It’s already gone. But it sure looked like proper summer bliss in ’68.
Cheers, Paolo!
Here is the pdf from a News report. It is in Italian.
Riemerge l’isola dell’Utopia – Corriere della Sera
And here is the link to the newspaper article – google might help.
Kosovo declared independence on February 17th. They came up with a new flag design, coat of arms and an anthem – that’s all what you need.
[youtube M8U4T1IH1C8]
This clip is a bit older, but still it is a good inspiration for YKON’s possible upcoming project on alternative Declarations of Independence.
Lars Vilks, one of the founders of Ladonia, received several death threats, including a statement by the al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq which has offered up to $150,000 for his assassination, after he made a series of drawings depicting the Islamic prophet Muhammad as a roundabout dog.
When the above photo circled the news wires in relation to this story, many commentators hold forth about the idiocy of the protesters in Lahore / Pakistan of not knowing the Swedish flag. In fact the demonstrators knew very well what they were doing – they actually were burning the Ladonian flag, which is green (green cross on green ground). Lars Vilks explained earlier how the Ladonian flag is produced: you take a special detergent and you boil the Swedish flag long enough in this detergent until the blue and the yellow colours are well mixed to form the Ladonian green. Obviously the special detergent wasn’t at hand in Lahore, so that the yellow cross hasn’t been dissolved out completely. It doesn’t come as a surprise that Pakistanis have a sour relation to Ladonia, since the country denied citizenship for 3000 Pakistanis in the late 90′s.
It is now also possible to burn flags cost-efficiently through an online flag burning service without the risks and fire hazards involved burning a ordinary flag. To burn the Swedish flag for example, simply click it!
A University of Leicester psychologist has produced the first ever ‘world map of happiness.’
Adrian White, an analytic social psychologist at the University’s School of Psychology, analysed data published by UNESCO, the CIA, the New Economics Foundation, the WHO, the Veenhoven Database, the Latinbarometer, the Afrobarometer, and the UNHDR, to create a global projection of subjective well-being: the first world map of happiness. (more…)
Good news from the Fabian Society Website: “A new Fabian poll shows the British public’s appetite for fairness and equality: they believe public sector workers should earn more, and are unhappy with the high salaries of those at the top end.
The report from the Fabian Society/YouGov which forms part of a new Fabian publication called The Equality Challenge, due out in September, found that although the British public thought the PM should earn more than top managing directors and footballers, he should earn less than he does currently. They felt £135,000 was a reasonable rate for the PM’s job. However, they would slash salaries for professional Premiership footballers to around £62,000 a year closely to their currently monthly salary. (more…)
A study of the University of Michigan showed how the male mortality rate in post-communist states has sharply risen after the fall of the iron curtain. The study argues that it is mainly the effects of a rough capitalist economy that can be held responsible for the higher mortality rates.
the continent of Australia seems to be a fruitful terrain of Micronations. They pop up here and there on this monstruously big island. The main reason for the potency is however the state of Australia. The continent itself is more of an container of these micronations, a peaceful medium-background while the micronations often are represented and represent themselves as independent of Australia (the state). The Gay & Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea (a micronation that together with Snake Hill and 9 other proposed recognition of Taiwan in Recognize Me, a very special project by YKON)is a good example of this, the name of the micronation draws a bond to the coral island while the reason for the exile on the Coral Island is the laws of Australia (condemning Homosexual marriages). The Principality of Snakehill has a very different story but was also created in a conflict with Australian Laws.
Slavoj Zizeks offers an interesting opening to a different view on these micronations of/on Australia.
Zizek: The Universal names the site of a Problem- Deadlock, of a burning Question, and the Particulars are the attempted but failed Answers to this Problem. The concept of State, for instance, names a certain problem, how to contain the class antagonism of a society? All particular forms of State are so many (failed) attempts to propose a solution to this problem.
So are these micronations in the end nothing but so many attempts to master the unbearable antagonisms and selfcontradictions of the Autralian state? Or maybe zizek has just made me confused?
Navigation is not as easy in our political landscape as it used to be. Communication between the given world and the Supranational World is increasing. And why not, as the supranational theoretician and psychoanalyst Branimir Stojanovi* put it, *Kosovo is a Micronation, Palestine is a Micronation and, yes, even Yugoslavia is a Micronation- why don*t you [YKON] travel there?* The solution to the problem of nations seems to be simple; you only literally transcend the old political space, the map space of two dimensions, by climbing into the third.
A lurid carnival of identities is hereby allowed to transgress the borders of the given World.
The Development Concepts and Doctrine Centre at The Minsitry of Defense took a look into the Chrystal Ball to predict the development of security threats until the year 2036. A team of 50 people around Rear Admiral Chris Parry analysed the key risks of the future to prepare the defense forces for this threats. They predict among many other things a “coalition” of ultra-nationalists, religious groups and environmental radicalists that could be dangerous. Furthermore it is predicted, that the current middle classes fall under the spell of Neomarxism and develop revolutionary potential, replacing Marx’ proletariat (termed the Middle Class Proletariat). (more…)