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Category: Analysis

  • MIL-OSI Global: Hurricane Milton: Flooded industrial sites and toxic chemical releases are a silent, growing threat

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By James R. Elliott, Professor of Sociology, Rice University

    An industrial storage tank overturned by Hurricane Helene in Asheville, N.C., shows the power of fast-moving floodwater. Sean Rayford/Getty Images

    Hundreds of industrial facilities with toxic pollutants are in Hurricane Milton’s path as it heads toward Florida, less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene flooded communities across the Southeast.

    Milton, expected to make landfall as a major hurricane late on Oct. 9, is bearing down on boat and spa factories along Florida’s west-central coast, along with the rubber, plastics and fiberglass manufacturers that supply them. Many of these facilities use tens of thousands of registered contaminants each year, including toluene, styrene and other chemicals known to have adverse effects on the central nervous system with prolonged exposure.

    Farther inland, hundreds more manufacturers that use and house hazardous chemicals onsite lie along the Interstate 4 and Interstate 75 corridors and their feeder roads. And many are in the path of the storm’s intense winds and heavy rainfall.

    Black dots indicate facilities in EPA’s 2022 Toxic Release Inventory within Hurricane Milton’s projected impact zone.
    Rice University Center for Coastal Futures and Adaptive Resilience, CC BY-ND

    Helene’s heavy rainfall in late September 2024 flooded industrial sites across the Southeast. A retired nuclear power plant just south of Cedar Key, Florida, was flooded by Helene’s storm surge.

    In disasters like these, the industrial damage can unfold over days, and residents may not hear about releases of toxic chemicals into water or the air until days or weeks later, if they find out at all.

    Yet pollution releases are common.

    After Hurricane Ian broadsided Florida’s western coast in 2022, runoff that included hazardous materials from damaged storage tanks and local fertilizer mining facilities, in addition to millions of gallons of wastewater, was visible from space, spilling across the coastal wetlands into the Gulf of Mexico. A year earlier, Hurricane Ida triggered more than 2,000 reported chemical spills.

    During Hurricane Harvey in 2017, floodwater surrounded chemical facilities near Houston. Some caught fire as cooling systems failed, releasing huge volumes or pollutants into the air. Emergency responders and residents, who didn’t know what risks they might face, blamed the chemicals for causing respiratory illnesses.

    Many types of toxic material can spread, settle and change the long-term health and environmental safety of surrounding communities – often with little notice to residents. Our team of environmental sociologists and anthropologists has mapped hazardous industrial sites across the country and paired them with hurricanes’ projected impact maps to help communities hold nearby facilities accountable.

    Major polluters on Gulf Coast at high risk”

    The risks from industrial facilities are most obvious along the U.S. Gulf Coast, where many major petrochemical complexes are clustered in harm’s way. These refineries, factories and storage facilities are often built along rivers or bays for easy shipping access.

    But those rivers can also bring storm surge flooding that can raise the ocean by several feet during hurricanes. The storm surge from Helene was over 10 feet above ground level in Florida’s Big Bend and over 6 feet in Tampa Bay. With Milton, forecasters warning of a 10- to 15-foot storm surge at Tampa Bay.

    A boom surrounds flooded railcars to try to contain leaks at a chemical plant in Braithwaite, La., after Hurricane Isaac in 2012.
    AP Photo/David J. Phillip

    A recent study found evidence of two to three times more pollution releases during hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico than during normal weather from 2005 to 2020.

    The effects of these pollution releases fall disproportionately on low-income communities and people of color, further exacerbating environmental health risks.

    Why residents may not hear about toxic releases

    The statistics are disconcerting, yet they get little attention. That is because hazardous releases remain largely invisible due to limited disclosure requirements and scant public information. Even emergency responders often don’t know exactly which hazardous chemicals they are facing in emergency situations.

    The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requires major polluters to file only very general information about chemicals and on-site risks in their risk management plans. Some large-scale fuel storage facilities, such as those holding liquefied natural gas, are not even required to do that.

    These risk management plans outline “worst-case” scenarios and are supposed to be publicly accessible. But, in reality, we and others have found them difficult to access, heavily redacted and housed in federal reading rooms with limited access. The reason local officials and national scientific review panels often give for the secrecy is to protect the facilities from terrorist attack.

    Oil storage tanks and industrial facilities line the Houston Ship Channel, which is vulnerable to storm surge from Gulf of Mexico hurricanes.
    AP Photo/David J. Phillip

    Adding to this opacity is the fact that many states – including those along the Gulf – suspend restrictions on pollution releases during emergency declarations. Meanwhile, real-time incident notifications from the National Response Center – the federal government’s repository for all chemical discharges into the environment – typically lag by a week or more,

    We believe this limited public information on rising chemical threats from our changing climate should be front-page news every hurricane season. Communities should be aware of the risks of hosting vulnerable industrial infrastructure, particularly as rising global temperatures increase the risk of extreme downpours and powerful hurricanes.

    Mapping the risks nationwide to raise awareness

    To help communities understand their risks, our team at Rice University’s new Center for Coastal Futures and Adaptive Resilience investigates how industrial communities in flood-prone areas nationwide can better adapt to such threats, socially as well as technologically.

    Our interactive map shows where elevated future flood risks threaten to inundate major polluters that we identify using the EPA’s Toxic Release Inventory.

    The U.S. has several hot spots with clusters of flood-prone polluters. Houston’s Ship Channel, Chicago’s waterfront steel industries and the harbors at Los Angeles and New York/New Jersey are among the biggest.

    Three of the biggest hot spots, where large numbers of industrial facilities with toxic materials face elevated future flood risks, are in the Northeast, the northwestern Gulf Coast and the southern end of the Great Lakes.
    Rice University Center for Coastal Futures and Adaptive Resilience, CC BY-ND

    But, as Helene revealed, there can also be great concern in less obvious spots. Inland, particularly in the mountains, runoff can quickly turn normally tame rivers into fast-rising torrents. The French Broad River at Asheville, North Carolina, rose about 12 feet in 12 hours during Helene and set a new flood stage record.

    When hurricanes and tropical storms are headed for the U.S., our interactive maps show where major polluters are located in the storm’s projected cone of impact. The maps identify hazardous flood-prone facilities down to the address, anywhere in the country.

    Knowledge is the first step

    Knowing where these sites are located is only the first step. Often, it’s up to communities themselves, many of them already overexposed and historically underserved, to raise concerns and demand strategies for mitigating the health, economic and environmental risks that industrial sites at risk of flooding and other damage can pose.

    These discussions can’t wait until a disaster is on the way. By knowing where these risks may be, communities can take steps now to build a safer future.

    This article, originally published Sept. 30, has been updated with Hurricane Milton.

    James R. Elliott receives funding from the National Science Foundation and the National Renewable Energy Lab.

    Dominic Boyer receives funding from the National Science Foundation, NOAA and Texas Sea Grant.

    Phylicia Lee Brown has nothing to disclose.

    – ref. Hurricane Milton: Flooded industrial sites and toxic chemical releases are a silent, growing threat – https://theconversation.com/hurricane-milton-flooded-industrial-sites-and-toxic-chemical-releases-are-a-silent-growing-threat-239977

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Do recent class actions against ‘flex commission’ car loans mean consumer voices are getting stronger?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jeannie Marie Paterson, Professor of Law, The University of Melbourne

    Gatot Adri/Shutterstock

    It’s been more than five years since the banking royal commission, but its findings continue to have an impact on the financial services sector.

    Law firm Maurice Blackburn recently announced it had settled with ANZ in a class action over allegedly unlawful “flex commissions” built into car loans made by Esanda between 2011 and 2016.

    ANZ agreed to settle the proceedings for $85 million on a “no admission of liability” basis. However, two further flex commission class actions – against Westpac & St George and Macquarie Leasing – remain on foot and will be heard this month.

    Class actions are a growing trend in the ways consumers seek to access justice. Many cases are simply too small to be pursued individually.

    On top of this, a recent High Court ruling could see organisations come under greater scrutiny over the systems they put in place. Could all of this mean consumers are getting a stronger voice?

    What are flex commissions?

    Many car dealers offer to provide financing for prospective car buyers as an alternative to getting a loan directly from a bank. But dealers typically don’t have their own huge reserves of funds to lend out.

    This financing usually comes from a finance company or bank lender through what is sometimes called a “white label” product.

    Many car dealers offer financing arrangements directly to customers.
    Tikhomirov Sergey/Shutterstock

    Dealers will usually be paid a commission on the loans they arrange by the lender. Prior to 2018, some lenders offered these car dealers arranging loans what is called a “flex commission”.

    Flex commissions allowed car dealers to set the interest rate on car loans above an agreed base rate.

    Higher interest rates meant a greater commission for the car dealer, but were not always in the interests of the borrower.

    Banned and heavily criticised

    Flex commissions were formally banned by Australia’s corporate watchdog, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), in November 2018.

    ASIC had been concerned that borrowers were paying excessively high interest rates on dealer-arranged car loans, and that the commissions were not fair or transparent.

    The watchdog’s own research found about 15% of customers were being charged an interest rate that was 7% or more above the base rate.

    Their main concern was that many car dealers weren’t increasing rates in line with actual credit risk, but rather opportunistically to target inexperienced or vulnerable consumers.

    Shortly after the ban, the final report of the banking royal commission didn’t mince words. Commissioner Kenneth Hayne noted a lack of transparency and a misplaced trust:

    Many borrowers knew nothing of these arrangements. Lenders did not publicise them; dealers did not reveal them. […] To the borrower, the dealer might have appeared to be acting for the borrower by submitting a loan proposal on behalf of the borrower. The borrower was given no indication that in fact the dealer was looking after its own interests.

    Why were class actions needed?

    Neither ASIC’s ban nor the criticisms of the banking royal commission guaranteed any redress for borrowers subject to loans with flex commissions.

    ASIC suggested flex commissions may have contravened the National Consumer Credit Protection Act by being unfair, or the ASIC Act by being misleading. But it is difficult and expensive for individuals to pursue such claims themselves in court.

    ASIC itself can seek compensation on behalf of borrowers, or require redress to be paid as part of other enforcement action. The watchdog has already gone down this road in some of the especially egregious instances of misconduct identified by the royal commission, such as fees for no service.

    Where individual action is too hard or regulator action lacking, consumers’ best option for redress may lie in a class action – taken on a no-win, no-fee basis. The likelihood of a good result may be increased in instances where the class action “piggybacks” on an adverse report from the regulator.

    Corporations may face increasing scrutiny

    It’s reasonable to ask why upstream lenders are being targeted in “flex commission” class actions when it is the car dealers who allegedly wronged borrowers.

    The ongoing class actions do not allege the lenders themselves misled borrowers or treated them unfairly. However, in this context that may not matter.

    In each of the class actions, Maurice Blackburn has argued the car dealers were acting as the representatives of the lenders, which they say makes the lenders responsible for the car dealers’ alleged misconduct.

    A recent High Court ruling may mean corporations have to take greater responsibility for the systems they oversee.
    Shutterstock

    Moreover, in these and similar cases, a recent High Court ruling that centred on “systemic unconscionable conduct” could make it harder for such upstream entities to argue their distance from alleged wrongdoing in systems they put in place.

    Better access to justice

    There has been a rise in consumer protection class actions in recent years, supported by changes in rules of procedure in several jurisdictions.

    Justice Bernard Murphy of the Federal Court of Australia has argued these changes promote the important value of access to justice:

    The important thing to remember is that class actions are critical in ensuring that people can obtain redress for mass civil wrongs. Laws which are not, in fact, readily capable of enforcement by ordinary Australians are little more than an illusion.

    This trend is important. Dishonest or unfair conduct has long been prohibited in the National Consumer Credit Protection Act, but this hasn’t been used much to date.

    Given the current flex commission actions closely follow the findings of ASIC, we should watch the regulator closely for hints of any future actions in other areas. Many could spark discussions that ultimately lead to stronger protection for consumers.

    But when they are successful, we also need to keep an eye on the actual payout to borrowers and hope it takes place without undue delay.

    Jeannie Marie Paterson has previously received funding from the Australian Research Council, DFAT and the Menzies Foundation.

    – ref. Do recent class actions against ‘flex commission’ car loans mean consumer voices are getting stronger? – https://theconversation.com/do-recent-class-actions-against-flex-commission-car-loans-mean-consumer-voices-are-getting-stronger-240795

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: In Vogue: the 90s was a boom time for Australian fashion and faces. What happened?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sasha Sarago, First Nations Cultural Innovation Lead – Beauty and Technology, Charles Sturt University

    The In Vogue: The 90s series transports audiences back to the glamour and grandeur of a transformative decade for fashion. Set against the backdrop of New York, London and Paris, the series explores the rise of supermodels, designer powerhouses and fashion’s global influence. But the fashion scene in Australia – a country that was also enjoying a meteoric rise in international success at the time – does not crack a mention.

    The 1990s marked a golden era for fashion. Supermodels like Linda Evangelista, Naomi Campbell, Cindy Crawford and Christy Turlington became style icons. Designers like Tom Ford, Jean-Paul Gaultier, and John Galliano pushed the boundaries of fashion creating moments that defined the times and influenced everything from pop culture to politics.

    Even though Australia may not have had the runway clout of Paris or New York, the nation was making significant strides in fashion during the same period. Australian designers’ and models’ distinct styles were impressive – giving fashion heavyweights a run for their money.

    So, what went wrong?

    The 90s turned the fashion industry upside down.

    Australian designers, international success

    In the 1990s, Australian designer houses such as Alannah Hill, Collette Dinnigan, Akira Isogawa and Sass & Bide signified Australia’s “coming of age” in fashion, with each designer bringing a unique flair and Australian sensibility to the international market.

    Alannah Hill created a whimsical aesthetic with an edgy twist. Her designs, worn by celebrities Nicole Kidman, Helena Christensen and Courtney Love, earned her a cult following. Business skyrocketed from her Chapel Street boutique in Melbourne to the department stores Selfridges and Browns in London and Bergdorf Goodman and Henri Bendel in Fifth Avenue, New York City.

    In 1996, Collette Dinnigan gained worldwide acclaim as the first Australian designer to showcase her collection at Paris Fashion Week. Dinnigan’s delicate lace dresses and couture craftsmanship found a spotlight at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum’s Fashion in Motion exhibition. Striking while the iron was hot, Dinnigan secured a lingerie collaboration with Marks & Spencer.

    Collette Dinnigan’s designs were celebrated in a 2015 retrospective exhibition.
    4Susie/Shutterstock

    Akira Isogawa, known for his blend of Japanese and Western aesthetics shared his first collection in 1994. He has presented subsequent collections in Paris bi-annually, a legacy sustained since 1998. Innovative from the jump, he turned early constraints to strengths. When the budget for his first big show didn’t stretch to shoes, he sent models down the runway in little red socks. The fashion statement helped him eventually secure more than 50 retail partners.

    Sass & Bide, founded in 1999 by friends Sarah-Jane Clarke and Heidi Middleton, brought a youthful, urban energy from London’s Portobello Road Markets back to Australian shores. Their signature brand quickly gained popularity and was acquired by Myer in a A$42.3 million two-part deal. Australia was no longer a disconnected island but a wild card in the global fashion ecosystem.

    Australian faces and Elaine George’s Vogue cover

    Australian designers weren’t the only superstars gaining fashion fame.

    By the time the supermodel phenomenon etched itself into the fashion zeitgeist, Australian model and businesswoman Elle Macpherson (known then as The Body) was already well known. Australian models Sarah Murdoch, Kristy Hinze, Kate Fisher and Alyssa Sutherland would follow.

    Sarah Murdoch (nee O’Hare, pictured with Anneliese Seubert and Emma Balfour in 1996) graced Australian catwalks in the 90s.
    Patrick Riviere/Getty

    Magazine cover models throughout the 90s showed sun-kissed “girl next door” charm. The exception was Emma Balfour, often touted as Australia’s androgynous counterpart to Kate Moss’s grunge-bohemian look.

    But 1993 produced a turning point in Australia’s beauty paradigm. It was the year Elaine George, Australia’s first Aboriginal fashion model, arrived on the cover of Vogue Australia magazine, making fashion history. Elaine’s presence highlighted the Australian fashion industry’s prioritisation of Eurocentric beauty ideals.

    First Nations beauty and fashion talent urgently needed celebrating. But Vogue’s Australian readers had to wait until October 2000 until Torres Strait Islander singer-songwriter and actress Christine Anu was featured on the cover. The gap showed the stain of underrepresentation and inequity within Australian fashion’s reputation had remained.

    The 2000s, when fashion got much faster

    While the 1990s were a period of optimism and growth for Australian fashion, the momentum failed to continue into the 2000s. Several factors contributed to this decline.

    One of the most significant changes was the rise of fast fashion in the early 2000s. Brands like Zara, H&M and Forever 21 began dominating the global market with affordable, quickly produced garments.

    This shift left many independent designers, including those from Australia, struggling to compete. The slow, meticulous craftsmanship that had defined Australian designers in the 90s could not keep up with the fast-fashion cycle.

    Another challenge was the lack of sustained support for the Australian fashion industry. Unlike New York, London or Paris, which had well-established fashion infrastructures, Australia’s fashion scene was still relatively young. There was no long-term strategy to nurture emerging talent or to promote Australian fashion on a global scale. Many designers either relocated abroad or found it difficult to maintain the same level of success they had achieved in the 90s.

    A new Renaissance?

    The story of Australian fashion in the 1990s is one of promise, yet ultimately missed opportunity. Today, Australia has a chance to enter a new renaissance fuelled by digital innovation and its unique cultures.

    The rise of digital fashion enables Australian designers to break free from the constraints of traditional fashion markets. With virtual clothing (simulated for real wear or digital realms), AI-powered design tools and metaverse runways, Australian creatives can harness technology to showcase their work globally.

    The championing of Indigenous models, designers and multicultural identity is essential. This inclusivity could position Australia as sustainable and ethical fashion innovator and present a compelling alternative to the fast-fashion giants.

    Sasha Sarago does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. In Vogue: the 90s was a boom time for Australian fashion and faces. What happened? – https://theconversation.com/in-vogue-the-90s-was-a-boom-time-for-australian-fashion-and-faces-what-happened-240784

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Clues left by the Alpine Fault’s last big quake reveal its direction – this will help NZ prepare for the inevitable next rupture

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jesse Kearse, Postdoctoral Researcher in Seismology, Kyoto University

    Kate Clark, CC BY-SA

    One of the world’s most anticipated earthquakes is the next major surface rupture of the Alpine Fault in the South Island of New Zealand.

    With a 75% chance of it happening within the next 50 years, there is justified interest in the likely magnitude, extent and intensity of ground shaking and impacts on the landscape, infrastructure and buildings.

    A key – and so far unanswered – question is which direction the fault rupture will take.

    Our new research reveals for the first time that the Alpine Fault ruptured from south to north in the great magnitude 8+ earthquake of 1717.

    We developed our technique to determine rupture direction based on the Kekerengu Fault after the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake. But our method is globally applicable for use in realistic earthquake scenarios and thus can contribute to better societal preparedness.

    In an Alpine Fault earthquake, there’s no direction that’s good news for the West Coast of the South Island. But a north-to-south rupture would send excess seismic energy into the relatively unpopulated region of Fiordland and the Tasman Sea.

    A south-to-north rupture on the other hand is forecast to cause higher intensity shaking in the populated regions of Canterbury, Marlborough, Tasman and the northern West Coast.

    A simulation of the shaking of a south-to-north earthquake along the Alpine Fault. Credit: Brendon Bradley, University of Canterbury.

    In the Kaikōura earthquake, Wellingtonians experienced this influence of rupture direction on shaking intensity. The south-to-north rupture meant more seismic energy was focused towards the capital city than, for example, Christchurch.

    So, while rupture direction has been observed to make a big difference in modern earthquakes, it is not something geologists have been able to directly determine for past earthquakes.

    Markings in the rock face

    The Kaikōura earthquake was well documented by seismographs. We know it started near Waiau in the south and travelled northwards to Cook Strait over a period of two minutes.

    We observed markings that were scratched onto the fault plane. Like coarse sandpaper against wood, these scratches, or “slickenlines”, record movement as rock faces slipped past each other during the earthquake. Some of these markings were curved, and our method can tell us the direction the earthquake rupture was travelling.

    Slickenlines from the Kekerengu Fault, taken days after the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake.
    Kate Clark, CC BY-SA

    Using computer models to simulate how the earthquake unfolded moment by moment, we were able to replicate the curved slickenlines observed in the field and relate them to rupture direction. This gave us the framework we needed to investigate rupture direction for past earthquakes on the Alpine Fault.

    The Alpine Fault hasn’t had a major surface rupture since 1717. During field work, we visited three sites along the fault and examined natural outcrops, carefully exposing the fault plane using hand tools. We found 146 slickenlines, 30 of which were curved.

    Geologist Tim Little measuring slickenlines on the Alpine Fault.
    Nic Barth, CC BY-SA

    The curved geometry of slickenlines from the Alpine Fault’s most recent earthquake indicated it had travelled from the south towards the north. We also found evidence for rupturing in the opposite direction, suggesting that earthquakes can start both north and south.

    On one outcrop, we found evidence of slickenlines from multiple earthquakes – a rare and tantalising find suggesting development of a longer history of rupture direction may be possible.

    The technique we’ve applied is a novel, on-fault observational method for determining past rupture directions. Its full potential is yet to be tested, but already it’s applicable to faults worldwide.

    Our research shows that the last Alpine Fault rupture was from the south, and that both directions are possible. New information about past earthquakes like this helps the scientific community produce realistic scenarios for the next major earthquake.

    We now have direct evidence from the fault itself that we need to prepare for the scenario of very strong to severe shaking for the northern West Coast, Tasman, Marlborough and Canterbury regions in the next major Alpine Fault earthquake.

    Jesse Kearse receives funding from the Royal Society Te Apārangi.

    Nicolas Barth receives funding from the Royal Society Te Apārangi.

    – ref. Clues left by the Alpine Fault’s last big quake reveal its direction – this will help NZ prepare for the inevitable next rupture – https://theconversation.com/clues-left-by-the-alpine-faults-last-big-quake-reveal-its-direction-this-will-help-nz-prepare-for-the-inevitable-next-rupture-240879

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: No savings? No plans? No Great Australian Dream. How housing is reshaping young people’s lives

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wendy Stone, Professor of Housing & Social Policy, Centre for Urban Transitions, Swinburne University of Technology

    Roman Samborskyi/Shutterstock

    Australia’s housing crisis is dramatically reshaping the lives and hopes of young people, highlighted in a new report launched today in Canberra as part of World Homeless Day.

    The research, developed by Swinburne University of Technology and funded by YWCA Australia, provided a platform for young women and gender diverse people from around Australia to share their housing experiences and aspirations.

    Our research found many young people are frustrated about the affordability, quality and security of housing in Australia.

    These housing barriers are changing the traditional life course that many of these young people expected to follow, undermining their sense of what it means to be an “adult”.

    Louise, 26, told us, as part of our research:

    I don’t feel like an adult sometimes because of my living circumstances … I thought I’d be like ‘Sex and the City’, having my own apartment and going out for drinks with my friends. But none of us have time to do that.

    The report highlights how such housing barriers and frustrations are severely impacting young people’s relationships, health and wellbeing, education, employment, and ability to plan for the future.

    Housing dreams are ratcheted down

    Home ownership is still “the great Australian dream” for many. However, numerous young people feel buying a home is out of reach or impossible.

    Erin, a young woman in her late 20s, states:

    It feels like you have to buy a house to be in the game, but to get there it just feels completely out of our grasp. And that’s quite scary.

    For many, buying or even renting is seen as unattainable without a partner. This has gendered implications where young women need to depend financially on a partner, potentially leading to disadvantage in the future.

    Amy, 30, articulates:

    It’s very hard to get a rental as a single female […] the uncertainty of not getting another place keeps me here.

    Participants with hopes of having children express anxiety when their housing circumstances are unpredictable and/or unaffordable.

    Jamie, a non-binary person in their mid-20s, says:

    The biggest negative impact of being stuck on the lowest end of the rental market is that it severely limits my ability to plan to start a family. My partner and I both want a child but are terrified of the idea of not being able to afford rent with a new baby and limited family support.

    Health and wellbeing are undermined

    Young people describe feeling overwhelmed, hopeless, trapped and crushed by their housing situations. For some, this stems from the daily challenge of simply making ends meet.

    Celia, a woman in her late 20s, describes:

    The constant cycle of living in a place for a year, getting a massive rent increase, having to find a new place and move again is exhausting, financially unsustainable and demoralising. It feels pretty hopeless because I’m stuck in this cycle and I’ll never save for a house deposit because I’m losing it all on exorbitant rent.

    For other participants, the health and wellbeing impact stems from their less-than-ideal dynamics at home, with many living with family as adults to save on rent.

    As Zoe, a woman in her late 20s, describes:

    It’s like you don’t pay with money to live with family […] but you pay with your mental health.

    Relationships and safety are affected

    Compromised safety is a concern among young women and gender diverse people we spoke with – whether it be escaping family and domestic violence, living in housing that is physically safe (such as with working locks on doors and windows), or sharing with others comfortably.

    Our research found gender has a material impact on housing experiences, and shaped young women’s and gender diverse people’s perceptions of safety.

    Julia, a woman in her early 20s, highlighted safety concerns:

    My family home was filled with a lot of domestic violence. And so when I left and now I have my own place, I feel very, very safe there in comparison. And also no one in my family knows where I live. So that makes me feel very safe.

    Some of the challenges of living with family were summarised by Ryde, a non-binary person in their early 20s:

    Even now I’m like learning how to like be my own person while still being under my parents’ roof […] like still living at home is a bit emotionally kind of weird.

    So what needs to change?

    Participants involved in the research provide a number of solutions for addressing their housing barriers, including:

    Beth told us:

    I feel like our education totally failed us. I always think there needs to be some kind of unit in Year 11 or 12, like a compulsory unit where it’s like just life skills. So taxes, superannuation, getting your first job, buying your first house, getting into the rental market. If we have the skills or knowledge from that education, we might be able to make more informed choices.

    Finally, young people urgently need a seat at the table when it comes to decisions about housing. They know what is needed and what politicians need to hear.

    In the words of Taylor, a 24-year-old woman:

    I think one thing that the politicians struggle to understand is that we’re not asking for, you know, four bedroom, three bathrooms at $400.00 a week. We’re asking for houses with working locks. No mould. And you know, we’re asking for very basic secure housing at affordable prices, it’s not a matter of us being picky. It’s a matter of health and safety.

    (All participants’ names have been changed).

    Wendy Stone receives funding from the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI), the Australian Research Council (ARC), the Brian M. Davis Charitable Foundation, Housing for the Aged Action Group (HAAG), Kids Under Cover and YWCA Australia, the funder of the research this article reports on. She has previously received funding from the Victorian Government.

    Catherine Hartung received funding from YWCA Australia to undertake this research.

    Sal Clark received funding from YWCA Australia to undertake this research

    Zoe Goodall has received funding from the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI), the Victorian government, the Brian M. Davis Charitable Foundation, Kids Under Cover, and YWCA Australia. YWCA Australia funded the research this article reports on.

    – ref. No savings? No plans? No Great Australian Dream. How housing is reshaping young people’s lives – https://theconversation.com/no-savings-no-plans-no-great-australian-dream-how-housing-is-reshaping-young-peoples-lives-240435

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Yes, nature is complex. But saving our precious environment means finding ways to measure it

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendan Wintle, Professor in Conservation Science, School of Ecosystem and Forest Science, The University of Melbourne

    Shutterstock

    Nature loss directly threatens half the global economy. The rapid destruction of biodiversity should alarm the many Australian businesses dependent on nature, such as those in agriculture, tourism, construction and food manufacturing. Yet nature considerations are often ignored in business decision-making.

    At the Global Nature Positive Summit in Sydney this week, scientists, politicians, conservationists and business leaders have gathered to discuss ways to help nature in Australia – not just by protecting it from damage, but improving it. Getting more businesses interested in – and taking positive action on – nature conservation is key to the talks.

    Reducing the environmental impact of a business first requires measuring that impact. It might seem an impossibly difficult task. After all, nature is a diverse and intricate web of connections. How can we capture that in a number?

    After all, nature is complex – but measuring how a business intersects with it need not be.

    Uncovering impacts on nature

    The fishing industry depends directly on stocks of wild fish. And a housing developer has a direct impact on nature if they clear natural vegetation to build a new suburb.

    Businesses interactions with nature can be indirect, too – for example, a margarine producer who uses canola oil from a grower who depends on bees for pollination. Builders might indirectly harm rainforests in Indonesia by buying timber grown there. A superannuation company investing in that developer is also having an indirect negative impact.

    From next year, Australian companies will be required to measure and report their climate impacts. While businesses are not yet required to disclose their impacts on nature more broadly, many are moving in that direction – both in Australia and globally.

    For example in 2022, more than 400 of the world’s largest corporations called for mandatory disclosure of nature impacts. They included Nestlé, Rio Tinto, L’Oréal, Sony and Volvo. And many early-adopter businesses have begun voluntary disclosures.

    Guidelines are available to help businesses understand and measure their impacts, however progress is slow. This is partly due to a perception from business that the task is too complex.

    Nature assessment is challenging. Unlike identifying a company’s contributions to climate change – by measuring tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions – there is no agreed single measure of impacts on nature.

    What’s more, different people ascribe different values to aspects of nature. Rightly or wrongly, for instance, most people would probably value a koala over a mosquito.

    What do you value more – a koala or a mosquito?
    Shutterstock

    Drawing on the expertise of ecologists

    Despite the difficulties, gauging the extent to which a business affects the environment can be done. Essentially, it involves three steps:

    1. understanding how a business broadly intersects with nature

    2. evaluating how specific business activities intersect with and put pressure on nature

    3. measuring and reporting the degree to which specific activities are impacting on the condition of nature. In other words, is the state of animals, plants and ecosystems improving or worsening?

    Online tools such as ENCORE can get businesses started on the first step – understanding a business’ broad impacts and dependency on nature.

    Many businesses are moving to the second stage – evaluating the specific business activities that put pressure on the environment, and determining the extent to which businesses depend on particular services ecosystems provide.

    The pressure a business places on nature can be measured via specific metrics, such as the amount of water consumed, air pollutants emitted, waste generated or area of land changed. Again, a suite of online tools and metrics can help with this.

    The next step is more complicated, yet essential. It requires businesses directly measuring their impacts on specific animals, plants and ecosystems. For this, we can turn to the expertise of ecologists.

    Individuals of a species can be hard to count, and extinction risk can be hard to measure. So ecologists often describe and monitor a species’ habitat – the environments in which a species can survive and reproduce – as a proxy for the fate of the species itself.

    Ecosystems – such as a rainforest, wetland or desert – can be described as being in good or poor condition. The rating depends on whether all the ecosystem’s plants, animals and other components are present, or whether unwanted components, such as weeds or invasive species, are found there.

    A graphic showing how ecologists measure the state of nature.
    TNFD

    In addition, maps, showing ecosystem condition and extent are available for much of Australia.

    Habitat mapping is also available for most threatened animals and plants, and thousands of other species. And mapping exists for World Heritage areas, important wetlands, national parks, Indigenous Protected Areas and other environment types.

    These resources are not difficult or expensive to access, and people and organisations with the skills to interpret and use such data are becoming more common.

    Some businesses are attempting these measurements. For example, plantation forestry company Forico last year prepared a natural capital report on a range of nature metrics, including the extent of species habitats, and assessment of vegetation condition.

    But many businesses are not yet grappling with this deeper nature analysis.

    This map, from ecosystem research organisation TERN, is one of many freely available to businesses seeking nature data.
    TERN

    Looking ahead

    We have the information and metrics to help businesses measure their impact on nature.

    Collaboration is urgently needed between business and nature experts, so the data available can be tailored to the needs of businesses, and presented in a form they can use.

    Governments can support this – for example by establishing accessible and practical online data platforms, and funding training for more nature experts who understand business.

    A new federal government agency, Environment Information Australia, will also hopefully become an important hub for data and information.

    By measuring what might seem immeasurable, businesses can become part of the solution to the nature crisis. There is cause for optimism – but no time to waste.

    Brendan Wintle has received funding from The Australian Research Council, the Victorian government, the NSW government, the Queensland government, the Commonwealth National Environmental Science Program, the Ian Potter Foundation, the Hermon Slade Foundation and the Australian Conservation Foundation. Wintle is a Board Director of Zoos Victoria and a lead councillor of the Biodiversity Council.

    Sarah Bekessy receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Ian Potter Foundation and the European Commission. She is a Lead Councillor with The Biodiversity Council, a board member of Bush Heritage Australia, a member of the WWF Eminent Scientists Group and an advisor to ELM Responsible Investment, the Living Building Challenge and Wood for Good.

    Simon O’Connor is affiliated with the Australian government as a member of the Minister for Environment and Water’s Nature Finance Council, and previously oversaw the national consultation group for the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures

    William Geary receives funding from the Victorian government and is associated with the Victorian Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action.

    – ref. Yes, nature is complex. But saving our precious environment means finding ways to measure it – https://theconversation.com/yes-nature-is-complex-but-saving-our-precious-environment-means-finding-ways-to-measure-it-240583

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Being on TikTok is a modern political necessity. Look no further than Peter Dutton

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Grantham, Lecturer in Communication, Griffith University

    TikTok

    Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s recent decision to join TikTok marks a big shift in his approach to political campaigning. He previously criticised the platform over security concerns, but now he is embracing it.

    Dutton’s reversal reflects a broader trend of Australian politicians using the platform. This is especially the case in 2024, a year marked by pivotal elections worldwide.

    TikTok offers a unique form of engagement and allows politicians to reach a wide range of voters in ways traditional platforms don’t.

    Dutton’s conservative first post does contrast with TikTok’s casual and engaging style, but signals a willingness to adapt to modern political communication. While his initial concerns about TikTok’s data privacy remain valid, his shift to actively using the platform emphasises its importance in political campaigns today.

    TikTok’s rise as a political tool

    The political landscape is changing. Politicians worldwide who once criticised TikTok are now joining it.

    This shift not only marks evolving campaign strategies but also raises broader questions about the role of social media in democracy.

    Major political figures, such as US presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, continue to use TikTok despite proposed bans in the United States. These bans are currently being contested in court, but are due to commence in January 2025.

    The continued use of TikTok by both candidates underlines the platform’s undeniable significance in shaping political communication.

    TikTok’s popularity stems from its ability to deliver accessible and engaging content. Voters are drawn to TikTok as a source of political news and information because of its easy-to-consume format.

    TikTok allows politicians to bypass the formalities of traditional political communication and present their messages in a relatable way.

    For instance, Senator Fatima Payman’s viral “skibidi” speech is a clear example of how effectively TikTok can amplify political content. She delivered this speech in the Australian Senate, using only TikTok slang.

    It resonated with a younger demographic, and so far has more than eight million views.

    As a result, her account now has more than 100,000 followers and continues to receive significant views on all posts.

    However, when leaning into slang, trends and other visibility strategies, politician walk a fine line where content could be considered “cringe”. This cringe factor can arise if the trend being used is losing relevance or when the content seems out of place or forced (Dutton himself copped some flack for belatedly jumping on the “demure” trend).

    The role of authenticity

    One of the key factors behind successful political engagement on TikTok is authenticity. The platform thrives on genuine, relatable content. Politicians who can showcase a more human side tend to resonate with voters.

    Payman’s use of TikTok slang in her speech connected her with younger audiences, demonstrating the power of speaking the language of the platform’s primary users. Authenticity plays a significant role in TikTok’s algorithm, making it essential for politicians to come across as sincere.

    Because TikTok’s advertising policy bans political ads, politicians must rely on organic content to engage users. Authenticity is therefore an entry requirement.

    Dutton’s presence on TikTok will be closely scrutinised to see how he balances the platform’s demand for authenticity with his public persona. Voters are more likely to engage with politicians they find relatable, so Dutton’s ability to reveal his “ordinary” side without making people cringe may determine how well he is received on TikTok.

    Electioneering on TikTok

    TikTok’s impact on elections has already been demonstrated in several countries.

    In the 2022 Australian federal election, the Labor Party’s use of the app was linked to its success. UK Labour’s similar strategy in 2024 mirrored this result.

    Elections are won and lost for many reasons. There is also no direct data linking TikTok content to voter decisions. But there is a clear correlation between effective use of the platform and electoral victories.

    As Australia approaches its next federal election, TikTok will play a central role in how parties reach voters. For politicians like Dutton, mastering the balance between authenticity and policy will be key to successfully engaging and informing voters on this rapidly evolving platform.

    Challenges ahead

    TikTok’s short video format poses a challenge for conveying complex policy ideas, often leading to oversimplification. Politicians like Dutton must find ways to deepen engagement outside the platform to ensure voters understand their positions.

    Another challenge is the legal issues TikTok faces, particularly in the US. If the platform is banned or restricted in what is a major market, it could affect its use globally, including in Australia. This could disrupt political outreach and engagement strategies, particularly for those who have cultivated a strong presence.

    Dutton’s engagement with TikTok may also spark debate about balancing the benefits of reaching voters through a platform with concerns about data security and misinformation.

    Susan Grantham does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Being on TikTok is a modern political necessity. Look no further than Peter Dutton – https://theconversation.com/being-on-tiktok-is-a-modern-political-necessity-look-no-further-than-peter-dutton-240009

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Israel has banned the UN secretary-general. Is this legal – or right?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Samuel Berhanu Woldemariam, Lecturer in law, University of Newcastle

    In early October, Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, announced on X he had declared the United Nations secretary-general, António Guterres, persona non grata. In other words, he had banned Guterres from setting foot in Israel.

    Katz said Guterres’ failure to “unequivocally condemn” Iran’s recent attack on Israel was the reason he was no longer welcome. The strongly worded statement further accused the UN chief of failing to “denounce” Hamas’ massacre in southern Israel on October 7 2023. He added:

    A secretary-general who gives backing to terrorists, rapists and murderers from Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis and now Iran — the mothership of global terror — will be remembered as a stain on the history of the UN.

    Security Council members expressed their support for Guterres after Katz’s declaration. And Guterres’ spokesperson called it “a political statement” and “just one more attack […] on UN staff” by the Israeli government.

    What is the significance of Israel’s declaration? And what kind of impact could it have?

    What does persona non grata mean?

    The Latin phrase persona non grata means “an unwelcome person”. In international law, it refers to the right of states to exclude a diplomat or consular officer from their territory. This can take the form of expelling a diplomat or denying them entry.

    Under international conventions, nations are not required to provide a reason for such a declaration.

    Diplomats and consular staff enjoy a wide range of immunities and privileges under international law. Among other things, they cannot be subjected to any form of arrest or detention, nor can they face legal action in a criminal or civil court.

    The diplomat’s home nation must waive immunity for this kind of action to be taken.

    The concept of persona non grata was therefore devised as a way to balance against these immunities and privileges. A nation that is aggrieved by the actions of a diplomat or consular officer can simply bar them from their territory, without even providing a reason.

    Can UN officials be declared persona non grata?

    There is a longstanding debate between the UN and its member states about the legality of such declarations.

    The UN maintains its officials cannot be barred from member nations because they are not diplomats accredited to those countries. Rather, they are international civil servants who are accountable to a global organisation.

    The UN also notes that declaring its officials persona non grata seriously interferes with the organisation’s functions, as well as the powers of the UN secretary-general under the UN Charter.

    Many countries, however, do not agree with the UN’s position. In recent years, Ethiopia, Mali, Sudan and Armenia have all declared UN officials to be persona non grata, just to name a few.

    Israel’s declaration is only the second time a nation has specifically banned the UN secretary-general. The first time was in the 1950s when both the Soviet Union and the Republic of China declared the first secretary-general, Trygve Lie, persona non grata.

    In 1961, the Soviet Union also said it would not recognise Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold as an “official of the United Nations”.

    Power must be handled with restraint

    I am researching this issue, which has not yet been widely explored. My study is looking at two main questions: whether states have the right to bar UN officials and the implications of doing this.

    On the first question, I believe there are strong legal reasons to support the rights of states to kick out – or keep out – UN officials.

    For one, nations have a wide scope of sovereign rights to decide who enters and leaves their territory. This is a cardinal principle of sovereignty.

    If UN officials are suspected of engaging in conduct harmful to a country’s national interests and security, it also has a right to defend and protect itself. One way of doing so is to expel the suspected UN official.

    Lastly, there is no direct rule under international law that prohibits this kind of action.

    Beyond these legal rights, however, is the important issue of what such an action means for the longer-term credibility and efficacy of the UN.

    Because countries are not required to provide a reason for banning a foreign diplomat, this makes it a powerful political weapon if used against a UN official.

    And banning UN officials specifically could also seriously jeopardise the organisation’s work and put innocent lives at risk. This is especially true in the context of armed conflicts where the UN is called upon to provide humanitarian assistance.

    For example, in 2021, Ethiopia expelled five UN humanitarian officials who were providing food, medicine, water and other life-saving items to more than 5 million people in a region that was engaged in armed conflict with the federal government. Given the expelled officials were high-ranking staff, the action disrupted the co‑ordination and provision of assistance.

    And banning the secretary-general, in particular, is perhaps the strongest indicator of the breakdown of the relationship between a state and the UN.

    The secretary-general is the chief international civil servant and the embodiment of the organisation. Their leadership is also critical for providing emergency relief, brokering ceasefires and promoting peace.

    Declaring the secretary-general persona non grata, therefore, seriously damages his or her standing, especially in the context of an armed conflict. It’s also a strong political statement against the UN more broadly, which could significantly complicate its humanitarian work.

    Therefore, while countries do have the sovereign power to declare UN officials persona non grata, they need to exercise restraint in how they use this power. What such restraint should look like is an open question, but one that must be urgently addressed.

    The author’s ongoing research work on the topic has received internal funding support from the College of Humanities and Social Futures at The University of Newcastle, NSW.

    – ref. Israel has banned the UN secretary-general. Is this legal – or right? – https://theconversation.com/israel-has-banned-the-un-secretary-general-is-this-legal-or-right-240674

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Huge waves in the atmosphere dump extreme rain on northern Australia

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Fadhlil Rizki Muhammad, Graduate Researcher, The University of Melbourne

    Bureau of Meteorology via AAP

    In 2023, almost a year’s worth of rain fell over ten days in parts of northwestern Australia, leading to catastrophic flooding in the town of Fitzroy Crossing and surrounds. The rainfall was linked to a tropical cyclone, but there were also lesser-known forces at work: huge, planet-scale oscillations called atmospheric waves which bring heavy rain to northern Australia.

    While climate drivers such as El Niño and La Niña are becoming more familiar to many Australians, fewer understand the significant role played by atmospheric waves, which are like vast musical notes resonating around the globe. These waves can greatly influence rainfall and extreme weather events in Australia – and we don’t know yet whether they could grow more intense as the world warms.

    In our latest research, we discovered how these waves affect Australia’s rainfall, and how they can help us make better weather forecasts. The research is published in the Journal of Climate.

    What are atmospheric waves?

    You can think of atmospheric waves as huge musical notes that travel through the atmosphere around the equator. Just like a musical note, an atmospheric wave has a frequency (a pitch, or how often it oscillates) and an amplitude (a volume or intensity).

    Atmospheric waves can interact with each other to create complex melodies and harmonies in the atmosphere. They affect many aspects of the atmosphere, such as wind, humidity and pressure.

    In the same way musical harmony can evoke emotions, certain combinations of atmospheric waves can lead to complex clusters of clouds that evoke extreme rain events.

    Equatorial atmospheric waves were first discovered mathematically in 1966 by Japanese researcher Taroh Matsuno. By solving equations that describe the behaviour of the atmosphere near the equator, he found waves that could be categorised by frequency, structure, speed and direction of movement.

    Later research found these waves exist in the real world – and they have been studied ever since.

    Some of the most important waves are called Kelvin waves and equatorial Rossby waves. Kelvin waves are centred around the equator, propagate to the east, and take between 2.5 and 17 days to complete one oscillation.

    On the other hand, equatorial Rossby waves are structured as a pair of swirls, one north of the equator and one to the south, which propagate to the west. They are also slower than Kelvin waves, taking between 9 and 72 days to complete an oscillation.

    There are also two other kinds of equatorial fluctuations, discovered after Matsuno’s original work. These are the Madden–Julian Oscillation, which propagates eastward, and tropical depression-type waves, which propagate to the west. Both of these have their own frequencies and influences on the Australian atmosphere.

    Impacts on Australian weather

    We studied the relationship between these waves and rainfall in northern Australia from 1981 to 2018. We found the waves had a significant impact on rainfall during the southern summer (December–February) and autumn (March–May).

    Equatorial Rossby waves that cross Australia may make heavy rainfall around 1.5 times as likely as normal, while tropical depression-type waves make it 1.3 times more likely.

    When waves combine in certain ways, heavy rain events become even more likely.

    Atmospheric waves travelling around the equator can increase the chances of heavy rain – and combinations of waves can have an even greater impact.
    Fadhlil Rizki Muhammad

    For example, a combination of an equatorial Rossby wave and the Madden–Julian Oscillation can make heavy rain in northern Australia two to three times more likely. Similarly, if a tropical depression-type wave and an equatorial Rossby wave cross Australia at the same time, heavy rainfall could be twice as likely as usual.

    Due to Australia’s vast landmass and local geography, the impacts of these waves are quite different across the continent. Regions such as the Kimberley, Cape York and the Top End experience the largest impact from these waves, increasing the chance of heavy rain by up to 3.3 times.

    Meanwhile, the impacts of these waves on the eastern coast of Queensland and inland Queensland are not as great as in the other regions. However, the change in likelihood is still quite high: the waves can make heavy rain 1.4–2.2 times more likely than it would otherwise be.

    What does the future look like?

    We have shown that the activity of these “atmospheric melodies” is important and potentially provides room for improvement in weather models.

    Currently, a good representation of these waves in weather models can improve forecasts up to two weeks ahead.

    A better representation of these waves may improve future weather prediction in the tropics.

    In addition, the impact of these waves in a warmer world is still a mystery. Recent research suggests some atmospheric waves, such as Kelvin and the Madden-Julian Oscillation, could become more intense, potentially with more organised cloud clusters and significant impacts on heavy rain events.

    Fadhlil Rizki Muhammad receives funding from The University of Melbourne and ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes.

    Andrew King receives funding from the ARC Centre of Excellence for 21st Century Weather and the National Environmental Science Program.

    Claire Vincent receives funding from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate Extremes and the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Weather of the 21st Century

    Sandro W. Lubis receives funding from U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science Biological and Environmental Research as part of Global and Regional Model Analysis program area. The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is operated by Battelle for the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract DE-AC05-76RLO1830.

    – ref. Huge waves in the atmosphere dump extreme rain on northern Australia – https://theconversation.com/huge-waves-in-the-atmosphere-dump-extreme-rain-on-northern-australia-240788

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: These 5 ‘post-truth’ claims are fuelling the water wars in Australia

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Quentin Grafton, Australian Laureate Professor of Economics, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

    Mr Privacy/Shutterstock

    The contest between truth and post-truth matters when trying to solve big public policy questions. One of these questions is how to sustainably manage water in Australia for the benefit of all.

    Truths can be confirmed or, at the very least, can be proved false. Post-truths, however, are opinions that masquerade as facts and are not supported by verifiable evidence.

    Post-truths muddy political and policy debates. They leave everyday people simply not knowing what to believe anymore. This prevents good policy being enacted.

    As I outline in a speech to the National Press Club today, several post-truths, espoused by a wide range of people and organisations, are getting in the way of Australian water reforms. These reforms are essential to secure a better water future for the driest inhabitable continent.

    Water policy in Australia is now at a crucial juncture. This year is the 20th anniversary of the National Water Initiative that was meant to lay the foundations for sustainable water management. The completion date of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, accompanied by billions of dollars in funding, is just two years away.

    Yet the so-called “water wars” are raging again. Here are five post-truth claims to watch out for.

    Australia’s water wars are raging again.
    Shutterstock

    1. Water buybacks to sustain rivers harm communities

    The Australian government buys water rights from willing sellers to return water to the environment. These buybacks have been controversial and blamed, with little evidence, for causing many farmers to become distressed and bankrupt, and to leave farming.

    It’s true some irrigators are opposed to buybacks and prefer subsidies to build more efficient irrigation infrastructure on their properties.

    But converting state water licences to a system of tradeable water rights gifted irrigators rights now worth tens of billions of dollars. In return, the government was supposed to buy back enough water from willing sellers to return rivers to health.

    But insufficient water has been bought back from irrigators, for a couple of reasons.

    First, the federal budget for buybacks was much less than needed to reduce irrigators’ water use to sustainable levels.

    Second, the Abbott government capped buybacks in 2015. Its justification was the post-truth claim, based on “low quality” consultant reports, that buybacks were “destroying” irrigation communities.

    The truth is, buybacks from willing sellers are much more cost-effective than taxpayer-subsidised irrigation infrastructure. Research shows infrastructure subsidies give irrigators an incentive to use even more water.

    And there is robust evidence that, overall, the net social and economic impacts of water buybacks are positive. They give sellers the flexibility to adjust their farming practices in ways that are best for them.

    2. Efficient irrigation ‘saves’ water and increases stream flows

    Australia’s irrigation industry, in general, uses water efficiently. It’s a result of many practices, ranging from drip irrigation to covered water channels to digital monitoring technology, among other things.

    However, spending on irrigation efficiencies has not saved much water.

    Landholders have been paid billions of dollars for efficiency improvements. These same taxpayer dollars, paradoxically, may have reduced stream flows in some of our largest rivers. That’s because more efficient irrigation can decrease the amount of water flowing from farmers’ fields to rivers and aquifers.

    3. Australia has world-best water management

    Australia has one of the world’s largest formal water markets. But that doesn’t mean everyone benefits.

    For a start, the water markets are unjust. First Peoples, who were dispossessed of their land and water from 1788 onwards, still have only a tiny share of Australia’s water rights.

    In key areas, Australian water management is also far from best practice. For example, building weirs and dams has partly or completely disconnected groundwater from surface water and prevented or restricted the water flows to floodplains and wetlands that keep them healthy.

    Fish, bird and invertebrate habitats have been destroyed as a result. This must change if we are to avoid further degradation of river ecosystems.

    There is no more obvious sign of the ongoing destruction of Australia’s waterways than the fish kills along the Baaka (Lower Darling River) at Menindee. This happened in 2018–19, during a drought, and again in early 2023, when there was no drought.

    The New South Wales Office of the Chief Scientist and Engineer investigated the 2023 fish kill. Its report found:

    Mass fish deaths are symptomatic of degradation of the broader river ecosystem over many years […] failure in policy implementation is the root cause of the decline in the river ecosystem and the consequent fish deaths.

    4. All Australians have reliable access to good-quality water

    It’s true that residents of Australia’s biggest cities and towns enjoy reliable, good-quality water supplies 24/7. But it’s also true that hundreds of thousands of Australians in rural and remote areas regularly face multiple drinking water threats.

    These threats result in temporary public advice notices to boil water to remove microbiological pollution and health warnings about contaminants that boiling cannot remove, such as nitrates. A few dozen communities have elevated levels of the “forever chemicals”, PFAS, in their tap water.

    5. Dams can ‘drought-proof’ Australia

    It’s true that dams have helped Australia cope with variable rainfall from year to year. It’s also true, however, that despite building very large water storages in the 20th century, too much water is being diverted in multiple places. They include the Murray–Darling Basin, Australia’s “food bowl”.

    Australia is over-extracting the available water in its dams. It’s happening in the northern Murray-Darling Basin, where there is little control over how much overflow from rivers onto floodplains can be taken.

    Over-extraction is a big problem, especially during long droughts when there may be very little water to spare. It means the livelihoods of downstream irrigators with perennial plantings, such as grapes or fruit trees, are at stake. If their trees die, so do their businesses.

    A sustainable future must be built on facts

    Responding to Australia’s water crises is a huge challenge. It’s made even more difficult if we accept the post-truth claims, rather than verifiable facts about how we manage our waters.

    Real reform is needed to secure a sustainable Australian water future. To achieve this, we must tell the truth, acknowledge what’s wrong and be clear about what works and what doesn’t.

    Quentin Grafton receives funding from the Australian Research Council in relation to his water research. He is a former Member of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists (2010-2011).

    John Williams is affiliated as founding member of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists, a former Chief CSIRO Land and Water and former NSW Comissioner of Natural Resources.

    – ref. These 5 ‘post-truth’ claims are fuelling the water wars in Australia – https://theconversation.com/these-5-post-truth-claims-are-fuelling-the-water-wars-in-australia-239941

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Peter Weir’s The Cars That Ate Paris – a driving force in Ozploitation filmmaking

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Mark David Ryan, Professor, Film, Screen, Animation, Queensland University of Technology

    IMDB

    It has been 50 years since the cinema release of Peter Weir’s iconic, offbeat, cult classic The Cars That Ate Paris. The film seared the image of a silver Volkswagen Beetle weaponised with deadly spikes into the national imagination. It also helped shape the tropes of Ozploitation filmmaking within the history of Australian cinema.

    Main character Arthur Waldo (Terry Camilleri) and his older brother drive through idyllic countryside, filmed like a tourism commercial. But when a sign diverts them off the highway towards the fictitious town of Paris, it soon becomes clear the place survives on a “crash economy”.

    Older men in the community orchestrate car crashes on the road into Paris and survivors are taken to a hospital where a psychopathic doctor experiments on them. The townsfolk trade luggage from the cars for food and clothing and wrecks are salvaged by youths who terrorise the community.

    The mayor of Paris (John Meillon) pities Arthur and adopts him into his family. Arthur is eventually forced to work as the town’s sole parking inspector, gripped by a phobia of driving, having caused more than one death from behind the wheel.

    A uniquely Australian genre

    Cars was Australia’s first “car crash” film. These were Ozploitation films, which privileged “low” culture and sensationalist sex, violence, nudity or gore to shock viewers after the R rating was introduced in 1971.

    The Mad Max franchise later popularised the car-crash trope to create what has been regarded as a uniquely Australian film genre in the 1970s and 1980s. Movies in this canon included Chain Reaction (1980), Dead End Drive-In (1986) and Road Games (1981).

    Both The Cars That Ate Paris and Weir’s next feature – Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975), which would catapult him onto the global stage – marked a critical turning point for Australian cinema. They generated increased interest from distributors and film buyers in international markets and established the Australian Gothic style.

    Cars is one of our most iconic Australian horror movies, but it is paradoxically a movie most Australians have never seen.

    ‘No one leaves Paris … no one.’

    The slow burn of success

    Cars was Weir’s second feature film and a far more polished effort than his first experimental horror. Homesdale (1971) is about the owners of a guesthouse performing hideous social experiments on characters already suffering trauma.

    Cars was the first Australian movie to screen at France’s prestigious Cannes Film Festival. It marked a significant achievement for a local movie during the rebirth of the local movie industry, after the production of fiction movies had collapsed during the 1950s.

    To market the film, Car’s producers drove the spiked Volkswagen around Cannes’ streets in an ingenious attempt to hype its screening during a packed festival schedule. The film was well received, but as critic David Stratton observed, it proved just too different from anything Australian filmmakers had made before, and indeed to anything being made anywhere.

    The film failed to secure a distributor or reach large audiences at home or abroad – though it was released several years later in North America as The Cars That Eat People.

    A cult following

    A key reason for the movie’s slow reception was also why it became a cult classic: it defies filmic categories. It was originally promoted as a horror movie before being marketed as an art film. This was partly because the movie’s tone shifts jarringly from parody and black comedy to social commentary, before settling on all-out horror.

    The film was later released with a different title.
    IMDB

    The story is mostly a dark comment on authority, normality and car culture, which descends into schlock violence in the final act. After the older patriarchy punishes youths for terrorising the streets, a gang of monstrous cars – including the iconic porcupine VW beetle – idle on a darkened hill to the sound of animal noises. The killer cars attack the town, leading to murder, mayhem and a violent battle.

    Authur, drawn into the fight, kills one of the youths by repeatedly reversing over him. But rather than express shock or regret, he delights at being cured of his phobia. Arthur drives out of town joyously as survivors of the carnage flee the burning town.

    Some things don’t change

    The movie’s longevity comes from how it tackles social issues at the heart of the national character. Onscreen we see a dark critique of our obsession with cars and the “hoon culture” that results in tragic speeding or drink-driving-related deaths every year.

    The movie also examines tensions between generations. The older, conservative generation arranges car crashes before hypocritically attending church services and preaching justice. The younger hoons bristle at being controlled in a town where they see no future.

    One of the movie’s lasting thematic contributions to Ozploitation film is Weir’s depiction of the economic fragility and inopportunity of rural economies that lead to absurdly immoral activities.

    More recently, the 2010 film The Clinic adapted this premise by portraying the small town of Montgomery as reliant on an illegal international adoption ring. Townsfolk steal babies and force their mothers to fight to the death in an abandoned abattoir while affluent foreign couples watch on monitors to determine which baby they will adopt.

    The Clinic is a bleak, absurd example. But it shows how The Cars That Ate Paris continues to influence Australian cinema in profound and surprising ways.

    Mark David Ryan has received funding from the Australian Film Institute Research Collection (AFIRC) fellowship and is a co-founding member of the Streaming Industries and Genres Network (SIGN).

    – ref. Peter Weir’s The Cars That Ate Paris – a driving force in Ozploitation filmmaking – https://theconversation.com/peter-weirs-the-cars-that-ate-paris-a-driving-force-in-ozploitation-filmmaking-237233

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: International student caps are set to pass parliament, ushering in a new era of bureaucratic control

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Norton, Professor in the Practice of Higher Education Policy, Australian National University

    The federal government’s controversial plan to limit international student numbers is now almost certain to win parliamentary approval. But it looks like there will be some changes to the original bill introduced in May.

    A Senate committee, which has a Labor majority, has recommended the bill be passed with amendments. The government is expected to accept the committee’s suggestions.

    What did the committee find and what does this mean for caps on international student numbers?

    Clashing views in parliament

    In the inquiry report, Coalition senators criticised the government’s handling of international education. But they continued to support the idea of putting a limit on international students.

    The Greens’ dissenting report completely rejected the idea of caps. The Greens don’t have the Senate numbers to block them, but they may find common ground with the Coalition on some amendments to influence the final outcome.

    Changes to caps on courses

    The government’s original legislation would let the minister set international student caps by education provider, location and course.

    Caps by provider and location are meant to reduce pressure on accommodation and other services, especially in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane. This is a key goal of the bill and other recent changes to international student policy.

    But course-level enrolment caps are not necessary to achieve this.

    As the inquiry report notes, most international students do not stay in Australia permanently. So they should be allowed to choose courses based on their own interests and job opportunities in their home countries.

    The report also notes significant administrative issues involved with setting and monitoring caps for the more than 25,000 courses on offer to international students.

    But the report does not take these points to the logical conclusion of recommending no caps on courses. Instead, it proposes no course caps for universities or TAFEs. Non-university higher education providers and non-TAFE vocational education providers could still be subject to course-level caps.

    After the report was released, Education Minister Jason Clare cited advice about some vocational providers offering courses that “don’t give [students] a real qualification”.

    Coalition senators may seek the full removal of course caps from the bill – in the Senate report, they criticise what they call the “appalling treatment of many private higher education and [vocational education and training] providers”. With support from the Greens, course caps could be stopped.

    A new power to exempt some categories of students

    The government has flagged it wants to exempt students from the Pacific or Timor-Leste and some students on government scholarships from the new cap regime.

    That would require amendments to the original bill, which the Senate inquiry also recommends. This change is unlikely to face any Senate obstacles.

    An earlier date for announcing caps

    The bill requires caps to be announced by September 1 in the year before the caps apply, except for this year when the deadline is December 31.

    This date was criticised because international students receive offers before September. Education providers need to know their caps before they start making offers.

    The Senate report recommends a July 1 announcement instead.

    Huge powers for the minister

    As drafted, the bill gives the minister extraordinary personal power to set international student caps. It sets no limit on the reasons for setting caps. It requires no consultation prior to setting caps, other than the minister for education consulting the minister for skills.

    The Senate report suggests improvements to this process. The education minister would also need to consult the immigration minister and the regulators for vocational education and higher education.

    The report also says education providers should be consulted on the initial setting of enrolment limits each year. With around 1,500 providers registered to offer courses to international students, this consultation may need to be with their representative groups.

    More scrutiny for the caps?

    The bill has a dual system for setting caps. One of these is via a “legislative instrument”, which the minister makes. This can be disallowed by either house of parliament and is the only limit on the minister’s power.

    But the bill also allows the minister to bypass the parliament with a “notice” to education providers. This has the same practical effect as the legislative instrument.

    The bill’s explanatory memorandum (the document to help readers understand legislation), offers a benign explanation for this. It says the minister will only exercise the power of using a notice in limited circumstances. Its examples include when the education provider has supplied additional student accommodation, or needs to expand to take students from other providers that have gone out of business.

    Nothing in the bill, however, limits the use of capping by notice.

    In a submission to the inquiry, I recommended requiring parliamentary scrutiny of the way caps are set. The legislative instrument would set out rules and formulas for calculating the cap. The notice to education providers would have to apply these rules and formulas to their specific circumstances.

    The Senate committee majority, however, recommended a much weaker form of scrutiny. It suggested replacing the notice with a “notifiable instrument”. This would ensure the provider’s cap was publicly available. The notices, by contrast, only go to to the affected education provider, the Department of Education, and the relevant regulator.

    A notifiable instrument would allow more public scrutiny of the minister’s decisions, for people who keep an eye on the government’s legislation website. But it falls well short of a system in which parliament is always directly notified of caps and given the power to intervene.

    A turning point

    The Senate inquiry partly answers some criticisms or weaknesses of the bill. It’s likely the bill will next be debated when parliament sits in November.

    But whatever views people hold on capping international students – and with the student visa holder population nearing 700,000 there is a case for moderation – we are witnessing a major turning point in higher education.

    This bill, in combination with planned controls on domestic student enrolments, signals the demise of student choice and university autonomy. A new era of bureaucratic control from Canberra is arriving.

    Andrew Norton is employed by the Australian National University, which has announced major job cuts that it partly blames on the capping of international student enrolments.

    – ref. International student caps are set to pass parliament, ushering in a new era of bureaucratic control – https://theconversation.com/international-student-caps-are-set-to-pass-parliament-ushering-in-a-new-era-of-bureaucratic-control-240988

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Space isn’t all about the ‘race’ – rival superpowers must work together for a better future

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Art Cotterell, Research Associate, School of Regulation and Global Governance, Australian National University

    Artist’s concept of the docked Apollo and Soyuz in 1975. David Meltzer/NASA

    In recent years, a new “space race” has intensified between the United States and China. At a campaign rally last weekend, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump invoked this rivalry when declaring the US will “lead the world in space”, echoing Democratic counterpart Vice President Kamala Harris.

    Meanwhile, the president of China, Xi Jinping, has said becoming “a space power is our eternal dream”.

    But what is this latest “race” about, and are there pathways to common ground? History suggests these do exist. As a space governance specialist, I argue our future depends on it.

    The ‘race’ to the Moon

    Lunar missions have become synonymous with a “space race”. During the Cold War, the US and Soviet Union’s competition to achieve that first “one small step” on the Moon was a symbolic and strategic quest for political, technological, military and ideological dominance on Earth.

    Geopolitical tensions are again moving off-Earth. The US and China are leading separate missions which aim to return humans to the Moon. One goal is to further scientific research. But space mining and economic expansionism are also driving these efforts.

    This new “race” may give rise to new conflicts, especially over prime landing sites and valuable and scarce resources speculated to be located on the lunar south pole.

    Mining water ice could produce oxygen, drinking water and rocket fuel – all vital for sustaining lunar exploration and beyond. The Moon may also contain rare earth metals used in everyday electronics, and a rare non-radioactive isotope, helium-3, for nuclear power.

    Space mining could lead to a concerning “lunar gold rush” or trade war with nations and private actors in space. Resources mined off-Earth are predicted to be worth trillions of dollars.

    The US has a longer history of demonstrated space-faring capabilities, investments and partnerships. Yet China is catching up. While the US made its first uncrewed landing on the lunar south pole this year, China has made several landings. In June this year, China’s Chang’e 6 mission returned with the first rock and soil samples from this sought-after region of the Moon.

    International Space Station’s Expedition 72 crew pose for a portrait on September 29 2024. For the past two decades, the ISS has been a great example of space collaboration.
    NASA Johnson

    How are nations working together on space?

    Both superpowers have invited other nations to join them in realising their lunar visions. This week the Dominican Republic became the 44th signatory to the US-led NASA Artemis Accords.

    Thirteen other nations are participating in the China-led International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) in collaboration with Russia. Senegal joined last month.

    With no membership overlap between the two initiatives, new “space blocs” are emerging, reflective of global power dynamics.

    The Artemis Accords and ILRS are currently not legally binding, but they will be influential in shaping space governance in the 21st century. This is because treaty-making in the United Nations’ Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS, established in 1959) hasn’t kept pace with the latest developments and actors in space.

    Nor has space governance adequately engaged with growing ethical questions, including on space colonisation and light pollution caused by satellites.

    We’re at a critical juncture. It’s important the emergence of these new “space blocs” doesn’t escalate into a contest over whose space governance approach prevails. Not only could this increase the risk of conflict on the lunar surface itself, but it could even fuel geopolitical instability and military competition on Earth.

    History shows we can work together

    Space has fostered cooperation even between superpower rivals during tense geopolitical times. During the Cold War, the US and Soviet Union cooperated on space governance, laws, science and technologies. This built mutual trust and eased tensions.

    Within COPUOS, nations worked together to agree on what became the first of multiple foundational space law treaties, the Outer Space Treaty in 1967. It prohibits placing nuclear weapons in space and national appropriation claims over celestial bodies like the Moon.

    A joint Moon landing never eventuated. But in 1975, the Apollo and Soyuz spacecrafts docked while in orbit. This marked the first international human spaceflight partnership, a historic feat made possible thanks to technical cooperation and diplomacy. COPUOS heralded this as inspiring ongoing cooperation.

    More recently, NASA’s International Space Station (ISS) has been an orbiting testament to coexistence. Astronauts from the US, Russia and other partners have conducted over 3,000 experiments in microgravity.

    At the recent UN Summit of the Future, video messages from the ISS and China’s Tiangong space station astronauts reaffirmed the importance of international cooperation and the peaceful uses of space.

    From rhetoric to practice

    Humanity has much to lose if global superpowers don’t cooperate on space governance. There is a real and growing risk of exporting and exacerbating our earthly conflicts in space. This will invariably increase tensions on Earth.

    The US and China need to explore opportunities to open dialogue between the Artemis Accords and ILRS. There are some similarities in their separate planned activities, governing principles and guidelines already.

    To make this happen, the US will need to revisit the 2011 Wolf Amendment, a law that restricts NASA from using its funding to cooperate with China, without congressional approval. But China has no equivalent and recently expressed its willingness to cooperate, including sharing its rock and soil samples.

    Sharing scientific information may help find initial common ground before further discussions on space governance. This could even move towards agreeing on landing sites or a lunar time zone. If a rescue mission is ever necessary on the Moon, having some compatible technology through interoperability would make it much easier.

    The US and China do actively engage in COPUOS, including in the working group on space resources. Yet treaty-making is often slow moving. This means greater opportunities for communication, consistency and certainty on space governance are imperative. This could even support multilateral efforts.

    Perhaps a joint lunar research mission between the US and China – in the spirit of the Apollo-Soyuz docking – can still happen in the future.

    In the meantime, the world needs to see space not only in terms of a “race”. It’s also an opportunity to improve international relations, benefiting our future humanity on Earth and, one day, beyond.

    Art Cotterell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Space isn’t all about the ‘race’ – rival superpowers must work together for a better future – https://theconversation.com/space-isnt-all-about-the-race-rival-superpowers-must-work-together-for-a-better-future-240543

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Is TikTok right? Can adding a teaspoon of cinnamon to your coffee help you burn fat?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Evangeline Mantzioris, Program Director of Nutrition and Food Sciences, Accredited Practising Dietitian, University of South Australia

    Evannovostro/Shutterstock

    Cinnamon has been long used around the world in both sweet and savoury dishes and drinks.

    But a new TikTok trend claims adding a teaspoon of cinnamon to your daily coffee (and some cocoa to make it more palatable) for one week can help you burn fat. Is there any truth to this?

    Not all cinnamon is the same

    There are two types of cinnamon, both of which come from grinding the bark of the cinnamomum tree and may include several naturally occurring active ingredients.

    Cassia cinnamon is the most common type available in grocery stores. It has a bitter taste and contains higher levels of one of the active ingredient cinnamaldehyde, a compound that gives cinnamon its flavour and odour. About 95% of cassia cinnamon is cinnamaldehyde.

    The other is Ceylon cinnamon, which tastes sweeter. It contains about 50-60% cinnamaldehyde.

    Does cinnamon burn fat? What does the research say?

    A review of 35 studies examined whether consuming cinnamon could affect waist circumference, which is linked to increased body fat levels. It found cinnamon doses below 1.5 grams per day (around half a teaspoon) decreased waist circumference by 1.68cm. However, consuming more than 1.5g/day did not have a significant effect.

    A meta-analysis of 21 clinical trials with 1,480 total participants found cinnamon also reduced body mass index (BMI) by 0.40kg/m² and body weight by 0.92kg. But it did not change the participants’ composition of fat or lean mass.

    Another umbrella review, which included all the meta-analyses, found a small effect of cinnamon on weight loss. Participants lost an average of 0.67kg and reduced their BMI by 0.45kg/m².

    The effect appears small.
    Radu Sebastian/Shutterstock

    So overall, the weight loss we see from these high-quality studies is very small, ranging anywhere from two to six months and mostly with no change in body composition.

    The studies included people with different diseases, and most were from the Middle East and/or the Indian subcontinent. So we can’t be certain we would see this effect in people with other health profiles and in other countries. They were also conducted over different lengths of time from two to six months.

    The supplements were different, depending on the study. Some had the active ingredient extracted from cinnamon, others used cinnamon powder. Doses varied from 0.36g to 10g per day.

    They also used the two different types of cinnamon – but none of the studies used cinnamon from the grocery store.

    How could cinnamon result in small amounts of weight loss?

    There are several possible mechanisms.

    It appears to allow blood glucose (sugar) to enter the body’s cells more quickly. This lowers blood glucose levels and can make insulin work more effectively.

    It also seems to improve the way we break down fat when we need it for energy.

    Finally, it may make us feel fuller for longer by slowing down how quickly the food is released from our stomach into the small intestine.

    What are the risks?

    Cinnamon is generally regarded as safe when used as a spice in cooking and food.

    However, in recent months the United States and Australia have issued health alerts about the level of lead and other heavy metals in some cinnamon preparations.

    Lead enters as a contaminant during growth (from the environment) and in harvesting. In some cases, it has been suggested there may have been intentional contamination.

    Some people can have side effects from cinnamon, including gastrointestinal pain and allergic reactions.

    One of the active ingredients, coumarin, can be toxic for some people’s livers. This has prompted the European Food Authority to set a limit of 0.1mg/kg of body weight.

    Cassia cinnamon contains up to 1% of coumarin, and the Ceylon variety contains much less, 0.004%. So for people weighing above 60kg, 2 teaspoons (6g) of cassia cinnamon would bring them over the safe limit.

    What about the coffee and cocoa?

    Many people may think coffee can also help us lose weight. However there isn’t good evidence to support this yet.

    An observational study found drinking one cup of regular coffee was linked to a reduction in weight that is gained over four years, but by a very small amount: an average of 0.12kg.

    Good-quality cocoa and dark chocolate have also been shown to reduce weight. But again, the weight loss was small (between 0.2 and 0.4kg) and only after consuming it for four to eight weeks.

    So what does this all mean?

    Using cinnamon may have a very small effect on weight, but it’s unlikely to deliver meaningful weight loss without other lifestyle adjustments.

    We also need to remember these trials used products that differ from the cinnamon we buy in the shops. How we store and how long we keep cinnamon might also impact or degrade the active ingredients.

    And consuming more isn’t going to provide additional benefit. In fact, it could increase your risk of side effects.

    So if you enjoy the taste of cinnamon in your coffee, continue to add it, but given its strong taste, you’re likely to only want to add a little.

    And no matter how much we’d like this to be true, we certainly won’t gain any fat-loss benefits by consuming cinnamon on doughnuts or in buns, due to their high kilojoule count.

    If you want to lose weight, there are evidence-backed approaches that won’t spoil your morning coffee.

    Evangeline Mantzioris is affiliated with Alliance for Research in Nutrition, Exercise and Activity (ARENA) at the University of South Australia. Evangeline Mantzioris has received funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, and has been appointed to the National Health and Medical Research Council Dietary Guideline Expert Committee.

    – ref. Is TikTok right? Can adding a teaspoon of cinnamon to your coffee help you burn fat? – https://theconversation.com/is-tiktok-right-can-adding-a-teaspoon-of-cinnamon-to-your-coffee-help-you-burn-fat-240683

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Australia’s child support system can put single mothers at risk of poverty and financial abuse

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kay Cook, Professor and Research Director, School of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, Swinburne University of Technology

    KieferPix/Shutterstock

    Australia’s child support system can not only increase women’s poverty, but can actually facilitate financial abuse, according to our recent research.

    Child support is an important system that aims to share the financial burden of raising children between separated parents.

    But there are some serious problems with the way it operates, putting already vulnerable women further at risk.

    Drawing on the experiences of 675 single mothers, we sought to examine women’s experience with the child support system from start to finish.

    Our research suggests four key changes could improve both women’s safety and financial wellbeing.

    How does child support work?

    Where deemed necessary, child support arrangements typically require one separated parent to make payments to the other, on a regular basis.

    How much is paid and how it is collected can vary in different circumstances.

    The amount agreed to be paid in child support can take in a range of factors, such as the cost of childcare.
    AKIRA_PHOTO/Shutterstock

    In some families, a child support recipient’s income will be too high to receive the family tax benefit – a key payment that assists with the costs of raising children.

    In this instance, a family can decide for itself how much will be paid, to whom, and how.

    This is called self management, but it is very difficult to navigate when abuse is present in a relationship.

    For families that do collect the family tax benefit, separated parents can use Services Australia to calculate the amount that will be paid.

    Services Australia will consider factors including what it costs to care for and educate a child, as well as the difference in income between the two parents.

    Once the amount has been calculated, separated parents can transfer payments privately between themselves, an approach called “private collect”.

    Alternatively, this group can also use a service called “agency collect” to manage the transfer. Here, Services Australia collects the funds from the paying parent, then gives it to the agreed recipient.

    For parents using agency collect, payments can also be “garnisheed” – deducted from a paying parent’s salary.

    The system is failing the most vulnerable

    Government reports reveal that across the agency collect system, a staggering $1.7 billion is owed to a third of single-parent households, representing 475,000 children.

    The vast majority of this money is owed to women, two-thirds of whom have children in their care 86% or more of the time.

    The vast majority of single parents are single mothers.
    FotoDuets/Shutterstock

    Losing out on payments

    Across the child support system, 28% of paying parents fail to submit tax returns on time, reducing the accuracy of assessments.

    Centrelink’s Family Tax Benefit A (the first part of a two-part payment) is linked to child support, with every dollar of child support above a certain threshold reducing this payment by 50 cents.

    Concerningly, while reports indicate that 60% of single mothers receiving income support have experienced violence prior to separation, less than 15% receive exemptions from having to seek child support on the basis of this violence.

    By not applying for either child support or an exemption, single mothers could lose a significant portion of their Family Tax Benefit A payments.

    These sobering statistics are only part of the picture. Others remain invisible.

    There are another 500,000 or so children in the private collect system. Many of their situations are a mystery. Services Australia doesn’t know how much those women and children are owed, as they don’t trace this amount and assume that payments are fully compliant.

    What we uncovered

    Our mixed methods survey of 675 single mothers asked women about their experiences in the child support system from start to finish.

    We asked women how they made various decisions about child support, such as when to apply for it and when to change how it is collected and calculated.

    Many women avoid chasing what’s owed to them for fear of retaliation from an ex-partner.
    rigsbyphoto/Shutterstock

    78% of women reported experiencing some form of violence at the time of separation.

    But the research also showed how the nature of this abuse can change post-separation, when financial abuse becomes the primary mechanism.

    Just over half the women reported currently experiencing either emotional or psychological abuse, and 60% financial abuse.

    Women shared they were often fearful of retaliation from their ex-partner if they applied or changed child support payment arrangements.

    I was advised not to apply at the time because of the family violence and he had made threats to kill me so [it] was recommended I didn’t give him any reason to act on this so I went without child support for some period of time.

    Others had to ask for an exemption to apply.

    A Centrelink social worker changed my son’s father to unknown so I wouldn’t be murdered.

    The results show how the current system’s logic can force women to risk their financial welfare to ensure their own safety.

    I withdrew my application to avoid further conflict by telling CSA [Child Support Agency] there was a private agreement but there isn’t and he doesn’t pay anything.

    Often, women are paying back debts to Centrelink due to retrospective changes in their ex-partner’s income or level of care, at the same time they themselves are owed thousands of dollars in child support arrears.

    I’ve at times been living on as little at $72 a week of FTB [Family Tax Benefit] as my sole income to feed, house, clothe and educate myself and two children. I don’t understand how that is possible.

    How could we fix it?

    Based on our findings, our report makes four recommendations that could bring about meaningful improvements, give women choices to suit their family, and create a system that is safe.

    1. De-link family payments from child support.

    2. Co-design family violence processes in the child support system.

    3. Move all payment collections back to being handled by the tax office.

    4. Make all payment debts owed to and enforced by the Commonwealth.

    Any meaningful solution to this problem will need to include the voices of victim survivors, advocates, researchers and social support organisations to co-design an effective system.

    The authors would like to acknowledge the assistance of Terese Edwards, chief executive of Single Mother Families Australia (SMFA), in the preparation of the report.

    Terese and SMFA provided in-kind support in the form of survey design feedback and recruitment assistance. Terese also contributed to writing the report.

    Kay Cook receives funding from the Australian Research Council in the form of a Discovery Project grant. She is Secretary of The Australian Sociological Association (TASA) and a Member of the federal Economic Inclusion Advisory Committee. She is the PhD supervisor of Terese Edwards, CEO of Single Mother Families Australia.

    Adrienne Byrt is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow on a Discovery Project funded by the Australian Research Council.

    Ashlea Coen’s research assistant position for this research was funded by Swinburne University of Technology.

    Marg Rogers received funding from the Commonwealth-funded Manna Institute for her Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2022-24.

    – ref. Australia’s child support system can put single mothers at risk of poverty and financial abuse – https://theconversation.com/australias-child-support-system-can-put-single-mothers-at-risk-of-poverty-and-financial-abuse-240917

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: China removes block on Australian lobster, in last big bilateral trade breakthrough

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

    China has removed the last significant trade barrier it imposed on Australia, with a timetable to resume full lobster imports by the end of the year.

    Anthony Albanese announced the breakthrough after a meeting with Chinese Premier Li Qiang in Vientiane, where the prime minister is attending the ASEAN-Australia summit.

    Albanese said the end of the barrier would be in time for the Chinese New Year. This would be welcomed by those in the lobster trade in places including Geraldton, Western Australia, and in South Australia and Tasmania, he said.

    The lobster decision means the Chinese over the last two years have removed trade barriers of nearly $20 billion slapped on Australia during the time of the former government when relations between the two countries went into a deep freeze. This followed various Australian decisions, including the call for an inquiry into the origins of COVID.

    Remaining impediments are now worth less than $500 million, with two red meat establishments still affected.

    The lobster trade was worth more than $700 million in 2019.

    More than 3000 people are employed in the lobster industry, 2000 of them in WA.

    “The reinstatement in normalised trade for all commodities is front and centre of the Government’s engagement strategy with China,” Albanese said.

    “It is in the interests of both our countries to continue this path of stabilising our relationship. A resumption in trade for all Australian commodities is an important part of this process.”

    Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. China removes block on Australian lobster, in last big bilateral trade breakthrough – https://theconversation.com/china-removes-block-on-australian-lobster-in-last-big-bilateral-trade-breakthrough-241012

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: Grattan on Friday: Oil prices could be where the Middle East crisis collides with Australia’s cost-of-living crisis

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

    Angry, accusatory partisan exchanges over the Middle East war have dominated federal politics this week. But for most ordinary voters the issue remains “over there”.

    Apart from the minorities for whom it has an immediate impact – Jewish people frightened by antisemitism, the Muslim community, those with families in Lebanon and elsewhere – it’s a tragedy without tangible relevance to their day-to-day lives.

    On Thursday however, Treasurer Jim Chalmers warned the foreign crisis could feed directly into the domestic cost-of-living crisis, via the price of oil.

    Midway through this week, oil was trading 11% lower than it was a year ago, but 7% higher than a week-and-a-half ago, Chalmers told a news conference.

    Treasury estimates that if prices were 10% higher for an entire year, this would reduce Australia’s GDP by 0.1% and increase the consumer price index by 0.4 percentage points.

    Nothing is certain about the coming months but the potential implications are obvious. Consumers would feel the effects at the petrol pump of the higher oil prices.

    The Reserve Bank will also be watching the possible trajectory of oil prices, together with all the other indicators relevant to its decisions on interest rates. This is against the background of the government’s desperation for a rate cut (or two) before the election.

    Although an increase in fuel prices (hitting businesses as well as families) would not be the government’s fault, it would be blamed.

    According to Labor, at present there’s a disconnect between, on the one hand, the partisan political heat the Middle East war is generating and, on the other, the public’s lack of engagement with the issue.

    Voters not concentraing on the Middle East

    Labor sources say focus group research this week, done with swinging voters, found most people aren’t closely following Middle East events.

    Beyond that, they are generally satisfied with the government’s stand and don’t think the crisis is distracting it from the cost of living (which is separate from how they think the government is handling the cost of living).

    This accords with this week’s Essential poll, in which 56% said they were satisfied with the government’s response on the Israel-Gaza war. Another 30% thought the government had been too supportive of Israel; 14% thought it had been too harsh on Israel.

    Except among some of those directly invested, the Middle East crisis is not likely to be a vote changer.

    In the domestic political battle, Dutton is trying to use the conflict to paint Albanese as weak. That’s a long bow on the issue itself, although more generally the prime minister and his government have come to be seen as having lost their way.

    While Dutton is trying to define Albanese negatively, Albanese is attempting to make Dutton a bigger target.

    NBN sale a distraction

    Thus on Wednesday the prime minister, shortly before he jumped on his plane to attend the ASEAN-Australia summit in Laos, personally introduced legislation that would ensure the NBN remained in public hands.

    If the Coalition didn’t vote for the bill, that would show it would sell the NBN, Labor claimed. It was a crude attempt at scare politics, easily seen through. The Coalition is not suggesting it would sell the NBN and if it did, would most people care? Anyway, originally Labor planned for the NBN to be privatised. Dutton ridiculed the tactic.

    As we look to election year, the 2025 parliamentary sitting calendar came out this week. It has a fortnight sitting in February and pencils in a budget for March 25, which would set up a May poll. Of course this doesn’t rule out an earlier (March) election although Albanese has said more than once he plans a pre-election budget.

    Regardless, we are already in the election campaign. At caucus on Tuesday Albanese was, for the second time recently, talking about the second term agenda.

    Announcements like confetti

    Announcements are raining down like confetti especially related to cost-of-living issues. Supermarkets are being heavily targeted. Launching his merger reform legislation on Thursday, Chalmers said every supermarket merger would be screened, regardless of whether it fell under the new arrangements.

    Present polls are showing the most likely election result, to be delivered by sour voters, is a hung parliament with a minority Labor government.

    Albanese told caucus he was focused on winning majority government. Dutton knows that if the Coalition can’t win, the more crossbenchers it can force Labor to need to rely on, the more unstable a second-term Labor government would be.

    Both sides have a great deal of bedding-down to do before the actual campaign.

    Key items on Labor’s legislative agenda aren’t just not introduced, they are unseen – for instance, on gambling advertising, social media restrictions for young people, electoral funding.

    Major bills are stuck in the parliament – notably on housing, where the Greens may eventually do a deal but are stringing out the pain.

    On the other side, the Coalition has released minimal policy. On its controversial nuclear power plan, it has put out minimal details, in particular refusing to produce costings. It can’t hold back everything until the last moment.

    Will the campaign even matter?

    When the formal campaign comes, how much will it matter?

    There is the old saying “you can’t fatten the pig on market day”. In other words, the election result may be decided well before the actual campaign.

    What do the last three elections (2016, 2019, 2022) tell us about the importance of the formal campaign? In each case, the result was narrow, a matter of a handful of seats.

    In 2022, there was probably nothing Morrison could have done in the last weeks to salvage the situation – to use another farm metaphor, his goose was cooked. In the event, he ran a bad campaign.

    In 2016 prime minister Malcolm Turnbull just scraped home; Turnbull’s flawed campaigning maximised the number of seats he lost.

    In 2019, when it seemed Bill Shorten was almost certain to take Labor to victory, its defeat may have been sealed in the campaign itself, although its heavy policy load always put it in a precarious situation.

    In 2022 Albanese was judged a poor campaigner. Aware of this, Labor strategists will be doing everything to make sure he is fully prepared for “gotcha” questions (on which he faltered last time) and the other hazards that can arise spontaneously.

    Dutton’s forte is negativity, his natural style is the attack. But in those final weeks, more will be needed.

    One challenge in leaving policy releases late is that holes can slip through, inviting slip ups.

    Dutton has far from established himself as a rounded alternative prime minister. Indeed his current approach on the Middle East, completely lacking nuance, raises questions about how he would handle the complexities of foreign policy generally. It has not been reassuring.

    Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Grattan on Friday: Oil prices could be where the Middle East crisis collides with Australia’s cost-of-living crisis – https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-oil-prices-could-be-where-the-middle-east-crisis-collides-with-australias-cost-of-living-crisis-241002

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-Evening Report: There’s a new school funding bill in parliament. Will this end the funding wars?

    Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew P. Sinclair, Lecturer and Researcher of Education Policy, School of Education, Curtin University

    On Thursday, federal Education Minister Jason Clare introduced a school funding bill to parliament.

    The bill aims to set a new “floor” for how much the federal government contributes towards public school funding in Australia.

    It would mean the Commonwealth has to contribute at least 20% of the schooling resource standard (how much funding a school needs to meet students’ educational needs) for public schools each year in all states and territories from 2025.

    Clare argues it will provide “certainty” to schools, but it also comes in the middle of a standoff between the federal government and some states over school funding policy.

    What’s in the bill?

    The bill proposes to change the current arrangement, under which the Commonwealth contributes 20% to the schooling resource standard of public schools. As the government explains:

    This means the 20 per cent will become the minimum, not the maximum, the Commonwealth contributes to public schools.

    The Albanese government says the bill will increase “transparency and accountability” and ensure funding cannot go backwards.

    But it cannot be certain of parliamentary support – Greens and independent senators are among those pushing for the government to provide more funding for public schools than is currently on the table.

    The bill will remove a 20% cap on federal funding for public schools.
    Bianca De Marchi/AAP, CC BY

    The bigger picture

    The bill also comes as the federal government is still trying to sign off new deals with some of the states and territories about their public school funding for next year.

    The current agreements will run out at the end of the year. While the new proposed arrangements would increase the federal contribution, it’s not by as much as some states want.

    So far, Clare has made agreements with Western Australia and Tasmania to increase the federal contribution from 20% to 22.5%. For the Northern Territory it will increase funding to a 40% contribution by 2029.

    So far, it has not signed deals with New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, and South Australia, which are pushing for a federal contribution of 25%.

    The Australian Capital Territory is also yet to sign, despite its public schools receiving at least 100% of the schooling resource standard (via both federal and its own funds) for several years now.

    Clare set a deadline of September 30 for the holdout states to sign on for the 2.5% funding boost, or risk losing an extra A$16 billion in funding. But that has passed without any compromise from either side.

    Progress and politics

    At the very least, the introduction of the bill to federal parliament is symbolically significant, particularly in light of the Commonwealth’s willingness to increase its contribution to the school resource standard of public schools.

    But politics is never far away in school funding policy. Critics could argue the bill is more of a box-ticking exercise, rather than substantive reform. Indeed, the change in wording to a 20% minimum was inevitable given the specifics of the funding agreements already signed with Western Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory.

    Critics might also point out national school funding policy is currently a bit of a mess, with four of the five most populous Australian states ignoring the government’s new funding deal. And they could remind us this agreement has already been delayed by a year. The previous one expired at the end of 2023 and was extended for 12 months by the Albanese government.

    What happens to schools next year?

    The bill does nothing to bring the holdout states any closer to signing on to the new funding agreement.

    But this does not mean the federal government will withdraw its funding when school starts next year. Instead, the current funding arrangements will continue for another 12 months. This is why Clare says $16 billion in “additional investment” is on the table for public schools.

    With a federal election due next year, it is even possible there will be no resolution before Australians go to the polls. This continues the fight over the schooling resource standard funding for public schools, which has has been ongoing since the so-called Gonski Review was made public in 2012.

    Matthew P. Sinclair does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. There’s a new school funding bill in parliament. Will this end the funding wars? – https://theconversation.com/theres-a-new-school-funding-bill-in-parliament-will-this-end-the-funding-wars-240994

    MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

  • MIL-OSI Global: What Israel and its neighbours want now as all-out war looms in the Middle East – podcast

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Gemma Ware, Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The Conversation

    The Middle East is perilously close to all-out war. In the year since the October 7 Hamas-led attacks on Israel, millions of people have been displaced from their homes in Gaza, Israel, the West Bank and now Lebanon, and tens of thousands killed.

    After Israel killed Hassan Nasrallah, leader of Iranian-backed militia Hezbollah, Iran launched a barrage of ballistic missiles against Israel on October 1. As the world waits to see how Israel will retaliate, Israel’s military continues to attack Hezbollah in southern Lebanon and in Beirut.

    In this episode of The Conversation Weekly podcast, we speak to two experts from the Middle East, Mireille Rebeiz and Amnon Aran, to get a sense of the strategic calculations being made by both Israel and its neighbours at this frightening moment for the region.

    Mireille Rebeiz is the chair of Middle East studies at Dickinson College in Pennsylvania in the US and an expert on Hezbollah. She says that since launching its manifesto in 1985 Hezbollah has always positioned itself “in opposition to the existence of the state of Israel”.

    It affirmed the dedication to the Palestinian cause. It affirmed its commitment to the Iranian revolution and the Shi’ite ideology.

    Rebeiz says Iran’s military goals are completely aligned with Hezbollah’s and traces them back to the US’s destabilisation of Iraq.

    When Iraq fell into a full chaos and war (it) allowed for Iran to meddle into Iraq and gave a big voice to the Shiite conservative voices.

    Then followed the 2011 Syrian civil war, in which Hezbollah stepped in to defend the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

    It’s a domino effect – it’s expansion from Iran to Iraq to Syria to Lebanon. And this is clearly visible in Iran’s military goals, which is ultimately the expansion of the Iranian ideology in the region. Honestly, at this point, I would say there is an attempt to hide behind the Palestinian cause to achieve that goal.

    Israel’s choices

    Amnon Aran is a professor of international relations at City St George’s, University of London, in the UK, and an expert in Israeli foreign policy. Aran says that for Israel, the past 12 months have been described as an “existential moment”, which has informed the war in the Gaza Strip and now Lebanon.

    When the question came about how to respond to this existential threat, it was very much from the prism of what I called elsewhere, a form of entrenchment, which really means that Israel only makes peace in exchange for peace. Any diplomatic arrangement has to be dependent upon and subordinate to a military advantageous balance of power towards Israel and that the Palestinians in the West Bank, and now in the Gaza Strip, would remain under Israeli occupation for the foreseeable future.

    Aran says there is fierce debate in Israel about what to do now. One side follows the line of thinking of the former Israeli prime minister, Nafthali Bennett, who took to X in early October to say that: “Israel now has its greatest opportunity in 50 years to change the face of the Middle East.” This camp is arguing that with Hezbollah weakened, this is the moment to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities.

    On the other side, Aran says, are those in the military establishment arguing against attacking Israel’s nuclear facilities and instead focus on weakening Hezbollah as much as possible. This camp’s reasoning is that:

    After a year of being in a prolonged and very difficult conflict, the next question is you are actually starting a war presumably on five or six fronts, including a very vast country, 90 million people, Iran, with a very rich history, and you are actually entering into a very new phase, which could become very prolonged.

    To hear the full interviews with Mireille Rebeiz and Amnon Aran, listen to The Conversation Weekly podcast.

    This episode of The Conversation Weekly was produced by Mend Mariwany. Sound design was by Michelle Macklem, and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Gemma Ware is the executive producer.

    You can find us on Instagram at theconversationdotcom or via email. You can also subscribe to The Conversation’s free daily email here.

    Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our RSS feed or find out how else to listen here.

    Amnon Aran does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. Mireille Rebeiz is affiliated with the American Red Cross.

    – ref. What Israel and its neighbours want now as all-out war looms in the Middle East – podcast – https://theconversation.com/what-israel-and-its-neighbours-want-now-as-all-out-war-looms-in-the-middle-east-podcast-240952

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Why isometric exercises are so good for you

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Dan Gordon, Professor of Exercise Physiology, Anglia Ruskin University

    Isometric exercises involve contracting your muscles. Odua Images/ Shutterstock

    Exercise is great for improving heart health. But the thought of hitting the gym or going for a jog might put some people off from doing it. And, if you have a heart condition already, such dynamic exercises may not be safe to do.

    The good news is, you don’t necessarily need to do a vigorous workout to see heart benefits. You can even improve your heart health by holding still and trying really hard not to move.

    Isometric training, as this is called, is becoming increasingly popular as a way of reducing blood pressure and hypertension, and improving strength and muscle stability.

    Normally, to build strength and force, our muscles need to change length throughout a movement. Squats and bicep curls are good examples of exercises that cause the muscle to change length throughout the movement.

    But isometric training involves simply contracting your muscles, which generates force without needing to move your joints. The harder a muscle is contracted, the more forceful it becomes (and the more forceful a muscle is, the more powerfully we can perform a movement).

    If you add weight to an isometric exercise, it causes the muscle to contract even harder. A wall sit and a plank are examples of isometric contractions.

    Isometric exercises are associated with a high degree of “neural recruitment”, because of the need to maintain the contraction. This means these exercises are good at engaging specialised neurons in our brain and spinal cord, which play an important role in all the movements we do – both voluntary and involuntary. The greater this level of neural activation, the more muscle fibres are recruited – and the more force generated. As a result, this can lead to strength gains.

    Isometric exercises have long been of interest to strength and power athletes as a means of preparing their muscles to generate high forces by activating them. But research also shows isometric exercises are beneficial for other areas of our health – including reducing hypertension and promoting better blood flow.

    There are a couple reasons why isometric exercises are so good for the heart.

    When a muscle is contracted, it expands its size. This causes it to compress the blood vessels supplying this muscle, reducing blood flow and raising the blood pressure in our arteries – a mechanism known as the “pressor reflex”.

    Then, once the contraction is relaxed, a sudden surge of blood flows into the blood vessels and muscle. This influx of blood brings more oxygen and (crucially) nitric oxide into the blood vessels – causing them to widen. This in turn reduces blood pressure. Over time, this action will reduce stiffness of the arteries, which may lower blood pressure.

    Over time, isometric exercises may help lower blood pressure.
    Andrey_Popov/ Shutterstock

    When blood flow is reduced during an isometric movement, it also reduces the amount of available oxygen that cells need to function. This triggers the release of metabolites, such as hydrogen ions and lactate, which stimulate the sympathetic nervous system – which controls our “fight of flight” response. In the short term, this leads to an increase in blood pressure.

    But when an isometric exercise is done repeatedly over many weeks, there’s a reduction in sympathetic nervous system activity. This means blood pressure is lowered and there’s less strain on the cardiovascular system – which makes these exercises good for the heart.

    Isometric exercises may be even more beneficial for heart health than other types of cardiovascular exercise. A study which compared the benefits of isometric exercise versus high-intensity interval training found isometrics led to significantly greater reductions in resting blood pressure over the study period of between two and 12 weeks.

    How to use isometric exercise

    If you want to use isometric training to reduce blood pressure, it’s recommended that you should do any isometric contraction for two minutes at around 30-50% of your maximum effort. This is enough to trigger physiological improvements.

    You can start by doing this four times a day, three-to-five times per week – focusing on the same exercise. As you progress, you can start to vary the exercises you do, add weights to the exercise, or add in more than one isometric exercise.

    Some good isometric exercises to begin with include a static squat, a wall sit or a plank. Even during these small bouts of exercise, your heart rate, breathing and arterial pressure will all increase – the same responses that occur during more conventional whole-body exercises, such as cycling and running.

    The beneficial improvements in blood pressure start to manifest around 4-10 weeks after starting isometric training – though this depends on a person’s health and fitness levels when starting out.

    Isometric training appears to be a simple, low-intensity mode of exercise that offers big benefits for cardiovascular health – all while requiring little time commitment compared with other workouts.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Why isometric exercises are so good for you – https://theconversation.com/why-isometric-exercises-are-so-good-for-you-239543

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Telegram: why the app is allowed when other social media is censored in Russia

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Olga Logunova, Research Associate, King’s Russia Institute, King’s College London

    Telegram’s founder Pavel Durov has confirmed that the messaging app, which is widely used in Russia, has made several changes related to user privacy.

    Durov, who was arrested in France in August in connection with a range of crimes as well as refusal to communicate information or documents, has made some alterations that address user safety and user privacy.

    Telegram says the changes are expected to also reduce criminal activity on the app. But users are concerned that the changes make the app more compliant with legal requests from authorities.

    While Durov’s political and legal tussle continues in the EU, at home in Russia Telegram remains one of the most influential media platforms. It is one of the only places where both opposition and official voices coexist.

    It is particularly popular with Russians between the ages of 12 and 24, with around 85% of them using Telegram. Around 25 of its 30 most popular channels are news and politics related. Telegram is also popular for calls and messaging.

    The platform is a vital space for the independent journalism and activism that survives in Russia. Independent media outlets and commentators covering Russian affairs and using Telegram include Meduza (1.3 million subscribers), TV Rain (500,000 subscribers) and Mediazona. All are using Telegram to reach the public but are operating from outside Russia’s borders.

    Pro-government channels also attract big audiences on Telegram, often with even larger followings than the independent outlets mentioned above. The most popular Telegram channels are Ria Novosti with 3.3 million subscribers, Readovka with 2.6 million subscribers, and Solovyov Live (1.3 million subscribers), along with several others promoting pro-government lines and supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine.

    Additionally, alternative voices such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oligarch and prominent Kremlin critic, and Ekaterina Shulman, a respected political scientist and commentator, are steadily gaining audiences. Both have been labelled as foreign agents or extremists in Russia.

    Where do Russians get news?

    In the past decade, Russia’s media landscape has undergone significant censorship due to increasing state control. Radio stations have closed down and many journalists have left the country to be able to report.

    Russian media usage

    Traditional media sources, such as television, continue to have a massive audience. Television has a monthly reach of 98%, while radio has a monthly reach of 79%. (Reach is the total number of different people or households exposed, at least once, to a medium during a given period).

    Both remain significant in today’s Russia. While television remains a primary news source for many Russians, the internet is used by 84% of people daily.

    Since 2012, the state has progressively tightened control over political information. People and organisations will self-censor, and there is legislation penalising social media reposts and other forms of dissent. These laws claim to be addressing users who “discredit the armed forces” or “spread fake news”, but are actually aimed at cracking down on dissent.

    Most viewed Telegram channels in Russia during July 2024

    As of 2024, over 2,000 administrative cases and more than 273 criminal cases have been initiated under these laws. Individuals and organisations critical of the official Kremlin narrative have been fined, had their assets confiscated and been imprisoned.



    Read more:
    Ukraine recap: Putin’s nuclear sabre-rattling becomes more ominous

    Another government method used to control online discussion includes slowing down or blocking social media platforms. The state blocked major western platforms Facebook, Instagram and Twitter in March 2022, leading millions of Russian users to migrate to Telegram.

    Content creators followed en masse, transforming Telegram into a vital hub for news and political debate. Alternatives to Telegram in Russia include state-controlled domestic networks like VKontakte (VK) and Odnoklassniki, which have strong ties to figures close to the Kremlin.

    Why is Telegram allowed?

    The use of Telegram for propaganda, influencing public opinion, and promoting the positions of the state and Putin could be one of the reasons why Telegram has not faced the same restrictions as other platforms.

    Another reason for its popularity is the platform’s ease of use as a messaging app, including for state organisations. This makes it less of a direct threat to state control over public opinion, while still serving as a crucial tool for those seeking alternative sources of information.

    Its appeal to the Russian government is strengthened by the fact that Telegram is not owned by global (western) companies such as Meta, which owns WhatsApp (also popular in Russia). Additionally, issues surrounding legally questionable content, such as the near-official tolerance of digital piracy, have long been controversial in Russia.

    Telegram’s moderation policies have often been associated with a less regulated approach to content, which has contributed to its popularity in Russia. These new changes may make ordinary Russians worry more about whether what they say on the app is safe from the state’s prying eyes.

    The platform’s prominence in Russian public life is undeniable, but so too are the challenges it faces. How Telegram and its leadership navigate the coming years will have profound implications, not just for the platform, but for broader public debate in Russia.

    Durov’s arrest underscores the growing pressure on Telegram, from some quarters, and reflects a critical juncture for platform leaders navigating state intervention. But for Russian people looking for a space where they can exchange news and views, it remains one of most free platforms they can still access.

    Olga Logunova does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Telegram: why the app is allowed when other social media is censored in Russia – https://theconversation.com/telegram-why-the-app-is-allowed-when-other-social-media-is-censored-in-russia-238261

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How 19th-century French novelist Balzac mastered the multiverse long before Marvel

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Harsh Trivedi, Associate Teacher, School of Languages and Cultures, University of Sheffield

    The multiverse has become an essential part of pop culture. The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) brought this shared universe style of storytelling to global prominence with Iron Man (2008), where a post-credit scene hinted at a larger interconnected universe.

    Over time, this expanded into a cinematic multiverse, particularly with the 2016 film Doctor Strange. Films like Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) and Doctor Strange: Multiverse of Madness (2022) introduced audiences to parallel universes where different versions of the same character coexist. The multiverse has also been embraced by other films, like Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022), which won multiple Academy Awards and Stree 2, which became the highest-grossing Bollywood film of all time in September 2024.

    This style of storytelling has deep literary roots. I believe the first person to master the fictional multiverse was the 19th-century French novelist, Honoré de Balzac, in his monumental work La Comédie Humaine (The Human Comedy, 1829-1847).



    Read more:
    Multiverse films take characters to increasingly dark places – as Robert Downey Jr’s Doctor Doom casting shows

    In the 1920s, German physicist Werner Heisenberg challenged Newtonian physics, positing that particles can simultaneously occupy multiple states – he called this the Uncertainty Principle. Later, in the 1950s, American physicist Hugh Everett proposed the Many Worlds Interpretation, suggesting that all possible outcomes of a quantum event occur, each in a separate parallel universe.

    While this theory was developed in physics, the term “multiverse” was introduced into literature by British science fiction writer Michael Moorcock. In The Eternal Champion (1970), he envisioned characters existing in parallel worlds with multiple avatars.

    Honoré de Balzac, by Louis Boulanger (1836).
    Wikimedia., CC BY-SA

    However, Balzac’s La Comédie Humaine, written over a century earlier, already contained the seeds of multiverse storytelling. Comprising nearly 100 novels and short stories, it features thousands of characters who reappear across different works, creating a shared universe that allows for complex narrative interconnections.

    Balzac’s innovation was not merely in these recurring characters, but in the thematic and conceptual unity he established across his fictional universe.

    This cohesion is built through his “typology” of characters. Balzac’s “types” are characters who embody universal traits while retaining their individual personalities – making them instantly recognisable across different stories.

    In his preface to Une Ténébreuse Affaire (An Historical Mystery, 1841), Balzac defends his use of types: “A type … is a character who summarises in himself certain characteristic traits of all those who more or less resemble him; he is the model of the genre.”

    Hungarian philosopher Georg Lukács expanded on this idea, stating that Balzac’s types represent a synthesis of the individual and the universal. These characters are universal enough to represent broader societal forces, while remaining distinct individuals within their own narratives.

    The moment Andrew Garfield’s Spider-Man saves the love interest of Tom Holland’s Spider-Man, MJ.

    This balance between the universal and individual is a cornerstone of multiverse storytelling. For instance, the climax of Spider-Man: No Way Home highlights the interplay between the universal and individual aspects of characters, as seen when three versions of Spider-Man (Toby Maguire, Andrew Garfield, Tom Holland) from parallel universes unite. Garfield’s Spider-Man finds redemption by saving MJ (Holland’s Spider-Man’s love interest), a moment that mirrors his own tragic loss of Gwen – emphasising both their shared trauma and divergent fates.

    In much the same way, Balzac’s recurring characters evolve across La Comédie Humaine, reflecting different facets of their personalities and situations. Although not planned as a shared universe from the beginning – Balzac retrofitted earlier works to fit this framework – the coherence of his fictional world is remarkable.

    Mobilising the multiverse

    The French philosopher Alain wrote that Balzac’s literary universe can sometimes feel like a “crossroads where characters from La Comédie Humaine meet, greet each other, and pass”. This creates a sense of disjointedness, due to its lack of strict chronological order, allowing readers to enter Balzac’s universe from any of the nearly 100 novels or short stories.

    Balzac addressed these concerns in his prefaces. He engaged in a meta-discourse similar to the post-credit scenes in modern Marvel films, where future plot-lines and character arcs are hinted at.

    Balzac’s use of prefaces as a space to preempt criticism and engage with his readers anticipates the dialogue between creators and fans in the MCU. Just as Marvel balances creative vision with fan demands, Balzac used his prefaces to address concerns from his readers about the trajectories of beloved characters.

    One of many such instances occurs in the preface to Pierrette (1840), where Balzac reveals that Maxime de Trailles, a notorious bachelor who ruins many women’s lives in La Comédie Humaine, is finally getting married. Despite criticisms from readers who wanted De Trailles to meet a tragic and painful end, Balzac defends his decision, humorously remarking: “What do you want me to do? That devil Maxime is in good health.”

    Both Balzac and Marvel deal with the challenge of catering to a wide and diverse audience. The multiverse model, however, offers a solution to the limitations of a shared universe. While Balzac struggled with the impossibility of creating a completely coherent world – La Comédie Humaine was unfinished at his death – the multiverse allows modern creators to explore multiple realities and satisfy diverse audience expectations without making irreversible narrative choices.

    In 2019, Marvel faced a backlash to the film Captain Marvel from conservative fans, for casting a female actor in a lead role – and then, in 2022, another backlash for casting a Muslim Pakistani actress as Ms. Marvel. Rather than directly addressing the criticism, which could have alienated both conservative and liberal audiences, Marvel used the multiverse to cater to a wide range of expectations.

    Across the Spider-Verse (2023) is a prime example. This animated film features over 600 versions of Spider-Man, from the “traditional” white Spider-Man to black, Indian and even animal versions of the character (notably Peter “Porker”, the Spider-Pig). In doing so, Marvel catered to diverse global markets without committing to a single interpretation.

    Balzac’s La Comédie Humaine laid the groundwork for modern multiverse storytelling. This approach allowed him to explore different dimensions of his characters across various stories. His visionary storytelling anticipated the fluidity and complexity found in today’s shared cinematic universes, demonstrating his enduring influence on narrative structures.


    Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.

    Harsh Trivedi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How 19th-century French novelist Balzac mastered the multiverse long before Marvel – https://theconversation.com/how-19th-century-french-novelist-balzac-mastered-the-multiverse-long-before-marvel-239764

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How to recognise burnout – and what to do if you’re affected

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Michael Koch, Reader in Human Resource Management & Organisational Behaviour, Brunel University London

    PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock

    Emily, a finance manager, has been working 60-hour weeks for several months to meet deadlines. She starts feeling constantly exhausted, both physically and mentally. Work that she once found engaging now seems overwhelming, and she’s easily irritated with her colleagues. Despite putting in more hours, her productivity declines. Eventually, she starts calling in sick frequently and considers quitting her job, feeling like she just can’t keep going any more.

    Emily is a victim of burnout. For 2024, World Mental Health Day is focused on workplace health, with the aim of helping people like Emily recognise when work is affecting their wellbeing, so that they can take steps to address it.

    Burnout happens when the demands of a job are high for a long time, and are not offset by sufficient mental and physical resources. In this situation, people are no longer able to recover from their demanding job. Their energy is gradually drained, resulting in a state of mental exhaustion, a cynical and negative attitude towards their work, as well as a declining performance.

    In other words, people affected by burnout are neither able nor willing to fully function in their job. Burnout can occur in any job, but is most likely in workplaces where demands are high and resources low. It is a widespread phenomenon.

    A report by the charity Mental Health UK asserts that the country is on the verge of becoming a burnt-out nation, with 91% of the working adults surveyed reporting high or extreme levels of pressure and stress at some point in the past year.

    According to the same report, 20% of workers in the UK even took time off work due to poor mental health caused by stress last year.

    You don’t have to work in a desk job to be at risk of burnout.
    ultramansk/Shutterstock

    Research has consistently shown that the primary causes of burnout are excessive and prolonged job demands. This includes, for example, high workloads, job insecurity, role ambiguity, conflict, stress or stressful events, and work pressure.

    Burnout has severe consequences, most of all for people affected by it. Burnout impacts people differently, but even mild cases – which could linger for several years – can lead to a multitude of negative health outcomes. This includes work-related anxiety and depression, increased risk of cardiovascular diseases, Type 2 diabetes, insomnia, headaches and perhaps most alarmingly, increased mortality.

    People with mild cases of burnout are also at risk of developing more severe burnout that will keep them off work sick for long periods.

    Burnout is also worrying for organisations as it has a negative impact on creativity, leads to higher employee turnover, increased absenteeism and poor job performance.

    The symptoms of burnout differ from one person to another, and sometimes people might not even fully realise they’re burnt out until they are no longer just tired but too exhausted to function.

    People who experience burnout are drained of energy and may be overwhelmed even by
    small tasks. They distance themselves from their work, struggle with self doubt and develop cynical, negative attitudes regarding their job or the people they work for.

    When looking for symptoms of burnout, it might help to ask yourself questions like: Do you mostly talk about your work in a negative way? Do you tend to think less about your work and do your job almost mechanically? Do you sometimes feel sickened by your work tasks? Are there days when you feel tired before you arrive at work? Do you often feel emotionally drained during your work? Do you usually feel worn out and weary after your work?

    Burnout recovery and prevention needs to help minimise the job demands which cause
    exhaustion and disengagement. For example, reducing workload and work pressure, and establishing clear boundaries between life and work can help to reduce stressful job demands.

    Job resources can also help to mitigate the impact of job demands. This includes things like job control, having a variety of tasks, social support, performance feedback, opportunities for professional development and the quality of a worker’s relationship with their supervisor.

    When people have an abundance of these resources, the link between the demands of the job and burnout is greatly reduced because they help workers to cope better.

    Recovery is possible

    Opportunities for recovery from work-related stress are an especially important job resource in this context. Recovery means that employees have non-work time where they can relax and detach themselves from work. This may include leisure activities that allow people to simply experience pleasure without competitive pressures.

    Research has also shown that job crafting is an effective burnout intervention. Job crafting means that employees make small adjustments to both their job demands and resources. Employees can decrease their job demands by taking steps to minimise the emotionally, mentally or physically demanding job aspects or by reducing their workload.

    For example, this might involve looking for a calmer place to work. They can also increase job resources by engaging in professional development, gaining more autonomy at work and by asking others for support, feedback and advice. Over time, engaging in job crafting will lead to lower burnout.

    Organisations also need to play their part to reduce burnout. A range of intervention strategies such as stress management training, mindfulness-based approaches or policies that allow employees to disconnect from work outside of normal working hours are useful tools for combating burnout in an organisation.

    The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. How to recognise burnout – and what to do if you’re affected – https://theconversation.com/how-to-recognise-burnout-and-what-to-do-if-youre-affected-240747

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: How a subfield of physics led to breakthroughs in AI – and from there to this year’s Nobel Prize

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Veera Sundararaghavan, Professor of Aerospace Engineering, University of Michigan

    Neural networks have their roots in statistical mechanics. BlackJack3D/iStock via Getty Images Plus

    John J. Hopfield and Geoffrey E. Hinton received the Nobel Prize in physics on Oct. 8, 2024, for their research on machine learning algorithms and neural networks that help computers learn. Their work has been fundamental in developing neural network theories that underpin generative artificial intelligence.

    A neural network is a computational model consisting of layers of interconnected neurons. Like the neurons in your brain, these neurons process and send along a piece of information. Each neural layer receives a piece of data, processes it and passes the result to the next layer. By the end of the sequence, the network has processed and refined the data into something more useful.

    While it might seem surprising that Hopfield and Hinton received the physics prize for their contributions to neural networks, used in computer science, their work is deeply rooted in the principles of physics, particularly a subfield called statistical mechanics.

    As a computational materials scientist, I was excited to see this area of research recognized with the prize. Hopfield and Hinton’s work has allowed my colleagues and me to study a process called generative learning for materials sciences, a method that is behind many popular technologies like ChatGPT.

    What is statistical mechanics?

    Statistical mechanics is a branch of physics that uses statistical methods to explain the behavior of systems made up of a large number of particles.

    Instead of focusing on individual particles, researchers using statistical mechanics look at the collective behavior of many particles. Seeing how they all act together helps researchers understand the system’s large-scale macroscopic properties like temperature, pressure and magnetization.

    For example, physicist Ernst Ising developed a statistical mechanics model for magnetism in the 1920s. Ising imagined magnetism as the collective behavior of atomic spins interacting with their neighbors.

    In Ising’s model, there are higher and lower energy states for the system, and the material is more likely to exist in the lowest energy state.

    One key idea in statistical mechanics is the Boltzmann distribution, which quantifies how likely a given state is. This distribution describes the probability of a system being in a particular state – like solid, liquid or gas – based on its energy and temperature.

    Ising exactly predicted the phase transition of a magnet using the Boltzmann distribution. He figured out the temperature at which the material changed from being magnetic to nonmagnetic.

    Phase changes happen at predictable temperatures. Ice melts to water at a specific temperature because the Boltzmann distribution predicts that when it gets warm, the water molecules are more likely to take on a disordered – or liquid – state.

    Statistical mechanics tells researchers about the properties of a larger system, and how individual objects in that system act collectively.

    In materials, atoms arrange themselves into specific crystal structures that use the lowest amount of energy. When it’s cold, water molecules freeze into ice crystals with low energy states.

    Similarly, in biology, proteins fold into low energy shapes, which allow them to function as specific antibodies – like a lock and key – targeting a virus.

    Neural networks and statistical mechanics

    Fundamentally, all neural networks work on a similar principle – to minimize energy. Neural networks use this principle to solve computing problems.

    For example, imagine an image made up of pixels where you only can see a part of the picture. Some pixels are visible, while the rest are hidden. To determine what the image is, you consider all possible ways the hidden pixels could fit together with the visible pieces. From there, you would choose from among what statistical mechanics would say are the most likely states out of all the possible options.

    In statistical mechanics, researchers try to find the most stable physical structure of a material. Neural networks use the same principle to solve complex computing problems.
    Veera Sundararaghavan

    Hopfield and Hinton developed a theory for neural networks based on the idea of statistical mechanics. Just like Ising before them, who modeled the collective interaction of atomic spins to solve the photo problem with a neural network, Hopfield and Hinton imagined collective interactions of pixels. They represented these pixels as neurons.

    Just as in statistical physics, the energy of an image refers to how likely a particular configuration of pixels is. A Hopfield network would solve this problem by finding the lowest energy arrangements of hidden pixels.

    However, unlike in statistical mechanics – where the energy is determined by known atomic interactions – neural networks learn these energies from data.

    Hinton popularized the development of a technique called backpropagation. This technique helps the model figure out the interaction energies between these neurons, and this algorithm underpins much of modern AI learning.

    The Boltzmann machine

    Building upon Hopfield’s work, Hinton imagined another neural network, called the Boltzmann machine. It consists of visible neurons, which we can observe, and hidden neurons, which help the network learn complex patterns.

    In a Boltzmann machine, you can determine the probability that the picture looks a certain way. To figure out this probability, you can sum up all the possible states the hidden pixels could be in. This gives you the total probability of the visible pixels being in a specific arrangement.

    My group has worked on implementing Boltzmann machines in quantum computers for generative learning.

    In generative learning, the network learns to generate new data samples that resemble the data the researchers fed the network to train it. For example, it might generate new images of handwritten numbers after being trained on similar images. The network can generate these by sampling from the learned probability distribution.

    Generative learning underpins modern AI – it’s what allows the generation of AI art, videos and text.

    Hopfield and Hinton have significantly influenced AI research by leveraging tools from statistical physics. Their work draws parallels between how nature determines the physical states of a material and how neural networks predict the likelihood of solutions to complex computer science problems.

    Veera Sundararaghavan receives external funding for research unrelated to the content of this article.

    – ref. How a subfield of physics led to breakthroughs in AI – and from there to this year’s Nobel Prize – https://theconversation.com/how-a-subfield-of-physics-led-to-breakthroughs-in-ai-and-from-there-to-this-years-nobel-prize-240871

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Blitz of political attack ads in Pennsylvania and other swing states may be doing candidates and voters more harm than good

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Heather LaMarre, Associate Professor of Media and Communication, Temple University

    Nearly $11 billion is projected to be spent on political advertising in the 2024 fall election season. PM Images/DigitalVision Collection via Getty Images

    For Pennsylvania residents like me, there is no escape from the record-breaking number of political attack ads disrupting our favorite shows and filling our social media feeds.

    A projected US$10.7 billion is being spent nationwide – but particularly in battleground states – on political ads this election season.

    For those who are feeling election fatigue and just want to stream in peace: Buckle in, because it’s about to get worse.

    As of late August 2024, over $1.7 billion in political ads had been reserved nationwide to run between Labor Day and Election Day. Over $400 million of that is just for presidential election ads in seven key battleground states.

    With Pennsylvania widely considered the most decisive state in the 2024 presidential election, it may be no surprise that the Keystone State has the most presidential ad reservations, totaling $137 million.

    And the Philadelphia market alone is the top market in the country, with $125 million in ad reservations. Democrats are spending about 25% more than Republicans on presidential ads in Philly.

    As a political communication expert and professor of media and social influence who lives in Philadelphia, I am often asked: “Why are there so many political ads, why are they so negative, and more importantly, how do we make it stop?”

    I’ll answer the first two below. For the last, the truth is we don’t.

    A billboard in Philadelphia purchased by the Trump campaign.
    Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images

    Voters feel exhausted, angry, stressed

    If campaigns are spending all this money on political attack ads, they must work, right? Surely they sway at least undecided voters?

    In a word: no. Research suggests deluges of negative political advertising do little to change voters’ minds.

    They can even backfire on candidates.

    When voters perceive ads as unfair or manipulative, they are less likely to vote for the candidate or party producing the ads. And when subjected to repeated unwanted exposure to political ads, they can experience “psychological reactance” and behave opposite of what the ads intended.

    Some studies also suggest that negative ads create election stress, which can reduce voter turnout among the less politically interested.

    In a 2023 Pew Research Center survey, 65% of U.S. adults reported that they always or often feel “exhausted” when they think about U.S. politics. More than half reported that they always or often feel “angry” with U.S. politics.

    More concerning, research suggests our elections are harming voters’ mental health. This is marked by lost sleep, increased anxiety and chronic stress.

    ‘Daisy’ and the birth of ad wars

    Historically, political advertising was considered an effective tool for educating voters, building momentum and engaging the politically uninterested.

    Although the research is mixed, past studies have shown that advertising increased election turnout and influenced voter behavior.

    The infamous 1964 “Daisy” ad run by President Lyndon Johnson’s campaign shocked audiences with the potential horrors of nuclear war. While the ad never mentioned Johnson’s opponent, Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater, it is largely credited as a turning point in presidential political advertising, ushering in an era of political attack ads.

    LBJ’s “Daisy” ad played on American’s Cold War fears.

    However, political ad wars have been a feature of U.S. presidential elections since the 1800s, with attack ads on TV starting in the early 1950s.

    But why the constant barrage now?

    Citizens United unleashes flood of dark money

    Political ad spending has monumentally increased over the past several election cycles, and hit the billions after the landmark 2010 Citizens United case.

    In that ruling, the Supreme Court decided that limiting spending from corporations or outside groups violated those groups’ First Amendment right to free speech. Prior to Citizens United, corporations and other groups like nonprofits and labor unions were subject to prohibitions on campaign donations. Individual campaign contribution limits, which currently stand at $3,300 per candidate per election, kept spending relatively level across the electorate.

    Following the ruling, however, the influx of corporate and outside money completely changed the campaign finance landscape.

    In 2010, political ad spending reached $3.3 billion – an 11% increase from the 2008 election that took place pre-Citizens United. A decade later, total spending on political ads soared to $9 billion in the 2020 election.

    Significant portions of this spending come from political action committees that are not bound by traditional campaign contribution limits as long as they do not donate the money directly to a candidate or coordinate with a candidate’s campaign.

    These groups, known as super PACs, can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money from undisclosed donors. While super PACs have to disclose identities of people who donate over $200 in a year, donors can use shell companies to hide their identities.

    This web of secret money, known as dark money, exceeded $1 billion in 2020.

    During the 2024 election cycle, over $2.4 billion has been raised by super PACs. This is where much of the funding for the political ad barrage that voters experience in the weeks leading up to the election comes from.

    But why are the ads so negative?

    Attack ads lose appeal

    These days, most political ads are negative, according to a 2020 Pew Research Center study.

    For example, in the weeks following President Joe Biden leaving the race, 95% of pro-Trump ads focused on attacking Vice President Kamala Harris rather than promoting policy, according to the Wesleyan Media Project, which tracks political advertising.

    Americans are a deeply divided electorate. Political violence is on the rise, misinformation floods the system, and trust in media is at an all-time low.

    Research shows that fear-based negative messaging leads to stress and anxiety, elicits more bias and entrenches attitudes.

    Knowing this, it is reasonable to ask why campaigns continue down the path of negative advertising. The answer likely rests in old beliefs.

    Prior studies have shown that people pay closer attention to negative information than to positive information. And infamous ad effects like Johnson’s easy win after the airing of the Daisy ad contribute to the commonly held belief that negative ads still win elections.

    But the media environment has changed drastically, and voters are growing resentful.

    Voters resent microtargeting

    Unlike traditional voter segmentation where an entire group of voters would receive similar messages, campaigns now use data analytics to microtarget messages for specific voters.

    Microtargeting enlists the help of social monitoring companies to identify voters’ psychometric data – their hopes, fears, likes, dislikes and so on – so that campaigns can finely tune messages to target them on social media.

    Not only are these microtargeted messages manipulative, but they can be an unwelcome disruption and invasion of privacy, especially among the politically uninterested.

    A 2020 Pew survey found that over half of voters believe tech companies should not allow political ads on social media. Three-quarters oppose campaigns using their personal data to target them with political ads.

    Some evidence suggests that political microtargeting even reduces citizens’ trust in democracy.

    After record-breaking amounts of advertising this election cycle, the latest polls remain very tight, and most are within the margin of error. The reality is that Americans are already divided and steadfast in their voting decisions, and it is difficult to change entrenched political attitudes.

    Put simply, the political ad barrage coupled with microtargeting strategies is not an effective campaign strategy that sways voters’ minds. Meanwhile, there is growing evidence that this level of negativity is harming the electorate and undermining trust in democracy.

    Heather LaMarre does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Blitz of political attack ads in Pennsylvania and other swing states may be doing candidates and voters more harm than good – https://theconversation.com/blitz-of-political-attack-ads-in-pennsylvania-and-other-swing-states-may-be-doing-candidates-and-voters-more-harm-than-good-239034

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Misspoke: The long and winding road to becoming a political weasel word

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Valerie M. Fridland, Professor of Linguistics, University of Nevada, Reno

    Democratic candidate Tim Walz, during the vice presidential debate in which he said he ‘misspoke’ about being in Hong Kong during Tiananmen Square protests. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

    During the Sept. 24, 2024, debate, Democratic vice presidential hopeful Tim Walz said he “misspoke” when asked to clarify his story of being in Hong Kong during the Tiananmen Square crackdown in June 1989.

    To many, Walz’s use of the word misspoke came across as an attempt to weasel out of what was at best an embellishment and at worst an outright lie.

    The word misspoke has certainly long been used to politically backpedal after verbal inaccuracies or blunders, as Ronald Reagan learned in 1981 after he said that Syrian surface-to-air missiles placed in Lebanon were “offensive weapons,” when they were in fact defensive weapons. Both Presidents Bill Clinton and the much “misunderestimated” George W. Bush likewise were deemed to have misspoken after making mistakes, big and small.

    For instance, a spokesperson for Clinton claimed he had misspoken when the then-president said that North Korea would not be allowed to develop a nuclear bomb – after there was reason to believe they had already developed them. During George W. Bush’s term in office, verbal errors were so common they earned a nickname of their own: “Bushisms.”

    But misspoke’s extension to factual fabrication is one step further down the semantic road. In using it in this way, Walz joined other “misspoken” politicians, such as Hillary Clinton, who used it after falsely recollecting having landed in Bosnia under sniper fire.

    As a sociolinguist who writes about how language changes over time, misspoke’s euphemistic recasting of lying as an inadvertent mistake calls for deeper linguistic scrutiny.

    Tim Walz, being pressed on a statement he made and whether it was true, during the vice presidential debate.

    From mumble to mea culpa

    To understand how and why words morph like this, linguists like to trace them to their very beginnings.

    According to the Oxford English Dictionary, “misspeaking” is quite old in the history of English, appearing as “missprecon” in a Northumbrian text dating before the 11th century. Its original sense was one of “to grumble” or “to mumble,” a meaning now obsolete.

    But after the 11th century, its meaning shifted from inarticulateness to that of speaking amiss or disparagingly, often mentioned in reference to saying something improper or upsetting. Chaucer makes use of this sense in the “Miller’s Tale”: “And therfore if that I mysspeke or seye, Wyte it the ale of Southwerk, I you preye,” where the Miller handily blames a bit too much ale for whatever impropriety might fall from his mouth.

    Around the time Chaucer was composing “The Canterbury Tales” in the late 14th century, the word “misspeak” branched off down yet another semantic path, taking on the meaning of “to speak incorrectly or misleadingly.” It is this sense that gave birth to the modern political mea culpa used when backtracking on a misleading prior statement, such as by Sen. John McCain after he claimed President Barack Obama was directly responsible for terrorist attacks on Americans.

    Expanding meaning

    These shifts in the meaning of a word over time fall under what linguists refer to as “semantic broadening.” Semantic broadening, which means expansion of a word’s meaning, is incredibly common, generally occurring when a word becomes used more frequently and across more situations. As a result, its core sense can expand to take on supplemental or tangential meanings.

    Semantic shift like this is constantly at work, pushing and pulling senses in related but new directions to stay relevant to the needs of speakers.

    The word “soon,” for instance, at first carried a meaning of “immediately,” but human nature being what it is, its meaning began to creep in the direction of “as immediately as possible” as people took their merry time.

    Some new meanings, such as the nonliteral use of “literally” and Walz’s use of “misspeak,” are sites of contest, with multiple meanings at play.

    The semantic broadening of misspeaking to cover not just misleading but knowingly false information didn’t start with Walz, nor did it begin with Clinton. In fact, this politically expedient expansion seems to go back at least to the Nixon administration.

    There’s been a lot of misspeaking by politicians over the years, as these stories show.
    The Guardian US; The Hill; Wall Street Journal; Politico; Washington Post.

    ‘I misspoke myself’

    In 1973, Nixon and his advisers were called to task in a Time article accusing them of a tendency to “make flat statements one day, and the next day reverse field with the simple phrase, ‘I misspoke myself.’” Given the Watergate scandal, it’s safe to say that misspoke as used by his administration had already shifted into deceptive speech territory.

    Perhaps misspeaking’s semantic slippery slope started even further back, when the prefix “mis,” with its sense of “badly,” combined with “speaking.”

    Consider other potentially weaselly words that are also formed by “mis” prefixation: misunderstood, misinterpret, mishear, mistake. These are all examples of words, like misspeak, that can and have been used by politicians to avoid taking responsibility for the false or “misleading” things they say.

    Even if led astray by its prefix, from a linguistic perspective, the broadening of misspeak to cover not just incorrect but fabricated statements turns out to be not such a surprising development given the tendency of words to take on new senses over time, particularly in the world of political doublespeak.

    The bigger surprise might be how this new meaning translates with voters, but that’s one surprise that will have to wait for the ballot box.

    Valerie M. Fridland does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Misspoke: The long and winding road to becoming a political weasel word – https://theconversation.com/misspoke-the-long-and-winding-road-to-becoming-a-political-weasel-word-240533

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: So you don’t like Trump or Harris – here’s why it’s still best to vote for one of them

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Daniel F. Stone, Associate Professor of Economics, Bowdoin College

    In a close election, every vote really does matter. Nadzeya Haroshka/iStock / Getty Images Plus

    Many Americans are not thrilled with either of the two major-party candidates for president. As of Oct. 4, 2024, polls showed that 46.5% had an unfavorable opinion of Kamala Harris and 52.6% felt unfavorably toward Donald Trump.

    Some of these unhappy voters are considering voting for a third-party candidate, or not voting at all. They may be thinking of those actions as a form of protest against the two-party system dominant in the United States, or against these two particular candidates.

    For example, in a September poll 3.5% of Michigan voters said they planned to vote for a candidate other than Harris and Trump.

    At first glance, these choices might seem perfectly reasonable: If you don’t like a candidate, don’t vote for that person. But my work as a scholar of cognitive biases – systematic errors people make in their thinking – makes me fear that this option does not best serve the interests of those voters.

    Instead, protest voting is in fact likely to harm the democratic process, potentially leading to the election of the candidate the majority of voters overall, and protest voters specifically, most dislike. There are several reasons protest voters might make this mistake.

    How much does one vote matter?

    It’s clear that any one vote is very unlikely to swing the presidential election. And some might say that if one vote doesn’t really matter, then voters may as well vote however they want, or not bother to vote at all. Here’s why that’s flawed thinking:

    Suppose there are 10,000 voters in a state who feel unhappy with both candidates. But they almost surely dislike one candidate more than they dislike the other. Perhaps they disagree with some of Harris’ views but fear Trump. Or maybe it’s the other way around. They don’t have to agree on why they’re unhappy about the candidates either – some who are unhappy with Harris but prefer her over Trump may think Harris is too far left, while others may think she’s not enough of a leftist.

    Now suppose the rest of the state’s voters – those who are happy to vote for one of the two major candidates – are very narrowly split. Perhaps the gap is 5,000 votes. So, if the 10,000 unhappy voters do vote for one of the two major-party candidates, they can swing the election.

    Again, these unhappy voters really do have a preference – they like one of the major candidates better than the other. So while each individual unhappy voter wants to keep their hands clean and not vote, they would each like the other 9,999 unhappy voters to step up and swing the outcome in favor of their preferred candidate.

    Parents teach the Golden Rule to kids – do unto others as you would have them do unto you – and most people do actually believe in it and try to act accordingly. In this case, following the Golden Rule means that if you’re an unhappy voter and would like other unhappy voters to hold their noses and vote for the major candidate they least dislike, you should be willing to do the same thing yourself.

    But not all unhappy voters think this way. Some are led astray by their intuition and choose to protest-vote even when their own values would indicate they shouldn’t.

    A boycott might close a store, but it’s not going to prevent an election from delivering a winner.
    Nikolay Tsuguliev/iStock / Getty Images Plus

    A boycott error

    One reason a person might still think a protest vote makes sense is because of the assumption that boycotting something they don’t like is an effective means of contributing to positive change.

    A boycott against a person or organization you have a problem with often makes good sense. For instance, if there’s a restaurant in town with a reputation for being discriminatory, or just for being slow to get the food out, don’t go to it. Maybe it will close and make room for another business with better performance. Or maybe it will make some changes in hopes of growing its customer base.

    But when you cast a vote, whether on Election Day or beforehand, boycotting the viable candidates isn’t going to help. One of them is going to win whether you like it or not. Boycotting in this context is an example of a misapplied heuristic – a rule of thumb that’s often, but not always, helpful. Boycotting here doesn’t help you achieve your goal of eliminating or improving something you don’t like.

    Omission vs. commission

    Another reason people might choose a protest vote is because of a phenomenon in which people prefer to make mistakes of inaction – omission – over making mistakes that involve taking action – commission. People feel less guilty when they haven’t acted directly in support of a bad outcome. But both action and inaction can be errors, and both can deliver undesired results that constitute bad outcomes.

    The omission bias can help explain why some people are hesitant to get vaccinated against serious diseases: If they chose to get vaccinated and the vaccination led to a health problem, that would be a mistake of commission. Not getting vaccinated also might lead to a health problem, but that would be a mistake of omission. People tend to prefer the latter.

    Similarly, voting for a candidate you’re unsatisfied with could feel like a mistake of commission. Not voting, or voting for a third party, risks a mistake of omission – an error often assumed to be less significant. But choosing the possibility of an error of omission over one of commission doesn’t ensure you aren’t making a mistake – it just changes your mistake to one that’s intuitively more appealing.

    They are both politicians, but they are very different candidates.
    AP Photo

    False equivalence

    A final reason people might opt out of voting or choose to back a third-party candidate is that they object to the assumption that they dislike one candidate more than the other. Instead, these people claim the two main options are equally bad.

    But regardless of what your actual values and policy preferences are, that’s almost certainly untrue. The two candidates hold very different views on a wide range of issues, and have different records of what they have done – and not done – when in office.

    People who claim the two different candidates are basically the same are misusing another mental shortcut: the human tendency to think in categories. Grouping distinct items in the same category can simplify thinking, but it can ignore substantial differences.

    Some people think about 1-in-10 chances and 1-in-a-million chances as both being in the category of “possibilities.” But they’re very different: If you’re flipping a coin repeatedly, one is about equal to your chance of getting heads three times in a row, and the other is how likely you are to get heads 20 times in a row.

    Seeking your most desired outcome

    During the 2000 presidential campaign, I recall a friend said he wasn’t voting for Democratic candidate Al Gore because he thought Gore and Republican nominee George W. Bush were equally bad. But after winning – partly because of third-party voters who cast ballots for independent Ralph Nader – Bush withdrew the U.S. from the Kyoto Protocol to limit global carbon emissions, invaded Iraq, and passed tax cuts favoring the wealthy.

    All of those were actions Gore would almost certainly not have taken. The two candidates were very far from being the same, and even though my friend didn’t see it beforehand, he should have been able to.

    The U.S. will have a new president on Jan. 20, 2025: Trump or Harris. A third-party winner is not a real option.

    In some states voters can rank candidates in order of preference, more clearly expressing their choices without wasting their vote on a candidate who can’t win. People who believe it would be nice to have more choices with realistic chances of winning could work to adopt that system – known as ranked-choice voting – in their communities, or seek to adopt other methods that could eventually yield more viable options in the future. But it won’t happen in time for this election.

    Whether you like it or not, you face a binary choice: Vote for one or vote for the other. And please vote.

    Daniel F. Stone does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. So you don’t like Trump or Harris – here’s why it’s still best to vote for one of them – https://theconversation.com/so-you-dont-like-trump-or-harris-heres-why-its-still-best-to-vote-for-one-of-them-240632

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Though home to about 50 white extremist groups, Ohio’s social and political landscape is undergoing rapid racial change

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Paul J. Becker, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Dayton

    Members of the white militia group Proud Boys march on the Ohio state capitol in Columbus on Jan. 6, 2024. Paul Becker, CC BY

    The first time many Americans heard about Springfield, Ohio, came during the September 2024 presidential debate when Donald Trump falsely claimed that Haitian immigrants in the city were eating other residents’ cats and dogs.

    Though shocking, these harmful rumors had been spreading on social media since the beginning of the summer and had gained more notoriety when JD Vance, a U.S. senator from Ohio and Trump’s running mate, made similar statements on X, the social media platform formerly called Twitter.

    But what has gone mostly overlooked is the effect these racist lies have had on energizing Ohio’s nearly 50 white extremist groups.

    Members of the white supremacist group Blood Tribe marched through Springfield on Aug. 10, 2024, with with swastikas on their signs.

    Since then, members of the Ku Klux Klan and the right-wing extremist group Proud Boys have each marched in separate demonstrations through Springfield.

    As scholars of extremism who live in Ohio and work at the University of Dayton, we have seen these events unfold at a time when city officials have received multiple bomb threats targeting local government offices and schools since Trump’s false and racist claims against Haitian immigrants.

    The changing landscape

    In our research, we have found that the rapidly changing social conditions in Ohio have played a significant role in the growth of extremism.

    Between 1990 and 2019, for instance, manufacturing jobs shrank from 21.7% of all employment in the state to 12.5%, a loss of nearly 360,000 jobs. As a result, income disparities between the professional and working classes have widened – as has the heightened sense among some alienated white men that white conservatives are the real victims of bias in a society growing more racially and culturally diverse.

    A neo-Nazi group speaks under heavy police protection at a 2005 rally sponsored by the National Socialist Movement at City Hall in Toledo, Ohio.
    Bill Pugliano/Getty Images

    For many of these alienated men, particularly those in rural areas that lack significant numbers of Black and Hispanic residents, extremist ideologies offer easy answers to complex questions that involve their sense of disenfranchisement.

    In 2020, for example, the population of Springfield was about 60,000. But over the past three years, city officials estimate that the population has grown by about 25%, partly fueled by the arrival of as many as 15,000 Haitian immigrants during that time. Many of them are legally living in the U.S. under a special federal program.

    Similar demographic shifts are occurring throughout the state. Between 2010 and 2022, the percentage of the white population dropped from 81.2% to 77.3%, a loss of about 250,000, putting the state’s white population at about 9.1 million. During the same time, the Hispanic population, for instance, grew from about 357,000 in 2010 to nearly 525,000.

    For some of these white extremists, these population changes will lead to an inevitable race war between white people and nonwhite people. We have found that the attraction of belonging to a group that promises strength, protection and a source of identity can be particularly compelling.

    The Ohio connection

    In recent years, white extremism in Ohio has received attention as a result of the extremist rhetoric of and often violent crimes committed by white men who call the state home. Consider just a few examples:

    Born and raised in Ohio, Andrew Anglin founded the Daily Stormer, a popular neo-Nazi website, in 2016.

    James Alex Fields Jr. of Maumee, Ohio, poses for a mug shot after he drove his car into a crowd of counterprotesters in Charlottesville, Va., on Aug. 12, 2017.
    Albemarle-Charlottesville Regional Jail via Getty Images

    James Alex Fields Jr., a white nationalist from the Toledo area, was sentenced to life in prison in 2019 for the murder of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, Virginia. Fields was convicted of driving his car into a crowd of counterprotesters during the white nationalist Unite the Right Rally in August 2017.

    Prior to the attack, Fields frequently posted the hashtag #Hitlerwasright on his social media accounts and called for violence against nonwhites and Jews.

    In the summer of 2022, Ohio law enforcement officers shot and killed Ricky Shiffer after the armed Navy veteran fired a nail gun at the FBI field office in Cincinnati. On his social media accounts, Shiffer had called for violence against federal law enforcement officials after the FBI searched Donald Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago as part of the federal probe into Trump’s handling of classified documents.

    Tres Genco, a self-described incel – short for “involuntary celibate” – who hated women and believed he was owed sex from them, was from the Cincinnati area and pled guilty in 2022 to plotting a mass shooting of women at Ohio State University. Law enforcement officials in Ohio stopped the planned attack before it happened.

    On April 21, 2023, Christopher Brenner Cook, 20, of Columbus, Ohio, and others were sentenced to nearly eight years in prison for his plan to attack power grids across the U.S. Cook and his accomplices believed that they were starting a race war and used neo-Nazi propaganda and white supremacist ideology to recruit young people to join their group.

    Online recruitment tactics

    Leaders of white supremacist and militia groups often use both traditional outreach and digital platforms to recruit people to their groups. Traditional outreach includes recruitment in conversations, attending events, and sharing books, pamphlets, flyers and posters.

    At the same time, social media has become a critical tool for extremist groups to spread their message, recruit members and organize events.

    These online platforms create echo chambers that reinforce extremist beliefs in debunked conspiracy theories, such as the assumption that the federal government is part of a plot to eliminate the white race.

    In addition to the increased traffic on social media, we have seen a rise of extremist groups in Ohio known as active clubs, where members engage in physical fitness, combat training and emotional support that encourages the development of a warrior mentality in preparation for what followers believe is an inevitable race war.

    Countering extremism in Ohio

    Though the emergence of white extremist groups goes far beyond the borders of Ohio, we have found that community-based, educational initiatives are effective in understanding and ultimately eradicating the root causes of racial and ethnic hatred on the local level.

    In our view, community engagement that emphasizes dialogue and understanding across different racial groups is crucial for demonstrating the dangers of intolerance – and the benefits of diversity.

    Paul J. Becker is part of a team at The University of Dayton that received funding from the Department of Homeland Security for the Preventing Radicalization to Extremist Violence through Education, Network-Building and Training in Southwest Ohio (PREVENTS-OH) project. Funded by the Department of Homeland Security under the Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) Grant Program, PREVENTS-OH recognizes that domestic violent extremism and hate movements pose a serious threat to the realization of human rights.

    Art Jipson is part of a team at The University of Dayton that received funding from the Department of Homeland Security for the Preventing Radicalization to Extremist Violence through Education, Network-Building and Training in Southwest Ohio (PREVENTS-OH) project. Funded by the Department of Homeland Security under the Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) Grant Program, PREVENTS-OH recognizes that domestic violent extremism and hate movements pose a serious threat to the realization of human rights.

    – ref. Though home to about 50 white extremist groups, Ohio’s social and political landscape is undergoing rapid racial change – https://theconversation.com/though-home-to-about-50-white-extremist-groups-ohios-social-and-political-landscape-is-undergoing-rapid-racial-change-239997

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Buyer beware: Off-brand Ozempic, Zepbound and other weight loss products carry undisclosed risks for consumers

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By C. Michael White, Distinguished Professor of Pharmacy Practice, University of Connecticut

    In just a few years, brand-name injectable drugs such as Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro and Zepbound have rocketed to fame as billion-dollar annual sellers for weight loss as well as to control blood sugar levels and reduce the risk of heart disease.

    But the price of these injections is steep: They cost about US$800-$1,000 per month, and if used for weight loss alone, they are not covered by most insurance policies. Both drugs mimic the naturally occurring hormone GLP-1 to help regulate blood sugar and reduce cravings. They can be taken only with a prescription.

    The Food and Drug Administration announced an official shortage of the active ingredients in these drugs in 2022, but on Oct. 2, 2024, the agency announced that the shortage has been resolved for the medicine tirzepatide, the active ingredient in Mounjaro and Zepbound.

    Despite the soaring demand and limited supply of these drugs, there are no generic versions available. This is because the patents for semaglutide – the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy, which is still in shortage – and tirzepatide don’t expire until 2033 and 2036, respectively.

    As a result, nonbrand alternatives that can be purchased with or without a prescription are flooding the market. Yet these products come with real risks to consumers.

    I am a pharmacist who studies weaknesses in federal oversight of prescription and over-the-counter drugs and dietary supplements in the U.S. My research group recently has investigated loopholes that are allowing alternative weight loss products to enter the market.

    High demand is driving GLP-1 wannabes

    The dietary supplement market has sought to cash in on the GLP-1 demand with pills, teas, extracts and all manner of other products that claim to produce similar effects as the brand names at a much lower price.

    Products containing the herb berberine offer only a few pounds of weight loss, while many dietary supplement weight loss products contain stimulants such as sibutramine and laxatives such as phenolphthalein, which increase the risk of heart attacks, strokes and cancer.

    Poison control centers have seen a steep rise in calls related to off-brand weight loss medications.

    The role of compounding pharmacies

    Unlike the dietary supplements that are masquerading as GLP-1 weight loss products, compounding pharmacies can create custom versions of products that contain the same active ingredients as the real thing for patients who cannot use either brand or generic products for some reason.

    These pharmacies can also produce alternative versions of brand-name drugs when official drug shortages exist.

    Since the demand for GLP-1 medications has far outpaced the supply, compounding pharmacies are legally producing a variety of different semaglutide and tirzepatide products.

    These products may come in versions that differ from the brand-name companies, such as vials of powder that must be dissolved in liquid, or as tablets or nasal sprays.

    Just like the brand-name drugs, you must have a valid prescription to receive them. The prices range from $250-$400 a month – still a steep price for many consumers.

    Compounding pharmacies must adhere to the FDA’s sterility and quality production methods, but these rules are not as rigorous for compounding pharmacies as those for commercial manufacturers of generic drugs.

    In addition, the products compounding pharmacies create do not have to be tested in humans for safety or effectiveness like brand-name products do.

    Proper dosing can also be challenging with compounded forms of the drugs.

    Companies that work the system

    For people who cannot afford a compounding pharmacy product, or cannot get a valid prescription for semaglutide or tirzepatide, opportunistic companies are stepping in to fill the void. These include “peptide companies,” manufacturers that create non-FDA approved knockoff versions of the drugs.

    From November 2023 to March 2024, my team carried out a study to assess which of these peptide companies are selling semaglutide or tirzepatide products. We scoured the internet looking for these peptide companies and collected information about what they were selling and their sales practices.

    We found that peptide sellers use a loophole to sell these drugs. On their websites, the companies state that their drugs are for “research purposes only” or “not for human consumption,” but they do nothing to verify that the buyers are researchers or that the product is going to a research facility.

    By reading the comments sections of the company websites and the targeted ads on social media, it becomes clear that both buyers and sellers understand the charade. Unlike compounding pharmacies, these peptide sellers do not provide the supplies you need to dissolve and inject the drug, provide no instructions, and will usually not answer questions.

    Peptide sellers, since they allegedly are not selling to consumers, do not require a valid prescription and will sell consumers whatever quantity of drug they wish to purchase. Even if a person has an eating disorder such as anorexia nervosa, the companies will happily sell them a semaglutide or tirzepatide product without a prescription. The average prices of these peptide products range from $181-$203 per month.

    Skirting regulations

    Peptide sellers do not have to adhere to the rules or regulations that drug manufacturers or compounding pharmacies do. Many companies state that their products are 99% pure, but an independent investigation of three companies’ products from August 2023 to March 2024 found that the purity of the products were far less than promised.

    One product contained endotoxin – a toxic substance produced by bacteria – suggesting that it was contaminated with microbes. In addition, the products’ promised dosages were off by up 29% to 39%. Poor purity can cause patients to experience fever, chills, nausea, skin irritation, infections and low blood pressure.

    In this study, some companies never even shipped the drug, telling the buyers they needed to pay an additional fee to have the product clear customs.

    If a consumer is harmed by a poor-quality product, it would be difficult to sue the seller, since the products specifically say they are “not for human consumption.” Ultimately, consumers are being led to spend money on products that may never arrive, could cause an infection, might not have the correct dose, and contain no instructions on how to safely use or store the product.

    Will prices for brand-name products come down?

    To combat these alternative sellers, pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly began offering an alternative version of its brand-name Zepbound product for weight loss in September 2024.

    Instead of its traditional injection pen products that cost more than $1,000 for a month’s supply, this product comes in vials that patients draw up and inject themselves. For patients who take 5 milligrams of Zepbound each week, the vial products would cost them $549 a month if patients buy it through the company’s online pharmacy and can show that they do not have insurance coverage for the drug.

    After a grilling on Capitol Hill in September 2024, pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk came under intense pressure to offer patients without prescription coverage a lower-priced product for its brand-name Wegovy as well.

    In the next few years, additional brand-name GLP-1 agonist drugs will likely make it to market. As of October 2024, a handful of these products are in late-phase clinical trials, with active ingredients such as retatrutide, survodutide and ecnoglutide, and more than 18 other drug candidates are in earlier stages of development.

    When new pharmaceutical companies enter this market, they will have to offer patients lower prices than Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk in order to gain market share. This is the most likely medium-term solution to drive down the costs of GLP-1 drugs and eliminate the drug shortages in the marketplace.

    C. Michael White does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Buyer beware: Off-brand Ozempic, Zepbound and other weight loss products carry undisclosed risks for consumers – https://theconversation.com/buyer-beware-off-brand-ozempic-zepbound-and-other-weight-loss-products-carry-undisclosed-risks-for-consumers-239480

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Columbus who? Decolonizing the calendar in Latin America

    Source: The Conversation – USA – By Elena Jackson Albarrán, Associate Professor of History and Global and Intercultural Studies, Miami University

    Demonstrators make graffiti reading ‘Columbus Out, Long Live the People’ on a fence protecting a statue of Christopher Columbus in Mexico City on Oct. 12, 2020. Pedro Pardo/AFP via Getty Images

    This is the season of patriotism in Latin America as many countries commemorate their independence from colonial powers. From July to September, public plazas in countries from Mexico to Honduras and Chile fill with crowds dressed and painted in national colors, parades feature participants costumed as independence heroes, fireworks fill the skies, and schoolchildren reenact historical battles.

    Beneath these nationalist displays ripples an uneasy tide: the colonial legacies that still tie the Americas to their Iberian conquerors. And as the calendar turns to October, another holiday highlights similar tensions – Columbus Day.

    Since 1937, the U.S. has observed the holiday on the second Monday of the month, commemorating the explorer’s 1492 arrival in the New World. It remains a federal holiday, even as many states and cities rename it “Indigenous Peoples’ Day,” rejecting Christopher Columbus as a symbol of imperialism.

    Indigenous groups protest in front of a statue of Christopher Columbus on Oct. 12, 1997, during marches in Mexico against ‘Dia de la Raza’ celebrations.
    David Hernandez/AFP via Getty Images

    Most Latin Americans, meanwhile, know Oct. 12 as “Día de la Raza,” or Day of the Race, which also celebrates Columbus’ arrival in the New World and the tide of Iberian conquistadors that followed. But commemorating the event is all the more charged in these countries, home to the Spanish Empire’s most lucrative territorial assets and sweeping spiritual conquests. Days before taking office in September 2024, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum reiterated her predecessor’s demand that the king of Spain apologize for the genocide and exploitation of the conquest 500 years ago.

    As a historian of Latin America, I’ve paid attention to the ways calendars signal a nation’s “official” values and how countries wrestle with these holidays’ meanings.

    Día de la Raza

    The first encounter between Aztec emperor Montezuma and conquistador Hernando Cortés took place on Nov. 8, 1519 – the latter backed by an entourage of 300 Spaniards, thousands of Indigenous allies and slaves, and hundreds of Africans, free or otherwise.

    This moment of contact began Mexico’s 500-year transformation into a “mestizo” nation: a hybrid identity with largely European and Indigenous roots. During the colonial period, racial differences were codified into law, and those with “pure” Spanish bloodlines enjoyed legal privileges over the racially mixed categories that fell below them. The 19th century ushered in independence from Spain and liberal ideas that promoted racial equality – in principle – but in reality, European influence prevailed.

    It was Spain that first proposed the Día de la Raza, held on Oct. 12, 1892, to commemorate the 400-year anniversary of Columbus’ arrival in the Americas – implying a celebration of Spain’s contributions to the mestizo racial mixture.

    The celebration was part of a bid to fortify nationalism in Spain, as the waning colonial power continued its retreat from the hemisphere it controlled for the better part of four centuries. Spain also hoped to export the invented holiday to the Americas, strengthening trans-Atlantic cultural affinities tested by the United States’ growing sway. Across the Americas, Día de la Raza came to be synonymous with celebrating European influence.

    Decorations for ‘Día de la Raza,’ in the Monserrat neighborhood of Buenos Aires in 1929.
    Archivo General de la Nación/Wikimedia Commons

    In Mexico, the 1892 commemoration empowered members of the political elite who promoted European investments and culture as the model for modernizing the country. They used the occasion to extol the civilizing influence of the “madre patria,” or motherland, justifying the conquest and colonialism as a period of benevolent rule.

    Mestizo nationalism

    Only a few years later, however, the U.S. victory in the Spanish-American War swept the last vestiges of Spanish empire from the hemisphere. Spain’s exit made way for dual – and dueling – phenomena: rising patriotic spirit in Latin American countries, even amid increasing economic pressure and cultural influence from the U.S.

    The 1910 Mexican Revolution ignited mestizo nationalism, which soon extended to other countries. In 1930s Nicaragua, Augusto Sandino started a revolution to oust the occupying U.S. Marines while calling for the unification of the “Indo-Hispanic Race.” Meanwhile, Peruvian intellectual José Mariátegui envisioned a modern nation built upon the ideals of a collective, reciprocal society, modeled by the Incan ayllu system. And in Mexico, beauty pageants celebrating native features gained popularity among the social classes accustomed to perusing department stores for Parisian imports.

    Yet a tendency to emphasize Spanish cultural ancestry rather than Indigenous ones persisted. In the late 1930s, for example, October issues of Mexican children’s magazine Palomilla celebrated Columbus’ arrival as a heroic entry that provided the region with a common language and religion.

    Pan American Day

    Meanwhile, the U.S viewed Pan-Hispanic sentiments as a threat: Spanish economic goals, cloaked in racial and cultural solidarity.

    To help shore up hemispheric allegiances, Franklin D. Roosevelt proclaimed a new holiday on April 14, 1930: Pan American Day, or Día de las Américas. The holiday sought to offset the narratives of both Columbus Day and Día de la Raza and marked the U.S. administration’s Good Neighbor Policy pivot toward Latin America – a softer form of imperialism that promoted solidarity and brotherhood, at least on the surface.

    The Pan American Union, an inter-American organization headquartered in Washington, saw the new date as an opportunity to forge common traditions across the hemisphere. It vigorously promoted Pan American Day celebrations, primarily among schoolchildren, exhorting teachers to implement games, puzzles, pageants and songs created in Pan American Union offices.

    Students at Parkway Public School in New York present a pageant for Pan American Day in 1943.
    Bettmann/CORBIS/Bettmann Archive via Getty Images

    The holiday met enthusiastic reception in the United States. Midwesterners donned sombreros for parades, and Spanish language clubs in California hosted pageants celebrating the flags of American nations.

    But Latin American commemoration was tepid at best. The Organization of American States, the successor to the Pan American Union, still recognizes Pan American Day. However, it never gained traction in Latin America and faded in the U.S. during World War II.

    Recent shift

    Latin America’s ambivalence toward holidays to commemorate the colonizers has taken a turn since 1992. The 500-year anniversary of Columbus’ arrival corresponded with yet another form of colonialism, in many Latin Americans’ eyes, as a new wave of multinational corporations colluded with heads of state to tap the continent’s oil, lithium, water and avocados.

    Activists used the commemoration to call attention to lingering economic, social, racial and cultural inequities. In particular, the anniversary inspired Indigenous rights movements – some of which commemorated an “anti-quincentenary” to celebrate “500 years of resistance.”

    The Día de la Raza has since been renamed to reflect anti-colonial sentiments, similar to Columbus Day in the United States. Ecuador calls Oct. 12 the Day of Interculturalism and Ethnic Identity; Argentina celebrates it as Day of Respect for Cultural Diversity; Nicaragua now refers to it as the Day of Indigenous, Black and Popular Resistance; in Colombia it is the Day of Ethnic and Cultural Diversity; and the Dominican Republic celebrates it as Intercultural Day.

    A statue in honor of ‘women who fight’ has replaced an effigy of Christopher Columbus on Paseo de la Reforma Avenue in Mexico City.
    Pedro Pardo/AFP via Getty Images

    In some places, renaming the holiday has drawn attention to Indigenous rights and culture. Bolivians, for example, draped a statue of a European monarch in a traditional “aguayo” garment, transforming her into an Indigenous woman. However, critics suggest that removing the holiday’s reference to the colonizers erases an important reminder of the conquest and its painful legacy.

    As in the U.S., monuments to colonizers are coming down – including the monument to Columbus that occupied a conspicuous spot on La Reforma, one of Mexico City’s most-traversed thoroughfares.

    In its place is a new installation: a purple silhouette of a girl with her fist raised, in honor of Latin America’s women activists. She heralds a new era of statues lining La Reforma, and heroes for the future – not mired in the colonial legacies of the past.

    Elena Jackson Albarrán does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. Columbus who? Decolonizing the calendar in Latin America – https://theconversation.com/columbus-who-decolonizing-the-calendar-in-latin-america-233307

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –