Watching Hillary Clinton’s commencement address at Wellesley reminded me of my experience with the college which is just outside Boston. It’s on the Boston Marathon route about 7 miles into the 26-mile run. Passing Wellesley was a highlight because the students were out in force vigorously cheering on the women runners & I ran the marathon several times.

There was always some drama when I ran the marathon: like the coworker who kept insisting (even when he passed me on the route) that I wouldn’t make it but then faded out 6 miles from the finish line (unfortunately for him, I passed him at that moment); or the friend who wouldn’t speak to me again when I finished & she faded out; or wanting to stop & punch the lights out of all the misogynists commenting on women’s bodies as we passed (it was like an echo chamber & we could hear it all); or the time I set out two hours early so I wouldn’t finish last & ended up obstructing the world class runners coming up behind me; or the time I finished last accompanied with a 68-year-old woman & five Japanese foreign students whose friends put up a finishing tape for us when everybody else had gone home. We were on the 6 o’clock news as the losers.

I had such good feelings about the Wellesley students that when I was in my 50s & heard about a special scholarship for older students, I applied for it. Part of it entailed attending some classes & I chose some on the history of 1970s feminism. It was impressive to me that the young professor had a very accurate take on the history I had been part of making.

Part of the application process required samples of my writings which were especially copious from my trade union activities but I also had a bundle from my feminist work going back to 1970 (especially many articles on reproductive rights), work from civil rights & antiwar work. I left out the socialist stuff.

It was a very competitive scholarship so I was not surprised when I was turned down. Especially since I was twice the age of most applicants. But a friend suggested I inquire of admissions why I was refused. I wasn’t curious but did phone them to ask. The admissions officer reviewed my file & could have graciously said they selected more impressive candidates. Instead, she said I didn’t measure up to their intellectual standards. I burst out laughing & asked “Are you calling me stupid? You’re teaching history that I helped make.” And that was that.

My friend later said she wasn’t calling me stupid but that I wasn’t the kind of person Wellesley was looking for–not just in terms of youth but in terms of politics. It is after all the alma mater of Clinton, Madeleine Albright, & other such notables. Likely true but I didn’t need consolation & would never confuse the snooty admissions officer with the young students cheering on women runners.

I’m not one to live with regrets & this would be the least of them anyway. Often the impediments in life become detours to a better destination.

Fake news only has meaning in the context of fear-mongering & propaganda. If you learn how to vet sources & hunt down a story, even the lies can provide insights.

This is about nationalists & thugs circulating a video uploaded on April 2nd from Bangladesh which went viral. In the first two versions, it was described as Muslims killing a Hindu man in two different Indian states. In the third version, it is Kashmiri students killing a CRPF soldier.

Now it is claimed the video is an April 1st, 2017 incident in Bangladesh where unknown assailants killed one man & seriously injured another who were wanted for the murder of a Bangladeshi political figure.

In the interests of vetting sources, I don’t read the languages involved in the deception but there are millions who do & who have no vested interest in lying. That vetting can be done & should be before such scurrilous rubbish is circulated all over social media.
If nationalists thought they were on the side of justice they would have no need for dissembling & fabrication.

If you follow the links within this one, you will see how the story morphed into vilifying Muslims in India & Kashmiris:

https://www.altnews.in/video-bangladesh-circulated-kashmiri-students-killing-crpf-jawan/

Philippine president Duterte gave a pep talk last Friday to soldiers at a military camp on Mindanao island where he imposed martial law last week to crush “ISIS-linked” forces. In what can only be considered incitement to rape, he “jokingly” said that if any of them were to rape three women, he would personally claim responsibility so as to give them impunity.

This isn’t the first time Duterte has found rape amusing. During his election campaign last year he talked about a 1989 prison riot in Davao city (where he was mayor) when an Australian missionary was killed & inmates lined up to rape her. In another one of those hateful misogynist jokes women are familiar with, he said the victim was beautiful & he should have been first in line.

Now we understand Duterte’s affinities with Trump & the affinity of Assadists with Duterte. We can also understand if some Filipinos might consider ISIS the lesser evil.

Photo is Duterte exhorting the soldiers to rape.

(Photo is Presidential Palace/Handout via Reuters)

After being unable to access the website or reports of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS), I contacted Khurram Parvez via FB. He said the website has been under repeated virus attacks & they are in the process of repairing & transferring the site to another domain. But meanwhile we can access the JKCCS reports on their blog.

I cannot recommend the reports highly enough for their rigorous documentation, to understand the monstrous character of the occupation, & see the quality of human rights activism in Kashmir.

https://jkccs.wordpress.com/

“The more India legitimises institutionalised violence against Kashmiri Muslims, the right wing zealots in India will assume the job of lynching Muslims of India on their own. The State patronised bigotry will promote bigotry in India. Indians need to save India.”

–Khurram Parvez

The Ramadan prayer of Kashmiri human rights activist Khurram Parvez:

“We will fast from tomorrow for a month with a special prayer each moment, May God end the tyranny…”

Wanting to re-read the 2015 report titled “Structures of Violence: The Indian State in Jammu & Kashmir” co-authored by Khurram Parvez, I went to the website of the Jammu Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society (JKCCS). In that 800-page report, the JKCCS, the International Peoples’ Tribunal & Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons had documented cases of extrajudicial killings, forcible disappearances, & sexual violence back to the early 1990s.

I have accessed the JKCCS website countless times but every way I tried to access it today this warning alert came up disallowing me access.

What’s up with that?

I’m honored to have become friends with some Kashmiri doctors/rebels recently. Not because they’re doctors but because I respect so much their work in treating the victims of occupation, especially pellet gun victims, which must be emotionally & psychologically exhausting.

More than just their medical work, there were frequent photos last year of doctors & medical students protesting the use of pellet munitions & also protesting in solidarity with Syria, Palestine, Rohingya, & others.

We should take a moment to honor those men & women who see horrors the rest of us can’t even imagine, who treat them, & protest them.

Knew I’d seen that pucker-puss before: Nero (on the right) fiddled while Rome burned; Trump makes an ass of himself on the world stage while impeachment & criminal charges proceed at home.

Comparisons are boundless. Especially in derangement.

Got a friend request from a guy still hammering on about 9/11–as if life hasn’t moved way beyond that episode into full-blown Islamophobia. He had a post calling it a controlled demolition as part of an occult ritual to create a New World Order. He had me at occult. I had to let him go. We’re not going through those debates again.