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cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/8953267

Banner image: Lilac-breasted roller in Etosha National Park, Namibia. Image courtesy of Giles Laurent via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

How Namibia's bird conservation projects build community resilience (commentary)

• Droughts and land degradation often erode communities’ social bonds, but in the Karas region of Namibia, bird conservation initiatives have become a rallying point.
• Women and youth are at the forefront of these initiatives, which has inspired confidence among peers and shown that conservation is not the domain of scientists alone, but also a practice of everyday community resilience.
• “It is time for policymakers, NGOs, and donors to support these initiatives not just as biodiversity projects, but as investments in community well-being,” a new op-ed argues.
• This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily of Mongabay.

In Namibia’s Karas Region, birds are more than symbols of freedom or beauty — they are teachers of resilience. Their survival in arid landscapes mirrors the endurance of the communities who live alongside them. Grassroots bird conservation projects here have revealed something profound: protecting birds can also strengthen families, nurture hope, and build social cohesion.

Across villages in Karas, parents and children tend habitats together, restoring nesting sites and planting native vegetation. These acts of care are not only ecological interventions; they are lessons in patience and problem solving. When a child sees a weaverbird return to a reed bed that the community has protected, it is a moment of triumph that teaches perseverance in the face of environmental challenges.

Women and youth are at the forefront of these initiatives. In one community, a group of young women organized bird walks for schoolchildren, teaching them to identify species like the sociable weaver and the pale chanting goshawk. Their leadership has inspired confidence among peers and shown that conservation is not the domain of scientists alone — it is a practice of everyday resilience.

Sociable weavers nesting in acacia trees, Karas Region, Namibia. Image courtesy of Martha Karas.

These projects also counter the isolation that environmental stress can bring. Droughts and land degradation often erode social bonds, but bird conservation has become a rallying point. Families gather to monitor nesting sites, share stories, and celebrate small victories. In doing so, they weave resilience into the social fabric. Conservation here is not only about biodiversity; it is about belonging.

The ecological benefits are clear. Protecting bird habitats safeguards pollination, seed dispersal, and pest control — services that sustain agriculture and livelihoods. But equally important is the emotional strength these projects cultivate. In Karas, conservation has become a human resilience strategy: a way to confront uncertainty with collective action and hope.

This perspective challenges the conventional view of conservation as a technical exercise. Too often, policies focus narrowly on species counts or protected areas. While these metrics matter, they overlook the lived experience of communities who find strength in caring for nature. By recognizing conservation as both ecological and social, we broaden its value and deepen its impact.

Lappet-faced vultures like this are native to the arid plains of the Karas Region, and organizations like Vultures Namibia ensure there’s awareness of them. Image courtesy of Martha Karas.

The lesson from Karas is urgent. As climate change intensifies, resilience will be as critical as resources. Grassroots bird projects show that resilience can be cultivated through simple, shared acts of care. They remind us that conservation is not only about saving species, but about sustaining the human spirit.

It is time for policymakers, NGOs, and donors to support these initiatives not just as biodiversity projects, but as investments in community well-being. Funding should prioritize programs that empower women and youth, foster intergenerational learning, and strengthen social bonds through conservation.

Birds in Namibia’s Karas Region are survivors of harsh landscapes. But they are also mentors of resilience, teaching us how to endure, adapt, and thrive together. By listening to the voices of those who lead grassroots efforts, we can reimagine conservation as a strategy for human strength as much as ecological survival.

Supporting these projects is not charity — it is foresight. In every nest protected, in every child inspired, we see the seeds of resilience that will carry communities through the challenges ahead.

Conservation, at its best, is a story of hope. And in Karas, that story is being written by birds and the people who care for them.

Martha Karas is a Namibian writer based in the Karas region.

List of enemies I beefed with and dispatched during my first year as a writer

1. Peter Ryan, anti-semitic tech bro and Irish-American, specifically for his Irish Hitler alt account

2. Compact Magazine for publishing him, Breaking Points for interviewing him, as well as Angela Nagle and Sean McCarthy for repeatedly platforming and pushing him

3. The Irish writer Odrán De Bhaldraithe as well as the Sinn Féin troll network around him

4. Sinn Féin, specifically diaspora donations to them

5. Kneecap and their manager

6. A severe alcoholic Irish e-girl and Twitch streamer, as well as her top simp

7. Niamh O’Connor

8. The IRSP, briefly

9. Justin Barrett and his wife

10. Christopher Farstad and his wife Soleil Ho

11. Grinnell College

12. The Bronze Age Bari Weiss network of Dimes Square and Peter Thiel-adjacent wignat Zionists

13. “Protector of vulnerable women” RASSO attorney Tom Farr

14. The British middle class as a whole, as well as American PMCs as a whole

15. NAFO and pro-Ukrainians

16. The entire Free State

17. Gaeilge gatekeepers, especially gay ones

18. My own family to get into rehab (As in, I wanted to go but they were in denial)

19. The rehab staff to fight my way out

20. My own C-PTSD

21. Dáil members who voted against Maria Steen

22. Rose Lyddon and her criminal history

23. Rachel Haywire’s career as a con woman

24. The DSA sect “The Marxist Unity Group”

25. The DSA as a whole and Ross Barkan and Zohran Mamdani in particular

26. The Irish government’s artist dividend requirements

27. Keith Woods

28. Raw Egg Nationalist

29. Alt-right woo-woo lifestylism in general

30. Russell Howard and The Late Late Show on RTE

31. Catherine Connolly

32. Various Irish and Irish diaspora OnlyFans girls such as Merrick DeVille

33. Julie Bindel

34. Geoffrey Martin/Captive Dreamer

35. The British press for publishing Rose Lyddon and Tom Farr

36. White supremacist Kevin MacDonald

37. Anglo white supremacy as well as Anglo liberalism in general as deracination for Gaels

38. A ring of leftists podcasters I used to be in a group chat called “Brothers Against NATO” with where people shared Holocaust joke memes, including Sean McCarthy, Miroslav and Steph of Regime Radio, and Eyup Lovely’s friends

39. The lack of physical media in 2026 such as Scarface on DVD

40. Naoise Dolan

41. Gemma McSherry

42. Civic nationalism

43. Eleanor Russell

44. Noah Kulwin

45. Chapo fans

46. Anglofuturism

47. Ben Burgis and associates like Matt McManus

48. Curtis Yarvin

49. Scott Greer

50. Nick Land

51. Howling Mutant/Alexander Norden

52. John Ganz

53. Sam Kriss’ writing style

54. Laurie Penny

55. The very term “sex work” itself (Prostitution)

56. Charli XCX’s last two albums and new singles

57. Two of my ex-girlfriends

58. London shoneens

59. Official narratives on Ukraine

60. Almost all of British and Irish twitter over the course of a week

61. John Duncan, his mentor Damien Short, and The Institute of Commonwealth Studies in general

62. The Sally Rooney-fication of Irish literature

German discount supermarket chain Lidl notified customers in Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands that attackers stole their personal information in a breach at a service provider. [...]

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BYD has secured a record-breaking 11.2 GWh battery energy storage contract, marking one of the largest battery deals ever announced. The agreement highlights the company's growing dominance in global energy storage and reinforces its position as a major player beyond electric vehicles.

https://carnewschina.com/2026/07/10/byd-lands-historic-11-2-gwh-grid-contract-equivalent-to-186000-electric-vehicle-packs/

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The Tragic Case of Aaron Swartz...

Free Palestine

Looking for some troubleshooting help, if possible.

Attempting to install Arch using the linux-zen kernel. Planning to encrypt root using dm-crypt.

Early on, after running

parted /dev/vda --script mklabel gpt

parted -a optimal /dev/vda --script mkpart "ptn-boot" fat32 2048s 1024MiB

parted -a optimal /dev/vda --script mkpart "ptn-root" btrfs 1024MiB 100%

on the disk.

i then enter

modprobe dm-crypt

modprobe dm-mod

I've done this procedure a lot of times before, but I think I'm missing something, bc when I run modprobe dm-crypt, i get

modprobe: ERROR: could not insert 'dm_crypt': Invalid argument

I don't get an error with modprobe dm-mod.

In /lib/modules/7.1.3-zen1-2-zen/kernel/drivers/md/, i have dm-crypt.ko.zst and dm-mod.ko.zst.

I am looking for help on how to run closed source / pirated games on linux within a virtual machine. I would like to start by saying if I could walk into a shop and buy with cash, a game on a CD like in the old days I would. I have recently become very privacy conscious and until I figure out a way to anonymously and privately purchase things like this I am going to stick with pirating. Also, it is helping me to archive content as everything seems to be moving online and I want to stick with offline applications / media etc in my control.

Now, I am familiar with virtualbox but of course, it is no good for gaming. I have read about other applications that offer much better performance with support for GPU passthrough or similar (but how does this affect the security side of things when running pirated games). Forgive me, this is all quite new to me.

What I want is a virtual machine capable of gaming so that I can more safely run pirated games on linux. Also, I am very new to linux and some help in how I should actually go about running games on linux in the first place. I do not want to just install steam because it has closed source elements and being more privacy conscious now, I’m not sure I want to. Though I am aware I can use the proton layer to enable gaming support which I believe is fully open source. For my purposes lutris sounds like it may be the route to go. Thoughts on this welcome.

As a side note, I am thinking of signing up to GOG as they, to me, seem like a better alternative to steam where I can actually own a DRM free copy of a game that I buy. On a pirating note I thought locating signed, hash checked GOG installers to be a good option for security for dipping my toe into pirating games on linux. I am much, much more comfortable with detecting and removing malware in a windows ecosystem. Linux, completely foreign. So I am trying to be careful.

Once I get fully set up I plan to buy the games I enjoy on GOG, I think that will be the path I can be most comfortable with. At the end of the day I will own a DRM free copy of the game itself. That is the best I can do where I cannot get it on physical media I think. I already do this for CD’s and DVD’s etc.

Any help would be appreciated, thank you.

Imagine wanting the naive undeveloped past unlike the dread of the now with the fear of the future. There is going to be a lot of beatings of dead horses. Fuck your nostalgia. Fuck the good ol days. Fuck the fascist futurist future. I want to look forward in the direction that is not the cliff. I mean they got all the money... of course they could push out a turd sandwich.. it could be better but the self appointed plebs pay no mind while those with no blinders on pull out their hair. I am the bad guy.

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