#10 Story Western Magazine

[gameraboy2]

"Loose Tongues Mean Hot Triggers" 10 Story Western Magazine, July 1950 Cover by Norman Saunders

[oakendesk]

10 Story Western Magazine Jun 1953

Norman Saunders

Worlds Of Fear Jun 1953

Norman Saunders

[covid-safer-hotties]

Long Covid activist Meighan Stone didn't want to take her mask off. After pressuring her multiple times, an ER nurse called security on her. This public health failure happened at Sibley Hospital in D.C. These incidents are happening on a regular basis now as mask bans and proposals spread from L.A. to New York. You're not going to hear much about it in the news. When you do, it's framed as a problem for the vulnerable, with blue fascists freely associating masks with crime and hate.

None of the handful of stories that discuss these mask bans mention that we're currently in the middle of a deep Covid surge, at a million cases a day. None of them talk about mask bans in the context of Long Covid in adults and children.

A widely cited study declaring "strikingly low" rates of Long Covid in children was recently retracted due to major flaws in methodology. The researchers who pushed for this retraction are heroes and champions of truth.

Is the media covering that?

Not really.

To their credit, Time did recently run a very important piece on Long Covid in children, focusing on a recent study published in JAMA.

Here's the highlight:

They estimated that 20% of the previously infected younger children and 14% of the previously infected adolescents met that threshold [for diagnosis]. Kids infected before the Omicron wave were especially likely to fall into the Long COVID category. Those numbers are higher than some previous estimates—for example, a recent U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report concluded that only about 1% of U.S. kids had had Long COVID as of 2022. But other studies have come to similar conclusions, estimating that somewhere between 10% and 20% of kids who catch COVID-19 will develop long-term complications.

Media outlets like USA Today and NBC are also covering this study. For once, major news networks are devoting attention to something that deserves it. Of course, they're doing it after years of running stories blaming children's school performance and developmental delays on smartphones and lockdowns.

Earlier this year, The New York Times published a misleading, biased story on the "long-lasting" harm of school closures. And The Washington Post recently ran a story also blaming absences on everything except Long Covid and immune system damage. Even Education Week has run pieces attributing weak academic performance to school closures and stress, not the virus itself. It's like shooting fish in a barrel. Pick a magazine or newspaper and you'll find stories like these, but very few talking about the ongoing harm of exposing children and teenagers to Covid. The ones that do are almost always sitting behind a paywall.

Absence speaks louder than words, and not just about Covid.

In 2022, barely 1 percent of all corporate television focused on climate change. That was, in fact, a record high. A year later, it fell 25 percent. That was 2023, the year we surpassed 1.5C of warming for all practical purposes. It was the hottest year in recorded history, and also the worst year for climate disasters, costing us $600 billion in the U.S. alone. Entire countries shut down because it was too hot for work or school. All that, and the corporate media spent even less time talking about the problem. Meanwhile, one columnist after another published long screeds against doomers and fearmongers, insisting that we still had plenty of time to turn things around.

A compelling piece by Ryan Hagen breaks down the unsettling relationship between western news media and the fossil fuel industry. As he points out, internal reports from companies like Exxon celebrate their campaign to turn liberal news outlets like The New York Times in favor of their own industries, convincing the public they were working hard to shift toward renewable energy when the plan was always to use it like icing on top of a cake made out of coal.

Tireless work by Amy Westervelt has chronicled the impact of these campaigns. As her research shows, climate change has morphed from a topic that 80 percent of the public felt an urgency about to, now, a divisive issue and a point that most people would rather not talk about. On top of that, think tanks like the Atlas Network have made a major push to criminalize peaceful climate protests and turn public opinion against activists. A Yale study found that more than 60 percent of Americans hardly ever hear anything about climate change now.

And if you bring it up...

You're a doomer.

There has been a concerted effort across the internet to paint anyone who actually cares about the future as a deeply unhinged fearmonger. Meanwhile, social media giants like Meta have relentlessly censored information about Long Covid.

Have you noticed?

Nate Bear pulled the curtain back on how the media works roughly a year ago. As he puts it, "A lot of the stories you see in the headlines are the result of a PR agency. And depending on the news, the PR agent might not send out a release en-masse but “sell in” the story as an exclusive to just one outlet... Every day a proportion of all news you read starts at just a handful of these agencies."

PR firms are constantly wooing journalists, creating an atmosphere where conflict of interest is more of a feature than a bug.

Caitlin Johnstone did a thorough breakdown of mass media bias. Perhaps the most egregious example: MSNBC reporter Krystal Ball leveled blunt but accurate criticism of Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign and correctly predicted that she would lose against Donald Trump because of all her neoliberal baggage. In response, the Clinton campaign threatened the entire network "not to provide any access during the upcoming campaign." The head of the network told Ball that she "could still say what I wanted, but I would have to get any Clinton-related commentary cleared with the president of the network."

So, she couldn't say whatever she wanted.

Right?

Johnstone cites a piece by Jeff Cohen in Salon that also outlines the peer pressure, groupthink, and careerism that dominates the newspapers, magazines, and mainstream news networks in the U.S.

As she further explains:

Journalists either learn how to do the kind of reporting that will advance their careers in the mass media, or they don’t learn and they either remain marginalized and unheard of or they get worn down and quit.

Christopher Hedges, who left The New York Times after a written reprimand for criticizing the Iraq War, has gone on to describe in disturbing detail how the U.S. media caters to the Israeli government, continually overlooking its war crimes. An outspoken critic of U.S. policy, Hedges has endured persecution for speaking the truth, including the cancellation of his news program for defending other writers and real journalists from charges of antisemitism.

Another outspoken critic, Mehdi Hasan, was dropped from MSNBC for speaking out over Palestine. As Sharon Zhang wrote after the decision, "Hasan has been one of the only news anchors on a major broadcast outlet speaking up against Israel's brutality." He was also one of the few news anchors who told the truth about Covid. As Hasan recently made clear in The Guardian, it's imperative for Democrats to take a stronger, pro-humanitarian stance on Gaza and break with Biden's approach, which has sparked outrage and disgust across the left.

Hasan makes a remarkable point in this column, looking to history for cues about how Democrats need to act to ensure history.

It's not vibes.

It's guts.

Nobody really remembers Hubert Humphrey, LBJ's vice president who lost the 1968 election to Richard Nixon by about a percentage point. It's a lesson worth talking about. Humphrey was losing badly because he couldn't stand up to his own party, the Democrats, who were actually very, very pro-Vietnam War. He managed to close the gap considerably in the 11th hour of the race, finally standing up to his own party and promising to end the war if he became president. Hasan wonders what would've happened if he had trusted his gut sooner.

Well, history gives us a few clues. After all, Nixon did end the war. In the decades since, the Vietnam War has gone down in history as one the biggest mistakes the U.S. ever made. Psychologists use it as a case study of entrapment in escalating conflicts. It's a touchstone used to rate our other failures.

Time and again, history tells us that doing the right thing actually serves political expedience far more than vibes.

Democrats could ensure a landslide victory if they would just take a clear stance on our biggest threats and challenges. They could be honest about Covid. They could stand up against mask bans. They could stand up against genocide. They could renew their promise to take on climate change.

We're not seeing that.

Instead, we see the same groupthink and indirect censorship that dominates the news media. It's not a surprise, given how entwined they've become.

Look at what's happening to Taylor Lorenz.

Outlets like The Washington Post and NPR, who pride themselves on their devotion to democracy and diversity, have assailed Lorenz for referring to Biden as "a war criminal" in a private social media post.

Here's the worst part of NPR's story:

Lorenz has also courted controversy, online, in print, and in real life. During the peak of the pandemic, and since its ebb, she has inspired mockery from conservatives over her insistence on wearing masks, even outdoors. She has cited autoimmune issues as the reason.

Look at the verbs here. Far from objective, they describe Lorenz as "insisting" on wearing a mask "even outdoors," and then frame her autoimmune issues not as a reality but as a reason, almost an excuse. For the record, multiple studies have shown that Covid spreads outdoors, especially at crowded events.

This is what writers and real journalists deal with as they try to do the right thing. It's disturbing to watch.

Both Jared Yates Sexton and Sarah Kendzior have expressed an ambivalent reluctance to get on board with the vibes as the DNC hosts their national convention. The kindest thing Sexton can say is that "It was a masterful feat of political theater" as organizers clambered to put down pro-Palestinian protests during speeches and tilted cameras away from violence and toward more soothing, therapeutic shots of Tim Walz with his family.

As Kendzior writes, "Today both the Democratic and Republican parties operate on cult logic, which means they sometimes have the same policies, but wrapped in different rhetoric--because cultists will abide anything so long as their leader is the one pushing it. Policies they would protest if they were carried out by the other side are suddenly deemed acceptable when pushed by their own."

The same goes for media coverage.

It's worth pointing out that Kamala Harris no longer supports a ban on fracking. She no longer supports a single-payer healthcare system, otherwise known as "Medicare for all" which would provide healthcare access to everyone. Her stance on border patrol and police funding have all shifted right. The media signs off on it, saying "Progressives said they’re disappointed but still support her as she works out the best strategy to defeat former President Donald Trump — even if it means leaving their cause behind."

But it's not just causes getting left behind.

It's human beings.

Is it simply a desire or a wish that nurses don't call security on us because we want to wear masks at an ER, like Meighan Stone? Do we have to leave our human rights behind so we can ensure our human rights?

Do we have to lay down our lives for vibes?

That's the current groupthink.

So there you have it.

The media doesn't report the truth. They spend about 1 percent of their time on things that actually matter. Politicians cater to an underinformed public, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy that leads to nurses calling security on immunocompromised patients for wearing a mask, while newspapers and networks fire real journalists for daring to do their jobs.

It's really something, isn't it?

It doesn't help when readers and viewers complain anytime someone salts their mood with the truth. In an era where free, independent content matters more than ever, it's also harder than ever to come by. How are content creators supposed to tell the truth or talk about things that matter when they're constantly being reprimanded, penalized, and punished every time they try?

We desperately need a free press, and we need a public that supports a free press and not silos of dueling echo chambers.

You get what you support.

It's that simple.

[vanessagillings]

Please talk about your favorite animated movies and what makes them special to you! I'm really curious about what you enjoyed about them both in the past and now?

haha, okay you asked!

I LOVE animated movies. My theory on this is that it took me a long time to emotionally relate to most media growing up, where I felt next to nothing watching most movies and shows as a young kid, and didn't relate to books until I was quite a lot older (I read picture books until I was around 10, and then suddenly in middle school, I hopped right to adult novels like 1984 and the entire Darkover series by Marion Zimmer Bradley, ha). But even before I emotionally related to fiction, I really enjoyed watching animation. It was nice to look at, and I enjoyed watching everything move and change. I grew up in the 90's where animated movies were largely 2D, and I spent hours watching and re-watching my favorite movies just studying how the characters moved -- it's definitely a lot of where I got my understanding of human expressions from. But I also think as I got older and started to relate more to fiction, animation was easier to parse emotionally than live action. The body language is clear. The stories are direct and not as forgiving of bad human behavior (I get frustrated sometimes with the defeatism in adult media, that assumes that People Just Act Badly, and that just needs to be accepted). Facial expressions are also exaggerated and more stylized -- think of a single arched eyebrow, for example, an expression that's commonly drawn to express one particular emotion in animation/illustration but which you next to never see on a real human face. My first introduction into serious reading was also manga -- a highly visual medium -- which uses a lot of the same tactics stylistically as western animation: big, expressive faces, bold gestures and big stories. Compare manga with western comics being printed at the time and it's even more obvious to me why I didn't particularly like comics until I was given manga as an option -- and thankfully I lived close to a kinokuniya, so I could spend all my allowance on untranslated books and magazines, which is also where I learned Japanese (もうたくさん忘れてしまいましたけど).

As far as my favorite movies? THAT IS SO HARD. The first animated movie that BLEW MY MIND was The Lion King. I saw it in theaters when I was eight and I was obsessed; it was definitely one of my first special interests. I know that entire movie line by line, frame by frame, and I had the stuffed animals and the trading cards and the clothes (man, was I teased for those clothes!). My other favorite movies as a kid were The Land Before Time, American Tale, and The Secret of NIMH (I was a big Don Bluth fan!) which have left deep impressions on how to approach storytelling for children; I warn you, I go hard on emotions for kids, because I needed that as a kid, and I know I'm not alone. Some of my other favorites are anything Miyazaki but especially Howl's Moving Castle (I relate to Sophie a lot), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (what I watch when I'm In A Mood), Ratatouille (a huge source of echolalia for my husband and me, we often detect nuttiness, let me tell you), Wallace and Gromit and Fantastic Mr Fox, which I watch every fall as an autumnal tradition. Even as an adult who likes live action, too, I still tend to like slightly over the top directors like Wes Anderson and Guy Ritchie, or movies that are highly cinematic like Road to Perdition, which is still one of my favorite films of all time.

In my opinion, animation is a super important medium outside of it being a very beautiful one. I truly believe it helped me access and understand emotion better as a child, and as an adult, it's a massive source of inspiration in my own work 💛

(Sorry for length, but you did ask!)

[akookminsupporter]

I will say that while no group is going to achieve everything BTS achieved simply because they were the FIRST in so many ways, Stray Kids is a group that has been blowing up in the western market. They have massive commercial appeal as well as critical appeal (they were in TIME magazine’s top 10 songs of 2020, they recently had a cover story in rolling stone magazine, they had a song in a marvel movie, etc etc). It’s definitely harder for 4th gen groups though because there’s SO MANY groups now (especially considering there’s still 3rd and even some 2nd gen groups still active)

I have to say, from what little I've seen on my personal Twitter about that group, it's mostly been about certain members, Felix and Bang Chan in particular, rather than the whole group as such. With Felix, it's usually about his connection to fashion, his commercial deals, or his unique vocal tone in some songs. And with Bang Chan, it’s mainly his lives—although, obviously, there’s also the fact that he’s friends with Jungkook and Jimin. But, funnily enough, I’ve mostly come across that last bit on the account I use for BTS-related stuff, which makes more sense.

From what you’ve shared, it seems like they’ve definitely made strides into the mainstream Western market, which is no small feat. That said, it’s not quite on the same level as what BTS has accomplished, which just goes to show how extraordinary BTS’s success really is... yet. Their journey has gone far beyond what many people expected, especially considering that, not too long ago, some dismissed it all as just “luck.” Of course, having such a massive and resourceful fandom has played a huge role in their success.

[pulpsandcomics2]

10 Story Western Magazine March 1950

[alexissara]

Gwitch and Minimum Viable Queerness

Trusting companies to make queer art is always asking for heart break even when it really and deeply seems like they made some queer art. However, despite my love for Gundam: The Witch From Mercury it must be said there is plenty of issues with the show that pointed towards the direction they have gone now that we've entered the post release era.

In the magazine Gundam Ace they edited our a writer stating that Sulleta and Mio were married. They apologized for that statement ever making it in to begin with on Twitter the X gonna give to you dot bomb with this.

This obviously lead to tons of angry fans and queer folks but it wasn't like this came out of nowhere. Despite some people saying it's just "western brained losers" or something that thought there was queer bait in the Witch From Mercury there is something that queer people forget which is that most straight cis people literally have no brain cells. They espically have an inability to see sapphic relationships as real or valid.

Gundam The Witch From Mercury was explicit, more explicit than a lot of media but they intentionally excluded the three universal signifiers of romantic or sexual love from the show despite it being centered for all 24 episodes around the Sulmio engagement. These three signifiers are an "I love you" "I Love You too", a kiss, or fucking. Gundam is a toy commercial for kids so while sex is probably not on the table it isn't actually even off the table for Gundam given the series history has had off scene sex and bad stuff too like adult women trying to seduce like a 10 year old boy. So like these shows aren't afraid to do some shit. Many say that Gundam doesn't do kisses that is a lie, Z, 00, Seed, and Iron Blooded Orphans's all have done kisses. I love yous also happen across the series, the end of G Gundam has a special love attack that blows up the last boss.

This is all to say Gundam: The Witch From Mercury activated a strategy corporate media called minimum viable queerness. In order to get the gay dollar, to seem progressive, whatever it may be a company will do as little gay as they can get away with to get the gays actively invested in their art. Ultimately, their aim is to have it be blaringly obvious to queer folks but invisible to the hets. The show also did the minimum viable amount of women making sure the men had utterly meaningless fights near the end just for women to be on screen less. These fights involve men who are not either of the main two girls getting mad at each other for some kind of connection or action towards one of the girls. These take up a significant amount of the second seasons run time not to mention one of these men got a full episode devoted to him. Meanwhile the main couple of the show was away from each other for the vast majority of episodes, almost never in the same room and almost exclusively on somewhat bad terms.

In the show Sulleta is the main character but in season one she is mostly piloting against men with one fight against a pair of girls near the end. Chuchu is given sidekick pilot status and lives to the end but she doesn't get her own highlighted battle ever unlike a side side character in Guel's brother who gets a major fight against his brother weighted against the fate of quite zero and Sulleta and Ariel fighting. Which comes after Guel fought Shadiq for no reason which came after Guel fighting Sulleta again for Ariel which came after Guel trying to survive in a mech when he was stuck on earth earlier. Guel was in a mech 1 more time than Sulleta was in season 2. The two other witch girls die in their first and second time respectively of being in a gundam in season 2 and the second of the pair gets maybe a word in with our main character her whole existence and never talks to our secondary main character at all. The action is still in large part being given to men even in the woman centric series.

And in this "queer centered" story we see very explicit delectations of feelings from Guel, Shadiq, Petra and Lauda which are all heterosexual ontop of all the adult characters being hetero, implied hetero E5 with Nora dying for considering being with a man and E5 sexually harassing Sulleta. The series overwhelming overcompensates for it's queerness by aggressively pushing straightness and in particular having other main characters want our lesbians heterosexually.

This does not mean that the writers or animations didn't want to be more explicit or that they did a bad job. they did a great job but we cannot know what is Namco Bandai and what is Sunrise. We just can't but it seems given recent statements that likely Bandai was very hands on in controlling the show. Not to mention giving it's first woman lead series a much shorter run time than most other Gundam series got and intentionally closing it off from an easy sequel series despite it being the most profitable series ever for them.

It appears to me as if Namco Bandai's intention was to convert a bunch of lesbians into gundam fan and throw mild gay bait at us to keep us coming now that we converted, far less explicit than Sulleta and Mio but attempting to ride it out in good faith and have us enjoy the men shows that appealed to boys to not break their delusion that they are making a boys toy for boys. Feeding us right into more Gundam Seed is like trying to choke out any potential life and I think we're gonna see a decline in Gundam sales following Gwitch representing the betrayal of these sapphic fans but more so simply the lack of interest in the bar being lowered.

As fans of Gwitch we need to demand better, it does work, we've seen companies fix statements about Sailor Uranus and Neptune before and other similar instances. We can also make them see if they want to reach the high highs again we need the great shit we get in Gwitch but then even more that the minimum we'll let them get away with is far more than the last time.

If you enjoyed this post consider throwing me some money on Patreon to help me make actually queer art without corporations controlling my voice. I'm hoping to write a bit more about minimum viable queerness in the future but I wanted to really just talk about this while I was mad about it and get it up there. Anyway, back to the writing mines with me, hope you have a great day and go out there and be gay.

[laresearchette]

Wednesday, November 27, 2024 Canadian TV Listings (Times Eastern)

WHERE CAN I FIND THOSE PREMIERES? HOPE STREET (BritBox)

WHAT IS NOT PREMIERING IN CANADA TONIGHT? COUNTDOWN TO MACY'S THANKSGIVING DAY PARADE (NBC Feed) THE UNTOLD STORY OF MARY POPPINS (ABC Feed) A SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE THANKSGIVING (Premiering on November 28 on Global at 8:00pm)

NEW TO AMAZON PRIME CANADA/CBC GEM/CRAVE TV/DISNEY + STAR/NETFLIX CANADA:

CBC GEM YOUR FAT FRIEND

CRAVE TV MARCO LACHANCE (Season 2 — Part 1 premiere)

DISNEY + STAR WITCHES: TRUTH BEHIND THE TRIALS (all episodes)

NETFLIX CANADA CHEF’S TABLE: VOLUME 7 OUR LITTLE SECRET

2024 CHL USA PROSPECTS CHALLENGE (TSN/TSN5) 6:30pm - Pre-Game (TSN/TSN5) 7:00pm: Game 2

NBA BASKETBALL (SN Now) 7:30pm: Knicks vs. Mavericks (TSN4) 8:00pm: Raptors vs. Pelicans

NHL HOCKEY (SN/SN1) 7:30pm: Leafs vs. Panthers (SN360) 7:30pm: Flames vs. Red Wings (SNEast) 7:30pm: Habs vs. Blue Jackets (SNPacific) 7:30pm: Canucks vs. Penguins (TSN3) 10:00pm: Jets vs. Kings (TSN5) 10:30pm: Sens vs. Sharks

CHRISTMAS CRUSH (CBC) 8:00pm: When Addie makes a Christmas wish for her neighbor, Sam, to fall in love with her, she's not expecting anything to happen - and she definitely isn't expecting the wish to go awry and cause her other neighbor, Pete, to fall in love with her instead.

SECRET HISTORY (APTN) 9:00pm: Season overview corrects Western history's misnomers about manly or strong-hearted women, exploring cultural perspectives, recapping episodes and highlighting characters for a comprehensive understanding.

HOARDER HOUSE FLIPPERS (HGTV Canada) 9:00pm: Mactar leaves the flip-finding to his baby brother and Khadim does disappoint; the house is full of lucrative sci-fi movie collectibles.

SNAKES SOS: GOA'S WILDEST (Nat Geo Canada) 9:00pm (SEASON PREMIERE): Wildlife activists Benhail Antao and Louise Remedios make repeated attempts to extract a python from a well over a span of 25 days.

PEOPLE MAGAZINE INVESTIGATES (Investigation Discovery) 10:00pm: In 2001, a mother of five is found shot in the head in her own minivan. Investigators have little physical evidence and struggle to make an arrest. As the children grow up, the family becomes divided over who killed the beloved soccer mom.

GOING NATIVE (APTN) 10:30pm: Drew heads to the top of the world in Canada's Arctic to explore how its indigenous people live; he tastes traditional foods and experiences near 24-hour daylight.

[always-is-always]

Weverse, HYBE, and BANG PD

You know when that light bulb goes off and you have that ah-ha moment?

That just happened.  I was just reading another post about what has or hasn’t been done to support Jimin’s solo project, or any of the other member’s solo projects and the light went on in my head.  

I was thinking about Weverse Magazine, and thinking about how they are beginning to bring Western Artists into their articles.  Why?  I was wondering.... why would they try to do that, I was thinking..... 

It is Bang PD.  It is a very intentional and planned effort that is headed up by the man himself, to globalize Weverse.  To DIVERSIFY Weverse.  

When you think about the things he’s been doing as of late (buying a multi-million{US$$} home in LA, spending time with the big boys in LA, cozying up to the top brass at BB), it begins to show us a pattern.  A trajectory, if you will.... 

Of course this is all my own idea, that is simply coming from multiple puzzle pieces that we have been shown.  I honestly think that they are intentionally watering down the HUGE presence of BTS in Weverse Mag (and Weverse overall), in an effort to expand their influence into the Western Music Industry.  To do so they had to be willing to begin to introduce Western Aritsts, and begin to dial back their most successful and biggest success story (BTS).  

Like I said, this is all conjecture, and I have nothing to prove it with other than looking at this from my own view and knowledge of the American Music Industry.  

This is all a part of Bang PD’s attempt at playing the game, in the style of the Big Boys in LA.  He’s wanting a bigger piece of that pie...He’s gotten so ambitious and greedy that he’s willing to pull back support of the band that started it all for him.  The band that has been his golden bread and butter for 10 years.  

Only time will tell, and hindsight will definitely show us how right or wrong we are about the situation.  I personally think that the time that the guys are all in the military will be most revealing, and then after they all return.  

I hope and pray that I am wrong.  Either way, we will keep supporting the guys as they navigate through the coming years and beyond.  No matter what, no matter what HYBE does or doesn’t do, BTS will always have the love and support of ARMY.  Period. 

[cleverwordsandotherstuffilike]

1. There are 300,000 items in the average American home (LA Times).

2. The average size of the American home has nearly tripled in size over the past 50 years (NPR).l

3. And still, 1 out of every 10 Americans rent offsite storage—the fastest growing segment of the commercial real estate industry over the past four decades. (New York Times Magazine).

4. While 25% of people with two-car garages don’t have room to park cars inside them and 32% only have room for one vehicle. (U.S. Department of Energy).

5. The United States has upward of 50,000 storage facilities, more than five times the number of Starbucks. Currently, there is 7.3 square feet of self storage space for every man, woman and child in the nation. Thus, it is physically possible that every American could stand—all at the same time—under the total canopy of self storage roofing (SSA).

6. British research found that the average 10-year-old owns 238 toys but plays with just 12 daily (The Telegraph).

7. 3.1% of the world’s children live in America, but they own 40% of the toys consumed globally (UCLA).

8. The average American woman owns 30 outfits—one for every day of the month. In 1930, that figure was nine (Forbes).

9. The average American family spends $1,700 on clothes annually (Forbes).

10. While the average American throws away 65 pounds of clothing per year (Huffington Post).

11. Nearly half of American households don’t save any money (Business Insider).

12. But our homes have more television sets than people. And those television sets are turned on for more than a third of the day—eight hours, 14 minutes (USA Today).

13. Some reports indicate we consume twice as many material goods today as we did 50 years ago (The Story of Stuff).

14. Currently, the 12 percent of the world’s population that lives in North America and Western Europe account for 60 percent of private consumption spending, while the one-third living in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa accounts for only 3.2 percent (Worldwatch Institute).

15. Americans donate 1.9% of their income to charitable causes (NCCS/IRS). While 6 billion people worldwide live on less than $13,000/year (National Geographic).

16. Americans spend more on shoes, jewelry, and watches ($100 billion) than on higher education (Psychology Today).

17. Shopping malls outnumber high schools. And 93% of teenage girls rank shopping as their favorite pastime (Affluenza).

18. Women will spend more than eight years of their lives shopping (The Daily Mail).

19. Over the course of our lifetime, we will spend a total of 3,680 hours or 153 days searching for misplaced items. The research found we lose up to nine items every day—or 198,743 in a lifetime. Phones, keys, sunglasses, and paperwork top the list (The Daily Mail).

20. Americans spend $1.2 trillion annually on nonessential goods—in other words, items they do not need (The Wall Street Journal).

21. The $8 billion home organization industry has more than doubled in size since the early 2000’s—growing at a staggering rate of 10% each year.

becomingminimalist.com

[atxn8]

The magazine TIME is choosing a new kpop group every year to be the 'The Next leaders generation'. 2024 will be a long year for us.The last year I think it was BP. The thing is that when BTS was given that title They did a remarkable impact and we are talking about the 2018. A phenomenon never seen for a korean group. The hype was real, and TIME reflected what was going on on the streets. Now, you only need the 1/4 of BTS to be named that. But now is different,is the media the first ones to give hype to these groups without having impact on the streets. Aslo, the way media are trying to erase and rewrite BTS story is dirty. Once, for them ,TIME on 2018, BTS They were breaking 'without catering to western audiences'. We have to keep in mind that the first entry of BTS on BB 100 was with DNA , and in the top 10 with fake love ( both,korean songs) and now it seems in this new article, that BTS changed to be in that market and is this new Next leaders generation the first ones who are getting success without catering western audiences ...

I won't let this media change the narrative. And We don't have to let them,we have to protect BTS's legacy.

[gameraboy2]

"Blaze a Wild Trail to Hell" 10 Story Western Magazine, January 1950 Cover by Norman Saunders

[oakendesk]

10 Story Western Magazine Dec 1951

Charles Doore

[alln64games]

Chameleon Twist

NA release: 9th December 1997

JP release: 12th December 1997

PAL release: December 1997

Developer: Japan System Supply

Publisher: Sunsoft

N64 Magazine Score: 70%

While Chameleon Twist came out in America and Europe, I played a Japanese copy with an English translation patch. The western versions seem to be based on an earlier build, perhaps sent off to the localisation teams before the game was fully ready. The Japanese version has some more challenging rooms (for example, the screenshot above is just an empty room with collectables in the other versions), the multiplayer powerups added into the main game and some unlockable characters.

The story is pretty much non-existent. A regular chameleon sees the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland jumping into a pot and decides to follow, turning into the big headed thing in the game. From there, you go through the levels, killing everything in your path.

When you start the game, you’ll test out the moves. The tongue is very impressive as you can move it as it extends. I was expecting lots of puzzle use with it, but unfortunately the game isn’t very inventive.

The tongue is used for four moves. The first lets you swallow enemies to spit them out as bullets Then you can latch onto poles, from there, you can pull yourself towards it or spin around. Finally, you can push yourself upwards for a high jump that’s very awkward to use. You don’t gain any extra abilities and it doesn’t have the usage of Mario’s move set to keep itself interesting across the game.

Being able to move the tongue seems more like something added just to combat the terrible aiming in the game.

The biggest difficulty in Chameleon Twist is the camera. Moving it twists it in really strange ways and it’s very difficult to judge jumps and to target where you’re shooting. The game itself is quite simple – especially due to how few moves you have – although to get the boss rush mode, you have to find lots of the crowns hidden throughout the levels.

Chameleon Twist is a nice start for a game. The game needs a bit more variety and a much better camera – hopefully these are fixed in the sequel.

Ocean reckon that Chameleon Twist is aimed at ‘the younger player’, but we know children of five who can complete Super Mario 64. Chameleon Twist is not only too short, but at its hardest it’s never more than mildly taxing.

- Jonathan Davies, N64 Magazine #10

Remake or Remaster?

An enhanced collection of the two games would be nice.

Official Ways to get the game

There’s no official way to play Chameleon Twist

[winxwiki]

"Hopes and Regrets from Winx Club's father" Iginio Straffi interview from 29/10/2010 translated

This interview came out during Magical Adventure 3D's italian press tour. There's a few interesting tidbits in here and it's a bit funny to read in hindsight now. How things change...

More under the cut!

What were your references for this film and, in general, for the creation of its protagonists?

Iginio Straffi: Here we wanted to take up the Shakespearean theme of Romeo and Juliet, and therefore a love thwarted by families, but without that tragic aspect. For Winx, I was vaguely inspired by Sailor Moon, but what I had noticed was that there was not, at the time, a cartoon with really badass protagonists who were not just ballerinas (translator's note: I think he means 80s magical girls like Creamy Mami). For boys there were a lot of interesting heroes, for example Spider-Man, but no super heroines for girls. (translator's note: Wedding Peach, PowerPuff Girls, Corrector Yui, SuperDoll Licca Chan and CardCaptor Sakura all came out after Sailor Moon in Italy and before Winx Club ever broadcasted)

Having started out as a comic book artist, then, was the American scene also an inspiration? And what were your favorite comic books?

Iginio Straffi: Sure, as a child I loved Mickey Mouse (translator's note: he specifically means the Topolino weekly comicbook magazine in Italy. Disney Comics industry in the country is huge!), then at the time there was also Corriere dei Ragazzi (translator's note: short ran comicbook magazine focused on western comics), then all the Bonelli comics, from Zagor to Ken Parker. Growing up I discovered Hugo Pratt and then all the French cartoonists, who are real masters.

In many scenes in the film the 3D aspect is not particularly evident, was that a specific choice?

Iginio Straffi: Yes, we calibrated this aspect scientifically so that it would not be dangerous for young children to watch the film. With 3D you can "push" more or less: it is clear that in a four-minute film you can create much more spectacularity, but here we had the responsibility of an entire film, which had to be suitable for everyone.

Since the television market is also moving toward 3D content, could future Winx series also go in this direction?

Iginio Straffi: We are thinking about it, because as it is also for cinema, 3D means a much higher cost for TV animation, about 30% more than for a standard series. We will have to consider whether in two or three years there will be a sales boom big enough to justify the investment, and also we will have to understand whether this 3D TV animation will be used only for movies or there will be a way to implement a more interactive experience. Perhaps for the fifth season it is still early, but maybe for the sixth season it can be considered (translator's note: lmao).

His future plans include talk of a film set in an academy for young gladiators. Is this a choice aimed at pleasing a male audience?

Iginio Straffi: That movie is really for everyone, it's a comedy about these goofy gladiators, but mainly it's also a love story, again with very badass female protagonists. We think it's going to be a movie for everyone, as they say in America, although still in 3D animation. (translator's note: this is about Gladiators of Rome, which later flopped)

Is there any project you gave up to make room for the Winx that you regret?

Iginio Straffi: Yes, there is one that I really care about and that I hope to be able to realize, sooner or later. It used to be in a drawer, now it's in a hard drive, but I have to slow down the pace if I want to have time for that as well. It is, however, a story not for children, as wonderful an audience as children are, and always able to win you over. (translator's note: could refer to the cancelled adult cartoon he's talked about other times)

[francostrider]

The Experience and Timing of Media

My group of friends had a tradition for every February called “Eat Like Hobbits”. Basically, our one friend would invite us all to her home, and she would have the excuse to cook several meals over the course of a day (which she loves doing), all the while the extended edition of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy play in the background. Well, we would watch it, but we are also chatting and just be glad January was over. We would have a good time, eat, well, like a hobbit, and embrace our nerdy selves.

So, I will confess one thing: The Lord of the Rings are not in my top five or top ten films of all time. But I have a lot of respect for the trilogy, and the amount of craft that went into every detail. And I do like them to a point. I treasure them as part of my introduction to western fantasy, as they were released around the same time as Champions of Norrath and I was coming to identify the DnD culture a lot more. The timing of the films coincided with the experience of discovering a favorite genre. And with the Hobbit day, it became a part of our shared experience.

As a fan of older media, like Robert E. Howard’s Conan books, I have been thinking a lot of the experience around the consumption of media. This involves more than the strict text of a given work. For instance, I started reading through Howard’s work via the volumes offered by Del Rey. It came in three volumes, the first of which I remember picking up after I graduated High School and in the ours before I saw X-Men 3. The volumes would follow me through our trip to Chatham, NY that year, into college and the smell of those old class buildings. They are synonymous with my experience in Rutgers and beyond.

The scents around us as we turned the page, the friends we would bring it up with, the chapter we try to squeeze in before class starts. These are all included with the actual consumption of the tale and make up our experience. We do not live in a bubble. The video games we play will either be affected by the outside world, or will be part of our relief from it. Prince of Persia: Sands of Time was played after a particularly rough time (and winter) of my life and it became part of spring. Castlevania: Circle of the Moon came out during 8th grade, a particularly joyful year of my life. And, of course, the ending of Majora’s Mask hit hard when I was a lonely kid outside of my household.

Going back to Conan, those were my own experiences, sure. But that was not the original context that the stories came out in. Those were published by Weird Tales back in the 1930s, usually one (or maybe even just a chapter) at any given publication. And these were published along side other authors, including HP Lovecraft. These would be on low quality paper (hence the “pulp” in pulp fiction), at 10 cents at a magazine stand. These would not be pre collected in a higher quality volume in a clean and orderly book store.

This was likely picked up by someone on their way to work, either to the local factory or grocery store. These were in the 1930s, so the Great Depression was either affecting the reader directly or at least seeing the damage it has caused. I imagine someone going “At least I got my Howard and Lovecraft for the month!” as they see another store close. Perhaps, like in Grapes of Wrath, copies were likely carried by migrant workers trying to make ends meet. “The Phoenix on the Sword”, “The Scarlet Citadel”, “Hour of the Dragon” and “People of the Black Circle” were just as much part of the life of a migrant worker as their tools, factories, current events and crops. Perhaps they held onto these copies and looked back on them with a mix of nostalgia and strain.

And the rabbit hole does not end there. I wonder what actors they were thinking of when they thought of Conan at the time. A mix of the movies from the 80s and artwork have long since codified Conan’s overall look and feel, but much of that was decades later. What music accompanied their reading in their heads? Did they find a friend or fellow worker and think “Oh, that could be Conan!” Did they try writing the Howard? Or at least to the publication house? And this isn’t even mentioning the human rights advocacies, protests and bloodshed at this era. Before Conan’s overall look was codified, did readers conjure a Conan of different races, imposing their own preferences?

My point is that the whole experience of reading Conan when it first came out will be eternally lost to me. I will likely never find some of the original volumes, which are either preserved in a museum or just dissolved into nothing. And even if I did, I will not know the desperation and attitudes of the time, or the actors of the time, what counted for “fantasy music” at the time, if that was even a concept.

But that does not invalidate my experience. The Experience that I bring up is always going to be unique to each of us. One 1930s reader is going to have a different experience from another 1930s reader, even if they are coworkers of similar backgrounds. I do not say this out of jealousy or some foolish self deprecating of our generation. This is more to illustrate why we love media, why we are nostaligic and why we more than enjoy, but cherish, our favorite works. The tricky thing is it is impossible to recreate. That version of you ended at the end of the experience. We have memories, but we have lost access to it at the same time. 

It is also one of several reasons why I have disdain for any claim of “Best X of all time”. Like much about the entertainment we consume, this is going to be subjective, and unique to every consumer. Awards try to find an objective truth, but they can’t dictate on a personal, subjective level. Bad timing and harsh experiences can also explain why we bounce off of works that we, in theory, “should” enjoy. I imagineThe Last of Us Part II would have been better received by audiences in a year that wasn’t 2020. These Experiences put the text to light. You never consume media without it. Despite everyone trying to talk me into it, I’m just not in the right mindset to go through Final Fantasy VII Remake or the new God of War games. They are something I currently do not want, and when I spend my entertainment hours on something I do not wish to do, I’m constantly looking forward to the thing I do wish to do.

The last “Eat Like Hobbits” we had before the pandemic was February of 2020, before the pandemic started. A lot changed since. Several people moved and found new homes. Job situations changed. But finally, in this year 2023, we got the invite we were waiting for. Our friend got her cooking going and we watched through the whole trilogy. This time, my wife and I watched through the whole thing, a first for herself. It was wonderful to have everyone over, but the trilogy changed in light of the pandemic.

First, there is what it meant: After three long years, we were able to do this again. Covid has not completely gone away, but something special had returned to us. Secondly, the scene where Frodo can no longer see home, but the fiery eye, really hit home. Leaving the house in 2020 could mean bringing back a deadly virus that has claimed over a million lives in this country alone and had filled hospitals to bursting. There was no escaping it, just the constant fiery watch of this disease and no catharsis or friends in person to comfort us. We were all trapped in our own personal Mordor, away from the lives we once had and the people we love.

And, thirdly, I am completely unashamed to admit that I thought of my own wedding last year during Aragorn’s Coronation (yeah, yeah, fuck off). But it is part of the experience I was going through. Our wedding was planned for 2021, but was postpone until late summer of 2022 for several reasons. Unfortunately, the pandemic was part of the drama leading up to it. But when all was said and done, everyone was there, hail and hardy, after three years of pain. My wife and I sat through the pains of moving, pandemics and grief together, and finally, FINALLY, we would have this day, Our day. It was not just a wedding, but also victory in its own way. All of that and everything that led to our wedding went into my recent viewing of Aragorn’s Coronation.

And let’s be honest, you should feel like a king on your wedding day.

We do not live in vacuums. It’s our real life that gives the fiction we consume meaning. As fantastical as a story or setting is, it is still a reflection of what we are. “All works are political” or so I’ve heard the phrase. We carry not only our preferences and likes, but also our life into everything we consume and create. Fiction makes little sense otherwise.