[News] News From Other Places!

One of China's most popular influencers has come under fire for dismissing a young follower's complaint over high makeup prices as "nonsense".

Livestreamer Li Jiaqi's retort - that those who couldn't afford the 79 yuan ($11; £9) eyebrow pencil did not work "hard enough" - struck a raw nerve as China's youth struggle to find jobs in a sputtering post-pandemic economy. The 31-year-old has apologised but his remarks continue to fuel debate.

"What stung people was not the 79 yuan price tag, but your attitude and opinions on us," reads a comment on Weibo, which has been liked thousands of times.

"You don't know about the current economic climate. Many people are still working hard and struggling, just to keep their jobs," it read.

The past six months has brought a stream of bad news for China's economy. Youth unemployment has hit a record high. As of July, more than one in five 16-to-24-year-olds were jobless. The following month, officials said they would temporarily stop publishing unemployment data.

The property sector, which until recently accounted for a third of China's entire wealth, has long been teetering on the brink of a full-blown crisis. Economists have downgraded their forecasts for China's economic growth, many to below the government's target of about 5%.

Li - who first rose to fame in 2017 when he started hosting online sales sessions on shopping platform Taobao - is one of China's most successful salesmen. He hawks a a range of products from food to cosmetics and homeware, and reportedly sells millions of dollars' worth of items every night. He earned the moniker Lipstick King by once selling 150,000 lipsticks within five minutes. Over the years, Li has garnered some 150 million followers across multiple platforms - that number has shrunk since his controversial comments.

Given the bleak prospects millions of young Chinese face, Li's comments are proof that his celebrity status has desensitised him to their struggles, critics said. But the anger has also provided a window to the disillusionment rampant among the country's youth - one tweet read: "In social media comments responding to the Li Jiaqi incident, I saw a China that's collapsing."

Organised crime groups in Mexico have about 175,000 members – making them the fifth-biggest employer in the country, according to new research published in the journal Science.

Using a decade of data on homicides, missing persons and incarcerations, as well as information about interactions between rival factions, the paper published on Thursday mathematically modeled overall cartel membership, and how levels of violence would respond to a range of policies.

The authors argue that the best way to reduce the bloodshed would be to cut cartel recruitment – whereas locking up more members would actually increase the murder rate.

“More than 1.7 million people in Latin America are incarcerated, and adding more people to saturated jails will not solve the insecurity problem,” wrote the authors.

The number of homicides in Mexico more than tripled between 2007 and 2021 – when the government reported 34,000 victims, or nearly 27 victims for every 100,000 inhabitants – making it one of the deadliest countries in Latin America.

At a national level, two organised crime groups – the Sinaloa cartel and the Jalisco New Generation cartel – battle for domination. But analysts have identified 198 armed groups in Mexico, many of which are subcontractors to bigger players but also undertake local turf disputes.

The paper, titled Reducing cartel recruitment is the only way to lower violence in Mexico, was cautiously welcomed by security analysts in the field. “It is a first of its kind,” said Victoria Dittmar, a researcher for the Insight Crime thinktank, who did not take part in the study. “I haven’t seen any other estimates of how many people we believe are somehow related to criminal groups.”

But Dittmar said the figure would depend on the definition of a cartel and what constitutes membership, since working for a crime faction is very different to being formally employed.

“It can be very difficult to say who is a member of a criminal organisation, and who isn’t,” said Dittmar. “What about a politician that receives money? Or someone who cooperates with the group just once?”

Mixolyde wrote:

H.P. Lovesauce wrote:

There's only one country with a name starting with "I" that Canada allows to get away with extrajudicial murders, and India ain't it.

Iceland or Ireland?

Obviously Indonesia. Bro, do you even know know about politics.

Yes or No. That is the choice Australia faces as polls open in what is being seen as a nation-defining referendum.

A Yes vote will recognise Indigenous peoples in the country's constitution and establish a body - called the Voice - for them to advise governments on the issues affecting their communities.

A No outcome will reject both reforms.

The historic vote has exposed uncomfortable fault lines, and raised questions over Australia's ability to reckon with its past.

Some of the most painful chapters include massacres against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and the forced removal of their children.

At the heart of this referendum is a decades-long debate that has gripped Australia over how to close the gap on the glaring disparities Indigenous communities experience in areas such as health, wealth and education.

The Voice is designed to be the first step in a three-part reform process - which would involve treaty negotiations and a period of national "truth-telling"- aimed at sparking change.

It was born out of the Uluru Statement from the Heart, a 2017 document drafted by over 250 First Nations leaders.

But since Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people make up less than 4% of Australia's population, it will be non-Indigenous voters who decide the outcome of the referendum.