a Thai Air Boeing 777-300ER suffered an "uncontained failure" of its left engine while taking off..
The incident occurred on Sunday afternoon on runway 01L at BKK.
Society's Child
a Thai Air Boeing 777-300ER suffered an "uncontained failure" of its left engine while taking off..
The incident occurred on Sunday afternoon on runway 01L at BKK.
© Reuters/Fabrizio Bensch
Starting in 2020, students of Art History and Visual Culture at the University of Exeter will be able to take a module entitled 'Pornography: Bodies, Sex and representation', where they will learn all about the main theories and debates surrounding the making, spreading and consumption of - porn.
The module will delve into a range of erotic material, including historically-censored films, gay and feminist porn, and amateur pornography.
Though a university module, students won't be analyzing the fluid dynamics of a perfect 'money shot,' or crunching the numbers to find out the business secrets of the most successful smut vendors. Instead, they'll be examining the subject through the lens of the social sciences.
"Students will, I hope, leave the module better equipped to think critically about issues of power, censorship, obscenity, sex, sexualities, subjectivities, desires and pleasures as they intersect and are co-shaped by modern and contemporary pornography,"said lecturer Dr João Florêncio.
© Joel Carrett/AAP
A protest rally calling for the protection of press freedom after the AFP’s raid on the ABC.
A protest rally calling for the protection of press freedom after the AFP’s raid on the ABC.
For most of its history, Australia managed with no specific federal legislation dealing with terrorism.
That might seem shocking, since, in the past 18 years, politicians have passed more than 60 anti-terror laws, generally on a bipartisan basis.
That "hyper-legislation" brought us, as Rebecca Ananian-Welsh notes, "expansive lists of criminal offences with uniformly severe penalties, and ... vast powers [for] police and intelligence agencies to search, seize, surveil and even detain."
In 2001, when the first anti-terror measures were mooted, the then president of Liberty Victoria, Chris Maxwell, queried why they were required at all.
"All that distinguishes a 'terrorist' act from any other criminal act," he said, "is its scale and its political motivation ... We already have offences like murder, like conspiracy to commit murder. We don't need this whole set of new powers to be conferred."
Comment: Australia - for all it's geographical distance from the West - seems to share a lot in common with it geopolitically:
- Unprecedented spying power: US, UK & Australia demand Facebook give backdoor access to encrypted messenger platforms
- Arm twisted? Australia joins the US' anti-Iran flotilla in as limited a way as possible
- US vassal Australia eyes developing new South China Sea port for American marines amid Washington-Beijing row
- Latest assault on press freedom : Federal Police raid ABC offices in Sydney, Australia with sweeping search warrant
- Ex-PM agrees Australia's security agencies are run by 'NUTTERS who are writing government policy' after article critical of foreign policy towards China published
- Vaccine skepticism in Australia now punishable by 10 years in jail
© (Sungjin Ahn photography/Getty Images)
An update on America's changing religious landscape
An update on America's changing religious landscape
and 2019, 65% of American adults describe themselves as Christians when asked about their religion, down 12 percentage points over the past decade. Meanwhile, the religiously unaffiliated share of the population, consisting of people who describe their religious identity as atheist, agnostic or "nothing in particular," now stands at 26%, up from 17% in 2009.
Both Protestantism and Catholicism are experiencing losses of population share. Currently, 43% of U.S. adults identify with Protestantism, down from 51% in 2009. And one-in-five adults (20%) are Catholic, down from 23% in 2009. Meanwhile, all subsets of the religiously unaffiliated population - a group also known as religious "nones" - have seen their numbers swell. Self-described atheists now account for 4% of U.S. adults, up modestly but significantly from 2% in 2009; agnostics make up 5% of U.S. adults, up from 3% a decade ago; and 17% of Americans now describe their religion as "nothing in particular," up from 12% in 2009. Members of non-Christian religions also have grown modestly as a share of the adult population.
Comment: And so even after decades of decay in the West, in the US the majority still believe in a higher power, even if the greatest move is those leaving organized religions. Although it's also clear there is a trend towards a significant portion of people - across all demographics - that are losing faith of any kind.
Comment: See also:
- Post-nihilism, a template for where we are heading
- Darwinism, Creationism... How About Neither?
- A 'global conspiracy' undermines Orthodox world - Patriarch Kirill
- The Truth Perspective: How Postmodernism Usurped the Western Mind
- The Truth Perspective: The Stoic Roots of Christianity: Self-Transcendence Through Meaning and Responsibility
- The Truth Perspective: Are Cells the Intelligent Designers? Why Creationists and Darwinists Are Both Wrong
© REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz
Charlotte Charles and Tim Dunn, parents of British teen Harry Dunn, speak during a interview in New York City, October 15, 2019.
Charlotte Charles and Tim Dunn, parents of British teen Harry Dunn, speak during a interview in New York City, October 15, 2019.
Harry Dunn, 19, was riding his motorbike on August 27 when he was struck by Anne Sacoolas, who was driving on the wrong side of the road near the RAF Croughton air force base in Northamptonshire, which is used by the US military. Foreign Minister Dominic Raab said on Monday that the rules which allowed Sacoolas to leave the country were being looked at.
"I have already commissioned a review of the immunity arrangements for US personnel and their families at Croughton," Raab told the House of Commons, adding that he does not believe that the current rules are "right" and that the review process will look at how to avoid having them be used in such a way again.
Watching the news over the last week, one would be convinced that the world has devolved into a series of flashpoints, with corrupt governments across the political spectrum facing the wrath of their enraged citizens. To be fair, that's not far from the truth.
Four continents have seen anti-government demonstrations over the last week, many of them sparked by seemingly innocuous taxes or changes to the law. In Lebanon, protesters have set Beirut ablaze in response to a proposed fee of 20 cents per day on internet voice calls, dubbed the "WhatsApp tax." Chileans set metro stations on fire following a $1.17 increase in public transport fares, and the streets of Ecuador are filled with rubble after a planned removal of fuel subsidies triggered mass unrest.
Comment: By the way, the above was not an exhaustive list of the rebellions that have erupted in the last few weeks/months. There's Haiti, Iraq, Indonesia, the ongoing stand-off in Venezuela of course, Algeria...
Each protest movement is motivated by different things of course. Still, many of them have much in common, especially where they involve mass resistance against onerous taxation and so-called austerity measures. That and the fact that people in almost all countries are subject to overwhelming barrages of fake news on a daily basis.
Other protest movements lack an 'internal logic', as is the case in Hong Kong, where extremists are now calling for full independence from China - where no such political demand existed just several weeks ago. These ones are geopolitical in nature, a form of 'proxy warfare' substantially directed from without.
Then there are entirely fake movements, like the 'Extinction Rebellion' in London, an elite-driven project. However, as deluded as the middle class participants in this latter movement are, they might - in a roundabout way - be the most 'on topic'.
Whatever their outward, stated rationale for protesting, it strikes us that people generally are 'acting out' because they sense that something is seriously 'amiss' with the world. Greta got one thing right y'know: we are living through the Sixth Extinction (except it's NOT man-made)...
© aliexpress.com
In many ways, however, the coastal regions that Clinton lauds represent the equivalent of a personal finance ponzi scheme. While many topline statistics like average income seem to show much higher standards of living in states like New York and California, a deeper dive into the numbers tell a different story altogether.
Poor policy decisions in blue states, including higher taxes on both the wealthy and working people, housing barriers, and higher prices due to regulatory burdens, mean that higher incomes vanish upon closer inspection. When accounting for the cost of food, housing, and commodities, the dollar goes significantly further in red states than in it does in blue states. A hundred dollars in cash will get you less than $90 worth of goods and services in New York and California. In Texas, Florida, and the rest of the mountain west except for Colorado, a Benjamin Franklin will buy you more than its value of $100. Across the midwest, the value actually exceeds $110.
© Reuters/Edgard Garrido
Chilean armed soldiers advance during a protest in Santiago, Chile, October 20, 2019.
Chilean armed soldiers advance during a protest in Santiago, Chile, October 20, 2019.
To prevent looting and arson attacks, thousands of armed troops have been patrolling the capital over the weekend, under the state of emergency introduced in Chile for the first time since the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Following another day of clashes with protesters, the general in charge of security in Santiago announced an extension of the curfew until 6am on Monday morning.
© AFP/Philip Fong
Construction work on a section of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge in Zhuhai, China
Construction work on a section of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge in Zhuhai, China
The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has approved 21 projects, worth at least 764.3 billion yuan ($107.8 billion), according to South China Morning Post (SCMP) calculations. The amount is more than double the size of last year's 374.3 billion yuan ($52.8 billion) in approvals recorded over the same period, which included 11 projects such as railways, roads and airports.
Three of the infrastructure projects approved by the NDRC are worth more than 100 billion yuan ($14 billion). The most expensive on the list is the new high-speed railway network linking Chongqing and Kunming in southwest China. The project is worth a total of 141.6 billion yuan ($19.9 billion).
Sichuan province has been given the green light to spend 131.8 billion yuan ($18.4 billion) to build a new airport. Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan province, will be allowed to spend 113.9 billion yuan ($16 billion) to continue with the third phase of its urban rail transit network.
Comment: It's extraordinary how they just 'keep calm and carry on' amidst the global hysteria and rebellions. A great example for individuals to follow: keep focused on building something real and long-lasting, lest the Wave drown you.
© WSJ
Lebanese PM Saad Hariri
Lebanese PM Saad Hariri
Lebanon's Cabinet, headed by President Michel Aoun at the Baabda Palace, has approved the package of reforms, as well as the 2020 budget, including halving ministers' wages in order to ease the economic crisis in the country, Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri has stated. The only controversial issue in the package was the power sector reform that has been under discussion for several hours. According to the PM, protests across the country restored Lebanon's national identity and broke sectarian barriers.
Cabinet Secretary-General Mahmoud Makkiyeh stated at a briefing that the Ministry of Information is to be abolished as part of measures aimed at tackling the financial crisis.
"The set of measures also envisions the abolition and merger of a number of [other] ministries and departments, including the abolition of the Ministry of Information, and instructions to the relevant authorities to prepare the necessary documents by 30 November 2019, at most."
Comment: Boeing has become a public safety hazard. The following are only a few recent issues: