India! WOW.

Today, I'm talking about:

• Myanmar's Facebook problem
• Somalia is electing a parliament right now
• Global study: Why we need to take care of young people better worldwide
• India's extremely happy farmers

what happened last week

We are forcing Facebook to pay attention to its dangerous impact to violence in Myanmar
Facebook and Myanmar aren't good for each other. (To be fair, Facebook isn't good for anyone but that's for another day.) The news agency The Associated Press got its hands on some documents and found out that, 'Facebook is still super dangerous for people living in Myanmar. There's so much hate speech and misinformation on the platform.'

Refresher:
Three years ago, reports showed that the social media/tech company had been one of the reasons for a lot of the (offline) violence against people of different ethnicities and religions living in Myanmar. Basically, people were putting up 'kill XYZ people!' posts and Facebook wasn't able to spot nor delete them. It promised to do better.

What's the situation like now?
Scrolling on Facebook today, it's still not hard to find posts threatening murder and rape in Myanmar.

Give me an example:
Just last month, on October 24, someone in support of the military in Myanmar posted a two-minute video calling for violence against those that stand against the new government (remember the coup on February 1?). The video (last I checked was Saturday) had received some 70,000 views. Now, I cannot find it anymore, luckily.

Someone else, a week later, posted a photo of soldiers who had captured and blindfolded men down a dirt path. The Burmese caption read, 'Don't catch them alive.'

Why this matters:
Facebook reaches billions of people worldwide. In Myanmar alone, some 29 million people use Facebook. Whatever you say on there can go viral -- cute dog videos or calls for a violent riot against an ethnic group. Content moderation is incredibly necessary. And it seems that Facebook isn't doing neaaaaarly enough. But -- repeat after me -- virtual platforms have real-world consequences.

Did you know:
Myanmar was connected to the internet in 2000? The country was under a strict military rule until then.

Diversify your intellectuals:
Follow Htaike Htaike Aung on Twitter. She's a Myanmar internet policy advocate.

We are electing a new parliament in Somalia -- and women make up 26 percent of it
Somalia is choosing a new parliament at the moment.

Why this matters:
Some 16 million people live in Somalia. They all have a right to a healthy, functioning government that works hard on keeping them safe and helping them thrive.

Tell me more about that process:
Each federal state is sending members in order to become members of parliament. The parliament is made up of two parts, the Upper House and the Lower House. As of last week, the Upper House is now officially elected.

Next up: the Lower House, and then presidential elections next year. Experts, specifically people working at the United Nations are like, 'congratulations on the successful Upper House elections! But, please, hurry and try to elect the Lower House by the end of the year. Don't let too much time pass.'

Who was elected?
54 people. Among them were 14 women, representing 26 per cent of the Senators (the plan was to reach 30 percent).

Why hurry though?
"Unfortunately, the security situation in Somalia continues to be volatile," said James Swan, Special Representative of the Secretary‑General for Somalia and Head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM). In other words: Al-Shabaab is a huge threat and super active still. Somali military, together with African Union military, is strong but the African Union is leaving at the end of the year. There's a plan for a...