Daddy Robin, looking for food for his babes. Click for full size.
© C. Ford. All rights reserved.
Affinity
Art, Fun, & Nonsense.
Daddy Robin, looking for food for his babes. Click for full size.
© C. Ford. All rights reserved.
Rick Tyler (Rick Tyler for President)
Alternate title: Waaah! You meanypants are unfair! Remember Rick “Make America White Again” Tyler? He’s very upset that people are being so mean and unfair as to do things like boycott his restaurant, due to his bigotry.
A new billboard campaign explicitly rejects the Donald Trump-inspired message of a Tennessee statehouse candidate — who said he appreciates the attention.
Rick Tyler, an independent Congressional candidate for Tennessee’s 3rd District, is facing a boycott of his restaurant business after he advertised his candidacy with racist billboard messages saying, “Make America White Again.”
Other residents of Polk County were disappointed with the national attention Tyler’s message attracted, and they wanted to counter the racist slogan to show not everyone agreed with the candidate, reported the Times Free Press.
“I really wanted to avoid the perception that residents in this region feel that way or treat one another that way,” said Josiah Vacheresse, executive director for Court Appointed Special Advocates for Children. “That’s not what we’re about, that’s not what we’re for.”
So Vacheresse asked family, friends and online supporters to help him buy advertising space on billboards in the county, where drivers will see inspiring quotes from Nelson Mandela instead of a more racist interpretation of Trump’s campaign slogan.
[…]
Tyler, who also set up a billboard quoting Martin Luther King Jr. alongside a Confederate flag, said he didn’t mind if the second campaign rejected his message.
“I think it’s great what they’re doing,” Tyler said. “They’re stoking the fire of the story.”
Two of Tyler’s signs were taken down last week by the billboard rental companies, and the candidate said he was disappointed.
“I’m all about freedom,” said Tyler, whose campaign website contains lengthy “conspiracy science” posts about chemtrails and communist plots. “It’s great that they are able to say what they want to say. What’s tragic is that I’m not able to. I’m not allowed to. My First Amendment right is being nailed to the cross.”
No, that’s not tragic, Mr. Tyler, and no one has taken your rights away, which I’d think you’d notice, what with giving interviews and all. You can talk, and write, and try to find a way to put up even more repellent ads, and here’s the great thing – other people are free to respond to all that, and they have. Darn meanypantses.
Full Story Here.
This whole ‘who would Jesus vote for’ is so damn absurd, but it doesn’t stop the less from stellar thinkers of the world using it, as if it actually meant something other than “I’m a willfully ignorant arsehole’. Today’s WWJVFer, why none other than Kevin Sorbo, who also had a fair amount to say about Trump’s immigration ban check ’em out policy.
However, TMZ’s protographer countered by saying that since Jesus grew up in the Middle East, “he wouldn’t be allowed to come over here under [Trump’s] immigration policy.”
“I don’t think that’s true,” Sorbo replied, before launching into a defense of Trump’s proposal to ban all Muslims from emigrating to the US.
“I’m Norwegian,” he said. “If there’s Norwegians going around strapping bombs [to themselves], you can check me out. I don’t mind if you racial profile against me. I have nothing to hide. So why do people if they have nothing to hide, why are they getting upset about stuff? If they have nothing to hide, they take one day out of your life, fingerprint me, check out my background, what’s wrong with that?”
“But isn’t he saying, ‘Let’s ban immigrants from those countries?’” the photographer replied.
“He’s saying, ‘Let’s check everybody out,’” Sorbo responded.
Full Story and video at Raw Story.
Scott Adams.
Adams believes U.S. men are under the yokes of women, as evidenced by v-neck sweaters which are a “uniform” they are forced to wear, according to the Daily Dot.
The website cited a June 23 post on Adam’s blog, “The Humiliation of the American Male in 2016.”
“Perhaps the biggest unreported story of this presidential election is the humiliation of the American male. Unless I’m blinded by confirmation bias – which is entirely possible – it seems to me that the humiliation of American men is now institutionalized in the media,” Adams writes. “Check out this commercial for dishwasher detergent. And take careful note of the American man’s v-neck sweater. That’s the uniform of a man who is owned by a woman.”
Don’t worry about Adams, he’s on to the ploy.
“You’re laughing because you know it’s true,” he writes. “How many of the married men reading this blog have received those same sweaters as “gifts” from women? Personally, I’ve received about 25 over the years. None from men. I received three of those sweaters so far this year. I throw them away. Nice try.”
However if the Daily Dot’s Cale Weissman is successful, Adams may soon have a lot more offending v-neck sweaters to throw away.
Yes, Adams truly believes these v-neck sweaters are cozy symbols of Male Oppression. Through this we may have figured out a way to remedy his constant humiliation: Get men to buy Scott Adams v-neck sweaters. Lots of them.
You may be asking, “Cale, what would that accomplish?” Well, maybe if Adams had a real male—that is, a manly man who does manly things like not being controlled by women and obsessively drawing nerdy cubicle workers’ mundane hellscape—buy him some v-neck sweaters, maybe he would form a new association with the knitted garment. Perhaps he would see v-neck sweater-wearers in a whole new light. They are not “men” owned by women but “people” leased by J. Crew.
To that end, Weissman has launched a GoFundMe account where he is raising funds to buy Adams male-sanctioned v-neck sweaters. As of Wednesday morning he’s donated $350 — enough to buy about four or five sweaters from J. Crew.
Full Story Here.
First up, a stunning Fallen Angel sculpture, from Sun Yuan and Peng Yu, who always produce phenomenal work, even when it does enter disturbing territory.
I love this piece, the one disturbing aspect for me are the chicken wings. In my head, chicken wings belong on a chicken, not a person, angel or no. The rest of it is so beautifully done, and the angel being netted for public consumption is terribly poignant. I put this down as another win for Sun Yuan and Peng Yu. Visit their gallery.
For Angel, however, they left the controversy for the piece itself, and worked with mainly fiberglass, silica gel, and stainless steel to create the startlingly realistic body.
Via The Creators Project.
Moving on to the irritation: Christo. I’m not sure what it is exactly, that leaves me cold and highly irritated with most everything Christo has ever done, but his latest is no exception. It’s been making art headlines all over, all with the same stupid fucking theme: Walking on Water, Oooh! Aaargh. No. It’s walking on fucking piers, not walking on water. It’s a big, expensive, temporary bridge. Perhaps this is the core of what bugs me about Christo’s stuff – it’s all a cheat.
Not impressed. Via The Creators Project (and every other art site).
Steve Spazuk paints with fire. Very exciting! As soon as I get some sturdier paper, I’ll definitely be playing!
there just might be a He-Man reboot.
Kellan Lutz.
Human thirst-trap Kellan Lutz tweeted about meeting with the filmmakers behind a reboot of Masters of the Universe, prompting the internet to subsequently geek the fuck out. […] Hollywood has been trying to churn out a He-Man reboot for a while, with several directors and writers attached to the project, but it now seems like it’s finally got some momentum. McG, of Charlie’s Angels and early-00s music video fame, has been working on getting He-Man to the big screen and recently Lutz met with him and producer Mary Viola:
Images courtesy of the artist.
An ecstatic mix of purples, greens, reds, and yellows flow in and out of one another in FLUID, a new series from Maggie West. Colored lights illuminate her subjects, globs of bodily fluid produced by modern-day renaissance man Christopher Zeischegg, with whom West recently entered a relationship. Better known by his former porn name, Danny Wylde, Zeischegg’s also an accomplished author and one-half of the metalcore duo Chiildren. Mixed in with the images of his blood, spit, and semen are snapshots of West’s own bodily fluids, recreating a chemistry on glass plates that’s usually only limited to the bedroom. Now, the full series appears exclusively on The Creators Project.
“These body fluids are an essential part of both our biological makeup and the procreation process. They simultaneously have the power to transmit deadly diseases and create new life,” West tells The Creators Project. Her repertoire is a devoted study of sexuality in all its facets, from the female and male forms to a book that captures intimate kisses between couples. Unlike other examples of bodily fluid-turned-art, like Andres Serrano’s Piss Christ, Milo Moiré’s vaginal egg excretions, and Sarah Levy’s menstrual Donald Trump portrait, West’s photography doesn’t feel transgressive. “Through this series, I wanted to find an abstract way to examine the beauty of each substance,” she says.
See more of Maggie West’s work on her website, and learn more about Christopher Zeischegg here.
The full story and images at The Creators Project.
Former President Ronald Reagan’s son and namesake Ron Reagan is literally the poster-person against religion. While the younger Reagan has been doing ads on news channels for the Freedom from Religion Foundation, it will be his father’s words that will hover over the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio in July.
“We establish no religion in this country… Church and state are, and must remain, separate,” the billboard will read.
[…]
“The RNC needs to be reminded that our nation is predicated on a godless and entirely secular Constitution,” she said. “The fate of our Establishment Clause hangs in the balance of the election. We’re not voting for the next president — we’re voting for the next Supreme Court justice.”
The local chapter director, Marni Huebner-Tiborsky, agreed that the message is an important one for Republican leaders to remember. “This billboard couldn’t be any more timely, and is definitely needed to remind our political leaders and the public that political campaigns should stick to a secular platform, where real change can happen,” she says.
Full Story Here. While I do think this might turn some heads, I doubt it will make a serious impact at this late date in the game. I also think the current crop of repubs is simply too far gone to consider this seriously, although it will hurt to see St. Ronnie going against their constant screed.
Pastor Steven Anderson (Screenshot/YouTube)
It looks like pulpit stomping pastor Steven Anderson has discovered the joy and limelight of pushing hate. It’s easy enough to imagine he’ll do anything to stay in the limelight, too, but with Anderson, we know his views were absolutely repugnant before anyone knew who he was, and they remain that way. Seems that attempts to reason with Steve don’t work. Gosh, how surprising.
Others simply tried to reason with Steve by pointing out that the bible contains quite a list of “sins” other than homosexuality which were also punishable by death, including adultery.
In response, Anderson unapologetically says, Yes! Let’s kill adulterers too!
“Today, adultery is not punishable by law in the United States, but it should be.”
Of course there are rules, the King James-quoting pastor explains … adulterers must be tried and convicted before they’re put to death, and if America were to implement the Old Testament law, it wouldn’t be retroactive, so if you’ve already cheated, you’re safe so long as you don’t do it again.
Think about it, though. Do you really think as many people commit adultery in societies where it is punishable by death? Of course not … so you can relax about your Aunt Trudy who cheated on her husband thirty years ago. If Aunt Trudy had lived in a society that enforced the death penalty for adultery, chances are she would never have committed that sin in the first place.
Oh, those Quiverfull people, always so sensible. I have bad news for Steve though – cheaters will cheat, no matter what. People will end up falling for someone they aren’t married to, because these things happen to humans. You can make all the rules you want, it won’t stop humans from being human. Another human thing is that most people get this funny idea that they won’t get caught. Full story here.
From Ice Swimmer. Beautiful birds! Click for full size.
All the photos were taken with a cell phone on the Midsummer Day 2016. The birds are a black-headed gull (Choirocephalus ridibundus) and a Eurasian jackdaw (Corvus monedula). The place is the quay of Helsinki Market Square.
© Ice Swimmer. All rights reserved.
Exquisite photos from D. Gregory. That last photo pushes all my buttons, in the best way. Click for full size.
© D. Gregory. All rights reserved.
Female Cowbird. Click for full size.
© C. Ford. All Rights Reserved.