'Unseen' News and Views
A scene from the exhibition in Paris at the Musée de l’Homme: “How do we categorise others?” Credit: A.D. McKenzie/IPS
Titled “Nous et les Autres: Des Préjugés aux Racisme” (Us and Them: From Prejudice to Racism), the exhibition’s aim is clear: to have visitors emerge with a changed perspective — especially in a climate of divisive politics that have created tensions ahead of the second and final round of the presidential elections on Sunday, May 7.
– Income and wealth inequality has increased in recent decades, but recognition of the role of economic liberalization and globalization in exacerbating inequality has never been so widespread. The guardians of global capitalism are nervous, yet little has been done to check, let alone reverse the underlying forces.
The World Economic Forum (WEF) has described severe income inequality as the biggest risk facing the world. Credit: IPS
8 May 2017 – TRANSCEND Media Service – There have been over the years since the 1953 armistice periodic increases of tensions related to the policies of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) and the Republic of Korea (South Korea).
Currently, the nuclear program and missile launches of North Korea, the establishment of sophisticated anti-missile systems in South Korea, increased sanctions against North Korea voted by the United Nations Security Council as well as a new administration in Washington has led to an escalation of tensions.
8 May 2017 – TRANSCEND Media Service – Very well known is post trauma stress disorder, PTSD; no doubt a very painful disorder experienced by many, most, maybe by all of us.
Johan Galtung
Something went very wrong: a shock, violence, physical, verbal, by and to individuals, groups in society, societies, groups of societies. Not only by and to individuals: PTSD does not belong to psychology only.
However, as Buddhist epistemology informs us: there is symmetry to the world. Anything can be seen from at least two angles: to “I walk down the street” add “the street moves toward me, ‘walks me up’”.
Was Einstein inspired by Buddhism when he asked his famous question, “Does Zurich stop at this train?” Maybe not; his relativity, “moving relative to each other”, forced that question upon him anyhow.
For Buddhism, however, this thinking goes far beyond movement, into concepts and discourses. What would be the opposite of trauma? Evidently something positive.
– Since a US Energy Information Administration (EIA) report announced in 2011 that Argentina had some of the world’s biggest shale oil and gas reserves, the dream of prosperity has been on the minds of many people in this South American nation where nearly a third of the population lives in poverty.
Two drilling rigs in the Loma Campana deposit, in Vaca Muerta, in the Neuquén Basin, in south-west Argentina. Credit: Fabiana Frayssinet/IPS
The question that hangs in the air is whether it is really possible for Argentina to become South America’s Saudi Arabia, or if it is just a fantasy.
Greenpeace – I can’t imagine a world without bees. These fantastic little insects are not only a vital part of natural ecosystems, they also play a crucial role in food production.
Worldwide, three out of four of our food crops depend on pollinators like bees, butterflies and other small creatures. In Europe, 84% of all cultivated plants are pollinated by insects – primarily bees.
Bees and other pollinators have a huge part to play in our food supply and the global economy. Pollination affects both the quantity and quality of crops.
Wall Street International – President Woodrow Wilson, the academic politician, in response to the propaganda machine orbiting around WW1 said he could, “imagine no greater disservice to the country than to establish a system of censorship that would deny to the people . . . their indisputable right to criticize their own public officials.”
Former Brazilian presidents Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff take part in an Apr. 29 demonstration in defence of the shipbuilding industrial hub in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul, one of the oil projects in Brazil on the verge of bankruptcy, due to the crisis plaguing the state-run oil company Petrobras due to the corruption scandal and the drop in oil prices. Credit: Stuckert/Lula Institute
But recent revelations give the impression of a drastic increase in corruption, involving unprecedented amounts of money, nearly the entire political leadership of the country, and numerous state-run and private companies.
6/5/2017
I REMEMBER the first few Independence Days, just after the foundation of the State of Israel. There was spontaneous jubilation, we were all out in the streets, the celebration was real.
Uri Avnery
That was long ago. This years Independence Day, last Tuesday, was not a very happy affair. The holiday was subdued, even sad. Old-timers felt that “this is not our state anymore”, that “they” have stolen Israel”. “They” – the rightists.
One of the reasons may be that there is no real unity any more. Israeli society has fallen apart into a number of sub-societies, which have less and less in common.
There are the Ashkenazim (of European descent), the Mizrahim (Easterners, from Arab countries and Iran, often erroneously called Sephardim), the “Russians” (from the former Soviet Union, who live a separate life of their own), the Haredim (God-fearing, ultra Orthodox, non-Zionists), the National-Religious (religious Zionists (including the settlers in the occupied territories and fascist elements), and, of course, the Palestinian-Arab minority, who constitute more than 20% of the population, and who exist outside of almost everything.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 