Apparently democracy in Romania is in great danger. In fact it's in the gravest of dangers since 1990.
People have been demonstrating for years, prime ministers went to prison, and corruption, apparently is high.
Yet not a peek from the EU. No angry sermons, no talks about (Western) European Values, just a muted reaction essentially saying "whatever". I guess you could make the argument that the very presence of protests mean that they are less corrupt than other Eastern members of the EU, but that would be quite a torturous argument... The fact is they are probably more corrupt than their neighbours, hence the protests.
Contrast this lack of interest to Poland, for example, which is facing some serious backlash for -guess what- rolling back democracy. Same with Hungary.
If you are the tinfoil-wearing type, you might ask why this difference in reactions.
Perhaps because Romania does not act as a thorn in Brussels's side about migration? Perhaps because unlike Hungary and Poland the Romanian government is not right-wing, hence their shenanigans are acceptable? (Just like in 2006 the Hungarian police was beating up random people was perfectly fine with regards to human rights and democracy?)
One can only wonder.
Monday, December 18, 2017
Friday, November 10, 2017
The Satanic George Soros
Since I wrote a little tongue-in-cheek post about why it is not antisemitic to criticize Soros, I feel I should clarify a few things.
I don't like Orban. I don't even like Soros. To be honest I do not know either of these people personally. I do support a lot of what Soros is doing- the CEU, promoting free speech, etc., but I also dislike a lot of what he's doing. I do not agree with him on mass migration, I think there's a good argument that some of the NGOs he is founding are, in fact, taking part in human trafficking- or at least enabling it-, and I do not believe that national identity is an outdated concept. I think the Hungarian government's hysteric anti-Soros rhetoric is equally hilarious and embarrassing; especially comparing him to Satan.
However -and this is the important part. Bringing accusations of antisemitism, nazism into this argument completely invalidates the "progressive" side of the debate. There is no need to imagine some sort of hidden and vile antisemitic attacks, like how the WP and other papers do. There is enough ammunition there against Orban that would last until the end of times. This -also- hysterical flurry of accusations are only accomplishing two things: it polarizes the field into two sides with no room for subtleties, and it absolutely discredits the critics of Orban.
So stop it already. You don't have to make shit up; he has given you a lot (corruption, rolling back on checks and balances, state propaganda) you can genuinely criticise. You don't have to make him into a Nazi or a necrophiliac as well. It just makes you look stupid.
I don't like Orban. I don't even like Soros. To be honest I do not know either of these people personally. I do support a lot of what Soros is doing- the CEU, promoting free speech, etc., but I also dislike a lot of what he's doing. I do not agree with him on mass migration, I think there's a good argument that some of the NGOs he is founding are, in fact, taking part in human trafficking- or at least enabling it-, and I do not believe that national identity is an outdated concept. I think the Hungarian government's hysteric anti-Soros rhetoric is equally hilarious and embarrassing; especially comparing him to Satan.
However -and this is the important part. Bringing accusations of antisemitism, nazism into this argument completely invalidates the "progressive" side of the debate. There is no need to imagine some sort of hidden and vile antisemitic attacks, like how the WP and other papers do. There is enough ammunition there against Orban that would last until the end of times. This -also- hysterical flurry of accusations are only accomplishing two things: it polarizes the field into two sides with no room for subtleties, and it absolutely discredits the critics of Orban.
So stop it already. You don't have to make shit up; he has given you a lot (corruption, rolling back on checks and balances, state propaganda) you can genuinely criticise. You don't have to make him into a Nazi or a necrophiliac as well. It just makes you look stupid.
Monday, October 23, 2017
Dumbing down everyone- one article at a time
I guess everyone is familiar with the usual "You don't believe how Pamela Anderson looks like today", "What this father did after his wife confessed will shock you" and "Why the dentists hate this Single Mom" articles that are flooding every. single. fucking. news outlet.
They want clicks, and this is how they get them.
And now it seeped into popular science reporting, too.
"Why The Science World Is Freaking Out Over This 25-Year-Old's Answer to Antibiotic Resistance"
Let's look at the actual publication, shall we?
Fist of all, nobody is freaking out. Scientist usually don't freak out unless there's an asteroid on a collision course to Earth, or a super virus emerges that kills 100% of infected people turning them into zombies.
Second: that "25-year-old" is not some girl toiling over some high-school project in the garage coming up with a world-saving method.
She is a competent PhD student who is working under the supervision of her PI as part of a team. She was given a topic to research at the start of her program, and she is constantly getting feedback, support and whatnot from her supervisor and peers. Crediting her, and her only for this is just as unfair as giving the Nobel Price for the leader of a research team only.
Science is a collaborative effort. This infantilisation of reporting just makes things really, really bad for all parties included. Your dumbed down readers get a bit more dumb for one.
They want clicks, and this is how they get them.
And now it seeped into popular science reporting, too.
"Why The Science World Is Freaking Out Over This 25-Year-Old's Answer to Antibiotic Resistance"
Let's look at the actual publication, shall we?
Fist of all, nobody is freaking out. Scientist usually don't freak out unless there's an asteroid on a collision course to Earth, or a super virus emerges that kills 100% of infected people turning them into zombies.
Second: that "25-year-old" is not some girl toiling over some high-school project in the garage coming up with a world-saving method.
She is a competent PhD student who is working under the supervision of her PI as part of a team. She was given a topic to research at the start of her program, and she is constantly getting feedback, support and whatnot from her supervisor and peers. Crediting her, and her only for this is just as unfair as giving the Nobel Price for the leader of a research team only.
Science is a collaborative effort. This infantilisation of reporting just makes things really, really bad for all parties included. Your dumbed down readers get a bit more dumb for one.
Tuesday, October 17, 2017
Austrian Freedom Party and the Press
So, two parties with strong anti-immigration stance have essentially won the elections in Austria.
Both are right-wing, and far-right to top that. You could make all sorts of arguments about how Nazism is rearing its ugly head in the birth place of Hitler; The Guardian is certainly not shy talking hard when it comes to the region. (Well, a bit east of Austria, but still the same region.) Yet, what is The Guardian fretting about?
The candidate's age.
The same newspaper that issues thundering rhetoric about Nazis in Eastern (well, Central) Europe every time these unwashed barbarians do something that affronts their "European Values", suddenly becomes really quiet when "their guys" do something as bad as electing some crypto-Nazis to power.
Figure that.
Both are right-wing, and far-right to top that. You could make all sorts of arguments about how Nazism is rearing its ugly head in the birth place of Hitler; The Guardian is certainly not shy talking hard when it comes to the region. (Well, a bit east of Austria, but still the same region.) Yet, what is The Guardian fretting about?
The candidate's age.
The same newspaper that issues thundering rhetoric about Nazis in Eastern (well, Central) Europe every time these unwashed barbarians do something that affronts their "European Values", suddenly becomes really quiet when "their guys" do something as bad as electing some crypto-Nazis to power.
Figure that.
Wednesday, October 11, 2017
The sorry state of journalism- the Weinstein affair
So there's this creep producer who probably engaged in activities most people would describe as "despicable". Let me start by stating this is not about the guy and what he (probably) did. It's about how it's being handled.
The jury is still out (well, it should be; after all the whole issue is pretty new, and we don't have all the information yet), but obviously the mob justice is the best justice; everyone is either condemning him or distancing themselves from him. Fair enough; this is what you get if you're rich and visible, and overstep certain boundaries; suddenly everyone wants to make sure they are not mistaken for your friend. (It's kind of funny that nobody seems to be discussing the systemic abuse of power in the entertainment industry... This is the best opportunity to talk about it, yet it seems like our perp here is made out to be "one bad apple", rather than the norm.)
Anyhow.
Enter: The Guardian.
Obviously we need to know which actresses Tweeted about this issue; it's a fundamental part of the story. After all if we don't hear what Winslet or Nunn has to say in 142 characters, we don't know the basics, do we? Let's repeat the same paragraphs on these people's -often baseless- opinions in every single article we write, so much so that a plagiarism detection program would have a hard time separating them from each other. This is what journalists do, right? The news become irrelevant; what other famous people say becomes the news itself, which is worth repeating almost verbatim in every single article you publish.
The other, even more fundamental part is the constant identity politics. Let's ask 20 male actors who worked with him for their comments. After all since they all have a penis (each, I think), they should be asked. And when they don't respond, let's imply there's something deeper going on there other than people unwilling to get into this cesspit of gossip. But the implication here is that men need to speak up or it means they condone this douche's behaviour. (Which, let me stress, is not unique in the entertainment industry, so nobody should be surprised.)
Interestingly when certain right wingers demand Muslims apologise for acts of terror, suddenly the grouping of people based on one shared feature becomes intolerance and racism by the Guardian, too. (Which is, let's add it.)
It must be really weird trying to figure out how to report on stuff based on identity politics... is the person in question male? Female? White? Black? When does criticising a Jewish person equal anti-antisemitism, and when it isn't? If it's Soros, any criticism is definitely Antisemitism, right? It must be. (Which is not to say the Hungarian government's increasingly hysterical anti-Soros rhetoric is any way justified. It's just not Antisemitic.) When it's about sexual assault, then it becomes tricky, after all it seems like in this case it's fine to put him in pillory; criticising a person does not mean implied hatred of Jews.
The jury is still out (well, it should be; after all the whole issue is pretty new, and we don't have all the information yet), but obviously the mob justice is the best justice; everyone is either condemning him or distancing themselves from him. Fair enough; this is what you get if you're rich and visible, and overstep certain boundaries; suddenly everyone wants to make sure they are not mistaken for your friend. (It's kind of funny that nobody seems to be discussing the systemic abuse of power in the entertainment industry... This is the best opportunity to talk about it, yet it seems like our perp here is made out to be "one bad apple", rather than the norm.)
Anyhow.
Enter: The Guardian.
Obviously we need to know which actresses Tweeted about this issue; it's a fundamental part of the story. After all if we don't hear what Winslet or Nunn has to say in 142 characters, we don't know the basics, do we? Let's repeat the same paragraphs on these people's -often baseless- opinions in every single article we write, so much so that a plagiarism detection program would have a hard time separating them from each other. This is what journalists do, right? The news become irrelevant; what other famous people say becomes the news itself, which is worth repeating almost verbatim in every single article you publish.
The other, even more fundamental part is the constant identity politics. Let's ask 20 male actors who worked with him for their comments. After all since they all have a penis (each, I think), they should be asked. And when they don't respond, let's imply there's something deeper going on there other than people unwilling to get into this cesspit of gossip. But the implication here is that men need to speak up or it means they condone this douche's behaviour. (Which, let me stress, is not unique in the entertainment industry, so nobody should be surprised.)
Interestingly when certain right wingers demand Muslims apologise for acts of terror, suddenly the grouping of people based on one shared feature becomes intolerance and racism by the Guardian, too. (Which is, let's add it.)
It must be really weird trying to figure out how to report on stuff based on identity politics... is the person in question male? Female? White? Black? When does criticising a Jewish person equal anti-antisemitism, and when it isn't? If it's Soros, any criticism is definitely Antisemitism, right? It must be. (Which is not to say the Hungarian government's increasingly hysterical anti-Soros rhetoric is any way justified. It's just not Antisemitic.) When it's about sexual assault, then it becomes tricky, after all it seems like in this case it's fine to put him in pillory; criticising a person does not mean implied hatred of Jews.
Monday, October 2, 2017
European values, West vs East in the EU, and the rank hypocrisy
It is interesting to see the contrast between reports of alleged Hungarian brutality towards migrants (with no actual proof, but in the he-said-she-said game we of course can take anything a migrant or an NGO says on face value), and the way they report on brutality by the cultured and civilised Western European countries.
Let's see...
We all remember when migrants rushed the border at Roszke, and threw stones at the border guards; the response was, not unexpectedly, some water jets to drive them back. The video footage was heavily edited leaving out the attack, and the footage of the poor kid his/her parent was dragging towards the violence, so later the child could be paraded as an innocent victim. The videos usually have shown the water cannon first, then the stone throwing, and the crying children last. (Here's the full video, by the way. You can see a child being dragged towards the tear gas at 1:29... which makes the whole farce even more comical. Most of the condemning articles you can find in this blog, but here is a collection by a Hungarian news portal.)
International condemnations, talks of overall racism in the whole country; the furore was real. Facts were taken quite liberally, but the whole incident was used to paint the whole country as the racist black sheep of the EU. Even the UN Secretary General had some harsh words.
In contrast, this is how an Italian use of the water cannon was reported upon.
The report is more like a factual description, and the Guardian had no thundering opinion piece on it. It kind of happened, and that was that.
Same thing about alleged violence against migrants/refugees in Hungary.
Apparently guards have been taking selfies with beaten migrants. Proof of any of these are obviously missing (even though these things tend to come out as we have seen with the US soldiers who took selfies in front of corpses they tortured to death), but let's not let facts get in our way.
In contrast, there are just dispassionate descriptions of the horrors if they are perpetrated by Western countries. No broad generalisations, no bleating about "European Values", no finger pointing to the highest level of power; I've yet to see anyone accuse Macron of being a horrible human being because of the well documented brutality of the French police, and the inactivity of the French government to help these people. (Who, let's just mention it, left the migrant processing centers without registering hoping to get through a richer country.)
The point is: Western media, and the Western world in general loves virtue signalling with the Eastern members of the EU. The political elite, the media are blatantly biased. It's not exactly a big revelation, but something that is worth recording.
Thursday, August 17, 2017
Racist Hungarians -Discrimination in the EU in 2015 report
Thanks to the media abroad Hungary seems to have acquired quite fame as a nation of the worst racists you can imagine. Articles, comments, reddit posts, google searches- all point to this notoriety, and none of them seem to be bothered by things like facts.
Rising antisemitism threatening all Jews in Hungary? Check. And check. And check. And check. And check. And check. (Again, which country are Jews fleeing from, and asking for special permits to carry weapons? I forgot. Perhaps someone could remind me.) It's so bad, we even need to lie about it to make it look bad.
They hate Muslims, too, of course. Who said they did not?
Racism everywhere? Check. And check.
Bigotry? Of course!
Second most nationalistic country? Check. (Even though the answers made no sense whatsoever: they asked if being born in Hungary was very important to be Hungarian in a country which is surrounded by areas where one third of Hungarians still live. There is something seriously fishy with these results when the most nationalistic Hungarians are the ones who are the most aware of -and most care about- the Hungarian minorities living outside of the country.)
Is the Far Right taking over everything? Do I hear goosestepping blackshirts every day? Check. And check.
Fascists? Of course! Are they downright Nazis? Check. Even their football fans are Nazis? Of course they are!
The question is: how deserved all this? Are Hungarians really just Nazis, waiting to fire up the ovens to destroy anyone who is not like them? (As if in such a mixed nation it makes sense talking about racial purity.)
Well, according to this survey, not very. I might point out that this was done in 2015, at the height of the migrant/refugee crisis.
Here's an imperfect map representation of the results.
As we see Hungarians are not special in any way; they fall into the middle of the pack when it comes to tolerance/intolerance; hardly the country in the brink of a Nazi takeover.
The question rather is: why so many articles pushing distorted half-facts or straight-out lies to support this agenda? Why do they spend so much time and effort to demonise a small, inconsequential country?
I have to say I have no idea. If you know the answer, please let me know.
Rising antisemitism threatening all Jews in Hungary? Check. And check. And check. And check. And check. And check. (Again, which country are Jews fleeing from, and asking for special permits to carry weapons? I forgot. Perhaps someone could remind me.) It's so bad, we even need to lie about it to make it look bad.
They hate Muslims, too, of course. Who said they did not?
Racism everywhere? Check. And check.
Bigotry? Of course!
Second most nationalistic country? Check. (Even though the answers made no sense whatsoever: they asked if being born in Hungary was very important to be Hungarian in a country which is surrounded by areas where one third of Hungarians still live. There is something seriously fishy with these results when the most nationalistic Hungarians are the ones who are the most aware of -and most care about- the Hungarian minorities living outside of the country.)
Is the Far Right taking over everything? Do I hear goosestepping blackshirts every day? Check. And check.
Fascists? Of course! Are they downright Nazis? Check. Even their football fans are Nazis? Of course they are!
The question is: how deserved all this? Are Hungarians really just Nazis, waiting to fire up the ovens to destroy anyone who is not like them? (As if in such a mixed nation it makes sense talking about racial purity.)
Well, according to this survey, not very. I might point out that this was done in 2015, at the height of the migrant/refugee crisis.
Here's an imperfect map representation of the results.
As we see Hungarians are not special in any way; they fall into the middle of the pack when it comes to tolerance/intolerance; hardly the country in the brink of a Nazi takeover.
The question rather is: why so many articles pushing distorted half-facts or straight-out lies to support this agenda? Why do they spend so much time and effort to demonise a small, inconsequential country?
I have to say I have no idea. If you know the answer, please let me know.
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