Two artists have recreated a “human zoo” in Oslo, just in time for the 200th anniversary of Norway’s constitution. The project is modeled after an actual historical event — a really, really racist one — and not surprisingly, it’s generated a lot of controversy.Right.
The “Congo Village,” or Kongoslandsbyen, was a fake tribal village built in Frogner Park for the 1914 Oslo World Fair. Visitors could pay to gawk at 80 African men, women and children — apparently Congolese — living in thatched huts, wearing traditional garments and doing “indigenous” things.
In just five months it attracted 1.4 million visitors, or roughly half the population of Norway. A newspaper at the time described it as “exceedingly funny” while another enthused, “it’s wonderful that we are white!”
Today a “human zoo” is nearly unthinkable. Which is exactly why Norwegian-Sudanese artist Mohamed Ali Fadlabi and Swedish-Canadian artist Lars Cuznor decided to rebuild one. To their surprise, very few Norwegians seemed to know about this aspect of Norway’s history.
Cuznor and Fadlabi felt that rebuilding the Congo Village was a way to spark discussion about colonialism, racism and equality in Norway. They secured co-funding from the Norwegian government and recruited international volunteers (of all races) to perform in the fake village.
The resulting display, called “European Attraction Limited,” is meant to challenge Nordic beliefs of moral superiority by confronting visitors with evidence of Norway’s racist past.
“Norwegians have been propagating this self-image of a post-racial society and it's been internalized that it's a good, tolerant society,” Cuznor told Reuters. “It's great branding and it’s self-perpetuating but it's a false image.”
But not everyone’s a fan. As Ugandan academic Bwesigye bwa Mwesigire wrote for The Guardian, “human zoos” were common in Belgium, Germany, France and the United States and depicted Africans (and other non-western peoples) as “uncivilised, primitive and animistic.” This helped justify colonial policies while providing Europeans with crude entertainment.
Bwa Mwesigire adds, “We are not in a post-racial world. Fadlabi and Cuzner can’t exonerate themselves because they mean well. Indeed, if they are serious about creating discussions of racism they ought to think deeper about the likelihood that their project may entrench the same prejudices they claim to fight.”
And Muauke B. Munfocol, a DRC-born Norwegian, questions the decision of the Norwegian government to sponsor a human zoo, rather than put its money toward more constructive forms of dialogue...
Through the prism of Navy SEAL training, a.k.a. ultimate badassery, Admiral William McRaven offered a few words of wisdom to University of Texas graduates earlier this week:
The media's latest political line is that the Republican establishment has finally crushed the tea party. The truth, as usual, is more interesting. The tea party has already changed the GOP on policy, and mostly for the better, but it is suffering this year because the candidates and operatives acting in its name have been motivated more by personal than policy agendas. That's a shame because the GOP needs the tea party to prevent it from lapsing back into the do-little caucus of the George W. Bush-Tom DeLay years.More.
Marco Rubio (Fla.), Ron Johnson (Wis.) and Pat Toomey (Pa.)—those are three Senators elected with tea party support in 2010. Yet they are now part of the Senate GOP mainstream, tugging the conference in a more reform direction. So is Rand Paul on domestic policy. And don't forget New Hampshire's Kelly Ayotte, who breaks with Mr. Paul on foreign policy but is making her mark as one of the Senate's smarter young conservatives.
These Senators won with the help of the tea party wave in 2010, but they also won because they were men and women of accomplishment. The tea party rode these candidates as much as they rode the tea party.
Now consider Matt Bevin, Greg Brannon and Steve Stockman. They are among the tea party champions this year who have lost by large margins in GOP Senate primaries. They didn't lose because the GOP primary electorate has suddenly been captured by "moderates," or some mythical establishment in the Burning Tree locker room.
They lost because they were inferior candidates who differed little from their GOP opponents on policy but seemed less capable of winning in November. GOP voters sensibly opted for the conservatives with the better chance to retake the Senate from Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer.
Far more than 2010, the tea party this year has also been hijacked by Washington-based groups that have personal axes to grind. That's especially true in Kentucky, where a cabal of former aides to former Senator Jim DeMint force-fed Mr. Bevin's challenge to Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
This wasn't about policy business; it was strictly personal revenge to oust Mr. McConnell as leader and establish the Senate Conservatives Fund, FreedomWorks, RedState and certain talking radio heads as the main GOP power brokers. Mr. Bevin was a weak candidate who attacked Mr. McConnell for supporting the 2008 bank rescue only to have supported it himself while he was in private business. On Tuesday he got about 36% of the vote.
In a recent interview with Time magazine, the actress Shailene Woodley was asked if she considered herself a feminist.Isn't this classic? All the so-called "genuine" feminists attacking Ms. Woodley because she refuses to endorse the PC definition of feminism as infinite oppression. That, and of course Ms. Woodley rejects "PIV is always rape." In other words, she's not a lesbian revolutionary socialist.
“No,” said Ms. Woodley, 22. “Because I love men, and I think the idea of ‘raise women to power, take the men away from the power’ is never going to work out because you need balance.”
It was a somewhat surprising response from an actress known for portraying strong-willed women in films like “The Spectacular Now,” “Divergent” and “The Fault in Our Stars,” to be released soon.
“She’s hardworking and talented, and the fact that she can open a movie is feminism in action,” said Melissa Stack, a screenwriter who wrote “The Other Woman” (a film Ms. Woodley called “really neat” in Time for “creating a sisterhood of support for one another versus hating each other”).
Ms. Woodley has a reputation for being outspoken about environmental causes and has aired her support in numerous interviews. But the online backlash to her comment about feminism came quickly.
Jennifer Weiner, 44, a novelist, took to Twitter to write, “Dear Young Actresses: Before you sound off on feminists and how you’re not one, please figure out what feminism is.” Zerlina Maxwell, 32, a political analyst, chimed in with, “Here’s another actress rejecting a feminist label she can’t define properly.”
Open letters addressed to Ms. Woodley showed up on The Huffington Post and on YouTube.
“My reaction was, ‘Oh, no, not again’,” said Sarah Marian Seltzer, 31, who wrote one such retort, “Dear Shailene Woodley,” for the website the Hairpin. “There is this pattern of celebrities immediately saying, ‘No, I’m not a feminist, I love men,’ and there’s not a chance for a follow-up learning experience for anyone.”
Ms. Woodley’s age is a likely factor in her distance, said Leonora Epstein, 28, who co-wrote the generational guide “X vs. Y: A Culture War, a Love Story.” Ms. Epstein said that, “She’s technically a millennial, but a young one, and it makes me wonder if they grew up with less oppression, and therefore never felt they needed a tool like feminism to fight or empower.” ...
It began in 2012 when scattered reports of mismanagement at VA hospitals started to emerge across the country, from vets contracting Legionnaires disease at a VA hospital in Pittsburgh to the deaths of several vets after an Atlanta VA hospital lost track of patients to a November 2013 report on CNN that the nation’s soldiers were dying in a Columbia, S.C., VA hospital as they waited for routine gastrointestinal tests.Keep reading.
But the scandal occupying Obama and Congress today first came to light, albeit unnoticed by the national press, in December last year, when Dr. Sam Foote, a doctor of internal medicine at the Phoenix VA, retired and began meeting with Arizona Republic reporter Dennis Wagner with detailed allegations that patients were placed on a secret waiting list and several died while awaiting care.
Foote also sent letters in February to Rep Jeff Miller (R-Fla.) Sen. John McCain, (R-Ariz.) Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, (D-Ariz.) and the U.S. Attorney’s Office, according to the Arizona Republic.
On April 9, Miller, chairman of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, attempted to nudge the issue into the spotlight when he held a hearing and said that his investigators had evidence the Phoenix VA kept two sets of records in order to conceal prolonged waits for appointments - a fake set to show timely care and real records reflecting the appalling delays.
The following day on April 10, the Arizona Republic published a report detailing Foote’s allegations, along with the moving story of a 71-year-old Navy veteran Thomas Breen who died of bladder cancer after repeated attempts by he and his family to schedule an appointment at the hospital.
“They (administrators) just don’t respect any rules at all,” Foote told the Republic. “They just don’t care. … They beat me to the ground. I retired just exactly so I could do this.”
McCain and Jeff Flake quickly added more fuel to the fire by releasing a joint statement calling for a Senate investigation. But the story remained a local one.
Veterans groups, however, began to step up the pressure. On April 16, Concerned Veterans for America organized a protest in Phoenix about the VA problems that drew 150 people, according to the Republic.
Then, on April 23, CNN aired a bombshell report on the Phoenix VA called “A Fatal Wait” by the investigative team led by Griffin. The broadcast revealed internal e-mails showing that top management at the hospital in Arizona knew about the practice of shredding evidence of veterans requesting appointments to make it seem as though the waiting times were shorter.
“Drew Griffin and his team have been persistent in their reporting on, and digging into, the VA scandal for over a year now, and their pieces have found a home on AC360 as part of the Keeping them Honest franchise,” CNN President Jeff Zucker said in a statement to POLITICO. “This story is one of many great pieces coming out of our investigative unit, and it demonstrates the breadth of reporting CNN is capable of; we are glad this story has gotten the national attention – and action - our vets deserve.”
