October 27, 2023

Speaker Mike Johnson Condemned by Far-Right for Comments on His Black Son and George Floyd: 'Undercover Democrat?'

https://www.mediaite.com/politics/speaker-mike-johnson-condemned-by-far-right-for-comments-on-his-black-son-and-george-floyd-undercover-democrat/

Newly-minted Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) is taking incoming fire from both sides of the political spectrum. Once it became clear he would win the gavel on Wednesday, the left began to hammer him for his conservative social views and hawking of conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election. But the far-right, too, has found a bone to pick with Johnson.

In the wake of George Floyd’s death in 2020, Johnson said Floyd had been murdered — a jury later found that Officer Derek Chauvin had murdered him — and, in an interview with Walter Isaacson, suggested that his adopted black son was treated differently than his biological white son. Asked what he felt after watching the video of Floyd, Johnson replied:



He expanded on that thought later in the interview:



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https://twitter.com/MattWalshBlog/status/1717318345911886183

October 27, 2023

Bing Search Promotes neo-Nazi Active Clubs

The search engine, owned by Microsoft, has an AI feature that promotes the transnational neo-Nazi network.

https://globalextremism.org/post/bing-search-promotes-neo-nazi-active-clubs/



The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) has discovered that the search engine Bing, owned by Microsoft, promotes the neo-Nazi network known as Active Clubs through its Artificial Intelligence (AI) program.



When searching for “Active Clubs” on Bing, the search engine immediately refers the user to Rundo’s propaganda company Media2Rise’s definition of the term. The company has promoted fascist MMA tournaments featuring the SoCal Active Club, Patriot Front, Proud Boys, and White Lives Matter. Contrary to Rundo’s stated goal of using the network to facilitate “the revolutionary war,” Bing promotes content that highlights Rundo’s harmful messaging and tells the user that Active Clubs are simply a “club of activists united in shared beliefs.”

Active Clubs are a transnational white supremacist network conceptualized by American neo-Nazi Robert Rundo and Russian neo-Nazi Denis Kasputin to become a “leaderless resistance…like the minutemen in the early stages of the revolutionary war.” Active Clubs have already mobilized, protesting the Anti-Defamation League and numerous LGBTQ+ events, spreading conspiratorial antisemitic propaganda, and in early October 2023, having members with a history of violence show up at a mayoral candidates forum in Franklin, Tenn., a major suburb of Nashville. An event in Germany organized by an Active Club was banned in 2019 for its extremist connections and potential for violence. Rundo himself was recently arrested in Bucharest, Romania, and has been extradited to the United States to face a charge of conspiracy to violate the Anti-Riot Act based on his previous activities in his Rise Above Movement (RAM), including his attempts to incite political riots in Southern California and the 2017 hate rallies in Charlottesville. GPAHE recently documented 149 Active Clubs and similar far-right fighting groups across 21 countries, including 49 in the United States alone.

Bing uses AI to provide “additional searches that might be useful” when searching for something specific. However, suggested search terms lead the user to “active club clothing,” which Rundo’s merchandise brand, Will2Rise, sells. Immediately under the Media2Rise snippet are some prompts generated by Bing Chat, which Bing states to be a “conversation-based AI search tool offering comprehensive results for your complex questions and commands.” The prompts provided are worrying, as they promote Active Clubs to the user by suggesting they ask “How do I start one?” and “What are the benefits of joining?”

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October 26, 2023

Skyscrapers planned for Indigenous land "look like the future of Vancouver"

https://www.dezeen.com/2023/10/18/skyscrapers-squamish-vancouver-revery-architecture/







Revery Architecture has designed the Sen̓áḵw residential skyscrapers for the Squamish Nation's land in Vancouver, which will aid economic development and "benefit all Canadians", according to the Indigenous group. More than 11 residential towers, with heights ranging from 12 to 58 storeys, are planned for the development, as well as a series of smaller buildings. |Sen̓áḵw will be arranged around the Burrard Bridge, which connects Downtown Vancouver with the southwestern portions of the city.







The parcel of land is owned by the Squamish Nation government and is a fraction of the Indigenous group's ancestral homeland, which was expropriated from the group by European colonial settlers gradually over the last three centuries. Sen̓áḵw is planned on land that was won back in 2003 by the Squamish from the Canadian government after a lengthy legal dispute. Design architect Revery Architecture based the development on the concept of a "village in the park", which it says was informed "by the values and traditions of the Squamish Nation".







"The idea is to optimize the public realm with a new urban park supporting various forms of activity, circulation and landscapes," Revery Architecture principal Venelin Kokalov told Dezeen. The studio used two distinct typologies when designing the towers, which together spread out like a "Y", flanking the bridge and extending past it in two directions. The first typology has wider towers with sloped sides and is called "mountain" – the other, "long", has more vertical towers with copper fins running their height. The "long" towers have cores that are lifted off the ground to create the sensation of walking through a forest on ground level.







"This gesture increases the openness and porosity through the site, creates natural cover for outdoor areas, and forms a seamless connection between interior and exterior spaces at the ground level," said Kokalov. Glass facades will be punctuated with copper details on both structures, a material that was chosen for its "cultural significance" to the Squamish Nation.

Squamish Nation culture to be integrated "at all scales"







The team said it is working with community members to integrate the culture of the Squamish Nation "at all scales of the project". "The process was collaborative with a goal to honour the culture and heritage of the Squamish Nation," a representative from Nch'ḵay̓ Development Corporation, the Squamish government's development arm, told Dezeen. "This included consultation with Squamish members leading up to the land designation," said the representative, adding that a Cultural Working Group has been formed in the development process.







According to Nch'ḵay̓ Development Corporation, possessing a large rental development in the middle of one of the most expensive cities in North America will help the nation on the path to "complete economic independence". "As such, the project needs to consider the context of potential future development of the lands nearby, which are expected to increase in density significantly. In this context, the design and density of Sen̓áḵw is appropriate," the Nch'ḵay̓ representative said. "It looks like the future of Vancouver."

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October 26, 2023

Dean Dyson Architects uses perforated brickwork to create "private oasis" for Melbourne home

https://www.dezeen.com/2023/10/20/dean-dyson-architects-cloud-house-melbourne/







Australian studio Dean Dyson Architects has used an outer layer of perforated brickwork to create a sense of privacy and calm at this home in Melbourne, which turns inwards to overlook a central swimming pool. Named Cloud House, the five-bedroom home in the suburb of Malvern, occupies a long, narrow site that is surrounded by neighbouring properties. The overlooked nature of the site informed the approach of creating a "private oasis", with the home wrapped in grey, perforated brickwork and divided by a series of voids and gardens that provide views out while maintaining privacy.







"We fused together a combination of design techniques to create a private world for our clients," Dean Dyson Architects founder Dean Dyson told Dezeen. "The strategic placement of physical barriers and use of internal gardens help create a sense of privacy within the home," he continued. "Adopting to wrap the whole first floor in the solid brickwork prevents direct sight lines from surrounding buildings and public areas to private bedroom & bathroom spaces."







Split across two levels, the ground floor of the home contains an open living, dining and kitchen area alongside a music room, guest bedroom and swimming pool. Above, the first floor is designed to be more private, containing three bedrooms at the rear of the home and the main bedroom at the front, separated to create a "private, parents-only sanctuary."





Behind the outer skin of perforated brickwork, sliding glass windows can be opened to provide ventilation to this upper level. Voids between the two floors crossed by small bridges help to provide natural light as well as visual connections through the interiors, framing views over the central courtyard. "We wanted the home to have a wonderful sense of connection across multiple levels with moments of pause that allowed the homeowners areas of visual engagement and connection," explained Dyson. "We used the voids as natural markers to define the moments of spatial transition as you flow down through the home."

October 26, 2023

Field Architecture clads flowing Sonoma Valley house in copper

https://www.dezeen.com/2023/10/20/field-architecture-sonoma-house-copper/









California studio Field Architecture designed this Sonoma Valley house out of a trio of fanning copper-clad pavilions with butterfly roofs. Named Madrone Ridge, the 4,920 square-foot (460 square-metre) house sits within the watershed of northern California's Russian River.











Dry in the summers with heavy rainfall in the winter, the area's geography informed the design, as did the client's desire to co-inhabit the land with the region's plants and animals. "We looked to the bush – those forested, undeveloped areas of nature that surround the house – while allowing the built structures to adapt to the natural terrain," the studio said.











"By simultaneously folding the house inward on itself and reaching outward to the land, we established a homestead in a transitional space that sustains human activity as well as wildlife." Palo Alto-based Field Architecture designed the home around the presence and absence of water in the unique microclimate, with the project completed in 2021.











"The cyclical presence of water metaphorically carves a path through the house and captures the poetic experience of falling and flowing water, rejoicing in this precious resource." the studio said. "By surrendering the manmade environment to the same natural forces that shape the land, the house collaborates with the natural hydrological systems that nurture the landscape." Tucked among trees on a hill overlooking the valley's vineyards, the house welcomes residents and visitors along a gravel and stone pathway.

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October 26, 2023

Drinkar till halloween (Drinks for Halloween)

https://www.ica.se/artikel/drinkar-till-halloween/









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October 26, 2023

One of the last lesbian bars in the US was set on fire in California this weekend

https://www.reckon.news/lgbtq/2023/10/one-of-the-last-lesbian-bars-in-the-us-was-set-on-fire-in-california-this-weekend.html



One of the few queer-women bars left in the country was a victim of arson on Friday, and the owners are stressing that it wasn’t a hate crime. As stated on their Instagram bio, Gossip Grill is a “women-forward safe space,” with the trans flag to signal that it is trans-friendly on top of being queer-friendly. The bar is based in Hillcrest, known as the center of the LGBTQ scene in San Diego, Calif.

The fact that there are just 27 lesbian bars left in the US today makes the incident even more significant. Since their peak in the 1980s, when there were around 200 in the country, lesbian bars have been on the decline, according to The Lesbian Bar Project, which chronicles the few remaining spaces focused on queer women, trans and nonbinary people.

Gentrification and rising rent has been a major issue for lesbian bars, according to Krista Burton, author of Moby Dyke, an investigation of the disappearance of America’s lesbian bars. In an interview with the Washington Post, she opens up about struggling to keep track of the lesbian bars that kept closing, especially given the pandemic’s financial impact on queer and trans-owned businesses. “It is incredibly sad when a place closes, because what ends is that time in our lives,” Burton said to the Washington Post.

Lesbian bars still matter to the LGBTQ community – they’re important community spaces where people of marginalized genders can gather to socialize, support each other, and feel safe and accepted. The destruction of a lesbian bar can feel like a huge loss to the entire LGBTQ community. “[Lesbian bars] are community centers, they’re fun places to meet other lesbians and/or bisexual women. And they can be sexy spaces,” said feminist writer Roxane Gay in The Smithsonian in 2021. “I think that they’re vital.”

So what exactly happened to Gossip Grill?.......

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October 26, 2023

The EU and the inevitability of immigration

Climate change and socio-economic trends will make large-scale migrations inevitable in the coming decades.

https://www.socialeurope.eu/the-eu-and-the-inevitability-of-immigration


Asylum-seekers arrive at Lampedusa: the EU has opted for a policing, not a humanitarian, response

For two years, every day, as I walked my daughter from the parking lot to the kindergarten of the European School in the Kirchberg district of Luxembourg City, I strolled past the street sign of the Rue Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi and often found myself wondering idly who he was. To my shame, it was only by the time my daughter was well into her high-school years that I found out that Richard Nikolaus Eijiro, count of Coudenhove-Kalergi, had co-founded the first movement for a united Europe (the Pan European Union) in 1922, proposed Schiller’s Hymn to Joy as united Europe’s anthem, proposed a Europe Day in May, received the Charlemagne Prize from the city of Aachen—and supposedly served as a model for the character of Viktor Laszlo, the resistance hero and Humphry Bogart’s romantic rival played by Paul Henreid in Casablanca.

Coudenhove-Kalergi also wrote several books, one of which deserves mentioned not so much because of the largely aristocratic vision it extols but rather a tiny paragraph about the future of the European population. The book is entitled Praktischer Idealismus and the paragraph in question has inspired one of the longest enduring right-wing conspiracy theories: the so-called ‘Kalergi plan’. I mention this brief text as a paradoxical counterpoint to Hans Kundnani’s recent book, Eurowhiteness, where the author argues that pro-Europeanism is ‘analogous to nationalism—something like nationalism but on a larger, continental scale’, and that the EU itself has ‘become a vehicle for imperial amnesia’ defining itself in terms of culture and religion, in other words, ‘whiteness’, especially following the refugee influx of 2015. It is difficult not to sympathise with this perspective when the Italian prime minister and the president of the European Commission talk about the ‘borders of Europe’ after their visit to Lampedusa.

Fleeing poverty or danger

Over the first three quarters of 2023, around 85,000 migrants reached the coast of Italy with their own precarious means, while almost 40,000 were rescued at sea and more than 5,000 arrived on boats operated by various non-governmental organisations. While these numbers of people, either fleeing poverty or physical danger, should hardly make a country of 50 million people—let alone a continent of 450 million—lament a siege or invasion, at the same time across Europe immigration is more and more perceived, and played up, as a crisis of our identity and a threat to our way of life. No political party, national or supranational authority, NGO or opinion-maker seems able to look beyond the ‘immigration crisis’ frame, according to which we are witnessing a temporary surge in unlawful entries driven as much by conflict and poverty as by human traffickers—in other words, a combination of unfortunate political-economic circumstances and criminal actions, to be addressed through larger foreign aid and stricter coastguard patrols.

It is usual at this point to observe that paradoxically almost every EU country has been experiencing labour shortages, population ageing and birth rate decline—all of which, barring a revolution in that same way of life we are so eager to protect, can only be balanced through an increase in immigration. Kalergi’s vision of a cosmopolitan and hybrid Europe will eventually come to pass not because of any conspiracy but simply due to an irresistible combination of culture, geography and climate, as poignantly explained in Gaia Vince’s book Nomad Century. Combating the threat of climate change, and specifically the increase in temperatures, with all its deadly consequences of extreme weather, droughts, floods and desertification, is now the official priority of national governments and supranational entities. The threat of climate change is fundamentally affecting economic policies as well as financial strategies. Regardless of whether we believe (and many already do not) that it will eventually be possible through appropriate transition policies to avert a ‘hothouse’ planet, growing parts of today’s world are however already too hot, too arid or too low-lying against an impossible-to-contain body of water and people are already leaving those regions in search of a better future.

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October 26, 2023

Official Swedish dictionary completed after 140 years

One hundred and thirty-seven full-time employees have worked on Swedish Academy Dictionary over the years since 1883

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/25/official-swedish-dictionary-completed-after-140-years



The definitive record of the Swedish language has been completed after 140 years, with the dictionary’s final volume sent to the printer’s last week, its editor said on Wednesday. The Swedish Academy Dictionary (SAOB), the Swedish equivalent of the Oxford English Dictionary, is drawn up by the Swedish Academy, which awards the Nobel prize in literature, and contains 33,111 pages across 39 volumes.

“It was started in 1883 and now we’re done. Over the years 137 full-time employees have worked on it,” Christian Mattsson told AFP. Despite reaching the major milestone, their work is not completely done yet: the volumes A to R are now so old they need to be revised to include modern words.

“One such word is “allergy” which came into the Swedish language around the 1920s but is not in the A volume because it was published in 1893,” Mattsson said. “Barbie doll”, “app”, and “computer” are among the 10,000 words that will be added to the dictionary over the next seven years.

The SAOB is a historical record of the Swedish language from 1521 to modern day. It is available online and there are only about 200 copies published, used mainly by researchers and linguists. The academy also publishes a regular dictionary of contemporary Swedish. The Swedish Academy was founded in 1786 by King Gustav III to promote the country’s language and literature, and work for the “purity, vigour and majesty” of the Swedish language.

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October 25, 2023

Gang violence: Sweden breaks record for number of bomb attacks

https://www.thelocal.se/20231024/sweden-breaks-yearly-record-for-explosions



As of October 15th, 138 blasts had been recorded across the country. Taking into account a further blast on October 23rd in Enskededalen, southern Stockholm, Sweden has seen 139 attacks using explosives this year, six more than the previous record year in 2019. Sweden has been hit by a wave of bombings over recent years, which police have linked to gang conflicts in major cities. The police have kept a record of bomb attacks since 2018.

Another change for 2023 is that Stockholm had more explosions than anywhere else (45). In previous years, the highest number of blasts occurred in the southern police region, which covers Skåne, Blekinge, Kalmar and Kronoberg, with Stockholm usually in second place. An ongoing gang conflict, between Foxtrot leader Rawa Majid and his former right-hand man Ismail Abdo, has resulted in a recent spate of violence particularly in Stockholm and Uppsala, targeting even relatives who are not themselves involved in gang crime – or in some cases killing the wrong target entirely.

The conflict has already led to September being Sweden’s deadliest month in terms of fatal shootings since December 2019. Eleven people were shot dead in September. "There have recently been murders and explosions on an unprecedented scale," police chief Anders Thornberg told a press conference in mid-September. After a government crisis meeting on September 27th, Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer called for a number of measures to cut the supply of explosives to criminals.

"This spring, the minimum penalty for illegal handling of explosives will be doubled, but more needs to be done to prevent explosions," he said. "That is why we are meeting with all the relevant groups to identify what can be done in the short and long term." "Not a single stick of dynamite will end up in the wrong hands," Civil Defence Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin said.

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