Edinburgh middle-class socialist; pro-indy electronic engineer, biker & psychotherapist. RTs mean I clicked a thing. @NodBruce@mastodon.scot

Edinburgh, Scotland
Joined August 2008
The Government™ has made an ad about the protests happening around the world, and it’s surprisingly honest and informative.🌍🌎🌏
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Cuál es tu opinión de ISRAEL 🇮🇱?
5%🟢🟢 Muy Positiva
8%🟢 Positiva
16%🔴 Negativa
71%🔴🔴 Muy Negativa
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Nod Bruce retweeted
The Nile is not a border. This is the simplest version of the argument and also the one that should require the least explanation. The Nile flows from the interior of Africa northward to the Mediterranean. The civilizations along its length were in constant contact, trading, fighting, exchanging people and ideas and religious concepts and agricultural techniques across what was not a separation but a connection. The civilization of ancient Egypt did not emerge in isolation. It emerged in relationship with the Nubian civilizations to its south, some of whose cultures predated the unification of Egypt, which contributed to and drew from Egyptian culture across millennia. The kings of Kush would eventually rule Egypt as its 25th Dynasty. And across the centuries that followed, Kushite civilization would leave behind something that still surprises people today. More pyramids. In what is now Sudan. Built by the civilization that the Western imagination has most completely erased. There are more ancient pyramids in Sudan than in Egypt. Most people reading that sentence right now are encountering it for the first time. That is not because the information is obscure. It is because the information does not fit a story that someone needed to be true. And the information that does not fit the story does not make it into the classroom.
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Nod Bruce retweeted
Hegel, the philosopher, the foundational figure of Western intellectual tradition, the man whose ideas shaped how generations understood history and progress and civilisation, said Africa had no history. Literally. In "The Philosophy of History," published posthumously in 1837, he described Africa as "the land of childhood, which lying beyond the day of self-conscious history, is enveloped in the dark mantle of Night." No history. No development. No participation in the movement of human civilization. This was not a fringe opinion. These were the intellectual assumptions that would help legitimize European colonial domination and, decades later, the partition of an entire continent. Now. While Hegel was writing this, the Oyo Empire in West Africa governed millions of people through a sophisticated constitutional system with checks on royal power. While Hegel was writing this, the Kingdom of Dahomey had a standing army, a complex taxation system, and active diplomatic relationships with the European powers who were simultaneously, in their salons and academies, insisting the continent they were negotiating with had no civilization worth the name. While Hegel was writing this, the Asante Empire operated under legal codes that European jurists would have recognized as sophisticated if they had been written in a language those jurists were willing to read. While Hegel was writing this, the manuscripts of Timbuktu, hundreds of thousands of texts on mathematics, astronomy, medicine, theology, history, were being preserved by African scholars in the city his tradition insisted had produced no thought worth preserving. And while Hegel was writing that Africa had no history, Ethiopia already had one that stretched back more than four thousand years. Egyptian pharaohs, themselves African rulers, had been sending fleets to trade with the Land of Punt, in the Horn of Africa, as early as 2500 BCE. Gold, frankincense, myrrh, ebony, ivory. By the third century CE, the Kingdom of Aksum was minting its own coinage, trading across the Red Sea and Indian Ocean, and commanding such international recognition that the religious teacher Mani counted it alongside Rome, Persia and China as one of the great kingdoms of the world. Its written literary tradition in Ge’ez carried scripture, philosophy, law, and royal chronicles that predated most of the nations doing the accusing by centuries. The darkness was not in Africa. It was in the theory that needed Africa to be dark.
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DAWN STURGESS INQUIRY: THE WITNESSES WHO DIDN'T APPEAR It's two years since the inquiry into the death of Dawn Sturgess, allegedly killed by novichok four months after the Skripal Salisbury events of 2018, began public hearings. The witnesses it *didn't* speak to are notable. 1/6
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Nod Bruce retweeted
The man who found out what happened to the Franklin expedition was a Scottish doctor who walked 6,500 miles across the Arctic on foot, lived off what he shot, and never lost a man. The Royal Navy never forgave him for it. John Rae was born in Orkney in 1813 and went to the Hudson's Bay Company as a surgeon. He learned to hunt, to snowshoe, to build a snow house and to sleep in it, from the Cree and the Inuit, and he saw no reason to carry a year of salt pork when the country was full of food. On his first survey he took 12 men 1,200 miles with provisions for 4 months and fed them for 15 on caribou, fish and seal. The Admiralty's expeditions went the other way. Franklin sailed in 1845 with 129 men, 2 ships, a library, silver cutlery and 8,000 tins of meat and soup, and died with every one of them. In 1854 Rae met Inuit on the Boothia Peninsula who had seen the last of the sailors, 40 men dragging a boat south, starving, and who had found the bodies after. Some had been eaten by the others. Rae reported it as he was told it. London was outraged. Charles Dickens wrote that no Englishman would do such a thing and that the natives were lying. Lady Franklin saw to it that Rae never received the knighthood every other Arctic explorer of his rank was given, and the memorial in Westminster Abbey names Franklin as the discoverer of the passage Rae had actually found. He died in 1893 at 79, still fit, still walking. The Navy's men had the best provisions in Europe and died of scurvy in a land full of game. The Orkneyman ate what the Inuit ate, walked further than any of them, and was punished for coming home with the truth.
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We spent last week in New York taking Scotland's national struggle straight to the heart of world diplomacy; meeting directly with United Nations delegations, seasoned diplomats, ambassadors, colonised peoples from Non-Self-Governing Territories, and prominent US civil society leaders. What unfolded across Manhattan was nothing short of a breakthrough. Despite administrative barriers and deliberate institutional gatekeeping designed to silence our presence, we shattered centuries of colonial deception in rooms where global power resides. And we can tell you that people are considering Scotland's colonial situation under English colonial rule very seriously; and considering Liberation Scotland very seriously. Interlocutors across the international diplomatic corps, especially from the Global South (notably Africa and the Caribbean) but also from UN Security Council Permanent members and American civic spaces are genuinely stunned to learn the truth. And we are not forcing anything. We present facts and let people make their own opinion. Zero rejection. People in high level places understand very clearly Scotland's situation once the facts are presented. For generations, English colonial propaganda has manufactured the myth that Scotland is dealing with a polite, internal domestic disagreement. We exposed the unvarnished reality. Scotland is an annexed, occupied nation enduring systematic economic extraction, standing on firm international law to demand the sovereign resumption of its statehood. The positive reaction from Global South and Non-Aligned Movement diplomats validates our case not as sub-state "separatism", but as a legitimate anti-colonial restoration that mirrors their own historic triumphs. We also discussed the question of slavery and reparations with some of the key architects of the UN resolution recently passed, who are legitimately seeking reparations from the English colonial state. They understand that Scotland was and is annexed and colonized itself. Scots were exploited, deported, genocided etc. themselves. Scotland had no sovereignty and so cannot be blamed. However, given a very small minority of Scots (just like many other colonised people) were involved, a decolonised Scotland will need to refuse any proceeds from the English system of slavery and colonialism and thus create close links with countries victims of slavery and support them fully. But since Scotland's wealth is completely plundered by the English colonial state, Scotland benefited from nothing. Colonial collaborators like in all colonised systems did. It was a fully English empire. Scotland was just one of the first English colonies and remains as England's last major colony. Far from an exercise in domestic separatism, Scotland's cause represents the legitimate international resumption of an annexed sovereign state, exposing the English state itself as the sole violator of Scottish territorial integrity and constitutional sovereignty under international law. Certain American cultural figures, discovering how our energy and democracy are stripped away under London’s colonial grip, pledged immediate solidarity with an anti-colonial struggle they had never been allowed to see; comparing this to Vietnam notably. Americans have been fully gaslighted about Scotland, victims of English propaganda and lies. The era of begging for permission within domestic colonial traps is over. Our cause has officially entered the arena of realpolitik and international law. We have forged unmediated diplomatic relationships, aligned directly with the global anti-colonial vanguard, and proved that Scotland’s liberation is a matter of international justice. The world is finally listening. The truth cannot be contained and must be told to everyone. Our march towards sovereign recovery is unstoppable. Refuse English colonial control, lies and oppression. Time to support Scotland's liberation and emancipation.
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Anti-nicotine groups demand to know who funds harm reduction. Fair enough. But who funds them? Our investigation traces public funding disclosures to pharma firms selling blockbuster COPD and lung-cancer treatments. The questions should run both ways. clearingtheair.eu/en/post/in…
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Facilities shuts off most office outlets every night to meet our energy-saving target. Fine. Except the lobby display PC also loses power. So every morning at 8:00 it boots up and immediately starts the updates it was supposed to install overnight. Our $28,000 digital welcome screen spends the first 20 minutes of each day saying: WORKING ON UPDATES 37% I asked Sustainability for one always-on outlet. They wanted a business case. Extra power cost: $4.18 per year. They scheduled a 45-minute meeting to review it. Seven people attended. Facilities. Sustainability. Finance. IT. Two directors. One “workplace strategy” consultant. The outlet was approved. At the end Finance asked me to document the financial impact. So I did. ANNUAL ELECTRICITY COST: $4.18 ESTIMATED COST OF APPROVAL MEETING: $860 Nobody has asked for an energy review since.
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IT'S THOSE RUSSIANS AGAIN OR IS IT ? Suddenly after the United Nations assembly finishes we get a breaking story about bubonic plague in Russia. Now we all know the story, filthy living conditions, rats, black death etc. This one is hinted at being different, laboratory, testing, dark, evil, scientist, illegal, germ warfare and it's the Russians again with one person contracting bubonic plague. OK got it, all good so far ? Russia have had three cases no deaths in the last few years. Mongolia outbreak remember that one ? no ? Ok 4 cases 2 deaths all this century btw, but you knew that right ? How about the China one ? 5 cases 4 deaths ? What about Bolivia then ? 3 cases 2 deaths. You didn't hear about that one I take it. Uganda 22 cases 3 deaths surely you knew ? What about Tanzania 36 cases 4 deaths ? What about Peru's 40 cases, now you definitely know about that. You certainly know about the USA and the 40 cases and 5 deaths, there is no way you missed that one. DR Congo 410 cases now you definitely knew that one. Now the acid test, 1 case no deaths in Russia plastered all over the media. In which country did 2,323 cases take place between 2013-2018 ? If you didn't know it was Madagascar, they probably did not panic scream it all over the media. #Propaganda #Manipulation #Media #news #newsupdate #newsupdates
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Nod Bruce retweeted
A man who passed his medical in 1996 with flying colours has four diseases today, and not one number in his body has changed. Blood pressure 135/85. Cholesterol 210. Fasting blood sugar 105. BMI of 26. In 1996 that was a clean bill of health and a handshake. Today the same man, with the same blood, is hypertensive, has high cholesterol, is prediabetic and overweight. Four diagnoses, and he never caught a thing. 1997: the line for diabetes drops from 140 to 126. 1.7 million new diabetics by morning. 1997: high blood pressure drops from 160/100 to 140/90. 13 million new patients. 1998: high cholesterol drops from 240 to 200. 42 million new patients. 1998: overweight drops from a BMI of 27 to 25. 29 million people go to bed normal and wake up with a weight problem. 2003: prediabetes is widened from 110 to 100. It now covers 98 million Americans, more than 1 adult in 3, for a condition the World Health Organization declines to call by that name. 2017: blood pressure again, down to 130/80. Another 31 million. Nearly half the adults in America are hypertensive. When the cholesterol targets were tightened again in 2004, eight of the nine men who wrote them had been paid by companies that make statins. No germ. No outbreak. No change in a single artery. Just a room, a vote, and a tablet waiting on the far side of every line. In every other branch of medicine you have to get ill to become a patient. In this one they bring the disease to you. The last healthy people are the ones who haven't been tested yet.
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Nod Bruce retweeted
The most successful drug advert in history said Lipitor cuts the risk of heart attack by 36%, and the truth was in the footnote. What the headline said: - 36% fewer heart attacks What the asterisk said: - On the sugar pill, 3 people in 100 had a heart attack - On Lipitor, 2 people in 100 had a heart attack Both statements describe the same trial. 3 down to 2 is a drop of about a third. It is also a difference of 1 person. What that means for the 100: - 1 avoided a heart attack - 2 had one anyway - 97 were never going to have one - 100 took the tablet every day for over three years - 100 were exposed to the side effects Nobody sat in a surgery was ever told "this will help 1 in 100 of you." They were told 36%, by a doctor who had been told 36%, by a rep who was paid on it. Lipitor went on to sell well over $100 billion. That asterisk is the most expensive piece of punctuation ever printed.
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This sentence in NHS Scotland’s new IPC guidance is a damning illustration of the sheer incompetence & ignorance of those who wrote it: “RPE should never be worn by an infectious person as the respirator filters incoming air & not the air being expelled by the wearer” ❌ WRONG!
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Nod Bruce retweeted
Should Israel be banned from all international sporting competitions - like Russia already is? Please RT after voting - thank you.
97%Yes
3%No
5,643 votes • Final results
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We hired a new VP named Michael Lee. Unfortunately we already have a Michael Lee. He works in the warehouse. He's been here 11 years. New VP gets: [email protected] He immediately messages IT. “Can you move the other Michael to michael.lee2 and give me michael.lee?” No. He asks HR. HR asks me if we can “prioritize seniority.” I explain that the warehouse Michael has eleven years of email history tied to that address and changing it because someone with a nicer title arrived would be insane. VP reluctantly keeps the 2. Warehouse Michael finds out. Changes his Teams display name to: Michael Lee (Original) By Friday the VP is being referred to as Sequel Mike. He has asked IT to intervene. Unfortunately nickname management is outside our support scope.
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THE FALSE FLAG These are the areas that are the targets. The Mallorca airport in Spain. The Sorrento Continental Hotel in Italy. The Promenade De Anglais, Nice. The area to be launched from west of Sardinia. The agencies involved CIA, French Naval Intelligence Services and the Ukrainian SBU. The method 3 Gerbera Drones recovered from Russian attacks. To kill civilians and trigger European entry into the war. Further details on our news show now. We have five independent sources. Two French Naval Intelligence staff. Two Spanish Embassy staff. One Ukrainian SBU member. We stand by our story 100%. #USA #CIA #SBU #FNI #France #Spain #Italy #drones #FalseFlag #news #newsupdate #newsupdates
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The constitutional debate is heating up again Scottish Independence or Union ? Please vote and share for the largest ever vote.
92%INDEPENDENCE
8%UNION
2,163 votes • Final results
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