sovietknuckles

Both of these strains of thought should be anathema to the left. Yet we see largely the same attitudes from leftist politicians and organizations:

• "You shouldn't be guilting your comrades over their refusal to mask"
• "People with disabilities do not automatically die when a coronavirus particle enters their airway"
• "If everyone in a room is asymptomatic and IMMUNIZED, then risk of spread is low. Immunization >> masking"
• "If you guys want to get really sad, check out r/ZeroCovidCommunity. It’s filled with people who are shut ins who lost their family, friends, and jobs because of their fear of catching COVID."
• "It's 2025, not 2021. If you're worried about your health you can wear an N95."
• "There’s solidarity and then there’s indulging. If you are immunocompromised to the point you require to be in a room where everyone is masked then maybe you need to sit this one out until you are feeling better. You cannot force a majority to the will of a very small minority."
• "Choosing to wear a mask to protest a genocide to protect your identity is one thing. Forcing everyone to wear a mask to protect one or two individuals that if they are so sick they should be at home [is different.]"

These are all comments from DSA members today, but I'm not cherry-picking. They're representative of the US left (and the left in other countries) on the whole.

I don't understand how this became leftist dogma. Covid minimization was clearly driven by the needs of capital, and the left should reflexively reject it. Accepting it means workplace and public space health and safety is gone, a whole host of people are essentially banned from participating in society, vulnerable minorities are no longer protected, and you no longer have the personal right to not be infected with a biohazard. This is all anti-labor and discriminatory.

I've seen people try to spin masking as a mark of white privilege and a restriction of the freedoms of non-white people. As if throughout the pandemic, non-white people haven't been at the highest risk of getting Covid and having long-term health problems as a result.

Outrage over the genocide in Gaza is righteous; but somehow the Covid genocide is irrelevant.

By this I mean people with progress flag buttons/patches/pins/shirts/hats usually paired with other social justice accessories, and, not to stereotype, but quite often also with unusual or brightly dyed hairstyles.

I want to be clear, this isn't a judgement thing, or a criticism or anything. I'm just genuinely curious why the LGBTQ+ community seems to be the last holdout of mask wearers. I suppose some of it could be confirmation bias, but I'm very confident in calling this a trend.

Not trying to debate anyone, just trying to understand!

The removal of the term “Han Chinese” from the Executive Yuan’s Web site, which has sparked an online backlash, was intended to improve ethnic equality in Taiwan based on advice from the Control Yuan and was not politically motivated, Cabinet spokeswoman Michelle Lee (李慧芝) said on Sunday.

A user on the Professional Technology Temple (PTT) online bulletin board on Saturday wrote that on March 24 a section on the Executive Yuan’s Web site about ethnic groups in Taiwan removed the term “Han Chinese.”

The current version of the site states that indigenous people make up 2.6 percent of registered households in Taiwan, while 1.2 percent were foreign nationals and 96.2 percent were “the rest of the population.”

A screenshot of the site archived on March 17 on the Wayback Machine shows that it previously said that Han Chinese accounted for the largest portion of the population at 96.4 percent.

Soon after the PTT comments gained widespread media attention, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) criticized the change as “cognitive warfare” against China by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party.

KMT Legislator Chen Ching-hui (陳菁徽) on Saturday called the change “absurd,” saying it recognized the ethnicity of minority groups comprising only 3.8 percent of the population, but referred to the 96 percent majority as simply “the rest.”

Such blurring of the nation’s ethnic composition is unhelpful and raises suspicions about the motive behind the change, she said.

Lee said the Department of Household Registration made the revision in response to a suggestion from Control Yuan member Antonio Hong (鴻義章) in December 2022, who said the previous description counterposed Han Chinese against indigenous people and new immigrants.

In the previous language on the site, the term “Han Chinese” encompassed Hoklo and Hakka people, as well as immigrants, Lee cited Hong as saying.

Such polarizing phrasing might hinder efforts to facilitate ethnic equality and eliminate racial discrimination, she cited Hong as saying, adding that he again proposed the revision in 2023.

The Executive Yuan updates the country profile on the Web site annually and uses terms related to ethnicity based on statutes such as the Household Registration Act (戶籍法), the Indigenous Peoples Status Act (原住民身分法) and the Immigration Act (入出國移民法), as well as demographic data, Lee said.

The term “more than 23 million people of Taiwan” refers to citizens of the Republic of China with a registered household, including foreign nationals, she said.

Indigenous people must register their ethnicity in accordance with the Indigenous Peoples Status Act and foreign nationals would be documented as a group based on their first-time household registration, she added.

However, the ethnic status of Hoklo or Hakka people, or minority groups such as Manchus, Mongolians or Tibetans, is not recorded and their numbers could not be calculated by category, Lee said.

As using “Han Chinese” as an umbrella term to encapsulate all these ethnic groups does not accurately reflect their ethnicity, it was replaced with “the rest of the population” to more objectively describe the demographic structure in Taiwan, she said.

The change was not politically motivated and should not be misinterpreted, Lee said.

Additional reporting by CNA

The summit, hosted by Saudi Arabia in its capital, Riyadh, was preceded by numerous predictions regarding the announcement that Trump referred to, describing it as a "very important announcement" during a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the White House on Tuesday, May 6.

In addition to what Trump intends to announce, the summit's agenda and the deals and agreements expected to take place have become the talk of the town, ranging from security and military deals to technology deals and artificial intelligence deals.

All Gulf leaders are scheduled to participate in the Gulf-US summit, with the exception of King Salman bin Abdulaziz, who has not participated in public events or meetings for a long time due to his health conditions.

Will Donald Trump recognize a Palestinian state?

A Gulf diplomatic source, who declined to be named or disclose his position, told The Media Line, "President Donald Trump will issue a declaration regarding the State of Palestine and American recognition of it, and that there will be the establishment of a Palestinian state without the presence of Hamas."

The source also added, "If an announcement of American recognition of the State of Palestine is made, it will be the most important declaration that will change the balance of power in the Middle East, and more countries will join the Abraham Accords."

The source confirmed that economic agreements will certainly be present, but many of them have already been announced, and we may witness the Gulf states being exempted from tariffs.

Ahmed Al-Ibrahim, a former Gulf diplomat, told The Media Line, "I don't expect it to be about Palestine. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and King Abdullah II of Jordan have not been invited. They are the two countries closest to Palestine, and it would be important for them to be present at any event like this."

Al-Ibrahim also said, "There will be major deals coming, perhaps similar to what happened at the 2017 Gulf-US summit, with Saudi deals worth more than $400 billion. Let's not forget that the UAE announced investments in the US worth more than $1 trillion, and Saudi Arabia announced investments worth more than $600 billion."

He continued, "This is clear because President Donald Trump intends to visit the UAE and Qatar after concluding his visit to Saudi Arabia. These are two important economies with significant financial resources and major investments in the United States."

Ahmed Boushouki, a Saudi political analyst, told The Media Line, "This is about major economic deals that will take place in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Perhaps US President Donald Trump hinted at this when he told the American people to 'buy stocks now, before his big announcement in the next two days.'"

Regarding the news of a peaceful US-Saudi nuclear cooperation to generate electricity in Saudi Arabia, Boushouki said, "Saudi Arabia has had a program announced since 2010, and it has been discussed several times before. International companies are now working to implement these projects in Saudi Arabia."

Plans are currently underway in Saudi Arabia to build the kingdom's first nuclear reactor, with several international companies competing to design and build the reactor. Meanwhile, the neighboring Gulf country, the United Arab Emirates, already owns the Barakah reactor and is the only Arab country with a four-reactor nuclear power plant, in collaboration with a Korean company.