La sociedad del espectáculo

"Y sin duda nuestro tiempo... prefiere la imagen a la cosa, la copia al original, la representación a la realidad, la apariencia al ser... lo que es 'sagrado' para él no es sino la ilusión, pero lo que es profano es la verdad. Mejor aún: lo sagrado aumenta a sus ojos a medida que disminuye la verdad y crece la ilusión, hasta el punto de que el colmo de la ilusión es también para él el colmo de lo sagrado." Feuerbach, prefacio a la segunda edición de "La esencia del Cristianismo".

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

August 15, 2013

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Cairo: Egyptian PM defends crackdown as death toll rises

Egypt's interim government and its backers remain defiant amid a rising death toll and widespread international condemnation of Wednesday's massacre of Islamist supporters of the ousted president Mohamed Morsi – the country's third mass killing in six weeks. The prime minister, Hazem Beblawi, said the crackdown was essential to create stability, and praised security forces for what he characterised as maximum restraint – despite Egypt's health ministry on Thursday saying 525 had died in the violence that ensued when pro-Morsi camps on either side of Cairo were cleared.via: The Guardian

Photo: Hussein Tallal / AP

Photo: Khalil Hamra / AP

Photo: Hussein Tallal

Photo: IBN Live

Photo: Hassan Ammar

Photo: Ahmed Gomaa / AP

Photo: Ahmed Gomaa / AP

Photo: Manu Brabo / AP

Photo: ATP

Photo: Manu Brabo / AP

August 15, 2013

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

The Guardian.

February 8, 2012.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Andrea Bruce / The New York Times

KABUL, Afghanistan  "Inside the family hut, only women and close male relatives were allowed to mourn over the body of the baby boy, Khan Mohammad, who had died earlier that morning. After Andrea Bruce, on assignment for The New York Times, bent over double and eased her way through the low door of the hut, she counted 17 women, including the mother, plus the boy’s 10-year-old sister Feroza, and the father, in a one-room house no larger than a normal-size bedroom. It was, she said, even colder inside than outside, where at least there was the weak morning sun.

Ms. Bruce had expected the keening and the ululations of grief, having covered the aftermath of death in many other war zones. Here, she found them surprisingly muted; what struck her most, she would recall later, was how indrawn the mother of the boy seemed, as if she had gone to some other place. What Ms. Bruce did not know at the time was that this woman, Lailuma, was grieving for the last but one of her nine children. “When I heard that,” she said later, “I understood.”

via The New York Times

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Yasuyoshi Chiba / AFP / Getty Images

Sao Paulo, Brazil: A woman greets a friend at an illegally occupied building.

February 10, 2012.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Farooq Khan / EPA

Srinagar, India: Kashmiri Muslims raise their hands in prayer at the Hazratbal shrine.

February 10, 2012.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Susana Vera / Reuters Madrid, Spain: A supporter of Baltasar Garzón writes a message on a banner after the judge was found guilty in a wiretapping case.

"The Spanish judge celebrated for pursuing international human rights cases was convicted of overstepping his jurisdiction in a domestic corruption investigation on Thursday, the culmination of a spectacular fall from grace. A seven-judge panel of the supreme court unanimously convicted Baltasar Garzón and barred him from the bench for 11 years. Although less severe than the 20-year-ban the prosecution had originally demanded, the ruling is not subject to appeal. Garzón, 56, is also liable to a fine of €2,500 (£2,095).

Javier Baena, Garzón's lawyer, said after the sentence: "We shall carry on fighting, carry on appealing. We have a long road ahead, but I believe both he and I are more than strong enough." via The Guardian.

February 10, 2012.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

From left to right, up and down:

Público, ABC, El País, El Mundo, El Periódico and La Razón.

February 10, 2012.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Best Time Magazine Covers 2011

more here

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Li Muzi / Xinhua Press / Corbis

A woman cries as her son receives surgery after being attacked at Abdul-Qader Shafta hospital in Homs, Syria. Mohammad Mustafa al-Dabi, the head of Arab League (AL) observer mission, told the private Addounia TV on Wednesday that the situation in Homs is "placatory till now," and has unequivocally confessed the presence of "gunmen" in the city.

December 30, 2011

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Li Muzi / Xinhua Press / Corbis

A Syrian walks past a pool of blood at a suicide blast site in Damascus, Syria. Two suicide bombers blasted two security centers in central Damascus Friday, leaving about 30 people dead and over 100 others injured, a senior local official told Xinhua.

December 23, 2011.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Adam Ferguson / The New York Times

In One Slum, Misery, Work, Politics and Hope

"In the labyrinthine slum known as Dharavi are 60,000 structures, many of them shanties, and as many as one million people living and working on a triangle of land barely two-thirds the size of Central Park in Manhattan. Dharavi is one of the world’s most infamous slums, a cliché of Indian misery. It is also a churning hive of workshops with an annual economic output estimated to be $600 million to more than $1 billion. “This is a parallel economy,” said Mr. Mobin, whose family is involved in several businesses in Dharavi. “In most developed countries, there is only one economy. But in India, there are two.” India is a rising economic power, even as huge portions of its economy operate in the shadows. Its “formal” economy consists of businesses that pay taxes, adhere to labor regulations and burnish the country’s global image. India’s “informal” economy is everything else: the hundreds of millions of shopkeepers, farmers, construction workers, taxi drivers, street vendors, rag pickers, tailors, repairmen, middlemen, black marketeers and more." via The New York Times

December 29, 2011

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Libération.

December 29, 2011

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

KCNA / Reuters

Pyongyang, North Korea: The body of Kim Jong-il lies in state during his funeral.

December 29, 2011

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

The Times.

December 29, 2011

[newsweekscience]

Take a look back at some of our favorite covers of 2011—a year in upheaval.

[lasociedadelespectaculo]

Chung Sung-Jun / Getty Images

Seoul, South Korea: Police bar the entrance to the office of a pro-unification group after one of its members entered North Korea to convey her condolences at the funeral of former leader Kim Jong-il.

December 28, 2011