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In 2020, Borderland Pride asked the township of Emo, Ont. (pop. 1,300) to proclaim Pride Month and fly the Pride flag. In a 3-2 vote, the council declined. It was a petty decision; Pride proclamations are generally considered pro forma, and Emo’s refusal was a bad look for a township seeking to attract business and newcomers. In fairness, Emo only had four such requests that year, two of them from Borderland Pride. This was a far cry from the 1990s, when Hamilton and London discriminated against Pride by excluding it from similar resolutions passed for everyone else. If Borderlands Pride had been smart, it would simply have gone ahead with its celebration, demonstrated support within the community, shamed the council and worked to turf the mayor and unsympathetic councillors at the next municipal election. Instead, it took Emo to the Ontario Human Rights Commission. As Borderlands Pride underlined in an open letter sent to the council in April, this action cost Emo’s taxpayers “tens of thousands of dollars” in legal fees at a time when Emo was “soliciting public donations to keep the lights on at its public library, (and) accepting handouts from the local food bank.” It told Emo that it would agree to a settlement if the township published an apology; gave Borderlands compensation (a lesser amount than what was asked at the tribunal); ordered diversity and inclusion training for its members and agreed to “adopt Pride proclamations in the future without stripping out their 2SLGBTQIA+-affirming language.” Emo declined and went through the full tribunal process instead. I am a gay man who has fought for LGB and T civil rights since the 1970s; Borderland Pride’s action angers and appalls me. Is there a better way to destroy the public goodwill we worked so long to achieve and feed the populist backlash building from a decade of activist overreach? Apparently, yes. The tribunal’s adjudicator, Karen Dawson, ruled on Nov. 20 that by voting not to proclaim Pride Month, the township of Emo and its mayor, Harold McQuaker, discriminated against Borderland Pride. She ordered the township to pay the organization $10,000. Further, the mayor was ordered to pay Borderland Pride $5,000 and, along with the township’s chief administrative officer, to take the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s “ Human Rights 101 ” course. The tribunal’s reasoning for its decision was just as confounding. Back when the township was voting on whether to make a Pride proclamation, the mayor told council, “There’s no flag being flown for the other side of the coin ... there’s no flags being flown for the straight people.” The tribunal found that this factually accurate statement was discriminatory because it “demonstrated a lack of understanding” of the Pride flag’s importance and was “demeaning and disparaging of the LGBTQ2 community of which Borderland Pride is a member....” The mayor’s argument that heterosexuals don’t have special recognition is common. In the 70s, our response was, “That’s because it’s Straight Pride Day 365 days a year.” But today, we’re regularly celebrated in every field from politics to finance and the arts, and the Alphabet calendar has more niche days than anyone can remember. Our inclusion under human rights legislation was especially important in the 20th century. We were fired, denied housing and purged from the civil service and military. We were beaten without impunity, unable to seek protection from police, who mocked and outed us — and even beat us themselves. Those were the kinds of important discrimination cases we brought to newly created federal and provincial human rights commissions. Similarly, that’s why Toronto’s first proclamation of Pride Day in 1991, and the other civic proclamations that followed, was so important. Conservative politicians and religious leaders of the day fanned hatred against us. They accused us of pedophilia, scapegoated us for the AIDS pandemic and mocked our deaths. Pride proclamations signalled that we were considered valuable community members worthy of equal treatment and respect. But today, such symbolic support has metastasized into absurdity. Pride has morphed from a day to a season and our claims before human rights commissions are often jawdropping and vexatious . Worse, even in the most outlandish cases, the process is the punishment: Complainants’ costs are paid for regardless of the merit of their case, whereas the accused must foot their own legal bills. The message is clear: Even if innocent, capitulate on accusation or suffer financial pain. More troubling, tribunals now often use their unelected, unaccountable and quasi-judicial power to impose Orwellian judgements. In this case, a factually accurate comment questioning special treatment for a specific group has resulted in severe financial penalties against a struggling, rural township, and a fine and forced re-education for its mayor and chief administrative officer. Ultimately, this is about the unilateral power of an unelected, unaccountable government agency to compel speech. Public officials must not be allowed to discriminate against us, but neither should they be forced to proactively support us. In the 21st century, we have full civil rights, including equal marriage and the ability to adopt. It is demeaning to our pride to run to the state when an idiot chooses to be an ass. In my view, Borderland Pride shamed LGB and T communities by trivializing our historic struggles for equality. It also fed the growing, and understandable, backlash against us. By finding in its favour, the Ontario Human Rights Commission lost sight of its mission, broke public confidence in its legitimacy and provided a counter-productive example of left-wing authoritarianism. National Post
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(The Center Square) – Legislators in Washington, D.C., have taken a number of steps over the past few days to push for insurance and pharmaceutical reforms to be passed before the end of the year. On Wednesday, a bicameral group of Republican and Democrat lawmakers held a press conference discussing the need for pharmacy benefit manager reform to protect small pharmacies across the country and “save lives.” “Whether you are a Republican, Democrat, or an independent, we all want the same thing. We want accessible, affordable, quality health care,” said Rep. Buddy Carter, R-Ga. “We’re not here today to just discuss one bill or to discuss just one patient’s story. We're here because there's broad, bipartisan pharmacy benefit manager, or PBM, reform that is needed to save lives.” Pharmacy benefit managers are the middlemen responsible for managing the drug prices covered by health insurance plans. According to the Harvard Political Review , the problem with pharmacy benefit managers is that they “have vertically integrated with pharmacy chains and health insurers through massive conglomerates.” That then allows them to abuse their power to cut out small pharmacies and increase prices. Carter also signed a letter that was released last week calling on the Department of Justice to dig into the role pharmacy benefit managers played in the opioid epidemic. Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., Deborah Ross, D-N.C., and Cliff Benz, R-Ore., all joined him in signing that letter. “The opioid crisis has devastated communities in North Carolina and across the country, and PBMs may have fueled it by prioritizing profits over people,” Ross said on social media . “That’s why I joined a letter calling on the DOJ to investigate their role and hold these bad actors accountable.” The letter looked at recent reports on the largest pharmacy benefit managers, CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, and OptumRx which state that they “colluded and conspired to steer patients towards OxyContin in exchange for $400 million.” OxyContin is a trade name for the narcotic oxycodone hydrochloride, a painkiller available by prescription only. This and the general “lack of transparency” is just one of the many complaints that legislators aired on Wednesday. “My colleagues who are joining me today, Democrats and Republicans ... all recognize that PBMs are decreasing the accessibility, the affordability, and therefore the quality of health care in America,” Carter said. “We have an opportunity, right now, to advance bipartisan legislation that increases reporting requirements, which would heighten transparency and shine a light on the opaque practices of these PBMs.” Carter was also joined by Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., who is leading the effort to get legislation passed in the U.S. Senate. “This year, we're losing about one pharmacy a day in America,” Lankford said. “We want leadership to be able to take this up and to bring it up in the end-of-year package ... Stop holding up legislation that is bipartisan, bicameral, and solving a problem that Americans need solved.”A machine-readable zone (MRZ) is an important security measure for many documents, such as ID cards, passports, and visas. It usually contains personal information that is related to the holder and allows for the reading and verification of identity documents via machine ID verification tools, which can be software or hardware. MRZ technology was initially used to speed up document check processes at airports and borders. However, businesses can use this technology for identity verification. Below, we will explore important features to look out for in an MRX reader for your business. Let’s begin. When choosing an MRZ for your business, you must consider how easy it is to extract data from the identity documents. While mobile scanning technology makes text machines readable easily, you must have a human-readable version of your data. A good reader should be able to collect crucial data points of IDs and passports, making it easy to double-check any scan. Data points that should be easily collected from IDs and passports include the type of document, document number digit, given first names, gender, date of birth, expiration of documents, surname, country code, etc. Time is crucial to all people, especially as a business homeowner. Speed is an important factor to consider. One of the benefits of an MRZ is that it is faster than manual data entry. Usually, mobile scanners can process huge amounts of data in an instant. This is a huge difference, especially in businesses where many ID verifications are performed, such as hotels . On the other hand, customers also appreciate fast and reliable service. Consider choosing a mobile document scanning solution that allows customers and their documents to be faster. Even if you offer the best service, it won’t count if you are unable to onboard customers that will make your business viable. Many individuals are often faced with decision fatigue , so signing up for a new service can often be a big ask. To onboard new customers, consider choosing a scanning service that makes it easy for your customers and also provides various data points for registration. Additionally, since it is almost instant, the chances of decision fatigue are lowered. It is best to choose an MRZ passport reader that onboards customers from any location. This flexibility enhances your business’s onboarding rate and results in more successful registration. It is possible to scan documents with dedicated ID card readers or scanning devices. However, many of these devices are very large and cumbersome to carry around. Consider using an MRZ with a smartphone-based scanning device that saves space in a work environment and does not require a charging dock or fixed electricity supply to function properly. This allows you to instantly create new points of service or security checkpoints for your customers. Many dedicated ID readers don’t come close to the kind of agility that such MRZ readers provide. MRZ was initially created for the aviation sector, but it is now an important aspect of document verification of many organizations and businesses, as well as government institutions such as immigration and border control. This technology automates routine procedures and makes the work process easier for your employees and customers. It is especially crucial for businesses that require smooth KYC flow or onboarding new clients digitally.AP News Summary at 4:45 p.m. EST
(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Maximilian Brichta , University of Southern California (THE CONVERSATION) Rockets aren’t the only thing Elon Musk is sending into the stratosphere. After a three-year plummet, Dogecoin is blasting off again , jumping 250% since the election of Donald Trump – part of a broader wave of optimism in the industry , due to Trump’s courting of crypto advocates during his campaign. Trump’s informal appointment of Musk to what he calls the Department of Government Efficiency – D.O.G.E for short – also helped pump the dog-themed meme coin . This isn’t the first time Musk, who styles himself as “ the Dogefather ,” has fueled interest in Dogecoin. In May 2021, its price shot up in anticipation of Musk’s guest appearance on “Saturday Night Live.” During one skit, Musk played a financial analyst in conversation with a Weekend Update host, who repeatedly asked him, “What is Dogecoin?” After some obfuscation, Musk’s character finally admitted that it was a hustle. The price of the coin went into a freefall . Just over a year later, it had shed over 90% of its peak value . The losses hit small investors hard. In 2022, one of them filed a class action lawsuit against Musk for market manipulation and insider trading, though the case was dismissed in August 2024. Why has Dogecoin – a meme coin that was never meant to be taken seriously as an investment – seen such extreme swings in value? We’re all in this together Dogecoin was launched in 2013 to spoof bitcoin and a slew of other cryptocurrencies that were claiming to disrupt the traditional world of finance. Two strangers from across the globe met online , copied the code of an existing coin, and branded it with the already popular Doge internet meme – a picture of a Shiba Inu dog surrounded by fragments of broken English: “wow much coin.” Although their main goal was to make the coin pointless and undesirable, it became one of the most popular and enduring cryptocurrencies on the market. Following Dogecoin’s previous surge in 2021, I studied how its fervent network of influencers and everyday investors worked together to draw tremendous attention – and capital – to the joke currency. To understand the appeal of these absurd investments, you have to look at the time and energy that users invest into these networks and the rewards, both financial and social, they get in return. Meme coins are collaborative enterprises. Members of these online communities have an economic incentive to become outspoken boosters: The more the value of Dogecoin rises, the more their investments grow. But they also receive social validation from other meme coin investors when they pump up the coin. In other words, behind every meme coin is a collective of strangers on a communal mission to make more money. Dogecoin and its imitators have been described by their leadership as crypto movements , shared journeys and community-owned projects. Beyond branding the assets with culturally resonant images, whether it’s a Shiba Inu dog or Pepe the Frog , successful crypto ventures are characterized by complex webs of trust. Trust in the technology. Trust in its potential for future appreciation. And trust that those holding power in the networks won’t exploit the rest. This loyalty is woven among a global network of users who collaborate around the clock to promote their coin and demonstrate their unwavering commitment to its success. In times of price appreciation, the collective buzzes with elation . During price dips, community members mutually reinforce their comrades’ – and their own – beliefs that this is just a bump in the road and that their collective efforts will eventually lead to a handsome payoff. Even in the coldest of crypto winters , this ritualistic behavior helps these speculative communities endure. Community serves as a substitute for financial loss. The investment strategies in these communities – and the conviction in their payoff – involve repeating and reposting what others have said, like any traditional internet meme. Trolling traditional valuation The real value of meme coins cannot be understood in the same way as traditional assets, such as stocks and physical commodities. These types of assets have fundamentals, such as a company’s financial statements, or public demand for basic goods, from coffee to oil. Conversely, the fundamentals of meme coins are reflected in their network activity, such as daily active users, and less concrete metrics, such as social sentiment and mindshare – how much public awareness a coin has generated compared with its rivals. Of course, the valuations of traditional assets are also affected by these social factors. The difference is that meme coins offer little by way of productive activity. They add nothing to the economy. Occasionally, their leadership will build financial services around them , but these are generally added as afterthoughts, especially as a way to drum up more speculative excitement. Meme coins troll the traditional conventions of valuation and mock the edicts and dogmas of mainstream investors. And that’s exactly the point. Participation in meme coin communities – or any crypto community, for that matter – entails embracing an alternative economic experience. They are speculative sandboxes for playing outside of the conventional rules of investment. Who let the Doge out? Musk is the quintessential meme coin influencer. As the richest man in the world, he’s viewed by many as a paragon of savvy investing. His massive following extends far beyond Dogecoin’s social network. And his promotional efforts are playful – so playful that the judge in his class-action case dismissed his Dogecoin tweets as mere “puffery” and that “no reasonable investor could rely upon them.” Dogecoin previously reached the peak of its memetic momentum when Musk appeared on “Saturday Night Live.” Now, instead of sitting at the Weekend Update news desk cracking jokes, he’s sitting in Trump’s office advising the president-elect. In other words, Dogecoin’s memetic resonance has ascended from pop culture to politics, helping it capture a bigger slice of the public’s mindshare. While Dogecoin has specifically benefited from Musk’s proximity to Trump, the broader crypto market is leaping with optimism for a crypto-friendly administration. Speaking at the Bitcoin 2024 conference in July, the GOP candidate ensured he’d make the United States “ the crypto capital of the planet .” After pouring $131 million into this election cycle , the crypto industry can now claim 274 pro-crypto members of the U.S. House of Representatives and 20 pro-crypto U.S. senators. Between Musk buddying up with Trump and a shifting regulatory environment, the dog can once again run free. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here: https://theconversation.com/dogecoin-is-a-joke-so-whats-behind-its-rally-243686 .None