Barbie dream house: A note of defence of the Barbie State

I suppose we all know Barbie. I was introduced to Barbie when I was 4ish but we were not a match at first sight. Barbie now has a life-size doll dream house in Berlin, down town at Alexanderplatz. 1,400 square meters of Barbie and Barbie and Barbie and Barbie. I just cant get enough.  

via barbie, barbie, barbie, barbie

Some people in Berlin don't like the Barbie dream house. So i drafted a brief note of defence. It could be also be read as a modest manifesto towards the creation of the Barbie State.

- Barbie is now 53 years of age and time stands still! *happy face* [still like a layer of concrete]

- Also, if I am not mistaken, Barbie is with Ken for such a long time. I call this good principles. I am a bit concerned though because I did not see any sign of Ken in the dream house. I would hate to make any kind of dreadful suggestions but only that he is on a business trip [who knows? maybe forever]

- Barbie rarely eats really and this is the reason that no food will be served at Barbie's cafe. Eat you greens people, or preferably eat nothing. 

- Barbie has such a superb lifestyle and clothes. You are just SO jealous cos you are a brunet.

- Everybody attacks Barbie, from Saudi Arabia to the FBI. She has even been accused of promoting child pornography - seriously. So unfair *sad face* 

- 'Thinking gives you wrinkles'. Damn right! [see Simpsons, 5th Season, 14th episode]

- Anti-barbie activists strongly protested against the dream house. They even have an Occupy group. Occupy barbie?? What is the problem with you people? 'Barbie wants women to do well', this is what the spokeswoman, Stephanie Wegener, stated. If you do not trust her, go and ask the feminists; for if it were not for Barbie, we would not know what a bikini is and how to eat gracefully. [Prunks] 

- What everybody misses here is the BIG PICTURE. In an ideal world Barbie would have created her own State: the Barbie State. In the Barbie State everybody would be happy. In the unlikely event that someone would not be happy, he/she would get deported. The Barbie State would be the utopian Kantian model of a State. We are not there yet. But the dream house is a start.  

#OpGTMO: hunger games & tweeter politics

Many prisoners in Guantanamo are on hunger strike for 100 days. That is more than 3 months. They are force-fed for some time now which is a painful process. This is where force-feeding takes place, a picture by Jason Leopold, an investigative journalist who has access to the premises of Guantanamo. 

via pic.twitter.com/T5z3rmIp6W

The hacktivist group Anonymous launched a new Op (eration) to mark the 100 days on hunger strike: #OpGTMO17 or #GTMO17 which stands for Operation Guantanamo 17th of May (2013). The plan was to create a twitter storm in order to raise awareness. It is a well-organised operation with an independent twitter handle @OpGTMO (Operation Guantanamo) and an Information Centre providing guidelines on the twitterstorm package (worldwide countdown, hashtags, things to tweet). Same thing happened for the 18th & 19th of May. The twitterstorm did happen since the hashtag trended No 1 in the US and at least No 3 worldwide which is good work. I suppose Eurovision had its fair piece of the cake too. 

What is all the more interesting however is the silence: not the RTs but the absence of RT's; not only who used the hashtag but those who did not; not those who talked about the twitterstorm but those who failed to report on this event.

The only large news agency on twitter that mentioned #GTMO17 is the @AJStream (AlJazeera Stream):    

Day 100 of #Guantanamo hunger strike marked by online twitterstorm #OpGTMO #GTMO17 aje.me/17GyFrVinstagram.com/p/Za9E9LjBp-/
— The Stream (@AJStream) May 17, 2013

@AJEnglish merely retweeted @AJStream:

Day 100 of #Guantanamo hunger strike marked by online twitterstorm #OpGTMO #GTMO17 aje.me/17GyFrV via @ajstream
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) May 17, 2013

Two differences between @AJEnglish and @AJStream. @AJEnglish has a bit more than 1,5 mil followers whereas @AJStream has almost 90,000 followers. Both are part of AlJazeera, but let's say that @AJEnglish reflects the official policy of the network whereas @AJStream is a 'web community and daily Television show powered by social media and citizen journalism'. 

CNN had nothing to say on twitter. Although they had a very instructive reportage on their website on the harsh conditions the GUARDS at Guantanamo Bay deal with everyday. God bless America. If you are up for it, here is the link.

Now turning to BBC. @BBCBreaking reported in detail: 

$1m (£650,000) worth of jewels due to be loaned to #Cannes film festival stars reportedly stolen from hotel room safe bbc.in/17Edbff
— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) May 17, 2013

Of course, after 5 years in England I am in position to appreciate the priorities:

How to make the perfect mint tea gu.com/p/3fqth/tw via @guardianfood
— The Guardian (@guardian) May 18, 2013 

But what about @mediaguardian? Nope, nothing there either which makes you question what the Guardian means by media in the first place.

Another interesting note is that Amnesty International was inclined towards using the hashtags #Guantanamo and #CloseGitmo. Very reluctant towards using #GTMO17, although it did use the said hashtag once. 

Amnesty member, who lost sister during Sept 11, talks about justice and the need to #closegitmo owl.li/l9fQ8 #GTMO17
— AmnestyInternational (@amnesty) May 17, 2013

@ICRC, the International Committee of the Red Cross, which does give its battles for closing down Guantanamo, did not think that it is important to tweet on the twitterstorm or take part in the digital protest.  

You draw your own conclusions. 

Jason Leopold REPORTS:

:D MT @jasonleopold Just arriving in Fla from week at # GITMO. No wifi. Base commander ordered it shut down until Mon due to #OPGtmo threat.
— Operation Guantanamo (@OpGTMO) May 18, 2013

Operation 'Teddy Bear'

Speaking of Cold War last time I thought I should write something on the Teddy Bear incident. In July 2012 Belarus was invaded by parachuting teddy bears. This is not some kind of a metaphor or a joke; it is a fact. 

via OSCE & credit to Studio Total

A Swedish marketing and advertising agency, Studio Total, well-known for its creative ideas decided to take action against Belarus' authoritative regime which is led by Alexander Sukashanko, 'Europe's last dictator'. In an effort to raise awareness for the violations of the freedom of speech in Belarus and in order to show their support to human rights activists Studio Total planned and implemented the Operation TeddyBear Airdrop Minsk 2012 (documented on Wikipedia): they flew from Lithuania to Belarus in their own private plane and dropped 879 teddy bears in Belarusian territory. The teddy bears were holding pro-democracy slogans and messages. You can watch the Youtube video here. 

As expected Sukashenko did not really appreciate this tender gesture and he surely did not have a good laugh. Instead, he fired two generals and initiated criminal proceedings against a journalist who published online photos of the cute teddy bears (OSCE press release asking Belarusian authorities to drop charges) and against a Belarusian border guard. The guard was convicted recently  (February 2013) to two years imprisonment in a maximum security prison for failing to report the invasion (BBC news). But the teddy bear row did not end here. Belarus effectively expelled Sweden's ambassador even though no tangible evidence seemed to exist between Studio Total's stunt and Sweden. Sweden in its turn reacted by expelling the Belarusian diplomatic authorities from the country and the EU took an official position supporting Sweden in the teddy bear incident. Studio Total's activists were of course summoned by KGB - Belarus security agency - for questioning over illegal crossing into Belarus' airspace. I have no idea if they went to Belarus to testify; if I were in their shoes I would not. 

But I had a feeling that teddy bears' involvement in diplomatic affairs and international law extends well beyond the Belarus incident. Since google did not reveal anything of interest I took the initiative and searched Wikileaks online archives. Teddy bears are implicated in the black market in Saudi Arabia. A cable titled 'Roses are red and blacklisted: Saudi Arabia not feeling the love on Valentine's day' attests the USA preoccupation due to the fact that teddy bears are banned on Valentine's day. However, the cable continues, young lovers travel to other countries to find their teddy bears. The cable worth a read for more details.     
Also, it appears that diplomatic personnel are quite keen on teddy bear terminology. For example, back to 2008 the US states that Russia is a country which is 'more a teddy than an Angry bear'. Or the US embassy in Armenia thought that Turkey exploits its 'harmless, teddy-bear image'. 

There are even more interesting cables if you decide to do the same search providing strong evidence that teddy bear tender has developed invisible threads with international affairs. Last but not least 2 days ago it came to the surface that AA Milne, author of the Winnie the Pooh, was a secret propagandist during World War I working for MI7b, a not very well-known British secret intelligence agency.   

Nothing shall be the same anymore. I will stop here before I destroy everybody's nice childhood memories. Recommended Song: Elvis Presley, Let me be your teddy bear.