Quartz: “Comrade!” how gay Chinese appropriated the word the Communist Party is trying to revive

Meetings of China’s Communist Party are about to get rather entertaining. In a bid to restore discipline, the party has issued written guidelines that say all cadres should now greet each other as “comrade.” The trouble is that, having fallen into disuse among the general population, “comrade” is now a common greeting among gay people.

The directive was included in new rules published earlier in November that outlined stricter party governance, and which encouraged members “to further consolidate their communist faith.” According to the South China Morning Post, an article published on the party’s website last week claimed that reviving the term would help “build an atmosphere of equality”. [...]

There is also a generational element to this. “I know people in their sixties, for instance, who may from time to time say nan tongzhi, 男同志 (male comrade), or nü tongzhi, 女同志 (female comrade) to refer to men and women, with no apparent awareness that the term means anything else,” says Lucas Klein, assistant professor in the School of Chinese at Hong Kong University. No surprise, then, that the members of the Politburo Standing Committee, China’s top decision-making body, are all in their sixties and seventies.

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Vox: Giving money away makes us happy. Then why do so few of us do it?

We can assess Americans' financial generosity by lowering the standard and seeing what percentage of Americans do not give even 2 percent or more of their income. Findings from the Science of Generosity Survey show that at least 85 percent give away less than 2 percent of their income. This, again, is calculated by dividing the sum of the amount of money they say they give away in 36 possible categories of types of giving by their reported annual income-which we have reason to believe produces accurate results. Assuming so, we see that most Americans, about six out of seven, do not give away even two percent of their income. Slightly more than half of this group give away not $1. That suggests a culture of miserliness, one that extends to other forms of generosity. More than three-quarters of Americans did not volunteer in the year prior to our survey and 88.5 percent did not give blood. [...]

We find a strong and highly consistent association between generous practices and various measures of personal well-being like happiness, health, a sense of purpose in life, and personal growth. In our book we discuss the various causal mechanisms that produce this association. While greater well-being can encourage generosity, practices of generosity also enhance well-being. The causal mechanisms we identify involve everything from reinforcing positive emotions to developing a sense of self-efficacy to expanding social networks to increasing physical activity. Generosity, for example, often triggers neurochemical systems that increase pleasure and reduce stress. It also has the capability of reducing the maladaptive self-absorption that many ungenerous Americans experience. By giving away some of our resources for the well-being of others we can enhance our own. By clinging to what we have, we shortchange ourselves. [...]

Nevertheless, we find consistent evidence that ungenerous lifestyles associate with an apathy riddled by anxiety. Our interviews with Americans who do not practice generosity reveal that they are deeply unsettled by individual and social problems. Yet they do not think they have any obligation to respond, and even if they do, they feel inadequate to make a difference without sacrificing their ability to care for their own needs. Feeling vulnerable to broader societal problems, the instability of the marketplace, material scarcity, and the challenges that come with relational intimacy, they respond by hunkering down, either alone or with immediate family members, to simply try to weather the storm. They imagine other people as restrictions on their autonomy.

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Atlas Obscura: The Bizarre 17th-Century Dioramas Made from Real Human Body Parts

In 1689, on the canal Bloemgracht in Amsterdam there was a museum that showcased preserved anatomical specimens in a peculiar manner.

Among jars of embalmed specimens, there were several startling dioramas containing skeletons of infants adorned with delicate and morbid decor. In one of the pieces depicted below, five skeletons are carefully positioned on a vase foundation made of inflated tissues from human testes. There was a feather headdress, a girdle of sheep intestines, and a spear made of the hardened vas deferens of an adult man. [...]

Some fetal heads were given lace collars, and the blunt ends of embalmed limbs wore textiles and fabrics, writes Britta Martinez in the Embryo Project Encyclopedia. Many of the skeletons are seen holdings jewels in their boney hands or strings of pearls. Ruysch also took to decorating the lids of preservation jars—a floating human hand cradling a hatching reptile topped with seashells, dried corals, butterflies, and flowers. By mixing exquisite plant arrangements with the human specimens, Ruysch hoped to soften the sight of morbid body parts for those who found it grotesque and unsettling. [...]

Ruysch never divulged the recipe of liquor balsamicum. After his death in 1731, at the age of 92, various chemists attempted to reproduce it but the results were unimpressive. In a book published in 2006, his secret liquor balsamicum has been revealed to contain clotted pig’s blood, Berlin blue, and mercury oxide, according to Erich Brenner in the Journal of Anatomy.

In 1717, Ruysch sold his anatomy museum (and secret liquor recipe) to Tsar Peter the Great, who had been an avid patron and fan of his work. His pieces still exist in the Kunstkammer of Peter the Great in Leningrad Academy of Science, and are immortalized in the illustrations of Thesaurus anatomicus.

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The Guardian: Tehran museum hosts exhibition of modern Arab art

Tehran’s Museum of Contemporary Art is hosting an exhibition of modern Arab art from countries including Saudi Arabia and the UAE, underlining a regional cultural bond that has thrived despite the simmering tensions between Iran and its Arab neighbours.

TMoCA, which has the finest collection of modern western art anywhere outside Europe and the US, boasting works by the likes of Jackson Pollock, Francis Bacon and Andy Warhol, is displaying 40 pieces by prominent Arab artists alongside 40 paintings by Iranians. [...]

TMoCA is planning to lend some of its treasures to museums and galleries in Berlin and Rome in the near future. Some works were due to go on display in Berlin earlier this year but the recent resignation of Iran’s cultural minister, who stepped down under pressure from hardliners, has delayed the plans.

There are concerns in Iran about the fate of its hidden treasures. Many artists, including the celebrated painter Aydin Aghdashloo, have expressed concerns about the conditions under which the paintings are held in the museum, and Lili Golestan, a prominent gallery owner, has complained about the secrecy surrounding the works. 

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The Guardian: Goodbye, American neoliberalism. A new era is here

The neoliberal era in the United States ended with a neofascist bang. The political triumph of Donald Trump shattered the establishments in the Democratic and Republican parties – both wedded to the rule of Big Money and to the reign of meretricious politicians.

The Bush and Clinton dynasties were destroyed by the media-saturated lure of the pseudo-populist billionaire with narcissist sensibilities and ugly, fascist proclivities. The monumental election of Trump was a desperate and xenophobic cry of human hearts for a way out from under the devastation of a disintegrating neoliberal order – a nostalgic return to an imaginary past of greatness. [...]

Rightwing attacks on Obama – and Trump-inspired racist hatred of him – have made it nearly impossible to hear the progressive critiques of Obama. The president has been reluctant to target black suffering – be it in overcrowded prisons, decrepit schools or declining workplaces. Yet, despite that, we get celebrations of the neoliberal status quo couched in racial symbolism and personal legacy. Meanwhile, poor and working class citizens of all colors have continued to suffer in relative silence.

In this sense, Trump’s election was enabled by the neoliberal policies of the Clintons and Obama that overlooked the plight of our most vulnerable citizens. The progressive populism of Bernie Sanders nearly toppled the establishment of the Democratic party but Clinton and Obama came to the rescue to preserve the status quo. And I do believe Sanders would have beat Trump to avert this neofascist outcome!

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The Guardian: Ugly fruits and vegetables: why you have to learn to love them

“When you look at our food system farm to fork, a stunning 52% of all produce in the US goes uneaten,” says JoAnne Berkenkamp, a senior advocate with the Natural Resources Defense Council. “Burgeoning awareness of this reality has led a growing number of eaters and businesses to take a second look at product that doesn’t meet prevailing industry standards for size, shape, color and other cosmetic attributes.” [...]

Imperfect Produce, which delivers to the Bay Area, started in August 2015 and says its produce costs up to 50% less than retail store prices since they’re fruits and vegetables that usually go to waste on farms. Ron Clark, the company’s co-founder and chief supply officer, estimates about 20% of produce overall doesn’t make it to the market because of cosmetic reasons. But the demand is there. Imperfect Produce began with 150 deliveries, he says, and now has over 10,000 customers. [...]

Beyond waste concerns, thanks to imperfect produce’s cheaper cost, some hope this trend will also help provide the more than 48 million Americans who struggle with hunger greater access to fresh food. This was part of the motivation behind the launch in May of Perfectly Imperfect by produce wholesaler Forest City Weingart. Perfectly Imperfect offers boxes of imperfect produce at discounted rates for pick up or delivery in and around Cleveland.

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Quartz: Scientists now think that being overweight can protect your health

Researchers immediately began trying to explain this “obesity paradox”—or, more often, to explain it away. Carl Lavie, a cardiologist in Jefferson, Louisiana, was one of the first clinicians to describe the paradox. It took him over a year to find a journal that would publish his findings. “People thought, ‘This can’t be true. There’s got to be something wrong with their data’,” he told Quartz.

Since then, dozens of studies have confirmed the existence of the paradox. Being overweight is now believed to help protect patients with an increasingly long list of medical problems, including pneumonia, burns, stroke, cancer, hypertension, and heart disease. Researchers who have tried to show that the paradox is based on faulty data or reasoning have largely come up short. And while scientists do not yet agree on what the paradox means for health, most accept the evidence behind it. “It’s been shown consistently enough in different disease states,” says Gregg Fonarow, a cardiology researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles. [...]

Even scientists whose own research has identified the paradox often seem ambivalent about the possibility that it might hold true. Carnethon has published several studies documenting the link between overweight or obese and better survival rates among people with type two diabetes. Yet like nearly every researcher I’ve interviewed on the subject, she resists the idea that fat might not always be unhealthy. “We’d never want to back away from weight-loss recommendations,” she says.

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Political Critique: Moldova’s new president: his bark is worse than his bite

The Party of Socialists’ Igor Dodon beat challenger Maia Sandu in a runoff vote on Sunday, with 52.3% of the vote to 47.7% for his pro-European rival. Dodon is known for his pro-Russian statements, promising to rule “like Putin”, and declaring that Crimea is Russian territory (with no hint of disapproval).

A cursory look at his campaign literature and his record hits all the pro-Russian talking points — defence of Orthodoxy and “traditional family values”, plus a firm strategic partnership with Russia. His campaign also plays on minorities’ fears of reunion with neighbouring Romania, a marginal but old bugbear in Moldovan politics. [...]

His former colleagues nurtured grudges; the ailing communist party boycotted the election. However, Dodon gained the support of his erstwhile rival Renato Usatii, whose candidate Ciubașcenco took 6% of the vote in the first round. Voting patterns were similar, with the north and south of the country voted strongly for Dodon, and historically pro-Russian autonomous region Gagauzia giving him 99%. The breakaway region of Transnistria played a part, too — over 16,000 Moldovan citizens living there cast votes, the vast majority probably for Dodon.

In its preliminary report, the OSCE has ruled the elections to be largely free and fair, though a polarised media environment and opaque party finances remained a problem. A number of polling stations overseas also ran out of ballots — one of several reasons why Maia Sandu has called on the head of the electoral commission to resign, and has threatened to challenge the result in court.

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Politico: The eurozone will be just fine

The euro was, and remains, a terrible idea — that’s the consensus among British and American economists, anyway. From Martin Feldstein on the right to Mervyn King in the center and Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz on the left, the conclusion is clear: Europe’s monetary union was a mistake and it should be dismantled. [...]

More than two-thirds of eurozone citizens — even those living in the most crisis-hit countries —want to keep the single currency. Take Greece. In the fall of 2005, just 46 percent of Greeks supported the euro. Ten years and two painful, humiliating near-Grexits later, the number climbed to 70 percent. Greeks and other Southern Europeans know the problems they face have mostly domestic roots. Leaving the euro, they feel, would only make matters worse. [...]

This is why left-wing parties like Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain — and even separatists in Catalonia — have refrained from calling to ditch the euro. The one exception is Beppe Grillo in Italy, but few believe that the comedian-turned-political-leader is serious about pulling his country out of the eurozone. [...]

Nor will Germany leave the euro, as suggested by Stiglitz and King. No chancellor wants to go down in history as the one who killed the European project. As Merkel made clear during the recent crisis: If the euro fails, Europe fails. This is precisely why Alternative for Germany has morphed from an anti-euro into an anti-immigration party. There are very few votes to win by bashing the euro in Germany.

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