Haras Rafiq: British, Canadian 'soft' counter-terrorism tactics have failed - "Canada’s systemic reluctance to tackle extremist ideology is coming home to roost. Two weeks ago, Edmonton gas station employee Khaled Hussein was convicted on multiple charges under Britain’s Terrorism Act alongside radical British preacher Anjem Choudary. Last week, the RCMP announced the arrest of a father and son, Ahmed Fouad Mostafa Eldidi and Mostafa Eldidi in Richmond Hill, Ont. on charges that include conspiracy to commit murder for the benefit or at the direction of ISIS. As a British Muslim counter-extremism expert, former advisor to Europol, numerous United Kingdom and United States governments and a current board member of Secure Canada, I am in a unique position to reflect on Canada’s evolving role in global counter-terrorism efforts. These recent events, and especially Choudary’s long career as an international extremist recruiter for terrorist organizations, serve as a poignant reminder of the transnational nature of extremism, the value of international cooperation and the urgent need to take this threat seriously. Choudary’s conviction and life sentence, while welcome, come too late. Having locked horns with him numerous times over the years, I can attest to the fact that his toxic ideology has been poisoning minds and radicalizing vulnerable individuals for decades. The harsh reality is that neither the U.K. nor Canada is winning the battle against extremism and terrorism, with hateful vitriol and intimidation tactics on full display in our streets, our public institutions and classrooms. Our efforts, while well-intentioned, have been marred by bureaucratic inertia, political correctness and a failure to address the root causes of radicalization. For years, Choudary exploited the very freedoms and legal protections that define our democratic societies to spread his message of hate. He walked a fine line, carefully avoiding explicit calls to violence while inspiring countless individuals to embrace extremist ideologies. Our legal systems, designed to protect freedom of speech, became unwitting accomplices to his agenda. Choudary was on the radar of British law enforcement for years and even spent some time in prison, but always found ways to skirt law enforcement by creating dozens of new entities to continue his global indoctrination project, a common tactic for extremist recruiters. In the U.K., we’ve seen the devastating consequences of extremism firsthand — from the 7/7 London bombings in 2005 to the murder of Lee Rigby, an off-duty soldier, in 2013, and beyond. Each tragedy has been followed by soul-searching and promises of reform, yet the fundamental issues remain unaddressed. Canada, while spared the scale of attacks seen in the U.K., is not immune to these threats. The 2014 attacks in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu and on Parliament Hill should have been a wake-up call. Instead, the response has been tepid, characterized by half-measures and a reluctance to confront uncomfortable truths about radicalization and extremist ideologies within our communities. Hussein, under Choudary’s tutelage, created digital content that glorified terror groups like ISIS and al-Qaida for a variety of platforms and extremist publications. He had been on the RCMP’s radar since 2019, but was only arrested when he travelled to London to meet with Choudary. When asked by the press why he needed to be arrested in the U.K., an RCMP assistant commissioner stated that travel to Britain presented an opportunity for him to be charged under the U.K.’s terrorism legislation. This raises questions about whether Canada’s legislative framework needs to be strengthened. Canada and the U.K. suffer from similar shortcomings in their counterterrorism approaches. Both are afflicted by chronic underinvestment and lack of systemic coordination on matters of national security, which contributes to inertia and inter-agency rivalries and hampers effective action — even when actionable intelligence is there. Each is hindered by a slow federal terror listing process, which cannot keep up with the proliferation of terrorist groups, domestically and internationally. Both work reactively to stop specific plots, rather than address and counter the ideologies that fuel them. This has allowed extremist ideas to spread, often unchallenged, in both physical and digital spaces. Diffused and misguided “soft” approaches to deradicalization are used in both countries. While community engagement is crucial, many of our counter-extremism and “deradicalization” programmes have proven ineffective because they focus disproportionately on social-emotional and economic factors, neglecting the ideological orientation that pushes individuals towards a certain kind of extremism. We need to be willing to have hard conversations and challenge extremist narratives head-on. It appears particularly difficult for Canadian and British governments and law enforcement to name Islamism specifically. (I am Muslim myself and it is essential to differentiate between Islam and Islamism.) British and Canadian laws often struggle to deal with the sophisticated and nuanced tactics of modern extremists. The Choudary case demonstrates how individuals can promote terrorist ideologies, constantly creating new organizations to evade prosecution for years. Despite efforts, both countries are losing the online war against extremism. Platforms continue to be exploited for radicalization, and our tendency to lean on influencers, PR specialists, psychologists and sociologists who do not understand the ideological drivers of extremism, has failed to move the needle. Finally, both the U.K. and Canada lack political leadership on speech and conduct that promote violence, and their misguided fears of appearing intolerant have even led to a disinclination to work with Muslim groups and individuals willing to name the prevalence of extremist ideologies within our own communities. The path forward requires a fundamental reassessment of our strategies"
Time to crack down on the "far right", because cracking down on Islamism is Islamophobic
National Newswatch on X - "Poilievre is seen leaving a RV with a drawing of the Diagolon flag on the door. According to RCMP, Diagolon is a militia-like network whose supporters subscribe to an "accelerationist" ideology - the idea that a civil war or the collapse of western governments is inevitable and ought to be sped up."
Even for the left, this is pretty impressive grasping at straws. But of course, if you push the left wing agenda and applaud a call to cut the throats of "Nazi fascists" and "get rid of them all", that means nothing
‘Don’t lecture me’: Eamonn Holmes shuts down GB News guest in fiery Union Jack row - "Holmes was leading a discussion about a row engulfing a Norfolk village, where some residents have expressed concerns over the divisiveness of flying a Union Jack over the village hall. Anti-racism activist Imarn Ayton and royal broadcaster and historian Rafe Heydel-Mankoo were invited into the studio to debate the topic, but things got particularly heated as the conversation developed between Ayton and Holmes. Heydel-Mankoo said the Union Flag is “about as British as warm beer” but Ayton made the point that the Union Jack is sometimes associated with far-right symbolism, which is why some people might find it divisive... “Be considerate of other people’s beliefs and views. If you are considerate and sympathetic of everyone and how we perceive the world, you might find yourself leading with equality. Just so you know, I’ll finish it there.”"
We are still told that left wingers don't hate their countries. Since everything the "far right" likes is bad, the "far right" should explicitlt promote life and the left will kill themselves to spite the "far right"
Ironically, left wingers are always trying to deplatform the "far right"
Lisa on X - "24 police officers are being treated after acid was hurled over them by Islamic extremists, during the pro terrorism rally today Throwing ACID over police is an act of terrorism I expect to see the Prime Minister and Head of ASIO on 6pm news tonight explaining this, otherwise the PM is complicit Never forget on Australia Day the counter terror squad held Nationalists on a train would not let them peacefully meet. The PM told us they were a threat - while these extremists were enabled by the government to protest in our national day"
Warning signs a side hustle job may be a scam - "DeGrippo says to be suspicious of any job that sends you a check before you start work. “That check is fraudulent, but because of the way the banking system works, our victim won’t know the check won’t be fully cashed until they sent that money back,” she said. At point, you have sent your own money out of your checking account to the scammer. DeGrippo says bogus side hustles include:
Secret shopper work
Personal assistant positions
Placing ads on your car to advertise a beverage or other product
Modeling, with no audition required"
Johan de Witt: That time the Dutch people ate their prime minister
How Fast Must You Drive Your Convertible To Stay Dry In The Rain? - "Mike goes on to explain that speed at which you must drive to stay dry depends on the car's shape. Specifically, the angle of the windshield. Cars like the Mazda Miata that have a steeper windshield can generate enough turbulence to deflect the rain at lower speeds, around 45 miles per hour or so. On the other hand, sleeker cars with windshields that are laid down nearly flat, like the Ferrari Portofino, have to go faster to achieve the same result. Some Mercedes-Benz convertibles actually employ wind deflectors at the top of the windshield frame that resemble miniature air brakes. They work to maximize laminar air flow while keeping turbulent air flow out of the cabin. In a rain storm, they can also keep you dry."
Meme - Reddit Lies @reddit_lies: "So there's an entire subreddit where Redditors talk about how much they want to r*pe conservative women..."
"Katie Pavlich says Socialism sucks but l...
I'd love to hatefuck this cunt's throat and fill it with salty loads
Make sure she swallows it :)
Right wing whores dont get to say no
So true! Plus it's hard to speak when your gagging on someones cock. Poor Katie Pavlich be tasting your warm cum all the way down her throat ;)
And the cunt will absolutely hate it being force fed cum against her will"
Weird. This is the side of empathy, decency and human kindness
This was from RightwingChicksNSFW: "This is a place for both ladies and gentlemen to talk about all the fun ways they want to punish or pleasure our cute political counterparts on the right ..."
Meme - *Man on fork*
Cow holding fork: "HA HAA! IT SEEMS THE TABLES HAVE TURNED."
Grass holding fork with cow on it: "HA HAA! IT SEEMS THE TABLES HAVE TURNED... AGAIN!"
Thread by @cremieuxrecueil on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "In the U.S., you are legally permitted to sell your blood plasma for money, but it's called "donation". In recent years, the numbers of places set up for donations has skyrocketed, and the amount they're compensating donors has followed suit. Let's dig in. Most of the visitors to these donation centers are highly local (A) People are also more likely to visit donation centers in census block groups (CBGs) that are marked by poverty (B) Why?
In surveys, donating plasma is predicted by being poor, Black, male, married, having kids, being a student, etc. In short, people who could really use an extra $150 twice a week for a minimal inconvenience are more likely to donate. We know this is true because we also have survey data indicating people's stated reasons for donating. Few people are donating altruistically. The top categories by far are about money! Take a look:
Now, before getting to the juicy result, I want to show one more thing: the impact of COVID stimulus checks on plasma donations. When the checks went out, the number of visits to plasma donation centers cratered. Donations plummeted because people had the cash they needed. Now here's the kicker: When plasma donation centers open up, local inquiries into predatory payday and installment loans falls off. People are seeking credit and donating blood might be how they get it. If we stratify these trends by age, we see that those with ages less than or equal to 35 - the less well-established - are the ones deciding to use blood plasma donations to offset the need for quick, dangerously high-interest cash, not those greater than 35 years old. When you look at payday transactions rather than inquiries alone, you get the same picture, albeit with more noise. Young people really do seem to be defraying the need for credit by selling (sorry, donating!) their blood plasma.
The reasons people sell their are also, evidently, not just to cover essentials. One of the clearest-cut impacts is that entertainment establishments see an increase in visits after blood plasma donation centers open up. That last part clarifies something: people would prefer not to get risky, high-interest loans, and they really want a little bit of extra cash. So while they will seek out those loans if push comes to shove, they're more likely to frivolously pursue blood donation. And that's good! We need blood plasma donations, so if paying people a bit of money makes that possible, so be it. If we take away that possibility, we can also see that it would make people's lives worse. How far can we take this? Maybe we can learn from Iran.
In the U.S., about 0.5-1% of the federal budget goes to dialysis: In Iran, there is a legal, regulated market in selling kidneys and it's such a good deal that the government even pays for the operations. It beats paying for dialysis! People are more than willing to sell their bodies in different ways that help their fellow citizens, from selling their blood plasma to pawning off a kidney. Given so many people want to do that, and so many people would benefit from it, the question is, why not? Frankly, I think we should just do it. The blood plasma donation model has been such a success and it's more than evident that organ payments could be too. Worried about corruption? Then regulate it well! Sources:"
German warship blasts the Darth Vader theme on the Thames - "Germany’s navy says there was "no deeper message” in the choice to blast the famed Imperial March — Darth Vader’s theme song in the “Star Wars” films — from one of its warships as it cruised down the River Thames through London... "The commander can choose the music freely," the navy said in a statement Thursday. “The choice of music has no deeper message.” Other video recorded the warship, the Braunschweig, playing “London Calling,” the 1979 hit from British rock band The Clash, upon its arrival in London. The song's title is drawn from the BBC World Service station identification in World War II and its lyrics include the lines, “London calling to the zombies of death/Quit holding out and draw another breath.”... The warship's commander “is a big ‘Star Wars’ fan and an admirer of the legendary musical scores of John Williams,” the embassy said in a statement. “He chooses a different Williams tune whenever his ship is visiting a foreign harbor.”"
Shrek, The Sheep Who Escaped Shearing for 6 Years - "Shrek was a Merino sheep, a castrated male, belonging to South Island, New Zealand, who gained international fame in 2004 owing to his gigantic coat of fleece. Shrek became famous after escaping his enclosure and evading the shearers for six years by hiding in caves. Merino sheep are usually shorn annually but Shrek managed to escape the blade for six years straight. When he was finally caught, the sheep was unrecognizable. “He looked like some biblical creature,” said John Perriam, Shrek’s owner. Primitive sheep shed most of their wool every year, but domestic breed like the Merino - the ones raised primarily for their meat, continues to grow wool year round until sheared. During his cave-living days, Shrek grew a fleece weighing 27 kg, roughly six times the average fleece produced by a Merino sheep. His fleece contained enough wool to make suits for 20 large men."
Crémieux on X - "The anti-fluoride crowd usually relies on studies of extremely low quality to make their case. One example that has stuck with me since I saw it was this: This study suggested that maternal fluoride exposure during pregnancy depressed the IQs of their children later on. There are multiple questionable results in this single graphical display of the study's findings and they throw the whole thing into question.
First, as you can see, the significant decrement they observed in IQs by maternal urinary fluoride concentrations was only observed in males, and not overall or in females. Why? Completely unclear, and marginally significant (p = 0.02). If we take it seriously, then the effect of a small amount of fluoride for those males was enormous. Each mg/L should reduce boys' IQs by 4.49 points. Males are so fragile! Second, look on the right now and you'll see that the difference in the IQs of kids in fluoridated and non-fluoridated communities was nonsignificant, but at the same time, the impact of maternal self-reported fluoride intake from beverages was significant. What a curious combination of results! And what a curious p-value for this main effect: 0.04. Third, did you notice the right plot, showing the alleged impacts of fluoride by maternal self-reported intake wasn't split by sex, but instead by something that failed to moderate the association? You could argue they did that to maximize the amount of information they showed in the set of graphs. OK, but I doubt it. More realistically, this happened because the sex interaction by maternal self-reported fluoride intake was nonsignificant.
This combination of results is extremely suspicious. It has all the hallmarks of being the result of a p-hacking expedition, and there are no indications that it should be regarded as a trustworthy finding indicating that we should be deeply concerned about fluoride. For one, the first result is a marginally-significant interaction with no biological plausibility. For two, this statistically unlikely and biologically dubious interaction fails to replicate. For three, these effects are enormous (yet barely significant despite a reasonable N and variance) for such small exposures. And for all the marbles, an effect that should have been present if the authors wanted us to take their reasoning about all of this seriously just wasn't. And despite demonstrating nothing, this is one of the better anti-fluoride studies. If you want to read the only study that has rigorously, causally looked into the impacts of fluoride in the typical range of exposures, check out: https://x.com/cremieuxrecueil/status/1826452344881516729
If you want to read this terrible study, first, guess where it was published. If you guessed @JAMAPediatrics , you're right! The link is here: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapediatrics/fullarticle/2748634 And if you're interested, I have another thread on a recent, awful study published in JAMAPeds, here: https://x.com/cremieuxrecueil/status/1825272744965034061"
Thai man is bitten on the testicles by a python while sitting on the toilet, leaving his bathroom sprayed in blood - "A man was bitten on the testicles by a huge python in Thailand, leaving his bathroom sprayed in blood as he desperately beat it to death with a toilet brush. Horrifying pictures show the aftermath of Thanat Thangtewanon's exchange with the 12ft reptile hiding in the U-bend of his home toilet... The father immediately went to a hospital to get a tetanus vaccine. He said doctors told him he would not need stitches as the wound was not deep enough to severe the skin and it would heal in a couple of weeks... Pythons attacking people using toilets have happened several times before in Thailand. In 2016, a resident Attaporn Boonmakchuay was ambushed by a 10-foot-long python while using a squat toilet in Chachoengsao province. His wife ran into the room upon hearing him scream, and helped prise the python's jaws from his penis. He passed out from blood loss, but survived after being treated at the Chularat Hospital. He replaced the squat toilet with a more modern version following the attack. In 2020, a housewife Boonsong Plaikaew was bitten on her buttocks by a python while sitting on the toilet bowl in Samut Prakan province. Volunteers gave her first aid and caught the snake which was later released into the wild."
Meme - "Asian Men Are Creating A Fatherless Africa"
"Glad to see the Chinese are assimilating into African culture."
Meme - "My roads look like this: *Major cracks*
So Pakistan's gender programs can look like this: *missiles*"
Suicide rates are up for Gen Z across the Anglosphere, especially for girls - "Over the last century, global suicide rates have been in decline, especially among older adults and particularly among those living in non-western nations. But this broad historical trend masks a very different story that emerges when we focus on adolescent girls in many Western nations. In all five Anglosphere nations, Gen Z girls and young women had the highest rates of suicide of any recent generation. The same was not true of Gen Z boys and young men... the spike in suicides among adolescent girls is so new and so large that it calls for intense efforts to identify the causes, and for efforts to change whatever is causing it. One of the most important facts about adolescent suicidality is that the motives among young people are often different than those among adults. Adolescents are much more likely to commit suicide as a result of interpersonal problems, while adults have more varied motivations—including illnesses and financial setbacks, as well as interpersonal reasons. There was one seismic shift in how interpersonal relationships work that fits the timing well: the global and simultaneous migration of adolescent social life onto smartphones and social media platforms, which happened roughly between 2010 and 2015. In The Anxious Generation, Jon shows that this evolution fundamentally altered the dynamics of interpersonal relationships, shifting childhood from one that was (generally) in-person, embodied, synchronous, and play-based to one that was (generally) virtual, disembodied, largely asynchronous, and phone-based. Since the early 2010s, stable in-person communities and relationships have rapidly disintegrated, as transient networks of low-investment relationships took their place. Figure 19 shows that American teens and young adults were already socially distanced from each other by 2019, before covid restrictions were imposed on them. The sudden switch from play-based childhood to phone-based childhood is—we believe—the leading candidate for being the major cause of the international collapse of adolescent mental health. The evidence of causation is particularly strong for girls. In fact, nobody has yet put forth an alternative theory—one that can explain why the same thing happened at the same time in so many countries. Jean Twenge recently considered thirteen such theories that have been proposed to explain trends in the U.S., and she showed that they don’t even work in the U.S., let alone internationally."
Meme - Michael / #PolderTheWash @_britmonkey: "Left: Argentine soldiers force a penguin to pose for a photo during the 1982 Falklands war.
Right: Penguin voluntarily stands to attention in the prescence of a British soldier. 🇬🇧🇫🇰🫡"
Sino-Forming South of the Border - "Broadband by itself doesn’t cause economic transformations, however. One gauge of the impact of broadband on economic life is the prevalence of electronic payments. In most of the industrial world, cash payments today are a small fraction of retail transactions; 10 years ago, they were the majority of all transactions. The following chart from the 2020 McKinsey Global Payments Report compares a group of developing and industrial countries: Among the big developing countries, only China has seen cash payments fall significantly, to just 41% of total in 2020 from 99% in 2010. Elsewhere in the developing the vast majority of transactions remain in cash. In the US, by contrast, cash has fallen to 28% of total from 51% 10 years ago, and in the Netherlands to 14% from 52%. What keeps Third World consumers in cash isn’t technology. It’s trust. Very few people pay taxes in developing countries. India for example has seven taxpayers per 100 voters, compared to 70 in the United States and nearly 100 in Sweden and Norway. Mexico and Argentina have about five taxpayers per 100 voters, while Turkey has three, according to India’s 2018 Economic Survey. Businesses remain small and under family management, because the owners trust no-one but blood relatives with the books. Households and entrepreneurs assume that if their corrupt and rapacious government finds out that they are making money, it will find a way to expropriate it. Most Mexicans work off the books, in the so-called informal economy, where no-one pays taxes, but no-one has access to bank loans or suppliers’ credits from established firms. Mexico doesn’t even have much of an idea where its people work; the last estimate of informal employment available from the government, was 61% of total, and that was back in 2004. As China demonstrated, you don’t need bank accounts to get people into the electronic payments system. China is one of the world’s least-banked countries, but one of the most advanced in terms of electronic payments. Turkey, where only 3% of voters pay income taxes, is one of the most-banked countries with 1.5 bank accounts per adult. The outcome is mixed in Mexico. The man with the PowerPoint at Huawei’s headquarters was right that the Chinese telecom giant could spread mobile broadband throughout Mexico at a low cost and improve quality of life. But it takes more than technology to lift people out of the vicious cycle of exclusion from the mainstream of economic life: It takes honest officials, a manageable tax burden and a minimum level of trust between government and governed. “Sino-Forming” the world through infrastructure is only half a plan. What China has accomplished inside its own borders is unique in world economic history. But miracles aren’t easy to export."
Canada’s productivity issues ‘could require structural change’: chief economist - "According to the report, productivity issues have been “broadly represented” in the goods sector of the economy since 2019. When looking at Canada’s productivity issues, the report said a “lesser discussed challenge” is Canada’s emphasis on construction investment which consistently experiences weaker productivity when compared to other industries. The report highlighted that although the issue is not a “uniquely Canadian problem,” the effects of construction-related productivity issues are amplified in Canada due to the “disproportionately large amount of resources dedicated to the sector.” “There are many factors at play outside of the commonly cited barriers associated with over-regulation and complex permitting processes. One of those is the disproportionate share of very small firms, where one-quarter have fewer than 20 employees,” Caranci said. Smaller firms are frequently slower to integrate new technologies compared to larger firms and often have thin margins that hinder risk-taking activity, the report noted. “Policymakers would have to think through an incentive structure to reward growth towards becoming larger, which hasn’t been the typical focus in Canadian policy,” the report said. Over the next five years, Canada’s economy is positioned to allocate more resources to the construction sector, according to Caranci, “which will amplify a weak productivity sector.”"
Frankly, We Do Give a Damn: The Relationship Between Profanity and Honesty - "There are two conflicting perspectives regarding the relationship between profanity and dishonesty. These two forms of norm-violating behavior share common causes, and are often considered to be positively related. On the other hand, however, profanity is often used to express one’s genuine feelings, and could therefore be negatively related to dishonesty. In three studies, we explored the relationship between profanity and honesty. We examined profanity and honesty first with profanity behavior and lying on a scale in the lab (Study 1; N = 276), then with a linguistic analysis of real-life social interactions on Facebook (Study 2; N = 73,789), and finally with profanity and integrity indexes for the aggregate level of U.S. states (Study 3; N = 50 states). We found a consistent positive relationship between profanity and honesty; profanity was associated with less lying and deception at the individual level, and with higher integrity at the society level."