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June 6, 2019
White Lies, a New Zealand period piece
White Lies is a story set in colonial New Zealand. It's a clash of 3 women: Paraiti, a medicine woman facing prohibition of traditional medicine; Maraea, an arrogant servant of equally arrogant and condescending Rebecca, a rich young married pregnant white woman. Rebecca sends Maraea for Paraiti to assist in aborting her baby who could possibly destroy her position in European settler society.
Last weekend, my husband and I watched White Lies on Netflix. He noticed that men had no prominent roles in it at all. I noticed that but in another way, it's about women's business when men aren't around. I read a bunch of reviews and they all correctly stressed that the movie is about identity and protecting it. Finally, I wanted to know what the director thought. She's Mexican-born ex-pat living in New Zealand, Dana Rotberg.
Q: What's important to you when you make films about women and how does White Lies/Tuakiri Huna fit within your other work?
A: What I love about this film - and it’s something that was always in my head when I was writing the adaptation - is what happens in the moment when the male closes the door and goes into the world, to work, to provide, to produce. In that moment, another universe opens and awakens and it disappears and goes dormant again when the male comes back. That is a feeling that I always wanted to convey in this film…what happens in this villa in the absence of the man in what becomes a solely female universe.
https://wellywoodwoman.blogspot.com/2013/06/dana-rotberg-and-white-liestuakiri-huna.html
As heart-wrenching and beautiful as White Lies is, it felt good being in that universe where women make decisions with guidance and the support best for us. I think that you might find White Lies as moving as I do.
June 5, 2019
Central Park Five prosecutor under fire again after Netflix series
A former prosecutor at the center of New York's notorious Central Park Five rape case faces strong backlash, after the release of a hard-hitting Netflix series. Linda Fairstein stepped down from the boards of a college and a non-profit charity. She was the top Manhattan sex crimes prosecutor when five teenagers were wrongfully convicted following the 1989 attack on a female jogger. Michelle Miller reports.
June 4, 2019
Cisero, the owner of The Caged Bird restaurant in Washington, D.C., used social media to share details of his encounter with Kate.
Once the small group arrived at the Airbnb shortly after midnight, Kate began yelling at Cisero and his friends, telling them she felt “unsafe” and said they would steal her items and destroy her property. She also asked them, which “monkey” would sleep on the couch.
Airbnb has since removed Kate from the platform and apologized to Cisero and his friends.
“We have a strict nondiscrimination policy, which we are enforcing to remove the host from our platform,” Airbnb released in a statement. “We’re thankful to them for bringing this to our attention so we could take action.”
https://rollingout.com/2019/06/03/racist-airbnb-host-calls-black-guests-monkeys-before-forcing-them-to-leave/2/
https://twitter.com/mcisero24/status/1134739663057555456
Good News is she's been removed from Airbnb
Meshach Cisero and a few of his friends were looking to enjoy an evening together by renting an apartment in Manhattan through Airbnb for the weekend. However, they were faced with racial harassment by the apartment’s owner, only identified as Kate.Cisero, the owner of The Caged Bird restaurant in Washington, D.C., used social media to share details of his encounter with Kate.
Once the small group arrived at the Airbnb shortly after midnight, Kate began yelling at Cisero and his friends, telling them she felt “unsafe” and said they would steal her items and destroy her property. She also asked them, which “monkey” would sleep on the couch.
Airbnb has since removed Kate from the platform and apologized to Cisero and his friends.
“We have a strict nondiscrimination policy, which we are enforcing to remove the host from our platform,” Airbnb released in a statement. “We’re thankful to them for bringing this to our attention so we could take action.”
https://rollingout.com/2019/06/03/racist-airbnb-host-calls-black-guests-monkeys-before-forcing-them-to-leave/2/
https://twitter.com/mcisero24/status/1134739663057555456
May 30, 2019
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1133139717069910017
https://twitter.com/ava/status/1133193883460939776
https://twitter.com/latimes/status/784442122258771968
Ava DuVernay Explains Why She Didn't Cast Anyone To Play Donald Trump In 'When They See Us'
If you follow famed filmmaker Ava DuVernay on Twitter, you already know she’s not afraid to call out the man who occupies the Oval Office. On Monday, when Donald Trump tried to get self-righteous about where he stands on criminal justice reform, it was only fitting that the director of the upcoming When They See Us Netflix miniseries, quickly got him together. https://www.essence.com/news/ava-duvernay-donald-trump-crime-bill/https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1133139717069910017
https://twitter.com/ava/status/1133193883460939776
The director went on the explain why she used news footage of Trump instead of casting an actor to play him in the series. DuVernay said that she wanted to present the reality show villain the way the families of the men—then just children—experienced him.
“I decided I was telling the story of the men. They knew a rich, kind of bloated, flamboyant guy who owned buildings across town had said something about them,” she explained. “They were much more concerned with their families and their lives than some guy in a golden tower.”
Unsurprisingly, Trump’s tune hasn’t changed.
While running for president in 2016, 14 years after the men were exonerated and their confessions proven to be coerced, Trump said that he still believes the men are guilty because “they admitted they were guilty.”
In 2002, Matias Reyes, a serial rapist and murderer, confessed to raping Meili, with DNA evidence confirming his statement.
https://www.essence.com/celebrity/ava-duvernay-explains-decision-not-to-cast-trump-when-they-see-us/
“I decided I was telling the story of the men. They knew a rich, kind of bloated, flamboyant guy who owned buildings across town had said something about them,” she explained. “They were much more concerned with their families and their lives than some guy in a golden tower.”
Unsurprisingly, Trump’s tune hasn’t changed.
While running for president in 2016, 14 years after the men were exonerated and their confessions proven to be coerced, Trump said that he still believes the men are guilty because “they admitted they were guilty.”
In 2002, Matias Reyes, a serial rapist and murderer, confessed to raping Meili, with DNA evidence confirming his statement.
https://www.essence.com/celebrity/ava-duvernay-explains-decision-not-to-cast-trump-when-they-see-us/
https://twitter.com/latimes/status/784442122258771968
May 30, 2019
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1133139717069910017
https://twitter.com/ava/status/1133193883460939776
https://twitter.com/latimes/status/784442122258771968
Ava DuVernay Explains Why She Didn't Cast Anyone To Play Donald Trump In 'When They See Us'
If you follow famed filmmaker Ava DuVernay on Twitter, you already know she’s not afraid to call out the man who occupies the Oval Office. On Monday, when Donald Trump tried to get self-righteous about where he stands on criminal justice reform, it was only fitting that the director of the upcoming When They See Us Netflix miniseries, quickly got him together. https://www.essence.com/news/ava-duvernay-donald-trump-crime-bill/https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1133139717069910017
https://twitter.com/ava/status/1133193883460939776
The director went on the explain why she used news footage of Trump instead of casting an actor to play him in the series. DuVernay said that she wanted to present the reality show villain the way the families of the men—then just children—experienced him.
“I decided I was telling the story of the men. They knew a rich, kind of bloated, flamboyant guy who owned buildings across town had said something about them,” she explained. “They were much more concerned with their families and their lives than some guy in a golden tower.”
Unsurprisingly, Trump’s tune hasn’t changed.
While running for president in 2016, 14 years after the men were exonerated and their confessions proven to be coerced, Trump said that he still believes the men are guilty because “they admitted they were guilty.”
In 2002, Matias Reyes, a serial rapist and murderer, confessed to raping Meili, with DNA evidence confirming his statement.
https://www.essence.com/celebrity/ava-duvernay-explains-decision-not-to-cast-trump-when-they-see-us/
“I decided I was telling the story of the men. They knew a rich, kind of bloated, flamboyant guy who owned buildings across town had said something about them,” she explained. “They were much more concerned with their families and their lives than some guy in a golden tower.”
Unsurprisingly, Trump’s tune hasn’t changed.
While running for president in 2016, 14 years after the men were exonerated and their confessions proven to be coerced, Trump said that he still believes the men are guilty because “they admitted they were guilty.”
In 2002, Matias Reyes, a serial rapist and murderer, confessed to raping Meili, with DNA evidence confirming his statement.
https://www.essence.com/celebrity/ava-duvernay-explains-decision-not-to-cast-trump-when-they-see-us/
https://twitter.com/latimes/status/784442122258771968
May 30, 2019
http://www.openculture.com/2015/03/langston-hughes-presents-the-history-of-jazz-i.html?fbclid=IwAR2MnPPe9JYmf8jp2QIhS0yDwfW5igBDauehlISHIcB-bjhgehorCCOY4AI
Langston Hughes Presents the History of Jazz in an Illustrated Children's Book (1955)
Delightful illustrations.
I can imagine no better guide through the history and variety of jazz than Langston Hughes, voice of the Harlem Renaissance and poetic interpreter of 20th century black American culture. Hughes’ 1955 First Book of Jazz is just that, a short primer with a surprisingly high degree of sophistication for a children’s book. I would, in fact, recommend it as an introduction to jazz for any reader. Hughes thoroughly covers the musical context of jazz in brief chapters like “African Drums,” “Old New Orleans,” “Work Songs,” “The Blues,” and “Ragtime.” He then “discusses the mechanics of jazz,” writes author and blogger Ariel S. Winter, including “improvisation, syncopation, percussion, rhythm, blue notes, tone color, harmony, break, riff….” Through it all runs the life and career of Louis Armstrong, whose story, Hughes states “is almost the whole story of orchestral jazz in America.”
A part of American music is jazz, born in the South. Woven into it in the Deep South were the rhythms of African drums that today make jazz music different from any other music in the world. Nobody else ever made jazz before we did. Jazz is American music.
Although it is a children’s book, Hughes’ First Book of Jazz is still a scholarly one, with a host of references in the Acknowledgements, and a list of famous jazz musicians, and their instruments, at the end. Also rounding out the short course on jazz history and musicianship is a two-part list of “Suggested Records for Study” and one called “100 of My Favorite Recordings.” Hughes even convinced Folkways records to release The Story of Jazz, an LP Hughes narrated with examples of each style of jazz he discusses. You can read the full First Book of Jazz at Winter’s Flickr, where he has posted scans of every page. See a gallery of Roberts' full page illustrations here https://www.flickr.com/photos/40423298@N08/5136768372/in/album-72157625289734072/
A part of American music is jazz, born in the South. Woven into it in the Deep South were the rhythms of African drums that today make jazz music different from any other music in the world. Nobody else ever made jazz before we did. Jazz is American music.
Although it is a children’s book, Hughes’ First Book of Jazz is still a scholarly one, with a host of references in the Acknowledgements, and a list of famous jazz musicians, and their instruments, at the end. Also rounding out the short course on jazz history and musicianship is a two-part list of “Suggested Records for Study” and one called “100 of My Favorite Recordings.” Hughes even convinced Folkways records to release The Story of Jazz, an LP Hughes narrated with examples of each style of jazz he discusses. You can read the full First Book of Jazz at Winter’s Flickr, where he has posted scans of every page. See a gallery of Roberts' full page illustrations here https://www.flickr.com/photos/40423298@N08/5136768372/in/album-72157625289734072/
http://www.openculture.com/2015/03/langston-hughes-presents-the-history-of-jazz-i.html?fbclid=IwAR2MnPPe9JYmf8jp2QIhS0yDwfW5igBDauehlISHIcB-bjhgehorCCOY4AI
May 29, 2019
https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-decline-of-historical-thinking
The Decline of Historical Thinking
Late last year, Benjamin M. Schmidt, a professor of history at Northeastern University, published a study demonstrating that, for the past decade, history has been declining more rapidly than any other major, even as more and more students attend college. With slightly more than twenty-four thousand current history majors, it accounts for between one and two per cent of bachelor’s degrees, a drop of about a third since 2011. The decline can be found in almost all ethnic and racial groups, and among both men and women. Geographically, it is most pronounced in the Midwest, but it is present virtually everywhere.
The steep decline in history graduates is most visible beginning in 2011 and 2012. Evidently, after the 2008 financial crisis, students (and their parents) felt a need to pick a major in a field that might place them on a secure career path. Almost all of the majors that have seen growth since 2011, Schmidt noted in a previous study, are in the stem disciplines, and include nursing, engineering, computer science, and biology. (A recent Times story noted that the number of computer-science majors more than doubled between 2013 and 2017.) “M.I.T. and Stanford are making a big push in the sciences,” Alan Mikhail, the chair of the history department at Yale, told me. Other universities have tended to emulate them, no doubt because that’s what excites the big funders these days—and with their money comes the prestige that gives a university its national reputation.
“History instills a sense of citizenship, and reminds you of questions to ask, especially about evidence,” says Lee L. Willis, the chair of the history department, University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point. In a follow-up e-mail after our conversation, Mikhail wrote, “A study of the past shows us that the only way to understand the present is to embrace the messiness of politics, culture, and economics. There are never easy answers to pressing questions about the world and public life.”
“Yes, we have a responsibility to train for the world of employment, but are we educating for life, and without historical knowledge you are not ready for life,” says David Blight, a professor of history at Yale and the director of its Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition.
As our political discourse is increasingly dominated by sources who care nothing for truth or credibility, we come closer and closer to the situation that Walter Lippmann warned about a century ago, in his seminal “Liberty and the News.” “Men who have lost their grip upon the relevant facts of their environment are the inevitable victims of agitation and propaganda. The quack, the charlatan, the jingo . . . can flourish only where the audience is deprived of independent access to information,” he wrote. A nation whose citizens have no knowledge of history is asking to be led by quacks, charlatans, and jingos. As he has proved ever since he rode to political prominence on the lie of Barack Obama’s birthplace, Trump is all three. And, without more history majors, we are doomed to repeat him.
The steep decline in history graduates is most visible beginning in 2011 and 2012. Evidently, after the 2008 financial crisis, students (and their parents) felt a need to pick a major in a field that might place them on a secure career path. Almost all of the majors that have seen growth since 2011, Schmidt noted in a previous study, are in the stem disciplines, and include nursing, engineering, computer science, and biology. (A recent Times story noted that the number of computer-science majors more than doubled between 2013 and 2017.) “M.I.T. and Stanford are making a big push in the sciences,” Alan Mikhail, the chair of the history department at Yale, told me. Other universities have tended to emulate them, no doubt because that’s what excites the big funders these days—and with their money comes the prestige that gives a university its national reputation.
“History instills a sense of citizenship, and reminds you of questions to ask, especially about evidence,” says Lee L. Willis, the chair of the history department, University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point. In a follow-up e-mail after our conversation, Mikhail wrote, “A study of the past shows us that the only way to understand the present is to embrace the messiness of politics, culture, and economics. There are never easy answers to pressing questions about the world and public life.”
“Yes, we have a responsibility to train for the world of employment, but are we educating for life, and without historical knowledge you are not ready for life,” says David Blight, a professor of history at Yale and the director of its Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition.
As our political discourse is increasingly dominated by sources who care nothing for truth or credibility, we come closer and closer to the situation that Walter Lippmann warned about a century ago, in his seminal “Liberty and the News.” “Men who have lost their grip upon the relevant facts of their environment are the inevitable victims of agitation and propaganda. The quack, the charlatan, the jingo . . . can flourish only where the audience is deprived of independent access to information,” he wrote. A nation whose citizens have no knowledge of history is asking to be led by quacks, charlatans, and jingos. As he has proved ever since he rode to political prominence on the lie of Barack Obama’s birthplace, Trump is all three. And, without more history majors, we are doomed to repeat him.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-decline-of-historical-thinking
May 27, 2019
And good Lord! Jesus on the end times...
https://ffrf.org/component/k2/item/25602-abortion-rights
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-truth-about-christianity-and-abortion_b_58f52ed7e4b048372700dab5
Hello, Religion Group members.
I was invited and it's a pleasure to cross-post this OP here.
God Is So Not Pro-Life
Most of us probably know this but I find the following useful in bolstering my counter-arguments IRL about "what God says."
Scriptural truths
Ten biblical episodes and prophecies provide an unequivocal expression of God's attitude toward human life, especially the ontological status of "unborn children" and their pregnant mothers-to-be. Brief summaries:
• A pregnant woman who is injured and aborts the fetus warrants financial compensation only (to her husband), suggesting that the fetus is property, not a person (Exodus 21:22-25).
• The gruesome priestly purity test to which a wife accused of adultery must submit will cause her to abort the fetus if she is guilty, indicating that the fetus does not possess a right to life (Numbers 5:11-31).
• God enumerated his punishments for disobedience, including "cursed shall be the fruit of your womb" and "you will eat the fruit of your womb," directly contradicting sanctity-of-life claims (Deuteronomy 28:18,53).
• Elisha's prophecy for soon-to-be King Hazael said he would attack the Israelites, burn their cities, crush the heads of their babies and rip open their pregnant women (2 Kings 8:12).
• King Menahem of Israel destroyed Tiphsah (also called Tappuah) and the surrounding towns, killing all residents and ripping open pregnant women with the sword (2 Kings 15:16).
• Isaiah prophesied doom for Babylon, including the murder of unborn children: "They will have no pity on the fruit of the womb" (Isaiah 13:18).
• For worshiping idols, God declared that not one of his people would live, not a man, woman or child (not even babies in arms), again confuting assertions about the sanctity of life (Jeremiah 44: 7-8).
• God will punish the Israelites by destroying their unborn children, who will die at birth, or perish in the womb, or never even be conceived (Hosea 9:10-16).
• For rebelling against God, Samaria's people will be killed, their babies will be dashed to death against the ground, and their pregnant women will be ripped open with a sword (Hosea 13:16).
Ten biblical episodes and prophecies provide an unequivocal expression of God's attitude toward human life, especially the ontological status of "unborn children" and their pregnant mothers-to-be. Brief summaries:
• A pregnant woman who is injured and aborts the fetus warrants financial compensation only (to her husband), suggesting that the fetus is property, not a person (Exodus 21:22-25).
• The gruesome priestly purity test to which a wife accused of adultery must submit will cause her to abort the fetus if she is guilty, indicating that the fetus does not possess a right to life (Numbers 5:11-31).
• God enumerated his punishments for disobedience, including "cursed shall be the fruit of your womb" and "you will eat the fruit of your womb," directly contradicting sanctity-of-life claims (Deuteronomy 28:18,53).
• Elisha's prophecy for soon-to-be King Hazael said he would attack the Israelites, burn their cities, crush the heads of their babies and rip open their pregnant women (2 Kings 8:12).
• King Menahem of Israel destroyed Tiphsah (also called Tappuah) and the surrounding towns, killing all residents and ripping open pregnant women with the sword (2 Kings 15:16).
• Isaiah prophesied doom for Babylon, including the murder of unborn children: "They will have no pity on the fruit of the womb" (Isaiah 13:18).
• For worshiping idols, God declared that not one of his people would live, not a man, woman or child (not even babies in arms), again confuting assertions about the sanctity of life (Jeremiah 44: 7-8).
• God will punish the Israelites by destroying their unborn children, who will die at birth, or perish in the womb, or never even be conceived (Hosea 9:10-16).
• For rebelling against God, Samaria's people will be killed, their babies will be dashed to death against the ground, and their pregnant women will be ripped open with a sword (Hosea 13:16).
And good Lord! Jesus on the end times...
"Woe to pregnant women and those who are nursing" (Matthew 24:19).
That's all he had to say!
https://ffrf.org/component/k2/item/25602-abortion-rights
Likewise, throughout the history of the early church into the middle-ages, there is little to no mention of abortion as a topic of great alarm – from the days of the Old Testament until modern history. Hence, there is no case to be made for a definitive Christian stance throughout history on the spiritual or moral aspects of abortion. Arguably, three of the most prominent authorities on Christian doctrine and teachings historically would be the Apostle Paul, St. Augustine in the 5th century and St. Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century, and compared to Christian leaders today, these figures are mostly silent on the topic. Traditionally the Church was “tolerant” on abortion before the third trimester, from the time of the early church until the late 19th century.
St. Augustine is considered a Christian doctrinal authority in all respects, helping to shape the Christian religion and finer points of doctrine and practices. His statements and teaching on abortion can be summarized in this quote: “The law does not provide that the act (abortion) pertains to homicide, for there cannot yet be said to be a live soul in a body that lacks sensation.” He was simply reiterating the traditional Jewish view…that the destruction of a fetus could be considered homicide only at a relatively late stage of fetal development.
St. Thomas Aquinas held a similar view in not calling abortion homicide until around the third trimester. Aquinas did not believe in life at conception, but rather “ensoulment.” He offered no defense for abortion, but also did not give the matter much importance in comparison to his other writings.
Abortion was very prevalent in many of the places Paul visited – we know this from other historical texts, and as he mentions in his letters, these cities were brimming with prostitution and illicit sexual activity. In fact, Paul never had a problem speaking out on any topic he believed followers of Christ should pay attention to!
There are 3,000 verses in the Bible that are concerned with social justice, taking care of the poor, the stranger, attitudes of kindness and compassion. It is dominant in the Old Testament and the New Testament and there is no ambiguity.
St. Augustine is considered a Christian doctrinal authority in all respects, helping to shape the Christian religion and finer points of doctrine and practices. His statements and teaching on abortion can be summarized in this quote: “The law does not provide that the act (abortion) pertains to homicide, for there cannot yet be said to be a live soul in a body that lacks sensation.” He was simply reiterating the traditional Jewish view…that the destruction of a fetus could be considered homicide only at a relatively late stage of fetal development.
St. Thomas Aquinas held a similar view in not calling abortion homicide until around the third trimester. Aquinas did not believe in life at conception, but rather “ensoulment.” He offered no defense for abortion, but also did not give the matter much importance in comparison to his other writings.
Abortion was very prevalent in many of the places Paul visited – we know this from other historical texts, and as he mentions in his letters, these cities were brimming with prostitution and illicit sexual activity. In fact, Paul never had a problem speaking out on any topic he believed followers of Christ should pay attention to!
There are 3,000 verses in the Bible that are concerned with social justice, taking care of the poor, the stranger, attitudes of kindness and compassion. It is dominant in the Old Testament and the New Testament and there is no ambiguity.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-truth-about-christianity-and-abortion_b_58f52ed7e4b048372700dab5
May 25, 2019
Wow, as if it's probable that anyone will readily admit,
before or once they're exposed, utterly failing these children. The kids also observed white students touching prohibited displays without reproach. It's disheartening that these academically exceptional kids, let alone any kid is treated this way and disbelieved without even checking for further proof that one's unquestioned belief about lying kids is correct.
As the students progressed through the museum, Lamy claimed the situation worsened. “We were instructed not to touch any of the artifacts in the museum, yet white students there touched the displays several times while security looked on without saying anything,” Lamy wrote on Facebook. “The minute one of our students followed suit, the security guards would yell at them…Throughout our walk through, they followed us.”
Lamy added that she addressed the issue with one of the museum’s security guards, but to no avail. “When I told him I did not appreciate him following our students, he said that he was just doing his job.” http://time.com/5595544/mfa-schoolchildren-racism/
Prestigious Boston art museum bans 2 of its members for 'racist comments'
The museum said in a May 24 message on its website that it looked into the complaints and found two instances of two of its patrons making "racist comments" to students.
"We have identified the patrons who made the disparaging remarks and revoked their memberships, banning them from the Museum's grounds," the museum stated. "We will serve them with a no-trespass cease-and-desist notification." https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/prestigious-boston-art-museum-bans-2-its-members-racist-comments-n1010286
If the museum relied on security cameras to definitively confirm or disprove what the kids say, there's no doubt their statement about the staffer is also true.
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