Pro-human & animal rights. Anti-war. Opposed to tyranny, dictators and lies, whether pro-West or anti-West. Human rights are universal, not selective.
England
Joined June 2010
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A self-help guide for anti-imperialists
This self-reflection checklist is designed to encourage critical thinking & help examine whether your views are consistent with your principles, especially when dealing with complex geopolitical issues.
Ideological Rigidity & Cognitive Dissonance
1. Do you hold strong anti-Western or anti-imperialist views that shape your opinions on global issues?
2. When confronted with evidence of atrocities committed by regimes you support, do you find yourself dismissing or downplaying this evidence rather than re-evaluating your stance because it challenges your core beliefs about the West & the USA?
3. Do you often find yourself justifying the actions of regimes opposed to the West, even when those actions conflict with your principles on human rights & justice?
Manichaean Worldview (Good vs. Evil)
4. Do you tend to see global politics in a binary "good vs. evil" framework, where the West & its allies represent "evil" & those who oppose them are automatically seen as "good"?
5. Do you believe that anyone who opposes the US must be inherently virtuous, regardless of their actions or policies?
6. To what extent do you think this worldview might over-simplify complex geopolitical issues, potentially leading to support for authoritarian regimes?
Group Identity & Social Influence
7. Do you align your views with a political or social group that strongly opposes Western policies, even if it means defending regimes with questionable human rights records?
8. Have you ever found yourself defending a position primarily because it aligns with the views of your social or political group, rather than based on your independent assessment of the situation?
9. On a scale of 1 to 5, how much do you think your stance on certain regimes is influenced by the desire to fit in with a particular group or to maintain a certain identity?
Projection and Attribution Bias
10. Do you often attribute the world's problems primarily to US or Western influence, minimising the responsibility of other countries or regimes for their actions?
11. Have you noticed a tendency to excuse or overlook the negative actions of regimes opposed to the West because you believe these actions are a direct result of Western interference?
12. How often do you critically assess the actions of both Western & non-Western governments with the same level of scrutiny?
Historical Grievances & Mistrust
13. Do you have deep-seated mistrust towards any narrative or information coming from the US or its allies, regardless of the evidence presented?
14. Have historical grievances against Western colonialism or intervention led you to automatically side with any regime that opposes the US, even when there is clear evidence of that regime's human rights abuses?
15. On a scale of 1 to 5, how open are you to re-evaluating your stance when presented with credible information from sources you may not fully trust?
Moral Relativism
16. Do you find yourself adopting a morally relativistic stance, where the actions of regimes opposed by the US are justified or seen as less severe compared to the actions of the US & its allies?
17. Have you ever rationalised or downplayed human rights abuses by a regime because they were in opposition to Western imperialism?
18. How do you reconcile your anti-imperialist views with the need to advocate for universal human rights & justice, regardless of who the oppressor is?
After answering these questions, consider the degree to which these tendencies influence your views on global issues. Does your stance truly align with your core values, or is it driven by opposition to certain powers, sometimes at the expense of supporting justice & human rights?
European Citizen retweeted
Hace 9 años, una rebelión popular salió a las calles de Venezuela, las protestas del 2017.
Manifestaciones que exigían un calendario electoral tras las dos sentencias del TSJ, controlado por Maduro, que sepultaron el Estado de derecho.
Fueron brutalmente reprimidas: al menos 143 personas asesinadas, más de 3000 heridas y miles de detenciones.
Los familiares, agrupados en el comité @Alfavic2017, siguen exigiendo justicia contra los máximos responsables, y que el Estado reconozca los hechos y garantice que estas graves violaciones a los derechos como a la vida, a la integridad personal y a la protesta pacífica no se repitan.
Hoy martes #27Oct harán una rueda de prensa frente al @MinpublicoVEN en Barquisimeto, Lara, para reiterar su llamado contra la impunidad.
European Citizen retweeted
Una publicación un poco random pero estoy buscando ayuda para un amigo. El es venezolano, vive en Caracas y habla inglés perfectamente y vivió en Estados Unidos, pero actualmente no tiene trabajo. Es ingeniero de sonido de profesión, pero hay muy poco trabajo en ese sector. Ha estado haciendo otros trabajos recientemente por unos 10 dólares al día, pero eso también se ha acabado .
Si alguien conoce por casualidad alguna oportunidad laboral que le pueda venir bien, ya sea como ingeniero de sonido o en algún puesto donde necesiten a alguien que hable inglés perfectamente, pf que me escriba.
Tiene un hijo y está pasando por una situación difícil para poder poner comida en la mesa, como tantos otros venezolanos. Es un hombre amable, tranquilo, y muy trabajador, y tiene unos 40 y tantos años. Gracias
European Citizen retweeted
Glad to help, Craig.
I’m not for or against María Machado, I watched your pieces from Venezuela with interest & retweeted them, I’m as disgusted as you are by US mugging of Venezuela, but you don’t help causes you support with this trickle of easily fact checked lazy bullshit.
European Citizen retweeted
A comment on my post reads: "Now there really are Venezuelans dancing in the streets."
When Trump made his comment earlier that Venezuelans were happy and dancing in the streets at the removal of Maduro, they were not. Of course, many people were overjoyed, jubilant, relieved and shocked at his capture, but they couldn't celebrate out of fear of detention. They were nervous and scared given that other chavista figures remained in power, dubious that repression would disappear.
There have been some small and modest protests once again this year, but none like the ones that will be about to come. Opposition supporters have been waiting for this day, for Maria Corina Machado to return. Although she is not in power and there is still no election date, her return undoubtedly gives her supporters a huge boost - and so yes, now there are Venezuelans dancing in the streets.
European Citizen retweeted
María Corina returns home to Venezuela. Qué piensan ustedes, los venezolanos? Cómo se sienten?🇻🇪
European Citizen retweeted
¡Todos los venezolanos la estábamos esperando!
Y así fue la llegada de @MariaCorinaYA a nuestro país después de meses de intentos para volver.
Venezuela cambió y se prepara para la transición definitiva a la democracia y la libertad, y lo haremos juntos, de la mano de Dios.
European Citizen retweeted
Andrew nice of you to weigh in with your usual two ha’p worth of futile cut and paste distortion.
Sarah Helm, wife of the UK national security adviser Jonathan Powell, has far worse social media than was reported at the weekend. She's compared Israel to the Nazis; defended Hamas; and questioned reports of their mass rape. Me for the Spectator. spectator.com/article/reveal…
European Citizen retweeted
Can anyone remember the last time @BBCNews interviewed a Palestinian about their experience of the racism of Zionism? Having spent the last two weeks interviewing elderly Nakba survivors in Jordan, driven off their land in their teens because of their ethnicity and religion, I'd be happy to suggest some astonishingly articulate victims of Israeli racism who would be only too happy to tell their tragic stories of eviction, slaughter and dispossession. It is like reporting on the Civil Rights movement in the US and only interviewing outraged Whites
@bbclaurak @bbcnickrobinson @JustinOnWeb
@BBCr4today
“[Saying] ‘Zionism is racism’ is offensive, it’s antisemitic and it’s dangerous”
Broadcaster Jo Coburn says she “watched in horror” as the Green Party passed its motion on Zionism and criticises leader Zack Polanski's defence in his #BBCLauraK interview
bbc.co.uk/news/live/c64gv8k2…
European Citizen retweeted
🚨 NOW: Settler terror attack on Abu Falah in the West Bank.
American journalist Heidi Levine was beaten by the settlers, many Palestinian were injured, one shot by the IDF.
The army allowed the settler attack, and tear gassed and assaulted the Palestinians.
European Citizen retweeted
If you haven’t yet seen this, it’s worth taking a look at this detailed examination of the UK Govt’s response to Israel’s bombardment of Gaza. One key revelation is when aid workers including British nationals were killed in an Israeli strike on a World Central Kitchen convoy. Two days later, the then UK Foreign Sec David Cameron signed off on the latest arms export approval to Israel. That same day he announced an urgent and “transparent” investigation into the attack. channel4.com/programmes/brit…
European Citizen retweeted
Israel has no right to exist. That’s the position in international law. It has nothing to do with hatred of Israel or antisemitism.
In fact, no state – none – has a “right” to exist, including states busy extolling their democratic credentials.
If the UK had a “right” to exist, for example, it would mean that Scotland could not be allowed to vote for independence. Why? Because such a vote would break up the UK. It would be a violation of the UK’s supposed “right” to exist as the UK.
Which is precisely why the UK has no “right” to exist.
Peoples have a right to exist. When that right is abused, it invariably involves very serious violations of international law – often through crimes such as apartheid, ethnic cleansing or genocide.
States, by contrast, don’t have a “right” to exist. They simply do exist as a matter of fact – until they suddenly don’t. Like apartheid South Africa. Like Rhodesia. Like Czechoslovakia. Like Yugoslavia. Like Nazi Germany.
This is so obvious it should not even need stating.
Were states to have a “right” to exist, completely arbitrary factors such as their borders, demographic make-up and political institutions would be sacrosanct. Inviolable. It would be impossible for minorities to secede, for territories to be transferred, for apartheid structures to be overturned . Any such change would be a transgression of the state’s “right to exist” as it is.
And yet every single journalist employed by an establishment media outlet is suddenly playing dumb on this most elementary of issues. They’ve all suddenly had a collective lobotomy. They insist Israel must be the exception to the rule that no state has a “right” to exist.
Watch, for example, the BBC’s Nick Robinson berating Green party leader Zack Polanski for refusing to affirm Israel’s “right to exist”. Polanksi correctly argues instead that Israelis and Palestinians have a right to live in equality.
Why all this incendiary stupidity from our supposedly brightest and best journalists?
Find the answer in my latest article No state has a ‘right’ to exist – least of all an apartheid, genocidal state like Israel. A link to the full article is in the reply post ⬇️
European Citizen retweeted
On January 16, 2007, Abir Aramin, a 10-year-old Palestinian girl, was shot in the back of the head with a rubber-coated metal bullet fired by Israeli Border Police in Anata, near Jerusalem. She had just finished a school examination and gone to buy sweets with her sister and two friends.
She died in hospital two days later, on January 18.
Israeli police initially maintained that she might have been struck by a stone thrown by Palestinian youths.
But in August 2010, Jerusalem District Court judge Orit Efal-Gabai ruled that Abir had been struck by a bullet fired by one of two Border Police officers, that no stone-throwers were present in the street where she was walking, and that the shooting was negligent or violated the rules of engagement.
Neither officer was ever criminally prosecuted. In July 2011, Israel's Supreme Court severely criticized the original police investigation as negligent and deficient but declined to overtur NJn the decision not to prosecute, citing evidentiary difficulties compounded by the passage of time.
In September 2011, the state was ordered to pay Abir's family approximately 1.6 million shekels in compensation.
Her father, Bassam Aramin, was a co-founder of Combatants for Peace, an organization bringing together former Palestinian militants and Israeli soldiers to promote reconciliation.
European Citizen retweeted
Still thinking about a call I joined today with Palestinian and Israeli activists about the medical situation in Gaza. In brief: there are thousands of sick people in Gaza in need of urgent treatment. Palestinian hospitals in East Jerusalem and the West Bank are ready and willing to treat them. But the Israeli authorities won’t allow them to cross from Gaza to the West Bank for surgery or chemo or whatever. A two hour ambulance drive so that a child’s life can be saved. Zero security risk. No legitimate excuse. So if you want to help, call your Member of Congress and ask them to demand that Israel open a medical corridor from Gaza to the West Bank immediately. Thank you!
European Citizen retweeted
Wtf!
Just arrived in Tel Aviv for coverage ahead of the Israeli elections
Only to be told the Israeli authorities are denying me entry to the country!
Have reported widely on Israel / Palestine for the past 4 years for @Channel4News
European Citizen retweeted
Por favor, lean esto. Un régimen capaz de apresar y torturar a niños.
Todos los venezolanos lo sabemos, todos.
Que el mundo también lo sepa.
Entre los detenidos por órdenes de Maduro hubo más de 200 niños. Aún hoy varios voceros del chavismo insisten en mentir diciendo que eran "terroristas" o que estaban protestando.
Al entrevistarlos, resulta que no fue así. Los detuvieron al azar en cualquier parte, incluso en sus casas, para llenar la cuota de detenciones.
Algunos denunciaron que los torturaron para obligarlos a inculpar a Edmundo González y María Corina Machado, diciendo que les pagaban por manifestar. Les hicieron juicios telemáticos y masivos. Les inventaron causas donde conectaban a muchos acusados sin que se conocieran entre ellos. Les impidieron tener abogados. Sufrieron desapariciones forzadas, incomunicación y otras violaciones sumamente graves.
Tuvo que salir un día de agosto María Corina en un evento de calle a exigir que los liberan y mientras tanto le pedía a los presos que protegieran a esos chicos y chicas de lo que les hacían los custodios. Esa declaración provocó que liberaran a decenas de ellos en menos de un día. A otros los excarcelaron meses después.
Todavía hoy algunos deben presentarse en tribunales. Todavía hoy viven secuelas de lo vivido y no hay un Estado que investigue, sanciones a los responsables ni repare todo el daño.
Es que ni siquiera lo reconocen. El chavismo todavía justifica las detenciones, las falsas acusaciones y todo lo que ocurrió con ellas. Se siguen presentando como las víctimas, mientras son responsables de crímenes de lesa humanidad.
Ahora aparecen informes de alto nivel que confirman lo que pasaba en Tocorón y Tocuyito, como en otras cárceles, y este video de Maduro y toda su gente aplaudiendo gana muchísimo más significado.
Se robaron las elecciones y reprimieron a la población de las formas más brutales para imponerse a la fuerza. La mayoría de los responsables sigue impune.
