🐱 Interesting clickbait, op-eds, fluff pieces and other smaller stories
- Thread starter CatParty
- Start date
CatParty
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2018
Holy fucking shit! Prince Philip doesn't have much longer. That's the face of death.
On another subject, here's some food for thought.
https://www.conservativesociety.org...AT&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=AT-122219-pm
Is A Civil War Coming? One Professor Believes This Group Is America’s Next Revolutionaries
It’s become pretty obvious the left intends to radically change the very fundamentals of America and their main strategy in accomplishing this is to usurp the country’s education system, which thus far they have been quite successful in doing. Our universities have long been far-left progressive strongholds but now they have moved into schools K-12 at rapid pace. It’s alarming just how inundated our public education system has become in such a short period of time.
Many of us believe a civil war is on the horizon but this time it won’t be a regional conflict but rather an ideological one. The way in which one side wins will be entirely different than the Civil War which was fought with guns and violence. One college professor believes homeschooling moms have already begun the fight for America’s future.
C. Bradley Thompson, a professor of political science at Clemson University and author of America’s Revolutionary Mind: A Moral History of the American Revolution and the Declaration That Defined It, discussed his concerns on the continuing fracture of American politics and culture in an interview on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight with hosts Rebecca Mansour and Joe Pollak.
In his interview he pointed out that currently there are two factions that have formed in America. Conservatives represent one of these factions while far-left progressives represent the other. Thompson says that America is not just a country but an ideology and one that is “associated with the principles of the Declaration of Independence.”
The principles of the Declaration of Independence used to be widely accepted by all Americans despite political leanings. Now, the division in politics seems to boil down to ideological differences in the way in which the two factions view the words of the Declaration of Independence.
“So the question is: What is it, what ideas can Americans rally around?” Thompson asked. “If we cannot rally around these words — we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, among which are the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — then we can rally as a nation around no words.”
Thompson went on to say that the sham impeachment of President Trump is really just a symptom of the deeper underlying problem.
“In my view, the problem that we are confronting now in 2019 is that America seems to be hopelessly and ideologically divided, so this show trial that is taking place in Washington, DC, right now, is just sort of the culmination of what I think are much deeper, subterranean ideological divisions that are taking place in this country,” said Thompson. “The problem is, part of the United States — one group in the United States — they seem to despise the principles on which this country was founded, and so we find ourselves in this very difficult position where one part of the nation really hates what this country has always stood for.”
In 21st century America, Democrats clearly hate what America has always stood for. Not only that, they hate anyone who stands for the principles America was built on.
Democrats also seem to hate truth and reality and have found the best way to combat the principles they despise is to literally take over the very meaning of truth which results in confusion and the breaking down of America’s moral fabric. Thompson points this out.
“Those very simple but graceful words in the second paragraph of the Declaration,” he started, “So, just go through them: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident.’ The first thing to say is that in 2019, the intellectual class in the United States doesn’t believe in the concept of truth. In 2016, the word of the year in the Oxford dictionary was ‘post-truth.’ It said that we live in a post-truth society, that is to say, we live in a world where truth is allegedly subjective. Every person effectively has their truth, or every group has their truth, where as the Founding Fathers believed in truth with a capital T, that truth is absolute, certain, permanent, and universal.”
This is where the battle for America really begins. Are we going to allow an entire generation to be educated to believe that truth is subjective and thus so is morality?
“The reigning intellectual and moral orthodoxy of American intellectual life, American universities would be the twin towers of moral relativism and nihilism, and the idea here, and the goal of the left over the last 50 or 60 years has been this long march through the institutions,” noted Thompson. “What they’ve tried to do — and in fact, have done quite successfully — is to take over America’s cultural institutions, particularly education, particularly K through 12 education, and colleges and universities, and that’s where the real battle is. It’s a battle of ideas.”
Thompson goes on to say, “Unfortunately I think, too many libertarians and conservatives and classical liberals invest too much time in politics, whereas John Adams and Thomas Jefferson believed that — what really is the underpinning — the soul of a nation is how we educate our children. That’s the core issue, and so whoever controls the schools, and now also the universities, will control the culture.”
“As Andrew Breitbart once said, politics is downstream from culture, and culture is downstream from the universities, and so if we lose the battle for the universities — and our schools, K through 12 — then we find ourselves in a very difficult position,” Thompson foreshadows.
Thompson remarked, “I, like many other people, do worry about a potential coming civil war. Now, obviously a civil war in 21st century America would be significantly different than the kind we had in 1861, but it would be a different kind of civil war, and it may not involve violence at all, but it might involve the fracturing of America. Now, unlike the 1850s and 1860s, this is not a regional [war]. It’s not north versus south. It’s really ideological, and how we deal with that issue is unclear.”
With this concern comes Thompson’s theory that the way in which children are being educated now will have a profound impact on the result of a future civil war. He believes homeschooling is the best way to combat the pervasiveness of the progressive left’s agenda, which has infested government-run public schools all across the country.
“I do have hope in homeschooling,” Thompson stated. “I think homeschooling is one way in which we can recapture this culture, and I would argue, and have argued, that the leaders of the revolution are America’s homeschooling mothers. They’re the ones at the forefront of this change, and I would strongly encourage people to pull their kids out of government schools and to homeschool their children.”
We join him in that suggestion. If you can, get your children out of the public school system where they are undergoing intense progressive indoctrination. In the Civil War many families were divided as siblings went to fight for opposing sides. We will see the same division should another civil war occur but it will primarily be children splitting from their parents after having been brainwashed by the government education system for years.
The fight has begun, parents. Which side are you on?
On another subject, here's some food for thought.
https://www.conservativesociety.org...AT&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=AT-122219-pm
Is A Civil War Coming? One Professor Believes This Group Is America’s Next Revolutionaries
It’s become pretty obvious the left intends to radically change the very fundamentals of America and their main strategy in accomplishing this is to usurp the country’s education system, which thus far they have been quite successful in doing. Our universities have long been far-left progressive strongholds but now they have moved into schools K-12 at rapid pace. It’s alarming just how inundated our public education system has become in such a short period of time.
Many of us believe a civil war is on the horizon but this time it won’t be a regional conflict but rather an ideological one. The way in which one side wins will be entirely different than the Civil War which was fought with guns and violence. One college professor believes homeschooling moms have already begun the fight for America’s future.
C. Bradley Thompson, a professor of political science at Clemson University and author of America’s Revolutionary Mind: A Moral History of the American Revolution and the Declaration That Defined It, discussed his concerns on the continuing fracture of American politics and culture in an interview on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight with hosts Rebecca Mansour and Joe Pollak.
In his interview he pointed out that currently there are two factions that have formed in America. Conservatives represent one of these factions while far-left progressives represent the other. Thompson says that America is not just a country but an ideology and one that is “associated with the principles of the Declaration of Independence.”
The principles of the Declaration of Independence used to be widely accepted by all Americans despite political leanings. Now, the division in politics seems to boil down to ideological differences in the way in which the two factions view the words of the Declaration of Independence.
“So the question is: What is it, what ideas can Americans rally around?” Thompson asked. “If we cannot rally around these words — we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, among which are the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — then we can rally as a nation around no words.”
Thompson went on to say that the sham impeachment of President Trump is really just a symptom of the deeper underlying problem.
“In my view, the problem that we are confronting now in 2019 is that America seems to be hopelessly and ideologically divided, so this show trial that is taking place in Washington, DC, right now, is just sort of the culmination of what I think are much deeper, subterranean ideological divisions that are taking place in this country,” said Thompson. “The problem is, part of the United States — one group in the United States — they seem to despise the principles on which this country was founded, and so we find ourselves in this very difficult position where one part of the nation really hates what this country has always stood for.”
In 21st century America, Democrats clearly hate what America has always stood for. Not only that, they hate anyone who stands for the principles America was built on.
Democrats also seem to hate truth and reality and have found the best way to combat the principles they despise is to literally take over the very meaning of truth which results in confusion and the breaking down of America’s moral fabric. Thompson points this out.
“Those very simple but graceful words in the second paragraph of the Declaration,” he started, “So, just go through them: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident.’ The first thing to say is that in 2019, the intellectual class in the United States doesn’t believe in the concept of truth. In 2016, the word of the year in the Oxford dictionary was ‘post-truth.’ It said that we live in a post-truth society, that is to say, we live in a world where truth is allegedly subjective. Every person effectively has their truth, or every group has their truth, where as the Founding Fathers believed in truth with a capital T, that truth is absolute, certain, permanent, and universal.”
This is where the battle for America really begins. Are we going to allow an entire generation to be educated to believe that truth is subjective and thus so is morality?
“The reigning intellectual and moral orthodoxy of American intellectual life, American universities would be the twin towers of moral relativism and nihilism, and the idea here, and the goal of the left over the last 50 or 60 years has been this long march through the institutions,” noted Thompson. “What they’ve tried to do — and in fact, have done quite successfully — is to take over America’s cultural institutions, particularly education, particularly K through 12 education, and colleges and universities, and that’s where the real battle is. It’s a battle of ideas.”
Thompson goes on to say, “Unfortunately I think, too many libertarians and conservatives and classical liberals invest too much time in politics, whereas John Adams and Thomas Jefferson believed that — what really is the underpinning — the soul of a nation is how we educate our children. That’s the core issue, and so whoever controls the schools, and now also the universities, will control the culture.”
“As Andrew Breitbart once said, politics is downstream from culture, and culture is downstream from the universities, and so if we lose the battle for the universities — and our schools, K through 12 — then we find ourselves in a very difficult position,” Thompson foreshadows.
Thompson remarked, “I, like many other people, do worry about a potential coming civil war. Now, obviously a civil war in 21st century America would be significantly different than the kind we had in 1861, but it would be a different kind of civil war, and it may not involve violence at all, but it might involve the fracturing of America. Now, unlike the 1850s and 1860s, this is not a regional [war]. It’s not north versus south. It’s really ideological, and how we deal with that issue is unclear.”
With this concern comes Thompson’s theory that the way in which children are being educated now will have a profound impact on the result of a future civil war. He believes homeschooling is the best way to combat the pervasiveness of the progressive left’s agenda, which has infested government-run public schools all across the country.
“I do have hope in homeschooling,” Thompson stated. “I think homeschooling is one way in which we can recapture this culture, and I would argue, and have argued, that the leaders of the revolution are America’s homeschooling mothers. They’re the ones at the forefront of this change, and I would strongly encourage people to pull their kids out of government schools and to homeschool their children.”
We join him in that suggestion. If you can, get your children out of the public school system where they are undergoing intense progressive indoctrination. In the Civil War many families were divided as siblings went to fight for opposing sides. We will see the same division should another civil war occur but it will primarily be children splitting from their parents after having been brainwashed by the government education system for years.
The fight has begun, parents. Which side are you on?
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2014
That was the worst looking of a batch. The light is terrible. He does look like he's dying but he doesn't look like he's already dead in the others.
- Joined
- Aug 29, 2017
First, there was Rachel McKinnon and now it's Gus the cat.
'Most popular cat in the country': Gus enters dog race, comes first in category
www.smh.com.au
'Most popular cat in the country': Gus enters dog race, comes first in category
The cat that entered a dog swimming race in Sydney's northern beaches on Christmas Eve walked away with a gold in his category, and he celebrated with a Christmas swim.
Glenn Druery has declared that his 11-month Tonkinese, Gus, came first in the cat category in the Scotland Island Dog Race, as the only feline to enter.
Gus also beat quite a few of the dogs in the annual 550-metre swim between Scotland Island and Church Point Wharf on Tuesday, Mr Druery said.
"We started a little up-wind from the rest of the dogs, which gave us a bit of a lead," Mr Druery said.
"Dogs are a little bit down the evolutionary chain than cats and Gus had the tactical advantage, but eventually the brute force and muscle of the dogs came through.
"He still beat most of the 5 kilogram dogs, and Gus is 4.6 kilograms."
Gus joined about 70 dogs and their owners in this year's race, competing for the prize of dog food and beer.
A dog named Bolt came first in Tuesday's race.
However, Mr Druery said the crowd at the finish line "went wild" at the sight of Gus finishing the race.
"At the finish line, there was this little cat swimming among the dogs and the crowd went wild, they were chanting 'Gus, Gus, Gus'," Mr Druery said.
"It was like a goal kicked between Brazil and Argentina. I carried Gus to the support boat and it took 20 minutes to walk 50 metres, he was inundated with people wanting selfies.
"He was the most popular cat in the country."
Gus' participation in the race drew some controversy and race organiser Scott Taylor initially said the cat's entry into the event was "not happening", pointing to safety concerns.
But Gus was eventually welcomed into the race.
Mr Druery said Gus successfully completed the swim and will enter again next year, with training beginning on Christmas Day.
"I had lunch at the beach and myself and the kids went for a swim, and Gus went with us," Mr Druery said.
He said he and his partner Melissa got Gus after their dog Bob died a few years ago and decided to treat the cat just like a dog.
"After we got him, I walked into the water at the beach and he just followed me, to him this is normal life," Mr Druery said.
He said the entire race has changed after Tuesday.
"It's no longer a dog race, it's a pet race now, this is the end of dogmatism," Mr Druery said.
He also said that Gus' original family lives in the Colo region and has been severely affected by this year's bushfires, and called on people to contribute to the firefighting efforts.
"I hope Gus was the impetus to raise a lot more money, I encourage people to [contribute] a couple of bucks."
'Most popular cat in the country': Gus enters dog race, comes first in category
The Scotland Island Dog Race has been changed forever after the 11-month-old Tonkinese's groundbreaking performance.
Cat Menagerie
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Nov 2, 2018
What a piece of shit this guy continues to be.
okcfox.com
Report: Bloomberg campaign used Oklahoma prisoners to make campaign calls
The campaign for Democratic Presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg reportedly used prisoners, including some at the Eddie Warrior Correctional Facility in Oklahoma, to make campaign related phone calls. That story was first reported by The Intercept on Dec. 24. Bloomberg, when asked about the...
- Joined
- Oct 1, 2018
Just eat burgers to get tits apparently
nationalfile.com
DOCTOR: Burger King's 'Impossible Burger' Has Massive 44mg of Phytogestrogen Compared to Regular Burger's 2.5ng of Estrogen - National File
Burger King's Impossible Burger may cause men to grow breasts.
nationalfile.com
- Joined
- Jan 12, 2019
The response to this is so amazing that it deserves its own thread. People are going apeshit across the internet about the article, and it's not the first time that Impossible Foods has had to cover for its overuse of soy fats and the high isoflavone levels in its products.Just eat burgers to get tits apparently
DOCTOR: Burger King's 'Impossible Burger' Has Massive 44mg of Phytogestrogen Compared to Regular Burger's 2.5ng of Estrogen - National File
Burger King's Impossible Burger may cause men to grow breasts.
- Joined
- Jul 23, 2019
If he runs for the Dems in '20 it's going to be a battle of the supervillains between him and TrumpWhat a piece of shit this guy continues to be.
Report: Bloomberg campaign used Oklahoma prisoners to make campaign calls
The campaign for Democratic Presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg reportedly used prisoners, including some at the Eddie Warrior Correctional Facility in Oklahoma, to make campaign related phone calls. That story was first reported by The Intercept on Dec. 24. Bloomberg, when asked about the...
MrJokerRager
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Nov 2, 2019
Where the fuck is the article about that Peloton bike on this forum, did someone delete it? And how did you post the links to articles with the mini picture and small summary?
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'Peloton husband' gets real-life girlfriend a Peloton for Christmas (Archive)
What else did she expect?
The actor who played the husband in the infamous Peloton bike commercial got his real-life girlfriend a not so surprising Christmas present. Hopefully, his girlfriend’s year with the bike goes better than his on-screen wife’s did.
Actor Sean Hunter shared an image of his girlfriend with their new Peloton bike on Instagram (his account is appropriately named Pelotonhusband). The photo is captioned, “Here’s hoping this goes over better the second time… Merry Christmas to my actual girlfriend (please don’t leave me).”
Hunter’s post references the backlash to a commercial he starred in earlier this year for the bike company. In the ad, a husband gives his wife a Peloton bike for Christmas. She then spends the next year chronicling her use of the bike, which she initially seems excited about but shows hesitation using throughout the year.
By the commercial’s end, she’s used the bike for an entire year and says that it’s changed her.
The commercial went viral, but not for the reasons Peloton was hoping, however. It was mocked online, with the husband being called “abusive” and “a symbol of the patriarchy.”
Hunter, an actor and elementary school teacher in Vancouver, Canada, wrote a long response to Psychology Today about his experience with the commercial, which he shot in September, claiming when the clip was first posted, it was “well-received.”
“A few comments from my friends came in and the overall consensus was that it was awesome, one even mentioning, ‘I always knew you would make the big time.’ I appreciated the compliments, but in my eyes, it was just a small role. I was simply grateful for the experience.”
However, the positive reception was short-lived when the video went viral, he says, and now he fears it will haunt him for the rest of his career.
“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My 5 seconds of air time created an array of malicious feedback that is all associated with my face,” he said in the Psychology Today essay.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
'Peloton husband' gets real-life girlfriend a Peloton for Christmas (Archive)
What else did she expect?
The actor who played the husband in the infamous Peloton bike commercial got his real-life girlfriend a not so surprising Christmas present. Hopefully, his girlfriend’s year with the bike goes better than his on-screen wife’s did.
Actor Sean Hunter shared an image of his girlfriend with their new Peloton bike on Instagram (his account is appropriately named Pelotonhusband). The photo is captioned, “Here’s hoping this goes over better the second time… Merry Christmas to my actual girlfriend (please don’t leave me).”
Hunter’s post references the backlash to a commercial he starred in earlier this year for the bike company. In the ad, a husband gives his wife a Peloton bike for Christmas. She then spends the next year chronicling her use of the bike, which she initially seems excited about but shows hesitation using throughout the year.
By the commercial’s end, she’s used the bike for an entire year and says that it’s changed her.
The commercial went viral, but not for the reasons Peloton was hoping, however. It was mocked online, with the husband being called “abusive” and “a symbol of the patriarchy.”
Hunter, an actor and elementary school teacher in Vancouver, Canada, wrote a long response to Psychology Today about his experience with the commercial, which he shot in September, claiming when the clip was first posted, it was “well-received.”
“A few comments from my friends came in and the overall consensus was that it was awesome, one even mentioning, ‘I always knew you would make the big time.’ I appreciated the compliments, but in my eyes, it was just a small role. I was simply grateful for the experience.”
However, the positive reception was short-lived when the video went viral, he says, and now he fears it will haunt him for the rest of his career.
“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My 5 seconds of air time created an array of malicious feedback that is all associated with my face,” he said in the Psychology Today essay.
- Joined
- Oct 6, 2014
So, there's a new, more #WOKE version of A Christmas Carol out now:
blogs.spectator.co.uk
My favorite review of it is this one:
"What I liked most of all: [...] Child molestation!"
BBC's A Christmas Carol was the victim of tub-thumping lefty politics | The Spectator
'People trust us,' claimed Lord Hall, recently. But like a lot of what you hear from the BBC these days I'm not sure that that is strictly accurate. The BBC's shamelessly biased news coverage over Brexit was bad enough but what has really started in sticking in viewers' craws is the way its...
My favorite review of it is this one:
"What I liked most of all: [...] Child molestation!"
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2014
Christmas really needed this.
Cat Menagerie
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Nov 2, 2018
This whole saga has been fascinating to watch unfold. @AnOminous the depravity in your profession seems to know no true depths.
www.news9.com
OKC Attorney Named Person Of Interest In Beggs Triple Homicide Faces Potential Suspension Of Law License
In newly filed court documents the Oklahoma Bar Association has presented evidence to the Supreme Court of Oklahoma to have an interim suspension of Harroz’s license to practice law. Documents state multiple reasons why they have a strong case. &ldq
- Joined
- May 3, 2019
Anti-Semitic graffiti daubed on London shops and cafes
The vandalism during Hanukkah is being treated as a "racially motivated hate crime", police say.
www.bbc.co.uk
- Joined
- May 24, 2019
Woman falls from 100ft cliff while looking at her phone
The woman was stuck at the bottom of the cliffs for 13 hours until a hiker heard her cries
I like to imagine she was too busy Tweeting about her current condition to phone for help.
- Joined
- Aug 20, 2018
How Herpes Became a Sexual Boogeyman
"It’s not a serious health threat."
slate.com
~~~~~
Why do liberals love diseases and perverts?
"It’s not a serious health threat."
How Herpes Became a Sexual Boogeyman
The real story of its journey from minor skin condition to “sexual leprosy.”
~~~~~
Why do liberals love diseases and perverts?
Last edited:
- Joined
- Dec 28, 2014
How Herpes Became a Sexual Boogeyman
"It’s not a serious health threat."
How Herpes Became a Sexual Boogeyman
The real story of its journey from minor skin condition to “sexual leprosy.”
~~~~~
Why do liberals live diseases and perverts?
Eat the bugs, bigot. Get pozzed up, it's totally okay, phobe! Suck the girl penis, TERF!
- Joined
- Aug 3, 2017
Just eat burgers to get tits apparently
DOCTOR: Burger King's 'Impossible Burger' Has Massive 44mg of Phytogestrogen Compared to Regular Burger's 2.5ng of Estrogen - National File
Burger King's Impossible Burger may cause men to grow breasts.
Increase your bust AND your waistline!
- Joined
- Nov 15, 2016
@AnOminous the depravity in your profession seems to know no true depths.
OKC Attorney Named Person Of Interest In Beggs Triple Homicide Faces Potential Suspension Of Law License
In newly filed court documents the Oklahoma Bar Association has presented evidence to the Supreme Court of Oklahoma to have an interim suspension of Harroz’s license to practice law. Documents state multiple reasons why they have a strong case. &ldq
I think the states around me suspend your license automatically if you're accused of a felony. Weird that this state doesn't.
edit: Person of Interest, that bullshit status meaning she hasn't been accused of anything. Never mind.
edit2: She has been accused of intimidating a witness, just not murder. That was only in the video, not in the text.
These days, everyone thinks it’s a cesspit. But it’s changed whose voices we hear. That’s a good thing.
Twitter Made Us Better
A DECADE OF DISTRUST
By Sarah J. Jackson
Dr. Jackson is a professor at the University of Pennsylvania.
DEC. 27, 2019
It’s impossible to avoid news about how harmful social media can be. The Cambridge Analytica scandal. The ubiquitous Russian bots. The lackadaisical response of tech industry leaders to privacy violations, election meddling and harassment.
All the optimism about social media as a vehicle for social change that followed the Arab Spring in 2011 has largely dissipated. Twitter — which once prompted users with the innocuous question “What are you doing?” — is now better known as a home for unforgiving criticism, stripped of the politeness that can soften real-life interactions. Many have become social media cynics.
Despite it all, the way we use Twitter made this decade better.
Rightful critiques of social media, and Twitter in particular, shouldn’t obscure the significance of the conversations that have happened there over the past 10 years. As we enter 2020, powerful individuals and societal problems can no longer avoid public scrutiny. That’s thanks in part to those who have demanded attention through the website. The online activism and commentary that take place on Twitter are often dismissed as expressions of “cancel culture” or “woke culture.” But a closer look reveals what’s really happening: Many people who lacked public platforms 10 years ago — the young and members of marginalized groups in particular — are speaking up, insisting on being heard.
For our forthcoming book, “#HashtagActivism: Networks of Race and Gender Justice,” my colleagues and I studied how groups including African-Americans, survivors of gendered violence and transgender women have used Twitter to build vibrant communities and to influence news and politics. We found that movements like #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo, while they had pre-Twitter origins, were pushed into mainstream consciousness by networks of ordinary people sharing firsthand stories, making demands and developing shared political narratives on the site. Without Twitter, these campaigns for race and gender justice would still exist, but they wouldn’t have nearly the same momentum.
It’s well known that African-Americans’ influence on Twitter — where they are overrepresented both compared with their numbers in the United States population and compared with other demographic groups who use the internet — shapes meme culture, fashion trends, slang and humor.
But it also fuels cultural criticism and political demands.
MAX WHITTAKER FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Just look at the record: With #OscarsSoWhite, users drew attention to the 2015 and 2016 nominations that featured no people of color in any of the lead or supporting actor categories. That hasn’t happened since, and in 2019 the hashtag’s creator, April Reign, was invited by the academy to attend the award ceremony. When a CNN headline about a black man found hanging from a tree in Mississippi inexplicably focused on his criminal record, #CNNBeLike inspired parodies of the network’s framing and the prevalence of racist media stereotypes. That was undoubtedly noticed by journalists responsible for deciding how to present reporting to their audiences. #CosbyMeme, a hashtag that originated with the actor’s own account and asked fans to create memes about him, was hijacked to redirect focus to his assaults on women. #IfSlaveryWasAChoice captured the absurdity of Kanye West’s bizarre analysis of American history, using stinging sarcasm to make clear that the rapper was not to be taken seriously.
Without Twitter, far fewer Americans would have heard the names Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown and Sandra Bland — black people whose deaths have become synonymous with #BlackLivesMatter activism. When users deployed the hashtag #TamirRice — the name of the 12-year-old black boy who was holding a toy gun when he was killed by a police officer — alongside #EmmettTill, the platform was being used to link current events to the long history of anti-black violence once documented by accounts like Ida B. Wells’s 1895 book “The Red Record.” These digital campaigns pushed many major news outlets to report more thoroughly on police shootings. The ways in which local and federal agencies collect and track use-of-force data have changed.
Long before #MeToo, hashtags like #YesAllWomen (used to note the pervasiveness of misogynistic violence), #GirlsLikeUs (used to discuss issues facing transgender women) and #YouOkSis (used to draw attention to black women’s experiences with street harassment) were deployed by diverse groups of women to illustrate how, to borrow the old feminist refrain, the personal is political.
Twitter users have disrupted a media landscape where gatekeepers — in an industry that has always fallen short when it comes to race and gender diversity — were for too long solely responsible for setting the agenda of what we talked about as a country. While most Americans do not have Twitter accounts, journalists and politicians often do, and they have turned heavily in the past decade to the activists, scholars and people of color on Twitter to inform their coverage and policies. When they haven’t done so, these communities have responded resoundingly online. And America has listened.
Twitter has fundamentally altered the ways many communities interact with the media, as users feel empowered to challenge harmful framing. “I think the presence of Asian-Americans on Twitter has actually really showed journalists, editors and people in general in the newsroom how it is important to cover Asian-American issues,” one user told my colleagues and me in an interview for a report published by the Knight Foundation. “With Twitter, you can call out a publication if they mess up, or if they don’t cover certain topics. Now there’s accountability.”
Film producers, television writers and advertisers have changed the way they create content to respond to fans who express their views online. Showrunners from USA Network and the CW have acknowledged the influence of Twitter fans on the content of their programs. Hashtags like #NotBuyingIt have called brands from Huggies to BMW to account for sexist ads. After a boycott promoted on Twitter, the Hallmark Channel reversed a decision to exclude advertisements featuring a lesbian couple. Gone are the days when a piece of art could promote stereotypes, demean women or ignore the existence of people of color without a backlash. Professional critics might identify these problems. Twitter users definitely will. They’ll demand better. And many times, they receive it.
It’s not surprising when powerful people resent Twitter, calling the critiques that come from it too negative, too intolerant, too sensitive. Twitter didn’t invent knee-jerk reactions, conflict or polarization, but it did expand the set of voices all of us have to hear.
Like all technological tools, Twitter can be exploited for evil and harnessed for good. Just as the printing press was used to publish content that argued fervently for slavery, it was also used by abolitionists to make the case for manumission. Just as radio and television were used to stir up the fervor of McCarthyism, they were also used to undermine it.
Twitter has fallen short in many ways. But this decade, it helped ordinary people change our world.
Sarah Jackson is a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and a co-author of the forthcoming book “#Hashtag Activism: Networks of Race and Gender Justice.”
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- Joined
- Aug 29, 2017
BTW Australia is on fire.
Look at this native koala who came out of the bush playing nice. (NB: They'll scratch you, they stink and more often than not they have chlamydia.)
Look at this native koala who came out of the bush playing nice. (NB: They'll scratch you, they stink and more often than not they have chlamydia.)
- Joined
- Aug 29, 2017
The article is a bit dry, but it's kinda interesting.
Secrets of how Russian attack helicopters came to Australia revealed 20 years later
www.abc.net.au
Secrets of how Russian attack helicopters came to Australia revealed 20 years later
Darwin's waste dump seems an inglorious full stop to an exciting story involving Russian helicopters, mercenary special forces soldiers and the fall of a prime minister at the brink of a military revolt.
But the events that led to two Mi-24 gunship choppers being secretly buried in the hazardous waste section of the Shoal Bay landfill have largely been a mystery — until now.
Cabinet papers from 1998 and 1999, released by the National Archives, go some way to explain these curious events.
Australia's northern neighbour Papua New Guinea was having trouble quelling the separatist movement in Bougainville, which had developed into a full-blown conflict that eventually cost tens of thousands of lives.
Frustrated by failed attempts to have rebel leader Francis Ona attend peace talks, PNG Prime Minister Sir Julius Chan took the remarkable decision to contract British-based private military consultants Sandline International to help quash the secessionist movement.
The $50 million deal, signed in January 1997 to the horror of the then Howard government, would have seen foreign mercenaries flown in to destroy the Bougainville rebellion, using second-hand military equipment.
But two months later, on March 27, 1997, Australia agreed to a request from the PNG government to accept custody of the gear bought by PNG from Sandline.
"The PNG government was concerned about the delivery of the equipment to PNG in the uncertain political circumstance that prevailed at the time," then defence minister John Moore wrote in his confidential cabinet submission.
That was an understatement.
Sir Julius was facing angry public protests and a mutiny from his army. The Sandline affair precipitated the end of his prime ministership by June and the resignation of several ministers.
But Australia became the reluctant custodian of two Russian Mi-24 gunships built in 1983, armed with machine guns, plus two Mi-8 transport helicopters (built in 1972-73, cabinet was informed) and associated ordnance.
This included, Mr Moore told cabinet, ammunition, air-to-surface rockets, rocket fuse, signal cartridges and initiators.
It was quite the cache.
All of it had been delivered to RAAF Tindal, near Katherine, by a Sandline-chartered Antonov-124 aircraft.
But what to do with it?
Cabinet was advised that the machine guns and rocket pods attached to the helicopters were classified "weapons of war" and could only be stored on defence property.
But a defence inspection of the ordnance in December 1998 found that the rockets and fuses were the main concern. The rocket motors were "suffering significant cadmium corrosion", according to a cabinet note, making them a toxic hazard to anyone who came in contact with them. Their safety could not be guaranteed after December 1999.
On May 1, 1999, Bill Skate, who had replaced Sir Julius as PNG PM, announced he had reached an settlement with Sandline. PNG would pay the company $US13.3 million in four instalments over 12 months and all un-delivered equipment would be deemed the property of Sandline.
The then Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer was told PNG waived any ownership of the helicopters, the ordnance, the rocket pods, ammunition and everything else.
Cabinet wanted destruction of the ordnance but wanted Sandline to chip in half of the $32,000 cost, which was eventually agreed.
That left the not insignificant matter of four Russian helicopters that were taking up some valued space inside RAAF Tindal, a sensitive military base.
Cabinet considered charging Sandline for the inconvenience, on the hope that it "would increase the pressure on Sandline to find an acceptable buyer or to abandon the helicopters".
The cabinet papers reveal patience was running out with Sandline and its mercenary ways.
"Notwithstanding the legal delays and some negative publicity, Sandline has done well out of its foray into PNG," Mr Moore told Cabinet.
"When the PNG government has paid its final instalment under the contract, Sandline will have received a total of $US31.3 million for its services.
He noted that the company's retention of the helicopters' ownership demonstrated Sandline's intention to further profit on the deal.
"Except possibly for spare parts, the helicopters are not a particularly good buy," the minister wrote.
But the whole episode had left cabinet with a sour taste.
"Sandline's controversial reputation, especially through its involvement in PNG and Sierra Leone, means that the Australian government's dealings with the company will be subjected to extra scrutiny," Mr Moore warned cabinet.
"It would be preferable not to publicly release the details of our discussions with Sandline until the issues are resolved."
In the end, a buyer for the Mi-24 attack helicopters could not be found.
The possibility of a new home at the Darwin Aviation Museum was abandoned when it was discovered the Soviet-era choppers were riddled with asbestos.
In July 2016, the helicopters were placed into a shipping container and quietly taken to the Darwin tip.
There they were buried. One last journey only recently uncovered.
Secrets of how Russian attack helicopters came to Australia revealed 20 years later
Papua New Guinea bought the military hardware in the 1990s to quell violence, but buyer's remorse landed the helicopters in Australia.
- Joined
- May 22, 2016
With taxidermist's help, Alberta man preserves bones of his amputated arm
Taxidermist had to check: 'You don't want someone bringing you a random arm'
The bones of Mark's Holmgren's amputated arm have been bleached and glued back together. (Legends Taxidermy and Skull Cleaning)
When Mark Holmgren had his arm amputated this spring, he couldn't stand the thought of his severed limb ending up in the trash.
Instead, he had his arm bones cleaned, mounted and preserved for posterity.
"If I was going to get rid of it, I wanted to do something cool with it," Holmgren said in an interview Tuesday with CBC Radio's Edmonton AM.
"I thought about it for years, you know. I always see those Halloween decorations with a hand holding an ashtray or something like that. That's where I got the idea from."
Holmgren was 17 when he wiped out on his brother's motorbike, severely damaging the nerves in his right arm and shoulder.
The limb hung immobile and numb at his side for years before he finally decided to have it amputated and contacted doctors at the University of Alberta Hospital.
'Sign a piece of paper'
After meeting with his surgeon, Holmgren sheepishly asked that he be allowed to keep his severed arm after surgery.
"I was even worried about asking the doctor, like, will they think I'm crazy or something? But I asked, and they just said I had to sign a piece of paper and I could have it."
A few weeks after his operation, Holmgren brought his arm home from the hospital in a garbage bag and kept it on ice in his freezer as he tried to find a willing taxidermist for the job.
It proved difficult to find one willing to handle human flesh.
"They all pretty much shut me down right quick," he said.
Holmgren brings home his severed arm in a garbage bag. (Mark Holmgren/Facebook)
'Putting that puzzle together'
Holmgren said he was rejected five times before a hunter friend put him in touch with Danielle Swift, who — along with her husband David — operates Legends Taxidermy and Skull Cleaning in Drayton Valley, Alta.
"I thought he was joking. I don't think I'll ever get a phone call like that in my life. I think I hesitated for maybe 10 seconds," Swift said.
"I thought, whoa, that's weird but, whoa, that's cool.
"When I told my husband about it he was, like, 'No way.' But I said, 'It's too late, he's already on his way.' "
Swift said she gets many "weird requests." She often rejects customers who want their dead pets stuffed, but she wasn't squeamish about working on Holmgren's arm.
"I get the feeling of not wanting to lose a part of yourself," she said. "It was done to honour his arm."
"Mark brought his arm here, but I had to make sure he actually only had one arm attached to his body, because you don't want someone bringing you a random arm."
Swift met with Holmgren before setting the bones inside a tank of flesh-eating beetles.
The colony of bugs picked the bones clean.
"It's human, it's not something that's scary. But when I actually took it out of the bag and I held it, that's when I was like, whoa, this is a little creepy. But at the same time, I thought, I saw the man, he is alive. I will get over it."
After they were cleaned and bleached, Swift enlisted the help of a physiotherapist friend to reassemble the complicated network of bones.
"That project took some time, that's for sure," she said. "There was just no way I was putting that puzzle together by myself.
"I think this is going to be in the top five requests I've had in my life."
Holmgren, 38, has put his arm on display in his home and couldn't be more pleased with the final product.
"I'll probably put a nail in the wall and hang it up like a picture," he said. "Right now it's behind my sink. There is a little shelf behind there with some flowers and plants and stuff.
"It's exactly what I wanted. It's all glued back together and it looks good. To me, it looks great."
Taxidermist had to check: 'You don't want someone bringing you a random arm'
The bones of Mark's Holmgren's amputated arm have been bleached and glued back together. (Legends Taxidermy and Skull Cleaning)
When Mark Holmgren had his arm amputated this spring, he couldn't stand the thought of his severed limb ending up in the trash.
Instead, he had his arm bones cleaned, mounted and preserved for posterity.
"If I was going to get rid of it, I wanted to do something cool with it," Holmgren said in an interview Tuesday with CBC Radio's Edmonton AM.
"I thought about it for years, you know. I always see those Halloween decorations with a hand holding an ashtray or something like that. That's where I got the idea from."
Holmgren was 17 when he wiped out on his brother's motorbike, severely damaging the nerves in his right arm and shoulder.
The limb hung immobile and numb at his side for years before he finally decided to have it amputated and contacted doctors at the University of Alberta Hospital.
'Sign a piece of paper'
After meeting with his surgeon, Holmgren sheepishly asked that he be allowed to keep his severed arm after surgery.
"I was even worried about asking the doctor, like, will they think I'm crazy or something? But I asked, and they just said I had to sign a piece of paper and I could have it."
A few weeks after his operation, Holmgren brought his arm home from the hospital in a garbage bag and kept it on ice in his freezer as he tried to find a willing taxidermist for the job.
It proved difficult to find one willing to handle human flesh.
"They all pretty much shut me down right quick," he said.
Holmgren brings home his severed arm in a garbage bag. (Mark Holmgren/Facebook)
'Putting that puzzle together'
Holmgren said he was rejected five times before a hunter friend put him in touch with Danielle Swift, who — along with her husband David — operates Legends Taxidermy and Skull Cleaning in Drayton Valley, Alta.
"I thought he was joking. I don't think I'll ever get a phone call like that in my life. I think I hesitated for maybe 10 seconds," Swift said.
"I thought, whoa, that's weird but, whoa, that's cool.
"When I told my husband about it he was, like, 'No way.' But I said, 'It's too late, he's already on his way.' "
Swift said she gets many "weird requests." She often rejects customers who want their dead pets stuffed, but she wasn't squeamish about working on Holmgren's arm.
"I get the feeling of not wanting to lose a part of yourself," she said. "It was done to honour his arm."
"Mark brought his arm here, but I had to make sure he actually only had one arm attached to his body, because you don't want someone bringing you a random arm."
Swift met with Holmgren before setting the bones inside a tank of flesh-eating beetles.
The colony of bugs picked the bones clean.
"It's human, it's not something that's scary. But when I actually took it out of the bag and I held it, that's when I was like, whoa, this is a little creepy. But at the same time, I thought, I saw the man, he is alive. I will get over it."
After they were cleaned and bleached, Swift enlisted the help of a physiotherapist friend to reassemble the complicated network of bones.
"That project took some time, that's for sure," she said. "There was just no way I was putting that puzzle together by myself.
"I think this is going to be in the top five requests I've had in my life."
Holmgren, 38, has put his arm on display in his home and couldn't be more pleased with the final product.
"I'll probably put a nail in the wall and hang it up like a picture," he said. "Right now it's behind my sink. There is a little shelf behind there with some flowers and plants and stuff.
"It's exactly what I wanted. It's all glued back together and it looks good. To me, it looks great."