#Adam Freedland

[thursdayisbetterthanfriday]

Fear Is The Mind Killer

Artist: Adam Freedland Year: 2003 Album: Now & Them

[wholesomeobsessive]

Books of 2024

The Battle Cry of the Tiger Teachers by Katharine Birbalsingh

The Power of Culture by Katharine Birbalsingh

This Is Not America by Tomiwa Owolade

Dominion by Tom Holland

Veni Vidi Vici by Peter Jones

Biracial by Remi Adekoya

The End of Race Politics by Coleman Hughes

The Zig Zag Girl by Elly Griffiths

Smoke and Mirrors by Elly Griffiths

The Escape Artist by Jonathan Freedland

Troubled by Rob Henderson

Sourcery by Terry Pratchett

Serpentine by Philip Pullman

The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

The Damages by Genevieve Scott

In The Woods by Tana French

The Likeness by Tana French

The Searcher by Tana French

Tansy Devoy by Anne Fine

The Hunter by Tana French

Verity by Colleen Hoover

Dopesick by Beth Macy

Hex by Jenni Fagan

Race and Culture by Thomas Sowell

Unruly by David Mitchell

Rizzio by Denise Mina

A Personal Odyssey by Thomas Sowell

Undoctored by Adam Kay

Transsexual Apostate by Debbie Hayton

If Symptoms Persist by Theodore Dalrymple

Spoiled Rotten by Theodore Dalrymple

Battle of the Wills by Anne Fine

An Amazing History Atlas of Scotland by David MacPhail

Penance by Eliza Clark

The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy

The Last Anniversary by Liane Moriarty

Men Should Weep by Ena Lamont Stewart

Vinne, The Vegan Vampire by Darren Spink

The Wife Between Us by Greek Hendricks and Sarah Pekkanen

Mary, Queen of Scots: Escape from the Castle by Theresa Breslin

Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty

Faithful Place by Tana French

Broken Harbour by Tana French

Reread

The Hobbit by J R R Tolkien

The Fellowship of the Ring by J R R Tolkien

Mansfield Park by Jane Austen

Persuasion by Jane Austen

Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

Emma by Jane Austen

This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett

Revenge of the Middle Aged Woman by Elizabeth Buchan

The Second Wife by Elizabeth Buchan

Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett

Men At Arms by Terry Pratchett

Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett

Jingo by Terry Pratchett

Thud by Terry Pratchett

Going Postal by Terry Pratchett

Making Money by Terry Pratchett

The Truth by Terry Pratchett

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

[coraniaid]

Andrew Wells is responsible for more than 5.6% of all 291 minutes of words spoken in Season 7 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Now, I'll confess to being something of an Andrew apologist -- in fact I think Storyteller is probably one of the stronger episodes of the second half of that season -- but that's ... a lot, isn't it?  An awful lot.

It's more than long-running characters like Anya (5.2%) or Giles (4.4%) get. It's more than Faith (2.8%) and Jonathan (0.8%) and Amy (0.4%) get that season combined, and these are characters who have all been around a lot longer than Andrew.  It's more than new characters like Robin Wood (4.8%) or Kennedy (2.8%) or Cassie (1.3%) get, or any of the other Potenials Buffy is meant to be training.  It’s actually more than any other character in the whole season outside of Buffy, Xander, Willow, Dawn and Spike.

Proportionally, the 5.6% of speaking time Andrew gets this season is also more than Spike (3.9%) or Drusilla (2.5%) or Jenny Calendar (2.4%) got in Season 2, or Cordelia (5.0%) or the Mayor (4.1%) or Mr. Trick (1.0%) got in Season 3.  It's more than Maggie Walsh (1.8%) and Forrest (1.7%) and Adam (1.7%) put together got in Season 4, more than Dawn (5.4%) got in Season 5, more than Tara (4.2%) got in Season 6.  It's more than Buffy's mother got in any single season of the show (the best she manages is 3.6% in Season 3).

In Storyteller alone Andrew gets more speaking time than Kendra managed over the course of the entire show. 

And is Andrew more important to the story of Season 7 than these characters were to their respective seasons? Is he more interesting?  Does he have more meaningful connections to Buffy?  Is there some compelling reason we should care about him this much?

A frequent criticism of Season 7 is that it introduces too many new characters and therefore can't give everyone as much development as it should.  And I think there's some merit to that: it would have been hard enough to juggle everyone who was around at the end of Season 6 without also introducing Robin Wood, the Potentials and a (mostly) new Big Bad. 

That's (part of the reason) Willow and Xander have less speaking time in Season 7 than they had since Season 2, why none of the Potentials beyond Kennedy really get any proper characterization, why Faith only appears in the last five episodes, why Buffy doesn't seem to actually spend any time hanging out with her sister or her friends.

But maybe it would have been easier to fix all that if the season hadn't devoted quite so much of its running time to fleshing out a minor joke villain from the previous season. Especially when that character was himself only introduced because they weren't able to recast the actor who played his brother in Season 3.

[Ultimate source for all these figures is Julian Freedland's audio timestamp data on GitHub, if you were wondering.]

[eucanthos]

Johan Zoffany   (1733 – 1810)

Charles Macklin as Shylock, ca. 1768. Oil on canvas 116 x 151 cm. Tate

Antonio’s face and neck, after the restoration, resembles Vitiligo

Other parts of the composition, such as the background and some of the figures, are sketched in with loose brushstrokes barely covering the canvas preparation - Tate restoration 

The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, scene i, Antonio, awaiting the knife, has bared his chest for his loan security: 1 pound of flesh - heart).

Shakespeare perpetuates the stereotype of the diabolical and avaricious Jew, involuntarily (?) exposing the prejudice caused by the mechanism of the scapegoat. and the hate propaganda associated.

No excuses for Shakespeare, the play is indeed anti-semitic, says Jonathan Freedland - The Guardian 2004

Francisco de Zurbarán   (1598 - 1664)

Zurbarán, Francisco de Fuente de Cantos, Badajoz

Agnus Dei (Lamb of God), 1635 - 1640. Oil on canvas. Museo de Prado

Mimetic Theory, desire and the scapegoat mechanism     

René Girard  (1923—2015)

Mimetic theory consists of three interconnected movements: Mimetic desire, the scapegoat mechanism, and revelation.

Girard developed a mimetic theory: Human beings imitate each other, and this eventually gives rise to rivalries and violent conflicts, partially solved by a scapegoat mechanism.

According to Girard, just as the theory of natural selection of species is the rational principle that explains the immense diversity of forms of life, the victimization process (sacrifice) is the rational principle that explains the origin of the infinite diversity of cultural forms...

The phrase "scapegoat mechanism" was coined by Kenneth Burke (lifelong interpreter of Shakespeare) in Permanence and Change (1935) and A Grammar of Motives (1940). Girard took  Burke’s concept and developed it as an interpretation of human culture, Violence and the Sacred (1972), a work on Fundamental Anthropology -wiki

Mimesis has been theorised by thinkers as diverse as Plato, Aristotle, Philip Sidney, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Adam Smith, Gabriel Tarde, Sigmund Freud, Walter Benjamin, Theodor Adorno, Erich Auerbach, Paul Ricœur, Luce Irigaray, Jacques Derrida, René Girard, Nikolas Kompridis, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, Michael Taussig, Merlin Donald, and Homi Bhabha. -wiki

Plato contrasted mimesis, or imitation, with diegesis, or narrative.

image 4 thnx vivipiuomeno1.tumblr

[bremont]

Brave New World vs Nineteen Eighty-Four featuring Adam Gopnik and Will Self

The battle between two of the greatest dystopian novels Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four is strikingly urgent in our world of Donald Trump, 'fake news', and technological advances. On the Intelligence Squared stage, we have Will Self arguing for Brave New World and Adam Gopnik arguing for Nineteen Eighty-Four. The debate was chaired by Jonathan Freedland.

[olamovies]

Due Date (2010) 1080p Bluray x265 10bit HEVC Dual Audio ESub

Due Date (2010) 1080p Bluray x265 10bit HEVC Dual Audio ESub

Due Date is a 2010 American black comedy/comedy-drama film directed by Todd Phillips and written by Phillips, Alan R. Cohen, Alan Freedland, and Adam Sztykiel. The film follows a man (Robert Downey Jr.) who must get across the country to Los Angeles in time for the birth of his child and is forced to road-trip with an aspiring actor (Zach Galifianakis). Michelle Monaghan, Juliette Lewis, and…

[aion-rsa]

The Freak Brothers Animated Series Premieres Mini-Episode

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Times are strange, man, and it takes some strange men, and one crazy cat, to make sense of it all. The Freak Brothers, which comes from the producers of Highly Gifted and King of the Hill, and was animated by Starburns Industries, aka Rick and Morty‘s alma mater, made its world premiere with a mini-episode that’s finger-licking good.

“In 1969, life in San Francisco consists of free love, communal living and political protest,” posits the Freak Brothers logline. “Freewheelin’ Franklin Freek (Woody Harrelson), Fat Freddy Freekowtski (John Goodman), Phineas T. Phreakers (Pete Davidson), and their mischievous, foul-mouthed cat, Kitty (Tiffany Haddish), spend their days dodging many things—the draft, the narcs, and steady employment—all while searching for an altered state of bliss. But after partaking of a genetically mutated strain of marijuana, the Freaks wake up 50 years later to discover a much different society. Quickly feeling like fish out of water in a high-tech world of fourth-wave feminism, extreme gentrification and intense political correctness, the Freaks learn how to navigate life in 2020—where, surprisingly, their precious cannabis is now legal.”

The producers will deliver eight 22-minute episodes, along with several mini-episodes. The premiere clip features John Di Domenico guest-starring as Donald Trump. The series was written and produced by Dave Krinsky and John Althschuler from Silicon Valley, and Highly Gifted’s Daniel Lehrer and Jeremy Lehrer. This series will be animated by Starburns Industries (Rick & Morty) and Pure Imagination Studios (The Simpsons).  

The showrunners are Alan Cohen and Alan Freedland, best known for their work on King of the Hill. Blake Anderson and Adam Devine (Workaholics) are executive producers. It is being co-executive produced by Jeffrey S. Edell. Jeffrey S. Udall, Mark Canton and Courtney Solomon, who produced the comic the series is based on, are also producing.

The series will also be executive produced by Gilbert Shelton, who created The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers in 1968 when it ran in an underground Texas newspaper called the Rag. It centered on Freewheelin’ Franklin Freek, Phineas T. Phreak, Fat Freddy Freekowtski, and Fat Freddy’s frisky feline friend. They basically spend their time looking for the most blissful high and traversing bad trips and worse paranoia. Underground Comix, many of them self-published and sold inside or next to subculture magazines, were marketed for adults and didn’t hold themselves to the restrictions of the Comics Code. The first Freak Brothers comic was published in 1971. It has since been translated into 14 languages and sold more than 40 million comics worldwide.

The Freak Brothers is being shopped and will premiere this fall on an as-yet-announced network.

The post The Freak Brothers Animated Series Premieres Mini-Episode appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Comics – Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2SLZuYK

[biofunmy]

While California Fires Rage, the Rich Hire Private Firefighters

Don Holter is an owner of Mt. Adams Wildfire, a private contractor in the Sierra Nevada foothills near Sacramento. Most of his business comes from contracts with federal agencies, but his company is one of only five private firms in California that he knows of that work directly for homeowners.

Most don’t advertise the service widely, he said, instead relying on word of mouth. “It’s not who you are, it’s who you know,” Mr. Holter said.

Mt. Adams Wildfire offers short-term “on call” wildfire protection for families and neighborhood associations in Northern California and Eastern Washington. Last year, the company was on call for close to 90 days, Mr. Holter said. The service can cost up to $3,000 a day.

The majority of private fire crews work for insurance companies like Chubb, USAA and Safeco, which often provide fire mitigation services to their policyholders in high-risk fire areas without extra charge.

But most insurance-contracted crews don’t actually fight the flames. They focus on making homes more fireproof by installing sprinkler systems, fire breaks and fire-blocking gels.

Firefighters with Mt. Adams Wildfire will battle wildfires threatening homes, Mr. Holter said, on the phone from a job in South Lake Tahoe.

As climate change makes wildfires more dangerous, and often understaffed fire crews are exhausted by the increasing frequency of blazes, Mr. Holter said he expects more companies like his will pop up.

“It’s coming,” he said. “It’s a good old boys’ system, but it’s going to change.”

Private firefighting isn’t new. In the United States, government agencies including the National Forest Service have contracted with private crews to fight and prevent wildfires since at least the 1980s.

What has changed is that contractors are beginning to hire out their services to homeowners directly, as well. It follows that some security firms see a new business opportunity.

Chris Dunn is the founder of Covered 6, a private security firm outside Los Angeles that contracts with homeowners in nearby Malibu and Hidden Hills. He said he is planning to cross-train his security guards to fight fires and hopes to offer a subscription-based fire protection service by next summer.

In addition to training his own staff, Mr. Dunn wants to create a federally accredited firefighting course for independent contractors, who could be on call when homes are at greatest risk.

“It would be like a temporary worker during Christmastime,” Mr. Dunn said. “Retail has them, why wouldn’t fire season have them?”

Disregarding Evacuation Orders

Ever-increasing wildfires are costing Californians hundreds of billions of dollars. Taxes in the state are already high, and insurance rates for homeowners in high-risk fire areas have soared.

On top of that, utility customers will soon be on the hook for over $10 billion in extra charges to help companies cover wildfire damages.

One of those companies, Pacific Gas & Electric, already charges some of the highest electricity rates in the country. The company has been harshly criticized for pre-emptive blackouts this month that have left millions without power for days.

It is also currently in bankruptcy proceedings to address liabilities resulting from recent fires started, in part, by its aging equipment, including the inferno that engulfed the town of Paradise, killing 85 people last year.

Residents in the wealthy enclave of Hidden Hills, who already pay for Mr. Dunn’s security company, plan to spend even more to protect their gated community. The city has earmarked $5 million to bury hundreds of feet of overhead power lines and plans to eventually move all electricity cables underground.

Last year’s devastating Woolsey Fire, one of the largest on record in Los Angeles County, was a big factor. The nearly 2,000 residents of Hidden Hills, where celebrities such as Drake, Jessica Simpson, Howie Mandel and members of the Kardashian family have homes, had to evacuate during the blaze on Nov. 8.

At first, flames appeared to safely pass by, so firefighters left the area to fight the fire in nearby Malibu, where at least 400 homes were destroyed. But by the next afternoon, strong winds had pushed flames across a wildlife preserve back toward Hidden Hills.

“We didn’t have any fire trucks left,” said Lilian Darling Holt, a resident of 40 years and a member of the Hidden Hills community emergency response team. “We basically had to fend for ourselves.”

Armed with pool pumps and fire hoses, residents and Covered 6 security guards held the fire at bay long enough for Cal Fire air tankers to arrive that evening and drop pink fire retardant around the edge of the city.

Though the Woolsey Fire ultimately burned more than 96,000 acres across Los Angeles County and Ventura County, in the end, only one structure in Hidden Hills, a barn, was lost.

The story was picked up differently in the media, however, after TMZ reported that Kim Kardashian West and Kanye West had hired private firefighters to save their mansion.

Quickly, the internet was flooded with arguments about the celebrity power couple’s personal fire crew, with critics saying that the privatization of wildfire services undermines what should be a public good. Later that month, Ms. Kardashian West appeared on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” seemingly to defend the action.

“They saved our home and saved our neighborhood,” Ms. Kardashian West said on the show. “I had them make sure they controlled every house on the edge. So it wasn’t just my home that I said take care of. I said, ‘Take care of everything.’”

But according to interviews with Hidden Hills residents and city officials, the reality was more complicated. When flames threatened, such a firefighting team was nowhere to be found.

It wasn’t until at least a day later that a crew arrived at the Kardashian-West home and began spraying its own retardant, said Mr. Dunn of Covered 6. “I know because I logged them in the gate,” he added.

Steve Freedland, who was the Hidden Hills mayor at the time and now is a member of the City Council, said: “The story about Kim and Kanye sending private fighters to save Hidden Hills — that was completely untrue. That really played no part.” (Representatives for Ms. Kardashian West declined to comment for this article.)

Mr. Freedland, who served in an emergency command center at Hidden Hills City Hall as the fire raged, said that about 30 residents and city security guards ignored mandatory evacuation orders and stayed behind to protect the homes in the fire’s path.

“Those are the people that I’d like to see get credit,” Mr. Freedland said. “Not some fictional fire crew.”

Too Many Fires to Fight Them All

Private fire teams that show up to protect homes sometimes neglect to coordinate with emergency agencies and can hinder evacuation efforts, according to The Los Angeles Times.

“From the standpoint of first responders, they are not viewed as assets to be deployed,” Carroll Wills, the communications director for the California Professional Firefighters, a labor union, told the newspaper. “They’re viewed as a responsibility.”

Many in California, most notably the writer Mike Davis, the author of “City of Quartz,” and the essay “The Case for Letting Malibu Burn,” have questioned the logic of protecting homes in extremely fire-prone regions in the first place.

Mr. Davis and others have argued that, at least when it is public agencies fighting the fires, it is an unfair use of resources and that as wildfire season in California worsens, the state should reconsider the amount of new housing that can be built in high-risk areas. (In recent years, some homeowners in fire-prone regions have begun to be dropped by their insurers.)

A new report by Los Angeles County found that emergency services were seriously unprepared to respond to last year’s Woolsey Fire, and that in a fire that size, residents cannot always expect public agencies to protect them.

When the blaze broke out, many fire crews in the state were already busy fighting the Camp Fire in Northern California and another fire in Ventura County. (Some in Malibu also reported that firefighters failed to arrive during the blaze.)

With that memory still fresh, Hidden Hills residents considered hiring a private firefighting service.

Instead, they bought their own fire engine. The pickup-size truck, which comes equipped with a water tank and hoses, is designed to fight blazes in rural areas. Local volunteers are training to use the vehicle to put out brush fires and hot spots.

“I want to make sure the next time people stay behind, we’re better equipped and not putting anyone’s safety at risk,” Mr. Freedland said. “Having a truck that has water and a pumper on board is a game changer.”

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