#what an outdated 2011 concept

[br1ghtestlight]

the older bobs burgers gets the more unrealistic it is that tina wouldn't have a cellphone at her age and i love that the show keeps acknowledging that while also refusing to actually give her a cellphone. everyone i knew when i was in middle school had a cellphone or some kind of device and this was in like 2014 she is DYING out here loren bouchard

[literatemisfit]

LiterateMisfit's Doctor Who Journal

Series 1, Episode 1 "Rose"

Of course, the first episode of the 2005 reboot serves to introduce a new audience to the concept of Doctor Who, the TARDIS, the Doctor, and the lore that surrounds the show. As a Canadian born in 1994, I was one of the many people who needed the information found in the first series, back in 2011 when I discovered Doctor Who, to understand the show as a whole.

Now re-watching the show, what struck me most during this episode was just how much information the writers were able to include without making us feel like we were being thrown a list of facts or a complex piece of lore. It was natural, well-paced, and genuinely intriguing. It felt both like we were being introduced to an already established legacy and that we were going to discover it together.

The episode opens with a completely retro energy (now even more outdated in 2023) in early 2000s style, from old cringey technology to electronic-like pop music in the background, all of which was new to me at the time, having been too young to remember it. The energy is exciting and ridiculous, yet somehow entirely iconic. Very Doctor Who-like.

One of the first themes that the episode tackles is perhaps my favourite Doctor Who theme of all time: the mundanity of every day human life. Rose Tyler is introduced as living an incredibly mundane life, experiencing both the happiness that mundanity can bring, in Mickey her boyfriend being sweet and silly with her, having chips on her work break, her family dynamic, and her very British (to me) teenage lifestyle, as well as the dullness of mundanity, in her retail job, her responsibilities, and her predictable routine.

The mundanity of her life is interrupted, or rather shattered, by the arrival of one mysterious and bewildering character: the Doctor.

The way the series introduces the audience to the Doctor is so satisfying, even in re-watching the show. We anticipate the iconic Doctor Who scares as soon as Rose arrives in the basement of her workplace. She is the cool, stylish every-girl but she is somehow entirely relatable as we the audience start to put together these clues with her. We wait for this first mystery to unfold, anticipating the Doctor to appear like a god, the all-knowing, confident, and brave hero that we long for. When he finally does appear, his hand appears in Rose's before we even see who he is, a sign of the help and care that he offers to humanity at every turn. And finally, we are introduced to the show's main concept with his first words: "Run!"

The villains of the episode, the Autons, are the first of many examples of how ordinary, simple things can be used so successfully in Doctor Who to absolutely terrify us. It is almost creepier that the monster is NOT a disgusting alien species, but something that we are regularly surrounded by in daily human life. Of course, Rose expects it to be a prank, the most obvious and human assumption to make, and only when she is surrounded does the reality of the danger hit.

Their first meeting is followed by several classic Doctor Who moments: the classic running sequence and escape, Rose questioning the Doctor on what is going on, and his flippant responses, showing her, and the audience, that we should not assume the obvious and instead think outside the box. We are also introduced to the classic technobabble explanations that the Doctor is famous for, his selfless and, somewhat suicidal, approach in stopping the villains with the knowledge that he may not survive himself, and his alien lack of compassion in revealing to Rose that Wilson, someone she knew, is dead.

As Rose comes to realize that this danger is very real, reminding us that there are real stakes in this silly-appearing scenario, the Doctor attempts, for the first time in this episode, to leave her behind, both for her own safety and in line with his own preference for solitude. Not only does he leave her behind, he also leaves her in the dark, refusing to explain to her what has happened or why, and expecting, with his own hubristic assumption, that she should and will forget about him. But, not before returning to introduce himself and learning her name ("Nice to meet you Rose. Run for you life!"), which cements their future together. As Rose escapes, we get our first glimpse of the TARDIS, hidden away in the shadows.

Another theme is revealed in the following scene: the human cost surrounding an alien invasion. The news station is investigating, the country is reacting, Jackie Tyler is on the phone with everyone in her social group about what happened and how her daughter almost died, and Mickey is a worried, nervous, and overly-affectionate wreck. Rose, meanwhile, has mixed emotions. Like most companions, she is bitter at not understanding, confused in light of what happened, and totally and insatiably curious.

Now jobless, Rose hits a new level of mundane life. She has a loss of focus and purpose, and a loss of balance in her life, which is why when the Doctor appears at her door, as they begin to be drawn together, they bicker like old friends and she welcomes him in. Slowly, she is beginning to trust him. Not only that, she is beginning to be excited by him. She is focused on the events of the night before, trying to put everything together, wanting to go to the police, and meanwhile the Doctor is focused on the apartment, his reflection - a nice touch post-regeneration - and Rose's things, human things. In an unlikely turn of events, at least in his own mind, the Doctor is warming up to Rose.

When the Auton's arm attacks the Doctor and then attacks Rose, he saves her and their relationship, and Rose's insatiable curiosity about him, becomes personal. Once again, he attempts to leave her behind without the answers to her questions. But she puts pressure on him, asking him his name, who he is, what is going on, and after refusing to answer anything ("You have to tell me what's going on" / "No, I don't"), her genuine curiosity gets him to open up ("There's a war going on" / "Start from the beginning").

This leads to an explanation, some banter and then, deadpanned: "They want to overthrow the human race and destroy you. Do you believe me?" / "No." / "But you're still listening." He is testing her fortitude, her curiosity, and more importantly, her trust in him. He foreshadows their future together ("We're falling through space, you and me") but ultimately, leaves her behind again: "Now forget me, Rose Tyler. Go home." He sends her away, dedicated to his solitude.

We hear the TARDIS for the first time, not knowing what it is, not seeing the TARDIS disappear yet, and somehow it is still completely exciting. Like us, Rose knows something is going on as she immediately begins doing research on "Doctor Blue Box". In her meeting with Clive the online archivist, we learn more integral pieces of lore: that the Doctor has no first name ("Just the Doctor, always the Doctor"), that photos of him exist from different historical periods, hinting at time travel before we even learn about what the TARDIS is capable of. In his research, Clive unknowingly summarizes the Doctor's legacy, the show's history, and foreshadows the rest of the first series:

"The Doctor is a legend woven throughout history. When disaster comes, he's there. He brings a storm in his wake and he has one constant companion: Death. [...] I think he's the same man. I think he's immortal. I think he's an alien from another world."

While Clive is absolutely correct, Rose once again makes the very human assumption that he is, like Mickey warned, an absolute nutter. Little does Rose know, Mickey has been attacked and replaced while she has been in this meeting. Only when the Doctor appears, once again out of nowhere like a fated hero, to save her from the False Mickey do they finally come together as a team: the Doctor saves Rose from the Auton and Rose saves the restaurant guests by pulling the fire alarm. They are now working together.

In their escape, the TARDIS is finally revealed. The simple fact of a wooden box bemuses Rose - and us. Why would that be a safe place to hide? She enters and peeks inside, but before the inside of the TARDIS is revealed to us, we watch Rose investigate the outside to show us that it really is bigger on the inside. We learn more Doctor Who lore: that the TARDIS can move, that the phone box exterior is a disguise for alien technology, and that the Doctor can invoke alien tribunal methods like the Shadow Proclamation in negotiations with alien species.

We also learn for the first time that the Doctor is both infuriatingly arrogant ("Are you going to witter on all night?" [...] "Now shut up a minute" [...] "I'm busy trying to save the life of every stupid ape blundering about on top of this planet") and entirely moral ("I'm not here to kill it. I've got to give it a chance" [...] "I'm here to help. I'm not your enemy"), a dichotomy that I cannot get enough of in this show. I did not realize it went back as far as the first episode of the new series.

The Doctor and Rose become partners in this case when Rose solves the mystery of the London Eye and we see the Doctor's first moment of pride in her as he says his catchphrase for the first time, "Fantastic!". Rose follows him into the sewers because her trust has truly been earned. For the same reason, he willingly shares information with her about the Autons and the Nestene Consciousness but these explanations no longer matter. What Rose is truly curious about is the Doctor: he is the real point of interest. She is discovering him at last.

We get the first mention of the Time War, again much earlier than I remembered, and thus we are introduced to the complexity of the Doctor's personal history ("I fought in the war. It wasn't my fault!"), and his grief and guilt, to be explored later on. As the invasion begins with Autons coming to life all over the city, we are reminded of the real danger that is now affecting more than just Rose. It now affects her family and all of London. Faced with the Autons, Clive finally understands that he was correct about the Doctor all along and is killed, foreshadowing the deaths of future companions and showing us the danger in knowing the truth when it comes to the Doctor.

The voice of the Nestene Consciousness first mentions the words "Time Lord", an admittedly thrilling moment, especially as someone who has already seen the show. Suddenly, the Doctor is trapped and Rose, faced with nothing but her mundane future, risks everything for the man that she just met armed only with her trust in him ("Got no A-levels, no job, no future") and SHE saves HIM, making her his equal ("You were useless in there. You'd be dead if it wasn't for me" / "Yes, I would. Thank you.") and proving herself as a worthy companion. Because of her, the alien invader is destroyed, the city is safe and, on a personal level, so is Jackie.

For the first time, the Doctor does not send her away. Instead, he tries to sell himself, and the abilities of the TARDIS, by pitting her mundane life against adventure ("Unless, I don't know, you could come with me"). Her response is surprisingly logical ("Is it always this dangerous?" / "Yeah.") and she refuses. She has responsibilities. She has a life here. And the Doctor disappears. Insatiably curious and hungry for excitement, she regrets her decision immediately.

Seconds later, the Doctor reappears ("It also travels in time") and makes his final pitch, his last desperate plea for a friend. Rose Tyler takes her second chance without hesitation and leaves Mickey behind to live his mundane life ("Thanks for what?" / "Exactly") and runs away to the stars.

[thephilosopheroffeelings]

The last episode of The Rest is Politics was delicious. I will definitely listen to it again. Alastair Campbell opens the program really well: Conventional wisdom shook to pieces. Conventional wisdom is not valid in Turkey for over ten years and I know Alastair, it is a crazy-making process. Since the 2011 general elections in Turkey, we do not understand how Erdogan still wins. I wrote my masters dissertation on democracy understanding in Turkey. It was fun as no conventional understanding was valid for Turkey. When a little Middle Eastern country like Turkey is an outlier or run by an authoritarian/electoral democrat, it is okay to ignore it. But when it happens to the US; everyone is talking about it. For 2 days, everyone is asking: Why? How? You guys have a lot to learn from Turkey for the last 15 years. As different from the conventional leftist approach in the world, leftists in Turkey do not want immigrants for instance. Surprising, eh? While old leftists, while left was conventionally left in Turkey, were defending Palestinians, current people who locate themselves on the left side of the spectrum in Turkey, couldn't care less about the war in the Middle East. Similarly, while abortion was one of the main topics of Harris' campaign, more than half of the white women voted for Trump. There are many many reasons behind these phenomena but so called progressive people patronizingly blame these people as not knowing what is going on. What if they do and they do not think the same way as you do?

The left is swinging to the center to steal votes from the right but it is not working. People are more clever than they seem to be. It looks like doing whatever it takes to win and it does not convey a sincere message. Besides, people seem to be having different worries than wealthy politicians and commentators. Who could believe that Kamala is more democratic than Trump given what happened to the students protesting Israel's war in Gaza? A liberal democrat who cares about abortion and transgenders but funding a war in the Middle East and putting protesters in jail? Or a democrat candidate who is endorsed by somebody like Liz Cheney. I will not explain who she is as my time is precious. Google it if you do not know her. Same in Turkey; leftist politicians trying to get together with outlier right wingers or woke culture supporters. They do everything not to be on the left side but not to be on the right side either. Center, mighty center. A bit of everything. Positioning your political stance on identity inevitably brings the result of not being able to be endorsed by any group or class. Social belonging is one of the needs of the human kind; you cannot ignore this reality. Or you do and fail. With identity politics, the left has become the representative of no class. No class, no economic background, no identity, no victory. And ironically, the conventional left was all about the class struggle. But all these efforts on trying to be on the center and not trying to define themselves as left is nothing but the product of capitalism (the right, if you like.). Capitalism makes us willingly giving our consent to the system and not define ourselves as anything but within its limits. Holy concept consent, my all time favorite.

After the elections, let's write essays on X saying that this is not real America. Or this is not real Islam, in Turkey's case. Or just say; elections were not fair, votes were stolen, the election was a project, etc. Denial. It is time to wake up. This is real America. People know what they want. The only thing happening is that we do not yet have the language to explain what is going on. Left vs right wing division is not working anymore. Conventional political terms are outdated. Patronizing progressive approach is not able to fight with post-truth politics. Yes, populist politicians are lying. But does condescending people just because they seem to be ignoring or believing these lies instead of trying to see their points help anything? I do not agree with one thing during the podcast though, left does not need to be on their soul searching way after this defeat. This will only make them lose again. As in Turkey, we have been there. They should just understand that soul crushing trials of being on the center left is not winning against polarizing right. Conventional political wisdom is not working and we definitely need alternative theories. We need to come up with better terms which can be used to have insight on what is going on on the left than just blaming the right like populism, post-truth, etc. If politics is really a science, now is the time to re-evaluate and update it.

[jcmarchi]

Siqi Chen, Founder & CEO of Runway – Interview Series

New Post has been published on https://thedigitalinsider.com/siqi-chen-founder-ceo-of-runway-interview-series/

Siqi Chen, Founder & CEO of Runway – Interview Series

Siqi Chen is the founder and CEO of Runway, an a16z and Initialized funded startup enabling operators to understand their business without needing a degree in finance. As an operator and founder, he served as the CEO of Sandbox VR (a16z), VP of Product and Growth at Postmates (later acquired by Uber), CEO of Hey, Inc (Google-funded, acquired by Postmates), Head of Product at Zynga (IPO 2011) and CEO of Serious Business (funded by Lightspeed, acquired by Zynga).

In addition to his operational roles, Siqi is an investor in nearly a hundred companies, including notable names like ElevenLabs, Amplitude, Pipe, and Owner.com. Prior to his entrepreneurial ventures, Siqi made significant contributions at NASA JPL, where he achieved the distinction of being the sole recipient of a Congressional Space Act award while still in school. This recognition was a result of his contributions to machine vision technology on the Mars Exploration Rovers.

Can you explain the concept of ‘ambient intelligence’ and how it differentiates Runway from other AI-driven financial platforms?

Ambient Intelligence is a completely new expression of how AI can be used in products. Most products treat AI as a separate creature right now—it’s either an agent working on its own, or a chat interface you have to talk to. Those are the default experiences, but there’s another way to do it: by making the AI invisible.

If you look at how people actually use AI at work, GitHub Copilot is probably the most widely used tool. It isn’t a separate chatbot or agent. It’s more subtle, and so deeply embedded in GitHub’s platform that it just makes what you’re doing faster and more efficient. With the current capabilities of AI models, that kind of seamless integration is a much better expression of AI.

Apple did the same thing with its latest iOS announcement at WWDC. They didn’t add separate agents or chatbots. They just built AI into their workflows, so it can solve math equations as you type them or summarize text in real-time.

That’s how AI should be expressed: as a tool for thought, working quietly in the background. At Runway, we call it Ambient Intelligence.

We agree with Joel Spolsky, who worked on Microsoft Excel, and once said: “Google uses Bayesian filtering the way Microsoft uses the IF statement.” That’s how deeply ingrained technology should be in a workflow. 

It’s the same with AI. Four years ago, we thought about calling ourselves “CFO.ai.” We were advised against it because calling our product “AI-powered” would soon sound as dated as labeling it “powered by AJAX” or “powered by AWS.” All technology eventually becomes outdated, so the focus should be on enhancing user experience instead. In Runway, AI is deeply embedded in workflows and doesn’t have to be prompted. It automatically explains what your model does or why your actuals are different from your forecast. That’s what we mean by Ambient Intelligence—an expression of AI that’s a native part of your workflow, so it enhances everything you do and makes you go faster.

What inspired you to create Runway, and what key challenges in financial planning are you aiming to address with this platform? In 2020, when I was the CEO of Sandbox VR, our revenue dropped to zero after the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Nobody knew how long the pandemic would last, so we needed to create multiple contingency plans for emergency funding—ranging from 3 months to 2 years. We had to create those scenarios manually in Google Sheets, using email and Slack to collaborate. It was such a clunky and error-prone process, that I asked my CFO if there was a better tool for this task. He said: “No, this is it.” I couldn’t believe it. We had tools like Notion, Figma, and Airtable, but nothing built specifically for finance. Everyone found finance—and by extension, business—difficult to understand. But no one had solved that problem. So I asked myself a simple question: what if everyone could understand how their business actually works? That’s why I started Runway.

Our goal is to make business accessible and understandable to everyone. Runway shows how all functions, from sales and marketing to product and engineering, fit together. It gives teams a clear, shared understanding of the business, so they can align on strategic decisions and create more impact.

Ambient Intelligence goes further. Because it’s deeply embedded in Runway, it makes your work clearer, better, and faster. It automatically gives helpful context, and surfaces deep insights to help you make better decisions effortlessly. 

How does Runway’s Ambient Intelligence proactively support finance teams without being intrusive?

The short answer: by not turning AI into a separate creature—like an agent or a chatbot—that you have to interact with. 

Ambient Intelligence is invisible; it’s part of your everyday experience with Runway. It works quietly in the background, without interrupting. It’s built into the platform, so it can anticipate intent and help you without being prompted. In the same way the GitHub Copilot autocompletes your code, or Apple Intelligence solves formulas as you write them, Runway’s Ambient Intelligence makes your work clearer, faster, and more efficient. 

What that means is you don’t have to trace a driver through your entire model to understand how it connects with everything else—we just tell you that, in plain English. You don’t have to check if your actuals match your forecast—we highlight deviations and help you understand what happened. All of that happens automatically—Ambient Intelligence doesn’t make any changes to your model or scenarios, and doesn’t have to be told which context or insight is most relevant to you in the moment. It just does the job.

Could you elaborate on the ‘Driver Explanations’ feature and how it enhances understanding across the organization? In any business model, the drivers are interconnected and form a complex network. That means you have to trace a driver through the entire model to understand how it’s calculated and what it impacts. The way people do that today is by digging through spreadsheets and tracing everything manually. Understanding a single formula is not enough; you have to know how one driver impacts others, and how the entire network is structured. That’s how you build deep intuition about the business and identify the levers you can pull.

Runway makes that easier. When you hover over a driver, we show you a clear, concise, automatically-generated explanation that helps you understand how it works. You don’t have to ask a chatbot what ‘Gross Margin’ is and how it fits into your model—we explain everything in plain English. That’s how ‘Driver Explanations’ work—seamlessly, invisibly, and automatically, so everyone at your company can understand your model.

Runway claims to turn hours-long tasks into seconds. Can you share specific examples or metrics that highlight this improvement

This was a quote from one of our customers Andrew Maher, Head of Finance at Superhuman. Read the full story here. 

“With Runway, we saw our efficiency skyrocket with a 50X to 100X improvement, turning hours-long tasks into seconds,” said Andrew Maher, Head of Finance, Superhuman. “Complex financial models were distilled into clear, actionable insights, making it easier to respond quickly to key executives. Runway was like adding a touch of magic to our financial strategy, turning data into actionable intelligence—imagine having a co-pilot in finance that brings critical insights alongside number crunching.”

How does Runway’s integration with existing business tools like accounting software and CRM systems enhance its functionality? We give you a holistic understanding of your business by pulling in both data and context. Runway integrates with over 650 of the most common tools, and we go beyond usual integrations like general ledgers and HR systems. We connect with CRMs, databases, spreadsheets, and even project management software like Jira.

We believe that finance isn’t just about finance; it’s about understanding how everything in the company fits and works together. By integrating with project management tools and databases, for example, we connect important context to your business model. This way, different departments work with a single source of truth, and get a shared understanding of your business.

How does Runway position itself against competitors like traditional financial planning tools and other modern AI-driven platforms? Our core belief places us in an entirely different category from other financial solutions.

The main challenge of modern finance is collaboration. But the idea that finance should be collaborative isn’t new; it’s been around forever. And yet, no one has actually built a product that enables real collaboration. Why is that?

Because traditional tools only help you save time or give you more control. That’s where they stop. Our core belief is that these things are table stakes. What modern finance needs is something that helps everyone immediately and intuitively understand how the business works. Real collaboration can only happen once everyone has that shared context. It’s understanding that lies at the center of this problem. That’s what Runway solves for finance, product, sales, marketing, and every other team.

To make business understandable, we start by connecting your data to important business context and your roadmap. We use abstractions that actually map to how people think. And people don’t think of plans in terms of numbers on a spreadsheet—they think of decisions and timelines. So we show plans in a way that’s intuitive, and that everyone can easily play with. Anyone in your team can modify these plans, and see how different decisions would impact your model. That’s how we deliver a shared understanding of how your business works. 

Our deep focus on creating clarity sets us apart. Our customers, like Superhuman, AngelList and ConvertKit (soon to be Kit), are already seeing the difference with Runway.

What strategies are you employing to maintain Runway’s competitive edge and continue its rapid growth in the market? We don’t compete with those who build financial products for finance teams. 

We have customers in finance, but the core value we deliver is this: real collaboration across the entire organization, driven by true understanding. 

We’re uniquely focused on creating deep, intuitive understanding. Our design and engineering efforts are focused on this single goal. No one else in the market shares our level of focus on solving this specific problem. 

I don’t think we have any competition at all. We’re playing an entirely different game.

How do you envision the role of AI and ambient intelligence evolving in the finance industry over the next five years? As AI capabilities evolve, I think we’ll see a major shift in how work fundamentally gets done. While I don’t think models are quite there yet, it’ll happen very quickly. When it does, we’ll see a significant increase in the amount of leverage people have—one person will do the work of ten, a hundred, or even a thousand people. Enterprises will leverage AI to get more output with the same headcount, and planning will become exponentially more complex. But people will still need to make strategic decisions and understand how the business works—only much faster, and way more efficiently than ever before. We’re going to need radically better tools for thought just to keep up. Ambient Intelligence can enable that by enhancing human capability effortlessly, without getting in the way.

As a CEO and AI influencer, what are your thoughts on the broader implications of AI in business planning and decision-making? Let’s set aside AGI, ASI, and the idea of technological singularity for a moment—because in that world, where AI does everything and we’re all lounging by a pool, it’s a completely different story.

Before we reach that point, though, I think we’ll see an exponential boost in human capability—where one person can do the work of hundreds. Human output will reach unprecedented levels, making businesses and systems much more complex. We’ll need AI to help us understand what’s happening and to make smarter decisions.

It’ll all go hand-in-hand—AI will drive increased leverage, which in turn will add to the complexity of systems. To manage increased complexity, we’ll need even more advanced tools to further enhance human capability.

Thank you for the great interview, readers who wish to learn more should visit Runway.

[awesome-casuallyfamouscollector]

Mazda's MX30 EV gets updated for 2023 - price rise but no more range

The Electric Viking

Mazda's MX30 EV gets updated for 2023 - price rise but no more range...

P.S. It looks like Mazda's management either doesn't know what's going on in the electric car market or completely ignores the latest developments in electric car technology. 

I wouldn't buy this "thing" even if it would be very cheap! The MX30 EV is based on completely outdated EV design concept,  inherited maybe from 2011/2012...! Such conceptually flawed designs for EVs offered by legacy automakers is one of the reasons why Tesla, BYD and others will defeat the old companies very easily. 

The management of many traditional companies has absolutely NO sense of what opportunities electric car technology offers and what buyers want to see in the electric car market...

[hellomynameisbisexual]

Since the very conception of the motion picture, the LGBT community have been represented on-screen in some form. An early example is Algie the Miner (1912), a short silent film which follows the effeminate Algie (Billy Quirk), who enjoys kissing cowboys. In order to marry someone’s daughter, he heads west to prove that he’s a man. While this is quite an outdated stereotype of being gay, the portrayals have varied greatly over time. Only recently is LGBT representation becoming more positive and common. However, when it comes to portraying bisexuality on-screen, it still seems to be a difficult task.

Many narrative tropes have been birthed through filmmakers trying to show sexuality on-screen and most of them contribute directly to the overall erasure of bisexuality in cinema – usually with ambiguous portrayals, negative stereotyping and characters needing to pick a side. Not all instances are problematic, but their prevalence isn’t helping to combat the stigma that bisexual people face. There are three main tropes when it comes to depicting bisexuality, which is infidelity, picking a side, and the horrible husband. They’re usually found together in a common narrative that erases bisexuality, whether intentional or not.

Infidelity

There’s a long-standing stereotype that bisexual people are more likely to cheat on their partners and are incapable of commitment. This is a trope that is heavily carried in some of the most well-known depictions of bisexuality. Typically, a female protagonist is engaged or married to a man, but she meets a lesbian woman and they become involved sexually and romantically, leaving the protagonist torn between two lovers. This happens in Imagine Me & You (2005) when Rachel (Piper Perabo) falls in love with lesbian flower shop owner Luce (Lena Headey), who provided the flowers for her wedding to Hector (Matthew Goode). It’s a fairly average film that could’ve been amazing had it acknowledged Rachel’s bisexuality, but it’s still one of the better ones considering Perabo and Headey have amazing chemistry.

For some reason, bisexual characters are often in serious relationships when they’re suddenly sexually awakened. This happened to Rachel right after her wedding because she happened to meet the right woman. While this type of experience does happen in real life, it’s always the go-to narrative for films about women realizing they’re not one-hundred-percent straight. In these instances, the same-sex love affair acts as the conflict within the narrative – this can create good drama when done right, but it gets boring and bisexual characters deserve better than constantly being portrayed as cheaters. People are not more promiscuous or likely to cheat on their partners because of their sexuality, but these tropes are constantly telling people otherwise.

We deserve to see bisexual characters whose sexuality isn’t the main narrative focus or who at least explore their sexuality outside of a relationship. Appropriate Behaviour (2014) is a good example of this as Shirin (Desiree Akhavan, who is also the film’s writer and director) is a bisexual Persian American woman who is keeping her sexuality a secret from her judgemental family, while also attempting to rebuild her life after breaking up with her girlfriend. Seeing bisexuality portrayed on-screen is another place where people pick up more stigma or acceptance, and with bisexuality it, unfortunately, seems to be the former. This is why bisexual filmmakers like Akhavan are better suited to portraying the experiences of bisexual men and women than others.

Picking A Side

When the protagonist is in conflict with her sexuality, the people around her usually wonder if she’s a lesbian now – despite them being engaged or married to a man. This can be seen in Below Her Mouth (2010) where Jasmine (Natalie Krill) begins having an affair with Dallas (Erika Linder). When her husband finds out, he tells her “You’re a lesbian” but she tells him that she loves him and nothing has changed between them. It seems impossible to grasp that a person could be attracted to both men and women. Bisexuality is erased.

Some films insinuate that the protagonist isn’t necessarily bisexual or even a lesbian, it’s just that they’re attracted to this one woman only and no others – they’re an exception! This is the kind of impression you get from Below Her Mouth, but also from other films such as Imagine Me & You and Elena Undone (2010), which isn’t particularly helpful for lesbian representation either. In Imagine Me & You, Rachel tells Hector “You are my best friend. That was enough before, and it will be enough again.” This implies that Rachel was never truly attracted to him in a romantic sense, thus implying that she’s a lesbian. While this could be a case of compulsory heteronormativity, it seems problematic as it’s never discussed or explained. Avoiding discussions about sexuality – as most of these films do – are what contribute to this trope massively and result in misinterpretation and erasure.

Films as new as Netflix’s Alex Strangelove (2018) also feed into the idea that bisexuality is a stepping stone to picking a side. Alex (Daniel Doheny) prepares to lose his virginity to his girlfriend but finds his plans derailed when he’s attracted to another boy. He spends most of the film questioning his sexuality and at one point thinks he’s bisexual. The film does highlight biphobia which brings attention to this problem, so it’s disheartening at the end when Alex realizes he is gay and not bisexual after all. The set up for Alex Strangelove was perfect for a bisexual love story and, while it’s still positive LGBT representation, it’s a shame it didn’t stick with that. It’s even rarer to see bisexual men portrayed on-screen, so it would’ve been really rewarding.

It’s important to acknowledge that bisexuality is a comfortable place for some people to be while they’re trying to accept that they are gay – and there’s nothing wrong with that. However, there still seems to be some widespread discomfort when it comes to sexuality being fluid. For bisexual people, there isn’t any side to pick – they’re not torn between polar opposites, nor are they confused. They aren’t on the fence, they’re on both sides of the fence. Nevertheless, films continue to portray bisexuality as a personal conflict that needs resolving, and it does this by putting bisexual characters in a situation where they’re having affairs. This makes their sexuality the narrative conflict, which is wholly problematic in itself.

The Horrible Husband

The protagonist’s fiancé or husband is usually abusive or passive in the relationship, and thus portrayed as the antagonist. She is then drawn to a lesbian woman who treats her so much better and gives her the attention she deserves. Sometimes it’s as though these films are saying that lesbianism is the cure for a dissatisfying heterosexual relationship. This contributes to bisexual erasure by suggesting that bisexual women can only be happy with women and never with a man because they’re horrible or not good enough. It also perpetuates the idea of picking a side – almost telling bisexuals that they should just be lesbians instead.

This trope is found in films like Elena Undone, where Elena (Necar Zadegan) meets Peyton (Traci Dinwiddie) who is a famous lesbian writer. Elena’s husband Barry (Gary Weeks), however, is a homophobic pastor. Elena Undone is actually loosely based on director Nicole Conn’s real-life romance with Marina Rice Bader, but the film itself isn’t great. It’s also shown in The World Unseen (2007) as Miriam (Lisa Ray) quietly follows the customs of 1950s South Africa, alongside dealing with her abusive husband Omar (Parvin Dabas). Miriam becomes empowered to change her circumstances when she meets and falls in love with free-spirited cafe owner Amina (Sheetal Sheth).

A much better film that deals with this trope is Bound (1996). Lesbian ex-con Corky (Gina Gershon) arrives at an apartment building to start work as a painter and plumber. She soon finds herself being seduced by Violet (Jennifer Tilly) who lives next door with her boyfriend Caesar (Joe Pantoliano). Violet explains that they’ve been together for five years and he’s a money launderer for the mafia. She wants to escape and make a new life for herself, so she and Corky plan to steal $2 million of Mafia money and blame it on Caesar. The horrible husband trope actually works well in this film because the women plan to screw Caesar over and it doesn’t use Violet’s infidelity as the main narrative conflict – it’s a lot more original, which isn’t surprising as the first directorial feature film from the Wachowski Sisters. Bound would’ve been much less effective if Caesar was just a regular guy who Violet hated, but she has a better motive with the drama surrounding his violent mafia connections.

These three tropes are collectively the entire plot of Imagine Me & You, Elena Undone, The World Unseen, I Can’t Think Straight (2008), Kiss Me (2011) and more. It’s a shame that there isn’t always a huge focus on the actual relationship between the two women in these films. It’s more about them hiding their relationship and because they officially get together at the end, we never get to see much of what their life is like as a couple. They all feature very similar themes, meaning that when it comes to telling the stories of bisexual characters, the narrative is rarely diverse. Romantic comedies in general always follow the same beats which is fine, but these tropes for bisexual characters either erase their sexuality and/or display it as a problem.

These tropes can still work well (like with Bound) depending on certain aspects of the narrative. Infidelity works well in Carol (2015) due to the 1950s setting. Carol (Cate Blanchett), who is in the process of divorcing her horrible husband, and Therese (Rooney Mara) have to hide their relationship due to homosexuality not being accepted during this time. This adds an extra layer to the narrative, giving actual depth to why things are happening the way that they are. There’s also Disobedience (2017) where it works well due to the Orthodox Jewish culture. Ronit (Rachel Weisz), who is considered bisexual, returns to the community for her father’s funeral to find her childhood friend Esti (Rachel McAdams) married to a man. Esti describes herself as a lesbian woman in a relationship with a man, which is disheartening but works in the film’s world. Disobedience also plays through the infidelity trope very differently to other films, allowing it to be more effective.

The Erasure

In films with bisexual characters, it’s rare that the word “bisexual” actually comes up. It’s mostly ambiguous, implied or erased completely by the protagonist seemingly picking a side. It’s constantly reinforced by narrative tropes that are set up for dramatic entertainment, with no real intention of representing sexuality with genuine care. Erasure also happens due to words like “gay” being used as an umbrella term when referring back to certain films. Brokeback Mountain (2005) and Call Me By Your Name (2017), for example, are often referred to as gay films on social media due to the gay relationships portrayed, However, the characters are portrayed to be sexually fluid/bisexual due to the nature of their relationships with women. It also happens with films like Blue Is the Warmest Colour (2014) which is always painted as a lesbian love story when Adèle (Adèle Exarchopoulos) is clearly bisexual. It’s not necessarily bad to use gay and lesbian as umbrella terms, but it, unfortunately, does contribute to bisexual erasure. We should be bringing more attention to bisexuality on-screen and pointing it out specifically when we see it.

One of the biggest erasures is the portrayal of bisexual men. They appear much less frequently than bisexual women. The most recent example that comes to mind is Jake Gyllenhaal’s character in Velvet Buzzsaw (2019), but the word bisexual was never used and he was portrayed as being promiscuous, which fits into the negative stereotype (although the film is satire so perhaps it can be excused). Some better, or at least more interesting, depictions of bisexual men are still out there and can be found in films such as Velvet Goldmine (1998), Kaboom (2010), The Comedian (2012), The Lobster (2015) and Moonlight (2016).

If anything, bisexual characters are usually left out of the bury your gays/dead lesbian syndrome trope. It’s very common both in film and television for gay men and lesbian women to be killed off in some dramatic way, such as in Brokeback Mountain, The Fox (1967), Les Biches (1968), Lost and Delirious (2001) and A Single Man (2009). Bisexual women have been killed off quite a bit in television – like Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton) in The O.C. – but they’re relatively safe in film and hopefully, it’ll stay that way.

Acknowledging Bisexuality

It is disheartening that bisexual representation on-screen isn’t as good or as frequent as gay and lesbian representation. We’re also at a time where it could be massively improved, but now we face the barrier of “queer” as another umbrella term. It’s wholly unhelpful when not everyone identifies with it and when we want bisexual characters to say the word bisexual on-screen. We want to be acknowledged. Bisexual actress Stephanie Beatriz made sure her bisexual character in Brooklyn Nine-Nine got to say it earlier this year, because that word means something to certain people and the impact is great. Hopefully this will start to happen more in film going forward.

There are definitely films out there where the word bisexual is actually said, like in Appropriate Behaviour, Kiss Me, Velvet Goldmine and Margarita with a Straw (2014). It’s rare that we hear it so when we do it’s pretty exciting. In addition to these, other films that feature positive and/or complex portrayals of bisexual characters in general (and not the previously discussed tropes) are: Cabaret (1972), Chasing Amy (1997), Black Swan (2010), Atomic Blonde (2017) and Tully (2018).

There have been many positive and negative depictions of bisexuality, but the majority of them aren’t great or feed into the biphobia and the erasure of the identity. Filmmakers need to do better when it comes to portraying bisexual characters and their stories. It’s always helpful when bisexual people themselves get a voice, whether as writers, directors or actors. For some reason, although there are exceptions, most straight male and lesbian filmmakers have trouble portraying bisexuality both positively and accurately. They essentially give the message that bisexuality doesn’t exist or is an inner conflict that needs to be resolved. We must do better because one day someone will be watching a film where a character says “bisexual” and their life will suddenly fall into place.

[the-cat-chat]

July 15, 2022

Shaun of the Dead (2004)

The uneventful, aimless lives of a London electronics salesman and his layabout roommate are disrupted by the zombie apocalypse.

JayBell: I have to admit, I had high expectations for this cult classic, especially because I like a good zombie movie (with specific exception to Warm Bodies which remains one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen).

First, I thought it would be funnier. Sure, there was a few chuckles, but it wasn’t as funny as I was expecting. Even the best friend character, whose major purpose is to be funny, just wasn’t. This is mainly what hurts my experience with the movie the most. The movie seems to promise a lot of comedy, but doesn’t follow through on it for me. By the end of the movie, I honestly felt like it got a little slow in pacing.

The concept for the movie is great. It’s a guy who’s kind of complacent in his life and in his relationship, which leads to his girlfriend breaking up with him. He also has a strained relationship with his stepfather, which has a nice resolution in the movie. So it seems that a zombie apocalypse is the perfect time to make an effort and become the confrontational, take charge person he wants to be.

Unfortunately, concept was greater than its execution. It wasn’t a painful experience, but I can’t deny my disappointment.

Rating: 5/10 cats 🐈

Anzie: What to say??? I think I had more expectations I guess?? I at least expected this movie to be fun. And it’s not that it’s outdated or filled with cringy nostalgia of the early 2000s- it’s just kinda boring?? It started out promising and the end bar scene was kinda cool. The fact that my brother had this on dvd and said he really liked it is quite concerning. I feel like the characters were a tad annoying for some bits (and the wittiness was lost on me most of the time). It all just feels like it didn’t mesh right and was slow?? And I really hate to admit this, but I really did wholeheartedly love Paul (2011), soooo I dunno- (Actually I do it’s probs that Seth Rogan was a deviant alien).

Also when I found out it was an Edgar Wright movie that made me sad because I really love Baby Driver (2017) and Scott Pilgrim v The World (2010). - I do have to give props that the filming and shots at times felt really cool. I know in terms of what makes a movie that isn’t a lot- but it is what it is - and the story of Shaun of the Dead isn’t it. I know it’s a parody of zombie movies and has a cult following, but I wasn’t feeling the love. I might not just be into zombies movies?? - except Scooby Doo on Zombie Island (1998) of course and maybe that’s why I can never accept another as truly the best zombie movie.

Final thought: does it warrant my full wrath of hate, no. But is it the best zombie movie of all time? Also no.

Rating: 4/10 zombies 🧟‍♀️

[passivenovember]

Tagged by: the lovely and talented @cherrydreamer​

Tell me which 5 TV shows make you feel better, then tag 10 other blogs.

Im dyslexic and I got the numbers mixed up so it’s 10 shows now whoops

(Through this I’ve realized how much I absolutely guzzle American content. I need recs from other countries so plz HIT A GIRL UP)! This is going to be long as fuck because I’m so passionate about storytelling. Hope you can find something comforting to watch <3

1. How I Met Your Mother: I love everything about this show. From the overarching plotline of “something better is always coming,” and “Nothing in life is legendary unless your friends are there to see it,” to the technical design (The mother is a Yellow Umbrella, Robin is the Blue French Horn) to the intricacy of how this story is told, How I Met Your Mother is integral to my happiness. So much so that whenever I have a panic attack my partner turns on HIMYM. I love it.

2. What We Do In The Shadows: This show is fucking hilarious. Just a bunch of pure of heart, dumb of ass bisexual vampires making a documentary about their lives. Nadja, my favorite character, is autistic and so is one of my best friends. To see her face light up at that kind of representation: unparalleled. There are only 20 episodes and I’ve seen each one four times. It’s hilarious. Colin Robinson the Energy Vampire is one of the most hilarious characters in television history.

3. King of the Hill: My uncle introduced me to a lot of the shows from the 90s that I love. He used to babysit me and show my inappropriate stuff and this was one that always stuck with me. While being genuinely funny I think it does a fantastic job of showing that conservatives can also be kind and understanding people. Hank Hill is one of the greatest cartoon dads; he loves his son, he loves his wife, and any time he is wrong he takes the criticism graciously. Fantastically funny. Also includes the late great Britani Murphy.

4. Daria: she’s one of the characters that I relate to the most. Misunderstood in her time, a fantastic portrayal of what it feels like to be the smart girl--the outsider. She eventually grows to understand that people care about her and what she has to say, that maybe her classmates and family members aren’t terrible. Incredible growth exhibited in someone so young. ALSO: the animation is so badass. Dry humor is the best humor.

5. Pen15: Shows us that we all were so awkward in our youth and that, in many ways, we never really left middle school. At its core it’s a story about friendship--how important it is not to take yourself so seriously. Has a staggering amount of heart, as well. Love.

6. Bobs Burgers: Loving the people around you BECAUSE of their eccentricities, not in spite of them. Loving fully and completely until it consumes you. Loving without fear. Fantastic, i’ve been watching since 2011 and I’m so proud of how far this show has come.

7. Sex and the City: First off, I’m a Miranda. While some of the concepts of this one are a little outdated, the heart of the show remains the same: friendship, good shoes, and good sex are the most important things in life. Carrie Bradshaw and her friends taught me that it’s okay to be unapologetically smart. And Sexy.  And sweet. That being a woman isn’t one-toned, it’s multivocal. That there’s not wrong way to be feminine. Love. Not to mention every person in America knew if they were a Carrie, Samantha, Charolette, or Miranda (let me know which one is you).

8. Grace and Frankie: You really don’t want to get me started with this one. Two women in their 70s must start fresh in life when their husbands leave them to marry each other. This show says so much about womanhood, how we are thrown away once we reach a certain age. It teaches us that it’s never too late to start over and live your best life. Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda? Powerhouses. Icons. Heroes to young women for decades. This show has so many fans of so many different ages and I could talk about this show for HOURS if you’d let me.

9. Gravity Falls: Spooky and funny and SO MUCH LORE! My gothy nerd heart sings every time I watch this. Such a beautiful message about growing up, too, which is one that always makes me cry. The buildup to the final moments of Weirdmegeddon 2 is incredible...I have a tattoo of Bill Cipher. And I’m a simp for outstanding animation. I could watch this show a trillion times and never grow tired of it.

10. The Proud Family: I’m black, so. And I was in elementary school around the time this originally aired so it taught me a lot of really important things about race and personality and sticking together as a family. Also: Beyonce and Solange did the theme song. What else could you ASK FOR!

Honorable mentions: Blackish, Moesha, Sister Sister, A Different World, 30 Rock, Arrested Development, and New Girl.

I nominate: Anyone who feels so inclined! (I also don’t have 10 mutuals that I interact with regularly oops)

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

Sometimes I lurk in "old" tumblr fandom pages for things and have thoughts which may or may not be good, especially when they are one of the more YIKES (tm) ones even back in the day.

But, I overthink and my brain shifted to Teen Wolf. Now mind, I myself never got into that fandom as it was as I said YIKES (tm) for so many reasons. And I never really got into it as a series based on what I thought was amusing sometimes as background noise with some bad writing or acting. I just watched episodes as they came on and off when it came out as I just graduated high school I have never been committed to anything in it from an analysis stand point. And honestly this is a one time piece from my usual fandom niches lol, don't expect anything else from me regarding Teen Wolf ever again.

But I suppose with all of this hesitancy my biggest issue may have been with the fan base itself. For posterity sake, I'm mexican/chicana and raised in that typical sort of household community and such and a lot of this is really just my own messy thoughts surrounding the entire sub-culture of Teen Wolf through that lens.

My major focus for this is oh boy, Scott McCall.

Mostly for the good, I dunno 10 years now as a lurker for this series, I had noticed the habit of a lot of white-anglo (European for specifics) fans saying that they themselves don't see how he is Latino or even Mexican as a characterization. Which fair yes, Tyler Posey being Latino himself was shoddily incorporated by a white writer and not exactly explored as it is in fact a very american Hollywood tool when it comes to Latino actors and characters. But the really just tone-deaf use of this is the expectation of mexican-americans specifically seem to need to "be" a certain way to white fans. This issue is already largely ingrained within the latino community as a whole and this is glossed over in hollywood media itself as it either puts us in the pile of "just being american" and assimilated or some other outdated stereotype of "all Latinos are the same anyways".

A lot of the rhetoric against him is that he might as well be white, nothing is explored in his heritage. Which is a fault of the writing itself even when it leaned into heavy Mexican concepts for one of it's arcs. (That is also a whole other level of misappropriation by hollywood and it's absolute separation of anything mexican within it's own country).

Usually chicano/a characters are not allowed to have the exploration of what being Mexican is in America. It is encouraged very heavily in society for the past 80 years or so as media became for prominent. Scott from 2011 to 2017 was not allowed to be anything other than his american side due to the writers and it's prominently white base. He was singled out as another white boy through the writing as that is what hollywood does to latinos. In their eyes Mexican is American only so much as it can can be used as a minority point for clout.

It is a shame that Scott McCall through Tyler Posey was not able to recreate what it means to be Mexican American. Even as an actor for things, that get Tyler Posey socially grilled and called out for has an edge of growing up in the southwest chicano society of california even with his own actions and wording. I see this analyzed by white-anglos without a lot of the heavy needed cultural context to some of these actions. Especially for men in latino culture, there is a lot of machismo that is used by them that comes off as off-putting as arrogant and cruel. It is not an excuse for him but very much a culturally ingrained specific issue that we are all unfortunately aware of.

It is also uncomfortable as a Mexican to see certain words even with Scott McCall the character to have certain terms slung around by white fans degrading him on basis of "meta" analysis for the past 10 years. A lot of the popular ones are that he is not good enough, disgusting, selfish, taking away the rights and not appreciating the actions of the two other white male leads, he uses them. He is talked of as lesser, while innocuous through the usual white meta lens as not being harmful, is harmful when mexican americans are subjected to those words through a fictional character. Cultural ignorance seeps through and is brushed off as only being said as hate of the character who for all intents and purposes is one of the few prevalent main brown youth leads given to latinos, shoddiness be damned.

We do not have the privilege of having more to look forward to when a character that was made to be white is given to us. The ironic thing is that if he stayed white his actions would be praised given that Scott McCall's friend Stiles (the white secondary) is made to be "better" than the brown boy in plenty of fanworks. Scott becomes dehumanized and derided in these works to a frightening degree. He is unpopular to the white audience and only so much of the excuse of anti-character meta can be used when the social ramifications and ignorance seeps through to those of latino background.

[republicanroyalpress]

2011 - I was so excited for W&K’s fairytale wedding. I was at university and was given a paper doll book of Kate with various wedding outfits for my birthday, which I stuck up on my wall. I felt optimistic a woman from a family that clearly understands hard work (as any small business owner surely does), who had spent time contemplating what her new role would entail before getting engaged but who also wore topshop and went clubbing, would be active and involved in promoting charities and make the family accessible to a new generation - overall an asset to the monarchy. I couldn’t imagine the UK without the pomp and circumstance associated with the royals, without the Queen, the nation’s grandmother looking after us all.

Ultimately however, I came to realise that there is just not sufficient transparency into the finances and the workings of the monarchy. The idea that members of the family are living in palaces and sold as ‘hard-working’ for attending a few hours of engagements and debatable levels of behind-the-scenes research in a climate where people work in demanding roles for minimum wage, worrying about keeping roofs over their heads and food on the table, is unsustainable. While the lack of privacy and relentless press obsession that comes with being a member of this family is obviously difficult to deal with, how does that compare to the constant worry about making ends meet and having enough money in the bank to pay your bills? What makes this family more deserving than the rest of us? In a modern democracy, it is unacceptable to cling to an outdated feudal system where our ‘betters’ rule over us by virtue of an accident of birth, rather than placed there by merit.

The main motivation of the Windsors is not to protect the UK and ‘their’ people - it is and always will be the continuation of the monarchy. Those two concepts can be mutually exclusive.

Once the Queen dies, I think the UK obsession with the royal family will experience a seismic shift and the questions of relevance and value will start coming thick and fast. Public affection for the Queen mostly protects the monarchy at the moment but I don’t see the same unmitigated fondness replicated for the later generations.

[handweavers]

[ actually scratch that im going to rant about this bc ive read this book so many times and i have so many thoughts on it and nowhere to put them now that i don't primarily study history for a living and i accidentally wrote what is basically an informal essay about this. ]

my main gripe with guns germs and steel is that the author is an old white xtian man of the more classical anthropological stream of thinking and used outdated and inappropriate language when making his antiracist points, ex. "blacks" instead of "black people" which is difficult to swallow especially because he's doing that while trying to dismantle white supremacist ideology (like pick one, are you actively anti-racist or not? this came out in 2011 man you should know better. you can't talk about the horrors of the trans atlantic slave trade whilst simultaneously calling them that), and despite dismantling one major aspect of white supremacist pseudoscience he doesn't dismantle the entire 'root' so to speak. he refutes a major branch of it but not the inherent issues with this type of thinking, doesn't even acknowledge it fully, and that lessens the impact of his argument.

this book isn't a complete refutation of white racial pseudo-science, he doesn't really take apart other fundamental parts of that entire structure, he focuses solely on how geography impacts human societies and their development (which i don't necessarily fault him for, as geography is his primary expertise), but part of that idea needs inherently dismantling just at its base because the concept of "development" is highly racialized and contentious. he doesn't really acknowledge this, and seems to support this idea and even talks a bit about being friends with some mormon missionaries with whom he went to papua new guinea in the 60s and doesn't condemn that nor acknowledge how fucked up and weird that is, indicating that while he claims to be anti-racist there is a lot more work left that he has to do.

he subscribes to the idea that there are societies that are 'primitive' and those that are 'more advanced' - the theory of technological advancement as something both inevitable and inherent and a progressive climb upward, something traditionally taught to students of social sciences but is taught far less these days because it isn't correct and it's highly eurocentric. it isn't a matter of who is more 'advanced' or who has 'progressed' further (what is progression? what is advancement? who decides what this means? which societies are heralded as advanced, and assign a positive value to that, and primitive, and assign a negative value to that?) but rather that different societies have different values.

there is nothing evolutionarily 'lesser' about hunter gatherer or iron age or stone age societies. they don't represent a natural progression of human technological capacity, they represent changing values and needs. all societies value and conceptualize technology differently, and there is no positive or negative value to these concepts. ex. hunter gatherer nomadic peoples of the amazon are not "primitive" and "less advanced" they simply have different values than we do. the author suggests that anyone who CAN "progress" WILL choose to do so, and there would have to be reasons "preventing" them from doing so, despite acknowledging that different cultures have different values and have "gained" new tech and understood their intended use and CHOSE to simply discard it because it has no value for them within their society (ex. several indigenous peoples of papua new guinea) and never directly makes a statement on this ideology, just kind of eventually implies "i dunno the answer to this one i just know that they aren't inherently inferior to me" but there is a big difference between "INHERENTLY INFERIOR" and "INFERIOR" because you can believe that someone isn't Inherently lesser than you, from birth, tabula rasa "blank slate" style, but still believe that they are lesser than you as a result of things that they have chosen after that - as a result of their culture, and unfortunately while jared diamond declares that nonwhite people are not inherently inferior to white people, he does strongly indicate that he believes many of us are culturally inferior. he tries to make this into a valueless judgement, that there is nothing wrong with being "primitive" or "less advanced" it is just a fact, but there is no such thing as a valueless judgement when it comes to western anthropological thought, it is constructed from the base up to be about hierarchies and white supremacy.

there is no way to talk about "progress" "development" "civilization" without it being racially loaded, and he doesn't acknowledge this at all, which lessens the degree of his thesis' impact. you have to at least address these things in a book like this, you can't Not address these things, and you also need people of colour to go over your book pre-publishing so your elderly white ass doesn't release a book trying to refute racism while you simultaneously refer to people of colour with inappropriate language.

[script-a-world]

Do you have any existing examples of world building a future that's actually accurate and predictive of the future? Say, ones that have depicted the last 5 years with some accuracy but created over 15 years ago. Or perhaps some future ones that aren't extreme sci fi writing genetically modified humans with superpowers or time travel in the next 50 years.

Tex: The Simpsons sure did give things a go (Metro, Business Insider).

That said, I could throw out some arguments in the line of “100% predictions are plausibly from time-travellers and would skew the time-line, likely creating catastrophic effects on spacetime as we know it” or something, but that would very quickly derail your question.

More realistically, Star Trek did a damn good job on the technological front (The Portalist, Quartz), and their cultural impact has been so significant that there’s a wiki on it. In this instance, I would argue rather more that the genre of sci-fi in particular has inspired our current technological advances - when we have an idea posited to us, it no longer becomes “impossible”, merely “improbable”.

Humans have historically liked a good challenge (or on the flip-side, really dislike being told no), so I would say that eventually most sci-fi things are created by sheer stubbornness. A warp drive, for example, has been talked about since at least the 1960s, but we’re slowly getting there in terms of real-world development (ScienceAlert, Universe Today).

We might not have the superpowers thing down yet (though that might take some paradigm changes, re: quantum entanglement in the brain and related topics - let’s scale our expectations of a “superpower” gradually), but we do already have genetically modified humans. Germ-line therapies (also known as somatic gene therapy, ScienceDirect) have existed for a while, and have many ethical issues arising from it (SingularityHub, National Academy of Sciences).

I do my best to keep up with as many STEM fields as I can, but in the past decade we’ve had a boom in development - I think if you asked someone in 2000 what sort of scientific and technological developments would exist by 2020, a good half of them might be wrong due to the simple fact that many fields just didn’t exist.

Given how long it took us to posit the theory of cellphones (in 1917 by Finnish inventor Eric Tigerstedt), to how long the first commercially available mobile phone was sold (by Motorola in 1973) - never mind flip phones (first posited in 1964 by Star Trek: The Original Series, first seen in real life via the Motorola StarTAC in 1996) - I would challenge anyone to bring a concept from drawing board to production line within ten years and have it be a commercial success!

There’s approximately 46 listed fields of engineering in this wiki, the Bureau of Labor Statistics cites that seven out of ten of the largest STEM fields were computer related in 2017 - the first concept of the modern computer was by Alan Turing in 1937 (Wikipedia), the first realization of this concept was with the Ferranti Mark 1 in 1951 (Wikipedia), and the first mobile computer was the IBM 5100 in 1975 (Wikipedia) - between Alan Turing in 1937 and the job statistics of 2017, a full 80 years had passed. I won’t delve more into the details of things like the history of social media, the Dot-com bubble, or literally anything about the 2000s, but suffice to say:

Description: Exponential Growth in STEM? Articles Published Worldwide, 1900?2011. Source: SPHERE project database of SCIE publications (Thomson Reuters' Web of Science).

STEM is likely increasing at an exponential pace (ResearchGate). I don’t know whether this means we’ll see things like the Enterprise, a TARDIS, or even Spiderman within our lifetime, but I distinctly would not preclude their possibilities just because our literature and scientific experiments didn’t have a palatable success rate. We got cell phones and 3D printing! I’m sure humans might be able to see things like superpowered humans or time-travel eventually, if not in our lifetime.

Delta: I’d also recommend The Martian by Andy Weir if you haven’t read it. It’s not super advanced sci-fi, so I’m not sure if it’s exactly what you’re looking for, but it’s an extremely realistic look at near-future space travel and Mars missions (realistic in every way, that is, except for the privatization of the American space industry; Weir wrote publicly funded space travel, which is looking less and less likely to be the case).

Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel, is less sci-fi and more apocalypse/dystopia fiction, but takes a realistic, hard look at how humanity would actually react to an apocalypse, and is disturbingly familiar in 2020 (the main plot is a pandemic, so read with caution). Similarly, Octavia Butler wrote a great deal of similar future dystopia fiction; I’m particularly thinking of Parable of the Sower (warnings for rape, violence, riots, looting, etc.).

Mary Doria Russel’s The Sparrow is another good one. The timeline is a bit outdated, things didn’t happen as quickly as she thought, but her ideas about everything from space travel in asteroids to continuing violence in the middle east are more or less shaping up the way she predicted. She also takes a realistic look at what “first contact” would actually be like, as well as the actual ramifications of relative time caused by space travel. (While Russel is herself Jewish, Roman Catholic Christianity plays a very important role both thematically and in the plot, so this won’t be everyone’s cup of proverbial tea).

(On a related note, the movie Arrival by director Dennis Villeneuve is another sci-fi story that’s a very realistic (if somewhat trippy) look at “first contact,” but is set in the present day, rather than the future, so it’s not necessarily what you’re looking for, but I think very highly of it because of its realism and creative restraint, so it felt worth a mention.)

[emilyrosebass]

10 Years Later: “Work of Art: The Next Great Artist”

The reality TV show that forecasted today’s contemporary art and television landscapes

While the Bravo series only lasted two seasons before its 2011 cancellation, Work of Art: The Next Great Artist is a cultural treasure trove. The show was years ahead of its time—Despite premiering after (and being outshadowed by) big-name reality TV shows like Project Runway and America’s Next Top Model, Work of Art perfectly encapsulated and satirized reality TV and the fine art world while effectually becoming a work of art in itself: A concept so high it wasn’t even recognized or appreciated in its day. 

Each season, fourteen contemporary artists competed through bizarre high-stakes challenges for the chance to win a solo exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum and a cash prize of $100,000. The series, which was produced by Sarah Jessica Parker, was backed by a cast of celebrity judges: actress and model China Chow, mega-famous art critic Jerry Saltz, and gallery owner Bill Powers; joined by Simon de Pury, famed Sotheby’s auctioneer who served as the quirky workroom mentor. 

It’s obvious the show was much more “Next Great Artist” than “Work of Art.” As in, the art wasn’t great, but the contestants were. While a few provocative pieces were exhibited, most of the work was just “eh,” obviously made to fit a prompt. But with glorious irony, the artists themselves emerged as far more captivating than any of the work they produced. 

When the average person lashes out on reality TV, they’re often written off as an actor or attention-seeker. “There’s no way a person would really react this way!” we accuse. But when it’s artists who act larger than life, the bit becomes believable. Countless misconceptions define our image of what an artist is like: A genius, a recluse, a nonconformist. Modeled after personalities like Van Gogh, Kanye, and Poe, artists are stereotyped as quirky, tormented outliers, prone to extreme behaviors and bouts of unrestrainable creativity. We find it believable when artists act eccentrically: It’s part of their creative process.

Work of Art: The Next Great Artist is a striking parody of what we believe artists are. In Work of Art, the most absurd contestants emerge as fan-favorites: A pop artist who calls himself “The Sucklord”; a weirdo performance artist everyone suspects is full of shit; a traditional realist painter who can’t fathom conceptual art; a self-trained artist with a distain for The Academy™️; and (my favorite) an interdisciplinary virtuoso adamant the best ideas came in his sleep, prompting him to stage frequent naps during challenges while others worked around him. 

Work of Art was not designed to reveal the most talented artist, rather, the most interesting characters. The show’s Renaissance man model is outdated; no artist today has to excel in every type of challenge—found-object sculpture, commercial commissions, book cover illustrations, self-portraits and more. Contestants have to race to grab the best materials, struggle through team challenges, and defend their work in front of judges—Environments designed to elevate stress and reveal contestants’ most extreme reactions to pressure. 

Instead of capturing the actual lives and processes of up-and-coming artists, the show captured another aspect of an art world that’s looking more and more like reality TV every day: The high-drama celebrity antics. Today, the art world is all about celebrity and scandal: Who can get into the news for the most bizarre, showy stunt, and who can be the next to outshine him? Rinse and repeat. Most recently, it was Banksy’s painting shredding at auction, then Maurizio Cattelan’s banana at Art Basel, then the hungry banana-munching performance artist who followed him. Each story blew up larger than the last, extending its reach from just art world insiders to household name dinner table fodder, consequentially skyrocketing the artists’ reputations. 

Status is now equated with shock value in the art world on a major scale. The same can be said of reality TV—The genre’s hall of fame is made up of its loudest characters, with big personalities viewers love to latch onto and tear apart. Knowing this, contestants now go on shows with the sole intention of seeking attention, building a platform, and launching a career as an influencer or public figure. But due to the flood of reality TV stars, truly standing out is a skilled craft requiring strategy, complex character building, undetectable acting skills, and business savvy. Succeeding in today’s crowded reality TV influencer market is a form of art. 

I propose Work of Art: The Next Great Artist was actually a work of conceptual art all along, and that its cast and crew designed the show with a nuanced understanding of contemporary culture. 

While it may come off as fluff, Work of Art is actually a striking, poignant text about the relationship between art, reality TV, and celebrity antics (Spoiler alert: They’re all one and the same). Each artist used television as a medium to promote the self as an idea, as a product for consumption—A practice now commonplace in the contemporary art world. They adopted extreme personalities in hopes to outshine eachother with absurd stunts. And in doing so, they created a work of art that was equally emotionally moving and amusing, as all great works of art should be. The show epitomized what reality TV does best and what the art world does best—all the way back in 2010 when nobody could surely predict the trajectory of either medium. 

Reality TV is, and always has been, performance art. But the cast of Work of Art took this to the next level, pushing the bounds of character acting while parodying the very medium they were working in. Despite this, the show was never taken seriously (Surprise surprise, reality TV being written off as frivolous!). I don’t take this as a failing on the show’s design, rather, it’s the kind of meta artwork that’s best appreciated in retrospect. 

Today, as outrageous artist-celebrities and reality TV personalities have both exploded out of control, Work of Art: The Next Great Artist is all the more hilarious—A lighthearted parody of what could be (and what did become). 

[hrk4]

My Sanskrit Story

I am an ardent student of Sanskrit.

Over the past few years, I’ve been learning Sanskrit in a slow, schizophrenic manner – a few weeks of frenetic study of grammar and literature with long months of lackadaisical, lukewarm engagement with the language, mostly through ‘study circles’ (we’ll come to this later) that I’m a part of. But I have kept at it constantly and never regretted it once.

My earliest exposure to Sanskrit was perhaps at the age of two. Born and raised in a typical Hindu middle-class family, I was taught simple shlokas and stotras. My father took me to Cubbon Park or Ulsoor Lake on Sunday mornings and on the way he would teach me verses from the Mukunda-mala (a poetical work composed by Kulashekhara azhvar, a ninth century king and poet-saint). My grandmother taught me the Krishna-ashtakam (usually during power-cuts) and my mother taught me verses from the Venkatesha-suprabhatam. At age three or four, I became a sort of ‘installation art’ at weddings where elders gathered around me, coaxing me to recite verses from the Mukunda-mala. (But of course, getting children to recite verses is not uncommon in our families. Many of you might have experienced this in your childhood.)

That was it, pretty much: Some stray verses committed to memory and the strong notion that Sanskrit was a great language. In spite of my rejection of orthodox theism, rituals, and outdated religious/superstitious practices during my rebellious adolescent years, strangely, I never lost respect for Sanskrit.

Most of my cousins studied Sanskrit in school but I didn’t have that good fortune. I wanted to learn the language but I didn’t know where to start; for years it remained a pipe dream.

By sheer chance, I got involved in co-writing a translation of the Bhagavad-Gita with Dr. Koti Sreekrishna in 2006. At that time, I didn’t know any Sanskrit. My role was to review and edit the English; after Dr. Sreekrishna produced a rough translation, I would work towards presenting the verses in the simplest way possible. By the time we published the book five years later, I had learnt a few words here and there, particularly when we discussed the meaning of difficult verses.

In early 2011, when the manuscript of our Gita translation was being sent to reviewers, someone suggested that I get the opinion of the renowned scholar, poet, and polymath Shatavadhani Dr. R Ganesh. Until then I hardly knew anything about him. When I phoned him, he spoke in an encouraging manner and I felt like I was speaking with a family elder rather than a celebrity-scholar. He graciously reviewed the manuscript and gave his feedback. I casually mentioned to him about my interest to learn Sanskrit and my helplessness at not knowing where to start. Not only did he give me general guidance but he also taught me some of the basics of Sanskrit grammar like noun forms, verb forms, sandhi, and samasa. More importantly, he taught me the real value of learning Sanskrit in today’s world.

The rest of this piece comprises what I’ve learnt from Dr. Ganesh about the study of Sanskrit coupled with my personal experiences. It might be of value to those interested in learning the language.

~

Why Study Sanskrit?

Given that learning Sanskrit—or any language for that matter—consumes considerable time and effort (and some money), it’s a good idea to think for a moment if it’s actually worth it. Now, the worthiness can be decided only by one’s intentions – Why do I want to study Sanskrit?

In my case, I love learning languages when the opportunity presents itself. The process of learning itself is a great deal of fun for linguaphiles like me. So if you are a language-lover, there’s no need to think any further. Go and learn Sanskrit!

There is a widespread notion that Sanskrit is a sacred language meant solely for rituals and that its literature is entirely ‘spiritual stuff.’ So if you’re someone who likes that sort of thing – tradition, philosophy, scriptures, and so forth – you might be thinking of learning the language. The good news is that you probably don’t need to learn Sanskrit.

If you are just interested in the Vedas and want to connect with the tradition better, you could consider learning Vedic recitation, which is definitely easier than learning Sanskrit. In addition, you can read a book or two on the philosophy of the Vedas or listen to lectures on the topic by scholars like Dr. Ganesh. Even those of you who are interested in philosophy can get by reading reliable translations of the Upanishads and Bhagavad-gita as well as general works on Indian philosophy by scholars like Prof. M Hiriyanna.

There is a feeling among the culturally inclined nationalists that it is our duty to preserve Indian heritage and showcase the glory of India’s past. Triggered by this missionary zeal, some people might wish to learn Sanskrit. This often leads to a narrow interest in hunting for science in ancient India, or in the study of traditional works of polity, economics, architecture, law, or other secular subjects. Again, the good news is that you don’t have to learn Sanskrit to accomplish this.

You can always look into reliable translations of works like Artha-shastra, Manu-smriti, Surya-siddhanta, or Brihat-samhita. You can also peruse through books on Indian history, ancient Indian mathematics, temple architecture, and so on. You could even take up the study of a serious treatise like P V Kane’s History of Dharmashastra. That will satiate your thirst to a large extent.

When something can be effectively translated from one language into another—particularly when the objective is to provide information or teach certain concepts—then there’s hardly a case for learning the source language. If I can give you the exact translation of a verse from the Gita and you understand it without any transmission losses, then why do you have to spend ten years of your life learning Sanskrit?

But there are things that simply can’t be translated. Jokes, for instance, are untranslatable when they employ puns or have strong cultural references. The same goes for poetry, where the structure and the substance are closely intertwined. So if you’re interested to explore the vast landscape of Sanskrit literature—Kalidasa’s masterpieces; the two great Epics (Ramayana and Mahabharata); Bana’s Kadambari; Shudraka’s Mricchakatika; Bharavi’s Kiratarjuniya; Vishakadatta’s Mudra-rakshasa; and many other poems, plays, and prose compositions—it is worthwhile taking steps to learn Sanskrit. Stories about gods and goddesses, romantic escapades, nature descriptions, episodes from the Epics, idiosyncrasies of public life, the history of a kingdom, tales of commoners – all this and more can entertain and enrich several lifetimes.

In addition to being a wonderful treasure trove of literature, Sanskrit is also a window to our past. Therefore, any serious student of Indian history, archaeology, sociology, culture, sculpture, philosophy, and so forth will benefit immensely if s/he learns Sanskrit. Here I wish to make a distinction between one who is interested in Indian history or philosophy or culture and a full-time student of these subjects (like a BA or MA student). Those who are merely interested to know more about a certain era in Indian history can read a book by R C Majumdar or Jadunath Sarkar and be fulfilled. But for students of history, the knowledge of Sanskrit will enable them to read inscriptions, contemporary literary works, and so on, which will prove invaluable for their careers.

However, if you’re looking to improve your knowledge of physics, become better at technology, get a promotion at work, or win an election, you will benefit from doing other things than learning Sanskrit. 

Is Sanskrit Difficult?

A good way to learn a language is like how we all learnt our mother tongues – by listening and repeating, then slowly moving towards understanding and speaking, and then eventually starting to read and write. If you wish to learn Russian, Spanish, or Japanese, this approach works well. But Sanskrit is not a widely spoken language. And our motivation to learn Sanskrit is not so much trying to communicate with other people as it is to read and savour ancient (and modern) literature.

Although there are a number of people who fluently speak in Sanskrit, it is almost impossible to find a person who knows only Sanskrit and no other language. It’s therefore obvious that you don’t need Sanskrit to communicate with others; you can get by speaking Kannada or Tamil or English. (On the other hand, if you’re visiting the UK and can’t speak a word of English, you’re going to be in trouble!)

To learn Sanskrit, you might have to choose an approach that’s different from what’s popularly known as ‘immersion’ in language-learning circles.

There are some people who think that Sanskrit is extremely difficult and wonder if they can approach it at all. In fact, those who are familiar with one or more Indian languages already have the basic equipment to understand Sanskrit. The nuts and bolts of the grammar can give you sleepless nights but it’s probably not as hard as you think.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are people who think that attending a ten-day Sambhashana course or reading a ‘Learn Sanskrit in 30 Days’ book can give you mastery over Sanskrit. That’s a dangerous notion to harbour if you really want to learn the language.

So, the one line answer is that if you’re interested and pursue it sincerely, it’ll get easier along the way, and more importantly, the journey will be great fun after the initial fumbling about.

Learning Sanskrit

Where do I start?

The answer, surprisingly, is: anywhere. Just start. Sanskrit is an ocean and where does one begin to swim in an ocean? Somewhere. Put your feet in the water, slowly get inside, get used to the cold, and before you realize it, you’re already kicking your legs and having a good time.

And that’s what I did: just started at some point.

I would read a verse from the Gita and then read the English translation. I had learnt Kannada and Hindi at school and as a result, many of the words were familiar to me. Reading the translation after reading the original Sanskrit verse exposed me to new words. I committed verses to memory and later replayed them in my mind, trying to check if I remembered the meaning completely.

That said, the most suitable works to start off learning Sanskrit are lucid compositions like the Ramayana or the Pancha-tantra. Get hold of a reliable translation of one of these works (preferably in an Indian language); start by reciting the original Sanskrit verse or prose passage a couple times, then read through the translation, and go back to reading the Sanskrit – this way you slowly make connections between the words and their meanings. Instead of diving into the technicalities of grammar straightaway, spending time with literature will help you experience the beauty of the language.

Three to six months after commencing the study of a Sanskrit work, you can start learning up some grammar – by reading good books, watching online tutorials, or learning from a teacher.

I’m extremely fortunate that Dr. Ganesh taught me the basics of Sanskrit grammar. That set me off on a winding path of reading different aspects of grammar and trying to wrap my head around them. This continues even today. The more I hunt for rules, more the exceptions I find. My advice: Keep aside logic while learning basics. In the initial stages, don’t ask questions; simply accept things as they are. It just makes life easier. Over time, you’ll develop an intuition for the correct form of a word.

All said and done, it’s easy to start but difficult to keep going. What’s the solution for sustained study?

In my experience, learning a language requires both self-motivation and external agency. Unless one is driven from within, no amount of external push will be fruitful; when self-motivation is present, external agency becomes invaluable. For instance, Sanskrit is taught in schools and colleges – this is a push from outside (i.e., external agency). But only those with self-motivation learn the language well and continue reading literature long after they have graduated.

When I met Dr. Ganesh in 2011, he told me about a fortnightly ‘study circle’ he was conducting and extended an invitation to me. I had never heard the term before so I asked him what that was. A group of friends would catch up every other Saturday and read the Raghu-vamsham of Kalidasa. 

I started attending the study circle. This went on for close to a year and I learnt a great deal. Owing to various reasons I became irregular in attending the sessions and after I shifted to another end of the city, I practically stopped going. During the years 2013–16,  I moved around quite a bit and finally I shifted to Malleswaram in November 2016.

There came an inflection point in my Sanskrit study in 2017. Around that time, my good friend Raghavendra G S had started his PhD program in IISc. and my house happened to be a sort of midpoint between the metro station and his lab. One day I casually suggested that we should meet once a week and read a Sanskrit work together. He readily agreed and we started reading the Krishna-karna-amritam (a poetical work by Lilashuka). By the time we finished reading the text in early 2018, a few other friends showed interest in coming together to form a study circle. And so, in April 2018 we formed our Sanskrit study circle and have continued ever since. I also got the opportunity to join a few other study circles and this ensured that my Sanskrit study is ever fresh; over the past three years, not a week has gone by without a few hours of Sanskrit reading (unless I was travelling or unwell).

So if you want to learn Sanskrit, try to find even one other like-minded friend and get started. Even better if you can find more friends – especially those who know more Sanskrit than you. The ideal is a group of four to six, meeting once a week, for about an hour or ninety minutes. (You can meet in person or online – it shouldn’t make too much of a difference.) There are ample online resources and translations available for various Sanskrit works. Start reading a work together. Take turns to read the verses aloud. (Even when you’re reading Sanskrit by yourself, it’s useful to read aloud). Then look at the translation. Discuss. Read the original verse again. Then move forward. In the first few sessions, you may read just three or four verses in an hour but as you go forward, your speed will drastically improve and you’ll start getting comfortable. After a while, refer to the translations only after you’ve made an attempt to understand the original. This will slowly push you to rely on your memory and learning.

And once in a while, when there’s an opportunity to meet during a long weekend, you can take a short poetical work like Niti-shataka or Kali-vidambana and read the whole thing in one marathon session.

There are many possibilities with study circles. In fact, it can prove to be the mysterious ingredient to accelerate your learning. That’s been the case with me for sure. I’ve still got a long way to go before I can say that I’ve learnt Sanskrit but the journey itself has been incredible so far. Dr. Ganesh and friends have been largely responsible for what little Sanskrit I know. And for that I’m ever grateful.

Hari Ravikumar August 2020

Thanks to my friends Pratap Simha (for getting me to write this piece), Arjun Bharadwaj (for his valuable inputs), and Sudheer Krishnaswami (for his review and feedback).

[pedrotpamplona-blog]

1st week Peer-Graded Assignment

For this first assignment, I was supposed to choose the data set and create a research question.

I decided to use the Gapminder dataset. 

In my country, specifically in the area where I am from, there is a general conception that people from the countryside, or less urbanized areas have a tendency to be binge drinkers. 

I believe this is a misconception, so I decided to use the following dataset to answer the question: Does the rate of urbanization directly affect the consumption of alcohol by the population?

The Unique Identifier is the Country name

To start, I went looking for additional literature on the issue. I used the terms: Urbanization, drinking habits, alcohol consumption, substance consumption, substance abuse, alcoholism.

Most of the articles that I found were somewhat outdated and were focusing on specific populations, but generally what they found is that the consumption of alcohol is bigger in more urbanized areas.

In a 2010 study about  the consumption of substances by Slovak adolescents, the authors, Pitel, Geckova and vanDijk state that there is a likelihood of adolescent health endangering behaviors in higher urbanized areas (1)

In another study, from 1996, Takano, Nakamura and Watanabe also found that the alcohol consumption between Japanese women increased in a direct connection with urbanization. (2)

A more comprehensive study was published in 2005 by WHO. The study is not only focused on drinking, but on the impact of substance use by young people  in urban environments. They do identify several other risk variables to young people when it comes to substance abuse, but it is clear that urbanization is directly linked to increasing the consumption. (3)

After that research, I developed the hypothesis that countries with higher urban rate have a tendency to have higher alcohol consumption by the population. And that is what I will try to show by analyzing the data set.

REFERENCES

1. Pitel, L., Geckova, A.M., vanDijk, J.P. et al. Degree of urbanization and gender differences in substance use among Slovak adolescents. Int J Public Health 56, 645–651 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00038-010-0219-3

2. Takano, T., Nakamura, K., Watanabe, M. Increased Female Drinking in Accordance with post-industrial Urbanization in Japan. Int Alcohol & Alcoholism, Vol. 31, No. 1,41-49 (1996). https://academic.oup.com/alcalc/article/31/1/41/215955

3. World Health Organization. (‎2005)‎. Substance use among young people in urban environments / edited by Isidore S. Obot & Shekhar Saxena. World Health Organization. https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/43326

[skunky2]

Top 11 Worst Cartoons of the 2010′s!!

We had so many great cartoons introduced in this decade and while I haven't seen every last one I can say this decade was one of the best for animation in general! Sadly for every good animated show produced in this era there are also some bad apples in the bunch the following cartoons are some of the worst I have seen but please remember this is only my opinion if you like any of these shows then that's great continue to enjoy them don't let me stop you!!! 

        Now let's get this list started!!!

11. Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs the series         (2017-2018) 

Ok before we talk about the show I want to make one thing clear I don't hate the films in fact I actually find them enjoyable even going as far as calling them guilty pleasures the show on the other hand is a huge flop compared to the movies were the films had creativity and fun humor the show lacks that in fact this is by far the most boring show to be based on a freaking film about an invention that makes it rain food!! The other problem I have with this show is it's set before the events of the films so Flint hasn't even become an inventor yet but instead it's about him in high school and apparently him and Sam knew each other already did they even watch their first film!? Also the mayor is the principle because why not seriously this has got to be the worst show based on a hit animated film it's so painfully unfunny that I question how kids found it entertaining to begin with!!!! Not every movie needs a tv series and this one proves it!

10.  Total Dramarama (2018-ongoing) 

Oh the pain to see the Total Drama series downgraded to this especially since the original Total Drama Island took a ton of risk for a show aimed at kids also how did we go from a series that spoofed reality  shows to a bad Muppet Babies rip-off!! What's really sad is that creators have no desire to produce a new Total Drama series they just want to work on this. On the plus side it's still not as bad as other shows your going to see later on the list. 

9. Super Noobs (2015-ongoing) 

Other then the "how do you do fellow kids" title I wasn't expecting this show to wow me considering it was brought to you by the same dude that brought us Johnny Test aka the original most hated cartoon of all time I got the DA pics to back me up! The worst part is this show has a very interesting concept but it's ruined due to the bad humor and characters. The show is about a group of outcast middle schoolers who receive super powers in the form of power balls from aliens who then become their mentors and how they must save the world from an evil virus that threatens the world sounds like an awesome plot too bad it's not pushed further. 

8. Almost Naked Animals (2011-2013)

Yes this is a children's cartoon not a title for an X rated film. All I can say about this show is why? Why would anyone greenlight a show about an animal nudist hotel not only is it disgusting but those character designs yikes!!!! They look so ugly looking no one wants to see something that looks this hideous!!  Not to mention the humor is just as terrible as the art design. 

7. Breadwinners (2014-2016) 

You know when you feature twerking in your show you automatically fail. The best way I can describe this cartoon is it's just awful first off the two idiot main characters who I'm not going to refer by name since they are some of the most stupidest names for characters seriously  SwaySway and Buhdeuce!? Anyway the show is about these two "ducks" I say ducks like that since they look nothing like ducks they look like frogs or aliens or something. Try to make your character if they are an animal try to look as close as possible as the species they're supposed to be so it will make it easier for you audience to identify them. Well they fly around in a rocket car or something I really don't care and deliver bread to stock-image ducks which brings me to another problem they can't even draw background characters they just go on Google find a duck photo and photoshop cartoon eyes and whatever on it how lazy a can you be!! Also I found out a long time ago your actually not supposed to give ducks bread yeah it can use malnutrition and illness to them so this cartoon is spreading the wrong message to kids. 

6. Brickleberry (2012-2015)

You know why I despise most adult cartoons because most of them are either trying way to hard to be quote on quote "adult" with overuse of swearing, gore, shock humor, and sex jokes and guess what this show is full of this!! Not only is the animation similar to that to Family Guy it's just as disgusting and offensive!!! The show revolves around these park rangers and their everyday lives at their jobs and the characters aren't very good either they are pretty much all assholes, stereotypes of usual characters you see in adult animation, and your typical characters that are just there to offend you! In fact the little bear cub character is pretty much the shows answer to Brain from Family Guy with the personality  of Cartman from South Park. Now I haven't seen this show in a long time but I just remember it wasn't a pleasant experience if you want to check it out just be warned it's not for the faint of heart.  Also the creators of this show produced another show for Netflix that is just a carbon copy with cops instead of rangers and I though that Seth McFarlane was lazy when it came to plots!! It's called Paradise P.D. btw 

5. Teen Titians Go!  (2013-Ongoing) 

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah you've heard it all before this show is garbage, a disgrace to DC comics, stupid etc. The animation community has tore this show apart so there really isn't much to say that already hasn't been said but I will say this I never intended to hate this show as much as I do in fact I was fine with it when it fist came out I mean the original Teen Titians cartoon from 2003 will always be better then this show in every possible way but I wasn't one of the fans to jump on the hate wagon when this was announced I mean I had nothing wrong with it just focusing on comedy if you remember correctly the original had eps that were just as silly and bizarre. The main reasons why this show is so high up on this list is for the following reasons the first is I've never seen a show like this disrespect a fan base this much  it's like the creators have it out for the original fans and they get joy out of mocking them with all these pathetic critic call out eps they do it also shows that they can't take criticism at all!!!! Second is how the creators view their show and animation in general they literally came out in an interview and said the reason why they made the show so stupid is because it's for children you do know kids aren't stupid right guys they deserve shows that don't try to talk down to them!!!! But the main reason for my anger towards this show is how they made an episode awhile were the moral literally was that cartoons are only for kids and told the original fans to grow up!! Mainly the creators themselves have this warped mindset that I honestly wish would just die out that only children should be allowed to watch cartoons and that their show should be immune to all the hate since it's for kids so they use the "just for kids" excuse for their show being like it is. It's hard to believe they would even have a mindset like that when they are adults themselves making an animated cartoon show. I didn't mean to rant this long but I mainly hate everything this show stands for and sadly it's going onto to get 300+ eps. Personality I really think it's time for this show to officially Go not because I don't like it's mainly because it's showing signs it's on it's last legs and with that Sixth Titian thing they pulled this summer and repeating episode plots is starting to show that the writers are becoming burned out this show was never good but I think it's time it ended. There are tons of other reasons this show is bad but I rather not go into them this has gone on long enough already. 

4. PPG 2016 (2016-Ongoing) 

Well TTG isn't the worst reboot/spinoff Cartoon Network produced in this decade the honor has to go to this piece of trash Powerpuff Girls 2016!! Why was this made simple CN wanted more money so they made this show to sell toys yes that was the only purpose of this reboot to sell merchandise too bad the show sucked so hard that the target demo along with the fans of the original Powerpuff Girls hated it! There are tons of problems with this reboot that have already been explained such as god awful animation errors, bad writing, and let's not forget the memes those outdated memes. Not to mention they removed the character Ms. Bellum since the creator thought that having a beautiful, warm-hearted, motherly, intelligent and strong-willed woman on the show was offensive to the new generation! Not to mention they got rid of breast but they did allow the girls to twerk tho!!! Yes because having an intelligent good-looking woman with boobs is bad but kindergarteners doing a sexually explicate dance is fine!! Seriously I feel so bad for Craig McCracken it was bad enough he was screwed over by Disney but to have his show turned into this!! 

3. The Problem Solverz (2011-2013) 

If you want to know my opinion for the worst animated show Cartoon Network has ever made it would be this one! Not only is the show ugly to look at but it uses enough bright colors to make your eyes bleed. The show is about these detectives who solve problems in their home town too bad they cause 90% of the problems they need to solve. These characters are so nasty to look out we got this ugly fish-like man, some robot, and a big nosed hideous lipped Domo wannabe. It was cancelled from tv but ran it's final season on Netflix. I still feel pain for any child that had to sit though this. 

2. Pickle and Peanut (2015-2018) 

Ugh this show!!!! If you've never seen it you may guess this would be something on Adult Swims line up since they're more known for wired shows like this but no it's not from Adult Swim in fact you'll never believe who made this Disney!!! Yes Disney Television Animation produced this the very same company that bought us shows like Gravity Falls, Phineas and Ferb, Star Vs. and so on made this garbage. There are several problems with this show first off the animation remember when I said that Breadwinners was lazy for using stock-images as background characters well this is the same damn thing but in reverse they couldn't even animate a pickle and a gosh darn peanut this is a peeve I have with most modern cartoons if it's not for a joke then why use stock-images it just makes your show look lazy! Second the humor it sucks it's mainly is "trying" to be Regular Show since both characters are slackers and get into bizarre adventures. Also this show loves to show gross-out shots like the ones in Spongebob for example but unlike Spongebob these are not funny and just plain disgusting like how is this show fun for kids to watch I mean I can understand why kids love cartoons like TTG but I can't see any child liking a show like this!!! Finally we have to talk about the god awful theme song it's not even a theme song but a random robot voice listing off things adults think that children are into so pretty much they're trying way too hard to appeal to kids just like with PPG 2016. There really isn't much more to say about this show it's just awful and it's still hard to believe Disney had a part in making this.

Now it's time for the cartoon from the 2010's that I believe disserves the crown as the worst show from this decade. Out of all the shows I've seen this year none of them of completely  disgusted me more then this one it pretty much has everything  I despise in modern adult animation it makes Brickleberry look tame in comparison!!! It comes to us from our friends at Adult Swim may I present to you the cartoon that I consider the worst!

1. Mr. Pickles (2013-Ungoing) 

I honestly don't know where to start on this one it's just god awful!! First it's got all the things I despise in adult animation shock humor, sex jokes, violence for the sake of it, and ugly character designs!! The show is about a family who owns a dog who is either the devil himself or one of his loyal followers and the dog does extremely messed up things to people stuff I rather not try to remember let's just say this show is MA for reason. If you have a faint heart please stay away from this show at all cost!!!

So there it is my opinions for the worst shows from this decade I hope you all enjoy it since I worked really hard on it.

I didn’t include Big Mouth or Paradise P.D. because I’ve never seen them but yeah I know they’re bad.