Johnny Harris | Vox

The violent rise of India’s cow vigilantes

2019-07-24T10:46:40-04:00

India’s government has strict laws surrounding cow slaughter because cows are sacred in Hinduism. In his campaign for prime minister in 2014, Narendra Modi emphasized the need to make sure India’s cows are protected, and some state governments followed suit by opening more cow shelters and ordering more police crackdowns. But some took cow protection into their own hands.

Cow vigilantes started patrolling neighborhoods looking to physically punish those who were allegedly harboring, consuming, or even transporting cows. In most cases, the victims of these mob beatings were Muslim.

In this final episode of Vox Borders: India, we look at why violence over cows has increased since India’s elections in 2014.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

India’s trucks are works of art

2019-07-17T12:36:57-04:00

Trucks are a crucial aspect of India’s economy; they help it move and grow. And Bedford brand trucks were one of the first introduced to India, brought to the country during World War II. Bedfords and other similar models stuck around after the war, and since then have been produced commercially throughout the country.

Today, the Bedfords you see transporting goods throughout India are usually covered in elaborate paintings. Painting these trucks makes them stand out on the road, and the colorful words and images help motivate drivers and keep them safe during long, brutal work hours. Covered in art, they’re more than functional and mundane, they’re spectacles of beauty in India.

These colorful trucks are all over the country, and the designs aren’t random. Artists that specialize in painting trucks put a lot of thought and effort into the art form.

In this latest episode of Vox Borders: India, the team looks at why truck art is so important.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

India and Sri Lanka’s violent fight over fish

2019-07-16T13:22:11-04:00

Fishing is the economic lifeline for villages in northern Sri Lanka. But after a decades-long civil war, fishers returned to find their fish stocks depleted — and they pointed a finger squarely at neighboring India.

As people in India developed methods to increase hauls, and crossed a maritime border that was more permeable during the war, they depleted the fish stock for both sides. Now the Sri Lankan Navy is retaliating with force, making the relationship between the two communities that rely on these waters worse.

This is the latest episode of Vox Borders: India. In this episode, Vox Borders looks at how the drawing of a maritime border and lack of access to fish caused a conflict between two communities that used to live in harmony.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

How India runs the world’s biggest election

2019-07-05T10:47:06-04:00

India voted to pick its central government for the next five years throughout the spring of 2019. An eighth of the world’s entire population was eligible to vote in this election. That’s 900 million people, and more than 67 percent voted.

India runs the world’s biggest elections, and officials put in a lot of effort to make this democratic exercise as accessible as possible. This means they make sure everyone, even in the most remote locations, is near a polling booth. In India, there is a law that election voting machines must be placed within 2 kilometers of every voter. Officials put in a lot of work to make this happen — even if it meant bringing these machines to voters on an elephant.

This is the latest episode of Vox Borders: India. In this episode, Vox Borders looks at how India pulls off these massive elections.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

How a border transformed a subcontinent

2019-06-26T15:24:40-04:00

The 1947 partition of India and Pakistan was a traumatic event. It split roads, farms, railroads; but also families and communities. To draw the line that would become the new border, the British tasked Cyril Radcliffe, a lawyer who had never been to the region before.

Radcliffe’s line separated the Punjab and Bengal provinces from India into East and West Pakistan. In doing so it separated Muslims and Hindus, but Sikhs and people from other faiths were affected as well. The border disrupted a centuries-old Sikh pilgrimage. It separated Punjabi people of all faiths from each other. And ultimately, it divided a culture.

This is the latest episode of Borders, a series from Vox’s Johnny Harris in which he travels the globe to listen to the people living on the front lines of international relations. In this episode, Harris looks at the ways that the Radcliffe line changed Punjab, and its everlasting effects.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

Vox Borders’ next stop: India

2019-02-21T13:36:14-05:00

Last year, Vox Borders went to Hong Kong and Colombia. For the fourth season, I’ll be heading to India — and I want to hear your ideas.

Vox Borders has allowed me to travel to some of the most interesting regions to cover the stories of people who live there. It started with one six-part season and expanded into an ongoing global series documenting the human impact of lines on a map.

Crowdsourcing is an important part of Vox Borders, and I’m looking for locals from India that can help out next season. Perspectives from communities in the places I’m traveling have always improved our reporting.

If you live in India or have local knowledge or expertise, I want your take on what we should cover. Please join the Vox Borders local network to tell me more about yourself and how you’d like to help.

View Link

Why Colombia is losing the cocaine war

2018-12-18T12:07:23-05:00

Colombia is the world’s largest producer of cocaine. The drug comes from the leaf of the coca plant, which is harvested and processed in the country. And despite the Colombian government’s effort to eradicate the plant, coca cultivation is at an all-time high.

Drug use and cartels surround the cocaine trade, but there’s another side of the story: the families in rural Colombia that rely on the coca leaf as their only means of income.

In the final episode of Vox Borders Colombia, Johnny Harris gets to know these families. And he goes deep into the cocaine economy to discover why the issues surrounding the drug are so complex.

In Vox’s Borders series, Johnny travels the globe to listen to the people living on the front lines of international relations.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

How this African beat spread through Latin America

2018-12-11T13:36:45-05:00

Cumbia is a staple of Latin American music. Its driving beat can be heard from Argentina to Mexico to the US and beyond. But the musical style’s catchy rhythms can be traced back to one specific area: villages along the riverbanks of Colombia’s Rio Magdalena, where African and indigenous musical elements fused to create a new style of music.

And cumbia keeps evolving. Today, DJs and pop stars are bringing cumbia into the electronic music realm. But no matter how much it evolves, it always comes back to Colombia.

This latest episode of Vox Borders looks at cumbia’s origins. Borders is a series from Vox’s Johnny Harris in which he travels the globe to listen to the people living on the front lines of international relations.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

How this drug lord created a hippo problem in Colombia

2018-12-04T12:13:15-05:00

In the 1980s, drug lord Pablo Escobar smuggled four hippos into Colombia for his personal zoo. But wild hippos are only native to the African continent, and their escape after Escobar’s death left Colombia with an unexpected problem: There are now dozens of hippos roaming around one of the country’s rivers.

This latest episode of Vox Borders looks at how these hippos affect Colombia’s biodiversity, and how people became fond of their presence.

Borders is a series from Vox’s Johnny Harris in which he travels the globe to listen to the people living on the front lines of international relations.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.

Why Colombia has taken in 1 million Venezuelans

2018-11-27T18:03:34-05:00

Colombia is currently dealing with a massive wave of refugees coming from Venezuela. A severe economic crisis under current President Nicolás Maduro is causing them to flee; inflation rates are high and there isn’t enough food available for people in Venezuela to eat.

Thousands of Venezuelans are crossing the Simón Bolívar International Bridge in Cúcuta, a Venezuelan border town, every day. And Colombia doesn’t seem to be turning anyone away.

This is the latest episode of Borders, a series from Vox’s Johnny Harris in which he travels the globe to listen to the people living on the front lines of international relations. Harris looks at why Colombia doesn’t deny entry to these refugees, the shared history between the two nations, and the potential limit of Colombia’s acceptance of incoming Venezuelans.

You can find this video and all of Vox’s videos on YouTube. Subscribe for the latest.