in the South, where hard-right Republicans hold a decisive advantage in state legislatures and nearly all executive chambers.

Though details vary by state, the rules governing abortion providers tend to hit similar notes. Among them are requirements that women seeking abortions, even via an abortion pill, submit to invasive vaginal ultrasounds; mandatory waiting periods of 48 hours between the initial consultation with a provider and the abortion; and complex rules for licensing physicians and technicians and disposing of fetal remains. Some states insist that abortion providers require women to listen to a fetal heartbeat; other providers have been unable to obtain admitting privileges at local hospitals.

“Everything is hard down here,” said Pepper.

The rules also have made some doctors reluctant to perform the procedure. While obstetricians and gynecologists in California, New York, Illinois and elsewhere routinely perform abortions at their medical offices — the same practices where they care for women through pregnancy and delivery — their peers in many Southern states who perform more than a small number of abortions a year must register their practices as abortion clinics. None has done so.

Texas offers an example of how targeted legislation can disrupt a patient’s search for medical care. In 2012, 762 Texans went out of state for abortions, according to researchers at the University of Texas-Austin. Two years later, after then-Gov. Rick Perry signed into law the nation’s most restrictive abortion bill, shuttering about half the state’s abortion facilities, 1,673 women left Texas to seek services. In 2016, 1,800 did so.

Similarly, in March 2020, as the coronavirus pandemic took hold, Gov. Greg Abbott issued an order prohibiting all abortions unless the woman’s life was in danger, deeming the procedure “not medically necessary.” The month before the order, about 150 Texans went out of state to seek abortion services. In March and April, with the order in effect, nearly 950 women sought care outside Texas.

There can also be an unsettling stigma in some parts of the South.

Vikki Brown, 33, who works in education in New Orleans, said she initially tried to end her pregnancy in Louisiana, calling her gynecologist for advice, and was told by a receptionist that she was “disgusted” by the request.

She sought out the lone abortion clinic operating in New Orleans but found it besieged with both protesters and patients. “I knew but didn’t understand how difficult it was to get care,” said Brown, who moved to Louisiana in 2010 from New York City. “The clinic was absolutely full. People were sitting on the floor. It was swamped.” It took her six hours to get an ultrasound, which cost $150, she said.

A friend in Washington, D.C., counseled Brown that “it didn’t have to be like that” and the pair researched clinics in the nation’s capital. She flew to Washington, where she was able to get an abortion the same day and for less than it would have cost her in New Orleans, even including airfare.

“No protesters, no waiting period,” she said. “It was a wildly different experience.”

Atlanta, a Southern transportation hub, has also become a key piece in the frayed quilt of abortion care in the region.

Kwajelyn Jackson, executive director of Feminist Women’s Health Center in Atlanta, said the clinic regularly sees patients from other states, including Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky and the Carolinas.

These visits often involve long drives or flights, but rarely overnight stays because the state-mandated 24-hour waiting period can begin with a phone consultation rather than an in-person visit. Georgia has many of the same laws other states employ to make clinical operations more burdensome — requirements to cremate fetal remains, for instance, and that abortion providers adhere to the onerous building standards set for outpatient surgical centers — but its urban clinics so far have weathered the strategies.

Jackson said staffers at her clinic are aware of its role as a refuge. “We’ve had patients who were able to get a ride from Alabama, but they weren’t able to get a ride home,” she said. “We had to help them find a ride home. It is so much simpler to go 3 or 4 miles from your home and sleep in your bed at night. That is a luxury that so many of our patients can’t enjoy.”

Many women embarking on a search for a safe abortion are also confronting serious expenses. State Medicaid programs in the South do not pay for abortions, and many private insurers refuse to cover the procedure. In addition, the longer a woman’s abortion is delayed, the more expensive the procedure becomes.

Becca Turchanik, a 32-year-old account manager for a robotics company in Nashville, Tennessee, drove four hours to Atlanta for her abortion in 2019. “We got an appointment in Georgia because that was the only place that had appointments,” she said.

Turchanik said her employer’s health insurance would not cover abortion, and the cost of gas, food, medications and the procedure itself totaled $1,100. Her solution? Take on debt. “I took out a Speedy Cash loan,” she said.

Turchanik had a contraceptive implant when she learned she was six weeks pregnant. She said she was in an unhealthy relationship with a man she discovered to be dishonest, and she decided to end her pregnancy.

“I wish I had a child, but I’m glad it wasn’t his child,” she said. “I have accomplished so much since my abortion. I’m going to make my life better.”

But the emotions of the ordeal have stayed with her. She’s angry that she had to call around from state to state in a panic, and that she was unable to have her abortion close to home, with friends to comfort her.

Others turn to nonprofit groups for financial and logistical support for bus and plane tickets, hotels, child care and medical bills, including the National Abortion Federation, which operates a hotline to help women find providers. Last year, the federation received 100,000 calls from women seeking information, said its president, the Very Rev. Katherine Hancock Ragsdale.

Access Reproductive Care-Southeast, an abortion fund based in Atlanta, has trained over 130 volunteers who pick women up at bus stations, host them at their homes and provide child care. A study published this year in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health examined 10,000 cases of women seeking assistance from ARC-Southeast: 81% were Black, 77% were uninsured or publicly insured, 77% had at least one child, and 58% identified as Christian.

“It’s amazing to see the scope of the people we work with,” said Oriaku Njoku, ARC-Southeast’s co-founder. “The post-Roe reality that y’all are afraid of is the lived reality for folks today in the South.”

A Texas law targets precisely this kind of help, allowing such organizations or individuals to be sued by anyone in the state for helping a woman get an abortion. It could go into effect Sept. 1, though abortion rights advocates are suing to stop the new law.

Despite the controversy surrounding abortion, Choices makes no effort to hide its mission. The modern lime-green building announces itself to its Memphis neighborhood, and the waiting room is artfully decorated, offering services beyond abortion, including delivery of babies and midwifery.

Like other clinics in the South, Choices has to abide by state laws that many abortion supporters find onerous and intrusive, including performing transvaginal ultrasounds and showing the women seeking abortions images from those ultrasounds.

Nonetheless, the clinic is booked full most days with patients from almost all of the eight states that touch Tennessee, a slender handsaw-shaped state that stretches across much of the Deep South. And Katy Deaton, a nurse at the facility, said few women change their minds.

“They’ve put a lot of thought into this hard decision already,” she said. “I don’t think it changes the fact that they’re getting an abortion. But it definitely makes their life harder.”

KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. Together with Policy Analysis and Polling, KHN is one of the three major operating programs at KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). KFF is an endowed nonprofit organization providing information on health issues to the nation.

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