#secret shanghai voting

[romajuliettemai]

I never thought about it this way but Chloe is actually so real for this one (in case you can't read what she captioned at the bottom, it says, "ROMA VS JULIETTE NOOOOOOO IT'S THE BOOK 1 RIVALRY BUT IN SHOWDOWN FORM")

And I literally could not have worded it better myself-

Now here's a question for anyone who sees this post: If you had to join either the Scarlet Gang or the White Flowers, which one would you pick, and why?

I would honestly pick the Scarlet Gang, one because my girl Juliette's in there and I am biased as fuck (I love her so much honestly my idol fr), and two because I just love the colors and the mansion sounds cool- idk the scarlet gang is just what I would rather join.

#chloe gong #these violent delights #our violent ends #foul lady fortune #last violent call #foul heart huntsman #secret shanghai series #secret shanghai voting #secret shanghai #secret shanghai finale #roma montagov #juliette cai #roma mai #juliette mai

[crispydonuts]

ROMA VS JULIETTE SHOWDOWN JDJDJSJDJSJS ITS GIVING BOOK 1 WITHOUT GUNS AND VIOLENCE

#my vote goes to juliette #these violent delights #our violent ends #secret shanghai #juliette cai #roma montagov #whahahaha krazy

[hotvintagepoll]

Propaganda

Ann Sheridan (I Was a War Male Bride, City for Conquest, The Man Who Came to Dinner)—she was called 'the oomph girl' and i think that deserves a vote

Marlene Dietrich (Shanghai Express, Witness for the Prosecution, Morocco)—its marlene dietrich!!!! queer legend, easily the hottest person to ever wear a tuxedo, that hot hot voice, those glamorous glamorous movies.... most famously she starred in a string of movies directed by josef von sternberg throughout the 1930s, beginning with the blue angel which catapulted her to stardom in the role of the cabaret singer lola lola. known for his exquisite eye for lighting, texture, imagery, von sternberg devoted himself over the course of their collaborations to acquiring exceptional skill at photographing dietrich herself in particular, a worthy direction in which to expend effort im sure we can all agree. she collaborated with many other great directors of the era as well, including rouben mamoulian (song of songs), frank borzage (desire), ernst lubitsch (angel), fritz lang (rancho notorious), and billy wilder (witness for the prosecution). the encyclopedia britannica entry im looking at while compiling this propaganda describes her as having an “aura of sophistication and languid sexuality” which✔️💯. born marie magdalene dietrich, she combined her first and middle names to coin the moniker “marlene”. she was a trendsetter in her incorporation of trousers, suits, and menswear into her wardrobe and her androgynous allure was often remarked upon. critic kenneth tynan wrote, “She has sex, but no particular gender. She has the bearing of a man; the characters she plays love power and wear trousers. Her masculinity appeals to women and her sexuality to men.” in the 1920s she enjoyed the vibrant queer nightlife of weimar berlin, visiting gay bars and drag balls, and in hollywood her love affairs with men and women were an open secret. she was an ardent opponent of nazi germany, refusing lucrative contacts offered her to make films there, raising money with billy wilder to help jews and dissidents escape, and undertaking extensive USO tours to entertain soldiers with an act that included her a playing musical saw and doing a mindreading routine she learned from orson welles. starting in the 50s and continuing into the mid-70s she worked largely as a cabaret artist touring the world to large audiences, employing burt bacharach as her musical arranger.

This is round 1 of the tournament. All other polls in this bracket can be found here. Please reblog with further support of your beloved hot sexy vintage woman.

[additional propaganda submitted under the cut.]

"ms dietrich....ms dietrich pls.....sit on my face"

"First of all, there are those publicity photos of her in a tux. Second of all, I have never been the same since knowing that she sent copies of those photos to her Berlin lovers signed "Daddy Marlene." Not only is she hot in all circumstances, but she can do everything from earthy to ice queen. Also, she kept getting sexy romantic lead parts in Hollywood after the age of 40, which would be rare even now. She hated Nazis, loved her friends, and had a sapphic social circle in Hollywood. She also had cheekbones that could cut glass and a voice that could melt you."

"Did a bunch of humanitarian work during ww2, pretty sure a shot of her from Shanghai express was the inspiration for one of queens album covers and also her in the suit in Morocco (1930) CHANGED LIVES. I’m sure she’s already been submitted but I wanted an opportunity to submit one of my favourite pictures of her for the poll"

Bisexual icon, super hot when dressed both masculine and feminine, lived up her life in the queer Berlin scene of the 1920s, central to the 'sewing circle' of the secret sapphic actresses of Old Hollywood, refused lucrative offers by the Nazis and helped Jews and others under persecution to escape Nazi Germany, the love of my life

Her GENDER her looks her voice her everything

“In her films and record-breaking cabaret performances, Miss Dietrich artfully projected cool sophistication, self-mockery and infinite experience. Her sexuality was audacious, her wit was insolent and her manner was ageless. With a world-weary charm and a diaphanous gown showing off her celebrated legs, she was the quintessential cabaret entertainer of Weimar-era Germany.”

"The bar scene in Morocco awoke something in me and ultimately changed my gender"

"Her manner, the critic Kenneth Tynan wrote, was that of ‘a serpentine lasso whereby her voice casually winds itself around our most vulnerable fantasies.’ Her friend Maurice Chevalier said: ‘Dietrich is something that never existed before and may never exist again.’”

"Songstress, photographer, fashion icon, out bisexual phenom (notoriously stole Lupe Velez and Joan Crawford's men, and Errol Flynn's wife, had a torrid affair with Greta Garbo that ended in a 60-year feud, other notable conquests including Erich Maria Remarque -yes, the guy who wrote All Quiet on the Western Front- Douglas Fairbanks Junior, Claudette Colbert, Mercedes de Acosta, Edith Piaf), anti-Nazi activist. Marlene was a bitch - she had an open marriage for decades and one of her favorite things was making catty commentary about her current lover with her husband, and her relationship with her daughter was painful- but she was also immensely talented, a hard worker, an opponent of fascism and the hottest ice queen in Hollywood for a long time."

"She can sing! She can act! She told the Nazis to fuck off and became a US citizen out of spite! She worked with other German exiles to create a fund to help Jews and German dissidents escape (she donated an entire movie salary, about $450k, to the cause). She looks REALLY GOOD in a suit. If you're not convinced, please listen to her sing "Lili Marlene". Absolutely gorgeous woman with a gorgeous voice."

Gifset link

"Bisexual icon and Nazi-hater. Looks absolutely stunning in the suits she liked to wear. 'I dress for the image. Not for myself, not for the public, not for fashion, not for men'."

"would you not let her walk on you?"

#marlene dietrich #ann sheridan #hotvintagepoll #fuck that old woman #ladies 1

[skepticalcatfrog]

I'll probably draw all my ideas, don't worry, but I'll do them in the order of how many votes each one gets! I'll start with whichever gets the most.

#these violent delights #our violent ends #foul lady fortune #foul heart huntsman #last violent call #roma montagov #juliette cai #marshall seo #benedikt montagov #alisa montagova #those are the various characters featured in my ideas btw #but that's all you get to know #chloe gong #secret shanghai

[mariacallous]

Today marks two years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. This week, we detailed the growing crisis in Eastern Ukraine, which is now littered with deadly mines. As it fights back the invading Russian forces, Ukraine’s government is working to develop new mine-clearing technology that could help save lives around the globe.

A leaked document obtained by WIRED has revealed the secret placement of gunshot-detection sensors in locations around the United States and its territories. According to the document, which ShotSpotter's parent company authenticated, the sensors, which are used by police departments in dozens of metropolitan areas in the United States, are largely located in low-income and minority communities, according to WIRED’s analysis, adding crucial context in a long-running debate over police use of the technology.

Speaking of leaks, WIRED this week obtained 15 years of messages posted to an internal system used by members of the US Congress. The House Intelligence Committee used the “Dear Colleagues” system to warn lawmakers of an “urgent matter”—something that has not happened since at least 2009. That urgent matter, which was quickly leaked to the press, turned out to be related to Russian military research of space-based weapons. But some sources say the matter wasn’t urgent at all, and the warning was instead an attempt by House Intelligence leadership to derail a vote on privacy reforms to a major US surveillance program.

On Tuesday, a coalition of law enforcement agencies led by the UK’s National Crime Agency disrupted the LockBit ransomware gang’s operation, seizing its infrastructure, dark-web leak site, and code used to carry out its attacks against thousands of institutions globally. Although ransomware attacks resulted in a record $1.1 billion in ransom payments last year, Anne Neuberger, a top US cyber official in the Biden administration, tells WIRED how the 2021 ransomware attack on Colonial Pipeline has transformed the ways American institutions defend against and respond to such attacks.

In dual wins for privacy this week, the Signal Foundation began its rollout of usernames for its popular end-to-end encrypted messaging app. The update will allow people to connect without having to reveal their phone numbers. Meanwhile, Apple began to future-proof its encryption for iMessage with the launch of PQ3, a next-generation encryption protocol designed to resist decryption from quantum computers.

And there’s more. Each week, we highlight the news we didn’t cover in-depth ourselves. Click on the headlines below to read the full stories. And stay safe out there.

A Mysterious Leak Exposed Chinese Hacking Secrets

Hundreds of documents linked to a Chinese hacking-for-hire firm were dumped online this week. The files belong to i-Soon, a Shanghai-based company, and give a rare glimpse into the secretive world of the industry that supports China’s state-backed hacking. The leak includes details of Chinese hacking operations, lists of victims and potential targets, and the day-to-day complaints of i-Soon staff.

“These leaked documents support TeamT5’s long-standing analysis: China's private cybersecurity sector is pivotal in supporting China’s APT attacks globally,” Che Chang, a cyber threat analyst at the Taiwan-based cybersecurity firm TeamT5, tells WIRED. Chang says the company has been tracking i-Soon since 2020 and found that it has a close relationship with Chengdu 404, a company linked to China’s state-backed hackers.

While the documents have now been removed from GitHub, where they were first posted, the identity and motivations of the person, or people, who leaked them remains a mystery. However, Chang says the documents appear to be real, a fact confirmed by two employees working for i-Soon, according to the Associated Press, which reported that the company and police in China are investigating the leak.

“There are around eight categories of the leaked files. We can see how i-Soon engaged with China's national security authorities, the details of i-Soon’s products and financial problems,” Chang says. “More importantly, we spotted documents detailing how i-Soon supported the development of the notorious remote access Trojan (RAT), ShadowPad,” Chang adds. The ShadowPad malware has been used by Chinese hacking groups since at least 2017.

Since the files were first published, security researchers have been poring over their contents and analyzing the documentation. Included were references to software to run disinformation campaigns on X, details of efforts to access communications data across Asia, and targets within governments in the United Kingdom, India, and elsewhere, according to reports by the New York Times and the The Washington Post. The documents also reveal how i-Soon worked for China’s Ministry of State Security and the People’s Liberation Army.

According to researchers at SentinelOne, the files also include pictures of “custom hardware snooping devices,” such as a power bank that could help steal data and the company’s marketing materials. “In a bid to get work in Xinjiang–where China subjects millions of Ugyhurs to what the UN Human Rights Council has called genocide–the company bragged about past counterterrorism work,” the researchers write. “The company listed other terrorism-related targets the company had hacked previously as evidence of their ability to perform these tasks, including targeting counterterrorism centers in Pakistan and Afghanistan.”

Avast Fined for Selling People’s Browsing Data

The Federal Trade Commission has fined antivirus firm Avast $16.5 for collecting and selling people’s web browsing data through its browser extensions and security software. This included the details of web searches and the sites people visited, which, according to the FTC, revealed people’s “religious beliefs, health concerns, political leanings, location, financial status, visits to child-directed content and other sensitive information.” The company sold the data through its subsidiary Jumpshot, the FTC said in an order announcing the fine.

The ban also places five obligations on Avast: not to sell or license browsing data for advertising purposes; to obtain consent if it is selling data from non-Avast products; delete information it transferred to Jumpshot and any algorithms created from the data; tell customers about the data it sold; and introduce a new privacy program to address the problems the FTC found. An Avast spokesperson said that while they “disagree with the FTC’s allegations and characterization of the facts,” they are “pleased to resolve this matter.”

Scammers Sent Apple 5,000 Fake iPhones, Hoped to Get Real Devices in Return

Two Chinese nationals living in Maryland—Haotian Sun and Pengfei Xue—have been convicted of mail fraud and a conspiracy to commit mail fraud for a scheme that involved sending 5,000 counterfeit iPhones to Apple. The pair, who could each face up to 20 years in prison, according to the The Register, hoped Apple would send them real phones in return. The fake phones had “spoofed serial numbers and/or IMEI numbers” to trick Apple stores or authorized service providers into thinking they were genuine. The scam took place between May 2017 and September 2019 and would have cost Apple more than $3 million in losses, a US Department of Justice press release says.

Fingerprints Cloned From the Sound They Make on Your Screen

Security researchers from the US and China have created a new side-channel attack that can reconstruct people’s fingerprints from the sounds they create as you swipe them across your phone screen. The researchers used built-in microphones in devices to capture the “faint friction sounds” made by a finger and then used these sounds to create fingerprints. “The attack scenario of PrintListener is extensive and covert,” the researchers write in a paper detailing their work. “It can attack up to 27.9 percent of partial fingerprints and 9.3 percent of complete fingerprints within five attempts.” The research raises concerns about real-world hackers who are attempting to steal people’s biometrics to access bank accounts.

[no-1-rosalind-lang-apologist]

All I’m saying is that some opinions are wrong

#chloe gong #foul lady fortune #secret shanghai #foul heart huntsman #these violent delights #flf #tvd #rosalind lang #orion hong #our violent ends #ove #fhh #last violent call #lvc #a foul thing #this foul murder #juliette cai #roma montagov #benedikt montagov #marshall seo #celia lang #oliver hong #phoebe hong #silas wu #alisa montagova

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 4.12

240 – Shapur I becomes co-emperor of the Sasanian Empire with his father Ardashir I. 467 – Anthemius is elevated to Emperor of the Western Roman Empire. 627 – King Edwin of Northumbria is converted to Christianity by Paulinus, bishop of York. 1012 – Duke Oldřich of Bohemia deposes and blinds his brother Jaromír, who flees to Poland. 1204 – The Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade breach the walls of Constantinople and enter the city, which they completely occupy the following day. 1606 – The Union Flag is adopted as the flag of English and Scottish ships. 1776 – American Revolution: With the Halifax Resolves, the North Carolina Provincial Congress authorizes its Congressional delegation to vote for independence from Britain. 1807 – The Froberg mutiny on Malta ends when the remaining mutineers blow up the magazine of Fort Ricasoli. 1820 – Alexander Ypsilantis is declared leader of Filiki Eteria, a secret organization to overthrow Ottoman rule over Greece. 1831 – Soldiers marching on the Broughton Suspension Bridge in Manchester, England, cause it to collapse. 1861 – American Civil War: Battle of Fort Sumter. The war begins with Confederate forces firing on Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina. 1862 – American Civil War: The Andrews Raid (the Great Locomotive Chase) occurs, starting from Big Shanty, Georgia (now Kennesaw). 1864 – American Civil War: The Battle of Fort Pillow: Confederate forces kill most of the African American soldiers that surrendered at Fort Pillow, Tennessee. 1865 – American Civil War: Mobile, Alabama, falls to the Union Army. 1877 – The United Kingdom annexes the Transvaal. 1900 – One day after its enactment by the Congress, President William McKinley signs the Foraker Act into law, giving Puerto Rico limited self-rule. 1910 – SMS Zrínyi, one of the last pre-dreadnought battleships built by the Austro-Hungarian Navy, is launched. 1917 – World War I: Canadian forces successfully complete the taking of Vimy Ridge from the Germans. 1927 – Shanghai massacre of 1927: Chiang Kai-shek orders the Chinese Communist Party members executed in Shanghai, ending the First United Front. 1927 – Rocksprings, Texas is hit by an F5 tornado that destroys 235 of the 247 buildings in the town, kills 72 townspeople and injures 205; third deadliest tornado in Texas history. 1928 – The Bremen, a German Junkers W 33 type aircraft, takes off for the first successful transatlantic aeroplane flight from east to west. 1934 – The strongest surface wind gust in the world at the time of 231 mph, is measured on the summit of Mount Washington, New Hampshire. It has since been surpassed. 1934 – The U.S. Auto-Lite strike begins, culminating in a five-day melee between Ohio National Guard troops and 6,000 strikers and picketers. 1937 – Sir Frank Whittle ground-tests the first jet engine designed to power an aircraft, at Rugby, England. 1945 – U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies in office; Vice President Harry S. Truman becomes President upon Roosevelt's death. 1945 – World War II: The U.S. Ninth Army under General William H. Simpson crosses the Elbe River astride Magdeburg, and reaches Tangermünde—only 50 miles from Berlin. 1955 – The polio vaccine, developed by Dr. Jonas Salk, is declared safe and effective. 1961 – Space Race: The Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to travel into outer space and perform the first crewed orbital flight, Vostok 1. 1963 – The Soviet nuclear-powered submarine K-33 collides with the Finnish merchant vessel M/S Finnclipper in the Danish straits. 1970 – Soviet submarine K-8, carrying four nuclear torpedoes, sinks in the Bay of Biscay four days after a fire on board. 1980 – The Americo-Liberian government of Liberia is violently deposed. 1980 – Transbrasil Flight 303, a Boeing 727, crashes on approach to Hercílio Luz International Airport, in Florianópolis, Brazil. Fifty-five out of the 58 people on board are killed. 1980 – Canadian runner and athlete, Terry Fox begins his Marathon of Hope Run in St. John's, NF. 1981 – The first launch of a Space Shuttle (Columbia) takes place: The STS-1 mission. 1983 – Harold Washington is elected as the first black mayor of Chicago. 1990 – Jim Gary's "Twentieth Century Dinosaurs" exhibition opens at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. He is the only sculptor ever invited to present a solo exhibition there. 1992 – The Euro Disney Resort officially opens with its theme park Euro Disneyland; the resort and its park's name are subsequently changed to Disneyland Paris. 1999 – United States President Bill Clinton is cited for contempt of court for giving "intentionally false statements" in a civil lawsuit; he is later fined and disbarred. 2002 – A suicide bomber blows herself up at the entrance to Jerusalem's Mahane Yehuda Market, killing seven people and wounding 104. 2007 – A suicide bomber penetrates the Green Zone and detonates in a cafeteria within a parliament building, killing Iraqi MP Mohammed Awad and wounding more than twenty other people. 2009 – Zimbabwe officially abandons the Zimbabwean dollar as its official currency. 2010 – Merano derailment: A rail accident in South Tyrol kills nine people and injures a further 28. 2013 – Two suicide bombers kill three Chadian soldiers and injure dozens of civilians at a market in Kidal, Mali. 2014 – The Great Fire of Valparaíso ravages the Chilean city of Valparaíso, killing 16 people, displacing nearly 10,000, and destroying over 2,000 homes.

#Events

[kleptonancydrew]

Nancy Drew and Education

So apparently the Clue Crew is full of teachers? Who knew. Well, as a former homeschooled student, current teacher, and (hopefully) future homeschooling parent/teacher I have been planning on integrating the games into lessons for a long time. Below the cut I have just a few of my many ideas (some more fleshed out than others). Feel free to use, adapt, or add your own! 

SCK:

-        Braille

o   How blind/vision impaired people navigate the world

§  How we can make it more accessible for them

o   How do braille books and printers work

-        ASL

o   Memorizing the alphabet and basic signs

§  Build up fluency

o   How HOH/deaf people navigate the world

§  How we can make it more accessible for them  

o   Connections of ASL to other signed languages

§  French Sign Language versus British Sign Language

-        Dangers of gas leaks

o   What to do if you smell or hear gas

-        Inequalities between mens and womens sporting opportunities

o   See Women’s Soccer

-        What are performance enhancing drugs

o   What is the difference between #steroids and the steroids your doctor might prescribe

-        How drug running is a gateway crime

-        Why blackmailing people isn’t good

-        More reasons to never move to Florida

-        Why you shouldn’t go to an actual high school part one

 STFD:

-        Television in NYC

o   Soap Operas

o   How television sets work

o   Role of director

o   Teleprompters

o   Props

o   Agents

-        Theatre in NY

o   Broadway

§  Learn a show

o   Carnegie Hall

-        Dangers in the ways we obsess over celebrities

o   Paparazzi

o   Stalkers

o   Respecting privacy

-        NY taxi system

-        NY regional accents

-        NY as a center for immigration – salad bowl

o   Ellis Island

-        History of NYC

o   Geography of NYC

-        Typewriters

-        Towers of Hanoi

-        Encoding  

-        How to make chocolates (with or without poison)

-        Read along:

o   New York the Novel (Edward Rutherford)

o   The Power Broker

o   All of a Kind Family

 MHM:

-        San Francisco Gold Rush

-        Earthquake and Fires in San Fran

-        Golden Gate Bridge

-        Angel Island

o   Asian (Chinese) Immigration to the USA

-        Chinese Zodiac

-        Fortune telling (and why it’s not okay)

-        Bed and Breakfasts

-        San Francisco today

o   Technology boom

o   Overpriced everything

§  How this hurts established residents

§  Homelessness in San Fran

-        Bandits in the American West

-        Hauntings in American buildings

-        How to remove and install tile

-        Renovations – refurbish something

-        Antiques

o   Visit an antique shop

-        Importance of fire safety

-        How to install lighting fixtures properly

-        How to fix a dumbwaiter

o   How not to be a dumb waiter

-        Tangrams

-        What is the Victorian period

o   Significance of Queen Victoria

-        Read Along:

o   Little Brother

o   Paper Son: Lee’s Journey to America

o   Angel Island Gateway to Golden Mountain

 TRT:

-        The French Revolution

o   Marie Antoinette

o   Women and the French Revolution

o   Worldwide effects of the Revolution

o   Historians of the French Revolution

-        Writing history

o   How we can focus on different events in history, how we can be sympathetic to certain people, how we can fulfill different spaces in the historical narrative, criticism of history as a field, entering history as a field

-        Wisconsin Dairy industry

-        Alarm systems and how they work

-        Fingerprinting

-        Elevator safety

-        Ski lifts

o   Skiing

-        Vandalism

-        Taking care of libraries

-        Latitude and longitude

-        Keeping records of good events and bad events

o   Nothing you do will ever stop me from loving you

-        Some people keep different sleep schedules

-        Journalism

-        Making translations  

-        Why France has different holidays – to keep the ski lodges from getting too full

 FIN:

-        History of theatre spaces

-        Use of film at theatres

-        Magicians

o   Houdini

o   Learn a ‘magic’ trick

-        Library of Congress

-        Demolition – wrecking balls

o   What’s involved

-        Plaster casts

-        Historic register of buildings

o   Visit a local historic building

-        Price of concessions and movie tickets today

-        Nickelodeons

-        Celebrity stunts for attention from press

o   Celebrity endorsements

-        Jazz music

o   Dancing

-        Kidnapping stories

o   What to do if someone tries to grab you

-        Rubber vs. electricity

-        Art/artists of the 20s

 SSH:

-        Numbering systems (particularly ones not based on 10)

-        Cultures of South America

o   Maya

§  Cultural understandings

§  Connections to what appears at Beech Hill

o   Aztec

o   Inca

-        Myths of lesser civilizations because of European preconceptions

-        Why do countries have consulates/embassies in other countries

-        What is amnesia and other medical memory issues

-        Provenance and why its important part one

-        Roles and responsibilities within a museum

o   Visit a museum

o   How to be critical of a museum and how knowledge is presented to you

-        Modern art

o   Make your own

o   Visit a modern art museum

-        Periodic Table of Elements

-        Positive and negative molds for casting

 DOG:

-        Prohibition

o   Speakeasys

o   Amendments to constitution

o   Drinking age restrictions

§  Comparison of USA to European countries  

o   Connections to modern drug policies

-        Recognizing and photographing local birds

-        Dangers in the forest – ticks and other pests

-        Why water sources are important

o   Flint water crisis

-        Visit a state park

o   Importance of maintaining public land

-        Alcatraz

-        How to care for dogs

-        Noise pollution

o   Light pollution

 CAR:

-        History of carousels

o   Visit a carousel

-        Lathes

-        Harmonicas

-        Band organs

-        Writing messages with lemon juice and other hidden inks

-        How to iron

o   How not to iron

-        How to make a sundae

-        How amusement park rides are designed

-        Soldering

-        What is parole

o   Welcoming those who have been in prison back to society

o   Problems with the American prison system

§  How it disproportionately affects minority groups

o   What can be done in prison reform

o   Abuses in prison

o   Making mental and spiritual help and guidance more available

o   Making sanitary products available

o   Prison for profit hurts everybody except the prison owner

o   Educational opportunities for those in prison

o   More half-way help

o   Juvenile sentencing reform – more out of system help

o   Respecting humanity of prisoners

o   Ending the death penalty  

-        Depression

o   How to get help

o   How to help others

o   Dealing with loss

DDI:

-        Native peoples of the Pacific Northwest

-        Orcas and other whales

o   Whaling industry in Northwest and Northeast

o   Things whale products were used for

o   Visit natural history museum with whale exhibition

-        Visit an aquarium with a good reputation

o   Problems with places that do not take care of their sea life – particularly large sea life like whales

-        What is a chowder and how is it made

o   Try or make chowder

-        Crabs

o   Restrictions on different types of crabs – what type is local

o   Try a crab dish

-        Importance of different knots  

o   Get some rope and learn how to tie different knots

-        Know the NATO alphabet and letter flags

-        Boating knowledge

o   Go on a boating trip – know the port and starboard sides

-        Learn how to kayak

-        Try to learn how to skip rocks

-        Visit a lighthouse

o   Importance and histories of lighthouses

-        Smuggling – what is it and why does it happen

-        Shanghaiing

-        Chess

 SHA:

-        The continuous oppression and mistreatment of Native Americans

o   From Mayflower to Pocahontas to Trail of Tears to Dakota to DAPL to Reservations to food deserts to voting rights to much much more

§  How to support current Native voices and concerns

o   Why Native Americans are not a costume

o   “Possession” of Native American objects and land

§  Arrowheads and native jewelry

o   Broad overview of regional Native American groups – using their own voices

§  Special focus on local Native American groups

·       Is there a local museum/educational resource that is either Native created or known for respecting Native voices

o   Current Native Americans of note (ex: politicians, activists, artists)

o   While the previous focuses on Native Americans in the modern day USA – also discuss First Nations from Canada and Native Groups from more southern areas

-        Why temperature and pan matters when baking (show what happens in the oven when it goes wrong)

-        Magnets and how different metals react differently to magnets

-        How to take care of a horse and other farm animals

o   Visit a local farm

o   Try horse-riding

-        Dangers of rattle snakes and scorpions

-        Lassos and how to use them

-        Legends of outlaws in the American West

-        Ghost towns  

-        Flower stitches when knitting/crocheting

-        Petrified wood

-        How to make a campfire

-        Picking fruits and veggies when they are ready

-        Flower language

-        Read Along:

o   Native American folk tales  

o   Motorcycles and Sweetgrass

o   Gone Away Lake

o   Black Beauty?

 CUR:

-        Where are the moors

-        Different regional accents within the United Kingdom

-        British foods

-        Latin

o   Learn fun phrases and prayers

-        Ancestry and genealogy

o   Map your own family tree and recognize family crests

o   How adoption has historically been a binding and irrefutable concept for lineage

o   Find places your family lived

o   Leaving a history for your descendants

§  Write a story book for them

o   British Royal Family

§  Why incest is bad

-        Parrots and their intelligence

-        Secret passages in old buildings

-        Alchemy

o   Connections to modern understandings of science  

o   Historical understandings of elements

-        Astrological signs

-        Witch trials

-        Legends of lycanthropy and other monsters

-        Importance of not taking other peoples medicines

-        Runic alphabet

-        Feeding your pets a healthy diet

-        Typing practice

-        How to embrace the idea that home taught students are evil geniuses

-        Forges and melting points of different metals

-        Carnivorous plants

-        Succulents

-        Constellations in different places  

-        Read Along:

o   The Secret Garden

o   The London Eye Mystery

o   Beastly

CLK:

-        Great Depression

o   Causes and effects

o   Who was hurt

o   Who was not hurt

o   Areas of America

§  Dust bowl

o   Famous people and literature

o   Homelessness and poverty

§  Bread lines

§  Soup kitchens

§  Anti-homelessness architecture

§  Connections to mental illness and veterans

§  How we can help those who do not have homes today

-        Early Telephones

-        Shakespeare

-        History of Nancy Drew

o   Mildred Wirt Benson

o   Edward Stratemeyer  

-        Fishing – why different fish respond to different bait

-        Orphanages in the early 20th century

-        Gas prices and accessibility of cars through time

-        How to make pie

-        What is jurisdiction and what is significant about crossing state lines

-        How do banks work

o   Safety deposit boxes

-        Identify theft

-        How to use a sewing machine

o   Sew an item of clothing

-        Mini golf – why and what

-        Mirrors and their usefulness

-        Stamp collections

-         

-        Radios and call signs

o   Comparison to modern internet forms

-        Telegrams

-        Read along:

o   Shakespeare

§  Midsummer Night’s Dream

§  Others

o   Pollyanna

o   Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm

o   The Grapes of Wrath

  TRN:

-        Trains

o   Steam trains

o   Visit a train museum

o   Take a train ride (if not a normal event)

o   Importance of transcontinental railway

o   Trains around the USA today

o   Trains around the world (TGV, bullet train)

-        Abraham Lincoln

-        Mark Twain

-        How to make a good burger (you leave off the PB&J)

-        Slugs

-        Periodic Table of Elements – abbreviations

-        Gemstones

-        History of Mining

o   England (Newcastle upon Tyne)

o   American West

o   Appalachia

o   Company Store

o   Health issues for miners

o   Danger of mines

o   Current issues for mining

-        Dancing the Hurley Burley

-        People who collect creepy dolls

o   History of porcelain dolls

-        Embroidery

o   How to

o   Patterns/symbols

-        General Stores in the American West

o   Sears

-        How to make taffy

-        Find a well maintained and beautiful tomb and research who is entombed

-        Focusing light through a magnifying glass can start a fire

-        Read Along:

o   Murder on the Orient Express

o   Mark Twain books

DAN:

-        All lessons in French

-        How using different ingredients and different amounts of ingredients can affect the outcome of your cookies

-        Paris métro

o   History

o   How to read/follow a métro map

o   RER

-        Montmartre and other Parisian neighbourhoods

-        History of Île de la France and Square de Vert Galant Parc and Pont Neuf

-        WWII and the French Resistance

o   Cross of Lorraine

o   Vichy France

o   Abuses of the French gov’t in this period

-        Paris and the fashion world

-        Beauty standards and the rejection of natural beauty by society

o   Dangers of weight and figure standards

o   You are beautiful as you are

-        Catacombs of Paris

-        Famous French Dishes (from this region)

o   Or Bretagne since I know and like them better

-        The French Café

-        Moulin in France

-        Tea and how hot leaf water can taste so bad but still be good for you

-        Buildings of Baron Haussmann

-        Paris History  

-        Decoders

-        Importance of vitraux historically, culturally, and religiously

-        Read Along:

o   Little Kids

§  Madeline

§  Babar

§  Petit Ours

§  Plume

o   High School

§  Hunchback of Notre Dame

§  Les Mis

§  Dale Van Kley

 CRE:

-        History of Hawai’i and her native people

o   How the USA screwed them over and continues to do so

§  Land colonizing today

o   Listen to voices from Native Peoples

-        Pearl Harbor

o   USS Arizona

-        Native myths and legends

-        Local flora and fauna

-        Surfing

-        How to make bead necklaces

-        Snorkeling

-        Entomology

o   Find some local bugs and identify and observe them

-        Horticulture

o   See if you can graft something

o   Watch a carnation placed in water with food dye

o   Regrow a fruit or veggie from the leftovers

-        Go looking for seashells – see how many complete shells you can find

-        Be aware of pesticides and the dangers they offer

o   Dangers of organic food too

-        Make something with pineapple in it

-        Fishing – different kinds of native fish

-        Volcanos

-        Hula  

  ICE:

-        Wolf sanctuaries – respecting wildlife and their place in the wild and not the domestic

o   What to do if you see a wolf in the real world

-        Fur trapping in Canada history

-        Regions and Capitols of Canada

o   Visit Canada?

-        How the Canadian government works

-        Use of French language in Canada    

o   Unique features of Canadian French  

-        Ice fishing

-        How to cook omelets, salmon, etc.

o   How to not add paprika cause like ew

-        Fossils

-        Radiation

o   Marie Curie

-        How to be a good maid

-        Snowballs/ice balls

-        Ice skating

-        Winter weather safety

-        Avalanches  

-        Saunas

-        Birthmarks

-        Fax machines

-        How to not lie about bird watching

-        Frozen water safety  

-        Modern offenses against First Nations by Canadian Government

  CRY:

-        Culture of the Arawak and Caraïbe

o   Voodoo

-        Mardi Gras in New Orleans

-        Hurricane Katrina and aftermath

-        French Influence

-        Eyes and their parts and functions

-        Teeth and their parts and functions

-        Alligators in the Southern USA and how they are dangerous pests  

-        Graveyards/cemeteries and how to be comfortable in them

o   Modern burial practices

o   Why are they above ground in Louisiana?

o   Places where they are running out of space for the dead

o   Historic violations of final resting places

-        Ventriloquism

-        Lizards and how to care for them

-        Rube Goldberg machines

-        Curio shops

-        Crystal Skulls  

 VEN:

-        International crime

-        Organized crime

-        Scopa

-        Italian basics

o   Learn an Italian aria

-        Italian food

o   Not just spaghetti

-        History of Venice

o   Current issues in Venice

-        Carrier pigeons

-        Micro-dots

-        “Observing the architecture”

-        Try to make gelato (or just get gelato, either way you get gelato)

-        Disguising yourself – put on an outfit and try to get me to not recognize you

-        Picking locks

-        Secret codes

-        Solfege

o   With hand signs

o   Learn a song in solfege

-        Carnivale

-        Learn how the sausage gets made

o   How to deal with food poisoning

-        How to secure your living space against burglars

o   Glass breaks, motion sensors, keypads, magnets, and more

-        Read Along:

o   Heist Society

o   The Prince

o   Merchant of Venice

  HAU:

-        Irish lessons (as much of this in Irish as possible)

o   Why the Irish language is important

-        Geography of Ireland

o   Provinces and counties

-        Irish names

-        Why Ireland has disliked and should dislike the UK

o   Historically

o   Famine

§  Emmigration

o   Easter Rising

o   Troubles

o   Present-Day

-        Importance of alcohol in Ireland

o   Uisce beatha

o   Guinness

§  Guinness world records

-        Irish music

o   Irish instruments

o   Learn some Rebel songs

-        Ogham runes

-        Irish foods

o   Something with lamb, who cares what

-        Don’t use friends for land development

-        Bogs

-        Chemical Reactions

-        Rockets

-        Inventions and secrecy during WWII

-        Religion in Ireland

o   Pagan traditions

o   Christianity

o   Catholic/Protestant tensions

-        Irish wedding traditions

-        How printing presses work

-        Irish castles

-        Sheep sheering/raising sheep

-        Irish legends

o   Fae

o   Leprechauns

-        Don’t drive and talk on the phone

 RAN:

-        Why blackface is problematic? (the fact that this needs to be said is problematic in and of itself)

-        Scuba diving

-        Sailing

-        Bermuda Triangle

-        Bats

-        Primates and their intelligence

o   Problems with animal research

o   Koko

o   Jane Goodall

-        Island resort culture

-        Metal detectors

-        Pirates

o   And the Caribbean

o   Their abuses

o   Different kinds

o   Modern day pirates  

-        How do walkie-talkies work

-        US mistreatment of island territories

-        Read Along:

o   Bloody Jack (Meyer)

 WAC:

-        Edgar Allan Poe

o   Stories

o   Baltimore

-        Piano

-        Victorian Dining traditions

o   How to set a place for fancy dining

o   How to fold napkins

o   Table manners

o   How to serve someone at a fancy dinner

o   How courses might work

o   How to use your silverware  

-        Why you shouldn’t go to an actual high school part two

o   Just fyi – that’s not how uniforms work

§  Have a school inspired dress code for a week

-        Bullying and why you absolutely will not be a bully

o   How to respond to bullying

o   Importance of talking to adults and counseling

-        Logic puzzles

-        Research the founding of a local school

-        Stringed Instruments

-        Plagiarism

o   Turnitin

-        Making sandwiches – like a good deli style sandwich

-        Photography scavenger hunt – make a digital (or physical) yearbook

-        Squirrels

-        Orthographic projection

-        DNA/RNA

-        Saving every major project on three different thumb drives

-        Getting along with roommates

-        States and Capitals

o   Countries and capitals of the world  

 TOT:

-        Tornados

o   Technology used to observe tornados

-        Meteorology

-        Prairie dogs

-        Life on the great plains

-        Great Plains Native Americans

-        Small towns in the Midwest honestly be like that

-        Defensive driving

-        Make a disaster kit

-        Know what to do in various natural emergency situations

o   What is the local alert protocol

o   What do local authorities recommend

-        How to maintain and fix a car

-        How to fix a broken device

-        What is tenure

-        How to budget

o   Go to the grocery store on a strict budget (however much you come in under budget is your candy budget)

-        Read Along:

o   Little House

  SAW:

-        Basic Japanese phrases

o   Learn to count

o   Writing in Japanese

-        Sudoku, nonograms, renograms

-        Japanese ghost legends

-        Japanese culture

o   Tourism

§  Ryokans

o   Space – everything small

o   Politeness/formalities

o   Hot springs/baths

o   Tatami and paper walls

-        Japanese cultural dress

o   Kimonos

o   Lolita? Fashion

-        Japanese names

o   Last name first

o   How to address others in Japan

-        Martial Arts

o   Ninjutsu

§  Traditional tools

-        Japanese tea ceremony

-        Schools in Japan

-        Teaching English as a foreign language

-        Japanese subway/train system

-        Pachinko and Japanese gaming

-        Japanese vending machines

-        Robotic animals

-        Bento

-        Japanese foods

-        Origami

-        How to fake a haunting

 CAP:

-        Basic German phrases

o   How to make a German word

o   Connections of German to English

-        German food favourites

o   Especially cakes

-        Storytelling as a cultural entity

o   How memory has worked differently in different times

-        Glass blowing

-        How castles provided for the local community

-        Bavaria in Germany

o   Cultural dress

-        Glockenspiel

-        How to make board games

-        Monster stories of central Europe

-        How to monitor security camera remotely

-        Read Along:

o   Heidi

ASH:

-        Arson

o   Watching how different accelerants burn a piece of paper

-        All politicians are at least somewhat self-serving

o   But write a letter to a local politician anyway

§  Different ways to contact elected officials, and why some don’t work

-        How to make ice cream

-        How a police investigation works

o   Problems with police departments around the world – specifically USA

o   Ways that police work unfairly targets minorities

§  If Nancy is innocent how many others are

-        How to use matches and lighters safely

-        Why you should not return to the scene of a crime – particularly a fire

-        Making sure smoke detectors work properly and the system is connected

o   We might not go to school but fire drills are still important

-        What is a mass spectrometer

-        Who to call if you’ve been arrested

-        What to do if you get pulled over

-        How the media can skew the truth and make their own narratives

-        Sound mixing

-        Be careful with what you say/post/record

o   Keep receipts and clarify when possible

 TMB:

-        What not to do at an archaeological site

-        Ancient Egyptian History

o   Pantheon, notable figures, relevant events

o   Pyramids, sphinx

o   Pharaohs

-        Modern Egypt

o   Arabic alphabet

-        History of archaeological digs in Egypt

o   Why they’ve been problematic

-        Dangers of the tombs

-        Mummys

o   How they are put together

-        Tomb raiders

-        Importance of water in the desert

-        How to piece together a broken artifact

-        How to gently brush off an artifact

-        There is no such thing as a dictionary for ancient Egyptian

-        Aliens did not build the pyramids

-        Senet

-        Desert life safety

-        How mirrors can be used to light a room

-        Read Along

o   Rick Riordan

 DED:

-        Nikola Tesla

o   All his fun stuff

o   Tesla Coils

-        3-D printing

-        Gummy fingerprints

-        Faraday Cage

-        Basic electric concepts

o   How to build a circuit board

-        Chemical safety

-        How a lab might work

-        Valuing different skills within academia

-        Ultraviolet light

-        How motorcycles work

-        Freelance photography

-        How to use academic databases

 GTH:

-        Slavery in the United States

o   Origins

o   ‘End’

o   Civil War

o   The connection to “southern culture”

o   Continued abuses of Black people in America

§  Importance of recognizing Black voices and what they are saying

§  Listening even when it’s uncomfortable

§  Checking privilege when you have it

o   Jim Crow Laws

-        Plantations

-        Gone With the Wind

o   The good and the bad

-        Civil War spies – female

-        Carbon monoxide poisoning

-        Burned out houses are not a safe space

-        Do not go digging through people’s coffins – rest in PEACE

-        Understanding that your family can be flawed

-        If you don’t want to get married, if you’re not happy in a relationship, end it

-        When a member of your family is sick you take care of them

-        Make a will, just in case your cousin kills you

-        Bachelor and bachelorette parties should feature activities that everyone is comfortable with

-        Read Along:

o   My Last Skirt: The Story of Jennie Hodgers, Union Soldier

 SPY:

-        Scotland and their identity

o   Celtic Nations

o   Independent Scotland

o   Call a Scottish person

-        Unicorns and other mythical creatures in Scotland

-        Scottish food

o   The appetizing parts

-        History of spies

-        Biowarfare

o   Code Orange

o   Other teenage stories dealing with anthrax

o   Current events and concerns

o   Historical biowarfare (smallpox blankets)

-        Ziplining

-        Archery

-        How to bug someone

-        Tartans and plaids

o   Kilts

-        Augmented Reality Glasses

-        Record players

-        How to reset a circuit breaker

-        Read Along:

o   Gallagher Girls

o   Code Orange

o   Little House (Martha)

o   Little Brother (Doctorow)

 MED:

-        Don’t meet your heroes

-        New Zealand

o   Maori culture

-        Survivor style game shows and realism

-        I’m not saying Aliens can’t exist, I’m saying they def aren’t involved here

-        Kayaking

-        Submarines and what they can do

-        Turtles

-        Earthquakes

-        Be careful with rope bridges

  LIE:

-        Provenance and why it’s important part two  

-        Greek art and how it was originally painted vibrantly

o   Abuses of Greek art through the ages

-        The British Museum and the issues with that

-        Greek pantheon

o   Legends and notable figures

o   Religious traditions  

-        Iliad and Odyssey

-        Art forgery

-        How to fire clay pots and pottery

-        Memorizing lines for a play

o   Staging for a play

o   Role of a director

-        Theatre

o   Lights

o   Curtains

o   Fly system

o   Sound

-        Greek alphabet

-        Historical importance of the Greek language and culture

o   Alexander the Great and Hellenization

-        Olympics

o   Historic and modern

-        Greece and the European Union  

-        Make something with pomegranates

-        Read Along:

o   Iliad

o   Odyssey

o   The Thief

o   Percy Jackson  

  SEA:

-        Iceland

o   Culture

§  Naming traditions

o   Language

o   Music

o   Food

-        Shipbuilding

o   Historic and modern ships

-        Ice caving

-        Northern Lights

-        Tides

-        Snowmobiling

-        Poetry

-        What is xenophobia

 MID:

-        Some games just shouldn’t be made

-        American witch trials

o   What actually went down

o   Misconceptions

-        Treating people with albinism as real people

-        Arson is bad

-        Herbal remedies and how they can interfere with modern medicine

-        Witchcraft and how not to

-        Salem MA

-        Ignorance promotes fear and hatred so we do our best to learn about others

#Nancy Drew Games #Clue Crew #Teaching #Education #Nancy Drew

[menarddg3]

THE SHANGHAI GESTURE: A PLAY WRITTEN BY JOHN COLTON - F. Orion Pozo reviews Johnny Colton's play, titled "The Shanghai Gesture." Pozo writes "Still relevant almost 100 years after it was written ..."

Pozo reviews Colton's play and published it through Amazon.com in the United States on March 4, 2012:

I became interested in this play after watching the 1941 movie of the same name that was adapted from it.

To get the movie past the Hollywood censors many changes had to be made to the story and I wanted to see what the original 1918 play was about. Fortunately my local university library has a copy.

Here are some excerpts from a March 16, 2009 OffBroadway.com review of a recent production of this play.

"Written in 1918 and last produced in New York on Broadway in l926 The Shanghai Gesture is a 100-year-old historic American play that has always been controversial for its bold confrontation of still-relevant issues."

"The Shanghai Gesture confronts issues of women's rights, the sex trade, child abuse/slavery, and what happens when one country imposes its culture upon another."

"It takes place in China in the roaring twenties when Shanghai was a truly cosmopolitan city filled with Russian refugees, its people exploited by opium traders and adventurers from all over Europe and Great Britain, and visited by American entrepreneurs.

Mother Goddam is a Manchu princess shamed and discarded by an aristocratic English merchant and sold into sex slavery who can never return to her home. A survivor, she has risen to great power and reputation within a complex society where she runs an elegant brothel frequented by governors, mandarins, and princes who chose amongst women who are beautiful and tastefully dressed. Tonight there is great excitement, for she is having a dinner party - and society folk, the British and other European aristocrats and their wives are coming to dinner.

What transpires during the dinner is hypnotic, humorous, erotic, terrifying, shocking, surprising, sad, and utterly fascinating. Many secrets - those of each guest - are revealed, and the ultimate secrets - those of Sir Guy Charteris - literally change lives. Even Mother Goddam must face an unanticipated revelation of a secret of her own.

Unlike Madame Butterfly, Mother Goddam chooses not to view herself as a victim. Instead she outwits and punishes her male oppressors. This single fact made this play (produced so soon after women had gotten the vote) a great favorite with female audiences as well and it was taken up as a popular feminist tract.

It played the Martin Beck (now the Hirschfeld) for an extraordinary 210 performances and then moved to the 46th Street Theatre (now the Richard Rodgers) where it continued to play for many months more."

There is not a lot to add to a review like that. In the book's introduction, John D. Williams talks about the significance of the title. The verb "shanghai" as in "to be shanghaied" originally meant to kidnap or force someone to work on a ship by drugging them. It is not much used these days but it came to take on the more general meaning of being coerced into doing something against your will.

From this comes the gesture that some know as the Shanghai Gesture. We all have seen it at one time or another. In the UK they call it "cocking a snook."

Williams describes how it is made. "Place the fingers of your right hand extended. Distend the thumb of your right hand until it touches your nose. The little finger of your right hand is stretched venomously toward the world. You say nothing but you think much, and that is that." He goes on to say: "When the world puts its heel on a derelict, when life is just a little too hard, when a man is marooned, by parents or otherwise, before he has a chance to plead, he is wont to accept his condition -- if there is no way out -- but he only accepts his fate after making the Shanghai Gesture."

It has a long history. The gesture can be seen in The Festival of Fools, a print made in 1560 by artist Pieter Bruegel (the elder). This may explain why a fool is pictured on the cover of Gary Indiana's 2009 novel The Shanghai Gesture.

@George David Maynard, A good job of work by F. Orion Pozo in reviewing John Colton's play "The Shanghai Gesture."

#linkedin

[obsidian-aurora]

Why I feel so sad for Xiao Zhan for winning the Weibo King award again in 2021

Right now you might see a lot of people spreading the fact that Xiao Zhan won Weibo King again with joy and happiness.  I can only personally feel sadness and regret.  Because when I look back at the year 2020, and what Xiao Zhan went through, Weibo had a big part to play in that story.  They took advantage of his pain to make money and profit from it.  They did little to stop what was happening because to them it was traffic.

His fans who left the 85 million votes for him for Weibo King probably weren’t thinking about what Weibo means to Xiao Zhan.  They weren’t thinking about how Xiao Zhan disengaged from the platform completely, moving his small interactions over to Oasis and Douyin to escape the toxicity inherent in the conversations taking place on Weibo.  All that they were thinking was “We want to show him how much we love him!”

Well you know what I think is love?  Listening to your own idol’s words.

Let’s take a small journey back through 2020 and listen to Xiao Zhan’s own words on what he wanted his fans to do this year.

I won’t rehash 227 itself - if you want my take on that event, then I’ll write another blog post about that, it being almost a year I’m probably finally reaching a point where I can discuss it rationally without bursting into tears remembering my own personal experience with it.  But rather, let’s take a look at what happened after 227.

On March 1, Xiao Zhan studio issued their first official statement.  What did they say?

Recently, we have noticed some controversies about Xiao Zhan fans, occupying some social public resources, and also causing trouble to everyone. We deeply regret and apologize for the impact of this incident. We are very grateful to all fans for their support and love to Xiao Zhan. At the same time, we also sincerely call on all love to be positive, and hope that everyone can chase stars rationally. While doing a good job of self-protection during the epidemic, we will work together in a more positive way and support things that bring positive energy to society.

On April 24, Xiao Zhan said something and his studio reposted.

@X玖少年团肖战DAYTOY What’s past is past, I’ll remember it by heart.  Thank you for all the criticism with good intensions, I’m working hard to improve.   

Xiao Zhan Studio April 25th 00:03 #肖战新歌光点# The light spot moves towards love. Please listen, @X玖少年团小战DAYTOY 's voice. ♥

And again, Xiao Zhan studio.

Xiao Zhan Studio April 25th at 14:27 Thank you for your love and support for Mr. Xiao Zhan and his works. In this studio, as always, I solemnly appeal to everyone to continue to take care of their study, work and life at the same time, and to distinguish the truth and not blindly follow in the thousands of voices. Thank you for your wise support. Every love, no matter how big or small, is a meaningful point of light, gathered together to form the most beautiful light.

When He Jiong was attacked, Xiao Zhan jumped in to say:

@X玖少年团肖战DAYTOY Sorry to disturb everyone, don't hurt others!

Xiao Zhan Studio April 27, 15:04 Please stop slandering and spreading rumors!

He gave his first interview after 227 on May 6.  He expanded upon the statement he made on April 24 when he said he was working hard to improve. He spoke about the controversy, the responsibility he feels as a public figure, and his desire not to control his fans but to guide them to do positive works like participate in charity that improves society.  He felt like as an artist, his role was to continue to improve his acting and his singing.  

“As for the people who love and support me, I hope they won’t do some extreme things, or hurt other people, or even hurt themselves.  I hope that they can protect and love themselves, and live their lives well.  Live their lives well.”  “And if it’s possible, outside of school and work, we can do things together to help others and contribute to society in a meaningful way.”  “I think charity is a part of an ordinary person’s social responsibility.”

Again in May, following a controversy when a teacher recorded her classroom cheering him on, Xiao Zhan was forced to make statements encouraging his fans to live their lives well.

@X玖少年团肖战DAYTOY Please listen to me carefully again! I hope everyone puts their studies, work, and life in front of star chasing. Study hard and work hard. Do your responsibilities and obligations, and abide by professional standards and industry bottom lines. I don't need help.

Xiao Zhan Studio May 10 at 23:26 I hope everyone puts their work and life first 🙏

Xiao Zhan Studio May 11 at 21:14 Starting from us, we hope that each of us can do things that are beneficial to society and be positive.

A school is a temple of knowledge, a place for preaching and teaching, not a fan factory for celebrities. Children's education is related to the future of the country, and the development of youth values is related to the hope of the nation, and it must not become a tool for chasing stars.

Furthermore, over the course of this time period Xiao Zhan Studio met with the organizers of his official fan organization and they rebranded the Fanclub to Xiao Zhan Film and Television Support Club to emphasize their goal to focus on his works and his works only.  They released a statement with their intent and called on all members to do the following:

Xiao Zhan Studio May 15 20:01 If you see the good, you will move, and if you have, you will change. Start with me and work hard together. 1. Do not support business and works with behaviors beyond our own economic capacity. 2. No more activities such as ranking, controlling and appraising and cheering. 3. Accept all well-intentioned criticism and don't maliciously attack others. 4. Continue to actively participate in public welfare advocacy. 5. Focus on Xiao Zhan's work such as film and music.

Take particular note here of the specific call out not to participate in activities such as ranking (like the Weibo King votes).

In July, when his own fans were accused of cyber bullying others again, Xiao Zhan studio released a statement saying that they would defend any victim of cyber bullying, even someone bullied by his own fans.

Xiao Zhan Studio June 30 at 21:42 No matter who is responsible for his words and deeds, we support all those who are suffering from cyber violence or personal attacks on the Internet, and bravely take up legal weapons to protect themselves. Regardless of who’s a fan, taking legal measures is a legitimate behavior 

@易胜华律师 Recently, some netizens posted on Weibo that they had suffered online violence for publicly publishing criticisms against Mr. Xiao Zhan. Entrusted by Mr. Xiao Zhan, we issued the following lawyer's statement: We welcome all kind criticisms and reminders, and resolutely oppose and resist all cyber violence. No matter who the cyber violence is directed at, it is an illegal act and should bear corresponding legal responsibilities. We are willing to provide legal assistance to the above-mentioned parties who have been violated by online violence, and we are also willing to provide assistance within our capacity for their rights protection operations. Yi Shenghua Lawyer Wang Xiaoyan Lawyer June 30, 2020

In July, Xiao Zhan and Xiao Zhan Studio met up with representatives from Weibo to discuss the cyber bullying that he had been subjected to this year.  But was this at Weibo’s own desire to clean up their platform?  No.  This whole time Weibo was profiting from every hot search that drove more traffic to their platform.  It was the Cyberspace Administration of China that DIRECTED Weibo to clean up their mess.

Over the years we have seen Weibo ban accounts from time to time that are so blatant with their cyber attacks that they have no other choice.  But often they will wait until stars pursue legal action before doing so.  And they will only release the real-world IDs of users when under a police investigation pursuant to a lawsuit.  I’m not suggesting the platform should start doxxing its own users, but rather ban all malicious and slanderous behaviour from the outset.  Right now under Chinese law anyone with over 30,000 fans who says slander against another can be pursued by the law.  Weibo should act before it needs to come to that.

Chinese Star News did an interesting video on Fanquan culture and the ways in which Weibo profits from it.  If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s worth a watch.

Ever since the summer, Xiao Zhan has been very careful and direct in all his public interactions.  Most of his events were pre-recorded.  Only at the end of the year did he start doing live events again, and when he was surrounded by friends he was okay, but as we could see from the recent iQiyi event when he is without friends around him he still struggles.

April 12 - Hymn of the Red Plum Blossom (pre-recorded)

May 6 - Interview with China News Service (pre-recorded)

May 9 - Bamboo in the Stone (pre-recorded)

May 10 - Mother's Day live stream (live) (unannounced) (no fan interactions)

June 11 - Xiao Zhan goes to do agricultural charity activity (pre-recorded)

June 15 - Xiao Zhan releases summer cocktail video (pre-recorded)

Aug 17 - Xiao Zhan RoseOnly live stream (pre-recorded)

October 19 - Xiao Zhan at Shanghai Reading Film and Television event (pre-recorded)

October 25 - Xiao Zhan sang Brightest Star in the Night Skies (pre-recorded)

Dec 20 - Xiao Zhan attends Tencent Awards (live) with friends around him

Dec 31 - Xiao Zhan attends New Year party (live) with friends around him

Jan 15 2021 - Xiao Zhan attends iQiyi Scream Night (no friends) (does not look happy/comfortable)

It must have been SO hard for Xiao Zhan to continue to work behind the scenes in 2020, recording his new show Ace Troops, attending some events in secret, shooting some advertisements that he wasn’t sure would be able to make it to the air - and some events that got leaked and then had his portion cut out.  It must have been so, so hard.

So to me, the least that we can do as fans is to listen to what Xiao Zhan has asked of us.  And over and over again he said that all he wanted from his fans was for us to live our lives well.  To not do extreme things.  He wants things to go smoothly.  He wants to take his time, to choose his events carefully, and come back at his own pace.

So what do his fans do?  They massively vote for him to win the Weibo King award.  This has put him in an impossible position.  

Either he needs to decline the award, and face criticism from everyone about being arrogant in a year that he should be grateful.  Or he has to suck it up and show up to an award hosted by a platform that did little to nothing to help him when he was in pain, and instead in fact profited from his pain.  

He will have to put a smile on his face and say thank you for recognizing that I was a high traffic star last year, even when the majority of his traffic was due to cyber attacks.

Why would his fans put him in this impossible position?  Back when this award was first announced, his own major fan club leaders requested fans not to vote for Weibo King.  If you wanted to vote for anything, then you should vote for his acting role in The Wolf, because that was about his professional work - not for Weibo King, which is literally like an award for Prom King.  It’s a popularity award, nothing more.

Will Weibo King help him to come back faster?  No.  Will it make industry leaders want to sign him on for more TV and film works?  No.  Speaking from experience working in the industry for many years, the only thing that industry professionals care about is ratings on the shows that are produced.  And Xiao Zhan cannot rely on his fans alone for ratings.  If his ratings are going to continue to increase, then he needs to attract the respect of a wider audience.  And if that wider audience is already of the impression that Xiao Zhan is a loose canon because his fans are out of control, this massive over-rating of Weibo King only reinforces that belief.

Just look at this graph.

Xiao Zhan fans are posting it with pride, saying look how well we did!  Xiao Zhan trounced the competition!  But the reality is that all other stars’ fan groups had also instructed their fans not to vote for this award, because they all see it for what it is - a popularity contest that can hurt more than it can help.  Xiao Zhan winning by such a large margin only shows how little his fans listen to him.

Now instead of Xiao Zhan deciding for himself when and where to come back, what events he wishes to attend, he’s going to have to make an appearance at this awards show and slap a smile on his face and say thank you.  

Thank you Weibo, for profiting off my pain.

It makes me sick.

If you voted for Xiao Zhan in this award, take a moment to think about Xiao Zhan’s words for your future behaviour. 

Live your lives well

Don’t do extreme things

Don’t spread rumours

Accept criticism and don’t attack others

Don’t protect me

If you can, do charity and help others

If you are following your own idol’s wishes, then I salute you.  You are the type of fan Xiao Zhan will cherish.

#xiao zhan #227 #weibo king #xiao zhan weibo king #weibo

[romajuliettemai]

LMFAO- The last round voting has started for Simonteen for the Secret Shanghai character showdown, and the last two on the list are...you'll never guess...ROMA & JULIETTE ASNFLWKAJFLKWJE

<3 They will always be the top favs though I think because we've been with them for so long <3

My vote is obviously going to my girl Juliette cause I love her

#juliette cai #secret shanghai voting #secret shanghai finale #secret shanghai series #secret shanghai #these violent delights #our violent ends #foul lady fortune #last violent call #foul heart huntsman #juliette mai #roma montagov #roma mai

[dweemeister]

2020 Movie Odyssey Award for Best Original Song (final round)

(Yet again, tumblr has not fixed bullet indentations. So this post doesn’t look as clean on your dashboards.)

TAGGING (among others): @addaellis, @cokwong, @emilylime5, @halfwaythruthedark, @idontknowmuchaboutmovies, @introspectivemeltdown, @maximiliani, @memetoilet, @monkeysmadeofcheese, @myluckyerror, @plus-low-overthrow, @shootingstarvenator, @themusicmoviesportsguy, @theybecomestories, @umgeschrieben, @underblackwings, @voicetalentbrendan​, @thewolfofelectricavenue, and @yellanimal.

I would also like to tag some followers/previous participants as well who I also would welcome to participate in this final round: @birdsongvelvet​, @bitch-genius​, @dog-of-ulthar​, @loveless422​, @lvl9gay​, @mehetibel​, @phendranaedge​, @poncho-honcho​, @sayaf​, @shadesofhappy​, @thethirdman8​, @uncoolforelimb​, and @wehadfacesthen​. Regardless of whether you were tagged or not, all of my followers can participate if they wish.

Happy Holidays to all! After a fascinating preliminary round, now begins the final round to 2020's Movie Odyssey Award for Best Original Song (MOABOS). This is the eighth time it has been contested and the seventh year it has been open to involvement from family, friends, and tumblr followers. I begin every new year not knowing whether I will be able to share with all of you these songs and the movies they come from around November/December. So on the day that MOABOS becomes viable (usually around mid-year), it's a long stretch of anticipation to this point.

For those who have never participated in this before, my classic movie blog traditionally ends the year by honoring some of the best achievements from movies that I saw for the first time this calendar year (the "Movie Odyssey"; rewatches do not count) with an Oscar-like ceremony. I choose all the nominees and winners from each category, save one: Best Original Song. It is the only category I can think of that does not require you to watch several movies in their entirety. I know some of you wonder why I bother with this quixotic social experiment. But I have always considered it a sort of cinematic-musical thank-you for your moral support in various ways - in the hopes of introducing to all of you films and music you may not have otherwise encountered or sought. A small slice of the 2020 Movie Odyssey, so to speak.

This final will be contested by sixteen songs. As I've mentioned before, for the first time ever, there are no MOABOS entries originating from this year that made the competition - a MOABOS first. I have seen one 2020 film since the prelim (Wolfwalkers... at a drive-in mind you), but this entire final is one of yesteryear. Even without any 1930s songs, this year's final is probably the oldest on average. There are some very recognizable songs that made it straight to the final, bypassing the preliminary; those songs are contained within. Among them, a city anthem and a song that should be a city's anthem. Elsewhere, this is the first final to ever feature two classic Bollywood songs - but no classic Bollywood song has ever cracked the top ten. Elvis has three songs in this final, a MOABOS joint record along with Prince and the Bee Gees (both in 2016). But also appearing in multiple entries are Frank Sinatra and Liza Minnelli, Louis Armstrong and Billie Holiday. With five non-English-language songs in the final, this year’s final ties 2017 with the largest contingent of finalists not in the English language.

INSTRUCTIONS Please rank (#1-16) your choices in order. The top ten songs will receive nominations. The tabulation method used in the preliminary round is being used for the final only as the second tiebreaker (the tabulation method that will be used principally for the final - aka "single transferable vote" - is described in the “read more” at the bottom). There is no minimum or maximum amount of songs you can rank, but because of the nature of single transferable vote, it is highly recommended to rank as many songs as possible, rather than only one or two. Those who rank fewer songs run a greater risk of their ballots being discarded in the later rounds of tabulation. Again, this is all described in the “read more”.

Please consider to the best of your ability: how musically interesting the song is (incl. and not limited to musical phrasing and orchestration); its lyrics; context within the film (contextual blurbs provided for every entry for those who haven't seen the films); choreography/dance direction (if applicable); and the song's cultural impact/life outside the film (if applicable, and, in my opinion, least important factor). Imperfections in audio and video quality may not be used against any song. I encourage you to send in comments and reactions with your rankings - it makes the process more enjoyable for you and myself!

The deadline for submission is Thursday, December 31 at 8 PM Pacific Time. That is 6 PM Hawaii/Aleutian Time / 10 PM Central / 11 PM Eastern. That deadline is also Friday, January 1 at 2 AM GMT / 3 AM CET / 4 AM EET. This deadline has been pushed back two consecutive times due to a sizable non-response rate - but I very much do not want to do so again.

I have compiled most of this final round's songs into this YouTube playlist. Please note that neither of Kaagaz Ke Phool’s two songs are contained in the playlist. You will need to access them using their respective links.

Enjoy the music! Feel free to listen as many times as you need, and I hope you discover music and movies you may have never otherwise heard of that you find fascinating. The following is formatted... ("Song title", composer and lyricist, film title):

2020 MOVIE ODYSSEY AWARD FOR BEST ORIGINAL SONG – FINAL ROUND

“Angela”, music and lyrics by José Feliciano and Janna Merlyn Feliciano, Aaron Loves Angela (1975)

Performed by José Feliciano

(English-language version) / (Spanish single version)

Played over the opening credits to this teenage drama that is partly a blaxploitation film, partly an interracial coming-of-age romance. The movie wasn't a hit, but the Spanish-language version of this song was received well in Latin America.

“Blue Shadows on the Trail”, music and lyrics by Eliot Daniel and Johnny Lange, Melody Time (1948)

Performed by Roy Rogers and the Sons of the Pioneers

This is the introductory song to the final segment of Melody Time. That segment is dedicated to the legend of Pecos Bill, and this atmospheric song leads into the telling of that story.

“Can’t Help Falling in Love”, music and lyrics by Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore, and George David Weiss, Blue Hawaii (1961)

Performed by Elvis Presley

(film version) / (single version)

Chadwick "Chad" Gates (Elvis) has just returned to his home state of Hawai'i after a stint in the Army. Not wanting to work on his father's pineapple plantation (seriously), he rekindles his relationship with his girlfriend, Maile (Joan Blackman). This song is sung as an accompaniment to a music box he gives to Maile's grandmother (Flora Kaai Hayes, a former Hawaiian Territorial Representative to the U.S. House). This song is among Elvis' best-known and most widely-covered.

“Dekhi Zamaane Ki Yaari / Bichhde Sabhi Baari Baari”, music by S.D. Burman, lyrics by Kaifi Azmi, Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959, India)

Performed by Mohammad Rafi (dubbing Guru Dutt)

Lyrics in Hindi - roughly, "I Have Seen How Deeply Friendship Lies / I Have Seen People Abandon Me One by One"

Part 1 (3:44-8:27) / Part 2 (2:16:29-2:20:42)

Make sure to turn on the video’s English captions

In this romantic tragedy, Suresh Sinha (Dutt) is a washed-up director looking back on his life. In the first part, the song leads into the rest of the film - which is almost entirely a flashback. In brief, Suresh is unhappily married to a woman whose in-laws look down on him because, to them, working in films is contemptible to their social class. Suresh meets a woman, Shanti (Waheeda Rehman), on accident and she is soon cast as the lead for his next film. They fall in love, but it is never consummated for various reasons. Eventually, his career crashes after a box office bomb and her career is ascendant. Leading into the second part of the song, Suresh is penniless and working as an extra at the movie studio. Shanti recognizes him, wants to help, but he refuses to revive his career on the back of her success. Kaagaz Ke Phool has elements of autobiography, and Suresh's fate has parallels with what happened to Dutt after this film was released.

“(Do You Know What It Means to Miss) New Orleans”, music by Louis Alter, lyrics by Edgar De Lange, New Orleans (1947)

Initially performed by Billie Holiday and Louis Armstrong and his band; reprised by various

(initial film performance) / (Louis Armstrong single version)

Endie (Holiday in her only appearance in a feature film) is a maid to the affluent Smith family, whose matriarch looks down on jazz as a disreputable genre of music. In secret, Endie frequents a gambling and jazz establishment in the historic Storyville district of New Orleans and performs here with Louis Armstrong (playing himself) and others when she gets the chance. The matriarch's daughter (Dorothy Patrick), an classical operatic soprano, is transfixed by this new music she has never heard before.

“ Exsultate Justi”, music and lyrics by John Williams, Empire of the Sun (1987)

Performed by orchestra and chorus under the direction of Williams

Lyrics in Latin

In this historical epic, affluent British school boy Jamie Graham (a young Christian Bale) is living with his parents in Shanghai when the Japanese invade. Jamie is separated from his parents and placed in an internment camp. Soon before the end of WWII, the prisoners are moved elsewhere, but Jamie hides and stays put. This song plays as Jamie bikes around the empty camp and continues to play as he encounters liberating U.S. troops. Jamie is dirty and malnourished when found; one can argue that this song is used ironically. It plays once more over the end credits. "Exsultate Justi" is a variation on a theme John Williams develops over the course of the film and harkens back to Jamie's past, attending Anglican services with parents.

“Farewell to Storyville",  music by Louis Alter, lyrics by Edgar De Lange, New Orleans (1947)

Performed by Louis Armstrong and his band, Billie Holiday, and company

In New Orleans, the Storyville district was a den of drinking, gambling, jazz, and prostitution. The district was the home to a heavily black populace. The U.S. military, about to establish a Naval base nearby, forces the city to close the district for good. This song is a swinging dirge to a center of jazz - a musical genre looked down upon by many of the city's upper-class whites due to its ties (real and imagined) to crime.

“Happy Endings", music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, New York, New York (1977)

Performed by Liza Minnelli and company (that's Jack Haley - who played the Tin Man and was, at the time, Minnelli's father-in-law - roughly seven minutes in)

(use in film) / (soundtrack version)

It is highly recommended one sees how this song is used in the film. Bear with me: this song is part of a movie within a movie. Within that movie within a movie, there is another movie. "Happy Endings" is the title end song to a film called Happy Endings within New York, New York. Singer Francine Evans (Liza Minnelli) has made it big as a recording artist and caps off her hit film, Happy Endings, with this song. We see Francine's ex, played by Robert De Niro, in the audience as the film ends. "Happy Endings" is a homage/deconstruction to midcentury Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) musicals. It serves the film as "The Broadway Melody" does to Singin' in the Rain (1952) or the 17-minute ballet does to conclude An American in Paris (1951).

“Here They Come (From All Over the World)", music and lyrics by P.F. Sloan and Steve Barri, The T.A.M.I. Show (1964)

Performed by Jan and Dean

The link above provides the entire film. You only need to watch from 0:00-4:11. If you like music from this era or want to hear more, this film is highly, highly recommended.

This is the opening credits song to a concert film recorded over two days in Santa Monica, California on October 28 and 29, 1964. The Teenage Awards Music International (T.A.M.I. - yes, I know it's an awkward name) Show included many of the most popular musical stars of that time - almost all of them name-dropped in this song. Jan and Dean, a surf music duo, served as hosts (and performed during) the show. You folks are lucky that this is the only original song from this film!

“Is There Still Anything That Love Can Do?", music and lyrics by Yôjirô Noda, Weathering with You (2019, Japan)

Performed by RADWIMPS

Lyrics in Japanese (translation)

Weathering with You is a romantic fantasy anime about a high school boy who runs away from his rural home to Tokyo, where he meets a girl who can manipulate the weather. It has been inexplicably raining for weeks without interruption in Tokyo, so they form a business to help clear the inclement weather for special events. The melody of this song is heard throughout the film's score. It does not appear with lyrics until late in the film. The song is played under the boy's seemingly impossible attempt to save her from an unwilling human sacrifice.

There is so much plot in this damn film (it's all Makoto Shinkai's fault) - I can't explain the context of the song or this movie in a reasonable amount of space.

“Moonlight Swim”, music by Ben Weisman, lyrics by Sylvia Dee, Blue Hawaii (1961)

Performed by Elvis Presley

In a musical packed end-to-end with songs, Chadwick "Chad" Gates (Elvis) has taken a job with a tour guide agency. On his first day, he drives his first clients - a school teacher (who not so secretly is attracted to Chad) and four teenagers (one of whom becomes smitten) - to their destination.

“Personality”, music by Jimmy Van Heusen, lyrics by Johnny Burke, Road to Utopia (1946)

Performed by Dorothy Lamour

(in-film performance) / (live radio performance)

In the fourth film of the Road to... comedy series, Bob Hope and Bing Crosby's characters have just overpowered two Alaskan thugs with a history of murderous violence. As they enter a saloon dressed up as those two thugs, all of the patrons - in a town that only knows the thugs by reputation - shut up in terror. They are treated to a performance by Sal (Lamour), who is trying to find a map of a gold mine that the real outlaws supposedly have. A visual narrator (Robert Benchley) interrupts the scene before the song briefly.

“Please Don’t Stop Loving Me”, music and lyrics by Joy Byers, Frankie and Johnny (1966)

Performed by Elvis Presley

(in-film performance) / (single version)

Johnny (Elvis) and girlfriend Frankie (Donna Douglas) work on a Mississippi River riverboat as performers. Johnny is addicted to gambling and believes that another woman is spurring on his recent run of good luck. During a fit of jealousy-as-acting, Frankie accidentally shoots Johnny during a bit of musical theater (someone switched out the blanks for real bullets). This song occurs after Johnny has recovered from the accident.

“Theme from New York, New York”, music by John Kander, lyrics by Fred Ebb, New York, New York (1977)

Performed by Liza Minnelli

(in-film performance) / (Frank Sinatra single)

For most of the film, saxophone player Jimmy Doyle (Robert De Niro) is trying to compose a song but cannot figure out the lyrics (this plays out as a subplot). His eventual girlfriend/later ex, Francine Evans (Minnelli) provides said lyrics. Some time well after they have broken up, he finds her singing this song - which he previously brought to the top of the jazz charts - in the nightclub where they first met. This film flopped (musical movies were out of fashion by the mid-'70s, and a musical didn't seem "on brand" for director Martin Scorsese). But the Frank Sinatra single popularized this song, and it has been used in many venues of popular culture.

“Waqt Ne Kiya Kya Haseen Sitam”, music and lyrics by S.D. Burman, Kaagaz Ke Phool (1959, India)

Performed by Geeta Dutt (dubbing Waheeda Rehman)

Lyrics in Hindi - roughly, "Time Has Inflicted Such Sweet Cruelty On Us"

Song begins at 1:03:31 and ends at 1:07:51

Make sure to turn on the video’s English captions

In this romantic tragedy told in flashback, Suresh Sinha (Guru Dutt) is a director looking back on his life. Suresh is unhappily married to a woman whose in-laws look down on him because, to them, working in films is contemptible to their social class. Suresh meets a woman, Shanti (Waheeda Rehman), on accident and she is soon cast as the lead for his next film. They fall in love, but it is never consummated for various reasons. This song is the most explicit statement of that love in this film. How much of the scene's set-up is observable by the characters is up to the viewer's interpretation.

“You Make Me Feel So Young”, music by Josef Myrow, lyrics by Mack Gordon, Three Little Girls in Blue (1946)

Performed by Del Porter (dubbing Charles Smith) and Carol Stewart (dubbing Vera-Ellen)

(use in film) / (Frank Sinatra cover)

In this rarely-seen musical (*insert plea to Disney to restore the massive 20th Century Fox catalogue they now own and are almost certainly neglecting*), three chicken farmer sisters decide to travel to Atlantic City in hopes of marrying a rich husband when they learn their aunt's inheritance is not nearly as much as they want. There, youngest sister Myra (Vera-Ellen) - despite the sisters' original intentions of marrying men of wealth - becomes involved with a waiter named Mike (Charles Smith). They go on a date, and they sing this song. A somewhat overly-literal fantastical dancing sequence ensues, complete with Vera-Ellen's dancing skills. This song was popularized by Frank Sinatra years later and has long enjoyed status as a big band/jazz standard.

Contact me however you wish if you have questions or comments regarding MOABOS' processes or something specific about a song or a few. Please let me know as soon as possible if you are having difficulty accessing one of the songs (especially if it is region-locked) or if there is an error in the playlist.

Once more, I thank you all for your support for the Movie Odyssey, the blog, and for me personally - no matter how long I’ve known you or in what capacity. There are no hard feelings if you cannot get to this, although I will be checking in as the deadlines get close. Please wear a mask. Practice social distancing. We'll see each other again on the other side of this pandemic.

TABULATION The winner is determined by a process distinct from the preliminary round. For the final, the winner is chosen by the process known as single transferable vote (the Academy Awards uses this method to choose a Best Picture winner, visually represented here - you should really watch this video if the below doesn’t make sense… which it probably won’t):

All #1 picks from all voters are tabulated. A song needs more than half of all aggregate votes to win (50% of all votes plus one… i.e. if there are thirty respondents, sixteen #1 votes are needed to win on the first count).

If there is no winner after the first count (as is most likely), the song(s) with the fewest #1 votes or points is/are eliminated. Placement will be determined by the tiebreakers described below. Then, we look at the ballots of those who voted for the most recently-eliminated song(s). Their votes then go to the highest-remaining and non-eliminated song on their ballot.

The process described in step #2 repeats until one song has secured 50% plus one of all votes. We keep eliminating nominees and transfer votes to the highest-ranked, non-eliminated song on each ballot. NOTE: It is possible after several rounds of counting that respondents who did not entirely fill in their ballots will have wasted their votes at the end of the process. For example, if a person voted the second-to-last place song as their #1, ranked no other songs, and the count has exceeded two rounds, their ballot is discarded (lowering the vote threshold needed to win), and they have no say in which song ultimately is the winner.

A song wins when it reaches more than fifty percent of all #1 and re-distributed votes.

Tiebreakers: 1) first song to receive 50% plus one of all #1 and transferred votes; 2) total points earned (this was the first tiebreaker in the preliminary round); 3) total #1 votes; 4) average placement on my ballot and my sister’s ballot; 5) tie declared

Previous years’ results for reference: 2013 final 2014 final (input from family and friends began this year) 2015 final 2016 prelim / final 2017 prelim / final 2018 prelim / final 2019 prelim / final

#2020 Movie Odyssey Awards

[newstfionline]

Thursday, June 24, 2021

World’s most expensive cities for expats in 2021 revealed (CNN) Ashgabat in Turkmenistan is the most expensive city in the world for overseas workers, according to this year’s Mercer Cost of Living Survey. The annual report ranks 209 cities based on the comparative cost of expenses including housing, transportation, food and entertainment, with New York City used as a baseline comparison. The Turkmenistan capital, which was number two on last year’s list, is something of an outlier in the top 10, which mostly features business hubs like Hong Kong (last year’s priciest city and this year’s second priciest), Tokyo (number four for 2021), Zurich (number five for 2021) and Singapore (number seven for 2021). Perhaps the biggest change from last year’s Mercer survey sees Beirut rising from the 45th most expensive city for international workers in 2020 to the third priciest for 2021. Mercer puts this development down to Lebanon’s economic depression, which was exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic and the Port of Beirut explosion in August last year. Meanwhile, as the Euro gained almost 11% against the US dollar, European cities were ranked comparatively more expensive than their US counterparts. This led to New York City dropping out of the Mercer top 10 altogether, while Paris climbed the rankings from number 50 in 2020 to number 33 in 2021.

Pressure builds to open U.S.-Canada border (Washington Post) A Florida man takes out ads to call out the U.S. and Canadian governments for failing to lift border restrictions. Lawmakers use salty-ish language. Business owners worry about losing a second lucrative summer season. As restrictions on nonessential travel across the U.S.-Canada land border enter their 16th month this week, pressure is rising on both sides for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and President Biden to crack it open—even a little—or to provide something, anything, about what a reopening plan might look like. Ottawa on Monday did announce some changes at the border, to start July 5. They’d allow Canadian citizens and permanent residents who are fully inoculated with a Health Canada-authorized vaccine, and who test negative for covid-19 before and after arrival, to bypass some quarantine and testing requirements. But the announcement means most fully vaccinated foreigners, including Americans, who hope to enter Canada for nonessential purposes are out of luck. And a growing number of lawmakers, residents and business groups on both sides of the world’s longest undefended border are out of patience.

GOP filibuster blocks Democrats’ big voting rights bill (AP) The Democrats’ sweeping attempt to rewrite U.S. election and voting law suffered a major setback in the Senate Tuesday, blocked by a filibuster wall of Republican opposition to what would be the largest overhaul of the electoral system in a generation. The vote leaves the Democrats with no clear path forward, though President Joe Biden declared, “This fight is far from over.” The bill, known as the For the People Act, would touch on virtually every aspect of how elections are conducted, striking down hurdles to voting that advocates view as the Civil Rights fight of the era, while also curbing the influence of money in politics and limiting partisan influence over the drawing of congressional districts. But many in the GOP say the measure represents instead a breathtaking federal infringement on states’ authority to conduct their own elections without fraud—and is meant to ultimately benefit Democrats. The rejection forces Democrats to reckon with what comes next for their top legislative priority in a narrowly divided Senate.

The Cuba embargo (Foreign Policy) The U.N. General Assembly is expected to vote to condemn the U.S. economic embargo on Cuba, in a resumption of what has become an annual tradition at the body following a pandemic-related pause in 2020. Up until last year, the assembly had overwhelmingly voted to admonish the United States over the embargo each year since 1992. The United States and Israel tend to be the only two nations to reject the resolution, although Brazil joined them in 2019. The vote coincides with increased U.S. support for a temporary suspension of the embargo during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a recent poll showing 66 percent of Americans surveyed supporting a suspension in order for Cuba to export its home-grown vaccines. On Monday, Cuba announced that its Abdala vaccine—one of several vaccine candidates—was roughly 92 percent effective at preventing COVID-19 infection.

France’s Macron Pushes Controls on Religion to Pressure Mosques (WSJ) President Emmanuel Macron is redrawing the line that separates religion and state, in a battle to force Islamic organizations into the mold of French secularism. In recent months, his administration has ousted the leadership of a mosque after temporarily closing it and poring over its finances. Another mosque gave up millions in subsidies after the government pressured local officials over the funding. A dozen other mosques have faced orders to close temporarily for safety or fire-code violations. The government has taken these actions as a precursor to a much broader push to rein in the independence of mosques and other religious organizations across France. Mr. Macron has submitted a bill to Parliament, called the Law Reinforcing Respect of the Principles of the Republic, that would empower the government to permanently close houses of worship and dissolve religious organizations, without court order, if it finds that any of their members are provoking violence or inciting hatred. In addition, the bill would allow temporary closure of any religious group that spreads ideas that incite hatred or violence. Religious organizations would have to obtain government permits every five years to continue operating, and have their accounts certified annually if they receive foreign funding.

Can pandemic recovery plan end Italy’s years of stagnation? (AP) The COVID-19 pandemic hit Italy especially hard, killing more than 127,000 people and sending the European Union’s third-largest economy into a devastating tailspin. Yet out of that tragedy may come solutions for decades-old problems that have held back growth and productivity—and with them, a new sense of stability for the euro, the currency shared by 19 of the European Union’s 27 members. Backed by 261 billion euros from the EU and Italian government, the country’s plan for recovering from the pandemic calls for a top-to-bottom shakeup of a major industrial economy long hampered by red tape, political reluctance to change, and bureaucratic and educational inertia. The challenge is formidable: Italy has failed to show robust growth in the more than two decades since it joined the euro currency union in 1999. Execution of the recovery plan remains a risk given Italy’s often-fractious politics. But “if they succeed with even half, it will have a big impact,” said Guntram Wolff, director of the Bruegel think tank in Brussels.

Militias in Afghanistan’s north are taking up the fight against the Taliban (Washington Post) A sweeping Taliban offensive across northern Afghanistan, unchecked by overstretched government forces, has triggered a sudden resurgence of anti-Taliban militias in half a dozen provinces, raising concerns that the country could plunge into a prolonged civil war. President Ashraf Ghani has endorsed the sudden call to arms by former ethnic rival groups. The Ghani government hopes the added support will shore up the beleaguered national defense forces, which have struggled to send reinforcements and supplies to troops facing repeated Taliban attacks. But the prospect of unleashing a hodgepodge of rogue warriors to repel their old enemies also raises the specter of civil war, a state of violent anarchy that Afghans remember all too well from the 1990s. And although the armed groups have pledged to coordinate with government forces, it is also possible that effort could unravel into confused, competing clashes among purported allies. In the past several days, fighting has been reported in nine provinces across the north, and armed militias or civilian groups have formed to repel the insurgents, often fighting alongside state forces. All are loyal to local leaders from minority Tajik, Uzbek or other ethnic groups that have no love for Ghani, a member of the dominant ethnic Pashtun group based in southern Afghanistan.

China prepares for Communist Party centenary in secret (AP) Chinese authorities have closed Beijing’s central Tiananmen Square to the public, eight days ahead of a major celebration being planned to mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the ruling Communist Party. The square, which normally attracts tourists from around the country, was barricaded Wednesday and will remain closed until July 2. The party will showcase the country’s rise from civil war and disastrous political campaigns in the early years of communist rule to market reforms that have created the world’s second largest economy, with a superpower status rivaled only by the United States. Old habits die hard, however, and arrangements for the July 1 anniversary remain shrouded in secrecy. Around Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City former palace complex and other scenic sites are also closed. Flyovers by air force squadrons suggest an aerial review is in the planning, but authorities have yet to release details. The ruling party was established in secrecy in 1921, following the collapse of the Qing dynasty in 1912. It held its first session at a girl’s school in Shanghai, and later moved to a lake boat to evade agents of the local warlord.

Apple Daily Shuts Down (Foreign Policy) On Wednesday, crowds of Hong Kong residents gathered in support outside the headquarters of Apple Daily, one of the last bastions of media resistance to Beijing, as it sent its final edition to print. The paper announced it would close after the arrests of senior leadership this week under the draconian national security law introduced last year. Banks froze the newspaper’s assets to avoid being charged themselves. The rollout of the national security law has seen successive groups targeted: first protest leaders, then democratic politicians, and now journalists. More than 800 Apple Daily staff have lost their jobs while Hong Kong has lost its long-cherished freedom of speech. But the impact of the closure goes far beyond journalism in Hong Kong. Each move like this raises the stakes for other sectors, especially academia and entertainment. Any challenge to the government has become a risk, making self-censorship even more likely. This kind of sweeping coercion has long been the norm on the mainland; in Hong Kong, it provides more proof China has shattered its promise to maintain “One Country, Two Systems” until 2047.

Tokyo shapes up to be No-Fun Olympics (AP) The Tokyo Olympics, already delayed by the pandemic, are not looking like much fun: Not for athletes. Not for fans. And not for the Japanese public. They are caught between concerns about the coronavirus at a time when few are vaccinated on one side and politicians who hope to save face by holding the games and the International Olympic Committee with billions of dollars on the line on the other. Japan is famous for running on consensus. But the decision to proceed with the Olympics—and this week to permit some fans, if only locals—has shredded it. The official cost of the Tokyo Olympics is $15.4 billion, but government audits suggest it’s twice that. All but $6.7 billion is public money. The IOC chips in only about $1.5 billion to the overall cost. The pressure to hold the games is largely financial for the Switzerland-based IOC, a nonprofit but highly commercial body that earns 91% of its income from broadcast rights and sponsorship.

World Powers Gather for Libya Conference (Foreign Policy) World powers gather today in Berlin to discuss a path forward for Libya, ten years after a NATO-led coalition helped oust former leader Muammar al-Qaddafi and eight months since warring factions agreed to a cease-fire in the country’s six-year civil war. The group of countries last met in January 2020. Since then, the October cease-fire has been followed by the selection in February of a transitional government. Today’s discussion will focus on the next steps in Libya’s transition, including preparations for elections in December and the removal of foreign fighters still active in the country. According to United Nations estimates, more than 20,000 foreign fighters and mercenaries from Syria, Russia, Sudan, and Chad remain in Libya. Although today’s meeting is a time to improve on positive developments, Libya is still far from a functioning state. Nearly 20 percent of the population is in need of humanitarian assistance, and the country remains a magnet for human traffickers as they move desperate migrants across the Mediterranean and into Europe.

Witnesses say airstrike in Ethiopia's Tigray kills dozens (AP) An airstrike hit a busy market in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray village of Togoga on Tuesday, according to health workers who said soldiers blocked medical teams from traveling to the scene. Dozens of people were killed, they and a former resident said, citing witnesses. Two doctors and a nurse in Tigray’s regional capital, Mekele, told The Associated Press they were unable to confirm how many people were killed, but one doctor said health workers at the scene reported “more than 80 civilian deaths.” The health workers spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. The alleged airstrike comes amid some of the fiercest fighting in the Tigray region since the conflict began in November as Ethiopian forces supported by those from neighboring Eritrea pursue Tigray’s former leaders.

No laundry day in space (AP) On the International Space Station, there is no such thing as laundry day. Right now, an astronaut needs about 150 pounds of clothes in space per year, and will wear their clothes—gym, underwear, all of it—until they cannot stand the smell, and then throw the clothes away, ejecting the shirts to eventually burn up in the atmosphere. A new study, a collaboration between NASA and Procter & Gamble Co., will attempt to find a good way to clean clothes in space.

#headlines #news

[no-1-rosalind-lang-apologist]

#chloe gong #secret shanghai #foul lady fortune #foul heart huntsman #these violent delights #flf #tvd #orion hong #rosalind lang #phoebe hong #fhh #our violent ends #ove #last violent call #lvc #a foul thing #aft #this foul murder #tfm #roma montagov #alisa montagova #benedikt montagov #marshall seo #celia lang #juliette cai

[adrianfavell]

The View from Global Britain (a small Island off the North West of Europe, sailing North-by-North-West towards an unknown destination)

Later, when he reviewed the strange sequence of events that led to the breakdown of order and the reversion of the high rise residence to a state of near primitive excess and violence, Dr Gove concluded that it might all be traced back to that one day...

A sickly, swollen orange early morning sun squinted pallidly through the chemical haze over the East End of London’s Docklands. Gove reached over casually from his balcony chair to pick up one of the three books lying on his coffee table. It was a warm day already at 8am outside on the apartment balcony:  he had not bothered to change out of his boxer shorts and T-shirt. A well thumbed classic Penguin edition of George Orwell’s Collected Essays and Journalism Volume 4, lay on one side of the reclining beach style chair, that was his usual morning professional treat before the driver arrived. It was marked with pink post it slips on the pages of the essay ‘The Lion and the Unicorn’. Underneath, was a glossy, less well read edition of translated selections from Michel Foucault’s 1970 College de France Lectures on Governmentality. But the book he perused over the top of his red designer Ace & Tate glasses – which he had bought on the last trip to Amsterdam – was a cherished copy of Roger Scruton’s The Philosopher on Dover Beach. An opera lover, the strains of one of Wagner’s Rings could be heard from his Danish Bang & Olufsen state-of-the-art stereo system inside. Funnily enough, he had seen it live together with his friend, rival and now boss, Johnson, and their now ex-wives in Germany, only a few weeks before D-Day, all that time ago. He congratulated himself once again on the purchase of the Segafredo coffee maker, as he drained the content of his third nespresso of the morning, pausing only slightly to feel the slight twinge of pain that followed in his chest. If only he were George Clooney, he thought, wryly.

Such was the cool clarity of his thoughts, that he barely stirred as a scream was heard from the Branson Mansion above him on the 255th floor of the monstrous tower block he lived in. This state of the art tower occupied mainly by high ranking government officials such as himself, or top end CEOs such as Branson, was one of two similar twin towers – “The Rock” across from “The Edge” – that commanded the entire festering zone wasteland of the former Docklands, north of Greenwich. The high rises were impregnable silver fortresses, self contained with sporting facilities, state of the art cinematic entertainment, and a high end shopping mall, that also functioned seamlessly as child care and schooling facilities for families, and contained all other essential services. The building was equipped with two helicopter landing pads that usually were high enough to clear the low lying cloud of pollution which mostly separated the social classes. Below the towers, under ground level society, was an interconnected underground elite parking facility, that led directly out on to the national freeway grid. His quizzical blue eyes lifted up momentarily from the pages of the philosopher Scruton elucidating a point about Edmund Burke, as a large dead dog thrown from above, flew past the balcony and down, a further half kilometer or so, before crashing through the roof of one of the dozen White “Go Home Immigrants” hostility vans parked there. There was a small commotion among a group of female cleaning service workers arriving for work, apparently Polish, from the distant sound of their foreign voices in the silent city morning. There were still irregularities in the population, he surmised.

He shifted his body with discomfort, however, when he noticed that one or two drops of a rabid red froth from the half decapitated dog had landed on the page of Scruton’s text. He lay the book aside to make a note on a pad that Branson would have to be asked to leave the country.

Gove had been around as a shadowy governmental advisor in the Santiago and Buenos Aires of the 1970s; you sometimes knew when it was a time for a change. These were places he had learned his trade. He recognised though that for all its rationality, violently capturing, torturing and then dumping by helicopter these “nowhere” types in the Thames Estuary was no longer a viable option in the England of the Twenty First Century. Yes, they were a fifth column. These cosmopolitan, nomadic, “transnational” intellectuals and their rich compatriots, who shared a hypocritical nostalgia for the free moving global planet of their youth; a few were still EU sympathisers and internationalist terrorists. Still, he smiled wryly, there was no going back to the River Plate during the heady days of the 1978 World Cup. Even for a criminal like Branson, it was not a practical option. Well, he’d made damn sure that his superior Mrs Thatcher wash her hands of any responsibility for anything her old friend, General Pinochet, had done. And it was true that after, his comrade General Galtieri had returned the favour to the dear Iron Lady, who had been in a tough spot herself in 1981. What they devised was the courtesy of a staged, “low level” invasion of the Falklands Island, that had proven a pioneer of a new brand of simulacra wars (“good for politics, good for business”, a military showcase “win-win-win” all round) that independent islands could engage in to maintain autarkic economic dynamism and electoral support in an now entirely protectionist world. Those were the stuff of international relations today, but always dangerous of course given the hardware, sometimes even nuclear, involved. Protest was usually muted among any remaining “Remain” activists or (so-called) “global” protestors. There were still plenty of academic sanctuaries abroad for renegade university academics, and Branson would be easily “persuaded” – with the right threat –  to take a one way ticket to New York or Los Angeles; places where enclaves of humanitarian CEOs still grumbled together in secret societies about the policies of supreme leader Donald Trump.

He wondered about the scream, though, and idly flicked on the telescreen that was partly masked behind a reproduction of a Kandinsky print on the dining room wall. The Party spokesman was celebrating loudly another victory for the People, that had been delivered that morning, like clockwork, with monotonous weekly regularity. The magic numbers: 52% for Leave, 48% for Remain; a weekly plebiscite delivered electronically by a large, government owned public opinion survey company, Big Big DATA Inc. The weekly vote stabilised the ongoing national need to adjust the population – for example, by removing persons of certain foreign extraction – to deliver the correct mathematical proportion that had been adjusted to represent the exact optimal mix for a definitively binding democratic result (the formula went): “democratic outcomes in divided societies which had decided to resolve their differences by a simple direct Yes/No method”. It was also one reason why they could not go on more strongly with the policy his previous boss Mrs May had devised. The “Go Home” Immigration vans and deportation squads (the “weekly hostility” she called it), particularly targeted at the heavily Europeanised university academic population. Too many deportations and the Remain vote (“Remoaners”, he chuckled) might be too quickly depleted.

The screen changed to an image of a man in a red tie, the officially employed Opposition Leader that Gove himself had hired in one of his occasional, but nonetheless regular, strokes of genius. The annoying man on screen swiftly changed the topic as always to a passionate denunciation of the poverty conditions of white working class voters. What a national shame it was, he said, they had been forced to live now for several decades of austerity gentrification and slum clearance, that had left nothing much of most major cities in the kingdom except mile upon mile of concrete wreckage underneath the sporadic, tree like growth of these huge, shiny residential blocks. Most of these had been built by shady Shanghai and Istanbul owned corporations that had been offered bi-lateral franchise access to the Island, in spite of other barriers to World Trade.

He went back to his laptop writing, a new proposal for entirely consolidating a nationalisation of the national game, which he had loosely imagined as an evolution of the Eton Wall Game. An architect of the national curriculum that had expurgated any traces of “global citizenship” from the education of Engand’s youth, Gove’s influence over the last years had extended to all areas of national culture where some sort of withdrawal from the previously established global or international practices needed to be conceived. Sport was his new brief. The idea had first come to him while watching the World Cup of Summer 2018: the brilliant combination of young British Black and White talent – Ali, Lingard and Kane – that had combined to score goal after goal against foreign allcomers – Japan, Columbia, Sweden – before unfairly succumbing to evil European refereeing against Croatia in the semifinal. As all the newspapers had said, in that hot and heady summer after the first Brexit vote, all future troubles were forgotten as England had united, and seemed to throw away all bitterness and caution in celebration, drinking, cheering, loving and kissing; the white St.George red cross fluttered everywhere over a happy and unified multi-racial land.

Indeed, as economists made clear, the date of January 31st 2020 was the demographic turning point. D-Day, it was called now, a national holiday; Independence Day, being the other major national festival on 23rd June. D-Day, Gove had argued, was the date at which Britain’s international and foreign population was at its optimal peak of absorption into a wholly national economy. The doors could be clanged shut on freedom of movement, but also on trade and industry, since Gove and his colleagues had devised a failsafe scheme to enable Britain to slowly transform all of its internationalised practices into distinct, diverse, incompatible alternatives, that would by their difference and originality, be highly innovative, rich in IP, and world beating. They would however have no compatibility with the outside; of little moment, given the huge backwater of an empire the Island still could call upon. This left a problem of course, for Britain’s national sport and greatest global export, football. This had necessitated Gove’s creative intervention, adapting the Eton Wall Game. He chuckled again at the thought of his heroes Ali, Lingard and Kane, mucking in with the boys, down in the scrum next to the wall, just as Gove, Johnson, Cameron, Goodhart and their idol Orwell had all done as youngsters.

This was still a white paper, for now, and the nation had continued to rely on bi- and multi-lateral agreements and some irregularities to allow the open labour market for the Championship League. It was true: it had more Italian and Portuguese football managers, and more star African players than ever. And yes, it was an exception to the nation’s stringent anti–immigration, zero foreigner policy. A mere “anomaly” , he had called it on Question Time.

What economists and demographers had also discovered though in 2016 was fateful. A now legendary paper by a demographer called Coleman, its framed original folio at the entrance to the British Museum, had shown that if population trends continued – with freedom of movement and immigration – the original White British population would become a minority by 2070, amidst mixed marriages, higher immigrant child birth rates, and (far) too many “people of colour” among foreign-origin migrants. Gove was analytic enough to recognise these populations had been sources of the extraordinary boom years of the 1990s and 2000s, but had been the one thinker with the foresight to see that the door had to be shut in June 2016, if Britain was ever to integrate all these human resoruces and become an independent island again. The People was called upon, and dutifully delivered its 52%. The answer was naturalising, rigorously, everyone on the Island at that moment in time – whether they wanted it or not. That was the key although it would be havoc for the weekly referendum that he knew was needed to maintain the 52% plebiscite of democracy over the Remain vote – hence the further statistical tricks and legal exclusion – and “disappearances” out to sea, if necessary.

They were well on the way to creating a new British population, however, which was remarkable for its multi-racial “super-diversity” (it was called) and yet could maintain stably what another economist, Collier, had calculated as England’s uniquely 80% English DNA national origins, traced back to the Magna Carta. Freedom and Rationality could grow again on this soil.

It was of course on that day, 31st January 2020, that England unveiled its secret plan to escape from Europe, at the cliffs of Dover: making use of the decaying tunnels abandoned by Eurostar and roll-on-roll-off transportation companies, the government had motorised the white cliffs, using a clever combination of nuclear and wind power, that in fact would enable a significant geological shift to begin to move the Island (henceforth capitalised) in a North-by-North-Westerly direction towards the Atlantic. The colony of Ireland would be merged again, as it collided with the British Isles, and a Scotland somewhat reduced -- natural shrinkage caused by damage to its exterior north west coastline buffered by the rough merging and the seas as the Island moved implacably in the direction of Greenland. The South East of England became the only temperate part of the Island as it moved out to sea, further driving up housing prices.

And so on that day, the TVs were all re-set to Telescreens and Party news only, and the new People’s Democracy began. Gove’s slightly lazy left eye almost welled with a gin soaked tear, as he recalled the first judder and grinding geological movement of the Island at the Dover coast. On the cliffs, all the major national dignitaries and leaders had gone to celebrate the occasion. Yes, the Island was moving in the sea, and it had been followed by the slow, at first imperceptible descending of a mist, then an ever thicker fog, which cut off all visible trace of the receding continent across the water. As had been planned, telecommunications and internet networks were disrupted to come under strict territorial control again, and the Island had its independence back. News footage of Lady Diana’s funeral had been used as the first broadcast, to set the right tone. The people cheered wildly, underneath the white and red cross flags, across the nation – the true World Cup spirit back again – as it headed out, impregnable and forever undefeated, towards the icy waters of the North West Atlantic....

*****

It may only have been synchronicity, but at that very moment in a liberal arts college in Southern California, Dr Wong, a young Asian Amercian academic put down her laptop, and reached for a lemonade. The book on her table was a new edition of Gayatri Spivak’s collected essays. The palm trees over the boulevard swayed lightly as a sweet breeze blew in from the desert.

She finished the final sentence of the draft of of a paper for Global Text, which proposed the theoretical framework for the creation of a new interdisciplinary field of occidentalist area studies, “England Studies”. The topic had strangely never been tried before. She had made her name as a post-doc in cosmology, studying black holes (like Steven Hawking, she used to joke), but had switched briefly but brilliantly to zoology during the first five years of her teaching career, making a cutting contribution to contemporary Japanese cultural studies, writing about its remarkable population of otaku and cosplay database animals. However, publisher interest in this well known remote but inaccessible East Asian Galapagos fantasy island lost somewhere in the Pacific, had been waning for some time. Were there not other black holes to discover? One day at the gym a new idea came to her. Why not somewhere in Europe instead of Asia, as a next career move? – especially since the EU had become such a historical curiosity, since its demise. After all, nobody could now quite work out what on Earth anyone had been thinking when they dreamed ludicrously of “European Community” or – and this one really took the grand prix – “European Citizenship”!!. What hilarious and zany times those European post-war “trentes glorieuses” had been!

Yet, ten years on from Independence Day, it seemed that Britain (as it was sometimes still referred to, in academic circles) had moved far enough away from mainland Europe into the upper ocean streams of the Atlantic – somewhere between “Greenland” and “Iceland”, which already had fields devoted to them – to allow for a new field of Area Studies, however challenging the remote fieldwork there. An Island, no doubt with its own strange, unsustainable, close-to-extinct creatures, practices and ideas, like 3G phone technology before the iPhone.

This would surely get her tenure, or even an outside job offer on this year’s market, certainly good enough to allow a fresh negotiation with her Department Chair, she thought....

  ADRIAN FAVELL

Berlin, 9 Dec 2018, early AM

with apologies to J.G.Ballard (1930-2009)

#brexit #global britain #j.g. ballard #gove #eurostar #eu citizens #boris johnson

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 4.12 (before 1960)

240 – Shapur I becomes co-emperor of the Sasanian Empire with his father Ardashir I. 467 – Anthemius is elevated to Emperor of the Western Roman Empire. 627 – King Edwin of Northumbria is converted to Christianity by Paulinus, bishop of York. 1012 – Duke Oldřich of Bohemia deposes and blinds his brother Jaromír, who flees to Poland. 1204 – The Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade breach the walls of Constantinople and enter the city, which they completely occupy the following day. 1606 – The Union Flag is adopted as the flag of English and Scottish ships. 1776 – American Revolution: With the Halifax Resolves, the North Carolina Provincial Congress authorizes its Congressional delegation to vote for independence from Britain. 1807 – The Froberg mutiny on Malta ends when the remaining mutineers blow up the magazine of Fort Ricasoli. 1820 – Alexander Ypsilantis is declared leader of Filiki Eteria, a secret organization to overthrow Ottoman rule over Greece. 1831 – Soldiers marching on the Broughton Suspension Bridge in Manchester, England, cause it to collapse. 1861 – American Civil War: Battle of Fort Sumter. The war begins with Confederate forces firing on Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina. 1862 – American Civil War: The Andrews Raid (the Great Locomotive Chase) occurs, starting from Big Shanty, Georgia (now Kennesaw). 1864 – American Civil War: The Battle of Fort Pillow: Confederate forces kill most of the African American soldiers that surrendered at Fort Pillow, Tennessee. 1865 – American Civil War: Mobile, Alabama, falls to the Union Army. 1877 – The United Kingdom annexes the Transvaal. 1900 – One day after its enactment by the Congress, President William McKinley signs the Foraker Act into law, giving Puerto Rico limited self-rule. 1910 – SMS Zrínyi, one of the last pre-dreadnought battleships built by the Austro-Hungarian Navy, is launched. 1917 – World War I: Canadian forces successfully complete the taking of Vimy Ridge from the Germans. 1927 – Shanghai massacre of 1927: Chiang Kai-shek orders the Chinese Communist Party members executed in Shanghai, ending the First United Front. 1927 – Rocksprings, Texas is hit by an F5 tornado that destroys 235 of the 247 buildings in the town, kills 72 townspeople and injures 205; third deadliest tornado in Texas history. 1928 – The Bremen, a German Junkers W 33 type aircraft, takes off for the first successful transatlantic aeroplane flight from east to west. 1934 – The strongest surface wind gust in the world at the time of 231 mph, is measured on the summit of Mount Washington, New Hampshire. It has since been surpassed. 1934 – The U.S. Auto-Lite strike begins, culminating in a five-day melee between Ohio National Guard troops and 6,000 strikers and picketers. 1937 – Sir Frank Whittle ground-tests the first jet engine designed to power an aircraft, at Rugby, England. 1945 – U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dies in office; Vice President Harry S. Truman becomes President upon Roosevelt's death. 1945 – World War II: The U.S. Ninth Army under General William H. Simpson crosses the Elbe River astride Magdeburg, and reaches Tangermünde—only 50 miles from Berlin. 1955 – The polio vaccine, developed by Dr. Jonas Salk, is declared safe and effective.

#Events