Borders are a social construct (THG S02 #1 of 12)
The concept of a social construct is a social construct.
Dear reader:
Hello and welcome back to the second season of The Hindustan Grimes, a news peddling agency that procures, piles together, promulgates, and sometimes perverts and prevaricates, news stories so softcore, the DOT wouldn't even bother asking Jio to block it.
This time around we have a slew of updates:
We will release two stories instead of three every week on Thursdays mornings. It'll carry the letter as usual.
We have a new correspondent writing in from Hubli whose reports will come out every week on Sunday mornings. This will carry no letter in the beginning.
Also, we've decided to keep this season shorter than the first one. It'll span twelve weeks, over June through September.
We've replaced The Grimes' Definitions of the Week section with In Other News. You'll see what that is at the bottom of this issue.
Eggsy's contributions can be found on his home page on the internet at jeevannavar.com.
This week, we bring you two stories on organisations with cross country impact, who are being awarded fancy international prizes for their troubles.
Yours On Time,
momo & eggsy
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"Spies Without Borders" frontrunners for Time Person of the Year 2021
ISI furious; Seeks compensation from US govt. for morale blow.
Lodhi Road, June 2021: "The past year and a half has been a spell of unprecedented peace and lethargy in the world," says Mr. Felsenthal, editor-in-chief of Time magazine. "We have been deliberating on who will be the Time Person of the Year and only one contender stands tall. What SWP started with, one couldn't even see with the naked eye, but now it affects us all." Spies Without Borders, an international group of skilled professionals with no known headquarters, has been attributed with planting the SARS-CoV-2 virus in Wuhan and kickstarting the fall of the dominoes. Chinese investigative agencies have refused to comment.
RAW, Mossad, and KGB held a joint press conference at Lodhi Road yesterday to decry Time Magazine's intent to award Spies Without Borders for integral services to humanity across borders. "SWB is a rogue outfit of mercenaries that are loyal to no one," said Mr. Bhatia, Senior Aide to the Secret Chief of RAW. Dr. Serov, representing the KGB, added, "if anyone should be getting awards, it should be us. We do the real surveillance and espionage."
Spies Without Borders has claimed responsibility for various pivotal moments in history, like the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and JFK, and guiding the world through cycles of societal and technological advances. Their current campaign is believed to have been for enabling widespread adoption of technology and the push for Work from Home schemes.
Spies Without Borders has existed in various forms and outfits for centuries. They have a long history going back to Potheads of the Persian Empire, Supernatural Shinobi of Feudal Japan, and Assassins Guilds of the Dark Ages. The current ensemble of Spies Without Borders works under the motto of: Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre^ and are based heavily on the teachings and functioning of the Ankh Morpork Assassins' Guild.*
Rumours suggest that RAW, Mossad, and KGB representatives held a high level meeting at Lodhi Road to discredit and besmirch Spies Without Borders and instead pin the blame of the pandemic on the CCP. The intelligence agencies' PR teams, on the other hand, are in talks with Helsinki to propose a new Nobel Prize category with them winning the introductory year. Bickering among the intelligence agencies continues as they fail to come to a consensus on who among them should win the prize the first year.
North Korea, reportedly, is not amused with the ongoing collusion among the foreign intelligence agencies. They have asked to be considered for the special prize as well. A day later, North Korean local news outlets reported that Kim Jong Un has been honoured with a special Nobel Prize for integral services to humanity within borders. The CCP has corroborated the North Korean news reports and says the G7 should stop conspiring against the East.
^Nil Mortifi, Sine Lucre = No Killing Without Payment
*"We do not execute. We do not massacre. We never, you may be very certain, we never torture. We have no truck with crimes of passion or hatred or pointless gain. We do not do it for a delight in inhumation, or to feed some secret inner need, or for petty advantage, or for some cause or belief; I tell you, gentlemen, that all these reasons are in the highest degree suspect. Look into the face of a man who will kill you for a belief and your nostrils will snuff up the scent of abomination. Hear a speech declaring a holy war and I assure you, your ears should catch the clink of evil’s scales and the dragging of its monstrous tail over the purity of the language. No, we do it for the money. And, because we above all must know the value of a human life, we do it for a great deal of money. There can be few cleaner motives, so shorn of pretence. Nil mortifi, sine lucre. Remember. No killing without payment"
~Terry Pratchett, Pyramids
Gates says drugs exist to make money for pharma, snubbed by Nobel Peace prize cmte.
What weighs more on your wallet? A kilo of gold or a kilo of vaccine?
Oslo, June 2021: The 2021 Nobel Peace Prize is scheduled to be announced in October. In the meantime, many individuals have begun receiving nominations for the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize, which has generated a great deal of conflict and controversy. Some of the top contenders for the prize include Benjamin 'Bibi' Netanyahu (nominated for his alleged role in brokering peace during the 2021 Israel Palestine Crisis), Narendra Modi (for uniting the people of India against him during India's second wave of COVID-19 and the negligence that led to the country wide oxygen shortage) and Donald Trump (nominated for stepping down peacefully after the 2020 US presidential election after causing an insurrection). The other nominees include Bill Gates, for his role in improving the accessibility of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine.
However, Bill Gates gave an interview with the BBC's Andrew Neil who questioned Gates' actions which ensured that Oxford could not open source their vaccine, to which Gates took offence. "Is it not true that you pressured Oxford to sell the exclusive rights of the vaccine to AstraZeneca?" asked Mr. Neil. Gates replied, "See this is something most people don't understand, our private sector partners must be able to make some significant revenue off the vaccines and drugs to ensure that they turn a profit before their next shareholder meeting. They control Oxford's grants." "Don't you control Oxford's grants?" asked Mr. Neil. "They are me and I am them. Get with the program, Neil!" he replied.
Gates drew significant flak for this interview worldwide. British MP for London South, Karan Singh brought the issue up in the UK parliament, and said that he planned to introduce a parliamentary motion to censure Mr. Gates. Subsequently, the Nobel committee invited Mr. Gates, who was already in town, for a meeting to discuss his comments. We have no record of what happened in the meeting, but our correspondent managed to corner Mr. Gates as he walked out of the interview.
THG Correspondent: What happened in there, Mr. Gates?
Mr. Gates: They disapproved of my honesty. It's really sad to see the Nobel Peace Prize committee fold to the demands of internet mobs.
THGC: But your words have drawn flak from leaders the world over, including South African and British Parliamentarians, as well as the health ministers of Pakistan and Niger.
BG: They're part of the internet mobs too, just reciting the same points. You don't get how these markets work! These things exist so you get a choice between vaccines.
THGC: Are you saying all these world leaders don't know what they're talking about? What do you suggest they do to solve their severe vaccine shortages?
BG: If you can't have AstraZeneca, have Pfizer.
THGC: If you are right, why is the Nobel committee listening to everyone else?
BG: I suspect that this has to do with the allegations regarding certain individuals I met in New York. All these allegations are surfacing after my divorce. They don't want to award a divorcee. That does not comply with their "family values". Such discrimination! I am already having a really bad year, you won't take this Nobel Peace Prize also away from me! I will go to The Hague if needed, this is a human rights violation.
Mr. Gates was referring to his alleged meetings with convicted paedophile and indicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. He was visibly annoyed through the interview, and was sweating profusely despite the Oslo weather. He cut the interview short after the Hague threat and got into his car to leave.
The Nobel Peace Prize has been a highly contentious prize for quite sometime, and has led to conflict among previous winners of the prize. One instance is when Malala Yousafzai (Peace Prize 2015) slapped Henry Kissinger (Peace Prize 1973) in public upon meeting him in Karachi in 2016. The Pakistani Home Ministry refused to press charges against Yousafzai for misdemeanour assault, and she was praised widely by Pakistani media. Another notable conflict between Peace Prize winners occurred in the early hours of the 3rd October 2015 Afghan Time, when the US Air Force, under the command of Barack Obama (Peace Prize 2009), bombed a hospital with volunteers from Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières, MSF, Peace Prize 1999) killing up to 75 people.
It is unclear what the Nobel Committee will decide regarding Mr. Gates' nomination. It is however clear that Mr. Gates will not go down without a fight, and we hope no violence is committed in this deliberation process or as a result of it.