Pumpkins and Ooze Discussion for October 30th to November 5th, 2023 - The International Ghouls-Based Order - COTW: Lebanon
Pumpkins and Ooze Discussion for October 30th to November 5th, 2023 - The International Ghouls-Based Order - COTW: Lebanon
Image is from the January 2023 World Economic Forum meeting in Davos. Over 50 heads of state and 600 CEOs attended.
holding flashlight under face
Imagine a terrifying world where we are all ruled by monsters of every stripe. And not hot ones like werewolves, but instead decaying zombies and mummies who are both insensitive to, and actively benefit from the immense suffering they cause on a daily basis. The top echelon of society, filled with profit-seeking, bloodsucking vampires. And the worst of it is that they repeat on a daily basis that what they are doing is not only just, but there is no other possible way to do it.
Pretty spooky, right? What if I told you that this world... was our own?
Happy Halloween!
Friendly reminder: when commenting about a news event, especially something that just happened, please provide a source of some kind. While ideally this would be on nitter or archived, any source is preferable to none at all given.
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
The Country of the Week is Lebanon! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.
This week's first update is here.
Links and Stuff
The bulletins site is down.
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Add to the above list if you can.
Resources For Understanding The War
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Telegram Channels
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
Pro-Russian
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Last week's discussion post.
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Saying “I support Palestinians but I don’t support Hamas” is the new “I’m socially liberal but fiscally conservative”
Some people really are just experts in taking a position on some issue that just doesn't meaningfully exist in the actual physical world.
It's so nice having a lovely, abstract, oversimplified point of view that doesn't require a) any knowledge of the context of the situation, b) doing any difficult calculus, or c) making difficult decisions - that is, being a liberal. You get to just barge in, state random phrases, quotes, and thought-terminating cliches that a person from like 1852 said in a totally different situation, claim that you're being cancelled when you annoy everybody, and then move onto the new issue in a month's time.
Wistfully floating through domestic politics and geopolitics like a jellyfish, carried by the currents.
Classic Bush-era stinker "I support the troops, I just don't support the war!"
A shibboleth held to deflect accusations of being soft on terrorism, like a crucifix between you and a vampire.
"I hate the CCP, not the Chinese people"
But they're not even socially liberal. They just believe they are.
Yeah. I was just thinking about this earlier today. While—as an anarchist—I don't really support Hamas in theory, there's just no real meaningful opposition to it, especially in the current context. It's wasted energy. I support all Palestinians fighting back against their oppressors, and that includes supporting Hamas' current actions, even if I wouldn't really want to support its authority as a governing organization. To the extent that it's a network that provides infrastructure for resistance, great. To the extent that other Palestinians can organize and struggle against colonialism and genocide outside of it—with or without direct collaboration—also great. Hopefully Hamas leaves people to engage in that struggle without trying to exert authority over them. Solidarity, diversity of tactics, and all that.
The only real meaningful opposition to act on right now regarding Palestine is against Israel and the empire. So saying "I don't support Hamas" is just a counterproductive diversion. The expression just doesn't need to be uttered. and in the current political atmosphere and propaganda backdrop it only signals a (disingenuous and cowardly, at best) support of imperialism, apartheid, colonialism, and genocide.
TBH I hate liberals for making the general discourse over it so fucking stupid like that. But it's the reality of what we've got to work with. 😫