Algerians Protest Upcoming Presidential Elections (VIDEO)
Parisians Commemorate November 13 Attacks (VIDEO)
Housing Horror Stories: International Students and the Catch-22 of French Apartment Hunting
When he accepted an offer to attend a graduate program in Sciences Po Paris, Nikos Biggs-Chiropolos, an American student, expected the apartment hunt to be easy. Two months and over 500 emails later, he is still virtually homeless, couch-surfing from friend to friend.
Biggs-Chiropolos is not alone. International students living in Paris encounter formidable challenges in their quest to find decent housing, often resorting to shady rent agreements, subjected to scams, and mistreated by landlords. Though most ultimately find a place to live, their journeys are perilous, costly, and time-consuming.
In 2016, France attracted about 325,000 foreign students, ranking fourth among host countries for international students, according to Campus France. Many of these students flock to Paris, whose cost of living ranks higher than that of London, Amsterdam, and Toronto. Numbeo reports that the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in the city center is €1,194, while a one-bedroom on the outskirts of Paris averages €846 per month. Finding suitable accommodations is the first challenge international students encounter, and the hefty price tag often pales in comparison with endless paperwork.
Continue reading “Housing Horror Stories: International Students and the Catch-22 of French Apartment Hunting”Passion Project Turned Career: Profile of a Freelance Photographer in Paris (VIDEO)
Verified Video Shows Man Shot by Snipers During Protests in Iraq
[WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT]
On October 8, Steven Nabil, a journalist at the US-funded TV network Al Hurra News, shared a video on Twitter that showed a man waving a flag and then being shot on the street. He tagged it #Iraq suggesting that the video was taken during ongoing unrest in Iraq.
Here’s the full video:
OP-ED: The Case For Government Regulation (and Against Mark Zuckerberg)
“I don’t believe that not fact-checking political ads is pro-conservative.” It’s with this awkward double negative that Mark Zuckerberg justified Facebook’s refusal to fact-check blatantly misleading political advertisements.
Zuckerberg spoke at Georgetown University this week, arguing that allowing Trump’s false ads to run on Facebook was fundamental to free speech. His position is reminiscent of English philosopher John Stuart Mill’s “marketplace of ideas”—if everyone is allowed to say whatever they want, good ideas will eventually drown out the bad. Except in Mill’s day, speech was not distributed on social media platforms with global reach, with AI algorithms choosing which content to display, and how often.
In an era of coordinated misinformation campaigns, private companies can no longer remain the sole gatekeepers of the digital marketplace, especially when their laissez-faire approach breeds lies and foreign intervention. It is time for governments to more proactively regulate Internet content in order to preserve the functioning of democracies.
Continue reading “OP-ED: The Case For Government Regulation (and Against Mark Zuckerberg)”
Parisians Protest Domestic Violence & Government Inaction (VIDEO)
American Expats Rally for the 2020 Democratic Primary
As the 2020 Democratic primary race coverage intensifies in Washington, there is a group of voters, scattered around the globe, who are increasingly making their voices heard – American Democrats living abroad. Between 2014 and 2018, voter engagement among Democrats outside the United States jumped 800 percent, according to self-reported data from Democrats Abroad. This figure speaks to an important trend: American expats are less apathetic, more involved, and more progressive. They may be no Pennsylvania or Iowa, but they are a demographic that shouldn’t be overlooked.
Continue reading “American Expats Rally for the 2020 Democratic Primary”As Sea Levels Rise, Federal Government Prioritizes Sustainability Over At-Risk Community Concerns
When you pulled up to the sandy parking lot at Tom’s Cove, all you saw was the dune and the open sky. The gentle whoosh of the waves spilling onto the beach was unmistakable, but you couldn’t see the water yet. First, you had to cross the gravel, pass a small lifeguard hut, and climb the glistening white sand dune, the Atlantic Ocean finally coming into view at the top.
This is what the southern tip of Assateague Island National Seashore, a national park on a long barrier island off the coast of Maryland and Virginia, looked like in September 2017. Now, only two years later, the lifeguard hut—raised on wooden piles over the beach—is gone, and the dune is so flattened that you can see the water from the lot without having to get out of the car. The seas are rising around Assateague, the barrier island is shifting toward the mainland, and each new storm risks breaching the recreational beach and washing away the parking lot.
Continue reading “As Sea Levels Rise, Federal Government Prioritizes Sustainability Over At-Risk Community Concerns”