On Thursday, “Robin Hood” operations – unauthorised by the government – provided free gas and electricity to schools, universities, and low-income households throughout the country.

Among the facilities provided free energy were public sports facilities, daycare centers, public libraries, some small businesses and homes that had been cut off from power.

The “Robin des Bois” operations – named after the English folk hero, Robin Hood – were part of a wider effort to force the government to drop plans to increase the retirement age in France.

Providing free energy was intended to “intensify the balance of power” in favour of striking workers, said Philippe Martinez, secretary-general of the GGT, one of the largest confederations of trade unions in France. “[It’s about] returning energy to those who don’t have it at all because they can’t afford to, and making it free for hospitals and schools.”

[…]

Plans to provide or cut power may also become more targeted. GCT Secretary-General Martinez denied on Wednesday that elected officials or specific individuals could have their power supply cut off – with some exceptions. “I would suggest that some billionaires who think that we don’t need to increase salaries and that everything is going well in this country could do with living the experience of millions of households who are facing energy insecurity,” he said.

Sheep living among rows of solar panels spend more time grazing, benefit from more nutritious food, rest more and appear to experience less heat stress, compared with nearby sheep in empty fields.

Earlier research suggested that agrivoltaic farms – which combine grazing animals with solar panels – offer more efficient renewable energy at lower overhead costs, as well as reducing wildfire risks. The latest findings show that the practice is also good for animal welfare, providing further evidence for a win-win situation, says Emma Kampherbeek, who carried out the work while at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.

[…]

As for pasture quality, the nitrogen content was higher and carbon content lower in the solar panel fields, suggesting that the vegetation in this pasture – which was greener – was more nutritious and more easily digestible. That might be due to the reduced exposure to intense solar rays and to dew dripping off the panels, providing much-needed moisture, she says.

The results are likely to be even more pronounced in warmer seasons, she adds. Additional research is under way to analyse the data taken from temperature recordings during her study.

Sheep make good candidates for agrivoltaics because they are efficient foragers, keeping weeds off solar panels, and are small enough to pass under the panels, says Kampherbeek. And, unlike goats, they don’t chew the electrical wires.

The findings strongly suggest that solar power centres should be designed with a partner animal species in mind, she says.

This is the beginning of a series of my thoughts on what the future of America holds through random and sometimes minute details, hopefully as time goes on I can better expand upon these thoughts

An Assortment of thoughts on the future of a Plurinational America.

(Just a heads up, none of these will be fully formed thoughts and require relentless scrutiny before actual implementation, so please don't hold back any criticism)

Part 1: What's in a name?

America, North South or Central is a name that's been in use for around 400 years to refer to the western Hemisphere. Now of course, this name hasn't always been in place, the name itself comes from the 2nd Italian explorer who came to these fair lands Americo Vespucci (or so the tale goes), but before him many people lived and thrived on a land with many different names. In light of Nations across the sea changing the English name of their country to better reflect their own name for it (Turkey changing to Turkyie, Swaziland to Eswatini, the Ivory Coast to Cote D'Ivorie to name a few) I believe what we call America, more specifically the USA should change its name to better reflect both the (hopefully) Plurinational and Local societal change as well as to reflect upon the homeland of the Natives. The question arises though, what should its new name be? A term that comes up a lot is Turtle Island/Mikinoc Waajew, from the Lenape and Haudenosaunee stories of creation. But should we keep this term in its Native Mikinoc Waajew or in the translated Turtle Island? On this I am unsure.

An Assortment of thoughts on the future of a Plurinational America.

(Just a heads up, none of these will be fully formed thoughts and require relentless scrutiny before actual implementation, so please don't hold back any criticism)

Part 1: What's in a name?

America, North South or Central is a name that's been in use for around 400 years to refer to the western Hemisphere. Now of course, this name hasn't always been in place, the name itself comes from the 2nd Italian explorer who came to these fair lands Americo Vespucci (or so the tale goes), but before him many people lived and thrived on a land with many different names. In light of Nations across the sea changing the English name of their country to better reflect their own name for it (Turkey changing to Turkyie, Swaziland to Eswatini, the Ivory Coast to Cote D'Ivorie to name a few) I believe what we call America, more specifically the USA should change its name to better reflect both the (hopefully) Plurinational and Local societal change as well as to reflect upon the homeland of the Natives. The question arises though, what should its new name be? A term that comes up a lot is Turtle Island/Mikinoc Waajew, from the Lenape and Haudenosaunee stories of creation. But should we keep this term in its Native Mikinoc Waajew or in the translated Turtle Island? On this I am unsure.

Cottage Core is based in Manifest Destiny's dehumanization of American Indians. Reject colonial aesthetics! Long live the indigenous movements of the world!

Unfriendly reminder that Native self-determination and sovereignty will always be more important than the feelings of white people who want to engage in their colonialist homesteading fantasies ✨

Police in this country (the US) cultivate an atmosphere of unchecked paranoia over every aspect of their job both out of a self-conscious effort to garner public sympathy as they vilify the people they ostensibly are socially expected to care for when they don't care for them, and out of a genuine self-reinforcing belief that they are the MOST besieged, endangered, vulnerable smol beans on earth. This is why cops keep pretending to OD on fentanyl purely from skin contact (impossible) or even just being near someone who's actually ODing (laughable) who they're expected to revive. It's not only that they're greedy lying attention seeking little piggies who want some paid time off to spend more time beating their families, it's not only that they resent being expected to save an addict's life instead of helping to end it, a LOT of them -out of a combination of indoctrination into the blue cult and baseline stupidity synonymous with those who covet the badge- genuinely believe that merely being in the presence of something even hypothetically dangerous to them means their life is actively under threat.

"why is the world's richest man --" shut up shut the fuck up i already told you. BECAUSE HE'S BUILT ON LIQUIDITY CRISIS AND NOW THAT IT'S A RECESSION THE BILLS ARE COMING DUE. there is no such thing as a world's richest man, only a world's biggest liar, con, and showman. his corporate valuation is fake, his cars are fake, his satellites are fake, his futurama train was fake, his flamethrowers were fake, his chocolate bar crowdfunding was fake, his skateboard for cars is fake, his brain implants are fake, his government contracts are fake, his taxes are fake, his SEC filings are fake, his capital is fake, his venture funding is fake, his car IPO was fake, his loans are fake, his battery subscription is fake, his solar panels are fake, his supply chain is fake, his assets are fake, his holdings are fake, his bitcoin is fake, his dogecoin is fake, his spaceships are fake, his rocket fuel is fake, his mars pipe dream is fake, his e-payment site was fake, his factory is fake, his covid shutdown evasion was fake, his farmwork to escape south african apartheid because his father held partial ownership in an emerald mine was fake, his degree is fake, his book jacket quotes are fake, his influence on the lithium coup in bolivia was fake, his projected revenue is fake, his clout is fake, his pull for advertisers is fake, his house is fake, his marriages were fake, his relationships were fake, his relationships with his children are fake, his excuse to get away with murdering his first child was fake, his hair is fake,

They did it with weed, they did it with crack, they'll do whatever it takes to punish people who are black

unfuckingbelievable and yet completely believable.

In the continuing story of "genius" Elon Musk taking over Twitter and then possibly fucking up entirely, apparently you have to give at least 60 days notice of mass layoffs by federal and state law in California, and shockingly enough, Musk didn't do that when he bought to company and planned to start mass layoffs within a week.

Link to a non pay-walled version of the story at Archive.org.

From "The Pitfalls of Liberalism" by Kwame Ture

Interesting article explaining one way mega corporations price their competitors out of business

The ideology of infinite economic growth destroys the ecological foundations of human life, produces alienating ways of living and working, gives rise to undemocratic productive forces and techniques, and mismeasures our lives, standing in the way of well-being and equality of all.

“I was on the brink of giving up on agriculture. It is tiring, strenuous, and financially useless work,” explained Odai Asfour, a teacher and farmer from Sinjil, a village located just north of Ramallah. “But we keep at it.”

Along with his wife, Odai grows seasonal plants on his 5 dunams (0.5 hectares) of agricultural land that he inherited from his great grandparents.  

“My wife and I grow cucumbers, green beans, tomatoes, kale, and watermelon, if the crop survives changing weather and scorching rising temperatures,” says Asfour. “But these crops are still at a great risk of being destroyed.”

Asfour, like many farmers in the West Bank, has been exposed to several Israeli settler attacks, who are often accompanied by an Israeli army escort.

“We lost almost half of our tomato produce just last month,” he says, “because Israeli soldiers decided to walk all over our newly planted tomatoes just after my wife and I finished planting them. And there were three other similar incidents throughout the year.”

PCBS has documented an increase in the number of settler attacks against Palestinian farmers in the West Bank in 2021, recording around 1 600 violations against Palestinian farmers in the West Bank. These include uprooting, destroying and burning 19,000 trees and plants.

Asfour found out about Souq al-Fallahin after asking around and searching the internet for two years ago. Before that he used to sell his crops by displaying them on the main street connecting Nablus and Ramallah.

“Then the Israeli army prohibited us from selling, for security reasons,” Asfour said. Although his participation in the market facilitated access to consumers once a week, there remain a number of fundamental challenges, namely the high production cost and the unfair competition with cheaper Israeli produce.

The hegemony of Israeli produce in different markets across the West Bank is perhaps the greatest barriers to Palestinian farmers. “They import second-class products that are harmful to our health,” Asfour says. “At least our produce is free of all of these chemicals.”

Comic by the Institute for Social Ecology

AI interpretation of an overgrown and Ecological city