National Public Radio: It's More Than Racism: Isabel Wilkerson Explains America's 'Caste' System

 Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson says racism is an insufficient term for the systemic oppression of Black people in America. Instead, she prefers to refer to America as having a "caste" system.

Wilkerson describes caste an artificial hierarchy that helps determine standing and respect, assumptions of beauty and competence, and even who gets benefit of the doubt and access to resources. [...]

That means that until arriving here, people who were Irish, people who were Hungarian, people who were Polish would not have identified themselves back in the 19th century as being white, but only in connection to the gradations and ranking that occurred and was created in the United States — that is where the designation of white, the designation of Black and those in between came to have meaning. [...]

One of the examples, a Japanese immigrant petitioned to qualify for being Caucasian because he said, "My skin is actually whiter than many people that I identified as white in America. I should qualify to be considered Caucasian." And his petition was rejected by the Supreme Court. But these are all examples of the long-standing uncertainties about who fits where when you have a caste system that is bipolar [Black and white], such as the one that was created here. [...]

It turned out that German eugenicists were in continuing dialogue with American eugenicists. Books by American eugenicists were big sellers in Germany in the years leading up to the Third Reich. And then, of course, the Nazis needed no one to teach them how to hate. But what they did was they sent researchers to study America's Jim Crow laws. They actually sent researchers to America to study how Americans had subjugated African Americans, what would be considered the subordinated caste. And they actually debated and consulted American law as they were devising the Nuremberg Laws and as they were looking at those laws in the United States.

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UnHerd: What we can learn from the Swedish paradox

 Since its lockdown-free response to Covid-19, Sweden has suddenly found itself the pin-up nation for libertarians worldwide, who see in its more laissez-faire response a defence of individual freedom and self-governance above all else. But Sweden is not a libertarian society — far from it; in reality, they are sticklers for the rules. Try putting decking on the seaside edge of your garden, or buying alcohol from anywhere other than the state monopoly — you will be met with restrictions that would be unthinkable in either Britain or the United States. [...]

It is notable that Anders Tegnell, who in our interview last week comes across as a perfect exemplar of unflappable lagom, naturally uses the vocabulary of the Left. The rationale behind his strategy he couches in egalitarian terms — closing schools, for example, would put unacceptable pressure on poorer and single parents as well as hitting disadvantaged children hardest, just as more dramatic lockdowns would most impact the poorest and most vulnerable in society. His most vocal critics tend to be from the Right, who see him as an intransigent technocrat standing in the way of more effective action. [...]

Njuta, allemansrätt, lagom — what are our equivalent values in Britain or the United States? Sweden has all sorts of problems, not least the political instability associated with high levels of immigration. But whether or not their approach to Covid-19 will be vindicated by the numbers, its consistency in the face of enormous pressure and international criticism makes a striking contrast to the jumpy and acrimonious debate in the UK and, even more so, the US. It strikes me as more a sign of cultural strength than weakness, and there’s really nothing “libertarian” about it.

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UnHerd: Is this the world’s worst dictator?

 Berdymukhamedov came to power in 2007, after his corpulent, megalomaniacal predecessor, Saparmurat Niyazov, dropped dead of a heart attack. Niyazov, a.k.a Turkmenbashi (“father of all Turkmen”) had become famous due to his extravagant personality cult. He literally renamed the month of January after himself, and renamed bread after his mother, while also authoring a truly atrocious “holy book” that he called The Ruhnama, or “book of the soul”.

That level of totalitarian excess is quite rare, and so it seemed that the Turkmen were due a break. Surely it was time for a normal dictator, less given to erecting gold statues of himself that rotated to face the sun?[...]

While Niyazov’s cult was grotesque and obscene, it was, at least, ambitious. Similarly, The Ruhnama was terrible, but its author at least knew what ought to be in such a book — history, myth, moral teachings, God, the people and his own personal story. Berdymukhamedov’s books were a lot less complicated. One of the emigres had predicted to me that since he was a medical professional his book would follow that theme — and sure enough, a series on the Turkmen herbal remedies appeared under his name. With that out of the way, he cast around for other themes, but he didn’t cast far. Turkmen were famous horse riders, so there was a book about horses. Then he produced a book about his dad. Running low on national motifs, he eventually put his name to a tome about drinking tea. The books were strikingly literal, strikingly pointless, oblivious to their own bathos. They were unselfconscious and kinda dumb. Here was a dictator with no depth at all. [...]

So clumsy and naïve is Berdymukhamedov’s cult that it serves as a particularly potent reminder of Anthony Daniels’ famous observation that the purpose of propaganda is “not to persuade, much less to inform, but to humiliate”. But while Turkmen citizens, condemned to live in a repressive police state run by a dullard, have little choice but to play along with Berdymukhamedov’s fantasy image of himself, the truly impressive thing is the way in which the president sometimes succeeds in getting foreign diplomats and organisations to abase themselves before him.

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Notes from Poland: “No apologies, no shame”: the rise of Poland’s guerrilla LGBT activists

Various legal efforts have been made by LGBT groups to stop the vans, but have largely been unsuccessful, due to the fact that Poland’s laws against hateful and offensive speech do not cover sexual orientation or gender identity.

Although a court in Gdańsk ordered Fundacja Pro to temporarily stop using some of the slogans it claims are based on “scientific” evidence, another judge in Wrocław rejected a case against the organisation, saying that its activities are “informative”. [...]

Speaking with Notes from Poland shortly before her latest detention, Margot explained what she calls the groups’ “no apologies” approach. They have sought to “throw off the discourse of docility and shame” that she associates with the respectability politics of more moderate members of the LGBT movement. But this radicalism does not exist in a vacuum; it has “adapted to the growth of homophobia”. [...]

For some, the insult to religious feeling was a step too far; others questioned the wisdom of strategies that make LGBT people standout, preferring campaigns that present them as “normal people”. One interviewee said they should be looking for issues that they have in common with religion, such as the idea of love.

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Time: #PolishStonewall: LGBTQ Activists Are Rallying Together After Police Violence at Protests in Warsaw

 By Saturday, thousands had gathered in Warsaw to denounce Margo’s arrest and police aggression against LGBTQ people. And although Poland is experiencing a rise in new cases of COVID-19, at least 15 solidarity protests, both big and small, took place on Monday in towns and cities across the Poland, as well as in Budapest and London, New York, Paris and Berlin, with more planned.

While not all activists may agree with Margo’s methods, her prosecution and imprisonment has been widely condemned. “These radical actions are a part of history that has happened in many other countries before,” says Julia Maciocha, chairwoman at the Warsaw-based LGBTQ organization Volunteers of Equality Foundation. In a nod to the Stonewall Uprising of 1969 in New York City, several users on Twitter started posting #PolishStonewall in tweets about the weekend’s events and subsequent solidarity protests. [...]

The church in Poland also wields enormous influence over education, law and politics, and about 86% of the population identify as Roman Catholic. Marek Jedraszewski, an archbishop, warned last year that a “rainbow plague” seeks to “control” the population. Since 2019, authorities in one-third of cities across Poland have adopted resolutions declaring themselves “LGBTQ ideology free zones.” In late July, the European Union announced it would not provide funding to six Polish towns that made this declaration.[...]

What activists want now is stronger international solidarity, particularly from European governments. Remy Bonny, a Brussels-based LGBTQ rights activist and researcher who focuses on Central and Eastern Europe, says “we have seen this kind of violence in Russia and Belarus, for example, but not in an E.U. country.” The European Commission should condemn police violence in Poland in the same way it recently denounced the repression of protests in Belarus, he says. Makuchowska says she and other activists are calling on the international community to “help us to immediately release Margo.”

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Psyche: You want people to do the right thing? Save them the guilt trip

 It’s important to distinguish here between guilt that arises internally, and guilt that’s externally induced. If we feel guilty about failing to recycle our plastics or adopt a vegetarian diet, we might be motivated to engage in reparative action. But if someone buttonholes us over dinner and tries to make us feel bad about our lifestyle choices, the picture might look very different; we might become defensive and try to justify our actions, which drives us further away from changing the way we behave. These scenarios then raise doubts about whether negative self-directed emotional appeals will be effective at promoting prosociality. [...]

The potential of positive self-directed emotions has largely not been embraced by activists. The worry could be that it might make those engaging in the cause appear self-satisfied or selfish. But these studies suggest that, instead of focusing on ‘doom and gloom’ messaging that zooms in on people’s shortcomings and risks alienating them, policymakers and strategists might find that positive messaging, speaking to people’s positive sense of self, might be a more powerful lever of behavioural change.

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Asia Times: Why Japan may cede the Senkakus to China

 Many Western observers have long assumed that if backed into a corner Japan would fight – despite its reticence about things military. The prospect of losing territory to the Chinese is presumably such a corner.

And despite their shortcomings, the Self Defense Forces – particularly the Maritime Self Defense Force (MSDF) with its highly professional surface, submarine and anti-submarine forces – have the capability to bloody an opponent’s nose. [...]

A recently retired JSDF officer, unprompted, recently confided his belief that, even if the Senkaku Islands are invaded by China, the “Japanese government will not choose war.” [...]

There are of course Japanese – including factions in the ruling LDP and most members of the JSDF – who think Japan should defend all of the territories it claims. But there were also Americans who thought Obama should forcefully defend US partners and interests in East Asia in the 2010s.

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Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty: Nobel Laureate Alexievich Says Lukashenka Has 'Declared War' On Belarusian People

 She said the Belarusian people were "absolutely sure" that Lukashenka lost the election to his main rival, Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who was forced to leave the country for Lithuania when she tried to file a formal complaint with the Central Election Commission about the official results. [...]

Alexievich also suggested that Russian riot police -- OMON security forces -- may have been brought into Minsk by Lukashenka's regime in order to violently disperse the ongoing protests. [...]

Alexievich said she thinks it is now impossible now for Lukashenka to resign without consequences because blood has been shed.

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