we are in trouble

We're on the brink of disaster: Violent protests and riots are breaking out everywhere as economies collapse and governments fail. War is bound to follow.

The global economic meltdown has already caused bank failures, bankruptcies, plant closings and foreclosures and will, in the coming year, leave many tens of millions unemployed across the planet. But another perilous consequence of the crash of 2008 has only recently made its appearance: increased civil unrest and ethnic strife. Someday, perhaps, war may follow.

As people lose confidence in the ability of markets and governments to solve the global crisis, they are likely to erupt into violent protests or to assault others they deem responsible for their plight, including government officials, plant managers, landlords, immigrants and ethnic minorities. (The list could, in the future, prove long and unnerving.) If the present economic disaster turns into what President Obama has referred to as a "lost decade," the result could be a global landscape filled with economically fueled upheavals.

Indeed, if you want to be grimly impressed, hang a world map on your wall and start inserting red pins where violent episodes have already occurred. Athens (Greece), Longnan (China), Port-au-Prince (Haiti), Riga (Latvia), Santa Cruz (Bolivia), Sofia (Bulgaria), Vilnius (Lithuania) and Vladivostok (Russia) would be a start. Many other cities from Reykjavik, Paris, Rome and Zaragoza to Moscow and Dublin have witnessed huge protests over rising unemployment and falling wages that remained orderly thanks in part to the presence of vast numbers of riot police. If you inserted orange pins at these locations -- none as yet in the United States -- your map would already look aflame with activity.

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For the most part, such upheavals, even when violent, are likely to remain localized in nature, and disorganized enough that government forces will be able to bring them under control within days or weeks, even if -- as with Athens for six days last December -- urban paralysis sets in due to rioting, tear gas and police cordons. That, at least, has been the case so far. It is entirely possible, however, that, as the economic crisis worsens, some of these incidents will metastasize into far more intense and long-lasting events: armed rebellions, military takeovers, civil conflicts, even economically fueled wars between states.

Every outbreak of violence has its own distinctive origins and characteristics. All, however, are driven by a similar combination of anxiety about the future and lack of confidence in the ability of established institutions to deal with the problems at hand. And just as the economic crisis has proven global in ways not seen before, so local incidents -- especially given the almost instantaneous nature of modern communications -- have a potential to spark others in far-off places, linked only in a virtual sense.

A global pandemic of economically driven violence

The riots that erupted in the spring of 2008 in response to rising food prices suggested the speed with which economically related violence can spread. It is unlikely that Western news sources captured all such incidents, but among those recorded in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal were riots in Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Haiti, India, Indonesia, Ivory Coast and Senegal.

In Haiti, for example, thousands of protesters stormed the presidential palace in Port-au-Prince and demanded food handouts, only to be repelled by government troops and U.N. peacekeepers. Other countries, including Pakistan and Thailand, quickly sought to deter such assaults by deploying troops at farms and warehouses throughout the country.

The riots only abated at summer's end when falling energy costs brought food prices crashing down as well. (The cost of food is now closely tied to the price of oil and natural gas because petrochemicals are so widely and heavily used in the cultivation of grains.) Ominously, however, this is sure to prove but a temporary respite, given the epic droughts now gripping breadbasket regions of the United States, Argentina, Australia, China, the Middle East and Africa. Look for the prices of wheat, soybeans and possibly rice to rise in the coming months -- just when billions of people in the developing world are sure to see their already marginal incomes plunging due to the global economic collapse.MORE

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In the sea of BS that is B & N's young adult section, comes a gem...

My Most Excellent Year: A Novel of Love, Mary Poppins, & Fenway Park.

I'd like to thank sansa1970 for highlighting the rainbow list for 2009 and 2008

Without her highlighting of the list, I might have missed this wonderful novel when I went up to Barnes and Noble yesterday for a mental health break. There I was, rummaging around in the YA section, casting a jaundiced eye on the myriad books featuring vapid white privileged girls with lots of money getting into more trouble than can be realistically believed and mentally composing a blog post taking my branch of B & N to task for their lack of diversity on their YA book shelves; when I saw a book with a brown girl, flanked by two boys with their faces hidden by an umbrella. Hmm. I thought. Nice cover design. So I picked it up. Saw the title. Said to myself, "Self, isn't this a book that was highlighted on rainbow 2009's list?" My brain did a quick check and confirmed that it was. So I glanced through it, got a laugh or two, put it under my arm, and wondered around looking for more books to purchase. (never mind that my bank account had about $20 in there. my therapy is book shopping, i rarely ever buy just one.)

Anyway. I ended up with (trigger warnings for rape) Speak which I have been meaning to buy for least 2 years, (and now there is a movie? *goes over to Amazon, adds to cart*) and The $7 Meals Cookbook: 301 Delicious Dishes You Can Make for Seven Dollars or Less (don't ask me why. I HATE cooking.) Went around to the series sections, saw one about vampires, tried it, found it boring, and then FINALLY turned to My Most Excellent Year.

Ladies and Gentlemen? It blew my socks off.The characterizations were excellent, from Alejandra, who is the daughter of the ambassador to Mexico, a strong, intelligent girl (who is NOT boy crazy thank god); to brothers Augie Hmong, who is a Chinese American who loved musicals and is so full of life and laughter that I wished that I knew him in real life and TC Keller, a white American who is a great fan of baseball and likes Alejandra. I loved the way the story was told in the form of diary entries, instant messages, emails, private messages, and newspaper columns written by Lisa Wei Hmong (Augie's Bio Mom), who acerbically reviews musicals from a feminist and classist POV. And the bond between the Hmong family and the Keller family made me bloody jealous, they are so close that TC and Augie consider themselves brothers and call each other's parents Mom and Dad. In fact, both families seems have to integrated into one family unit, which includes whatever extended family that each may have. Did I mention that I am very jealous?


I especially loved the email correspondence between Craig Hmong (Augie's Bio Dad) and Ted Keller (TC's Bio Dad); that discussed topics ranging from whether or not Craig should let Augie know that he and Wei (Augie's Bio Mom, remember?) knew that Augie was gay and how he was looking forward to commiserating with Augie on his first crush; to Ted asking for advice on how to woo TC's school adviser Lori. I loved the touches of Chinese culture that were noted in the telling the story and I loved the easiness with which they were referenced, just as easily as American culture was referenced. And I loved the way the two main romances in the book, Augie and Andy and Alejandro and TC, unfolded. And I loved the relationship between TC and Hucky, a deaf little boy, abandoned by his mother due to his deafness; who lives in a group home and wants Mary Poppins to come take care of him.


Also, I love the fact that feminist themes are present and portrayed as a great thing, that the teens are activists and get things done, that stereotypes are pretty much avoided, and relationships and drinking and other typically silly gossip-girl-like activities are not their be all and end all, in short, these teens have substance and sense and don't leave me wondering what kind of adults they would make. And the book is as funny as hell.

I don't usually buy books at full price, because I buy so many that I can't afford to. But this is one book that I would make a great exception for. I bought it at $8.99 and I would have paid up to $14 without a murmur. Get it from your library, your online retailer, or your local bookstore. However you choose to obtain it, get it and come laugh, squee and enjoy along with me.

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