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A Brit Asks an American Why Their Gun Laws Are So Awful

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The widespread enjoyment of food portions so big they would make most people vomit; the way they pronounce "route" and "thorough"; turning up to hospital and being asked for your credit card details. Of all the ways that America can seem like an alien place, none is weirder than US gun law and how it seems impervious to even the most monstrous of tragedies.

British people like to act all superior to our crass American cousins, but this is mostly just a way to make ourselves feel better about the polite awfulness of our country’s reactionary heart. Mind you, wandering into a Walmart and picking up several assault rifles with your groceries? This, I cannot understand. America, you have truly lost the plot.

Such feelings surfaced again as I watched, agog, news of the recent Florida school shooting and the fallout from it. So I called up a colleague across the sea, Harry Cheadle from VICE's New York office, to ask him to bring me up to speed with a truly baffling debate.

Simon: How’s it going?
Harry: Good here. No mass shootings today.

That's good to hear. The whole thing is so bizarre from a British perspective. American politics is always quite bombastic compared to the UK. But when it comes to gun law it's just like, 'Wow, are you serious?'
Right! Is it just like, 'Why don’t you guys just get rid of the guns?'

I mean, yeah. But I thought I’d start with the most recent headlines I've been reading, which is that Donald Trump wants to arm teachers as a solution to this. Obviously over here that sounds like a sick joke, but then so much of what Trump says comes across like that. How weird and beyond the pale is it to the general American conversation?

I would say it’s pretty weird. I think it is a bit outside of the mainstream, but not super far outside of the mainstream – and also not likely to happen. The NRA and gun advocates always say the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. So the 'solution' to a mass shooting that gets a lot of attention is generally, 'Why wasn’t there more security there? Why wasn’t someone armed to be able to stop this?' That’s the justification for expanding concealed carry and eliminating gun-free zones. So their argument would be, 'If a teacher had been armed at the Florida school where the shooting took place, then someone would have shot the guy.' There was an armed security guard on the campus, but he just wasn't around to stop the shooting.

[After this conversation took place, it was reported that an armed guard who was outside the school failed to confront the attacker.]

How persuasive do people find the idea that if everyone had guns there would be no problem?
It’s not that persuasive. I think it’s a minority of people that are in favour of that. Because that would sort of suggest that everyone should be carrying a gun all the time, which seems sort of self-evidently crazy. Even if you had a gun and there was a mass shooting going on, it’s very difficult to respond in a way that’s helpful, you know? Like, you hear gunshots, people are running, you may not be able to identify who has the gun. If there are multiple people who have guns and are trying to stop the shooting, they might think one of the good guys with the guns is actually the bad guy with a gun. There’s a lot of issues. If you shoot and you miss you can hit somebody else. There are a lot of problems.

Yeah, those kinds of objections pretty much go without saying to me.
One thing I’ll say is that gun control people don’t usually say there are cases of people with guns – like, ordinary civilians – actually stopping crime because they had a gun. Like a convenience store robbery. The customer has a gun and, like, shoots the [thief] – that does happen.

But, I mean, even in a case where it stops a crime, I think extra-judicial shooting is not OK, but in America people would be down with shooting a robber?
In the US, I would say, yeah, I think a lot of people are fine with it. You could go too far with it. I remember there was a case from a couple of years ago, or last year, where some woman fired at a guy that had shoplifted from the Home Depot, and was just kind of firing wildly at him as he went away. That sort of thing is bad, obviously.

What’s the general public opinion about gun regulation?
There's a two part answer, maybe a three part. The first part is if you look at polling on questions of different types of gun control – universal background checks, a ban on assault weapons, some waiting periods, different measures – almost all of them have a very high level of support. Maybe like 90 percent for universal background checks... it’s super high [a poll released on Tuesday showed 97 percent support].

So there’s a broad span of people who if you say, "Would you like some gun control?" they would say "yes". But, traditionally, the people that have been most energised by the subject have all been gun rights people – people who are really insistent that there should be no gun control at all. They want to expand situations where somebody is allowed to carry a gun. And these people are extremely politically active. They’re energised, they might launch a primary against a Republican politician who seems to be soft on guns.

Sometimes they’ll even oppose what you might call common sense gun control. Like if you say you shouldn’t be able to buy an AR-15 assault rifle on the ground, then next you’re going to take away handguns, and then you’re going to take away all the guns. They think it’s a slippery slope.

What might be changing is that there are more people who are activated gun control voters. With all these mass shootings that have taken place in the past year, there might be more people who are pro-gun control but also really passionate about it.

Yeah. That’s one thing that seems to be coming across on the news following this latest Florida shooting. All these teenagers marching on Washington. Is that unprecedented? It seems like people are suddenly really shocked into action.
I think the teenagers marching on Washington is a new thing. I can’t remember a time when teenagers in particular were so energised and so out in the news and protesting. That’s definitely new. There have been a lot of cases where parents of children who were at schools where shootings happened were leading the charge.

Those parents getting active has less effect than a bunch of gun-nuts acting against a soft Republican?
Sort of. I think one problem may be that they’ve definitely raised their voices in the debate, but haven’t succeeded at winning elections quite yet. If politicians – especially Republican politicians – decided that being pro-gun was a liability, they would start pushing for more gun control. But that hasn’t happened yet. So after the Newtown shooting [at Sandy Hook elementary school] there was a lot of energy and they very nearly passed a gun control bill that was actually very mild. It was only the most popular and obvious measures. And that ended up failing in the Senate.

So the consensus in the Senate is for gun rights?
Yeah, Republicans right now control not only the Senate, but also the House of Representatives. And almost all Republicans are opposed to any sort of gun control. Some Democrats are also opposed to gun control.

To an outsider it seems so simple. You guys have loads and loads of guns, and people keep getting shot. And in Europe, the UK or wherever, we don’t have many guns and fewer people get shot. Do you perceive it like that and, if so, are you frustrated by that?
Gun control advocates are frustrated by the lack of action on the national federal level, but they also are working all the time to change laws at local and state level. It is sort of maddening in a way. But I should say reducing the number of guns in the country is sort of like, that's the third rail. To reduce the number of guns you’d have to basically force people to give their guns up, and that is considered so radical that almost no mainstream politician endorses it.

Right. No mainstream political endorses fewer guns?
Yeah. Well, no one endorses actively taking guns away or forcing buy-back programmes.

Like an amnesty or something?
Yeah. You’d say cities have these programmes like, 'Bring in a gun and we’ll give you $300 or X amount of money." But to really reduce the number of guns, you’d say, "You have to bring in this gun and we’ll trade you money for it." That’s what Australia did in the 1990s, famously. That kind of thing – that’s what the NRA and all these people are worrying about.

I saw a video of this teenager asking Senator Marco Rubio if he would reject any future National Rifle Association (NRA) money. How big a deal is the NRA in American politics?
This is sort of controversial, because a lot of people attribute a lot of power to the NRA and the money it gives. They don’t give that much money, you know? I think it’s more that they can speak for a type of voter who cares a lot about gun issues and gun rights. And they can mobilise those voters against anyone they think is soft on guns. I think politicians are more motivated by being opposed by gun activists than they are losing out on that money. That question was a good soundbite way to put Rubio on the spot. But I don’t think that NRA money is that powerful – I think it’s more of the gun culture and more the gun voters. The NRA is good at speaking to them and being part of that culture.

They always evoke the constitution and the Second Amendment, right?
Yeah. The Second Amendment guarantees the right to bear arms. There’s a sort of legal debate about how broadly that right should apply. Should it apply to assault rifles or handguns, or what's the deal there?

Why can’t people get past that?
I think almost more important than the Second Amendment is just the culture of gun ownership, y’know? Which includes hunting, but also going to a shooting range and treating it as a hobby. And also this idea that you should have a gun for self defence – I think all of that is a more powerful cultural force than the Second Amendment. I think if you got rid of the gun culture side of things people would start interpreting the Second Amendment in a lot less limited ways.

The whole debate also seems to be tied up a lot in the idea of "freedom". Do you think there’s any chance of that interpretation of "freedom" being politically defeated?
I think what has to happen is voters in purple states – meaning states that aren’t super conservative, but aren’t super liberal, they’re more in between – if more people in those states, which includes Florida, start thinking of gun control as the most important issue, and then they start electing people who talk about gun control on the campaign trail, then I think laws in those states could change and, gradually, over time, there could be a shift.

I think it's sort of geographically dependent. Like, people in California or New York might be really fired up about gun control, but the people who really count are voters in states like Ohio or Florida or Nevada – places where they could adopt stricter gun laws and elect people to the Senate and House who support stricter gun laws. I think that’s where the change comes.

Does the Parkland shooting seem the thing that’s going to change that?
It’s hard to tell in the moment. I think when the Newtown shooting happened a lot of people thought that would be the moment. I mean, because there were children that were murdered for no reason. It was very emotional. President Obama cried when he was talking about it on television, there was a lot of energy behind gun control, even from politicians who had previously been really pro-gun, and nothing happened there. So it's really difficult to say whether this movement of teens will really become something that actually achieves legislation getting passed at some point. It might not be this year, it might be in a little while, but I think we’ll have to judge the shooting in retrospect for the political effects.

Thanks, Harry.

@SimonChilds13 / @HCheadle

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.


The VICE Morning Bulletin

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Everything you need to know about the world this morning, curated by VICE.

US News

Trump Proposes Giving Teachers Bonuses to Carry Guns
The president suggested 10 percent to 40 percent of teachers might be qualified to carry a gun on school grounds. “You give them a little bit of a bonus, so practically for free, you have now made the school into a hardened target,” he said Thursday, echoing language used by the NRA. Meanwhile, the sheriff's deputy tasked with guarding Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School resigned after video revealed he did not try to enter the school to face down the shooter.—The New York Times

Students Expect 500,000 People at Gun Control Protest
Activists behind the “March for Our Lives” scheduled for March 24 in Washington, DC, said they believed up to half a million people could attend. Organizers were still finalizing the location with the National Park Service, with Pennsylvania Avenue and West Potomac Park said to be possible sites for the rally. Marches were also expected to be held in London, as well as various other US cities.—The Washington Post

Manafort and Gates Hit with 32 Charges, Gates Expected to Plead Guilty
Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted the former Trump campaign manager and his deputy—the men were already facing a slew of federal charges—for new, finance-related felonies. The allegations of false tax returns, bank fraud, and failure to register foreign accounts (among others) were connected to work carried out by Manafort and Gates for political parties in Ukraine. Meanwhile, Gates was expected to plead guilty, possibly as soon as Friday, in a move that would increase pressure on Manafort and ultimately on Trump. —VICE News / The New York Times

Bernie Sanders’s Son Mulling Run for Congress
Levi Sanders said he was “excited, motivated, and interested” in this year’s race for New Hampshire’s first district congressional seat. Levi told VICE News he was “dotting my i’s and crossing my t’s” before officially launching a campaign and that if he did run, he would campaign on a similar policy platform to his father.—VICE News

International News

Moscow Complicates UN Resolution on Syria Ceasefire
Russia’s ambassador to the UN said the current plan for a 30-day ceasefire to allow aid and evacuations across the war-torn country was impractical. The UN Security Council was tussling Friday on the resolution, backed by the US, UK, and France. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, over 400 people—nearly 100 of them kids—had been killed in regime-affiliated strikes on rebel-held Eastern Ghouta, east of Damascus, since Sunday.—BBC News

Australian Deputy PM Quits
Barnaby Joyce is out as both deputy prime minister and leader of Australia’s National Party, though he was expected to stay in parliament. The politician came under fire after admitting he had an extramarital affair with a former aide, now his partner; he was later accused of sexual harassment, which he denied but conceded made his current role untenable. His official resignation was slated for Monday.—The Guardian

Cocaine Worth $61 Million Seized at Russian Embassy in Argentina
Former Russian diplomat Alexander Chikalo and Argentine police officer Ivan Blizniouk were arrested after authorities discovered an alleged smuggling operation at the Russian embassy. After 389 kilograms of cocaine were found inside luggage, Argentine officials replaced the drugs with flour, attached a GPS system, and tracked the bags to gather evidence.—AP

UNICEF Deputy Director Steps Down
Justin Forsyth resigned from the UN children’s charity after news broke that he had been accused of sexual misconduct in his previous job as head of Save the Children. Female staffers there said he sent unwelcome messages and made inappropriate remarks about their attire.—Al Jazeera

Everything Else

One Kylie Jenner Tweet May Have Cost Snapchat $1 Billion
Snap Inc.’s share price fell 6.1 percent and its market value tanked by $1.3 billion Thursday, apparently at least in part as a response to a thumbs down from Kim Kardashian’s little sister. Jenner tweeted: “sooo does anyone else not open Snapchat anymore?”—Bloomberg

David Mamet Writes Play About Harvey Weinstein
The acclaimed writer of Glengarry Glen Ross said he has finished new work about the disgraced Hollywood mogul. “I was talking with my Broadway producer and he said, ‘Why don’t you write a play about Harvey Weinstein?' And so I did.”—Chicago Tribune

Joss Whedon Ditches ‘Batgirl’ Project
The Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator will no longer helm a Batgirl movie for Warner Bros. and DC Entertainment. “It took me months to realize I really didn’t have a story,” said Whedon, who was supposed to write and direct.—The Hollywood Reporter

Janelle Monáe Releases New Music
The artist dropped two new songs from her forthcoming album Dirty Computer. Monáe revealed “Make Me Feel” on Zane Lowe’s Beats 1 show and also released a video for “Django Jane” in which she sits on a throne.—Noisey

There's a Movie About Flamin’ Hot Cheetos on the Way
FOX Searchlight revealed it will be making a biopic about Richard Montanez, the factory janitor who invented Flamin’ Hot Cheetos by adding his own spices to the snack. Lewis Colick will write the screenplay.—VICE

Make sure to check out the latest episode of VICE's daily podcast. Today we hear from Christopher Gray, the founder of the app Scholly, which helps young people access and receive college scholarships.

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

Some People On Vancouver Island Adopted a Rescue Pig And Ate It

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This is the story of Molly, a rescued Vietnamese potbelly pig recently adopted by a BC couple who promptly slaughtered and ate her. Naturally, some people are angry.

The RCMP have said they are not investigating the couple who adopted the pig/free dinner as killing and eating a pig is not an illegal act in Canada—even if it’s adopted as a pet. A Facebook post by Rasta Sanctuary, who were involved in the rescue of Molly, says the pig was one of 57 that were rescued from a “hoarding situation.” According to Global News, Molly was nursed back to health and adopted out on January 19 to a couple.

At some point between that January day and February 16, the new owners realized they didn’t know how to care for a pig and turned Molly into pork.

[Author’s note: here is some recommended reading music for this article.]

“It takes a special type of person to adopt an animal from a rescue organization simply to take them home to kill them, and eat them,” reads the Facebook post by the sanctuary.

Molly. Photo via Facebook.

Most would assume that when an animal is adopted you can’t just like, you know, kill it—well, most people would be wrong. Lorie Chortyk, a spokesperson for the BC SPCA, explained this to Global News.

“Because animals are considered property under the law, once an adoption agreement is made, that person is the full legal owner of that animal, whether it’s a dog, or a cat, or a pig or whatever so the minute the adoption is signed we lose all legal rights to that animal,” said Chortyk. “The new person has all legal rights to that animal.”

“The reality is, it’s not illegal to kill your own animal in Canada. Someone can take a gun and shoot their dog in the head and as long as the dog dies instantly, unfortunately there’s no law against that.”

The rescuers who saved Molly from her original owners only to have her be eaten by her new owners posted a meme of two pigs looking at a shooting star to show their angst over the situation.

The Rasta Sanctuary also shared screenshots of a Facebook account they purport belongs to the man who ate darling Molly which show him speaking callously about the act. The couple also apparently Snapchatted videos of them seasoning and preparing the meat. As you can imagine, a number of people are rather upset at the couple, especially as the SPCA said they specifically adopted the pig as a pet. The society said the person who took and ate the pig has been banned from adopting more critters from them in the future.

Rasta Sanctuary expressing their grief over the loss of Molly.

Rasta Sanctuary said that what happened to Molly is why they don’t typically rehome animals like pigs and instead act as a sanctuary for them, saying that “while we recognize that we could rescue more animals by rehoming them, unlike with dogs and cats, the risk of our residents ending up on someone's plate is just too high and it's not something we're willing to consider.”

According to a website that caters to rural Americans, pot belly pigs apparently aren’t meant to be food as their meat isn’t that good—especially if they have the diet of a pet pig. That said, they are a pig and one of the few skills humans have is the ability to eat pigs.

VICE could not confirm what recipe the owners used for Molly, but this story will be updated if new information comes out.

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My Nude Photos Were Stolen While I Was at School

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This article originally appeared on VICE Germany

When I was 15, the biggest problems my classmates faced were all the usual teenage woes. How best to get vomit out of their parents' carpet after a house party? How best to finally have sex, with absolutely no experience in that field? For me, there was a more pressing issue. All I could think about was how long it would take for everyone I knew to forget about the photos they'd seen of my naked arse.

The story of my stolen nudes begins in 2007, in the childhood bedroom of my then-boyfriend. Between posters of Christina Aguilera and Ronaldo, I posed in my first lingerie set – a corset with suspenders, a matching thong and stockings. Looking back, the fact I decided to opt for a set in a horrid pink and white colour scheme might have been a sign that I wasn't quite mature enough to be taking sexy selfies for my boyfriend.

I took the selfies on his bed before he came home from school – legs open, hands on breasts, bum exposed – using the timer on my phone. When he arrived, I sent them to him via Bluetooth, but he deleted them from his phone. "If you keep them, they’ll eventually end up everywhere," he said.

He was right. In fact, it only took two weeks for a classmate to run up to me in school and show me a photo of my semi-naked body on her phone, before she carefully explained that "the whole school has seen your arse".

The leak hadn't come from my boyfriend. Two other boys at school had pinched my phone out of my bag and sent themselves the photos. After that, they sent them to all of their mates, who in turn sent them to all of theirs. This snowballed until the entire school had caught a glimpse of me in that exposed state.

My teenage body was now communal property. The pictures originally marked a special moment in my life – the first time I looked at myself and thought I was sexy and grown-up. When I posed for the pictures, I had felt confident and empowered, and I had wanted to share that moment with my boyfriend. But that wasn't how it turned out, and I was left feeling disgustingly naïve.


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"Women are often made to feel guilty for taking these sorts of photos and videos," Anna Hartmann, a digital violence officer at the German Federation of Women’s Counselling and Women’s Emergency Services, tells me. The organisation launched a campaign in 2017 against digital violence, to help women who have suffered experiences like mine fight back.

According to Hartmann, more and more women are seeking counselling due to digital violence – though neither the counselling service nor the police know the exact figures. A spokesperson for the German Federal Criminal Department confirms that there were almost 6,000 reported incidents in 2016 in which photos and videos of intimate situations were deliberately leaked against the wishes of the people in the images. An Austrian survey in 2014 found that 16 percent of Austrian 14 to 18-year-olds said they had taken nude photos, while 50 percent reported knowing someone whose pictures had either been spread around, been used to blackmail or to bully them.

When the iCloud accounts of female celebrities like Rihanna and Jennifer Lawrence were hacked and their nude photos posted across the internet in 2014, the EU Digital Commissioner at the time, Günther Oettinger, said: "If someone, especially a celebrity, is stupid enough to take nude pictures of themselves and put them online, they shouldn't expect us to protect them." But if a person takes private naked photos that are subsequently stolen, they should be able to expect some protection. As Hartmann says, sexting itself isn't the problem; the blame should be on people who steal intimate images or publish them for clicks. "But far too often, we place the blame on the victims."

Two days after my photos first started spreading around school, a friend rang me up. He was calling to tell me that my best friend had just posted my pictures on her blog. When I checked the site, I saw that the caption below the photos read: "Whore."

This was my best friend, posting hurtful, derogatory messages about me online at a time when I needed her most. I felt ashamed, afraid and completely alone, and I knew that I couldn't go back to school.

According to Hartmann, that was a perfectly normal reaction. "Watching your pictures or video spread quickly without knowing how many people will see it is an immense loss of control," she says.

I was pretty young when I learned the first rule of the internet: if something is online once, it’s online forever. But that might not always have to be the case in the future.

In December of 2017, the EU passed new measures to better protect people affected by revenge porn and related acts, like what happened to me. In 2015, the British government introduced a law that made revenge porn a crime punishable with a two-year prison sentence. But in Germany, we don’t have any specific laws yet to tackle the issue.

As soon as I saw my pictures on the internet, it became clear that I wasn't going to be able to get out of the situation without a bit of help. So I went to my dad, who immediately rang one of the boys who had stolen the photos, and threatened to contact his parents if they were not deleted immediately from my friend's blog.

The pictures were taken down quickly after that, but the problem didn't go away – I had no way of knowing just how many people had downloaded them in the hours after they went up, if other students had posted them somewhere too or if any of my teachers had seen them.

The next day at school, the friend who had blogged my nude photos confronted me in the hallway about an angry text I had sent her the night before. Before I could say anything, she slapped me in the face. I walked back into the classroom, packed my stuff and ran out of the building. I spent the rest of the morning crying behind the gym.

Eventually, I drew some strength from the idea that the next big school scandal was just around the corner and that, soon, everyone would stop caring about my photos. In the weeks after, I went on something of a rebranding campaign. I wanted to prove to the people who insulted me that I wasn't who they said I was. So I dressed as basic as I could at the time – trainers, jeans and hoodies. I wore less makeup and didn’t go out. I devoted myself to my boyfriend, who I stayed with for a few more years because, I reasoned, if I had a boyfriend, nobody could call me a whore.


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For the next two years, I had to share a class with the two boys who stole my photos. After my father spoke to one of them on the phone, they both apologised, which I accepted because I actually think they never expected it to get so out of hand.

But I didn’t speak to my former best friend for almost ten years. Until recently, when she added me as a friend on Facebook. I got in touch with her for this article to see if she remembered why she did it. "I just wanted to hurt you," she explained. "I can't even remember why, I just did. I guess the fact that I've forgotten shows how little I cared about your feelings."

Although I forgave my classmates, I have never been able to completely overcome the invasion of my privacy, or the way that I was blamed for what happened. For years, people in my hometown who didn't even go to my school told me they'd seen those pictures of me. In many ways, it's still a big part of who I am. Even though I know now that I can wear whatever I want, I still can't help feeling like I've done something wrong whenever someone makes a throwaway comment about the way I look.

Ultimately, we need to come up with effective ways of ensuring that victims of nude leaks and revenge porn are taken more seriously, and that social media and video platforms respond quickly and delete sexually violent conduct like this. Because, as Hartmann says, "Revenge porn is, above all, a form of gender-specific sexual assault."

This article originally appeared on VICE DE.

Parkland Survivor Samantha Fuentes Said She Was 'Unimpressed' by Trump's Call

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In the wake of last week's school shooting in Parkland, Florida, young people are angry: angry at the NRA, at lawmakers reluctant to take action on gun control, and at President Trump. Despite the president's "thoughts and prayers," talking points on empathy, and break with the NRA, he hasn't done much to quell the outrage people around the country are feeling after 17 students and staff died at an American high school.

Now it looks like Trump couldn't even manage to console recovering survivors over the phone, like Samantha Fuentes, 18, who got a call from the president while she was still in the hospital. The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School senior, who had been shot in both legs and still had shrapnel behind her eye, said she'd "never been so unimpressed by a person in my life."

"He didn’t make me feel better in the slightest," Fuentes told the New York Times. "He said he heard that I was a big fan of his, and then he said, 'I’m a big fan of yours too,'" she added. "I'm pretty sure he made that up."

It was the first bizarre exchange in what would turn out to be a painfully awkward conversation, Fuentes said. Trump allegedly went on to call suspected shooter Nikolas Cruz a "sick puppy."

Fuentes is now just one of many Marjory Stoneman students who hasn't been afraid to speak truth to power in the wake of the school shooting. A handful of survivors have already become activists, leading rousing speeches, challenging politicians and NRA leaders, planning massive rallies, and even facing down right-wing conspiracy theories, all to fight for stronger gun control.

Fuentes was released from the hospital shortly after speaking with President Trump and she now says she hopes to be "a voice to what happened."

"My survival is important now more than ever," the teenager told Inside Edition. "I think it is important for people to have a physical reminder of what it looks like. That is why I am showing my face. I am not very shameful of it at all because it is truth."

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Follow Drew Schwartz on Twitter.

Related: Teens Tell Us Why They're Protesting After the Parkland Shooting

This article originally appeared on VICE US.

Finally, a Vibrator That Can Also Order You a Pizza

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These are exciting times for sex toys. Through the wonders of technology, none of us need to settle for our ancestors' mundane forms of masturbation—a cornucopia of dazzling carnal delights are here to help us bust a high-tech nut. Want to bang a terrifyingly realistic sex doll? No problem. Long for the sweet caress of an alien who will lay some eggs inside you? There's a dildo for that. Dream of fucking an Oscar-nominated fish man? Please, say no more.

And now, there's a fancy new fuck toy coming especially for all the masturbators out there who know that food is another integral piece of self-care. On Thursday, an adult entertainment company called CamSoda announced a new sex toy called the RubGrub, a vibrator attachment that can also order food for you.

According to CamSoda, the RubGrub will be a WiFi connected button like Amazon's Dash Button that can fit on a vibrator and will automatically order a large Domino's cheese pizza whenever it's pressed—because who doesn't want to follow their jerk off session with mass amounts of grease and cheese, right?

"Masturbation, while ultimately enjoyable, can be a strenuous physical activity during which an individual exerts a lot of energy and burns many calories. Inevitably, once someone has climaxed, they feel lethargic and hungry," CamSoda's vice president, Daryn Parker, said in a press release. "Now, in order to enjoy your Saturday night, all you need is your RubGrub device. Get off and get stuffed, all with the quick click of a button." The future is here.

Unfortunately, the vibrator button will only be programmed to order Domino's once it goes on sale this spring, so apologies to everyone out there trying to stick with Whole30. And the pizza chain doesn't seem particularly stoked about being chosen for CamSoda's nifty new invention, either.

"[The RubGrub] is news to us," a spokesperson for the pizza company told FOX News this week. "We have not worked with this company, nor have we authorized them to use our name in conjunction with their 'toy.'"

For its part, CamSoda promises that the RubGrub will soon be able to order other kinds of food, like "Mexican and Chinese," so the day may finally come when we can order a post-coital Cheesy Gordita Crunch from the comfort of our beds. What a world!

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

More than 300 Charges Against Weed Dispensary Workers Have Been Dropped

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More than 300 charges against weed dispensary employees in Toronto were dropped in the last week, according to the lawyer representing the workers.

On Thursday, a Crown prosecutor agreed to withdraw approximately 180 charges against 90 former workers at Canna Clinics in Toronto in exchange for signed peace bonds requiring them to avoid working in dispensaries for the next two years. This comes just a week after another slew of charges—approximately 128—were dropped relating to the Project Lincoln raids that targeted seven Canna Clinics and six residences in Toronto as well as six Canna Clinics in BC last summer.

“It’s a progressive approach between the Crown and the defence to deal with a problem that police are dumping on the court system,” said Jack Lloyd, a lawyer representing the workers.

“Toronto police should not be arresting young people simply for working at or being inside medical cannabis dispensaries.”

VICE has contacted the Public Prosecution Service of Canada for an exact breakdown of the withdrawn charges and will update this story with that information. Last year, VICE News revealed that 72 of the charges in police’s massive Project Claudia raids in 2016 had been withdrawn or stayed. The fact that the offences aren’t sticking raises questions as to the efficacy of continuing to crack down on dispensaries.

Toronto police spokesman Mark Pugash told VICE charges being dropped doesn’t mean the raids are a waste of time and money.

“A peace bond is a consequence,” he said, describing dispensaries as “illegal organizations that are generating large amounts of cash.” Police seized more than $350,000 during Project Lincoln as well as roughly 250 kilograms of cannabis.

However, Pugash said there is a “compelling argument” that the owners and operators of the dispensaries often aren’t on site when arrest warrants are being issued. Frequently, low-level employees are the ones arrested.

The courtroom was packed with young people Thursday, including many people of colour. In an assembly-line-like fashion, they were divided into smaller groups based on when and where they were raided, and made their way in front of the judge to sign their peace bonds.

The workers who spoke to VICE said they started out as budtenders and made between $40,000 to $58,000 a year. They said Canna Clinic paid for their legal bills and that the dispensaries take in anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 a day.

Outside the courtroom, there was a sense of relief—people were hugging and speaking excitedly, having just ended what was undoubtedly a stressful ordeal. But there was also a unanimous feeling that the cops and courts are needlessly going after dispensary workers, and that the future of legalization looks unfair to the people who fought against prohibition.

“It’s a waste of money. They’re stopping people from being comfortable doing what they like. It’s no different from going to a bar and getting a drink or a shot,” said Houston Bongeli, 22, who was working at Canna Clinic’s Yonge and Eglinton location when it was raided last June. He was charged with possession for the purpose of trafficking and possession of the proceeds of crime.

Bongeli described working at the dispensary as his “dream job.”

“I love weed,” he said, noting he would make a commute from Oshawa to Toronto every day to get to work. “I dedicated myself to this company.”

He and others who spoke to VICE Thursday said sometimes cops would park outside of the dispensaries and watch customers coming in and out. They believe it was an intimidation tactic.

“I was in a hot paddy wagon for four to five hours,” said Grad Murray, 30, describing his arrest at Canna Clinic. “They turned off the AC… They were taking their sweet time.”

Murray, who is black, spoke at length about the issues surrounding enforcement of prohibition laws, which disproportionately target people of colour. He pointed out that in places like Oakland, victims of the war on drugs are being given priority to get into the legal market and he said he wants to establish an organization to push for that here.

“That’s something the Canadian government should be doing. They say they’re going to look into it, I don’t really believe that,” he said.

When VICE asked Prime Minister Justin Trudeau about the Oakland model at a town hall last April, he said the government is focused on making sure there are no “criminal elements” in Canada’s licensed producer system. “If someone is convicted drug trafficking already, I don’t think we’re going to reward them with an opportunity to sell it legally.”

He did however admit it was “unfair” that people of colour are more likely to get arrested for possession. A VICE News investigation found that almost all of the country’s LPs are run by white men; even ex-cops are cashing in on the green market.

“It’s a slap in the face,” said one former Canna Clinic employee whose charge was withdrawn Thursday.

Murray said the new weed laws will leave people of colour vulnerable to more arrests.

“They’re introducing so many more regulations and laws and punishments that are even harsher [than the current laws].” Under the new regime, selling weed without a license could result in 14 years of jail time.

Under Ontario’s plan, only government-run stores—essentially dispensaries—will be allowed to sell weed.

“They take [our] business model and still lock people up for it,” said Murray. He also noted that legal weed businesses will require background checks and therefore could eliminate candidates who have been convicted for weed-related crimes. Alberta has said minor possession convictions will not automatically eliminate potential dispensary operators.

The federal government has yet to promise amnesty for individuals punished by prohibition.

Follow Manisha Krishnan on Twitter.

What’s Wrong With the ‘No Trans’ Dating Preference Debate

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OK, let’s talk about “no trans” dating preferences, a recent fixation in sexual politics that often ends up in transphobic and abusive conversations.

Take, for example, a recent video by LGBTQ commentators Arielle Scarcella and Blaire White, which argued that lesbians were not transphobic if they were only attracted to cisgender women.

Trans feminists and YouTube personalities, such as Riley J. Dennis and Contrapoints, have been arguing for some time that a lack of sexual attraction to trans folks is, to some degree, shaped by societal prejudices and stereotypes. As a PhD student in sociology and a trans feminist, I am concerned how the debate has misrepresented trans critics and led to attacks on trans feminists and activists.

The attraction debate has been popping up on-and-off over the last few years, but seems to have been kicked off by a video posted by Dennis called “Your dating ‘preferences’ are discriminatory” which explored how social inequalities and oppression shape our attractiveness to marginalized peoples.

Dennis concludes in her video, “Because these dating preferences are ultimately harmful to people who don’t fit into your box of what a conventionally attractive person looks like, it makes people feel isolated, alone, and unwanted to hear that they are universally unattractive to people.” Dennis urges her viewers to critically reflect on the stereotypes that shape their preconceived attractions to others.

But Scarcella and White twisted the terms of this argument to read as an assault on the rights of lesbians and cis-women, an attack on the lesbian community by “SJW” authoritarians. This isn’t entirely surprising as Blaire White’s YouTube channel routinely resorts to offensive conservative arguments that belittle and misrepresent the feminist community.

Scarcella claims “being gay is transphobic.” But their hot take has a selective hearing problem: it cherry picks controversial lines from trans feminists and ignores the important context that frames the entire argument.

This video struck a nerve in far-right circles, which led to a harassment campaign against Riley carried out by an angry cyber-mob of thousands of users systematically downvoting her videos and sending her hurtful content, comments, and venomous response videos. For instance, her video mentioned above has two thousand likes and fifty thousand dislikes followed by an endless stream of abusive comments, many of them misgendering Riley.

Many of the critiques of Riley’s arguments alleged that her video accused cisgender folks of having sexual identities that were transphobic. Such an argument would understandably irritate a lot of people. Critics argued that Riley was attempting to coerce straight men and lesbian women into having sexual attractions to trans women.

Of course, this is not what Riley was arguing.

This debate has riled trans exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs), which has heightened the already intense transphobic harassment practiced over online spaces like YouTube and Twitter. TERFs, for those of you who don’t know, are radical feminists who accuse trans women of being “men in dresses” trying to infiltrate women’s spaces for god knows what reasons. Many of these TERFs already go out of their way to harass, intimidate, and dehumanize trans women, especially those women in publicly-facing positions. As any woman and feminist killjoy could likely tell you, gendered online abuse and harassment is not only highly prevalent and commonplace, but very damaging and traumatizing.

It is especially dangerous for trans women who speak out against transphobia and abuse. The last time I wrote an article about transphobia, I was featured on Kiwifarms (a troll website dedicated to abusing, harassing, and embarrassing transgender folks and those who suffer from mental health issues). A group of aggrieved trolls dug up my Internet history, misgendered me, threatened me, and lamented that me and people like me should not exist.

Scarcella and White argue that sexuality is defined entirely by biological factors, which implies that it is entirely static. They propose that sexuality and gender are not at all influenced by “society,” despite the commonly-accepted fact that homophobia and transphobia are culturally-motivated belief systems.

In her video, Riley asserts, “we know that sexual orientations are more innate than learned.” And she goes on to assert that the ways people talk about their dating preferences are most assuredly shaped by societal prejudice. For instance, when someone expresses disgust towards a trans woman that they mistook for a cis woman—that is transphobia. In fact, that is the very definition of transphobia; the irrational fear of transgender folks.

Many trans feminists, including myself, would argue that this sense of disgust isn’t a given in our predetermined sexual identities; it is a flexible frame of mind that can be changed through critical self-reflection. There are plenty of people, including heterosexual men and lesbian women, who might find themselves surprisingly attracted to a trans woman. That is very different than saying that if you’re not attracted to trans women you are transphobic.

Let me repeat: I am not saying that it is imperative to be attracted to trans women. I am arguing that your attraction is shaped by preconceived notions and stereotypes of transgender folks. So, no, I am not shaming you because of your sexual orientation. I am merely asking you to critically reflect on the factors that might shape your attractions.

For me, these arguments feel super reductive. Sexuality and gender are complicated identity categories that sit on a shifting identity continuum. The social scientific canon has an abundance of research on these topics, starting with the famous Kinsey scale that reveals the diversity and flux of sexual identities. For many sociologists such categories are culturally constructed and historically situated. This doesn’t mean that you have individual control or agency over your sexuality or gender, but that the meanings and perceptions that inform our sexuality and gender are relative to your culture and history. This also doesn’t mean there’s no biological influence, but how we interpret our biological impulses do not exist in a vacuum empty of ideological takes on the world.

Much of the work towards queer liberation in the past few decades have been literally engaged in re-shaping public perceptions of LGBTQ folks from a perceived medical and psychological illness to a legitimate, normal, and natural continuum of sexualities and genders.

Sexuality and gender aren’t simply something that comes from some biological imperative. They are phenomena that are developed through a messy brew of social, cultural, historical, and psychological factors. They can also prove to be lightly malleable if we try to dig into the foundations of how those oppressive structures influence the ways we see and understand the world.

It is essential that YouTube personalities like Scarcella and White who are engaging in sexual and gender politics critically interrogate the nasty effects of their reach and influence. They might get thousands of views, but there are trans women who need to deal with the fallout of their wide breadth of influence. We get shit on enough as it is, and we don’t need our arguments grossly misinterpreted so that you can make a few dollars on advertising.

Follow Abigail on Twitter.


You Need to Watch 'Mute' on Netflix This Weekend

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Looking for some stuff to point your eyes at this weekend? Whether it's the best Netflix movies and shows to watch when you're stoned, or simply movies that pass the Bechdel test—VICE has you covered when it comes to TV, movies, and books, the best music to listen to, and the best art events happening across the US. Read on for our staff recommendations on what to take in during your downtime:

Mute

The second-most beautiful Skarsgård (after Stellan) plays a mute bartender on the hunt to find out what happened to his lost lady-friend in the neon-soaked Netflix debut of WarCraft director Duncan Jones. With Paul Rudd, Justin Theroux, Seyneb Saleh, and Sam Rockwell in the mix, this one looks like a long-awaited return to sci-fi form from the Bowie scion behind the tragically under-appreciated Moon. —Emerson Rosenthal

Annihilation

Coming off the sneaky success of slow-burn sci-fi thriller Ex Machina, Alex Garland’s latest raises the stakes dramatically on two fronts: one, with a budget of $55 million, Annihilation falls into the nervous realm of “oh-fuck-what-if-it-tanks?” for a beleaguered Paramount; and two, Garland’s chosen to adapt an award-winning novel, one that’s been notoriously labeled “unfilmable” in the past. And yet, much like Arrival, another philosophical sci-fi book Paramount bet big on—and won big on—Annihilation seems comfortable swimming in the Sea of Heady Concepts, where questions only beget better questions, and satisfying answers feel like the stuff of science fiction. —Patrick Adcroft, Writer/Copy Editor, Snapchat Discover

NYCB Art Series Presents Jihan Zencirli, a.k.a., GERONIMO

Each winter, the New York City Ballet partners with a contemporary artist, sells tickets to the ballet for $30 a pop, and throws a big party afterwards with free beer and DJs. It's one of my all-time favorite art events—I go every year—and this time around, the NYCB has partnered with Jihan Zencirli, a.k.a., GERONIMO, a Turkish-American artist known for her monumental balloon installations. She's filled the David H. Koch theater atrium with more than 200,000 multicoloured balloons in various shapes and sizes. In addition to being a chance to see world-class ballet for very little money, it's also a primo opportunity for selfies. Saturday, February 24th is the final performance of the year, but the installation will be on view through March 4th. All tickets $30, available here. —Kara Weisenstein

All Our Asias

All Our Asias is a deeply personal game from Sean Han Tani, a musician and game designer previously known for Even the Ocean and Anodyne. Here, he's working almost alone, in abstract 3D spaces that directly recall the Playstation 1 era. In it, you play as Yuito, a Japanese-American guy who gets a letter from his estranged, dying father. When Yuito arrives at the hospital, dad's in a coma, so he decides to undergo an experimental procedure that allows him to enter his father's mind: his "memory world," filled with decaying memories and ghostly notions of identity and loss. It's a sharply drawn, personal meditation on the Asian American experience, and a really beautiful exercise in 3D storytelling. It's also free, or you can support the artist with a $4.99 fan pack complete with OST and art book. —Danielle Riendeau, Managing Editor, Waypoint

The Next Gen: John Yuyi

Installation photos by Beckett Mufson

Taiwanese artist John Yuyi opened her sexy, unsettling breakout solo show The Next Gen: John Yuyi at nonprofit The Art Vacancy this week. By printing her own temporary tattoos, the artist transforms models'—and occasionally plants' and animals'—skins into chameleonic canvases. You may have seen her work shared on Instagram, commissioned by Gucci, or in a series of New York Times articles, but damn if they don't pop off the wall as large-format prints. The Art Vacancy's lighting is perfect for selfies, so consider this your cultural cache for the weekend, and support an emerging artist while you're at it. —Beckett Mufson, Staff Writer

Cyprien Gaillard: Nightlife

Cyprien Gaillard, Nightlife (9 Film Stills), 2015. 3D motion picture, DCI DCP 14:56 min. © Cyprien Gaillard, courtesy the artist, Sprüth Magers and Gladstone Gallery, New York and Brussels

Now through April 14, the Parisian multihyphenate Gaillard brings his 3D video piece to the Gladstone Gallery's Chelsea location. In short, it's a 15-minute waltz of plant life and fireworks shot in super high-definition at nighttime. In long, "this three-dimensional film connects a series of divergent natural and cultural phenomena throughout Cleveland, Los Angeles and Berlin. Organized into distinct chapters, Nightlife optically, audibly and conceptually brings together an obscure yet significant mix of historical monuments and occurrences, forming a hyper psychedelic experience," according to the gallery. In medium, last night I went to 21st street, threw on a pair of heavy-duty 3D glasses, and took in all the power and delicacy of an evening on earth. It was so nice, I watched it twice. —ER

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

Before Acting, Oscar Isaac's Job Was Transporting Dead Bodies

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In Early Works, we talk to artists young and old about the jobs and life experiences that led them to their current moment. Today, it's actor Oscar Isaac, who stars in the just-released sci-fi drama Annihilation. (You've seen him in Star Wars and Ex Machina too.)

We moved to Miami in second grade, which was interesting because we lived way out in Kendall, Florida, which is full of life now—but at the time it was way out. My father's a doctor, and he worked the graveyard shift for a long time, so we'd have to be very quiet around the house while he was sleeping until he went to work at night. He was also a musician and had a video camera that I would borrow. For my birthday, he got me a video equalizer, where you could run the camcorder through the VCR and add titles, music, and weird effects. I'd make a lot of movies with my friends, my little brother, and my sister—they were all cast in the movies. That was the beginning of my love for that form of artistic expression.

I was terrible at every part-time job I had when I was younger. I worked as a bag boy at a Publix, which lasted for about a week. One of the ladies who I bagged groceries for worked at a golf club, and she said, "I might have a job for you." So I worked as a waiter at a golf club that was down the street from where I lived. That lasted for about a month. They had weddings there all the time, and if I had to hear "We Are Family" one more time, I was going to shoot myself. I worked at a movie theater concession stand. That lasted two days.

The longest job I held was as a transporter at the hospital where my dad worked—taking people to do X-rays, bringing the deceased down to the morgue. My first day on the job, I had to do that. When I applied to Juilliard, they asked "What other jobs have you done that qualifies you?" I put the hospital down, because you get to see the extremes of humanity there—life and death. People can get stuck when they're doing movies into focusing on what's probable, but at the hospital you focus on what's possible. It's possible that someone could start laughing when they learn that someone dies. Anything can happen.

In high school, I really fell in love with music in a big way. I had bands with different groups of friends. One of the bands got more and more popular, and that took precedent for me. But when I graduated high school, I was still auditioning at surrounding theaters in Miami, and I even got a couple of commercials. When I got accepted to Juilliard in New York, I had to make the decision to put the band on the backburner and focus on acting. But even to this day, I play music all the time. I occasionally play live, too.

I never had a moment where I stopped to think, What if acting doesn't work out? I couldn't imagine not doing it—finding some outlet for it. If I hadn't been given certain opportunities, I'm sure I would've found some way. I never got to the point where I thought, What if this doesn't work out? Nowadays, it's less about that and more about, Where do I go now that I don't necessarily have the same feeling? I have so much I want to say to the world now. I've had a lot of wonderful opportunities, and now that I have a family, the priorities shift a bit. It's more mysterious now—maybe the trajectory used to feel more certain. I've scaled the mountain, I'm looking over it, and there's many more mountains. It's just about choosing where to go now.

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

If the Olympics Had a Streaking Category, This Guy Would Win Gold

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It's Winter Olympics time again, the glorious period every four years when the world's greatest athletes on ice and snow go head-to-head to prove they're the best sweeper or sledder or Bond henchman cosplayer or whatever. And Friday was no exception as PyeongChang audiences were treated to yet another gold-medal performance for an under-appreciated sport, albeit not one that's officially on the list—streaking.

On Friday morning, a mysterious man broke onto the ice after the Men's 1,000m Speed Skating medal ceremony, wearing nothing but a pink tutu and a monkey pouch over his crotch, TMZ reports. If that isn't Olympics-level streaking, I don't know what is.

Behold, the man in all his glory, as he pirouettes his way across the PyeongChang ice:

ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP/Getty Images

The guy appears to be middle-aged, judging by his flowing salt-and-pepper mane and dad bod paunch. He also seems to be a pretty chill dude since he opted to write "PEACE + LOVE" across his chest—the math equivalent of a shaka.


MLADEN ANTONOV/AFP/Getty Images

In a blurry video of his nearly nude venture, the guy appears to strip down right on the ice and then immediately take a pretty nasty fall. But like many Olympians before him, he doesn't let the brief tumble discourage him from the duty at hand. He just rises to the occasion and keeps on going.

According to TMZ, his routine only lasted a few minutes. From the look of the photos, some security guards escorted him away, though it's unclear whether he will face any charges for his moment of glory.

Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images

Though the identity of the streaker is still unknown, he looks like the same dude who ran the track before Usain Bolt's final race at the IAFF World Championships last August. Back then, he was fully naked and sporting a summer-y shorts tan, though he still went with the same handwritten message across his bare chest, again attempting to spread his joyous message with the masses.

Nudity has low-key been a part of the Olympics since the Greeks, but nowhere in the annals of history has anyone taken the spectacle to such an extreme. Dance on, sweet streaker, and may the message written across your chest spread across our quickly-deteriorating world. We need it now more than ever.

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

People Who Actually Work in Schools Don't Want Armed Teachers

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When Michael Newman was a kid, he usually just tried to avoid the people he had problems with at school. But early in his career as a substitute teacher in Florida, he realized things are more complicated on the other side of the desk. Apart from the delicate politics that come with that profession—he says he was once banned from a teacher's classroom for daring to suggest Ayn Rand was a bad writer—if a kid makes trouble or exhibits disturbing behavior, it's not like you can just avoid them.

If there were a kid with a dead look in his eyes telling racist jokes he'd picked up from Stormfront and openly fantasizing about guns, for instance, Newman still had to teach him. That, coupled with the fact that his co-workers often seemed to shrug such characters off, made for a terrifying routine. In fact, it's what ultimately led Newman to quit teaching for good in back in 2014.

"A breaker must have blown, because the power went out in my room," he recalled. "I immediately freaked out and locked the doors and closed the windows cause I was not gonna die that day. I ended up calling the front office on my phone and they just sent a maintenance person to flip the breaker. But that fear—that's when I knew I couldn't make a career out of it."



Newman might be an extreme example, but he's certainly not alone in feeling like teachers are ill-prepared for dealing with a maybe-shooter in their midst. In the aftermath of the Parkland shooting that left 17 people dead in Florida dead last week, survivors-turned-activists are begging Congress and the president to make semi-automatic rifles harder for disturbed people to purchase. Meanwhile, local Sheriff Scott Israel said his deputies would now be carrying rifles of their own, and the president went so far as to suggest that teachers get bonuses for carrying guns themselves.

As a product of Florida's public school system, I'm a bit disturbed by the prospect of who might be attracted to teaching if and when packing a gun were to be financially incentivized. But leaving that side, experts have been pretty clear that, at least historically, shooters have not targeted gun-free zones. What's more, the veteran school resource officers (SROs) I spoke to this week agreed that those measures would not necessarily make them feel more safe. What they suggested instead was decreasing the ratio between school cops and students and engaging in what is essentially a more robust form of community policing.

Matt Liston got his start as an armed school resource officer in 1997, as what he calls a "pre-Columbine SRO." Back then, he said, his department paid 100 percent of his salary. But after Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 13 people at their Colorado high school, the feds helped pay for for about 6,300 officers to be stationed in schools across the country. Today the Derby, Kansas, policeman is an instructor for the National Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO) who teaches a week-long class to school-cops across the country.

"I don't necessarily think that an armed guard standing out front of the school would be the answer," he told me, adding, "More SROs might be the answer, and I think the relationship piece is the more important piece to all this. I think talking to kids, bridging that gap, and kids feeling comfortable to come forward with that information," is essential.

But while adding more cops could help mitigate the problem, police presence—even an armed one—does not seem like a particularly effective countermeasure right now. After all, Scot Peterson, the sheriff's deputy stationed at Marjory Stoneman Douglas, heard the slaughter from outside and did nothing, his boss told the press Thursday. Peterson is also said to have either ignored or failed to respond aggressively to repeated warnings that Nikolas Cruz was a potential shooter.

Liston noted that not much has changed in the world of school resources officers since the introduction of the SRO funding back at the turn of the millennium. (The extra cash was nixed after 2005.) And the curriculum he teaches now—which centers heavily around how to intervene when a kid is troubled—does not seem ideally suited for facing down an AR-15-armed teen.

In fact, Jimmy Angeles, an armed school resource officer at Winter Park High School in Orlando, told me he received no job-specific active shooter training as an SRO. He added that each of the seven years he's been in the profession, he and his department have run through scenarios at places like local movie theaters. But the 39-year-old said that when they run the training at the campus where he works, it's mostly to familiarize other area cops with the school's layout so that if "Meet me at the 700 building," went out on the radio during an emergency, there'd be no confusion.

The idea is that the officers on the beat would often be the first responders in a shooting. But the implication is that there's been disturbingly little consideration of what school cops like Angeles—and by extension, Peterson at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School—are supposed to do until backup arrives. Still, Angeles doesn't think that having assault weapons on campus is necessarily the best approach. Like Liston, he suspects it all comes down to the campus version of community policing, though he also thinks faculty should perhaps be running drills with cops in what might amount to a more sophisticated version of the active-shooter training programs for students and staff already in place at schools like Marjory Stoneman.

"I think that there should be a plan in progress, and there should be certain people within the school that might be able to be part of a tactical team maybe, and put them through the same training that police officers have," Angeles told me. "I think that might be a better option than telling everybody that we're all going to have rifles in a school."

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

This Group Wants to Save the World By Yelling 'Wow' Like Owen Wilson

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Things are pretty bleak right now: Climate change is pushing the planet toward collapse, we're on the brink of nuclear war with North Korea, and we just saw the second-deadliest school shooting in American history. But none of that will stop one group of resilient souls from trying to spread some joy on this depraved husk of a planet the best way they can think of: Converging on a public square, huddling together, and saying "wow!" like Owen Wilson in unison.

While you slave away at your soul-crushing job on Monday, almost 4,000 people are planning to meet up in Melbourne, Australia, where they'll all do their best one-word impression of the comedic star. You know the one—the "wo-ah-ow" he's uttered as a rookie model in Zoolander, a cowboy-hat wearing Eli Cash in Royal Tenenbaums, or as a guy who just really can't get enough of Paris in that one Woody Allen movie.

It's Wilson's universal sound of shock and awe that Nicolas Zoumboulis, the organizer behind the actual Facebook event, is hoping to tap into on Monday—for no particular reason at all, other than to bring the world a bit of joy and camaraderie. At Melbourne's Federation Square, Zoumboulis plans to lead the masses in a "hype speech" and a few "warmup wows" before the main event.

"Ultimately I just really want to put some 'positive energy,' as Owen likes to say, out into the world," Zoumboulis told the Independent. "If I can remind people that this world we are lucky to inhabit is beautiful, and to embrace that like Owen does in his movies by saying 'wow,' then I’ll be happy."

Can you hear that "wow" now? Maybe it's Wilson's disbelieving "waaaaw" from Wedding Crashers, or Hansel's whispery, baffled "wow" when he gets the skinny on Matilda's sex life in Zoolander. Perhaps it's the long, joyous "woooooow" Lightning McQueen lets out on the Western plains in Cars.

At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter—once every conceivable Owen Wilson "wow" comes together as one, it'll probably just sound a lot like this:

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Related: How to Speak Australian with Catherine McNeil

This article originally appeared on VICE US.

The Artist Turning Interior Decor into ‘Reparation Hardware’

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It feels warm in the gallery hosting Reparation Hardware, a solo show from multidisciplinary artist Ilana Harris-Babou, but it has nothing to do with the temperature. Inside Larrie, NYC, a relatively new spot owned by friends in the biz’, the walls are painted a sagey-beige known as “Plantation Tan.” The color gives off a luxury cabin-in-the-woods vibe when Harris-Babou flicks the switch on the tungsten bulbs overhead. The space at once feels more like a high-end interior decor storefront, which would not be out of place in the Lower East Side neighborhood where it resides.

“Depending on what light you look at it in, it’ll look brown or green,” Harris-Babou told me of the exhibition-specific paint job. “The kind of thing where it’s a showroom that’s a fake living room; something that’s supposed to be homey or unobtrusive.” It’s perfect for Reparation Hardware, a subtle evisceration of the upscale design philosophy that gilds the homewares company from which the show takes its name. “I started looking at Restoration Hardware and what it is about that impulse to take, say, wood from an old barn and bring it into your house tastefully, and maybe in so doing, naming the past as a success, not a failure,” the artist explained. “I was doing a play on words and started thinking about restoration, reparations. Reparations maybe as being so terrifying because they’re an admission of failure, right? Maybe specifically saying this American Dream didn’t succeed in its goal.”

Her investigations take the form of mixed-media sculptures. They're hefty amalgamations of lumpy but glossy ceramics and polished furnishings. She's also made two videos: Red Sourcebook and Reparation Hardware. Red Sourcebook juxtaposes the racist ethos of “redlining” practices against crisp HD footage of a Restoration Hardware design guide getting marked up in red Sharpie. And Reparation Hardware is mock ad for the exhibition that stars an abandoned New England barn, a field of urinating cows, and a wry Harris-Babou herself as the Reparation Hardware spokesperson. The show conjures a feeling more than a thesis. It's about being outside of time and looking in, with free reign to mix and match objects new and old for the express purpose of curating a nondescript yet distinctively “cultured” sensibility.

VICE: How did this show come about?
Ilana Harris-Babou: The video came first. I initially created it as a commission for the Dis.Art platform. I work across a bunch of different disciplines, but each body of work I have centers around a new video piece. I look at a lot of aspirational forms of entertainment, video, and things we watch often that we don’t think about ourselves watching. Cooking shows, home improvement TV, these kinds of formats that promise a more idealized life, a perfect life where you can form your identity based on the objects that you surround yourself with. I was thinking about what kinds of dreams are thwarted and what it would mean to repair those dreams.

So what’s up with the barn in the Reparation Hardware video?
I’ve been living up in Western Massachusetts, like in the Berkshires. Some of my workmates, on their land there’s this cow barn that was abandoned for 30 years. I had already been watching these videos specifically for the Salvaged Wood Collection from RH, where there’s this British man who’s talking about de-nailing wood to make these $2,000 tables. So that barn seemed like the perfect place to shoot. Also, these Americana fantasies, this sort of blue-state version of “Make America Great Again,” has to do with some kind of purity or “going back to the land.” I feel like so many New England barns are left just so, to look perfectly disheveled or fallen apart. So I shot part of the video in there, and part of it in my studio.

Is your studio in New England as well?
Yeah, my studio’s up in Williamstown, MA. I’m teaching at Williams College, so I’m out there for work. I had to learn how to drive, because I’m from East Flatbush. No one in my family drives. Shooting this video was a pretty good excuse to drive around searching for cows and stuff, and just figure out what’s going on in that landscape.

A lot of the stuff that’d been brewing around in my head became so much more real in that environment—this manifest destiny impulse, spreading out over land, owning land, all of that. After I shot in there, I brought all of the bits and pieces from the barn back to the studio, and I was torn by exactly what it was I would pair with the words [in the video]. The script is almost entirely from actual Restoration Hardware catalogs and Reconstruction-era tracts, like Sherman’s field notes, the ones about giving 40 acres to freed slaves.

How did it all come together?
The way I work is, I’ll shoot a whole bunch of footage and see how it makes sense in the editing process. And I’ll go back and forth, and then the script forms around the images. I had this wood [taken from the barn] and I was playing around with it while also making my ceramics. The ceramic hammers had been on my mind for awhile as these tools that undo themselves from their own use, and how the tools of the American Project might have a similar kind of vulnerability built into them.

They’re tools that would break if you tried to use them.
I started making those this past summer. I was an artist-in-residence at the Museum of Arts and Design in Columbus Circle, working 40 hours a week. While I was there, I had been making these dysfunctional ceramics, tools that would force you to question their utility. I thought it was super fun because folks who stopped by wouldn’t know who I was, and would think I was an extension of the gift shop or something. So they’d pick up all my stuff and touch it. And it has that kind of look, right? In a lot of ways, quite intentionally. I’d been making these ceramic hammers, and it was just so fun to see how people would interact with them. People would always want to pick them up and fake-hit their spouses with them. It was super weird to see all these psychodramas play out. So that’s when I started making the ceramic hammers, thinking about them quite literally: ceramic that is dysfunctional.

What about the larger sculptures?
These are the first bigger ones I’ve made. I started making these specifically about this space and what it would look like to make Reparation Hardware, the store, happen in real life, and what camouflaging would occur—even on this block. There’s someone else installing a show right there [across the street], but there’s also a pencil store, so I was thinking that oftentimes [the show] would have an array of little things.

There are two impulses at work in a high-end furniture store: There’s a minimalist impulse that’s the fetishization of smooth surfaces and stuff, and then there’s the nostalgia part. I was thinking about Brancusi and ridiculous modernist stuff when I started cycling through the fake products in that video [Reparation Hardware], and how would I translate those things into something that would look both convincing, as if it could perform a function that maybe spoke about something Brancusi’s doing but failed miserably. Feeling super mushy and inelegant but still having some of that seductive surface.

The whole space feels like a den, but it’s also a store.
That’s what I’m going for. I like to think of these familiar forms as a Trojan horse, something familiar or easy to digest that, once it’s in your line of sight, lets in weird other sorts of content. With [Reparation Hardware], for example, it seems straightforward, but then it starts to unravel. This similarly can be seen like a den or a store, but then also it’s maybe neither of those things—you have to triangulate it against all the other stuff that’s happening. That’s the hope, at least. Some of the smaller objects will look like a wall hook with a function, and some of them have a more un-nameable functionality.

Just like stuff they sell at Restoration Hardware.
There was this thing [at RH] that was this ball with these pokey things, and that’s why I made the sculptures with nails in them. There’s this thing where it’s like, you could spend money on it, or you could find some pinecones outside, but you spend the money because it already comes from this preordained world of taste. So you trust that it’s the right weird-collection to have.

What can you tell me about Red Sourcebook ?
The idea of this part is redlining. There are two texts in this one: a 1930s federal document for home loans about what to avoid in order to keep property values up in the places you give loans to. Basically if there’s one black person in there, get out. Or go up by the edge of a mountain to block the “wrong elements” from moving in. And then [the other text is] things that the spokesman for Restoration Hardware says at the opening of the catalogs, about what they’re going for this season. He had these quotes from Steve Jobs about ratcheting up our species through taste. He’s like, “I hope you appreciate our decision to curate the very best people, objects, and ideas that humanity has to offer.” And in that issue, they have these chandeliers made from beads made by South African women, and the designer is posing in a long silk robe with a South African woman. They’re like, “Buy this chandelier and you provide life-changing income to these women,” not, “Buy this chandelier and we got this labor for cheap.” So they seem to have so many overlaps, but I like the idea of outlining or planning.

The catalog you used seems to photograph really well, like painted backdrops from film sets.
Yeah, it does, because I guess that’s all it wants to do: photograph well and make you think about photographing yourself well. It’s like that cropping we’re used to from Instagram, too. Where you get just enough of a photo to give you a whole vibe or mood or something, without having the thing itself. They don’t give you the instructions on how to assemble the furniture, or how to make enough [money] to get a mansion with a palm tree, but you get little snippets of it. I like to use HD cameras and really nice lenses just because of that instant seduction that happens with the surface, which we don’t even question. The seductiveness of surface and how we ascribe value to that. You could light a turd beautifully, and it would seem delicious with the right camera equipment.

You’re in the video as the Reparation Hardware spokesperson. Do you get into character when you work?
Yeah! I like to think about the tropes of the artist flinging around paint in their studio, the cooking show host with the lovely home, the genius designer who goes out and finds inspiration everywhere. In these terms, what kinds of labor are mundane, which ones are revered, and why? What happens when these different archetypes get flattened out? It’s confusing if I’m just a messy artist playing around with clay, or a not-genius home designer, or something like that.

Every time I worked on this piece and that piece and the sculptures, I have this denim button-up shirt that I put on to work—the one I was wearing in that video I’m shooting in. Part of it is shooting in costume, and part is the state of mind of making this sort of work.

So do you plan on running the gallery as if it were a real store?
I’m gonna be back and forth because I have to go back for my teaching job, but when I’m down here, yeah I’m interested. I’m not gonna ask these folks [the gallery owners/attendants] to perform as not-themselves when they’re here, but I like the idea of this measured capacity to be ironic in terms of how I talk about social inequities or race. I feel like oftentimes as a black woman making video art, to have my body on the screen, people expect me to be describing the work with a lot of sincerity, in terms of its own oppression, like explaining why it’s there in the first place... Maybe the moral of the story is just around the corner. I like adopting this end of the lens built into the piece. This capacity to also have a level of self-deprecation, that’s one brand of really true freedom: When you have the chance to make fun of yourself. We see so often how reified power mocks itself, almost to affirm its power. So sometimes I think, How can I put the images I want to see in the world out into the world via the work? My mom quite often in her life never felt like she had the chance, or opportunity, or space to be frivolous.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. It is a part of VICE's ongoing effort to highlight the contributions of black women around the globe who are making a difference. To read more stories about strong black women making history today, go here.

Ilana Harris-Babou: Reparation Hardware runs at Larrie, NYC through March 11, 2018.

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.

Will Somebody, Anybody, Make Some Noise for Stormy Daniels?

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"If you're ready for Stormy Daniels, make some noise," the announcer commanded. Gossip, the aptly named Long Island strip club hosting the event, was crawling with just as many journalists as regular patrons, and the audience did not, actually, make much noise. Even if we did, it would've been awfully difficult to hear us over the blaring music, an eclectic selection of club remixes of everything from Eminem's "The Real Slim Shady" to ACDC.

Out of guilt, I gave a half-hearted clap for Daniels, born Stephanie Gregory Clifford, the porn star who Donald Trump's lawyer reportedly paid $130,000 to keep quiet about her alleged 2006 extramarital affair with Trump. She has kept quiet about it, but in 2011 she talked to InTouch in rather too much detail about the tryst—according to that interview, Trump loves Shark Week and hates sharks, and she was worried that he would try to pay her for sex.

Under any other president, a story that includes lying, cheating (on a wife Trump had a newborn child with at the time), and payoffs would be a defining scandal that would dominate the news cycle for weeks on end. But this is Donald "Grab 'Em By the Pussy" Trump. Thanks to his administration's nonstop stream of controversy, flubs, general incompetence, and ostentatious corruption, never mind the 19 allegations of sexual misconduct against the president, the Daniels story has faded into the background. But Daniels, 38, has been doing her darndest to make sure America didn't forget about her, going on a "Make American Horny Again" stripping tour that is the only stripping tour in recent memory to get coverage in the mainstream press.

"If you're ready for Stormy Daniels, make some noise," the announcer repeated before introducing the performer going on before her. Again, no noise was made.

I asked one of the strippers walking around the club what she thought of Stormy's upcoming performance, but she could barely hear me over the blasting music. I asked her how if she liked Trump. She smiled, shook her head no, and walked away. When I asked another stripper about Daniels later that evening, she cryptically told me, "The past is in the past.”



Gossip is in Melville, New York, just far enough outside the city that you feel like you're in a different world. (The county went for Trump by a margin of 51,450 votes in the 2016 election.) The club is exactly what you'd imagine when you hear the words strip club, minus the buffet. Amid the strobe lights and smoke were seven or eight beautiful, impeccably made-up and scantily-clad women, all either standing alone on their phones or looking for would-be paying customers amid the hordes of journalists.

A club regular told me it was actually less crowded than a normal Thursday, a sentiment echoed by a stripper I spoke to later that evening. "When Christy Mack was here, you wouldn't have been able to get in the door," the regular said, referencing the former porn star and domestic violence victim, unimpressed by the president's alleged mistress scheduled performance.

Another patron, a white man with a beer belly who looked like he was in his mid-50s, told me he wasn't here to see Stormy, that he goes to a strip club maybe once a year and tonight just happened to be his annual outing.

"Are you a Trump supporter?" I asked.

"Well, I like some of his ideas," he said, pulling me a little too close to him as he attempted to explain, over the music, that Trump's unfaithfulness to his wife has no impact his professional life, asking me again and again to come downstairs with him to the cigar lounge. The easiest way to discern which men in the club were patrons and which were journalists was examining how they greeted their friends—the patrons eagerly put their arms around the people they spoke to, holding them close. The journalists ambled around awkwardly.

I managed to find a couple of patrons who had specifically come to see Daniels. Fred, a 32-year-old Long Island Trump supporter and the only man I spoke to who offered up his name, told me he isn't bothered by the president's alleged infidelity with Daniels, who he called "today’s version of Marilyn Monroe.”

“At least it wasn’t in the White House like other presidents,” Fred said.

"If you're ready for Stormy Daniels, make some noise," the announcer said again. Somebody, please, make some noise, I silently begged. An automated voice boomed through the speakers detailing Daniels's adult film credits, mentioning her recent appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live, and that's she currently surging in Pornhub searches. The announcer pleaded, once again, "If you're ready for Stormy Daniels, make some noise." The crowd did their best to appease his request, but it was still underwhelming.

Daniels finally took the stage, and her act, no longer than ten minutes, was pretty anticlimactic. Though I'm no stripping critic, if that's a job, it was obvious Daniels wasn't a professional stripper. She began in a little red riding hood costume, which was on the floor within minutes, and lingered around the pole and rubbing it between her breasts—she didn't swing around it or do any acrobatics that makes stripping so great.

When the first song ended, she laid out a small tarp on the stage and began to grind on the floor, holding a clear bottle of lotion that she squirted into the crowd and onto her breasts. As she got up, shaking her breasts and hips, as she pranced to the edge of the stage, I couldn't help but think she looked a little lost. Opening her arms like Jesus, she stood smiling as patrons stuck $1 bills between her breasts, mouthing thank you, baby to a man who gave her a ten.

Don't get me wrong—Daniels is a pro. She's the type of person who oozes warmth and charisma, even from afar. Smiling and blonde, she was totally engaged with whoever she was speaking to, whether it be scoop-hungry journalists or fans willing to pony up $20 for a picture. She has a politician's gift for schmoozing, in other words. I get why Trump was drawn to her, I thought to myself.

After her performance, she stood by the stage with a spread of merchandise—sexy signed photos, DVDs, a T-shirt with an image her amid an explosion of milk with the words "GOT MILF." “She’s sooo sweet,” a drunk girl excitedly told me after she got a picture with Daniels. "You have to meet her, just push your way to the front. All those guys [waiting for pictures] are assholes."

After Fred got a chance to meet her, I asked him if she had met his expectations. Yes, he told me, remarking on how nice she was and proudly showing off the autographed picture he'd bought from her.

Congrats to Fred

I watched a journalist eager for a selfie with Daniels finally get her moment, then walk away looking a little shook. “I asked her if she slept with Trump and she said no,” she told me.

That's the weird thing about the porn star who allegedly slept with the president doing a heavily promoted stripping tour—she's doing all this without admitting that she actually did the (alleged) deed that made her famous. Daniels's rep, Gina Rodriguez, told the Associated Press earlier this month, “Everything is off now, and Stormy is going to tell her story." But Daniels has nevertheless kept mum about the incident.

Figuring I'd get the same answer if I asked her about the affair that the other journalist got, when I finally got the chance to meet Daniels, I asked her if she liked Shark Week.

"Of course I do! Who doesn't?" Daniels said with a laugh, before explaining to me that "it's funny" because in porn, "shark week" means having sex with a girl while she's on her period.

"What's your favorite part of doing the 'Make America Horny Again' tour?" I asked.

She clarified that she didn't coin "Make America Horny Again," and that's just how clubs have been marketing her shows, many of which she booked before the InTouch story came out. "Make American Horny Again" strikes her as "opportunistic," she told me, and she doesn't like that.

"Are you still a Trump supporter?" I asked her.

"Was I ever a Trump supporter?" she replied.

"I thought I read that you were," I said.

"I’ve read a lot of things about myself. I’ve read I have a penis," she said with a laugh. "Which is funny because I've given birth."

After I parted ways with Daniels, the announcer informed club-goers that Daniels would go on again at 2 AM. I hope they make some noise for her then, I prayed. Somebody should be paying attention to her.

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This article originally appeared on VICE US.


A Mafia Acquittal Is the Latest L for Quebec Law Enforcement

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Leonardo Rizzuto and Stefano Sollecito walked out of the Montreal courthouse on Monday, February 19 as free men. That this caused surprise among organized crime observers is understandable. That it caused extreme frustration among law enforcement is probable, given that this is yet another case against Quebec-based organized crime figures botched by the cops and the Crown.

The two alleged high profile Mafia leaders had their charges of conspiracy to traffic cocaine and gangsterism tossed out of court after Quebec Superior Court Judge Eric Downs ruled that key evidence was inadmissible. That evidence stemmed from wiretaps planted by police in 2015 in the office of lawyer Loris Cavaliere—wiretaps that the judge said violated the sanctity of solicitor-client privilege. The accused argued that investigators didn’t put in enough safeguards to guarantee the privacy of Cavaliere’s other client. The judge sided with them and threw the wiretap evidence out, leaving the Crown with little else to prove Rizzuto and Sollecito’s guilt.

“The judge recognized that you don’t enter a law office like you do a warehouse” to plant wiretaps, said Sollecito’s lawyer Daniele Roy, according to the Montreal Gazette.

Pierre de Champlain, an organized crime expert and former civilian analyst for the RCMP, says the result is another humiliation for cops and the Crown.

“This isn’t the first time this has happened,” he told VICE. “We’ve had Operation SharQc with the Hells Angels and Operation Clemenza, where all the charges were withdrawn, so really, these last few years haven’t been lucky ones for the Crown.”

Operation SharQc was an investigation into the Hells that culminated in the 2009 arrests of over 150 people—including almost every known full patch Hells Angel in the province—and the seizure of over $5 million in cash plus large quantities of cocaine, cannabis, and pharmaceuticals. While over a dozen men would plead guilty to charges of murder and conspiracy, dozens upon dozens more went free due to procedural abuse by the Crown and delays in getting the case to trial. Operation Clemenza was the arrest of almost 40 alleged members or associates of the Montreal Mafia in 2014 on charges ranging from arson to drug trafficking to gangsterism. Those cases fell apart last year, when the Crown stayed the charges after questions arose about the method police used in gathering evidence—especially its use of collecting PIN-to-PIN Blackberry messages—and other legal issues.

The constant thwarting of high profile cases is symptomatic of a deeper malaise within Canada’s overall strategy in fighting organized crime, according to Antonio Nicaso, a well-respected authority on the mob and a lecturer at Queen’s University. He describes last week’s acquittals as “a short circuit in the system.” The electronic intercepts were authorized by judges in the first place, so the fact that the evidence they gathered was deemed inadmissible by another is puzzling.

“It’s the legislators’ fault,” he says. “We grant too much discretion to judges. If you clearly stated what police can do or not do during an investigation, you’d eliminate this discretion.”

Nicaso believes that the interception of communications is essential to fighting organized crime because it’s the only way to establish hierarchies of command and to figure out just how widespread and pernicious its influence is.

“If you want to dismantle a criminal organization, you have to investigate the links a criminal organization establishes with people outside the organization,” he says—meaning the lawyers, the accountants, the bankers, the politicians and the union leaders who regularly do business with the mob. “There’s no other way to fight them.”

Both men say that the acquittals mean the instability that has gripped the Montreal underworld since the death of Vito Rizzuto—Leonardo’s father—in December 2013 won’t be abating any time soon. Since the late don’s passing, there has been a sharp spike in the number of Mafia-related murders. Among them was the brazen 2016 shooting of Stefano Sollecito’s father, Rocco, reputed to have been a close associate of Vito Rizzuto.

Things have been quiet lately but with the return of two alleged leaders of the Montreal Mafia’s Sicilian faction to the scene, de Champlain says “some adjustments” may be coming at street level.

“No real leader has emerged” since Vito Rizzuto’s death, he says. “There are a several smaller clans which are sprouting up all over Montreal, but they are all more or less independent from one another. With everything that’s happened over the past few years, tensions have been very high and the police presence has been very strong.”

He believes the pair will be keeping a low profile while the much-weakened Sicilian faction struggles to maintain a position of prominence among its newly emboldened peers. In the meantime, Leonardo Rizzuto still has to face firearm and drug possession charges from January 2016. He’ll be back in court for those in late March.

“What is clear is that the war to fill the void left by Vito Rizzuto is not over yet,” says Nicaso.

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The VICE Morning Bulletin

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Everything you need to know about the world this morning, curated by VICE.

US News

Death Penalty for ‘High-Volume’ Drug Dealers Wins Trump's Favor
The president has privately expressed interest in allowing the US to execute drug dealers, according to sources close to him. Trump is said to have more than once compared drug dealers to serial killers and praised policies in Singapore, where drug traffickers can be sentenced to death. Kellyanne Conway, who helms the White House’s anti-drug initiative, suggested Trump’s remarks about dealers and the death penalty referred only to “high-volume” traffickers.—Axios

Weinstein Co. Gives Up on Sale, Moves Toward Bankruptcy
The production company's board announced the decision after one final attempt to sell itself to a group of investors led by Maria Contreras-Sweet, President Obama’s former Small Business Administration chief. The Weinstein Company's board said it was “an extremely unfortunate outcome for our employees, our creditors, and any victims.”—Los Angeles Times

Dianne Feinstein's Path Gets Steeper in California Primary
The veteran US Senator could not get the 60 percent of California Democratic Party votes she needed to win official backing and campaign cash for a June primary against rival Kevin de Leon. State Senate leader De Leon, determined to be seen as the more in-touch, left-y candidate, said it was “an astounding rejection of politics as usual.”—AP

Florida Lawmakers Want Parkland Sheriff Suspended
State House Speaker Richard Corcoran and fellow Republicans asked Florida Governor Rick Scott to put Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel on leave. They claim he “failed to maintain a culture of alertness” prior to the mass shooting at the Parkland high school. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement was investigating the police response to the shooting.—The Washington Post



International News

Gas Attack Suspected in Eastern Ghouta
A medical volunteer group said the Syrian government used chlorine gas in strikes on eastern Ghouta, the rebel-held turf on the edge of Damascus that has seen hundreds perish in horrific violence inflicted by the regime in recent days. Syria’s Civil Defense said one child was killed after suffocating. Bashar al-Assad’s forces kept on the offensive Sunday despite a unanimous vote at the UN Security Council backing a 30-day ceasefire.—Al Jazeera

Nigeria Intensifies Hunt for Kidnapped Schoolgirls
President Muhammadu Buhari apologized to the parents of 110 girls apparently seized by Boko Haram last week amid reports soldiers were removed from the town of Dapchi before the children got kidnapped from school. Buhari promised additional security personnel and planes were being made available to hunt for the kidnappers.—BBC News

China Ready to Scrap Two-Term Limit on the Presidency
The ruling Communist Party introduced a plan to change the constitution to allow President Xi Jinping to stick around for good. While state newspapers have been supportive, one of Hong Kong’s leading pro-democracy campaigners, Joshua Wong, said it would mean “China would again have a dictator as her head of state.”—Reuters

North Korea Willing to Talk to US, South Says
South Korean President Moon Jae-in said Pyongyang was open to negotiating directly with the US after meeting with a senior North Korean official over the weekend. “The United States needs to lower the threshold for dialogue, and North Korea should express a willingness to denuclearize,” Moon said.—The New York Times

Everything Else

‘Black Panther’ Takes in $700 Million Worldwide
The landmark superhero movie earned another $108 million in North American theaters over the weekend. Only Star Wars: The Force Awakens has enjoyed a more successful second weekend at the domestic box office. The Marvel movie has now taken in $704 million globally.—Forbes

Kevin Smith Suffers Major Heart Attack
The Clerks director tweeted a photo of himself recovering in the hospital after he had a “massive” heart attack. “If I hadn’t canceled show 2 to go to the hospital, I would’ve died tonight,” he told fans.—The Hollywood Reporter

Michelle Obama Memoir Set to Drop in November
The former first lady announced her autobiography Becoming will hit store shelves November 13, one week after the midterms. Pre-orders of Obama’s book already landed it in Amazon’s top 20 Sunday night.—AP

Alice Glass Says Defamation Suit Dismissed
The former Crystal Castles singer told fans Ethan Kath's lawsuit against her was axed in court. Glass, who has accused Kath of sexual assault and abuse, called it “a victory for survivors of abuse and sexual misconduct.”—Noisey

New Zealand PM Called ‘Attractive’ in Strange Interview
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was told by an interviewer for Australia’s 60 Minutes she was “attractive” and also asked when her baby was conceived. “I wasn’t particularly offended or phased by the interview,” said Ardern, who is pregnant.—VICE

45 Music Festivals Agree to Gender-Balanced Lineups
The PRS Foundation has a launched a campaign to ensure music festivals feature an equal number of male and female performing artists by 2022. So far, 45 festival have committed to the goal.—Noisey

Make sure to check out the latest episode of VICE's daily podcast. Today we’ll hear from Tristan Walker, the founder and CEO of two hair care brands created specifically for people of color.

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Shirley Manson Thinks You're Wasting Her Time

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Shirley Manson is over it. During a recent 45-minute chat, she reels off all sorts of things she no longer gives a shit about – being popular, fake people, getting things wrong, having to change – but you get the sense that, really, it's been a long time since the Garbage frontwoman let anything as tedious as other people's opinions bother her too much.

This year, Manson has been back in the press for winning the NME Icon Award, using her speech to demand change for women, and black women in particular. In an interview afterwards, she said that "men need to start policing their own", exactly the sort of biting-at-the-bit quote we've come to expect from a Manson interview.

When I loiter half-inside, half-outside the interview room, waiting for an introduction from her PR, I hear her politely and enthusiastically ordering sushi. She's high energy, interested and interesting, and her hair has returned to firey red – slicked back in a tight red bun with shaved sides.

VICE: Have you ever had a period of creative difficulty you didn’t think you’d move past?
Shirley Manson: I got scared because I realised we were in a position where we had fallen so far out of favour, and we’re out of step with culture. When you’re a zeitgeist band – and we had been – you’re the hot rod of culture for a while. By the very nature of that, you fall off that perch, and to get back on the perch is complicated and really difficult. But I had confidence in my band. You may like us or you may hate us, but we are good at what we do, and that much I do know.

I used to say my band could fucking write Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band 2, and coming from us the world’s going to hate it, because it comes from us and we’re old news. So how do we counteract that? Eventually, we came to the conclusion that we were just not going to give a shit if people loved us anymore. What matters is we were creative as a unit, because we function well together and do something that we believe is of merit. That’s basically how we approached what I call the second passage of our career, and it worked. We got back up on our perch and we felt good and we’ve enjoyed it ever since on our own terms. We don’t want to be in the charts and appearing on children’s TV at 4 in the afternoon anyway. We’re well over that.

Tell me how many books you’ve read in the past 12 months.
I’ve always been really well read, then over the last couple of years my reading has seriously gone by the wayside. I've attempted to really force myself to read over the last six months, and I’ve read a lot of fantastic books. A lot about race, actually. I just finished Patrisse Khan-Cullors’ When They Call You a Terrorist, and I was certainly blown away by it. Beautifully written and just a somewhat shocking memoir. I was ashamed that I didn’t know so much about what black women are up against. She’s the woman that started the Black Lives Matter movement, a proper hardcore activist. Why I’m No Longer Speaking to White People About Race is a bit more academic, but well worth reading. Again, I was just sitting in despair. I’m trying to really discipline myself to read instead of just aimlessly flicking through social media.

What’s your favourite book?
I've got so many. My Dark Places by James Ellroy is definitely a touchstone; American Pastoral by Philip Roth is another one. I’m always writing lists of, like, my 100 favourite books. I’m like a 15-year-old girl about those things.

This is a bit of a bleak one – do you often think about mortality?
All the time. Which I love, actually. I’m very grateful, because if you think about death you’re going to value your day more. If you try to block it out I think you forget how lucky you are to be alive and have this incredible privilege of feeling good in your body. I feel like being a little bleak and a bit dark is informative and really helpful to my joy. I was talking about this this morning; as I’m getting older, I can’t be scared to look into the dark. I have to keep reminding myself of the dark but force myself into light and be around people that make me feel good. I’m done with people that make me feel shit. I’m just done. And I think that comes from the idea of mortality. The fucking clock is ticking, you’re wasting my time [laughs].

Shirley Manson portrait by Joey Cultice

What is your specialist subject?
I don’t know anything about anything. I’m serious. I’m absolutely serious. I honestly don’t know much about anything.

What age did you find the most difficult?
I found the thirties hard, and then things started getting easier. But the late thirties were probably the hardest, and then everything has gone uphill since.

Everyone says the thirties are meant to be amazing.
Mine were miserable. I loved my twenties. I had a riot. Then my thirties felt serious and stressful, and then I became less and less stressed as I passed into my forties. And now that I’m 50 all of my friends literally accuse me of being in denial. They’re like, 'You’re a freak, how do you feel so good about being 50?' But I can’t help it, I feel free. They may think it’s denial, but I just know there’s something magical about stopping having to give a shit. You just stop giving a fucking shit about how other people view you, what their expectations of you are.

Do you ever lie when you answer interview questions?
I try to avoid lying. When I was young I got caught up in a terrible lie and it really fucked my life up. I lost my best friend forever as a result. So, occasionally, I’ll hold back truth, but I don’t lie. It’s not really my style.

Also, do you not feel that sometimes your opinion changes on something slightly, then it will just be written there forever?
My opinion changes like the weather. There are some things that I hold dear and I’ve got conviction about, but also I can literally be like, "I love green nail polish!" and then the next day be like, "I fucking hate green nail polish." It’s just that stupid, that’s how my brain is. I’ve allowed myself to change my mind whenever I see fit, and I don’t care if it’s on record if I say one thing. I’ve changed my mind, I’m a different person now. There’s lots of things that I believed when I was young and as, I’ve gotten older, I’ve had to change my mind. I’ve learned more, I understand better and I’m shocked by my own ignorance. I’d rather change my mind and be informed.

It reflects the rapid rate in which everyone is understanding other people’s perspectives and other ways of living.
How old are you, if you don’t mind me asking?

I’m 26.
So young. So you won’t remember anything pre-internet, right? How old were you when you got your first phone?

I was 11.
Wild.

Quite gross, isn’t it?
It is and it isn’t. It keeps children safer in many ways, too. I don’t know – it’s like anything. There’s good and there’s bad. All evolution, right?

Right. I believe that, while holding people accountable for their beliefs, within reason we should be more allowing for people to evolve and learn than we currently are. How do you feel about that?
Well, I think that’s really cool that you think like that. It’s forgiving of yourself and therefore being generous of other people. Everyone’s so hard on themselves that they’re judgemental and harsh towards everyone else, and it’s getting really crazy. It’s intolerable.

What would be your last meal?
Probably sushi. It’s the one thing I go mad for. I think that would be my last meal. Sushi Park or Sushi Sasabune in Los Angeles.

Which film or TV show makes you cry?
Anything to do with animals. I actually nearly fell out with my husband watching Buck. It’s a man who deals with disturbed horses, and I sobbed my way through the whole frickin’ thing. My husband got rigid with rage. He was just like, "Pull it together. We’re 15 seconds in!" I don’t know what that’s about, but that will be how I get emotionally engaged.

How did you break up with your first boyfriend or girlfriend?
I threw a hairbrush at his head and said, "We’re done!" He was banging a bunch of other girls and I knew it. It was all driving me so insane. And he gave me a dose of the clap, so horrible. Then I cried over him for two years or something mad like that.

What did your parents have in mind for you to do as a career?
University. And my dad – to this day, and I’m not kidding, to this very day, after 35 years of me working in the music industry at a successful level – continues to say, "You should have gone to university. Would you consider going back to university?" He goes on and on and on. He’s an academic, so that’s what’s important to him, you know? My dad’s a hoot. I always host Christmas dinner, for a random example, and he will mark the dinner I prepare for everyone out of 10 every year. He’ll give me a mark, a grade. It’s fucking insane. That’s what I’m dealing with here.

What kind of grades do you get? Good?
Sometimes good. Sometimes things apparently aren’t as good as they were the year before. I used to get really upset, it used to make me crazy. Now I laugh, I think it’s funny. I just think my dad is whack.

How often do you fall in love?
All the time. I mean, I’m married and my husband is the love of my life, but I also fall in love with girls all the time. You know, in friends and other men who become my buddies. I spent a lot of time in my youth being quite miserable, and I didn’t quite know how to give love or receive it at all. I didn’t know what feeling loved was, and I wouldn’t really let it happen. I'm sure it was a control issue, but now I’m like "I'll give away my control", because I know the experience is interesting, exciting and fun. And if you hurt me I'll move on and survive. I’m not scared about being hurt.

What has been the highlight of your career?
I’ve had so many. Opening the Scottish Parliament when Scotland got its first Parliament in 300 years, and we were invited to open the Parliament celebrations. That was arguably the biggest honour in my life, to represent my country at a major moment in our history. Doing a Bond theme was also a moment. I was talking to another journalist earlier this morning about when I got to perform with Fiona Apple last weekend in LA. I’m a huge Fiona fan, but it was with an all female choir and an all female band with a string quartet, harpist, drummer, a keyboard player. Everyone was female. All the engineers and all the crew were female. All the riggers were female. Everybody was female. We all understood it’s really rare. Fiona and I were talking about how I’ve been performing for 35 years and have never ever walked into a room and saw a female in the music industry. Not once. It was powerful and wonderful and weird, you know? That was ecstatic.

What’s next on your bucket list?
My current obsession is I need to get to Montana, I need to be in the dog sled. I need to see them run.

But, until then, your sushi.
Yeah, until then.

This interview was edited for length.

@hannahrosewens

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

The Strange Secrets of the Online Dating Industry

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Do you have an app idea that solves a genital-intersection problem no one really knew existed?

Is it Spoonr, "An app that connects people who just want to cuddle"? Or Wingman, "the dating app that plays cupid for users' single friends"? Or, perhaps, Ditto, where "users are mutually exclusive with one match on the app, until one of them un-matches"? Or even Chappy, a "high end gay dating app co-founded by Made in Chelsea's Ollie Locke"?

No? You’ve actually found an unfilled micro-niche? Well then, get yourself down to iDate, the meat market's meat market, where every drunken conversation you've ever had about "wouldn't it be great if there was, like, an app that could tell you when someone who's serious about their Judaism and also earns over £80,000 a year is ready for kids" has already been realised by someone now seeking angel investor funding in a third seed round.

Over two days, 40-odd entrepreneurs, CEOs, CTOs, COOs and CFOs have found themselves stuffed in a windowless basement conference centre at London's Strand Palace Hotel, each hoping to claw a larger share of the £3 billion global dating industry pie.

Of course, the shape and scale of that pie is not equally sliced. Like a lot of things that have the internet as their bedrock, the market is increasingly winner-takes all. A handful of companies control the roadway. Everyone else is hanging on. That can be seen simply by who isn’t here. Tinder is the ghost at the feast. No one from the app, their parent company, match.com, or their parent company's parent company, IAC, has bothered to show up.

"The problem," organiser Marc Lesnick tells me, "is that millennials don't want to pay for anything. They want it all for free. It's hit the business hard." The first morning I meet him, Mark has been running between venues so much that his top lip is beaded with sweat.

"It's one of those industries where the monkeys all mistake themselves for future gorillas," another attendee explains. "You see, in any business, you have monkeys, chimps and gorillas. Gorillas are the market leaders. They spend the most on marketing and product design, they get the numbers, they win the game. Now, there's still enough space in the market for copycats to take a bit off the gorillas – the monkeys – provided they simply copy the market leaders and don’t spend on R&D or marketing. Chimps are businesses that invested heavily in becoming the gorillas, but lost the race. They’ve got too much debt and they’re losing market share. So their best strategy is to find a niche – become their own gorilla in a smaller sub-market. There’s a niche for everyone. But you’ve got to recognise which category you are, or else you’ll invest too much, or too little. Do you see?"

Uhm, so… dicks fuck pussies, but sometimes dicks fuck assholes?

Day One

Fittingly enough, the start of conference is "Speed Networking". Will I meet a nice startup? Caring, kind to animals and earning over $400,000 in pre-tax profits? The heart's a flutter. My first hunk is maybe 40, has piercing, normal eyes, a body that goes all the way to the top, and is trying to flog me a redux version of the Blind Date game show as an app.

"It just came back onto Channel 5 recently, with Paul O'Grady," he gabbles. "We raised around £175,000 in total, and now we’re looking for another 750 to really push it out there."

What does that buy you? Where does that kind of money go?

"The biggest cost, really, is in your marketing. It’s about customer acquisition. If we don’t get it we might have to take about half and then just roll out regionally."

How much of that money is building the app?

"I've learnt from past experiences. You can build an app for 30 grand, but it'll be shit. It cost us about 140k to build it properly. It’s a six-month build."

His sales patter starts to penetrate; I'm worn down by his sheer persistence.

"We've been getting customer feedback which has been really good," he says. "At the minute, we're not thinking so much about that. It's all about engagement statistics. Our session time is the same as Tinder’s. Any time between eight and 12 minutes."

Like most monkeys, he has gorilla eyes: "We want it to be bigger than Tinder – that's the ambition."

In the lobby, over coffee and those weird mini-croissants you get at hotel breakfasts, I meet Max, who has come up with something called Jigtalk. "Through a gamified edge-of-your seat experience, JigTalk covers its users' faces in 16 jigsaw pieces," the blurb says. "These pieces pop away, one by one, as more and more messages are exchanged."

Then there are the monkeys who have identified their species and are happy there, like the guy from Forces Penpals, who’s been doing this since before Friends Reunited was a thing. His original letters were sent by users in the post and matched by hand. There’s almost no reason for Forces Penpals to still exist except that it got there first – it has a brand and an audience, and the overheads are kept correspondingly low: it's run almost entirely by one guy.

'Growth is still out there for chimps who are leaders in niche sub-markets,' I remind myself as I gaze upon the only big stall in the conference foyer, replete with banners and merch. It belongs to singlemuslim.com. The guy I start talking to is non-Muslim: an amiable computer-programmer who built the back-end of the original site, and still has shares. He answers a couple of questions, before he's displaced by a Muslim guy in a flat-cap, clearly the frontman.

"Islam is like a clear flowing river," he seduces me. "It takes on the colour of whatever rocks it flows over."

A month after this interview, a court will hear evidence of the relationship between Munir Mohammed and Rowaida El-Hassan. El-Hassan was looking for "a man who fears Allah before anything else". Cupid shot his AK-47 and, soon enough, Rowaida, a pharmacist, was assisting new boyfriend Munir in couples-y stuff, like researching how you make the deadly nerve-toxin ricin from castor beans. The pair will be jailed and the lead in most of the papers is that they met on singlemuslim.com.

If they could get beyond basic bitch sensationalism, though, those same papers might at least have something more nuanced to say about how Singlemuslim.com doesn’t define dating as a pairs activity.

"The family is very important," he continues. "So part of the process often involves setting up profiles for aunts, uncles, parents... the whole family gets to have their say on a potential match."

I'm not quite sold on whether this is a force for progress, or merely the reinforcement through digital means of a medieval mindset. At the very least, in common with almost every other site here, singlemuslim.com is aiming its guns at a great social ill: loneliness. "Lots of women write in to thank us. Because, you see, they get divorced, or their husband dies, and they think they'll never be able to marry again. But then they go online."

Day Two

For reasons best known to the gods of free publicity, Mark has put me in charge of a panel on Fraud Detection.

David Wiseman

There's twinkly-eyed consultant David Wiseman, who seems to have fingers in every pie. Two weeks later I will meet him again, at a Bitcoin conference, where he’s selling another software solution, under a different hat. Wiseman is pushing 70. He made a packet by programming computers as far back as the 1970s, then growing multiple businesses out of software solutions. When I talk to him on the phone he mentions his Bentley.

Today, he’s touting something called Scamalytics, a sweeper system to clean up your user profiles. As various Channel 5 shows have illustrated, there is an almost infinite supply of Nigerian men with access to stock photos of pleasingly-dimpled Americans, callously determined to scam the life's savings of horny 50-something women.

Wiseman's software monitors your site’s stock of profiles and figures out where the fakes are. They verify whether the photos are already elsewhere on the internet, compare the overall volume and location of the traffic, and match it against what they’re receiving from other dating sites. It’s an ongoing war: the traffic is constantly shifting, the scams are constantly adapting.

"Some weeks it’s the Philippines, some weeks it’s Nigeria. Sometimes Morocco. These things tend to come in waves. Then we patch that. Then they find another ruse. And so it goes on."

The author on the panel

There’s also Wayne May, a lisping Welshman who runs his own website – ScamSurvivors.com. His forums offer spiritual counsel and practical advice for the recently scammed. Wayne was himself a victim once. By day, he still works as a carer. Scam Survivors is his passion project. He shows me two letters he’s had forwarded to him – different names, different photos, same handwriting. It’s chilling; they’re a pair of life-destroying bear-traps, laid out in dainty girlish font.

Edouard is a consultant for a French company, Besedo, which deals in similar territory to Scamalytics – down on scams and bad behaviour. Except their approach is also focused on humans. "It's possible to overcome a great deal with software," he explains. "But there is always a last percentage that the machines miss, or can’t decide on." They do classifieds too, and online marketplaces, and forums. They’re the garbagemen of the internet. You need someone to hand-scrub the Jewish conspiracy rants, the kiddie porn, the Western Union traps, the bogus Russian brides? They have around 500 employees, in France, in Malta, Romania, Malaysia and Colombia, hovering over the delete button.

After lunch, the conference has split into two teams: on one side are the pure dating app people, then – in the other windowless basement – with more polished manners, much more polished nails and far shinier hair: the matchmakers. The brahmin caste of the dating world.

I get talking to a tall, auburn-haired Scot called Gillian, who runs something called Drawing Down the Moon. I can’t shake the feeling I’ve heard of it before.

"Private Eye," she replies. "We’ve been running an ad there since the 90s."

It's true – along with the guy who sells bespoke speakers by mail order, they’re a staple of the back of the mag, so eternal you never think about them. Gillian took over the business after the founder decided to retire, a few years back. She'd made a lot of money in PR, but found her life a bit hollow. "When I found out the business was for sale, I absolutely jumped at the chance. Matchmaking was always my dream. I was fascinated by that ad in the back of Private Eye."

Gillian talks quite mystically about the matchmaker's art. It’s the only part of the monetised dating world that still has continuity with the past, with the old, pre-internet world of "lonely hearts", of smoky offices in obscure backstreets behind Tottenham Court Road, yellowing rolodexes of name/age/sex being flicked through by middle-aged women with dangly jewellery.

"Partly, what I’ve done is to take on fewer, better clients," Gilliam explains. A matchmaker is paid per scalp. If they spend all of their time faffing about with the hopeless cases, they quickly erode their margin. Those margins are still good offline – the survival of this strange priestly class depends upon an average fee of a few grand to place a lonely heart in a long-term relationship. "Our packages start from £6,000 inclusive of VAT," the Drawing Down the Moon website trills.

In the seminar room, we’re treated to a very long pitch by an American matchmaking firm, The Matchmaking Institute. They "certify matchmakers" – essentially, they run the American equivalent of an NVQ in matchmaking.

On the matchmaking side of the aisle, it seems obligatory to hymn how rewarding your job is. "I got into this to change lives," says a New Englander in her forties. She explains that they’ve developed a back-office system that will pay commission to anyone who is the first-introducer in a successful match. "I've always maintained that the future of our industry was collaboration," she beams.

My friend from Drawing Down the Moon gets into a low-volume but heated argument with them. They’re effectively hollowing-out the game, she implies, turning matchmaking into something anyone can do. The Americans are taken aback. They’d assumed everyone would just fall in line.

Gillian has a point. But then so do the Americans, because the key problem with matchmaking – and most dating sites – is sheer database: it's not having enough humans on your books to get a successful fuckable-human. If your pool is shallow, you’re dead in the water. Broaden it, and "everyone wins", we’re told. Except long-established matchmakers with large pools.

The row rumbles on, the two agree to disagree. The seminar breaks up, and we’re back into mingling around the coffee machines. They’re decent minglers, but there’s no megawatt schmoozing charisma here. Tonight, the conference concludes with a champagne reception at a Pall Mall club. But it’s not going to be the kind of conference champagne reception where they end up in each other’s hotel rooms.

"They’re all pretty well shacked-up already in the dating biz," an attendee tells me. "There aren’t many singles. They practice what they preach, you might say."


Right now, we are all practising what they preach. And the amazing thing is that, despite all the cheap gags and easy scorn, it seems to be working. Last year, a UK study reported that half of all respondents had only ever asked someone out online, never face-to-face. In the States, 13 percent of dating survey respondents said they’d got engaged or married from an app. Those numbers will only rise.

Scan the Strand Palace foyer and this business might appear as little more than a tattered band of delusional monkeys and deranged chimps puffing after a distant gorilla, but these are the people who are now ferrying us into the arms of the one we love (after the last one but before the next three).

@gavhaynes

Previously:

The Future of Beauty

The Beef and Brawn at the Heart of the Food Industry

Sex, Sea and Slavery: What It's Like to Work On a Cruise Ship

This article originally appeared on VICE UK.

Hedley Singer Jacob Hoggard Accused of Rape by Ottawa Woman: Report

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Warning: This story contains graphic details of an alleged sexual assault.

An Ottawa woman who matched with Hedley’s lead singer Jacob Hoggard on Tinder told CBC he brutally raped her after the pair met up in November 2016.

The latest allegations come after several sexual misconduct allegations about the Canadian band, who’ve been accused of targeting fans as young as 14. One allegation included a police investigation into a drugged concertgoer back in 2015. The band has denied all of the allegations although they said they "engaged in a lifestyle that incorporated certain rock and roll clichés." They have been dropped from the upcoming Juno awards and several radio stations. Their management group Watchdog Management and The Feldman Agency, have also cut ties with them.

The 24-year-old woman, who CBC did not name, said she started chatting with Hoggard, 33, when he was in Ottawa for a WE Day concert in November 2016. They went from using Tinder to Snapchat.

She told CBC Hoggard bought her train tickets to come see him in Toronto two weeks later; he was staying at the Thompson Hotel. She said she “expected sex” but that Hoggard completely crossed the line once they were together.

Hoggard told CBC he had consensual sex with the woman.

"At no time did Jacob act badly or do anything without [her] consent,” his lawyer said in a statement.

The woman alleges that once they got into Hoggard’s hotel room, he started kissing her and she pushed him off him. Then they moved down the hall into a different room, apparently the one that Hoggard intended to stay in.

They started watching a movie in the second room, but the woman told CBC about 10 minutes in, Hoggard flipped her onto her stomach, slapped and spit on her, and penetrated her anally. She said she began crying and told him to stop. He didn’t stop, she said, and wasn’t wearing a condom.

“He just kept telling me that I was being a good girl and petting my head,” the woman told CBC. She also said Hoggard grunted and called her a “dirty little pig.”

She said she saw her reflection in a large mirror positioned over the bed, and could see that Hoggard was choking her. The woman alleged Hoggard dragged her off the bed and into the bathroom, repeatedly asking if he could urinate on her and vice versa, but that she refused. Over the course of several hours, she said he repeatedly raped her anally and vaginally, to the point where she was bleeding. At some point during the alleged assaults, he ordered room service, she said.

Afterwards, the woman said Hoggard ordered her a cab, while she was still crying.

The CBC said it corroborated parts of the woman’s story with friends whom she confided in afterwards. She also provided a note from a doctor’s visit that took place after the incident, which noted that she believed she was a sexual assault victim.

The woman said she was traumatized by the incident, and has had repeated nightmares, but did not want to report it to police because she blamed herself for meeting him in the first place.

After the alleged assault, she said Hoggard texted her to tell her he had a great time with her. She said the next day, she accused him of rape. He blocked her number after telling her not to contact him again, she said.

Using the hashtag #outHedley2k18, numerous Hedley fans have accused members of the band of sexual misconduct.

The band responded by saying that while it respects the #MeToo movement, the allegations against the group are false.

“The recent allegations against us posted on social media are simply unsubstantiated and have not been validated. We would hope that people will bear-in-mind the context in which these unsupported accusations have been made before passing judgment on us as individuals or as a band.”

Follow Manisha Krishnan on Twitter.

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