A video of violence showing the maltreatment of a man on a tram in the Netherlands has put Dutch politicians on alert. The leader of the Dutch Freedom Party, Geert Wilders, commented on the crime on the short message service X (formerly Twitter), saying: “Arrest, lock up and throw away the key.” The local voters’ association “Heart for The Hague” spoke of “crazy, lawless savages” and called for “a kind of black book” with house bans for violent offenders on public transport and increased deployment of conductors.
The video, which was shared thousands of times on social media over the weekend, shows a group of youthful-looking people beating and harassing a man on a tram in The Hague. The local police department reported that the attack took place on Friday evening. In the short clip, which was first posted on Snapchat and then shared by the Dutch video portal “Dumpert”, there are multiple kicks and punches against the victim. Some viewers also point out a possible stabbing attack with an unknown weapon. Some users suspect from the victim’s behaviour that he might have been disabled.
The police could not give any information about the perpetrators, but the dark skin colour of some of the attackers caused speculation that they might have been migrants. The right-wing party “Forum voor Democratie” wrote on X: “This kind of misery is what you call for when you, like the VVD (editor’s note: currently the governing party), open the borders wide.”
Itâs funny that Brockschmidt is treated as an expert on the U.S. on the local talk show circuits here.
Itâs kind of pretentious for such a person to pretend to be an expert on a country, given that she is only about 30 years old and wasnât even in the United States at the time she wrote this book.
This has also led to a major controversy. To challenge this person’s expertise, you see, would lead to getting crushed with the word ‘sexism’ or whatever. But it’s astonishing that anyone would have the chutzpah to write about another countryâs political system and want to establish herself as an expert for doing so, calling America’s religious right a problem and focusing on the recent abortion controversies in the U.S in particular.
But well, Germany knows America isnât a democracy, so we have to feel superior, and Annika knows that, too.
After Roe vs. Wade was overturned and abortion was no longer a federal right in the U.S., there was a howling in Germany that hadnât been heard for a long time about how bad it was.
Do they all want an abortion in the U.S.? To Annika, it was clear that the U.S was no longer a democracy, based on that ruling, even though it was a democratic decision by the Supreme Court.
She claims she can see democracy at play here. But if there’s a court ruling she doesn’t like, then America is no democracy.
Itâs not for nothing that Politico’s Matthew Karnitschnig compares her to Karl May, another German who wrote novels featuring his ideas about cowboys and the American West and became Hitler’s favorite author.
But what can be said about the book from the perspective of a woke city student?
All fascists who criticize sex education lessons or are generally interested in their childrenâs school, or who do not see abortion as a new form of contraception, are bad guys in her book. Any kind of conservatism is bad anyway, just like economic liberalism is bad, and worst of all individuality is bad. All rights are group rights and those include special rights for minorities. All awakened leftists and Democrats are good, while Republicans are bad, even if there are historical mistakes in the book, who cares, it’s the feeling that is important.
Two examples: Her claim that Jimmy Carter supported abortion because he was in the Democrat party like Joe Biden and always did. That was factually wrong. Jimmy Carter pushed the law through for abortion but was personally opposed to abortion and hoped Democrats would repeal it and create better conditions for mothers. As for Joe Biden, he also was also of the opinion in 1986 that Roe vs. Wade was wrong, yet of course no longer tilts that way today, because todayâs Democrats would give him hell. It’s no different from the claims about Barack Obama — that he was always in favor of gay marriage. The author forgot that Obama spoke out against it in 1994 and also during his 2012 election campaign in California, but maybe that would have been too explosive for his electoral prospects because Mormons and Afro-Americans had campaigned against it together. Had Obama lost their favor, the African American voters would have been gone. Obama only spoke out in favor of gay marriage in 2015, and only because Joe Biden had forced his hand.
It doesnât occur to this know-it-all author that minorities can also be conservative. Does she know that Latinos, in particular, tend to be socially conservative? Maybe, she should talk to them about abortion.
It’s such nonsense, this view about America. Anyone who cannot say LGBTQ perfectly or who refuses to participate in gender madness is called a white supremacist.
So itâs not surprising that she even accuses a black priest of judging homosexuality according to the Bible. He, too is a white supremacist.
That something like that can still be said at the end, is outrageous.
After the publication of her book, Annika said that she wasnât in America with her own money, of course, but with a grant from a foundation that is supported by German taxpayers. This is how abolishing capitalism is fun.
And for all the Germans reading that book and nodding in agreement at how backward Americans are, I hope they arenât complaining about what to teach their kids or that we now have drag queen book readings for kids too.
The Guardian is entangled in a trans crisis after leaked tapes exposed staff members disagreeing over issues relating to gender.
The newspaperâs staff have been butting head for months over how to cover issues relating to trans people in their publication.
The media group called for an âuntangling sex and genderâ meeting back in April for staff to discuss the ways they cover womenâs rights.
In the meeting, two journalists, Sonia Sodha and Susanna Rustin, stated that they believed trans women should be kept separate from biological women in specific areas.
In the recording leaked to American media site Semafor, the attendees discussed internal disagreements at the publication which have led to tensions between staff.
Four speakers stated that they had been harassed because of their trans-critical views.
A deputy editor also said that their personal attempts to organise internal events had been met with resistance.
They said they had been faced with âefforts to loudly, even violently, protest or stop meetings taking placeâ.
The meeting, which was allegedly heavily imbalanced in favour of trans-critical speakers, was blasted by many staff members.
Many were annoyed that the meeting had been held during the newspaperâs diversity, equality, and inclusion week, according to Semafor.
The row led to multiple journalists stepping down from the paper.
This includes Hadley Freeman and Suzanne Moore, pro-trans writers.
The Egyptian government has made a decision to restrict the wearing of the niqab (full-face veil) by girls in schools during the new academic year, which begins on September 30 this year.
Reda Hegazy, Egyptâs Minister of Education, publicly announced the decision and described the new guidelines. Hair covers are permissible, according to Minister Hegazy, but they must not obscure the studentâs face. Furthermore, unless approved by the Directorate of Education, no models or illustrations promoting the hair cover are permitted, he said.
Minister Hegazy also emphasized the responsibility of the guardian in the studentâs decision. âIt is crucial that the guardian is aware of and consents to their daughterâs decision to wear a hair cover, and this choice should be entirely voluntary, free from any external pressure or coercion,â the Minister said.
As per the reports, the ministry has adopted a coordinated strategy for school uniforms. The school board will decide on the appropriate uniform colour for both male and female students in conjunction with the board of trustees, parents, and teachers. The decision will be taken in collaboration with the competent Directorate of Education, ensuring that students have a unified and coordinated appearance at the school.Â
Minister Hegazy also emphasised that modifications to school uniforms should be considered at the start of each educational stage, with a minimum of three years between alterations. Guardians will decide where to purchase uniforms, but kids must follow the uniform regulations. Any student caught in violation of these rules will be barred from entering or attending school, he added.
Apart from Egypt, several countries like Austria, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Canada, France, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Uzbekistan have imposed bans on the wearing of headscarves at schools and colleges.
Recently, in the year 2022, the Karnataka High Court in India also pronounced its verdict on wearing hijab in schools. The court upheld the ban and ruled that wearing of hijab is not an essential religious practice of the Islamic faith.
The hijab controversy in Karnataka gained traction in the first week of January last year when eight Muslim girls were denied entry to classes at a Udupi college as they wore hijabs. The college authorities had informed that the hijab was not a part of the uniform dress code mandated for the students.
The Muslim girls, who were adamant about wearing hijab, subsequently petitioned the High Court to be allowed to attend classes while wearing hijab. They claimed that donning the Hijab was both an âintegral practice of Islamâ and their âfundamental rightâ guaranteed by Articles 14 and 25 of the Indian Constitution.
However, the court ruled that wearing of hijab is not an essential religious practice of the Islamic faith.
“Levitha, Syrna and Agathonisi are under Greek occupation,” defiantly declared the vice-president of the Turkish extra-parliamentary party Yeniden Refah Partisi (New Welfare Party), DoÄan Aydal going so far as to claim that islands and islets around Crete are… Turkish.
Speaking to SözcĂŒ TV about the possibility of extending the territorial waters to 12 nautical miles from Greece, Aydal said that our country, taking advantage of the Law of the Sea, is trying to “narrow Turkey’s Exclusive Economic Zone and recalled the casus belli made on Greece.
“They also invaded two islands. In Levitha and Syrna. They were transporting troops there as in Agathonisi. We are not talking about small islands here. It is three times the size of the Princes. If they extend their territorial waters to these islands in Levitha and Syrna, our exit to the Aegean will become more difficult. That is why we, in 1995, through the Parliament, made the casus belli. In other words, expanding territorial waters here is a cause of war for us.”
The vice president of the party went so far as to defiantly claim that islands and islets around Crete belong to Turkey and that there can be an agreement with Greece after… consultation.
âThose islands are ours. Six of them are around the area of ââCrete. Close to Crete. With maritime law, they are trying to narrow Turkey’s Exclusive Economic Zone. There can be an agreement on this through consultation,” he said.
According to the Turkish narrative, the islands around Crete that the neighbours are methodically trying to “grey” are Avgonisi, Dias, two rocky islands near Dias, Petalidi, Paximadi, Dionysades, a rocky island north of Dionysades, Dragonada, Prasonisi and Paximada.
The New Prosperity party may be extra-parliamentary, but in the recent presidential election in Turkey, it strongly supported the re-election of President Recep Tayyip ErdoÄan.
After six months of fierce debate, Germanyâs left-wing government has passed the countryâs controversial green heating law, the Building Energy Act (GEG), with high estimates indicating the law will cost Germanyâs economy over âŹ1 trillion over the next 20 years.
While politicians belonging to Germanyâs three-way politician applauded the heating law coming into force on Friday last week, the political fallout has likely yet to be fully realized.
Many Germans â already struggling with inflation and a slowing economy â balked at the mandate to install new expensive heating systems, with the law being rejected by the majority of the populace, according to polling. The government is also being accused of a hasty legislative process and a lack of parliamentary hearings, calling into question the democratic basis for the law in its entirety.
The law mandates that Germans with older heating systems replace them within a certain time period, although the final bill passed watered down some requirements and carved out some exceptions. Nevertheless, the final cost of the bill is still expected to be enormous, with high estimates placing it at âŹ1 trillion and lower estimates hovering at âŹ600 billion.
Many Germans have all of their savings in their home, and for many seniors, their homes, often featuring older heating systems, have seen their value take a hit due to the law. At the same time, in the coming years, they will be forced to make costly heating upgrades â usually in the form of a heat pump and the associated costs of making it work efficiently inside a building â to meet new green standards. Experts are also warning that landlords will have an incentive to increase rents in response to the Building Energy Act.
The problem is that approximately three-quarters of the old buildings in Germany were built before the first thermal insulation regulations came into force in 1979. Many of these buildings will now need to be made energy efficient, representing an enormous cost burden at a time when Germany has also phased out nuclear power and the price of energy, particularly oil and natural gas, has soared.
The Free Democrats (FDP), usually seen as a pro-business party, first fought their coalition partners on the proposed law, but in the end, the liberal party helped pass the law on Friday. There are already signs the FDP is paying the price for its decision, with the latest YouGov poll putting the party at just 5 percent, which is the threshold for entering the German parliament.
âThere is fear among the population,â shouted Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) in parliament. He said it is âthe height of disrespectâ for the citizens to pass the law and that the CSU would work to abolish it.
The Alternative for Germany (AfD), which saw its polling numbers soar around the same time the heating debate raged, has also said it will abolish the law should it come to power, saying it is an arduous tax on German businesses, pensioners, and those who invested in a home or apartment.
âThe AfD faction strictly rejects Habeckâs (âŠ) heating hammer. Despite severe criticism, the law was neither postponed nor defused,â said Marc Bernhard, a parliamentary spokesperson for the AfD.âThe tricky thing about the law, however, is that the heating has to be torn out again if it does not meet the municipalitiesâ heat planning required by 2028. In this way, the government is hiding the devastating consequences for millions of people and is transferring the risk of the heat transition to the citizens.â
He further pointed out that the nuclear power plants would save twice as much CO2 if they were allowed to continue to operate.
As Remix News reported last year, the proportion of poor people in Germany reached a new high, according to the Federal Statistical Office, with the data highlighting a sea change in the German economy. The report also only covered data up until the end of 2021 before the dramatic increase in food and energy prices in 2022.
Image: Free image, Pixabay license, no attribution required.
By Reb Peacher
Do the crime, pay the timeâat least thatâs what the county health department said to me when I went to fill out the necessary paperwork to procure religious vaccine exemptions in order for my children to attend school.
In my âconservative strongholdâ state, even a private school is forbidden from admitting students lest they present religious exemptions acquired by a parent through the government health department. Last Friday, when I capitulated to my abuserâs demandsâwhoops! I meant to say, when I went to satisfy legal requirements to uphold my personal convictions, little did I know I would become a prisoner of conscience.
After checking in with the âclinicâ desk, I was told to wait in the lobby. As a native English speaker seeking a religious exemption, I was a minority by far; the majority of the âclientsâ only spoke Spanish (requiring bilingual staff), and they were all there for welfare or subsidized medicine. (I sat there wondering how much this was costing me.)
I was called and buzzed through a door to partitioned desks, at which point the woman behind the glass took my lettersâI had to provide hardcopy ârequestsââand began building my familyâs file. She asked for every bit of personal information possible; I have never seen a government employee transcribe information so efficiently, and I doubt I ever will again.
She told me Iâd have to meet with a nurse and watch a video; to this I asked âI have to?â She said that I could decline, but it was strongly discouraged. I returned to the lobby, before being called back by âRN Simpsonâ who brought me to a semi-secluded injection site room, turned on the video, and leftâso much for freedom of choice. The room contained unlocked refrigerators full of vaccines, confidential paperwork was in my view, and the computer video player was not a locked applicationâwhat sensitive data could I have hypothetically accessed?
The videoâs narrator was a âprominentâ pediatrician propped up as a âhealth expertâ (her evident obesity indicates otherwise), and the doctor made no pretense of hiding the agenda: this was vaccine reeducation. If these unsophisticated anti-vaxxers want to act subhuman, then they can be treated as subhuman; as the doctor said, âIf every parent exempted their child from vaccination, these diseases would return in the community in full force.â Also, âMany hospitalizations and even deaths are caused by infections of unvaccinated children with vaccine preventable diseases.â
The doctor insisted vaccines were safe, because theyâre âtested in very large studiesâ and when adverse side effects like seizures, retardation, and death do happen, itâs par for the course because âthis can happen with any other medication too.â (Curiously, she implied that vaccines are part of the âmedicationâ family. Odd, no?) She said the medications (vaccines) must be in a number of studies to âensure safety and effectiveness.â Now where have I heard that before?
In 2013 ⊠Health and Human Services ⊠commissioned an update of earlier findings on the lack of evidence to support claims that the ⊠(CDC) infant/child vaccination schedule was safe.
âŠ
Ten years later, the CDC has yet to do such a comparison study, even though it is sitting on a vast repository of data in the VSDâŠ.
The doctor relied on âsoundâ medical advice from both the American Academy of Pediatrics and the CDC (appeal to authority fallacy); about a month ago, the AAP issued a statement to âreaffirmâ its âgender-affirming care policyâ which currently includes the organizationâs support for âtransgenderâ surgery of minors, and the CDC? Needless to say, I donât exactly have the highest regard for either of these âmedicalâ institutions.
Failing to vaccinate your child is akin to willful negligence; âdoing nothing is still doing somethingâ and forgoing vaccines is a choice that actively puts everyone at risk.
Simpson returned shortly after the video had ended, and said she needed to go over a few things with me, just to make sure I really understood the âconsequences of my actions.â
âYou know unvaccinated children spread diseases. If your children cause an outbreak, no one will be able to attend school and this will affect you too; youâll miss work, do you realize that?â
âYour choices are putting the community at risk, do you realize this?â
My âcertificatesâ for religious exemption were held hostage unless I signed a âRecord of Vaccine Declinationâ form which noted:
My healthcare provider has recommended that my child be vaccinatedâŠ.
I understand that my unvaccinated child could spread disease to another child ⊠This could result in health complications and even death for the other person.
I clarified she was certainly not my healthcare provider, but it didnât matter; on the back:
Unfortunately, some parents will refuse to have their child receive some vaccines. For healthcare providers who want to assure that these parents fully understand the consequences of their decisionâŠ.
âTo address the risk of VPD [vaccine-preventable disease], states should consider adopting more rigorous standards for non-medical vaccine exemptions that require parents to demonstrate that they have made a conscious, concerted, and informed decision in requesting these exemptions for their children. An example of such a standard might include a requirement for parents to complete a form that explicitly states the grounds for the exemption and requires them to acknowledge awareness of the disease-specific risks associated with not vaccinating their child(ren) [emphasis added].â
Lastly, the document includes a blurb for âprovidersâ which issues this mandate:
For parents who refuse one or more recommended immunizations, document your conversation and ⊠have a parent sign the Refusal to Vaccinate form, and keep the form in the patientâs medical record [emphasis added].
I feel like the minerâs canary, attempting to signal that the danger is everywhere, even in the âconservative strongholdsâ but people only seem to notice once itâs too late.
The Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in Halle is calling for an immediate crisis summit under the leadership of the municipality of Halle (Saale) on the subject of migrant and juvenile delinquency. The reason for this are the incidents of the last few days. Afghan youths attacked participants at the CSD, and on Sunday there were three major confrontations on Riebeckplatz involving people from Syria, Jordan and Gambia. Parents have formed a sort of vigilante group because of the constant attacks on pupils. Pupils have been advised to only walk in groups.
“The events of the weekend at the CSD and at Riebeckplatz, as well as the founding of a vigilante group to secure the routes to school, must have made even the last responsible person realise that Halle has an unresolved problem with violent migrants who do not abide by the law. The ideological talk about these problems must be stopped and the administration must give top priority to the fight against gang crime,” said Marco Tullner, chairman of the district council.
The deputy chairwoman of the district, Kerstin Godenrath Member of the State Parliament, also points out that the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) city council faction had already demanded a corresponding security concept in February 2023, which was adopted by the city council in May 2023.” The question is what measures have been implemented since then, because apparently the situation is getting worse and worse. I expect Halle’s migrant organisations to have a stronger preventive effect on the migrant milieus concerned,” says Godenrath.
