‘Moral bankruptcy’: whistleblower offers scathing assessment of Facebook

Accumulate, accumulate! That is Moses and the prophets! – Karl Marx, Capital, volume 1, Chapter 24, Sec 3.    It might, as one senator put it, be remembered as “the big tobacco jaw-dropping moment of truth”. The truth-teller was former Facebook data scientist Frances Haugen, appearing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday to testify that the online platform… Read More ‘Moral bankruptcy’: whistleblower offers scathing assessment of Facebook

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Priyanka Gandhi asks PM Modi to see video clip showing SUV mowing down farmers / Indian farmers to step up protests after 8 killed in clashes

Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra on Tuesday cited a new video clip showing an SUV mowing down farmers and asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi to see it. “Have you seen this video Modi ji? This video shows the son of a member of your council of ministers running over farmers with his vehicles. Please see… Read More Priyanka Gandhi asks PM Modi to see video clip showing SUV mowing down farmers / Indian farmers to step up protests after 8 killed in clashes

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Anjan Basu: Remembering Eric Hobsbawm Who Made History Reading Delightful With His Wit

Consider the ‘Overture’ to Hobsbawm’s The Age of Empire, 1875-1914… where we are told how a young Viennese woman and a young male English immigrant of Polish-Russian origin happened to find themselves during 1913-14 in the Egyptian city of Alexandria. There they met by chance, fell in love, and were eventually married. The marriage, though, took place… Read More Anjan Basu: Remembering Eric Hobsbawm Who Made History Reading Delightful With His Wit

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Justin Sider: In Defense of Disinterested Knowledge

When we judge scholarship only as politics, something crucial is lost    A new consensus unites college administrators with many of their faculty members, especially in the humanities: Scholarship today must be socially engaged. This demand, and the morally charged language that comes with it, might seem to meet the urgency of our political moment.… Read More Justin Sider: In Defense of Disinterested Knowledge

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Heather Barr: For Afghan Women, the Frightening Return of ‘Vice and Virtue’

There is no better symbol for the disappearance of women’s rights in Afghanistan than the end of the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and the return of the Ministry for Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice. When the Taliban on September 7 announced their new interim government, the vice and virtue ministry featured on the list, with… Read More Heather Barr: For Afghan Women, the Frightening Return of ‘Vice and Virtue’

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Sanjiv Krishan Sood: It Is the Need of the Hour To Understand Police Brutality in India and Take Action

The police all over the country is increasingly brutal in their approach towards common people. Flouting law rather than protecting the rule of law is becoming the norm. When the chief minister of a state says “thok diya jayega” (will be shot), it is an open call to the police to ignore rule of law in dealing… Read More Sanjiv Krishan Sood: It Is the Need of the Hour To Understand Police Brutality in India and Take Action

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Anita Hill on sexual harassment and survival: ‘You have to think: what is my life for?’

In the pantheon of women shamed for exposing the actions of high-profile men – before Christine Blasey Ford in 2018 and Monica Lewinsky in 1998 – there was Anita Hill. In 1991, the US president, George HW Bush, nominated Clarence Thomas to the supreme court. Senate hearings for his confirmation were completed without incident, until an interview… Read More Anita Hill on sexual harassment and survival: ‘You have to think: what is my life for?’

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‘Blah, blah, blah’: Greta Thunberg lambasts leaders over climate crisis

Greta Thunberg has excoriated global leaders over their promises to address the climate emergency, dismissing them as “blah, blah, blah”. She quoted statements by Boris Johnson: “This is not some expensive, politically correct, green act of bunny hugging”, and Narendra Modi: “Fighting climate change calls for innovation, cooperation and willpower” but said the science did not… Read More ‘Blah, blah, blah’: Greta Thunberg lambasts leaders over climate crisis

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