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The world’s waterways—oceans, rivers, Antarctic ice sheets, Arc­tic polar bear habitats, Alpine mountain lakes, Himalayan gla­ciers—are inundated with plastic. At first, it was just a garbage problem, something we as humans thought we would be able to deal with as we advanced technologically. We could always rely on recycling.This thought comforted us with its reassurance. The familiar man­tra: ‘Reduce, reuse, recycle’ was chanted at institutional settings and activist ones. The power of this rep­etition was enough to shield us from our own arrogant, self-destructive scientific certainty.

In the past few years, the scale of the plastic threat has become clear. We are now inundated, according to scientific estimates, with 8.3 billion tons of this non-biodegradable mate­rial since 1950. That’s one ton for every living person on earth. Only 6 percent of US plastics was “recy­cled” (more accurately, shipped to China to be incinerated). This will plummet to 2 percent with China’s import recyclables ban.

The US produces 19.5 percent of the world’s plastics—55 Mtons in 2012, according to Polymerda­tabase.com. Europe produces 20 percent, China 25 percent (same source). PlasticsEurope’s “Plastics: The Facts” says 51.2Mtons were pro­duced in 2016 in Europe. This indus­try newsletter also states very high recycling rates which don’t match with facts on the ground.

Recycling has been shown to be a myth: much of the recyclable waste ends up being shipped from rich countries to poor communities in middle income countries like Malay­sia and Thailand where it is inciner­ated due to lack of recycling capa­bilities. Protests of local inhabitants go unheard. How can a city like New York City, mighty beyond belief in the global financial landscape, not be able to dump its trash wherever it wants?

The only problem with this model of the rich trashing the poor is the interconnected nature of the planet. Inevitably, emissions from burning plastic returns to people in the US in the form of global warming, causing massive storms, cyclones and hurri­canes in coastal areas. The ocean, rapidly warming through these man­made atrocities, is forecasted to inundate the same New York City which now dumps massive amounts of plastic trash in South-East Asia.

We may not realize it, but our food items are significantly more expensive because we are paying for their plastic packaging

The scale of this problem is clear to everyone. But no government, municipality or mayor has lifted a finger to halt the tide of plastic, despite overwhelming evidence that the status quo is suicidal, not just for humans but for all forms of life on earth. Why is that?

Plastic is a product of the petro­leum industry, which has reigned with its petrodollar power for the past century. Petroleum and plastic companies are registered on the stock market, their value counted in trillions. The biggest corpora­tions selling petroleum also sell plastic. Plastic industries employ 1.45 million in Europe and 1 million in the US. In 2012, the US plastic industries made over $380 billion annual turnover, with $13 billion trade surplus (Polymerdatabase.com). These MNCs have lobbyists in Washington. They are an “American success story”.

Also deceiving is the activist response. “Circular economy” is the catchphrase being pushed by bil­lionaire philanthropists in response to plastic pollution. Institutions which promote this are under the illusion that 1,000 billion tons of plastic generated since mankind started to make this destructive sub­stance can not only be vacuumed up and repurposed (a Sisyphean task), but also that plastic can continue to pour out of the pipeline because we now have this reliable Circular Economy in motion.

This is as dangerous a myth as recycling. Any modern object, for example a laptop, is created through multiple supply chains which provide materials and parts from countries scattered globally. A circular economy would need a massive apparatus to reclaim, reship and repurpose each tiny part, the costs of which MNCs do not want to bear. Perhaps policy may make them change their mind. Left to their own purposes, MNCs would rather pump and dump in a disposable economy.

Loop, a much-hyped new com­pany, the founder of which social­ized with billionaires in Davos and got new customers, ostensibly recy­cles containers for big MNCs. The only problem: it again asks its com­panies to create plastic containers—only this time they’re used 100 times instead of once. The hype of the new Silicon Valley entrepreneurs doesn’t match the reality of the plastic men­ace on the ground.

I asked Nestle on Twitter how they would clean up the mess they had caused so far. They sent me their new guidelines on sustain­able packaging. It included a pol­icy to still use plastic bottles, but with 35 percent recycled content by 2025. To imagine Nestle plan­ning to manufacture this object for the next six years when sustainable options are available is deranged, in my opinion. But can any force stop them? What law or ethical guide­line is in operation to modulate, regulate or punish global crimes of large corporations?

Ocean warming and microplas­tic pollution have led to danger­ous die-offs of plant, animal and insect species—coral, frogs, insects, birds, penguins, polar bears, among others.

It is clear our gleeful arson of the planet has catastrophic ecological and economic costs. The pyramid of life is at risk. We can alter our course by globally banning all forms of plastic now. Or we can continue to delude ourselves with bedtime sto­ries of the circular economy, which will cost us another few decades, in much the same way as the myth of recycling lost us valuable time since the 1980s.

Nepalis pay a massive “plastic tax”—we may not realize it, but our food items are significantly more expensive because we are paying for their plastic packaging. The gov­ernment should invest in sustain­able packaging that can be made from our own natural resources, which would save us billions of rupees a year.

This much is clear: Nepal’s Hima­layan glaciers, which provide spring water for a billion-plus inhabitants, are melting from global warming. Our drinking water supply is at risk. If we continue to manufacture and burn plastic, we have no future in the subcontinent.

A few days ago, I came across a video in which Abdus Miya, a leadership coach and young leader, beautifully expressed how the dominant “Politics is a dirty game” narrative was established across educational institutions. He highlighted the need to challenge this narrative and encouraged young people to engage politically. Trying to live up to the constructs of a ‘good student’—read: A student who never questions the teacher or the teaching and unquestionably adheres to the structures and pro­cesses created by the administra­tion—most of my student life, I had accepted “Politics is not my cup of tea” as my mantra. In this brief write-up, I reflect on my experiences and urge the readers to be politically aware and engaged.

Let me begin by reflecting on my personal experience to understand why individuals do not question dominant narratives. Years after I completed school, a close friend told me how most of the class dis­liked me because I was the teachers’ pet and always got preference over the rest in most activities, including leading school clubs and represent­ing the school in inter-school com­petitions. Looking back, I see some truth in what my friend shared.

I personally did not want all the opportunities for myself and was happy when my colleagues shared them. I took pride in sharing the credit with my colleagues and cherished collective growth. But although I didn’t stand for ‘good students’ getting all the exposure and opportunities at school, I didn’t stand against it either (I was living up to the expectations of a good student, right?). Perhaps it was sim­ilar to “I’m not racist, but... I do live in a system of institutionalized racism that I absorb & actively ben­efit from,” as Aparna Nancherla tweeted on 16 April 2019. So I was either enjoying the privileges of a ‘good student’ subconsciously or didn’t have the courage to ques­tion the institutional structures and processes as I was striving to prove myself as a ‘good student’. And ‘good students’ focused on good grades and had nothing to do with politics. This changed in my later life.

After living in a few countries in Europe and the US for my studies, I experienced firsthand the impact of politics in the everyday lives of people. I began to understand how politics was instrumental in all spheres of life—from determining the cost of food, shelter and cloth­ing; to establishing basic wages and salaries, educational structures and processes; to taxation, development priorities, social welfare and provi­sions for social security and foreign relations. In essence, I did not find anything that politics does not gov­ern, thus fostering my interest in it.

Many people strongly link politics to governments. As a social work educator, I often hear students say “I’m going to work for a non-govern­ment organization and I will remain apolitical”. But even the NGOs are political, in the sense that they address the needs and represent the voices of a certain population. In doing so, they align to the vision and acts of the government at times and against it at other times, hence reflecting their political nature. For example, NGOs working for people with disabilities cannot remain silent on the political action of people in wheelchairs breaking the pavements in Kathmandu because they are not wheelchair-friendly.

Environmental NGOs spoke against the government’s decision to cut trees around the Ring Road in Kathmandu for its expansion. We have been hearing outcries from many NGOs over the government’s plan to clear large forest areas to build an airport in Nijgadh. It is particularly difficult for NGOs to be apolitical when they stand for the marginalized populations; their understanding of and actions to address structural marginalization are political in nature. Further, polit­ical leadership affects NGOs’ regu­lation on registration and working modality, scope of work, adminis­tration and funding.

The understanding of politics among the youth has to expand beyond political parties, says my colleague Ujjwal Prasai. He adds that politics is a broader phenom­enon that prevails when there is hierarchy, when power is in play, when interactions between people are based on power structure. This makes politics everyone’s cup of tea at all times, places and interac­tions. But the question will most likely arise: What will the youth get through political involvement? www.lincoln-strategy.com flags that youth engaged in politics are more inclined to serve their communities and their involvement will refine their understanding of how civil engagement in the country works. This suggests that youths who want to be change-makers will reap the benefits of political engagement.

Also, people who opt out of pol­itics will not have opportunities to change the system and the pro­cesses. As Plato puts it: “The heavi­est penalty for declining to rule is to be ruled by someone inferior to yourself”. The next prominent ques­tion could be, how can youth engage in facilitating change? Freechild Institute, which works on advanc­ing youth engagement worldwide, suggests that youth can change the world by mainstreaming (creating awareness, opportunities, policies, systems and cultures fostering youth engagement), running for office, and voting (or casting null votes to express dissatisfaction but exer­cising adult suffrage). It also adds that in order to change the world through politics youth need edu­cation (on political issues, systems, actions); training (on communica­tion, problem solving, change man­agement and conflict resolution) and the confidence that their voices matter in politics.

I want to reiterate the importance of politics in shaping our lives, both in the present and in the future. We have seen significant political changes in our country, from the days of active monarchy to insur­gency to mainstreaming of an armed political party to a unique and seemingly unlikely coalition of the political left and right, all within a short period. Reflecting on these experiences can highlight the importance of political awareness and engagement. Someone rightly said: “When politics decides every­thing in your life, decide what your politics should be”.

The author is a PhD student at Boston College School of Social Work [email protected]

 When the earthquake struck in April 2015, many of us knew that a major one was due. There were projections of 40,000 deaths, 95,000 injuries and over half a million homeless­ness in the Kathmandu Valley alone—with roads and bridges collapsing—making it difficult for international rescue and relief to reach the survivors on time. The US military estimated in 2011 that “4,000 metric tons (MT) of food and water, or 1,000 MT of just food,” would be required per day to feed the survivors. This would require support of over 257 C-130 Hercules military trans­port aircraft missions per day to sustain the level of humanitarian operation.

As early as April 2011, the US Embassy in Kathmandu and the then US Pacific Command (now the Indo-Pacific Command) had tasked the US Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE) Civil-Mil­itary Emergency Preparedness (CMEP) program with seismic assessments of critical infrastruc­ture at the TIA and development of an emergency response plan for the airfield.

As I reported in The Kathman­du Post in Sept 2011, US military concluded that the TIA’s capacity at the time could only support 40 landings and take-offs of C-130 and CH-47 Chinook transport heli­copters per hour.

While most of these warnings about the worst-case scenario were out in the public, it did not necessarily trickle down to the level of public discourse until the events of 2015. (There was a brief momentum in Sept 2011 follow­ing the Sikkim earthquake, but it quickly fizzled out.)

The fateful day

When the shaking began on that fateful afternoon of 25 April 2015, I was driving to a col­league’s house for lunch. As our car shook violently just minutes away from her apartment locat­ed in a high-rise in Lalitpur, my first instinct was to blame the mechanic—who had serviced my vehicle the previous week—for poor workmanship. If we had arrived a few minutes earlier, we would most likely have been trapped in an elevator. It took me a few more seconds to be aware of what was happening. After that the cries of animals and birds served as an earthquake alarm for the repeated aftershocks. I don’t know if we were halluci­nating, but there was a strange hissing sound that accompanied the aftershocks.

As dozens of us spontaneous­ly huddled together in an open space for safety in the immediate aftermath, there was pervasive fear about our own safety and that of our loved ones. There was also a sense of connection with the strangers. For several weeks afterward, all the tenants in our apartment building cooked and ate together. Prior to the quake, our interactions barely went beyond pleasantries when we passed each other. We even slept in our neighbors’ living room on the ground floor—with doors open in case we needed to flee at a moment’s notice.

The death toll and injuries from the earthquake could have been much worse had the earthquake not struck during day time—and on a Saturday when schools were closed. Many of us who came through the quake felt extreme­ly lucky and for months carried what psychologist call survivor’s guilt. A lot of the spontaneous public mobilization for rescue and relief perhaps stemmed from that guilt.

Sense of preparedness

Beside the tragedy, several sto­ries about how the earthquake offered lessons in humility were reported in the media. My favor­ite: a story involving another Lal­itpur high-rise and the adjacent slum. According to the story, some folks living in the high-rise looked down on the people living in the slum area and often argued with them. But after the quake, they pleaded to stay with the folks in the slum.

We all vowed to change our ways and prioritize safety, yet anecdotal evidence suggests that the level of building code com­pliance has probably gone down. For the first six months, many of us took measures to secure our cupboards and flowerpots and kept a go-bag ready. But four years later, that sense of readiness has evaporated.

But the biggest amnesia can be seen among our officials responsi­ble for disaster risk reduction and preparedness. As I argued in this space two weeks ago, the Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act 2017—which was passed nearly a decade after it was first floated and two and half years after the earthquake—continues to treat risk reduction and response as a seasonal occupation. The Act puts no emphasis on specialized staff and rapid decision-making—which as a matter of common sense should be the hallmarks of a rapid response agency.

WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange has been taken into cus­tody by the British Police. After almost seven years in the Ecua­dorian Embassy, he was dragged out, looking haggard and mag­nificent as Tolstoy with a giant white beard. The Ecuadorian Embassy had given him gener­ous refuge till a change of regime brought an end to his asylum status—who knew asylum could be revoked? Maybe the catshit had something to do with it. One of the demands of the embassy was that Assange clean up after his cat. Video footage has also surfaced showing him trying to learn how to skateboard inside the embassy.

Assange was probably a night­mare tenant. Kudos to the Ecua­dorians for suffering through seven years of a celebrity jour­nalist living in their premises. But now the question arises—what next?

First and foremost is the freedom of the press, which all democratic nation-states must uphold

First and foremost is the freedom of the press, which all democratic nation-states must uphold. Assange was involved in collecting information on war crimes conducted by the US mil­itary. This reportage is the job of a journalist, which he was in full measure. In keeping with the times, his methods of informa­tion collection involved a large amount of cyber data. Collecting information for the purposes of verifying a story, especially a story as massive as the one WikiLeaks was working on, has always been the professional prerogative of the press, and one that cannot be hampered by any state institution.

Putting Assange in jail is the equivalent of what the Nepal Police has just done to jour­nalist Arjun Giri, the editor of Tandav Weekly (tandavweekly.com), who was detained and charged under cybercrime law on April 15. His crime? Reporting on a financial fraud conducted by a member of a powerful family that rules Pokhara. Giri is a member of Nepal Journalists Forum, Kaski Chapter. Clearly if people had issue with his reportage, they should have printed rebuttals or put a lawsuit on him for defama­tion of character. Instead, they went to the police and put him in jail for cybercrime. Reporting on stories is not a crime—but often in tin-pot democracies like Nepal, where the police can be used for the ends of pow­erful families, this misuse of the law is possible.

The US however is not a tin-pot democracy. It is the home of the brave and land of the free. Journalism holds special respect there—at least it did, before Trump took a person­ally antagonistic position to the press and started to attack its members with impunity. Assange has done nothing that another bea­con of democracy, Noam Chomsky, has not done over a lifetime of critiquing the US military and its atrocities world­wide. The only difference is that Assange, a freewheeling Aussie with libertarian tendencies, has drawn the ire of his jealous contemporaries who will never break a story as important as this one, as Glenn Greenwald pointed out. “Narcissist” is a favorite insult to hurl at Assange, which is odd because he’s clearly sacrificed his life to a cause much larger than himself.

This much is clear: Assange, despite the vociferous insults heaped upon him by the corpo­rate American press, has already consolidated his legacy. Perse­cuting him now brings forth the opposite results desired by the US state. Extremely negative publicity is sure to follow any attempts to extra­dite him to the US. A friend of mine who studied Evangelicals used to say they love perse­cution—the more persecuted they were, the more their suf­fering elevated them towards Christ. Something similar is in operation here: the more Assange is persecuted, the more his already canonized image is going to solidify with the young and the moderates, globally.The US is already on shaky ground due to Trumpian isola­tion policies. Separating itself from rule of law and the freedom of the press is not going to make it more popular in the inter­national stage. Britain is caught between Brexit and the annoyed Europeans, and any attempts now to cozy up with the Trump regime is only going to make their position more tenacious on the European continent. The only solution now is a speedy legal resolution which drops all charges against Assange and his publica­tion, and a quiet flight back to Australia with his cat.

The author is a writer and filmmaker from Nepal. She has a BA in international relations from Brown University