The Current Events Thread

[Syobon]

Protests going on in Brazil, police responding with disproportionate violence.

[Exeres]

[Lambeth]

Exodus International, the biggest anti-gay therapy organization in the world, has disbanded. Right in the middle of a big conference they were having too.

[TheStranger]

Did they realize they were essentially a hate group hiding behind the veener of civility?

[Lambeth]

The current leader did anyway. Don't know if the rest of the organization is with him.

[Lambeth]

Everyone should read this, it's absolutely disgusting.

[Reyo]

As fucked as it sounds, I'm not surprised. Since joining, I've found more to take shame at in how the organization conducts itself than reasons to be proud. The more I stay in, the more I see the same horse and pony show I saw in High School after I graduated.

More focus placed on showing off the stronger members and schuffing the weaker ones under the rug just to make themselves look good (you know, as opposed to training the weaker ones to make them stronger).

Leadership and trust being blindly placed in rank rather than the individual's character.

Character not even being taken into account when it comes to rank being given, making it where less than decent individuals are given that seniority (like rank being used as a conversation ender rather than the wisdom that would have neen used to produce that rank).

Exercises in leadership being turned into gladatorial competitions that ultimately end up fracturing the comradery of the lower enlisted ranks.

Punitive action being based on how bad the individual made his leadership look rather than designed to prevent further infractions.

It comes and goes in waves. A majority of the time, we're a well oiled machine, but then you hit a rough patch and all of the shit hits the fan. The main problem is that the "majority of the time" can be very slim.

[Syobon]

US and NSA accused of criminal privacy violations in dozens of countries -- Snowden blowback

This is a poorly written and sensationalist article, but it still does a good job illustrating the importance of the international incident that is the NSA scandal.

[SaintCrazy]

And then the US wonders why no other country is helping them extradite Snowden.

"Guys, he's a criminal, we're the good guys here... guys?"

[Exeres]

And every news source that I know of here is completely on the government's side, ignoring all of this fallout and simply reporting that the US is having a hard time extraditing a criminal and announcing that "US-[whatever country] relations WILL suffer." Like they give a shit about our passive-aggressive pseudo-threats.

[SaintCrazy]

Yeah that's why I don't watch the news anymore.

[Madican]

US and NSA accused of criminal privacy violations in dozens of countries -- Snowden blowback

This is a poorly written and sensationalist article, but it still does a good job illustrating the importance of the international incident that is the NSA scandal.

You're not kidding about the adjectives you chose. Reads more like a conspiracy theory than journalism. There are some good points to it though, namely that the rest of the world is not going to stand for this happening.

I never like discussing American politics because it just reminds me of how powerless the common man is. We don't influence the laws, we don't even know who most of the politicians are, and the only times we ever manage to stop something controversial from happening is not through appealing to the common sense but riling up the population to threaten the re-election of those politicians. We're just votes to them and it takes a whole lot before they'll actually listen.

[Exeres]

Yeah that's why I don't watch the news anymore.

Neither do I, but my parents do, and it makes it fucking impossible to explain what is actually going on.

[TheStranger]

I want to stop watching the news, its the same shit over and over. A metaphor for life, really. Same shit, different day

[Madican]

Snowden gave a plane full of journalists the slip and now no one knows where he is. Journalists piled onto the plane, found the empty seat reserved in his name, and got shipped off to Cuba.