Milos Uzelac

From 0:38, he talks about, what I see, as a key insight on the future for the most strategic path of struggle and type of policy creation and framing for democratic socialist movements market and corporate regulation legislation pushes in the U.S. in the daily increasing turmoil and suffering. ''All these bailouts, totally violate market logic. We are already entering a different system. At a certain point, I claim here, money, when you give trillions of dollars, no longer functions in the old capitalist way, now money becomes a simple means of allocation. Karl Marx thought money will function like this in the first stages of socialism. Money is no longer surplus, exploitation and so on, it becomes simply a way to give to those poor, suffering three thousand dollars to survive, to each family''. From 1:47 ''I think what we need is, which is totally irrational from the point of market standpoint, print trillion's of dollars, distribute them, and so on, and so on...'' From 2:01 ''We have minimal democratic control, at least in some countries, to look closely at how this money will be spent.'' From 2:24 ''Capitalism as we knew it is in the last stage here''. From 2:34 ''The state is doing things now, which even during the worst crises, the Great Depression '29 and the Great Recession of '08 - where they pumped also millions of dollars into the economy - this was then done to help the banks to keep the economy functioning, now something much more radically is happening - it no longer fits the capitalist logic - and on the other hand, it is clear that the system cannot survive, by just printing trillions and trillions of dollars, somebody has to work, problems will arise... but I am also like you basically a pessimist'' says Zizek but nonetheless concludes, ''but I think a space for struggle will open up.'' From 8:00 - ''I see a progressive potential." ''I disagree with those who claim that this is not a political moment, that it is just a crisis, we just have to go through it to restore normality. No! We have to be very attentive to, of course, hand in hand with following the orders and minimizing victims and so on, but then the key point will be what kind of ''new normality will be proposed to us. This will be the critical moment.'' I share here some of Zizek's pessimism, that is progressive potential is not were a lot of developing and state authoritarian countries are heading towards. They are rather, I see an experiential example from my country during the crisis and other developing (some developed) countries, that I see virtually online, and hear from the news, ramping up and using this crisis to expand the national surveillance and security state apparatus to solidify and protect their hold on republican institutions and legitimacy of their power. This includes, as I heard on RT news, increased data collection from citizens or required data sharing from them in Israel, on the pretense of marking people who are most likely in danger of having or getting the disease, to protect themselves and others and using a sort of a prototype of the ''social credit score'' system in China to rank people on the basis of the danger level of likelihood of contracting the virus and appropriately restricting their movement if they fit the danger level ranking quota. In Algeria, for example, there are a few far distance computer-controlled (sorry can't remember the correct scientific terminology in English), robot mini-vehicle buggies roaming the streets of the capital (or some other city, I don't know I am not good with their geographic nomenclature) with laser beam face-scanner rods attached on top of them and micro-cameras on and with connected flat computer screens, also affixed top in a horizontal position and slightly bent downwards, that display the citizen's identification that was stopped to be scanned on the street by the robot-buggy and tries to determine, using the citizen's id and I don't know the exact procedure or method, but I am guessing they try to determine (based on data collection update in the citizen's id database, regarding passport control checks and passport data updates that he passed in order to travel abroad, that all are transferred into his id database, that the governmental bodies corresponding to regulating traveling have access to if he was in a possible dangerous hotspot of the virus infection and spread in his recent travel destination and stay) if he should be roaming the streets and if determined he is a potential viral carrier they adequately send signals to local authorities to request sending a test or containment unit to conduct a test on that citizen and carantine them, if necessary, immediately. So regarding Zizek's question, will the ''new normality'' put forward, 1.) be an increase in power, legal authority and reach of an authoritarian based national security and surveillance state to continue it's ubiquitous favoring trickle-down neoliberal monetary and fiscal economic policies, to sustain and regulate unfettered capitalist transnational corporate oligopoly arena of global economic competition and flooding of cheap goods on market's of developing nations and minimizing prospects and stimulus for any competitors for them to arise in the market of those small national economies and control consumers via loan and debt repayment force and intimidation and continue suppressing and using ''police state force monopoly'' to crack down on worker's organizing and union's and ultimately to be rid of them or 2.) will it be an opening for strikes, and protests or even uprising or rebellions and creation of progressive movements with a solid base and that gain widespread support, because of the global citizen reaction to the handling by established governments of this situation, that push for and ultimately succeed in progressive solutions regarding financial market regulation reforms, healthcare reforms for the U.S. scenario and a more equal and sustainable global and national income distribution vis-a-vis progressive tax reform, more opportunities for union organizing and rebooting and reconstructing social safety net and benefits for workers government programs and benefits for workers for a new and also reborn, from the ashes of the 20th century one, welfare state-oriented economy, to help ease and curb the greatest wealth and social inequality in history between classes in developed countries and between first world and third world nations. Zizek, 9:30 - ''I disagree with those who try to give a cheap New Age, anti-consumerist steam towards what is going on, that sound like'' Zizek imitates them (or caricatures them) in the following statement manner: ''Now we have time to reflect, what are really the crucial things in our lives, have we really to be cheap consumerists and so on'', Zizek then exclaims ''I hate this so much!'' He then continues to explain his ire and reasoning as a young lad ''From when I was young, I distrusted this critique of consumerism'', he then a mentions hypothetical examples of ''what consumerism means differently for some poor and downtrodden, third-world country workers and their families, that are the maybe most endangered from the unfolding economic consequences of this crisis in the upcoming months and years'' and concludes with his final view on the topic ''I don't believe this New Age metaphysics claims: ''That we will become soberer, acquire some wisdom'' No!'' claims and thinks Zizek ''There will be no greater wisdom and so on.'' The interviewer says she agrees with him. I wonder what this says about the broader left-wing intellectual consensus that leads and inspires left-wing movements today, regarding their stance on ''New-Age'' theory and practices in general. I heard a Zizek quote, from a part of the book called ''McMindfullness'' by an ordained, I think, Mahayana tradition Buddhist monk and American writer Ron Purser, I haven't read that book but plan to, when I do, post it on high-consciouness resources (regarding the McDonaldization (which is a process of global economic standardized product consumption by consumers and of standardized productions of those goods by transnational corporate oligopolies which translates to, as a mode of consumer lifestyle, to other sphere's of society including the shape of and cultural state in them) of the practice and teaching of mindfulness, by even it's appropriation by some corporate entities for workplace event colleague gatherings and mindfullness course training offered by the corporation itself, for the purpose of increasing work productivity and to fit a middle-class consumer lifestyle and to decrease job-related stress and employee subjected demands of performance pressure) and that of mindfulness that critiques the shallow work productivity enhancement aspects and stress management and reduction aspects of some claimed mindfulness organizations and movements, which are status-quo and deaf in regards to broader social engagement, solidarity and change strives and more generally on the charity aspect of the struggle and compassion for the endangered and vulnerable in society and represent a well off middle-class lifestyle consumerist revision and strict utilitarianism for work and career advancement in regards to mindfulness practices, be it less spiritually oriented and more physical type of yoga or stress reduction mindfulness meditation techniques. The quote goes something like ''the newly developing standardized theory and practice of mcmindfulness is ramping up to replace and become the new hegemonic ideology on which neoliberalism as a globalized system gains it's legitimacy and sustains it's declining consensus among the middle-class lifestyle consumer.'' - Zizek quote from McMindfullness book by Ron Purser All in all, Zizek sees a kernel of optimism in the virtual world as an international solidarity sphere and as a device of communicating, sharing ideas for developing programs of action for movements and as a means of forming plans to organize and recruit after the pandemic epidemiological crisis wears off, vast swathes of the population into new grassroots organizations, that have more argumental leverage due to the crisis economic consequences and also into convincing them into joining existing progressive political parties that fight for and demand progressive governmental policy changes and solutions when he says at 11:24, that ''This is one paradox that people should remember, and here I don't agree with other leftists critics, who claim we are more isolated now than ever, but I would add while the physical reality part of that may be true, on the other hand, we are in regards on the communication front and ideas for solutions unanimity front, more connected than ever. This is the first stage of thinking, when people should be aware, that even to confront these problems - we need vast international links.'' at 12:34, ''We have to learn dealing with this crisis and future ones in a coordinated way internationally, that's the paradox of these technologically global interconnected times when facing a common global crisis, isolation now doesn't really isolate us, it actually connects us more than ever'' at 13:04, ''But nonetheless, I think that it's not a big hope since there is a better chance that some sort of barbarism with a technocratic face ensuing in the crisis aftermath and will prevail, combined with direct barbarism, but I think something of this tradition of local-level cooperation and even gangs in favelas (as mentioned earlier as a real-world event happening now in Brazil's favelas by the interviewer) of cooperating for the benefit of the whole community, national cooperation, etc.'' and finally, Zizek concludes with the following remark at 13:48: ''You know when we on the contemporary political left, left in regards to certain like-mindedness and demand of global economic, political, and legal policy changes and solutions, we're talking about potentials of vast cooperation between peoples of same and even different backgrounds, most thought: ''No, usually people are egotists, you are utopian etc.'', now we see it's not a matter of utopia, precisely if want to be an egotist as an egotist, to survive, I need to think globally''. Sorry for the lack of clarity in certain areas of the post and if it's is too long and bulky if you care to read the excerpts. My intention was to practice my English writing grammar in writing this and see if I can correctly, articulately and precisely write out my own conclusions on thinking about the potential future and heading of the globalization and blue developing nation-state evolution future and internal organizing in the future global economic and political landscape as consequences of the outbreak.

A very interesting study of COVID-19 testing results from Iceland as a comparative analysis of predicting outcomes in other countries (shared by one of my friends on Facebook). From the Article: What we’re learning from Iceland this week is as fascinating as it is crucial to fighting the coronavirus epidemic: That somewhere in the neighborhood of half of everyone testing positive for the coronavirus will show absolutely no symptoms. The hard data, out of Iceland, straight from their (impressive) health ministry’s dedicated COVID-19 page: – As of March 25, Iceland has administered 12,615 tests. – Of those tests, Iceland has found 802 confirmed cases. – While it might not sound like a lot, in a sparsely-populated nation of around 364,000 citizens, it’s an impressive number. They’ve nearly tested 3.4 percent of the entire country (compared to the United States, and according to the COVID-19 Project data tracker: we’ve tested 432,655 of our 327 million citizens or just a tenth of one percent of our country’s population). Iceland currently claims to have tested more citizens per capita] than any other country in the world. Needless to say, Iceland’s efforts are revealing fascinating and potentially lifesaving details about the virus. And via BuzzFeed News, it’s how they came to the striking conclusion about symptom rates, emphasis ours: “Early results from deCode Genetics indicate that a low proportion of the general population has contracted the virus and that about half of those who tested positive are non-symptomatic,” said [Iceland’s chief epidemiologist Thorolfur] Guðnason. “The other half displays very moderate cold-like symptoms.” https://futurism.com/neoscope/half-coronavirus-carriers-no-symptoms?fbclid=IwAR3ZUASmtQZcE14P1UvND2e9ctrk2tflL8EOVh_HSkwPPovSHZ3oUOmcPQ4

Of course, I am not of a student of medicine but given what I've been reading about the virus online and on the threads on this forum I think he will, with the help of exclusive respirators and treatments, go through it just fine, It is a more uncertain outcome if an older American politician, with worse physical health, like Trump or Biden, would catch it or some old U.S. senator in the upcoming infection surge in the upcoming weeks.

It seems like this a goodbye to the EU for a long time now (even though we have most of our foreign trade done with Germany the economic center of the Union), this reporting is misleading in some instances (we received a 5 milion € stimulus help from Norway), this move was in preparation and awaited a crisis like this one to use it as an excuse to fully turn eastward to the effectively one-party state geopolitical bloc way of governing and our authoritarian often times unstable president along with his corrupt, incompetent for the position and some equally unstable sycophants and effectively one-party run state since 2016 aptly named the Serbian ProgressiveParty (shown in this report) who further enforced blue stage policy foreign and domestic in this country, which along with unrestrained nationalism and its Serb ethnic and political myths was one of the causes for the collapse of Federation of Yugoslavia and the seccesion of its republics and ensuing Balkan Civil Wars from 1991-1995 and NATO bombing of 1999 from which this country got stuck in most of its part in deeply blue thinking among the populace and hasn't recovered effectively since economically, culturally and politically from the mostly self-inflicted trauma.

Of course ??

Thanks and sorry for the error, it actually more house DJ genre, mixed it up with another song, but lyrics stuck with me

One of my favorite World Music genre songs, a Bob Sinclair one now oldie:

I just watched the Russian series, Trotsky, from 2017 last night with my father in our "quarantined" flat and in episode 5 the aforementioned Rivera is featured along with his then also fourth wife and also surrealist painter Frida Kahlo (who suffered a lot of abuse in the volatile marriage from him that from what I read in a Wikipedia article) (as one of Leon Trotsky's mistresses during the time he spent in Coyoacan (birthplace of Kahlo), Mexico City as the last country and place of his decade long exile from the Soviet Union under Stalin and eventual place of death in 1940 from assassination by ice ax from a Mexican NKVD agent under orders from Stalin directly). Rivera was famous for his variety of murals and was the founder of an artistic movement in Mexico dedicated to mastering various techniques of painting murals and this particular one in its content and interpreting of exhibited features has that ideological prescription to it and almost a prophetic message of a time foretold by the natural law of historical progression of the upcoming triumphant determined rise of the scientific communist society ordered and created by the workers who enlightened by the mandatory dissemination scientific knowledge and upholding of atheistic and historical materialistic principles in the new society will along with the most enlightened scholars and upholders of Marxism-Leninism (Lenin stands in the center of a mural painted as Jesus like figure, handing out not bread but his knowledge of Marxism to an array of workers from different races and ethnicities, who was the first to usher (by coup d'etat) in this new upcoming age of socialism along his principles and theory - which we know were it then went) will be able to because of the victory over and liberation from the regressive, fascistic, apocalyptic, barbaric, anti-humanist, destructive and superstitious (I am just listing traits that I am seeing being depicated as contrasting in this mural) past capitalist socio-economic order to fully gain access to the potential of the fully libearted human reason that will allow workers of this new society to operate technology that will allow humans as the universal workers, now free from the contstraining and inhumane laws of capitalistic production to achieve total understanding and control over the natural laws and the natural world and phenomena. Control and manipulation for the sake and benefit of humanism (guess you can in it's misconceived form call it anthropocentrism), that's what I am seeing in the middle with the natural law (including cosmic and nuclear physics law) and world bending machine operated by the universal human worker that will along with the law of natural-historical progression through the revolutionizing of technological forces of production usher a scientific communist world society. A lot of Bolshevik's justification of the necessity of their triumphalism and propaganda depicted (by using Marxist language and laws to justify it) in it at the outset of the war between Nazi Germany and the USSR. This is what I see it depicting at least. I've been thinking about the outbreak of CoVid-19 in terms of an indicator of how the world economic system of capitalistic production and neoliberal economic and cultural unrestrained consumption is inhumanely and destructively for the environment and natural world set up and encouraged to run by influencing and manipulating consumer choices through various means and methods. Immanuel Wallerstein's diagram explaining the economic running the World Capitalistic System is what I have been thinking about since last week, and this pandemic as a wider and deeper symptom of an inherent systemic flaw and outright means of facilitating it by maintaining and furthering barbaric injustices (social and economic) also inherent in it. I saw it as a transfer of overdue collective karma of the exploited, extracted and used Periphery to the consumer, financial capital management and developed conformist in its lifestyle Center. This simplified and I lack a lot of practical and knowledge backed by data but I am was thinking a lot in these terms that this outbreak has a systemic cause and root and that is a warning coming from structural flaws of how our world trade and economy is currently set up.

I would argue that we should start as the governed now to start waking up enough to start taking those governing positions seriously and start to think from the perspective of this global situation if votes, legitimacy governing status should given to people who got into office by entertaininment and media rating value alone and treating politics like its an arena spectacle, and not position of management of an entire nation-state. That's how Trump and "BoJo", they are even reffered with nicknames as some entertainment celebrities (which yes they to a degree they already were) who run politics like a reality show while the armies anynomous advisors and experts scramble around them with last ounce of strength them to keep things from crumbling in these for our media-entertainment monopoly age unprecedented circumstances.

This came like a Black Swan event for the global and financial market's response (or better unresponsiveness, business as usual till now), a 23% DOW drop in 23 days while the Great Recession of 2008 witnessed a stock share loss of 56% in the course of 516 days. I watched a video clip on YT two days ago from Feb. 25 by Adam Barrata, a market and financial expert he gave a talk at the Cambridge House International and he there explains and claims how this recession that started formally today with the Bank of America announcement will signal a change, by utter economic unsustainability of the present debt-driven economic growth in conditions of economic productivity and spending freeze, the course of monetary and fiscal economic policy globally for the next decade. Key ideas: 1. The Black Swan theory, whose popularization author for the theory of financial market response Nassim Nicholas Taleb, explains is at as from Wikipedia: ''a metaphor that describes an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight.'' '' A black swan, juvenal's phrase was a common expression in 16th century London as a statement of impossibility. The London expression derives from the Old World presumption that all swans must be white because all historical records of swans reported that they had white feathers. In that context, a black swan was impossible or at least nonexistent. However, in 1697, Dutch explorers led by Willem de Vlamingh became the first Europeans to see black swans, in Western Australia. The term subsequently metamorphosed to connote the idea that a perceived impossibility might later be disproven. Taleb notes that in the 19th century, John Stuart Mill used the black swan logical fallacy as a new term to identify falsification. Black swan events were discussed by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his 2001 book Fooled By Randomness, which concerned financial events. His 2007 book The Black Swan extended the metaphor to events outside of financial markets. Taleb regards almost all major scientific discoveries, historical events, and artistic accomplishments as "black swans"—undirected and unpredicted. He gives the rise of the Internet, the personal computer, World War I, the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and the September 11, 2001 attacks as examples of black swan events. Taleb asserts: What we call here a Black Swan (and capitalize it) is an event with the following three attributes. First, it is an outlier, as it lies outside the realm of regular expectations because nothing in the past can convincingly point to its possibility. Second, it carries an extreme 'impact'. Third, in spite of its outlier status, human nature makes us concoct explanations for its occurrence after the fact, making it explainable and predictable. I stop and summarize the triplet: rarity, extreme 'impact', and retrospective (though not prospective) predictability. A small number of Black Swans explains almost everything in our world, from the success of ideas and religions to the dynamics of historical events, to elements of our own personal lives.'' 2. Bacteria Petrie dish exponential growth experiment unnoticeable to regular consumers and market actors (due to most people (me included as I became aware of my rationalizing of my past actions in the lead up to this event) being unable to have expectations about the future that go outside the realm of the recently experienced past (that acts in a way as our collective social anchor), outside of expectations of regular consumers in the economy and non-experts and the asymptote curve shoot-up to infinity 3. Saeculum, 90 years time measurement supercycles - Etruscan civilization's in an ancient Italy calendar and way of measuring time by marking and the span between social crises which they believed occurred every 90 years, cyclic time perception of upcoming events, repetition of the same mistakes by new generations due to the disappearance of warning from the generation who made mistakes that led to the last social crisis. 4. The Great Devaluation of the 2020s - heading to the steady rise of fiscal dominant economic policy across developed countries with parliamentary democracies and as Barrata prophesizes ''the greatest transfer of wealth in human history'' in the upcoming decades. Hope this theory and its ideas connect well to this thread's theme. And this all adds to my suspicion that this might the horrible spark that veers some people enough for upcoming future popular movements that put pressure on the current political establishment to go away from utterly trusting market logic runs a lot of mechanisms as dogma akin to '' market fundamentalism'' in our modern society - as a prelude in the necessity of more government Keynesian economics style intervention in economic policy heading to the future decade.

Though I remembered now she has an Israeli citizenship (on grounds of being an ethnic Jew through her mother's ancestry) with her I don't know if she's going to try to use it a political bartering tool of privilege of having an Israeli passport for getting that Green card don't know if they may give her a pass on those grounds.

I will clarify here and explain why I am posting this in this thread. One of my friends (I consider her that) who I came to knew when she went on the same sociology department has planned a trip to the U.S. in the wake and beginning of the exponential infection growth among U.S. residents from the gradual increase in spreading and the infection rate of the COVID-19 pandemic through the U.S. states and the as I followed the stock market gradual crash from Monday and tremendous historic losses the DOW is suffering because of the epidemic, it seems to me like a wake of a new economic recession and a sudden halt to normal economic participation, life and work for a lot of Americans and upcoming potential mass panic and critical and deadly healthcare infrastructure problems your country might be facing in the next weeks as I inferred this from watching the news on Democracy Now and RT America. She wants to because she has worked hard in planning and arranging this trip to U.S. state of Missouri (which has currently 13 reported cases as of now from the CDC and maybe countless more poor people which couldn't get tested because of the dysfunctional unpreparedness of this outbreak from the healthcare system) because (I don't know which city or town in the State, I don't want to ask here until I receive advice from people here on the forum) she wants to get a Green Card permanent citizenship by getting married to a guy (only for the because I heard it from here last Thursday she wants through the marriage to obtain a Green Card) she arranged with online for a fee (as I understood I am not sure again, I want to consider pressing her on that after I hear advice from people here on the forum about the subjective experience you have about the state and life now generally through the U.S. and the safety of traveling there by flight and staying for a couple of the days in these conditions). She has booked a flight from a Turkish international airport (she is from Serbia like me, she would travel to Turkey on Friday I presume) for the Kansas City International Airport in Missouri on Saturday (I couldn't find here flight so I don't know the exact time I don't know which airline company she booked it on) and wants to in these conditions go on that international flight, stay in Missouri, get married, get through the process of getting a Green Card and leave after a couple of days in the midst of this day by day worsening pandemic and economic crisis in the U.S., in which they may soon shut down eventually, if the situation worsens very fast, all international airline travel, despite the recent bailouts by the Federal Government, just so she can get that Green Card because she might not be able to have this opportunity again to make a travel to the U.S. for this goal, if she doesn't go now, in a couple of months as I understood. What I really could use is advice from the people who now live in the U.S. on whether on not making a trip now in these uncertain circumstances is worth the risk that she is taking or too dangerous for her safety now and on how to convince her rationally and showing genuine care for potential serious danger to her safety, not becasue of her capabilities and independece which she has, but because of the potentially chaotic external circumstances, while not being intrusive to her of somehow postponing this trip now until the situation calms down despite her oportunity to get fast Green card now (I consider going to her apartment tommorow in Belgrade with another friend that she is much closer to than me and trying to convince her that is too dangerous for her to make the trip now with evidence and answers from people which I would post on her messanger (I talked to her before through the chat on this issue and showed her evidence of the current state of utter uncertainty in the U.S. but she said she to me she is responsbile enough for herself, a grown financially idependent adult and that she is aware of the high risks and is willing to take them becasue of a rare opportunity to get that Green Card the she planned for now) knows the U.S. about current state and future crises that may occur in the country), in this really uncertain and dangerous circumstances (in which she may be getting stuck in the country not being able to make a trip back), even though she has planned it and wants to because I think she feels it's her may be her only opportunity in a long time and I don't know somehow because she thinks she may not receive a refund for the ticket by the airline despite this uncertain continued international flight travel situation, she arranged to get a green card with a marriage deal with this guy. So I would be really grateful if I could get some advice until Friday from people here that live in the U.S. (that I would as your advice and personal experience of the current and future state of the U.S. is heading to, send it to her with my comments on messanger and use as it one of the last ditches to try convince her to pospone the trip and ask for a refund of her card and try explain to that guy that she wants to make that arrangement with him after this crisis settles down) and are going through this crisis on how to approach with care her on this with relevant facts about the state of your country and shared direct personal experience that you have now in living through this national, healthcare, economic and potentially wider total social crisis (I'm seeing online that people that are suddenly getting fired suddenly who worked in bars and restaurants other service sectors in various states because of the pandemic caused economic crisis) and on what to do let her go to make her potential life-threatening gamble because of the opportunity of a Green Card gain that she planned weeks ahead (and that's what I am worried about that she is trying to do because of her partial I think from my perspective stubbornness that she doesn't want to listen to the advice of people that care about her safety and are worried about her unchanging of desicion and plan despite the circumstance and because she maybe thinks they are not experienced as her (she went to Flordia on her own before), too scared and that they are trying to infringe on her independence and generally don't konw what they are talking about despite the outer circumstances that are in my view systemic and wholly collective transcend any individuals lone capability and sole experience). Sorry guys who are struggling in reading this for this bad sentence structuring and phrasing I didn't have a plan on how to make this appeal to you and request and I am trying to write it fast because I am not sure when she will leave and I procrastined on writing on this forum after I started this plea with her on Monday, I apologize. Hope you are able to read it and supply me with a short answer, personal experience of what you are going through in the U.S. and predictions of what's going to happen there and advice and criticism of me If I am doing something that doesn't concern me and too intrusive to her even though I know her and I am worried about her adamant desire and grave risk-taking of going against the grain and going despite the external world circumstances that go against her opportunity of making a trip now because of the reasons I stated above. Thank you for your response and time set off on them in advance.

@Preety_India Thanks a lot for the response and advice I will message and ask her tomorrow morning and find out what's her plan now (given that there's a travel ban on Turkey and she said to me and friend of hers that she is supposed to fly from there) given the situation since she is now inactive for 3 hours now on Facebook and probably asleep if she is still adamant about it tomorrow on the chat (I might try to see if she wants to talk to me on the phone) or wont to respond to me, I will forward your responses and ask her close friend if she is willing to help me persuade her. I read some basic green card info online concluded that if you get through a marital legal process that you might get it as the citizen of the spouse that you're officially in marital communion with since I went into it as a complete newbie and probably sounded a whole lot pretentious in the post like I know the inner-workings of applying and getting citizenship in the U.S. from first hand or from studying the U.S. legal system, thanks for dispelling my illusions and intellectual high-horse with a quick informed answer, though when I think about her options now maybe she changed her plans and plans to stay there during the pandemic with the guy she arranged it with, I really hope not. I will find out somehow tomorrow, thanks a lot for the help!

@Rebecca Kalamata Thank you for replying so soon Rebecca, Serbia is not as far as I know a part of the list of the travel ban countries in the U.S. because of the pandemic since we are not an E.U. member state and infection rate in the country is low for now (but could rapidly grow because of inadequate health infrastructure that we currently have and because of a recent domestic recent migration flow of 50.000 somewhat people coming from seasonal working jobs in Germany because of the situation that want to probably take care of their family members that they left behind in the country and stay with them or simply in the country during the crisis, the Serbian government despite the media narrative I think is not adequately prepared to quarantine infected people and contain the potential infection spread of the virus among the abroad workers and the rest of the population at all, and we may witness a major outbreak in a couple of days because of these people that migrated) 50 some cases no deaths as of today. Sorry I just looked at an update of the travel ban countries for flights to the U.S. from CNN Travel, yeah Turkey is on it as well I don't know Il check with her now since she said she plans on traveling to Turkey and taking a flight from there as I know there are no direct flights from Serbia to Kansas City, Ill try to find out from her. I'll ask her and try to get find out If she is still planning to travel now (I hope not though some illegal dark charter flight canals) and will send her your response and advise Rebecca if she is still adamant about it. Thanks for giving advice and setting time off for a helpful response.

I will just add a part that I think is a useful pointer for this real concern from Chris Hedges's Statement of Faith that refers to Scripture but I in fact think it is meant for any text: ''The Holy Spirit opens us up to God’s truth. It empowers us with God’s love when we despair. Yet it is beyond our control. We cannot invoke it. It comes only when we surrender ourselves and open our hearts in contrition to God. It is only through the Holy Spirit that the scripture, written by human beings, can be rightly interpreted and the Word of God can be correctly heard and understood''. - Chris Hedges, Statement of Faith

@jimwell Yeah I am glad you understand as well, sorry about that I was writing at 2 am my time a liitle drunk after buying and drinking some Corona beer as a joke with colleagues on college for photos after we were being escorted out of class.

Thanks for this correspondence with this it reminds me of a sort of Marxist-Leninst vibe (my assumption based on some observed historical similarities ) position that @jimwelljimweltook in this discussion and I felt it today when today the because of the risk of a coronavirus spread in a crowded Belgrade University they abruptly ended all our planned lectures and escorted us all out, after we watched a video that our assistant sociology professor showed us called Living Wage Now! showing the range of worker oppression, exploitatintimidation and death by horrfying work-place related freakish infrastructure crumbling accidents (in 2014 a Bangladesh textile factory the factory roof crumbled under peopleand killed more than 1100workers and other people employed there) in Cambodia and Bangladesh caused by below living wages, employee job indimidation, sexual predatoring of female employees by male workplace managers or employees and out of contract overtime 4h+ labor all this suffering and unrestrained exploitation so oligopolic world famous garment brand companies production line affiliates who have a job market monopoly in the region and can't be state regulated more heavily since they can simple always move their production line for cheaper labor and outsource jobs so they can sell their branded clothes even more cheap to encourage more consumers to buy them and to encourage more people to buy them to advance and expand orange consumer, brand status-association and display of wealth, and reproduction and repetition of narcissistic exhibition of personal style of living and looks to others in countessly produced and displayed photographs - overly selfish personal gain and advancement orange culture and I am reproducing it in a large portion in my choices that resulted in allowing all this time to be financially dependent and similiarly consumer product bombarded by my father and allowing that to continue for 2 years in degrees since I discovered Leo's content and channel. That's what I thought about and felt when watching that documentary and then observed in some behaviour in people when we talked on the faculty grounds in reacting in a panic sort of don't infect me self-survival driven collective mood but joking about it happening to others about the news of to the virus spread. I felt that Marxist-Leninist feeling of class cleansing and karmic justice redemption in the coronavirus, it's market repercussions and a looming negative feeling I have (or perhaps because I don't have adequate expertise knowledge prediction skills about it, and I am speaking out of ignorance and feeling of an underlying hate, selfishness and uncultivated love towards people and the world and I am to close minded in pessimism) of a close future world turmoil caused by the current world political heading and direction till now mostly orange uncritical and complacent consumer and self serving middle class individuals including me through leasening the unrestrained cheap price driven consumption. But I know deep down it was surrendered lie caused in panic and my current self induced social isolation and that I deep down can't accept just dying now without achieving anything, making connections with new people and rekindling, saving and cultivating freindships and family relations that I screwed up and correcting my mistakes and not getting distracted from the overlying goal of the teaching and aim of this community , that I have so much left to do mentality and make right mentality I can't die just yet because of my not to leave unfinished business current ego driving factor in my mind because of the strive to make things right and better in my relations with my close proximity community that I share interactions with and to eventually, finish faculty and my fantasy wish to gather intellectual knowledge, pedantry, term precision, and skill and have enough free personal time to translate untranslated academic studies or books from English into Serbian or vice versa and as an ultimate fantasy that I thought about in different times during the day over the past couple of months obsessively to be able to write a sociological/historical scientific paper or a book title dealing with that theme on my own, achieve economic independence and be on my own in a first career job atleast. I had the share feeling of @jimwell in spiral dynamics like fashion adding a past lives karma assumption of rebalancing unconscious suffering infliction through the world which was I then in myself actually disguised past traumas and current struggles, feeling of inferiorty and a large degree of alienation in having close quality cultivated and intimate relationships with people projected disguised as an ideological paradigm on society. Sorry if I bothered you and was intrusive with this sudden comment reply but I wanted to share my underlying feelings in my experience and current position that created these generalised feeling towards the rest of society that I see daily and that surrounds me in hopes to add an intuitive current personal experience and life position as one of the possible sources that my generate this worldview for some to manifest itself to, in this world sociologically important (in my view) discussion.

March10th Short conversation with a seeming social outcast and maybe a 15 year and older electric pole falling 3 minutes after I passed it. I've started thinking during my breath focus meditation for this procrastinated study session I have now for a quick test tommorow. About the seemingly random event that happened in my proximity today. One metal pole for connecting cords conducting electricity to power trolley's (excuse me if I am lacking more accurate terms in English I need to work on expanding my vocabulary), that were parked there, fell over on the sidewalk beside the traffic road were people pass by near one of my capital's city's central parks, after probably having a base connected to the ground that cracked from rust after not being replaced for probably 15 years. That trolley stop that that old pole is located for the electricity conduct cables that the trolley's are connected to with rods is diagonal to that central park for students to gather since it is right smack in the center between different faculties facing each other that are part of the Belgrade University in one of city centers, so the "Student Park", as it is called, is an often spot for students from different faculties to come to sit and talk during breaks. So I was going on the break form lectures to to the park go socialize with some people from my sociology department that were already there and to get there was walking on the sidewalk that passes the trolley stop and where that pole is. 3 minutes right after I passed the old metal pole it made an electric spark on the interconnected cable cords and it fell on the sidewalk luckily missing any pedestrians and not hitting any trolley's. Before that happened a local wandering poor rugged (thug looking) man approached our group in the park and started trying to sell us sketches that he drew of a girl and a guy in our group. We knew him from before and didn't buy them from him then since we remembered that's what he does and that he already sold us some sketches that he drew of us while we were sitting before. He I sensed had a strange kindness (or simply salesman strategy for potential couples) in him since when he saw a boy or a girl sitting together even if they just met or were just friends, would sketch them as if they were a couple facing and looking at each other affectionately. I struck up a conversation with him about him taking some prescription medication for panic attacks and he claimed to be suffering from schizophrenia (though he seems to be delusional and that he wanted to portray him self as a victim of life in general, fate or events bigger than him to others or in his mind which life unfairly struck with every possible mental illness, I could be unfairly skeptical to him seemed like it to me). He then prided himself in taking risks with taking microdosage of LSD aside from prescription medication, since he thinks taking risks that may worsen his mental state or have a bad trip that may traumatise him badly and permanently is all part of a daily struggle of life and proving himself to be fearless person who doesn't fear any consequences of actions that he takes mostly impulsively and just rather takes the risk when there is an opportunity and when other people on the street challenge him to do it, that's how at least I interpreted of him wanting to portray himself to others. He said to me "Why not take the risk, when I might as well be accidentally hit by some car and be killed , what do I have to lose?" And then he recalled while speaking to me about his friends or people he knew that he lost, during the economic and political crisis in the 90s and 00s in this country, he didn't mention how he lost them (didn't want to ask then and there at that moment when my colleagues were around but I felt a slight compassionate need to ask him more questions about his life and how he got where his now and talk to him more but felt a restrain of being in a group and indecisiveness in breaking up with the group and talking him to him one on one for a while) but I think it maybe in a violent criminal shotout, in an car accident or drug overdose related. He then said to me (paraphrasing) "That Lord Jesus guy up there (pointing to the sky) he has some plan for all of us, we all live our life in some kind of divine providence according to his plan." Then just I nodded (I was kinda nervous and didnt feel like it that I wanted to talk him or question him about this since he seemed to me to be impulsive and maybe prone to a violent move if he took some comment or question the wrong way as degrading him personally or insulting his intelligence or maybe I was to distrustful to him (though sometimes I don't have that with some strangers that approach me and I talk to)) and he had a conversation with my colleague with some his sketches that were scattered around the park before and then he parted ways with us tumbling a bit probably a bit drunk. Then right afterwards we moved to a different seat and I heard the noise and my friend said she saw sparks and that a pole near the trolley stop fell on the sidewalk . It was 3 minutes after I passed it and had a short conversation with that guy. I had depressive and fatigue like state (because of accumulated unconscious actions, regrets and emotional repression because of a myriad of actions I took and choose that I won't get into now) during rest of the day in classes. But when I came back to my grandparents home I had this feeling stuck with me of the lightness and release after recollecting this event. When I meditated just now I had this feeling and perception of my being as being light and an emotional depressive or numbness earlier this day (tommorow midday now according to my time zone) of calling death or an external quick pain relief event to end it but after that event have the feeling (sort of fatalistic I guess) that I sort of don't choose when I die or that when I feel like I want to end the pain I will be shown in some event the sensitivity and thin between life and death and yet being somehow in my gut feeling miles away from death not determined for it, that's sort of my thinking now. When I have a hateful feeling or a lack of care for my life I will be shown a warning sign or lesson that there is no guarantee for me just being human and being financially backed in the market that I will have some immunity from being close to death, that's what I want also take from this. And that somehow there is some spontaneity in life and also scriptedness that I feel sometimes in lucky moments as flow and on which I can't force my ego survival story, mind, desires or wishes on. This may look incoherent and I apologise for sentence errors and mistakes that I am to sleepy and lazy now to correct, just wanted to write this out and store it somewhere as an remberance collection of those, I want phrase it as, magic like and at the same time seemingly, in my gut, almost scripted events in life, where its almost like you receive an almost direct note, signal, warning or message from it.

@Emerald Thanks for articulating that more precisely than I did, giving more concrete examples in which other parts of the political and economic system does the dynamic of white privilege play out on a structural level of keeping and advancing systems of racial inequality and of course sharing your first-hand experiences from your country in giving credibility to the fact in contrast to my theoretical ramblings and rants about white privilege just from youtube research, articles, stats, and books that I read @Apparition of Jack I would just add to your excellent sum-up, the origin of the term Whiteness and what was meant by it at least when I first heard it. I heard the term first being used by social scientists to explain the dynamic of a sort of phenomena among white European (or from other majority-white countries) immigrants of developed first world countries such as Canada or America, who before migrating had a recent political history of ethnic animosity (such as Ukrainians and Russians, Croats and Serbs, Irish and English, German and French, etc.) or stereotypes among their former countries neighboring ethnicities, forgetting that pre-existing dynamic that existed before among themselves when migrating to a multiracial and multiethnic developed country and rallying up together and forming communities on the basis of their shared skin pigmentation against different looking racial and ethnic minorities in those developed countries and effectively infusing themselves with the domestic majority white populace's treatment and relationship towards those ethnic and racial minorities in the country they migrated to. This phenomenon was particularly observed in the past migrational cycles of white European immigrants that arrived in the first and second waves of migration to the USA and Canada in the 19th and 20th century but also is still observed to be present as a new group identity creation among newcomers among white immigrants and as a newly formed and often observed to be spontaneous racial solidarity to contrast solidarity of other present minority groups. The historian of black people in the USA, Canada, and in other Western colonial nations Gerald Horne talks more accurately, eloquently and precisely than me about this phenomenon and existing migration dynamic. @Raphael thanks for another excellent example, I forgot about that pernicious dynamic in developing countries and thanks for sharing, had no clue about the scale of that begpacking practice in developing Asian countries and elsewhere.

I think this term primarily got traction in the first world developed Western world (e.i. The U.S., Canada, and Western European countries with ties to history colonialism and a pronounced segment of the population being first or second generational migrants from undeveloped or developing countries) political, historical and socio-economic context. I also think it I read somewhere long ago can't remember the site or the article (correct if I am mistaken and if you can link me an article) got widespread public attention and got traction as a term in public discourse by the efforts of Black Lives Matter activists and founders (a lot of the former Black Panther Party members) and by the activism and speeches of prominent black left-wing intellectuals such as Cornel West. And it was primarily aimed at raising awareness of disproportionate discriminatory targeting and police brutality directed towards black people for a petty non-violent crime much more so then the dominant white population (regardless of class position) for the same crime and they argued it was because of the existence of a deeply ingrained tradition of institutionalized racial prejudice and stereotypes in the law-enforcement on the basis of skin color and the remnants of that tradition kept in its past historical role and conduct of that sub-system in the past in American politics hence the term white privilege in terms of unequal law-enforcement conduct and treatment of different ethnic and racial groups. And also in the judicial systems rulings on petty crime sentencing (most pronounced being drug possession) being unequal and discriminatory towards poor black people much more so than whites giving them some times unreasonable multiple life sentence (oftentimes life sentences to poor black teenagers and adolescent youth) for non-violent crimes such as illegal drug or gun possession and also the penitentiary system in the U.S. being disproportionately more filled with blacks and other minority groups more so than whites for decades now (some describing it as neo-slavery due to exploitation and striping the rights of black prisoners by private firms in state prisons and the rising amount of private prisons that pay prisoners almost nothing for virtually free labor that they do in them many of them for decades). Also, this term is some times also used on a systematic level globally in my opinion too as a lens to view how the history of imperialism, colonialism, and racism amounted in the unequal wealth distribution and possession in majority Western white countries even today and the a much bigger slice of the populace there having much more potential advantages of that centuries ahead wealth accumulation and industrial development much more so than developing and undeveloped majority brown and black nations on which sweat's and back's was it gradually built and shipped and concentrated in those Western white nations - so white privilege in a regard to the accumulated and existing remnants historical privilege of opportunity in Western majority-white industrial nations to inherited lane of opportunity and better standard of living in them by means of colonialism and imperialism (or as the author Domenic Losurdo and critic of classical liberalism put it democracy for the '' master races'' on a planetary scale). It's a divisive and ''warfare-like" term for a populace, and also consensus status quo politicians and their business allies, that's oblivious and not mature enough in terms of honestly looking and educating themselves more on the truth of the history of their countries and how they got to their current position and being fearful of peer pressure and public consequence for their status and even job status for holding and declaring without fear such opinions and facts. As with any term that holds some water and truth around it and sums up advocation and calls for fundamental social changes in the world, in that regard, there is a lot of resistance, fear, and denial around it. My opinion based on some research around it.

@Johnny5 This was filmed by that Belgian ethnographer Duttilex and his assistant cameraman in the early 2000s, correct me if I am mistaken. It's been 20 or more years I hope that the Toulambi are still around and doing well as a tribe and cooperating and getting help and assistance from the locals and the government since the awareness raised from the doc to at least preserve themselves as tribe while healthfully and steadily integrating to the rest of New Guinea contemporary society. I watched it whole as a side project for my former anthropology class earlier in the semester, it's beautiful exposure to see in footage how animistic beliefs and magical thinking operate real-time in people's behavior and perception of phenomena they experience in reality with little or none knowledge and outside influence of the working's and stories we tell ourselves in the modern world. And also, in my opinion, it demonstrates in real-time how in this human interaction how racism amongst white colonists slowly developed and took root in developed colonial and later industrial societies as means to exploit these people and use them as free labor with no rights. Since a lot of tribes earlier in human history around the world like the Toulambi today in New Guinea who haven't seen an alive white man in person before, immediately, as it is natural in their small community dependent on the immediate natural surroundings view of reality and inter-generational transmitted tales, origin myths of their tribe, and ancestral beliefs, associated their white skin appearance with the white bones of their dead ancestors and saw them through the only lens they knew as a small tribal community as the immortal living dead who with the technology they brought with them must have magical powers of creation of the gods and are maybe equal in power as the gods who control the natural world themselves. And the red, blue and maybe even orange stage seized this opportunity of the powers of advanced technology and equipment they at the time acquired and possessed that these people associated with their skin color and started using it to justify racial oppression and exploitation against them (primarily to get free, subservient and disposable physical labor from them) and started after setting up these systems of segregation and oppression to keep them out of all possible free time privileges, educational and personal developmental opportunities reserved for the whites when keeping these slaves out of the wealth that with the use of their labor they generated for themselves wondered why are they not on the same level as they are while barring all opportunity for them started believing their own racist bullshit - that these people are not the same human genus as them, that they are doomed to be stuck in a child-like state of development so exploiting them is fine and is the only useful thing to do with them and that since they are doomed to be inferior to whites, and some went so far to think that maybe they have even different primate ancestors, therefore their human life is not the worth the same as a white man's life. So you can see the potential for the tragic and atrocious history of racism unfolding through the doc by manipulating innocence and misunderstanding for selfish and closed-hearted personal gain - that's the real-time lesson I got from it when watching it. Sorry I hope didn't bore you and that I am not too intrusive with this whole paragraph of comment since you shared that clip I spent in awe watching that documentary and thinking about it for a while after wanted to share some of my input since deeply got ingrained in my memory and those beautiful humans in it.

I pondered of asking this since It is information I by primarily consuming content from YT clips (not articles and direct economic data) and excerpts from the book America Farewell Tour Chris Hedges and Democracy at Work YT channel founder and Marxian economist Richard Wolff (and he said that there is also a consensus about the the potential direness of this particular upcoming crash among other of his economic colleagues who are not Marxists) who predict based on economic data comparison of huge debt and its constant increase, record low interest rates (going in the negative), ostensive fear in big investment by a lot of corporations, almost non existing savings by the lower classes and stimulating unlimited spending by them to keep the economy afloat, depravity of the real economy at home, potential of dollar not being the reserve currency anymore etc. (I am not educated enough in economics so I am listing the reasons that I memorized in the clips but I am motivated because of this now to start learning the basics in this year). By citing this data they say, since there are approx economic recessions every 4 or 7 years of a boom bust capitalist economy, that since this one is long overdue since the 2008 financial crash it will be particularly severe and may have the likes of the 1929's Great Depression in some of it consequences and scale. I would greatly appreciate if people who follow the economic trends in the U.S. have time to enlighten me and share their thoughts and info on this and also I would really like to hear other people like me who think how are mildly informed like me and wonder what will be the scale of this crash and the potential consequences for the this integrated (heavily reliant on U.S. economy I think) world economy at large? Thanks in advance for setting and having the time to read and respond. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtqZ8ttyypg

BTW Thanks for sharing about that book I am not currently reading anything from the self development genre at the moment probably should given my current life position, started on a history of early Chrustianity book the Origin of Satan by Elaine Paigles - on how and why early orthodox Christian churches and the Church fathers took the persona of Satan from his original metaphor in Judaism as mostly personal hindrance or obstacle in living in accordance to God and repurposed and recontextualized in various historic epochs this term to generally rally and unify Christians believers and followers of the orthodox* (all of them that fall under the orthodoxy category including catholic and later various protestant denominations) in externalizing Satan to various individuals and groups of people deemed a political or in teaching a theological threat in the history of orthodox churches.

Sorry for not responding been in a self created entertainment rut/addiction the previous day and couldn't get myself to think this through. After I am done studying tomorrow I will give you a concise response but I think if you are on my self level they are a very much real and necessary starting point mostly in terms of holding obligations and doing something and being accountable with in an organised way with people in a wider society for achieving small material day to day existantial needs and accomplishing and commiting to common day to day future plans. For example telling the truth (with the small t - real experience and action articulated in speech which for example I am not doing with my grandparents in terms of studying). An early prevention from an egoic ideology of moral nihilism perhaps.

I am writing this first entry at 1:42 am my Eastern European* time on something that I have been thinking over these months the past year and this year mostly at night time but what I due to some pain avoidance or obsessive unrealistic negative thinking and often being too lazy on articulating, and reiterating my thoughts and writing grammaticaly correct sentences in paper form (or more correctly pixel form) , which I still have sort of a struggle now due to avoiding practicing it since my written English, mostly using incorrect phrases, has sharply declined due to not practicing it enough. I will after I am done commit myself at finishing what I must for my study for an upcoming tommorow put this thinking to written word which I hold a regret of not doing sooner. I have written this now in hopes of motivating myself and having a written comitment and a positive motivation for studying of doing this when I finnish my set quota as a reward.