Could Climate Change Fuel the Rise of Right-Wing Nationalism?

Could Climate Change Fuel the Rise of Right-Wing Nationalism?

By Joshua Conrad Jackson, Doctoral Student, Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Michele Gelfand, Distinguished University Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Maryland. First published on The Conversation.

Two trends have defined the past decade and both have been on display at this year’s session of the United Nations General Assembly.

One has been the escalating effects of climate change, which were the focus of the United Nations’ Climate Action Summit. Forest fires, floods and hurricanes are all rising in their frequency and severity. Eight of the last 10 years have been the warmest on record. Marine biologists warned that coral reefs in the U.S. could disappear entirely by the 2040s.

The other trend has been the surge of right-wing nationalist politics across Western nations, which includes Donald Trump’s election in the U.S., and the rise of nationalist political parties around the world.

Indeed, the first four speeches of the United Nations general debate were given by Brazilian right-wing populist Jair Bolsonaro, Trump, Egyptian dictator Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and far-right Turkish President Recep Erdogan.

Angelina Jolie Speaks Candidly On World Refugee Day As New TIME Contributing Editor

Angelina Jolie Speaks Candidly On World Refugee Day As New TIME Contributing Editor

Activist actor Angelina Jolie is now a monthly contributing editor at TIME magazine.

Editor-in-chief and CEO Edward Felsenthal announced that Jolie’s essays will focus on topics related to human rights and displacement, issues front-of-mind for the humanitarian who has worked with the UN Refugee Agency for 18 years.

Jolie first official piece was published to coincide with World Refugee Day, June 20, with the title Angelina Jolie: What We Owe Refugees. She argues: "Under international law it is not an option to assist refugees, it is an obligation," she writes. "It is perfectly possible to ensure strong border control and fair, humane immigration policies while meeting our responsibility to help refugees."

Happy Birthday AOC

Anne of Carversville had a birthday this week, 12 years old on June 17. AOC came to life seemingly out of nowhere, inspired by my reading our founding muse Angelina Jolie’s Esquire interview. Reading her thoughts marked a turning point in my life: Smart Sensuality Angelina Jolie: Virtue Considered in Carversville's Country Air.

Angelina is one of the many Winning Women in Action we track on AOC.

Enjoy reading all of Angelina Jolie’s AOC Archives.

Angelina Jolie Archives @ AOC

Donald Trump and Beto O'Rourke Duke It Out In El Paso As Congress Works Against A New Shutdown

FORMER CONGRESSMAN AND POSSIBLE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE BETO O'ROURKE MARCHED IN HIS OWN RALLY MONDAY. IMAGE: IVAN PIERRE AGUIRRE FOR THE TEXAS TRIBUNE

Donald Trump and Beto O'Rourke Duke It Out In El Paso As Congress Works Against A New Shutdown

As Trump spoke, O’Rourke led a march to a park just steps away from the coliseum. There, the former congressman and U.S. Senate candidate pressed his case — to raucous cheers — that El Paso is “safe not because of walls but in spite of walls.”

“We can show the rest of the country ... that walls do not make us safer,” O’Rourke said, arguing such barriers force immigrants to cross in more remote, dangerous stretches of the border.

“We know that walls do not save lives,” he added. “Walls end lives.”

Can GirlForward's Superior Program Structure For Refugee Girls Be Applied To American Girls?

Can GirlForward's Superior Program Structure For Refugee Girls Be Applied To American Girls?

The Austin, Texas branch of Girl Forward, a nonprofit founded in Chicago in 2011, is run exclusively by millennial women for high-school age refugee girls. Politico profiled the group in November 2018, landing in Austin. because Texas is second only to California in its refugee population.

GirlForward is predicated on the notion that refugee girls face particular hardships due not only to the tumultuous circumstances of their upbringing and relocation but also their gender. “Oftentimes, our girls haven’t been able to pursue education in the same way their brothers have,” Shannon Elder, 24, GirlForward’s Austin development manager, observes. “In countries of conflict, girls’ access to education can be much more limited than it is for boys,” said Arielle Levin, who runs the mentorship program. GirlForward recruits refugees through Austin nonprofits, schools, and word of mouth. It tries specifically to recruit the oldest daughter in a family, reasoning that they are usually shouldered with the heaviest burdens. “A lot of my family don’t speak English,” said Storai Rana, an 18-year-old refugee from Afghanistan, “so there was so many responsibilities of things I had to do. Like I had go to the bank, to the market,” she said.

Girl Forward attempts to help its girls lead lead full and rich lives, moving behind tangible tools like opening a checking account or learning how to use the local library.

Fatima Mirzakhail, an 18-year-old refugee, told Politico’s Ethan Epstein that her initial optimism on arriving in America and leaving her war-torn country of Afghanistan soon evaporated. “In Afghanistan I felt like I was in a box, and I couldn’t fly anywhere.” Fatima explained. Her expectations that life in America would be so different soon evaporated. Before becoming part of Girl Forward, “I was crying all the time, hating myself,” she said.  Now Fatima is blossoming “planning on attending a local community college next year before transferring to UT. “

UN Ambassador Gigi Hadid Visits Jamtoli Refugee Camp In Bangladesh, Housing Rohingya Muslims

UN Ambassador Gigi Hadid Visits Jamtoli Refugee Camp In Bangladesh, Housing Rohingya Muslims

Gigi Hadid has embarked on her first humanitarian mission as a UNICEF ambassador, visiting the Rohingya Muslim refugees in Bangladesh as part of a United Nations Children’s Fund initiative. The part Palestinian model is documenting her visit with Muslim children in Cox's Bazaar's Jamtoli Refugee Camp on her Instagram account. The Jamtoli Refugee Camp is currently home to approximately 45,000 Rohingya refugees who escaped Myanmar after the 2012 riots that resulted in the displacement of over 90,000 people.

The 23-year-old showed her 40 million followers a football game with some of the children, along with this text:

“As well as psychosocial work to help them get through trauma through activities like art, they also can play sports, learn music, and learn to read & draw (some for the first time in their lives). Separate from educational spaces, the importance of these spaces is huge due to the fact that refugee children can spend a majority of the day working, usually collecting fire wood from miles away so their families can cook, taking care of siblings, helping around the house, etc., and here they can just focus on having fun!”

Hadid also visited the ‘Women/Girl Friendly’ zones in the Jamtoli Camp: a safe place for females, young and old, to come learn basic education as well as personal hygiene, skills such as sewing, and also a place where they can share and connect with other women and girls.

AOC missed the June announcement that Gigi Hadid was joining HM Queen Rania of Jordan, Serena Williams, Priyanka Chopra and Katy Perry as a UNICEF International Ambassador.  We've never been critical of Gigi, including when she speaks in support of Palestinians, but it thrills us extra, when she puts her celebrity status to good works like this visit to Bangladesh. This is true beauty!!

Updated Encouraging News :Nominated For Nobel Peace Prize, Syria's White Helmets MAY Arrive For Oscars

"They are not yet on US soil, and we await their arrival with tense anticipation," said the filmmakers of Raed Saleh and Khaled Khateeb. "In these uncertain times, their story is one of the most moving of our generation. We stand ready to welcome them."

On Wednesday, the outlook was grim that the key figures in the Netflix film 'The White Helmets' would obtain the necessary paperwork to gain US visas in time for the Oscars. In 48 hours since Hollywood Reporter and websites far and wide rallied around the issue, the situation has improved dramatically. 

“We are eagerly looking forward to coming to the Oscars," said Saleh in a statement. "It will give us an important platform for the voices of Syrian children and women trapped under the rubble as a result of the airstrikes and artillery shelling, and for the voices of thousands of displaced Syrians who have been forced from their homes.”

“It is so important that people see the film. It is important that people understand that Syria has people who want the same things they want: peace, jobs, family and to live without the fear of bombs," added Khateeb. "If we win this award, it will show people across Syria that people around the world support them. It will give courage to every volunteer who wakes up every morning to run towards bombs."

Previously Wed. Feb. 15, 2017: There is deep concern in Hollywood that key international talents will not be present for the Academy Awards due to President Trump's executive order banning Syrians and others from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States. 

Director Orlando von Einsiedel and producer Joanna Natasegara's  Netflix film 'The White Helmets' is nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. But it appears that the real heroes of the documentary will not be present at the Oscars. 

Every day in Syria, a group of ordinary, unarmed civilian volunteers known as the White Helmets risk their lives to help rescue men, women, and children injured by the incessant air raids destroying the country. Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2016, the apolitical White Helmets are credited with saving more than 75,000 people since 2012. 

Now it appears unlikely that Raed Saleh, the leader of the White Helmets, and Khaled Khateeb, the photographer who filmed all of the documentary's footage inside Aleppo, will get the necessary travel documents to attend the Oscars. Vogue interviews Einsiedel and Natasegara about their relationship with the White Helmets, and why we must watch their documentary in today's political climate. 

Anish Kapoor Honored As Genesis Prize Laureate 2017, Will Donate $1 Million Prize to Refugees

Anish Kapoor, I Like America and America Doesn’t Like Me. Courtesy Anish Kapoor.

British-Indian, Bombay-born (now Mumbai) artist Anish Kapoor is named the Genesis Prize Laureate 2017, often called the 'Jewish Nobel Prize', awarded to those of Jewish heritage who have excelled professionally. 

"Jewish identity and history have witnessed recurring conditions of indifference, persecution and Holocaust," Kapoor is quoted by The Guardian. "Repeatedly, we have had to repossess ourselves and re-identify our communities. As inheritors and carriers of Jewish values it is unseemly, therefore, for us to ignore the plight of people who are persecuted, who have lost everything and had to flee as refugees in mortal danger."

Kapoor announced that he will use the $1 million prize money to assist the refugee crisis.

The artist recently joined the chorus of dissent against US President Donald Trump, creating a protest work inspired by Joseph Beuys. ArtNet explains:

Kapoor has re-created the poster for Beuys’ performance work I Like America and America Likes Me (1974). Kapoor's image is overlaid with the title 'I Like America and America Doesn’t Like Me' written in a pseudo Antiqua–Fraktur font commonly associated with Nazi German media

Beuys’ 1974 work saw him wrapped in felt upon arriving at JFK airport in New York, and transported to the René Block Gallery in an ambulance, where he spent the entirety of his three-day stay in a room with only a torch, a cane, a wild coyote, and a felt blanket. The performance is seen as a protest work, as Beuys never really saw any of the US, or technically set foot on American soil.