Al Jazeera Syrian students find new home at Mexico university

They were members of the Habesha Project - a Mexican NGO that relocates Syrian students to Mexico to continue their academic careers, interrupted by the conflict in Syria."

As a Kurd, my options have always been limited," says Hazem, who is from al-Malikiyah in the mainly Kurdish Hasakah governorate of northern Syria.

"In Syria, we could never get government jobs or study certain majors in school."

Like many Kurds, Hazem describes the institutional discrimination he witnessed while living in Syria, which has led to many Kurds finding themselves torn during the conflict - with rebel forces seeking recruits from backgrounds presumed to have an instinctive animosity towards Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government while, on the other hand, military checkpoints were profiling racial minorities and imprisoning suspected dissidents and deserters. [...]

he Habesha Project is the brainchild of Adrian Melendez, the programme's coordinator. The project arranges for students to arrive in Mexico like any visiting foreign student - not as asylum seekers. Melendez is currently in consultation with European institutions to illustrate how the model is both economic and replicable in other countries.

Students enrol in intensive Spanish classes at Universidad Panamericana, where a volunteer student committee helps them to integrate through cultural activities and informational evenings. When they are ready, students can apply for courses at different universities around Mexico.

read the article 

Nerdwriter1: How To Correct Donald Trump In Real Time

The Telegraph: Archbishop: nothing improper about gay sex

Christians who support same-sex marriage are not “abandoning the Bible” the Archbishop of Wales has insisted, as he told leading Anglicans that sex in a committed gay or lesbian relationship is perfectly “proper”. [...]

In his address he cites a string of examples from both the Old Testament and New Testament in which, he said, different passages effectively contradict each other on topics as diverse as the status of eunuchs in Jewish society to the use of violence in retribution.

“What all this shows is that within the Scriptures themselves, there are radical shifts in understanding in what it means to discern the will of God,” he said. [...]

Last week the Bishop of Grantham, the Rt Rev Nicholas Chamberlain, disclosed that he is in a same sex relationship but made clear that he observes celibacy.

But Dr Morgan pointedly rejected the celibacy requirement, quoting a passage from a recent book of essays on the subject, entitled Amazing Love, which argues: “Christians have discovered that most people flourish best when this living for others finds its focus in a commitment to one other person: when a couple make a lifelong commitment within which sex properly belongs.”

He added: “Those of us who were or are married have found that to be the case.  Why would we want to deny such a possibility for those who are attracted to their own gender?”

read the article 

VICE: How Many Racists Are There in America?

No matter how many times America has a national conversation about race, the topic of actual racists rarely seems to come up. That is, racism is usually regarded as a major challenge facing America, but since no one will admit to being a racist and calling someone the R-word is regarded as the gravest possible insult, politicians generally shy away from calling out specific people or groups as fomenting prejudice. [...]

I do think that based on the analysis I've done and based on some analysis more recently, there's no doubt that Trump supporters are more motivated by racially resentful views and negative racial views than Hillary Clinton supporters or [supporters of] previous Republican candidates. That was stuff I started analyzing in the spring during the primary. The people that supported Donald Trump, their views on negative racial stereotypes towards blacks, and negative views of Muslims, and negative views of immigrants was just off the charts. That's a new thing this election cycle. [...]

We've seen those kinds of measures rise since Obama's election in America. So they had kind of gone away or dissipated after the 1960s to the 2000s, but with the election of Obama, we started to see explicit, old-fashioned racism reemerge in American politics and become politically salient. And it was much more likely to be true of Republicans than Democrats. People who hold those racist views would also be more likely to think negative views about things like the economy when [these views] weren't true objectively.

The other thing we started doing as a discipline in the 80s and 90s as explicit racism was declining in American society, we started asking questions that focused on what we called "racial resentment." And so racial views were not about characteristics or individual traits of black people or immigrants or what have you, but rather about how much they deserve benefits, if they should work harder and not blame society for their troubles, if they're being discriminated against. It was this idea to connect it more to government policy. And there's some debate, with some people saying that's not racism, it's political ideology. But I think the results are pretty clear, it's connecting politics to the color of people's skin and judging them as not worthy because of whatever. It depends on the scholar, but people call that symbolic racism or racial resentment.

read the article 

Deutsche Welle: A Russian city that could 'collapse'

At first there is no hint of the catastrophe. There's a blue paddling pool. There are red cherries. There are tomatoes, potatoes and dill. It is an idyllic place, somewhere in the Urals.

There is no hint of the catastrophe if you stay in the garden. The garden belongs to Irina and Andrej Chorow, who are both around 40. They have been living here for 13 years. But for how much longer? They don't know.

The catastrophe becomes visible once you leave the garden and go into the house belonging to the couple. Then you see the cracks. They are everywhere in the facade, as thick as a finger. They are under the torn wallpaper in all the rooms. They are on the walls and next to the windowsill. "It's cracking everywhere," complains Andrej. "The house is crooked. You can't open the doors properly anymore. The building is being pulled apart. We can't do anything." [...]

Instead I am allowed to go to the other danger zone that made headlines nine years ago. It is the old main mine shaft that has been closed down. This is where the earth first caved-in in 2007. It made a crater with walls that plunged 350 metres down. The city authorities evacuated 2000 people. Three years later the Beresniki central station became a danger to people. It was closed down. In 2011 methane gas that had been leaking out of a crater, exploded. This has turned into a lake.

read the article