#National and international acts. Inside its big top

[mariacallous]

Before Google’s disastrous social network Google+ came the less remembered Google Buzz. Launched in 2010, Buzz survived less than two years. But its mishandling of people’s personal data motivated the first in a series of legal settlements that, though imperfect, are to this day the closest the US has come to establishing extensive rules for protecting privacy online.

When users set up a Buzz account, Google automatically created a friend network made up of people they email, horrifying some people by exposing private email addresses and secret relationships. Washington regulators felt compelled to act, but Google had not broken any national privacy law—the US didn’t have one.

The Federal Trade Commission improvised. In 2011 Google reached a 20-year legal settlement dubbed a consent decree with the agency for allegedly misleading users with its policies and settings. The decree created a sweeping privacy standard for just one tech company, requiring Google through 2031 to maintain a “comprehensive privacy program” and allow external assessments of its practices. The next year, the FTC signed Facebook onto a near-identical consent decree, settling allegations that the company now known as Meta had broken its own privacy promises to users.

WIRED interviews with 20 current and former employees of Meta and Google who worked on privacy initiatives show that internal reviews forced by consent decrees have sometimes blocked unnecessary harvesting and access of users’ data. But current and former privacy workers, from low-level staff to top executives, increasingly view the agreements as outdated and inadequate. Their hope is that US lawmakers engineer a solution that helps authorities keep pace with advances in technology and constrain the behavior of far more companies.

Congress does not look likely to act soon, leaving the privacy of hundreds of millions of people who entrust personal data to Google and Meta backstopped by the two consent decrees, static barriers of last resort serving into an ever-dynamic era of big tech dominance they were never designed to contain. The FTC is undertaking an ambitious effort to modernize its deal with Meta, but appeals by the company could drag the process out for years and kill the prospect of future decrees.

While Meta, Google, and a handful of other companies subject to consent decrees are bound by at least some rules, the majority of tech companies remain unfettered by any substantial federal rules to protect the data of all their users, including some serving more than a billion people globally, such as TikTok and Apple. Amazon entered its first agreement this year, and it covers just its Alexa virtual assistant after allegations that the service infringed on children’s privacy.

Joseph Jerome, who left privacy advocacy to work on Meta’s augmented reality data policies for two years before being laid off in May, says he grew to appreciate how consent decrees force companies to work on privacy. They add “checks and balances,” he says. But without clear privacy protection rules from lawmakers that bind every company, the limited scope of consent decrees allows too many problematic decisions to be made, Jerome says. They end up providing a false sense of security to users who might think they have more bite than they really do. “They certainly haven't fixed the privacy problem,” he says.

The FTC has sometimes strengthened consent decrees after privacy lapses. In the wake of Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica data-sharing scandal, in 2020 the agency agreed to stepped-up restrictions on the company and extended Meta’s original consent decree by about a decade, to 2040. In May this year, the FTC accused Meta of failing to cut off outside developer access to user data and protect children from strangers in Messenger Kids. As a remedy, the agency wants one of its judges to impose the most drastic restrictions ever sought in a privacy decree, spooking the broader business community. Meta is fighting the proposal, calling it an “obvious power grab” by an “illegitimate decision maker.”

There is more agreement between FTC officials, Meta, Google, and the wider tech industry that a federal privacy law is overdue. Proposals raised and debated by members of Congress would set a standard all companies have to follow, similar to US state and European Union privacy laws, with new rights for users and costly penalties for violators. “Consent decrees pale in comparison,” says Michel Protti, Meta’s chief privacy officer for product.

Some key lawmakers are on board. “The single best way to increase compliance for different business models and practices is by Congress enacting a comprehensive statute that establishes a clear set of rules for collecting, processing, and transferring Americans' personal information,” says Republican Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the chair of the House committee that has studied potential legislation for years. Until she can rally enough fellow legislators, the privacy of every American on the internet is reliant on the few safeguards offered by consent decrees.

Innocence Lost

At the time Buzz launched in 2010, Google fostered a companywide culture of freewheeling experimentation in which just a couple of employees felt they could launch ideas to the world with few precautions, according to four workers who were there during that time. The search company’s idealistic founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin closely oversaw product decisions, and head count was one-eighth of the nearly 190,000 it is today. Many of the employees “were in a utopia of trying to make information accessible and free,” says Giles Douglas, who started at Google in 2005 as software engineer and left in 2019 as head of privacy review engineering.

During the earlier era, some former employees recall privacy practices as informal, with no dedicated team. Company spokesperson Matt Bryant says it’s not true that reviews were looser before, but both sides acknowledge that it wasn’t until the FTC settlement that Google started documenting its deliberations over privacy hazards and making a clear commitment to addressing them. “The Buzz decree forced Google to think more critically,” Douglas says.

The settlement required Google to be upfront with people about the collection and use of personal data, including names, phone numbers, and addresses. The former employees, some speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss confidential practices, say Google established a central privacy team for the first time. The company learned early that the FTC’s new invention had sting. It paid $22.5 million, then the agency’s highest-ever penalty, to settle a 2012 charge that Google had violated the Buzz agreement by overriding a cookie-blocking feature on Apple’s Safari browser to track people and serve targeted ads.

Google now has an extensive bureaucracy dedicated to privacy. Its central team has hundreds of employees who oversee privacy policies and procedures, three people who worked with the unit say, like the company’s public privacy principles that promise people control over use of their data. A web of hundreds of privacy experts scattered across Google’s many divisions reviews every product launch, from a minor tweak to the debut of an entirely new service like the AI chatbot Bard to a marketing survey sent to less than a thousand people.

Though a public agency forced many of those changes, there is diminishing transparency about how Google’s consent decree operates. The agreement requires an outside consulting firm such as EY (commonly known as Ernst & Young) to certify in an FTC filing every two years that Google’s guardrails are reasonable. Yet public copies of the filings have been increasingly redacted by the agency to protect company “trade secrets,” preventing any insight into the results of the assessments or the recent evolution of Google’s safeguards. Google’s Bryant says the assessments have led to program improvements, process discipline, and well-informed feedback but declines to provide details.

Unredacted segments of older filings show that Google’s compliance with the FTC has involved measures such as training employees on best practices, expanding data-related user settings, and, most importantly in the view of former employees, analyzing the implications of everything the company releases into the world.

Inside Google today, the privacy and legal review is the only step that a team cannot remove or mark as optional in the company’s main internal tracking system for project launches, commonly referred to as Ariane, the former employees say—unlike for security assessments or quality assurance. And only someone from Google’s privacy team can mark the privacy review as completed, the people say.

Reviewers must pore through an internal management tool known as Eldar to compare product code and documentation against company guidelines about uses and storage of data. With tens of thousands or more product launches annually, many updates Google considers “privacy non-impacting” or “privacy trivial” get only a cursory examination, former employees say, and Google is trying to automate triaging of the most important reviews.

Privacy reviewers have considerable power to shape Google’s products and business, according to five people who formerly held the role. One of their most common actions is to block projects from retaining user data indefinitely without any justification beside “because we can,” the sources say. More exhaustive reviews, according to the sources, have prevented YouTube from displaying viewing statistics that threatened to reveal the identities of viewers from vulnerable populations, and required workers involved in developing Google Assistant to justify every time they play back users’ audio conversations with the chatbot.

Entire acquisitions have died at the hands of Google’s privacy reviewers, former employees say. The company evaluates the privacy risks of potential targets such as data retained unnecessarily or collected without permission, and sometimes commissions independent assessments of software code. If the privacy risks are too high, Google has canceled purchases, sources say, and efforts are underway to apply a similar process to divestitures and strategic investments.

For some Google employees, the changes demanded by privacy reviewers can be frustrating, the former reviewers say, delaying projects or limiting improvements. After a review restricted access to location data on users of Google Assistant, engineers struggled to assess the technology, one former employee involved says. For instance, they could no longer be sure whether the virtual helper’s responses to queries involving ambiguous street names, like Brown or Browne, were accurate.

Proponents of consent decrees say the roadblocks and dead ends show the settlements working as intended. “Google and its users are better off for the decree,” says Al Gidari, an attorney who handled the FTC’s Buzz deal for Google. “One might say but for it, nothing would be left of our privacy.”

For some of the Google sources and privacy experts more critical of the decrees, the sprawling compliance apparatus Google developed over the past decade is privacy theater—activity that fulfills the FTC’s demands without providing public proof that people who use its services are better off. Some former employees say that while staffing and funds for the consent decree’s “comprehensive privacy program” have ramped up, more technical projects that would give people greater protection or transparency have withered.

For instance, the Google Dashboard, which shows the type of data people have stored with different services, like the total number of emails in their Gmail account, has gotten little investment as engineers have had to focus elsewhere, two former company privacy managers say. A privacy-focused “red team,” distinct from a similar squad for cybersecurity issues, that has snuffed out unintended over-collection of data and inadequate anonymization in services available to users is still staffed by just a handful of employees, three sources claim.

New Threats

Meta’s privacy scandals show the limited power of consent decrees to encourage good behavior. The company signed its first agreement with the FTC in 2012 after disclosing some users’ friends’ lists and personal details to partner apps or the public without notice and consent. Like Google, the company pledged to establish a “comprehensive privacy program.” But it took a different tack to Google and didn’t have sufficient staff and tools to review everything it does today, says Protti, the product-focused chief privacy officer. The decree-mandated assessments didn’t catch the shortcomings.

In 2018, through media reports it became clear that Facebook for years allowed partner apps to misuse personal information. Personal data such as users’ interests and friends got into the hands of election consultancies such as Cambridge Analytica, which attempted to create psychological profiles marketed to political campaigns. Facebook re-settled with the FTC and agreed to a $5 billion penalty in 2020. The updated consent decree imposed firm new requirements, including making privacy central to the work of many more employees, tightening security around personal data, and limiting the company’s use of sensitive technologies such as facial recognition. Meta has spent $5.5 billion to comply with the revised deal, including growing staff focused on privacy to 3,000 people from hundreds, representing “a step change for the company in terms of the importance, the investment, the prioritization of privacy,” Protti says.

Meta is now required to conduct a privacy review of every launch that affects user data, conducting more than 1,200 each month and deploying automation and audits to increase their consistency and rigor while ensuring orders are followed post-launch, Protti says.

Each unit of the company has to certify internally on a quarterly basis how it's protecting users’ data. After the $5 billion fine, people don’t take these certifications lightly, the former employees say. New hires have to review and agree to the consent decree before they can even get to work. Failing to complete regular privacy training locks employees out of corporate systems indefinitely, employees say. “I don't think you will find an employee that doesn't believe that privacy is absolutely mission critical for Meta,” Protti says.

The FTC contends that Meta has failed on that mission. In May, the agency alleged that Meta misled its users about the meaning of privacy settings on the Messenger Kids chat app and failed to block its business partners’ access to Facebook data as quickly as promised. The FTC wants to ban Meta from profiting off the data of people under 18 years old and require it to apply privacy commitments to companies it acquires, so no unit escapes scrutiny. Protti says the accusations and demands are unfounded.

No matter the outcome, the legal battle could be the breaking point for consent decrees.

FTC chair Lina Khan has made taking on big tech a priority, and if she wins the case the agency may feel emboldened to pursue more consent decrees and to successively tighten them to keep companies in line. But an FTC win could also weaken decrees by making companies more likely to take the chance of going to court instead of signing an agreement that could later be unilaterally revised, says Maureen Ohlhausen, an FTC commissioner from 2012 to 2018 and now a section chair at the law firm Baker Botts who has represented Meta and Google in other matters. “That changes the calculus of whether to enter a settlement,” she says.

If Meta stops the FTC’s updates to the consent decree, it might encourage other companies to try to fight the agency instead of settling. Either result in the Meta case will likely increase the pressure on US lawmakers to establish universal restrictions and precisely define the agency’s power. In the process, they could empower Americans for the first time with rights beyond the consent decrees, like to delete, transfer, and block sales of personal data held by internet giants.

Jan Schakowsky, a Democratic representative from Illinois in the congressional talks, says though the FTC has forced reform at “formerly lawless companies” through consent decrees, “a comprehensive privacy law is needed to improve Americans’ privacy across the internet and from new types of threats.” Even so, there are no clear signs that years of inaction in Congress on privacy are set to end, despite vocal support from companies including Meta and Google for a law that would not only cover their competitors but also prevent a patchwork of potentially conflicting state privacy rules.

The FTC agrees that a federal privacy law is long overdue, even as it tries to make consent decrees more powerful. Samuel Levine, director of the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, says that successive privacy settlements over the years have become more limiting and more specific to account for the growing, near-constant surveillance of Americans by the technology around them. And the FTC is making every effort to enforce the settlements to the letter, Levine says. “But it's no substitute for legislation," he says. "There are massive amounts of data collected on people not just from these biggest tech companies but from companies not under any consent decree.”

[whileiamdying]

David Lynch, Visionary Director of ‘Twin Peaks’ and ‘Blue Velvet,’ Dies at 78

By Chris Morris

NurPhoto via Getty Images

Director-writer David Lynch, who radicalized American film with with a dark, surrealistic artistic vision in films like “Blue Velvet” and “Mulholland Drive” and network television with “Twin Peaks,” has died. He was 78.

Lynch revealed in 2024 that he had been diagnosed with emphysema after a lifetime of smoking, and would likely not be able to leave his house to direct any longer. His family announced his death in a Facebook post, writing, “There’s a big hole in the world now that he’s no longer with us. But, as he would say, ‘Keep your eye on the donut and not on the hole.'”

The “Twin Peaks” TV show and films such as “Blue Velvet,” “Lost Highway” and “Mulholland Drive” melded elements of horror, film noir, the whodunit and classical European surrealism. Lynch wove tales, not unlike those of his Spanish predecessor Luis Bunuel, which proceeded with their own impenetrable logic.

After years spent as a painter and a maker of short animated and live action films, Lynch burst onto the scene with his 1977 feature debut “Eraserhead,” a horrific, black-humored work that became a disturbing fixture on the midnight movie circuit. His outré and uncompromising style quickly won the attention of the Hollywood and international movie-making establishment.

He was hired by Mel Brooks’ production company to write and direct “The Elephant Man,” a deeply affecting drama about a horrifically deformed sideshow freak in Victorian England who became a national celebrity. The feature captured eight Academy Award nominations, including Lynch’s first for best director.

He found less success with his 1984 adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sprawling science fiction novel “Dune.” The production, made on a budget of $40 million during an arduous three-year shoot, was a colossal box office flop.

However, Lynch rebounded from the disaster with two films that defined his mature style: “Blue Velvet” (1986), a frightening hellride through the psychosexual underbelly of a small American town, and the sexed-up, violent road movie “Wild at Heart” (1990), which was honored with the Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or.

In 1990, he revolutionized American episodic TV with “Twin Peaks,” a series he created with writer Mark Frost. With action springing from the investigation of a high school girl’s mysterious murder in a Washington lumber mill town, the weekly ABC show plumbed disquieting, theretofore taboo subject matter and made the inexplicable a fixture of modern narrative television.

A major hit in its first season, “Twin Peaks” lost its momentum and ultimately its audience in year two. However, it spawned a feature-length prequel, 1992’s over-the-top “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me”; 25 years later, the ongoing affection of a loyal cult of viewers sparked a limited-run third season for Showtime that picked up where the second season left off.

Later in his career, in such features as “Lost Highway” (1997), “Mulholland Drive” (which won him the best director award at Cannes in 2001) and “Inland Empire” (2006), Lynch flexed a super-heated style that pivoted on plots emphasizing doubled personalities, unexplained transformations and shocking acts of violence. The quiet yet quirky “The Straight Story” (1999) harkened back to the more reserved emotional pull of “The Elephant Man.”

The director himself was consistently reticent about sorting the meaning of his work for his viewers. In the book-length collection of interviews “Lynch On Lynch” (2005), he addressed the enigmatic core of his work with writer Chris Rodley.

“Well,” Lynch said, “imagine if you did find a book of riddles, and you could start unraveling them, but they were really complicated. Mysteries would become apparent and thrill you. We all find this book of riddles and it’s just what’s going on. And you can figure them out. The problem is, you figure them out inside yourself, and even if you told somebody, they wouldn’t believe you or understand it in the same way you do.”

Lynch’s one-of-a-kind career was acknowledged by a special award (shared with his frequent star Laura Dern) at the 2007 Independent Spirit Awards and a Golden Lion at the 2006 Venice Film Festival.

He was born Jan. 20, 1946, in Missoula, Montana. His father was a research scientist for the Department of Agriculture, and his peripatetic family lived in the plains states, the Pacific Northwest and the Southeast before settling in Alexandria, Virginia, where Lynch attended high school.

An indifferent student, Lynch focused on painting. A one-year stay at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and an abortive trip to Europe with his friend Jack Fisk (later a noted Hollywood production designer) were succeeded by his enrollment at Philadelphia’s Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in 1965.

Living in a forbidding Philly neighborhood with his first wife and infant daughter Jennifer (later a director herself), Lynch began to dabble in film, directing the animated shorts “Six Men Getting Sick (Six Times)” and “The Alphabet” (1968).

“The Grandmother” (1970), a combination of animation and live action, was filmed with money obtained from a grant by the newly founded American Film Institute. In 1971, Lynch moved to Los Angeles to study filmmaking at the AFI’s Conservatory for Advanced Film Studies, headquartered in the former Doheny mansion in Beverly Hills.

Beginning in 1972, Lynch began work on a feature at the AFI. Inspired by his bleak years as a print engraver and struggling artist in Philadelphia, a 21-page initial script began to take shape; Lynch would later say he had no memory of writing it. Over the course of the next five years, he made the film with several collaborators who would remain constants in his career, including sound designer Alan Splet, cinematographer Frederick Elmes and actor Jack Nance.

Shot laboriously, cheaply and on the fly for five years, “Eraserhead” was released by indie distributor Libra Films International in 1977. The disquieting black-and-white film followed the psychological descent of its maladroit hero Henry Spencer (Nance) after the birth of his monstrously malformed baby.

Critics were decidedly alarmed by the picture when it premiered at L.A.’s Filmex in 1977, but it took on a commercial life of its own when Libra opened the picture at midnight screenings in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Lynch would frequently appear at L.A. screenings, admonishing his mystified audiences, “Don’t ask about the baby.”

One enthusiastic viewer at a midnight show at L.A.’s Nuart Theatre was Stuart Cornfeld, a producer at Mel Brooks’ Brooksfilms. He urged Brooks to employ Lynch, and, after viewing “Eraserhead,” Brooks offered the director a job.

For his project, Lynch took on the story of John Merrick, whose sensational life story had already inspired Bernard Pomerance’s hit 1977 play. The film version of “The Elephant Man” was an entirely new enterprise, co-written by Lynch and starring a heavily made-up John Hurt as the sensitive Merrick, Anthony Hopkins as the London Hospital surgeon who became his guardian, and Brooks’ wife Anne Bancroft as a sympathetic West End stage star.

“The Elephant Man” had a powerful emotional impact, and became a box office and critical hit; Lynch received Oscar nods as best director and for best adapted screenplay, with the film also taking a nomination for best picture. The triumph led to a multiple-picture deal with Dino Di Laurentiis.

The sprawling space opera “Dune,” about galactic family dynasties warring over possession of a space-travel “spice” mined on a desert planet, had already defeated projected adaptations by Alejandro Jodorowsky and Ridley Scott when Lynch took on the material.

Filmed laboriously on Mexican soundstages with an enormous international cast, “Dune” sported an unusual Flash Gordon-meets-Antonio Gaudi production design, a memorable gallery of demented Lynchian villains and the director’s trademark amniotic visuals.

The picture satisfied no one: Both audiences attuned to the boisterous heroics of “Star Wars” and impatient critics rejected Lynch’s contorted, confusing and harshly digested reading of Herbert’s novel, and the film tanked on arrival. Lynch later told Chris Rodley that at the conclusion of the ordeal, “I was almost dead. Almost dead!”

However, Lynch’s second film for De Laurentiis defined the contours of his mature style. “Blue Velvet” starred Kyle McLachlan, who had played the messianic hero of “Dune,” as a small-town boy who is plunged into a whirlpool of sexual violence, murder and sadomasochism.

Featuring a potent cast that included Isabella Rossellini (with whom Lynch became involved romantically), Laura Dern, Dean Stockwell and, most notably, Dennis Hopper as its deranged, out-of-control villain, “Blue Velvet” polarized critics, but it cemented Lynch’s reputation as a fearless and daring film author. The film was the start of his collaboration with composer Angelo Badalamenti, 

Four years later, the Lynch style was brought to the small screen with “Twin Peaks.” Starring McLachlan as eccentric FBI agent Dale Cooper, the series used the investigation of the murder of homecoming queen Laura Palmer as a springboard into a swirling narrative vortex involving sexual intrigue, drug addiction, prostitution, madness and demonic possession. TV audiences tuned in to track the mystery and remained for the series’ complexly interwoven characters and perverse, at times supernatural plot twists.

The show’s first season scored 14 Emmy nominations, including nods for Lynch for writing and directing the pilot, but declining ratings after the drawn-out revelation of Palmer’s killer and Lynch’s diminishing participation due to production of a new feature led to a cliffhanging wrap-up at the end of season two.

However, the “Twin Peaks” saga had legs. Actress Sheryl Lee was brought back from the dead to play Laura Palmer in “Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me,” which tracked the fateful last week of Palmer’s life in lurid, screaming detail. And cable audiences were baffled anew by 2017’s much-belated third season, which reunited McLachlan and several members of the original cast.

The truest legacy of “Twin Peaks” may have been its impact on the development of unusual long-form episodic series. Successors ranging from “Wild Palms” to “True Detective” all bore Lynch’s distinctive stylistic fingerprints.

Lynch’s first feature after “Twin Peaks,” 1990’s “Wild at Heart,” was an oddball exodus, based on a novel by Barry Gifford, in which an Elvis-fixated ex-con (Nicolas Cage) and his hot-to-trot girlfriend (Laura Dern) are pursued by the murderous minions of the girl’s jealous mother (Dern’s own mother Diane Ladd). Domestic reaction was mixed to the gory, sexually frank mix of “Detour” and “The Wizard of Oz,” but the Cannes jury was wowed.

Lynch’s association with Gifford continued with “Lost Highway,” for which the two collaborated on an original screenplay. A doppelganger murder mystery that foreshadowed “Mulholland Drive,” the disquieting, brutally effective thriller starred Bill Pullman, Balthazar Getty and Patricia Arquette as the players in a homicidal foursome.

After spending most of the decade on the far side of narrative coherence, Lynch came back down to earth with “The Straight Story,” the first feature in which he took no hand in writing. In the incongruously Disney-distributed picture, based on a true story, Richard Farnsworth starred as an Iowa man who drives from Iowa to Wisconsin on a power mower to visit his seriously ill brother.

Though not a major hit, the film was critically well received, and proved to Lynch’s naysayers that he was capable of bringing life to material that was not extravagantly outrageous. Farnsworth received an Oscar nomination for his performance; the veteran actor and stunt man, who was suffering from terminal prostate cancer during the production of the film, died by suicide in 2000.

An enlarged version of a prospective pilot for a new TV series became what may have been Lynch’s most widely acclaimed film, and a defining summation of the filmmaker’s themes and narrative obsessions.

“Mulholland Drive” served a darkly satirical comment on the ways of Hollywood in the story of a young actress (Naomi Watts) whose relationship with an amnesiac stranger (Laura Elena Harring) becomes a hall-of-mirrors story of manipulation, betrayal and suicide. Lynch was nominated for a 2002 best director Oscar.

Some of the same themes came to the fore in “Inland Empire,” Lynch’s first film to be shot entirely on digital video, with Laura Dern starring as an on-the-skids actress involved in typical Lynchian psychic disorder. Owing to its format, still a relative rarity theatrically in 2007, the three-hour feature was little seen after its 2007 premiere at the Venice Film Festival.

Beyond his work in film and TV, Lynch exhibited his paintings internationally and issued many solo and collaborative albums of music. He contributed a weekly comic strip, “The Angriest Dog in the World,” to the alternative weekly the Los Angeles Reader for eight years. His wry, deadpan weather reports were aired daily on the L.A. rock station Indie 103.1 for several years and continued on social media.

A devotee of transcendental meditation from the 1970s on, he established his David Lynch Foundation to promote the Eastern practice, and enlisted such stars as Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and Donovan for fund-raising concerts.

Despite persistent rumors of new feature and TV projects after “Twin Peaks” came to an end in 2017, Lynch focused on making music videos and composing music with collaborators including Christabell. He offered his name to the David Lynch Graduate School of Cinematic Arts at Maharishi University and a line of coffee beans and designed Silencio nightclubs in Paris and New York. 

Lynch was married four times. He is survived by two daughters and two sons.

[craigawalt]

Meet your (Chinese) Facebook censors

By 

Sohrab Ahmari

Published Oct. 20, 2020

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China is one of the most censorious societies on Earth. So what better place for ­Facebook to recruit social media censors?

There are at least half a dozen “Chinese nationals who are working on censorship,” a former Facebook insider told me last week. “So at some point, they [Facebook bosses] thought, ‘Hey, we’re going to get them H-1B visas so they can do this work.’ ”

The insider shared an internal directory of the team that does much of this work. It’s called Hate-Speech Engineering (George Orwell, call your office), and most of its members are based at Facebook’s offices in Seattle. Many have Ph.D.s, and their work is extremely complex, involving machine learning — teaching “computers how to learn and act without being explicitly programmed,” as the techy website DeepAI.org puts it.

When it comes to censorship on social media, that means “teaching” the Facebook code so certain content ends up at the top of your newsfeed, a feat that earns the firm’s software wizards discretionary bonuses, per the ex-insider. It also means making sure other content “shows up dead-last.”

Like, say, a New York Post report on the Biden dynasty’s dealings with Chinese companies.

00:08

04:19

To illustrate the mechanics, the insider took me as his typical Facebook user: “They take what Sohrab sees, and then they throw the newsfeed list into a machine-learning algorithm and neural networks that determine the ranking of the items.”

Facebook engineers test hundreds of different iterations of the rankings to shape an optimal outcome — and root out what bosses call “borderline content.”

It all makes for perhaps the most chillingly sophisticated censorship mechanism in human history. “What they don’t do is ban a specific pro-Trump hashtag,” says the ex-insider. Instead, “content that is a little too conservative, they will down-rank. You can’t tell it’s censored.”

I won’t share the names of the Facebook employees in question. The point isn’t to spotlight individuals, but to show how foreign nationals from a state that still bans Facebook have their hands on the levers of social media censorship here in America.

The Hate-Speech Engineering team’s staff includes a research scientist based at the Seattle office who earned his master’s degree in computer engineering from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, according to his LinkedIn profile.

see also

Facebook workers ‘ashamed’ by tech giant’s censorship of Post’s Hunter Files reporting

Another member of the team, a software engineer for machine learning based in Seattle, earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science from Jilin University in northeast China. Still another, an engineering manager, earned his bachelor’s in computer science at Nanjing University in eastern China.

Another software engineer previously worked for the Communist-backed conglomerate Huawei, as well as the Beijing National Railway & Design Institute of Signal and Communication. I reached out to all six employees; two replied to confirm that they are Chinese nationals but refused to comment further; the rest didn’t reply.

Plenty of Big Tech firms, of course, recruit their foreign specialists from China, India and elsewhere, and many of these workers hope to resettle in the United States permanently and share the American Dream.

But some may not, and the trouble is that the society they might return to ­already deploys one of the most comprehensive and fine-tuned intellectual control mechanisms on its own population. What’s to stop Facebook’s Chinese engineers from delivering their Facebook expertise to Xi Jinping? Globalists thought that engaging with China would make that country more open; I fear it’s making us more restrictive.

A Facebook spokesperson denied that these employees influence broader policies. “We are a stronger company because our employees come from all over the world. Our standards and policies are public, including about our third-party fact-checking program, and designed to apply equally to content across the political spectrum. With over 35,000 people working on safety and security issues at Facebook, the insinuation that these employees have an outsized influence on our broader policies or technology is absurd.”

Yet, as Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) put it in an email to me, these revelations are yet “another indication that Big Tech is no longer deserving” of statutory protections that render it immune to a publisher’s liabilities. Big Tech critic Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), meanwhile, said “this is all the more reason for the Senate to demand that Mark Zuckerberg — under oath and before the election — give an account of what Facebook has been up to.”

Sohrab Ahmari is The Post’s op-ed editor. This is his second column based on conversations with a Facebook insider.

[elxctrics]

"i've been reading books of old, the legends and the myths the testaments they told, the moon and its eclipse and superman unrolls a suit before he lifts but i'm not the kind of person that it fits."

(—) ★ spotted!! ELIJAH DE VERE on the cover of this week’s most recent tabloid! many say that the 36 year old looks like KENDRICK SAMPSON but i don’t really see it. while the FOOTBALL PLAYER ON THE LA RAMS is known for being KIND HEARTED my inside sources say that they have a tendency to be GOOFY i swear, every time i think of them, i hear the song SOMETHING JUST LIKE THIS BY COLDPLAY AND THE CHAINSMOKERS { he/him cismale }

  ˗ˏˋ ＊ ‣ 𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐬    :  

connections || musings || instagram || headcanons

𝓼𝓽𝓪𝓽𝓲𝓼𝓽𝓲𝓬𝓼

name: elijah de vere

age: thirty six

nicknames: eli

date of birth: april 2nd, 1988

astrological sign: aries

place of birth: a small town, usa

occupation: professional football player

label: the himbo

positive traits: kind hearted, empathetic, gentle, easy going

negative traits: goofy, non-committal, immature,

characters/celebrities he’s like: joey tribianni from friends, coach from new girl, ken from the barbie movie.

𝓫𝓲𝓸𝓰𝓻𝓪𝓹𝓱𝔂

he was just a small town kid, although he never truly lived the 'small town' life.

his family was that family in town - the one that somehow, someway, owned every major property and building and business and the de vere's had always very much been a big deal.

because of that, from a young age, elijah thrived off of being surrounded by people - whether it was having his entire class over his house, since it was the biggest one in town, after all, or playing on every single sports team, he simply loved to be surrounded by people and more importantly, he loved having fun.

being the eldest child of the de vere's, they expected him to follow in the family's footsteps, to get involved in the family business somehow, but elijah was never one for books or academics or business.

he was always told he had ants in his pants growing up and possessed an inability to sit still or pay attention to things, unless of course, sports were involved.

from the time he was little elijah was obsessed with sports, especially football, and it seemed to be the only thing he could focus on for a long amount of time.

he played all throughout high school and when college came around, he was drafted by the university of georgia, the top football school in the nation, to play on their team.

not only did he play hard, but he partied hard - joining a frat and living the best, college boy life and he truly felt like he found where he belonged.

it wasn't long into his college career that his sister sprung up into international stardom, which only increased his popularity.

he wasn't the best football player, but it was because of his last name that elijah was drafted by the los angeles rams right out of senior year.

he's been on the team for 15 seasons now, but not much has changed with him or his life - he still lives in his bachelor pad, still dates around, and still acts like he's twenty one years old, but there's no malintent behind his behaviors, he's just a simple dude who likes to have fun.

he loves the spotlight and attention and has formed close bonds with different talk show hosts, has hosted snl, made some movie cameos here and there and stared in some commercials and fashion campaigns, just because he's good at making friends and is incredibly loved in the industry.

he very much has a golden retriever kind of personality and would give the shirt off his back to anyone, especially to his family, but this also could be his downfall, as more often than not, he's far too trusting of those who may not deserve it.

[baglove]

(via cat lovers Mask by mohammed elhachimi)

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[hansoheeglobal]

The Infinite Realm of Han Sohee

Article by Woman Sense

Han Sohee who wanted to be an irreplaceable actor, was confident. It's already irreplaceable.

Actor Han Sohee is starting now. She made a good impression as a "national affair woman" in JTBC's drama "The World of the Married" (2020) and became a leading role as a fresh female college student in JTBC's drama "Nevertheless" (2021). And with the Netflix series "My Name", she became the top of the three rabbits, appearance, acting, and action. It is the first time in just four years since its debut with the SBS drama "Into the New World" in 2017.

My Name in which Han Sohee threw off her "pretty" and declared a drastic transformation, is an undercover genre drama depicting the harsh truth and revenge process faced by Jiwoo (Han Sohee) who entered the organization Dongcheon faction under a new name "Oh Hyejin." In the play, Han Sohee plays Hyejin, a member of the organization who loses her father and throws herself to revenge. It is well received for its high-level action acting and delicate acting that goes back and forth between extremes. In the play, Han Sohee worked with Park Heesoon and Ahn Bohyun.

Immediately after its release, "My Name" topped Netflix's "Top 10 Contents Today in Korea." It is creating a syndrome by ranking fourth in the world's Netflix TV show category and sixth in the United States. I met Han Sohee who is currently on a break, at an online production presentation.

<My Name> is well received worldwide. How do you feel?

It hasn't hit me yet. I didn't know so many people would watch. Thank you. There were many memorable reviews. Among them, it was good to hear that it was different from the way it was shown in the previous work. That's what I wanted to hear.

How was it when you first read the script?

At first, it was difficult to draw the character Jiwoo just by imagining it. It was difficult to define because there were more gestures, situations, and actions for revenge than expressing emotions in words. So I thought that if the color inside and the eraser in the scenario were combined, it could be expressed differently. That's how I approached it.

It showed a very different color of acting from the past works.

The director sent me works, books, and movies that I would like to refer to. I tried to see various things, focusing on those things. I didn't want to start with a clear definition. I wanted to approach the character open.

What is the most focused part of expressing 'Yoon Jiwoo'?

I tried not to lose my goal and direction. Since I had to express things that I had never encountered, I tried to find the intersection between the character and me, especially the intersection inside.

What is the intersection of Jiwoo and Sohee?

If you set a goal, you don't care about water. It's emotional, but I think it resembles me to put the raw things in words and actions. I acted thinking about how to relieve my feelings well when wearing Jiwoo's clothes.

It was first unveiled at the Busan International Film Festival.

I felt good because there would not be many occasions to see my work on such a big screen. I thought my heart was going to explode when the music that announced the start came out. Afterwards, the audience clapped, and I choked up. I was grateful to see many people sitting down despite the COVID-19 situation. I felt responsible when I saw people asking questions about the work. I could feel the sincerity. It was even more so.

It's the first action movie.

The most difficult thing was the early gym scene. It was a scene where I was competing with this person and that person. I remember filming tired in the beginning. The best scene is the scene where they attack each other with a knife without any big action. In a way, it was the best scene because it focused on emotions rather than actions. It remains in memory.

Was there any pressure about the leading role?

Actually, it was burdensome and hard. I relied entirely on the director and on my seniors. In particular, it was a great help because (Park) Heesoon took the center stage. There was also a burden of action, but I enjoyed filming.

I am also curious about the relationship between Jiwoo and Mujin (Park Heesoon).

I think the relationship between Jiwoo and Mujin is more attractive because it is indescribable. He was my father's friend in the beginning, but he becomes another father in the second half. He is a father who raised Jiwoo, who almost lived on the street, strong. And from Mujin's point of view, it is true that the relationship ends only when someone dies. That's what it says in the script.

I heard that you gained 10kg for your work.

With a choco pie, I can gain 5kg.(Laugh) I often got hungry because I exercised a lot. And the martial arts director bought me a lot of chicken noodle soup. The happiest moments of training were snack time and lunch time. After eating well and exercising, I gained 10kg without realizing it.

I think there is a great desire for "transformation." I'm curious about your belief in acting.

I want to act irreplaceable. I want to show myself to the public that I don't even know. I try to find an expression that I can't express without myself. So I want to play various genres and various characters. I want to do it well. It's natural to work hard.

What do you think about the bed scene of Ahn Bohyun?

I thought a lot about how to express it. I think it was not love, but a relationship and scene where Jiwoo could only look like a person.

The favorable reception continued for Jiwoo's outfit and makeup.

The makeup teacher worked hard. Rather than looking pretty, she thought a lot about how to make dark circles look good, or how to make them look a little more tired. So, I often wore makeup to dry my lips. I wanted to look exhausted. In terms of clothes, we focused on the outfits that express the action well.

It is a work that stands out in the emotional line. Wasn't it hard?

In fact, I am not the type of person who reserves energy, but rather the type of person who drives herself to the edge of a cliff while filming a work. So throughout this work, I had a hard time regardless of my day off and filming days. I think I lived as Jiwoo for about five to six months. The director was also worried about my psychological part. It was hard, but I was able to concentrate. It was a scene where I could express myself freely. So I was able to get out of the character quickly.

You said that running toward the goal resembles Jiwoo, but what is Han Sohee's goal?

The goal is to create a state without a goal. In the process of working every day without a break, I felt that I was not using the time I didn't work to benefit rather than setting plans and goals for the day. So I'm trying to spend my days full without a goal and without much thought.

Han Sohee's action is receiving favorable reviews. Have you been working out since "My Name"?

In a way, exercise is very simple. When exercise enters life, many changes occur. So, we are now inseparable from exercising. Since the base of Jiwoo's action in this work is boxing, I am still learning kickboxing. In fact, there is a disappointing part. It would have been better if I learned more kickboxing and filmed. Action is a really cool genre.

You played the action without a stand-in. I wonder how you feel about watching your own action.

Desperate? I really threw my body and acted. Not only me but also all of us did that. I'm proud that the effort and teamwork were revealed in the work.

Is there a line that you personally like the most? Online, "The gangster's daughter has to do this, Mr. X" was chosen as a famous line.

M(Laughs) I think I like Jiwoo because it’s a line that makes change happen. There are lines that are personally sad. After killing Kang Jae, there is a line to Pildo saying, “Do you enjoy living?” I felt a lot of emotions for Jiwoo, who spoke bluntly.

Noir, the female lead.

I don't think it's a gender distinction. Personally, I want you to remember how far a person can fall with the single purpose of revenge for the work <My Name>, and it is a work that expresses it raw. Personally, I really like the genre called noir.

“While filming a work, it is a style that drives itself to the edge of a work. Therefore, it is difficult to distinguish between day off and day of filming throughout the work. I want to act irreplaceable, and I want to show myself to the public that I don't know. It's natural to work hard. I try to find an expression that I can't express without myself. So I want to play various genres and various characters.”

Due to health problems, you rejected the next work. How is it right now?

In fact, it may have been accumulated since the filming of My Name. I don't think I was aware of my physical condition. I thought my mind was tired, not my body, but I didn't feel well. Now I'm doing well while treating and exercising.

Is there any character or genre you want to try?

This role was a character who lived their lives with one person's body. I wonder what it would be like to meet a better character here.

Since 2017, you have been working on your work without a break. Do you want to have a personal time?

I want to have my own time, but I think I forgot how to spend my time. In the past, I rested without doing anything, but these days, I am looking for my lifestyle by watching movies, books, exhibitions, and exercising

You cut your hair short from long hair.

It's comfortable. On the other hand, I want to grow it out, but in fact, I like all kinds of hair. I am grateful to those who want to cut their hair after seeing my short hair.

If you look at SNS, you take lactobacillus well.Is there a special reason?

Lactobacillus love is special.(Laugh) It's actually the easiest medicine to take. It's delicious and it keeps you healthy. I think I kept recommending it to people because the intestinal function must be good to boost metabolism.

I'm also curious about future activities.

My body has gotten a lot better. I think we need time to remove the eraser and empty it. Now, it's time for my time to be complete. Looking at various scripts, I am thinking about how to meet the public.

What hobbies do you have?

I like drawing, but I exercise a lot these days. I also like to binge watch dramas or movies. Sitting on the sofa, crying and laughing alone. That's how I spend the day.

How satisfied are you with this work?

Personally, I hope to find something fun to find the character Jiwoo lives in itself. It's hard for me to evaluate my work, but it's a work that gave me 120% satisfaction. My acting skills are far short. So I'm just grateful to the director.

I’m sorry if there’s miss translation

[swan-of-sunrise]

Civil War (Chapter Four)

Summary: In the aftermath of the U.N. bombing, (Y/N) receives a call from Steve and is ‘invited’ to the Joint Counter Terrorism Centre in Berlin for questioning.

Pairing: Steve Rogers X Reader

Word Count: 3k

Warnings/Disclaimers: None

A/N: I’m not too sure about this chapter, it’s all over the place and I’ve rewritten it twice so I can’t tell if it’s good or not lol thank you for reading, I hope you all enjoy!

Chapter Four (Previous Chapter)

While the paramedics finished fastening the bandage around her head, (Y/N) sat in the back of the ambulance and silently watched the chaos unfolding. A fire crew was busy hosing down the still-smoldering ruins and a medical helicopter flew overhead as different government agencies began setting up their base camps on the outskirts of the caution tape. The CIA agent who’d questioned her about the incident had informed her that a large-scale bomb had gone off next to their building, injuring over seventy people and killing twelve; she’d gone on to explain to her that if not for T’Challa’s last-minute warning, many more people would’ve perished in the blast.

Poor T’Challa, (Y/N) thought to herself with a pang of sadness. His father, King T’Chaka, had been the closest person to the blast and was killed instantly. The paramedics completed their work and she thanked them before quickly getting out of their way, knowing that there were many others who still needed to be helped. Shoving her hands into the pockets of her ash-covered blazer, she walked along the edge of the crime scene towards where she’d last seen Natasha and T’Challa; different international news reporters were documenting the tragedy and as she passed by one of them, their words almost made her stop dead in her tracks.

“Officials have released a video of a suspect who they have identified as James Buchanan Barnes, the Winter Soldier. The infamous Hydra agent, linked to numerous acts of terrorism and political assassinations…”

(Y/N) continued walking, afraid that she’d be recognized if she lingered too long, and finally sat down on an empty bench near the CIA’s base camp. Once she got over the initial shock of learning the suspected identity of the bomber, she couldn’t help but feel confused; Bucky had been on the run for over two years, ever since the Battle at the Triskellion and the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D., and there hadn’t been any sign of him since. Steve and Sam had tracked down every single lead they could find but to no avail. To her, it didn’t make much sense that after all that time, the wanted man would suddenly decide to do something as massive as bomb the United Nations.

The buzzing of her cell phone in her pocket jolted her out of her thoughts; pulling it out and glancing down at the screen, her eyes widened in recognition and she was quick to answer it. “Hello?”

“Are you hurt?”

“Um…yeah, a little. My right eardrum ruptured from the noise of the blast and my lungs feel like crap, but other than that I’m okay…” She trailed off, listening as Steve let out a shaky sigh of relief. Try as she might, memories of their recent fight came to mind but she forced aside her irritation with him as she continued. “Listen Steve, I just heard about Bucky and I-”

“You’re gonna tell me the same thing Nat did: to leave it up to the Task Force and stay home.”

She blinked, taken aback by the shortness of his tone. “Well, I think she has a point about staying out of it but what I was actually going to say is that-”

“I’m the only one who can bring him in alive, (Y/N), so that’s what I’m gonna do. I just wanted to call and tell you myself so that you didn’t believe I was hiding things from you.” Steve abruptly interrupted and after a moment of tense silence, the hard edge in his voice softened a little. “Look, I’m…take care of yourself while I’m gone, okay? Don’t forget to change that bandage of yours every few hours.”

The call disconnected as (Y/N)’s head snapped up in shock and she hurriedly scanned her surroundings, but the super-soldier was nowhere to be seen. “Bastard.”

“(Y/N)!” She looked over in time to see Natasha striding over to her, her brow furrowed in worry. “(Y/N), I just got a call from Steve a few minutes ago, and-” The spy stopped herself short as she examined her assumedly-angered expression. “I take it you got one, too.”

“Yep, and I’d rather not discuss it right now if that’s okay.”

Natasha nodded. “Fine by me, hot-shot, but we should be going; our presence has been…um, requested in Berlin. At the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre, to be precise.”

Frowning, (Y/N) stood and walked alongside her. “Our? What’s all this got to do with me?” The spy gave her a pointed look and she exhaled through her nose. “Ah, yes, my ‘association’ with Steve Rogers. They’ve guessed that he’d be the first one after Bucky and since I’m his fiancé, they want to hold me for questioning.”

“Pretty much…but there’s another reason that I’ll let Tony tell you about himself when we arrive. It was his bad idea, after all.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

By that point, (Y/N) was well and truly sick of flying; they’d taken the Quinjet to the Berlin-Tegel Airport, where a car had picked them up and drove them to the Joint Counter Terrorist Centre. If her head hadn’t hurt so much and she were in a better mood, she would’ve taken the time to admire all the historical landmarks they passed by. And here I thought that week we spent dealing with Ultron was exhausting, she thought with a humorless smile, getting out of the car and walking alongside Natasha as they entered the parking garage’s elevator.

“When you’re questioned by an agent, be sure to answer as honestly as possible.” (Y/N) glanced up from her dirty sneakers and met Natasha’s serious expression. “Cooperation’s the only thing that’s gonna help Steve and Sam out right now, (Y/N). Don’t let the agent get inside your head, though; make sure that you’re the one in control of the situation, just like I’ve taught you. If I know them like I think I do, they’re gonna try and get more valuable intel out of you than just Steve’s whereabouts.”

She nodded after a brief moment of hesitation and the spy’s shoulders relaxed a little. The elevator stopped at the top floor and its doors slid open to reveal two men; one was Tony Stark, dressed stylishly in a dark-grey suit with a tense smile on his face and the other was an older man with salt-and-pepper colored hair that she didn’t recognize. The stranger stepped forward and shook Natasha’s outstretched hand. “Miss Romanoff, thank you for coming in so quickly.”

“Of course,” Natasha replied before glancing over at (Y/N). “(Y/N), this is Everett Ross, Deputy Task Force Commander of the CIA. Agent Ross, this is (Y/N) (Y/L/N).”

Agent Ross smiled and shook her hand, but (Y/N) got the distinct feeling that he was studying her expression and analyzing her behaviors. “I wish we were meeting under better circumstances, Miss (Y/L/N); my niece and nephew are big fans of your novel.”

(Y/N) murmured her thanks and followed the trio as they walked down a covered sky-way, not noticing that Tony had fallen into step beside her until he quietly asked, “How’re you holdin’ up, Austen?”

“Let’s just say that I’ve had better days.” She remarked, glancing over at the billionaire with a raised brow. “Nat mentioned something about a bad idea you wanted to run by me?”

“Oh, I have a couple of ‘em, but I’ll let you get changed before I go ahead and tell you. When I heard about the bombing, I figured that you and Romanoff would need clothes so I packed some before I left the compound.”

Touched by his thoughtfulness, (Y/N) allowed him to lead her to a private bathroom and quickly changed out of her soot-covered clothing; she felt a little bit like her usual self as she emerged from the bathroom, but the comforting feeling her change of clothes had inspired soon disappeared when the billionaire ushered her into a glass-walled conference room in the middle of what she imagined was a control room.

“Sorry if it seems like we’re sitting inside a fish bowl but this is the only place where we can talk without being overheard.” Tony sat down across from her at the long table, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest. “And I’m sorry about the civilian consultant thing, Austen. We all found out about it last night when Secretary Ross called to ask who’d decided to sign; he seemed crankier than usual when we told him that we didn’t know what you’d decided to do.”

(Y/N) rolled her eyes and leaned her elbow onto the table, resting her head in her hand with an exasperated sigh. “What, does Ross think that if I sign then that’ll make Steve suddenly change his mind and decide to sign too?”

“Pretty much…but truth be told, he’s not the only one.” Her brow rose in surprise as Tony sat forward in his chair, an uncharacteristically subdued expression on his face. “Look, (Y/N), none of us wants to see Rogers gone. The team needs him and we both know how much he needs the team, so…I was hoping that if you signed, you’d be able to convince him that he’d be doing the right thing by signing too. Once Rogers signs them, then Wilson and Maximoff should follow suit and we’d have our Earth’s Mightiest Heroes all back together again in no time. What do you think?”

“You make it sound so easy…and I wish it was, Tony. I really do.” She stood and walked over to the glass wall, her eyes trained on a large computer monitor that bore her fiancé’s photograph on a wanted poster. “But you and I also know that once Steve’s made up his mind about something it’s impossible to change it. I tried telling him that refusing to sign might put our future together in jeopardy, and do you know what he said?”  Turning back around, she met the billionaire’s gaze and mirthlessly smiled. “He said that he couldn’t afford to be selfish and he left it at that.” A lump formed in her throat as she blinked away her tears and shrugged. “He respects the hell out of you, Tony, so maybe you’ll have a better change at convincing him. I’ll be there when you do, but…since I haven’t decided what I’ll do yet, I honestly don’t know how much help I’ll be.”

Just as Tony opened his mouth to reply, the glass door of the conference room slid open and none other than Sharon Carter poked her head into the room. “If you’re ready, Agent Ross would like to ask you some questions.” (Y/N) stood and spared Tony a final glance before following the agent down the hall, pointedly ignoring the jealous pang in the pit of her stomach as she did. “Romanoff mentioned that you weren’t much of a coffee drinker, so I brought you some hot chocolate instead.” She looked over to see Sharon holding out a to-go cup out towards her, a hesitant but friendly sort of smile on her face. “Might help settle your nerves before your talk with Ross.”

She accepted the beverage with a murmur of thanks and took a sip as they continued down the hall; giving the agent a sideways glance, she cleared her throat before saying, “I’m sorry about your aunt, Sharon.”

“Thank you…and thank you for everything you said in your eulogy. Actually,” Sharon stopped beside the stairwell door and gestured towards it. “We don’t have much time, but do you mind if we talk for a quick sec?” (Y/N)’s brow furrowed a little but she nodded and followed her into the stairwell, watching as she leaned back against the wall and shuffled her feet. “You meant a lot to Aunt Peggy, (Y/N), but I don’t think you know just how much she appreciated you. Back before her dementia got worse, she’d call me after her visits with Rogers and we’d talk for hours; she worried about him, always telling me that he was deliberately keeping himself from embracing his new life and that there wasn’t anything she could do to help. But then you came into his life and from what she told me, it was a night and day difference; knowing that you were there for Steve, as a friend and then as something more, gave her piece of mind. She really liked you, (Y/N), and she really respected you. I just thought that you should know that.”

“Thank you, Sharon, that…that really means a lot to me.”

The agent nodded, suddenly looking a little uncomfortable. “I would’ve told you all that after the funeral but you and Steve were sort of…well, you know…arguing. I swear I wasn’t eavesdropping, it’s just that you both were kind of loud and the cathedral has crazy-good acoustics.” (Y/N) started to reply but Sharon cut her off with a firm head shake. “You’ve got nothing to apologize for, (Y/N). I’m not exactly a fan of the Accords but just between us? I think that Steve was out of line back there.” Unsure of what to say, she nodded once and took another sip of her drink as the agent looked down at her wristwatch. “C’mon, we should get going before Ross starts looking for us.”

The two of them left the stairwell and continued down the hallway to an office; Agent Ross was seated at a desk and reading through a file, looking up from his work with a friendly smile. “Thank you, Agent 13, that’ll be all.” With one last glance, Sharon turned and left them alone. “Please, take a seat.” (Y/N) sat down in the chair across from him and crossed her leg over her knee, trying her best to remain cool and collected. “Miss (Y/L/N), we have reason to believe that Captain Rogers plans on interfering with the apprehending of the Winter Soldier; can you tell me when you last spoke to your fiancé?”

“A little over three hours ago in Vienna. He called to ask if I’d been injured during the bombing and then he warned me that he was planning on bringing in Bucky himself. That’s all he said.”

Ross nodded and gestured to the bandage wrapped around her head. “And are you okay?”

“Yes, it’s only a ruptured eardrum; the bandage is just keeping the ear from becoming infected.” (Y/N) shrugged, taking another sip of her drink before setting it down on the desk. “Truth be told, I’ve had worse.”

Nodding again, the agent picked up the open file on his desk and scanned its contents. “Yeah, it seems like you have. In March of 2014, you suffered a moderate-grade concussion, GSW on your left thigh and a severe muscle contusion on the other thigh; it also says here that you even needed an emergency blood transfusion upon arrival at the hospital.” He looked back up at her with an arched brow. “Sounds like a lot for a civilian to go through.”

(Y/N) blinked in surprise. “I-it was-”

“And according to witness statements from the Avengers, the Artificial Intelligence known as Ultron targeted you last year because of your close relationship with Steve Rogers, is that correct?” Nodding, she struggled to keep her expression neutral as her fingers began reflexively tracing along her old gunshot wound. “It looks like you were just a pawn in Ultron’s plan to break the Avengers apart, and it very nearly worked.”

Her first instinct was to snap at the agent but after recalling Natasha’s earlier warning, she swallowed her frustration and gave him a fleeting smile. “The CIA certainly cares a lot about historical fiction novelists, doesn’t it?”

Ross chuckled and leaned forward in his seat. “Only the ones engaged to rogue super-soldiers, of course. Speaking of super-soldiers, can you elaborate on the nature of your fiancé’s connection to James Barnes?”

“There’s nothing much to say that hasn’t already been said; Steve and Bucky were childhood friends who fought together during World War II and when S.H.I.E.L.D. fell, Steve and Sam tried searching for Bucky but they never found him.”

Nodding, the agent reached over and moved his computer monitor to face her; on the screen was a blurry image of a man wearing dark clothing, obviously taken from grainy security camera footage. “And is this James Barnes?”

“Yes, although I’ve only seen him in person once and this photo’s a little blurry.”

“Okay, let me see if I’ve got this straight: Steve’s old pal bombs the U.N. meeting that you, his fiancée, was attending and instead of rushing to your side like any other partner would do, he decides to leave the country to apprehend Barnes himself. Does that pretty much sum things up?” (Y/N)’s jaw clenched tightly and she stared silently at the agent in front of her, who tilted his head to the side as he considered her. “You see, the CIA knows that you and Captain Rogers are close but what we don’t know is how far you’d go to protect a man who doesn’t sound like he’s got your best interests at heart.”

Before (Y/N) could finally lose her temper, another agent poked his head into the office. “I’m sorry, Agent Ross, I know you said that you didn’t want to be disturbed but this is urgent.”

“Fine, fine…”

Ross stood and followed the agent out into the hallway, leaving the office door cracked open just far enough for her to make out some of what they were saying. “Rhodes…all of them arrested…Bucharest…ETA in less than six…”

Thank goodness they’re all right, (Y/N) thought as relief washed over her, they’ll both be charged with obstruction of justice but at least they’re alive. Some of her elation disappeared as her mind drifted back to Agent Ross’ line of questioning; Natasha was right, the CIA was taking the golden opportunity to get intel on Captain America with the knowledge that what they were doing was protected under the Sokovia Accords. The thought of being manipulated and used that way infuriated her but what angered her more was that this all stemmed from Steve’s unwillingness to consider the consequences of not signing the Accords. You’re in control here, she told herself with a calming breath, just do everything Nat told you to do and you’ll be okay…

Agent Ross reentered the office and sat back down with an expectant smile on his face. “Well, now, where were we?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A/N: This story’s a little more challenging to write than The Winter Soldier or Age of Ultron, there’s so much angst to deal with and writing these chapters really takes a lot out of me, so any likes, reblogs and comments are really appreciated ❤️

Thank you all so much for reading and commenting, you guys are truly amazing! I’ve created a Spotify playlist inspired by this series, and I’ll be updating it every time I upload a new chapter. Enjoy!

Spotify Playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4TsJ2TY1F2HDXhEYOfzCjY?si=f5f309da80a74a63

Chapter Five

Civil War Masterlist

Tagging: @mrs-obrien​ @lahoete​ @awkward117​ @cminr​ @natdrunk​ @momc95​ @savedbystyle​ @miraculouscloud​ @awkwardnesshabitat​ @marinettepotterandplagg​ @khuang3​ @supersouthy​ @benakenalove​ @brooke0297​ @hufflepeople​ @becausewelie​​ @outoftheregular @supreme-tantrum​ @ladydmalfoy​ @mads-weasley​ @username23345​ @crist1216​ @aesthethickks​

[rainbowbutterfrosting]

The Revived - Chapter 22: Preparations

This is chapter 22 of the Dream SMP multichapter fic @dramaticsnakes​ and I wrote together! I hope you’ll enjoy!

AO3

Read in order (on Tumblr)

Characters in this chapter: Wilbur, Ghostbur

Word count: 3,093

Cw: pain, brief loneliness, implied derealization

Fic summary: Wilbur was alive, and it was such a magnificent feeling, that made his mind spark with anticipation. It didn’t take long, however, for Wilbur to realize that this new breath of life, was not just his own. An echo-y voice hides in the back of his mind, and before he knows it, the transparent version of him he saw at the endless train station, is a lot more ingrained than he’d expected him to be.

And Wilbur really shouldn’t care. Because he’d be damned, if he spent the life he’d awaited for so long, babysitting a lost cause of a ghost, stuck in the very same limbo Wilbur spent so long in. It was an even exchange, and one Wilbur wasn’t going to mess with. Why exactly he ends up setting out to get the ghost out of his mind, in order to save the both of them, however, is beyond him. And perhaps Wilbur’s past isn’t as easy to leave behind, as he’d hoped it would be.

Wilbur was somewhat thankful that the early morning interaction had been disheveled enough, for Wilbur not to have been asked to leave. It was kind of funny really, that even though Wilbur had been caught trespassing where he shouldn’t, the young boy had been far too distracted to kick him out. Far too confused and awkward. It seemed to be a general trend whenever Ranboo was talking to him.

Though perhaps Wilbur couldn’t act as if he was above that awkwardness, as he hadn’t even gotten around to asking exactly what kind of party it was. He assumed however, for natural reasons, that if it was a party for a toddler, presents for said toddler would be involved. Regardless, Wilbur didn’t think giving a present to a child would be looked down upon in any case. If anything, it might repair what he previously damaged. Even if it was an infinitesimal amount, it could still help.

“Oh oh oh! What should we get him?” Ghostbur asked excitedly, “What does he like? Red, gold, nether things, books…” He chuckled as he jokingly added, “Us! We could wrap ourselves in a present.”

Wilbur chuckled despite himself. “We could,” he said with a smile, feeling a bit of exhaustion dragging at him, but finding it easier and easier to ignore. “Let’s see if there’s anything we can use in these chests.”

Wilbur rummaged through them for a while, only managing to find four gold ingots that could perhaps interest the child. He briskly crafted them into a pair of gold boots that he figured would suit Michael’s size. He narrated the action to Ghostbur as he did it.

“They’re like rubber boots!” Ghostbur had commented excitedly.

“Mhm.”

“Oh, I have an idea!” 

“Shoot,” a smile lingered in his voice as he grabbed a dark gray satchel nearby. It was light-weight and durable. Perfect for a gift or two. He carefully put the golden boots inside it as Ghostbur rambled on cheerfully.

“So, hear me out. I’ve got the best idea ever in the whole universe. We should make him a card! He can hold and look at it, and you can be nice in it too!”

Wilbur walked downstairs, grabbing some sugar cane from the farm as he quickly pressed it into paper. A quill sat nearby as he picked it up. “Alright, so a simple message…” Wilbur’s voice trailed off.

“Okay, how about, ‘Oh, Michael, you are the most amazing person to exist and I hope you continue existing forever.’”  

Wilbur looked into the air as if he was on The Office. “Or we could go with something more general.”

“I gotcha! We can do ‘You are the most amazing person to exist and you are so cool that I hope you continue existing forever.’”

“First of all, I thought I said more general, not less.”

“I did make it more general! I removed Michael’s name from it.”

Wilbur facepalmed gently so it wouldn’t hurt Ghostbur. “I meant for it to be less… emotional? I don’t think that’s the right word, but I want the card to be neutral.”

Ghostbur hummed in agreement. “Okay. We can say ‘I feel neutral about your existence, but I do agree that you chose to exist at this current time, and by the way, you are also very cool.’”

Wilbur sighed, “I’ll take over the writing.” He narrated the words on the paper, “Dear Michael, The world will be at your feet someday! But for now, it's just these gold boots.” A smile slipped on his face at the words replaying in his mind in company with Ghostbur’s noises of approval.

“Oh can we do a drawing at the bottom? Michael likes drawings.”

Wilbur nodded, “Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

Ghostbur excitedly squealed, “Can we- oh my, I have so many good ideas.”

Wilbur chuckled, pleased to hear the ghost being his typical self again. “I can start with drawing Michael?”

Ghostbur clapped, “Yeah! And- and holding hands with him?”

“Sure, just give me one second.” He might have been a leader of a nation and a general for many soldiers, but Wilbur certainly was not an artist. He tried genuinely drawing a face, only for him to scratch it out and get a new paper out and transfer his original message onto it. Instead, he imitated Michael’s drawing style- stick figures. 

He drew playful lines across the bottom of the paper. He eventually formed a small stick person with little pig ears, a big smile, and black boots. He would have colored them, but he didn’t want to risk Michael eating the paper as he did just days ago. 

Next to Michael, he drew a slightly bigger person. Curly hair at the top and a rough trenchcoat around the body. He hesitantly finished the picture with a small smile on his own face. It felt a bit silly to draw like that. To be making a card for a child after everything, drawing handholding and smiles. Yet Ghostbur’s excitement was strangely infectious. It was sort of relieving in a sense, even if Wilbur wasn’t the type to fall for such bright positivity.

“Alright, the drawings are finished.” 

He was about to fold the paper into his pocket when Ghostbur called out, “Wait, did you put any stars on there?”

“No?”

“What kind of drawing is it if there’s no stars?!”

Wilbur sighed quietly as he quickly scribbled some stars in the corners. “Alright, I’m putting it away now-”

“Wait! Did you sign it?”

Wilbur furrowed his brow, “I’m giving it to him. He knows it’s from me.”

Ghostbur pleaded, “But cards always look better if they’re signed. Just a quick, ‘Love, Wilbur and Ghostbur’ makes the card a thousand times better! No- a billion!”

Wilbur sighed as he remained frozen in place before the words settled in. His mind easily processed the ridiculous request, but not the fact that Ghostbur wanted to be signed on the card too. Wilbur should have probably assumed it, but the idea didn’t fully settle with him. “Alright.” The words were quiet as he quickly wrote down, ‘Sincerely, Uncle Wilbur’.

"Is there anything else I need to add?"

"Hmm, I don't think so."

Wilbur gently placed the card in the satchel as he quickly ran up to see the clock once more, but he slightly frowned to see the hour hand still lingering between the four and five. He brushed it off though. He could easily occupy himself anyway. His eyes glazed over the books on the table before he internally groaned at the thought of hitting the books once again. 

He walked over to the table, placing the satchel onto it, before grabbing one of the books before Ghostbur spoke, "Oh, we're reading again?" His voice sounded slightly dismayed.

Wilbur shook his head, "Nah, I'm just putting away some books." Ghostbur made a pleased sound  as Wilbur quietly pushed the leather-bound book back into its spot. 

He sighed quietly at the odd silence of the room. He focused on the ticking of the clock. It

was a nice sound to focus on. It was a constant reminder he was still alive. Even if he wasn't

the happiest in his position, he was alive. 

An alive man that was going to attend a toddler's party with a homemade card that had poorly drawn stickmen inside.

He exhaled sharply through his nose, as he finished putting some of the books away. Most of them held no useful information anyhow, and perhaps leaving them out would appear suspicious, should Tubbo return.

He wondered for a brief moment if Ranboo intended on telling Tubbo about Wilbur’s presence in the bunker. He imagined Tubbo insisting on having a talk as soon as Wilbur arrived. Prime, Wilbur despised talks. He just hoped the awkwardness of the interaction, and Ranboo’s apparent secrecy, was enough for Ranboo to leave it out.

Wilbur walked downstairs, finding that his leg had almost healed during his days in the bunker. He was going to harvest some watermelon, simply to pass the time. As he was about to do so, his eyes fell upon something dusty, peeking out of a chest he hadn’t bothered looking much at before. He knew what it was. He closed his eyes momentarily, to get a hold of his thoughts, before walking to the chest, and taking out a dusty mirror. 

He rubbed the shiny end of it with his sleeve. The mirror was still vaguely cloudy, but it still showed him nonetheless. Well- not exactly him, but rather his body. The man who stared back was nearly unrecognizable with gray bruises scattered along his face that easily complemented the bags under his eyes.

Complement was a rather strong word as all of his features seemed off-putting to him. His greasy hair hung close to his pale-ish skin. He squished his face with one of his hands, truly making sure that his reflection was his own. Of course, the mirror version moved along with him, but he strangely wished it didn’t. 

His mind drifted back to his encounter with Ranboo. Had they really intended on inviting Wilbur to the party in the first place? Or had that been done out of pity?

The only good thing about his reflection was that he couldn’t see the burns along his chin anymore. He touched it gently, finding the skin to be a little softer than before. 

He automatically put the mirror down as he headed towards the shower that laid in the bunker. He stopped two steps away as Ghostbur chimed in, “What time is it over there?”

“Oh… I don’t know.” He was pulled out of his thoughts quite easily as he stayed frozen in place.

Confusion laced Ghostbur’s voice, “You can’t check?”

Wilbur shut his eyes tightly for a moment before taking a sharp breath, “I could, but I have to ask you something.”

Wilbur despised the cheeriness in Ghostbur’s response. “Ask away!”

Images of Wilbur’s face flashed through his own mind as he hesitantly asked, “Alright, Ghostie, there’s not an easy way to bring this up.” Ghostbur hummed in acknowledgement, not wanting to interrupt Wilbur. Despite Wilbur not wanting to continue on, he forced the words out of him, “So- do you know what a shower is?”

“Yeah! It’s one of those plants on the ground with pretty petals.”

A dry chuckle left Wilbur, “No, that’s a flower.”

“Oh. Is it what Tubbo uses in baking?”

Wilbur sighed this time, “No, that’s wheat flour.” As Ghostbur was about to give another guess, Wilbur cut him off, “I’ll just tell you.”

Ghostbur sounded slightly dismayed at his refused answers, “Alright.”

“Alright. Alright,” the words were quiet in his mind as he forced himself back on track. “A shower is something people do to get clean. They use soap and… water to do this.”

“Aww, I was about to guess that too.”

“Right.” It was now or never. “I think I need to take a shower.”

“Okay!”

Wilbur furrowed his brow, “You’re… okay with me taking a shower? You know it’s going to require water, right?”

Ghostbur’s breath hitched at the realization. “Ah. I thought you meant soap or water.”

Wilbur exhaled, the tension flowing through his body. “Yeah.”

“So why do you need to take one? I know people in general do it, but you can explain to him that water hurts me.”

Wilbur shook his head, “He can’t know about you.”

Child-like curiosity filled Ghostbur’s voice, but it was slightly dimmer than what it should have been, “Why?”

Wilbur pursed his lips. It was too risky to describe in words. With how little trust Tubbo had in Wilbur, it would most likely foil their plans of Ghostbur’s escape. The suspicion and worry in Tubbo’s eyes wouldn’t temporarily go away at a joke. There wouldn’t be a moment alone with his thoughts as everyone whispered about the mind of his. They wouldn’t say anything bad either, just harsh truths that hurt more than he’d like to imagine. The truths he thought he could escape by finishing his unfinished symphony. 

Wilbur’s failed nation transitioned to a mind that couldn’t go a day without the desperate need to talk to someone again. The need for someone to reassure him he was alive and he wasn’t imagining something in the train station again. He was quite imaginative in there. He made fantasy worlds with so many new people, but at the end of the day, he imagined Tommy by his side laughing or cooking breakfast with Tubbo again. 

On the rougher days, he would imagine Fundy there. Sometimes he talked about his problems to him, only to cry harder when he remembered his son wasn’t actually there. Or he would imagine Niki running a hand through his hair, telling him all the things he needed. He’d been without that real warm touch for thirteen years that holding himself made a shaky sob leave. It had been pathetic of him to imagine such things, but the silence got to you after a few years, after he had spent a long time growing bitter. No one could see him anyway, so maybe it hadn’t counted at all, as he thought about those potential blissful moments.

The moments he never got. Perhaps he was still at the train station after all, the slight buzz of the lights being the only noise he could hear. No one laughed with him when he came back. The most he got was a dry chuckle that he happened to witness. There was no one to hold or listen to him. Not a single person smiled at his return. He was alone in the train station he thought he escaped days ago.

Tears blurred his vision as he wrapped his arms around himself. He pushed his body against a wall as he slid down it. The gray wall that accompanied the gray floors and flickering fluorescent lights. The tunnel that didn’t stop seemed to stop his mind. It blocked him in every direction that led to happiness before his murmuring thoughts entered.

It took a moment to realize it wasn’t his thoughts, but rather an echoy version of them. “Wilbur? Is everything okay?”

Wilbur swallowed back a cry. “Yeah,” his voice shook for a moment as he tried to breathe normally. “Sorry I spaced out for a second.” There wasn’t a train station. He wasn’t back there. He was in the bunker. “What were you saying?”

Ghostbur quietly answered, “Nothing. Oh- earlier you said you wanted to take a shower?”

The words brought Wilbur back to a more tangible reality. “Right…” he said with a nod, pushing himself up from the ground, his posture wavering slightly. He swallowed something in his throat. “Are you… Are you okay with that?” he quickly added, “I’ll make it as brisk as I can I promise! It’ll mostly be to wash my hair, and to look and smell just a little more presentable.”

Ghostbur had very little reason to trust him. Wilbur was incredibly aware of that at this point, his promises losing all meaning at his forgetfulness, or plain dishonesty. “Of course. Just- Just don’t take too long please.”

“I won’t,” Wilbur said. “I promise,” he repeated, trying to add as much weight to the words as he could. Engrave them, so his mind wouldn’t drift away from it. To keep his mind from drifting away in general.

Gently he put his clothes aside, placing the familiar old trenchcoat and blouse in a little pile. He had associated the outfit with himself for so long, that looking at it apart from him, was almost surreal. Slowly, he walked into the shower. He put the temperature to be as cold as he could, unsure if there would even be hot water in a bunker like this. It would serve as a good reminder that he should make this quick. “I am going to turn it on now. It’ll… It’ll probably reach my entire body.” 

“Okay…” Ghostbur said. Wilbur caught himself missing the excitement from when they were making the card together. Frivolous. 

He placed his hand on the shower knob and turned it, careful not to let his hand too much under the water. It proved to be a rather needless endeavor though, as his face and body were immediately drenched in cold water. He immediately shivered from the feeling as he felt his movements become jittery and robotic. He heard hurried breaths from his mind, and whimpers of pain, though it was surprisingly silent this time around.

Wilbur let his hand through his hair, massaging his scalp. He grasped some soap next to the shower, and mixed some into his hair and on his body, quickly using the water to wash it off. His heart was beating fast, as he rushed to turn the knob once more, some soap still lingering on a few strands of hair. He bolted to the other side of the room, to dry all the remaining water off with a towel, almost as if the uncomfortably cold water was burning him too. The second he could no longer find a drop he let out a few breaths. “There we go. Done.”

Ghostbur took a moment before he replied, his own breathing calming down as well. “Okay… Okay, that’s good! T-thank you.”

Wilbur cringed slightly at the gratitude, not entirely certain what he was being thanked for. “Of course,” he said quietly, his breathing quite obvious and echo-y in the empty room. He suddenly realized that he missed the ticking of the clock. He shook his head, and put on his clothes again, unsure if the warmth they brought was comfort or something that settled heavier in his chest. He didn’t have time to dwell on it.

He walked out of the room, grabbing the satchel with Michael’s present in it. He glanced at the clock once more, finding that it was only around 5:30am. He stood in the middle of the bunker for a good minute, closing his eyes tightly, and holding on to the sound of the clock. When he opened his eyes once more, they settled on the potions he brewed over the past few days. There weren’t many, but they comforted him nonetheless. He absent-mindedly packed three strength potions into the satchel, perhaps planning on giving some to Tubbo and Ranboo as a gift. 

Then, with determined steps he started walking towards the exit. It felt as if a weight was slightly lifted as he walked out the bunker, though he had grown so used to the weight that he wasn’t sure if that was comforting to him or not. Once he found himself in Pogtopia, he decided to focus on the ground beneath his feet, rather than the buttons lining the walls.

When the sun reached Wilbur’s face, the rays seemed to make his vision less blurry in a sense. The darkness that was so welcoming before, and still called to him, was shoved away in favor of the sunrise.

He remembered right then, when he had declared the first sunrise he saw when he returned, his sunrise. A reminder of life, and opportunity. He stared at the bright sky for a little while. Gently, he placed the satchel on the ground, the glass bottles quietly clinging against each other, and sat down in the grass next to it. He breathed the air into his lungs, as his shoulders untensed. He watched the sunrise intently, as he waited for the party to approach.

[qqueenofhades]

So I’ve been thinking about the end of empires lately, the way they behave, the patterns that emerge, things like that. Yes, I know. What a lovely topic. Lol. My brain likes punishment. Shhh. Anyway, I was wondering what we have learned from past ended empires that could help us understand today’s world? Do you have thoughts? Any book refs on this? Thanks qqueen!

Aha, okay, I'll give this a crack. I'll try not to get bogged down in too much pedagogical woolgathering about how it is defined, determined, decided, or otherwise applied as an analytical concept, but we'll say that an "empire" is a geographical, political and territorial unit that comprises multiple countries/regions, is united under one relatively centralised administration, ruled either by one all-powerful figure or a small circle of powerful elites (usually technically answerable to the former), and held together by military, financial, and ideological methods. The basic model, as established by the Romans: take their sons to serve in the army, make them pay their taxes to you, and worship Roma, the patron goddess of the city, alongside their own preferred religion. Simple, straightforward, and lasted for five hundred years (almost a thousand if you count the Roman Republic which preceded it). We hear a lot in Western history classes about the "Fall of Rome," which is usually presented in popular narratives as the moment when everything went to pot before the "Dark Ages." Is this true? (No.) If so, did it happen because, as is often claimed, "barbarians/savages were attacking Rome and overthrew it?" (No.)

The collapse of the Western Roman Empire is way more than we can get into in the course of one ask, and there are other fallen empires to consider: for example, the Aztec, Ashanti, Russian, and British ones. It's a subject of debate as to whether modern-day America should be termed an empire: it fits most, if not all, of the historical criteria, but is an empire only an empire when it declares itself to be one? The long and sordid history of American imperialism, whether it's a rose by any other name or otherwise, is covered in American Empire: A Global History by A.G. Hopkins, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States by Daniel Immerwahr, and A People's History of American Empire by Howard Zinn. All are worth looking into.

Overall, I think the basic similarities for what makes an empire fall would include:

it geographically overextends itself (Roman, British)

it is attacked by foreign rivals and internal enemies (Roman, Aztec, Ashanti)

it becomes massively financially indebted and deeply politically unstable (Roman, Russian)

it resorts to heavy-handed attempts to punish dissatisfaction among its people, spurring popular resistance (Aztec, Roman, British, Russian)

it is emerging from a period of long war internationally and internally that has strained it militarily (Roman, British, Russian)

it simply gets devastatingly unlucky thanks to a combination of unforeseeable external factors (Aztec, Ashanti)

And so on. Basically, the administrative bureaucracy gets too big to manage itself, the ever-increasing financial exactions can't pay for the necessary wars to maintain and expand its borders, people become dissatisfied both outside and inside the imperial system, and since no human institution or nation-state lasts forever, down it comes. However, I would caution against too much insistence on a total or categorical end of any of these societies. You've probably heard of Jared Diamond, who wrote uber-popular bestsellers including Guns, Germs, and Steel and Collapse, focusing on how human societies survive, or not, from an eco-scientific perspective. However, Diamond is not a trained anthropologist, archaeologist, or historian, despite writing extensively about these subjects (he's a professor of geography at UCLA) and a whole bunch of eminent historians and anthropologists got together to write "You're Full of Shit, Jared Diamond," also known as Questioning Collapse: Human Resilience, Ecological Vulnerability, and the Aftermath of Empire.

This book basically blasts Diamond (as he deserves, frankly) for removing all social/cultural factors from his analysis in Collapse and only focusing on ecology/science/environment. Geographical determinism can shed light on some things, but it's very far from being a total explanation for everything, completely divorced from the human societies that interact with these places. For example, did the Easter Island society of Rapa Nui collapse because the Polynesian people "recklessly" overexploited the environment (Diamond) or the impact of European diseases, colonialism, slave trade, and other direct crises, combined with the introduction of the non-native rat to the islands? (Spoiler alert: The latter. You simply can't write about these societies as if they're just places where things somehow happened thanks to natural processes, entirely outside of human agency and cultural/social/political needs.)

Anyway, the silver-lining upside, especially in an incredibly gloomy political milieu where the current American system was nearly overthrown by the last president and hordes of his fascist sympathisers (as they were talking about on Capitol Hill today, incidentally), is that the usual story of human societies is resilience rather than disappearance. None of the empires listed above, with the exception of the Aztecs (conquered by the Spanish, decimated by smallpox, and resisted by internal indigenous enemies) totally vanished. Their structures and ethos often just got a change of paint and name and carried on. For all the ballyhoo about the "Collapse of Rome," the Western Roman Empire had been an almost entirely ineffective political entity for years and the capital had already been transferred to Ravenna well before 476. There were outsider attacks, but Rome had weakened itself by a constant succession of military coups, palace intrigue, too-heavy taxes, and a simply too-vast area to effectively control. The Eastern Roman Empire, however (aka the Byzantine Empire) carried on being a major political player straight through the medieval period and only ended in 1453, with the Ottoman sultan Mehmed II's conquest of Constantinople.

Even the Ashanti Empire still exists today, as a small independent kingdom within the modern African country of Ghana. The Russian and British empires no longer exist under that name, but few would deny that those countries still retain considerable influence in similar ways. When people talk about the "collapse" of societies, especially non-Western societies, it also produces the impression that they did in fact just disappear into thin air, often as no fault of the invading Westerners. (Sidenote: I suggest reading "Settler Colonialism and the Elimination of the Native" by Patrick Wolfe in the Journal of Genocide Research. The whole thing is online and free.) How many times have we heard that, say, the Mayans/Mayan Empire "vanished," when there are up to seven million Mayan speakers in modern Mexico? If you're insisting that they're gone, of course it's easier to act like they are.

Anyway. I think what I'm trying to say here is that in terms of lessons for the modern world:

empires always (always) fall;

this comes about as some combination of the above-mentioned factors;

however, the societies previously organised as empires almost never disappear, so the end of an empire does not necessarily mean the end of its attendant society, culture, countries, etc;

empires often re-organise as essentially similar political units with different names and can maintain most of their former status;

empire is an inherently unequal and exploitative system that often relies on taxonomies of race, gender, power, and class, with the usual suspects at the top and everyone else at the bottom;

empire is usually, though not always, related to active colonialism and military expansion, and as soon as it cannot sustain this model, it's in big trouble;

the idea that human societies just disappear solely as a result of inadequately correct economic choices and/or ecological determinism is a lot of shit;

And so on. The end of an empire isn't necessarily anything to fear, though it can, obviously, be incredibly disruptive for those living within the country/countries affected. And until we learn how to move, as a species, permanently away from political and ideological systems that give so many resources to so few people and nothing to so many others, we're going to continue to experience this cycle.

[papermoonloveslucy]

LUCY SHUNS AUDITIONS

July 21, 1950

[In the below article, reprinted verbatim, Johnson writes using a lot of imagery and insider jargon.  This sort of article was common in trade papers like Variety, but seems odd in a daily newspaper.]

Hollywood—(NEA) Lucille Ball slipped me the lowdown on her failure to pin to the canvas the dumb chick role in “Born Yesterday” and make it holler uncle. (1)

She’s got a touch of Francis the mule in her when it comes to auditions. (2)

Instead of scrimmaging for the role with Evelyn Keyes, Judy Holliday, Marie Wilson, Shelly Winters and Jan Sterling, (3) Lucille went bolting the other way. 

The “let’s-see-if-you’re-it” boys pleaded and cajoled. 

But Miss Anti-Auditions wasn’t having any of the competition, thank you. 

“I figure if they want you, they want you,” Lucille plainspoke it. If you’ve got to read and test for it, to heck with it.’

She isn’t chronicled in Hollywood history, but once, badgered by her RKO bosses, Lucille went tripping over to David O. Selznick’s office for a whack at the Scarlett O’Hara role in “Gone With the Wind.” 

That’s what curdled her in the first place. 

“It was awful,’’ Lucille shudders. I was shaking all over when I hit Selznick’s office. My knees gave way. I did the whole audition in scrubwoman position. Selznick laughs and says thanks a lot. (4)

Judy Holliday landed the junkman’s doll role and Lucille grabbed a railroad ticket for a personal appearance tour with hubby Desi Arnaz. She strutted to Latin rhythms, swung a glittering purse in a manner dear to runaway girls and wisecracked for the customers. (5)

MIMICS OSCAR WINNER 

At the last moment she nixed a dancing and singing routine. The star with the forest-fire hair shrugged: 

“I decided it would be silly to compete with Grable.” (6)

A lot of movie queens laid in fresh supplies of smelling salts, ice beanies and copies of “Release From Nervous Tension” when word got around that Lucille was about to whoop it up on the six-a-day circuit. (7)

She’s a blister-raiser from way back and the air was shrill with ouches about a year ago when she whipped up an impression of an Academy Award winner. 

But the girls can go back to worrying about other things—like shrinking from larger-than-life to television screen size. 

Lucille didn’t let any “furriners” see the routine. 

“It's for Hollywood only," she said. “I should take radio-active material on the road?” 

Her Oscar-grabber routine is strictly for unreal anyhow, she says. and no blood relation to Bette Davis, Olivia de Havilland, Ingrid Bergman or any other Screen Duse. (8) She insisted:

“She's any movie star, even me. This character has to go up on that stage and act surprised. She’s only been rehearsing what she's going say flor eight weeks. So she says, ‘Ye gads, me?  But I’m so unprepared. Really, I didn’t dream...” Lucille is generally is as unflinching about the movie queen business as Pearl White was about onrushing trains. (9)

But her knees executed some wobbles that aren’t in Arthur Murray’s rhumba dance book when she checked into her first vaudeville dressing room. (10)

“Those stages—they’re so big.” she gasped. “Hey, I’d hate to get caught in the middle of one of those stages without bread and water.” 

Lucille didn’t take any chances with out-of-town press interviews, either. “I once did a personal appearance tour with Maureen O'Hara and had to show up at a press party,” she grinned. (11)

My sinus - I just die from it - was acting up. The reporter next to me didn’t understand my puffed eyes and cold sores. He called Maureen a lady in his story. But he referred to me as a whisky tenor with red-runny eyes.” 

Lucille’s brain cells work on direct current and she’s not one to make with the figure eights when a straight glide to home base would get her there quicker. 

They still laugh about her exit line to Louis B. Mayer. (12) Mayer always referred to her as a thoroughbred and sometimes compared her to his famous horses. "Yes, and like your other nags, I'm leaving your stable," Lucille said when she decided to bow out of her contract. 

She has high hopes for her new picture “The Fuller Brush Man.” Not that she enjoyed it: (13)

“Honey, this ones that I don t enjoy turn out be the best ones.  This one put me in the hospital. My feet are still bandaged up. I’m a mess. No more physical-type pictures for me.”

#   #   #    FOOTNOTES FROM THE FUTURE

(1) The 1946 Broadway hit comedy Born Yesterday by Garsin Kanin was bought by Columbia Pictures. Things got complicated when its stage star, Judy Holliday, swore she would not do the film version. Columbia used this as fuel for publicity about who would win the role.  Naturally, Lucille Ball was considered a top contender.  As the article states, she was not eager, however, to prove her worth to the ‘let’s-see-if-you’re-it’ boys (aka producers).  There was talk of Lucille performing the play in London, or summer stock, but her film contracts would not allow her time off for a stage run. 

(2) Mules are supposedly notoriously stubborn animals - just like Lucy. Francis the Talking Mule was the star of seven popular Universal-International film comedies. The character originated in the 1946 novel Francis by David Stern III, adapting his own script for the first entry, simply titled Francis.  On “I Love Lucy” Fred Mertz sometimes called Ethel “Francis” to indicate she was being stubborn about something. 

(3) These were some of the Hollywood stars looking to play the part of Billie Dawn in the film Born Yesterday. Evelyn Keyes (1916 – 2008) was best known for playing Sue Ellen, Scarlett O’Hara’s kid sister, in Gone With The Wind (1939).  Judy Holliday (1921-65), changed her mind about playing the role she originated on Broadway, but by then the casting net was cast, and she was just another performer on the short list. She eventually got the role, which defined her career. Marie Wilson (1916-72) was a zany comedic actress in the style of Gracie Burns. She was widely known as the star of radio and TV’s “My Friend Irma”. Shelley Winters (1920-2006) would be nominated for an Oscar the year after this article. She was adept at playing drama and comedy, and had a long-lasting career in Hollywood.  She appeared on “Here’s Lucy” in 1968; Critics raved about her Jan Sterling’s portrayal of Billie Dawn in the Chicago touring company of Born Yesterday and Columbia brought her out to the West Coast to test for the film. At one point, she was actually announced to play the part but the role ultimately went to Holliday.

(4) Lucille Ball did indeed read (not screen test) for the role of Scarlet O’Hara, just like nearly all of the women in Hollywood in 1938. Ball told the story several times on television, each time with varying details, but probably most completely on “Bob Hope’s Unrehearsed Antics of The Stars” (1984).

(5) This is a vivid description of the “Cuban Pete / Sally Sweet” portion of Lucy and Desi’s nightclub act to convince sponsors to buy them as a couple. 

(6) Betty Grable (1916-73) was considered one of the most famous pin-up girls in history. In addition to her million dollar gams (legs), she could sing, dance, and act, too. She guest starred with her then-husband Harry James on “Lucy Wins A Racehorse”, an installment of “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” aired on February 3, 1958.

(7) “Release from Nervous Tension” was an actual best-selling book by Dr. David Harold Fink, published in 1950. Vaudeville and Burlesque shows were often known as the ‘six-a-day circuit’ because sometimes there would be as many as six performances of the same act in a day.  Naturally, this did not apply to Lucy and Desi, who were big film and radio stars at the time. 

(8)  These were some of Hollywood’s top-line dramatic actors. Bette Davis (1908-89) had won two Oscars, and was nominated for several others during her long career. She was supposed to guest-star on “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” in “The Celebrity Next Door” in 1957 but dropped out after a horse-riding accident, leaving the role to Tallulah Bankhead; Olivia de Havilland (1916-2020) had also won two Oscars, the second the year this article was published. She was best remembered for playing Melanie Wilkes in Gone With The Wind (1939); Ingrid Bergman (1915-82) was a Swedish-born actress, who, by career’s end, had scored three Academy Awards.  When Johnson talks about “any other screen Duse” he is referring to Eleonor Duse (1858-1924), an Italian-born stage actress known for her grand, dramatic style.  

(9) Pearl White (1889-1938) was best known as the silent film actress who was tied to the railroad tracks in “The Perils of Pauline” (1914).  

(10) Arthur Murray (1895-1991) was a ballroom dancer and businessman best known for the chain of dancing schools that bear his name. Murray was often a punchline on “I Love Lucy,” especially when the subject of dancing came up. The Rhumba was a Latin dance that took America by storm in the late 1940s and 1950. Desi Arnaz often called his orchestra a ‘rhumba band.’ 

(11) Maureen O’Hara (1920-2015) and Lucille Ball had starred in Dance, Girl, Dance in 1940. As a result, the two went on a promotional tour that took them to several US cities, including the nation’s capitol. 

(12) Louis B. Meyer (1884-1957), along with Samuel Goldwyn and Marcus Loew of Metro Pictures, had formed a new motion picture company called Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) in 1918. Over the next 25 years, MGM was "the Tiffany of the studios," producing more films and movie stars than any other studio in the world. Mayer became the highest-paid man in America, and one of the country's most successful horse breeders. Both he and MGM reached their peaks at the end of World War II, and Mayer was forced out in 1951, just a year after this article was written. 

(13) Erskine Johnson gets the title wrong. Lucille had madeThe Fuller Brush Girl, a sequel to The Fuller Brush Man (1948).  The film was released in mid-September 1950. 

[newstfionline]

Friday, May 28, 2021

San Jose Shooting Leaves Eight Dead (CNN) An employee of the Valley Transportation Authority (VTA), a public transit operation in San Jose, California, went to work as usual early Wednesday morning at the VTA maintenance and dispatch rail yard. But that morning, he brought a gun and opened fire, killing at least eight coworkers and wounding others, one critically, before committing suicide. Around the same time as the shooting, a house in San Jose that is believed to be that of the shooter erupted in flames. Investigators are looking into the gunman’s motive. This mass shooting is the 232nd incident so far this year in the U.S. in which at least four people were shot.

U.S. drivers to get hit by soaring pump prices over Memorial Day holiday (Reuters) U.S. motorists will see the highest gasoline prices in seven years when they hit the roads this Memorial Day weekend, the traditional start of the summer driving season, as fuel demand surges alongside coronavirus vaccination rates. Retail gasoline prices are at about $3.04 a gallon on average nationwide, the most expensive since 2014, data from the American Automobile Association showed. And after a year of lockdowns to curb the coronavirus pandemic, tens of millions of American road-trippers are expected to be stung by those prices: More than 34 million Americans are expected to take to the highways between May 27 and May 31, AAA expects, an increase of 53% from last year but still down 10% from 2019.

Less defunding? (WSJ) One year after the movement to “defund” law enforcement began to upend municipal budgets, many American cities are restoring money to their police departments or proposing to spend more. In the nation’s 20 largest local law-enforcement agencies, city and county leaders want funding increases for nine of the 12 departments where next year’s budgets already have been proposed. The increases range from 1% to nearly 6%.

Competition, not engagement (Bloomberg) The U.S. is entering a period of intense competition with China as the government running the world’s second-biggest economy becomes ever more tightly controlled by President Xi Jinping, the White House’s top official for Asia said. “The period that was broadly described as engagement has come to an end,” Kurt Campbell, the U.S. coordinator for Indo-Pacific affairs on the National Security Council, said Wednesday at an event hosted by Stanford University. U.S. policy toward China will now operate under a “new set of strategic parameters,” Campbell said, adding that “the dominant paradigm is going to be competition.”

Poll shows Argentines expect inflation to hit 50% in next year (Buenos Aires Times) Argentines’ expectations for inflation over the next year hit a record, as government price controls have failed to tame elevated food costs. Argentines’ expectations for inflation over the next year hit a record, as government price controls have failed to tame elevated food costs. Prices rose four percent or more in three of the first four months this year, prompting the government to extend some price controls and temporarily ban beef exports. Alongside concerns of no economic plan, the government’s money printing last year to finance Covid-19 social spending is also fueling expectations for elevated inflation in 2021.

Relations in the ditch (Nikkei Asian Review) The European Parliament has voted overwhelmingly to freeze the ratification process of an investment pact with China—a deal that Beijing six months ago considered a big strategic victory. It has sent shock waves throughout China, with only one month and change before arguably the most important event in President Xi Jinping’s era, the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party’s establishment, on July 1. Some party members are worried that the centenary’s festive mood will be dampened by the harsh diplomatic reality. Not only are China’s relations with the U.S. bad, but now EU relations are stuck in a ditch.

China keeps diplomats out of espionage trial of Australian Yang Hengjun (Reuters) Australia’s ambassador to China was denied entry to a heavily guarded Beijing court on Thursday that is hearing an espionage case against Australian blogger Yang Hengjun, at a time of worsening ties between the two nations. China said the case involved state secrets and so could not be heard in open court. Yang, an Australian citizen born in China, wrote about Chinese and U.S. politics online as a high-profile blogger and also penned a series of spy novels before his detention two years ago. Diplomatic ties between the two nations have deteriorated sharply since Yang was detained, with China imposing trade sanctions on produce from Australia and reacting angrily to its call for an international inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus, as well as its 5G ban on telecoms giant Huawei. Details of the Yang case have been shrouded in secrecy, with no information released on which espionage agency he is alleged to have acted for. If convicted Yang faces a jail term of 10 years or more on charges of endangering national security.

The Super Rich Are Choosing Singapore as the World’s Safest Haven (Bloomberg) When Singaporean car dealer Keith Oh first read the Facebook message, he wasn’t sure it was real. A Chinese client ordered a S$1.1 million ($830,000) Bentley—sight unseen—over the social network. “They just asked for the price and when we could do the delivery, that’s all,” he said. “It’s a million dollars to us but it’s probably nothing to them.” Money is sloshing around Singapore like never before. As the coronavirus pandemic hammers Southeast Asia and political turmoil threatens Hong Kong, the city has become a safe harbor for some of the region’s wealthiest tycoons and their families. Singapore has long been a draw for wealthy Chinese, Indonesians and Malaysians who would come for short trips. The pandemic has changed all that, prompting many tycoons and their families to stay for months, in some cases seeking residency to ride out the storm. On a per capita basis, the mortality rates in Malaysia and Indonesia are more than 10 and 30 times higher than in Singapore, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University.

A Wave of Afghan Surrenders to the Taliban Picks Up Speed (NYT) Ammunition was depleted inside the bedraggled outposts in Laghman Province. Food was scarce. Some police officers hadn’t been paid in five months. Then, just as American troops began leaving the country in early May, Taliban fighters besieged seven rural Afghan military outposts across the wheat fields and onion patches of the province, in eastern Afghanistan. The insurgents enlisted village elders to visit the outposts bearing a message: Surrender or die. By mid-month, security forces had surrendered all seven outposts after extended negotiations, according to village elders. At least 120 soldiers and police were given safe passage to the government-held provincial center in return for handing over weapons and equipment. “We told them, ‘Look, your situation is bad—reinforcements aren’t coming,’” said Nabi Sarwar Khadim, 53, one of several elders who negotiated the surrenders. Since May 1, at least 26 outposts and bases in just four provinces—Laghman, Baghlan, Wardak and Ghazni—have surrendered after such negotiations, according to village elders and government officials. With morale diving as American troops leave, and the Taliban seizing on each surrender as a propaganda victory, each collapse feeds the next in the Afghan countryside.

Israeli Police Round Up Palestinian Protesters Out of Global Spotlight (The Intercept) Palestinian activists urged the world not to look away from their struggle for freedom and equality following the ceasefire in Gaza, as Israeli police began rounding up Palestinian citizens of Israel who took part in demonstrations described as riots by the authorities. At least 74 Palestinians were detained by Monday afternoon, in the first hours of what Israel’s police force is calling “Operation Law and Order.” Palestinian rights groups called the planned arrest of up to 500 protesters—on charges ranging from attacks on the police to vandalism to online incitement—a blatant crackdown on dissent, timed to coincide with the dimming of the global spotlight on the conflict. “Israeli forces and police are going on a mass arresting rampage in Lydd, and other Palestinian cities in an attempt to ‘even the score’ with Palestinians that spoke up against their ethnic cleansing,” the Palestinian writer Mariam Barghouti observed on Twitter, as video of two men being detained and blindfolded in the city Israelis call Lod circulated online. “This is what we warned about. Israel will target us all when you stop looking.” “The world tends to look away as soon as Israeli lives are no longer threatened by rockets but it is stuff like this, that Israel does to Palestinians every day, that guarantees future rounds,” the writer and political analyst Yousef Munayyer commented on the same images.

UN envoy: Syrian people face immense humanitarian suffering (AP) The U.N. special envoy for Syria said Wednesday it’s “a tragic irony” that ordinary Syrians are facing “immense and growing humanitarian suffering” at this time of relative calm in the more than 10-year conflict. Geir Pedersen pointed to “economic destitution, a pandemic, displacement, detention and abduction—all while violent conflict, terrorism and human rights abuses continue” in the country. While the military situation is relatively calm in some areas, Pedersen said, “recurring signs of a hot conflict are abundant.” He cited spikes in violence in several areas, with shelling by both sides, airstrikes including some by Israel, and more attacks attributed to the Islamic State extremist group. On the economic front, Pedersen said, the Syrian pound has stabilized somewhat “but the price of essential goods and transportation costs are increasingly outside of the grasp of many Syrians.” And in many areas, basic services including water, electricity and health “remain compromised,” he said. U.N. humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock stressed the dire water situation, saying reduced water levels in the Euphrates river which started in January “reached a critical point this month.”

Famine Looms in Ethiopia’s War-Ravaged Tigray Region, U.N. Says (NYT) Famine is now knocking on the door of Ethiopia’s Tigray region, where a civil war that erupted last year has drastically cut the food supply and prevented relief workers from helping the hungry, the top U.N. humanitarian official has warned. In a confidential note to the United Nations Security Council, the official, Mark Lowcock, the under secretary general for humanitarian affairs, said sections of Tigray, a region of more than five million people, are now one step from famine—in part because the government has obstructed aid shipments. “Humanitarian operations are being attacked, obstructed or delayed in delivering lifesaving assistance,” Mr. Lowcock wrote, and at least eight aid workers have been killed.

Thousands evacuate Congo’s Goma amid more volcanic activity (AP) Tens of thousands of people are fleeing the city of Goma in eastern Congo fearing another volcanic eruption by Mount Nyiragongo, which spewed lava near the city last week. Traffic was jammed and pedestrians streamed through the streets, desperate to escape the impending danger. A new eruption could occur at any moment, the military governor of Congo’s North Kivu province, Lt. Gen. Constat Ndima Kongba, announced early Thursday. He ordered the evacuation of 10 of the 18 neighborhoods in the city of 2 million people. The center of Goma, which was spared when the volcano erupted last week, is now under threat, with activity being reported near the urban area and Lake Kivu, Kongba said. Residents were advised to carry very little and told not to return to their homes until advised by authorities. Many people were seen heading northwest toward the town of Sake and east toward Rwanda. International organizations such as the U.N. mission in Congo had on Wednesday already begun evacuating their staff.

[royalrajcabs]

Pushkar - Most Sacred Dham For Hindus

Pushkar Old History

Pushkar is taken into consideration as one of the 5 sacred Dhams for Hindu Pilgrims. It is called the advent of Lord Brahma. It is thought that you'll acquire salvation via taking dip in holy Pushkar Lake.

Pushkar, considered as one of the historically inhabited metropolises of India. It advanced alongside the edge of Pushkar Lake. Pushkar is situated inside the Ajmer district of Rajasthan. It is the handiest 14 Kms far away from Ajmer City. It is separated from Ajmer via the Nag Parbat (The Snake Hill). There are very few temples of Lord Brahma inside the international and Pushkar has the maximum prominent temple in all. It is considered that one that has visited all 4 Dham (Badrinath in North, Dwarka in West, Jagannath Puri in East and Rameshwaram in South) but now not visited Pushkar will no longer be capable of obtaining salvation, it can be done only with the aid of taking a holy dip within the water of holy Pushkar Lake and traveling the Jagatpita Brahma Temple in Pushkar. Famous annual fair (Pushkar Camel Fair) held right here within the pious month of Kartika.

Pushkar Lake

Pushkar lake is one of the most sacred Sarovar of Hindus and considered as the introduction of Brahma Ji. This Lake is surrounded by way of many temples and ghats. It is thought that the holy water of the lake is having recuperation properties.

The legend associated with the Pushkar Lake or Pushkar Sarovar

As mentioned in Hindu scripture Padma Purana, devil Vajranabha become killing and harassing humans on earth. As Lord Brahma is the creator of the universe, he got aggressive and immediately tried to kill the satan Vajranabha with a weapon (Weapon of Lord Brahma is lotus flower). Devil Vajranabha destroyed by means of the Lotus flower however three lotus petals fell on this planet at extraordinary locations during this and holy springs emanates from earth. These holy springs fashioned three lakes - Jyeshta Pushkar Lake (finest or first Pushkar), Madhya Pushkar Lake (middle Pushkar), and Kanishta Pushkar Lake (youngest or closing Pushkar). Lord Brahma got here to the earth and specify the metropolis by naming it Pushkar (Pushpa approach flower and Kar means hand, as a result, Pushkar manner place wherein flower fell from Lord Brahma's hand). After killing devil Vajranabha, Lord Brahma wanted to execute a holy fireplace sacrifice (Mahayagna) at Jyeshta Pushkar Lake.

The Temple

It is the simplest temple of Lord Brahma, where a devotee can provide worship to him. The temple is built with stones and marbles. The indubitable capabilities of the temple are - It's crimson Shikhar (spire) and image of a Hamsa (a swan - the mount of Brahma). The Shikhar is ready 700 feet in top. The emblem of hamsa enhances the entrance gate. The temple is located on a high platform which may get admission via marble steps main to an entrance gate. The entrance gate is having a big arch that is embellished with pillared masking. Entry gate leads to a Mandap (pillared outside corridor) after which the Garbhagriha (sacred shrine). Many cash (specifically silver ) embedded at the marble floor and walls of the temple with the aid of the devotees. A silver turtle is within the mandap facing the Garbhagriha. The main murti also, known as Chahumurti is made from marble. This statue elaborates Brahma Ji seated in a crossed leg position thinking about the motive of the advent of the universe. This shape of Lord Brahma called the Vishvakarma. This icon is of life length with 4 hands and 4 faces, every symbolize a distinct path. The 4 palms maintain akshamala (rosary), pustak (e-book), Kurka (kusha grass), and kamandalu (water pot). Each has its own importance. Akshamala represents the time, pustak represents the expertise, Kurka represents the adoptions of a device of sacrifices for the life of numerous lifestyles-paperwork in nature and kamandalu represents the waters from which the universe emerged. In the temple, Goddess Gayatri located left to the Brahma ji and Goddess Saraswati to the proper. There are images of various God-Goddess, which embossed on temple partitions.

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The Legends

Lord Brahma desired to perform his Mahaygna peacefully without being attacked with the aid of the devils, then he surrounds Pushkar by using the hills from all directions. He evolved — Ratnagiri in the south path, Nilgiri in the north direction, Sanchoora inside the west course, and Suryagiri inside the east path. Lord Brahma allocated precise locations to Gods in hills to keep the yagna from being broken or attacked with the aid of the Devils. Lord Brahma wanted to complete the yagna inauspicious time however Goddess Sarasvati could not make her presence at that point to carry out the essential part of the yagna referred to as Aahuti as she was anticipating her accomplice goddesses Lakshmi, Parvati, and Indrani. As Goddess Saraswati kept Brahma ji waiting, he gets aggravated and requested God Indra (the king of heaven) to find the appropriate woman for him, with whom he can wed and finish the yagna in a special auspicious time. At that time Lord Indra becomes capable of locating only a Gujar's daughter (a milkmaid) however in yagna's requirement is of purest lady like Goddess. Then Lord Indra requested her to pass through the body of a cow to get purified. The girl did the same and Lord Vishnu, Lord Shiva, and the priests confirmed her purity and take into account her 2d start. She turned into the given name Gayatri. After purification Lord Brahma married Gayatri in presence of different Gods. Devi Gayatri sat beside him and start imparting Aahuti. When Goddess Sarasvati along with different Goddesses arrived at the yagna vicinity, she saw Gayatri sitting next to Brahma ji and he or she got dissatisfied as it becomes her rightful region. She cursed Lord Brahma within the presence of all God and Goddess that he would be forgotten and by no means worshipped by means of everybody on the planet.  That is why the Pushkar temple is accounted as the simplest temple which is especially committed to Lord Brahma for worship.

The Importance of Pushkar

As Mahayagna turned into accomplished within the presence of all God and Goddess, it's far believed that a dip within the holy lake at Pushkar will provide assured salvation from all sins and evil things. Pushkar Lake referred to as "Adi Tirtha" - "The unique sacred water-frame", in Ramayana and Mahabharata. There are five sacred serovars (lakes) as per Hindu non-secular notion that are called Panch-Sarovar and Pushkar is one in all them. It is believed that a dip within the holy lake on Kartik Poornima day equated to the blessings received through acting yagnas for several years.

Temples of Consorts

The temples constructed at the hills situated on the alternative ends of the lake. Goddess Sarasvati's temple placed at the very best hill (Ratnagiri Hil) inside the Pushkar and Goddess Gayatri's temple placed on the decrease hill on the other end. Goddess Gayatri fearful of the livid nature of Goddess Savatri's, so she stayed at decrease hill.

Mahadev Temple

This temple become built with the aid of marble inside the 19th century. It is famous for its 5 faces white marble icon of Mahadev(Shiv ji). The region is adorned by means of the statues of many Hindu God-Goddess. It is believed that Lord Mahadev satisfy all the needs in their devotee then and there on travelling the temple.

Varsha Temple

The Varah temple is one of the well-known temple of Pushkar. It was constructed in 12th century by means of king Anaji Chauhan but destroyed by using the intruders. It has icon of Lord Vishnu inside the incarnation of untamed boar. As per Hindu mythology, Lord Vishnu came to earth within the incarnation of Varah to kill the Hiranyakashyup and to shop his devotee Prahlad from his atrocities. It changed into rebuilt in yr 1727 by using Raja Sawai Jai Singh of Jaipur. It is an eminent temple which has elegant carvings, exceptional sculptures and delightful statues.

Temple of Rangji

This temple is dedicated to Rangji, an manifestation of Lord Vishnu. Temple turned into constructed by using Seth Puran Mal Ganeriwal in 1823. It is constructed within the regular South Indian Style Temple however on the same time it suggests the effect of Mughal structure on it. The temple has a high growing 'Gopuram', which usually located in a South Indian Temple. Temple may be very gracious and taken into consideration as one of the sacred temples of Pushkar.

Nag Hills

It is one of the oldest hills inside the international. As in line with belief, its height is lowering each day due to the fact it's far sinking into the earth. In Sat-yuga its height become ten crores yojanas , in Treta-yuga it was ten lakhs yojanas and in Dwapar-yuga it turned into 10000 yojanas. By the quit of Kali Yuga it'll almost disappear as believed. One who visited this vicinity never discover problem in lifestyles.

Pushkar Fair

One of the sector well-known farm animals honest held within the Hindu month of Kartika (October-November) in Pushkar. It is also referred to as Camel Fair. Traders and villagers deliver several camels, livestock and other birds here for the reason of purchase and sell. People acquire right here in massive quantity at the truthful ground in a celebratory mode and Fair floor is occupied through the shops of promoting mementos, jewellery, craft paintings and eateries. Vibrant people song and dance, magic indicates, circus indicates and video games are the famous a part of the truthful. At the time of truthful Pushkar got jam-filled with people from all over the India and vacationers from different nations of the World. One also can do camel ride right here as Pushkar is likewise famous for its Camel Safari inside the dessert.

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The Report & Marriage Story: Adam Driver at TIFF

(If you just want to skip down to one/both of the film recaps, scroll on down to The Report and Marriage Story bolded headings. :)) There are some pics and vids down there too!)

So my friend Sarah and I spent just over 24 hours in Toronto, and it’s no exaggeration to say that during those 24 hours Adam made us feel the entire spectrum of every single possible human emotion. The Report was a nerve-wracking, intelligent, quick-witted political drama set at a break-neck pace of horrific headline after shuddering truth after sickening revelation. Marriage Story was nothing short of a masterpiece - delivering laughs, heartbreak, emotional turmoil, tears, and aching poignancy. I’m not usually one for romantic or real-life dramas like Marriage Story, but damn if that film wasn’t literally one of the most moving and powerful pieces of cinema I’ve seen in recent memory. The Report rises to the same standards, but for completely different reasons.

The films themselves are so incredibly well made in terms of writing and production, but seeing Adam in two major leading roles back to back that couldn’t have been more utterly different in tone or persona was nothing short of flooring. I know this, and of course most of you reading this also know, but GOD it isn’t even possible to fully describe the breadth and sheer force of Adam’s talent. The performances were light years apart, and yet both seared with completely unique energy that just radiated off the screen. I’ve watched almost everything Adam has appeared in, I know he’s the best actor of his generation, and yet he still manages to completely stun me with his seemingly never-ending ability to reveal an entirely different way of being in a new role. Beyond simply an accent or posture, Adam has this unparalleled ability to not only embody a completely novel persona each time, but to then completely naturally reveal that persona’s deepest, truest essence with the smallest facial twitch, turn of his head, or break in his voice. Watching him in a fresh role is literally like discovering a new facet of the human experience.

Watching these superb films in a setting like this massive film festival, where the audience was riveted and excited to engage with the content, elevated both of the viewing experiences to monumental heights. THEN, there was the fact that before and after each screening, Adam and the rest of the main cast members would come on stage with the director to speak about the film and answer questions. This of course meant – being me – that even the slightest glimpse of him would send me into silent fits of glee and awe. So combine being in Adam’s presence repeatedly and for rather long stretches of time with the emotional hurricane powerhouse of not just one but two film epics, ANNND yup it was a recipe for Biggest Emotional Rollercoaster Trainwreck Ever Known To Man. :’)

I did (somehow) manage to keep myself together! Enough so that I asked Adam a question during the Marriage Story Q&A! ;_____; (Sarah was trying to film covertly so needed a second to achieve that zoom action!)

I couldn’t even tell you how it’s possible to string two coherent words together while speaking to 6’2” of well-dressed Talented Babe who’s fucking radiant in person, because it’s literally like an out-of-body experience where some alter ego screaming ‘TALK! TO! HIM!’ just takes over my body while the rest of me is floating off into the stratosphere!!!! (Skip on down to the Marriage Story movie analysis for more info on what I was asking about.)

Okay so let me back up and go through the day chronologically so I have SOME organization for my fangirl thoughts!

I got into Toronto from a 14-hour bus ride at 8:30 AM; Sarah got in on a flight at 9:30. We met up at our hotel and went straight to the theatre where the premium screenings would be taking place. We were able to get front barrier spots along the street and who soon arrived but none other than….!

Our lord and savior Rian Johnson, all hail! He directed the movie Knives Out that was playing at 11 AM in the same theatre. We took turns grabbing coffees because brrrr the Toronto morning was a bit nippy. The Report screening was scheduled to start at 1:45, but none of the cast had shown up yet as of 1:00. Shortly after, big cars started to pull up and Annette Bening and Jon Hamm arrived! We started nail-biting a bit at this point, because we needed to get into the theater 15 minutes before the movie started otherwise they might give our tickets away to people in the Rush Ticket line, but Adam hadn’t arrived yet and there was a chance he would sign for the barricade when he did. But once it started ticking below 15 minutes and still no sign of Adam (tension was real – the whole crowd would go quiet every time a car pulled up, then all sigh in disappointment when someone other than Adam got out), we called it and went to join the Ticketholder line to enter theatre.

WELL, good thing we did! Turns out Adam arrived late and had to rush inside right away, and we had the very serendipitous timing of walking past the secret elevator entrance up into the theater RIGHT when the elevator doors opened and Adam appeared, walking out and into the theater auditorium!! My heart slapped me in the face a bit (a lot) when we caught that glimpse of him so close up. I know there are plenty of pics now but he looked sO striking and sleek in that understated, classic blue suit. He’s SO taLL and still so massive when he’s a few feet away, don’t worry guys he looked plenty healthy even if without the Kylo Ren bulk <333  IT WAS GREAT. I COULD CRY ABOUT JUST THAT MOMENT. God help me with everything that would follow :’’’’’)

Before The Report started, Director Scott Z Burns came on stage to give a brief introduction. This was the first time the film was screening outside of the US and he was very much looking forward to the response and a wider dialogue about the issues raised in the film. He introduced the cast, and was joined on stage by the producer, Jon Hamm (who came on stage in a very silly fashion – see vid below), Annette Bening, and then Adam. And damn if that man didn’t look even MORE drop dead beautiful up there in stage lights. Be still, my heart.

…fat chance of that happening, because my heart was about to rev up into breakneck pace for the following 2.5 hours of the film.

The Report (We’re about to get very spoilery, fair warning!)

Movies are often called “important.” This one is more than that; it is imperative. The tragedy that will plague this film is that much like the staffers of the Senate and CIA that bicker back and forth throughout the decade chronicled in this movie; unproductive bickering will continue between those who appreciate a difficult truth-seeking film like this, and those that will disparage it knowing only the bare minimum of its premise. The latter will do so because of their unswerving understanding of American Patriotism to mean that America comes first, that there’s no justification more ironclad and unquestionable than national security, and America wins no matter the cost.

But. If by some miracle, the people of that latter group could be corralled into watching this film, it just might change their minds.

This movie is difficult. It is horrifying, at times nauseating. It challenges you as the investigations and counter-investigations build over each other, as the conflicting characterizations of the Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EIT) program multiply, and yet even for all that, its takeaway hits you with clarity that is both sobering and impartial.

“National security” rationales were a chimera for barbarisms that achieved nothing. The US government tortured, degraded, and murdered prisoners at its mercy for no demonstrable reason or result. One of the most on-the-nose scenes where all the many moving parts of this complex, dirty history come together is when Dan meets with a New York Times journalist in his car towards the end, as he debates giving his report to the press to release when he fears government red tape will never let it see the light of day. The reporter asks him something like, “Why did the CIA keep doing it, if it wasn’t working?”

After two head-spinning, sickening, revelatory two hours, Dan compresses it all down to something like: “After 9/11 everyone was scared, and the CIA used that fear to act with impunity. They resorted to illegal means to try to keep some control of the situation. They knew it was wrong, and they knew it wasn’t working, so they became more desperate for results to justify it. And it was easy, because the detainees looked different than us. They spoke a different language than us, with different values.”

And so it spiraled to darker and darker depths, in which one failure to produce information by dubious means was taken to justify the next escalation in interrogation techniques.

This is where I need to warn everyone that this is not easy viewing. This film doesn’t let you shy away from what these interrogation techniques really meant. It doesn’t sanitize. You will see waterboarding happening. You will see people naked and chained in cells. You will see glimpses of even worse depravities. And then you will see the psychologist contractors who came to the black sites and claimed with utterly clueless, infuriating impunity that no, they’d never interrogated a terrorist before; no, they didn’t know anything about international law or the rights to trial and legal counsel. (“You think he’s getting a trial?” one said skeptically when his techniques were questioned.) But what they did know was the human brain and how to break it down. Then, you will see the CIA top brass back in DC who never saw with their own eyes even an instant of the abuses they were blithely and sanctimoniously sanctioning.

This film poses the question of how one defines American Patriotism. Chances are, you’re not going to be much moved by the CIA staff’s understanding - who say in defense of their tactics, “It’s only illegal if it doesn’t work.” Then when it doesn’t work, who go on to baselessly credit their EIT program with the intelligence that led to Bin Laden’s capture.

Then, we have Dan Jones/Adam. Dan Jones, who spent literally five years of his life in a basement bunker researching and scraping details together about a program the CIA did everything they could to keep under lock and key. He persevered when the CIA refused to provide any documents, communications, or witnesses; when the CIA denied that they themselves internally questioned the effectiveness of the program; even when they accused him of stealing the documents he finally managed to get his hands on. When the real Dan Jones was brought on stage after the film ended, he received a minutes-long standing ovation that couldn’t have been more deserved.

Most of the audience would probably find it difficult to identify with that understanding of patriotism that claims “It’s only illegal if it doesn’t work” and “Shouldn’t we be grateful just for the fact that we live in a country where a report like this can be written?” (claimed by Jon Hamm as Obama’s Chief of Staff, when pressed by Bening’s Diane Feinstein about releasing the report before the mid-term shift of the Senate going Republican.) What’s much more moving is Feinstein’s rejoinder that “I want to live in a country that publishes this report.” Or the coup-de-grace scene towards the film’s end that incorporates real footage of John McCain’s speech on the Senate floor against the EIT program, when he introduced the McCain-Feinstein bill that would ban the practice. When McCain called on the US to be better than its enemies, and to maintain a standard of honor worth defending.

Dan puts it painfully aptly in the full monologue teased in the trailer: “They say they saved lives but what they really did was make it impossible to prosecute a mass murderer, because if what we did to him ever comes out in a court of law, the case is over. The guy planned 9/11… (continued from memory) … but instead of spending the rest of his life in jail, we turned him into the strongest recruiting tool for our enemies.”

These moments of Dan’s desperation to make others see the truth so glaringly, shamefully obvious to him are when he delivers his most biting rejoinders. As he questions John Yoo’s legal justification in the Torture Memo of the interrogations not amounting to torture so long as they don’t cause “lasting harm”, Dan points to the detainee who died under the conditions of his confinement and demands, “So how long is he going to be dead?!”

Okay so FINALLY, here’s where I turn to Adam’s oh so stellar performance. Adam mentioned in both the Q&A after this screening and in a previous interview that he had to learn the appropriate sense of “decorum” from Dan Jones that would befit a Senate staffer. Adam nailed it. He was playing a relatively low-ranking staffer, grappling with issues of abuse and mismanagement that would have incriminated all manner of public figures miles above him. He had no real power to do anything about the horrific truths he was unearthing, and yet there were too many moments when he seemed to be the only one who truly understood or cared for the truth. Adam played this tight-knit, occasionally fraying sense of necessary professionalism with just the right amount of restraint and understatement. His performance was never boisterous nor melodramatic. And yet, the ever more desperate edge to his dedication couldn’t have been more palpable. Adam’s performance delivered every bit of impact commensurate to the towering gravity of Dan Jones’ investigation.

And yet, for every bit that Adam’s performance remained appropriately understated (it never felt like anything but a true-to-life depiction; hardly ever making you aware you’re watching a dramatization), the depth and nuance in its subtlety was nothing short of masterful. His brief but singeing moments of frustration are short-lived but strike deeply. What really struck me though were two particularly powerful #King of Microexpressions moments.

When the threat of criminal charges for hacking into CIA records is raised against him and he sees a lawyer for the first time to assess his options. After he has to face the fact that this is more complicated than his repeated assertion that “I didn’t do it. I didn’t do it.” He’s quiet for a moment, then asks in a soft, defeated voice, “How long could I go away?” The camera zooms close on Adam’s face when the lawyer responds “twenty years.” Adam’s face barely changes, and yet you can see that number settling into him with pained horror alongside incomprehension. It’s one of those moments where without saying anything, without barely even a gesture, Adam renders his character so desperately empathetic. As the viewer, you realize at that moment you’ve been building an irresistible and compelling emotional connection to him since the second you saw him the first time, and he didn’t even make you aware he was doing it.

The shot in the trailer of him sitting at a desk between the two giant stacks of his report papers. This is when the Senate Intelligence Committee is taking a vote whether to recommend the investigation for further action. I’m pretty sure Adam didn’t say a single line in this scene. Senator Feinstein called the Committee to vote, and as the voices around the table chime “aye” or “nay,” the camera does a slow pan on Dan sitting there, listening with his hands folded. You can barely trace the shifts in his expression. You can barely see anything discernible in his face, and yet simply by the way his shoulders move, the way his jaw shifts every so slightly, and the way he blinks – you’re right there on the edge of your seat with him. You can feel in your very soul his repressed, barely-controlled sense of desperation as the report that’s become his life’s work is put to a vote of either life or death.

Guys, just in case you didn’t realize this by now… Adam is a wonder and it simply defies my understanding how everyone in the whole world hasn’t come to consensus by now that he invented acting and everyone else can just go home and let him play every role ever.

Okay now the one kind of amusing bit in the film! Sadly most audience members won’t get the same kick out of this that we will, but Joanne is in the film playing a CIA staffer. She and Adam share one scene, in which she walks up to him and says, “Your face and your report are bullshit.”

INCREDIBLE. Roast your man, Joanne.

Although the movie tries to tie things up with the McCain-Feinstein anti-torture amendment that ended the EIT program and shows a quote by George Washington before the credits (in what to me seemed a bit of a forced attempt to put a comforting lid on everything) what left me feeling most helpless and frustrated was seeing how partisan politics repeatedly derailed meaningful action against the EIT program throughout the entire span of the film, and knowing full well that that’s exactly how DC still operates. There’s a scene where the timing of publishing the report is being debated. (“If we push this now, the Republicans will pull gun control. What if they pull healthcare?”) And to me, the most infuriating part is seeing the ethics by which our government runs constantly reduced to mere bargaining chips.

It seems there are no absolute lines of the permissible and impermissible. As we see, the CIA got away with torturing unarmed prisoners for years because they disguised it behind code words, wrapped it in nonsensical legal jargon to authorize it, engaged in some serious doublethink and called it a day. Constant debates that twist and manipulate the issues at stake can reduce every law to subjective application. Fallacies in logic and gruesome vengeance disguised as national security measures are defended without shame. The same modes of thinking that started the EIT program and sustained it for year upon shameful, unsuccessful year continue spinning the wheels of today’s destructive and shortsighted policies of self-interest and American exceptionalism.

OKAY, I’m off my soapbox now. Promise.

But last thing. Think about this for a crazy minute: Dan Jones’s report in full was some 7,000 pages. The only version that was ever published was heavily redacted down to a few hundred. What an incredible feat of scriptwriting that a five-year investigation that produced 7,000 pages worth of text was condensed down into a 2 hour movie.

((Also – I kept thinking at regular interviews during the film that holy shit this is giving me such strong vibes of my Presidential staffer Ben in my modern politics AU and I LOVED IT. I’m so extra inspired to press on writing!!))

End Spoilers: The Q&A afterwards! After the audience spent a few minutes giving Daniel Jones his much-deserved minutes of applause, the panel moderator started with a few questions, and here Jon Hamm and Annette Bening immediately started messing with Adam. (It’s clear they’re all buddies who love each other and I appreciate it so much :3) Whenever questions were posed generally to the cast, they would both immediately start passing the microphones down the line towards Adam, knowing full well that he wouldn’t want to talk but nudging him to do so anyway >:)) At one point he wound up with two microphones at the same time and started desperately shoving one back at Annette! For one question, before the microphones could be thrust upon him, as soon as Jon looked over towards him Adam sidestepped back behind the group and turned to start feeling the screen like he was looking for a way out. Lskdjflaskj DORK <3 Annette immediately teased him like “There’s no door, Adam!” and then on a later question that was also posed to “the cast,” Jon and Adam both started pretending to look for a door together. :’)

When responding to a question about what drew him to the role, Adam made a really interesting comment about Dan as a character who “gets the instructions for something to build, and it turns out he was building his own gallows.” (Video below!) He also spoke a bit as to the fact that he was intrigued to create a clear depiction of the internal effort to fact-find and implement accountability about such a contested, tangled issue for which a whole PR campaign existed to defend, even with misinformation.

Have I mentioned how GOOD he looked in that suit?! Somehow he looked extra tall, I thought. And again, I know people are concerned about how thin he is right now, but he really looked fine!! His face is definitely a bit thinner, but his face shape has often changed along with his physique whenever he’s buffed up or down. He still looked plenty solid and very very damn pretty. >:3

Being the adoring fangirls we are, we’re well familiar with Adam’s ~discomfort or stiffness when he’s forced to be in public and speak at things like this. (We love one (1) awkward antisocial man.) During this panel, even though his answers had his usual introspection and self-deprecating, unconscious charm, he seemed to have an extra air of seriousness/attentiveness to him when listening to others’ comments or to audience questions. While he was giving the serious topic every bit the gravity it deserved, he also seemed to be conscious of not seeming partisan to any particular political outlook? I mean, the audience would often clap when someone on the panel said something about how the takeaways from the film are still relevant to the dysfunction and hypocrisy in today’s political climate. Adam would join in the clapping, but something I’ve always respected about him is that he never infuses his persona opinions – whatever they may be – with discussion of his work or his approach to it. I think it takes a lot of hubris and self-awareness to maintain that distinction, and resist the temptation to use a public platform to advance your own opinions. But he never seems remotely interested in any such thing. AITAF advocacy is maybe the closest, but even in that context he remains very restrained.

Did I mention he looked Beautiful like a damn vision? ;____;

Okay so leaving the theatre, my and Sarah’s heads were reeling. There was SO much to process and discuss from the film, we were grabbing onto our favorite lines and moments to recall, which launched us into discussion about political affairs today, interspersed with the occasional “Can you BELIEVE Adam’s Power in that one scene?!” and basically it was my absolute favorite kind of impassioned conversation ever. <333

Time was ticking though, and just before 5 we needed to head back to the theater entrance before Marriage Story started at 5:30. Okay and here – as if we hadn’t already endured enough emotional walloping today – came two massive emotional rollercoasters right after the other! With how little time we had between the films, it was difficult for us to get into the red carpet crowd just beforehand. But as we turned the corner, we heard shouts of his name and !!!!!! there he was outside signing!! Bless his heart, he was across the street from the theatre signing for the long line of people on the other side who I hadn’t seen anyone go over to that morning. :’) Sarah and I ran over to try to join the end of the line and he almooooost got down to us, but it was a little too dicey with the line being kind of chaotic where the barrier ended. But WE WERE SO CLOSE TO HIM. HE WAS RADIANT EVEN WHILE LOOKING ADORABLY SLIGHTLY GRUMPY WHILE HE UNCOMPLAININGLY TOOK PHOTOS AND HE’S THE BEST AND MOST EXQUISITE EVER

I can just imagine in his head like halfway down that line: “oh god this was a mistake. Adam what did you do.” <3333

Emotional rollercoaster moment #2: Because Adam and ScarJo were both out signing, the sidewalk right in front of the theater had been barricaded off. This meant that we weren’t allowed to enter the theater until they both went inside, which only left us a few minutes to spare! We rushed to the entrance, but alas there was a problem with scanning our tickets, so we were told to go to the Box Office to get them reprinted. We’re already on edge, afraid we’re going to miss the beginning of the film, when the woman at the Box Office tells us she can’t reprint the tickets because the name on them doesn’t match ours. (We bought them from a resale site so of course it didn’t…)

Even after showing her every email we had documenting payment and that the tickets were transferred through an official sale site, she remained adamant it was policy that she couldn’t print the tickets. Clearly, we were kind of devastated for a moment there, thinking we’d just paid way over face value for these tickets that weren’t even going to work. But Sarah, bless her soul, had the idea to leave, then go back in through a different door with a different ticket scanner person. The tickets still didn’t scan correctly, but we told the woman scanning that we’d already ambiguously “checked” with the box office, and honestly I think she was just a very nice person and could sense our Desperation, so SHE LET US IN. Woman – wherever you are right now, know that we love you and are forever indebted to you. ;___;

By the time we got to our seats, Noah Baumbach was already on stage introducing the film. But luckily we were in our seats, we had caught our breath and clutched each other in rejoicing relief before Noah introduced the cast and brought Adam and Scarlett on stage. Queue lots of enthusiastic applause! Someone in the audience yelled, “We love you Scarlett!” There were some whoops through the theater, then someone else yelled, “And we love you too, Adam!” and he did an adorable awk wave of appreciation and have I meNtiOnED this giant of a man is the softest and most precious being to ever grace this world????? And I’m not sure if it’s come up yet or if maybe I haven’t mentioned? But I really really really love him? ;____;

Thank gosh Sarah caught it! Painfully presh video of our painfully presh man!

Marriage Story: (Again, there will be spoilers)

Oh god, okay. This one was a beast of massively epic proportions that I was not nearly prepared for. It takes you on an intense fucking ride that spans every possible angle of passion between two people, ranging from love to hatred. To be entirely honest, I had gone into the day more excited for The Report because the subject matter was of such interest to me, and because I’m not usually one to really enjoy real-life dramas all that much.

But this fucking movie was Exquisite from the very first shot. The film opens with the “What I love about Nicole / What I love about Charlie” voice overs, and within the span of mere minutes you already feel deeply for these characters. You already feel as if they’ve been your close friends all your life, and instead of just entering your awareness abruptly – they’ve lived entire lives with ups and downs, mistakes and successes for as long as you can remember.

The movie is a sweeping epic, and yet remains achingly resonant and relatable. Charlie and Nicole’s relationship is passionate, fiery, and riddled with both miscommunications and repressed resentments. You rarely see a (doomed) love study played out with such complexity and fireworks. And yet, their frustrations, desires, and victories/losses both large and small are completely credible. Relationships are messy, and this film doesn’t shy away from their absolute darkest and even cruelest corners - even while maintaining sparkling moments of human connection that somehow survive alongside even the most difficult challenges.

The film is a brilliant study of contradictions. As Charlie and Nicole move through the divorce process, their control over it and the very narrative of their own lives becomes appropriated by their respective lawyers. The beginning of the film showed us the tenderness and deep understanding that exists between these characters, so the stories the legal teams spin seem ridiculously far afield from reality. The beginning of the film brought us into a rich world between these characters that was natural and so effortlessly believable (long, uncut monologues of dialogue; characters wandering from room to room as they talk – It’s masterfully and deceptively purposeful filmmaking that completely hides all trace of itself). Then later, listening to the lawyers concoct disingenuous legal narratives to “win” rather than tell any truth of reality is a towering contrast. The lawyers seize on the smallest tiny things Nicole or Charlie did in previous scenes (Nicole finishing a bottle of wine in one night with her family; Charlie forgetting to strap in their son’s car seat once) to paint them as habitual alcoholics or neglectful, absent parents. As the divorce proceedings escalate, things become distorted past recognition – twisted into abstracted and even absurd depictions of these two characters, between which we simply can’t decide whom we feel more sympathy for.

And then, following a gloves-off divorce hearing couched in legalese where neither side gives any quarter, you have a scene that’s quiet and effortlessly heartwarming. Nicole calls Charlie because the power’s out at her house and could he try to fix the power box in the front yard? He comes over, he works on the box, they pass their sleeping son between them (“Maybe he should just sleep here?” “But it’s my night.”), and then they both have to manually pull the gate on the driveway closed from either side – Nicole inside, Charlie outside. They look at each other as they pull the gate, perfectly in sync and their gazes locked, until the gate slides closed in the inches just between their faces. The movie is littered with these tiny gorgeous moments that just tear at your heart.

Or, the moment in the middle of negotiations between their lawyers when everyone decides to pause and order lunch. Charlie is handed the menu and he simply stares at it helplessly, uncomprehending because he’s still trying to work through the shock of their new reality that was just being argued over by the lawyers with such casual cruelty. Everyone stares at him for a long minute, until Nicole gently takes the menu from his hands and says, “I’ll order for him.” She knows just what to order – a salad with a specific type of dressing – and he quietly, almost absently agrees, “Yes, I’ll have that.”

The film takes pains to be even in presenting both sides of the story, and giving Nicole and Charlie equal screen time. I spent the entirety of the movie switching my sympathies back and forth between the two of them. By the film’s end, I understood both of their positions and experiences completely, as well as how much their perspectives on all they shared had come to oppose each other. Even though it’s impossible for either us or the characters to understand how they developed such divergent perspectives on their marriage, all parties involved have to face just how irreconcilable their grievances have become and how differently they each view the fundamental shortcomings of their marriage.

Being the annoying feminist viewer that I am, I was completely absorbed by Nicole’s monologue early on, the first time she meets with her lawyer (Laura Dern). She comes clean with the whole account of how she feels no control over her own life, and the longer she spent with Charlie and living in Charlie’s world, the “smaller” she was becoming. She felt that he didn’t respect her interests or her undertakings, when they weren’t connected to his theatre company. In essence, she feels she never got to be anything other than what he made her.

With that background of her position, I absolutely wanted Nicole to build her own life apart from him and find her own sense of personhood. One where she makes her own decisions and follows her own passions. In her recounting, she keeps saying that she’s used to part of her feeling “dead inside,” in terms of not feeling truly engaged with or in control of what she’s doing with her life. Taking a television acting job in California – separate from Charlie’s theatre company where she was the star under his direction, where he called the shots and she supported “his genius” – was the first time she did something bold for herself. This was also after repeatedly expressing to Charlie that she wanted to spend more time in California (where her family live), and Charlie never seeming to seriously consider the idea. Nicole felt she didn’t really have a voice, living shrouded in Charlie’s shadow.

But also being the annoying Adam fangirl I am, I was drawn in by Charlie’s charisma, by his effortless and guileless charm. I may have “sided” with Nicole towards the beginning of the story, resenting the small ways we could see that Charlie might have unconsciously been controlling (“Did you change your hair? I like it better long.”), but as the story progresses, so does Charlie’s unraveling. His world begins to crumble and fall apart before his very eyes, and even though he tries his best, he’s unable to do a single thing to stop it. Once Nicole gets her high-powered, cutthroat lawyer involved, things escalate beyond all control at breakneck pace. Suddenly he finds himself having to hire lawyers he can’t afford just to prevent the possibility that their 8 year old son Henry might move permanently to California with Nicole and Charlie might not get any custody; or that Nicole will take most of their shared assets and he’ll have nothing left to fund his theatre company with.

Neither of them mean for the negotiations to reach some vindictive heights, but suddenly they both find themselves fighting just to be able to live the life they each think is theirs.

Charlie finds himself having to move temporarily to California and rent an apartment so he can see his son and so Nicole’s lawyers can’t try to depict him as neglectful. We know he’s anything but. The first scenes in the film showed him being so patient and good with Henry that we could just about cry at the injustice.

(There’s the most darling scene at the beginning where little Henry comes into their bedroom, pokes Charlie saying “Dad? I had a nightmare.” Charlie gets up and comes to lay down in Henry’s bed with him. When he tries to get up, Henry asks him to stay, but there’s not really enough space for both of them in the bed so Charlie shifts to sleep on the floor. Queue a shuffling sequence where Henry goes to sleep on the floor next to his dad, Charlie goes up into the bed when it’s empty, then shortly thereafter Henry climbs up on top of Charlie so they both fit in the bed and fall asleep there. Yeah, MY HEART.)

As the accusations start flying when things are on the line during the divorce proceedings, this huge element of performativity comes into play. In a way it’s fitting, since they both work in theater, but these roles of enemies they suddenly have to perform is also terribly heartbreaking. (Also going back to the contrasts I mentioned earlier between the true essence of their relationship and their easy, ceaseless intimacy; vs the cold-hearted narratives forced on them both through the divorce proceedings.)

But in some ways, they’re not just playing the roles. There are two sides to passion, and just like they once cared about and loved each other so intensely (in some ways, they still do), there is also a shadow side to emotions of that intensity. In a catharsis that is much-needed after the austere, inhumane ways their relationship problems were discussed through their lawyers and absolutely devastating to watch in its destruction, their belated attempt to “talk” escalates into all-out war. “Talking” was the route Charlie first wanted to take – no lawyers involved – but which Nicole spurned. I was frustrated with her throughout the film for never fully communicating with him her expectations regarding their separation, but upon further reflection I understand that she might have feared that if they managed it on their own, it would turn into him managing it and her voice would once again disappear. Something along these lines rushes out during this scene of purging their demons and years of budding resentments and secrets all in one near-fatal blow.

(I’m about to quote a few sporadic lines I remember, but I have to say watching this scene with no idea of the savagery that was coming delivered absolutely lethal power, so I kind of advise not knowing the specific lines? Plus they’re a hundred times more powerful on screen, with these top-tier actors delivering them with every bit of feeling they possess. Skip to after both sets of ///// if you don’t want to know! But quoting here for those who don’t know if/when they’ll see the film ☺ These are definitely not in order and they jump around but whew, every moment when they were screaming these lines is simply unforgettable.)

/////////////////

Charlie: “Oh you just like to play the victim. We were happy. YOU were happy. Until you decided you weren’t anymore.”

Nicole: “You are just like your father!”

Charlie: “Don’t you EVER say that! Don’t you ever compare me to my father. You’re the one just like your mother. And your sister - you’re the worst of all of them combined.”

Nicole: “You slept with Donna!”

Charlie: “One time! Because you stopped having sex with me! For a whole year you shut me out and I didn’t know what to do. And after I gave up so much for you.”

Nicole: “Oh what you gave up?!”

Charlie: “I was in my 20s! I had my first solo work, I was successful, I wanted to fuck everyone but I didn’t. Because I loved you and I didn’t want to lose you. But I- I missed out on so much.”

Nicole: “You are SO selfish, you can’t even separate anything else from your own self-interest! You can’t even see me as something separate from yourself!”

Charlie: “So you hate me! You wish you’d never married me, fine, but god this last year it’s like you hated me!”

Nicole: “And I did! I do! (Screaming helplessly) I can’t believe I have to know you for the rest of my life!!”

Charlie: (Savagely snarling) “Maybe you don’t because I hope you get sick and die. I hope you get hit by a car tomorrow!”

///////////////

This scene escalates and escalates until they’re both in these uncontrollable, violent piques of rage. Charlie punches a hole in the wall, and things simply get uglier and uglier until they are screaming at each other the most horrible things each can think of with every bit of vitriol they can possibly muster. The build up in the scene is masterful, and the performances are simply stellar. You can feel that they are pissed as all hell at each other – that this is literally years of unspoken, repressed feelings all being torn out. But you can also feel that both of them are in such awful pain. Both of them are actively bleeding as the scene progresses, but it’s because both of them still care so much. It’s because there are still feelings there, and there always will be no matter what either of them do. That’s why the emotions are so desperate and searing off the screen.

After Charlie spits the final horrific line in her face, he sinks to the floor and weeps for it. It ends with her comforting him, and him putting his arms around her knees.

And – just fuck me up completely, why don’t you – if you thought that scene was the biggest beating your heart would have to take in this movie, THINK AGAIN BUDDY.

Because. Whew. My god. Words are going to fail me in describing this scene but I’ll do my best to go for it.

Months have passed since their fight, and grab every box of tissues in existence, because here’s the rumored scene where Adam sings “Being Alive” from Company. Now, I had somehow completely forgotten about this going into the film. So when Charlie stands up in the cabaret restaurant with his theatre group back in New York and starts jokingly singing the words when the pianist starts the song, I was just like ‘oh haha he’s singing! Wow!’

Charlie moves to sit back down after the first verse, still mostly fun and games…. But then the words draw him back as the song continues. He gravitates towards the small stage and the microphone, and little by little the joking edge melts away. Emotional gravity rises behind his voice little by little, until suddenly the words are loud and ringing and gorgeous, and there is palpable heartbreak in his eyes as the words begin to take the exact shape of all he has lost.

Now, we’ve heard snippets of Adam singing in Hungry Hearts and Inside Llewyn Davis and even briefly in Burn This. But. People…. You have never heard or seen anything like this. I don’t even mean from Adam. I mean… in your life. I mean: This scene literally stirred such a profound reaction in me; I didn’t know it was possible for an actor to evoke feelings like this. And imagine, this was on-screen performance. The entire theater applauded when the song ended, and I was in tears.

The song encapsulated in truly heartbreaking beauty the revelation Charlie was having of all he once had – every part of love that is both good and bad; cherished and difficult. And in possibly the most tragic contrast of the whole film: He is singing about love making it worthwhile to be alive – of how he’s now essentially left searching for what will now make his life worth living; while across the country Nicole is finally feeling “alive” for the first time, after years of being plagued by the feeling of part of her being dead beyond reach.

Yeah. I could spend thousands of words just trying to describe the devastating power and beauty of this scene, but no matter what words I use or how I phrase it, I’m going to come up short. It’s simply beyond description. Adam is beyond description. You’d think because I literally couldn’t love him more if my life depended on it that I couldn’t be so stunned by new demonstrations of his talent??? But jesus CHRIST. This man is a force that defies comprehension. To my ear, his voice sounded strong but untrained, and that was what made it so heartrendingly magnificent. In the held notes, his voice will crest into the gentlest vibrato as his emotions build, and I couldn’t tell you whether it’s the song that Adam disappears into, or if it’s Adam purposefully weaving every single element at play here into the most moving minutes of performance you’ve ever seen. Either way: The scene will ruin you utterly, and you will love it beyond comprehension.

I know a clip of this scene will certainly hit the internet as soon as the whole film becomes available, but god I almost wish that everyone has to watch it in context with everything that’s come before it. Because knowing every bit that Charlie has suffered along the way, understanding the way his heart is continuously breaking with each of the words-…. God, it’s too much.

Next up on Adam Driver Eviscerates Your Heart And You Thank Him Profusely For It: The scenes where he cries are just as painful as you think they’d be. Probably even more so, because he’s a talented jerk like that who takes no pity on us at all.

The first major crying scene is when he and his lawyer go off into a side room during a break in the first meeting on divorce terms. It’s just dawning on Charlie that Nicole probably has no intent to bring Henry back to New York, and unless Charlie does something serious, Henry might never live there with him again. While the lawyer’s talking, Charlie silently lowers his head, and suddenly the tears just rise up over him. It’s quiet and he only shakes slightly, but god do you feel for him.

The second time is…. lord, yet another moment that’s utterly heartbreaking and yet one of the most beautiful moments of film you’ve ever seen. This is the final scene in the film, and it references back to one of the first, where Charlie and Nicole try to go to a divorce counselor, who requests that they each write down the things they love about the other and then read them aloud. These are the lists each of them voiceover in the trailer and that play at the film’s very beginning. But during this session, Nicole refused to read her list aloud, because she didn’t “like what she wrote.” So Charlie never heard her list about him.

In this final scene, Charlie hears Henry reading something aloud in his bedroom. Henry had been struggling with reading, so Charlie immediately comes in to listen and help him. Charlie sits down on the bed with him, and realizes what it is Henry’s reading. Charlie helps him with the words he can’t pronounce, and then halfway through Henry hands him the list. “You finish reading it, Dad.”

Charlie continues reading the list, and it goes on much longer than the version we heard in Nicole’s voiceover. As Charlie’s reading aloud, Nicole appears in the doorway and begins to listen without Charlie realizing. He manages to read it all relatively evenly… until he reaches the end.

“I fell in love with him…” Charlie stops suddenly, and in an instant his mouth is trembling, the tears are brimming over, and he is fighting desperately to hold back the onslaught of tears in front of his son, even as it overtakes his entire body. Finally, he is able to finish: “I fell in love with him seconds after I saw him, and I’ll always love him. Even if it doesn’t make sense.” In the door, Nicole fights off her own tears.

This film is cinema at its very best. I know this is an incredibly bold statement, but: It just might be Adam’s best role to date.

End Spoilers: Q&A!

I WAS STILL SO STUNNED BY THE SINGING SCENE THAT I ASKED ADAM ABOUT IT AND JUST TO ROUND OUT FROM THE HAND TAKEN VIDEO ABOVE THIS IS THE OFFICIAL ONE AND THAT’S ME YOU CAN JUST BARELY HEAR AT 17:45!!!!!

 CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT HAPPENED??? BECAUSE I CAN’T AND I WAS THERE. BYE I think I’m having an out of body experience taking in the fact that I’m watching this vid of Adam WATCHING ME OMG HE WAS SQUINTING INTO THE AUDIENCE TO SEE ME AND LEANING FORWARD TO HEAR ME SOMEONE HOLD ME I’M WEEPING HE WAS TALKING TO MEASKDFJALKSFJ

Ahem.

From Noah’s comments throughout the panel, it was amazing to hear how much of this movie was truly a collaborative process between him and Adam. In many ways, Noah built this role and film around Adam. He said that he and Adam had focused on the scene of him performing “Being Alive” very early on, and Noah structured the script to work towards that vision. Though he already had the idea of working in themes of performance and theatre, it was Adam’s idea to make Charlie a theatre director. I absolutely love hearing that Noah essentially wanted to make a film where elements of who Adam is in real life or his interests in what he wanted to play in a character were built into the heart of the script.

Someone asked Noah why he likes dysfunctional families so much and he replied “What other kind are there?”

Most of the other things said during the Q&A had already been echoed in other interviews. Plus I sometimes have trouble processing memories while Adam’s talking/standing in front of me because slkdjflsakjfdklsf just taking in the sight of him is a fucking lot to process :’’’’’’’)

“A fucking lot to process” is actually a perfectly apt summary of the day in its entirety! When Sarah and I got back to the hotel, we discovered it had a jacuzzi on the rooftop! That was truly the best soak ever, to soothe away the emotional overload and talk through all of our many, many thoughts on the two stellar films we’d just had the privilege of seeing.

Writing through this entire massive thing was also a huge help to work through all my complex feels about these films. As you might have gathered, I can’t recommend them highly enough. And as you also might suspect – Adam is an absolute force to be reckoned with in both. Seeing two of his most powerful performances ever back to back (and then getting to hear him talk about each in person!) was truly an experience I’ll never forget.

A massive thank you to anyone who persevered through reading all that!! I love writing analyses not only to work through my emotional response to sweeping works like this, but also to remember every bit of the impact. Give it a share if you don’t mind helping a girl out? :) I’m not on twitter at all so it’d be much appreciated!

(...have I mentioned I love Adam and I’m in awe of every single thing he does? Shower this man with Oscars already?!)

[bangtan]

How BTS Gathered Over Half A Million Fans Online & In Real Life For Digital Record Project ARMYPEDIA

BTS is one of the biggest artists on the planet undoubtedly in part thanks to the unwavering support of their dedicated fanbase ARMY. As noticed by followers of the South Korean boyband for years, even when the guys can't meet with their fans in person, there's always a stream of communication between the two whether with social media or unexpected music drops. But that relationship reached a special milestone this year with the launch of ARMYPEDIA. Envisioned as a campaign to allow BTS and fans to look back on their time together ahead of new music in 2019, ARMYPEDIA was launched as a one-of-a-kind, digital memory project to archive 2,080 days together as band and fandom. Starting on February 22 and concluding on March 24, the ARMYPEDIA campaign and its accompanying website were created not only as a way for the group and its fanbase to celebrate where it is now—the biggest boyband in the world and one of the top-selling artists globally—but also where it started. A combination of the words ARMY (the official name of BTS' fandom) and Wikipedia (a word now synonymous with digital archiving), ARMYPEDIA is the organized database for followers, regardless of when they became a member of the ARMY, to populate with memories they have relating to the band, their music, their messages and beyond. By the conclusion of the month-long campaign, a reported 540,000 fans had participated in the project that included finding and scanning QR codes around the Internet and real-life world locations to access specific days to leave personal memories in the archive—see November 12, 2017 as an example, where member Suga held a livestream broadcast and many user left their memories from tuning into the stream as well as other thoughts about that day. ARMYPEDIA also boasted real-life, off-site meetups between fans (including 10,000 people coming together in Seoul) and newly recorded content from the boys themselves (including a special talk show starring members Suga, RM, Jin, J-Hope, Jimin, V and Jung Kook). Big Hit Entertainment shared exclusive insight and reflections with Forbes from the project. "From the very, very beginning, we wanted to create a campaign that's only possible at this moment for BTS as well as all the ARMYs in the world," the agency explains, giving insight as to why the project concluded less than a month ahead of the April 12 release of BTS' forthcoming Map of the Soul: Persona album. One of the main points of BTS' international appeal—and a key part to the purpose of ARMYPEDIA, according to Big Hit—is the group's dedication to deeper themes in their music since Day 1. From discussing bullying and harsh school life in their debut album 2 Cool 4 Skool to tackling topics like mental health, politics and the struggles of the young generation in their music today, BTS have a constant, through-line of poignant messages. A project like ARMYPEDIA looks to highlight that for those who may have only been recruited to the ARMY in the band's past two or three years of breakthrough success. But ARMY's heartfelt reactions and connections to BTS' message acted as another core factor in launching ARMYPEDIA. When BTS appeared and spoke at the United Nations General Assembly last September, leader RM emphasized the idea of "speak yourself,"considered by many as the next step of self-actualization following the "love yourself" themes of BTS' past three albums. When fans began taking that message to heart and speaking up more on Twitter TWTR +0% about their identities, experiences and connection to the fandom, the idea for ARMYPEDIA and a space for supporters to document their memories became more clear than ever. "We couldn't have come this far without our ARMY's great love and support," BTS tell Forbes in an exclusive statement after the campaign had concluded. "Through ARMYPEDIA, we were able to get to know all of you a little better—and we want to get to know our ARMY even more." Big Hit cites genuine support from the members, also pointing to a livestream session where Jin and Suga gave a shoutout the project. Business-wise, ARMYPEDIA was also a savvy move to market the Big Hit brand. The most active participants in the archive were rewarded in points usable on the Big Hit Entertainment online store, leading to the opportunity to have more BTS products, ideally including additional support for the band's forthcoming album, or chances to support another Big Hit artist. Upon signing up for ARMYPEDIA, users were not required but could also opt to sign up for a newsletter, a key way for brands to stay top of mind with their audience. And just like ARMY, big companies were happy to take part in ARMYPEDIA and bring more participants into the fold. Big Hit teamed up with the likes of Hyundai (BTS act as the brand model for the South Korean car company's Palisade), Korea Yakult (the yogurt drink that launched a special BTS collaboration drink last year), Hot Topic Spotify, LINE Friends and more to help deliver both digital and real-life QR codes to fans. The results proved beneficial to both parties with Big Hit citing the companies helped enlarge the reach of their campaign—including inserting QR codes on public-square billboards, hidden in between clothing racks and inside popular streaming playlists—while the brands were able to expand their engagement with ARMY—a.k.a the highly engaged fanbase whose online activity has kept BTS at No. 1 on Billboard's Social 50 chart for nearly two years, as of press time. Big Hit describes these talks as bringing "genuine excitement" from all involved. So, where does the ARMYPEDIA concept go next? Big Hit isn't sure if it will launch a second part for BTS or if it will create similar services for the other artists on their label like the newly debuted boyband Tomorrow X Together. Instead, what they see this acting as is a legitimate, fan-sourced resource that dives into what it means to be a member of BTS' ARMY. "Every day, ARMYs are having lots of fun and making a lot of memories being ARMY," the company reflects. "We think it's meaningful that we are putting this into an archive for anyone that could be searching on BTS and for any sort of history of ARMY and BTS." With BTS embarking on the next chapter of their careers with the majorly anticipated new album, a key component of that next chapter will undoubtedly be ARMY. ARMYPEDIA now sits as a completed, heartfelt scrapbook of what BTS and hundreds of thousands of ARMY have shared together, as well as a promise to create and share even more in the future.

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