Georgia

By Sopiko Japaridze Reproduced from Monthly Review, with thanks (posted Dec 15, 2023) “If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”—Malcolm X A couple of years ago, I was hanging out with friends and decided to play a game. It resembled Mafia night but involved “Who is Hitler?” cards. We deal the cards, someone receives the Hitler card, and we have to figure out their identity through conversation. It’s a spin on the classic ‘Mafia’ game popular in Georgia. The ‘good guys’ were the ‘liberals,’ featuring a crest reminiscent of the Soviet Union—minus the hammer and sickle, which was replaced by a dove. The game pitted the liberals against the villainous fascists. None...

By Sopiko Japaridze Reproduced from Monthly Review, with thanks (posted Dec 15, 2023) “If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”—Malcolm X A couple of years ago, I was hanging out with friends and decided to play a game. It resembled Mafia night but involved “Who is Hitler?” cards. We deal the cards, someone receives the Hitler card, and we have to figure out their identity through conversation. It’s a spin on the classic ‘Mafia’ game popular in Georgia. The ‘good guys’ were the ‘liberals,’ featuring a crest reminiscent of the Soviet Union—minus the hammer and sickle, which was replaced by a dove. The game pitted the liberals against the villainous fascists. None...

Feature photo | Illustration by MintPress News In the second week of March, thousands took to the streets of Tbilisi, Georgia, to vent their fiery indignation over a draft law requiring any NGO operating in the country that receives over 20% of its revenue from overseas to register as a “foreign agent.” Violently clashing with police, daubing anti-Russian graffiti on virtually every available vertical surface, chanting mutinous, belligerent slogans, and prominently displaying the flags of the European Union, Georgia, and Ukraine, these widely-reported scenes were complemented by a never-ending soundtrack of hostile commentary from E.U. and U.S. officials. Calling upon Georgian parliamentarians to “drop” the proposal, notorious war hawk and USAID chief Samantha Power inexplica...