#Top 10 Richest People In The World | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

anastasiabowe · 6 months

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𝙍𝙄𝘾𝙃 𝙂𝙀𝙉𝙏𝙇𝙀𝙈𝘼𝙉 — As a broke college student, it’s not wrong to want a rich boyfriend! That doesn’t mean you’re a gold digger, or will stoop so low you will ruin your worth, it just means you want a man who will take care of you, and guess what? You found him.

note: this will be a 3 part series! First one I’ve ever made and may be my last! So please not too much on these writings! Luv you!

𝙋𝘼𝙍𝙏 𝙄 𝙋𝘼𝙍𝙏 𝙄𝙄 𝙋𝘼𝙍𝙏 𝙄𝙄𝙄

Content Warnings: language, suggestive content

Nanami is a man of morals. He usually keeps his hands and eyes to himself, he holds the door for anyone, women especially, he respects boundaries, and if anything that causes him to think inappropriately he will kindly excuse himself to make sure he doesn’t seem like a creep. But Nanami is just like any man.

Nanami longs for a lover, a wife. He desires children, a family. But in this cruel, sick world, he can’t find a woman who wants him for him. Nanami is one of the top 10 richest men on the planet, he not including himself, but his company in that title.

Every woman he has attempted to date tries to put on their best “I love you for your heart not your money!” act, but it slips the second they tell him “oh no! I forgot my wallet!”

Nanami knows every trick in the book, he knows the look women give him when they are impressed by his wealth, he knows the lip biting they do to show interest in his looks, he knows the voice and excuses they say to make him fall down to their feet, which he never once has done nor will do. He knows it all. So dating people that have seen him before he’s met them makes it all the more boring.

So, when Nanami’s friend, Haibara introduced him to dating apps, he obviously was shook.

“You really had no idea there were dating apps?” Haibara blankly looked at him. Nanami bit his thumb in uncertainty.

He grumbled a little “no.” And his friend smiled. “Then sign up! What can you lose? They don’t have to know what you look like.”

Nanami hated that idea. “No, I want them to know who I am.” His firm voice erased that idea completely from his friends plan.

“Well, 80% of this world knows who you are, that wish you want isn’t going to happen.” Nanami sighed knowingly, just tired from his sad lonely life.

“Haibara, thank you for this..” Nanami thought carefully of his words. “Great discovery, but I think it’s best you head home and I sleep on it.” Haibara understood, and firmly grabbed Nanami’s shoulder on his way out.

“You’ll find her, I know you will.” Nanami placed his hand firmly on Haibara’s in a thank you, and Haibara left.

After Nanami heard Haibara leave, he hurriedly sat down on his couch and opened the dating site.

“RICHTON THE DATING APP FOR THE WEALTHY!”

Nanami quickly laughed at the cringe advertisement, but it was a popular app, so something was working.

Nanami put in his information and had to choose which photos to put on his profile. He chose the first decent ones he could find, not caring too much about perfection, and he was brought up with the interests slide.

He clicked three random ones and pressed continue. The app asked to use his camera to verify his age and photos. Nanami positioned the camera to where it said to and he was verified. The app welcomed him to a very ugly woman.

Nanami had skipped the tutorial at the beginning and just swiped towards the X like he has seen on TV. This app was the definition of a gold diggers dream. Rich men pay to speak with women that aren’t even all that.

Nanami swiped and swiped towards the x. No woman looked like a decent women. They all looked like they seduce men or are prostitutes, maybe both. Nanami frowned seeing all the half naked women.

“Should I really be on this app?” He thought to himself. He continued to swipe, heart sinking each swipe to the left seeing women who don’t know their worth. Ass in the camera more than their face just to get a quick buck. Nanami swiped one more time ready to turn his phone off, and his thumb froze.

A girl with straight hair smiling in what seems to be senior photo. She was in a white summer dress posing in a daisy field. The beach was calm behind her and he couldn’t help but stare at her smile. She seemed so pure, so innocent and that was exactly what he was looking for. He swiped right on her profile and it opened up a message saying:

“YOUR FIRST MATCH! SEND HER A MESSAGE WITH THE AMOUNT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SEND!”

Nanami saw a text box and a drop box. The drop box has let Nanami type in the amount he would like to send. The minimum was 5 dollars. He typed in $100 and pressed on the text box.

His thumbs again froze. What should he say? Should he compliment her? Introduce himself? Nanami combined them. He typed.

“Hello, my name is Kento and I couldn’t help but be in absolute awe seeing your photos. You are absolutely beautiful.” He sent it without looking back, this was already hard enough.

Nearly instantly you saw his message and typed.

Y: “Oh my god, you did NOT have to send that much money!”

He imagined your voice as he read your message. He chuckled to himself like a madman and he started typing back.

N: “I wanted to, you are so beautiful, I couldn’t help myself.”

He nervously tapped his thumbs on the side of his phone waiting for your response.

Y: “I really do appreciate the compliment but $100 is too much, I can’t accept that!”

N: “Too late, I want you to have it, I want to talk to you.”

Y: “You can’t talk to me for free!”

N: “That’s not how this app works..?” Nanami was confused.

Y: “Oh, right.. I forgot you have to pay to chat.”

N: “Please don’t be alarmed by the money, I’m not running out anytime soon😂”

Nanami cringed at himself for using such an emoji, but he wanted you to feel at ease.

Y: “Thank you, you really didn’t have to though. I won’t stop saying that.”

N: “Then let’s change the subject. Why are you on this app?”

You saw his message but didn’t text back. Did he ask a triggering question? You soon started typing, and his nerves came back.

Y: “You know, a broke college student who needs a little extra cash😅”

He chuckled, for a girl who didn’t want a hundred bucks, that’s sure what she was looking for.

N: “Haha, so you won’t mind if I send more?”

Y: “Don’t send more! I’m not that broke😭”

Nanami smiled. He smiled as if you were really there. He imagined having this conversation with you and how hard you would make him laugh with your silly remarks.

N: “Don’t worry, I won’t 😂, but it’s not like you’re going to stop me.”

Y: “I’ll send it back😜✌🏾”

N: “I’ll send it back!”

Y: “And I’ll send it again, it will be a whole thing if you make it💀”

The fact you both were arguing over money is crazy, Nanami never argued with a woman about sending them money. They usually do a “oh no you don’t have to do that!” But will eventually accept. You on the other hand are just outright refusing. Nanami is now intrigued by you.

N: “If you won’t accept my money via here, how about dinner? I’ll pay, and I won’t argue about it when we get there.”

You again took your time typing, very obvious you are unsure.

Y: “Okay… but where are you tryna take me?”

N: “I was thinking…. Hermes?”

Y: “You’re joking!”

N: “What?”

Y: “I can’t afford that!”

N: “You’re not paying.”

Y: “Still, I can’t make you pay for that!”

N: “I want to pay for it, I eat there all the time.”

Y: “Not for two☹️”

N: “I’ve paid for 10.”

Y:“Kento..”

N: “Y/n, please. I want to meet you. You intrigue me, I’ve never met someone like you. I don’t want to seem like a begged, nor do I want to pressure you, but I would love to meet you and enjoy a nice dinner with you.”

Nanami felt desperate even though he just met you not even an hour ago.

The long response time again happened, and Nanami felt like he blew it. The once time he felt like he actually found someone worth the time, he blew it.

Y: “Okay.”

Nanami’s heart fluttered seeing your message.

N: “You will have dinner with me?”

Y: “Yes! I’ll have dinner with you😂”

Nanami felt like a little boy again. He hadn’t felt this excited to ask a girl out since never and it felt good.

N: “How does tomorrow sound? I know that’s soon, but it’s the only day my schedule isn’t busy.”

Y: “Yeah, tomorrow would be great!”

N: “Alright, I’ll see you then!”

Y: “See you!”

The next day Nanami felt different. His head was somewhere else, somewhere lighter, happier. He felt… excited? He wasn’t sure, he hasn’t felt this way until his first client offered him half a million dollars as he started his journey in this company.

Nanami played more upbeat music, very different from his normal taste, and he swayed and stepped with every beat to the song as he ironed his clothes. He had opened windows and instead of wincing from the sun hitting his eyes, he smiled.

“What a beautiful morning.” He thought to himself. Nanami must have been in a different place that he didn’t even know was so negative until now. He was looking forward to a dinner with someone. He hasn’t felt that way in years and he just wishes he could meet you right then and there.

Nanami nearly put on his freshly ironed clothes and grabbed his briefcase and blazer. He locked his garage door and headed straight to his black Porsche that he usually doesn’t drive, but today, why not?

Nanami drove to work with a smile on his face. Haibara greeted Nanami as he stepped out of his car and a valet stepped in for him.

“Good morning.” Nanami smiled and Haibara walked beside him.

“Good morning…” Haibara stared at Nanami’s face.

“Did something happen?”

“What do you mean?”

“Did you win the lottery? What’s got you so happy?”

“Haibara.” Nanami stopped and turned towards his friend, “Thank you.”

Haibara wanted to laugh, he didn’t even do anything, right?

“for what” Nanami smiled at Haibara.

“For showing me that ‘app’. I’m going to meet someone for dinner tonight.” Haibara smiled at Nanami.

“That’s great, Kento! What’s her name?”

“Y/n.”

“Hm, is she pretty?”

“Beautiful.”

“Is she rich?”

“Eh..”

“Is she young?”

“Kind of.”

“What do you mean by ‘kind of?”

“She’s… 20..” Nanami purses his lips waiting for Haibara’s reaction.

“20?!” His eyes were wide and he laughed. “You’re 34!”

“She’s very aware of my age.” Nanami said not amused by his friends reaction.

“I mean, hey, if a woman 14 years older than me asked me out, and she was hot, I’d go out worth her too.” Haibara threw his hands up in a ‘what can I say’ pose and Nanami rolled his eyes.

“We meet at 6, so I just need to get through today.” Nanami said more to himself. The happy facade started to break, and he felt the butterflies pool in his stomach.

He was nervous. He hasn’t been on a date with someone he actually wants to meet in over 10 years. He doesn’t remember how to be charismatic, he doesn’t remember how to be enticing and interesting. Work has been the only topic that’s been keeping his conversations alive. He doesn’t talk to anyone about anything personally other than Haibara and that is hard enough.

Haibara saw Nanami. He knew Nanami for nearly 6 years and this was the look of nervousness. He’s seen it countless times, but that’s only because he knows him. He can tell from the slight twitch in his jaw and the subtle fidgeting with his hands.

“Come on Nanami, let’s go to my office.” Nanami nodded and followed Haibara.

In Haibaras office, he gave Nanami tips.

“Now I have met countless women. Hard to believe, I know, and I know how to get them wanting more.” Nanami cringed at the thought of his good friend seducing women.

“I’m not trying to get anything from her, I just want to hold a conversation and hopefully get to know her more.”

“Alright, I got you.” Haibara walked over to his whiteboard and wrote “NANAMI’S FIRST DATE”

“This isn’t my first date, Haibara.”

“I know, but you’re acting like it is.”

Nanami nodded in agreement, and Haibara clapped his hands together.

“I have cancelled all meeting that require you to be there, and will have your secretary fill in for the ones that don’t. We have all day to get you ready for your date, alright?”

“Ok.” Nanami replied. Nanami felt silly sitting in the chair and listening to his younger friend teach him how to act right on a date. Nanami usually lets the women talk since he usually doesn’t care too much about them. He usually just lets his colleagues recommend a woman and set up a date. Nanami regrets every single dollar he wasted on the money thirsty women. But he wants to try with you. He wants to talk to you and let you talk. He wants to actually get to know you, maybe even go on more dates and hang out.

“Ok, first step. Do NOT let them talk the whole time. Even if they ramble, try and have a mutual conversation. Sometimes when they ramble, they think it’s because you aren’t interested and they will want to make sure you're still intrested” Haibara took in a huge breath, “OR they are nervous.”

Nanami nodded.

“You just have to read their body language.”

“Well, how will I know if they are nervous or not?”

“You’ll know. If they look around when talking, when they cover their face when talking, when they hold their hands in their lap, if they look tense, come on, you know what nervous looks like.”

Nanami nodded again.

“Use your words, this is practice. Don’t just nod your head,” Haibara mocked him by aggressively nodding his head “say things like ‘I agree’ or ‘I’m listening’ or ask them about whatever they’re talking about so they know you’re listening.”

“Okay.”

“And don’t just say ‘okay’.” Haibara mocked again. “Try and be more creative! Let’s practice.”

Haibara sat down in his seat and tried his best to look more feminine.

“So yeah, me and my friends went mini golfing and I didn’t know what to do so I just sat and watched them play.”

Nanami sat there. What did Haibara want him to say? Haibara looked at him, waiting for a response.

“Oh, well that is very sad.” Nanami said unsure. Haibara sighed and rolled his eyes.

“Yep, might as well pay the bill and leave.” Nanami sat there dumbfounded. What was he supposed to say?

“What should I have said instead?”

“Nanami, I can’t tell you what to say, but that would have sent her home crying. You sounded like you didn’t care. You should say something along the lines of ‘did you ever end up knowing how to play mini golf?’ That will at least let her know you’re listening.” Haibara stood up and sighed.

“We have a lot of work to do.”

After many hours of preparing, Nanami’s watch chimed. It was 5:30 and he needed to head home and change.

“Thank you Haibara, this was very helpful.” Nanami shook his friends hand and headed towards the front of the office.

“Don’t try too hard! Just let it come out naturally!” Haibara cakes out to Nanami. Nanami smiled back at his friend and Haibara sighed.

“Please don’t screw this up.”

#nanami x you #jujutsu nanami #jjk nanami #nanami smut #nanami kento #nanami x reader #kento nanami #jjk kento #kento smut

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livemintvideos · 2 years

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On an average, Indian billionaires increased their wealth by 120%. While the bottom 50% continue to battle inflation, and saw their wealth depreciate during the exact same period. An obvious question this gives rise to is if India should consider taxing its super rich. But more on that later. OXFAM recently published a report called ‘survival of the richest’’ on the opening day of World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The report makes more such shocking claims. It goes on to say that the richest 1% of the country own more than 40% of India’s total wealth. Whereas the bottom 50% or 70 crore people own just 3% of India’s total wealth.

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the9jafresh · 2 years

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Top 10 Richest Men in Africa and Their Net Worth 2022

Top 10 Richest Men in Africa and Their Net Worth 2022 Despite the global coronavirus pandemic, Africa’s wealthiest have become wealthier in the last eight years. The continent’s 18 billionaires are worth an estimated $84.9 billion, up 15% from a year ago and the highest total since 2014, when there were 28 African billionaires; the average net worth is higher this year due to the smaller number…

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treethymes · 7 months

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With the exceptions of North Korea and Cuba, the communist world has merged onto the capitalist highway in a couple different ways during the twenty-first century. As you’ve read, free-trade imperialism and its cheap agricultural imports pushed farmers into the cities and into factory work, lowering the global price of manufacturing labor and glutting the world market with stuff. Forward-thinking states such as China and Vietnam invested in high-value-added production capacity and managed labor organizing, luring links from the global electronics supply chain and jump-starting capital investment. Combined with capital’s hesitancy to invest in North Atlantic production facilities, as well as a disinclination toward state-led investment in the region, Asian top-down planning erased much of the West’s technological edge. If two workers can do a single job, and one worker costs less, both in wages and state support, why pick the expensive one? Foxconn’s 2017 plan to build a U.S. taxpayer–subsidized $10 billion flat-panel display factory in Wisconsin was trumpeted by the president, but it was a fiasco that produced zero screens. The future cost of labor looks to be capped somewhere below the wage levels many people have enjoyed, and not just in the West.

The left-wing economist Joan Robinson used to tell a joke about poverty and investment, something to the effect of: The only thing worse than being exploited by capitalists is not being exploited by capitalists. It’s a cruel truism about the unipolar world, but shouldn’t second place count for something? When the Soviet project came to an end, in the early 1990s, the country had completed world history’s biggest, fastest modernization project, and that didn’t just disappear. Recall that Cisco was hyped to announce its buyout of the Evil Empire’s supercomputer team. Why wasn’t capitalist Russia able to, well, capitalize? You’re already familiar with one of the reasons: The United States absorbed a lot of human capital originally financed by the Soviet people. American immigration policy was based on draining technical talent in particular from the Second World. Sergey Brin is the best-known person in the Moscow-to-Palo-Alto pipeline, but he’s not the only one.

Look at the economic composition of China and Russia in the wake of Soviet dissolution: Both were headed toward capitalist social relations, but they took two different routes. The Russian transition happened rapidly. The state sold off public assets right away, and the natural monopolies such as telecommunications and energy were divided among a small number of skilled and connected businessmen, a category of guys lacking in a country that frowned on such characters but that grew in Gorbachev’s liberalizing perestroika era. Within five years, the country sold off an incredible 35 percent of its national wealth. Russia’s richest ended the century with a full counterrevolutionary reversal of their fortunes, propelling their income share above what it was before the Bolsheviks took over. To accomplish this, the country’s new capitalists fleeced the most vulnerable half of their society. “Over the 1989–2016 period, the top 1 percent captured more than two-thirds of the total growth in Russia,” found an international group of scholars, “while the bottom 50 percent actually saw a decline in its income.” Increases in energy prices encouraged the growth of an extractionist petro-centered economy. Blood-covered, teary, and writhing, infant Russian capital crowded into the gas and oil sectors. The small circle of oligarchs privatized unemployed KGB-trained killers to run “security,” and gangsters dominated politics at the local and national levels. They installed a not particularly well-known functionary—a former head of the new intelligence service FSB who also worked on the privatization of government assets—as president in a surprise move on the first day of the year 2000. He became the gangster in chief.

Vladimir Putin’s first term coincided with the energy boom, and billionaires gobbled up a ludicrous share of growth. If any individual oligarch got too big for his britches, Putin was not beyond imposing serious consequences. He reinserted the state into the natural monopolies, this time in collaboration with loyal capitalists, and his stranglehold on power remains tight for now, despite the outstandingly uneven distribution of growth. Between 1980 and 2015, the Russian top 1 percent grew its income an impressive 6.2 percent per year, but the top .001 percent has maintained a growth rate of 17 percent over the same period. To invest these profits, the Russian billionaires parked their money in real estate, bidding up housing prices, and stashed a large amount of their wealth offshore. Reinvestment in Russian production was not a priority—why go through the hassle when there were easier ways to keep getting richer?

While Russia grew billionaires instead of output, China saw a path to have both. As in the case of Terry Gou, the Chinese Communist Party tempered its transition by incorporating steadily increasing amounts of foreign direct investment through Hong Kong and Taiwan, picking partners and expanding outward from the special economic zones. State support for education and infrastructure combined with low wages to make the mainland too attractive to resist. (Russia’s population is stagnant, while China’s has grown quickly.) China’s entry into the World Trade Organization, in 2001, gave investors more confidence. Meanwhile, strong capital controls kept the country out of the offshore trap, and state development priorities took precedence over extraction and get-rich-quick schemes. Chinese private wealth was rechanneled into domestic financial assets—equity and bonds or other loan instruments—at a much higher rate than it was in Russia. The result has been a sustained high level of annual output growth compared to the rest of the world, the type that involves putting up an iPhone City in a matter of months. As it has everywhere else, that growth has been skewed: only an average of 4.5 percent for the bottom half of earners in the 1978–2015 period compared to more than 10 percent for the top .001 percent. But this ratio of just over 2–1 is incomparable to Russia’s 17–.5 ration during the same period.

Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, certain trends have been more or less unavoidable. The rich have gotten richer relative to the poor and working class—in Russia, in China, in the United States, and pretty much anywhere else you want to look. Capital has piled into property markets, driving up the cost of housing everywhere people want to live, especially in higher-wage cities and especially in the world’s financial centers. Capitalist and communist countries alike have disgorged public assets into private pockets. But by maintaining a level of control over the process and slowing its tendencies, the People’s Republic of China has built a massive and expanding postindustrial manufacturing base.

It’s important to understand both of these patterns as part of the same global system rather than as two opposed regimes. One might imagine, based on what I’ve written so far, that the Chinese model is useful, albeit perhaps threatening, in the long term for American tech companies while the Russian model is irrelevant. Some commentators have phrased this as the dilemma of middle-wage countries on the global market: Wages in China are going to be higher than wages in Russia because wages in Russia used to be higher than wages in China. But Russia’s counterrevolutionary hyper-bifurcation has been useful for Silicon Valley as well; they are two sides of the same coin. Think about it this way: If you’re a Russian billionaire in the first decades of the twenty-first century looking to invest a bunch of money you pulled out of the ground, where’s the best place you could put it? The answer is Palo Alto.

Malcolm Harris, Palo Alto

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f1crecs · 1 year

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Fic Rec List - Fernando/Lance

you might enjoy: Canadian Fest, eh - for more Lance content.

If your fic is on this list and you don’t want it to be, please let me know and I will remove it immediately, no questions asked. I have contacted most of the authors on this list, but sometimes people fall through the gaps - just pop me a message🤍

have a pairing you want me to do next? please read the faqs and then head to my inbox.

don’t forget to give the authors featured on this list some love in the form of kudos, bookmarks, and comments!

i won't lie to you, anon... I thought we'd agreed on Strollonso as the pairing name. 🤭 my vote still goes to Lando.

i hope you enjoy these ❗️🤍

nsfw: El Dick Plan by @waddlingpenguin | E | 800 Lawrence and Fernando have a misunderstanding at the dinner table. This fic is hilarious - unashamedly unhinged, just as Strollonso should be, and so unbelievably funny. This was one of the first Lance/Fernando fics I read. I think it rearranged my brain a little bit.

'In fact, Lance literally has his foot so far up Fernando’s pant leg that Stoffel is surprised he’s not choking on Canadian toes each time he opens his mouth to talk to the engineers.'

shatter my life apart (see me for somebody else) by @vicsy | M | 1.4k An exploration of Lance and Fernando's relationship. This is a stunning fic. This author has just the most beautiful writing style - it's like poetry, and flows in the most stunning way. This is as much a love letter to Lance as it is to Strollonso - I really, really loved this one.

'Fernando Alonso is a perpetual wildcard and Lance builds his attitude around this little image, prepared for some sort of psychological warfare but it never happens.'

nsfw: victor's spoil by venerat | E | 1.9k Following Fernando's first pole for Aston Martin, Lance is invited to his room - a Winner's Room AU. The vibes here are suitably unhinged/rancid/possessive. If I were to recommend a fic to help someone get Strollonso, to understand the essence of who they are together, I would recommend this one. I love everything this author writes.

'Imagining Fernando with them makes Lance want to chew through wire. Again: fucked up, truly and extensively. He’s just really fucked up about Fernando.'

nsfw: I make two grand an hour by @kritischetheologie | E | 3.1k Lance meets Fernando for the first time at a sponsor event. I adored this fic. It is so funny and well-characterised and hot. One thing that I really love about this author is their ability to weave in detail - you could read their fics over and over again, and still pick up something new each and every time. It just makes for the richest, most delicious stories that draw you in every last time.

'(Lance had almost just said fuck it and gone into banking when he graduated two years ago, like he’d always known he probably would eventually, ever since the day he showed up at St. Andrews and realized that the entire world economy ran on fake numbers on a half-dozen computer screens, but the whole point of trust funds was supposed to be not having to be boring. Who the fuck else was going to make art? Humanity needed him to be living dramatically, falling in love with a thousand beautiful men whose lips he could immortalize in poetry.)'

nsfw: green light, red wine (and i don't feel fine) by @vicsy | E | 9k (wip) Fernando is a crime boss caught in a long-standing feud with Lawrence Stroll - things get complicated when he meets Lance. This fic is fantastic. The vibes are unmatched. This author has such a beautiful, almost melodic writing style, which I love. Also. This is fucking hot. 10/10.

'There aren’t many opportunities Fernando deliberately missed in his life. He wouldn’t be on top if he did. Right next to him, clad in a tight white t-shirt, sits an opportunity for a power move, the one Fernando would take all the way.'

nsfw: silver platter by @wewentcarracing | E | 9.7k Lance and Fernando grow closer, much to Esteban's dismay. This is delicious. Full of unhinged and intense moments. Every word of this is perfection; something I particularly appreciate about this author is their ability to build tension - you won't be able to put this story down once you've started it. Perfection.

'Lance laughs, off-guard and delighted. Fernando has this way of deciding what's true in his own mind and then forcing it into reality with brute strength alone. He's decided that Lance will make it to the podium this year, and so he will. It feels so, so good to hear coming from another driver—any driver, really, but the fact that it’s Fernando. Two-time WDC. Veteran. It doesn't feel like he's being toyed with; it feels real.'

nsfw: Not Even Jail by @baldrmoon | E | 9.9k (wip) Lance is a rookie detective with a new partner - they've met before. This is such a fantastic start to what I know is going to be an incredible story. The world-building here is fantastic. A world away from F1, but with so many of the dynamics and relationships mirrored in a totally new setting that feels very organic and true-to-life. It's just very well done, and I am excited to see what the author does next!

'Lance was charmed almost despite himself. The guy – Fernando, Lance made a mental correction, – smiled, a bit sideways, narrowing his eyes. Lance immediately felt flustered under his intense stare.'

#strollonso #alonstroll #1814 #fals #f1 rpf #pairing:fernando/lance #driver:fernando #driver:lance

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mostlysignssomeportents · 11 months

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Naomi Alderman’s ‘The Future’

Naomi Alderman burst onto the scene in 2016 with The Power, an explosive and brilliant feminist apocalyptic parable. Now, seven years later, she's back with a chunky, propulsive second novel about a very different sort of apocalypse: The Future:

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Future/Naomi-Alderman/9781668025680

The Power was a thriller about a mysterious force that gives women the power to administer violent electric shocks – even lethal ones – from the palms of their hands. As this power races around the world, the status quo is abruptly shattered. Abusers get nasty surprises. The Saudi government topples. Parents of teenaged boys demand sex-segregated classes to protect their sons from vicious girls:

https://memex.craphound.com/2017/10/10/naomi-aldermans-the-power-in-which-fierce-power-of-women-is-awoken/

In The Future, we get a very different kind of apocalypse: the imagined apocalypse of the prepper. At the core of prepperism is a fantasy: that the world will experience a cataclysm that requires the special skills and supplies of the prepper themselves. Water chemists who turn prepper fantasize about attacks on the water-supply – not because there's any special reason to expect one, but because if terrorists attack the water supply, then water chemists become civilization-rescuing heroes:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/22/preppers-are-larpers/#preppers-unprepared

(And of course, if the world ends in such a way that marauding bandits rove the wasteland, eating their former neighbors, then macho, AR-15-obsessed musketfuckers get to reinvent themselves as warlords who defend the sheeple from "bad guys.")

This is what makes billionaire prepper fantasies just so weird – for most of us, it's hard to imagine how the skills of a billionaire are the one thing we'll need to see us through a crisis. But for billionaires themselves, the necessity of billionaires in rebooting civilization is so self-evident as to be unquestionable.

What's more, billionaires are convinced – more than any of us – that the world is about to end. As Douglas @Rushkoff puts it, these guys want to earn enough money to outrun the consequences of how they're making all that money. This is #TheMindset, the idea that your own position has jeopardized civilization itself, but that also, you must survive the cataclysm, because only you can survive it.

Rushkoff chronicles the real-world fantasies of luxury bunkers patrolled by mercenaries locked into explosive discipline collars in his book Survival of the Richest:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/09/13/collapse-porn/#collapse-porn

But billionaires don't just suck at running civilization, they also suck at making up stories about its collapse. One thing that's striking about Rushkoff's ethnography of rich people preparing to outlive the end of the human race is how banal their eschatological fantasies are.

It's not that there aren't any exciting stories to tell about billionaire survival fantasies. The granddaddy of these is, of course, Edgar Allan Poe's 1842 "#MasqueOfTheRedDeath":

https://www.poemuseum.org/the-masque-of-the-red-death

I published an updated version with the same title in 2019 in my novella collection #Radicalized:

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/14/masque-of-the-red-death/#masque

In The Future, we get a cracking, multi-point-of-view adventure novel about billionaires prepping for the end of the world. Three billionaires, the lords of thinly veiled analogs to Facebook, Google and Amazon, each getting ready in their own way. Stumbling into their midst comes Lai Zhen, a prepper influencer vlogger with millions of followers.

When Zhen becomes romantically entangled with Martha Einkorn, the top aide and chief-of-prepping for one of these billionaires, she finds herself in possession of an AI chatbot that is devoted to protecting a very small number of people from incipient danger. This chatbot determines that Zhen is being stalked by an assassin at a mall in Singapore, and guides her to safety.

The chatbot is a closely held secret among the tech billionaire cabal. It is designed to monitor world events and predict when The Event is imminent, be it disease, war, or other cataclysmic disaster. With the chatbot's predictive powers and its superhuman guidance, the billionaires, their families, and their closest confidantes will be able to slip away before the shit hits the fan, fly by different private jets to one or another luxury bunker, and wait out the apocalypse. Once the fires raging without have died down to embers, the chatbot's billionaire charges will emerge to assume their places as wise and all-powerful leaders of the next human civilization.

As you might imagine, not everyone who finds out about this plan – including various members of the billionaires' families who are fully aware of these rich, powerful people's fallibility – is enthusiastic about it. As we build toward a looming crisis, we cycle between these family members, Zhen and her hacker buddies, and members of an online prepper community where Einkorn is a kind of provocateuse and eminence grise.

Alderman skillfully maneuvers all these power players and blocs into position before detonating the crisis that sets off the book's second act, where we get into some damned fine Masque of the Red Death territory, but clad in Tony Stark mecha survival suits and against a backdrop of total disaster.

I won't give away any spoilers here, except to say that there are lots of twists (that won't surprise readers of The Power, which had its own excellent surprises). But without delving too deeply into the fake-outs, crosses, and turns that Alderman lays, I will say that this is a fantastic and incredibly satisfying comeuppance novel that gets very deep into the ideology of wishing the world would end, and dreaming that when it does, you will finally matter.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/07/preppers-of-the-red-death/#the-event

#pluralistic #naomi alderman #the future #books #science fiction #apocalypse #billionaires #abolish billionaires #big tech #maneki neko #preppers #gift guide

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readyforevolution · 8 months

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TOP 10 AFRICAN TRIBES/ETHNIC GROUPS THAT ARE GLOBALLY KNOWN.

(In no particular order)

1) Zulu ?? South Africa – The Zulu tribe is popular outside Africa. They’ve been featured in music, documentaries and movies. Shaka the Zulu was a warrior king whose popularity is well spread. Famous Zulus, Lucky Dube, Nasty C, black Coffee etc.

2) Yoruba ?? Nigeria – The Yorubas are globally known for their history, culture, art and literature. Fela, Wole Soyinka, Wizkid, Davido, Tiwa Savage, David Oyelowo, John Boyega, Anthony Joshua etc are a few Yorubas who have taken their culture to the world. The Yoruba culture has been featured in many Hollywood movies.

3) Masai ?? Kenya – The Masai are perhaps one of the most documented tribes in Africa, with alot of documentaries shown about them and books written about their culture.

They are known for their traditional clothing and hunting skills

4) Hausa ?? Nigeria – The hausas are very popular. Often known as the Igbos of the North, The richest black man in the world Aliko Dangote is Hausa along with his brother from the same state Kano Abdulsamad Rabiu (BUA). Their culture has also been well written about and have featured in a few Hollywood movies including the Amazon prime series were a woman was seen eating Tuwo shinkafa.

5) Igbo ?? Nigeria – The Igbos are undeniably known world wide. Chinua Achebe wrote about the Igbo culture alot. They are known for their history, culture and literature.

The popularized the kolanut and palm wine through books, movies and music

Chinwetalu Ejiofor, Zain Asher, Ckay, Flavour, Chimamanda, phyno, P-square are Igbos who have taken their culture to the world. Igbo are known in Nollywood movies.

6) Swahili ?? Tanzania – This tribe have phenomenal spread their language in East Africa and a few central African nations.

In the 70s, their language was part of the African-American black pride movement been pushed forward.

7) Edo/Bini ?? Nigeria – The Binis are perhaps the culture in Africa with the most famous artworks outside Egypt.

Binis are known for their history, culture and art/architecture.

The famous Benin bronze, ivory and brass artworks are known globally. The country Benin republic gets their name from them. Benin art and culture have been featured in Hollywood movies including black panther. Many Nigerian cultures have roots in Benin. The bronze mask of Queen Idia is perhaps the most famous mask in Africa and one of the most famous in the world. Popular Edos are Kamaru Usman, Rema, Odion Jude Ighalo, Victor Osimhen, Dave, Sam Loco Efe etc.

Asante Ghana – This tribe are known for their history and culture. Popular American hip hop artist was named after this tribe Asante. Their Kente is perhaps the most popular African attire outside of Africa and were known to be masters of the gold craft.

9) The Fulani – This nomadic tribes are known for their history and culture. They are predominantly in West Africa and are found in 18 African countries. Most In Nigeria ??

Popular Fulanis or people with Fulani ancestry are Muhammadu and Aisha Buhari, Tafawa Balewa,

10) Berbers/Amazigh – They are predominantly found in North Africa. They are predominantly found in Morocco ?? and Algeria ?? They known for their use of silver silver. Their culture and history well documented and have a unique language and writing system that traces back to ancient Egypt. Books are currently being written about them including a book titled salt by Haitian-American Pascaline Brodeur.

Disclaimer: Every African tribe and culture is beautiful, unique and important. No one culture is more important than the other. This only highlights tribes known outside the continent overall, this doesn’t mean there aren’t other cultures that aren’t known.

PLEASE YOU CAN ADD AND TELL US ABOUT YOUR TRIBE.

#blacktumblr #black history #black liberation #african history

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