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Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 18:50
What’s confusing about the woke movement is that it expresses traditional left-wing emotions: empathy for the marginalized, indignation at the plight of the oppressed, determination that historical wrongs should be righted. Those emotions, however, are derailed by a range of theoretical assumptions that ultimately undermine them. Theory is such a nebulous and trendy concept that […]
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 10:29
I feed the pigeons, I sometimes feed the sparrows tooIt gives me a sense of enormous well-being -from “Parklife”, by Blur I know this is kind of a personal question, but…have you ever bathed in a forest? I have, many times. Now, I’m not talking about “skinny-dipping” (get your mind out of the gutter). The Japanese have a term for it… shinrin-yoku, which roughly translates to “forest bathing”: Whether you call it a fitness trend or a mindfulness practice (or a bit of both), what exactly is forest bathing? The term emerged in Japan in the 1980s as a physiological and psychological exercise called shinrin-yoku (“forest bathing” or “taking in the forest atmosphere”). The purpose was twofold: to offer an eco-antidote to tech-boom burnout and to inspire residents to reconnect with and protect the country’s forests. The Japanese quickly embraced this form of ecotherapy. In the 1990s, researchers began studying the physiological benefits of forest bathing, providing the science to support what we innately know: time spent immersed in nature is good for us.
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 09:03

NIKKI, a rescued green sea turtle, is making great progress in the care of Coffs Coast Wildlife Sanctuary. Nikki was found on Boambee Beach in January, entangled in fishing line with an injured flipper, requiring immediate rehabilitation from float syndrome and malnourishment, and eventual surgical intervention to facilitate her return to the wild. Advertise with...

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Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 08:57

BORN in Chatswood in 1924, World War Two veteran David Martin celebrated his 100th birthday on Sunday 21 July at the Sawtell RSL Club. “What a great 100th birthday celebration we had yesterday at Sawtell RSL, surrounded by loving family and friends from near and far,” said David’s son Greg Martin. Advertise with News of...

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Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 08:56
Do you all experience flow? Or rather, as I think everyone does at times, do you experience it often? Obviously I have written plenty of words in my life, but this is not generally something you experience when writing blog posts unless you are maybe excoriating someone in an unnecessarily profane way that is–fundamentally–unfair. Like, […]
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 08:38

THE Coffs Coast Safety Network (CCSN) will host a Psychological Safety at Work conference on August 7, unpacking where a worker’s self-care ends and an employer’s duty of care begins. Themed ‘Mind Matters – Navigating Psychosocial Risks in the Workplace’, the event will be offering insights and practical workshops on managing stress, enhancing workplace culture,...

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Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 08:00
Oh puleeze… With cameras rolling and flashing, the two men sought to repair what had been seen as one of the closest relationships between leaders when they were in office, now that Trump is once again the Republican presidential nominee three months out from a new election. At their talks, also attended by Sara Netanyahu, Trump declared that he could not understand how Jews could vote for presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, referring to remarks she made on Thursday after she met with Netanyahu regarding the suffering of Gazans that Trump called “disrespectful to Israel.” Trump also charged that the world would see “major wars in the Middle East and maybe a third world war” if he didn’t win the election. As things stand, he further said, “You are closer to a third world war” than ever “because we have incompetent people running our country.” Netanyahu should be ashamed but, of course, he isn’t.
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 06:30
More evidence that JD Vance is shockingly un-moored from any principles — and may be literally unhinged: J.D. Vance’s long correspondence with a transgender friend who attended his wedding has been revealed—including how he spoke about hating cops and disparaged Donald Trump and conservative icon Antonin Scalia. Sofia Nelson, a Yale Law School contemporary of Trump’s running mate, revealed how they corresponded by text and email for years until falling out over his support for a ban on gender-affirming medical treatment for minors. The dossier of his emails and texts was revealed by the New York Times Saturday, with Nelson telling the paper the release was to highlight Vance’s shapeshifting from anti-Trump moderate Republican to MAGA culture warrior, accusing him of using his old position to amass money and his new one to amass power.
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 05:00
JV Last at the Bulwark explains what all this “single cat ladies” stuff is all about: Watching the JD Vance / New Right obsession with natalism, I’m struck by how racially coded it is. Because while Vance and his confederates are super-duper concerned about childless people who “have no stake in America’s future” I have also heard many conservatives/Republicans express a great deal of concern about brown people having too many babies. Here, for example, is the Manhattan Institute’s Heather Mac Donald in 2007: Pretty obvious what her problem is there, isn’t it? You may have forgotten, but back in the 1990s, conservatives were worried about African-American women having too many babies, so they pushed for a welfare “family cap” which denied extra benefits for low-income women (translation: African-American women) who had children while on public assistance. Sometimes the Republican pro-natalists let the mask slip. Last year in Texas Republicans pushed a bill that would give large property tax credits to households with four or more children.
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 04:57
The hole in the Antarctic’s ozone layer is recovering but very slowly. How to eat seafood sustainably, restoring our disappearing mangroves and cemeteries for the living. Has the hole in the ozone layer been fixed? I was puzzled by a headline in the New York Times that read ‘A Global Push Fixed the Ozone Hole. Continue reading »
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 04:56
It’s once you’re dead or out of the picture, unable to meaningfully contest the narrative, that institutions can appropriate the very struggles of those who once fought against them. This sort of co-option of movements is a consequence of how memory works in society. Writings from the ANU Gaza Solidarity Encampment – Part 5 This Continue reading »
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 04:53
In the theatre of politics, Trump has always upstaged. Whether cast as hero or villain he insatiably dominates the spotlight. A diviner of public sentiment, throughout his various professional iterations, Trump has elevated his unique gift for performance into an artform. In his incarnation as a politician, he has perfected the knack of cannibalising American Continue reading »
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 04:50
When the spring finally came, we returned to our neighbourhood, and we found that wildflowers had grown amid the fallen buildings and the rubble. Wildflowers grew above it all, above all our people, and above all their dreams. December 2, 2023 We were together with my extended family in our grandparent’s ground floor apartment in Continue reading »
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 03:30
JD Vance’s wife seems to be a shape-shifter too: During her rise through America’s most prestigious schools, law firms and judicial clerkships, Usha Vance rarely— if ever — volunteered her opinions on the nation’s bitterly partisan politics to friends and colleagues. But she did express revulsion at former president Donald Trump’s actionson Jan. 6, 2021. Vance told friends she was outraged by Trump’s incitementofthe deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol and lamented the social breakdown that fueled his political support, according to one friend, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitiveconversations. Her view at the timecontrasts with the later pronouncements of her husband and Trump’s newly minted running mate, JD Vance, who has downplayed the storming of the Capitoland called participants who were jailed “political prisoners.” “Usha found the incursion on the Capitol and Trump’s role in it to be deeply disturbing,” the friend recalled.
Created
Sun, 28/07/2024 - 02:00
Lookee here: The US economy is on the verge of an extremely rare achievement. Economic growth in the first half of the year was solid, with the economy expanding a robust 2.8% annualized rate in the second quarter, according to fresh Commerce Department figures released Thursday, which are adjusted for inflation and seasonal swings. Stocks surged in the morning after the economy’s powerful show of resilience, but later lost steam and closed the day mixed. The Dow rose 81 points, or 0.2%, after jumping more than 500 points earlier in the session. The S&P 500 fell 0.5% and the Nasdaq Composite lost 0.9%. That comes after the benchmark index and tech-heavy Nasdaq on Wednesday logged their worst day since 2022. Gross domestic product, the broadest measure of economic output, was much stronger in the second quarter than economists had predicted. The GDP report showed that businesses are continuing to invest and that consumers are still opening their wallets. That’s key, because consumer spending is America’s economic engine, accounting for about two-thirds of US economic output.