What the Dirty War tells us about Argentinian politics today
… plus curiosities from Columbia University’s frontlines, Angola, and more.
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Without further ado, here’s what’s on deck this week:
🇦🇷 Four true stories of life under Argentina’s dictatorship
✊ Reconvening for women’s rights
🌸 The word for peak bloom
But first, here’s a closer look at what’s been going on around the world in the last week or so:
42,000 — The number of job applications submitted by Americans to join U.S. President Joe Biden’s Climate Corps program last fall. On Tuesday for Earth Day, the president launched a website to accept yet another wave of queries for Americans to join the Corps, which is a climate change-centered jobs and training program focused on jobs ranging from wildfire fighting to solar panel installation. Experts speculate that it’s part of the president’s broader efforts to appeal to young voters by forming initiatives around causes young Americans care deeply about. In this case, climate change is among the top priorities for voters under the age of 35 alongside gun violence.
100x — The increased likelihood that the historic drought currently happening in the Horn of Africa was driven by human-caused climate change, according to the USAID. The region’s record-smashing heat displaced over 20 million people in 2023 amid food and water shortages – a population roughly the size of New York state. Experts predict 1.2 billion people worldwide could be displaced by climate change and natural disasters by 2050.
30% — The percent increase in deforestation in Colombia so far this year compared to 2023. Experts say this is largely due to armed groups in the country leveraging the rainforest as a bargaining chip in peace negotiations with the Colombian government, according to the country’s environmental minister, Susan Muhamad. Read our story from 2022 on why Colombia is one of the deadliest places in the world for environmental activists.
100+ — The number of Columbia University faculty that gathered in protest on campus in New York City on Monday. The faculty gathered to speak out against Columbia University President Nemat Minouche Shafik’s decision to call in police last week to arrest more than 100 Pro-Palestinian student protesters and clear an encampment they had made on campus. (As of Wednesday, students have re-occupied the grounds.) On Tuesday, the Policy and Planning Committee of Columbia’s Faculty of the Arts and Sciences released a statement condemning “reckless conflation by some in the media” of student-led protests with “abusive acts of visitors.” You can read the full statement here.
From 1976 to 1983, Argentina underwent a brutal military dictatorship known as the Dirty War. During this time, some 30,000 citizens disappeared as a result of the government’s violent political and societal reorganization scheme known as “El Proceso.” Today, just over forty years since the re-establishment of Argentina’s democracy in 1983, human rights advocates fear human rights could be under threat amid the election of the far-right populist president Javier Milei and far-right vice president Victoria Villarruel in December 2023.
What are Milei and Villarruel’s ties to the country’s brutal past, and what has yet to be uncovered from this chapter of Argentina’s dark history? This week in Frame, four women tell their stories of life under the Dirty War — and shed light on its modern-day consequences.
On Thursday, April 25 — ANZAC Day occurs in Australia and New Zealand to commemorate the sacrifices of their armed forces, particularly during the bloody Gallipoli Campaign during World War I. You can read about the history of the day here.
On Thursday, April 25 — USAID Administrator Samantha Powers completes her trip to Angola amid a broader mission to resurge investments in malaria prevention in the country. One such investment is a $2.3 billion project to build a railroad called The Lobito Corridor, which would “be absolutely critical in moving commodities like malaria bed nets more quickly to families who need them,” Power said in a statement from the Angolan Presidential Palace in Luanda on Wednesday.
On Monday, April 29 — The United Nations Working Group on discrimination against women and girls convenes in New York City. Founded in 2010, the international group of delegates come together to recommend legal and policy reforms for countries to incorporate women’s rights into domestic law. Last year, the group submitted a case to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to consider the extremely restrictive legislation and policies around women seeking abortions in El Salvador.
Last fall, I took a class at the Strother Radical School of Attention in Brooklyn. It’s an informal school made up of academics and artists who are interested in exploring how we can re-claim our attention in our busy, often distracted lives. During one of the classes, Peter Schmidt, the school’s Program Director, brought up the idea of anthesis.
Anthesis is a term in botany that refers to period when a flower is fully open, or the period leading up to the flower opening. Peter talked about how anthesis is the point at which the flower must bloom, when it has no other choice. He gestured to anthesis meaning moments in life, art, conversation, relationships, where a threshold is reached and something naturally blossoms.
I love this idea and how it speaks to the moment where the conditions are set for something beautiful to emerge, and where then that emergence occurs with what feels like little effort. It could be ideas that have been simmering in your mind coming together into a realization, or all the pieces in a jam band coordinating into a moment of musical duende.
It makes me think, how we can create more conditions for anthesis in our daily lives?
— Ben
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