#in this documentary alone we have testimonies such as well. this one. and then when steves former bandmate said that brian dressed like

[pikslasrce]

The thing about Brian and his makeup is, I—I don't remember him being that over the top to begin with. I guess he might've been dabbling with a bit of foundation at the time, but he certainly wasn't standing in the middle of Camden in a dress. I think that sort of came after, I think he started the band and he played with this sort of, you know, being a bit of androgynous and all that. But he was never really over the top. And I think after the first few records when people said he sounded a bit, you know, a bit girly, that I think it sort of started manifesting itself after that, and then by the time they were doing Brixton Academy, yeah he was a bit more feminine than PJ Harvey — God bless her.

Androgyny (watch the whole thing here)

[caspira-writes-fanfiction]

Finding Family (Fizz's Found Family)-Chapter 9

Flying (pt. 3)

The past two months had been the most incredibly wild two months of Fizzarolli’s life. He had never been more popular. Mammon was right, he would make a lot of money for Greed. Nearly every day Fizzarolli had a different engagement with Mamm’s team. There were photo shoots and choreography rehearsals and meetings. Meetings to discuss brand deals were underway almost every other day. There were going to be Fizzarolli shirts and hats and mugs, Mamm wanted pillows and plushes and window clings and jewelry. They even floated a Fizzarolli makeup palate by him the other day.

“You could glitter for everyone, Fizzy.” Fizzarolli didn’t like the way Mammon said it, always a bit more sexual than Fizz was comfortable with. Fizzarolli also never imagined he’d have such a legacy to leave behind, though, and Mammon has given him that. Mamm seemed excited about the idea so Fizzarolli agreed. It was just makeup, it didn’t really matter.

While the meeting and photo shoots and days playing dress up might look like fun, it was still work. Fizzarolli had taken Asmodeus’s advice from when they first met and was reading over each contract carefully. None of them had Fizzarolli walking away with any money for a long time, but with each one he signed he felt that much closer to getting out of his debt. That much reading alone had him tired, but Fizz also needed to rehearse his skills and memorize his lines for multiple upcoming commercials he was set to shoot in the coming weeks.

Fizzarolli had just gotten out of another meeting with Greed’s marketing team. They wanted to bring the Survival Tour back. Well, they wanted to revamp it. A documentary, exploring Fizzarolli’s ~incredible~ story. They promised it would be focused on his story about winning Mammon’s pageant, that it would take a more empathetic approach. There wouldn’t be shock value and a whole section focused on blaming Blitzø. Fizzarolli wouldn’t have to watch the videos or read the newspaper testimonials. It would be a movie to be streamed across the seven rings, Fizzarolli wouldn’t have to sit under a tent and sign autographs or prove what he could do. He’d already proven what he could do by winning the pageant. It wouldn’t be bad. It would be happier, more uplifting. He said he’d think about it, but Fizzarolli wasn’t too sure he had much of a choice.

There was a car waiting for Fizz as he left the building. He wasn’t surprised, but it did make him feel strange. Comforted, but guilty.

Jingles:* I’m taking it I’m welcome back in Lust tonight? TheBigO: You’re always welcome here. Did you have other plans? The car will take you wherever you want to go. Jingles: We don’t have a meeting scheduled, do we? I’m sorry, this one went long. TheBigO: No, nothing in the books. Though if you’re coming back, I have been meaning to float something by you. TheBigO: If you’re in the right headspace, I know this has been a busy week for you.

Fizzarolli almost made a joke about headspace but refrained. He wasn’t feeling particularly flirty right now. Fizz didn’t respond to Ozzie’s message, but he got in the car. Ozzie would get a notification about that, it was response enough.

Fizz had been staying at Ozzies almost exclusively since he’d won the pageant. He’d gone back to his apartment during the day to grab things, but he no longer worked at LooLoo Land and found Lust to be much more comfortable anyway so long as he was allowed to stay. He didn’t feel particularly safe in his old flat. Not now, not after becoming Mamm’s new face. Ozzie never really made him feel unwelcome anyway, he’d been more than supportive and helpful with everything. Still, Fizz felt a little guilty. While they’d slept with each other more than once since that first night, Fizz couldn’t help but feel like he was keeping Lust from really being able to be….well, Lust.

Fizz knew he shouldn’t, but he opened his phone and read over the message thread that he’d stupidly read through hundreds of times in the past few weeks.

Jingles: Send a car. Jingles: Please. Jingles: Oz, right now. Please send a car. Please. Jingles: Please. Jingles: Actually no, sorry. Just kidding! Everything’s fine. No need to send a car. Situation handled.   TheBigO: Where are you? Are you okay?

They hadn’t really talked about that night since, but it weighed heavy in Fizz’s mind. The cheap, shitty apartments outside of LooLoo Land were never particularly safe. The locks weren’t great and being on the first floor the windows were easy enough to break and get into if you were determined. Nobody really tried while Fizz lived there because he had nothing. He was a bit of a pathetic target, anyway. But after winning the pageant, that status changed.

He’d been feeling guilty for sleeping at Ozzie’s for almost a month after winning the contest. He’d decided to give Lust a night, let him get back to how things used to be. How they were supposed to be. Fizz hadn’t thought it would be bad to spend a night on his own. He didn’t have to sleep under his old gross blankets, he had new ones with him. A new pillow too. It would be good for the both of them.

But when Fizz got to his apartment it was trashed. The door had been kicked open, and what little things he had left there were thrown around the room. Papers scattered the floor, his sofa was turned over and the pillows slashed into. All of the cabinets were open and ransacked. He wondered how long it had been like this. He wondered what exactly whoever had been here was looking for. He wondered what would have happened if he’d been here when they came. He wondered if he was here alone.

He’d sent the panicked messages to Asmodeus without thinking. After ten or fifteen minutes, when he was able to walk around the flat and make sure nobody was hiding and waiting to get him, Fizzarolli realized what he’d done. This was supposed to be Asmodeus’s night off from him, and he hadn’t responded, clearly he’d been busy. Fizzarolli had never been a great judge of his emotions, he never knew if his reaction was appropriate or not. He was so embarrassed.

But Asmodeus responded, and when Fizzarolli didn’t answer he called. And when Fizz didn’t answer again, he called a second time. When Fizz picked up and didn’t know what to say, he talked, and when Fizz finally explained what had happened, Asmodeus was stepping out of a blue portal in the middle of Fizzarolli’s living room only moments later. He helped Fizz pack up the rest of his things, and he took him back to Lust.

The guest room was now Fizzarolli’s room until further notice. He was welcome to join Asmodeus in his bed as often as he wanted. Asmodeus put no pressure on sex when Fizz did want to sleep in Ozzie’s bed with him, either. It felt strange, Fizz felt guilty.

With Fizz around all the time, that didn’t leave much opportunity for Ozzie to have other guests over. Surely Lust was getting bored with him.

Mammon had known Asmodeus since the beginning of Hell, he knew him well. A lot better than Fizzarolli did, surely. Fizzarolli had been spending a lot more time with Mammon since winning the pageant, he’d been giving Fizz a lot of advice about a lot of things. When he learned that Fizz had been staying with Asmodeus, he’d given him the lecture about Ozzie’s play things.

Fizzarolli tried not to think about it right now. He tried not to worry about what would happen once Ozzie tired of him, decided that Fizz too much of a burden in his castle. Fizz didn’t ‘put out’ like Mammon suggested he do. Fizz hadn’t felt the need to, but as he reflected on how long he’d been staying in a palace rent free, he couldn’t help but wonder if he should. He didn’t want to go back to the LooLoo Land slums.

The rain in Lust was warm, it didn’t make Fizz’s bones ache. It was comfortable. He liked it here.

Nobody questioned when Fizz got in the elevator to the penthouse. All of the staff knew Fizz well at this point. He wondered how many other guests the staff had known well.

Fizz remembered his breathing exercises as the elevator brought him upstairs. Smile inside and out.

“Fizzarolli!” Asmodeus’s voice boomed happily as Fizz exited the elevator. Asmodeus was just walking down the hall himself.

Fizzarolli had grown comfortable at the penthouse. He smiled up at Asmodeus.

“I am so glad the day is finally over! Are you hungry?” Asmodeus is in a good mood. He looked excited, playful. A very different mood from the marketing team Fizzarolli had spent all afternoon with.

Fizzarolli nodded and followed Ozzie to the kitchen, he knew the routine. “I wasn’t sure if I should come up here or to your office. You said you wanted to talk?”

“Still in business mode, then? How many meetings did you have today?”

“Three. How did your meetings go today?” Over the time that Fizz had known Asmodeus, he’d noticed that the Sin was…...quite terrible at time management. He was driven by passion, and prone to putting off the unexciting parts of his job until the last minute, then they got overwhelming and stressful for him. The night after Fizzarolli had moved into the penthouse, after he found his apartment ransacked, he’d spent the night reorganizing Ozzie’s schedule for the week instead of sleeping. Organizing had been safer than sleeping, he hadn’t wanted to wake Ozzie up with nightmares two nights in a row. Fizz had been afraid Ozzie would be mad that he’d messed with his schedule like that but Asmodeus had tried it and asked Fizz to arrange his schedule the week after that. Fizz didn’t arrange Ozzie’s schedule this week, but he saw that there sere several blocks that just said “meeting.” Today Ozzie had two.

Asmodeus’s smile grew. He hummed as he approached the kitchen and started looking through the fridge. “They went very well, thank you.”

Fizzarolli wanted to ask about them, but he knew better than that. Maybe these meetings were to compensate for what Lust couldn’t do here now that Fizz was living here. Had he overstepped? Was he on his way out? Had Oz gotten bored of him already?

“So, what was it you wanted to talk about?”

Asmodeus laughed, but it was all excitement. “Alright, we can start with business first.” Asmodeus’s hand dug in back pocket and tossed something onto the island Fizz had made his way over to. Fizz grabbed them. A set of keys. His brow furrowed.

“What are these?”

“Keys” Asmodeus chuckled, as if Fizzarolli had never seen keys before. He didn’t turn to see Fizz’s face, he was busy chopping vegetables.

Fizzarolli didn’t know what to think. His chest was tight, his face warm while his spine was dripping cold. “Keys to what?” What did this mean?

Asmodeus took a long while to answer, at least it felt like a long time to Fizzarolli. Fizz could tell that Asmodeus was happy, maybe even proud, but Fizz couldn’t help but feel a little nauseous.

“Oh, well. The set of three. That’s for my club”

“You have a club?” How could Fizzarolli not know about this at this point? Was it some sort of secret? Oh Satan, was this some sort of secret sex club or something? Was this another level in the play thing hierarchy? Mammon hadn’t said anything about this. One deep breath, Fizz. He needed to stay calm.

“I’ve been toying with the idea for a while. I have a space in Jizztown that would be nice, but I’ve never quite known what I wanted there.”

Asmodeus had answered Fizzarolli’s question with more detail than was necessary, but Fizzarolli was more confused than he’d ever been. He toyed with the keys in his hand. There were two sets of keys on the large heart shaped ring, the set of three that went to the club and then another set of two. One was a standard sized key, the other was much, much smaller.

“What are these other two for?”

“You.” Asmodeus said that as if that was the most natural answer, as if that made any sense. They were for Fizz, sure, but where did they go? Fizz didn’t need keys to the palace, all of the staff knew who he was. These weren’t his keys to the LooLoo Land flat, and they were distinctly different from the club keys.

“Last I checked I didn’t have any stuck locks.” Fizzarolli settled slightly as he heard Asmodeus snort.

“No, no. Not for you, your body. For you. For your apartment.”

It was Fizzarolli’s turn to laugh now. “No they’re not. My apartment keys have a square head. This key is rounded.” Worry started solidifying in the pit of his stomach, hard like a stone. Ozzie wanted him out of here. Fizzarolli couldn’t look upset, that would only make things worse.

“No. Not there. You’re not going back there.” Ozzie’s voice was firm and convincing. Normally it would have comforted Fizzarolli, but it only made Fizz’s heart pick up the pace even more. He ran his thumb over one of the keys absently, as if he could even feel the texture. The back and forth motion was just comforting, he tried to be as silent as possible. Ozzie was still rather fixated on cooking.

“It’s for your apartment in Lust.” Ozzie’s voice was lighter now, but Fizzarolli was nearly frozen still. It wasn’t until Asmodeus turned around to look at him that Fizz broke out of it and spoke.

“I don’t understand.” Fizz could see the excitement on Ozzie’s face dull as Fizz admitted to his confusion. He felt guilty for it. Ozzie probably wasn’t even being confusing at all, Fizzarolli just fundamentally misunderstood something. Was he supposed to be expecting this? Was there something in his contracts that he’d missed? Why would he have an apartment in Lust?

“I wanted you to have a place that you felt safe to be at. Without the expectation that you had to be here.”

So Asmodeus did want him out. That’s okay Fizzarolli reminded himself. You’ve been through worse and come out better. You’re living the dream. This is not the end of it. He just had to convince his body of the same too.

Fizzarolli didn’t know what to say. A King of Sin had gotten him something, it would be rude not to accept it. His mind flooded with worry about the implications of this, but he didn’t allow himself to focus on any singular one for too long. Anything other than acceptance would be rude.

“Thank you, Sir.”

This shouldn’t hurt. His chest shouldn’t feel like it’s crushing in on itself. The room shouldn’t be loosing all it’s oxygen but something about this just feels wrong. Mammon was right. Lust would get sick of his little fuck doll. He hadn’t even kept his interest more than a few months. Fuck.

Smile inside and out.

“Sir?” That had piqued Ozzie’s interest. Fizzarolli didn’t call him Sir. Not in the kitchen he didn’t. “You feeling alright, Fizzy?” Something about this moment felt off, but Oz wasn’t entirely sure how yet. He was hoping that it was just his own expectations of Fizz’s reaction not being met.

Fizz smiled and nodded. Best to distract Ozzie now, put on a little show. If he could keep Ozzie focused on him for a while longer, convince him that everything was fine. Things tended to crumble for Fizzarolli when Asmodeus started showing concern, Everything was fine, Fizz was fine.. Fizzarolli stretched a leg out as far as it would go and wrapped it around Ozzie’s middle. He pulled himself to the other, his arms wrapping around Lust’s shoulders.

“I’m feeling great. What about you, Big Sexy?” His tongue licked up the side of Ozzie’s neck and made the Sin shiver.

Asmodeus smiled as he welcomed the horny little demon holding onto him like a jetpack. He was tempted to pause, give Fizz a bit more attention, but his hands were already covered in onion. Best to keep choping. “I’m hungry. I’m thinking Shakshuka.”

“Shakshuka” Fizz repeated. It was a fun word to say. His tongue stuck out as he let go of Asmodeus and shrunk down to his normal size, only to spring back up and sit himself on the counter next to the stove.

“And a salad. And maybe we could finish off that cake from the other night?”

“Whatever you want, Oz. You know I’m not picky.”

Asmodeus gave Fizzarolli a look, but he didn’t argue. Something still felt off about this moment but he dismissed it. Ozzie nodded and carried on with his work. When he was back at the sink, he got a glass of cold water and set it down next to Fizzarolli. It had been a long day and knowing Fizz, he hadn’t stopped to take care of himself once if he didn’t have to. He wondered if now was really the right time to continue this conversation.

Asmodeus hummed and continued on with his work in the kitchen. He smiled as Fizz sat pretty and kept him company. Never one to sit still, though, Fizzarolli changed his pose every few minutes. If Asmodeus didn’t acknowledge one of his poses, the next one would get more outrageous. When Ozzie had missed three in a row to wash the salad greens, he returned to find Fizz tangled in a knot of his own limbs.

“Well now” Asmodeus chuckled. “This is your most unique one yet. Walk me through the process of how you got here?” Lust placed the greens down on the counter beside Fizzarolli and carefully helped him unknot his hand from his ankle from his other leg. He watched carefully from his peripheral as Fizz caught his breath. He hadn’t waited for Fizz to reply or ask him for help before he’d helped him, there was a distinct look in Fizz’s eyes that read as pain to Asmodeus.

“You alright?” he asked a moment later, after Fizz had an opportunity to assess himself. Asmodeus was definitely picking up on some tension and stress. That was to be expected to some extent though, it had been a long week.

“Fine, yeah. Just fine.” Fizz stretched, then decided to sit himself back down on the edge of the counter with his legs crossed high over his knees. He sat pretty while Asmodeus sauteed the aromatics, crushed tomatoes, and poached the eggs in their divine smelling sauce.

Fizzarolli had never ’put out’ like Mammon had suggested, but he knew what he was referring to when he spoke about it. Sex work wasn’t an uncommon side gig in the circus business, and while Fizzarolli had stayed far away from it himself that didn’t mean he didn’t understand. Plenty of his circus friends, especially as he got older, had. He knew the basics. Sit pretty, look alluring, laugh at what the other person says, do what they ask (unless they want to hurt you).

Fizz gave Asmodeus his flirtiest eyes while he cooked. He made as many sex jokes as he could. He got in trouble more than once for sticking his finger in the pot and having a taste.

“Stooop” Asmodeus’s voice chided melodically as Fizzarolli stood on the edge of the large pan and bent down to smell it. “You’re going to make a mess” Asmodeus’s hand leveled to the pan for Fizzarolli to step onto. Fizzarolli on his shoulder is a much safer Fizzarolli.

“I thought you didn’t mind a little mess” Fizz teased.

Ozzie gave an amused hum and nodded. “Did you want to be covered in tomato and feta?”

“It’d give you a reason to undress me”

Asmodeus did appreciate the imagery, but with Fizz sitting so close to him he could get a better read on the energy. There was something forced about it, something bitter. “What’s the rush? Can’t I do that after we eat?”

Fizzarolli paused. The air in the room seemed to still for a moment. “I get to stay the night?”

The chuckle Asmodeus replied with was light, it was the comforting laugh that Fizzarolli loved, but Fizzarolli still felt uncertain. He was confused. He didn’t even know where to begin, he didn’t think he could ask questions.

“Of course you can stay the night. What’s gotten into you today?”

“Nothing! What’s gotten into you?!” Fizz hadn’t meant to get defensive, he just hated that none of his tricks were working. He was an entertainer, he was good at putting on a face and yet Asmodeus seemed to see right through him. Is that why he’d gotten bored of him? He’d figured him out?

“What are you talking about?”

Fizzarolli’s heart was beating up in his throat. You must be doing some real freaky things to keep him entertained for so long. You a sick fuck, Fizzarolli? No? Well then, what’s the fucking deal? Asmodeus wasn’t like that, though. He’d never made Fizz feel like there were those types of expectations. Still, Mammon had known him longer. He’d know how this would play out, wouldn’t he? You’re amazing, Fizzy. Really. One of a fucking kind, a legend. But he’s Lust, mate. He’s got a rotation. Don’t get too in your head thinking you’re special. He gets bored of even the most legendary.

“You’re tired of me.” It fell out of his mouth like a mistake, it wasn’t the most regal or practiced thing to say. Probably another reason he needed to leave, he didn’t fucking know how to act.

“What?” Asmodeus was offended.

“I’ve overstayed my welcome. I get it, I know. What do I owe you for all this?”

Asmodeus had overstepped somewhere, but he couldn’t understand what Fizz was asking for. “Do you want another bill?” His tone shifted to be quieter, hoping Fizz would recognize he was not a threat.

Fizzarolli did not make that connection.

“I want you to tell me when I have to be out of here!” Fizzarolli jumped down from Asmodeus’s shoulder back onto the counter. His arms were crossed tightly over his chest. Asmodeus frowned.

“You don’t have to be anywhere.” Asmodeus turned off the stove and turned to Fizz. He looked so stressed. Asmodeus sighed. “Come on, let’s eat something.” Asmodeus turned towards the cabinets to grab dishes for them.

“No!”

Ozzie paused. He turned and looked at Fizzarolli, completely confused. “Fizz…”

“No, I mean, fine!” Shit. He knew he fucked up. He always crumbled once Asmodeus started showing concern. He didn’t know how to explain what was wrong in the first place, it was easier to just make Ozzie happy, but he wasn’t making Asmodeus happy. Fizz extended his leg, stepping halfway across the room to grab salad bowls. “This looks great by the way, have I mentioned that?”

Fizzarolli flitted around the kitchen, filling all the roles Asmodeus wasn’t as he stood in the middle of the room studying Fizzarolli. He set the table and grabbed water for both of them, he put the salad in the middle of the table, he grabbed forks and knives. He then tried to get Asmodeus to join him, and to tell him how he was supposed to plate the shakshuka.

“Come on, sexy. Let’s go eat.” Fizzarolli stretched to be Asmodeus’s size. He wrapped his arms around Asmodeus and rested his head against Oz’s shoulder. He blinked up at him and stuck his tongue out of the side of his mouth in a way that usually got Asmodeus to smile.

“Pause.”

Fizz retracted. His blood ran cold, he stood up straight and waited to be told what he’d done wrong. Usually it was Fizzarolli that called pause, and that was usually just as a test to make sure Ozzie would. Fizzarolli understood the importance of this moment. Asmodeus had sensed something was off, they were going to check in. Fizzarolli always began to crumble once Oz showed concern. He didn’t want to be told he was obsolete another time tonight.

Asmodeus’s movements were slow. He took a deep breath, he sighed. He sat down on the floor so that he’d be slightly less towering over the other. He could see how tense Fizzarolli was, he didn’t want to do anything to make it worse. Despite being the one to initiate the pause, he felt the urge to hold his hand out, give Fizz the option to buy back into the moment. Maybe he would, but not yet.

“Why do you think I’m tired of you?”

Fizzarolli flinched at the question. He didn’t dare look into Ozzie’s eyes, not yet. His arms wrapped protectively around himself. He stayed quiet for a long time, he tried to find the right words.

“I’ve stayed here too long.”

Asmodeus pinched the bridge of his nose but he did his best not to look irritated. “You’re always welcome here, Fizzy. How many times have I told you that?”

“I’m keeping you from being yourself, you want me out."

Lust had to think for a long time to understand what Fizzarolli was talking about. It took him far too long to make the connection, and he felt like a complete idiot once he had. “Is this because of the keys?”

Fizz nodded. He was looking away from Ozzie, biting the insight of his cheek. He hated how easily Asmodeus saw through him. How he seemed to understand things about Fizzarolli before even Fizz did sometimes. He was trying to keep himself from crying.

“Fizz, we barely had a conversation about that.” Fizzarolli continued to stay turned away from Asmodeus. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to stay here. And you’re not going back to those slums in Greed.”

When Fizzarolli continued to stay quiet, Asmodeus continued. “I should’ve presented the idea more formally. I got too excited.”

“You don’t want me here anymore.”

“No!”Asmodeus blurted out almost too quickly. Fizzarolli turned to face the Sin. “I want you to headline at my club.”

Asmodeus had to reassure Fizzarolli half a dozen times that he wasn’t opening a sex club in the way he worried it was going to be before Fizzarolli held his hand out, letting Asmodeus know he’s comfortable enough for touch again.

“It’s a sexy club, not a sex club”

Asmodeus chuckled and nodded. “Yeah, sure….I like that!. The club space needs a lot of work still. We can talk through what the place will look like as we make renovations.”

Fizzarolli was no less confused than he was before, but he was less afraid.

“And you can stay here every single night if you want, I like having you around. But you’ve spent many nights in your room instead of my bed. And that’s fine! It’s just….it’s only a room. And it’s attached to my palace. You deserve a place that’s your own, truly private.”

He still didn’t understand why Ozzie would do all this for him. Why he wanted Fizz to headline for his club, why did he deserved his own apartment? This was more than he’d ever had. “So my paycheck for working at the club pays for the apartment?”

“The apartment is included in your contract. Part of your paycheck for working at the club would go towards your debt to Greed.”

Fizzarolli’s lips pursed and he nodded. “The other part goes to the apartment.”

“The other part goes to you.”

It took Fizzarolli a long time to figure out what that meant. He’s still not sure he can accept what he wants to believe it means. “Towards another debt.”

Asmodeus sighed. “No, Fizz. To you. Money for you.”

Another long pause. “Money for spending?” That got Asmodeus to chuckle.

“Money for spending, money for saving, you can cash it all and turn it into little paper crafts for all I care. It’s yours to decide.”

Fizzarolli hadn’t had pocket change in a long time, not since the accident, let alone an opportunity to save? He’d been reliant on what he could get from loans, and worked his ass off to repay them. He had accepted that would be his life a long time ago. Mammon was too greedy to allow anything else. How had Asmodeus swung this?

“H-how? Why?” This had to be a prank, or a dream. Maybe Fizzarolli actually died a year ago in surgery and this was just some long, drawn out hallucination as he bled out in the operating room. That would explain why absolutely none of this made any sense. The look Asmodeus gave him made no sense either. It looked sad, but not in a way that conveyed pity. That was a difficult expression to relay, but Fizzarolli accepted it was genuine with the firm way he spoke.

“You deserve agency.”

The world suddenly became very big and very small at the same time. Things stilled and he felt close to Asmodeus, but the idea that he could save, that he could have money of his own made his world feel so much larger. Fizzarolli felt like he was floating, he was in shock. He still couldn’t entirely believe it.

“Why?” Fizzarolli repeated.

Asmodeus was puzzled. He looked down at Fizzarolli, then laughed. “What do you mean why?” Asmodeus leaned in closer to the other, his hand reaching out to ask if Fizz wanted to be picked up. “I’m offering you a job, you deserve to be paid for it.”

“You’re offering me an apartment for the job.” Fizzarolli countered.

“The apartment comes with the job. You still deserve a paycheck.”

Fizzarolli didn’t know what to say, this felt almost too good to be true. Fizzarolli was blushing. It felt like a lot, but it no longer felt like an obligation. He had some agency, he had some power.

Falling almost felt like flying, and Fizzarolli often had to ask himself which was which. He wasn’t too sure where this new endeavor would leave him. Asmodeus wanted him to headline at his club, he wanted him to have opportunities. Certainly that meant that he still had interest in him. Fizzarolli wasn’t to be tossed aside just yet. The anxiety of becoming boring to Asmodeus still weighed on him, but Asmodeus reminded him a dozen times that this wasn’t a one day conversation.

Oz convinced Fizzarolli to eat their dinner, he felt a little less afraid. He convinced Fizzarolli to watch a shitty movie with him, he was feeling tired by the end of it. Asmodeus invited Fizzarolli into his bed at the end of the night, Fizz didn’t feel so indispensable. He decided to trust Asmodeus.

A few days later when they visit the apartment that would be Fizz’s, he felt more like flying than falling. When they visit the club space and Ozzie writes down every idea Fizz spits out, he feels closer towards the clouds than the clay. When the opening of Ozzie’s is heralded as a remarkable success months later, Fizz was floating. When Fizz got his first paycheck he was soaring.

Fizzarolli had more freedom than he’d ever had before. He was on top of the world.

[berlinini]

god if some of the larry theories are correct and there was something going on between harry and louis imagine processing this break up as well on top of everything else//

I don’t really think about Larry, it’s not on my mind at all usually but this did something to me. I hope it wasn’t true bc that would be so awful. A heartbreak alone is worse but adding it to all the other horrible things Louis had to go through…I had a moment when watching documentary where i genuinely did stare at the screen and wondered how it can be that he is still here after all that.

Harry betrayed the band and Louis’ world falling apart because of him must have been terrible, regardless of the nature of their relationship. FITF talks about love in all its forms and surely what the guys had as bandmates that grew up together and experienced something completely extraordinary must have been so special. And for that bond to be broken by one of your own, when you’ve just found your feet within the formation…. Louis could’ve become bitter and full of resentment. He could’ve given up, especially with what happened next. And we know these were some really tough time. Louis talks about resilience in the movie and it’s so true.

I think one of the reason I was so emotional during the film was that we know all this - and even more - but to see this person on the screen telling his story in his own words, not shying away from his emotions, it’s once again a testimony of his strength.

I can’t stop thinking about All This Time and how Louis experienced this much pain - more than most of us will ever live - and came out of it still seeing life as a thing of beauty and love. That’s why he’s so inspiring.

[magical-bigbang-noona]

I'm still completely stunned over the verdict. I honestly did not expect that.

I don't feel like I thought I would? I wanted him to see accountability for his part and it happened.

I still feel betrayed and used. I'm mad at myself for giving him the benefit of the doubt all those years even though red flags kept going up. For supporting him enthusiastically during his solo year and thinking he'd turned himself around. I admit, I turned a blind eye, even when I saw video and read actual testimony of how he treated fans who'd won a contest and got to meet him at his m/v shoot.

"Oh, he was tired. Oh, that's just narcissist Seungri flaring up under pressure. Don't worry about it. He'll do better tomorrow."

I still find it chilling now how the members ramped up their warnings and pleas to him, couched in jokes in public, during the run up to him being alone and responsible for carrying the BigBang banner.

I honestly think "Papa YG" had a really harmful influence on him. I mean, the whole kpop industry is a pressure cooker anyway, but he treated his non favorite artists terribly. Look what he did to 2ne1. He was misogynistic and cruel and threw them under the bus whenever they needed the company's support most.

That scene fans uwu over of him finally giving Seungri a birthday acknowledgement while Seungri is sobbing and apologizing always made me nauseous, personally. He treated him like dirt for years, took him under his wing for awhile while GD was gone and his album was getting noticed, then dumped him again because BlackPink was doing phenomenal.

We saw how he treated iKon, how the company abandoned B.I. even though they were the ones who let the kind of environment they shouldn't have flourish on the down low at their own company. Way to pass the buck and deflect your own wrongdoings, YG.

I personally think he's one who should be doing jail time.

That was a bad set of circumstances for someone with Seungri's personality to grow up and work in. It doesn't excuse him by any means but I think it explains a lot.

It's a shame someone was made to feel they had no talent because they weren't as shiny as the wunderkind that was Jiyong or as surprisingly successful as T.O.P. became and spent their whole career trying to get the boss's recognition.

He has talent. The Great Seungri is a good album. He definitely did not deserve to be abandoned on his tour and promotions, business wise.

I think he acted out and tried to prove himself in some obviously harmful ways. Coupled with the rampant misogyny in the culture and the industry where women are either dismissed or objectified, it had all the ingredients for disaster. (Not that he didn't already have those behaviors but having it condoned and excused by his peers and having the clout and wealth to get it covered up by a corrupt justice system as he saw the people he wanted to emulate do...well...that's a dumpster fire of Bad just waiting to happen. He got involved in dealings he should never have gone near and it got worse. He just got better at hiding it.)

I honestly liked his voice. Strong Baby was honestly my favorite solo BB song. He performed it beautifully and knocked it out of the park during the MADE tour. I loved VVIP and it's m/v. He never got enough credit for what he DID do right.

And it's not just Korea, take a look at the Weinstein sexual abuse culture in Hollywood that flourished for years. Look at uber rich billionaire Jeffrey Epstein and his pedophile ring with other rich and famous men. Seriously, if you want to be thoroughly horrified watch the documentary about him on NetFlix. It will make you physically ill to see what he did and how long he got away with it because of money, power, and an army of lawyers, some who were also involved and also still lying about their involvement. Ex-Cheeto-Prez was one of his besties. It's a seething 💩-show.

The powerful, rich, and famous, mostly men, should not keep getting passes on their criminal behavior. Nor should corrupt government.

This was longer than I meant it to be but I needed to vent. There was never going to be any good outcome and happily ever after for everyone.

Mostly I am experiencing every bit of the confused feelings as I had when all this was first brought to light. And yeah, I'm shocked as hell he got a prison sentence and arrested as a flight risk. I was convinced he'd skate.

I never thought any of the ones still outside the initial net would be brought to account. My wish is that they prosecute some of the ones higher up the privileged, elitist, and monied ladder than Seungri and his circle of friends.

Lastly, a disclaimer to say I'm not setting my feelings on this matter down as the absolute gospel truth of everything. It's merely my take on what my view was/is.

I hope the remaining 4 get thru this with minimal shots and criticism aimed at them. l hope to see them come back and not have their legacy tarnished. They don't deserve that.

[letterboxd]

Truffle Hunter.

As Pig snuffles its way up Letterboxd’s best of 2021 ranks, Mitchell Beaupre hunts down writer-director Michael Sarnoski for a chat about some of the finer creative points of his Nicolas Cage-starring meditation on cookery and grief.

In a time when audiences know too many specific plot details of films months before they’re even released, the idea of a surprise sensation feels like a fleeting memory. Yet that’s exactly how one could describe Pig, the debut feature from director Michael Sarnoski. With minimal pre-release buzz and no flashy festival premiere, Pig is a film whose status has been created through sheer quality alone.

This is a true word-of-mouth smash, hailed by critics as one of the best films of the year, as well as quickly earning itself a high placement on our Top 50 of 2021. Jacob Knight praises the film as “an existential rumination regarding how people find meaning in a mostly meaningless world”, while Muriel declares it “the most unexpectedly wholesome movie I’ve seen in forever”. Not bad for a first feature.

Written by Sarnoski, from a story he developed with co-producer Vanessa Block, Pig opens on Rob (Nicolas Cage), a loner isolated in the woods with his truffle pig. Rob makes his living selling truffles to the eager and ambitious Amir (Alex Wolff), but when two people break into Rob’s home and steal his animal companion, he must do whatever it takes to be reunited with his only friend.

A rough day deserves a decent vin rouge.

While that setup led many to give Sarnoski’s film the moniker “John Wick with a pig” when the trailer dropped, the story ends up charting a course away from genre thrills and towards something else entirely. Pig is an exploration of grief, loneliness and compassion, featuring one of the finest performances of Nicolas Cage’s illustrious career.

Raised in Milwaukee, Sarnoski and co-producer Block met in college before working together on the documentary short The Testimony, which focused on the largest rape tribunal in the history of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That film made it onto the shortlist for the 2016 Oscars, putting the two of them on a path that would lead to their breakthrough opportunity with Pig.

Sarnoski spoke with us about the origins of Pig, the long-term impacts of loss in his own life, the joy of hand-cranked pasta and Bruce Springsteen.

Congratulations on the film! How has it felt seeing this outpouring of love coming for your first feature? Michael Sarnoski: It’s been amazing. Everyone who made this movie felt for themselves that it was special, and we all put a lot of care into it. We also knew that it was a risk, a strange film we figured would hit right for some people, but then plenty of others would think it was boring and weird. We’ve been very pleasantly surprised that it’s a small minority of people who feel that way.

What was the seed of the story that would eventually sprout to become Pig? I had this image in my head of an old man in the woods with his truffle pig. There was something sweet and tragic about that. Then I began asking questions about who this guy is and why he’s out there alone in the woods. What’s his backstory? It all evolved from there.

While the first act inhabits that “John Wick with a pig” space that people were perhaps expecting from the trailer, the story then takes a swerve and becomes a somber, thoughtful character study. Could you speak about navigating that unique arc with your storytelling? We never set out to try and subvert that John Wick sort of genre. We knew that we were playing with that lone-cowboy idea of a film and some of those tropes, but we never wanted to poke fun at that or switch people’s expectations in some sense by choosing Nic to star. We never wanted to “surprise” people by making a quiet Nic Cage movie. It was always just about these characters, what this story is, what we’re trying to explore. I think if we had tried to be subversive it would have come off as hokey.

Silence plays a key part in the film, as so much is being said in those spaces between the dialogue and action. How did you want to utilize the impact of saying more with silence? From early on, we always knew it was going to be a very silent film, and that followed all the way through the edit. Some of us wanted that opening to start out the way it’s done in the movie, where it’s totally silent and the music only comes in at the very end, while others were worried that people would get bored with it. The argument against that was that if they’re going to get bored with that, then they’re going to get bored with the rest of the movie. So, we might as well just lean into it, and let them know what it’s going to be.

From there we gauged how we wanted to approach the silence throughout. There’s some beautiful music in the film that Alexis Grapsas and Philip Klein did an incredible job with that allowed us to bring this beauty and splendor into the scenes. But there were also a lot of really quiet moments where we wanted the audience to be focused on the faces of the characters, and really be feeling the space and letting the sounds of the forest, or wherever we were, come across.

Nicolas Cage, his knife skills, and cinematographer Patrick Scola.

Along with the faces, you focus a lot on hands in the film. Whether it’s in scenes of violence or making food, there’s a real emphasis on what hands are capable of. Where did the inspiration for that come from? Nic was very into the idea of conveying artistry through your hands. He spent a lot of time with local chefs to try and get the vibe of how they moved and how they worked. He was always practicing knife skills in his room. I was constantly waiting for the AD to come up and tell me that we can’t use Nic today because he cut off a finger, but thankfully that never happened. Nic really sold that emphasis on the hands. Those shots could have felt empty if it wasn’t for him. I still am surprised watching some of the little hand choices he made.

I remember there was one shot where we didn’t get it on the day. So, we set it up with his stand-in, and just had him wearing his gloves. We all watched it, and it just wasn’t the same. Nic agreed, and so we reset the entire thing just to get that one shot with his hands in there instead. It was totally worth it. He’s an incredible actor, and it comes through every part of him.

Cage is an actor with an almost otherworldly mythos about him, which allows people to sometimes forget what a tremendous performer he’s always been. What was your experience in building a relationship with him, not just as an actor, but also as a human being? I only have positive things to say. That’s not just a gimmick. From the moment he read the script, he was interested, and he really responded to the character. He was committed to bringing the script to life, and was extremely respectful towards everyone on set. He had no reason to respect me. I’m a first-time director. He could have been a total diva. He could have been whatever he wanted to be, and we still would have paid him and been happy with his performance.

He was very kind, and maybe some of this came from the character, but he was also kind of somber and quiet in general on set. At the same time, he can also be very playful and sweet, even though he was trying to remain in the mood of the character. He set the tone, in a way, for the whole crew. A crew could easily look at a first time director and decide to just slack off and scrape by, because I wouldn’t have even known the difference. The fact that Nic treated me and the material with such respect really trickled down, and was so valuable to the film.

We shot the whole thing in twenty days, so if there had been any weak link with someone not doing their job or not being totally on top of it, we would have been screwed. I credit a lot of that to Nic, and him treating this with an incredible amount of professionalism. I think that’s where a big part of his long career comes from. He’s an incredible actor, but he also takes the art form seriously, treating it as both an artist and as this being his job, knowing that you have to do both in order to get what you need across.

Do you have a favorite Nicolas Cage performance? Other than Pig, of course. There are so many incredible ones. I really love Moonstruck. I saw that a couple of years ago, right before we officially cast him, when I was going through some of his ones that I hadn’t seen. Part of it I think is because I’m half-Italian, and I felt like it was showing me a side of my life that I never realized because my Italian family is on the east coast, and we moved out to Wisconsin when I was very young. I never got to be a part of that kind of thick Italian family, and seeing that on screen gave me a taste of what that would have been like. I loved him in that role. He was the perfect balance of sincere and sentimental, and also over the top when he needed to be.

Grub’s up.

Speaking of being Italian, Pig gets deep into the transformative power of food, and of the right meal. Has food always been an important part of your life? Definitely. I’ve never worked in restaurants. The closest thing was when I worked at a snack bar at a summer camp, which was very fun and also kind of a nightmare in its own way. I think most of the importance of food for me came from when my grandma lived with us. It was after my dad passed away, when I was a little kid, and she became this sort of old Italian cook in the house who was using food as this language of love and also as a sort of control. It had a lot wrapped up in it, this sense that we’re going to have family dinners to prove that everything is fine.

I think any Italian family is that way, but especially in that situation, having that presence come into the house when I was a kid, it made food quite charged for me. It was both a form of bonding and love, but also that control. That was very important to me. As I got older she taught me how to cook some things, and I became interested in that. I had a lot of friends who were great cooks and taught me how to do different things. I’m not an amazing cook, but I love cooking.

I love that act of making something that’s about to disappear. I think if you can be okay with that, and put a lot of time and care into that, it’s kind of a therapeutic thing to do. Accepting transience is a big part of cooking.

What’s your favorite dish to cook? I would say over the pandemic I really got into making lasagne. I had my grandma’s old hand-crank pasta maker, so I was enjoying making my own pasta and lasagne with that. I don’t know if I could pick one favorite dish, but that is definitely one that contributed quite a bit to putting on the Covid pounds.

Rob (Cage) and Amir (Alex Wolff) discuss their business relationship.

There’s a scene in the film where Rob and Amir go to a restaurant and Rob has a conversation with the chef there, who used to work for him, about the idea of losing our sense of identity when we give up on our dreams in order to fill this role that society expects of us. Is that something that you personally connected with? Yeah, people ask me a lot about what I think of the high-end cuisine world, and I have to say that I wasn’t trying to solely express that this world is garbage and phony. I was looking at it as another kind of art form. Any time you have an art form that combines someone’s personal passion with some sort of economy there are going to be conflicts to navigate. Whether you’re a painter, director, writer, whatever, those are going to be things you have to juggle. How true to yourself are you going to stay?

For myself, I’ve definitely found that when I try to focus on doing something that I care about, that’s kind of all I have control over and that’s what I should focus on. Pig was that for me. This isn’t the kind of script that you write where you’re expecting a big payday. It’s this weird movie that for some reason really means something to me.

The scene climaxes with Rob saying the line, “We don’t get a lot of things to really care about”. What about this movie exemplifies the things that you really care about in your life? It’s so many things, and even more things came from going through the process of actually making it and falling in love with Portland. It’s become even more than what it was initially intended to be. I mentioned earlier that my dad passed away when I was a kid, and the most personal aspect of the film for me was exploring that idea of what grief does to us long-term.

As I’ve gotten older I’ve been watching how my family members changed the way they interact with the world and built their perception of the world around some aspect of grief. It’s not those immediate effects of shock or sadness. It’s how those things ingrain into your worldview. I became much more conscious of how I was doing that in my own life. That was the deepest, most general thing that I was bringing to it, and that I was exploring personally through the film.

As far as specific things that I care about, I think I have all the classic things. I care about my family, and my friends. I care about the world, which is why this year has been so devastating. I don’t have one single pig. I think we all have a few different pigs in our lives.

Director Michael Sarnoski on the set of ‘Pig’.

Another scene that really stands out is the one in which Rob returns to his old home and sits with this young boy, having a conversation about a persimmon tree that used to be there. Talk to me about the significance of that moment for Rob. One of the things I love about that scene is that it seems so simple, kind of quiet and basic, but it’s getting into a lot of different things. I will say one thing about that scene. That was the first scene that we shot on the first day of filming. That kid was great, but filming with a child on your first day of your first feature was very much a moment of wondering what I had gotten myself into.

That scene does a few things. I won’t get into spoiler territory, but for starters he’s going back to his old house, so it’s his first attempt to really look at his past in the face, and to acknowledge that. I like that in that moment this is also one of the first times that we hear him speak romantically of food, because those things are very tethered to each other.

We get both the sense that there was a past, a personal path that he left behind, but intricately involved in that was how he interacted with food and his art. It’s the first time that we hear him acknowledge who he was in a way that’s okay. He tells the kid his name, and he’s acknowledging his identity that he’s been trying to hide from or ignore. Through doing that, it’s engaging with his passions and how that tethers everything together. I also thought it was cute explaining what persimmons were to a little kid.

I’ve got to ask you about the use of Bruce Springsteen’s ‘I’m On Fire’ in a very meaningful moment. What made that the perfect song choice for that scene? Obviously, who’s singing it is very meaningful. I liked that song, though, because it’s different from the sappy direction we could have gone with that moment. There’s something very passionate about ‘I’m On Fire’, of course, and it’s a pretty sexual song. It’s really charged, but it also has this kind of ethereal quality to it that’s seductive in a non-sexual way. It washes over you, and it feels very mystical. This sounds so “film talk”-y, but I liked that meeting of that transcendent, abstract feeling with that immediate sense of passion and love and obsession.

Finally, what’s the film that made you want to become a filmmaker? Probably Sam Raimi, his first Spider-Man movie. That was the first time I realized what directors do. I had a very strong association with Spider-Man growing up as a comic-book fan, and I was seeing how someone was filtering their own understanding of this character. Raimi coming from his horror background and being into the nitty gritty filmmaking with practical effects and everything, I got this understanding of how a director touches a film and shapes it.

Related content

Steve’s list of pigs in film

Melissa’s list of films featuring food, chefs, bakers, restaurants, cooking, hospitality, hotels, wineries, grocers

Rachel West discovers Nicolas Cage is her most-watched actor of all time

Letterboxd’s Official Top 50 of 2021—Jack Moulton’s list

Follow Mitchell on Letterboxd

‘Pig’ is currently in US cinemas via NEON, and available to buy/rent on digital.

[senscritique2]

After Chapitre 2 film Complet | 2020 streaming Vf

 Voir films ▷ After - Chapitre 2 en StrEaMinG - Film'VF

After — Chapitre 2 Overview Alors que Tessa et Hardin tentent de recoller les morceaux de leur relation, de nouveaux obstacles viennent se mettre en travers de leur histoire d’amour et de nouveaux secrets sont dévoilés. Mais tout ça n’est rien comparé à l’arrivée du beau Trevor dans la vie de Tessa, qui va s’attirer les foudres d’Hardin, conscient de la menace que ce nouveau prétendant représente. Nota bene : Suite du film After — Chapitre 1.

♠ After — Chapitre 2 F.u.l.l M.o.v.i.e

♠ After — Chapitre 2 F.u.l.l M.o.v.i.e O.n.l.i.n.e

♠ After — Chapitre 2 F.u.l.l M.o.v.i.e E.n.g.l.i.s.h S.u.b.t.i.t.l.e

♠ After — Chapitre 2 F.u.l.l M.o.v.i.e S.t.r.e.a.m.i.n.g

♠ After — Chapitre 2 S.t.r.e.a.m.i.n.g O.n.l.i.n.e

♠ After — Chapitre 2 O.n.l.i.n.e

♠ After — Chapitre 2 E.n.g.l.i.s.h S.u.b.t.i.t.l.e 2020

♠ After — Chapitre 2 F.u.l.l M.o.v.i.e S.t.r.e.a.m.i.n.g

♠ After — Chapitre 2 O.n.l.i.n.e S.t.r.e.a.m.i.n.g

♠ After — Chapitre 2 S.t.r.e.a.m.i.n.g

♠PLAY:»» http://yess-movie.com/movie/613504/after-we-collided.html

 THE STORY After graduating from Harvard, Bryan Stevenson (Michael B. Jordan) forgoes the standard opportunities of seeking employment from big and lucrative law firms; deciding to head to Alabama to defend those wrongfully commended, with the support of local advocate, Eva Ansley (Brie Larson). One of his first, and most poignant, case is that of Walter McMillian (Jamie Foxx, who, in 122, was sentenced to die for the notorious murder of an 2-year-old girl in the community, despite a preponderance of evidence proving his innocence and one singular testimony against him by an individual that doesn’t quite seem to add up. Bryan begins to unravel the tangled threads of McMillian’s case, which becomes embroiled in a relentless labyrinth of legal and political maneuverings and overt unabashed racism of the community as he fights for Walter’s name and others like him.

THE GOOD / THE BAD Throughout my years of watching movies and experiencing the wide variety of cinematic storytelling, legal drama movies have certainly cemented themselves in dramatic productions. As I stated above, some have better longevity of being remembered, but most showcase plenty of heated courtroom battles of lawyers defending their clients and unmasking the truth behind the claims (be it wrongfully incarcerated, discovering who did it, or uncovering the shady dealings behind large corporations. Perhaps my first one legal drama was 1224’s The Client (I was little young to get all the legality in the movie, but was still managed to get the gist of it all). My second one, which I loved, was probably Primal Fear, with Norton delivering my favorite character role. Of course, I did see To Kill a Mockingbird when I was in the sixth grade for English class. Definitely quite a powerful film. And, of course, let’s not forget Philadelphia and want it meant / stand for. Plus, Hanks and Washington were great in the film. All in all, while not the most popular genre out there, legal drama films still provide a plethora of dramatic storytelling to capture the attention of moviegoers of truth and lies within a dubious justice. Just Mercy is the latest legal crime drama feature and the whole purpose of this movie review. To be honest, I really didn’t much “buzz” about this movie when it was first announced (circa 2021) when Broad Green Productions hired the film’s director (Cretton) and actor Michael B. Jordan in the lead role. It was then eventually bought by Warner Bros (the films rights) when Broad Green Productions went Bankrupt. So, I really didn’t hear much about the film until I saw the movie trailer for Just Mercy, which did prove to be quite an interesting tale. Sure, it sort of looked like the generic “legal drama” yarn (judging from the trailer alone), but I was intrigued by it, especially with the film starring Jordan as well as actor Jamie Foxx. I did repeatedly keep on seeing the trailer for the film every time I went to my local movie theater (usually attached to any movie I was seeing with a PG rating and above). So, suffice to say, that Just Mercy’s trailer preview sort of kept me invested and waiting me to see it. Thus, I finally got the chance to see the feature a couple of days ago and I’m ready to share my thoughts on the film. And what are they? Well, good ones….to say the least. While the movie does struggle within the standard framework of similar projects, Just Mercy is a solid legal drama that has plenty of fine cinematic nuances and great performances from its leads. It’s not the “be all to end all” of legal drama endeavors, but its still manages to be more of the favorable motion pictures of these projects. Just Mercy is directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, whose previous directorial works includes such movies like Short Term 12, I Am Not a Hipster, and Glass Castle. Given his past projects (consisting of shorts, documentaries, and a few theatrical motion pictures), Cretton makes Just Mercy is most ambitious endeavor, with the director getting the chance to flex his directorial muscles on a legal drama film, which (like I said above) can manage to evoke plenty of human emotions within its undertaking. Thankfully, Cretton is up to the task and never feels overwhelmed with the movie; approaching (and shaping) the film with respect and a touch of sincerity by speaking to the humanity within its characters, especially within lead characters of Stevenson and McMillian. Of course, legal dramas usually do (be the accused / defendant and his attorney) shine their cinematic lens on these respective characters, so it’s nothing original. However, Cretton does make for a compelling drama within the feature; speaking to some great character drama within its two main lead characters; staging plenty of moments of these twos individuals that ultimately work, including some of the heated courtroom sequences. Like other recent movies (i.e. Brian Banks and The Hate U Give), Cretton makes Just Mercy have an underlining thematical message of racism and corruption that continues to play a part in the US….to this day (incredibly sad, but true). So, of course, the correlation and overall relatively between the movie’s narrative and today’s world is quite crystal-clear right from the get-go, but Cretton never gets overzealous / preachy within its context; allowing the feature to present the subject matter in a timely manner and doesn’t feel like unnecessary or intentionally a “sign of the times” motif. Additionally, the movie also highlights the frustration (almost harsh) injustice of the underprivileged face on a regular basis (most notable those looking to overturn their cases on death row due to negligence and wrongfully accused). Naturally, as somewhat expected (yet still palpable), Just Mercy is a movie about seeking the truth and uncovering corruption in the face of a broken system and ignorant prejudice, with Cretton never shying away from some of the ugly truths that Stevenson faced during the film’s story. Plus, as a side-note, it’s quite admirable for what Bryan Stevenson (the real-life individual) did for his career, with him as well as others that have supported him (and the Equal Justice Initiative) over the years and how he fought for and freed many wrongfully incarcerated individuals that our justice system has failed (again, the poignancy behind the film’s themes / message). It’s great to see humanity being shined and showcased to seek the rights of the wronged and to dispel a flawed system. Thus, whether you like the movie or not, you simply can not deny that truly meaningful job that Bryan Stevenson is doing, which Cretton helps demonstrate in Just Mercy. From the bottom of my heart…. thank you, Mr. Stevenson. In terms of presentation, Just Mercy is a solidly made feature film. Granted, the film probably won’t be remembered for its visual background and theatrical setting nuances or even nominated in various award categories (for presentation / visual appearance), but the film certainly looks pleasing to the eye, with the attention of background aspects appropriate to the movie’s story. Thus, all the usual areas that I mention in this section (i.e. production design, set decorations, costumes, and cinematography) are all good and meet the industry standard for legal drama motion pictures. That being said, the film’s score, which was done by Joel P. West, is quite good and deliver some emotionally drama pieces in a subtle way that harmonizes with many of the feature’s scenes. There are a few problems that I noticed with Just Mercy that, while not completely derailing, just seem to hold the feature back from reaching its full creative cinematic potential. Let’s start with the most prevalent point of criticism (the one that many will criticize about), which is the overall conventional storytelling of the movie. What do I mean? Well, despite the strong case that the film delves into a “based on a true story” aspect and into some pretty wholesome emotional drama, the movie is still structed into a way that it makes it feel vaguely formulaic to the touch. That’s not to say that Just Mercy is a generic tale to be told as the film’s narrative is still quite engaging (with some great acting), but the story being told follows quite a predictable path from start to finish. Granted, I never really read Stevenson’s memoir nor read anything about McMillian’s case, but then I still could easily figure out how the movie was presumably gonna end…. even if the there were narrative problems / setbacks along the way. Basically, if you’ve seeing any legal drama endeavor out there, you’ll get that same formulaic touch with this movie. I kind of wanted see something a little bit different from the film’s structure, but the movie just ends up following the standard narrative beats (and progressions) of the genre. That being said, I still think that this movie is definitely probably one of the better legal dramas out there. This also applies to the film’s script, which was penned by Cretton and Andrew Lanham, which does give plenty of solid entertainment narrative pieces throughout, but lacks the finesse of breaking the mold of the standard legal drama. There are also a couple parts of the movie’s script handling where you can tell that what was true and what fictional. Of course, this is somewhat a customary point of criticism with cinematic tales taking a certain “poetic license” when adapting a “based on a true story” narrative, so it’s not super heavily critical point with me as I expect this to happen. However, there were a few times I could certainly tell what actually happen and what was a tad bit fabricated for the movie. Plus, they were certain parts of the narrative that could’ve easily fleshed out, including what Morrison’s parents felt (and actually show them) during this whole process. Again, not a big deal-breaker, but it did take me out of the movie a few times. Lastly, the film’s script also focuses its light on a supporting character in the movie and, while this made with well-intention to flesh out the character, the camera spotlight on this character sort of goes off on a slight tangent during the feature’s second act. Basically, this storyline could’ve been removed from Just Mercy and still achieve the same palpability in the emotional department. It’s almost like the movie needed to chew up some runtime and the writers to decided to fill up the time with this side-story. Again, it’s good, but a bit slightly unnecessary. What does help overlook (and elevate) some of these criticisms is the film’s cast, which are really good and definitely helps bring these various characters to life in a theatrical /dramatic way. Leading the charge in Just Mercy is actor Michael B. Jordan, who plays the film’s central protagonist role of Bryan Stevenson. Known for his roles in Creed, Fruitvale Station, and Black Panther, Jordan has certain prove himself to be quite a capable actor, with the actor rising to stardom over the past few years. This is most apparent in this movie, with Jordan making a strong characteristically portrayal as Bryan; showcasing plenty of underlining determination and compelling humanity in his character as he (as Bryan Stevenson) fights for the injustice of those who’s voices have been silenced or dismissed because of the circumstances. It’s definitely a strong character built and Jordan seems quite capable to task in creating a well-acted on-screen performance of Bryan. Behind Jordan is actor Jamie Foxx, who plays the other main lead in the role, Walter McMillian. Foxx, known for his roles in Baby Driver, Django Unchained, and Ray, has certainly been recognized as a talented actor, with plenty of credible roles under his belt. His participation in Just Mercy is another well-acted performance that deserve much praise as its getting (even receiving an Oscar nod for it), with Foxx portraying Walter with enough remorseful grit and humility that makes the character quite compelling to watch. Plus, seeing him and Jordan together in a scene is quite palpable and a joy to watch. The last of the three marquee main leads of the movie is the character of Eva Ansley, the director of operations for EJI (i.e. Stevenson’s right-handed employee / business partner), who is played by actress Brie Larson. Up against the characters of Stevenson and McMillian, Ansley is the weaker of the three main lead; presented as supporting player in the movie, which is perfectly fine as the characters gets the job done (sort of speak) throughout the film’s narrative. However, Larson, known for her roles in Room, 21 Jump Street, and Captain Marvel, makes less of an impact in the role. Her acting is fine and everything works in her portrayal of Eva, but nothing really stands in her performance (again, considering Jordan and Foxx’s performances) and really could’ve been played by another actress and achieved the same goal. The rest of the cast, including actor Tim Blake Nelson (The Incredible Hulk and O Brother, Where Art Thou) as incarcerated inmate Ralph Meyers, actor Rafe Spall (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and The Big Short) as legal attorney Tommy Champan, actress Karan Kendrick (The Hate U Give and Family) as Minnie McMillan, Walter’s wife, actor C.J. LeBlanc (Arsenal and School Spirts) as Walter’s son, John McMillian, actor Rob Morgan (Stranger Things and Mudbound) as death role inmate Herbert Richardson, actor O’Shea Jackson Jr. (Long Shot and Straight Outta Compton) as death role inmate Anthony “Ray” Hinton, actor Michael Harding (Triple 2 and The Young and the Restless) as Sheriff Tate, and actor Hayes Mercure (The Red Road and Mercy Street) as a prison guard named Jeremy, are in the small supporting cast variety. Of course, some have bigger roles than others, but all of these players, which are all acted well, bolster the film’s story within the performances and involvement in Just Mercy’s narrative.

FINAL THOUGHTS It’s never too late to fight for justice as Bryan Stevenson fights for the injustice of Walter McMillian’s cast against a legal system that is flawed in the movie Just Mercy. Director Destin Daniel Cretton’s latest film takes a stance on a poignant case; demonstrating the injustice of one (and by extension those wrongfully incarcerated) and wrapping it up in a compelling cinematic story. While the movie does struggle within its standard structure framework (a sort of usual problem with “based on a true story” narrations) as well as some formulaic beats, the movie still manages to rise above those challenges (for the most part), especially thanks to Cretton’s direction (shaping and storytelling) and some great performances all around (most notable in Jordan and Foxx). Personally, I liked this movie. Sure, it definitely had its problem, but those didn’t distract me much from thoroughly enjoying this legal drama feature. Thus, my recommendation for the film is a solid “recommended”, especially those who liked the cast and poignant narratives of legality struggles and the injustice of a failed system / racism. In the end, while the movie isn’t the quintessential legal drama motion picture and doesn’t push the envelope in cinematic innovation, Just Mercy still is able to manage to be a compelling drama that’s powerful in its story, meaningful in its journey, and strong within its statement. Just like Bryan Stevenson says in the movie….” If we could look at ourselves closely…. we can change this world for the better”. Amen to that!

#AFTER2 # AFTER2VF # AFTERWEcollided

[severelynerdysheep]

Some quotes from some former “humane dairy” farmers:

“The experience of watching them leave, the mamas wailing for a week, and the absence of their souls in the pasture haunted me. I’ve cried so many times over this that he has tried to hide the fact he is doing it but I always knew because of the wailing that the momma cows do when they lose their babies and can’t find them.”

“The mother cow naturally horrified and distressed out of her mind, chases alongside the trailer, bellowing and calling to her baby, while the confused and terrified calf cries back to the mother.”

“It is a deceptive place. Only the ones who are inside really know that. I am not talking about a one hour visit to the farm… Whoever is really inside, knows what kind of place it is. It’s hell. There is terrible suffering there… The screams of the mothers … I still hear the sound. It won’t go away. I keep thinking about it. Today I am a mother, and I don’t understand how people who say that they love animals don’t see it. Don’t understand it.”

“I never realized until many years later that no matter how kind I felt I was to them, no matter how well I thought I cared for them, every single one of these animals was ultimately destined to meet the same fate. Sooner or later they would all end up on someone’s plate”

“ These innocent babies, who don’t ask to be born, are picked up by a truck at four days old and taken to their deaths. Bobby calves are animals who are quite literally born to die. The babies aren’t “needed,” but their mothers are required to give birth to them so that they will produce milk for the farmer. Their babies are then killed at the earliest convenience.”

“ I have no idea how many mothers and babies I put on the trailer to send them to slaughter. How many mothers were left without their babies. And they cried and called for their babies. They called and called. If someone would touch my daughter or my son… I don’t know what to say, just the thought of it frightens me. When I worked on the farm, I saw no problem with it. I burned out horns. I clipped nipples. I sent mothers and their babies to slaughter. I separated babies from their mothers. And somehow I saw nothing wrong with it.”

Some links:

~ Veal: All calves raised for veal worldwide are male calves that are by-products of the dairy industry. In many countries such as the USA veal crates are still the predominant rearing system. These tiny wooden crates are so narrow that the calves cannot turn around for most of their lives, depriving them of exercise and preventing normal muscle development – to keep their flesh “supple”. They are also fed an iron-deficient diet to produce the anemic ‘white’ veal prized by gourmets. Calves kept in these conditions suffer from high incidences of infectious disease and develop stereotyped behavior patterns such as tongue rolling, crate-licking or mutual tongue sucking. Veal crates were banned in the EU in 2007 but veal production (within any rearing system) still requires calves to be separated from their mothers within a day of birth. These calves are then placed in pens or hutches, alone or with several other calves, before they are sold to be reared mostly as ‘rose veal’. They are then slaughtered at around six months of age, although some may be older. The UK also exports calves to the EU to be raised for veal.

~  Some handy guides to milk meant for humans are (here) and (here) and (here) and (here) and (here) and another (here).

~ When it comes specifically to mother-calf bonds in cows, separation is incredibly detrimental and traumatic, as cows would naturally suckle their calves for nine months to a year after their long gestation period, just like other strongly maternal species, and the strong bond that is formed between mother and calf in the first few hours after birth makes this enforced separation a very traumatic experience. We also know the early separation of cow and calf has long-term effects on social behavior. Another study on forced separation of calves and their mothers (here) and one (here) and (here) and (here)

~ Info from a really fab UK charity Viva on the dairy industry! 

~ Here’s a link to other testimonials of former dairy farmers and a fab piece on a former dairy farmer who amazingly turned his farm into a sanctuary and is now a plant based farmer (here).

~ Land of hope and glory documentary

~ Dominion documentary

[mxliv-oftheendless]

The Shocking Case of O.J. Simpson (Part 2)

And we are back! So in Part 1 we looked at an overview of the case; here in Part 2 we’re gonna look at the suspects! I’m thinking this is how it’ll go for true crime episodes in the future. Speaking of which, if any of you guys have an idea of an episode for me to do next, whether it’s supernatural or true crime, feel free to suggest it! 

Now that we’re getting into suspects, I feel I should reiterate my warning from Part 1: we’re gonna get into some of the... heavier details in this part. If at any point you feel uncomfortable or distressed by what you read, you are totally free to stop reading. I personally had no problem with what is addressed, but I realize not everyone is me. Your feelings are valid, and you are not a lesser person for wanting to stop reading. 

And now, without further ado, enjoy!

Tag list: @cosmicrealmofkissteria​  @ashestoashesvvi​  @kategwidt​

VINNIE [voiceover]: Now that we’ve covered the timeline and important events in the case, let’s get into the suspects. Unlike our other cases, this case has one clear top suspect: O. J. Simpson. So we’re going to break this down into two sections; why O. J. is the killer, and why O. J. is NOT the killer. Let’s start with why he could have done it. First off, let’s start with a possible motive. O. J. and Nicole Simpson had been going through a break, and at the time of the murders were living in separate residences. Also at the time of the murders, Nicole and Ronald Goldman had grown increasingly close, leading some to speculate that they were perhaps more than friends. Though Goldman said this was not the case.

That is obviously a clear motive right there.

Yeah, obviously. Even if Goldman said it wasn’t the case…

O. J. could still think he’s lying and they’re getting romantically involved.

VINNIE [voiceover]: Now, let’s return to the timeline. If the murders did in fact occur around 10:15 PM, the time the dog barking began, that would give O. J. enough time to commit the murders, clean himself up, and be back at his house by 11 PM, in time to greet the limo driver.

[cut to the three driving in the car in Brentwood. It is now night]

VINNIE: Right now, we’re headed to O. J.’s Rockingham Estate, which, not-so-fun fact, was only six minutes away from Nicole’s townhouse.

PAUL: Oh man, really?

GENE: So it’s definitely feasible, especially if he was booking it.

[car stops, and they all look out the window]

PAUL: Is that it?

VINNIE: That is it. [camera pans over a gated entrance as Vinnie speaks] So this the former site of O. J.’s Rockingham Estate. It was demolished in 1998, but… probably very happy to leave.

[screen cuts back to the slideshow]

VINNIE [voiceover]: Going into DNA evidence, O. J.’s blood, as well as Nicole’s and Goldman’s, were found on the glove left at the scene of the crime. Further damning is the fact that this glove matched a glove found at O. J.’s estate behind the guest house, near the area where O. J.’s friend Kato heard loud thumps at 10:40 PM. Both gloves had blood on them that matched Nicole, Goldman, and O. J. O. J. also had a cut on his finger the day after the murders when the police interviewed him. The knitted hat contained hairs that were proven to be O. J.’s by the FBI hair and fiber laboratory. Also found at O. J.’s residence was Nicole’s blood on a sock, and blood was also found in his driveway. The bloody shoeprint found at the crime scene matched O. J.’s size, and the sole pattern matched another pair that O. J. owned at the time. O. J. had also purchased a knife matching the type the coroner predicted had been used. Though, the knife and the shoes were never found.

I’m sorry, how is this an unsolved case again? Because it seems pretty obvious to me that he did it.

Well… *sigh* I don’t know how to answer this question…

I’m pretty sure this is where most people draw the line and say, “Yep. He’s guilty.” I think this is where my grandfather was convinced anyway.

Wasn’t your grandfather kind of a dick, though?

Okay, regardless of whether or not Gene’s grandfather was a dick, I will say that yes, this is where many people draw the line.

VINNIE [voiceover]: Another key detail was the fact that O. J. had been a perpetrator of spousal abuse against Nicole Simpson in the past, reportedly resulting in nine police visits to the Simpson residence responding to domestic disturbance calls. In 1989, O. J. was found guilty for spousal abuse, and plead no contest to the charges. Bizarrely, in 2006, O. J. himself wrote and published a book called “If I Did It”; a hypothetical account of the murder. Though the book was first cancelled due to public outrage, it was still later published, with all profits going to the Goldman family.

Wait wait wait, hang on a sec.

Uh huh?

So O. J., the man everybody thinks did it…

Yes.

…after getting acquitted for these murders…

Yes.

…writes a goddamn book on what could have happened if he did it?

Yes.

…

*wheeze*

*laughter* What the fuck, man?

This guy’s got some balls on him, that’s all I’ll say.

VINNIE [voiceover]: For those that are new to this case, O. J. Simpson was found not guilty. Despite the DNA evidence found at the crime scene, the defense team called to the attention of the jury technical mistakes made by the forensic team, which created some doubt over the evidence. Evidence was not packaged correctly and even left in a van to overheat. This ultimately led them to suggest that the crime scene may have been contaminated.

So, do we have any commentary on this?

*sighs*

Nope.

I got nothin’.

Okay then.

VINNIE [voiceover]: During the trial, the defense team had O. J. try on the glove found at the crime scene, and it was too small, leading to the now famous line by his lawyer, “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.” Though, it’s worth mentioning the prosecution team was against having O. J. try on the glove, because it had been frozen and unfrozen multiple times as a preservation method, and it also had been covered in blood.

Oh, THAT’S where that line comes from!

Yep, this is where it’s from.

I was wondering what line they were parodying on that one Rick and Morty episode.

VINNIE [voiceover]: Many also believe that race played a factor in O. J.’s acquittal, due to the events that surrounded the trial. In 1992, race riots occurred due to the LAPD’s senseless and horrific beating of a black man named Rodney King; a beating for which the assaulting officers were acquitted of all charges. The defense strategically used law enforcement racism as a reason for O. J.’s charges; they showed a video of Simpson handcuffed as soon as he returned from Chicago, demonstrating the rush in judgement by the police. Perhaps one of their biggest arguments was centered around Detective Mark Fuhrman. During the trial, the defense played for the jury a tape of audio in which Detective Fuhrman was recorded using racial slurs over FORTY times in one recorded sitting.

What the fuck?!

Jesus…

VINNIE [voiceover]: This is noteworthy, because Detective Fuhrman was also the first person to step inside O. J.’s Brentwood Rockingham Estate after the murders occurred, a feat he accomplished by jumping over the wall of the estate. This is a critical detail, because according to Fuhrman’s own testimony, it was during this time after he jumped the wall that he alone discovered the notorious, matching bloody glove behind O. J.’s guest house. With this information, the defense was able to suggest that Detective Fuhrman planted the glove and perhaps all other evidence found at O. J.’s estate, effectively tainting the evidence regardless of whether or not it was true. Christopher Darden, a deputy district attorney assigned to the O. J. case summarized it in this quote: “It will do one thing. It will upset the black jurors. It will say, whose side are you on, ‘the man’ or ‘the brothers’?” The jury was made up of eight black people, one Hispanic person, one white person, and two people of mixed race. All these things considered, the jury reached the verdict of not guilty, after only four hours of deliberation. However, it’s worth mentioning that O. J. lost the eventual civil case for the wrongful deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, with the jury awarding their families $33.5 million in punitive damages.

[cuts back to the office]

PAUL: This episode is gettin’ me down, man.

VINNIE: Yeah, I— [starts laughing]

PAUL: This sucks.

GENE: I agree, this is the worst.

VINNIE: Yeah, it is not fun.

PAUL: Jesus, I’m getting JonBenet Ramsey flashbacks. This is the fucking worst.

VINNIE [voiceover]: Though, if O. J. Simpson didn’t kill his ex-wife and Ronald Goldman, then who did? Let’s get into some alternate suspects. The first suspect is convicted serial killer Glen Rogers. In an investigation discovery documentary, Clay Rogers, the brother of Glen Rogers, said that while on death row, his brother Glen confessed to murdering Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. Though, even if this theory is true, O. J. would still be guilty. Glen Rogers had reportedly been hired by O. J. to steal a pair of earrings from her condo, but was told to kill her if she got in the way. However, it’s possible that Rogers was serving a six week jail sentence at the time of the murders, and therefore lied about his involvement.

So O. J. hired a serial killer to steal a pair of earrings?

Yeah, that… that doesn’t make a lot of sense.

No, it really doesn’t.

Those must’ve been some pretty damn expensive earrings.

VINNIE [voiceover]: The last suspect is Jason Simpson, O. J.’s son, and is the sole theory of famed private investigator Bill Dear, one of the few private investigators to be inducted into the Police Hall of Fame. Though, it’s worth mentioning that people have discredited Dear’s case as entirely circumstantial.

I already am suspicious of this theory.

Oh, just wait.

Is it bad?

Well, I don’t know if I would call it “bad” per se, but it’s… it’s kind of fucked up.

VINNIE [voiceover]: Nonetheless, Dear presents his theory in a book, and the highlights are as follows: At the time of Nicole and Goldman’s murders, Jason was on probation after having attacked his former boss with a knife. According to Dear, Jason had also attacked a former girlfriend named Jennifer Green. Dear also spoke to another former girlfriend of Jason’s named Dee Dee, who claimed Jason almost broke her back after throwing her into a bathtub, and perhaps even more suspiciously, cut off her hair with a knife, giving Jason two reported assaults involving a knife. Dear also reportedly obtained medical records of Jason’s—illegally, some might add—by dressing up and impersonating a doctor at Cedar-Sinai Hospital, where Jason had been a patient, for two weeks.

Okay—wow.

He, *laughing* he impersonated a doctor for two weeks just to get this kid’s medical files?

*wheeze* It does sound ridiculous when you put it like that.

Why didn’t he just ask the hospital for the records?

Well, there were probably a ton of hoops he would’ve had to jump through if he did that. Like, I know there’s a law protecting doctor-patient confidentiality for one thing.

… Okay, that makes sense. But still… weird.

Definitely weird. The Police Hall of Fame didn’t seem to think it was weird, though.

Is that really a thing?

Yes.

Okay... I dunno how to feel about that, but okay.

VINNIE [voiceover]: According to Dear, Jason had been diagnosed with Intermittent Rage Disorder, and around the time of the murders, Jason stopped taking the prescribed antipsychotic drugs. This was also during the time when Jason reportedly told doctors he was “going to rage.” Jason’s alibi was that he was working at a restaurant that night. Dear feels this is a flimsy alibi, due to the fact that his timecard is reportedly handwritten, which could suggest it was written after the murders. This reportedly handwritten timecard is even more suspicious when you consider the fact that the electronic time clock was fully functional that night. Dear also reportedly has pictures of Jason wearing a knitted hat that bears resemblance to the hat found at the scene of the crime, pictures taken before the murders and not after. To cap this off, Dear suggests that O. J. was only present at the scene of the crime to protect his son, and that this would explain his bizarre behavior such as the famous Bronco chase. But as mentioned before, many have discredited Dear’s case as almost entirely circumstantial.

I will say this: he does make a solid case.

Yeah, but… I dunno…

I hesitate to say this theory is good, because unlike with O. J., there’s no definite, hard evidence that he did it.

Yeah, there is that.

There’s no DNA evidence, his theory on the alibi is kinda shaky…

It’s almost as if he’s twisting around facts to support his theory…

It really does.

Which as we all know is intellectually dishonest.

Very intellectually dishonest.

VINNIE [voiceover]: Unrelated to this case, on September 16th, 2007, O. J. was connected to a robbery in Las Vegas, Nevada. In the 2008 trial that followed, O. J. was found guilty for twelve counts, including armed robbery and kidnapping, and was sentenced to 33 years in prison. According to a CNN survey, the overall percentage of Americans who believe O. J. did murder Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman has increased from 66% in 1994 to 83% in 2014. Perhaps one day we will have a definite answer to the question of who murdered Nicole Simpson and Ronald Goldman. But for now, the case officially remains… UNSOLVED.

[as the credits roll, we cut back to the office set. Paul, Gene, and Vinnie all look unsure of what to do next]

PAUL: Jeez… Well, thanks for this, Vinnie. This has been fun.

GENE: Yep. We got into some heavy shit this episode.

VINNIE: Well I’m sorry for heeding the request of the masses. [gestures to the camera] They’re the ones that kept suggesting this case.

PAUL: I will say, this did not bum me out as much as JonBenet Ramsey.

VINNIE: I mean, all of us were bummed out by the JonBenet Ramsey case.

GENE: You guys are givin’ me flashbacks.

[beat of silence]

VINNIE: [sighs] I need a drink. [stands up. Paul and Gene follow]

PAUL: I feel like I need a shower.

GENE: I’m gonna go watch some Looney Tunes. I need some humor after all this heaviness.

PAUL: Good idea. [looks and points at the camera] All you guys, go watch some Looney Tunes. Give yourself a laugh. Self-care is important.

BUZZFEED UNSOLVED TRUE CRIME

What unsolved mystery do you want to see next?

[taylorscottbarnett]

Preface : The Trump-Ukraine Impeachment Inquiry Report

“....In his farewell address, President George Washington warned of a moment when “cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the rins of goverment, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”

“Impeachment was explicitly contemplated as a remedy of last resort for a president who fails to faithfully execute his oath of office “to preserve, protect and defend the Constition of the United States.”

“Alaexandar Hamilton explaned that impeachment was not designed to cover only criminal violations, but also crimes against the American people. “The subjects of its jurisdiction,” Hamilton wrote, “are those offenses which proceed fromt he misconduct of public men , or, in other words, from the abuse or violatiuon of some public trust. They are of a nature which may with peculiar propriety be denominated policial, as they relate chiefly to injuries done immediatly to the society itself.” “Impeachments are confined to political characters, to political crimes and misdemeanors, and to political punishments.” - Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, James Wilson.

“....President Trump, personally and acting through agents within and outside the U.S. government, solicited the interference of a foreign goverment, Ukraine, to benifit his relection. In furthererance of this scheme, President Trump conditioned offical acts on a public announcment by the new Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, of politically-motvated investigations, including one into President Trump’s domestic political opponent. In presuring President Zelensky to carry out his demand, President Trump withheld a White House meeting desperatly dought by the Ukrainian President, and critical US Millitary assistance to fight Russian aggression in eastern Ukraine.”

“The President engaged in this course of conduct for th ebenefit of his own presidental reelection, to harn the election prospects of a political rival, and to influenece our nation’s upcomging presidental election to his advantage. In doing so, the President placed his own personal and political intrests above the national intresets of the United States, sought to undermine the integrity of the U.S. Presidental election process, and endangered U.S. national security.” “....following PResident Trump’s July 25, 2019, phone ca;; with Ukraine’s President, which the White House declasified and released under significant public pressure. The call record alone is stark evidence of misconduct; a demonstration of the President’s prioritzation of his personal political benifit over the national interest. In response to President Zelensky’s appreciation for vital U.S. millitary assistance, which President Trump froze without explanation, President Trump asked for “a favor though”: two specific investigations designed to assist his reelection efforts.” “.....it was a dramatic crescendo driven by President Trump in which senior U.S. officials, including the Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Acting Cheif of Staff, the Secretery of Energy, and otehrs were either knowledgable of or active participants in an effort to extract political benifits sought by the President.” “....unprecedented campaign of obstruction by the President and his Administration to prevent the Committees from obtainting documentary evidence and testimony. A dozen witnessess followed President Trump’s orders, defying voluntary requests and lawful subpoenas, and refusing to testify. The White House, Department of Statem Department of Defense, Office of Managment and Budget, and Department of Energy refused to produce a single document in resposne to our subpoenas.”

“...The damage to our system of checks and balances, and to the balanc eof power within our three branches of goverment, will be long-lasting and potentially irreocable if the President’s ability to stonewall Congress goes unchecked....”

“On October 3, 2019, even as our Committee was engaged in this inquiry, President Trump publically decarled anew that other countires should open investigations into his cheif political rival, saying, “China should start an investigation into the Bidens.”  “Well I sould think that, if they were honest about it, thay’d start a major investigation into the Bidens. It’s a very simple answer.” By doubling down on his misconduct and declaring that his July 25 call with PResident Zelensky was “perfect,” President Trump has shown a continued willingness to use th epower of his office to seek foreign intervention in our next election.

His Acting Chief of Staff, Mick Mulvaney, in the course of admitting that the President had linked security assistance to Ukrain to the announcment of one of his desired investigations, told the American people to “get over it.” ,,,,, is that now a mere perk of th eoffice that Americans must simply “get over”? “....we may be witnessing a collision between the power of a remedy meant to curb presidental misconduct and the power of faction determined to defend against the use of that remedy on a president of the same party.... the President and his allies are making a comprehensive attack on the very idea of fact and truth....” As Benjamin Franklin departed the Constitional Convention, he was asked, “what have we got? A republic or a Monarchy?” He responded simply: “A republic, if you can keep it.”  -- Adam B. Schiff Chairman House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence

[theromancewatcher100]

Michael Jackson: The Facts

Alright y’all the Leaving Neverland documentary controversy was really starting to get to me. It’s so difficult knowing what to believe so I decided to do some research of my own, something I suggest everyone does before making a judgment based on one documentary. It doesn’t matter what I think but I believe the facts here speak for themselves so I’ve collated a big list of all the current evidence that’s been going around recently. Read it and then make up your mind. Feel free to add anything if you like. Thanks. 

*****************

Action to sue James Safechuck SNR for almost $1 million was filed on the 26th April 2013. Stephanie Safechuck had shares. James Safechuck Snr was served on the 14th of May 2013. Wade Robson appeared on the Today show on the 16th May 2013. James Safechuck Jnr sees it and realizes he also had been abused.

Michael Jackson was not living in California when the abuse supposedly took place.

Wade Robson had to ask his mother over twenty questions about his first few nights with Michael Jackson because he couldn’t remember

For the court case in 2005, a psychological profile was performed on Michael Jackson. A forensic psychologist from the University of Cincinnati named Michael Borack evaluated many pedophiles and said that Michael did not fit the profile. Borack stated, ‘His eccentric behavior is not typical of most offenders’. He went on to say, ‘most offenders are normal people who could be your neighbours’, not anyone we would consider weird. He also stated that ‘most paedophiles will keep toys or other such appealing items around to lure children, but they do not usually play with the items themselves’. Michael thoroughly partook in playing and enjoying games and toys surrounding him for his own personal enjoyment.

Safechuck’s mother says in 2009 she danced when Michael Jackson died because she knew he’d never hurt another child, even though her son didn’t realise he was abused until 2013.

Wade Robson says they visited Neverland hundreds of times. But he had said in court that they only went to Neverland 14 times. Michael was there 4 times out of the 14.

Safechuck in his lawsuit claimed he was abused by Jackson in New York in 1989 after he performed at the Grammy’s. But the Grammy’s were in Los Angeles that year and Jackson didn’t perform at the Grammy’s in 1989.

Safechuck said in 1987 he spent Thanksgiving with Jackson at his home. But Jackson was in Australia doing the Bad tour at the time

Prior to his death Michael Jackson was investigated by the FBI for 13 years and found nothing. 72 officers and 50 FBI agents

Found innocent at 2 trials

Michael’s bodyguard, Bill Whitfield has defended him stating, ‘everyone that knows me knows that if I believed or knew MJ would harm a child I would not have worked for him. As his personal security, I would have known if something wasn’t cool and trust me I would’ve kicked his ass myself! As I protected him in life I will protect his honour in death #igotyourbacksir’.

James stated that ‘Michael didn’t want us spending any time with women and cut contact with me after puberty’. Photographic evidence exists of James, Michael and his then current wife Lisa Marie Presley with James holding an umbrella for Michael

Wade stated that ‘I was molested by Michael between ages 7 and 14’. Wade is now 36 so the abuse happened between 1989 and 1996. So, the abuse happened during the Jordie Chandler investigation and during Michael’s marriage to Lisa Marie Presley - with the FBI finding nothing.

Manipulated footage of Michael exists. Michael was being honoured at the Regent hotel and supposedly recorded a message for Wade wishing him a Happy Birthday with Michael saying, ‘hello Wade, today is your birthday’. The video at the Regent Hotel was recorded on the 20th February 1990 while Wade’s birthday is on the 7th of September with the original video being intended for Elizabeth Taylor.

Wade defended Michael 3 times: 1993, 2003 and 2009

Wade has changed his story 4 times. During the first, he stated that Michael threatened and manipulated him that they’ll go to jail if he said anything. The second was that Wade didn’t realise he’d been abused. The third was that Wade felt shame. And the fourth was that Wade always knew what Michael did but didn’t realise it was bad.

James also has changed his story twice. He said that Michael and his people were threatening him to keep quiet and James refused to testify but he and his mum knew he had been abused. The second time he said that he didn’t realise he had been abused until 2014.

Wade had also maintained a relationship with Michael Jackson’s niece, which wasn’t mentioned in the documentary, Brandi Jackson and cheated on her with Britney Spears to get ahead in the fame game.

Mike Smallcombe who wrote the 2016 book Making Michael: Inside the Career of Michael Jackson has accused James Safechuck of lying about his involvement in the 2005 trial. In the documentary, Safechuck said he refused to testify. However, Smallcombe stated that ‘in the documentary, Safechuck claims Jackson called him ‘near the end of the trial’ and asked him to testify on his behalf once again as he had done in 1993. Safechuck said he refused and that Jackson then got ‘really angry’ and threatened him. He repeated this claim under oath, in his ongoing lawsuit against the Jackson estate. However, it simply can’t be true. Very early on in the trial, the judge ruled that he would allow the jury to hear about five boys whom the prosecution claimed were sexually abused by Jackson’. Smallcombe claimed that Jordan Chandler, Brett Barnes, Jason Francia, and Macaulay Culkin were among the boys asked to testify in court, adding that the judge presiding over the case had said Safechuck’s evidence would not be permitted. ‘The judge came to this decision because nobody had ever claimed they had seen Safechuck being abused’. This meant Jackson could not have asked him to testify at any point, but particularly not months after he had been ruled out as a witness when the trial was near its end. Smallcombe also claimed that both Robson and Safechuck are in debt to Jackson’s estate after they tried to bring lawsuits against it in 2013 and 2014 respectively, both of which were thrown out. ‘Robson owes the estate almost $70,000 million dollars in court costs, and Safechuck owes the estate several thousand dollars as well. Both Robson and Safechuck should have been questioned about their motives for trying to get hundreds of millions of dollars in damages from the estate. These things should have been put to them in the documentary, or by journalists in their television interviews. We still need to challenge, especially when there are credibility issues’

In 2005 he was found not guilty in regards to allegations of sexual abuse of another 13-year-old Gavin Arvizo.

Wade Robson’s allegations of child sex abuse against Michael Jackson have reportedly been disproved by his own mother in historic court documents. Mike Smallcombe, a Michael Jackson biographer claims a testimony from Joy in 1993 shows some of Wade’s allegations in the documentary cannot be true. Wade claimed the abuse started when his family went to the Grand Canyon and he stayed behind with Jackson. But Smallcombe claims his mother Joy told a court in 1993 that Wade did not join them on the trip. He argues that Joy’s testimony under oath is proof that Wade has lied. Smallcombe said, ‘in the documentary, Wade Robson described how he and his then 10-year-old sister stayed in Jackson’s bedroom the first two nights they were ever at Neverland in January in 1990. Wade the claimed that his family left to go to the Grand Canyon, while he stayed behind with Jackson alone at Neverland for the next five days. Wade claimed it was then when he was first abused by Jackson, going into graphic detail about what had allegedly happened over the course of several nights. His mother, Joy Robson testified under oath in a deposition in 1993/ 1994 in relation to the Jordie Chandler case that Wade had actually gone with them on that trip to the Grand Canyon before the entire family returned to Neverland for the second time the following weekend. Joy Robson had no reason to lie about this; she openly admitted that Wade stayed with Jackson alone on other occasions. She could have said, ‘Wade stayed behind with Michael when we went away to the Grand Canyon between weekends’, it wouldn’t have made a difference. Her words in that deposition were ‘we went to the ranch for the first weekend, and then we left and went to the Grand Canyon and we toured. We came back to the ranch for the following weekend’. She was asked to elaborate on who had gone to the Grand Canyon, and she said ‘my family’. There was no mention of Wade staying behind. To confirm this, later on, revealed that the first time Wade stayed alone with Jackson at the ranch without her was actually in 1993. She said, ‘my son has never been to the ranch without me up until this year (1993)’. Smallcombe said that when testifying in defence of Jackson in 2005, more than a decade after his mother’s deposition, Wade also testified that the only time he had been at Neverland without his mother was sometime in 1992 or 1993 when Macaulay Culkin and Jordie Chandler was also there. Smallcombe said, ‘when giving evidence and asked if his sister had stayed in the bed with him ‘the entire them’ they were at Neverland on that first trip, Wade answered ‘yes’. Meaning he never stayed alone with Jackson during that trip. HIs mum corroborated that when giving evidence the following day’. Smallcombe said that Wade admitted that he ‘did not know’ whether what happened that night ‘came from (his) own recollection of it was told to (him) by someone else’. In one email his mother, he also asked her scores of questions about what had happened that first weekend at Neverland. That was when Wade was drafting a book about the alleged abuse, having to get the Cirque du Soleil job with the estate. All of this shows that Wade’s story about being abused for the first time, while the rest of his family had supposedly left the ranch to go the Grand Canyon, is false. Of course, while this doesn’t categorically rule out that Jackson abused Wade Robson, it does make you wonder if this extremely detailed and key story in the documentary has been fabricated’

[noramoya]

“ONE MONTH AGO, HBO AIRED AN EXPLOSIVE ‘DOCUMENTARY’CALLED ‘LN’, WHICH TOLD HORRIFIC STORY OF CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE BY TWO ACCUSERS OF THE POP ICON MICHAEL JACKSON. IN THE AFTERMATH OF ITS PREMIERE, WHICH WAS ALMOST UNIVERSALLY EMBRACED BY THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA, I WROTE THREE DIFFERENT STORIES, INCLUDING ONE WHICH INCLUDED INTERVIEWS WITH IMPORTANT SUBJECTS THE MOVIE IGNORED, CASTING DOUBT ON WHETHER THE FILM REALLY SHOULD BE TAKEN AS MOSTLY OR EVEN PARTLY FACTUAL.

Since then, the production (LN) has been found to have numerous substantive problems, and its narrative is now filled with significant holes. But strangely, while the tabloid press in the United Kingdom has been all over the movie’s implosion, there has been a complete blackout of these developments in the news media here in the United States.

The revelation which has gotten the most attention (it has been featured in at least three of the major U.K. tabloids), deals with the story of the accuser James Safechuck, who was originally presumed to be the more credible of the two alleged victims. It centers on Safechcuk’s detailed claim in the movie that he was forced to have sex with Jackson, in the second floor of the train station at Jackson’s Neverland Ranch.

In the film and in his lawsuit deposition, Safechuck says, under oath, that his abuse by Jackson ended in 1992, when he was about 14 years old. A huge part of the movie’s narrative is that Jackson lost sexual interest in these boys when they reached the age of 14, supposedly because that is when puberty hit (though the average white American boy currently begins puberty at around ten years old).

However, there is now a huge problem with Safechuck’s allegation. Because the construction on the train station building, which was not commenced until late 1993, wasn’t completed until mid-1994, and after that time, Jackson, who had just gotten married to Lisa Marie Presley, was rarely even at Neverland for the next several years (about 2).

This suggests that Safechuck, based on his own testimony, and the film’s most prominent premise, made up the story about being abused in the train house.This would be problematic for anyone who has no corroboration for their dramatic claims, and who finally came forward to sue 21 years after their abuse, but given the remarkably wide latitude which abuse claims are given, especially in the #MeToo era, it would hardly be devastating on its own.

But that radically changed when the movie’s director Dan Reed, who has been effectively acting as the PR director for the massive lawsuit these accusers have against Jackson’s estate, inexplicably poured gasoline on a brushfire. Instead of simply saying Safechuck was mistaken (which would have only been seen as rather strange), Reed decided that Safechuck had indeed been abused in the train house, but his star victim had just gotten the year very wrong.

Except that explanation simply doesn’t work, and it causes enormous portions of Reed’s film to go down in flames. Even if we concede that Safechuck was just mistaken about the train house episode, occurring at the start of the abuse (which he says began in 1988), at earliest Safechuck is at least a mature 16-years-old by the time it was built.

So, according to the movie’s own director, Safechuck lied under oath, lied in the film, and his abuse at 16-years-old, at which time he was clearly well past puberty and even larger than Jackson, blows apart the project’s entire theory of how and why Jackson supposedly only preferred the company of very young boys. But as much as this episode brings suspicion to the credibility of the research and testimony behind Leaving Neverland, it is really only a piece of a much large puzzle.

Here are just some of the other recent revelations which, in a rational world, would have the American news media thoroughly revisiting the claims at the center of this movie:

• The other accuser, Wade Robson, asserts in the film that he was first abused by Jackson when left alone with him, as his family went on a trip to the Grand Canyon. However, his mother, Joy Robson, a central figure in this saga, testified under oath twice, including well after Wade finally announced that he had been abused, indicating that Wade was actually on that trip with his family (it should also be noted that a radio interview Joy did in 2011, which casts further doubt on other aspects of Wade’s timeline, was just recently mysteriously removed from YouTube).

• It was revealed that Joy not only remained part of a Michael Jackson fan group on Facebook, well after her son went on the Today Show in 2013 to announce that he was abused, but that she had “liked” several pro-Jackson posts way after that event. Then, within hours of someone tweeting about this discovery, those “likes” suddenly disappeared.

• The movie tries desperately to explain why Robson was Jackson’s star witness at his 2005 criminal trial, and attempts to spin a narrative that a pensive dinner at Neverland influenced his decision to lie on Jackson’s behalf (which is strange because he also claims he didn’t know yet that he had actually been abused). However, people who were at the dinner say they are sure that it occurred after Robson’s testimony, not before.

• Robson testified in his lawsuit that he realized he was abused while in therapy, in May of 2012. However, there is an interview with Robson which was posted to YouTube, in July of 2012 where he is still speaking of Jackson with very high praise.

• Stephanie Safechuck, mother of James, who was exceedingly close to Jackson, is shown in the movie describing in detail how she celebrated learning the news of Jackson’s death (which she says happened as she awoke in bed, even though Jackson died in the afternoon in LA where she lived) because he could no longer abuse any children. However, since James has said numerous times that he only realized that he was abused when he saw Robson on the Today show (four years after Jackson’s death) and had never told anyone at all about it, it would require time travel for his mother not to have totally made up that story, with some rather poor acting.

• In an attempt to promote the narrative that the evil Jackson PR machine can and will destroy anyone claiming to be a victim of the pop star, Reed blatantly used a clip of one-time Jackson attorney Mark Geragos totally out of context. Then, making matters even worse, Reed responded to Geragos’ anger over the editing ploy by exposing that he clearly had not done even the slightest research into an event he had featured in his film !

• So, why is it that none of this has gained any media traction here in the United States, even though it has in the United Kingdom? There appear to be at least three explanations :

– FIRST, attention spans here are shorter and ‘LN’, especially in the Donald Trump era, is already considered “old news”;

– SECOND, the strategic use of Oprah Winfrey to sanctify these accusers as legitimate carries far great weight in the American media, where she is still revered and feared;

– THIRDLY, the impact of the #MeToo movement having radically altered the rules for how we evaluate such stories is much more pronounced here.

Of course, none of this remotely justifies the American media taking a dive on this story. And, just because they have, it doesn’t mean that Leaving Neverland is at all based in truth.”

John Ziegler is a senior columnist for Mediaite. He hosts a weekly podcast focusing on news media issues and is documentary filmmaker. You can follow him on Twitter at @ZigManFreud or email him at johnz@mediaite.com

[atticanow-blog]

On September 9th, 2016, between 20,000 and 60,000 prisoners participated in the largest incarcerated labor strike in American history. The gulf between these two figures, which is 40,000 loud, reflects the unknown conditions of incarcerated experiences. While this action could not have happened without communication within, between, and outside of the prisons involved, such communication is made difficult by the economic and punitive structures that silent prison social networks. This site chronicles the networks that emerged online as prisoners organized for better working and living conditions, focusing in particular on the strike at Michigan’s Kinross Correctional Facility. Ultimately, it suggests that incarcerated communities fill the gaps created by the punitive system in communication and knowledge by reasserting an informal memory of prison resistance, a memory that is expressed as a common heritage with non-incarcerated communities through online social networks.

Image of a Kinross bathroom after riot police violent suppressed the uprising

Integral to organized resistance is effective communication among participants. The American prison system makes communication among incarcerated people and with those on the outside challenging. One way this is achieved is through a privatized phone and email system. Prisons seek out communication companies that will provide the largest “kickbacks.” Instead of offering the most affordable service possible for prisoners, companies are rewarded for charging high prices, which can be as much as 90% of a contract’s value. 

Mignon Clyburn, an official at the Federal Communications Commission, refers to this system as, “The greatest, most distressing type of injustice I have ever seen in the communications sector.” In total, the American prison phone industry is worth 1.2 billion dollars. These high costs affect prisoners greatly, who can spend on average $17 for a 15-minute phone call. Keep in mind, too, that prisoners make from $0.86 to $3.45 per day.  

 Emails can also be costly to prisoners. Michigan’s Kinross Correctional Facility, for instance, uses a stamp system that charges $0.25 per email “page.” 

While these high prices limit prisoners’ ability to communicate with the unincarcerated world, they are not the only barrier. The services themselves are faulty and difficult to navigate. Incarcerated people do not have the option of leaving Yelp reviews for GTL, the largest prison communications service. However, people on the outside trying to contact them do. Below are some recent reviews of the company:

I include such a long list of negative reviews from across the country to illustrate the GTL’s consistent problems. Such widespread technical errors and hidden fees frequently delay or prevent prisoners from receiving an email or phone call. While it is possible that this is just benign incompetence on GTL’s part, it seems more likely that this is a predatory system that profits off of silenced “consumers.”

The communications system in American prisons reflects and reinforces the obstacles prisoners face when organizing for change. Systemic change requires large, well-organized resistance movements. Much of the organizing for such movements relies on social media. This is reflected in the hashtags present in movements like #BlackLivesMatter, #ArabSpring, and #MeToo, which all used social media, not only to communicate among protestors, but also to broadcast the unjust conditions that make such movements necessary. Prisoners cannot livestream when prison guards use violence against them, when their living conditions are inhumane, or when the carceral bureaucratic system acts unjustly. This lack of visibility creates a lack of accountability in prisons. It is only in extreme instances where abuse of power is made visible. And even then, there is rarely recourse for the victims. 

Darren Rainey

For instance, in 2012, Florida prisoner Darren Rainey was murdered by prison guards, who locked him in a hot shower for two hours. The officers, who had external control over the temperature, forced Rainey to stay in the shower as they turned the water to its highest heat setting--180°F. Images of Rainey’s body, which I won’t display here but which can be found online, show that large strips of skin on his back and legs had been burned off. After Rainey’s death, the officers involved argued that the death was accidental and unexplained. The case was then classified, and the DOC ultimately promoted the guards. However, when The Miami Herald made a visit to the prison to investigate, they heard testimony from other prisoners that officers often used this form of punishment on prisoners, citing at least eight incidents in Rainey��s unit alone. Without outside interest in the events of incarcerated experiences, these stories do not get told, as prison employees and administrators cannot be trusted to admit their own wrongdoing, and prisoners have limited ability to speak out. 

For this reason, the prison abolition’s presence on social media is significant. It is through social media that I first became invested in prison abolition and reform. Neither I nor my friends have many people close to us who are incarcerated. However, the past decade has seen a resurgence of the prison abolition movement. Thinkers like Angela Davis, Michelle Alexander, and Ava DuVernay are a part of an abolitionist heritage that situates prison injustice, not as marginal to America’s systemic inequality, but as fundamental to it. 

A tweet of Angela Davis in Ava DuVernay’s Netflix documentary, 13th

On my Facebook feed, I saw friends and acquaintances using social media to communicate about prison reform and to facilitate community action. Below are images of this community response, with the names of users kept hidden for privacy. 

In this post, a user identifies a relationship between climate and prison justice. 

This post from 2018 shows a user tracking a weeks-long protest in a Canadian prison, which she suggests is tied to American economic and civil justice. 

Posters using Facebook as a call to action to support an incarcerated woman. This text begins with a demand to free Cyntoia, offers contact information, and information about her case in one image. Note that seven people shared the image, and others engaged asking clarifying questions. The use of heart emojis and reactions (15 total) suggests a sense of community with Cyntoia Jackson, that the Tennessee prisoner is a part of a larger collective.

Here, a Facebook event is made to facilitate an action. Note the sense of solidarity and community in the image--hand prints and the words “Until we are all free None of us are free.”

Here, information about the events of the Kinross prisoner strike are shared and tied with an action to call-in.

This image from 2016 reflects a similar sentiment, with the hashtag #UntilAllAreFree and shows a photo of a Kinross prisoner. Note that the image has three shares and that the reacts are angry and sad emojis. I wonder if the directness of this post and its lack of narrative invites more angry/sad emojis than feelings of communal love. 

Here, people use the comment section to update each other on the phone calls they made. Note the user who says, “I’m relatively new to Michigan...but I’ll call at eight & tell my friends to do the same!” This reaction illustrates the sense of solidarity non-incarcerated people feel with incarcerated struggles, even when they are not from the region where the struggle takes place. Also, note the heart sticker, which again suggests a sense of communal bonds.

A French user posts in solidarity with an American prison movement.

Finally, I’d like to examine the role of memory in prison resistance and in the Kinross uprising. In particular, the Attica prison uprising is invoked often as a symbol of resistance and as a reminder of the need to continue fighting. Note the post below, which references the movement, saying, “We remember #Attica!”

The Attica prison uprising was a 1971 movement in a New York prison. After prison guards killed George Jackson at the San Quentin State Prison, over 1,000 Attica Prison inmates seized control of their facility, taking 42 staff hostage. 

Image from the Attica uprising

Riot police were brought in, and after four days of protests, the 28 of the rioters’ demands were met. However, the riot also resulted in 48 deaths, 33 of which were inmates.

Many articles and social media posts commenting on modern resistance movements reference this uprising, using terms like “remembering” and “looking back” in order to understand emerging movements. Two years after the Kinross protest. Note the “We remember #Attica!” comment above. 

A 2018 radio podcast by Rustbelt Abolition Radio uses this terminology to frame its interview with participants in the Kinross labor stoppage (link below).

(via Specters of Attica: Reflections from Inside a Michigan Prison Strike)

In the interview, prisoner Ajhamu Barati explains how and why he participated in the labor strike. Throughout the interview, he identifies the need to read about the past in order to take effective action in the future. The interviewer comments that he often quotes George Jackson, the prisoner whose death sparked the Attica uprising.

To me, this referencing to the past is necessary in the wake of systemic silencing of prison narratives. There seems to be a need to remember what has happened, as the prison-industrial system suppresses communication and asks us to forget the deaths of people like Darren Rainey. In the Rustbelt interview, Barati explains that, “The whole thing is about control: control your movement, control of what you received in here. Because I just received a paper from the San Francisco black national paper and they were talking about the Million Prisoner March that (just) happened August 19th, in Washington D.C. about the human rights and they rejected it. And I asked the counselor about why did you reject it, is that advocating violence? And she just said because it’s speaking about human rights and the conditions of prisoners here. So any time you talk about prisoner conditions, they don’t want the prisons to hear that, they don’t want that kind of news to come in here.”

While this silencing created within prisons is disheartening, the living memory forged through people like Barati can challenge that silence. That his sentiments and experiences are echoed by non-incarcerated people through social media suggests that the slow-moving, deep-rooted knowledge of incarcerated memory tied with the speed and interconnectedness of social networking is perhaps forging a shared heritage of resistance. Barati’s closing comments, though not expressed through the language of emoji and reposting of Facebook, iterate the same feeling. He says, “If you control a man’s thoughts, you don’t have to worry about his actions. And we in a psychological warfare so brothers got to start getting a political consciousness they gotta read, they gotta read, and broaden our awareness. Solidarity and love out there to everyone.” While the gaps in communication and knowledge created by the prison system may seek to obscure the oppression experienced by prisoners, it may be through those gaps that memory and resistance persist. 

[kalluun-patangaroa]

Suede: The Insatiable Ones – the ugly beautiful truth is a must watch

Waiting for this:

you may read this nice review:

The GQ Magazine

Saturday 24 November 2018 

By George Chesterton

A new Sky Arts documentary about Suede uncovers the tangled tale of a band who mixed glamour and excess with the dark poetry of suburbia

Credit: Sky/Dean Chalkley                        

                        By the time of Suede’s fourth album, 1999’s Head Music, it was easy to imagine that Brett Anderson had been replaced by a Brett Anderson Random Lyric Generator. But by 1999 Suede were out of step, just as they had been when they released their first single in 1992. They are a band who admit to never fitting in and even at their commercial peak they were trapped between what they had been rejecting, American grunge and indie dance, and what they inadvertently gave birth to, Britpop. They remained outside whatever cultural moment they happened to be sashaying past in slightly flared trousers. Suede always had delusions of grandeur. But what beautiful delusions they were.

The Sky Arts documentary Suede: The Insatiable Ones, follows the band’s successes and troubles through interviews, archives and a mass of video shot by the drummer Simon Gilbert in the studio and on the road. The film, by Mike Christie, begins with Anderson nodding sagely in a studio listening to some orchestration in Prague. It’s indicative of what Suede always wanted to be: a band not necessarily driven by an ambition to be huge, but rather a band with huge ambitions.

Suede: The Insatiable Ones begins with the journey of Anderson from school in Haywards Heath to University College London, where the singer met Justine Frischmann in 1989 and formed the core of the group with his childhood friend, bassist Mat Osman (brother of Richard Osman, who appears throughout). The generosity of Frischmann’s testimonials provide some of the warmest moments of the film, adding welcome perspective to a band whose entire existence was so cultivated or, to their detractors, contrived.

               Suede admit to never fitting in. They always had delusions of grandeur. But what beautiful delusions they were    

Recounting the cash-strapped early years, we discover the shock when The Smith’s drummer Mike Joyce auditioned – “It was one of the strangest things that ever happened to us” says Osman – and that Gilbert’s arrival was down in part to his friend Ricky Gervais, who, for a short time, was their ineffectual co-manager. “I remember saying, ‘oh I’m rubbish at this,’” says Gervais. “And the band agreed.” Then Bernard Butler answered an ad for a guitarist in the NME. His arrival and Frischmann’s departure – she left Anderson with a broken heart but a stack of his best lyrics to write – hastened the great leap they were looking for. “It enabled me to tap into something primal – loss, frustration, jealousy,” says Anderson. “I was trying to reflect the world around me – squats, roundabouts – but it was also an escape.”

The film captures the sudden emergence of Suede’s particularity, as they signed to Nude Records and played to increasingly hysterical audiences. As Stuart Maconie, the man who put Anderson on the cover of Select magazine in April 1993 with headline “Yanks Go Home” explains. Suede have a very definite constituency. It emerged from and reflected the emotional frigidity and patio-grey deserts of suburbia. And just like any artists looking beyond the horizons of their claustrophobic home, Suede were at once explorers and prisoners. The music, the image, the lyrics were a reaction against their environment that could never escape its own frames of reference.

Credit: Getty Images 

From the first time I heard The Drowners – especially the B-Side To The Birds – it was obvious to me why I liked them so much. The early part of the documentary explores Anderson and Osman’s emergence from Haywards Heath – something Anderson himself eloquently recounts in his autobiography Coal Black Mornings. This was a world I knew rather too well for comfort and he articulated it with unnerving accuracy. He became the poet laureate of pylons, municipal parks and cheap housing stock. If anything, the film does not state the impact of the first singles and their debut album, Suede, enough. It was a moment of exuberance and drama just as British pop seemed to have run out of steam (again). “The sexuality in the lyrics was a really important thing,” says Anderson. “I wanted to talk about sexuality in the same way Lucian Freud paints the human body.”

Butler, a lithe, beautiful figure with a guitar in his hands, is shown only in old clips and his contributions do not go beyond an interview he shared with Anderson after their acrimony had been resolved in 2004. It’s telling that when Osman talks of Butler’s slide into the musical monomania that saw him leave during their second album, Dog Man Star, he admits he wishes they had shown more empathy for this fragility. Butler was still grieving for his father in 1994, and this compounded the collapse of his relationship with Anderson and their producer Ed Buller.

Dog Man Star was recorded in shifts so Butler could work alone and he and Anderson effectively wrote their songs “by post”. Butler’s dark Brian Wilson routine did help create the massive sound and scope of Dog Man Star, which appeared just as the meat and potatoes of Britpop was emerging into the mainstream. “I felt partly responsible for it,” says Anderson of Britpop. “Like giving birth to some awful child.” It’s an album that should be treasured – grandiloquent and brooding but also deeply humane and smart. Butler’s exit fulfils that great trope of pop and rock history: the “what if” question. But this is misleading, as Anderson explains. He knew from the beginning that Butler would leave. It was simply a question of when.

       Suede's first album was a moment of exuberance and drama just as British pop seemed to have run out of steam

This sorry episode is lifted by the bathos of film’s funniest moment: the footage of a dewy-eyed Anderson in his dark glasses at a press conference following Butler’s departure, looking like David St Hubbins after Nigel Tufnell quits Spinal Tap. He admits, “Ninety-nine per cent of the world thought we were over, including part of me.”

Frischmann explains that Suede survived because it was always Anderson and Osman’s band. With bloody mindedness and the 17-year-old guitarist Richard Oakes (the first gig he had ever been to was Suede, who he watched with eyes on stalks at Poole Arts Centre in 1993) they returned with new songs and the wise decision to change the mood. That led to their most commercially successful album, bursting with big hits, Coming Up, helped by keyboard player Neil Codling. “It was such an optimistic record and that was a side of Suede nobody had seen before,” said Buller. The film reunites Anderson with the legendary Factory designer Peter Saville, who seemed to have created the band’s artwork of this period entirely in his dressing gown.

Credit: Getty Images

By the late Nineties the momentum was unsustainable, especially as Anderson, who admits his penchant at the hard stuff, became an free-basing self-parody. “I justified my addiction by seeing it as part of a rock’n’roll mythology.” Needless to say, wanting to make a Prince album hit a few snags. Firstly, he was high on crack and heroin. Secondly, he wasn’t Prince. Osman remembers how the band could tell if Anderson had been smoking crack because he would arrive at the studio with his hair pushed back to avoid setting it alight. Even when the singer got clean, the music had run dry. “We were done – we’d run out of inspiration,” says Osman. The fifth album has been officially disowned. In a group therapy session arranged for the film, Anderson apologises to the rest of the members for his behaviour and for announcing the split on Graham Norton. After a few awkward confessions, the footage cuts to them reforming at the Royal Albert Hall in 2010 and loving every minute of it.

           Osman said he could tell if Anderson had been smoking crack because he would arrive at the studio with his hair pushed back to avoid setting it alight

After side and solo projects, Suede returned and are slotting comfortably into national treasure status with three albums since, including this year’s The Blue Hour. Suede care. They do their homework. They make the effort. Nothing demonstrates this better than their love of the now archaic-sounding B-side, which they produced by the bucketload (collected on the fine Sci-Fi Lullabies in 1997), when other bands couldn’t be bothered.

Accusations of pretentiousness are pointless. If pop can’t be pretentious then there is no hope for humanity. Anyway, such barbs are often made by those for whom imagination itself is an act of class war. Like their contemporaries Pulp, Suede are canonical English pop, mixing the wry fantasies of art school (Bowie, Roxy Music, even Kate Bush), the working-class smarts of The Kinks and the sleaze of new wave. If you don’t understand Suede, you don’t understand English music. This is an understated documentary for a band who tried to be anything but understated. Then again, under the filthy glamour of Suede there has always been something dark and grey. To take a few examples at random: concrete, flyovers, motorways, council houses, skyscrapers, telephone wires, electric lights…

Suede: The Insatiable Ones is on Sky Arts on 24 November at 8pm, followed by Suede: Live At The Royal Albert Hall at 11.15pm    

[ckcker]

My Backsplash

The sun was out then for a second was covered and a second later reappeared like a fadeout that gave up, it was enough action to make me look out my window and enough environmental pressure to stick a leg out through my thoughts.  Feeling the way my skin pulled tightly over my face as I often did, I prostrated my nurdlescape wisdom before an inner monologue consumed by detecting evil in the actions or statements of other people. I collected these kind of events, unsure as to what actually is evil but hypervigilant about detecting it, guzzling the inner monologue. It refuses to name the behaviors of others as ‘evil’ because it claims to not believe in a supernatural arena of judgment, but the ‘negative’ behavior it searches for, still, in the part of the body where solutions are emotional, takes on the feeling of experiencing evil. Let’s say this affected communication. The physical-mental feed tube moves so fast, it is hard to grab it, to behead it. Another undetected speed. There should be a word for the period of time in which early users of a new technological device appear insane before the device becomes extremely popular.  

From some rapidly opened crypt came the suggestion, ‘I just feel like it’s time for me to date again, to get out there and meet people,’ a popular summary given by those recovering from a bad romantic calculation. Somehow everyone knew the location of that ‘there,’ and I began to think of it too since I also could say I knew where to access ‘there.’  The ‘out’ was hard, I did not want to go out.  Work forced it and at least gave the ‘out’ a knowable structure, but the other conditions of ‘out there’ shared certain aspects also found in the haunted house portrait with the moving eyes.  And I wanted to be that portrait, steeped in outdated inertia, spraying the room with unacceptable stares, not human but rendered in human form, accepted as a condition of the space.  It was difficult to be noticed against my will.  My apartment, though only on the 2nd floor, still gave me a view of urban space that was elevated, and so I felt a certain amount of reflection-conjuring power when I looked out my window at buildings, businesses, dogs that couldn’t see me, people looking down at their hands, streetlights and building lights in the cruise of twilight and the lights of businesses, and people with bum backs or legs moving temperately down the sidewalk. Even from the 2nd story window I could look at the components of an urban area and feel like I was above it, both subject to its expectations and laws and electric bills as well as the distant surveyor exploiting its pervasive electricity and improvisational arrangements of shapes as the overabused cinematic container for my longings, lunges and literal hurls. My skyline consisted of a hardware store with a parrot living in the front window, a few backyards connected by weed smoke and in the distance a tall supermarket that people said was not organic but had some good organic items, a billboard unpeeled displaying a solution for upside down credit, beyond it all the upper 1/5 of a prominent downtown building that relieved the panic of not knowing what city I was in, and over it all the far away voices of a mentally disabled singing group rehearsing guitar-accompanied pop/rock standards from the last 60 years at the community center catercorner from the dead spider I did not kill lying legs up on my bathroom window sill.  I had seen many things from this window in the brief time I had lived there, I saw a man fall into an abandoned Chipotle once. If one continually expects a problem (aka evil) in the voices and actions of others, always looking for the barbaric silica packet that helps covertly maintain some image of ethical, sensitive, open, accepting person, the ‘out there’ will move on to someone that appreciates it.  How obvious, and difficult to learn when you find your identity drifting towards the high cenobite of backsplash.  

“Slay mignon” I heard Rob say through the apartment door and then a different voice responded with something less interesting, it meant there were at least two people entering Rob’s apartment next door and that they were using a joking tone as they entered.  It was possible to joke around with friends: it was possible to fall into a Chipotle.  The reaction I communicated towards the front wall when I heard the knock on my door was jazzy reluctance (muted terror).  I answered the door, taking in the image of Rob and similarly young friend, who perhaps was trying to rehabilitate the toupee, in the 8:30pm apartment walkway light.  

“How’s it going?”

“Not bad, how are you?”

“Tired.  We’re having a bunch of friends over next door though, to let you know.  I hope it’s not too loud.”

“Oh that’s okay, don’t worry about it.”

“This is my friend Q.C.”

“Hi. Nice to meet you.”

“We’ll try to keep it down. But no promises, hahaha. Feel free to stop by if you want.”

“I mean, not sure what you’re doing tonight, or.”

“Thanks, I. I am just gonna do something low-key tonight I think. Thanks for asking.”

“Ok great. What’re you getting into tonight?”

“Well,”

“Oh sorry, you just kinda answered that.”

“Yeah, I, there’s that new nature documentary everyone is talking about. I’ll probably watch that.”

“Cool.”

I closed the door. I thought of the slightly crooked curtain dowel in the back right frame of a neckplay fetish porn still.  I thought of the crumpled top 1/4 of a straw wrapper on the oak floor of an upscale espresso bar.  One must be brave enough to forge one’s own backsplash. I didn’t know what I meant by that, I looked out my window. The skyline at dusk, I aggressively remembered a time.

I thought, ‘all that’s left is the practical and measured execution of plans I previously laid out under uncontrollable feelings.’  The feelings had passed but the structure of living developed during those de-cablings stuck around.  Now meaning nothing, their former dominance must be honored. I needed extensive plastic surgery asap.  My memory was too personal, gory, smelling of rain-scented incense. I fast walked from my room to a place where a TV played, which joined the space with testimony of a woman who somehow escaped her potential murderer.  She described her final maneuver in warbled tones, we are with her running alone through the California desert at night as she tries to find a road and a passing car.  This type of flashback people might find interesting, there are no cars nearby, her recollection voice was high and childlike.  Though I may stare so hard at my phone to make sure it will forever remember me, I never feel more powerful than when I close my eyes in public.  The story finished with her finally waving down a car on the highway; a couple picked her up and listened to her story in shock, as related by her and by then the killer had disappeared.  

The cool underside air of dusk in July on exposed skin, calm weather re-routing every thought or experience towards a positive conclusion was its own kind of repression: healthy.  It was possible to look at things during the sunset.  Sunset had something to do with the way restricted natural light made faces feel diminished with retreating red and less visible, and the time limit on how long was left for someone to be able to see was enough narrative intensity to leave a scratch in the head, if combined with some other high octane action, for instance walking near a pond with friends and viewing a deer.  I had not spoken with friends in months, I had not told them more than a present location, Missouri. That I lived in the side of the city that is Kansas seemed to be some sort of rotting occult intel that I kept totally to myself.  

I had no intention of watching the new nature documentary everyone was talking about. I decided again to try and experience the city. I closed my apartment door, turned, and, after several steps, read “What is PAIN Music?” typed on top of an unfolded piece of paper. It was lying alone on the roasted teal carpet and thus an object that I could view.  Underneath this title was one full page of description meant to answer the question and define PAIN music; it read:

“Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif  oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif  oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif  oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif  oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif  oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif Dghdhdfj dfloifkij oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif  oifj kidfjg adfupifgj Dghdhdfj dfloifkij,” and ended “oifj kidfjg adfupifgj adpoifg adsoif dfpoifgja [poifj apijf.”

What was most clear to me on seeing this text was that I didn’t and would never have any interest in trying to decipher or decode the definition of PAIN music. I did not know if it was even possible.  But I folded it back over and then again and put it in my pocket to walk with me.  

As I moved through the outdoor hallway from my apartment, I brought viewings into my head of the piece of paper, focusing on the detail I had seen in the lower middle-left corner: “The Coolest Music Ever” in dark font and gassy drop shadow.  This was an important clue that I had decided to never interpret or care about.  If the piece of paper had unfolded itself for me and only me, it would not receive the pleasure of my humiliation in tracing its undoubtedly core-tearing motives.  If it was meant to curse me with an assortment of serrated traumas and thus make new life paths available to deflate myself in and then be educated by, I would not meet it halfway to know why.  But I had decided to take it with me anyway, I did not interrogate my reasons for this, and neither did I ask myself why I considered “The Coolest Music Ever” to be an important clue.  Maybe because my days of pursuing an acute pleasure had passed by, had been “completed,” crunched by a mania for self-direction and fully shaved of shallow mysteries, like PAIN music. I had dropped my body parts in the mouth of a man in an empty field during a music festival, I had stared at the uptempo lonely dance music video playing on multiple screens at the club meant for young people and had sopped up the vulgar hypnotism, I had held the funneling friend too drunk at the party to not hear longing in any song with house chords and a gay male vocal. Amicable-disabled, part LARP, marshy, far, bloated as forensic bodies, hanging out menacingly, far away, deciding to try and drive along the spilling highway brush, more drooling light the color of mango and then new sustainable light, white and incapable of drool.

Luckily I have a second set of actions that play out in my mind during an action of my body, lucky for me that no one can read them, though I listen for any distant sound that might indicate a second set of actions in a person standing near me.  As my finger points at a happy hour menu, it also points at my shredded bed sheet that I will never replace.  The sheet that shredded wholly on its own, all it took was a sustained propulsion of my fatefully wound body in sleep over several years to cause a rip and days later a completed tear.  One has dual purposes, sometimes one’s purpose is to lose consciousness and rest the body, while one’s purpose is also to interrupt the body’s rest.  Sometimes one’s mind considers, ‘it would be more illuminating to challenge a command that this be the time for the body to rest.’  Two drinks in, the happy hour is passing and buy one get one free, and the young woman who is bartending has the look of someone reeling in a fantasy.  A cup of hot water fell off the counter and landed on the floor upright yet the black tea bag inside, briefly resembling a violent mid-launch health store fig, whacked against the bar wall with the sonic clarity of a professionally-recorded sound effect. Afterwards, her voice, direct and lifeless, responded when I asked for a lime.  When I opened my mouth very very slightly, my teeth touched each other in a light shake that was uncontrollable. My body did not want to talk, but my mind could not help but announce it was at work.  It caused my jaw to move although there was no content it considered to be worth releasing.  My teeth softly struck each other and it was because my second set of actions were reaching a stealth crescendo; whether a result of the bar music or not I couldn’t tell.  There are certain ways one can react to popular shriveled leprechaun vocalists building up hearts of listeners with irreversible we will hope’s and oooooh, don’t you know?s over simple creamy synth and a delirious light tone. One must pay attention to the background world, it is a dangerous dimension that sprays its mechanisms onto thoughts and senses even if you are in focus and obviously the more interesting subject. Therefore, background music must be monitored at all times. Atrocities incubate under background music, background glances, moments on the way to being busy, sounds on the street on the way back home. 

[lawinformation]

Where do you file a divorce in Texas and what are the steps after filing?

On the off chance that you have require a best reasonable Texas Divorce Law encounter, Where do you file a divorce in Texas and what are the steps after filing? with the immense procedure!

Houston Family Law Lawyers: A divorce is like many things that we want to achieve in our lives. We know where we currently are and we know what the goal is. The part we are often unsure of is how to actually get there.

When you get to a stage in your marriage and you know that a divorce is in your and your family’s best interest knowing what you actually have to do and where you have to do it can provide great peace of mind.

The attorneys with the Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC would like to walk with you through that divorce journey by going over the ins and outs of a divorce in Texas. While we cannot guarantee that your divorce will proceed along these steps exactly, we can share with you the common steps to a divorce in order to provide a clearer picture of the road ahead.

You’ve heard of filing for divorce, but what does that actually mean?

Family Law Lawyer Houston: First and foremost, to get a divorce in Texas one of the spouses must have been a resident of the state for at least six consecutive months prior to filing the divorce. Whatever county you decide to file the divorce in must have been the home county of one of the spouses for at least ninety days prior to filing as well. This is the residency requirement for jurisdiction purposes.

Once you’ve determined that a particular county has jurisdiction over your divorce case, you can go ahead and prepare an Original Petition for Divorce. Your petition is an extremely general document that contains the names of both spouses, the grounds you are filing for divorced based on and limited information about the children of your marriage.

If you believe that a hearing is necessary before a judge in order to iron out details surrounding temporary custody of a child or to determine who will be responsible for what bills then you must also request a hearing date from the court for that.

Once those documents have been filed in the county where you want your divorce to take place, the court will review the documents and prepare for them to be served upon your spouse. Once the documents are ready you can either have a professional process server retrieve the documents and serve them to your spouse or a law enforcement officer may be able to do the same.

You will need to verify which law enforcement body in your jurisdiction does this as a service, however.

What responsibility does my spouse have after I file for the divorce?

Kingwood Divorce Attorney: From the moment that your spouse is served with your Original Petition for Divorce he or she has until the first Monday at 10:00 a.m. after the expiration of twenty days in order to file their Original Answer. I realize that the time requirement I just told you may seem random, but it is in fact what our law requires of the responding party.

Assuming that this deadline is met, you and your spouse will most likely head either to a mediation where the issues of your case can be negotiated upon or a temporary orders hearing where a judge will make decisions in regard property and any children’s issues.

I’ve heard of Discovery but have no clue what it is

Discovery is the process by which both sides are able to literally discover information that they may not have known or at least may not have had access to about the opposing party.

Documents, theories of their case, potential witnesses and admissions can all be sought and are typically due back within thirty days from the date on which the discovery is served. Once both sides have had an opportunity to issue discovery then another mediation attempt will likely occur

Final Orders Mediation

By this stage in the case, both parties are usually tired of the divorce, tired of each other and tired of paying their divorce lawyer. With those factors in mind, the parties and their attorneys will mutually select a third-party attorney to help them mediate their case.

The mediator will set up each party and their lawyer in separate rooms (likely at the mediator’s office) and act as an intermediary to communicate settlement offers. If every outstanding issue of the case is decided upon and settled then the parties have avoided a trial.

The mediator will take all of the agreements and type them up in a document called a Mediated Settlement Agreement (MSA). All the parties, their attorneys and the mediator will sign off on the MSA certifying that this will stand as the final agreement of the parties and neither party is able to back out of the agreement.

A Trial (but only if you have to)

The Woodlands Divorce Attorney: Trials occur rarely due to the high rates of success parties to divorce experience in mediation. If all of the issues of a case are settled except for one, then the parties can go to trial on that one issue alone.

If the parties are not able to settle on any issue then they will engaged in a full-fledged trial that involves presenting their case through witness testimony and the admission of documentary evidence into the record.

Final Decree of Divorce

Upon the conclusion of either mediation or a trial, one attorney will draft a Final Decree of Divorce. A Decree contains all of the agreements or Orders of the court from a trial and puts them into a format that the parties, their attorneys and the judge can sign their name to.

There is usually some back and forth between the attorneys in order to get the wording just right but once a case makes it to this point the end is in sight.

One party (usually the petitioner) will appear with his or her attorney in front of the judge to present the Decree and to answer some questions. Once this is done and the court approves the Decree, the judge will sign the document and the parties are officially divorced.

Contact the Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC to learn more about your particular divorce situation

Spring Divorce Lawyers: If you are contemplating a divorce please do not hesitate to contact the Law Office of Bryan Fagan, PLLC. A consultation with one of our family law attorneys is free of charge and can provide a great deal of benefit to you as you enter into a difficult phase in your life. We represent clients across Southeast Texas and would be honored to represent you and your family ... Continue Reading

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Family Law Cases in Texas: Marital Property and the Community Presumption

If you have need a best suitable service your Texas Family Law experience, Family Law Cases in Texas: Marital Property and the Community Presumption with the great process!

Divorce Attorney in Houston: If you read anything about divorce in Texas then you have probably come across at least one article online that has told you that Texas is a community property state. What does this mean and how exactly does it affect- your case? Today’s blog post from the Law Office of Bryan Fagan will discuss this topic in detail so that you know for certain what it means to your divorce and your life moving forward.

PRESUMING PROPERTY TO BE COMMUNITY OWNED DURING A MARRIAGE

All property that you and your spouse own when it comes time for a divorce is presumed to be owned by both of you. The same rule applies for debts that either of you incurred during your marriage. In your divorce, the court will divide both your property and your debts prior to the finalization of your case.

In order to prove to a court that a particular piece of property is not community property, but separate property owned by either you or your spouse individually, you or your spouse will need to present evidence that is clear and convincing to the judge.

At the moment that a piece of property was first acquired by either you or your spouse, you would need to show that at that moment in time the property was, in fact, the separate property of one of you. This is done typically with title documents, receipts or other documentary proof of the transaction that brought the property into your marriage. Testimony from a witness alone about why the property is separate and not the community will not suffice in most cases.

DEFINING SEPARATE PROPERTY

Houston Family Attorney: Now that we’ve begun to discuss what separate property is we need to define the term so we can know exactly what we’re talking about. Property that is acquired prior to your marriage or property that is acquired during your marriage by either gift or inheritance is considered to be separate property in Texas.

Many spouses in Texas will sign off on a premarital agreement that places certain property in the category of either separate or community property. In this way, you and your spouse can take property that may ordinarily be viewed as community property and convert it into separate property.

ASSERTING A REIMBURSEMENT CLAIM AGAINST YOUR SPOUSE

During the course of your marriage, you and/or your spouse may have contributed community income to pay a debt on either of your separate property. That same community income could have been used to improve a piece of your separate property.

For instance, say you owned a home prior to your marriage and that home needed a new roof. You could have used your income to put a new roof on the home. Because that income is community property your spouse, upon divorce, would potentially be able to assert a reimbursement claim against you for utilizing community funds to improve a separate property asset that you own.

PREMARITAL AND MARITAL PROPERTY AGREEMENTS

Houston Family Law Attorneys: We had briefly discussed premarital agreements earlier in this blog post and now we will open up a more wide-ranging overview of these documents. You and your spouse, either prior to your marriage or during the course of your marriage, have the ability enter into a signed, written agreement regarding how you and he/she are going to classify certain pieces of property. This is done to take the decision out of either of your hands or a judge’s hands in the future should you two decide to get a divorce.

Many times spouses enter into premarital agreements in order to keep separate certain pieces of property that have been owned prior to the marriage or to keep certain debts of theirs separate from the community estate.

Marital property agreements are signed off on during your marriage. Many times people will enter into marital property agreements so that certain pieces of community property can be separated between the spouses. In the event of a divorce, the marital or premarital agreement will be attached as an exhibit to your Final Decree of Divorce or incorporated into the Decree by quoting the specific language utilized in the agreement.

DIVIDING UP COMMUNITY PROPERTY IN A DIVORCE

Divorce Houston: If you had not read anything about divorce in Texas before going through this blog post you may believe that it is a foregone conclusion that your divorce case will be decided by a judge in a courtroom. This is not the case, however.

Typically divorces are decided by the parties themselves in either a formalized settlement process like mediation or in informal settlement discussions between spouses and their attorneys. If you and your spouse cannot reach an agreement on your divorce terms then a court will intercede.

A court will divide community property in your divorce in a just and right manner. The court will determine what is just and right by evaluating the circumstances of your case, each of your rights and spouses and the circumstances at play regarding your children (if you have any).

The popular notion regarding community property is that debts and property will be split evenly down the middle and divided between you and your spouse. Often times this does not occur. Your separate estates and the fault either of you played in causing the divorce will be considered. This often results in what is known as a “disproportionate” share of the community estate going to either you or your spouse.

On top of these factors, taking a knife a la King Solomon and dividing community property in an even fashion is not always possible. For instance, suppose that you and your spouse own a home and one of your files for divorce. What often happens (and what is easiest) if you go to court is that the judge in your case will order the house to be sold and the proceeds would be divided between the both of you. Seems straightforward, right?

DIVIDING THE MARITAL HOME IN A DIVORCE

Well, what if you all have three children who are all school-aged and live in that home. This is a circumstance that does not lend itself as easily to just simply ordering the house to be sold … Continue Reading