National Rally (RN) lawmaker Jean-Philippe Tanguy said his proposed bill would allow sex workers in France to be "empresses in their kingdom."

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://www.euronews.com/2025/12/09/french-far-right-wants-to-reopen-brothels-and-put-sex-workers-in-charge

Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.

Comments

The developer team at Discord released a new engineering blog post yesterday (December 8th) detailing lots of fixes, along with some Linux improvements. As one of the most popular chat apps in the world, it's good to see their support of Linux continue to get better over time.

"In a year when Syria says it is reclaiming the breaths of its first freedom… a lump remains in the heart like no other. ...."

https://xcancel.com/MusabAlShareef0/status/1998487866716926254

#Palestine #Gaza #Israel
#MusabAlShareef
@palestine@lemmy.ml @palestine@fedibird.com

Comments

The bill also expands limits on demonstrations by banning protests around community, cultural, and religious centres, regardless of the activities taking place inside. Critics warn that creating “bubble zones” around such places restricts freedom of speech and peaceful assembly, and could effectively criminalize lawful protest that is not hate-motivated—for example, when Palestine solidarity protesters (many of them Jewish) protested outside synagogues hosting non-religious events promoting the illegal sale of Palestinian land in the West Bank.

The federal government says these new restrictions aim to make Canada safer and better able to fight hate crimes. But, in a joint letter, 37 diverse civil society organisations stressed their opposition to the bill. The signatories demanded that Parliament withdraw the bill, saying it would worsen systemic inequities and undermine Canada's commitments to freedom of expression.

Some legal infrastructure defining criticisms of Israel as hate speech is already in place. In 2019, the federal government adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which broadens the definition of antisemitism to include some criticisms of Israel. According to the federal government's document on the subject, referring to "the existence of the state of Israel is a racist endeavor" is anti-semitism. The document's list of examples of hate-speech includes phrases such as "you can't be antiracist and Zionist" and that "Zionism is a racist & violent settler-colonial project." Independent Jewish Voices (IJV) criticized the definition, saying it was being used to "suppress and even criminalize pro-Palestine speech and activism."

U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday threatened to impose a 5% tariff on Mexican goods if Mexico doesn't promptly release a significant quantity of the water it owes to the United States under the terms of a 1944 treaty.

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/trump-tariff-threat-water-texas-farmers/

Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.

[Op-ed by Maria Popova and Anastasia Leshchyshyn, both researchers at McGill University.]

When Canadians think about our neighbours, we generally think only of one: the United States. But we also have a neighbour to the North: Russia, whose proximity has only been enhanced by the effects of climate change on the Arctic.

And we need to shift our assumptions quickly. With the terms of Ukraine’s future now being determined, the kind of Russia that emerges from the Russo-Ukrainian war is the one Canada will meet in the Arctic.

...

However, despite our mental maps fooling us otherwise, the North does not end with us; the Russian neighbour just across the Arctic Circle is much closer than we tend to realize.

Last week’s speech by CSIS Director Daniel Rogers should jolt Canadians from their North American preoccupations and reorient our attention to Canada’s Arctic with warnings that Russia and China have “significant intelligence interests” in the region.

Word of Russian prowling in the Arctic is far from revelatory, and it has been suggested that Rogers’ address was a timely effort to shore up public support for the Carney government’s recent increases in defence spending. Yet “significant” was also the adjective selected by Rogers to describe Russia’s military presence in the Arctic, and the state itself was notably characterized as remaining “unpredictable and aggressive.”

...

In a speech delivered in Kyiv on Ukraine’s Independence Day in August 2025, Prime Minister Mark Carney offered an assessment of Russia’s imperial ambitions in Ukraine: “We see this war clearly, as a horrific act of aggression, a maniacal quest to recreate a history that itself was filled with injustice, and we know that peace will only come through strength.”

Canadians are perhaps not as clearsighted in comprehending their own country’s proximity to this same aggressor, and even less so in their ability to predict or imagine how exactly Russian aggression might manifest to undermine Canadian interests.

...

To call Russia our neighbour would be to recognize that the outcome of the Russo-Ukrainian war has direct implications for Canadian security, and that support for Ukraine is a direct investment in our own defence, rather than a donation to a distant cause.

To call Russia our neighbour would be to induce a shift in Canada’s broader political calculus, by illuminating the scope of our susceptibilities and expanding our understanding of what the defence of our interests entails.

...

If Ukraine is defeated, Canada risks dealing with an emboldened, expansionist neighbour — and not just the one to our south.

...

Comments

RAM-related price hikes are about to hit a bunch more devices.

Bad for consumers, bad for the environment, 230+ groups say

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://www.theregister.com/2025/12/09/datacenter_pause_congress_help/

Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.

Rachel Reeves has received over £200k from the Zionist lobby over the years - how the fuck is this a functioning democracy?

Stay safe out there

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has reaffirmed his refusal to cede territory, resisting U.S. pressure for compromise with Russia.

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-zelenskyy-trump-putin-cf17d925e21e6d6329fadff7e3efbb90

Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.

"The Syrian army's military display, accompanied by chants supporting Gaza and anti-Israel slogans, received extensive coverage in the Hebrew media, along with direct reactions from both the security and political levels in Tel Aviv. ..."

https://xcancel.com/Gaza24Live/status/1998324207134900401

#Palestine #Gaza #Israel #Syria @palestine@lemmy.ml @palestine@fedibird.com

Latest news from the Sameer Project in South Gaza, Tues 09 Dec:

$182,365 for more than 2 million liters of water and fed more than 20,000 people over 22 days!

"Over the last month or so, 150 trucks or so have been entering Gaza daily when the agreed upon number of trucks for the "ceasefire" was 600 trucks. The military occupation is also barely letting medication or medical supply in. However, tents and some variety of food has entered making prices drop but still not affordable to a population that mostly doesn't have a source of income.

Our focus over the last month and this month for this campaign is water, food and tents. This update will be from October 9th - October 31st for water and food. Another update will be posted with all the tent information."

Support the Sameer Project's work in Gaza. Any amount is very welcome!

More info on their IG and on
https://chuffed.org/project/113222-tent-campaign-the-sameer-project

@palestine@lemmy.ml @palestine@fedibird.com 
#Gaza #FamineRelief #MutualAid #FreePalestine

The Linux Foundation today announced it's formed another foundation under its growing umbrella that extends well beyond the traditional "Linux" landscape: the Agentic AI Foundation.

The Agentic AI Foundation "AAIF" has been formed with Anthropic contributing the Model Context Protocol (MCP), Block's goose, and OpenAI contributing their AGENTS.md specification for guiding coding agents.

The Agentic AI Foundation aims for "a neutral, open foundation to ensure agentic AI evolves transparently and collaboratively."