hunger

The rapid growth of knowledge
Cultural evolution depends on the non-genetic storage, transmission, diffusion and utilization of information. The development of human speech, the invention of writing, the development of paper and printing, and finally, in modern times, mass media, computers and the Internet: all these have been crucial steps in society’s explosive accumulation of information and knowledge. Human cultural evolution proceeds at a constantly-accelerating speed, so great in fact that it threatens to shake society to pieces.

Question One. In 1990, twenty percent of all children in the US lived in poverty. What percent of the children in the US live in poverty today?
A: Ten percent
B: Fifteen percent
C: Twenty percent
Question Two. The median wealth of black households in the US is $11,000. What is the median wealth of white households?
A: $22,000
B: $62,000
C: $141,000

You and I constitute the very system that we blame for the world’s problems, which is starkly illustrated at Christmas when we rob our fragile earth on the high streets in the name of Jesus. What better way to celebrate the birth of Christ this year than to unite under the banner of freedom and justice, and peacefully demonstrate for an end to hunger and poverty across the world, writes Mohammed Mesbahi.
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How can we bring about an awareness that sharing is the solution to a planetary crisis, and our last remaining hope for rehabilitating a divided world? Central to this question is the problem of ‘isms’, in which our complacency has intellectualised itself in order to justify its existence as being normal.

In Part 1 of the World of Resistance (WoR) Report, I examined today’s global order – or disorder – through the eyes of Zbigniew Brzezinski, a former U.S. National Security Adviser and long-time influential figure in foreign policy circles. Brzezinski articulated what he refers to as humanity’s “global political awakening,” spurred by access to education, technology and communications among much of the world’s population.

Oregon voters in two counties voted against GMOs, against Monsanto. That’s 2 to 1 in favor of protecting organic farmers, communities, farmers and our health from pollan and seeds of the Frankenstein variety.
Vermont has signed the nation’s first GMO-labeling law, effective July 2016 (again, incremental, slide-side change — labels — but it’s something, nonetheless).

Internationally ignored, life in Eritrea is brutal and shrouded in secrecy. The world is indifferent. The regime trusts nobody – even the UN’s special rapporteur on Eritrea, Sheila Keetharuth, has been denied a visa.

When Prime Minister David Cameron pulls a stunt or announces a “ground breaking” new policy, it is pretty well guaranteed to backfire. Indeed, his coalition government policy U-turns are heading for encyclopedic.

This week:
1. Warming up police intelligence
2. A hungry man is an angry man
3. Farm land not airports
4. Vintage riot porn: The battle for Narita

Two weeks ago in a room in Kabul, Afghanistan, I joined several dozen people, working seamstresses, some college students, socially engaged teenagers and a few visiting internationals like myself, to discuss world hunger. Our emphasis was not exclusively on their own country’s worsening hunger problems.  The Afghan Peace Volunteers, in whose home we were meeting, draw strength from looking beyond their own very real struggles.