kj35

How do you identify them as a novice?

Deleted. Too close to home .

Absolute fucking joke 'Covid pandemic blamed for increase in heart deaths' https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/621b598e-8887-11ed-bb21-8f4d97ec7b02?shareToken=3356f4079e10589d10f76d63ead5e851

Absolutely disgraceful ruling today https://nltimes.nl/2022/12/19/dutch-court-upholds-2-year-entry-ban-conspiracy-theorist-david-icke

Also been catching up on David's court case

Personally these are my reasons for being quiet lately 1) family death and a lot of death admin 2) Christmas shopping 3) visiting people I love as I realise life is short following 1.

DNA hadn't been discovered in Steiner's time. If people you know are contemplating suicide please encourage them to see a GP or ring one of the charity helplines such as the samaritans.

You absolute star !!

You've cheered me up x I'm properly sad at removing my subscription. I like The Times, I do read a lot of papers guardian etc however I do especially chill out to a review of a sausage restaurant by Giles Coren or enjoy a Janice Turner pro woman rant. Sad I know, there you have it, The Times was my guilty pleasure. But enough is enough.

Subscription of 20 years cancelled.

Removal of anonymity begins. Got this from The Times this morning

Yep. Mostly viewing coronavirus mega thread, flat earth, q and potus and Richard d hall.

Bill Gates is not a Doctor. Professor Devi Sridhar is a Rhodes scholar l, a world economic forum member and a Davos contributor that tells us all we need to know about her affiliations and purpose.

You can buy the physical books from David's own online shop.

For people who need advice on dying and the death process I've just read :- " with the end in mind" by palliative care doctor Kathryn Mannix. It takes you through real stories gathered over the years and is very strong about not condoning euthanasia. It's helped me as I witnessed a death recently for the first time and the process that the dying go through which follows a very familiar pattern in almost every case and was reassuring and helpful to me to process what I witnessed. Here's an excerpt 'The second part of life is about transcendence to wisdom, and for many people this only develops over a long lifetime. For others, though, there can be an early transition, and this is very often through a personal experience of deep loss and enormous pain – exactly like the experience of knowing they have an incurable illness that our patients encounter; the knowledge that death is approaching, and that it will mean the end of everything they hold familiar and dear. Each of the wisdom traditions describes this transformation process in its own way, yet the key ‘Golden Rule’ of all of them is the development of a sense of compassion for others. The focus moves from ‘me’ to ‘everyone and everything’. This includes a kindness to oneself, and the ability to recognise and forgive one’s own faults in the same loving way that those transformed, second-part-of-life people forgive the faults of others. The stories of the people facing death that I have shared in this book are mainly about people who have reached that new phase in their lives. They have become compassionate and wise, they overlook or even embrace the foibles of others, and they relish their sense of ‘being’ in every moment. This transformation of world view is a spiritual transformation, whether theistic or not. It enables the person to review their life and to recognise and regret any hurt they may have caused other people, and often to desire to make amends. It is this recognition that underlies the first of the recurring last messages of dying people: ‘I am sorry. Please forgive me.’ It also supports their desire to avoid causing any further hurt, and this translates into a deeper patience with others’ shortcomings.'

What was pleasing about this story was the congregation was up in arms showing that the masses can be pushed too far.

It says season one but looks like just one episode? Season 2 is on prime. I'll take a look and report back. I've even got a photo of me on Hitler's main headquarters stairs, the same stairs they did tons of photos from. The building they're in in Munich is owned by a private company now. I didn't know until after the photo was taken.

Thanks for this I've just downloaded it. Will watch later. I've been in Hitler's tunnels in Munich so it'll be interesting to see what they say about them.

Copy of the open letter Open Letter to Bill Gates from AGRA Watch & 50 Co-Signers Posted on November 11, 2022 An Open Letter to Bill Gates on Food, Farming, and Africa AGRA Watch drafted this letter in response to two recent articles we found very troubling. We are joined by 50 organizations focused on food sovereignty and justice worldwide, who want Bill Gates to know there is no shortage of practical solutions and innovations by African farmers and organizations. We invite him to step back and learn from those on the ground. Published November 10, 2022 on Common Dreams: https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/11/10/open-letter-bill-gates-food-farming-and-africa Share the Instagram story Dear Bill Gates: You were recently featured commenting on the global state of agriculture and food insecurity, in a recent New York Times op-ed by David Wallace-Wells and also in an Associated Press article. In both articles, you make a number of claims that are inaccurate and need to be challenged. Both pieces admit that the world currently produces enough food to adequately feed all the earth’s inhabitants, yet you continue to fundamentally misdiagnose the problem as relating to low productivity; we do not need to increase production as much as to assure more equitable access to food. In addition, there are four specific distortions in these pieces which should be addressed, namely: 1) the supposed need for “credit for fertilizer, cheap fertilizer” to ensure agricultural productivity, 2) the idea that the Green Revolution of the mid-20th century needs to be replicated now to address hunger, 3) the idea that “better” seeds, often produced by large corporations, are required to cope with climate change, and 4) your suggestion that if people have solutions that “aren’t singing Kumbaya,” you’ll put money behind them. First, synthetic fertilizers contribute 2% of overall greenhouse gas emissions and are the primary source of nitrous oxide emissions. Producing nitrogen fertilizers requires 3-5% of the world’s fossil gas. They also make farmers and importing nations dependent on volatile prices on international markets, and are a major cause of rising food prices globally. Yet you claim that even more fertilizer is needed to increase agricultural productivity and address hunger. Toxic and damaging synthetic fertilizers are not a feasible way forward. Already, companies, organizations, and farmers in Africa and elsewhere have been developing biofertilizers made from compost, manure, and ash, and biopesticides made from botanical compounds, such as neem tree oil or garlic. These products can be manufactured locally (thereby avoiding dependency and price volatility), and can be increasingly scaled up and commercialized. Second, the Green Revolution was far from a resounding success. While it did play some role in increasing the yields of cereal crops in Mexico, India, and elsewhere from the 1940s to the 1960s, it did very little to reduce the number of hungry people in the world or to ensure equitable and sufficient access to food. It also came with a host of other problems, from ecological issues like long-term soil degradation to socio-economic ones like increased inequality and indebtedness (which has been a major contributor to the epidemic of farmer suicides in India). Your unquestioning support for a “new” Green Revolution demonstrates willful ignorance about history and about the root causes of hunger (which are by and large about political and economic arrangements, and what the economist Amartya Sen famously referred to as entitlements, not about a global lack of food). Third, climate-resilient seeds are already in existence and being developed by farmers and traded through informal seed markets. Sorghum, which you tout in your interview as a so-called “orphan crop”, is among these already established climate-adapted crops. You note that most investments have been in maize and rice, rather than in locally-adapted and nutritious cereals like sorghum. Yet AGRA (the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa), which your foundation (the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) created and financed, has been among those institutions that have disproportionately focused on maize and rice. In other words, you are part of creating the very problem you name. The AGRA initiative, which your foundation continues to fund, has also pushed restrictive seed legislation that limits and restricts crop innovation to well-resourced labs and companies. These initiatives don’t increase widespread innovation, but rather contribute to the privatization and consolidation of corporate monopolies over seed development and seed markets. Finally, your assertion that critics of your approach are simply “singing Kumbaya,” rather than developing meaningful (and fundable) solutions, is extremely disrespectful and dismissive. There are already many tangible, ongoing proposals and projects that work to boost productivity and food security–from biofertilizer and biopesticide manufacturing facilities, to agroecological farmer training programs, to experimentation with new water and soil management techniques, low-input farming systems, and pest-deterring plant species. What you are doing here is gaslighting–presenting practical, ongoing, farmer-led solutions as somehow fanciful or ridiculous, while presenting your own preferred approaches as pragmatic. Yet it is your preferred high-tech solutions, including genetic engineering, new breeding technologies, and now digital agriculture, that have in fact consistently failed to reduce hunger or increase food access as promised. And in some cases, the “solutions” you expound as fixes for climate change actually contribute to the the biophysical processes driving the problem (e.g. more fossil-fuel based fertilizers, and more fossil-fuel dependent infrastructure to transport them) or exacerbate the political conditions that lead to inequality in food access (e.g. policies and seed breeding initiatives that benefit large corporations and labs, rather than farmers themselves). In both articles, you radically simplify complex issues in ways that justify your own approach and interventions. You note in the New York Times op-ed that Africa, with the lowest costs of labor and land, should be a net exporter of agricultural products. You explain that the reason it is not is because “their productivity is much lower than in rich countries and you just don’t have the infrastructure.” However, costs of land and labor, as well as infrastructures, are socially and politically produced. Africa is in fact highly productive–it’s just that the profits are realized elsewhere. Through colonization, neoliberalism, debt traps, and other forms of legalized pillaging, African lives, environments, and bodies have been devalued and made into commodities for the benefit and profit of others. Infrastructures have been designed to channel these commodities outside of the continent itself. Africa is not self-sufficient in cereals because its agricultural, mining, and other resource-intensive sectors have been structured in ways that are geared toward serving colonial and then international markets, rather than African peoples themselves. Although you are certainly not responsible for all of this, you and your foundation are exacerbating some of these problems through a very privatized, profit-based, and corporate approach to agriculture. There is no shortage of practical solutions and innovations by African farmers and organizations. We invite you to step back and learn from those on the ground. At the same time, we invite high profile news outlets to be more cautious about lending credibility to one wealthy white man’s flawed assumptions, hubris, and ignorance, at the expense of people and communities who are living and adapting to these realities as we speak. From: Community Alliance for Global Justice/AGRA Watch Signatories:- Skip to content 1322 S Bayview Street, Suite 300 Seattle, WA 98144 (206) 405-4600 Menu Open Letter to Bill Gates from AGRA Watch & 50 Co-Signers Posted on November 11, 2022 An Open Letter to Bill Gates on Food, Farming, and Africa AGRA Watch drafted this letter in response to two recent articles we found very troubling. We are joined by 50 organizations focused on food sovereignty and justice worldwide, who want Bill Gates to know there is no shortage of practical solutions and innovations by African farmers and organizations. We invite him to step back and learn from those on the ground. Published November 10, 2022 on Common Dreams: https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/11/10/open-letter-bill-gates-food-farming-and-africa Share the Instagram story Dear Bill Gates: You were recently featured commenting on the global state of agriculture and food insecurity, in a recent New York Times op-ed by David Wallace-Wells and also in an Associated Press article. In both articles, you make a number of claims that are inaccurate and need to be challenged. Both pieces admit that the world currently produces enough food to adequately feed all the earth’s inhabitants, yet you continue to fundamentally misdiagnose the problem as relating to low productivity; we do not need to increase production as much as to assure more equitable access to food. In addition, there are four specific distortions in these pieces which should be addressed, namely: 1) the supposed need for “credit for fertilizer, cheap fertilizer” to ensure agricultural productivity, 2) the idea that the Green Revolution of the mid-20th century needs to be replicated now to address hunger, 3) the idea that “better” seeds, often produced by large corporations, are required to cope with climate change, and 4) your suggestion that if people have solutions that “aren’t singing Kumbaya,” you’ll put money behind them. First, synthetic fertilizers contribute 2% of overall greenhouse gas emissions and are the primary source of nitrous oxide emissions. Producing nitrogen fertilizers requires 3-5% of the world’s fossil gas. They also make farmers and importing nations dependent on volatile prices on international markets, and are a major cause of rising food prices globally. Yet you claim that even more fertilizer is needed to increase agricultural productivity and address hunger. Toxic and damaging synthetic fertilizers are not a feasible way forward. Already, companies, organizations, and farmers in Africa and elsewhere have been developing biofertilizers made from compost, manure, and ash, and biopesticides made from botanical compounds, such as neem tree oil or garlic. These products can be manufactured locally (thereby avoiding dependency and price volatility), and can be increasingly scaled up and commercialized. Second, the Green Revolution was far from a resounding success. While it did play some role in increasing the yields of cereal crops in Mexico, India, and elsewhere from the 1940s to the 1960s, it did very little to reduce the number of hungry people in the world or to ensure equitable and sufficient access to food. It also came with a host of other problems, from ecological issues like long-term soil degradation to socio-economic ones like increased inequality and indebtedness (which has been a major contributor to the epidemic of farmer suicides in India). Your unquestioning support for a “new” Green Revolution demonstrates willful ignorance about history and about the root causes of hunger (which are by and large about political and economic arrangements, and what the economist Amartya Sen famously referred to as entitlements, not about a global lack of food). Third, climate-resilient seeds are already in existence and being developed by farmers and traded through informal seed markets. Sorghum, which you tout in your interview as a so-called “orphan crop”, is among these already established climate-adapted crops. You note that most investments have been in maize and rice, rather than in locally-adapted and nutritious cereals like sorghum. Yet AGRA (the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa), which your foundation (the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation) created and financed, has been among those institutions that have disproportionately focused on maize and rice. In other words, you are part of creating the very problem you name. The AGRA initiative, which your foundation continues to fund, has also pushed restrictive seed legislation that limits and restricts crop innovation to well-resourced labs and companies. These initiatives don’t increase widespread innovation, but rather contribute to the privatization and consolidation of corporate monopolies over seed development and seed markets. Finally, your assertion that critics of your approach are simply “singing Kumbaya,” rather than developing meaningful (and fundable) solutions, is extremely disrespectful and dismissive. There are already many tangible, ongoing proposals and projects that work to boost productivity and food security–from biofertilizer and biopesticide manufacturing facilities, to agroecological farmer training programs, to experimentation with new water and soil management techniques, low-input farming systems, and pest-deterring plant species. What you are doing here is gaslighting–presenting practical, ongoing, farmer-led solutions as somehow fanciful or ridiculous, while presenting your own preferred approaches as pragmatic. Yet it is your preferred high-tech solutions, including genetic engineering, new breeding technologies, and now digital agriculture, that have in fact consistently failed to reduce hunger or increase food access as promised. And in some cases, the “solutions” you expound as fixes for climate change actually contribute to the the biophysical processes driving the problem (e.g. more fossil-fuel based fertilizers, and more fossil-fuel dependent infrastructure to transport them) or exacerbate the political conditions that lead to inequality in food access (e.g. policies and seed breeding initiatives that benefit large corporations and labs, rather than farmers themselves). In both articles, you radically simplify complex issues in ways that justify your own approach and interventions. You note in the New York Times op-ed that Africa, with the lowest costs of labor and land, should be a net exporter of agricultural products. You explain that the reason it is not is because “their productivity is much lower than in rich countries and you just don’t have the infrastructure.” However, costs of land and labor, as well as infrastructures, are socially and politically produced. Africa is in fact highly productive–it’s just that the profits are realized elsewhere. Through colonization, neoliberalism, debt traps, and other forms of legalized pillaging, African lives, environments, and bodies have been devalued and made into commodities for the benefit and profit of others. Infrastructures have been designed to channel these commodities outside of the continent itself. Africa is not self-sufficient in cereals because its agricultural, mining, and other resource-intensive sectors have been structured in ways that are geared toward serving colonial and then international markets, rather than African peoples themselves. Although you are certainly not responsible for all of this, you and your foundation are exacerbating some of these problems through a very privatized, profit-based, and corporate approach to agriculture. There is no shortage of practical solutions and innovations by African farmers and organizations. We invite you to step back and learn from those on the ground. At the same time, we invite high profile news outlets to be more cautious about lending credibility to one wealthy white man’s flawed assumptions, hubris, and ignorance, at the expense of people and communities who are living and adapting to these realities as we speak. From: Community Alliance for Global Justice/AGRA Watch Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) Biodiversity and Biosafety Association of Kenya (BIBA) Southern African Faith Communities’ Environment Institute (SAFCEI) GRAIN African Centre for Biodiversity Kenya Food Rights Alliance Growth Partners Grassroots International Agroecology Fund US Food Sovereignty Alliance National Family Farm Coalition Family Farm Defenders Oakland Institute A Growing Culture ETC Group Food in Neighborhoods Community Coalition Detroit Black Community Food Security Network Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville Haki Nawiri Afrika Real Food Media Agroecology Research-Action Collective Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) Les Amis de la Terre Togo/ Friends of the Earth Togo Justiça Ambiental/ JA FoE Mozambique Friends of the Earth Africa Health of Mother Health Foundation (HOMEF) Committee on Vital Environmental Resources (COVER) The Young Environmental Network (TYEN) GMO Free Nigeria Community Development Advocacy Foundation African Centre for Rural and Environmental Development Connected Advocacy Policy Alert Zero Waste Ambassadors Student Environmental Assembly Nigeria (SEAN) Host Community Network, Nigeria (HoCON) Green Alliance Nigeria (GAN) Hope for Tomorrow Initiative (HfTI) Media Awareness and Justice Initiative (MAJI) We The People Rainbow Watch and Development Centre BFA Food and Health Foundation Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA) Women and Children Life Advancement Initiative Network of Women in Agriculture Nigeria (NWIN) Gender and Environmental Risks Reduction Initiative (GERI) Gender and Community Empowerment Initiative Eco defenders Network Urban Rural Environmental Defenders (URED) Peace Point Development Foundation (PPDF) Community Support Centre, Nigeria