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master-k0hga · 3 months

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| M A L I C E C I L |

[ Category: Misc OCs ]

| Another non related OC, think I showed him off last time but I re-drew him recently again cuz I didn't like the one before...

Anyways super awesome demon bf Mali, who, another OC I previously introduced, is dating Winston for like... Idk years- Winnie didn't believe he was an actual demon for like a whole year, people were telling him but he would've just shrugged it off... Til he finally believed Mali one day that the horns were not a headpiece-

But anyways, a wild ride their relationship first started out with, but funnily enough it never got worse.. It actually got better, Mali is usually the type of Demon to have fun, go out drinking, one night stands, groupies; All that, but Winston was an exception for him, like yeah he'll do his basic normal demon things, but he'll always be willing and happily come back to Winston, even plans one day to propose to him... Which he'll need to get a job for himself if he were to do that as a surprise.. Anyways-

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

INFO

Name: Malicecil Species: Demon General Personality: Perverted, cocky, confident, easy going, flirtatious, playful, funny, overall very welcoming, very chill Height: 9ft Relationship Status: In a relationship

Extra Info:

His age doesn't seem to be very easy to tell as he looks roughly in his late 20's/ early 30's all the time, but it's not a surprise that he is well older than that. Winnie himself was in complete shock when Mali just randomly walked up to him one morning and just whispered how old he was in his ear; Whether it was to sound impressive or just to see his reaction is of course another question however

As mentioned, he has in fact gotten arrested one time for driving while under the influence of alcohol. Apparently despite being a demon who could potential wreck havoc to the world one day if he snapped; He's so chill to the point where authorities can still get him done for human related crimes

Has an underworld form for whenever he ventures in and out of hell, or as most demons decide to call it; "The Underrealm", how he looks on the surface is the best he can ever get to looking more "human", despite him not looking THAT much different to his real look. He's literally only slightly taller and more brute built in his Underworld form

There are other demons who have socialised along with humans just like him, he even hangs out with them in clubs, going out for drinks and so forth while keeping it buddy-buddy; Humans aren't excluded from joining them if they ask, no discriminating here after all

Has gotten romantical with quite a few humans at LEAST dating back to the late 60's, unsure whether he has lived longer than that is unclear however as he refuses to acknowledge his life before that era

Has many forged ID's for every country; Why wouldn't he, he's a demon after all. Winston sometimes wonders how he manages to get himself into trouble before the problem is "seemingly forgotten"

Acts as Winston's personal mannequin when it comes to stylizing and tailoring; Mali enjoys it believe it or not, anything that makes his boyfriend smile is good enough for him

Despite being green, he actually likes the colour brown more

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That's all I believe, didn't really have much for him at all honestly so with this was definitely a good time to delve a little deeper into his character... Most of my OCs are mainly just made because I've thought of them either for a purpose of another OC or just because my brain decides to go "I dreamt this" (kinda like the "I made this")

...

Anyways, I don't really have much to talk about this besides just the usual so I guess that's it really....? I'll just get on with trying to get on with my other OCs in the meantime and take a break from it with fan art from time to time.. I'll just hopefully get more refs done for the OC spam, since I know I won't be really doing much online these days so I'd rather not work on a drawing then post it immediately... And then having nothing else to post, especially when it takes me ages just to be happy with a sketch and finish it off..

... Oh well, whatever.

. Malicecil, Art © Me . DON’T RE-POST .

#MASTER-K0HGA #Ary / Kohga Chronicles #Ary / Kohga OCs and Works #Malicecil #Male #Fandomless #Misc OCs #My OC #My Art #Demon OC #Demon #My Character #Re-post #My art re-posted #I do enjoy the fact that I'm categorizing my OCs at this point #it does kinda help with trying to keep this blog organised and whatnnot #Especially when I tag said categories too... Makes it easier for me to search them via tags on this blog too!#Easier way to separate OC related art and fan art as well when I'm trying to quickly find another post of mine.. Especially older ones.#Anyways not much to say....Never is tbh with how dead online is always for me... I've been talking to myself for years online #So it'll never change for me. I won't ever be like. Busy others are online but that's cuz people are interested in what they do #And don't get randomly ignored or left behind for now reason at all other than cuz people get bored of you #Or have heard random bs about you that you've never heard of in your life.. Oh well............ Minding my own business #Not that anybody gave a shit about me in the firstplace anyways...... Mali the chill demon dude who's kinda awesome #...... And wish he was my real friend too... He'd probably be my only friend actually...

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sayruq · 6 months

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So, I've had people asking, why does it matter if rockets are fired towards Tel Aviv and other settlements when they cause a fraction of the damage done by an Israeli missile?

Psychological warfare - the rocket barrages eliminate any sense of security that Israelis might have during the war. It reminds them that there's a price for the occupation of Palestine. I can't tell you how many videos I've seen of people in luxury resorts and other high class lodgings shouting and fleeing in fear at a rocket from Gaza or Yemen. It makes it hard for them to go about their daily life ignoring what is happening. Furthermore it undermines the strength of the IDF. Netanyahu can go on TV and claim to have complete control over Gaza but a rocket barrage undoes that easily. A rocket barrage tells Israelis and the rest of the world that not only is Hamas (and the other groups) still intact, it has enough of a stockpile to still bomb parts of Israel over 50 days into the conflict. Israeli media is constantly shocked every time this happens because there's always the assumption that Palestinians are unprepared in every way for the conflict we're seeing today. It forces them to take the threat posed by the Resistance very seriously which of course leads to the existential meltdowns you see on Israeli social media accounts.

De-settlement - There are hundreds of thousands of internally displaced settlers right now. Most of them are unwilling to return because the settlements are still getting hit and it's obvious the IDF is struggling to get things under control. The annexation of Palestinian land and the formation of settlements has led to a great deal of violence towards Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank. Hence, why forcing settlers to evacuate is seen as a great success by the Resistance and their supporters. Hezbollah, for example, has mentioned that several times while doing debriefs of their efforts in the conflict

Hits to the economy - if the settlers are evacuated, who will run local businesses? Not to mention underpaid and overworked foreign migrant workers have fled the country while exploited Gazan workers are trapped in Gaza. Israel is trying to combat this by making deals with countries like India and Mali to get tens of thousands of workers but it's not going to be enough especially the longer this conflict goes on. There's also the fact that tourism won't recover to pre war levels due to security concerns. The same thing with foreign capital leaving the country. Israel is too unstable and evidently incapable of regaining that stability (by quickly defeating the Palestinian resistance) which makes it risky to invest in Israeli businesses.

Logistical nightmare - Gazan rockets are cheap to produce, Israeli interceptor missiles are not. Israel is spending more to stop the barrages of rockets than the Resistance has spent probably in the past 5 years. It's the same issue on the Northern border to Lebanon and whenever Yemen sends its long range missiles. It's not like both Israel, America and Europe have endless supplies of weapons and ammunition, they sent most of their stockpiles to Ukraine. The longer this goes on, the more dire things will get but we're already seeing the strain

#yemen #jerusalem #tel aviv #current events #palestine #free palestine #gaza #free gaza #news on gaza #palestine news #war on gaza #war news

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reasonsforhope · 2 months

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Note: I super don't like the framing of this headline. "Here's why it matters" idk it's almost like there's an entire country's worth of people who get to keep their democracy! Clearly! But there are few good articles on this in English, so we're going with this one anyway.

2024 is the biggest global election year in history and the future of democracy is on every ballot. But amid an international backsliding in democratic norms, including in countries with a longer history of democracy like India, Senegal’s election last week was a major win for democracy. It’s also an indication that a new political class is coming of age in Africa, exemplified by Senegal’s new 44-year-old president, Bassirou Diomaye Faye.

The West African nation managed to pull off a free and fair election on March 24 despite significant obstacles, including efforts by former President Macky Sall to delay the elections and imprison or disqualify opposition candidates. Add those challenges to the fact that many neighboring countries in West Africa — most prominently Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, but other nations across the region too — have been repeatedly undermined by military coups since 2020.

Sall had been in power since 2012, serving two terms. He declined to seek a third term following years of speculation that he would do so despite a constitutional two-term limit. But he attempted to extend his term, announcing in February that elections (originally to be held that month) would be pushed off until the end of the year in defiance of the electoral schedule.

Sall’s allies in the National Assembly approved the measure, but only after security forces removed opposition politicians, who vociferously protested the delay. Senegalese society came out in droves to protest Sall’s attempted self-coup, and the Constitutional Council ruled in late February that Sall’s attempt to stay in power could not stand.

That itself was a win for democracy. Still, opposition candidates, including Faye, though legally able to run, remained imprisoned until just days before the election — while others were barred from running at all. The future of Senegal’s democracy seemed uncertain at best.

Cut to Tuesday [April 2, 2024], when Sall stepped down and handed power to Faye, a former tax examiner who won on a campaign of combating corruption, as well as greater sovereignty and economic opportunity for the Senegalese. And it was young voters who carried Faye to victory...

“This election showed the resilience of the democracy in Senegal that resisted the shock of an unexpected postponement,” Adele Ravidà, Senegal country director at the lnternational Foundation for Electoral Systems, told Vox via email. “... after a couple of years of unprecedented episodes of violence [the Senegalese people] turned the page smoothly, allowing a peaceful transfer of power.”

And though Faye’s aims won’t be easy to achieve, his win can tell us not only about how Senegal managed to establish its young democracy, but also about the positive trend of democratic entrenchment and international cooperation in African nations, and the power of young Africans...

Senegal and Democracy in Africa

Since it gained independence from France in 1960, Senegal has never had a coup — military or civilian. Increasingly strong and competitive democracy has been the norm for Senegal, and the country’s civil society went out in great force over the past three years of Sall’s term to enforce those norms.

“I think that it is really the victory of the democratic institutions — the government, but also civil society organization,” Sany said. “They were mobilized, from the unions, teacher unions, workers, NGOs. The civil society in Senegal is one of the most experienced, well-organized democratic institutions on the continent.” Senegalese civil society also pushed back against former President Abdoulaye Wade’s attempt to cling to power back in 2012, and the Senegalese people voted him out...

Faye will still have his work cut out for him accomplishing the goals he campaigned on, including economic prosperity, transparency, food security, increased sovereignty, and the strengthening of democratic institutions. This will be important, especially for Senegal’s young people, who are at the forefront of another major trend.

Young Africans will play an increasingly key role in the coming decades, both on the continent and on the global stage; Africa’s youth population (people aged 15 to 24) will make up approximately 35 percent of the world’s youth population by 2050, and Africa’s population is expected to grow from 1.5 billion to 2.5 billion during that time. In Senegal, people aged 10 to 24 make up 32 percent of the population, according to the UN.

“These young people have connected to the rest of the world,” Sany said. “They see what’s happening. They are interested. They are smart. They are more educated.” And they have high expectations not only for their economic future but also for their civil rights and autonomy.

The reality of government is always different from the promise of campaigning, but Faye’s election is part of a promising trend of democratic entrenchment in Africa, exemplified by successful transitions of power in Nigeria, Liberia, and Sierra Leone over the past year. To be sure, those elections were not without challenges, but on the whole, they provide an important counterweight to democratic backsliding.

Senegalese people, especially the younger generation, have high expectations for what democracy can and should deliver for them. It’s up to Faye and his government to follow."

-via Vox, April 4, 2024

#senegal #africa #bassirou diomaye faye #elections #2024 elections #democracy #voting matters #young people #political corruption #coup attempt #good news #hope #international politics #african politics #fair elections #autocracy #macky sall

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tarotwithlove · 8 months

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PICK A CARD ⋆ where is your current career path leading you?

reminder that this is a general reading and messages found here may not apply to everyone. take what resonates, leave what doesn't, and don't force anything if it does not fit.

BOOK A READING WITH ME · LINKTREE · SUGGEST A PAC TOPIC · TIPS ♡ tips and feedback are highly appreciated!

GROUP ONE

cards · king of swords, page of wands (reversed), king of wands (reversed), strength, king of pentacles (reversed), the star.

songs · caffeine by eyedi. the rapper that came to tea - interlude by little simz. start it up by alex mali.

hey there group one ♡ your current career path may, for a long time, offer you little more than uncertainty. you may feel hopeful about your career path and race forward with great passion and drive, only to crash and grow despondent when things don’t immediately turn out the way that you want them to.

this is not so much a message regarding your career path that’s coming through here as it is, rather, a message regarding your work ethic. whatever career you pursue will likely fall to pieces around you, leaving you with very little to show for your time and effort, because your work ethic is simply lacking. it is one thing to move from a place of passion, and another to be consistent.

get over the idea that things need to be perfect and they need to be perfect right now.

this mindset is only going to keep you from achieving your dreams and seeing the kind of career successes you want to see. imagine what the world would look like if everyone gave up after a few months or years, how cold and empty that would be. you will not achieve your goals overnight. kill the part of you that thinks you can and go forward prioritising consistency over perfectionism and hard work over immediate success.

GROUP TWO

cards · five of swords, five of cups (reversed), justice, king of pentacles, seven of wands, ten of pentacles.

songs · prisoner by the weeknd & lana del rey. freedom by beyoncé. diva by beyoncé.

hey there group two ♡ it may be slow going, but your current career path is leading you towards wealth and success - to the kind of wealth that makes you much, much more than just financial stability.

it may not feel like it at times - in fact, you may spend a lot of your life as it currently is feeling hopeless and at a loss - but you are walking towards your destiny. you are walking towards the life that is meant for you, that is even greater than anything you could ever have dreamed of or asked the divine for.

you may experience some hiccups along the road, taking jobs just to have some income or working in a field that you have no interest in just to get by. but this will be temporary.

think of it as a rite of passage, or as an interesting part of your backstory. do whatever you have to do to get through this time, but do not give up on your dream.

you may not have the same opportunities or connections as others, making it difficult to be where you want to be in life. but that does not mean you will never have the kind of career success you wish for. it just might take you a little bit longer. and that’s fine. is there really a deadline on when you can succeed? on when you can become successful? no, there is not. keep going, keep doing what you’re doing, because you will one day find that you are exactly where you have always wanted to be.

GROUP THREE

cards · three of cups, seven of cups (reversed), nine of pentacles, four of cups, the fool, wheel of fortune.

songs · don’t want it by lil nas x. forever only by jaehyun. eighteen (end of my world) by key.

hey there group three ♡ your current career path may be one that leads to you receiving accolades and recognition. your heart may not be in your current career or in the career you end up following, but it’s enough for you because it provides you stability and financial security. this may even be a job you start because it’s all that’s available, only to stay with this company for the next twenty or thirty years.

and while you may come to love your career, what it has done for you, and what it has allowed you to do for others, your heart may not be in it at all. so you will find yourself financially satisfied, but not emotionally or mentally satisfied.

this current career path may cause you to make a drastic change later on in your life. you will think about the years you have given to this career and wonder what would happen if you can give some of that time to yourself and following your own passions - whatever these passions may be.

and because this job has provided you with such financial security that you can afford to live off your savings and investments for a certain period of time, you will decide to leave it to find yourself or to pursue a completely different career path.

you will find yourself as a complete beginner again. and while you may at times wish for the security of your old career, you will never want to go back.

for some of you, you may even be quitting your jobs to sail the world. something fun and adventurous like that!

#**#tarot #pac #pick a card #pick a photo #pick a pile #tarotblr #tarotonline #tarotcommunity #channelled message #channeled message #spirituality #spiritualism

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zvaigzdelasas · 8 months

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The EU plans to launch a new military mission in West Africa. According to reports prior to the meeting of EU foreign ministers in Toledo yesterday (Thursday [31 Aug 23]), soldiers and police officers are to be deployed in the northern regions of four countries at the Gulf of Guinea (Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin). [Salafist extremist] insurgencies threaten to spread to these regions, against which EU states have been fighting for nearly a decade in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger – without any success. The deployment aims at securing an EU military presence in the central Sahel in case France and the EU are forced to withdraw from Niger. Major forces within the Nigerien population are planning to demonstrate their support for the withdrawal – beginning this Sunday near the French military base in Niamey. In its new military mission, the EU is cooperating with governments, which are calling for a military intervention in Niger to overthrow the junta. Berlin and the EU have had a presence in the Gulf of Guinea, for quite a while. The EU is deploying ships against piracy, while Berlin is providing finances for training military personnel for deployments abroad. Withdrawal from the Sahel

The new EU mission planned for West Africa is intended to prevent European governments from soon being forced to abandon their military presence in the Sahel’s main hotspot. Mali is lost to them for the foreseeable future. France has long since withdrawn its troops, which had been stationed there in accordance with a bi-lateral agreement. Units from the EU, deployed within the framework of the UN MINUSMA force – including more than a thousand German soldiers – must leave Mali by the end of the year.[1] France has also had to withdraw its troops from Burkina Faso. The original plan to have Niger serve as a major substitute deployment location – for the French and EU troops – is about to canceled due to the putsch in Niamey. [...]Abrogation of EU deployment agreements have not yet been announced. Troops from the EU and Germany depend on the French military presence for their security.

The EU wants to take advantage of the fact that [Salafist extremist] militia attacks are now beginning to spread in the Sahel to countries to the south of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. It seeks to station its troops in the north of four countries at the coast of the Gulf of Guinea – in Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo and Benin – under the pretext of seeking to halt the advance of the [Salafist extremists]. Considering the record of the European countries and the EU’s missions in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, there are little grounds for hoping that especially the EU will be able to effectively help with this new mission. Nowhere in the Sahel has it proven capable, over the past few years, of weakening the [Salafist extremists]. On the contrary, the [Salafist extremists] are stronger now than before. Specifically, the new EU mission is supposed to train and advise local security forces of the four countries, according to an EU spokeswoman. Soldiers from EU member countries will help prepare for “anti-terror operations,” giving technical support and allegedly “to enhance social and economic conditions of the local population.”[2] The mission is expected to initially last two years. However, traditionally EU missions are always prolonged. The number of deployed police officers and soldiers is still to be determined. The mission is set to be formally launched by EU foreign ministers at their next regular meeting in October.

The EU’s new deployment plans are primarily relying on two countries playing central roles in the discussion of a military intervention to overthrow the junta in Niger – Côte d’Ivoire and Benin. Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara had announced his intention to prepare around a thousand soldiers for the possible intervention in Niger. In the course of disputed election results in the spring of 2011, Ouattara, a former Vice Director of the IMF,[3] had, himself, been heaved into power by a French military intervention. The French military reduced the presidential palace to rubble in the overthrow of the incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo. Ouattara ran for a third term in 2020, even though the Ivorian constitution only allows two terms of office. The election was boycotted by the opposition, after the Ivorian judiciary banned the main opposition candidates Gbagbo and Guillaume Soro from running. Benin, on the other hand, has also promised troops for the possible ECOWAS war on Niger. Its common border with Niger is considered one of the possible launching positions for the invasion. Currently, by maintaining the closure of its border to Niger, as a means of imposing sanctions, Benin is withholding vital supplies for Niger’s needy population.[4]

Militarily, Germany and the EU would be blazing no new trails in West Africa. Ghana, for example, is home to the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Center (KAIPTC), where soldiers and police from West Africa are being trained for foreign missions. The KAIPTC was inaugurated in January 2004 in the presence of the German Chancellor, at the time, Gerhard Schröder and has been co-funded by the German government ever since.[5] In addition, Germany has helped train and equip Ghana’s military. From 2009 – 2017 Germany had funded the creation of a Ghanian engineer unit with nearly €11 million and accorded Accra another €8.2 million from 2017 – 2020 for the creation of a mobile command post.[6] The EU is also engaged in anti-piracy combat in the Gulf of Guinea. Thus, in early 2021, it began dispatching warships into those waters. Then in early 2022, the initially one-year Coordinated Maritime Presences (CMP) pilot program was granted a two-year extension.[7] On the one hand, this naval presence provides exclusive knowledge of what is happening in that maritime region for the troops involved, and on the other, it contributes to developing ties to neighboring West African militaries. It remains uncertain, whether the coup in Gabon will have an impact on the plans for the EU’s military operation in West Africa. Gabon’s overthrown President Ali Bongo is considered one of Africa’s most corrupt partisans of France. It is not yet clear whether the coup that removed Bongo from power – to the jubilation of large portions of the population – following a presumably heavily rigged election victory will have an impact on relations between Libreville and Paris. According to allegations in Paris, the coup may merely be the result of a power struggle between rival sectors of the ruling elite, without having an impact on the foreign policy.[8] However, it is not at all certain that the strong West African opposition to the former colonial power, France, has not also taken root in Gabon. In the meantime, to maintain a margin of maneuver, EU Foreign Affairs Commissioner Josep Borrell has declared that the coup d’état that was carried out in Gabon cannot be equated with that in Niger. Bongo’s return to the presidency is not really being demanded. Should the junta in Libreville reach an agreement with Paris, Paris and the EU could at least somewhat consolidate their positions on Africa. If that does not happen, Europe’s withdrawal from its former African colonies will have proceeded another step further.

1 Sep 23

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ptseti · 28 days

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AFRICAN LEADERS, STOP SELLING OUR COUNTRIES

In this video, 23-year-old rapper and Pan-Africanist based in Kenya @realsensicalsense ranted about many African leaders upholding the neo-colonial system.

For centuries, the world’s industrial powers have treated Africa as an open market for cheap raw materials to fuel their economies. At the end of the European slave trade and throughout the colonial period, Europeans forced Africans into a global economy that disadvantaged Africa and other colonised regions of the world. Today, most African countries are nominally free. Yet, African states still find themselves beholden to unfair trade deals, widening the gap between the industrialised Global North and the extractivist economies of the Global South. It’s a race to the bottom at the expense of our lands and people.

Every country is looking out for its interests. In some cases, two countries can strike a mutually beneficial deal. New collaborations between Russia and African countries like Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger are allowing these Sahelian states to move away from France’s stranglehold and develop new industries.

BROTHER SPEAKING FACTS ..these so-called leaders are nothing but corrupt mother fvckers

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riya-kaur · 5 months

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calum thomas hood

eight years.

↪ part one!

↪ part two.

"merry christmas eve!"

"mhm, come back to bed" you hear calum whine in his morning voice. you giggle at the sight of your boyfriend patting the empty mattress beside him.

it was now two days after the snowball incident, the one which led to calum finally confessing his feelings for you. well, since then, you and calum talked things through, about where you both stood with each other. the next day after that talk, calum took you out to a rooftop dinner and asked you on the balcony to be his girlfriend.

the both of you had waited so long for the moment, and your answer was obvious, but the fact he asked you - was something you appreciated.

the day after that, the four of you: you, calum, ashton, and mali, all went to target to get some christmas decorations for the cabin.

you and calum hadn't told mali and ashton yet of your guys' relationship, but they didn't ask either. the both of you were pretty sure that they already knew, though - due to the fact that calum was very into pda, and sometimes they would walk in on you two cuddling or just you two getting along.

and now it was the present day...

"cal, you need to get up, mali, and i made breakfast," you inform him as you stand beside the bed, hovering over him as your hand reaches for his hair. he turns to his side and looks up at you before retracting your hand from his hair and intertwining it with his.

"calum" your lips pout before you turn them into a frown. "fine" he huffs, "can i least get a kiss" his eyebrow arches as he looks up at me. you let your lips turn into a smile before placing them on his lips.

with the hand that was holding yours, you feel a light but effective tug, resulting in you falling on top of calum. "you're terrible." you shake your head before letting out a giggle.

"i've got you now," calum hums. he wraps his arms around you securely as he rests his face in your shoulder. you turn your head slightly to place a kiss to the the side of his head.

"ashton! you owe me fifty bucks!" the sound of mali's voice fills the room before rapid steps are heard running down the steps.

you'd turned your head to the bedroom door, which was now opened, you thought back to when you walked in before, remembering that you closed it behind you. "she knows, they know." your eyes widened as you turned back to calum.

"i'm surprised they didn't figure it out earlier" calum mumbles against your shoulder. "i've not been the most discrete" he admits. "but can you blame me? look at you" he says, pulling away from your shoulder, letting his eyes take you in.

"stop it!" you blush as you attempt to get out of his grasp. "no" he says, letting one of his hands reach up to your cheek. "you're beautiful, y/n" his fingers trace circles against your skin. "i'll never stop telling you that" he smiles before letting his lips rise to yours.

"thank you" you smile as against his lips, "for everything, calum" with that, you place another kiss on his jaw.

"so what was that bet about?" calum asks, walking into the kitchen. you follow behind him, looking over at ashton and mali, who were sitting at the table eating their stack of pancakes

"you two," ashton answers, "who won?" calum asked, already knowing the answer. he grabbed a plate of pancakes and sat beside his sister. you stood at the island as you were finishing up your food.

"me" mali spoke, "i knew something was going on between you two!" she exclaimed. calum chuckled before looking over at you. his fork had reached his lips as his eyes settled on you, "c'mere" he smiled at you.

you let out a small laugh as you pick up your plate and place it down on the table before taking the chair out from under the table. "i meant here, baby." he frowns as he opens up his arms.

"you guys are making me feel really single right now" mali sighed as she dropped her head to the table. "i don't care" calum shrugs, making you and ashton laugh.

mali raises her head from the table and sends a glare to her brother before looking over at you. you had tucked the chair back under the table and walked around the table to calum.

"i really have to show you that picture of him as a bratz doll" mali says, "he really pulled it off, didn't you cal?" she pointed her sarcasm over at calum, who just rolled his eyes.

you took a seat on calum's lap as he glared back at his sister. "is that really all you have against me" calum shrugs before he lets his arms settle around you. he drops his chin on your shoulder.

"so how are you this morning, ash?" you asked ashton as you pulled your plate towards you.

you and ashton began talking, leaving the two siblings to their squabbling and glaring

"are you guys coming!" ashton shouted from the bottom of the stairs. "we'll be five minutes!" you shout back.

at breakfast, ashton brought up seeing a poster of the winter wonderland fair that was being held tonight, so we all decided to attend.

"calum, will you do up my necklace?" you stood in front of the full-length mirror as your eyes locked with calum's through the glass.

he was in the middle of running a hand through his hair before he turned to look at you. he gave you a small nod before striding over to you, stopping when he reached a few inches behind you.

he let his hand scoop your hair over on one side of your shoulder before taking the small chain from your hands. he clasped it close, letting his fingers graze your nape.

you watched through the mirror as calum dipped his head, leaving small kisses on the side of your neck. his hand slightly tugging down the turtle neck you wore, leaving behind your exposed skin.

"cal-" your voice comes out breathy as you tilted your head to the side.

"will you two hurry up!" the sound of mali shouting from the bottom of the stairs left you both startled.

"we should probably go"

the four of you headed into an uber, ashton sitting in the passenger seat whilst you, calum and mali sat at the back.

mali was against you and calum sitting beside each other, so she sat in the middle. "you're so annoying," calum whispered, so the driver wouldn't hear.

you let out a small giggle as you see calum extending his hand out to you. before taking it, you see mali squatting his hand away. "i'm right here" she huffs.

"you're being really childish." calum shakes his head at his sister before letting it rest against the window.

"you need to stop being so touchy" mali argues back. "guys, let's not -" you shake your head with a smile to your lips.

"you're sitting in the middle on the way back"

"okay, what shall we do first?" ashton asks, the four of you huddled around together.

"i'm starving!" you exclaim with a pout on your lips. "let's get food, i wanna try that burger place" mali joins in. the four of you walk over to a burger hut. you and mali tell the boys your order before getting table.

"i'm so happy you two finally got together," mali smiles. "i know calum, and i pretend we don't get along, but i'm so happy to see him happy and finally be himself with you" she continues, "and now one of my best friends will eventually become my sister-in-law" she pouts as she pretends to wipe a tear off her cheek. you shake your head as you let out a laugh.

"thank you, though, that's means a lot, mali" you smile, "speaking of you and calum, have you told crystal, she'll be over the moon excited for you guys" mali giggles. "not yet, i was planning to call her tonight, but i have a feeling she already knows" you admit. "why" mali asks, her eyebrows furrowing.

"i spoke to michael a few days ago thinking it was crystal, and i just went on about -" you start, "well, calum" you shrug. "and i have no doubt that michael told crystal about it" you finish. "in that case-" mali chews on her inner cheek, "i'll admit she may already know- but i swear i didn't tell her" she says.

"have you seen calum's instagram recently?" she asks and you shake your head. "have a look" she urges.

so you do. you take your phone out of your bag and click onto instagram, tapping onto calum's account. you click on his recent post.

it was the picture mali took on our first morning at the cabin, me and calum tangled against the white sheets in bed. you felt deep red tint rise to your skin as you admired the picture.

"i didn't know my brother had it in him to be a romantic" mali says.

you giggle at the statement before reading calum's caption:

' we made it- it took eight years, but i finally have the girl of my dreams. it's you and me against the world, baby. i love you, always have and always will <3 '

you felt your eyes water at the caption, but quickly wiped them away when you raised your head back up at mali. "this is so cute" you point at your phone, "what's so cute?" you hear calum say.

you turn around in your seat, looking up at calum with a grin across your lips, "you" you tug on his sleeve, telling him to bend down. he does so, letting a kiss fall on your lips.

calum takes the seat next to you, his lips still on yours whilst his tongue runs across your bottom lip, "guys, food?" mali breaks the two of you up with the short sentence.

"oh yeah, i'm starving!" you squeal, calum let's out a chuckle before placing a kiss to the side of your head. he waits a few seconds before letting out a pretend yawn, his arms stretching out and then settling on the back of your chair.

"cliché"

"i'll hold your hand!"

you look over at calum, who sat on a bench with his arms crossed over his chest. "it's so embarrassing, i'll end up falling," he says. "i promise you won't, i'll be right be your side. look at ash. he was the same as you, and now he's doing great"

you stretch your hand out in front of calum, pointing over at the ice rink where mali and ashton were skating laps around the rink. "you'll be fine, calum" you bat your eyelashes whilst holding out your pinky finger. "i pinky promise baby"

"fine" calum huffs as he hooks his pinky finger on yours. "but you owe me since i'm literally going out there to embarrass myself" he sighs.

"thank you! thank you! thank you!" you squeal as you pull his arm, trying to pull him off the bench- it failed because he didn't move an inch. "get up" you shake his arm as you watch him smirk, amusement dripping off of him.

"you're so cute" he chuckled as he stood up from the bench. "mhm i know"

calum rolls his eyes playfully, you let out a scoff before hitting his chest, "come on," you say impatiently as you take his hand in yours, dragging him to the ice rink.

the two of you made your way to the counter and requested your skates. after a couple of minutes, you had received the skates, and you both took a seat on a bench to put them on and tied them up.

"stay there," you say calum as you rush over to the lockers, "not like i can move anyway, i'll end up falling" he states. you shake your head as you watch him lean back into the bench.

you pick up yours and calum's trainers from the ground and carefully make your way over to the lockers. after putting in the locker combination, you made your way back to calum.

"okay, you ready?" you ask calum, you let your hand push his legs apart, allowing you to stand imbetween them. he looks up at you, his bottom lip imbetween his lip. "what?" you coo as you raise your hand to cup his jaw. "why don't we just skip skating and do something else" he pleads, his hands find yours, tugging on them, making you take a seat on one of his thighs.

you adjust yourself on his thigh before letting your fingers trail his jaw. "you'll have fun" you pout, your fingers mindlessly trailing down his chest.

he catches your wondering hand with his, "kids" he says, darting his eyes to a group of children, who were staring at you both. "oh god" you say, embarrassed as you rush yourself off of calum.

calum lets out a laugh as he watches you turn flustered, a deep red tinting your cheeks. "come one then, before i change my mind" he takes your hand in his and wobbles over to the rink.

you walked onto the rink first, still holding onto calum's hand. he eventually made it onto the rink, earning glances of both adults and children as he struggled to balance himself.

"you're doing it!" mali exclaims, sneaking up from behind calum. calum jumps but holds onto you and the side of the rink. "god, mali. don't do that" he furrows his eyebrows at his sister. "you're doing great, cal." you smile as you watch him take small strides on the ice.

"ash, look!" mali exclaims, gaining ashton's attention. "well done, man, you're doing great" ashton beams as he strides over to the three of you.

"wanna try let go?" you ask calum, he nods in response, "stay close though, just in case" he shrugs, "i will, i'll be right beside you " letting go of calum's hand, you watch as he lets go of the side wall, taking small strides ahead.

he eventually starts taking longer strides around the rink, feeling much more confident from when he first stepped on the rink.

"how'd you find that?" you ask calum as you untie the skates off. "supringsly fun, thank you for making me do it" calum smiles.

the both of you were sat on the bench, now putting on your trainers and doing them up. calum leaned into your side, placing a kiss to your head once he had finished tying his shoelace up.

"where did mali and ahston go?" you ask calum, turning to your side. "on the rollercaosters" calum points out. "right." you bite your inner cheek, "what shall we do now?"

"i have an idea" calum pipes up. you hum in response. "the wheel?" he asks. your eyes shoot up at the illuminated wheel.

"it's a bit-" you begin to say, "high" you finish off by looking over at calum. "you helped me on the rink, now let me help you" he says. "cal, that's really high" you sigh, looking up at the wheel again, "i'll be right next to you, baby" he says, tucking a stray piece of your hair behind your ear.

you turn to look at calum again. "i'll hold your hand" calum turns the corners of his lips down as he bats his eyelashes at you.

"i guess this is karma for making you go on the rink" you huff, standing up from the bench, "come one then" you say, reaching out for his hand. he takes your hand in his and practically runs over to the line for the wheel.

"you'll be okay, i promise," calum reassures you, "i know." you smile, hugging into calum's side. "i've got you" you mumble against him. "you do, baby, you always got me. you've had me for eight years" calum whispers against the top of your head, leaving behind a kiss.

it eventually came to yours and calum's turn to sit in a carriage. the man guarding the ride strapped you both in, whilst you kept your eyes on calum, "if i just look at you, it'll be fine, i just won't look down" you state, tightly clasping onto calum's hand.

calum places another kiss to the side of your head as the carriage moves forward, your feet now off the ground and instead dangling.

calum brings his hand to your cheek as the carriage starts getting higher, "you're okay," he whispers.

"wanna try look down?" he asks. you nod as you unconsciously grip calum's hand tighter. you draw your eyes beneath you, looking at the lights that were lighting up the night sky.

"i-it looks beautiful," you state. "mhm, it does," calum says, his eyes never leaving you.

once the wheel had come to a halt, you and calum jumped out, giggling. " that was so fun!" you squeal, you let your arm link with calums as the both of you walk towards a nearby fire.

there were little bonfires scattered around, under little huts, to help keep warm. so you and calum entered a hut and stood beside the fire, letting your hand hover over the fire. you leaned into calum's side whilst doing so.

"look up" calum smiles. you look up at the wooden ceiling, seeing a mistletoe hanging down.

you giggle as you shuffle around calum, now standing in front of him, on your tiptoes. you let your arms wrap around his neck whilst he let his arms wrap around your waist.

you pull him down for a kiss, calum quickly slipping his tongue in, imbetween your parted lips.

"merry christmas, baby."

this took longer than i'd hoped :/

but thank you to those of you who asked for a part 2 to eight years! 🫶🏽

i initially had wanted to do something completely different with this, but i ended up with this!

also, there might be a part 3 to this

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sissa-arrows · 10 months

Note

Do have any opinions/resources about the situation in Niger? You’re the most knowledgeable of the people I know about French colonialism and that seems to be at the centre of the recent protests and coup.

First of all I am in no way or shape a specialist in the subject of French colonialism. I learned everything because it’s part of my family history (proud grand daughter and great grand daughter of freedom fighters) and the decolonization of all of Africa is part of the history of Algeria and therefore part of my history. Because you cannot learn about decolonization without learning about colonization I had to learn about France’s colonial history in the rest of Africa and eventually in the rest of world.

One thing to keep in mind when addressing military coups in Africa is that the military was created in a very different context than it was in the West. In Africa a lot of armies were created by freedom fighters who go fought against colonialism. It doesn’t mean that their modern version is not corrupted and that it is never used as a way to oppress the people. But unlike the west where the army was often created to protect the powerful, in Africa it often originated in groups of men fighting to protect the people from the powerful colonial power.

Anyway to your question! To use the words of Gabon’s first president after the independence in 1960 when he visited France after his election in 1961 “Gabon is independent, but between Gabon and France nothing has changed; everything goes on as before.” And this applies to too many African countries.

France refuses to accept the independence of African countries. They have a paternalist colonial behavior with us. Algeria is one of the rare former French colonies who manages to say fuck you to France and even Algeria is not completely free to say fuck you because of the consequences it could have on us Algerians who live in France. Because of France’s refusal to accept the independence and the desire to keep a form of control over the continent France has been involved in multiple assassination and coup d’Etat in the continent. They were also involved in multiple civil wars. They control the currency of some African countries. How can you be independent when your currency is owned and printed by the former colonizer?

Terrorism gives an excuse to France to send its army in the continent especially in the Sahel region and that same army pillages the region instead of actually helping against terrorism. Now when those countries decide that France’s presence is doing more harm than good and kick out France they are vilified. They are told they are controlled by someone else (depending on the situation their either accuse Algeria or Russia or both). It happened with Mali and Mauritania. And this is what’s happening with Niger.

Africa is a young continent in term of population. The youth kicked out colonizers in the 60’s and 70’s. Now the young generation wants to get rid of Neo-colonialism. African governments who are greedy and let the colonizers take whatever they want need to go. If it has to happen with a Coup d’Etat then so be it. That’s my personal opinion in general not specifically for Niger.

For Niger specifically I don’t know enough about Abdourahamane Tiani and don’t have enough perspective to decide if I support him personably but I have enough knowledge and perspective to support the demise of Mohamed Bazoum government and the decision to cut tie with France. France is still pillaging Africa and Bazoum was allowing it in Niger. The simple fact that the ECOWAS is standing in favor of Bazoum and willing to actually start a war should be enough to tell you that what is happening in Niger is bad for France’s interests. And if it’s bad for France’s interest if the new leader is not corrupted then it will be good for the country. The ECOWAS pretends to act in the interest of the continent but it only benefits France. The countries that were suspended are the same countries that are getting rid of French influence and Neo-colonialism. Corrupted African leaders who serve as France’s lapdogs refuse to have fair elections so the only solution to kick them out and gain real freedom is a coup or a revolution. It’s not an accident if all the latest coup d’etat in Africa happened in former French colonies. It’s not an accident if a big portion of the population support those coups. People are fed up by the control France still has.

(I actually read something very interesting about what’s happening in Niger yesterday but can’t find it anymore I will share a link later if I find it again)

Also I just want to add something off topic about terrorism in Africa and South West Asia. I find it extremely fascinating how countries where the US, France or the West in general came to “help” never managed to find a durable solution against terrorism. Meanwhile during the Algerian Black decade/civil war in the 90’s, Algeria refused to let France and the US send soldiers to “help” and we did eventually find a durable solution on our own.

#Niger #France #colonialism #neo colonialism #African politic #decolonize Africa

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hrodvitnon · 3 months

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Okay, I need to calm down... so I've been working on another SIGNALIS fic, this one considerably lighter in tone than Ne Cede Malis, in which Ariane has art block and seeks to fix that by sketching Elster. Gay Panic ensues. But before that Gay Panic, there is...

---

Well, why not? It's not as if they've probably broken a dozen extremely specific rules by this point in the voyage. Elster holds out one hardtack. Ariane scrutinizes the cracker-like foodstuff, leans in to sniff at it as if that will make it more palatable, and gingerly presses her teeth into it. What little flavor she gets on her tongue is a whole lot of... nothing.

"Harder," Elster instructs with an amused lilt in her voice.

Ariane applies more pressure, but Elster wasn't kidding about tooth strength – do Replikas have hydraulic jaws just to crack these things apart?

"Do you require assistance, Officer Yeong?"

Ariane shoots her a look that says, Yes, and would you kindly please not take so much enjoyment out of this? Elster cracks a smile, her fingers snapping the infernal thing with a loud crack so that Ariane can be left with a much smaller and more manageable piece. It's rather funny seeing how the officer's face scrunches with every audible crunch as she meticulously works through the aggressively dry hardtack.

"Not to your taste?" Elster surmises.

Somehow, Ariane reduces it into small enough pieces to swallow without choking her. "I wasn't aware that clinical depression came in cracker form."

Elster makes a chuffing noise, Ariane taking a spoonful of oatmeal to wash the nonexistent taste out of her mouth.

"It's not that bad."

"We could use that stuff to repair a damaged hull!"

"Yes, but then what would I eat?"

Ariane slides the bowl to stand between her and Elster, scoops up some oatmeal in her spoon and holds it up in offering. Elster doesn't plan to start diving into the Gestalt rations just to get away from panzerplatten for a cycle or two, but Ariane isn't the sort to back down from an offer and she has to admit, the idea of tasting actual food is tempting. Elster leans in and opens her mouth, tongue extending to catch a bit of oats and fruit about to drip down from the spoon. There's a silent hitch in Ariane's breath as she watches this.

And then her cheeks flush the instant Elster's lips make contact with the spoon.

Elster's lips just touched her spoon.

The same spoon she needs to finish her breakfast with.

Schoolgirl giggling from Mandelbrot Polytechnical echoes in the chambers of her memory, of popular girls at a crowded lunch table gossiping over So-And-So getting an indirect kiss from Such-And-Such. Ariane has never been kissed before, directly or otherwise. Her only experience with it had been the maternal affections of her mother pressing a peck to her brow or on her cheek. At the time, Ariane pretended it didn't bother her because why make a big deal out of some spit when she had more pressing concerns, like not getting jumped by a gang of upperclassmen when Erika wasn't around to protect her? Nobody liked the creepy ghost girl from Leng anyway. Boys didn't draw her eye and girls were pretty but insidiously cruel. Such things were locked away in the realm of impossibilities.

But now here Ariane is, and Elster's lips and tongue have touched her spoon.

Meanwhile, Elster is blissfully unaware of the fact that she just caused Ariane's brain to shift gears without a clutch.

#signalis #elster 512 #ariane yeong #ACHTUNG. ACHTUNG.#preview

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mask131 · 3 months

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It is very amusing - and yet quite terrifying - to see how still to this day there are blogs on Tumblr that support the belief that "All these things the West claims Putin did outside of Russia? He didn't do anything because there's no proof so people are just making it up, Putin's my poor innocent little baby :3 owo". I just saw a post like that two days ago. [It would be interesting to see what those people think the "West" means, because this range from "It is just the USA" to "It is just Western Europe" - anyway]

So, today is my obligatory post about the fuck-ups of Putin's Russia within other countries. And while I always wanted to make a post about the various misinformation campaigns and manipulations of Wagner in various countries of Africa (including the creation of a false mass-grave in Mali that Wagner wanted to use to accuse the French military in place in the area of war crimes - hopefully this plan was foiled because a drone ended up filming them as they were preparing the mass-grave), today I will rather focus on a more recent and more worrying case. And much more "hot-topic" because it involves... The Hamas-Israel conflict, and the mass wave of antisemitism in Europe that recently rose!

Let us go back in time briefly. 7 of october 2023, terrorists of the Hamas organize a surprise attack on Israel. On the 8th of October, Israel starts throwing bombs at Palestine in retaliation - and this is the beginning of the Hamas-Israel war. A war that completely, vividly and violently split the opinion in both Europe and North America, due to how muddled and complex and devastating this conflict is. And a war that had one notable very dark side-effect in Europe (but also in North America) - it woke up a dormant wave of antisemitism. Due to Israel position when it comes to the history of Palestine, and due to how excessive Israel's attacks towards Palestine in retaliation for the Hamas' actions were - notably leading to a grave humanitarian and sanitary crisis in Gaza, that a lot of people chose to define as a "genocide" - a "pro-Palestine" wave arose in Western Europe that was against "Zionism" (understand, support and affiliation with Israel). Problem is - for decades now a lot of antisemitic people had been using "anti-zionism" as a thinley veiled excuse for what was pure antisemitism, due to how Israel is THE Jewish nation. AND for years now, especially in France, antisemitic actions have been on the rise (in France we had the graves of great Jewish personalities covered in antisemitic tags, and various synagogues degraded). As such, alongside movements supporting Palestine and denouncing Israel, numerous antisemitic actions and attacks started happening in various European countries.

In this context, end of October, in the Ile-de-France region, in the Parisian area, over several habitation buildings, more than 250 Stars of David had been painted in blue, overnight. On the morning of the 31st of October, they were on display for everyone to see.

This of course only fueled further the panic and the socio-political debate. The blue color of the stars clearly indicated a tie to Israel. But the fact was that these buildings were habited... by Jewish people. These stars were used to "mark" these buildings - with the clear message "Jews live here". And due to the blue color, it seemed to be part of the whole antisemitic distortion of the pro-Palestinian message: "There are Jews here - There are people of Israel here".

This made all the news, and one interview in particular was in loop over the various info channels of France. Several of the inhabitants of this building were elderly people. Old enough sometimes to have known World War II. And one of the old ladies that lived in these buildings broke down in tears when interviewed because as she explained: "This is all like when I was a child. It is happening all over again."

Because, it should be known - and if you don't know, you will now - that France wasn't just invaded and occupied by the Nazi forces during World War II. The Vichy government of France actively collaborated with the Nazi government to "save" a bit of French independance and "prevent" some casualties - and this formed the darkest part of France's history, La Collaboration. France was divided in two - and while the South was the "free" zone... the North, including the Ile-de-France, was the "occupied" zone where Nazis and collaborators were in control. And Paris saw some of the worst things... Like the infamous "Rafle du Vel' d'Hiv", when the French government, by order of the Nazi government, arrested and gathered in a velodrome more than 13 000 Jews before sending them to the death camps.

As such, to have buildings in the area marked by David stars (the symbol used during World War II to mark Jews on their clothes, shops and houses) as a "visual denunciation" in the context of an antisemitic wave tied to foreign governments' decisions... You can understand how traumatizing this can be - or rather how this wakes up the old trauma and the old shames of France.

But here is where things get INTERESTING.

The police of course searched thoroughly the ones responsible for all these tags - and they ended up finding them... It was a couple. A man, 29 years old, and a woman, 33 years old. They were actually caught while they were painting more of those, in the 10th arrondissement de Paris. But... they were not of French nationality. They were from Moldavia. And this was intriguing. Everybody believed this had been done by antisemitic French people... But no.

And what was the Moldavians' justification for what they did? Support for Palestine? Antisemitism? No. They were "paid" to do so. They just did a job. Curious isn't it? The police found, by digging in the couple's phones, who exactly had paid them and given them the instructions for this operation... And it turned out to be another Moldavian man, but not anybody.

Anatoli Prizenko. A Moldavian businessman known for his strong pro-Russia views and for his open support of Putin. Of course, Prizenko was asked about this whole affair - he was notably interviewed by French media. And what was his answer? When asked why he paid a couple to go paint more than 250 Stars of David in the Parisian region, what did he answer? The funniest and most pathetic excuse you can find. "This was a gesture of support. This was a gesture of support towards the Jews of Europe. It was meant to be positive". I put pictures of the painted tags in this post: I will let you judge if it seems like a support for the Jewish people of Europe, or if it rather looks like the kind of tags left on buildings during World War II.

Okay, so a pro-Russia Moldavian businessman did this in hope to exploit the current tense and hostile climax in France, in light of the disastrous events in Palestine. But beyond his support of Putin, nothing actually clearly ties this operation to Russia, right?

Let us go deeper down the rabbit hole... By November, French authorities revealed that yet another campaign of mass information led by Russian entities was plaguing the French Internet. I say "yet again", because it wasn't Russia's first attempt. Already the French authorities had to denounce and warn the population about an enormous amount of fake websites created by Russians. These fake webpages were almost perfect copies of the ACTUAL websites of the various newspapers and information channels of France, and all covered the war on Ukraine... With the difference that these fake websites twisted the words, faked the numbers or outright invented elements that made it seem like Europe's support of Ukraine was a bad thing, causing all sorts of troubles and dysfunctionments, or that made it look like Ukraine was wasting all the resources it was given. A pure misinformation-operation in hope of making people lose faith in the support of Ukraine, or even making people hate Ukraine for "stealing all our money and weapons".

And they did it again... With this case. Another important Internet operation by Russian - from fake web pages to fake web accounts, this new operation was about mass-sharing and mass-spreading the news of the Stars of David... And insisting upon all sorts of fake rumors that were later debunked, and highlighting the antisemitism in France. (As I said, they didn't really need to do that since there is already an antisemitism on the rise that was well-noted and is already worrying everyone, so Russia didn't invent that... But their point was to overblow this specific incident in order to create a true mass psychosis). France denounced this Internet operation - and Moscow only answered by saying France was "stupid" for suspecting them in such a way...

And does it stop here? NO MY DEAR! Because these last days there's been a new development! Now it is not fully confirmed/revealed, because the investigation is still underway. But after all these months of research, there are pretty solid and conclusive elements to determine who was behind this Internet campaign of misinformation and rumor-spreading... All the clues point towards the "fifth department" (foreign business department) of the FSB, the Federal Security Service of Russia.

So yes... We are back to the Cold War...

And you want to know the worse thing? European countries have started collaborating on this business, because as it turns out, there were a lot of pro-Russian and anti-Otan manifestations or "waves" in several European countries recently (Spain and Germany for example)... that when investigated tie back to the FSB in one way or another. The oldest identified FSB operation of the sort is - at least from what I heard - from the spring of 2023, in Poland. There was a series of misinformation, sabotages and spying actions with strong anti-OTAN slogans used - and at first it seemed that this was a manifestation of the will and desires of Polish people themselves, as it was presented as "the folks of Poland are speaking"... But a bit of investigation revealed the core of this movement were... again, Moldavians, not Polish people. And further digging proved that these Moldavians had ties to the FSB, who very likely ordered them to do all this...

#putin #russia #antisemitism #putin's russia #misinformation #france #moldavia #the cold war is back

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i-dont-know-nor-care-go-away · 7 days

Text

Justice for Joost

usually I don't like to be political but this is fucking stupid. I did block the person who wrote this post but I need to break down this stupid ass argument

"So I think Joost's actions were either xenophobia, antisemitism or a mix of both though leaning to a mix of both.

For those who are not aware, Eden Golan was being interviewed in the big second semi final panel and a report asked her if her participation was putting other contestants at risk. The question was gross as it is not her fault people would want to risk harming other contestants to harm her and people wanting to harm her is also not her fault as she is literally just an israeli women who exists and went to eurovision. Eden's manager said "you don't have to answer that" in response to the question and Joost (who had been covering himself with his flag during her turn being interviewed) uncovered himself and said "why not?". Eden did answer the question elloquently.

The issue I have with Joost's actions is that they were not about whether or not Israel should participate as that decision had already been made and Eden was already at Eurovision, but instead they were just him being xenophobic and/or antisemitic.

Eden Golan, just like every other contestant, is not her government.

If we were to act like every contestant was their government, then why did Bambi Thug not recieve backlash for Ireland's treatment of refugees? Why did the Azerbaijan contest not recieve the same level of backlash for their government trying to ethnically cleanse Armenians? Why did Slimane not recieve any talk about the Mali Wedding Airstrike (which killed children) that France did back in 2021?"

No, he was just against a fucking genocide. The contest this year is funded by morroco oil (https://eurovision.moroccanoil.com/) which is not from morroco, but from (you guessed it) the genociders !(https://en.hespress.com/84896-how-moroccos-argan-fueled-a-62-million-israeli-business-and-became-a-scientific-experiment.html#google_vignette) standing against genocide is not xenophobia. Its the right fucking thing to do.

Yeah israiel is not gonna be banned but taking is stand against their participation because of their FUCKING GENOCIDE is not unhelpful. Showing support is good. She is not just a person from Isreal competeing in Eurovision. She is actively and willingly representing a genocidal and colonial government, and willingly doing that on a huge stage is more than endorsing that. if she is so fucking innocent and not complicit, she would not be on that stage. People refuse to join the IDF and suffer the extreme consequences, she could've just not joined. That question was so fucking relevant. Why are we coddling the feelings of an adult woman represneting a colonial power that is currently commiting warcrimes. She is a terrible fucking person.

The other issues this post brought up are terrible. we should call these out. But also, You can't just bring up other genocides or bad things and be like "hm if you don't care about every other bad thing in the world then you don't really care about this one" A fucking mass genocide with war crimes is a seperate issue than Ireland's treatment of refugees. Ireland should be better, mistreating refugees is bad. Armenians should also get support,(https://www.armeniafund.org/) but you can't just change the subject to a different genocide in order to defend someone WHO IS ACTIVELY REPRESENTING A COUNTRY COMMITING GENOCIDE. The Palestinian Genocide is so bad right now and they need all the help they can get, but someone being kinda mean to someone complicit in a genocide is this issue here? we should hold every government accountable, but the fact that we started with the one that is actively commiting genocide is a good thing. The energy should be "its good to support palestine and lets keep holding governmetns accountable" and not "why are you getting mad at isreal if everyone else is just as bad? seems like you're playing least favorites"

(disclaimer: I do not condone any of the bad things that happened. They are bad. I don't agree with them being used to defend someone who is complicit in a genocide)

"Why is it okay for Joost and other contestants to treat Eden Golan like she is the Israeli Government whilst not holding other contestants to the same standard?

This goes even further once you bring in how after Russia invaded Ukraine, Joost collaborated with a Russian Artist CMH. Now, either CMH also represents the Russian government entirely and Joost supports Russia's invasion of Ukraine or, CMH does not represent the Russian government which makes his treatment towards Eden Golan even worse and reaffirms its antisemitic roots."

Little miss genocide is not the one being harrassed. The isreali officals are going around harrassing people and being dicks. She is in no way the vicitm here. (Allegedly) The isreali officals mocked Joost's DEAD PARENTS. As far as we know, Golan saw what her sad excuse for a country did and actively and willingly chose to represent that. Even if she was being harrassed, it would be because of her actions. But she really fucking isn't. she is not the one being kicked out of the contest. she can get the actual fuck over it. You cannot just ask "well what about the other contestents? their governments are also bad" Everyone is bad. No government has their hands clean. Bambi Thung representing Ireland (which needs to stop mistreating refugees) is not the same as someone representing Isreal (which is commiting genocide). Ireland is a country with a complex history and Bambi thug is not representing every single one of the many political opinions by representing her country. I think we can assume she would be against mistreating refugees. Isreal is a made up, totalitarian state in which every part of it's government is complicit in genocide. No one can seriously believe that little miss genocide supporter is not endorsing or ok with her country's actions. There is a huge difference if you actually think about it.

I looked up CMH. He doesn't seem to have ties to the russian government. CMH did not compete to represent his government. He makes music and is from russia. It is so different. the comparison doesn't even work. Maybe that supporting a Russian musican during the Ukraine thing was not like. a very good thing to do (sorry idk how to phrase it) but while it isn't great, it doesn't have the same effect as EUROVISION. Eurovision is international. I could barely find information on CMH. Yeah the morality of that collab is debateable, but why are you using it to defend the person representing a genocide??? CMH did not choose to go into a international competition to represent his country. He didn't go through mulitple competitions to represent russia. He is literally just russian. The collab was bad, fine, but representing GENOCIDE WILLINGLY is WORSE.

"Lastly, someone sent me an image of a Joost song (which is what I think spurred this current ask) where Joost has a hitler mustache. You can find that post and image here.

So lets put the evidence together, Joost treats Eden Golan as being the Israeli Government but doesn't hold anyone else to that standard,including a Russian artist right after Russia's invasion + he willingly took and the uploaded publically online, a picture of him with a Hitler mustache.

At the very best, he is just xenophobic, at worst he is antisemitic or a mix of both.

Am i sad that Joost is antisemitic? yes very. I really liked his song europapa and a few other songs of his. It always hits a bit harder when an artist you like turns out to be an antisemite. I was ready to get super into his music and then bam, i find out he is an antisemite."

I am gonna be honest, I am not really excited to address this. I'm not Jewish. I don't get to say what is offensive or not. I have seen the photo. It does look like hitler. It is antisemtic and yeah. I honestly even kinda took offense to it. But as the post below says, he took it down. It isn't playable. It's bad, and ignorant but it is also possibly just in poor taste. It could have been an attempt at a parody or just trying to get a rise out of people WHICH ARE BOTH BAD. He took it down. I can't find that image on any of his youtube. He doesn't have any other instances of something like this. He probably should apologise for it, but it seems like he grew. I THINK THAT IT WAS A BAD THING TO DO AND I DO NOT ENDORSE IT AT ALL. I THINK IT DESERVES AN APOLOGY.I AGREE IT IS ANTISEMTIC. It was taken down, and he hasn't done anything like it since. I think it is safe to saw that he grew (he should still like. apologize and address it though) I find it really weird that you're pulling out this isolated incident from what seems to be six years ago in order to defend someone representing an actual genocide. It's really weird. It is so dumb to imply Joost is speaking out against genocide only because he hates jewish people. I do not think that something from six years ago that he took down is indictive of his current views or his motivations for not supporting genocide.

"Yeah Joost fans is this your man?

Do you think his actions towards Eden Golan were purely anti israel still? Or are you finally willing to admit that he is not the innocent man yall think he is?

(btw i checked via reverse image search and the song which the picture is the album art for, feminist on da block, is taken down, but you can find the proof of it on spotify here, its just not playable)"

Yes he is still my man. His actions were probably purely anti Israel. He has not done anything wrong in his protest of a genocide. He was kicked out of a contest because of it. This weird "gotcha" thing where you point out all the problematic things he did pales in comparison to the people who were killed by isral. He has done bad things and he needs to address/apologize for them, but now he is trying to support those in need. People are facing genocide and because someone is being loudly against that, you want to point out all the reasons why he is bad? be so fucking for real right now. Children are dying. Babies are dying. Why the hell are you defending anyone that stands by that?

TDLR

yeah Joost is not an angel. He has done a couple problematic things in the past I DO NOT ENDORSE THEM, but Isreal is commiting genocide and the person representing that is far worse. We have more pressing issues

disclaimer

I support jewish people. I do not condone any antisemitism at all. People should not start attack jewish people for the actions of israle. The points I am attempting to make are (a) not everyone that supports palestine is anti semetic and (b) while antisemitism is bad, you cannot use that as an excuse for supporting a fucking genocide.

#tw: antisemitism #tw: antisemitsim mention #palestine #gaza #free palestine #free gaza #fuck israel #joost klein #eurovision 2024 #I'm begging yall please have media literacy #AGAIN #I DON"T CONDONE ANTISEMITISM #I SUPPORT JEWISH PEOPLE #ABJERJAN GERNOCIDE AND IRELAND MISTRESTING REFUGESS IS ALSO BAD #is it a good idea to post this? probably not #am I going to? yes

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countriesgame · 5 months

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Please reblog for a bigger sample size!

If you have any fun fact about Mali, please tell us and I'll reblog it!

Be respectful in your comments. You can criticize a government without offending its people.

#mali #africa #country polls #polls

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gsirvitor · 1 year

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Africans, Europeans, Middle Easterners, Native Americans, Asians and so on, and this is just me talking about the slavery that went on during the only period in history in which you people seem to care about slavery.

Yes, Europeans had slaves, but they didn't run into the Congo with nets, they bought them from local African kingdoms, Dahomey, Kanem Bornu, Kingdom of Allada, Aro Confederacy, Ashanti Empire, Songhai Empire and the Mali Empire to name a few.

These African nations grew fat and opulent on money gained from "slaving," however they are never critiqued, never condemned by your side, but those, like the British, who put a stop to the slave trade in the west, are condemned and anyone who speaks out against this blatant racist bias, is condemned as a nazi or white supremacist, as you and the one you reblogged from have done.

No, instead people who believe as you do make movies glorifying the worst slavers in Africa, such as when Hollywood decided to make "the Woman King," a movie glorifying the Dahomey slavers.

Let's read what the Late King of Dahomey said when the British ended the slave trade, king Ghezo said; "The slave trade is the ruling principle of my people. It is the source and the glory of their wealth…the mother lulls the child to sleep with notes of triumph over an enemy reduced to slavery." Coincidentally he was played by John Boyega in the film, despite having been long dead by the time the film is meant to take place.

Oh, then we have the Indian Ocean slave trade which took Africans from east Africa, mainly the Christian kingdom of Ethiopia, and traded them to areas of India and Asia, then we have the Arab slave trade which took slaves from east Africa, North Africa, Europe, India and Asia, btw this was all happening at the same time as the Trans Atlantic, however you won't find slave descendants in these areas, why?

They castrated male slaves prior to selling them.

An even better fact is this, the Arab and Asian slave trade of Africans and other races is still going on today, it hasn't stopped, and today more than 30 million people are slaves globally, but that's a conservative estimate, it could be far higher.

In fact, let's use this very liberal estimate map from the global slavery index;

And would you look at that, you're so preoccupied with condemning an entire race for something we willingly ended hundreds of years ago, while ignoring the ongoing slavery around the world, oh, but you can't actually do anything about that so you'd prefer to virtue signal online rather than campaign to end slavery globally, after all one is easy and gives you immediate gratification by your online circlejerk while the other you may never see the end result of.

Personally I choose the latter, why?

Blessed are those who plant trees knowing that they shall never sit in the shade of their foliage.

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reasoningdaily · 4 months

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Visit the original article to click through to the entire list - PASS IT ON

Lesson 1: Kemet

Ancient Egyptians called their land "Kemet"--or Black Land. The first person to practice medicine was from Kemet, along with the first dentist! 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 1 01:10

Lesson 2: Shotgun homes and front porches

The shotgun home and front porch design originated in West Africa in what is now Nigeria. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 2 01:07

Lesson 3: Walls of Benin

The Walls of Benin were four times longer than the Great Wall of China. So, what happened to them? 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 3 01:10

Lesson 4: University of Sankore

One of the first universities in the world was located in Mali. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 4 01:07

Lesson 5: 1526

The year 1619 is known as the year that Blacks were first enslaved in America. What about the year 1526? 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 5 01:10

Lesson 6: Freedom by any means

How braided hair, Gospel music, and drums played a role in the liberation of Blacks. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 6 01:06

Lesson 7: Benjamin Banneker

Meet the man who helped design Washington, D.C., and that's not all. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 7 01:07

Lesson 8: Queen Nanny of the Maroons

She was like Harriet Tubman, but she freed slaves someplace else. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 8 01:05

Lesson 9: Henry "Box" Brown

Learn more about how Henry Brown got his nickname. It's incredible. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 9 01:10

Lesson 10: Henrietta Bowers

Learn how this undertaker used her background to free Black slaves. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 10 01:06

Lesson 11: John Berry Meachum

Learn more about the "Floating Freedom School" and why Meachum had to put it on a boat. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 11 01:04

Lesson 12: Lewis Latimer

How Louis Latimer made one of Thomas Edison's famous inventions better. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 12 01:00

Lesson 13: Granville T. Woods

How modern wireless technology can be traced back to Granville Woods in the 1800s. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 13 01:06

Lesson 14: Oscar Micheaux

The man who paved the way for today's great Black filmmakers. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 14 01:02

Lesson 15: Marie Van Brittan Brown

Those Ring cameras are everywhere. It basically started with Marie Van Brittan Brown's invention in the 1960s. 29 Black History Facts You Probably Didn't Learn at School: Lesson 15 01:02

#Black History #Black HIstory Month 2024 #29 Black History Facts

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i-write-boop-spoops · 2 years

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Guzma as an expecting father! headcanons

ignore the fact I'm a day late for father's day, it's dilf! guzma time!

features: pregnancy and discussion of symptoms, a smidge of angst, and some mild references to sex

Enjoy!

Oh shit.

Well, this wasn’t part of the plan

It’s not necessarily unexpected though

Admittedly, you two had been rather lax when it came to protection

And as much as he talked up his pull-out game, Guzma found it very hard to put his money where his mouth is when he’s about to bust a fat nut

So here you are

His baby

His fucking cinnamon applin

Almost in tears as you tell him that you’re pregnant

From all the shock, he doesn’t know what to say

He doesn’t know what to feel either

His mind is a swirl of emotions

It takes him a moment (or several minutes) to fully comprehend the situation

Not great, since you’re freaking the fuck out waiting for his response

Eventually, he just gives you a big, reassuring hug and tells you that he’s here for you, and your baby too.

In reality, Guzma likes the idea of having a family with you

And you’re his boo, he’d do anything to support you, no matter what

He really really wants to be a good dad

A provider for your burgeoning family

The kind of man you deserve

So first things first – well after he takes you both out for malasadas to calm yourselves down and celebrate - he’s gotta get a job

He’ll take anything

Fast-food chef, janitorial duties, cashier, Pyukumuku thrower…

Hopefully some professional battling to get some legit earnings

Next thing, you two are moving OUT of the Shady House

And by extension Po Town

That place is not suitable for babies

You don’t stray too far though

Getting yourselves a cramped (but thankfully two-bed) apartment in Malie City

Lowkey

And by that, I mean HIGHKEY

Guzma thinks you’re hot af pregnant

Man is like 100 times more handsy

Which is wild considering how handsy he already was

But his touches are a lot gentlerand loving

Though still quite protective and possessive

My man may or may not have shed a tear when he felt that first kick

Guzma goes back and forth on whether or not to propose to you

On one hand, he loves you, and he wants to give your baby a more stable home

But on the other, he doesn’t want you to feel like he’s just doing this because you’re pregnant and it’s “the right thing to do”

Plus, weddings are so stressful

And expensive!

Eventually, he decides to wait until after your baby is here to propose

After all, they’d make such a cute little flower boy/girl on the big day!

God-mon Plumeria!

You two set up the cutest little nursery for youe baby

Ideally he wanted to fill it with brand-new stuff

But that wasn’t totally feasible, so many things are second-hand

Some from when you were born!

One of the new items though, is a cutiefly teddy

It was the first thing he bought for the baby

First thing he bought from his first pay-cheque actually

Walking home tired and stressed from his first week on the job

He’s usually pretty good at dealing with your symptoms

Gives you back-rubs, holds your hair back when you’re getting sick, over-indulges your weird-cravings…

Seriously he went out at four a.m. trying to find somewhere that sold pickled lumberries so you could have them with some yogurt and peanut butter

Though considering the fact he is new to all this + he has 0 patience things can get a bit hairy sometimes

Like he is not good at handling any mood-swings

Or when baby kicks him in his sleep

One thing he does enjoy about you being pregnant is that you’ve taken to wearing his clothes a lot more

They’re big on you, so they’re perfect for your changing body

We all know how he feels about you in his clothes 👀

He keeps ultrasound pictures on him at all times

Just as a reminder of his little larva

Makes the tough days easier

He loves being the big spoon even more now

Finding great comfort and excitement in holding you and cradling your bump while he falls asleep

When baby finally comes

Yall know ya boi is gonna be right by your side

Doing his best to support you through this traumatic, demanding time

(though I can also totally see him just chilling, casually eating a sandwich while you’re pushing out a LITERAL human baby from your bits)

Once baby pops out, and you get to hold your little one

Guzma wraps his arms around both of you, gazing at the wonderful life you’ve created together

And after a moment he asks:

“So, Guzma Jr.?”

“Absolutely not!”

#guzma #guzma x reader #guzma pokemon #guzma headcanons #guzma pokemon x reader #guzma pokemon headcanons #ya boi guzma #pregnancy

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