SheWasSpeaking

https://en.prolewiki.org/wiki/Xinjiang_Vocational_Education_and_Training_Centers

I appreciate the effort you put into your replies to me. Genuinely. But this article is... not good. While it does make some good points about accusations of genocide being weaponized against China maliciously and about US hypocrisy, it's also riddled with arguments I'd expect from Zionists and conservatives. To give a few examples:

abetting them to “die for their belief in order to enter heaven”.

Has very much similar energy to western stereotypes about suicide bombers and 77 virgins.

They over-generalize the “Halal” concept, stamping food, medicine, cosmetics, clothing, etc. with the Halal symbol.

This is such a weird and specific grievance that it comes off as not just prejudiced, but personally so.

Chinese protections of Islam have been reputed to be contested by some citizens as suggesting preferential treatment, refuting the claim that the China's policies are anti-Islam.

Conservatives claim that trans, Black, etc people in the US are protected classes all the time despite severe prejudice - both systemic and social - against them existing at all levels of society, e.g. the recent refrains against DEI. One might even argue that assertions that a marginalized group is treated too well tend to be a feature of widespread prejudice. (Not saying that's necessarily the case IRT China, just that this is a very poor argument.)

I'll stop there, because I don't want to be obnoxious and turn this into an argument, but there's an abundance of issues like that. I think the writer(s) of this article have, to be blunt, probably spent too long exclusively circulating the same talking points to like minded people and have become completely oblivious as to how they sound to outsiders. I'm not trying to be insulting or mean when I say that. I personally believe that anti-China sentiment in the west currently cannot serve as anything but an excuse for western imperialism, regardless of whether or not it's justified, so I sympathize regardless - but the only thing this article has convinced me of is that I owe my partner an apology.

There is some useful information in it and in your replies, particularly about the US side of things, but I unfortunately do have to take even that with a grain of salt as well because I cannot overstate just how poor an impression that article leaves. It may have served its purpose a few years ago, but after almost two years of the world watching the genocide in Palestine and the justifications used for it, even the most obtuse of us are intimately acquainted with Islamophobia.

That's insane. Hope Russia didn't get hit too hard, since it was right off the coast.

Tsunami was mid.

Tsunami warning on my island. I'm out of the evacuation zone, but still got me rattled. Likely not to have power tonight at the very least.

Ooh, thanks. I'll keep that in mind. Idk I'm not too worried yet because it's only been the two times, but if it comes back again after this I'll definitely try and get tested.

Yeah, that's always good advice. I do try and wash everything I use before cooking.

Picked up a nasty stomach bug for the second time in a few months. Wondering if it's something in the soil or somesuch since I harvest a lot of fresh vegetables. Either way, went like thirty six hours without eating and just ate a strawberry and a few miracle fruit (called thusly because they coat your tongue in an enzyme that makes sour things taste sweet) and am already regretting it. Either way, eurgh.

As a white nonbinary trans woman, we absolutely do not need to be defending white trans women from critique for being racist. Cease this infernal nonsense.

I know some people do guerilla gardening and plant trees without permission, too. Sometimes nobody bothers to file the paperwork take them down.

Speaking as someone who grew up in a family that idolized homesteading, and who now has a very abundant garden, I do think we should be careful with promoting the ideal of food self-sufficiency - at least on an individual level. Gardening is a lot of work. Most people don't even have enough space to produce any meaningful amount of food. Yes, you can try growing some beans on your balcony or something of that sort, but if you factor in the price of soil, potting materials, fertilizer, etc and time spent, it's hard to justify compared to just buying the food in stores, and it certainly won't be enough to feed yourself in a famine.

If you do have land, one thing you could try doing is looking into trees that produce food, because trees tend to be pretty low maintenance and abundant producers. I'm personally growing breadfruit, moringa, and ice cream bean, all of which are vigorous growers and should be abundant food sources once they're big enough. (Though I live in Hawai'i, and many places will likely have too much frost for these to survive.) You can also go with edible weeds & invasives - every area has at least a few of those. Jerusalem Artichokes (/ sunchokes), for instance, are a plant in the sunflower family native to North America that produce an abundance of roots and are virtually impossible to remove once they get going. I've personally considered keeping some air potato starts on hand in case things ever get really desperate, since they're highly invasive and produce an absurd amount of edible rhizomes.

It's a good idea to look into plants native to your area that are edible (even some weeds you consider grasses can be edibles) and lesser known fruits / vegetables / leaf greens in general. The food grown at supermarkets is generally there because it does well on large scale farms with plenty of pesticide, and more importantly, stores well. But there are hundreds (if not thousands) of other edible plants that you will never see in a store, and in many cases they'll produce food far more efficiently than seeds from a grocery store tomato. You also have to note that a lot of produce sold in stores are from hybrid varieties that won't be true to seed; if you really want to be food self-sufficient, even if you do just want to grow green beans and tomatoes, you're still going to want to look into heirloom seeds and seed saving. Finding varieties that grow well in your area is also something to consider, as again, grocery store produce is bred for mass production and won't necessarily do well where you live. Plus, if you're going to go through all that effort, you may as well grow something that brings you more joy than russet potatoes. E.g. I'm very fond of this heirloom Italian purple green bean variety which is more or less stringless when young and produces abundantly here.

I think there's a good reason so many communities have moved towards specialization. It's simply not efficient to have a few people (or even a large family) trying to do everything they need to do to survive. What we should be doing is establishing mutual aid networks for when things go bad that include farmers, people with building know-how, blacksmiths (and yes, those are still an actual thing, speaking from personal experience), etc. If you have free time and want to get your hands dirty, by all means, start a herb garden, plant some potatoes, or whatever else - but be aware that it's a lot harder than it sounds, and realistically, the vast majority of people in the west do not have access to enough land to grow a significant amount of food.

Edit: Had to rush this post b/c I had to leave the house - want to clarify that this wasn't meant as a rebuke of the OP so much as sharing my thoughts on gardening as a whole.

Also, one potential solution for the lack of space issue is finding members of the community who do have space but no time to make use of it themselves. At least where I live, this is a common situation, but I don't live in a city, so it probably won't be much help to those that do.

I think learning how to grow our own food is very important, but just as important is organizing locally and figuring out the logistics of doing so.

Yeah, I feel you. It was Bernie for me. Kill your heroes.

Nevermind that Contrapoints originally started becoming hated because she couldn't keep her mouth shut about nonbinary folk (and non-passing binary trans people)... plus the whole Buck Angel thing.

But I dunno maybe outing a trans woman against her consent is fine as long as you don't criticize her while doing it.