But first, here’s a closer look at what’s been going on around the world in the last week or so:
GIF design by Kelly Kimball for Frame. Image sources: Wikimedia Commons
157,651 — The number of African migrants who arrived by sea in Italy in 2023 to seek asylum — a surge of over 50% from the prior year. On Monday, Italy’s Giorgio Meloni unveiled a development plan to tamp down the influx of migrants coming from Africa. The “Mattei Plan” will leverage $5.95 billion USD to build climate adaptation and clean energy projects in Africa.
“Italy wants … A cooperation from equal to equal, because Africa needs no charity, but to be put in the condition to compete on an equal footing, on strategic investments that can tie our futures together with mutually beneficial projects,” said Meloni in her speech at the one-day summit Italy hosted for African leaders in Rome.
African leaders were not consulted in the formulation of these plans, Euronews reports.
400 — The minimum number of mourners who have been detained in at least 39 cities across Russia as they paid tribute to the late Russian opposition leader Aleksei A. Navalny over the weekend. Navalny reportedly died in prison in an Arctic penal colony last Friday. His wife and political companion, Yulia Navalnaya, has promised to continue the fight for a Russia bereft of Putin’s hardline rule.
“Putin didn’t only kill Alexei Navalny as a person. With him, he wanted to kill our hope, our freedom, our future,” said Navalnaya in her first public statement since her husband’s passing.
13-1 — The vote among the 15-member United Nations Security Council on Tuesday regarding an Algeria-proposed U.N. resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war. The United States was the sole veto, and the United Kingdom abstained from the vote. So, what does this mean? The Security Council may soon vote on the U.S.-led competing resolution for a “temporary” ceasefire that U.S. officials believe would more easily triage the safe return of Israeli hostages, Reuters reported on Monday.
3 — The total number of inquiries that have been made following the mysterious 1973 death of Chilean poet and Communist Party senator Pablo Neruda. On Tuesday, a Chilean appeals court ordered the third investigation into Neruda’s demise. Here’s why: For decades, it was believed that the Nobel Prize-winning writer and fervent Salvador Allende supporter had died of cancer just days after dictator Augusto Pinochet took over Chile by force. But a series of queries by a panel of international experts now suspect Allende may have been poisoned by pro-Pinochet political enemies.
If the terms “hot girl summer,” “girl dinner,” and “girl math” have come across your feed, you’re not alone. This week, journalist Isabella Grullón Paz unpacks why the “girl everything” rhetoric has taken hold of the internet in the past few years.
Here’s the tweet from American rapper Meghan Thee Stallion that started it all:
Design by Jeremy Siwik and Aloma Antao for Frame. Image sources: X/Twitter & Wikimedia Commons
Stallion, the internet’s original “hot girl,” started a movement that remains culturally relevant today — but how? Paz speaks to sociology experts, Gen-Z creators, and other social media connoisseurs to decode how “girl everything” has remained the feminist calling card for being “hot shit” without a demand for the male gaze — and what it says about Gen Z’s hold on the internet.
“This redefinition of mainstream hotness … ushered in a new feminist attitude — a little flirty, girly, but filled with uncompromising empowerment,” writes Paz.
When thinking about how we wanted to build our product, one of the principles we began with was phones. Why? Well, because that’s where many of us at Frame read the news, and more readers worldwide are doing the same. Frame articles don’t present like your typical scrollable experience. Instead, we opted for a tappable, slide by slide form.
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While this has introduced many engineering challenges, it’s also enabled a stylistic flexibility not possible in scrolling articles. “The Girlification of the Internet” by Isabella Grullón Paz shows this off to full effect, combining funky collages with punchy shapes, full-bleed images, videos, and a healthy dash of emojis.
Until next time,
Jeremy
This Saturday, February 24, marks the two-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Since then, both Kyiv and Moscow have lost tens of thousands of troops in battle, let alone the 10,000 minimum Ukrainian civilian casualties.
War is horrific enough. But for the members of ethnic minorities in Eastern Europe, especially one particular group that has faced exile and ethnic conflict for generations, a battle fought between Ukraine and Russia also stirs an internal crisis of identity and belonging.
Enter the Meskhetian Turks, a predominantly Muslim people that speak Turkish and are originally from a region once called Meskheti that is modern-day Georgia.
“The Meskhetian Turks have been caught in the crossfire of the largest land war in Europe in generations, forcing them to fight, and die, on both sides of a war many do not consider their own,” Liz Cookman writes in New Lines magazine.
Meanwhile, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan proposed last fall to accelerate the process for Meskhetian Turks to gain Turkish citizenship — a new landing ground, perhaps, amid ever-present bureaucratic obstacles experienced among this diaspora. As the war trudges on with no end in sight, Cookman brings the moral concept of home into sharp relief — not only in regards to where home is, “but also of what reaching that home would mean for the community.”
Throughout this week — Representatives from Maui County will share updates on a final disposal site for 400,000 cubic yards of ash and debris removed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers six months after devastating fires ripped through the coastal community on August 8, 2023, killing at least 100 people and displacing thousands.
On Thursday, February 22 — Saudi Arabia will celebrate the anniversary of its Founding Day, which commemorates Muhammad bin Saud who is considered the founder of the first Saudi State and the Saud dynasty. Expect cultural celebrations all day. Speaking of which, the Kingdom has made massive investments in its brand-new music industry, Zinya Salfiti writes for Frame.
On Saturday, February 24 — The final day of the traditional Chinese New Year will end with a Lantern Festival, a.k.a the Shangyuan Festival, in China. The day will also celebrate the intricate craft of lantern making, which you can learn more about here. Below are a couple of my faves from prior years. (Hello, panda in a teacup!)
Elaborate lantern designs at a Lantern Festival in 2020. Source: Wikimedia Commons
In Judaism, there’s a concept called tikkun olam, which means “repairing the world”. It tends to take on a more spiritual meaning in Jewish mysticism, asserting that although a divine being created the world, people have the power to mend the spirit of the world and continue God’s work.
Here is writer Glenn Mitchell on the concept:
“Tikkun olam is a Hebrew expression from the Judaic tradition. It is an invitation to repair the world. In Islam there is a parallel tradition, carried by the Arabic word islah. The tradition asserts that in the midst of creation God pulled back enough to give space for humans to tend or repair the world. The tradition has mystical roots asserting that it is our stepping forward to create and mend, that continues the intention of God in creation. Our stepping forward is essential in the ongoing creative and redemptive process.”
— Ben
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