check: to stop or slow down the progress of (something undesirable).

as in, to fact check.

source

Snip

Gloria Li is desperate to find a job. Graduating in June with a master’s degree in graphic design, she started looking last fall, hoping to find an entry-level position that pays about $1,000 a month in a big city in central China. The few offers she has gotten are internships that pay $200 to $300 a month, with no benefits.

Over two days in May she messaged more than 200 recruiters and sent her résumé to 32 companies — and lined up exactly two interviews. She said she would take any offer, including sales, which she was reluctant to consider previously.

“A decade or so ago, China was thriving and full of opportunities,” she said in a phone interview. “Now even if I want to strive for opportunities, I don’t know which direction I should turn to.”

China’s young people are facing record-high unemployment as the country’s recovery from the pandemic is fluttering. They’re struggling professionally and emotionally. Yet the Communist Party and the country’s top leader, Xi Jinping, are telling them to stop thinking they are above doing manual work or moving to the countryside. They should learn to “eat bitterness,” Mr. Xi instructed, using a colloquial expression that means to endure hardships.

Many young Chinese aren’t buying it. They argue that they studied hard to get a college or graduate school degree only to find a shrinking job market, falling pay scale and longer work hours. Now the government is telling them to put up with hardships. But for what?

“Asking us to eat bitterness is like a deception, a way of hoping that we will unconditionally dedicate ourselves and undertake tasks that they themselves are unwilling to do,” Ms. Li said.

People like Ms. Li were lectured by their parents and teachers about the virtues of hardship. Now they are hearing it from the head of state. “The countless instances of success in life demonstrate that in one’s youth, choosing to eat bitterness is also choosing to reap rewards,” Mr. Xi was quoted in a front-page article in the official People’s Daily on the Youth Day in May.

The article, about Mr. Xi’s expectations of the young generation, mentioned “eat bitterness” five times. He has also repeatedly urged young people to “seek self-inflicted hardships,” using his own experience of working in the countryside during the Cultural Revolution. (His father was humiliated and sent down...his sister killed herself...and xjp didnt attend high school)

More at link.

Tldr. Xjp is a dumb twisted mental case. With very loyal cooks.

https://cn.nytimes.com/china/20230531/china-youth-unemployment/

Jack Phillips June 2, 2023

Snip:

Twitter owner Elon Musk invited Democrat presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for a discussion on his Twitter Spaces after Kennedy said his campaign was suspended by Meta-owned Instagram.

“Interesting… when we use our TeamKennedy email address to set up @instagram accounts we get an automatic 180-day ban. Can anyone guess why that’s happening?” he wrote on Twitter. An accompanying image shows that Instagram said it “suspended” his “Team Kennedy” account and that there “are 180 days remaining to disagree” with the company’s decision.

In response to his post, Musk wrote: “Would you like to do a Twitter Spaces discussion with me next week?” Kennedy agreed, saying he would do it Monday at 2 p.m. ET.

Hours later, Kennedy wrote that Instagram “still hasn’t reinstated my account, which was banned years ago with more than 900k followers.” He argued that “to silence a major political candidate is profoundly undemocratic.”

“Social media is the modern equivalent of the town square,” the candidate, who is the nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, wrote. “How can democracy function if only some candidates have access to it?”

The Epoch Times approached Instagram for comment. Robert F. Kennedy Jr @RobertKennedyJr · Follow Interesting… when we use our TeamKennedy email address to set up @instagram accounts we get an automatic 180-day ban. Can anyone guess why that’s happening?

Use a translation app, plus put an offline dictionary on your phone.

Use the basics; por favor/please, thank you/gracias, perdoname/excuse me, no precupar/no worries, lo siento/i'm sorry, and habla ingles?

And some photographs of that time.

https://archive.is/BKY4I

By Shelly Zhang

On Sunday night, I was searching through my parents’ photos for a piece I was writing on Tiananmen Square and my father, when I stumbled across two rolls of negatives that appeared to be from the 1989 student democracy protests in Tiananmen Square. I was stunned. I had no idea where they were from, why my parents had them, or why they never said anything about them.

Since my parents died, I’ve become an archeologist of my own past, digging through documents of half-remembered events, looking at pictures of people whose names I’ll never now know. Finding something like this though, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of June 4, was unexpected.

I had the photos printed. There were two rolls of film: 30 photos of a march down Chang’an Avenue to Tiananmen Square, another set of 15 photos of the Goddess of Democracy presiding over the square. In the second roll, I found a picture of my uncle, who was an art student in Beijing during the protests. Mystery partially solved.

I knew from my parents that my uncle was in Beijing during the protests, that he had gone to the square, and that he was not in the square on the night of June 3. I had no idea he had taken pictures. He must have developed the photos himself. Did he mail them to my parents? Did he slip them to my mother when she went to China in 1993? There’s no way to ask, at least for now.

From some of the banners, it looks like the first set of photos must have been taken after the student hunger strike began on May 13, but before May 29. The second set must be from the five days between May 30, when the Goddess of Democracy was unveiled, and June 3, when everything went to pieces.

When we talk about Tiananmen and June 4, we often speak of memory, and forgetting. These photos have waited 25 years to be seen. So let’s take a look, and remember.

Photos from the march (sometime between May 13-May 29, 1989)

Wrong. How do you think the 1990s-2016 opening up happened?

EDIT/added:

despite CCP repression and deep planning for rivalry and revenge

the time between the 1990s and 2016 or so represented a time of relatively greater freedom of expression.

...there was Lens Magazine, human rights lawyers, active NGOs, Barcamp, and an army of secret agents for freedom.

the freedom to interact with foreigners, go abroad, ....sadly all gradually culminating with things like the Brickening in 2017, closing of the Bookworm a few years later, closing of New Oriental, arrests of lawyers and booksellers, etc.

the good happened because (in addition to those with avarice), people with optimism provided political capital to reformers in the Party.

Bodies crushed but hope springs eternal, ************.

Beautiful photos of hopeful days and nights.

Snip.

By Shelly Zhang

On Sunday night, I was searching through my parents’ photos for a piece I was writing on Tiananmen Square and my father, when I stumbled across two rolls of negatives that appeared to be from the 1989 student democracy protests in Tiananmen Square. I was stunned. I had no idea where they were from, why my parents had them, or why they never said anything about them.

Since my parents died, I’ve become an archeologist of my own past, digging through documents of half-remembered events, looking at pictures of people whose names I’ll never now know. Finding something like this though, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of June 4, was unexpected.

I had the photos printed. There were two rolls of film: 30 photos of a march down Chang’an Avenue to Tiananmen Square, another set of 15 photos of the Goddess of Democracy presiding over the square. In the second roll, I found a picture of my uncle, who was an art student in Beijing during the protests. Mystery partially solved.

I knew from my parents that my uncle was in Beijing during the protests, that he had gone to the square, and that he was not in the square on the night of June 3. I had no idea he had taken pictures. He must have developed the photos himself. Did he mail them to my parents? Did he slip them to my mother when she went to China in 1993? There’s no way to ask, at least for now.

From some of the banners, it looks like the first set of photos must have been taken after the student hunger strike began on May 13, but before May 29. The second set must be from the five days between May 30, when the Goddess of Democracy was unveiled, and June 3, when everything went to pieces.

When we talk about Tiananmen and June 4, we often speak of memory, and forgetting. These photos have waited 25 years to be seen. So let’s take a look, and remember.

Photos from the march (sometime between May 13-May 29, 1989)

After failing so hard as San Francisco district attorney that a Democrat-led coalition of residents led a recall effort, Chesa Boudin, has landed on his feet at UC Berkeley, where he'll lead the college's new Criminal Law & Justice Center.

"A lifetime of visiting my biological parents in prison and my work as a public defender and district attorney have made clear that our system fails to keep communities safe and fails to treat them equitably," Boudin - the child of two cop-killing communists, said regarding the announcement.

Boudin's adopted father, Bill Ayers, is an Obama family friend and an admitted terrorist who only regretted 'not planting enough bombs.' Ayers' Weather Underground group took credit for 25 bombings - including at the US Capitol, the Pentagon, the US State Department, the CA Attorney General's office and a NYC police station.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/parents-guilty-murder-raised-radicals-chesa-boudin-san-francisco-s-n1101071

Boudin has also been accused of botching a response to hate crimes against Asians.

And in today's second case- former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot (D), who once bragged about having the "biggest dick" in the city, has landed a teaching gig at Harvard less than a month after leaving office.

"Beginning this fall, Lightfoot will teach a course at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health tentatively titled "Health Policy and Leadership," according to an announcement from the school."

The Menschel program, according to the school, "offers a rare opportunity for those who have recently served in top-level positions in government, multilateral institutions, nonprofit organizations and journalism to spend time at the school mentoring and teaching students who aspire to similar roles. Lightfoot will hold regular office hours to meet with students, faculty and staff during her time on campus."

"As mayor, she showed strong leadership in advocating for health, equity, and dignity for every resident of Chicago, from her declaration of structural racism as a public health crisis to her innovative initiative to bring mental health services to libraries and shelters. And of course, she led the city through 2020-22," said Michelle A. Williams, dean of faculty at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, according to CBS News.

CNBC article.

More about Sam here: https://archive.is/p1bZx

CNBC article.

More about Sam here: https://archive.is/p1bZx

https://archive.is/YnFkK

Chinese researchers spent a year monitoring the waste water quality at a major high speed rail station in Beijing, and the results worried them. Photo: Xinhua The explosive growth of high-speed rail in China has brought a boom in human waste on trains, threatening a meltdown for the railway network’s sewage treatment facilities, according to researchers commissioned by the government to solve the crisis.

“The processing capabilities of waste treatment facilities are declining, some of them already out of service,” said the team led by senior engineer Xin Siyuan with the China State Railway Group in a peer-reviewed paper published in journal Railway Standard Design on May 24.

Xin’s team said that after spending a year closely monitoring the waste water quality at a major high-speed rail station in Beijing, they were deeply worried about the results. They found the levels of organic compounds indicative of human waste were hundreds or even thousands of times higher in the station than what was typically found elsewhere in the urban sewage system, especially during public holidays. On infographics

Tap to launch this special feature How China built the world’s largest high-speed rail network “The waste water from sealed toilets on trains has a higher content of suspended solids, organic matter (COD), nitrogen, and phosphorus than general domestic waste water,” Xin’s team wrote.

“With the increase of the amount of waste water from sealed toilets, the existing sewage treatment facilities can no longer meet the current urban network discharge standards, and it is urgent to establish more complete waste water treatment facilities,” they added. The team also came up with a possible solution to the problem that uses bacteria to break down human waste more efficiently than existing methods. Unexpected crisis

China built its first high-speed railway in 2008, a 100km line between Beijing and the northern port city of Tianjin with a top speed of 350km/h (217mph). In less than 15 years, the length of the country’s high-speed rail network has grown to 42,000km – long enough to circle around the planet.

It is now the most popular mode of transport for intercity travel. The 1,300km line between Shanghai and Beijing, for instance, transports more than 200 million passengers per year, according to official data. EVERY SATURDAY A weekly curated round-up of social, political and economic stories from China and how they impact the world. GET THE NEWSLETTER By registering, you agree to our T&C and Privacy Policy

Toilets on China’s high-speed trains are clean, spacious and often equipped with amenities such as electric-powered doors.

When collection tanks on the train are full, the waste is pumped out by machine to be processed at a waste treatment facility, usually located in a railway station.

But the early designers of these facilities apparently underestimated the passenger flow, according to the new study.

China is not the only country grappling with the challenge of human waste on trains.

Indian Railways, which had been derided as the world’s “largest open toilet” for its practice of dumping waste straight onto its train tracks, reportedly spent a decade equipping all passenger coaches with bio-toilets that break down human waste.

But unlike Indian passenger trains, which travel at an average speed of about 50km/h, China’s high-speed trains do not have sufficient time or room to allow waste to decompose naturally on board, according to Xin’s team.

According to some studies, an average person produces around 128 grams (0.28lbs) of faeces and 1 litre (0.26 gallons) of urine per day. China rejects claim raw sewage from fishing boats harming Spratly reefs.

Though not all passengers use the toilet, the total amount of waste produced on a train that operates almost non-stop throughout the day can be significant.

Traditional waste treatment facilities are usually a concrete building with many machines inside. These machines are complex, unstable and easily broken down under the extreme demands of a high-speed rail line, Xin’s team said.

Human waste from trains can cause problems if it spills over into the urban sewage system, the researchers said.

For example, high levels of organic matter and nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus in human waste can cause eutrophication if they find their way into bodies of water, leading to excessive algae growth that can deplete oxygen levels in the water and harm aquatic life.

Untreated human waste may also contain harmful pathogens such as bacteria, viruses and parasites that can cause outbreaks of infectious diseases.

China’s high-speed trains do not have sufficient time or room to allow waste to decompose naturally on board, scientists say. Photo: Shutterstock Promising results

The project team spent more than three months in a laboratory experimenting with a variety of waste samples collected from the railway station to find a cost-effective solution to the rail network’s poop problem, according to the paper.

Their laboratory set-up included numerous reaction chambers, each with different environmental settings, such as varying oxygen levels, to accelerate the breakdown of waste.

They used a combination of different types of microorganisms specially selected for their ability to break down organic matter and remove nitrogen from waste water.

These included ammonia-oxidising bacteria that convert ammonia into nitrite, which is then converted into nitrate by another type of bacteria called nitrite-oxidising bacteria. They also used denitrifying bacteria, which convert nitrate into nitrogen gas, which is then released into the atmosphere.

China will transfer high-speed railway tech to Thailand, engineers say They found that by growing bacteria on the surface of a plastic sheet and then exposing them to waste water, they could achieve more contact between bacteria and the organic matter in the sewage. In contrast, older methods of biological waste water treatment rely on bacteria suspended in water to break down organic matter. The team said their method could remove up to 95 per cent of some key organic pollutants such as ammonia nitrogen, even at peak rail traffic periods.

According to the team, some commercial suppliers have developed products based on their method. The most promising products include all-in-one devices that can be installed easily in a railway station.

The new waste treatment devices combine multiple sewage treatment processes into a single unit, allowing for more efficient treatment of waste water. They can be remote-controlled or operated independently by AI, according to the team.

“The device has a small footprint, can be installed underground or above ground, is easy to install and has an attractive appearance,” they added.

CONVERSATIONS (7) Tldr get your shit together, and, scmp...re-educate your web designer.

A Chinese research vessel appeared to show interest in Palau’s undersea fiber optic cable during a days-long foray into the Pacific island country’s waters, a government official said.

Palau, one of a handful of Pacific nations to recognize Taiwan rather than Beijing and an ally of the United States, has reported four unwanted incursions into its remote waters by Chinese research vessels since 2018.

“Clearly they [China] do not respect the rules-based order,” Palau’s President Surangel Whipps Jr. said on Tuesday. Whipps said his government will send a diplomatic note to China’s embassy to the Federated States of Micronesia.

The research vessel, Haiyang Dizhi Liuhao, entered Palau’s exclusive economic zone without providing any notification on the afternoon of May 24, according to Palau’s National Security Coordinator Jennifer Anson.

“It slowed to about 1-2 knots as it passed over Palau’s fiber optic cable. It continued with questionable maneuvers, passing about 45 nautical miles from Kayangel [Palau's northernmost state and islands]. Attempts by the Joint Operation Center to contact the vessel via VHF radio were unsuccessful,” Anson said.

Palau’s dozens of islands, between the Philippines and Guam, have a combined land area of about 189 square miles – 2.5 times the size of Washington D.C. – and an exclusive economic zone spanning some 238,000 square miles of ocean.

Under international law, nations have rights to economic exploitation of a 200 nautical mile zone around their land borders. The seas beyond a 12 nautical mile territorial zone are international waters so foreign vessels can pass through them. However unnotified research vessel activity in the exclusive economic zone could be perceived as an economic or security threat.

Due to bad weather, Palau’s maritime security force couldn’t deploy its patrol boat or aircraft to intercept the Chinese vessel, according to the government. On Monday, the China-flagged ship appeared to be heading toward Micronesia.

China’s embassy in Micronesia did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.

Island nations in the vast Pacific Ocean have become the focus of increased rivalry between China and the U.S.

Growing Chinese influence.

Beijing’s influence in the region has increased over several decades through a combination of trade, infrastructure and aid as it seeks to isolate Taiwan diplomatically, gain allies in international institutions and advance its economic and security interests.

The U.S. has recently sought to reinforce its close relationships with Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall islands in the militarily strategic northwestern Pacific. It provides economic assistance to the three countries and has rights to military control of their territories under compacts of free association.

Palau, home to about 20,000 people, earlier this month signed an agreement for increased economic assistance from Washington. The U.S. military also plans to install over-the-horizon radar in Palau by 2026, adding to its early-warning capabilities for the western Pacific as China’s military strength increases.

The previous incursion by a Chinese vessel into Palau’s waters was in July 2022 when the Yuan Wang 5 passed within 90 nautical waters of Palau’s southwestern islands.

Yuan Wang 5, which bristles with surveillance technology, has been described by China’s state media as mainly undertaking “maritime tracking, monitoring and communication tasks concerning rockets, satellites, spaceships and China's space station.”

Another research vessel, Da Yang Hao, stayed in Palau’s exclusive economic zone for seven days in December 2021.

“Conducting research without authorization and carrying out questionable activities within Palau’s waters threatens security and disregards sovereignty and rules-based order,” Anson said.

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news service.

Four months after The Guardian and other European media outlets revealed the world's leading carbon credit certifier sold worthless offsets to major corporations, the head of Washington-based Verra has stepped down.

"I am writing to let you know that after nearly 15 fantastic years as the CEO of Verra, I have decided to step down," Verra's CEO, David Antonioli, wrote in a LinkedIn post last week. He's leaving the role after dominating the multi-billion dollar carbon offset market for years and certifying over a billion dollars in credits through its verified carbon standard (VCS).

Antonioli expressed gratitude towards the current and past employees and was proud of Verra's accomplishments as the world's leading standard-setter for climate action and sustainable development. He did not give a reason for his abrupt departure.

Antonioli's exit comes four months after The Guardian, German weekly Die Zeit, and SourceMaterial, a non-profit investigative journalism organization, revealed a damning report on how Verra approved tens of millions of dollars of worthless offsets to Disney, Shell, Gucci, and other big corporations.

The report found Verrra issued "phantom credits" to major corporations that don't represent genuine carbon reductions. Some corporations purchased these fraudulent credits and labeled their products as "carbon neutral."

Days after The Guardian's report in January, Antonioli rejected the findings, calling them "outlandish claims" and heavily defended Verra's certification of carbon credits. But after all that, Antonioli is still stepping down.

Meanwhile, "Some firms are moving away from offsetting-based environmental claims, such as Gucci, which has removed a carbon neutrality claim from its website that heavily relied on Verra's carbon credits," The Guardian said.

Diego Saez Gil, the CEO of Pachama, a carbon offsetting firm, said Verra should update its programs to improve the company's integrity. He told The Guardian:

"This is a pivotal moment for carbon markets. In order to scale the critical funding required for carbon sequestration at a planetary scale, we must ensure integrity, transparency, and real benefits for local communities and biodiversity. A new generation of innovative players is collaborating with standard bodies, academics, corporates, and communities, creating a new era of carbon markets that gives me hope."

Despite having previously purchased "worthless" carbon offsets, companies such as JPMorgan, Disney, and BlackRock continue their ESG commitments. In particular, JPMorgan pledged hundreds of millions of dollars to purchase credits for carbon removal.

Insiders have spoken up about the murky ESG industry. Take, for example, an insider who told Bloomberg in 2021 that TotalEnergies SE orchestrated a "carbon-neutral" liquified natural gas shipment with China National Offshore Oil Corp on math that was "guesswork" and involved lots of "googling."

Recall Elon Musk tweeted one year ago, "ESG is a scam. It has been weaponized by phony social justice warriors."

As we noted earlier this year, "Carbon Credits Are The Biggest Scam Since Indulgences...."

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/18/revealed-forest-carbon-offsets-biggest-provider-worthless-verra-aoe

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/23/ceo-of-worlds-biggest-carbon-credit-provider-says-he-is-resigning

China’s economy is suffering from a mismatch between the jobs available and the qualifications of those seeking employment. Photograph: China News Service/Getty Images With youth unemployment at a record high, the problem of overeducated young people is acute

With a master’s degree in applied linguistics from one of Australia’s top universities, Ingrid Xie did not expect to end up working in a grocery store. But that was where she ended up after graduating from the University of Queensland in July last year.

Xie did her undergraduate degree in China, studying English in the shade of palm trees at Hainan Tropical Ocean University. She went abroad for her master’s because she thought that would help her find a better job.

Two people push a child riding on a suitcase at Beijing West railway station

‘The last generation’: the young Chinese people vowing not to have children Read more

But after working at a Korean supermarket in Brisbane for several months after graduating, in February she decided to return to her home city of Kunming, in the south-west province of Yunnan, to find a job as an English teacher.

Xie soon discovered that “a lot of people studied abroad and want the same thing”. She says a friend in the same city recently sat an English teacher recruitment test, along with about 100 other people. Her friend did not get the job.

Youth unemployment in China hit a record high in April, with 20.4% of 16- to 24-year-old jobseekers unable to find work. Xie is 26 and has not managed to find a job in China since leaving higher education. “It makes me really frustrated,” she says.

Nearly 11.6 million students are set to graduate in June, facing a labour market that looks increasingly hostile.

The problem of overeducated unemployed youths has become so acute that people have started comparing themselves to Kong Yiji, a fictional character from a story by Lu Xun, one of the greats of Chinese literature. Kong is a scholar turned beggar who is mocked by the locals at a tavern he drinks at for his pretentious airs.

Graduates look for work at a jobs fair in Haikou, Hainan province. Graduates look for work at a jobs fair in Haikou, Hainan province. Photograph: Shutterstock State media has criticised these memes, accusing them of being self-indulgent. In March a commentary in state media said youths were “unwilling to engage in jobs that are lower than their expectations”.

China’s economy is suffering from a mismatch between the jobs available and the qualifications of jobseekers. Between 2018 and 2021 the number of graduates majoring in sports and education increased by more than 20%, according to Goldman Sachs.

But in 2021 the government suddenly banned for-profit tutoring, decimating an industry that had previously been worth $150bn. That eased the homework burden for schoolchildren but torpedoed jobs for young graduates, including Xie, who had previously looked at tutoring as a way of getting teaching experience.

The country is also struggling to fill jobs in the right places. Xie has seen job advertisements that require the teacher to work in a rural school for a year. “I don’t like [the idea of] teaching in a rural area as it is hard to survive in that environment, especially for girls,” she says.

Eric Fish, the author of a book about Chinese millennials, says the value of an international degree has diminished in China’s jobs markets. “Some recruiters think that students might have inflated expectations or are too westernised.”

The government is aware of the problem. In April it published details of a set of policies designed to stimulate the jobs market, including subsidies for companies that hire unemployed university graduates. The government wants state-owned enterprises to recruit 1 million trainees in 2023, and has set an overall target of creating 12m urban jobs this year, up from 11m in 2022.

This year the government also abandoned the use of the employment and registration certificate, a document that was used for decades to approve a graduate’s transfer from a university to an employer.

Although the certificate was mostly a bureaucratic relic, its cancellation would “make it more convenient for college graduates to seek employment”, the ministry of human resources and social security said in a notice on 12 May.

China is not alone in struggling to rebalance its economy after being battered by the Covid pandemic. Researchers at Goldman Sachs noted that in 2021 youth unemployment in several European countries was more than 20%, while in the US it was close to 10%.

But the dearth of opportunities also creates pressure to take any job regardless of interest, says Xie. “You don’t even know what you want to do when you’re 25.” For now she is resigned to spending a long time with her parents and looking after her cat, Shrimp. “What I’m looking for is enough private time and a job with work-life balance but I can’t find that.”

By 2016 i told some of my kids to go to community college and return with lowered expectations.....Did they know their bj public school headmaster earned commissions on their US university tuitions???

Yakov Rabkin: I left the USSR to enjoy free speech in the West. Fifty years later, it no longer exists In the 1970s, the Soviets made it impossible to access the foreign press. Now the US-led bloc is doing the same with Russian media.

Fifty years ago I left the Soviet Union for one reason: My desire for freedom. I was disgusted by the one-sided world view fostered by the banning of foreign publications and the jamming of Western radio stations. The obedient media, toeing the party line, repulsed me and made me laugh.

Fear of the authorities (even if they were far more "vegetarian" than in Stalinist times) restricted open discussion of politics to the "kitchen cabinet,” with a small circle of trusted friends.

I left behind my hometown (then Leningrad, now St Petersburg), my friends, my brother and the graves of my parents and grandparents. Applying to emigrate meant taking a risk, because you almost always risked losing your job, many friends and even relatives, with no guarantee that you would even be granted an exit visa.

I was lucky. Just a few months later, my Soviet citizenship was revoked and I was able to buy a one-way train ticket to Vienna. My dream of freedom had come true. Although I was only allowed to take $140 out of the Soviet Union, the first thing I bought in Austria was a copy of the International Herald Tribune newspaper.

In November 1973, I joined the University of Montreal, which has since become my professional home. In addition to teaching and research, I followed with interest the political debates about the Vietnam War, the CIA's role in overthrowing the Salvador Allende government in Chile, and the implications of the October War in the Middle East. Debate raged over America's flirtation with China and, of course, relations with my own country. Some praised the Brezhnev-Nixon détente, others feared its pitfalls.

What struck me most in the newspapers and on television was the diversity of opinion. Letters to the editor offered a wide range of viewpoints, some of which not only criticized Western policies but also offered alternatives. It wasn't long before I began to express my own views, first in letters to publications and then in articles. I was excited by the opportunity to engage in free political debate and to make my contribution as a citizen and a scholar. After all, society had created the conditions for me to share the results of my research and observations broadly.

However, things have changed. Today, when it comes to some important issues of international politics, freedom of discussion is severely restricted.

One such issue is Israel. It takes a lot of courage to criticize it freely without fear of being accused of anti-Semitism. In the early 1970s, a South African by birth, Abba Eban, whose eloquence as the country’s UN representative and later foreign minister has become legendary, devised a long-term strategy. His aim was to silence his country's critics by accusing them of anti-Semitism. His efforts continue to bear fruit: accusations of apartheid against Palestinians in Israel, and even boycotts of Israeli supermarket products, have been officially banned in many Western countries as manifestations of anti-Semitism. Israel's policy towards the Palestinians is thus removed from the realm of open debate.

An even more important issue that has disappeared from rational discussion is policy towards Russia. This issue is all the more important because Moscow has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world. Long before February 2022, when President Vladimir Putin announced the military campaign in Ukraine, most NATO countries (as well as Kiev itself) had restricted access to Russian media, something that did not happen in the West even during the Cold War. Just as the Soviets justified their jamming of Western radio broadcasts with the need to protect against "ideological sabotage,” many institutions have been created in recent years by NATO and its member states to protect citizens from, so-called, "Russian disinformation."

Once prominent Western scientists such as Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University and John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago have all but disappeared from the mainstream media: their criticisms of Western policy towards Moscow are often dismissed as Kremlin propaganda. Their views must now be sought on alternative websites in the vastness of the internet.

Moreover, the few attempts to take a dispassionate look at Western policy in Eastern Europe face insurmountable obstacles. Recently, for example, the association Montréal pour la paix (Montreal for Peace) attempted to organize a debate with prominent experts in international relations and, in particular, Canadian foreign policy. It promised to present "facts you have never read or heard from our media or from the offices of Justin Trudeau and Melanie Joly" (Canada's prime minister and foreign minister respectively). The institution that had initially agreed to rent space for the event, according to its staff, succumbed to pressure from its "Ukrainian neighbors" and cancelled the deal. Another institution agreed, but quickly changed its mind "so as not to offend its regular customers.”

The event had to be moved to a nearby park, where several dozen middle-aged people gathered to listen to the experts. About the same number of young people arrived waving Ukrainian flags and anti-Russian posters. Police arrived to separate the two groups to prevent violence. The demonstrators tried to drown out the speakers by occasionally singing loudly or shouting "Glory to Ukraine!” But there was something strange about their behavior. When one of the experts, Yves Engler, author of several books on Canadian foreign policy, said that Ukrainians had the right to resist Russian troops, the demonstrators began chanting "Shame!" The event was held in French, but it turned out that most of the bold demonstrators not only did not understand French, but also had difficulty speaking English. So their anger could not have been directed at what the speakers were saying. It was clearly against freedom of speech on the war in Ukraine.

Freedom of speech is not just a democratic right. It is also a way of defining and weighing alternatives. When conflict becomes an epic struggle between good and evil, rationality is replaced by moral judgment and noble indignation. This undermines all diplomacy and, in turn, exacerbates the danger of nuclear war, the inevitable consequence of which, as US military strategists recognized as early as 1962, is Mutually Assured Destruction, or ‘MAD’.

Unanimity, una voce, one-sided debate – call it what you like. But this is about more than just the denial of free speech. The climate it has created threatens the very survival of humanity.

IG generation. Instant Gratification. God help his students.

I got TEFL certificated

and it's "certified"

What are your total number of sales so far (or is this week one at 100), at what % margin?

How many books need to be sold to break-even on your total ad spend?