Vivat Libertas

Israel invited to join UN Human Rights Council's Western nations group - Diplomacy and Defense Israel News | Haaretz

Taylan Kulaçoğlu Sent to Prison - Bianet

It occurs to me that I really, really don’t mind staying up till midnight doing maths; in fact, I actually quite enjoy it. Yes, you heard me correctly – I am that strange, unnatural and perhaps slightly broken person who genuinely enjoys mathematics. I’ve talked about it before, I think, how I consider maths an elegant and beautiful language to work with. But more than that, it’s just…well…it’s fun. I find it a very natural language to work in, and I enjoy learning more and more of its grammar and vocabulary every day. It calms me down when I need to relax and fires me up when I see something new. More than anything, it just makes sense: from the relatively simple equation F=m dv/dt to the beauty that is Euler’s relation, it’s elegant and precise and, to my mind, deeply intuitive.

So. Three years. I'm sitting here writing this feeling absolutely knackered and not in the mood to write, to be honest. I haven't had the time or inclination to do so. Not for a very long time. My depression's picked up and I now function much better. My life's picked up a lot too: I'm a lot more outgoing and social despite an anxiety condition that means spending too long in loud places makes me agitated. I have more friends now, through poking my head out of the shelter and self-contained society that is my school. I'm going steady with my boyfriend and just saw him off at the station after a weekend enjoying Christmassy shit in London, seeing Jeeves and Wooster (it's hilarious), and going on bus adventures. And, of course, it's my final year at school, which means work and anxiety over going to university - though I've got an offer from Manchester. So between working hard and having an actual social life, I don't know how much time I'

CyberGuerrilla soApboX » Anonymous Open Letter to the Corrupt Regarding Jeremy Hammond

Prada, suicide and sexual harassment: A whistle-blower speaks out This is one of many, many reasons I have no love for the fashion industry.

Million Mask March ‘Anonymous’ Activist Arrested At White House NEEDS YOUR HELP : We broke the story on the arrest of 'Anonymous' activist Michael Stxs, thanks to our sources on the ground at the Million Mask March in Washington D.C. this November 5th...

Vietnam brushes off criticism of its UN human rights council bid | Bangkok Post: breakingnews

The stolen children of India - In Depth - Al Jazeera English

This post mentions (in passing) biphobia, transphobia, cissexism, ableism against mentally ill people and the infamous use of "go kill yourself" as a debating tactic. If any of this stuff triggers or upsets you, you might want to stay away. Something that pisses me off, at least some of the time, is when people talk about fee-fees. For those of you who have never heard the term, it's a derogatory term used to mock people who derail conversations by talking about their feelings. Most of the time, I feel it's a perfectly justified term. As someone who's mentally ill (and I know this is an example most people wouldn't use, but I can give others), I know that sometimes if I or other people start talking about just how crappy being sick actually is, or how some sane people are absolute dickwads about mental illness, a sane person might talk about how it upsets them to hear about someone else's mental state, or how not every  sane person is like that and y

So every time a new album or novel or TV show comes out by some upstart no-one's ever heard of (rare enough as it is), the creator is instantly hailed as the voice of a generation depending on their age. People are absolutely obsessed with this concept of creators speaking for the ordinary person, with the idea that you find some band or novelist when you're 14 or 15 who like, totally gets your teenage angst and how you're so totally not like the others. However, these media are sufficiently generalist in scope that they manage to attract a significant number of suspiciously similar misfits, who then create a subculture based around being able to keep up with the same stuff. You guys are lucky. You will never need to develop the skills to speak for yourself, because there'll always be someone there to put the words in your mouth. You will always have someone else to speak for you, someone to speak for your generation. I am a part of my generation. I'd be s

I wrote this in a fit of irritation. I have some big, big privileges that affect my view on allies - namely, I won't get shit from as many of the privileged classes because of my own privileges. If I were less privileged, maybe I'd also be less trusting. Shockingly, I don't have that much of a problem with allies. "But how can this be?!" you gasp. "You must be a white cisgendered healthy straight rich upper-class male who lives in your country of origin, you piece of shit! How dare you speak for us!" Well, nice try, but no. While I admit to being very privileged in the interests of honesty and full disclosure, I'm also an immigrant, bisexual, mentally ill and a woman. There are still some battles in this world that I have to fight for myself, and let me tell you that I don't take that much pleasure in fighting them. This is where allies come in. I don't like it when men (and some women) act like misogynist twatwads, sane people