fascism – Desdemona Despair

A partially removed sign at Twitter headquarters in San Francisco, California, US, on Wednesday, 26 July 2023. Photo: David Paul Morris / Bloomberg / Getty Images

September 4, 2023

Thousands of scientists are cutting back on Twitter, seeding angst and uncertainty – “Now it’s just a cesspool of trolls and bots”

By Michael Hiltzik 25 August 2023 (Los Angeles Times) – In the first couple of years of the COVID-19 pandemic, Peter Hotez, an expert in vaccines and tropical medicine at Baylor University, found Twitter to be “a useful and at times almost essential tool for timely and important exchange of information.” The platform banned the […]

August 5, 2023

Texans die from heat after GOP Governor bans mandatory water breaks – “Houston will fight so its residents retain their constitutional rights and have immediate local recourse to government”

By Steven Monacelli 6 July 2023 (Texas Observer) – As a part of a bill critics have dubbed the “Death Star” bill—an expansive law that preempts legislation in eight key areas of local government—the Legislature has overridden local ordinances that require giving workers water breaks. Otherwise known as House Bill 2127, it was signed into […]

Age-standardized mortality trends in the United States and other wealthy nations. Figure shows deaths per 100,000 person-years: A) 1933–2021 and B) 1980–2021. The solid thick red line is the United States, the dashed thick grey line is the population-weighted average of 21 other wealthy nations, and the thin grey lines are country-specific trends for each of the other nations. Total mortality was age-standardized to the 2000 US population age distribution. Graphic: Bor, et al., 2023 / PNAS Nexus

July 23, 2023

More than one million Americans “missing” as U.S. endures crisis of early death – “Americans die younger than their counterparts elsewhere because when corporate profits conflict with health, our politicians side with the corporations”

By Tessa Koumoundouros 20 July 2023 (ScienceAlert) – If the United States of America had the same mortality rates as other wealthy countries, more than 1 million people would have avoided death in 2021, a new study found. Researchers have termed these excess deaths the Missing Americans. “The number of Missing Americans in recent years is unprecedented […]

Map showing the Global Peace Index for 2023. In the period 2022-2023, deaths from global conflict increased by 96 percent to 238,000. 79 countries witnessed increased levels of conflict including Ethiopia, Myanmar, Ukraine, Israel, and South Africa. The global economic impact of violence increased by 17 percent or $1 trillion, to $17.5 trillion in 2022, equivalent to 13 percent of global. Conflicts became more internationalised, with 91 countries now involved in some form of external conflict, up from 58 in 2008. GDP Graphic: IEP

July 23, 2023

Conflict deaths in 2023 at highest level this century – Conflicts are becoming more internationalised, with 91 countries now involved in some form of external conflict, up from 58 in 2008

LONDON, 28 June 2023 (IEP) – Today marks the launch of the 17th edition of the Global Peace Index from international think-tank, the Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP). Key results Impact of the war in Ukraine on peacefulness The 17th edition of the annual Global Peace Index (GPI) [pdf], the world’s leading measure of peacefulness, reveals […]

KCCI-TV chief meteorologist Chris Gloninger stands outside his home, Tuesday, 27 June 2023, in West Des Moines, Iowa. Gloninger announced that he was leaving the Des Moines station due to threats he received for his coverage of climate change on air. Photo: AP Photo / Charlie Neibergall

July 23, 2023

Iowa TV meteorologist hounded off the air over climate-change reporting – “I started just connecting the dots”

By Hannah Fingerhut, Heather Hollingsworth, and Summer Ballentine 7 July 2023 DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – The harassment started to intensify as TV meteorologist Chris Gloninger did more reporting on climate change during local newscasts — outraged emails and even a threat to show up at his house. Gloninger said he had been recruited, in […]

Iranian-Canadian artist Simin Keramati sits in the PaykanArtCar during its unveiling at the Oslo Freedom Forum on 13 June 2023. The car is adorned with women's hair, serving as a visual representation of support for the “Women, Life, Freedom” protest movement against Iran’s Islamist regime. Photo: Fredrik Naumann / AP Images / PaykanArtCar

June 18, 2023

Activists say the human rights movement is failing – “Back in the day, human rights groups were ahead of the curve. But autocratic regimes have learned from that. They’re investing in their tactics, and they’re coordinating.”

By Nahal Toosi 18 June 2023 OSLO, Norway (POLITICO) – Gatherings of human rights activists tend to feature commitments to the cause mixed with a lot of gallows humor — after all, many such advocates have survived and persisted in their roles despite imprisonment, torture and surveillance by authoritarian regimes. But on a sunlit June […]

A water meter stands in dry wetland in Donana natural park, southwest Spain as unprecedented drought hits the nation in 2023. Photo: Bernat Armangue / Africanews / AP Photo

May 27, 2023

“Murderers” and “criminals”: Meteorologists face unprecedented harassment from conspiracy theorists – “It was one of the hardest experiences in social media in my life”

By Laura Paddison 27 May 2023 (CNN) – “Murderers.” “Criminals.” “We are watching you.” These are just a handful of the threats and abuse sent to meteorologists at AEMET, Spain’s national weather agency, in recent months. They come via social media, its website, letters, phone calls – even in the form of graffiti sprayed across […]

State of press freedom worldwide 2013-2023. Changes in 180 countries and territories evaluated by RSF since 2013. In 2023, the situation was “very serious” in 31 countries, “difficult” in 42, “problematic” in 55, and “good” or “satisfactory” in 52 countries. In other words, the environment for journalism was “bad” in seven out of ten countries, and satisfactory in only three out of ten. Graphic: RSF

May 9, 2023

2023 World Press Freedom Index – Journalism threatened by fake content industry – The environment for journalism is “bad” in seven out of ten countries, satisfactory in only three out of ten

3 May 2023 (RSF) – According to the 2023 World Press Freedom Index – which evaluates the environment for journalism in 180 countries and territories and is published on World Press Freedom Day (3 May) – the situation is “very serious” in 31 countries, “difficult” in 42, “problematic” in 55, and “good” or “satisfactory” in 52 countries. In […]

Domestic extremist-related killing incidents in the U.S. by decade. The recent surge of extremist-related mass killings is immediately obvious. From the 1970s through the 2000s, extremist mass killing incidents consistently occurred at a relatively low level—from two to seven incidents a decade (although, it should be noted that, because of the difficulty in determining which left-wing extremist bomb attacks in the 1970s and 1980s were intended to cause mass casualties—many were actually aimed at property and warnings were telephoned to targets beforehand—it is possible that the number of such incidents may be undercounted here). Graphic: ADL

February 27, 2023

U.S. mass killings linked to extremism spiked over last decade – “It is not an exaggeration to say that we live in an age of extremist mass killings”

By Lindsay Whitehurst 23 February 2023 WASHINGTON (AP) – The number of U.S. mass killings linked to extremism over the past decade was at least three times higher than the total from any other 10-year period since the 1970s, according to a report by the Anti-Defamation League. The report, provided to The Associated Press ahead of […]

EIU Democracy Index 2022, global map by regime type. The average global index score stagnated in 2022. Despite expectations of a rebound after the lifting of pandemic-related restrictions, the score was almost unchanged, at 5.29 (on a 0-10 scale), compared with 5.28 in 2021. The positive effect of the restoration of individual freedoms was cancelled out by negative developments globally. The scores of more than half of the countries measured by the index either stagnated or declined. Western Europe was a positive outlier, being the only region whose score returned to pre-pandemic levels. Graphic: EIU

February 3, 2023

EIU Democracy Index 2022: Frontline democracy and the battle for Ukraine – “Overall the story is one of stagnation. This is a dismal result given that in 2022 the world started to move on from the pandemic-related suppression of individual liberties that persisted through 2020 and 2021”

1 February 2023 (EIU) – The Democracy Index, which began in 2006, provides a snapshot of the state of democracy worldwide in 165 independent states and two territories. This covers almost the entire population of the world and the vast majority of the world’s states (microstates are excluded). The Democracy Index is based on five […]