By JONAH LOSSIAH

ONE FEATHER STAFF

With the Black Lives Matter movement reaching global support, many organizers in small towns have begun to demonstrate their support on a local level.

On June 2, a solidarity march in Sylva brought together hundreds of people. (Sylva Herald photos)

There have been several demonstrations around the region over the past couple of weeks. Asheville has seen large protests and Bryson City had a march this week. Just down the road in Sylva there has also been gatherings, all of which have been entirely peaceful.

On June 2, a solidarity march in Sylva brought together hundreds of people. They held speeches at the courthouse steps and marched downtown. The event was calm from beginning to end, with the organizers and many protestors consistently thanking the police officers that were helping to direct traffic and facility the demonstration.

Communication is everything, said Chris Hatton, Chief of Sylva Police.

Meeting with and speaking with the organizers for events like this is the most crucial part of having a successful event. The sooner law enforcement leaders can get involved in that planning and that conversation, the sooner they can get to know those folks. And, those folks get to know the law enforcements leaders and that creates trust, said Hatton.

Carrie McBane, who was one of the organizers of the march, said that she has been impressed with Sylva police during Hattons time there. McBane works with the Jackson County chapter of Down Home North Carolina, a grassroots organization that works to build multi-racial power for working families in North Carolinas small towns and rural places. However, the demonstration was not organized directly by Down Home North Carolina.

Hatton has been nothing but willing to work with us and to be transparent. And, I did not get that feeling from the last police departmentI really feel like he came into this community wanting to see change, wanting to see effective change. Thats important to him, and I think that has come across I appreciate his willingness to stand up for the rights of everybody, said McBane.

She also said that if she could give advice to anybody regarding marches or demonstrations such as the ones in Sylva, it would be to do their research. There are permits that need to be obtained, as well a need for a network of people. She said that communication between everyone involved is crucial.

This is true when it comes to the Qualla Boundary as well. When asked about any potential demonstrations, Alica Wildcatt, of the Cherokee Indian Police Department said that they would need to file for the proper permit or else the act would be unlawful. She sited Section 167-1 of the Cherokee Code.

Radonna Crowe, EBCI Public Health and Human Services public information officer, said she hopes that an event of this sort would take into account community safety.

If an individual plans to protest, due to the increase of COVID-19 cases in our community, we ask that they: wear a cloth face covering, use hand sanitizer, keep at least six feet apart from others stick to small groups that they have been quarantined with, stay hydrated and stay safe. When the event is over get tested/re-test for COVID-19, said Crowe.

For more information regarding COVID-19 and testing, you can call the CIHA Hotline 497-3743.

Principal Chief Richard G. Sneed has been preparing for protests in the area. He recently discussed his views in a commentary with the Cherokee One Feather.

Like all Americans, I was outraged when I saw the video of George Floyd pleading for his life, only to have his pleas fall upon deaf ears and his life snuffed out at the hands of an overzealous government official. As Native Americans, we understand prejudice, we understand struggle, and we understand the trauma inflicted upon a people when government officials, sworn to protect the rights of the people, become oppressive, said Chief Sneed in a commentary on the subject.

Those of us who have suffered the trauma of oppression will no longer tolerate the oppression of our friends, our neighbors, or our fellow citizens. We cannot allow this message of truth to be lost in noise, chaos, and violence. It is incumbent upon each of us to exercise our right to free speech to make this truth known. But to be successful- to actually get others to listen to us- we must remember that meaningful and respectful dialogue will be the mechanism for change, Sneed continued.

When it came to the event in Sylva, Police Chief Hatton said he came into the event prepared for peace. He said they intentionally wore a more relaxed uniform and that he gave a talk to his team beforehand. He said that afterward all his officers were encouraged by the support at the event. That they lost count of the thank yous they received, and that it was a great experience for everyone involved. Hatton continued by saying that he wishes to maintain the level of mutual respect moving forward.

What I told [the organizers] was, Im giving you my word. My officers are not here to slow down anything youre doing. In fact, theyre here to protect what youre doing. Even though some people may see police presence as a form of control, what were actually here to do is to make sure you get to have your voice and you get to say what you want to say. And that nobody else stops you from doing that.

Link:

Communication is everything: Communities finding the best way to support - The Cherokee One Feather - Cherokee One Feather

The Covid-19 coronavirus might not be a disaster in the ordinary meaning of the word. As when faced with a tsunami, most people cannot protect themselves against it. It requires extraordinary measures, and the responsibility to provide such protection rests with the state. Picture: GCIS

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For the affluent, who can practise social distancing and keep the vulnerable masses at bay because they benefited from the exploitation and conquest of the majority, a disaster will have a different meaning. They have the resources and capacity outside the state to protect themselves. And the rich will be the first to use the Constitution and the Bill of Rights to fight off anything they regard as an invasion of or intrusion on their rights.

The vulnerable majority will be their excuse as to why the governments interventions should be challenged.

The exploiters of the poor and the vulnerable become messiahs when it suits their interests. They have trapped the vulnerable into alcohol and will fight to keep them drunk so that they do not confront the real issues. The rich know they can always replace the cheap labour if those who work for them get sick. The rich enjoy the high levels of poverty, inequality and unemployment because it presents a captive market of the desperate and vulnerable.

The government should not be able to invade our human rights and there should be no doubt about that.

We, the masses, have lived the pain of colonial and apartheid governments that passed many laws to oppress and subjugate us. Any form of oppression must be rejected with the contempt it deserves.

READ:High Court rules lockdown regulations unconstitutional and invalid

But how should the government react and what should it do to deal with the pandemic? It is true that the regulations promulgated by the government as part of the measures to fight this invisible enemy might not pass legal and constitutional muster. And, of course, they should to be sustainable. If they fail, they should be set aside as the high court ruled and the government must be ordered to correct any anomalies to bring them in line with our constitutional values and prescripts.

The reality remains, though: With or without the regulations and their validity or otherwise, Covid-19 is upon us.

Not even the functioning of the courts has been spared by the aggressive virus. When it struck, the judiciary, like the other two arms of the state, imposed restrictions on citizens that stopped access to the courts and, by extension, to justice.

The heads of the various courts adopted measures no less different in principle than those adopted by the executive and Parliament. There must have been a good reason for this. It would be foolhardy to argue that their intention was to violate rights. Their true intention was to protect life and limb.

One cannot argue that the measures were inordinately restrictive and too intrusive

Modidima Mannya

Equally, one cannot argue that the measures were inordinately restrictive and too intrusive. To say so would suggest that there was a far better mechanism the courts could have adopted. Like all of us, the judicial officers were confronted with the reality of an invisible enemy.

It is significant that those who took the executive to court to have the regulations declared unlawful and unconstitutional did not do the same about the measures adopted by the courts. The courts, like the executive, allowed for the exercise of the rights of access to justice under certain restrictions.

Those who had urgent matters could still have their cases heard under certain conditions, the same way we were allowed to go to the shops to buy essentials under level 4. But the restriction to access the courts has affected economic activity.

There are those whose livelihoods depend on the courts functioning every day without restriction. There are those who had disputes that required the attention of the courts to survive in their businesses and their lives. And there have been many court cases which could not be heard because of the restrictions imposed to prevent the spread of the virus.

Those who could not afford lawyers were simply deprived of any opportunity to have their justiciable disputes heard by the courts, not because of the regulations, but because of the measures adopted by the courts.

This category of people has suffered an oppression and subjugation at no fault of the regulations.

READ:Government to appeal judgment declaring lockdown unconstitutional and invalid

Removing the offending regulations does not remove the offending virus. The infection and death rates continue to rise. Nothing says the court officials, legal practitioners and judicial officers will be spared getting infected and possibly dying if courts open and social distance is not maintained.

The reality of Covid-19 is that it not only is invisible and incapable of easy detection but strikes at the heart of the most precious human right, the right to life.

The regulations and directives issued might have been invasive and, in some instances, legally irrational but the primary objective remains logical and is intended to protect the good of the public.

At this time it has been difficult to maintain a proper balance between the realities of an invisible deadly enemy and constitutionalism. The beneficiaries of poverty and inequality will always be those who have the means.

Those without the means will remain oppressed and subjugated by both the deadly virus and the application of the law supposedly meant to protect them.

Mannya is an advocate, writer and executive director of legal services at Unisa

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The courts and Covid-19 | Citypress - News24

When protests kicked off throughout the nation a week and a half ago, commentators turned to history to make sense of events. One year dominated the conversation: 1968. Racial tensions, clashes between police and protesters, a general sense of chaos 1968 and 2020 seemed to have a lot in common. Observers wrote about how Trumps use of law and order rhetoric echoed Richard Nixon and George Wallace in 1968. The comparison makes broader sense, too: 1968 was a destabilizing year in American politics, marked by Civil Rights protests, uprisings born out of racist oppression, assassinations, violence at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago (classified later as a police riot) and protests against the Vietnam War. Racial tensions and inequality were at the center of the instability that year, with the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. sparking uprisings in cities across the country.

[Related: How Much Can History Teach Us About These Protests?]

But 1968 isnt the only chapter in American history thats relevant to the current crisis. America has a long history of racial injustice, which makes it difficult to isolate any one precedent for the current environment. History has a way of building on itself; the injustices of one generation are passed on to the next, even as incremental progress is made. This is why I want to share with you three other episodes that also help contextualize the moment were in now. They, like 1968 and the broader Civil Rights movement, highlight the depths of violence and injustice that black Americans have faced, and explain why everyday political processes have failed to bring about lasting systemic change.

The early 1990s saw two connected developments that still shape the dynamics of policing in the U.S. First, in 1991, before there were cell phones everywhere, a witness in Los Angeles caught police officers beating Rodney King on a hand-held camcorder, and the video caught the nations attention. The four officers charged in the incident were acquitted, which sparked further national outrage, and some Los Angeles residents took to the streets, turning to violence and destruction of property. In total, the demonstrations lasted for five days.

The Rodney King episode is different in important ways from the protests happening now over George Floyds death, but there are still some similarities. Namely, it was a high-profile incident of police brutality that underscored just how differently police treat black Americans from white Americans. Additionally, a bystanders video recording of the officers beating King brought the incident to national audiences, heightening a broad sense of injustice when the verdict was announced.

[Related: De-escalation Keeps Protesters And Police Safer. Departments Respond With Force Anyway.]

The fallout after the King verdict is worth considering in this moment. For one, some research shows that the event triggered lower public trust in the police in Los Angeles, especially among African Americans.

The role of the federal government is instructive here as well. In 1992, California Gov. Pete Wilson requested military assistance under the Insurrection Act of 1807, which Trump has suggested he might also invoke now. But LAs ordeal also prompted federal change Congress passed legislation allowing the Department of Justice to order reforms of police departments found to have engaged in misconduct. That ability has allowed the federal government to investigate police departments and root out poor practices. This oversight, however, has not been enough to prevent police killings, as we saw again with Floyd.

This provision was also part of a larger piece of anti-crime legislation the now somewhat-infamous 1994 crime bill that helped create the mass incarceration crisis and forced recent Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden to confront their past stances on crime. The crime bill arguably helped to create some of the challenges todays protesters are responding to. As sociologist Philip McHarris explained in The Washington Post, the bill flooded black communities with police, helped states to build prisons and established harsher sentencing policies. These policies not only helped to create the conditions for further police violence, but by expanding policing and incarceration in the U.S., they also helped to diminish the political power of many black communities through disenfranchisement and disengagement.

The point is that while focusing national attention on police brutality brought about needed change in some respects, reforms fall short when the system charged with implementing that change has racist origins.

After the American Civil War ended slavery in 1865, there was no road map for what Southern society would look like, but white Americans quickly adoped two major changes that harmed formerly enslaved people. First, Southern states passed laws restricting black citizens freedoms and essentially preserving the abuses of slavery. Second, violence against freed people living in those areas changed form but very much continued, and included the destruction of homes and churches, and sexual violence.

Particularly relevant to the current moment: Then-President Andrew Johnson allowed all this to happen. He failed to extend federal protection to the victims of the violence that Southern whites were engaging in, and, through his liberal use of pardons and lax loyalty requirements, he even allowed former Confederate leaders to find important roles in new state governments. These individuals, once in power, enacted oppressive measures. As historian Annette Gordon-Reed describes in her biography of Johnson, simple things like hunting and fishing became criminal activities for many black Americans, meaning they were increasingly dependent on their employers for their livelihoods.

Johnsons decision to allow both state and non-state violence against southern blacks deeply shaped American racial politics. The laws states adopted in this period ultimately created the status quo that the civils rights movement of the 1960s pushed back against.

[Related: Trumps Use Of Tear Gas To Break Up A Protest Undermined Three Core Values Of American Democracy]

But this historical period is also a pivotal one in understanding race relations in America today as it highlights the lasting repercussions of morally bankrupts presidential judgment. As my colleague Perry Bacon and I wrote a few days ago, the events of the last few days and years suggest that Trump is not interested in using federal power to help those protesting racial injustice, and is, at best, indifferent to those goals. Experts have compared Johnson to Trump for years. History shows us that when federal leaders ignore racial injustice and violence and certainly when they embody and enshrine it that injustice and violence continues unabated, even if its form changes.

The power structure created after the Civil War led to a lynching crisis in the South (and elsewhere in the U.S.). Thousands of lives were lost in this brutal and inhumane system of vigilante justice journalist Ida B. Wells, for instance, wrote extensively to document the violence of lynching and to spread awareness nationwide about what was happening.

But it is also in this dark chapter of American history that black American activists entered a new phase in organizing against systemic racism, using a variety of approaches. As political scientist Megan Ming Francis has written, this period gave birth to civil rights organizations like the NAACP, which pushed to change policy through Congress, the White House and the courts.

Those efforts made a real difference. Francis emphasizes the way in which black Americans organized and achieved these changes despite their exclusion from much of the political process and lack of traditional political power. These groups increased public awareness, improved legal standards and persuaded presidents to publicly denounce lynching.

[Related: What Protests Can (And Cant) Do]

The struggles of this movement, however, also illustrate how slow and frustrating it can be to work through official government channels. For instance, at the urging of these early civil rights activists, the House of Representatives passed an anti-lynching bill. But the bill died in the Senate after a filibuster, and no federal anti-lynching law was ever passed. (The latest anti-lynching bill was held up in the Senate as recently as June 4, 2020.) The American political system makes change difficult. In both Congress and the White House, Southern votes exerted a great deal of influence, and the opponents of an anti-lynching bill had both political power and the power of the status quo.

Every moment in history is distinct, and there are no perfect parallels for whats happening in 2020. However, looking at other points in both the distant and recent past helps us see how deeply racial injustice is ingrained in the American system. The 1968 comparison can be helpful, but it also tempts us to frame the situation in terms of tranquility and unrest. But tranquility has been defined by those in power almost always whites. Looking at other events helps answer some deeper questions about why people have taken to the streets to demand change and why protesters may be able to accomplish more faster by disrupting normal life. Because the system itself is part of the problem, politics, again and again, has set up the rules to make it difficult to pursue accountability and justice within the system.

The rest is here:

1968 Isnt The Only Parallel For This Political Moment - FiveThirtyEight

Turkey using its influence in Libya upon the request and in the interests of the countrys legitimate government has completely tipped the scales in the country. However, this change has also led countries to increase their efforts for diplomacy and review all their plans.

Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj, who was increasingly isolated until now for incurring losses despite being the representative of the legitimate administration, is now at the center of everyones attention. He has become the most important player in Libya, with whom everyone, primarily Russia, wants to re-establish ties.

In the meantime, Libyas pro-coup parties jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire in Cairo by striking poses with Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi; they were later joined by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Russia, Saudi Arabia, and France. However, Frances attitude toward Libya is viewed as strange in both Europe and NATO, because it is now being considered as a sort of autonomy that does not comply with any ethics of the alliance.

NATOs strongest countries, the U.S., Turkey, the U.K., Germany, and Italy have taken a completely contrary attitude to France regarding this matter; and the NATO and the U.S. are rapidly adopting the stance of Turkey, which is providing support to Libyas legitimate government. As a matter of fact, this means that the military victories achieved on the ground by the GNA with Turkeys support have been positively reflected to the international political domain.

President Erdoan and his U.S. counterpart Donald Trump spoke yesterday with the main focus being on Libya, during which a consensus was also reached. Yet, allow me to reiterate: it was only six months ago that Trump held a telephone call with Libyas putschist Gen. Khalifa Haftar based on the trajectory of the battlefield. It was probably after that conversation, when Haftars rapport with Russia was made clearer, reconfirming its untrustworthiness, that the U.S. started to adopt the vision put forth by Turkey, with whose support the GNA made great advances on the field.

We need to accept that international relations also develop based on ones power on the ground.

There are many examples in history of those who won on the battlefield but lost at the diplomacy table. Therefore, it is critical for the victories on the ground to be carried to the diplomacy table by a strong political will. Those who face defeat on the ground opening up fictitious areas in the discourse and propaganda domain in efforts to make gains by mispresenting the situation there is a common occurence. Thus, even if they cannot make any gains, they will be seeking solace or try to exact revenge from the winning side by spitting fire and cursing.

The alliance, whose chosen method in the Middle East is coups, is exponentially increasing its attacks on social media against Turkey and particularly Erdoan in proportion to the smackdown they faced in Libya. The insults directed at Erdoan through caricatures and photoshop effects are truly inversely proportional to their circumstances. It is not at all difficult to understand their mindset, but of course, there is also nothing about it to take seriously. In fact, the more such posts and publications increase, the easier it becomes to form an idea about the dimensions of that axis intention.

For example, out of nowhere, the Egyptian Fatwah Council made a statement describing the Conquest of Istanbul in 1453 as an Ottoman invasion. What was that all about? Positioning oneself against the Conquest, which is unquestionably accepted by the entire Islamic world, by associating the issue of Hagia Sophia a current hotbutton topic in Turkey with Erdoan, purely out of resentment against him, will do Turkey no harm. However, it will completely disrepute the Egyptian Fatwah Council in the eyes of the Muslim world.

In fact, it appears that the matter was not heard by anyone other than a very small faction in Turkey and, hence, it drew no reaction here. Yet, every segment of the Muslim world, on the other hand, harshly reacted. For example, International Union of Muslim Scholars Secretary-General Ali Muhyiddin al-Qaradaghi said that the statement was a mark of shame.

Meanwhile, we also discerned an interesting parallel. At about the same time Sisi was staging his bloody coup with Tamarod in 2013, we were also experiencing a coup attempt in Turkey with the Gezi Park events. It was soon understood that they were both cooked up in the same kitchen. Of course, those who are still romanticizing the Gezi Park events cannot begin to comprehend this connection. However, one of the most provocative slogans of Gezi was a slogan written on the wall: The Oppression started in 1453.

It is not a great surprise that the religious staff of the coup that was dished up in Egypt during the same period are thus opposing the transformation of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque. It seems that the disintegration between the coup plotters and those representing the values of the people which everyone knew about and has long been ongoing in the Middle East, needed to be thus exposed.

NOTE: When the statement made by the Egyptian Fatwah Council drew great reaction on social media, the council stepped back and made another statement saying, The great conquest was realized by sufi Ottoman Sultan Fatih Sultan Mehmet, and President Recep Tayyip Erdoan has no relation whatsoever to Sultan Mehmet.

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The irony of Egpyt accusing Turkey with invading Istanbul and 'oppression since 1453' - YASIN AKTAY - Yeni afak English

Justice for Breonna Taylor protest, Louisville, Ky., May 29.

These slightly edited remarks were given by Monica Moorehead at a June 7 International Womens Alliance webinar: Building our militant global womens movement to resist imperialism in the time of COVID-19.

This series of International Womens Alliance webinars could not have come at a more opportune time. A wave of rebellion is sweeping the globe. Who would have thought six months ago that the epicenter of this rebellion would be the U.S. the imperialist belly of the beast? It is both shocking and not surprising that this is happening.

The billionaire ruling class, their Wall Street investors and the Trump government are having nightmares, fighting among themselves, knowing that their entire system is under attack first for ignoring all the early signs of the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by the lack of testing and health care for everyone, including essential workers and with the unemployment rate approaching Great Depression levels, not counting 2 million incarcerated workers in prisons and detention centers, undocumented migrant workers, working-class and oppressed youth. Workers are resisting with strikes, sit-ins, car caravans and even resisting armed neofascists who want to reopen businesses.

The second pandemic is the rebellion ignited on May 25 by the horrific torture and police lynching of the 46-year-old Black man in Minneapolis, George Floyd. It took five days for the cop who asphyxiated Floyd to be charged and several days later for the three other cops to be arrested. That rebellion will reach two weeks tomorrow (June 8).

This rebellion against police terror has brought together Black, Latinx, Indigenous and white people of all generations, genders and abilities with marches, rallies, shutting down bridges, interstates, carrying out civil disobedience and expropriation all in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, with people risking their health to be in the streets in all 50 states, in large and small cities. This inspiring rebellion has spread around the world on almost every continent in solidarity with Black Lives Matter, which is an international struggle.

Underneath these two unprecedented pandemics is a dying capitalist economic system based on making profits, not meeting human needs. Capitalism has been in a permanent economic crisis since the housing market crash in 2008. It never has and never will fully recover. This crisis is reflected in low-wage jobs, lack of housing, closings of hospitals and clinics, mass incarceration, a rise in domestic and sexual violence, attacks on reproductive justice, police brutality, environmental racism, lack of healthy foods, etc.

For working-class people and people of color, there has always been a generational social crisis for years before 2008. But COVID-19 has made these issues more acute, especially with the genocidal numbers of people of color dying, at a rate 50 percent higher than whites due to institutionalized racism.

Women are resisting on all fronts

In my organization, International Working Womens Coalition, our main slogan is Every issue is a womans issue. We have a 10-point program that begs the question:

Can we live without all the basic human needs like health care, jobs, housing, food and more? We say that in order to win these rights, you have to unite and fight capitalism and imperialism, which propagates white supremacy in all forms. And patriarchy and gender oppression are used to divide women and all sectors of our class.

Who are on the front lines in the COVID-19 crisis? Mainly health care workers, the majority being women who put their lives on the line to save lives, but are dying because they dont have personal protective necessities, access to ventilators and other lifesaving equipment. Women, especially women of color, have seen their numbers swell as incarcerated workers. Many are single mothers.

Women have also been victims of police violence, like Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old Black EMT worker, shot eight times by Louisville, Ky., police while sleeping this past March. Her 27th birthday was on June 5. She is just the latest victim of police terror. Theres Sandra Bland in Texas, Rekia Boyd in Chicago, Shantel Davis and Kyam Livingston in New York, and countless other women of color whose lives have been tragically cut short. None of the police involved have been arrested or charged.

But women are resisting on all fronts. Women of color, Black, Latinx and Indigenous, as well as anti-racist whites, a vast majority of them young, are on the front lines of this rebellion, not backing down from the police. Health care workers are rallying and marching against their terrible conditions, fighting both COVID and saying Black Lives Matter. Women are on the frontlines fighting these and other neoliberal policies emanating from the imperialist system both at home and abroad.

The COVID-19 virus may be keeping a lot of us off the streets due to age and preexisting health conditions, but we can still show solidarity in other ways to fight any isolation, including womens assemblies. We need to agree on some global united days of action on issues that most impact women, because despite where we live and struggle, we face the same struggles and the same fight against the same oppressive system. A good start is to defend this global rebellion against police and military terror, however long it lasts, because it is a womans issue. As the Assata Shakur chant says, as it applies to women and gender-oppressed people, We have nothing to lose but our chains.

Monica Moorehead is an executive committee member of IWA. She is also a coordinator of the International Working Womens Day Coalition in New York City. Moorehead is a managing editor of Workers World newspaper and a contributing writer for the 1995 pamphlet, Capitalisms war on women: Why the system is responsible for violence against women.

Read more:

Police terror, COVID-19 are womens issues - Workers World

Dr Ebun Joseph, an unapologetically black Irish woman of Nigerian descent, established the countrys first Black Studies university course at University College Dublin. Here she talks about racism in Ireland, the importance of black studies and bringing an end to Direct Provision

On May 25, the horrific murder of George Floyd took place in Minneapolis. The resulting protests against age-old racism in its most visceral form have since spread across American cities. The murder of George Floyd has led to the commitment made over the weekend by the city council in Minneapolis to dismantle the police force there.

The police officer responsible for kneeling on George Floyds neck for almost nine minutes, Derek Chauvin, has now been charged with second-degree murder. The other three officers present Thomas Lane, Tou Thao and J. Alexander Kueng have also been charged with aiding and abetting Chauvin in committing murder and in committing manslaughter. All four officers were immediately fired from Minneapolis police force.

This appalling, naked injustice and its brutal execution have stirred collective political consciences, from Washington to Dublin to Sydney. George Floyd has become a symbol of racism and how deeply ingrained it has been in America for so long.

In Ireland, a country that is itself a survivor of colonial oppression, murals of George Floyd and slogans have appeared on walls in different cities. The children of James Connolly flocked through the streets of Dublin, Belfast, Galway and elsewhere, to take a stand against the oppression of black Americans. In the process, Black Lives Matter came into focus as the new mantra of a generation too often wrongly accused of apathy.

But does the anger sparked by the murder of George Floyd mean that racism no longer exists on our island? Not by a long shot.

Dr Ebun Joseph, an unapologetically black Irish woman of Nigerian descent, established the countrys first Black Studies university course at University College Dublin (UCD). Dr Joseph became a microbiologist in Nigeria at 20 and migrated to Ireland in 2002, at the age of 30. She focused her PhD on Social Justice and has worked her way up to become a lecturer in Trinity and UCD.She says that we sweep Irish racism under the carpet.

Our colonial past makes honest discussions around the issue doubly complicated we tend to see ourselves as the oppressed, not the oppressor. Yet the system, she says dramatically, referring to the barbaric way in which George Floyd was murdered, kneels on the necks of Irelands marginalised people, every day, frequently rendering them invisible.

Dr. Ebun Joseph hopes that the rise of Black Lives Matter will prompt sincere deliberations in Ireland, forcing us to admit that racism, in all its forms, is a global social issue and that it plagues us too.

On The Lessons of Minneapolis

Firstly, it should make us realise that racism is real, and it is bigger than we think, and if we are not addressing it if we are sweeping it under the carpet it is going to cause a lot of damage. We are in the middle of a [health crisis] that has killed hundreds of thousands of people, but what is raging now? Race and racism. I think we underestimate how important the issue of race is. If we want to learn from what happened in America, we should admit that racism is not something that just happens over there. It is right here. Here, we think, 'Oh it is American, it is in the UK.' I'm like, are you joking? Racism it is here too. Yes, we are not being physically killed, but every day when we apply for jobs people who look like me we are being discriminated against. We're being called the N-word. You are kneeling on our necks, and thats why I'm saying, we can't breathe.

On Seeing the Murder of George Floyd

I cry every time I watch it. My first reaction was sadness that we have to deal with this in 2020. For me, that video is evidence to the permanence of racism. A man puts his hand in his pocket and kneels on another human being. As African-Americans would say 'a grown-ass man, was lying on the floor and crying for his mother. He was saying, 'Mama, I can't breathe. His mum was dead. He knew he was being killed. That picture is etched in my mind. It's never going to go away.

On Direct Provision in Ireland

People are effectively incarcerated in our Direct Provision system. You know it's like Donald Trump and his wall (laughs). Direct Provision is the same idea as Trump's wall. There is a base that wants Direct Provision to exist, and the Government wants to please them. We repealed the Eighth Amendment; we have marriage equality now, because there was a political will for that; but the Government doesn't have the same will to abolish Direct Provision. Theyd rather pay billions of Euros to private companies to incarcerate people and it is a form of incarceration than to allow them to work and live in society. We are actually spending more money than we would if we were to give people autonomy to have their own lives and be a part of the community here and contribute to the system. We talk about how lockdown is hard, how we don't have our freedom but people live five/six/ten years in Direct Provision. It should make us look inside and (then) underscore the issue of race and racism in Ireland in academia, in our schools and Government. Race studies is the most under-resourced topic in Ireland. We dont believe it is a big issue here.

On the Meaning of White Supremacy

The way we imagine Ireland is that it was the victim of British colonisation, of the Irish oppression in America, but we stop the history there. We dont teach our students, our nation, that once Ireland gained independence when we became white and we became white on the backs and the necks of Africans. When we ticked that box of whiteness, we began enjoying our white privileges. Now, when we hear the word white supremacy, we think of KKK. No. White supremacy is when a white person places another white person above a black person: that's what white supremacy is to me. When you think because you're white you're superior, that's what white supremacy is.

On the Oppressed and the Oppressors

In Ireland, we think we can't be racist because we were once discriminated against. We were the oppressed. If you go and read Paula Freires Pedagogy of the Oppressed, it says, that when the oppressed is free, if they're not careful, they can become worse than their oppressors. When I tell you that the racism we experience in Ireland is of the worst kind, it is not because we are doing worse things than the rest of the world. No, we are not doing half as much they are doing. It is because, here, we still have to grapple with admitting that we have racism here. Nobody in the US would tell you that there is no racism in their country. In the UK, they agree with you if you talk about their racism. In Ireland, we can't even admit that we have racism.

On the African Scholars Association

Because we don't see many people coming out to report racism, we think we don't have it. When people don't come out to report, it is an indicator of the level of oppression within our system. People are insecure; they are afraid. In the US, people of colour, they became President, they are managers, CEOs. They're in the police force. They are also drug dealers (laughs): they are at every sector. So is the case in the UK. Here black people, Travellers, people who have a different name, who look visibly different, they are at the bottom of the ladder. So, there is no occasion for conflict. Here, black people are cleaners. Your cleaner won't confront you about your racism. They would be afraid. They know if they talk, they can lose their jobs. I set up the African Scholars' Association. I get emails from people who have PhDs in nursing, working as a care assistant. Do you understand? Im being blacklisted, they say, if we get her, shes going to bring her black activism into things. But, so be it. I am unapologetically black. Im Ebun Joseph, and Im willing to pay that price.

On the Influence of Leaders

Leadership is everything. The minute you do something or say something, you tell people that it is okay to do that or say that. Leaders are role models. Leo Varadkar made a statement just last night at about 8 pm or so, and it was not a strong statement. He forgot to mention to young people that he understands how difficult this must be, to make them feel calm. Many of us still look to Obama for leadership. He wasn't perfect, but I was still looking to read a statement from him. When Donald Trump said, 'When looting starts, shooting starts,' that is a 1968 racist comment and that's what he is teaching his people. So, people focus on the looting. Who taught people how to loot? Who taught people that looting was a weapon of war? Who taught us looting, rioting and burning? The British and the French, when they went to Africa, when they went to Benin: the first thing they did was burning beautiful houses. They looted and rioted. They taught us how to loot.

On the 27th Amendment to the Constitution

In 2004, when we took away the citizenship rights of children who are born to non-Irish parents in Ireland, what we did was create classes of citizenship, categories of citizenship. That's why (racist) people can go out and call us 'paper Irish'. [The 27th Amendment] acknowledges that there are levels of Irish citizenship. That's why even if you have an Irish passport if your name doesn't sound Irish or you have a different skin colour, they can say you're not Irish. Remember the little, black girl who did Irish dancing and they went after her. It's like Africans telling white people you can't rap because we invented rap music. So, Irishness is defined on the basis of whiteness. So, we feel if were not white, we cant be Irish.

On Feedback from Students

I was in a bad way because of George Floyd these past few days. But I got the most amazing email from a young man. I taught him in Trinity College. He wasn't part of my Black Studies course. I taught him Race, Ethnicity and Identity. I'm used to getting these emails from black students or white, female students. But I held this one so dear in my heart. He was a young, white male student. His email said, 'Thank you so much for teaching me so excellently that he's not somebody who normally gets a 70. But he wrote [his essay for me] on whiteness, the hypocrisy of whiteness. I didnt give him that topic. He chose that topic. I had to go back and re-read his essay to see what he wrote, and it was brilliant again. I tried to encourage him to get it published. When I get that email from him, thats exciting.

On Feedback from Students Part 2

Last year, my Black Studies students emailed me as part of black history month that they are running a seminar on the significance of Black Studies. I was like, 'Oh my god'. They finished the course in June and on their own in November, they were going to do that. The course taught black students how they were programmed to be embarrassed by their race. It helped them to find pride in themselves. Now, they are unapologetically black. It was a mixed class though, half-white and half-black students. What I enjoy most about it is that in Black Studies, I'm teaching students that history is not about the amazingness of whites' achievements and black slavery.

On her plan for the Institute of Black Studies in Ireland

There was also a UN resolution in 2019 that schools should teach students African history, and Africans should teach it. No one is doing that here. But I put myself behind this, and I'm going to make it happen. UCD should not take any credit for the Black Studies course. All they did was giving me a platform, and thats because I had people like [UCD Prof] Kathleen Lynch advocate it. They have no right to the glory of it. Its my sweat and blood. Im going to set up The Institute of African Studies in Ireland. All these colleges have Diversity and Inclusion officers. What does that even mean? How many of them reached out to their migrant students to see how they were doing during the pandemic? They just give themselves big titles.

On Online Harassment

I recently looked and realised that I had blocked 720 people. Do you know how draining it is to block 720 people? I think what triggers them the most is that I don't fit into the stereotypes. Im confident. One of them told me that I should be grateful that they gave me an education. Im like, no. You didnt fucking give me anything. I paid for my education.

On the Race to Deliver Her Thesis

I stayed up for 78 hours, and I submitted my PhD dissertation, because if I didnt submit that on time, I had to pay for extensions, and I didnt have the money. My body was shaking from lack of food and sleep. I jumped into my car and drove to Maynooth to print it. They couldnt print it there. I drove to the city. We had to submit it [physically] I think at 4pm. I got to UCD at 3.48pm. I was so hungry, I tried to eat, but I couldn't. And you want me to be grateful? I worked for it. I was working full-time, doing my PhD and raising two kids as a single parent. I wasn't funded by any organisation. When they tell me, we gave you these things, I'm like, then let's give them to everybody. Why are we not doing that?

On the Disproportionate Impact of the Pandemic on Women

We recently had a series of webinars, and one of them was the Gendered Face of Covid-19. You can see that we are taking all the flak. Even my son was telling me, 'Mum, I think you're actually cooking more now. When I'm going to work, I'm like: 'Guys, sort yourselves out.' But when I'm at home, I feel like since I'm not commuting, I can use that one-hour to cook and clean because women still do over 80 per cent of the work at home. I also saw that more men were publishing academic work during the pandemic. In the academic world you get promoted based on your publications and research so, what happens is that once the pandemic ends, these men are going to get ahead of women because women had to take care of the kids. You can't try to publish; you don't have time to write down anything. I'm not saying all the men, but a high percentage of them, are not taking on home responsibility. And when they do, it is called helping, and when it is called helping, that means you don't see it as your responsibility. Gender roles still negatively impact women. A vast majority of our nurses are women because it is considered to be a female profession.

On the Formation of a New Government

There are so many issues that opposition parties need to prioritise. Once the pandemic is over, we are going to try to make the health care system privatised again, and that is going to affect our marginalised groups. We're not going back to square one. We're going back to square zero. Before the pandemic homelessness was a major issue, but we saw that if we wanted to house the homeless, we could. So, parties must make sure we are not going back to having our men, women and children on the streets. Inequality of income must be addressed. I think the Government realised that the social welfare payment was not enough, during the pandemic. So, maybe it is time we had a liveable, basic income for everybody, if they need help, whether they are cleaners or consultants. Our health system serves the wealthy. Let's try to see if we can have an equal health service. Lets abolish Direct Provision and help people actualise their citizenship. These are some of the things that the new Government should prioritise.

On The Possibility of Running for Office

No way (laughs). My dad was a politician. He was like a commissioner for education and finance, different things during his life. He's retired now. He's 82. But it made me realise that politics was dirty. You get there with all those amazing ideas, and you get disillusioned. I'm an academic. I want to teach future politicians and managers. If I can change their mindset, then I can have a bigger reach and have an influence on politics.

Excerpt from:

Dr Ebun Joseph: Why Black Studies Matter In Ireland and Responding to the Murder of George Floyd - hotpress.com

From small towns to big cities, to nations across the world, people have gathered en masse to protest the deaths of George Floyd, who was killed in police custody on May 25, Breonna Taylor, who police fatally shot in her home on March 13, and the many other unarmed Black Americans who have been killed by the police. A second week of protests and rallies united against police brutality and systemic racism in the United States has brought a resurgence of attention to policy ideas that could reduce racial injustice.

Many people are protesting not only the numerous police murders of many people, especially Black people, but also the day-to-day oppression they face, says Spencer Piston, a Boston University College of Arts & Sciences assistant professor of political science whose research focuses on racial and economic inequality.

Last year, Piston and research collaborators revealed that general political knowledge-what Americans are taught about the United States legal system through school curricula and media exposure-does not take into account the real lived experiences of people in communities that frequently interact with the police.

The paper describing their findings, which Piston coauthored with Vesla Weaver of Johns Hopkins University and Gwen Prowse of Yale University, describes how individual perspectives are shaped by the presence of police in their communities. The researchers hope their findings will help broaden the conventional definition of political knowledge, which ignores the experiences of people living in heavily policed communities, which are disproportionately low-income communities and communities of color.

If you start with the premise that people who are routinely oppressed by police know more about the carceral system, then we can learn from [those communities], become better advocates, and improve the quality of our actual democracy.

Were challenging the story by taking a very different approach, which is to ask the question, what happens when we look at [political] knowledge people actually have about the face of government thats most relevant in their lives? says Piston. That face is the police, or the carceral state, a term used to capture all of the ways a state can exercise control over individuals, including jail, prison, and forms of surveillance.

The researchers read the transcripts of 233 conversations that happened between Black Americans living in neighborhoods in Baltimore, Chicago, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, and Newark. These conversations were facilitated through The Portals Policing Project, an initiative started by law students at Yale University after the death of Michael Brown, an unarmed Black teenager who was shot by police in 2014. The Portals-gold-painted shipping containers retrofitted with immersive virtual technologies that connect residents of different cities as if they are in the same room together-fostered conversations about policing in everyday life within Black and Latinx communities. The project has compiled the largest collection of first-hand accounts of police interactions to date, according to the projects website.

The researchers found Black Americans possess dual, contradictory knowledge about how the state should operate based on written law and how it actually operates as a lived experience, and this knowledge is a byproduct of forced, frequent interactions with the police in those communities. These interactions-some of which escalate quickly and violently-cause affected individuals to distance themselves from both the American political and carceral system in order to preserve physical safety, autonomy, and dignity.

Of the study participants, 28 percent reported being stopped by the police in the last week or month, and 39 percent had been stopped over seven times starting, on average, at 15 years old. While the number of incarcerated people is slowly on the decline in the US, stark racial disparities persist. Black people are incarcerated at a reported five times the rate of white Americans, and Latinx people account for 23 percent of inmates while only making up 16 percent of the adult population.

If you start with the premise that people who are routinely oppressed by police know more about the carceral system, then we can learn from [those communities], become better advocates, and improve the quality of our actual democracy, says Piston. I think [this paper] should change how we approach our fellow citizens. And its a start in addressing tremendous problems in our democracy in practice.

In response to the death of George Floyd, Massachusetts Representative Ayanna Pressley has introduced a resolution to condemn police brutality, racial profiling, and the excessive use of force, cosponsored with Minnesota Representative Ilhan Omar. The weeks of protests have also prompted a rethinking of the responsibilities given to the police and how they operate in society, with many protesters calling for police forces to be defunded, as well as US Senate and House Democrats to propose new plans for police reforms.

In recent decades, many reforms have been tried and failed, or even backfired, says Piston. Some reforms, such as body cameras and implicit bias training, actually transfer additional resources to police. The ideal strategy is to reduce the scope of our carceral state, and take resources, authority, and power away from police.

Already in Minneapolis, where George Floyd was killed by police officer Derek Chauvin, kneeling on his neck for nearly nine minutes, city council members have voted to dissolve their police department and recreate their public safety system.

Encouraging people to vote in national and local elections is also an essential step in using political knowledge within a democracy, Piston believes, and as essential as voting remains, social movements and political protest must exist alongside the civic duty to elect leaders who understand how to reimagine and reexamine policing as it currently exists.

I do think that voting is not enough, and many of the folks in these conversations are very aware of that, he says. Its hard to know how much things will change, but the [recent] protests provide reason to be hopeful about the future of our democracy. They are liberalizing white peoples racial attitudes, and are also placing many policy options on the table that were nowhere near consideration in a variety of states and localities.

Originally posted here:

Tapping into Lived Experiences of People in Black Communities Is Key to Police Reform Efforts - Mirage News

John Hickenlooper touted his record as governor and ability to find compromise, and his rival Andrew Romanoff called for bolder action to address racial injustice, health care and climate change in the first Democratic U.S. Senate primary debate.

The differences in style and substance between the candidates became clear from the start of the 30-minute virtual event hosted Tuesday by 9News. Romanoff took an aggressive approach and staked out progressive stances while Hickenlooper played defense and answered for the state ethics commissions verdict Friday that he violated Colorado law.

WATCH: The Colorado Sun, CBS4 and PBS12 will host the second Democratic primary debate in the U.S. Senate race at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, June 10. Watch it streaming live at coloradosun.com

The debate unfolded at a crucial point as Democratic and unaffiliated voters begin to receive mail ballots this week ahead of the June 30 primary, and the candidates prepare for two more debates in a weeks span.

Heres a breakdown of what we learned about Hickenlooper, the former Colorado governor, and Romanoff, the former state House speaker, from the first debate.

In the debates opening question, Hickenlooper declined to endorse calls from civil rights activists to defund police a term that refers to reducing spending on police departments and diverting the money to social service programs. Instead, he said he supports banning the use of chokeholds and requiring officers to wear body cameras, as well as broader actions to address equal opportunity in housing and jobs.

I dont think we should defund the police, but I do believe we need to reform the police, Hickenlooper said.

Romanoff replied: Reform is not enough. We do need to shift resources and demilitarize the police. We need to invest in community services. John fundamentally misunderstands this moment just as he misunderstood what Black Lives Matter means.

The remark invoked a comment Hickenlooper made at a recent racial injustice forum. When asked what Black Lives Matter means to him, Hickenlooper replied that it means every life matters. Days later he clarified his position, saying he tripped on his words and said the same again when given the opportunity in the debate.

But Romanoff didnt let go at that point. He noted that Hickenlooper backed the unproven broken windows theory of policing when he was Denver mayor in 2006 and even hired the criminologist who led the push for the policy, which suggests that cracking down on small infractions will help reduce more serious crimes.

Romanoff said Hickenloopers approach is responsible in part for this new era of mass incarceration.

We need a new approach, and thats why I stand with the protesters in their effort to turn America into a source of equality and end the oppression that has persisted for generations and centuries, Romanoff said.

Hickenlooper touted efforts he made to address police accountability shortly after taking office, including putting in police oversight measures, but he acknowledged the efforts didnt go far enough.

MORE: Find more coverage of Colorados U.S. Senate race

Days ahead of the debate, the Colorado Independent Ethics Commission determined that Hickenlooper accepted rides in a corporate-funded private plane and luxury limousine, twice violating the states constitutional ban on public officials accepting gifts.

In his first comments on the verdict, Hickenlooper said he accepted responsibility for his actions but declined to apologize. He also didnt address the commissions decision to hold him in contempt for ignoring a subpoena to testify.

I made a commitment to travel anywhere and everywhere to try and bring jobs and created economic growth for Colorado, he said, explaining why he took a private jet owned by homebuilder MDC Holdings and rode in a Maserati limousine in Italy paid for by Fiat Chrysler Automobiles on separate trips in 2018.

Romanoff said the violations should disqualify him from the race because it plays into the Republican opposition and helps U.S. Sen. Cory Gardners reelection chances.

The truth is that John Hickenlooper represents a threat that we cannot afford, Romanoff said. I believe he should consider withdrawing from this race.

Hickenlooper, whose candidacy is predicated on his electability in November, came armed with a retort against his rival.

I campaigned statewide in 2010 and 2014, difficult years for Democrats, and won both times. Andrew you havent won in what, 12 years? Hickenlooper said, referring to Romanoffs failed bids for U.S. Senate in 2010 and U.S. House in 2014. I think its clear I have a relationship with Coloradans through thick and thin and they are going to recognize these as smear tactics.

MORE: Hickenlooper makes campaign trail debut touting compromise. His rivals in Senate race say its the wrong approach.

The differences between the candidates became apparent on most issues throughout the debate.

On health care, Hickenlooper said he supports a public option to expand insurance coverage, calling the federal health care law signed by President Barack Obama a great foundation to build upon. And he defended his record working with the oil and gas industry to craft new methane emission standards.

Romanoff said he supports government-paid health insurance through Medicare for All, a plan that would dismantle the costly current health care system. On the environment, he reaffirmed his opposition to fracking and his support for the Green New Deal, a proposal to take quicker action to address climate change. He also announced support for trillions of dollars in reparations for African-Americans and Native Americans.

The candidates crystalized their viewpoints in the closing moments of debate.

Hickenlooper talked about compromise as an antidote to government dysfunction. I worked to bring change to Colorado, he said, adding a moment later: I want to take that change to Washington.

Romanoff responded with a more urgent call. This is no time for timidity, he said. We need bold, structural change to address each of the challenges we discussed tonight.

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3 takeaways from the first US Senate debate between Democrats John Hickenlooper and Andrew Romanoff - The Colorado Sun

We have a history of intra-communal conflict. It is not unique, but it has certainly influenced our journey. Despite the romantic notions of Vartanantz, there were Armenian feudal lords (nakharas) who did not rally behind the cause and were considered duplicitous. The absence of a sovereign state over the centuries made Armenians targets for division and disunity. Students of our modern history will note that many of the names identified by the Ittihad leadership on April 24, 1915 were offered by Armenians. This is a sad note we prefer not to discuss. We are an independent-minded and diverse-thinking people which has been a double-edged sword, particularly in the post-Genocide errors.

The attributes that have enabled our survival have also contributed to sub-optimizing that survival. This has been particularly evident in the diaspora where, prior to 1991, different perspectives on Soviet Armenia eventually led to intra-communal conflict that altered the structure of the diaspora. It was prominently manifested in the church with the administrative division in 1933-34 after months of debate, arguments and the tragic murder of the sitting Primate Ghevont Tourian. This began an era where several unaffiliated churches (that were either expelled or exited depending on your perspective) continued from 1933 to 1956 as independent churches without an allegiance to a hierarchical See. The decision in 1956-57 to seek affiliation with the Great House of Cilicia in Antelias, Lebanon (which until 1915 was seated in Sis, Armenian Cilicia and relocated to Antelias in 1930 as a result of the Genocide) cemented a dual affiliation in the Americas. That administrative division remains in place today with two entities in Canada, Western US and Eastern US.

The division was not limited to the church. As the most prominent institution was divided, the adjacency impact resulted in de facto alignments of certain organizations. The AYF, ARS, ARF, Homenetmen and Hamazkayin were essentially aligned with the Prelacy community, while the ACYOA, AGBU, Tekeyan and ADL were traditionally with the Diocese. The good news is that, particularly since 1991 and a common goal to help sovereign Armenia, the walls built since the 1930s are being dismantled. The emerging generation is basically ambivalent to a problem from the 1930s. Social relationships and collaboration have transcended traditional boundaries with a pan-Armenian atmosphere. The bad news is that the reality of what remains rears its ugly head displaying hypocrisy to the nation.

To illustrate this point , lets briefly identify the hierarchical Sees of the Armenian Church. For centuries, the Armenian Church has had four hierarchical Sees, each with a distinct history and responsibility. Two of the seats have had a stable geographic presence for centuries. The Patriarchate of Jerusalem was established in the seventh century when the church became a permanent part of the Christian leadership in the Holy Land. Its jurisdiction includes those churches and lands under its responsibility either singularly or jointly with other Christian denominations. It has a rich tradition and is a great presence for the Armenians in the land where Jesus ministry on earth took place.

The Patriarchate of Constantinople (Istanbul) was founded by the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II in 1461 to lead the Armenian community in the millet system of governance. The Patriarchate has a long and noble history of service to the Armenians of the empire, but has also suffered greatly, particularly in the last 125 years, at the hands of Turkish oppression and interference. Both Patriarchates operate independently, but accept the spiritual hierarchical authority of Holy Etchmiadzin.

Holy Etchmiadzin is the birthplace of the Armenian church where the only begotten descended in 301. It is the seat of the supreme Catholicos of All Armenians. Ironically because of political turmoil and instability in the region, the seat was moved many times over the centuries, finally settling in the Cilicia region in the 11th century with the establishment of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia. In the 15th century (1441), with conditions in eastern Armenia stabilizing, the seat was returned to Holy Etchmiadzin for the first time in many centuries as it continues today.

The last of the four Sees is the Great House of Cilicia, which continued after the return of the supreme Catholicos to Etchmiadzin in 1441. It began in Sivas early in the 11th century and by the end of the century was in the new kingdom of Cilicia. For nearly 400 years, the Catholicos of All Armenians resided in Cilicia. After 1441, the Great House of Cilicia continued, eventually moving to Sis administering to the needs of the Armenians in Cilicia. The Cathedral and monastic complex were destroyed during the Genocide. After Turkish nationalists retook Cilicia in 1921, the See was without a permanent home tending to the refugee needs in former Ottoman territories. The See settled in Antelias, Lebanon in 1930 on a site owned by the Near East Foundation where it remains today. The See recognizes the primacy of the Holy See of Etchmiadzin. It is interesting to note that today what most Armenians are aware of are the jurisdictional conflicts between the Holy Sees of Etchmiadzin and Cilicia, which are post-Genocide issues. For many centuries the four Sees operated with major disagreement. These matters of conflict seem to find their source in external factors (geo-politics, genocide, creation of the diaspora), but we tend to define them as internal disagreements.

A great deal has changed with 2020. The Cold War and its secondary conflicts are long gone. Armenia and the church institutions live in a free state. Our conflicts were masked for decades by larger global issues. There is no excuse for the church Sees to not resolve any open disagreement. There is a tendency to exclude the laity from these realities as if they dont exist. Coming together when the leaders deem it convenient is unacceptable. As many have reminded me, it has improved. True, but the need has increased at a pace greater than the progress. We should remind ourselves that the remaining issues are self-imposed. During the Soviet era, it was difficult to resolve issues when the church was under the control of the Soviets. Today, they are experiencing more freedom than at any point in modern history. An institution based on Christian love must lead with reconciliation and forgiveness.

In 2015, we commemorated the 100th anniversary of the Genocide. There was a particularly powerful event held in Washington D.C. The Holy Badarak was celebrated with His Holiness Karekin II and Aram I. It was a beautiful sight as priests from both the Prelacy and Diocese offered Holy Communion to the faithful. The ultimate unity, the Body and Blood of Christ, was the gift of that day. As a church there is no greater statement, no reverse gear. After that weekend, several of us suggested to both the Prelacy and the Diocese that the respective Vehapars should conduct Hrashapar service in the others parishes. Break down those walls after the Holy Communion experience. Sadly we were almost laughed at. Lets not push it was the common response. How can we not expect continued Christian love and respect after sharing the most holy of His gifts? It is shameful that our church does not have the will and courage to build momentum after major breakthroughs. That day I recall many of my diocesan friends saying how impressed they were with Aram I, and for most, it was their first encounter. It reminded me of my youth in the Prelacy where I admired Archbishop Tiran Nersoyan for his courage and vision, yet our paths would not naturally cross until I decided to expand my horizon.

The leaders of the hierarchical Sees must walk the talk within their jurisdictions and provide us with a sustained sense of oneness. The days of becoming one church when it is convenient for large public issues (earthquakes, genocide, etc.) only to return to business as usual is both a turnoff and hypocritical. Today, the perception of the newly-elected Patriarch Sahag in Istanbul is still open. He gets a pass from many for the dire conditions of leading a church under Turkish oppression. The early indications are that he will be a placater to the government. In Jerusalem, Patriarch Nurhan is a strong leader who has brought stability and strong leadership to a seat that operates under challenging circumstances. Aram I is a highly respected intellectual and spiritual leader who was mentored by Karekin I of blessed memory. Aram Vehapar has been consumed by the instability of the Middle East and its impact on the Armenian communities, particularly in Lebanon and Syria. Karekin IIs popularity has plummeted after years of corruption allegations. His visibility in the public has diminished as it has been several years since an extended pontifical visit to the United States.

Our church cannot afford to offer sacraments of the church with photo ops and then return to a partitioned state. This only frustrates the faithful further from the euphoria of the Eucharist to the downside of returning to the status quo. We have the most powerful force in the universe as our foundation: Gods love. There is no need for fear. There should be courage, love and the desire to build a stronger church. All of these leaders have titles and jurisdictions, but most importantly they are Armenian clergymen. They need to look at us from that perspectiveone faithful community.

Stepan was raised in the Armenian community of Indian Orchard, MA at the St. Gregory Parish. A former member of the AYF Central Executive and the Eastern Prelacy Executive Council, he also served many years as a delegate to the Eastern Diocesan Assembly. Currently , he serves as a member of the board and executive committee of the National Association for Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR). He also serves on the board of the Armenian Heritage Foundation. Stepan is a retired executive in the computer storage industry and resides in the Boston area with his wife Susan. He has spent many years as a volunteer teacher of Armenian history and contemporary issues to the young generation and adults at schools, camps and churches. His interests include the Armenian diaspora, Armenia, sports and reading.

Continued here:

Hierarchical Harmony: Walking the Talk - Armenian Weekly

N

eville Lawrence is so right to say that black people are still treated as second class in Britain (Neville Lawrence: black people still second-class citizens in Britain, 9 June). I was 70 before I realised with a shock that all my life I had subconsciously regarded all people of colour as inevitably second class.

I was listening to a speech by an imam, and slowly it dawned on me. I was a liberal-minded white chap, churchgoing. I was in tears, and finally managed to get up and apologise to the imam. I fear that perhaps over half the nation feels as I did. Its not just the police. Its ingrained from 400 years ago. My great-grandfather employed slaves on his Virginia tobacco plantation. As a Jew, when after seven years he released them, fellow owners burned his barns down and he fled to Cuba.

But now at 90 I still worry sometimes over growing immigration, and the vast gap between rich and poor that one day must surely come to the boil.John MunroArundel, West Sussex

We should not be concerned with racism only in our own country. Big (mainly western) companies are dumping toxic waste in mainly low- or middle-income and non-white countries, causing illness and death. The worst example is the pesticide plant of Union Carbide Corporation, now taken over by Dow Chemical, in Bhopal, India, where the poison gas leak of 1984 is to this day compounded by toxic contamination of the water supply. Women are particularly affected, in their health, by being widowed, and by having to devote their lives to caring for children born with toxin-induced disabilities. When they applied for compensation, a Dow PR man said $500 is plenty good for an Indian. There is much talk of corporate responsibility: this should be put into practice by detoxifying the site and restoring what is left of their lives.Martin WrightLondon

The world of drama and acting is dominated by rich, privately educated white people (Drama schools accused of hypocrisy over anti-racism statements, 9 June; Gbolahan Obisesan: give BAME talent trust and theatre will thrive, 9 June). Including a proportionate number of rich black people would leave privilege largely intact. Many middle-class white parents throughout the country go to any lengths to ensure that their children attend a good middle-class white school (New UK teachers union chief: Institutional racism in schools has got to be addressed, 9 June).

These same people are often the most prominent in offering lip service to campaigns against systemic racism: their performative support diffuses and deflects from their particular privilege. Action on systemic racism will have to include class awareness if it is to be effective.Peter McKennaLiverpool

While I support the view that black history should be taught in schools, I am not sure that it should be termed black history (Calls grow for black history to be taught to all English school pupils, 8 June). It is white history as well. It is the history of empire and colonialism. It is a history of supremacy and oppression.

It is not just history either. Slavery is alive and doing very well for those who are still trading in human bodies here and across the world. I believe that we should be encouraging children to look at why and how people can become supremacists. We have a number of leaders of nations who are supremacists. History can show us whole galleries of supremacists whose beliefs have led to the slaughter and subjugation of millions of people.

We need to be taught to think about how these acts can not only be conceived of, but how it is that people can allow them to happen. George Floyds murder was an illustration of this phenomenon. How did those policemen come to believe that that act was OK?Jane DarlingHythe, Kent

I am sure all Guardian readers welcome the call for black history to be included in the schools history curriculum. But let us not forget those of us who grew up in the 1960s when the rented-sector advertising said no blacks, Irish or dogs. So let us also include the appalling period of history when Ireland was part of the UK between 1801 and 1922, my forebears language was systematically destroyed and over a million of the 8 million population died of starvation.Brian KeeganPeterborough

I am Chinese, which means I come under the minority ethnic part of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME). Our often sorry history under British imperialism and colonial rule is seldom mentioned. It needs also to be included in the curriculum. Not to do so would seem like another example of institutional and systemic racism. If black history is to be mandatory, then yellow history should be too.Dorothy ChangLondon

Is it time for an educational programme to be set up to teach the realities of the Atlantic slave trade, following the models of Holocaust education? Could there be educational visits to the forts on the West African coast, in the way that there are to Auschwitz? Are there philanthropists willing to support such innovations? Would the government provide funding?Barbara HibbertHarrogate

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Tackling deep-rooted racism will take courage - The Guardian

A library named after former Prime Minister William Gladstone has responded to calls for its name to be changed and his statue to be removed due to links with slavery.

Activist Ciara Lamb said the name of the Gladstone Library in Hawarden "glorifies" the former PM and that his family, including his father John Gladstone, was "one of the largest slave-owning families in the country".

The call to change the name and remove Gladstone's statue has come in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests around the world, including a protest in Bristol which saw a statue of slave trader Edward Colston pulled down.

The library was formerly known as St Deiniols Library, but changed its name in 2010.

In 1895, Gladstone bequeathed 40,000 to the library - the equivalent to 3.31m today - and much of his own book collection can be found there.

Ms Lamb, who launched a petition to change the library's name, said it is a "symbol of oppression" and changing it would be a sign of progress which the community "so desires".

She said: "St Deiniol's Library - within recent years renamed as Gladstone Library, after Prime Minister William Gladstone - is a centrepiece to the village of Hawarden.

However, the links to PM Gladstone are now even tighter affiliated due to this name change.

"With the recent Black Lives Matter protests, a symbol of such oppression is not what our village supports.

"His history in building the library and initiating the collection of books held there are impactful yes, however the glorification of a man known to negatively impact the BAME peoples in our community cannot be celebrated.

The library is a place of great knowledge within our community and is something many of us hold dear to our hearts, the change in name would be the progress our community so desires.

A national campaign called "Topple the Racists" is calling for the removal of numerous statues across the UK, including the statue of Gladstone which stands outside the library in Hawarden.

Responding to the calls, Peter Francis, warden and director of Gladstone Library, said: "We also believe that if it is the democratic will, after due process, to remove statues of the founder, William Gladstone, we would not stand in the way. Nor, I think, would Gladstone.

"At the core of our being, we at Gladstones Library believe that Black Lives Matter.

"What matters is how we live today: our values, our democratic process and political involvement.

"William Gladstone, whose politics were strikingly different to his Tory fathers politics and values, was the first British politician to lead a left-leaning government and to institute dramatic democratic changes when he introduced the secret ballot, universal education and a foreign policy based on freedom and liberty and not the aggrandisement of Empire.

"Gladstones Library, and I should add the Gladstone family, have continued to uphold and promote those liberal values.

"As a Library, we are building our programme around the Gladstonian themes of democracy, human rights and freedom of belief and we do not mean by simply looking back at history but by reading the signs of the times and working for a more democratic, humane and tolerant society."

Mr Francis said the library is aware of John Gladstones "plantation-owning past" has "instituted a scholarship for research into historical and contemporary slavery".

He said: "William Gladstones record of public office was one of almost unequalled service.

"He was the driving force behind the emergence of the Liberal party, he was a humanitarian, one could even celebrate him as one of the founders of the modern concept of human rights.

"He was passionate about education for all rather than just the elite. He was quick to defend the oppressed whether in Italy, Ireland, Bulgaria or Armenia.

"It is a career that is worth celebrating but we memorialise it best by being politically involved, humane and tolerant."

Mr Francis said it is "undeniable" that, during the early 19th century, Gladstones father owned land in the West Indies and South America that used slave labour.

He said that, while John Gladstone received 106,769 in compensation when slavery was abolished, William Gladstone himself received nothing.

"In 1831, William did speak in the Commons in favour of compensation for slave owners," said Mr Francis.

"It was his first speech in the Commons and he was still in thrall to his father."

Mr Francis said that, by 1850, Gladstone was "a changed man" and described slavery as by far the foulest crime that taints the history of mankind in any Christian or pagan country.

"He had changed," said Mr Francis.

"Towards the end of his life, he cited the abolition of slavery as one of the great political issues in which the masses had been right and the classes had been wrong.

"He thought it was a taint on national history and politics. His change was a move towards a profound commitment to liberty and perhaps this quote exemplifies his shift: 'I was brought up to hate and fear liberty. I came to love it. That is the secret of my whole career.'

"Liberty today means countering racism, sexism and intolerance wherever we see it.

"That is where our energy should be exerted. That would be truly Gladstonian."

The University of Liverpool has said it will rename its Gladstone student halls because of the former PMs links to the slave trade.

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Gladstone Library responds to calls for statue to be removed and name to be changed amid BLM protests - North Wales Live

A lawsuit brought by Republican lawmakers against Evers and Department of Health Secretary Andrea Palm seeking to strike down the order is now in the hands of the state's highest court. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

MADISON - Gov. Tony Evers and his administrationcame under fire Tuesday by conservative justices on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, one of whom compared his order to close businesses and schools amid the coronavirus outbreak to government oppression.

"Isn't it the very definition of tyranny for one person to order people to be imprisoned for going to work among other ordinarily lawful activities?" asked Justice Rebecca Bradley, who later questioned whether the administration could use the same power to order people into centers akin to the U.S. government's treatment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley listens during a 2018 Wisconsin Supreme Court session.(Photo: Michael Sears / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

A lawsuit brought by Republican lawmakers against Evers and Department of Health Secretary Andrea Palm seeking to strike down the order is now in the hands of the state's highest court, which is controlled by conservatives.

Evers and his attorney said Tuesday the lawmakers' lawsuit could upend life-saving measures and needlessly put more residents' health and their lives at risk.

"Everyone understands such an order would be absolutely devastating and extraordinarily unwise," DOJ attorney Colin Roth said. "If safer-at-home (order) is enjoined with nothing to replace it, and people pour out into the streets, that the disease will spread like wildfire and we'll be back in a terrible situation with an out-of-control virus with no weapon to fight it no treatments, no vaccine, nothing."

In response to Bradley's questioning, Roth said the order does not give Palm unlimited power. ButBradley questionedwhether the law set limits to the actions it allowed.

Live updates: The latest on coronavirus in Wisconsin

Daily digest: What you need to know about coronavirus in Wisconsin

Evers issued a public health emergency on March 12, a week after the coronavirus began to spread in the state following outbreaks in China, Europe, and on the coasts of the United States.

The governor in late March issued an order to shut down scores of businesses, bars and restaurants, and schools leading to more than 500,000 unemployment claims since then.

That order was set to expire in late April but Evers and Palm extended it by a month as cases of the virus continued to climb a move that prompted GOP lawmakers to sue.

Arguments in the suit were held virtually on Tuesday a rule adopted by the court because of the order it now will decide should continue.

The lawsuit is the latest battle between the Democratic governor and Republicans who control the state Legislature that could again reshape how state government works for Wisconsin.

At issue is whether Evers andDepartment of Health Secretary Andrea Palm acted lawfully when Palm signed the order extending restrictions on business operations and schools until May 26.

Palm signed the order using powers in state law that allow the health secretary to take sweeping actions to shutdown public lifeduring a virus outbreak like the current pandemic.

Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, who is running for Congress in the 5th District, and Speaker Robin Vos argue the Evers administration cannot act on its own in perpetuity and instead want a long-term plan to be crafted through the Legislature's rulemaking process.

"This case is not about whether a lockdown is a good idea,"Ryan Walsh, an attorney representing the lawmakers, said Tuesday. Instead, he argued, the case is about whether state law provides Palm with the ability to close down daily life.

Roth argued state law is clear and that if conservative justices or GOP lawmakers are unhappy with her powers, they should find a solution through legislation to change the law that he says provides those powers.

If the court sides with Fitzgerald and Vos, a legislative committee with three of the most critical lawmakers of the Evers administration's response to the virus outbreak will have veto power over the new rules.

The GOP leaders argue lawmakers should have a say in broad restrictions moving forward. Evers argues the process will bog down decision making that needs to be nimble to react to an unpredictable virus that has infected more than 8,000 people in Wisconsin in two months.

Walsh argued DHS had the authority to issue orders for certain areas of the state, but not the state as a whole, while Roth disputed that and said DHS' orders supersede less-stringent orders of local governments.

Roth noted while the majority of cases were once in Madison and Milwaukee, Brown County now has the second-highest number of cases a change that occurred within a couple weeks.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Patience Roggensack dismissed the idea that the outbreak was community-wide and could be replicated elsewhere.

"(The surge) was due to the meatpacking that's where Brown County got the flare," Roggensack said. "It wasn't just the regular folks in Brown County."

Three meatpacking plants in Brown County have been tied to outbreaks, pushing the county to have the second-highest number of cases in the state.

JBS Packerland shut down its Green Bay plant last weekafter the virus had sickened nearly 300 workers, about a quarter of the company's local employees.

Even with the microscope on food processing plants, Brown County officials have emphasized that those facilities aren't solely driving the increasein cases.

Claire Paprocki of Brown County Health and Human Services said the recent uptick stemsin part from people who don't practice social distancing, show up to work sick or continue to gather with family andfriends.

Haley BeMiller of the Green Bay Press-Gazette contributed to this report.

Contact Molly Beckat molly.beck@jrn.com. Follow her on Twitter at @MollyBeck.

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GOP lawsuit to block Tony Evers' order to stay home in hands of Supreme Court - Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Utilizing cutting-edge technology, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is perfecting the religious oppression of millions at home and exporting the same capabilities abroad. The CCP's ongoing abuse of Christians, Muslims and Buddhists lays bare the stakes for human freedom in the United States' great power competition with China.

In its annual report released last week, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) concluded that the CCP is "engaging in systematic, ongoing and egregious religious freedom violations." Thanks to Western media investigations and courageous Chinese whistleblowers, many outside China are familiar with the CCP's deplorable persecution of Muslims in Xinjiang. In the past year, Muslims have suffered "torture, rape, sterilization and other abuses," and authorities have "destroyed or damaged thousands of mosques."

Christians, who make up roughly five percent of China's population, have fared little better. Chinese officials "raided or closed down hundreds of Protestant house churches in 2019." Local officials continue to offer cash bounties for information on underground churches. Chinese authorities have burned unauthorized Bibles, ripped down crucifixes and replaced likenesses of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary with images of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Tibetan Buddhists continue to suffer "forced assimilation and suppression." Monks and nuns unwilling to subordinate their faith to the CCP's dictates have been "expelled from their monasteries, imprisoned and tortured." As an extraordinary sign of the hopelessness and desperation the CCP's oppression has caused, USCIRF noted that at least 156 Tibetans have self-immolated since February 2009.

While authoritarianism and religious persecution are sadly not new, the CCP leads the world in the abuse of advanced technologies to carry out its religious cleansing. In an update last September, USCIRF noted that authorities have often forced religious minorities to provide "blood samples, voice recordings and fingerprints." Government officials then employ "advanced computing platforms and artificial intelligence to collate and recognize patterns in the data on religious and faith communities." Surveillance cameras, sometimes installed inside places of worship, utilize advanced facial recognition software to assist these efforts.

Some may want to dismiss these concerning facts as the unfortunate but isolated plight of Chinese civilians struggling half a world away. But that would miss the true extent of the CCP's global program.

According to USCIRF, "China has exported surveillance technology and systems training to more than 100 countries," allowing them to "target political opponents or oppress religious freedom." With the technology in hand and international opprobrium still at a whisper, repressive regimes will see little downside to following suit.

Some have already made that calculation. The report notes that in August 2019, "Uzbek authorities forced approximately 100 Muslim men to shave their beards, claiming that the beards hindered Chinese facial recognition technology used by the government."

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-MA) summed up the stakes in February. "China is exporting authoritarianism. And they are giving everyone a packageI mean a literal tech package," he said. "The surveillance cameras, the artificial intelligence, the databases, the ways to control a society, just like they do at home."

The technology is hardly safer in democratic hands. Some U.S. allies and partners already use CCP technologies, clinging to dangerously outdated notions of a Chinese private sector. The reality is that no "private" Chinese company will refuse a dictate from Beijing. As free nations become increasingly reliant on Chinese hardware, they give the CCP potential points of access into security infrastructure and sensitive information.

Additionally, the more reliant nations, companies and individuals become on Chinese technology for critical services, investments and trade, the more reluctant each becomes to criticize Beijing's foreign or domestic policiesexpanding Beijing's ability to act with impunity. Some of America's closest European allies are already beginning to suffer from this affliction.

An effective response begins with documenting and disseminating Beijing's violations of religious liberty. The U.S. has taken positive initial steps. In October, the administration imposed restrictions on Chinese companies and officials abusing minorities.

But meaningful relief for China's religious minorities will come quickest if the U.S. recruits other nations with the economic and diplomatic firepower to stand together against Beijing.

This requires buy-in from America's partners. It also means tireless engagement with international organizations and the difficult diplomatic work of coalition-building. If Washington neglects these partnerships or vacates these international fora, Beijing will simply fill the vacuum.

As the USCIRF report makes clear, the competition between the U.S. and the CCP is about more than fleeting economic or political primacy. Hanging in the global balance are the protections of minorities, of conscience, of worship and of a private life beyond the reach of government.

If Beijing displaces the United States as the leader in shaping international rules and norms, one need not wonder the direction they will take: China's minorities already know.

Bradley Bowman is senior director for the Center on Military and Political Power at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, where Mikhael Smits is a research analyst.

The views expressed in this article are the writers' own.

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Beijing Hones and Exports Religious Oppression | Opinion - Newsweek

Chinese Christians have welcomed a damning US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) report but said religious oppression in China is more severe than what is reported.Christian leaders say the space for religious freedom has severely shrunk in the past two decades, with the communist regime implementing a series of policies aiming to eradicate religion from society.The US State Department has considered China "a country of special concern" since 1999, following the USCIRF recommendation. The recent 2020 report of the commission kept China among the global worst performers in terms of religious freedom.But some religious scholars told UCA News that the most serious but often overlooked form of religious suppression in China is to make Christians sign a declaration rejecting religion under the threat of denying them government benefits such as pensions. Since 2018 in areas such as Zhejiang province, Christian teachers in schools and colleges have been forced to sign such documents, without which they are denied pensions. The oppression continues subtly, blocking people from practicing their faith, said a religious leader who requested anonymity.The USCIRF report, released on April 28, said that "the state of religious freedom in China has continued to deteriorate" over the last year, with authorities using facial recognition and artificial intelligence to monitor religious minority groups. Series of violationsIndependent experts estimate that between 900,000 and 1.8 million Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyzstans and other Muslims are being held in more than 1,300 concentration camps in Xinjiang, the report said.It also referred to attacks on Christians, saying that authorities had raided or seized hundreds of Christian house churches. They released members of the Autumn Rain Covenant Church in December 2018, but a court last December charged its priest, Reverend Wang Yi, with "subversion of state power" and sentenced him to nine years in prison.The report also explicitly mentioned Auxiliary Bishop Guo Xijin of Fujian Mindong Diocese and Coadjutor Bishop Cui Tai of Hebei Xuanhua Diocese. Authorities harassed and jailed them for refusing to join the official state-sanctioned church.It also alleges that various local governments, including Guangzhou, are offering cash incentives to people who report underground church groups.In addition, crosses from churches across the country have been removed, people under 18 are banned from participating in religious liturgies, and images of Jesus or Our Lady are replaced with those of President Xi Jinping.The report recommended that the US government again designate China as a country of special concern under the International Religious Freedom Act.It wanted the US to impose targeted sanctions on institutions and officials that commit serious violations of religious freedom by freezing the property of the individuals involved or barring them from entering the United States.They also suggested that if the Chinese government continues to suppress religious freedom, US government officials will not participate in the Winter Olympics hosted by Beijing in 2022.The report also asked for intensified efforts to fight back against the Chinese government's attempts to exert influence in the United States to suppress information or propaganda about religious freedom violations.'China defends freedom'Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang responded to the report at a regular press conference. He said the US committee was biased against China and has published reports over the years "denigrating China's religious policy."He claimed that China has nearly 200 million people of all kinds of religious communities, more than 380,000 religious staff, about 5,500 religious groups and more than 140,000 religious activity sites registered by law.Geng reiterated that China would never allow anyone to engage in illegal criminal activities under the guise of religion.He also urged the US to respect basic facts, reject arrogance and prejudice, stop the misguided practice of releasing reports year after year, and stop using religious issues to interfere in China's internal affairs.But a Chinese religious scholar who wished to remain anonymous argued that the report was "basically telling the truth."Chinese authorities have been increasingly cracking down on religion in recent years, with the worst crackdown on Christianity in Henan province in 2018.More severe than the demolition of crosses and churches is the "coercion of citizens to sign declarations rejecting religion under the threat of denying them benefits," he said."It is a serious violation of human rights and contempt for the law, causing regression of the legal system in society," he added. Religious oppression as cultural revolutionThe scholar said suppression in Henan province is like a rehash of the Cultural Revolution, which will cause major social trauma and great stimulation to people's minds, triggering mutual hatred and creating a social group psychological distortion."After all these years since the Cultural Revolution, people have just regained a little bit of sanity, but they didn't expect to go back all of a sudden, which is a disaster," he said.He pointed out that just 10 days before Geng Shuang responded to the report, the cross of Our Lady of the Rosary Church in Anhui province was removed. On the following day, the cross of Yongqiao Catholic Church in Suzhou City was also removed."But the Chinese communist authorities did not produce any legal documents for their action," said the scholar.Chinese official Geng Shuang was lying, said Cebu parishioner Paul Li. "The officials accused this US report of denigrating China's religious policy. Is it China's religious policy to tear down the crosses of churches? And to spend public money to demolish crosses despite churches' objections,?" Li asked.Father Thomas Wang, who has been following the developments, said authorities have never responded positively to these accusations of religious persecution, "either dodging them or outrightly evading them, or accusing others of interfering in internal affairs."Father Wang said the Chinese side sees it as a domestic fight. "I beat my wife and children behind closed doors; it has nothing to do with you, I just beat them to death, it's our family business, it's none of your business."Maria Li in Guangdong said China is no longer worried about international pressure and condemnation."They have bribed a lot of small countries and organizations; even international agencies like the World Health Organization defended it.So what are they worried about?" she asked.However, she wanted the international community to pay attention to the religious and human rights situation in China."If more countries unite and put pressure on China, authorities will desist from blatant oppressions, which will help the Church to breathe," she said.

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Chinese oppression 'worse than US reported' - UCAN

San Salvador, El Salvador: A soldier guards the city as part of preventive measures. Camilo Freedman/Zuma Press/PA Images

The big issue of the coronavirus in Latin America is hunger says the head of Cafods Latin America Department. Clare Dixon toldThe Tabletthis week that of course its a health crisis but it is also a social catastrophe one of hunger, and also human rights, inequality and violence against women.

Draconian clampdowns in El Salvador and Guatemala mean that people are allowed out only once a week to buy food but, as Clare reports, they say we dont live week by week but day by day and they would rather risk catching the virus on the streets and earn an income than die of hunger. In both countries, soldiers patrol barrios during strict lockdown, and thousands have been detained.

Cafod partners working with young people in an area of San Salvador afflicted by gang violence report families having trouble accessing food. Some subsidies are provided by the governments, but many poor people cannot access them because they do not have bank accounts.

In health terms, social distancing is difficult where several generations of the same family live in one or two rooms. El Salvadors hospitals are ill-equipped and Cafod supports a clinic set up by the Jesuit Refugee Service which has been co-opted into the national system to tackle the virus, and personal protection equipment has been provided. Cafod was already supporting the Church in challenging the government plans to privatise water which would push up its price and make it less accessible for poor communities. In Guatemala, Cafod supports community-based radio projects which provide virus information, an SOS service and information about food distribution.

In Brazil, Clare highlighted Cafod's support for the urban poor in Sao Paulo by funding womens groups taking the lead in distributing food.

It is also working with rural groups, such as the Pastoral Land Commission, to link farmers to city dwellers needing their produce.

In Manaus, the largest city in Amazonas where the virus is causing mounting deaths, Archbishop Leonardo Steiner of Manaus is spearheading calls of bishops of the Amazon region to protect the poor and indigenous communities. Cafod is providing food and health resources to the most vulnerable families and measures to help indigenous tribal people protect themselves from the virus brought into their traditional lands by loggers and mining companies. The urban poor are suffering the worst impacts of the virus through hunger and, in many countries such as Colombia and Bolivia, the crisis has brought human rights abuses Clare reports.

Columban missionaries in Peru also report that food security is a huge problem in the barrios during the eighth week of lockdown. From Lima, Fr Ed OConnell reports that while the governments response to the virus has been compassion and not repression measures taken to help the poor have left many hungry.

A lot of people not included in the censuses of 2013 and 2017 fell outside of the official lists and many of the municipalities have not had the capacity to distribute food stocks to the most needy. Seventy per cent of the people get their income in the informal sector but have no work.

Around 42 per cent of Limas families are without an income and the most desperate are leaving Lima and walking back to their home towns: along the coast both north and south; up to the Andes mountains and some down the other side into the jungle. Columbans are supporting San Benito, a barrio on the northern side of Lima, helping 60 families with essentials who have had no money and no work for seven weeks. Fr Ed says, it is a drop in the ocean but to those who do receive it it means everything. Meanwhile, there are rising numbers of virus infections, with hospitals already full, in a population already coping with TB, HIV, Dengue and Malaria.

Venezuelas prolonged social, political and economic crisis has only been compounded by the coronavirus pandemic, the archbishop emeritus of Caracas, Cardinal Jorge Urosa Savino, said last week. While the cardinal acknowledged the lockdown has prevented the spread of the virus, he pointed out that informal workers are barely surviving, and only with the help of family members, social organisations and the Church. The cardinal felt the government has used the quarantine as an opportunity to strengthen its social and political control.

In South Africa, the government lockdown has been effectively observed, with support from religious leaders. Archbishop William Slattery, Emeritus of Pretoria, toldThe Tabletthis week that informal settlements or ghettos around townships have faced greatest health risks with the virus and lockdown. People are thrown together and it is hard to observe social distancing he said; and, yes, people are hungry and much of our work at the moment is trying to help them. He reported that, mobile phones are being utilised to identify those in need of food parcels and there is an emergency fund to draw on.

Bishop Kevin Dowling of Rustenburg toldThe Tabletthat although there have been just over 100 deaths recorded in South Africa until we ramp up very substantially the number of people being tested, we will not really know the extent of the infections in a country of 56 million people. He warned that prevention strategies also highlight the reality of South Africa. How can the millions of poor people who live in one-room shacks as in this Diocese be expected to maintain social distancing, stay at home, and wash their hands frequently when there is no readily available water?

The social situation in South Africa is increasingly tense, especially for both immigrants and South Africans living in townships", according to Scalabrinian missionary Fr Pablo Velasquez. I receive messages almost every day from desperate immigrant workers, with nothing to eat, among them Mozambicans who are victims of exploitation here in South Africa" he reports. Hundreds came daily to the gates of his parish of St Patrick, south of Johannesburg, to get food parcels, despite the police trying to disperse them. Fr Pablo reports that among the people queuing in front of the parish, many say "it is better to die of coronavirus than starvation".

Meanwhile, in neighbouring Zimbabwe, the coronavirus emergency exacerbates economic crisis. The government has sent the army to enforce lockdown but, according to Jesuit Fr Brian MacGarry, forcing people working in the informal sector to stay at home means condemning them to death and I fear there will be riots to which law enforcement agencies will respond with violence". The health system is collapsing, with a lack of personal protective equipment for health staff. Archbishop Robert Ndlovu of Harare has announced that 55 Catholic health institutions have been offered to the government for use in the fight against the pandemic. In Bulawayo, ongoing drought has depleted reservoirs and some neighbourhoods are facing months cut off from the municipal water supply. Regular washing of hands is impossible in a city of two mission people, despite cases of infection.

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Growing hunger and oppression face urban poor - The Tablet

Zafrullah Chowdhury

Gonosasthya Kendra founder Zafrullah Chowdhury on Sunday urged the government to allow journalists to speak the truth and provide them with incentives so that they are further strengthened to do so.

The veteran physician made the demand while addressing a demonstration organised by Asian Journalist Society in front of the National Press Club in the capital protesting against the oppression and arrest of journalists by the government and sacking of journalists by their employers.

He demanded their regular salaries and allowances while speaking against the above injustices.

Asian Journalist Society organised the demo in the backdrop of the recent arrest of eight journalists under the Digital Security Act, job cut of a number of journalists in different media outlets while in some media houses salaries of journalists remained due.

Zafrullah said that the countrys founding president and prime minister Sheikh Hasinas father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman used to allow criticism and preferred that his mistakes were pointed out.

The physician-freedom fighter said that the prime minister was now surrounded by members of the intelligence agencies and bureaucrats who had not been feeding her facts.

In this situation, there is a class who forage for facts. They are journalists. They publish what the countrys people think, he said.

Please allow journalists to speak out, allow them to excavate the truth and publish the truth, he said.

He wondered how the prime minister committed the mistake by letting the law enforcers arrest journalists under the draconian Digital Security Act.

He said that newspapers and journalists work as a media for identifying and informing the mistakes committed by the authorities and demanded scrapping of the Digital Security Act.

Zafrullah expressed his dissatisfaction over the fact that though Bangladesh Nationalist Party secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir on Saturday had denounced the arrests of journalists under the act, he did not mention whether they would scrap the black law if they were voted to power.

He urged the government to provide journalists with an incentive of Tk 15,000 to Tk 20,000 per head per month for next six months so that they could gather strength for speaking the truth.

Presided over by the organisation secretary general Zakir Hossain, the demo was also addressed by senior journalists Shawkat Mahmud, M Abdullah and Ilias Khan among others.

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Allow journalists to speak out truth, give incentive, Zafrullah urges government - newagebd.net

By Sharrona Pearl / The Washington Post

Its amazing how quickly social norms have (temporarily) changed. Just a few weeks ago, people wearing masks were few, far between and subject to multiple dirty looks and whispered asides (Why didnt you donate that? Dont you know it doesnt really work?).

Now, in many states, wearing masks is the law. And millions of people are listening. The home mask-making industry is one of the few vibrant corners of the economy right now, as is unexpectedly the bandanna sphere. If you step outside right now (and please only do so if you need to!) you will see a sea of masks. We are all doing it.

But we dont really like it.

The mask has been portrayed by protesters as a symbol of government oppression, rather than lifesaving gear. But there are also more common complaints: Its harder to breathe with a mask on. Our glasses fog up. Our noses get itchy. Our ears get pulled. Our voices are muffled.

But, most significantly, we cant smile at each other, use any facial expressions or even see each others faces, giving even brief, socially distanced social encounters a cold, eerie cast.

Not being able to see other peoples faces challenges a crucial part of how we communicate. Rooted in the ancient practice of physiognomy, which links external facial features to internal character, people have long built relationships and assessed others based on how they look. The long history of physiognomical practice which saw its height in the 19th century but lingers through today demonstrates the tremendous stock we place in faces as an index to character, and helps explain why we are so uncomfortable in masks today, even if they are a temporary necessity.

Dating from the 16th century, the term barefaced described someone who was beardless or maskless and thus open, unconcealed and honest. Telling a barefaced lie through the 19th century was a particularly egregious offense, being as it was so shameless and unconcealed, paving the way for todays equally impudent boldfaced lie.

In 1802, the novelist Maria Edgeworth wrote about those who call a good countenance the best letter of recommendation, speaking to the mistrust of those who covered, concealed or in other ways manipulated their faces.

Charles Darwins face was among the most famously read for physiognomical clues: He was almost prevented from joining the journey on the HMS Beagle, the trip that gave him the material to develop his theory of evolution. The captain of the ship, Robert FitzRoy, was an avid physiognomist and felt that Darwins nose was too short, reflecting a lack of determination to see the arduous journey through to completion.

Reading facial features to judge a persons character reached its height in the 19th century, with the unprecedented urbanization and industrialization that produced some of the biggest cities in the history of the world. People in the madding crowd needed a way to make judgments about others fast.

Physiognomy, in consonance with other reductionist evaluative practices like craniometry (skull measurements) and phrenology (brain bumps) provided a seemingly empirical way to classify both individuals and groups. In reality, these supposedly empirical approaches reflected underlying biases, with fundamental assumptions about race and class framing both the approach and the findings. A brief example: The physiognomical categories of Roman nose and Jewish nose were both aquiline and beaklike, yet one was indexed to nobility and the other to avarice.

By the end of the 19th century, Western classification practices shifted from individual assessments to large group categorizations with the rise of statistics, census practices, eugenics and social Darwinism. Individual physiognomical readings declined. It became less common to openly assess an individuals character simply by looking at her face. Yet remnants of the practice remained, with phrases like beady-eyed criminals and notions of noble-jawed heroes continuing to shape peoples assessments of character through physical features.

In many ways, the idea that we can measure and evaluate peoples physical features to determine something about who they are remains with us today, often in deeply problematic, reductionist, racist, sexist and homophobic ways. Attempts to assess, for example, sexuality based on finger length, or levels of aggression based on face width are recent examples of modern physiognomy. And more abstract notions of what kinds of faces and skin colors are desirable permeate our approach to appearance. These assessments are not about expression or communication, but actual static features and the assumptions we build into which ones we think are better.

We look at people to know them. When we cant look at them, we feel we know and trust them less. And when we cant show our own faces to the world, we may feel we are hiding something.

So what do we do at a time when we need to wear masks in public but we also need to connect with one another while maintaining social distancing?

A group of doctors at Israels only dedicated coronavirus hospital have an innovative solution to this problem. They have started wearing images of their faces on their protective gowns. While these faces serve no purpose in terms of communicating expression or reactions, they appear to make patients feel better. Knowing what their doctors look like provides patients a sense of comfort and familiarity, even as they are static representations.

Designer and artist Danielle Baskin has a different response to this need, offering personalized masks that have a picture of the obscured part of the wearers face on the outside. Eventually these could be used to confuse face recognition technology or experiment with nonsurgical ways to alter appearance, but for now, they help people feel like they arent hiding their faces. Which helps other people feel like they know those they are looking at.

Faced masks dont help with the nose tickles, voice clarity or foggy glasses. But they may make wearing masks less uncomfortable, especially when we actually get to see other people or part of them on a regular basis again. For now, we should absolutely trust people wearing masks more than those whose faces we can see. Masks will continue to itch, but the greatest unease is not physical; its historical.

Sharrona Pearl is associate professor of medical ethics at Drexel University. Her most recent book is Face/On: Face Transplants and the Ethics of the Other (University of Chicago Press, 2017).

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Commentary: Why we're so uncomfortable with wearing masks - The Daily Herald

At this time of the global pandemic, solidarity, many argue, will strengthen and find ways for a better transformation of society. The writer Yuval Noah Harari; also shared this view: In Indonesia, we have also seen flourishing signs of citizens solidarity for the needy, indicated by much volunteerism and charity.

Is it true that solidarity will strengthen and that societies will be transformed for the better? Is that also the case in Indonesia? I will reflect on several contexts in Asia and especially Indonesia, following a webinar on the roles of government and society in handling the COVID-19 pandemic in Asia held on April 22 by the Veteran National Development University Jakarta (UPNVJ).

First and foremost, we need to be clear on what we mean by solidarity. It is a concept that has long been discussed academically, mainly as theory, and became particularly relevant amid the mushrooming of studies on social movements.

Solidarity is essentially the feeling of reciprocal sympathy and responsibility among members of a group which promotes mutual support. Such feeling emerges as a reaction to oppression or marginalization against the group or its certain members and works best if they share common goals against common enemies.

Solidarity is different from benevolence or charity. Benevolence does not require shared political goals, struggles for the oppressed or the marginalized, or forms of social awareness that aim to change for a better society. Benevolence involves hierarchy, from top to bottom, or from the rich to the poor. It is interpersonal rather than social. Those who join and those who help do not intend to join the struggle or fight together for a common cause but only to help the weak.

In Indonesia, the boundaries between solidarity and benevolence is practically blurred. Several civil society organizations and grassroots communities are raising social assistance to help the groups most affected by the pandemic, such as informal workers, laborers, urban poor and so on. Several individuals, especially public figures, have also flocked to provide food, money, masks, and so on for the poor. One thing in common from all these efforts is that each runs independently without any monitoring or process of evaluation.

In other countries in Asia, solidarity is closely related to the level of public confidence in the government and/or the governments ability to manage the pandemic. In countries where the government has successfully handled the pandemic, solidarity arises for the global motivation of helping people in other countries. In Taiwan, the rapid response to the pandemic makes people feel safe and protected, including with the governments strategies and use of technology and information, says Deasy Simandjuntak of Academia Sinica.

In South Korea, effective bureaucracy and well-managed public services has led to an increase in public trust in its leaders for the past few months, as Alvin Qabulsyah observes.

In Singapore, transparent, consistent and data based communication coupled with a multiracial approach have appeared to stabilize peoples confidence and support in their leader, according to Aninda Dewayanti of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies-Yusof Ishak Singapore.

Japans government was initially slow in responding to the pandemic because of its insistence for the Olympics to be held this year. However, with mounting confirmed cases, local governments and civil society urged the government to fight the pandemic more effectively, as noted by Iqra Anugrah of Kyoto Universitys Center for Southeast Asian Studies.

In these countries, the needs of citizens are relatively already addressed by the government, so that while domestic solidarity is not very visible, calls for global solidarity strengthened.

Calls and initiatives for solidarity at the domestic level are effectively regulated and managed by their respective governments, such as in Malaysia where local governments provide guidance and regulations for aid distribution, according to M. Riza Nurdin of Universiti Malaya.

In Singapore, the dominance of the governments role in dealing with a crisis has led to the dependency of citizens on government policy, and only limited advocacy initiatives have been carried out in the community-based informal social sector. Similarly, Musa Maliki in Brunei Darussalam notes how the sultanate dominates all sectors in dealing with the pandemic.

In Indonesia, the level of confidence in the governments response to the pandemic tends to be low, as a recent survey shows. The formulation of appropriate policies has seen a stuttering beginning; incompetence as well as inconsistency, coupled with communication patterns that are not transparent and tend to be defensive, which have confused people, add to the sense of insecurity.

The government seems more concerned with preserving power, for example by initially dismissing the severity of the pandemic on the grounds of avoiding panicking and tightening control of public expression with narratives of anarchism and arbitrary arrests.

Solidarity is not included in the vocabulary, let alone the governments strategic policies, because for the administration of President Joko Jokowi Widodo, the enemy seems to be the citizens themselves who potentially can destabilize the government power. Indications of solidarity within government measures would include, for instance, much more protection of the most vulnerable groups from COVID-19 transmission or promoting national solidarity behind efforts to fight the virus, like what Taiwan's government did.

What we hear every day on television by the spokesperson for the COVID-19 government team is that the number of cases continues to increase because people do not wear masks and still leave the house. The impression is that the government is ignoring widespread expressions among the poor that they have little choice to survive amid limited provision of safety nets.

Global solidarity? It is still far from where we are now. Citizens must deal with the pandemic by relying on themselves. Benevolence or charity can be the initial stage because solidarity has not yet become a shared awareness.

However, as long as solidarity has not been established, relying solely on benevolence can lead to dependency and reaffirm the social class hierarchy between the rich and poor. Benevolence will gradually become a new competition to do good for others.

Solidarity challenges this because solidarity has the capacity to strengthen the resilience of citizens. Solidarity also challenges the practice of bad governance and drives public pressure for accountability.

______

Lecturer, School of Social and Political Sciences, Veteran National Development University Jakarta (UPNVJ), specially appointed associate professor at Osaka University, Japan.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not reflect the official stance of The Jakarta Post.

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Beyond charity: Solidarity and role of state in time of pandemic - The Jakarta Post - Jakarta Post

The Greek philosopher Aristotle emphasized that human beings are by nature social animals. So, of course, are bees and ants and elephants. But humans, argued Aristotle, are particularly complex social animals because of speech, an evolutionary gift at the heart of the diverse ways humans have politically organized themselves into groups or societies.

Since groups are comprised of individuals, from the beginning the relationship between the individual and the group has been a contentious issue. What are the rights of the individual? What are the rights of the group? Whose rights take priority? This conflict can especially become contentious when the group is the political society, that is, the state or the national government. This issue dramatically presents itself in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some have taken to the streets demonstrating on behalf of the individuals right to work and play when and wherever in opposition to the political groups decision and direction for individuals to shelter in place.

Some philosophers, professional and otherwise (and anyone who thinks hard about matters that matter is philosophizing), celebrate and defend individual freedom, sovereignty and autonomy. They value highly the importance of thinking for oneself and choosing freely how to live. This position focuses on the human capacity, right and obligation to choose ones own values, ones own ends or goals, to live ones life unimpeded. Even the most adamant proponent of such individual rights, however, would acknowledge that such freedom is always subject to the same rights for others; the goals one pursues, the life one leads, the choices one makes must not inhibit or interfere with the right of others to choose freely their values and goals. This defense of and celebration of individual rights is sometimes referred to as the liberal conception of freedom. The classical expression of this position is the 1859 essay On Liberty by the 19th century English philosopher John Stuart Mill.

Other philosophers are made uneasy by this valuing of autonomous choice. They emphasize that individuals always live in a particular place, at a particular time, and that persons inevitably and legitimately have obligations that grow out of the community or communities of which they are a part. This position stresses that the well-being of the community depends upon cultivating in citizens the moral virtues necessary for the group to survive well, including, preeminently, the virtue of valuing the common good, which always involves constraining individual choices. This view, because it emphasizes the value of community, is sometimes called the communitarian conception of freedom.

As is the case in all controversies, there are strong arguments for both positions. That is precisely why there is controversy. One has to decide where the weight of the evidence lies, and equally intelligent people weight the evidence differently. Why intelligent people can differ so is itself a complicated philosophical question. But for now, the reality is that thoughtful people disagree over which should take precedence, the rights of the individual or the rights of the group.

And it gets even more complicated because in some situations a person might argue for the individuals right to pursue unimpeded his or her interest, while in another situation the same person might argue that the rights of the group take precedence.

In general, my own philosophical tendency is to defend the liberal conception of freedom. Emphasizing the value of individual rights is and always has been the major bulwark against oppression of various sorts political, religious and economic. How we admire those Germans who bravely chose their own individual way in opposition to the Nazi government. How we praise those individual abolitionists who fought against Americas legalization of slavery. How we wish those who flew the planes into the twin towers had rejected the values of the group to which they belonged. To be a responsible moral agent sometimes requires that one reject the values of ones own group. If this were not true, there would be no individual moral accountability. Moral maturity is the willingness to think for oneself, sometimes in opposition to the community of which one is a part.

On the other hand (and this is why moral decision-making is so often hard), surely the well-being of the whole at times takes precedence over the desires of the individual. The COVID-19 pandemic should help us understand that the communitarians are often right. We should not think of ourselves as individual atoms simply pursuing our own self-interest. An undue emphasis on individuality and autonomy can undermine any sense of communal commitment to public order, any sense of commitment to the physical and emotional health of society; in a word, any commitment to the common good.

Even John Mill, the most prominent spokesman for the liberal conception of freedom, recognized that no person is an isolated being. Ironically, in this time of social distancing we have become aware of our dependence on one another and the importance of sometimes sacrificing individual interests for the common good. At times we do need to share in the affirmation that we are all in this together.

Postscript: We do, however, need to bear in mind that sheltering in place for the common good is easier for some than for others, makes less demands on some than it does on others, affects the financial and emotional well-being of some less than it does of others. The cry that we are all in this together should also make us aware of this. Being sensitive to the variety of meanings COVID-19 has for individuals can also be a valuable way of serving the common good.

Robert Baird is emeritus professor of philosophy at Baylor University.

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Robert Baird: Seeking the right pandemic balance of individual liberty, common good - Waco Tribune-Herald

Sunday 3 May was World Press Freedom Day. It is usually an occasion for the German public to take note of press censorship and oppression in African or Middle Eastern nations. But this year, it was different. There was a sense, thanks to the coronavirus crisis, and the effective states of emergency under which were now living, that the media in the so-called free world was also in a bind that it was torn between being a mere government mouthpiece and being more critical.

Although, as a freelance journalist, I myself am part of the media, I have also felt uneasy about the medias role during the pandemic. It is becoming clear that we in the German press have a free-expression problem. But this is not because of external state censorship. It is because of profound doubts as to what the medias own role and task should be right now. To report word-for-word the government press conferences? Or to try to catch it out, in scandal or error? Or something else?

It is certainly an odd position in which journalism now finds itself. Journalists had traditionally been defined by their differing relationships to, and distance from, power. Some were closer, others more critical. But now, as a result of the coronavirus crisis, many citizens are starting to see journalists as if they were a self-contained group; indeed, an elite group with a single special interest.

When, as a youngster, I timidly started reading newspapers over 30 years ago, it was a challenging experience. I confronted troubling facts and different, opposing perspectives. I learned things I didnt want to know and saw things I didnt want to see. But through this confrontation, my horizon was broadened. I learned to distinguish different points of view. And I learned to position myself, and develop my own point of view, through engagement with those I agreed and disagreed with.

It is this freedom of the reader or the listener, or the viewer that lies at the heart of freedom of expression. A newspaper editor or a TV show may have a clear editorial line. And those who work for them may have to toe that line. No matter. Whats important is that the reader or the viewer has the freedom to choose from among different, diverse media, each offering different perspectives on the world.

Historically, the viewpoints of newspapers were delineated along left-right political lines. But in recent years those lines have become blurred. Not just because of the broader blurring of left and right politics over the past few decades, but also because of the modern medias aspiration to address everyone. While news outlets no doubt tried to do this as part of an attempt to expand their markets, they succeeded only in losing their distinct left-right profiles, and, with that, their journalistic depth.

They stopped trying to provide profound and challenging explanations, according to their different points of view, of events or trends. They were too worried that such an approach might estrange readers. Likewise, articles and news items became shorter and shallower, because they were worried about the attention span of consumers, who were deemed all too ready to read the competition just a click away.

Something else shifted, too. Modern journalism ceased to try to report the facts, and then allow the reader to make up his or her own mind. Instead it started to act almost as a teacher, standing by the readers side, and guiding him or her towards the right viewpoint.

This is particularly visible at the moment in the reporting of the science around coronavirus. Here, journalists both patronise the reader, explaining the science as if he or she was a child. And they also turn the scientist into an oracle, someone who stands above politicians as a pure truth-speaker. Hence, argument and contestation among scientists are hidden from view. No doubt is permitted.

When news outlets take it upon themselves to prevent doubt arising among the public, they are effectively exercising censorship. Likewise, their conformism and avoidance of dissenting opinions and reports are also forms of censorship. Yes, a false report or a conspiracy theory adds little to the public conversation, and can be dangerous in a time of crisis. But it is not up to the media or the state to decide what should and what shouldnt be reported or aired. This assumes readers and viewers are incapable of deciding and judging for themselves.

Moreover, controversy and dissent are signs of vital democratic life. If an opinion or report is false or wrong, thats positive, because it forces the politicians or scientists to explain their positions better. It would be good for Germany, then, if the media understood their role. They are not the arbiters of truth. And freedom of opinion is not their possession. It is the possession of the people.

Matthias Heitmann is a free journalist and columnist for the German magazine Cicero where this article first appeared on 3 May 2020. Visit Heitmanns website here.

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Press freedom in the time of Covid - Spiked