Category Archives: Transhuman News

Mask Fan Attic: Bug Eyed
DR LADY discusses a Don Post "human fly" mask.

By: MASKWIZARD

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Mask Fan Attic: Bug Eyed - Video

Pic: AP.

By Thitipol Panyalimpanun

In the past several weeks Thailand has witnessed a series of incidents that altogether signal the beginning of the publics shift in perception. Slowly, Thais are becoming more and more concerned about the abuse of human rights, freedom and democracy. Now, Thai liberals have a reason to be optimistic despite the continuous oppression by the junta. A whiff of change is in the air.

It began with the public broadcast service Thai PBS on November 15 when it was reportedly pressured by the junta to, and eventually did, replace program host Nattaya Wawweerakup after she questioned the coup. The incident kicked off a campaign by her fellow Thai PBS fellow journalists in which they closed their eyes, ears and mouths as a protest symbol on social media. Thai PBS, which had been considered by many as pro-coup, now stood against the junta. And this was just a starter for that very busy week for Thai politics.

Several days later, on November 19, while junta leader General Prayuth Chan-ocha was giving a speech in Khon Khaen, five university students flashed the Hunger Games three-finger salute. These students from the Dao Din movement were then taken to a military camp to get their heads fine-tuned. They still managed to show the three fingers everywhere, on the police truck that took them away and in front of the camp, rollicking like rockstars. Coming long after the first waves of demonstration against the junta, this protest resonated in other parts of the country, including the 11 Bangkok students who symbolically picnicked in front of the Democracy Monument that same evening.

A protester shows the three-finger salute during an anti-coup demonstration in Bangkok earlier this year. Pic: AP.

Then National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) chief Amara Pongsapitch spoke out against martial law and the arrest of the student protestors. Although this sounds like a fitting action for a person of her position, it in fact came as a surprise. This was the first time Amara took a clear stance against the juntas oppression since May 22. Last Saturday, when Amara was presenting awards for contribution to human rights, of which a representative of the Dao Din movement was a recipient, the ceremony was disrupted by students again showing up with banners protesting the NHRCs lack of action. Where were you when people were taken to camps? being an example of the criticisms. Yet, from a broad view, that six-month-late remark she eventually made still spoke volumes, implying that the total compliance the junta had been enjoying was not set in stone.

After the May 22 coup and the following crackdown on academics and activists, many fled to social media. Facebook has become a hotbed of commentary and opinion from liberal advocates. On November 22, there was collective ecstasy online when the social media heard of Somsak Jeamteerasakul s return to Facebook. The outspoken Thammasat University professor has always been quick to cricize Thailands draconian the lse majest law and had disappeared from the scene since the coup (his house was the target of gunfire in February. The rapture went beyond the Internet as Thammasat students threw flyers celebrating his comeback. With Somsak joining forces with vocal advocates like The Nation journalist Pravit Rojanaphruk and Fah Diew Gan magazines editor Thanapol Eawsakul, Facebook became even more active on the Thai political front.

The junta knows well theres no easy way in stopping this online information, as demonstrated when it allegedly tried and failed to shut down access to Facebook in Thailand. When newspapers and TV are busy with self-censorship, social media probes and speculates.

In this series of incidents, extreme royalists too were triggered to question their support of the lse majest law after the arrest of the police officers and relatives of Princess Srirasmi, as Reuters reported, who were charged for citing the monarchy for benefit and were later stripped of their royal surname. While the story was reported internationally, major news outlet could only beat around the bush. Before the event concluded last week with the then princesses resignation from the royal position, the ambiguity surrounding the issue has put the public at unease. This is not to mention the significant rise of the lse majest cases, which are now handled by the military court, including the imprisonment of 23-year-old Pornthip M. for her political play about a fictional monarch in August.

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Opinion: Post-coup oppression teaches Thais a lesson in human rights

The Human League, who played Bristol's Colston Hall on Monday night

For a short while during the Human Leagues packed Colston Hall show, frontman Philip Oakey comes close to self-parody.

Standing in the centre of a white tiered stage, in front of a giant screen pumping out sci-fi visuals, wearing a tightly-fitting Matrix-style suit and frowning with his immaculately-coiffed eyebrows, the 59-year-old singer chants recent tune Egomaniac.

The song is from their latest album, 2011s Credo, but seems completely new to many of the fans filling the venues stalls and balcony, who mostly nod along politely to this snatch of new material.

While some bands would run the risk of losing a crowds good will with this kind of move, the Human League manage to get away with it.

This is partly because Oakey looks like he appreciates the silly side of it all, flipping as he does between serious poses and knowing smiles with the audience.

But more importantly, its because the band spend the rest of the gig giving the crowd what they clearly want: the larger-than-life pop songs which propelled the band to fame in the first place.

As the night goes on, Oakey and long-serving backup singers Joanne Catherall and Susan Ann Sulley perform hit after hit with only a few detours to more recent fare. Eighties classics like the introspective Mirror Man, the political The Lebanon, and hypnotic the Love Action are all met with whoops.

But it is the bands international mega-hit Dont You Want Me which gets almost everyone on their feet, clapping and singing along after the first few keyboard stabs.

Oakey still sounds quite menacing when he sings Don't forget it's me who put you where you are now, and I can put you back down too to Catherall and Sulley who he famously plucked from a Sheffield night club.

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The Bristol Post published Human League at Bristol's Colston Hall; Review

Blog

Jean R. AbiNader, Exec. Dir., Moroccan American Trade and Investment Center

For several years, I have been commenting on the challenges in assessing human rights progress without a more comprehensive understanding of how the people affected define human rights. This applies as well to evaluating development efforts tied in large part to democracy promotion - whether it's the Marshall Plan, the progenitor of post-war reconstruction, or funding water reclamation projects in the Sahel.

This theme is echoed in an article by Professor Eric Posner of the University of Chicago, who takes on the issue of defining and defending human rights without a grounding in the milieu in which these rights are operationalized. His aim is not only to encourage the human rights reporting community to undertake their own assessment of their efficacy - much as development experts have been forced to do - but to give them ways to legitimately help governments improve their human rights.

This has important resonance for a country like Morocco, where development and democracy goals go hand in hand in building a sustainable, inclusive, and equitable society based on Morocco's unique, local cultural ethos.

Unfortunately, for human rights monitors, it is far easier to focus on a few issues that become criteria for a human rights report than to recognize that each culture manages its priorities in the context of its national needs and aspirations. This can be quite challenging to assess since, according to Posner, "In most countries people formally have as many as 400 international human rights. The sheer quantity and variety of rights, which protect virtually all human interests, can provide no guidance to governments. Given that all governments have limited budgets, protecting one human right might prevent a government from protecting another."

While some may counter that there must be universal standards otherwise there are no comparative criteria for assessing human rights, Posner says that "the problem is not entirely one of moral pluralism. The real problem is the sheer difficulty of governance, particularly in societies in the throes of religious and ethnic strife that outsiders often fail to understand. There are many legitimate ways for governments to advance people's wellbeing and it is extremely hard for outsiders to evaluate the quality of governance in a particular country."

So what can be done?

While the work of international human rights groups is to be commended for its altruism, oftentimes the impact of their efforts is to distort perceptions of the host countries among international organizations and the donor community. Given the universe of acknowledged human rights (political, economic, social, institutional, religious, associative, property, etc., etc.); the differing cultural, ethnic, historical, and contemporary conditions in countries; and the limitations of resources and infrastructure; how does an analyst determine what advice to give countries regarding what their priorities and policies should be?

The first step: Rather than generating reports that generalize from a handful of cases to a blanket charge of malfeasance without a realistic understanding of the context for human rights priorities, organizations should maximize the benefits of an open dialogue with liberalizing countries such as Morocco. Morocco is more than willing to engage in a respectful, balanced exchange. The country's commitment has been emphasized time and time again by King Mohammed VI, who places the people at the heart of Morocco's development - economic, social, human, and political - and he strongly supports promoting rights in a way that makes most sense for his country's unique circumstances. It seems that this openness would lead to greater collaboration to enhance and enshrine human rights regimes grounded in local values and realities.

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Morocco: Grounding Human Rights in Local Aspirations - Jean Abinader