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Enlightenment, the Ghanaian dream and renaissance – Myjoyonline.com

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The sole focus of an enlightenment programme is to instil, in the breasts and psyche of Ghanaian citizens, a consciousness of fidelity to the Republic; pride in our culture, traditions, institutions and achievements; awareness of civic rights and responsibilities; and an African identity. We seek to stand out as a powerful and highly influential Republic that, with the divine help of God, shall build a better universe for mankind.

Our academic mission and curriculum is the most potent antidote for poverty, disease and various other social obstacles that continue to deprive the average free citizen from realising a dignified life in Ghana thus service, first and foremost, to God and ancestors duly; family and enterprise; district and province; and the Republic to which distinctive duties are owed.

The Ghanaian Dream and Renaissance

The Ghanaian Dream is to be an erudite and moral law-abiding administrator of your household and an industrious entrepreneur or public servant; a proven catalyst of district development; an accomplished statesman and, or, innovative industrialist to the province; and above all, a distinguished architect of the Republic.

The Ghanaian Renaissance is a full expression of our traditional aesthetics in beautifying our public institutions and private enterprises a form of ultra-nationalism and love for our Republic that crystallises the diverse cultures of each clan and nation-state.

Centres of Scholarship

It is the paramount responsibility of government to ensure education, at whatever cost necessary, is provided to all Ghanaians, wherever they may find themselves on the map, without regard for their individual social and economic circumstances.

The quality of indigenous scholarship and excellence of educational institutions ought to be a great source of national pride, a worthy continental export and our rightful claim to global fame.

To each Province, a model deluxe primary and secondary centre of scholarship which is culturally aesthetic inspired by a fine blend of indigenous ancient African architecture and modern technology must be constructed in its Provincial capital. Each monumental structure, an edifice that evokes fascination, must be furnished with a baronial public library; palatial classrooms; resident halls; a banquet hall and private museum; athletic facilities; a grand theatre hall and state-of-the-art science and technology labs.

The government must make provincial funds and bursaries, at secondary and tertiary education, available to students proven exceptional in academia; sports and theatre.

Centres of Scholarship should be separated, administratively, from institutions of dogma such as traditional shrines/temples, mosques or churches. The educational curriculum should include, at the conclusion of secondary school education, optional service to either the government or military as a prelude to university studies.

Our Republic must unswervingly aim at, and strain our treasury to procure, despite the ever-present question of finance, quality education for our citizens.

The Era of Enlightenment.

In an era when multiple esoteric fraternities were established on the Gold Coast G. H. T. Lyall inaugurated, in 1874, the Masonic Club; the Good Templars founded, in 1877, by the General Superintendent of the Wesleyan Mission and Commanding Officer of the Castle garrison, with the support of Lodge Deputy Grand Chief Templar, J. P. Brown; and the Odd-fellows was instituted in 1880 the Mfantsi Amanbuhu Fekuw, also known as the Fante National Political Society, was established in Cape Coast, Central Province, Gold Coast in 1889 to deliberately to revive African literature, fashion and music.

A legal colossus, eminent political reformist and publisher who hailed from the Central Province, as well as a pioneer of the Fante National Political Society, John Mensah Sarbah joined the Fante Public School Company, a missionary enterprise which in 1903, founded the Mfantsi National Education Fund that, by 1905, financed the Mfantsipim Secondary School.

Sarbah, an altruistic person, embodied the values of a true patriot dedicated to enlightenment and renaissance. He set up a scholarship for students and staff members to protect the perpetual success of Mfantsipim.

It is through the ethics and values of our centres of scholarship that the Republic could harness a meritocratic Ghanaian society where there is equal opportunity for all citizens, abundant reward for ambition with an emphasis on individual freedom and national unity.

There is, therefore, still an urgent need, as bluntly expressed by the Gold Coast Aborigines Protection Society in 1902, for educated Ghanaian citizens, and not westernised Africans, committed to the ideal of a Republic with a revered and ethereal civilisation. While our indigenous institutions must meet internationally acceptable standards, our enlightenment programme must be devised on the basis of Ghanaian exceptionalism.

I cannot emphasise enough; this is Ghanas Space Generation. This is the generation of rationalism, freedom of thought and enquiry.

***

The author, Vincent Djokoto, is Business Executive and Columnist. Twitter/Instagram @VLKDjokoto

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Ron Insana: Rebuilding the American economy to bring peace and prosperity to all – CNBC

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A cyclist passes by the New York Stock Exchange in New York, on May 26, 2020.

Wang Ying | Xinhua News Agency | Getty Images

It has long been evident, though not necessarily obvious to all, that the ground of America's economy was shifting beneath our feet.

The very institutions that laid the foundation upon which the "American Dream" was built, were in decay.

Their facades may still have been bright and reasonably well-maintained, but their interior walls became discolored and their support beams rusty and fragile.

A dozen years ago, it became increasingly apparent to me that something more than half-measures and lip-service were required to re-lay that foundation to ensure prosperity for all, particularly, for the next generations to come.

Indeed, when I first thought of writing this column, I was among those recommending that the U.S. rebuild the entirety of its infrastructure to stimulate an economy ravaged by the Great Financial Crisis (GFC) and subsequent Great Recession while using that crisis to bring the U.S. economy fully into the 21st Century.

Sadly, amid the building hyper-partisanship in Washington, President Obama was only able to pass $800 billion in relief and stimulus. That was far short of the estimated $4 trillion required to do the job.

The bill that was passed barely allotted any money for rebuilding anything.

Instead, it was used to fill state and local budget gaps, extend unemployment insurance and offset a small portion of the $17 trillion in capital losses accumulated in the GFC.

Rebuilding our physical infrastructure; hardening our critical infrastructure; updating the nation's electrical grid; modernizing federal, state and local technology and procuring productivity-enhancing tools simply has not been, and still isn't, a true priority of the Federal government despite the obvious and increasingly pressing need.

While this was exposed, in stark relief, during the Great Financial Crisis, it was illustrated even more clearly, only a decade later, as America faced its first great plague in over 100 years.

Like the GFC, the emergence of the coronavirus and subsequent economic lockdown, made quite plain the structural reforms needed to revive the U.S.

It also exposed the deepest of racial divisions that still plague this nation.

The deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade or Breonna Taylor, along with a disproportionate number of people of color killed by the coronavirus, have made, more clear and vivd than ever, the institutionalized racism that has prevented every citizen, no matter their race, creed, color or religion, from obtaining equality of opportunity, if not outcome.

Beyond that, there remains a pressing need to make America truly great for a next generation of Americans while also supporting a recovery strong enough to restore normal daily life to the citizens of today.

Consider the implications of the virus-induced recession that has toppled the domestic and global economy.

America's longest expansion was stopped dead in its tracks by the Corona virus pandemic.

While the virulence of this illness is not unprecedented in human history, the Bubonic Plague and the "Spanish" flu killed more people, the sudden impact that disrupted economic life in 2020 is without parallel.

Within only a matter of weeks, 90% of the American population was told to "shelter-in-place." By early April of 2020, some 25%-50% of the nation's economic output was completely shut off.

In the first ten weeks of the American pandemic alone, some 41 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits, many times the number of the previous peak in filings.

It has been estimated that the unemployment rate will top 30%, exceeding the highest jobless figures of the Great Depression, while the economy could contract by as much as 30-60% when all is said and done, marking the deepest economic decline on record.

Economists hope that recovery from the pandemic will be speedy, both in terms of the human and economic toll. But such optimism, while typical of Americans of all stripes, may be misplaced.

For the first time in modern history, we've witnessed just how deeply our most cherished institutions have fallen into disrepair.

The anti-science approach of President Trump has led to delays and mixed messages from infectious disease experts, likely exacerbating both the human and economic toll.

His divisive comments, as race riots erupted around the country, propelled us back in time, much as his economic policies are wont to do, to 1968 and to that summer of violence and discontent that scarred an entire generation of anti-establishment youths.

As a consequence, the disruption and associated behavioral changes that took place as the pandemic, and subsequent violence, spread may well have long-term consequences.

That does not mean the U.S. won't ultimately recover. And with the proper policies and incentives, the economy of the next 50 years could be, quite conceivably, far stronger than the economy of the last 50 years.

Working from home (WFH), social distancing, limited physical contact and increasing dependence on technology via telecommuting and telemedicine, may radically alter how we live and work for years, if not decades, to come.

The Federal Government and the Federal Reserve will have spent, or lent, untold trillions of dollars to support large and small businesses and replace much of the personal income lost to the rapid shutdown of the U.S. economy.

In this "whatever it takes" moment, deficits be damned as a the first few rounds of government assistance have provided as much as $6 trillion, or roughly one-third of U.S. GDP, to help right the ship of state. There is likely more, maybe even much more, yet to come.

Even that assistance, however, has been unevenly distributed, despite the government's seemingly best efforts.

Still, at some point in the relatively near future, therapeutic medicines and, ultimately, a coronavirus vaccine, will allow us to return to some sort of normality.

Medical technology and innovation will heed the call to action and deliver solutions both to control future pandemics and measures to ensure that our work-a-day world becomes more flexible and more resilient over time.

However, the septic shock that the economy has suffered, both on the supply and demand sides of the economy, and along political and racial lines in society, has also given us pause time to reflect on the type of world to which we want to return once this crisis has passed.

As nature abhors a vacuum, it has been fascinating also to observe that the global work stoppage has significantly reduced, or eliminated, the pollution clouds that are visible over vast areas of the world.

In China, Europe or the U.S. CO2 levels fell by 35% during the period when human travel plunged precipitously.

The Himalayas became visible from miles away, Los Angeles smog was wiped away while blue skies reappeared around the world.

It stands as testimony, and confirmation, that anthropogenic activities have greatly affected the environment and also proves that we are capable of taking steps to more quickly address climate change than previously assumed, provided we show the wisdom and the will.

Having said that, the resumption of production in China has already brought the clouds back. That will soon be true elsewhere in the world, as the global economy re-starts its engines of growth.

Clearly, this shock should prove to be a wake-up call, not just to America, but to the world, as well.

How can we re-create the relative peace and prosperity of the post-World War II period? This is the critical question that we all must address.

Can we restore and improve upon multi-national alliances, and address the political, economic and social imbalances in the United States that have been laid bare by an invisible enemy we were ill-prepared to fight, or one we have not battled with for far too long? The simple answer is yes. But, getting to yes may be far more complex.

The U.S. has many inherent strengths, but also some glaring weaknesses that have been brought to light in an extremely short period of time.

The U.S. has the most sophisticated higher education system in the world, the most vibrant valleys of innovation, a robust financial infrastructure and a resilient workforce that, historically, has overcome world wars, prior pandemics and other dislocations, only to emerge stronger in the end.

However, those institutions were hamstrung by a lack of leadership, both in the public and private sectors, the former focused on power rather than policy and the latter focused too much on profits over shared prosperity.

As in prior period of restructuring and reform, a new class of leaders and a new enlightenment among the elite will be required.

This time, however, that will likely not happen without a top-down restructuring of how America handles the challenges of the future, without looking to the past.

These challenges that include everything from the distribution of healthcare to a radical re-thinking of how it does business.

The focus needs to be on the governed and not the government on all stakeholders, not just shareholders.

America can be re-built, and it can be as prosperous as it once was. But it will need visionary leadership that has a keen and perceptive eye on the future.

It will require reimagining a U.S. economy built for 2050 and beyond, not 1950 and before.

We must not look to the past to restore America's greatness. The triumphs of yesteryear are relics of an age gone by. Coal, steel and smokestacks are not America's future.

Enlightened governance, enhanced technologies, advanced infrastructure, lifelong learning and adaptability are the keys to our economy's future success.

We desperately require a new image of an America that, while already great, can renew its domestic power, project an image of global vitality and industriousness, and re-engage with our allies, upon whom we so obviously rely, to realize the restoration of a peaceful and prosperous world that shares its riches with all and holds malice towards none.

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Ron Insana: Rebuilding the American economy to bring peace and prosperity to all - CNBC

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June 1st, 2020 at 6:45 am

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Break Through Is A Must: More On The Keyword Instruction Of Dhu – Patheos

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Kensh: Seeing Nature Lets get right down to it

Break through is a must if you want to verify the truth of this one great life and not just take others words for it, hiding behind the Buddhas robes, as it were. Or hiding inside your own robes. Hiding in the bells and smells of Zen orthodoxy. Or spending a dharma career trying to talk others into believing that non-enlightenment is really enlightenment. Exhausting!

Rather than just do a little bit of good for a short period of time, the aspiring bodhisattva vows to profoundly benefit living beings by helping them awaken. As I said above, for this, break through is a must. You cant help beings break through unless youve done it your-nonself. Then, in addition to the exquisite joy that comes from doing what can be done with this life, blabbing on about it might just flow from your heart.

A more typical message in contrast to saying break through is a must was exemplified in a dharma talk I recently heard from a teacher in one of the large St centers in America. The speaker said that because aspiring to awaken is a desire like any other desire, and that awakening doesnt come when we want it, and when some people awaken and others do not, it creates an unsettling power dynamic in the community, they do not emphasize break through at all in their community, and instead emphasize how were all already Buddhas.

First, if you cannot tell the difference between the desire for fame and gain and aspiring to awaken for the benefit of all living beings, Id suggest attending to these feelings with more subtle mindfulness, and see what you find.

Just because you can quote Sawaki Rshi doesnt make it true.

And, yes, there are issues that arise when we focus on kensh, but if Buddhism stops being about awakening, whats the point? We have psychotherapy, secular mindfulness, pharmacology, Netflix, and many other things to help people feel better, so if Zen practice is not about awakening, and instead is about becoming a ceremonial technician, for example, the end of Zen is near at hand. And appropriately so.

Dont throw awakening out with the bathwater!

In contrast, here is the attitude that Dhu recommends:

I vow that this mind of mine will be firm and will never retrogress. Relying on the protection of the buddhas, I will meet a good teacher, at a single word from them forget life-death, realize unexcelled perfect awakening, and perpetuate the wisdom-life of the buddhas, in order to repay my debt of enormous gratitude to the buddhas. (1)

So refreshing!

Dhu himself made this additional vow:

I would rather substitute this body of mine for that of all sentient beings and undergo sufferings in the hells than ever with my words compromise the buddhadharma [by bending to accommodate] customary etiquette and in the process blinding everyone [i.e., what I am about to say to you is not a case of bending to accommodate your feelings]. (2)

Well, Ive totally jumped the gun of this post, placing the cart in front of the horse. To paraphrase the translators bracketed clarification, what Ive said to you is not a case of bending to accommodate your feelings. But I grew up with in-depth training in Northern Minnesota nice, which means Ive just got to add, Sorry about that.

Before this kensh rant, I should have said that this is the ninth of ten posts in this series, so now, after the horse left the barn nearly six-hundred words ago, Ill share the usual series introduction and disclaimer:

In the recent translation ofThe Letters of Chan Master Dhu Pju,translators Jeffrey L. Broughton and Elise Yoko Watanabe offer nine themes, motifs, that emerge in the letters about how to do keyword practice ( hutu, Japanese,wat). Ive been sharing them on theVine of Obstacles: Online Support for Zen Trainingfor students working with keywords (e.g., mu), and Ill also be sharing them here for others who might be interested. Close study of an ancient text can help both students and teachers notice details of the method and refresh their practice spirit. If you are working with a keyword with another teacher, consult with them, of course, and rely on their guidance.

This breaking through or passing through leads to a state wherein you dont have to ask anything of anybodyyou know for yourself:

Letter #29.3: Also, if your mind is agitated, just lift to awareness the keyword of dog has no buddha-nature [i.e., wu/mu/no ]. The words of the buddhas, the words of the ancestors, the words of the old monks of all the regions have myriad differences; but, if you can break through this word mu , youll break through all of them at the very same time, without having to ask anyone anything. If you intently ask questions of other people about the words of the buddhas, about the words of the ancestors, and about the words of the old monks of all the regions, then in endless aeons youll never attain awakening! (3)

Some of the practitioners Ive met who have come to me reporting a previous kensh, actually have. And a fair number, the majority, have mistaken samadhi or boon experiences for kensh. Others seem to have had a glimpse of true nature, but its become a calcified part of their identity, and so putting it to use in ongoing practice verification to benefit others, takes some time and skillful practice.

But despite whatDhu seems to be saying from this extract about not needing to ask anyone anything, the full text and annotations makes it clear that he is addressing another issue instead of doing the practice of lifting the keyword, Secretariat Drafter L, to whom letter #29 is addressed, was inquiring about traveling around asking questions of various teachers, depleting his energy for the Way. In that context,Dhu encourages him to do diligent keyword practice and see for himself.

Just like old Dgen said, Why abandon your own sitting place, disrespectfully wandering through another countrys dust? If you make one mistaken step, you miss the crossing over that is in your face. (4)

Traveling around with straw sandals, or via Zoom, in order to collect an impressive bevy of stories, Teachers Ive Asked About the Dharma, is a waste of precious time. Focus! Only doing diligent practice will open up awakening, not the number of hours you log on Facebook or Twitter either! And with awakening, personally knowing the truth of the buddhadharma, rather than relying on the words of others, no matter how venerable they might be, such that you can truly be of service to the many beings wandering in life-death.

In other words, asking a well-trained and clear-eyed teacher about the dharma aint going to magically awaken you.

Usually.

Unless and until you do the work and suddenly are ready, like the persimmon that goes SPLAT! Working with a teacher, breaking through, verifying your kensh in face-to-face meetings, and benefiting others is the Way.

Secretariat Drafter L might be the type of guy (yes, theyre almost always guys), who after a dharma talk begin a question with, Well, Katagiri/Suzuki/Uchiyama/Maezumi (etc.) Rshi once said, Blah, blah, blah.

Where does this end?

(1)The Letters of Chan Master Dhu Pju,1.4: Shows the mental work necessary to extinguish habit-energy from past lives,trans. Jeffrey L. Broughton and Elise Yoko Watanabe. Modified.

(2) Op. cit., 7.1: Dahui certifies Lis awakening.

(3) Op. cit., Introduction: Recurring Motifs in Huatou Practice.

(4)Eihei Dgen, Fukanzazengi, (General Advice for the Zazen Ceremony),trans. Dosho Port.

Dsh Port began practicing Zen in 1977 and now co-teaches at theNebraska Zen Centerwith his wife, Tetsugan Zummach sh. Dsh also teaches with theVine of Obstacles: Online Support for Zen Training,an internet-based Zen community. Dsh received dharma transmission from Dainin Katagiri Rshi and inka shmei from James Myun Ford Rshi in the Harada-Yasutani lineage. Dshs translation and commentary onThe Record of Empty Hallis due out in early 2021 (Shambhala). He is also the authorofKeep Me In Your Heart a While: The Haunting Zen of Dainin Katagiri.

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CIE releases new documentary "The American Way. Connecting the dots…" – To inspire & reboot the global economy – Yahoo Finance

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Available worldwide on Vimeo

SURREY,BC, May 28, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -The American Way. Connecting the dots isa new documentaryreleased worldwideon Vimeoby the Center for introspection & enlightenment Foundation, a non-profit based in Canada.

What makes the USA the richest nation in the world? How does it create & retain wealth? The American Way provides a roadmap for developing nations (CNW Group/Center for introspection & enlightenment)

The American Way is an initiative by the Center to inspire Americans and reboot the American and the global economies.

The Covid 19 pandemic and the drop in oil prices have created a global economic crisis and pushed the United States to the brink of recession.

The Center feels that a quick boot strapping of the US economy is vital to revive the global economy,create employment and foster livelihood not only for Americans but for millions of people around the world.

The American Way provides a panoramic view of the US economic engine. The documentary outlines all the critical elements that make the USA the richest nation in the world. The documentary describes how the US creates, retains and distributes wealth. It explains the role of the US government, businessmen and consumers in the American wealth creation process.

The American Way. Connecting the dotsalso provides a Holistic solution and a road map for poor and developing nations to eradicate poverty through "Systemic Changes". The film identifies the key Macro elements that trigger the cycle of American wealth creation.

The documentary is meant for lawmakers, bureaucrats, business leaders and citizens of nations.

According to Mr. Ramesh Kulkarni, Founder of the Center and author of the documentary, "Aid and donations cannot be a long term solution. Global poverty can be eradicated only through 'systemic' changes. Key and critical laws and systems need to be implemented. The American way identifies and elucidates these key structural changes for poor and developing nations."

Aboutthe Center for introspection & enlightenment Foundation - Canada A non-profit organization, the Center had recently launched 'Initiatives for a utopian world based on Science & Technology' and released a documentaryEverything is One.

Ramesh Kulkarni, Founder of the Center and author of these films, has worked in theIT industry for 25 years.

View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cie-releases-new-documentary-the-american-way-connecting-the-dots---to-inspire--reboot-the-global-economy-301065598.html

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CIE releases new documentary "The American Way. Connecting the dots..." - To inspire & reboot the global economy - Yahoo Finance

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Time for whites to be as angry as African Americans about the stupidity of racism – Kent Sterling

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by Kent Sterling May 31, 2020

this protest by Colin Kaepernick bothered me. I am more bothered by the obvious and odious issue he was bringing attention to.

Racism has always baffled me, so I ignored it.

Thats what I do when I am confrontedwith humanitys insistence upon making our world less pleasant and loving. Its as though we want to make our lives more challenging through self-imposed trials and challenges.

Racismdoesnt make sense, so while I was horrified by the killingof George Floyd by a Minneapolis policeman, I have not acted. When I hear of blacks being targeted by police, I grieve for the loss of their hopes forfair treatment. The riots that followed are tragic expressions of righteous anger by some and a thirst for anarchy by opportunists.

Click herefor your copy of Oops the Art of Learning from Mistakes and Adventures by Kent Sterling

For many whites, the source of racism isnt simply a need to hate. People are insistent upon succeeding whatever that means to them and elevating themselves by standing on the backs of others is one strategy to gain an advantage. From a pragmatic perspective, racism appears to be little more thanthe race of the majority suppressing aminorityrace to liftitself. Its a morally bankrupt ideology, but it continues to be expressed and felt in a variety of ways.

White people are at a distinct disadvantage when discussing racism because we have no idea what it feels like to be preyed upon in the way African Americansare. Efforts to empathize are well-intended but ultimately fail becauseimagining what its like to be discriminated against and actually being someone is fundamentally different.

My strategy in dealing with racism has been to quietlyreject it. I try to treat all people equally, believing that racism is best fought on a micro level, one person at a time. Obviously, thats not getting the job done. Racism is not going to fade because non-racists continue to treat all people as equals. Its the racists that need to change.

So the question becomes, how do we compel racists to alter their core belief that blacks are a sub-class rather than part of humanity? Weve tried shame, logic, and occasional moments of enlightenment when racistswere prosecuted for crimes driven by their hatred or pragmatism. We wind up with an unending series of atrocities and protests/riots.

Furious riots in Ferguson, Watts, Detroit, and Minneapolis have exploded, been extinguished,and nothing has changed. Blacks are still targeted, persecuted, and killed because of the color of their skin. Dr. Martin Luther King and Malcolm X led movements against racism and were assassinated. Great thinkers and writers like James Baldwin and Alex Haley have made us think. Athletes like Colin Kaepernick, John Carlos, and Tommie Smith made us angry before weunderstood that the only thing that gets our attention is what pisses us off.

Nothing has changed.

The time has come for us to take racism as a personal affront an expression of extreme narrow-mindedness and stupidity that requiresan immediate and loudresponse. When people insult our wives, mothers, and children, our emotions flare and defensive reflexes are engaged. Whether through physical or loud verbal confrontation, we bring a consequence upon those who enrage us.

We need to engage with those who express hatred toward minorities with the same zeal we reserve for our family and friends. If we are all brothers, then letssafeguard one another as we would family members.

Not sure punchingracists would change minds, but at this point its more important to not repeat mistakes than to coddle these fools, and white people dismissing racism as not my fight has been an American mistake dating back to the 1600s.

I used to think that racism would certainly cycle out of our society during my lifetime, despite 400 years of history that screamed the opposite, so now Im going to do something about it in the small way I can. Racist yammering and actions I witness will be met withgreat vengeance andfurious anger.

In the past, racists believed they had safe harbor in my presence because Im white. Those days are over. Im done editing out racism from conversations rather than confronting it.

.

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June 1st, 2020 at 6:45 am

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Dairy Food Market 2020: What Is Creating Robust Demand In Market? – 3rd Watch News

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Dairy Food Market 2020: What Is Creating Robust Demand In Market? - 3rd Watch News

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June 1st, 2020 at 6:45 am

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Keralas successful battle against the virus – The New Indian Express

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In a state perennially given to fruitless political strife, ingrained bureaucratic arrogance and rampant corruption, the sheer earnestness of Keralas recent face-off with Covid-19 surprised Malayalis more than anyone else. In the post-Independence history of governance in Kerala, nothing similar had ever happened: The government actually made moves in a consistent manner to attend to the well-being of people. The handling of the massive floods in August 2018 had elements of this, but that was essentially an area-focussed, intensive rescue effort. The adversary, water, was right there under ones nose. The coronavirus, however, had put the whole state under its alien shadowand it was invisible.

The response of the LDF government to the virus threat was remarkable in its determination and zeal. It is possible to argue that sheer existential terror brought about the shift from lethargy, incompetence and indifferencewhich has characterised governance in Kerala ever since the state came into existenceto committed involvement. There certainly could be truth in it. But even to channelise fear into a combat mode, a spark is needed. However much one may dislike to say it in times of totalitarian dreams sprouting everywhere including India, that spark could be leadership. The state everywhere is a leviathan with a hazy mind. It cannot be a leader. A person becomes the face of the state.

One can say emphatically that in the corona crisis, Keralas CM Comrade Pinarayi Vijayan represented that leadership. He became the face of Keralas corona resistance. His daily press conferences came to be more eagerly watched than The Ramayana reloaded. The person directly in charge of the Covid battle, Comrade K K Shailaja, the health minister, complemented Vijayan in her own unadorned but firm style. She is a natural leader minus the weight of seniority and patriarchal authority that Vijayan commands. In a Kerala thats slowly but inevitably shifting from its male supremacy paradigm, being a woman has only worked in her favour, if that mattered at all.

What sets both these communists apart from the usual politician, communist or non-communist, is a simple trait: a grave, no-nonsense approach to issues. If Vijayan is ponderous and magisterial, Shailaja is sprightly and unpretentiousand tough. Vijayans style, along with obedience, triggers fear and caution. He has the additional advantage that he controls both the party and governmentwith an iron hand. That goes a long way in the smooth transmission of the processes of decision-making and implementation. You could call him a dictator if you wish. But the description wouldnt exactly fit, either. Shailajas leadership has a feminine forcefulness that inspires teamwork. Both are communists first and communists last. Virus or no virus, the party comes first.

Theyve worked hard. And considering the corona predictions for the immediate future, its going to be a long haul for them. Surely they must be enjoying the rewardswords of appreciation that rarely come a politicians way. Both Kerala and Shailaja hit international headlines several times. One suspects it was not just the spirited fight Kerala put up against the virus that attracted media attention. The capitalist media seems to have been fascinated by the fact that communists were accomplishing such a feat. And that a lady comrade was the field commander.

Ranged behind these two were the government personnelthousands of officials, health workers and police who didnt go by the clock and often risked their lives in the physical handling of patients. In the no-mans land of Keralas bureaucratic quagmire, health professionals had always stood apart as a different breed who, in general, stayed committed to their responsibilities to the people. They were the foot soldiers leading the corona fight from the front. The participation of thousands of women, in various capacities, gave the battle a different synergy. Platforms of womens empowerment like Kudumbashree and ASHA delivered priceless service. The police, not always extolled for humanitarian concerns, was exemplary in carrying out their new role as guardians of public health. Add to it over 2,00,000 volunteers who provided hands-on support at the grassroots.

That is only one part of the story. The other part derives from Keralas historical tryst, in the sixties and seventies, with a development model born out of socialist ideals and democratic convictions. Arising from a humanist perception that could be described as Left and Gandhian, it sought to directly touch the lives of the people in key areas like education and health. That was how a multi-level healthcare network was created which, in a poor society like Kerala, produced results equalling developed nations in the human development index. Equally radical was the broadening and strengthening of democratic institutions at the ground level through a process of decentralisation in which women, for the first time, occupied key roles. These two networks of democracy, despite being battered by vested interests both inside and outside successive governments, have precariously survived and today they are the backbone of the fight against corona.

The success of Keralas corona battle is much more than the sum of its parts. In the final analysis it was underwritten by the progressive values infused into the Malayali psyche by Keralas historic Enlightenment spearheaded by great humanists like Narayana Guru and Ayyankali. Those values have survived murderous onslaughts by sectarian forces and underlie all civilisational leaps in Kerala. The corona fight was such a leap. it was an expression of Keralas democratic commitment, however flawed; secular credentials, however bruised; communal harmony, however besieged; scientific temper, however cornered. Thats why to each one of those women and men be they SC/ST, BC, Dalit, Hindu, Moslem or Christian who fought the corona war, it was beyond the pale of imagination to segregate hospital beds on a religious basis as happened elsewhere in India.

Paul Zacharia

Award-winning fiction writer

(paulzacharia3@gmail.com)

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Keralas successful battle against the virus - The New Indian Express

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June 1st, 2020 at 6:45 am

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The Trump and Barr un-reality Twitter show – National Catholic Reporter

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Today, I am going to do something I never, ever thought I would do: Rise to the defense of Twitter. Call me guilty of moral relativism, but I find myself inclined to support almost any person or thing that President Donald Trump attacks, even if I have long harbored my own concerns about that person or thing.

Last week, Trump signed an executive order that strips social media outlets like Twitter of some of their liability protection. Except that the relevant statute, Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, does not give the president any special powers to narrow or expand the liability provisions contained in the law beyond his constitutional duty to see that the laws are faithfully enforced. Just as he did the week before when he demanded that churches be reopened without any real legal role in opening or closing churches, Trump is singing from the King Canute hymnal, ordering the waves to recede.

When the president signed the faux executive order in the Oval Office, he was flanked by Attorney General William Barr. Barr functions like a big brother to the president, willing to fend off legal bullies who might obstruct his expansive understanding of Article II of the Constitution, which establishes presidential powers. "I have an Article 2 where I have the right to do whatever I want as president," Trump famously said last year.

Barr seems unwilling to explain to his chief that his understanding of his executive powers is not exactly correct. The attorney general is a fan of executive power, so maybe he just wants to see how far down the field Trump can carry the football. But Barr could at least point out, as his own oath of office compels him to do, that when Trump says "I have an Article 2," he misunderstands the nature of the document, that Article 2 belongs to all of us, as do the other articles, that the opening words of that document are "We the People" not "I alone can fix it."

When George Orwell penned his classic 1984, he did not have Barr in mind when he referred to Big Brother. His concern was totalitarian influence. While the world witnessed the horror of state control in the 20th century, we have also become increasingly worried about corporate control. This is not new. In the 1950s, social critics were deeply concerned and very vocal about the need to resist corporate-sponsored conformism and they celebrated a highly individualistic understanding of freedom. (Corporate marketeers took note!) Historian George Marsden wrote brilliantly about these critics in his book The Twilight of the American Enlightenment, which I reviewed here, and those critics were writing long before there was an internet!

Now, many Americans are as worried about corporate Big Brother as his governmental sibling, and that worry is very much focused on Big Tech. I remember the first time I searched online for a consumer purchase and soon found pop-up ads from companies I had never heard of flooding my inbox. It creeped me out. It still does, so I try really hard not to do any online searches for consumer products.

The irony of all this is that the concern Trump raises is not entirely wrong-headed, but he is the last person on the planet to champion the issue. If the premise for the conferral of liability protection is that social media platforms only serve as conduits for other people's information, then they really should not have to spend millions of dollars monitoring what is said on their platform. If you do not like what is said on the street corner, you can't sue the street, or the corner. But, then, on what basis should social media platforms be marking some items as suspicious and others not? On the other hand, if they had an especially prominent client routinely spreading misinformation, how can they justify ignoring that fact?

Back in 1996, who would have thought a public figure, let alone the president of the United States, would be the one whose conspiracy theories were so outrageous they needed to be flagged by Twitter? They flagged his false claims about voter fraud, but even more morally worrisome were the tweets that trafficked in the conspiracy theory that "Morning Joe" host and former GOP Congressman Joe Scarborough is guilty of murder. Sadly, that is where we are, and now that same president raises a worthwhile concern not because he thinks it has any merit, but because he worries some of his more than 80 million followers might begin to question his infallible utterances if Twitter places its red flag, inviting readers to check the facts.

Through the looking glass, Alice!

The president's behavior and comments are so untethered from reality, no one should be terribly surprised that the irony of his executive order is lost on him. But what is Barr's excuse? Has he also abandoned any concern for truth? Has he become that particular kind of sycophant who convinces himself that, without his presence, the unhinged principal would be even more reckless? He is not a former reality TV star. This is his second stint at the Justice Department. What moral calculation is he making to justify his involvement with this nonsense?

The problems with Twitter are many, and almost none of them would be solvable by executive order or legislation, even if it were put forward in good faith by a morally serious president. Twitter is a mirror that also accelerates our human capacity for reflexive vindictiveness. As if that ugly character trait needed acceleration! There is a reason I do not tweet but only use this medium for providing a link to my articles, putting them into the bloodstream of the commentariat. The fact that I sleep on a column, and that other eyes see it before publication, is no absolute guarantee that my opinions are judicious, but it helps.

What does not help is a president who rode Twitter to prominence, used it to dominate and divert and degrade the nation's political discourse, and now complains that it demands a sliver of accountability for his reckless tweets. And more than complain, he signs an executive order that will have no concrete effect but is a rallying point for his mobs and a threat to his enemies. Maybe it is not only Alice who slips through the looking glass, maybe it is the American Il Duce too. And the larger question is whether or not he will drag the rest of us with him as he has already dragged Bill Barr.

[Michael Sean Winters covers the nexus of religion and politics for NCR.]

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The Trump and Barr un-reality Twitter show - National Catholic Reporter

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June 1st, 2020 at 6:45 am

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Radical Repair: Log 48 in Conversation with Mabel O. Wilson – ArchDaily

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Radical Repair: Log 48 in Conversation with Mabel O. Wilson

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The center of architecture is shifting and cannot hold, writes guest editor Bryony Roberts in Log 48: Expanding Modes of Practice. This moment of change, in which issues of inequity and intersectionality are coming to the fore, represents an invitation to think differently, a chance to reask the questions that haunted the 20th century. To that end, Roberts conducted a series of interviews with experimental architects exploring new forms of practice, including this conversation with Mabel O. Wilson.

Mabel O. Wilson is a scholar and designer who has become a leading voice in discussions on space, politics, and memory in black America. She is the Nancy and George Rupp Professor of Architecture at Columbia University, as well as a professor in African American and African Diasporic Studies and the associate director of the Institute for Research in African American Studies. Her books include Begin with the Past: Building the National Museum of African American History and CultureandNegro Building: Black Americans in the World of Fairs and Museums. Her interdisciplinary practice Studio & is part of the architectural team that designed the Memorial to Enslaved African American Laborers at the University of Virginia. She is also a founding member of Who Builds Your Architecture?, a collective that advocates for fair labor practices on building sites worldwide. We talked at an outdoor cafe near Columbia on one of the last warm days in fall 2019.

Bryony Roberts: The catalogue for Torkwase Dysons show 1919: Black Water, which opened at Columbias Arthur Ross Architecture Gallery in September, includes a great conversation between you and the artist. You talked about the importance of decolonizing the tools of creation and listed some as the book, the argument, the essay, and the memorial. This was after a longer conversation about decolonizing form. Could you talk more about how you approach decolonizing these tools in your own practice as someone who makes books, forms, and arguments?

Mabel O. Wilson: Well the root problem is decolonizing knowledge. There is a Peruvian sociologist who recently died, Anbal Quijano, who said we have to decolonize the episteme.

The Western body of knowledge that everyone takes for granted as universal actually isnt. It has multiple histories and origins, and there are other bodies of knowledge ways of knowing and naming and understanding subjectivity in the world that are not Western at all. They were not necessarily centered on the individual, on the human body, on the subjectivity of liberalism. Even in the so-called West Europe or pre-Europe there were other ways of being in the world.

But the trick about the Western episteme, and you see this meticulously analyzed in Foucaults writings, is that it becomes universal. Thats its trick. It absorbs all other bodies of knowledge and posits that theres only one body of knowledge and one way of being in the world. Architecture is part and parcel of that its the Western practice of building. Ive come to the realization that the art of building is part of the formation of the Western episteme.

We can see how other cultures built the Incans, the Chinese dynasties, Mori tribespeople in ways that werent necessarily the Western methods of architecture. Im talking about conceptualization and modalities of representation, like drawing, that rely on paper, ink, and geometric projection. Europeans did not invent geometry per se but borrowed concepts from ancient Greece and Islam. These tools were combined into a discourse and a discipline of architecture, which solidified by the 18th century. In the 19th century, architecture was a body of knowledge that was institutionalized within both a profession and modern universities. This all emerged alongside colonialism, which fueled the wealth of Europe and enabled the construction of museums, theaters, and government buildings. Architectures function was, in part, to house the modern nation-state and modern liberal society.

So those tools are what we inherit. Thats what we teach. Thats what we practice. But they have a very particular history.

BR: So, how do you think about your own process of writing, researching, and designing?

MW: I found early on, when I kept trying to explore black neighborhoods, spaces, and histories, that the language, tools, and techniques of architecture were completely inadequate because theyre not made to register and give meaning to those things. So, I was constantly developing new techniques, hybridizing them, turning things inside out, questioning, and renaming in order to begin to even record those spaces and imagine what those spaces could be. I looked at literature, art, and other creative ways that people have done work on these subjects and then tried to translate them into architecture.

BR: Torkwase Dyson describes black compositional thought as a way of improvising spaces and objects of liberation in an oppressive system. That resonates with what you describe in your book Negro Building and also with what you and I researched in our project Marching On. But alongside these ways of appropriating and manipulating a found system, there are recent moments of visible institution building, like the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which in some ways takes on the monumentality of the colonial system. Do you see the improvisational techniques as being replaced by institution-building or as a means of creating alternative kinds of institutions?

MW: I think that there are two trajectories. One is Afro-pessimism, which argues that the Enlightenment project, including its institutions, is bankrupt given the contradiction of the presence of freedom alongside slavery, so there has never been a place for people of color to find liberation within it. Were never going to survive in that system. And I think theyre right. But Im more aligned with the optimistic position that were going to have to survive somehow. Were going to have to make some way of being human in the world intellectually, in the mind, and also in the body, materially. So the optimist in me believes that to do that were just going to have to make do and rework what we have.

Thats why I think challenging and changing institutions is important, and the new African American museum is the perfect example, because it took 100 years to come into fruition. Different generations kept trying and trying again. It didnt happen overnight. That was primarily because the archive was never meant to collect the culture of black peoples because the belief was that if you were African or of African descent, you had no history.

Thats what Kant argued, Hegel expanded, and European intellectuals debated, and the concept spread. So, often theres little black history in the institutional archives. The Smithsonian collected almost nothing of black people from its founding in the mid-19th century. The project of the African American museum was not only to build a museum but also to build a collection. They had to make an archive of black life in America because there wasnt one. So institutionally, its a really radical proposition.

BR: So is it useful to work with the normative conventions of institutions to gain a place in a canon? Or is it important to just create new methods and new forums that dont follow those rules?

MW: I think you can do both. At some point, there are certain things concepts, practices, or methods that are just going to be exhausted, and you have to leave them behind. But there are also ways of working with what exists. For the Smithsonian to take on a project to build a black museum, particularly at this moment of such division, was a radical act. And now the museum is in a position to help a lot of other institutions, smaller black museums, and to transform other Smithsonian museums as well. So it is impactful.

BR: Youve talked about how the institution of architecture has served as an instrument of oppression. For example, at the University of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson used elevational changes in section to obscure slave labor. Can you expand on that?

MW: An article could be written about Jefferson and the way he uses the section to hide what he knows to be a disavowal of his fundamental Enlightenment values. With Monticello, he develops all the dependencies below ground. The best signifier of that is the dining rooms dumbwaiter. The enslaved waiter remained unseen because he would just place the bottle on the dumbwaiter and pull it up. The other bodies in the intimate spaces of the main house were kept at bay or kept outside.

Jefferson did the same thing at the University of Virginia. All of the areas where the enslaved people worked were below the pavilions or in the gardens that everyone thinks were formal gardens but were actually work yards. Those areas werent meant to be seen. If you did happen to walk through that zone, your eye was delighted by the serpentine walls, right? So the aesthetic beauty of the brick wall shields the brutal labor of the enslaved just on the other side.

BR: A lot of your work is to bring history into the present and to wrestle with stories that werent fully told or werent recorded. Im wondering how you work with someone elses personal history or the reconstruction of someone elses memory. How do you approach telling stories of people who are not here and can no longer speak for themselves?

MW: Part of it is personal not knowing my family history, for instance, and trying to understand why that information was unknown. Ive been piecing it together through genealogical research over the years, which has been fascinating. I had a white friend in college who said once, I can trace my family back to 12th-century France. He had the evidence to show a famous poet in his family lineage. By contrast, I didnt know much about my family before my grandparents. Black folks just dont talk about those painful histories. So Ive always been curious.

When I studied architecture as an undergraduate, I learned canonical history, primarily European history, but I sort of felt like an outsider not seeing myself in these narratives. Why should I care about the Villa Lante, for example, which is absolutely beautiful and its proportions are perfect, but in the end the heritage of the Italian aristocracy was somewhat meaningless to me. Now, of course, I find it utterly fascinating through its social history, its connection to the development of mercantile capitalism in Italy, and what it means to own land outside the city. But thats not how architectural history was being taught at the time as a social history.

The first opportunity that I had to consider black history and architecture was in a studio as an undergrad at UVA. We had a site named Oregon Hill in Richmond, Virginia, next to a very famous cemetery with a large pyramid that was a Civil War monument to the 18,000 Confederate soldiers buried there. On the cemeterys other side was a black community, in the Randolph neighborhood. I was interested in the black community too, so I just expanded my site across the cemetery and into Randolph. That move in my project engaged the racialized spatial politics and histories of Richmond.

When I came to Columbias GSAPP to do my masters degree, I was interested in probing these questions. My final project looked at race head-on through the lens of a single-family suburban house. I examined how the history and spaces of the house had been racialized by covenants and redlining. Levittowns exclusivity no blacks or Jews was produced by those restrictions. So my project unpacked the racial exclusions buried in suburban domestic spaces and construction. Aunt Jemima, after all, still lurks in the kitchen cabinet!

In my project, I was extremely interested in how history and, more specifically, methods of drawing can dissect and transform the meaning of architectural representation and architectural history. That became a long-term project, one that has nonetheless been challenging because studying race, racialization, and racism in the disciplines of architecture and architectural history has made people uncomfortable.

Currently, Im wrapping up a collection of essays with Irene Cheng and Charles Davis called Race and Modern Architecture: A Critical History from the Enlightenment to the Present, and, in a way, its the project that I really wanted to undertake as my dissertation. But now, instead of just my voice, its 18 voices that explore race as part and parcel of the formation of modernity and modernism.

BR: Who are some of the people now, both in writing history and in design practices, who are inspiring to you?

MW: I think the work of Charles Davis, my coeditor, is really timely and thorough. Its been great working and thinking with him about how the racial shapes modern bodies of knowledge. Darell Fields did a lot of the early work that was really impactful, and Irene Chengs work is also brilliant and probing important histories. We have some great people in the book: Dianne Harris, who wrote an important history titled Little White Houses, which explored how architecture helped build the whiteness of American suburbia in the 1950s; Mark Crinsons scholarship on imperialism and the racial made important strides; Reinhold Martin, my colleague from Columbia, who has been thinking through the implications of racial difference in his work on American universities. We want the book to serve as a primer that can be foundational to future research. We want our proposition to be debated.

But I also look at artists like Torkwase, who explores blackness through space and the language of architecture. This semester my studio is framed by concepts from the artist Kader Attia, who posits radical repair through reappropriating and transforming modernist architecture.

BR: Your work with Columbias Global Africa Lab also opens up other modes of representing these histories, can you talk about that?

MW: Along with my codirector Mario Gooden, weve been developing data spatialization techniques to look at complex landscapes, like post-apartheid Johannesburg, to ask if its really no longer divided. In some ways, it is unified. People move more freely. But in other ways, economic inequalities and racial stratification remain embedded. Working with data spatialization has helped us show that despite media images representing the city as world-class, neoliberalism and globalization are nonetheless reproducing precisely the same inequalities as apartheid.

BR: How do you work with these representational tools in a studio context? How do you transition from analysis into the design process?

MW: In terms of pedagogy, Ive always found it helpful to show how representational techniques have their histories and their limits. You have to understand what the tools actually produce so that you could use them to produce not what you already know but new knowledge new ways of working.

To spatialize data we used Rhino for the last six years, with software plugins developed by Carson Smuts, a researcher in the Global Africa Lab, to scrape and spatialize data from social media feeds like Twitter. We used it to trace how people move through and occupy the city. These types of mappings prompted a radical rethinking of the tools and techniques. But also, these tools and techniques document the transformation of cities over time, animating daily life as well as history in the making.

For my current advanced studio at Columbias GSAPP, were looking at the theme of repair and reparations. Students have worked on an object of radical repair, where they take two objects and try to use one to repair the other. Weve looked at the artist Jan Vormann, who patches stone and brick walls around the world with LEGO bricks. It produces this playful but also incongruent landscape attentive to the everyday. Weve also been interested in the artist Yeesookyung, who breaks apart beautiful ceramic vases and then reconstructs them in these crazy monstrous ways with gold adhesive.

The studio asks what would those techniques produce when you start to think about repair at the urban scale. My students examined the Cross Bronx Expressway, which forms a gash in those Bronx neighborhoods. So what would a protocol of repair do for the inequalities that are rampant in the South Bronx, how do we give them a stronger voice in the public sphere of the city? We arent interested in restoration to return it to the thing that it was but instead we are asking students to engage in actions of radical repair that recognize the transformation of time and the violent acts that have produced disruption and social divisions.

BR: How do you see the agency of design in the face of this historical violence? What might the design of radical repair look like?

MW: We need to delve into all aspects of architectures frameworks its historical formation, its tools of representation, its academic structure, and its professional organization. All of these facets of the discipline emerge from the Western episteme and are thus just as entangled with the racial, racialization, race, and its legacy as they are with capitalism, another parallel modern formation. When it comes to radical repair, I like to rework Audre Lordes declaration on power and institutions in the form a question, can the masters tools dismantle the masters house?

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Radical Repair: Log 48 in Conversation with Mabel O. Wilson - ArchDaily

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June 1st, 2020 at 6:45 am

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Can multiculturalism survive the new Cold War? – MacroBusiness

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The answer is yes but it needs to toughen up.

At heart, Australian multiculturalism is a post-modern phenomenon. It is the ultimate manifestation of global psychology and the death of God. Only in a world in which secularism dominates can such a society exist.

That is, AM is a figment of enlightenment thinking. It is a pure social expression of hundreds of years of rationalist doctrine culminating in a liberal state in which all faiths and identities can co-exist peacefully.

The problem is, it now faces a pre-enlightenment system launching a sustained assault to control it. The Chinese Communist Party is pre-modern and fascist, preaching a rubric of total social control, obedience to a god-like emperor, equipped with cults of personality, technology surveillance and terror.

It is unabashedly pre-enlightenment.

Victoria is the test case today for this clash of post- and pre-modern. It is the most progressive, read post-modern, state in Australia. It has a leader steeped in this value-system such that he is happy to court all comers, via The Australian:

Meet Jean Dong. She is the 33-year-old Chinese-Australian businesswoman who by her own description is on a global journey of influence.

A professionally filmed and edited YouTube biography provides an extraordinary insight into the life of the young woman who is emerging as a key player in the unfolding political row over Victorian Premier Daniel Andrewss controversial decision to sign up to Chinas Belt and Road Initiative.

In the short promotional film, Ms Dong claims to have played key roles in bringing about the China-Australia free-trade agreement, and Victorias Belt and Road Initiative deal, telling the story of her journey from student journalist in Beijing, to rubbing shoulders with Australian prime ministers and premiers and Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Even his own party cant hold a candle to the embrace, also at The Australian:

Anthony Albanese says Australia will not join Chinas Belt and Road Initiative if he wins the next election, after Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews was criticised for his governments agreement with the Asian superpower.

It was the first time the Opposition Leader has confirmed a future Labor government under his leadership would not support Chinas controversial global infrastructure and trade strategy.

When pressed several times if he supported Mr Andrewss BRI deal, Mr Albanese said he never backed it and would not support a similar agreement with China if he became prime minister by 2022.

There is nothing intrinsically pre-modern about Australian Chinese. They have taken to, and contributed to, the Australian multicultural phenomenon as well as, if not better, than many ethnicities.

But the community is also claimed by the pre-modern state from which they come. And they are vulnerable to its manipulations and intimidation, if for no other reason than many still have family trapped within the clutches of the fascist state.

This opens up a difficult and perhaps irreconcilable question for AM. Dan Andrews does not mind exploiting the Australian Chinese community, indeed as a pollie, thats his job, via The Age:

The Victorian Labor Party used the politics of the states controversial Belt and Road agreement with China as an electoral weapon to help the Andrews government win votes in three seats with a high number of Chinese-Australians in its 2018 election victory.

As the Labor government continues to shrug off pressure to walk away from its memorandum of understanding with China, a prominent Australian China-watcher has highlighted how Premier Daniel Andrews and his colleagues used the relationship with China to win votes.

A senior manager with Labors election campaign told The Age on Monday that the agreement, and the controversy it sparked, helped Labor gain the winning edge in three eastern suburbs seats with high numbers of voters of Chinese descent.

Mr Andrews signed the first Belt and Road MOU in October 2018, just a month before the first-term Labor government faced voters at the election.

In doing so, Victoria became part of the Chinese governments $1 trillion global infrastructure investment program that its critics say is an attempt by the Communist nation to exert economic and strategic influence around the world.

News of the deal sparked a storm of criticism from the Coalition at state and federal levels, with Victorian Liberals demanding to see what was in the text signed by the Premier. Mr Andrews eventually bowed to pressure and published the document.

A senior Labor operative said the signing of the agreement itself was not a vote driver in the Chinese community but that the the oppositions vitriolic response handed Labor the material for a negative campaign against the Liberals in the seats of Box Hill, Burwood and Mount Waverly.

Deputy campaign director Kosmos Samaras said the ALPs culturally and linguistically diverse campaign unit swung into action, deploying Chinese-language media adverts, videos posted on Facebook and the popular messaging app WeChat, all painting the Liberals as hostile to the Chinese community.

Chinese language phone banks were also used to speak directly to voters, spruiking Labors messages.

And so we find ourselves at a paradox and impasse. Post-modern AM welcomes all. But the pre-modern CCP abuses that very liberalism to undermine itself with the long term result that freedom itself dies. Yet, if we cut off the flow of Chinese immigrants, the principle upon which AM is based is debased.

Moreover, the Chinese Australian community itself requires protection from this menace.

The obvious and brute answer is to import no more ethnic Chinese. But that is a hypocritical outcome that fundamentally alters the compact of AM: that if you come to Australia then you will be an Australian welcomed to practice whatever notion of divinity or truth that you choose to believe in.

A better solution is to cut all immigration. Theres no need to go to zero. Halving it will take it back to a pace that bulwarks our society against CCP encroachments.

We are not helpless in this fight. We can and are pushing back to protect our marvelous post-modern system. But it needs to be protected from a pre-modern state that would impose its will upon the entirety of our little Nirvana.

He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.

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Can multiculturalism survive the new Cold War? - MacroBusiness

Written by admin

May 26th, 2020 at 8:47 pm

Posted in Enlightenment


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