corporate rule

Court dismisses child labor case against Big Tech

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on March 5 dismissed a child labor case against technology companies and refused to hold them accountable for their alleged complicity in the use of children in cobalt mining in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Former cobalt miners and their representatives filed a lawsuit against Alphabet (Google), Apple, Dell Technologies, Tesla and Microsoft under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 (TVPRA). The TVPRA penalizes anyone who "knowingly benefits financially from participating in a venture that engaged in trafficking crimes." They claimed that the companies were involved in a "venture" with their suppliers that engaged in forced labor of children to obtain the metal.

Podcast: the Facebook dilemma

This week's Meta outage plunged millions around the world into panic. No sooner did Bill Weinberg get back on Facebook than its robots slapped restrictions on his account for supposedly promoting "dangerous organizations"—precisely in response to his protests against online stanning for extremist groups! Apart from subjection to such Orwellian diktats from Meta's robotocracy, Facebook has tweaked its algorithm to sideline links to news articles and instead boost "reels" and "memes," with high entertainment value but little informational content. This has tanked hits for news outlets and resulted in ominous layoffs across the news industry. In Episode 216 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill reiterates his call for a meme moratorium, as the only means of consumer resistance to Meta's profiteering, anti-social agenda—but also asks what can be done about the more fundamental question of this corporate Borg's assimilation of every sphere of human reality.

Podcast: for Palestinian-Uyghur solidarity

In Episode 213 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg notes how divergent responses to the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians and mass internment of the Uyghurs reveal the West's shifting definition of genocide. Tragically, elements of the Palestinian leadership merely reverse the double standard, causing elements of the exiled Uyghur leadership to balk at supporting the Palestinians. Yet another example of how a global divide-and-rule racket is the essence of the state system. Illustrating the irony, the same corporate nexus is involved in putting in place the surveillance state that monitors the Uyghurs for China and the Palestinians for Israel. Fortunately, principled voices of dissent among both the Palestinians and the Uyghurs are calling for Palestinian-Uyghur solidarity.

'Blood gold,' diamonds behind Russian war effort

Gold-mining operations in Africa under the control of the paramilitary Wagner Group are funneling money to the Kremlin for the Russian war effort in Ukraine, according to a new report by watchdog organizations. "The Blood Gold Report," prepared by the Consumer Choice Center and Democracy 21, finds that Wagner has laundered some $2.5 billion in proceeds from its African operations since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, helping Moscow to ride out international sanctions.

Podcast: for a meme moratorium

Meta has tweaked the Facebook algorithm to sideline links to news articles and boost "memes"—precisely the format most subject to the fabrications and distortions being aggressively peddled by both sides (yes) in the Gaza conflict. Such propaganda has already been implicated in genocide in Burma and Ethiopia. But even apart from such egregious abuses, memes are dumbing down discourse and entrenching groupthink and dogmatism—and are being pushed by Meta as part of its sinister corporate design to enclose the internet. In Episode 207 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg calls for a total moratorium on posting or sharing memes as a means of pressure on Meta to re-emphasize actual news articles, and deep-six the war propaganda.

Podcast: geopolitics of the Essequibo dispute

In Episode 205 of the CounterVortex podcast, Bill Weinberg looks at the recent re-escalation and (hopefully) denouement of the dispute over Esequibo—an oil-rich territory controlled by Guyana and claimed by Venezuela. Ironically, this claim was first asserted by the conservative, anti-communist Venezuela of the 1960s to help destabilize the anti-imperialist Guyana of Cheddi Jagan. Today, the left-populist but increasingly nationalistic regime of Nicolás Maduro even entertains hubristic claims to sovereignty over Venezuela's other much larger neighbor, Colombia. But this revanchism appears to mask the fact that "revolutionary" Venezuela largely remains a petro-state with a rentier economy, vulnerable to drops in the global oil price, even if Chinese corporate exploiters have been replacing gringo ones. With the recent easing of sanctions, US giants like Chevron have even returned to Venezuela—while the extractivist model results in indigenous resistance. Contrary to the dogmas of left and right alike, the real root of the Venezuelan crisis is that the country is insufficiently socialist.

Protests prompt Panama mining moratorium

Panama's President Laurentino Cortizo announced Oct. 29 that he will hold a referendum to determine the fate of a contentious mega-mining contract, after several days of the country's largest protests in decades. Cortizo also said he would instate a moratorium on any new mining projects in response to the protests, a move approved by a vote of the National Assembly on Nov. 2. The moratorium bill was signed by Cortizo the next day, which was Panama's independence day. The protests, driven by environmental concerns, were sparked by the National Assembly's Oct. 20 vote to award an extended concession to Canadian company First Quantum, allowing it to operate the largest open-pit copper mine on the Central American isthmus for another 20 years.

Uruguay: water crisis sparks protests

With the return of El Niño, rising temperatures are leading to a surge of life-threatening weather patterns across the globe. While Europe experiences new record temperatures, in Latin America drought is affecting countries in unprecedented ways. In Uruguay, the lack of rain has emptied one of the capital's main reservoirs, forcing the government to declare a state of emergency in Montevideo and to add salty water to public drinking water supplies—provoking protests from citizens angry over the significant decline of water quality. While the country faces its worst drought in the past 74 years, critics accuse the government of prioritizing water use by transnationals and agribusinesses over human consumption. News of a plan to build a Google data center that would require 3.8 million liters of water a day further infuriated Uruguayans. On July 13, UN experts called on the Uruguayan authorities to take action to protect citizens' access to clean drinking water.

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