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Category: covid-19

  • Kia kaha Lebanon: NZ media only tell half your story of struggle

    The United States has vetoed a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution — for the fourth time — in Israel’s war on Gaza, while Hezbollah demands a complete ceasefire and “protection of Lebanon’s sovereignty” in any deal with Israel. Amid the death and devastation, Joe Hendren reflects on his time in Lebanon and examines what the crisis means for a small country with a population size similar to Aotearoa New Zealand.

    SPECIAL REPORT: By Joe Hendren

    Since the Israeli invasion of Lebanon I can’t help but think of a friend I met in Beirut.

    He worked at the Regis Hotel, where I stayed in February 2015.

    At one point, he offered to make me a Syrian dish popular in his hometown of Aleppo. I have long remembered his kindness; I only wish I remembered his name.

    At the time, his home city was being destroyed. A flashpoint of the Syrian Civil War, the Battle of Aleppo lasted four long years. He didn’t mention this of course.

    I was lucky to visit Lebanon when I did. So much has happened since then.

    Economic crisis and a tragic port explosion
    Mass protests took over Lebanese streets in October 2019 in response to government plans to tax WhatsApp calls. The scope of the protests soon widened, as Lebanese people voiced their frustrations with ongoing economic turmoil and corruption.

    A few months later, the covid-19 pandemic arrived, deepening the economic crisis and claiming 10,000 lives.

    On 4 August 2020, the centre of Beirut was rocked by one of the largest non nuclear explosions in history when a large amount of ammonium nitrate stored at the Port of Beirut detonated. The explosion killed 218 people and left an estimated 300,000 homeless. The government of Hassin Diab resigned but continued in a “caretaker” capacity.

    Tens of thousands of protesters returned to the streets demanding accountability and the downfall of Lebanon’s political ruling class. While some protesters threw stones and other projectiles, an Al Jazeera investigation found that security forces violated international standards on the use of force. The political elite were protected.

    In 2021, The World Bank summarised the situation:

    “The Lebanon financial and economic crisis is likely to rank in the top 10, possibly top three, most severe crises episodes globally since the mid-nineteenth century. This is a conclusion of the Spring 2021 Lebanon Economic Monitor (LEM) in which the Lebanon crisis is contrasted with the most severe global crises episodes as observed by Reinhart and Rogoff (2014) over the 1857–2013 period.

    “In fact, Lebanon’s GDP plummeted from close to US$ 55 billion in 2018 to an estimated US$ 33 billion in 2020, with US$ GDP/capita falling by around 40 percent. Such a brutal and rapid contraction is usually associated with conflicts or wars.”

    The Lebanon Poverty and Equity Assessment, produced by the World Bank in 2024, found the share of individuals in Lebanon living under the poverty line more than tripled, rising from 12 percent to 44 percent. The depth and severity of poverty also increased over the decade between 2012 and 2022.

    To make matters worse, the port explosion destroyed Lebanon’s strategic wheat reserves at a time when the war in Ukraine drove significant increases in global food prices. Annual food inflation in Lebanon skyrocketed from 7.67 percent in January 2019 to a whopping 483.15 percent for the year ending in January 2022. While food inflation has since declined, it remains high, sitting just below 20 percent for the year ending September 2024. The World Bank said:

    “The sharp deterioration of the Lebanese pound, which lost 98 percent of its pre-crisis value by December 2023, propelled inflation to new heights. With imports constituting about 60 percent of the consumption basket (World Bank, 2022), the plunging currency led to triple-digit inflation which rose steeply from an annual average of 3 percent between 2011 and 2018, to 85 percent in 2019, 155 percent in 2020, and 221 percent in 2023 . . .

    “Faced with falling foreign exchange reserves, the government withdrew subsidies on medication, fuel, and wheat further fuelling rising costs of healthcare and transport (Figure 1.2). Rapid inflation acted effectively as a highly regressive tax, striking hardest at the poor and those with fixed, lira-denominated incomes.” 

    The ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy has amplified the power of Hezbollah, a paramilitary group formed in 1982 in response to Israel’s invasion and occupation of Lebanon.

    “Hezbollah is famous for entrenching its power in an elaborate social infrastructure of Islamic welfare. The social grip of those structures and services is increased by the ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy. When the medical service fails, desperate families turn to the Hezbollah-run health service,” says Adam Tooze

    As banks imposed capital controls, many Lebanese lost confidence in the financial system. The financial arm of Hezbollah, the al-Quad al-Hassan Association (AQAH), experienced a significant increase in clients, despite being subject to US Treasury sanctions since 2007.

    The US accuses Hezbollah of using AQAH as a front to manage its financial activities. When a 28-year-old engineer, Hassan Shoumar, was locked out of his dollar accounts in late 2019, he redirected his money into his account at AQAH: “What I care about is that when I want my money, I can get it.”

    While Hezbollah portrays itself as “the resistance”, as a member of the governing coalition in Lebanon, it also forms an influential part of the political elite. Adam Tooze gives an example of how the political elite is still looking after itself:

    “[T]he Lebanese Parliament in a grotesque act of self-dealing in January 2024 passed a budget that promised to close the budget deficit of 12.8 of GDP by raising regressive value-added tax while decreasing the progressive taxes levied on capital gains, real estate and investments.

    “For lack of reforms, the IMF [International Monetary Fund] is refusing to disburse any of the $3bn package that are allocated to Lebanon.”

    While the protest movement called for a “technocratic” government in Lebanon, the experiences of Greece and other countries facing financial difficulties suggest such governments can pose their own risks, especially when they involve unelected “experts” in prominent positions.

    One example is the political reaction to the counterproductive austerity programme imposed on Greece by the European Commission, European Central Bank and IMF in the aftermath of the 2007-2008 financial crisis. This demonstrates how the demands of international investors can conflict with the needs of the local population.

    Lebanon carries more than its fair share of refugees
    Lebanon currently hosts the largest number of refugees per capita in the world, despite its scarce resources. This began as an overflow from the Syrian conflict in 2011, with nearly 1.2 million ‘displaced’ Syrians in Lebanon registered with UNHCR by May 2015.

    When I visited Lebanon in 2015, I tried to grasp the scale of the refugee issue. In terms of population, Lebanon is comparable to New Zealand, with both countries having just over 5 million people.

    I imagined what New Zealand would be like if it attempted to host a million refugees in addition to its general population. Yet in terms of land area Lebanon is only 10,400 square kilometres — about the size of New Zealand’s Marlborough region at the top of the South Island.

    Now, imagine accommodating a population of over 5 million in such a small space, with more than a fifth of them being refugees.

    While it was encouraging to see New Zealand increase its refugee quota to 1500 places in July 2020, we could afford to do much more in the current situation. This includes creating additional visa pathways for those fleeing Gaza and Lebanon.

    On top of all that – Israeli attacks and illegal booby traps
    Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza, Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged fire across Lebanon’s southern border.

    Israel makes much of the threat of rocket attacks on Israel from Hezbollah. However, data from US based non-profit organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) shows Israel carried out 81 percent of the 10,214 attacks between between the two parties from October 7, 2023, and September 20, 2024.

    These attacks resulted in 752 deaths in Lebanon, including 50 children. In contrast, Hezbollah’s attacks, largely centred on military targets, killed at least 33 Israelis.

    Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.

    While the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) disputed these figures as an “oversimplification”, the IDF do not appear to dispute the reported number of Lebanese casualties. Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.

    In a further escalation, thousands of handheld pagers and walkie-talkies used in both civilian and military contexts in Lebanon and Syria suddenly exploded on September 17 and 18.

    Israel attempted to deny responsibility, with Israeli President Isaac Herzog claiming he “rejects out of hand any connection” to the attack. However, 12 defence and intelligence officials, briefed on the attack, anonymously confirmed to The New York Times that Israel was behind the operation.

    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later boasted during a cabinet meeting that he had personally approved the pager attack. The New York Times described the aftermath:

    “Powered by just a few ounces of an explosive compound concealed within the devices, the blasts sent grown men flying off motorcycles and slamming into walls, according to witnesses and video footage. People out shopping fell to the ground, writhing in agony, smoke snaking from their pockets.”

    The exploding devices killed 42 people and injured more than 3500, with many victims losing one or both of their hands or eyes. At least four of the dead were children.

    Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikatri called the explosions “a serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards”.

    While around eight Hezbollah fighters were among the dead, most of those killed worked in administration roles and did not take part in hostilities. Under international humanitarian law targeting non-combatants is illegal.

    Additionally, the UN Protocol on Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices also prohibits the use of “booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material”. Israel is a signatory to this UN Protocol.

    Israel’s decision to turn ordinary consumer devices into illegal booby traps could backfire. While Israel frequently stresses the importance of its technology sector to its economy, who is going to buy technology associated with Israel now that the IDF have demonstrated its ability to indiscriminately weaponise consumer devices at any time?

    International industry buyers will source elsewhere. Such a “silent boycott” could give greater momentum to the call from Palestinian civil society for boycotts, divestments and economic sanctions against Israel.

    The booby trap pagers are also likely to affect the decisions of foreign airlines to service Israel on the grounds of safety. Since the war began in October 2023, the number of foreign airlines calling on Ben Gurion Airport in Israel has fallen significantly. Consequently, the cost of a round-trip ticket from the United States to Tel Aviv has risen sharply, from approximately $900 to $2500.

    Israel targets civilian infrastructure in Lebanon
    Israel has also targeted civilian organisations linked to Hezbollah, such emergency services, hospitals and medical centres operated by the Islamic Health Society (IHS). Israel claims Hezbollah is “using the IHS as a cover for terrorist activities”. This apparently includes digging people out of buildings, as search and rescue teams have also been targeted and killed.

    Israel accuses the microloan charity AQAH of funding “Hezbollah’s terror activities”, including purchasing weapons and making payments to Hezbollah fighters. On October 20, Israel attacked 30 branches of AQAH across Lebanon, drawing condemnation from both Amnesty International and the United Nations.

    Ben Saul, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-terrorism maintains AQAH is not a lawful military target: “International humanitarian law does not permit attacks on the economic or financial infrastructure of an adversary, even if they indirectly sustain its military activities.”

    Where the author ate his Za’atar man’ousheh - Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche, Beiruit
    Where the author ate his Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche, Beiruit. Image: Joe Hendren

    On top of all that — an Israeli invasion
    In 1982, Israel attempted to use war to alter the political situation in Lebanon, with counterproductive results, including the creation of Hezbollah. In 2006, Hezbollah used the hilly terrain of southern Lebanon to beat Israel to a stalemate. Israel risks similar counterproductive outcomes again, at the cost of many more lives.

    Yet on 1 October 2024, Israel launched a ground invasion of Lebanon, alongside strikes on Beirut, Sidon and border villages. The IDF confirmed the action on Twitter/X, promising a “limited, localised and targeted” operation against “Hezbollah terrorist targets” in southern Lebanon. One US official noted that Israel had framed its 1982 invasion as a limited incursion, which eventually turned into an 18-year occupation.

    Israeli strikes have since expanded all over the country. According to figures provided by the Lebanese Ministry of Public Heath on November 13, Israel is responsible for the deaths of at least 3365 people in Lebanon, including 216 children and 192 health workers. More than 14,000 people have been wounded, and more than one million have been displaced from their homes.

    Since September 30, 47 Israeli troops have been killed in combat in Southern Lebanon. Around 45 civilians in northern Israel have died due to rocket fire from Lebanon.

    So, on top of an economic crisis, runaway inflation, unaffordable food, increasing poverty, the port explosion and covid-19, the Lebanese people now face a war that shows little signs of stopping.

    Analysts suggest there is little chance of a ceasefire while Israel retains its “maximalist” demands, which include a full surrender of Hezbollah and allowing Israel to continue to attack targets in southern Lebanon.

    A senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, Mohanad Hage Ali, believes Israel is feigning diplomacy to push the blame on Hezbollah. The best chance may come alongside a ceasefire in Gaza, but Israel shows little signs of negotiating meaningfully on that front either.

    On September 26, the Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah BouHabib summarised the mood of the country in the wake of the pager attack:

    “[N]obody expected the war to be taken in that direction. We Lebanese—we’ve had enough war. We’ve had fifteen years of war. . . .We’d like to live without war—happily, as a tourist country, a beautiful country, good food—and we are not able to do it. And so there is a lot of depression, especially with the latest escalation.”

    In Aotearoa New Zealand, the Māori phrase “Kia kaha” means “stand strong”. If I could send a message from halfway across the world, it would be: “Kia kaha Lebanon. I look forward to the day I can visit you again, and munch on a yummy Za’atar man’ousheh while admiring the view from the beautiful Corniche Beirut.”

    Joe Hendren holds a PhD in international business from the University of Auckland. He has more than 20 years of experience as a researcher, including work in the New Zealand Parliament, for trade unions and on various research projects. This is his first article for Asia Pacific Report. His blog can be found at http://joehendren.substack.com

    Where I ate my Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche Beiruit

     

    This post was originally published on Asia Pacific Report.

  • Existence and Isolation

    Dr. Samantha Bailey – The Truth About Contagion

    A Farewell to Virology
    Dr. Mark Bailey’s comprehensive essay, “A Farewell to Virology,” is a scathing critique of the virus model and virology as a whole. The expert edition, published in July 2024, presents a compelling case against the scientific community’s claims about viruses causing disease. According to Bailey, the evidence supporting this notion is lacking, and virology has consistently failed to meet its own requirements.

    Key Points
    Virology’s virus model is flawed and lacks scientific backing for its claims about viruses causing disease.

    Bailey’s essay is a 67-page refutation of the virus model, which has been condensed into a 19-page Word document for easier consumption.

    The essay has been praised for its thoroughness and has been described as a “stellar gem” and a “masterpiece” by experts in the field.

    Mark Bailey’s work has been adapted into a 3-part documentary series by Steve Falconer, providing a captivating visual representation of the essay’s findings.

    Impact
    Bailey’s critique has sparked significant discussion and debate within the scientific community, with some experts labeling it the “medical establishment’s worst nightmare.”

    The essay has been shared and discussed on online platforms, including Reddit’s r/Whatsyourtheory, where it has been praised for its thoroughness and critical thinking.

    Overall, Mark Bailey’s “A Farewell to Virology” is a groundbreaking work that challenges the conventional wisdom on viruses and disease. Its impact has been significant, sparking important conversations and debates within the scientific community.

    The post Existence and Isolation first appeared on Dissident Voice.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • Unionized Letter Carriers Organize for Better Than Meager 1.3 Percent Raise

    A wave of anger is cresting at post offices across the country. Letter carriers are looking at the big raises that other union members have won — 38 percent over four years at Boeing, 62 percent in six years at the East Coast ports, $7.50 in five years at UPS. They’re comparing those gains to the tentative agreement their president handed them in October: 1.3 percent a year for three years.

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • From the Ashes: How Grief Shapes Our Struggles

    “The capitalist system also doesn’t care if we die. So insisting on the value of human life, insisting on grieving, particularly grieving publicly and collectively, is a real statement against this entire death-making system,” says author Sarah Jaffe. In this episode of “Movement Memos,” Jaffe and host Kelly Hayes talk about the lessons of Jaffe’s latest book, From the Ashes: Grief and Revolution…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • New Film Documents the Struggle and Triumph of Amazon Labor Union

    Stephen Maing and Brett Story’s documentary Union is one of the best American films about the labor movement since 1940’s The Grapes of Wrath. Using cinéma vérité “you-are-there” film techniques, Union chronicles the fight to organize the JFK8 Amazon fulfillment center in Staten Island, New York. Union, a Sundance Film Festival Special Jury Award winner, focuses on fired Amazon worker Chris Smalls…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • What Kind of Pandemic?

    The post What Kind of Pandemic? first appeared on Dissident Voice.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • Experts Sow Confusion About State of COVID Pandemic Amid Another Serious Wave

    From summer into fall, SARS-CoV-2, the COVID-19 virus, ran up another epidemiological spike just as the feds sunset their pandemic control program. While the virus continues along a loop of boom and bust repeatedly reset by its capacity for evolutionary escape, putting people in the hospital and out of work at a steady clip, U.S. officials and well-connected epidemiologists have abandoned…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Left to Battle a Pandemic With Little Help, Nursing Aides Struggle With PTSD

    One evening in May, nursing assistant Debra Ragoonanan’s vision blurred during her shift at a state-run Massachusetts veterans home. As her head spun, she said, she called her husband. He picked her up and drove her to the emergency room, where she was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm. It was the latest in a drumbeat of health issues that she traces to the first months of 2020…

    Source

    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • On the Frontlines with Healthcare Workers Fighting COVID-19


    This content originally appeared on VICE News and was authored by VICE News.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • When You Suffer for Your Sanity and Struggle to Get Free


    Vincent van Gogh (Netherlands), The Starry Night, 1889.

    In 1930, Clément Fraisse (1901–1980), a shepherd from France’s Lozère region, was confined in a nearby psychiatric hospital after he tried to burn down his parents’ farmhouse. For two years, he was held in a dark, narrow cell. Using a spoon, and later the handle of his chamber pot, Fraisse carved symmetrical images into the rough, wooden walls that surrounded him. Despite the inhumane conditions in these psychiatric hospitals, Fraisse made beautiful art in the darkness of his cell. Not far from Lozère is the monastery of Saint Paul de Mausole in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, where Vincent van Gogh had been confined four decades earlier (1889–1890) and where he completed around 150 paintings, including several important works (among them The Starry Night, 1889).

    Ex OPG, Naples (Italy), 2024.

    I was thinking about both Fraisse and Van Gogh when I visited the old Ospedale Psichiatrico Giudiziario (OPG) in Naples (Italy) in September for a festival that took place in this former criminal asylum, which once held those who had committed serious offences and were deemed to be insane. The vast building, which sits in the heart of Naples on the Monte di Sant’Eframo, was first a monastery (1573–1859), then a military barrack for the Savoy regime during Italy’s unification in 1861, and then a prison set up by the fascist regime in the 1920s. The prison was closed in 2008, and then, in 2015, occupied by a group of people who would later form the political organisation Potere al Popolo! (Power to the People!). They renamed the building Ex OPG – Je so’ pazzo, ‘ex’ meaning that the building is no longer an asylum, and Je so’ pazzo referring to the favourite song of the beloved local singer Pino Daniele (1955–2015), who died around the time the building was occupied:

    I’m crazy. I’m crazy.
    The people are waiting for me.
    ….
    I want to live at least one day as a lion.
    Je so’pazzo, je so’ pazzo.
    C’ho il popolo che mi aspetta.
    ….
    Nella vita voglio vivere almeno un giorno da leone.

    Today, the Ex OPG is home to legal and medical clinics, a gym, a theatre, and a bar. It is a place of reflection, a people’s centre that is designed to build community and confront the loneliness and precarity of capitalism. It is a rare kind of institution in our world, one in which an exhausted society is increasingly isolated and individuals, encaged in a prison house of frustrated aspirations, nonetheless hope to use their meagre tools (a spoon, the handle of a chamber pot) to carve out their dreams and to reach for the starry sky.


    Anita Rée (Germany), Self-Portrait, 1930.
    Rée (1885–1933) killed herself after the Nazis declared her work to be ‘degenerate’.

    Even the World Health Organisation (WHO) does not have sufficient data on mental health, largely because the poorer nations are unable to maintain an accurate account of their populations’ immense psychological struggles. As a result, the focus is often limited to the more affluent countries, where such data is collected by governments and where there is greater access to psychiatric care and medications. A recent survey of thirty-one countries (mostly in Europe and North America, but also including some poorer nations such as Brazil, India, and South Africa) shows a shifting attitude and increased concern about mental health. The survey found that 45% of those polled selected mental health as ‘the biggest health problems facing people in [their] country today’, a significant increase from the previous poll, conducted in 2018, in which the figure was 27%. Third in the list of health challenges is stress, with 31% selecting it as the leading cause of concern. There is a significant gender gap in attitudes towards mental health amongst young people, with 55% of young women selecting it as one of their primary health concerns, compared to 37% of young men (reflecting the fact that women are disproportionately impacted by mental health issues).

    While it is true that the COVID-19 pandemic heightened mental health problems across the world, this crisis predated the coronavirus. Information from the Global Health Data Exchange shows that in 2019 – before the pandemic – one in eight, or 970 million, people from around the world had a mental disorder, with 301 million struggling with anxiety and 280 million with depression. These numbers should be seen as an estimate, a minimum picture of the severe crisis of unhappiness and maladjustment to the current social order.

    There are range of ailments that go under the name of ‘mental disorder’, from schizophrenia to forms of depression that can result in suicidal ideation. According to the WHO’s 2022 report, one in 200 adults struggle with schizophrenia, which on average results in a ten- to twenty-year reduction in life expectancy. Meanwhile, suicide, the leading cause of death amongst young people globally, is responsible for one in every 100 deaths (bear in mind that only one in every twenty attempts results in a death). We can make new tables, revise our calculations, and write longer reports, but none of this can assuage the profound social neglect that pervades our world.


    Adolf Wölfli (Switzerland), General View of the Island Neveranger, 1911.
    Wölfli (1864–1930) was abused as a child, sold as an indentured labourer, and then interned in the Waldau Clinic in Bern, where he painted for the rest of his life.

    Neglect is not even the correct word. The prevailing attitude to mental disorders is to treat them as biological problems that merely require individualised pharmaceutical care. Even if we were to accept this limited conceptual framework, it still requires governments to support the training of psychiatrists, make medications affordable and accessible for the population, and incorporate mental health treatment into the wider health care system. However, in 2022, the WHO found that, on average, countries spend only 2% of their health care budgets on mental health. The organisation also found that half of the world’s population – mostly in the poorer nations – lives in circumstances where there is one psychiatrist to serve 200,000 or more people. This is the state of affairs as we witness a general decline of health care budgets and of public education about the need for a generous attitude toward mental health problems. The most recent WHO data (December 2023), which covers the spike in pandemic-related health spending, shows that, in 2021, health care spending in most countries was less than 5% of Gross Domestic Product. Meanwhile, in its 2024 report A World of Debt, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) shows that almost a hundred countries spent more to service their debts than on healthcare. Though these are foreboding statistics, they do not get at the heart of the problem.

    Over the course of the past century, the response to mental health disorders has been overwhelmingly individualised, with treatments ranging from various forms of therapy to the prescription of different medications. Part of the failure to deal with the range of mental health crises – from depression to schizophrenia – has been the refusal to accept that these problems are not only influenced by biological factors but can be – and often are – created and exacerbated by social structures. Dr. Joanna Moncrieff, one of the founders of the Critical Psychiatry Network, writes that ‘none of the situations we call mental disorders have been convincingly shown to arise from a biological disease’, or more precisely, ‘from a specific dysfunction of physiological or biochemical processes’. This is not to say that biology does not play a role, but simply that it is not the only factor that should shape our understanding of such disorders.

    In his widely read classic The Sane Society (1955), Erich Fromm (1900–1980) built on the insights of Karl Marx to develop a precise reading of the psychological landscape in a capitalist system. His insights are worth re-considering (forgive Fromm’s use of the masculine use of the word ‘man’ and of the pronoun ‘his’ to refer to all of humanity):

    Whether or not the individual is healthy is primarily not an individual matter, but depends on the structure of his society. A healthy society furthers man’s capacity to love his fellow men, to work creatively, to develop his reason and objectivity, to have a sense of self which is based on the experience of his own productive powers. An unhealthy society is one which creates mutual hostility, distrust, which transforms man into an instrument of use and exploitation for others, which deprives him of a sense of self, except inasmuch as he submits to others or becomes an automaton. Society can have both functions; it can further man’s healthy development, and it can hinder it; in fact, most societies do both, and the question is only to what degree and in what directions their positive and negative influence is exercised.


    Kawanabe Kyōsai (Japan), Famous Mirrors: The Spirit of Japan, 1874.
    Kyōsai (1831–1889) was shocked, at the age of nine, when he picked up a corpse and its head fell off. This marked his consciousness and his later break with ukiyo-e traditional painting to inaugurate what is now known as manga.

    The antidote to many of our mental health crises must come from re-building society and forming a culture of community rather than a culture of antagonism and toxicity. Imagine if we built cities with more community centres, more places such as Ex OPG – Je so’ pazzo in Naples, more places for young people to gather and build social connections and their personalities and confidence. Imagine if we spent more of our resources to teach people to play music and to organise sports games, to read and write poetry, and to organise socially productive activities in our neighbourhoods. These community centres could house medical clinics, youth programmes, social workers, and therapists. Imagine the festivals that such centres could produce, the music and joy, the dynamism of events such Red Books Day. Imagine the activities – the painting of murals, neighbourhood clean-ups, and planting of gardens – that could emerge as these centres incubate conversations about what kind of world people want to build. In fact, we do not need to imagine any of this: it is already with us in small gestures, whether in Naples or in Delhi, in Johannesburg or in Santiago.

    ‘Depression is boring, I think’, wrote the poet Anne Sexton (1928–1974). ‘I would do better to make some soup and light up the cave’. So let’s make soup in a community centre, pick up guitars and drumsticks, and dance and dance and dance till that great feeling comes upon everyone to join in healing our broken humanity.

    The post When You Suffer for Your Sanity and Struggle to Get Free first appeared on Dissident Voice.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and other Problems


    How Covid Increased Housing Rage

    Covid may have reduced road rage and cut gas and transportation bills but it has increased housing rage. Many in apartment or condo buildings have had their fill of the following irritants after more than a year of seclusion (not to mention their fill of family or roommates). Here are some of the issues of contention that have increased since Covid.

    Mail Room

    Why do businesses keep attaching door hangers for home improvements or cut-rate auto tune-ups? Don’t they know we are as broke as they are?

    Why do companies send several copies of the same piece of junk mail? If we didn’t want one of the fliers—why would we want three? Why do neighbors drop the junk mail on the floor? Don’t they live here too?

    Why are the mail compartments in the building five inches by two inches so packages don’t fit and you only get an Attempt-To-Deliver notice of a package or worse—the package left on the floor for anyone to steal?

    Why has a phone book covered with spider webs sat in the corner for a year?

    Laundry Room

    Why are the washers and driers either in use or holding hot masses of “done” clothes that you don’t want to touch?

    Why do the settings either boil your delicate clothes or barely heat?

    Why has drier Number 3 not had heat for a year?

    What is the blue glue-like substance on the top of washer Number 2 that apparently doesn’t wash off? Can you avoid washer 2?

    Who owns the clothing in the “lost and found” box that is so big or strange that it seems like a joke for Halloween? Are there really neighbors who wear those articles?

    Neighbors

    Is there an apartment rule that one neighbor must cook cabbage, Brussels sprouts or cauliflower every day of the week so there is always a sulfur smell?

    Are the daily pot smokers really “medical users”? Has anyone ever seen them?

    Why do the techno music lovers begin, not end, playing their music at 10 PM?<

    Why doesn’t the couple in Unit 12 just get a divorce?

    Do the people in Unit 22 really move furniture every night? Or are they jumping up and down with ten friends for our edification?

    Amazon

    We get it that anything brick and mortar stores can do, Amazon can do quicker. We get it that people like to shop online at all hours and that driving for Amazon is one of the few viable jobs today. Still, why must the building entrance be filled all day every day with so many Amazon deliveries you could fall getting around them?

    Family

    Covid caused many Millennials to move home with their families and many white collar workers to “work from home.” We predict that many extended families will skip celebrating holidays this winter with their family, if they can—having had enough exposure to them. We also predict that no one for the next ten years will say they are leaving a job to “spend more time with my family.

    The post Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and other Problems first appeared on Dissident Voice.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and other Problems


    How Covid Increased Housing Rage

    Covid may have reduced road rage and cut gas and transportation bills but it has increased housing rage. Many in apartment or condo buildings have had their fill of the following irritants after more than a year of seclusion (not to mention their fill of family or roommates). Here are some of the issues of contention that have increased since Covid.

    Mail Room

    Why do businesses keep attaching door hangers for home improvements or cut-rate auto tune-ups? Don’t they know we are as broke as they are?

    Why do companies send several copies of the same piece of junk mail? If we didn’t want one of the fliers—why would we want three? Why do neighbors drop the junk mail on the floor? Don’t they live here too?

    Why are the mail compartments in the building five inches by two inches so packages don’t fit and you only get an Attempt-To-Deliver notice of a package or worse—the package left on the floor for anyone to steal?

    Why has a phone book covered with spider webs sat in the corner for a year?

    Laundry Room

    Why are the washers and driers either in use or holding hot masses of “done” clothes that you don’t want to touch?

    Why do the settings either boil your delicate clothes or barely heat?

    Why has drier Number 3 not had heat for a year?

    What is the blue glue-like substance on the top of washer Number 2 that apparently doesn’t wash off? Can you avoid washer 2?

    Who owns the clothing in the “lost and found” box that is so big or strange that it seems like a joke for Halloween? Are there really neighbors who wear those articles?

    Neighbors

    Is there an apartment rule that one neighbor must cook cabbage, Brussels sprouts or cauliflower every day of the week so there is always a sulfur smell?

    Are the daily pot smokers really “medical users”? Has anyone ever seen them?

    Why do the techno music lovers begin, not end, playing their music at 10 PM?<

    Why doesn’t the couple in Unit 12 just get a divorce?

    Do the people in Unit 22 really move furniture every night? Or are they jumping up and down with ten friends for our edification?

    Amazon

    We get it that anything brick and mortar stores can do, Amazon can do quicker. We get it that people like to shop online at all hours and that driving for Amazon is one of the few viable jobs today. Still, why must the building entrance be filled all day every day with so many Amazon deliveries you could fall getting around them?

    Family

    Covid caused many Millennials to move home with their families and many white collar workers to “work from home.” We predict that many extended families will skip celebrating holidays this winter with their family, if they can—having had enough exposure to them. We also predict that no one for the next ten years will say they are leaving a job to “spend more time with my family.

    The post Food, Clothes, Men, Gas, and other Problems first appeared on Dissident Voice.

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  • Florida Issues Blatantly False “Guidance” on Latest COVID-19 Boosters

    New guidance from the Florida Department of Health includes disinformation directed at people who are considering getting vaccinated with the new COVID-19 boosters, wrongly describing the vaccinations as untested and dangerous. In reality, the vaccinations have been tested and provide updated protection from new coronavirus variants. They have been approved for use by both the Food and Drug…

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  • As COVID Emergency Funding Sunsets, Public Health Faces Budget Cuts and Layoffs

    Even as federal aid poured into state budgets in response to the covid-19 pandemic, public health leaders warned of a boom-and-bust funding cycle on the horizon as the emergency ended and federal grants sunsetted. Now, that drought has become reality and state governments are slashing budgets that feed local health departments. Congress allotted more than $800 billion to support states’ covid…

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  • COVID Vaccines May Cost $200 for Uninsured People Due to Federal Funding Cuts

    The latest coronavirus vaccine costs up to $200 for the roughly 25 million uninsured people in the U.S., due to the defunding of a federal program that previously covered the costs, The Washington Post reported Tuesday. It’s the “latest tear in the safety net” as pandemic-era programs wind down, the newspaper reported. Covid-19 vaccines were free for everyone in the U.S. in 2021 and 2022…

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  • New COVID Vaccines Arrive as Many Are Poised to Lose Access to Free Shots

    Last week, the Food and Drug Administration approved two COVID-19 vaccines earlier than expected due to record-breaking surges of the virus. Instead of releasing them in the fall, following the pattern of previous coronavirus vaccine roll outs, they are available as early as this week. However, for some people, time is already running out to get the updated shots. For the nearly 27 million…

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  • Technofascism: The Government Pressured Tech Companies to Censor Users

    Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, has finally admitted what we knew all along: Facebook conspired with the government to censor individuals expressing “disapproved” views about the COVID-19 pandemic.

    Zuckerberg’s confession comes in the wake of a series of court rulings that turn a blind eye to the government’s technofascism.

    In a 2-1 decision in Children’s Health Defense v. Meta, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed a lawsuit brought by Children’s Health Defense against Meta Platforms for restricting CHD’s posts, fundraising, and advertising on Facebook following communications between Meta and federal government officials.

    In a unanimous decision in the combined cases of NetChoice v. Paxton and Moody v. NetChoice, the U.S. Supreme Court avoided ruling on whether the states could pass laws to prohibit censorship by Big Tech companies on social media platforms such as Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube.

    And in a 6-3 ruling in Murthy v. Missouri , the Supreme Court sidestepped a challenge to the federal government’s efforts to coerce social media companies into censoring users’ First Amendment expression.

    Welcome to the age of technocensorship.

    On paper—under the First Amendment, at least—we are technically free to speak.

    In reality, however, we are now only as free to speak as a government official—or corporate entities such as Facebook, Google or YouTube—may allow.

    Case in point: internal documents released by the House Judiciary Select Subcommittee on Weaponization of the Federal Government confirmed what we have long suspected: that the government has been working in tandem with social media companies to censor speech.

    By “censor,” we’re referring to concerted efforts by the government to muzzle, silence and altogether eradicate any speech that runs afoul of the government’s own approved narrative.

    This is political correctness taken to its most chilling and oppressive extreme.

    The revelations that Facebook worked in concert with the Biden administration to censor content related to COVID-19, including humorous jokes, credible information and so-called disinformation, followed on the heels of a ruling by a federal court in Louisiana that prohibits executive branch officials from communicating with social media companies about controversial content in their online forums.

    Likening the government’s heavy-handed attempts to pressure social media companies to suppress content critical of COVID vaccines or the election to “an almost dystopian scenario,” Judge Terry Doughty warned that “the United States Government seems to have assumed a role similar to an Orwellian ‘Ministry of Truth.’”

    This is the very definition of technofascism.

    Clothed in tyrannical self-righteousness, technofascism is powered by technological behemoths (both corporate and governmental) working in tandem to achieve a common goal.

    The government is not protecting us from “dangerous” disinformation campaigns. It is laying the groundwork to insulate us from “dangerous” ideas that might cause us to think for ourselves and, in so doing, challenge the power elite’s stranglehold over our lives.

    Thus far, the tech giants have been able to sidestep the First Amendment by virtue of their non-governmental status, but it’s a dubious distinction at best when they are marching in lockstep with the government’s dictates.

    As Philip Hamburger and Jenin Younes write for The Wall Street Journal: “The First Amendment prohibits the government from ‘abridging the freedom of speech.’ Supreme Court doctrine makes clear that government can’t constitutionally evade the amendment by working through private companies.”

    Nothing good can come from allowing the government to sidestep the Constitution.

    The steady, pervasive censorship creep that is being inflicted on us by corporate tech giants with the blessing of the powers-that-be threatens to bring about a restructuring of reality straight out of Orwell’s 1984, where the Ministry of Truth polices speech and ensures that facts conform to whatever version of reality the government propagandists embrace.

    Orwell intended 1984 as a warning. Instead, it is being used as a dystopian instruction manual for socially engineering a populace that is compliant, conformist and obedient to Big Brother.

    In a world increasingly automated and filtered through the lens of artificial intelligence, we are finding ourselves at the mercy of inflexible algorithms that dictate the boundaries of our liberties.

    Once artificial intelligence becomes a fully integrated part of the government bureaucracy, there will be little recourse: we will all be subject to the intransigent judgments of techno-rulers.

    This is how it starts.

    First, the censors went after so-called extremists spouting so-called “hate speech.”

    Then they went after so-called extremists spouting so-called “disinformation” about stolen elections, the Holocaust, and Hunter Biden.

    By the time so-called extremists found themselves in the crosshairs for spouting so-called “misinformation” about the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines, the censors had developed a system and strategy for silencing the nonconformists.

    Eventually, depending on how the government and its corporate allies define what constitutes “extremism, “we the people” might all be considered guilty of some thought crime or other.

    Whatever we tolerate now—whatever we turn a blind eye to—whatever we rationalize when it is inflicted on others, whether in the name of securing racial justice or defending democracy or combatting fascism, will eventually come back to imprison us, one and all.

    Watch and learn.

    We should all be alarmed when any individual or group—prominent or not—is censored, silenced and made to disappear from Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram for voicing ideas that are deemed politically incorrect, hateful, dangerous or conspiratorial.

    Given what we know about the government’s tendency to define its own reality and attach its own labels to behavior and speech that challenges its authority, this should be cause for alarm across the entire political spectrum.

    Here’s the point: you don’t have to like or agree with anyone who has been muzzled or made to disappear online because of their views, but to ignore the long-term ramifications of such censorship is dangerously naïve, because whatever powers you allow the government and its corporate operatives to claim now will eventually be used against you by tyrants of your own making.

    Eventually, as Orwell predicted, telling the truth will become a revolutionary act.

    If the government can control speech, it can control thought and, in turn, it can control the minds of the citizenry.

    As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, it’s happening already.

    The post Technofascism: The Government Pressured Tech Companies to Censor Users first appeared on Dissident Voice.


    This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by John W. Whitehead and Nisha Whitehead.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Experts Call Long COVID in Kids a Public Health Crisis. Why Is It Being Ignored?

    For years, public health experts have said that COVID-19 infections in children are “mild.” According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the most common symptoms of COVID in kids are a fever and cough. While some children with the coronavirus are admitted to the ICU and there are pediatric deaths, studies have found that underlying medical conditions including obesity…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Summer COVID Wave Prompts Early Emergency Approval of New Vaccines

    This summer’s COVID-19 wave has gotten so bad — even worse than winter peaks in some regions — the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced they are approving two vaccines early, but leaving one out for now. On Thursday, the agency used its emergency use authorization (EUA) to rubber stamp a group of updated mRNA vaccines produced by Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech. They inoculate against the…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • Spread of Mpox Underscores Global Health Disparities and Lack of Vaccine Access

    Another global emergency involving mpox is unfolding, with cases spreading from Africa now springing up across the globe, an echo of the viral crisis two years ago. But this time around, things are different, with a mutated strain of the mpox virus that seems to be more contagious — and more deadly, threatening to become a pandemic on par with COVID-19. The crisis first attracted attention…

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  • The COVID Tracking Project Part 3

    At the height of the pandemic, COVID-19 was talked about as “the great equalizer,” an idea touted by celebrities and politicians from Madonna to then-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. But that was a myth. 

    Ibram X. Kendi and Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research worked with The COVID Tracking Project to compile national numbers on how COVID-19 affected people of color in the U.S. Their effort, The COVID Racial Data Tracker, showed that people of color died from the disease at around twice the rate of White people.

    The COVID Tracking Project’s volunteer data collection team waited months for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to release COVID-19 testing data. But when the CDC finally started publishing the data, it was different from what states were publishing—in some instances, it was off by hundreds of thousands of tests. With no clear answers about why, The COVID Tracking Project’s quest to keep national data flowing every day continued until March 2021. 

    This week on Reveal: We examine the myth of COVID-19 as “the great equalizer,” what went wrong in the CDC’s response to the pandemic, and whether it’s prepared for the next one. 

    This Peabody Award-nominated three-part series is hosted by epidemiologist Jessica Malaty Rivera and reported by Artis Curiskis and Kara Oehler from The COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic.

    This post was originally published on Reveal.

  • Universal Health Care Was Big on the 2020 Democratic Platform. Where Is It Now?

    The last time the Democratic Party released a platform, mass death and illness were haunting the political landscape. By mid-August 2020, more than 160,000 United States citizens had died from COVID-19, and the daily mortality rate had just climbed above 1,000. Vaccines were still months away from being available, and nationwide cases exceeded 5.4 million. Inundated with corpses…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • More Than 3,000 Floridians Have Died From COVID Over Past 12 Months

    Thousands of Florida residents have died due to coronavirus over the past year, according to new data from the state’s Department of Health website — a figure that is significantly lower than was seen during the worst parts of the pandemic, but worryingly higher than has been recently observed. According to those figures, 3,162 Floridians died from COVID-19 over the past 12 months.

    Source

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  • Jeffrey Sachs: US Biotech Cartel behind Covid Origins and Cover-up

    Jeffrey Sachs joins The Grayzone’s Max Blumenthal and Aaron Maté to discuss the investigation into the origins of Covid-19. As chair of the Lancet COVID-19 commission, Sachs alleges that SARS-CoV2 originated from dangerous gain of function experiments sponsored and conducted by US biotech institutions. He alleges a vast cover-up of Covid origins, including by former members of his commission, and details the personal attacks he has incurred for speaking out.

    The post Jeffrey Sachs: US Biotech Cartel behind Covid Origins and Cover-up first appeared on Dissident Voice.

    This post was originally published on Dissident Voice.

  • The US Government Has Abandoned Us to Endless COVID. We Can Do Better.

    This week, Nassau County, New York, passed a mask ban. Those wearing face masks will now face the possibility of up to a year in jail or a $1,000 fine. Angry at the power of anti-genocide protests, lawmakers banned one of the most basic forms of disease protection just as the world is experiencing a record surge in COVID cases. While officials insist that the law will not be used against those…

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    This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.

  • The COVID Tracking Project Part 2

    In March 2020, health care technologist Amy Gleason had a daunting task ahead of her. She was a new member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force’s data team, and it was her job to figure out where people were testing positive for COVID-19 across the country, how many were in hospitals, and how many had died from the disease. 


    Gleason was shocked to find that data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention wasn’t reflecting the immediate impact of the coronavirus. At the same time, the country was suffering from another huge shortfall: a lack of COVID-19 tests. The task force also faced national shortages of medical supplies like masks and ventilators and lacked basic information about COVID-19 hospitalizations that would help them know where to send supplies. 


    Realizing that the federal government was failing to collect national data, reporters at The Atlantic formed The COVID Tracking Project. Across all 50 states, hundreds of volunteers began gathering crucial information on the number of cases, deaths, and hospitalizations. Each day, they compiled the state COVID-19 data in a massive spreadsheet, creating the nation’s most reliable picture of the spread of the deadly disease.  


    This week on Reveal: The second episode of our three-part series asks why there was no good federal data about COVID-19. This Peabody Award-nominated series is hosted by epidemiologist Jessica Malaty Rivera and reported by Artis Curiskis and Kara Oehler from The COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic. 


    This is an update of an episode that originally aired in April 2023.  

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    This post was originally published on Reveal.

  • The Jab

    The post The Jab first appeared on Dissident Voice.

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  • Indoor air quality shapes as pandemic-sized policy challenge

    The Prime Minister’s top scientific advisers are backing a multi-faceted response to airborne infections with air quality interventions that can be tailored to specific buildings like hospitals or classrooms to guard against the next pandemic. Their advice, released this week, sets up a complex policy challenge stretching across portfolios, jurisdictions, health systems and sectors, but…

    The post Indoor air quality shapes as pandemic-sized policy challenge appeared first on InnovationAus.com.

    This post was originally published on InnovationAus.com.

  • Sanders Unveils “Moonshot” Bill to Fund Research Into Long COVID

    Over four months after seeking public comments on long Covid legislation, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders on Friday unveiled a bill to help tackle the crisis “that is affecting more than 22 million adults and 1 million children across the United States — and millions more around the globe.” Long Covid “can include a wide range of ongoing symptoms and conditions that can last weeks, months…

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  • The COVID Tracking Project Part 1

    The United States has 4% of the world’s population but more than 16% of COVID-19 deaths. 


    Back in February 2020, reporters Rob Meyer and Alexis Madrigal from The Atlantic were trying to find solid data about the rising pandemic. They published a story that revealed a scary truth: The U.S. didn’t know where COVID-19 was spreading because few tests were available. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also didn’t have public data to tell citizens or federal agencies how many people were infected or where the outbreaks were happening.  


    Their reporting led to a massive volunteer effort by hundreds of people across the country who gathered the data themselves. The COVID Tracking Project became a de facto source of data amid the chaos of COVID-19. With case counts rising quickly, volunteers scrambled to document tests, hospitalizations, and deaths in an effort to show where the virus was and who was dying. 


    This week on Reveal: We investigate the failures by federal agencies that led to over 1 million Americans dying from COVID-19 and what that tells us about the nation’s ability to fight the next pandemic.This Peabody Award-nominated three-part series is hosted by epidemiologist Jessica Malaty Rivera and reported by Artis Curiskis and Kara Oehler from The COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic. 

    This is an update of an episode that originally aired in April 2023.

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