Watch the full discussion between Leonardo DiCaprio, President Obama, and Dr. Katherine Hayhoe above.

Leonardo DiCaprio doesn't seem convinced that we can ever un-fuck our planet out of its current environmental decline, so he's apparently looking for a way out—onboard Elon Musk's one-way mission to Mars.

The actor moderated a discussion between President Obama and climate scientist Dr. Katharine Hayhoe Monday before screening his new climate change documentary, Before the Flood, at the White House's South by South Lawn festival. The trio got to the subject of Musk's SpaceX after Hayhoe said that climate change should be thought of as a global issue.

"The reality of it is, if you're a human living on this planet—which most of us are, yeah? As long as we haven't signed up for the trip to Mars. I don't want to know if anyone has, I think you're crazy," she said of the trip Musk outlined earlier this month.

"I did," DiCaprio said.

"I think he'll acknowledge he's crazy," Obama jokingly chimed in.

It's not clear if DiCaprio was truly serious about leaving our little rock behind, but a gritty survivalist reboot of The Revenant filmed on the barren space tundra would be pretty sweet.

Read: Elon Musk Wants to Die in an Ultra-Democratic Society on Mars, Apparently

A Democrats Abroad banner from 2012. Photo via Wikipedia

Blaise Nicklas used to hear about politics all the time back when he lived in Pennsylvania. But since he moved to Spain in 2015, he's been more isolated from the 24-hour-newsiness of the election, even as that election has turned into one of the most heated in living memory.

"Obviously I'm not around US citizens," Nicklas said, but at the moment he was at an event that was the exception to the rule—a debate-watching party hosted last week by Democrats Abroad, the official organization for Democrats outside the US, at Variopintos, a restaurant in Madrid.

By the time the debate began, the room was so packed, people were standing in the aisle. Sarah Graves, the chair of the Madrid chapter of Democrats Abroad, said there were around 150 people at the event.

The focus of the party was to register these prospective voters, who may stay informed about events in the home country and have to file taxes with the US government, but often don't vote. According to a survey released last month by the Federal Voting Assistance Program, only 4 percent of 2.6 million eligible expat voters sent in their absentee ballots in 2014. Though turnout for that election was lower than normal, on US soil it was about 36 percent.

"The turnout has been really low for this group, which is somewhat surprising," said Jay Sexton, a professor specializing in constitutional democracy at the University of Missouri. Part of the problem, he said, is the absentee voting process can range from inconvenient to "a pain in the ass" depending on the state in which you are registered.

"I imagine that's the case because a lot of these states are concerned with voter fraud, and they want to make sure you are who you say you are," said Sexton.

For instance, to cast an absentee ballot in the crucial swing state of Ohio, you have to register by mail by October 11 (better get on that!), then request a ballot by November 5, then send your ballot in so that it's received by November 18.

So the Democrats Abroad event wasn't just to watch the debate, but to register voters and help them navigate the sometimes tricky waters of absentee voting, according to Julia Bryan, the international secretary of Democrats Abroad, who said that the group has registered more than 100,000 voters.

Though the government estimates that there are 2.6 million potential voters overseas, other counts range from "2.2 million to 6.8 million," according to a 2013 report released by the Migration Policy Institute, so there is no way to actually know how many Americans there are abroad. "There is no one clear measure of overseas Americans," said Amanda Klekowski von Koppenfels, a co-author of the report and an expert in migration and policy at University of Kent. And it's even trickier to figure out how they're going to vote.

"I have also interviewed Republicans who say they keep a low profile because the perspectives that they hold are not particularly welcome," she said, adding that Democrats Abroad has a stronger grassroots presence than any equivalent Republican group, which could make them seem more numerous. (Attempts to contact Republicans Overseas—the unofficial expat arm of the GOP—for this article were unsuccessful.)

Lily Humphrey, a 22-year-old Republican from Boston now teaching English in Madrid, told me that she often keeps her opinions to herself when Spanish people ask her about American politics. "I think its better for them to make there own decisions and their own opinions instead of hearing one side of the story," she said.

While the main goal of the debate-watching party was registering voters, it also gave Americans a chance to show off their patriotism. One woman fanned herself with an American flag notebook, battling the Spanish heat. Another man had red, white, and blue tights sticking out of his shorts.

"I feel like it gives me a sense of home," said Zora Mihaley, a 19-year-old who interns for Democrats Abroad.

Steve McCormick, a 25-year-old Republican who, like Humphrey, teaches English in Madrid, said he doesn't mind being abroad during election season. "I kind of enjoy being away from it," he said. "I used to be really interested in politics... but I just found that it's not going to change, and to me, it just becomes depressing because neither side is going to get anything done."

That sort of detachment seems to be common on both sides of the aisle among American expats in Madrid. A 28-year-old from Detroit named Isaac Hudson told me at the Democrats Abroad event that he left the United States because of the way he was treated as a gay American. "I wanted to live in Europe because there were a lot of things I didn't like about the US," said Hudson.

Hudson said that while he was happy gay people could now join the military and get married, his plans for returning could change based on the results in November: "If Trump becomes elected, I definitely don't feel comfortable."

While some at the event felt like Hudson, others said a Trump win wouldn't stop them from returning home. Ted Liu, who has been living in Madrid for three years, doesn't think the people promising to leave the US should actually take off. "What would the place become if every person left the country because they didn't agree with an elected official?" he said.

Follow Matt St. John on Twitter.

A crowd gathers at a peaceful vigil and march held in Huntsville, Alabama, Friday, July 8, 2016. The event included speeches, prayers and a march from to the city's Fallen Officer Memorial. (Bob Gathany/AL.com via AP)

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A 17-year-old in Alabama was brutally beaten on Friday in what his mother says was a hate crime targeting the teen for his support of police in America.

Brian Ogle, a student at Sylacauga High School, was found in the parking lot of an Ace Hardware store with a skull fracture and severe bruising after a homecoming football game. Police believe multiple assailants were involved, although no arrests had been made as of Tuesday.

Authorities told a local ABC affiliate that there's no reason to believe that supporters of Black Lives Matter coordinated the attack, though Ogle's school was on lockdown earlier last week after threats of racially motivated violence appeared on social media. Sylacauga police chief Kelley Johnson released a statement asking residents not to jump to conclusions about what happened and why.

A Facebook account that appears to belong to the teenager reveals a preoccupation with the racial strife that has dominated American life in recent years. That tension was reignited during a violent summer that saw the deaths of unarmed black men at the hands of police officers, along with assassination-style attacks on police in Dallas and Baton Rouge.

The teenager apparently posted favorably about cops after seeing Black Lives Matter shirts at school last week.

In a viral clip shared on the Facebook account on September 26, a man holds a "Black Lives Matter" sign in what the video calls a "white neighborhood" and an "All Lives Matter Sign" in what is referred to as a "black neighborhood." In the latter, the host appears to endure a beatdown.

"Clearly shows as to why things happen," the account owner, apparently the victim of the attack, commented above the video.

Back in August, the Southern Poverty Law Center classified White Lives Matter—which one might call a cousin of the more parochial, pro-cop Blue Lives Matter—as a hate group. Mark Potok of the SPLC told me his organization makes its decisions based on the ideology of a particular group's leadership.

"Although some people who have participated in Black Lives Matter rallies and other events have done some unpleasant things, its just false that Black Lives Matter is a hate group whose leadership has suggested white people and police officers or anything," Potok says. "Black Lives Matter has been subjected to a propaganda campaign thats really unfair."

In May, the State of Louisiana became the first to make police officers a protected class under its hate crimes law––a decision that Potok from the SPLC says his organization takes issue with, since one's occupation isn't an immutable characteristic like skin color, nor as deep-seated as a religious belief. Plus, there's the fact that cops already have special protections under the law in most states.

"If kill you, I go to prison for 15 years," Potok told me. "If I kill a cop, I am almost certainly gonna be on death row."

Ogle, who suffered brain trauma, is now said to be in fair condition, and police have interviewed about 20 people so far in an attempt to piece together what happened. But for her part, the teenager's mother is telling the local press the school failed to take the threat of violence seriously, and that her child was singled out for backing law enforcement.

"I want to see them in jail," she said. "This most certainly is a race issue, it's a hate crime."

Follow Allie Conti on Twitter.

A software engineer. Photo by Joonspoon

This article originally appeared on VICE Sweden.

Last week, two researchers at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (KTH) presented a study that suggests gender-neutral course literature helps students perform better. This means you're more likely to apply for a course and get good grades if the books you read are less about boring stereotypes and more about situations you can personally identify with.

The study focused on a programming course, because programming is typically associated with nerdy dudes. "We noticed that more men tended to apply for the course than women," said Maria Svedin, when I called her last Thursday. "We tried to identify the factors that could have led to that, and gender-neutral wording was one of them."

Svedin authored the study, together with Olle Bälter. Both work as researchers in Media Technology and Interaction Design at KTH. "Firstly, we presented programming as a technical and creative craft that also has a social aspect," she explained. Then they changed some of the course material to reflect the above notion. For instance, the textbook featured one problem that focused on a mother, who wanted to program a weather app because she was worried about her son's ability to dress according to the weather. Svedin and Bälter replaced that problem with the story of a person named Kim, who wanted to snooze for as long as possible in the morning with the help of a weather app (Kim didn't have a window in her/his bedroom).

"We also had to make sure that the course literature reflected what programming is today, and make sure to eliminate stereotypes such as that programmers are nerds, have dry humor, or that they are lazy," Bälter added.

The researchers found that this led to more applications, regardless of gender. "For this specific course, we hope that more people—men and women—get access to the correct idea of what programming is and therefore find it more interesting," concluded Svedin.

Follow Caisa Ederyd on Twitter.

Your boyfriend has been quietly asked if he can please drink up and leave this branch of Wetherspoons, it's 12PM on a Sunday and a lot of families have made complaints (Photo: Eli Christman, via)

I hate to alarm you, but the clowns are loose. It is important you do not panic about this. It is important you remain calm. Slow your breathing. Regulate your heart rate. The clowns can sense your panic like sharks moving for blood. Do not turn around, do not look behind you. We do not have time to discuss this, but there is a clown there. Claw-like hand stretching silently over the crown of your head. Curled and frazzled fronds of hair bob just millimetres away from your own. You cannot sense the clown's breath because it does not breathe like a human does. It does not eat like one, either. The clown – behind you, remember, don't sweat and don't move – has teeth sharp and long like an animal would, black gums. When you turn around the clown will be gone. But right now it is there, eyes milky, face paint obscenely blurred, peeled lips just inches from your naked neck. The fingernails that remain attached to the clown are yellow. The ones that don't cannot be found. It is impossible to know where they pinged off to. You need to seize all the belongings in your immediate vicinity – take your laptop, please, and god, you have to take your phone, the police cannot help you, but perhaps there is someone listening in the dark – and you need to run. You need to run and run and run. The clowns are coming, and they won't stop until they seize you.

Anyway! Halloween news now, and it is with heavy heart that I must announce that the dickheads are at it again. What is the "it" in question? The "it" is: dressing like clowns and moving all spookily down streets in the dark. Who are the dickheads? It is impossible to know the psychological profile of the kind of dickhead who dresses as a clown, but we can make some vague stabs at guessing:

— It is the lad at your secondary school who used to always talk about "how he liked to put bangers up stray cats' arses", but you know he never actually did do that thing because you saw him get in a fight once – a scuffle outside Londis over a bottle of Mars milkshake that basically ended up with him getting his backpack pulled up over his head and nothing more – and he started crying immediately, like even pre-violence, his face red and puce and puffy, a single outstretched hand in front of his balls, begging, "Please mate, don't deck me, please mate, please";

— Anyone who has ever worn a full-mask balaclava with a skull embossed on it to paintball or laser quest;

— Any boy who ever said, "I already took the test to be in the army but they say I'm too hard to be sent to Afghanistan because it's just not fair on the enemy," ideally while doing a wheelie on a scrambler;

— That weird kid at your school – you know the one, enormous black bellbottom trousers that tailed out in a row of buckles and studs, single streak of colour in his otherwise lank and greasy hair, slightly-too-small band T-shirt over a weeping nipple piercing, smell of up-until-6AM-playing-Warcraft-and-watching-The-Matrix-again-sweat – who got expelled for being quote-unquote "too goth".

Anyway:

Schoolchildren across Newcastle have been targeted by pranksters dressing up as clowns and jumping out from behind bushes.

Thought to be inspired by a craze in America, police have now been forced to step in after the youngsters were left "incredibly distressed".

Northumbria police said they have received six separate reports since Friday, leaving parents and teachers very concerned.

— The Guardian, October 4 2016

And

Police have arrested a teenage "creepy clown" allegedly carrying a blade as officers continue to hunt down pranksters that are terrorising children.

— The Mirror, October 5 2016

This happens more or less every year, and it happens because clown masks are very widely available in costume supply shops and anywhere else because of Halloween, and because "being afraid of clowns" is a very common trope most especially since Stephen King's It, and also because it's easy to slip a clown mask on while you're wearing a big puffer jacket with the pockets full of devil bangers and Refresher bars and then hide it inside layers of clothing when the police drive slowly by.

As Time reports, America started on this shit early this year: in August, reports surfaced in South Carolina of a person dressed as a clown trying to lure kids into the woods; in Alabama, seven people were arrested in connection with "clown-related activity"; last week, Penn State university students swarmed the campus at night on a "clown hunt"; a Connecticut school district banned clown costumes; the White House press secretary was forced to sort-of-jokily-but-also-not say that the police were taking this all very seriously.

It's the clowns I feel sorry for, most of all. Real ones. I spoke to a clown, once, back when this shit was happening again, some other October, a sweet aged clown man who just wanted to entertain but instead became a trope of deep horror. Why doesn't Stephen King write a horror novel where other agents of children's entertainment are pilloried? Spread the hate around a bit? Why not write a novel where a group of small-town children are slowly terrorised by those really cheery Christian groups with T-shirts tucked into khakis who come to your primary school and do assemblies about Jesus? Why isn't there a jump-and-scare horror film where a group of teens are regularly murdered by Dave Benson Phillips?

Crawl up into the attic for safety, past the dust and old bedding, ignore the tin figure of a monkey playing symbols that has only just now decided to jump into life, hunker down in the corner, slow your breathing – stop. Stop. Quiet now. And then you hear a creek, in the distance, too far away for you to turn around and gaze at, and you hear it, menacing through the air, the last thing you ever hear before the knife drops:

To me

To you

@joelgolby

More stuff about clowns:

Playing the Fool: My Life as a Freelance Clown

Clowns Without Borders Go Into War Zones Armed Only with a Smile

Clowns Are Going Extinct

There's cutting coke with lactose powder or mannitol, and then there's completely forgetting about the cocaine altogether and just giving your customers pure washing powder. Which is what a Middlesbrough conman was doing for two months before he got caught.

Jamie Lee Taylor, 27, passed off the cleaning product as the Class A drug, which, according to Teesside Crown Court, earned him a "fair bit of money". But he found himself in the dock because, despite having never actually being caught selling illegal drugs, he was passing stuff off as real. He pleaded guilty to offering to supply cocaine to others between July and September, and "possession of an article for use in fraud" – AKA three bags of white powder – on the 5th of September.

Alex Bousfield, the defending lawyer, said: "It's an unusual case. He has not been supplying drugs to anyone. Surely the real peril in the offence of drugs is it contributes in continuing that misuse of drugs and everything else that follows from it. He knows throughout – he's the only one who knows – these are not drugs."

Prosecutor Rachel Masters said: "Essentially, the defendant is purporting to sell drugs in the way that a drug dealer would sell drugs. He's making a fair bit of money out of it as a result."


The judge is still unsure on how to proceed, and has adjourned the case, meaning Taylor will be sentenced next Monday.

Obviously, it should be considered that the washing powder itself could have done damage to the people taking it. A few years ago it was reported that some crystal meth users had turned to snorting washing powder as a substitute, and then become violently ill. Once in the body, it can cause vomiting and burning of the internal organs.

More on drug busts:

Here's What Happens After a Massive Cocaine Bust

Women Charged In Coke Smuggling Bust Posted Everything On Instagram

The UK's Biggest Ever Drugs Bust

Yahoo's Sunnyvale headquarters. Photo via Yahoo's Flickr account

Last year, Yahoo secretly began sifting through every single one of its hundreds of millions of users' incoming emails for specific information at the request of the US government, Reuters reported Tuesday. This appeared to be the first time an internet company created a specific software program to search for a set of characters in all incoming emails.

Three different sources with knowledge of the situation told Reuters that, in 2015, the company's legal team received a classified directive from either the NSA or the FBI, asking the company to play ball. Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer reportedly decided to go along with the directive. It's not yet clear what the government was looking for or who it was trying to target.

When asked to comment, Yahoo released a brief statement, saying, "Yahoo is a law abiding company, and complies with the laws of the United States."

Experts told Reuters that it's likely that the government sent the same directive to other big internet companies, although Yahoo is the only reported case as of now. Google and Microsoft did not respond to Reuters' requests to comment on the matter.

Read: How Scared Should I Be of Getting Hacked?

I've been treated by a variety of doctors and surgeons over the course of my pathetic, sickly little life, and I would say about half of them were born here in the UK. One person who seems to have a massive fucking problem with that is Jeremy Hunt, who is sick to the absolute back teeth of foreign doctors healing and helping the country's poorly, and would much prefer nice British doctors who wear Union Jack scrubs and whistle "Jerusalem" while performing keyhole surgery on your child.

During his speech at the Conservative party conference, Health Secretary Hunt claimed that the NHS will be "self-sufficient" within ten years so we don't have to rely on foreign doctors. You know, the guys and girls from France and Egypt and Brazil who are the best in the world at helping people. Yeah, let's get rid of them!

Of course, the chances of this happening now are minute, thanks to the very man making the announcement. Jeremy Hunt's proposed new junior doctors' contract has already inspired some British doctors to actively pack up and leave the country – and what's his plan to keep others here? Threatening them with fines if they think about working abroad after completing their medical training.

It's a real shit-show, basically, and something needs to be done. Because if Brexit makes it harder for people to come and work here – which it will – and fewer people apply to be doctors – which they probably will – there's not going to be anyone left to look at my arches. So to get the ball rolling, I thought I'd take matters into my own hands.

THEORY

As I don't have a lot of time before all doctors leave the UK and I'm called up to the country's many hospitals and surgeries with my stethoscope and brown leather doctor's back from the 1920s, I had to get my theory down fast. The best way to learn things really quickly is to skim-read Wikipedia pages, so I opened a load of tabs about different body parts, diseases, that sort of thing. I learned a lot.

I then took to the rest of the internet to start my standardised testing on the website QUIZWOW. QUIZWOW provided me with some tough questions, ones that I had to rack my medical brain to get to the bottom of, like:

But in the end I triumphed, because I can retain biological terminology better than a lamp can light a cave. The result said I was "Med School Bound", and I think it just might have been right.

The next quiz I took didn't quite go to plan, though. The questions on this one were harder, and they made me feel small and feckless, which is the opposite of how I'll need to feel if I'm to be responsible for removing a clot from someone's brain or something.

It said I was a medical misfit. What the fuck is that about? You mean, internet quiz, to say that I'm incapable of training as a doctor in such a short amount of time and that I would present serious danger to anyone I operated on? That sounds like a load of quitter talk to me. Quitter talk and poppycock.

Mind you, some people don't really do so well with the book-learnin', so I thought I'd try my hand at some field-work instead, guided by a website that explains how doctors do open heart procedures. Perhaps I'm just a kinesthetic learner – perhaps all I needed to do was stab a baguette and then I'd be fine to carry out invasive surgery?

PRACTICAL

Armed with a knife and a rickety old box full of bandages and what have you, it was high time to stab up some stuff and stick it back together. I asked my desk mate if I could just cut up his arm a bit and try to patch it up, but he had his headphones on and is a big fan of ignoring me. Instead, I got a sandwich from the local sandwich point.

We'll call him "Pete". Pete has a benign tumour in his chest cavity. I'm not sure what it's attached to, but it's probably his lungs and / or heart. It's up to me to excise the evil, the black death, from this poor cunt.

According to an article on healthline.com sub-titled "How is open heart surgery performed?" I needed to anaesthetise my patient. I didn't have any morphine or whatever to hand, so some paracetamol that cost me all of 18 pence would have to do. It might be a bumpy ride, Petey boy, but if you stick with me I'll see you through.

I made the incision into Pete's solar plexus. There was some light screaming, but nothing a junior doctor like me hadn't heard in the medical pavilion bar where all the students try to inject each other with paralysis drugs for a laugh.

I attached the heart-lung bypass machine, here illustrated by this Beats By Dre headphone wire, and got to work removing the tumour. It was a big'un, but luckily I was there to fix this poor bugger and guide him through the recovery process, until I forget about him altogether, like I have to do with all my patients, because I can't let myself get too attached.

Phew! It was out. Another life saved in the nick of time by Joe Bish M.D. It's all in a day's work, but the toll it takes on my personal life will almost certainly drive me to booze and fags.

I patched Pete up and wrapped him in one of those blankets you see medics give to people who've just come out of house fires, or who are sitting in the back of an open ambulance at the end of a film, talking about their adventures over a cup of hot chocolate. I did it because I thought it would look funny, and it sure did.

GRADUATION

So there we have it, folks – with a couple of online quizzes, a bit of practice and a hooky diploma from a dodgy website, I'm now Dr. Joe Bish, Oncologist. I was once in favour of keeping our hard-working, integral workforce of foreign doctors, but now I've seen that it's a piece of piss, I'm all for scrapping them and just doing the job myself.

And hey, maybe even you could get yourself a medical qualification if you play your cards right.

@joe_bish

More from VICE:

Understanding the Junior Doctors' Contract and How It Will Affect Us All

What Happens Next in the Junior Doctors Dispute?

This Globe-Trotting Brain Surgeon Says Doctors Are Doing Medical Missions Wrong

Atlanta's stellar debut season has so far focused primarily on the show's male characters: Earn, Paper Boi, and Darius. Through engaging storytelling, the show has managed to build these three into well-developed and endearing guys, giving the writers enough latitude to explore a male-dominated storyline without alienating female viewers. But that does mean that Atlanta has mostly left Van, the mother of Earn's child, on the back-burner. This week, the show invites us into her world.

Despite her limited screen time, Van (Zazie Beetz) already felt almost fully formed before Tuesday night's "Value," an impressive feat and a credit to the show's writing. Until last night, Van's most on-screen time came in "Go for Broke," a surprisingly tense episode that largely revolved around a date, but was told through Earn's broke point of view. With "Value," Van is brought into the foreground of Atlanta and established as her own character, outside of Earn. This separation allows Atlanta to really build Van out from the ensemble—and to have some fun with it. "Value" presents Van as her own individual by taking what we know about her (her job in education and penchant for "corny" guys, for instance) and expands it while simultaneously expanding her world, all delivered in one of the funniest episodes of the season.

We immediately understand Jayde's place in the friendship hierarchy: She speaks over Van, explicitly disapproves of Van's choices, is always ready with unsolicited and patronizing advice.

But "Value," co-written by Donald Glover and Stefani Robinson, has more on its mind than simply spotlighting Van. In its first scene alone, "Value" takes on the intricate and intimate details of female friendships, as well as the complexities and multitudes of being a black woman—all through a simple dinner with Van and her best friend Jayde. The two have a complicated, layered relationship, and Atlanta does a brilliant job at conveying this through a single conversation. The two women lead almost opposite lives, with Van employed at school while taking care of her daughter and dealing with Earn's occasional nonsense whereas Jayde can just hop on a plane to Paris; her only balancing act is juggling the multiple pro-athletes whom she dates. We immediately understand Jayde's place in the friendship hierarchy: She speaks over Van, explicitly disapproves of Van's choices, is always ready with unsolicited and patronizing advice. But we also understand that there is clearly something there, "old times" that they can't let go of, and a lingering love that allows the two to remain friends (the sporadic but mutual laughter throughout simultaneously heightens and bridges the awkwardness). After all, it's Jayde who later effortlessly convinces Van to smoke pot on a work night.

There are some moments in the scene that don't require subtlety—at one point, Jayde explicitly says, "Women have to be valuable. Black women have to be valuable"—but for the most part, Atlanta tells entire stories with a single line of dialogue (referring to Van's hair, Jayde remarks, "It's cute—looks better than last time," and we immediately understand the nature of their friendship) or a look (Van's tight smile, hinting that she's not saying everything she really wants to). Even the editing builds tension: The two women are rarely in the same shot, but instead each alone in the frame as the scene cuts back and forth. They're also generally framed off-center, adding a little disorientation to the conversation. Even as the friends' conversation gets into dicey, defensive, and argumentative territory, "Value" seamlessly lightens the mood with Jayde instagramming her dinner—nothing in the real world will distract her from presenting her best life online.

From there, "Value" switches gears when Van wakes up the next day to a phone reminder about an upcoming drug test, essentially going into slapstick territory. (There is that wonderful and strange joke with a black student in whiteface that I hesitate to dive into further because it could—and should—lead to multiple interpretations.) Yet even when the episode goes into decidedly lighter (and grosser) material, it's still committed to building Van as a character: Through Paper Boi's amused mocking, Van's creative desperation, and her ultimate last-ditch confession, we learn that Van is more than just Earn's baby's mama—she is, in her own right, one of television's strongest, most interesting characters.

Maureen Sargent

In Chris Edwards's new book, Balls: It Takes Some to Get Some, out today, he offers an ultra-candid account of the five years of operations he underwent in order to get complete bottom surgery. With a light touch and a heavy dose of gory detail, Edwards walks you through the experience from soup to, ah, nuts.—Kate Lowenstein

From 2002 to 2007, I had surgery 22 times.

If you break it down, that's roughly one procedure every three months. Some required multiple-night stays in the hospital and a few weeks' recovery in Nashville. Others I was able to knock out over a long weekend. Those "weekend wonders" were performed in Doc's office with me wide-awake, acting as his assistant. Once I was numb from the Novocain and the continual sight of my own blood, I had no problem handing him instruments, applying pressure with gauze, or holding my would-be shaft at a certain angle while he stitched, cut, or cauterized. These newfound medical skills were saving thousands of dollars in hospital bills.

In the end, my five-year quest for male genitalia would cost more than $100,000, not including travel. I was beyond fortunate my parents had the means to pay for my surgery. Lord knows I sure didn't. Nor do most people in my situation today. Again, this is why I'm one of only a small group of transgender men in this country who have chosen to "go all the way" when it comes to bottom surgery. As I've mentioned, the "deluxe model" doesn't come cheaply or easily. It's an expensive, painful, and time-consuming proposition with the potential for myriad complications and no guarantees when it comes to aesthetics or sensation. It's pretty freaking scary, and oftentimes I felt like I was in what would have been Dante's tenth circle of hell. But I'd do it all over again if I had to. That feeling of finally being complete—of being who you really are—trumps everything.

That said, many people who are transgender choose not to undergo surgery, even if they can afford it. There could be a number of reasons: pain, risk, fear, uncertain results, lack of support, or just being happy with their body the way it is and not feeling the need. Which brings me to an important point: You should never ask someone who is transgender if they have had or plan to have surgery. First, it's none of your business. Second, it's offensive because by asking that question you are implying that the person is not the gender they feel they are unless they alter their genitals. The fact is gender identity is not defined by what's inside your pants; it's defined by what's inside your brain. It's also something nobody questions or even thinks about unless it doesn't match the body they were born with. This is why people who are not transgender have so much trouble understanding what it's like to be in our shoes, and often why they are compelled to ask so many questions.

While many members of the transgender community consider the surgery topic off limits, I was very open about it. I didn't care if people knew I was having surgery. It was actually less stressful for me knowing I didn't have to hide it, especially at work. What was I going to do? Make up 22 different stories about why I would be out of the office for weeks at a time? It was a relief being able to be honest. I'd simply say, "I'm having surgery," and people would just say, "Ohhhhh," and kind of nod. When I'd come back from medical leave, everyone would ask me how it went—more out of genuine concern than anything else—and wait for me to offer up whatever information I was willing to share.

Of course my close friends and family were privy to all the gory details—partly because I'm an over-sharer and partly because they were curious and wanted to know. I tried to explain the basic procedure in terms they'd understand, which was challenging because I was having difficulty understanding it myself. Doc took me through it at least three times, but I still couldn't process all the technical details—kind of like when I'm lost and someone is giving me directions that start to get complicated. I'll nod along, but if it takes more than three steps to get me back on track, I just stop listening.

So the simplest way I could describe the first stage of my phalloplasty surgery was that the doctor would use abdominal tissue and a skin graft from my hip to create a vertical tube resembling a suitcase handle. One end would be attached below the bellybutton and the other at the pubic bone. After three months, I'd go back for the second stage of the procedure, in which the top part of the "handle" below the belly button would be detached so that it hung down, and voila! The shaft.

This sparked major discussion among my female friends who, upon finding out I'd have some control over the dimensions of my penis, felt compelled to weigh in. Aside from one assertion that "it's not the size of the wave but the motion of the ocean," most of the female input I received was that size did matter but length was not as important as girth.

"You definitely don't want the nickname 'needle dick,'" I was told.

"Go for the beer can!"

These comments led to an in-depth discussion with my doctor about penis size. I had read somewhere that the average penis was 3 to 3.5 inches long when flaccid and 5 to 5.5 inches when erect. Since my penis would remain the same length in both situations, I needed to take a one-size-fits-all approach. Doc said he would make the shaft six inches long to start and that he could make it up to two inches longer or shorter at a later stage. He said he couldn't make any promises on the girth as it would depend on my abdominal tissue and skin graft but assured me I would definitely not be called "needle dick." He added that most guys come in wanting huge penises and then end up coming back in to have them made smaller because it's too much to carry around all day—especially for patients who are vertically challenged (i.e. short) like me. Since my penis would be spending most of its time inside my pants, I was leaning more toward being average size than porn star size. Little did I know, Doc had other plans . . .

••

Everything was dark. I could hear voices but couldn't make out words. The one with the Greek accent that was extremely chipper I knew belonged to my doctor. That's right, I'm in the hospital. I tried to open my eyes but again, the sandbags were back. That must be the anesthesia kicking in. Then I heard laughter and two voices I recognized as my parents.

"What's so funny?" I mumbled, straining to open my eyes.

"Heeeey, Chris," Doc said cheerfully. "You're awake."

"Hi, Shtine," I heard Mom say and then felt a light kiss on my forehead.

"Are they taking me in now?" I asked, catching a blurry glimpse of the three of them standing over me like Mount Rushmore before my eyes drooped closed again.

"You're all done," Dad said warmly. I felt his hand pat my leg.

"You were in there six hours," Mom added.

"I gave you eight inches!" Doc announced.

I recall muttering something about not needing a kickstand, which got everyone laughing, and then felt a draft below my waist from what I presumed were blankets being lifted off of me.

"Jesus Christ!" I heard my dad say. "That thing is bigger than mine!"

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The two potential VPs square off on Tuesday night. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

For fans of TV shows where two older gentlemen interrupt each other and compete to condescend to each other, Tuesday night's vice-presidential debate was a dream come true. For the rest of us—at least those who didn't switch over to a thrilling American League Wild Card game that went into extra innings—the silver lining in the contest between Democrat Tim Kaine and Republican Mike Pence is that at least we won't have to suffer through another one of these.

Throughout the 90-minute debate, moderated by CBS's Elaine Quijano, the two career politicians talked over each other and Quijano, and repeatedly went off on tangents that had little or nothing to do with her questions. Kaine's strategy was to bring up Donald Trump at every turn and to attack the GOP candidate whenever possible, at one point turning a discussion about Syria somehow to Trump's refusal to release his tax returns.

For his part, Pence played the role of a midwestern Roger Sterling, dripping with confidence and self-superiority. While Kaine talked, he shook his head the way you would at a child, and when the Democrat brought up especially damaging statements made by Trump, Pence shrugged him off, denying that his running mate had ever called for other countries to acquire nukes, praised Russian President Vladimir Putin's leadership, said women who had abortions should be punished, or floated the idea of banning all Muslims from immigrating to the US.

The closest Pence came to actually defending these outlandish positions was when he admitted, "Look, he's not a polished politician like you and Hillary Clinton... You know, things don't always come out exactly the way he means them." This was a polite way of referring to Trump's habit of talking out of his ass on topics he apparently knows nothing about—most of the GOP candidate's statements in interviews are off-the-cuff remarks that don't reflect actual policy endorsements. Unfortunately, all that ass-talking is recorded for posterity, which allowed the Clinton team to quickly cut a video highlighting the absurdity of Pence's constant denials of stuff Trump has said:

Michael Weinstein marches on Washington alongside Margaret Cho in 2012. Photo via Flickr user Elvert Barnes

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A report last month from APLA Health, an arm of AIDS Project Los Angeles (APLA), revealed that only 1 in 10 young Californian men who have sex with men (MSM) have used PrEP, the HIV-prevention therapy that can be 99 percent effective in reducing transmission during anal sex with daily use.

That's a remarkably low rate of adoption for a drug that prompted dramatic headlines when it debuted in 2012. And they weren't hyperbolic—following decades of darkness in the fight against HIV, the treatment spurred nothing less than a cultural revolution among gay and bisexual men. It's a vital breakthrough given that 1 in 2 black MSM and 1 in 4 Latino MSM will become HIV-positive in their lifetime at current infection rates.

Getting the treatment to those who need it most requires public education—and last Monday, California made a leap forward in that battle when Governor Jerry Brown signed Assembly Bill 2640, mandating that every Californian who receives a negative HIV test result must be educated about PrEP.

The bill's mandate might seem simple, but it represents the most dramatic step forward for PrEP education by a government body to date, and a de facto endorsement of the treatment by the State of California.

Given the treatment's proven efficacy and wide-ranging support from a variety of medical and activist organizations, something like mandated PrEP education might seem like a foregone conclusion—especially in California, which has the second-highest HIV infection rate in the nation. But while organizations from the Free Speech Coalition (FSC), the nation's largest porn and adult entertainment political advocacy group, to the Los Angeles LGBT Center and APLA Health have been fighting for the bill this year, PrEP has met opposition from a small group of gay activists, the most vocal among them being Michael Weinstein, the president of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF).

Weinstein rose to prominence in the 80s and 90s, when his organization was little more than a small group of friends asking for money on the street. Together, they helped to defeat Lyndon H. LaRouche's Proposition 64, one of the ugliest pieces of HIV legislation ever proposed, which qualified for the ballot in 1986 with 700,000 signatures and would have required those who tested positive for HIV to be quarantined. And despite his admirable record in the fight against AIDS, today, Weinstein might be better known for headline-making statements calling PrEP a "party drug."

As PrEP gained visibility in the years following its debut, Weinstein and the AHF expressed deep skepticism about the treatment's potential as a community-wide intervention, based on data that showed men who enrolled in early studies had a poor track record of adhering to its once-daily dosing. Because of that adherence issue, Weinstein and the AHF have questioned PrEP's readiness "for prime time as a public health strategy." Though an ad campaign from the organization last year appeared to roll back some of that skepticism, suggesting PrEP is appropriate on "a case-by-case basis by medical providers working in conjunction with their patients," the organization still opposed its use "as a community-wide public health intervention strategy." Even with that softened stance, they continue to spend considerable amounts of time and money on their years-long public campaign against the treatment.

While real-world rates of adherence to the drug have varied from study to study, many have shown a majority of users adhere to the drug at four doses a week or more. At that level, PrEP has been shown to reduce the risk of transmission by an estimated 96 percent (though a majority of participants in the iPrEx OLE study, from which that figure is derived, did not achieve that level of adherence). It's important to remember that condoms are far from 100 percent effective, too—one study found that 51 percent of new HIV infections among Ontario MSM were via anal sex with a condom. A 2013 CDC study said that gay men who always use condoms have an estimated 70 percent reduced risk of HIV transmission compared to those who bareback. PrEP and condoms are both tools in the HIV-prevention toolkit. The CDC recommends using both, and as it emphasized in its PrEP clinical practice guidelines, we need more options like PrEP, not less.

Activist groups and medical experts alike have been working to dispel anti-PrEP narratives promulgated by the AHF since it began its advertorial and lobbying campaign. Its competing interests rose to an ideological head with AB 2640.

Eric Paul Leue, president of the FSC and former sexual-health director for San Francisco–based porn studio Kink.com, has been one of Weinstein's most vocal critics.

"All too often we believe that well-balanced journalism means we have to give people like Jenny McCarthy and Michael Weinstein a chance to use the media as a megaphone to spurt anti-scientific personal views as facts," Leue said. "Weinstein believes PrEP is bad, when in actuality PrEP addresses and acknowledges the sexual reality we have been trying to ignore to our detriment."

Coming to terms with that reality—that gay men, like it or not, are having risky sex, and that a prevention tool like PrEP is more necessary than ever given that fact—is something that Dr. David Holland has been working to realize. Holland, chief clinical officer at the Georgia Health Department and assistant professor at Emory University, has worked with Leue on more than one occasion to testify on PrEP's efficacy in California.

"The research shows a majority of gay men are having bareback sex," Holland said. "We are trying to make everyone's lives safer within that reality."

Though Weinstein is just one man, his organization has wide reach. In 2014, the Advocate reported that the AHF issues 14,000 HIV tests each year, employs more than 1,000 people, and provides medical care and services to more than 123,000 people in 26 countries, according to the organization's website and its most recent tax filings at the time.

When AB 2640 was being debated, Rand Martin, an AHF lobbyist, said in his California Health Committee testimony against the bill that Truvada can be "toxic" and "it does have side-effects." If, for example, "a 45-year-old man who's been married for 20 years, who has a fling and panics and gets tested, and is told that he should try PrEP, he's going to be asked to be prescribed Truvada," Rand said, and that in this scenario, doctors would be "condemning a person who should not be taking it to forever having to take this pill." Rand's comments, which were filmed, were later featured in a video released by the Los Angeles LGBT Center. But a 2016 report showed that short and medium-term use of PrEP is as safe as aspirin, and PrEP's prescribing guidelines—in the AHF's own words—note the treatment is intended for those who "have not and will not use condoms and are having multiple sexual partners," not men who are having a "fling."

"AHF did oppose AB 2640," wrote Geb Kenslea, the AHF's Communications Director, in an email in response to a request for comment. "In brief, AHF worked to lessen statutory requirements around testing, counseling etc., and felt this bill was unnecessary. Doctors already can talk to their patients about whatever they want—including pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). However, AHF believes a requirement here that a physician must speak about PrEP was overkill." Weinstein did not respond to a request for comment by the time this article went to press.

But without efforts to spread awareness of PrEP, especially among black and latino MSM—of whom 37.1 precent and 28.2 percent, respectively, were unaware of the treatment in the APLA Health survey—the drug's revolutionary potential may never be realized. And among participants in that survey under the age of 22, 41 percent were unaware. "The people who have most embraced PrEP and who have the most awareness of it are gay men in my age bracket," said Dr. Holland, who is 48. "Our annual infection rate is actually doing down." The same cannot be said for younger, marginalized men.

Public health campaigns can only go so far; efforts like AB 2640 may have the ability to make a lasting dent in the HIV crisis among critical groups. "Knowledge is power," said Leue. "AB 2640 not only prevents further infections, but it also helps fight stigma, fear, and prejudice that have for too long reigned against sexual health knowledge."

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There are several ways to handle a breakup. You can take it day by day and stay busy with the help of your sympathetic friends, stay in on weeknights and mope around in your pajamas, or send 3,000 text messages to your ex until he or she blocks your number.

Or you could turn to Byro Zoltan, owner and proprietor of BreakupDok.com. Zoltan describes himself as a "personal breakup counselor," and for a small fee, he promises to coach you on how to win your ex back and permanently repair your relationship.

"I had three special relationships in my life, as well as three painful breakups," he said. "But the last one put me on the road where I am today. It came with such a deep emotional pain that I felt like my soul was ripped into millions of pieces. I watched the woman of my dreams get married to another man and start their own family." After that split, he created BreakupDok because he "believes in a dream that one day men and women will respect and love each other in a way that they can solve their issues with grace and understanding, so the breakup rates of today's world will be just a bad memory in our history."

BreakupDok.com is covered in self-help ad banners that paint a fairly optimistic picture: "10 Signs That Your Ex-Girlfriend Wants You Back," "How to Make Your Ex-Boyfriend Respond to Your Call," "Quick Tips and Tricks to Make Your Ex-Boyfriend Regret Breaking Up with You" (which includes tactics like "write a card invoking old memories"). Zoltan offers three different tiers of service: the basic package runs about $100 and includes "10 email responses" and "10 SMS responses" to answer your most pertinent questions about how to win him or her back. The $297 package offers unlimited emails, and the obtuse $897 edition (referred to as the "Peacock") comes with hour-long, one-on-one Skype strategy sessions and emergency phone access.

"In every unique situation, I create a customized roadmap that we follow and adjust according to any changes that will happen—mostly when their ex contacts them in a certain way," Zoltan explained. He claimed his system is simple and complex at the same time, and is designed to focus on emotional healing, improving one's self image, and mastering a strict "no-contact" rule, among other things. He also works on "deeply improving relationships skill, using social media tactics to influence their ex's feelings, building attraction via text messages, and other advanced psychology techniques required for different situations."

That might seem a little creepy—selling guides that encourage the emotional manipulation of exes isn't very ethical, and it likely won't solve the fundamental differences that lead to most breakups. But BreakupDok proudly states that the system will help the heartbroken "win your ex back with dignity," and Zoltan maintains that getting a former partner back is a realistic thing to hope for.

"In most cases, it's absolutely possible if you are open to change, arm yourself with a certain mindset, and follow the right instructions," he said. But Zoltan also admits there are situations where issues of compatibility are present, and that some relationships aren't worthy of being salvaged. "Getting your ex back is just one part of the equation," he says. "Keeping them interested and getting them to commit for life is harder than most people think."

It's easy to see how Zoltan and others online have found success with promises of getting back together with an ex. Breakups suck, and severing ties with someone you may have a deep emotional connection to is hard; it can make you feel alone and devoid of self-worth, and building that self-worth back is also part of Zoltan's job. "I believe in my dedication, focus, and strong will to understand each breakup situation and create real results for my clients. That's all that I care about."

Zoltan isn't the only one working in this industry. Brad Browning is probably the biggest name in breakup counseling. He hosts a YouTube channel with several videos promoting the same techniques you'll find on BreakupDok; while introducing his program, Browning says, "Would you ever forgive yourself if you let the woman you love slip out of your life forever? For the next eight minutes, I'm going to explain how a naturally occurring hormone inside your ex-girlfriend's mind gives you a foolproof way to make her fall deeply in love with you again."

What Browning and others in this burgeoning online sub-community offer is pseudoscience at best, and a mean-spirited scam at worst. People get back with their exes all the time, but framing it as attainable through a system of behavior is genuinely disquieting. Letting go is hard, but the idea that we never have to let go, ever, is a delusional and maybe dangerous fantasy.

Zoltan doesn't see himself that way, however, and although he's charging significant fees for things he can't authentically promise, he says he's seen it work many times before. His favorite success was a 37-year-old man from Budapest who believed his relationship was permanently destroyed. "We took things very gradually and planned ahead until they started to talk more often to each other. After six or seven weeks, she was back in his life," he says. "I hope that for many years they will be together. I can tell you that it was a truly great day for me too."

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A version of this article appeared on VICE Germany

Oral sex can be the greatest thing to give and to receive – but it can also be mind-numbingly boring. Especially when you're giving it, it's 7AM, your mouth is parched and your partner keeps nodding off cause the coke is wearing off. Or, it's 11PM on a weekday and you're just trying to prove to yourself that your relationship is still in great sexual shape.

Still, despite the boredom, you'll likely soldier on – either because you are not a quitter or because you care so much about the person attached to those genitals, you want them to be happy. We asked our friends what they think about when they're going downtown.

VIVIENNE, 22

VICE: What goes through your mind when you go down on a woman?
Vivienne: How am I doing? Where should I put my tongue? Does she like what I'm doing? Has she come already?

Which thought dominates?
Wondering whether she's come, for sure. Not every girl announces their orgasm by moaning "I'm coming" – and I don't like asking them either. I made that mistake once and it completely ruined the moment, because when I asked, she felt this pressure to come quickly. So she was suddenly a lot more tense. I kept telling her that I hadn't meant it that way and that she should relax, but that didn't help at all. So since then, I've asked myself that question a lot, but I never do it out loud.

SVENJA, 25

VICE: What do you think about while going down on someone?
Svenja: "Don't even try to ram your cock into the back of my throat." I hate it when guys do that – maybe it's the influence of porn, all those hardcore films. It's happened three or four times to me. Whenever I give a blowjob, I just hope a guy lets me do my thing without feeling the need to turn it into a porno.

So when he lets you do your thing, what do you think about?
In that case, I think about the guy whose penis I have in my mouth.

JAKE, 23

VICE: What do you think about when you're giving a blowjob?
Jake: Well, my mind is either blank or I think about food, for some reason. My gag reflex is very strong, so I usually try to distract myself. My boyfriend is fairly understanding, which makes me more inclined to try harder – so I also think a lot about ways to stimulate him more.

Are there any particular physical aspects you focus on?
I always need to be in control, so I don't respond well to guys pushing me down or pushing their dick in deeper without warning. And I'm always worried that I'm hurting a guy with my teeth. I have four teeth that are basically fangs – two on top and two in my lower jaw – and they're pretty sharp. So if you're girthy, you're in the danger zone.

MARTHA, 21

VICE: What went through your mind the last time you gave a blowjob?
Martha: I wondered about how long it would take for him to come, and then I realised that my mouth was too dry from the alcohol and cigarettes I'd had – especially from the red wine. That was disgusting.

Did you soldier on despite your cottonmouth?
Well, after a whileI couldn't handle it any more. So I left him on the bed and staggered into the bathroom to drink a glass of water. For some reason, I then decided to brush my teeth with the first toothbrush I found. And then I went back to it.

Image via

JO, 26

VICE: What do you think about when you're going down on someone?
Jo: To be honest, I'm not really thinking about much. I'm just having a great time, I listen to the person's noises to try to figure out how it's going and what they want me to do.

You identify as queer – would you mind talking to me about the difference between going down on a man and going down on a woman?
With penises I worry about gagging more – and cis men are usually a bit more porny, which brings thoughts like "If you push my head down, I'll bite your thing off" to mind.

When it comes to vaginas – I myself am super sensitive, so I'm really careful not to be too rough and direct unless she asks me to be. When I lick a woman, I'm always like, "This is the best, I'm having a great time, you taste great." Partly because it's true, but also because I know what it's like to be super self-conscious when all sexual attention is only on you. I'm still into it when I'm giving a blowjob, but I'm giving off a bit less of a "This is the best" vibe because I have arthritis. So if I go on for too long, my jaw will lock.

THIMO, 22

VICE: What did you think about when you last went down on your girlfriend?
Thimo: Mostly about the fact that we've been a couple for quite a while now.

Can you talk me through that train of thought?
I realised that after being together for five years you have less inhibitions regarding personal hygiene. I don't think that's bad – you don't always have time to shower before, or you just can't be bothered. But when I go down on my girlfriend and she doesn't smell so great down there, I find it difficult not to think about that.

MAXIMILIAN, 31

VICE: What do you think about when you go down on a woman?
Maximilian: I start out just thinking about the technical stuff – how to do it right – until I get into the groove. If I don't know the woman well, I spend the first 30 seconds trying to figure out if she likes what I'm doing.

What about when you're in the groove?
Well, the position you're in when you give a girl head is pretty comfortable and I don't move my head that much – so I usually put a pillow down under my head and just rest comfortably. That way I can go on for hours.

When I'm lying comfortably like that, my mind begins to drift and I think about all sorts of things – what I've done that day, what I have planned for the next day, or what I could have been doing if I wasn't going down on a woman.

ANDI, 26

VICE: What do you think about when you're going down on someone?
Andi: I think about the girl I'm with and what she likes. I try to focus on that, but I can get distracted sometimes.

How do you get distracted?
Well, for example, if a woman isn't completely shaven, her stubble can be itchy. When that happens I can make weird leaps in my mind and start thinking about pubic hairstyles. Sometimes, I'll come up with fun patterns for hairstyles that I would give her. Like a snake, or something Christmas-y.

ISABELLA, 27

VICE: What do you think about when you're giving a blowjob?
Isabella: "No teeth!" When I was 15, my best friend had a boyfriend and she warned me never to use my teeth when I gave a blowjob. That stuck with me.

So what do you do to make sure of that?
I imagine I'm peeling an orange with my tongue. You really have to focus. I want to see how he responds to what I'm doing, if he's enjoying himself or not. That's how you get the job done.

Image via

HARLEY*, 24

VICE: What do you think about when you give a girl head?
Harley: Oh God, the first time I went down on a girl I was just so overwhelmed by the fact that I had never seen a vulva from that angle before. I couldn't stop thinking about whether mine looked like that or if she'd think my vagina was weird.

Is it less overwhelming now?
The fact that there are so many expectations on both sides can still make it a bit overwhelming. But once the pants are off that usually changes. I just worry about what I look like with my head between their legs sometimes – it can't be the most flattering angle. I have been giving people head for almost eight years now and I still worry that I don't have a clue as to what I'm doing. When I was in high school, a friend taught me how to give a blowjob by demonstrating the act on a pen. But nobody ever says, "This is how you eat pussy".

AYLIN, 22

VICE: What do you think about while giving head?
Aylin: Just everyday stuff like uni, work or my plans for the weekend.

Does that set the mood for you?
I've been in a relationship for four years, and sex has become a bit of a routine. When I give my boyfriend a blowjob I do it only because he's into it. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't give him a blowjob if I found it awful. It's more like, "OK, let's get this over and done with."

ALEX*, 21

VICE: What do you think about when going down on someone?
Alex: I'm always focused on the technical aspect – like making sure my teeth are covered, that there's enough saliva and that I'm not just letting my tongue sit there. If I let my mind wander I know I'll probably end up accidentally scraping him with my teeth. That's less of a problem when I go down on girls. But thoughts like "Shit, I should have brought a hair tie" or "this position makes me fart" I think are universal.

Can you tell me more about the biggest difference for you between going down on guys and girls?
I have only eaten out vaginas twice, and both times I was pretty panicked and had no idea if I was doing the right thing. I think penises are easier to please.

WAYLAND, 24

VICE: Can you tell me about the thoughts you have when going down on someone?
Wayland: All kinds of stuff, really. First of all, I try to read the way that person responds to what I'm doing. But then the rest of it is taken up with mentally singing songs I've got stuck in my head, wondering what to have for dinner – and wondering how long it'll take to get them off, to be honest. I don't mind at all if someone takes a while but you can always get a sore throat or neck.

You identify as queer – is there a difference between men and women?
Giving head or eating someone out are completely different, yet there are a lot of similarities. You have to be aware of your breathing, of when you're too rough or too gentle, of the warning signs that someone's about to come. Eating a girl out tends to be a bit messier for me. I'm not one for half measures so I always end up really going to town – having a beard means I really need to wash my face afterwards.

LENA, 29

VICE: What goes on in your mind when you go down on a woman?
Lena: I find myself not having much time to think about anything else than the job at hand. I'm pretty busy trying to pay attention to how she responds to what I do – does she breathe faster if I put my tongue a bit to the left, right, up or down? What happens when I speed things up?

Can you block out everything else?
Sure – I mean, I register what kind of pubic hairstyle she has or what she tastes like. But generally I'm as focused as I am when I play avideo game.

* The names of Harley and Alex have been changed.

* This article was revised at 16:06 GMT, on October 5th, 2016

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I Sent Everyone I've Ever Had Sex with a Survey to Find Out How Good I Am in Bed

My bar mitzvah was a lovely affair. I remember standing at the bima, singing from the Torah in ancient Hebrew as my beaming parents sat in the front of a packed congregation. Two hundred of my closest friends and family were on hand, and our conservative synagogue had the simultaneously majestic and austere look about it befitting the gravity of such a seminal moment.

But something was missing, and despite a few fond memories, the day didn't live up to my expectations. Like many American Jews I know, I didn't really feel like I changed at all, let alone become a man.

That posed a question I recently returned to after more than two decades: How can modern Jews inject meaning and spirituality into this important coming-of-age ritual? In 2004, a prominent former professor of psychology at Harvard, reflecting on his own bar mitzvah, broached one possible solution—even as he took pains to emphasize he was not advocating it: "If we have only the most superficial of ossified religious rituals, it is because these rites of passage no longer provide direct contact with the numinous. This is where psychedelics can help."

Which is to say maybe what the modern bar mitzvah service is missing is a drug like LSD.

Not everyone I spoke to shares this sentiment, of course. The handful of rabbis I canvassed were in uniform agreement that there's no place for psychedelic substances in the bar or bat mitzvah. That said, our conversations did leave me strangely hopeful.

Rabbi Joe Schwartz of the Conservative Synagogue of Fifth Avenue in Manhattan told me that "the goal of Judaism is to teach each individual to transcend themselves... and ultimately to align themselves with God, as opposed to the cravings, yearnings, and temptations of the self." Rabbi Haim Rechnitzer, associate professor of Modern Jewish Thought at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, explained how Jewish mystics believe "you cannot really grasp the divine if you constantly see only one side of the kaleidoscope, only the outside of the prism, only the break of the light into different colors." And Rabbi Jerry Steinberg of Temple B'nai Shalom V'Tikvah in Ontario, Canada said altered states of consciousness—when achieved naturally—are important to experiencing echad (unity) "at the emotional and spiritual levels."

As I spoke to these leaders of the Jewish community, I was reminded of my own LSD experiences—I founded the Psychedelic Society of Brooklyn—and how essentially Jewish each has been by the rabbis' own metrics.

Now, I realize young teens consuming acid sounds like a rather dangerous proposal. Indeed, even though psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy seems to have potential to treat end-of-life anxiety, addiction, and depression in adults, what does that have to do with mere kids getting something substantial out of their bar mitzvah service? But the fact is human history is rife with precedent for using drugs to achieve spiritual and moral growth, and there's no scientific reason the modern Jew can't eventually get in on the action.

For starters, psychedelics like LSD and psilocybin—a.k.a. shrooms—have been shown to occasionally produce something called a " primary mystical experience"—spiritual phenomena highly correlated with therapeutic outcomes, and reported by practitioners of many of the worlds' great religions. So if what's missing from some modern bar and bat mitzvahs is essentially a sense of the magic of religion itself, or "direct contact with the numinous," as the former Harvard professor—born Richard Albert but now known as Ram Dass, a seminal figure in the history of psychedelics—put it in his essay, then these substances could liven things up a bit.

Indeed, in a 1962 study at Harvard, ten divinity school students took psilocybin before a Good Friday service; eight claimed to have a mystical experience. In a 2006 study at Johns Hopkins, a third of the 36 "healthy, well-educated" volunteers rated their psychedelic session as the most spiritually significant event of their lives.

The idea that young people can benefit from intense, even terrifying experiences is not unfounded. Consider indigenous coming-of-age rituals, where adolescents must prove their courage and strength by living alone in the wilderness. When they return home, teens are often instilled with a newfound confidence that comes with facing their fears—and surviving. Maybe the same process can unfold during in an intense psychedelic trip, which is often likened to an ordeal, a harrowing journey, or even, as Tehseen Noorani, a former psychedelic researcher at Johns Hopkins, once put it to me , "a bout of incomprehensible experiences, perhaps akin to a hazing"?

William Richards, co-founder of the Johns Hopkins Psilocybin Research Group, is sympathetic to this dynamic—with the qualification that he's nowhere near ready to embrace adolescent usage. "You're confronting grief, you're confronting guilt, you're confronting fear, and you're getting wiser and more mature and more confident, and you start to feel like, I am man ," he told me of a plausible experience one might have on a drug like LSD.

Neal Goldsmith, a psychotherapist and author of Psychedelic Healing, offers another reason to give acid-infused bar mitzvahs (and other coming-of-age rituals) serious consideration. "Adolescents around the age of puberty, just like adults at other developmental stages, seem to have the need to go through rites of passage: a deconstruction of their current personalities, followed by—and with the guidance of their communities—a reconstruction of personality at the next level," he told me. Goldsmith believes psychedelics can help with this process by "loosening the mortar between the bricks of the edifice of the childhood structure," so to speak. In a way, they can expedite and facilitate natural processes that might not happen "on their own, or as successfully, or on time," he added.

Check out our documentary about Gordon Todd Skinner's subterranean LSD palace.

Of course, even if you're open to the concept of mixing LSD and bar (or bat) mitzvahs, the not-so-insubstantial concern of giving intense drugs to children lingers. I mean, are 13-year-olds really ready for such an intense experience?

There is precedent for adolescents taking psychedelics ritualistically. Some cultures in South America use ayahuasca, while another in Western Africa uses iboga, two psychedelics I would argue to be far more powerful than LSD. In fact, Goldsmith went so far as to say "every tribal culture that has access to visionary plants has used them as part of their cosmology and spiritual practices, including rites of passage."

Compared to some of these other societies around the world, dosing an American 13-year-old with LSD doesn't seem like such a radical proposition. Furthermore, two studies conducted in 2005 and published in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs suggest that ayahuasca use among teens isn't just safe, it's beneficial. Forty adolescents who drank ayahuasca ritualistically at least 24 times in the preceding two years were compared to their psychedelically naïve counterparts. No harmful effects were found among the subjects who took psychedelics in one study, and the other found them to actually be psychologically healthier than the control group.

But what would these drugs do for the bar mitzvah, specifically? As a matter of cultural futurism, I asked Rick Doblin, founder of the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies—and also a Jew—for his thoughts. "I think that's a potential," he told me, elaborating that "encasing these kinds of experiences in the community and in the family, that's the way to get the best results, and that's what we're talking about in terms of bar mitzvahs and other rites of passage."

Doblin's opinion isn't just theoretical; it stems from his own first LSD experiences as a 17-year-old.

"My use of psychedelics was doing what I had hoped my bar mitzvah would do," he told me. "It took courage, it took looking deep into my self, it involved a certain kind of transcendence of the ego, seeing the bigger picture. It had that spiritual element. I felt that it was really very opening and transformative."

My only hope is that in some distant future where LSD is not a Schedule I substance—and new studies have more definitively demonstrated it to be safe for young people—the dream of mixing acid and the bar mitzvah won't seem like such a crazy idea anymore. And maybe, just maybe, young Jews will look at our coming-of-age ritual not just as a rote religious exercise, but a spiritually rich pathway to adulthood.

Daniel Miller is a lawyer, writer, and activist in New York. He has previously written for the Washington Post, Psymposia, and the Forward. Follow him on Twitter.

Protesters on Parliament Hill Tuesday. All photos by THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld

A Indigenous women's advocacy group is demanding more transparency and calling out the government for what they see as a "lack of progress" in Canada's national inquiry into missing and murdered indigenous women.

The condemnation comes a day after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau stood on the steps of Parliament and denounced Canada for repaying Indigenous people with "neglect" and "indifference" during a vigil honouring Inuit artist Annie Pootoogook, whose body was found in an Ottawa river two weeks ago.

In a press release Wednesday, the Native Women's Association of Canada slammed the government for a lack of communication and called for easily accessible information on office locations, how to reach commissioners and their staff, how members of the public can get involved, as well as a straightforward website.

"We are very disappointed to see that over two months into the two-year Inquiry mandate, no visible progress has been made," said President Francyne Joe in a press release. "Family members, loved ones have been waiting for decades to be heard. We recognize that it a big task to start a National Inquiry but the lack of communication has been disappointing and worrying."

A 2014 RCMP report found 1,181 Aboriginal women have gone missing or been murdered in Canada between 1980 to 2012, although Carolyn Bennett, the minister of Indigenous Affairs, has said the true figure is "way bigger."

The inquiry is expected to investigate how cases were handled by police forces, many of which have been accused by families of racism and not taking complaints seriously.

Vigils, like the Ottawa one attended by the prime minister, were held across the country on Tuesday in memory of missing and murdered Indigenous women.

Trudeau said he hoped the event would continue for "many decades and centuries, to remember the beautiful sisters that were taken from us and that we weren't able to protect and uphold."

"But I hope in the coming years, we'll be able to do it as a remembrance of things past, and not as a reflection of an ongoing national tragedy that continues," he said.

A photo of Pootoogook, an award-winning artist from Capt Dorset, Nunavut, who had received international recognition for her depictions of life in Canada's North, was featured prominently by a crowd of protesters who gathered on Parliament Hill, along with photos of other missing and murdered Indigenous women.

Read More: Why a Ottawa Cop Won't Be Held Accountable for Racist Comments

Although Ottawa police said initially that they didn't suspect foul play in Pootoogook's death, the investigation was subsequently taken over by the force's major crimes unit. There were elements of the case that were "suspicious," police said.

Activists say the initial dismissal of Pootoogook's death is rooted in systemic racism.

"It is shameful that the police said there was no suspicion when we Inuit knew there was something suspicious, so were ahead of them right from the beginning," said Sytukie Joamie, an Inuit community worker, who added that Pootoogook had been afraid of water and never went near it.

The vigil comes a week after the Ottawa Police Service launched a probe into one of its own officers for racist remarks about Pootoogook allegedly posted in an online comment section under his Facebook account, suggesting that Pootoogook's death wasn't a murder but an accident or a suicide, the result of alcoholism or drug abuse.

The comment was discovered by Veldon Coburn, the adoptive father of Pootoogook's daughter.

"It is the racists of that department who hindered the investigation right from the beginning and said those racist remarks," said Joamie.

Ottawa's police chief has called the comments "inappropriate" but maintained that he has no evidence that there are racist officers on his force.

Trudeau cautioned that repairing the "broken trust" between Canada and Indigenous peoples won't happen overnight.

"And it's not something that a prime minister or a government can do on their own... everyone who lives today on this land shares the responsibility to honour those who have always lived here, who welcomed us, who helped us make it through those first long winters, and who we have repaid with neglect, indifference."

Follow Tamara Khandaker on Twitter.

Étienne Jeaurat's 1755 painting "La Conduite Des Filles De Joie à la Salpêtrière" (Transportation of Prostitutes to the Salpêtrière Hospital)

When Dane* gets into a car with a client, the first thing he does is ask the guy to pull out his dick.

It's a measure he developed after nearly getting arrested for having an escort ad on Craigslist. "I met up with the person, and we drive around the block and he starts talking," said Dane, a Seattle-based escort. "The way he was talking was weird, and you could tell he didn't know anything about gay sex. After a while I told him to stop." That's when the cop pulled out a badge, terrifying Dane before letting him off with a lecture.

Since then, Dane does what he can to ensure that his clients are honest about their intentions. He previously used Rentboy.com, but federal regulators seized the site over a year ago, and its legal status today remains unclear. Once the most visible site for male escorts, Rentboy allowed them to check client reputations and block minors, providing a peek at what a regulated escorting marketplace might look like.

Because their work is illegal, escorts face a near-total lack of access to the protections and professional services that other entrepreneurs take for granted, from marketing to legal advice to insurance and beyond. As a result, sex workers who already face physical risks and financial volatility endure a unique form of economic isolation.

"Hiring drivers, security, people who assist in the screening process, money management, or utilizing a friend for a ride or as a safety call—all come the risk of those people being charged with sex trafficking crimes," Maxine Holloway, a Bay Area sex worker, pornographer and activist told me in an email. "I personally have employed drivers and screening services. Though hiring someone does keep me safer or make my job easier, involving someone else in the legal and safety risk I am taking always weighs heavy on me."

"I had a client stiff me once," said Ben*, a San Francisco-based escort. "He was like, 'oh, I don't have the cash on me and I'll just pay you with a check.' Being young and not knowing much about the financials of banking and checks, I was like, 'okay, sure.'" The account turned out to have been closed.

"There wasn't anything I could do," Ben said. He couldn't call the police or go to small claims court. "I just took the loss."

Ben takes his taxes to H&R Block, but only reports income from his retail day job. He tracks escorting income via his phone's text messages; when I asked if it would affect his insurance if he was caught driving his car for business, he seemed surprised. "I've not thought of that. That's a good point," he said. "I dunno. I have no idea. Could I write off my car?"

Those questions are nearly impossible for most escorts to answer, since most financial advisors avoid helping clients break the law. If they're lucky, a sex worker might find a sympathetic friend or unofficial mentor; Dane takes his taxes to a client who mentioned that he did financial counseling. The two men pay each other out-of-pocket whenever they avail themselves of each other's services.

But such arrangements are rare, especially when it comes to health and safety. "Public health research shows that sex workers experience higher rates of occupational harassment, violence and murder," Holloway wrote. "In the Bay Area we're lucky to have the St. James Infirmary and Red Light Legal," organizations which provide medical and legal care to sex workers. But on the whole, she wrote, sex worker-focused organizations "have difficulty functioning outside these pockets of self-run wellness services."

"There's very little help available," said Dallas Steele, who left his career as a TV news anchor to become an escort and adult performer in 2014. "You're pretty much on your own. The help I get is from other porn performers who have been around doing porn and escorting for a lot longer than I have, who can pass along experience."

Dustin*, an IT professional based in Portland, charges an escorting rate exactly three times his computer consulting rate. "Every escort hour I record on paper gets recorded as three computer hours," he said. "Money from the computer business goes in the bank, money from the escorting stays in my wallet. That cuts down how much travels through the bank in the first place."

In contrast, porn performers, whose work is legal, may have a wide array of services at their disposal. Steele works with TitanMen, one of the world's largest gay porn producers. "They're very much on top of it," he said. "They have all of the forms in place and are always good about getting you 1099s back, and they always provided good advice in terms of money."

In fact, the porn industry provides a model for how prostitution could be legally regulated. Mainstream studios have employed extensive STI testing programs for decades, overseen by organizations like Performer Availability Screening Services.

Currently, Nevada is the only state where prostitution is legal, with strict licensing requirements that include STI testing. A widespread licensing program for escorts could follow similar guidelines, and most escorts I spoke to were eager to operate legally. As it is, Dustin estimates he loses hundreds of dollars each month due to his inability to accept credit cards.

Violet Blue, a writer specializing in online censorship and security, noted the financial industry's refusal to process payments that could be even remotely related to sex, a practice that she says disproportionately impacts women.

"All women deserve business opportunities facilitated by Chase, Paypal and Square," Violet wrote, "not just those who live in what these companies consider the 'right neighborhoods' on the internet."

Decriminalization could eliminate many of these obstacles, and is supported by a wide range of medical and civil rights organizations.

Cut off from legal protections, unable to access financial services, harassed by police—why do escorts pursue such challenging work in the first place?

"It's gratifying," said Dane, though he acknowledged "this isn't for everyone. If you're going to escort, you should have a backup job, because it's not stable."

But he does love the work. "Not because of the money, but because I helped someone else. I've had several clients who have cerebral palsy, people that shake, or people that are bigger. It gives me a good feeling that I got someone off."

Recently, an older client hired Dane just to cuddle. "All he wanted was an overnight and 'boyfriend experience,'" said Dane. "I was weirded out because usually I'm like, 'let's just fuck.' But I got to lie down and talk about his whole life and stay up 'til the morning." Dane says that, the next morning, the client cried as he told him it was the most intimacy he'd experienced since his husband passed away. "It was so good to have someone in his bed again. He didn't want sex, he wanted to be loved. I think that's what everyone's trying to go for."

*Names have been changed to protect the anonymity of some interviewees.

Follow Matt Baume on Twitter.

Photo via Flickr user Bill Abbott

A Southwest flight was canceled Wednesday morning after a Samsung Galaxy Note 7 smartphone exploded and started to fill the plane with smoke during boarding, USA Today reports.

Brian Green was reportedly powering down his Samsung phone while boarding in Louisville when the Note 7 made a popping noise and started smoking. Green yanked the phone out of his pocket and threw it on to the ground while flight attendants evacuated the 75 people onboard.

The Federal Aviation Administration strongly advises passengers to power down their Galaxy Note 7s and not charge them while the plane is in-flight, due to reports that its lithium batteries have been causing the phone to explode and start fires—two things you don't particularly want while on an airplane.

By mid-September, Samsung reportedly received 92 claims of Galaxy Note 7 batteries overheating, 26 instances of burns, and 55 reports of property damage. The company recalled 1 million Galaxy Note 7s it sold before September 15 and offered to replace them with an safer, updated model.

However, according to Brian Green's wife, Sarah, the defective Note 7 onboard the Southwest flight was one that her husband had replaced after the massive recall. "I would love to know why the replacement phone is doing what the other one was doing," she told the the Courier-Journal of Louisville.

Samsung is reportedly looking into the incident, saying in a statement, "We are working with the authorities and Southwest now to recover the device and confirm the cause."

Read: An Exploding Smartphone Probably Destroyed This Guy's Jeep

Fuudoe, Xian, RB, members of Team Razer. Photo courtesy of Team Razer

It seems like every other day I load up my Twitter feed to see that another fighting-game player has been signed to a major eSports team—and often, to teams not previously known for their participation in the fighting-game community. Last year, high-profile eSports entities like Team Elevate, Echo Fox, and Team Secret didn't have any fighting-game players, but this year, they've broken into the FGC by adding Smash Bros players, Street Fighter V players, or both to their rosters.

Using the players who placed in the top 32 at EVO Street Fighter tournaments from 2013–2016 as an example, we'll see that the number of high-placing sponsored players hovered around 20 to 23. However, when we look at those sponsoring these players, there's a trend in top players moving toward what we'd traditionally consider "eSports teams" and away from being sponsored by retail stores and local fighting-game communities.

In 2013, 20 percent of sponsored Super Street Fighter IV players were signed to squads that were dedicated eSports teams (not hardware manufacturers who happened to have a team) and which had a presence in non-fighting-game competition. Thirty percent of Ultra Street Fighter IV players met those criteria in 2014; the number rose to 42 percent in 2015. When Street Fighter V took over at EVO 2016, the number of players on high-profile eSports teams had risen to 60 percent. With figures from mainstream sports continuing to invest in eSports, the trend looks set to continue as the industry expands.

The mad dash appears to come as part of the FGC, notorious for sticking to its grassroots beginnings, is accepting the fact its passion counts as eSports now. With increasing prize pots, matches being broadcast on ESPN, and celebrities like Lupe Fiasco throwing down with FGC greats, fighting games have never had a higher profile than they do now. But even with the growth in prize money, fighting games are at the low end of eSports when it comes to rewards for top players. For some perspective, the top ten earners in Street Fighter V have earned a total of $176,000 combined in the six months since the game's release while Counter-Logic Gaming, winners of the 2016 Halo World Championship, split a prize of $1,000,000 among their four members.

With the exception of Team Razer's Lee "Infiltration" Seon-Woo, who has made $79,642 in SFV so far, top players would be hard-pressed to cover the travel expenses of international competition with their winnings, never mind making a real living. That makes the chance to join a dedicated eSports team—which could provide both financial resources and training support—that much more attractive. But what does it take to make the transition from FGC standout to eSports acquisition? Do you need to be the best player? Or do you need to be an incredible showman like ANTi, who provided one of the most memorable entrances to CEO2016's top eight bracket?

At Red Bull's Proving Grounds: Fight for the 6ix Street Fighter V tournament in Toronto on September 10, I was shocked to see how many players had jerseys with their gamertags on the back. I caught up with a few sponsored players to find out why fighting games are getting so much attention and what it means to be signed.

"From what I see in other eSport games, their top players have crazy fan bases and the players are treated like celebrities," said Matthew "Blitzman" Lam who plays Street Fighter V for team Set to Destroy X (a team that made its mark in the Canadian Call of Duty scene before expanding). "Some of our top players in the fighting-game community are getting like that now. If I walk into a venue with Justin Wong, there are going to be people asking to take a picture with him. We're on ESPN now. That's pretty eSports to me."

If EVO 2016's Street Fighter V finals, which drew more than 200,000 viewers on ESPN2, are any indication, fighting games are going mainstream. This presents the problem of how to be inclusive toward TV audiences who are not familiar with FGC culture, which long focused on exposing your opponent's weakness and then letting the world know through trash talk. TV has stricter conventions to adhere to than online streaming, so longtime competitors in the FGC will need to play by new rules if they want to maintain their marketability and succeed on new platforms.

"The FGC has changed a lot. . That's where the Pacquiao fight was."

The major eSports realm is primarily made up of team games like League of Legends and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Squads like Cloud 9 and Team Liquid are hot destinations for skilled players looking to take advantage of the opportunities that arise from signing with such powerful brands. When teams establish a pedigree in one game, they can expand into other disciplines and attach some of that clout to the name of new signees.

What established teams have, beyond the respect associated with the name, is money. Not all sponsorship deals come equal, but the general idea is that, in exchange for representing your team's brand, they offset your costs and therefore allow you to focus on practicing and competing.

"The fighting-game community and eSports are slowly coming together. For a long time, the FGC classified eSports as 'corporate,' and they didn't want to be a part of that," said Justin "Nagata Lock II" Baisden, the director of Fight for the 6ix. "Now you've got a lot of eSports teams that have portfolios they want to diversify across as many games as possible, but they don't know the FGC because, for so long, the entities were separate. So now you've got this mad scramble because there's only so many top players that are good on stream, good on the mic, and good players. It's supply and demand. Every big team has to get their FGC rep."

Jack "White-R" Liang and Matthew "Blitzman" Lam at the Fight for the 6ix tournament. Photo by author

Major teams want success across multiple games, so the best way to represent them is through achieving consistent success beyond your initial signing. Unlike athletic sports, eSports titles are constantly getting updates, sequels, or even entirely new games on the scene. Along with skill and showmanship, versatility is another integral pillar of what it takes to get signed.

That's what makes competitors like Team Let's Play's Bernard "Raynex" Mafei invaluable. He was at Fight for the 6ix competing in Street Fighter V but is better known for his contributions to Canada's Super Smash Bros. Melee scene where he's considered one of the best Fox players in the country. Multi-gamers like him are invaluable because they can represent their team several times in a single tournament, which is cheaper than sending several players.

"How you get sponsored depends on a few things. Common denominators are good results, respect and making an impact locally," said Raynex. He signed with Team Let's Play when they approached him after he won one of their Smash tournaments. His status as a multi-gamer who could play Street Fighter V and Smash made him an attractive acquisition. "I let them know I could be their liaison between multiple gaming communities, so we communicated for a few months, and after that, I was signed."

The floodgates have opened on eSports sponsorship for the FGC, but the genre's tenure in mainstream eSports is still new, and the scene is going through growing pains. But it's impossible to deny the rapid pace of that growth.

Follow Marc Shaw on Twitter.

On an all new episode of Weediquette, Krishna visits a detox facility in Maine where opiate addicts try to get clean by smoking and eating massive amounts of weed.

Weediquette airs Wednesdays at 10 PM ET/PT on VICELAND.