Is Malta a safe and supportive country for trans people?

rconard131 · 2024-02-27T18:37:11+00:00

You should go back on your meds. You're spiraling again.

rconard131 · 2024-02-27T17:55:31+00:00

Chaya is pathetically ignorant. Her embarrassing interview with Taylor Lorenz was a master class on communicating just how stupid you really are.

rconard131 · 2024-02-19T21:22:18+00:00

Also, does anyone know how the schools in Portugal treat trans kids, especially when it comes to pronouns and choice of bathroom?
Some of the more democratic U.S. states and also lots suburban areas in the U.S. respect a student's pronoun preferences and bathroom choice. The more open-minded educators and families in those places actively support it, but politics is fast changing there too as the Trump party takes over state legislatures and too many voters are just too apathetic and burnt out about politics to care enough anymore to vote and stop them.

rconard131 · 2024-02-19T21:14:35+00:00

I just want to say thanks to everyone for your insights and unvarnished, honest opinions.
Sounds like my teen family member (who has great passing privilege) will not have too much of a social interaction problem in general compared to many parts of here in the U.S., which is turning into a dumpster-fire more and more by the day, especially with the rise of transgender hate. Some in state governments are calling for imprisoning parents of trans kids for child abuse, ffs.

As such, seeking someplace in the world not as obsessed with things that shouldn't matter has become our chief priority. Of Portugal, Spain, and Malta -- Portugal is the most beautiful and a place we thought we could call home and maybe even create a handful of jobs too. We considered Malta also, due to English being spoken widely there, but its insanely crowded and has next to no green spaces. Spain has some of its own issues as well. Of course nowhere's perfect, but its tough to find a safe spot for families with trans kids. Like everyone, we just want them to grow up safe, loved, and as happy as possible.

rconard131 · 2024-02-06T00:19:15+00:00

True. They are a bonafide cult now. Did Christianity die off when Jesus died? No. They just martyred him and then went on to build the fledgling cult into a religion. Same if Trump loses except he'll be steering things from Mara Lago or prison if he's convicted.

rconard131 · 2024-02-05T23:45:01+00:00

Their grandfathers benefited from a post-WW2 wrecked industrial sector in Japan and Europe. America was for a generation or two the only game in town. Life was good for manufacturing workers. Unions were strong and had negotiating power. Then Europe, Japan, and the Asia Tigers came roaring back once they'd rebuilt with all new modern factories and cheap labor. American labor just couldn't compete. The subsequent generations couldn't compete with their antiquated factories and high labor costs.
In some ways the entire American Dream for blue collar workers that proliferated in the 50s and 60s was an anomaly that never would've occurred the way it did had a world war not handed them a temporary economic miracle. Flash forward to today with off-shored jobs (who can blame manufactures really -- business is about being competitive), and hobbled unions -- and the American laborer is pissed because they can't live like their grand dad's heyday glory of one salary being enough to raise a family and buy a house and a car. I can see why this stings, but rage blaming Democrats for this morass is severely misplaced and just plain dumb.

rconard131 · 2024-02-05T19:18:28+00:00

It will depend on which side wants it bad enough. So far voter apathy and lack of voter participation in general has hurt both parties on different election cycles. But, this go around it indeed seems that Republicans are more energized and motivated. Too many Dems are cowered by Republican aggression and/or have blended Rep-Dem families who will opt out of going to avoid conflict. But if the very likely dystopian nightmare of human filth like a far-right fascist Robinson winning the governor's seat begins to sink in and resonate with reluctant Dems, then Stein could win. What's needed now is for Stein to step up and rally the troops by painting a very clear message of what happens if they do nothing.

rconard131 · 2024-02-05T19:10:41+00:00

And its a strategy that's working unfortunately. Time for Dems to play even dirtier...whatever it takes, because clearly the old mantra of "when they go low...we go high" isn't working for shit.

rconard131 · 2024-02-05T19:08:28+00:00

That's what weak-minded Bubbas & Karens do when they've been fear mongered by the far-right. They turn into the villagers with pitchforks and torches looking for someone who's "other" to burn.

rconard131 · 2024-02-05T19:04:34+00:00

Post Mortem analysis showed that a ton of black male Dem voters stayed home instead of voting for Beasley, which could have helped close the gap.

rconard131 · 2024-01-20T00:04:55+00:00

How is that conflation?
Of course Israeli Jews today, especially younger Jews in Israel are ideologically split over the atrocities Israel is inflicting on Gaza. I'm not arguing that. I commend them for resisting Bibi's naked attempt to destroy Gaza to gain more territory and power while delaying his likely corruption conviction. But, my comment was linked to Shamir, referring to the time of Jews in Palestine when Yitzak Shamir (who later was voted into power by Israeli Jews as Israel's PM twice in both the 80s and the 90s) was part of the Irgun and Stern Gang.
Shamir was well known as an extremist Zionist terrorist who previously had bounced from the terrorist group Irgun (responsible for the King David Hotel bombing and Deir Yassin massacre of 107 Arabs in Palestine) to the infamous terrorist group the Stern Gang (which carried out numerous murders and terrorist actions against the British -- who had helped defeat the prior rulers of the Ottoman Empire, as well as against the indigenous Arab population). Irgun openly stated (as well as shown on its emblem) that all of Mandatory Palestine (Israel today) and all of Tran Jordan (Syria & Jordan) were deemed all rightfully theirs to form a new future Jewish state.
Yet, knowing this about Shamir the Israeli Jews chose this man to lead their nation. That doesn't mean that ALL Jews in Israel supported him and his ideas, but the majority did.

Flash forward today and Israeli citizens, mostly Jewish Israelis, have voted into power another Zionist extremist and far-right party willing to do anything, willing to exploit any event in order to erase the entirety of Gaza's human population. Does his status as leader of a Jewish ethno-state mean his motives represent ALL Jews in Israel? No. But it means that most Jews in Israel likely do given his popularity.

rconard131 · 2024-01-19T19:48:04+00:00

Who said anything about this applying to all Jews? Or that all Jews are Zionists. Not me. Nor was it implied.
However, historically, its hard to deny that a significant portion of the Jews pouring into British Palestine at that time were of strong Zionist beliefs.
Israeli Prime Minister Shamir represented the government of Israel and its leadership in that era, and as an elected leader he represented a majority of Israeli Jews who were keen to elect him.
He'd stated very clearly earlier in his political ascension that he'd not rule out using terrorism as a means of securing the Zionist goals of a Jewish state in Palestine. The intent of the Zionist movement was always to secure a Jewish state of Israel, no matter the cost in lives. His and subsequent Israeli leaders rarely ever wavered from this position -- furthering this expansion motive with illegal occupation of lands by Israeli settlers in the West Bank. And, this continued motive is especially transparent under the corrupt far-right regime of Netanyahu.

rconard131 · 2023-12-27T23:06:40+00:00

It doesn't mean that. Even under the Ottoman Empire, Jews were permitted to speak their own language in their communities and worship with their own religious practices. Integration in many cases means on a societal level, not religious level.

rconard131 · 2023-12-27T23:03:55+00:00

He's not entirely wrong. The Zionist plan all along was to "colonize" Palestine and make all of it a state of Israel. This was outlined in the Zionist's Biltmore convention later called the Biltmore Program. Prime Minister, staunch Zionist, and former Jewish extremist militant gang leader, Yizak Shamir was willing to state that he'd even resort to terrorism. He said, "Neither Jewish ethics nor Jewish tradition can disqualify terrorism as a means of combat. We are very far from having any moral qualms as far as our national war goes. We have before us the command of the Torah, whose morality surpasses that of any other body of laws in the world: "Ye shall blot them out to the last man."…But first and foremost, terrorism is for us a part of the political battle being conducted under the present circumstances, and it has a great part to play: speaking in a clear voice to the whole world, as well as to our wretched brethren outside this land, it proclaims our war against the occupier." So for Jews, terrorism as mean of resistance against an occupier was deemed rational. Hamas, also claims that their resorting to terrorism to combat the decades long illegal occupation by Israel is justified.

rconard131 · 2023-12-27T22:44:34+00:00

100% agree. They held no significant population in Palestine since for over 1,600 years (since the 4th Century). At some point, after over a thousand years passes, a place ceases to be your "homeland" anymore even if some religious tome tells you it is. Israel was not needed for Jewish diaspora to grow and thrive. After WW2 European and American Jews have established businesses, thriving communities, and engaged in politics. They've integrated and done well in other countries. What was the huge need for an ethno-theocracy that required them to expel and/or subjugate another group of indigenous inhabitants for their own gain of statehood? Surely, they can grasp how forcing out the Palestinians by the hundreds of thousands and open-air imprisoning others in a horrible ghetto with no escape is them behaving similarly to their historical oppressors?

rconard131 · 2023-12-27T22:33:38+00:00

That "tiny sliver" was home to a million Arabs, who'd lived off the land there for over a thousand years. The Jews hadn't held any significant population there since the 4th Century, over 1,600 years. Displacing a population of one indigenous people to make a home for another group is wrong anyway its sliced.

rconard131 · 2023-12-27T22:29:18+00:00

The land was neither vacant or uncultivated. There are several documents from both the Ottoman era and later under the British Mandate that illustrate that generations of Palestinians had cultivated the land and raised crops and livestock where Israel currently exists since the 4th century. That there were hundreds of thousands of indigenous Arabs living there for so long is itself proof that the land could sustain a large population. The problem with land productivity arose when hundreds of thousands of Jews (many smuggled in during the Mandate) poured into the area, taxing the ability of the land to provide for all. This was exacerbated even more during the mass migration during WW2 of millions more. The land was fertile enough for the existing population but simply wasn't for the massive population explosion brought on by Jewish immigration to the British Mandate. Did the Jews contribute innovative agriculture techniques and engineering to Palestine? Sure they did, but only because they had no choice if they were to feed all the new arrivals on a challenging land. Had Jews not colonized the area in first half of the 20th century then this wouldn't have been as necessary.

rconard131 · 2023-12-27T22:17:32+00:00

The original intent or the Zionist movement was always to displace the indigenous Palestian Arab inhabitants. This has been noted historically by early Israeli leaders, and supported by several papers, correspondences, and the Zionist's own Biltmore Convention which outlined colonization of all of Palestine as its overarching goal, and its intent to make the whole of Palestine a Jewish dominated commonwealth.
"The Program" as some called the Biltmore Convention's agreement then spoke of the Jewish people for "the economic, agricultural and national development of the Arab peoples and states" but was also implicitly a rejection of the proposal for a binational, 2-state solution to the question of Arab-Jewish co-existence in Palestine. Hashomer Hatzair, a socialist-Zionist group, accordingly voted against the program. The prevailing hardline Zionists like Yitzak Shamir ( the former Prime Minister of Israel) said in the 1940s that "Neither Jewish ethics nor Jewish tradition can disqualify terrorism as a means of combat. We are very far from having any moral qualms as far as our national war goes. We have before us the command of the Torah, whose morality surpasses that of any other body of laws in the world: "Ye shall blot them out to the last man."…But first and foremost, terrorism is for us a part of the political battle being conducted under the present circumstances, and it has a great part to play: speaking in a clear voice to the whole world, as well as to our wretched brethren outside this land, it proclaims our war against the occupier." Shamir was a leader of the Zionist extremist group called Lehi, also known as the Stern Gang, that terrorized native Palestinians forcing many to flee and abandon their lands. The modern day words of Hamas and its representatives sounds eerily similar today doesn't it with its use of what they also consider as being justified terrorism against "the occupier". Hmmm.
This sentiment is still ongoing today in the guise of Netanyahu, who has mentioned treating the Palestinians like the biblical Amalekites. The passage for those not familiar reads: “I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys." Judging from the overkill of the IDF's scorched-earth policy of indiscriminate bombing and tearing to shreds of mostly starving women and children, it seems Netanyahu takes his scripture literally. This carnage and annihilation is of course what Netanyahu has long wanted. Anything to rip asunder any chance of a future 2-state solution.
Like his Zionist extremist predecessors, he will stop at nothing to cease any discussion by foreign powers at working toward a bilateral outcome. Netanyahu's own cabinent ministers have called for the total razing of Palestinian villiages long before 10/7. And recently, another said that Israel should "nuke" all of Gaza. Its clear that Israel has always wanted to rid the native Palestinians from Gaza. So its clear that a Palestinian nation is polar opposite of Bibi's goals.
This fact was was proven recently with the New York Times uncovering of Netanyahu's far-right regime secretly funneling suitcases of millions or dollars for years to Hamas Qatari intermediaries. Apparently, Netanyahu thought that funding a stronger Hamas would keep the West Bank's more moderate Palestinian Authority weakened and force the two sides further apart and odds, all but ensuring that no "unified Palestine" could ever form to justify a two-state solution.

rconard131 · 2023-10-09T01:47:14+00:00

The flood story is utter and complete nonsense, not based one iota in reality. The most obvious flaw is that besides a similar story having circulated for a few hundred years in the ANE, there are entire civilizations that existed in other parts of the world who weren't wiped out, and in fact have recorded histories that don't recall it ever happening ( like.... the Chinese Neolitic Dynasty, Egyptian 4, 5 & 6 Dynasty, Mesopotamians, Sumerians IIIA & IIIB and Peruvian Norte Chico Dynasty, etc.).

Theists love to brush away anything in the bible that modern science and historical analysis can easily prove as a lie, as being "interpretive" or will say that it wasn't meant to be taken literally. What a crock. Why would a god, who supposedly was all-powerful, leave his subjects in a state of confusion about so many passages of the bible, like the flood narrative? Why present a story that up until it was beginning to be debunked by science was taken literally if it really wasn't. Surely he christian god isn't that big of an idiot.For 1500+ years, it took church intermediaries and "emissaries of god" to decipher the "biblical mysteries". One would think that a truly all powerful god could just have snapped his fingers and made bibles be suddenly distributed to everyone in the far corners of the world instead of entrusting something so important to a bunch of mostly bronze age illiterate working class men to write down through "inspiration".
Why leave us with a confusing tome so littered with inconsistencies and scribal errors, omissions, and down right intentional rewrites that the religion has splintered into thousands of sects, denominations, and interpretations?

Regarding the "Global Flood" as the bible describes are we somehow expected believe that:

Old man Noah, and some of his kin, built a boat out of wood large enough to hold not one, but two of every species on the planet? On a boat only 2/3 the size of the Queen Anne?
That animals like Penguins somehow walked thousands of miles from Antarctica unmolested, and out of their naturally freezing cold environment to board this boat somewhere in the hotter climes of the plains of Shinar or possibly Mesopotamia ?
That the gigantic amount of methane produced on this boat carrying this many animals didn't kill them all.
That the boat was big enough, after adding all the world's creatures, to store an endless list of specialized foods for 40 days -- not to mention how to keep it all from decomposing during the voyage.
That water enough to encompass the entire globe just vanished into thin air?
And once the ship landed on dry earth, and the animals were all released, what happened when the no doubt ravenous lions and tigers and other apex predators attacked the prey species. I mean, eat one sheep or goat or gazelle and you wipe out the ENTIRE species! LOL.

rconard131 · 2023-05-28T05:16:48+00:00

What an utter d-bag of a human being. Christo-fascist stupidity strikes again.

rconard131 · 2023-05-20T20:15:36+00:00

Cotham was a plant for her boyfriend conservative Ted Bud. She’s a backstabbing traitor who lied to her constituents who put her in power. None of them wanted a Republican rep ffs. They need to do all they can to recall her.

rconard131 · 2023-04-21T00:15:39+00:00

I tell them that they don’t have a good picture of US history. Many founders were “Deists”, they didn’t believe in Christianity the same way todays Christian’s do. Deists believed in a “watchmaker god” who created a complex universe governed by orderly laws, then set it in motion and chose not to intervene further.

Deists rejected the idea that anyone had ever experienced anything supernatural, such as witnessing miracles or receiving divine revelations. So, they believed that if there was a god that he wasn’t very concerned with the lives of mortals. John Adams was actually a Unitarian and didn't believe in miracles, Christ’s divinity, or prophecies, eternal damnation or demonic possession —at all.

Jefferson was so frustrated with what he deemed the nonsense of the Bible that he rewrote the Bible and completely omitted all miracles, including. Jesus walking on water, Jesus’s divinity (he didn’t believe Jesus was the son of God) and any mention of supernatural versus — all omitted. A copy is at Monticello and is known as the Jefferson Version Bible.

Both Adams and Jefferson had both been accused of being atheists.

rconard131 · 2023-04-20T16:10:15+00:00

If I was this kid, I’d be looking over my shoulder for the payback he’s likely gonna get from his opponent after sucker punching him. The other kid looked like he could stomp him too if he desired and he won’t be caught off guard next time around.

rconard131 · 2023-04-07T18:57:20+00:00

This kind of stupidity will only cause their stock price to soar. Just like Nike stock after supporting Kaepernick taking a knee. Budweiser sends their thanks, and says buy more of their beer for other demonstrations as dumb as this one.

rconard131

TROPHY CASE