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http://www.cnbc.com/2015/08/24/caitlyn-jenner-halloween-costume-sparks-social-media-outrage-.html

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/ne...een-costume-labeled-817515?utm_source=twitter

It's nowhere near October, but one ensemble is already on track to be named the most controversial Halloween costume of 2015.

Social media users were out in full force on Monday criticizing several Halloween retailers for offering a Caitlyn Jenner costume reminiscent of the former-athlete's Vanity Fair cover earlier this year.

While Jenner's supporters condemned the costume as "transphobic" and "disgusting" on Twitter, Spirit Halloween, a retailer that carries the costume, defended the getup.

"At Spirit Halloween, we create a wide range of costumes that are often based upon celebrities, public figures, heroes and superheroes," said Lisa Barr, senior director of marking at Spirit Halloween. "We feel that Caitlyn Jenner is all of the above and that she should be celebrated. The Caitlyn Jenner costume reflects just that."
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Soros university says it being forced out of Hungary, mulls move

Hungary’s Central European University, a graduate school founded by U.S. financier George Soros, said it was being forced out of the country by the nationalist government and would switch to enrolling new students in Vienna if it did not get guarantees of academic freedom by Dec. 1.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...orced-out-of-hungary-mulls-move-idUSKCN1MZ1TY
 
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-45964624

A homeless man has turned a parking space on the fourth floor of a multi-storey into his personal "hotel" complete with framed pictures, bedding and a cardboard carpet.

Paul Lindsay-Jones, 55, transformed the disabled spot in Truro, Cornwall, after being evicted about two weeks ago.

"I take pride," he said. "Some people are on the street with just a sleeping bag but I like a bit of luxury."

The local council said it would meet to discuss Paul's situation.

'Eight-storey hotel'
He said he found pictures and furnishings by raiding bins and skips around the city, with other pieces donated by charities.

Paul, who is originally from Bodmin, has made a small table, and is making a sofa from two chairs.

He said he planned to get some carpet next.

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Image captionPaul has furnished the space with cushions and bedding
Paul said the space, which boasts flowers and a doormat with "Home" written on it, was his "own eight-storey hotel".

Among the flowers and clocks there is a landline phone with a cable running from it.

"It doesn't work but it's a bit of luxury, isn't it?" he said.

"There are people living on the streets just lying on a sleeping bag. But I like a bit of luxury. It's about using your brain.

"I keep it clean and cause no problems. I'm polite with the public and the security guys have no problem with me."

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Image captionThe space is decorated with paintings and pictures
While Paul, who is deaf and lip reads, said he was "sad to be evicted" from his former home, he also said he was enjoying taking care of the space.

"I don't mind it - it's my hotel. I've got my own eight-storey hotel. I keep it clean and don't get any complaints."

Despite being offered accommodation in Newquay and St Austell, Paul said he wanted to stay in Truro.

"I get on with people here," he said.

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Image captionThe telephone does not work but Paul says it is a piece of "luxury"
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Image captionPaul Lindsay-Jones describes the space as his own "eight storey hotel"
Justin Day, legal director of local homeless charity St Petroc's Society, said: "It is a sad story as he was evicted from his former property but our outreach teams are visiting him daily and trying to build up trust.

"We are ultimately trying to entice him into our resettlement centres but he doesn't want that at the moment."

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Image captionThe car park is in the middle of the city
The safeguarding team at Cornwall Council has triggered a multi-agency meeting to discuss his situation and the Cornwall Fire and Rescue Service has said it is not concerned about a fire risk.

Safer Truro said in a statement: "We are aware Moorfield car park continues to be an area where individuals rough sleep.

"We continue to monitor this, and extensive work is taking place to continue to support and offer suitable accommodation options, safeguard individuals and take appropriate action to reduce any escalating concerns."
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Ngl, I'm legit impressed with this. Better than the usual lazy arse in the shop doorway.
 
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in fairness, that's about the average size of a new-build house these days (and it's probably more structurally sound)
 
Honestly, living in Seattle, I'm just glad to see a homeless person cleaning up after themselves and improving the public/private property they're currently squatting on.


Around here they just throw dorito bags and beer bottles everywhere and build piles of heroin needles.
 
https://www.vaticannews.va/en/church/news/2018-10/philippines-church-year-youth-2019.html

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The Philippines is getting ready for "The Year of Youth" 2019
“Year of Youth” 2019 is a part of a 9-year preparation for the celebration of the 5th centenary of the arrival of Christianity in 2021.

By Robin Gomes

The Philippine Catholic Church will be celebrating its “Year of Youth” 2019 in the wake of the world Synod of Bishops on young people that is concluding in the Vatican on Sunday.

The October 3-28 Synod of Bishops has as its theme, “Young People, the Faith, and Vocational Discernment.”

Speaking to Vatican’s Fides news agency, the Episcopal Commission on Youth of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), said that the "Year of Youth 2019" will officially kick off with the feast of Christ the King, November 25, 2018, but the solemn opening ceremony will be held on December 2 in Manila.

Preparations
The Commission has invited its network of 86 diocesan youth ministry leaders and leaders of national youth organizations to "take part in the general organization and to give their contribution, including the creation of the official logo and theme song", Eva Mae Famillaran Palmero, a young Catholic told Fides.

"The celebration of the Year of Youth will be an occasion for experience, sharing, prayer,proclamation of God's love for others. It will be an opportunity to become more firm in faith ", said Jovanie Bacolcol, a youth leader and animator.

500 years of evangelization
The Year of Youth is part of a 9-year preparation for 2021 when the Philippine Church will celebrate 5th centenary of the arrival of the Gospel in the archipelago.

The preparation kicked off in 2013, with each year dedicated to a specific theme related to the faith and new evangelization. 2018 was dedicated to the clergy and the religious.

“We look forward with gratitude and joy to March 16, 2021, the fifth centenary of the coming of Christianity to our beloved land,” the Philippine bishops had written in a 2012 pastoral letter, ahead of the 9-year preparation.

First Christians
According to the bishops, the first Mass on Filipino soil was celebrated in Limasawa Island on Easter Sunday on March 31, 1521, and the first Filipino Christians were Humabon and Hara Amihan, who were baptized Carlos and Juana respectively.

The Spanish missionaries brought the Christian faith to the Philippines 500 years ago and today the nation is home to Asia’s largest Catholic population. Out of 110 million inhabitants, 80% are Catholics.
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#IAmSexist: It’s time that we men take responsibility for our role in the problem of violence against women.

Men, listen up.

In light of a year of disturbing revelations from the #MeToo movement and from last month’s profoundly troubling Brett Kavanaugh hearings and his eventual confirmation to the Supreme Court, it is time that we, men, act.

Certainly, some of us men have spoken out on behalf of women. But many more of us have remained silent. Some have kept silent out of fear of being judged, fear of criticism or censure, others out of genuine respect. In fact, silence has become the default stance of many men who consider themselves “allies” of women. But given all that has transpired, staying out of it is no longer enough.

I’ve decided not to cut corners. So, join me, with due diligence and civic duty, and publicly claim: I am sexist!

In fact, perhaps it is time that we lay claim to a movement — #IamSexist. Think about its national and international implications as we take responsibility for our sexism, our misogyny, our patriarchy.
It is hard to admit we are sexist. I, for instance, would like to think that I possess genuine feminist bona fides, but who am I kidding? I am a failed and broken feminist. More pointedly, I am sexist. There are times when I fear for the “loss” of my own “entitlement” as a male. Toxic masculinity takes many forms. All forms continue to hurt and to violate women.

For example, before I got married, I insisted that my wife take my last name. After all, she was to become my wife. So, why not take my name, and become part of me? She refused. She wanted to keep her own last name, arguing that a woman taking her husband’s name was a patriarchal practice. I was not happy, especially as she had her father’s last name, which I argued contradicted her position against patriarchy. But as she argued, “This is my name and it is part of my identity.” I became stubborn and interpreted her decision as evidence of a lack of full commitment to me. Well, she brilliantly proposed that we both change our last names and take on a new name together showing our commitment to each other.

Despite the charity, challenge and reasonableness of the offer, I dropped the ball. That day I learned something about me. I didn’t respect her autonomy, her legal standing and personhood. As pathetic as this may sound, I saw her as my property, to be defined by my name and according to my legal standing. (She kept her name.) While this was not sexual assault, my insistence was a violation of her independence. I had inherited a subtle, yet still violent, form of toxic masculinity. It still raises its ugly head — I should be thanked when I clean the house, cook, sacrifice my time. These are deep and troubling expectations that are shaped by male privilege, male power and toxic masculinity.

If you are a woman reading this, I have failed you. Through my silence and an uninterrogated collective misogyny, I have failed you. I have helped and continue to help perpetuate sexism. I know about how we hold onto forms of power that dehumanize you only to elevate our sense of masculinity. I recognize my silence as an act of violence. For this, I sincerely apologize.

I speak as an insider. I know about what so many of us men think about women — the language we use, the sense of power that we garner through our sexual exploits, our catcalling and threatening, our sexually objectifying gazes, our dehumanizing and despicable sexual gestures and our pornographic imaginations. This is not simply locker room banter but a public display of unchecked bravado for which we often feel no shame.

We have heard many accounts from women of what it is like to live under the yoke of our self-serving construction of a violent, pathetic and problematic masculinity. It is time that we stop gaslighting their reality.

By now, many of you are probably saying, this doesn’t apply to me — I’m innocent.

It’s true that many of us, including me, have not committed vile acts of rape, sexual assault and sexual abuse the likes of which Harvey Weinstein has been accused of. We have not, like Charlie Rose, been accused of sexual harassment by dozens of women who worked for us; and we are not, like Bill Cosby, being sent to prison for drugging and sexually assaulting a woman, in this case, Andrea Constand. Yet I argue that we are collectively complicit with a sexist mind-set and a poisonous masculinity rooted in the same toxic male culture from which these men emerged.

I’m issuing a clarion call against our claims of sexist “innocence.” I’m calling our “innocence” what it is — bullshit. As bell hooks writes in “The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity and Love,” men unconsciously “engage in patriarchal thinking, which condones rape even though they may never enact it. This is a patriarchal truism that most people in our society want to deny.” When women speak out about male violence, hooks writes, “folks are eager to stand up and make the point that most men are not violent. They refuse to acknowledge that masses of boys and men have been programmed from birth on to believe that at some point they must be violent, whether psychologically or physically, to prove that they are men.” We have learned it. In the language of Simone de Beauvoir, “One is not born, but rather becomes” masculine.

We have hidden behind a myth that “boys will be boys” — a myth that distorts our moral compass, that stunts our growth, maturity and self-respect, and smothers our capacity to love and experience the genuine ecstasy of Eros. Audre Lorde writes in “Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power” (1978), “The erotic has often been misnamed by men and used against women.” She adds, “Pornography is a direct denial of the power of the erotic, for it represents the suppression of true feeling.” Not only are we as men taught to deny our feelings, but we also are taught that sexual vulnerability is weakness, not the province of “real men.”

We mask that vulnerability. I find hooks’s description powerful and true to my own experience as a boy: “Learning to wear a mask (that word already embedded in the term ‘masculinity’),” as hooks writes, “is the first lesson in patriarchal masculinity that a boy learns. He learns that his core feelings cannot be expressed if they do not conform to the acceptable behaviors sexism defines as male. Asked to give up the true self in order to realize the patriarchal ideal, boys learn self-betrayal early and are rewarded for these acts of soul murder.”

What does hooks mean by “soul murder”?

When I was about 15 years old, I said to a friend of mine, “Why must you always look at a girl’s butt?” He promptly responded: “Are you gay or something? What else should I look at, a guy’s butt?” He was already wearing the mask. He had already learned the lessons of patriarchal masculinity. I was in an unfortunate bind. Either I should without question objectify girls’ behinds or I was gay. There was no wiggle room for me to be both antisexist and antimisogynistic and yet a heterosexual young boy. You see, other males had rewarded his gaze by joining in the objectifying practice: “Look at that butt!” It was a collective act of devaluation. The acts of soul murder had already begun.
Yet I, too, participated in acts of soul murder. As early as elementary school, the young boys would play this “game” of pushing one another into girls. The idea was to get your friend to push you into a girl that you found attractive in order to grind up against her. I was guilty: “Hurry up! Push me into her.” He pushed, and the physical grind was obvious. She would turn around, disgusted, and yell, “Stop!” Youthful? Yes. Was it sexist and wrong? Yes. This was our youthful collective education; this is what it meant for us to gain “masculine credibility” at the expense of girls.

Later, I was also made to believe that girls were “targets,” objects to be chased down and owned. That is the contradiction. For example, at about 16, we used to play a game called “Catch a girl, get a girl.” There was no equivalent called “Catch a boy, get a boy.” After all, as boys, we named the game. We would count to give the girls a head start. We would then run after them. If you caught a girl, you could steal a kiss. Some of the boys attempted to grope the girls.

The logic governing the game, unseen by both the boys and the girls, was predicated upon sexist assumptions that relegated the girls to positions of prey. This is what American male culture taught us early on: Women were like “meat” and we must always nurture a voracious appetite. This fact alone should challenge how we construe “mutual consent.” The game was orchestrated around what the philosopher Luce Irigaray would call a “dominant phallic economy.” We chased; they ran. We were the pursuers; they were the pursued. Our objective was to “get them.” We gazed upon the prey and then we would strike. Though the girls played, they were not to blame. We were the “winners,” possessors of conquered territory. That is part of the early training that I received when it came to my toxic masculinity.

Looking back, I wish that I could speak face to face to that younger self and undo the soul murder. Yet, I am not beyond redemption. That young boy is still learning from the older me. I have tremendous love to give him, a demanding love that he learn to undo the toxicity of male masculinity.

This is why Donald Trump Jr. got it all wrong when he was asked which of his children he is most concerned for and he answered, “Right now, I’d say my sons.” This is pure obfuscation, a substitution of fictions for facts, and a form of dangerous denial regarding the reality that his daughters may one day face. With that statement, he lied to his daughters.

Trump Jr. should get his priorities straight. In a male-dominated and sexist toxic world, a world where his own father grabs women’s genitalia and kisses them without their permission, it is our daughters who should concern us as targets of sexual violence. Trump Jr. should be concerned about raising his sons not in the image of his own father but in the image of those of us men who are prepared to recognize our soul murder, our toxic masculinity, and to do something about it.

What are we afraid of?

We all recently lived through the public spectacle of the Brett Kavanaugh hearings. What is at stake transcends but also includes Christine Blasey Ford’s allegations that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when they were both in high school during the 1980s. The history of toxic and violent masculinity should have been enough for us to give full weight to the reasonableness and believability of Ford’s testimony. But we did not.

Donald Trump’s cruel public mocking of Ford in Southaven, Miss., days after her testimony was despicable and must be seen as another violation of Ford’s character. And as the crowd laughed and applauded, including women present, Ford’s words, her emotional testimony, were denounced as the ramblings of someone without any claim on the veracity of her experiences. To add insult to injury, Sarah Huckabee Sanders’s defense that Trump was just “stating the facts” is both a blatant lie and a further act of cruelty, a denial of Ford’s pain and denial of the collective suffering of women more generally from acts of sexual violence.

I can imagine being passionate about defending myself if put in Kavanaugh’s position. Kavanaugh, however, unabashedly reinforced white male machismo and aggressiveness such that even if one thinks that he is innocent of what Ford accused him of, he put on full display the performance of a cantankerous white male who is recklessly determined to seek revenge against those he claimed were out to get him.

The history of male violence against women speaks to Ford’s pain and suffering. The statistics regarding sexual assault are telling: One in five women are raped at some point in their lives; 90 percent of rape victims are female; in the United States one in three women experience some form of contact sexual violence in their lifetime; roughly half of female victims of rape reported being raped by an intimate partner and 40 percent by an acquaintance; in eight out of 10 cases of rape, the victim knew the perpetrator. We can no longer deny this reality.

I know that if you are a woman, you don’t really need me as a man saying to you that you are not paranoid when it comes to male violence, sexual and otherwise. I speak not for you but with you. In my view, and in the view of many others, Kavanaugh failed himself, and you. And we have all played our part in that failure. I don’t want to fail women anymore.

Since the world is watching, we, as men, need to join in the dialogue in ways that we have failed to in the past. We need to admit our roles in the larger problem of male violence against women. We need to tell the truth about ourselves.
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Prof. Yancy calls for the collective acknowledgement of guilt from ALL men for being sexist. Later, he recounts his personal struggle with sexism, including his conscious desire to subordinate his wife against her will and his grope-y childhood antics.

It's cowardly narcissism disguised as brave virtuosity. When Yancy apologizes for his uniquely sexist behavior (and it was sexist, for sure), he doesn't claim he apologized to specific women he may have hurt (with the exception of his wife) -- he apologizes to ALL women, as if ALL women were affected by his specific behavior. In his mind, each individual woman is simply a representative of her gender class. What's good for one woman is good for them all. Harm one woman, you harm them all. Of course, I doubt Yancy felt he was harming "all women" when he tried (unsuccessfully) to subordinate his wife against her will. I assume his subsequent reconciliation with his wife was an exercise in interpersonal growth and positively affected their relationship. That's great, but his personal redemption had no effect on the state of womanhood or gender dynamics in America.

And yet here he is, apologizing to ALL women for his shitty mindset and childhood behavior, while reaping the benefits of this performative "mea culpa." Perhaps hearing "I forgive you, let's move on" from his wife wasn't enough; he needs validation from every woman. It's so transparently self-serving.

What's even more infuriating is his attempt to collectivize his own individual transgressions. 'Since the world is watching, we, as men, need to join in the dialogue in ways that we have failed to in the past. We need to admit our roles in the larger problem of male violence against women. We need to tell the truth about ourselves.' In this way, he gets to share the blame. His individual sexism is now a property of masculinity and manhood. To me, this is a cowardly way of abdicating TOTAL personal responsibility for his actions by conflating his own individual rottenness with the nature of men. This becomes evident when he quotes bell hooks:

'As bell hooks writes in “The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity and Love,” men unconsciously “engage in patriarchal thinking, which condones rape even though they may never enact it. This is a patriarchal truism that most people in our society want to deny.”'

Yancy's decision to quote this particular book's line is quite revealing. Perhaps Yancy HAS condoned rape in his head in the past. I know I haven't, and I know (or at least am justified in believing) none of my close male friends or family members have (or do) either. I'd wager the vast majority of men in the US do not condone rape or have ever felt tempted to rape.

Yancy is clearly projecting in his article. He views women as property. He views women as little more than "meat" (he clearly has a hard time balancing his sexual desires with his acknowledgement of female agency and personhood). He instinctively seeks to subordinate women around him. He may have condoned rape in his mind at various points during his life. And he's too frightened to acknowledge that, maybe, JUST MAYBE, he belongs to a minority of men who really struggle with this stuff.

In short, it's another example of how male feminists continue to excuse their own shortcomings and dodge personal responsibility for their actions by projecting them onto their gender as a whole.

I imagine being this sexist in deeply feminist environments is pretty lonely. However, I do not think publicly throwing every heterosexual male with balls and a penis under the bus is a good solution. Perhaps Prof. Yancy should consider seeking therapy as an alternative. It has to be gentler on his psyche than this glorified Struggle Session.
 
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-46006470

The Leicester City owner's helicopter has crashed in a car park outside the club's ground shortly after taking off following a match.

It is not known if Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha was in the helicopter at the time.

Leicester City had been playing West Ham United in the Premier League at their King Power stadium.

Pictures from the ground showed a large fire in the car park although it has been put out, according to reports.

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Image copyrightLEICESTER CITY FOOTBALL CLUB
Image captionVichai Srivaddhanaprabha, from Thailand, purchased the club in 2010
Sky Sports News reporter Rob Dorsett said the helicopter took off from the pitch, as it does after every game.

He said that after a few seconds it appeared to lose control and crashed into the car park just a few hundred metres away.

One witness said it appeared "the tail propeller wasn't, working putting it into a spin".
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Breaking news at the mo, but it's unknown if the owner was in the chopper at the time, but still pretty horrifying.
 
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