Mar 19th 2020

THE FOUNDER of this column, Stephen Hugh-Jones, died on February 28th. He was an extraordinary character at The Economistlong, lean, waspish, and a self-appointed menace to facile consensus. His theatrical interventions tended to come at Monday editorial meetings where, sitting on the floor with his back to the editors desk, he would uncurl his lanky frame to shout Phooey! Such exclamations (Ho hum, Baloney, Piffle) often found their way into copy, both his own and other peoples. His edits, during which he chanted and sometimes almost sang the lines aloud, were razor-sharp.

He was hired in the 1960s before leaving to run a magazine in Paris. He was lured back to oversee the business pages in 1974, and his first act was to buy calculators for his writers, which along with his force of personality made an immediate difference in quality. He huffed out in 1980 after an organisational dispute, but so admired was he that he was hired a third timeand given a language column from 1992 to 1999.

The column grew from Stephens love of the great dictionary-makers humanity, and of the original Johnsons hatred of cant. The Goths have already seized the airwaves. Do not expect young Johnson to encourage them, he wrote in high dudgeon in his opening manifesto. His exactitude showed up in columns on may v might. Hitler might have won the war is a counterfactual that wonders what would have happened had Stalingrad gone differently, he explained. Hitler may have won the war means the outcome remains unknown.

But he also knew (like the original Johnson) that though changes in language could be slowed, they could not be stopped: Lovers of English do well to resist until majority opinion overrules them. In the endless debate between...the pedantic view of language and the anyfink-goes one...the wise man expects no resolution. He could be shockingly old-fashioned. Parental love is seldom honoured in poetry, he opined; most mothers, perhaps, are too busy caring for their young to write poems about them, and men prefer their mistresses. Yet he knew this about himself, and welcomed change too: political correctness, at its silliest, has never done one-fiftieth as much harm as its reverse.

His column was global in its reach. Portuguese pronunciation, Indian languages and Chinese characters found a home alongside the more obvious German and French, Greek and Latin. Despite the odd potshot at the yoof and yobs, he wrote admiringly of Caribbean patois, black American vernacular and rural English dialects. Johnny Grimond, who wrote most of The Economists style guide, calls him a keen contributorbut mostly to suggest rules for deletion, not addition. His column (twice) quoted Churchill as saying the rule forbidding a preposition at the end of a sentence was the kind of nonsense up with which I will not put.

Alas, Churchill never said itthe kind of misstep Stephen would not have made in the age of Google. Indeed, he did not mention the internet until a Christmas piece in 1999. He drank in the worlds languages the old-fashioned way. He was born in Egypt, brought up in Scotland, and was variously an encyclopedia salesman in America, a soldier in Germany and a junior journalist in India. And he was a lifelong reader.

A stubborn legend pursued Stephenthat he threw a typewriter out of his office window in a rage. Or perhaps intended to, but failed to break through the glass. Or perhaps it was a phone, through a window in an internal door. No two versions of the story are the same; he himself denied it, in a history of The Economist published in 1993. But, he told the books author, he could understand why people might believe it.

Yet his frantic bursts of irascibility would be followed by graceful and kind conversation, as though nothing was untoward. Friends and colleagues remember surprising tendernesses. He collected glass artefacts. He lavished affection on children visiting the office. Perhaps his most lyrical piece for the paper was a tour of the English churchyards he cherished, finding poignant gravestones of both great and humble. And yes, he was in love with language.

He knew words could be weapons, but they were the best kind. His son David recalls a cover of The Economist that showed a Palestinian and Israeli shouting in each others faces, and his father saying What a hopeful picture that is. To his puzzled childs inevitable why? he replied: theyre talking to each other.

This article appeared in the Books and arts section of the print edition under the headline "Talking to the world"

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A tribute to the original Johnson columnist - The Economist

The HuntDirector: Craig ZobelWriter: Jason Blum and Damon LindelofStarring: Betty Gilpin, Hillary Swank, Ike Barinholtz, Ethan Suplee, Emma Roberts, Glenn Howerton, Amy Madigan and Sturgill Simpson.Opens: On video on demand. (The Hunt is one of a number of films that was to earn a wide theatrical release but, in the wake of the coronavirus shutting down most theaters, has been pushed as an on-demand release instead.)

In this current political climate and era of social media, the should-be simple-enough act of even just going online has become a risky endeavor.

No matter where you look, theres a friend sharing a meme about political correctness or an uncle forwarding you a story about how #pizzagate is still relevant.

It can be exhausting trying to decipher the real from the fake, let alone trying to simply exist through ones screen without engaging in a heated political conversations.

The Hunt takes this current political climate and tries to flip it on its head.

A group of people wake up in a clearing, gagged and with no explanation as to how they got there. Eventually, they begin to be picked off one-by-one by sniper shots, arrows and booby traps that have been set for them.

They dont know what brought them to this fate, or how to escape.

Turns out, all of the hunted here all have a common thread of political ideals. They seem to lean more on the conservative spectrum they use terms like snowflake, defend the second amendment at the drop of a dime and yell about crisis actors.

Soon enough, its revealed that they were brought into this situation by a group of elite liberals who are ultra-PC people who use the word deplorables unironically, and get onto each other if theyre too gender-minded when addressing one another by saying Hey, guys! instead of Hey, people!

The Hunt is a bloody mess.

But its also surprisingly fun and dripping with satire.

The film tries really hard to issue a new social commentary about the current political tribalism in our country. It doesnt completely sticks the landing.

The film lacks any nuanced characters, and none of the ones it has boast unclear motivations. Its pretty cut-and-dry where they all stand. So theres not really anyone to root for here.

Well, except for Crystal.

Crystal (Betty Gilpin) is a tough cookie who clearly has survival skills far beyond any of the other hunted with whom shed been lumped. Shes a veteran unconcerned about anything except her survival. Even as we figure out the political stances of the her peers, she remains a bit of an enigma. She doesnt share any real expression when others rant and rave about refugees or conspiracy theories.

She just wants out.

Her journey is nothing short of action-packed. The Hunt is super bloody, and creative in its death and action sequences.

Dont buy into the hype that this film is one-sided with its political leanings it isnt. Here, each side is equally awful.

Granted, audience members might feel more sympathy toward one side or the other. But the film does a decent job showing the depravity of both parties.

Though The Hunt wants to be a cutting-edge political satire about modern-day politics, it falls short of that goal.

Its a fun film with lots of blood, gore and funny moments, and Gilpin does an amazing job carrying the film. It wont disappoint viewers as they watch the film but, without the current circumstances driving some to see this film out of boredom, it wouldt quite stand as a memorable bit of cinema.

Grade: C+

Originally posted here:

[Review] The Hunt Aint As Smart As It Thinks It Is. - Central Track

Nobel laureate and Nigerian author, Wole Soyinka has added his voice on the coronavirus pandemic currently taking siege of the African continent and across the globe.

The author, who lives in Nigeria which has confirmed 46 cases of the deadly Covid-19, has criticized the Nigerian government for sitting back and watching as religious leaders run amok and be indifferent over the virus.

While the national government has issued directives about social distancing, over the weekend some preachers in the West African country ignored the directive and went ahead with Sunday services, which were attended by thousands of congregants.

They have been treated with kid gloves for too long I think there is too much political correctness going on. Soyinka told the BBC's Charles Mgbolu.

The 85-year old poet and playwright said the government ought to take on religious institutions who continue to defy the directive.

What the government should do in such instances is to take note of these contraveners of common sense and ensure that they are punished after this crisis is over or at some point or the other.

We have to take on churches and mosques, religions of any kind including traditional religions that misbehave and let them understand that they are living in very different times than that of their imagination."

Prof Soyinka has been in self-isolation for nine days after returning from the United States.

Despite Sonyikas sentiments, there are concerns that there is too much indifference towards the deadly virus in Africa's most populous nation which could spell disaster.

If at all there is anything like coronavirus its for rich men not for the poor man. So, we are free men and we will continue to live free. Thats their business, a trader in Lagos told Al Jazeeras Ahmed Idris.

Whats worse, Africas most populous nation with more than 200 million people has only has 5 molecular labs.

Meanwhile, an outbreak of Lassa fever, caused by a more common virus, has been active in Nigeria for the past few months and has even promoted calls for the declaration of a national health emergency.

Between January 1 and March 15, the Nigerian Center for Disease Control reported 161 deaths of Lassa fever patients, with 3,735 suspected cases and 906 confirmed cases, across twenty-seven of Nigerias thirty-six states. For the same period in 2019, Lassa killed 114 with 1801 suspected cases and 455 confirmed cases across twenty-one states, but the 906 confirmed cases for 2020 is already greater than the 810 confirmed cases for all of 2019.

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Wole Soyinka, in self-isolation, blast Nigerian government for treating coronavirus pandemic with kid gloves, calls for action on rogue churches and...

The University of California told students this week that it is inappropriate for them to use the term Chinese virus. The university released a set of guidelines that made the case that the term projects hatred towards Asian communities.

According to a report by the College Fix, the University of California system has released a set of guidelines that were designed to reduce xenophobia during the ongoing Wuhan coronavirus pandemic.

The guidelines encourage students to actively seek out and condemn intolerant speech that is taking place in response to the pandemic. Reject racism, sexism, xenophobia and all hateful or intolerant speech, both in person and online. Be an up-stander, and discourage others from engaging in such behavior, the guidelines read.

The guidelines go on to add that students should not use terms such as Chinese Virus or other terms which cast either intentional or unintentional projections of hatred toward Asian communities, and do not allow the use of these terms by others. Refer to the virus as either COVID-19 or coronavirus in both oral and written communications.

Breitbart News reported this week that actor George Takei had accused President Trump of emboldening racism by using the term Chinese virus. Takei said that Trumps use of the term Chinese virus sends a cold chill throughout the Asian-American community.

The University of California system has often inappropriately prioritized political correctness. Breitbart News reported in February that 17 students at the University of California, Santa Cruz, were arrested for blocking a local intersection during a protest for higher wages. Earlier in February, Breitbart News reported that UCLA told students to avoid using the words lame and insane because they create a stigma against marginalized people.

Stay tuned to Breitbart News for more updates on this story.

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University of California: Saying Chinese Virus Projects Hatred Towards Asian Communities - Breitbart

Two years after the much-acclaimed handshake between President Uhuru Kenyatta and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, is Kenya going up or coming down? To avoid the embarrassment of being seen as pro-handshake or anti-handshake, I will answer: Maybe, maybe not.Even as we celebrate that BBI has quieted things down, one cannot fail to notice the overpowering sense of seeing things as either black or white, depending on which side one takes.This could also explain the rise of not in my backyard syndrome where what happens on the other side of the fence does not matter so long as all is well in your corner. The equivalent for Kiswahili speakers is the saying:Pilipili usiyoila yakuwashiani?Support or opposition to ideas is fashioned along tribe and political affiliation.Why should we worry?Nimbyism risks denying the country better alternatives as loyalty and principled opposition gets undermined. There is more focus on being politically correct. Never has it ever been so right to conform even while breaking away from the group and taking a stand seems to be the right and sensible thing to do.The debilitating herd mentality holding sway currently negates the steps we have taken as a democracy. Democracy essentially centres on the contest of ideas. When a majority of the people begin to see things as either black or white - because none of them wants to step out of the common line - then we are treading on dangerous grounds. It should worry that Opposition MPs line up to defend, rather than kick the stool from underneath the government, while those supposedly in government are fighting government from within.

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Of handshake and the depressing culture of political correctness - Standard Digital

Groupthink, according to Christopher Booker, is one of the most valuable guides to collective human behaviour we have ever been given. But what is it exactly? It begins Bookers final, incomplete and posthumously published work as a descriptor for behaviour dictated by the group mind, the fixations of the human herd, or a collective make-believe. It is, in other words, a worldview with a superficial importance, whose relation to reality is fraught, and serves as an explanation for much of our world today: from identity politics, or the European Union, to the belief, passionately held by an increasing number of people, that the greatest threat facing the planet is man-made global warming.

Bookers climate scepticism, made patently clear from the books introductory chapter, offers an insight into the partisan nature of the study that's to come. The early stages of Bookers investigation carry us through American and British counterculture, US civil rights activism, and the emergence of Second-Wave Feminism earlier iterations of our contemporary groupthink, each operating in pursuit of a shared vision: to see white, male, euro-centricity consigned to the dustbin of history. Such assertions, however, come at the expense of evidence. The conclusion to the book, penned after Bookers death by the political analyst Richard North,states that the majority of its preceding 183 pages have been compiled with the lightest of editing. It shows. Bookers tendency to list rather analyse is repetitive; when he does pause for thought, he is more concerned with the rate of change than its value, repeatedly noting events that might, for instance, have played out differently only five years earlier.

Other passages are yet more puzzling. During a hashed examination of Darwinism, we catch Booker marvelling at the impossibility by which the evolutionary process eventually produced just one [species] which displays those two absolutely crucial but seemingly contradictory attributes that mark it out from every other form of life. Disappointingly, one of these attributes that [man] developed a brain much larger than that of any other animal is incorrect; the largest brain is found in the sperm whale, the largest brain-to-body mass ratio in the shrew. And, while we find Booker at his most engaging on Europe (perhaps not a surprise North has compiled these mostly from scratch), his logic is often flawed. Bookers discussion of the European Union begins with an attractive though typically under-sourced argument in support of the idea that a United States of Europe was incipient at the first conception of the economic zone. But his timeline leapfrogs blithely over successive decades, or is disrupted by his frequent failure to distinguish so-called groupthink from its broader, and less interesting cousin: bad decision-making.

Riding a wave of extreme examples(of which, he declares, none were untypical)uncritically cited from the Daily Mail and his former employer, the Daily Telegraph, it emerges over Groupthinks course that Bookers supposedly neutral principle of human behaviour is, in fact, a stand-in for a specifically left-wing political correctness. But if this helps to explain Bookers combative stance towards the last seven decades of progressive activism, it cannot prepare us for a set of views that cross, with unmistakable swagger, into downright misogyny and blatant homophobia. During a passage on the 2002 Adoption Act, which legalised adoption for same-sex couples, Booker draws on the example of the 18-month baby girl Elsie, whose death in 2016 came at the hands of her male adoptive parents. Elsies case, Booker argues, was made worse by the fact that the authorities, bowing to the ideological make-believe of the time, entrusted her into the care of her eventual murderers. What he declines to say, though he knowingly implies, is that the fact of the couple being same sex in some way contributed to Elsies death a more than controversial opinion that he nevertheless feels the need to disguise, with intentionally uncertain terms, as one of an unspecified number of basic human realities.

On this evidence, it is a small wonder that, in light of other instances of publisher-censorship in recent weeks, Groupthink has not garnered similar attention. But it may well be that the book is too farcical to cause offence. Bookers contrarian credentials are well-known, and it is hard to account otherwise for how anyone with such concern for objective reality might display such indifference towards the integrity of his own methods. In any case, it begs the question as to what, if anything, is the value of this book? Proponents of Bookers theories would be better served by Canadian "academic" Jordan Peterson, whose more astutely worded pop-science, along with his notorious Channel 4 interview with Cathy Newman in 2018, Booker is keen to both reference and seemingly without knowing contradict in the adjacent pages. Likewise, a scant account of Swiss psychologist Carl Jung is equally muddled, Booker doing a considerable injustice to a man and a set of theories he clearly admired.

If there are any lessons to be had, they are, rather, for Bookers opponents. Many on the left would do well to note the willingness, typical of Bookers brand of conspiracism, to utilise any example of leftist scorn or abuseagainst the right relevant or not to the discredit of its arguments, while his case against natural selection, set in opposition to a few half-hearted arguments in favour of intelligent design, make for an impressively sophistic spectacle. Otherwise, this aptly subtitled Study in Self Delusion offers only unsubstantiated polemic. Its crowning achievement is the proof, in Bookers own words, that we cant all be experts in everything. The dustbin awaits.

@danielbaksi

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Christopher Booker: Groupthink review an uncritical history of political correctness - The Arts Desk

Back in August, Blumhouse Productions pulled the plug on its newest filmThe Hunt,a thriller about a human hunting expedition loosely based on the famous 1924 short story The Most Dangerous Game.

When a couple of mass shootings happened close to its release date, the studio decided to pull the film fearing it would be insensitive to the victims of those tragedies.

Thats when things suddenly went hog-wild (no pun intended). Following the cancellation, media officials on the conservative side were quick to point out details from the trailer that hinted at the films deeper plot. It became clear that the people being hunted were conservative members while the ones hunting them were of the rich, liberal type. They quickly labeled the film an insult to their beliefs and another example of insensitive, liberal Hollywood.

Now the film is finally out, and as it turns out,The Huntisnt a thriller but a satire. The films story wisely never takes the idea of hunting humans for sport too seriously. Though it does have its serious moments, it mostly relies on the ridiculousness of its situation to generate some bloody yet stellar action sequences and a more than healthy dose of humor that takes aim at the wide divide between Americas two biggest political parties.

The predictions were right about the hunted being of the conservative side. The 12 strangers who have been placed in the game are all conspiracy obsessed Mericans who were all wrapped up in an Internet rumor about the game they are currently in. All the characters take time to express their grievances about gun rights, illegal immigrants and the idea that liberals are ruining the country they love so dearly.

While on the other side, the hunters of the game are most definitely of the far liberal side. The elites on the hunt are simply looking for revenge against the far-right supporters who, in their opinion, are making their lives worse by spreading the rumor. They fiercely believe in the importance of political correctness, inclusion and the idea that conservatives are a scum that need to be taught a lesson.

Though the early press predicted that the film was targeting the far-right specifically, it turns out that both sides are getting the finger pointed at them. The regressive Republicans being hunted are just as bad as the progressive Democrats that are hunting them. There are villains on both sides, and this movie isnt afraid to directly reference some very sensitive topics to make this portrayal clear.

This is whereThe Huntgenerates its biggest laughs. The one-sided portrayals of the political parties make for some truly hilarious moments. The characters are designed to be ridiculous, and the movie wouldnt be as entertaining as it is if they were taking everything happening around them seriously.

But its the liberals in general that bring in an unexpectedly high number of belly laughs. Theres one scene in particular where the liberal hunters are waiting around in a fort, talking about the importance of pro-choice and other basic liberal topics. One even has a small freakout when filmmaker Ava DuVernay (a known woke supporter) likes one of his photos on social media. Its a smartly written scene that knows how to keeps the chuckles coming.

It also contains some very entertaining action sequences. Director Craig Zobel clearly took inspiration fromThe Purgedirector James DeMonaco, as the scenes are blood splattered and somewhat hard to watch, but never to the point that it will make you want to hurl. They are just violent enough to get the pulse going.

The Huntfeels like a social media comment section come to life. Everyone hates the other side for some reason, and it quickly devolves into insults and death threats. The idea to represent this mindset as a game of hunting humans perfectly represents the ridiculousness of these comments. Combine this with the expertly crafted humor and action pack fight sequences and this movie is way better than what people initially thought.

Rating: 3.5 of 5

Check out more of Motion Picture Institute graduateBen Rothrock's reviews atdefactofilmreviews.com.

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Review: 'The Hunt' takes aim at the wide divide between Americas two biggest political parties - The Oakland Press

"Let's blow it all up." That was the sentiment that animated any number of Republican primary voters in 2016. The "it" was (take your pick) the Republican Party, the "establishment," the country. There were many good reasons for voters to be dissatisfied with the state of things in 2016. There were also any number of able candidates who could have instituted reforms. But that wasn't the mood, at least not for the nihilistic 30%.

It's hard to think of a less conservative impulse than "Burn it down!" But that's what this minority did, voting for the malignant narcissist who had never served anything other than his bottom line.

Eventually, when the Republican Party's winner-take-all rules made Donald Trump the likely nominee, most Republicans threw in their lots with him, too, because partisanship is the opiate of the people. By elevating Trump, they violated their sacred responsibility. Before considerations of policy or identity or history or "fight," voters must ask themselves whether the person to whom they are granting the powers of the presidency is fit to handle an emergency. If the answer is even a bit uncertain, that person must be ruled out.

Trump has been fortunate until now as have we all because no crisis happened. But the coronavirus has obliterated that lucky streak. It's the most serious challenge we have faced since the 9/11 attacks, and it may yet turn out to be far deadlier. Dr. Brian Monahan, the attending physician for the U.S. Congress, estimates that between 75 million and 100 million Americans will contract COVID-19. If the mortality estimates of 1% hold up, that would mean up to a million Americans could die. It may not be as bad as that, but it could be worse.

If we are not successful in inhibiting the spread of the virus right now to "flatten the curve" as the epidemiologists have taught us to say the crush in our hospitals could be catastrophic. If hundreds of thousands of sick Americans show up at hospitals all at once, the staffs will be overwhelmed. The U.S. has about 1 million hospital beds, and 68% of them are usually occupied. That leaves about 300,000 spare beds.

Trump did not create the virus, but his solipsism has deepened the crisis. What is his chief talking point? That he halted flights from China. He did this on Jan. 31, aftermajor airlines like United, Delta and American had already canceled dozens of flights and waived cancellation fees for their passengers.

Trump spent the next six weeks boasting about this brave defiance of political correctness while also lying to the American people about the scope of the threat. Just at the key moment when people needed to wash their hands, avoid crowds and learn ways to protect themselves and others to slow the progression of this pathogen, Trump and his minions were peddling a stream of falsehoods. On Feb. 24, for example, the president tweeted: "The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. ... Stock Market starting to look very good to me." Two days later, he said that the number of people infected is "going very substantially down, not up." And he said, "The 15 (cases) within a couple of days, is going to be down to zero."

Rush Limbaugh told his 20 million listeners on Feb. 24 "the truth" that "the coronavirus is the common cold, folks." Sean Hannity quoted an "MIT guy" to the effect that "coronavirus fear-mongering by the 'deep state' will go down in history as one of the biggest frauds." Fox host Laura Ingraham told her viewers that "Democrats and their media cronies have decided to weaponize fear and also weaponize suffering to improve their chances against Trump in November."

The crowd that howls about "fake news" is the most pernicious purveyor of it even on a matter of life and death.

After days of plunging stock prices, declarations of emergencies by governors, closings by private companies, cancellations of professional sports, and 38 deaths, the president finally decided to stop lying and admit, in a televised address, that we have a problem. But such is his indifference to the seriousness of his job that he made three factual errors in the prepared remarks. As for the bits that weren't inaccurate, the most he could muster were some vague promises of stimulus and yet another travel ban (for Europe, but not Great Britain). Nothing about improving testing. Nothing about providing paid sick leave for those who need it. Nothing about procuring more ventilators for hospitals, nor masks and gloves which are also in short supply.

The crisis is here and we've put a serial liar and cheat in the big chair. We must never do anything so reckless again.

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Mona Charen: We need a capable leader to oversee the virus crisis - Omaha World-Herald

The most famous review of The Hunt comes from the 45th president of the United States. The man formerly known as Donald Drumpf tweeted that The Hunt was made to inflame and cause chaos. They (the filmmakers) create their own violence, and then try to blame others. They are the true Racists, and are very bad for our country!

The 45th president wasnt the only person to weigh in. Much has been said about The Hunt, most of which came before its release. The buzz concerned the plot, which consists of liberal elites sport hunting radical conservatives, dubbed Deplorables, at a manor in Vermont.

Now, this reviewer is no President of the United States, but I do know a bit about movies enough to determine that The Hunt isnt inflammatory, racist or harmful to Americans. Real dangers, like shootings and viral infections, easily combatable by gun control and test kits respectively, probably should be higher on this Presidents priority list than exploitation cinema, but thats neither here nor there. Now, back to The Hunt.

The movie was originally supposed to be released in September 2019, but was pulled in the wake of the Dayton and El Paso shootings, and moved to Mar. 14 of this year (ironically perhaps an even worse time to release the movie, but who could have known). The release date switch was both spurred by and accompanied with controversy, from both sides of the political aisle. Be it because of its perceived glorification of violence, or depiction of deplorable hunting, many deemed The Hunt a movie that should never have been made. However, others lamented the movie's delay, with one pundit calling it left-wing political correctness getting out of control. Everyone had something to complain about, yet no one had even seen the movie.

Like with Joker, so much had been predicted, analyzed and determined about The Hunt before its release that it was always destined to fall short of every hyperbolic claim lobbed its way.

First of all, its not hate speech. The Hunt takes aim at everyone, reflecting current politics through a fun-house mirror that inflates the worst qualities of both sides of the political aisle. The liberals are arrogant, touchy holier than thou CEOs of huge companies. The conservatives are racist, homophobic and trophy hunters. While The Hunt is undoubtedly satirical, it does not try to solve Americas problems its politics are too exaggerated to be sincere, leaving the viewer to make their own conclusions. Theyre also incredibly funny. One highlight is when one of the elites shoots someone and leans in, exclaiming, For the record, climate change is real!

Political flourishes aside, though, The Hunt is really just a well-done thriller. Theres a fascinating swap of protagonists at the start, where it seems that every character is expendable, as well as a few cool fight scenes. Betty Gilpin (Killing Eve) is great too. Its basically Black Mirror meets Inglourious Basterds, a hyper-violent, imaginative and satirical thrill ride which doesnt take itself too seriously. Still, this feels like somewhat of an anticlimax. Was all the arguing really about something this harmless?

Its high time movies stopped becoming hotbeds of controversy for no reason. All the hand-wringing creates unreasonable extremes that the movies involved rarely live up to. Dont presidents and TV news anchors have better things to do than lament the perceived politics of an action movie? The conservative pundits couldnt get over the term Deplorable, even though it is only used once or twice in the entire movie. Keep in mind, these people are fine with hurling snowflake at most liberal pleas for decency.

Movies arent meant to be picked apart by political demagogues. Theyre meant to be watched, and hopefully enjoyed, by individuals. Its past time to move past the outrage machine turning cinema into an ideological battleground does nothing but cloud the movies themselves. If people watch a movie before arguing about it, everyone will be better off as the films can actually stand on their own.

Thats not to say that cinema shouldnt engage with contemporary issues or be debated for doing so. However, if any movie that includes politics is going to become a flashpoint of societal rage before it is even released, studios may eventually start avoiding them entirely which, in the age of masterpieces like Get Out and The Invisible Man, would be something truly deplorable.

Original post:

Behind the controversy, 'The Hunt' is just another thriller - The Michigan Daily

Recently, my daughter and her teenage son were trying to sort out the term "cisgender" as opposed to "transgender." It's a "woke" term to describe people like my daughter who seems quite happy to live with the anatomical equipment she was born with. (The prefix trans- comes from Latin, meaning across from or on the other side of. In contrast, the prefix cis- means on this side of.)

Millions of Americans have come to resent the notion that they are racist or homophobic if the "woke" guardians of political correctness say they are. Oops, I fear it's possible I may have inadvertently committed a "micro-aggression" just now. That means I might have offered someone an insult so minuscule as to have almost escaped detection.

A world obsessed with purity is a violent and unforgiving place. We recognize it quickly in others. We see the cruelty in Islamic fundamentalism, for example. If theology were drugs and you were looking for the really pure stuff, you might need to find a madrassa in Yemen. Liberals see it and fear it in right-wing nationalism and its obsession with ethnic purity, sexual purity, ideological purity. What liberals don't get is that some of the extremism on the right is a reaction to its counterpart on the Left.

Let's not tumble into a he-hit-me-first distraction. As the Right moved right, the Left moved left. Please be patient with me. Im not assigning blame; Im looking for clarity.

The progressive movement grew up in the Roaring 20s. It was a reaction to the grotesque concentrations of wealth supported by a vast toiling class who lived in 50 shades of misery. Many of its recruits, in this country at least, were motivated by Jewish and Christian principles of compassion and social justice.

By the Depression Era, New Deal liberalism saw the rising prosperity of unionized working men and women. The Civil Rights Era wasn't here yet but the liberalism of the time took the same position Abraham Lincoln took. Minority groups may not have been equals, but they certainly didn't deserve slavery or oppression.

By the 1960s, the civil rights movement was born - and it insisted on nothing less than equality. Finally, the suffering sustained by institutionalized inequality was being faced squarely. The founding impetus for the movement was compassion and empathy. With it came a growing astonishment and revulsion at the ugliness and cruelty latent in the human heart. Liberals, in facing how entrenched racism was in America, fell out of love with Joe Sixpack and much of the working class they'd previously championed. Too prejudiced or, as Hillary put it, "deplorables."

At that moment, a gust of oxygen flowed into the conservative movement. If the Left no longer could embrace ordinary working people, the Right would. The secret was to happily accept the white working class just the way they were and promise not to threaten them with multicultural initiatives.

In our long history, America has still not come to terms with its own diversity - and liberals have failed to grasp how difficult it is for so many people to accept human difference. The effects of racism are cruel, but for many people the roots of it are a profound discomfort. If shaming people for this discomfort had been an effective strategy, wed have solved our problem back in the 1960s. Instead, an unrelenting hardscrabble economy and even coronavirus worries convince many Americans the economy is a zero-sum game. Liberals, it is being argued, want to take from you and yours and hand it out to them and theirs.

This is the worst time for the political and cultural Left to double down on blaming and shaming people who cant keep up. The classic Democratic coalition was built from blue-collar workers. As the party began to defend racial, then sexual minorities, it started to lose its labor support. This sensitivity to the suffering of others and their exploitation is the moral bedrock of liberalism, but liberals are losing their compassion for those with whom they disagree. This is understandable but also catastrophic morally and politically. The remedy is spiritual: Compassion for all, listening without judgment, explaining without condescension.

The Left cannot successfully claim to represent the economic interests of people whom they cannot love.

Lawrence Brown of Centerville teaches humanities and is a columnist for the Cape Cod Times. Email him at columnresponse@gmail.com.

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The price we pay for an obsession with purity - Cape Cod Times

Lets blow it all up. That was the sentiment that animated any number of Republican primary voters in 2016. The it was (take your pick) the Republican Party, the establishment, the country. There were many good reasons for voters to be dissatisfied with the state of things in 2016. There were also any number of able candidates who could have instituted reforms. But that wasnt the mood, at least not for the nihilistic 30%. Its hard to think of a less conservative impulse than Burn it down! But thats what this minority did, voting for the malignant narcissist who had never served anything other than his bottom line.

Eventually, when the Republican Partys winner-take-all rules made Donald Trump the likely nominee, most Republicans threw in their lots with him, too, because partisanship is the opiate of the people. By elevating Trump, they violated their sacred responsibility. Before considerations of policy or identity or history or fight, voters must ask themselves whether the person to whom they are granting the powers of the presidency is fit to handle an emergency. If the answer is even a bit uncertain, that person must be ruled out.

Trump has been fortunate until now as have we all because no crisis happened. But the coronavirus has obliterated that lucky streak. Its the most serious challenge we have faced since the 9/11 attacks, and it may yet turn out to be far deadlier. Dr. Brian Monahan, the attending physician for the U.S. Congress, estimates that between 75 million and 100 million Americans will contract COVID-19. If the mortality estimates of 1% hold up, that would mean up to a million Americans could die. It may not be as bad as that, but it could be worse.

If we are not successful in inhibiting the spread of the virus right now to flatten the curve as the epidemiologists have taught us to say the crush in our hospitals could be catastrophic. If hundreds of thousands of sick Americans show up at hospitals all at once, the staffs will be overwhelmed. The U.S. has about 1 million hospital beds, and 68% of them are usually occupied. That leaves about 300,000 spare beds. In China, 15% of those infected required hospitalization. If the virus spreads very rapidly, and if only 5% of American cases require hospitalization, we will run out of hospital beds on May 16. This is, as the saying goes, as serious as a heart attack. It means many Americans who are now out for dinner and walking the dog will die on gurneys in makeshift clinics in hospital cafeterias. Some percentage of them will die because they couldnt access intensive care.

Trump did not create the virus, but his solipsism has deepened the crisis. What is his chief talking point? That he halted flights from China. He did this on Jan. 31, after major airlines like United, Delta and American had already canceled dozens of flights and waived cancelation fees for their passengers.

Trump spent the next six weeks boasting about this brave defiance of political correctness while also lying to the American people about the scope of the threat. Just at the key moment when people needed to wash their hands, avoid crowds and learn ways to protect themselves and others to slow the progression of this pathogen, Trump and his mendacious minions were peddling a stream of falsehoods. On Feb. 24, for example, the president tweeted: The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. ... Stock Market starting to look very good to me. Two days later, he said, (The number of people infected is) going very substantially down, not up. And he said, The 15 (cases) within a couple of days, is going to be down to zero. When the stock market panicked, Larry Kudlow suggested that investors buy the dips.

Rush Limbaugh told his 20 million listeners on Feb. 24 the truth that the coronavirus is the common cold, folks. Sean Hannity quoted an MIT guy to the effect that coronavirus fear-mongering by the deep state will go down in history as one of the biggest frauds... Fox host Laura Ingraham told her viewers that Democrats and their media cronies have decided to weaponize fear and also weaponize suffering to improve their chances against Trump in November.

The crowd that howls about fake news is the most pernicious purveyor of it even on a matter of life and death.

After days of plunging stock prices, declarations of emergencies by governors, closings by private companies, cancellations of professional sports, and 38 deaths, the president finally decided to stop lying and admit, in a televised address, that we have a problem. But such is his indifference to the seriousness of his job that he made three factual errors in the prepared remarks. As for the bits that werent inaccurate, the most he could muster were some vague promises of stimulus and yet another travel ban (for Europe, but not Great Britain). Nothing about improving testing. Nothing about providing paid sick leave for those who need it. Nothing about procuring more ventilators for hospitals, nor masks and gloves which are also in short supply.

The crisis is here and weve put a serial liar and cheat in the big chair. We must never do anything so reckless again.

Mona Charen writes for Creators.

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Charen: After this, voters will take their responsibility seriously - The Winchester Star

When Brexit and Trump sent transatlantic politics into a spin in 2016, many searched frantically for a handrail in the darkness. The times demanded fresh perspectives and they appeared in the shape of political podcasting. As a medium, the podcast was poised for adaptation, offering a range of furious, original, funny, marginalised and independent voices when the political going got weird.

Suddenly, everything was up for grabs: if Donald Trump could enter the Oval Office, surely nothing was off the table? Could a socialist become US president? The Bernie Sanders ultras on the self-proclaimed dirtbag left certainly thought so. Pods such as Chapo Trap House and Red Scare a mix of radical politics and irony found sizeable niches, using abrasive humour to tap into a disaffection not represented by mainstream broadcasters. In the centre, Pod Save America former insiders from Obamas White House horrified at Trumps rise was soon averaging 1.5 million listeners per episode. On the Republican side, Steve Bannon and Raheem Kassams War Room feels disconcertingly like being in Donald Trumps head, while John Zieglers Individual 1 vocalises anti-Trump conservatism.

In 2020, political podcasts have become increasingly important, and in the run-up to the US presidential election they are sure to be a significant battleground, with aspiring candidates lining up to be grilled on them. They are big business too: tours and book tie-ins underpin the business model of the likes of Chapo. Crowdfunding platforms such as Patreon, which enable fans to support their favourite pods and unlock extra tiers of content as a reward, have made independent profitability possible. Crooked Media, which hosts multiple shows alongside Pod Save America, is arguably becoming a new media empire.

The UK has followed suit. Pods ranging from Trashfuture (a response to the continuing psychic trauma of capitalism) to Novara Medias TyskySour have extolled the virtues of Corbynism. The Remainiacs podcast (centrists who suddenly found themselves on the outside looking in) and their second, less Brexit-focused spin-off The Bunker, have become the voice of despairing liberalism. On the right, there is the podcast arm of online magazine Spiked (which recently interviewed privilege-denying thesp Laurence Fox) and The Delingpod, in which journalist James Delingpole does his tendentious, climate crisis-sceptic thing in surround sound.

The much-mocked mainstream media has responded with pods of its own, in the process often making it clear why their competitors had to happen in the first place. The BBCs Political Thinking With Nick Robinson boasts titles suggesting the least appetising Friends episodes ever (The Nicky Morgan One; The What Does Boris Johnson Really Think One) and actually uses its extended duration as an excuse to get even cosier still with prominent politicians. These pods dont exactly go out of their way to dispel the notion that conventional political journalism is frequently a self-perpetuating Human Centipede of quid pro quo banality.

Conversely, the success of independent political podcasting is in large part due to the energy generated by outsiders grabbing a platform without permission. Political podcasts thrive on insurgency, on opposition to jaded official voices. Unmediated, unscripted, direct and authentic content is hugely appealing, says Dr Lance Dann, who co-wrote Podcasting: The Audio Media Revolution with fellow academic Dr Martin Spinelli. Its a raw energy and anger that people can express in the moment. The traditional media has struggled with balance, so in the face of the absurdity of Trump, Johnson and Brexit, these unguarded and incredulous voices have felt not just refreshing but necessary.

In fact, the unashamed lack of balance is part of the fun. In an era of correspondents parroting the briefings of anonymous government sources, they feel honest: vigorously and proudly partial. If you are starting to doubt official versions of the truth, it is thrilling to find youre not alone. The form itself is incredibly free, says Spinelli. There are no gatekeepers, there are no rules, the fear of defamation is virtually nonexistent, and podcasters have been experimenting in developing relationships with their audiences based on these attributes. Thats a key point: podcasting is really about a relationship rather than the spoken word.

But relationships can become too cosy, and insurgency can curdle into isolationism. Jessa Crispin, whose Public Intellectual podcast in the US explores a variety of outlooks, recently hosted an episode whose title suggested that You Can Talk to a Conservative Like a Normal Human Being. It was a reaction to a consensus in which, she says, audiences are mostly looking for a podcast that agrees with what they already believe. These podcasts hosts, she adds, try to turn everything into a punchline. Everyone is trying to follow the Chapo model; guys shouting over one another, eager to make the best joke. If I wanted to listen to men from privileged backgrounds who think they know best about everything, Id turn on the cable news.

In fact, one of the most notable problems with some of the dirtbag left pods is how light on policy discussion they have become. Rather than being a meaningful part of a battle of ideas, they can sometimes feel like hipsterism manifesting as political punditry, what Sigmund Freud called the narcissism of small differences rendered streamable. Some of the hard-left podcasts often seem more animated by their loathing of centrists than by adversaries on the right. Similarly, few liberal podcasts manage to hide their scorn for the Corbyn project. As Crispin puts it: Theres a lot of territorial behaviour. This is what I believe; if you dont believe it too, get the hell out. Theres very little bridge building. The thing I get from most of them is not just a lack of humility but a lack of curiosity. Theres the assumption that they have the right opinions.

With that in mind, it would be fascinating to see how the likes of Chapo might react to actually getting what they want. The shows host, Will Menaker, recently sparked controversy by pledging to refuse to vote for anyone but Sanders in November. But if Sanders were to win the Democratic nomination, Chapo would be forced to move on from thinking up insults for Pete Buttigieg (Ratfuck CIA operative, being a recent highlight) and on to discussing policy detail. They would move from the outer edges to the inside track.

For a glimpse of how tricky this mainstreaming process can be, it is worth considering the opposition. Take the pugnacious provocateurs over at The Spiked Podcast. A recent episode titled The Woke Stasi spoke volumes about their determination to continue obscuring dry policy issues with emotive cultural ones. But its shtick is now predictable to the point of tedium; straw men constructed for the sole purpose of presenting themselves as the contrarian opposition to what they term cultural Marxism.

However, the problem with evoking the Stasi is that the Stasi were the government. Their power was tangible and frightening. Whereas wokeness, political correctness or whatever other lazy identifier you might employ to avoid discussing systemic inequality, is currently under siege like never before. If Spiked ever offered an outsider perspective, those days are long gone; its viewpoint is now represented at the heart of the establishment. How much more culturally dominant would the performatively populist right have to be before its outriders accepted that they were policing the status quo?

And yet the medium retains vast potential. The best political podcasts boast wit and irreverence while allowing space for the informed deep dive too. With its generous tone, Ed Milibands Reasons to Be Cheerful pod is the sound of a man bringing a plastic picnic knife to a gunfight but it has established a niche, and it is set apart by its open-mindedness and emphasis on policy and ideas. Likewise, for his Getting Curious podcast, Queer Eyes Jonathan Van Ness conducted an impressive, humanising interview with Elizabeth Warren.

Fascinating material can emerge in unlikely places. Podcasting behemoth Joe Rogan (whose audience runs into millions per episode) is best known as a politically unaffiliated libertarian comedian; a weed-smoking, bench-pressing, deer-hunting avatar of red-blooded male America. And yet his conversation with Bernie Sanders was as thorough an interrogation of Sanderss actual policy as any of the radical left pods have managed, and will have reached parts of the electorate that previous Democratic candidates can only have dreamed about.

Novembers US presidential election may mark a turning point for political podcasts. Can they use their energy and large audiences to make a difference, and convince those outside of their echo chambers?

People listen to podcasts for a sense of community, for companionship and, in terms of politics, to have their views confirmed, says Dann. As such, podcasting has become the perfect embodiment of the dangers of social and web media bubbles. Audiences are listening in. They need to force themselves to listen out.

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Sound and fury: are political podcasts the future or just an echo chamber? - The Guardian

Harvey Weinstein told a courtroom Wednesday hes worried about this country.

He neednt be. Its a whole lot safer now with him behind bars.

Weinstein, the disgraced movie mogul and leering face of everything #MeToo set out to dismantle, was sentenced to 23 years in prison. He was convicted of two felony sex crimes last month and faced a minimum sentence of five years and a maximum of 29 years.

Weinstein is 67. Twenty-three years in prison would put him at 90. I dont find joy in the prospect of him suffering through his final days in captivity, but I do think a more than two-decade sentence sends a message that serial sexual predation will not be taken lightly, even when the predator has fame and fortune on his side.

Every argument that couldve been made on his behalf was made, Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Joan Illuzzi said in court. And the system worked.

She gave credit to Weinstein accusers, two of whom delivered victim impact statements before the judge sentenced Weinstein.

The defendant would never have been stopped from hurting and destroying more lives, Illuzzi said. Every one of these women represents the strength and fortitude of every moral person who stands up and says, Enough.

Enough from Weinstein. Enough turning a blind eye to the sort of harassment and abuse and dehumanizing that felt, for far too long, in far too many industries, routine. Par for the course.

If not for the Weinstein story opening the #MeToo floodgates, we may never have learned about rape allegations against Matt Lauer. R. Kellys multiple accusers may have continued to toil in obscurity. Larry Nassers victims may still be waiting for a grown-up to take them seriously.

Weinstein offered his own take.

We may have different truths, he told his accusers in court. But I have remorse for all of you and for all the men going through this crisis.

Before the sentence was announced, he told the court, I am totally confused.

I think men are confused about all of this, he said, this feeling of thousands of men and women who are losing due process. Im worried about this country. This is not the right atmosphere in the United States of America.

Due process affords you the right to a fair trial. It doesnt guarantee youll be happy about the outcome.

But Weinstein is still trying to paint himself as the poster boy for political correctness run amok. Life as he knew it is over. But maybe, he supposes, life as a martyr is just beginning.

The Weinstein sentence reminds us of the importance of those sources and of leaders at news organizations who refused to kill the story including the editors at The New Yorker who published the first allegations of rape and assault about Weinstein, journalist Ronan Farrow tweeted Wednesday. In a letter to the judge this week, Weinsteins attorneys said that reporting destroyed his life. In fact, it fairly parsed a mountain of evidence suggesting Weinsteins actions accomplished that.

Our days of having to endure his tortured logic, his feeble attempts to pass this whole thing off as a he said/she said misunderstanding rather than a he said/she said and she said and she said and she said and she said and she said and so on are numbered. Soon hell report to prison, where the flashbulbs and microphones will be scant and hell have ample time to nurse his concern for this country.

And his accusers, I hope, can find peace and healing. Knowing that their courage paid off. Knowing that their voices made a difference. And that difference made ripples, the likes of which well never be able to count, far and wide and forever.

Heidi Stevens is a lifestyle columnist for

the Chicago Tribune.

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Harvey Weinstein is 'worried about this country.' He needn't be. It's safer with him behind bars - Dothan Eagle

The embattled Lions will also have some proper time for introspection after the franchise on Monday announced that its whole Super Rugby tour group has gone into self-isolation for 14 days.

Following an initial scramble to get return flights from New Zealand, where the final match of their trip against the Highlanders was suspended, the team managed to hop on and arrive back in Johannesburg on Sunday night.

Coach Cash van Rooyen and the rest of his staff were on a separate flight, scheduled to arrive on Monday evening.

ALSO READ: Bulls go into self-isolation as Dobson fears political correctness over coronavirus

It is difficult circumstances but peoples health come first. Sanzaar is in ongoing discussions with broadcasters and have been keeping everyone informed of the decisions. The situation will be reviewed on an on-going basis, Rudolf Straeuli, the Lions CEO, said in a statement.

Meanwhile unlike the Bulls, whove implemented a blanket suspension on players reporting for duty at Loftus the Lions fringe players are continuing training for the upcoming SuperSport Rugby Challenge though that competitions prospects of continuing looks pretty dire anyway.

Their full training programme at Johannesburg Stadium remains in place while being monitored on a daily basis by the medical team, the statement continued.

As a result, the franchise warned supporters not to be alarmed should social media posts emerge of their activities.

For more sport your way, download The Citizens app for iOSandAndroid.

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Lions join their Bulls neighbours in self-isolation - Citizen

This column is an opinionby Michael Coren, a columnist, broadcaster, speaker, and the author of 17 bookspublished in 12 languages. He is also anordained cleric in the Anglican Church of Canada.For more information aboutCBC's Opinion section, please see theFAQ.

Back in the late 1970s while living in the U.K., I took a university course on modern British history. In one tutorial we discussed pre-war fascism and its leader, the repugnant Sir Oswald Mosley, whose black-shirted followers would randomly attack Jewish people in London's East End. One of the young men sitting around the table said, "We had that chap speak at our school once."

Silence. I broke it by asking if there were any Jewish children at the school. Pause. "I rather think there were,"he drawled. How, I asked, do you think they felt? His reply: "I have absolutely no idea."

No, he certainly didn't.

It's increasingly fashionable to make fun of, dismiss, even insult concepts of "political correctness" and "woke," and to describe progressive comment as "virtue signalling." The habit, a spasm really, used to be the preserve of the hard right, but has become increasingly common in the mainstream.

The well-known British actor Laurence Fox recently became something of a hero to some, for example, when he appeared on a highly popular weekly television show and made the correct noises for conservative-minded viewers. He then solidified his status by claiming that he would never date a woman under the age of 35 because they are "too woke" and that "woke people are fundamentally racist."

In Canada, federal Conservative Party leadership contender Erin O'Toole ran an ad in January in which he said he would, "defend our history, our institutions against attacks from cancel culture and the radical left."

Cancel culture the most important issue to everybody in Canada! No doubt he said it because he thinks, or was told, that it hits home within right-wing circles, among people who genuinely believe that free speech and contrary opinion are distant memories. And it probably did.

Which is odd, because almost every weekend when I look at Twitter I find right-wing journalists trending because of yet another ultra-conservative and provocative opinion expressed in their newspaper column. I also see the same types of people white, usually male, invariably from similar backgrounds dominant in politics and business.

I graduated from the University of Toronto last year as a mature student after spending three years studying for a Masters of Divinity degree. Based on all the noise around woke culture, I'd confidently expected a hotbed of censorship and intolerance. In fact, it was incredibly similar to the university I'd attended in Britain three decades earlier, other than the students were generally more studious and less self-indulgent

Which is not to say that there are not problems. As society evolves and power is redistributed, there will be abuses and extremes. The healthier rhythms of a balanced and just culture will eventually settle, but it's hard to deny that there are people on the far left, sour and jargon-adoring puritans, who seem to define themselves by how offended they are. Sometimes about everything.

They seek to control, curtail and ban, and they can be harsh and even violent. We learn about their excesses, however, not because they are particularly common occurrences, but usually because those who are their victims, tellingly and ironically, have access to media.

But these zealots are a small and vocal minority, and are little different from those on the far right with similar notions.

Six years ago, after I embraced a more open and radical view of my Christian faith and in particular spoke out in support of equal marriage, I was banned from speeches, fired from jobs, harassed and vilified. My children's Facebook pages were trolled, my wife received letters demanding that she leave me, and I was accused of being a rapist and a thief. By the very sort of people who shout "woke" at those with whom they disagree. I know this because they said it, and still say it, to me.

That alliance of the polarized and irrational is hardly surprising, and both sides the far left and the far right are convinced that it's the other, not them, who is the problem.

I appreciate that change can be intimidating, and I say this as a 61-year-old white, straight man. But this doesn't justify sweeping generalizations and turning "woke" and similar terms into abuse. It's not only facile and inaccurate, it also reveals an enormous misreading of life's realities.

What we might think of as political correctness is, at its best, being socially aware and sensitive.

It's about developing a visceral and emotional understanding, openness to transformation, and the ability to admit painful and often shocking truths about oneself. Privilege isn't linear, but it is genuine and about the only people to deny that are those who fail to grasp their own possession of it.

The recently canonized Cardinal Newman, although often adored by modern conservatives, wrote that, "To live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often." That implies a permanent revolution of new vision, an ever-expanding circle of sympathy and ideas. It's not easy, and if it were it probably wouldn't be the real thing.

It was not very long ago that jokes about racial minorities, LGBTQ2 people, and anybody else outside of society's circle of dominance were mainstream and common. Today most of us cringe when we recall that time, but some still try to justify it with, "They were just jokes!"

Not for their targets.

I'd much rather signal a virtue than scream a vice. And while I've no idea if I'm "woke" or not, I hope I'm not asleep.

The bloodstream of the body politic is receiving a transfusion, and while a few toxins might sometimes be flowing, we'll all likely be a lot healthier in the end.

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Change can be intimidating, but that doesn't justify turning words like 'woke' into slurs - CBC.ca

It feels like an inside joke every time.

That moment you pull up to a car with the Colorado native bumper sticker and the driver turns out to be white. Its a split second of funny visual dissonance and lets be real, a Broncos sticker is more telling of old-school Denver pride.

But after the short-lived chuckle, comes the painful reality; the history of Native Americans in our state is no laughing matter.

In August 1864, territory Gov. John Evans authorized Colorado citizens to kill and destroy hostile Indians. Three months later, more than 100 innocent Cheyenne women, children and men were slaughtered and mutilated during the Sand Creek Massacre led by Colonel John Chivington.

This treatment is not unique to our state. Massacres like Wounded Knee in South Dakota or the Bear Creek Massacre in Idaho claimed the lives of indigenous families and communities. History has been brutal to native peoples across the country in the name of civilization.

And still, our everyday lexicon is laced with clichs and misnomers that minimize the experience of indigenous people.

Language is a powerful tool as the practice of self-awareness and expression. It helps us archive events and share stories. We learn lessons and grow from the past. At its best, it helps people connect, belong and arrive at mutual understandings.

Mishandled it can create exclusion, division or erasure.

And while these clichs or idioms can be labeled benign, these words can depict gory pasts. Some of these fictional exchanges below are laughable but most are cringeworthy.

When its time to get multiple departments together, sound the alarm and circle the wagons. No thank you Mark, its not that serious, and we arent under attack.

Its 4:55 p.m. on a Friday at your office when your coworker comes up and gleefully announces, were the last of the Mohicans. Sandra, just no, and go home already.

As you pass your supervisor he says, lets pow wow in the kitchen in five. Bill, pow wows are actual cultural events that are fun and that dont happen at work. The term means medicine men in a language spoken by the Algonquian peoples in Massachusetts.

Bill then tasks you with defending the fort next week after four of your five colleagues are out sick, on business trips or working from home. Again, Bill no one is under attack.

In all seriousness, even while awareness continues to grow the pervasiveness of incongruent language continues. Its like your nose which is always there out of sight until you mention it.

But then again, the use of incongruence here not matching meaning to intention assumes we care. Most of us actually care. We care a lot about belonging, being heard and understood.

Thats why the problem with finding your tribe is that it feels so inconsistent. Everyone deserves to search for their social groups, their tight-knit community and kindred. Just dont name it at the expense of others who physically fought hard to keep their tribal affiliations alive and together.

Wait didnt we start with a simple sticker.

Call it what you wish. Iconic. Infamous. Enraging. The green sticker with white snow caps with the word native has long been a contentious topic. And still, over 30 years later the sticker remains plastered on the bumpers of cars, SUVs and pickup trucks.

Many share a great sense of pride in being from Colorado. Or growing up here even before memories could form. Maybe youre Colorado-born or raised, but native as an identifier feels incorrect. Unless you are Arapaho, Cheyenne, Kiowa, Sioux or Ute.

Now you might sigh, call this a tirade and dismiss these as mere words theres no malintent. Or maybe you think this is encouraging a culture of victimhood. Native people are not victims, they are survivors of a mass genocidal attempt.

No, this isnt a call to police each other or to default mindlessly to political correctness. This is an invitation to practice self-awareness. This is a cosmic pizza order for someone to make a sticker that replaces native with born or raised.

That horrid day in November, 170 miles southeast of Denver, two Army officers of the 700 soldiers led by Chivington refused to open fire.

In a similar way, we can decide what barrels out of our mouths and unto our bumpers.

Mimi Madrid is a Denver-raised writer who works as a communications content writer at Nurse-Family Partnership and has worked in non-profits serving youth, LGBTQ survivors of violence and Latinx communities.

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Madrid: Heres why you should peel that native bumper sticker off your truck - The Denver Post

by Jennifer Mercieca|March15,2020

Presidential candidates have long found ways to take their messages directly to the voters, by avoiding the filter of press coverage. But today, candidates have gone steps further, turning themselves into direct competitors with the media that cover them and creating an increasingly bitter conflict between the press and politicians.

The competition also explains why voters are suddenly seeing so many new approaches to political communicationsapproaches that can make politics feel both more democratic, and more chaotic. We are watching the end of one kind of political campaigning and the rise of a new post-rhetorical era. To understand what post-rhetorical means, and why campaigning now feels so different than even a decade ago, one has to look at the past, when the press and presidential campaigns werent at odds. In fact, they once cooperated for the mutually beneficial purpose of making news.

Presidential candidates used to campaign via retail politics, such as meeting voters face to face in diners or speaking to voters at train stops or other events, while the press gave print space and airtime to candidates, amplifying the rhetoric and messages of campaigns while also filtering political news for the public. Since candidates needed to use the press to connect with voters that they couldnt meet in person, they gave the press access and information. In return, the press had campaign news to sell to advertisers and enjoyed the prestige of winnowing candidatesseparating the legitimate candidates from the also-rans. Press and politiciansparticularly winning politicianscooperated with each other, and were mutually dependent.

Scholars call presidents communicating to the people via the press the rhetorical presidency model because presidents use rhetorical practice (communication) as a tool for governing. The era of the rhetorical presidency started first when Teddy Roosevelt wanted to get the public interested in his ideas and agenda. In 1898 he invited reporters to cover his Rough Riders as they prepared for battle in the Spanish-American War. By providing the press with a good story, Roosevelt also got their cooperation to get out his ideas about why he thought that the war was necessary. The press covered Roosevelt as a hero, preparing for battle. Once he was president, Roosevelt then used the press to go over the heads of Congress by using the press to speak directly to the people, hoping that voters would pressure Congress to enact his agenda. The press facilitated Roosevelts message distribution and Roosevelt found that he had a bully pulpit from which he could set the nations agenda. The rhetorical presidencycommunicating with the public via the pressincreased the power of the presidency itself, and in its time it was revolutionary. It helped to elevate the Executive Branch over Congress, establishing what scholars call a second Constitution.

The rhetorical presidency model worked for presidential campaigning too. Woodrow Wilson took advantage of the latest media technology in 1908 by recording his campaign speeches on phonographic records. Presidential candidates since Wilson have taken advantage of each new technologyradio, television, cable, internetwith the winner typically being the one who best took advantage of the new ways to communicate. The opposite was also true: presidential candidates who failed to understand how new communication technologies could work against their campaigns have tended to fail in their bids for the presidency. When JFK and Nixon debated on TV in 1960, Nixons failure to understand how TV would magnify non-verbal messages sank his campaign. Likewise, in the Bush-Kerry campaign of 2004, Kerrys failure to understand the power of political blogs resulted in Kerry being swift-boated.

Were no longer in the era of the rhetorical presidency. Cooperation between the press and presidents began to fray after Watergate, and was hastened along by the invention of cable news, the rise in horse-race reporting, and the fracturing of media. By 1988, the average presidential campaign soundbite had shrunk from 43 seconds to 9 seconds. Presidential candidates found that the press was filtering their messages more than they were facilitating them and they sought new ways to communicate with the public.

In our century, presidents, starting with George W. Bush, sought to cut the media out of the communication process, which laid the foundation for the post-rhetorical era. New communication technologies meant that candidates could make their own media networks and communicate their messages directly to the public.

Barack Obama was the first to perfect post-rhetorical campaigning. His 2008 run was the first to take advantage of newly available communication technology to communicate with supporters directly via text message, apps, email lists, and social media. As Obama campaign chief communications officer Anita Dunn explained after the election, the campaign sought whenever possible to communicate around the filter. The campaign announced important decisions like selecting Joe Biden as Obamas running mate, rejecting public financing, and picking the location for Obamas 2008 DNC acceptance address directly to supporters via email and text message. The press found out the news when everyone else did, which meant that they no longer had a monopoly over what was news. Never again would the press have the sole power to filter, amplify, and winnow presidential candidates.

Political campaigning since 2008 has operated within the logics of the post-rhetorical presidencypresidential campaigns compete rather than cooperate with news organizations. While candidate Hillary Clinton was known for being suspicious of the press, carefully controlling her campaign messages, Donald Trump attacked the press directly. During his 2016 presidential campaign and since he has threatened the press, called them lying scum, his re-election campaign has sued them, withheld information from them, prevented them from covering his events, stopped holding press briefings, and lied to them almost constantly. In so doing Trump has tried to take the agenda-setting power away from the press. All of this is the opposite of the kind of cooperation required by the rhetorical presidency model. As journalism professor Jay Rosen noted, Trump has tried to break the press.

What are the consequences for society of having presidential candidates with unlimited access to communicate with the public? Should the press have any power to set the agenda, policerhetoric, or winnow and vet candidates?And if the press doesnt have that power, then who should?

Trump was able to break the press because political campaigns work on the same metrics as everything else in the attention economy: engagement. Trumps campaign and presidential communication strategy was to use post-rhetorical messageswhat he calls his modern day presidential communication styleto speak directly to supporters to keep them engaged. This enables Trump to set the nations agenda and frame reality. The post-rhetorical presidency model is asymmetrical, with power resting with the most engaging candidates. The press has been reduced to amplifying the news that Trump makes on his own vast direct communication network. Because Trump attracted so much attention, media companies were powerless to withhold news coverage. In fact, they did the opposite: During the 2016 campaign, the media gave Trump the equivalent of $5.9 billion in free airtime.

In 2020 we can clearly see that were in the post-rhetorical era of campaigning, and we can see new norms for this strategy taking shape. The post-rhetorical campaign model is a combination of retail face-to-face politics and direct communication with supporters. Campaigns are still using traditional media for amplification, but they are trying to mitigate the medias ability to winnow and filter as much as possible.

So far, weve seen three different post-rhetorical models in 2020 and one candidate who is still using the rhetorical presidency model.

First, Trump and Sanders are both using what we can think of as the post-rhetorical extreme energy strategy. This strategy requires campaigns to have the ability to speak directly to supporterscalled vertical communicationand counts on supporters to be energized to spread the campaigns messages to other votersa form of horizontal communication.

Since 2016, both Trump and Sanders have taken advantage of the horizontal energy of their supporters to drive their messages. The campaigns have amplified messages from supporters and then relied on outrage for those messages to go viral. This strategy makes sense because both Trumps and Sanders campaigns are outsider populist campaigns that infiltrated a major political party, attempting to remake it in the candidates image. An outsider campaign like that requires an energetic horizontal and vertical strategy to be viable.

Campaigns take risks with this strategy because it is difficult to control the horizontal messages that circulate on your campaigns behalf. For example, some Sanders supporters have used hostile, swarming techniques to attack supporters of other Democratic candidates online, which could hurt the Sanders campaign when it needs to attract those supporters for the general election. While some Democrats have asked Sanders to discipline his supporters, Republicans have not sought to hold Trump accountable the behavior of his fans, rejecting standards as mere political correctness.

For voters, the risk of such extreme energy horizontal communication is that its hard to know whether it is authentic. One wealthy benefactor supported some of Trumps 2016 campaigns horizontal meme magic, and the Mueller investigation found evidence that internet personas funded by Russia supported both Trump and Sanders campaigns in 2016, with U.S. intelligence officials now warning that Russian trolls are active on behalf of both of their campaigns again in 2020.

By contrast, Elizabeth Warren used what we can think of as a post-rhetorical strategy of connection. Unlike Trump and Sanders campaigns, Warrens campaign was not based in outrage. Instead, Warrens campaign sought to use a positive message to go around the news filter through a horizontal selfie campaign. Warren spent hours talking with voters and taking photos with them after her speaking events, which allowed her to hear directly from voters and connect with them about their concerns. Voters then posted their selfie photos online, which spread Warrens messages horizontally. Warrens campaign strategy was deliberately joyful and relied upon connection and engagement. It sought to gain attention and engagement through the authentic joy people felt about spreading her message through posting selfies.

The risk of this strategy for the campaign became obvious when voting started. While voters may have liked Warren, connection was not a sufficient motivation to show up to the polls and vote for her. Extensive research shows that a negative emotion like outrage can motivate voters, but its less clear if a positive emotion like connection can. That being said, Warren used the attention gained through her horizontal strategy to effectively fundraise and spread her detailed policy proposals. In this way, the horizontal campaign supported and complemented her vertical campaignas well as her overall campaign message. In hindsight, her campaign strategy may enable future campaigns to get the press to focus more on policy ideas rather than merely on personality or the horserace.

The third post-rhetorical model weve seen might be called the Billionaire strategy, used by Mike Bloomberg, and to a lesser extent Tom Steyer. Bloomberg paid for a vertical, top-down campaign. The former New York City mayor went around the news filter by purchasing nearly a half a billion dollars in paid advertising, hoping to connect with voters through abundant message saturation. Typical of an outsider negative campaign, Bloombergs ads featured lots of attack ads on the incumbent. The horizontal element of Bloombergs campaign was also paid forthe campaign created scripts for paid campaign workers (deputy digital organizers) to use with their social networks. In addition the campaign paid for the creation of viral meme messages that winked at the fact that they were paid for.

One problem for the Bloomberg campaign was that a paid-horizontal strategy did not read as authentic. Another problem was that its difficult to control so many paid campaign workers or to check on their work due to the private nature of their networks. Reports emerged of Bloombergs paid-horizontal memers negating the campaign-provided vertical messaging by instructing their friends to vote for other candidates after they shared Bloombergs paid message. For the electorate, the obvious and serious concern about the billionaire strategy is whether a wealthy person should be allowed to buy a position of political power, which would strike at the very heart of the American democratic process.

The exception to these post-rhetorical campaign models may be former Vice President Joe Biden, who has continued to use the rhetorical presidency model, combining retail politics with earned media coverage and endorsements from high-profile supporters. In his comeback surge in South Carolina and on Super Tuesday, he seemed to rely on the backing of other politicians, from U.S. Representative Jim Clyburn to U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, who had endorsed him. Bidens surprise success on Super Tuesday may have been a result of voters exhaustion with post-rhetorical politics. Its unclear whether Biden can win this wayhe will surely have to build some version of his own post-rhetorical strategy if he wants to control his message and speak directly to his supporters.

It can be fascinating to watch campaigns develop new strategies to sideline the press. But these strategies also raise serious meta-questions about the political process and its future. What are the consequences for society of having presidential candidates with unlimited access to communicate with the public? Should the press have any power to set the agenda, police rhetoric, or winnow and vet candidates? And if the press doesnt have that power, then who should? And how could the process work? There are lots of questions with these emerging presidential campaign strategies, but few clear answers.

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Why Does the 2020 Presidential Campaign Feel So Loud and Angry? - zocalopublicsquare.org

For a small fee, the opaquely funded Policy Exchange thinktank will exchange your old worn-out policy for a more rightwing one, chopped out in a pub toilet by co-founder Michael Gove. Nyaaaagh! Gerard Lyonss uncut analysis of our thriving economic prospects under World Trade Organization tariffs has burned out my septum, and Ive sneezed snot and blood on to my copy of Ayn Rands The Fountainhead!! Michael!!! Help me!!!! You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!!!!!

Last week Policy Exchange tried to make liberal higher educational institutions the next bogeypersons in the Rightwing Coups culture war, another target in an ongoing parade of necessary phantoms. The EU has been knocked off the top of the list, and the BBCs head is already on the chopping block, gazing up lovingly into the eyes of its executioner, eager to please until the end, like a stupidly loyal dog.

As other dead cats disappear, it can only be a matter of time before Dominic Cummings blunderbuss is aimed at the marsh-dwelling myth of the will-o-the-wisp, a small burning cloud of glowing methane, known for its leftwing sympathies, and responsible for curdling all the milk, souring all the cheese, and straightening all the bananas.

Meanwhile, Turning Point UK, the British incarnation of a wealthy American rightwing youth organisation, endorsed by the child-friendly Conservative luminaries Priti Patel and Jacob Rees-Mogg, is aiming to compile a student snitches website listing the dangerous leftwing academics exposing our kids to their anti-racist mathematics and frayed corduroy jackets.

This isnt a new idea. When I was a leftwing student, I subsidised my full grant via a variety of jobs. I dressed as a monkey to leaflet for a fancy-dress shop, and was beaten soundly in the lane by hooligans to whom a boy dressed as a monkey for money, who just wanted to learn Anglo-Saxon poetry, was some kind of threat. And all through one beautiful and balmy Indian summer 33 years ago my lithe young body carried heavy suitcases up historic staircases for conference attendees at an Oxford college, a memory that now seems like a scene from an unwritten autobiographical novel which, like most autobiographical novels, has no need to exist.

My favourite guests were the ghost hunters from the Society for Psychical Research. One of whom, a hugely likable man I now think must have been the renowned Tony Cornell, told me in the bar about his machine, the Spider (Spontaneous Psychical Incident Recorder), which he hoped would trap ghosts. I began to believe I had retroactively imagined the invention until, halfway through writing this sentence, I used the internet to verify the Spiders existence, and catapulted myself back through time to haunt my own memories in smaller trousers.

My least favourite conference attendees were the centre-right libertarians of the Freedom Association who, unlike the ghost hunters, didnt tip me at all, seeing the practice as a socialist intervention in the marketplace. And they hadnt invented any ghost-hunting machines with cool acronyms either. Founder member Norris McWhirter, who I knew as the boastful statistics goon from the BBCs Record Breakers, had drawn napkin plans for a self-guided miniature vacuum cleaner, able to de-fluff the belly-buttons of freedom fighters whose attempts to discredit trade unions were hampered by distracting lint-clog. But Tonys Spider was infinitely superior to the McWanc (McWhirters Automatic Navel Cleaner).

In the evenings, wispy-haired McWhirter would hold forth to his followers in the bar. I couldnt help but overhear the spindly statistician outlining his plans to get sympathetic scholars to help the Freedom Association compile a dossier of students involved with left-leaning causes, which could then be given to potential employers. Drunk and irked I sarcastically interrupted: Norris. What is the biggest blacklist of left-leaning students that has ever been compiled and how long exactly was it? McWhirter fixed me with his angry iron gaze, but couldnt resist an arrogant display of knowledge. The biggest blacklist of left-leaning students that has ever been compiled is the one I am working on now and it is 43.6 centimetres long, he declared, But I think it just got longer by the length of one name. And what is your name? Dont tell him Lee, piped up Tony from a corner, where he was compiling a dossier of fraudulent mediums to supply to potential ectoplasm. But it was too late. And two years later, my mysteriously rejected application to be the chairman of PricewaterhouseCoopers forced me instead into my standup comedy career. And the rest is history.

In the end self-interest and disillusion will make Conservative voters of the best of you

Why dont Policy Exchange, Turning Point UK, Toby Youngs X-Men of Shits, and the Freedom Association just set up their own universities, teaching climate-emergency denial, anti-trade union theory, progressive eugenics and political correctness gone mad? Universities are supposed to be leftwing, daddio! And so are students. If you cant believe naively in the possibility of a better, fairer world as a 19-year-old, when can you? You will have the rest of your life to be an arse, and in the end self-interest and disillusion will make Conservative voters of the best of you. For example, though known today as a white Tory party grandee, in the 1950s Kenneth Kenny Clarke was actually a black American jazz drummer, who pioneered the use of ride cymbals and irregular accents, and had an affair with Lenny Bruces ex, Annie Ross, before dying of heart failure in Pittsburgh in 1985.

And if I hadnt lived the charmed life of the standup comedian, clowning around in the same clothes and off-the-peg opinions I sported at 17, I could have been chopping out policies alongside Michael Gove, and campaigning to have my former self retroactively banned for speaking at any venues that receive public subsidy.

Stewart Lees Snowflake: Tornado is at Londons Southbank Centre in June and July, and is touring nationally now

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Oi, Cummings! Leave those lefty kids alone - The Guardian

Japanese animation has long had a reputation for pushing the boundaries of whats acceptable, but is it pushing too far these days?

Anime used to be conceived, produced, and consumed pretty much all within the confines of Japan. Sure, the occasional series would get licensed for overseas distribution, but with its story and characters so thoroughly rewritten, and its visuals so extensively re-cut, as to have little to no relation to the original version.

That started to change in the first major overseas anime boom of the 1990s, but even then, a series getting officially released outside of Japan was still the exception, not the rule. Nowadays, though, things have flipped entirely. Its now practically a given that any anime but the most obscure or prohibitively expensive-to-license ones will stream online internationally, and most of those will get overseas home video releases too.

But as access to anime gets easier and easier, its overseas audience is continually expanding beyond people who grew up with or have an interest in/affinity for the set of Japanese societal values reflected in the medium. Because of that, theres been increased debate as to whether or not anime needs to be more concerned with the idea of political correctness, and Japanese Twitter user @poepoeta01 recently weighed in with his opinion.

Many people are under the mistaken impression that Japans manga and anime have earned their popularity overseas simply because of the artists high level of technical skill.

Japans manga and anime are interesting because compared to other countries, theyre made under wild, limitless freedom of expression, without any restrictions.

Saying If anime isnt more conscious about being politically correct, it wont expand its overseas market it totally off the mark.

The majority of the direct reactions to @poepoeta01s tweet have been in support of his analysis and stance, with comments such as:

Totally right. I think this is why Chinese-made anime-style animation hasnt caught on internationally.Its like how late-night comedy shows are really funny, but then they lose their edge when the performers try to transition to more mainstream prime-timeprograms.I cant imagine another country where artists would be able to make a manga about Buddha and Jesus sharing an apartment.Japanese culture has traditionally been a closed-off one, where otaku-like communities come together to push an artistic field forward, and while that inner circle is amusing itself, the art becomes so polished that eventually outsiders notice and are impressed by the quality. People who like anime support each other, and people who dont like it dont watch it.

That last bit of reasoning, though, is something one could argue has new wrinkles to it in the current anime industry. With international distribution now easier than ever before, brand-new anime content is just a few clicks away for anyone with an Internet connection. Setting aside the question of whether or not anime has become more mainstream in overseas markets, access to it has definitely gotten much easier for non-Japanese media consumers, and an anime with content they find objectionable now risks leaving money on the table, money that could be used to help secure the long-term stability of a franchise and bankroll the continuing content production.

While not as numerous as the responses of agreement, @poepoeta01s assertation that anime shouldnt be concerned with political correctness also produced a few that disagreed.

Youre totally wrong. I have no idea what youre talking about.Looking at the staff credits for anime, I feel like you can say that it isnt made only by teams that are 100-percent Japanese anymore, and I think thats going to be the case more and more.

@poepoeta01, though, went on to offer a different idea of how the internationalization of anime could play out in a follow-up tweet, saying that he hopes Japan becomes a bastion of free expression that will welcome artists from overseas who feel like their creative efforts are being stifled by regulations in their home countries.

In a purely mathematical sense, all else equal it stands to reason that reducing the amount of potentially offensive content in an anime broadens its potential market. On the other hand, animes distinct style and atmosphere, which grew out of its by Japan, for Japan nature, has established a fanbase outside its original country of origin thats really only surpassed by Disney in the animation field. If the goal is to maximize animes popularity overseas, ostensibly theres a sweet spot between aligns so poorly with overseas societal expectations as to anger and alienate viewers and overlaps so much with the tone of overseas media that it cant stand out as unique.

The question of whether or not Japanese anime creators want to try to find that sweet spot, or if they fell trying to do so would put too much of a damper on enthusiasm from Japanese audiences, though, is something they still seem to be sorting out.

Source: Twitter/@poepoeta01 via Hachima KikoTop image: PakutasoInsert images: Pakutaso Want to hear about SoraNews24s latest articles as soon as theyre published? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter!

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Does anime need to start being more politically correct for overseas audiences? Twitter debates - SoraNews24

I am at a loss to discern the purpose behind Lee Elci's column, Maybe Im too old for a politically correct, non-binary world, (Feb. 5), denying the long-acknowledged reality that sexuality is not always a binary choice. Is it a disingenuous denial of a reality that Lee finds discomfiting? Is it a rationalization of bigotry against a misunderstood and vulnerable minority? Or is it simply political tribalism?

I am a generation older than Lee and a proud fellow graduate of Waterford Public Schools, and I do not use those facts to avoid the sometimes uncomfortable complexity of humanity. When I was in school, homosexuality was an unspoken topic, and my gay classmates were relegated to a life of secrecy and unnecessary shame. That is our disgrace, one we should strive not to repeat.

Thankfully, the world we live in has progressed and our gay brethren can, for the most part, acknowledge their identity and live honestly and openly without repercussion. Lee celebrates his scholarship. Perhaps he should update it and peruse the social and physiological literature on sexuality. He may be surprised to find a long social, literary, and scientific history supporting the reality of non-binary gender rather than, as he dismissively characterizes it, "a leap into the abyss of political correctness".

Lawrence Tytla

Waterford

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