In a world where the reality principle has largely been conflated with the totalizing logic of capital, the most powerful messages may be those that repudiate common sense. Consider this provocative sticker from Brussels, one of a series popping up around the city: “If you are really cold, set fire to your house.” Like the Zen koans it resembles, this counter-intuitive advice has the potential to turn one’s thinking inside out. (More…)
Nafeez Ahmed has written a piece for The Guardian’s Earth Insight that is getting a lot of attention. It is no wonder, since he reports on a paper called “A Minimal Model for Human and Nature Interaction” which uses mathematical models to argue that industrial civilization will not continue in its current form. It isn’t actually as bad as it sounds. (More…)
One of the important tasks of the on-going project of Never Again for Anyone, including our own to take place in Berlin during the Holocaust’s 70th anniversary, is to highlight the danger of a resurgence of violent far-right activity in Europe. As a German resident, I think the most notable example in recent times is undoubtedly the case of the National Socialist Underground (NSU). (More…)
“We can’t fire them.” For anyone who has ever worked in Italy, the complaint is a familiar one. Often proffered to British and American employees, who are used to working with at-will type contracts, where staff can be let go on a whim, there’s an air of “Why can’t we be more like you?” to the declaration, as though a lack of job security is a more natural, albeit desirable state of affairs. (More…)
Today’s tensions with Vladimir Putin probably make American policymakers nostalgic for the days of Boris Yeltsin. If we wish to understand today’s Russia, we have to look at the way the Federation emerged from the tumultuous collapse of the USSR. Putin’s allegiances were clear from the beginning. He was not a mindless KGB thug, as he is often portrayed. (More…)
Perceptions of the crisis in Ukraine have been driven by the media. The Western press has taken a guardedly positive line toward the protestors in Maidan Square, constructing the flirtations of the Ukrainian opposition with NATO and the EU as simple struggles for freedom and the rule of law, mostly ignoring the neo-fascist presence in the movement. (More…)
As the Ukrainian revolution continues, the spectre of “The Jew” has once again reared its head. Rather than on the streets of Kiev, though, it is being seen a bit more subtly in Putin’s official homophobia. It has been made especially obvious by Russian-language assertions that the Euromaidan revolt was part of a larger “international gay conspiracy.” (More…)
I grew up hating Ahmaddiya Muslims. It’s almost a ritual for Pakistani Muslims, especially in the deeply pious newly middle class. Even calling them Muslims will bother many of my family members: we all grew up using the pejorative “Qadiani.” We hated them with a vehemence that somehow rivaled our disgust for Sikhs and Hindus, though maybe it’s all part of the same thing. (More…)
In the comments section, there is nothing worse than the person who confesses to neither reading the piece, nor viewing/reading/listening to its subject before levying an opinion. And yet, that is what I am about to do. Because I did not watch the Academy Awards, and yet I have an opinion about them. (More…)
Britain has invaded or occupied or at some point laid claim to virtually every spot of earth on the planet. So it should not be surprising that British boots once trod the otherwise obscure Ukrainian peninsula which is today attracting so much attention. What’s interesting is that Crimea has such cultural resonance in Britain, and why. (More…)
Most Americans who walk around Berlin are shocked. Graffiti is everywhere: storefronts, walls, and even the sides of entire buildings. They find it surprising. After all, this is the type of thing that was crushed by aggressive policing in cities like New York during the 1980s and 1990s. (More…)
As the situation in the Ukraine worsened last month, the usual right-wing suspects started to circle the White House. A strong President, they declared, would never have let things get so far out of hand. And now that Russian troops have moved into the Crimea, their attacks on the Obama Administration are becoming more forceful each day. In their eyes, he has become “Putin’s bitch”, (More…)