SovereignState

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/1550739

"Gabon military officers claim power, say election lacked credibility Television announcement comes shortly after state election body announces incumbent Ali Bongo had won a third term as president.

A group of senior military officers has gone on national television in Gabon saying they have seized power because elections held over the weekend were not credible.

The officers, appearing on Gabon24 in the early hours of Wednesday morning, said they had cancelled the elections, dissolved all state institutions and closed the country’s borders.

They said they represented all security and defence forces of Gabon.

The announcement came shortly after the state election body said President Ali Bongo Ondimba had won a third term in office in Saturday’s disputed elections.

“In the name of the Gabonese people … we have decided to defend the peace by putting an end to the current regime,” the officers said.

The Gabonese Election Centre said Bongo had secured 64.27 percent of the vote compared with 30.77 percent for his main challenger Albert Ondo Ossa, after a process beset by delays.

Further Context: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/08/26/gabon-will-ali-bongo-ondimba-rule-for-another-five-years_6108971_4.html

"Gabon military officers claim power, say election lacked credibility Television announcement comes shortly after state election body announces incumbent Ali Bongo had won a third term as president.

A group of senior military officers has gone on national television in Gabon saying they have seized power because elections held over the weekend were not credible.

The officers, appearing on Gabon24 in the early hours of Wednesday morning, said they had cancelled the elections, dissolved all state institutions and closed the country’s borders.

They said they represented all security and defence forces of Gabon.

The announcement came shortly after the state election body said President Ali Bongo Ondimba had won a third term in office in Saturday’s disputed elections.

“In the name of the Gabonese people … we have decided to defend the peace by putting an end to the current regime,” the officers said.

The Gabonese Election Centre said Bongo had secured 64.27 percent of the vote compared with 30.77 percent for his main challenger Albert Ondo Ossa, after a process beset by delays.

Further Context: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/08/26/gabon-will-ali-bongo-ondimba-rule-for-another-five-years_6108971_4.html

MAJOR SPOILERS FOR THE ENTIRETY OF DS9 THROUGHOUT

Okokok.

This is the first post in a series I plan to make depending on interaction.

I really want to delve deep into Marxist-Leninist's thoughts regarding these important issues affecting all of us in the Alpha quadrant.

Issues such as...

The Maquis. They're explicitly named after a French resistance group that included prominent communist leadership. They do a lil terrorism to preserve their land that was ceded to the enemy. This included their homes and farms.

But like are they kinda actin' like kulaks rn?

It's explained to us that all of the settlers were offered free and immediate resettlement. The Maquis refused on ideological grounds... in perhaps unfairly literal terms, their right to property. They could have been just as comfortable or even moreso had they took the Federation up on its offer, but their personal "connection to the land" (that was once again, a settlement or colony) is making them refuse to relocate.

Refusing to relocate threatens peace for the entire Federation. Cardassians, who have fought a long and bloody war in living memory against the Federation, now have an intergalactically recognized right to the land, including from the Federation itself. There is a horrible regional conflict playing out between settlers of either side and it seems to many like the Federation is too weak or too foolish to protect its people any longer.

Ben Sisko, in a chat with Eddington (IIRC), insinuates that he no longer believes that the correct choices were made when it came to the Maquis' existence or the plight of the settlers. I see a couple of things that could have happened had things turned out differently, from the Maquis becoming a paramilitary wing of the Federation (a la Azov in Ukraine, except this time it's based and not neo-Nazis), to the Federation actually affording a higher level of security in the region to protect against violence instead of letting Cardassian "peacekeepers" allow murder to occur.

What do you think of the Maquis, though? I synpathize with the connection element, but when we are aware that they were offered free, comfortable resettlement it certainly demystifies their ideological foundation.

I liked Section 31 and even found myself mostly agreeing with them and supporting their existence within the universe.

Starfleet Intelligence exists, of course. But intelligence can only go so far. An officially unaffiliated group that can bend the rules to defend the Federation, to defend fucking Eden, Gaia, the paradise that Earth has become is incredible! By any means necessary!

Ehheheh. Then, the attempted fucking genocide.

Oh, bother. I believe the showrunners intended to demonstrate in part how self-proclaimed "strong men who protect weak men" willing to justify the means at any cost tend not to be great, and giving these people completely unchecked power to kill and destroy is probably a bad idea. A major theme in the show is that killing and destroying is usually a bad idea anyway, so.

What do you think? Section 31: based successors of their NKVD and Stasi ancestors, or disturbed feds attempting to recreate the foreign policy of a thankfully long dead Amerika? Does their portrayal as le not epic genociders rub you the wrong way at all -- a bit Kilmonger-y maybe?

I wanna see some intense ass critique, comrades. I wanna see those downvotes pop off. 👎👎👎

They asked what our starting pay is. Funny thing is, I don't even remember. I could theoretically do the math backwards from paystubs, but eh. I know how much to expect.

Regardless, I said somewhere around 13 dollars, but the company I work for is unionized so the shit pay is offset a little bit by ensured basic rights like the ability to actually take breaks, unlike any of my previous workplaces. Coworkers are awesome, even management's tolerable.

They said they worked for a place that was "worker-run" but then it stopped being so worker-run so they quit. Then they said Walmart of all places had started hiring at 17 an hour, all positions, so that was still their first choice.

To see a small wage increase (not even to a livable wage) sway a worker in real time against the right to negotiate with their employer as workers collectively... bruh. It just sucks.

I once worked for a pharmacy where I made $16.50 an hour and I consider it one of the worst jobs in the world. It was so alienating, I had intrusive thoughts like

etc. etc. It's maybe a bit worrisome that I remember that feeling so intensely, I don't know. At the same time, those thoughts and my internal battle against them were instrumental in creating a fundamental understanding in me that wages are not worth your sanity, your ability to take breaks, your ability to call in, your ability to take or leave more work at your request.

I am so grateful for my new job tbh, cringe as it may be. I am learning to enjoy labor for labor's sake. Making actual, meaningful connections with people. And I get to take breaks, in fact I am forced to take a break. This is because we have a union.

I don't know if Walmart conditions have improved generally... but every time I've been inside a Walmart, I've thought to myself *If I ever find myself working here, I am going to redacted myself. I'll have to."

I don't know. I'm having a strange time with it all. Unions are good, and I'm beholding a part of the struggle in real-time. Thanks for reading or even skimming 🫡

Don't work at Walmart if you don't have to, kids.

Throughout the entirety of the date, everything was reciprocated. There was, uncommon for me, even unprompted active flirtation from the person in question when the present conversation was not necessarily flirtatious - random sweet things.

It lasted over four hours. We talked about our intentions, our interests, our passions, our traumas. There were two hour+ phone calls prior to the date that contained much of the same personal conversation.

They asked me to kiss them, prompted only by the vibe of sitting on a park bench by a river surrounded by geese enveloped in the reflections of the sun on the ripples of said river. This has never happened to me before, I have always been the instigator - always the asker, never the asked - it was not considered a masculine or attractive trait during my childhood to be asked. I obliged. We kissed quite a few more times the rest of the night, by my initiative and theirs.

They complimented parts of myself that I hate, or at least find hard to love - my nose, my freckles, my hair. They made me feel both seen and beautiful and I did my best to reciprocate. I have not felt this way in years, I can't remember the last time I felt this way. It is only a first date, I know this. I know this. For like 50% of the date we were laughing and planning our second date, a potential third. We had talked about how things may change the more comfortable we became with one another, like hanging out at each others' houses. They talked about getting me a birthday present.

Date ends. Get home. We text about how wonderful the date was, when our schedules would align well next - the sooner the better. Two hours since the last message was sent, I see:

I am taken aback but I think, ok, sometimes these things happen. Rejection would be one thing. I wrote a message saying it was totally ok but I just wanted to know if it was possible to remain friends, and if they were comfortable telling me if I did anything wrong or could have done something better, but they had already blocked me on everything. I just don't understand. I'm starting to feel like something is seriously fucking wrong with me.

We had shows we agreed to watch together, games we agreed to play, and music we agreed to share. All gone in an instant without any recourse or explanation.

Am I acting entitled? Is this an extreme reaction to something trivial? I've been crying for a while. I've always considered myself an open book but I shared deeply personal things with this person. The connection was instant and nigh tangible.

I just wanted someone or some people to talk to. Most of my friends won't care. I'm living out of a hotel for now. I returned to this horrible, disgusting room with a smile on my face. I was ready to get some rest and do what needed to be done tomorrow with that same smile. Now it's 2am and I just lie here staring at the ceiling through soaked eyes tuning out the hotel cable until infomercials become little more than meaningless gibberish.

I'm trying to get better. I feel so fucking alone. They probably had a good reason for ending it so abruptly. Maybe they were scared of retaliation because I'm a man. I just wish I could know why. Is this type of hurt so fucking typical for "casual" dating? I am so drained, it's a fucked up thing to say but I wonder about chemical castration sometimes. Is there something similar for "romantic attraction", too? Because if this is at all typical, I'm ok. Count me out. I'm an adult and I still feel like a scared little kid.

On S4 E16, time 17:48, but I had to pause the episode to talk about this. Beware spoilers throughout.

Are you KIDDING ME? Part of a small lingering complaint I've had in my head is that they have been somewhat understandably shy about using many opaquely radical terms: communism, socialism, revolution, etc. But now we're going ham into pro-union storytelling with no shame and no relent.

How can this show keep getting exponentially based-er? They can't keep getting away with it!

I was not aware that scifi could be this good.

Only on S1 E17 ("only" as if I didn't start watching this like 3 days ago) and I'm told it only gets better. It has not disappointed me yet even with its wildest shit.

Blows my mind that this came out in 1993. It feels like communist art. Diplomacy first, always. Profiteering is disgusting and condemnable and humans should have no desire to do it, to the extent that it would be literally alien to us to fuck over others just for economic gain. The Bajoran politics are fascinating and, like I said, I love Kira and stan whatever carbombings she had to do to win independence.

Also, the Cardassians are fucking horrifying and look like animated and decaying Greco/Roman statues. I get major Rome and Amerika vibes from them, though the Ferengi are also quite Amerikan.

Can't believe I've put off Star Trek for this long. Also can't believe there was ever a freakin' debate between whether Star Trek or Star Wars is better, I'm feeling a radical difference in tone. In DS9 at least, there's rarely been le good guys and le bad guys the way there is in Star Wars especially post-Disney. I feel Star Wars also plays up the heroic fantasy to the 14th level, which is ok, but not necessarily interesting aside from visually, at least to me.

Anyway, I love this show and would like to see what people wanna say about it.

Just weird times we live in. I didn't not expect this from CGTN necessarily, I guess I'm still pleasantly surprised.

I'm not crying, you're crying. 😭

Damn moving speech. ¡Hasta la victoria siempre!

Jimmy "Juche" Carter arc?

This is horrific, straight up fascist terrorism. Only gonna get worse.

Five killed, 18 injured in Colorado Springs gay club shooting.

Can't wait for all the thoughts and fucking prayers. Can't wait for the hand-wringing about guns and not about the hateful ideology being tube-fed down the throat of Amerika's collective psyche. Can't wait for the pathologization and mental-health scapegoating. Can't wait for absolutely nothing to be done, ever.