Breaking the mattress of America. pic.twitter.com/M4Cq62YS2c
— Full Frontal (@FullFrontalSamB) July 15, 2016
One day after its reveal, the Trump Pence logo has been disappeared. Unfortunately for Donald, the internet has that mass failure archived all over the place.
Via Raw Story.
There is Hope: Time to Follow an Indigenous Model for Peace in America.
Gyasi Ross has an excellent article up at ICTMN about these troubled times we find ourselves in. I’m just going to do a bit here.
[…] We’re progressing as a society, becoming more compassionate as a society. Some folks call that “political correctness,” but I don’t think so. Instead, it seems like it’s just a heightened humanity that holds certain behavior accountable. Bullying. The stuff that is making news today would not make news 100 years ago. Heck, it may not have even made news 50 years ago. The “tiny” little daily assaults against the dignity and bodies of so many people who were not white men—Natives, black folks, gay and lesbian folks, Mexicans, women—would not even be an issue some years ago. That’s one of the reasons why Donald Trump’s Trumponian use of hateful rhetoric is so interesting; Donald Trump’s campaign really seems to be is the last stand of those white men who wish for the days when they could commit those assaults against all of those groups with impunity.
That’s not political correctness. That’s fixing inhumanity. And the stories that accompany them, whether “black man got shot by the police” or “Native man shot by the police” are no longer taken for granted. And the subsequent protests and social media outrage over those shootings are likewise no longer taken for granted.
That’s good. We’re evolving.
However, there is a genuine divide between different generations of people. Amongst those generations, let’s be clear, none of them are bad. Even Donald Trump. But many of us simply have fundamentally different worldviews and perspectives depending on how we grew up and the entanglements into which we were born. Currently, there is an old guard oftentimes represented by those in power. Police. Law enforcement in this nation was constructed to protect property and not people; as such, it inherently favors the wealthy. Certain communities have historically been intentionally and systematically kept out of wealth structurally because of many reasons (that’s a different conversation and I’d love to have that conversation with all of you someday; still that’s not the point now); those communities include pretty much all of the communities—black, Native, LGBTQ—who are catching hell from law enforcement today.
A genuine divide.
INDIGENOUS MODEL FOR PEACEKEEPING
I’m a disciple of John Mohawk, a dearly departed Seneca philosopher and professor. He introduced me to the Great Law, a model for peacemaking and peacekeeping amongst warring nations—communities where there is a genuine divide. I’m simply going to quote his 2004 take on the Great Law from “The Warriors Who Turned To Peace” and hopefully start a conversation about how we can heal some intergenerational wounds and provide our children a new start.
Idris Elba, looking absolutely fabulous in pink with spray paint.
Idris Elba visits a street art mural promoting Star Trek Beyond in East London on July 14, 2016 in London, England.
Via Mashable.
At 80 meters, the statue — which itself is 33 meters tall and is intended to stand on a 47-meter pedestal — would be twice as large as the famous Christ statue in Rio de Janeiro.
The actual giant Jesus in question, in a photoshopped location.
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia — Residents of Russia’s “northern capital” are once again girding themselves to defend the city’s world-renowned, 18th-century skyline.
Less than five years after locals successfully fought off an effort by state-controlled natural-gas giant Gazprom to build a 400-meter-high skyscraper in the center of the city, municipal officials are now looking for a place to erect a towering statue of Jesus Christ that has been donated by the Kremlin’s favorite sculptor, Zurab Tsereteli.
“Tsereteli has hardly created anything decent, even on such a holy topic,” longtime Petersburg rights activist Yury Vdovin says. “But it seems the authorities of the country and the city don’t give a damn about people’s opinions. They are pursuing their own ends.”
[…]
It was originally intended for the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, but officials there rejected it because of its enormous scale. Last year, there were reports of plans to put it up in Vladivostok.
This spring, St. Petersburg officials tried to place it in a large park on the outskirts of the city but local residents objected and the initiative was withdrawn. On July 9, however, St. Petersburg Governor Georgy Poltavchenko ordered the city planning committee to find a new home for the statue.
Local reaction to the announcement has been uniformly negative, particularly after municipal authorities just last month overruled public opinion and named a local bridge after former Chechen President Akhmed Kadyrov, the controversial father of current Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov who had no discernable connection with St. Petersburg.
[…]
Outspoken local clergyman Andrei Kurayev has said the best place for Tsereteli’s creation would be the Novaya Zemlya archipelago more than 2,000 kilometers to the northeast in the Arctic Ocean.
The Life.ru website created a satirical photo gallery of the statue photoshopped into various iconic St. Petersburg locations such as Palace Square or next to the Peter and Paul Fortress.
“Petersburgers love their city,” local lawmaker Aleksandr Kobrinsky says. “We shouldn’t forget how they unanimously resisted the construction of the [Gazprom tower] and won. I am sure that if the authorities insist on placing this statue, they will meet just as much resistance.”
“Instead of telling [Tsereteli] where to take his gift, the city authorities are looking for a place to put that monster,” he adds. “It is exactly the same as it was with the Kadyrov Bridge, when they spat on the opinion of 90 percent of the city because Moscow pressured them.”
[…]
Even local representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church in St. Petersburg think Tsereteli’s statue is a bad idea that not only does not fit into the city’s historic image but flies in the face of Orthodox practice as well.
“I am not opposed to new things, but they have to be canonically based,” says priest Georgy Mitrofanov, a professor of the St. Petersburg Spiritual Academy. “I’m not speaking about its aesthetic basis. From the aesthetic point of view, not being a fan of Tsereteli’s, I think this work clashes with the sculptural ensembles that already exist in St. Petersburg and I cannot imagine Tsereteli’s masterpiece within the cultural atmosphere of the city, particularly because it is so dubious from the canonical point of view.”
Full story at RFERL.
All I have here is WOW. From Kengi, click for full size.
© Kengi. All rights reserved.
:D
© C. Ford. All rights reserved.
Baaaabies. Baby Sparrows. So cute. Click for full size.
© C. Ford. All rights reserved.
I had an attack of nostalgia. From the Rats Past files, Chas and Alfie, two of the smartest and best boys ever.
© C. Ford. All rights reserved.
In an effort to keep that momentum going with a new Indigenous host each week covering a variety of topics, and due to her diligence in bringing awareness to Indigenous issues, ICTMN’s UK-based correspondent Lisa J. Ellwood (Nanticoke-Lenape) has been invited to host its Canadian version, @IndigenousXca, July 14th – starting at 7pm ET – through July 21st.
[…]
Ellwood’s week as host kicks off with a look at her “Comprehensive Report on MMIW: The Curiously Different Tales of Violence against Indigenous Women On Both Sides of Turtle Island” story.
Follow ICTMN Correspondent Lisa J. Ellwood on Twitter at @IconicImagery and on her week-long account at @IndigenousXca.
Full Story at ICTMN.
Less than a week before the convention takes over Quicken Loans Arena, the Cleveland City Council Wednesday unanimously approved an update to the city’s antidiscrimination ordinance that will guarantee transgender people can access facilities that correspond with their gender identity.
The revision — which has been hotly debated for three years — specifically bans discrimination based on gender identity or expression, along with numerous other characteristics, in employment and public accommodations (including restrooms). The change approved Wednesday replaces old language that only referred to “protected classes,” without enumerating what those classes were.
I can’t imagine the repubs are all too happy about this, but it’s a great win. Even so, I think I’d be damn careful about using a public facility at the RNC. The Advocate has the full story.
In less pleasant RNC news, Peter Thiel, founder of PayPal, and apparently still mighty pissed about being outed, is going to speak. As if people needed yet another reason to hate PayPal.
Gay PayPal cofounder and Facebook board member Peter Thiel is one of the nation’s 300 wealthiest people. He’s also an ardent Donald Trump supporter, so much so that he’s speaking at next week’s Republican National Convention.
Though the convention’s platform is described as the most anti-LGBT in Republican history — with calls for a reversal of marriage equality, restricted bathroom access for trans people, and legalized “conversion” therapy and religious-based discrimination — Thiel was happy to take part in the convention. Thiel will be one of only three openly gay speakers at the event and the first in 16 years, according to The Huffington Post.
[…]
Thiel will be joined at the convention by a calvalcade of anti-LGBT speakers, including Jerry Falwell Jr., Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, and Florida attorney general Pam Bondi. Click here for the full list of speakers. Former presidential nominee Mitt Romney and former presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush have declined to speak at the event.
Full story at The Advocate.
I. Have. No. Words. Words are completely inadequate. Visit Pascal Goet, and lose yourself in wonder. Hang onto those jaws.
CANTHUS.
BOUCARDI.
CORNIS.
HEMI.
XYLO.
I’ll stop now. Go see the rest!
Credit: Mike Eisenberg.
Mike Eisenberg captured this stunning moment, with thanks to @weatherchannel.
A short while back, I posted about the FFRF billboard going up at the RNC. The makers of the movie God’s Not Dead 2 wanted to put up an advert too, a rather large one:
What convention attendees won’t see is an even larger sign with a pro-religion message that would have advertised the DVD release of God’s Not Dead 2. That’s because, after two months of back-and-forth with the movie’s distributor, the billboard company, Orange Barrel Media, may have deemed the Christian-sounding messaging needlessly provocative.
The sign, which would have measured 32 feet by 60 feet, would have draped down one side of a large building in downtown Cleveland and was to feature a picture of Melissa Joan Hart, who plays a teacher in trouble for invoking scripture in the classroom. Alongside the image of the actress was the text: “I’d rather stand with God and be judged by the world than stand with the world and be judged by God.”
That is truly a monster sized ad. It’s even huuuuuuuuuuuge.
Orange Barrel told Pure Flix, the distributor, it didn’t like the “judged by God” message, calling it “too political” and “way too incendiary,” according to emails obtained by The Hollywood Reporter. On another occasion, insiders said the billboard company complained that even the title of the film was considered problematic.
Early on, Orange Barrel cited Republican National Committee rules barring “scandalous” signage, though Pure Flix argued that the RNC would have no problem with their message, especially since former GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee is in the movie. In fact, the GOP has partnered with Pure Flix for a worship service the night prior to the start of the convention, followed by a screening of the movie (with food provided by Chick-fil-A).
No word right now on whether or not the ad will eventually find a home at the RNC, but the FFRF has another ad up:
Via Hollywood Reporter.