The fight for racial justice, economic equity, and reproductive freedom are undeniably intertwined. On Martin Luther King, Jr. day, we celebrate the leader who dedicated his life to ending oppression for Black communities. His courage, commitment to justice, and legacy continues to inspire and unite movements around the world.
Eyes on Africa - Lagos, Nigeria - Makoko Floating Schools
Makoko is a fishing village located in the Lagos Lagoon. Due to the weakness of the nearby soil and its proximity to water, much of Makoko rests on structures constructed on stilts above Lagos Lagoon. Traditionally this area has been self governing so schools are funded and provided by the village.
The ingenious adaptation of building a structure that floats came from growing concerns with climate change and rising water levels. This adds to its versatility not just from an environmental standpoint but from a political and practical standpoint as well. The area of Makoko is consider a poor area and one of the slums of the city. The necessity to create a school that is not only low cost and sustainable but that also mobilizes as needed to serve the children of the village is significant. Additionally recent land reclamation efforts and commercial developments in the area have reclaimed much of the lagoon from the residents of Makoko. Their homes on stilts must be deconstructed and reassembled elsewhere, while the school’s maneuverability eliminates this process.
Built in 2013 with locally sourced wood and electrically powered with solar panels, the floating construct is designed to house about 100 students and even has a playground and green space. It is entirely sustainable due to the application of solar cells to the roof and incorporating a rainwater catchment system. The structure is also naturally ventilated and aerated. The barrels used to help the structure float are also used as water reservoirs from the catchment system. The floating schools are an ingenious design that serves the needs of the community in a cost effective and eco-friendly way.
What are we supposed to do
with rural America? This is a question that keeps Paul Krugman up at
night. It bothers him because he’s both a liberal and a true believer in
capitalism. He sees deindustrialization—capitalism’s logical
consequence —leaving people behind in rural areas, but he doesn’t have a
way to square this troubling fact with a worldview that ostensibly
honors the rights and dignity of all people. So he half-asses a few
articles every now and then about expanding the social welfare state and
increasing governmental spending in rural areas.
Krugman has been on this kick for years. In 2015, he wrote about
how the only solution for the deindustrialized wastoids still living in
places like Puerto Rico and Appalachia is better social security
payments, healthcare, and public services. His reasoning was that some
places are sacrificed every now and then to the “shifting tides of
globalization.” As a pragmatic economist, Krugman understands that it’s
not wise to entirely throw these people away; indeed, you have to
preserve some semblance of a labor force in the event that the tides of
globalization shift back in their favor.
…
The only thing capable of breaking the conservative stranglehold on
rural communities—and of breaking the power of their foot soldiers in
the local school boards, chambers of commerce, and churches—is a
nationwide political movement based in the actual interests of the
working class: the service industry employees and care workers, the
teachers and tenants. That’s because the right wing has their own
institutions, programs, and forms of ideological preservation in rural
areas. They have invested heavily in them for the last thirty years, and
they will not stop until rural America is a useless ecological
graveyard. Conservatives see their beliefs gradually losing support, and
they have entered death cult mode. They want to squeeze as much profit
and as many resources out of rural areas as possible, until we, too,
have gone to the graveyard.
The result is a rapidly deteriorating economic landscape that stumps
writers like Krugman. When he writes about the economic forces
contributing to rural America’s decline “that nobody knows how to
reverse,” the “nobody” he’s referring to is himself. Krugman’s
liberalism, with its focus on slow incrementalism and social tinkering,
has become incompatible with rural economies that are beholden to the
whims of increasingly embattled industry. In the days when America’s
economy was booming after World War II, when regulations meant to
safeguard the financial interests of ordinary people didn’t necessarily
threaten the immense wealth that was being produced throughout society,
it was feasible that pro-business ideas could coexist with liberal
doctrines like human rights and social welfare policies. But in the era
of post-industrial capitalism, as wages decline, jobs are relocated, and
the social safety net shrinks, it’s become impossible to square that
contradiction.
Panther Squad is available on
Blu-ray and DVD
exclusively from Full Moon Direct as part of the Eurocine Collection. It’s $19.95 for the Blu-ray and $9.95 for the DVD.
The 1984 action/exploitation film stars B-movie icon Sybil Danning alongside Jack Taylor, Karin Schuber, and Donald O'Brien. Pierre Chevalier directs.
Panther Squad has been newly remastered in high definition from the original 35mm negative. Special features are listed below.
“Love, the strongest and deepest element in all life, the harbinger of hope, of joy, of ecstasy; love, the defier of all laws, of all conventions; love, the freest, the most powerful moulder of human destiny; how can such an all-compelling force be synonymous with that poor little State and Church-begotten weed, marriage?”
— Emma Goldman, “Marriage and Love”, Anarchism and Other Essays (via philosophybits)
