2023
July
17
Monday

Monitor Daily Podcast

July 17, 2023
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Ira Porter
Education Writer

Last week, New Hampshire radio host Arnie Arnesen asked me to join her show to talk about a recent story I wrote on reparations. The story was about California’s consideration of being the first U.S. state to issue reparations. Check it out here when you get a chance.

Ms. Arnesen asked me if working on the story taught me anything new about California, which made me reflect. I had learned that California was admitted to the union as a free state, but white slave owners flocking to the gold rush brought enslaved people with them, moving the evil practice west. I had learned that California enacted its own fugitive slave act, that the Ku Klux Klan terrorized people in the state during Jim Crow, that Black San Francisco and Los Angeles neighborhoods were gutted by government land seizures that shattered families and businesses.

Much of this was in a 1,100-page document put together by a task force and full of recommendations to address discrepancies in housing, education, mass incarceration, health care, and economics. Task force members I spoke with stressed a crucial point: The source materials that helped them make their recommendations should be made available to the public. They are a trove of information.  

Initial public reaction to the task force’s recommendations included widespread concern that reparations would be too expensive. Ms. Arnesen’s question made me realize why democratizing the information is so important. It has the capacity to soften hearts. Regardless of whether reparations come to fruition or not, if truth is being served, we should all eat the dish.


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Today's stories

And why we wrote them

Trust in the FBI has been plummeting among Republicans during the Trump era, as voters increasingly see institutions – including law enforcement – as being weaponized for political purposes.

Oren Alon/Reuters
Israelis take part in a demonstration against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government's judicial overhaul plans, in Tel Aviv, Israel, July 15, 2023.

At a previous crescendo of Israeli protests over the controversial judicial reform plans, the government backed off. But talks at reaching a compromise collapsed. As a first bill moves toward passage, distrust runs deep, and protesters vow to resist.

Altaf Qadri/AP
Displaced members of the Meitei community gather in a cramped shelter in Moirang, India, near Manipur's capital city of Imphal, June 21, 2023. Manipur state is caught in a deadly conflict between two ethnic communities that have armed themselves.

A relief camp for displaced children in India’s violence-wracked Manipur state shows the challenges of keeping hope alive amid crisis.

Karen Norris/Staff

Difference-maker

Breadfruit, long a staple of Pacific island diets, is enjoying a resurgence – bolstering food security in part due to its potential resilience to climate change.

Books

Images courtesy of Charly Palmer from “Sam and the Incredible African and American Food Fight” by Shannon Gibney, published by the University of Minnesota Press, 2023.

Need something to do in the heat? Amid long summer breaks, reading gives families time to connect and keeps kids on track for school.


The Monitor's View

The persistence of gang violence in much of Latin America has boosted support for some heavy-handed remedies. Several leaders look with admiration to El Salvador, where dragnet arrests and mass incarceration have cut the homicide rate in half in recent years, despite raising concerns about human rights.

A different approach may be emerging in Haiti. After weeks of dialogue, the leaders of four of Haiti’s most violent gangs have pledged to cooperate for peace. That may not sound like much in a country where some 200 criminal groups control as much as 90% of the capital city, Port-au-Prince, and vital national transport corridors. Yet the text of the pledge holds a sliver of light. “We promise our loving God to work hard to end violence, to bring peace to all people,” it states.

Such an appeal to divinity fits the findings of a 2020 study by the U.S. Agency for International Development in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. The study found that a desire to draw closer to God was a key reason that many gang members cited for leaving that violent lifestyle behind.

“Some recalled the need for transformation as coming from inside,” the study stated. “Others described it as an experience prompted by their relationship with other people who found God and served as models for [gang] disengagement.”

The four gang leaders in Haiti are “not saying, ‘We’re going to stop shooting or we’re going to stop doing this,’” Tom Hagan, a Catholic priest based in Haiti who facilitated the peace dialogue, told the Miami Herald. “But they are saying, they are more for peace and forgiveness.”

To be sure, the root causes of gang activity in Haiti remain unaddressed. Nurtured for decades by politicians seeking leverage during elections, gangs now thrive amid Haiti’s political and economic collapse. The last elections were seven years ago. The Caribbean nation doesn’t have a single elected official serving a current term. Nearly half of the population lives in acute hunger. Kidnapping is now a key revenue source for rival criminal groups.

The United Nations has backed calls by Haiti’s unelected leadership for a foreign force to help stabilize the country and prepare for elections. But there is little enthusiasm among potential contributing nations.

While gangs compete for economic control, often violently, they have also shown a softer side during humanitarian crises. Tending the public good in the absence of government services during times of distress may be attempts at whitewashing, writes Amalendu Misra, a professor of international politics at Lancaster University, but “there is no denying the fact these are indeed deep and honourable deeds.”

The truce in Haiti may offer an opening to build trust and to focus on helping young people create a post-gang society. As Haiti’s former Education Minister Nesmy Manigat told The New Humanitarian last year, “The urgency is to train a new generation of citizens.” 


A Christian Science Perspective

About this feature

Each weekday, the Monitor includes one clearly labeled religious article offering spiritual insight on contemporary issues, including the news. The publication – in its various forms – is produced for anyone who cares about the progress of the human endeavor around the world and seeks news reported with compassion, intelligence, and an essentially constructive lens. For many, that caring has religious roots. For many, it does not. The Monitor has always embraced both audiences. The Monitor is owned by a church – The First Church of Christ, Scientist, in Boston – whose founder was concerned with both the state of the world and the quality of available news.

When we trust and affirm the spiritual truth of harmonious being, we see natural adjustments to situations that seem discordant.


Viewfinder

Paul White/AP
People take good-natured aim with water pistols to cool the effects of another hot day in the Vallecas district of Madrid, July 16, 2023. Southern Europe is facing a second wave of intense heat in which temperatures may match or exceed the record set in 2021 of 118.4 degrees Fahrenheit (48.8 degrees Celsius), according to the European Space Agency. The director of the World Meteorological Organization has described current extreme temperatures across the world as “uncharted territory.”
( The illustrations in today’s Monitor Daily are by Karen Norris. )

A look ahead

Thanks for spending time with us today. Tomorrow, we’ll look at the turmoil in Hollywood as actors, writers, and studios question what’s fair in an industry navigating a period of major technological disruption and change. 

More issues

2023
July
17
Monday

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